Water lapping at his hand woke him up. He started, wondering how long he had slept. The storm raged louder than ever outside, the shrieking wind making the roof tremble and groan. He eyed it uneasily. He knew now that the wind, far from being the ally he hoped, was his enemy.

He lifted his dripping hand, still keeping a wary eye on the roof, and cautiously licked. Sea water, a surge pushed in by the storm. He looked toward the door and saw a puddle... no, not a puddle but a torrent of water... spreading across the room. He scrambled to his feet, an entirely new fear snatching away his breath. If the seawater somehow managed to fill his small building...

He glanced at the stone walls, trying to see if there was a high water mark that had gone unnoticed in his previous inspections. He could see none, but that did nothing to reassure him. It could simply mean that the light was too dim to see such a mark, or worse, that the water regularly rose to the top. He chased away a bleak image of being trapped against the roof, gasping the last bit of air as the water closed over his head.

Within minutes, the entire floor had an inch of water, the level steadily rising.

He returned to the door. It swung inward, but he still leveled a kick at it, hoping against hope to find a weak spot, a rotten timber that would give way. The jarring thud of his ankle slamming into the unyielding door shot straight to his battered skull. He gasped, although it was more of a scream if he cared to admit it.

He did not care to admit it.

He grabbed his head and cursed in every language he could think of. The door still stood, and now, in addition to having a head that roared with pain with each beat of his pulse, every joint all the way to his hip ached. He felt like he had loosened every sinew in his leg. He limped away, his boots sloshing as the water lapped at his ankles.

Water surrounded him, but still he thirsted. He grimaced, remembering a stupid ditty from childhood... water, water everywhere but not a drop to drink.

He looked up at the ceiling. Surely the water could not rise that high.

Then his heart skipped a beat. The water would not have to reach the top. He looked at the walls, the bare walls. No stairs, no ledges, nothing to hold once the water rose above his head. In his weakened state, he would tire and drown long before the water reached the roof.

And in the moments he had stood dithering, it had already gained his knees, pouring in under the door and through all the ventilation slits. He needed something to block its inflow ... slow it down enough for him to come up with a plan ... something ... anything...

He ripped his shirt off over his head, shivering as the chill air hit his bare chest. He sloshed over to the door and thrust the tunic under the water, jamming it against the space beneath, where the water seemed to be flowing in the fastest. He moved his hands back, but after a moment, the shirt floated free, pushed out by the water. It was simply coming in with too much force. And all those slits ... he didn’t have enough clothes to block every one, even if he stripped to his skin.

His only hope was that the building was on high enough ground to keep the water below his head. But as the water sloshed above his knees, he somehow knew how feeble his hope was.

~~~

His head slipped under the water and he thrust upward, desperately grabbing at the stone wall to reclaim his precarious grip on the slight ledge, a ledge that had appeared almost like a miracle a few feet beneath the spot where the roof met the walls. He had been unable to see it from the floor, but for the moment, it was all that kept him from sliding exhausted under the surface and into Ulmo’s cold embrace.

But still the water rose inexorably, and despite the ledge’s brief succor, the dreadful vision of drowning, trapped against the roof, was looking to be dismally prophetic. He hooked an elbow on the ledge and reached up with his right hand to push against the planks of the roof. Solid. He hitched along, half swimming, half pulling himself, and tried the next spot, then the next and the next.

Nothing gave.

He slipped again, going under. Seawater burned his eyes. He kicked and shot upward, surfacing in the middle of the room. The roof peak was now less than five feet over his head and still the water rose. He had never seen the like. Within an hour, the room was so full he had been forced to swim and tread water constantly to keep his head above water. His relief when he discovered the hidden ledge was indescribable, for it allowed him a bit of much needed rest. But the respite had been exceedingly short lived, and now the situation had deteriorated to the point where if he didn’t find a way to break through that cursed roof very, very soon, he would not have long to worry about his strength holding out. Ledge or no ledge, there would be no air left to breathe.

His legs were tiring. He took a deep breath and let himself sink beneath the surface, down to the floor by the door. Once more, he pushed against it, pulled on it, tried to kick it, but it held as fast as ever. He kicked upward, so feebly at first that fear gave his next kick more strength, and struggled back to the surface. He took in several gasping breaths and looked up. The roof peak was almost close enough to touch.

Forcing back panic, he grabbed one of the rafters and pulled himself along it. He could hear the wind roaring outside, could feel the vibration in the wood in his hand. He held still for a moment, examining the entire roof. The light that filtered through a few cracks at the roof’s edge was nearly too dim for sight, but he let his eyes trail carefully along every board, every edge, and finally hope dared raise its head. One board, near the very top of the peak, vibrated visibly, and a steady stream of water issued forth from around its edges.

Quicky he swam directly under it and reached up, pushing at it with his outstretched fingertips. It gave, slightly, and he balled his fist and with a kicking lunge, threw himself up out of the water while driving his fist at the board. He yelled in pain as his knuckles hit the board, but it gave noticeably. He shook out his hand, opened and closed his fingers a few times. It might be broken, but better to be alive with a mangled hand then dead with two whole ones. He braced himself against the pain and repeated the lunging punch. The board popped loose at one end, letting in a torrent of rainwater. Aragorn took a moment to let the fresh water pour into his mouth but then focused all his efforts on ripping that board loose.

The angle was all wrong and the nails too stubborn but the wind did it for him in the end. As Aragorn lifted the board higher with each blow, with each feeble yanking tug, the wind caught under its edge and finally lifted it completely clear. With a ripping squeal of agonized nails, the board tore free completely and disappeared into the stormy sky, leaving an opening just wide enough to let him through.

Aragorn grasped the slick edges of the opening and with a loud groan hauled himself out of the water and up and out onto the roof. The wind slammed into him with bruising force as he flopped onto the slick tiles. He started to slide, but he caught at the edge of the hole and managed to keep himself from falling further. Rain-driven wind hammered into his skin like a thousand needles and thunder felt like a fist against his skull, but he was free. He might be blown out to sea or worse, but at least he would not die trapped like a rat in the stinking hold of a doomed ship.

He tried to turn away from the wind, but it seemed to batter him from all directions. He squinted, but saw no sign of a shoreline through the driving rain. But he did see that raging waters surrounded the little building, marooning it like some lost island. Churning water covered most of the roof–indeed, his legs were half submerged in water that pulled and tugged with surprising force. He hitched himself as high as he could and curled his legs up, trying not to look too long at the dizzying swirl of the surf.

He wondered how long the storm would last. He hooked his elbows around the edge of the hole in the roof, ignoring the throbbing in his left hand and wrist. He could hold himself there, after a fashion, but already his arms trembled with fatigue. The blow to the head, the struggle against the rising waters, the fight against the roof...

It was all getting to be too much.

He dropped his head down, his face to the roof in order to spare it some of the punishment meted out by the wind- driven rain. Debris hurled past him. Tree limbs, leaves, bits and pieces of things that Aragorn couldn’t identify and feared might be houses and even animals or people. He clung stubbornly to the roof, trying to melt against the tiles, and never felt so frightened in his life. But the roof seemed to be holding. Now if only I can do the same....

~~~

Disaster, by its nature, strikes without warning.

One moment, Aragorn was holding on, secure as he could be under the circumstances, his elbows locked around the edge of the hole in the roof, thinking that maybe, for once in this entire foul chain of events, the Valar would smile on him and he would ride out the storm.

But within a blink, a tile loosened and ripped upward. Caught by the wind, it slammed against him, knocking his right arm loose and clipping his forehead as it spun crazily skyward. His wounded left arm failed, and dazed, he slid, scrabbling feebly for any sort of handhold.

In the span of a breath he fell from the roof into the surging water.