AN: Well guys, this is it. I'm predicting that there will be eight or more stories left. Thankfully, they will be slightly longer than previous chapters to allow more time for the characters to really grow and breath. I've been mapping this volume out and making sure that this turns out to be the best volume for the series I've written. Get ready for some major feels down the road. This is the deepest, darkest, and most emotional entry in the series. Thanks again for the support and I hope you're ready for this! Read on!
Three Hundred Fifty Years after the Battle of the Greenwood…
*The trees were still. The air was still. Everything was still. All was quiet. Maybe too quiet. It was in fact odd. The birds made no sounds, in fact they had all seemed to have disappeared.
Then Elros blew the horn.
Following the horn's piercing sound, an earsplitting roar exploded across the woods, obliterating the stillness that was just there.
One moment, Tauriel was able to count her hearbeats. The next moment, she couldn't catch up.
Something was here. Something more terrifying than Tauriel had ever seen before. It passed over her, with the force of its movement so violent it thrust Tauriel forward, burying her face into the dirt. She held her head up and spat blood and wet dirt out of her mouth. A thick strand of scarlet dangled from her chin. When she tried to move, a pain more horrible then she had ever felt before on her back made her scream.
"Tauriel!" Legolas screamed. Tauriel couldn't breath to call for her friend. Smoke drifted up her nostrils and clogged her windpipe.
"Legola…"
"Tauriel, don't move! Let me pick you up," the Elf prince urged. Tauriel felt her body get slowly lifted off the ground by someone pulling her up by the arm. She fell back against Legolas, struggling to take deep breaths.
"Focus now, Tauriel. Focus on breathing. That's it, that's it," Legolas encouraged. Tauriel felt her strength return to her, one ounce at a time as she focused on breathing like Legolas said.
Part of her dress in the upper back area stuck to her. She felt it get torn away to expose part of her back.
"Tauriel…do you…feel alright?" Legolas asked.
"Where—is it going?" Tauriel asked instead. There was a short pause, as if Legolas had to figure it out first before telling her.
"It's heading straight towards Esgaroth."**
One Hundred Fifty Years Later…
*When Tauriel pressed her hand against the tree branch, it felt cold and slimy to the touch. When she looked at her palm, it had black wood chips stuck to it by whatever slimy substance was on the tree. She faced Legolas, who was up in the tree across from her. His bow was out with an arrow aimed directly at one of the Orcs below.
There was a small group of them. How they had been able to so easily cross the borders of the kingdom recently was beyond Tauriel. This was unacceptable. Every day, it was only getting worse.
The Greenwood wasn't what it used to be. Most of its beauty had faded away, replaced by a shadowy darkness that blocked out just about all the sun's light from coming through the trees. So many of the plants were dead, and more and more webs were being found. Webs that belonged to giant spiders.
Legolas and Tauriel were both assigned to kill any and all foul creatures they came across but also figure out where they were coming from.
Legolas's arrow flew, pulling Tauriel out of her thoughts. The arrow struck the Orc it was aimed at. Its tip sank through the front of its head and protruded out the back. With a wet groan, the Orc collapsed. The others, four more of them, snapped to attention and crowded closer together.
Now it was Tauriel's turn. After getting her own arrow ready, she aimed at one Orc and fired. The arrow buried itself through the thing's heart.
"Show yourself!" One of the Orcs cried out. It tried to sound intimidating, but Tauriel could hear the uncontrollable fear in his voice. Legolas gave Tauriel the signal to fire again. Tauriel fired another arrow, killing another. She then drew another arrow without waiting for Legolas's call and killed yet another. There was one more left. Deciding he wouldn't survive, the Orc turned and began running away. Before Tauriel could react, an arrow from Legolas flew and tore straight through the creature's leg. The Orc yelped in pain and fell over onto his hands.
Legolas leaped down the tree and Tauriel followed him. They both caught up to the Orc and flipped him around onto his back so that he was looking up at both of them with wide, terrified eyes.
"Where are your friends keeping the Skin-Changers?" Legolas asked. His eyes blazed with a hate that Tauriel could feel towards the miserable creature.
"Skin-Changers? I don't know about any—aaaah!"
Legolas had his grip on the arrow in the Orc's knee, twisting it until bone popped.
"Yes yes! I know where they're keeping them!" The Orc screamed.
"Where?" Tauriel hissed.
"The Eater's Webs. A whole colony of them. The Skin-Changers will never be able to get out of there alive," the Orc declared. Having heard enough, Tauriel unsheathed her dagger and cut the Orc's head clean off. She looked at Legolas, and realized that his hand had been on his own dagger to execute the Orc himself.
"You beat me to it," Legolas sighed.
"He told us what we needed to know," Tauriel replied. She stood straight up and returned her dagger to her sheath without cleaning it first.
"The Eater's Webs?" She asked.
"I've only seen it from a distance. It is a colony of spiders that was formed in a clearing near the Echanted River," Legolas explained. Tauriel bit her lip and looked down at the headless corpse.
"What do we do with the body?" She asked.
"What you always do," Legolas replied. Knowing what he meant, Tauriel raised her hand so that her palm was facing the corpse and summoned a violent burst of energy that completely incinerated the corpse into nothing. It was a part of her power that she had discovered shortly after being accepted into the Woodland Realm. To this day, she still didn't know how she had her abilities.
"Come, we must get to the webs," Legolas urged. Tauriel stared at where the body used to be for several seconds before finally turning and following the prince.**
*Tauriel pressed herself against a tree to hide while Legolas did the same with another tree next to her. Not too far now was the Web of the Eaters, where several Skin-Changers were stuck to webs, getting burned in the stomachs by torches that Orcs held. One of the Orcs was a large pale Orc, with a metal claw crudely jammed in a stump where his arm used to be. He was Azog the Defiler. He had been spotted several times by the king's scouts, being seen capturing Skin-Changers and torturing them. When more Orcs were beginning to appear close to the Woodland Realm, Skin-Changers fled deeper into the Greenwood to be safe, but it didn't make much of a difference now, since the Orcs were also starting to show up deeper within the Greenwood.
What tore at Tauriel's heart was that the woods was now being often referred to as Mirkwood. To everyone, it was a dark, poisonous woods that no one wanted to enter except foul creatures such as Orcs and giant spiders. How had it come to all this and how were they going to fix it?
Legolas motioned for Tauriel to join him at the same tree. She ducked low and made her way to the prince, intently watching the Orcs that were busy torturing the Skin-Changers.
"I count fifteen Orcs and spiders, including Azog," Legolas whispered. Tauriel nodded.
"Do we attack them now?" She asked, anxiety rising in her voice. Legolas raised an eyebrow, seeming to detect her urgency.
"We should have taken more guards with us," Legolas said.
"We can't now. It's up to us," Tauriel replied. Legolas bit his lip then finally nodded.
"Alright. Go when I say to. And one more thing, let me handle Azog," he said. Tauriel wrapped her fingers around the hilts of her daggers. The suspense was agonizing. Why was Legolas stalling this long?
"Now," Legolas finally said. Tauriel leaped from her hiding place behind the tree and charged after the enemy. They didn't know they had been coming. Legolas and Tauriel had finally been able to spring a trap on them this time instead of the Orcs springing their own trap.
Tauriel's dagger sliced the thick, meaty flesh of an Orc across the abdomen, spraying black blood that salted the ground. Another Orc swung at her with a club which Tauriel ducked away from and she flicked her blade up, which severed the Orc's ear from his head. The miserable thing dropped his club and clutched the place where his ear had been in exctrutiating pain. Tauriel let loose a fierce grin before slicing the Orc's throat with both daggers.
An Orc attempted to catch Tauriel from behind, but she drove the hilt of her dagger against its head, bashing its skull in with a sickening crack that even made Tauriel groan as if she could feel a whisper of the thing's pain.
A giant spider came crashing down on top of her, pinning her to the ground. She dropped her daggers in the process. She reached for an arrow in her quiver, pulled it out, and stabbed it between the thing's eyes. The spider screamed in pain as Tauriel drove it deeper and deeper in. The spider finally gave in and fell over onto its side, dragging Tauriel along with it. She let go and retrieved her daggers.
She looked around for anymore incoming enemies, but most of them were all already dead, killed by Legolas. She spotted Azog, fleeing on a large white Warg. Two giant spiders were left, taking a moment to figure out how they were going to kill Tauriel and Legolas.
"You've thought it through enough," Legolas commented. He then got an arrow ready and shot it into one of the spider's eye. Driven mad by pain and fury, the spider charged for Legolas, knocking him off his feet. The other spider went for Tauriel, screaming along the way.
Tauriel cut both her daggers across the spider's face between the eyes and its gaping mouth. The spider put forth its best effort to get Tauriel away by shoving its head against her, forcing her off her feet.
Tauriel shook the pain out of her head and stuck the tip of her dagger up the spider's chin. She could see her bloody blade through the spider's mouth when it opened again. With one last gurgling scream, the spider went down.
Removing the dagger from its head, Tauriel proceeded to help Legolas.
She didn't need to do what she decided to do. She had been warned against it. For hundreds of years now, she was keeping herself from using her special abilities as much as she could. Why she felt compelled to do it now she didn't know, but she was going to do it nonetheless.
She returned her daggers to her sheaths and raised both hands toward the spider.
"Tauriel!" Legolas cried out.
"Trust me, my lord," Tauriel yelled back. With the lethal intent to decimate the spider, she put forth her hatred towards it, allowing the energy to flow through her arms and erupt off her palms. An invisible blast shredded the spider's body into a cloud of green blood. There was absolutely nothing of the spider left.
Legolas coughed and slowly rose back to his feet with Tauriel's help. His armor was stained with blood. Green blood was peppered across his face.
"I'm…I'm sorry for the mess," Tauriel said.
Legolas let out a deep, weary breath. "Was that really necessary?" He asked.
"It is my power to use. I have been trying to show you that," Tauriel pointed out.
"You are growing more powerful. Please think next time before you do something like that," Legolas warned. Tauriel felt her shoulders sink a little and her gaze fell.
Legolas surveyed his surroundings. Tauriel followed his gaze, and she realized that all but one of the Skin-Changers tangled in the webs were dead. The one was breathing heavily, his chest rose and fell hard and his mane was drenched in sweat.
"They're all…they're all dead?" He asked. Tauriel couldn't answer. She didn't know what to say. 'Yes' was an obvious response, but she couldn't bring herself to do it.
The Skin-Changer got himself disentangled from the web, despite the chains he wore.
"Let me help you out of those," Legolas offered. The Changer shook his head.
"No. I will keep them. To remind myself what has happened to my people," he insisted. Before Legolas and Tauriel could do anything more, the Changer walked away from them, disappearing into the thick of the woods.
"This place has become dangerous. Not just to people like him, but for us too," Legolas admitted.
"What do we do about this?" Tauriel asked, her voice barely above a whisper.
"We keep fighting, and we drive the rest of them away."
Tauriel had a sad feeling that that wasn't going to be enough.
"I know where Azog went," Legolas said. Tauriel's ears perked up, and a tiny glimmer of hope ignited in her.
"Where?"
"He fled in the direction of the old fortress of Dol Guldur," Legolas replied.
"So do we go to Dol Guldur then?" Tauriel asked.
"No. We clear the forest first. Perhaps then we can attack them at their source," Legolas said.**
*Tauriel placed a fistful of blackened, slimy, dead plants on Barad's table where he worked.
"The last element I can find," she explained. Barad set aside a grimy piece of tree bark and took a closer look at the plants.
"There is no doubt that a sickness lies upon the Greenwood," he said, speaking more to himself than to Tauriel.
"Do you think this will help?" Tauriel asked. Barad stared up at her with a look as if he was surprised she was still there.
"It may take a while, but I believe I can find a way to reverse the effects of whatever is poisoning the woods," he said. Tauriel stayed where she was for a few more seconds, as if she was expecting something else from him. But what? She and Barad hardly ever spoke to each other, and it had been that way for a few hundred years.
"Will that be all?" Barad asked. Tauriel gasped inwardly, but kept her composure.
"Yes, that will be all."
As she stepped out of Barad's own room he had been given for his studies, she reached into her pocket and felt the black gem inside. She didn't take it out. She rarely looked at it anymore, but she had to feel it to assure herself that she still had it.
The gem had ended up in the possession of Meleth's parents, and its power had infected Meleth herself. It eventually killed her, and the gem fell into the hands of Thranduil, which then fell into Tauriel's hands because she couldn't help but feel like she needed to have it for herself for reasons that she didn't know.
There were whispers of pain in her temples that no amount of healing or rest was able to expel. It had nothing to do with getting burned by the dragon over a hundred years ago. This was a pain that was much deeper.
She still remembered very clearly the death of Niniel during the great battle long ago, but she felt like something was missing in her memory. As if there was someone else she had known that passed away, but she couldn't remember who that person was.
If only someone else knew who she was trying to remember. No one had found a body after the battle that she really recognized as someone that she knew truly well besides Niniel.**
*Barad set his findings out in front of Radagast the Brown. A blackened, poisoned plant, stripped pieces of dead tree bark, and a bit of slimy flora.
"You have to help me find a way to reverse the effects," he said. Radagast stared on at the stuff with a deep sadness lingering in his eyes.
"What do you expect me to do?" He asked.
"You're a wizard. People expect big things from wizards," Barad pointed out, irritated at Radagast's uncertainty.
"I will do what I can. I was able to use a potion to cure my hedgehog Sebastian, but that was only for animals, and they can only be treated one at a time. This is a dark and powerful magic we are dealing with," Radagast explained. Barad slammed his fists down on the table and whirled around. He stared out the window, which wasn't a good idea, because all he saw was darkness and decay. He shifted his gaze downward.
"I understand."
"What of Tauriel?" Radagast asked.
"What about her?"
"Have you told her who she should see for answers?"
"There is no way she will leave the Woodland Realm just yet. She wants the forest healed just as much as I do."
"But what does she want more?" Radagast asked.
It was a question that Barad couldn't answer. He rarely talked to Tauriel anymore, and she had grown to become loyal to the king and his son. She wasn't the innocent and curious young Elf anymore. She was a true servant of King Thranduil who killed without question and followed every order.
He feared that nothing would ever pull her away from that.**