Chapter Two – Fight

Three days earlier...

It had hardly escaped Aragorn's attention that the morning after the battle, despite the fact that they had won, Legolas was nowhere to be seen. The good news was that he was not among the collected dead. The bad news was... he wasn't among the collected living either. So when all the bodies of those that had been slain in battle had been gathered, everybody who had been involved was now accounted for.

Everyone, that is, save Legolas.

Aragorn was beginning to wonder what could have happened to his friend when he met Gimli. The dwarf had a nasty cut on his forehead, but other than that, seemed absolutely fine. And was also looking for the elf, greatly desiring to tell him that Legolas must have lost their game because Gimli had managed to kill several at once by throwing them into one of the Nine's steeds. Aragorn, however, was more worried than smug.

"You don't think something has happened to him?" Aragorn asked the dwarf, who looked mildly amused at the prospect.

"Yes. I think he fell into a puddle and doesn't want us to see his face muddy."

Aragorn glared at his companion, clearly not sharing the joke.

"Look, if you're so worried, then we go and ask if anyone saw anything." The dwarf looked mildly exasperated by Aragorn's worry.

"I really don't think that will work... " Aragorn's half-hearted attempt at dissuading the stubborn dwarf was about as effective as going up to a dragon and asking it nicely if it would please surrender its treasure.

"Has anyone seen Legolas?" Gimli's voice rang out over the confused din that filled the crowded hall of people trying to get food, water, and, most importantly, blankets. "Y'know, the elf? Tall, blonde, a little bit ditzy?" His cheek earned him a hard stamp on his toes from Aragorn.

As Aragorn had predicted, very few people paid even the slightest bit of attention to them. Aragorn folded his arms and looked at the dwarf, intending to pass a smug comment, when a quiet voice interrupted him.

"I did."

They both turned, shocked, to face an archer, who sat very close to the door, his arm bandaged and in a sling. There was a blanked draped around his shoulder, but the man was shaking uncontrollably, so it was slowly slipping down his back.

"He was taken." The man's voice was dripping with terror.

"What? When?" Gimli's normally amused exterior was shattered, replaced with one of panic.

"He... He was the one who shot down the first... the first..."

"Ringwraith," supplied helpfully, with more than a hint of impatience in his tone.

The man nodded. "Yes. And then two others flew at him. One from the front, and one from behind..." The man gave a poorly suppressed shudder. "He shot down the first one, but the one from behind came and knocked him off the wall. The second one he shot down put his hand over his mouth and he fell limp. They dragged him onto the steed and they... they... they took him away." The man buried his face in his hands.

He didn't see the masks of shock and horror on Aragorn and Gimli's faces.

Had the orcs known that Legolas still had strength left in him, they might have treated him with a little more caution. As it was, they saw an elf, deprived of all his strength, and frogmarched him down the rough hallway. However, Legolas was not deprived of all the strength he had, and his mind certainly wasn't deprived of all the intelligence that it held. He could remember, as clearly as though it was yesterday, a conversation that he had had with Gandalf, seemingly a lifetime ago.

"And so am I, very dangerous. More dangerous than anything you are likely to meet, unless you are brought alive to the seat of the Dark Lord."

That was where he was going. He was being brought alive to the seat of the Dark Lord. And if these orcs thought he was going to come quietly, then they were either very stupid or very high. Or both.

Legolas stumbled as he tripped over the rough stone floor. One of the orcs stopped, turned around exasperatedly and stomped back with every intention of hauling him up. However, Legolas had other ideas.

In a fluid, well-practised move, the elf drew himself up sharply, pulling out the orc's sword from its sheath as he did so, before elbowing the orc sharply in the face. His "friend" turned back, and raised the sword high above his head, before bringing it down with an extraordinary amount of strength onto Legolas' head. Or would have done, provided that Legolas hadn't spun out of the way. Using his opponent's temporary confusion to his advantage, he stamped on the blade while it was down, causing it to slip from the orc's hand. The elf caught it before it hit the floor. He turned his now weaponless opponent so that its back was to his front, and drew the orc very close and placed the second sword to its throat, pointing the other sword at the first orc's head. Not that the first orc showed any signs of getting up soon, as the elbow to the face had thrown it into the wall, giving it a concussion and knocking it out.

"You have five seconds to give me a reason why I shouldn't kill you!" hissed Legolas in the conscious orc's ear.

"Because..." the orc whispered desperately. "Because if you do, then they'll kill you!" The orc pointed at the circle of hitherto unseen archers lining the balconies that ran the length of the corridor.

"Drop your weapons!" called one of them to Legolas. And the elf obeyed their orders. Despicable though these orcs were, and despite just how happy it would make him feel, Legolas had no desire to sacrifice his immortality.

Yet.

Three days earlier (again)...

"But if what this man says is true, then Legolas could be in danger!"

Aragorn was pacing the length of this somewhat emptier hall, having just filled the other occupants of the hall, Gandalf, Theoden, Eomer and Gimli, in on what the archer had told them.

"And, pray, how do you propose we help him?" asked Gandalf sarcastically, who was leaning against the pillar. "Would you have us storm the Dark Tower?"

"Maybe, if that's what it takes!"

"Aragorn!" snapped Gimli, who was sitting on the ornate throne that occupied the centre of the hall, his short legs dangling a foot off the ground. "Think about what you are saying! We can't storm the Dark Tower! It's suicide! We'd get killed before we got into the garden!"

Aragorn stopped pacing by a bench and collapsed onto it, his face buried in his hands. "He saved my life." His voice was thicker than usual. "When I was younger, he saved my life in the wild."

Gandalf looked at him piteously. "I'm sorry, Aragorn."

Aragorn didn't raise his head. "The last things we said to each other were cruel and unkind..." Suddenly he got to his feet, tear tracks etching their way down his face, and walked towards the door. "I don't care if you're not coming, but I'm not going to sit back and let him die-"

"ARAGORN!" Gandalf seized the man's shoulders and spun him around. "The Legolas we know is dead! Either in body or in spirit, because you know as well as I do what Sauron will do to him even if he is still alive!"

Aragorn looked into Gandalf's eyes, desperately trying not to believe him.

"I'm sorry," Gandalf said. "But don't throw away your life needlessly. He wouldn't want that."

As Gandalf stared into the man's eyes, he saw, behind all the attempts not to believe Gandalf, a small part of his realisation that Gandalf was right. Aragorn shook himself free and stormed out the door. He walked out into the evening light, and, once he had got as far away from Gandalf as possible, sat down and wept.

Eowyn found him like this ten minutes later.

"Aragorn..." she said tentatively. "What's wrong?"

Aragorn looked up at Eowyn, before looking down again at his hands. "Legolas has been captured by the Nazgûl."

Eowyn clapped her hands to her mouth, before lowering them. "He may still be alive..." she muttered hopefully.

"Yes, but then that's even worse!" Aragorn's voice was a mixture of grief and exasperation and as he looked up to face Eowyn, his face mirrored his voice. "Do you know what Sauron does when he captures elves?"

Eowyn shook her head, fear and confusion etched in every line of her face.

"He... He..." Aragorn's voice caught in his throat.

"He what?" she asked.

"He takes them... tortures them... and... and he turns them into orcs!" he finally blurted, before breaking down again.

Eowyn blinked back tears, before trying a different tack.

"Why him?"

Aragorn looked at her, and saw puzzlement on her face.

"Why him specifically?" she asked. "Why not Theoden, or Eomer, or you?"

"I don't know..." Aragorn's voice was bitter. "Because he's an elf, because he's the Prince of Mirkwood, because he was travelling with us..." his voice trailed off, comprehension dawned upon him as everything fell into place.

"What is it?" Eowyn asked.

"Legolas may still be alive."

Legolas was indeed still alive. The archers had decided not to shoot the elf, and the unconscious orc was replaced by one made of sturdier stuff. His arms had been tied together in front of him, and this time, he made it to the hall without anything interesting happening.

The hall was somewhat longer than most, spanning approximately 100 metres in length, and, like the corridors that led to it, rough balconies were cut out of the stone near the top of the walls. Unlike the corridors that led to it, however, the floor was tiled with large, smooth slabs of a dark red stone. Near the centre was engraved the symbol that embossed every banner of Mordor – the symbol of the Red Eye.

It was near the end of this hall that the throne of Sauron stood, black, ornately carved and embossed with gold and rubies. Legolas, despite the danger he was in, couldn't fail to admire the attention to detail that Sauron paid his hall. And Sauron himself sat on this throne. His armour was exactly like how it was described in legend, and so was the menace that seemed to emanate from him. As Legolas was thrown to his knees, he struggled to repress a shudder.

"So, Legolas son of Thranduil," Sauron said in a voice that would strike fear into the heart of even the bravest warrior. "Welcome to Mordor."