Synopsis:
In the time before the War of the Ring, a loved one
was lost. Now, in the peace that follows, Valraen, the King's own cousin
has been found. But her past is covered in darkness and Valraen has no
memory of herself or the Elf she loved. As the forces of darkness that
separated them gather once more, can Legolas bridge the distance between them
and reclaim the one he lost?
Hi All! Here is Chapter 12. I am so terribly sorry about the delay. My studies are getting the better of me. Hopefully this chapter will not be as confusing. My love and thanks to those of you who are continuing to read the story. As always, please read and review!! (We are heading into some majorly dark themes and over the next chapters will finally see some Legolas and Valraen action. It'll be worth it, I promise!).
Legal Stuff – All characters (except Valraen/ Arienel; The Master and Fidelian)
belong to Tokien The Great.
None to me (more's the pity). I am but a
trespasser on his glory.
Chapter 12: The great mountain
Fidelian had lost count of the hours. Unwilling to risk the Master's wrath, he had made his home on the small rock he sat on for the past week. He ate and slept there, knowing that disobedience was more than his small life was worth. Rising painfully from his crouched position, he shifted hesitantly closer to the tall, thin man before him.
The Master was as he had been for days now. Since the small explosive cry he had let out three days ago, there had been no further movement. The candle that sat before him had burnt to the table and Fidelian had been forced to replace it. Its meagre flame reflected eerily off the Master's face, throwing the scars there into sharp relief. Blonde, stringy hair clung heavily to the Master's thin head.
Fidelian's hand moved automatically to his severed ear. Here was the face that haunted his nightmares. Was there a man under all that, he wondered. Was he a man at all? Unaware of his movements, Fidelian now edged his face closer, peering with watery eyes into the Master's closed features. The eyeballs moved rapidly back and forth underneath the pale blue lids, shifting the large scar that ran from the tip of the right eye to and fro. It ran across his cheekbone and through his lips, severing them like a pale blue river. Fidelian found himself drawn to the terrible face. It had a kind of faded beauty.
Quite abruptly, the candle flame expanded, throwing a menacing shadow across the table, and then flickered and died.
Fidelian let out a small cry of alarm and stepped back, tripping over his robes and falling onto the dusty ground.. Looking upwards, he stared, horrified, as the features of the Master drew back into a stretched grimace and then froze..
Fidelian sidled quickly back to his place on the rock. God help me, he thought. But somehow, deep down, he knew that God no longer listened.
***
'Legolas, you are not listening.'
Legolas looked across at the old woman. 'What?' he asked vaguely. 'Oh, I'm sorry. It's this place. The air itself feels dead.'
They had travelled through the forest, for what seemed like both a moment and an eternity, to reach the place at the edge of the dream. Although the old woman had told him he would not need them, Legolas had taken with him his tunic and weapons. When they had finally reached the end of their journey, Legolas had found himself at the base of a great red mountain. Looking up, he saw that its peek was concealed by a blanket of thick grey cloud. Bright glimmers of light shone out periodically from its depths.
The old crone gazed at him sternly. 'It's alright,' she said, 'but Legolas; you must concentrate. You must be prepared for what you will face. Once you are in there, I cannot help you. '
'I know. I'm sorry,' Legolas said. 'Go on.'
'What you are looking at is the entrance to the underworld,' the old woman continued, pointing to the cavernous entrance in the side of the mountain. 'It is there that you will find the shadow that plagues us and the part of Valraen that you must save.'
Legolas looked into the gaping abyss before him. 'The shadow?' he asked, as a particularly large streak of lightning drowned them in light. 'What is it?'
Something akin to pain flickered over the old woman's face before it settled again into an impassive stare. 'Not what,' she whispered. 'But who. Someone we once held very dear.'
Legolas frowned at her but the she shook her head. 'More than that I cannot tell you. Valraen herself does not consciously know,' she said. 'You must discover for yourself.'
'Tell me again,' Legolas said. 'What part of Valraen I must look for?'
The old woman walked towards the entrance to the labyrinth and placed her hand gently on the edge. For a moment, she seemed lost thought.
'I am not entirely sure what part of us - what part of me - exists in there,' she replied finally. 'I can only guess. Once we were one and now we are not. Only by keeping away from this place , have I managed to survive. I know that I am not the part you seek. Neither is she.' She motioned towards the young child who sat playing in the grass behind him. Although Legolas had insisted she stay behind, there seemed to be no separating her from the old woman; where one was the other would follow. 'We are mere images,' she said. 'Representations of the Valraen that you love. We are real, but insubstantial… phantoms.' The old woman stared at him, her features unreadable.
Legolas shook his head apologetically. 'I still do not understand,' he said.
'Legolas, look at me.' The old woman walked purposefully towards him and grasped his face firmly between her ageing hands. 'What do you see?'
Legolas stared at her intently 'I see Valraen,' he said slowly, taking in her soft white hair and her strange, yet familiar, violet eyes. 'Valraen as she will one day be.' The old woman didn't shift. Legolas forced himself not to turn away from her deep stare. Something imperceptible stirred behind it.
'No, wait,' he whispered suddenly. 'I see wisdom.' A flash of understanding sparked in his mind. 'You are Valraen's wisdom.'
A small smile tugged at the old woman's lips. 'And her,' she said, turning him towards the child, who was now busy picking flowers from around the mountainous rocks. 'Who is she?'
Legolas walked over to the small child and knelt down before her. She looked up at him shyly and offered up one of the athelas blooms she clutched in her small hand. Legolas took it and brushed his pale fingers across her soft cheek. 'Innocence,' he whispered.
'She is Valraen's innocence.' He stood up and looked towards the old woman.
'Yes,' she said, now grinning fully. 'Exactly. So what is the part that is missing?'
Legolas contemplated the mountain. All of this was part of Valraen's mind. All of these things: the mountain, the woman, the child, the forest, the cottage; it was all a part of Valraen. He stared at the small girl as she skipped in circles around him and at the old woman's wise face as it regarded him calmly. The part that was missing… what was the part that was lost? A lightening bolt lit the grey clouds above, bringing with it the answer.
'Love,' he said slowly. 'I must find Valraen's heart.'
The old woman clasped her hands together. 'Good,' she said. 'Very good. I always did think very highly of you.'
Energy began to pulse through Legolas' body. Now that he knew what he was looking for and where he had to go, he was eager to begin the quest; eager to save the woman he loved. He had just stepped forward, intending to pass into the great mountain, when the old woman's voice stopped him in his tracks.
'It is damaged, you know,' she said. 'At least, as far as I can tell.'
Legolas turned and stared at her blankly. 'Damaged?' he repeated.
'Her heart,' the old woman said quietly. 'She is not the woman you remember, Legolas. She has seen things… done things, that no –' her voice caught in her throat, as the pain in her features became more pronounced. 'You cannot know what it has been like.'
Legolas frowned at her 'I know she was Selenar,' he said.
'You cannot know, Legolas,' the old woman insisted. 'You do not know what this means. But you will be tested, of this you can be sure. Are you certain you can live with what you will learn? Are you certain your love for her can survive?'
Legolas stared at her, his eyes bright. 'My love for her will last to the end of time. Nothing I learn here will change that.'
The old woman looked at him intently. She opened her mouth to speak, then shook her head imperceptibly, as if she had changed her mind on some important thing.
'We shall see, Legolas Thranduillion,' she said finally. 'Let us hope, for my sake, that you are right.' She reached up and, taking his face between her hands once more, placed a gentle kiss on his forehead.
She stepped back and took the hand of the young girl, who had come to stand at her side.
Legolas took one long, last look at the old woman and the child. Both of them part of Valraen, yet neither one the part he sought. For that he would have to go into the mountain.
He turned towards the entrance before him and, with a last nod to his companions, disappeared into the dark fog beyond.
The old woman, clutching the hand of the young one in hers, watched as the darkness claimed the Elf. 'May the Valar guide you, my love,' she whispered and with that the old woman and the child dissolved into the mist.
***
Valraen had no concept of how long she had sat bound in the dank cave. Time seemed to drag on forever, leaving her with no memory of any other reality. A steady drip of dirty water fell from the roof onto a puddle before her in a deep echoing rhythm. A thin stream of light shown down through the crack in the rock over her head, reflecting waves of light across her pale, battered face. Bruised shadows had crept out from under her eyes. She had neither eaten nor drunk anything in what seemed an age.
Her clothes, nothing more than rags, hung limply around her emaciated form. Her hands and feet were bound in chains attached to the rock behind her. Blood from her wrists trickled in thick rivulets down her arms.
'Please,' she whispered hoarsely to the man standing before her. 'Please kill me. Why won't you let me die?' The last word ended on a sob that turned into a dry, racking cough.
The shadowing figure before her laughed. The sound echoed off the walls and into the labyrinth beyond.
'Die, my beautiful… my darling, Arienel?' he said. 'When we are having so much fun?' He crouched down before her and brought his thin, spidery hand to her face. 'Why would I do such a thing to my best, my most worthy assassin?'
Valraen flinched, repulsed beyond her capacity for reason by his cold, death-like fingers. 'I don't understand,' she sobbed weakly. 'Who are you? What do you want from me?'
The Master ran his fingers across her chin and over her bottom lip. He inserted his thumb between the cracked edges, opening her mouth to his touch. Valraen tried and failed to suppress the shudder that moved through her body.
'You don't remember me, Arienel,' he said softly, his eyes focused intently now on her mouth. 'But I remember you… I know you very well. Very well, indeed.' He leant in towards her and placed an icy kiss across her parched lips.
'He comes for you, you know,' the Master continued vaguely, tracing his fingers now across her cheek and down her neck. 'He is on his way towards you, right now… as we speak.' With these last words, he pressed his thumb deeply into the hollow at the base of her throat. 'He wants to save you.'
Valraen began to weep.
'Won't that be fun to watch, my love?' Running his hand down Valraen's chest, the Master grasped a breast painfully between his fingers. 'Won't it be wonderful to watch him suffer and die? And when he's dead, and the blood is running freely on the ground beneath our feet, I will restore you and you will remember none of it and you will be mine again… my own… my precious Arienel.'