Author's Note: We're going a bit A/U here in that Thorin was never killed in the Battle of the Five Armies and thus is still King under the Mountain.
Feast
Legolas felt guilty as he looked down the food and drink laden table at Aragorn. Remembered just how much the brown-haired Ranger and Gandalf had trusted him the last time they'd met. Then he looked up toward the entrance as Acharn leaned over to whisper, "Loki's here." Simply put, he hadn't expected Loki to walk in at all, much less accompanied not only by Gandalf, but also Lord Elrond.
'They must have said something to help him calm down. I hope for what little bit we'll be here, the fact that we won't be moving every day will help him.' Loki had been flipping through a great deal of emotions the last few days - from nervous to angry and nervous to sad about the freak thunderstorms stopping on the third night out from the cave. Like if the storms had continued Thor would have flown in one night and taken Loki away. That all before his friend had switched to being excited about how much closer they'd gotten to Imladris only to flip to nerves just before they'd entered the forested valley that morning.
'At least if that, that, Thor were here he would probably know if something was wrong with Loki. That's why I haven't mentioned why we were really going to Imladris when he fell from the sky - the fact that I, even more than Air or Acharn, lost the creature Gollum. With how odd he's been acting lately, he probably would have found some way to blame himself.'
The creature called Gollum was even odder looking than Loki - he was hunched over and thin as a skeleton, paler than a fish's stomach with maybe three strands of hair. Gollum had as many teeth as he did hairs and was even easier to pity than the lost frost-giant warrior. Still Gollum was nearly as clever as the jotun with how he'd gotten away.
Flashback
Once again, the creature was screaming that the rope was burning it. Gandalf had said that no matter how much Gollum screamed or how pitiful he looked that it was an act, but as he looked at the extremely pale-skinned being tied up, writhing and flopping around on the forest floor, it was hard to think any creature could feign such agony.
Gail was patrolling the perimeter with his little, lighter-red haired brother Gel. Whilst Air and Acharn were like him gaurding the prisoner. Gel's shout of, "Orcs ! Le-", was abruptly cut-off.
'Why did Gandalf not give us more time to get weapons ? I don't even have my bow with.'
Barely unsheathed one of his long-knives, when suddenly a large unit of very short orcs were streaming into the clearing. He found himself surrounded quite quickly as he had to focus on blocking and parrying swords and maces, before he was able to fight back. Suddenly, he heard a shrill screeching from Gollum as he punched an orc with the long-knife's hilt, then pulling it into a slash across the orc's throat. Pushed that orc's body into two of the others and as they fell, he ducked beneath a swing. As he rose, he thrust the long-knife into the orc's chest before an arrow embedded itself into an orc on his right.
Acharn shouted, "Legolas ! The creature is getting away."
Pulled the long-knife out of the orc's chest to decapitate it. That was when he noticed that the orcs had started to fall back and a tall orc had picked up and was carrying Gollum away.
"Acharn, give me your bow."
Dropped the long-knife to catch both bow and arrow, then he nocked the arrow, turning to sight it after the orc. For a second, the orc stopped to look back, its grey-yellow eyes sickly-bright in the darkness, he loosed the arrow at those eyes and the orc ducked. The arrow flew less than an inch over Gollum's head as the creature cringed away.
Its yellow-tipped teeth flashed as it chuckled, "The next time you lose, Elfie...you're lunch.", before it disappeared.
End Flashback
'That, that was Valog ! Valog was the one that gave me that glare. This is great, the orc Captain that Loki seemingly befriended wants to eat me. Well, at least, he thinks that Loki or rather Bani already ate me. He's probably disappointed he couldn't eat me himself.'
He wasn't used to people staring at Loki. But, stare they did as the jotun walked along the light-wooded back wall towards the empty seat between himself and Acharn. Much to his, Acharn and Air's amusment and relief, Glam was stuck between Air and a young red-brown haired and bearded dwarf. Glam hated dwarves even more than he did Loki because of the dwarves sacking of Doriath.
As Loki sat down the dwarf asked, "Ai, lad, what sort of odd looking elf are you ? Ya look like you spent too long in an ice bath."
The deadpan response of, "I'm an ice elf." and the dwarf's confused look elicited laughter from himself and the others, but especially Glam. 'Even for a dwarf he should know there is no such thing as an ice elf.'
A different dwarf chimed in, "Don't mind them, Gimli, they like their fun at our expense. Especially since they don't get out much themselves."
Gimli replied, "You're right about that, Thorin King, they look like dirty limestone." That got roars of laughter from the gathering of dwarves.
When the laughter faded, one of the three-foot tall hobbits; the oldest and white-haired one, who sat across the table from the dwarf-king, shook his head and admonished, "Now, now, Thorin, you're a king and you should be controling your dwarves, not joking about your host."
Thorin said softly, "My apologies dearest Biblo." then louder, "My apologies, Lord Elrond, you know how the young ones are - always getting into trouble."
He looked down the table at the elf-lord who's response was eloquent, "Then young Gimli is obviously related to you - considering that it was yourself and Gloin, among others who raided my kitchens of all food sixty years ago. Let us hope that you do not repeat that feat tonight."
"Well, we'll try not to."
At that everyone laughed instead of just one of the groups and then they started eating.
'Elves, dwarves and men along with hobbits, one wizard and one, perhaps home-sick, jotun. It's no wonder that according to Gandalf, Elrond is waiting to call a council to deal with all these issues at once - nearly all of Middle-Earth is here in one form or another.'
Loki murmured, "At least there's more of a selection now.", after a bite of roasted chicken.
Nothing could have made him disagree, not even if his mother had told him to do it. After weeks of apples, fruit-bread, potatoes and deer, the roasted chicken could have been part of Loki's Valhalla to him, it was wonderful. The feast seemed to fly by after they started eating and talking.
There was a red-haired hobbit and a lighter-blond haired hobbit sat across from himself and Loki. The red-haired one who was staring at Loki, asked, "You look really blueish, are you feeling okay ?"
The light-blond hobbit, who'd been eating until that point, suddenly snapped, "Pippin !" and jabbed Pippin in the ribs. Before the blond hobbit looked apologetically at Loki, "I'm very sorry, Sir, Pippin shouldn't have said that. I'm Meriadoc Brandybuck, but you can call me Merry."
Pippin blurted, "I'm sorry ! Merry's really a lot better at this stuff than I am...oh, I'm Peregrin Took."
"Well, you're honest, I can't fault that; I am Loki Frost. Master Took, yes, I am perfectly healthy and it's nice to meet you, Master Brandybuck. And this is my friend, Prince Legolas Greenleaf of Mirkwood."
Merry and Pippin stared at him for a second, then Pippin stammered, "Uh, i-it's a pleasure to meet you, Your Highness-ness."
"Please Pippin, we're far from Mirkwood, just call me Legolas."
Air and Acharn introduced themselves next and they started talking about nothing in particular. The next thing he noticed he was standing outside the dining-hall watching the dark-silver and black clad jotun walk away.
"Legolas ? What are you doing here ?"
'This is why I was avoiding him all day.'
Reluctantly, he turned from Loki to look at Aragorn, "The others and I came here because I failed, Aragorn. He got away from me, from all of us, but if my aim had been better he wouldn't have escaped."
The dark-green coated man put a hand on his shoulder, "I'm sure you did everything that you could. Does Elrond know about this yet ?"
"No, I didn't see him except for a few minutes this morning when we entered Imladris and just barely."
"Was he with you ? You looked surprised to see him enter."
"Loki ? No, Loki wasn't with us and I didn't expect him to join us."
Aragorn mused, "Loki ? What an unusal name and he has the looks of an orc as well. Where did he come from Legolas ?"
'Don't tell me he's going to join Glam on the, "He's a monster/spy for the Dark Lord.", hay-wagon. Didn't he listen to Gandalf about looking foul and feeling fair ? Hypocritical of him considering how he ends up looking at times.'
After having endured Glam's verbal abuse of Loki for far too long, he jumped to his friend's defense, "Loki fell from the sky, Aragorn ! From a realm that is far from here. I think the Valar may have sent him, he's as powerful as Gandalf, if not more by all that he can do. I know he may look like an orc, but he is not a spy. He's had a poor life with all, but his mother practically ignoring him. With barely any true friends before myself and the others and yes, the one time he did look like an orc, but he saved our lives that time. Before that he saved us from the spiders when he hadn't even known us for a day, even Glam who hates him. Have you ever known a spy of Sauron who was capable of killing to let an opportunity to murder someone who couldn't defend themselves go ? Or to stop and break down after nearly killing someone ? If that is not enough Beorn trusts him as I, Air and Acharn do."
Aragorn shook his head, "No, I haven't ever known a spy to do that. I don't know him Legolas, but as you obviously trust him I will too, unless he proves otherwise."
He smiled at that, "Thank-you, Aragorn, it means a lot to me."
With that he turned and walked away, hoping to find Loki and the room the jotun had been given. 'M-maybe he could just stay in my room tonight instead ?'
