It was the terrible pain in his neck that awoke him first and he quickly became aware of a cold, damp, crispness to the air that bit his face. He opened his eyes to see nothing but his own wan, if not translucent chest - malnourished with large purple plum bruises vibrantly staining it from his numerous deaths. The front of his tunic had been cut open. His head was cocked forward due to something hard that lay under his head. He longed to move and crack his neck, but instead, merely squished his eyes closed again.
"Oh, I am sorry." Said a scratchy old voice.
And the hard item under his neck was removed and his head lay flat with the rest of his body. Legolas didn't want to open his eyes to his next hurdle…
"I don't know how you managed it. I admit that I have seen it before, but never like this." The voice became recognizable as that of an old woman's.
"… Seen … what? Managed …? Arnnnnnggg." And the Prince's sentence ended in nothing more than a moan as a light began to penetrate his eyelids unbearably. He wasn't sure that he wanted to be awake anymore. His entire face felt broken, scratched and sore. His body, too felt bruised, which he gradually realized must have been from the fall off of Táriël. Where was that horse now? Oh, but what did it matter.
"It's early. We can talk about that later." The old woman said hastily.
He crushed his eyelashes together all the harder as, with extreme effort, he lifted his head and cracked his neck. He let out a gasp of relief. He didn't want to know anything about his surroundings, or who was with him or why he wasn't dead, or even if he had died again. He merely wanted to lay and try and heal.
"I had to cut your tunic open to make sure that you didn't have any internal bleeding. I thought that you fell on a rock. Your loud and clumsy chase caught my attention while I was out picking berries near the highway. I don't think I've ever seen a horse run more erratically, or an elf behave more inelegantly. Or a more feeble effort of escaping orcs… I was watching you flee and I knew something like that was going to happen. It was only a matter of time." The old woman nattered on.
Legolas wasn't listening. He felt a rough cloth dabbing the blood off his cut lip, which he could taste in his mouth. He tried to move his head away. He was trying to think: But wasn't he supposed to be doing something right now? Where had he been going? Why did it matter so much?
"Aragorn!" The elf screamed, his eyes snapping open, bolting up into a sitting position, finding that he had been lying on a raised bed of hard-packed earth.. He finally saw his surroundings. He seemed to be underground in a cave or hovel of some sort. The low roof was covered in tangled, wicked-looking roots, which had herbs and deceased animals, and other foods drying from them. The walls were packed earth with little concaves in which candles burned, casting a low golden light over everything. He could not find the source of the bright light, which had so terribly hurt his eyes when he had awoken. A fire burned in a mud hole in the wall with various cooking implements around it.
And next to him sat the most haggard old woman the Prince had ever seen. She had frizzy gray hair, withered and knarled skin that looked more like bark than living tissue. Her hands and face were covered with warts and she seemed to be growing more hair on her face than was natural for a woman. She wore a long dark gray robe that, despite her ragged appearance, seemed in rather fine repair. She moved quickly to comfort him, however, putting her hands gently on his arms, restraining him.
"It's okay. Everything will be all right. Don't move too fast. You are going to hurt yourself." She tried to calm his rapid movements, her wretched body softly glowing green to the elf's eyes.
He shivered as he remembered that what remained of his scraps of clothing had been cleanly cut open.
"Oh, you poor dear. You're freezing." She reached over and pulled a large filthy-looking quilt from behind her and wrapped it around him, tucking it under. The elf did nothing to stop her complete invasion of his private space. He was so frightened and so anxious to leave and yet, too sore to do anything at all.
And he began to feel more and more cold. His body began to shake violently, and he couldn't get Aragorn off of his mind, which ached miserably.
"A-aragorn…" Chattered out of his mouth. He was so tired, and frustrated with this new set back.
"I can feel your morale running lower and lower with every passing minute. You must stop this. Stop this shivering. It will be all right." The old woman began to run her hands over his blanketed arms rapidly, trying to warm him. It was then that he noticed that, though her words and her actions were kind, her tone was not soft. It was firm and responsible. In fact, her manner reminded him greatly of Elrond. But she was not important now.
"I-I.." Without thinking, the elf tried to stand. "I've got to go to him." His head swam with a wave of air and his eyes rolled back in his head, nauseating him. He fell to his hands and knees, his face, mere inches from the ground, and began to vomit – or at least tried to. There was nothing in his stomach and he could do nothing but wretch phlegm.
When he was done, and kneeling in shock, his quilt blanketing only his shoulders, the old woman finally spoke from where she stood perfectly still, "You have concussion. I tried to tell you not to move."
"Where am I? Who are you?" Legolas coughed out, his head hung low, his hair sheeting his face and his eyes clenched shut. Every inhibition that unfolded made him angrier and more desperate and this sickness was another slap in the face.
"My name is Maeryn. And this is my home. It lies within the forest on the edge of Elven territory, just north of your path. Now come over here and sit at the table. If you're going to vomit, you might as well have some food in you to make it worth while."
And she got up and put her hands under his armpits and helped him to his feet. She was shockingly strong for someone so old and stubby. Once he was standing, she told him to lean on her and she wrapped the blanket more tightly around his tall frame. She helped him into a seat that had been carved out of a stump and he leaned his arms on the table, rubbing his temples.
He doubted he would ever eat again. It was good that he seemed to have become immortal, as he had had no sustenance since Aragorn had made that tea for him when he was losing his senses.
Aragorn! His heart leapt at the thought. To think that this had all started with some stupid mushrooms….
"Here you are." Maeryn said, setting a bowl of hot white soup in front of him. She then began ladling herself a portion from the caldron on the fire.
Legolas stared silently down at the soup, gripping his quilt around him. For the first time, it occurred to him that he had no reason to trust this woman.
As she was sitting down to her own bowl, Maeryn noticed that he was not eating and said, "Eat up. Even you will need your strength." And when he merely stared at her, her face fell and questioned him with her expression.
"It's just… What reason do I have to trust you?" Then, feeling the tension in the air pulled taught like a cord, the Prince excused himself. "If I may be blunt."
"Look, will it help if I eat too?" She asked, impatiently. "Because I was going to, remember? Look." She took up her bowl and began to drink. When she had finished half the bowl, she gave a satisfied slurp. "I will warn you though, it is hot."
"I'm not hungry."
"Rubbish."
"I don't much feel like eating."
"You need to eat."
"This is madness. What am I doing here, dining with a stranger, wasting time!" He suddenly blurted out, slamming his fist down on the table. Maeryn jumped but did not seem fazed.
"I know, I know. You're worried about your friend. But I wouldn't worry too much about that ranger rogue. He can take care of himself."
"What? How do you know about him?"
"It's pretty obvious. Everyone knows of your friendship. It's not as though you two have never been by over the years. So, it only seems natural that Strider would be the one that you would be searching for now. As for what is going on, I can only surmise. But he did go thundering by here yesterday."
"What! You know where he went!"
"You were on the right trail."
"Then I was right. He is in danger!"
"There is no proof of that. But do you see my point now? You need to eat so that you will have the strength to find him and face whatever danger is waiting for you out there in the woods." She picked up her bowl and began finishing it off as though to encourage him. "One needs to eat, even in your state." She muttered.
"What was that?" Legolas had picked up his bowl.
"I'm sorry?"
"What do you mean, 'in your state'?"
"Well," Maeryn started slowly. "You are dead."
The Prince nearly dropped his bowl.
"Even if I didn't know that you were the Prince of Mirkwood, supposedly dead, I would still know what you are. I can see it on you. Your entire body, even your eyes, are all just one big tell. But that's what I was trying to tell you when you awoke. I have seen those like you before, but never anyone so far gone. You aren't just dead, but you are dead over and over. As I said, I don't know how you managed it. You are incredible. Born again and again…."She shook her head at him in amazement.
Legolas looked down and avoided her eyes, unsure of how to respond to this sort of attention.
"You're not just the undead now. You are a miracle amongst even the supernatural."
"It . . .It doesn't make any sense." He began, reluctant to speak of it. "I have died over and over and each time I rise again, a shorter time dead for each death." Legolas slowly gained confidence and spoke with increasing ease. "And there doesn't seem to be any rules about how death, or life affects my body. I stuck a branch through my throat and yet, now, look, I have no hole, yet, I have bruises all over my body. Why?" He paused and waited for an answer, but Maeryn merely leaned forward and waited for him to continue. "Yet I see no reason why I cannot eat and digest and sleep and laugh and cry like any living creature." He looked her in the eye now.
"Oh, I haven't got any answers for you about that." She looked behind him, suddenly remembering something. "Curses. I have to go and bring in a deer steak I have marinating outside before the creatures get it. Don't go anywhere. I'll be right with you." Maeryn said as she began to quickly hobble to the stairs, which Legolas was only just noticing. "Oh, and don't touch Brom." Without explanation she limped up the stairs and opened the door.
Legolas pushed the soup bowl away. He would not allow himself to consider how ill he felt. He found himself rubbing his hands on the smoothed, rustic table. It was then that he noticed that he was not wearing gloves or boots. He rubbed his bare feet on the earth floor and glanced over to where they were stuck on pegs by the door. He wished vaguely that he had new clothes. It would be difficult to do any search and rescue with a split tunic, cut boots and disintegrated tights. It was then that he noticed a curious thing for the first time. In the rough dirt wall there was a mullioned window set into the earth itself. It looked straight into more dirt, serving no purpose. He looked around the home and found a series of windows, all of which shone clear through to more dirt. He decided that he must ask Maeryn if her home had been buried by mudslide. He then heard a flapping fluttering noise and looked back to his right and abruptly found a large raven standing on the table next to him.
"Hello." He said in Elvish. "Are you her companion, Brom? Aren't you nice." Legolas reached up and gently stroked the soft black feathers of the bird. Immediately, the plague spread from his hands across the bird and it dissolved almost instantly into a pile of charcoaled dust and tiny bird bones. Legolas instantly melted into a violent shaking spell. "N-not again…" He shivered. Why? Why does this keep happen-
"What have you done!" Maeryn shrieked. Stepping down into the hovel, a large slab of meat in her hand, she caught sight of Brom's new form. "I told you not to touch Brom! What was so difficult about that?" She let out a moan, dropping the steak into a basin and running over to the table. "My dearest treasure…"
"I-I'm so sorry. I never meant for it to happen. I don't know what happened!"
"You touched him, that's what happened! You haven't noticed anything unusual happening when you touch things lately?" Maeryn demanded.
A cold recognition washed over him, his eyes widening, guilt filling up his stomach. T-the root… the trees……………the horse…. He covered his eyes with his hand.
"Yes. You know what I'm talking about now. How to know how much you've killed since you first died… You're dead. You can only spread death to everything you touch."
"Are you saying that I am becoming death itself?"
"Don't be ridiculous. It is nothing mystical. There is no divinity in it. You were not chosen as a new reaper for mankind or something. You are dead. You spread death. Just at the diseased spread disease. The plants spread seeds. You spread death which makes more dead."
Legolas let out all of his air, and let his head drop into his hands.
"I will help you find your friend, but you will one day help me."
"I will." Legolas agreed from within his hands.
TBC