As Life Goes Out

by Virodeil

For B2MeM 2011 Day 3. Being so attuned to one's homeland is good on many levels but detrimental on others. An Elfling has to learn it the hard way, as his home in Southern Mirkwood was ransacked by orcs. *C-TA 1000.

Title: As Life Goes Out
Author: Rey
Beta-Reader: None

Story Type: Fanfiction
Book/Fandom: The Lord of the Rings
Language Used: English

Challenge: Back to Middle-earth 2011
Day 3: Vinyamar: Some people have difficulty embracing changes and moving on. Write a story or poem or create artwork that shows the consequences of refusing to change.

Summary: Being so attuned to one's homeland is good on many levels but detrimental on others. An Elfling has to learn it the hard way.

Credit: the B2MeM 2011 team
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Character Death, First Draft, Moderate Violence

Genres: Horror, Hurt/Comfort, Stream-of-Consciousness, Tragedy
Characters: Legolas of Mirkwood, OMC
Place: Southern Mirkwood: unknown
Timeline: early Third Age: TA 1200
Point of View: single: first person limited
Word Count: 1,593

Disclaimers: The challenge belongs to the B2MeM 2011 team. The patanted characters and settings belong to Tolkien Estate and its associates. The original characters and ideas belong to Rey as the author of this story. No infringement is intended to the copyright holders of Arda Legendarium, and no profit is intentionally made by writing and publishing this story.

Story Notes:

Some background history for this piece: Oropher, the first Elven King of Greenwood the Great, fell in the Last Alliance. His son, Thranduil, took over ruling the mostly-Silvan realm after his death. But Sauron, who was steadily-but-secretly regaining his strength and former forces, managed to take Amon Lanc – the centre of the realm – in early Third Age, and Thranduil was forced to relocate with whomever willing of his people to a set of caves in the northern part of the realm, featured in The Hobbit. Since his people were majorly formed of Nandor and Avari though, who were infamous for clinging to their homeland stubbornly as implied in The Silmarillion, there must still be several small villages of his people left scattered behind enemy's line, so to say. This is the point that I wished to explore through this story.
Also, in The Fellowship of the Ring, it is described that trees in Southern Mirkwood are black and claw-like, and that they ever strive with each other to reach the sun. The description translated into "The trees around Dol Guldur have been corrupted and coerced into betraying their Elven friends by Sauron and his minions" to my mind. And so, the twisted, unusual behaviour of some trees in this story stems from that perception.
Lastly, the vague identities here is deliberate. It stemmed from my lack of ideas for names, but also from my reluctance to up the rating of the story to R.

Translation:
Ata: Daddy
Emmë: Mummy
Linda: Singer, singular of "Lindar," the name the Silvan Elves called themselves with

As Life Goes Out

"Yrch!"

"The children! Quick!"

"We cannot abandon the trees – I shall not go!"

"They are nearing – hurry!"

And I am bundled in a blanket, with each of my playmates suffering from a similar treatment. We are saddled in slings like tiny babies! Neither of us have the heart to protest, however, it seems. But indeed, those grown-ups who are carrying us look frantic and very, very worried, quite different from their usual selves. Still, we have a short limit for our patience, unlike them…

All the same, they keep climbing trees and running from branch to branch, ignoring our tentative whinging and weeping. And soon, I realise that our paths are diverging from one another. I want to cry out for real this time, yelling for my carrier not to stray, to separate me from the other children. But as if noticing it beforehand, he clamps my mouth with two fingers – two clammy, trembling fingers.

What is happening? Nobody was ever this afraid; and no grown-up ever treated us children like this also. What is wrong? I want to ask my carrier, but he goes on determinately in silence.

And the other pairs are getting farther and farther apart from us… I really cry now, feeling hurt and miserable.

And then, a life goes out farther back, followed by a smaller one accompanied by a familiar cry. I bite my tongue, my tears falling faster. Ata and Emmë once explained to me that sometimes life has to go out to preserve others. But I do not want my friend to die! Worse, I cannot mourn him also, because my carrier is getting even more frantic than before, muttering about the trees betraying us. But surely the trees will not betray us? Ata and Emmë said so. – And where are they?

Another life goes out, this time nearer. And then my older sister screams in pain, before her life, too, goes out. I wail in agony.

The tree my carrier is running upon suddenly shifts, sending him stumbling and fumbling, trying without avail to grasp at the animated branches. I can no longer weep now, nor feel afraid. My sister is dead, and my parents are possibly dead also, back in our village.

And now my carrier is running ever faster, flying – tumbling from the treacherous tree, just as a whistle-call sounds ahead and below. I fly through the fear-choked air under the forest canopy, launched from the arms of my carrier, and land in another grown-up's embrace, a totally-unfamiliar grown-up. I open my mouth, wanting to yell for my previous carrier, but then he lets out a scream of pain and terror similar to my sister's, and I can hear his body breaking as his life goes out.

I feel empty and hollow, as if my life, too, has gone out. But it must not be so, for my new carrier is shaking me and whispering frantically into my ears, even as he is sprinting on the forest floor away from where my previous carrier has fallen. My knees bump a pair of long, hard something, so I guess this grown-up is a Linda living in another village, because those must be knife-hilts. (My friends and I often snuck into the village's weapon room and peeked at the knives and bows mounted there, relics from the War of the Last Alliance.) Where is he bringing me to, though? This is not the direction of my village; it is the opposite, in fact.

My carrier does not stop running for quite a long time. I drift in a haze of reverie, meanwhile, playing and replaying today's strange, morbid events. The emptiness lingers in my spirit, and I feel cold now. I wish I were the one to go, not my sister, or my previous carrier. I wish…

"Drink, little one?"

A flask is proffered under my nose. I can smell sheep milk in it, flavoured by a sharp tang belonging to some liquid kept by my parents in jars in a secured spot in our storage talan, which they expressly forbade me to drink. And now this grown-up asks me to drink it?

He has ceased running so swiftly, and now he is only walking in a rapid pace, as his right hand refuses to move the rim of the flask away from my lips. What does he expect me to do? Drink the forbidden beverage? Why is he not running anymore anyway, to keep us as far away from anyone or anything who made the lives of my friends and my previous carrier go out?

In the end, tired with his silent persistence, I lift the flask further up with a shaking hand and tip it slightly.

I nearly gag and throw up from the sharp, burning sensation flooding my mouth, travelling through my throat and settling in my belly. It is sheep milk, indeed, but mixed with some fiery liquid which I bet is really the one my parents forbade me to drink. But it does give me strength, and returns some warmth to my body and limbs.

It does not return my friends or the grown-ups to me, though. I miss them so much…

I look up into my carrier's eyes, being free to do so for the first time since when I was firstly bundled away by my previous carrier. "Why?" I ask in a tremulous whisper, unable to articulate the question more than that.

The grown-up's blue-green eyes are coated with tears, and I can see pain in them. But no, he must not cry! Grown-ups must be strong, so they can protect us children, like my parents always said when I wept for one reason or another.

But the grown-ups that I knew are most likely dead by now, together with my playmates…

"You cannot go back to your village, little one," the stranger murmurs. I look further into his eyes, baffled. He seems to hesitate; not knowing how to tell me, perhaps? But I just want to know. Why can he not do just that?

He blinks, and stares long at me ponderously. Perhaps he has discerned my hope?

Finally he says, quite reluctantly, "Few escaped your village with their lives, child, and the number includes you." He looks straight ahead, avoiding my gaze, then adds in a softer, wistful voice, "They refused to move north with us. We found a good cave-chain and built a new stronghold there. Sauron could prey on them easily because they were staying in such an open and defenceless place. He has subdued and corrupted the trees…"

But we are not weak! Ata and Emmë said so, anyway. And Ata and Emmë also said that moving north was not good; we would abandon the trees that had been protecting us, then.

But the trees betrayed us now, like this grown-up just said…

I look down and shiver. A tree has taken my previous carrier, and another must have taken my sister also, and the third my friend. They are wicked and vile, not at all like Ata and Emmë said, not at all like my woody friends around home. Why did they change? My parents said things would not change, except for the cycle of the seasons and little ones growing up. Why this? Why now?

I curl into myself as best as I can, hiding my face in the nook of my carrier's neck, breathing in his scent. What he said pains me, but I cannot turn away from it, like I do his gaze now, and that only pains me more.

A big, long finger unsticks a bunch of cold-sweat-drenched locks from my face. But I refuse to look up, meeting the grown-up's gaze. Where am I now? What is going to happen to me? Where am I brought? We are already far from my village, judging from the ache of home-yearning deep in my body and spirit. Shall we move even further?

The same finger traces my jawline gently, before tipping up my chin, making my eyes meet the blue-green ones, which are no longer swimming with tears. "We must move on, little one," my carrier – now my protector, I guess – whispers, as if knowing how deep my pain goes, having felt it himself. (But surely it is not possible?) He tells me his name is Legolas, and he lost his emmë to the same forces that bereft me of my family some time ago. He tells me that he tries to move on now, helping his ata protect our people.

He asks for my name, but I do not answer him. If changing makes him better, then I shall change too; and the first step is to leave my old name behind, I suppose. It is not going to be forgotten, but I shall be the only one who will remember it – and also my family, my old life. It is better this way.

And again, as if he knows what I am thinking, he says nothing to my silence.

I smile, vaguely noting that my lips tremble with the effort. "Thank you," I breathe, hugging his neck as far as my arms will go. A heavy, dreadful weight seems to be lifted from my spirit when he returns the cuddle, and I bury my face into the side of his neck, breathing in his scent again. I shall not be alone enduring everything, it seems. It may not be a scary future, then. I can live with that, and not wish my life to go out.