"Unlikely Roommates."
Chapter 2
"The seeds of friendship."
"This is beyond disgraceful! How could he do this to me?!" A youthful, angry voice yelled, waking up the young ranger from his goodnight sleep. "This time he's gone too far! I'm sick of him treating me like a defenseless elfling! I'm almost a thousand years-old and I do not need my daddy to lock me up in a dungeon, in order to prevent me from getting hurt by air and a few small spiders!" The new voice growled. "I can take care of myself just fine, thank you!" There was a yell of irritation that echoed in both the walls of the cell and Aragorn's ears. "By the Valar, this needs to stop! When I get out of here, I'm going to go to that son of a-"
"Legolas!" Another voice, a one the ranger recognized, scolded. "Stop this rampage this instant! Despite your feelings for your father, he is still your king. You cannot go insulting him, no matter how angry he makes you. It doesn't fit for an elven warrior nor a prince to disgrace their ruler in that way."
"I can't help it, Alanell!" The voice, Aragorn began labeling as 'Legolas', yelled back. "Everything he's putting me thought, just to keep me from leaving, is driving me nuts!"
The ranger just had to chuckle. He remembered himself saying those exact words a few years back, when he was going through the 'Overprotective-Elrond' stage a few years back.
A growl came from the right side of the cell.
"What are you laughing at, human?" Legolas growled at him and Aragorn just realized he kept his eyes shut the entire time.
When he finally opened his stormy orbs, he nearly instantly closed them in laughter.
Right next to him lied a young, golden haired elf dressed in a dark-green tunic and brown leggings…tied up like a deer after a hunt. With his hands being tied to his legs with a separate rope so that, even if he manages to separate then, he'd still be unable to move.
The ranger probably wouldn't be laughing so hard, if the poor elf didn't look a bit too much like Thranduil for his own good.
"Stop laughing!" The elven prince growled. "This isn't funny!" Legolas then somehow managed to push himself to a sitting position, blonde hair ruffled from all the wriggling he did on the floor and the, usually pail, features were reddened with the blush of embarrassment. That moment Aragorn realized that they were, in fact, sharing the same sell.
Seeing the angry face of the unfortunate princeling, made the ranger laugh so hard his insides hurt.
"Will you knock it off already?!" Legolas yelled angrily. "My condition stopped being funny, five minutes ago! Stop. Laughing!"
"S-Sorry, sorry" Aragorn wheezed, trying to calm himself down but failing miserably. "I-I'm s-sorry, I r-really am." He closed his deep gray eyes and took a few calming breaths. "It's just that-" Another wave of laugher claimed him at the sight of the angry prince, this time accompanied by him punching the ground with his fists and tears running down his face. "You...l-look so…so much like-" He wasn't even able to finish that sentence, that scene was so funny.
Legolas's bright-blue eyes narrowed and then widened in realization.
"You're…you're not even laughing at me, are you?" His face angry. "You're laughing at my father, imagining him in my place!"
The ranger knew he had been discovered, but couldn't rid himself of the image of a tied-up King Thranduil, looking more like a deer after a successful hunt than a respectful ruler. He simply nodded to confirm the prince's accusation, earning himself a growl from the (by elf standards) younger man.
"Well stop it! Your fun has gone on, long enough!" He yelled clearly irritated and embarrassed, turning his back to the ranger rather clumsily. "Not. A. Word." The elf warned as he moved towards the further corner of the room, the only way he knew how. By dragging his bum across the floor like a dog, muttering something about 'insufferable humans' and 'annoying Adas' under his breath.
Not wanting to angry the poor elf any further, Aragorn listened to his warning and turned his head away.
After a minute of silence, the sound of a rope scratching rock, hit his ears. It looked like the young heir to the throne was trying to get rid of his bonds.
"I'm sorry about his…cranky behavior, Strider." The guard, AKA Alanell, said after a long sight. "He's usually a lot…friendlier towards the people he just met."
Aragorn gave a short chuckle before shaking his head. "It's all right. I was no better than he is, when I was his age." He then turned to face the green clad elf, trying desperately to free himself from the bounds. "I can also safely say, I know exactly where he's coming from." The scratchy sound stopped for a second. "The strong need to put all that hard training to use in a real battle, the frustration when your own father gives in to his overprotective instincts and wants to keep you safe form the brutality of the outside world, just a little longer; the fierce anger when you miss your first real patrol because he pulled out another of the many tricks he keeps under his sleeve, to prevent you from even leaving the palace. Be it ordering the guards to block your path for at least ten minutes, whenever you pass them, or placing sleeping herbs into your morning drink, or something eternally different."
Isildur's heir knew the prince was listening and smiled at that. "But that all passed after a few months." He admitted. "My father just needed the extra time to comprehend the fact, that his youngest son is already old enough to leave his nest." He sighted reaching out for the tray of food a passing guard left him. "It was a hard journey for the both of us, but ultimately he accepted the fact that I'm no longer a child and began treating me like an adult." He took a break for a small bite of lembas. "You see, princeling?" Aragorn asked smiling at the elf, who turned his head and was staring at him over his shoulder. "We're more alike than you think."
The blonde humph-ed. "Perhaps." He an agreed hesitantly. "But there is a difference between my situation and yours."
"Oh really? What difference?"
"Your father's 'overprotective' stage was over in a few months." He slighter. "My father will stay in it for the rest of my life. Valar, he doesn't even let me leave the palace nowadays." Legolas then turned his attention towards the rope bounding his hands and legs. "I have to get out of here tonight, if I ever want to see something other than the four walls in my room."
Aragorn mussed over what the younger said. He heard tales form his father and brothers about Thranduil's legendary stubbornness and was fairly sure the blonde elf was right.
If the King of Elves dedicated himself to protecting his elfling, there was little that could change his mind as well as prevent him from fulfilling his plan, if he thought Middle Earth was too dangerous for his little Greenleaf to explore it, right now.
The only way the young elf could go out to see the world outside the palace walls, was to run away from home under the cover of the night.
But nothing said he had to go alone.
"You are right princeling." Aragorn said walking up to the elf. "And that's why, I want to offer you my help."