Oh, someone pointed out to me that I should include English translations for the Sindarin I used…heh, sorry about that. For the previous chapters, translations follow thus:

Tua amin, Ada – help me, father

Tampa – stop

'Quel amrun – roughly translated "Good morning/day"

Taruku - ox

Okay, this isn't a new chapter, but a fixed one. I've decided to change the plotline a little, just to be a little nicer (not to mention more reasonable) to poor Aragorn. Anyway, let me know what you guys think. Make more sense? Make less sense? As always, I was too lazy to get a beta, so if you see mistakes point them out in a review, and I'll change them in my original copy. As always, a pleasure doing business. J Have a happy!

Aragorn could feel the ground beneath him shifting as he slowly regained consciousness. For a moment, he couldn't figure out where he was, or how he'd gotten there. He now knew he was on a horse, and someone was holding him upright, but that was all he could tell. He tried to open his mouth, but found a wad of cloth firmly bound around his mouth. Suddenly, memory came crashing down around him as he realized where he was and his eyes snapped open. He found himself looking up at the face of a man he remembered being named Corbin and without thinking, rolled himself away from the perceived threat. He grunted as his body collided with the ground several feet below him. Right…forgot about that whole being on a horse thing.

"Hey, stop guys!" Corbin shouted to the head of the line of packhorses.

Aragorn didn't move from where he landed, waiting for the world to shift into focus before trying anything more drastic than lying perfectly still. However, the tilting world before him didn't prevent him from rolling away from the hand that touched his shoulder. He immediately pulled his hands up in front of his face, warding off any attack.

"Whoa kid…not gonna hurt you…" the man assured, holding his hands palm out to show he had no weapons.

Aragorn glared at him and scooted further back until he hit a tree. He folded his arms as best he could with his wrists bound together and would've stuck out his tongue if he had not been wearing a gag. He didn't care if he was acting like the child his older brothers, Elladan and Elrohir, constantly accused him of being. If these people were still intent on kidnapping him, he would make sure they thought long and hard about how worthwhile their hassle would be.

Corbin laughed at the boy, who was obviously no longer scared of them, but resolved to stay right where he was. "Okay, I understand. Not much worth in what I say, considering how well you've been treated."

Aragorn tugged at the gag around his mouth and managed to slip it down around his throat. "I want to go home," he stated vehemently.

"We're taking you home," Corbin reassured. He knew the others were watching him now, trying to gauge how much of a problem this child was going to be.

"Not your home, taruku," Aragorn spat. "My home. I want to go back to Rivendell."

"Look, kid, I know you think they're your family, but they're not. You're not even the same race," Corbin pointed out.

"I was adopted!" Aragorn protested. "Not kidnapped! This is kidnapping! I know the difference!" As his temper flared, Aragorn noted with a slight hint of amazement, his Common didn't sound nearly as accented. If one good thing could come of it, perhaps his language skills would improve. Ada always said he was a fast learner.

Corbin looked slightly ashamed when Aragorn brought up the fact that he thought of this as kidnapping.

The apparent leader of the band, Kendak (if memory served him properly), had turned his horse around from the head of the line and now stood towering over the youngster. "Look, kid, you belong amongst your own kind. Whether you were 'adopted' or not. You're human, like it or not, and you should grow up with your own kin. Now stop acting like a brat and come quietly."

Aragorn couldn't prevent the almost animalistic snarl of contempt that escaped his lips.

"I won't hesitate to have you gagged…and blindfolded," Kendak warned.

"You do so well at convincing me 'my kind' are worth spending the time with," Aragorn muttered hatefully underneath his breath.

The boy allowed himself to be picked up once more by Corbin, though went completely limp in his grasp, giving about as much help as a corpse.

Corbin grunted under the effort of trying to lift the kid dead weight.

"By the stars, kid, how can someone so small weigh so damn much?" he asked, finally managing to wrestle the kid onto the front of the saddle. However, as soon as he let go of the boy's shirt to swing himself into the saddle, the boy started sliding back off the other direction.

"Hey! You're gonna break you neck!" Corbin scolded, shifting Estel back into place. He looped the boy's tied wrists around the pommel, hoping that the threat of two dislocated shoulders would discourage him from falling off again.

Estel sat up straighter in his seat, frowning slightly at his new predicament as Corbin swung up behind him.

"Are you done fooling around?" Rhoran asked impatiently.

"We're set," Corbin called back to the head of the line.

As they started forwards, Estel fell limply forwards, collapsing over the horse's neck.

"You can misbehave all you want, kid, we're still taking to back with us," Corbin stated matter-of-factly.

Estel muttered something in the strange language he kept using into the horse's ear. The chestnut flicked its ear backwards, listening carefully to the young boy.

"Oh, isn't that cute…the little savage can talk to animals," Rhoran snorted, dropping back in the line so he was now behind Corbin and Estel.

Estel shot a dirty look at Rhoran over his shoulder. He clenched his teeth together and let out a shrill whistle, leaning forwards as he did so and grabbing onto the pommel with both hands as all the horses reared on their hind legs, trying to throw their riders to the ground.

Corbin's horse bolted, slamming into Kendak's big gray as they thundered past, with Corbin barely clinging to the reins.

As he shouted in alarm, lurching forwards and instinctively grabbing the boy around the waist, he could hear Estel laughing, urging the horse on.

Corbin hauled on the reins, but they pulled short and the horse didn't slow as they continued to gallop down the path. A branch that brushed over Estel's head caught Corbin full in the face, almost knocking him loose once more.

Why isn't the horse slowing down? Corbin thought desperately, pulling harder on the reins. He ducked as a particularly low branch whipped overhead and caught sight of his problem: Estel had wrapped the reins around pommel, rendering them entirely useless. He was guiding the horse simply by touch and his voice, which was still uttering that strange, musical language.

"Stop the horse!" Corbin shouted. "Estel, stop the horse!" Corbin knew this path well. In a few turns, they were going to hit a particularly overgrown section of the trail. Huge tree roots crisscrossed into a tangled mess that a horse would be lucky to get around at a walk, let alone a full gallop.

Estel ignored his plea however, and continued to whisper fervently to the horse.

"Estel! The path up ahead isn't safe!" Corbin tried again, this time trying to grab the reins further up, beyond where they were secured to the saddle.

Estel elbowed him hard in the stomach, knocking the air from his lungs temporarily, hissing something at him.

"Stop the -" Corbin's demand was cut short as Estel suddenly shouted a familiar word: "Tampa!"

The horse suddenly braced its legs, skidding along the dirt trail several feet before coming to a complete stop, sides heaving and nostrils flared.

Corbin cautiously looked over Estel's shoulder, and heaved a sigh of relief. They had missed the roots by a few spare inches. "Jeez, kid, you scared me."

Suddenly, Estel started laughing. Not the tense giggling of someone who had barely avoided death, but that of someone who had just had the greatest time of his life. For the first time since they met him, Estel was smiling. Not a tiny smile, but a beaming one that engulfed his whole face.

Corbin couldn't help himself. Estel's laughter was contagious. He released his death grip around the boy's waist, leaning back in the saddle. "Stars, you almost scared me to death."

Estel suddenly stopped laughing, turning his head to the side as if listening for something.

Corbin tensed. "What?" he whispered. Then he heard it. The distant pounding of shod hooves beating down the path after them. "Oh, that's just the others, no need to worry…" The man trailed off. The look of desperation and longing on Estel's young face was almost heart-breaking and Corbin wondered if they really were doing the "right" thing by this kid.

The boy's exuberant attitude deflated like a balloon someone stabbed with a pin, his shoulders slumping forwards and his smile pressing into a firm line.

"Look, it really will be all right, you'll see. You'll like the village," Corbin said, not sure who he was trying to convince.

Estel stared off to the side of the trail, his silver eyes unblinking. "If I stay in the village, how will Ada and El know where I am?"

"Who?"

"My father and brothers…how will they know where I am?"

The others were fast approaching, they would be there any minute.

"I'll tell them," Corbin said. "What's your father's name?"

"You promise you'll tell them?" Estel asked warily.

"I promise."

Estel took a deep breath. "My father is Lord Elrond, master of Rivendell."

Corbin's insides felt like they had turned to ice. This is Lord Elrond's child? He knew Estel had said Elrond had adopted him, but somehow that didn't register in Corbin's mind that the Lord of Imladris had raised the boy as his son.

"You'll tell him?" Estel asked, his eyes desperately searching the man's own.

"There you are!" Tyn's voice called. "We were beginning to think you would never stop!"

"I promise," Corbin whispered, before turning in his seat to face the others as the came round the bend.

"Why didn't you stop sooner?" Kendak demanded angrily. "We must've chased you about half a mile!"

"Sorry," Corbin said, "I dropped the reins. He pulled the horse to a stop." He nodded in the direction of Estel, who stared back at him quizzically.

"That little runt pulled your horse out of a head run?" Rhoran said skeptically. Corbin's horse was one of the more mule-headed of the horses in the group, and was known for taking the bit in his mouth and running with it.

Corbin shrugged. "Like you said, he talks to animals."

Kendak eyed his second-hand man wearily. "Right…well, let's get moving. I want to make it to Falling Waters by tonight."

Corbin waited, his eyes downcast, as the other rode by him to take the lead. He knew what they were doing was wrong, but to go against Kendak? More importantly, Rhoran? Not for the first time, Corbin cursed himself for being a coward.

That night, as they were setting up camp, Dabryn stuck the bound Estel off to the side of the campsite so he would be out of the way while they were pitching tents. On Rhoran's insistence, he tied the boy's hands behind him, staking them firmly to the ground.

Corbin kept staring off into the distance, biting his thumbnail, as he was wont to do whenever he was nervous.

"Corbin?" Tyn asked, gently laying his hand on his friend's shoulder. "Are you alright?"

"Hmm?" Corbin blinked. "Yeah, I'm fine. Just…thinking."

Tyn gave him a look that clearly stated "Well, duh."

Corbin sighed. "Does Estel look familiar to you?"

Tyn raised an eyebrow and glanced over at the boy, who was flat on his back staring up at the canopy. "A little, but I don't know why. Maybe he just has one of those faces."

"He looks like Adelle's boy," Corbin stated firmly. "Marcus's son."

Tyn shrugged. "I was just a kid when Marcus's son was killed. I don't remember him that well. What does that have to do with anything?"

"Kendak was the boy's godfather. He took it pretty hard, losing him that way. Lady Adelle took it worse. Just sort of holed up inside herself, not caring about much of anything, and started to waste away. Poor Marcus had his heartbroken…he'd lost his son and now it looks like he's losing his wife. Kendak always thought there was nothing to be done about it…but then…"

"We found Estel," Tyn finished quietly, feeling his stomach drop. "Corbin, how much like Galen does Estel look?"

"Almost a spitting image. Galen had his mother's eyes, and his father's dark hair." Corbin ran a hand through his hair and over his face. "I want to let the poor kid go. I've never seen a kid more miserable in my life…but then I think of Lady Adelle, and Marcus, who have suffered so much. Estel could be happy with them, but…" Corbin trailed off. "Why does the right thing have to be so complicated?"

Aragorn wasn't paying much attention to the camp, his focus on the tawny rabbit that had hopped up next to him a moment ago, oblivious to the men invading his space.

"I wish I could be ignored by them so easily," Aragorn muttered to himself. He had slipped back into Sindarin after his brief conversation with Corbin.

Aragorn glanced up to see where Corbin was, curious whether he could somehow ensure he would tell both the El's and his father where he was. He had never been gone from home for so long. Elladan was going to pound him, once he was through fussing.

He caught sight of the man talking to his younger friend on the other side of the camp, both glancing in his direction with worried looks on their faces.

Aragorn didn't have too much time to worry about it; setting up was done, and Dabryn ambled over to unstake him from near his tree, moving him closer to the fire.

When Tyn and Corbin joined the group for dinner, they wouldn't even look at him. Aragorn was beginning to think he had somehow offended Corbin when he asked him to speak with his father. For what seemed like the millionth time, he cursed his inability to understand his own race.

Rhoran was a different story however. The large hunter kept his eyes on him at all time, watching every move he made, a dangerous glint in his eyes. Subconsciously, Aragorn shifted away from the heated stare, accidentally bumping into Dabryn.

He jumped when the elderly man laughed at his startled look.

"Don't worry kid, I ain't gonna bite," he said, smiling. He moved over slightly to allow Aragorn room on the fallen log he was sitting on.

Aragorn gave a tentative smile back, carefully sitting on the edge so he didn't touch the man as he continued to silently observe the camp.

I want to go home…he thought miserably.

Excerpt from MST3K Fellowship:

Aragorn: We should not go under the mountain. No. Never. Baaaaaad idea. Trust me, it'll be much better freezing to death than burning to death in the grip of a fiery hell-demon.

Gandalf: We shall ask the ring bearer.

Frodo: Let's go under it!

Aragorn: What the hell? Why do you insist that I 'embrace my destiny as hope of mankind' when you never listen to me? I tell you 'don't go under the mountain! Bad idea!' and what do we do? We go under the fcking mountain. First act as 'King' I'm giving the midget the crown.