Author: Mirrordance

Title: Escape

Summary: Aragorn is lost during a tour with the Rangers, and Legolas later finds him in Bree, without his memories & happily relieved of all his noble burdens, making the elf hesitate to bring him back to who he truly was.

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PART 4

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Outskirts of Bree

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      The smell was curiously a mix of the foul and the invigorating (or perhaps simply intoxicating).  Even from the barest of its outskirts, busy Bree was a hub of concentrated activity, and the pair of warrior elves looked at it from atop a gently sloping hill, considering their options.

      ~Lord Elrond said his sons were in hot pursuit of the Rangers,~ said Legolas, ~I've heard many a tale from Estel of them stopping by here.~

      ~I've personally never been,~ shared Haldir wrinkling his nose, ~nor do I desire to do so.~

      ~It is on the way to the North and so we really might as well,~ Legolas pointed out.

      ~We will stick out like sore thumbs,~ Haldir said dispassionately, glancing at his clothes, ~Unless you plan to roll around in the mud and actually look and smell like the edain.~

      Legolas almost smiled.  After a week of near-ceaseless traveling, he was getting more and more accustomed to the Lothlorien elf's candid ways.  Haldir had Estel's honesty, if not his charm. This particular instance, however, would have lent him a measure of joy anyway, whether he was beginning to get used to the other elf or not; the comment was mostly an unfair assessment, he thought, but was rather keen on teasing Estel of the same thing.  He kept this to himself though. 

      ~I've been here some years before,~ he said instead, pulling the hood of his cloak over his head, ~This should do for now.~

      He urged his horse forward.

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      The Prancing Pony Inn was a place of sensational legend.  In the daylight it was a pleasant enough, though it was still undoubtedly a tired-looking house in an even more bedraggled town.  But at night, alive as it was with merry drunken fools and the wild flicker of scattered candlelight, it looked energized and stimulating, full of exotic strangers, travelers, drifters, merchants.

      The adventurer in Legolas was invoked, though he kept his mind level against what he had to do.  Haldir beside him looked as coolly indifferent as always, though it was also painfully clear to Legolas that the Lothlorien elf was profoundly dismayed at, what to Legolas was actually an enchantingly different kind of disorder.

      Legolas made his way up to the innkeeper, who could not have been anyone else but the owner Mr. Butterbur, as was mentioned by sign outside.

      "I seek the Rangers," Legolas said to the man, who was busy seeing to his guests.

      "They came by some weeks hence," the innkeeper replied distractedly, handing out the local brew before turning to face the new arrival.  His eyes lit in surprise and pleasure at finding the glowing face of an elf undimmed even by the dark of his hood.

      "They lost one of their own, I heard,"
 he continued, "Though they never really were much for merrymaking to begin with.  They held their corners, brooding, watching life unfold.  They were often quiet, except in those instances when they would tell some tale or news from their multitude of travels.  A curiosity is what they are, rather than friends of us Bree-folk.  Hostile peoples I bet they are, and you knew, just knew, in their silence, they listened to everything.  'Tis a fool who would want to keep their company, I say."

      "Would you know of anyone who can give me information on their whereabouts?" asked Legolas.

      The innkeeper shook his head, "They always know more than what is actually known of them, I'm afraid."

      "I see," said Legolas, tossing the old man a golden coin from one of his discrete pockets, "Thank you for your time."

      "Will you not have a drink?" asked the man, "Or perhaps stay a night?"

      "Our business is more or less done here," Legolas said, nodding and turning to leave.  The old man seemed hesitant to let him go, though.

      "We do not have many elves come by here," he said, "A shame that you will leave so soon and not regale us with your tales.  Why, some weeks back another pair of elves inquired of the same, and left just as quickly.  And one other some weeks after that.  All of you strange folk looking for them cursed Rangers.  What is happening out there in the rest of the world, master?"

      Legolas stared at the old man for a moment, not really knowing how to answer.  The pair of elves must have been Elladan and Elrohir.  The one after that must have been Sari.  For a town that was generally not much frequented by elves, it really would have been a curiosity to know why it was they suddenly seemed to come in reasonable force, all seeking the same thing.

      "Nothing that concerns you," Haldir said to him coolly, "And nothing that needs any worrying."

      "Everything concerns everyone here," the old man said wryly, but he let them go at that, saying, "I'll hold my tongue, as you would have it.  Stranger folk have come and gone here than you, leaving more questions than answers.  'Tis hardly new.  I just thought perhaps you'd indulge an old man."

      "I happen to be much older than you," Haldir said, almost smiling, just before he and Legolas left the inn.

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      Outside the Prancing Pony, the night breeze still seemed to manage to trickle into noisy, busy old Bree.  Legolas and Haldir clung to the refreshing blessing, small as it was, and breathed it in.

      The streets here were no less populated than the notorious inn.  Much more so this night, for people seemed to be crowding a makeshift stage set up by a motley crew of traveling actors. 

      Legolas and Haldir paused for a moment, glancing at art that their elvish senses deemed hideously inadequate and almost painful.  The elderly man who presently held the stage was a rather terrible performer, standing there with profound unease.  What was even stranger was that he had a pair of carrots attached to his ears, and Legolas and Haldir blanched almost simultaneously the moment they realized this man was acting as an elf, of all things!

      "Where goes my s-s-son?" the 'elf' asked out loud, as if giving someone a hopelessly obvious cue to enter, looking left, and then right.

      ~Have they no shame?!~ Haldir exclaimed, fascinated and embarrassed for the performers.

      Legolas opened his mouth to say something more veiled though probably just as scathing, when the most astounding sight in the world stepped forward from the wings of that rickety stage.

      "You would know not to look for me, further, father," the new entrant said in a jovial, achingly familiar voice, "If you looked but a point further than the tip of your raised nose."

      The crowd ooohed at the remark implying the marked aloofness of the elves, and the entrant bowed gamely at them, making some locals laugh and scream in delight.

      ~Oh for the Valar's sake,~ muttered Haldir, ~Let us leave this place and strive to forget this mockery of a dignified art form.~

      Legolas wordlessly held his ground, gaze arrested.  Haldir looked at him with eyes wide, trying to comprehend why he would not leave the offensive performance.  He turned back to the stage, where one of the elderly actor's carrot-elven-ears fell off.  The crowd laughed, especially when he stooped forward and the other ear fell off too.  He doddered quite a bit, and all the laughing only seemed to worsen his already-terrible performance.  The other actor though, held such a mighty presence.  Tall, and dark-haired, muscular and strong, he sucked the already-meager light from the grim night, a sight to behold was he, a great force, a King.

      Legolas pushed his way past the crowds.  It was rude, yes, but most of Bree hardly gave a care.  Brows furrowed, Haldir followed him forward as he made his way to the front of the stage.

      To Haldir's misery, they stood amidst the crowd of laughing fools 'til the end of what was admittedly a comedy that was only funny because it was performed so profoundly wrongly.  Either way, the laughter resounded in the night, and the cheers were loud as the band of actors bowed out and concluded their performance.

      Oh Estel, Legolas thought, as he watched the burly human bow and smile, apparently unaware that he was there, You always seemed to know just how to get into trouble.

     

      And you always seemed to know just how to find me.

TO BE CONTINUED…