"I have summoned you this morning to speak about why I am truly here."

Thranduil's drawling voice rang through the room, drawing Arwen's attention to every word he was saying. She was quite tired this morning and whished she could be resting rather than listening to the king. She half-heartedly asked her father earlier that morning if she could lie down a bit longer, but he had said it would have been disrespectful to ignore Thranduil's summons and she agreed. Thranduil was a king and it was dangerous to defy his wishes.

Thranduil shifted in his high-backed chair, leaning slightly forwards to look at the young elves who stood before him. "I know that you both have no idea about the friction between Imladris and Mirkwood." Behind her, she heard Elrond's sigh. "We are on the brink of war, and the only way to resolve that is by uniting the two."

Silence settled over the room as Thranduil let the words sink in. The only noise that filled the room was the chirping of happy morning birds that sang outside the tall opened windows. But the world seemed to go quiet and her head filled with a ringing noise as what Thranduil said was setting in. A feeling of concern washed over her. What did Mirkwood have against Rivendell? There was no way for her to comprehend why there would be friction between the two of them. To her, their relationship with them had seemed so peaceful and they had never been openly rude to Thranduil or his people. Of course there was the occasionally story about how evil, selfish and scary the Silvan elves were, but they were just children's tales that some parents used to scare their children into behaving. And quite frankly, Arwen had never believed them.

After a few minutes, Thranduil spoke again. "You are to be betrothed and married."

It felt as if her stomach had dropped to the floor and a wave of dizziness fell upon her. She could feel nothing and hear nothing, only her beating heart and rushing blood in her ears. Her mind could not wrap around what Thranduil had said, and so she could say nothing.

In her shock, her face feeling numb, she looked over at her father who had moved more towards where Thranduil was sitting. In his gaze, she found that same look he had been giving her over the course of the last few months.

"Father! How could you do this?" Legolas demanded. Arwen was surprised at the boldness of him, blatantly disrespecting and yelling at his father with others in the rooms to listen.

Thranduil turned harshly to his son, giving him a cold and menacing look Arwen had never seem from her own father. He leaned forwards in his make-shift throne, tilting his head slightly to the side in what seemed a mocking way.

"Would you rather have out kingdom die in war?" His voice was quiet, but his words were filled with malice. He straightened and look away from his son and at the wall opposite him. When he spoke again, his voice was back to its normal tone. "I will not suffer our soldiers to fight when there's another way to get what we need."

Legolas straightened his back and squared his shoulders, looking his father in the eyes. "I am a prince. I can protect the kingdom. But I am not a doll that you get to decide the fate of. I should be choosing my own path."

"You may be a prince, but I am a king."

Arwen glanced between the two as they argued in front of her. She was slowly awoken from her numbness and initially shock. A hard lump was growing in her throat as reality was fully hitting her with each second that passed as tears threatened to spill from her eyes.

Though she tried her best to repress her emotions and represent her people, she was not strong enough. She felt betrayed by her father who had once told her that who she loved would be her own choice. A sob escaped her trembling lips and all the eyes in the room turned to look at her, halting the argument that was still ongoing in the background. Arwen dropped her gaze to the floor in shame, muttering about how she needed a minute alone, then leaving the room before any other words could be spoken.

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Arwen's room was quiet solitude. No prying eyes stood by to watch as she let her tears that she had so desperately tried to contain flow freely down her face. It was better to let her feelings out this way: in private with no one to make her feel ashamed.

Thoughts raced through her mind as she went over everything Thranduil had said. How could he do something like this? She knew that in these moments of anger and despair she was reacting emotionally. Maybe once her head was cleared, she could see it through better eyes. But her mind was far from clear at this moment, and it felt as if she had been stabbed in the heart.

A soft knock came at the door. Arwen harshly wiped the tears from her face, glancing in her mirror and seeing a flushed reflection of herself looking back. She stood up from her bed and walked to the door, already knowing who stood behind it.

"What is it Ada?" she asked him, her voice cold and hoarse.

He held her gaze for a minute, his brows knit together in concern. His eyes look sad, as if he had shed a few tears on her behalf. "I am so deeply sorry, Arwen. I cannot fully express how I feel about this matter right now."

"Why did you never tell me?" Arwen demanded, causing her father to look down in shame.

Elrond hesitated before replying. "It was because I was not allowed to tell you."

"That is the only reason?" Arwen cried in disbelief. "You could not tell me because you were not allowed to. On whose authority?"

"Thranduil's. He knew you and Legolas would not react very well to this news. And if anything happened to one of you-perhaps one of you running away-the war would begin. And if I had told you without his consent, he would have waged it prematurely."

Arwen looked up pleadingly into her father's eyes. "Please. There has to be another way. Do not make me do this."

"I am afraid there is no other way. Anything else I suggested Thranduil would not listen to. It is the only way I could keep you safe."

Elrond gazed into his daughter's desperate eyes before turning away from her and leaving. He could not bear seeing the pain in her face that he had caused her by trying to protect her.

Once he was gone, Arwen gently closed her door, leaning on it heavily after it was shut. In her mind her doom was settled: there was absolutely nothing she could do to change this course of events.

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Legolas wished that there was a forest or an area with denser trees somewhere around Rivendell. He felt like he was in a beautiful prison, surrounded by lovely things and happy places filled with memory, but all he was was trapped. Trapped and desperate and his anger was not helping.

As he brusquely walked through the paths outside, he had to resist the urge to punch every elf in the face that gave him a cheery 'hello'.

Back at his home in Mirkwood, when he was upset or angry he would spar with another, letting his steam off through that. But when nobody was willing to be beat by him, he went to the forest to be by himself. Sometimes he would sit there and stare off, other times he would hunt. But today he could not do anything like that. Instead of his beloved forests, all that stood before his were paved paths with too many flower beds filled with beautifully bright and cheery colors that gave him a headache.

Why would his father do this to him? He had had his suspicions of war by listening outside the throne room to the councils his father gave the captains. Often he would see maps strewn about in the war room of the areas right before Rivendell, with all of it's passes over the Misty Mountains as well as the emptier areas towards the west. He didn't think too much of it at the time, and he certainly didn't think it would end in a betrothal. To be honest thought, he really wasn't that surprised in the end that his father would do anything to get more power and control.

And although Arwen was a beautiful elf maiden, more beautiful than any he had ever laid his eyes on, he had never loved her or longed to be wed to her. They hardly even knew each other, seeing that this was only their second time meeting. There were many long years in between the two times they had met-enough to say that they had both changed and matured significantly since then, and because of that they could be considered complete strangers.

As he walked through the gardens-now just ignoring the happy elves around him-his anger slowly died to numbness and reality hit him: there was nothing he could do to change this.

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AN: Here is the next chapter! Finally it's getting a bit more exciting than it was. I am having a lot of fun writing and editing this, even though it was just a silly idea that came to me one night.

If you are enjoying this story, please leave a vote! And feel free to comment.

-cherrymochiii