A/N: Mel is mine. As is Taratoun. Rest isn't mine. sobs miserably

The game Legolas and Mel, along with others, plays in this chapter is the one known as Mikado among humans. A quite simple, yet very entertaining game.

Chapter 9: Change of events

Legolas was happy to notice that Mel quickly was making friends among the Mirkwood guard, although he could not help but feel an odd pang of something akin to jealousy whenever Mel was talking to someone other than Legolas self and his father or Aragorn and Arwen.

He supposed it was because Mel caused more than common mayhem around Mirkwood due to his exotic looks and winning personality, even though the dark elf distanced himself from anyone showing interest in anything but his friendship. This, however, turned out to include a surprisingly high number of both female and male elves, who, despite the dark elf's obvious rejections, continued their more or less (usually less) subtle advances. Over the next three days, Mel was often forced to resort to threats in order to get a single night of relative peaceful sleep. Thankfully, he had also become Taratoun's favourite person after Legolas, and the giant spider proved helpful in keeping the more persistent pursuers at bay.

Mel also began spending more and more time in the library, locked away either alone or with one of the scholars for company. What took place there, however, was something that remained a mystery to all, as neither scholars nor dark elf would tell anything of what they were doing. The only clue that anyone got was that Mel's accent, if possible, became more noticeable. Orundel was no help either, as he merely smiled and gave a cryptically nod when asked, before giving the excuse that he was needed elsewhere and disappeared, leaving a confused Legolas behind.

It was not until the morning on the third day, where Aragorn and Arwen were preparing for departure, and Aragorn leaned down from his horse to shake Mel's hand, that it became clear what exactly had occupied the dark elf in the past days.

''Good journey, king Elessar. May the wind and road see to that you may safely return to Gondor," Mel said with a beaming smile. ''I hope that I will one day have the chance to come by and see the White city in all of its glory."

"If you do, it will be my pleasure to give you a personal tour," Aragorn replied with a grin, shaking the hand of the dark elf.

As the royal couple rode out of the small courtyard at the back entrance of the Mirkwood palace, Mel turned around and flashed Legolas a beaming smile – and the lighter elf knew that he was openly gawping. By his side, Orundel was making a strange string of choked sounds that revealed his inability to keep his laughter contained, and judging from the smiles and coughs from many of the other scholars, it was clear that everyone had been hard at work to create this surprise and dramatically broaden the dark elf's vocabulary.

"I'm impressed," Thranduil said, not able to hide a light grin himself.

"I've been told I learn fast," Mel replied, his voice, though still as melodious as before, holding an implacable accent that revealed him as not yet fully proficient in the common tongue. However, even despite this, Legolas had to admit he, too, was greatly impressed…

The weather, however, turned to heavy rain within the hour, and soon the elves retreated to the shelter of the Mirkwood Palace, seeking out the wide, public rooms to spend the time with friends and relatives. Mel quickly introduced Legolas to a type of game his people had played, using a small circle on the carpet and a handful of small sticks marked with different dots. Dropped randomly on the ground, the challenge was to slowly remove one stick at the time, while avoiding any of the other sticks moved in the process.

Other elves soon joined in, each participant sitting on the floor to form a circle around the sticks on the ground. However, it did not escape Legolas' attention that a majority of the other players were more busy openly staring at Mel than with playing the game, and, judging from the increase in small twitchs in Mel's facial muscles, the dark elf had noticed the looks as well. One of the female elves shuffled close to the dark elf, stretching lightly in a fashion that Legolas easily could predict would result in her hand 'accidentally' dropping into Mel's lap.

Before she managed to complete the move, however, Mel suddenly rose to his feet, excused himself, and briskly walked out of the room, leaving the others behind. Giving an apologetic nod as well, Legolas too rose to his feet and followed his friend out the cosy hall and into one of the more deserted corridors connecting each room in the Palace. Mel stood near one of the tapestries decorating this particular hall, leaning against the wall and his face hidden within his hands.

"Are you okay?" Legolas asked, concerned about his friend's wellbeing.

"I'll be fine," Mel replied with a sigh, dropping his hands to his sides again. "Just tired of attention. Feel like fine prize to hunt – cannot event sleep in peace at night."

"Well… I'm afraid it's somewhat the truth," Legolas replied, moving to stand beside his friend and leaned against the wall as well. "It's often been so that if someone exotic, charming, pretty and single arrives in the Hall, it becomes something close to a contest to see who can manage to seduce said person into their bed first. Unfortunately, the longer you try to avoid their attentions, the harder they will try."

"So you say cure is to sleep with one?" Mel asked, raising a single white eyebrow.

Legolas opened his mouth to answer, but did not manage to utter anything before the dark elf continued with a sigh of surrender: "One night would be to survive, if they leave me alone then…"

The Mirkwood elf found he choked on his own protest, managing only to break into a fit of coughs rather than tell it would not be an idea he would recommend. A concerned look crossed the dark elf's features, and he patted Legolas' back, helping him to regain control of his breathing.

"Take easy, then it stop," Mel said, rubbing Legolas' back in an effort to help calming the taller elf's breathing, and Legolas fought against the desire to continue coughing in order to make the dark elf continue the rubbing.

"I'm okay," he croaked instead. "I'll be fine."

"Good," Mel smiled, then glanced down the corridor. "Orundel tell me about a book he says I should read. The book be in library near here, he say."

"Yes. It's just two doors down, and it has a view over the forest," Legolas replied, giving a final cough to clear his throat. "I'll walk you there."

Mel smiled, and obediently trotted alongside Legolas the relatively short distance to the tiny library. It was safely hidden away, the door nearly invisible between two large tapestries, but it was one perfectly suited for more private studying than the large library which also housed the scholars. The only reason for why it had not yet become an attractive place for lovers to meet was the single, large window that allowed light to shine into the library, and the fact that the door was quite loosely build and thus not good at keeping sounds from leaving the room.

However, as the door slid open, both elves stopped dead in their tracks. The large window had apparently not been closed by the last person within the library, and now several of the large spiders inhabiting Mirkwood had used the darkness and humidity of the rainfall to move close to the Palace, and to crawl through the ajar window. Far bigger than Taratoun, each of these spiders rose three-and-a-half feet into the air, and each had a body the length of an elf. They hissed and cackled among themselves, pieces of common mingled with the black tongue of Mordor used to curse and alert those crawling up the wall that elveses had entered the library. Mel acted instantly, breaking into a leap longer than Legolas had thought possible, and gave one of the spiders crawling through the window a flying kick that flung it back out, taking the following spiders with it.

Legolas quickly turned around, shouting a warning down the hallway, and prayed that it was loud enough to be heard by someone, before he turned his attention back to the intruders. A small fireplace was near the door, used for heating the library during the winter, and the poker from said fireplace would prove to be a functional temporary weapon until assistance arrived.

Mel was already kicking and punching at the many spiders that had gotten inside the library, causing several of them to back off with their backs on fire and sending even more flying through the air, trying to get them back out of the window. Deciding that the strategy of trying to keep the spiders from getting further into the palace through this library, Legolas took up guard near the door, using the poker to drive off those spiders seeking to escape through the door.

However, being given a brief respite in the seemingly endless onslaught from the spiders, the Mirkwood elf briefly glanced to his friend, and gave a cry of warning when he saw that one of the eight-legged beasts had leaped at the dark elf's back. Mel heard the cry and turned around, just in time to bring up an arm and block the fangs that would otherwise be buried in his neck. With a snarl of pain from the elf, the spider received a solid punch that, though its fangs dragged a nasty cut down the elf's arm, sent it out the window.

At the same moment, Legolas heard running feet in the corridor behind him, and he quickly sidestepped, allowing the four armed elves from the Mirkwood guard to burst through. Now suddenly faced with several elves, the spiders quickly retreated, even though none of them managed to return to the depths of the forest, as archers had lined up below the window and took out each spider making its escape, causing those that had not been killed by the arrows to plummet to their doom against the hard rocks below the window.

Taking a few, steadying breaths, Legolas quickly assured that no spider still lived, and turned his gaze to Mel with a grin. However, his happiness quickly evaporated, as he realized the dark elf had grown oddly pale, and was leaning against the wall while he clasped the wounded arm to his chest. Giving another glance at the corpses on the ground, Legolas immediately understood why. This was the only type of spider in Mirkwood that had a poison strong enough to kill an adult elf…

A/N: Don't kill me! Look – next chapter is up already!