Title: Soul Taker
Author: Keladieea
Summary: There is a taker, and there is a giver. One fierce and dangerous, feasting off the souls of elves, gaining strength, to ultimately become the end of all Middle-Earth. This One is the Soul Taker.
Author's Note: This is an AU. The Fellowship was never formed, and the ring was destroyed after Islidor destroyed Sauron.
Disclaimer: I do not own LoTR, but I own my little world and its characters
Read and Review please!
Soul Taker
Chapter Fifteen: The Last Battle
Legolas fixed his gaze on to the rose, and fought heard to keep breathing. It was all a dream, it couldn't be her. It just couldn't be.
"Legolas…." Her voice was like a beautiful song to his ears.
Still he said nothing, for his voice betrayed him. Instead he turned around to meet whoever stood behind him with that rose…her rose.
She was there before him. Her ebony hair shined under the light of the sun and her skin was a tabooed cream color, screaming at him that it was forbidden to touch. And all he wanted to do was touch her, love her, and caress her until the end of his days on this cursed Middle-Earth.
"You are not real." Legolas said softly.
"I am as real as the sun and the moon. I am as real as you." Irisaylia whispered and her voice, though soft, held a power that almost made him fall to his knees before her.
"How can this be, Irisaylia?" Legolas sucked in a breath and took a step forward.
"I traveled far Legolas, through dreams and realms that even the wisest of elves do not know about. I chased the Soul Taker through shadow, and rain, and death." Irisaylia closed her eyes and Legolas thought that she had left the world.
Legolas watched her closely. Her hair that had blown with the wind had stilled, yet the wind itself kept blowing. The rise and fall of her chest had ceased and she had paled to look that of the dead. And he knew. She had left Middle-Earth for that moment. She had gone beyond all knowledge and into a realm where Souls of all pasts went.
And then, as if she had just been born, Irisaylia gave a great gasp for air and her hair flew past her in a furry with the wind.
"You were gone…" Legolas whispered, "I balan a anglon ned le gar bell, im pul thuia ha a nosta ha. The power and magic in thee hold strong, I can breathe it and smell it."
"Lin meleth an enni gar bell sui eithel. Thy love for me holds strong as well." Happiness was brought into Irisaylia's silver eyes, for before all they held was deep sorrow.
"It will always hold strong for you." Legolas responded in a whisper and lowered his lips to hers in a long awaited kiss.
Irisaylia moaned against his touch and held fast to him, afraid that her strength would finally leave her. She had endured much over the long years and all but her strength and purpose had left her. As if her body knew that it was time to end its mission, her knees buckled and she fell against Legolas.
"You are weak Irisaylia. Your quest has drained you." Legolas said knowingly and lifted her into his arms.
Through the shadows and darkness that Irisaylia had brought with her arrival, Legolas carried her to his chambers and laid her on his bed. He ran a hand along her cheek, and with the elfin magic the Valar had granted him, he had her asleep within seconds.
He sat there, on his bed that was once theirs, and studied her. He was ashamed to know that he had forgotten her scent of pure lilacs. There was only a trace of it left on her, as she smelled of fire and smoke, but it was enough to jar his memory. Long years he had waited to hold her against him, and it was in these years that he was ready to go from this place. He had been ready to leave and travel to his resting place. But now….now Irisaylia was back in his life and all thoughts of leaving the shores of his world were lost. He had his life force back.
That was when he noticed it. A scar lay above her eyebrow, its length slightly longer than the eyebrow itself. Legolas leaned forward and studied it with an intense glare. Before he knew what he was doing, his hand was upon her face and his thumb was tracing the scar with high interest.
Legolas let out a gasp as the air in his lungs and his eyesight left him as soon as he had finished tracing the scar. Suddenly he had sight again, but it was neither Irisaylia nor his chambers that he saw. He was flying through what seemed to be a tunnel of flame and shadow. His free fall was straight down and then it was as if he had been thrown into ice cold water. Legolas shuddered as the immense cold overtook his body and mind as his breath made little clouds.
Then he saw her. She stood on a high ledge and across from her on a ledge of his own was the Soul Taker. He watched them stare intensely at each other and then Irisaylia drew her sword. It gleamed as the fire light hit it and Legolas noticed how it seemed to mold into Irisaylia. The Soul Taker drew his own sword and he cackled, waving his free hand to beg her forward.
Irisaylia, with the grace that her elfin kindred had granted her, leapt from her ledge and landed on the stone bridge formed down the middle of the flames. The Soul Taker followed in suite and soon they were sword to sword.
"My kin and I have yet to fall under the prophecy, Mordriell." Irisaylia said clearly.
Mordriell….that was the Soul Taker's elfin birth name. Legolas was hit with all these things at once and he felt as if his mind was in overdrive. And then he knew. He was to witness the last fight between Taker and Giver.
As if on cue, Irisaylia's sword clashed with Mordriell's. Legolas watched in amazement as the two went back and forth on the bridge of stone. A dreadful feeling rose in the pit of his stomach when he realized that Irisaylia was going to fall with the Soul Taker, but this would show him how she had survived after her alleged death.
And then it happened. Irisaylia's sword, with all its malevolence and malice, was driven through the Soul Taker's abdomen. Mordriell let out a sharp gasp through clenched teeth and began to fall. To the horror of Legolas and Irisaylia, he did not fall before he could plunge his own sword into the stomach of Irisaylia. She let out a pain-filled scream and fell to her knees, coming to eye level with the Mordriell. Legolas felt his hands clench as they stared at each other.
Slowly, with great pain, Irisaylia's hand rose from her side to reach forward, caressing the hooded cheek of Mordriell. Her voice was soft but Legolas could still hear it as she chanted something in a language unknown to him or any of his kin back home. Mordriell winced but his hand rose as well and he allowed it to fall upon Irisaylia's cheek. Legolas could hear and understand his words this time.
"Darkness will always be apart of you, Giver. You may have destroyed me, but what of those who follow in my wake? What will you do when the shadows and flames bring tremors back to your love's kingdom and the rest of his cursed Middle Earth? I will tell you what will happen Irisaylia." Mordriell sucked in another breath, "One of you will fall. One of you will die and pass on to a place where shadows do not exist. And the one left behind with grieve and slowly disappear, to be remembered only in a whisper among tales told by the fires…"
Irisaylia closed her eyes and again a murmur rose from her bleeding lips. Mordriell let out a crow like scream and fell forward to lay beside Irisaylia's kneeling form. She allowed one hand to clutch her stomach and the other she placed on the stone walk to steady her body.
Legolas knew than that this last image, of the dead Mordriell and the dying Irisaylia, was the vision sent to Galadriel in her forest home. This was what she had seen, but not on the stone walks of the Realm of Souls. She had seen them battle in the meadows of a land far from Mirkwood, Rivendell, and Lothlorien. It was trickery of some sort, probably from the darkness that had wrapped itself around Irisaylia and Mordriell's form like a sheet. It was this dark trick that had clouded Galadriel's vision and made her believe that the battle had taken place in the fields. But where had the rose Legolas had found come from? Roses did not grow freely in the lands that he came upon.
Legolas stilled in his hiding place in the shadows. Irisaylia's hand, the one that had been steadying her frame, was in the air, palm outward and fingers separated. Then he heard her start chanting and her voice became louder and louder. The language she screamed out with her bitter-ending strength was not understandable to Legolas again, but somehow he felt her emotions. She was praying to someone, maybe to Valar itself. Suddenly a bright twilight gleamed down into the flaming caves of the Realm of Souls and it covered Irisaylia in a white glow. And then she was gone, the light with her. Legolas sucked in a deep, needed breath.
All that remained was a single rose.
***I am sorry that this chapter took so long to get up, please forgive me. However, I am VERY pleased with the way this turned out. Please review and tell me what you think! As for the ending of this story, it is very near. Only one or two chapters left. Of course, then you can look forward to the sequel which I already have big plans for.
And I have yet to acquire a beta reader. Please someone help me! J