A/N: Wow…I haven't updated this story in forever! For those of you that still want to read it, I've decided to get back on track with this story…At least, I hope to remain on track this time. I'm sincerely trying, but I get bored easily and I want to move on to another story long before I finish one of them. Once again, I apologize. Now, Let's get this over with.
Disclaimer: See First chapter if you need to get the disclaimer.
Chapter Four
When Legolas next awoke, it was to the sound of a child coughing. Confused by the sound, Legolas glanced to the side and saw little Estel, curled in on himself as if against the cold, his grey eyes staring off at the rising sun and his cheeks looking slightly flushed. Legolas then remembered the events of last night.
Seeing the flushed cheeks, the elf immediately assumed that the child had an infection. Legolas inwardly groaned; now he'd have to look after not just a human child, but a human child that was feverish due to infection.
Estel turned his steel gaze towards the elf and smiled wanly. "Hello. I appreciate the fact that you saved me back there…erm…" the boy was obviously trying to recall his name and Legolas obliged, "Legolas." was all he said.
Suddenly, Estel's eyes lit up and he looked more energized. Unsure of what had brought the sudden change to the boy, Legolas looked at him blankly. "You are Prince Legolas. You are El and Ro's friend, aren't you?" The human asked excitedly. Taken aback by the question, Legolas could do nothing more than nod.
"Oh, wow! I mean, I am sorry, Prince Legolas. It's just that I'm so surprised to finally meet you. El and Ro told me all sorts of things you three did together and I always wanted to meet you. You are somewhat of a legend!" Estel said smiling brightly but suddenly a fit of coughing stole the boy's youthful enthusiasm and sent him into a groan of pain as the coughing motion sent his leg and shoulder ablaze with pain.
Legolas went over to his things and pulled out some mix and immediately made a liquid and handed it over to the still coughing human. "Here. Drink this. It will make you feel better." Legolas said as he stood up and stretched. If he wanted to get to Rivendell on time, and with the injured boy in tow, he'd have to move swiftly.
As soon as Estel's coughing fit died down, Legolas reached down and helped him to his feet and soon the two were mounted on Lathril and prepared to ride the rest of the way to Rivendell.
After a while of riding in silence, Estel decided to speak. "Prince Legolas--"
"Legolas." the elf corrected and Estel nodded before continuing, "Legolas, why did you save me back there? Ada said you did not like humans." Estel said. Legolas's eyes narrowed, "Would you rather I left you back there with the goblins?" he said dangerously.
"No, no!" Estel quickly added, "I just thought that you yourself rather would not want to save me, not that I was not grateful to you!" the boy finished.
Legolas sighed. "I do not like humans, it is true. But I also cannot leave a child to die when it is within my abilities to save him." Legolas explained, wanting for the conversation to be over. "Oh…I see. Well, Thank you, Legolas for saving me from certain death." Estel said, and he meant it.
"However, do not take my saving you and the subsequent treating of your wounds as friendship. It will be long indeed before I can come to forgive humans for their greed and evil ways, and it will be long after you have died, human." Legolas said darkly.
Estel gulped audibly and his skin paled. Even though he knew Legolas would not kill him, he did not want the elf to get too upset with him; He was scary enough without that.
The two continued riding in silence, Estel often tried to start up a conversation but the elven prince was very reluctant and soon, the boy gave up his efforts and the silence continued.
This did not last too long, for soon there were rustling sounds coming from their left. Quickly, Legolas jumped off of Lathril and sent her off with Estel still sitting upon her back.
"Hey! Legolas! What are you doing?" Estel cried briefly before Lathril carried him away further from the elf.
Legolas paid no heed to the child's questions and instead gave his attention to the sounds he heard previously. They were loud, and they seemed to be rather heavy footsteps; Most likely wargs. He groaned inwardly at the prospect of having to face them. At least Estel wouldn't be here to interfere in his fighting.
Just then, a growl and a crash came from behind him and Legolas turned to face the first of the wargs in the battle. It didn't take long for the skilled elven prince to stick his daggers into the throat of the warg, but just as the huge creature fell, two more broke from the bushes, one directly in front of him the other on his right.
It took longer but he managed to kill another by stabbing it in the eye before turning to the other, but even as he prepared to fight him, more of the beasts entered the clearing and Legolas found himself all but completely surrounded.
The wargs charged him and he spun around slashing one in the side and the other across the nose before ducking as one of them jumped for his head with the intent of ripping it from his shoulders. As it soared above him, Legolas rose and shoved one of his daggers into its belly and then the momentum of the dying creature took it over him and into one of its brethren, knocking it down. That put two out of commission for the time being, at least, but Legolas had much more work to do before he could consider himself the victor of the battle.
This was proven as another warg, this one slightly larger than the others rushed at him. Legolas managed to dodge to the side, but just barely and one of the claws caught him in the side. The prince cried out ever so slightly, but quickly pulled himself together enough to force his adversary away from him with his daggers. Now injured, Legolas had to work much harder to defeat the wargs, but he managed to kill three more before the injury truly took affect. There were only two left now and one was still trapped underneath its dead sibling. The only other one was the large warg that had injured Legolas in the first place. The blood loss was making Legolas dizzy and he was sure that he would lose consciousness if the battle did not end quickly.
The large warg made for Legolas at a bound, baring its teeth dangerously and attempting to end the battle quickly as well. It had noted that many of its pack-mates were dead and did not want to be the next to fall victim to this creature. Legolas tried to dodge, but the blood loss coupled with his weariness made this all but impossible and the warg was on top of him, its stinking breath nearly causing Legolas to choke. It took all of Legolas's strength to keep the wargs teeth away from his throat, let alone get the creature off of him. Not to mention, its claws were digging into the wound that had already been made before this and the other warg was almost free.
As the smaller warg gained its feet, Legolas felt for sure he was going to die and so, with strength borne of sheer desperation, he managed to extricate himself from the grips of the warg, but not without a price. He shoved his arm into the mouth of the warg that was attempting to rip into his throat and with his other arm, he pushed the warg off. The large warg tried to keep the arm in his grip and so, when Legolas pushed, it's teeth dug deep into Legolas's arm, causing excruciating pain. The elf cried out at the onslaught before pulling his knife out and finally killing the large warg.
Legolas didn't have time to feel relieved, however, because the smaller warg was upon him instantly. So, Legolas pulled the same knife out of the large warg and turned its blade on the smaller one, stabbing it in the roof of the mouth and into the brain, killing it. Finally, the battle was over. The weary elven prince made his way over to a tree and slumped down in front of it, his strength spent and his eyes swiftly closing. He gave a passing thought to Estel, but that was all he had and consciousness left him.
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Estel sat shivering next to Lathril. He had painfully climbed off of the mare when she'd stopped. Legolas had yet to return, which worried Estel. He had vowed that if Legolas didn't return in a few hours he would go after the prince, even though he wouldn't be of much service in the event of a battle that Legolas was having problems with.
The young boy wanted nothing more than to pull the blankets out of Lathril's saddle bags and curl up for a night of rest but he was worried. It would be entirely his fault if Legolas were in any danger. Had it not been for the fact that the prince had stopped to help him, chances were he would have passed here before any danger had been close.
So, Estel just got the blankets out of the bag and sat, waiting, listening. Hoping that the elf who saved him would not come to any harm. After a while, he dozed off into an uneasy slumber, filled with nightmares.
Less than three hours after he dozed off, Estel opened his eyes again and looked about him. It took him a while to remember what had happened and when he did, he groaned and attempted to haul himself painfully to his feet. His ankle, though set, was still rather painful and he knew that he probably shouldn't be putting too much weight on it
Lathril was close by and so Estel went over to her and petted her. He whispered a few words of elvish into her ears and she kneeled down so that mounting her would be easier for the child. Before long, he'd steered the horse in the direction from whence they came, hoping beyond hope that it was not a dead elf he sought to find this night.
The fact that the horse had let Estel upon her back was quite amazing in itself, but apparently the child had a way about him that made the horse feel comfortable. Usually, Elven horses would not allow any riders but those that it had formed a bond with upon its back. Maybe the horse understood that its master needed help and was willing to bear even a human child upon its back in the event that the master could be found and tended to.
It took some time but finally Lathril brought Estel to the clearing where Legolas had last been seen, and surely enough the prince was still there; However, he lay up against a tree, unmoving. Estel gulped and all but jumped off of the horse in his haste to help the prone elf, aggravating his injured ankle and sending waves of pain up his leg. But Estel paid it no heed as he kneeled down next to Legolas and pulled the prince's head into his lap.
"Legolas…Open your eyes. Come to the light," the child pleaded with the unconscious prince in elvish.
When Legolas made no show of having heard anything the boy said, Estel started to panic; He was just a child, how could he be of help to this elf? He didn't know anything about healing, really, and here he was, holding an injured elf in his lap.
With this sad thought in his mind, Estel couldn't help it; He began to cry. This elf had risked his life to save him, and now he was hurt and the only person around was a scared little boy and a horse. For all he was worth, Estel cried out his grief and wished for somebody, anybody to come and help him and Prince Legolas.
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The search party had begun to give up any hopes of finding the human son of Lord Elrond alive. Even then, Elladan and Elrohir continued their frantic efforts. They had found evidence of a camp in a Goblin cave and now sat looking for clues as to where the human occupant had disappeared to.
"Elladan! Come quickly! I think I have found something!" Elrohir cried out from where he kneeled just outside the cave. What he had found was not promising; He'd found traces of a battle. The problem with Goblin fights is that the Goblins took their dead away to eat them before they could be found, which made it harder to figure out that a battle had even taken place.
Elladan walked over and stood next to his kneeling twin, glancing about and seeing other proof of battle; indents on the ground evidencing a place where a body had lain, broken arrows lying about and there the tiniest bit of blood, which could have belonged to anyone.
"Elrohir, we have to find him. What if this blood is his?" Elladan said, his voice showing a deep panic and fear for his younger brother. Elrohir nodded.
"What if he didn't make it, 'Dan? Mayhap we go to bury our little brother this night." Elrohir said quietly. Elladan glanced quickly at his twin, who only shrugged; one must prepare himself for the worst case scenarios.
"How could you say that? This is our little brother we're talking about! He is not dead, Elrohir. I know it." Elladan near shouted. Elrohir stood and placed a hand on Elladan's shoulder.
"I hope you're right, Gwanur. I hope you're right (Gwanur: (twin) brother)." Elrohir replied and continued his observation of the battleground.
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Estel began pulling himself together after a while of weeping; He knew that his whining wasn't going to save the Prince. Something in the back of his mind told him to buck up and do what he could, which was, admittedly, not much.
But one thing he did know was that he should stop the bleeding and bind the wounds. Wiping his face, Estel gently set Legolas fully on the ground and went over to Lathril, examining her saddle bags for healing items; they were there.
The human pulled out bandages, rolls and rolls of them. And then he found a salve that had a small description in elvish; apparently, the salve would help prevent infection. Having grown up in Lord Elrond's household, Estel could at least bind a wound and rub salve into them. He just hoped he would not hurt Legolas too much. Mayhap the fact that the Sindarin elf was unconscious would prevent him from feeling it.
Estel limped back towards the elf and began working; He worked the salve into the side wound first, which was difficult to do around the clothes. Of course, the boy knew that if he could get the shirt off then it would be much, much easier but the boy was not strong enough to put the elf in the proper position for that, for all the elf was incredibly light. Then, once that was finished (much of the salve ended up on the shirt more than the wound, but Estel supposed that would do), Estel pulled Legolas's sleeve up and rubbed the salve into the wound on his arm, which was a lot easier.
All the salve having been applied, Estel began wrapping the bandages around Legolas's middle, shirt and all. The work was sloppy and Estel was sure he would get scolded at by his father, but given the circumstances, Estel thought he did rather well before applying bandages to Legolas's arm. Blood was going to start soaking through the bandage soon, but hopefully Estel had bought a few hours. Now he only had to be found. There was no way he would be able to keep Legolas and himself alive much longer.
To pass time, Estel sifted through Lathril's saddlebags some more and found flint and kindle for a fire. This gave Estel a plan; He would build a fire. Maybe he was close enough to Rivendell, or a search party, that his fire would be seen so that someone could come to his aid. Once the fire was done, Estel put a pillow under Legolas's head, placed a blanket on top of the elf, and then grabbed a blanket for himself and curled up next to the elf. After all, there was nothing else to be done but to sleep.
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