The plan was a simple one that had worked against Orcs many times in the past; no reason to worry it would not work this time as well. Just before the sky began to darken toward sunset and Ithil was seen on the opposite horizon already risen, a little more full this night than the night before, the Elves attacked silently out of the forest dimness. With eyes far keener than those of the Orcs, despite the heritage of the evil ones, they picked out their targets and moved - silent, deadly. Of the twenty Orcs in the raiding party, some fifteen of them were hiding in the forest waiting until the hated sun had set. All fifteen looked upon their last glimpses of sky and trees as their heads were drawn back and throats slit by Elvish knives. It was a merciful way to die, though none of the Elves were feeling particularly merciful; it was simply the most practical way of insuring that, if Prince Legolas was still alive, he might stay that way should no alarm be raised.  Accompanied by Glorfindel, Tinuvil, Saeros and Hellan, Elrond made his way up to the hut and peeked around the broken corner where once wall met wall. What he saw within made a thin, angry smile slip across his lips, and he drew back.

Without words, he drew in a patch of moss with the tip of his bow: a quick sketch of the hut and where the Orcs could be found. Elrond pantomimed sleep; around him, the elder Elves nodded understanding. As the Lord of Imladris pointed first to an Orc position, then to one of his fellows, each moved off to get into place.

It was over in a matter of moments - the fighting at least, if such could be called fighting in any proper sense. Elven bows sang in unison; five Orcs dropped over dead, none of them still alive long enough to see the silent shadows of their death-dealers slip into the hut's dimness. Knowing the others would patrol, gather bodies to be burned, and attend the other minutiae of camp and protection, Elrond stepped over the body of his victim and stripped off his gauntlets. He moved to kneel beside the bedstead and carefully peeled back the cloak that lay over the young prince of Mirkwood.

"Ai, Elbereth! Legolas!" Tinuvil whispered behind him on a sibilant note of pain.

 "Glorfindel," Elrond breathed without turning. His friend moved to take Tinuvil gently in hand, easing him away from the bed, murmuring something about "best possible hands... must let Lord Elrond do his work..." Both Elves were already out of his thoughts though, as his hands gently touched the child before him. Elrond could feel the healing stir within him - a good sign, for if life had fled altogether there would have been an entirely different sensation.

At first though, and for several long moments, he could not find any more mundane sign of life. No hint of breath stirred the slender chest; Legolas did not twitch even a bit as Elrond cut the three straps binding the child's arms to his sides at shoulder, mid-torso, and waist. The arms dropped leadenly to Legolas' sides; there was no other immediate reaction. Elrond touched the still chest very gently with one hand; nothing. He unbuttoned the filthy, blood-stained shirt, peeling the fabric away from the arrow wound with very careful fingers to inspect it, then lowered one ear to the child's unmoving torso, right over his heart.

Elrond's eyes closed with relief; he squeezed them shut and compressed his mouth, hard. The child lived. The gallant heart beat steadily, for the most part, if occasionally interrupted by a momentary lapse, followed by a gallop of a few seconds as if trying to catch up. Elrond sat up and informed his fellows; Tinuvil let out an exclamation of joy and slipped outside to tell the others. Elrond continued his work, relieved almost past endurance when Legolas gave a brief, shuddering breath, exhaling on a low, humming note the Lord of Imladris almost did not hear. Moving with exquisite caution, he cupped the back of the child's head in one hand and gently turned the boy to face him; it was to the smallest nuance the same face he had seen in his visions, though sorely used and marred by cut and bruise.

Glorfindel brought a torch, leaving Saeros at Elrond's side to hold it, and went to fetch the Lord's haversack of healing items. Elrond's own breath caught in pain to look into those crystalline eyes: they were all pupil nearly, with the merest hint of sea fog and sapphire rimming the black circles within. He raised his free hand to brush Legolas' forehead, and bent closer.

"Legolas, son of Thranduil - can you hear me?" he murmured. "If you can, try to give me some manner of sign."

Elrond thought he felt breath stir beside him, and thought a name was on that breath of air, but the child gave no indication he had heard or replied. The Lord of Imladris took Legolas' near hand in his, cupping the small, dirty fingers within his own. "If you can hear me, child, squeeze my hand," he said, his tone soft and commanding. "Try; I know you have been ill-used, little warrior, but try." He squeezed the slender hand as an incentive.

Legolas gave another thready breath; Elrond thought he saw a spark of some kind shoot through the depths of the dilated eyes. Glorfindel returned with the haversack, opening it to stand ready and assist; it was not necessary for words to pass between them, they had worked together too many long years to require audible instructions much, any longer. He also sent the others for more items: water, clean cloths, bandages. Soon there was a fire in the old hearth and water boiling in a small pot from the haversack; outside there was food being prepared, of a far healthier and more wholesome variety than that gorged on formerly by the deceased Orcs.

All these preparations were mere background noise; Elrond kept his attention fixed on the injured prince of Mirkwood.

"Hear me, Legolas," Elrond murmured, slipping into the near trance-state that he knew would fully awaken the healing power within him. "You are safe now. The Orcs are dead, and their foul master is departed. The pain will go away. Hear me..."

It seemed to Elrond that white and pure light gathered around them both, though he knew the others would see no such thing. There came a fractional movement of the slim skull cupped in Elrond's hand; the eyes slipped shut, revealing bruises on one side and the dark circles of exhaustion under both. A shudder ran through the child's body; one hand stirred on the bed, tried to move, but could not manage it at first. Elrond squeezed again gently on the hand he held, so small within his own, so fragile-seeming.

To his intense relief the little hand weakly squeezed back. "That's it," he breathed, gazing more intently at the child's face. "Come back to me now, little prince. Come back."

The healing phrases, deep and musical and beyond the hearing even of Elven ears, rolled out of Elrond then. The prince became restive under Elrond's touch; he put the head back down onto the mattress and gently gathered the stricken child into his arms. Legolas turned to hide his face in Elrond's tunic with a soft, pained, humming sigh, barely voiced, barely heard. The child's left hand came up slowly, shaking with exertion, and latched onto the quiver strap across Elrond's chest; the Lord of Imladris put another hand atop that one, and used it as a conduit for healing, sending strength and light and warmth into every dark corner of the prince's slight form. The musical, sibilant phrases went on, tumbling over the pain like soothing water over stones in a brook, slowly and peacefully rounding the rough edges, making all things whole again. The heat of infection left Legolas, calmed him; the two, healer and patient, remained in the heart of the moment for many long minutes.

But the healing did not dissipate as Elrond had expected it to, and worry nibbled at the edges of his consciousness. Shifting the now quiet, softly breathing child in his arms, taking pains not to jostle him, Elrond felt inside the soiled, bloodied tunic for the edges of the worst wound, the arrow hole in Legolas' right shoulder. Odd... very odd. The wound felt healed - Elrond could barely find any trace of it, though his fingers went unerringly to where he had seen the injury. The alabaster skin was perfectly smooth there now; Elrond could feel the young muscles, trained many long hours at the handling of bow, knife and sword, knitting back to wholeness. Why then did the healing seem to want to go on?

"Legolas, son of Thranduil," Elrond whispered into the small pointed ear below his chin. "Can you hear me? Open your eyes, little prince."

The child gave a demurring mew of exhaustion and dug his face deeper into Elrond's tunic. The Lord of Imladris tried to pry the slender fingers from his quiver strap, but found them surprisingly strong, insistent in hanging on. A faint smile slipped across Elrond's mouth; he pried a bit more powerfully, and the hand let go - only to twist about and take him by the archer's bracer on his wrist, the fingers worming knowingly into the lacing and hanging on for dear life.

"Thou small and fierce warrior," Elrond chided, amused. He reached down with the same hand to which the boy clung, to cup his chin and turn the protesting face up toward his. "Legolas, look at me. There is nothing but light here, all is well."

It took some doing, but eventually Thranduil's small son allowed his face to be turned. The eyes were still largely dilated, but Elrond could now see more of the blue and foggy grey he had seen in his visions. Legolas stared up at his rescuer with some confusion - but then a piercingly bright, sweet smile lit the child’s face like the coming of dawn.

"I knew you would come," the little Elf breathed, his voice so soft Elrond had to tip his head to hear a-right. "I tried very hard not to be afraid, truly I did, but only the Valar can know of their own comings and goings. Forgive me if I lost hope too soon! Forgive me..."

The eyes rolled up and back, sliding shut, and the child went limp in Elrond's embrace - sleeping now, his breath even and stronger as his chest rose and fell. It was Elrond's turn not to breathe; he held the sleeping child, staring down at him, stunned and shaken beyond thought. For his words (startling enough in their import, naming him one of the Valar as they did!) had been delivered, not in the Sindarin Elrond knew was spoken in Thranduil's court, nor the Silvan speech of the Elf-King's people - but in fine, purest Quenya, the ritual language of the High Ones.

"Sleep then, pityo," Elrond whispered, replying in kind, resting a cheek against the disheveled golden hair. "We shall see what can be made of this interesting matter when you have fully recovered!"

Glorfindel took Elrond's place at the child's side once the healing seemed to be done. Not a healer in the same sense as his friend and Lord, the other Elf was, nevertheless, a talented physician with a touch of the same talents as Elrond possessed, just not in that same measure. With heated water from the fireplace, Glorfindel bathed the child, stripping off of his body the fouled, bloodied clothing and tossing it into the flame. As he expected, he found that every mark was fast fading, every wound disappearing. Knowing that Elrond was seated nearby watching, wearied by the experience, Glorfindel told off the catalog of what he saw:

"More than one arrow struck, Lord. Besides the one in his shoulder, there was one in his left leg also. It would appear they beat the lad as well." Glorfindel's mouth was a thin line of anger as he turned briefly to look at his friend. "But then, no surprise; he would not have submitted passively. He is Thranduil's son, after all."

"He is indeed - and more besides." Elrond closed his eyes, listening to the faint rustles of cloth as Glorfindel dressed the child in a clean shirt belonging to one of the rescue party. Presently Elrond opened his eyes at a touch upon his knee.

"Would you take the lad for a moment, Lord - I want him resting on something less noisome." Elrond accepted the limp bundle, amazed at how little there was to the prince. In the oversized shirt he looked even smaller.

"Is this really twenty-three years old?" he wondered aloud.

Glorfindel chuckled. "It is a bit small for its age," he agreed, tossing the Orc cloak into the fire and spreading out a larger, clean Elven garment. "But twenty-three is young yet, and I daresay if he is aught like his father, the lad will grow."

"Now that he has a chance to, yes. I had forgotten; it has been a long while since mine were this young." Elrond helped his friend settle Legolas down, and tucked another cloak over him as a blanket. "Glorfindel - the healing continues to run through me," he said into the silence that followed. "And I cannot understand why. Did we miss anything, you and I?"

Glorfindel gazed gravely at him. "I thought I felt as much," he sighed, and turned to look at the child. "I do not see anything more - unless one of the wounds was from a poisoned weapon?"

They exchanged a glance. Fighting Orcs was always fraught with that danger. Since the creatures randomly poisoned both arrows and blades, there was no knowing whether the weapons were fouled until the wound was taken. Elrond knelt by the bedside once more, gently peeling back the cloak, and undid the fastenings of the oversized shirt. He stared at the fading pink spot where the arrow had pierced Legolas' shoulder, regarding the injury with a kind of suspicion.  Very carefully, so as not to disturb the sleeping child, he rested fingertips upon that spot, reading the vague remaining signs. He gasped with the suddenness of the memory, as the prince's quiescent mind reached out and met with his, and suddenly Elrond could see it all: the hunt turned battle, the panicked pony; an incoming arrow from a nearby Orc archer. He cried out softly from the depths of Legolas' memory, echoing the child's cry: more anger than pain, for the adrenaline rush of battle is no respecter of age.

But it was Elrond, the bystander to these memories, who had the experience to know the truth of it all. No arrow burns like that, continues burning, robs the senses of coherence in that fashion, without the tip being adulterated with the dark poisons of Morgoth.

Legolas also had insufficient experience to recognize the second arrow shot for what it was, when it smacked into his thigh; had he known what to feel for, he would have realized the difference and torn the poisoned arrow from his flesh immediately. All he knew was that his mount was still rearing in terror, as he was hemmed in on all sides by what seemed an illimitable supply of Orcs. He clung to the animal's neck, making himself as small as he could, but it was to no effect when the pony was gutted and died in a bone-crushing tangle of equine limbs. The child was quick: he released the animal and leaped from its back.  Had he not been wounded, he might have seized the tree limb at which he clutched. Once in the trees there was no way the Orcs could have taken him prisoner, for there he would have been in his own element. But the poison was already invading his system and he entirely missed that for which he so desperately reached...

Then there was a leering, vile-smelling Orc face before his, and Legolas was struggling, kicking, screaming defiance, biting anything that came near him. Despite every effort, the child was borne away from the battle; beaten until he could struggle no more, Legolas lost consciousness just about the time he was bridled and gagged, his limbs strapped and hog-tied.

Elrond shook himself out of the memory, shuddering as he reached within for control. "This was indeed a poisoned wound," he murmured. "But how then did the child survive this long? Unless they knew, and - "

The Lord of Imladris made a hissing intake of breath.

"The Black Rider..." he stumbled to his feet and went through the doorway, glancing about for one of his sons. Elladan was nearest to hand; his father seized his arm. "My son - when the Nazgul departed, which way did it go?" he demanded.

"To the northeast, Father," the younger Elf replied instantly. He placed a hand beneath his sire's elbow, concern in every line of his features. "Towards Eryn Lasgalen, one might surmise, or looking for someone - I know not whom. Are you all right?"

"Yes. No. That is - yes and no," Elrond murmured, distracted. He closed his eyes, trying to reconstruct vague and confused bits of vision: a cup. The Black Rider had a cup... The Lord of Imladris turned on his heel and strode back inside.

"It gave the child one of their foul potions," he said to Glorfindel, who caught his breath and murmured in pain. "No wonder the healing did not end. It saved his life, no doubt, but only the Valar know what it may have done to his soul. The process of turning him to an Abomination may have already begun! I have not the talent to fight this - only the Lady of Lórien can save this little prince, now."

"Easily a hundred and fifty miles from here," Glorfindel said quietly. "How great is his immediate danger?"

"If my healing wishes to continue at the rate it is insisting," Elrond said raggedly, "I can only assume the danger is very great indeed. We must leave now, or at least some of us. I needs must concentrate on the child - will you ride with me, Glorfindel?"

"Always and anywhere, Lord."

As Glorfindel made preparations, Elrond called the others to him and told them what was amiss. "Some of you will need to ride to find Thranduil, to tell him his son lives and will hopefully soon be well," he told them. "Tinuvil, I know it will be hard for you to leave the boy - but will you do this?"

"I will," said that worthy Lord of Mirkwood, though his heart was heavy. He looked up as Glorfindel came out of the hut with young Legolas; the child was deeply asleep, wrapped warmly in cloaks, his golden head resting peacefully on Glorfindel's shoulder. Tinuvil bent to place a kiss on his nephew's forehead, then turned to look at Elrond.

"Ride hard and carefully, Lord of Imladris," he murmured. "May Elbereth watch over you!" Then he turned and was gone along with several of the Silvan folk, who rode along as escort. Elrond turned to his sons.

"Ride behind us a space, my sons, and guard our backs against anything coming out of Dol Guldur," he said, mounting up and taking the sleeping prince from Glorfindel. "If you wish to join us in Lothlorien and visit your grandparents, by all means do so; it is my fervent hope, however, that to one of Galadriel's power this will be but the work of a few moments. Then I mean to take to the Anduin and sail north, to reunite Thranduil with his little warrior."

Glorfindel had already chosen two of their company to ride hard to Lothlorien with himself and Elrond. The remainder went with Elladan and Elrohir as rearguard, leaving behind a pile of Orc bodies that burned long into the night, a beacon and reminder to the Dark that there were still Elves in these woods to safeguard and to take vengeance where necessary.

*****