"My point is that love is the most powerful motivator in the world. It spurs mortals to greatness. Their noblest, bravest acts are done for love." ― Rick Riordan
Note: This chapter was written by my friend Lord Exar Kun who kindly agreed to type up a few of the chapters. Originally were thinking of writing a fic together but as we never got to that he offered to write a few chapters to lighten my load. Enjoy!
It had been a few hours, as the night rolled by much as the day had before in these days of moving and patrolling the untamed great woods. The prince was resting, his head against a tree, and his hair freely falling down his shoulders, cloak pulled down and bow put beside him, as he allowed the wind to whisper to him and calm his mind and body. The smell of the creek and the woods around him sending an earthy thrill through the young elf by some standards. The darkness that polluted his home seeming so far away now as he allowed the darkness of closed eyes to take him and allow his mind to wander. Not sleep necessarily but the closest elves could get to the mortal phenomena.
Then, it happened. A crack of a twig, subtle but snapping and loud, and all eyes opened. All elves rose from their rest and from their plots upon the earth, as did the prince who gathered his bow in hand and snatched an arrow with great speed from his back where they hung from, and set his gaze down upon a tree line. All elves followed suit and they pointed their bows around themselves and their small camp, pointing in all directions not knowing where the noise had come from.
Legolas trained his eyes and hardened. He could feel something, or possibly someone watching them. No mere animal. It had intent, and suddenly the mood was broken from the peace and calm. Something had disturbed the woods, as birds nesting upon branches made to leave their homes or resting spots, and other animals called into the night.
"My prince! Do you see where the noise is coming from?" Lhinnor, not but a few feet away, his own arrow ready upon his bow asked, but the prince shook his head to himself.
"No, but keep your wits about you. Something festers in these woods, and is watching." A mere whisper of words, but heard by every elf whom all seemed doubly aware of the trees that surrounded them now, but the creek giving them some room to move about.
No sound but the movement of elves, and the continued drawing of their bows was heard, beside the snapping of twig and wood from the darkness beyond them. The prince waited with silent calmness sweeping through him as he watched the trees that interested him, and then he found his mark.
From the trees moved a figure, like a shadow among the branches, and he released an arrow and made his mark. It sung through the air spinning and pierced the shadow. A terrible groan that resonated in the woods rang out and the figures body slammed down, hitting branch upon branch. Well known screeches and groans escaping its maw as it fell, and finally slammed to the soil dead, and before the company of elves.
"Orcs!" Legolas called suddenly shrieks and calls came from the woods, from the darkness that surrounded them all, and flames lit between and beyond the trees. Their calls rung high into the air and pierced the veil of trees sending all manner of creatures whom braved not running from them, now into runs of panic at the call of the sickly little killers and rabble
"Ready your bows, and show no mercy! Keep blades at ready!" the commands of the prince went heard and set to memory for these elves as their night took the sudden turn to battle
The brushes and bushes before them and the trees as well rustled and came forth the snarling, sickly black or pale, but no less disgusting Orcs. They sneered, snarled and roared and with scimitars and blades in hands they charged the nearest elf to them.
"Release the arrows!" Lhinnor echoed the desires of the prince and a precise hail sped forth and slammed into bodies with sickening thuds of piercing metal and cracking bone, through sickly flesh. Gargles and gagging followed as they fell, but their kin came forth in droves and ran over body be it dead or alive with no mercy nor care for fallen ally. They stomped and screamed as they ran like mad animals at the elven woodsmen, who felled more with every step with arrow released after arrow. The sound filling and splitting the air.
Yet arrows did not nor could not hold back the swarm that followed. Orcs and their smaller and far weaker Goblin kin flooded forth from the trees. Rushing at the elves. Bows were tossed aside and elves to the front took up their blades. The sweeping swords swept up and across the first Orcs to reach the elf whom wielded the blade and gashed them open letting black blood fly and pool beneath their corpses. Goblins ran and threw themselves into the air at the elves, and the singing of the elvish blade through the air swung and slammed through and into armor, cleaving foul Orc upon Orc and Goblin.
What amounted to a small army was upon them and the prince knew not how such a force could have been upon them so quickly and so silently as they had come, but he could not waste time thinking. He slipped with ease his two knives from his back holsters for them, and with speedy wrists and ample movements, the blades came forth, twisted up and into Orcs that charged him from behind and forward. His right arm slammed a knife into the head of a foul Goblin and it squealed as he pulled it back out and spun his body cleaving both blades across and through an Orc rushing him.
His blades sung as he swung around and slammed his wrists from below up, passing shabby armor, and pierced the abdomen of a rather larger than usual Orc.
The screeching and snarling behind him caught his attention and he flung around stabbing into the neck another beast, before flipping around a kick across another fell beast before swiftly in a blur pulling his bow back forth and firing an arrow into the face of an unsuspecting Orc. A second one slammed into a Goblin, and a third hit another Orc in the left shoulder, causing it to roar in anger.
Legolas swung low away from a swinging blade, and stabbed his knife up into the Orcs leg and it fell over in pain, as he pulled the black blood covered weapon back out and swung it right into another Orcs chest directly into its black heart.
The elves around him were not faring well. Legolas sneered in disgust at the evil creatures as they swarmed and endlessly came running forth from beyond the darkness itself seemingly. Elves felling Orc after Orc, and Goblins by the droves were soon fallen upon by Orcs larger than others seen before, nearly that of men in stature, brought massive axes and scimitars over their heads, their maws roaring into the night and slamming down cleaving through flesh and bone of the elven warriors.
Legolas dodged another swing of an Orcish blade, and kicked the creature away before falling upon it with an arrow aimed with bow and released the arrow into its head directly on. He threw himself aside into a roll as more blades were upon him, and he fired another arrow while kneeling and pierced an Orcs eye as it fell in screaming pain and yanked at the protruding object with viscous anger and pain coursing through him.
"Legolas!" the prince turned and saw Lhinnor, four of the company beside him aiming their arrows and releasing them upon a horde of Goblins chasing after him from his side, and each one of the greenish monsters fell down into the soil dead. The prince with a notable sneer swung around and his blade struck into Orc body, followed directly by his second knife through its neck. The gurgling of the creature received no pity from the prince who kicked the limping carcass off and away from him.
"There are far too many! We must break and make back toward the north!" Lhinnor called over the resounding clanking of metal upon metal, horrific cries and shrieks. Legolas ran aside as two Orcs came at either side of him croaking and swinging the swords with wild abandon, and as he dodged and rolled away they struck one another, one gashing the others side, and the second falling to the soil in a heap as his ally howled.
Lhinnor came to the prince's side and helped him stand, as his companions fired another volley into a crowd of Goblins attacking three elves away who were cutting down in droves the nasty things. Their swords illuminated by the fire these beasts carried sparkled sickly with blackened blood, as they cleaved and cut away at flesh.
"We cannot hope to hold them, or fight them off my lord, there are far too many and more come!" Lhinnor warned as he fired another arrow with the prince standing and joining him as they let loose and struck two creatures in their backs, and sent them tumbling.
"The battle and path is fell my lord! I must get you to safety and you must return to the Woodland realm, to your father."
"I'm not leaving you all to die here!"
"My lord, you cannot linger! You are our prince! The only the only heir to your fathers throne and that of the Woodland elves! I nor any of us can allow you to fall here, and leave your father in despair!"
The prince sneered, as the battle went on. Elves were falling and the shock of seeing the mortality of his kin did not yet have time to fully register with the elfling. He only allowed himself to release arrow after arrow, but they were few now, and the Orcs kept swarming. Fires burned from dropped torches and Orcs and Goblins swarmed onto his kind as they split and stabbed at the elves whose bodies lacked armor, and where he had but hours before thought such a thing for the better, he now cursed himself.
The battle was indeed lost.
Lhinnor could see the acceptance in the prince's eyes, and motioned, before shouting to his fellow patrolmen to help him move the prince back and away from the battle toward the woods. They released another volley that struck Orcs with Goblins charging their way at the prince, whom now was slowly nudged and pulled by Lhinnor backward toward the treeline and the other elves.
They turned then after Legolas released a final arrow slamming with a crack into the face of an Orc who groaned and fell dead, and broke into a full hasty run toward their fellow elves. The prince felt it gnaw at him as he knew behind him his men were being hack and cleaved at, not knowing their prince was being ushered to safety...a silent curse entered his mind for these creatures, and he continued on forward.
Two of the four elves were at his side, their blades drawn and they slammed their bodies into unseen foes no doubt coming at him from behind, and with two arrows left, Legolas snapped the first and turned firing as he spun and the shot met its mark into the throat and out the back of the neck of an Orc attacking his men, before he spun full back around; continuing his run as his allies braved the Orcs still very much alive, and charging in the place of those who fell.
The final two fired and released arrows and cut down Orc upon Orc, but they continued, the other two battling ferociously against every enemy that came. Running an Orc through, then yanking blade out and slashing immediately across the neck of a second before slamming around into the very gut of a third in a spin. The second warrior very much following along. His blade piercing flesh of an Orc who flew back as blood spilled and sprayed the soil and elf. Then the same warrior cleaved up and across the face of another Orc who fell stunned at the gash crossing his unarmored face.
He felled two Goblins slashing at his legs, in one fell swoop they lost their heads, but soon two Orcs came running from behind and leapt atop the back of each elf. They fought and tossed them about, but more Orcs and Goblins raced to seize their opportunity and fell upon the elves who slashed wildly, losing their finesse of battle and merely stabbing and cutting the foul beings where they stood and as they attacked and jumped upon them, and stabbed, gutted and finally felled these two elven warriors or the Woodland realm.
"Come my lord," Lhinnor beckoned over the cries of death and pain on both sides, and Legolas followed as they neared the two archers. We will make into the woods and travel along the tr-" Lhinnor stopped, both speaking and running and Legolas followed suit but out of confusion, and followed his companion's stare.
The two elven archers too noticed their captains change of demeanor and frozen body and turned only to come to face an Orc larger than any other. Taller likely than a man, garbed in hulking black armor, spiked and broad along his torso, covering his elbow, and shoulders, with a simple helm atop his head, that allowed his snarling face to be seen but not his eyes, as he roared. The elves raised bows in haste, but he tossed them aside. They fell in a heap, and he smashed their helms so violently that consciousness was lost to them, and all went black.
Lhinnor drew an arrow and readied bow, training it upon the massive figure, even as they were encircled by a horde with the tall Orc towering over all others a sinister contemptuous snarl lingering across his blackened face, lit only by fire.
"I will fire the arrow, and draw the attention of this monster my lord. You must run then, and run faster than ever before." Legolas heard but barely registered Lhinnor staring at the brute, likely a chieftain, if ever he had seen on of the Orc kind. He had but a single arrow left and he had no logical way of escaping this encirclement no matter how Lhinnor desired him to try, and with cold blue eyes, the elven prince drew final arrow and fastened it to bow and aimed at the brute whom held a mighty scimitar in both hands and let a throaty growl slowly ebb from his throat.
"My lord!"
"Whether you want it or not Lhinnor I am trapped here, and I would rather die alongside my kin than run from this pack of foul monsters. Let us draw bows, and ready arrows for our final moments Lhinnor, and take as many of them clawing and scratching into the void before we go into the halls of Mandos and begin the long wait." Lhinnor did not speak, but accepted the reply a disheartened nod was all that was given and a set face of disgust and anger toward the Orcs and Goblins squealing and grinning and chanting around them lit by fire and moonlight as elves were felled beyond their vision.
"Now!" Legolas gave the final command and two arrows were released both aimed at the head of the greater Orc, but the fiend was not without a brain it would seem. He recoiled and sidestepped and Lhinnor's arrow fell beyond and slammed into the head of a further Goblin, but the Orc growled deeply and angrily in blazing rage as he noted the prince's arrow lodged in his right shoulder and he violently grabbed and pulled the black bloodied projectile from his flesh and tossed it beneath him and crushed it underfoot.
The two elves readied blades, and Legolas charged the great Orc, with Lhinnor, a mighty sword in both hands, followed his lord into battle. The Orc spread arms wide as if waiting for this, and allowed the prince time to jump into the air, diving down with both knives aimed at his chest. The Orc roared and suddenly rolled forward and the prince brought knives down into soil, and went wide eyed as he turned. The great Orc behind him like a tower of darkness, a pillar, like that of Dol Guldur shadowed over him, and with a mighty swing of his blades hilt he slammed down onto the head of the prince and sent him reeling back around and fell to the soil in a hap. His vision blurred and his mind weary, as aches suddenly pulsed along and across his body, and he watched in his final moments of consciousness as Lhinnor faced the great Orc, and around him a horde of Goblins and Orcs ran toward the elf captain, and pain filled Legolas' heart, and finally he allowed total darkness to take him.
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