Warning:
It contains some graphic depictions of torture and violence. No good guys die though.
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The other four members of their patrol waited for Avaleina and Tern to come back from their tentative scouting mission to get more specific information from the trees about whatever threat had been lurking through the human villages and the edges of the forest for nearing two months now.
The two of them were the smallest and the fastest at slipping through the tree's, and the most difficult to knock out of the branches. There was hardly ever a reason to be worried about them, but Legolas always did until he heard the familiar thudding of them landing back on the ground.
Two thuds, right on time, "Well?" Legolas asked.
Avaleina and Tern looked at each other, probably hoping the other had a better explanation to offer than they did.
"Well, that's encouraging," Farlen said dryly and leaned dramatically against a tree.
Avaleina gave him a prolonged dirty look before she turned her full attention back to Legolas, "It's had to tell."
She paused again, and Legolas held up a hand for Farlen to remain silent, "The trees say that they are not orcs or goblins of any kind and that they remind them of humans but they aren't human. They know they're sinister, but they can't tell for or about what."
"And what did you feel?" Galdahon asked with open sincerity.
"Nothing," Tern and Avaleina said together. Without a glance or change in expression, they bumped the backs of their hands together in silent delighted acknowledgment.
This time Tern elaborated for the both of them, "We looked around everywhere they were last felt but couldn't see or feel anything. We have no idea what it is. There are tracks and whatever it is, is wearing some kind of footwear. But that's it."
They were all silent for a few minutes while they pondered the situation.
"If we do nothing?" Legolas asked the group, seeking their most common opinion.
Technically every patrol team had a captain even the Amrath. And the technical leader of this particular group of Amrath was Legolas, but if they were allowed the fortune of time to discuss things amongst themselves and come to a group decision they always tried to take it.
"If we do nothing, then they continue killing random farmers, fishermen, young women, and Eru only knows what else," Farlen answered, and the rest didn't argue with his statement.
"And if we try to investigate?"
"Well," Avaleina said, "all things considered I think it seems very likely this could be some sort of elaborate trap, that seems likely to end very, very poorly for us."
None argued with her statement either.
"When have things ever not sounded like they could end very poorly for us, hmm?" Galdahon asked, looking around at all their faces, "And when have any of you had the will to leave the village to be slaughtered like cattle?"
"So instead we should be the cattle?" Farlen countered.
There was a heavy silence as they all contemplated the words, Avaleina broke it by doing a fairly good impression of, "Moooo."
All the others copied her Moo, Farlen only after a deep sigh.
"Come fellow cattle," Legolas proclaimed enthusiastically, throwing an arm around Farlen's shoulders and starting forward, "Let's go stomp around in the underbrush and see what scary things come out."
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Regardless of what other people might have thought, Thranduil didn't give his son any special treatment when it came to official matters. Just because he could theoretically 'see' what was happening in most parts of the forest if he put enough thought or power into it didn't mean that he allowed himself to do so.
While the vague, and at first rather haunting, feeling of Greenwoods vastness lived permanently at the back of his mind, it did not often tell him anything about the happenings of anything that was not close to their home unless he looked or asked for it.
That was not to say the forest did not tell anybody of suspicious things or of patrols in danger. There were just proper channels for that.
So when they frantically reached out to him without prompting under the command of their Prince, followed by sending borrowed emotions of complete distress, surprise, dread, and some sort of aching numbness Thranduil had never felt before he paid attention.
"Excuse me," Thranduil said without really even noticing or caring who was talking or what he was interrupting.
He was halfway to the door before anybody could think of a reply.
Because regardless of what others may think, Legolas did not ask for any special treatment for attention. In fact, it seemed he had done the opposite and trained himself to stay silent perhaps even when he should not have been.
So if he had reached out with urgent and clear intent to communicate he needed help, not even Mandos could have kept him from going to his son.
He was about to yell for Galion when he came skidding around the corner, "I was with Ferdan when Ava sent him a message too. He's on his way to get elk's and medical supplies, he wants you to get 'his good knives' because he doesn't think I would get it right."
The two of them were practically jogging down the hallway, "Do you think you would have gotten it right?"
"I would have just brought him all of them."
Legolas had to admit, the Necromancer had thought it out this time.
The dart with a tranquilizer that worked on elves, sending men instead of orcs, finding a cave deep enough that a few simple charms on a few necklaces could keep them from contacting the forest, and chains fastened securely to the wall and ceiling to keep them from going anywhere.
Except the Necromancer hadn't quite anticipated how little the men knew of elves. He hadn't anticipated that the men would not properly check to ensure that the rest of their elven patrol was dead when they choose him and Avaleina to take.
'We can't leave any of the others alive.'
Granted, the wounds they inflicted would have killed any man.
But elves are not man, and elves do not have to breathe as often as humans, especially when they're in a deep and artificial sleep. Elves' hearts to do not beat as quickly as men do and so they do not bleed out at the same rate, especially when they're in a deep and artificial sleep.
They rushed.
The only thing the woodland realm took more seriously than injured elves, was missing elves.
"I really, really, wish I had something to tell you, but I don't. I don't know anything," Avaleina said, a few words slurred due to a badly split lip, forcibly not looking at Legolas who hung by his wrists several feet behind the three men and their fire.
A knife slid farther underneath her fingernail and Legolas watched with hopelessness as Avaleina tried valiantly not to scream out with the pain of it, the strong boards her legs were chained to creaking with her effort to try and kick them in the face.
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Even Ferdan had lost the trail when they entered the mountains, but none of them had lost their resolve. The trees would tell them if they departed the mountains, and so they intended to search every crack and crevice until they found Legolas and Avaleina.
Even with the sun setting, they didn't slow their methodical but hastened search. Thranduil knew that Ferdan was as determined as him to not return home without their elfings. Which was for the best, because if they hadn't been, then they wouldn't have been around to hear the echoes of an agonized scream.
Avaleina's agonized scream, to be specific.
Like the fires of Mordor were lit beneath them, Thranduil and Ferdan began scrambling up the mountainside towards the sound. The rest of their company struggling to keep up.
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Blood still streamed from the three fingers that were already missing their nails, pooling on the cave floor at her feet.
"Tell me what you know," The human man said, twisting the knife sideways until finally, she did scream, the sound echoing around the cavern with incredible sincerity.
"I told you," She said, spitting blood out of her mouth onto the ground with a few gasping breaths, "I don't know anything."
With the flick of the humans' wrist, another nail popped off and Legolas struggled not to cringe at the sound and the sight. The human seemed disappointed when she didn't scream again.
Humans were always the most dangerous when they were abducted to the ways of darkness, always too eager and ready to prove themselves. So cavalier and uncaring about whatever pain and destruction they caused, too excited to inflict it.
If they hadn't been, then the men wouldn't have taken turns slicing random parts of their flesh before they were even half awake, just to say that they spilled elven blood. Again and again, before chaining them up for the entire day with no food or water.
Humans were easily blinded in conscience, forethought, and guilt by greed and the tantalizing scent of fleeting power.
Some of them already so full of hatred already, even before the darkness crept into every part of their minds, "And I told you that I know that's a lie. We were ordered after you for what you know, now tell us,"
Leaning in until his nose was practically against hers, he gently ran his dirty and unworthy fingers across her cheek and purred "Come now, little kitten, our master is waiting. I think you are the prettiest thing I've ever seen and I'd hate to have to keep marking you up like this, but our master is not patient."
Avaleina just stared at him with cold fury and jerk her head as far away from his hand as she could. The knife in the human's hand was replaced with a near red-hot one, and he sliced it across her stomach in a deep but near bloodless gash.
Her teeth were gritted with pain, "I think I'm over two thousand years old, I know many things that you do not-"
He backhanded her across the face again for her backtalk, hard enough her head bounced off the rock behind her and Legolas wrestled inwardly against his own temper to not struggle against the chains that hung him against the wall and roof.
They couldn't know how much hurting her affected him, they couldn't know that he would have done anything in the world at that moment to take her place.
Anything.
Because that would only make their game that much more fun.
They both stood perfectly still, listening.
Trying to get some sort of clue which way to go, which way it had echoed from originally.
Which hole they had crawled in.
"Anything?" Thranduil whispered, knowing that his friend's ears had always been better than his own. Ferdan shook his head in silence.
Together they began creeping up the mountainside again, this time much slower. Internally berating themselves for not being able to find a clue or a trail. Externally nearly glowing with anger.
Like living proof that falling stars hit the earth.
When they found whoever had done this, not even Mandos himself would be able to put the pieces together to figure out what part belonged to who.
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"What do you know?" Before even waiting for an answer, another one of the humans stabbed her in the thigh, and left the knife in as it sizzled and burned away, "We're growing impatient of your lies."
"I'm not lying!" She nearly shrieked, face wet with tears and sweat, "I'm not lying, I'm not lying, I'm not lying. I swear to you I'm not. I don't know-"
They twisted the knife slowly to the right until blood oozed out in a small river and she cried out in pain, "Do you want to hear the names of all the flowers that used to grow in our forest? Or how many different kinds of tree's there are to call friends? I know that. I can tell you about that-"
Another fingernail dripped into the puddle of blood. Another scream. Legolas accidentally bit a chunk out of his cheek with and effort of withholding his reaction.
He knew he was next. After they were done playing with Avaleina, he was next to be questioned and tortured. But that thought didn't matter to him, not in the slightest. Not now.
All that mattered was finding a way to get her out of there, through freedom preferably, but death if there was no other choice. He wouldn't let her get taken to Dol Guldur, and he wouldn't let the vile humans force themselves upon her.
He just hoped that they would be rescued before it came to anything as drastic as that.
The human looked about ready to ask another question or to stab or cut her again, and so Legolas interrupted him, "We don't know anything. We're exiles. Our people sent us away years ago, anything we might have known will be useless now. They'll have changed everything."
The leader turned to scrutinize him, "I have never heard of elves being banished from their people before this very moment."
"I don't suspect you've come across many elves before this moment."
Because if he had, he would have known better than to not do everything to reduce noise. Better than to force scream after scream to echo out of the cave, so easy for other elven ears to hear.
Legolas continued, "King Thranduil does not tolerate disobedience from his subjects."
He must have said it convincingly enough because the humans faltered and glanced at each other. Legolas and Ava took the opportunity to do the same, he tried to make his look as strong as possible for her steadily weaker one.
The tallest and seemingly the leader of the men turned back to Legolas, "Then why were you with so many other elves, so heavily armed and with good weapons?"
"Do you really believe that there are only two elves in an entire kingdom that has been exiled? As for the weapons, King Thranduil is strict and cautious, but he is not cruel. He would not send us out into the forest with no way to protect ourselves."
The man laughed mockingly, and it echoed around them, "Are you telling me that we were told specifically to capture members of a military patrol at that specific time and just so happened to get a group of exiles instead?"
All the retorts that immediately came to his mind were much too rude and hostile for such a situation, and Legolas stalled to think of a better way to word it.
Avaleina picked it up seamlessly, even with her bloody lip, "There are plenty of us exiles wandering around at the edges of the kingdom, are you sure whoever told you it was a patrol didn't confuse us with them?"
The humans looked at each other again, and Avaleina spit more blood onto the ground and continued, "We can't stay in one place, there are people like you around and far worse. It's dangerous to travel aimlessly in these woods, even for us, so we have chosen routes. Our paths probably look like some sort of patrol."
One of them punched her in the face, and Avaleina's head banged harshly against the cave wall again. For a very worrying few seconds, her head didn't right itself.
Legolas' heart couldn't beat until it did.
In a rage, the man whipped around and threw the dagger as hard as he possibly could at Legolas. Probably aiming for something more vital, but striking the spot where his right shoulder and his chest met.
He grit his teeth and tried to remember how to count to ten in one of the Avari languages to distract himself from the pain. He stormed across the fire and ripped it out without thought or concern.
Still not adequately vented, he also stabbed Legolas in the leg twice and one that struck his rib.
Legolas was dizzy with the pain or perhaps the blood loss, but he still saw the same internal heartbreak and struggle reflected in her eyes that he had been feeling for hours.
The man ripped the knife back out of Legolas and turned back to Avaleina, "Now where were we?"
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"Tell us what you know!" It echoed towards them from somewhere rather close, not the voice of an orc or goblin as they expected. The voice of a man.
A soon to be a dead man.
They quickened their pace again, well aware but uncaring that many of their companions hadn't been able to catch up with them yet. That didn't matter much, there were very few creatures who could stand in the way of Thranduil and Ferdan's collective furry.
And a group of men was not one of them.
Soon they were able to catch the scent of blood and human stink and crept over the last hunk of rock, careful to keep low enough to not create a silhouette. Around thirty men stood gathered around a fire at the entrance to a cave, while another fire seemed to burn from within.
Legolas and Avaleina were nowhere in sight.
The crept down the back of the rock again, and then carefully around the side towards the completely unaware campsite. They unsheathed their weapons in silence, and stepped out of the shadow at once.
Eight were dead before they could even blink, silent enough that Thranduil could hear the sound of bones breaking from inside the cave, and then Avaleina cry out in pain again.
The next ten men died before they could scream. But there was another pained scream from within the cave.
Thranduil watched Ferdan's thin grasp on composure slip, he sliced a knife across one's face before smashing the hilt over his head. Another lost its head at the same moment, putting a swift end to the start of a terrorized shriek.
Then he stormed into the cave, leaving Thranduil to kill the few that remained and follow him in.
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"Tell us what you know!" The leader screamed in her face, punching her in the stomach over one of the older wounds. She doubled over as far as the chains would let her, coughing, blood dripping from cuts on the inside of her lip from being smashed against her teeth so many times.
When she took too long to catch her breath, he bent all of her fingers backward until they cracked and snapped, she screamed again. By the strength of her arms alone, Avaleina pulled herself back upright, "That's a very broad question, do you have something more specific perhaps?"
He twisted the knife that was still in her leg, drawing out yet another shriek, "Think of the most important secret you've ever been told, and we'll work our way down from there."
A terrorized and clearly cut short scream ripped from near the mouth of the cave, and everybody froze.
Silence echoed after it, and Legolas waited for the storm.
He might have laughed with the knowledge of the vindication yet to come if he didn't fear the might manage to kill Avaleina if he did.
Like absolute rage incarnated, Lord Ferdan appeared out of the darkness.
Two of the men were dead before they could even take in the sight of him. The third, the leader, the one who Ferdan had probably seen break Ava's hand and wiggle the knife like a toy found himself pinned by his throat with his feet dangling off the floor.
Ferdan demanded in a tone even more deadly than his knives had been, "The key?"
Face turning red the man pointed with a shaking hand to the body of one of his companions, Legolas couldn't turn his head to see but he assumed somebody was checking the pockets.
Ferdan didn't take his iron stare off the man's face even as he asked, "Thran?"
There was a small jingle, before Legolas heard his father's voice, "Here."
Like a twig, Ferdan snapped the man's neck and dropped him to the ground, catching the keys as Thranduil tossed them since he was the one closest to Avaleina. He undid her feet first, momentarily letting most of her weight hang off her wrists while he undid those locks as well, draping her over his shoulder.
He tossed the keys to Thranduil, just as he arrived to free Legolas in the same manner, "Oh my poor little leaf."
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This got wwaayy longer than I expected, so I'll see you all in chapter 2 :)