In the few moments of being at least half-awake since the kidnapping, Aragorn had often been convinced to be back in the cellar dungeon of these Haradrim back then, at the beginning of this millennium. Somewhere laying across from him in the dark, the dying body of an elf whom he'd called his best friend later, in the war ... Moist, rough walls that had the coldness of the night burn on his skin like thousands of needle-pricks and turned a simple cold in a life-threatening infection … A cough that felt as if parts of his lungs were trying to crawl up through his airways to choke him.
Whenever his bad head injury allowed him to remain orientated for longer than a few minutes, he caught himself wishing every time, it wouldn't be just an illusion. Back then, there had at least been hope. He had also not had to fear yet that said elf would stab him from behind in an inattentive moment, just to get him out of the way and fulfill a blood vengeance; because Aragorn had failed to help him with his pain and had not taken his concerns seriously enough, because he had been unable to make Legolas forget about his dangerous plans. And first and foremost, in some way, he'd still been in control on that day back then. He hated losing control. In this regard, even twenty years later, Legolas and he had still something very elementary in common.
Today, his hands were literally tied. Whenever he came about – which happened usually when his enemies reluctantly poured a few sips of water down his throat –, it took him mostly too long to even sit up before the two men vanished again. At that point, the world was usually spinning around him again already, and any attempt of getting up from the uneven ground ended with another blackout.
Judging by the dangerous weakness in his body and the unpleasant smell of any missing care, more than one day must have gone by when he had finally gathered back enough strength to walk through his cell for the first time; something turned into a challenge by the trembling of his knees and the ongoing cough, caused by lying around in a room for too long where low temperatures were prevailing even in summer. A hint that he was being somewhere underground, probably in an altered cave system.
A suspicion quickly confirmed by a first exhausting pat-down of the surroundings. It had to be a long-forgotten soldier base or an old prison. Unlike the ground, the walls were smooth, chiseled carefully into the rock, not offering even a single loophole, no hiding place. Aragorn didn't know such a place to exist anywhere close to his home, but the Stewardaides couldn't have taken them far.
He managed to get to the door before he needed a break. Just water wasn't enough to keep your strength. There was not a single piece of furniture in the room that measured but a few feet in every direction. It was impossible to open the door with any kind of tricks, especially when you were bound and had no tools on you at all. During the first attempt, Aragorn already had to drop to the ground because his legs gave out under him. The wound at the back of his head, encrusted with blood, throbbed angrily; his stomach rebelled not only because of his hunger. Two good reasons to not ask too much of himself.
There was no way he could just stay idle either though. He had been wondering for days in vain if Arwen was anywhere in this dungeon as well. Now that he did finally have some energy to go sure, not only the fear about what might be going on in Ithilien right now but especially the one for his wife was driving him crazy. When the next coughing fit subsided, he made it with some effort to call her name, in spite of his sore throat. The echo quickly gave him an idea of how thick the cave walls were.
She probably wouldn't even have heard him if she had been close by. The Stewardaides could long have killed him. For some reason, they had not. That allowed him to have the despaired hope that for now, nothing had happened to Arwen either.
The child, however … Aragorn had been a healer for far too long to fool himself in this regard. It would be a miracle of a kind he'd never experienced before if the baby had survived the effects of the sleeping draught and this whole excitement. Miracles only occurred in legends and fairytales, or when Manwë was having a good day.
Like that fairy talk of the invincible King. A very entertaining tale, admittedly. For a while, he'd even believed it himself. He'd just been shown how much his supposedly legendary skills left to be desired. That narcotic in the water had only been the last mistake in a long, sad series of stupid mistakes happening on the evening of the fire in Taur Adab. Mistakes that had almost certainly cost at least one little girl her life already.
After all, Amina had already been in a far too bad shape on their way to Minas Tirith. There was no doubt that her death was already on those bastards as well.
And other mistakes that Aragorn himself had made, had once plunged Legolas into that deep abyss that he could now not find a way out of anymore. It was ironic that Aragorn had first had to feel this overwhelming guilt of causing the death of his own child, to fully understand how much the time right after the war had been responsible for what had happened between Legolas and him.
That was probably what Glorfindel had tried to tell him at their last good-bye. Now it was too late to regret all the harsh words that had been spoken between one of his best friends and him. And if none of the soldiers hopefully looking for Arwen and him would by chance run into this hideout, there would never be a chance of making anything right.
Steps outside. Someone had apparently heard his calls. Unfortunately, it was the wrong people.
Aragorn wasn't even really back on his feet yet when the door was being yanked open. The sudden light, as bad as it was, hurt his eyes and slowed his movements. A punch to the gut tore him to the ground again immediately.
"Our precious King has certainly seen better days."
Against better knowledge, he tried to free himself from the grasp on his elbow that yanked him upwards. Instead, the next punch hit his jaw, not as firmly as planned without a doubt because his eyes were slowly adjusting to the brightness and he saw the attack coming this time. Yet he couldn't suppress a loud moan when his jaw cracked audibly. Not fractured, not yet, but if the two of them kept that up, that was only a matter of time. The ropes binding his arms prevented him from resisting; any attempt to kick the men would have ended with another fall. So he rather saved his strength for something useful.
"Where is the Queen?"
"You hear that? His Majesty still fears for his little elven whore. Guy just won't learn."
Now, Aragorn tried instinctively to fight the grip on his arm after all and was rewarded with a kick against the back of his knee from behind. This time, he needed no motivation to raise his head immediately; a dagger blade on his throat was enough.
He was regarded with an expression of deep hate, by a warrior who had no patience to wait for his goal left. "There are other things you should worry about much more, Elessar. How about the best way to beg our leader for your miserable life? Who knows? Maybe the Steward has use for you if you admit that you are nothing but a fraud who obtained the throne with nothing but lies. I'm sure, they still need servants in the stables."
"You should finally give up the wishful dream that the Steward is backing your miserable plans," Aragorn somehow managed to say with a growl. "Every single one of you will pay for their crimes. If you actually do have the courage to kill me someday instead of talking big, the gallows will already have been built for you. And then there won't be a King to protect you from the people anymore."
More laughter, so confident that Aragorn felt a fear that he had usually well under control in such situations. Men who thought they had won were often most dangerous.
"The Steward is just getting rid of your annoying elvish friends after we made him see they only damage our land, and now he's having dinner with our leader. No one's going to miss these cowards with the pretty faces, and now that the Steward could finally exploit his full potential, soon, no one's going to miss you either. You see, our leader is enjoying some rest before coming here to take you out personally. Given the folk has been living in grief for days already, it would really be a shame if they won't find a body."
In spite of his worry about old friends being kindled new, Aragorn saw the blade get dangerously close to him and let himself fall to the side, into the brutal grip the other held him in. A scream escaped him when his torturer pushed back before throwing him to the ground and something in his shoulder didn't hold up. His thoughts were anywhere but with his fresh injuries though.
Faramir … And the elves … Legolas … Sure, the Stewardaides had a way with words. Usually, you couldn't even believe them when they told you how late it was without looking out of the window.
But what if it was true?
Something hot and sticky dripped over his right arm. After feeling numb for a moment, it suddenly seemed to sing all of Imladris' hymns at the same time. Aragorn somehow managed to brace himself on his left arm and screamed out once more, a sound muffled thanks to the lack of energy in his body when the movement had his enemy's dagger slip from his flesh and drop to the ground. That bastard had cut the old scar open that these people were already being responsible for.
The pain kept him busy until the man had closed the door behind them. He wasn't dazed enough though to not hear what the two of them shouted at each other cheerfully before leaving.
"What do you think? Is the little whore better at fighting back?"
It took Éowyn long, nerve-wracking minutes to convince her handmaiden that nothing was wrong with her, that she did neither want any additional blanket nor a calming tea and watchdogs in her bedroom least of all. That she didn't need anything but silence right now.
When Viwin had finally closed the door behind her, she tiptoed through the room and listened into the silence of the hall outside intensely once more. Experience had taught her, some people just didn't understand the meaning of the words "I want to be alone right now".
Fortunately, the steps outside departed indeed, a door was quietly being closed. Viwin had gone to her own chambers.
Taking a deep breath, Éowyn traded her uncomfortably tight government dress against one slightly more revealing, one originating from her time in Rohan. In the few moments that Faramir and her could spend alone, she never wanted to dress up. Then she didn't want to be a noblewoman, the niece of the former King or the White Lady of Rohan, not even the Steward's wife. She only wanted to be the woman that Faramir had fallen in love with in the Houses of Healing back then. She felt that would be necessary more than ever today.
A fleeting look in the mirror reminded her how much she had recently let herself go. That needed to stop immediately. No matter how terrible this afternoon had been: At least in this regard, she had woken up. She quickly put up her unsightly hair and then ducked away under the heavy, white leather curtain behind her bed that only a few people knew of that it could be slightly lifted, just enough to get to the narrow opening in the wall behind, closed shut with a simple wooden door.
So far, it had always only been Faramir to open this door from the other side, in his own bedroom. They hadn't talked about it – actually, they had never been talking particularly much, which Éowyn suddenly realized, startling and shuddering. They'd had something like a silent agreement that he had his duties that kept him busy and that he should make the decision about wanting to visit his wife at night. That hadn't been the case exactly often.
Admittedly, after a while, she hadn't really given him a lot of reasons to come see her anymore. Far too many things had just gone wrong between them.
For the first time since the deaths of these elves at the beginning of the year, Faramir had looked really alive again in that fight earlier. He was finally getting active again instead of hiding away with all his feelings of guilt.
If he could do that, so could she. Éowyn hesitated only for a moment before quietly knocking on the secret door and passing through it without waiting for an invitation. "Love?"
"I was just about to come to see you." Faramir stood in front of his cabinet. He had traded his armor against his old Ranger clothes and was just about to throw on the matching, camouflaging dark robe. Once more, he only had a short side glance to spare for her. "You have to …"
"No." Her sharp tone had him look up astonished and slightly offended. Even that was suddenly something, she didn't care about anymore. She wouldn't let herself be ordered about like a servant anymore. "What are you doing? You can't leave! You're in charge of the whole realm right now!"
"And I have a responsibility towards the King," he nodded. "So I will not leave it to soldiers who haven't found even the smallest clue so far, to look for him. Whoever it is that has kidnapped the Queen and him, knows these realms very well. Maybe I'm the only chance he still has."
"Your people know this country just as well!" Not ready to give in, Éowyn came to stand in front of him in determination. "How do you think this is going to work? Our cellar is filled with prisoners! You just declared these elves enemies of the realm, and now you want to leave the people here alone with them? And this Barhit – I don't trust him! Don't tell me, you're seriously buying that he didn't mean to kill the King back then."
"Of course not. Barhit will never be a free man again, don't worry. And there are still enough soldiers here. Nothing will happen to you." Faramir caressed her cheek for a far too brief moment. "If I didn't trust my people, I wouldn't leave you behind. I know their abilities, and I know yours. You've lost a little weight and muscle, yes, but the woman who defeated the Witch-king of Angmar still knows how to fight back, doesn't she?"
"I just don't feel like that woman right now." Éowyn hid her face against his shoulder so that he wouldn't see the tears in her eyes. "Didn't you see me earlier? I froze. I couldn't even lift up any armor anymore. I feel …" Suddenly she started to sob, and there was no way she could stop it. "Some days, I feel like I'm dead."
"Don't talk like that!" Only now did she have the feeling, she was actually reaching Faramir's heart. Fear sent a violent shiver through him. The fear that so shortly after losing his father and his brother, someone else that he loved would leave him. The fear was even stronger than the anger and the worry about what had happened. "This is all my fault. I'm being there for you far too little." He stroked her hair again and again, not even realizing that his fingertips were being stopped by knots again and again. "You have to stay with me, love. I won't make it without you. You're the only one in these halls of whom I know exactly that they're loyal to me."
"Do you really think, the elves have …?" she asked, hesitatingly. They usually didn't talk much about politics. And she herself knew even less what to think about all this.
"Who can say that for sure?" Faramir answered just as harshly as expected. "Do you think I like ordering someone to be locked up who would have given his life for Men anytime in the war? They courted this. I feared for you. And then this weird Imladris elf. I need to track him down as well. He's the only one who really knows who had anything to do with the King's disappearance. And the soldiers have to find out what by the Valar is going on at Cair Andros. I can't talk to Legolas before they do. He's deceived me once too often."
"And what if he's telling the truth?" Éowyn asked almost inaudibly. The idea alone frightened her too much that there could indeed be hostile men in this house, who might worship her husband more than anything and would even kill for him but who had to hate her just as much as the elves, her being a Rohiril and all.
Once the Stewardaides would gain the upper hand, they wouldn't allow her to stay by Faramir's side. Maybe they would wait until she would have given him a child, the necessary heir for the Steward-line, but then the Stewardaides would get rid of this disgrace for Gondor as well, that a wildling of the stables was ruling alongside their beloved leader.
"What if it really is poison, Faramir? You've been so different since the … since then."
"Impossible." He was already sounding dismissive again, unkind, but tried for a softer tone when Éowyn startled.
"Gandalf has often talked to me about it. Back then, he was the only person I had, especially when Boromir went to battle once more. He was there for me in a way, father never could. I absorbed each of his words like a thirsty flower going for a few drops of water. Especially when it came to things that father always called humbug because those did mostly contain the most truth. All writings that people have done on such poisons have been destroyed or are being kept safe, Éowyn. Not even Legolas' people could create something like that, much less simple men. I don't know what he thinks this story of his will change. Do you really think, Stewardaides could be operating in our house without us noticing anything?"
"Unlikely." She tried to smile that possibility away as easily as he did. "But what about that soldier that the Prince recognized?"
"I don't want to accuse anyone prematurely. We've seen enough of the elves' hate for the Stewardaides. Maybe the Prince was wrong. After all, his eyes are obviously not doing that good a job anymore," Faramir remarked dryly, in reference to Legolas' miscalculated jump earlier. "But the others do have the order to watch the man, in case something's really wrong with him. I need to go."
Faramir bent forward a little and gave Éowyn a gentle kiss on her still trembling lips. "Take care of yourself. Stay away from the prison cells."
"I don't feel good about people sitting around in dark dungeons who came to our country to help." In some regards, Faramir still knew Éowyn very well, no matter how misunderstood she felt by him on other days.
As soon as he would be left, she would probably have gone downstairs first thing to see how Legolas in particular was doing. She had already feared for his life in the war once. Though they were having their problems right now, she didn't want to be responsible for him doing so badly again.
"Can't we keep an eye on them in the guest chambers?"
"Sometimes your heart is too big for battle." Faramir couldn't muster up so much leniency towards the elves. "They have injured several people, one of them badly no less. If they'd acted reasonably, that wouldn't have happened. I gave them a chance to leave; they didn't listen to me. Until I'm back, they stay where they are – and you keep away from them, you hear me? The dungeon is no place for a woman who's not as capable of fighting as she used to be right now. I don't want you anywhere near Barhit in particular."
He looked her firmly in the eyes, ever until she nodded reluctantly, then he said goodbye to her with another kiss and finally hurried to the door.
"I like you better that way, by the way," Éowyn shouted after him with an askew smile. "Without wine in your hand, and with your thoughts no longer dwelling in the past, I mean."
He returned her smile, though it did still look slightly distorted. "Maybe this is a good day to stop drinking."
"The Steward is leaving Emyn Arnen." Camhanar raised his head to look through the little window right below the ceiling of their cell.
The estate's stables were located too far from here to make out anything, still, the fearful words of the servants outside revealed that they were wondering why Faramir was leaving them alone in a situation like this.
"Unless the wrong people find him first, it's better that way, for the sake of Elessar's wellbeing." Thranduil had bigger things to worry about than a man who had let himself be poisoned for months without noticing.
His eyes were fixed on the cell next to the one that Camhanar, Tauriel, and he had been taken to. Under different circumstances, he'd already been busy making a list with people in his head who would have to pay for this effrontery of locking the King of Eryn Lasgalen up in a tiny, only tolerably clean room. Elessar would have an appropriate answer to look forward to, Elrond's foster son or not, and this incapable Steward should better not dare to leave the house without soldiers henceforth.
Under different circumstances. It was difficult to put the blame on people when you were responsible for your misery in large parts yourself.
Besides, they had bigger problems than dirty clothes. That they had taken Legolas into a cell of his own had been suspicious enough. For a stupid moment, Thranduil had been naive enough to hope, it was only a precaution. As if he hadn't fought enough battles and not seen enough abysses of Mannish and also Elvish life, to know better.
Either way, it wasn't much of a surprise, seeing that when the healer that the Steward had sent, had finished his conspicuously quick treatment and stepped back, the two soldiers stood the still unconscious prisoner up instead of leaving the cell, and bound his wrists to the rear wall, far away from the cell door, using iron shackles on long chains.
"What are you doing?" Tauriel shouted in protest immediately. The former warrior who was still being far too impulsive had watched the sloppy wound treatment closely as well, as far as the bad lighting had allowed her to, and had commented on it with disapproving words that the man had deliberately ignored.
"Order from on high," one of the soldiers explained briefly. "A measure not uncommon for criminals who attack high figures. We don't have any orders concerning you, she-elf, but if you feel solidary enough to prefer restraints, too …"
"Let it go." Grabbing his wife's wrist for a moment, Camhanar kept her from giving any more angry remarks that would only have tempted the men to take further sadistic actions.
The two of them, fortunately, took the lack of objections as a clue to retreat; the heavy dungeon door closed behind the men.
For now, the elves stayed back alone. Alone with a cell door that withstood even the combined strength of the three of them, as a brief attempt showed; and any too noticeable noise would only call their enemies back to the scene. They couldn't risk that as long as one of them couldn't fight back.
"The soldiers are part of their group as well," Camhanar realized in frustration. "At least they sympathize with them. The Steward would never have given such an order. Half of this house has been brainwashed by these bastards. We can't expect any help here."
"But Legolas is …" Tauriel started again.
"Hurt, yes, I can see that. That's the only reason I ran back," Camhanar answered unusually gruffly. "But as far as I can see it from here, the bleeding has stopped. The Steward can't afford to let him die if he doesn't want to provoke the anger of other elven realms. This is one of his orders that the Stewardaides won't ignore, for they would lose even more of his trust with that. None of this would even have been necessary if His Highness had handled this whole thing a little differently, so forgive me for my compassion with him being limited right now."
"Why are you suddenly so angry with him?" she asked, shaking her head. "None of us has been forced to come along. If I have the choice of either waiting for these insane King's enemies to poison our food next or shoot my child because it's playing too far from the camp, or of finally opening the Steward's eyes, I know I'm in the right place right now. We knew from the start that this wouldn't be easy."
"But not how bad the preconditions for a possible fight would be."
Camhanar regarded Thranduil with a look that spoke volumes. "You should have said something earlier. I'm sure you've been knowing for a while the shape his eyes were in."
"A blacksmith storming a well-guarded base with a group of badly trained elves shouldn't be the judge on this kind of things." Under the others' disconcerted gazes, Thranduil fished a few exotic smelling herbs from his belt and started to chew on them, unimpressed.
"If you and my son can communicate so easily, I'm surprised you didn't realize it yourself. And don't even get me started on you, Tauriel."
"Just don't, Oropherion. What are you two even talking about?"
In the next moment, Tauriel forgot the question because a short gasp sounded in the other cell that quickly turned into a pained moan. "Legolas!" She came to stand next to Thranduil, every argument suddenly irrelevant, and pressed her face against the bars, to be able to see better, which unfortunately didn't help much. The only torch in the hallway, between the two doors, produced hardly enough light to even make out Legolas' silhouette right, much less to check his condition. "How are you feeling?"
"Why are you still here?" was the anything but kind answer.
The chains rattled, followed by another tight hiss; then Legolas quickly gave up the first instinctive attempt of freeing himself.
"She's here because you just had to drag her along on a mission that has been hopeless from the start."
"Stop it!" Tauriel tried to reprimand her husband again, to defend herself, but Legolas interrupted her.
"Never mind. He's right, and you know it. It's as if the two of us never left that damn cave back then. I've bitten off far more than I can chew once more, and therefore got people harmed yet again. I should never have… taken you along. This whole settlement is cursed, just because I'm making one … mistake after another." Only two, very short pauses in the last sentences that a Man would maybe not even have noticed. Elves however were trained to listen well. The other cells were empty; the oblong cellar hall had a bright echo. No matter how hard they tried, they couldn't ignore that there was an unwanted moan escaping Legolas' lips again and again.
"Why don't we talk about it later that you suddenly want to be like your father, constantly trying to rob your people of their free will?" Tauriel asked tiredly. Realizing how grave the situation was for her patient took much of her enthusiasm and fighting spirit from her. "I can hardly see you; you have to help me out so that I can judge your condition. If you need the healer again, I'll find a way somehow to make these arrogant armor-bearers see that."
"You better save your stubbornness for negotiations with them," Legolas objected. "You have to find the others and get them to safety before this son of a madman calling himself a Steward kills them all in his ignorance."
"I won't leave you alone," Tauriel refused. "As you know, I had no problem, breaking with your father twice already. If I have to ignore another order to protect your life, I won't hesitate. Now stop being an infant and tell me about that wound. There was far too much blood …"
"Because the arrow hit the old scar from Helm's Deep," Legolas admitted reluctantly.
Thranduil startled almost invisibly – so that was where that blackout had come from. The attack of these unworthy Dunlendings dated back only a year; that still quite freshly healed tissue had apparently collapsed like a house of cards. He started to say something but then rather went for a second helping of that eucalyptus mixture. Chewing was calming him down. And in conversations with him, Legolas didn't have much patience anyway.
Until an opportunity would knock to put an end to this whole thing, he could only wait. And be almost glad on his part about the same bad lighting that was bothering Tauriel so much. He didn't know if he could have stayed that silent if he'd have to watch this on top of everything. He had feared for his only child during the whole war, and here of all places, in this completely needless conflict … His hand clenched around one of the bars, the ring of his father scratched over it. It didn't help much to tell himself that there was no mortal danger – yet – when it was your own son suffering so audibly just a few feet away from you.
Tauriel started to walk up and down the bars between their cells. She looked tempted to just try and slip through between them, but for that, she would need to be even thinner than the Steward's wife. "Though apparently, no one here seems to care: If that injury gets severely infected, you could lose your arm. Tell me how big the swelling is. What does the skin around the bandage look like?"
"Tauriel." Camhanar grabbed her shoulder so that she would turn around to him. "He can't tell you."
Since his wife still didn't understand and Legolas had once more chosen to remain silent, Camhanar had no choice but to reveal it himself what his leader seemed to have kept from the others for so long, even from someone who had once been one of his best friends. "He's become blind. And surely not for the first time, given how many problems you had with your eyesight since we know each other already. Am I right?" he asked pointedly in Legolas' direction.
"It's the first bout in years," Legolas murmured into the shocked silence. "It was the infested water. That warg back then; afterward, it started again. As if that beast knew exactly where to hit me." Another moan drowned out a bitter laughter. "It will pass again. It always does." Though he tried to sound impassive, they all realized exactly that it wasn't only pain choking his voice. For beings of light, there just wasn't anything crueler than losing that exact thing.
And in this anxious situation no less – again, Thranduil wished, they would have put them all in the same cell. On a chart between "degrading" and "war catalyst", that would still have bordered on the top position, but he could have tried at least to take this fear from Legolas, of the only thing that really could make him despair completely.
On the other hand, his son had already sent his own wife away, just to not have to argue with her anymore or even worse, to have to let her comfort him. Maybe the bars in truth spared the two of them mutual insults.
A theory perfectly supported by his son's next words already. "This is my problem alone, Camhanar, nothing that you would have to concern yourself with. I already told you what I expect you to do. You leave as soon as you can, and take your wife with you. The Steward and I will handle the rest. How did you even know?" he asked, suddenly very mistrustful. "Did Ilya …?"
"Ilya didn't do anything," Thranduil threw in, more irritated by the second. It was no surprise that his daughter-in-law betimes was a little rebellious if her husband was always treating her like this. "I told him."
Only belatedly, he realized that Legolas couldn't even know yet that he was also here.
For a few long moments, they didn't hear anything but too quick breathing and the sound of the chains when a twitch went through Legolas' body once again and the pain of the fresh wound became unbearable.
Now at the latest, Thranduil expected reproaches because he hadn't left Legolas behind like he'd wanted him to without a doubt. Instead, suddenly all the aggression that his son had met him with earlier, vanished and left behind a helpless elfling who had to see for the first time how completely swamped he was with everything. "But you couldn't even know …"
Somehow, Thranduil resisted the temptation to beat his head against the bars a few times. Admittedly, not everything had always gone right between them, but the way Legolas was drowning in this role of the victim now, of an unloved stepchild, that was something he definitely didn't deserve.
"Your messages were rare, ion nín, and as we know by now, your enemies disrupted correspondence with Cair Andros. But that doesn't mean I threw whatever did reach Eryn Lasgalen into the fire."
"But I never …" Legolas paused, audibly completely shocked – much like his wife not too long ago – by the revelation that even long before this day he'd suffered from a dangerous kind of blindness towards the outside world. And no, he had not written a word regarding the at least as dangerous condition of his actual eyesight to Thranduil … unusual for someone who – on Thranduil's prompting – had gone to see the healers regularly before the war, no matter how often the answer had been cluelessness.
"It would not have made a difference either way. No matter in how many words and in which language I've been trying to make myself clear since the war, no one's been listening, and you always listened the least. You should never have got involved in the first place." There still was no reproach; it was a resigned finding, and maybe that hurt even more. "You made things even more complicated."
"Why? His Majesty might be the only chance to put a peaceful end to this matter." Tauriel was no longer ready to listen to their bantering. The news had left her quite white around the gills. She was visibly close to just call for the soldiers very loudly.
"You have to tell them who you are. These people won't dare to keep the King prisoner."
Was there anything worse than being locked up with two adolescents in the tightest of spaces? "You think? These people sure had no problems, abusing the King's son. And what exactly do you think will happen when they learn who they have locked up in here?" Thranduil gave up on leaning against the bars for the moment and came to stand right before the she-elf who was suddenly looking just as small as back then when he had asked her, for her own sake, to turn her back to his realm for a while and whose hurt pride had rather made her give up on everything forever.
"Do you think they'll skip the chance to tell people that even the leaders of the big elven realms have joined the fight against Gondor? Not even the Steward could have kept that a secret; his office alone forbids him to."
"The situation would escalate, whether they set you free or not," Camhanar now finally realized too. "The citizens of Minas Tirith would lose their heads. If neither the King nor the Steward is there then …"
"You don't need a few disgruntled farmers to spark a war," Thranduil interrupted him angrily. "Have knowledge of this incident reach Eryn Lasgalen, and within a few days, South Ithilien will be raided by an army that Sauron could only dream about. Without my voice speaking out against it, my people will not hesitate to strike back. For now, all we can do is wait."
"I would think about that again if I was you." Something else suddenly seemed to enter Tauriel's mind. She turned to Legolas abruptly, her fine nose slightly wrinkled, as if she was scenting something. The dungeon's stuffy, moldy air had fooled even a Firstborn's senses. Only now, a faint but unmistakable smell reached their cell.
"Do you have the bag with the black water on you, Legolas?" Tauriel didn't sound as if she believed that. The other possibility was far more likely. And it did also explain why Legolas in his damn pride refused to talk about the injury so much, even now. He didn't want any of them to know how bad it really was.
In a moment like this, only the big swords helped, and a tone that Thranduil knew from Tarisilya. "Legolas, talk to me!"
"It's the bandage." With the tedious discussion being over, the pain returned, even stronger now. Legolas sounded as if he could hardly breathe anymore from how much he was biting back every smallest sound. "They've soaked it with water from the poisoned spring. Before we could clean everything back then, they must have collected an even bigger amount of it than what they used for that attack a few days ago."
"That won't allow for a healing." Tauriel crossed her arms; she suddenly seemed to freeze.
She gratefully nuzzled closer to her husband when he embraced her silently from behind, now looking just as shocked as she was. For a healer, there was hardly anything worse than being so helpless.
"It's just dirt though …" Earlier, it had been anger that had allowed Camhanar to have so much distance to this terrible scene; now he was trying in vain to comfort his wife.
Legolas had made a mistake, sure; but he was still the leader of these people, and obviously a very good friend of these two elves. Knowing about the pain that he would have to suffer soon, put even Camhanar's deep worry for his family in the background.
"It is not." The other elves looked up in surprise because Thranduil was entirely upset for the first time since his arrival in Ithilien. The moment when Tauriel had noticed the stench, an image had flashed before his inner eye that only his subconsciousness had registered earlier. One that sent him to his knees when he realized that it wasn't just his son's torture that he would have to witness.
That alleged healer with the arrow in his hand that had been stuck in Legolas' shoulder … On his way outside, only for a second, the man had been in the light of the torch before he had let the weapon vanish under his cloak – long enough for elvish eyes to remember it if you consciously tried.
There had only been feathers at the one end of the arrow. The other one had been dull. The tip still was in Legolas' body. If he didn't get help soon, he would die within a few hours.