Title: As Life Goes Out

Author: Eärillë

Rating: PG-15

Warnings: Character Death, First Draft

Summary:
Being so attuned to one’s homeland is good on many levels but detrimental on others. An Elfling has to learn it the hard way.

Genres: Family, Horror, Hurt/Comfort, ShortStory, Tragedy

Place and Timeline: Mirkwood, Early Third Age

Characters: (young) Legolas Thranduillion, OMC Elf-child

Words (in MS Word): 1,367

Point of View: First Person, Present Tense

Challenge: Day 3: Vinyamar:
Some people have difficulty embracing changes and moving on. Write a story or poem or create artwork that shows the consequences of refusing to change.

Story Notes:
Background idea: Mirkwood is being invaded stealthily and persistently by Sauron’s forces during the time of the story; TA 1200. Amon Lang is the Elven stronghold retaken by those forces and turned into Dol Guldur. (I need canon references here.) Thranduil, who holds reign over the then Greenwood the Great, relocates to the caves featured in The Hobbit. According to some earlier sources, he is a Sinda; and he reigns over a mix of people built mostly by Sylvan Elves – Nandor and Avari. And those two groups of Elves are particularly stubborn about clinging to their homelands, or so implied in The Silmarillion. Many of them must persist and keep staying around the war zone even though the Sindarin part of the community (and perhaps some tiny portion of their own) have relocated alongside Thranduil.
In The Lord of the Rings, The Fellowship of the Ring, it is described that trees in Southern Mirkwood are black and claw-like and ever strive with each other to reach the sun. The description translated into “The trees around Dol Guldur have been corrupted and coerced into betraying their Elven friends by Sauron and his minions” to my mind. The unusual behaviour of some trees in this story stems from that perception.
And, as I had no time to do proper research, I am sorry for errors or inconsistencies. Please help me with them, if you find any here, especially with the terms. (I tried to find the Nandorin equivalents for them, but failed.)

Translation:
Ata: Daddy
Emmë: Mummy
Linda: “Singer” (singular of “Lindar”), a name the Elves who refuse the summons of the Valar use to call themselves

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“Yrch!” – “The children! Quick!” – “We cannot abandon the trees – I shall not go!” – “They are nearing – hurry!”

And I am bundled in the blanket with my playmates, and saddled in slings like tiny babies. Neither of us can protest, however, as those grown-ups who are carrying us look frantic and very, very worried. They climb nearby trees and run from branch to branch, ignoring our whinging and weeping.

And soon, I realise that our paths diverge. I want to cry out, yelling for my carrier not to stray, to separate me from the other children. As if noticing it beforehand, though, he clamps my mouth with two fingers – two trembling fingers.

What is happening? Nobody was ever this afraid; and no grown-up ever treated us children like this. What is wrong? I want to ask my carrier, but he determinately goes on in silence. – And the other pairs are getting farther and farther apart from us… I really cry now, feeling hurt and miserable.

And then, a life goes out farther back, followed by a smaller one accompanied by a familiar cry. I bite my tongue, my tears falling faster. Ata and Emmë once explained to me that sometimes life has to go out to preserve others. But I do not want my friend to die! And I cannot mourn him, because my carrier is getting more frantic, muttering about the trees betraying us. But surely the trees will not betray us? Ata and Emmë said so. – And where are they?

Another life goes out, this time nearer. And then my older sister screams in pain, before her life, too, goes out. The tree we are running upon suddenly shifts, sending my carrier stumbling and fumbling with the animated branches. I can no longer weep, nor feel afraid. My sister is dead, and my parents are possibly dead also, back in our village.

And now my carrier is running ever faster, flying – tumbling from the treacherous tree, just as a whistle-call sounds ahead and below. I fly through the fear-choked air under the forest canopy, and land in another grown-up’s arms; a totally-unfamiliar grown-up. I open my mouth, wanting to yell for my previous carrier, but then he lets out a scream of pain similar to my sister’s, and I can hear his body’s breaking as his life goes out.

I feel empty and hollow, as if my life, too, has gone out. But it must not be so, for my new carrier is shaking me and whispering frantically into my ears, even as he is sprinting on the forest floor away from where my previous carrier has fallen. My knees bump a pair of long, hard something, so I guess this grown-up is a Linda living in another village. (Those must be knife-hilts. My friends and I often snuck into the village’s weapon room and peeked at the knives and bows mounted there, relics from the War of the Last Alliance.) Where does he bring me to, though? This is not the direction of my village; it is the opposite, in fact.

My carrier does not stop running for quite a long time. I drift in a haze of reverie, meanwhile, playing and replaying today’s strange, morbid events. The emptiness lingers in my spirit, and I feel cold now. I wish I were the one to go, not my sister, or my previous carrier. I wish…

“Drink, little one?” – A flask is proffered under my nose. I can smell sheep milk in it, flavoured by a sharp tang belonging to some liquid kept by my parents in jars in a secured spot in our storage talan, which they expressly forbade me to drink. And now this grown-up asks me to drink it? He has ceased running so swiftly, and now he is only walking in a rapid pace, as his right hand refuses to move the rim of the flask away from my mouth. What does he expect me to do? Why is he not running anymore, to keep us as far away from anyone or anything who made my friends’ and the caretakers’ lives go out?

In the end, tired with his silent persistence, I lift the flask further up and tip it slightly.

I nearly gag and throw up from the sharp, burning sensation flooding my mouth, travelling through my throat and settling in my belly. It is sheep milk, indeed, but mixed with some fiery liquid which I bet is really the one my parents forbade me to drink. But it does give me strength, and returns some warmth to my body and limbs.

It does not return my friends or the grown-ups to me, sadly. I miss them so much…

I look up into my carrier’s eyes, being free to do so for the first time since when I was firstly bundled away by my previous – first – carrier. “Why?” I ask in a whisper, unable to articulate the question more than that.

The grown-up’s blue-green eyes are coated with tears, and I can see pain in them. But no, he must not cry. Grown-ups must be strong, so they can protect us children.

But grown-ups were dead, just some time ago, together with my playmates…

“You cannot go back to your village, little one,” the stranger murmurs. I look further into his eyes, baffled. He seems to hesitate, not knowing how to tell me. – I just want to know. Why can he not do just that?

He blinks, and stares long at me, ponderously. Perhaps he has discerned my hope?

Finally he says, quite reluctantly, “Few escaped your village with their lives, child, and the number includes you.” He looks straight ahead, avoiding my gaze, then adds in a softer, wistful voice, “They refused to move north with us. We found a good cave-chain and built a new stronghold there. Sauron could prey on them easily in this way, in the open. He has subdued and corrupted the trees.”

But we are not weak! Ata and Emmë said so, anyway… And Ata and Emmë also said that moving north was not good; we would abandon the trees that had been protecting us, then. – But the trees betrayed us now, like this grown-up just said…

I look down and shiver. A tree has taken my previous carrier, and another must have taken my sister also. They are wicked and vile, not at all like Ata and Emmë said. Why did they change? My parents said things would not change, except for the cycle of the seasons and little ones growing up. Why this? Why now?

I curl into myself as best as I can, hiding my face in the nook of my carrier’s neck, breathing in his scent. What he said pains me, but I cannot turn away from it, like I do his gaze now, and that only pains me more.

A big, long finger unsticks a bunch of cold-sweat-drenched locks from my face. But I refuse to look up, meeting the grown-up’s gaze. Where am I now? What is going to happen to me? Where am I brought? We are already far from my village, judging from the ache of home-yearning deep in my body and spirit. Shall we move even further?

The same finger traces my jawline gently, before tipping up my chin, making my eyes meet the blue-green ones – no longer swimming with tears. “We must move on, little one,” my carrier – now my protector, I guess – whispers, as if knowing how deep my pain goes, having felt it himself. (But surely it is not possible?) He tells me his name is Legolas, and he lost his emmë to the same forces that bereft me of my family. He tells me that he tries to move on now, helping his ata protect our people.

He asks for my name, but I do not answer him. If changing makes him better, then I shall change too; and the first step is to leave my old name, I suppose. It is not going to be forgotten, but I shall be the only person to remember it – and my family, my old life. It is better this way.

I smile, vaguely noting that my lips tremble with the effort. “Thank you,” I breathe, hugging his neck as far as my arms go. A heavy, dreadful weight seems to lift up from my spirit when he returns the embrace, and I bury my face into the side of his neck, breathing in his scent. I shall not be alone enduring everything; it might not be a scary future, then.