AN: Just a heads-up, there is some action/violence at the end of this chapter, and a pretty major cliffie.
If you read Beginnings, the infamous story of Elladan and Elrohir's banishment from the palace is in here. It seems a little out of place to me considering the rest of the story...but I had to include it somehow, and this was the only way I could think of.
Chapter Twenty-One: The Worst Enemy
"What are we going to do about Amarthwen?" Elladan demanded, turning his back to the balcony railing to face Elrohir. They had left the banquet early, after making Brithdil promise to stay with Legolas (the captain was one of the few elves who knew the truth about the attack).
"We promised we wouldn't confront her," Elrohir reminded his twin. The two were standing on the balcony outside their guestroom, discussing how they could protect Legolas from any further danger.
"But there must be something we can do," Elladan said. He frowned in thought, watching the curtains inside the room wave with a slight breeze. "What about...remember that time we went to that human settlement just south of Bree? There was that uproar about a death threat."
Elrohir nodded. "Someone put a dead skunk in the man's bed. He said it was a threat because he'd been cheating on his partner-in-crime." The younger twin shook his head. "But do you really want to kill an innocent animal just to threaten Amarthwen?"
Elladan sighed in agreement. "That wouldn't be fair to the animal. Well, we wouldn't have to kill one...we could use a live one."
"What sort of threat would that be?" Elrohir asked. "What would you use? Anything small enough to carry could have gotten in on its own."
"Not if it was a frog," the older twin suggested.
Elrohir stared at his brother for a moment. "A frog?" he asked incredulously. "Elladan, aren't we a little old for pranks like that?"
"It worked on Glorfindel."
"That was almost two thousand years ago!"
"Can you think of anything better?"
"Give me a moment," Elrohir shook his head. Elladan's idea might work, but it was far too immature for the two of them...if their father ever found out about it he would be furious, and they wouldn't even have youth as their excuse. "Elladan, we're representatives of our realm here, we have to act responsibly."
"What if we just put it in her room, then? And left a note to say we know what she's up to and watching her...maybe the frog would just scare her."
Elrohir nearly groaned. Elladan's idea was sounding less and less like a way to warn Amarthwen to stay away from Legolas and more like an elfling's prank. "Are you sure about this?" he asked, wondering why he was even considering Elladan's plan. Of course, the only other alternative was to say something to her face, and they had promised Legolas they wouldn't do that. Then again, how dangerous could a nursemaid be?
"We can always come up with something better later," he replied, walking into their room to grab a quill and a piece of parchment. "'We know what you're doing. Stay away from him. We're watching you.'" He dictated as he wrote.
The younger twin sighed heavily. "I suppose we need to go catch the frog now."
"That can wait until morning," Elladan said, blowing on the ink to dry it and rolling the parchment up. "First, we need to find her room."
"I can't believe we're doing this," Elrohir groaned. He felt like an elfling again—and not in a good way.
Elladan shook his head. "Let's think about this. She has to be staying the guest quarters, right?"
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
"I can't believe we're doing this," Elrohir muttered, following Elladan as they sneaked through the lower levels of the palace. The front of his tunic moved and made a strange noise, and he quickly covered it with both hands. "I can't believe you made me carry the frog!" he said. Elladan had found a rather nice bullfrog—an especially large specimen. This made Elrohir think his twin was enjoying this plan rather more than he should.
"Quiet!" Elladan hissed. "We're almost there...I think it's down this hall."
"You've said that several times already," Elrohir groaned. "It's trying to get away," he hissed. "We shouldn't go through with this, we should just let this go."
Elladan ignored him, peeking around another deserted corner. "No one's here, let's go."
Elrohir was seething by now. "Elladan, we can't do this. We're too old for something like this. We aren't elflings anymore."
"I know that," Elladan retorted. "But can you think of a better idea?"
"Other than breaking our promise to Legolas and alerting the palace guard?" Elrohir asked. He still thought they should do that, but Legolas had promised them that he was going to do that...later. Elrohir groaned.
"I don't like it either, but he'll know if we do anything else. 'Ro, we're the only ones he knows he can trust here, do you want to break your word?"
Elrohir rolled his eyes. Trust Elladan to come up with an excuse like that.
"Let's get this over with," he muttered.
However, their idea was destined for failure, for at that moment one of the doors in the hall opened, and the king and Belegdur stepped out.
"Elladan? Elrohir?" Thranduil asked, frowning when he caught sight of the twins creeping down the hall with guilty expressions. "What are you two doing? This is a private wing."
"We were just looking for Legolas," Elrohir offered feebly. The frog he had hidden in his tunic chose that moment to make a loud noise.
"I think he's in the garden," Thranduil replied. "Is something wrong?"
Elrohir felt the frog start to wiggle again. "Oh, no, nothing," he stammered, backing away. Elladan gave him an odd glance, and he tried frantically to divert Elladan's attention to the problem.
"I suppose we should go find him, then," Elladan said, finally understanding that something was wrong.
"Yes...good day, Lord Thranduil, Lord Belegdur," Elrohir said, turning to escape. He did not see the vase behind him and ran into it. The vase began to wobble, and Elrohir slipped and landed on his back, knocking Elladan over in the process.
The frog, suddenly freed from its constraints, leapt out of Elrohir's tunic. In its panic, it ran straight toward the king and the prince. Belegdur jumped back in surprise, accidentally bumping into his father. The papers the prince had been holding went tumbling to the floor, sliding over to the frog who promptly leapt on top of them.
Thranduil, caught off-balance, tried to steady himself by grabbing a nearby torch bracket, only to have it snap off in his hands as he fell to his knees. Belegdur was dragged down with him, and the torch fell from the wall and caught the papers on fire.
With a cry, Belegdur whipped his outer robe off and started beating at the flames, startling the frog into leaping away to a new perch. Which happened to be the king.
Belegdur put out the flames, surveying the ruined papers in despair. "It took three days to get that agreement finalized," he groaned, glaring over at the twins.
Elrohir opened his mouth to apologize, but before he could say anything the vase stopped wobbling and crashed to the floor, shattering into hundreds of pieces.
The king peeled the frog away with a look of disgust, and dropped it into Elladan's hands. "Take that thing out of here," he said angrily. "And make sure you go with it...and I don't want to see you back within the next century!"
Elrohir struggled to his feet, helping his brother up. "It was an accident," he tried to apologize. "We were just—"
"I don't want to hear it," the king lifted a hand. He sighed. "Just go...you don't have to leave the palace, but just got."
Elladan and Elrohir nodded, and quickly slipped out of the king's sight. "So much for your brilliant plan," Elrohir muttered. "What do we do now?"
The older twin shrugged, grimacing as the frog tried to wriggle out of his grip. "I guess we could go find Legolas. What is he doing in the gardens, anyway? I hope he didn't go alone."
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
"Thilator?" Legolas called. "Are you here?" he sighed. Thilator had said they'd meet in the morning, but he hadn't said a time. Legolas hoped he wouldn't have to wait too long—he did still have to see his father.
"Ah, there you are, Legolas!"
The prince nearly jumped. "You have to stop surprising me like that!"
Thilator smiled. "We'll see," he said in a strange tone. "It is nice to have you back, Prince Legolas."
"I'm starting to feel at home here," Legolas said. "It's so different from Rivendell...but I don't feel as out of place as I did when I first arrived."
"Too bad you had to leave at all," Thilator said with a sigh. "I wish you could have stayed. There was so much I could have taught you...but I suppose circumstances were against it."
Legolas nodded, studying the vines that crept up the stone wall of the royal gardens. "I did have tutors in Rivendell," he offered.
"Ah, but would they have taught you that the worst kind of enemy is one who masquerades as a friend?"
The younger elf barely caught a flash of light before instinctively dropping to one side, reaching out to catch Thilator's arm as the tutor's knife flashed by right where he had been standing. He didn't let his surprise at the sudden attack show, instead tangling one leg around the older elf's to trip him.
Thilator sprawled on the ground as the knife tumbled from his hand, and he grabbed Legolas around the ankle when the prince turned to run and tripped him as well. Legolas kicked out at his attacker, hearing a woof of air escape the tutor when one of his blows landed in the elf's midsection.
Abruptly the older elf released his grip, and Legolas scrambled to his feet, intent on alerting one of the guards. But Thilator was ready, and quickly pulled him back into a painful headlock, his fingers digging into the back of Legolas' neck.
Legolas panicked for a moment as Thilator's grip tightened and the tutor began to half-drag him deeper into the garden. It was the same headlock the elf with Amarthwen had used...that meant Thilator and Amarthwen had to be working together! But Elladan and Elrohir had trained him too well for him to just let the tutor kill him. He went completely limp, letting his body become a dead weight to throw the tutor off then launched himself backward against Thilator, knocking them both over.
Rolling off the tutor, Legolas backed away, keeping an eye on the older elf. "Why are you doing this?" he asked.
Thilator slowly stood up, panting for breath, the now-recovered knife clutched in his hand. "You wouldn't understand if I told you," he said through gritted teeth. "That was a very foolish thing to do."
In an instant the tutor lunged out again, swiping wildly and forcing Legolas to duck and scurry backward to avoid the blade.
He suddenly felt the wall against his back, and realized the older elf's goal had been to back him into a corner.
Thilator rushed at the prince, gloating, knife held high for a killing blow. Legolas stepped into his attacker's advance, grabbing for the knife with one hand and wincing as it cut along his arm before he got a grip on Thilator's arm, halting the intended blow. He brought up his forearm and caught the older elf under the chin, stunning him and knocking him back a pace. Twisting the older elf's wrist he pried the knife out of his fingers and kicked it away under the bushes.
Undaunted, the former tutor launched a more physical attack, throwing wild punches and kicks at the prince. Legolas blocked most of them, focusing on protecting his face and torso. He could not counter the attack while under Thilator's barrage, but he also knew that the older elf would exhaust himself relatively soon.
Sure enough, a few moments later Thilator began to slow, and Legolas found the right opening to fight back. He shot out one fist, catching the older elf in the stomach and doubling him over. Thilator stumbled forward and grabbed Legolas about the waist, slamming the prince backward into the garden wall.
Legolas grunted as his head met the brick, and he fought back a wince as the tutor managed to land several well-aimed blows while the prince was dazed.
"You," Thilator panted, pinning Legolas to the wall with his forearm across his neck, "are going to pay for that."
The prince tried to twist away, but the tutor only pressed down harder. "You were already going to kill me," Legolas retorted.
"Ah, but that was going to be quick," Thilator said with a smirk. "Not any more." With that he shifted his grip so that both hands were around the prince's neck.
Legolas gasped for breath, clawing at the tutor's hands. The tutor's smile widened and he tightened his grip, but jerked away with a cry of pain when Legolas managed to land a blow on one of his attacker's ears.
Thilator stumbled back a pace, rubbing his ear and glowering at the prince. Legolas clutched at the wall for support, one hand going to the bruised skin of his throat. "Thilator," he rasped, wincing at the sound of his own voice, "you don't have to do this."
The tutor sneered. "You don't know what you're talking about," he growled, lunging for Legolas again. The prince stepped away, crying out in pain as Thilator managed to seize his arm and twisted it, nearly popping his shoulder out of joint.
"Now," Thilator sneered, pinning Legolas against the wall and twisting his injured arm up against his back, "where were we?"
Reviews? Flames? Tar and Feathers?
Yuggster whistles innocently before sprinting for her hot-air balloon to escape.
The next chapter is coming soon! I promise!