Disclaimer: Tolkien’s creations are still Tolkien’s creations. I claim all the rest.

The sun shone brightly from a clear blue sky, though it was still too early in the Spring and too far north for it to warm the morning air.

The path was wide and Legolas and Aragorn rode silently side by side, each lost in his own thoughts.

The journey thus far had been quiet and peaceful. There had been no mishaps, no injuries, no battles that needed to be fought. So naturally that that was about to change.

The two friends pulled their horses to a stop, when they came to the river they had known would be just ahead. The winter snows were still packed in the mountains upriver, and it would take at least another month of sunshine-heated air to cause enough melt to swell the current to overflowing.

The lowlands had seen the last snow storm until next winter, so crossing the river now would not be too difficult, however, neither friend made a move in that direction.

"You realize once we cross, we will be in troll country," Legolas said, eyeing the thick forest directly across from them.

The elf looked as if he half expected to see trolls hiding among the tall oaks. It was hardly a farfetched notion. Trolls didn’t like intruders into their territory, so even those less-than-bright creatures guarded what they considered theirs.

Aragorn nodded his agreement. To his human eyes, sharp though they were, a big, dark, gnarly tree trunk would easily resemble a troll, who was also big, dark and gnarly. "I know," he replied, "but we have no choice. Considering the terrain that surrounds it, it would take us a week or more to go all the way around. Depending on what we encountered, it could take longer. I’m not willing to take that extra time. Lord Elrond is waiting for us. Besides," he added, "there aren’t enough trolls to cover every bit of the land they claim, so we might make it through with no trouble."

Legolas stared at the man as if he had grown another head. The look said it all, so the elf didn‘t comment on that last statement. Instead, he said, "Lord Elrond has more patience than anyone I know. He will wait."

"Patient or not, he will be anxious for our return," Aragorn stated. He thought back to all the times he had snuck back into Rivendell and found the elf lord tapping his foot in a clear demonstration of his decided lack of patience with his wayward foster son. Admittedly, he had been a child then and not the full grown adult he was now, but still the imagine was a lasting one.

Legolas grinned broadly, remembering similar circumstances with his own father, though Thranduil never tapped his foot. He simply scowled his displeasure, and that was sobering enough to straighten up a mischievous elfling, at least until the next irresistible adventure beckoned. And they always did.

Returning to the subject at hand, Aragorn said, "His note said it was important we get there as soon as we can."

The grin on the elf’s face was still there. "Yes, but he knows we do not always arrive when expected."

The ranger just rolled his eyes. How true that statement was. "Well, sitting here won't get the job done."

The elven prince didn't comment further. He knew Aragorn was right. They needed to get moving, because delaying wasn’t going to get them any closer to Rivendell.

Their minds made up, the two friends nudged their horses into the swiftly flowing river. It barely reached half way up the stallions’ legs. Splashing across, the animals showed no reaction to the ice cold water.

The far bank was broad and no more than a gentle slope so low it was easy to see that the melting snow would soon swell the river until it inundated the land far into the forest they now entered, making it almost a swamp until the water receded.

Moving onto dry land, Legolas and Aragorn both scanned the trees in an effort to make sure it really was just trees they were seeing. Even the elf had to keep his eyes focused on the dark trees, trying to detect movement among them.

Nothing did move, but it wasn't long before both elf and ranger were convinced they were being watched. The feeling was like an itch that couldn’t be scratched, and it niggled at both of them.

"I know you feel them."

"Oh, yes." Legolas confirmed. "They are very near." His eyes continued to dart around him, as he spoke.

Aragorn was decidedly not looking forward to a running battle with the large creatures. "I guess that means we won’t be moving through their territory unnoticed or unmolested," he replied grimly.

"Hardly. They would as likely put us in their dinner pot as not."

The man shivered at those unfortunately true words and added chilling ones of his own. "They'd eat us, because that's what trolls do."

Legolas turned and looked behind them. Still nothing moved. However, when he swung back around, he saw a troll to his left duck back behind a huge three trunk. "To the left."

"And the right," Aragorn remarked, having spotted two trolls, who were also trying their best to hide. Despite the fact the trees were quite large, the trolls weren’t able to keep out of the sight of the keen-eyed elf and the observant ranger.

Trolls were faster on their feet than their size would indicate. Still, they couldn’t come close to the speed of a horse, so as one, both Legolas and Aragorn urged their mounts into a gallop.

Both horses were experienced in running through thick forests, so they were able to avoid roots and maneuver through small thickets. Even so, they weren’t able to move quite as swiftly as their riders would have liked.

Aragorn knew that if they could get past these few trolls, there was a better chance that they could keep from being caught by others that may be between them and freedom.

Trolls were too big to ride. Even the large draft horses used to pull heavy wagons, move large boulders and drag downed trees weren't strong enough to carry one of these creatures.

Continuing to negotiate the trees with expertise, Legolas and Aragorn outdistanced the trolls near the river. Both knew, though, that it was far too soon to feel relieved.

As the two riders moved deeper into the forest, they began to see more and more trolls appear. The creatures were no longer trying to avoid detection. They were now openly trying to capture or kill the elf and the ranger.

Before long it became evident that there were just too many trolls aware of the presence of the two friends for them to think they could escape.

Before they had gone a quarter of a mile, a net dropped down on them. They didn't even have a chance to draw their weapons.

Once in the net, they were pulled to the ground by a troll standing near them. The creature gave the net a single tug.

Aragorn and Legolas fell heavily. They rolled and squirmed, trying desperately to draw their daggers.

One troll, seeing the attempt, kicked Legolas in the side. The elf didn't pass out, but sparks swirled inside his head, as he tried to ignore the pain and focus his vision.

The same troll tried to kick Aragorn, but the man rolled far enough away so that the blow wasn't solid. He knew it would cause a dark, very sore bruise. "Going around doesn’t seem like such a bad idea right now. Wish we had done it."

Instead of commenting on that remark, Legolas asked, between clenched teeth, "Can you see the horses?"

The blond warrior’s face was being pressed into the ground, so he couldn't see anything but dirt. He was afraid the piece of rope that was biting into his nose was going to pull it off. Even with the pain he was in, Legolas was more concerned bout the welfare of the two stallions than about himself.

Aragorn, flat on his back, could see only the trees above him and the one troll who had kicked them. "No,"' he whispered in answer to the elf’s question.

"We’ve ’em., too," the troll said, bending down and laughing in Aragorn’s face.

The stench from the troll was almost unbearable to the ranger, and he came close to gagging.

Even Legolas, who was facing the other way, was nearly overcome by the foul smell. He thought of making a comment but didn’t want him or Aragorn to get kicked again. Another blow like the first one, especially in the same place, and Legolas knew he would pass out, not to mention the probability of getting a broken rib or two.

Another troll came over, reached into the net and pulled Aragorn’s sword out of its sheath. "Elven," he spat. "Magic for sure. Good. I need me a new sword." His voice was deep and rasping.

This one’s clothes, while dirty and tattered, were in better condition than the other trolls the friends had seen before the net hit them. They were mostly covered by thick, coarse, matted hair, so it was a mystery why they even bothered with clothes at all.

This troll looked to be the leader. He reached down and pulled Legolas's knives loose from where they rested beside the elf’s quiver. Holding the ranger’s sword in one hand and the elven knives in the other, he announced triumphantly, ""My name be Hatch," he declared to the two captives, "and these’ll be my new weapons." He glared around at the other trolls, as if challenging any of them to disagree. No one did.

Hatch then tossed his old sword to another troll, who was instantly beset by four others, hoping to get the blade for themselves. He won the brief skirmish by brandishing the sword and driving the others back with it.

Once he had secured possession of the blade, the rest of the trolls accepted his ownership.

Hatch had not interfered, because that was not a popular thing to do. Leaders ruled by strength against a single challenge. If he got in the middle of a fight between other trolls, they could turn on him, and he could be killed. Hatch was too smart, by troll standards, to take such a risk. And anyway, he didn’t care who ended up with the sword. He had what he wanted, and that was as far as his concern went.

Suddenly, Legolas and Aragorn were jerked to their feet. Just as the net was flipped up off of them, both of their visible daggers were taken.

"Where’s the other ones?" the leader demanded.

No answer was forthcoming, so Hatch put one of Legolas's blades against his throat.

Aragorn decided they'd be searched and their remaining knives would be found anyway, so he said, "In our boots."

Both knives were taken, which didn’t sit well with Legolas. He hated being totally unarmed while in the presence of his enemies.

"Any others?"

Aragorn shook his head.

"Only our brains, and you will find out about those soon enough," Legolas whispered, as Hatch walked away to converse with the troll that now possessed Hatch’s old sword. Luckily, no one but Aragorn heard the elf's words.

Hatch motioned for the man and the elf to be brought forward, and they were roughly pushed from behind.

Hatch regarded the two captives, then looked intently at Legolas, pointing his finger at the elf’s chest. "Try any of yer filthy elven magic an‘ I‘ll gut you with one of yer own knives. Understand?"

Legolas just glared up at the creature. There was no fear in his eyes.

When Hatch turned away, Aragorn whispered, "I don’t know how yet, but we’ll get free of these creatures before they can do us any harm."

Before Legolas could respond, Hatch yelled back, "Shut up, or I’ll cut yer tongues out. Now git moivin’."

Another shove in the back closely followed the leader’s command and was accompanied by the harsh laughter of derision. Anything that caused the prisoners any kind of upset, especially if it involved humiliation and pain, was reason for amusement.

Legolas gritted his teeth and clenched his fists. He would have dearly loved to punch any one of these foul beings in the face. He vowed that before he and Aragorn gained their freedom, more than one of these accursed creatures would feel the pain of an elven boot.

Aragorn noted the elf’s attempt to control his desire to do some damage to these beasts. It was a desire he heartily shared.

Clearly both Legolas and Aragorn were determined to get their revenge. But first they had to survive.

TBC

Chapter Two

The troop that consisted of ten trolls, one elf, one human, and two horses marched through the forest and then out onto rolling hills. Without hesitation, the group made their way up the first one.

Up, over, and down. Up, over, and down. Each hill looked exactly like the next one and the one before it. The scenery never changed. It seemed endless. If they hadn’t known better, Legolas and Aragorn would have thought they were not moving at all but only walking in place.

“Can we stop for some water?” a very thirsty Aragorn called up to the head of the group where Hatch was located. The ranger held the hope that these trolls didn’t want to see their captives die of thirst before they got where they were going. Still, the man wasn’t really expecting to be accommodated.

“Shut up!” Hatch yelled back, as snickers erupted from the other trolls.

“We’re thirsty,” Aragorn protested. “We can move faster, if you give us some water.”

Plainly irritated, Hatch swing around and came back to stand towering above the sweaty ranger. There was murder in his eyes. “Prisoners don't get treated like friends. You might get somethin’ to drink when we get to where we’re goin’. I ain't decided yet." He poked his finger at Aragorn’s chest. “Complain again, and you won’t get nohin’ but a rap on the head. Then we’ll drag the both of you the rest of the way.” Hatch turned around and headed up the next hill.

Neither Legolas nor Aragorn doubted the creature would do exactly as he said. They were actually a little surprised it hadn’t been done already. Trolls loved to have fun at the expense of whatever unfortunate being was in their grasp at the time. They hated anyone that was not a troll.

Aragorn decided not to push his luck. “I guess that settles that.” He gave his elven friend a sympathetic look and then licked his dry lips, though there was precious little liquid in his mouth to wet them with.

*~*~*~*

It was another hour of marching across the hills before they entered another forest, a much larger one, on the far side of the largest hill they had yet encountered.

In the center of the forest was a huge clearing that was quickly recognizable as the trolls’ permanent home. There were more trolls here than either Legolas or Aragorn had ever seen together in one place at one time.

The large creatures all turned to look at the group, as they emerged from the dark trees. Most of the trolls were laughing and pointing at the prisoners.

“I think they are happy to see dinner coming,” Legolas commented grimly. He wasn't smiling when he said it. It was too close to the truth to be even mildly amusing.

Aragorn surveyed the large group that had moved closer to surround them. He hadn’t expected there to be so many of them. Surprisingly, these appeared to be a social group, though perhaps social wasn’t the right word to use. The term mutual cooperation came to mind.

With a sigh, the ranger remarked, “I think it’ll take a little bit longer to gain our freedom than I was hoping.”

Both Legolas and Aragorn surveyed the camp, as they moved slowly through it. Along the outer edges of it were rudimentary huts put together in a somewhat haphazard way. The rough-hewn tree trunks that served as the walls were solid enough, but they were attached to each other with knotted ropes. The wood was laid together at odd angles, some overlapping while others left gaps. More than half were leaning to one side or another.

In the center of the clearing was one huge fire whose flames reached up to the top of the trolls’ eight foot frames.

“I’m not sure I want to stay in one of those huts,” Aragorn remarked. “They look like one good breeze will send them all tumbling down on top of whoever happens to be inside.”

“I do not believe we have to worry about that. Look.” Legolas nodded to a spot between two of the larger huts off to their right.

What they saw was four cages made of metal bars lashed together firmly with chains, indicating that far more care had been lavished on these structures by the trolls than on their living quarters. The cages were sturdy and meant to hold securely whoever or whatever was put into them.

The two friends were gripped tightly around the arm and half pushed, half pulled over to the cages, which, upon closer inspection, looked even stronger than was first thought.

Hatch untied Aragorn from the lead rope but made no move to undo the smaller rope that bound his wrists. He then grabbed Aragorn by the shoulder and shoved him into the cage on the end nearest them. The door clanged shut behind the ranger.

As one of the trolls secured the door to Aragorn’s prison with a large metal padlock, Legolas was untied in the same way and pushed toward the cage on the opposite end and shoved inside. His door was secured with a second padlock.

Hatch looked from one captive to the other and laughed. “There’ll be a guard right in front of these here cages between you two. You try talkin’ to each other an’ you’ll pay. You ain‘t gonna get away, so no use tryin’.”

There was more laughter from the trolls who had gathered nearby and heard Hatch’s warning. The sound was not pleasant and did not bode well for the future of elf and human.

Legolas grasped two of the metal bars beside the doors and shook the cage, trying to test its strength. ‘Too strong,’ he thought. He looked over at Aragorn and shook his head.

Aragorn sighed, knowing that if the structure was too strong for an elf, it was a sure thing that they wouldn’t be able to break out by loosening anything. He sat down on the ground. There was nothing else in the cages to sit or lie on. The two occupied enclosures measured only six feet by six feet by six feet.

Legolas and Aragorn, in their bare feet, were each only slightly under six feet tall. With the added height of their boot heels, they were slightly over six feet, which meant that they couldn’t quite stand up straight without scraping their heads on the metal bars overhead. Neither was willing to take their boots off. They had to be ready to flee, if the opportunity presented itself.

The middle two cages were decidedly bigger than those on each end. They were clearly made for much bigger captives and would have suited the elf and the man together quite well. However, comfort was out of the question, so giving them a larger place to stay wouldn’t have provided the kind of discomfort the trolls obviously wanted them to endure.

Legolas soon tired of having to bend his head down, so he, too, sat down. At least he could stretch his weary legs out.
The elf glanced at Aragorn, who was looking intently at the trolls’ camp and all the other structures in it. Size up the enemy and their surroundings was one of Aragorn’s unwritten rules. Little details could mean the difference between success and failure. And in the world of a ranger that could easily mean the difference between life and death.

Growing bored with watching the captives do nothing, all of the trolls walked away, leaving the two friends to ponder their captivity.

Aragorn wasn’t about to underestimate these creatures. Trolls were fierce fighters, and an out-and- out confrontation with this many of them would be insurmountable. That fact didn’t sit well with the ranger, but it was inescapable nonetheless.

Sheer size and brute strength couldn’t be ignored, no matter how puny the brain behind those traits may be. Even so, this particular species of trolls wasn’t as stupid as most.

Eyeing the imposing creatures that stood around the clearing, Aragorn knew that the only chance for him and Legolas to escape would rest with their ability to outwit them.

At the moment, Legolas wasn’t thinking about escaping. He picked up a small rock and angrily threw it at the ground. He hated being a captive. It had happened more times than he cared to think about. Now here he and Aragorn were, once more in the hands of beings who wanted to destroy them. Did it never end?

The elf picked up the same rock and threw it again, this time slamming it against one of the bars of the cage and shattering it.

Aragorn watched Legolas’s mounting frustration and was about to say something to try and calm his agitated friend, when shouting got the attention of both of them.

Near the large campfire, Hatch was waving his arms and yelling at one of the other trolls. He then pointed toward the cages.

The slightly smaller troll on the receiving end of the tirade opened his mouth in what would probably have been an attempt to defend himself and then shut it quickly. The look in Hatch’s eyes had evidently warned him not to argue with his leader. In obvious defeat, the hapless creature lumbered over
and stood, head down, in front of the center cages.

Aragorn decided to see if he could win a few points with this creature. “What’s your name?” he asked in a mild voice meant to put the troll at ease.

“Pickett,” the troll replied.

Pleased that he was answered, Aragorn continued sympathetically. “Guard duty’s tough, isn’t it? There’s no we could never escape from these well-made cages, so it wasn’t right that your leader yelled at you like that for not coming right over here to guard us.”

Legolas grinned. It was an old trick that Aragorn often used. If possible, make friends with a guard. It usually only worked on very young or very ignorant people. This troll looked to be both.

Pickett turned and looked at Aragorn, who was looking back at him with a very sympathetic expression.

Not understanding that he was being exploited, Pickett nodded in response to the man’s comments about Hatch. “He’s always on me ’bout somethin’. Hatch jus’ don’t like me.”

He was so pathetic, Aragorn could almost feel sorry for him. But, not quite. This creature could possibly be taken advantage of, but he could just as easily turn on him and Legolas and snap both of them in half. Aragorn knew he would have to tread carefully.

Legolas decided to join the conversation. Throwing rocks wasn’t going to help his mood any. Referring to Hatch, he said, “He does not seem like the kind of...uh... person you can reason with.”

“He ain’t,” Pickett whispered, trying to make sure no one but these two could hear him. He began to wonder if maybe these two captives could be different from the others the group usually brought in. They were so unusual. The dark haired one looked to Pickett like many of the humans he had seen before. But the other one had pointed ears and much longer hair, which was a pretty golden color. He was also a lot cleaner.

“I never seen a human like you before. What’s wrong with yer ears?”

“He’s an elf,” Aragorn replied before Legolas did, not sure how his friend would handle the question.

“What’s an elf?” Pickett asked in total bewilderment.

Legolas stared back at the troll and let out a growl that sent Pickett back a step, which pleased the elf. He couldn’t believe that this creature did not know about elves.

Aragorn burst out laughing. “Don’t mind him, Pickett. He was born that way. We all took pity on him because of his deformity, though he doesn’t believe there‘s anything wrong with him. It’s really very sad.”

The blond archer turned a stony glare on the ranger. “My ears are not deformed.” The elf’s tone was decidedly arrogant.

“See what I mean?” Aragorn sighed, shaking his head. Legolas had a great sense of humor, but sometimes the elf’s pride got in the way, even with him, and at such times the man knew it was best just to change the subject.

“Pickett, can you get us some water? We’re very thirsty.” That was a genuine statement.

“I cain't leave here. I already told you Hatch don’t like me. If I leave, or give you somethin’ he didn’t say to, he’ll beat me.”

It was clear to Aragorn that the troll wasn’t going to be talked into getting them water or anything else, for now at least. He would try again later, if he didn‘t dry up and blow away first.

“Where are our horses?” Legolas asked the troll. He hadn’t seen where they were taken and couldn’t spot them anywhere in the camp or the nearby trees. He had thought about whistling but knew the two stallions would answer him, and he didn’t want to risk any of the trolls hitting them to shut them up.

“They’re behind the fence in back of the big hut." Pickett jerked his thumb to indicate the direction where the captives’ horses could be found.

His voice now had a slight edge to it. All the while he talked, he never relaxed his position, his dark eyes darting furtively toward where Hatch stood. He wasn’t just nervous, he was actually afraid, and considering what he had said about Hatch’s not liking him, that feeling was completely justified.

A few moments later, Hatch walked over and stood directly in front of Pickett, making the younger troll cower before his leader. “Get ’em some water an’ food. We don’t want ’em dyin’ on us ’til we have our fun.” He smiled, revealing black, broken teeth.

Pickett shuffled off, and Hatch stood looking first at Aragorn and then at Legolas. “Why’d you two come here?”

“We just wanted to cross you territory,” Aragorn replied. “We meant you no harm.”

Hatch laughed heartily at that. “You cain’t hurt us.”

“Well, that’s certainly true,” the man conceded. “What I meant was, we weren’t planning on trying. We’re just travelers.”

“You shoulda gone around. We don’t like strangers here. You’ll pay fer yer mistake.”

Turning his attention away from Aragorn, Hatch went over to Legolas’s cage and, in a move faster than his size would indicate, slammed his hand against the front of the cage, rattling it loudly.

Legolas slowly lifted his head and glared at the troll but showed no other reaction to Hatch’s sudden move, and that annoyed the large creature, who seemed to want, and was surely expecting, the elf to jump.

Before Hatch could do more, Pickett returned with water and a small amount of what was evidently supposed to pass for food. Hatch held the two bowls down for the captives to see. He laughed when he saw Legolas wrinkle his nose at it.

What Aragorn saw were chunks of meat that looked to be more than half raw and floating in a slimy, bloody mess that was disgusting. "What is that stuff?"

"Black rabbit," Legolas replied, his nose having identified the bowls' contents.

"Black rabbit?" Aragorn echoed, also wrinkling his nose. "That stuff is awful. We can’t eat it."

"We eat it," Hatch said. "So can you."

"I would rather starve," Legolas declared defiantly. The elf had to turn his head away to keep from gagging.

"Fine with me," Hatch replied, throwing the contents on the ground. He shoved the two bowls back into Pickett’s hands. "Give ’em water, but don’t give ’em nothin’ else to eat," he said over his shoulder, as he walked away.

TBC

Chapter Three

After Hatch had walked away, Pickett handed a crudely made cup full of water to Legolas and then one to Aragorn. After securing the padlocks to their tiny prisons, he took up his guard duty as before. He didn’t really dislike these two, especially the one with the deformed ears, the way he usually did the other captives that had been brought to the camp. But even he realized that they could get him into deep trouble with Hatch, if he showed them even a hint of friendly attention. Picked on or not, he knew which side he was on.

Legolas and Aragorn looked at each other. They needed to find a way to communicate without letting any of these beasts know they were doing it. What they said could be covered by speaking Sindarin. It was the fact that they were talking at all that had to be kept a secret. Pickett’s brain may not be of the highest quality, but there was nothing wrong with his ears.

Those ears were almost eight feet above the ground. Pickett also stood several feet in front of the cages. At the same time, Legolas and Aragorn were sitting down. Despite all of that, talking between themselves would be difficult. If Pickett heard them and turned to hush them, Hatch, or one of the other trolls, would surely be alerted.

The two friends looked at each other, and then Legolas had an idea. He gave Aragorn a knowing look and then began to hum. At first, that’s all he did, waiting to see what Pickett’s reaction would be. If the troll made him stop, the elf’s idea would fall apart. When he saw that the troll had merely looked at him and then turned back around, he knew he had found the method of communication he and Aragorn needed.

It wasn’t until Aragorn saw Legolas motion toward his mouth and then point at him that the man understood what his friend had in mind.

The song was a familiar one to the ranger, so he began to speak softly in Sindarin in a way that blended with the melody. "How long do you think they’ll wait before they start their little games?"

Smiling that Aragorn had understood, Legolas waited until Aragorn took up the melody before replying, "Midnight would be my guess."

Legolas looked at Pickett again for any sign that the creature suspected anything. The troll, to Legolas’s surprise, was slowly moving his head from side to side. He didn’t seem to know what was going on. To him it was merely a sweet sound the two were making that he had never heard before. Trolls didn’t make music.

Pleased that they would evidently be allowed to continue, Legolas said, "Getting out of here is not going to be easy. There are at least twenty-five trolls in this camp."

The elf took up the humming again, as Aragorn said, "That makes the odds about even, I would say."

"Be serious, Estel," Legolas said rather loudly before the man could begin his turn at humming.

After a moment of startled silence, Aragorn did resume the melody, and Legolas finished his say. "We are not talking about orcs here. Trolls are far more dangerous."

"I know." Aragorn’s tone was no longer flip. "But we have no one to help us, so we have to believe the odds, if not in our favor, at least not too badly against us. Otherwise there would be no chance for us."

Legolas nodded at those words but felt the need to make another point, though he didn’t think it was anything Aragorn hadn’t already thought of. "We must not only free ourselves but get our horses and our weapons back, as well."

"Since we don’t know what they have planned, we can’t really make any definite plans. We have to wait and see what comes up and decide on something whenever the opportunity presents itself."

"We may need to make an instant decision."

"I think we’ll be ready," Aragorn said and then took another drink of his water before setting the half-full cup down on the ground beside him. "We’d better save what water we have left. It’s a long time until midnight, and I don’t want to run out too soon. I doubt they’ll give us any more."

Legolas, who had already come to the same conclusion, nodded.

"We might as well get some rest," Aragorn said, effectively ending the musical discussion.

The man curled up on his side, resting his head on his folded arm, and stared out toward the camp. He made a mental note of the physical layout before him. He paid no attention to the trolls themselves. After memorizing the camp and everything in it, Aragorn closed his eyes and went to sleep.

Legolas knew that he would need every bit of his strength, if he was going to successfully defend himself and possibly his friend, so he lay down flat on his back diagonally so he could fully stretch out. Placing his hands across his stomach, he was soon treading the paths of elven dreams.

*~*~*~*

Legolas and Aragorn were abruptly awakened when two trolls noisily approached the cages. The doors were opened, and huge hands reached in and roughly pulled them to their feet. "It’s time," the troll rousing Aragorn said. He laughed. "We’re gonna have some fun with you two."

Legolas fought the urge to hit the troll who was grabbing him by the ankle and yanking him out the door. The elf fought to gain his feet and tried not to show the pain he felt from the iron grip now on his left forearm. He knew there would be sore, bruised places where the troll’s fingers dug into his skin. However, it wasn’t the pain or the impending bruises that angered the elf. It was the idea of being handled in such a rough way by this disgusting creature. But then trolls were not known for their manners. Legolas also knew that before long, bruises were probably going to be the least of his pains.

Once out of their cages, the two captives were pushed forward toward the large fire in the center of the camp. Hatch was there along with every troll in the band, including Pickett, who was following. In the flickering firelight, their faces took on the look of creatures born of nightmares.

When Legolas and Aragorn reached Hatch, they were stopped. "Now you’ll see what we do to those who cross our territory," was all the troll leader said at first. There was a wicked look in his dark eyes.

Aragorn had seen the same look in the eyes of wargs just before they attacked. It bordered on bloodlust.

"Take off yer clothes."

Legolas blinked. He hadn’t known what to expect, but it definitely wasn’t this. If it weren’t for the fact that these were trolls, who, despite their reference to fun, had absolutely no sense of genuine humor, he would have thought it was a joke.

"They’re serious," Aragorn remarked, as surprised as Legolas.

Hatch sneered. "Now!"

Legolas and Aragorn looked at each other and then began to undress. They did it slowly, hoping the trolls would change their minds and stop them before they had shed all of their clothes.

No such order to stop came, however, when Hatch saw the gold chain Aragorn was wearing around his neck, his eyes lit up and a greedy grin appeared on his ugly face.

The gold medallion was a tiny image of the Last Homely House, complete with waterfall. Lord Elrond had given it to his foster son as a remembrance of his home just before the man had left Imladris to join the rangers for the first time.

The troll leader grasped the chain and then ripped it off of Aragorn’s neck, breaking the clasp.

Legolas saw the anger rising on Aragorn’s face and put his hand on the ranger’s arm to stay him from trying to take the necklace back. "Easy, Estel. There will be time to get it back later," he whispered in Sindarin. He could feel the ranger’s tense muscles under his hand and gripped his friend’s arm a little tighter.

It took Aragorn a moment to realize that Legolas was right. Causing a stir now would only get him and Legolas into more trouble than was already coming their way.

Now there was one more thing they had to get back from these disgusting creatures before they left this place.

Hatch stared at the gold medallion lying in his hand, as it sparkled in the firelight, before shoving it into one of his pockets. He squinted at Legolas. "You got one like that somewhere?"

"No," the elf barked emphatically.

Hatch motioned toward the two friends. "Finish takin’ off yer clothes."

Knowing that there would be no further interruptions, Legolas and Aragorn were soon standing in nothing more than the soft linen undergarment they wore from waist to knee and were prepared to defend having to shed.

By this time, the other trolls had formed a large circle around them and were now beginning to laugh and point at them.

At first, neither elf nor ranger was sure why, until it dawned on Aragorn that it was the fact they had smooth, hair-free chests. The trolls, their entire bodies covered with coarse hair, thought the sight funny.

Aragorn looked down at his well-muscled chest and then at Legolas’s. "I don’t know about you, but I always thought we looked pretty decent."

"I guess it all depends on your point of view," Legolas remarked dryly.

The trolls had seen a number of human captives over the years, but while they certainly hadn’t compared to a troll, the majority of them had all been endowed with various degrees of chest hair.

After another round of laughter, Hatch held up his hand. "Enough." There was instant silence. He was evidently willing to let the captives keep their short pants, as he deemed them to be. He turned and motioned to a troll standing off to one side. He was the one who had Aragorn’s sword, which he proudly wore in his belt. He also had two ropes, each about six feet long, which he handed to Hatch.

Aragorn frowned, not having any idea what the trolls had planned for them, though he was sure it wasn’t going to be pleasant. "What are the ropes for?"

"You’ll see soon enough," Hatch sneered.

The troll leader twirled the ropes in opposite directions, laughing as he did so. When he stopped, he glared at Aragorn with narrowed eyes.

There were two trolls, who now stood back to back in the center of the large circle. Hatch walked over and tied one end of one rope around Aragorn’s left wrist and handed the other end to one of the two trolls. He repeated the maneuver with Legolas, separating him from the ranger. Neither of the two captives could see each other past the huge creatures holding their ropes.

Hatch stood back and watched with gleeful anticipation, as did the other huge creatures.

Even if Legolas and Aragorn had entertained thoughts of escape right then, there would have been no way to break through.

Four other trolls opposite each other in the circle held a type of whip, consisting of several leather straps five feet long and woven at one end to form a handle. Expertly used the multi-tailed whip could inflict severe damage. In the hands of these powerful creatures, such damage was a given. Death was also a distinct possibility.

The trolls holding the ropes began to turn, forcing Legolas and Aragorn to swing in a circle at the end of the ropes, which were kept taught by centrifugal force.

Legolas and Aragorn were each struck with a whip as they passed a troll wielding one. They both tried to dodge the blows, and in the beginning, succeeded to a certain extent, but the creatures were turning fast enough to keep the archer and the ranger from gaining any slack. It was all they could do to stay on their feet.

All the trolls that were not directly involved in the ‘game’ raised their fists in the air and shouted each time a whip met flesh. There were a lot of shouts.

The two friends were hit four times with every complete loop they made around the circle. Most of the blows struck their backs, but several times one or more of the straps managed to curl around and strike their sides and chests.

A few of the blows that rained down on the two captives were glancing ones, but even so blood was drawn and painful welts appeared.

One troll took particular pleasure in hitting Legolas across his neck each time the elf passed. It didn’t take long to open up a deep laceration, causing blood to trickle down onto Legolas’s chest. More strikes to like those could open up the artery in his neck, and he could bleed to death in very short order. The elf did his best to cover the area with his free hand.

The move worked, because the troll became discouraged and resumed aiming for the elf’s back with renewed vigor.

After a few minutes, the trolls stopped. The two holding the ropes had been spinning in place and had become so dizzy they needed to be replaced.

When the rope became slack, Aragorn bent forward, his hands resting on his knees. He was breathing heavily and every inch of his exposed flesh stung viciously.

Legolas, stronger and more able to take the abuse was afraid that what he was about to say would upset Aragorn, but in his own mind, his first priority was to protect his friend as best he could, regardless of what that friend thought about his method. "My brother is weak, more so than most humans. He can’t take this kind of punishment. He’ll die on you, if you continue. Where is the fun in that?"

Legolas would have been surprised to know that the man didn’t care that Legolas had called him weak. Whatever it took to stop this torture was all right with him. He hated to admit it, even to himself, but he was well aware of the fact that he would give out before the elf did. He was, however, not willing to let Legolas take all of the abuse, even if sharing it did not lesson it for either of them.

"Beg some more," Hatch goaded.

The word beg was not in the archer’s vocabulary. He would never beg this hideous creature for anything. Of course, he hadn’t heard the phrase ‘never say never’.

By then two fresh trolls held the ropes. When Legolas remained silent, Hatch motioned for the new trolls to start turning. He jerked Aragorn to his feet just as the rope became taught again. Legolas was swung so forcefully he had to double-step to keep from going down.

Several minutes later, both elf and ranger were down and being dragged.

Hatch yelled for the trolls to stop. Neither captive moved, and Hatch thought they were both unconscious. He went over and kicked each one.

There was no response.

TBC

Chapter Four

‘Don’t kick us again,’ Legolas said to himself, biting back his anger and resisting the urge to open his eyes and see the condition Aragorn was in. Even though the blows had not been overly hard ones, he still couldn’t be sure that the man was faking unconsciousness, as he was doing.

Aragorn was faking. He braced for another kick, which never came. He prayed that Legolas wasn’t hurting as badly as he was.

“I shoulda known these two couldn’t take it,” Hatch spat, clearly unhappy that the fun he had been looking forward to hadn’t lasted longer.

“What can you expect from such puny creatures, who don’t even have no chest hair,” one of the onlookers sneered, pounding his own chest, which looked more like a filthy, matted rug.

There was more laughter from the whole group.

“Throw ’em back in the cages,” Hatch instructed. “Maybe tomorrow we can get more enjoyment out of ’em."

The whole thing was a major disappointment to Hatch and the other trolls. All the other prisoners they had done this to had lasted longer. Maybe the lack of chest hair on these two did have something to do with their weakness.

Hatch kicked a log and stalked off. He wasn’t used to not having his way. He vowed that this would be the last time. These two would give him what he wanted before they died.

The two trolls with the ropes dragged Legolas and Aragorn back to their cages and unceremoniously threw them in. Their clothes were thrown in on top of them.

Aragorn landed on a particularly sore spot along his right side and bit his lip to stifled a groan.

Legolas landed face down on a small pebble that dug painfully into the skin right over a lower rib.

Neither one dared move until they were sure all the trolls had forgotten about them for the time being. They didn’t want to risk letting impatience cause them to be taken out again and have the whole episode they had just endured start all over again.

Finally, when all around the camp was silent, Aragorn risked opening an eye and saw that Pickett had not taken up his usual place in front of the middle cages. The ranger didn‘t know if Pickett was just slow in getting there, or if he had been relieved. Perhaps, Hatch thought that he and Legolas were lost to the conscious world, and didn’t need watching for the rest of the night.

The man slowly shifted so that he could look out across the camp and make sure Pickett or any other troll was not approaching. There were only two trolls in evidence, both tending the campfire.

Legolas’s face was hidden by his shirt, which had landed on top of his head. There was no movement from the wood-elf other than the slightly elevated rate of his breathing.

A large part of his friend’s back was visible, and Aragorn almost flinched to see it. He knew his own back must look very similar. It certainly hurt enough to make him believe it did.

Aragorn whispered Legolas’s name. If the elf was conscious, he would respond.

The blond archer slowly pulled his shirt back so he could peep out under the sleeve. His arm was laid out in front of him, so that’s all he could see. In an effort to let the ranger know he was all right, he lifted his fingers and moved them back and forth in a small wave. He realized that his hands were probably the only part of his body that didn’t hurt.

The elf wanted to reach down and remove the pebble that was really bothering him, but since he couldn’t see if Pickett was there, he couldn’t take the chance that the troll might be looking at him.

Legolas continued to look in Aragorn's direction and soon saw the man’s head rise up and nod. He released a long breath, when he heard Aragorn say, “No guard, so far”.

Legolas pulled his shirt all the way off of his head and sat up, deciding that even if he was spotted, it had been long enough since the ordeal that he hoped he would simply be perceived as having revived.

The pebble that hurt so much had not only made an indentation in his skin but had stuck there thanks to the blood that had run down from a cut just above it. He pulled the offending rock free and lay it down, though he felt like chunking it as hard as he could. He tenderly rubbed the sore spot. ‘That will make a nice bruise to add to the others,’ he thought.

Aragorn brought himself into a sitting position and did his best to examine his own cuts and bruises. He decided that collectively the injuries were not good, but luckily, there was no single one that he deemed serious.

Turning around to look for any nearby trolls, Legolas moved to the back, inside corner of his cage, as close to Aragorn as he could get. “How are we going to get out of these cages?” the elf whispered.

Aragorn jabbed his fingers toward the camp. “One of them has to unlock the doors for us.”

Out of the corner of his eye, Legolas saw Pickett approaching. In a hushed tone, he said, “Pretend to be sick.”

Not quite able to hear the soft-spoken words, Aragorn asked, “What?”

Slightly louder, Legolas repeated what he had just said, “Pretend to be sick.”

Understanding the ploy that the two had used before, Aragorn nodded. He lay down and began to moan and jerk his body, being careful not to roll onto his back.

When Pickett didn’t react, Aragorn moaned louder.

When the troll reached the cages, Legolas said, "Pickett, please get some water for him. He is sick. He no longer has the strength to fight off the illness.” Concern intensified in the elf’s words. “I have seen him in this condition before. He is near death.”

Legolas didn’t want to lay it on too thick, so he tried another tact. “If he dies, Hatch will be very angry. He stopped the game, because he did not want either of us dead, just yet.” Legolas paused and let his meaning sink into the dense troll’s head. If Pickett would open both cages, they had a chance to outmaneuver the troll and get free.

“Open my cage first, so I can help him,” Legolas said in a slightly demanding tone. This troll was used to taking orders, so hopefully he would respond to the elf’s command. When Pickett hesitated, Legolas added, “You needn’t worry about me trying to escape. I would never run off and leave him here alone. He is my brother.”

“He’s yer brother? I didn’t know that. You don’t look nothin’ alike.”

“We had different parents,” Aragorn piped up, unable to hold back on the joke.

“Oh,” Pickett said, nodding his understanding, even though, in truth, the joke had gone sailing way over his head.

Aragorn quickly moaned loud enough to take away any possibility that Pickett might have time to realize that he was being tricked. It didn’t hurt to be cautious, even with a thick-headed creature like this.

“Please help him,” Legolas pleaded in his most compelling tone. He briefly thought about his vow that he would never beg for anything. This, he rationalized, was different, since it was mostly a put-on, though serious in intent. “I will not tell Hatch. I promise. I just want to save my brother.”

Pickett looked around to make sure there were no other trolls around, especially Hatch. He saw none, so he went over to a large barrel and filled a wooden bowl. He took it back to the elf’s cage and unlocked the elf’s door. Pickett stood back, seemingly unwilling to get close enough to be touched. Legolas got up and walked out slowly, hands in the air.

Pickett opened Aragorn’s cage and handed the bowl of water to Legolas, as he entered.

Pickett had been told that these two were to be kept in separate cages, so the thought of locking them in together, even temporarily, never entered his mind. The golden-haired one with the funny ears would help his brother and then be put back in his own cage. The dark-haired brother would be all right and none of the other trolls would be the wiser. Simple logic from a simple brain.

As Legolas knelt down beside Aragorn and helped him to drink, he was well aware that the door was wide open, offering a very tantalizing invitation.

The problem was that Pickett was standing next to that open door. Could Aragorn get to his feet, and the two of them get through the door before the huge creature reacted and slammed it shut? Compounding their problem was the fact that the opening was narrow enough that they would have to go out one at a time. Whoever went second would be in danger of being caught.

The dilemma was soon solved, as Pickett moved into the opening, evidently to get a better look at what was going on inside.

“Curses on his curiosity,” Aragorn mumbled, so low that only the elf heard him.

Leaning forward, Pickett asked, “Is he better?”

“A little,” Legolas replied in a frustrated voice. “But I will need to stay with him for a while.”

“Oh no. You cain’t do that. Hatch says you two need to be in yer own cages.” He pointed to Legolas, “You got to go back.”

The two friends looked at each other in total dismay. They had been so close. So very close.

“We will just have to wait for another chance,” Legolas said in Sindarin.

“I hope it comes before they decide to have more fun,” was Aragorn’s disappointed grumble.

“Let us hope.” To the troll guard, Legolas said, “I need more water. I have to clean these wounds.”

“Hatch always says that dried blood stops it from leakin’ out.” He looked proud that he had imparted important knowledge to these two, who he deemed ignorant of the right way to heal a wound.

“The wounds should be cleaned,” Aragorn informed the troll, as the healer in him came to the forefront.

Pickett shook his head. “Hatch says that’s not right. Dried blood works ’cause I seen it. You drink the water,” he looked at the ranger, “an’ you get back in yer cage.” He was now staring at Legolas.

When the frustrated elf didn’t move, Pickett jabbed his finger at the archer. “Come on, you.” Then in an attempt to show this defiant captive who was boss, he added, “Just ’cause yer ears are dee-formed don’t mean you can do what you want.”

Aragorn had to grab Legolas’s arm to keep him from spinning around and punching the troll. He gave his friend a warning look. “You are usually the one that has to stop me from doing something foolhardy.”

Legolas clenched his teeth and nodded before standing up and moving toward the door. He may have been able to hold back a physical reaction, but as he went back to his own cage, he couldn’t hold back a piercing glare that forced Pickett to turn his head away.

*~*~*~*

Once things had settled down with Pickett back at guard duty, Aragorn, who had put his clothes back on, did his best to get some sleep. He knew that his body needed the rest to try and replace the strength that had been whipped and dragged out of him. The lack of food didn’t help any, either.

He lay diagonally across the cage, so he could stretch out flat. He noticed that Legolas had donned his own clothes and was standing with his head slightly bent and staring out at the trees several yards behind them. Aragorn knew how much solace the elf got from his beloved trees, wherever they were found, so he didn’t want to disturb him by speaking.

The ranger’s back and sides still stung in places, but taken all together, the wounds were more of a dull ache than outright pain. At least, that was what he kept telling himself.

As for Pickett, he was remembering not to show sympathy toward these captives. However, it didn’t mean he didn’t feel anything at all. In fact, he felt a little guilty that he had either hurt or insulted the poor deformed prisoner by what he said and what had been done to him and also his brother. Still, he wasn’t about to actually say he was sorry. That was another thing that Hatch had taught him. Do what you are told, and don’t expose weakness by showing regret, unless the apology was made to Hatch himself, of course.

Picket edged his way over from his usual place in front of the middle cages to stand in front of the elf’s small prison. He mistakenly felt that the deformed being would appreciate his presence, since he couldn’t be allowed to stay with his brother.

Even though his mind was concentrating on the trees, Legolas heard the scraping noise the troll made as he sidestepped closer to him. Curious, the archer moved toward the front of the cage. As he did so, he stumbled and fell forward. He reached out but instead of grabbing one of the bars for support, his right hand slipped between two of them and onto Pickett’s tunic.

The huge creature was totally oblivious. He didn’t hear a thing nor did he feel the elf’s hand on him.

Aragorn had finally fallen asleep and also didn’t see the elf stumble. He would have been very worried, if he had seen such an uncharacteristic occurrence from the normally sure-footed wood-elf.

Legolas quickly straightened up and moved away from the troll. He looked down at his hand, as if expecting to see it covered in the grimy filth that covered the troll. However, it wasn’t grime that he saw.

*~*~*~*

Across the camp, in the largest of the huts, Hatch was thinking. He may have been the smartest of the forest trolls, but even so, his powers of reasoning were limited. It didn’t matter though, because whenever he thought about torture, he knew what he was doing.

The troll leader realized that because the prisoners didn’t take to the whipping game very well, he needed to come up with another game of torture. It had to be something painful yet wouldn’t kill or disable them over much.

Hatch began to sift through his memory for the various games they had used in the past on other prisoners. Then he hit on the perfect one. It was slow, painful and wouldn’t kill, at least, not until he got tired of these two and chose to end the game.

TBC

Chapter Five

Legolas walked back to the rear of the cage and sat down, closing his eyes. He was not happy that he hadn’t been able to do more for Aragorn. He knew the man was hurting and had wanted to relieve that pain, as much as he would have been able to under the crude conditions. But Pickett, evidently due to his fear of Hatch, had put a stop to that.

Putting aside thoughts of something he couldn’t do anything about, Legolas glanced up to see if Pickett was watching him, but the troll was not only not paying any attention to him, he had sat down and was leaning against the bars of the middle cages, his chin down on his chest. Even trolls, it seemed, finally gave out from exhaustion.

The elven archer grinned, as he searched around for one of the small rocks on the cage’s dirt floor. He soon found what he was looking for.

Aragorn was sound asleep in his own cage, and showed no signs that he was faking, which was good, because he definitely needed the rest. Legolas hated to interrupt that rest, but it needed doing. It wasn’t going to be an easy task to wake the man, but he decided that delaying would only complicate things.

The elf quietly made his way to the side of the cage nearest his friend and dropped to his knees. He looked through the bars, lining them up so that there was a clear pathway all the way into Aragorn’s cage. He extended his right hand, which held the rock, and aiming carefully, he threw the rock. It hit the ranger squarely on the man’s forearm, but Aragorn didn’t stir.

Pursing his lips, Legolas tried again and again. Each time the rock got bigger, and the throw got harder. The target, one small area on the ranger’s arm, stayed the same. Finally, on the fifth try, Aragorn groaned.

An insistent hiss and a mysterious pain brought the ranger fully awake. He rubbed his arm and looked down, noticing the small pile of rocks on the ground beside him. Aragorn frowned, not remembering having seen them concentrated in one place like that before. Another hiss got his attention, and he looked over at the elven archer.

Quickly connecting the sore spot on his arm with the pile of rocks, he frowned at the elf. "Why are you throwing rocks at me?" he asked, after making sure Pickett wasn’t listening.

"To wake you up," came the slightly annoyed reply. "It took several tires."

"So I see." By contrast, there was amusement in the man’s voice. He normally didn’t sleep so soundly, but he was tired and hurting. "Is something wrong?" Then he thought of the elf’s wounds, which he knew hadn’t been tended to. "Are you all right?" The amusement had clearly turned to concern.

Legolas smiled, prepared to lie, as he usually did, when it came to his own injuries. "Better than all right." He held his left hand up, revealing what he held there.

Not sure what he was seeing, Aragorn leaned closer. It took a second to reassure himself that what he was seeing was actually there. Between his thumb and forefinger, Legolas was holding a key. The man instantly recognized it as the key that Pickett used to unlock their cages. His gaze moved up to stare in disbelief at the elf’s grinning face. "How?" was all he could manage to ask.

"I will explain later. Right now we need to get out of here."

A myriad of thoughts ran through the ranger’s head. The idea of soon being free took precedence, but there were other considerations, as well. He looked up and saw that the eastern sky was beginning to lighten. He didn’t know how late trolls slept or rather how early they rose, but he didn’t think he and Legolas would be able to get free, find all of their belongings, free their horses and get completely away before the trolls not only stirred but raised the alarm about the prisoners’ escape.

On the other hand, they couldn’t stay where they were. For one thing, the fact the key was missing would soon be apparent, and it didn’t take much brain power to know who would be suspected of having it. Then there was the fact that whatever the trolls, Hatch in particular, had in store for them next would likely lead to their incapacitation, if not their outright death.

By the time Aragorn had come to the inevitable conclusion that they had to make good on the one chance they were likely to get, Legolas had unlocked his door and made his way back to the side of his cage nearest Aragorn.

At first the man couldn’t figure out why the elf hadn’t just walked around Pickett and unlocked his cage. Then he realized that any troll that might be looking in their direction could easily see Legolas on the outside of the cages, and their escape would end almost before it had begun.

Legolas then threw the key to Aragorn the same way he had earlier thrown the rocks. This projectile was much more welcome.

Catching the precious piece of metal, Aragorn reached through the bars of the door and, as quietly as possible, unlocked his own padlock. When he looked up, he saw Legolas motioning for him to go around the outside of the cages in the opposite direction and hand him the key from the back. He hadn’t done it the other way around, because he wanted Aragorn free first, a fact the ranger would not have been happy with had he realized it.

Legolas was hoping that the trolls would have just the one key. If the doors were locked and the key was missing, then if worse came to worse and they were recaptured, the cages would no longer be usable. Putting them in one of the huts would hopefully be much less secure. Legolas was trusting that his line of reasoning was sound.

Once Legolas got the key from Aragorn, who was crouching behind the elf’s cage, he slipped out of his door, locked it, and the two friends ran for the woods behind them and away from the prying eyes of possible early risers.

When they were out of sight of the clearing, Legolas squatted down and pushed the key into the dirt between two large tree roots. "We must hurry," he whispered, as he gained his feet. "Dawn is almost here, and those creatures will likely be stirring soon."

Their goal now was to travel under cover of the trees until they reached the hut area, where they felt sure their confiscated weapons were located. They hadn’t worked any details out beyond that, since their original idea was to play out whatever opportunity offered itself to them. They would need to take this escape one step at a time. And time was not on their side.

With stealthy movements, honed over the years and used often, they moved through the trees like ghosts. They made their way toward the trolls’ shelters.

*~*~*~*

Several trolls emerged from their huts, yawning, stretching and scratching themselves. The movements were slow and deliberate, as if they hadn’t a care in the world. Considering their size and the fact they were the absolute rulers of their territory, they had no reason to think otherwise.

One of the creatures glanced toward the cages and saw that Pickett was sitting on the ground obviously asleep. The clearing was still in partial gloom, so he couldn’t see into the cages well enough to tell there was anything amiss. He grinned and shook his head, deciding he wouldn’t wake the sleeping troll. He, like most of them, enjoyed seeing a fellow troll get into trouble with Hatch. For one thing, it kept the leader’s attention off of them.

It took only a few more moments for Hatch to make his way out of the largest hut in the camp. After doing his own more pronounced yawning, stretching and scratching, he also looked toward the cages, though it was more of a casual glance than anything else . When he saw Pickett, his reaction was far different than the previous troll’s had been. Hatch’s anger rose in a flash, and he marched toward the unsuspecting guard.

Pickett jerked awake when a particularly vicious kick connected with his left thigh. At first, he didn’t know what had happened, just that a sharp pain was present. As he leaned over to examine his leg, he saw two very large feet next to him. His gaze moved straight up until it rested on the very angry face of Hatch.

"Git on yer feet," the leader commanded, kicking Pickett again on the same leg.

Pickett quickly to his feet and then spoke before thinking. "I was tired, so I was just restin’ my legs some," he said. He tried to ignore the pain Hatch’s kicks had inflicted. "I could still guard...." He didn’t get the chance to finish.

Hatch backhanded the smaller troll across the face. "You don’t rest while yer watchin’ prisoners." As he said the last word, he poked his finger toward the cage that should have held the golden-haired prisoner. But when the troll leader looked into the cage, all he saw was empty space. Hatch screamed in rage, "Where is he?"

Pickett turned his gaze to where Hatch’s finger still pointed. His eyes went wide. "I don’t know," he replied helplessly. His words were met with another, and much harder, backhand, this time over his ear. He winced but said nothing.

Hatch went to the cage door and jerked on it. It didn’t budge. When he looked down, he saw that the padlock was securely fastened. He rushed over and saw the same thing at the cage that should have contained the dark-haired captive. He screamed again, this time attracting other trolls, who ran over to see what had enraged their leader.

Livid, Hatch swung back to face Pickett. "How’d they git loose with the doors locked?"

His leader’s narrowed eyes and growling voice made Pickett stutter his answer. "I...I...locked ’em up just like I...I was told to." It was a feeble attempt to defend himself, but it was the truth as he knew it. His befuddled mind couldn’t understand how the two brothers could have escaped the locked cages. There were no holes to indicate that they had dug themselves out, which would have been a ridiculous notion had he been able to think it through.

Turning and facing the growing crowd, Hatch waved his arms in the air, "Find the prisoners!" he yelled. "Don’t let them two git away!"

There was no hesitation, as the other trolls began to scatter, rushing to obey the orders they had been given. Some ran across the clearing to check the other side, and some ran around behind the cages to begin looking amongst the trees.

Satisfied his orders were being obeyed, Hatch turned a furious face toward the hapless Pickett. He pointed to one of the middle cages. "Git in there and don’t come out ’til I say so."

With his head down, Pickett did as he was told. He sat down on the ground and put his head in his hands. He thought and thought but just couldn’t figure out how the two brothers had done it.

He clearly remembered getting the key out of his pocket and locking the cage of the sick brother. Then he had gone to the other cage and locked that one after the dee-formed brother entered it. He knew he had done it all right. How then had they escaped? He had heard other trolls say that there were some people out in the world who were magic. Were these brothers two of those people? Why then would they have gotten themselves caught in the first place, if they were magic? Nothing made sense to the bewildered troll.

The confusing thoughts, coupled with Hatch’s powerful slaps, had given Pickett a headache, so he just concentrated on his current miserable situation. And he didn’t like those thoughts, at all.

Meantime, Legolas and Aragorn could clearly hear the trolls shouting. "It sounds like they have discovered our absence," the elf said.

"I was hoping we’d have more time. We aren’t even halfway around the clearing yet."

The two were just barely able to see the trolls’ camp through the leaves that were constantly shifting in the early morning breeze.

Legolas looked up into the trees. The sun had risen, and he could see it reflecting off of the very top of the tree he and Aragorn were standing behind. It would take a while longer before any sunlight shone directly down on the clearing, but not long at all before the whole area would be light enough to easily see by.

Just then, both elf and ranger heard the tramping of troll feet not too far from them. The trees were close enough together so that they not only offered the two friends a measure of security but also tended to slow the huge creatures down somewhat. They couldn’t run through the forest the way Legolas and Aragorn could. The only problem was that there were quite a few trolls in the area, and the two could run into one at any time.

Realizing there was only one thing to do, Legolas pointed upward. He and Aragorn would have to take to the trees.

In less time than it took the ranger to nod his agreement, Legolas had disappeared into the overhead foliage, making Aragorn shake his head rather than nod it.

Aragorn couldn’t hope to negotiate a tree the way a wood-elf could, of course, but he was no slouch when it came to climbing. Grabbing the nearest branch, he pulled himself up, aided by Legolas’s helping hand.

Carefully, they made their way up, and by the time the first troll appeared directly under them, Legolas and Aragorn were far enough up to be out of the troll’s sight.

Several more trolls crossed below the two friends, but evidently it hadn’t occurred to any of them that the two escapees might be in a tree and not on the ground. They probably weren’t used to having their prisoners anywhere but in their cages.

Aragorn wasn’t comfortable on the branch he was standing on. He had been forced to stop short of where the much lighter Legolas had gone. However, it was the quick arrival of the trolls that made him freeze before he had found a suitable position. He was balancing on the balls of his feet with his heels touching nothing but air. Aragorn firmly gripped the branch just over his head. Looking down, the man couldn’t see the creatures moving around, but he could easily hear them.

Two branch levels above him, Legolas not only heard the huge creatures but was able to ask the tree to move its leaves just enough for him to look between them to view the ground far below. What he saw froze him.

One of the trolls had stopped directly under the tree the two friends were hiding in. The creature rested one hand on the trunk of the tree and looked around him but saw nothing.

For some reason even he probably couldn‘t have explained, the troll decided to look above him, and when he did, he found himself staring straight into the bright, unblinking eyes of the elf.

TBC

Chapter Six

Standing under the large tree, the troll frowned and stared more intensely up into the heart of the foliage over his head, not sure exactly what it was he was looking at. He rubbed his eyes with his fists and when he looked again, there was nothing but gently fluttering leaves in his field of vision. It must have been a bird or a squirrel, he decided. Trolls were not patient creatures or ones prone to thinking too much, so this one just shrugged and lumbered off to resume the hunt for the missing prisoners. He was never to know that he had actually found them and then walked away.

Legolas took a deep breath, held it a moment, and then let it out very slowly. That had been much too close for comfort. It was easy for Legolas to figure out what had happened.

The tree had felt the instant rise in the elf’s level of fear and had moved its leaves to shield him. Luckily, it was the right move to make, and the wood-elf offered the tree his immense gratitude for saving himself and Estel.

Of course, the danger was far from over. There were trolls coming and going in all directions. Since the same territory was being covered over and over, there was obviously no coordination among the searchers. One moment the area where Legolas and Aragorn were hiding was completely devoid of the large creatures. The next moment, it seemed to be swarming with them. Thus the haphazard search left the two friends no way to figure out how much time they might have to climb down and flee the area.

It was during one of the relatively quiet times that Aragorn took the opportunity to get into a better position so that he could be more secure, not to mention more comfortable. He did so by carefully moving his feet, resulting in both now being firmly planted atop the branch he was standing on. He changed the grip he had on the branch above him. As he released each hand, he opened and closed this fingers to try and relieve the ache that had developed. Stretching his shoulders muscles soon followed. It was a brief, but welcome, respite before he had to re-grip the branch.

Making these necessary adjustments also allowed him to give his whole body a short rest, though he retained enough tension to be able to move quickly, if need be.

Having this hiding place in the midst of the trolls was well worth any discomfort he might be feeling, so complaining was out of the question - at least for now. Comments on being stuck in a tree with the lithe wood-elf would, however, be too good an opportunity to pass up at a later time. Legolas would be expecting some remark or other from him. Aragorn refused to think that the current predicament would not be resolved in their favor and thus allow for a little humor.

Due to the trolls’ disorganized search patterns, it became apparent that the two friends were going to have to wait the creatures out, and it looked as though the wait was going to be a long one.

The sun had just risen above the treetops.

*~*~*~*

Hatch listened to the other trolls shouting and stamping through the forest but did not join them. He wanted to search, as well, but first he had another task in mind.

The troll leader walked over to the cages and stopped in front of the middle one that now contained a forlorn Pickett. He slammed his hand into the bars.

Pickett had not seen or heard Hatch’s approach, so the resulting noise startled him. His whole body jerked, and he almost fell over backwards.

“Git our here,” Hatch commanded in a tone that brooked no argument or even hesitation.

Pickett got to his feet and quickly, though reluctantly, exited the cage to stand directly in front of Hatch. His posture had a defeated look to it while his eyes reflected naked fear. He knew he was in for a tongue lashing, and possibly a physical one.

Hatch put his hands on his hips and stared down at the shorter troll with narrowed eyes. “How did they git out?” he demanded in a menacing tone.

Pickett didn’t think he could be in any more trouble, if he had unlocked the doors himself and then told the prisoners to run. Looking down at his very large, hairy feet, the troll replied, “I don’t know. I locked ’em up and stood right here in front like always.”

“You was asleep,” Hatch pointed out.

Picket nodded. “But, Hatch, they couldn’t’ve gotten loose, even if I was sleepin’. The doors was locked.”

“Then you tell me how they did it, you worthless piece of dung.”

All the hapless Pickett could do was shrug his shoulders and continue looking down.

“So they wiggled outa them cages and left ’em locked. Is that how they did it?” Hatch obviously didn’t believe his own words.

It wasn’t until then that Pickett looked over at first one padlock and then the other. They were still as secure as he had left them. He was really confused now. “They was magic,” he blurted out. It was the only thing that came to him.

Hatch cuffed Pickett on the left side of his head. Then, for good measure, he did it again on the other side. “They wasn’t magic. If they was, they’d never’ve got caught to start with.”

The troll leader was tempted to make Pickett go out and join the rest of the trolls in their search, but that would have been too easy. Also he didn’t trust this one to do even that with any kind of reliability. “Give me the key,” Hatch demanded, as he held his hand out.

Pickett rammed his hand down into the pocket of his dirty jerkin and moved it around inside. He soon stopped, a look of near horror on his ugly face.

Hatch’s expression showed that he was undoubtedly getting impatient. Finally, he barked out, “Well, give it here.”

“I don’t have it,” Pickett mumbled.

Not sure he heard right, Hatch asked, “You what?”

Rather than raising his voice to be sure he was clearly heard, Pickett mumbled even lower, “I don’t have it.”

Hatch was too impatient to ask again what Pickett had said. Instead he just grabbed the other troll’s arm and jerked it out of his pocket, prepared to rip the key from Pickett’s palm. When he saw the empty hand, he glared at Pickett with fury in his black eyes. “Where’s the key?”

Pickett shrugged piteously. “I don’t understand where it went.”

To say Pickett’s declaration was pathetic was an understatement. However, Hatch was not moved in the slightest by the other troll’s bewilderment.

“They stole it from you, you worthless piece of dung.” The troll leader was so enraged, he couldn’t even come up with a different insult from the one he had used a moment ago.

Shoving Pickett back into the cage, Hatch said, “If we don’t get them two back, you’ll suffer what they would’ve.” The threat was not an idle one, and Pickett knew it.

Hatch slammed the door. It clicked shut but remained unlocked. Hatch was sure that Pickett wouldn’t dare leave without permission. If he somehow worked up the courage to get away, he’d better keep going until he left troll territory far behind, because if he was caught, Hatch would kill him.

*~*~*~*

There was no problem for Legolas to outwait the trolls while sitting up in the large tree. He not only would not be uncomfortable, he would be quite happy doing so for hours on end. His calm demeanor proved that.

Aragorn, on the other hand, was already getting weary of standing on one branch and tightly gripping the one above him. His will was as strong as ever, but his body was betraying him more than he cared to admit.

“How are you doing?” Legolas asked an hour after the sun had risen above the trees.

“Not as well as I would like.” the man replied. He hated admitting that fact to the elf, but he knew he had to be truthful. Too much was riding on them staying hidden and thus staying safe for him to let pride get in the way.

From above, Legolas said, “I can come down and help you get settled on that branch.”

“It wouldn’t help, I’m afraid. Sitting down on this branch would be even worse than it is now, after a while.” He remembered more than one time when his bottom had pained him after spending time sitting with the elf in a tree very much like this one. A soft chuckle told him that Legolas also remembered such times.

“Of course, I can’t stay like this much longer, either,” the ranger unhappily pointed out. He looked up at the elven archer. “I don’t hear any trolls nearby. Can you hear any shouting?”

Shaking his head, Legolas said, “None of them are shouting. They went silent a while back, but I do hear a lot of crashing through the underbrush to the east.”

“Do you think they’ve left this area and gone that way to search?” the man asked hopefully.

“Probably. However, I don’t trust them to be gone entirely. I think we should wait until I hear nothing at all from them for a time.”

Aragorn pursed his lips. “How did I know you were going to say that?”

“Sorry, Estel, but I would not care to leave the safety of this tree too soon and run in to any of those creatures. We worked too hard to get this far.” Though he had to concede it wasn’t very far at all, as distance goes.

Aragorn couldn’t argue with the elf’s logic. He would just have to suck it up and endure the position he was in for a while longer. He was getting to hate those three words. He was a ranger, after all, and rangers were patient people, either by nature or by training. They were also not new to discomfort.

There was one other fact that had a bearing on the situation: Aragorn was still young yet. He had not lived long enough to fully develop the maturity and confidence he would be renowned for in the years to come.

Happily, it wasn’t too long before Legolas slid down next to Aragorn and said, “I think they have moved farther out into the forest. It is probably a good time to climb down and retrieve our horses and our weapons and get away from this place.” Legolas grinned and swept his arm downward. “Shall we?”

“I thought you’d never ask.”

Legolas held on tightly to the ranger’s arm, as Aragorn let go and bent down so he could grab the branch he was standing on. He swung down to the one below it. He was joined by the nimble elf, who was beside him in a flash. The maneuver was repeated until both friends found themselves on the lowest branch.

“Stay here,” Legolas whispered, and before Aragorn could do more than think about opening his mouth, the elf was on the ground. He soon disappeared from Aragorn’s sight.

Making a quick check of the nearby area, Legolas satisfied himself that no trolls were close enough to intercept them. He returned to stand directly below Aragorn. “Jump,” he told the man.

Not taking the time to think about what he was about to do and trusting Legolas implicitly, Aragorn jumped. He barely felt himself touch the hard-packed earth, as Legolas grabbed him and eased the last few feet of his decent.

The two friends stood for a moment and grinned at each other before crouching down to further hide their location.

“Where do you think our weapons are being kept?” Aragorn whispered.

“I would say the leader would keep them in his hut,” the elf answered. “I doubt he trusts the others with any of them.”

“My thought, as well. I just hope that Hatch isn’t carrying my sword with him. I won’t leave without it.” The ranger’s stubborn streak was firmly intact.

Legolas put his hand on the man’s shoulder. “Do not worry, Estel. We will not leave without all of our weapons.” He understood exactly how Aragorn felt, because he didn’t intend on leaving his bow or his knives behind. Of course, their lives came first. It just remained to be seen if they could get away with all of it.

Those words from Legolas were all the ranger needed. “Let’s go.”

Keeping low, they began to run through the trees. They stayed out of sight of the clearing, as they moved in a wide circle around the nearby camp.

Legolas soon brought them both to a stop.

A little anxious, Aragorn asked, “Do you hear a troll?”

“No, but I think Hatch’s hut is right through there.” He had turned to the left and was now pointing that way.

The two crept to the edge of the trees and peeked over the tall grass that grew between the trees and the ring of huts.

Aragorn was not surprised in the slightest when a hut, larger than its neighbors, appeared right in front of them.

There were no sounds to be heard in the camp.

“The trolls must have gone a long way off looking for us,” Aragorn remarked.

“I do not think they have the least notion that we would not have run as far and as fast as we could once we escaped the cages.”

Legolas then made his way to the rear of the hut with Aragorn right on his heels. They both flattened themselves against the lopsided wooden slats and inched their way to the corner.

Holding up his hand to stay the ranger’s progress, Legolas carefully peered around the corner, and when he didn’t see any trolls, he motioned for Aragorn to follow him.

The same maneuver was repeated, as the elf came to the front corner, which was visible from the clearing. The large fire burned low but no trolls were in sight.

“No one is home,” Legolas remarked.

“They must all be out looking for us.” The ranger grinned. “It’s nice to know we’re so popular.”

“I can do without that kind of attention,” the elf commented dryly.

Archer and ranger quickly made their way into the hut, moving into the shadows on either side of the door, just in case one of the camp’s inhabitants showed up and might be able to spot them in the sunlight shining into the hut through the open doorway.

Now it was time to begin the next part of their escape.

TBC

Chapter Seven

The sight that greeted the two pairs of eyes as they adjusted to the dim interior was incredible. There were all sizes and type of bones, some still with shreds of meat attached, littering the blood-stained floor. Along one side wall was a large pile of bones that had been stacked up like cord-wood. It was the only ‘neat’ thing in the room, and appeared to have been set up as some kind of trophy of Hatch’s kills.

Neither Legolas nor Aragorn looked too closely at what they saw, not wishing to be able to identify any that may have belonged to people rather than animals. They just didn’t want to know, since these victims were far beyond any help.

The horrible stench nearly made the two friends pass out right then and there. It had to be experienced to be believed.

“Rotting orc carcasses don’t smell this bad,” Aragorn commented, though it was only a slight exaggeration. He put one hand over his nose and mouth while his other hand went to his stomach almost protectively. It was hard for him to suppress his gag reflex.

As bad as it was for Aragorn, it was even worse for Legolas. Vision and hearing were not the only things that were more sensitive in elves. The foul odor hit Legolas’s nose like a physical blow, and he had actually taken a step back, fighting not to sway on his feet.

To top it all off, huge black flies buzzed all around them. They seemed to be examining the new arrivals. They evidently found their previous occupation more to their liking, so in short order, they had settled back on the bones.

Both Legolas and Aragorn took a moment to overcome their instinctive reactions. The need to hurry was pressing in on them, and they had to fight their bodies’ desires to flee out into the open air.

Forcing aside the offensive sight and smell, Legolas turned to his friend. The look he gave the man spoke volumes. Neither wanted to get close to, much less touch, anything in this filthy hovel but touch things they must.

Aragorn didn’t say anything. He just shrugged his shoulders in resignation.

A crudely made bed sat along the rear wall. It was hard to tell if what lay on top were bedcovers or just a pile of dirt and grime. Whatever it was, it added its own offensive smell to the putrid air inside the hut. So it was with great reluctance that Legolas and Aragorn headed for it to begin their search. Both were batting the flies that were still airborne out of their way.

Aragorn spotted a tattered corner of what he decided must be a blanket. Taking a deep breath, he reached for it like someone who was trying to avoid being bitten. He clamped his forefinger and thumb over the filthy fabric and pulled. It didn’t move, as his fingers came loose from it. Aragorn pursed his lips and tried again with more fingers and more force. Still the cover didn’t budge.

Legolas regarded his friend with amusement in his eyes. “Having any luck?” the elf asked needlessly. He had seen what had happened.

“Yes, and it’s all bad,” Aragorn grumbled. He finally grabbed the blanket with both hands and yanked it as hard as he could.

The resulting shower of dirt and dust filled the air around them. Both backed off to get clear of the now suffocating air.

“If I wanted to be choked to death, I would have let the trolls catch me,” Legolas said between coughs.

Aragorn glared at the elf. “You and your superior elven strength could have helped, you know.” He fought the urge to cough, so his stinging words would have more impact.

The elf was still amused. “But it was so much more fun watching you do it.”

“Then don’t complain about the outcome.” Those words were punctuated by a sneeze, quickly followed by two more.

The verbal exchange may have bordered on the humorous, but the circumstances were far from it. The weight of the situation was soon pressing in on them once again.

Legolas ran to the doorway and peered outside. It wouldn’t do for a passing troll to hear the sneezes and come running in. He saw no one. Relieved, the archer returned to where Aragorn stood looking down at the bed.

Until the dust settled a bit more, all that was visible was a thick layer of the stuff. Then gradually the scene became clearer. Under the dirt on the bed were lumpy clumps of dried grass that didn’t look as though they had been changed since the bed was built, and who know how long that had been. Under the grass a row of crooked boards holding it all up was barely visible. Despite the haphazard look of the bed, it was strong or it never would be able to hold a troll.

“What is that?” Legolas asked, pointing down into the mass in the center.

Aragorn peered where Legolas was pointing but could see nothing that might have drawn the elf’s attention. He just shrugged.

Sticking his face down closer, Legolas made a small noise that Aragorn couldn’t quite interpret. “What did you find?” the man asked.

The elf didn’t answer, because he wasn’t sure what he had seen was what he thought it was. He reached down and curled his fingers under the side board of the bed frame. “Help me turn this thing on its side.”

Knowing Legolas had found something worth investigating, the ranger moved up and grabbed the side board a couple of feet from where the elf’s hands had been placed.

Together they pulled the heavy bed up until they could get their hands under it. With a strong push, they succeeded in turning the bed onto its side. It hit the floor with a heavy thump. Most of the dirt and dead grass was trapped between it and the wall.

The two companions stopped for a moment and held their breath, listening for the sound of running troll feet. When only silence greeted them, they examined the bottom of the bed.

Legolas smiled while Aragorn’s eyes went wide. “I don’t believe it!” the man exclaimed.

There, lashed to the underside of the bed with rope, were Legolas’s twin knives. It was the flash of one of the blades that had first attracted the elf’s attention. It didn’t take him long to untie the knots and free the knives. He examined them carefully to make sure Hatch hadn’t damaged them with careless handling. He sighed in relief, when he saw that they were in good shape. He quickly stuck both in his belt and then turned his attention to the ranger. “I am sorry, Estel. Your sword is not here. I imagine Hatch has it?”

The ranger was glad that Legolas had found his treasured knives, but he was disappointed that his sword had not been found. He couldn’t really say that he was surprised, though, considering how much the troll leader had admired it, when they were first captured. “I wonder why Hatch didn't keep your knives, though, of course, I'm happy he didn't."

"I have no idea what goes on in the head of a troll," the elf replied. "It would be much easier to escape, if we could predict what those creatures had in mind."

"So, we’ll just have to get my sword from Hatch.” Aragorn said with determination.

When Aragorn walked around the front end of the upturned bed, he saw the end of the elf’s bow lying under it. “There it is!”

Another strong effort was required to pull the heavy bed far enough away from the wall for Legolas to reach behind it and pull the bow free.

The archer ran his fingers down the carved wood. Every inch of the bow was as familiar to him as his own hand, so he would easily be able to detect any damage, even minute, that it may have sustained. “It is all right,” he declared with immense relief.

Aragorn smiled and put his hand on the elf’s shoulder, gripping it firmly. He had discovered and then picked up Legolas’s quiver while the elf was checking his bow. He handed it to the elf. “It looks like all your arrows are here, as well. I’m sure we’ll need them before this is all over.”

A quick search of the hut followed but none of their other knives were found. It was logical to assume that the trolls must have divided them up among themselves. That was not good, because it meant they would have to overpower several trolls to retrieve the small blades. Worse yet was the fact that they had no idea which trolls had them. Even so, the next priority was Aragorn’s sword. Hard as it would be, if the need arose, the knives could be left behind.

“We had best be on our way,” Aragorn said. He wanted to be sure there was nothing that might prove beneficial to them left behind here, but he was also anxious to leave.

*~*~*~*

Pickett heard the sound of a heavy tread approaching his cage. He was sure it was Hatch, coming to inflict some kind of harsh punishment on him. He assumed that the captives had made good their escape, and he was now about to pay for it. He kept his head down. It would be all too soon before he had to look into his leader’s angry face.

“Look who’s in the cages now.”

Pickett’s head came up. The sarcastic voice was not that of Hatch. When he looked at the troll that now stood in front of him, he saw it was the one that considered himself the third-in-command. His name was Nater, and for some reason, Pickett had never been afraid of him.

“What do you want?” Pickett asked in a derogatory tone.

“I came back to get somethin’ fer Hatch. I saw you was in here. Yer in big trouble.”

“Not from you,“ Pickett spat, before turning away. He wasn’t going to give this troll any more of a reason to ridicule him.

When Nater saw he couldn’t get a rise out of Pickett, he also turned away and headed for Hatch’s hut.

*~*~*~*

Just as Legolas and Aragorn were finishing up their search and about to leave, a dark shadow began to grow in the bright sunshine coming in through the doorway. Legolas caught sight of it out of the corner of his eye. He spun around and saw a troll approaching. There was no chance to make it outside of the hut and out of sight before the troll reached them. They could have slipped behind the bed, but there was no way the fact it was upturned could go unnoticed.

Grabbing Aragorn’s arm Legolas whispered, “Troll coming.” He then reached down and picked up a large piece of board and handed it to Aragorn before pointing to the near side of the doorway, indicating the man was to go that way. He himself grabbed a large bone and quickly darted to the far side. When he got into position, he indicated that the ranger should swing low.

Aragorn nodded his understanding. He mouthed the words, “How many?”

Legolas held up one finger before flattening himself against the front wall.

The troll didn’t even hesitate before entering the hut. It took a moment for his eyes to adjust to the dim interior. When they did, he spotted the overturned bed. He took a couple of steps toward it before stopping, a broad frown creasing his face. He didn’t see the two beings behind him.

In true troll fashion, the creature stood and pondered why Hatch would turn his bed on its side. He scratched his head in bewilderment.

While the troll was totally preoccupied trying to figure out the puzzle, Aragorn took the opportunity to strike. The ranger held the board sideways to concentrate the force of the blow. The resulting vibration traveled up the man’s arms, causing him to wince. It was offset by the satisfying sound of the crunching impact.

The troll took a few seconds to react, but when he did, he bent down to see what had caused the pain he now felt.

Legolas wasted no time in raising the piece of bone he held, which looked like the thigh bone of a cow, and bringing it down hard on the back of the troll’s neck.

The creature dropped like a rock and lay motionless amid the filthy debris on the dirt floor.

Aragorn didn’t think a troll would be able to reason out the concept of playing dead to lure an enemy in close. Just to make absolutely sure, though, he kicked the beast several times. “Well, if he was faking, I doubt he is now.” He stepped back and turned toward the door.

The elf grinned in agreement. “Let us leave. We can work out later how we will get the rest of our weapons.” He picked up his bow and quiver and took one step toward the door. The next instant Aragorn was flying backwards past him, his body slamming into the back wall. The man slid down next to the overturned bed.

Shocked, Legolas looked toward the doorway and saw the huge form of Pickett filling the entrance.

TBC

Chapter Eight

Once the surprise of Pickett’s sudden attack on Aragorn had worn off, Legolas’s first reaction was extreme anger. He wanted to grab the bone he had used on the unconscious troll and charge Pickett with it. Fortunately, reason prevailed, and the elf‘s thoughts instantly shifted to Aragorn.

“You an’ yer brother tricked me,” Pickett declared unhappily.

Ignoring the huge beast, Legolas ran to Aragorn and knelt down beside him. It didn’t take a healer to see that the man had been knocked out cold. The elf carefully lifted him up by the shoulders and saw the beginnings of a bruise on the left side of Aragorn’s fast-swelling jaw. A bruise was also forming on his neck.

“We did not trick you. You fell asleep,” Legolas said firmly over his shoulder. “We merely wished to leave here and return to our home.”

“You two almost got me killed by Hatch. Now he’ll have you to beat up, not me.” The troll spoke with an air of triumph that he had deflected the anger of his leader off of himself on onto these two.

It occurred to Legolas that Pickett had suddenly become a complete opposite to the pathetic creature he and Aragorn had known before. There was no mistaking that this version was potentially dangerous. Pickett could well decide not just to hand Hatch two captives but to hand him two dead ones.

“I just about liked you,” Pickett said, his former pathetic tone almost coming through his words. Then the anger returned. “But you stole my key and ran away, leavin’ me to face Hatch.”

“We do not have your key,” Legolas declared. His statement was true enough, since he had buried it in the woods right after they had escaped the cages.

“I ain’t figured it out yet, but I know you did it.”

Legolas was well aware that once creatures with minimal brain power made up their mind about something, it usually stuck and couldn’t be budged. Such was the case with Pickett right now. The troll was convinced he had been tricked and that was that, as far as he was concerned.

“Git him up,” the troll demanded, abruptly changing the subject.

“He is unconscious,” the elf remarked irritably. He was worried about Aragorn and wanted Pickett to shut up and go away, and it had nothing to do with wanting to be free to escape.

Pickett narrowed his eyes. “What’s that mean?”

“It is similar to sleep, but he cannot just wake up.” Legolas suddenly realized the absurdity of trying to explain the meaning of a word to this creature, like he was a child.

“It’s another trick. Wake him up.” Pickett insisted. He was not going to accept anything that ran contrary to what he believed. He reached down to grab Aragorn by the arm.

Without thinking, Legolas pushed the troll’s hand away angrily. “I will carry him.” To himself he said, ‘Just keep your filthy hands off of him.’

The elf gently picked Aragorn up and cradled him in his arms. He then turned to face Pickett. If the expression on Legolas’s face didn’t inform the troll of the elf’s total lack of fear, the look in his eyes did.

Pickett let out a low growl, showing that he was not intimidated. Nonetheless, he stepped out of the way and let Legolas move out of the hut ahead of him. Once outside, the troll swept his arm toward the cages.

Sighing, Legolas moved across the camp with his burden, though that was one description he would never use in reference to an injured friend. He stopped several feet from the metal bars, gritting his teeth at the thought of being put inside those bars again.

Since both of the smaller cages were locked, and the key was missing, Pickett pointed to the very center cage where he had most recently been held. “Git in that one. It’s where Hatch put me after you got away.” The concept of irony was beyond him, yet the idea of these troublesome brothers being put in the same place he had been held in for letting them escape pleased him.

Legolas frowned. How had he missed seeing Pickett, if he had remained in the camp? Legolas shook off the mental question. Time enough later to think about that. Legolas entered the cage.

This time around, Pickett stood facing the metal prison and watched the two recaptured beings.

The elven prince paid no attention to what Pickett was doing. All he had on his mind was helping Aragorn. He carefully laid the ranger down on his stomach and gently turned Aragorn’s face away from him, so he could have a better look. Parting the dark hair in back of the ranger’s head, the elf made his examination both by sight and by feel.

After several moments of careful inspection, the archer found evidence of a hard hit to the head and decided that Aragorn probably had a mild concussion. Luckily, the knot that had formed under the skin was not bleeding.

Suddenly, Aragorn’s eyes snapped open. He tried to jerk his body up and wondered why all he saw was dirt. He rolled over on his back but could move no further. Lifting his head, he saw two slender hands pressed against his chest. It was an all- too-familiar position he found himself in.

The man moaned, more from the realization that he was hurt - yet again - than from any pain his injuries were causing him. However, he quickly became aware of a throbbing headache.

He slowly lowered his head and then looked up to see an upside down elven face suspended above him. He also recognized the worried look on said elven face. “What happened?” he asked in a slightly disgusted tone, knowing for sure now that something had.

“I am pleased to see your eyes open, Estel. As for what happened, Pickett sent you flying into the back wall of Hatch’s hut.”

“Ah yes. I remember now.” The ranger struggled sit up. This time no elf was going to hold him down, so Legolas readily offered his help. Aragorn couldn’t hold back both a grimace and a groan.

“Your head sustained a hard blow when it hit the wall,” the elf explained.

Aragorn shook his head, then quickly regretted it. “No, it isn’t my head, though it does throb.”

“It is your back,” Legolas stated with no hint of uncertainty.

“Yes. First the whips, then standing in that tree with my arms over my head. Now this latest assault on my body.” As if to emphasis another injury, he gingerly rubbed his sore jaw, as he worked it from side to side.

Legolas couldn’t help but laugh. “You do seem to be collecting injuries rather swiftly.”

Then Aragorn’s expression turned to bewilderment. “My head must have struck pretty hard, because it just dawned on me that you said Pickett hit me.”

“Slow but sure,” the elf remarked, referring to the ranger’s tardy grasp of what was said when he first came to. “Yes, it was Pickett.” He pointed to the troll a few feet away.

Aragorn looked and saw that it was indeed Pickett standing in front of the cage. The troll’s beady black eyes were glaring at them so intently that Aragorn almost looked down to see if whiffs of smoke were coming off of his body.

Before Aragorn could ask, Legolas said, “He claims that Hatch was going to punish him for letting us escape, so now we are to pay instead.”

“Why am I not surprised at that?” the ranger commented. “I think my poor body is going to be collecting even more injuries before this is all over.”

It was a serious jest, and Legolas vowed he would do all in his power to keep that from happening, or at least to minimize the injuries Aragorn would have to endure. He totally ignored the thought of what hurts his own body was likely in for.

Aragorn swallowed hard, unable to push aside his body’s craving for water. He looked around the cage.

“There was no water for either wounds or thirst,” Legolas replied to the ranger’s fruitless search to have his body and throat refreshed.

Both knew asking Pickett for water was a lost cause. He would as likely give both of them more of his fist.

Pickett listened to the two beings talk, though they were using more of those strange words, and he had no idea what they were saying. He didn’t fear their language. That, he decided, was not what they had used to trick him before. Against his will, he found that the sound of the speech was pleasant to listen to. Had he possessed the capacity to understand beauty, he would have said it was beautiful.

Pleasant though their speech may be, the sight of the two brothers kept the troll’s anger up. He had grown to hate these people, and that kept him from falling under the spell of the Sindarin language. He would be glad to watch the punishment that would be meted out to them. Now, all he had to do was wait for Hatch to return. He was sure that this time he would receive a reward for his efforts in bringing back the two captives.

At Legolas’s stern insistence, and despite Aragorn’s argument that his back stung but that was all, the man now sat quietly while the wood-elf satisfied himself by checking his back for any further damage that might have been done, when the ranger was thrown against the wall.

Finally, Legolas pulled Aragorn’s tunic back up on his shoulders. “The cuts are on their way to closing nicely and only a little red remains.”

Aragorn gave his friend an I-told-you-so look.

“Yes, Estel, I know you told me.” The elf’s tone was indulgent in conceding the ranger’s earlier argument that his back stung a little but had suffered nothing worse from the troll’s unexpected attack. “You could have sustained a broken jaw or even worse, a broken neck.”

Aragorn nodded but then said, “I have a feeling that we may still need to consider those injuries as possibilities.”

Turning the subject back to Pickett, Legolas returned the troll’s even stare. “I do not understand how I could have missed seeing Pickett, if he was in this cage when we entered Hatch’s hut.” The idea that that had happened irked the elf.

“Pickett was in these cages?” It was the ranger’s turn to be puzzled.

“Yes. Hatch put him here for letting us escape. I should have seen him in here.”

“Well,” the ranger mused, “if you look across the camp at the hut, you can see that the fire is still fairly high and sends off waves of heat that distort what lies beyond. He might not have even been in the cage right then. Or he could have been lying down.”

Legolas sighed. “I suppose you are right. Yet, I still think I should have seen him.”

Aragorn clapped his hand on the elf’s shoulder. “You, my friend, sometimes put too much pressure on yourself because of your elven senses. It may come as a big surprise to you, but elves are not infallible.”

Legolas gave the ranger a mock look of horror. “Please do not let my father hear you say that.”

Aragorn started to make a remark about the elven king that he would probably have been glad he did not have the chance to make.

Just then a noise could be heard at the edge of the camp. When Legolas and Aragorn looked in that direction, they saw Hatch returning with several other trolls.

The troll leader did not look toward the cages but headed toward the fire. When he got close, he kicked a large log and sent it flying into the middle of flames. Sparks flew and a pile of burned out branches collapsed under their own weight.

Aragorn could not resist a snide remark. “I guess they couldn’t find the escaped captives.”

“They will soon enough,” Legolas replied dryly. There was little humor in his all-too-true words.

Hatch stomped off toward his hut.

Pickett wasn’t sure what to do. He certainly wanted to tell Hatch that the captives were back in the cages. However, running after him would leave the prisoners unattended in an unlocked cage.

The logical thing to do was shout out to Hatch and get his attention. But Pickett remembered all too well that the leader had once cuffed him on the ear for raising his voice. That Hatch would happily forgive such disobedience did not occur to Pickett, nor did the fact that he would still be in trouble if he didn’t inform Hatch right away.

The elf and the ranger just stared in disbelief at Pickett’s failure to report their recapture. Neither had the slightest notion as to why this was happening.

“I have no idea,” Aragorn said.

“Estel, we must hide my knives. Once Hatch sees his overturned bed and finds that they are missing, he will be back out here angrier than ever.”

Using their bodies to shield their actions, they buried one knife very shallow in the dirt to keep it from being found should they be searched.

Legolas reached out and pushed the other one inside the ranger’s tunic.

“No, Legolas,” Aragorn protested, starting to pull the knife back out again. “It’s your knife. You should keep it.”

Legolas gave the man a warning look of discouragement, as he held Aragorn’s wrists.

“Legolas,” the man said in frustration. When he saw that he wasn’t going to get anywhere in this particular argument, he shook his head. “Stubborn elf.” With narrowed eyes, he said, “I win the next one.”

Legolas grinned. ‘Maybe,’ he said to himself. Then he moved away from that line of discussion and tackled another point regarding the knives. “We can only hope that Hatch will think one of the other trolls took them. I doubt he would think we found them under his bed.”

Unknown to the two friends, the troll they had knocked out had come to and found Hatch’s bed on its side. Thinking he would be blamed for doing it and knowing nothing about the hidden knives, he turned the bed back over and piled the grass and blanket back on it. Then he quickly exited the hut. All this was done while Pickett was watching Legolas and Aragorn and before the others had returned.

It remained to be seen whether this was a lucky break for the elf and the ranger, or whether it would ultimately prove to make no difference at all.

TBC

Chapter Nine

After watching Hatch stride across the camp and enter his hut, it struck Legolas that he could see the doorway of the hut from where he was. That seemed to shoot down one of Aragorn’s theories that the cages couldn’t be seen from the front of the building and that may have been the reason he hadn’t seen Pickett before they slipped into the hut to search for their weapons.

The elf regarded the heat rolling off of the large central fire in waves that swung from side to side, as the wind shifted directions. Had he not known that Hatch was on the other side, the elf wouldn’t have noticed him in the heat’s distortion. That theory seemed to make more sense, so the mystery was solved to Legolas’s satisfaction. It didn’t entirely negate the fact that his pride had still taken a hit, knowing that Pickett had gone completely unseen.

Now Legolas’s undivided attention joined that of Aragorn on the hut’s doorway. Both held their breaths, fully expecting Hatch to come running out and shouting in rage. After all, inside there was an unconscious troll and an upturned bed, which had once held knives that were now missing.

When Hatch did not emerge, the two friends were totally baffled. The only disturbance in the clearing was the noisy return of the other trolls, who had been out searching for them and were now filtering back into camp.

“I don’t understand,” Aragorn commented, a slight frown on his face.

Legolas’s tone and expression were just as bewildered. “Nor do I.”

“Not even that stupid creature could miss seeing another huge troll sprawled out on the floor of his hut, not to mention his bed lying on its side. It makes no sense.”

“Look at Pickett,” Legolas said, jutting his chin toward the troll still standing in front of the cages and looking decidedly nervous.

Pickett’s face was scrunched up, clearly expecting the eruption of his leader just as the captives were. When no such reaction came, he also turned to look toward Hatch’s hut. No one was there. Pickett’s whole demeanor suddenly drained of tension. His reasoning didn’t often turn to conjecture, so if Hatch wasn’t in sight, then Pickett believed all was well.

“Perhaps the troll inside regained consciousness and left,” Legolas offered, unable to think of any other reason for Hatch’s failure to come out and demand to know what had happened. “I cannot explain the bed,” the elf said, as he shrugged his shoulders.

“It wasn’t leaning, and it was much too heavy to just fall back on its own,” Aragorn theorized. The ranger’s eyes lit up, as a possibility came to him. “Maybe the troll came to, grabbed the bed to pull himself up, and it fell back into place.” He grinned at his own logic.

“And with the bed down, Hatch would not know my knives are missing, which is a break for us,” Legolas concluded.

Ordinarily being captured by enemies would be a time to be discussing things much more serious than their current line of conversation. But until they knew what Hatch was going to do, when he finally discovered that they had been returned, there was no reason not to indulge in a little harmless speculation.

“Let’s hope that Hatch has no reason to look under his bed.”

The ranger’s hand went to the long knife tucked securely under his tunic. He still wished that Legolas hadn’t insisted he keep the blade. The words ‘stubborn elf’ came back into his mind.

Just then, Pickett let out a low groan, and both friends looked up at him. The troll had turned back their way with his head down and his shoulders hunched over. He had all the appearance of someone desperately wanting to hide and hoping his efforts to make himself look smaller would do the trick.

Looking out toward the camp, Legolas and Aragorn saw Hatch coming their way. Stomping was a more accurate description. Next to him was another troll, who was talking rapidly in Hatch’s ear while pointing in their direction.

“Peace time is over,” Aragorn said with a resigned sigh. “Things are about to get ugly, I fear.” Legolas didn’t comment, but looking at his blond friend told the ranger that he thought so, too.

Hatch made his way straight toward Pickett, his eyes boring into the hapless troll. As he reached him, the leader jerked him around by the arm and then gave him a hard backhand across the face. “Why did I have to hear from Tack that you caught the prisoners? They was here when I got back. You shoulda told me first thing.”

In pure anger, Hatch raised his hand, and Pickett leaned away, trying to avoid another strike. It didn’t do him any good, because another blow landed, this time even harder and on the smaller troll’s chin.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” Hatch demanded again with his face mere inches from Pickett’s.

Unable to meet his leader’s eyes, but afraid not to answer, Pickett stared at the ground beyond Hatch’s shoulder and said, “I was afraid you’d punish me ’cause they got away while I was watchin’ ’em an’...”

“An’ what?” Hatch snarled, his eyes narrowing dangerously.

“I left the cage after you said don’t.” Pickett’s voice was barely above a whisper. Naively he thought by speaking very low, maybe Hatch wouldn’t hear his answer and wouldn’t bother asking him to repeat himself.

Hatch heard the explanation just fine. “Well, now you git punished twice.”

Hatch, who had not let go of Pickett’s arm, pulled open the door to the cage next to Legolas and Aragorn and shoved the other troll into it. He pushed harder than he needed to, since Pickett wasn’t about to resist. As a result, Pickett fell backwards and landed on his backside. His arms were stretched out behind him for support, so he wouldn’t topple over completely. He didn’t dare move a muscle in protest to the rough treatment, or even to register any discomfort.

Hatch then turned his attention to the elf and the ranger. The scowl he had adopted while dealing with Pickett was still firmly in place. “You two are gonna suffer for makin’ us look fer you.”

Neither captive showed any outward signs of the fear that gripped them. Trolls, they both knew, were brutal by nature, even among themselves. And when it came to tormenting captives, they were absolutely vicious. The two friends already had a painful taste of it the night before.

Turning to the troll, who had told him about the captives’ return, Hatch said, “Tack, you watch ’em. Pickett, too.” He leaned toward Tack menacingly. “An’ none of ’em better git loose.”

“They won’t,” Tack assured his leader with no trace of fear in his voice or on his face. He never did anything, or failed to do anything, that would get himself into trouble. He would never admit it, but he was intimidated by Hatch, and that’s what the leader counted on.

Nodding his approval, Hatch gave a sneering look at Legolas and Aragorn, “Have fun, you two. We’ll have ours later.” Then he turned and left.

Tack glared at the captives, as if to reinforce Hatch’s words. The troll sat down facing the cages and prepared to fulfill his assigned task. He adopted a slightly lopsided sneer that didn’t look like it was going to fade anytime soon.

Not knowing how long they had before the evening’s ordeal began, Legolas and Aragorn decided to try and rest. They needed to gather as much strength as they could. That, however, was easier thought about than done, and they both knew it.

*~*~*~*

Night had fallen and the camp was relatively quiet, as the trolls ate their evening meal. The silence was punctuated by the sounds of slurping and crunching bones, but it didn’t bear thinking about beyond that knowledge. Watching trolls feed was not something anyone not a troll would care to do.

It was Legolas who first realized that the camp had gradually become quiet. He looked out into the clearing and found that Hatch and several other trolls were coming their way. “Estel.”

“I see them,” the ranger replied somberly. “I guess they’re ready now for their after-meal entertainment.”

Hatch brushed past Tack but instead of going to the cage that held the elf and the human, he went to Pickett’s enclosure. “Git out here,” he commanded the troll within it.

Pickett, who had been sitting with his back to the other captives, got to his feet, exited the cage and stood facing his leader. Wanting to look brave, he tried not to show his fear, but he wasn’t very successful at it. He was all but physically shaking.

“It’s time fer yer punishment.” Hatch made the statement with a great deal of glee.

The troll leader turned and walked away, leaving Pickett confused as to why he was being left behind, if he was to be punished.

That puzzle was solved when two trolls grabbed his arms on either side and began dragging him after Hatch.

Legolas and Aragorn were content to stay back and watch whatever was about to unfold. However, it wasn’t surprising that the trolls had other ideas. A couple more of the large creatures soon had the two friends firmly in hand and were marching them off behind Pickett.

“I don’t think I like this,” Aragorn commented.

There was nothing to say to that statement, so Legolas didn’t say anything. He kept his eyes looking forward, hoping he could see what might lie ahead for them. Whatever the trolls were planning, they weren’t ready to reveal it.

When Pickett was taken past the fire, the trolls holding him swung him over toward it, as if they were going to throw him into it.

Pickett screamed and desperately struggled to pull back, eliciting laugher from all the others gathered around.

Seeing Pickett’s reaction to the fire gave Hatch an idea. “Stop,” he yelled out.

Everyone did stop. Even those trolls who had hold of Legolas and Aragorn became rooted to the spot where they stood.

“Make two lines along here,” the troll leader said, pointing on either side of himself from the trees to the edge of the fire.

No one was moving fast enough to suit Hatch, so he shouted, “Move”, to put everyone in motion. It became apparent very quickly that the trolls nearest the fire weren’t very keen to get too close to the flames, which had been fed more wood before their evening meal and was now roaring wildly. Hatch motioned those trolls to spread farther out, widening the path at that end to resemble a funnel.

Hatch then looked toward where Legolas, Aragorn and their guards were standing. “Stay there.”

Once the trolls were in place, Hatch himself grabbed Pickett and pulled him to the far end of the pathway between the two rows.

It was hard to tell whether Pickett knew what was coming or just feared what it might be, because he was struggling even harder than he had before.

“Go,” Hatch commanded and pointed down the path in the direction of the fire.

Pickett didn’t budge. In fact, he turned to run the other way but was stopped and abruptly turned back around. Soon he found himself being roughly shoved forward.

He was pushed along the line, as he was kicked and punched by each of the trolls that he passed. No amount of hunching over did any good. He held his arms up over his head, which was down almost to his chest. The blows not only rained down on his back, but up under his arms, as well.

Twice he was kicked so hard that he almost lost his footing and was just barely able to save his balance. Each attempt to avoid a fist or a foot sent him moving a little closer to the fire.

The trolls that were issuing the punishment held no clubs, however, their fists and feet were like hammers, so it was debatable whether their lack of weapons made much difference.

Legolas and Aragorn stared at the utter brutality of the trolls’ treatment of one of their own. It served to re-enforce their belief in the vicious nature of trolls. It also re-enforced their fears of what was likely to happen to them.

Pickett suddenly went to his knees, while his arms still tried to protect his head. It didn’t take long for Hatch to start shouting for him to get up. His reaction was to hunch down until he was almost lying on the ground.

“Git up, you worthless sack of filth,” Hatch yelled. Unfortunately for Pickett, the troll leader backed up his words with a few well-placed kicks.

Pickett slowly got to his feet. As soon as Hatch stepped aside, the other trolls began their assault again.

The last troll in line used both hands to shove Pickett toward the flames. He yelped, as the heat singed the thick, wiry hair on his body, and he threw himself back away from the pain. He hit the dirt and began scooting backwards as fast as he could get his arms and legs to move.

The horrible odor of burnt hair was carried on the wind and soon filled the clearing. It thrilled the gathering of large creatures and repulsed Legolas and Aragorn.

The trolls all laughed and pointed at Pickett, who was now sitting on the ground and whimpering.

Aragorn tried to muster some sympathy for the pitiful creature, but the memory he had of being slammed into the hut wall by this troll kept him from finding very much of that particular emotion. He flexed his sore back to act as a reminder that Pickett was a troll.

Legolas was fighting his own battle to keep from sympathizing with Pickett. He easily remembered Aragorn’s unconscious body lying in his lap, and his concern for his friend served as the reminder to harden his heart.

Hatch approached Pickett again, this time standing over him. “Git back in the cage,” he commanded. The scorn he felt at the pitiful sight of the beleaguered troll prompted him to give Pickett one last kick.

It didn’t take long for Pickett to get to his feet and flee back to the relative safety of the barred enclosure.

Hatch ignored Pickett’s escape and turned his attention on Legolas and Aragorn.

Running through both of their minds was the prospect that they would soon be experiencing this cruel and potentially deadly game.

TBC

Chapter Ten

Legolas had been intensely concentrating on what was happening to Pickett. It wasn’t that he was overly concerned for the troll. It was mainly to keep his mind off of what was obviously in store for him and Aragorn.

When Pickett left the clearing, Legolas found himself watching the other trolls with just as much intensity. He didn’t like the curl- lipped, teeth-revealing sneers that the trolls had on their faces. It was worse than any look he had ever seen on the hideous faces of orcs.
The trolls’ anticipation of what was planned for the two captives was so evident, it sent chills down the elf’s spine.

Fighting the Shadow that was overtaking his home, not to mention the misadventures, like this one, he and Aragorn had been involved in often led to numerous injuries. Being shot, being stabbed with sword and knife, being poisoned and suffering all manner of tortures were all too familiar to Legolas. Yet of all the painful things he had endured in his long life, being burned was the one he truly feared above all else.

An elf’s rapid ability to heal prevented all but the most grievous flesh-destroying wounds from leaving any kind of scar on the fair skin of the Firstborn. Legolas’s own flesh bore only one scar, and it had been caused by a deep burn, when he was, by human reckoning, still in his teen years.

All the while he had watched Pickett’s ordeal, Legolas had been steeling his nerve against the prospect of being burned again. Legolas’s will was strong, but he could not totally hide his feeling of dread.

When Aragorn saw the elf shudder while staring at the fire almost mesmerized, he remembered the first time he had seen the scar on the inside of Legolas’s right leg just above his ankle. His natural curiosity had made him ask how his friend had received the almost unheard of scar, but Legolas had refused to talk about it, even to his sympathetic friend. Aragorn knew that whatever had happened to cause the scar, it was that incident Legolas was thinking of now.

Aragorn was unable to move any closer to Legolas, so he used his voice to try and comfort the elf. “It will be all right, Legolas.” To himself he said, ‘Though at the moment, I don’t know how.’

“I would rather be in a small, dark cave right now,” the archer whispered back, though he continued to stare at the roaring campfire.

That statement alone told the ranger the intense level of the current emotion running through the wood-elf’s mind. He was forced to admit that the fear running through his own mind was very near to matching what Legolas was feeling.

Hatch made a ‘come here’ motion with his arm, and the trolls holding the prisoners moved them forward. When they reached him, he grinned and pointed to Aragorn. “Take him first.”

Aragorn, despite the fact that he stood straight with his shoulders squared, couldn’t hide the apprehension in his eyes. Yet, he was determined that his knees were not going to buckle, as he faced the end of the path that led to the blazing campfire.

The troll holding Aragorn let go and placed his hands on the ranger’s back. Then the creature gave him a hard shove, almost overbalancing him.

Aragorn had to do a double shuffle to stay upright. No sooner had he regained his balance than the first troll in line on the left-side struck him on the shoulder, spinning him around.

Aragorn was kicked to the opposite line and then struck again and again. After each blow, he was moved forward to the next troll. Aragorn tried to fend off the blows, but he continued stumbling until he was finally brought to his knees.

Before Aragorn could rise, two trolls began pummeling him with their huge fists. Each strike sent a new wave of pain spreading through his whole body.

Hatch shouted, “Better git up. They won’t stop, if ya don‘t.” Then he laughed uproariously, followed by the other trolls, who were watching and waiting for with turn at the man.

Desperate to rise, Aragorn tried to gain his feet, but the blows only served to knock him back to the ground.

One particularly vicious kick to the head sent stars swirling around the edges of Aragorn’s vision, and he could do no more than lay in a heap.

Blows continued to rain down, but Aragorn couldn’t find the strength to fight them off long enough to rise, so he remained where he was. He silently prayed to the Valar and felt no disgrace in begging for their intervention.

Turning his head aside to avoid a fist he could just see out of the corner of his eye coming at him, Aragorn caught sight of the look of horror on Legolas’s face and added a prayer that the elf would be spared this punishment.

Seeing Aragorn barely conscious under the physical assault, Legolas began to struggle, trying desperately to break loose from the troll that held him. It soon became clear that he did not possess the strength to defeat the troll, using force.

To counter the elf’s attempts to break free, the troll simply tightened his hold.

Legolas froze in place until he felt the creature relax slightly, evidently thinking the elf had stopped trying to escape.

Legolas grabbed the only opportunity he thought he might have. He raised both of his legs, hanging all of his weight on the troll’s arms. Then the elf stomped down with both feet on the huge left foot of the creature. When the troll looked down, Legolas jerked one arm free and elbowed him under the chin.

Shocked, the troll rubbed his chin and stared down at his now aching foot.

Legolas easily broke free and ran to Aragorn’s side. At least that was where he was headed. Before he could get there, however, Hatch stuck his foot out and tripped the elf, sending him flying.

As it happened, the archer ended up exactly where he wanted to be but not how he wanted to be. Instead of dropping to his knees so he could offer aid to Aragorn, his head struck the hard-packed earth. The impact did not render him unconscious, but he was definitely stunned.

Enraged that the elf had escaped his guard, Hatch yelled at the trolls nearest the two captives to get them up.

Jerked to their feet, Legolas and Aragorn were both too woozy to offer even token resistance.

Hatch was furious that his plans for the captives had been thwarted yet again. Neither of them would be able to provide the anticipated entertainment, since neither could even walk on their own, much less make it down the line of trolls waiting to pummel them.

Hatch kicked the ground, sending a puff of dust upward from the force. These beings were too puny to endure either of the tortures he had planned for them. First had been the whippings and now this. He kicked the dirt again.

The elf and the ranger soon found themselves being dragged across the clearing. Each was then tied with ropes between two trees. The distance between the trunks was far enough apart to force the arms of the captives to be stretched straight out, putting painful pressure on their wrists, arms and across their shoulders.

Legolas had a deep, slightly slanted cut on the left side of his forehead just below the hairline. Blood was trickling down into his eye. He dipped his head to wipe the red fluid on his tunic, but more soon followed. It wasn’t long before the blood had thickened to the point that it effectively clouded that eye and made it almost useless.

Every inch of the human’s body was aching from the pounding he had received. He also suffered from double vision. It looked like two Hatchs were moving toward him, and the thought struck him that he didn’t know which one to glare at. Aragorn blinked several times and then tried staring at the creature but his vision still wouldn’t focus. He wasn’t sure if he was looking at Hatch’s eyes or his chin.

Hatch reached Aragorn and stood looming high above him. He slapped the ranger across the face and turned away.

‘Thanks, I wasn’t dizzy enough already,’ Aragorn said sarcastically under his breath.

The troll leader was now aiming his fury at Legolas. It was the elf who had broken the guard’s grip and gotten loose. The fact that Legolas had run to his friend and not away from the clearing didn’t matter to him. Getting free was getting free, and that exposed the weakness of the guard, which did not sit well with Hatch.

When Legolas refused to look up at him, Hatch wrapped one hand around the elf’s jaw and forced his head up. “You are gonna pay for what you done.”

With that remark made, Hatch grabbed the rope around Legolas’s left wrist and jerked it as hard as he could.

The tension was already as tight as it would go, so the only give was the elf’s shoulder. And it did. He grimaced, as the end of the bone separated from the socket, causing an agony so sharp that had he not known better, the elf would have thought he had been thrown into the fire, shoulder first. Despite the pain, he steadfastly refused to cry out.

Not satisfied, Hatch reached over to Legolas’s right and grabbed hold of the rope on that side.

The troll yanked on the rope playfully. It was enough to elicite a silent grimace from Legolas, not only because it pulled on his dislocated left shoulder but also because of the anticipation of intense pain. Hatch thought this was fun and demonstrated his pleasure with a huge laugh.

“Legolas,” Aragorn called in Sindarin, “hang in there. I’ll get his attention away from you.”

Knowing there was only one place Hatch‘s attention would be directed if that happened, Legolas shook his head. “No, Estel,” the elf ground out between clenched teeth, “do not provoke him to turn against you.”

Aragorn didn’t listen. “Leave him alone, you coward!” he shouted at the troll leader. To his chagrin, Hatch just looked at him and grinned. “Yer next.”

Still looking at the ranger, Hatch yanked on Legolas’s rope again. This time the force was a little stronger, though it wasn’t enough to dislocate the elf’s right shoulder.

Hatch laughed again. “I was gonna burn both of you, but this’ll be more fun. I’ll ruin your arms and then your legs. Then we can listen to you scream.”

It seemed to Legolas that Hatch was going to incapacitate both of them before long, so neither one of them could escape even if they were untied and left to themselves.

The elf decided he had to act while he still had one good arm and two good legs to work with. Even better was the fact that Aragorn hadn’t been touched as yet. Delay now would result in their slow and painful deaths. There would be no more games of entertainment beyond this day. That he was as positive of as anything.

Legolas took a deep breath and wrapped the fingers of both hands around the ropes holding him. As his body lifted off of the ground, the pain in his left shoulder was so intense he feared he might pass out, but the elf had already steeled himself against it, concentrating instead on doing what needed to be done.

Earlier he had used his feet to stomp on the foot of his troll guard. Now, as he swung his legs up, he held them together and straightened them out. As they moved upward, he locked his knees, turning the limbs into a battering ram.

Pulling his toes toward him, he extended his heels and smashed them into Hatch’s face. One ploughed through the creature’s right eye, while the other slammed into his nose, forcing it up into his brain. All this had happened in less than a second. Now, blood spurted out like a fountain, covering the front of Legolas‘s clothes, as well as his own.

The troll shook violently for several seconds before toppling over backwards like a felled tree.

Hatch was dead before his huge body hit the ground.

Aragorn had seen the elf execute this maneuver before, but it still took him by surprise. He stared down at the dead troll leader.

The other trolls were in even more shock. Every pair of eyes was on Hatch. For several moments, the clearing resembled a still-life painting.

Once he had recovered somewhat, Aragorn looked at the elf. “Legolas, I know you did what you had to do, but how do we get loose from here? Tied up like this, I can’t reach my knife. You just killed their leader, and once those creatures get their wits back, they’ll be coming after us with a vengeance.”

TBC

Chapter Eleven

The trolls, who had been standing around and watching Hatch begin the torture of the captives, were struck speechless by the attack on their leader. The whole incident had taken place so quickly that most of them weren’t even sure if they had actually seen what their eyes were telling them they had seen.

Now, what they saw before them was their leader covered in blood and lying motionless on the ground. No captive had ever done anything like that before, and it was hard for them to take in. They knew that Hatch wasn’t just injured and unconscious. He was dead.

Gradually coming out of their shock-induced lethargy, the creatures began to move forward. Oddly enough, there was nothing menacing in their demeanor. Their expressions reflected only curiosity. It was clear that they weren’t paying the captives any attention whatsoever. Their minds were concentrated solely on Hatch, though there was no sign of sympathy from any of them.

There had been no discussion as to what they should do now. It was as if their actions had been preplanned, and all that remained was for them to carry that plan out.

After sparing no more than a few seconds to stare down at the inert body, two of the largest trolls grabbed the leader’s arms and began to drag him across the clearing. Then they unceremoniously threw Hatch’s body on the fire.

Hissing sparks exploded upward, as the logs on the front side of the pile collapsed under the added weight of the new burden.

Legolas and Aragorn watched the horrific scene unfolding before them in shocked silence. The total callousness with which the trolls had dumped their leader’s body on the fire to be burned was stunning. Hatch might as well have been another log for all the care with which it was being treated.

Legolas had killed the beast out of desperation to save Aragorn and himself from a slow, painful death, and he felt no guilt for having done it. But the coldhearted lack of feeling behind the trolls’ actions made the elf cringe, and it had nothing to do with his own aversion to being burned.

The archer looked at Aragorn, who had turned his head away from the scene and was just now looking back at him.

“I would expect such treatment from orcs, but for some reason, I thought these creatures were a little less barbaric. I was obviously wrong,” the ranger said, still in a bit of shock. He may have been young, but he had already seen more horrible things than he cared to remember. This topped many of them.

“I believe it is less about what they did,” Legolas began to explain, “and more about the callous way in which they did it.”

“I agree,” Aragorn replied, just as a thought began to form in his mind. “Perhaps now they won’t be so anxious to do mere captives more harm, if they cared no more for their leader than that.”

As much as Legolas wanted to believe his friend’s words, he didn’t think that would end up being the case. In fact, he feared that the opposite would be true, and it caused a cold knot to form in his stomach.

He thought back to his attack on Hatch. It had been a necessary one, and he realized that it and what had followed had taken his mind off of his separated shoulder. However, the pain was now becoming too great to ignore.

Legolas shifted his weight over to his left foot and leaned that way, trying to ease the pull on his injury. The knot holding the rope to the tree had tightened somewhat when Hatch had yanked on the rope, causing it to loosen slightly. However, it wasn’t enough to give the elf any real relief.

Aragorn saw the grimace on his friend’s face and knew the reason for it. “Legolas? How bad is the pain in your shoulder?” He asked the question in his most serious tone, hoping to let Legolas know that he was not going to accept the standard reply of “I am fine”.

“It will be all right once the rope is off.” That terse remark was not an entirely honest one, and he was sure that Aragorn knew that, but he didn’t want to worry his friend any more than he already was by telling an outright lie. Legolas followed that up by making an effort to give Aragorn a smile of reassurance.

The answer Legolas had given didn‘t fool Aragorn a second. Since it was more honest than usual, and since he didn’t want to openly disagree with the elf, he chose to ignore it for the moment. “If only I could reach your knife...” he grumbled unhappily instead. He didn’t need to finish the thought to get his point across.

As usual, the two friends each hid their true feelings to save the other from undue worry. And as usual, it wasn’t really working very well.

Meanwhile, the trolls were crowding together in a rough circle. An argument soon broke out, accompanied by loud voices and raised arms. There also appeared to be some pushing and shoving going on.

“I was next to Hatch,” the troll called Tack yelled above the din. “I should be leader now.”

He was quickly shouted down by all the others before another raised voice was added to the mix. “That don’t mean nothing. You gotta prove yerself, an’ you ain’t strong enough.”

“I can beat you,” Tack replied. His voice held a strong note of anger in it.

“I kin beat the both of you,” a third voice yelled, though it didn’t sound very serious, more like a remark to bring about laugher. It did.

“I can beat any of you.“ Tack didn’t like being talked to like he had no standing in the group.

Aragorn may have changed the subject while talking to Legolas, but he still wanted desperately to help the injured archer. He knew, however, that there was nothing he could do for the wood-elf until they were released, so he once again turned his attention elsewhere. This time it was to the disgruntled trolls. “It’s like watching children argue.” ‘Or my brothers,’ he added to himself.

The numerous squabbles of the twins also came to Legolas’s mind. He couldn’t help but smile, though it was only a half-hearted one. Intense pain tended to dull a sense of humor.

The trolls’ arguing continued unabated. “I’m strong enough fer you, Scron,” Tack said, as he poked the other troll in the chest with his forefinger. “Do you want to challenge me?”

Just then, several trolls moved aside, creating a pathway among them. Into the middle of the circle walked Pickett. He slugged first Tack and then Scron in the jaw, knocking them both back.

When Tack tried to lunge at the new arrival, the charging troll had his feet kicked out from under him, and he fell over backwards. A heavy foot soon came down on his stomach. He groaned and rolled over with his arms wrapped around his midsection, effectively taking him out of the proceedings.

There was a collective gasp, as the surrounding trolls stepped back a few paces. This was definitely not the timid, easily pushed-around Pickett they were used to seeing. This was more like a slightly smaller version of Hatch.

“I’m claimin’ leader rights,” Pickett declared. “Do any of you slugs wanna challenge me?” His upper lip curled into a snarl, as his eyes narrowed.

Not one troll moved a muscle. Pickett was not physically threatening, but deep within his eyes smoldered a burning hatred that no one else dared to confront. In fact, each one who was the recipient of his glare, found himself unable to meet it and looked away.

The trolls were so big that the ones on the outside of the group blocked the view of Legolas and Aragorn. It was like trying to look through a tightly packed stand of trees.

“What’s happening?” the ranger asked, not even attempting to hide his impatience.

As expected, the elf said, “I have no idea, but something appears to have been a big surprise to the group. And I believe I heard Pickett‘s voice among them, though I could not make out what was being said.”

He didn’t want to admit that the pain he was enduring was causing a buzzing in his head that made even his acute elven hearing all but useless. Had he been inclined to admit such a thing, his response would have been, ‘You can probably hear better than I can.’ No way was he going to worry Aragorn any further with that piece of information. Let the man think it was all the raised voices together that accounted for his inability to hear everything that was being said.

It was then Aragorn noticed that the cages off to their right were empty. That unexpected realization kept him from picking up on the significance of the fact that Legolas’s hearing wasn’t sharp enough to hear every word the trolls deep, loud voices were saying. “If Pickett’s in there now, I hope it doesn’t mean a nasty surprise for us.”

No sooner had Aragorn made that comment than the trolls nearest the captives began to part. Whatever had happened was about to be revealed.

Legolas had been right, and it was Pickett who walked out of the group and strode toward them. In less than a minute, the second shock was registered on the faces of the captives, because Pickett seemed to be the one in control.

Blinking, Aragorn said, “Please tell me that what I’m seeing doesn’t mean what I think it means.”

“I wish I could, mellon-nin,” Legolas replied, “but I do not have a good feeling about this.”

The ranger agreed. “Neither do I. We should have made friends with him,” He lamented, as he shook his head. “How could someone so pitiful and put-upon take over leadership of these trolls? It makes no sense.”

Pickett stopped in front of the captives and looked from one to the other. “I almost liked you two,” he stated with a note of disgust in his tone. It was plain enough that he no longer had such feelings. “Hatch is dead. I am leader now.”

“How did you...” Aragorn started his question but then stopped. When Pickett turned narrowed eyes squarely on the man, he decided not to say what he was thinking.

If Aragorn had asked his question, and Pickett had been able to explain properly, the troll would have told the ranger how it had all come about.

Pickett had been humiliated since the day Hatch had taken over from the former leader. He kept control by instilling fear and used Pickett, whose physical stature was smaller than his, as an example to the others of what would happen should they step out of line. He also just plain liked to boss the hapless creature around. Hatch had possessed a cruel streak in him that had nothing to do with maintaining control.

To the other trolls, Pickett was weak, scared and easily dominated. Everyone knew he didn’t have the courage to stand up to Hatch. Truth was they didn’t either, but they liked to laugh and taint Pickett just the same. It made them feel superior.

As Pickett had sat in the cages and nursed his burns, his hatred for Hatch had built up. It was doubtful that he would have challenged the larger troll, but Hatch’s death had changed all that. Now was probably the only chance Pickett would have had to assert his new-found courage.

All of these things were vague ideas in his head. The emotions, however, were very strong and clear. He had acted on them by taking the chance. Now he was the leader.

Instead of being grateful to Legolas for giving him the chance to claim leadership by getting rid of his tormenter, Pickett turned his wrath on both captives. Even he didn’t know exactly why. Perhaps he feared the same thing would happen to him at the hands, or rather the feet, of the one with the deformed ears.

Pickett didn’t know that Legolas had a dislocated shoulder, and that was a good thing. Had he been aware of it, the troll would have done more than punch the elf in the chest, which he did now with relish.

The pull on the ropes around Legolas’s wrists, as his body was forced backward, almost broke both of them. The flaming agony that burst through his shoulder was so sudden and so violent that the elf could not hold back a scream before his entire arm went numb. Then he mercifully passed out. His body could barely move, but his head fell forward.

“Legolas!” Aragorn yelled, fully aware of what had happened. He turned gray eyes of burning rage at Pickett, but all he saw was a huge fist moving very fast toward his face. He didn’t have time to turn it aside. The blow caught him on the jaw and knocked him out cold.

Pickett, the former weakling who had now found a backbone, crossed his arms over his chest and roared with laughter.

After enjoying the result of his actions for a moment, Pickett turned to several of the trolls behind him. “Take ’em down and put ’em in the cages. Don’t put ’em together.” His newfound voice of authority pleased him.

He watched as the two unconscious brothers were untied and dragged off. A grin crossed his face, as thoughts of what he was going to do to them began forming in his mind.

During an Age in the distant future, it would be said that those who had been abused often became abusers themselves. Pickett was about to become a prime example of that belief.

TBC

Chapter Twelve

The wonderfully warm and dark place where Aragorn had been residing for the past several hours began to fade away, as his conscious mind struggled to find the waking world. He was soon to regret that it did, because the first sensation that replaced the feeling of security was pain. His whole body was aching.

The next sensation was the very hard ground that he realized he was lying flat on . He groaned, because he was so hoping that he would find himself in his own soft bed in Imladris, being tended to by his father and brothers. It was a hope that he was forced to abandon in short order.

Knowing he would have to face whatever had put him on the ground in so much pain, Aragorn opened one eye. It was the only thing he thought he could move at the time that wouldn’t cause his body to rebel. After a moment, the other eyelid came up. Even with both eyes open, his vision was somewhat blurry.

Almost immediately Aragorn became aware of one particular pain that was more persistent than the others, ans that was saying something. It was his right arm. When he attempted to pull it out from under him, it gave a lively protest for his efforts. He groaned again.

‘How did I end up like this?’ he wondered. ‘Did someone beat me head to toe?’ It felt more like he had been placed in a box and it had been shaken without mercy.

Then he remembered. Legolas!

Aragorn looked around him, but his fuzzy vision kept him from seeing the elf anywhere. Blinking rapidly, the man was able to clear away the clouds. What he saw were the metal bars above and around him. His heart sank. ‘I’m back in one of the cages.’

Aragorn gritted his teeth, as he turned his head to the side in the hopes of finding Legolas lying beside him, but the elf was not there.

The ranger gritted his teeth even harder and slowly pulled himself into a sitting position. The welts on his back stung, as his skin was stretched under the dried blood, which he could feel cracking. He did his best to ignore the pain and focus his attention solely on finding out where Legolas was. Had the trolls taken the wood-elf someplace else?

There was a moment of panic before Aragorn spotted his friend. Legolas was lying on his side in the next cage facing his way. He was dismayed to see that Legolas’s eyes were closed. He was on the other side of his cage and there was too much distance between them for any physical contact.

He wanted to find out how the elf was faring, but he was undecided whether he should try and wake him. Aragorn was sure Legolas needed rest, but it was also important that he have his wounds tended to, especially since the man had no idea how extensive they were.

The ranger didn’t have to think on the dilemma for very long. As he was watching Legolas, the elf began to stir. Aragorn waited for just a moment to make sure his friend was waking and not just shifting positions in his sleep. When he saw that the archer was indeed rousing to consciousness, Aragorn called his name. It wasn’t very loud, but he knew the elf could hear him.

Legolas did hear. He wanted to answer but was struggling to get his bearings. Like Aragorn, the first sensation he felt was pain, very intense pain. He didn’t know how he could have slept through such agony.

His body must have driven his mind to seek comfort in the depths of oblivion, though he realized that while he had been unconscious, he hadn’t really gotten any rest.

His chest was sore from the blow that Pickett had dealt him. His back stung and his head was pounding. However, it was his shoulder that commanded his immediate attention. It felt as if someone was holding a torch to it. Burning. That was the one thing he had been dreading, and now he was feeling its effects without the presence of any flames.

The elf heard his name being called again, a little more urgently. He didn’t want Aragorn to get upset, so this time he answered, as he opened his eyes. “I am awake.”

“Yes, but how do you feel?”

With a heavy sigh, Legolas said, “You do not want to know.”

“Then it must be far worse than I imagine, and believe me, that’s bad enough,” the ranger replied, knowing how reluctant the elf always was to admit to any hurts.

Trying to scoot over to the inside row of bars that their two cages shared cost the man a higher price than he would have paid for himself alone. It hurt, but he kept at it until he reached his goal.

“Can you make it over to me?” he asked Legolas, when he finally reached the bars.

Wanting nothing more than to go back to sleep and find what little comfort he might be able to gain from it, Legolas knew that was not a real option. He nodded and blew out a breath to prepare himself before making the effort to sit up. He made it, but it was a slow process that cost him, as well. More fire flared through his shoulder, down his arm and across his already hurting back.

He tried to remember if he had ever hurt so badly before, but thinking about it was too taxing. Such a comparison didn’t change how he felt now, so the exercise was a futile one, and he abandoned the effort.

Aragorn winced at the obviously painful progress the elf was making to reach him. He was frustrated to the point of anger that he couldn’t do a thing to help. He also felt a little guilty that he had asked Legolas to move at all, but he had deemed it necessary. He assuaged his guilt by reminding himself of that and the knowledge that healers often had to hurt in order to heal.

What concerned him most was the fact that Legolas was holding his left arm close to his body. Something was definitely wrong. He had known that Hatch had hurt Legolas’s shoulder in some way with the rope, but he hadn’t really known the extent of the injury, and of course, Legolas hadn’t told him..

When Legolas finally reached the bars, Aragorn looked intently at the elf’s left shoulder. “It’s dislocated, isn’t it?”

Legolas nodded. “Hatch did it when he first yanked on the rope.”

“And yet you used your arm to pull yourself up so you could kick him,” Aragorn stated flatly. He wasn’t the least bit surprised.

“It had to be done, although it does not look as though having Pickett as the current leader will be much better, if at all.”

“I had hoped he would let us off easy, but I don’t think that will happen. He wants to make up for what Hatch did to him, only Hatch is no longer here.” It was a thought he had had before, and nothing had happened to change his opinion.

There was no arguing with that logic. In fact, Legolas fully agreed with it. “We have to find a way out of here, Estel. I killed Hatch to save our lives. I do not think that has been accomplished yet.”

The healer in Aragorn came to the forefront. “Let me take care of that shoulder before we do anything else.”

Legolas looked at Aragorn with pain-dulled eyes. The only way to keep the resulting agony from happening was to move out of the man’s reach. He didn’t have the energy. Besides, he knew his shoulder would not heal on its own. It had to be put back in place or become irreparably damaged. He had noticed that his fingers were already beginning to go numb, and that did not bode well.

Feeling bad that he would soon be causing his friend even more pain, Aragorn apologized. “I’m sorry, Legolas. This will hurt.”

The elf looked at Aragorn with the unmistakable message that it already hurt.

Aragorn shrugged somewhat sheepishly. Then with a sigh, he reached through the bars and grasped Legolas’s left arm, using both hands to gently pull it toward him.

The elf bit down on his lower lip to keep from vocalizing the pain that movement alone had caused. He knew, however, that worse was about to come. He took a deep breath and then nodded.

Aragorn maneuvered the elf’s arm and popped it into place. At least, he thought it had gone back where it belonged. He wasn’t sure, despite his experience in doing this same procedure. “Does it feel any better?”

Legolas’s eyes, which were tightly closed, snapped open. It wasn’t the question itself that surprised him but the tone with which it was asked. There was uncertainty behind the words. The elf stared at Aragorn, who was forced to explain why he had to ask that question.

“The tissue surrounding the joint is swollen. I think the bone went back into place, but I can’t be sure. It should have been done long before the swelling set in, but circumstances conspired against us. You’ve had this before, so I was hoping you could tell.” Aragorn felt totally inadequate saying that. He was the healer, after all.

Clamping his jaw down hard, Legolas tried to move his left arm. It seemed to move a little easier, but the pain made it hard to tell. “I believe it is where it should be.”

Tears almost entered the ranger’s eyes, as he said, “Try to move it straight back. I hate to ask, but if this doesn’t get done right, there could be permanent damage.”

The elf had heard that before, so he did as instructed. It took him a moment to catch his breath from the strain of fighting the flaring fire again. Finally, he said, “It is in place.”

He carefully placed his arm back against his chest. His expression all but begged Aragorn not to ask him to try moving it again.

Aragorn nodded. “Keep your arm where you have it. The less movement from now on the better.”

“How are you doing?” Legolas asked. The inquiry was made more because of his concern for the ranger’s well-being than just turning the subject away from himself.

“Better than you, I think.”

“That is not saying much, is it?”

“No,” the man had to admit. “I guess it isn’t.” It wasn’t for the first time that Aragorn thought that the two of them made quite a pair when it came to being injured at the same time. Wouldn’t Lord Elrond and the twins be in familiar territory, if he and Legolas could show up in Imladris right about now. Oh, how he wished they were on their way there.

The elf and the ranger were sitting side by side, with their shoulders touching in between the bars. The physical contact gave each of them a measure of comfort.

While Aragorn’s thoughts were of home, Legolas’s were of a more practical nature. He was studying the cages. It beat thinking about pain.

The trolls could not lock the cages with the key missing, a key that the elf had buried in the woods. Just leaving a guard to watch them didn’t seem to be a very good idea. So they had tied the doors shut with heavy ropes, wound around a number of times and then knotted several times. There was also a guard. He was facing them but didn’t seem to be paying them any attention.

The cage that Legolas now occupied was the one he and Aragorn had been in before, so it was the one that had the elf’s second knife buried in it. Ordinarily, he would have retrieved by now, but he didn’t think he could drag himself over to where the blade rested. He absolutely hated being this weak. It went against his very elven nature not to be strong and in control.

Aragorn had stopped daydreaming about Imladris and his family and had started watching Legolas. When he saw the elf clench his fist, he also saw the tension in the elf’s whole body and knew not only his frustration but the reason for it. “You will heal soon enough,” the man said.

“We have to get out of here, and I cannot even reach my knife,” the elf said unhappily.

“We will both do whatever is needed, mellon nin.” He smiled at the archer. “Those trolls have secured the doors with ropes. It should be easy enough to cut through them.”

Despite how he felt, Legolas smiled back at the ranger. “I know we will, Estel.” His tone was pure stubbornness. “I know we will.”

Legolas reached over with his good hand and grasped Aragorn’s arm. The ranger in turn put his hand over the elf’s. It was at moments like these that the true friendship the two enjoyed was expressed, and it didn’t need words to accomplish it.

*~*~*~*

In Hatch’s hut, Pickett sat on the bed his former leader used. He looked around him. He had spent his entire life in this camp but had never set foot in this house before. He wondered how many others could say that.

“This is mine now,” he said aloud. “All mine.”
He liked hearing his own voice say that.

Pickett had lived in another hut shared by two other trolls. He had slept on dried grass like this he sat on now, but it had not been on a frame. The grass had just been piled up on the floor in a back corner.

This place was also neater than his other hut had been, though only a troll could make that distinction. Pickett grinned. This was one of the rewards to being leader, a nicer place he didn’t have to share with anyone else.

The doorway suddenly darkened, and Pickett looked up to see Tack standing right outside. “What you want?” the new leader growled.

“You wanna eat out here with us or in here?” the other troll asked somewhat timidly. He hadn’t forgotten what had taken place when Pickett had seized control. In fact, even asking the question was Tack’s attempt to get on Pickett’s good side.

Pickett thought about telling Tack to bring him his food but thought better of it. He decided it would be better to sit among all the others and show off his new-found superiority.

He didn’t answer Tack. He simply got up and walked out of the hut, noting that the other troll moved out of his way. Pickett had seen others do it to Hatch. He had certainly done it. Now they would do it to him. He was definitely going to like being leader.

As Pickett approached the fire, he looked past the gathered group, who were waiting for him before beginning their meal.

His gaze fell on the cages, and he was glad to see that both captives were there, as was the guard he had appointed to watch them.

Walking up to the cages he looked at the two brothers. “You two are gonna die tonight. First we’re gonna have fun.”

If he was hoping to see fear on the faces of Legolas and Aragorn, he was disappointed. Neither captive showed any emotion. However, if he had been aware of the knots that the two had in their stomachs, he would have been pleased.

Pickett turned and left the two beings to think about their impending torture and death.

TBC

Chapter Thirteen

Pickett sat and ate his dinner, surrounded by those who he now ruled. He was pleased to be treated with deference by the other trolls. Not only were they eager to get in good with the new leader by constantly complimenting him, but they were also practically falling all over themselves to keep his plate piled with food and his cup full. He clearly remembered that Hatch had been treated the same way.

Pickett had tried at first to be respectful, but Hatch didn’t like him, so in the end, he just ignored the leader whenever he could, sitting as far away from Hatch as possible and keeping his head down. Sometimes it worked and sometimes it didn’t. Now he didn’t have to keep his head down to avoid anyone. Some would have to do it to avoid him.

It wasn’t until the meal was half over that the pain started, or at least, got bad enough to draw Pickett’s complete attention. The burns he had suffered after his run through the gauntlet were now being activated by the nearness of the campfire and the heat it was throwing off. He would have welcomed it in the winter, but now it just plain hurt.

Pickett was not about to display any of his pain to the other trolls. They would see it as a sign of weakness and immediately start thinking that maybe Pickett wasn’t the best leader they could have. Then, he was sure, some of them would question his fitness to lead. Tack would undoubtedly be the first to offer a challenge, since he already thought he should have been the one to replace Hatch.

Pickett had snatched the role of leader more or less by sheer surprise and the kind of bravado Hatch had displayed, intimidating everyone before they fully had a chance to take control. Even with his limited brain power, he knew that to continue in his current position, he had to show nothing but strength when anyone else was around.

The more he sat eating, the more uncomfortable he became. He suddenly stood up and declared, “I’m gonna finish eatin’ in...” he started to say Hatch’s hut, but corrected himself in time. “...my hut.”

Pickett held his plate out and food was heaped on it without him having to utter a word. With a grunt of satisfaction, he walked to the hut. Once inside, he closed the door, which was lopsided and had only one functioning hinge. There were enough gaps in it and the walls themselves that anyone could put an eye to one of them and see inside. However, it was better than no door at all, so it gave Pickett a measure of privacy.

The troll set the plate down on the bed and sat down beside it. He was still hungry, but more than more food, he wanted relief from the pain that permeated his skin beneath the singed hair.

He had never been burned like this before, so he had no idea how long it would take until the burning sensation stopped. In his ignorance, he thought it would be gone in only a little while, just as it had always done before.

Hatch was responsible for his current pain. But since Hatch was no longer around to take his anger out on, Pickett decided, and not for the first time, that the captives would be the ones to pay.

The troll started to get up and march out to see to carry out that idea this very minute but knew he needed to wait until he felt better. He couldn’t afford to let the other trolls see him suffering, which he was doing a lot of at the moment.

His anger, along with his pain, would only grow in the meantime.

*~*~*~*

Legolas and Aragorn had been sitting in silence all the while the trolls had been eating. They didn’t know about the pain Pickett was in, though it was a good guess, but it wouldn’t have really mattered. The elf and the ranger had their own pains to nurse.

As so often in the past, they had drawn comfort from each other using physical contact. As much as it soothed them psychologically, it, unfortunately, didn’t do much for their hurting bodies.

“Perhaps, we have received a short reprieve,” Legolas said, as his gaze went past Tack, the troll guard, and across the camp.

Aragorn raised his head and looked at his friend. “Why do you say that?” he asked somewhat puzzled.

Nodding his head toward the group of trolls, the elf replied, “Pickett came out to eat with the rest of them, but now he is taking his food to his hut, apparently to eat alone. If he does not wish company, perhaps he may just stay there.”

Now, it was the ranger’s gaze that went to the retreating back of the troll leader. “I wouldn’t want to eat with those disgusting creatures, either,” was the comment he made.

Legolas just stared at Aragorn, his expression clearly saying, ‘He is one of those disgusting creatures himself, you silly human.’

Feeling Legolas’s eyes on him and knowing exactly what was in the elf’s mind, Aragorn grinned and shrugged but did not look at the archer.

“It’ll be dark soon. We have to get out of here.” The man grimaced, thinking about how many times that had been said between them, since they had been taken captive.

Legolas broke his contact with Aragorn and began to move slowly and painfully across the cage, being careful to keep his left arm tight against his chest. He didn’t want to attract too much attention from Tack, so he scooted rather than standing up. Using this one-handed motion was not the most graceful way to get anywhere, especially for an elf. Neither was it particularly efficient, however, at this point, Legolas didn’t really care. He just wanted to get form here to there.

At first, Aragorn didn’t know why the elf was moving in such a manner. He thought perhaps Legolas was going to lie down, though why he wouldn’t do it right where he was didn’t make sense to the man.

When Aragorn saw where it was Legolas was headed, he realized that the archer was going after the knife buried near the back of the cage. “Do you need me to create a diversion?” he whispered.

“No,” Legolas whispered back. “I can hide my intentions.” ‘I hope,’ the elf said to himself.

It wasn’t long before Legolas had positioned himself between the troll guard’s line of sight and the spot where the knife was located. It wasn’t buried very deep, but he had to go slow, so Tack wouldn’t get suspicious. The last thing they needed was for this knife to be found. Then if a search of Aragorn was made, the second one would be found.

Out of the corner of his eye, Legolas saw the guard looking directly at him. He had no choice but to sit perfectly still, because however slowly he dug up the dirt, there was no way to keep his right arm from moving.

Legolas hung his head and acted like he was in the process of going to sleep. He wanted to lie down and dig with his back to the troll, but that wouldn’t work. If he lay on his right side, he would have to dig with his left hand, and that one was all but useless to him now. Lying on his injured shoulder so he could use his right hand was even more out of the question. Thus he sat and looked as if he were nodding off.

Picking up on what Legolas was doing and why, Aragorn raised his voice slightly and said in the Common tongue, “Sleep well, my brother.”

As expected, there was no reply from the elf, but even from his vantage point, Aragorn could see a faint smile on his friend’s lips.

It took an interminable amount of time before Tack turned away. The beast was just standing there staring at them, and Aragorn was getting impatient. “Come on, you big, hairy lump’ he grumbled out of earshot of the creature, ‘stop watching us and turn back around. We have some escaping to do.”

Legolas had to stop himself from laughing. He couldn’t make a sound or even twitch a muscle. Doing so could cost them dearly, so he continued to sit, slumped over and looking for all the world like he was sleeping.

Finally, Tack did turn back around. However, what he then did was not what Aragorn wanted to see. The troll had stepped back and then sat down with l his back against the doors of both middle cages.

The ranger thought perhaps the creature was just tired and would hopefully move before too long, but then he saw another troll walking toward them. In one hand was a plate of food and in the other he held a large cup.

“Oh no,” Aragorn couldn’t help saying out loud.

The troll had his mind on his dinner and didn’t appear to have heard him or care, if he did.

Forgetting that he needed to tell Legolas, whose back was to the troll, what prompted his dismayed remark, Aragorn just sat and watched, as Tack began to eat.

Legolas made a noise, and Aragorn sighed. “He’s eating dinner.”

It was impossible for a troll to lean back against the cages without causing vibrations, so Legolas had wondered what had happened. He still hadn’t dared to look. Now he understood, but instead of being dismayed, he was relieved. Now he could dig for his knife and not attract any attention.

“It is well, Estel,” the elf said softly. “As long as he doesn’t get drowsy and fall asleep right where he is.”

“You just had to add that little tidbit, didn’t you?” the man grumbled. If that turned out to be the case, they would have no chance to escape during the night.

Aragorn decided not to think about that until or unless it happened. There was already enough real problems without borrowing any that may not even show up.

When the man looked over into the other cage, he saw Legolas digging into the dark dirt. He smiled. It looked like the troll’s distraction with dinner was proving to be an advantage for them.

Legolas’s long, slender fingers soon moved aside enough dirt that he was able to expose the long knife he had buried there. He slipped it under his tunic. Now he and Aragorn were both armed. The sigh he exhaled was one of pure relief.

Aragorn was also thinking about them both being armed. He would have much preferred to have his sword and for Legolas to have his bow, but what they had was certainly better than nothing. Used with skill, the twin knives were extremely deadly, even to creatures as large as trolls. They were, after all, flesh, blood and bone, possessing no magical powers.

By the time Tack had finally finished his dinner, night had fallen. The campfire had died down, though it was never allowed to go out completely. Several trolls roamed around the clearing, casting sidelong glances toward the cages. It was plain that they were anxious to get started on torturing the captives. No one, however, had the courage to go and ask Pickett when the fun would begin.

As the night wore on, and it became clear that nothing was going to be done that night, more than one troll could be heard grumbling. Such complaints were followed by glances toward Pickett’s hut in case he came out in anger. They wanted to be ready to scatter, if he did.

Tack, on the other hand, cared nothing for what might be going to happen. He was full of food and drink, tired and upset about the turn of events after Hatch’s death. Once Pickett had taken over, however, he lacked the courage to get in the new leader’s face with demands regarding the captives. It didn’t stop him from griping to himself.

Legolas and Aragorn heard him mumbling but had no idea what the troll might be saying.

Gradually, as it got later, Tack got sleepier. Soon he was snoring, if that’s what it could be called. It was actually a dreadful noise that sounded as if he were more choking than anything else.

Getting more impatient by the minute, Aragorn decided to take a gamble. He inched forward until he was directly behind Tack. He reached out and poked the troll in the back with his finger. There was no reaction.

“Estel, what are you doing?” came Legolas’s voice out of the dark.

“Trying to make him move away from the door.”

“If you miscalculate, he will move all right. Then you may find him with his hand around your neck.”

“We’ll see,” Aragorn replied in that infuriatingly self-assured tone of his. He poked Tack a little harder.

The troll shifted, as if reacting to a troublesome insect.

When Aragorn poked still harder, Tack let out snort and moved a few inches away from the cage doors, unconsciously moving away from the irritation.

Aragorn smiled. “It’s working.”

“Be careful, Estel,” the elf warned rather unnecessarily. He was sure the ranger wasn’t going to take any more of a risk than he had to. At least, he hoped not.

On the fourth poke, the hardest one yet, Tack jerked upright.

A soft but heartfelt dwarven curse word reached Legolas’s ears from Aragorn’s lips. Lord Elrond would definitely not approve, but then, he probably didn’t know his foster son knew such words.

Tack looked around, but seeing nothing, he looked behind him into the cages. All he saw there were the two captives lying down, apparently deep in sleep. The troll rubbed his back from side to side along the metal bars in an attempt to calm a particularly insistent itch.

Thinking the bars must have cause his discomfort, Tack lay back down a good foot from the cage doors.

Even in the dark, Legolas could see the ranger’s triumphant smile. He just shook his head. Only Estel.

When the troll began snoring again, both elf and ranger went to the bars, stood up on their knees and began sawing the ropes with their knives.

The maneuver was a little more difficult for Legolas. He could only use one hand, so he wasn’t able to hold the rope still while cutting through it. After it began to fray, it also began to move with the motion of the blade. Undeterred, Legolas just had to get more creative, since he certainly wasn’t going to let an uncooperative rope slow him down. He used his teeth in place of his left hand.

Aragorn finished first. He pulled the shredded rope away from the bars and slowly pulled the door back. To his surprise and delight, there was no squeaking. The cages were maintained well, to keep their captives from getting away, he supposed.

Once the door was open far enough, Aragorn stood up, bent over slightly and slipped through the opening, being very careful not to touch Tack. It would be disaster, if he woke up now.

“Do you need my help?” the man asked, seeing the trouble that Legolas was having with the rope.

“No, I almost have it. Go on out to your right. I will meet you in the trees.”

Sliding his feet sideways, Aragorn did as Legolas requested and soon found himself free of the troll body. Then he made his way around the end of the cages and into the woods, dropping down to wait for Legolas.

Meanwhile, the elf had managed to cut his rope and was also making his way around Tack and the cages, moving silently toward the crouching Aragorn.

Then Tack sat up.

TBC

Chapter Fourteen

Legolas froze. Not only had Tack sat up, but the moon had made its way out from behind the a thick cloud at just that same instant. To make matters worse, it was the first night of a full moon for that month.

He knew he could make it to the trees where Aragorn waited without Tack hearing him. That was easy. But even an elf couldn’t defy the laws of physics. Movement by its very nature was motion. And motion could be seen, especially if the surrounding area was not moving.

Aragorn’s heart leapt into his throat. He was sorely tempted to rush to the elf’s aid, but he knew there was really nothing he could do. After all, he would be moving, too. Besides, Legolas knew what he was doing.

The archer was afraid even to try and indicate to Aragorn that he should move farther back into the trees. He was faster than Aragorn, so if they had to run, he wanted the ranger to have a head start.

There was one more potential problem, and it was the biggest one. Legolas was able to dim his natural luminescence, but he couldn’t ‘turn it off’ completely.

Even though Tack didn’t turn around, he might be able to see Legolas out of the corner of his eye. The elf gave a silent prayer to the Valar that Tack wouldn’t notice.

From his place just inside the tree line, Aragorn offered the same prayer. He thought briefly about making a noise to attract the troll’s attention but realized that tactic, at least in this situation, might not be the best action to take. He stowed it away for possible use later, if things got even more dicey than they already were.

Tack yawned, scratched and yawned again but did not turn to look in Legolas’s direction. After a while, he leaned back against the cages, evidently forgetting all about the irritation he had experienced a short time before.

Legolas took that opportunity to make his bid for freedom. He hunched over to make himself as small as possible, lowering his face to hide the visible glow of his skin. He then made his way into the woods on silent feet.

When Legolas reached his friend’s side, Aragorn gripped the elf’s good shoulder and squeezed it. “We made it.”

Now that Legolas was free, as well, Aragorn allowed himself to appreciate the fresh air of freedom. It was sweet, and it got sweeter as Legolas began to lead the way deeper in among the trees, who sang to the elf of their joy at his escape.

The two friends had not taken more than a dozen steps, when there was a loud yell behind them, clearly coming from the camp. A second yell was joined by several others. Before long the whole camp was in turmoil.

Another troll came up behind the first one and pointed toward the trees. “They musta gone that way.”

Aragorn groaned. “Don’t tell me we’ve been discovered missing already.”

Glancing back through the trees, Legolas saw several trolls running toward the cages. One of them kicked Tack, who was apparently dozing again. “I am afraid so,” the elf replied with a strong note of despair in his voice.

“I don’t believe this,” the ranger grumbled. “When is our luck ever going to change?”

Legolas laughed mirthlessly. “We have to make our own luck now.” Then he turned to flee.

The ranger was close on his heels. “What about the horses?”

“We have to find a way to get to them. I will not leave them behind.”

“Nor will I,” Aragorn agreed. But there was clearly no way to free their animals until they could remain free themselves long enough to do it.

Legolas and Aragorn picked up speed, while still moved as quietly as they could. Legolas had no trouble with the dark or the trees. Aragorn did. The dark night was an aid in hiding them, but it also kept the less keen-eyed human from spotting all of the roots and partially embedded rocks from grabbing at his feet. He felt clumsy as he tripped and stumbled along behind the swift elf. He didn’t fall, but the noise he was making was loud even in his own ears.

Still they ran.

*~*~*~*

When the door to Pickett’s hut banged open, almost coming loose from the one rusty hinge that held it, the troll leader jerked upright from a sound sleep. “What’s gonin’ on?” he asked gruffly. When the answer didn’t come quick enough, Pickett yelled, “Why did ya break in here? I was sleepin’” His burns had kept him up a long time, and exhaustion had just reached the point where it had overcome the pain enough for him to find sleep.

The troll, who had volunteered to get the leader, was beginning to have doubts. He had wanted to gain favor with Pickett by being seen as someone who was thoughtful enough to inform the leader of what was happening. Seeing Pickett’s shadowed but still visible anger made him decide that it wasn’t such a good idea after all.

“The...uh...the captives have...uh...escaped again.” The troll turned and left the hut before Pickett could throw anything at him. Hatch had sometimes done that whenever he received any news that displeased him. More often than not, though, he would just reach out and punch the messenger.

Pickett growled. Why didn’t those brothers just give up? Thanks to them his sleep was being interrupted, his burns were making themselves known again, and now his head hurt.

He stood up. “They’ll die when I catch up to ’em,” the troll leader vowed. He stomped outside to begin the search that he was determined would lead to that conclusion.

*~*~*~*

Aragorn was so intent on trying to keep his feet from catching on something on or near the ground that would send him flying, that he wasn’t paying attention to the things that were higher up.

As he passed a particularly dark patch under a group of close growing trees, a tall whip-like branch of a spindly bush slapped him in the face. Unfortunately, the part of his face that was struck was across his eyes.

A cry of pain turned Legolas around and sent him hurrying back the way he had just come. He found Aragorn bent over almost double, hands over both eyes.

The pain was incredible, and Aragorn was almost breathless from the intensity of it.

“Estel, what is the matter?”

After several deep breaths, Aragorn straightened up but kept his hands over his eyes. “I didn’t see the bush. It attacked me.”

“Let me have a look at it.” Despite the darkness under the trees, Legolas could see relatively well. His eyes were like a cat’s. They could pull in every available speck of light to give him thea kind of night vision only dreamed of by humans.

When Aragorn didn’t make a move to comply, Legolas tried to pull the man’s hands down with his good hand.

Aragorn jerked back. “I can’t, Legolas. It hurts too much to open them.”

“It’s a reflex action. They are clamping shut to protect themselves.” Neither of them thought about the fact that it was Legolas who was giving that explanation to a healer rather than the other way around. Healer he may not be, but he had learned a lot about wounds and injuries as a warrior fighting in the forest of Mirkwood, not to mention as a traveling companion to the trouble-prone ranger.

It took a few moments, but gradually Aragorn was able to open his eyes. They still hurt.

“Can you see?” Legolas asked, as he titled the man’s head back and looked to see if he could detect any damage.

“Yes.”

“Are you sure? Do not try to push on, if you are not able to continue right now. You will only injure yourself further.”

“That’s what I usually tell you, for all the good that does.” The sarcasm was evident, but it had not been said harshly. He tried to give his friend a glaring look through red and now puffy eyes.

That attempt at a glare only drew a laugh from the elf, but it did not distract him. “Hold still,” Legolas said sternly, as he continued to examine the ranger’s eyes.

Finally, Legolas dropped his hand and stepped back. “I see no scratches on the cornea, though I imagine there are a few tiny ones. Most of the damage seems to have been done to the surrounding flesh.”

Aragorn breathed a sigh of relief. A badly scratched cornea could be serious, especially if left untreated. That, unfortunately, was the case out here with no supplies and no real chance to take care of the problem.

“You should tie something around your eyes to avoid straining them,” the elf advised, even though he was surel what the ranger‘s answer to that would be.

“I can’t afford to do that right now. We both need our eyes in this situation. I’ll rest them later.”

Knowing further argument would be fruitless, Legolas slapped his friend on the back. “Come on then. I can hear the trolls moving through the bushes not far away. I will guide you, my half blind friend.” The elf was not above a little innocent teasing.

Aragorn knew he would need to stay closer to Legolas and match the elf’s swift strides, which he was determined to do. It soon became evident that the pace had slowed.

“You don’t have to coddle me, Legolas. I promise I won’t run into any trees.”

“Do not make promises you cannot keep, Estel. Besides, it is me I do not wish you to run into. I have one bad shoulder. I do not need you to give me another.” The thought of both shoulders hurting the way his left one did was almost too painful to joke about. The archer did manage to grin to himself, however, he did not increase his speed.

This territory may have been the home of the trolls, and they may have known it well, but they still did not have the kind of sight that allowed them to maneuver all that well in the dark. So far that made it advantage escapees. How long that would hold true remained to be seen.

Except for the darkness, the search was just like the previous one. The trolls were scattered all over the area. Rather than organizing their search patterns, they were each looking around in hopes of simply running across their former captives.

“Do we climb another tree?” Aragorn asked after a few moments of zig-zagging through the forest, avoiding whatever trolls they heard nearby.

“No. We should not linger here any longer than is necessary. We should get the horses and make our break as swiftly as possible. Our best chance is in the dark of the forest. The horses will be an advantage there, as well as in speed.” He avoided mentioning that fast horses hadn’t helped when they were first captured. No need to bring up anything negative. They were both aware of the odds.

Aragorn was usually quite good at finding his way in the dark, but as Legolas suspected, he wasn’t seeing as well as he had let on. “Do you know where they are in relation to where we are?”

“Yes. They are that way.”

Aragorn assumed Legolas had pointed in the right direction, but he couldn’t see which way that was. Not willing to tell the wood-elf that, he simply nodded. The man would just follow the elven warrior wherever he went.

Pickett’s voice yelling out that the worthless trolls had better find the captives or face his anger was sudden and much too close.

Legolas pulled Aragorn down to crouch behind a thicket of bushes. Then he raised his head above the surrounding greenery and looked around but couldn’t spot the troll leader.

“Do you see him?” Aragorn asked from his crouching position.

“Not at the moment,” Legolas replied before adding, “and I hope that will not be changing any time soon.”

An owl hooted angrily almost directly above their heads. The night hunter was not at all pleased that all the raucous noise was scaring his prey into scurrying for cover.

“I hope that owl doesn’t attract Pickett’s attention. The last thing we need is for Pickett, or any other troll, to make his way to our hiding place to see why that normally silent owl was so flustered.” The man looked up and tried to pin the owl with a scathing glare. The best he could hope for was that he was staring in the creature’s general direction.

Legolas lifted his head, held his hand up to the side of his mouth and hooted in soft tones up to the bird of prey, as it sat in the tree to their right.

Aragorn did not hear the bird fly off, but in a few seconds he heard the owl screech from much farther away in the opposite direction to where the elf and the ranger had been traveling.

Looking at the wood-elf, Aragorn said, “You did that, didn’t you?”

“Did what?” the elf asked in all innocence.

“Sent that owl away to draw the trolls’ attention elsewhere.”

The elf just grinned and changed the subject. “How are your eyes?”

“They itch,” was all that the man would admit to, much like a certain stubborn elf, who minimized every hurt he had. As if to prove it, the man asked, “And how is your shoulder?”

“It is all right.”

“Of course it is.” He couldn’t see Legolas’s features very clearly in the darkness and with his bleary-eyed vision, but he knew the elf was grinning at him.

“Come,” Legolas said. “I do not hear any thrashing in that direction.”

Aragorn had no idea which direction was being referred to, but he stood up and prepared to follow Legolas whichever way he headed.

Walking around the thicket to their left, the elf moved off. No matter how many times they had turned, sidestepped or backtracked, Legolas never lost his sense of direction. That was an inborn elven gift that never failed to impress Aragorn.

He himself was good at finding his way, but he could never compete on the same level with an elf. He had learned that lesson many years ago when trying to either track or get away from his foster brothers. After meeting and traveling with Legolas, his shortcomings only became more apparent. Even so, for a human, he was a good tracker. And to their credit, neither the twins nor Legolas ever did anything but help and encourage the man to make the most of his abilities. And he had not disappointed them.

After avoiding several trolls along the way, the two friends finally heard the whinny of two horses.

“They are just beyond those trees,” Legolas said, pointing toward a dense wall of trees about twenty yards ahead of them.

More troll shouting to their right sent the elf and the ranger ducking for cover behind a large tree that split about five feet from the ground and formed two separate trunks from there to the top, some forty feet above.

Legolas stood behind one of the trunks and Aragorn stood behind the other.

A minutes later, the two friends were moving again, and this time when they left the trees, they found themselves staring at a crude corral, containing their two beautiful stallions.

Approaching cautiously, Legolas whispered in elvish that the horses should remain quiet. He was afraid that the animals might be too boisterous in the welcome of their masters.

Slipping under the rough wooden rails of the corral, Legolas and Aragorn greeted their horses. It felt good for animals and riders to feel each other after what seemed like a very long absence.

Legolas never used a saddle or bridle, so seeing his stallion without them was normal, however, now Aragorn was going to have to use his riding skills without either of those items, as well.

They mounted up.

The gate was located on the far side of the corral nearest the troll camp. The two companions weren’t willing to risk being spotted, so they simply jumped the low fence and headed into the forest, hoping to leave the whole horrendous affair behind them.

TBC

Chapter Fifteen

Trees and bushes flew by as Legolas and Aragorn rode away from the troll camp into the dark forest. Every few feet they would move through beams of silver moonlight, only to be swallowed up in darkness an instant later. They and their horses resembled ghostly wraiths appearing and disappearing between two worlds.

At first, Legolas wasn’t sure if he should let Aragorn keep the lead or stay behind. It was a toss up as to which position would offer the best protection. Not only was the elf’s tendency to protect his friend in play, but with Aragorn’s eyes not functioning properly, Legolas didn’t want the man to lose his way. Staying together was the elf’s foremost concern at the moment.

Finally deciding the unknown ahead was the more dangerous, Legolas took the lead, and as he rode past, he leaned over and whispered to Aragorn’s horse to stay close.

Without warning, just as Legolas moved into one of the shafts of moonlight, what resembled a large tree branch shot out of the shadows and hit the elf full across the chest, knocking him from his horse.

Legolas was so surprised, he didn’t have time to stifle a startled cry of pain. He landed hard and promptly fell unconscious, as his head impacted with the ground.

Aragorn was shocked at what he saw, or thought he saw. He blamed it on his blurry vision, because surely no tree would send a branch against one of the Firstborn, and especially not a wood-elf. It was unthinkable, even in hostile territory like this.

Legolas’s horse had disappeared into the shadows but soon came to a stop and stood with nervous anticipation to be remounted. The stallion did not like this place and wanted to keep moving. But, of course, he would not go anywhere unless Legolas told him to. So he waited.

As for Aragorn, even blinking did not clear up the ranger’s perceived misconception of what had just taken place.

The ranger was in the middle of dismissing the unbelievable incident, when two things happened to change his mind. First, his horse jumped over something in his path, and the ranger realized with horror that it was Legolas’s prone body. And second, the same branch he had seen strike Legolas now came after him.

Because his horse was in the middle of a jump, the object hit Aragorn on the thigh. The solid blow was certainly painful, but it did not unseat him.

Aragorn had traveled no more than ten feet farther along, when he pulled his mount to a stop and jumped down. He limped back to find Legolas lying motionless among the tree roots and leaves that littered the forest floor.

Despite being in the center of the shaft of moonlight streaming through the trees, the elf was lying in darkness. Aragorn did not see what it was that was causing the shadow until a deep, gruff voice said, “Leave him be.” The tone in that voice was menacing, to say the least.

It was then that the ranger received his second shock. The voice belonged to Pickett, and he realized that it was the troll‘s huge arm that had knocked Legolas off his horse. Despite the implications, namely imminent recapture, Aragorn was relieved that it hadn’t been a tree that had attacked the wood-elf.

The next thing Aragorn knew, something hard and strong clamped onto his shoulder and shoved him away. The man landed in a heap on the ground a few feet from Legolas. There was a sharp pain in his side, which he realized was caused by the pommel of Legolas’s knife, digging into his skin.

Aragorn stifled the urge to reach inside his tunic and adjust the long knife’s position. Even though Pickett probably wouldn’t notice, he couldn’t take the chance that the troll might get curious and search him.

Gathering his feet under him, Aragorn tried to get up, determined to protect the elf from this angry troll, but Pickett moved between them. His legs were like tree trunks, and there was no chance the ranger was going to move them. He was determined to get to Legolas, so he tried to go around.

Pickett reached down and again shoved Aragorn back. “Stay there,” the troll leader warned, as he kicked out toward Aragorn. He missed but was satisfied the man was going to do as he was told.

Pickett then turned around, grabbed Legolas and swung the elf over his right shoulder like a bag of onions. He grabbed Aragorn by the arm, roughly yanked him up and began dragging him along the path toward the troll camp.

The position Aragorn was in on Pickett’s left didn’t allow him to reach Legolas to determine how the elf was faring. All he could see by leaning backward and looking across behind the troll was the upper half of Legolas’s body hanging down, as his arms and long hair swayed to the rhythm of Pickett’s long strides.

There was nothing Aragorn could do to help himself or Legolas, and his frustration was mounting. He hated being manhandled like this, or rather ‘trollhandled’, he amended to himself with a grim smile. It was obvious that Pickett wasn’t going to slow down for anything, and he either kept pace with the troll on his throbbing leg, or risked having his arm broken. The grip was so tight, he couldn’t be sure that wouldn’t happen anyway.

As they moved down the path, they came across several other trolls who had been searching that area of the forest for the escapees.

The creatures howled in glee when they saw Pickett hauling the captives back. They fell into line behind the three and followed, continuing to howl, laugh and grin at each other. It didn’t take much imagination to tell that they were anticipating another round of ‘fun’ with the two captives.

Pickett paid them no mind. All he cared about right then was getting the newly-found captives back to camp and then dealing with them there.

When the leader entered the large clearing, Scron, who had arrived in camp moments before, narrowed his eyes. He cared nothing about the captives. They provided entertainment, but that was not what was on his mind. He stared at Pickett with both envy and anger.

A challenge for leadership could be issued at any time, but the rest of the group had to back the winner, or he wouldn’t stay in power for very long.

Scron had not mounted a direct challenge to Pickett, though he had talked big against Tack after Hatch had been killed and disposed of. He had waited to see how successful Tack’s challenge would be, so he could judge Pickett’s strength.

Scron had been disappointed when Pickett had taken supreme power over the group. The troll had then pretended to accept Pickett as leader to avoid having done to him what Hatch had always done to Pickett. He had suffered enough as it was. However, he still felt the urge to be the leader. Scron wanted to be the one to tell others what to do and to hand out punishment when anyone didn’t follow his orders.

Now Pickett had made an even stronger case for remaining the leader, and Scron was not happy about it.

Pickett marched across the clearing, looking neither to the right nor the left. He didn’t seem to care that he was being cheered on by his followers. The troll had one goal in mind, and he wasn’t going to let anyone distract him.

Aragorn was prepared for him and Legolas to be taken back to the cages, where they had spent most of their time since they first arrived in this awful place. He was in for a shock. When Pickett showed no signs of heading there, the man couldn’t help but ask. “Where are we going?”

“You’ll find out,” was the only answer the ranger received, and he didn‘t like the sound of it.

He wasn’t sure if not going to the cages was a good thing or a bad thing. Somehow he felt the latter was going to be the case.

The ranger’s assumption proved correct, when Aragorn saw Pickett heading straight for one of the huts. It wasn’t until they were closer to it that Aragorn saw it was the leader’s hut.

The only other time he and Legolas had been in that hovel had been when they went there to search for their weapons. That meant that his sword and Legolas’s bow, which had not been successfully retrieved due to Hatch’s arrival, might still be there.

Then the thought struck the man that Pickett wouldn’t be taking them there unless he had cleaned the place of anything the captives might use as weapons, including large bones or boards. Surely even the dim-witted troll wasn’t that dumb.

Before Aragorn could think on the matter further, they reached the entry and crossed into the almost pitch black interior.

Pickett took a few steps and then shoved Aragorn back against the rear wall. There was just enough moonlight coming in the doorway to allow the ranger to see Pickett lower his right shoulder and let Legolas slide unceremoniously to the floor.

Aragorn lunged forward with outstretched arms to try and cushion Legolas’s head before it hit the ground, but he was too far away.

For the second time in less than twenty minutes, the elf’s head impacted the ground.

“Move out of here and you both die.” The statement held more than just a threat. It held a promise, and Aragorn didn’t doubt it.

The ranger crawled over beside Legolas and pulled the elf into his arms and then scooted backwards, not wanting to stay out in the middle of the room.

At one point he had to stop and reach behind him and pull out a bone that he had run into. He tossed it over into the pile of bones near the side wall. They clanked dully, as the thrown one hit the others.

Still clutching Legolas, Aragorn continued moving backwards until he could rest his back against the rear wall.

Between his blurry sight and the dim light inside the hut, there was no way Aragorn could properly assess his friend’s injuries. So he used his fingers to feel around Legolas’s scalp. Before long he encountered a large bump on the back of the elf’s head, which he could tell was covered with a small amount of dried blood. A second, smaller bump was located just above his left ear but did not appear to have any broken skin.

“I am sorry, mellon nin,“ the man whispered softly, “I can do nothing to help your injuries.” All Aragorn could do was hold Legolas in a comforting embrace and hope it would be enough for now. He held the elf against his chest, being careful not to disturb his swollen shoulder. The man took a deep breath and closed his aching eyes.

Pickett was sitting on his bed, looking at the two beings on the floor near his feet. His stare was intense, as he tried to decide what to do with these two brothers. Keeping them in the cages had not worked. Tying them up had led to Hatch’s death, and he had no intention of putting himself in a position to have the same thing happen to him.

The troll was still deep in thought about his dilemma when Legolas finally woke up.

Since Aragorn was the first to become aware of Legolas’s rising consciousness, he quickly leaned his lips down to the elf’s ear and whispered, “Be still and quiet, Legolas. The troll is near.” He dared not say more, hoping those few words would be enough and that his friend would be aware enough to understand and follow his instructions.

Legolas’s head felt like a dwarf was inside hammering to get out. Through the pounding he heard someone speaking. Was it the dwarf, demanding to be set free? He would have shaken his head at such a ridiculous notion had he not feared it would have fallen off his shoulders. His chest also ached mercilessly and made simple breathing more difficult.

‘It is Estel speaking to me,’ he suddenly realized. Legolas almost asked his friend to repeat what he had said, when the meaning of the words finally penetrated the pain-induced fog in his mind. ‘Do not worry, Estel,’ he silently said, ‘I do not think I could move, if I wished to.’

The archer lay still and listened. All he could hear was the steady rhythm of Aragorn’s breathing and... much harsher breathing from nearby. He finally understood. The troll. That was why Aragorn wanted him to be still. A troll was with them.

The elf turned his thoughts inward and began sorting through his recent memories. He and Aragorn had escaped on their horses. when he remembered feeling a sudden pain in his chest and then one in his head. Everything went dark after that.

He and Aragorn were certainly not on their horses. He wasn’t lying on the hard ground but rather something relatively soft, though he knew it wasn’t a bed. It was Aragorn. How familiar that feeling was. Whenever he was hurt, the ranger often held him in a gesture of comfort. So it was now, he was sure. After all, he was definitely hurting.

There was no way to know what had happened until he could talk to Aragorn. He could not sense being among the trees, nor could he hear the sounds of the forest close by. Did that mean they weren’t hiding from the trolls? Worse yet, did that mean they had been recaptured?

It was then the stench of the rotting flesh and bones in the hut registered with him. The one place that he remembered smelling like this was... Hatch’s hut. He and Aragorn had indeed been recaptured, and for some reason, they were now in Hatch’s hut, or rather the one that now belonged to Pickett. It must be the troll leader who Aragorn didn’t want knowing the elf was awake. His spirits sank.

Both Legolas and Aragorn were startled when Pickett said, “Wake him up.”

In a defiant tone he could not for all the life of him avoid using, Aragorn said, “I’ll tell you what I told Hatch. It’s not something I can make him do. He can’t wake up until his body is ready to let him.”

Pickett stood up and moved to stand at Aragorn’s feet. “I don’t know what Hatch said, an’ I don’t care. Wake him up.” His tone was menacingly demanding.

Knowing the truth about the archer’s state of wakefulness and fearing that Pickett might do one or both of them immediate harm, Aragorn shook Legolas gently.

The elf, who had been about to rouse himself after hearing Pickett’s threat, quickly opened his eyes. Though Pickett’s back was to the moonlight, casting the front of him in shadow, Legolas could still clearly see the frown of impatience on the troll’s ugly face.

Aching body or not, it was time to face the trolls yet again.

TBC

Chapter Sixteen

No sooner had Legolas and Aragorn managed to gain their feet, than Pickett slammed them both against the rear wall by putting a huge palm flat onto each of their chests. They were no more than toys to the powerful troll.

The forceful move by Pickett was particularly painful for Legolas. His chest was already sore from having been struck with great force during the two friends’ flight for freedom by the same arm that now pinned him fast against the wall. In addition to that, his not-quite-healed back, not to mention his swollen shoulder, didn’t get off easily, either, as they was pressed against the rough wood.

Aragorn’s aching back protested the maneuver, as well. The man felt the force so strongly that he had a hard time catching his breath. He just hoped his breast bone wouldn’t crack under the pressure.

When Pickett leaned forward, it was with his entire body resting on the balls of his feet, and the pressure increased. The troll didn’t seem to realize that he was forcing the air out of the captives, as his weight moved against them. He looked from one to the other before saying, “I won’t take no more trouble from you two. We want our fun, but we don’t need both of you. I can kill one and have fun with the other one.”

Pickett’s foul breath was so strong that Legolas had to turn his head to the side. The stench coming out of the troll’s mouth almost made the sensitive elf pass out.

It wasn’t the first time that Pickett’s threat had been made against them, and it wasn’t that Legolas and Aragorn hadn’t believed those words before. This time, however, they both knew that Pickett was about out of patience with them. Their attempts to escape had finally driven this new leader to feel desperate, and a desperate troll was a very dangerous troll.

On the other side of the coin was the fact that it was not in the nature of either the archer or the ranger to give up, no matter how dire the situation might be. They would escape or die trying.

Pickett narrowed his eyes. “You two understand?”

Neither captive answered, so Pickett pressed a little harder. He was not in the mood to keep asking.

Finally, Aragorn nodded.

Unfortunately, Pickett didn’t see the nod in the darkness of the hut. “Understand?” the troll leader growled.

White spots had begun to appear in front of Legolas’s eyes. He couldn’t have answered the troll, if he tried. The heavy hand on his chest wasn’t allowing him to inhale, and he feared he was about to pass out.

Feeling desperate to keep Pickett from doing any more damage to them, Aragorn wheezed, “Yes.” He was close to passing out himself.

When Pickett backed away, the pressure on the two friends’ chests was mercifully released. They immediately began sucking in air and coughing until their lungs were functioning sufficiently. It offered enough strength to their bodies so that they were able to stay upright, despite wobbly legs.

Aragorn, who had been bent over while catching his breath, straightened up and promptly found the troll’s hand grabbing the front of his tunic.

The next thing he knew, he was flying through the air. He didn’t even have time to think about what was happening, when he came down on the pile of bones on the right side of the hut. He groaned, as a large bone poked him in the back of his thigh. The ranger slid forward, when the pile partially collapsed from the impact of his weight.

Legolas landed beside his friend, further rattling the bones, as the elf’s body hit them, and then rolled to the floor away from Aragorn.

“Don’t neither of you move,” came Pickett’s threatening voice.

The troll leader walked to the door and yelled out, calling for a troll whose name the two friends did not recognize.

When the called-for troll arrived, Pickett pointed at a spot right outside the doorway. “Sit here, facing this way. You’re to guard them captives. If they git away, you’ll meet the same end as Hatch, only you won’t be dead first.”

The implication of those words were not lost on the other creature. He didn’t like the idea of sitting in front of Pickett’s hut all night, but he was not about to say so.

“What do I do if they try to git away again?“

Pickett just stared at the troll. Then he said, “You wake me up, stupid!”

The other troll simply nodded and sat cross-legged where Pickett had told him to. Even sitting down, the bulk of the troll’s body filled the doorway, effectively blocking the doorway.

Pickett walked over to his bed and lay down on it, evidently ready to get some sleep. His burns still hurt, and he was tired.

Aragorn tried to sit up. It wasn’t easy on the shifting pile of bones. At the first sound they made, he stopped, afraid that Pickett would react unpleasantly. There was no reaction at all from the troll leader. He had dismissed them from his mind, because he felt the captives could not escape. He was right.

Another attempt to sit upright was met with success, as the ranger slid down the pile and hit the filthy floor on his behind. He rubbed the sore spot on his thigh where the bone he had landed on made what he was sure was a large bruise.

More bone shifting on his right alerted him to the fact that Legolas was also moving. That in itself brought the man relief. Crawling on hands and knees around the bones, Aragorn made it to where the elf still lay on the edge of the pile. “Legolas.”

The archer answered with a low groan that the man knew meant his friend was probably woozy and certainly hurting more than might be evident. Otherwise, the proud elf wouldn’t have uttered a sound.

“Let me help you,” Aragorn said, as he reached out and placed his arm under the elf‘s shoulders and gently pulled him up. “Several bones have stuck to your clothing, but luckily, none seems to have punctured you.”

“That is encouraging,” the elf replied dryly. Then he looked into Aragorn’s eyes. “Are there any punctures in you?”

“There’s a tear in my leggings but not in my flesh.”

Legolas grinned. “I always said you have a tough hide.”

“This time that perceived failing has worked in my favor.”

“So it seems.” Legolas took a deep breath and then put his hand over his chest.

Noticing the move, the ranger pulled the elf’s hand away and began opening his tunic. “You are injured worse than you let on.” It was a flat statement of fact. He didn’t bother asking permission to check the elf, because he knew exactly what the answer would be.

Legolas didn’t really protest, because he knew from experience the healer in Aragorn would only argue. However, the elf just couldn’t let the man’s attempt go completely unchallenged. “You know you cannot see anything in the dark.”

“Well, I can feel and...” He didn’t finish before Legolas hissed in reaction to Aragorn pressing gently against his chest.

“I knew it,” the man said, almost triumphantly.

“You seem pleased with yourself.”

Aragorn had the good grace to look sheepish. “I’m sorry that you’re injured, Legolas. I truly am, but I can’t deny I like being right.”

The elf nodded. “I have always known that about you. you are very competitive.”

“I had to be to survive my childhood with Elladan and Elrohir for brothers.” A wistful look crossed the ranger’s face at the many memories that flooded into his mind.

Before he could comment, Legolas had to bite his lip and then hold is breath to keep from hissing yet again, when Aragorn leaned forward and did more probing.

After a few moments, the man sat up straight and sighed. “No broken ribs, thank goodness. But several are badly bruised.”

That statement was a piece of good news for both of them. It meant that Legolas wasn’t going to damage his ribs or risk puncturing a lung by moving. It was just going to be painful, something the elf had endured more times than he cared to remember.

The subject of injuries was soon sidelined when, out of the corner of his eye, Aragorn spotted the troll who had been appointed to be their guard. The man frowned, as he took a closer look.

“Did you notice that troll sitting by the door?”

Legolas stared at the creature before saying, “Not until now.” It was an admission he hated to make. He was usually much more observant, and he didn‘t consider being injured an excuse for missing something as large as a troll in the doorway.

“I guess Pickett doesn’t trust us to stay put,” Aragorn quipped, though the meaning was no joke.

The troll at the door was well aware that the captives were talking to each other, but Pickett hadn’t told him they were not to speak, so he ignored them.

All he was concerned about was keeping them from trying to escape, and so far, they hadn’t made any moves toward the door he guarded.

His most important train of thought was his own comfort, or rather discomfort. Sitting on the ground all night while not only watching two puny beings but also having to watch Pickett getting a good night’s sleep was making the troll angry. Unfortunately, there was nothing he could do about it. There was, however, something that could stop his anger from growing any worse.

Suddenly, a large arm encircled the creature’s neck at the same time that a hand rested along his jaw. His head was jerked to the side, accompanied by a loud crack. The troll’s body went limp. Then in a move so quick it belied a troll’ size, the guard was dragged away from the door and out of sight.

Both Legolas and Aragorn blinked in total surprise. They couldn’t believe what they had seen, and yet their guard was gone and the doorway was empty.

“Did you just see that?” Aragorn asked, still doubting the vision he had just seen.

“I did, but I do not know what to make of it,” Legolas replied. The elf didn’t know whether to be happy or suspicious.

“Dare we grab the chance to leave? We might have the same thing happen to us.”

Logical as ever, Legolas said, “If we stay here, I am sure something far worse will be in store. I would rather die making another attempt to escape.”

“I can’t argue with that,” Aragorn agreed, as he made it to his feet and reached down to help Legolas to his feet.

Was this bid for freedom going to be the one that finally worked, or would it lead to yet another failure? Neither one knew, but they weren‘t about to sit around and debate the matter.

The two began to creep very slowly toward the door, hoping against hope that another troll would not suddenly appear before them. Legolas had no trouble moving soundlessly. Humans made more noise, but there was so much at stake that Aragorn was almost as silent.

Once they reached the doorway, Aragorn poked his head out and looked all around to make sure that no other trolls were around. He saw none. “It’s clear.”

Legolas took one last look at Pickett. If for some reason the troll leader had awoken, he wanted to be able to warn Aragorn to run. Silence at that point would hardly matter.

Pickett was sound asleep and gave no indication that the captives had been seen or heard.

Legolas was just turning his head back toward the door when he suddenly stopped. Something had caught his eye. Without a word, he began to make his way, almost on tiptoes, across the front wall to the corner on his left.

Aragorn was so busy looking at all areas of the camp that he didn’t notice Legolas wasn’t right behind him.

In less than a minute, Legolas had returned to stand behind the ranger, so when Aragorn turned and grinned at the elf, he didn’t know that Legolas had just arrived at his back. “Let’s go,” he whispered.

The two friends slipped through the doorway and made their way to the edge of the trees behind the hut. They hadn’t gone far before a large troll stepped out in front of them.

Aragorn shook his head in frustration. “Not again!” he declared angrily and then took a defensive stance. As futile as fighting this huge creature might be, he was prepared to do just that.

To the surprise of both elf and ranger, the troll held his hands up. “I won’t hurt you.”

Legolas recognized the troll. “Scron.” He asked simply, “Why?”

“I hate Pickett. I should be leader.”

Aragorn could think of only one reason that fit the situation. “So you think if we escape, Pickett will be seen as a weak leader, who can’t even keep captives in his own hut, and then you can challenge him and take over as the new leader.”

“I hate Pickett,” the troll repeated. Perhaps his limited brain power didn’t allow him to accurately follow exactly what the man had just said, but it was clear that that was the troll’s primitive reasoning.

“We hate him, too,” Aragorn offered in an attempt to stay on this troll’s good side.

The more time they spent out here talking, the more chance there was of being discovered by another troll or Pickett, if he woke up and found them missing, so Legolas decided to prod the creature. “You will let us go?”

“Yes. Go,” Scron told them. “I’ll take care of Pickett.”

Not willing to risk another moment, Legolas and Aragorn turned and ran farther into the forest.

Once they were out of sight of the clearing, Legolas stopped and handed Aragorn his sword.

The man stared at it, looking for all the world as if he had never laid eyes on such a weapon before in his life. “How? When?”

Legolas smiled. “Elven magic.”

“Right. And did it not occur to you to give me the sword before we ran into Scron?”

“I had no idea Scron was waiting for us. Besides, there was no time. Like now,” Legolas said, as he began moving away, the smile still firmly on his face.

It was then the man saw the longbow and quiver across the elf’s back. The ranger shook his head and grinned to himself. Only an elf could have pulled off a weapons rescue like that at the last second.

He sighed, as he trotted after his friend. The quiver was empty, so Aragorn hoped they wouldn’t find themselves in a situation that required the use of a bow. At least they had both of the elf’s long knives and his sword. And, if all went well, they would soon have their horses, too.

TBC

Chapter Seventeen

Legolas and Aragorn were on the other side of the camp from where they had attempted their last escape, so the two friends would once again have to work their way around the large clearing, giving it a wide birth, before making their way to the rough trail where they had left their horses.

Clouds had now moved in and covered the moon, shrouding the already dark forest in even deeper shadow. They were not, however, able to hide the faint lightening of the eastern sky. Dawn was not far off.

“It will rain before too long,” Legolas observed with little emotion. He actually loved the rain, but he couldn’t avoid a quick glance at Aragorn, who wasn’t overly fond of getting drenched.

“That’s all we need,” the man grumbled.

“Tell me, Estel, why did you choose the life of a ranger, if you dislike many of the elements that a ranger must face?”

Aragorn debated whether to give a glib answer or none at all, before finally saying, “It is the timing of the those elements that is often not to my liking.”

“Oh, you mean like the cold in winter or a thunderstorm in spring, similar to the one that will reach us in,” the elf looked up at the eastern sky, “say an hour?” He couldn’t have left the sarcasm out of his voice, if he tried.

Making an effort to show his friend that he could appreciate the many moods of Nature no matter how uncomfortable some of them could be, Aragorn grinned and said cheerfully, “Then again, it may be a blessing. You can bet those trolls will be after us again, once they realize we’re gone. Rain will hide our trail.”

Legolas noted the man‘s grin, as sarcastic as his own words had just been, but chose to ignore it. “I hope you are right,” he said seriously.

The archer wasn’t sure how good the trolls were at tracking, although the fact they couldn’t organize a decent search was probably a pretty good clue. They were far luckier than they were good.

“How are your eyes?” Legolas asked, as they quickly made their way through the trees. “It is very dark.”

The implication of the last statement wasn‘t lost on the ranger. “Yes, that I can see.” When the elf turned his head back and gave him a stern look over his shoulder, Aragorn sighed and said, “They’re still a little blurry but not too bad.” When Legolas made a disparaging noise, he said, “Really,” with as much genuine feeling as he could. Then he quickly added, “So how are your shoulder and your chest and your head and your back?”

“Fine,” Legolas lied without the slightest hesitation. The elven prince hated hearing his injuries listed one by one like that. Besides, now was not the time to let Aragorn know that his left shoulder was throbbing, his chest was sore, he was slightly dizzy, and he had a very bad headache. Legolas shuddered to think what Lord Elrond would do had he been able to show up in Rivendell in the condition he was now in.

Gritting his teeth, Legolas began moving at a faster pace. It was as much a case of trying to keep his very perceptive friend from questioning him further as it was for the need to make haste. He gave a quick prayer to the Valar that he wouldn’t stumble or worse, pass out.

Continuing to move as swiftly as they thought safe, the two companions finally reached the place where they had been captured after their previous failed escape attempt.

There was no sign of their horses.

*~*~*~*

Not long after Legolas and Aragorn headed into the trees, Scron made his way back toward Pickett’s hut. He had two choices as to what to do next. He could do as he had originally planned and wait until Pickett woke up and found the captives missing. Then he could alert the other trolls as to their new leader’s lax vigil. Of course, his would be the voice that would make a case for deposing the incompetent Pickett.

Now, however, Scron realized that Pickett might just find enough support to stay in power, despite the captives’ escape. After all, he had bullied the other trolls into accepting him as Hatch’s replacement. So, a crude but, to him, better plan was forming in his head, as he walked.

When he reached the front of Pickett’s hut, he looked around to make sure no one saw him. The camp was quiet, with no one else about, so Scron moved into the dark interior.

Raising his voice, Scron called out to the shadowed form that was lying on the large bed. “Pickett!”

There was a groan and a slight shift of the troll body but no other sign that Pickett was responding to his name.

Scron moved a little closer. “Pickett!” he called out louder. He was tempted to shake the other troll but was afraid he might be grabbed in surprise. That would put him at an immediate disadvantage, so he stayed just out of reach.

“Pickett, wake up. Them captives are gone.”

That last statement seemed to penetrate the sleepy leader’s groggy mind, though Pickett remained less than alert. “What?”

“Them captives are gone.” Scron’s voice was hardly the excited one that such an announcement would normally generate. He was almost grinning.

Pickett sat bolt upright and jerked his head around to face Scron. “Gone? How?”

“I don’t know, but I saw ’em in the woods runnin’ away, so I come to tell ya.”

Pickett swung his legs over the side of the bed and planted his huge feet firmly on the hard- packed dirt that served as the floor of the dwelling. A quick survey of the room showed that Scron was right. The captives were indeed gone.

Pickett stood up and at the same time, used his arm to shove Scron aside. Intending to head for the door, he took one step past the other troll.

The next instant Pickett felt something bulky around his neck. Before he could even register the pain that resulted from the violent twist of his head, he was dead.

Scron pulled his arm back and let Pickett’s body drop like an inert boulder. He stared at it for a moment in total satisfaction, and then he ran out into the camp, yelling.

It took a few moments before the camp of sleepy trolls roused themselves and stumbled out into the fresh air of the fading night.

“What’s goin’ on?” asked one of the trolls.

Scron was only too happy to inform all of them of his version of events. “Them captives. They killed Pickett, and then run off.”

“Killed Pickett?” another troll asked, confusion plain on his ugly face. The same look was soon on every other face in the crowd. Even Scron had adopted the look.

Tack scratched his head. “Wasn’t Monks watching ’em? I saw him sittin’ at Pickett’s door, blockin’ it.”

Scron had forgotten all about Monks guarding the door. He had to try and think faster than he ever had before in his life. And while the speed of that activity eluded him, he did realize that not even these trolls would believe two puny beings like the ones they had captured could kill two trolls and then drag one of them away.

Shrugging, Scron simply said, “I don’t know. He was gone when I saw the captives leavin’.”

That explanation would have to do. Lucky for him, the other trolls seemed to accept it, especially since none of them could figure out where Monks could have gone to or why.

The troll who had asked the first question asked another. “Now we gotta git us another leader?”

Before anyone could comment, Scron said, “I’m takin’ over.”

After making his intention clear, Scron eyed Tack, who had been the main one to challenge after Hatch died and would likely be the main one to do it again.

Tack wasn’t afraid of Scron, but still he hesitated. He eyed Scron’s balled up fists and taut muscles, gauging how successful a challenge would likely be. Unfortunately for him, he waited too long. Being tentative rarely worked out. Tack should have declared his intention to vie for leadership immediately and stepped forward to back it up. Now the chance was gone, and he knew it.

When Scron saw Tack’s shoulders slump and no one else spoke up, he knew he had won and had become the new troll leader. Now he had to do something to solidify his position even more, and Scron knew exactly what he was going to do.

*~*~*~*

It was not really too surprising for Legolas and Aragorn to see that their horses were not where they had left them. The two stallions had been sent to a safer distance and self-preservation would keep them out of danger.

Aragorn was tempted to whistle for the horses. However, he feared that the sound could be picked up by a nearby troll, even though he didn’t really think their absence would have been discovered so soon. Still, it wasn’t worth the risk. There was always the chance that individual trolls patrolled the forest around their camp. It was much safer to just do a little searching for the horses.

The ranger was about to ask Legolas if he could detect any sound the horses might be making, when he turned and saw the elf doing just that. He couldn’t help grinning, as he observed Legolas with his head tilted and his eyes closed. The warrior prince was so used to using his heightened senses when they traveled that Aragorn realized he should have known the elf would be thinking ahead.

“Do you hear them?” the man asked after a couple of moments of holding his breath, as if afraid to add any sound that might hinder the elf.

Legolas sighed. “No,” he answered with a hint of frustration in his voice. “We trained them too well.” The elf laughed. “Actually, I think they probably felt the trolls were too near and moved farther off.”

“So which direction do you think is the best one we take to look for them?”

It was still too dark and the ground too hard packed to find a decent track until daylight had made a stronger appearance. The rain was not far from also making an appearance.

“My guess is they continued on in the same direction we were headed when Pickett found us.” Legolas subconsciously reached up and rubbed his chest at the memory of just how that discovery had happened.

“That sounds logical,” the man agreed.

“There is a river ahead of us,” Legolas informed his friend. He had just picked up the faint roar of the water. “Perhaps the horses needed a drink. I doubt the trolls took much care of them.”

Just then, there was the unmistakable sound of shouting behind them, the bad thing being it wasn‘t concentrated in just one place.

The two friends looked at each other, a mixture of “Not again” and “We should have known” on both of their faces.

“How did they discover us missing and get here so soon?” Aragorn asked, knowing Legolas didn’t have the answer but so upset he couldn’t avoid expressing his frustration.

“I have no idea,” the elf replied, equally frustrated. “Someone must have risen early.” There was no humor in the statement.

“Or perhaps Scron changed his mind and alerted Pickett, maybe trying to get on his good side.”

Without another word or signal between them, they both began to run. If they could find their horses and cross the river before the trolls caught up to them, they believed they could finally make their escape from the horrid creatures.

As they moved through the trees, the noise they were now both clearly hearing grew louder. It became more obvious, as they neared it, that this was not going to be an ordinary river. Both Legolas and Aragorn knew that roaring sound all too well, and their hearts grew fearful.

Finally, breaking through the trees, their fears were confirmed, when the sight that greeted the two friends caused their hearts to sink.

What they found themselves facing were white water rapids, as wild as any they had ever come across. The vibration moved up through the ground and jarred their insides.

The water roiled and churned over and around boulders of varying sizes. The two friends knew immediately that there was no way they could fight such a current.

The larger rocks that rose up from the riverbed sent the water crashing around them, forcing it to squeeze through narrow gaps that increased the power of the flow.

The smaller rocks didn’t offer anything more promising. The water rolled over them, forming small but powerful waterfalls that were sometimes forced back in on themselves. This action created v-shaped depressions slammed from both sides that trapped small pieces of debris at the bases of the rocks with no way to escape.

The larger pieces of debris were jerked free of these waterfalls by the violent current. Most were swept, bobbing and dipping, downstream out of sight. Still others were caught and spun in endless circles in whirlpools.

Getting caught in any of these current-created traps could easily be fatal. Despite its lethal nature, the wild river was beautiful and held a fascination all its own.

The whole scene was mesmerizing, but time was of the essence, so elf and ranger had little time to indulge in admiration. They needed to find their horses and a place to cross, neither of which seemed within their grasp.

Legolas’s elven eyes searched downstream while Aragorn’s vision followed the riverbank upstream. There was a small sandy bank strewn with rocks in both directions. But there were no horses to be seen.

The roar of the river drowned out any other noise, so even Legolas’s keen hearing could not pick up the sound of approaching trolls crashing through the trees.

“We have to decide which way to go,” Legolas advised. “I cannot hear the trolls over the river, but I feel that they are getting closer.”

Aragorn nodded. “I know we must hurry, but I don’t want to end up heading away from the horses. We not only need them, but I do not want to leave them here with those foul creatures.”

Legolas had no intention of doing so, either.

“Give me a moment to check the tracks in the sand,” Aragorn said. “I may be able to find which way they went.”

“Hurry,” was all Legolas said before turning and moving back into the forest. He stopped and looked back toward the river, making sure he didn’t lose sight of Aragorn. He knew the man could not see him among the trees, and he didn’t want to them to become separated with the enemy on the way.

Aragorn quickly made his way to the edge of the river and began searching around for hoof prints. He saw none. The ranger stretched his search pattern farther and farther in both directions but still found nothing that indicated any animals larger than forest deer had been here in days.

Standing up and again staring upriver and then down. ‘If the horses didn’t come to the river, where could they have gone off to?’ The ranger shook his head.

Aragorn heard a noise behind him and spun around, fully expecting to see a huge troll lunging for him. He recoiled and reached for his sword.

TBC

Chapter Eighteen

Aragorn had his sword half way out of its scabbard, only to find that the troll he had imagined moving up behind him was only an elf.

“Did I frighten you?” Legolas asked with a wry smile.

“Nothing so simple,” the man replied, taking several deep breaths to calm his racing heart. “You nearly gave me a heart attack.”

“Did you imagine me to be a troll?” The elf couldn’t hide the amusement in his voice.

Aragorn pushed his sword home rather more forcefully than was actually needed. It wasn’t until he let go of the hilt that he realized how tightly he had been holding it. “You have a very nasty habit of just appearing out of nowhere in absolute silence, yet this time I heard you. What was I supposed to think?”

Frowning, he ran his eyes swiftly over the elf from head to toe. He feared Legolas may have been heavy of foot due to the aggravation of one of his injuries. It certainly wouldn’t be the first time.

Legolas shook his head, knowing exactly what the ranger’s close scrutiny meant. “None of my habits are nasty, I will have you know,” he declared indignantly.

Toning his voice down a notch, he said, “I merely wanted you to know I had returned. And why must you always complain that I sneak up on you?”

“Because you always do!” Not willing to engage the elf in what had become a continuing and mostly humorous exchange through the years, an exchange he never seemed to win, Aragorn simply sighed and said, “Never mind.”

The man then glanced behind Legolas, in hopes the elf had run across the horses while he had been in the trees. He didn’t have to ask to know that there were no horses accompanying the wood-elf.

“Which way did the horses go?” Legolas asked, hoping the ranger would have at least seen signs of them along the riverbank.

“They haven’t even been here,” Aragorn answered glumly. “I saw only deer tracks along with a few smaller animals. No horses. They must have gone another way.” He sounded both dejected at that thought and resigned to it.

The ranger’s attention turned to another more immediate problem. He jutted his chin toward the forest. “How close are the trolls?”

“Too close for us to continue standing here and talking. I would say maybe three minutes.”

“That doesn’t give us much time.”

“No, it does not.” Legolas turned to his right and pointed. “I suggest we go that way. There seems to be fewer rocks to hinder us.”

Most of the rocks on the riverbank that were upstream ranged in size from pebbles to ones that were less than two feet in diameter. Downstream it was a different matter. After a few dozen yards or so, the rocks gradually grew to the size of towering boulders. Due to a bend in the river, they couldn’t see that another hundred yards farther along, a forty foot cliff rose above the river.

The two friends headed upstream as fast as they could manage, but It wasn’t fast enough.

Suddenly, a troll came out of the trees and stopped midway between the forest and the water’s edge. Luckily the creature had chosen to scan the area upstream as soon as he came into the clear and thus had his back to the elf and the ranger.

The two former captives came to an abrupt halt thirty feet from the creature and froze, keeping themselves well behind him. However, they both knew it was only a matter of time before the huge beast turned to look in their direction.

“That’s a mighty quick three minutes,” Aragorn whispered in a slightly accusatory tone, though it wasn’t aimed at Legolas. The loud roar of the river insured that only the elf beside him heard his words.

Legolas shrugged. “There is always one who has to be ahead of all the others.” He looked at the ranger pointedly.

Aragorn rolled his eyes and dashed toward the trees.

It was going to be very risky to try and get through the edge of the forest between this one troll and all the ones they could now hear moving their way.

When Legolas arrived to settle beside his crouching friend behind a large oak, the man pointed above them. “We can take to the trees again,” he suggested. “Those creatures never seem to look up.”

Legolas shook his head. “The trees are too sparse here. And we do not have the time or the room to move into a denser area farther in.” The thought that if he’d been alone, he could have made it easily never entered his mind.

That thought did, however, enter Aragorn’s mind. Since he knew that urging Legolas to take that route was less than a waste of breath, the notion vanished as quickly as it had arrived. Their best chance was to stay together.

“There are sure to be trolls to our left, as well,” Aragorn said. “And since they seem to be farther back, I say let’s head downstream. We can hide in those large rocks, if need be.”

Legolas gave a quick snort of opposition. “You realize we night well be trapped there, should the trolls decide to look there, especially now that darkness can no longer hide us . And there is no reason to think they will not do so.”

“Maybe there’s a hidden cave in there somewhere?” the man asked hopefully, eyebrows raised and a grin on his face. When Legolas moved away without making a comment, Aragorn mumbled, “I guess not.”

With the decision apparently made, Aragorn began running after the elf, who had abandoned the trees to make a faster run along the open riverbank.

It didn’t help that Aragorn’s injured leg had picked that moment to let him know it was still there and wanting attention. He ignored it as best he could.

What neither he nor Legolas were able to ignore was the loud crack of thunder that boomed farther downriver and the black clouds that were rolling in on a very strong wind. The storm would be upon them in a matter of minutes, though at this point, even getting thoroughly drenched was much more preferable to getting captured again.

By the time the two friends reached the nearest of the large boulders, the troll, who had been on the riverbank, had spotted them and was giving chase. He was waving his arms in the air and yelling for all he was worth, trying to alert the other trolls now emerging from the forest.

The advancing creatures couldn’t understand what was being shouted, so they all turned toward the lone troll running beside the river. It wasn’t long before enough of them had emerged to make them look like a mass of dark tree trunks moving along the sand.

The lone troll was continuing to yell and wave his arms. He wasn’t trying to call the group to him, as they were evidently thinking. He was trying to tell them that they were running away from the fleeing captives.

Once the creatures came together and crowded around the single troll, they were finally able to understand what he had been shouting.

Scron had reached the river by then. “Git them back,” he commanded angrily, and they all turned and headed back the other way.

Legolas and Aragorn darted in among the boulders just as the sky opened up. So much rain was coming down so fast that it resembled a curtain, able to hide them until they were safely out of sight of the trolls.

Rain bothered the creatures about as much as it did a spring flower, so the search was hardly going to be suspended until the storm passed.

The wind had not let up, so the drops were being driven almost sideways. That was actually a blessing to Legolas and Aragorn. Instead of being pelted from above, the two were partially protected by the high rocks, as long as they stayed on the opposite side of them. The rain poured down the sides of the boulders and was carried away in little streams across the sand to add their volume to the raging river.

“Good as any cave,” the man commented, grinning broadly.

A momentary lull in the wind sent a spray of water full in the face of the ranger. He was no longer grinning, as he swiped across his face with his sleeve. The gesture did little good, since his tunic had become so wet, it wouldn’t hold any more water.

“I would say so,” was the elf’s sarcasm-tinged remark.

Aragorn held his finger up and pointed it at Legolas. “Not another word, elf,” he warned.

Even above the wind, the rain and the roar of the river, Legolas could hear the trolls getting closer to their position. “They are coming. We must move farther back into the rocks.”

Legolas and Aragorn made their way behind a boulder that had been at their back and then twisted around another one. It was hard going, because the bases of the rocks were so close together that the two friends couldn’t touch the ground between the giants and had to step over. They pushed against the wet sides with their hands in order to keep their balance.

“We must hurry,” Legolas urged. “The trolls are getting much too close.”

At one point, Legolas tried to swing himself between two rocks. His left shoulder protested and was not able to take the weight he was asking it to hold. The pain struck him so suddenly that he didn’t have time to prepare for it. He jerked his hand away to relieve the pressure and with his support gone, the archer promptly slipped.

Aragorn grabbed the elf’s right arm and held him steady until he could maneuver to the other side. Legolas turned back and nodded to his friend, who just grinned at him.

Aragorn made it over the rock base with no problem. He couldn‘t resist a jibe. “It isn’t usually you that needs help when balance is involved.” The words weren’t out of his mouth before he remembered Legolas’s injured shoulder.

Seeing an apology coming, Legolas waved it off. “No need to apologize, Estel. You forgot for a moment. That is hardly a reason for guilt.”

This time, it was Aragorn who nodded, knowing the elf was right, though he still felt bad about making the remark.

The two friends continued to work their way among the rocks, seeming to inch their way along much too slowly but still staying just ahead of the trolls.

The large creatures weren’t slowed by having to maneuver between the rocks, but they were slowed by searching as deeply into the crevices as they could go. Some spaces were just too small for them to get through. They stayed as close as they could, rooting around as they made their way downstream.

There were a couple of close calls, as either Legolas or Aragorn was forced to move parallel to a nearby troll and was almost discovered.

One thing the elf noticed, as they moved around a bend in the river, was that the ground to their left was rising up into a solid rock wall. He wasn’t pleased, because that cut off one way to escape should the trolls find them and try to swarm the rocks. It surprised a little him that they hadn’t already done so.

It wasn’t long before Aragorn moved around a boulder and found himself facing a rock wall. “Where did that come from?” he asked himself. He had been concentrating so hard on keeping his feet firmly under him that he hadn’t noticed a cliff growing up beside him.

The man felt a hand on his shoulder and turned to see Legolas standing next to him.

“I see you have found the cliff.”

“Yes. It seemed to suddenly appear, just like a certain elf I know.”

“Of course, it did,” was Legolas’s only comment.

Aragorn stood and stared up at the rock face. He thought that perhaps they could wait until the trolls moved farther downstream and then attempt to climb out of their current position. However, on closer inspection, he saw that the wall was relatively smooth with little in the way of protrusions or indentions to offer secure hand and foot holds. Also the rain was pouring down its sheer surface, creating what amounted to a waterfall. “No way to climb it freehand, and without ropes, it’s impossible.”

Even the elf doubted he could have been successful on this cliff in these conditions.

“Are there trolls down the bank behind us?”

“There are," Legolas replied. "They have scattered themselves all along here. All they have to do is wait us out.” That was not a very encouraging thought, but knowing how unorganized they were, it might not be a situation that lasted very long.

“Well, we have plenty of water,” Aragorn pointed out, sticking out his tongue and licking water off of his upper lip.

The sky was beginning to lighten, as the darkest of the clouds continued moving to the east. As a result, the rain had slackened to a steady drizzle.

Legolas and Aragorn were starting to feel a little better about their situation, when both of them had to duck down after hearing a troll rooting around on the other side of the rock they were behind. He was so close they could smell his stench, made worse by being wet.

As big as the creature was, he couldn’t wedge himself into the spaces between the surrounding boulders. After a few minutes of trying, he gave up and moved away.

The ranger closed his eyes and sighed. “That was entirely too close.”

Legolas moved on and cleared the space between two boulders. While he waited for Aragorn to join him, he looked up and saw a faint purple glow under the darkest of the receding clouds. He then felt a sizzling sensation crawl over his skin. “Get up on a rock, Estel!” he yelled urgently, heedless of any nearby trolls. At the same time, he himself jumped and found a precarious perch on a tiny piece of rock that jutted out from its base.

Their years together had taught them both that when one said, “duck” or “stop” or “run” or whatever else needed an immediate reaction, the other did it instantly without thinking about it.

Aragorn had barely leapt onto a small flat rock beside his left foot when the world seemed to vanish in the blinding flash of a bolt of startlingly brilliant blue-white lightning. The super-heated air around it expanded so fast it sent out a shockwave of thunder that drowned out all other sounds, including that of the wild, raging river.

TBC

Chapter Nineteen

The lightning bolt had hit a boulder several yards in front of where Legolas and Aragorn stood. The top of the rock exploded in a shower of shards and dust, while the remainder of the stone split in two with a tremendous cracking noise. The two halves fell apart as if they had been cleaved by an ax swung by a maddened dwarf.

Legolas and Aragorn had been so close that if their wet hair hadn’t been plastered to their heads, it would have stood on end. As it was, both elf and human had felt a strong tingle go through them.

Aragorn was hit by the shockwave so violently that he almost fell of the flat rock he was on. He had to reach out and put his hand on the boulder to his right, so he could steady himself. The heat, though brief, was enough to make him decidedly uncomfortable. His ears were ringing from the intense sound, and he shook his head, trying to clear it.

The ranger looked down at the rock he was standing atop and knew that had it not been there, he would have been standing in a puddle of water. If the lightning had hit the ground instead of the boulder, he may well have been electrocuted. He put his head down on his arm and sighed, grateful to the Valar for sparing him.

For Legolas the result was far more devastating. The elf felt the heat and the shockwave as much as Aragorn had. However, his elven hearing was so sensitive that the accompanying sound deafened him and nearly rendered him unconscious. He fell against the boulder whose base he was standing on. It was the only thing that was keeping him upright.

A quick glance told Aragorn that Legolas, whose feet were mere inches above the ground, had escaped the lightning‘s electricity, as well. "That was even closer," the man breathed. "Scary close."

It was then that Aragorn heard the cries and yells of the trolls. These sounds were different from the ones the creatures made during their frantic search. These cries reflected pain and fear. Had one of the trolls been near enough to the lightning to be hit by the charge or burned by the heat?

There seemed to be mass confusion among the creatures. There was no way to tell how long the trolls would be in this disoriented state.

"It sounds like our big, hairy friends didn’t fare quite as well as we did. I think now would be a good time for us to move on."

When Aragorn didn’t receive an answer from Legolas, he scrutinized the elf with a practiced eye. He noticed that not only was the archer’s body leaning against the rock, but so was his forehead. His eyes were closed.

The ranger almost panicked. Had the lightning struck his friend? He knew it hadn’t, but still he couldn’t keep the terrifying thought from forming in his mind.

*~*~*~*

Two of the trolls had been standing beside the boulder that the lightning bolt had hit. They were both flung backward, into another troll, who had been a few feet behind them. The three lay in a heap, but only two managed got up.

The troll, who had been hit, lay motionless, head in the sand and feet in the water at the edge of the river.

Several other trolls came up and stood looking down at him. Not one of them seemed too concerned about his well-being or very interested in offering him any aid. It wouldn’t really have mattered; The creature was dead and trolls did not mourn their own.

Scron had been close enough to the lightning bolt to be affected by all that had taken place as a result, but he was basically uninjured. What he was, though, was furious.

With one dead troll and most of the rest milling around, as if they didn’t have a clue what to do next, the leader needed to get them back on track. Nothing was going to get done until the group regained its focus.

Scron jumped up on a short rock and yelled for the others to shut up and listen to him. It took a few moments of shouting, but the trolls gradually quieted down and looked up at him. "You seen lightning before. It comes and it goes and there’s nothin’ you can do about it. So stop your bellyachin’ and start searchin’ for those captives. I knew they’re here somewhere. Find ‘em!" The last two words were spoken in a commanding voice that got everyone’s attention.

Scron jumped down from the rock and latched onto two trolls that were just passing him. "Git rid of Wig."

Not about to disobey, the two trolls nodded and headed over to the troll body. One picked up Wig’s arms and the other his feet. They carried him farther out into the river and swung him several times between them until they had a rhythm going. Then they let go and watched as Wig’s body was grabbed by the current and sent rushing down the river, bobbing like a cork, before disappearing into a foamy wave and not resurfacing.

Urged on by a very angry Scron, the search began anew. It was clear to all of them that their leader was not going to be satisfied until the captives were found. And they knew that a dissatisfied Scron was a dangerous Scron

*~*~*~*

Knowing that once the lightning bolt had disappeared, the electricity had gone with it, as well, Aragorn jumped down onto the water-soaked ground and covered the distance between him and Legolas in three strides.

Aragorn wrapped his left arm around Legolas’s shoulders, careful not to put pressure on the injured one. He put his right hand under the elf’s chin. Legolas was shaking uncontrollably. Aragorn didn’t try to pull him away from the rock. He simply held the trembling elf and spoke his name softly. "Legolas."

There was no response, yet Aragorn knew that Legolas was conscious. Even the rock would not have held him up, if he had no strength in his legs. He would simply have fallen to the ground. The man would wait patiently, if somewhat anxiously, for his friend to gather himself without being pushed to do it.

Legolas’s mind was reeling. His head felt as if it was incased in cotton, and that was in addition to the pounding it had started with. He had been near lightning strikes before, and the noise had hurt, once knocking him to his knees, but never had it weakened him like this. He felt Aragorn holding him and knew his friend would not let him fall.

Gradually, through sheer willpower, Legolas gained the strength he needed to straighten himself up. Slowly his head came up, and he opened his eyes. He tried to smile when he saw the worried look on Aragorn’s face. "I am all right, Estel," he reassured the man.

"Yes, I know. You always are, despite all the things that may be wrong with you." His attempt at humor failed miserably. "Can you walk?"

Aragorn’s words sounded muffled, but Legolas heard them. "I believe I can manage that." The declaration was bold but hardly matched the effort he was able to give to accomplish it. His legs were wobbly and the dizziness he had experienced earlier was back in full force.

There were a number of remarks Aragorn could have made, but he knew how badly Legolas felt, not to mention how badly he felt about feeling so bad, so the ranger kept quiet.

The two made their way as best they could in the small space between the boulders and the bottom of the cliff face.

The sound of the trolls wasn’t receding any, so it was a safe bet that they were spread all along the river. They most likely would remain so, as long as they knew their former captives were in here among the rocks.

Just then, it started to pour down rain again. Once the brunt of the storm had passed, the wind had not picked up, so the large drops were falling straight down, pounding on the heads of the two friends. The world had tuned gray again.

"Great," Aragorn grumbled, though he realized that he shouldn’t really complain. They had just escaped certain death by lightning, and they hadn’t yet been found by the trolls. What’s a little rain? Instead of fussing, he thanked the Valar and hoped their luck would hold.

As Legolas and Aragorn continued to make their way downstream, the elf inwardly shuddered at how near they had come to disaster. He was immensely relieved they had escaped relatively unscathed from one of Nature’s most spectacular and deadly phenomenon. He was not in great shape and needed Aragorn’s help to maneuver, but he knew it could have been so much worse.

Rather than becoming weaker as they worked their way among the rocks, Legolas was gaining strength. His head still hurt, and he also still felt as if his ears were stuffed with cotton, but his legs had become steadier. He turned to Aragorn, "I can walk on my own now."

"Are you sure?" the man questioned, not willing to let go let go until he had satisfied himself the elf spoke the truth.

At times like these, Legolas knew that just saying the words were not enough. He turned his head so that he could look straight into Aragorn’s eyes. Tempted as he was to say the old familiar words, ‘I am fine’, he didn’t think Aragorn would believe them. Instead, he just repeated, as sincerely as he could, "I can walk on my own now."

The sincerity that Legolas’s blue-gray eyes reflected told the man his friend was telling the truth. He also saw the pain that the elf was trying to hide, but he chose not to comment on that, at least not at the moment.

Aragorn slowly released his hold on Legolas and was pleased to see the archer standing steadily on his feet. He rolled his eyes when Legolas gave him a ‘you see’ look.

They hadn’t gone more than a few feet, when a loud shout brought the two friends up short. They looked in the direction the sound had come from, though all they could see was rock.

"Find them captives or two of you go in the river!"

Legolas and Aragorn looked at each other and said in unison, "Scron." His voice was the most distinctive of all the trolls they had heard speak, so it was easy to pick it out among the group.

"I wonder what happened to Pickett?" Aragorn couldn’t help wondering. He spoke softly, not wanting to betray their position even though the driving rain was hitting loudly against the rocks, and the roar of the river seemed to be increasing.

"Perhaps there was a change in the power structure," Legolas offered, speaking equally as soft. He shrugged and said, "I do not care to stay and investigate. Do you?"

"No, let’s go."

A couple of minutes later, when Legolas disappeared around another boulder, Aragorn tried to follow but made a wrong turn. The light-colored rocks and the rain made the whole world look gray.

Still thinking he was following Legolas, Aragorn was soon facing an enormous rock wall, though it was clearly not the cliff. To his surprise, he found himself staring downward at a black triangular-shaped spot that made itself more visible through the driving rain, as he moved nearer to it.

Legolas had passed several boulders, when he looked behind him and saw nothing but rain-covered rock. There was no human in sight. He dared not call out to Aragorn, so he turned back to look for the man.

It didn’t take long to locate his missing friend, who was standing still and staring at a huge pile of rock, far larger than any they had yet encountered. "What are you doing?" he asked.

"Would you look at that."

Legolas followed the line of the ranger’s pointing finger to see what he was talking about. As soon as his line of sight landed on the spot Aragorn was indicating, Legolas came close to letting out a groan. "I do not believe this," he sighed. "A cave - of sorts."

He then looked upward to the top of the cliff, raising his right hand to shield his eyes from the rain. "It isn’t a true cave," the elf stated. " A large section of the cliff broke away and toppled down. It must have broken into pieces when it hit the bottom here. They are leaning at such an angle that they form...".

"A cave," Aragorn finished, grinning broadly.

"Not exactly, but it is certainly a shelter."

"Let’s give it a try." Aragorn didn’t wait for Legolas’s answer. He bent down and crawled into the narrow opening.

Legolas had to remove his bow from its place on his back before he could move inside without hindering his progress or more importantly, hitting the weapon on a rock and possibly damaging it.

It quickly became obvious that the giant slabs of rock had hit together at the top, forming a tent-like structure below. It was also quickly noted that there was no way anyone was going to be able to stand upright inside the confined space.

On the positive side, the area was much too small for a troll to get into. And the slabs were much too large for even the combined effort of a group of the creatures to move.

The back of the cave was the cliff wall itself. With the rocks jammed hard against it, no one was going to get in that way. Of course, that meant that Legolas and Aragorn couldn’t get out that way, either, however, neither was thinking of that at the moment.

The two crawled all the way to the back and sat down with their backs against the wall. It was a little tight for them to sit side by side, but they weren’t overly crammed together. They were just glad that they were at least able to stretch their legs out.

Unfortunately, the top of the little structure was jagged with gauges and missing chunks, and thus did not fit together very smoothly, so the rain was not hindered in its effort to reach the ground. Some ran down the inside walls of the rock slabs in rivulets, while the rest was left to come dripping down on what or, in this case, whoever was below.

Aragorn decided not to grumble about the one disadvantage there was to this shelter, so he decided to be positive about the situation. "We’ll be safe here. I doubt the trolls can even get back here through the regular boulders to find this place." He smiled. "I guess now we can wait them out," Aragorn offered.

Legolas nodded but did not comment. They had not found this shelter a moment too soon. He was beginning to feel bad again. Or perhaps now that he and Aragorn were relatively comfortable, his aches and pans were making themselves more noticeable.

Crawling even the ten feet or so into this shelter had put a strain on his left shoulder. The elf knew he could hide that pain well enough, but his body, already weak from the effects of his proximity to the lightning strike, was shaking.

With luck, Aragorn would be too preoccupied thinking about the trolls and the rain dripping on his head to notice.

TBC

Chapter Twenty

Several minutes went by in silence. Both Legolas and Aragorn were leaning back against the rock wall and letting their tense muscles relax as much as they dared under the circumstances. They were using the time simply to take a few deep breaths and experience the peace of just sitting still and not having to crawl over, around and between rocks or dodge searching trolls, not to mention continuing to recover from a much too close escape from the lightning bolt.

The thunder that had been booming overhead was now moving off, taking with it the darkest of the clouds. That meant that the chance of more lightning striking in this area was quickly decreasing. It was, however, still raining rather hard.

The two friends were well aware they were in the safest place possible short of being completely out of troll country. That was a goal they would strive for even to their last breath, which neither wanted to think about.

Aragorn easily felt Legolas’s body trembling. It was impossible not to, since they were virtually jammed up together inside the narrow shelter. He wanted to say something, but couldn’t quite bring himself to do so, especially since there was absolutely nothing he could do about it.
He knew he could offer words of comfort, but he was afraid that mentioning it would only make Legolas feel the need to make denials of hurt or declarations of well-being, neither of which would ease the man’s concern.

It was best just to keep his worry to himself until or unless the elf got worse. That would put a whole new light on the situation, and his silence would definitely be broken.

What Aragorn didn’t know was that the elf was getting worse. At the moment, Legolas wasn’t in any real danger from any of his injuries, but they were all making themselves felt in a most unpleasant way. He couldn’t believe that Aragorn hadn’t said something already, but even his curiosity as to why that was the case wasn’t going to make him bring the subject up first.

Ignoring the water that was running down the wall at his back, Legolas rested his head against the solid stone and closed his eyes. Maybe he could just will away the pain and dizziness in his head and the throbbing in his shoulder, as well as the collection of minor but persistent hurts. Such an endeavor rarely worked unless he had far more pressing things to occupy his mind, like fighting orcs or spiders or escaping trolls. He almost laughed.

Here he was in the one place around here where he could count himself relatively safe enough to relax a bit, and it was that very peace that kept him from being distracted enough to forget how miserable he felt. He sighed. Just one of life’s little ironies.

Refusing to give in to his misery and not wanting to disturb Aragorn, who appeared to be relaxing himself, Legolas concentrated outward, listening to the trolls still searching the rocks, the almost hissing sound the rain made, as it hit the rocks, and the constant roar of the river, all punctuated occasionally by the retreating thunder.

Listening to his surroundings was such a natural thing for him and often done without much thought, that it was only then the elf realized he could hear without straining to do so. It was less sharp than usual, but the sounds were no longer muffled. At least one part of his body had righted itself, he mused. He turned his attention back to the sounds outside the shelter.

Having been deep in the rocks and knowing they had once gone around a bend in the river, the archer had no idea how far downriver these large boulders went. They didn’t exist upriver near the forest. They were obviously the result of chunks of the cliff that had fallen, similar to the two huge pieces he and Aragorn now sat under.

Legolas knew the cliff could go on for miles or end a hundred yards from here. He wished he had taken the extra time, when they first spotted the rocks, to look more closely at what lay ahead of them.

Common sense told him he had done all he could just to get to this place without being caught. After all, by the time he and Aragorn decided to head this way, they were running for their lives. Still the elf wished he had done more to investigate what lay around them.

It often made the difference in a battle, large or small, to be aware of where you were and what possible land features you could utilize to your advantage. That lesson had certainly been drummed into him when he was training to be a warrior. There were many more things, often things easy to overlook, than just trees or a river to rely on.

The elf would also dearly love to have known how close they were to the edge of the trolls’ territory. A river had been the boundary on the far side, but was that the case here? While he doubted that he and Aragorn would be pursued beyond its borders, he couldn’t be sure these creatures would let a little thing like the end of their land stop them from getting what they were after. Never underestimate the enemy. Another lesson drummed into his young, warrior-in-training head.

Legolas’s attention was jerked away from his thoughts when he heard a cracking, crunching noise high above and looked up, even though he knew he wouldn’t be able to see anything. He was sure he knew what the noise meant.

Almost by reflex, Legolas grabbed Aragorn and pulled him down, leaning forward and crossing his arms to form a shield so that Aragorn’s head and neck were protected.

Aragorn, not having heard the noise, had no idea what was happening. He didn’t have time to ask before a tremendous crash erupted next to the shelter followed by shattering stone. The earth was shaken so violently that the tops of the shelter slabs, huge as they were, moved enough to grind together, sending tiny chunks of rock raining down with the real rain.

“What was that?” Aragorn asked, as Legolas released him, and the ranger sat straight up, eyes wide in surprise. “It wasn’t another lightning strike,” he stated, sure it couldn’t really have been unless several had hit at once.

“No,” Legolas replied. “Another piece of the cliff fell.” He felt confident enough of that fact to be able to say so with certainty. “The rain probably loosened and washed away the dirt in some of the larger cracks in the section next to the piece we are now sitting under.” He didn’t even realize that this had become one of the very things that would make him forget his aches and pains.

Aragorn looked up but had to jerk his head aside, as a drop of water hit him square in the eye. He blinked several times and pointed upward. Some of the gaps between the rock slabs at the top had grown in size. “Our roof has shifted.”

“So it would seem,” was Legolas’s only comment, remembering the grinding he had heard a few moments ago. He knew that they were extremely lucky one slab hadn’t shifted inside the other, so that both ended up collapsing.

“That falling cliff could have landed on top of us,” Aragorn observed with no lack of grateful appreciation that it hadn’t. “Would these rocks have protected us or caved in at the top of us, do you think?”

The elf shrugged. “The latter most likely, but it probably depends on how large the piece is that fell.”

“It sounded pretty large,” the ranger remarked.

The almost casual discussion struck Aragorn as one that was keeping him from shaking. That was a near miss even more remarkable than their escape from the lightning. Well, he amended to himself, they were about even.

With the exception of the rain and the river, all had become relatively quiet once the sound of the crash had subsided.

At first, the trolls had been frozen with shock and fear but had recovered and were now scattering, waving their arms in the air and shouting, much the same way they had done after the lightning strike. None of them had been close enough to the falling chunk of stone to be hit by any of the shattering rock, which had hit right below the cliff face it had broken away from. The whole incident had frightened them worse than the lightning had done.

Still shaky but unwilling to show it, Tack approached Scron, a glower on his ugly face. “We gotta leave. Cacthin’ those two ain’t worth gittin’ ourselves killed over.”

Drawing himself up to his full height, Scron retuned the other troll’s scowl with one of his own. He pointed to himself. “I say when we leave here. You got no say.”

It might not be such a bad thing for Scron to get killed, Tack thought to himself. Then he could grab the leadership quickly, the way Picket and Scron had done.

Tack was tempted to say that Scron might be next, after what had happened to Wig, but self-preservation prevented the words from leaving his mouth. Now, was not the time to challenge Scron, who was too strong.

Even though Tack wasn’t about to say anything that might make him the next intentional target, he still couldn’t resist making a parting comment. “Maybe they got caught under the rocks.” Then he turned and left Scron to ponder that notion.

Scron scratched his head. Maybe the captives did get mashed underneath the rock when it tumbled from the cliff. Several smaller pieces had split off from the stone, but the main piece was too big to move, so how would they know if the captives were under it? Not deterred by that question, he yelled out for all the trolls to gather around him.

“Look ’round them rocks,” Scron said as he swung his hand in circles, vaguely pointing in the direction of the newly shattered rocks. “I want them captives found and brought to me, if they ain’t dead.”

These trolls may not do much in the way of logical reasoning, but it was unavoidable that they wouldn’t pick up some knowledge from the natural world they lived in.

Using an example of that knowledge, Scron said, “Look fer blood on the ground. If they got mashed, they’d bleed.”

The rock that had fallen may have missed the shelter, but it managed to split several of the boulders that served as protection from the trolls, who had been too big to get in between them. That, however, was no longer the case.

It didn’t take long for a dozen trolls to start milling around the remnants of the boulders, upturning those they could lift and moving aside those they couldn’t quite get off the ground.

It soon became apparent to Legolas and Aragorn what was happening outside. The unmistakable sound of rummaging trolls and shifting stone easily reached them. They stared at each other and then at the open end of their shelter. There were still boulders in front of it but if a troll somehow saw the entrance, he could lean in from the side, stick his head down and look inside. None of the creatures might have been able to actually reach the elf and ranger, but they could certainly pound on the sides of the slabs until they finally broke and collapsed inward.

This situation was getting a bit too uncomfortable for the two companions, as they both stared at the shelter entrance. Neither dared take a deep breath, though both were aching to do just that.

“Please, Valar, don’t let any of them find us,” Aragorn whispered half under his breath. Even the elf sitting close to him barely heard the words.

This concentration of dreadful anticipation went on for interminable minutes, which seemed to stretch on into hours with no relief.

Suddenly, a hairy troll leg came into view and Aragorn thought his heart had tried to leap out of his chest and had gotten caught in his throat instead.

The appendage belonged to a troll that he could hear shifting a piece of rock and grumbling in frustration the whole time. Then the leg disappeared and a large piece of rock slammed down across the front of the shelter, plunging it into shadowy gloom.

It seemed that the troll had not found what he was looking for and had cast the stone aside right where it would inadvertently do two things: It blocked the shelter entrance from being discovered, and it blocked any chance of escape for the two friends, who sat and stared in shock at this latest turn of events.

Scron, who had moved up right next to one of the shelter slabs spoke up loudly, “Anybody seen anything?”

There were several negative mumblings before Tack said, “If they’s under there, we can’t find no proof.”

“The rain mighta washed the blood away,” Scron told him. He stood still for a minute and then said, “If they ain’t dead, we gotta find ’em. Start lookin’ down the river like we was doin’ before.”

A short time later, Legolas and Aragorn heard the trolls begin searching the rocks on the downriver side of the shelter. It would take them a while to get far enough away for Legolas and Aragorn to feel safe again.

The elf was staring at the rock that covered the shelter opening. He could feel his heartbeat starting to pound in his ears. Being in this cave-like stone structure was bad enough, but now he was closed in, and the thought of being trapped did not sit well with him. Legolas was far from panicking, but he was also far from calm.

Aragorn placed his hand on Legolas’s arm. “All we have to do is wait for the trolls to get out of earshot, and we can push the rock away.” He wanted to ease his friend’s discomfort without actually expressing the fact he knew how much Legolas hated being in places like this.

Legolas nodded, forcing himself to be positive. Somehow just hearing the words Aragorn could have said would make it worse. He knew what his friend was trying to do, and he was grateful.

“I know we must wait,” Legolas said with as calm a voice as he could. After all, he told himself, if could be far worse. They could be in a real cave deep inside the cliff with a blocked entrance and no way to get out at all.

The archer shook his head. Now was not the time to be thinking such things. His head hurt, but his mind wasn’t fuzzy or muddled, just not on the subject it should be. Legolas knew the healer next to him would probably diagnose his head injury, rather than his hatred of small, dark places, as the cause for his drifting concentration.

When he looked at Aragorn to reassure him, he saw the gray, slightly narrowed, eyes staring back at him.

“Your head is worse, isn’t it?”

Legolas stubbornly kept his mouth closed.

Undeterred, Aragorn continued. “Since we’re waiting until the trolls are far enough away not to hear or spot us leaving, we have the time now to discuss your injuries - in detai,” he added firmly, feeling a measure of triumph that he had somehow trapped the elf into talking about what the man wanted, and that was never an easy thing to do.

“We can discuss that at a later time,” Legolas replied, showing a little annoyance. He had just known Aragorn would find him out sooner or later.

TBC

Chapter Twenty One

Seeing the determined set of Aragorn’s jaw, Legolas pretended not to hear what Aragorn had just said about wanting to know the details of the elf’s injuries. Instead, he tired to turn the discussion away from himself, as he often did, and on to an entirely different subject. “I am sorry that we were not able to retrieve your gold medallion. I think it may have been lost when Hatch was burned. He is the only one that I saw with it.”

“I hate to lose it, but if I know my father, he’ll have another one made for me. Besides, he would much rather me show up in Rivendell in one piece than risk life and limb trying to find it.”

“Still, I know how much it meant to you.”

“It did, but our lives mean much more, so that’s what we need to concentrate on saving.”

If there had been more light in the shelter, Aragorn would have seen the pain and slight dilation in the elf’s blue-gray eyes. That would have outright frightened the man, and he would have spent his last ounce of energy getting the elf out of the shelter. Then he would have gotten Legolas into the forest, fighting every inch of the way, if need be.

Legolas kept his eyes averted, so his perceptive friend couldn’t read the truth of his condition in their depths. He knew he couldn’t be too obvious, or Aragorn would be alerted by that maneuver in itself.

Aragorn observed Legolas, fully aware of what the elf had been trying to do when he mentioned the medallion. “I know that your offer of sympathy was genuine, Legolas, not just a way to distract me. Right?”

“Of course,” Legolas replied, a little too quickly.

“It didn’t work, my friend. Nice try, though.”

Closing his eyes, Legolas just sighed. He should have known - did, in fact, know - that the ploy wouldn’t work. Occasionally it did, but this was clearly not going to be one of those times.

“Now tell me,” the ranger said firmly, as he shifted his position so he could look squarely at the elf. “How bad does your head really hurt?” It was clear he was prepared to sit right where he was until the question was answered.

“Bad,” Legolas finally confessed, unable to put his friend off any longer. “It pains me enough that I am dizzy, and even in this gloom, I can tell my vision is not as focused as it should be. And before you ask, my shoulder throbs, because I have overused it in our escape attempt, instead of being able to rest it.” In the spirit of full disclosure, he added, “And I cannot control the trembling.”

The rush of words came out flat and had a distinct, ‘Are you happy now?’ tone to them. He regretted the harsh declaration as soon as it left his mouth, because he knew Aragorn didn’t deserve to be spoken to in that manner. The elf felt somewhat like an elfling who had been scolded for misbehaving during his lessons and was now sorry for talking back to his tutor. “Estel...”

“Don’t you dare apologize,” Aragorn interrupted. “I know how annoying I can be with my persistence, because I know how you hate admitting to anything you consider a weakness, even when it isn’t your fault.” The man’s own harshness softened considerably when he added, “I’m worried about you.”

“I know you are,” the elf replied in a much softer voice. He knew his friend was genuine in his feelings of concern. “I do not mean to worry you, Estel. You can do nothing for me, and it only frustrates you.”

Aragorn nodded. “That’s true, but I still want to know. I’m a healer, and there’s a chance I can help in some way.” ‘A very small chance,’ he was forced to admit to himself.

“This is not a distraction,” Legolas declared before saying, “but we need to find a way out of here. Those trolls will not stay gone forever. When the large rocks that have hidden us so far run out, they will be back. We will be trapped, because I think they will simply wait us out.”

Aragorn had to agree with Legolas’s reasoning. They did indeed need to leave this shelter as soon as they could.

“There seems to be only one way,” the elf stated, as he pointed toward the shelter’s entrance.

Looking at Legolas, the ranger shrugged and gave the archer a wry smile. “It’s simple. We just have to move the stone that’s blocking our way out.” After seeing the dubious expression on Legolas’s face, he said, “Like I said, it’s simple.”

From where Legolas and Aragorn sat, there was no way to tell the full size and weight of the rock the troll had pushed across the shelter opening. They hadn’t the slightest idea if moving it was even a possibility. The fact that it might not be was too frightening a thought to even entertain, much less dwell on.

“You stay here,” the ranger told Legolas.

“No,” the elf replied. “You cannot do it alone.”

“You’re in no condition to be trying to move large stones.” Aragorn spoke firmly.

“Neither are you,” the stubborn elf insisted. “I did not tell you how I felt, so that you could make me sit while you did all the work. I will do my share.” The last words were uttered in a tone the ranger was well familiar with. It said that there would be no argument on the matter. Like Legolas a moment ago, he knew when to give in.

Resigned to the decision Legolas was determined to follow through on, Aragorn moved forward first, crawling on hands and knees until he reached the entrance through which they had earlier sought safety. That now seemed like an age ago.

More slowly, Legolas crawled up behind the man, laying his bow down on the ground beside him. He maneuvered himself sideways so his good right shoulder would be next to the rock that was hindering their escape.

Aragorn would have preferred Legolas not tax himself, but he knew there was no way he could move the stone by himself. Even injured, the elf was till probably stronger than he was. So, turning to face Legolas, Aragorn placed his left shoulder against the rock. “Now we push.”

It soon became apparent that this approach wasn’t working. The rock wasn’t budging.

Legolas sat back on his heels to conserve his strength and to think. After a moment, he looked at Aragorn and said, “The stone is leaning slightly against the slabs. We are too low. We must push against the top, so it will move past its base and topple outward.”

Looking at the stone while still on his knees, the ranger realized that the angle was indeed working against them. “The problem there is the top of the rock is above us on the outside. We can’t get our shoulders against it. We’ll have to use our hands.”

Aragorn could almost see Legolas gritting his teeth at the prospect of having to use his left arm on the heavy stone. “Let me take most of the weight of the push,” he said.

Shaking his head, Legolas replied, “We now know how heavy the stone is, Estel, so we must both use all of our strength. It is the only way we can move the stone and clear the entrance.” He stared at his friend. “It is the only way we can escape.”

Those last words were enough to make the ranger agree, reluctant though he was to do so. After all, what was the use of saving Legolas more pain and possibly further injury, if they ended up trapped here? They would either be found and eventually taken again by the trolls, or they would die in this dark place they had so recently believed was their salvation. Neither of those prospects was an option in the minds of the two friends.

Determination again flared in the ranger. ‘Whatever happens to Legolas as a result of this, I will take care of him when we are free,’ he vowed silently. Those words resonated in his mind, and he would see them fulfilled or die trying.

Legolas placed the palms of his hands flat against the stone as close to the top as having them side by side would allow. He determinedly ignored the pain just raising his left arm caused in his shoulder. It would take a lot more determination, he knew, to get through what was coming.

Aragorn placed one hand in the small space above Legolas’s and one below. “Ready?” he asked.

Clenching his jaw tightly, Legolas nodded and said, “Now.”

The two friends pushed with all their might, but the stone did not budge any more than it had a few moments ago.

They continued until Legolas had to pull back, shaking from the exertion. “We need more leverage.”

“Stay on your knees,” Aragorn instructed. “I have an idea.” He stood up, bending over slightly, so his head wouldn’t hit either of the slanted slabs only inches above him.

Keeping his hands on the rock, the ranger straightened one leg out behind him and the other he bent at the knee. “Let’s go again,” he said, when he was set.

It wasn’t the rock that moved. It was the ranger. The rain coming down from the top of the shelter had turned the ground inside into a sheet of mud. It wasn’t thick, but it was extremely slippery, and it caused both of Aragorn’s feet to slide out from under him.

Instinctively, he reached out and latched onto the only thing that was there to keep himself form falling. To his utter horror, it turned out to be Legolas’s left shoulder.

Legolas was startled by the intense pain that exploded inside his shoulder. It was so sudden and so different from the throbbing he had been living with that he gasped and tried to jerk backwards. If his head hadn’t been bent forward, he would have hit it yet again.

Instantly, Aragorn let go, and as a consequence, he slammed down face first into the mud. His mind was reeling by what he had done to Legolas, and thus he didn’t notice the blood trickling from his nose, as he raised his head.

Despite several failed attempts to rise, Aragorn finally made it to his knees and then to Legolas’s side. “Oh, mellon nin, I am so sorry. It was slippery and...” The man stopped. He had just hurt his friend worse than the trolls had done, and offering excuses wasn’t going to make matters any better.

Still speechless from the pain, Legolas shook his head. Then, almost breathless, he said, “Not your fault.” Black spots danced across his already impaired vision, while he fought to hang on to consciousness.

Aragorn let the elf catch his breath, knowing that fussing over him would only upset him more. And he certainly dared not touch him. He closed his eyes and cursed himself in three languages for being ten kinds of a fool.

Keeping his distance, Aragorn opened his eyes and stared at Legolas’s shoulder. The look did not go unnoticed by the elf.

“It is not dislocated again,” he offered weakly. He refrained from saying that it was so swollen by now, the bone couldn’t have moved no matter what was done to it. He knew that was an exaggeration but not much of one.

Aragorn did mention it. “It’s probably too swollen to move,” he said, his voice choked with regret and guilt.

“Are you all right?” Legolas inquired of his friend.

“Me?” the ranger asked in surprise.

“Yes, you. You fell, did you not?”

“In the mud. It hardly did any damage.” Aragorn sounded as if it would have been better if he had done something to himself. He deserved it.

“Are you sure? Your nose is bleeding.“

Aragorn rubbed his fingers over his upper lip and then looked at them. There was mud and blood mixed up together.

After taking his thumb and forefinger and placing them on each side of his nose, he cautiously moved them from side to side, trying to determine if there was a break. He triumphantly declared, “It isn’t broken, just mashed a bit.”

Relieved, Legolas said, “We must still move the rock, Estel. The need for that has not changed.”

Legolas was being as practical as ever, Aragorn noted, and he was right. “But how?” the man inquired. “We couldn’t do it before I hurt your shoulder again.”

“It is only pain. No further damage was done to it.” He had no idea whether or not he was lying about that, but he continued quickly before Aragorn had time to say otherwise. “We will push on the rock again.”

“Legolas...”

“We will push again,” the elf said firmly, reaching out with his good arm and placing his hand on Aragorn’s shoulder. “We must.”

Conceding, Aragorn said, “We push again.”

The two companions again moved up to the rock and placed their hands against it. There was one difference this time, something Aragorn thought of by accident. As he moved forward, again standing, he came up against the rock slab at his back.

Despite the water running down its surface, it wasn’t slippery, and there was a small amount of friction between the rock and Aragorn’s clothing. He decided he would use it as the leverage he needed.

“One thing,” Legolas said, as he looked up into his friend’s eyes. “We do not stop until the stone has fallen. Stopping and restarting will not accomplish the task. It will only drain our strength.”

“Agreed,” the man replied.

It was now or never, and they both knew it.

Aragorn placed both of his feet against the top of the rock next to Legolas’s right hand.

At a nod from Aragorn, the two began exerting as much force against the stone as they could muster.

The angle at which the ranger was forced to work made the maneuver more difficult, but it was more than offset by the added strength of Aragorn’s legs rather than that of his hands.

Legolas and Aragorn were pushing as hard as they could, but at first, nothing was happening. Both friends were holding their breath, not willing to use even the tiniest bit of strength on anything but pushing on the rock.

Just when it seemed both elf and ranger would collapse in a heap of exhaustion, the stone moved. It wasn’t much, but it encouraged them to keep going.

Then, in deceptive silence, the rock began to fall. When it hit the rock behind it, there was a dull thud rather than the loud crash that was expected. It was raining harder, and black, rolling clouds, once again covered the sky.

The two friends crouched down and looked out before turning to look at each other and grin.

Aragorn was still grinning broadly, as he swept his hand forward, indicating that Legolas should go first.

Gratefully, the elf crawled through the shelter entrance, actually happy to have the rain hit him in the face, as he emerged.

Aragorn was right behind him.

They stood up and looked at one another again.

“Shall we?” Aragorn asked. “I want to leave this place.”

They took two steps in the direction of the forest upriver that they had left so long ago, before a deep voice said, “Goin’ somewhere, scum?”

TBC

Chapter Twenty Two

Legolas and Aragorn froze at the sound of those chilling words from a creature they both knew much better than they wanted to. For a few seconds, it seemed that the whole world had frozen with them, especially since the rain chose that exact moment to stop falling.

Neither friend had to say a word. They could both ‘read’ the silence and know that they were each experiencing total disbelief. After all they had been through from the moment they had made the fateful decision to enter troll country, they had now been caught once more.

It took Scron putting a huge hand on each of their shoulders, in a move he thought would convey his complete triumph, to spur the elf and the ranger to action.

“Not again,” Aragorn ground out between clenched teeth, as he twisted under the palm of the troll, breaking free before the grip could tighten. At the same time, he reached inside his tunic and gripped the handle of Legolas’s long knife.

Legolas’s rage had boiled up instantly, and though he hadn’t uttered a sound, the same words Aragorn had spoken rang in his mind. It was not going to happen again, not while he still drew breath.

The elf’s hand slipped inside of his own tunic and came out with his other long knife clutched in his fist. While this was happening, his muscles were tightening into a coil, ready to spring. The elf’s composure snapped, as he instantly exploded into action.

Aragorn had raised the knife he held and was preparing to drive it into the creature, when Legolas suddenly spun on the ball of his right foot, swinging the knife around with him. The blade rose until it was just below the bottom edge of Scron’s ribcage, then it moved forward with incredible speed.

Once the knife had broken through the troll’s skin, it had taken all of the strength the elven prince could muster in his one good arm to push the knife through the thick muscle covering the troll’s stomach.

The maneuver had been aided not only by the force of Legolas’s momentum but also by the power of the archer’s anger.

Still spinning, Legolas brought his body in behind the thrust and drove the blade in at an upward angle, piercing the creature’s heart.

Scron’s head slowly dropped until he was staring down at the knife protruding from his body. His eyes were wide with shock. He reached up and placed his right forefinger on the tip of the bone-colored handle just above the elf’s hand, as if to make sure that what he was seeing was really there. Unfortunately for him, it was. Scron then toppled over backwards like a felled tree.

The knife was so firmly embedded in the troll and so tightly held in the elf’s hand that Legolas was pulled over on top of Scron’s now prone body. He narrowly missed having the knife’s handle slam into his chest.

The speed of the elf’s attack had taken Aragorn by surprise, even though he had seen the elf perform that maneuver many times while fighting orcs and other fell denizens of the Shadow.

Totally engrossed in the scene playing out right in front of him, Aragorn didn’t think to check the area around them to see if any other trolls had been with Scron. His only thought right then was to help Legolas. He quickly pushed the long knife he held back under his tunic.

By the time Aragorn bent down to help his friend up, Legolas had managed to pull the knife free and had rolled off of Scron on the other side and out of the man’s reach. It didn’t take Aragorn long to make it around the hairy mound to where Legolas had landed on a slab of rock.

He reached out again to aid his friend. However, the elf needed no help, for no sooner had Legolas reached his feet than Aragorn felt the blade of a knife at his throat. He froze every muscle in his body. That included his heart and lungs, and he was close to becoming light-headed until he could get them functioning again.

As chilling as the knife pressing the flesh of his throat was, more chilling was the low growl that resonated deep in Legolas’s own throat. It was a warning not to move, and Aragorn wasted no time in heeding it.

Slowly and softly, Aragorn said, “Legolas, it’s me, Estel. You know me, and you know I won’t harm you, so please lower the knife.”

When the archer raised his head to look full in Aragorn’s face, the man saw the reason for his friend’s violent reaction. Legolas’s eyes were not only reflecting a cold anger, but they were also dilated to the point that only a small circle of blue-gray rimmed the black centers.

More chilling than anything, however, was the fact that there was no recognition in the hate-filled glare of the elven warrior.
Inwardly shaking, but determined not to let his fear show, Aragorn tried again, still speaking softly. “Legolas, do you hear me?”

The almost imperceptible increase in the blade’s pressure against his neck told the man that he had been heard, if not clearly understood. And, the slight sting he felt told him that his skin had been broken. His concern was not for himself. Aragorn worried about the guilt he knew the elf would feel when he finally came to his senses and saw what he had done.

Aragorn refused to give up. “Legolas, it’s Estel. Please, mellon nin, tell me that you know what I’m saying to you.”

The wait was nerve-wracking. Aragorn didn’t know if Legolas would come to himself and back off or simply slit his throat.

The ranger tired to will his heart to keep beating at a normal pace, yet he couldn’t avoid holding his breath. He was only able to keep himself from betraying his fear both for Legolas and for himself by sheer willpower.

After a few more excruciatingly tense minutes, Legolas blinked, and Aragorn let his breath out ever so slowly. Even so, the ranger was still unwilling to move. And as long as the knife remained against his neck, that’s the way he would stay.

Legolas blinked again, and this time the blade gradually dropped down a few inches. Though the elf kept the knife close, it was no longer in a threatening position.

The tension may have eased a bit, but Aragorn’s attention did not waver. He was all too aware of how quickly the situation could revert back to what it had been just a moment ago. The man was not willing to let that happen, if there was anything he could do to stop it.

Aragorn had also seen Legolas act this way toward enemies many times, but to have it happen to him was an experience he’d sooner forget.

There was no question in Aragorn’s mind about what was the root cause of Legolas’s behavior. It was not the elf’s anger at the situation, though that had to be a contributing factor. It was certainly not the absurd idea that he had mistook the ranger for a troll.

The tell-tale answer was in Legolas’s dilated eyes. The elf was quite literally suffering from a severe head injury, compounded by the difficult circumstances they had both found themselves in.

Aragorn’s conclusion was hardly surprising, considering the two head blows Legolas had sustained recently plus the painful shoulder injury that was only adding to the elf’s physical distress. Aragorn was plainly worried.

“May I have the knife?” the ranger asked politely, still keeping his voice low and soft. He knew he was taking a chance asking, since Legolas might consider wanting to be disarmed a threat.

Aragorn slowly reached out, palm up, but made no move to actually take the knife from Legolas’s hand. It would be up to the elf to give the weapon up.

The archer looked down at his friend’s hand before finally nodding and raising the knife. In a deft move, he flipped the knife, catching the blade between his fingers. He held it out to the ranger, handle first.

Aragorn had no sooner reached out and taken the long, slender weapon than Legolas’s legs gave out under him. With the anger gone and the situation defused, the tension the elf had been experiencing was released, and he began to sink toward the ground.

Forgetting everything else, Aragorn grabbed his friend, wrapping one arm around the elf’s waist. He took the knife he had just taken and slipped into the elven warrior’s hand. “Hold onto the knife, Legolas. We may need it later.” He had no idea whether Legolas understood him or not, but he didn’t have the time to worry about it.

Rain was starting to fall again, and he needed to get the elf out of the rocks, along the riverbank upstream and into the forest. A glance over his shoulder told him that some of the trolls were heading their way, though they didn‘t seem to have been spotted yet.

Half supporting and half carrying the elf, Aragorn began to move through the boulders back the way they had come. He was moving as fast as he dared, but at the same time, he couldn’t be as careful as he wanted to be. The two of them had to reach the trees before the trolls reached them, and that wasn’t going to be easy.

Aragorn and Legolas finally cleared the last of the tall boulders, putting them in full view of any troll who happened to be looking their way.

Legolas was still conscious and trying his best to keep from being a burden to his friend, and thus he and Aragorn were able to make fairly good time, though they still had to maneuver around the smaller rocks that littered the sandy riverbank.

It looked like, for once, good luck was on their side. The trolls they had left behind were still looking among the large boulders, sure the escapees were still hiding among them. They had no evidence to prove that theory wrong.

Once the two friends reached the area even with the forest, they made a bee line for the trees. A shout downriver told them that Scron’s body had been found.

“I think those trolls will be looking for another new leader about now,” Aragorn commented.

Legolas, barely able to keep himself from slipping into oblivion, could only manage to nod his drooping head.

While they had been moving, Legolas had been trying to concentrate on putting one foot in front of the other. He was only partially successful due to the fact that neither his mind nor his body were doing their part to accomplish either action.

He was aware that Aragorn was not only with him but was actually the one moving them along. He felt the man’s arm around his waist and his own right arm across Aragorn’s shoulders. He hated being a burden but was aware that there was nothing he could do about it at the moment.

The ranger was tempted to lean Legolas against the first tree he came to, but of course, he couldn’t do that. A tree would offer the elf comfort, but as long as Legolas was on the ground, it couldn’t protect him from the trolls, if they were found. They had a long way to go before there was any way he was going to chance stopping.

“We’ve reached the trees, Legolas,” the ranger informed the elf. “I’m afraid we can’t stop for a while, though.”

Legolas raised his head to look upon his forest friends. This time he managed a small smile, as he felt the trees’ welcome him back. There was a mixture of joy and sadness in the song they sang to him. Joy as his return and sadness that he was injured. “Can we climb?” he asked, so low that Aragorn barely heard him.

“No, Legolas,” the ranger replied, hating having to tell the elf he couldn’t do the one thing he needed the most right now: to rest in the branches of a sheltering tree. “We must find a way out of the trolls’ territory before we can stop.” He added silently, ‘And that may not be anytime soon.’

Suddenly, the two friends heard shouting close by. That in itself would have been cause for worry, but the sound was coming from ahead of them, not behind.

Aragorn uttered a dwarven curse word. He had believed, mistakenly it seemed, that all the trolls had been searching together by the river. It never occurred to him that some might have been left behind in the forest. Did trolls understand the concept of doubling back or were they simply laggards? It didn’t really matter, at this point, why they were there. The fact was that trolls were in front of them, as well as behind them.

As a child growing up among elves in Rivendell, Aragorn had often wished that he was an elf, too. At first, it was in the belief that he would fit in much better than he felt he did as a human. Later, it was because of all the things elves could do that mortals could not. But, Aragorn had never wished for that more in his whole life than he did at this moment. If he was an elf, he could easily carry Legolas up into a tree to hide as long as need be. Eventually, the trolls would give up and go back to their camp.

“Wouldn’t it be a pity to be caught by trolls wandering the forest while those actually looking for us have no idea where we are?” He shook his head.

“What?”

It was then Aragorn realized that he had spoken out loud. He looked at Legolas and noted the half-closed eyes. The elf was barely conscious. Taking a deep breath, the ranger’s determination mounted. Something had to be done. If they were caught again, Legolas wouldn’t survive, and it had nothing to do with being killed by the trolls.

Moving deeper into the forest was no longer an option. So, getting a tighter grip on his friend, Aragorn turned to the left and began to move them in a straight line, parallel to the river. It was the only way that was clear to them. There was no time for subterfuge nor would they be able to hide anywhere. They simply had to move quicker than the enemy. Easier said than done, but it had to be done nonetheless. Their very survival depended on it.

TBC

Chapter Twenty Three

The shouting that was coming from behind Legolas and Aragorn had not increased. But then again, it hadn’t decreased either. That could only mean one thing: the trolls that had evidently found Scron’s body had not spend any time staying by their dead leader. They were moving upriver away from the boulders and toward the fleeing former captives.

The trolls had shown no regard for Hatch, having thrown him in the campfire to burn like a common piece of wood. Neither Legolas nor Aragorn knew exactly what had happened to Pickett, though he could well have ended up in the same burning wood pile. So, it wouldn’t be a stretch to think that Scron may well have been chucked in the river, letting the current carry him away so nothing further need be done with him.

Whether the trolls were actively in pursuit of the elf and ranger or whether they were simply aroused by Scron’s mysterious yet obviously violent death and were heading back to their camp, Aragorn didn’t even try to hazard a guess. Even so, the man couldn’t imagine that even these stupid creatures would be able to make the connection between Scron‘s death and him and Legolas. Right now, though, all he was certain of was that he needed to get the two of them somewhere that would offer them a measure of safety.

Even if the trolls were going to their camp to select a new leader, the man had no false illusions that they wouldn’t soon be searching again, once the question of who would lead them now was settled. Whatever else they were, these trolls were relentless.

Unwilling to stop for even a short breather, the ranger kept moving upriver, as he continued to hold tightly to Legolas in an effort to keep the elf on his feet. It was all too obvious to him that Legolas’s strength was waning, and it wouldn’t be long before it failed completely. Thus it was imperative that they be much farther along than they were right now, a fact that was driving the man to do possibly more than his own body would stand for.

So much of Aragorn’s efforts had been directed at helping Legolas that he had neglected his own well being, except where it directly affected his ability to offer aid to the elven prince.

As he moved, Aragorn remembered something that Lord Elrond had told him on more than one occasion. “Who can you save, Estel, if you deny yourself life-sustaining food, or water or if you fail to protect your own life in a fight? It may sound selfish, but remember, ion nin, that you cannot help anyone else, if you do not help yourself first.”

That philosophy was often a hard one for the altruistic ranger to adhere to, because it went against the grain of his very nature. He was a fierce warrior but a gentle man. He was also a healer, and his instincts were to help others before he gave any thought to himself. Still, he understood the wisdom of his father’s words.

Knowing that if he collapsed from exhaustion, there would be no one to help or protect his ailing friend, Aragorn moved toward a small thicket of bushes he had spotted a moment ago. This would have to be the place they sought rest, however brief that rest might prove to be.

The ranger maneuvered himself and his friend between the stout, intertwined branches of the bushes. He had hoped to find a secluded area surrounded by the thick greenery, which would offer a shelter of sorts. However, he found that the bushes only existed on two sides of an open area and that they would offer a screen from prying eyes from those two directions only. It would just have to do, he told himself, because both he and Legolas had to rest, or their bid for freedom would soon end.

Aragorn laughed, thinking that had he known, he could have simply walked around the bushes, instead of forcing his way through them. He was sure he and Legolas had some scratches, but they were hardly worth the effort to worry about.

Once inside the meager protection, Aragorn gently lowered Legolas into a sitting position on the ground, being careful to avoid touching the elf’s bad shoulder. Amazingly, the archer was still conscious, though just barely so.

When Aragorn checked, he found that he still had a little water in the small pouch he carried on his belt. It was much smaller than the water skin he normally carried and consisted of only a few swallows, but it had served him often in a pinch. And he couldn’t think of a time it was more needed. Aragorn wished he had had the time to refill it in case they were forced to leave the river. ‘Well, nothing can be done about that now,’ the man said to himself.

He removed the stopper of the small container, and slipping his arm around Legolas’s back for support, he held the container’s opening to the elf’s lips, allowing him a few, small swallows of the cool, refreshing water.

He may have need of water, as well, but this time Aragorn was giving some to his ‘patient’ first. Then he would drink. “Sorry, Ada,” he whispered, thinking that maybe for this one time, Elrond would have understood and wouldn’t have been so hard on him for ignoring this particular teaching.

Legolas eagerly drank, though Aragorn held back on the amount he allowed the elf. He suspected that Legolas had a concussion, and too much water could easily cause nausea.

Then the ranger drank a little. He was tempted to save all the remaining water in the container by holding his head back with his mouth open and letting the rain water fill his mouth. However, he knew that was really only practical if all you were going to do was moisten your mouth. It was not going to quench your thirst. Beside, they were under the trees not out in the open.

No sooner had Aragorn finished taking his meager share of the water than Legolas began to heave, almost bringing the water back up. His body, affected by his head injury, wasn’t going to let him put anything into his stomach without trying to expel it, just as Aragorn had feared.

“Hold it down, if you can, Legolas,” the man encouraged. “You need the water, or your body will dehydrate and make it worse on you.” Aragorn spoke soothingly, hoping that if the elf relaxed instead of trying to actively fight the nausea, he might keep from losing the precious, essential liquid.

After a few moments, it looked as if the water was going to stay put. Just the same, Aragorn wasn’t going to chance trying to give Legolas more. Even though he knew the archer needed it, forcing the issue might result in none of it staying down. Best to leave things as they were. He would try again later.

Putting the little pouch back on his belt, Aragorn sat down in the grass next to the elf. “Legolas, how does your head feel?”

It took a moment for the elf to answer. “Hurts,” was all he said. It was enough.

That word, coming from this elf, who would sometimes deny having a wound, even when it was bleeding for all to see, was worrisome. It meant Legolas felt too bad even to try and deny his condition.

At this point, the ranger would have preferred a bleeding wound. At least then he would be able to clean, close and bandage it. There was nothing he could do for a head injury like this.

The best way to treat a concussion was plenty of rest with as little movement as possible. It looked like this was going to be another instance where Aragorn was going to ignore the teaching of his father. Under the current circumstances, staying put and letting Legolas rest quietly was not an option. The more immediate danger was the trolls, and Aragorn felt that Lord Elrond would understand that, too.

It only took a couple of minutes of quiet stillness for Aragorn’s weary mind to begin drifting away. He was sitting up with his eyes closed and his hands resting in his lap. When he began to sway, he jerked awake.

Blinking several times and shaking his head to clear it, he looked over at Legolas. He was not surprised to see that the elf was lying on the ground, sound asleep. His friend looked so peaceful, unlike the expression he wore while fighting the pain in his head and shoulder. How he wished he could leave Legolas like this. But, he knew he couldn’t.

The ranger reluctantly reached over and gently shook the elf. At first, there was no response, and Aragorn experienced a moment of panic. He continued to shake the elf, though slightly harder this time, until his eyes finally opened. Greatly relieved, Aragorn said, “We have to go, Legolas. I’m sorry.”

He held back a groan, as he stood up and leaned over, gripping Legolas by his good arm and pulling him to his feet. He did it without giving the elf a chance to resist. “I wish we could stay and rest, mellon nin, but we must leave before this place becomes too dangerous for us. And you must stay awake.”

The elf nodded. He raised his head slowly, as if it weighed almost more than he could manage, and gave his friend a small smile. “I know, Estel. You have told me before.” He closed his eyes but quickly opened them before Aragorn could say anything, or before he could fall asleep on his feet.

Aragorn smiled back. “I suppose I have.” His smile broadened. “I remember a time when you talked, sang and drug me around to keep me awake for almost two days straight after I had fallen and hit my head. You even threatened to throw me in a river. Shall I do that to you?”

“I feared you would die on me, and no, you may not throw me in a river.” the elf said, barely clearer than a mumble. He bit down on the inside of his lower lip, hoping the new pain would keep him from succumbing to the overwhelming desire to lie down and drift back into comforting oblivion.

“Then you know what we must do. I will not lose you.”

The man’s words made their way into Legolas’s foggy mind and touched him with their sincerity. He made the effort to straighten up, so he would be less of a burden to his friend. The gesture lasted barely more than two minutes before he began to slump sideways, once again leaning heavily against Aragorn’s shoulder.

What little good the water and the brief rest had done both of them was soon dispelled by Legolas’s pain and exhaustion and by Aragorn’s exhaustion and worry. Both of their lives were in the ranger’s hands.

It wasn’t much longer before Aragorn’s feet began to stumble and slide on the wet ground. Each time that happened, he had to tighten his grip on Legolas to keep the elf from falling, while also trying to keep himself from falling. Aragorn was forced to slow his steps, because if he lost his balance, they would both go down, and he felt sure that if Legolas was to hit his head again, it would kill him.

*~*~*~*

The elf and the ranger continued on through the forest. It became increasingly evident that Legolas was not going to make it out of troll country on his own two feet. It became just as evident that Aragorn did not have the strength left to carry the elf, light as he was.

The edge of the forest near where they were traveling began to turn to the left. The roar of the river told the ranger that there was a bend in the river. He knew that he and Legolas had one chance to get to safety. If the river broadened once it straightened out again, the current might slow down enough to allow them to cross. It was a small chance, maybe one in a hundred, at best, but Aragorn clung to it, because there was no other hope to cling to.

Slowing down to get a firmer grip on the elf and take a small breather, Aragorn asked, “Legolas, do you hear the river’s roar getting any fainter? Or is it the same?”

He waited for an answer that wasn’t coming. Turning his head, he looked at Legolas. The elf’s eyes were open, but they didn’t hold any evidence of cognitive thought. The ranger’s heart skipped a beat. “Legolas?”

“I am here,” the archer replied wearily.

The answer struck the man as odd. Of course, he knew that Legolas was there. If they had been any closer, they would have been wearing the same clothes. Aragorn shook his head, wondering if maybe he himself was not thinking clearly. Legolas was probably just letting him know he was still conscious.

“I hear a river,” Legolas said. “I did not know we were near one. Is it the Forest River or the Bruinen?” His words were becoming so slurred that he sounded like someone who had had too much wine to drink. Even more worrisome was the fact that Legolas evidently thought he was either in Mirkwood or close to Rivendell.

Aragorn knew exactly what was happening. He had no doubt that the elf could tell him every detail of his entire childhood, but he couldn’t remember anything that had taken place recently. Legolas was suffering from concussive amnesia. “What is the last thing you remember?”

Legolas frowned in thought. It was obvious he was having trouble trying to recall the last events that were clear to him.

Aragorn wasn’t sure how far back Legolas’s memory would go. Anything longer ago than a couple of days would have surprised the man. He was anxious, but knew he had to be patient while the elf sorted out his memories.

“We were being held by trolls.” He looked at Aragorn and then at the surrounding forest. “How did we escape?” The elf seemed very frustrated that he didn’t know the answer to that question.

Now was not the time to catch Legolas up on how their escape had come about. He simply said, “I’ll explain later. Right now, we must move quickly or be captured again.”

“Estel, where are we, and when did it begin to rain?” The idea of being captured again hadn’t even registered with the elf.

Aragorn needed to find something to keep Legolas’s mind occupied, as well as keep the archer awake, so he himself could concentrate on getting them through the forest.

“Legolas, talk to the trees and ask them to tell you if any danger comes our way. You must remain alert to any warning they may give.” He might as well put the wood-elf’s ability to commune with the trees to good use. They needed all the help they could get.

The ranger realized that it didn’t matter if the river slowed up around the bend or not, because they had no choice but to go that way. And once they got there, they would just have to deal with whatever they found.

TBC

Chapter Twenty Four

The progress that Legolas and Aragorn were making through the troll forest was slow, agonizingly slow to the man’s way of thinking. He frequently looked at Legolas and found the elf, more often than not, staring up into the trees. His eyes were narrowed in concentration.

Aragorn nodded to himself. If the trees kept Legolas’s mind off of his recent memory loss and his painful shoulder and headache by offering him comfort then that was good. If they could also offer a warning of approaching trolls, or any other form of danger that might show up, all the better.

So far, the trolls had not given any evidence that they were following the former captives. They may have lost interest after losing a third leader, however, Aragorn knew that they could just as easily burst through the thick forest at any moment. Even if the trees did warn Legolas, there was not a lot he could do to get the elf and himself to safety. Good luck would most likely lie in not being discovered at all, not in finding another hiding place.

As the two friends moved through the trees, the ranger tried to keep the sound of the river at a constant level on his left. That way he would be able to stay the same distance from it. Otherwise, the river could bend away from them, and he and Legolas would continue moving in a straight line and end up deeper in troll territory. Unless the river flowed in a circle, Aragorn thought with a touch of grim humor, it would eventually lead them out, and right now, that appeared to be their only hope.

The going became even more difficult as the forest floor started to become more and more littered with debris and exposed tree roots. Broken branches lay in disarray under the trees they had probably fallen from. They were covered with green leaves, which attested to the fact that they had been torn loose from their parent tree fairly recently, before the leaves had had a chance to die and turn brown.

“The storm must have been quite fierce along here to have torn up these branches inside the forest.” It was the only thing Aragorn could think of that could have done something like that.

He briefly thought that the trolls were strong enough to have accomplished such destruction, but that made no sense. The creatures didn’t know that he and Legolas had hidden high up in the trees the first time they had escaped from the cages, so the trolls would have had no reason to pull down the branches looking for them.

After a moment of silence, Legolas said, “They are in pain.” His voice was low and full of sorrow.

Aragorn had been so deep in thought, he had completely forgotten that he had made his comment out loud and thus was slightly startled when the elf spoke. He quickly regained his composure. “I’m sorry,” he whispered. He may not have been an elf, but he also hated to see living things destroyed in such a way.

“It is the way of Nature.” The fact the elf understood that didn’t seem to ease his mind any.

“Have they warned you of the trolls’ presence?”

Legolas shook his head and immediately regretted it. He was so desperate for sleep that he felt as if he could barely hold his eyes open. The pounding inside his head was driving him to a weariness he hadn’t experienced in a very long time. As if his body wanted to emphasize that fact, his next step resulted in a stumble.

Despite knowing a stumble was probably inevitable, Aragorn was so surprised he couldn’t prevent them both from falling. He landed on his knees while Legolas’s weight pulled him from the ranger’s suddenly limp grasp, and he fell flat on the ground. Luckily, he didn’t hit his head, but he became so dizzy, he almost passed out anyway.

Aragorn reached for Legolas and gripped his good right arm.

“No,” the elf said softly. “Let me lie here and rest a while.”

The simple pleading in his friend’s voice tugged at Aragorn’s heart, but he knew he couldn’t give in to his feelings. “We can’t stop, Legolas. I’m sorry. We have to keep moving.”

It wasn’t in the elf’s nature to beg, and he wasn’t going to start doing it now. With more willpower than he believed himself capable of, he pushed his weary, pain-ridden body up and then allowed Aragorn to lift him to his feet. He hated weakness, but he hated stupidity even more, so there was no way he was going to protest being aided. He couldn’t do it alone. Besides, arguing took too much energy.

Once he had a firm grip on the archer, Aragorn, himself weary beyond words, started moving them onward again.

The ranger tried to occupy his mind so he wouldn’t fall asleep on his feet. He suddenly realized that that was exactly what he had done. When awareness finally penetrated his groggy mind, he and Legolas were standing still, leaning on each other. How they had remained upright, he couldn’t begin to guess.

The first thing he noticed regarding their surroundings was that it was no longer raining, a minor blessing at this point but a blessing nonetheless. The second thing he noticed was the silence. Silence? Where is the river? Had they done exactly what he had feared: continued straight on while the river veered away from them? The man almost panicked. “We’ve left the river,” he said fearfully. He could have kicked himself for letting his physical exhaustion affect his good sense.

Legolas, still amazingly awake, said, “It is there.” He pointed to the left.

“You can still hear it?”

“Yes.”

Aragorn almost sagged with relief. Even though he knew how keen the wood-elf’s ears were, they had their limits. So if Legolas could still hear the river, they hadn’t gone too far off course. He promptly turned them to the left and headed directly toward where Legolas had pointed.

The sudden spike of fear had pumped adrenalin into the man’s veins and given him a jolt of energy, and he was determined to take advantage of the surge while it lasted.

*~*~*~*

The going for the next twenty minutes was still laborious, but Aragorn was able to keep them moving at a slightly quicker pace. His new-found energy was running low again by the time he finally heard the river.

At first, he was puzzled, because the river was not roaring the way it had been doing since he and Legolas had first encountered it. Then it dawned on him. His earlier hope must have been right. The river must have widened and flattened out. And with the current no longer surging over any large rocks, there was no longer the kind of rapids that existed downriver. That thought spurred the ranger to hasten his steps.

Legolas, who had appeared to be oblivious of anything but the forest around him, felt the pace pick up. However, it was Aragorn’s altered demeanor that alerted him to the change. He looked over at his friend. “What has happened, Estel?”

The man smiled. “I think the river has flattened out, so there may be a chance we can cross.”

Because of the amnesia, Legolas had no memory of the rapids at all, so he thought the comment was perfectly logical. Had he remembered the condition of the river, he might have felt differently.

After a few more moments of walking, the two friends broke free of the forest and made their way toward the river bank, which was only a few feet wide where they were.

As they approached the water’s edge, Aragorn stopped and stared. He was dismayed to see that, despite the fact the river appeared smooth by comparison to the wild rapids, it was running very fast, much faster than he had expected.

Even had he and Legolas been in top form, they still might not have been able to make it across. The river, normally no more than two feet deep, was now almost twice that, and in their weakened condition, neither elf nor ranger would get very far against this powerful current.

Through half-lidded eyes, Legolas saw and understood what Aragorn was thinking. “We cannot cross here,” the elf said, his voice barely above a whisper.

Unable to keep the disappointment out of his voice, Aragorn replied, “I know”. He looked upriver but saw no change in the river’s condition. “I’m sorry, mellon nin, but we must keep going.”

The very thought of doing so almost caused Legolas to sag in defeat. He had worked so hard to get here while trying to help his friend expend as little energy as possible. And now it was all for naught, because they were not going to be able to stop.

Just as Legolas had read Aragorn’s demeanor earlier, the ranger was now doing the same with the elf. “Don’t worry, Legolas, we’ll make it.” Aragorn inhaled deeply and let his breath out slowly. ‘Somehow,’ he added silently.

*~*~*~*

As the two friends continued along the narrow riverbank, it became clear that the river was widening even more. That realization lifted the ranger’s heart.

The main reason for the change was that the land itself had become lower than it was downriver, allowing the water to penetrate in toward the forest. It looked as though the water’s depth would be such that it could be crossed with only a minimum of danger.

After going around another bend, this one to the left, the riverbank disappeared completely, as the water did indeed extend into the trees.

Aragorn halted, pulling Legolas to a stop beside him. There was a choice that needed to be made. They could go back into the forest until they were able to skirt the water or go into the edge of the river and hope the current wouldn’t undercut them.

Legolas, his eyes almost closed now, looked up. Despite the fact the elf appeared to be near unconsciousness, he was lucid enough to ask a question appropriate to the situation. “Why have we stopped?”

“We have to go into the river,” Aragorn said. “I don’t know if we can withstand the current.”

Legolas calculated the choices they had and understood what they were facing. “We really have but one choice. The trolls lay that way.” He pointed toward the forest, as he spoke.

“Agreed,” was the only reply Aragorn needed to make.

With another deep sigh, the ranger adjusted his grip on Legolas and started forward. It didn’t take more than a few steps before they entered the water at the edge of the river. The going was a little harder in the water-soaked dirt under the water.

Before long they were forced out farther into the current. The pressure against their legs increased with each step to the left that they had to make.

Another twenty yards found them farther out into the river than Aragorn knew was safe for them to be. Even so, he and Legolas were managing.

Then disaster struck. Or rather, it was an uprooted tree that did so. The tree wasn’t large, but it was being driven with tremendous force, seeming to fly along the surface of the water. It hit Aragorn’s legs and knocked him backwards. He and Legolas splashed into the water and were quickly swept along, moving downriver at a rapid pace, as if trying to catch the tree that had just upended them.

Try as he might, Aragorn couldn’t hang on to Legolas, who was torn out of his grasp and flung away from him. “Legolas!”

The elf heard Aragorn call his name and tried to call back to the ranger, but when he opened his mouth, it quickly filled with water. It was all he could do to keep his head above the surface, as the two of them were being separated farther and farther apart with each second that passed.

At least, the cold water, the result of runoff from melting snow in the mountains to the north, had brought the elf’s groggy mind back to something resembling full alert. He wished the bracing water could renew his weary body the same way. Instead, it seemed to sap even more of his energy, and he began to shiver.

Survival now, he quickly realized, was going to take every bit of willpower his mind and heart could summon. He wasn’t going to give up by any means, but he wondered if it was all going to matter in the end. The powerful river had a mind of its own, and right now the river was the one winning the battle.

Even though they were separated, Legolas and Aragorn each knew their best chance to get through this ordeal was not to fight the river but simply to let themselves be taken by it. They would just have to ride out the worst of it as best they could. That would have been all right if it hadn’t been for the fact that they were fast approaching the rapids, which would be by far the worst of it.

The trick was to keep moving in the strong flow of the current and not get caught in one of the whirlpools at the base of the large rocks that they soon found themselves flying past.
Avoiding being smashed against those very rocks was also imperative. Neither idea was exactly novel, but they had to concentrate if they hoped to get out of this alive.

Legolas may not have remembered that these rapids even existed due to his memory loss covering the time they had spent among the boulders, but he had been caught up in enough of them in his long life to know what was coming.

His swollen shoulder prevented him from actually swimming the way he normally would have, but he did manage to stay on top of the water most of the time, only occasionally being thrown or pulled into its depths.

When he saw these times coming, he was able to take a quick breath to see him through until he surfaced again. More than once, however, he didn’t see it coming and ended up underwater with no air in his lungs. At those times, he came close to drowning.

The next time it happened, Legolas was flipped up and over a rock, sending him plunging down the other side. He expected to bob up and be swept free the way he had been the last time this had happened. He wasn’t.

The elven prince found himself being forced downward from the immense pressure of the water coming at him from above. It felt like a giant hand pushing down on his back. He was caught in a backlash of current, and what little air he still held was being forced out.

When he opened his eyes to try and see what he could do to extract himself from this predicament, all Legolas saw were bubbles and the base of the rock he was pinned against. The swirling of the water skewed his sense of direction, and it was only then that he realized he was partially upside down.

His lungs were burning from lack of air, his dizziness was back in full force, and the pressure of the current was stronger than he was, at this point. Time was running out. If he passed out or failed to take in more air quickly, Legolas knew he would die trapped underwater.

In short, if he didn’t get loose soon, he never would.

TBC

To all my readers: Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.

Chapter Twenty Five

Unlike Legolas, Aragorn had the full use of both arms, so he was able to hold his head above water more often than not. However, even that didn’t keep him from taking a sound dunking far too many times for his liking.

He tried to reach a kind of rhythm where he could inhale when he was above the surface and exhale when he went under it. The river’s wild thrashing was unpredictable, so he wasn’t always successful, but it worked enough to keep him from drowning outright.

Aragorn was able to avoid most of the rocks that lay in his path. Sometimes he managed to push off from one of the larger one, only scraping the skin on his hands. At other times, he was swept away by the strong current just as it appeared there would be no way to avoid a painful and possibly fatal collision.

Futilely Aragorn tried to reach Legolas, but the river would begin taking him toward the elf and then would pull him away at the last instant seemingly in a cruel form of teasing. Frustrated, the man had to settle for just trying to keep an eye on his friend, whenever his head was turned in the elf’s direction, although he knew that if he saw Legolas in more trouble than he was already in, there would be little he could do to help.

Catching a glimpse of his friend once in a while only heightened his concern during the occasions he wasn’t able to find the archer’s head above water.

To his great consternation, the ranger soon found himself being spun around too often to be able to track Legolas’s progress down the river. Aragorn would have panicked had he known what had befallen Legolas mere yards behind him.

Forced to turn his full attention back to the river, Aragorn found himself entering the section of river that held the huge boulders he and Legolas had sought shelter in and had so recently vacated. Facing the shore, he clearly saw three trolls standing on the shore. One of them was Tack, who Aragorn assumed had most likely become the new leader.

The creature was looking straight at him and shaking his fists, which were raised in the air above his head. Tack was obviously shouting something, but the ranger could only hear the roaring of the water in his ears, so he didn’t know if the troll was angry that the captives were being hurtled away from his grasp or if he was simply rejoicing that they were about to be killed by the raging river. It was easy to believe that Tack would think it was exactly what they deserved.

Another thought came to the man. He realized he would rather drown or be smashed against a rock full force than have his life taken by any of those disgusting trolls. He felt like giving the loathsome creature a mocking wave but couldn’t manage to get either arm above the water to do so. Still, as a parting shot, he silently shouted, ‘I hope I never see your ugly excuse for a face ever again!’ It was with only a small measure of regret that the troll couldn’t hear him.

The scene of what Aragorn hoped was Tack’s total aggravation was the last thing the ranger saw, as he was suddenly slammed against a large rock, and everything went black.

*~*~*~*

Legolas could feel his life slipping away. The utter blackness he saw was not because he had closed his eyes. Everything had gone numb except his lungs, which burned with a fire that he ruefully thought wasn’t able to offer him any warmth. He knew it was his body shutting down from the lack of air and the freezing water. If his mind followed suit, he would die. This was not the way he wanted to leave Middle-earth.

The elf suddenly thought of Aragorn. He knew the ranger would blame himself for the rest of this own life for the archer’s death. ‘I will not do that to you, Estel.’ Had he known what had just happened to his friend, he would have been even more desperate than he was already.

Exhausted, hurting, close to drowning, and desperate he may be, but Legolas was still one of the Firstborn, gifted with endurance beyond the measure of men. And it was doubtful that any man, even Aragorn, with all of his physical strength, would have been able to escape the fierce current now trying to take the elf’s life. Legolas’s will was even more fierce.

Forgetting everything else, including the pain in his fast-numbing shoulder, which was ironically the only relief he had had from the constant ache there, Legolas reached down and placed both palms flat against the rocky riverbed and pushed upward with all the strength he still possessed.

At first, it didn’t seem that anything was happening. The force of the water was still pinning the elf down against the base of the boulder. Then the current rushing past the rock grabbed at his outstretched legs and began to tug at him.

The two sections of the current battled for possession of the elf‘s body, as if in a game of tug-of-war. Both were strong, but the one coming over the boulder had Legolas’s torso, which was much more substantial than his legs. It was that part of the current that was winning - at first.

Once Legolas added the leverage from his arms pushing against the riverbed, the water that held his legs in its icy grip began to move the elf away from the boulder.

When Legolas’s body came free, it was jerked out into the main stream of the river and sent bobbing like a cork around the bend in the river Aragorn had observed when they had first sought refuge in the boulders. Legolas’s concussion had erased all of that from his memory.

Luckily, the archer was right side up and, despite having water splash in his face, he was able to suck air into his tortured lungs. However, it seemed that with every one breath he took came two coughs, as his lungs worked to eject the liquid trying to fill them. If only he could make his way to the shore before he passed out, which he realized he was on the verge of doing. ‘Try to reach the riverbank, Greenleaf,’ he told himself. ‘You must try.’

*~*~*~*

When Aragorn opened his eyes, he had to blink several times due to the strong light that assailed them. He stared up at the sky for several minutes before he realized that he was no longer bobbing in the water.

A quick glance to the left showed him a row of trees a good ten yards away that remained steady, instead of flying past as they had done... ‘When?’ The man frowned. ‘How long have I been here? And where exactly is here?’

An attempt to sit up met with searing pain along the ribcage on his right side. ‘I must have hit a boulder,’ Aragorn theorized. ‘Hard,’ he added with another wince.

Carefully the man rolled over onto his left side, trying not to breathe too hard. He couldn’t help it, he grinned when he saw that his first assessment was right - he was on dry ground.

It was logical to assume the current had somehow thrown him up where he now found himself. That thought lingered for about thirty seconds before he realized that he was a good ten feet from the edge of the water. ‘That was some throw,’ he said. But in truth, it made no sense, especially when he eyed the river and saw that the current along this area was swift but not violent. “How did I get here?” he questioned, aloud this time.

When he looked down at his feet to better see the distance from him to the water, he noticed two long ruts that ran from the water to where his heels had come to rest. Drag marks. “I was dragged.” That realization made him sit up suddenly, and he paid the price for it, as his ribs screamed in protest. He wanted to wrap his arms around himself but was afraid to touch the injured bones.

Aragorn ignored the agony. There was only one way he could have gotten to where he was. Legolas. The elf had to have found him in the water and dragged him onto the bank. That meant that his friend was all right. Legolas had survived the river.

The next question that entered his mind made him frown. Where was Legolas now? Why was he not here beside an injured friend, as he most surely would be, if all was indeed well with the elf.

Something, not a sound or a movement really, but something made him turn and look to his left. Aragorn took in a sharp breath, though it had nothing to do with the pain in his side.

Lying on the ground facing the ranger was the object of Aragorn’s concern. Legolas’s hair had come loose and was lying across his face, completely covering it.

Aragorn’s heart lurched, as the thought that Legolas was dead struck him like a physical blow. He turned, again ignoring his ribs, and reached a shaky hand down to touch the elf. “No,” he whispered in shock and denial, when he felt the coldness of the alabaster skin on the back of the elf’s hand. “No, Valar, please. You cannot have taken him like this.”

Fighting back the urge to scream, Aragorn pulled the wet, golden hair away from Legolas’s face. The pale complexion that was revealed did nothing to ease the man’s mounting heartache. The elf's lips were blue, as were the bruises that stood out in stark contrast. He held his breath, as he placed his fingers against Legolas’s neck and waited. Was the stillness he felt the result of his own cold, stiff fingers or...? He refused to even complete the thought.

As time moved on around him, Aragorn seemed stuck in a silent and unchanging nightmare. Even the roar of the river had faded far into the background. He shook violently from the effects of the icy water that had gripped him in his wild ride down the river. One tremor followed another through his body. But it was cold grip of grief that had taken his mind and heart. Irony could be a cruel thing. Now that he was in the open air, he felt like he was suffocating.

How could this have happened? How could Legolas, an immortal elf who was not meant to die, be dead? The ranger looked toward the river. When he saw the drag marks in the dirt, he groaned. That was the answer. Legolas had used the last ounce of strength left to drag him to safety, even at the cost of his friend’s own life.

It was not fair. It was not right. It was...

Aragorn’s head jerked around, and his eyes got very wide. There was a bump against his fingertips, which he hadn’t realized he still held against Legolas’s neck. He held his breath and felt it again. Then again. It was slow, but it was unmistakable. The ranger leaned down and placed his ear under the elf’s nose, rejoicing when he felt the faintest breath of air.

There was still no color in the archer’s skin other than the bruises, and he was as cold as the river had been, but he was alive! Aragorn placed his hands on each side of Legolas’s face, hoping to transfer some warmth. He had to laugh at himself when he realized that his hands were as cold as the skin he was touching.

Being a healer, Aragorn realized that Legolas was not out of danger just because he had survived drowning. He had to admit that conscious though he himself was, he wasn’t exactly in the best of health, either. His trembling body was trying desperately to keep his core warm, even at the cost of his extremities, which were almost completely numb.

Aragorn had no idea if he and Legolas had left troll territory or not. He had no desire to fight those creatures again, but right now, they were the least of the problems that beset the two friends.

The storms were long gone, but darkness would soon be upon them, and the wind had picked up again, adding more chill to their already half-frozen bodies. As wet as they were, they could easily freeze to death overnight. They needed to get out of the open and into the trees where they could find some shelter.

The only problem was that he didn’t think he would be able to get himself there much less carry Legolas. There was simply no way it could be done. He could crawl, though his broken ribs would surely cause a great deal of pain. It galled Aragorn to know that Legolas had given his all to drag him to safety, but he hadn’t the ability to return the favor.

A small groan brought the ranger’s attention back to the elf at his side. “Legolas? Can you hear me?”

Another groan, though Aragorn couldn’t tell if it was meant as an affirmative answer or if it was just the elf’s simple reaction to regaining consciousness. The man leaned over and called to Legolas softly.

“I hear you,” came the raspy reply. Those three words seemed to take a great deal of effort to utter.

“You have no idea how joyful it is to hear you speak. I thought you were dead.”

“So did I.”

Despite himself, a grin broke out on the ranger’s face. “I’m glad we were both wrong.”

TBC

Chapter Twenty Six

“Let me help you sit up,” Aragorn said, not willing to let Legolas lie still long enough to fall asleep or pass out completely.

Between the two of them, they found the strength to raise Legolas to a sitting position, but he was unable to remain that way without leaning against Aragorn’s shoulder.

The ranger was well aware of his own injuries and the exhaustion that plagued him, but he was not prepared for the extent of the weakness he found his body surrendering to. And all he had done was help Legolas sit up.

The elf was in worse shape than he was, so the man was forced into realizing for the first time since the whole terrible ordeal had begun that they were both in deep trouble.

In the past, the two friends had always either saved each other, or, if both were hurt, they had possessed enough strength between them to persevere until they could recover on their own or find help. Now Aragorn had to wonder if either option was even possible. Had they finally encountered a situation that was too much for them? Had their incredible luck, despite all the trouble they often found themselves in, finally deserted them?

The ranger certainly didn’t want to admit defeat and just give up, at least not until he and Legolas drew their last breath. Both he and the warrior prince were strong-willed people, so that was what they had to rely on now.

Aragorn’s dark thoughts were interrupted when he heard Legolas say, “It is cold.” The elf was unable to suppress a shiver.

He regretted the words as soon as they left his mouth. He knew Aragorn was already worried about him, he didn’t need to hear it expressed. Nor did he need to see it in his friend’s eyes, so he kept his own eyes averted.

Rather than responding with the concern he felt, Aragorn forced a laugh. “I thought elves didn’t feel the cold.”

“We do not feel it as keenly as mortals, but we do feel the extremes of any weather. I have told you this before, human.”

The attempts at humor was appreciated by Aragorn, but he knew Legolas was engaging in the banter mostly to ease the man’s concerns.

“How badly are you hurt? And do not minimize it, Estel,” Legolas warned his friend. “I felt you wince when you helped me sit up.”

Knowing that, as usual, any effort to deflect the seriousness of any injury would be met with stubborn insistence on the truth, Aragorn sighed. “I smashed into a rock and broke several ribs on the right side. My left foot has decided to let me know it’s not doing well, either.” The mere mention of his injuries seemed to start them aching even more. “Satisfied?”

“That depends. Is that everything?” Despite his condition, the elf was still able to fix his friend with a piercing stare.

“The big stuff, yes,” the ranger replied firmly. “The rest of the tally is minor by comparison. You have some lovely bruises, by the way.” The smile the man offered couldn’t quite hide the concern in his eyes.

The pair’s problems, which needed immediate attention, had to come ahead of any further discussion of aches and pains, as bad and annoying as they might be.

“We have to find shelter for the night.”

Legolas was fighting the urge to give in once again to pain, exhaustion and the cold and seek shelter in oblivion. It took him a moment to figure out what Aragorn wasn’t saying. He nodded slightly. “Are we really in any shape to be moving.” It was a flat statement with no real inflection in his voice to indicate it had been a question. The elf doubted he could get very far, even if he had spotted a troll coming their way.

Though his voice didn’t sound as strong as he wanted it to, Aragorn said, “We have to try.”

“I would expect nothing less,” the elf replied. “What do we do?” Legolas’s normally nimble mind was too weary to think the problem through.

“Crawl?” Aragorn offered, realizing that the answer may have been said in jest, but it was nonetheless a very distinct possibility.

Legolas didn’t take the answer as a jest. It was a very real possibility to him, as well. He was facing the river, so he asked, “How far is it?”

“Not too far to the edge of the trees,” he replied, trying to sound encouraging.

While the trees themselves would offer a measure of shelter, they would have to move a lot farther into the forest before they could hope to find and real protection. They really needed an enclosed place with a roaring fire, but that seemed an impossible dream, at this point in time.

The elf closed his eyes and sighed. Did he have it in him to get that far? Did Estel? Did they have a choice?

“The longer we stay here, the worse we’ll feel, and the harder it’ll be to get where we need to go.” Aragorn was too tired to feel the least bit proud of his logic. Besides, he knew it was really just basic common sense. Another sign he was losing his ability to function, the man thought grimly. It was time to move.

Knowing that the two of them might very well end up crawling, Aragorn was not quite prepared to start out that way, despite his earlier reasoning.

The odd and unexpected thought struck him that he would rather die on his feet than simply fall over from the position of being on his hands and knees. He was glad that he hadn’t said that out loud because it was too close to the truth to be funny. It didn’t occur to him that being on his hands and knees would be a testament to his determination to seek safety no matter what.

Somehow, and he couldn’t have said from where it came, he found the strength to get himself and Legolas to their feet. The elf helped as much as he could, but the bulk of the energy had come from the ranger.

Although he knew Legolas could now see the forest right in front of them, Aragorn felt a crazy sense of accomplishment when he gave voice to the obvious. “That way.”

Legolas smiled. Even that seemed to take more strength than he wanted to spend. His attempts to straighten up and take a step were met with resistance from his over-taxed body. But he did it.

The move was not wasted on Aragorn, who also had a smile cross his face. He matched the elf’s step with a step of his own - right foot, then left foot. The elf did likewise and before long they were walking, or more accurately, stumbling forward. But, they were moving.

*~*~*~*

It took almost twenty minutes for Legolas and Aragorn to make it to the edge of the trees. They almost fell a number of times on the short yet arduous journey to reach them, but each time they managed to stay upright. Had they hit the ground, crawling would definitely have been next, because getting to their feet again wasn’t going to happen.

As soon as they came even with one of the large oak trees right inside the forest, Legolas reached out to touch the dark, rough bark. He pulled away from his friend with a smile of gratitude and leaned against the trunk, as did Aragorn, though for a very different reason.

Aragorn simply needed something strong and solid to keep himself from doing what he wanted most to do: sink down to the ground and rest.

Legolas needed that as well, but his main reason for embracing the tree was for communion and consolation. It was at times like these, when he was at his lowest, that Legolas appreciated the comfort of the forest, whether it be from one tree or many.

It didn’t take the elf long to realize that this tree was not like the ones he was used to. It did not sing its ancient song to him nor did it offer any kind of solace to his weary soul. His disappointment was profound. “We are still in troll country,” the elf said, his voice tinged with sorrow.

Aragorn’s heart sank at the news. He had so hoped that they had been swept far enough down the river to have escaped any chance that they could be pursued once again by those disgusting creatures.

He didn’t doubt the elf’s words nor did he have to ask how Legolas knew. He remembered that the trees of the forest near the troll camp were not responsive to the elf, a fact that still puzzled him. The ranger had grown up thinking that all trees responded to wood-elves, but Legolas had told him that unfortunately that was not always the case.

Legolas needed the comfort of the forest not the disappointment of being ignored, which would only drain more of whatever reserves the elf had left. “Does it speak to you at all?”

“No. I believe that it, and all these trees, have been affected by the cruelty of the trolls that live here. The tree does not offer me any ill will. It just does not speak. None of them do.”

“I’m sorry, Legolas. I know how much they mean to you.” Aragorn may not have been able to hear the trees, but he loved the forest as much as any man could.

“It is not their fault,” the elf began in defense of the trees. “The air hums with the brutality of creatures that do not appreciate the magnificence of the forest. The trees have been in this hopeless situation so long that they have shut themselves off from the negative vibrations around them. They do not even know that there is someone here who cares for them.”

Aragorn had complete faith that given time, Legolas could have reawakened the essence of the trees’ nature. However, there was not the time to spare for that right then. He and the archer had to reach shelter before the cold night wind sapped any more of their energy.

Reluctantly, Aragorn said, “Legolas, we must go.”

The man wished he had turned away before he saw the melancholy on the elf’s face. He almost gave in and told Legolas he could stay, but he knew he couldn’t. They had to move and move now.

Legolas understood when Aragorn gripped his arm and gently pulled him away from the old oak. He had also felt that given time he could have broken through the tree’s wall
of silence. The elf said, “Perhaps we can return later when our precarious circumstances have changed for the better.”

Aragorn was thinking the exact opposite. He believed that once they left this accursed land, they should never set foot in it again. However, he wasn’t sure he would be able to convince Legolas of that, so once the two had started on their weary way again, he asked, “Do the trees suffer?”

“I do not think so. They simply go through the seasons of life without contact, even with each other it seems.”

“Then it’s like they’re sleeping.”

“In a manner of speaking, I suppose so.”

Aragorn didn’t comment on that answer. He was sure this conversation wasn’t going to go away, but it would have to be continued later. Legolas would have to be disappointed when he could better handle it. Then the ranger almost laughed. He was Legolas’s friend, not his keeper. He could no more stop the elf from doing something he wanted to do than he could stop the river that churned and roared behind them.

The air was cold, but the trees blocked the worst of the wind, so both elf and ranger only shivered sporadically. However, it was still bad enough to make traveling more difficult. It seemed that their legs were getting stiffer by the moment and moving was getting slower. Aragorn’s sore foot, which caused him to limp, certainly wasn’t helping matters any.

As the two friends continued to drag themselves along, the forest closed ever tighter around them, intensifying the darkness within.

Aragorn was straining to see the few feet ahead of them, so they wouldn’t trip over any tree roots. He couldn’t completely rely on Legolas’s sight, since his head injury had dulled that normally keen elven sense. The man was beginning to wonder if they would be able to spot a yawning cave entrance if one appeared before them. ‘If that happened, I guess we could stumble blindly straight into it,’ he laughed to himself. It was not a humorous laugh. ‘I’ll take it any way I can get it,’ he added, as he gripped Legolas just a little tighter.

“Estel?”

“Yes, Legolas. What is it?” The ranger was hoping to be told that the elf had indeed spotted a cave or an equally secure shelter.

“Why are we here alone in the forest at night? Did we escape the trolls’ camp?”

Aragorn was so shocked and so dismayed, he almost let his grip on the elf slip. Apparently, Legolas’s concussion had caused further amnesia, and he had forgotten not only their harrowing trip down the river but everything that had happened since.

Forcing his voice into a steadiness he did not feel, Aragorn said, “Yes, my friend. We have escaped the trolls and are looking for shelter.”

“There is a hill rising up ahead of us. Perhaps, there is a cave or overhanging rocks there.”

It didn’t help the ranger’s concerns that Legolas had casually mentioned finding a cave to seek shelter in. That was usually the last place the elf wanted to end up in. Legolas’s words seemed to be a mixture of logic and confusion. At least, that was the way Aragorn thought of it. Whatever the reason, the ranger was happy to hear that shelter was possibly close and headed for it.

TBC

Chapter Twenty Seven

“Can you see anything?” Aragorn asked his companion. Feeling the need to make such an inquiry of a keen-eyed elf instead of simply asking what he saw struck the man as extraordinary. But then, most of the things that had happened to them since they had first been captured had been anything but ordinary.

Legolas did not answer. He heard the words, but for some reason he couldn’t fathom, he didn’t know if they formed a question or a simple remark. There was something wrong with that lack of distinction he was sure, but he couldn’t quite figure it out.

It was too much of an effort to ask again, so Aragorn simply assumed the answer was no and trudged on, barely able to drag himself and Legolas, because by now, the elf was of little use in helping to move them forward.

Then, it happened.

Aragorn stumbled over a tree root, and he and Legolas both went sprawling. The sensation was startling. One instant they were upright and the next, they were on the ground. What made it worse was the fact that it was Aragorn’s bad foot that was the cause of the misstep. It was now hung up under the slightly raised root, twisting as the man went down. He couldn’t hold back a yelp of pain.

The knowledge of a painful hurt being suffered and the concern for his friend that it elicited penetrated the fog in Legolas’s mind, but the fall surprised him so much, he could do nothing more than yelp at the pain he himself suffered an instant later when he hit the ground on his bad shoulder.

Aragorn was stunned but still in control of his thought processes. They had been taken over by the need to see what damage had been done, because the result might mean the difference in finding shelter and being at the mercy of the elements.

The ranger realized he couldn’t even sit up to inspect his foot, so he just curled up until he could reach it with both hands. He had to wiggle around in order to be in a position to grasp the trapped appendage and work it loose. Several groans accompanied the maneuver, but at last the throbbing foot was free of its woody trap.

‘That’s all I need,’ the ranger groused to himself, as he massaged his foot the best he could without removing his boot. It was the strong leather of that boot that probably kept the bones in his foot from snapping. He sighed. The result could have been a lot worse.

Aragorn suddenly felt a hand on his left arm. Turning his head, he could barely make out Legolas no more than two feet away. It frightened him to see that the natural, elven glow from the elf was almost non-existent, making his golden hair almost as visible in the darkness as his pale skin. He immediately forgot his foot. “Legolas, were you hurt in the fall?”

“I do not know,” the elf replied in confusion. There was a pause, and then Legolas said, “Did I fall?”

Aragorn groaned.

“You are hurt,” came the archer’s worried voice.

The ranger didn’t realize until then that Legolas had thought he was groaning from pain. The wood-elf couldn’t know the groan was a result of his concern for the elf’s mental state, which seemed to be diminishing by the moment.

Gritting his teeth, Aragorn forced himself into a raised position, leaning on his elbow for support. He opened his mouth to say something, but just then thunder rumbled ominously in the distance.

Another storm was brewing, and it wouldn’t be long before it would be upon them. They were already wet and cold, but the ranger knew that it wasn’t just a case of “We can’t get any wetter or colder”. A storm, as they were well aware, brought other things with it, like lightning. And being under trees was not the best place to be should lightning enter the area.

“We have to find shelter,” the man said. He knew he was repeating himself, but the way Legolas was right now, it was probably the first time the elf was aware of the remark.

“There are rocks to the right, at the foot of the hill in front of us,” Legolas said in a mater-of-fact tone, as if the subject had never come up before. “We may find shelter there.”

Aragorn almost laughed, though there was no humor in his heart. He shook his head and then scooted over to Legolas. He made sure he had a secure hold on the elf’s good arm. and then tried to get them both to their feet. It wasn’t happening.

Legolas frowned. Why weren’t he and Estel able to stand up? He looked around but saw no reason for their inability to accomplish that simple task. The elf knew he was hurting, and he seemed to remember that his friend had some hurts, as well. Maybe they were both worse off than he believed.

‘We move or we die.’ That seemingly extreme thought ran through the ranger’s mind, and he didn’t much care for it. He tried to push the idea away, but it kept repeating itself over and over, becoming more irritating each time. Yet, it may well have saved their lives, because Aragorn, in an effort to defy those doom-filled words, summoned the last reserve of strength he possessed.

He held tight to Legolas and, using the trunk of the tree whose root he had just tangled up with, he worked his way up until he and Legolas were upright once again. Aragorn was almost panting with the effort, as was Legolas, who had done his best to help, but they were on their feet.

Legolas pointed toward the rocks that he could see at the foot of the hill they were slowly and painfully moving toward. It should have taken them two minutes. It took fifteen.

When the two friends reached the rocks they stopped and leaned against them, as they had done several times with the trees on the way there.

“Do you see anything that might offer us a safe place to rest?” Aragorn asked.

Legolas stared, trying to make out some kind of refuge among the rocks. He had to blink several times, because his clear vision lasted only a few seconds before it clouded again.

Aragorn could tell that these rocks were similar to the big boulders by the river, not surprising since the stone of this area would most likely be the same. However, at this point in time, he didn’t really care what kind of rocks they were, as long as they offered some shelter from the elements.

The one good thing about these rocks, as opposed to the ones on the riverbank, was that these were far enough apart that Legolas and Aragorn were able to move between them with no trouble other than what the weakness of their own bodies caused. Had the elf and ranger needed to step over the bases of the rocks more than once or twice, they would have been completely stymied and forced to continue around the stones or simply stop where they were and take whatever came.

The move into the rocks was accompanied by more thunder, this time much closer, adding a sense of urgency to the search for a a place to find refuge.

‘There has to be a cave,’ Aragorn thought. It was apparent that the hill was made of stone, not earth, so he hoped there would be some kind of tunnel into the interior of the hill. “It must be here somewhere.”

“What must be here?” Legolas asked.

Aragorn hadn’t realized he had spoken out loud. “A cave.”

Legolas frowned. Not remembering that the man had never been here before, he asked, “You know of a cave around here?”

“No,” Aragorn had to admit. “I was just hoping. We need a place to get out of the approaching storm.”

“It must have rained already,” Legolas reasoned. “We are both wet.”

The ranger closed his eyes. Although he had seen many concussions in his time as a ranger and a healer, he still found himself surprised at the extent of Legolas’s memory loss. It seemed to be progressing to include more recent events.

“It stormed earlier,” the ranger said, totally leaving out the harrowing time they had spent in the rapids. “We need the chance to get out of the cold air and dry out.”

Legolas nodded, apparently not questioning why he didn’t remember the earlier storm but understanding the current need to escape the torrent that was heading their way.

It seemed that they were forced to stop each minute and lean against a rock to rest. That made progress extremely slow, yet they moved on relentlessly, pushing themselves beyond what could be expected of man or elf. Still no cave made an appearance.

“Up there,” Legolas said suddenly, as he pointed to a spot about ten feet above his head. Leaning against Aragorn with his good shoulder meant his only free arm was his injured left one, so he had to hold his elbow against his side to raise his hand, forefinger aimed almost straight up.

Aragorn followed the line of the elf’s finger. There, slightly darker than the surrounding rock, was the entrance to a small cave exactly where Legolas indicated.

The ranger groaned before shaking his head.
“There is no way we can get up there, Legolas. We can barely stand, much less climb.”

In his mind, the elf knew he was a nimble climber. He could find the tiniest of hand and footholds that would easily support his light weight. It had often been the source of humor for him and great consternation for the ranger, who couldn’t hope to follow him up the straight, almost smooth face of a cliff.

Before Aragorn knew it, Legolas had pulled away from him and fallen into the rock in front of him. Then the elf began to climb. He managed to put one foot in a tiny depression and pull himself up. When he tried to do the same with his other foot, his strength gave out and his feet slipped back to the ground.

Aragorn had recovered from his surprise, and his quick reaction saved the archer from another hard landing, possibly flat out on the ground.

Legolas tried again to get free for another attempt, but this time, Aragorn held him back before he could get another foot into the rock. “You can’t make it, Legolas. You are hurt and too exhausted. And so am I.”

The admission was bitter in the ranger’s mouth. He winced when he saw Legolas turn and stare at him. He couldn’t see the wood-elf’s eyes clearly in the dark, but he could guess the emotion they held.

Had he seen the look in Legolas’s eyes, Aragorn would have known that he was right. The elf’s eyes held disbelief and hurt that his friend would have so little faith in him. They also reflected a fierce determination that he could do it, despite what the ranger said.

With a flash of anger, Legolas jerked away from Aragorn and tried for the third time to climb the face of the rock. He couldn’t even get his foot high enough to reach the first foothold. Frustrated, he leaned against the cold stone and buried his head in the crook of his arm.

Aragorn laid a gentle hand on the elf’s shoulder. “There’s no shame, Legolas. We have both been through a lot these last days.”

“But, I am an elf!” Legolas declared vehemently, once again staring at the ranger.

“No elf I know, not even my father, or yours,“ he added to give his statement a personal touch for Legolas, “would succeed in these circumstances.”

Clarity dawned in the elf’s mind. “We cannot stay down here. We must reach that cave.”

He looked upward as far as he could see into the darkness but saw no way to reach the cave from above, even had they been able to find an easy way to the top of the hill, which in itself would have proven impossible.

“Then we keep looking,” Aragorn said grimly, still not yet willing to give up on their quest.

They trudged on, each step becoming harder to make. Their legs felt like lead, and they could barely keep their eyes open.

Legolas suddenly sank to the ground, and Aragorn was unable to keep it from happening, nor was he able to raise the elf. He sighed and sank down next to his friend. After pushing and pushing his body to continue to handle more than it was designed to do, it, like Legolas’s, had finally come to the end of its endurance.

They were hard pressed to keep the air moving in and out of their lungs.

Aragorn leaned his head back and was shocked to see that they were actually on the outer edge of a lean-to formed by one large rock leaning against the rock face of the hill. It wasn’t large enough to keep them completely out of the elements, but between the cover it did provide and the trees that were growing close by, maybe this little rocky shelter could keep the worst of the rain and wind away from them. With the storm nearly upon them, it was all there was.

Wearily, the ranger on the outside rolled over Legolas and then pulled him under the rock slab until they were both as near the center as they could get. The top was high over their heads, which meant rain would most likely come in on them, but it would be so mild compared to being out in the thick of the storm that Aragorn thought the confines of the lean-to quite cozy.

Suddenly the man’s stomach growled. It was a loud reminder that he and Legolas hadn’t eaten in a long time. Aragorn reached into his pocket and brought out a handful of sodden berries. He had completely forgotten hat he had them. They had once been dried, but of course, the river had taken care to plump them up again. Aragorn was surprised they hadn’t been smashed to mush by the river and the rocks. He sighed. It wasn't much, bit it was better than nothing at all.

He handed the majority of them to Legolas and was gratified to see the elf make the effort to eat them, despite both his and the berries‘ poor condition.

As he ate his meager share of berries, the man couldn’t’ help thinking back to the slab tunnel he and Legolas had been hiding in by the river. This was larger and much more open. He knew that being in here wouldn’t have the same effect on Legolas the other had done.

In an odd way, Aragorn was thankful that the elf didn’t remember being there, though in truth, he wanted his friend’s memory returned to him.. Perhaps, when they were free of this nightmare ‘adventure’, and the elf’s concussion healed, the memories would come.

A moment later, the storm hit with all of the ferocity of the previous one - and then some. Rain lashed the covering slab of rock and slanted inward toward the two friends.

Aragorn shuddered to think what would have been their fate had they been out in the thick of this display of Nature’s fury.

Aragorn was glad to note that this shelter had another advantage over the one by the river than just more space. The back wall just below where the slab leaned against it, had a long protrusion with a little trench that ran across the top. It caught the water that ran down the hill and deflected it to either side of where Aragorn and Legolas sat. They were able to lean against the rock wall without worrying about water running down their backs.

The shelter was a Valar-send, and it was here that the elf and the ranger would ride out the storm.

TBC

Chapter Twenty Eight

Tack sat on his lumpy, filthy bed and pondered the escape of the two captives that had so recently been firmly in the group’s grasp. He had been stewing about them ever since he and the others had returned to their camp, shortly before the full force of the storm hit.

It infuriated him that after he had finally achieved his goal of becoming leader, he had lost the prize. That did not sit well with him. Of course, it had been Scron’s fault. And Tack spared no amount of blame for Hatch and Picket, as well, even though they had been dead when Legolas and Aragorn made their way to freedom. In Tack’s way of reasoning, they had been the leaders during the time the captives were in camp, so they had to share the responsibility for the group now being empty handed. So angry was he that he even blamed them for getting themselves killed, even though that worked in his favor.

The huge creature couldn’t get the vision out of his head of the dark-haired captive being swept past him in the river, so close and yet so far out of reach. He never saw the golden-haired one, but he knew that he must have been in the river, as well. Tack slammed his fists against his thighs in anger.

To him, it wasn’t a strange notion that he wished the two had not drowned but had somehow survived their ordeal. He wanted them back. He wanted them back in the worst way. Like the other leaders before him, he thought that his position would be more secure, if he could give the rest of the group a reason to think him smart, powerful and worthy to be leader. It was easier to control a group of contentious trolls if they thought he was the best one to follow.

It wasn’t often that strangers came into their territory, so they needed to capture and keep those that did. That usually wasn’t a problem. Few ever escaped. In fact, none had done so in Tack’s lifetime. Now was not the time to start letting captives get away.

The intensity of the rain pelting down on Tack’s ramshackle hut increased. The wind, which had also increased, drove sprays of water through the gaps in the slats, which was probably the only reason the rickety building was still standing. A solid wall probably would have been blown down long before now. The roof was leaking in several places, some dripping hard enough to cause water to puddle on the bone-littered, dirt floor. None of that bothered the troll, who could just as easily have been out in the storm with no ill effects. The entire group of trolls was tough and robust enough to withstand and all of Nature‘s extremes.

It was a loud clap of thunder directly overhead that jerked Tack out of his thoughts. The troll leader stared toward the lopsided door. A strong gust of wind slammed into the hut at that exact moment, shaking it and sending the precariously hinged door flying backwards. It landed at Tack’s feet. Rain lashed inward but did not come far enough to reach the troll or his bed.

It wasn’t long before the creature’s thoughts strayed back to the escapees. At first, he grinned, thinking that the captives didn’t have a hut to keep the worst of the torrent off of them during the storm. Then the troll frowned. If those puny beings got sick and died, it’d be the same as if they’d drowned.

Having convinced himself that Legolas and Aragorn were still alive, because he wanted so badly for it to be true, Tack stared up at the ceiling and shook his fist. "Don’t you kill ’em," he shouted to the raging tempest. "I want ’em, and I’m gonna get ’em."

*~*~*~*

Aragorn sat with his back to the rock wall behind him. His eyes were closed. He had slept for most of the night, exhaustion having won the battle over the loud fury of the storm. However, the ranger was not asleep now. He may have slept but worry and pain had kept him from truly resting as he should and had finally driven him back to the conscious world.

Last night Aragorn had spent his time listening to the brunt of the storm raging all around the tiny shelter that he and Legolas had managed to find.

Before succumbing to slumber himself, the ranger had tried to keep his friend awake, but was not able to do so. Legolas’s body had needed to cocoon itself in a deep sleep so he could begin the healing process. It had been hard, at first, for Aragorn to allow that, because of the elf’s concussion, but in the end he had had no choice in the matter. He had finally gone to sleep trusting that the archer’s elven healing ability would take over, and Legolas would be better when he woke up.

When he first awoke, Aragorn had glanced down and saw Legolas’s head resting against his shoulder, his still damp, disheveled and unbound blond hair cascading around his own shoulders. He was glad to see that Legolas still slept.

The pain in Aragorn’s swollen foot hadn’t abated much this morning, though now it was more of a throbbing ache. He wanted desperately to take his boot off to relieve the pressure but knew that if he did, he would never get it back on again. That would be a hindrance he could ill afford, since sooner or later, they would have to begin walking again.

Injuries or no injuries, they couldn’t stay where they were for much longer. Legolas had said they were still in troll country, and that was definitely not a good thing. Aragorn had no way of knowing whether the trolls would come after them again or if they had simply given up, but it was too risky to assume the latter was the case. He had a nagging feeling that they hadn’t seen the last of the trolls.

The wind had died down with the retreat of the storm, and now all that could be heard was the constant dripping of water from the nearby trees as well as the little rivulets that still ran down the face of the rock wall. Even under the slab, Aragorn could smell the fresh air. However, in the wake of the storm, the temperature had dropped noticeably, making the ranger shiver.

He looked down at Legolas again, now able to make out the elf’s form more clearly as dawn was breaking. Even though he couldn’t see the sky from where he sat, Aragorn knew the day was going to be a beautiful one - cold, crisp and clear.

*~*~*~*

Half an hour later, sunlight was filtering through the trees, and Aragorn knew it was time to leave their shelter. He sighed heavily, but didn’t move. His mind was willing, well most o fit anyway, but his body just didn’t want to cooperate. It actually wanted to go back to sleep. ‘Not yet,’ he told himself. Further rest would just have to wait.

This time when he said move, his arm, which was still grasping the elf, shook back and forth. When no response was forthcoming, he shook the elf more forcefully.

A small groan from the archer told Aragorn that Legolas was close to the surface of the waking world. He shook the elf’s arm again, this time adding a verbal stimulus. "Mellon nin, it’s time to wake."

The elf opened his eyes, blinking several times in slow motion. It took his vision a moment to adjust to the light and focus on what was straight ahead. Then it took another moment for his mind to catch up. "Where are we?" he asked in a slightly husky voice.

Aragorn had already prepared himself for the idea that Legolas’s memory might not have returned, though he knew it would stab at his heart, if it hadn‘t. "We’re in the shelter we found last night." He waited anxiously for Legolas’s reaction.

The elf straightened up, moving his bad shoulder as much as he dared to try and get the stiff muscles stretched out a bit. He winced when the shoulder protested the effort. He finally replied, not realizing that his friend was sitting on pins and needles waiting for his answer. "Yes, I remember. The storm."

Aragorn was so happy that his whole body sagged in relief. "You do remember."

Offering the man a puzzled frown, Legolas asked, "Why do you think I would not?"

Not wanting to upset his friend, Aragorn simply said, "It was a long, difficult day yesterday." When those words were met with the same frown, he shrugged. "I’ll explain later. Right now we need to get going. I have the feeling that those trolls will be out looking for us again."

"I also feel that they will be searching," Legolas agreed. "We were too good a prize for them to just give up."

Aragorn groaned inwardly. He was hoping Legolas would say he thought the creatures would leave them alone. He wasn’t surprised, though, that Legolas had agreed with him.

Gritting his teeth against the pain he knew would come when he stood up, Aragorn used the wall to aid himself as he rose to his feet. He kept most of his weight off of his bad foot, not wanting to get the sharp pain stirred up until necessary. He then reached down and helped Legolas to stand.

The two companions made their way out from under the rock slab. They were quickly pelted with rain drops that were still falling from the tree branches above, but considering what had been falling the night before, they were hardly concerned.

Legolas stood very still. "I remember something else," he said sadly, his gaze staring into the forest. "The trees do not talk."

Aragorn had hoped that the silence of the trees was one of the things Legolas wouldn’t remember, although it was impossible to keep something like that a secret, when they were surrounded by trees. "You told me that you thought they had been exposed to the cruelty of the trolls so long they had more or less retreated from communicating, even with each other."

The elf nodded. "I will try to come back and help them, if I can."

Aragorn wasn’t going to broach that subject again, even in his own mind. Legolas was his own person and would do what he wanted, and in truth, the ranger wouldn’t want it any other way.

"We should go back toward the river and try to follow it out of this Valar forsaken territory," the ranger said. "We really have no other choice. We can’t cross the river, we can’t go back upriver, and we certainly can’t go off that way." He indicated the forest to their right where the troll camp was located. He grimaced, because he hated not having more than one choice in any given situation. It was all too close to making him feel trapped.

As the two started off, having agreed on their route to the river, they were happy that neither had to lean on the other. Aragorn was limping but was otherwise unhindered. Legolas’s head still hurt but neither that nor his bad shoulder was a detriment to his progress. It was a far cry from the condition the two were in last night when they reached the shelter.

Legolas and Aragorn had gone no more than twenty yards when the elf suddenly stopped.

"What is it?" Aragorn asked, though he was sure he knew the answer. His guess was confirmed when Legolas said, "Trolls."

This deadly game of hiding and seeking with the hideous creatures was getting entirely too old, but unfortunately, it wasn’t getting any less dangerous. It also was showing no signs of ending any time soon.

The elf and the ranger increased their pace. This time Legolas put his good arm around Aragorn to aid the man as he tried to move on his bad foot as fast as possible.

"I hope we do not have to go into the river," Legolas said. "I do not think we would survive it." He didn’t understand why Aragorn laughed the way he did.

"If you only knew," the ranger remarked barely above the soft sigh of a breath.

Legolas, of course, heard it clearly but couldn’t figure out what that remark was supposed to mean. Aragorn had made it sound as if they had been in the river already. "Did I miss something?" he asked his friend.

Another laugh made the elf shake his head. Either he was reading something in Aragorn’s words that weren’t there, or the man was losing his senses, which wasn’t too farfetched considering everything he had suffered.

Since he knew he wasn’t going to get any enlightenment on the subject, for the moment at least, Legolas kept silent and concentrated on their forward progress.

By that time, they had reached the river, which, to their dismay, was even fuller and more violent than when they had first seen it. They looked at each other, and both sighed at the same time. The storm had made its wrath apparent on more than the forest.

Aragorn thought back to Legolas’s remark earlier about not being able to survive the river. Looking at it now, he was sure the elf had been right. After this last storm, it was doubtful that anyone, even a troll, could survive in that wild, raging water. Timing, it seemed, was everything. Bad timing that the river was up when they reached it the first time, and good that they were swept downstream yesterday.

Then Aragorn realized that they were at the exact spot where Legolas had pulled him from the current the day before. Most of the tell-tale signs had been washed away by the rain, but there was still a faint impression of the two ruts made by Aragorn’s boots being dragged onto the bank.

The fact that the ruts were parallel and had been deep enough not to completely wash away caught Legolas’s attention, and It didn’t take him long to ‘read’ those signs on the ground. Now Aragorn’s remark made sense. "We were in the river," Legolas said with a tone that said he knew it but didn’t really remember it. "So who pulled who out?"

The ranger was only mildly surprised by the question, but he realized he shouldn‘t have been. Legolas’s memory may still be a little spotty, but the elf’s mind was as nimble as ever. "You pulled me out."

"Let me guess. You’ll explain it all later." There was a hint of humorous sarcasm in the wood-elf’s tone.

"I wish I could, but the truth is that I was unconscious after smashing into a rock, and I wasn’t aware of a thing until I woke up here with you unconscious beside me." His tone turned serious. "I feared you were dead."

It wasn’t the first time the ranger had told Legolas that. It wasn’t the second, or, he suspected, even the tenth. He was sure he had said the same words to his friend just as often. It was a fright that seared both of their hearts each time there had been cause to make such an assumption.

A shout coming from the nearby forest reached the two, and they turned as one to look into the trees. It was immediately obvious to both of them what that shout meant. Trolls were coming!

TBC

Chapter Twenty Nine

“Can you tell if it’s one, a few or a big bunch of them?” Aragorn asked, turning to look at Legolas, and giving the elf a hopeful expression. When it came to trolls, he wished for the first but feared it was the latter.

“There is more than one,” Legolas replied, as he titled his head to listen more intently. Then he continued. “However, it does not sound as if a whole group is coming. I do not hear words, just shouting.” Legolas wished he could be the bearer of better news. The more trolls there were, the more they could spread out, and the harder it would be to get away from them. Right now, if there was a confrontation, one of the creatures would be a handful. With a grin, he added, “Of course, there may be many more of them who are not making any noise at all.”

Aragorn groaned. “Just what I needed to hear.” He looked toward the forest. “It might have been better if we had stayed in our shelter,” the man offered. The statement was made without any conviction, though, because he knew as he said it, that remaining under that rock slab hadn’t been much of an option.

Not realizing that Aragorn hadn’t really been serious, the elven archer shook his head. “No. We were right to leave there. It had two open sides, and if they checked there, we would have been caught with no way to escape.”

He didn’t have to explain what that feeling was like. He and Aragorn had been in similar circumstances far too many times not to know exactly how that felt. They would both rather run for their lives, even if there was little chance of getting away, than be trapped in a hopeless situation.

“Then shall we?” Aragorn asked, as he swept his arm forward. It looked like they very well may be running for their lives - and soon.

The all too familiar sound of trolls crashing through underbrush reached the two friends above the shouting, just as they started along the riverbank in the same direction they had taken before falling in the torrent the day before.

It wasn’t long before they saw that the hill at whose base they had sheltered, sloped down to the river’s edge. It was a steep incline, though certainly not one that would have deterred or given more than a little trouble to the elf and ranger had they been in better shape.

The pair came to a stop and looked first at the hill, then at the churning current near the bank and then at each other.

“We have no choice,” Aragorn said. He tried to ignore the ache in his foot that was telling him climbing across this slope was not going to be a enjoyable experience. He would be moving with his bad foot on the downhill side and at an awkward angle, which would put more pressure on it. Then, of course, it would also be easy to roll over on his already painful ankle. Not a pleasant thought.

Legolas studied the course before them while trying to ignore the signals of pain from his body to his brain. His head throbbed in tune with his pulse, and his shoulder ached continuously. They were two different kinds of pain, which actually made them feel worse. Had they been making themselves known in unison, they would have been easier to disregard. As it was, the elf was just going to have to push everything, except finding a way to avoid the trolls, to the back of his mind.

“I will go nearest the river,” Legolas volunteered, so he would be on the man‘s weakest side. “I can help you with your balance.”

“That’s a kind offer,” the ranger replied, “but if I fall, I’d probably take you down with me, and then you’d fall on your bad shoulder, and we’d both be hurt even more than we are now.” He grinned. “We could follow one another.”

Both knew they couldn’t stand around and talk about their strategy. They had to do something and do it fast.

Being careful not to cause Aragorn’s foot any added stress, Legolas moved forward. At the same time he got a firm hold of the ranger’s left arm and gently pushed the man higher up onto the slope, hoping it would be a little more stable than the accumulated rubble nearer the bottom. He made sure there was sufficient distance between them and the water’s edge so that a misstep wouldn’t lead to disaster. He also made sure that Aragorn had no room to try and maneuver below him.

Pursing his lips in resignation, Aragorn let the elf do as he wished. There really was no more time left for two very stubborn people to engage in a verbal confrontation. He doubted he could overcome the elf physically, even with Legolas’s depleted strength and only one good arm.

The terrain where they were consisted mostly of rough, scrubby grass. Also sticking out of the ground or loosely covering the surface of the incline were tiny branches. A few were reaching upward like bony fingers, ready to snag any unsuspecting traveler who dared cross their path. There were varying sizes of rocks partially embedded in the earth. All of these things were very hard on the feet and legs of the fleeing pair, causing them to slip and slide with each step. It took great care to keep from impaling themselves or tripping over the obstacles. Yet, despite it all, they did manage to keep their feet under them - for the most part.

Aragorn had to grit his teeth every time he took a step, fearing that at any moment his bad foot would roll over and add something worse than a sprained ankle to the mix. Oddly enough, it was a slip on a loose rock that saved the man from tumbling into Legolas and sending them both plunging toward the river, which, in this particular spot, was splashing heavily against the rocks at the base of the hill.

His leg had begun to tremble from the sheer effort of keeping upright. He felt his foot about to go over sideways when the rock he had just stepped on gave way, causing his foot to slide out rather than roll over itself. He landed on his right knee, narrowly missing crunching the joint on one of the half-buried stones. Aragorn tried desperately to grab something to keep himself from sliding into Legolas.

The archer felt, rather than saw, what was happening and grabbed the ranger’s arm even tighter to stop his slide and steady him. The elf ended up on his knees, as well, and both friends began to slide. However, neither of them had traveled sideways more that a couple of feet before coming to a stop.

They both watched as little rocks tumbled down and plopped into the water, thankful that it hadn‘t been them.

“That was one disaster averted,” Aragorn said, swinging his other arm wide to aid in gaining his balance. “Now to make it across this slope before another one rears its ugly head.”

“We will make it, Estel. Do not worry,” Legolas assured the man.

“Easy for you to say,” Aragorn retorted. “You don’t have to put your weight on your bad shoulder.”

“You humans certainly do complain when you are forced to put out a little effort after being injured.” The elf’s tone was sarcastic, but it was obvious that humor lay behind the words.

The man snorted but didn’t answer. Despite his own bit of sarcasm earlier, he was grateful for Legolas’s assistance. He had no desire to repeat his wild ride through the raging current to his left.

As they slipped and slid across the slope, Legolas and Aragorn heard shouting across the river. Startled by the direction from which the sound originated, they both stopped and stared.

Running along opposite them were about ten trolls. In the lead was Tack. He had slowed up to keep from moving too far ahead of the stumbling former captives.

“How did he get over there?” Aragorn asked. Almost instantly, the man slapped his forehead. “I didn’t even think about the fact that we ended up on the opposite side of the river to where we started out. I can’t believe that little detail escaped me.” Aragorn seemed more miffed at himself for failing to notice on which side of the river they found themselves than he was about there being trolls on both sides of the river.

Legolas couldn’t help but laugh.

“Well, you didn’t think about that either,” the ranger pointed out rather curtly.

“That is why I am laughing. It also did not dawn on me that the river is now on our left and not our right as it was.” It didn’t occur to him that his previously faulty memory had now supplied him with that information.

Aragorn looked behind him before turning his head back to look downhill at his elven friend. “Then who are those trolls behind us? Even trolls could not make it across that river in its current state.”

It had also never occurred to the two of them that more than one group of trolls might be occupying the large territory the creatures inhabited.

“I guess,” Aragorn said with a sigh, “that even if we had realized we had been thrown across the river by the current, we still wouldn’t have been safe from those beasts.” He shook his head. “The ones over here may be even worse than those.” He jutted his chin out to indicate Tack and his group, who were continuing to shout. He thought the difference in the level of cruelty between the two groups would probably be negligible.

Legolas realized that the new leader of the group he and Aragorn had escaped from was not facing them directly. “I think Tack is shouting at the trolls over here on this side.”

“Too bad the two groups can’t get together. Maybe they’d knock each other off and leave us be,” Aragorn grumbled his disappointment.

“Or they could join forces to come after us,” Legolas said, by way of an alternate suggestion.

Aragorn glared at the elf for a moment before a quirky grin crossed the man’s face. “I like my idea better.”

The two then hastily started off again. There was only about ten feet of high ground left before the slope began a gentle incline toward the riverbank on the other side of the hill.

Finally, the pair gained the narrow but level strip of sandy soil between water and stubby grass not far from the edge of the forest. They weren’t naive enough to think the slope they had just spent a hard time crossing would do more than slow the trolls a step or two. With their long strides and heavy weight, they could reach this side of the hill in short order with little difficulty.

Again Legolas came to a dead stop.

Aragorn knew the elf wouldn’t do so at this point in their progress unless something worse than pursuing trolls had caught his attention. When he raised his head to follow Legolas’s intense gaze, his breath caught in his throat.

Coming toward them along the riverbank were four of the largest trolls either of them had ever seen. They wore a slightly different type of clothing than the creatures that had held them captive. This was indeed a different group, but they didn’t look any more friendly than Hatch’s group had when they were first captured. If anything, they looked even meaner.

“Git ’em, boys,” the lead troll yelled with glee in his gruff voice that reminded the elf of orcs. If only... He couldn’t help rolling his eyes, because he couldn’t believe he was wishing for orcs.

When Legolas and Aragorn instinctively turned to run back the other way, they saw the trolls that had been chasing them from the forest. They were crossing the slope.

The elf looked back downriver while the ranger looked upriver. Their options were limited to two. They could stay where they were and become prisoners again and hope for another chance to escape, which was highly unlikely. Or, they could go into the river again.

*~*~*~*

From across the river, Tack watched the scene, as it unfolded before his disbelieving eyes. He could clearly see the two groups of trolls closing in on the beings he himself wanted more than anything right then. He was helpless to stop the other trolls from getting his prize. His ire rose, as he saw the beings pause and then turn, as one, toward the river. They both ran into the swirling water and when it reached their knees, they dove into the full force of the current and were quickly swept away.

It was the second time Tack was having to watch while the former captives used the river to evade the clutches of his group. He had no idea that that was not what had happened the day before, because, to him, that had been the pair’s only means of escaping recapture.

Tack was furious. He ran along beside the river, screaming and waving his arms in the air. He knew there was little chance that he would catch up to the captives. The current carrying them was just too strong, and they were moving much too fast.

Tack knew that yesterday they had come ashore on the opposite bank, so maybe they would do the same thing on this side. He was determined to be waiting wherever it was they ended up.

When Tack got even with the two groups of trolls on the opposite bank, who had now joined up with each other, he yelled out, “Sump, you ain’t gonna git ’em. They’re mine!”

The troll named Sump, who was obviously the other group’s leader, yelled back. “You the new boss over there, Tack?”

“Yeah, and those two are mine.”

“How you figure that?”

“We had ’em first,” Tack yelled back over the roar of the river.

Sump sneered derisively. “Then you couldn’t hold ’em, so they belong to who catches ’em now!” Uproarious laughter erupted from the creature’s twisted mouth, indicating he was convinced it would be him and not Tack who would be the victor. Then he ran off after the two beings that had disappeared from sight.

Sump and his group did the same.

*~*~*~*

Legolas and Aragorn had taken only a moment to decide that going in the river would offer them, if not the best chance of survival, at least the most preferable one. Both knew that at least it beat being tortured, killed and eaten by the disgusting trolls. Though they wouldn’t be aware when the latter happened, the mere thought of having their flesh torn to shreds, their bones ripped apart and then all of it greedily consumed was enough to send more than one shudder down their spines.

They hadn’t said a word to each other. None was needed. A look between them said it all from their mutual decision to their possible farewells. They clasped forearms and then made their way to the river’s edge. Wading in a short way, they then dove into the icy water. It had only taken seconds for the swift current to send them flying downriver.

TBC

Chapter Thirty

As the two friends were swept out into the river, in a grim replay of the day before, Aragorn reached over and grabbed Legolas’s right forearm, wrapping his hand tightly around it. He hoped he and the elf would be able to ride out whatever was to come together. Though in reality, he doubted their physical connection would last long, he did his best to beat the odds. As he feared, it only took mere seconds for the current to start trying to pull them apart.

Legolas keenly felt the desperate hold the man had on his arm. Between splashes in his face that caused him to close his eyes, he managed to see the near panic on Aragorn’s face, as his grip began to slip. The elf knew it wasn’t fear for himself that the ranger was feeling. It was fear of losing contact with him.

Twice the two were sent down into a depression of water and then up and over a strong wave created in the wake of a boulder. Because of his superior elven strength, Legolas knew that he would be able to hold a grip firmer and longer. So, as they rode up the second wave, when they were both pushed waist high above the water, Legolas broke free of Aragorn’s grasp and quickly grabbed the man’s wrist. His hold tightened like a vise, as they slipped back down into the icy water.

Elf and ranger were moving at top speed down the river, struggling to keep their heads above the surface and the water out of their lungs. They were only winning the battle half the time.

Aragorn had tried several times to grab Legolas around the waist to keep them from being parted, but the river seemed to have other ideas. It threw them toward one of the largest boulders they had yet seen in the river, rising up in front of them. The water was being parted by the rock, whipping around on either side and then crashing back together in a churning mass behind it. It was a regular occurrence in the river, and it was very familiar to the pair.

It was obvious that one of two things was going to happen. If they stayed together, they were going to smash into the rock sideways, possibly breaking both of their arms, if not doing something even worse. If Legolas let go, they would be separated, probably for good. Neither choice was appealing, but in the end, there was really only one thing to be done. The elf reluctantly let go of Aragorn’s wrist.

Any hope the two friends had that they might also come back together behind the rock was soon dashed, as the elf, in a slightly stronger part of the current, rounded the boulder quicker and was several feet away by the time Aragorn was flung around the other side.

“Estel, swim toward me,” Legolas yelled out. It was his thought that if he swam against the current, slowing him down even slightly, and Aragorn swam with it, speeding him up, they might be able to meet up again.

Aragorn began to swim as hard as he could, slicing through the water, but again the river thwarted Legolas’s plan. If he and the elf had been able to remain in line with each other, it might have worked, but such was not the case.

Legolas was certainly doing his best to fight the current. Unfortunately, with only one arm to try and accomplish the maneuver and the river swirling strongly in various directions, the attempt failed miserably. He and Aragorn were quickly pushed farther apart.

The pair were virtually helpless to do more than bob like corks in the churning current. Whatever the river had in store for them was what would happen, and they were powerless to change it.

*~*~*~*

There were two very angry trolls currently chasing after the two beings that had gone into the river. Each was so determined to be the winner that they had come close to reaching the boiling point of rage at the other.

Anyone else might have been content to hope that they each got one of the pair in the water. But, in addition to their other unsavory traits, these two troll leaders were greedy. They wanted both of the ones they chased, partly to claim the total prize and make their planned torment more enjoyable and partly to be able to taunt the troll leader across the river, who would end up with nothing.

Tack and Sump kept their eyes on each other as much as they did on the river to try and locate Legolas and Aragorn. They were all moving as fast as they could to keep the other group from outdistancing them.

What was amazing was that the huge creatures were able to cover as much ground as they did. It was true they had long legs, but they were also bulky and incredibly heavy. Yet, instead of sinking into the soft, sandy soil along the river, they were abler to move quickly .

It was certainly evident that a competition had long existed between the group formerly led by Hatch and the one belonging to Sump. It probably had existed long before either of them were even born. Any troll not a member of a particular group was considered the enemy to all others and was to be challenged over anything and everything that would bring victory to that group.

It had rapidly become a foot race between the two groups, and it remained to be seen who would be the ultimate winner, either or both of the trolls or the escaping captives.

No amount of determination or physical speed by the trolls was a match for the swollen river’s wild current. The huge creatures were being left far behind the breakneck speed attained by Legolas and Aragorn.

*~*~*~*

Against their wills, Legolas and Aragorn were soon out of sight of each other, a fact that upset them both, though they each realized they would have to concentrate on saving themselves and, for the moment, forget the other.

It amazed the ranger that a current that was flowing at the same speed could send one friend down its length faster than the other. He was sure there was some physical reason for it, a reason that Lord Elrond would no doubt know, but the ranger did not. Had it been a lesson his tutor had tried to teach the oft times inattentive human child? Probably, but it was too late to worry about that now.

Downriver, Legolas didn’t have the time right then to think about the metaphysical aspects of the river‘s current, either. He was once again fighting for his life.

Another boulder had appeared in front of him, seemingly to pop up out of nowhere. Legolas tried to relax, counting on the current to take him around it.

By the time he was swept past the boulder into a swirling whirlpool, inside his head was spinning to match that of his body. The dizziness he had been suffering from since his head injuries, was back in full force. His head didn’t actually hurt like it did before, not yet at least, but he found it hard to concentrate, and the situation he was in demanded total concentration.

It was then that instinct for self-preservation kicked in. And Legolas kicked out, pumping his legs as hard as he could while also using his cupped right hand to help pull himself out of the swirling water.

For a while, all that was happening was that Legolas spun around in circles. Luckily, the whirlpool wasn’t a large one, so the archer was able to break free of the deadly hold it had on him. As if tired of the tug-of-war, the water suddenly spewed Legolas out and flung him outward. Legolas’s nose came close to scraping the rocky river bottom before he was jerked up and sent to the surface. The elf felt like a hapless leaf, though certainly a grateful one.

Once he was moving down the river again, Legolas looked around for Aragorn but didn’t see the man. The elf fought the urge not to do more than let the current take him at its own pace. Instead, he turned in a complete circle, risking more dizziness, in order to try and locate his friend. He did this twice before he was forced to quit the maneuver.

No Aragorn.

The elf prayed to the Valar that Aragorn had moved farther downriver while he was caught in the whirlpool, which is exactly what had happened. To Legolas, the alternative was unthinkable.

Just then, a large tree that had been uprooted far upstream floated past Legolas, as the elf continued to struggle against the current.

In a last ditch effort to save himself, Legolas reached out and managed to grab onto a small branch sticking out of the side of the tree trunk. He had to do it using his injured left arm, because that was the side the tree was on, and if he had taken time to turn his body around and use his right arm, the tree would have moved out of his reach.

The pain in his shoulder was instantaneous, but the elf did not let go or even loosen his grip a little. This fallen tree was his lifeline, and he had no intention of letting it get away from him.

*~*~*~*

Aragorn had been sent downriver almost half a mile farther than Legolas. He did his best to avoid as many rocks as he could. Fortunately, he was successful, for the most part. A few times, he hit with glancing blows but nothing like the impact that sent him into oblivion the day before.

It was inevitable that, if he met with no disasters, sooner or later he would reach a section of the river that was not as violent as what he had just been through. That time had just arrived.

Aragorn found himself being inexorably moved toward the shore. Occasionally, he would be pulled out near the center of the river, but he could tell that the river itself was becoming calmer. The current was still extremely swift, but the rapids had all but disappeared.

The ranger soon realized that he was able to drag his feet - or foot, since he was reluctant to use the bad one - against the rocky riverbed. The result was that he slowed his progress and moved ever closer to the riverbank.

To his great surprise and joy, Aragorn soon found himself on his hands and knees in barely ten inches of water, which allowed him to crawl out of the river. Once he had dragged himself onto the sandy soil, he collapsed, falling onto his stomach and breathing deeply. It felt wonderful to inhale air that contained no water.

Aragorn looked behind him, hoping to see that Legolas had made it to shore, as well, so the two of them would be reunited again. His heart sank when the elf was not there.

The ranger lowered his head down on his outstretched arm. He was certainly relieved at being on solid ground, but that feeling was tempered by the absence of his friend. He could only hope that somewhere along the river, the archer was having the same kind of good fortune he was having. He knew better than to count the elf out and would begin the search for him, as soon as he gathered his strength.

Suddenly, a sound nearby made him jerk. At first thinking a troll, or worse yet many trolls, had found him, the ranger started to roll over and grab for his sword. Then he remembered he no longer possessed the treasured blade.

A soft nicker gave him a shock he was hardly expecting. Raising his head, Aragorn looked into the large brown eyes of his horse, who had lowered his head to welcome his master. The relief Aragorn felt was so profound, his body went limp for a moment.

The animal took a step closer and nudged the human with his nose, nickering again in happy greeting. It seemed Aragorn wasn’t the only one relieved and overjoyed.

“Where did you come from?” Aragorn asked the horse, as he rose to his feet. His bad foot quickly reminded him it was not in shape to hold his weight, so he balanced on his other foot.

The horse raised his head, and he was now making snuffling noises against the man’s shoulder.

Aragorn rubbed the stallion’s velvety nose with one hand while patting his muscular neck with the other. “You’ve no idea how glad I am to see you.” He put his forehead against the warm neck he had just been patting.

Another soft nicker a few feet away drew Aragorn’s attention. It was Legolas’s horse. The animal looked past Aragorn at the river and then back at the ranger. Nickering again, he seemed to be asking where his elf was.

Aragorn held his hand out, and the elven stallion walked up and nuzzled it. The man closed his eyes, then opened them and sighed. In elvish, he whispered, “Don’t worry. We’ll find Legolas. We won’t leave him behind.”

The horse tossed his head up and down, not understanding those exact words but feeling the reassurance behind them. Because of Legolas, he had known the ranger most of his life and trusted him as he knew his master did.

Turning back to his own horse, Aragorn bent his knees, then jumped up, using his arms to pull himself across the animal’s back. He swung around to face forward and lowered his legs, easing them down on either side of his mount. There was no saddle, but at the moment, that hardly mattered. It felt so good to be on a horse again, both physically and, because of what it meant, emotionally.

He could cover a great deal more territory on horseback, not to mention being able to rest his throbbing foot. His recently-found good luck was holding, and it brought a smile to his face.

Turning toward the river, the man realized he had ended up back on the side where Tack and his group lived. At this point, though, it hardly made a difference. A troll was a troll, and being captured by either group would prove deadly.

The only question now was: How could he scour the river for Legolas without running into Tack and his group of hideous creatures? His answer was to move into the trees where the trolls running along the bank wouldn’t see him.

With luck, Legolas had either already reached this calmer stretch of the river and had made his way ashore or he would reach it soon. The man knew the elf would do all he could to avoid the trolls along the riverbank. If he could then find his friend, they would be able to use their horses to leave this accursed land.

Just before turning to head into the forest, a large uprooted tree came floating down the river. Aragorn had no way of knowing that Legolas, clinging to the far side of the tree trunk was passing unseen right in front of him.

After watching the tree for a moment, Aragorn marveled at the power of the current that such a large one could have been yanked out of the ground and moved along like a twig.

Then with a sigh, the ranger moved toward the forest. Legolas’s horse, needing no command, trailed behind.

*~*~*~*

Figuring he had gone far enough downstream to outdistance the trolls, Legolas’s plan was to abandon the tree he clung to, gain the riverbank in the calming current and then run the other way.

What Legolas didn’t know was that some of Sump’s members, separated earlier in the day from the main group, were less than forty yards from him.

TBC

Chapter Thirty One

Legolas noted with a deep sense of relief that he was entering a part of the river where the rapids had all but disappeared, making the surface relatively smooth. What had been roiling, white-capped waves farther back were now merely small swirls of flat water. However, the current was deceptive. It was still very strong and anyone unable to read the river or not paying proper attention to it could nevertheless end up in trouble, even here beyond the wild water.

Legolas’s shoulder had begun hurting so badly as he awkwardly clung to the tree that he had been forced to shift his body in order to hold onto the short, protruding branch with his right hand. It was a bit uncomfortable, and he had to work to keep his body from swinging around to face where he had just come from. Calmer water or not, he needed to see what was coming. Therefore, he had no choice but to struggle with his right arm across his body in order to stay facing downriver.

The energy he expended was well worth the effort, because he was able to spot what he hoped would be his ultimate salvation before he passed beyond it.

The riverbank had eroded inward a few yards, allowing a small pool to form. It was calm and still enough for a child to play in and certainly provided a safe and easy place for Legolas to make his way out of the river.

Knowing that if he waited too long, the current would sweep him past the miniature pond, Legolas judged he would have to let go of the tree trunk just before he reached the front edge of the pool, so he would be carried into it. Timing it just right, he headed for the shallow water.

Now completely ignored by the elf, whose sole attention was focused on escaping the river, the floating tree no longer had the archer to hold it steady. It hit one of the few hidden rocks in this area and bounced up and then sideways before turning back around and continuing its way downriver. It would no doubt eventually find its way to the riverbank, and lodge itself there. Over time, debris would hang up and collect against it. Several such long-trapped tree trunks could be found at various spots along the whole length of the river. Unfortunately, during their two wild rides neither Legolas nor Aragorn could get close to any of them.

This particular tree, making its way downriver at such a critical time, had probably saved the wood-elf’s life.

Dripping wet, Legolas stumbled out of the river and made his way across the sandy bank to the nearest living tree edging the forest.

Leaning his head against the rough bark, Legolas, like Aragorn had done earlier, filled his lungs with fresh, water-free air. A few strong coughs, and the elf was able to take in the amount of air he needed to stabilize his oxygen-deprived body.

After his breathing resumed its normal rhythm, the archer turned back to face the river and sat down, putting his back squarely against the tree trunk.

At first, he used his right hand to rub his left shoulder. The strain that had been put on it when he first grabbed the floating tree, was making it ache almost as bad as when he had first dislocated it. He used his fingers to probe the joint gently, not sure if he had done so again. Gritting his teeth, he raised his arm to see how far it would go. The pain was intense, but he was able to get it high enough to know it was not dislocated this time. It was just painfully swollen.

Relived, Legolas then placed his right hand on the exposed root beside his right thigh. The elf reached his weary mind out to seek comfort from the tree.

When he received no response to his plea, the elf frowned and tilted his head upward to look into the swaying branches above him. He couldn’t understand the tree’s silence at first. Then he remembered that the trees here didn’t communicate, probably due to their exposure to the constant cruelty of the trolls that lived in this land.

“I am sorry, my friend“, Legolas whispered sadly. “I cannot help you now. I have not the strength. It is your comfort I had hoped to find.”

Legolas lowered his head and closed his eyes. It made his heart ache to think that neither of them could offer solace to the other. He felt as though he had lost a friend, which in a way, he had. Even though he had never seen this particular tree before, the wood-elf felt connected to every tree that lived in Middle-earth.

A moment later, Legolas heard a noise. He jerked his head around and listened. It was not one of Nature’s variety of benign creatures. On hearing the noise again, Legolas was sure it was trolls.

Still woozy and shivering a little from so recently being submerged in the river’s icy water, the elf realized he could not stay here and rest, something both his body and mind desperately craved. He needed to find a hiding place, and he needed to find it fast.

The elven archer slowly stood and, after wishing the tree well, made his slightly unsteady way deeper into the forest, seeking sanctuary until he could gain enough strength to meet whatever came next. Whether that included battling trolls, something he wasn’t sure his body could handle right now, or whether it involved searching for Aragorn, he did not know. He only had the feeling that whatever it was could well be even more wearying than what he’d already been through.

Leaving the tree behind, Legolas continued his way through the trees. As he moved, he was trying to get the world to stop spinning. Or was it his head that was whirling around? He wasn’t sure but either way, he knew that without the numerous trees he was using to steady himself, he would have fallen several times. The very idea made him cringe for his weakness, though logically he knew the condition he was in was not really his fault. He finally decided that getting upset with himself was a waste of time. He needed to concentrate on the task at hand.

It had been a few moments after Legolas departed that the tree under whose branches the elf had rested felt a small shudder run through it, faintly rustling its leaves. It did not know that it had been touched by a wood-elf. It did not sing or call out to its neighbors, but it sensed, in some deep inner part of itself, that something different had taken place. It had become - vaguely aware.

*~*~*~*

As Aragorn made his way into the forest, he turned his head several times and looked back over his shoulder toward the river. He wanted to be deep into the trees so he could be hidden enough not to be spotted by the trolls he knew would be showing up before long and still be close enough to the river to be able to try and keep an eye out for Legolas. To his dismay, by the time he found a spot he deemed safe, he was able to see only slivers of the sparkling river through thin gaps between the trees. Anything floating by would be past and gone before it was seen, especially a blond headed elf.

Now the ranger had to make the decision which way to go: upstream or down. He had no idea whether Legolas had passed him while they were both in the river or whether it had been the other way around. Aragorn did know that making the wrong choice would not only lose valuable search time but could very well end up costing Legolas his freedom or even his life.

If the elf was still in the current upriver, it would soon bring him this way. If, however, he was hung up somewhere, there was little the ranger could do to help, though Aragorn knew in his heart, he would try to the farthest limits of his ability.

At times like these, Aragorn knew he needed all the help he could get. He closed his eyes and asked the Valar for guidance.

Convinced Legolas would eventually end up downriver, no matter how far that might be, Aragorn made up his mind that his best bet was to go in that direction. The ranger turned his horse and began moving parallel to the river.

Aragorn didn’t see the trolls, led by Tack, running along the riverbank until they were even with him. As the dark figures moved, they flashed in and out of his line of sight.

When he spotted the first one, Aragorn had halted his progress immediately. Then, to the man’s horror, he saw one of the huge creatures stop in one of the shafts of light and look toward the trees. Despite the fact that only a small part of the troll could be seen, the creature’s intent was all too obvious.

Aragorn froze, hardly daring to breathe. If he was seen now, the alarm would be sounded, and he would have to make a run for it, likely taking him farther from Legolas. That would not be good for his elven friend, who could well be depending on him for rescue. Aragorn hated it when he and Legolas were apart like this, not knowing what was happening to the other. It was nerve wracking.

The troll lifted his head and sniffed the air, hoping to catch the scent of the quarry. The only way he could actually smell the human was if Aragorn was upwind of the creature. There was no wind, not even a small breeze, and the ranger was grateful for that no small piece of good fortune.

After a moment, the other trolls had rumbled on out of sight and sound. Tack evidently wasn’t concerned with whatever this lone troll might be attempting to investigate. The leader believed their prize was still ahead of them, and he had no intention of losing any time by veering away from going after it. Tack was still determined not to lose what he believed was his to Sump and his group.

The curious troll, who had no doubt thought he could earn some kind of reward by finding the former captives, growled in frustration when he could neither see nor smell anything out of the ordinary. Disappointed and disgruntled, he turned and ran after his leader and the rest of his group.

Aragorn let out a long sigh of immense relief. He patted his horse on the neck and then leaned over and did the same to Legolas’s horse, standing quietly beside him. Both animals had easily recognized the tension in the man’s demeanor, as well as being aware of the cruel beasts who had so recently held them and their masters in very unpleasant surroundings. Thus they remained as still and quiet as Aragorn had.

Quickly recovering from his scare, the ranger resumed the hunt for Legolas. This time, however, there was even more urgency in his mission, because now, the trolls were between him and the elf, if he was right and Legolas was indeed downriver from him.

Aragorn shook his head. This was not working out the way he had hoped when he found the horses, or rather the horses had found him. He could not - would not - let Legolas get captured again. Just how he was going to keep them both out of the clutches of those horrid beasts, he had no idea - yet.

*~*~*~*

The country that Legolas and Aragorn had entered what seemed like an age ago was troll land, which was over six hundred square miles. And in that area, there were fifteen different troll groups. Most lived in the forests, some lived among the open hills and a few were nomadic.

It was one of these roving groups who was making its way through the forest toward the river. There were only eight of them, and they were smaller than the other groups like those belonging to Tack and Sump. They would seem to be at a disadvantage, however, what they lacked in size, they made up for in ferocity.

These creatures were thieves and merciless killers, necessary traits for survival, because they were constantly crossing the territory of stationary groups and often had to fight their way from one end to another. They were battles the nomads actually enjoyed. They went beyond just trying to survive. They made an effort to look for trouble.

Between them and the river a lone elf was making his way to safety. Or so he hoped.

TBC

Chapter Thirty Two

Tack continued to lead his group along the riverbank, convinced that the prize he sought was ahead of him but just out of his sight. As long as he believed that, he would not give up his pursuit.

The trolls that were spread out behind him were becoming more anxious as they moved downstream. They, like their leader, were consumed with finding the escaped captives. The idea of recapturing the two beings, taking them back to their camp, torturing them with their games and then making a savory meal of them was more than enough to get them excited.

Several of the creatures joked among themselves, hitting and punching each other, as they discussed the captives’ fates, which became more gruesome with each suggestion.

The capture itself may be the main goal, but the chase was almost as pleasurable. Believing as they did that their prey were all but caught, the trolls were able to actually enjoy running the beings they sought to ground. To them, high anticipation didn’t foster impatience but rather whetted their appetites for the hunt.

Trailing behind the group of huge trolls was Aragorn. He maintained his cover by remaining among the trees, so no one looking back would spot him. He was desperate to get ahead of the creatures, so he could find Legolas first but knew he couldn’t risk being seen. Even going deeper into the forest and riding as hard as he dared wasn’t worth the risk of possibly bypassing the elf. He continued to believe that his actions might well make the difference in Legolas’s survival. He would either be saved from the river or from the trolls.

There was one advantage to staying behind, though. By keeping the trolls in front of him, Aragorn could keep track of what they were up to. If Legolas was taken, he could launch a surprise rescue. That, however, was something he had to keep in the back of his mind. Right now, he needed to let things play out as they would and react accordingly. It was a strategy he and the elf had learned to employ.

In the early days of their friendship, they had found that settling on definite plans too early often interfered with what needed to be done. Forcing a plan to fit circumstances that may have changed in the meantime had more than once caused big problems.

The man had been forced to admit that Legolas had told him such was the case, but the stubborn ranger had to find out for himself.

It was a painful lesson but one well learned in the end.

Suddenly, Aragorn realized that he could no longer hear the river nor could he see it through the trees. While he had been moving straight ahead, working through his thoughts, the river had been subtly curving to the right.

Stopping abruptly, Aragorn cursed himself. He had been focusing so hard on keeping himself safe, he had let the trolls get too far away from him. Safety was essential if he was to help Legolas, but he had let that idea carry him away from the very thing he was trying to accomplish.

Refusing to let guilt get in the way, as well, Aragorn headed to the right and didn’t stop to get his bearings until he could again see the river through the gaps between the trees, as he had when he first began this trek.

He didn’t see the trolls, but he heard them. They were once again shouting. At first, Aragorn’s heart seized up, fearing the beasts were celebrating Legolas’s capture. But after paying closer attention to what he was hearing, it became clear that their shouts were made in anger and were aimed at the trolls on the other side of the river. It sounded like the two groups were directly across from each other.

Aragorn had, at first, been hoping Legolas was on this side of the river. After seeing the determination of Tack and his group, he was about to hope that his friend had ended up on the far side instead. As hard as that was for him to admit, he now knew that having trolls on both sides meant the elf’s chance for escape would be just as slim no matter where he ended up. Unfortunately, getting across the river wouldn’t be safe for him, either, and the ranger didn’t even know about the roving trolls - yet.

*~*~*~*

As Aragorn moved downriver, looking for him, Legolas was moving away from the river. He was finding it harder to concentrate on the task at hand, that of finding a safe place to hide.

It didn’t sound as if the trolls were actively looking for him. No shouts of discovery or sounds of pursuit came from their direction. Hoping that he was right in believing the creatures were simply moving toward the flowing body of water, Legolas spotted a large oak tree and made his way to it.

The elf pressed himself against the broad trunk, so that the tree was between him and the creatures that were coming much too close for comfort.

It was a tense few moments before the trolls passed by and continued on their way, totally oblivious to the fact a valued prize was only a few yards away.

As they had passed, Legolas had inched his way around the tree, careful to keep any part of him from ‘showing’. The tree was so much wider than he was, he thought that if he didn’t make any noise, he would be safe. That piece of logic proved to be a good one.

Because this group of roving trolls were constantly in someone else’s territory, they had to take extra precautions. One always went ahead to make sure the way ahead was clear, though if other trolls appeared, these creatures wouldn't have backed down from a good fight. And to make sure no enemy could catch them from behind, one always trailed the group.

So it was that when Legolas moved around to the back of the tree, he came face to face with a lone troll. For a few seconds neither being moved. The encounter was as much a shock to the troll as it was to Legolas.

The troll was huge, very strong, fit and eager for a conquest. The elf, though strong, was no match for his opponent muscle for muscle. He was injured and far from fit. However, he had two things the troll didn’t: incredible reflexes and a far superior brain.

Legolas’s foggy mind snapped to attention. Survival depended on reaction, and he didn’t have but a split second to decide what to do.

The branches of the oak he stood next to were too far from the ground for him to jump into while in less than perfect physical condition, even though adrenaline was giving his body a boost. Almost without thought, he also discarded the idea of running. Legolas knew if he did try to make a run for it, the cry of discovery would go out, and the other trolls would arrive in short order, and he had no doubt they would run him down before long.

The elf’s only other choice was to stand and fight, which offered less than favorable odds, but favorable odds seemed in short supply at the moment.

Legolas pulled out the long knife he still carried inside his tunic. He flipped it in the air to get it in position to throw. It was his only chance. Waiting to get close enough to use the knife in hand-to-hand combat would be all but suicidal.

Hoping the troll wasn’t fast enough to move out of the way, Legolas threw the knife as hard as he could straight at the base of the creature’s throat, the most vulnerable place facing him. Then he immediately dropped into a defensive crouch.

The elf was right in that the troll couldn’t get out of the way of the fast-flying long knife. Unfortunately, he was able to move just enough so that the blade embedded itself in his upper right shoulder.

Roaring in pain and rage, the troll reached up and yanked the knife out of his flesh, leaving behind a slit that began to bleed freely. The creature had no desire to turn the knife on this new enemy who had thrown it at him. He much preferred to tear the elf apart with his bare hands, so he threw the knife to the ground and started forward, totally disregarding his wound.

Legolas squared himself to meet the onslaught, though he remained low in his crouch, ready to move in any direction necessary.

When the troll was no more than three feet away, the elven prince took a gamble. He bent down even farther and dove between the creature’s legs.

Ignoring the huge beast once he was past him, Legolas rolled along the ground and headed straight for the fallen long knife. When he came to his feet, the knife was in his hand once more. He and raised it, ready to throw again, hoping this time to catch the troll before he turned around.

Again, fortune was not on the elf’s side. By the time Legolas had the blade in position to throw, the troll had turned and was coming back his way. ‘How can this creature be so fast?’ the elf wondered. ‘Maybe I am just too slow,’ he reasoned, as the ache in his own shoulder reminded him his body wasn’t quite up to normal standards.

Despite the fact trolls weren’t too bright, Legolas reconsidered the idea of throwing the knife. He realized that he couldn’t afford to be without the weapon. This time, if the blow wasn’t fatal, the troll would probably hang on to the knife to use against him, and the huge creature didn‘t need any more advantages.

Gathering himself, Legolas charged again. This time when it appeared he would dive between the troll’s legs, he turned to the side at the last second.

The troll saw the blond being coming at his legs again, and this time he bent down to snatch the elf by the neck but succeeded in grabbing only empty air.

Another roar of rage exploded out of the troll’s throat, followed quickly by a scream of pain.

Legolas wanted to aim high but had to roll low to avoid being hit by the troll’s swinging arm. The archer just reached out and cut into whatever part of the troll was the closest.

The creature’s hide was tough and covered with thick hair, but the finely honed blade, backed by the elf’s determined strength, sliced a large gash across the troll‘s thigh. It went in so deep, Legolas felt the metal scrape across bone.

The troll bent down and looked at the new wound and then screamed again, as blood gushed down his leg.

As he rolled up to his feet, Legolas heard loud shouting coming toward them. It didn’t take much thought to know the other trolls in the group had heard this one’s screams and were coming to see what was happening. So much for getting away unnoticed.

There were usually moments, very brief ones, when the outcome of a battle could be completely alerted. The future itself could be revised with the tiniest change in events.

Legolas believed that right now his future revolved around one of those moments. He had a slim chance to kill the beast and make his escape, and the elf knew he had to go for it - now!

Not willing to wait another second, Legolas clamped his teeth together and pushed himself off of the ground from the balls of his feet, launching himself toward the troll. With the long knife held tightly in both hands, the elf ignored his ailing shoulder and slammed into the troll, as he drove his blade into the creature’s back, severing his spine.

Jerking the knife free, as the beast crumpled, Legolas looked around to see if any of the other trolls were within sight. None were. It was time to leave.

Winded and aching all over, the elf began to run parallel to the river before turning back toward it a few moments later.

A sudden outburst of screams erupted from the forest behind him. Legolas knew the other trolls had found the one he had killed. Now they were in full rage and would be single-minded in their pursuit of whoever was responsible. They had no clue as to who had done the killing, but if they found him, they wouldn’t stop to ask questions.

Moving as quickly as he could, Legolas soon reached the edge of the forest. He looked out at the river and sighed. ‘Blessed Valar, there has to be a better choice than going in there a third time.’ The prospect was one the elf dreaded. He was too exhausted to fight the swift current, even without the rapids.

Then Legolas lifted his head and straightened his shoulders. ‘I am a wood-elf, not a fish,’ he declared to himself firmly.

Turning to his right, he saw that the nearest tree had branches low enough that they would offer him a chance to climb the tree with little difficulty, exhausted or not.

Legolas moved under the tree, jumped upward and grabbed the lowest branch with his good hand. His momentum carried him high enough for him to put his right foot on the top of the branch and pull himself up. He repeated this procedure, using his good hand more for balance than strength, and was soon a good twenty five feet above the ground.

His green and brown clothing allowed the elf to vanish from the sight of anyone who might look upward. Even his golden hair, though less than sparkling at the moment, resembled a small shaft of muted sunlight. The elf’s overall look and the tree’s varying shades of green leaves blended together for the perfect camouflage.

Feeling far safer than he had in a long time, Legolas finally gave himself permission to relax, extremely grateful that he had sustained no new injuries in the fight.

Well hidden he may be, but he still directed his keen hearing to keep track of the approaching trolls.

Unable to track, hear or see anyone in the forest that could have killed one of their own, the rovers used the only other sense they had - their noses.

There had been no breeze deep in the forest, but here near the river, it was a different story. Had there been a straight-line wind, the scent of the elf would have been carried high above even the tall trolls. However, this wind was swirling high and low in all directions. So it was that the elf’s scent reached the sensitive noses of the searching trolls, and they headed straight for the source.

TBC

Chapter Thirty Three

Frustrated by the thickness of the trees around him, Aragorn began to feel that he was being cowardly by hiding among them. He understood the need for caution, but at the same time, he decided he would have to be bolder, if he was going to get anything accomplished. So, knowing what he had to do, the man turned and moved toward the river.

Breaking free of the forest and coming out onto the rich, red soil of the riverbank, Aragorn looked upstream. Because of the bend he had just come around, he wasn’t able to see much, but he couldn’t shake the sudden feeling that there was something back there that needed his attention. Of course, Legolas came to mind immediately. The elf was in trouble. Aragorn was sure of it.

The riverbed was hidden from sight due to the amount of churning silt that the upstream current had sent this way, so the ranger felt a little uneasy about trying to cross here. There was no telling what pitfalls lay in wait for anyone hoping to make their way through the water blindly.

Aragorn deemed that it wasn’t worth the risk of reaching the middle of the river and finding himself involved in a mishap that could prove deadly. Sturdy though horses are, their legs are vulnerable. A slip on a shifting rock or a wrong step into a hole, and Aragorn knew he and his horse could go down. Since horses cannot walk on three legs the way dogs can, the ranger didn’t want to think of what would transpire if his horse broke a leg. It certainly wouldn’t help the situation either, if he was the one that ended up with one.

Looking downstream, Aragorn saw that the river broadened out considerably from the width it had been to this point. Therefore, with the same amount of water covering a larger space, the current had settled into something resembling gentle.

Squinting his eyes, he could barely make out the trolls that had moved farther ahead of him. They were much farther along than he had expected them to be, though he could see now that they were moving faster than before. ‘You won’t find us down there,’ he thought with a grim laugh. “Stupid creatures,” he mumbled aloud.

The ranger believed the trolls far enough away that even if he was spotted, and they came after him, they wouldn’t be able to reach him before he got away. That was certainly his logic anyway.

Aragorn made his way swiftly along the riverbank. The speed at which he was traveling was bringing him closer to Tack’s group, but they had their attention aimed farther in front of them and with luck, wouldn’t notice him moving behind them.

When the ranger finally reached the widest part of the river, he was pleased to see that the current had slowed as much as he had at first hoped. The silt was settling with the slower movement. The water was still too murky for him to be able to determine its true depth, but he couldn‘t wait any longer.

With a deep sigh and a few rubs on his horse’s muscular neck, accompanied by words of encouragement, Aragorn urged the stallion into the river. He only smiled when he heard Legolas’s horse, who had been faithfully following this whole time, splash in behind him.

The trio moved cautiously one step at a time. They were half way across when it happened.

One of the trolls in Tack’s group turned around and looked behind him. There was no particular reason he had done it. He wasn't thinking that someone was behind the group. It was just dumb luck.

The troll stared for a moment and then began yelling at Tack and waving his arms in the air for attention. The members of the group around him became excited, as they saw what had attracted his interest.

The leader ignored the shouts, still single-mindedly focusing ahead, where he believed his prey was located. The yells became louder and more insistent, as more shouts were soon joined by others.

Angry and ready to lay into somebody for the distraction, Tack stomped back until he was standing in the middle of the group. “What’re you toads yelling for?”

“Look!” the first troll to spot Aragorn said. “Ain’t that one of them captives we’re chasin’?”

It was a good thing for him that Tack didn’t consider his question an insult. It could have been looked upon as a slap in the leader’s face since he had been heading them in the opposite direction.

Also not recognizing how his words could have been taken, the troll instead felt sure that even if who he saw wasn’t one of the captives, Tack would be pleased to have someone in his clutches. It always paid to be on the leader’s good side.

Tack hesitated for just a moment, straining to see who exactly it was that had been pointed out to him. He really wanted the two who had gotten away from them before. Their escape was what he considered an insult. However, he was smart enough to know that the others in the group wouldn’t stand for letting someone they could see get away in order to go after two others they had no idea the location of. Such a decision could bring about a challenge to his leadership.

Running through the back end of the group, Tack started toward the one human and two horses in the river. As he got closer, his eyes widened in shock, and he almost came to a complete stop. It was one of the former captives. That spurred him on even faster.

The trolls headed into the river, their sturdy, long legs making easy work of the current. They were hoping to catch the human before he made it across and could disappear into the forest. That would make him more difficult to catch but not impossible. Tack gave no notice to the fact that he was about to enter Sump’s side of the river.

Sump, however, did notice. He had been leading his group down the riverbank on his own side of the river, keeping Tack’s group in sight. Then he, in the lead, spotted Aragorn and realized why Tack was coming across into his territory.

All of the creatures in Sump’s group began shouting, as they started running toward the rider and the riderless horse with him.

Aragorn saw Tack’s trolls enter the river and make their way toward him. It seemed like only a few seconds later that he heard Sump’s trolls moving toward him along the riverbank. His heart almost seized up, because it didn’t take a genius to know he was about to be the rope in a tug-of-war contest.

Disregarding the dangers that may be lurking in the murky current, Aragorn urged his horse into as quick a pace as the animal could manage in the water. If luck was with him, he could gain the shore and make it into the trees before either group reached him. It would be his only chance.

He gained the trees and began to run. He could feel his horse’s muscles tense up and figured he, and surely Legolas’s horse as well, remembered the trolls and were just as anxious as the human to get away from them.

The elven horses were used to traveling swiftly in forests, so they were efficiently able to navigate the trees, the exposed roots and the various ups and downs of the terrain.

Maybe, Aragorn thought, the two groups behind him would come together and be so intent on fighting each other that they would forget about him entirely. Unfortunately, it didn’t happen that way.

The two groups of trolls did come together, shouting angry insults and threats at the other. However, instead of fighting, they moved side by side through the trees, separated by only a few yards. Despite their animosity toward each other, Aragorn remained the object of their attention. Wanting to get there first, they were driven to an even more frenzied pace.

When the man realized that the trolls, all of them, were still after him and not each other, he just shook his head. ‘What does it take to get rid of those disgusting creatures?’ he asked himself. Regrettably, the answer was just to keep going until he left troll country far behind, which of course, he couldn’t yet do. That would have been easy, but his top priority at the moment was to find Legolas.

*~*~*~*

Right then, Legolas was listening as the roving trolls were approaching his position. He knew he wasn’t going to get any help from the oak he sat in due to the silence of the forest around him.

Not realizing the creatures were following his scent, the elf believed he was safe enough that they would simply pass him by. Even if they had found the troll he had killed, they shouldn’t be able to find his hiding place high in the tree.

As the trolls came into view through the leaves, Legolas closed his eyes and whispered, “Please keep going.”

When he opened his eyes, the trolls were heading straight for him. ‘How?’ he wanted to know. How could these dumb creatures track an elf, especially one hiding in a tree? It made no sense to him and served to shatter his feeling of security.

Jus then, a gust of wind hit Legolas in the face, rustling the leaves around him. That was the answer! Most trolls’ senses weren’t any more keen than a human’s, however, their sense of smell was very sharp.

The trolls milled around below the elf. They had narrowed the area he was in, but even they weren’t able to pinpoint his exact location, since it wasn’t a ground trail they had been following.

“He’s here somewhere,” one of the trolls said.

“Find him,” another, larger troll, commanded. This one had to be the leader. His anger only made him look fiercer that just being a troll already made him look.

Legolas watched as the creatures searched all around the nearby trees, expecting that their quarry was hiding among them. They punctuated their visual exploration with constant sniffing.

The problem for them was that Legolas’s scent was no longer sweeping through the forest in a relatively straight line from where he was to where they had been. They had found the place of origin, but the elf’s scent was now swirling all around them in the shifting wind, confusing them and causing great frustration.

These trolls didn’t know they chased an elf. They weren’t even familiar with that race and had no way of knowing that some, like the one they sought, had an affinity for trees. Therefore, it didn’t occur to them to search above their heads, just as Hatch‘s group had failed to do when Legolas and Aragorn had first escaped their camp.

One troll did look up, but Legolas was too well concealed and his clothes blended too well with the colors within the canopy of the tree for him to be spotted. All the creature saw was various shades of green and gold, shifting in the windy tree top. He finally gave up and began searching the ground once again.

To Legolas’s way of thinking, this close encounter was going to end in one of two ways. Either he was eventually going to get caught, or the trolls were eventually going to leave. Fearing the first and hoping for the latter, the elf didn’t move. He simply stared down at the trolls that went in and out of his sight.

As he watched, the elf noted that the shafts of sunlight were coming in at a lower angle. He was almost shocked when he realized that the sun had dropped into the west without him even noticing. Of course, his attention had been on other matters. He knew it would be several hours before all light was gone, but he had a feeling that darkness would deter these trolls.

Legolas thought back to all the times he had spent hiding in trees while on patrol in Mirkwood. He had spent many an hour waiting out orcs, so they would pass by, and he and his fellow warriors could ambush them from behind. Even as far back as novice training, he had learned the kind of patience that such endeavors required. That lesson served him well now.

The archer shook his head. He needed to keep his mind on what was happening now, not focusing on long ago memories.

Shouts from downriver reached the keen ears of the elf. The wind had died down quite a bit, so Legolas was able to hear the noise clearly, but he didn’t like what he was hearing. The shouts were obviously those of trolls. Had Tack’s group found a way across the river? Or was it yet another group of the horrid creatures? How many groups were there? He knew it had to be more than just one that had split up. He had visions of all the trolls showing up at the bottom of his tree and looking up. The elf shivered.

With a sinking heart, the elf slumped against the tree trunk. The more trolls there were looking for him, the higher the chances became that he would be found, high in a tree or not.

Looking down, Legolas could tell the trolls that had been searching for him had not heard the noise - so far. However, it wouldn’t be long before they did.

Suddenly a new sound made its way upward to find the Legolas. It was the sound of a horse, no two horses. They were running and heading his way. For a second his heart soared, thinking that his and Aragorn’s horses were on their way to him. He could envision himself jumping down on one of them and making his escape.

Then the thought slammed into his mind that they would run right into the trolls, who wouldn’t hesitate to kill them and eat them there and then. The idea horrified the elf.
There was no way he could just sit up there, safe high above the ground, and let the horses become the victims of these creatures. He had to find a way to save them and himself.

Before he could do more than stand up and turn toward the approaching stallions, he caught a glimpse of a rider on one of them.

Estel! No!

The man was riding directly toward the trolls near the tree Legolas was in.

These creatures had now heard the shouts of Tack’s and Sump’s groups moving fast toward them.

Legolas had no choice but to shout a warning to his friend, causing the trolls below him to look upward. This time, they didn’t miss seeing the elf, who was moving along the branch in a frantic effort to turn Aragorn aside from the doom Legolas saw coming.

TBC

Chapter Thirty Four

Aragorn had been keeping an occasional eye on what lay ahead of him, as he rode through the forest. He only had to keep clear of low-lying braches that could knock him from his stallion’s back. To counter any possible mishap, he rode low over the neck of the horse, who would take care of avoiding any obstacles or dips on the ground. Taking note of the branches that were in his path with each glance forward, Aragorn was much more concerned with what lay behind him.

The trolls didn’t seem to be gaining any ground on him, but they weren’t losing any, either. That last thought surprised Aragorn. Then he remembered that the trolls, as big as they were, called these surrounding forests home and thus were capable of moving through them fairly quickly - too quickly for his liking.

The shouts of pursuit, almost sounding like a frenzy, continued unabated. It was all too clear what the creatures had in mind if they caught up with their prey, not that the ranger ever had any delusions about that.

Suddenly, Aragorn sat upright, almost getting smacked square across the forehead. He managed to duck just in time, feeling the leaves grab at his hair, as he went under the sturdy branch. He didn’t spare the time to think about the headache that near miss would have caused.

What had startled him was the fact that he was sure he had heard his name, his elven name, coming to him through the trees. The man dismissed the idea that someone in this forest could be calling out the name Estel. Then it struck him that it had to be Legolas! It couldn't be anyone else. The man had to smile, because that meant the elf was not only alive but nearby, as well.

Hard on the heels of the joy that had immediately flooded his heart, Aragorn realized there had been a desperate tone in the call. Legolas was not yelling out a happy greeting. It was a warning! Did the elf see the trolls behind him and was trying to make the ranger aware of them? Or was there something Legolas knew that he did not? Either one could easily be true.

It only took a few more long strides of his horse before Aragorn saw exactly what the warning had been for. He saw a number of trolls seemingly milling about ahead of him. Oddly enough, they didn’t appear to have seen him yet. Legolas must be in a tree, and perhaps the trolls thought he was just yelling at them.

The elf, though cautious when caution was required, did tend to become defiant at times. Of course, these creatures wouldn’t know that. Who were these trolls anyway? Aragorn wondered with a puzzled frown on his face.

Even though he only had a brief glimpse of them, he could still tell that they looked different from all the others he and Legolas had seen so far. He didn’t have time to pin down the details, but he knew there was something not quite the same as those of the two groups behind him.

The ranger had only a few seconds to decide what he was going to do. Legolas was evidently safe in the tree, for the moment at any rate, but if the trolls were around him, it was doubtful his safety was going to last long.

The beasts behind him were coming fast, but they were still out of sight. Therefore, it seemed these creatures in front of him were the immediate problem that Aragorn was going to have to deal with.

He would lead the trolls away from Legolas, giving the elf time to escape. The decision was easy, made more from instinct than careful consideration. Even if he had given it more deliberation, he would have come to the same conclusion. Aragorn would do whatever he could to save his friend.

Meanwhile, being on horseback gave Aragorn the advantage. If all went well, he could send Legolas’s horse back to get him. Once they were both mounted, freedom couldn’t be far behind.

It sounded like a good plan. However, the ranger knew very well that plans, no matter how well thought out, often went awry. Look what had happened when all he and Legolas had wanted to do originally was cross troll territory and reach Rivendell.

Aragorn thought back to the message they had received from his father, Lord Elrond, asking for their help. Bandits had been spotted around several of the human villages nearest to the elven haven. Elrond had wanted Aragorn and Legolas to help the twins and other Rivendell warriors to find their hideout and clean it out.

“I’m sorry, ada. We will be quite late. I trust you all can handle the bandits without us.” That would have been humorous enough to bring a laugh, if things hadn’t gotten so serious for the two friends.

In truth, he had no doubt that the Rivendell elves could indeed handle the bandits or whatever else came their way. Why then had Lord Elrond requested their presence? He would have to ask when he and Legolas finally reached Rivendell, something he was fiercely determined to do.

These thoughts were quickly banished as Aragorn continued to head straight toward the new group of trolls. It broke his heart to hear Legolas shouting for him to go back, thinking the ranger was unknowingly riding into danger. He tried to shout back that he saw the trolls in front of him and would lead them away, but the creatures had now seen him and were yelling far louder than he ever could. Even with Legolas’s keen hearing, he didn’t think the elf would hear him. All he could do now was ride away and hope all the trolls would follow him.

As Aragorn continued his mad dash away from the trolls around Legolas, this time heading in a new direction, he whispered, “Stay safe, Legolas, until I can find you again.”

*~*~*~*

Legolas was shouting as loudly as he could for Aragorn to turn back. He hadn’t yet seen the trolls behind the man, only those around the tree he was in, but they were enough.

His heart sank when he saw that the trolls below him had now seen the ranger coming and were starting to shout at him.

A quick wave of Aragorn’s hand in his direction told the elf that his friend knew he was there. ‘He is leading them away from me.’ Legolas was stunned, though he quickly realized that such a move by the man shouldn’t really be a surprise.

If only the trolls around him weren’t so close, he could call his horse to him, then drop down onto the stallion’s back and follow Aragorn away. But the trolls were between him and the animal. He would never deliberately turn the horse into the horrid creatures, though he knew the faithful stallion would come if called, trolls or no trolls.

It was with mixed feelings that Legolas watched Aragorn and the two horses move deeper into the forest. They would most likely be safe, but they were also his only hope of freedom. There was no contest as to which was more important, but it was still a despairing feeling watching them disappear from sight.

Just as Legolas was beginning to fear might happen, the trolls below his tree split up. Most went after the man and the horses, but a few remained. They had one quarry treed, and they were not going to let him get away, no matter how many other potential prey ran past them.

It was then that Legolas saw the trolls that had been chasing Aragorn come into view. They hadn’t seen the man turn away into a new direction, but they did see the rover trolls heading off, so they began to follow them.

Neither Tack nor Sump paid any attention to the trolls that stayed behind. There was a full-blown chase going on, and they each intended on being the ultimate winner.

Legolas stood on the oak branch and was still staring long after the howling horde of creatures had gone so far into the forest that even he could no longer hear them.

Legolas sighed. “Do not come back for me, Estel,” the elf whispered. It was a futile hope, and he knew it. The ranger would no more leave him behind than he would leave the ranger. Legolas just hoped his friend wouldn’t take too many risks trying to come back and rescue him.

When Legolas finally drew his attention away from Aragorn, he looked down and saw that four trolls had stayed behind. The elf shook his head. At this point, even one would probably be too much for him. He sat down on the branch, not sure what to do next. The troll he had killed, the flight after it and the climb up the tree had taken the last of his strength.

The four trolls, seeing that the only thing left for them was the creature in the tree, began to hit the tree with their shoulders.

Their efforts sent vibrations upward toward the elf. He was not worried that they could topple the old oak, who was far too sturdy for anything short of an ax. However, Legolas did feel bad that the tree had to endure the vicious blows.

One of the trolls then tried to climb the tree. Each branch he grabbed was unable to bear his great weight. They were cruelly ripped loose from the trunk and then thrown down to the ground by the frustrated beast.

Soon there were no branches left for even the tallest of the trolls to grab onto.

Legolas stared at the gaping holes and twisted splinters that dotted the tree’s lower trunk. The light beige color stood out in stark contrast to the much darker bark. They were comparable to wounds in the flesh of an elf or mortal, and it was upsetting for the wood-elf to see.

“I am sorry, my friend,” Legolas lamented, “that I have brought these brutes to cause you pain.” He had no idea whether the tree heard him, or in its current unresponsive condition, if it could even feel what had just been done to it, but his guilt made him feel the need to apologize nonetheless.

Two of the other trolls began to grab the branches from the ground and throw them up into the tree, hoping to dislodge the being that was looking down on them.

It didn’t take more than a few times of either being hit by a branch falling back down or having to jump out of the way, for the fourth creature to realize that what the others were doing was not getting the job done.

“Stop throwin’ them stupid branches’,” the fourth troll said in exasperation. “You ain’t gittin’ close to him. Yer just gonna hurt one of us.”

“Well, you was tryin’ to climb up there,” one of the others pointed out. “That weren’t too smart, neither.”

The object of his ridicule backhanded him across the face. “Shut up!” he bellowed.

Legolas couldn’t help but be amused by the utter idiocy of these creatures. Since they couldn’t reach him, and he had no intention of going anywhere anytime soon, he hoped they would get so frustrated that they would give up and take off after the other trolls.

He grimaced, since he realized he was wishing that more trolls would chase Aragorn, but there were so many already on the ranger’s trail, that four more would hardly tip the balance of power in any way. Besides, if he could get free, he felt sure he would be able to help. Just how that might happen, he had no idea, but he tried to hang onto hope That thought made him smile. Hope.

“Stay safe, Estel, until I can find you again.”

TBC

Chapter Thirty Five

As Legolas stared down at the trolls at the foot of his tree, his vision began to get hazy. He blinked several times and took a chance on shaking his head, hoping that would not make the situation any worse. Finally his vision cleared up and was sharp again.

It was p lain that all the things he had been through in the last few days were catching up with him. Now, it seemed, his exhaustion was stealing the last of his strength away.

The elf was not dizzy, but he feared that he was still in danger of passing out. If such a thing happened in any other forest, he was confident that whatever tree he was in would keep him from falling out of it. Here, among these unresponsive trees, that was not a sure thing or even a probable thing. If he fell, he would die, either from the fall itself or from the trolls, who would delight in tearing him apart. If given the choice, he would much prefer to be dead by the time the trolls got their hands on him.

Sitting down sideways on the branch, Legolas firmly wrapped his arms around the trunk for support. Closing his eyes, he took several deep breaths. His heart was pounding so hard that both his head and his injured shoulder were throbbing in unison with his pulse. He thanked the Valar that this infuriating failure of his body hadn’t happened before Aragorn had showed up.

No sooner did his friend come to mind, than the trolls began to hit the tree again. Two of them were slamming their shoulders into the trunk, once more causing vibrations to work their way up to where Legolas sat. It didn’t take long for the elf to realize that now was the time to move.

The stubborn creatures below were not going to give up no matter how long it tool. They were relentless, and Legolas’s heart sank when he realized that they would keep at it until they somehow managed to bring the tree down. He could not allow that to happen. Not only would the tree be destroyed, but he would lose any chance he might have of escaping.

With a strength of will born of millennia of elven stubbornness, Legolas knew he had to reach deep inside himself to do what he was planning. Standing up again, the elf looked around him at the nearby trees. There was no way he could jump to another one without the trolls seeing him, but he knew that if he kept moving, they would not be able to catch him as long as he was able to keep moving.

There was just one problem with his logic. The nearest tree was not close enough to make a very safe leap, in fact it would be a very dangerous one. An old adage came to him. Desperate times called for desperate measures. How many times had his training masters told the future warriors that. It was hardly the first time that phrase had come to him, but it had never been more appropriate than it was right now.

Disregarding the trolls’ yelling and tree slamming, Legolas moved as far to the end of the branch he was on as he could safely reach. He eyed the nearest tree. He had made leaps that far before, but he had always been in top shape when he had done it.

He remembered another thing he had been told while in training. Desperation lends a kind of strength that an individual might not ordinarily possess. It was that strength that the elf would have to tap into right now.

Making one last survey of the distance he was going to have to cover to successfully reach the safety of the other tree, Legolas moved back along the branch, turned and ran has fast as he could until he felt the next step would no longer support his weight. Leaving the outcome in the hands of the Valar, he leapt into the air toward the neighboring tree.

*~*~*~*

Nothing had changed for Aragorn. He was still riding through the forest as fast as he dared, knowing that the best he was able to do was stay the same distance ahead of the pursuing trolls. They may not have been getting any closer, which was a good thing, but their shouts were getting much more intense. Frustration at not being able to catch him was driving the creatures to a frenzy.

“Go after each other,” the man grumbled aloud. “Leave me alone.” He was in no short of supply of frustration either.

The trolls had not stopped or even slowed their pursuit in order to battle each other for the prize they were hoping he would be. Now, since they weren’t able to get their hands on him, maybe each group would take their aggravation out on the other group. So far it wasn’t happening.

Tack and Sump were still in the lead, trying to outrun the other. The rovers who had left Legolas and started after the human weren’t far behind.

Aragorn had it in mind to swing round in a circle so wide that the trolls wouldn’t figure out what he was doing. Then he could return to Legolas, and the two could leave troll country far behind.

The trolls were familiar with this forest, and Sump, who lived on this side of the river, soon realized what the man was doing. He hadn’t figured out the details, but he knew, after a while, that the one they chased was heading back toward the river. Not entirely stupid, Sump suddenly veered off to the right, planning on intercepting the rider as he passed by.

Tack stopped dead in his tracks, not sure if Sump’s actions were the result of something he had seen or if it was a trick to get rid of him and his group, so he could have the prey all to himself.

“What you stoppin’ for?” one of his group asked.

“Sump’s headed that way,” Tack pointed out. “Why’s he goin’ that way?”

The trolls in his group had all stopped and the ones who heard his question, just shrugged.

Tack narrowed his eyes. “He wouldn’t just quit. He must know somethin’.”

It was then that Tack made the decision that if Sump was headed in a new direction, he better head that way, too. As long as he kept Sump in his sights, the other troll leader couldn’t slip away and go after former captive without him. So Tack turned his group to the right, and they began running after the other trolls.

By this time, the rovers had almost caught up with them. They increased their pace, but the rovers were smaller and faster. They passed Tack and his group up, driving the larger trolls into a desperate drive to get back in the chase and overtake all of them, Sump included.

When Aragorn saw and heard the trolls coming at him from the right rather than from behind, he realized that they had figured out what he was up to and were trying to cut him off. They were also spreading out to try and surround him. They couldn’t get in front of him, but they could trap him against the river. It wasn’t taking them very long toward accomplishing that.

Quickly looking around him, the man saw a gap of about twenty feet where an opening lay before him. Aragorn wasted no time in making straight for it.

He shop through the gap, and then he checked behind him, the opening had closed, and the trolls were once again running after him. That was too close a call. He would have to be more observant. It was getting harder to do, since the sun had now gone down behind the trees. There was still plenty of light, but it wouldn’t last long. In this forest, gloom would descend soon. Giving the trolls the slip might be easier now, but finding Legolas would be harder.

*~*~*~*

Legolas felt the fear and exhilaration he always experienced whenever he made a leap that he wasn’t convinced he could make. It never mattered whether it was from tree to tree, rock to rock, ledge to ledge or some combination. He was by no means a daredevil, at least, he hadn’t been one for a very long time, but he couldn’t deny that the thrill was still there.

The stakes now, however, were higher than just the risk of missing the next branch and possibly falling. That would have resulted in humiliation and endless teasing from his friends. A failure this time would end in death.

Legolas had given the leap every ounce of strength he possessed. Once he left the tree he was jumping from, he no longer had any control over whether he would make it or not. His concentration now was to make sure he caught the branch he was aiming for.

The two trolls who were slamming into the tree, and the one close by watching them didn’t see the elf make his leap. The fourth one, however, was far enough away that he easily caught sight of the elf sailing overhead. He had never seen such a thing before, so at first, he just stood and stared, too surprised to alert his companions that their prize was on the move.

As he neared the tree, Legolas couldn’t be sure that the outer edge of the branch he planned to land on would hold him, so he concentrated on the one above his head. He would have to grab it and hold on, literally for dear life. He knew that as long as he didn’t lose his grip, the branch could bend, and he would still be safe until he gained his balance.

He had lost count of the number of times he was forced to ignore his injured shoulder in order to get a necessary task accomplished. Now was no exception, it seemed, so he reached out with both hands. As soon as he felt his hand hit the wood, his fingers closed around it. The branch did bend, but Legolas was able to get his feet firmly onto the lower branch.

Once he was sure his position was secure, the elf made his way to the trunk. He took only a moment to catch his breath, and then he made his way around to the other side to see how close the next tree was to this one.

The troll who had seen him jump, started yelling. “He’s jumped to another tree!”

The other three creatures stopped and looked at him. They saw how far the nearest tree was and scoffed at the idea that anyone would even attempt such a thing. “Nobody can jump that far.”

“I don’t care if he can or not, he did. I seen him do it.”

The troll didn’t wait to see if the others believed him or not. He knew the being they sought was gone, and there was no longer any reason to remain here. “Stay then. I’m goin’ after him, and when I catch him, he’ll be all mine.”

The others looked at each other. Then they looked up into the tree. It quickly became apparent that there was no one there. One of them shrugged and began to follow the troll now running after the fleeing prey. His two companions soon followed.

The next jump Legolas was forced to make was not as far. The one after that was even shorter. Before long the elf was moving through trees so close together, their branches were intermingled with each other. It was almost like traveling through the trees at home, ‘a highway of wood’ one of his masters called it.

Pushing pain and exhaustion out of his mind, Legolas began moving the same way he had last seen Aragorn heading. If the ranger hadn’t changed direction, he could catch up to his friend.

Legolas had no way of knowing that Aragorn was heading straight back toward him, having made a slight detour to get past the trolls’ attempt to surround him.

Legolas had outdistanced the trolls after him so far, since he could no longer hear them yelling. There were only four of them, but that was still four less than he and Aragorn might have to deal with, if things went ill.

The archer head a noise up ahead of him and stopped to listen, hoping to decide exactly what it was he was hearing and what it might mean for him.

“Estel,” the elf said, as he saw the ranger coming his way.

As luck would have it, the man was not only headed his way, but if he didn’t veer off, he would pass under him just three trees over. The elf wasted no time in making his way to that tree and working his way down to the lowest branch.

By the time he was in position, Aragorn was right under him. He had time to do only one thing. He jumped.

Aragorn had just looked behind him to confirm what his ears had already told him about the progress of the trolls. He was now setting his sight ahead, when he felt a jolt behind him. Even though he was startled, the ragner reacted swiftly. He raised his left arm, hoping to knock off whatever was attacking him.

Before he could do more that raise his arm half way up, he heard a voice in his ear. “Estel, it is me. Keep going.”

The man almost melted from shock, though it was that very shock that kept his body stiff enough to keep him from falling from his horse, not that the elf would have let that happen.

“Legolas? It it really you?” It was all he could think of to say.

“Aye, it is me.” The elf’s hand on his shoulder was as reassuring as his words had been an instant before.

Grinning, the ranger said, “You really know how to make an entrance, mellon nin.”

Listening to the horde of creaturels following them, Legolas couldn’t resist saying, “I see you have not lost your touch for attracting a crowd of unpleasant characters out for your blood.”

“A well-honed talent, I’m told,” the ranger replied dryly.

“I think we should turn off to the left. The four trolls who stayed to make a meal of me are up ahead. I would rather not meet up with them again.”

Aragorn eased his horse into a gentle angle rather than a sharp turn. He tuned his head and spoke over his shoulder. “They are all spread out behind us.” After a slight pause, he remarked, “You realize we’re headed back toward the river.”

Aragorn felt the slight movement of Legolas’s body against his back, as the archer nodded.

“Do you think we can make it to the riverbank and outrun them there?”

“I don’t think so,” Aragorn replied in a flat and decisive tone, leaving no question that he might have doubts about what he had just said.

“That is not what I wanted to hear,” the elf said, though it was exactly what he expected to hear.

He wasn’t surprised to hear trolls on both sides of them. Though they weren’t quite even with the two riders, it was easy to tell that going in either direction was going to result in a confrontation.

“Do you still have my knife?” Legolas asked.

“Thank the Valar. I do have that. Do you still have the other one?”

“Yes, so we won’t have to face them unarmed.” He wouldn’t have wanted to face them even if he’d had six arms and each had a weapon at the end of it.

Just then something very large hit them from the side and knocked Aragorn’s stallion completely off his feet, sending him and both his riders flying toward the ground.

TBC

Chapter Thirty Six

The suddenness of being thrown through the air was a shock, to say the least. Knowing what was coming, Legolas’s reflex action was to bring his right hand down across his body to take most of the brunt, saving both his bad shoulder and his head from impacting the hard ground full force. The pain that shot through his wrist was immediate and brought to mind one thought: it couldn’t be broken, because he had to be able to use his knife.

Aragorn was a bit luckier. He didn’t sustain any new injury. The only one he already had was his bad foot, and that hit the ground after the rest of him, saving it from further damage but not from further pain.

This sudden assault was far from the first time it had happened to either the elf or the ranger. Both had experienced this kind of attack more often than they cared to think about, and it was that experience that allowed them both to recover almost instantly, mentally at any rate. Yet no amount of experience could temper the bone jarring impact from causing hurts that would turn into deep bruises and soreness, if they survived long enough for either to develop.

Legolas was on his feet with knife drawn much quicker than anyone would have believed, considering his pre-existing injuries and depleted strength.

The ranger was only a few seconds behind the elf in gaining his feet and drawing the twin to Legolas’s knife. It was obvious that now was not the time to worry about the pain that shot up his leg from the protest of his already aching foot. As long as it held his weight, he would just have to ignore it.

Legolas was just as determined to ignore his own ailments. Once he gripped his knife, he decided his wrist was not broken, so whatever pain he had would be pushed aside. Adrenalin was a great pain killer.

Their attention was quickly drawn to Aragorn’s horse, who was just now making it to his feet. The stallion shook his head, and snorted. He was not pleased at what had just happened. It was a source of pride that he had never before let his master fall. The fact he was not at fault for doing so now was not in his thinking. Rearing up and kicking out with his forelegs, the horse displayed his anger.

It seemed that anger was also a great pain killer, because it wasn’t until the horse tried to take a step that he, as well as Aragorn and Legolas, noticed the large gash in his right shoulder, causing him to limp.

Upset and fearing that more damage might be done, Aragorn sent the horse away from further danger with a few encouraging words. The stallion did not want to go, but the man made sure the animal understood it was for his own good. Reluctantly, the horse moved off, unable to move as fast as his master would have wished.

Legolas sent his own horse off, as well. Not only did he and the ranger not want them to be killed, but they would also be needed if he and Aragorn survived the coming battle, though it was apparent that both friends would have to ride Legolas’s mount.

There were no trolls standing nearby, which was a surprise to Legolas and Aragorn. They looked at each other with mirrored frowns on each face. What else around here could have knocked a full grown horse over?

Then they saw it. A very large tree branch lay a few feet away in the growing shadows of twilight. It appeared as though a troll had torn it loose and launched it through the air, aiming right where it had landed, hard against the chestnut stallion’s shoulder.

Aragorn looked toward the trolls, who were getting very close now, and saw one rubbing his hands together and laughing. He knew that was the one who had injured his horse and ended his and Legolas’s chances at escape. That troll was going to pay, even if it wasn’t done until Aragorn drew his last breath.

Even if they weren’t about to be surrounded, the two friends knew it was no use trying to run away. There was nothing they could do but use the last of their endurance to face the ugly creatures head on. The odds were so far from being on their side, it was laughable, but a stand would have to be made, right here, right now.

With their backs toward the river, Legolas and Aragorn stood shoulder to shoulder, knives held out in front of them, and watched as the trolls advanced.

Tack and Sump were the first to reach the small clearing where the two companions were holding their ground. The two troll leaders were elbowing each other and trying to trip the other up to get ahead, but neither was doing enough damage to gain an advantage.

Behind them the members of their groups were doing pretty much the same, while the rovers were following suit, contending with both groups. Nobody went down, and nobody was deterred.

“Idiots,” Aragorn remarked with disgust in his voice.

“Dangerous idiots,” Legolas countered.

It would have been amusing to watch, if the trolls hadn’t also been advancing while all this maneuvering and one-upmanship was going on.

Aragorn sighed heavily, as he realized that instead of fighting, the creatures were trying to beat each other to the prey - him and Legolas. ‘Well,” he thought, ‘this prey is going to fight back.’

How they defended themselves, when withdrawal wasn’t an option, usually depended on who and how many the enemy was, where they were, if they had any help, what condition they were in and the weather conditions, including the time of day.

Those factors were pretty obvious, in this case. The enemy was huge and numerous, they were in a forest, they were alone, they weren’t in the best condition, and while the weather was nice, it was getting dark fast.

Aragorn glanced at Legolas, and knew his friend was taking note of those very things. After he saw that the elf had sized up the situation, the man said, “Not very good odds, are they?”

“We have had worse,” the blond archer replied wryly.

“We have?” Aragorn figured that may have been true, but he couldn't come up with a single one of those times, at the moment.

There was just enough time for the two friends to look hard into each others’ eyes and transmit a lifetime of emotions. Neither seriously expected to survive the forthcoming struggle, though they never entered a battle without hoping to do so.

“Lord Elrond would not be pleased that we ended up like this,” Aragorn said. “He always said we took too many chances with our lives.”

“I would drink a tub full of his foul tea, if only we could live long enough to get to it.” That was saying a lot, considering how much Legolas hated that tea.

They turned their full attention back to the oncoming trolls. Simply waiting to be set upon would put them at a disadvantage and wasn’t in their mindset. So, with a quick nod, given simultaneously, Legolas and Aragorn attacked.

Their knives were handled with precision, as the elf and the ranger spun and slashed, ducked and wove their way through the leading line of trolls, inflicting wounds that ranged from minor to deadly. The main thing was to keep moving, no matter what.

The surprise attack was working, but the two companions were too battle-savvy to think that this advantageous situation would last. It wouldn’t be long before the creatures would recover and aim their wrath at their prey.

Despite the initial bloodshed, the trolls were far from the point of wanting the two beings dead. Experience had taught them that they couldn’t be defeated by such inferior creatures, so they thought that anything done to them would be negligible. That overconfidence was a weakness and would be exploited by the pair.

After the initial advance by Legolas and Aragorn, two trolls lay dead, one with a knife wound in his chest, courtesy of Legolas, while the other had gone down when Aragorn sliced through the large tendons at the back of his ankles and then jumped forward to slit his throat when he hit the ground.

Most of the trolls carried no weapons. Three of them held tree branches swung like bludgeons, while several others had actual clubs. It was hard to tell those from the trolls’ long arms and fists. The result of being hit by either was equally bad.

Legolas found himself ducking from one troll’s arm and jumping over the leg of another, who had a long gash in his thigh from Aragorn’s deft stroke. The elf tried to inflict more damage, but the act of getting out of the way took him too far from the beast to make an effective strike.

A moment later, Aragorn felt himself being lifted up by two very large, very hairy arms that gripped him like a vice. The pressure that was being exerted began to crush the man’s chest, forcing air from his lungs. He tried to yell to Legolas, but no words were forthcoming. A painful wheeze was all he could manage.

As he spun around to the back of a troll, Legolas saw what was happening to his friend. He struck out with his knife, causing a deep cut in the troll’s right calf. He then crouched down and rolled forward to avoid a blow leveled at his head. As he did so, he aimed his body toward the troll who was holding Aragorn.

Legolas grabbed his knife with both hands so that when he straightened up from his roll, he would have the two-handed strength to ram the blade into the foot of that troll.

The knife went down through the creature’s foot bones with a crunch, eliciting a scream of agony from the beast.

The archer just barely rolled away before Aragorn came crashing down after suddenly being released. He winced when he heard the ranger’s impact with the ground.

“A soft cushion to fall on would have been nice,” the man grumbled, as he shook his head to clear the cobwebs the lack of air had created.

“you would have landed on my head had I not moved,” the elf pointed out.

“Well, that definitely isn’t soft.”

“You are welcome,” Legolas commented with a hint of sarcasm to the man’s lack of expressed gratitude. Then he came to his feet ready to meet the next troll.

By now, the two friends had made their way through half the trolls. That was due mainly to the fact that, even with their prey inflicting more than a little damage, the three troll groups were refusing to cooperate by rushing the elf and ranger as one and overwhelming them rather than attacking one or two at a time. They also continued to punch and push each other aside, which was fast becoming an advantage for the two friends. Unfortunately, there were still more than enough creatures left to accomplish their goal, cooperative or not.

Aragorn yelled a warning to Legolas when he saw Tack take a branch he had just ripped from a nearby tree and throw it. The large plank of wood was headed straight for the elf’s back.

Throwing himself forward, Aragorn swung his knife down in a savage arc and sliced through all four of Tack’s fingers, leaving only his thumb. An ordinary knife would probably have cut through only the flesh, but the elven blade, wielded by a skilled hand, sliced through bone, as well.

The tree branch fell harmlessly to the ground at the elf’s feet.

Tack wailed in pain, clutching his mutilated right hand in the crook of his left arm. “Kill ’em!” he screamed at the top of his lungs. “Kill ’em both! Now!”

“None of you better kill them two,” Sump yelled above the din, aiming his words at every troll within earshot. “They be mine, and I want ’em alive.”

With blood pouring from the stumps of his severed fingers, Tack yelled back, “They was ours first, you scummy maggot, and I want ’em dead.” The pain on his face was mingled with a deadly glare in Sump’s direction.

“I side with the ones that don’t want to kill us,” Aragorn said with a grim smile on his face.

“Do not be too anxious for that,” Legolas warned. “I do not think we would care much for the alternative.”

“Point taken.”

Darkness had fallen completely now. The night sky was clear, and the first stars were just beginning to wink into view. The moon had not yet risen enough to offer any kind of light to those beneath the trees far below.

The vision of trolls was roughly equivalent to that of humans, so they held no benefit over Aragorn that way. However, Legolas had a distinct advantage, since his keen eyes could draw in even the tiniest bit of light available to aid his night vision.

The trolls were not night blind, so sneaking past them was not an option. Elf and ranger would have to continue to fight their way through the hulking creatures around them.

Legolas knew that every time he and Aragorn advanced, it put more trolls behind them. For that reason, he wasn’t surprised when Aragorn moved to try and keep them being jumped from behind.

Back to back, each friend was engaged in hand-to-hand combat with a troll.

The creature facing Aragorn was in Tack’s group and was trying to kill the man, who was swinging his knife like a sword to avoid that outcome. The blade was effective in keeping the troll from moving in too close.

The creature facing Legolas was from Sump’s group, and he was making every effort to disarm the elusive being in order to capture him the way his leader wanted.

The troll in front of the ranger reached down and picked up the branch that Tack had dropped and began swinging it, negating the man’s knife.
Just as Aragorn stepped back to get out of the way, his injured left foot, ignored until now, had reached its limit and finally gave out. Aragorn found himself lying on the ground, and the branch swung over him.

Unfortunately, it was just at that moment that Legolas stepped back to avoid a blow from the fast moving troll he fought. The branch connected with the elf’s back right below his shoulder blades, sending him forward into the fist he had been trying to avoid.

Receiving devastating blows front and back, Legolas was stunned into near unconsciousness.

TBC

Chapter Thirty Seven

Aragorn winced when he saw Legolas get hit in the back with the branch that had been intended for him. He could almost feel the intense pain himself. It took a second to register the fact that the elf had fallen backwards rather than forwards. Then he saw the reason why. A troll had hit the elf from the front, landing the blow on his jaw.

"He be mine," the troll who had tried to kill Aragorn said. Shaking his fist in the other troll’s face, the creature intensified his anger by narrowing his eyes. "Tack said to kill ’em," he snarled, "so I aim to kill ’em."

"I don’t care what Tack said," the other troll declared just as fiercely. "Sump said they was to be captured, so that’s what I’m gonna do."

"Sump ain’t my leader."

"Well, Tack aim’t my leader."

Looking above him, the ranger saw the two trolls, who had caused so much devastation to Legolas, squaring off against each other. They resembled dueling tree trunks. The man was glad that their attention had been diverted, but if he didn’t get him and Legolas out of the way, they could still suffer as ‘innocent’ bystanders.

Aragorn looked toward Legolas, who wasn’t even attempting to rise. Fortunately, he was moving just enough to indicate he was alive and at least partially conscious.

The ranger was not willing to risk trying to stand up and attract the attention of the quarrelling trolls, who were obviously focused solely on each other. He also was not willing to risk having his good leg give way on him again opening up the possibility of twisting it and causing further damage. His luck might not hold another time, and he and Legolas would be doomed for sure.

As quickly as he could, Aragorn belted the long knife, then crawled over to where Legolas lay in obvious pain. He watched as the elf made a futile effort to raise what the ranger could only imagine was a severely bruised back up off the ground. He prayed that no bones had been broken.

Aragorn pulled himself up enough to lean over the elf. "Legolas?" the man whispered. "Can you hear me?"

"Yes," came the soft, almost inaudible, reply.

"Can you move?" The man was terrified that Legolas’s spine could have been crushed, rendering him paralyzed.

Legolas didn’t answer that question directly, but he did move both of his feet, as much to reassure himself as it was to set his friend’s mind at ease. "I must still be alive," the elf remarked. "I hurt too much to be dead. Was I hit with a tree?"

The ranger couldn’t have kept a smile from his face if he tried. "You are most definitely not dead," Aragorn reassured. "And yes, you were hit with a tree, or rather the rather sturdy branch of one."

The shouting of the two trolls above them, arguing over their fate, sent more urgency coursing through the ranger. "We have to get away from here as quickly as we can."

Until now, the elf’s eyes had been slightly unfocused, even though his mind remained relatively sharp. Hearing the trolls and understanding what was going on immediately brought the archer’s attention back to the situation at hand. He nodded.

Aragorn grabbed Legolas’s upper right arm and pulled him up into a sitting position, as he himself sat up straight.

The elf had no idea if he could do anything resembling traveling, but little choice had been left to him. "Go," he told Aragorn. "I will follow."

Having seen the pain the elf was trying to hide when he sat up, Aragorn didn’t think that was likely to happen. "Sure you will."

At least half a dozen of the trees on the nearest side of the clearing were growing so tightly together that they would provide a temporary hiding place, provided they were able to get there undetected. Hiding would work at least until the two friends could get themselves sorted out enough to make a run for it, though perhaps run wasn’t exactly the right description to use, under the circumstances.

It was impossible to push Legolas, so Aragorn had no choice but to go ahead of the elf and pull him along the ground, even though it meant that if they were spotted, the elf would be the first to get caught, not that the man would be out of range.

Legolas had dampened his natural elven glow when the fight had first begun. Had he not, the trolls would have followed them like following the glow from a torch.

Though their progress was so slow it seemed to take forever, the pair finally made it to the sheltering trees. Aragorn pulled Legolas against him and lay panting from the effort he had expended.

A frown crossed the man’s face. Why hadn’t the trolls come after them? There were dark shadows all around, but the area was not in total darkness. Two beings dragging themselves across the ground should have been picked up by somebody.

After a moment spent catching his breath, Aragorn rolled around the far side of the tree they were behind and cautiously peered out.

The clearing was still full of trolls. Most were watching the two who had been arguing over the seemingly cornered prey. Several had begun trading punches. It didn’t take long for all the trolls in both Tack’s and Sump’s groups to begin engaging in an all out battle.

The rovers, who didn’t have affiliations or even a spark of friendliness toward either group, were going about punching any trolls that weren’t part of their own band.

"I can’t believe it," the man muttered.

"What?" came the elf’s soft voice beside him.

"They’re all fighting among themselves. None of them seems the least interested in us."

"That ain’t exactly true," came a gruff voice from above and behind them.

Aragorn jerked his head around, and Legolas lifted his up. Both stared at a lone troll, standing about ten feet away, his fists resting against his hips. It was one of the rovers.

"Seems I got you both all to meself."

"No you ain’t." Now, another rover joined the little group. He pointed at Legolas. "He’s the one that killed Raster. I want to be the one that takes care of him. You kin have the elf."

"I want the elf," the first troll declared menacingly.

It was clear the rovers, at least these two, didn’t get along among themselves any more than those in the other groups did.

None of Tack’s group had known that Legolas was an elf. Pickett had believed Aragorn’s story that he was his brother who had deformed ears. It was unclear if Sump’s group knew Legolas‘s origin either. However, this troll evidently did. Since the rovers moved across troll territory from one end to the other, it was likely they, or some of their predecessors, had come in contact with elves at some point.

Legolas sighed wearily. It seemed that elves were hated and considered a prize by every foul creature known to Middle-earth. Lying there in pain, he was tempted just to go to sleep and let the creatures fight over him. It was a fleeting thought, of course, since he had no intention of giving up, even had Aragorn not been there to be concerned about.

Aragorn felt a tug on his sleeve. He turned to look at Legolas, who whispered in elvish, "Still armed?"

The ranger nodded.

"We can’t run, and we can’t surrender, so I see only one way left to us."

It took the ranger a mere second to discard the idea that they could stand up and fight. That left only one way to deal with these huge creatures, and he was pretty sure it was the same idea Legolas had.

He slowly took the elven long knife out of his belt and gripped it firmly.

Legolas did the same, having thought of his idea as soon as he realized he was still firmly holding his long knife.

As one, both elf and ranger lifted their arms and let fly both knives, which hurtled through the air in deadly silence. The, traveled side by side, until each blade sank into the neck of one of the rover trolls.

One creature dropped straight down like a felled tree, dead before he hit the ground, while the other clawed at his throat as he fell, dying where he landed. Fortunately, they had fallen away from the two friends.

"That was close," Aragorn remarked. "A couple of feet this way, and we would have been buried under a large pile of very heavy, very smelly trolls."

In typically haughty style, Legolas replied, "I aimed my knife so my target would fall just where he did. Are you saying yours fell that way accidentally?" He sounded genuinely horrified at the notion that they had been spared purely by chance.

In lieu of a laugh, which might have drawn attention, Aragorn answered by swatting the elf on the arm. More seriously, he said, "We had better move out before the victors in the battle over there," he indicated the squabbling trolls in the clearing with a jerk of his head, "come looking for us."

"I agree," Legolas remarked. "One of them is bound to think of us before too long." The elf secretly hoped that they would be thinking of only one thing at a time - getting the upper hand against their neighbors.

Gritting his teeth tightly, Legolas made it to his feet. He began to sway and reached behind him and placed this hands against the tree trunk. With closed eyes and deep breaths, the archer concentrated on finding his balance. Once he regained it, he slowly made his way over to the two dead trolls and retrieved his knives. Walking back, he handed one to Aragorn, who put it back in his belt.

"Can you stand?" the elf asked.

"Help me up, and I’ll tell you," the ranger replied, mentally preparing himself for what he knew was coming.

When he was on his feet, Aragorn let go of Legolas and tried to put his weight down on his left foot. It hurt like fire, but knowing it wasn’t broken made him determined that pain alone wasn’t going to stop him. However, he had to be practical. "I think I’ll need you to lean on," he said reluctantly. He knew Legolas wasn’t in the best shape and needed his own strength to keep himself upright, but they had to get going.

Luckily, the strongest part of the archer right now was his legs. Nothing more than bruises and soreness plagued them at the moment. He worked hard to forget what the rest of his body felt like.

The elf took Aragorn’s left arm and draped it around his shoulders. It worked out well that the man’s left side, including his bad foot, was on the elf’s right, so that Legolas’s body could act as a crutch, and his injured left shoulder was opposite the ranger’s body where it would receive no pressure.

So it was that the two friends were able to put distance between them and the clearing, the trolls and hopefully any further chance of being killed or captured.

Sounds of shouting, clashing clubs and crashing bodies were growing fainter, as the pair made their way deeper into the dark trees.

The two friends were hurting, hungry and weary beyond belief, but they didn’t stop until they could no longer hear anything but the night sounds of the forest, and those sounds were very comforting to both elf and ranger.

Just as they had decided they needed to stop and rest, they heard the unmistakable sounds of horses. Two horses to be exact.

Fearing to even whistle, lest the sound alert any troll who might be attempting to find them, Legolas pursed his lips and made a trilling sound. It was the same sound used in Mirkwood to call patrols’ warriors to their captains and was virtually indistinguishable from the cry of a red-tailed hawk.

In less than a minute, both his and Aragorn’s horses approached their two masters.

Aragorn’s stallion was still limping slightly, but the gash had stopped bleeding, and the animal was more interested in greeting the ranger than worrying about his injury.

"Are you a sight for sore eyes," the man remarked, as he stroked the horse.

Legolas had let go of Aragorn when he saw that the ranger was able to walk well enough to hold onto his horse. The elf was soon greeting his own stallion with a rub on his forehead and long, loving strokes along the horse’s proudly arched neck.

Both stallions nickered softly, and it was easy to see how happy they were to have found their masters again.

"Estel, you need to ride with me. He is still limping."

"I agree," the man replied and then explained in elvish why he was going to mount Legolas’s horse instead of him.

The horse snorted and jerked his head up and down, clearing indicating that he was sure he could do the job.

Aragorn smiled. "No, my friend, I will not tax your strength or cause you more pain." With a final pat, Aragorn turned and swung up behind Legolas, who had already mounted his own horse and was holding out a helping hand.

Legolas wasn’t sure which way would take them out of troll country the fastest. West led back the way they had just come from, and heading east would take them deeper into troll country. So, he asked, “North or south?”

Aragorn didn’t know either, but he didn’t want to stick around long enough to try and figure it out. "Let them decide."

Grinning in total agreement, Legolas leaned down toward his horse’s ear and uttered one word, "Home".

The End