ch 1 : returning
Legolas arrived back in Middle Earth on
a calm day in mid-Spring, when the natural life had begun to reawaken
after its winter sleep. He stepped back onto the shores of Middle
Earth, the sun warming his back as he bent down to pull his boat
up the shore and away from the water. He had only brought a few
posessions with him which he carried in a bundle on his lower
back, along with his quiver full of arrows and his bow, also stored
away. A mixture of emotions were stirring in him as he stood there,
primarily a sense of wonder and fear at the unknown. Galadriel
had warned him that the world might have changed beyond his comprehension;
beyond anything he could have imagined. But he could see nothing
that indicated this to him, instead, his attention was caught
by a single sparrow that flew rapidly across his line of vision.
He bent down again suddenly and collected a handful of pebbles,
looking at them for a minute, their texture and worn surfaces.
Then he let them drop, and ran lightly up the grassy slope ahead
of him.
When he reached the top of the slope, he sat down in the long
grass to gaze at the land stretched before him. It was a peaceful
looking grassy flat, surrounded by hills and much as he had remembered
it. The day was as clear and the landscape as green as when he
had left it over two thousand years ago. The breeze reached him
as he reclined there and lifted a few strands of his golden hair
from his shoulder, while sending many mixed messages flowing into
his senses. Narrowing his clear blue eyes against the glare of
the sun, he sat for a moment more, a brief smile flitting across
his mouth and a glad feeling rising in his heart. He was back
in the lands he had grown up in and, for the moment at least,
he felt safe. Although the breeze had brought to him a sense of
change, he could see no sign of it. Idly plucking a blade of grass,
he stood up again, shifted the pack and quiver on his pack and
turned to the path which led down the slope to the fields below.
He walked for a while across the green landscape, the only sound
the swish of the grass against his soft boots, and the whispering
of the breeze in his ears. Before him stretched the green carpet
of the fields, flanked by the endless hills, looming shades of
dusky purple in the distance that were capped with streaks of
snow. The sky remained the same clear cloudless blue for the next
few hours as he walked along at the feet of the mountains and
the sun was still glaring down on him as he took a path up the
side of the mountain, intending to get a longer view of the land
beyond. He was beginning to feel nervous, puzzled by how the land
seemed entirely the same, and yet his senses were still aware
of the changes that must have occurred, and wondered what they
could be.
The path climbed up, and he followed it up the steep slope to
where the grass met the sprawl of rocks, his steps silent and
his sudden appearance startling a couple of rabbits dozing in
the sun on the grass above their burrows. He watched them dart
away into the nearest undergrowth, and smiled slightly. They were
the first signs of life, other than the birds, that he had seen
and he felt comforted by their timeless presence. He turned his
gaze away from them, tightened the strap holding the quiver to
his back, and lightly jumped onto the rocks on the crest of the
hill. Below him the mountains tumbled in a mass of rocks and dense
undergrowth, back to the stretch of fields, which then gave way
to the land beyond. With his keen eyesight, Legolas picked out
a stream cutting across the fields, and then he was hit with confusion.
He could see buildings, but they were not like any other buildings
he had seen previously. He could tell they must be farms, as they
had fields around them marked with fencing, and contained livestock,
but he could make no sense of the strange objects beside them.
They reflected the sun, and brought to his senses a mixture of
smells that he couldn't understand and had never come across before.
He again felt the shiver of fear, but also intense curiosity,
and remembering his reasons for returning to Middle-Earth, he
was suddenly overcome with a feeling of reckless excitement. Surefooted,
he jumped down the rocks, his feet finding a path down the dangerously
steep slope, his mind suddenly filled with the image of a small
figure, its expression both frightened but determined, fingers
closing around the gold Ring inside its hand.
He reached the bottom of the hill, and stood there slightly breathless,
running his fingers lightly over his bow while glancing around
him, remaining constantly alert. Absently pushing back long locks
of golden hair behind his pointed ears, he headed towards the
nearest farm, a feeling of nervous apprehension growing inside
him. It was all still very quiet, although as he drew closer to
the buildings he heard the sounds of the grazing animals in the
fields. He stopped and stared at the fence strands of wire
tacked to wooden posts. He ran his fingers along this, and stepped
back in surprise when it pricked his fingers. On the other side
of the fence, the grazing cattle lifted their heads and stared
at him with liquid brown eyes. They were also comforting to him,
he breathed in their warm animal smell, then stared closer, at
the metal tags in their ears. A sign of the change, although only
slight.
He stepped away from the fence and slowly walked around to the
front of the farm, every nerve beginning to prickle. He wasn't
afraid, but he was unsure of himself and these surroundings, and
therefore couldn't feel entirely confident either. He suppressed
a sudden instinctive urge to reach for an arrow and fit it to
the bow which was held tightly in his grasp, but he stayed his
hand and looked around again. He was now standing at the end of
a wide track leading up to the farm building, and after a moment's
hesitation he hurried along it towards the large barn and the
house set to one side of it, the cows in the field beside him
watching his progress. The track widened out into a yard, and
one side of the barn was open, divided into two sections, one
filled with a stacked mound of hay bales, and the other an open
space where some strange looking vehicles were parked. Filled
with curiousity, and a sense that this was another sign of the
change, the elf approached these strange looking contraptions
cautiously. They resembled carts of some kind, but were made of
an entirely different material, and had an alien smell that clung
to his senses in an unpleasant way. Yet the yard also had the
warm smell of animals and hay and the contrast between that timeless
smell, and the cloying scent of fuel, made him close his eyes
for a second to attempt to collect his thoughts. He opened them
abruptly when he heard the sound of a dog barking, and a voice
calling out. Glancing towards the house, he saw the side door
had opened and he was now being spoken to by a young man who looked
at him with a faintly uneasy gaze, while the dog, a brindled cross
of sheepdog and terrier, trotted up to him and sniffed around
his heels. Reaching a hand down to briefly ruffle the dog's fur,
the elf shifted the weight of the quiver on his back and walked
across towards the young man who was definately gazing at him
with an expression of mistrust.
"Can I help you?" the man finally said, his gaze expressing
his puzzlement at this strange apparition that had suddenly appeared
in his yard. Legolas, sensing the man's confusion, stepped back
a pace to make him feel more at ease, while at the same time noting
the man's unfamiliar clothing as yet another change.
"Can you tell me where I am?" the elf asked finally,
while the dog still snuffled at his boots which had brought so
many mingled senses and smells that were as odd to the dog as
the changes Legolas had already witnessed had been to him.
The young man's expression didn't change, in fact it became slightly
more bewildered.
"You're on my farm, that's where you are, but if you mean
where is that, well, then, we're in ."
The name was utterly unfamiliar to Legolas, but his expression
didn't betray his own puzzlement. Nodding to the man, he thanked
him, and then asked where the nearest town was, earning himself
another strange look of distrust.
"Where did you come from then?" the young man said,
then ploughed on without waiting for an answer. "When you
get to the end of my driveway, turn left onto the lane and when
you reach the crossroads, you'll see the signposts, that'll direct
you."
"Thank you," Legolas said again. "My mind now
feels much clearer."
He turned and started walking back down the track towards the
lane, the dog following him a little way until its master called
it back.
"Nice costume!" the man called after him, as he turned
the corner again and set off down the lane in the direction of
the sun.
He found the crossroads easily, and spent a while standing on
the verge studying the signposts and deciding which direction
to go in. Eventually he chose , and set off briskly once more.
While walking, he wondered to himself whether all the other inhabitants
of this age of Middle Earth would regard him with the same puzzled
mistrust that the farmer had. He doubted it, but the man's comment
about his garments, his appearance even being a 'costume', somewhat
unsettled him. He hoped he would soon meet others of his kind,
although he knew there would be few Elves left who hadn't taken
the journey to the West. But surely there would be some, and if
not, he was sure he would be able to find someone who would assist
him in finding his way about.
Whilst musing on these thoughts, he kept walking along the lane
by the side of the hedge and although absorbed in thinking, he
still was alert, and so heard the distant noise of something approaching,
quickly seeing it on the horizon a second later. He stopped, and
felt uncertain, his hand straying towards his arrows and then
checking himself, hesitating, while the strange thing was moving
fast. Eventually he just crouched down in the long grass and watched
as it came speeding down the lane towards him. His senses hadn't
alerted him to any threat, so he waited and then the thing was
suddenly tearing past him with a muted sound resembling a strangled
roar, sending up a cloud of dust into the elf's face, and then
disappearing off along the lane and into the distance.
Legolas stared after it, then suddenly coughed and realised that
he had both held his breath for the seconds that the vehicle had
gone past him, and that also his hands were shaking. He wasn't
afraid, he told himself, he knew that whatever the strange thing
had been, it wasn't going to harm him, but he hadn't expected
changes like these, and now all he could think was, what other
changes am I going to see? He was prepared for any kind of danger,
after all he was an experienced fighter and had proven many times
that he was capable of protecting both himself and others with
his fierce fighting skills, but still the thought of the unknown
sent a slight shiver through him. He would have to wait and see,
he mused to himself, see what other changes had occured, and he
would have to learn to adjust to them. It would be an adventure,
it would be an experience. He rubbed the dust from his eyes and
straightened up, feeling detirmined once more. After all, why
else had he returned, if not to find out what time had done to
Middle Earth, and to live the changes for himself?