They call me Snow-Walker, they that raised me, but they that raised me are not my people. I had always been different than the dwarves, but I did not realize I was not one myself until he came along.

He is Legolas. He is Greenleaf. He is of my people. But that will come in time; first how I came to meet him.

It was not yet light outside when I crept outside of the cave, but it was much darker inside. Never one to relish the dark and damp, I escaped as often as I could to the outside world. This was one of many things my playmates, all of them dwarves, had never understood. They would pause mid- toy-hammerstroke to stare blankly at me as I strained towards the small shaft of sunlight that penetrated the mountain. And then, I had grown.

Dwarves rarely reach beyond three feet in height. I surpassed my playmates when I was very young, and by seventeen was over twice as tall as my adoptive mother. The other dwarves hated me silently for the disparity.  I was not "proper"; I was not "right". It was a game we played, that I was not different. But I knew I was, and in my heart I hated the dwarves for keeping me below, in the mountain, in the dark.

With a grace I had always known, I stole over the snow. Caring not where I went, I allowed whim to lead me over the familiar mountain paths. Snowflakes, which had always been better and warmer friends to me than the dwarven children, tumbled down on my long brown hair, gentle companionship.

My cloak rippled in the mountain wind, dark and coarse. The dwarves seemed to know naught to be soft; even the beards upon their faces were wiry. I had become more or less accustomed to it over time, but the roughness grated at me, callusing my resolve.

The cry of a snow-wolf cut the fog, and I was reminded of how wild my mountain home was. My hand went instinctively to the small axe at my belt, and my senses strained to find from whence the howl had come. Perhaps that is why I did not sense him behind me, why I almost killed myself. All at once, I felt two hands grip my shoulders.

They were strong hands; hands that had held a bow. They were smooth hands, hands that folded in front of a young man's face as he contemplated the fate of the world. They were delicate hands, hands that fletched an arrow. They were elven hands; hands that saved my life.

"Do you really wish to learn to fly?" The voice that belonged to the hands whispered in my ear. It was a voice I could trust.

"Fly?" What did he mean? Who was he?

"One more step and you're a dead elf. We stand on a cliff."

"A dead...what?" Had he said elf? He must be confused... The cloud we were wrapped in suddenly passed, and the truth in his voice was proven. My feet stood on nothing but air. I stifled a gasp, and the man behind me pulled me back onto firm rock.

"Elf."

That word again. I thought to protest it, but did not. I was still weak with surprise. He must have seen that, for he still supported me, his hands firmly on my shoulders. "Who are you?" He did not seem like any other dwarf I had encountered. He seemed too tall, too lithe, and too graceful.  Like me.

He turned me around to face him, but said nothing. I could finally look upon this mysterious benefactor.

His features were strangely serene, almost delicate in their appearance. Framing these, his hair, impossibly straight and pale, reached his mid-back. Over his shoulders, I perceived twin axes, small but useful, and a bow and quiver. There was an overall alertness in his presence that warned of his skill; I pitied his enemies. His eyes, piercingly, indescribably blue, seemed all at once joyful, sad, carefree, and pained. He had seen something terrible only a short time ago, something it was still fresh in his memory. They were the kind of eyes that can make one feel sorrowful and lighthearted at the same time.

When he lowered his hands from my shoulders, I grasped my small axe by the end of the handle and extended it in greeting.

The stranger seemed confused; he withdrew one of his own axes and looked at mine uncertainly. "Here you greet each other by fighting?"

I nearly laughed aloud; how could he be so ignorant? "No," I said patiently, "You cross your axe with mine and introduce yourself."

With a nod of understanding, he did so. "Legolas, they call me Greenleaf"

That word again. "Bryna, daughter of Brendun, they call me Snow- Walker."

Legloas smiled slightly. "We are all snow-walkers, are we not?"

"We?"

"Our people," he paused, looking puzzled, "the elves."

And yet again. "I am a dwarf!" It came out harsher than I had intended. I was horrified that I might offend this amazing being.

Legolas was not offended. Instead, he laughed! It was a joyful, musical sound, as though his laughter was a melody. He led me away from the cliff and over to a large depression in the snow. Three large figures and five small figures were curled up in the snow. Legolas pointed to the largest of the small figures. "My friend Gimli there, he is a dwarf. You..." His right hand left my shoulder to lift my hair away from my ear. He shook his head. "...are an elf. Feel the point of your ears?" He lifted his own hair aside, and I beheld the points on his own. "You are an elf."

I knew it to be true, was even glad to hear it, but..."If I am an elf, how did I come to live among dwarves?"

"You may never know. Many families were destroyed when the woods burned."

"What woods?"

Legolas looked at me sharply. "Have you never been off this mountain?"

I shook my head. "Not in my memory." The mountain was big enough...I had never needed to leave.

"Have you never seen trees and grass and moss?"

Again, I shook my head. "All I know is snow, but I have heard stories of those."

"They cannot be fully justified in stories. You must see them, feel them, be them." Legolas began to walk across the snowdrifts, and I followed him. "It is hard even for me to describe the forests. I have never had need to until now."

"Are they far from here?"

"A few days' march, but the forest from whence you came burned long ago. It was called Mirenvir." He paused, bowing his head for a moment. "It is horrible to feel a forest burn."

"Were you there?"

"Yes. A group of dwarves had come to trade with the elves, whom I too was visiting, but the elves did not want much of that cold metal. Angrily, the dwarves made as though to leave, then a party snuck back and burned the elven settlement. The elves fought bravely, but fire is a terrible foe, and one cannot fight both it and ones attackers at the same time. The dwarves, now frothed into a bloodcraze, killed almost all of them. A small group of us gathered some children and fled, but we were able to save few. An elven child should never have to feel a forest die around him. The children who did not die in the fire were silent for years afterwards, ever grieving."

"But I survived?"

"It is likely that a dwarf heard your cries and rescued you. Brendun, you say your father is? It was Brendun's cousin Gorthral who headed the attack."

"So Brendun killed my parents and took me? His wife could not have children; was I the replacement?"

Legolas looked at me with a terrible expression. "You have allied yourself with your parents' murderers?"

"No!" What did he take me for? "I have never been a true dwarf!"

"That is not what you would have had me believe." Legolas gestured at my axe.

"It is all I have ever known. How was I to hate those who raised me?"

"But you do."

He had read my heart.  I said nothing.

"Will you avenge your family, Mirenvir, and the other children lost in the blaze?"

He was asking me to kill Brendun? How could I?  But I remembered the treachery of the dwarves. Was I a fool? I could not remain among such creatures, nor could my people's murderers be allowed to live. "I will."

Legolas reached over his shoulder and removed his bow and quiver. "These are yours now. Avenge your people with the weapon of your people."

My hands shook as I accepted the gifts. "What will you do?" I protested.

"I have another bow, and many arrows. You will have need of these."

"I do not want to kill." It was the truth.

"Do what is right in your sight. Your arrows will be elven-guided. Should the dwarf have need to keep his life, the arrow will not take it."

We walked through another cloud, and when it passed, he was gone. I was left with my people's weapon, and a solemn resolution.

When I returned, Brendun immediately began scolding me. "What do you mean by staying out there at all hours of the morning?"

"I needed to have a walk; my thoughts are heavy."

Then he noticed the bow. "What's this? Elvish work, eh? Where did you get it? What's wrong with your axe?"

"This is a bow of my people, the elves. There is nothing wrong with my axe, but I cannot wield it anymore." I notched an arrow to the string. "There is blood upon it."

Brendun laid his axe at my feet. "I had hoped this day would not come. How foolish of me."

I let the arrow fly, and he died without further ceremony. I could not cry for him, nor did I cry for the other dwarves I slew that day. I killed only those who had participated in the torching and massacre at Mirenvir, then I fled. There was little resistance; they seemed to know why I was there.

As I skimmed the top of the snow, I searched the mountain valley for the burned expanse I knew I would find. It was not hard to locate, and soon I found myself overlooking the site. Somewhere down there the bones of my parents had mingled with the soil of their beloved forest floor. I knew that the woods would never be my true home; my heart was the heart of the mountain, and it beat with the dwarven hammerblows, which I had so recently silenced. My vengeance was my death.

And now I stand upon this cliff, dwarven hatchet in hand, elven bow in the other. I know what I will do, what I must do, but it is not easy to hurl oneself from such a height. Far, far below me, rocks wait to crush my body, to stop my heart mid-beat. I hear the weeping of the forest for its slain, and the frozen tears of the mountain for those it has lost. Which will weep for me?

The wind catches my hair, whipping it around my face. Such a display of gentle fury stirs deep within me a fierce pride for my home. I pray the mountain weeps.

The fire leaps in my eyes, the screaming of the elves distorts the music of the wind into a hideous howl. How can I long for a place so treacherous to my true family; a place that lied to me and kept my cries silent. I pray the forest weeps.

Legolas has gone. One of the halflings chose to go beneath the mountain, through the mines of Moria. He is my only connection to any type of family anymore. I pray that Legolas weeps.