The mountains of Mirkwood were swathed in a tangled weave of green and brown, a chaotic snarl of vines and branches so dense and bewildering that a stranger stumbling into it would likely never escape. Yet to those who had run beneath the leaves of the woodland for two thousand years, the forest was a playground.

Legolas ran swiftly along the slender branch of an elm, feeling the tree shift and strengthen under his feet to allow him safe passage through the canopy. He dropped to the stronger boughs below and leapt from there into an oak, making his way ever downward as the forest thinned and light peered through the leaves.

As Legolas fell easily to the ground, he heard raucous laughter from ahead and the delighted shout of an elf-child. He felt his heart grow lighter and he quickened his pace, eager to see the fun - the halls of Thranduil had lost their mirth of late, and children seemed ever rarer as the Elves sensed their twilight drawing near.

"Ai! Unfair!" As Legolas emerged into the bright sun of the camp, he saw a tiny elf-child struggling in the grip of a tall warrior as another elf feigned an attack, tickling the little one and tousling her hair as she squirmed and shrieked.

"You shall release my subject at once, Ambassadors of Imladris!" Legolas called sternly.

The two warriors turned as one, raising identical eyebrows in an eerily accurate imitation of their father.

"The lady was the aggressor, my lord!" protested one - Legolas could not tell which - as the child giggled in his arms. "She sprang upon us in fierce assault at the very moment we entered the camp, unprovoked, and we had no warning - we were forced to defend ourselves!"

"Is this true?" Legolas asked, fixing the child with a steely glare. "Lady Miriel, did you attack the two finest warriors of the Noldor?"

The elf-child giggled madly and nodded, cheeks flushed and eyes bright as she struggled in the strong grasp.

Legolas glared at Miriel as though extremely displeased. "Then why did you not win?"

"I slaughtered them, Leg'las!" she protested. She made one more attempt to squirm free, and added with a pout, "Then they cheated."

The warrior - Elrohir? - set Miriel down and came forward to meet Legolas, grinning widely. "It has been too long," he said, clasping his forearms tightly. "The little one is at least a head taller than when we last traveled through your realm."

"Aye, and it is good to see growth in the midst of our decline," Elladan added, sending Miriel on her way with a last cuff on her ear. "Remove yourself, muindor-nin, I must greet our sweet prince in turn."

"Prince indeed," Legolas said derisively. "I would thank you to remember that title before you sneak another spider's nest into my quiver, if that is again your purpose in Mirkwood."

"Nay, my lord," Elladan answered. "We have not traveled all the way from Imladris merely to witness you trying to shoot with a tarantula in your hair -" "- Although we did enjoy that," Elrohir added - "Our message concerns a matter more serious."

"The shadow spreads, the forest darkens, trees die, our people grow weak, and those who venture to the south are never again seen by living elf," said a bitter voice from behind. "Is this the subject of your errand?"

A tall, pale elf stood there, his black hair bound in the braids of a ranking Mirkwood warrior, a silver circlet on his brow. The eldest son of Thranduil shared not his father's light build or fair complexion, but his strong features and undeniable air of power were clearly those of the king.

"Seregon!" Elladan quickly detached himself from Legolas and seized the Crown Prince in a turbulent embrace.

Legolas saw his brother stiffen uncomfortably, but only for a moment; then Seregon clapped Elladan roughly on the back and held him out at arm's length. "Unchanged," Seregon remarked with a smile, but Legolas saw no mirth in his eyes; and unchanged was not what Seregon would have said if he had looked more closely at his friend.

In marked contrast to his brother, Elrohir bowed to Seregon and did not move to greet him. Elladan may not have sensed a change in the Crown Prince, but Elrohir had always been the more sensitive; Legolas could see that the younger twin had perceived something amiss since Seregon first spoke.

"My lord," Elrohir said stiffly, "we are sent from Imladris with a message for the Woodland King."

Seregon paused a moment, then forced a laugh. "Formality from a son of Elrond?" he teased. "Then the End of Days is surely near. Come, Elrohir, you must have more than that to say to your old friend!"

"Mirkwood has changed," Elrohir said hesitantly. "As have you."

"I?" asked Seregon, and his voice was strange. "Perhaps. Yet our circumstances warrant change, Imladris - you have heard that the halls of Thranduil have been moved beneath the ground, and our villages drawn ever further north. Indeed, the shadow is now so near that we dare not to venture south of this camp."

"Yet we are only at the foot of the Mountains!" Elrohir protested in astonishment. "Surely the evil has not advanced so far."

"It has, Elrohir," Legolas said quietly. "This hunting camp of Daemar is now our only settlement beyond the Forest Road."

"What of the southern villages?" demanded Elrohir. "Where have the people of the deep forest gone, now that Thranduil's protection has failed?"

Legolas dropped his eyes, and would not answer.

"Evacuated," Seregon said flatly. "Slowly at first, but then faster as we realized the extent of their peril and our weakness. The Elves of Mirkwood hide now in the labyrinths of the palace, frightened and hungry, while hunters and warriors ride out to camps such as this to find what food they can and hold the line against the enemy."

Legolas found his voice. "Daemar is perhaps our safest settlement, for it is our best hunting ground and therefore well protected. Yet unease grows among its people - none are eager to stand against the shadow in the south."

Elrohir felt ill. He had not known that Mirkwood had grown so perilous. The orcs on the Road, and the strange fear of the scouts who had found the brothers and brought them to Daemar - he had dismissed these as aberrations. Yet now they seemed signs of a greater trouble. "These tidings are evil," he murmured. "We did not know how desperate your circumstances had become."

"Yet we offer aid," Elladan cut in. "Imladris shall send a contingent of its finest warriors, and we shall win back your homes in the south and assail the enemy, even at his strongest fortress. Lord Elrond will not suffer the Woodland Realm to fall."

"Fool," Seregon said calmly.

For a moment, Elladan could not speak. "My friend - I do not understand."

"You are a fool," Seregon said again. "There is still hope for Imladris, but you cannot spare a fourth part of such a contingent as could attack Dol Guldur. Mirkwood is beyond your aid."

"Yet you must accept it!" cried Elladan. "If we do not defend your realm, it will fall!"

"Our realm will fall," Seregon said. "It is inevitable."

"It is not inevitable," Legolas answered quietly. He and his brother had argued the matter for many years, but he had begun to feel his faith waning as the Elves were forced ever further to the north. Yet he would not yield. "There is still hope for the Greenwood."

"If hope lives at all, it is far from here," Seregon said. "It will not come."

Elrohir stared disbelieving at the prince. How could his friend of old change so quickly, so completely? "Seregon - this is not how I remember you."

Seregon did not seem to hear. "Thranduil will not accept your aid," he said. "Go home to Imladris, sons of Elrond. Protect it while you are able - however long that may be. Hope will not come to Mirkwood."

*

A flash of silver, then dark blood shone in the moonlight when Aragorn swept his blade across the throat of the wolf. The beast stumbled back with a choking gurgle of pain and fear, then staggered and fell, its life ebbing away as its comrade leapt over its body and sank its teeth into Aragorn's boot.

The snarling wolf shook its massive head, throwing Aragorn to the ground as easily as if he weighed nothing at all, and Aragorn saw stars explode before his eyes as he struck his head hard on a rock. He realized dimly that his sword had fallen from his hand and pulled unthinking an arrow from his quiver; when the wolf let go his boot and leapt onto his chest to seize his throat, he plunged the arrow into its blazing eye. The wolf fell away with an unearthly scream and then collapsed, its head cleaved from its body by Mirlos' curved scimitar.

The southern captain seized Aragorn's hand and yanked him up, but the earth spun under his feet and Aragorn stumbled unsteadily.

"Are you injured?" Mirlos shouted over the howls and cries of battle, his brown face streaming with sweat and grime.

"I can fight!" Aragorn yelled back, pulling his bow from his shoulder to fire an arrow into the chest of a wolf approaching a wounded Ranger from behind.

The company had journeyed unchallenged for two days and a night before the wolves had come upon them. Mirlos had heard the beasts in time to wake the Dunedain from their slumber, but the attack had come too swiftly to form an effective defense; now the camp was in chaos, the Rangers scattered and trapped in desperate combat against the pack, which never seemed to shrink no matter how many they slaughtered.

In the heart of the battle near the fire, Aragorn plunged his recovered blade into an open red maw, blood streaming across his hands; then a blur of black fur leapt for his face, and he whirled reflexively out of its path, a tail slapping his face as the wolf shot by. The beast twisted in the air landed hard to face him again, gathering its legs underneath it for another spring; it leapt, and Aragorn crouched low to drive the blade through its belly.

In the light cast by the blazing fire, Aragorn caught sight of Halbarad, fighting barehanded; the warrior seized a wolf's head with both hands and twisted with a sickeningly loud snap, and heaved its body away to meet another with a kick that sent it sprawling. Yet the wolves pressed him mercilessly back toward the fire, knowing with predatory intelligence that a human without a weapon could only last so long.

Aragorn lunged forward, driving the wolves before him; unslinging his bow from his back, he fell two in quick succession. The wolves encircling Halbarad paused in their attack to regard Aragorn with bright, calculating stares.

Aragorn seized the moment of their brief distraction. "Halbarad!"

The eastern captain glanced up to meet his gaze, teeth bared in the rage of desperate battle. Aragorn would marvel later that Halbarad had survived so long without a weapon, but for now the exhaustion and anger in his face made clear that the Ranger did not have much time. Aragorn unsheathed his blade, and hoping his aim was true, threw it over the wolves' backs to Halbarad, who caught it easily -

- and cast it into the fire.

"Halbarad!"

Aragorn stared bewildered at the Ranger. In the flickering light, Halbarad's eyes gleamed; yet the fury of battle had left him, and he looked upon Aragorn only with contempt? Surely - he cannot hate me so much, to throw away his best chance of survival merely because it came from my hand!

Yet Aragorn had no time to spend in thought. The wolves still pressed their attack; and as the superior skill and weaponry of the Dunedain began to turn the tide of the battle, their assault became still more savage and frenzied. Aragorn did not know how long it was before all the wolves lay dead - he had lost all sense of time, and was now simply tired. He felt that even while he hunted for lost arrows and tended the wounded with care, a part of his mind was numb, and another part still locked in desperate battle.

As Aragorn rose from setting and immobilizing a broken arm, he heard his name called over the stifled moans of the injured and the quiet talk of those well enough to help them. Merenglas stood across the camp where the fire was burning out slowly, a slender figure prone at his feet.

"Halbarad is injured," Merenglas said, "and I have neither the ability nor the time to heal him. He needs your skill, but be swift - we must leave soon."

"I will, my lord," Aragorn answered. His voice betrayed more hesitation than Aragorn cared to reveal, but if Merenglas perceived this he did not show it.

The injuries of the proud Ranger were less serious than Aragorn had anticipated. Indeed, he had feared that after fighting weaponless against a pack of wolves, Halbarad would be dead. He had been both remarkably skillful and extraordinarily lucky. However, ability and good fortune had not saved Halbarad a swollen ankle and numerous cuts and bruises, some serious, others merely painful.

When he had confirmed that the ankle was not broken, Aragorn tore a rag from an old blanket that he had been using for bandages and began to wrap it tightly. It was not broken, but in the Misty Mountains even a slight limp could turn deadly if it caught the wrong eye.

"You must heal quickly," Aragorn said to break the silence. Halbarad was watching him as a snake would watch an eagle overhead - warily, fangs exposed. He did not answer.

Aragorn finished binding the ankle and moved to secure the bandage so that it would not come loose; but a wiry brown hand of uncommon strength seized his wrist.

"Do not try to help me," Halbarad said. He released Aragorn and tore the bandage easily from his ankle. "It is not necessary."

"You need my aid!" Aragorn exclaimed in frustration as Halbarad rose with difficulty to his feet. "Or shall some undeserved malice lead you to risk your life, as you did in battle?"

Halbarad stood above him as he crouched on the ground, staring down at him with simmering anger. "I did not need your aid in battle, nor do I need you now," he said quietly. "I never need you, Heir of Isildur."

*

A/N: My humblest and most groveling apologies for the late chapter. It will not happen again. Actually, it probably will happen again, often. However, the next installment will be posted quite soon - within two days.