A/N: Elrond is finally here! But what will he find...?
Chapter 9: Of Witchcraft and Wizardry
As the gates to the Mirkwood Palace came into view through the parting trees, Elrond felt a deep sense of foreboding fall over him. His company should have been greeted by a patrol several miles back. At the very least, guards should have made their presence known the moment Elrond pulled his steed to a stop at the edge of the bridge.
Glorfindel reined in his horse beside Elrond and whispered, "It is too quiet."
He nodded once in agreement. Though Mirkwood elves were skilled in stealth, the silence that hung in the air was not one of sentineled waiting. Where was Gandalf? The wizard's missive had sounded urgent, though it was sparse in detail due to little space on the scrap of parchment. All Elrond had deduced was that Mirkwood needed aid with some kind of sickness, and so he had packed supplies, gathered three of his best healers, and set out for Mirkwood, with Glorfindel insisting on escorting them. Elrond had hoped to run into his sons returning from Lorien and enlist their help as well, but they had not been seen on the road.
Glorfindel dismounted and set one foot upon the bridge, pausing as though the very act would summon forth a stream of guards. Yet none emerged. He drew his sword.
Elrond waved for the three healers to wait as he swung down as well, eyes narrowed with shrewd wariness. Something was terribly wrong here. He was so on edge that the sound of the gates creaking open actually jolted him, and his hand went to his sword. Glorfindel tensed, positioning himself slightly in front of Elrond.
An elf poked his head through the small gap in the gates, eyes wide. "Lord Elrond, you've come," he breathed, sagging against the door frame.
Elrond frowned, and began moving across the bridge. "What has happened?"
The elf looked positively terrified as he glanced over his shoulder hesitantly, and then pushed the door open further. Elrond stopped short at the sight of elves lying sprawled on the ground, most pushed up along the sides of the corridor.
"By the Valar," Glorfindel murmured behind him, taking the words right out of Elrond's mouth.
"They sleep," the Mirkwood guard said dejectedly. "We cannot wake them, and more fall every hour." He gave Elrond a desperate, pleading look. "Half of our people are trapped in comas none can explain."
Elrond sucked in a sharp breath. Of all the potential crises that had run through his mind on the journey here, this was not one of them. He beckoned the other healers to hurry forward. "What of Thranduil?"
"He is still awake and being notified of your arrival, though I don't know if he will leave Legolas's side."
Elrond shot the elf a sharp look. "Legolas is afflicted?"
The guard's face pinched with distress. "He was the first. Mithrandir and…y-your…" The elf trailed off, blinking rapidly as he began to sway. In the next instant, his eyelids slid shut and he sank to the floor.
Elrond lunged to catch him, guiding him down before he struck his head. At that moment, an inky black tendril snaked out from the guard's collar and latched onto Elrond's riding glove. He jerked back and tried to shake it off, but it clung with hungry ferocity, splitting and branching off like a sprouted seed. Barbed ends appeared to be trying to skewer through the leather.
Elrond ripped the glove off and threw it on the floor, leaping to his feet and stumbling back a step. He stared in horrified fascination as the tentacles writhed, gummy ends seeming to dig hooks into the floor and drag itself toward Elrond. It detached from the glove with a sticky squelch and picked up speed, scurrying like a spider.
Glorfindel's blade arced through the air, clinking on the stone floor as it cleaved the worm in two. There was a tiny squeak, followed by a spew of black smoke. The tendrils shuddered before falling limp and then shriveling into brittle shoots.
"Father!" a familiar voice cried.
Elrond turned to find Elrohir running toward him, with Thranduil trailing behind, though he was too stunned by what had just happened to fully process seeing his son where he least expected.
"Are you all right?" Elrohir demanded. "What was that?"
Thranduil's eyes were fixated on the black smudge on his floor, which Elrond returned his attention to for the moment.
Glorfindel poked the husk with the tip of his sword. "That," the warrior spat. "Is black magic."
"Ada?" Elrohir worriedly asked again.
"I'm fine," Elrond replied, looking at his son. He frowned at the dark circles under Elrohir's eyes and the tired lines etched on his face. "What are you doing here, ion?"
Elrohir's jaw tightened. "It is a long story, ada."
"Don't touch them," Glorfindel said sharply, startling the healers who had moved toward some of the other unconscious elves. They flinched back, casting wary looks at the warrior.
Elrond's brow furrowed. Was an evil spell responsible for what was happening here? He turned to Thranduil. "The guard mentioned Legolas was the first to be infected. Was there any sign of…that?" He waved a hand at the thing Glorfindel had slain.
Thranduil's normally severe expression now bore as many worn lines as Elrohir's, and his eyes were noticeably dimmer. "No," the Elvenking finally spoke, voice completely hollowed out by weariness and grief. "We have not seen anything like that before."
Elrohir eyed the fallen guard critically, then moved toward him and slowly crouched down.
"Elrohir!" Glorfindel reprimanded.
"I'll be careful," he replied, and reached for Elrond's discarded glove, which he put on before reaching out toward the guard's neck.
Elrond stiffened, hand poised to draw his sword and protect his son, but nothing happened when Elrohir pressed his fingers to the hollow in the elf's throat.
After a long moment, Elrohir stood again and slipped the glove off. "I believe the spell is only active at the first contact after one falls asleep under it." His gaze turned inward as he nodded to himself. "Yes, that explains Elladan and not me, and the next two were the guards who touched him first." He looked toward Thranduil, brows arched as though searching for confirmation.
Elrond, however, felt a stab of dread. "What do you mean Elladan? Where is your brother?"
Elrohir's expression turned pained. "He is in a coma as well. He was the second, after Legolas."
Elrond almost reeled in shock, yet snapped himself out of it just as quickly. He was a trained healer, and so knew that in order to help his son, he needed to set emotion aside. "I think you should start from the beginning."
Elrohir nodded and began the tale as he led them through the underground palace to the healing ward. The number of elves left lying around was staggering, but made sense when they finally entered the infirmary and Elrond saw that every single bed was occupied. His gaze immediately searched out his other son, and his breath caught when he spotted Elladan lying motionless in one of the beds. Elrond hurried forward, but hesitated before touching him.
"It's all right, ada," Elrohir said. "I have held his hand often since he fell asleep, and nothing has attacked."
Elrond laid his palm on Elladan's brow, startled at the cold touch. He was only half-listening to Elrohir recount events now as he tapped into Vilya, the Ring of Power he'd carried since Gil-galad had perished. Using its healing power, Elrond mentally connected with his son to determine the nature of his ailment. There was nothing physical, save the slow deterioration that came from days without proper nutrition. Elrond poured some of his healing strength into Elladan.
You must wake, my son, he called. Come back to the light. But something wasn't right here. Elrond delved deeper, and then jerked back, breaking contact. The voices around him suddenly cut off, and he found himself blinking at several concerned faces.
"Elrond, what is it?" Glorfindel asked, arm hovering as though to grip him should he falter.
He reached up to brace his temple, taking a moment to steady his pounding heart. "His fëa is…not there."
"What do you mean not there?" Elrohir exclaimed, rushing around the other side of the bed to cup his brother's face. "But he still lives!"
"I did not mean he had passed," Elrond gritted out, shaking his head as he tried to understand what he had sensed. "But his spirit is not in his body. It's…on the other side of a veil." He reached for Elladan again. Yes, his son's fëa was still anchored to his physical form, and yet it was somewhere else.
Looking up, Elrond spotted Legolas lying in the next bed. The prince was a ghost of his normal self, pale and wan and utterly still. Elrond moved around to his side and placed a hand on Legolas's brow. Vilya pulsed with power, aiding Elrond in his examination, and to his horror, he discovered the same—Legolas's spirit was also removed beyond a veil. Elrond probed at the wall tentatively, but it didn't give. Finding Legolas in an equally weakened condition, he poured some healing energy into the prince's body before drawing back.
Thranduil was staring at him intently. "Elrond…"
"The same," he said.
"What does that mean?" Elrohir asked desperately.
Elrond shook his head. "I don't know. Where is Gandalf?" If anyone knew more about dark curses, it would be a wizard.
"He has not been seen in ten days," Thranduil replied bitterly. "Either he and Radagast found no answers…or whoever did this to my son found them instead."
Elrond exchanged a worried look with Glorfindel. Two missing wizards, and an entire elven kingdom under some kind of magical attack that had the capacity to rip a fëa from its shell… Whoever was behind this would likely make themselves known soon, especially if Thranduil's forces kept decreasing.
"We have to stop the spread," Elrond said, looking to the warrior.
Glorfindel nodded and drew his sword again. "We'll need to know who recently fell asleep. Use gloves to trigger the curse and destroy it before it can find a new host."
"We should also systematically check every elf asleep thus far, just to be certain," Elrond added.
A muscle in Thranduil's cheek ticked. "I will gather everyone still able to assist you."
"We'll work in teams of four," Glorfindel instructed. "Not only for caution, but in case any who are still awake are already infected and collapse while working."
"Good idea," Elrond replied. "I will stay here. I assume those in the ward have been asleep the longest? I'll do what I can to strengthen their bodies."
Thranduil's eyes drifted to Legolas. The prince's color was only slightly better from Elrond's ministrations, but given the number of patients, the elf-lord would have to pace himself.
"Can you bring them back, Elrond?" Thranduil asked.
He glanced back at Elladan. In truth, he did not know, for this was not something he had ever faced before. Vilya's power gave him unique abilities to heal, but this was sorcery, and that was a whole other matter.
Elrond held back a heavy sigh. "One step at a time."
"Aha!" Gandalf exclaimed, startling the little fennec fox awake from where he lay curled in a ball next to the warm hearth. "Erm, sorry, Norman."
After being trapped in a cave for seven days with the fur ball, Gandalf had grown rather fond of the creature, so much so that he willingly gave up the last of his rations so the poor thing wouldn't starve. Which wasn't a terrible sacrifice, since a wizard could go longer without food than a mortal.
Radagast ceased his mumbled chanting at the caved-in rocks blocking the exit, and craned his neck to look over his shoulder. "What did you find?"
Gandalf held up the tome he'd been reading. "The spell that was cast on Legolas." About time, too.
Eyes widening, Radagast shambled over to the altar where Gandalf set the book. Norman bounded around the wizards' feet until one of them picked him up and set him on the stone as well. He tentatively sniffed the yellowing parchment of the ancient grimoire.
Radagast leaned over the page. "Ooh, this is dark magic, Gandalf."
"Indeed," he sighed. The first couple days after the cave-in trapped them here, the wizards had split their time between searching for the ingredients of the curse and trying to break the magical seal that'd been placed over the cave. Norman had actually been a help for the first, and once they'd isolated most of what the sorceress had used, then came the task of searching her spell books for what those ingredients accomplished. And now that Gandalf knew, he was even more worried.
"She's been planning this for years," Radagast said, voice equally concerned. "Centuries perhaps, to weave a dreamscape as complex as this."
"And it will not be simple to dismantle." Gandalf pursed his lips as he studied the page. In fact, it would be nigh near impossible, which he supposed was the brilliance of her plan. He had wondered why she'd willingly sacrificed her hidden cache in order to trap them, but if she had that much confidence in her plan to conquer Mirkwood, it was probably a reasonable concession to her. Whoever she was.
The Grey Wizard turned to face the wall of boulders, uttering a spell that struck the blockade, only to bounce harmlessly off. "Confound it!"
Norman mewled pitifully, earning a pat on the head from Radagast.
"Easy, Gandalf," the Brown Wizard said absently as he thumbed through the text.
Gandalf whirled on him in frustration. "I will not! Friends I deeply care about are trapped in a vicious nightmare realm with no hope of escaping. We might—might—be able to help them, if only we could get out of this blasted cave! Now are you going to get back to helping me or not?"
"Mornince."
Gandalf sputtered. "What is that?"
"Not what, who." Radagast slid the book to the edge of the altar, tapping a finger to the middle of the page. "She is our sorceress."
Arching a brow, Gandalf scanned the parchment, which appeared to be a personal record. His jaw slackened as he read further, the words on the page filled with such vitriol that he could almost feel the acerbic emotions behind the penmanship. Evidence of it was also noticeable in the thick ink lines where someone pressed extremely hard while writing, and even poked holes through the paper in a few places.
"She is one of the Avari," he muttered. A 'Dark Elf,' named for refusing Oromë's call to journey to Valinor long before the First Age of Middle-earth. They were not generally evil, though this one had obviously become a student of Melkor.
"I thought they had all faded by the end of the Second Age," Radagast said.
Gandalf made a noncommittal noise in the back of his throat. "This one was apparently only in hiding."
"She has quite the grudge against Oropher and Thranduil."
Gandalf clenched his jaw. Indeed. It seemed this Mornince had set her sights on ruling Greenwood the Great, once upon a time, and had attempted to seduce Oropher in order to become his Queen. When that failed, she redirected her efforts toward Thranduil, who also rebuffed her. After it was discovered she was aiding Sauron, she was banished, and then never seen again.
"We need to get back to the palace," Gandalf pressed. "It has been too long already." Now that he knew what curse had been laid upon the elves, he greatly feared that Mirkwood had already fallen.
Radagast made a low humming noise and walked back to the barrier where he picked up his staff. "Hm, so there's that, then this piece there." The Brown Wizard moved his hands around as though fiddling with invisible knobs.
Gandalf cast a commiserative look at Norman, who by now was probably the saner one in his company. Then there was a sharp crack, and the mountain lurched. The fox leaped onto Gandalf's shoulder and tried to duck under his beard as silt crumbled from the ceiling. A split second later, the rocks blocking the exit exploded outward with a resounding boom.
Gandalf coughed and waved his arm through the cloud of dust, grimacing when Norman's claws frantically dug into his shoulder for purchase. "Radagast?"
His friend's face suddenly appeared before him. "There, we can go now." Retrieving the grimoire, Radagast turned on his heel and strode toward the cleared tunnel.
"Wh—" Gandalf scooped up his staff, snatched the fox from his shoulder to carry in his arm, and hurried after the other Istar. "How did you do that?" he demanded. Gandalf had tried everything he could think of, from disarming seals to brute force, none of which had worked. And Radagast had brought it down with barely any effort!
The Brown Wizard squinted at him as they emerged into daylight for the first time in a week. "Oh, I found her name woven into the spell and simply rewrote it backwards."
Gandalf pulled up short, and not because he was half-blind as his eyes adjusted. "You…wrote the author of the spell's name…backwards?"
Radagast shrugged, and then lifted a hand to his brow to shield his eyes. "Ah! They finally made it." He hobbled through some briars until he came to a herd of Rhosgobel rabbits hitched to a wooden sleigh.
Gandalf stared at his wizard friend dumbly as Radagast happily scratched each of the hares behind their ears. He glanced at the fox in his arm, who bent one giant ear back in confusion. A chuckle worked its way up in Gandalf's chest, and he started shaking his head. He would never underestimate the Brown Wizard again.
Radagast climbed onto the back of the sled. "Come on, Gandalf!"
He surged forward to board the sleigh as well, sending a prayer to the Valar that they wouldn't be too late.
A/N: I love Radagast. *g*
