Chapter 7
The Humans stayed together, huddled in small groups in the water, lavishing themselves in copious amounts of fragrant Elven soap. “Keep at it you clumsy louts, you still stink!” shouted one of their more fortunate comrades from the sandy shore with a laugh.
“Mind yer mouth, or I’ll throw you into another one of them prickly bushes!” retorted a burly man covered in purple suds. Laughter drifted over the water along with playful splashes as the men relieved their tension with foolery. Haldir watched all this from the tent with a look of disdain.
“Humans,” the soft voice drifted over his shoulder in lyrical tones underscored by sadness. “They never seem to do what you might expect of them.”
Haldir turned to see the young Monarch, standing in a clean white tunic and leggings. His long blonde hair hung wet and unbraided down his shoulders. A pale thin hand rested unconsciously over his heart. The sharply beautiful face was drawn into a pained expression. His eyes were suspiciously bright as they followed the figure of the Gondorian King walking with his Captains.
Haldir approached the Mirkwood Elf, and after a moment’s deliberation placed a gentle hand on Legolas’s shoulder. “My Liege, if I might inquire…you seem …troubled. Might I offer my assistance?”
Legolas tore his eyes away from the Human who walked among the men, occasionally stopping to inspect their wounds. Watching Aragorn brought back so many memories that were both wonderful and deeply painful all at once. He turned his misty blue gaze to Haldir in confusion. “What do you mean, Marchwarden? I am well…” The young Elf’s evasive response was cut off impatiently.
“You are obviously distracted and in pain, King,” interrupted the Marchwarden sternly. “I respect your desire for privacy when it does not compromise your effectiveness…and now is not the time to be so …compromised.”
Legolas’s eyes flared in indignation. He made to shrug off the hand of the older Elf but Haldir took hold of his shoulders and swung the young King to face him.
“My Liege, I am well acquainted with your remarkable capacity for stubbornness but I must insist that you now tell me what it is that ails you.”
Legolas pushed at the older Elf in an effort to free himself but found the Lórien’s grasp was surprisingly immovable. The Marchwarden leaned closer so that the heat of his body sent a signal of pleasure to the King’s shocked brain.
“Release me!” stammered the King, with an effort to sound indignant. The Lórien did not seem to be fooled.
The two Elves stared at each other.
“Nay, you will talk to me. You have barred the Gondorian King from you. And you sent the healer I sent to you away…now, young King, you will have to talk to me.”
Legolas’s eyes flashed in indigo fury. “I don’t need to talk to you! I don’t need anything…or anyone! My duty is all I need to think about now…”
The grip of the Marchwarden was like a vice but the Lórien’s gaze softened slightly. A hand drifted up to stroke the Wood Elf’s cheek. Legolas shivered and felt his lips part slightly at the unexpected caress. Haldir leaned closer and Legolas could feel the solid strength in the arms that held him. Something in him wanted to yield to that strength.
“So brave…and so alone. Why do you push everyone from you, young King? It is because of that Human, isn’t it?”
Legolas gasped slightly at the words and at the touch, which grew bolder. Haldir took in the pain his words caused and the body that leaned into him despite that pain. How he longed to wipe that pain away and replace it with something else.
“The Man is breaking you…here,” he whispered. His hand drifted down to rest gently on the young Elf’s chest, over his heart.
Legolas tried to break free again but his eyes welled up in sudden moisture. The Marchwarden leaned forward and placed a gently kiss on the King’s smooth forehead. Legolas gasped and froze as the lips drifted down to softly press against his own.
“You do not need to be alone, fair King.” The lips brushed against his mouth and he felt himself wanting to lean in and taste them.
“No,” Legolas whispered but his body betrayed him. He no longer pushed at the Marchwarden to release him. The pain in his heart was almost unbearable. He needed this. He needed someone to hold him, the way the Marchwarden now was holding him. He needed someone to take the pain away! And Haldir’s lips held so much promise. He was so close…
But at that moment a voice from the tent flap traveled to them, tinged in tones of challenge.
“Is there a problem here?” said Aragorn. His steel gray eyes locked onto the tableau of the two Elves. Haldir released the fair King and Legolas pushed past Aragorn as he left the tent hurriedly without looking at the Man.
Aragorn watched his lover go, his heart constricting with the pain of their silence. Since their rescue, Legolas had refused to speak to him. And there was precious little time for any intimate moments between them. The sun was rising in the sky and the joint forces of Mirkwood, Lothlórien and Gondor were preparing to enter the cavern lair of the creatures.
With a sigh, Aragorn turned and leveled a steel gaze unto the Marchwarden. Haldir met the hard look with one of his own.
“You know what the problem is, King Elessar,” said the Marchwarden in a cold voice. “And if you do not find a way to repair the damage you have caused, Mirkwood will lose another King.”
The Lórien stalked out of the tent, Aragorn’s suspicious gaze following him. Fuming at his helplessness, Aragorn stepped out of the tent to be greeted by some mild commotion. Faramir came running up to him. “My Liege, the Istari has arrived. A meeting is being assembled in the King’s tent.”
Aragorn nodded and walked briskly next to the Gondorian. “How are you, My Liege?” asked Faramir, carefully. Aragorn sighed and looked at his advisor with a telling shake of his head. They entered the tent. Mithrandir looked up, his gaze sweeping over the haggard features of Gondor’s King in sympathetic understanding. Aragorn took his seat around the small round table, taking in the shuttered expressions of the Marchwarden and of Mirkwood’s Sovereign.
Gandalf paused, the tension between the three commanders settling like a heavy mantle in the makeshift war room. The Istari grunted but kept his silence, for the moment, about that irritating factor. He looked at Aragorn gravely.
“I have news. This menace is an ancient force that has visited Mirkwood before.” He turned his sage head toward Legolas who had gasped at this declaration. “I think you have some knowledge about this that you have not shared with us, young Legolas.”
All eyes turned to the Wood Elf. Legolas stared back at them, then with a sigh brought an old scroll out and laid it upon the table. “I have been trying to decipher it,” he offered guiltily.
Gandalf opened the scroll and spread it out for all to see. It was covered in ancient runes and pictographs. “Hmmm…it is an ancient tongue of your forefathers, King Legolas. Fortunately, a duplicate has resided in Imladris for millennia and Lord Elrond translated it for me.”
His weathered hand pointed to an obscure symbol. “This represents a pact…an ancient contract made between your house, King, the House of Thranduilion, and the dark forces that have been prematurely resurrected in the bowels of your forest.”
“What sort of pact?” asked Legolas nervously, avoiding the stunned stares of the others.
“It appears as though a wager of some sort was entered into, millennia ago, …a Royal Hunt …” the wrinkled hand traveled down the scroll to tap on a pictograph. “See here? Some sort of army…strangely represented. They do not appear to be Elves. That is peculiar. Elrond suggested they were some ancient race that no longer inhabit these lands. Yet, see here? They are lead by an Elf. See this figure here?”
Legolas leaned forward with a soft gasp, “The crest of Thranduilion.”
“Yes,” said Gandalf, somberly. “A Mirkwood King is challenged by this…” a dark ominous representation of a beast, clearly meant to illustrate the creatures, stood in opposition to the crude drawing of a lone warrior. “As long as the Mirkwood Sovereign defeats this, peace continues to reign in the land. If he fails…” his finger trailed to another series of crude drawings showing the stick woods overrun by black dragon like shapes.
A gasp drew the startled looks to the Gondorian King. “Legolas is not going to enter into some ancient duel with …with one of those …things!”
“No, not one of those things…they are merely minions to the real threat, I am afraid…” said Gandalf. Stunned eyes gaped at the Wizard’s solemn face.
“You can’t be serious!” Aragorn rose from his chair in alarm.
“I am afraid I am,” said the Wizard whose voice rose to match the Man’s. “And, I am afraid there is more…” He indicated that Aragorn had best take his seat.
Aragorn drifted back into his seat, suddenly very pale. The Istari continued gravely, “I said this was an ancient pact. Legolas’s ancestors were hunters of these things,” he declared to the shocked audience. “It seems your ancestors had their own ideas of sport…but also by defeating and enthralling these creatures, they might be used as an army against Mirkwood’s enemies.” All eyes turned toward Legolas who looked equally horrified. He knew better than anyone the brutality of his House’s history but even he had no idea of this dark past.
The Istari continued, “When the Elves arrived to these shores, the means of summoning the creatures was dissolved. In an effort to maintain peaceful relations between the three Elven realms, an agreement was forged. Three magic stones used in the summoning rite, once all held by your forebear, were disbanded. One was sent to the Golden Wood, one remained here, in the keeping of the Mirkwood Sovereign and one was given over to Imladris.”
The onlookers waited as Gandalf took a sip of nectar and looked over at Aragorn. “The stone held in Imaldris is no longer there. I found it in Gondor.”
“What??” came the stunned response from both Aragorn and Faramir. Legolas and Haldir looked at each other. “It was used in some other dark magics to somehow do the work of all three…to summon this dark menace from the skies and reawaken it.”
Haldir stood up to face the Gondorians. “So perhaps our Human ‘allies’ have their own agenda, after all.”
Faramir rose to his feet in challenge to the insulting words. “You can’t be serious! This could threaten all of Middle Earth! We came here to help and our own men have fallen prey to it…how can you accuse us of such a treacherous act?”
“Is treachery then unknown among Men?” said the Marchwarden scathingly.
Gandalf rose as well, arms raised to the two disputants, while Aragorn and Legolas stared at each other from across the table in silence.
“This is pointless! Sit down the both of you…” said the Istari but the combatants showed no sign of backing down.
“Men fought along side Sauron’s orcs!” said the Marchwarden, “And what of your own King’s treatment of the Mirkwood Prince?”
“HOW DARE YOU?” yelled Faramir, rounding the table to respond to this insult to his King.
“FARAMIR, STOP NOW!” commanded Aragorn, who now stood up as well.
“Sit down, Marchwarden,” the soft tones of the Mirkwood King penetrated the heated standoff. “Aragorn did not loose these creatures upon us.”
Haldir reseated himself angrily, Faramir followed suit, eyes still flashing at the Lórien.
“Gandalf,” said Aragorn, “why was the stone in Gondor? How was this done?”
The Wizard took a deep breath. Clearly, what he was about to reveal pained him deeply. “When I went to Imladris, Aragorn, Elrond and I examined this scroll carefully and then looked for the stone where it has lain undisturbed for these many centuries. It was gone. I then had a suspicion based on a recent conversation I’d had…with the Queen of Gondor.”
He took a breath as all three pairs of eyes rested on him. “Arwen, Aragorn, has been suffering a malady of the mind. She knew of this ancient lore from her long perusal of the texts in Imladris and in Lothlórien. In a mad scheme to visit revenge upon you…she unleashed this thing to kill the object of your heart’s deepest desire…” the Istari looked at Legolas.
Aragorn shook his head in stunned disbelief. “It can’t be…it’s impossible…”
Gandalf looked at him sadly. “Here is the proof.” He laid down a small flat black stone onto the table. “When Elrond and I began to surmise what may have happened we flew by Eagle to Gondor. We found everything there…a Palantir and this. She used the Palantir to create the illusion of three stones instead of one and magic to weave the ancient spell to summon the monsters from the sky rock.”
Faramir stirred first from the stunned silence, “Where is Arwen now?”
“She is in Imladris with her father. But the damage is done…the ancient creature has been awakened from it’s slumber and expects the Hunt to resume.”
The old Wizard looked at Legolas. “If you do not meet this challenge and defeat it …it will consume all of Mirkwood, and eventually spread to the lands outside of your realm.”
“Mind yer mouth, or I’ll throw you into another one of them prickly bushes!” retorted a burly man covered in purple suds. Laughter drifted over the water along with playful splashes as the men relieved their tension with foolery. Haldir watched all this from the tent with a look of disdain.
“Humans,” the soft voice drifted over his shoulder in lyrical tones underscored by sadness. “They never seem to do what you might expect of them.”
Haldir turned to see the young Monarch, standing in a clean white tunic and leggings. His long blonde hair hung wet and unbraided down his shoulders. A pale thin hand rested unconsciously over his heart. The sharply beautiful face was drawn into a pained expression. His eyes were suspiciously bright as they followed the figure of the Gondorian King walking with his Captains.
Haldir approached the Mirkwood Elf, and after a moment’s deliberation placed a gentle hand on Legolas’s shoulder. “My Liege, if I might inquire…you seem …troubled. Might I offer my assistance?”
Legolas tore his eyes away from the Human who walked among the men, occasionally stopping to inspect their wounds. Watching Aragorn brought back so many memories that were both wonderful and deeply painful all at once. He turned his misty blue gaze to Haldir in confusion. “What do you mean, Marchwarden? I am well…” The young Elf’s evasive response was cut off impatiently.
“You are obviously distracted and in pain, King,” interrupted the Marchwarden sternly. “I respect your desire for privacy when it does not compromise your effectiveness…and now is not the time to be so …compromised.”
Legolas’s eyes flared in indignation. He made to shrug off the hand of the older Elf but Haldir took hold of his shoulders and swung the young King to face him.
“My Liege, I am well acquainted with your remarkable capacity for stubbornness but I must insist that you now tell me what it is that ails you.”
Legolas pushed at the older Elf in an effort to free himself but found the Lórien’s grasp was surprisingly immovable. The Marchwarden leaned closer so that the heat of his body sent a signal of pleasure to the King’s shocked brain.
“Release me!” stammered the King, with an effort to sound indignant. The Lórien did not seem to be fooled.
The two Elves stared at each other.
“Nay, you will talk to me. You have barred the Gondorian King from you. And you sent the healer I sent to you away…now, young King, you will have to talk to me.”
Legolas’s eyes flashed in indigo fury. “I don’t need to talk to you! I don’t need anything…or anyone! My duty is all I need to think about now…”
The grip of the Marchwarden was like a vice but the Lórien’s gaze softened slightly. A hand drifted up to stroke the Wood Elf’s cheek. Legolas shivered and felt his lips part slightly at the unexpected caress. Haldir leaned closer and Legolas could feel the solid strength in the arms that held him. Something in him wanted to yield to that strength.
“So brave…and so alone. Why do you push everyone from you, young King? It is because of that Human, isn’t it?”
Legolas gasped slightly at the words and at the touch, which grew bolder. Haldir took in the pain his words caused and the body that leaned into him despite that pain. How he longed to wipe that pain away and replace it with something else.
“The Man is breaking you…here,” he whispered. His hand drifted down to rest gently on the young Elf’s chest, over his heart.
Legolas tried to break free again but his eyes welled up in sudden moisture. The Marchwarden leaned forward and placed a gently kiss on the King’s smooth forehead. Legolas gasped and froze as the lips drifted down to softly press against his own.
“You do not need to be alone, fair King.” The lips brushed against his mouth and he felt himself wanting to lean in and taste them.
“No,” Legolas whispered but his body betrayed him. He no longer pushed at the Marchwarden to release him. The pain in his heart was almost unbearable. He needed this. He needed someone to hold him, the way the Marchwarden now was holding him. He needed someone to take the pain away! And Haldir’s lips held so much promise. He was so close…
But at that moment a voice from the tent flap traveled to them, tinged in tones of challenge.
“Is there a problem here?” said Aragorn. His steel gray eyes locked onto the tableau of the two Elves. Haldir released the fair King and Legolas pushed past Aragorn as he left the tent hurriedly without looking at the Man.
Aragorn watched his lover go, his heart constricting with the pain of their silence. Since their rescue, Legolas had refused to speak to him. And there was precious little time for any intimate moments between them. The sun was rising in the sky and the joint forces of Mirkwood, Lothlórien and Gondor were preparing to enter the cavern lair of the creatures.
With a sigh, Aragorn turned and leveled a steel gaze unto the Marchwarden. Haldir met the hard look with one of his own.
“You know what the problem is, King Elessar,” said the Marchwarden in a cold voice. “And if you do not find a way to repair the damage you have caused, Mirkwood will lose another King.”
The Lórien stalked out of the tent, Aragorn’s suspicious gaze following him. Fuming at his helplessness, Aragorn stepped out of the tent to be greeted by some mild commotion. Faramir came running up to him. “My Liege, the Istari has arrived. A meeting is being assembled in the King’s tent.”
Aragorn nodded and walked briskly next to the Gondorian. “How are you, My Liege?” asked Faramir, carefully. Aragorn sighed and looked at his advisor with a telling shake of his head. They entered the tent. Mithrandir looked up, his gaze sweeping over the haggard features of Gondor’s King in sympathetic understanding. Aragorn took his seat around the small round table, taking in the shuttered expressions of the Marchwarden and of Mirkwood’s Sovereign.
Gandalf paused, the tension between the three commanders settling like a heavy mantle in the makeshift war room. The Istari grunted but kept his silence, for the moment, about that irritating factor. He looked at Aragorn gravely.
“I have news. This menace is an ancient force that has visited Mirkwood before.” He turned his sage head toward Legolas who had gasped at this declaration. “I think you have some knowledge about this that you have not shared with us, young Legolas.”
All eyes turned to the Wood Elf. Legolas stared back at them, then with a sigh brought an old scroll out and laid it upon the table. “I have been trying to decipher it,” he offered guiltily.
Gandalf opened the scroll and spread it out for all to see. It was covered in ancient runes and pictographs. “Hmmm…it is an ancient tongue of your forefathers, King Legolas. Fortunately, a duplicate has resided in Imladris for millennia and Lord Elrond translated it for me.”
His weathered hand pointed to an obscure symbol. “This represents a pact…an ancient contract made between your house, King, the House of Thranduilion, and the dark forces that have been prematurely resurrected in the bowels of your forest.”
“What sort of pact?” asked Legolas nervously, avoiding the stunned stares of the others.
“It appears as though a wager of some sort was entered into, millennia ago, …a Royal Hunt …” the wrinkled hand traveled down the scroll to tap on a pictograph. “See here? Some sort of army…strangely represented. They do not appear to be Elves. That is peculiar. Elrond suggested they were some ancient race that no longer inhabit these lands. Yet, see here? They are lead by an Elf. See this figure here?”
Legolas leaned forward with a soft gasp, “The crest of Thranduilion.”
“Yes,” said Gandalf, somberly. “A Mirkwood King is challenged by this…” a dark ominous representation of a beast, clearly meant to illustrate the creatures, stood in opposition to the crude drawing of a lone warrior. “As long as the Mirkwood Sovereign defeats this, peace continues to reign in the land. If he fails…” his finger trailed to another series of crude drawings showing the stick woods overrun by black dragon like shapes.
A gasp drew the startled looks to the Gondorian King. “Legolas is not going to enter into some ancient duel with …with one of those …things!”
“No, not one of those things…they are merely minions to the real threat, I am afraid…” said Gandalf. Stunned eyes gaped at the Wizard’s solemn face.
“You can’t be serious!” Aragorn rose from his chair in alarm.
“I am afraid I am,” said the Wizard whose voice rose to match the Man’s. “And, I am afraid there is more…” He indicated that Aragorn had best take his seat.
Aragorn drifted back into his seat, suddenly very pale. The Istari continued gravely, “I said this was an ancient pact. Legolas’s ancestors were hunters of these things,” he declared to the shocked audience. “It seems your ancestors had their own ideas of sport…but also by defeating and enthralling these creatures, they might be used as an army against Mirkwood’s enemies.” All eyes turned toward Legolas who looked equally horrified. He knew better than anyone the brutality of his House’s history but even he had no idea of this dark past.
The Istari continued, “When the Elves arrived to these shores, the means of summoning the creatures was dissolved. In an effort to maintain peaceful relations between the three Elven realms, an agreement was forged. Three magic stones used in the summoning rite, once all held by your forebear, were disbanded. One was sent to the Golden Wood, one remained here, in the keeping of the Mirkwood Sovereign and one was given over to Imladris.”
The onlookers waited as Gandalf took a sip of nectar and looked over at Aragorn. “The stone held in Imaldris is no longer there. I found it in Gondor.”
“What??” came the stunned response from both Aragorn and Faramir. Legolas and Haldir looked at each other. “It was used in some other dark magics to somehow do the work of all three…to summon this dark menace from the skies and reawaken it.”
Haldir stood up to face the Gondorians. “So perhaps our Human ‘allies’ have their own agenda, after all.”
Faramir rose to his feet in challenge to the insulting words. “You can’t be serious! This could threaten all of Middle Earth! We came here to help and our own men have fallen prey to it…how can you accuse us of such a treacherous act?”
“Is treachery then unknown among Men?” said the Marchwarden scathingly.
Gandalf rose as well, arms raised to the two disputants, while Aragorn and Legolas stared at each other from across the table in silence.
“This is pointless! Sit down the both of you…” said the Istari but the combatants showed no sign of backing down.
“Men fought along side Sauron’s orcs!” said the Marchwarden, “And what of your own King’s treatment of the Mirkwood Prince?”
“HOW DARE YOU?” yelled Faramir, rounding the table to respond to this insult to his King.
“FARAMIR, STOP NOW!” commanded Aragorn, who now stood up as well.
“Sit down, Marchwarden,” the soft tones of the Mirkwood King penetrated the heated standoff. “Aragorn did not loose these creatures upon us.”
Haldir reseated himself angrily, Faramir followed suit, eyes still flashing at the Lórien.
“Gandalf,” said Aragorn, “why was the stone in Gondor? How was this done?”
The Wizard took a deep breath. Clearly, what he was about to reveal pained him deeply. “When I went to Imladris, Aragorn, Elrond and I examined this scroll carefully and then looked for the stone where it has lain undisturbed for these many centuries. It was gone. I then had a suspicion based on a recent conversation I’d had…with the Queen of Gondor.”
He took a breath as all three pairs of eyes rested on him. “Arwen, Aragorn, has been suffering a malady of the mind. She knew of this ancient lore from her long perusal of the texts in Imladris and in Lothlórien. In a mad scheme to visit revenge upon you…she unleashed this thing to kill the object of your heart’s deepest desire…” the Istari looked at Legolas.
Aragorn shook his head in stunned disbelief. “It can’t be…it’s impossible…”
Gandalf looked at him sadly. “Here is the proof.” He laid down a small flat black stone onto the table. “When Elrond and I began to surmise what may have happened we flew by Eagle to Gondor. We found everything there…a Palantir and this. She used the Palantir to create the illusion of three stones instead of one and magic to weave the ancient spell to summon the monsters from the sky rock.”
Faramir stirred first from the stunned silence, “Where is Arwen now?”
“She is in Imladris with her father. But the damage is done…the ancient creature has been awakened from it’s slumber and expects the Hunt to resume.”
The old Wizard looked at Legolas. “If you do not meet this challenge and defeat it …it will consume all of Mirkwood, and eventually spread to the lands outside of your realm.”
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