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Xena vs. The Lord of the Rings
Prologue
Signs and portents
An old man who was not a man walked into a moonlit garden. He moved like a
shadow, peeking furtively from under the hood of his brown cloak. He stopped
before a thing that looked like a silver basin but was not a silver basin,
and stared deeply into its crystal clear water. And behold; the reflection
of the stars disappeared, and an image appeared -- an image of a
raven-haired woman sitting on a throne in a tower on top of a mountain, with
a mithril crown resting on her head, and wearing a colourful cloak
embroidered with the finest threads of gold. She stood up, and looked
around, and everything she saw belonged to her, and all nations knelt under
her feet.
The man was shaken by this vision, but then it blurred away to be
replaced by another vision. It had this very same woman, but now she was
younger, much younger, no more than a child. He saw her hold her dead
brother on her lap, crying for revenge against the killer, though any sound
couldn't be heard. She took her brother's sword from his hands, and ran
madly against the killers, slashing left and right, until they didn't move
any more. The man tilted his head, and began to understand. Again the image
changed into something new.
This time, the center of the basin was filled with an innocent face of a
young, strawberry blonde girl. The man started. Who was she, and why did she
appear? The image widened up, and the girl turned around. She took a stick
from the ground, and used it to lift a pot from fire, yelling something to
someone. The raven-haired woman came in, sat nearby, and accepted a plate
offered to her.
The man smiled, and slowly lifted his left hand above the basin, and then let
it touch the water surface so very lightly that it didn't break at all. But
as he did that, the dark woman in the picture became tense and she looked
around nervously. "Incredible," the man mumbled, as she turned to
look curiously at the place where he would have been, if he had been there
at all.
Suddenly, something else drew his attention. Swiftly he let his hand sweep
away the vision on the water before he retreated, and turned to face another
person. "My Lady," he said.
The newcomer, a tall, beautiful Elf, looked at him curiously, smiling
slightly. She threw a glance at the silver basin where the water had almost
settled down, and arched an eyebrow. But then she just greeted the man with
a nod of her head, and said nothing.
Go to Part 1.
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