Chapter 14

Limloeth took a long time to gather her story, making sure that everything that had happened was clear in her mind. She took such a long time that Lainfea crawled half out of her brother's lap to pinch her sister in the arm.

"Ouch!" Limloeth said, looking at her sister with a startled gaze. "Why did you do that?"
"You have to wake up," the little one stated matter-of-factly. "Wake up and tell Legolas about
the mean people."
"I wasn't sleeping, Lain. I was thinking. It is a hard story to tell. I don't know how to start it."
"You should start with words," Lainfea suggested simply and helpfully, making Legolas smile.

His youngest sister had a way to simplify a problem to a level she could understand and solve it.
"Things aren't always simple, Lainfea," Limloeth tried to explain.
"Sure it is!" the elfling protested. "There were boats and we sneaked onto them.
The mean people didn't see us, because we sneaked very good. We tried to get to you but there were too many mean people, and we needed keys. I sneaked some more and got the keys, and Limloeth magicked their drinks so they fell asleep. Then she got you out of the cage and we jumped of the ship. That's the story." Lainfea climbed out of Legolas' lap and slid off the bed.

"Now I have to go," she announced. "Biddy and I are going to bake cookies!"

Legolas watched her as she skipped off. After the bathtub incident the other day, Biddy and Lainfea had fast become friends, though it was a friendship primarily based upon cookies. Lainfea had tasted them for the first time in her life and had decided that people that baked things so nice couldn't possibly be evil.

Legolas envied her trust in people. He envied her innocence. Just the same, he was exceedingly worried. He knew better than to trust people by the cookies they baked. He worried what it would do to Lainfea if it turned out Biddy and Artamir weren't nice at all.

"They can be trusted," Limloeth said, as if she was following his thoughts.
"How do you know?" Legolas asked, doubt still eating at his heart.
"I can feel it," His sister answered simply. "Now, did you understand anything of Lainfea's story?" she continued with a smile.

"She sneaked around, and you got me out. Oh, and she's going to bake cookies," Legolas answered with a smile of his own.
Limloeth laughed. "Basically what she told you is what happened. In a slightly more complicated way.

When we got on the corsair ship, we could only hope it was the right one, but before we could do anything, we had to find a place to hide somewhere below deck.
Lanthir led the way and found the supply room. It was a perfect hiding place, because there was food there, and shelter as well. The only downside of it was that the corsairs entered on a daily basis, so we always had to be on our guard.
Lanthir and I didn't get any sleep. We were far too nervous, and we had to search for you. After three days on the ship, Lanthir returned to our hiding place telling us that he had found you, but had been unable to reach you."

"You were unconscious and chained when I discovered you," Lanthir interrupted the story. He had woken up somewhere halfway through Limloeth's narrative, and now felt he should add his part.
"Seven corsairs guarded you at all times, sometimes even more. When I saw them, I thought it was hopeless. I got back to Lim and Lain and asked them if they still wanted to go on. I'm sorry, Legolas." His face fell as he said these words, the full brunt of his failure washing over him. "I asked them if we should abandon you. I didn't mean to be a coward. It's just… What if we got you out, but Lainfea died? You told us to leave you behind if you should fall, and I understood. It's just... I didn't want to! I thought maybe, you would want us to..." His brother stopped talking.

"It is alright, Lanthir. I understand," Legolas soothed his brother. He shivered at the thought that one of them would die to save an other. It must have been a hearthbreaking decision his siblings had made to get him out. They took a huge risk.
"It was I who convinced Lanthir we had to go on," Limloeth said. Legolas almost wished he would have been there to see it. Lanthir talking about caution, and Limloeth urging them to step further into danger. Why did miracles always happen when he wasn't there to see them?

"I had a plan than didn't involve violence." At Limloeth's words, Legolas smiled. That made the previous statements a bit less incredible. She continued. "You see, I had been thinking about healing and killing and feeling spirits. It had never been that strong in Mordor, but on the corsair ship I could feel it coming back. It was like I had been blind for years but suddenly regained sight.
I tried a few things. I could send Lainfea to sleep easily, so I wondered, if maybe I could… extend that. To something else, like water. It is hard to explain. "
"Lainfea said you 'magicked' the corsair's drinks," Legolas said, remembering.
Limloeth uttered a short laugh before replying, "Yes, I 'magicked', as Lainfea so eloquently put it, the corsair's drinks. We were in the supply room after all, so the waterbarrels were close at hand. I… extended my healing power to the barrel, and thus made it a sleeping potion without using herbs."

"But it was better than a sleeping potion," Lanthir interrupted. "Because the corsairs didn't have to drink the potion to fall asleep, they just had to touch it. We found that out when one of them came to get a barrel and accidentally spilt some of it on his hand. He dropped to the floor, dead asleep! It was fantastic!"
"It wasn't fantastic at all" Limloeth protested. "There was an unconscious corsair lying in ourhiding place, so we suddenly had to move a lot faster. Lanthir carried Lainfea, and led the way to the place they were keeping you. He was right.You were heavily guarded." She shivered at the memory.

"But Limloeth's 'sleeping water trick' worked perfectly," Lanthir intervened before his sister could continue. "She sprayed water on them, being careful not to get any on herself of course, and everyone of them fell, fast asleep. I was almost dancing."

"But then we realized we had forgotten something," Limloeth said. Lanthir nodded. "Keys. Your guards didn't keep the keys to your cell. They were hidden in the captain's office. The most heavily guarded place on the entire ship. With the exception of the windows."

Limloeth continued; "And the only one of us small enough to slip through those windows..."
"Was Lainfea," Legolas said in understanding.
"Yes, Lainfea," Limloeth confirmed.
"I sneaked to the deck of the ship, taking Lainfea with me, while Limloeth stayed behind defending you with the tainted water. Lainfea got Limloeth's knife. As we reached the window, I lifted her, and then all I could do was watch.

It all went well at the beginning. She moved silently toward the captain's quarters and moved out of my sight. I held my breath and tried following her by sound, but she made none. A few endless minutes later she reappeared, waving at me, pointing at the keys on her belt.
Then suddenly something moved in the edge of the room. The corsair captain had been sleeping there all along, and for some reason chose that moment to wake up. When he spotted Lainfea, my heart stopped beating."

Legolas knew how his brother must have felt. He had felt the same way himself when he had spotted Lanthir lying on the floor of the cave. The feeling of failing the ones you loved most. "What did you do?" he whispered.
"Nothing," Lanthir confessed. "I couldn't move. I didn't know what to do! I…But I didn't have to do anything. Lainfea turned towards the corsair, raised Limloeth's blade, aimed, and threw with all her strength. It hit the captain square in the eye. He never even had the chance to scream. Then she ran toward me, handed me the keys and climbed out of the window."

"So that's how she killed a corsair," Limloeth continued. "Where she learned how to aim and throw a blade beats me."

Legolas, however, understood completely. "The orcs," he whispered as his heart wept for his little sister. "She watched the orcs kill and learned how to do it herself. Arms and legs to hurt, and heart and eyes to kill. How could she not know? How could she have forgotten after seeing it a thousand times?"

"Meanwhile," Limloeth started again, trying to banish those memories from her mind, "I was losing you. When I arrived, I thought you were unconscious, but you weren't. Your eyes were moving, but you didn't respond when I called out to you. All you said was; 'Nana' and then you closed your eyes. I did all I could to keep you alive, but it did not seem enough. I used nearly all my strength to keep your heart beating, to keep your spirit from giving up. When Lanthir and Lainfea arrived with the keys, I had managed to steady your heartbeat to a point where you didn't need my help anymore, but that was it. Your eyes didn't open, and none of your other wounds would heal. I was completely and totally drained. The only thing we could do for you was to get you off that ship. "

"So thats what we did," Lanthir took over once again. "I carried you and we snuck back to the deck. It was dark, and the corsairs were all gathered. Besides the corsairs guarding the captian's office, and the one steering the ship, there were none present that was awake, and those there didn't notice us.

We used ropes that lay there to tie you to my back. Lainfea jumped on Limloeth's and the both of us used the anchor rope to slide into the water and let go. The corsair ship sailed on. They had not even noticed something was amiss. We swam towards the shore, and by all the plants we found there, we realized we were not in Mordor anymore, though we were too worn out to be very happy about it. Well, that's it. That's how we got you out. As me and Limoeth argued what to do next, you woke. We all fell asleep, and we woke up here. The end."

Legolas looked at the dark circles under Limloeth's eyes once more. "Worn out," Lanthir had said. He could see that. Then suddenly he noticed something else.

"What?" Limloeth said as she grew uncomfortable by her brother's stare.

"Your eyes," Legolas said. "You have Nana's eyes." Limloeth looked at his in confusion, but Legolas offered no explanation.

That night, on the corsair ship, when he thought he had seen his mother, Lalaith, he had seen his sister, Limloeth instead.

TBC

Tadaa I posted twice a day, well as it is past midnight.. I actually didn't but still..

Nessa Ar-Feiniel: Yes.. It is that strange, is it,... Poor Legolas..

Rutu: Alright Alright.. I'll update.. Here it is..

Karone Evertree: "Bedankt voor je recensie" That is dutch for thanks for reviewing. And I knew what Quenya was.. I just don't speak it.. Or sindarin, Or silvan. Or blackspeech or anything besides Dutch and English.(and a bit of French and German)

Aly K: Well I'm not making the chapters longer.. Anything up to Chapter 34 is already written, you see.. I'm not altering a thing!

moonshine44: Thanks!