AUTHOR NOTES - This chapter is a brief summary of the events that happened
to the Fellowship between Rivendell and Lothlorien as seen through the eyes
of Legolas (not too long, leaving out quite a bit as well). Though I
specifically said beforehand that this is a fic based upon the book and not
the film, I've included several scenes that resonate the leisure time spent
during the quest, as they appeared onscreen. Also, I couldn't resist: the
cave troll bit is in-with a few alterations, of course. There's a lot of
skipping around now, so I'm cutting some book scenes, adding or expanding
others, but since you all SHOULD know the story line (wink wink nudge
nudge) you should be able to follow it all rather painlessly. Be on the
look out for foreshadowing of future events! (Eowyn, Eowyn, Eowyn...)
Chapter V - An Account of the Quest
They departed at dusk, a time which the Hobbit named Sam whispered reminded him most of the Elves. Legolas agreed, though in an admittedly more cynical way. Sam saw it as the time when the entire world was bathed in the cool blues of twilight, with the first pinpricks of stars showing themselves in the darkening sky: the way he imagined things must have looked upon the shores of Cuiviénen so many thousands of years ago. But Legolas saw it as an ending, a fading, and a steady dwindling that only diminished more and more with each passing minute, as though the dawn would never come again. The shapes of things were lost in the night. The day was denied to the Elves. They were to forever dwell in the constant twilight.
He felt a keening sorrow as he left Rivendell, saying good-bye to Duilwen, Eilinel, Gwindor and Lómion who had gone with him for so far and long. The two Elf-maidens he felt he would never see again though he knew that one day, he too would follow across the phantom sea. He must. They embraced, but kept silent.
Arwen he saw for a moment, but she only had eyes for Aragorn. They met beneath the birch trees near the narrow bridge. The river was trickling quietly: most of the water had frozen up in the mountains with the onslaught of winter. They clung to one another almost violently, but did not kiss.
"Wait for me," he whispered.
She touched the ring of Barahir upon his hand and said, "I swear it, Estel."
Legolas did not know that it was upon Arwen's suggestion that Elrond had selected him for the Fellowship. She never told him thereafter.
Legolas turned and, not looking where he was going, nearly walked right into the dwarf, Gimli. The stout creature seemed at least to be strong and hardy, for he had insisted upon wearing a full coat of Dwarven mail upon his person at all times-a tradition, apparently. Shoved in his belt was an enormous gleaming axe, its blade newly sharpened by Elrond's Elven-smiths. Gloin, Gimli's father, had loudly proclaimed that no Elf could do justice to a blade of Erebor, and Gimli seemed to agree. If the axe hadn't been so dreadfully blunt from his trek to Rivendell, he probably would have refused the smiths' aid. *He's in for a surprise,* Legolas thought to himself, a smile flickering across his face. *Everyone knows the blades of our people are the keenest in all Middle-earth.*
A chorus of voices laced in various languages came from the Last Homely House, as the nine were bidden "Farewell" by Elves, Dwarves, Men and one old Hobbit. Legolas turned his head to see his friends and kin, wondering if it truly was for the last time. The smell of the trees made him delirious with sorrow. They rounded the path and the Last Homely House disappeared from sight.
Walking with his selected companions, Legolas took some comfort. He and Aragorn walked in silence, shoulder-to-shoulder, equal in height and similar in gait. They walked behind the rest, a rear-guard fortified with blade and arrow. He tried to guess Aragorn's mind, but knew the task was fruitless. Legolas could never understand the things that Aragorn would have to face. He knew the Man thought of Arwen, too. The thought of her lit a fire in his dark gray eyes.
They walked for a while, mostly in silence save for the quiet conversation the Hobbits shared. Gimli seemed to be muttering to himself, but no one heeded him. As they went further and further from the borders of Rivendell, the woods seemed to transform from alive and friendly to menacing and savage. Legolas took some comfort in the feral quality of the forest. It was a reminder of home.
He needed comfort. A nameless Elven sense had begun to warn him of something...
Legolas felt the Shadow again.
It was soft, like a humming below even Elven frequency. Yet it was there plainly, in front of him or a bit to the right. His body tensed: evil this close to Rivendell? They had not walked eleven miles. What was going on? Where was it coming from?
Aragorn felt Legolas stiffen, and recognized the alertness in his friend's sharp eyes. He leaned near the Elf and whispered in a low voice: "What is it? I yet feel nothing."
"I know not. It's very faint, but it's there. It is as if it hangs over us." Legolas shook his head. "I am imagining things. It is the effect of the Black Breath still tainting my spirit. Forgive me."
The Man nodded, "That wound may take a long time to heal," and looked away. Yet even as he did so, Legolas' mind acutely focused upon the darkness he felt, the steady pulse. Enlightened, he looked up and his piercing eyes fell upon the curving shoulders of Boromir.
The Shadow flickered, staring him in the face, and went out.
* * *
The days went by with little variation. Life for an Elf passes both quickly and slowly. It seemed they had not been abroad long before the looming form of Caradhras appeared, towering and menacing, the white sun glinting off of the uppermost icy peaks like fangs on the Wargs they had battled some nights ago. The Fellowship was thankful for the fur-lined cloaks made for them in Rivendell. Even Legolas, whom the elements could not fully affect, took comfort in the added warmth.
The trek up the mountain was long and tedious. Legolas passed the time by falling into daydreams. Whenever the snow stung his skin where it landed, he projected his spirit to Mirkwood, just outside its borders, running free upon an open glade. He thought on the cool sound of his father's voice, and the atonal cries of the forest creatures.
The swirling snow was taxing upon all the others' spirits. Yet Legolas, who had been in snow so few times during his long life, reveled in the experience. While the others huddled together, pressed against a cliff face, he stood out alone on an outcropping of rock. He knew that his companions (save Aragorn) looked at him quizzically, but he found that he didn't care. The cold wind whistling through his hair was refreshing. Why were mortals so weak to the pleasures of nature?
Standing alone, Legolas took the white knife from his side and unsheathed it, staring at the beauty of the tempered steel in the white light. Yet the sight of the blade brought him back to the night of June 20th. Suddenly a vision flashed before his eyes and the blade was black with orc-blood, and red with the blood of the Elves. He shoved the knife back into its scabbard, banishing the memories from his mind.
He confessed no sadness when Frodo decided to take a different route. Yet when Moria was discussed, he spoke up.
"I do not wish to go through Moria. Can we not risk the southern road, where at least our enemies will be in daylight and not the smothering dark?"
Yet the voice of the lone Elf was ignored. The gloom of Moria engulfed them all.
* * *
"Look out!" came a cry. It was Pippin.
Legolas wrenched his blade out of the orc's throat and spun around. His reflexes literally forced him to stop thinking and duck just in time as the massive Cave Troll hurled its heavy chain at his head. As it whistled by, Legolas knew the force of the thing would have crushed his skull in an instant. He threw himself back, the shock of the attack making him unsteady. The Troll, annoyed at having missed this prime target, bellowed terribly and brought back its arm again. The Elf ducked. Frustrated, the Troll tried a third time. Legolas managed to throw himself to the side, but a stray orc arrow whistled by his arm, ripping his sleeve and barely missing the flesh.
They had been fighting in this ceaseless manner for a good hour. In time, they wouldn't hold out.
The Cave Troll was furious now. Something in its small, dark mind made it hate Legolas more than the others in the chamber. It saw beauty and wisdom and even maddening compassion: it had to stamp this out. It had to end this thing, this intruding light in his perfect, dim world. With a great roar, it heaved its arm back a fourth time. Legolas' mouth went dry as he realized he had nowhere left to go: orcs below, and a chain the width of a man screaming towards his neck.
Something remarkable happened. The Cave Troll's actions were angry and unmeasured: it had miscalculated the radius of its swing and brought the chain down upon a column. The links coiled around the cylinder twice.
Seeing his chance, Legolas rushed forward. He slammed his foot down upon the chain where two links had caught, securing it around the stone column. Then, without a thought for his own well being, he flew up the taught chain and leapt upon the Troll's back. This wasn't to the creature's liking at all. It screamed and stamped, throwing its weight around, trying to get the horrible, light-dwelling thing off of itself. It hurled up its arms, its huge hands wildly swinging about, hoping to clamp onto a limb he could rend off. But Legolas, quicker than mortal sight, knocked an arrow and aimed it straight down at the base of the Troll's spine. *If I get it right,* Legolas thought to himself, *I'll break its neck. I can end this now.*
As he unleashed the arrow, the Troll clamped its hand around Legolas' leg with a crushing force. But in the next instant, the pain from the arrow made it let go. Legolas, stunned by the pressure on his ankle, shook himself out of shock and leapt off the Troll's shoulders. He cursed himself- he had missed. The Troll was still very much alive: but more annoyed, more bloodthirsty, more haphazard. Someone was going to get very hurt very soon. If only he had gotten that shot! Legolas reached behind him to pull another arrow and was horrified when his hand only caught air. With his ammunition spent, he was vulnerable. He strapped his bow back on and fell to using his knives again; cutting a path toward the slain orcs from whom he might retrieve used arrows.
The orcs seemed to fear him, and yet for their fear they fought him the most fiercely. They remembered what an Elf was: they recognized, with an inborn sense, the scent and sight of their greatest enemy in all of Middle-earth. Legolas did not grant them the luxury of fighting for long. They leapt at him, but he ducked and spun with a grace they could not match, not even in speed and with great numbers. When a spear was thrown at his side, he twisted out of the way and yanked an arrow from a body near his feet. A small fountain of black blood seeped from the disturbed wound. Grimacing, Legolas replaced it in his quiver. He retrieved three more arrows. Sighting the fifth, he heard Aragorn yell. An orc blade had slashed his arm, but did little damage. Legolas smiled grimly, knowing now the Ranger would simply fight harder and more ferociously.
The number of orcs dwindled as more and more fell dead, yet the Troll was unstoppable. When everyone else was distracted with saving their own skins, it cornered young Frodo. Before aught else could be done, they all froze with fear hearing a breathless cry. Legolas whipped around, his heart guessing at what had occurred. Frodo had been smashed in the torso by a lance hurled by none other than the Cave Troll.
Something snapped inside Legolas then. Something changed within each of them.
He spiraled back into action, fighting harder and more recklessly than he had before. Sorrow was stinging his insides like a poisoned dart, but he fought on, gritting his teeth, ignoring the foul blood that was splattering on his skin. He heard Sam break down into hopeless tears, falling to his knees, becoming even smaller. An orc loomed at the sobbing Hobbit but Legolas leapt upon it from a ledge above, cleaving its face into four pieces.
The Troll wasn't finished.
Gimli had been fighting off orcs admirably-for a Dwarf. Yet the Troll seemed to be getting the better of him. It swatted Gimli aside like a doll, hurling him hard into a stone column. Legolas saw his chance to avenge Frodo. The Troll, distracted by the wounded Dwarf, had its back to Legolas. His plan was perfect. Running with all the speed he could muster, Legolas knocked an arrow and threw himself in front of Gimli. The Troll made the mistake of screaming in anger. As soon as it opened its steaming, spike- toothed mouth, the bow of Legolas sung with the note of death and an arrow shot up, embedding itself in the creature's upper palate. Caught off guard, with the end of the arrow in its brain, the Troll moaned and fell back with an echoing boom.
But the damage was done. The Ringbearer had fallen. The most innocent of them all had been taken from them.
*Who will take it now?* he wondered to himself, feeling panic rise in his heart. *Should I? I do not think I should be able-* and he stopped. He felt something growing inside him like a sob. The terror of the Ring was a vice on his throat. His bow began to slip from his fingers, but he caught it again and banished the thought from his mind. Aloud he managed to whisper, "Frodo." It echoed around the silent room.
Aragorn knelt before the Hobbit and picked him up. "We must run before more come. Gandalf, which way leads out?"
The wizard, his eyes dead with sadness, said nothing for a moment. The scream of oncoming orcs shook him back into reality. "This way," he said, and gestured toward the southern door with his orc-grimed sword. "To the Bridge of Khazad-Dûm."
As they took off running, Aragorn let out a cry. "Frodo?"
"I'm alright!" came a small voice. "Put me down. I am not dead."
Legolas thought for a moment that he would burst into tears. He stopped in his tracks and ran back to Aragorn and Frodo, nearly shoving poor Gimli off his feet. Frodo was indeed alive, though a bit pale looking, and breathing hard. He turned to see Legolas' smiling, breathless face and grinned. They had not been lost to each other. Not yet.
Without awaiting an explanation, Aragorn kept running, still holding Frodo in his weakness. Gandalf smiled, and kept sprinting ahead. Legolas knocked an arrow, turned his body and hit an orc in the eye while still running, and he smiled as it met its mark. They were one again. The darkness of Moria would not defeat them.
* * *
Was it Elvish intuition that had granted Legolas the horrible ability to be the first among the Fellowship to see Gandalf's doom spiraling up? The fear that gripped his heart had silenced him. He wanted to scream; "Mithrandir!" but he found himself without even the air to make a sound. The terror of the creature of Morgoth had made him lose all senses. He saw quite clearly the curving arc of the flaming whip as it swung up, and he heard the sound as Gandalf's knees were burned as the thong coiled round them. He wanted to run to the brink of the broken bridge, but he couldn't. He couldn't move, fixed to the place were he stood upon the far side of the chasm. He remembered the nauseous feeling of something holding him back that had afflicted him when the Nazgûl had assailed his envoy at the Ford. This was different. Something inside, not of evil-make, was rooting him to where he stood.
Frodo screamed and then there was silence. A voice, deep and commanding, issued from the crevice.
"Fly you fools!" He was gone.
They stood silent with horror and disbelief, save Frodo who was sobbing freely, fighting Aragorn's strong arms that held him back. Legolas stood open-mouthed, staring at nothing. His lungs burned from running, but he could not breathe. He could not move.
Boromir seized his arm. "Come, Legolas."
He didn't move until the Man physically dragged him out of his stone- still standing position. Stumbling, he ran toward the thin stripes of white light ahead. It was daylight. The sun was shining and beyond, water was running and leaves were glistening. The world did not stop to mourn the passing of the Grey Pilgrim. They ran out, orc arrows whistling behind them, drum beats fading into silence and tears. Legolas stood alone from the others again, staring at the valley below, feeling the wind blow cold against his face, and once again he could not cry.
-Fin-
Continued in Chapter VI - The Council of Galadriel (A considerably less-depressing chapter)
Please o please o please Review!
Chapter V - An Account of the Quest
They departed at dusk, a time which the Hobbit named Sam whispered reminded him most of the Elves. Legolas agreed, though in an admittedly more cynical way. Sam saw it as the time when the entire world was bathed in the cool blues of twilight, with the first pinpricks of stars showing themselves in the darkening sky: the way he imagined things must have looked upon the shores of Cuiviénen so many thousands of years ago. But Legolas saw it as an ending, a fading, and a steady dwindling that only diminished more and more with each passing minute, as though the dawn would never come again. The shapes of things were lost in the night. The day was denied to the Elves. They were to forever dwell in the constant twilight.
He felt a keening sorrow as he left Rivendell, saying good-bye to Duilwen, Eilinel, Gwindor and Lómion who had gone with him for so far and long. The two Elf-maidens he felt he would never see again though he knew that one day, he too would follow across the phantom sea. He must. They embraced, but kept silent.
Arwen he saw for a moment, but she only had eyes for Aragorn. They met beneath the birch trees near the narrow bridge. The river was trickling quietly: most of the water had frozen up in the mountains with the onslaught of winter. They clung to one another almost violently, but did not kiss.
"Wait for me," he whispered.
She touched the ring of Barahir upon his hand and said, "I swear it, Estel."
Legolas did not know that it was upon Arwen's suggestion that Elrond had selected him for the Fellowship. She never told him thereafter.
Legolas turned and, not looking where he was going, nearly walked right into the dwarf, Gimli. The stout creature seemed at least to be strong and hardy, for he had insisted upon wearing a full coat of Dwarven mail upon his person at all times-a tradition, apparently. Shoved in his belt was an enormous gleaming axe, its blade newly sharpened by Elrond's Elven-smiths. Gloin, Gimli's father, had loudly proclaimed that no Elf could do justice to a blade of Erebor, and Gimli seemed to agree. If the axe hadn't been so dreadfully blunt from his trek to Rivendell, he probably would have refused the smiths' aid. *He's in for a surprise,* Legolas thought to himself, a smile flickering across his face. *Everyone knows the blades of our people are the keenest in all Middle-earth.*
A chorus of voices laced in various languages came from the Last Homely House, as the nine were bidden "Farewell" by Elves, Dwarves, Men and one old Hobbit. Legolas turned his head to see his friends and kin, wondering if it truly was for the last time. The smell of the trees made him delirious with sorrow. They rounded the path and the Last Homely House disappeared from sight.
Walking with his selected companions, Legolas took some comfort. He and Aragorn walked in silence, shoulder-to-shoulder, equal in height and similar in gait. They walked behind the rest, a rear-guard fortified with blade and arrow. He tried to guess Aragorn's mind, but knew the task was fruitless. Legolas could never understand the things that Aragorn would have to face. He knew the Man thought of Arwen, too. The thought of her lit a fire in his dark gray eyes.
They walked for a while, mostly in silence save for the quiet conversation the Hobbits shared. Gimli seemed to be muttering to himself, but no one heeded him. As they went further and further from the borders of Rivendell, the woods seemed to transform from alive and friendly to menacing and savage. Legolas took some comfort in the feral quality of the forest. It was a reminder of home.
He needed comfort. A nameless Elven sense had begun to warn him of something...
Legolas felt the Shadow again.
It was soft, like a humming below even Elven frequency. Yet it was there plainly, in front of him or a bit to the right. His body tensed: evil this close to Rivendell? They had not walked eleven miles. What was going on? Where was it coming from?
Aragorn felt Legolas stiffen, and recognized the alertness in his friend's sharp eyes. He leaned near the Elf and whispered in a low voice: "What is it? I yet feel nothing."
"I know not. It's very faint, but it's there. It is as if it hangs over us." Legolas shook his head. "I am imagining things. It is the effect of the Black Breath still tainting my spirit. Forgive me."
The Man nodded, "That wound may take a long time to heal," and looked away. Yet even as he did so, Legolas' mind acutely focused upon the darkness he felt, the steady pulse. Enlightened, he looked up and his piercing eyes fell upon the curving shoulders of Boromir.
The Shadow flickered, staring him in the face, and went out.
* * *
The days went by with little variation. Life for an Elf passes both quickly and slowly. It seemed they had not been abroad long before the looming form of Caradhras appeared, towering and menacing, the white sun glinting off of the uppermost icy peaks like fangs on the Wargs they had battled some nights ago. The Fellowship was thankful for the fur-lined cloaks made for them in Rivendell. Even Legolas, whom the elements could not fully affect, took comfort in the added warmth.
The trek up the mountain was long and tedious. Legolas passed the time by falling into daydreams. Whenever the snow stung his skin where it landed, he projected his spirit to Mirkwood, just outside its borders, running free upon an open glade. He thought on the cool sound of his father's voice, and the atonal cries of the forest creatures.
The swirling snow was taxing upon all the others' spirits. Yet Legolas, who had been in snow so few times during his long life, reveled in the experience. While the others huddled together, pressed against a cliff face, he stood out alone on an outcropping of rock. He knew that his companions (save Aragorn) looked at him quizzically, but he found that he didn't care. The cold wind whistling through his hair was refreshing. Why were mortals so weak to the pleasures of nature?
Standing alone, Legolas took the white knife from his side and unsheathed it, staring at the beauty of the tempered steel in the white light. Yet the sight of the blade brought him back to the night of June 20th. Suddenly a vision flashed before his eyes and the blade was black with orc-blood, and red with the blood of the Elves. He shoved the knife back into its scabbard, banishing the memories from his mind.
He confessed no sadness when Frodo decided to take a different route. Yet when Moria was discussed, he spoke up.
"I do not wish to go through Moria. Can we not risk the southern road, where at least our enemies will be in daylight and not the smothering dark?"
Yet the voice of the lone Elf was ignored. The gloom of Moria engulfed them all.
* * *
"Look out!" came a cry. It was Pippin.
Legolas wrenched his blade out of the orc's throat and spun around. His reflexes literally forced him to stop thinking and duck just in time as the massive Cave Troll hurled its heavy chain at his head. As it whistled by, Legolas knew the force of the thing would have crushed his skull in an instant. He threw himself back, the shock of the attack making him unsteady. The Troll, annoyed at having missed this prime target, bellowed terribly and brought back its arm again. The Elf ducked. Frustrated, the Troll tried a third time. Legolas managed to throw himself to the side, but a stray orc arrow whistled by his arm, ripping his sleeve and barely missing the flesh.
They had been fighting in this ceaseless manner for a good hour. In time, they wouldn't hold out.
The Cave Troll was furious now. Something in its small, dark mind made it hate Legolas more than the others in the chamber. It saw beauty and wisdom and even maddening compassion: it had to stamp this out. It had to end this thing, this intruding light in his perfect, dim world. With a great roar, it heaved its arm back a fourth time. Legolas' mouth went dry as he realized he had nowhere left to go: orcs below, and a chain the width of a man screaming towards his neck.
Something remarkable happened. The Cave Troll's actions were angry and unmeasured: it had miscalculated the radius of its swing and brought the chain down upon a column. The links coiled around the cylinder twice.
Seeing his chance, Legolas rushed forward. He slammed his foot down upon the chain where two links had caught, securing it around the stone column. Then, without a thought for his own well being, he flew up the taught chain and leapt upon the Troll's back. This wasn't to the creature's liking at all. It screamed and stamped, throwing its weight around, trying to get the horrible, light-dwelling thing off of itself. It hurled up its arms, its huge hands wildly swinging about, hoping to clamp onto a limb he could rend off. But Legolas, quicker than mortal sight, knocked an arrow and aimed it straight down at the base of the Troll's spine. *If I get it right,* Legolas thought to himself, *I'll break its neck. I can end this now.*
As he unleashed the arrow, the Troll clamped its hand around Legolas' leg with a crushing force. But in the next instant, the pain from the arrow made it let go. Legolas, stunned by the pressure on his ankle, shook himself out of shock and leapt off the Troll's shoulders. He cursed himself- he had missed. The Troll was still very much alive: but more annoyed, more bloodthirsty, more haphazard. Someone was going to get very hurt very soon. If only he had gotten that shot! Legolas reached behind him to pull another arrow and was horrified when his hand only caught air. With his ammunition spent, he was vulnerable. He strapped his bow back on and fell to using his knives again; cutting a path toward the slain orcs from whom he might retrieve used arrows.
The orcs seemed to fear him, and yet for their fear they fought him the most fiercely. They remembered what an Elf was: they recognized, with an inborn sense, the scent and sight of their greatest enemy in all of Middle-earth. Legolas did not grant them the luxury of fighting for long. They leapt at him, but he ducked and spun with a grace they could not match, not even in speed and with great numbers. When a spear was thrown at his side, he twisted out of the way and yanked an arrow from a body near his feet. A small fountain of black blood seeped from the disturbed wound. Grimacing, Legolas replaced it in his quiver. He retrieved three more arrows. Sighting the fifth, he heard Aragorn yell. An orc blade had slashed his arm, but did little damage. Legolas smiled grimly, knowing now the Ranger would simply fight harder and more ferociously.
The number of orcs dwindled as more and more fell dead, yet the Troll was unstoppable. When everyone else was distracted with saving their own skins, it cornered young Frodo. Before aught else could be done, they all froze with fear hearing a breathless cry. Legolas whipped around, his heart guessing at what had occurred. Frodo had been smashed in the torso by a lance hurled by none other than the Cave Troll.
Something snapped inside Legolas then. Something changed within each of them.
He spiraled back into action, fighting harder and more recklessly than he had before. Sorrow was stinging his insides like a poisoned dart, but he fought on, gritting his teeth, ignoring the foul blood that was splattering on his skin. He heard Sam break down into hopeless tears, falling to his knees, becoming even smaller. An orc loomed at the sobbing Hobbit but Legolas leapt upon it from a ledge above, cleaving its face into four pieces.
The Troll wasn't finished.
Gimli had been fighting off orcs admirably-for a Dwarf. Yet the Troll seemed to be getting the better of him. It swatted Gimli aside like a doll, hurling him hard into a stone column. Legolas saw his chance to avenge Frodo. The Troll, distracted by the wounded Dwarf, had its back to Legolas. His plan was perfect. Running with all the speed he could muster, Legolas knocked an arrow and threw himself in front of Gimli. The Troll made the mistake of screaming in anger. As soon as it opened its steaming, spike- toothed mouth, the bow of Legolas sung with the note of death and an arrow shot up, embedding itself in the creature's upper palate. Caught off guard, with the end of the arrow in its brain, the Troll moaned and fell back with an echoing boom.
But the damage was done. The Ringbearer had fallen. The most innocent of them all had been taken from them.
*Who will take it now?* he wondered to himself, feeling panic rise in his heart. *Should I? I do not think I should be able-* and he stopped. He felt something growing inside him like a sob. The terror of the Ring was a vice on his throat. His bow began to slip from his fingers, but he caught it again and banished the thought from his mind. Aloud he managed to whisper, "Frodo." It echoed around the silent room.
Aragorn knelt before the Hobbit and picked him up. "We must run before more come. Gandalf, which way leads out?"
The wizard, his eyes dead with sadness, said nothing for a moment. The scream of oncoming orcs shook him back into reality. "This way," he said, and gestured toward the southern door with his orc-grimed sword. "To the Bridge of Khazad-Dûm."
As they took off running, Aragorn let out a cry. "Frodo?"
"I'm alright!" came a small voice. "Put me down. I am not dead."
Legolas thought for a moment that he would burst into tears. He stopped in his tracks and ran back to Aragorn and Frodo, nearly shoving poor Gimli off his feet. Frodo was indeed alive, though a bit pale looking, and breathing hard. He turned to see Legolas' smiling, breathless face and grinned. They had not been lost to each other. Not yet.
Without awaiting an explanation, Aragorn kept running, still holding Frodo in his weakness. Gandalf smiled, and kept sprinting ahead. Legolas knocked an arrow, turned his body and hit an orc in the eye while still running, and he smiled as it met its mark. They were one again. The darkness of Moria would not defeat them.
* * *
Was it Elvish intuition that had granted Legolas the horrible ability to be the first among the Fellowship to see Gandalf's doom spiraling up? The fear that gripped his heart had silenced him. He wanted to scream; "Mithrandir!" but he found himself without even the air to make a sound. The terror of the creature of Morgoth had made him lose all senses. He saw quite clearly the curving arc of the flaming whip as it swung up, and he heard the sound as Gandalf's knees were burned as the thong coiled round them. He wanted to run to the brink of the broken bridge, but he couldn't. He couldn't move, fixed to the place were he stood upon the far side of the chasm. He remembered the nauseous feeling of something holding him back that had afflicted him when the Nazgûl had assailed his envoy at the Ford. This was different. Something inside, not of evil-make, was rooting him to where he stood.
Frodo screamed and then there was silence. A voice, deep and commanding, issued from the crevice.
"Fly you fools!" He was gone.
They stood silent with horror and disbelief, save Frodo who was sobbing freely, fighting Aragorn's strong arms that held him back. Legolas stood open-mouthed, staring at nothing. His lungs burned from running, but he could not breathe. He could not move.
Boromir seized his arm. "Come, Legolas."
He didn't move until the Man physically dragged him out of his stone- still standing position. Stumbling, he ran toward the thin stripes of white light ahead. It was daylight. The sun was shining and beyond, water was running and leaves were glistening. The world did not stop to mourn the passing of the Grey Pilgrim. They ran out, orc arrows whistling behind them, drum beats fading into silence and tears. Legolas stood alone from the others again, staring at the valley below, feeling the wind blow cold against his face, and once again he could not cry.
-Fin-
Continued in Chapter VI - The Council of Galadriel (A considerably less-depressing chapter)
Please o please o please Review!