[AN: To everyone who has been following this story from the beginning: my sincerest apologies for this ridiculously long pause; I have not even an excuse, apart from RL kicking my backside quite a bit lately, plus a lot of trouble with the plot… I wrote and rewrote (and rewrote, and REwrote…) large parts of the chapters that are about to come up, only then to realise that other things I had written earlier (and were already published) would not work out that way… Well, I'm not gonna bore you any more, you get the image ;-) Again: Sorry! That being said, I should be able to get back to updating every week – every two weeks at the latest – from now on; hopefully until the first part of the story is finished.
Also a heartfelt Thank you to everybody who has been reading this fiction, and especially those who took the time to give me some feedback. I really hope you will keep reading and, more importantly, enjoying the story!
**And as always my special thanks to Lady Demiya for being the most efficient beta-reader I know]
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III III III
It was warm and soft around her, almost a bit too warm actually. The next thing Anne noticed was the fact that her shoulder and her back were hurting, though not as bad as they had before. She was lying on her stomach, and her face seemed to be surrounded by fluffy fur or hair, which was tickling her nose.
With a groan, she rolled over on one side – the one that did not hurt, and opened her eyes. She appeared to be in some sort of cave; the light was dim, but sunshine was coming from somewhere above her and from the side. Anne suddenly realised that her upper body was naked except for a few linen bandages that were wrapped around her chest and the injured shoulder. At least she was still wearing her long underpants as far as she could tell, and a thin blanket was covering her. Nevertheless, someone must have undressed her while she had been unconscious, which was not a comforting thought.
Anne decided that she should try to get up and find out how much damage exactly had been done to her shoulder and the rest of her body. She half sat up, unable to stiffle a moan when the dull pain in her shoulder increased at once.
"Do not move."
Anne froze in midmotion, but could not resist the urge to look in the direction the voice had come from.
He stepped soundlessly out of the shadows and approached her. Anne noticed that he was not carrying his bow and quiver anymore, but then, she thought sardonically, there was probably no use in shooting her twice.
"Tell me your name." He demanded calmly, his voice as smooth and cool as silk.
"Why don't you tell me yours first?" Anne retorted, and she was surprised by her own words and the vehemence they came out with. Perhaps it was the pain, or perhaps it was the simple fact that she was still alive after everything that had happened to her recently. Either way, there was after all only so much a person could take before cracking a little bit, she suspected.
His face remained impassive however; he simply paused a couple of steps away from her and crossed his arms over his chest. He probably had about eight inches on Anne, and even if he was a lot weaker than he looked, she would be no match for him, she realised with a sinking feeling.
"Some of your people call me Delior," He said softly.
"My people?" Anne asked, bewildered.
"Yes, your people - Men."
"So, then you are not…" Anne stared at him, forgetting her pain and her agitation for a moment. "You are really one of the… one of them…?"
Delior's grey eyes narrowed slightly and his shoulders seemed to stiffen. "'One of them'?"
"One of the... the Elves?" Anne asked, a little hushed.
There was only a small pause, and the slight tension - if it had really been there and not just her imagination - appeared to dissolve.
"Yes."
"So... so, those people in the woods, who... who attacked me... do you know them?"
While asking, she could not help goggling at him a little bit, trying to take in his appearance more fully. His unusually tall and slender build, the pale skin with that almost pearly texture, his slightly too prominent cheekbones and the blueish shadows under his eyes.
The elf tilted his head to the side as if pondering her question, or perhaps to express displeasure; it changed the shadows on his face, and for a split second, Anne had the disquieting sensation that his skull seemed to shine through the skin in the twilight. He shifted again, and the illusion was gone.
"Are you referring to those I shot?" Delior asked tonelessly.
That was probably supposed to mean 'no'. Maybe it was simply elvish custom to shoot at everything they did not know.
As if he had read Anne's thoughts, Delior went on. "I assumed you belonged to them."
"'Belong to them'! They attacked me!"
"When I arrived there, it did not look like an attack. I only realised my mistake when it was too late."
Anne glared at him. 'Mistake', what an interesting way to put it... Hell, he could have killed her! That did not seem to bother him much, though. Of course, now that she thought about it, the pain in her shoulder increased at once.
The Elf's dark eyes wandered down towards Anne's collarbone as if again, he had read her mind. More probable was that she was being rather obvious about her feelings, but there he was! Anne did not get attacked by a horde of... things, and then shot afterwards every other day (At least she hoped so) - everyone would be a tad upset. Suddenly she felt very exposed, wearing nothing but those bandages around her torso, and she pulled the blanket up a little.
Delior averted his gaze, but he was not finished with her. "You have yet to answer my question. What is your name?"
Still that cool and somewhat indifferent tone, which slowly began to vex Anne. She hesitated but finally decided that this was after all not too presumptuous a demand. "It's Anne," she said reluctantly.
"That sounds strange. Why were you alone in the woods? Surely a green thing like you was not traveling on her own?"
"I was not," Anne retorted. "I was traveling with a group, but when we were attacked, I was separated from the others, and-"
"Who attacked you?" Delior asked, his voice sharpened by a fraction.
"I don't know... We never saw them. I expect they were the same who found me in the woods..."
"Where were you traveling from?"
"From Carrockton. We-"
"And where to?"
"Rohan," Anne answered, feeling decidedly annoyed now. "There was an attack on the village, and a group of them decided to leave for Rohan... It is supposed to be safer there -"
"'Them'?"
"What?"
"You said 'a group of them decided to leave'. You are not from Carrockton, I understand?" the elf said in a would-be-patient voice.
Anne stared at him. He sure was a lot more observant than he looked.
"No, I am not," Anne said, after a short pause. "I am from Esgaroth," she added, just having remembered it, and hoping that he would not press the matter; she did not feel inclined to share all of her considerably short history with him.
Fortunately, Delior did not seem all too interested in her origins.
"Those people who attacked Ecthel - you were in the village when that accured?"
"'Ecthel'?" Anne asked, confused.
"Yes... the elvish name for Carrockton."
The hint of a frown had appeared on Delior's face, and Anne wondered uneasily whether this was something everybody was supposed to know.
"I was there, yes," she went on hurriedly. "But it happened at night, I did not see anything… People said that... that the attackers had been both men and elves."
She had just remembered this and closely watched Delior for a reaction while speaking, but his face remained blank.
However, he finally seemed to be satisfied, because he abruptly turned away and walked over to a corner where he squatted down (Somehow managing to make the movement look elegant), and started rummaging in the dark.
Anne watched him apprehensively. What if he had only kept her alive to interrogate her, and now that it was apparent she was of no more use, he would just finish her off?
Suddenly, the elf rose in one flowing movement and turned back to Anne, causing her to jerk, and then to wince, when she was unpleasantly reminded of her wounded shoulder. The next moment she forgot all about it once more, as Delior made to throw something at her. With a squeal, she backed away against the stonewall behind her.
"I assumed you might want to cover yourself up a little more," Delior said dryly, indicating the small heap of cloth that was now laying next to Anne's bed of furs.
"Ah... thank you..." Anne mumbled awkwardly, feeling rather foolish.
"You are quite welcome," Delior said, with his back to her; he was now pouring some water from one of a few large stone jars which stood against the cave wall.
"What, er... happened to my own things?" Anne asked when he put the water jug and a basket with sweetly smelling, slightly shrivelled apples next to the clothes.
"I am afraid I cut them to pieces," the elf replied off-handedly, causing Anne to drop the apple she had just picked up. He glanced at her. "Not because it amused me, but in order to treat your injury, I might add. I shall escort you back to Ecthel, as soon as your condition allows it, so do not worry – you will not have to wear those things for very long."
'My injury'... right, only that said injury was his work as well, Anne thought rebelliously, as she began examining the clothes he had given her, while awkwardly holding the blanket around her with one hand.
In addition to a thin tunic, some sort of waistcoat made of soft leather, and slacks of the same material, she also found a couple of clean strips of linen, which were probably meant for her shoulder. Anne glanced down at the bandages she was still wearing. They actually did look like they needed changing, having rust-brown stains on them and smelling rather unpleasantly. She had better do the changing first, so she would not need to undress again later.
Anne made to unwrap the bandages from her upper body, but then paused abruptly. She looked over to Delior, who was now perched on a rock near the entrance of the cave, working on something that looked like it might become an arrowhead someday. Well, he probably needed a lot of those, trigger-happy, as he appeared to be. Right now, what bothered Anne a lot more,however was the fact that he was sitting merely a couple of feet away. Sure, he had his back turned to her, and he had probably already seen everything there was to be seen, when he had first patched her up. Yet, still…
Anne knew that she was being ridiculous, but she could not help it; she just felt uncomfortable 'undressing' in front of him - or rather behind him, in broad daylight, with absolutely nothing between the two of them to shield her from view.
She hesitated, biting her lip and staring at the back of Delior's head when he suddenly spoke - a distinct note of haughtiness and impatience in his voice.
"If I had even the slightest desire to do anything that might besmirch your… honour, I could have done so more than a dozen times. Stop making such a fuss, would you?"
Anne glared at him while starting to take off the bandages. From what she knew about Elves so far, she definitely did not like them very much.
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The next couple of days, Anne spent her time alternately sleeping or at least lying down, since her shoulder and back still hurt quite a lot and wondering what could have happened to Liecia, Nardil, Goda and the others. She could not bear thinking about the various possibilities for too long though, and in the end, she finally settled on deciding that her travelling companions must have gotten away and be alright. Perhaps Nardil had even decided that the journey was too dangerous after all, and they had already returned to Carrockton…
Delior turned out to be a man – or person of even fewer words than Anne had first thought. He barely spoke to her again after the interrogation when she had first woken up, but Anne did not mind. The elf was so withdrawn and indifferent towards her, that she did not exactly feel the need to establish close ties with him. Yet, at times, she kind of wished for someone she could talk to; it really did not have to be hours-long in-depth conversation, but simply a light exchange every now and then to loosen the atmosphere - that would have been nice. However, Delior did not seem inclined to provide either, so in the end, Anne followed his example, remained silent and kept her thoughts to herself.
On her second afternoon at the cave, Anne felt considerably better than the night before; she had already spent a couple of very boring hours lying on her fur, staring at the ceiling, the wall and the opening in the ceiling in turns. The latter of the three seemed to serve as both a light well and some sort of flue for the campfire. The view was partly obscured by some blooming shrubbery that was growing over the hole, but Anne gazed longingly at the small speck of blue sky she was able to see, where butterflies and lazily humming bees would float by every once in a while. Finally, deciding that some fresh air would do her good, she tenderly got to her feet and headed for the entrance of the cave.
On her way there, she passed Delior who was sitting next to the fire pit, long legs outstretched, and poking around in the feebly glowing remnants of the fire that had been burning during the night.
As usual, he did not seem to pay a lot of attention to whatever Anne was doing; she was just beginning to look forward to stretching her legs outside in the sun, away from the constant and somewhat gloomy presence of the elf, when he suddenly spoke without even looking up.
"Where do you think you are going?"
Caught by surprise, she paused and turned to him. "Oh, nowhere really. I just thought I could go outside for a bit… have a look around…"
"Do you really deem it wise to search for new trouble that soon?"
Anne resisted the urge to roll her eyes. "I am not planning on wandering into the forest; I simply would like to see something other than these stonewalls for a change. Besides, you did not seem to think it a problem when I went out last night and this morning."
"That appeared to be inevitable. Aside from that you went not further than a stone's throw away – I could hear every step you took and every leaf you picked."
Anne could feel her face going red. So that was why he had not followed her on those occasions. Who could have known he had hearing like a dog!
Delior finally looked up. As he did, a little sunlight fell on his face; turning the grey of his eyes into silver and making the dark circles under them stand out more prominent than ever, against the otherwise blemish-free skin. For the first time, and only swiftly Anne wondered if something was wrong with him.
"Have your previous encounters in these woods not teached you anything?" he asked coldly.
"That elves tend to shoot first and ask questions later?"
His nostrils flared and his eyes narrowed by a fraction. "And are you not lucky that I tend to do that… Otherwise you would be dead now, or at the very least –"
"You could have killed me just as well!" Anne shouted at him, her voice suddenly a lot shriller than before. Her terrifying encounter with those empty-eyed creatures that must have been normal people at some point was not something she was keen on being reminded of.
He watched her for a moment, while she fought to get her breathing under control. Finally, he lowered his gaze back to the pit and resumed stoking up the fire.
"It is not my duty to chase after you if anything should happen due to your foolishness," he said, though devoid of any edge now. "Rest as best as you can, and stay where you are – as long as I have you around my neck."
She stared down at him, feeling a confusing mix of anger, humiliation and helplessness. In the end, she turned around and went back towards 'her' corner.
"There is something else you had better understand…"
Anne sighed, paused and looked back at him; he still had his eyes fixed on the branch in his hand, and as he continued speaking his voice was calm and soft - almost gentle: "If it really had been my intention to kill you… you would be dead now."
Anne watched mutely as long, slender fingers snapped the branch effortlessly and threw the pieces into the fire.
III III III
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