A/N: I'm back! Sorry for the long life, some things happened and I was not able to write. I have holidays now, which means more updates for you.

Enjoy!

"It is a truth serum", he continued, "Once it has entered your system, you will only be able to tell me the truth, no matter how hard you want to lie. You are probably asking yourself: 'But Saruman why did you have to hurt me when you have everything to make me talk'; well dear Peredhel, because it is fun.

Sauron isn't expecting the information until tomorrow, so I had a bit of time to kill with nothing to do but to hurt you. It is something I have always wanted to do, since you voted for dear Mithrandir to be the head of the white council. My compliments, you truly know how to make enemies."

With that, Saruman mixed the substance into a glass filled with fresh water:
"Drink up, little Half elf", and pressed it against Elrond's lips.

Elrond pressed with lips together with all the strength he still possessed, he was not allowing Saruman to win now! However he was too weak and the bare thought of water too compelling, even if it was laced with the serum; Elrond hadn't drunk or eaten anything since the disgusting Orc drink.

So when he felt the cool liquid running down his throat, he swallowed the rest of it without much thought to sooth the constant burning at the back of his throat.

Soon after that loud sounds came from the outsides of the castle, first Elrond thought that there were just some Orcs causing havoc but when orcish shrieks and even more noise came, even Saruman looked concerned.

"We are not done yet.", Saruman grumbled and hurried outside.

Elrond was glad that the wizard was gone but he quickly realized that he was still hanging from the wall and that was no comfortable position to be in.

Treebeard found Isengard more than suspicious. Most Orcs seemed to lust after blood and tried to cause as much pain as they could, others, mostly the leaders and stronger ones seemed to be oddly proud of themselves. He felt sorry for the poor soul who had to suffer to make them look so happy.

The battle for Isengard was over quickly and Saruman was not able to leave the tower unnoticed. Angrily he stomped into the basement to Elrond, uncuffed him from the ceiling and threw the half-elf at the wall:

"This is all your fault. I'm going to make you suffer, I am going to kill everyone you have every met, there will never be any peace for you!"

At that moment Grima Wormtongue came to the cell:

"My lord, Gandalf the Grey is at our door and wishes to speak to you."

"Very well, I will be back soon", he said looking at Elrond with a nasty grin on his face.

But Saruman didn't come back, neither did Grima nor anyone else. Elrond was and stayed alone.

Luckily for him, Grima had left some food and water, so he didn't have to starve. At least not for the first weeks.

Weeks after the battle in Isengard, the final battle in Mordor took place and Sauron was defeated. Aragorn's coronation was shortly after but there was once more concern in the life of the Elves:

Lord Elrond was missing, he had been for some time. There had been search groups scavenging the entire land of Middle Earth but the Elf lord had not been found.

Most assumed that he was dead, others had been forced to stop searching.

Galadriel, Celeborn, Gandalf, the Hobbits and a few other Elves started the journey to the grey Havens; before they were going to Cirdan, the were going to visit Treebeard first to make sure everything was alright in Isengard.

Isengard itself was a mess. Food was lying around everywhere along with orc corpses and wood splinters.

The tower itself was still tidy like it had been for the last few decades.

The small group began searching through the tower to find any remaining evil, Treebeard and the other Ents had not been able to do so.

Glorfindel and Galadriel went into the basement; Celeborn, Merry and Pippin went on the upper levels and Gandalf, Frodo and Sam searched the rest of the tower.

None of them found anything only Glorfindel had found something suspicious:

A dark corridor leading to a few even darker rooms, only when Galadriel followed him with a candle in her hands, it became clear that the corridor was leading to cells. And now they could see, that one of the cells was occupied!

A small bundle was hurled up in the corner, Glorfindel hurried to see who or what was locked but to his dismay, the creature's back was turned to him.

He opened the cell's lock with a small knife and without hesitation he went into the cell. What he saw in there shocked him more than anything had ever before:

It was Elrond! A more injured, hurt and starved version of him but Elrond none the less! With shaky hands he felt for a pulse and sighed in relief when he felt a weak, but steady one.

TBC