"…Something is not right here…"

Legolas looked around and he said the same thing to himself. Beside him, Gimli has unsheathed his axe from his back. He reached behind him and felt for an arrow.

They were in the forest of Lorien, and they noticed… they felt… like there was something wrong. Lothlorien was supposed to be empty, as its inhabitants have left with Lady Galadriel. But there was something in the forest. Something alive.

"Daro!"

A voice echoed through the woods. Legolas raised his bow and arrow as Gimli had done to his axe, but he cannot find a target. There was nobody there.

"Man le! Man le carel si!" The voice echoed through the woods. Legolas looked around to see where it was coming from, but he could find no one.

"Rhaich…" Legolas whispered, and the voice came again.

"SEDHO! SUCH FOUL LANGUAGE!" The voice boomed again. He noticed that Gimli seemed to have started to panic a bit. He swallowed.

" Legolas i eneth nin." He shouted back. "Suilaid, Edhellen …"

Gimli looked up at Legolas and whispered, "Are you sure he's an Elf? He could be a Dunedain Ranger. Like Aragorn…"

His elven friend shook his head, "No, I'm pretty sure he's an elf…"

"Pedich i lam edhellen?" The voice asked, and he swallowed as he answered, " Mae…"

The voice seem to smile as it asked, "And your friend?" it said, "Does he speak his own tongue, or the tongue of Men?"

"Both!" Gimli exclaimed, "And I will speak more if you do not show yourself, coward!"

"SEDHO! AVO THANO RûTH VI GûR ALFIRIN!"

Gimli backed away at the thundering voice. Legolas mentioned for him to stay quiet as he spoke again. "Forgive him. He does not mean it…"

"He'd better not. I shall regret staining this place with his blood."

Gimli growled.

"Who are you? Why don't you show your face to us?" Legolas implored, "If you wish to shelter here, then can we not know each other? We seek solace in this forest too."

"Very well…"

A hooded creature in violet came out from the shadows of the trees in front of them. Something in the creature's appearance made Legolas' brows furrow. He took as tentative step forward as he asked, "Iston le?"

The figure tilted its head, as if to say it was confused, "No… I do not think so." The figure continued to walk to their direction as it spoke, " Who are you, and what are you doing here in Lothlorien?"

Legolas bowed slowly once again, "I am Legolas, son of Tharanduil of Mirkwood. This is my friend, Gimli, son of Gloin…"

"Mirkwood?" The figure asked, "You are a woodland elf?"

He nodded, "Yes. We have come here to visit the realm of the Lady of the Woods."

The figure slowly turned to walk around them. Legolas raised a hand to calm Gimli down, as the dwarf continued to look at the creature in suspicion. "The Lady Galadriel does not dwell here anymore. She has fled to the Undying Lands…"

"We know of this." Legolas answered, as the purple human continued to walk around them, "We came here to visit our memories, as there was once a time wherein we met with the Lady of Light and her kin."

"I see…" The figure stopped and turned again, looking at the two of them through the veil, "I myself is just a visitor here, as I was hoping to find elves here, to accommodate me. I had not known they have left, until I came here to find the forest empty." The figure raised a hand to mention them deeper into the forest, "Come, let us continue this conversation inside Caras Galadhon. I had cleaned one of the homes here, so it is fit for habitation…"

"Wait!" Gimli exclaimed, and the figure turned to him, "How can we be assured that you are not a creature of the Shadows?"

"Can a creature of darkness come into a place that dwells in light…?" The figure shook its head.

"What I meant was, how can we be assured that you will not harm us?" Gimli continued, "You hide your face under your cloak. Are you hiding something?"

Legolas noticed that the creature stiffened, "I have nothing to hide but my face, sir… for it is foul and ugly, as my people has once said." it said.

"Oh, come now!" Gimli exclaimed once again, "Legolas and I have been in wars against orcs and other foul creatures on Middle Earth, surely a human face is not that foul."

"And neither am I human, sir…"

The Dwarf' eyebrow raised, "You… are not mortal?"

"Lau…"

"What are you, then?"

The figure seem to hesitate, but it slowly raised a hand to it's veil and undid it. As the cloth fell to the earth, Legolas gasped…

Mainly because the creature, was a woman.

"I am an Elf, sir, the same as you, actually." The woman said, nodding to Legolas as she tucked her hair behind her ears. Her very pointed ears. "I am Meiou Linnadhiel… and I came from the kingdom of Thranduil. Welcome once again to Lothlorien, Prince Legolas…"

Gimli and Legolas stared at her for a few minutes, before Legolas grinned down at Gimli and said, "I told you she was an Elf…"

"I do not understand…"

Legolas, Meiou and Gimli all sat around a campfire, eating some lembas bread and roast deer. Legolas and Gimli have told Meiou their tale about their journey, but she was still reluctant in sharing her story.

"You are an elf, and from what I have learned, Legolas is the only elf that has not left Middle Earth." Gimli said as he took another bite of his deer, "Then why are still here?"

Meiou shook her head, "We have not left because of Sir Legolas." She looked over at the prince, "King Tharanduil has not ordered of our departure, mainly because he thought that you still have need of us. He is just waiting on your word for us to go to the Undying Lands."

Legolas shook his head, "I have no knowledge of this…"

"That is because we have no idea where you are, dear prince." She raised her eyes to the sky, "Whenever we sent a messenger to King Elessar about your whereabouts, the messenger would return saying you are not in Minas Tirith nor in Ithilien." She looked at him again, "Your father was so frustrated that he issued the order not to sail without your saying." She shrugged, "Although my father was very keen on not following your father. The only reason he stayed is because he had no idea where to put me."

Gimli was busy gnawing on his deer bone, but at Meiou's last statement, his attention perked up. "Where to put you? Why? Are you in some sort of exile?"

She sighed as she chewed the last piece of meat from her portion of the deer and threw the bone into the fire. "I was in exile, but I ran away."

"Please, Meiou … Trenaro i narn…" Legolas said as he leaned back to listen.

She sighed, "I… was exiled by my father, ever since I was born. He kept me in a tower beside our home, with only one door and a balcony. I was not to be visited, to be seen, and my door was always locked from the outside so I cannot leave. I am always enraged and threw tantrums all the time. I have no one to comfort me except my mother, who can only visit me if she had my father's permission…"

"You were exiled since childhood?" Gimli asked.

"Man agorech? What did you do to deserve such punishment?" Legolas also asked.

Meiou's eyes watered a bit, "It was not of what I did… it was of what I am." She shook her head again, "If you hadn't noticed, I am not exactly what you would call beautiful. My father, in particular, thought of me as a female orc. He did not wish that an ugly creature such as me be seen by anyone in Mirkwood."

Legolas and Gimli looked at each other, bewilderment both present in their eyes. Meiou saw their look and asked, "Mani?"

"He thought of you as ugly?"

She nodded.

Legolas raised his brow, "I do not think of you as ugly…"

"As do I." Gimli agreed, nodding his head vigorously.

Meiou looked into their eyes and saw that they weren't lying. She blushed faintly despite of herself and looked at the fire, as to make sure that they both wouldn't see her face. "Well, sirs… that is your opinion. My father's is different…"

Gimli leaned closer to her haughtily, "Well, then, Miss Meiou Linnadhiel of Mirkwood, has your father ever seen an orc?"

Meiou's black eyebrows furrowed together as she thought, "I… don't suppose he did…"

Gimli let out a laugh, "Then your father has never seen a travesty!" He looked at her and said, "Legolas and I have been at wars with orcs, with King Elessar at our side at that. And in all our years of fighting, we have never seen anything uglier than orcs. Real orcs." He smiled at her as he patted her arm, "If your father says you look like an orc, then he has never seen one. For I have never seen a prettier woodland elf than you, Meiou."

She blushed, "Well… I… don't know about that…"

Legolas patted her hand, "You should believe in Gimli's words. When he says you are a pretty elf, then you are one. But he can't say you're the most beautiful, as he considers Lady Galadriel as the most beautiful creature that ever walked Middle Earth."

Gimli's eyes misted over, "Ahhh… Lady Galadriel… now there's a beautiful creature if I ever saw one." He looked around the Lorien forest as he whispered, "It's not quite the same, not having her around here. Her light is what makes this place shine."

Meiou laughed a bit, "Her room is up there." She pointed up a flight of stairs.

Gimli pursed his lips and said, "There's probably nothing left there anymore." But as he continued to look up the stairs, his lips pursed more and more. Finally he cursed and ran up the stairs to Galadriel's room.

Meiou and Legolas laughed as they watched the dwarf bound up the stairs. As their comrade disappeared under the canopy, Meiou said, "Quite a character, this friend of yours. I do not expect anything else to be in there, but he is still hopeful."

"Dwarves are hard-headed." Legolas said as his laughter slowly settled down, "But his persistence can be rewarded sometimes. I feel that he would find something of hers up there. He'd probably pick-up a single thread up and still keep it."

Meiou laughed again, but as she was about to rise her hand to tuck her hair, she noticed that her hand was underneath Legolas' own hand. As the other elf noticed this, he drew his hand away and smiled nervously, "Goheno nin… I did not mean to…"

She shook her head, "Ú-moe edaved." She smiled as she drew her hand away from him and tucked it back into her cloak. "So tell me, Prince, Where shall you be heading after your rest here in Caras Galadhon?"

Legolas looked around as he sighed, "I think we shall return to Minas Tirith for a while, and visit King Elessar. We have not seen him for months and I long for his company. That is if Gimli consents with my decision…"

Meiou raised a goblet of water to her lips, which she has fetched from the fountains of Lorien. Although the place had been uninhibited for a while, the water was still crystal clear and cool. "Do you ever leave towards a place without your friend's consent?" She said after she lowered the goblet.

"Never… I never left to a place without him." Legolas looked up the balcony to where Gimli disappeared. "I will never leave without him, for he has become more than a friend to me. He has become my brother." He looked at her and grinned, "He's my younger and shorter brother, actually…"

Meiou laughed melodiously and Legolas couldn't help but laugh with her. For some reason, there was something in her that made him happy, and as their laughter died down, he found himself staring at her. She noticed this and asked "Mani?" underneath her grin.

"What is it about you that makes me happy?" Legolas whispered, as if he was speaking his thoughts out loud, "You laugh like there's no tomorrow… but in a graceful way that seems captivating… and endearing." He leaned a little closer to her, "Meiou … where have you been all my life…?"

She grinned again, thinking his words were a joke. "Where have I been all your immortal years? Locked up in my father's tower, where else?"

Legolas was about to say something when Gimli bounded down the stairs. He closed his mouth, stopping himself and turning his attention to his friend. Meiou looked up at him and smiled as she asked, "What did you find, Sir Gimli?"

He raised up a small veil and held it close to his heart as he closed his eyes to relish in some sort of memory. "I remember this veil very distinctly.", he whispered, making Meiou grin and raise a brow. "This was the veil she wore when she bid us farewell… when she gave me the three strands of her hair from her golden head…"

Meiou laughed again and slapped her thigh in mirth, which made Legolas happy again, and he laughed with her.

Gimli sniffed the veil and said, "Her scent still lingers, though it's mixed with the scent of the woods." He went to his pack and fixed it up right, making a pillow for himself. As he took his elven cloak around him as a blanket, he released a loud yawn and said, "Well, off to sleep with this dwarf. Tomorrow begins another day, and another journey."

Legolas peered at him from behind Meiou, "We leave for Minas Tirith tomorrow. Is that alright with you?"

"Certainly, Master Elf." Gimli replied as he kept shifting around on his palette.

Meiou raised her eyebrow, "Sleep? At such an early hour? It's not even Six in the evening!"

Gimli turned to look at her as he grinned and said, "I sleep for it is my wish to dream of Lady Galadriel, until the morning hours if possible." He laughed and bid both Meiou and Legolas goodnight before turning to his side again and falling asleep.

Legolas nodded, "I believe we should follow the dwarf's lead and sleep. We shall wake before dawn."

"I understand." Meiou nodded in agreement, as she went underneath a nearby tree and made a palette for herself and Legolas. As she was fixing their bedding, Legolas extinguished the fire and removed his weapons and hunting shirt, taking only a single dagger with him.

"Is that necessary?" Meiou asked as Legolas hid a dagger under his pillow. He laid down on the palette, a few inches away from her.

"Not really." He answered as he shifted to a comfortable position to sleep. "But every since Sauron's defeat in Mordor, his orcs and fellbeast seem to have escaped their lord's destruction." He looked at her as he said, "We still find orcs and other creatures roaming."

Meiou's eyes widened with fear as she whispered, "Are these… orcs and creatures… really evil?"

"Yes. They are." He said as he looked over at her as she shifted to look at him on her palette. "The Dark Lord Sauron's evil runs deep. His treachery is like that of Morgoth's. It dwells in the dark, and comes whenever unexpected. His evil is hard to contain. It's just luck and strong will that made us win against him." He smiled over at her as fear became evident in her earth brown eyes again. "Avo 'osto, Meiou. I shall not let anything happen to you."

Meiou's eyes brightened and she nodded in reply. She blinked once, then a look of tranquil came to her face. Legolas continued to watch her, and as her breathing slowed, he guessed that she fell asleep.

Legolas continued to stare at her, not blinking, as sleep finally came to him.