Ok, this one's a little short, but if you're nice maybe I'll get in two next time. Actually, I'm lucky I got this one in tonight. I am supposed to be in a 6-9 class right now, but we got out a little early...the professor never showed up! Yeah me...but we still had to watch a 3 hour 46 min. movie called seven samurai from like 1954 or 56 or something, I'm just glad the stand in guy 'accidentally skipped' the middle of the movie! So, here we are with chapter eight. I'm typing this up waiting for my boyfriend to how up (he needs my computer) I have an equestrian meeting in twenty min. and my roommate is watching Lion King 1/2 (love the music!) But its very distracting...you guys have to keep me focused so I can keep writing, and write better too!

Alone

She yelled one last time so loud, it was heard, even through the pillow, by Legolas, drifting down the hall after him as he walked away, passing Banethiel with Eriathwen's dinner as he did.

"Careful when you go in there, she might bite your head off" he simply stated with all sincerity. "I would knock first if I were you." Banethiel walked forward, a look of terror scribbled on her face.

She balanced the tray on one hand and lightly rapped on the door, giving the guards a wary look as she did. Fortunately for her, Eriathwen did a bit of thinking in those few moments, and had decided to try, once again, to turn over a new leaf. But unfortunately for Eriathwen, Banethiel had built up a wall of her own in a matter of seconds. Nothing was getting in or out, nothing Eriathwen did was going to faze her or get to her, not this time.

She walked in and sat the tray down. Without a word she sat the tray down and began to leave. Eriathwen had sat up at the knock, and watched her as she entered with her evening meal.

"Banethiel, right? I'm sor…." Banethiel was gone before she could finish. She acted as though she didn't hear her, which was highly possible; she was trying her best to ignore her. It's like I don't even exist anymore. Like, I really am alone in this world. I never liked other being's attention, and now, I am completely ignored, by everyone, the prince, the king, even the maid! Its as though I am truly alone at last. But is that what I really want?

Bitterness held her heart once again, and she longed to escape to the woods she knew where she was forever by herself. She hated the world and it was then she realized that she hated herself too. She stared across the room into the mirror where she saw a distinct reflection of herself. She willed herself not to throw something and smash the glass. She didn't, but she did see something that she never saw before; herself, her true self. She looked back over the years, and everything she had gone through, that she had put herself through.

She put herself though a lot. And a lot of it might have been avoided, but it never bothered her before. But this, she might have avoided and she might still be able to fix things. She longed to have her freedom, yet there was something about Mirkwood that had changed her, she didn't know what, but she felt different and she felt like a different person. But she knew she was still the same old Eriathwen, the deadly, cunning, seductive Eriathwen, and she would work her way out of this mess. She would just have to use her cleverness instead of her deadly skills.

Yes brains. She stood and walked over to her dinner. Brains and perhaps beauty. This shall be sweet. She thought as she bit into a juicy red apple sitting on the table.

She never saw anyone again that night, never heard a sound, not anything close at least, just a few distant footsteps. But nothing immediate, and nothing audible, except one thing; one thing that she heard late at night when she should have been sleeping, one thing that stopped her mind in its tracks. And make her rethink her plan of action completely.

She could hear them; arguing. All the way down the hall from his study, the prince and his father, fighting over what was to be done with her. They could not decide what they should do with her. Things were getting pretty heated, but it was quite apparent; unless she gave more specific answers, she wasn't going anywhere. So alone in her room, she laid and thought when she should have been getting rest. She couldn't sleep anyway. She couldn't get her mind off what she heard, or what she would have to say when she saw them again, which was sure to be soon.

It didn't matter how long she laid awake in her room in the dark. And it didn't matter what thoughts drifted through her head, taunting her about her past, present and future. Because she was in this alone, and that mattered to her. She didn't have any one to help her, she never did. No one's shoulder to cry on, no one to wipe away her tears, or to encourage her through the day, but she didn't need that, Eriathwen never cried. She had somehow always managed on her own, and she would this time to, somehow, someway she would.

Eventually she fell asleep, though it wasn't very rejuvenating. But none the less the last thing she remembered hearing was the slamming of a door coming from the study, and next thing she heard was the song of a bird drifting through the window.

She sat up and ran her hand over her face, focusing her eyes as she did. She didn't remember opening the window. By the sun's positioning, she guessed it was around eight or so in the morning. Like always, her dinner plate had been removed, and her breakfast replaced it. She felt so secluded in her room she was starting to think of her food as company instead of the trees. The food soon became her stomach's company, and truth be told, she liked it better there. She saw something on the tray, tucked underneath her plate that she had missed at first. It was a note; from Banethiel.

'It's ok.' That's all that it said. It could have meant a million different things, but whatever its purpose, it made her feel better. It made her feel that maybe she wasn't alone after all, not exactly.