VII

Open Sky

Legolas spent that miserable night alone in the tent, while the others sat outside and talked until dawn broke. Then Beren sent two riders away to the nearest elven settlement, and the others waited in the camp until they returned by noon. The elves of the shadow-wood would take care of Tuiw's body, they said, and if possible they would send word to the Mountain. But the trees were unusually quiet and the birds were anxious. The shadow-wood elves didn't know why, but they didn't like it.

It was almost noon when they set off and Legolas had not spoken a single word all day, but before they left the camp he turned to Tinuhen, because there was something he had to know.

"Did you give Tuiw a blanket?"

Tinuhen did not even turn to look at him, but he nodded shortly.

"What about his horse?"

"No."

That seemed unfair. Against better knowledge, Legolas begun to ask why - but Hethulin pulled him aside and whispered:

"It's getting cold and we can't spare too many blankets. The horse will be fine. It doesn't need blankets where it is now."

As they rode away, a light snow fell, and Legolas stared at Amlûg's neck and tried to find comfort in the familiar rise and fall of his steps. There was nothing else he could do. Neither lunchtime nor afternoon nor evening would make Tinuhen any less angry with him or the rest of the company any happier. Tuiw's death had taken what little optimism they had left after Radagast's tidings. Not even Maidh had told a joke since last night.

When they stopped to camp that night, the snow had turned to a drizzle and then frozen to hail, and it took over half an hour to get a fire burning steadily. The trees here consisted mostly of spruce and provided little shelter, so everyone who could crawled into their tents and huddled at the openings so they could speak to each other, while the cooks and sentinels eyed them with envy. Tinuhen was still angry and Legolas could not stand to be near him, so he helped rubbing the horses down and then he stayed with Amlûg while the hail drummed on the hood of his cloak and the grey of the forest slowly turned to black again. At least Amlûg was not angry, and not miserable either. He was warm and calm and homely and if there was one thing that was good with this journey it was that Legolas had come to know him better, because he had never been very fond of riding before.

When they ate - porridge this time; Beren wanted to spare their last bread and meat before they got to the mountains - Tinuhen said that this would be their last night in the forest. Legolas dared to ask what would come next. Tinuhen actually smiled at him.

"Nothing you have ever seen before", he said. "And if I described it to you you would not understand."

"The Misty Mountains?"

"You will see", was all Tinuhen would say.

Legolas could not sleep that night. He thought about Lake-town and what it had looked like, but all around the shore there had been plenty of trees, or fields surrounded by trees, or at least by grooves and copses and large bushes. The Lonely Mountain had been visible, pale blue against the horizon, but they had not gone near it.

But if they neared the Misty Mountains, they would soon get out of the forest - and he had never paid enough attention to his geography lessons to remember what came next. He thought it might be a place without trees. As he lay in the tent and looked up at the dark hide roof, Legolas tried to picture a place without trees - but he could not imagine it. He dreamt that he walked in a desert, but the next morning he had forgotten what it looked like.

The following day they left earlier than usual. Everyone was excited to see the end of the forest, though all in their own way - Hethulin was nervous, Tulus tense and quiet, Naru beaming with apprehension and Tinuhen excited but reserved. When they stopped briefly for lunch, all were deep in their own thoughts.

Hours later, a spot of light appeared in front of them, and it was not the light of a fire, and it was not just a ray of sunlight on the road.

Legolas reined Amlûg in. "Is that..."

"It is", Tinuhen said. "The edge of Greenwood the Great."

Legolas wanted to set off towards in in a gallopp, and he wanted to turn back the way he had come. Tinuhen took Amlûgs reins and said: "Easy now, we're not there yet."

The spot of light grew larger as they rode. Once the road bent and the light vanished between the trees; then it appeared again, much closer. It took the shape of an uneven arch, framed with naked branches. Something moved behind it; tall winter grasses tinted with frost. The ground billowed up and down in hills and valleys. A wind blew strong over the pale lands.

Legolas stopped, heart pounding. Suddenly there was grass beneath him, and sky above. The grass - it stretched as far as he could see, rising and falling and waving in the wind, and there were dry flower-stalks in it and some bushes but no trees, not a single tree, just grass and grass and grass. Where it vanished, something blue and massive loomed, not the sky, but mountains, larger than anything he could have imagined.

And the sky - Elbereth, he had never thought the sky could look so big and so far away. Pale wintry blue it started down by a distant horizon to the north, and arched over Greenwood and ended so far south Legolas hardly dared to think about it. He got dizzy only from looking up. But looking forward was not much better; there was so much nothing, so much empty space with no tree-voices and no branches and no life. He would never go out there. No one could make him go out there. There was nowhere to hide.

"Impressive, is it not?" Tinuhen said. He had stayed with Legolas and a couple of other elves in the forest edge - some of them had never seen this either. "To think some people live here."

"They do?"

"Of course! Men live anywhere there is space. There used to be more of them though, before they moved south. Come along now. You cannot stand here all day."

Legolas did not move.

"Come on", Tinuhen said, "you have not even been out there yet."

"I don't want to be out there!"

"You are like a caterpillar", said Tinuhen, "who does not want to get out of your cocoon. Do you not think they feel just like this? The cocoon is safe and they want to stay there. But they have to leave it, and when they do, they find that the world outside is a wonderful place, and not as scary as it may seem at first."

"I'm not a caterpillar", Legolas protested. "And Greenwood's not a cocoon."

Before Tinuhen could answer, Maidh rode up behind them, glowing with excitement.

"Finally!" he said. "Come, my princes, lets race down the hill!"

"You go", Tinuhen said. "My brother needs some coercion yet."

"Wait for me, Maidh!" Hethulin cried, gathering her courage, and they leaned forward over their horses' necks and set off into the blinding light, hollering with joy as the wind caught them. Amlûg side-stepped eagerly, his muscles taunt and shivering. Legolas took a deep breath. Then, without thinking, he whispered: run!

And Amlûg ran. No, he flew. The forest disappeared and the grass became a yellow blur and Amlûg flew through it, stretched his body out, lengthened his stride, rushed down the hill and onto the next faster than an arrow. There were no trees to dodge, no branches to duck for; nothing, nothing, nothing, expect for the wind that made Legolas' eyes water and caught his hair and stuffed his laughter back into his mouth. He leaned over Amlûgs neck and hid his face in his mane and screamed with joy and fear.

But he forgot about the fear then, when they came over the ridge of the second hill and saw the fields of grass before them again, and the sky, even greater now that they had left the forest behind. Birds crossed it, swift and strong-winged. The dead flower-stalks rustled softly against each other, remembering summers past when the hills bloomed and bees buzzed in the thorn bushes. This was not nothing. It was not Greenwood, but it was something, and there was life.

Legolas reined Amlûg in on top of the hill and let him catch his breath. Maidh and Hethulin and some others were already far ahead, but he wanted to stay and look because he could see to the end of the world from here. Tinuhen soon caught up with him. Even he was flushed from the ride and he was smiling.

"Well", he said, "what did I say?"

Legolas grinned at him devilishly. "You said I was a caterpillar. You were wrong."

Then he let Amlûg decide the pace again, and they raced down the hill with Tinuhen close behind, into the valley, and to the west.

The long journey had taken its toll on both elves and horses, so Tinuhen decided they should stay in the forest edge for the rest of the day, and set off the next morning.

They rode some ways north, not more than a mile, and found the very edge of the Shadow. Deep and dark the forest loomed behind them; grey and sad, but not entirely quiet, stood the trees where they set up camp. But they still had their voices, and the elves spent half the day walking the grasslands and admiring the view, and half the day under the trees, taking farewell. They kept to themselves, excited and sad at the same time.

Evening came - not the swift, pitch-black evening of the shadow-wood, but a sunset that turned the grasslands to gold and set the Misty Mountains on fire. When the shadows were long over the grasslands and the warmth had gone out of the air, Beren and Tinuhen gathered them around the fire.

"We have been on the road now for eighteen days", Tinuhen said. "If we are lucky, we have only three left."

A long silence followed those words. After all the time they had spent travelling it felt strange to be so near the end.

"That means we are almost a month ahead of our time", Tinuhen went on, "but we could not have predicted that the journey would run so smoothly all the time."

"We still cannot", said Beren. "Three days, at the least, is what it will take us to travel the High Pass, but if the snows have been too heavy in the mountains we will have to turn south for the Dimrill Stair, or even the Redhorn Pass. That is a long road."

"Isn't the Redhorn Pass where lady Celebrían was assaulted?" Hethulin asked.

"It is, and though it is safer now than two years ago we will only take that road if we have no other choice. There is another pass as well - but we will discuss that if the need arises."

Tinuhen nodded. "When we reach the mountains - tomorrow - there will be no fooling around or loitering and no... straying from camp." He looked at everyone when he said it, but Legolas knew it was aimed at him. "What we have been through until now is nothing compared to the mountains. It is not only the snow and the terrain, it is also orcs and goblins and wargs - and the giants."

"Really, my prince", Hethulin said, "do you think we can't manage the mountains? I think we handled ourselves perfectly well in the shadow-wood."

The other warriors began to agree, but Beren said: "Did you? Really?" Something in his tone made them all fall silent.

"I had to tell you over and over again to never go in smaller groups than five if you needed to leave camp", Beren went on. " You fell asleep on your watches, neglected your weapons, and lit fires even when it was not safe. Hethulin let Legolas leave his tent against strict orders. Tulus wasted all his arrows on squirrells. Not more than five minutes after we saw a spider web, Maidh was about to leave the path to chase after a deer."

Everyone was too shocked to speak, and stared at the ground or in their laps. Even Tinuhen looked worried that Beren might say something about him - but he didn't, of course, because Tinuhen always followed the rules.

"It is just as well you face it", Beren said. "You only made it because nothing actually happened. You are all untried and inexperienced, and you have behaved as if you had no concern at all for your lives or our mission. When we reach the mountains, there must be a change. If you let your guard down even for a moment, that might be the end of us all."

The elves remained silent. If Beren had been angry and roared, like Tinuhen had done a hundred times, it would have been another thing - but he was only disappointed, because he had expected more.

Beren looked from on elf to the other, waiting until they had looked back up at him before he turned to the next. Then he said: "There was something else you wanted to say, Tinuhen?"

"Ah... um... yes. Rivendell", Tinuhen said. "Most of you have not been there before, and you will find it quite different from Greenwood. The Noldor will welcome us, of course, and they know how different our customs are, but nevertheless you must pay attention and do as they do. There are several things you need to know before we get there."

The wood-elves frowned and shifted impatiently. No one dared to say anything after what Beren had said, but no one truly listened either. Legolas yawned. The sun was gone, and he had not had much sleep the night before.

Tinuhen droned on about formalities and finery while their dinner cooked over the fire. Suddenly there was a whoosh of wings and as Legolas looked up, a bird of prey circled them, black against the darkening sky.

"It's a sparrowhawk!"

"Do not interrupt me", Tinuhen snapped, but he looked up as well. The sparrowhawk swooped down to sit on a low branch just behind Maidh.

"Whoa! Good eve to you", Maidh said. "Did you want something?"

The sparrowhawk cocked its head to the side, blinked with its large black eyes, and nodded. "Has message from Ragast, yes!" It spoke differently from the birds at home.. "Important message for elf!"

"From Radagast?" Tinuhen said. "Why, then, let us hear!"

Hethulin stretched out her arm so the sparrowhawk could sit down on it, with its claws digging into her bracer.

"What's your name?" she asked.

The sparrowhawk fluffed its feathers importantly. "Is swift to fly, yes, so Quick-wing is name. Now, message. Ragast says, elf not dead, so elves must go on, not worry, Ragast not here yet. You understand?"

"Um", said Hethulin.

"Would you mind take that again, a bit slower?" said Tinuhen.

"Elf-king", Quick-wing said. "You know elf-king in big cave, yes?"

"I know him, he's my father!" Legolas said. "It's not a cave, though."

Quick-wing turned to him. "Then little elf not to worry. Elf-king not dead, but can't fly, no, strange sickness, strange magicks. Ragast try help, then come after little elf. You understand now?"

"I believe I do", said Tinuhen slowly. "The Elvenking is sick, but he's alive, at least. And Radagast says we should go on? Not wait or him?"

"Not wait, no. Must be in time. Quick-wing must fly back to tell you here. You understand?"

"Very well. Then we will go on as planned, and you will tell Radagast that. Are you tired, Quick-wing? We shall get you some food."

Quick-wing spread his wings and sailed down to the ground. The elf nearest the food-wagon brought him some dried meat to him, and another poured the contents of a waterskin into a small bowl. Quick-wing looked up at Tinuhen again.

"Elf-queen says to remind, be cautious. Someone in valley cannot be trusted, yes?"

"Valar, yes!" Tinuhen said. "That reminds me. I was going to tell you all that."

"What?" Legolas said.

Tinuhen waited until everyone paid attention.

"The Elven King and Queen has long suspected there might be someone in Rivendell, or at least someone closely tied to it, that cannot be trusted", he said. "A traitor to all elves and good folk. It has been very difficult to send messages to lord Elrond, and the message Tuiw would have carried was stopped as well."

"Stopped?" Hethulin said. "You mean that was why..."

"We do not know", said Beren before Tinuhen could speak, "and we do not wish to speculate too much, but we must be preapared for anything."

"I don't understand", Legolas said.

"All you have to know", said Tinuhen, "is that we must be very catious when we are in Rivendell. There may be a traitor there, and there may be more than one. This is why we're not travelling, officially, as the princes of Greenwood. We won't hide in Rivendell, of course, but that only means we have to be more careful."

"Indeed", said Beren gravely. "I'm not saying you should not trust the Noldor..."

"We won't, though", said Maidh, "so no worries."

Beren scowled at him. "Very well then. But Tuiw gave his life for Greenwood, and I won't have you waste that away by acting like irresponsible children. I hope I have made myself clear."

When they woke the next morning, the world was changed. Where before there had been grassland, there was now only snow; hills of snow, valleys of snow, and snow-triangles with some pine needles sticking out of them.

They left Greenwood behind and rode down the first hill in a long line. Then they rode up the next, and down in a valley, and onto another hill; and before they knew it, Greenwood was far behind, a darkening line at the horizon that slowly faded to blue. Soon they came to the river Anduin and rode over the ford.

When they came closer to the mountains, their feet turned from hazy blue to grey, and soon the elves could make out trees growing on the slopes, and the clefts and ridges higher up; but where the scarce woods ended the grey became blue again. Not even half-way up, the mountains were shrouded in clouds. Their peaks were hidden from view.

"Look up!" Hethulin said, and they tilted their heads back.

"It's an eagle", Beren said. "It's flying rather low."

"It's not low", said Hethulin. "It's just at level with that cliff up there, see?"

The elves squinted, then drew their breaths.

"That's impossible!"

"I never thought they'd be that big!"

The eagle wheeled round and came to hover, barely moving its great golden wings, far above them. Its shadow covered them all, from Tinuhen at the front to Laeros' wagon at the rear.

"Great Eagle", said Hethulin, awed. "The Kings of every bird in Middle Earth."

"That must be a good sign", said Tinuhen. "They are watching over us."

Not long after that Legolas looked back, and though he had barely noted it was up they went, the grasslands were already below them. Ahead of him the ground sloped up to a climbing forest, up and up and up to where the earth met the sky.

They had come to the feet of the Misty Mountains.

Thranduil walked through dark dreams. He stood on the plain of Dagorlad and dead elves rose from the earth and asked why he had left him there, had he forgotten, were they not his friends?

The trees around him twisted and burnt, crumbling into ashes. The telain hung from dead branches and the orcs from the Black Lands set them afire, felled the mighty oaks and the graceful beeches, and the streams flowed red with blood. The elves that had died outside the Black Gates looked on and asked, was this what we died for? For you to leave our land to die, for you to fail?

No it wasn't, Thranduil tried to say, but his father turned away and Thranduil saw, again, the orcs pull him from his horse into the dust and the scimitars rise and fall. He tried to reach him but again he was too late, and now father was gone and the orcs and the trees and Thranduil walked alone through the dark. He walked over ashes and embers and the fire ate his face away.

And then he was not alone. In the dark something - a sentient - looked at him and laughed at his littleness. Look at you, it said, look at you Thranduil Elvenking. You are the last king. None shall come after you. None shall remember you.

Come to me, the voice said. If you helped me, I would grant you great power. Your realm would be fair again. Your people would not have to suffer.

You fool, his father said, you utter useless fool. Do what he says and save us.

Thranduil wavered, alone again in the dark.

Fairly short chapter this time, but the next will be longer. And oh it's just beginning to get exciting ;)

Thank you for reading this far - there's not a lot of you but I appreciate each and every one!