I also realized I made a slight mistake. I had meant this chapter seemed somewhat superficial. Now that I've reread it, though, I'm not so sure. I also made a few changes. Anyway, I hope you like it.
Serena: Um, you could call it vicarious torture. *thinks hard* Yeah.
Grumpy: A lot of places would be better than where they are now. Mm, well, her hands aren't exactly on him. Oh, I want candy! Lol. Here is soon. Lol.
Bill the Pony: Sure you can. I just won't make you wait any longer. *g*
Okay, I think I've posted too quickly for you all now, and unless I get more reviews next time, I'll have to wait an extra day too make up for it. You wouldn't want that would you?
To avoid that fate, all you have to do is send a little review. Enjoy!
Chapter 13
Guilt Born by Two
Aragorn was jolted sharply from his stupor by the sound of approaching footsteps. His gray eyes focused on the passageway Kaialian had disappeared down earlier, and waited.
As soon as she had appeared, he spoke, his voice sharp. "What have you done to him?"
She looked up lazily, a teasing smile on her lips. "Done to whom, my sweet?"
The ranger's eyes narrowed dangerously, looking every bit as intimidating as a king, despite the fact that he was tied to a chair, and asked the question again. "What have you done to my friend?"
Kaialian looked at him, her smile slipping, and her brown-green eyes taking on all the warmth of a glacier. Perhaps she should have used the needle on him, after all. No, what she had planned would be even better, even if he did not last even half so long as the elf.
"Not very patient, are we, sweety? Nay, I could not tell you. In fact, mayhap, soon, I will show you. And I would hate to ruin the surprise." She walked up next to him, lightly trailing her hand down his arm, and the ranger stiffened in pain.
Surprise flickered in his eyes; he had all but forgotten about the cuts, which proved to be a mistake, as he remembered them vividly now. He tensed in anticipation of more pain, and the woman laughed.
"Oh, no, Ranger. Not yet," she admonished, moving away and then coming back, a bucket in her hand. "I'm not yet ready to continue playing with you. Your friend is sleeping, after all, and we would hate for him to miss all the fun."
She dumped part of the bucket's contents over his arm, and Aragorn stifled a shocked cry of surprise, drawing his breath in sharply, not having expected the icy cold water, though he felt he should have. The woman smiled coyly, then scrubbed at the blood on his arm with a sponge, none too gently, either. He hissed, slightly, a soft exhalation between his teeth that did not go unnoticed. Then she dumped the rest of the freezing contents on his arm and walked away.
He shuddered from the cold. Oh, to be an elf, he lamented. At least this particular little cruelty did not bother them. Beings could not dump cold, ice water on them and expect it to effect them in any way. Not so for him.
The woman returned, and he glared at her darkly, already tensing in anticipation of the freezing bath. Only to cry out in surprised pain when the water was not cold at all, but shockingly hot, scalding his arm, her scrubbing not helping the pain at all. He curled in as far as he could, pressing his head down and squeezing his eyes closed. Then the rest of the water was dumped on his arm, much of it soaking his side, and while not as hot as before, still plenty warm enough to make him jump and hiss.
"Oh, was that too hot?" she asked, mock concern dripping from her voice. "So sorry, my sweet. I merely did not want it to be too cold." A wicked grin was tossed his way before she turned to walk away. He was too busy holding his breath against the pain to truly notice or retort.
The young man breathed out shakily and turned his head in an attempt to track her position. He failed to visually mark her, but picked up her quiet footsteps just the same. He had a hard time discerning if her footsteps were purposely made audible to unsettle her captors, or if she was simply not capable of walking silently. Then he wondered which truly unnerved him most.
Silence, he decided after a moment, determining that sneaky elves were worse than menacing women. The shock of the water having returned a portion of his sense of humor, he thought he was having a peculiar stroke of luck, running now into two women who fancied killing him; that the first one had changed her mind was no fault of his.
He frowned at that thought, unnerved that he had thought convincing someone not to kill him was a fault.
Still, as he tracked Kaialian's footsteps, he doubted he would manage the same feat with this one. He could not tell what the woman was doing, and the uncertainty was wreaking havoc on his nerves, his already frayed, sleep-deprieved, and twitchy nerves.
He tensed as she began moving his way, only to frown when she bypassed him and moved in the direction of the passageway that led to where Legolas was being kept. Fear skittered down his spine, a feeling he was becoming quite familiar with and similarly annoyed with.
The young man strained his ears after her, desperate to discover she was not returning to torment his friend. The steps faded from his hearing, only to return long eternities later, followed by a widely grinning Kaialian but no additional screams.
He gulped, his eyes wide at her apparent glee; he had a feeling it did not bode well for him that she was so pleased.
"Your friend has decided to join us, my sweet," she purred, reminding him of a content cat that was stalking his prey. "Which means that it is time for us to play."
He turned his head to follow her movements as she stepped behind him, then returned, ten long metal pins in her hand, thin and incredibly sharp. She played with one teasingly, flipping it a bit in her palm, a strange light dancing in her eyes as she looked coyly at him. She approached the chair that was still beside him and rested a hand against it's back.
"I think I may let him see you," she murmured, loud enough to be heard. Moving forward, she traced his arms again. "These cuts are so beautiful. Perfect, even. What do you think, hm?
Forcing himself to be steady, he simply returned her gaze, gray eyes hard as flint. She was not deterred. "Ah, yes, I think he would enjoy it. Though, I suppose you don't want to talk. 'Tis fine. We can play instead. I think you will like this game."
The glint in her eyes convinced him he would not. Without another word, she moved over to his hand, first depositing all but one of the long pins on the chair behind her, then held it lightly over his hand, just touching his skin. Her hand hovered over his, the pin dangling from her fingers and she traced it lightly across his palm before taking a firmer hold of it and placing the point against his fingertip.
Horrible realization shot through him and he tried desperately to move his hand away, struggling, though he could go nowhere. Her other hand had already come down to pin the finger in place, though the ropes had not allowed it to move much in the first place.
Aragorn grit his teeth, bracing for the horrible pain, his fingers already aching with the mental picture of what she was about to do. Then the object slid into his finger and he screamed, the horrible pain cutting through him, a hundred times worse than he had imagined, and reason was driven from his mind. His body tensed, pulling against the ropes, forcing the unforgiving lines into his skin and cutting it deeply. Red surrounded the ropes, but whether or not it was blood was hard to say.
The pin held his finger rigid, and every twitch--every hint of a twitch--sent more fire through his finger and up his arm, moving all the way to his head. He gasped raggedly, his lungs refusing to work properly in light of the conflicting orders streaming through his mind, namely: hold still, and breathe.
A far distant part of his mind, somehow still removed from the pain, noted that the object had pierced bone. He would hate to see what his father had to say about this, assuming he escaped in the first place. So far, that was not looking to be a very promising possibility.
He struggled valiantly against the overwhelming pain, forcing himself to remain awake despite his agony, and not quite sure why he desired consciousness over the blissful darkness of unconsciousness when he had desired just that after the cuts on his arm, and those were nothing compared to the pain the pin in his finger inflicted. He squeezed his eyes tightly shut as if the pain could not reach him if he could not see it.
Suddenly, sadistically, the pin in his finger twisted, grinding against the bone and shifting against the screaming nerves. His eyes flew open, and he shrieked, the high, pain-filled sound vibrating the very stone around them and lights, brilliantly white, flashed before his eyes, strobing light and dark. Small rocks and pebbles worked their way lose and collapsed to the floor around them.
When he managed to at least partially catch his breath, the small, distant, sole remaining part of his brain still capable of thought noted she had ten of those pins, and that he had ten fingers, and that she most likely intended to do the same thing ten times.
His eyes were wide as he stared intently, fearfully, at the shiny objects that rested just behind her, eyes glazed and incoherent, unaware that tears streamed down his cheeks. Soft, clear laughter pried his attention up almost automatically, and he caught the glint of another of them in her hands, slowly being twisted in her hand. "Don't enjoy this too much, my sweet. We still have a long ways to go."
Whimpering against his will, he suddenly screamed again when the next pin was shoved into his finger. The pain once more overwhelmed rational thought, and though he knew there was a reason he had not wanted to scream--aside from personal pride--he could not pinpoint what that reason had been.
Before he knew it, a strange, bitter concoction was flowing down his throat, his traitorous body swallowing before it even registered in his overwrought mind that he was swallowing, and it burned on the way down, the new sensation almost unnoticed as his fingers shrieked. Too late, he realized it was something he did not want to drink, the mixture speeding up his heart and awakening his mind. Unconsciousness suddenly seemed a whole lot further away.
Just then, another pin was shoved into his finger, and thought was left alone, shattering into a million pieces which drifted away from his reach, not even sought after as the pain sought to detach him from all save the pain, losing himself in a swirling world of dark and light that flashed with each new burst of pain.
He screamed.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
A groan echoed through the room. It's lone occupant frowned as he tried to discover who had made the sound. He could find no one else anywhere around him, not that that was surprising considering his eyes were closed.
Closed? Wait a second. When did I close my eyes?
He frowned and tried to pry his upper lids away from his bottom lids. Neither cooperated, and he would not have been surprised to discover they had, in fact, been glued together some time while he was . . . sleeping? Had he been sleeping?
He did not feel rested, and sleep usually helped you feel better. He felt horrible, so that must not have been it. He tried to shift positions, and heard another moan, this time sounding closer.
The elf half jumped in surprise at how close this other person had to be before he realized the sounds had come from himself. Had he had the energy, he would have blushed at how long it had taken him to reach that conclusion. Really, though, he could come up with no reason why he should hurt so bad.
Why did he hurt in the first place? Oh, right. Woman. Needle. Tar. Hot. He groaned again and moved his head from side to side, groaning louder when that motion did not go over well with said head. He sighed, then finally managed to pry his eyelids open after several time consuming and useless tries.
The cavern he was in, not surprisingly, looked exactly the way he remembered, minus the woman in the golden dress sitting in a chair next to him and poking him incessantly with fire. It was a variation he was not disappointed by in the least. Carefully, he looked down at his arm to see a black shape outlined and partially shadowed.
Legolas frowned. Partially shadowed. She did not plan on returning to finish once he was awake, did she?
He heard approaching footsteps, and froze, then closed his eyes to pretend he was not awake. They paused near him, then retreated back in the direction they had come. Cautiously, the elf lifted his head to glance back towards the passageway that lead from his room, saw it empty, and breathed a sigh of relief.
She had fallen for it and was not coming back to finish. The pain was only an echo now, a shadow at the back of his mind, but he had no desire to become reacquainted with it. Besides, the longer she was away, the more time he would have to figure out a way to escape and free Aragorn.
Aragorn.
The elf's eyes widened. Oh no. What if instead of hurting him, she decided to hurt the ranger? Suddenly, he wished he had not pretended unconsciousness, that she had not left, that she had instead stayed and introduced him to some new kind of pain, just so long as she did not do anything to Aragorn.
His friend had undergone enough trauma. He had only just returned to them, albeit not quite whole, but definitely on the mend, and now she was just going to break him again. The elf wondered, painfully, how many times the young human could be broken before he could no longer be put back together and they finally lost him whether he lived or not.
Humans were fragile, easily getting sick and nowhere near as resilient as the firstborn. What if he could not stand what she did to him, and he never returned? Something was already preying on the ranger's mind. What if this woman pushed him further into the shadows, away from their help, so far that they could no longer reach him? What if he lost his friend?
Blue eyes widened, pain and fear shining in their depths. What would Lord Elrond say? Valar, what would he do? The lord of Imladris had sent his human son to Legolas to help him, and what did the elf prince do but get him into even worse trouble, possibly causing his death.
With that thought, he started twisting in his binds, pulling at the ropes as heedless of his injured arm as the protestations from his head. The cavern spun nauseatingly around him but he kept pulling, fighting, desperately twisting his hands, heedless of the blood that began to seep into the ropes that held him without sway. He kept at it, sawing and twisting. Maybe, just maybe, if he kept at it long enough, the ropes would give way. He denied everything he knew about his people's elven rope and refused to give up.
Then an inhuman sound echoed through the room, freezing him in surprise. The noise was so unexpected that it took him a moment to identify it. When he did, any and all remaining color drained from his face and his body fell limp.
Oh, Aragorn, he thought despairingly. Mellon nin, I am so sorry. So very sorry.
He choked on a sob, tears pricking at his eyes as he realized that, once again, his friend was being tormented and there was nothing he could do. He was trapped, able to hear his friend's pain, but unable to help, unable to end it or relieve the other's suffering. A tear slipped down his cheek as he dropped his head back against the top of his chair, the dull thunk of impact meaning nothing to him in the face of his friend's pain.
Before the echoes even had a chance to fade, they were overrun by the most painful sounding shriek Legolas had ever heard, making him cringe as the sound assaulted his ears, and the agony the sound carried assaulted his heart. The very mountain trembled with the sound, and Legolas shuddered.
Images from the past flew across the backs of his closed eyelids, a slide-show of events he could not escape from by looking away, some of which he did not want to remember nor relive. Images of his time together with Aragorn, from their very first meeting, to the quiet times, to the hair-raising and deadly adventures, and the teasing banter.
Another scream was added to the cacophony of the first, bouncing around the bound elf and indelibly marking his memories. What was she doing to pain his friend so? He began struggling again, twisting his wrist and attempting to wear out the ropes. He had a feeling it was his wrist that would wear out first.
Another scream, this one just as pain-filled but quieter than the last and the first, hoarse. The human was running out of strength. Against his will, Legolas' movements slowed, nearly stilling as he listened to his friend's pain, those agonized cries the only links to the young man that were left to him, the only way he could judge his condition.
He did not even want to imagine what that woman could be doing to pain his friend so, but his mind refused to listen, and provided a host of images, each worse than the last, the screams echoing around and through his mind, threatening to pull the elf's mind down the very same dark path Aragorn's had traveled into despair, whispering at him to give up while his friends screams provided a soundtrack for the gruesome images.
Unlike the human, though, he fought the suffocating darkness of despair, aware of the dark whispers Aragorn was too near to be able to resist the tempting call. Pushing against the darkness, knowing that all was lost as soon as he gave up, gave in, Legolas grit his teeth and bore the pain, hoping that some way, some how, his friend would find the strength to hold on until he could get them both out.
And with that resolution, another scream echoed.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
At the foot of the Mountains of Mirkwood, a lone man stood, dark gray eyes watching their peaks as the white snow glistened in the bright sun. White reflected back to dazzle his eyes, but to his mind, the snow was red.
He should be working, readying for the bite of winter that hovered on the horizon, yet he could not. His heart would not release him to his duties. Agitated, plagued by guilt, he had not attended the festival the night before, instead choosing to watch from a distance.
He had watched, and it made him sick. Those two, their guests, had been seeking help, had been injured, had trusted them, and what had they done? They may as well have fed them to the wolves, it would have been kinder. Or the orcs, even, likely would have been a better fate than sending them to the Witch of the Mountains. The orcs, at least, were unlikely to keep you around for a year, in pain, constantly in pain, though there was no proof anyone actually lasted that long.
Every year he had been spared, been passed over in favor of his fellows, he had come to this very spot to stare at the mountain. Every year, if the wind was just right, he could swear the sound of screaming reached his ears, full of unspeakable agony.
And just like every year, distant screams met his ears, stabbing knives through his heart. He did not know the two that had been placed in her hands, yet he felt he did, or would like to. They had been innocent. His mind whispered that those two would have volunteered to help, that they could have helped his people had they just asked them instead of depositing them, helpless and ignorant, into her twisted grip.
Worse, though, was the knowledge that he could have helped them and done nothing. He had watched, knowing that meal was to be their last--their last meal in comfort, in any case--and done nothing to warn them as his heart had so desperately pleaded.
He could have helped, and done nothing, left them to the fate that had been placed upon them by cowards who preferred to cling to nothing instead of fighting the darkness.
Pained, dark eyes closed tightly, as he swallowed. When they opened again, a new resolve shone in their depths. Then, with a last glance back at the village he had called home, where he lived with people he could no longer stand to call kin, he started towards the mountain.
Maybe hope could be salvaged.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Aragorn lay very still, his skin deathly pale and sparkling from the sheen of sweat that drenched his body, plastering his shirt to his chest and back, and which occasionally dripped down his back, slowly. Glazed, unaware eyes stared off into the distance, a dark, dull gray that was completely alien to anyone who knew him; never had they, through even the worst of dangers, looked thus.
Ten rods had been stabbed through the tips of his fingers, ten rods stuck out the end, ten rods held his fingers straight, and ten fingers wanted nothing more than to move, occasionally twitching and sending sparks, agonizing sparks, of pain up his arms. Blood dripped slowly from the tips, and had the human had a choice, or the chance, he would have cut his hands off in a heartbeat.
His breathing was strained and shallow, erratic and whispery through the air. The injuries themselves were less grievous than many others the human had sustained in his short life-time, yet never before had so few wounds hurt so very much. His mind had spiraled away into a dark room, locked away from all that happened to him.
He was unresponsive to outside stimuli, his body jerking, but he no longer screamed, and his expression did not change. The pain had been too much, mixed with the drug to keep him conscious.
That was how Legolas saw him, broken, and his heart ached, threatening to follow the human down that dark abyss. Sobs caught in his throat and tears pricked at his eyes. "Aragorn," he whispered. "Hold on, my friend. Hold on. Don't leave yet, please don't leave."
Kaialian, for her part, was immensely pleased. When she had decided to show the elf his friend, she had not expected the other's pain to be so scrumptious. The desolation in the luminous being's eyes was even better than she had imagined. An irrepressible smile graced her features, lighting her face up like a little girl's whose every wish had just come true.
At this moment, it matter not to her if she could never play with the ranger again, he had given her all she needed with his delightful screams, and the pain his condition inflicted on the elf was priceless. She could have spent ages trying to break that one, and his own friend had broken him in less than a day.
Her eyes danced. These two almost made her feel at peace, like the debt men owed her had finally been paid, like she could finally let go. Yet she could not, and she would not have wanted to if she could. That sorcerer had gifted her with eternal life, and men would pay for all eternity. But if these two proved finished, she might just have to lure another man into her grasp and play with him . . . remembering to go a bit slower this time.
She pushed the dazed elf into a seat, the fair being forgetting to resist her in his distress, and continued to simply stare at his friend. Kaialian had decided to leave them in the same room. Maybe she could increase this delicious pain if they could see each other. It was worth a try. Perhaps the sight of his friend's pain would even bring the ranger back around. One could never tell, after all.
Feeling incredibly satisfied with herself, she left the two alone in the room. She never realized, in her pleasure, that she had forgotten to secure the elf to the chair.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
Unnoticed by all, the mountain shifted. The ground trembled, rocks and boulders jumped and bounced down inclines until they could go no further. The caverns that sheltered the occupants trembled, pressed down by tons of rock, age wearing the sides away, until they no more could support the weight.
Aragorn, locked in his own mind, never noticed the shift in the mountain. Legolas, lost in his worries for his friend, held by shock, never felt the shift, the feeling of impending doom, so similar to what it was he had been feeling all along. And Kaialian, so used to the occasional grumblings of the mountain, so pleased with her accomplishments, nothing dark or bad penetrated her thoughts. She gave no consideration to the condition of her own home.
It had stood for five hundred years. It would stand for five hundred more.
Only it would not.