Katie felt very small and very scared as she stepped out into the stable yard the next morning. It was full of soldiers and their horses milling about, preparing to leave with the search party. Katie found her horse (someone had taken pity on her and saddled it already) and followed suit.

"Katie!" She turned to see Elrohir striding toward her. "Here," he said when he reached her. "I want you to carry this." Katie took it gingerly. It was a long elven knife in a leather sheath. "It is only for defense," he reminded her.

She nodded. "I'll keep my promise."

Elrohir nodded, but had no time to respond. Aragorn and Legolas had come over to speak with him.

"Where are we beginning our search?" Aragorn asked.

"We tracked the orcs all the way into the North Downs," Elrohir answered. "It was there in the hills that we split up."

"No one lives in the Downs," Aragorn mused. "'Twould be an excellent hiding place for Orcs—in the crags and hills of that land."

Katie shivered suddenly, and they looked over at her in concern.

"You can still remain here; you do not need to come," Elrohir said gently.

"No." Katie shook her head decisively. "I'm coming. I have to come."

Aragorn looked grim, but he and Elrohir exchanged a glance, and he nodded.

000

The search party left soon after. Everyone came to see them off: Arwen, Sam's family—even Elboron, carried by one of the serving women, waved goodbye to Katie.

It was a fine morning, but no one had the heart to enjoy it—least of all Elrohir, riding grim and determined at the front of the line with Aragorn, Legolas, and Katie herself. They spoke little. Katie found herself wondering what she had gotten herself into.

They rode without stopping to eat. Late in the afternoon, Aragorn and Legolas both dropped back to speak with a few of the soldiers, and Elrohir and Katie were left alone at the front of the line. Katie expected Elrohir to be as reticent as before, so it was a surprise when he spoke.

"Are you angry with me, Katelyn?"

The use of her full name surprised her even more, and she turned a startled face to him. "Angry? Why should I be angry with you?"

"I left you alone at Lake Evendim to go off and fight the orcs, when I might have stayed and comforted you," he said slowly and painfully. "Can you forgive me?"

"There is nothing to forgive, Elrohir," Katie said softly. "I was not alone. And you see that I'm well." He only shook his head. Katie wanted to pursue the topic further, but Aragorn came back up to join them, and they spoke no more on the subject.

000

Katie discovered that very evening when they halted why it was that women never rode out with men on these kinds of excursions. Awkward was not even the word. They brought no tents and all slept on the ground—but whilst they were at pains to keep Katie in a safe location near the fire, none of them could sleep right next to her. Imagine the embarrassment if they rolled over in the night and found themselves a little too close! And that was the least of it. Finding a place to relieve herself discreetly, but at the same time letting people know what she was doing so that nobody would walk over and find her was nigh impossible. Katie was actually glad there was no place to wash more than their faces and hands, and that they none of them intended to change clothes on this journey. They might smell overpowering by the end of it, but it would eliminate another modesty problem for everyone to worry about.

And worry about it they did. The men were used to being in all-male groups on these kinds of travels, and it was nearly as hard on them as it was on Katie. Now they had to sneak off to relieve themselves, as well, and worry about bumping into the wrong person around the campfire.

Almost Katie began to regret her demand. But no, she reminded herself, she would be glad of her choice in the end.

000

Katie had a horrible time sleeping that night, unaccustomed as she was to sleeping on the ground with no more than a blanket. In the end she bunched up her cloak and stuffed it under her head as a pillow, wrapping herself up in her blanket. She tried to do this all silently, so that she would not disturb the men sleeping nearby. For all her efforts, she came unwrapped in the middle of the night and awoke cold, with a stone digging into the back of her head.

Breakfast was a quick and cheerless affair, and Katie soon found herself rolling up her blanket and climbing stiffly back onto her horse. She was horribly sore from riding all of the day before. She hadn't ridden regularly since her last visit to Middle-earth more than a year ago, and she knew that she would be quite glad to go to bed that night, stony ground or not.

Elrohir led them east, into the North Downs. "Nobody goes here now but for the Rangers of the North," Aragorn told Katie quietly. "Eventually we hope to resettle this area, but…" He gestured to the land about them, and didn't need to finish his sentence. Katie could see that their surroundings were completely bare of any sign of humanity.

The North Downs were a chain of hills rising green and silent from the plains. A few trees grew there, and she could hear the sounds of small animals moving about. But there wasn't as much as a footpath or cart track to be seen. She suddenly wondered how many of the orcs the twins and the soldiers had found and killed.

She didn't want to ask Elrohir, but she was pretty sure Aragorn and Legolas would know. She edged over near Legolas when he was farther away from the other two, and asked him.

"Unfortunately, they do not believe they killed very many," Legolas answered gravely. "In fact, we have reason to believe that most of them are left. That is the reason we have brought so many soldiers along in the search party. We shall most likely meet with Orcs, and we are going to try to wipe them out. Elrohir gave you that knife for protection, did he not?"

Katie nodded. "I really hope I don't have to use it."

"I hope the same."

000

But though they hunted carefully through the North Downs for two days, they found no sign of the orcs—or of Elladan. They all began to worry. They had searched almost the entire length of the Downs, with no results.

"Elladan is cunning," Aragorn reminded Elrohir. "He has only hidden his tracks well from those fiends. You alone know how many times he has fought against the orcs—yes, and you have been in plenty of scrapes before this, and probably worse ones, at that."

"Yes, but then we were in them together," Elrohir answered shortly, and that ended the conversation.

They retraced the twins' movements from the time they reached the downs to the time they split up. Elrohir had gone northeast and Elladan southeast. They followed Elladan's tracks as far as they could. Then they found signs of a fight, with a confused mass of footprints covering the ground. It was not difficult to make out the hoof prints of Elladan's horse, which they followed far into the hills until they found the body of the horse itself, with orc-arrows in it.

The men wanted to stop and bury the horse, but they had no time. They carefully retraced the path of the horse back to the scene of the fight, looking for Elladan's footprints. They found none. Katie remembered that Elves were amazingly soft-footed, and could probably run lightly enough to leave no tracks if they so wished.

The search party turned off and followed the tracks of the retreating orcs, but eventually reached a rocky strip of land on which almost no tracks could be found. Orcs were cunning of necessity, and had masked their retreat.

Katie was beginning to feel extremely disheartened, not only at the lack of clues as to Elladan's whereabouts. She had demanded that they let her come along on the search, and now she was entirely useless. She had no idea where Elladan was, and was absolutely no help tracking him, as she had no skills in that direction. She wasn't even able to offer any hope to Elrohir, whose silence worried her. Had she made the wrong choice in asking to come along? She didn't know. She just hoped desperately that she wouldn't be involved in combat with the Orcs.

000

Katie woke in the middle of the night with a stone digging into her spine. She shifted and half sat up, planning to roll over and go back to sleep. The last few days had been hard for the entire search party—riding all day, straining their eyes in search of clues, and finding a disheartening lack of results. Katie was glad of sleep, even on pebbly, uneven ground. But her glance happened to fall on Elrohir, who was sitting on a fallen tree a short distance away, taking his turn at keeping watch.

His very posture spoke of defeat: he leaned his arms on his knees, and his head was sunk between his shoulders. Her heart went out to him, and without thinking she rose and picked her way quietly over to him. She took a seat beside him on the tree. Neither of them moved nor spoke for some minutes.

"I did not need to ride out with the soldiers," he said quietly, so as not to disturb the sleeping men. "I could easily have stayed with you and helped you through your grief."

"Elrohir, I've told you before that you have nothing to apologize for," Katie remonstrated with him, equally quietly. "And your having stayed at Lake Evendim wouldn't have helped Elladan in the least."

"I am not thinking of Elladan; I am thinking of you," he answered.

Katie shook her head. "You had to go out and fight the orcs. I understand that, just as I understood when you had to ride out with the Rangers during the war."

"You do not understand," Elrohir answered without anger. "I did not have to do anything of the sort. Elladan advised me to stay by the Lake, and even Legolas offered to take my place with the soldiers. But I went anyway."

Katie watched him, confused. Finally, he turned and looked at her.

"Do you know why my mother sailed to the Undying Lands?" he asked suddenly. Katie shook her head. Elrohir looked down at his hands and took a deep breath.

"About five hundred years ago, our mother was traveling from Rivendell to Lórien. She was waylaid by Orcs in the Redhorn Pass. Her escort was scattered by the sudden assault, and she was seized and carried off." He swallowed hard. "They tortured her in their filthy dens," he continued, his voice barely above a whisper, and broken with pain. "Elladan and I went after her and found her. I will never forget it. We slew the Orcs at her very feet and then released her from her bonds—and she barely knew us. She shrank from us, and cried out when Elladan lifted her. She could not even bear the touch of her own sons!"

He took a deep breath to calm himself. "We took her home immediately. She had received a poisoned wound, and we thought for a time that we would lose her. Father healed her body, but in the end, we lost her anyway—to the Undying Lands. She lost all delight in Middle-earth, and would have died of grief had she not sailed.

"Elladan and I could never forget our mother's torment at the hands of the Orcs, and so for five hundred years we have ridden out against them, alone or with the Rangers of the North. It brings us no peace; it brings not our mother back to us; and yet, we cannot stop." He turned to face Katie, and his face in the fitful firelight was older than she had ever seen it. There were dark marks beneath his eyes, which were wet with unshed tears. His brow was lined in pain. "The Orcs took my mother from me, Estel-oneth; will they take my brother, as well?"

Tears of sympathy fell down Katie's cheeks, and without thinking she put her arms around him and held him close. Elrohir laid his head on her shoulder and wept, wrapping his arms about her as if he feared that all he loved would disappear from his grasp.

"I have no hope to give you," Katie whispered sadly. "I'm sorry." Elrohir shook his head, but could not speak.

They sat thus together for a long time.

TBC

AN: Huge thanks to everyone who reviewed! Hugs all around!

Lady Dragon, Jammchra: At one time I did intend to become a professional writer. I'd still like to get some stuff published. I've got a ton of ideas bouncing around in my head, and I'd like to revamp and complete this one series of stories I wrote in eighth and ninth grade. There's some awful stuff in them, but some decent material to work with, as well. Fanfiction has been a short detour for me (well, I guess "short" is subjective…). It's really given me a lot of good practice—I can tell how my writing has improved, just from the beginning of the series to this point! Thank you so much for the in-depth reviews; I really appreciate them!

Thalion: You're right: Elves have a very soothing and healing presence, I think.

The Reviewing Llama: No! Not… HOMEWORK! —cue scary music— I hear ya. I've got finals next week…

Alenor Peredhel: Let's see if I can explain this time thing… Imagine that Middle-earth time is actually, say, the 1800s. What Katie is actually doing therefore when she goes to Middle-earth, is traveling back in time. Let's say she leaves at noon on December 12, 2003, and finds herself in Middle-earth: June 4, 1822. She then spends a week in Middle-earth and leaves on June 11, 1822. Now theoretically, she could end up at any time in history, but these stories always have her coming back to exactly the time she left: December 12, 2003, at exactly noon. The only thing is, she has aged one week, because she spent a week in the past. I hope that helped; let me know if you're still confused. :)

Darkened Dreams: lol Yeah, it's inevitable.

Madd Hatter: lol —shakes head— Nopers! Not tellin'!

Catalainya: Thank you!

Please review!