Rivendell's Gardens were decked out in all the splendor of a May morning. Sunlight beamed down from a clear blue sky and twinkled off a million dewdrops giving a fresh, newly washed appearance to trees and grass. It was a perfect setting for the customary promenades along the fashionable Royal Row. It was perfect.
Perfect, except for one discordant detail. In the middle of an open stretch of grass well within sight of the Royal house, some sort of commotion was rapidly drawing a crowd of the curious. That it was a fight became quickly evident. Not a duel – there were four participants instead of two and the morning was far too well advanced – but an indecorous outbreak of fisticuffs.
Gentlemen and a few ladies too rode closer to see what was transpiring. Many of the gentlemen stayed to watch the progress of the fight, their interest in the morning considerably piqued. A few, those unfortunate enough to be escorting ladies were obliged to ride hastily onward since it was most certainly not a genteel sight for female eyes. Some pedestrians too approached the scene along the path that ran close by and either hurried past or drew closer, depending largely upon the gender.
" Scandalous!" one haughty male voice declared above the hubbub of the crowd gathered about the empty square in which the brawl was proceeding apace. "Someone ought to summon a sentinel. Riffraff should not be allowed into the garden to offend the sensibilities of decent folk."
But although the shabby garments and generally grubby, unkempt appearance of three of the participants in the fight proclaimed them to be undoubtedly of the vary lowed classes, the elegant though scant clothing and general bearing of the fourth told an entirely different story.
" It is Greenleaf, sir," Lord Elaniel explained to the outraged Sir Lolwen.
The name was apparently explanation enough. Sir Lowlen raised a quizzing glass to his eye and from the vantagepoint on horseback peered through it over the heads of those on foot at Prince Legolas Greenleaf, who was stripped to the waist and at that particular moment was having much the worst of the encounter. He had an assailant clamped on each arm while the third pummeled him with hearty enthusiasm in the stomach.
"Scandalous!" Lord Lowlen declared again, while all about him gentlemen cheered or jeered, and two of the three were engaged in laying wagers upon the outcome of such a seemingly unequal contest. " I did not believe I would live to see even Greenleaf stoop as low as to brawl with riffraff."
"Shame!" someone else called as the red-haired giant who was doing the pummeling changed the direction of his assault and planted a fist in his victims undefended right eye, snapping his neck back in the process. " Three against one is no fair odds."
" But he would not accept our assistance," Lord Malfreeigh protested with some indignation. " He made the challenge – and insisted that three against one suited him admirably."
" Greenleaf challenged riffraff?" Lowlen asked with considerable disdain.
" They dared to be insolent after he rebuked them for accosting a milkmaid" Lord Elaniel explained. " But he would not simply chastise them with his whip as the rest of us suggested. He insisted --- oh I say!"
This exclamation was occasioned by Greenleaf, heir to Eryn Lasgalen's response to the punch in the eye. He laughed an incongruously merry sound, and suddenly lashed out neatly with one slim leg and caught his unwary assailant beneath the chin with the toe of his boot. There was a loud cracking of bone and clacking teeth. At the same moment he took advantage of the astonishment of the two who held his arms and twisted free of them. He spun around to face them in a half crouch, his arms outstretched, his finger beckoning. He was grinning.
" Come on, you buggers," he invited profanely. " Or do the odds suddenly appear less to your advantage?"
The opponent whose jaw had just been shattered might have thought so. But although his eyes were open, he appeared more intent upon counting stars wheeling in the morning sky than considering odds.
There was a roar of appreciation from the ever-growing crowd of spectators.
Legolas Greenleaf showed to far better advantage without his tunic than with it. A gentleman of slender grace, he had doubtless appeared an easy mark to the three thugs who had taken him on with a collective smirk of insolent contempt a few minutes before. But the slim legs encased in fashionable breeches and boots, showed themselves to be impressively well muscled now that he had descended from the back of his horse. And his naked chest, shoulders, and arms were those of an elf who had exercised and hones his body to its fullest potential. The white seams of numerous scars on his forearms and chest proclaimed the fact, as his clothes did not, that at one time he had been a military elf.
" Atrocious language to use in a public place," Lowlen remarked disdainfully. " And an unseemly display of flesh, and all over a milkmaid you say? Greenleaf is a disgrace to his name. I pity his father."
But no one, not even Lord Elaniel, to whom his remarks were addressed, was paying him any attention. Two of the bullies who had thought to amuse themselves by coaxing unwilling kisses from an unaccompanied milk maid in the park were taking turns rushing at the Prince, who was laughing at repulsing them with his jabbing fist every time they came within range. Those who knew him were well aware that he spend a few hours of most days at the ranges, sparring with partners far his superior in weight.
" Sooner or later," he said conversationally, " you are going to put together your two half-brains to make one whole and realize that you would stand a far better chance against me if you attacked simultaneously."
Victory came easily and swiftly.
But the morning had one more incident of interest to offer – both for him and the cheering spectators. The milkmaid who had been the unwitting cause of the fracas came hurtling across the grass toward him – the crowd parted obligingly to let her through – flung her arms about his neck, and pressed her person against his.
" Oh thank you, thank you, your worship," she cried fervently, " for saving a girls virtue. I'm a good girl, I am, and they would of stole a kiss or p'raps worse if you 'and't 'appened along to save me. But I'll kiss you, I will. For a reward, being as you earned it an' all."
She was plump and shapely and ruddily pretty and drew shrill whistles and admiring, bawdy comments from the spectators. Prince Legolas grinned at her before dipping his head and availing himself of her offer with a lingering thoroughness. He tossed her a half sovereign along with a wink from his good eye when he was finished, and assured her that she was indeed a good girl.
