Stories of Arda - Lord of the Rings Fan-Fiction Archive

The morning sun filtered down through the oaks and beeches of Doriath, dappling their summer leaves and the ground below with rays of gold. The stillness of the waking forest was stirred by the scratching of a squirrel as it descended from its leafy nest, the light cascade of birdsong, the lilting call of quail in the thicket. Pale blooms of niphredil dotted the shaded hideaways, ready to welcome the warmth of the dawn upon their petals once more.

The gentle song of the wood was suddenly accompanied by peals of fair laughter and a hasty rustling through the brush. There came Lúthien, the enchanting daughter of the king. She bound through the forest barefoot in her simple gray gown with only a girdle of twisted silver. She moved with the heedless grace of one born to the wild and free ways of the untamed world, her dark hair streaming behind her, fleet and sure as a deer.

She glanced behind to see a flash of gold, her companion crashing through the undergrowth with a bit more noise than she had made. Her young kinsman followed as best he could, valiantly endeavoring to keep pace with her. They both enjoyed leaving the stately court behind in these playful forays into the wood, and she was trying to take him more often before he finally grew out of his childhood. It kept him out of the trouble adolescents of his age often found for themselves. He still could not catch her, but each time his chase improved.

Lúthien slowed in a secluded glade beside a babbling offshoot of the Esgalduin where the grass grew thick and soft underfoot, allowing him to catch up to her. He was not too far behind and soon came panting into the clearing.

He was armed with only a silver flute in his belt, a gift from his mother who thought he spent entirely too much time playing with swords. He had only seen thirty-five years of the sun, and had not yet attained his full form or stature, both of which promised to be great. The traces of boyhood lingered in his face, and he was as bright and spry as Celeborn had been in his younger days.

“I shall catch you someday,” Thranduil boasted as he recovered his breath, though his smile betrayed the impossibility of it all.

“Perhaps,” she laughed, “but it will not be this day! Your legs are not yet long enough. Perhaps later when you have filled out more.”

“You never cease to humor me, Lúthien,” he smiled, folding his legs beneath him in the deep grass. “Not even the doe can keep pace with you.”

They often came to this place. Lúthien had long hallowed it, so that it was called the Hírilad, the Lady’s Vale. She danced now upon the grass, and it seemed the living spirit of the wood had taken visible form. Thranduil played for her, for she always insisted that dance was poorer without music. The birds were drawn to their lady, and flitted round with a song of their own.

“I fear I am a poor substitute for Daeron,” Thranduil apologized when the song was ended and the dance stilled.

“The apprentice is not expected to rival the master,” Lúthien smiled as she came to sit near him, folding her legs in the grass, “and his fingers are more often upon the harp than the bow. You have skills of your own.” Plucking one of the wild lilies that grew all around them, she slipped it into her dark hair like a white star amid the night sky. “I hear that Master Cúthalion has nothing but praise for you.”

She saw his eyes glow with pleasure at that. Several errant wisps of hair made him look even younger, not yet concerned about cultivating the meticulous appearance of the elder lords. “I do try,” he said modestly, though with some measure of underlying pride.

“Many try; it seems you succeed.” She gathered more of the small long-stemmed blossoms to make a chaplet of them. “The King is quite pleased with you, and he expects you to be a great credit to our house. Now the Finarfinionnath have not even their honey-colored tresses to lord over us!”

Thranduil seemed more thoughtful at that, finally pulling the ineffective stay from his hair which then fell like a river of gold over his shoulder. “Lúthien, you have been more often among the Golodhrim than I,” he said. “What do you think of them? Why have they come?”

Lúthien hesitated, for she did not know what to tell him. A light breeze swept through the leafy boughs above, making the shadows dance. “We know not why,” she said at last. “It was first said that they were sent by the Belain to aid us in our hour of need, but the Queen now greatly doubts that. A shadow lies upon them which they have yet to explain, and still we wait for them to enlighten us in their own time and of their own will. But they are proud.”

Silence hung between them, the same uncomfortable uncertainty that arose any time one tried to ferret out the secrets of the Golodhrim. Nerwen had gracefully deflected Celeborn’s inquires, nor had fair Finrod offered the full tale. They were indeed proud, and yet Lúthien was almost certain she had also sensed some measure of shame. It seemed they had brought something upon themselves they were still unwilling to bare before their Mithrin kin.

Lúthien looked to Thranduil, still in the first bloom of youth and innocence. She recognized a resilient spirit in him, but one that could still be shaped like white-hot steel. Given the time and nurturing, he could yet be molded into something great, another pillar of Mithrin strength, remembered alongside Thingol, Galadhon, Celeborn, Oropher, and the other lords of Doriath. Or he could yet be twisted into something ruined, crippled by strife and bitterness, marred as she had heard and suspected Fëanor to be marred, consumed with pride and jealousy.

“Pride has been the honor of some,” she said at last, “but the downfall of many. Do not allow your passions to rule you, Thranduil. A rampant garden overtaken by weeds pleases no one, and scatters the seeds of discord far and wide. The mind is the master of the heart, for it will guide when the other is given to caprice. Cultivate passion with discipline, and it will serve you well.”

“That is what my grandfather has often told me,” Thranduil confided, twisting his fingers in the thick grass. “He seems to think my father somewhat lacking in those virtues.”

Lúthien nodded with a strange shadow of a smile. “In that mind, I trust he is not alone.” She knew Lord Thalos well, one of those favored by her father the King. Born of Vanyarin mother before the March of the Eldar, Thalos seemed to have inherited their sedate demeanor along with their singular beauty. It was with considerable reluctance that he had granted Lord Oropher leave to wed his daughter, for that scion of the crown could indeed be capricious and overbearing at times. Now it seemed he endeavored to hedge those tendencies in his grandson before they grew like thistles. But, fair-haired or not, Thranduil was Oropher's blood, and such efforts were not always successful.

“It seems strange to me that pride should have driven them from their homes,” he mused, almost to himself, digging the end of a twig into the dirt. “If the Blessed Realm was darkened, I do not know what better place they expected to find here. I certainly have no desire to leave Doriath.”

“We are sheltered here,” Lúthien said with a wan smile, “and for that, I am thankful. Young ones should be allowed to grow and mature in peace. You are skilled with bow and blade, but it is another matter to use them to take life in defense of your own.” Gently, she lifted Thranduil’s chin and traced the line of his jaw with a tender and sisterly air, knowing there would come a day when the starlight in his eyes would inevitably be sharpened, when the blind trust of youth would fade or be broken. He still allowed her to touch him, to offer the endearments she had offered when he was a child. There would soon come a day when he would not. At times she thought one of the keenest tragedies of life was that the young must leave their fairest years behind them, gradually transformed and disillusioned by cruelty and injustice. Now it seemed even the immortal West was not safe. What had their cousins of the Blessed Realm seen that had scarred them so? Or was it something they had done? What was the shadow they had brought back to Middle-earth with them, and how long could the enchantment of Doriath resist it?

“I wish that you may never know the brutality of war,” she said, her voice heavy, “but in this changing world, I fear all such hope is vain.”

A RING OF LIVING FLAME

The royal hall was emptied for a time, as it almost never was in these new days. The King had concluded his audiences for the morning and retired to the company of his intimates, though he was scheduled to return at midday. All the foreign embassies had gone elsewhere during Elessar’s absence. Still, one solitary individual remained, and he savored a moment of solitude after enduring the oppression of the crowd for the King's sake.

Legolas paced slowly along the empty and echoing hall, hands swept idly behind his back as he passed the silent tributes to the kings of years gone by. He remained within these walls by an act of his own will, for he wished to somehow find it in his heart to love this place as Aragorn loved it. But it remained foreign to him, strange and cheerless despite the summer sun that streamed in through the windows above. All was stone, majestic but lifeless, without even a tapestry to soften the severity. He ran his fingers across a pillar of smooth black marble as he passed. Given time, those dark and stately pillars could gradually assume the air of bars, this hall a cage. No, he did not envy Aragorn his lineage.

He looked again to the statues as he passed them, standing regular as sentinels. His eyes fell upon the names chiseled beneath their feet, searching out those he would recognize. Isildur he knew, for his own father had known him, though he was remembered with small love. He had heard of Meneldil, and Cemendur, but in later days these kings of Men seemed to fade from the histories of the world he knew. The sun and shadow played over their stony features, all alike, noble and unmemorable. He admitted the workmanship was magnificent, but everything was in stark contrast, black and white, lacking all the vibrant living hues he loved. It seemed too severe, too dead.

Whatever his personal preferences, he had suffered himself to be clad in the same stark black and white. He was dressed as a Gondorian for the simple reason that there was little else to be had, as he was one of the only Elves present within the city. Also, it had been a practical effort on his part to quietly conform to his surroundings and therefore escape the unsolicited attentions that had plagued him of late. It seemed there were many in Gondor who had doubted the Eldar of old still existed in Middle-earth, and every curious thrill-seeker was now determined to catch a glimpse of him. He tried to elude most of them when he was not in formal attendance at Aragorn’s court, but it was no use. Noble and fair beyond his power to conceal, he remained as conspicuous among these Men as would be a lord of Rohan at a gathering of Dunlendings. Nor was solitude yet so dear to him that he would go so far as to sacrifice his hair, though Gimli had offered his assistance in that regard with a hearty laugh.

The clothes were heavier than those he was accustomed to, more restricting, but it was nothing he could not endure with good grace. They were very like those Boromir had worn. The entire city reminded him of the man. Everywhere there were the winged emblems, the distinctive manner and speech of the people. Now and then he would catch it in a guard, the same bold swagger, the same sonorous voice. It made their incredible victory profoundly bittersweet when he remembered Denethor’s proud son who had not lived to see it.

Legolas put his shoulders back as he paced the floor, straining gently against the confines of his attire, listening to the muted stretch of black leather. The white sleeves of his tunic brilliantly caught the sun as he passed into the slanting shaft of a skylight. He could see dust floating lazily in the sun's rays, stirred by the rush of new life that had gathered within these walls. It was high time, he thought, that Aragorn brought some vigor back into this realm and stopped its sad decline.

Legolas lingered there in the celestial glow of the world outside, bathed in sunbeams, turned toward the small patch of azure sky that was admitted into this grim magisterial chamber. He closed his eyes for a moment, savoring the glowing warmth on his face, the scents of the outside world, of summer in the mountains. It was a relief after the brooding history of the place.

The moment was disturbed by a subtle stirring of awareness at the fringes of his mind. He was not alone, though he was meant to believe he was. More than that, his keen ears caught the distinctive sound of skirts swept over polished stone, a stifled giggle as they ventured a look at “The Elf.” Ai, they were everywhere. Returning to himself, he casually wandered away from the light. He resumed his idle pacing, paying no mind to his covert band of admirers, determined to outlast them. He imagined the centuries had given him greater patience than theirs, though he felt uncomfortably like a live exhibit at an animal fair. If he could only be dull enough, perhaps they would lose interest and move on.

It might have been a long battle between elvish resolve and feminine tenacity, but the latter party was worsted into a frenzied scatter at the approach of an infinitely more welcome presence.

“Legolas!” Aragorn greeted him warmly, his great royal robes sweeping over the smooth floor as he approached with open arms. He was still arrayed as royalty but had left the king behind with his guard at the door. Legolas accepted his fraternal embrace as Aragorn seemed to revel in returning to the Sindarin tongue of his upbringing. “One never has any trouble finding you these days,” he said, the bright gleam on his crown still no match for the devious glint in his eye. “I have but to look for knots of maidens hovering about in doorways.”

“I do not know which of us they wish to see more,” Legolas confided, still trying to be pleasant, though Aragorn probably knew him well enough to notice his subtle irritation.

“Oh, it is you,” Aragorn assured him. “They have seen me, for I make no secret of myself. But you insist upon teasing them, sneaking around crowds and slipping through halls. Walk boldly out among them, Legolas,” he advised with a smile, making his fist an imitation of a battering ram. “Perhaps the novelty will wear away in time. You were overt enough before.”

“Yes,” Legolas agreed, “before, when the city was peopled with soldiers and guardsmen. Then I did not face a procession of skirts at every turn. These past two days I have scarcely dared to leave the court!”

“You should,” his friend advised, with a sweeping indication of his current attire, “before I make a Man of Gondor of you! I daresay my Lord Thranduil would receive such a report with small pleasure.”

“Doubtless.” Legolas smiled, his discontent banished in the light of Aragorn’s good-humor. He imagined his father would not be offended so much as flattered by his present difficulties, though it was true that King Thranduil was somewhat impatiently awaiting his return. “My lord’s messengers have already begun to wonder.”

“Bah, let them wonder,” the King said. “I cannot hold you here forever, Legolas, but while you stay, I am enjoying it immensely. I hope you may say the same.”

Legolas smiled. “The companionship makes up for any lack in the accommodations,” he assured him.

Aragorn glanced around the hall, and then pulled at his high collar. “Ai, Legolas. It grows hot in here. Come; I know you pine for the open air.”

King Elessar led the way from the royal hall, Legolas following with easy familiarity. The resplendent guardsmen brought up the rear, their deportment a credit to the bygone pride and dignity of Númenor.

“I do not relish the thought of attending a full court with the sun riding so high,” Aragorn admitted as they entered the courtyard, soaring far above the rest of the concentric city below. There was a greater wind here on the heights, refreshing after the confines of the palace walls. “With so many so close it can become difficult to breathe.” He glanced at Legolas as they wandered toward the looming remains of the White Tree. “I can forgive you if you decline to attend.”

“I shall be there,” Legolas assured him with quiet emphasis.

“You understand I do not ask it of you?”

“Perfectly.” Legolas smiled again, amused by Aragorn’s anxious solicitude. It was strange that as the man’s power waxed he became more and more reluctant to make open demands upon his friends. If he was endeavoring to be duly attentive to Legolas’ own rank and dignity, he could well have saved himself the worry. “If we braved Moria and Mordor together, it should be a small task to endure a few hours of stuffy decorum, should it not?” Still, that was easily said now that he stood in the open with the free wind on his face. Already he felt revived by the living things of the world, as if the wind itself lent him its strength as it swept past.

“The Elves of Mirkwood long ago learned to make the best of trial,” Aragorn conceded as he folded his legs to sit beside the patch of green lawn. “Your resilience should be a lesson for us all.” He looked forlornly at the gnarled remains of the ancient tree, one of the last details that marred his reign.

“You will find it,” Legolas insisted, guessing his thoughts. “The Power who has guided this miraculous ascent of yours will not be so negligent as to let that slip past Him unattended.”

“I wish I shared your confidence,” his friend sighed. “I have looked, in vain.”

“You have not yet had the time,” Legolas maintained, sinking backwards to lie on the precious green grass, arms crossed placidly over his chest as though he had no cares at all. He could feel Aragorn was mildly envious of his effortless tranquility. “You received your crown only two days ago, and have since been drowned in a flood of new concerns. Give the waters a moment to calm, and then I imagine much will be made clear to you.”

Waters. It was an unfortunate figure of speech. The Sea had been growing on his mind of late, especially as he was surrounded there by the history of the Sea Kings of old, not to mention the Prince of Dol Amroth and his retinue, a noble Man with the echo of Elvendom about him. His early fascination with the West-call had gradually begun to assume a new face, appealing still, but unsettlingly so. He felt a twinge of fear in dwelling upon it now, so he made a deliberate effort to ignore it. The warmth of the sun overhead had by now been absorbed by the darker portions of his clothes; there were celestial kingdoms of white cloud in the sky, and birdsong upon the air. He filled his mind with the simple beauties of Middle-earth, striving to quiet the restless memory of something he had never seen.

“And since we speak of trees,” Aragorn said at last, subtly leading the conversation elsewhere, “I have heard you speak of renewing the gardens of the city.”

Legolas sniffed scornfully. “What gardens?” he asked. “This place has very little to recommend it to those who appreciate growing things. It is no wonder the people fade.”

“It is a far cry from Imladris and Lasgalen,” Aragorn admitted, “but it has beauties of its own. Do you suppose the different loves of wood and stone could not here be made to complement one another?”

Now Legolas smiled with the eagerness of an artist soon to be given free rein to prove his craft. “It could be done,” he said, sitting upright again, “if you will give me leave.”

“The rebuilding of the outer circles is due to begin in earnest,” the King explained. “There many beds have gone fallow for lack of flowers. I leave those touches for you when the masons have done their own work.”

“Flowers, perhaps,” Legolas mused, already imagining the white stone shaded by green. “But you must have trees first.”

“Very well,” Aragorn consented, seeming to know he had left the matter in capable hands. “What kind would you propose? Beech?”

“Beech or maple,” Legolas agreed. “Fair in the spring and summer, they shall hang with living flame in the autumn in memory of the battles gone before, the fires of siege and war. It was not through peace that Elessar came to the throne of Gondor.”

Aragorn’s gray eyes brightened at the prospect. “Well thought, my friend! We shall have a Rath Cormallen, for it may be that the old Rath Celerdain shall need a new name. You will bring others of your people to assist you?”

“If my lord father allows it,” Legolas promised. “I will be anxious to return now that you have set challenges for me, although I fear there is afflicted wood enough to last us many years in the North.”

“None escaped the Great War unscathed,” Aragorn nodded. “But if I know anything of the relentless Elvenking in the north, it is not a bit of fire that will be his undoing. The wood will grow again, and still his colors will fly beneath them.”

Legolas smiled, appreciating his candor. “That they will. I know he bore it admirably, though I was elsewhere. Give me a year with him when I return, and then I shall come and plant your Rath Cormallen for you.”

The clear tolling of silver bells imposed their voices on the city and the lands about, heralding midday. A startled flutter of gray birds took flight from the face of the city, soaring skyward, their shadows passing over the courtyard like wisps of cloud in the wind. Legolas watched them go, appreciating their simple unfettered freedom to fly where they would. Yes, Middle-earth was enough to content him for several years yet. He need not cross the last bridge for some time.

Aragorn climbed back to his feet, brushing the pale dust from his dark and stately robes. He offered Legolas his hand and pulled him up as well, a gesture of friendship more than necessity. “Come on, then,” he said, lingering in the form of Estel of Imladris and Aragorn the Ranger before assuming again the guise of King Elessar. “If you so wish to humor me and my court, it would not due to keep them waiting, Legolas Adanedhel.”

As Aragorn had predicted, the court had become as close and oppressive as the Huorn forests of Fangorn. Much had been dealt with, including some of the more exotic tasks of defining the legal standing of the Haradrim and reestablishing the slaves of Mordor on their own lands. Legolas had dutifully stood in his place and given heed to the proceedings, but he would freely admit his relief to finally be released.

Passing through the echoing corridors, he trailed his fingers along the white and gray stone wall, imbibing the distinctive taste of the place. It was very much of Men, utterly different from the home he had known, but it was something he would have to grow accustomed to.

His wandering steps carried him to the library. Not the dark depths of the archives, but merely the retreat of the Stewards when they looked for a moment of peace. That is what he sought now, in addition to the satisfaction of an idle curiosity. Slipping past the velvety black drapery, he came into a dimly lit room, the walls lined with shelves bearing all manner of old and intriguing volumes.

“Ernil Legolas.”

He turned, already recognizing the soft voice. “Speak, Daerin,” he said. It was both Daerin and Bregonsúl, the two silvan heralds of Thranduil. It was not for nothing that the Elvenking had chosen them. Faithful as a pair of hounds, they had followed him from court and now seemed bent upon securing an audience of their own. Evidently Thranduil deemed his errant son in some need of supervision while he moved in foreign spheres.

“The spring wanes, my lord,” Daerin said at last. “The King bade us tarry not overlong here in the South, but return to the aid of Lasgalen which so sorely needs us all.”

“Then you may go,” Legolas said simply. “You need not tarry on my account.”

They seemed taken aback by his answer. “It will not please our lord the King if we should return without you,” Bregonsúl warned. “Our second duty was to be your escort.”

“Then I relieve you of it.” It was only occasionally that Legolas asserted his will, gently but firmly when he would brook no opposition. “I shall return soon, but not yet. If you wish to go now, I give you leave. The responsibility is mine if the King objects.”

They were not pleased with their new assignment, but at last he convinced them. They would bear with them his reply to his father’s letter, as well as a cordial missive from Elessar. He recognized that there was something else that chafed them, presumably just how little deference their prince was accorded in this court of Men. It smacked of brazen inhospitality to their minds, but they who idolized their warrior king and his heir could never understand that Legolas was quite content with his marginal anonymity. There would be a time and a place for him to stand upon his own lineage, and he deemed this was neither. For now, he remained Legolas of the Fellowship, one who dwelt in the shadows of others accorded more regard than he. This was not yet his sphere to command.

His attendants dismissed, Legolas fell to idly browsing the bookcases, searching out any title that would arrest his interest. He was exhaustively instructed in the histories of the Elves, including several extended visits of a scholarly nature to the archives of Imladris. We of Oropher’s blood have many faults, his father had freely admitted, but ignorance has never been numbered among them. It was not for nothing that he had been raised in an actively trilingual household.

He finally chose a promising volume from among its leather-bound fellows, entitled A History of the Elvish Alliance. Intrigued, he availed himself of a chair nearby and perused the closely written pages at the crackling protest of the ancient binding. The work was recorded in the script of Gondor, legible enough, though the scribe had left extremely narrow margins.

Several weary pages later, he realized the description and tribute to Gil-galad would go on for some time. That was all well and good, but he had seen it before, and it held no kindred interest for him. Leafing through many of the subsequent pages, he at last hit upon the reference he had sought.

Other hosts joined to the ranks of the High King included silvan tribes of the North. These were led by their lords, Oropher and Amdír, Elves of uncertain origin. Slain early in battle, Oropher was succeeded by his son Throndul, who returned to the North. Little else is known of these, save tales of an apocryphal nature.

Legolas drew himself up with a dry huff. “Throndul,” indeed! Perhaps during the years to come he and Aragorn could do something to right the lore of this realm. Oropher . . . of uncertain origin . . . joined to the ranks of the High King . . . Those statements alone suffered from woeful oversimplification. If nothing else, Legolas swore upon the slighted soul of the formidable grandfather he had never known that he would at least restore his memory before they met beyond the sundering seas.

Following his nose into the dustiest and most unfrequented corners, he discovered a shelf of volumes written in the elvish tongue, but quickly recognized them to be Quenya. His father could speak the Noldorin dialect after a fashion, having picked it up during his years in Balar and Lindon, but had never bothered learning to read it. Thranduil had been gifted with a natural aptitude for language, though he did not deliberately cultivate the talent; he loathed study, despite appreciating its virtues, and so had not been disappointed that Legolas had not made much headway with the tongue of the Exiles under Lord Elrond’s brief tutelage.

Leafing through the worn pages with no immediate purpose, Legolas then caught the distinctive sound of a heavy tread, one he knew well by now. Gimli he recognized, but unfortunately the Dwarf was followed. Belain, not again. He shrank back into the shadows where the shelf met the wall, a position which still afforded him a glimpse of the others through a gap in the oppressive ranks of books. He was still unwilling to face another encounter today.

They were not long in coming.

“Good day to you, Master Dwarf,” said the first, a lady of a regal and determined mien in a sweeping gown of midnight blue. Several of a younger and less august sort had come in her following. “Do you know perchance where we may find the elvish lord honored by King Elessar? My ladies and I would very much appreciate the honor of his acquaintance.”

She was palatable enough, with a dignity Legolas admired; however, her maids were a silly, starry-eyed bunch, and he felt he had been spectacle enough for one day. If she was so very determined, he would do himself the honor of her company at another time and another place. Gimli glanced imperceptibly aside to meet his gaze, but Legolas shook his head, begging a diversion.

“Alas, my ladies,” Gimli apologized in excellent performance, “he has not passed by this place to my knowledge. Still, I feel he is not far. If you do not tarry long, you may find him yet.”

Nor did they tarry. With no small relief, Legolas soon deemed it safe enough to leave his dusty retreat. “Thank you, my friend,” he said, brushing himself off. “I can stand no more; not this day.”

“So I gathered.” Gimli chuckled into his beard, hooking his thumbs in his belt. “It would seem you have become the envy and despair of half the dandies of Aragorn’s court. Not that you are one,” he hastened to add, as Legolas looked rather offended.

“I have been called many things, Master Gimli,” he said, “but never that.”

“Well, perhaps you should acclimate yourself to it,” the Dwarf said as he dropped himself comfortably into a chair, gloating perhaps in his own invulnerability, “because that is how the eyes of mortal kind interpret you. If you want to get by in their company, you may perhaps consider a few strategic alterations to your appearance. And, as you have seen, wearing their clothes makes not one whit of difference.”

“I did notice,” Legolas confided, choosing to humor him. “And just what would you suggest, Master Gimli, wise in the ways of Men as you seem to consider yourself?”

“First of all,” he said, pointing briefly but adamantly, "do something about that hair. So long as you wear it as you do, the entire cause is lost. Now, I’ve a grand idea in mind, and have already offered it.”

“And I have refused it,” Legolas reminded him with a wry and mirthless smile, “with thanks.”

Gimli shrugged where he sat. “Suit yourself. Now, if only you could somehow manage a beard . . .”

“All the Powers forbid,” Legolas recoiled. “I cannot understand how you endure that pelt on your face.”

Gimli grinned. He looked thoughtful a moment, cocking his head like a curious bird. “You know, a few touches here and there and we could almost make you look a good deal like young lord Éomer.”

“Your solicitude honors me,” Legolas said, with a generous serving of good-humored sarcasm. “It therefore goes without saying that with few touches we could well make you to resemble a blunt-eared lout of a halfling.”

“Very well. I shall let you alone,” Gimli assured him, raising his hands in admission of defeat. “One cannot say I did not try, but all my offers seem in vain.”

“Try you did, and valiantly,” Legolas admitted. “I shall not forget your willingness to remedy my affliction, good and noble-hearted Dwarf that you are. But, if affliction it is, I am yet unwilling to be parted from it.”

“So be it,” Gimli acquiesced, but with a devious smile. “You may run then, my friend, but you can never hide.”

“That remains to be seen.” Legolas ran an idle finger over a row of uninteresting records, offering Gimli a confident smile. “Barring any unforeseen circumstances, and with your capable help, I may be able to hide as long as I like.”

“Ah, Legolas!” came a familiar lilting voice just as the liveried figure of Pippin appeared triumphantly in the doorway. "I wondered where you’d gone! Milady here was asking after you, as I guess she's rather curious about the Fair Folk, and I knew you would hate to have her wandering all about the city on your account with no right idea where to look for an Elf, if anybody here would know such a thing, they being a bit unfamiliar to them and all. The Elves, I mean. But by now I’ve learned where to look, so I brought her right to you with no fuss or bother!”

The slopes of Caradhras were stern. Twisted and rough, often with no clear path, it was a grueling way for those who went on shorter legs. It was nothing to Legolas, for he had been born and raised in the shadow of the Mountains of Greenwood, and climbing was to him almost second nature. He went unnoticed as the silent rearguard as Gandalf and Aragorn forged ahead in the lead while the daylight waned. They had not consulted him in choosing this road, exhibiting the same independent nature common to them both that excluded all others from their counsels. It was a disposition that was a particular vexation to Thranduil his father when it was he who was slighted by it, but for himself Legolas did not quibble his subordinate place in the Fellowship.

He looked ahead to see the dour-minded Dúnadan surmount another stony obstacle, a fine figure of a man with a broad back and straight shoulders. A lord. Legolas remembered when Aragorn had been naught but a youth of twenty years, boldly and proudly wearing his newfound name and rank into Greenwood where he presented himself to the Elvenking only to have Thranduil harden in one unforgiving week what aspects of his manhood Imladris had neglected. He smiled, for anyone who merited the final approval of his hardbitten father must be a worthy captain. And even as tumultuous as was the working relationship between Thranduil and Mithrandir, the wizard had won the respect of the Wood and its king. Legolas would not object to following the two of them.

Darkness was falling rapidly in the monotonous struggle to climb the foot of the mountain, but darkness alone would not obscure an Elf’s vision. Adjusting naturally to the fading light, Legolas fulfilled the duties of his placement. It was with confidence that Aragorn had assigned him the rear, the most vulnerable of positions. Even so, Legolas feared it would not be evils of flesh and blood that would harry them on this quest, and it was in that vein that his mind most often wandered.

Two paces ahead of him, Boromir stumbled on a treacherous crumbling of rock in the twilight, weighted down by his equipment. Legolas caught him ere he could fall, ignoring both the jarring of the rigid shield where it fell hard against his arm, and the rough blow of firewood against his shoulder. Ahead of them, Gimli and the hobbits glanced back when they could spare their eyes from the trail, but the incident was righted when it had hardly begun.

"My thanks," Boromir offered with sincere but colorless gratitude as he resumed his climb.

"It was nothing," Legolas said. But his voice was devoid of emotion as well, a match for the task before them. They had to stop once more as Sam coaxed Bill, the heavily-laden pony, over yet another ill-placed obstacle. With a stirring of sympathy for the patient beast, Legolas shifted his own load of dry wood on his back, making a conscious effort to keep it from entangling in his bow and quiver. It was a burden they all bore by Boromir’s advice. Even while it was a prudent foresight, the extra encumbrance made climbing all the more difficult.

Legolas exploited the idle moment to taste the crisp winter wind on his face, thinking what a pity it was that the threatening clouds obscured what would have been a fiery sunset upon the frozen face of the peaks towering above them. He was very much a creature of the North, and the Season of Snow held much charm for him despite the hardships it brought. He ceased resisting the cold and embraced it, imagining the snowfall and ice that must have graced the landscape of his home by this time. This was not where nor how he had imagined himself spending this year’s winter, but it would require more than a chill to turn him back. You may tarry, or come back, or turn aside into other paths, as chance allows. The further you go, the less easy will it be to withdraw; yet no oath or bond is laid on you to go further than you will. Lord Elrond’s words returned to him often. He had promised to go as far as the passes of the Mountains, and maybe beyond. It was the "maybe" that weighed upon him now, watching the laborious progress of the Fellowship ahead of him. Could he ever turn away with good heart? He was beginning to doubt it. Faithless is he that says farewell when the road darkens. Those had been Gimli’s words, and for once he and the dwarf were in complete agreement.

He could hear the idle complaints of Pippin ahead of them, both echoed and admonished by Merry, and could descry their diminutive forms in the thickening darkness that had descended upon them all. The clouds overhead obscured moon and stars, leaving them to find their way in inclement obscurity. Gimli grunted over the trail as it gradually steepened, demonstrating the unexpected surefootedness of his kind over arduous ground. The dwarf pushed the pony’s hindquarters ahead of him even as Legolas often braced his hand against Boromir’s swaying back, each doing his own part to keep their Fellowship together.

There was no one to catch Legolas if he should fall. The rear was a rather lonely place, but he would not have wished it on any of the rest of them. Well, he rethought himself with a twisted excuse for a smile, maybe the dwarf.

Boromir cursed under his breath as he was righted yet again from behind, perhaps annoyed by the Elf’s firm but quiet solicitude in addition to their trials. "This is madness," he grumbled, crawling blindly over the ascending rubble. "There are other more worthwhile ways to flirt with death, I am sure."

"For myself, I follow where Aragorn leads," Legolas maintained, though he imagined Boromir had not sought an answer. He did not expect insubordination of him, but the Man certainly had the discontented pride for it.

"He knows there is no need." Legolas gave him a helpful shove to get him over the next rise, taking careful note of what particulars of the terrain the Man would be blind to in the dark. There was heard a stumble ahead of them accompanied by the grumbling of a hobbit, their fair young voices roughened by the strain of endless travel.

The wind was merciless, beating down on them with sharp and intrusive fingers until even Legolas felt uncomfortable. It matched the unpleasant chill that threatened to grow in his heart, the same that had taken tenacious hold that night in Eregion when his suspicions had been confirmed and he had interrupted Boromir’s perilous musings. He had not spoken to Aragorn of it; he did not wish to throw more shadows onto the Gondorian before they were deserved. But he had kept a watchful eye on him, even as they all had to reinforce their own resistance to the insidious temptation Frodo bore with him.

Legolas had heard that guttural voice for himself, and he knew too well what Boromir faced. Gondor had been largely foreign to him before Elrond’s Council, but now he saw that realm’s position to be starkly similar to that of his own besieged homeland. The lure was the same: take the Ring, serve your father, defend your people. It was a lure baited with a twisted grain of truth, barbed with the guilt of negligence. Would either of them stand aside and let their people be destroyed because they lacked the courage to do this one great service to their cause? Imagine Lord Thranduil bearing the Ring of Power, was the enticement. His father was already one of the last of the mighty Eldar of old, a King and a Captain beyond compare in the eyes of his son. Possession of the Ring would render him nigh invincible, greater than all the lords gone before him, fair and terrible. But was that what he wanted to do to his father, make an unbridled terror of him? But why not take the burden upon yourself? Relieve your father of his burdens, take his place, Elvenking Legolas of the all the North with the One Ring safe upon your hand.

Boromir lost his footing again in the rock-strewn dark, falling inelegantly into Legolas below, shattering the dangerous fascination those thoughts had woven around his mind. Knocked and bruised one too many times by the gear the Man carried, Legolas held him back a moment when they had both picked themselves up. "Wait," he whispered tersely, catching his arm. "Give me some of that."

"No," Boromir objected in a hushed but adamant tone as he pulled away, his pride already suffering. "I shall carry what is my own, and I need no more assistance from you."

"Your ire is ill directed, son of Men," Legolas admonished him, the experience of his years coloring his tone. "You cannot see in this dark, nor can you climb adequately with your hands otherwise engaged, and I grow weary of breaking your falls upon my shoulders. Come, it is dark; none will know."

Soon Legolas had relieved a reluctant Boromir of his shield and his share of the wood, thus freeing the man’s hands to aid his forward progress over the uncertain terrain. The additional impediments were certainly bothersome enough for an Elf, but it was nothing his strength was unequal to. He would be useless now as a rearguard unless he let it all drop, but the driving objective at the moment was to bring the Fellowship to the mountain whole and entire. Legolas could feel that Boromir was far from pleased as he clambered over the ascending path to close the widening distance between him and Gimli. Slinging the great shield over his shoulder as gently as he might lest he damage his bow or fletching, Legolas gathered the second bundle of wood under one arm and continued on, cloaked in darkness, bounding with the sure footing of a buck over the random stones.

Left alone again with his thoughts, he returned to the fractured illusion Boromir had fortuitously interrupted, unwittingly returning the selfsame favor that had been extended to him on the forsaken plains of Eregion. It was the purpose of the Fellowship to catch one another when they began to fall, and that in more than a literal sense upon dark mountain passes.

As he always did, Legolas rethought the temptations that repeatedly invaded his mind now that their influence was diminished. He had found rational thought to be the most effective way to banish the lingering vestiges and strip them of their false allure. No, he did not want to bring the Ring any nearer his father than it had already been, then in the keeping of Bilbo the halfling. He would not want to see his father become any more or less than he was. As for the pretended fantasy of his own rise to absolute power, the mere thought did violence to his very nature and proved the Ring itself did not yet know him. He had no desire to be king. It was not only a deep and abiding love for his father that had given him sleepless nights at the royal bedside while their sovereign lord lay wounded, for Thranduil had taken his full share of the malevolent shafts he commanded his warriors to face. The Elvenking was no less vulnerable than the rest of them, though he seemed to think otherwise. Legolas sighed as he hitched up the sagging shield on his archer’s shoulders, thinking again of what a challenge his mother had left him in his father. The two of them together had been scarcely enough to look after him as it was.

Thranduil had not been at all pleased by his son’s decision to join Mithrandir’s Fellowship, but had let him go with his reluctant blessing. As much as it had grieved Legolas to cross him, knew he could never have taken no for an answer, and his father had recognized that. Sometimes the call of duty assumed a foreign voice. But now another choice loomed before him, one of north or south, for he had come as far as he had promised. Once they had passed the mountain barrier, should he go on with Frodo or return to his father? Looking ahead through the gloom, Legolas fixed his keen eyes on the back of Gimli the dwarf, wondering what he would do. After wrestling with his own conscience and reconciling his conflicting loyalties, he knew in his heart of hearts that it would be reduced to a mere matter of saving face, for an Elf of Lasgalen would never do less than a Dwarf of Erebor. His father would not wish him to shrink from that kind of challenge.

After midnight the path narrowed dangerously, sheer cliffs on the left, a dark ravine on the right. Legolas thought he could see the bottom in the gloom, but did not like to think about the distance. Boromir finally turned and silently demanded the return of his shield, but that was all Legolas would surrender. He did not want to be reaching out here to catch those who were not blessed with elvish balance and agility. The way only grew steeper, taxing the strength of weary legs and backs. Legolas’ heart went out to the hobbits, who were not adequately conditioned for this discipline. He watched them trudging bravely up the winding path as it twisted ahead and showed them to him, climbing single-file in unquestioning dedication, curly heads bent obdurately against the biting wind. And did he dare consider turning away? At last he stopped deceiving himself, for he knew he could never leave them, not before they had seen the end together. His fate would be theirs.

At last they reached more level ground, but had only exchanged one difficulty for another. Legolas knew that scent, cold and sharp, that faint sound that softly muffled all else. Frozen flakes gently stung his nose and cheeks, swirling in quiet wraithlike forms to settle thickly on their cloaks. The snows had begun.

They went on, but the snows only thickened. No one voiced their concerns, but all knew the peril was mounting against them by the moment. It was not long before they all pulled up their hoods, blessing Elrond again for the cloaks and furs given them in Rivendell.

"I don’t like this at all," came Sam’s voice from somewhere in the middle of the line. "Snow’s all right on a fine morning, but I like to be in bed while it’s falling. I wish this lot would go off to Hobbiton! Folk might welcome it there."

His hands full, Legolas let his hood blow back and then shook the snow from his hair. He was glad to hear Sam still had spirit enough, but the little one had a legitimate concern. Legolas liked snow well enough, but he looked forward to cinnamon spiced wine afterward beside a warm hearth with his friends. He seriously doubted they would find any such amenities at the summit of Caradhras.

Gandalf had halted in front, a discouraging sign. He turned to Aragorn beside him, and Legolas trudged forward through the ankle-deep snowdrifts with Gimli and Boromir to hear what passed between them.

"This is what I feared," the Wizard sighed, snow thick in his beard. "What do you say now, Aragorn?"

"That I feared it too, but less than other things." Aragorn glanced back to meet the gaze of the others. It seemed to Legolas that he looked for something in his eyes, advice or admonition, suggestion or sentiment. But Legolas had nothing to share with him besides uncertainty, and that was no help to anyone. "I knew the risk of snow, though it seldom falls heavily so far south, save high up in the mountains. But we are not high yet; we are still far down, where the paths are usually open all winter."

"I wonder if this is a contrivance of the Enemy," Boromir offered, echoing Legolas’ unspoken thoughts. They had seen many severe winters after the coming of the Shadow to Dol Guldur. "They say in my land that he can govern the storms in the Mountains of Shadow that stand upon the borders of Mordor. He has strange powers and many allies."

A snow-frosted Gimli grumbled in front of him. "His arm has grown long indeed if he can draw snow down from the North to trouble us here three hundred leagues away."

Legolas surreptitiously returned Boromir’s bundle of wood to him, and then shook out his cloak as the snowfall slackened and the wind quieted. Gimli growled and spat snow from his beard, stomping about where he stood lest his feet succumb to the falling temperature.

"Too cold for you, Master Dwarf?" Legolas asked with mock solicitude, unable for the moment to help himself.

Gimli turned a frigid look back at him, enough to freeze him where he stood if the storm did not. "And what would an Wood-elf know of snow in the mountains?" he asked scathingly. "The laugh will be mine when we press on and the frost has found you longing after your haunt beneath the trees."

Legolas scowled but said nothing. He was not one to continue an idle quarrel, regardless of how uncouth his opponent might be. His father had called him self-deprecating; his mother had called him prudent.

Gandalf continued on again through the deepening snowdrifts now that the wind had shown them mercy enough to relent for a time. But they had hardly begun when they were assaulted again by driving blasts of snow, and it seemed the mountain meant this time to stop them. Legolas turned his face from the biting fury of the storm with a grimace lest he be blinded. This was quickly becoming ridiculous, the sharp whistling howl of the wind seeming to mock him, all of them. The snow underfoot was piled higher by the moment, and doubtless would only worsen as they continued further up the pass. Still they trudged forward, for they had little choice in the matter. They had slowed considerably though their effort had doubled, pushing through rising drifts against the unbridled force of the wind.

At last they could walk no more and halted at once by unspoken consent, for it was effort enough to maintain their footing on the path when the ferocity of the gale seemed intent upon sweeping them away to the nightmarish fall beside them. More than that, Legolas had felt a familiar prickling chill creep up his spine that had nothing to do with the cold, the same that over time had come to instinctively warn him of a malevolent presence near. The wind had indeed assumed a wild and laughing voice, and with a flash of premonition he pulled Boromir back against him as there came a dull roar like thunder, and a great frosted boulder crashed down onto the path beside them, fracturing the jagged stone with a showering of cold shards. Nor was it the only one.

"We cannot go further tonight," Boromir called over the howling of the storm, unnerved by the incident but still steady on his feet. "Let those call it the wind who will; there are fell voices on the air; and these stones are aimed at us!"

"I do call it the wind," Aragorn said, turning. "But that does not make what you say untrue. There are many evil and unfriendly things in the world that have no love for those that go on two legs, and yet are not in league with Sauron, but have purposes of their own. Some have been in this world longer than he."

"Caradhras was called the Cruel, and had an ill name long years ago, when rumour of Sauron had not been heard in these lands," Gimli said for himself.

"It matters little who is the enemy, if we cannot beat off his attack!" Gandalf shouted back.

Legolas heard the plaintive plea of a hobbit over the shrill voice of the storm, probably Pippin. Those gentle folk were suffering badly in the fury of the elements, and he wished for their sakes that they would find someplace to weather the worst of the unnatural blizzard. Gandalf answered in his strong voice, to the relief of many. "It is no good going on. Only a little higher, if I remember rightly, this path leaves the cliff and runs into a wide shallow trough at the bottom of a long hard slope. We should have no shelter there from snow, or stones – or anything else."

"And it is no good going back while the storm holds," Aragorn said. "We have passed no place on the way that offered more shelter than this cliff-wall we are under now."

Shelter, Legolas thought wryly. He passed a bare hand over his eyes to brush the frosted snow from his brows and lashes. This was hardly a shelter. It was a pity Caradhras did not have a higher timberline.

There on the cliff side the Fellowship gathered as near to each other and to the rocky wall as they could. The storm showed no sign of relenting, nor the sun of rising. It would be a long night still. By this time Legolas had tired of his place in the back, and so with an effort he crawled out of the knee-deep drift he stood in, treading with light steps over the surface of the snow to settle down amid the hobbits and the pony. The good beast was himself a meager shelter for the halflings, bearing his trials with proverbial patience as he stood up to his hocks in snow.

The great drifts mounted by the moment, Legolas and Aragorn working together to keep the hobbits from being buried. Aragorn took unspoken charge of Merry and delegated Pippin to Legolas’ charge. That one had begun fading, chilled and drowsy, his once rosy cheeks turned a deathly blue. Legolas gathered him into his lap to share his cloak and his warmth, for those elven kind were more constant and mere cold would not easily prove fatal to them. The snow did not relent, but now Legolas allowed it to build up around him as his father’s hounds often did, something to blunt the buffeting of the wind. Pippin shivered violently where he lay against him – a good sign – and after a moment some color began to return to his pale face. The perian was so young, he would not wish him an early death on a pitiless mountainside. His father would have been fond of him.

"Elf, have you ever had frostbite?" Gimli asked with a grim smile, eyeing Legolas’ fine ears and fingers, both of which were unprotected. "You will, if ever we pass this mountain. I will be glad to cut off anything you wish," he said, running a gloved hand over the dark outline of a small ax at his belt.

Legolas turned a silent but withering glance upon him, trusting to the fabled eyesight of dwarvish kind in dark places, concerned more for the hobbits and with good cause. Boromir leaned over and lifted Frodo out of a new drift, jarring the spent hobbit again to consciousness. "This will be the death of the halflings, Gandalf," he said, an irritable tone in his voice directed at the cruel world at large. "It is useless to sit here until the snow goes over our heads. We must do something to save ourselves."

Gandalf searched in his pack and produced a flask of the miruvor of Imladris, admonishing them to take only a mouthful each. It did much to revive them all, banishing the deadly apathy that a chill can effect in a weary heart. Pippin was awake now but seemed to have no intention of leaving Legolas’ arms until the snow had gone, and still it seemed inexhaustible. There was much Legolas would have freely given at that moment for a glimpse of the sun, but the reign of darkness was yet far from over. He remembered when he and his cousin had once been stranded in bitter weather, and he had known many eternal nights like this one. Aragorn and Merry pushed away yet more of a growing white drift as Sam brushed frost from the pony’s forlorn face. It was an exercise in futility, for the snow swirled faster and thicker than ever before on the wind that howled madly around them.

Pippin shuddered again, but more out of fear than from the cold. Legolas felt him cling to him with the desperation of a child riding a nightmare, a faltering heart beating fearfully against one of a more staid rhythm, hiding his face from the wrath of the malevolent mountain that threatened to punish them all. Legolas felt for him, imagining Pippin’s lapse of courage was only what could be expected of one who had been swept far from home to an uncertain future at the mercy of heretofore nameless powers he did not understand. Merry sat close against them and Aragorn stood over them all with a look of grim sympathy upon his dour face, holding out his cloak to blunt the wind over the shivering halflings. Boromir had set his shield against longsuffering Frodo while Sam huddled behind the shelter afforded by his pony. Both Gandalf and Gimli sat alone, enduring in frigid silence. The snow rose ever higher.

Frodo hung his head wearily, revealing a glint of silver chain at his neck in the snow-swept darkness. Legolas sat imperceptibly straighter against the cliff face, for it eerily seemed that a maleficent eye had just opened to him, an unwelcome and loathsome presence added to their company. It was there still, and in the depths of his mind he heard it laugh. Bitter and sardonic, it ridiculed their hopeless attempts to destroy it, for in the end it would master each of them. What chance did you think you had? It is all in vain. Do you see? Already they die. Did you believe a hobbit could contest the will of the Dark Lord, you misbegotten spawn of Oropher the Fool!

Legolas started as Aragorn kicked him in the leg, his burning flare of anger jarringly smothered in that jolt of surprise. The Dúnadan’s gaze was hard but concerned, and as he steadied his breathing Legolas knew Aragorn must have noted the unhealthy fixation in his eyes, something they had to watch for in each of them. Released once more from the dark tendril that had ensnared his mind with thoughts that were not rightly his own, Legolas shuddered once and looked away. Even the intangible touch of the Ring was repulsive when it did not seek fair cloak for its intent, for it smacked putridly of the Dark Lord that had so marred their lives. He did not envy Frodo the task appointed him.

"What do you say to a fire?" Boromir asked at last, throwing his bundle of wood down in front of their huddling group. "The choice seems near now between fire and death, Gandalf. Doubtless we shall be hidden from all unfriendly eyes when the snow has covered us, but that will not help us."

"You may make a fire, if you can," Gandalf said, but seemingly with little confidence in their success, for the wood was more than a bit damp by this time, and lighting a flame in the driving wind and snow would be a challenge indeed. "If there are any watchers who can endure this storm, then they can see us, fire or no."

There was one who could see them, Legolas knew. But that mattered little, for they carried it with them.

"Legolas, you are of the woodland folk," Aragorn said hopefully. "Perhaps your skill will have greater effect than mine."

It was true that in Mirkwood Thranduil could ignite or put down a great blaze by his will alone, a talent his son shared to some extent. But here Legolas was far from their own realm and his father’s puissant influence, and thus his own power was sadly reduced. Setting Pippin aside, he relied on woodcraft alone, and though his skill in that regard was rivaled by few, no flame he struck could survive the unsparing wind. At long last he was forced to reluctantly admit his defeat in favor of the dwarf, but neither could Gimli coax a fire to life.

"Give it to me," Gandalf sighed at last, seeing the others were helpless to fight the ill will of Caradhras. Taking the bushel of tinder, he held it high and thrust his staff into it with a stern word of command as the Company watched. With a flamboyant burst of unnatural blue and green flame the wood ignited in the surrounding dark, an ineffably welcome sight. "If there are any to see, then I at least am revealed to them," he said, setting it in their midst. "I have written Gandalf is here in signs that all can read from Rivendell to the mouths of the Anduin."

None were listening anymore, for they were busily feeding the fire. The hobbits came to new life in the light of the cheerful flames, and everyone climbed to their feet as the snows began to melt and turn to cold streams of slush underfoot. Gathered into a tight circle around that windswept beacon of hope, they all warmed their hands, and the hobbits their feet, daring to hope the end was near.

Gandalf leaned down to speak to Frodo, and Legolas felt Aragorn nudge him inquisitively. "A trying night for you?" he asked in a low voice, using the Sindarin tongue.

"Yes," Legolas confirmed in the same tone. "But it does not seduce so much as provoke me."

"I saw that. It knows not yet how to seduce you, perhaps. Do not dwell upon it."

"That is easier said than it is done, my friend," Legolas murmured wryly. "You ought to know that."

"I do," Aragorn nodded, admitting the inability to ignore that intrusive voice. One might as well ignore the coiling of a snake around his throat. But they did not have to consent to be bitten. "It is a difficult road, Legolas." He smiled, heedless of the incessant storm. "But I would sooner have you among us than all the lords of Elrond’s house."

He threw his bushel of wood onto the fire, renewing its waning vigor. It was initially comforting, until Legolas considered just how quickly it burned. Like many of them, he knew a great deal of fires and survival in the untamed reaches of the world, and it was the brutal truth that the wood would not last long.

"Another already?" Pippin asked shakily, eloquently voicing their thoughts over the threatening howl of the wind, held at bay only for at the moment. They could only hope the dawn was not far.

"The night is getting old," Aragorn assured them when at last all the fuel had been spent. "The dawn is not far off."

"If any dawn can pierce these clouds," Gimli said, suffering from a bout of pessimism.

"The snow is growing less, and the wind is quieter," Boromir observed. He had wandered away from the circle and turned his noble face toward the sky, though there was little enough to be seen.

He was right. Legolas felt the fury of the storm melt into a gradual calm, but the glaring intent was not lessened, as though the black spirit of the mountain waited only to draw new breath before it lashed them again. Dawn grew around them slowly but strongly, showing them a world silent and buried beneath a chilling blanket of white, the path behind them vanished. Even so, it was a clear breath of air after that dark and vicious night, and Legolas was glad to have it. His spirits rose with the coming of the light, banishing the memories of biting wind and sharp swirling snow as an awful dream.

"Caradhras has not forgiven us," Gimli observed, his breath turned frosty in the cold air. Their position was readily apparent to others besides Legolas, and the dwarf needed no sixth elvish sense to know it. "He has more snow yet to fling at us, if we go on. The sooner we go back and down the better."

"Yes, but how?" Merry asked, looking back at the bright wall of snow that stood where the path ought to have been. It would be enough to drown the smaller ones among them.

"If Gandalf would go before us with a bright flame, he might melt a path for you," Legolas suggested, looking out over the snow-softened crags. How they went did not matter to him now. They would go, and then they would be gone from this cheerless mountain. That alone was enough to lighten his heart.

"If Elves could fly over mountains," Gandalf came back at him, obviously not enjoying the same benefits brought by the dawn, "they might fetch the Sun to save us. But I must have something to work on. I cannot burn snow."

"Well, when heads are at a loss bodies must serve, as we say in my country," said Boromir, adopting the familiar air of a captain as he saw a lapse in command. "The strongest of us must seek a way. See! Though all is now snow-clad, our path, as we came up, turned about that shoulder of rock down yonder. It was there that the snow first began to burden us. If we could reach that point, maybe it would prove easier beyond. It is no more than a furlong off, I guess."

"Then let us force a path thither, you and I!" Aragorn said, accepting the challenge as between two Men. After lingering so long, the prospect of renewed activity was appealing to all of them. They fell to their task with hopeful enthusiasm, burrowing through the ever deepening drifts as well they might, forging a path through the glistening snow at times chest-deep with all the brute strength they could muster. Their progress was slow, but promising.

Legolas watched them and smiled. He could well have been named one of the strongest among them, but he had not been invited, and their way was not his way. "The strongest must seek a way, say you? But I say: let a ploughman plough, but choose an otter for swimming, and for running light over grass and leaf, or over snow – an Elf." With familiar ease he bounded to the top of the piled snow, shifting his weight as only an Elf knew how. The drift bore him without complaint, sinking only slightly under his feet where he stood. The fresh crest of white stretched away before him, open as the woodland path where he and his friends would run at home. The temptation was irresistible. "Farewell!" he said, smiling back at Gandalf. "I go to find the Sun!" And gathering his legs beneath him, he broke into a free run over the snow reminiscent of so many white winters beneath the eaves of Greenwood. And after his confinement through the night, he felt like a horse turned out of the stable at last into the sunlight. He passed Aragorn and Boromir in a matter moments, waving back at them before he reached the turn in the path and rounded it without a pause.

He ran on, gliding over the lessening snowdrifts, the nearest his kind would ever come to the experience of flight. At last he slowed when the snow was suddenly no more, enjoying the bite of the cold air in his chest and the awakened strength of his heartbeat. He looked back over the pattern of the snowfall, the abrupt cessation confirming their suspicions that Caradhras himself was to blame for their ordeal. In any case, it would make their retreat easier. That word was sour where it sat on the tip of his tongue, agitating what traces of his father’s pride ran in his blood. The clouds hung thickly about the ledge where their Company had been pummeled and punished, but were not gathered so much elsewhere. Continuing at an easy pace down the path, he set out to find the Sun as he had pledged to do.

Observing the position of the clouds, he sought a way around them. It was not an easy task, for the paths were still treacherous and usually did not go where he had a mind to go. Picking his way quickly down the way they had come the night before, stone to stone, Legolas at last found a rambling ravine that looked promising. Dropping from his perch, he braced his legs and slid down the crumbling wall in a cloud of gravel dust, bounding away from boulder to boulder with the quick judgment and confidence that comes of uncounted years in a challenging world. Veering away from the road the Fellowship had taken, this straying trail at last began to climb again, but at the same time it was leaving the choking cloud cover. Legolas followed eagerly, seeking the sun on his face.

But when he finally mounted the high point, there were still clouds hanging overhead intent upon denying him a clear sight of anything. It was frustrating, and Legolas sighed visibly with a huff of frosted breath, wondering if Caradhras was mocking him again. "Go on!" he rebuked him, shaking a fist at the clouds for all the good that would do. "You have already bested us! Leave me be!"

He did not expect anything to come of it, and sat down on one of the many cold boulders to be had, wondering just what Gandalf had in mind now. The mountain would not let them pass regardless of whether the way was watched or not. They would not turn for the Gap of Rohan despite Boromir’s insistence. That did not leave many options to consider, and he shuddered to think of what roads remained to them.

Sitting there on the foothills of a hostile mountain, Legolas wondered again how it had come to this, all their hopes of salvation riding on the shoulders of a valiant but weary halfling. He had often heard his father lament the folly of the Rings, and his son had to agree after what he had seen. The Rings had been wrought long before his birth, but his grandsire Elvenking Oropher had not been offered one, dismissed by the Noldorin Lords and their allies. It was just as well, for it would have required great strength of will to refuse it at the time. But it also meant now that the One Ring had afforded Sauron no special influence over Thranduil, for the Woodland King’s mind remained adamantly closed to him. Their abstinence had not granted them a particularly comfortable existence, but they had learned to make the best of it, and took some measure of grim pride in that they did not rely upon a jeweled crutch of Celebrimbor’s making.

A spill of bright sunbeams fell over him unexpectedly, and Legolas looked up to see the clouds receding, chastened. Revealed with their passing was a clear blue sky over the reaches of Eregion below, and smiling down upon the world was the distant winter Sun, offering more light than warmth, but the very sight of her was heartening. Legolas rose to his feet, a smile again gracing his features. It seemed Caradhras had at last done with them. Gratefully saluting the fair face of the Sun as an elvish knight would a lady, he turned back to return to the Fellowship, leaving her to her appointed ride over the vast reaches of the ever-changing world.

Retracing his steps without hesitation, he followed the ravine back to where he had left the path, surmounting the rockslide with a running start. From there forward it was a mere matter of following the snow, and if sight or memory would not serve him, he could follow the scent well enough.

He walked back, listening to the cold and quiet stillness of the place, the same lifelessness that had disconcerted Aragorn in Eregion. They all could feel their progress was marked by faraway eyes, a paranoia that evoked a feral instinct to slink under a rock. But it seemed there was no help for it.

Again there was a dusting of snow underfoot, deepening only gradually as he went on. Then it rose sharply in a great drift behind the shoulder of rock that marked the beginning of the storm the night before. At first he wondered that their Men had not yet forged their way through it, but then a smile touched his lips again as he caught the faint sounds of discouraged voices within the snow. With a lithe bound he knelt upon the top of the mighty snowdrift, and loosed a bark of laughter. "You have tired so soon, my stalwart friends?" he asked with a glint in his eye.

Aragorn and Boromir looked up at him there, their strength spent as they sat in a churned mess of snow and wiped cold perspiration from their brows. "Laugh at us if you will, Legolas," Aragorn sighed wearily, "but look first how far we have come. But the snows have not receded and we have little enough strength left as it is."

"I do laugh at you," Legolas said, "and if you could see from my vantage, you would laugh as well."

"Tell us then, Elf of Many Talents," Boromir said testily, catching his shortened breath. "How far does this cursed snow stretch? Tell us how far yet we heavy-footed Men must toil ere we see our escape?"

Legolas smiled knowingly, forgiving the Gondorian’s ire. "Tell you?" he asked. "I shall show you." Sliding down the back of the drift, which neither of the Men could see, he thrust his hand deep into the snowy barrier. In a matter of moments his efforts had cleared a hole that was enough to see through in a wall of snow as deep as his arm was long. "Now," he called to those on the other side, "can you find strength enough within you to come this far?"

Their enthusiasm renewed upon seeing that freedom was at hand, both Aragorn and Boromir kicked and pawed at their snowy prison, bursting through at last and stumbling out over the remaining piles of slushy white. Now Aragorn did laugh, seeing how near they had come without knowing it. "My thanks again to you, Legolas," he said, laying a grateful hand on his shoulder. "We were tempted strongly to despair when there remained only the final effort before us."

Legolas returned the gesture. "I am your eyes when your own will not serve," he said. "But come, Mithrandir awaits us."

Not wishing to trudge through the snowbound path the Men had made if he did not have to, Legolas returned to his light-footed way over the drifts themselves. He covered the open furlong again at a brisk but unhurried pace, knowing they would have to wait for Aragorn and Boromir as it was. "Well, I have not brought the Sun," he apologized playfully as he rejoined the others. "She is walking in the blue fields of the South, and a little wreath of snow on this Redhorn hillock troubles her not at all. But I have brought back a gleam of good hope for those who are doomed to go on feet. There is the greatest wind-drift of all just beyond the turn, and there our Strong Men were almost buried. They despaired, until I returned and told them that the drift was little wider than a wall. And on the other side the snow suddenly grows less, while further down it is no more than a white coverlet to cool a hobbit’s toes."

"Ah, it is as I said," Gimli said bitterly, striking a fist against his leg. "It was no ordinary storm. It is the ill will of Caradhras. He does not love Elves and dwarves, and that drift was laid to cut off our escape."

"But happily your Caradhras has forgotten that you have Men with you," Boromir said heavily as he trudged back to them with Aragorn behind. "And doughty Men too, if I may say it; though lesser men with spades might have served you better. Still, we have thrust a lane through the drift; and for that all here may be grateful who cannot run as light as Elves."

At that, Boromir turned the smile of an amiable rival on Legolas, and he returned it. That Man had an endearing charm about him, he thought to himself, but that was only greater reason to keep a wary eye turned his way.

He followed as the Men carried the hobbits beyond the snow one by one, and waited at the end with them as the others made their way through. Poor Bill was made to carry Gimli as well as the rest of the baggage. Behind the pony came Aragorn with Frodo, and with the Ringbearer among them again Legolas recognized the same twinge of warning just as an angry avalanche of snow and stones fell from the laden cliffs with an awful roar. The Fellowship cringed against the mountainside as they were lashed again with a vicious spray of ice, the small ones shielded by their taller companions. When the malevolent rumble had stilled and the powdered snow had settled, the path behind them had become impassible yet again.

"Enough, enough!" Gimli shouted as he shook his fist at the mountain, his auburn beard again frosted nearly as white as his father’s. "we are departing as quickly as we may!"

It was a humiliating defeat. Weary and discouraged, their Company plodded through the lessening snow that remained in their way, admitting Caradhras’ victory. Legolas had again assumed his place behind the others, shaking the snow from his hair and clothes before it could melt. The downward climb would be a long weary way for those tired by the rigors of the previous day, and the hobbits were already dragging their furry feet. The weariness that plagued Legolas did not abide in his limbs, but in his heart. A day had been wasted in a futile attempt that had done nothing but tax the strength of the Company, and time and vitality were two things of which they had little enough to spare. More than that, he felt an ominous foreboding when he thought of the road ahead, and he knew it to be more than his imagination at work. Their way darkened as the noose was tightened. He glowered ahead at Frodo’s back, his anger directed not at the hobbit but at what he carried. It was laughing again, the silent but very real sound just as ominous as the hoarse cackling of the crebain ahead that only his ears could hear.

"That cannot be helped now," Gandalf said with short enough patience. "Whether they are good or evil, or have nothing to do with us at all, we must go down at once. Not even on the knees of Caradhras will we wait for another night-fall!"

The mountains again stood starkly against the clear blue of the sky. He felt the wind on his face, the golden light of the sun, the living grass underfoot. But he gave no heed to them, for in his heart Legolas felt as desolate as the forlorn trail of black smoke that curled from the depths of that demonic inferno they named Moria, blurred in his sight.

At heart he felt as lost and pitiable as Pippin, or Sam, sobbing their grief into the grass. But as often happened, tragedy had numbed him to the tears he wished to shed, and the only ones that would come were slow and silent. The rest would come later, when at last he came to terms with the blow they had suffered. The Fellowship had been beheaded, their very cause had lost its patriarch. Death was not the end, but wherever Mithrandir’s spirit had gone he would be of little help to them now. It was the same hollow loss he knew well, inflicted often by the unforgiving environs of Mirkwood where many a fair Elf met an untimely demise. But what could they do without Mithrandir?

"Alas! I fear we cannot stay here longer," Aragorn said at last in a voice roughened by contained grief, the glistening tracks of noble tears visible on his face. "Farewell, Gandalf! Did I not say to you: if you pass the doors of Moria, beware? Alas that I spoke true! What hope have we without you?"

He only spoke the thoughts they all shared. It seemed pointless to go on to certain failure. But what else could they do? Legolas drew a deep breath he did not feel, striving to take what new life he could to face the road ahead.

"We must do without hope," Aragorn called to them, sheathing the bright sword he had lifted toward the mountain. "At least we may yet be avenged. Let us gird ourselves and weep no more! Come! We have a long road, and much to do."

They were slow to heed his voice. Legolas heard but stood motionless for a while yet. He had left his cloak in the deep places of Moria when the battles began, as had many of them, but took no notice of the chill in the air. For that moment he felt nothing, only desolate sinking in his heart as he wondered whether the Fellowship had failed when it had hardly begun. Thought of his father did enter his mind, he who remained in the deeps of Mirkwood, depending on him and this Quest lest any victory of theirs be ultimately in vain.

When they had all picked themselves up and were resigned to go on, Aragorn led the way along the broken road through the Dimrill Dale. As chance would have it, Legolas found himself walking with Gimli. Strangely, whatever friction had once existed between them seemed to have passed, perhaps burned away in Balrog fire. It was but small comfort, but proved again that even tragedy was behoovable.

"That is Durin’s Stone!" Gimli cried at once, startling Legolas from his musings. "I cannot pass without turning aside for a moment to look at the wonder of the dale!"

"Be swift then!" Aragorn bid him, calling out his warnings of Orcs and the perils the night would bring. Gimli brought Frodo with him to see as well, and Sam followed. But while the others thought little of it, there was a nostalgia about Gimli’s enthusiasm that struck Legolas deeply. He was reminded of a time, many years ago, when at last he had come of age and his father had taken him south to show him the old kingdom, the forsaken halls of Oropher his grandsire. Now Amon Lanc had become a wretched haunt of Sauron, even as Kheled-zâram the Mirrormere had become the abode of Orcs. A stab of guilt cut him then, remembering that he had yet to fulfil one of the last requests Mithrandir had made of him. But I beg of you two, Legolas and Gimli, at least to be friends, and to help me. I need you both.

That night found them deep inside the northern border-woods of Lothlórien, where Legolas had never been before. He knew of it, of course. Here reined his father’s kinsman Celeborn, whom he had not seen since the years of his youth. It was no secret in his house that the distance between the two kinsmen had a great deal to do with Lord Celeborn’s wife, the Lady Galadriel. There was some bad blood between her and Thranduil, though they themselves were cousins far removed.

They had already come far that day, and their Company was seeking a secure place to spent what remained of the night. "I will climb up," Legolas said at last, laying a gentle hand against the trunk of one of the great silver beeches characteristic of Lothlórien alone. "I am at home among trees, by root or bough, though these trees are of a kind strange to me, save as a name in song. Mellyrn they are called, and are those that bear the yellow blossom, but I have never climbed in one. I will see now what is their shape and way of growth."

"Whatever it may be, they will be marvelous trees indeed if they can offer any rest at night, except to birds," Pippin quipped. "I cannot sleep on a perch!"

"Then did a hole in the ground if that is more after the fashion of your kind," Legolas suggested wryly. "But you must did swift and deep if you wish to hide from Orcs." With a crouch and a practiced spring, he caught a branch that had been far overhead. But just as he prepared to swing his legs up to a hold of their own, a sharp elvish voice forbade his advance.

Letting go at once, Legolas hit the ground and shrank against the tree in the same motion, turning his keen gaze into the boughs above, searching out their unseen company with the critical vision of both the hunter and the hunted. How had he missed them? He had been trained a better scout than that! "Stand still!" he admonished the others in a whisper as they began to stir. "Do not move or speak!"

Now there came a light cascade of wry laughter from above them as the marchwardens reveled in their successful ambush. "It is the custom of woodland Elves to search the boughs ere they climb into them, is it not?" one addressed him in accented Sindarin, enjoying a laugh at his expense.

"It is the first time in many years I have not!" Legolas returned, though his voice carried a smile, graciously admitting their advantage. "It is something I shall not neglect again, I assure you."

"If you wish to go quietly," suggested another, "you would do well to go with other companions. Their breathing is so careless the darkness would have been no impediment to us at all if we had deemed them foes. But your voice has been their salvation, for when we heard we knew you to be a kinsman from the North, one who remembers the tales of Nimrodel. Come, and bring the first halfling with you. Bid the others wait and watch about the foot of the mallorn until we have taken counsel with you."

"They’re Elves," Sam enlightened him before Legolas could say as much. "Can’t you hear their voices?"

"Yes, they are Elves," Legolas confirmed; "and they say that you breathe so loud that they could shoot you in the dark. But they say also that you need have no fear. They have been aware of us for a long while. They heard my voice across the Nimrodel, and knew that I was one of their Northern kindred, and therefore they did not hinder our crossing; and afterwards they heard my song. Now they bid me climb up with Frodo; for they seem to have had some tidings of him and of our journey. The others they ask to wait a little, and to keep watch at the foot of the tree, until they have decided what is to be done."

A rope ladder was let down and Legolas scaled it easily, climbing up onto a flet built into the limbs of the great tree where there were seated the three distinct Elves he had expected. Clad in soft grey, they were almost one with their environment to the untrained eye, and he no longer wondered that his distracted mind had not made note of them.

"Mae govannen," the first said, taking his hand amiably. "I am Haldir of Lórien, and these are my brothers, Rúmil and Orophin."

"Well met, Haldir," Legolas returned politely as he was seated among them, "Rúmil, Orophin. I am Legolas of Lasgalen."

"The son of the Lord Thranduil, I gather," Haldir smiled, indicating his golden hair; pale but unmistakable in the night light, it was an obvious legacy of his father. "Welcome to the Golden Wood, my lord."

"Discovered," Legolas smiled back at him, forgetting for a moment the griefs that day had brought. "But there need be no formalities between us, Haldir. I do not come as a prince."

Then Frodo’s head appeared in the entryway in the floor, for he had been cautious in his ascent. He was helped up onto the floor, and Sam after him. Haldir and his brother stood to regard the newcomers, directing the slanted beam of a pale lamp at their small faces. Assuring himself of their good nature, Haldir covered the light again. "Mae govannen. Gîl síla erin lû e-govaded vín," he said graciously, but in his own tongue. Legolas understood well enough, but he doubted Frodo did.

"Suilad, Galadhrim o Lórien," Frodo replied uncertainly, confirming his suspicions.

Haldir noticed as well, and redressed the difficulty. "Welcome!" he translated loosely, not so comfortably fluent in the Common Tongue as Legolas was. "We seldom use any tongue but our own; for we dwell now in the heart of the forest, and do not willingly have dealings with any other folk," he explained, making the round of introductions again for the benefit of the hobbits.

"But we have heard rumor of your coming," he went on when they were seated again, "for the messengers of Elrond passed by Lórien on their way home up the Dimrill Stair. We had not heard of – hobbits, of halflings, for many a long year, and did not know that any yet dwelt in Middle-earth. You do not look evil! And since you come with an Elf of our kindred, we are willing to befriend you, as Elrond asked; though it is not our custom to lead strangers through our land. But you may stay here tonight. How many are you?"

"Eight," Legolas answered promptly in the military fashion fostered in his home. "Myself, four hobbits; and two men, one of whom, Aragorn, is an Elf-friend of the folk of Westernesse." He was certain Aragorn was known in Lórien, but it would not hurt to remind them, just in case.

"The name of Aragorn son of Arathorn is known in Lórien," Haldir nodded, "and he has the favor of the Lady. All then is well. But you have yet spoken only of seven."

"The eighth is a dwarf," Legolas confessed rather reluctantly. He did not expect to completely avoid the subject, but it would have been more agreeable now that his own opinion of Gimli was uncertain.

"A dwarf!" Haldir’s face became bleaker to match his brothers, in no way pleased by that piece of news. "That is not well. We have not had dealings with the Dwarves since the Dark Days. They are not permitted in our land. I cannot allow him to pass."

Legolas had been afraid of this, and he was forced to face the foundations of his own regard for the Stunted People, or rather the lack of it. How could he tell Haldir of what he had seen in Gimli only hours before if he himself was not yet sure of it? But the fate of the Fellowship was entrusted to him now, and to repudiate any one of them was simply unacceptable.

"But he is from the Lonely Mountain, one of Dáin’s trusty people, and friendly to Elrond," Frodo jumped in for him. "Elrond himself chose him to be one of our companions, and he has been brave and faithful."

It was as much a lecture to Legolas’ mind as it was for Haldir, though he knew Frodo had not intended it to be. Was there any real issue chafing between them at all?

It would not please his father, but neither had joining the Fellowship in the first place.

Haldir spoke quietly with his brothers for a moment, but seemed to come no nearer to resolving the question. "Legolas," he said gravely at last, returned to their tongue. "What say you of him? You come of a wary realm, we know. Do you trust him? Is it true what the halfling says?"

"Frodo speaks well," Legolas assured him with a slight lift of his chin, sure of that much. "Gimli has shown himself valiant and steadfast, and it was with confidence that Elrond named him for our Company." He paused indecisively, knowing dismally that such would not be enough to gainsay the laws of Lórien. He knew the mind of a guard, knew their commands were not dismissed without gravest cause or the utmost assurance. His next words rose to his tongue of their own accord, but he held them back a moment, knowing with a dreadfully helpless feeling that he was putting the noose around his own neck. Curses, Legolas, you are far too trusting! his father had once berated him, but he braced himself, for there was no help for it now. "I shall vouch for him."

The Galadhrim were amazed, the impression evident in their keen grey eyes. The solemn word of Elvish royalty was not taken lightly. It was a great responsibility Legolas had taken on himself, and if he had confidence enough to do so it was not something they would dismiss without careful thought. Legolas only wished that had been a luxury he could have enjoyed before he was forced to make such a pledge.

"Very good," Haldir said at last in words they could all understand, though his tone still carried a certain apprehension. "We will do this, though it is against our liking. If Aragorn and Legolas will guard him, and answer for him, he shall pass; but he must go blindfolded through Lothlórien. But now we must debate no longer. Your folk must not remain on the ground," he told them. "We have been keeping watch on the rivers, ever since we saw a great troop of Orcs going north toward Moria, along the skirts of the mountains, many days ago. Wolves are howling on the wood’s borders. If you have indeed come from Moria, the peril cannot be far behind. Tomorrow early you must go on.

"The four hobbits shall climb up here and stay with us," he said; "we do not fear them! There is another talan in the next tree. There the others must take refuge. You, Legolas, must answer to us for them. Call us, if anything is amiss! And have an eye on that dwarf!"

An hour later a baited silence hung over the wood. The dry leaves rustled in the trees as the southern night wind teased through them, bringing with it a gentle chill that Legolas found refreshing. He sat up in their flet among the leaf laden branches, unable to find sleep. Aragorn, Gimli, and Boromir lay about him wrapped in the warm furs the Galadhrim had provided, wearied beyond wakefulness by their toils. The hobbits remained unseen in the next tree with Haldir and his brethren. They were all well hidden from whatever would chance to pass below, but even safe at last within this fabled country of his kinsmen Legolas could not dismiss the lingering vigilance which remained fully roused, denying him rest.

And so he sat in silence, resting his chin on his knees, letting the wind drive away the memory of the choking heat of Moria and the gravelly laughter of the Orcs like the voices of so many cockroaches. He felt something had gone horribly wrong that day, beyond their poor power to rectify. If Mithrandir had fallen, who could hope to stand in his place? Saruman had betrayed them, Radagast had not the strength. Aragorn was uncertain, Boromir was growing restless, and he had no desire to take command upon himself. Would the Fellowship collapse into anarchy?

Through the years, Legolas remembered how he had seen his father endure spoken abuse from Mithrandir which he would tolerate from no other. When asked why, Thranduil’s answer was that Mithrandir came with authority, and that if the free world would ever be moved against the forces of darkness it would be by his hand. His words were true, it seemed. What would he say now?

Legolas felt alone here on the border of this kindred but foreign wood, pining for what comfort could be found in the familiarities of his own land. They had passed the mountains, and in the North lay his own home. He could feel it, even if it was a presence that lived only in his heart. "Adar, ú-erin hirad rad," he said miserably in a voice held beneath the wind, sunk in the dark depths of failure. "I cannot find the way. How can we go on?"

How can you not? It was not that his father spoke to him now, but he had heard that answer before, and it rose full and strong in his mind. They must go on, for they had no choice. They could not afford the luxury of despair.

He stiffened then, reft from his contemplation by new sounds in the night, sounds he knew too well. It was a muffled stomping, the growling laughter and sharp clank of metal. The verdict of his ears was confirmed by unerring testimony of his nose. He did not need to look past the flet to know a foul cohort of Orcs was passing near, daring to compromise the guarded borders of Lórien.

He watched now for something else, his sharpened mind predicting their movements. A swift swirl of grey through the next tree told him all he needed to know. Quickly pulling on one of the soft hooded cloaks of the same muted shade the Galadhrim had left, Legolas deftly fastened his quiver again onto his back, descending from the flet like a shadow of quicksilver and throwing the rope ladder back after him.

Nothing seemed to move in the dim twilight. He dropped lightly into the brush below, then picked his careful way through the wood in the direction whence the sounds had come. The trail left by the Orcs was plain to behold when at last he found it. The path lay trampled and bruised in the slanting starlight, here and there a young sapling slowly righting itself after the abuse it had suffered. Legolas remained there in the brake, both saddened and angered by the wanton harm inflicted by creatures who bore no love for aught that was green and good. Quiet and dreadful, his grief took new form as vengeful anger now that he was given an object upon which to unleash it. These Orcs were of Moria, and they had come to stain Lórien with the blood of what remained of their Company. That he would not suffer. He had done with running and hiding.

But despite his restless blood, he had to admit the impracticality of it all. There were obviously entirely too many Orcs for him to challenge alone, or even with the help of the Galadhrim brothers. And what good was he with only three arrows? Finally he turned back to rejoin the others, thwarted, disgusted for the moment with the unfairness of the world.

Retracing his steps as an elvish scout is taught to do, he was nearing the two familiar trees when he saw a grey clad figure moving through the shadows. He guessed it to be Haldir, for he had come near already to learning the particulars of each of the brothers, a perceptive habit come of the necessity of learning to recognize the comrades of one’s patrol despite darkness or distance. Haldir looked twice at him before an expression of keen annoyance settled on his face.

"Legolas!" he whispered sharply. "What are you doing? Your place is there, with the others of your company. Who will watch them if you do not?"

"Aragorn remains with them," Legolas said to placate the tetchy Nando. "You have trust enough in him. And the hobbits would never leave the flet alone. I can find no rest tonight, and went to see where the Orcs had passed."

"You would have done better to have remained here, my lord," Haldir persisted in a low voice. "Only a moment ago I returned to find a something I cannot name scaling the bole of this tree. I cannot guess its intent, but it fled quickly enough."

Legolas felt himself go cold, his thwarted purpose provided another more practical adversary. He turned a sharp glance to the branches above where he knew Frodo lay concealed. Frodo – and the Ring. "A wretched little thing?" he asked pointedly. "All skin and bones, the size of a halfling? It could climb?"

"It climbed very well," Haldir affirmed, disconcerted by the sudden severity of his manner. "Like a treefrog, I thought it. And yes, thin and starved. You know him? He is a foe? I did not shoot for fear of arousing his cries."

"Yes, I know him," Legolas said, darkening, "better than I could wish. Take this for me." Quickly he had unfastened his bow and quiver, giving both into Haldir’s care. "Wait for me; I shall not be long."

Circling the foot of the tree like a hound, he at last found the meager traces he sought, faint but fresh. On cat feet he ducked into the winter undergrowth, pushing through with the acquired skill which stirred hardly a rustle from what dry leaves remained. This quarry had long evaded him, had been the death of his friends, had humiliated him in the face of all his people, and compromised the integrity of Thranduil’s realm on a grand scale. The only other to do all of that with such effectiveness had been Sauron himself, and so it was with a terrible intensity that Legolas resumed the chase. He had a crow of his own to pluck with this Gollum.

He stopped a moment in the dark to run a sensitive hand over the ground, considering the subtle tastes to be found there. It was not an easy trail to follow, but he had been trained in a stern school. If he knew Gollum, he would still be lingering near, fleeing before Haldir but not retreating far. If he had shadowed them all through Moria he would not abandon them now. That of course again raised another question, and as he went on Legolas considered just what he would do when he found him. He was acutely aware of the familiar weight of the knife riding on his hip, wondering if any would object to his killing him now. The kindness he had shown before had only burned him in the end, and he had more than enough bitterness reserved now for that wretch in a special dark corner of his heart.

Through the thickets, grey in the starlight, around trees and over more than one gentle rise of ground, at last he sighted that hunched silhouette that had haunted his dreams, crouched amid a copse of young beech trees. Moaning piteously, he was wiping his hands on the ground as though they were dirty, though Legolas mused darkly that such concerns had not seemed to trouble him before. Low to the ground, he advanced further toward his prey with the swift and halting steps of a lynx, unblinking and unseen. Utilizing the cover of the trees, he came upon Gollum from behind, blade drawn in his hand. It would be simple enough to catch him at unawares, slit his ungrateful throat and be done with it. They had worries enough without second-guessing a tireless phantom driven by a Ring-lust of his own.

But then the balding head came up abruptly, warily tasting the air. Legolas froze motionless where he was, the moment become as sharp as cut glass. He knew Gollum was aware of his presence, even if the little spook knew not where nor what he was yet. He would soon, and it was now or never. With all the speed and precision he could command, Legolas lunged forward from the covert, whipping his arm around Gollum’s head; sparse fangs bit hard into his vambrace as he set his gleaming blade to that thin neck. But then he hesitated over his repulsive armful, cursing himself and whatever misguided pity rendered him unable to end it this way. Whimpering around the armored elvish wrist in his teeth, Gollum took timely advantage of his captor’s indecision to throw himself backward with a strength that belied his withered form, slamming Legolas against a tree behind them.

"Be still, you wretch!" he snarled, struggling to contain what seemed to be twenty flailing limbs with one hand as Gollum bit deeper into his arm. Thrown off-balance, he tried now to regain his advantage, though he might as well have tried to catch a barbed catfish with a fierce lust for life. Twisting forward, he managed to throw Gollum to the ground beneath him, but that entailed pulling his wrist away from the toothy grip that held it. Freed of his gag, Gollum was set to let out a hideous shriek; Legolas silenced him with an ungentle blow only to have his hand wildly gnashed. Biting back a outcry of his own, he fought to regain his hold on the raving creature, but his grip was made slick by blood, and after crawling madly over one another for a time Gollum slipped free and ran frantically through the brush and into the night. Disgusted with the whole affair, Legolas let him go.

For a moment he remained where he was, lying on his elbows in the grass, watching the lingering agitation slowly still itself on the bushes where his quarry had disappeared. Unfinished tasks boded no one any good, and he had known this one would not be easily remedied when he had first confessed it to Elrond’s Council. Nor was this the first time such an encounter had drawn blood.

Picking himself up, he decided to say nothing of the incident for the time being; his hand would heal soon enough. But it was indeed a concern. He had heard enough of Gollum’s ramblings to know his burning desire for the Ring, and his undying hatred for those who held it from him. They would need to watch closely now, lest they awake to find Frodo’s neck wrung and the Quest in shambles.

Broken Glass by Conquistadora