Chapter 10:

Legolas gently brushed the loose hair out of Aria's face before leaning close and kissing her deeply on the lips. As he pulled away from her, he gently thumbed away the tears that slowly ran down her cheeks. "It is only going to be for a few months, meleth nin," he whispered. "Then you will arrive in Mirkwood with your family and we will be married."

Aria nodded as she leaned into Legolas' touch before leaning up and capturing him in another kiss. While she had known that this was inevitable, she did not want Legolas to return to Mirkwood without her. Yet like he said – it was only for a few months.

Besides it was not like she did not have plans for her remaining months in Imladris. Shortly after their coming of age celebrations, Aragorn felt that he needed to get away from the hidden valley and seek his rightful place in the world. Therefore he accepted his place as chieftain of the Dúnedain of the North and became a Ranger as well. Joining him were Elladan and Elrohir, who had no problem in hunting orcs. They had long despised orcs for the torment that they had inflicted upon their mother, Celebrían, so long ago. Elrond had not stopped his sons from leaving Rivendell, but had requested that they protect Aragorn from harm they best that they could.

And now the twins were going to have to add Aria to their protection detail.

She was going to join them in the wilds for a few months until she left for Mirkwood.

Legolas was weary about her decision, but she promised that she was going to be staying at a cottage in Bree where she would tend to the wounds of the townsfolk as well as the Northern Rangers. She also promised to never go into harm's way. As long as she was doing only healing, then Legolas could live with it.

Thankfully it would only be for a few months. What could happen in that amount of time anyways?

"Quickly! Over here!" Aria instructed to the men who carried the wounded Ranger into the cottage just outside of Bree. The Rangers set their wounded companion on the bed that Aria had prepared for them as she quickly set to tending to the wounds of the Ranger.

"Another orc attack?" she asked.

"Unfortunately my lady," one of the Rangers answered. "We were to bring him to you then join up with the rest of the Rangers."

"Understandable." Aria said with a smile. "Please inform my brother that if there are more orc attacks that I will need Elladan and Elrohir's help in healing."

The two uninjured Rangers acknowledged her message before bidding Aria farewell as she attended to their fallen companion.

"What's your name?" she asked, as she gently cleaned out the gash on his leg first.

"Halbarad," he said through gritted teeth.

"Well I'm not going to lie to you Halbarad, you are in for a long night," she said. "But I do have a sleeping draught that should help take some of the pain off."

A loud thud followed by muffled yells and screams, awoke Halbarad from his daze of dreamless sleep that he had been in. A sudden jolt of pain shot through his leg and both arms as he moved to try and get up to see what was going on as another scream penetrated the darkness of the night.

He could swear that it was Aria who was screaming from the front room. He knew that it was the middle of the night and no where close to sunrise since the candle had long since burned out. The more screams he heard, the more he fought through the pain to see what was going on.

Slowly and painfully, he got to his feet and moved towards the door and opened it. A rush of cool night air greeted him. Allowing his eyes to fully adjust to the faint light of the moon, he could make out that the front door had been smashed in and several other things had been broken in the small main room of the cottage. "Aria?" he called out.

No response.

He slowly made his way to the smashed door. Off in the distance he could see several figures riding away on horse back with screams fading away in the distance.

Aria.

He had been right. The screams had been from her.

He had to get to Aragorn and let him know what happened.

Slowly making his way to the side of the house where Aria had her horse stabled, Halbarad managed to get onto the stead and rode off into the night towards the Rangers camp. He prayed to Valar that he wasn't too late and that he didn't pass out from the pain that he was in.

"Aragorn! Aragorn! Come quickly!" Elrohir cried out awaking most of the sleeping camp.

It was the early morning hour when Aragorn was awoken by his elf brother. Typically the Rangers did not camp together since the job was a solitary ordeal. But with the recent uptake in orc attacks, it was better safe than sorry.

"What is it?" he asked sitting up and looking around a bit dazed. He tried to shake the sleep from his head.

"It's Halbarad! He's returned!"

Aragorn was fully awake now. Aria never sent a Ranger back into the field until they were completely healed. Even he knew how severe Halbarad's injuries had been – if neither he nor the twins could treat him in the field, he would be sent to Aria. Which was what had happened.

Standing up, he followed Elrohir to where Elladan had Halbarad settled down.

"Now tell us what happened to our sister?" Elladan calmly asked, obviously using some sort of elvish calming technique.

The trio listened to Halbarad's account of the previous night's events and the mysterious disappearance of Aria.

"There had been those disappearances along the Great East Road and as far south as the North-South Road. All young women." Elrohir said, trying to put everything that had been relayed to them together.

"But this is our sister!" Elladan said.

Both of them turned to look at Aragorn, waiting for him to say something. Neither of them were prepared for the look on his face – a look of determination that had never been on his face before had suddenly appeared. "Elrohir, ride to Imladris and tell Ada what has happened. Perhaps he has seen something or can even send some trackers out searching. Elladan, ride to the Halls of Mirkwood and find Legolas and see if you can convince King Thranduil to help in our search for Aria and the other missing young women. I will inform the others of our new situation. We will meet in Imladris in one month no matter what."

The twins nodded in agreement and immediately left.

"We're coming for you, Aria…" Aragorn whispered to himself.

A sudden sense of dread coursed through his body as he sat up straight in bed. It took him a moment to catch his breath and to calm his pounding heart. All that Legolas had seen in his dream was Aria surrounded by darkness then she was suddenly snatched away.

Had something happened to his beloved?

Was she in danger?

They had been apart less than a month and while Legolas counted down the days until she would return to him in Mirkwood to become his wife, he had never had a feeling such as this.

Something was definitely wrong.

Yet how would he be able to find out what?

AN: Short, sweet and to the point. I know I'm evil…

So until next time, check out SleepyHollow5's stories. She's been slacking lately, but as far as I know, she should pick up the pace soon!