I neither own nor created Celebrían, Elrond, Elladan, Legolas, Imladris/Rivendell, Green Wood The Great, or Middle Earth.
However, I did create Sadorchyl, his father Arathrad, the Noldo Idhrenohtar, and Queen Lathwinn.
I wrote this one-shot at the request of Lady Alambiel who has given me much encouragement in my Fanfiction career as well as inspiring me with her own. :)
The Silvan warrior glared down from the tree branch. His squatting form bent down another degree. Then it again became as still as the limb beneath him. Only the elf's eyes moved as they tracked the figure passing through the shadow of the tree.
The Noldo soldier halted his steps. He raised his own gaze up the tree trunk and along its branches before stopping at the right place. Grey eyes met green.
The Wood elf's nostrils flared. His body tensed like a cat's as it prepares to pounce. The Noldo grinned, but his eyes hardened and glinted like a knife. The Silvan's fingers twitched.
Then the Noldo turned his head towards the direction he had been going and continued to stroll forward. The Silvan's shoulders fell. His taunt form loosened like a broken bowstring. He had also turned his gaze elsewhere when the words drifted up to meet his ears.
"Wood-splinter."
The lawn rushed up to meet the Noldo's face. The air in his lungs was slapped out. His mouth gasped for more, but drew in grass and dirt instead. He tried to rise. His shoulders were pinned to the earth. His spirit felt a cord of fury shrieking in The Song just above him.
Beyond this screech, the note of his lord's eldest son raced up. One shoulder was freed a moment before a shout of pain came from Elladan. Fury swept through the soldier. He rolled.
His opponent sprang up. When the Silvan landed, he planting a foot in the Noldo's chest. Now the soldier could look up into his attacker's face. Green eyes flashed like leaves that could slice through skin. The lips snarled around bared teeth. A little spittle flew out with the words.
"Get up and fight me, Kin-killer!"
The Noldo froze. His flesh chilled. His breath and heart stilled. His mind flashed back through ages of time to hours he longed only to forget. His hands clenched into fists.
One shot up, aimed at his attacker's leg. The Silvan jumped aside and off his opponent. The Noldo leapt to his own feet. The two began to circle each other.
The Silvan sprang forward reaching for the Noldo's arm. The soldier drew his arms in while stepping out of the Silvan's path. The Silvin stopped and turned to face his foe. The Noldo rushed forward to plant his hands in the warrior's chest.
The youth bent over backwards. As the Noldo's hands swept over him, his own flashed up. The Silvan ensnared his opponent's wrists and twisted. Pain flashed up the Noldo's arms. He fell forward and to the side while kicking out. The Silvan swung away from the blow, using the momentum to swing his opponent over himself and delivered a kick of his own.
The Noldo fell to the ground pulling his opponent down with him. As his back hit the earth, he curled his legs up. He would ram his knees into the other elf's mid-section as he fell atop him. But it was the Silvan's feet that met the Noldo's knees. He released his opponent's wrists and sprang off his perch, rotating through the air like a ball, before landing. He did so facing his opponent a stride away from the soldier who now rose to his own feet.
The Noldor's jaw clenched. The younger elf waited only a heart beat before leaping at his opponent again. He grabbed the soldier's forearm and reached for his other, just as the Noldo drew something from his belt. The sun flashed off the object. The light dazzled the Silvan's eyes. He only felt the slice up his arm.
The younger elf cried out and fell back. He rolled away some strides, before rising into a crouch to blink up at his opponent. The Silvan panted like a cornered animal.
The Noldo stood before the younger elf, holding a knife out in front of himself. One edge was coated in scarlet. A red droplet fell from its tip to land on a grass blade. The Silvan looked from the weapon to its wielder's eyes. His own hatred seemed nothing. This was a deeper, keener spite that chilled his soul more than a mountain wind could chill his skin. The Silvan's heart froze.
Then a streak of brown and green slammed into his foe. The Silvan rose to his feet. One hand went to the gash along his forearm as his legs tensed to spring and help if necessary.
The Noldo crashed into the ground again and blinked. Brown eye burned into his. The passion pouring from this foe was aged by a lifetime perhaps equal to his own. Yet, there was something familiar in the snarling lips and bared teeth. The shout from this Silvan seemed to fill the valley.
"How dare you to cut my son in a hand-to-hand combat!"
The Noldo's grey eyes stared back into the brown. The soldier pressed his lips together. Silence fell over both elves as the Noldo considered how to reply, if he should reply, and whether or not he wanted to.
"Arathrad!"
"Idhrenohtar!"
The Silvan lifted his head to stare at something beyond them. Idhrenohtar, tilted his back and lifted his chin to do the same. Two elleth stood just beyond the copse of trees.
One was short and slight as a sapling planted last year. The green and tan clothing she wore and brown hair falling down her back made her further look a daughter of the forest. Her earth-colored eyes were as filled with grief as the other Silvan eyes he had stared into today had been with hate. The other elleth was more the Noldo's description of beauty.
Her hair was bright as starlight. Her skin shone soft and smooth as porcelain. Her eyes glinted like clear gems as a tear escaped them. Her rose-petal pink lips parted to reveal rows of perfect teeth.
"What have you done to our guest?!"
Idhrenohtar felt the blood rise into his face. He wanted to shout, but dared not. None shouted at Celebrían daughter of Galadriel, not even her lord and husband. Instead, the soldier kept his voice low and steady.
"He attacked me, my Lady, in our own kingdom."
A voice echoed from a tree branch above.
"What happened, was this Noldo saw he could not win the fight fairly!"
Between ten and twenty elves, each garbed in brown and green, dropped from the trees like acorns. Rage poured through their every pore. Every one of them looked not to the elleth draped in white, but to the one garbed like them. A Silvan warrior who had not yet spoken pointed at Idhrenohtar.
"We witnessed it all! He gave Sadorchyl insult none of us could ignore."
Another Silvan stepped forward.
"And when he saw he could not win by legal means, the Noldo drew a knife and spilled Sadorchyl's blood."
The lines of Lathwinn's face went lax. Her head bowed and eyes closed. The elleth's throat moved in a swallow before she parted her lips.
"And did Sadorchyl draw the blood of the son of our host?"
Now all, including Sadorchyl himself, looked to Elladan. The Peredhil had been standing with one hand cupped over his nose and the other on the hilt of his own knife. His eyes had been darting about to stare at whoever moved or spoke. Now he locked gazes with his mother.
"I'm fine, Nanneth, really."
The Silvan who had last spoken now pointed at the eldest son of Elrond.
"He interfered without cause! The combat was legally begun!"
Another Silvan folded his arms over his chest and nodded to the elf still holding down the Noldor soldier.
"Unlike Arathrad, who interfered when this coward broke the laws of combat!"
Lathwinn's head snapped up. Her eyes narrowed as they pierced each of her warriors in turn.
"These Laws we speak of are the code observed in Green Wood The Great, not Imladris!"
The faces of every Silvan warrior flushed. Sadorchyl also looked down at the ground. He trembled, but his note in The Song revealed fury as well as shame. His father's face, ears, and neck flamed red. His head drooped and eyes closed, but he did not release his foe.
Lathwinn turned to them both with gentle eyes. She began to approach the two elves one hesitant step at a time, like a doe venturing into the meadow, afraid of wolves. She stopped a stride away from them both, knelt down, and looked into the Noldo's face.
"Do you intend to further harm any of my warriors?"
Idhrenohtar's eyes left the Silvan straddling him to glare up at the Silvan Queen.
"Not if they do not harm me."
Lathwinn raised her head and locked eyes with the elf pinning the soldier to the ground.
"Your son is no longer in danger, mellon nin. Release the servant of our host."
Arathrad's hands opened and drew away from the other elf. He rose by degrees and kept his eyes closed until he stood over the other soldier. Then he opened them and nodded down to the Noldo.
"Forgive me. At the sight of my son's blood, I forgot what I should have remembered."
Idhrenohtar stared back for a heartbeat, and then also nodded. Arathrad stepped over the other elf and strode to his son. Celebrían had already reached hers and was pulling his hand away from his face. One of her own covered her mouth as she spied the smear of blood covering his top lip.
Arathrad took his son's forearm, rolled up the sleeve, and examined the red rivulet across the skin. His voice came out low, but firm.
"Apologize to the soldier, as well as the son and wife of our host, Sadorchyl."
Anger flashed in the younger Silvan's eyes.
"What?"
"I told you The Hidden Valley does not observe our combat laws and you attacked one or their folk anyway. Then you struck another for protecting his fellow. Apologize."
Sadorchyl's head whipped about to stare at Idhrenohtar. The Noldo had just risen from the ground. His squinting eyes held no apology.
As the young elf's chest heaved, he looked to Celebrían and Elladan. The elleth was wiping her son's blood from his skin. The look on her face softened that upon Sadorchyl's. His eyes looked like frosted grass when they met Elladan's, but his voice was even.
"I did you wrong, Elladan Elrondion, for that I ask pardon."
The Peredhil nodded after a moment, but still did not wear his usual grin.
"Consider my pardon granted." He looked back to his mother. Her face now held less fear. She looked to the visitors.
"I think he will heal fine."
Celebrían then stepped towards the other young elf who was bleeding. She reached a hand out towards his arm.
"May I see it? I have bandaged much worse my own sons come home with."
Sadorchyl jerked back from her and out of his father's hold as well. His eyes flashed.
"Our queen is the finest healer in The Green Wood and has bound up such wounds and worse for ages. I will be treated by no other."
Celebrían slumped. Then she nodded and turned away. Lathwinn's hands went to her hips as she looked to her warrior.
"Your scratch hardly warrants the attention of 'the best healer in The Green Wood.' Yet, you could have the best healer in Arda treat it if you asked. And throwing away an offer from his wife? For shame Arathrandion."
Sadorchyl looked to the Noldo still staring at him, though he refused to meet those grey eyes again.
"Twas shame the other meant to give me with his words. He meant them with all his heart. He is the one filled with poison, not me."
Lathwinn's eyes filled with sorrow again. Her voice lowered to a murmur.
"We all are filled with that poison, Sadorchyl. And for my son's sake, I ask you to let yours go."
Sadorchyl's lips pressed together. His face went both hard and red. Tears filled his eyes. He swallowed and spoke it not, but the thought echoed through his heart.
Forgive me my queen, but I cannot.
Without a word, the Noldor soldier turned and jogged away.
. . .
Lathwinn entered Imladris' healing Wing. Her gaze went to a bed beneath a window. She strode past a dozen empty cots before stopping before this filled one.
Perhaps "filled" was too strong a word. For the occupant was about half as long as the bed and not a quarter its width. The pillow was three times the size of the head of sunshine-colored hair rested upon it. Lathwinn sat down on the edge of the bed, leaned over the figure, and whispered down to it in Silvan.
"Wake up, my Green-leaf."
Eyelids fluttered open to reveal brown eyes like her own. The form sat up with a grin, which became a slight grimace as his muscles pulled at whatever the white bandages wrapped around him were hiding. Still, the elfling's grin returned as he tilted his head up to the elleth.
"I'm awake, nanneth!"
"How do you feel?"
"Fine, but did I miss something outside? I felt and saw funny things in my sleep wanderings . . . I think."
The child's expression fell into a slight pout and his gaze left his mother's face to stare at the wall. The elfling rested his chin in one hand as he tried to recall what he had felt and seen. Lathwinn lifted a hand and ran her fingers through the pale hair.
"Nothing very wondrous occurred nearby, while you slept, my Green-leaf. For if something wondrous had happened, I would have woken you for it."
The elfling looked back up and flashed her another grin.
"Then can you tell me a story of when something wondrous did happen Nanneth? Please!"
Lathwinn grinned back.
"Of course I can."
She lifted her legs up on the bed and crossed them before leaning back into the great pillow herself. She wrapped an arm around her elfling, who snuggled against her. Lathwinn tilted her head up to gaze at the ceiling. Her fingers continued to run through the elfling's silky blonde hair.
"Once upon a time . . . before I met your father . . ."
"That was a reaaaaaaallllllllllllllly long time ago."
Lathwinn's fingers stopped running through his hair and gave his shoulder a harmless swat while she grinned more brightly still.
"Hush!" She went back to running her fingers though his hair and looked back to the ceiling. "During that time, long ago, a friend and I wandered from our wood and found the prone form of a man."
"Who was he?"
"We would not know it for some time, but his name was Beren, and while he lived, he became one of my best friends."
Legolas frowned and looked up at his mother.
"I don't think I could be friends with a 'man,' nanneth!"
Lathwinn looked down. A tear wound down her cheek as her smile turned sad.
"Depending on the man, my Green-leaf, befriending one is an easy thing to do."
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ScribeofHeroes