Sorry, not sorry about the last cliffhanger. You guys have no idea how hard I worked to finish this so soon. But seeing as how my next chapter will probably take some time, I decided to put you out of your misery. Plus, this is the longer chapter I've written so far, and I think I deserve a reward for finishing it so quickly. I can't really write from kid POV, so you'll have to forgive me if Legolas acts more like an adult than he should.
Special thanks to The12thBookworm, this chapter is dedicated to her. I'm really glad you like my story so much!
Disclaimer: Not one Elf.
Summary: Lindariel nodded, satisfied. She gasped once, and her grip slackened, her hand falling down at the grass as her eyes went dark. Legolas looked at her in horror and then he ran. He couldn't see where he was going, the tears blurred his vision and he stumbled, but he didn't stop. The trees around him were burning and it was dark and it the smell of smoke was suffocating, but Legolas ran. Away from the battle, away from the scary men, away from his mother who couldn't see him anymore. A hand closed around his wrist, and the image of his mother doing the very same thing made Legolas stop short. A pain at the back of his head and then everything faded away.
4. Part Two
Third Age, Year 125
Thranduil awoke suddenly in the middle of the night with a stabbing pain in his gut and a painfully strong feeling of something being scarily wrong.
So, naturally, the first thing he did was worry about his family. His wife and child had left yesterday to visit Imlandris on the occasion of the birth of Elrond's daughter. Thranduil would have liked to be there himself, but liabilities had him tied to Mirkwood.
He spent fifteen minutes needlessly pacing in his room, when he realized that he could just go and ask the trees. Deciding their grumbling if he woke them was worth knowing his family's safety, he quickly threw a tunic on him and made his way to the Queen's Gardens.
The Queen's Gardens were a big plain with flowers and trees that belonged entirely to the Queen of Eryn Galen and the least likely to be annoyed with the King if he woke them with demands of his family's whereabouts. It was where the royal family spent most of their time together. When Lindariel and Thranduil got married, the Elvenking had made the garden and presented it to her as a wedding gift.
It was a beautiful place, filled with various flowers that gave the garden color against the lively green of the grass. The many trees around the plain liked the Queen most, but they all adored the little prince. There were a few benches as well, but Lindariel preferred to sit down under the great oak tree in the middle of the garden.
Legolas, for his part, spent more time on the trees than under them.
Thranduil neared the garden, and knew immediately that something was terribly wrong.
The trees, instead of sleeping like the King had expected them to be, were weeping, their cries incoherent and broken. Without use did the King try to get something more than separate words out of them. The specific words that kept being repeated were "queen" "princeling" "men" and "fire", doing nothing to calm Thranduil's already worried state.
Something had happened to his family, and Thranduil could do nothing for it yet, for the entire kingdom was asleep save from the trees that would not answer his questions. No amount of pleading or threats would make them reveal anything of what had happened at the forest, and perhaps it was for the best now, because Thranduil didn't think he could survive the night if he did.
And that is where Lord Thorontur found him in the morning, still pacing around among the weeping trees that wouldn't give him an answer. The archery Master hadn't yet walked properly into the gardens, and the King was on him, explaining to him what had happened (even if he needed a little help to form a proper explanation).
Half an hour later, the King mounted his horse and set out to search for his family with the largest searching party Mirkwood had yet to send.
Legolas woke up wet. His head was pounding, and he couldn't place where that horrid smell was coming from. Maybe it was coming from one of the guards, or his Nana was-
Legolas' eyes opened wide as he snapped into a sitting position. Yesterday's memories were coming back flooding. The screaming, the trees burning, the attack and then the scary man with the sword and his Nana...
Legolas let out a small sob. He tried to raise his hands to cover his mouth and drown the sound out, but he found out that he couldn't. Both of his hands were tied behind his back with a harsh rope that cut into them. They were sore from being in that awkward position most of the night, and they hurt.
"He's awake!" A foreign voice said from somewhere next to him. Halden's insistent voice in his head informed him that the words were said in the common tongue. "Well, how are you feeling, you little brat?" An ugly face appeared into the line of his vision, making him shrink back. That caused the man's ugly face to twist in laughter, making him look even uglier.
It was only thanks to Halden's lessons that Legolas managed to understand what the man had said. He didn't tell him that though, deciding to keep his mouth shut. These people were scary and mean, and they had attacked them and killed his mother, and Legolas felt no obligation to answer to the ugly man. He would thank Halden for the lesson later, but right now, all he could think was that he was cold, his arms were sore, his head hurt and he wanted his mom.
"He probably can't understand you Rowland!" Another voice yelled, and Legolas abandoned glaring at the ugly man -whose name was apparently Rowland-, in favor of locating it. It belonged, the Elfling saw, to one of the many men sitting around a camp fire. The flames that leaped up were like the ones consuming away the trees...
"Hey, hey!" A hand gripped his shoulder and shook him roughly. Legolas blinked and stared up at Rowland in front of him. "You understand what I'm saying, ya brat?"
The Elfling kept his mouth shut. The man shoved him back, hard, releasing his hold of him and headed to the campfire.
"It's useless." He said sitting down. "Little demon can't understand what I'm saying."
The rest of the men contributed with equally insulting things that Legolas didn't care to listen. They obviously hated elves, but Legolas didn't understand why they hated him. How can you hate someone you have never met before? He was sure he had never met them before. He didn't ponder on it for long however, because the reality of his situation came crushing to him.
He was alone in the woods with a party of men that hated him, his own party was dead, his mother was dead as well and his father probably had no idea of happened to him. Finally letting the grief take hold of him, Legolas turned his back towards the men in the campfire and sobbed.
In the pace with which they were going, it was not long after they reached the place of the attack. After much pleading and threats, the trees had finally calmed enough to tell Thranduil where the party should head first, but refusing repeatedly to tell him what he would find there.
Now Thranduil knew why.
The place had been painted red from the blood.
All the trees around the clearing had been burnt to the ground, bodies of both men and elves lying all around. The nearest trees that were still standing were quick to assure him that the men that had put the fire, had put it out too. That piece of information didn't do the slightest difference to King. The men were going to pay for what they had done anyway.
The entire party was dead. The twelve guards accompanying the royal family had to be severely outnumbered or caught entirely off guard for such a result to ensue. Many bodies had been burnt beyond recognition, others just partially burned and very few still intact. Some of the soldiers dismounted and tried to gather the corpses of the fallen, completely ignoring the men that may among them. Thranduil scanned the area to calculate the damage done in the forest, but his eyes froze in one of the elven bodies that had remained intact.
His first instinct was denial. It wasn't her, it couldn't be her, but her figure didn't shimmer away like an illusion.
This was real.
Thoughts rushed through his head without Thranduil paying attention to them. His blue eyes remained fixed on the elleth's body in the ground, at the furthest part of the clearing. Thorontur, noticing the change that came upon his friend, turned and followed his gaze, only for his own eyes to widen in shock.
"Thranduil..." The King shrugged off the hand put on his shoulder as he dismounted, and as in a trance moved towards where his wife lay. Thorontur followed him.
She was laying there, with one arm spread over her middle and one in the grass beneath her. Her auburn curls were laying around her head like a fiery halo and her eyes were closed. She could have been sleeping if not for the pool of blood that soaked her skirts and the ground below her.
It was too much red.
It hit him suddenly, the cruel realization that his beloved wife wasn't coming back, stealing the air from his lungs and, suddenly, his feet felt too heavy. Thranduil fell, his knees hitting the bloodied ground with force, but he barely noticed the painful impact. A shaking hand reached out and lightly touched her cheek.
"Lindariel..."
And the cold, proud Elvenking broke.
Doing nothing to prevent the tears from escaping his eyes, he reached down carefully and lifted her body and hugged it close to his chest. But her arms didn't come around him, instead her head fell back, lifeless. Her body was devoid of all life and now only a broken shell remained of the beloved Queen that used to be. Her lifeless body was dead weight in Thranduil's arms, her arms limp at her sides.
He buried his face in her chest and cried like he couldn't remember crying before.
And Thorontur standing behind him didn't matter, the archers gathering the bodies didn't matter, it was just grief. A grief that overcame him, drowning him, and there were no thoughts, no cares in that moment Thranduil could only cry for the wife that was so cruelly taken away from him.
He didn't register Thorontur walking away and busying himself with helping the archers. No one bothered him for as long as he cried, and after, when he only sat there. His gaze was lost, and his eyes looked far away without seeing, but slowly, determination was setting inside them.
Legolas wasn't there.
And if Legolas wasn't there, then that meant he was most probably still alive. With a renewed glint in his eye, Thranduil arose and neared the rest of the elves that had sited themselves.
No one mentioned the King's emotional breakdown. Steadily and surely, Thranduil ordered the bodies of the fallen back with an escort of as many elves as they could spare to carry them.
"The rest of us, we will keep searching for Legolas."
There were no disagreements.
This, Legolas decided, was how Orcs had to be like.
He had been travelling with the men for three days now, much against his will. His arms had been tied the whole time, and although they didn't particularly forbid him of doing anything, there was one of them with him all the time.
And they all hated him. Legolas had never thought it was possible for someone to loathe another individual so much. Especially if they didn't know him. He knew that his father had a hostility towards dwarves, but still. The men hated him. And that is why Legolas ended up with various cuts and bruises decorating his frail form.
They didn't beat him. No, they didn't beat him, but they pushed and dragged him hard enough to fall down and hurt himself. And when they were in a really bad mood, they might even go as far as kick him. But nothing more than that. Legolas considered this a good thing, but he still wanted to go home more than ever.
He had tried to talk to the trees and ask them to tell his father where he was, but they had never left alone, and every time they heard him talking in Sindarin they gave him a kick or slap. The language seemed to put them in an even fouler mood, so Legolas learned to keep his mouth shut. This was how he spent most of his time since whatever he did seemed to infuriate at least one of the humans.
Still, he hoped the tress would tell his father anyway. The men paid no attention to them, they didn't seem to think the trees were a threat. They chose to completely ignore them. Legolas would have felt bad for the trees if he wasn't convinced that this party of men wasn't much of a company for anyone.
When the first sight of the village appeared at their line of vision, the men's spirits lifted considerably. They kept talking among themselves, saying what they would do to celebrate catching the Elfling.
Legolas, for his part, still didn't know what the men could possibly want him for. They had said something about trade and money but Legolas didn't understand what that had to do with him. You traded goods, not people.
When they entered the village, Legolas thought it looked rotten. All the trees were dead, and there was an air of moodiness around that clung to Legolas like a bug. It was a poor village, some of the houses were half ruined and everything was filthy from the streets to the people that had gathered to see them pass. Apparently, a dirty blonde Elfling with a bloodied tunic was an interesting sight.
Which was fair, Legolas concluded, since he didn't think these people had ever seen an elf before.
"Move." The leader of the men, Beran, pushed Legolas forward. Legolas pondered on struggling, or kicking him and running away like he had thought of doing many times during the past days, but decided against it. He hung his so that he wouldn't see all the people looking at him and let Beran lead him to wherever they wanted him to be.
Which, apparently was a cold, bare room with bars that reminded him of his father's dungeons in the palace. They threw him in and left him there, with an old man whose skin looked like crumbled paper. Legolas retreated in one of the back corners and wrapped his arms around legs, resting his chin on his knees, finally alone.
His eyes filled with tears, but he stubbornly wiped them away. He was going to be strong. And then, when his father came to find him, he could tell him that he had been brave. The thought of his father made something in his chest stung and it was more difficult to keep the tears at bay.
He just wanted to go home so much.
Terrence had seen the little elf child pass with Beran and his bandits like everyone else. It was the only thing they talked about in the village. No one had ever seen an elf before, and everyone was buying the bandits beers to hear the story of the child.
Most of the people in the village didn't like elves. They thought them arrogant and selfish because they were living in luxury while the village starved. Terrence might not live in the village but he agreed with those few people -mainly women- that said it wasn't the elves fault. For all they knew, the elves didn't even know of the village. It wasn't as if they had asked for help or something.
And now the worst group of bandits had captured a child and locked him in prison just because they disliked his kind. Terrence didn't want to think of how they came to have the child in the first place.
He lived with his wife in a house in the woods, away from the village, but they usually came down to get supplies. Terrence was about to leave and head back, when they brought the elf.
"Did you hear about the elf?" The words caught Terrence's attention even if they weren't directed at him. He could not say he wasn't curious, and street gossip was the most reliable source of information around. "They say there was a whole party with them and they attacked Beran."
Terrence winced. Knowing Beran, he probably attacked them.
"Will they search for the child?" The other woman asked.
"Nay, they're dead, all of 'em."Terrence's heart sunk. Not only did they take the child away from his kin, but they killed his family in front of him. The man felt a flash of anger. It was a child for Bema's sake!
Making up his mind, he turned around and headed towards the prison in a rush of sudden determination.
As he hoped, the guard of the cells, Freddy, was fast asleep, most probably passed out drunk. Terrence had no problem stealing the keys from under his nose.
The child was curled up in the furthest corner, with his eyes glazed over. Terrence didn't know what to think of that. He slowly opened the door and neared the boy, carefully putting a hand on his shoulder.
The result was instantaneous. The child's eyes snapped into focus and he recoiled from the touch immediately. Terrence calmly put a finger to his mouth, signaling him to keep quiet.
"Can you understand me?" Terrence asked quietly, desperately hoping that the elf indeed could. It would make busting him out of there easier. The child's blue eyes inspected him with a calculating look that made Terrence want to avert his gaze. It made him wonder how old the elf actually was. He didn't look a day more than ten, but he was an elf, you could not be sure, with them living forever and everything.
Finally, the child gave him a small nod. Terrence resisted sighing in relief.
"I'm going to get you out of here." He whispered, his determination growing stronger with the spark of hope in the boy's eyes. "And I'm going to help you find you kin again. Do you have a family you can go back to?"
The child eagerly nodded, the hope in his eyes growing stronger.
"Ada- I mean, my father, he must be searching for me." The Elfling sounded sure of that, but he also looked so small and innocent as he said that Terrence wondered how on earth could anyone ever hurt such a pure creature. His words were hesitant, as if he had never spoken in the common tongue before, but he could just fine.
"What's your name? I'm Terrence." He smiled, trying to make himself look friendlier.
"Legolas." The elf muttered hesitantly. "My name is Legolas."
"Come on them Legolas." Terrence smiled. "Let's get you away from this village and back in the woods."
Taking extreme caution not to be noticed, although there was almost no one in the streets, Terrence seated himself on his horse with Legolas in front of him, hidden under his cloak. The child was small enough to fit under and it and hide without it looking suspicious.
It took a few hours for them to reach Terrence's cabin, and when they finally did, the moon was high in the sky and the elf in his arms was limp. His eyes were open and glazed over again, and Terrence concluded that this must be how elves slept. It was weird, to see someone, anyone, sleeping with his eyes open, but the man shrugged it off. It was not like he could do anything about it anyway.
Instead he picked up the child in his arms, and carried him over to the cabin. Purposely, he knocked on the door to wake his wife. The little one was covered in bruises and cuts, and even though his wife was no healer, she had gained quite some knowledge from years of tending wounded travelers.
Agatha opened the door with an irritated expression of someone who had been unfairly woken from his well-deserved night's sleep, but it changed to one of astonishment as she took in Terrence holding the elven child.
"Terrence," she hissed "what have you done this time?"
"You're speaking like it happens often." Her husband protested.
"It had better not." Agatha warned, and even though she was considerably shorter than him and delicate-looking, Terrence knew better than anyone how hard she could hit with a frying pan. "What happened?" She demanded, and her features softened as she examined the delicate sleeping form.
"Beran and his gang attacked a party of elves in the forest, killed them and took the child." Terrence watched his wife's eyes widen in horror.
"Bring him inside." She said and moved aside to let them enter.
Once inside Terrence carefully set the child in a small bed in the corner of the room. They usually reserved it for travelers or wounded people that knocked on their door, and this was no different.
"I will tend his cuts, and tomorrow we will see what we'll do with him." Agatha decided, a wet cloth already present in her hands as she kneeled in front of the bed. "Is anyone searching for him?"
"The little one said his father should be searching for him, but the men in the village surely will search for him when they realize he's missing."
"Let us see what will we do when Beran come knocking on our door in the morning, searching for him." Agatha shook her head.
"I couldn't just leave him there!" Terrence lowered his voice to a whisper as the boy stirred in his sleep. "And anyway, he'll never think to comes to us first. In the worst case, we surely have until noon." Agatha absently nodded as she wrapped one particularly nasty cut in the child's arm.
"Let us hope that the boy's father will find him first."
Terrence silently agreed.
...
The next morning, there was a moment of confusion when Legolas woke up. At first he looked confused, but when he looked around his surroundings and realized he didn't know where he was, he grew scared.
Agatha took it upon herself to explain. A woman and better with children, Terrence let her, silently standing back as she attempted to explain the situation to the child.
"Well little one-"
"Legolas." The child corrected.
"Legolas," Agatha smiled "I'm Agatha and this is my husband, Terrence. He found you in the village and took you to our house in the woods. I tended your cuts, and you slept in our bed for the night." She said as gently as she could. The elf visibly perked up at the word "woods". He started fumbling with the edge of the green tunic he wore. It was still stained with blood, someone else's blood Terrence though, because it was too much to be all his. But seeing as the couple did not have anything else to give him to wear, it was what he had to do with.
"Hannon le." The elf said in his own language. It sounded musical to the ears, even those two words. Watching the boy's grateful pale face, Terrence could guess the Elfling was thanking them. "Can I..." The child hesitated, and Agatha smiled encouragingly at him. "Can I go outside?"
Agatha met his own eyes warily. She was afraid of Beran, he knew, but it was too early for him to be here.
"I don't want to cause any trouble." The child hastily assured them when he noticed the exchanged glance. "I just- I want to be outside." Terrence heard the unuttered "need".
Finally, the Elfling's pleading eyes won over his wife's protests and the blond elf rushed outside, exclaiming delightfully in his own song-like language. When Terrence and Agatha walked outside after him, they were greeted by one of the strangest sights.
Terrence had never seen anything like it before.
The trees began to move without any wind to guide them. Their branches swirled around and leaves fell down from the canopy on the elf as if to welcome him. They seemed to lean downwards as if they were trying to reach the Elfling, and all around them nature seemed to become alive with joy.
It was like magic.
But perhaps, the most magical sight was that of the elf himself, who was laughing as if greeting an old friend. Real laughter, real joy, something the couple of humans had yet to see from him. His eyes were crinkled at the corners from smiling and his hands were reaching up, as if they could catch the tall branches. It was almost as if the elf was glowing with happiness.
Terrence had never seen anything so pure and innocent, and it would be a precious memory he would keep for the rest of his days.
"My King! The trees! They found him!"
And King urged his horse forward, brushing past the archer with a steady determination that could only develop from years of love and a desperate emotion that only arouse from losing the source of such a love.
A steady determination that arose from finally having real hope of finding him again.
The King was going to find his son and nothing was going to stop him.
The elf stayed like that for hours, chatting happily with the trees in his own melodic language. Terrence was fairly sure the trees answered him. Legolas had grabbed both of them and dragged towards an old willow and introduced them to it with so much childish enthusiasm Terrence had laughed.
Suddenly Legolas stilled, and then a bright, wide grin spread over his face. "Ada is coming." He stated, nothing but joy and certainty in his tone.
And sure enough, the galloping of horses sounded from somewhere inside the forest in front of them, nearing closer to them as minutes passed. The couple of humans and the small Elfling waited with batted breath -well at least Terrence and Agatha did. Legolas wouldn't stop bouncing with enthusiasm.
As soon as the elves were on sight, one of them immediately dismounted his horse. He was tall, blonde, and looked alarmingly alike with the Elfling Terrence found. There was an air of authority around him -and if the silver circlet on his head was anything to go by, great authority- and his blue eyes were fixed on Legolas.
"Ada!" The Efling yelled and ran towards him.
Everything happened too fast for Terrence to follow. Legolas was on the elf's arms, who was kneeling on the ground, a good distance closer to him from where he had been before. He was hugging the little one with a desperation Terrence had yet to see on anyone, and he could swear that was a tear that fell from his eye.
After a few minutes and many words in the musical language exchanged between Legolas and who Terrence strongly suspected was his father, the older elf rose to his feet, settling Legolas into his arms with great ease, planting a kiss on the blond head as he did so. He walked until he stood in front of them, and then bowed his head.
"You have saved my son's life." He started in the common tongue, confirming Terrence's guess. "I am forever in your debt."
His blue gaze was piercing, ancient blue eyes that were a shade darker than his son's. They seemed to analyze him, like Legolas had done back in the prison and Terrence felt again the urge to look down and squirm.
"It was the right thing to do, um..." Agatha was obviously searching for a way to address the elf.
"King Thranduil of the Woodland Realm." The elf helpfully provided. Terrence's eyes bugged.
King? He though. This was the terrifying Elvenking the elven stories talked about? They had unknowingly rescued the King's son?
"I'm Terrence, and this is my wife, Agatha." He said when he found his voice. "Your Highness." He added after. He bowed slightly, watching from the corner of his eye as Agatha did the same.
"Well met, Terrence, Agatha." He bowed his head respectively to each one. Terrence was starting to feel self-conscious. "My kingdom is obligated to you. It would be to cruel for my people, and for me, to lose the Prince so soon after the Queen's passing."
Terrence's heart sunk at the identical expressions of grief and guilt in the so alike fair faces. He wanted to ask if she had been killed in the attack, but one look at Legolas spoke for itself. A rush of loathing towards Beran pang in his chest, but Terrence pushed it down. It would no help anyone.
"The men in the village, they will search for your son." Agatha said hesitantly. The silent "and us" hung in the air.
The elf's smile was lethal and terrifying. "I think Thorontur can take care of that." He turned back at the elves, and looked straight at the dark-haired one in the front that straightened under the King's gaze. "Don't kill them," he ordered "but make sure we never come across them again."
The other elf, whose name apparently was Thorontur, nodded and yelled something in their language at the rest of the elves waiting behind. Half of them followed him as he made way to the village.
"Worry not my lady." He smiled at Agatha and this time his smile was kind, but there was an undertone of sadness in both his smile and eyes. "The men of the village will not bother you."
And with he turned around and walked back to his horse and the party of elves that had stayed behind. Terrence estimated them to be around twelve. Legolas waved at them behind his father's back, and Terrence raised his hand to return the gesture, a genuine smile forming on his lips. He had never been more proud and grateful for a decision in his life, watching Legolas disappear with his kin in the forest with a sense of contentment.
Whatever happened in the next years, this was an experience he would never forget.
Thranduil woke with a start and a cry, the image of his wife's terrified face still engraved behind his eyelids. It was that dream again. She was in pain, burning in front of him and crying for Thranduil to help her, but he couldn't move. Instead he stood there frozen and helpless as she burned in front of him.
He barely registered the door sliding open.
"Ada?" Legolas hesitantly stood in the doorway of his father's room with his nightclothes. Thranduil didn't acknowledge his son as the little prince walked into the room with hesitant steps. He sat on his bed, his face into his hands.
"Ada?" Legolas clambered into Thranduil's lap, his small hands clawing away his father's hands that covered his face. The King hadn't bother to enchant his face while he slept so his scar was plainly visible, but that didn't make any difference to Legolas. He circled his arms around his father's neck, and Thranduil embraced the Elfling back as if his life depended on it.
"It's about Nana, isn't it?" Thranduil didn't reply. Even if he tried, he doubted he could, there was a lump in his throat that prevented him from doing so. "It's alright, I miss her too."
Without a word the Elvenking clung to his child tighter and sobbed.
When Thranduil finally composed himself some while after, he released Legolas, who had been crying too. The little prince was fumbling with his tunic.
"You-" he started hesitantly "you aren't going to leave too right?"
Thranduil looked at his son with a startled expression. "Of course not, why would you think that?"
"Because- because some of the elves in the Healing Wands were wondering if you were going to sail or not, and I don't you to! I don't want you to leave me alone!" The last word was a sob, and Thranduil carefully pulled the Elfling towards him. "I don't want you to leave too." Legolas sobbed, curling his fist around his father's hair, in absence of a tunic. Thranduil's face softened, and he planted a kiss into his son's hair.
"I will not go anywhere, tithen las nîn." He promised.
"Gwestol?" Watery blue eyes looked up at him.
Thranduil smiled. "Gwestol."
"Ada?'" Legolas asked after a few moments. "Can we go to Rivendell after all?"
Sindarin Translation
tithen las (nîn)= (my) little leaf
penneth= young one
tithen pen= little one
Ada= Dad /Daddy
Nana= Mom /Mommy
meleth nîn= my love
Gwestol (?)= Promise (?)
elleth= female elf
Hannon le= Thank you
Weeeell? What do you think?
