On Firmer Footing
Aragorn nearly died that night. When he came to think of it later, he would wonder how his judgment could have deserted him so much that he stumbled and staggered into that foul and evil place in the dead of night.
They called it the Dead Marshes, and with reason, for it stank of rottenness and corruption, a fitting gateway to the even fouler Mordor. But it would have been better if the Marshes had been dead in fact. There were no higher beings there, it is true – no Men, or Elves, or even Orcs, who had the sense to use the dry passage to the East in their predations. Nor were there cattle, or horses, or even birds. But the marshes teemed with creeping, slimy life: snakes and beetles and slugs and strange beings, neither plant nor animal, living out their hidden lives in the mud and fetid water.
None of this could the Ranger see as he staggered across the unsteady ground. He had not dared rest during all the week before, while he pursued his unsuccessful search in Mordor itself; he had been liable at any moment to be killed or, worse, to be captured and found interesting by the master of that place. Now, half-blind with fatigue, and straining his untrustworthy eyes at every dull glimmer of moonlight the begrudging clouds let pass, he stumbled wearily from one crumbling mound of filth to the next, slipping as often as not knee-deep in mire. His arms were covered in muck to the shoulder from the all too frequent necessity of feeling his way forward on hands and knees in the darkness. He had nearly lost his way, only a small deeply-buried sense keeping him moving north, ever north, to the outer bourn of this hellish place – if indeed it had an end. In the delirium of his fatigue, Aragorn was far from sure.
At first he thought the lights that flickered around him were mere delirium too. It was only with difficulty that he dredged up from his memory the descriptions he had read of the Marshes. The lights were harmless, he told himself sternly, as were the illusions of corpses that were rumoured to show themselves to unwary travellers. Somehow the thought gave him little comfort.
Onward and onward he laboured, wretched and exhausted but unable to stop for lack of a few feet of solid ground on which to stretch his weary body. At length, off to his right, it seemed the black horizon lightened a little, a very little. Dawn was coming. Or was it the approach of an enemy? Or just another delusion? In any case the Ranger resolved to meet it standing on two feet, not grovelling like a beast. He heaved himself shakily upright.
It was a mistake. A pale face with a ghastly gash across it suddenly leered at him from the water nearby and Aragorn, startled, lost his footing and measured his length in the slimy pool. Wild thoughts of being dragged to his death by the ancient corpses passed through his bewildered mind, and he nearly panicked when something seized him by the scruff of his neck. But the firm grip yanked him up, not down, and Aragorn found himself gasping but undrowned in the mud at the edge of the water.
His rescuer wore a dark cloak and hood. "Are you well?" inquired a silky, masculine voice in Elvish.
"I am grateful, stranger," Aragorn forced out in the same language. "I am greatly fatigued, but uninjured, thanks to your assistance." He looked up, but the other's face was hidden.
"You are very dirty," observed the other in chilly tones. "Let us find the edge of this marsh, and some place for you to wash and sleep."
Aragorn assented meekly, like a chidden child. He stumbled along behind where the other trod, assisted a little by the dawning day, though it was a feeble sun without heat or brilliance. Occasionally the Elf had to reach back and save him with a rough grasp on his arm when the human sank through where the Elf's lighter tread had easily passed. At such times, Aragorn could have sworn he heard a sigh of exasperation, but they persevered, the Elf severely silent, and Aragorn saving his breath for the struggle each step cost him.
"Here will do," said the Elf at last. Aragorn started, realizing that he had been walking half-asleep, eyes closed, and had not even registered the firmer ground beneath his feet. The stench of the marshes was still all around, but they had reached a small promontory of rocky ground, with a few trees and, miraculously, a small but clear stream trickling its way down to the muck. Too tired to be ashamed, he sank to his knees and then fully to the ground, asleep in seconds.
/-/-/-/-/
When the Ranger awoke, it was dark once more. His head rested on something soft and fragrant, which proved to be the Elf's own cloak. Several feet away, the Elf sat in the moonlight fashioning a bow from some branches with one of his long, sharp knives; another, completed, rested nearby. Aragorn felt a pang of warrior's shame: his sword had been broken and lost in a scuffle with Orcs just before he entered Mordor, and his sole remaining knife, in his boot, was blunted and nearly useless.
"Good, you are awake," said the Elf, and if there was contempt in his tones, it was only what the Ranger deserved, after all. "There is a stream over there."
It was neither a request nor an order; it did not have to be. Aragorn went silently to the bank of the little stream, and stripped off his boots, then his filthy tunic and breeks. There was enough water to immerse himself, so that is what he did, and the harshness of the cold water refreshed him greatly. Reaching for his filthy clothes, he sighed and then immersed them too, managing to wring at least one layer of dirt out of them.
"I have already washed your cloak," said the Elf, pulling that object off a bush where it had been drying and tossing it to him. Aragorn climbed out of the stream and wrapped the warm material around himself gratefully.
For the first time, he had a good look at his rescuer, and in that silvery light, it was a sight indeed. The Elf was tall and slender, with the pure, proud beauty of the Sindarin people evident in every symmetrical feature. His green hunting clothes were practicality itself, but cut to perfection, cinched at the waist and emphasizing the strong set of shoulders that could carry any burden asked of them without the waste of one extra ounce of flesh. Aragorn had been reared by Elves, and knew better than to mistake beauty for femininity. This was an ellon, and not merely male, but if his manner was any indication, a leader as well, accustomed to command and unlikely to countenance weakness or failure in his companions. The tight braids he wore in his striking blond hair were not decoration, but honours earned by valour in the field.
Aragorn bowed slightly. "I am grateful…" he began, but the Elf made a dismissive gesture.
"There is no need," he said brusquely. "I sought you and I have found you. It is enough. I wish to join you on your quest, Aragorn son of Arathorn."
Aragorn stiffened. He was not called by that name these days, even by his closest associates, and the fact that this stranger Elf knew it seemed clear proof he had been betrayed.
"Who is this Aragorn you speak of?" he enquired guilelessly.
For the first time, the Elf displayed real emotion, and it was irritation. "It is yourself," he said. "Several of my countrymen have met you and described you accurately to me. And Mithrandir also…"
"Gandalf?"
"Yes, Gandalf. It was he who told me what you do in these forsaken parts."
"There you are mistaken. He knows nothing of my whereabouts."
The Elf shrugged. "He guesses. And he guesses for what purpose, and honours you for your courage in seeking to do by stealth what no army could hope to accomplish - find and capture the debased halfling, Sméagol, who knows great secrets."
Aragorn was greatly alarmed; not only did this Elf know his name, but also his quest.
"Who are you?" he demanded.
"I am Legolas," replied the other proudly, as if no other name were needed. And none was. This was the famed Greenleaf, son of Thranduil King of Mirkwood, renowned not only for the accuracy of his bow amongst a nation of archers, but his swiftness, his strength and his ruthlessness in battle. Men said that in the Battle of the Five Armies he had slain forty-seven with his own hand.
Aragorn bowed in earnest this time. "I am honoured," he said. Then he sighed bitterly. "But you waste your time with me. I have failed; the creature is endlessly elusive. Gandalf does not do well to squander a warrior like yourself on such a mission."
"Mithrandir did not send me," replied Legolas coldly; "I am here on my own account. As far as the world knows, I still patrol the northern borders of my father's kingdom at this moment, and so I would prefer it to remain."
Many questions rose to Aragorn's lips, but the Elf's chilly gaze repressed them. Instead, the Ranger said only, "As you wish. I am most happy to have your assistance."
"It is agreed, then. Shall we start now, or do you wish to wait until dawn to resume your search?"
Aragorn looked at his sodden clothes drying upon the bush. "Dawn will favour my human eyes," he said wryly, and Legolas nodded, neither mocking nor disagreeing.
"Till dawn, then," he said, and swung himself up into the branches of one of the trees to take his rest, leaving Aragorn to lay his head once more upon the strange, fragrant cloak and sleep as best he could.
End of chapter 1.