hello everyone!

anyone up for a weekend update? ;) i was going to wait until later, but i'm in one of those moods, lol...

first off, thanks to all who read, followed, favorited and especially all who reviewed the first chapter of this tale :) It is my 70th piece on fanfiction . net and I wanted to go bolder than my usual. I'm taking some risks that terrify me so I am grateful for your shared thoughts :)

Indeed, if I learned anything from writing 70 pieces on this site over the course of well over a decade - more than anything we are a community here. What this means for me is that though there are a few bad apples who could be unkind, it is mostly a safe place that gives room for both writers to grow in their craft and readers to grow in their tastes and perspectives. We dare each other to be better and to try new things. This is a safe place, and one built on generosity because we share our passions, we share our talents, we share our thoughts, we share our time.

Thank you friends for the solace this site provides and always, for giving me and others like me the courage to put our thoughts to paper and try new things.

As always, C&C's are treasured only if you are able to spare them. Mostly I hope you have as much fun reading as I am having fun writing. All the best!

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2: Traces of You

Eryn Galen

Early in the Third Age

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"It wasn't so long ago – years barely a handful, really – that Legolas started training in earnest," Thranduil murmured. "and yet he is doing remarkably well, do you not think so?"

He asked it of his wife, the Queen. His tone was flat, but his eyes crinkled with fondness. She, on the other hand, seemed preoccupied by her thoughts. He wished to coax them out and tried to do so with both levity, and a topic that he knew would rile her into engagement.

"Do you think it is possible they are humoring us and letting him win everything?"

Even after all their time together, she was not very good at going along with his subtle yarns, delivered as they were in blasé, courtly, Sindar fashion.

"Accuse your own kin of that politicking nonsense," she told him darkly, "but I would ask you to spare my people. We would never let him win a contest just because he is Thranduil's son. And besides - Legolas did not win everything."

The Prince of Eryn Galen overheard the tail-end of his parents' hushed conversation as he turned to enter the royal family's private quarters.

"Blast it, elfling!" exclaimed his mother, who tended to startle like a Silvan (that is, with a raised knife). "The one thing – the one thing! - you had to inherit from me was that stealth of yours!"

He smiled at her uncertainly, and looked inquiringly upon his father. Thranduil, however, was turned toward the fiery warrior-queen with mild amusement.

"What have I done to displease the Queen?" Legolas asked, only half-jesting.

The three royals had come from a minor event in the kingdom's Yen War Games, held once every 144 years to coincide with the Alaglach – the Feast of Rushing Flame. During the Alaglach, the sky burst with the light of thousands of shooting stars. The most anticipated event in the Games was when the kingdom's military captains participated in a series of stepladder contests simulating battle conditions. But there were also several minor competitive events held around it for novices who had not yet reached their majority – the Prince Legolas among them in this particular instance, for was not quite 50 years yet.

"You did not win everything apparently," Thranduil replied mildly. It irked the competitive, young Sindarin prince nonetheless, and his brow quirked in betrayal of this emotion. He was not yet as good as his father at pretending to be unflappable, though the gods knew how hard he tried.

"I've won in hand-to-hand combat, horse racing, free-style fighting, swimming and even set a record for archery," he replied. "My friends and I have also just triumphed at the regatta, naneth." It was from the riverbanks that they had actually just come. "Ranking second in the sword-fighting competition is disappointing I agree, and for that I apologize. But I will do better-"

The warrior-queen cut off her son with a raised hand. "It is not with your solitary loss that I am saddened, son." She muttered something in the deepest of her Silvan dialect, a language Legolas picked up only about two-thirds of. He understood it well enough, but could not boast of speaking it eloquently.

"You could be awful and I would be happy just to see you try your best," she said, shifting her language to Sindarin. "What I find inexcusable is that you insist on using a long sword when you could be better with a pair of knives. I am disappointed that you would rather lose with a sword than win with a knife. You are trying so hard to be him," she jerked her head at the sword-carrying King who looked unbothered, "that sometimes you carry no trace of me."

She after all, carried a pair of twin white knives on her back. Almost always, she had them. Legolas always found the weapons too delicate, and perhaps he was trying to be like his father but then again, almost all of the soldiers – Sindar and Silvan alike - carried swords instead of knives. Especially the proper, higher-ranking officer types he hoped one day to become.

"Is aran-nin really so bad to emulate?" Legolas kidded, attempting to tame her roiling fire.

"Your built is like mine," the Queen insisted. "You have lighter bones, lighter feet, a subtler strength. You are tailor-made for this forest, and can stand upon branches without stirring a single leaf. These light knives will sing in your hands, ion, especially if you learn how to use them from your grandfather."

Legolas winced. There was the long-dead Oropher of legend, his father's father, whom Legolas never had the honor to meet. Then there was that ornery, subsisting Silvan who had sired his stern but loving naneth, whom he met (by mutual preference) on very few occasions.

Grandfather, as Legolas called him, suffered nothing of the Eryn Galen court and was unimpressed by the Sindar (his son-in-law the King Thranduil very much included). Thus, he stayed away from the stronghold and royal home. He lived in a small settlement community on the far northwest of the Wood, the same home he always had, even after his daughter became Thranduil's wife and so, the Queen. Grandfather spoke only in an especially flowery and archaic Silvan dialect, though Legolas suspected he understood Sindarin and even Westron perfectly, except he refused to bother.

The old Silvan kept a rugged home among ageless oaks not far from the foot of the Grey Mountains. Winters were frigid there and ran particularly dry and long – a tough survival situation for any Wood-elf, especially for forest farmers like Legolas' Grandfather. But he always claimed he could make anything grow at any time. Avalanches happened in particularly snowy conditions, and warmer weather was sometimes ushered in by a thaw that swelled the river and caused flash floods. It was an altogether untamed place.

The warrior-queen sighed into her son's uncertain silence. Legolas did not know what precisely she wanted from him, and she was unsure herself.

"Forgive me, Legolas," she said. "I am proud of your accomplishments, I truly am. I have a yearning for home perhaps. Too long cooped up here in your father's veritable pile of rocks surrounded by the Sindar and their politics and I am losing my mind."

Thranduil shook his head at his wife in amusement, and Legolas gave his mother a small smile. He was still slightly confused, but like his father he indulged her exotic outbursts. The Queen was a passionate Silvan with very strong opinions she did not like (or perhaps had no capacity for) keeping to herself. She did not play courtly games and preferred saying what she meant and meaning whatever she said. Sometimes she was right and sometimes she was wrong but she was always straightforward. She was thankfully as quick to apologize as she was quick to retort.

"I think I will leave you two to revel in your victories, Legolas. I have been a poor companion." She pressed a reckless kiss somewhere between Legolas' ear and almost poked his eye –they were the same height now and his speedy growth towards adulthood was not something she found easy to navigate, and she had never been particularly good at affection to begin with. But she gave a gentler, more expert one upon her husband's cheek. They have been together since early in the Second Age, after all.

"No nana," Legolas protested, "please stay."

"I must see Galion about the preparations for tonight's feast at any rate," she said. "He could be so indulgent and prone to waste in happy occasions."

She left in a flurry of leathers and skirts and in wide, purposeful strides. For a long moment, Legolas and Thranduil just watched her go. The warrior-queen was like a force of nature, and neither of them envied Galion her critical eye and imminent storm.

"I hope he is ready with his accounting figures," Legolas joked.

Thranduil smiled. "He almost always is."

"I didn't do too badly in the swords, did I, adar?" Legolas asked. "And I am learning and improving still."

"I think the Queen's concerns about you are of shall we say, a more profound nature," Thranduil murmured thoughtfully. "Of late she has been feeling as if the song of the forest is discordant. That something stirs within that obscures things from her. You know how these Silvans could be with the trees. She does not know if it is because the forest is changing or if she is, 'cooped up' here as she has been with us. She thinks some time in her father's house can help her reclaim that connection or at least understand what is happening."

"She means to go away for a while," Legolas deduced. He bit his lip in thought, suddenly realizing where the conversation was leading. He grimaced. "She means to take me with her."

Thranduil shrugged. "That wood-elf of mine takes such pride in her roots, as you know. I believe it is a sentiment she is hoping to share with you."

Legolas looked at his father with a suddenly thunderous expression, barely veiled. He was his mother's son too. "Do you agree with her? That I have no trace of her and am not 'Silvan' enough? And so how is it that in your vaunted circles I am also not quite 'Sindar' enough either? Which is it?"

"Your quarrel is not with me, princeling," Thranduil said flatly, with a slight warning the young royal could not have missed. It surprised the Elvenking that his son was cognizant of the occasional whisper and resentment amongst their peers that the heir to the kingdom was not fully of the Sindar. It was a discussion for a different day, however.

"I have no qualms about your choices in weaponry, in language, in friendships," Thranduil said. "You do everything appropriately – dare I say even perfectly – for a Sindarin prince, vile whispers of your mixed heritage aside. Small minds will think their small thoughts, Legolas, always remember that. But the Queen is not wrong in desiring to see more of her Silvan heritage in her own son. She is your mother. She has equal claim to you as I. Go with her to her father's house or not, that is your decision. I will not command you and so save your quarrel for elsewhere. You are certainly old enough to make your own choices. But I expect you to understand what all of this means to her."

Legolas sighed. It was such well-constructed emotional blackmail, wasn't it? The decision is yours, but know that you will hurt her if you decline... His father was not King for nothing. Thranduil always knew how to get what he wanted, whether it be by the end of a blade or a turn of the phrase.

"Nana is so very strange sometimes," Legolas said quietly. "I do not know what the difference is, really, if I should be one or the other or both. I am just... what I am. But what you are asking me to consider is not unreasonable. A season or two with her in Grandfather's homestead," he gulped, "is not entirely unbearable."

"You will go with her of your own will?"

"I will consider it."

Thranduil favored him with a beatific smile, because he knew he'd already won even if Legolas was still unprepared to say it.

"I don't know why I should bother," said the younger elf. "You yourself don't have the highest opinion of Silvan ways I must note, aran-nin. Why you should wish for me to appropriate some of their customs is beyond me."

"I have the highest opinion of that Silvan elf," Thranduil corrected his son fondly, in reference to his warrior-Queen. "From the day I met her I knew I would happily lay the finest jewels of the world at her feet, but she is insistent that nothing of the sort would impress her."

"Maybe you need a better jewel," Legolas joked.

"We shall see," Thranduil said vaguely. His features brightened in memory. "Do you know, ion-nin, that I met your mother at a War Games, not unlike this one?"

Legolas did know it, but knew his father liked telling it again.

"The best warriors in our Woods came from far and wide," Thranduil shared. "She was – is – beautiful but she stood out amongst the multitude because she fought so differently and looked like she was only dancing. Except higher and higher up the rankings she went, winning everything until she faced me. She won my heart when she fought with everything she had. She drew first blood, too."

"You fell for naneth because she tried to kill you," Legolas smirked. "And how did you, unattractive Sindar prince that you almost certainly were, win her over? The Queen harbors not the best opinion of us either."

"I bested her," Thranduil said with a glint in his eye. "I had to defeat her you see, and soundly too. Otherwise she would not have found me worthy of her time."

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The Mirkwood

Third Age 2509

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"It's been a long time...her death and what you both suffered there is not something anyone wishes to revisit," the War Minister Brenion tells the ailing elven prince before him, "but we believe you have unexplored memories of what happened from when you were both captured and held prisoner."

"I recall n-n-nothing m-m-material of those d-days," Legolas stammers through chattering teeth. "I was young and ill and out of m-my mind h-half of the time and everything I knew I m-mentioned. I withheld n-nothing." His head is pounding, and he can hear his harsh breaths and fast, thunderous heartbeats in his muffled ears.

"We are aware of that," Brenion says earnestly. "We recall very much the grave condition in which you were restored to us, all those years ago. Your young age, your royal status, the fact that you were not yet a soldier, the severity of the injuries inflicted on you, the grief you and your father bore – all these protected you from a more intensive debriefing. But we believe this is something we can do now."

"But I recall n-nothing m-more!"

"Sometimes even the barest snatches of images, sounds and feelings help to form a more concrete picture of events," Lastor explains. "You were barely of age when you were imprisoned, you might not have known the relevance of what you witnessed. If you speak to us of whatever you remember, no matter how small a detail, it could help us come to a better understanding of what happened."

"But what g-good does it d-do anyone," Legolas asks mournfully, "what good does it do anyone, dredging up all the horrible p-past?"

Brenion bites his lip in consideration. "We do not ask this lightly, Legolas. There is a military reason for our inquiry."

Lastor nods. "If we consider the recent capture and torture of Lady Celebrian as an emergent tactic of the enemy, we need to prepare our soldiers for the possibility of imprisonment. They need to know what to expect, how to resist giving away vital information, and how to survive if possible. And of all the elves in all of Arda, there is only one left fit enough to speak from experience of what happens when one falls into the hands of the orc – you."

"Furthermore," adds Brenion gravely, "we need whatever information you have to properly determine the motives behind your capture. Were you being held for ransom and if so, in exchange for what? Or were you being held for sport until a long, slow death with no further intentions? Back then we mourned our Queen and barely got our Prince back alive. We all struggled to move forward. Now we can take a larger view – now we must take a larger view, because the recent attack on Celebrian shows us this is still a significant danger. This is particularly true in your case, because your duties take you outside the stronghold frequently, Legolas. We must be able to formulate a military response in case you too are targeted. This will have repercussions on the kinds of duties you are assigned and where, and what strategies we can pursue in case you are captured."

"If you are held for ransom," Lastor elaborates in a flat tone, "we have to decide if our inclination is toward non-negotiation and a stealth retrieval, or to give in. If we are to give in to the orcs' demands, to what extent? If you on the other hand are held for sport until a slow, agonizing death – would it be better to encourage suicide upon impending capture? Is this something we must advocate amongst our other soldiers too? The implications of whatever information you can provide will range far and wide, my lord.

"You are a soldier now," Lastor continues. "And one gifted at gathering and understanding vital intelligence, too. It is perhaps with these more seasoned eyes that you can finally look back upon those dark days, and turn them into a strength rather than just a foul memory. Make the information an asset with which to arm our warriors."

Legolas takes a deep, shaky breath and rubs his hands over his eyes. He feels profoundly weary. He feels inadequate. He feels perilously close to shameful tears. He feels shame. He feels unprepared.

He also feels brewing anger.

He is physically ill and factually, objectively weakened. He is being unfairly ambushed for answers by three older and militarily more senior elves, knocking on the doors of memories long shuttered, monsters kept in the airless dark. The gods know what's become of them, how these memories may have fed and fattened and become larger and stronger and more malevolent over time.

He feels deep sorrow for even the barest snatches of the memories of what had happened to his mother. They live in a pit in his stomach with unknown depths. They lived in a dark, unmapped corner of his mind. Her loss and the circumstances of it are always with him, always too near. One misstep and he falls into the abyss. One stray thought and he is consumed. They dare ask him to go there?

Her death has become such a pain that he can never even think of their happy memories together, because even these things were inextricably bound by the loss of them, by the death of her. The oh-so- very brutal death of her...

He can feel himself shaking more violently, quaking, in illness or fear or anger or all of them all at once.

But you are a soldier now, he tries to tell himself in an effort to find some hidden reserve of strength, You are a soldier now...

"Speaking from another perspective," Maenor the Health Minister opens tentatively. His hesitation catches Legolas by surprise and so the Prince, as well as the other two Ministers with them, turn to him curiously.

"You've been brought to my halls in all states of awareness or lack thereof, hir-nin," says Maenor. "Your fever dreams I've been privy to since you became a soldier frequently subject to my care. I've heard you in disoriented mutterings and desperate ranting."

Legolas' brows rise in surprise. He did not know he sometimes makes for a noisy patient, but he's been an occupant in the healing halls often enough to have heard even the toughest of soldiers cry out in their agonies. It is perhaps conceit that he thought himself stoic and exempt.

"Sometimes your words made sense to me," Maenor says, "like in the cases when you ranted and raved of the missions you were recently in. You called out orders, called for fallen friends. But other times you called for her – for our Queen. And other times you spoke of phantom pains and events that were not there or at least, not there anymore. I understand now... you were remembering a different place and a different time, even if you did not know it. Maybe you need to speak of what happened, too. Maybe you need to face this. For your own sanity."

Legolas looks at each of the three imploring faces. Lastor looking for intelligence information. Brenion trying to determine a military course of action. Maenor wanting to heal him. They were all there for all their respective duties.

He feels his anger fade. He feels his body settle.

"I do not know how I can help in this," he says softly. "I've spoken of everything I know. I do not even know what else I can recall or speak of..." he remembers something, suddenly.

"What does father think of all this?"

Brenion and Lastor visibly wince.

"Clearly he is unaware of our miserable little conspiracy," Maenor says wryly.

"You know how he is," Brenion says of his old friend, and it is really unbecoming of a War Minister but he shifts uneasily in his seat. "It is easier to apologize than to ask permission."

"As you can imagine," adds Lastor, "like you, news of Lady Celebrian's torture has unearthed distressing memories for him. It became worse when we found you collapsed and unresponsive in your rooms."

"You were rushed to the healing halls," Maenor says gently, "your adar followed quickly once informed of the condition you were in." He bit his lip uneasily before continuing. "You were fevered as was earlier said... but... soon ranting and raving too. You were calling for her."

Legolas' barely restrains a pained grimace. He was screaming for his dead naneth in the healing wards, with his father there. With healing staff and hurting soldiers in hearing range. It really was conceited of him, to have ever believed himself exempt from succumbing to suffering as he has seen others succumb.

"We worked to ease you," Maenor continues, "and as soon as you were somewhat recovered, your adar promptly ordered your transfer to the privacy of your own rooms away from the eyes and ears of others. He also strictly barred visitors and unnecessary personnel. I was to care for you personally."

Legolas rubs at his eyes wearily, as if he could rub away his torment, his embarrassment, and the torment and embarrassment he spread by his fevered ranting.

"I'm sorry."

Maenor reaches for his hands and places them down so that he may be looked upon. "I would have done so either way." He clears his throat. "And so as I have said earlier - maybe you need to speak of what happened, too. For yourself and these burdens you carry."

"So Adar doesn't know you are here for this purpose," Legolas says slowly, thoughtfully.

"Yes," Lastor says. "He made sure you were well-looked after and away from danger first, but then retired to his own company, lost in his own thoughts. He is in his office, elbow-deep in paperwork and Dor-winion."

Legolas nods in understanding. It is just as well that his father is not here if he is to recall more of what happened to his naneth. He's already put the King through enough.

He himself would leave if he could.

"He is not to be disturbed," Lastor continues, "not that we are eager to ask him for permission to harass his injured son for information. But this needs doing, and so here we are."

"I will cooperate my lords," Legolas says carefully. "I understand this is a matter of duty. But as I told you, I do not quite know how."

"I may be able to help," Maenor says carefully. "I am of the belief that buried memories can be reclaimed when the sufferer returns to the states he had previously endured. In your case... years ago you were pulled from Gundabad in the throes of a raging fever. And in my years of experience treating you since you became a soldier, it is indeed whenever you fell in a similar state of illness that the dreams, the brutal memories, tend to make a reappearance.

"You are currently on heavy doses of fever and pain reducers," Maenor goes on, "If you let me, I will modify the regimen and lower the dose. You will consequently feel disorientation and distress. The fever will return, so will the pain from your poisoned and infected injury. In this state, you may be able to return to the place of your memories. I will not mince words – you will certainly hurt. But under my care, I can also guarantee that you will not be in mortal danger."

Maenor looks pointedly at the Intelligence and War Ministers in his company. "But if Legolas should even come within a hairsbreadth of hazard, I will exercise my professional judgment in restoring whatever treatment I see fit, even if it should deprive you of the information you seek."

"We expect nothing less of you my lord," says Brenion.

"We are all agreed. What say you, Captain?" Lastor asks Legolas.

"I will do what I can," the Prince promises. His voice is thin and it wavers, but his eyes blaze in determination. What did Lastor say? Turn the dark memories into an asset, turn them into information with which to arm their soldiers...

Maenor nods in satisfaction. "Very well. You are still under the soothing effects of the last dose, Legolas. I suggest you find what rest you can and gain some strength." He gives his charge some water to drink, then assists the Prince back to lying down.

The healer fusses with the blankets as he speaks, "In the next few hours, your rally will wane. You are still unwell and we expect that without the proper treatment, the pain will return and the fever will rise. We will see what you can remember then."

Legolas settles into his pillows and closes his eyes, hoping the three Ministers would leave him be for a moment. He opens one eye and then the other, to find them nestling into their chairs around his bed.

"There is no rest to be found with you three hovering there my lords," he grumbles miserably at his elders.

"That is not an unfair request, ernil," Maenor concedes with a dry laugh. "But you should know better than to expect to be left completely alone in your condition."

He rises from his seat and starts dragging the piece of furniture away from the bed and toward Legolas' desk in another end of the room. The two other ministers follow suit.

"We shall stay here," says the wily healer, "and partake of your dinner."

Legolas groans, but carefully turns away from the lot of them and covers his head with a pillow. He wishes he could be outside instead, where there is air and starlight. The stars remind him of how small he and his troubles are in the larger scheme of the world.

Oh how he wished for stars.

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Eryn Galen

Early in the Third Age

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Thousands of stars, for hours and hours shooting across the sky... The elves of Eryn Galen delighted in the phenomena celebrated by the Alaglach. They marked the event with rowdy and fiercely competitive war games in the day but ended it with a quiet, community feast on the banks of the Forest River at night.

The water was tree-lined, but along its considerable length, there were patches of sandy riverbank and outcroppings of flat-topped rock that were unobscured by the thick canopy of branches and leaves that otherwise dominated their proud forest. On these spaces along the water, one could readily look up and watch the shooting stars.

The elves would spread out blankets and cushions in these spaces, and sit in small groups of families and friends to watch the phenomenon above them. In areas where the waters of the river were still, the shooting stars were also reflected on the surface such that there were stars to see up in the skies and on the water itself.

There was quiet, good-natured chatter and soft music. There was food to be shared and always, always, excellent drink from the King's own stores for sharing in the community.

The royal family – Thranduil, his Queen and his young son - walked among their people, sharing in felicitations and tales of the exciting day that had transpired. They also toasted the gods, who had blessed them with the thousands of stars that blazed in the skies.

It was not a formal event, and one of the few social duties the Queen enjoyed fully because after the three royals finished mingling, they were able to comfortably settle in and watch the stars with their closest friends.

Legolas stretched out on lush furs with his fellow young nobles, all these elves of roughly the same age and status as he. He munched idly on pieces of bread as he listened half-heartedly to their chatter. He watched his naneth as she settled in amongst her most preferred fellows, a few paces away. They were all Silvan soldiers of course, and there was not a single light head of hair among her circle of friends.

Not that he could boast very well of diversity, he reflected. In perfect foil to his mother, there was not a single Silvan amongst his own group.

Except for me, he thought wryly. I am the Silvan here, apparently. Such as I am...

He asked his father once, how the King Oropher had received the news that his Sindar son and heir had fallen in love and intended to marry a Silvan elf. The world-threatening dangers they faced in that earlier Age had apparently overshadowed whatever reservations Oropher might have had, and Thranduil said there was no resistance to the union his heart desired. It certainly helped that there was also political value in a mixed union. The Sindarin elves were a minority ruling over the majority Silvan population. Though Oropher consolidated power and united the Realm and his leadership had never been contested, a marriage between his son Thranduil and one of the local folk only increased his legitimacy.

But apparently, I am not nearly Silvan enough for naneth, thought Legolas. He wondered if it was a sentiment shared by the other Silvan elves in their woods. He probably did not help matters by his choice of primary language, or limited set of friends. He pondered spending a season or so in his dour Grandfather's house and winced. If his mother already found him lacking, Grandfather could very well look at him as if he were as strange as a dwarf.

He sighed, and let himself be taken from this miserable thought by the mention of the Silvan soldier who had defeated him in sword fighting.

"Did you hear that, Thranduilion?" one of his good friends poked him on the ribs, "The delightful Lady Mallossel confided upon Limbes that she is of a mind to lose her maidenhead to that Silvan farmer who left you in the dust today!"

"Lady Mallossel," echoed another one of their companions, "even her name glides upon the tongue. So fine a creature would be such a waste on that farmer. I hope she was only kidding."

"I'm just not sure if she meant to lose her maidenhead to whoever emerged winner in the swordfight," said Limbes with a laugh, "or if she wanted the Silvan farmer on his own merits to begin with. Imagine, Legolas – if you had only triumphed, Mallossel could have set her sights on you instead!"

Legolas was not sour about losing, especially to the superior skills of the rather gentlemanly and previously unknown swordsman who had distinguished himself amongst so many other elves today. The line of conversation amongst his friends was also not so strange – they exchanged irreverent barbs with each other easily, and no one was immune from their sharp tongues, not even himself. He also had little to no care for the attentions of Lady Mallossel, as fine as she admittedly was. But because of his earlier conversation with his parents, thoughts of Silvan farmers led him to his mother's concerns about how he valued his mixed heritage. She, after all, had been farming with Grandfather before she distinguished herself in the War Games and captured the heart of Thranduil.

"That Silvan farmer," Legolas snapped, "bested me not only easily, but had also taken pains to let me keep face. His name is Melchanar and everyone sees a bright future for him here."

"Maybe Legolas also intends to give up his maidenhead to this champion!" chortled one of their companions. The jibe was met by a chorus of laughter and it diffused Legolas' irritation. He just rolled his eyes at them and kept his peace. It was all very trifling.

But he knew then that he would be going with his mother on her planned trip to the far northwest of their Woods, King's command or no. He would go with nana to the home she missed and yearned for, to Grandfather's untamed forest farm.

He did not think he would learn much from them – much less appropriate anything and change himself. But if it made naneth happy, he could stand some time there and besides, he had not been by to visit his Grandfather and pay respect in years.

He was resolute in his decision to accompany his mother and would tell his parents so. That did not, however, mean he was happy. From the occasional seasons he spent there, time felt different from how it was in the stronghold. It was agonizingly slow because he was only ever either bored or uneasy.

He did not look forward to it at all. He sighed and stretched out on the fur, and looked up at the shooting stars, which made a heavenly ceiling above.

TO BE CONTINUED...