The world and situation is Tolkien's while all the characters, but Erestor and Melkor Morgoth are mine.

I wrote and then posted this without any expectation of financial gain, but only the hope it will (eventually at least) uplift my audience.

The first elleth leaned forward at his side. "Nephew … our guest is awake and alert now. While your sister and I feed him, why don't you gather your brothers and bring them here to meet him. The river should not flood and carry the orc's bodies away as you do."

"As you say, Aunt Sarnin." The younger ellon turned and stepped over the side of the cliff disappearing into the dark. Afterward, the older ellon could hear his voice bouncing off the cliff-walls shouting his aunt's news and instructions to the others. Three voices bounced back.

The other ellon flinched. Cheerful familiarity mixed with mild teasing and tense competition sounded in those voices. Their music struck a cord within him the vibrating of which in turn cut through a deep and raw place in his heart.

He felt the older elleth embrace him with one arm. Then she held up something before his face. He blinked at it.

The orb was about the size of a grape and the color of gold. A shadow of darker hue floated within it though. The younger elleth spoke from his other side. "It's a berry-centered honey-drop."

His stomach clenched and screamed within him, but he looked away. Then he turned more fully from both of them, pulling his arms out of their holds. If he did this, he'd be committing to days more on these shores barring further violence being committed against him of course.

"Not going to eat, are you?"

The older ellon looked back over his shoulder. This time a fairly tall ellon stood on the cliff edge looking at him. This one was not quite as tall as the Noldo himself used to be. However, in height this new ellon beat his aunt, brother, and sister by far. Yet, there was an even greater difference between him and the other members of this family the Noldo had met so far.

The Noldo felt an instinct telling him to step back from this Arda native. There was something in his grin. It was less horror inducing than orc leers full of blood-lust, far less paralyzing than Melkor's gaze filled with even worst, but … there was something … feral … in this ellon's smile. The Noldo had the impression this one would shed his blood if he gave him the slightest excuse.

The elleth on either side of the Noldo stiffened and glared at their kin.

"Brother" said one.

"Nephew" said the other.

"Don't scare him," they said together.

"Why? Can't he take a scare?"

The other ellon stepped nearer to the Noldo. In return, the Noldo stood as tall as his bent back and stooped shoulders would allow. He hardened his frame as well. He would not quake before this dark elf.

The other ellon's eyes narrowed. He titled his head and studied the Noldo. "Are you giving my aunt and sister trouble?"

The Noldo relaxed slightly and shrugged. "I am saving them trouble. I am cursed. I have no wish to spread such to them or to you."

The other ellon laughed. The sound was a dark and angry. Afterward, the fierce smile spread even farther over his face. A knife-edge-like gleam lit the ellon's eyes. "You have missed your chance. You cannot escape their love now. They've found you like a half-drowned forest creature washed up after a flood. They'll be lusterless and lax all the journey home if you die now. We'd rather have them active and alert. So, eat the honey-drop or I'll stuff it down your throat."

"My brother speaks harshly, but he is right."

The ellon from across the sea sneered at the ellon right in front of him. Then he stepped to the side to see around his figure and look in the direction of the cliff-edge. A third Silvan ellon stood there. He looked almost taller than the feral one.

This newest ellon's eyes reminded the Noldo of his own, or how they had once been. Their expression was serious, cautious, respectful. The Noldo felt like inclining his head, but refrained, and simply spoke respectfully instead. "I am merely trying to protect you all from the danger my presence among you will bring."

"Coward."

The Noldo looked back to the feral ellon. He was smirking at him. "Not going to fight for those who fought for your life. You'll just turn, run, and hide. Then you'll wait for your enemies to find you in some deep, dark hole and drag you out of it."

"I never asked any of you to give me anything."

"Yet we have given it anyway!"

The older elleth's voice startled him slightly. He turned toward her. Her sharp eyes softened slightly as they looked into his. "I believe I found you for a reason. Eat, and find out what it is."

He opened his mouth to reply. Then his gaze turned to the form lying silent and frozen on the ground between them and the cliff-edge. His mouth closed and twisted as he stared at it. Then he spoke. "Where did that orc corpse come from?"

"One of many we killed down in the canyon, after our aunt refused to surrender you to them."

The ellon close his eyes. He raised his face to the sky. Then he sighed. He turned back to the older elleth, took the tiny orb from her still open hand, and popped it into his mouth.

It melted there. The insides of his mouth soaked up the liquid of the outer shell and energy flooded through his veins like a released river after a thaw in the mountains. He glanced around. For better or worse he had thrown in his lot with these strange elves … for now.

. . .

"I am beginning to see a pattern in how you Silvan healers handle your patients."

Mellolaes paused in her story-telling to scowl at Erestor, and then continued in a harder voice for a time.

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God Bless

ScribeofHeroes