If I am honest, I had perhaps expected a different reunion between the King and the elfling. Their relationship is a complicated one.

How to resolve this creature of ash and fire as a childhood hero? How to accept this King as a once fragile boy?

I find the stash of food that I knew would be laying around the place. Aragorn is the King of Gondor, after all; apparently his entire household seems to follow him around with food, just in case. They have gone Kingless for a very long time so I understand their anxiety, and right now it suits me well. The bread is a bit stale, the cheese a bit hard, the pastries have seen better days but it is food, and none of us have eaten for a while. Nothing more than soggy field rations or tough salted beef.

Sig crams as much food into his mouth as it will hold, spilling crumbs all down himself. He picks up a silver salver that he finds and heaves it up to his chest; clutches it with both hands… cups it against him as though it is something precious and then waddles off to distribute the food to the men.

I drop into the chair next to Arwen who shifts to allow my presence, dropping bare feet to the floor where her boots sit. She reaches over to wipe some blood from my forehead with a scowl and I give her the slightest acknowledgement, but I am more curious as to my brothers' actions. They are an odd pair, and sometimes it is interesting to not be the oddest amongst us.

They have stopped arguing, at least; the steady stream of incomprehensible elvish has dried into a standoff with a battered and bloody elf on one side, and a frustrated King on the other. I cross my leg upon the knee of the other, tear a bite of bread. Lean back comfortably and watch as Aragorn's chest heaves as though he has just run a mile in short order. He looks livid, but I know why. I know them.

"You look awful," Aragorn accuses, as though this might be a capital crime here. His face is cut into planes and hollows in the firelight, pale blue eyes the only colour to him apart from the slightest flush to his cheeks. He stands cut to one side, his sword arm held as though he is ready for battle. I am fully prepared for their argument to escalate, for this shouting match to continue well into the next few days, but I shift my glance to Legolas for just a moment.

The poor lad is exhausted.

Legolas is old, so very old, but in the ways of his people he is younger than both Aragorn and I. We put much weight on the years that he has lived, but not the fact that elves are not men and they are certainly not dwarves. Legolas is tired, hurt… I think there is a shadow in his heart that he carries from some of the things that he has done tonight. He stands before Aragorn and instead of battle I see weakness in him: a tilt of his head, a blink, a deep breath. He has not the energy for this particular fight, not any longer, and of course Aragorn sees it before I do. Of course he does.

He steps forward suddenly; a lunge… grabs the elfling's jerkin and yanks him forward before he can right himself. Aragorn catches our friend into an embrace that is tight and fierce, as close as he can pull him, and Legolas tenses like a wire, for just a moment before he folds into the embrace. An elven Prince and a mannish King, a boy and his protector.

"He has been worried," Arwen murmurs to me. I turn and she smiles. "For both of you."

I feel a measure of the weight upon me lift, but only a measure. I turn again to my brothers and Aragorn screws his eyes tightly shut, buries his face into Legolas' shoulder, then claps him upon the back and releases him. Rests his forehead to Legolas' just for a breath.

"Truly, my friend," he smiles. Cups one hand to the side of the elfling's face. "You look awful. Again. Still? I lose track sometimes."

Legolas reaches up and pulls Aragorn's hand away, but it is gentle and he holds it for a moment, pats it. He smiles a golden smile, casting the shadows of the room into hiding. He changes in a moment, and it affects us all. He glances at me and I throw a honey cake toward him, which of course he catches, and Aragorn finally laughs. His anger has been nothing but worry, and he now he feels relief. The mood breaks, scatters, dissipates like morning mist.

Aragorn has a fine face for laughing. All of his lines and edges are made for it. When he smiles – truly smiles – his face is animated and handsome despite the crags and creases… perhaps because of them. He laughs and drags me out of my chair to embrace me once again, and I am starting to wonder how much of this night will be spend hugging. I laugh in any case, because we came here to spend time with one another and we have barely done anything of the kind. It is poor circumstance that has us in his chambers this way, dripping mud and other things best not examined too closely all over his nice floor, but I will take it where I can get it.

"Captain Hob," Aragorn calls, breaking the spell first. Legolas almost instantly melts into the dimness… out of the way and out of focus. An observer. He kisses Arwen upon the forehead as he passes and I allow him this retreat, because he needs it. "I am ready to leave, but I would have a report from you. And Gimli, you may save your breath because I will have no argument."

He glares at me, expecting a fight, and I consider being glib or acting innocent, but I have not earned this accusation. Not this time.

"I have said nothing," I tell him flatly. He narrows his eyes.

"Then it is worse than I thought. Come, Hob; some of your men require a healer and I have supplies. I will see to them whilst you provide your report and I would have no tarrying; I have waited in this room for long enough."

To a man, everyone in the room blinks at him. Some glance at the Queen doubtfully, others shift uncomfortably, and Aragorn tsks in irritation.

"You, you, you… take your shirts off and try not to bleed on my floor. Sig fetch water and bring it to the next room, and you… yes you, can wash those filthy hands and assist me. Any man who thinks he can best the Queen with a sword is welcome to try, and will someone tell me why there are assassins in my bedchambers."

And that is about enough of that.

~{O}~

The King of Gondor has the hands of a healer, it is known far and wide. To see such a thing in action though… it settles my heart just to watch. It reminds me of nights in the dark, cold and weary, with the thought of hope nothing but a glimmer held carefully in our hands. It reminds me of days long gone when we were naught but a ranger, elf and dwarf. Dark times, dark indeed, but there were moments of back then… moments when I was at my best. With light ahead and darkness behind, and my greatest friends at my side. There is familiarity in it, and Aragorn returns me to a place of comfort and succour when I need it the most. He heals in more ways than just his touch.

By nothing but fire and candlelight he stitches and binds the hurts of the men gathered here, and none escape his ministrations. He is quick but not rushed, he is fluid and practised and I think he could have done this in his sleep. He listens to Hob's report with little more than a question here and there, his focus narrowed – falcon sharp – upon the task that he has put himself to. The men beneath his ministrations seem uncomfortable at first, but once they are patted upon the arm to show that they are done, they are – to a man – looking far better. Their lines of pain are eased, their weariness lessened, their backs straighter and their loyalty renewed a thousandfold.

He works through them like a wind through grass and I had imagined that this might slow us down terribly, but it does not. For every man he lays his hands upon, Arwen is there in his wake to clean their wounds with warm water, sweet and fresh with herbs. As she passes them by, Sig gives them water to drink and – in some cases – an awkward hug and a wet kiss if he is fond of them. I sit quietly in a chair beside Hob, far more comfortable than he is, and behind me I feel the ghost of Legolas' presence shifting in the shadows. Shutter has also found himself a seat nearby, and I think perhaps he has earned that position, but Oren and his men refuse all help and stand back where they could easily be taken as part of the draperies. I watch them with the side of my eye, but I know that Legolas is watching them all the more closely and that is enough.

There is a look that Aragorn gives me during Hob's report – barely a glance – but it shifts from me to Legolas in the darkness and I can read it as though he has spoken aloud. He has seen exactly what the elfling has, and what I am starting to suspect as well. There is something that falls foul with the Lady Briar… something is not right, something does not sit correctly with her behaviour or what she has said.

I meet his gaze with nothing but blankness, no reaction at all, but that is a reaction in itself for someone like him. He reads it quite clearly.

Arwen sends Sig into one of the other rooms; a small one that I think might be little more than a storage room, although it is bigger than the room I have been given to sleep in. There is a chest of weapons in there, she says, and he is to bring them out so that the men might replenish their supplies. There are fresh blades and a few swords, a water-tight box filled with fresh arrows so that Legolas might fill his quiver again, but Sig near enough tears his arms out of his shoulders trying to drag the chest into the room.

Shutter goes and helps him, opens the chest with a murmur of appreciation, takes a few flechettes to replace those that he has lost and distributes the weapons where they are most needed.

"Well then," Aragorn announces, casts his eye across the room and decides we are more or less likely to survive the rest of the day. He turns to the boy, little Sig, who has not stopped feeding and watering the men. "Let me see to this little Whitecloak before we go."

Sig goes to him, perhaps a little shyly at first. He stands before his King, so very tiny and yet so mighty, and Aragorn picks up his arm by the sleeve, drops it. Picks up the other, drops that too. Picks up a mop of his pale hair between thumb and forefinger and this time the boy laughs, squirms. Aragorn crouches before him and looks into his ear, pinches his nose, Sig laughs a little louder and a little braver.

"Well," the King decides sadly. "I am afraid I shall have to chop off both arms and your nose, and perhaps your legs as well. You will simply have to grow new ones."

He pokes the lad gently in the ribs on both sides, a gentle touch that is… eru he is tickling him! I have never seen such a thing, and I look across to where Legolas is staring at him in horror, as though he has taken all leave of his senses. Sig laughs fully then, bright and happy, because I am starting to think that nothing can truly upset this child; that he is so innocent he is beyond harm in his heart or mind. Aragorn grins and stands, casts his eye again across the room.

"Legolas?" he turns to the elf, who has made his way quietly to the door and is stood guard. "Can you tell what happens without?"

The elfling's face turns scandalised for a moment.

"I can hear through a door, Estel," he scowls, then turns back to the ornate wood. His eyes are distant but not for long. "There is nothing but silence, at least outside this door in any case."

I stand, and I notice Jin and Larke speaking quietly over by an enormous bookcase as I straighten my clothing, stretch the knots and cracks out of my body. This moment of rest has done far better for my bones than anything before now, and I feel better rested if not better. I also catch Shutter's eye, and I see something in there that bothers me but he shakes his head.

Not now, he tells me. Not yet.

Larke comes to Hob, who is stood by my side and so I hear what he has to say.

"The khands, sir, they have a request."

Hob looks to Aragorn, to me, then nods to the lad.

"When the Prince was taken, when he was found in the vaults, we took prisoners. Two of them are Oren's men. He has asked for leave to fetch them."

Hob's eyebrows shoot up further than I have ever seen eyebrows reach, barks a laugh that speaks far more than any words.

"Not all of them, sir," Larke adds. "He requests leave for only three of them, and they will meet us at the Tower."

"He would consider me so foolish?!"

"What harm could it do, truly?" I interject. Hob turns very slowly in my direction, blinks at me as though I have just insulted his great ancestors, but I am too old to quake beneath the gaze of a man half my age. I turn to Jin instead, squint into the darkness where they all skulk. "Perhaps you could tell us why this must be done now? When we have need of you most?"

"You lose three to gain five once we return," Jin says simply, barely raising his voice. "One of the men is an expert with a blade… far better than I am."

I am still unconvinced, and if I am unconvinced then Hob looks as immovable as the mountain. Jin sighs.

"He is also my brother. And I would be in your debt."

And this time Hob pauses, deflates, tilts his head to the ceiling and groans.

"Oh, by the stars and the moon there is always something! Go then, do as you must… but Larke will go with you, and if anything happens to him – or you are not there when we need you – then each and every one of you will owe far more than any debt."

Jin bows deeply, nothing of gratitude upon his face, but I catch a glance at Oren and I see it there instead. He nods at Hob but it is not returned, and finally… finally we are ready to move. Sig pushes himself to the centre of the group, gives Shutter a glare that dares him to say anything of him remaining behind, but none of us do. An oath has been sworn to the boy, as inappropriate as it might be to swear such oaths to children. If Edgar is still alive he is going to murder us all for this.

Aragorn comes closer to me in a pretence of pulling on his cloak, murmurs beneath his voice.

"Who exactly is in charge?" he asks, and I think perhaps he could have clarified this a bit earlier. I blink at him, because the answer to that should be fairly obvious, but he shakes his head. "I have come into this too late, I will not confuse matters. Who has been in charge thus far?"

I open my mouth to answer and yet I freeze, because it is not a simple thing. I honestly cannot say!

"All of us, in different things," I point to myself, to Legolas, to Hob… and after a moment of thought, to Oren and Shutter as well, although it hurts a little. I look at the Lady Briar curiously, and she is sat silently in the shadows away from all of us. She seems diminished and unhappy, a deep frown upon her brow, and it is the first time I have noticed that she has not been one of the voices to lead us. She should be… she truly should be. This entire mess is directly linked to her, through whichever story she is telling us from one moment to the next.

Is her brother here to take charge, or to destroy the lower circle of the city? I am not sure that I believe any of it any longer, but there is nothing I can do right now. Short of asking Legolas to break her arms in a few places, I must bide my time for now. I return my attention back to what I have been asked.

Hob is the solider, the true leader of these men… the one they all look to, but he can sometimes lack in imagination if I am honest. Legolas is our scout, the experience and the blade and the shadow, but he is not trusted enough to be our leader. I do my part in trying to rein in the madness, Shutter tries equally hard to add more in its place, and Oren is there to make sure we all have someone we understand less than the elfling.

It… works, or at least it has so far. It is all we have right now.

Aragorn seems doubtful as I mutter this to him, but he has worked with less. I am sure he will be taking over in no time; he cannot help himself.

Arwen has spent a moment in tying her hair into a knot – not unlike the warrior braids of the archers, but the whole dark fall is tucked neatly into a club. I wonder for a moment if this is what Faelwen's hair is meant to look like when she ties it back, but I have never seen it in any state other than wilful and wind-blown so I am not sure. The Queen moves to stand beside the elfling, gives her husband a heavy looks that says much, and rests her hand upon the sword at her side. She is no laegrim, she is a Noldorin, and I am far better used to elves wearing twin blades, but the sight of her there gives me more comfort than I would ever admit to. Any elf fighting at my side is a boon, one that I am grateful for, and these two in particular I trust utterly.

I retrieve my axe… heft it once and then twice and then look to Legolas. He catches my gaze, grants me a quick grin across the distance, across the throng and the sudden storm-tense anxiety of the men within the room. Such an odd creature, to be at his best when things are at their worst. I cannot help but return the grin and I clap Hob across the shoulder, staggering him, so that Shutter shakes his head at me. Gives me a look that asks why I must constantly hit everyone.

"Come lads!" Hob strides forward, taking his turn at being our figurehead. The room stills, turns to him, listens. "We have men in that Tower, I am certain of it. We have found no sign of them yet, but a Whitecloak is always to be found where they should not be, so let us fetch them. After all of this we will drink the taverns dry and then sleep for a week. If our Lord permits it."

He turns to Aragorn questioningly, and the King pauses for just a moment before he laughs.

"I will pay for every flagon of wine and ale in Minas Tirith to be brought to you, and I will drink it with you quite happily. But first there are men in our city that have no place in it, and I think perhaps they have underestimated the old soldiers of Gondor. A military man with a coin in his purse and a promise of ale would have the necromancer himself considering the wisdom of his coming in his way."

There is a grin and a laugh that ripples through our men; clapped shoulders and chests raised in pride. I knew he could not help himself, and if these men were loyal before then they are inextricably bound to him now. Aragorn catches me looking at him, gives me a questioning glance back, and I shake my head with a laugh. He truly does not know what he does.

"After you, Captain Hob," he gestures toward the door with his unsheathed sword. An elven blade, twice forged and with a covenant more mighty and noble than most of our family lines, but right now it is just a sword. He passes command back to the captain of the Whitecloaks, and Hob raises his hand so that Legolas pulls free the bars upon the doors… heaves it open. The door sticks, groans, shifts and then shudders inwards, and I see the musculature of an elven archer ripple for just a moment across his back, but then we are spilling outward. Quiet, careful, focussed and disciplined.

We fall into practised positions; defence and offense. These men know their roles, they fall into them as easily as a thought, and a sliver of the khands melt away with Larke into the corridors behind us.

We go to the Tower.

~{O}~

We move well, considering.

We step over the bodies in the corridor and move quickly through the lower parts of the city. We come across little resistance, nothing we cannot dispatch easily enough, and with Legolas and Arwen at our fore we evade the groups too large to deal with. There will be much in the way of routing these pockets of men once this matter is dealt with, but first we must deal with it. We do not rush matters, but we make good time through the corridors until I start to feel some familiarity with where we might be.

We are about to turn into the tunnels that will take us back out into the daylight – because they are tunnels, no matter what Aragorn calls them – but when we reach the junction that splits off toward the sunlight I pause. I stop, but I do not know why.

I am at the rear of our group so my hesitance goes unnoticed at first, but there is something… something different, wrong perhaps? There is a thrill that tugs at me, deep in my chest, and I look curiously down the dim corridor that we leave behind, the one that would take me deeper beneath the city. There is nothing there but silence and emptiness, nothing but echoing stone, and I can hear the footsteps of my friends receding away from me but I cannot move. Cannot silence the small and secret voice that whispers at me – tells me that there is something amiss.

It gives me pause, halts me in my stride. Shadow fingers trace across the nape of my neck, a whisper speaks to me and calls… calls that I should turn around and follow.

But then it is gone.

I am released, the corridor is simply a corridor, and I am being left behind.

I shake my head, dislodging the cobwebs and the lingering whispers, and it is though it has never happened. Barely a hint of it left, barely a memory. I go to follow the others but of course Legolas has noticed I am missing. He has held back – waits for me with a questioning look – but I shake my head and move past him. He continues to gaze down the corridor, curious as to what has so captured my mind. I see him reach out and trail his fingers against the stone wall, listening intently, but he hears nothing, sees nothing, feels nothing. He follows me and we catch up with the others, and I think little more on it.

~{O}~

More time has passed than I had imagined.

By the time we return to the air and the sky there is far more of the day passed than I had expected. The sun that dawned so brightly this morning has become overcast and grey, and although I doubt we will experience any further storms, it is not entirely unlikely that there will be more rainfall before the night comes. It is good, in a way, because we are not lit so brightly, not cut in sharp relief against the sky, but there is so little cover between here and the Tower that it barely makes any difference at all.

I had expected to find our way barred, had imagined guards to be posted to this final door out of the lower parts of the city, but it is one more thing that does not seem correct… just one more oddness that is starting to pile up – one upon the other. I had been concerned, I must admit, as to how we were to make it from the lowers across the flagstones and gardens of the terrace to reach the Tower. It is a knot of topiary and walled gardens – a desperate attempt to calm the blasting wind in such heights – and so we could probably sneak our way if we were slow enough, or if we were few enough. But although we are few, our number is not quite conducive to making this entire journey crawling in rhododendron bushes or submerged in ornate fish ponds.

There is a cluster of walls and follies to the centre of the top lawns, stone archways that will be bobbing with heavy roses come the summer. Cherry trees line flagstoned walkways, heavy with bloom despite that most of the blossoms lie stripped… floating and twisting in puddles after the storm. Legolas runs to the nearest, and he makes it look so easy; crouched low and fluid and swift. Aragorn, Arwen, Shutter and Oren follow him easily enough, but the rest of us waddle and lumber and lurch in our closest approximation of his movements. We come together by the wall, and I make sure I finish the journey close enough to the elves to at least peer around the walls at what they have seen.

There… the Tower. Huge, a knife cut into the cloud, bone white and intimidating.

"They are not there," Legolas murmurs.

I shoot him a look, but he does not return it. There are guards posted outside, and it is the luck of the Valar that have us unseen so far. The Valar and some very well placed shrubberies, but that is all the relief we are going to get. The rest of the approach is wide open lawn, and the last time we got this far we ended up fighting a man as large as Beorn. Our movements have not gone without repercussion, because the posted guard is twice the size that it was.

"Why have they increased the guard if they are not there?" Hob asks, but it is not a challenge. He is merely questioning.

"Do you not believe this to have been overly simple?" Shutter asks to counter the question. Hob looks horrified for a moment.

"Simple?"

"He is correct," Aragorn agrees. "If we had realised how little resistance we would meet once the guards in the corridor were done with, my wife and I would have moved without you many hours ago."

"We had only half of the only elves we have now, my King," Shutter points with a thumb in Legolas' direction. "I thought you might have been waiting for some ears to go with the eyes you already had. They are fairly large ears."

"They are no larger than yours," Legolas sniffs, uses that tone of long sufferance that he often uses with me, but it does not stop him touching his fingers to the fine tips of his left ear. I do not think he realises he has done it.

"It feels wrong," Arwen murmurs.

I have often noted that the daughter of Elrond sees everything… quite literally everything. She will be a fearsome mother one day. It is not often, however, that I see such intensity there. The elven burn, the unblinking age there in those depths. She has had better tutelage in softening the part of an elven gaze that makes us feel so uncomfortable, but it is an affectation, and therefore sloughs away when the situation draws her focus. I wonder whether Legolas has ever had such tutelage, and I almost laugh out loud at the thought. Even if he had not spent the last age battling beasts and monsters and swinging through the treetops, I cannot imagine the Greenwood King giving any more thought to how comfortable mortals are than he does to what his horse had for lunch.

Even if he had been taught, Legolas likely forgot it instantly. Probably on purpose.

"There are people in there," Arwen decides finally, turns her gaze to Legolas. They speak somehow; a look so intense that I could probably cook my lunch between them. There are tiny gestures, the smallest glance and movement, a whole conversation in the space it takes me to quash a sigh of bemusement. This is probably how Aragorn feels when Legolas and I do this, and we are nowhere near as close as these two. "There are people in there," she repeats, stronger, "but they are not the number we should find. It is wrong, it is all wrong."

"Well, it is certainly good that you tortured that man, Legolas. I could not imagine coming all of this way for nothing."

He gives me a filthy look, but it is not the filthiest he has ever given me. I think he recognises some truth in what I say, but instead he holds one hand out in Oren's direction and the assassin moves forward, crouches low until he joins us, then looks at Shutter as well.

"Can either of you climb that wall?" he asks.

I would be offended, but then I see the wall he refers to and I am quite happy not to be a part of this conversation. Eru, he means the actual, sheer wall of the Tower itself.

There are few windows in the White Tower, but they do exist, and there is one perhaps a hundred feet from the base. It barely a window at all, and an elf could probably slip through it but I find myself eyeing the assassin and the thief; measuring their dimensions curiously. Shutter narrows his eyes, squints at Oren as though he measures his girth just as I do.

"I could maybe climb it," he muses. "I have climbed higher, but the walls were always far more cragged and I had a lot more time available to me."

"Arwen could climb it," Legolas considers to himself, "but she must remain if I am to go. None of you have functional senses beyond that of a tree stump."

"I admit the same," Oren murmurs, a hint of apology in his voice. "If I were fresher, if it were darker, if I had more time… then perhaps. I am not so proud as to admit my shortcomings; I am skilled but I am no elf."

"You believe that you can climb it?" Shutter asks doubtfully. Oren looks at the elf curiously as well, as if he, too, doubts it.

I can see where his doubt stems from. The wall is quite literally sheer; a marvel of masonry without any visible flaw or marring to grant a handhold. Not even for the most skilled of men. But Legolas is no man, and he looks at the thief in consternation. Aggrieved that his ability to climb a wall is being doubted in this way.

"You are not going alone," Aragorn says, because at least he recognises that Legolas could make the climb, and Hob nods in agreement.

"I do not doubt your skill, Master Elf, but you do not know what you walk into. You will be alone, and with all of the respect I am capable of granting, you are in fairly poor condition."

There is a hint of a frown that pinches the elfling's forehead, and although I go to jump in – to stop him from becoming all uppity about how 'fine' he might be – it is not necessary. He frowns because he agrees, and because he is not happy about it.

"I have another thought," he admits with a sigh. Turns to face Aragorn. "You are going to hate it."

~{O}~

"So we are agreed," Aragorn nods with false cheer. Glassy eyed and rigid. "We are going to set fire to the White Tower. A tower which, I would add, has survived an age of war and darkness, but only because it had yet to come up against Legolas and Gimli."

"We are going to set fire to a bit of it," Legolas rolls his eyes, just as I exclaim:

"What do you mean Legolas and Gimli? I have never set fire to any part of your city before now!"

"Have you ever seen how men react to fire?" Legolas continues. "They lose their heads entirely; they will come running out of the doors in a wild panic, we probably will not even need to fight them. They will likely fall over the walls in shock and fear."

"They are not chickens!"

"Aragorn, my dear husband," Arwen reaches out and lays one hand upon his arm. "If you do not want Legolas to set fire to the Tower then we will simply need to do something else. I am sure you have another plan."

He gives her a look of betrayal.

"Then I go to climb the wall," Legolas nods. Goes as if to stand. "I apologise, Aragorn. If I do not return then please tell my father that I love him, and tell Faelwen that I will be waiting for her upon the shores of the Undying Lands. Tell Idhren that he is an idiot, and Almárean that…"

"Oh, stop it," Aragorn snaps, as quietly as he can but without losing any of the ire behind it. "Do as you wish, but you are paying for the repairs."

Legolas grins, I school my face carefully into a neutral mask because I cannot be drawn into this – I certainly cannot afford to open my purse toward such repairs – and Legolas comes to his haunches. He bears a newly filled quiver at his back, pulls his bow free and carries it low at his hip as though he was born with it there. He has been without use of it for a while, and it looks so natural that I admit I missed seeing it. A bow is a fine weapon, especially when you can work miracles with it the way that he can, but it is woefully restricted once the arrows run dry. He is also the only one of us that carry one.

He holds his hand out to me, I blink at a complete loss until I realise I hold our tinder box. I dig it out for him, elegant fingers curl around it and it disappears into the small pouches at his belt that usually hold poultices and remedies for spider venom. There is a light in his eyes that speak plainly of how happy he is to be doing something; to be running off to do something dangerous and foolish on his own. I should have expected it; it has probably been a good few hours since the last time he did.

"You know where to be," he says finally, but he is speaking to me when he says it. I think he falls into certain habits sometimes, and I wave him away. Nod at him and do not say any of the things I mean to say, because there are many ears listening and it is not always appropriate to tell him to be careful all of the time.

Legolas rests his hand for a moment upon Aragorn's shoulder and then he is gone. We can see him for a short time, but Legolas is all of the colours of the natural world and he is a laegrim elf. He is not in the wood, he does not race the wind in the treetops, but he could make himself invisible in an open field if it were necessary.

"He will ready before any of us," Aragorn mutters to himself, "idiot elf. Hob, form your men into four and remain in formation at a distance, Oren your men are with me because I can better see them that way. Gimli, take Shutter and get as close to the main gates as you can. Briar – remain here with Sig. I will be truthful and say I do not know your intentions right now, and I will not have any blade at my side that I do not trust fully."

The Lady Briar looks incensed but resigned, nods although she looks as though she is chewing a wasp, and I hook a hand into the boy's sleeve and drag him near. He gives me a questioning look, but the poor lad trusts me utterly and leans into my side as though I am nothing but a favourite uncle.

I speak to him quietly, too quietly for anything but elf ears to capture, and I tell him to run if anything goes awry. To run and to hide, and to find us once the danger has passed. I tell him he is to follow no one, to listen to no one, to trust his own senses and bless his tiny heart he gives me a look of disappointment.

"You are unkind to her," he says, quietly but honestly. "She has always been very brave and very good, and I think she has done things she should not have, but she is very sad. You should help everyone, and she needs help I think."

"Aye," I sigh, take a breath and rise so that he slips away from me. His hands trail upon my sleeve as we lose contact. "That remains to be seen, laddie."

~{O}~

Legolas is good at a great many things.

He is utterly dreadful at a vast swathe of skills that most people are born with, but the things that make him stand out – that truly contribute toward the legend of the elves – are those feats that he can accomplish easily and without thought. Skills beyond all others: beyond their dreams, beyond their physical capacity, beyond their endurance.

His ability to cause panic and destruction, when he really sets his mind to it, is one of those things.

He has little to hand, to be fair to him. He has naught but what he has upon his person and what he finds around him – storm sodden and decorative by intent – but I have faith in my elf. Shutter and I shear off from the main group and get as close to the Tower as we possibly can without being seen. The guards seem tired, bored, but I have come against these men many times in the last few days and I do not let this give me false confidence. I hide at the base of a statue – a particularly naked young man that I try not to look at too closely, because it is quite cold up here bless his stone heart – and Shutter secrets himself into the fold of a wall, nothing more than a wind break. It is barely hip height, but this is something that Shutter is good at and I have begun to trust him quite considerably.

We are close enough to the guards to see their features, blurred and indistinct, but that is as close as I mean to get with nothing but grass between us. The Tower hulks above us, dominates the skyline, and as I crouch I feel a whisper again of something in the mountain beneath me. Something different, something off, but I am given little opportunity to explore it. I watch a trail of smoke fly true and fast through the air and right into one of those shutter-less windows.

I freeze, expecting a hue and cry from the guards, but they have not noticed. I breathe in relief, and I wait.

"What do you think we will find?" Shutter asks, barely a breath of sound but I can hear him.

"We should not be talking," I breathe back, and he gives a soft snort.

"We are downwind, and they are men. There is no chance they can hear us. What do you think we will find?"

"In truth? Our prisoners," I admit. He nods in agreement.

"Simply creates more questions, aye?" he muses, turns his gaze to the Tower. Another streak of smoke from an entirely different location, and into a completely different window. "Why dump the prisoners here and then go elsewhere? Nothing makes sense any longer."

"Only if we think on it with Briar's words in our ears," I grumble, and he gains yet another level of respect from me by making a sound of agreement. He does not sound happy about it, not at all, but he is not the sort of man to defend his oldest and closest friend for the sake of it. Not to the point where she is making fools of us all.

"I do not think he is here for her, or for the city, or for the second circle," Shutter admits finally.

I am surprised, and it has been a difficult thing for him to say, and so I grant him the respect he deserves.

"I think you may be correct, my friend."

It is the first time I have called him such, and he cants his eyes toward me for just a flicker before he returns them to the Tower. I think I see surprise there; surprise, and something similar to gladness. We watch another streak of smoke fly into the highest window – a difficult shot indeed from that angle, and it has relied upon the wind to carry it through the aperture of the window. A graceful shot, clever, and blast him I doubt he even thought about it for anything longer than a heartbeat. Shutter makes an involuntary sound of appreciation in his throat, but by now the first window is starting to spew thicker smoke. I see a flicker of flame lick at the stone. The fire is beginning to catch.

How the elfling has even made his way around the Tower to make these shots is beyond me. We are as close as we can get, and he has either passed before or behind us to get to where he has been, but neither of us have noticed his passing. The guards are still entirely unaware of his presence.

"He is a strange one," Shutter murmurs. "He frightens me, I will admit to it, but I am glad that he is allied with us."

I grin. The White Tower catches fire, and Aragorn is going to kill us for this.

"He could have climbed that wall, you know."

As the first shouts of alarm begin.

TBC

Does anyone remember back when I started this, and I said it would be quite short?

HA!

I know this one has been a while coming (again) but I actually meant to post this three weeks ago. It wasn't the chapter itself, which I'm actually very happy with, but rather a confluence of events that have held me back from getting it in the position where it could be posted. That and the fact that the site was being weird last week. I'm doing this in Firefox because Chrome isn't working properly. Gross.

Anyway.

I'm going to keep this a/n short because I'm planning on finishing the next one tonight. Maybe. Perhaps. I really don't know anymore; these chapters have a life of their own. I just wanted to shout out to the fact that my stories still seem to get a lot of love that I'm not sure I deserve. There are alerts every week that new readers are favouriting my stuff, and considering how long I've been here - and how old some of these fics are now - it's endlessly gratifying. A huge hello to my new readers, and an enormous hug to those of you who have kept up with me for all this time, and I leave you tonight with about a thousand more questions.

Oh and Legolas just set fire to a historic landmark. How many of you think he's actually enjoying that just a tiny bit? Elves must have bucket lists, surely. No matter how angry it makes their bestest most special superest of friends XD

Have a great weekend x

MyselfOnly