~*~ Chapter 1 ~*~

The 20 year-old Ranger walked through the woods stealthily. He enjoyed going through new places, always wanting to explore. He had been sent out to chase a small band of orcs out of and away from Rivendell. The only reason he had been allowed to go by himself was because there were only three or four of them left. Though he'd thought it kind of boring chasing three small orcs, he went just so that he could get some time alone to explore the forest he'd heard so much about, Mirkwood. He was always getting into mischief too and so he didn't manage to get out for very long or very far by himself. This was the first time he'd been this far in this direction. He'd been to the gap of Rohan, but that was the furthest he'd gone. This was the first time he needed to come in this direction. Sighing, he looked around at his surroundings. Ever since he'd walked into Mirkwood he had paid attention to his surroundings, placing and remembering things as he went so as not to get lost on his way out. Looking back at some odd looking plant he tripped over a tree root that stuck out of the ground. He hit the tree root with a thump he automatically put his hands out in front of him and stopped his fall. Smiling, he pushed himself up and laughed quietly at his carelessness.

While this was happening a figure was watching him in the trees above, the interlacing branches allowing him to move from tree to tree effortlessly. Keeping himself hidden, he watched the intruder cautiously from above. The wind rustling through the trees blew his long blonde hair about his face. The fair being balanced himself perfectly on the tree branches, walking along even some of the thinner ones, without much help from his hands. He glared down at the human on the ground, he hated humans, in fact his whole race did.

The Ranger was completely unaware of the being in the trees overhead, not even his amazing hearing (on human accounts) could detect the being above him. He wasn't able to hear anyone, but for the last hour or so he had felt someone watching him, he looked around nervously, wondering why he was feeling this way if no one was watching him. He turned around and started heading back, starting to feel very uncomfortable. After the feeling didn't leave, he quickened the pace and continued doing so until he was running as fast as he could go without missing any of the things he'd seen before and taking a wrong turn.

Taken off guard, the being in the trees stumbled over an odd shaped branch and fell over, stunned, he didn't think to grab the branch before he fell and hit the ground with a quiet thump. To his distress, he landed weird and in a thorn-bush. He sat there for a moment, surprised at what had happened. After a second he tried to push himself up and cried out slightly at the pain that shot up his arm like a hundred flaming needles.

The Ranger stopped suddenly, the weird feeling was gone. He stood still for a moment and jumped when he heard an unexpected cry of pain. He took an uncertain step forward as if to keep going but instead he turned around and ran towards the sound of the cry, to confused to take note of his surroundings. He continued on until he felt as if he could go no further. He had been running all day and was tired out from his long orc chase. He pulled out a flask quickly and drank a bit. Putting it back away, he listened for the cry to come again, or any noise that may tell him where the hurt one was. He started listening intently. Nothing. He couldn't hear a single sound. He decided to head the way he was going slowly and hope he found him, judging the sound carefully, he walked for a couple of minutes, then stopped. From what he heard, the person should be around here. He wasn't sure if it was human or what, but he guessed it wasn't because a human couldn't go very long at all without him hearing him. He looked around the area wondering where he could be, listening carefully, he tried to hear him, but that didn't work. Walking backwards and searching the ground for footsteps, he found something, but not something he would have liked. a thorn-bush. He walked backwards right into it.

"Ouch!" he mumbled and fell away from the bush, "that hur." he stopped mid-sentence. There in the bush lay the last thing he would have expected. "An elf!"

The Ranger was confused and surprised. He'd heard of elves in Mirkwood, of course, but he didn't expect to see one so near the forest edge. He sighed and climbed over the thorns, picked up the elf and tried to climb back over without falling over, constantly catching his foot on tangled, thorny vines. He finally got out and carefully laid the elf on the ground. Checking to make sure he was alive, he wondered how the elf got himself into the middle of a thorn-bush, just to black out. He shook his head and checked the unconscious elf over. When he had finished, he'd pulled dozens of thorns out of his back and had discovered that he had broken his arm. Taking advantage of the elf's unconsciousness, he grasped the elf's thin arm and braced himself. He took a deep breath and pulled, setting it back where it belonged. Half awakening from the pain the elf winced and cried out, he breathed deeply for a little while before the pain slowly dragged him back into unconsciousness. The Ranger looked at the elf's pale face and he felt weird, almost the same feeling he had when he felt he was being followed a while before.

- Of course! The elf must have been following in the trees, and when I ran, he must have fallen somehow. But why was he following him? - The Ranger shook his head in confusion and looked up into the trees, sure enough, there was an odd twisted branch in the tree that hung almost right over the thorn-bush.

Slowly, the Ranger pulled out two blankets from his pack; secretly glad he had brought an extra. He threw one on the ground and draped the other over the elf. Then he built up a fire and ate his lunch, waiting for the fair being to regain consciousness. He toyed with the fire a bit, deep in thought when suddenly many things started to happen. The elf woke up slowly, but the Ranger was too deep in thought to notice. The being struggled to regain consciousness, and when he did, was surprised. and slightly angry. He sat for a minute and didn't move, realizing the human wasn't paying attention; he slowly rose on unsteady feet and, unsheathing his knife, crept around behind the human. The Ranger had actually fallen asleep right there, so tired after having next to no sleep the last three or four days on his hunt. a very deep sleep. The elf noiselessly snuck up behind the human and was about to put the small elven blade under the human's neck when he woke up. Sensing something wasn't right the Ranger woke up and, noticing the elf wasn't where he left him, jumped up and across the empty fire-pit, slapping his palm onto his forehead. Whirling around and unsheathing his sword he stopped. The elf was surprised, but not put off guard. This human wasn't as slow as he had expected, in fact, he could say that he was quite fast. Though not as fast as the elf, unfortunately, when the elf jumped forward unexpectedly and caught the Ranger in the stomach with his shoulder. Though, surprising the elf again, the human stumbled back a bit but did not fall. The elf lunged again but this time the Ranger was ready and he jumped aside. The elf tripped on a rock that was surrounding the fire-pit and tumbled forward. Closing his eyes the elf winced as his head swam and he realized that with him on the ground the human would have an advantage. Ready to hit the ground he swung his injured arm out to the side so as not to land on it, but he never hit the ground. He felt someone catch him and lay him gently onto a blanket.

- Okay, when's the punishing going to start, - he thought, -this human's acting odd and he's probably planning some kind of cruel torture for me. -

"Where did you think you were going?" The young human asked the elf, smiling.

"What?!?!" The elf replied, surprised.

"I asked you where you where going and I would like to know whom you are," the Ranger said smiling down at the elf on the ground.

The elf studied him, "I was trying to get away from you human," he said, "and I'm an elf."

"Well yeah, I know you're an elf but what's your name?" The Ranger replied, stifling a laugh at the elf on the ground, he was trying to hide his fear, and he was doing a good job, but looking into his eye's you could see it, "there's no need to be afraid."

"My name is none of your business and I'm not afraid," the elf replied angrily.

"Right," The Ranger replied, "okay, anyway, I'm Strider," he said slowly, deciding to use his nickname from Bree. He flopped down next to the elf and Strider could see him flinch.

"That's your real name?" the elf asked with a low voice, trying to create something for the human to work on as he tried to move further away from him.

"No," Strider laughed, "it's a nickname. and quit trying to move away. Here, let me see your arm."

The elf jerked his arm away and moaned softly as the movement caused his arm to get sore again, "I'm fine."

Strider laughed again, "I'm sorry if I'm mistaken, but when I find an elf in a thorn-bush with a broken arm and he's blacked out, I wouldn't call that fine. Oh, I want to ask you something," he added and looked at the elf. When the elf just looked back at him, he continued, "Were you following me?"

The elf looked at him for a moment, "maybe."

"I'm guessing I'm not going to get any more than maybe.right?" Strider asked.

The elf just glared at him. Laughing, Strider carefully took the elf's arm and undid the bandage. The elf winced a bit but didn't pull away so he wouldn't hurt his arm. He brought a pot of water over and dumped in a handful of crushed leaves from his pocket. The scent quickly took over the camp and even the elf calmed a bit. The elf had gotten a long gash over his back where a particular thorn didn't want to let got of the vine for a while, but when it did, it got in deep. Gently rapping the bandage back around after he'd had a look, the Ranger gently turned the elf over and re-cleaned the gash with the water from the pot and taking some of the leaves from the water, pushed them carefully into the wound.

- I'll bet they're poisonous, - the elf thought quickly, starting to get a bit more afraid, - he's probably pretending to be nice so that I wont suspect anything. I'm getting out of here as soon as he's asleep. -

Strider slowly made the elf sit up and wrapped another bandage from an extra tunic in his pack around his back and stomach to cover the gash on his back and to keep the leaves from coming out before he needed them to. After that he rolled up what was left of the tunic and threw in on the ground for the elf to use as a pillow. Laying the elf back down, he went over and sat on his blanket, waiting for the elf to fall asleep. When he did fall asleep, Strider lay himself down and sighed, falling slowly into sleep.

A couple hours later the elf's eyes blinked and looked over at the human. Realizing he was asleep, he slowly got out of his bed and walked off slowly, not able to climb with his broken arm. It was the rustling of leaves nearby that woke the Ranger. He woke quickly and looked over to where the elf had lain.

- Of course, - Strider rolled his eyes and stood up, - I should have known. -

Quickly following the sound he started tracking the elf. He knew elves weren't easy to track, but this one couldn't climb and with the slight limp from the awkward fall, he might be able to find some footprints in the few areas that were only dirt, or mainly dirt. All his senses on full alert, he looked around carefully, searching for broken branches, plants that looked awkward from being moved or kicked and footprints. He almost laughed, finding this one an easy elf to track, his limp showed slightly in some spots and Strider knew he wasn't far because he could still smell the athelas plant. He could hear the slight rustling of branches and leaves and after a while he started wondering if the elf was okay. He had started coming across blood spots and they were getting bigger and more frequent as he went. After a while it stopped but as he went it started slowly again. The Ranger did not find this odd though, a while back the prints changed and he knew that the elf was in bad shape because he couldn't walk anymore, he had taken to crawling, looking for a place to hide. As he went the prints started getting more clear, as if the elf had to struggle to make himself go faster, or just to keep going.

Continuing on his way, Strider keep going until he found what he was looking for. Unfortunately, not in the way he wanted to see the elf. He had passed out again. Gently picking him up, and ignoring the blood that began to slowly run down the front of his dark overcoat, he started walking back to camp as quickly as possible. The elf was slowly regaining consciousness and he moaned at the pain his back was causing.

"Shh," the Ranger said, "calm down, you're in no condition to take off like that. What were you thinking?"

The elf just started to struggle, "put me down, I can walk."

"Sure looked like it back there," Strider answered, "you say one thing, but all evidence points to the fact that you were crawling. Now stop struggling, I don't want to drop you."

Surprised at the fact that the human didn't want to hurt him he stared for a minute then looked off into the direction they were going and started muttering to him-self.

They went on for a while and when they got near the camp, the Ranger stopped.

"Something's not right, listen."

The elf stopped his muttering and listened for a minute, "yrch!" he said quietly, falling into his own speech.

The Ranger nodded his head and carefully put the elf on the ground. The elf just sat there. They looked at each other for a minute and then Strider drew his sword and crept towards the sound, their camp, in other words. He sighed in relief when he saw the small orc party he'd been after. It wasn't a relief seeing orcs but it was better if there were only three of them and no more, they were small ones too. They seemed to be looking for their food because they were searching through their stuff but didn't take clothing and blankets. Strider was glad he'd hidden his pack before he left. He was also glad they weren't bright enough to think that humans could climb tree too. He climbed up the tree he put his pack in (which was right over the camp) and aiming for the bigger one, he pulled out a small hunting knife and threw it into his throat. The others, seeing their leader fall, started freaking out. Taking advantage of this, Strider jumped on the second, driving his sword down into its head. He pulled it out and chased after the last one, not willing to let it go to get reinforcements he jabbed it and buried all three in a hole that took him half an hour to dig. After that, he went back to get the elf, hoping he didn't take off again, not much hope there.