Title: Masquerade

Authors: Celebdil-Galad and Tinlaure

Summary:

Captured as prisoners of war by the Haradrim, Legolas and Aragorn are tortured ruthlessly at the hands of their host. If things go as planned there will be no dawn for either Elf or ranger, but first one must break.

Though more than their lives and spirits are at stake, an ancient alliance and bond could be shattered and all Middle Earth could be condemned. The fates of many, rest squarely on the shoulders of Legolas and Aragorn, will they give under the pressure?

Rated: PG-13

: DISCLAIMER :

We do not own anything of Tolkein's Lord of the Rings Trilogy or any other works by he or his family. We wish we could write like that though.

Please enjoy and review! Reviews are always good-Smiles- Thanks!

Part I

0o0: 0o0 "Masquerade" 0o0: 0o0

CHAPTER ONE

As the Seasons Change

The night was dark, very dark, not to mention bleak. The description just wouldn't be accurate without the word 'bleak'. A storm threatened to break in horrible wrath any moment and Aragorn looked grimly at his blonde companion. "So how far ahead are they my friend?" he inquired as to the position of the Haradrim enemy that all knew were lying in wait for them at some point.

Legolas Greenleaf smiled thinly and leaning close to the ranger, whose hood was drawn about his face, whispered his reply. "Well, Thorongil, they lie just over in the ledges of the dried up creek bed and deep in the foliage. They are strong, we are never going to make it past them." The Elf's voice was indisposed and he looked past the hood into his friend's eyes with a look of intense worry.

"Double-cloaked Elf," sneered a man near Aragorn's left; his second lieutenant. "With all due respect sir, how do we know we can trust him?" asked the man as he stared the scowling blonde being down.

Legolas gave the man who was questioning his honesty and honor an I-am-a-Elf-prince-and-you-doubt-my-word look. His narrow blue eyes spoke of irritation and discontent. Aragorn was not going to stand idly by and let this slur against his friend stand. "And with all due respect to you, officer, you question more than the Prince Legolas when you ask if he is trustable, you question my choice of friends and allies."

The man glared at his junior officer and the other man didn't seem to be put off. "Sir, I never meant to question your abilities, but every attack we have had ourselves in the midst of was known to him before the rest of us."

"Are you going to continue to question my sincerity, sir?" asked the disguised ranger tersely with a knitted brow and darkened gray eyes.

"I suppose I had better not, Captain," concluded the other man as he gazed into the deepening darkness, avoiding Aragorn's piercing gaze and the sharp and annoyed glare of the offended Elf.

Legolas turned his attention back to Aragorn serenely, but he kept half of his hearing turned back towards the men who he did not doubt would like nothing better than to kill him and call it an accident. He wasn't about to become some tragic victim of their fears, but he wasn't about to strive fruitlessly against them. He could never win and resistance would only make there opinion of him worse.

Aragorn knew what Legolas was thinking and he gently placed a hand on Legolas' shoulder and guided the Elf in the front, before him. Putting himself between his friend's back and the ones whom would like to stab it. He whispered dispiritedly, "Is there any alternative at all, Legolas?"

"None that would be less risky than the attack itself," came the forbidding response. As Legolas watched the trees and foliage sway in the wind of the upcoming storm he let loose a small and inaudible sigh. He felt the trees distress but he also felt their hostile nature towards him and his friends. In the distance, lightening flickered and sent tendrils of blazing volts across the darkened sky. "Remind me again why we came down South to fight Haradrim?" he said as he calculated the throbbing air and rumbling thunder with his scrupulous hearing.

Aragorn looked at the Elf's stony face and anxious eyes. "I don’t know about you, but I came down because they were a threat to Gondor and as a ranger that happens to be one of my jobs...protecting Gondor that is."

Legolas smiled dilutely and gave the ranger a somewhat dubious look. "And I vaguely recall your brothers saying that you wouldn't stay down here more than a few days before you came crawling back. Bets are dangerous things you know," he whispered in a tone that was filled with as much laughter as his fluctuating looking eyes as the friends crouched down now with the men in the brush, waiting for the Haradrim to launch their attack.

"And I remember someone else who's father told him that he needed to settle down and get married and if I recall that same someone disappeared that very night and trailed me everywhere until I consented to having him as a companion," teased the young human lightly. Making fun of his Elven companion was rejuvenating if it was nothing else and he was sure that Legolas had about the same opinion regardless of the fact that he was the center of the jests.

Legolas sniffed in mock contempt, "you exaggerate ranger. He said nothing about getting married." Aragorn just smiled in the dark.

The men laughed and snickered quietly behind the Elf and ranger. Even though they didn’t trust the Elf as far as they could shoot him, they did enjoy the teasing between the two friends that brightened the darkest moments and made the prospect of dying a little easier to bear. They carefully prepared to draw their weapons and the archers readied their bows.

Lightning flashed and in the faint light that lasted only a brief moment, Legolas and Aragorn smiled at one another and the Elf grabbed his bow from its place over his shoulder and grabbed a random arrow from the quiver on his back. Aragorn gripped the hilt of his sword tightly.

The enemy was near, they could feel it in the growing tense air that seemed to throb in their ears precariously. The trap was about to spring and it was growing rigid in preparation for the pounce, like a cat playing with a mouse. The thought did nothing to help the blonde Elf's mood as he ran his hand along the feathers on his arrow shaft. He did not like getting played around with under any circumstances and the thought that a regiment of Haradrim warriors had managed thrice to catch them in a snare was disturbing.

Legolas knew that the blame for this attack had been squarely placed on his shoulders by the men and he had no doubt that if a few of them lived they would find a way to make sure he did not. But, he mused angrily, how was it his fault that he always knew the attack before them? He was a scout, what in the name of great Manwë had they expected him to do? Rolling his eyes inwardly with disgust at the men's' ungrateful attitudes, Legolas knew it was because he was an Elf. If a man had been the scout and placed himself in that kind of danger then he would have been congratulated and believed without the slightest hesitation. But because he was an Elf they didn't care what dangers he was placed in and the Elven prince knew with a stab of what could be called slight heartache, that despite all his labors for their well being they would rather that he never came back. Legolas felt a bitter anger rising as he realized what he had thought for a long time was true; they would rejoice to see an arrow embedded in his heart.

The wind blew stronger and as Legolas listened beside Aragorn he heard a series of war cries, like wolves on a hunt, arise in the air and suddenly something whistled past his ear and a javelin hit the dirt by his foot. He crouched lower in surprise and slight fear, and heard everyone else doing the same. Well at least he wasn’t alone, thought the Elf candidly.

But no more shafts came and Aragorn whispered grimly, "they are taunting us. But the attack will not be put off long." A huge shadow loomed not more than a couple hundred yards off and lightening revealed it to be what Legolas already knew as an oliphaunt.

Its bulk was painted in bright paint. As the thunder rumbled Legolas looked back at Aragorn and whispered, "they are close enough to launch their attack."

The ranger murmured, "I know. Stay down, Legolas. Be careful." The last thing he wanted was one of those thick-shafted javelins in his friend's back or head. He looked back at the men he was leading and whispered, "steady. Perhaps we can surprise them if you keep calm.” The proposition was more of a command than a conferral.

The men looked stony faced at one another and shifted quietly in the bracken and shrubs.

A small drop hit Legolas on the nose and he thought, wonderful, the storm is moving in. This is going to make fun combat weather. He sighed under his breath and watched as figures ahead moved soundlessly through the brush and positioned themselves all around the surrounded contingent.

Legolas suddenly shouted, "look out! "As he heard the bows of the enemy drawn back and then released. Bolts thudded against trees, stone, dirt and bodies. A few cries came from those wounded, those dead had been slain silently.

Then the battle began.

Legolas and Aragorn fought side by side as best they could, watching one another's back.

Everything was chaos, between claps of thunder, the cries of men dying and bleeding, oliphaunts crying in agony as arrows found their marks in the large creatures' hides.

In the lightning Legolas saw a man aiming his spear for Aragorn, who was preoccupied with another in intense combat. Drawing the bolt of his bow back so the feathers were along his cheek, Legolas shot the enemy's man dead quicker than sight.

He had hardly time to notch another arrow before he found himself assailed by a number of foes that came out of nowhere. As he looked around he found himself lost in a sea of enemy faces and immediately back stepping in pure instinct, he suddenly felt his boot go against nothing. Air. He was trapped on the edge of the cliff that overlooked the dried up creek bed.

Aragorn spun around as he struck out with his long sword and seeing his friend assailed by foes on all sides, the man gave a cry of trepidation and dismay. Taking his attention away from his own enemies trying to kill him, he ran towards Legolas, who was firing off arrows as quickly as possible, but his quiver was running out and his enemies were pressing in closer. Legolas realized with alarm that they were not trying to kill him, they were trying to capture him.

The ranger stumbled in weariness and abruptly felt a sting as something bit into his shoulder, no, his collarbone. He felt it rip through the muscle of his chest and crack through the bone in a violent assail on a path to his heart. He then hearing a strangled cry he had hardly realized he had given, the young ranger looked up to see Legolas staring straight at him with a contorted face of horror and rage even as the Elf ducked a blow intended to render him unconscious.

He must be hurt badly, or else Legolas would never look at him thus. Aragorn knew it and he looked to see thick-shafted javelin in his chest, just beneath the collarbone, dangerously close to his heart.

Aragorn felt hot blood run over his tunic and he gasped in horrible pain. It was shockingly hard to breathe. He felt as though he had a weight upon his chest, pressing down relentlessly and biting him fiercely.

He saw Legolas struggle to get to him and he saw the Elf notch his last arrow and looking where the fair being was aiming, he saw a Haradrim warrior just above him, ready to drive a scimitar into his skull.

But dazed, Aragorn told his muscles to move and they didn't respond.

Looking up he saw a green and white-feathered shaft sing through the air just as a blinding streak of lightning lit up the sky about them.

But Aragorn could feel the heat of the lightening, blinding, searing, and sending tendrils of volts of current through his body. But when he looked up all he saw was a bunch of dead Haradrim and Legolas, being hurled backwards and over the brink of the ledge and into the dried up creek bed below.

Aragorn felt huge ran drops begin to splash all around him and finding his legs, he ran stumbling to the edge of the cliff and fell to his knees as he looked over the edge and saw a pale and forlorn Legolas lying below.

The Elf's body was at a strange and twisted angle on the rocks beneath, so it made Aragorn think that his friend had broken his back. He felt a pang run through is heart and he could not tell if it was because of the javelin in his breast or because his heart had just shattered at the sight of his mutilated friend. He saw the Elf's lips moving faintly and then his chest rise and fall, and then after a violent shiver, the convulsing form of the blonde Elf lay completely still.

If Aragorn had had a difficult time breathing before, he found it impossible now. As hard as it was for him believe it, Legolas had been thrown by the lightning into the gaping pit below, his body smashing against the rocks. His mind was going through enough torture seeing his contingent annihilated but now that he saw his dearest friend lying mangled below he felt like his chest had been ripped into shreds and he knew it came from more than the wound be bore. As Aragorn gazed groggily down into the pit his mind reeled, taking in all the gore and bodies that were beginning to float in the rising water. The creek bed had become a mass grave.

It was more than the ranger could bear. The men he had been entrusted with and who had trusted him back were dead or captured. It was a heart-wrenching failure, one he wasn't sure he could endure. He knew now how Gil-Galad and other wise beings, like his foster father, must have felt after seeing their troops slain in battle and mercilessly tramped upon by the cruel feet of the enemy as though they were being ground into useless and unrespectable dust.

The rain became heavier, as if all heaven cried for his lost friend. Thunder rumbled loudly and lightening strapped across the sky in bright purple and white flares casting light on all the pale faces coated in blood.

Aragorn didn't even bother to remove the barbed spear from his chest and he just leaned forward, not caring if it was pressed deeper into his flesh. His wavy dark hair hung limply with perspiration and rainwater as he hung his head in despair and horrible, twisted agony. His eyes were fixed unmovable on Legolas' helpless and wrecked form, the Elf's hair thrown over one side of his face and plastered to it by the rain.

Legolas blinked in numb awe as he gazed up at the sky and watched the rainfall upon his pale face as he began to come free of his shock that still held a slight grip over his boggled mind. It felt good just to lay still and breathe again. He watched the sky intently, with all its strange and wondrous tendrils of purple and white and the darkness of the blackened world beyond while crystal rain beat upon him.

It was cold enough in the desert at night. The temperature often dropped to single digit number or below. He shivered as he felt his clothes getting soaked to the bone and the bone seemed to be pierced to the marrow. The rocks of the sandy and hard bottom bit into his cold skin like jagged knives and he tried to move, but he found that it was impossible. That alone was enough to send new stab of fear throughout his awareness.

Looking inquisitively up at the edge of the cliff where he guessed he had fallen from, he saw Aragorn hanging over the brim of the precipice, bent over in agony or grief, Legolas could not tell and he closed his eyes in passionate and physical pain. He wondered if he had broken something and thought it would be a miracle if he hadn’t.

He shuddered and then looked up again and as if Aragorn had known Legolas had opened his eyes, the man lifted his head and saw the wide blue orbs staring up into his own gray ones, wondering if he were alright. Legolas' face was still pale and he lay in a contorted form nevertheless, unmoving but his eyes spoke volumes about his thoughts.

After the ordeal Legolas had just gone through, Aragorn was touched to know his best friend was seeing if he was well first. When the Elf's sharp eyes caught the scarlet water running from the man's tunic he knew Aragorn was wounded and he cried up towards the ranger in a horror filled cry, "Thorongil!"

But it was then Legolas realized he could not hear, or at least, not like he used to. Everything was muffled and sounded so far away, even his own voice. He felt cold fear clutch at his stomach in a tight and frigid knot that threatened to grow and break through.

Everything had seemed unreal to begin with, now it was totally surreal and Legolas found himself floating in the juxtaposition of two worlds; fantasy and reality. He felt like he was dying and yet he felt nothing at all and seemed to be watching time drag by in slow motion. Why was it the painful moments seemed to last forever and the joyous faded so fast?

Legolas did not know and he determined rather quickly now was not the time to wonder.

He swallowed hard and saw Aragorn looking at him with dropped jaw and saying something, but he could not hear it. He was going deaf or slowly dying, he couldn't differentiate. The Elf did not even remember what had happened exactly, but he knew he had fallen and he knew he had felt a terrific jolt go through him, running around in his insides and feeling like it as unwinding him through and through.

"Thorongil!" he cried up to Aragorn as the man suddenly found himself surrounded by the enemy. The Elf's cry was desperate and overwhelmed and it delved into the ranger's heart as he realized his friend needed him and he couldn't be there. But he had no time for further thought about Legolas, his men or the rising rain water…anything. All his thought now went to the enemy that surrounded him in a tight, merciless mass.

The precipitation was coming in buckets and Legolas felt the flowing water rising about him, cold and tickling. The ground had been so hard form lack of rain that in this rainy season flash floods were not uncommon.

As the torrential rains spilled around him, Legolas watched in a haze as his best friend was set in bonds and lead away to only the Valar knew where. This didn't make Legolas despair, at least, not in the initial thoughts and reactions. His initial thoughts were intense wrath and a longing to deliver death to every last one of those cursed Haradrim men and personally scalp their leader. But seeing as how that was not possible, he began to retreat into an abyss of guilt and mourning that he felt was well earned on his part.

If only he had been quick enough, if only he had been there when Aragorn needed him most. Cursing himself inwardly in every tongue he knew and even considering for a brief moment making up a few of his own, the Elf-prince felt hot tears burn his eyes despite the cold rain and biting winds. He wanted to scream, but that would do no good.

Aragorn struggled as many warriors of the Haradrim pressed him down and made him completely immobile; he was all but suffocating. But his wound did not allow him to grapple much anyway. He kicked with his feet as the faint and fleeting opportunity arouse but as he did, the javelin was yanked out with a distinguished twist followed by a sickening popping sound and the ranger lurched forward accompanied by a cry before he was slammed into the ground harshly by his subjugators.

His face was smeared into the mud and grime and when that didn't put an end to his fighting a hand came and tangled itself in his dark and wet hair before using it as a painful handle to slam his skull into the ground. Stars danced before Aragorn's eyes and he struggled very little now as he was pulled up to his knees and his arms yanked behind him, and then twisted brutally for good measure before being tightly bound and rebound with thick hemp. A man, with dark eyes and a muscular build stood before him, spear in hand.

He was tall too, as far as Haradrim went and the way he carried himself lead the captive to believe that he was one of distinguished rank among the Southron Men. War paint of a bright red color was about his face and drawn in extravagant designs. He had earrings of gold and a nose ring with a red stone set in it.

His right hand tightly clenched a sword and Aragorn noticed absentmindedly that he had many rings upon it, including a seal of the Haradrim. He was a prince among them then or someone close to the King in one way or another.

"Greetings, Ranger," he said haltingly, Westron spoken by the rangers was not his first language and he wanted Aragorn to hear every word he said. This was not exactly a comforting thought, but Aragorn was too groggy at the moment to really try and discern the man's dark purpose. All he knew was that he was wet, miserable, weary, and first and foremost, utterly furious.

"For so I hold you," the Harad man went on slowly. "None would fight half so well and," he sneered suddenly, "and my intelligence reports you are close to the Elf-spy." He tapped his fingers on his sword hilt rhythmically as though he was calculating what to say next. The annoying sound got on Aragorn's nerves and made him feel even more uncomfortable than he was.

Aragorn twisted in his bonds and strong hands gripping his bound arms so tightly bruises were left, held him firmly in place. He glared up at the man with degenerate and uncaring eyes that still sparked a fierce defiance in their own way.

"Where is the Elf? He wouldn't die so easily." said the man as he watched the mute ranger with amused eyes that glittered in a flash of lightning. The Haradrim man then drove his boot into Aragorn's stomach, causing more hot blood to suddenly burst out of his collarbone wound. "Where is the Elf?"

The captor's attention was momentarily distracted as he watched other prisoners get rounded up at spear point. It was enough time for the hostage ranger to grit his teeth in agony and he doubled into himself against the hands holding him.

The Haradrim mortal narrowed his eyes and said in a commanding voice, "have you nothing to say?"

"Not for your ears, Slave of Sauron," spat the ranger back with difficulty. He was certain that the words 'Slave of Sauron' were not necessary to answer to stupid question (in his opinion), but in his usual manner, he had to infuriate his captors to madness. Of course he didn't do that on purpose, but he never could really stop himself either. Elrond was convinced that this was something the twins had taught him, the young Dúnadan recalled gloomily.

The rain, tumbling down still in buckets, provided little help for the interrogation of the prisoner. And when the Haradrim warrior thought about it more, it provided no help. He glanced at the captain to his left and nodded, "We are moving out. I can't imagine even an Elf surviving out in this."

CHAPTER TWO

Silent Storms and Clandestine Dreams

He was stupid. That was the conclusion the blonde Elf came to as he lay in the bottom of the reviving stream. Staring up at the steep embankment, the fair-haired being known there was not a chance a man or Elf could get up that. He watched the rain come and he watched the lightning flash, unable to hear the thunder roll. He had been stupid for believing that a single arrow could have saved his friend when there had still been over fifty foes on their feet with more coming. He had been stupid for trying to convince the men to trust him. In summation, he had just been really stupid. No… extremely stupid and under the influence of a gripping madness.

Now Aragorn was captured and most likely soon to be dead. And he was trapped down here, unable to do anything. You can't predict the lightning you fool, he told himself with an inward shake of the head. However, he still felt like an idiot for getting trapped on the edge of a cliff in the first place. Were his fighting capabilities no better than that?

Looking to his right, he saw the pasty white face of a dead man, a Gondorian man. With eyes glazed over and blood running from his nose and mouth to mix into he water, which alone was enough to make Legolas sick. And the fact that the deceased mortal was up stream and the bloodied water flowed over Legolas as the Elf was still stricken immobile from being so close to the lightning's impact was not helping his stomach's strange feeling either. If anything it was enhancing its abilities to create vomit. The water was a repulsive and deep crimson and still turning darker with enemy and allied blood alike. He noticed one thing that gave him a twisted regret: all of the blood was red, none of it was black. There had been no orcs, simply men fighting men…and himself, the only Elf.

Legolas felt his feeling coming back and he felt his nerves regaining their control over his body, but his hearing was not returning and that was a bit frightening. He had never realized how much he had relied on hearing alone. It gave a whole new meaning to the saying; "you never know what you've got until it's gone".

The blonde being could see the water rising slowly but surely and he knew it was get out of the fast flowing water or die. He began to work his numb and freezing fingers first, clenching and unclenching them. He knew the blood was still in them of course, but the fact that they were cold from the water was not helping. It felt like they were detached from his body except for the fact that occasionally they gave him slight twinges of pain as he supposed they were getting cut upon the rocks.

It was rushing to his face now and his golden hair streamed out about him and washed over his eyes as the water began to rise quicker. He gulped the frigid air and struggled, pressing his boots against the rocks and boulders for support. He had to keep his head above the surface. He could feel the icy water closing in and biting his flesh, freezing him and he began to shake. Suddenly the urge to sleep became very strong and his blonde head stopped jerking and leaping out of the water.

What was he fighting for? This was it, everything was over. This was the end of all his hopes and dreams. This was the end of everything. Dying didn't sound too painful and the frigidness of the water seemed to lulling him gently to sleep as he felt the current taking him along. Besides, if he were dead, he would get to rest…and that sounded so…peaceful, so wonderful that he let his muscles relax.

He ceased struggling and just watched the clouds roll across the sky in flickering forms as lightning ripped holes in them with purple streaks. He wasn't frightened anymore, at least for himself, he realized with a stab of guilt that was not easily suppressible.

Aragorn was captured, or lying dying somewhere, with a wound that from what the Elf had seen, was mortal. He had failed his friend and would only help the enemy if he stopped fighting now. Aragorn would fight for him, and Legolas knew it. It was the least he could do to drag himself form the watery grave he was meant to have and track Aragorn on foot.

The current swept him under suddenly and water filled his nose and as he gaped it rushed to fill his mouth and enter into his lungs to suffocate him. He looked around under the current and saw the corpses of more men, floating by his side, showing him what he would be if he stopped now. Legolas felt fear grow inside and blowing bubbles through is mouth, he narrowed his eyes, glaring down at a huge boulder below that he was sinking to rest with. It was dark and he could only see it because of the way the water parted around it.

He was slammed into it feet first and pressing against it with all he had left, Legolas forced a way to the surface of the sinuous river. Once his head broke the frothing crest of the water, Legolas reached a hand up to brush his loose, blonde hair from his face, where it had been plastered and he drew a deep breath. You never could realize just how sweet even horribly foul air was until you have been deprived of it, mused Legolas to himself. Not that this air was foul, but if it had been he was certain it would have still tasted like honey, or maple sugar, if air had a flavor that was recognizable.

Another boulder ahead that jutted out of the water offered hope and the Elf let the current take him to it and plaster him against it. Then, all but giving it a huge hug, he managed to climb so only his waist and below was in the water.

Clutching its jagged surface and feeling it cut his skin, Legolas knew he was still alive and this wasn't some nightmare. Then, he coughed and a slight bit of water came up from his lungs, answering the question as to why his breathing had been hampered when he seemingly had no water in the organs. At least he knew he was still breathing. Just keep thinking those positive thoughts, he told himself silently with an inward and sardonic grin.

Resting his face on the rock, he took in all the air he could and then he finally felt hot tears begin to run down his pale and nearly transparent cheeks, creating their own littler rivers to join the oscillating water that would splash up and froth about his features. At first he felt incredibly stupid. He didn't know why he was crying, but he was. He hadn't cried like this in a while and an acute feeling of helplessness and hopelessness set in. But then the reason for the tears came to him in a reminder of painful clarity.

Shivering, he let the tears fall. He had lost Aragorn, he was all alone and half-dead. He was freezing and he had no knowledge of the world about him. Legolas had never really traveled this far South. His knowledge was only the things Aragorn had taught him.

The rivers all flowed South. Though he had known that himself, it didn't hurt that Aragorn had reminded him, forgetting he was dealing with a couple thousand and some years old Elf. But Aragorn had told him that since this was a desert climate, the people of Harad often built their towns and strong hold along the rivers.

Still crying and biting back sobs of failure, the Elf thought glumly that ending up in a Haradrim village was about the last thing he needed to have happen. He had no desire to get sacrificed or turned into a slave of only Valar knew what sort with these people. His shoulders shook and he couldn't hold back sobs of bitter despair, fear, and anger.

He felt like he as dying inside even if he was alive on the outside. Legolas narrowed his eyes and yelled at the water"my friend is in trouble and you are holding me back" He snarled"curse you" He didn't care if it was stupid to scream at water, it made him feel better to vent his frustrations and wrath upon something reasonably tangible.

This water was not the water of the river Nimrodel, and it was not friendly with Elves to begin with, so naturally Legolas felt his anger returned. He didn't care and he crinkled his blonde brows in fierce bitterness. Not able to blame this situation on anyone else, he blamed it on the water, rushing, frothing, pulling at him, calling him to die and forget the greatest friend in the world.

He choked and cried"I failed" He sobbed irrepressible and then he closed his eyes to try and block out the situation he as in. He couldn't hear, he was trapped and freezing, Aragorn was captured or worse.

He then remembered something that Aragorn had told him long ago, you are my best friend Legolas. Whenever you feel like you are in trouble and can't go on, just remember that and remember that I will do anything to help you. Even travel leagues upon leagues in a few days if need be.

This was some encouragement and Legolas felt his tears stop abruptly as though on command and a temporary calmness filled his mind. If Aragorn would do that for him, then he would do the same back. What was he doing feeling sorry for himself and letting undeserved guilt weigh him down? It would mean going further South into Manwë alone knew what dangers, but that was where he was going.

Recalling how his father had often called him insane, Legolas managed to crack a smile as he saw the truth in the allegation. He gave a wry and emotionless laugh before he looked at the water and watched it flame up in its fury against the rock he was clinging against for dear life. It was not going to get the best of him and he smirked at it darkly, as though it was a foe he had longed to defeat for a long time and finally sent to the Halls of Waiting.

Now, there was one problem that remained as far as this dilemma in the water went; getting free of the large and meager salvation of the reef without drowning. That was going to be a challenge he had never even dimly thought of in his craziest and most dark dreams.

As he was pressed to the rock by the force of the water current, he watched things slip by, bodies, lost and forlorn, fallen trees, arrows and leaves, fading and gliding past as though they had wings and the water were the air. Staring at the water himself once more, he began to see it as a devious being of its own. He snickered inwardly and wondered if Ulmo, Lord of the Waters was as devious as the water seemed to be at the moment.

He wouldn't find trouble believing it and then he wondered if Ulmo might be merciful enough to calm these wrathful waters and spare him. However, he doubted that as one of the top ten things on the god's list.

He saw a dead horse float by and that in itself was not surprising, many of them had to have been wounded and unable to gallop to the safety of the hills and higher placed woods. As Haradrim warriors popped up from beneath the current, Legolas felt strangely satisfied, for he saw a green and yellow feathered shaft sticking from the enemy's throat. It was satisfying to know he had slain at least one of these humans-if indeed that was the right word for them-who had injured his friend and slain many men with families.

Others might have felt a slight guilt, but not Legolas. It wasn't like he had wanted to kill these men to start with. He never wanted to go to war with Aragorn and hoped he never would again. But all was fair in love and war, or so he had heard. It was kill or be killed. He didn't enjoy it like some warriors of other races did. Of course the fact that he was rationalizing made him wonder if he did have some guilt somewhere inside. Reminding himself that war had killed those men, not himself, the Elf decided he would have to let go of the rock before he was going anywhere.

This was kind of laughable, because when he was younger, before his mother's death, he had been walking with her and had gotten stuck up in a tree. A simple walk had been too much to ask for and she had the hardest time just getting him to let go of one branch and grip another to gradually begin to climb down.

Now he was on his own and had to force himself to let go with no guidance. But he as older now, so he could do this, right? Not exactly. Looking at his fingers, holding on so tightly they were white at the knuckles he frowned and narrowed his eyes.

Willing his hand to shift one finger from its deadlock position in a crevice, he felt a thrill of victory that swiftly ebbed and was lost when a wave of water made him return his tight grip. Cursing himself, the blonde prince finally just placed his faith in Ulmo's mercy and let his grip slide free.

Instantly the rapids engulfed him and he felt strangely calm. He felt a strangeness of calmness and detachment followed by hope, a combination of emotions that one was not most likely to feel as he sank beneath the surface of the rapids and was in dire danger of drowning.

He looked at the surface longingly for a moment and then let the water take him. It was odd that for being an Elf and living for a long time compared to a human, nothing could have ever prepared him for this. He felt like he was in another world. He wasn’t frightened anymore, but in awe.

A mass of rising and bursting bubbles beneath the surface of the churning and foaming water caught Legolas' eye and he stared at it intensely. Still contemplating the thought of how the bubbles were swirling into neat shapes and sparkled like purple and nebulous stars, he came to the realization that they pointed out a dip in the rapids and a place to get pulled under and swirled around enough to suck the breath out and force the water into the lungs.

He remembered when Elrohir had been pulled out of the water after slipping from the top of a dam (while trying to pull a potentially lethal stunt of course) and how he had been so shaken, Elladan couldn't travel within site of the dam while in the company of Elrohir. Elrohir had been nearly drowned and frightened out of his mind for weeks. Of course they had all found it funny after a while, but in the beginning it was hardly amusing.

Legolas did not have much time to ponder this before he was pulled suddenly much farther under the superficies of the water than he had ever thought and for a brief moment a look of trepidation and confusion crossed his fair face.

Then everything blurred and he was twisted in the water. He felt the liquid sneaking its way into his mouth as he parted his lips to scream. His hair became wrapped around his face and he slammed into something and had the sensation of vomit rising in the back of his throat as the thought that it could be a corpse. He worked on keeping his mouth closed but the want to scream and vomit was very nearly overpowering.

Something hard hit his head and sent a shocking and immediate amount of pain throughout his body and a blinding light through his vision before blackness loomed before him. He felt himself glide as graceful as a fish through warm water into nothingness.

O0O0O0O0O0O

Eru, Legolas! Thought Aragorn with a worried frown. He heard the river rushing as he was led away and would have preferred at that point in his life to know nothing of the word drowning, nor the facts about flash floods that he knew, and thus salvage some hope for his lost friend.

The harsh fact was that he didn't believe that Legolas was coming back. He wasn’t going to white wash it, though it would feel better if he did, it would do nothing to help the situation. Being optimistic was all well and good to a point, but totally ignoring reality was quite another. Ignoring reality could result in untimely deaths and tragic accidents, not to mention depression when one realized the truth of a matter was far from his calmest and most imaginable dreams.

But now was hardly the time to get all philosophical about life, he told himself as he felt the hard grip of a Haradrim warrior sent a numb feeling through his arm as it pinched a nerve. The wound in his chest was hardly ebbing in its pain and that was a bit disturbing but it was to be expected. It was getting much worse, actually and so was the weather.

Water was frothing about his ankles, with small sticks and other minute debris dancing on the surface. All the enemy warriors around him looked tense as they escorted the prisoners to a group of Oliphaunts reserved for taking them to Manwë or Namo knew where. They obviously knew the situation was graver than originally expected.

It was not a comforting thought at all to consider the fact that these warriors had lived here their whole lives. They knew everything about the land, from weather to landscape, had planned this attack most likely according to weather and climate and now were giving the expression that their plans were dashed.

Of course for the war, this was a good thing, but for the fortune of himself and the other misfortunate captives, this was hardly a nice position to be in at all. He had the ominous feeling that things were going to go from bad to worse and that he and his companions were out of the frying pan and into the fire.

His wound was throbbing and he could still feel the hot blood running down his tunic front and turning it crimson. With a stab of pain, he stumbled and nearly fell over. He cursed his growing weakness from the excessive loss of blood and stubbornly rose up again where he had tripped onto his knees.

As he raised his eyes to see what was taking place around him, he saw a guard with a hand on his sword hilt as he watched the ranger. Aragorn gave the man a hard and defiant glare and then began to walk forward. These men were obviously not afraid to cut down the dying and had no qualms about spilling further blood without death.

Why did he keep thinking in this frightening logic? Legolas was the one who always saw the dark side before he saw the brighter side. But Legolas wasn't here, he reminded himself sharply and he felt his heart slow in his own chest as he thought of his friend broken upon the rocks and…dead. He had to be drowned by now, the water was roaring and he could hear it as he was led away.

As they neared the Oliphaunts, there was a board, revealed in a flash of lightning, that carried prisoners and supplies up to be packed onto the creature's broad back. As Aragorn watched some men being shoved onto it to that the structure was overly packed, he felt slightly more sick than he had before, if indeed that was possible.

The guards must have experienced quite a show as the ranger's face changed from white to ashen gray to a sickly green and then to a white tone again all in about ten seconds. Aragorn was watching the water rise deviously about his ankles and observing the strong undertow when he heard a scream that sounded for the entire world like a wild cat in its death throes. '

Looking up once more he saw a shadow fall from the board and crash to the ground below and as he gazed further he saw the neck of the man was bent at a strange and unnatural angle. The Haradrim were none too gently or caring about the body and gripping it cast it aside without the slightest compunction.

When it was his turn along with other numerous prisoners, he was shoved forward and pressed in tight with his captured men. As they were hauled up one of them said"Captain, where is the Elf"

His tone sounded genuinely remorseful and anxious for the blonde prince. Aragorn sighed and said"he is lost."

The young man who had inquired looked at his companions and then at his feet in shame. Drawing a deep and broken breath, the man said"I am sorry to have lost him." The soldier watched as flashes of pain, memory, sorrow and wonder danced across Aragorn's face all at once. It was truly a sad scene that would have touched the hardest soul.

"So am I" said Aragorn softly and he looked away further South, to where the lightning was flickering across the sky. The lightning had claimed his friend's life, and yet it was so beautiful and fascinating.

A soft voice to his right asked"Captain Thorongil, Prince Legolas was killed quickly, right" Aragorn turned to look at the young man who was about eighteen and a smile faintly formed on his face as he realized what the young man was trying to say him.

"I like to think so, Sirith"answered the young Dúnadan thoughtfully as he listened to the thunder rumbling in the distance as the storm moved away to trouble other places. But he knew that wasn't true…Legolas had drowned…suffocated…the most lengthy death and most frightening that he could think of.

Sirith had been one of the men that had taken the time to talk with Legolas like he as one of them and not some stranger who had no feelings. Legolas and Sirith had gotten along rather well and Aragorn had the feeling that Legolas felt child-like again when he was around the boy. He knew Legolas would be grieved to know of Sirith's capture.

Aragorn saw Legolas again, his body lying on the jagged rocks, twisted and looking broken. He could not imagine looking up through the rushing water pressing you down and seeing the sky in all its majesty above as you died…

The boy asked"Captain, where did he go…when he died" He hoped it was someplace good. He could not see Legolas going to a horrible place when he had so much faith and always seemed so kind and serene.

"He went to the Halls of Waiting to be with his grandfather and his mother" Aragorn answered as he watched the boy's face convey both pain and relief. Aragorn felt like he was going to cry buckets in about a minute. He had not thought of this sort of emotional stuff before and now that young Sirith was bringing them up, they hurt.

Sirith looked at Aragorn's shoulder and he grimaced"you are wounded, sir."

Aragorn nearly snickered at the boy's naiveté but the pain was a bit too real for that and said gently"I am. But I will be all right. Rest assured." It was a lie, but it obviously a whole lot better than the truth right now. He knew how Legolas had felt when he had been younger and the Elf had received a cut. The ranger had told him and Legolas looked at him with one raised brow in a sort of laughing pose and gave him a sarcastic no-do-you-really-think-so look.

Sirith asked one final question before they were at the top of the beast and ready to be secured, to be transported away. "Are you sure, sir"

"You have been following Prince Legolas far too much for your own good" teased the ranger. Sirith looked crestfallen and Aragorn bit his lip to not smile despite the dark situation. Then he remembered Legolas was no longer around to mother him and he no longer had to bit his lip to keep back a smile, he had to bite his lip to keep from crying. The sudden change in emotion was so fast, it would put an Elf's work with a bow to shame.

"I am sorry, Captain, but he told me to look after you if anything should happen to him, a while back" confessed the young mortal with a tear springing into his eye.

Aragorn turned a pair of dead serious grey eyes upon the younger human and asked in a flat tone"when did he tell you that"

"After he woke up from a dream, sir"replied the soldier swiftly, trying to please his captain and friend. "He saw you sleeping, said something in Elvish and then turned bright eyes on me. It was during my watch" he added quickly as t the explanation on why he was even awake. "He said he didn't think he was going to be going home and made me promise to make you treat your wounds."

Aragorn felt a tear melt from his eye and slip down his face. He had wondered why Legolas had been so quiet lately and so quick to anger and frustration. He had known he was going to die. Anger burned in Aragorn's heart. Why had Legolas not told him? That stubborn secretive Elf! He fumed inwardly, tears streaming from his eyes.

He found it slightly amusing though that Legolas had known he, Estel, was going to get wounds. Aragorn guessed that he had received them often enough and it was pretty much predictable. But the ranger also found it highly annoying that Legolas would think someone younger was more capable of looking after him than he himself.

He placed a hand on his wound and it came off wet with blood. Aragorn really had no idea why he felt so surprised. Sirith asked in a soft whisper"does it hurt, sir"

"It does indeed, Sirith" Aragorn said in an absorbed voice that sounded very close to being completely lost. "But I don't mind." His eyes took on a lost look and he watched the world far below washing away, and the bodies floating by in the fast rising water. This pain was better than the pain of loss and so he would rather be distracted by it than by his grieving heart.

Sirith seemed to understand and said nothing, but looked at his boots with sorrow and despair.

CHAPTER THREE

These Wounds We Bear

There is nothing that fear and hope does not permit men to do.
-Marquis De Vauvenargues

Legolas opened his eyes gradually and looked wearily about himself. Sandy grit half covered the blonde Elf and stuck in his hair that as plastered like a blonde paste to his neck and face. Brushing it out of the way to better his vision, the prince saw that it as dawn. A new morning and as he laid on the sandy side of the rushing river he realized it was also a new chance. He had to admit this was not entirely what he had expected. Well, waking with the sandy grit half covering his body was expected but other than that things seemed to be going strangely.

Sighing, he suddenly coughed and a considerable amount of water spilled from his mouth. Wheezing, the blonde Elf tried to sit up and found it made things worse. Fallen trees and large rocks swirled and merged into surreal images and he sank back onto his stomach setting his cheek against the cold gritty 'soil'. It felt like everything in his body was detached. He couldn't really explain the feeling and for a temporary moment his memory lapsed and he could not bring up the slightest recollection of why he was here, half-drowned and miserable.

Then all memory of the prior night flooded back and he moaned wearily at the sad and painful thoughts. But he still had no real idea of where he was. That was more disturbing than it was annoying.

This was perfect! He thought satirically.

The sun was bright and he could feel its heat on his back. Rolling over onto his back, the nearly drowned being watched the clear sky curiously. Just last night it had been storming without mercy. Now there wasn't a cloud in the sky and the cruel heat fell to the earth's surface.

It was then that Legolas remembered where he was and he moaned once more into the hot air of the morning. "Oh, Estel. I am sorry. Where are you" Closing his eyes against his pain as much as against the bright light of the sun, which he felt he didn't deserve to see, Legolas Greenleaf resisted the urge to cry in his misery.

He had to go and find Aragorn or die trying. He knew his father would rather he came home alive and if the older Elf was here right now Legolas knew he would be getting the lecture of a lifetime.

A brightly colored, exotic bird sat on a branch nearby and Legolas saw it moving its mouth in song, but he did not hear it. He then remembered the lightning and recalled bitterly that his hearing was lost. He couldn't even hear himself breathing.

Realizing he had a gift given to him by surviving, Legolas willed himself to get up and begin to walk. He was weaponless; everything lost in the torrential rainwater that had washed him away. It was a frightening thought. If he did catch up to the Haradrim, then he would be unable to fight and he was more or less sacrificing himself to let Aragorn know he wasn't alone. As he walked he began to wonder if the 'gift' was more of a curse. As far as he was concerned his life at the moment was wretched, nothing more.

As much as Legolas wanted to be there for Aragorn, he wasn't stupid. Doing that would be what an idiot would do. He would have to rely on secrecy and the power of his cloak to hide him. But that would never work, especially if he got into the heart of their kingdom or stronghold.

Walking further, Legolas knew he was at a severe disadvantage because of his hearing loss. He could be walking into an ambush and never know it, unless he saw it set up with his own eyes. The Elven prince had never before realized how much he had relied on his healing. Glaring at the sand as he walked, as if it was its fault, the immortal's blue eyes became dark, storming slits of self-bound anger.

Looking over to his left he saw something against the horizon. A long row of moving oliphaunts. They had huge structures on their backs, swaying gently with the great beasts' slow and large strides. Legolas looked closer, squinting against the sun and his eyes widened when he saw that these oliphaunts were loaded with prisoners.

Face contorted in fear, Legolas Greenleaf watched the slave drivers lash out at the bound men simply for fun. If Aragorn was with them, Legolas was horrified to even think about what they were doing to his friend. But he was also angry. If he had his bow he might have sneaked in closer and shot some of the Haradrim warriors from their mounts. That would certainly be satisfying.

If these were the same prisoners Legolas realized that he would have little chance of rescuing Aragorn until dark came. He would have to simply trail the caravan of warriors and captives.

Stumbling and nearly falling over with weariness and strangely enough, with dehydration, the prince placed his hands on his knees and bowed over for a second to catch his breath. This was not natural and it certainly was alarming that his energy and sense of balance should be deteriorating so fast. He suspected the balancing problems spawned from his ear troubles, so there was really no way around those. His head felt so detached from his body that he placed a hand on his throat to make sure that there wasn't an empty space between his shoulders and head. Nope, his neck was there and he was surprised it wasn’t broken for how twisted it felt. What his father would say if he saw him in this state, Legolas had no idea and he really was beyond caring.

O0O0O0O

It was some time later, when darkness had crept over the land and the cold winds blew once more that the oliphaunts stopped and the prisoners were lowered down to be fed and get rest. But everyone knew that there was never really a 'rest' for the prisoners, just a slight reprieve from their absolute misery. The Haradrim warriors would still perform interrogations and such things at night when there was a proper place to bind a prisoner.

Legolas shifted his feet uneasily in the wet sand and mud as he waited for the exact and right moment to sneak forward a few meager feet closer to their vast camp. Many watch fires burned and that alone told Legolas they expected the men of Gondor to retaliate.

He was being watched for.

Weaponless, the Elf had no idea what he was going to do if he was surrounded. A shadow fell over the blonde being and the prince slowly turned around to see one of the large mounts grazing in the moonlight. But something else moved… another shadow. Even though Legolas could not hear him, he knew there was a man of Harad, in the briars, watching vigilantly over the pasturing oliphaunts.

He was going to have a hard time getting past the oliphaunt's gaze. They were not fond of Elves, remembering the dark days where Elves had been forced to kill them in battles. Legolas was surprised they could remember back that far, being only animals, but they did and he had long ago accepted it as being one of nature's oddities.

Finally, after what seemed a century, Legolas crept forward a few more yards. He was thus far not discovered, but it was only a matter of time before he was taken prisoner as well. Perhaps a wiser Elf might have gone back for help, but where would he go and who would he go to? There was no one else he could confide in. He could not hear, and he knew the harsh fact that he was as good as dead at the moment as it was. But he would rather be killed trying to protect his friend or save him than he would any other way.

Narrowing his eyes and furrowing his brows, the Elven prince flipped his hood over his head and pushed his face deeply into it, hoping to be less noticeable. Now that he was closer, he could see the faces of the men, Haradrim, cruel and many.

The sight of the tattooed and painted cutthroats was chilling, but the conditions of the Gondorian prisoners tore at his heart. They were bound extremely tightly and quite a fair share of them bore gruesome wounds that would in the end prove fatal. Remembering how Aragorn had a wound and realizing now that he saw his friend nowhere, the blonde being willed himself not to sigh in despair.

This had to be by far the hardest and most despairing situation he had found himself locked within for quite some time, well, he thought with an inward shake of the head, that was if you disregarded the Corsairs. But that hardly bore any remembrance and he gave a small frown as he further studied the camp about him.

There were many Harad warriors; more than he thought his father had Elven warriors. They must have gathered from every corner of the Southern country. The wind blew and Legolas held perfectly still hoping that the soft and nearly inaudible ruffles of his cloak didn't give his position away. After a few moments of nothing incidental occurring and thinking he was clear, Legolas wriggled forwards just a little in his crouched position. He was nearing the circle of firelight from one of the large watch fires and was about to stop when something slammed into him.

A look of surprise and anger crossed Legolas' fair face before he was smashed to the ground on his stomach and his chin brutally connected with the damp soil. Cursing his luck and being found and counting his blessings for not biting his own tongue off, the Elf looked around slightly bewildered. The blow had seemingly come out of nowhere and he rued the fact that if he had his hearing still he might have heard the attack coming. But as it was he did not.

He tried to roll over to see who his attacker was but whoever it was snarled his fingers in a good sized handful of golden-hair and slammed Legolas' forehead into the hard ground with violent force causing the Elf to cry out softly. Feeling blood running down his face from where his soft skin must have come in sharp contact with a rock, Legolas blinked stupidly and tried to roll over onto his back again.

He should have known that that was never going to be allowed to happen so when a strong hand twisted one of his arms abruptly if not angrily Legolas was hardly surprised. The way the arm was twisted created enough pain to convince him that the more he struggled the more pain he would find himself in. Some blood trickled into his eyes and burned them. Shaking his head to try and relieve the tickling and burning blood on his face, the prince dug his booted feet into the soft soil and tried to pry himself out of the grasp of his assailant.

It was not even meagerly affective and so he stopped and just rested his chin on the ground. It wasn't that he had given up, he just happened to know when it wasn't worth the trouble to fight because it was going to be fruitless in the end no matter how much pain you went through to get there.

Apparently satisfied that the Elf was no longer battling him, the attacker suddenly, in one swift and fluent move, flipped Legolas onto his back. The Elf stared up into the face of a Harad warrior, bright red with war paint. He scowled down at the Elf and placed a knee on Legolas' sternum, pressing it in so that it would be harmful to struggle anymore if he chose to apply any more pressure. Legolas felt the wind being slowly but most assuredly pressed from his lungs and he wheezed.

Glaring up at the man pinning him to the earth, Legolas let his eyes speak volumes about his contempt and displeasure. Nearly curling his upper lip in disdain, the Elf wondered absentmindedly what this man might look like with an arrow in his forehead. With an inward laugh Legolas decided that it would be an improvement and only felt unsatisfied that he was not able to place on there.

The man placed his spear point against the blonde prince's throat and said slowly"Elf, you will rise without any tricks. We know your kind and won't tolerate an escape attempt." Legolas didn't hear the harsh voice, but the man was speaking slow enough he could read the lips and knew roughly what was being said.

Legolas asked bitterly but with hardly any breath left to give a lethal tone"do I look stupid to you" The man had a spear to his throat, like he was going to try some sudden move to escape! That would be insanity.

Laughing, the man said"not exactly. But what you were trying to do was a fool's errand."

"What do you have here, Sarchel" asked a harsh voice, full of scorn and contempt for the other warrior, whom he really didn't like.

The man called Sarchel dug his knee further into Legolas' breast bone causing the Elf to stifle a cry and try to squirm clear of the dull pain. Something that he found highly degrading, having to squirm. "An Elf, Captain Darcíl. He was sneaking about and up to no good I warrant."

"I bet he was up to plenty of good" said the other"good thing you caught him" The Captain sneered down at the pinned Elf with scorn in his eyes. "Prince Dorrag will be very much pleased."

Legolas glared up at this new human with utter loathing and the man just smiled. That was something that got on the blonde prince's nerves, but not nearly as much as being unable to hear what was being said of him.

As he gazed up at Darcíl, he noticed that this man had many strange designs tattooed all over his chest and face. A snake wound about the man's neck, done in a bright blue color with a purple tint to outline the scales. Its eyes were made in red and long fangs protruded from its mouth in s snarl.

Legolas noticed also, that the man carried himself with much assured posture. He seemed to know exactly how much power he had and how much he could get away with. He also knew that those beneath him could be manipulated. His eyes spoke about his temper and sly nature.

Seeing Legolas looking at him he looked at the Elf and smiled brightly"welcome to the army of the Haradrim, Elf." Then, shifting his hard gaze at Sarchel he spat"have you searched him for weapons or valuable things, like maps"

The other man shook his head and said"all my strength has been at use keeping him in place." He gave the captive prince a dig with his spear point.

Darcíl rolled his eyes as though he thought Sarchel was a complete idiot, (which wasn’t far from his conclusions on the other man) and drawing out his scimitar, he touched the cold hard tip to Legolas' neck and pressed. "Now search him"

Legolas felt alarm rising in his throat as he felt the buttons to his suede tunic being undone and he jerked only to feel the prick of the blade against his neck. Struggling to control his breathing, the Elf tried not to let his fear slip into his gaze. Instead he allowed all the anger he felt and what extra he could gather to give expression to his façade.

Finding no weapons hidden beneath is tunic, the man saw the belt Legolas used to hold his knives at times and daggers. Unbuckling it, he searched the sheathes for their weapons and found them not. They had all been washed away in the flood.

Getting frustrated and wanting to please Darcíl, the man moved down to Legolas' leather boots and slipped those off, checking the insides for maps or boot daggers. When he found nothing he reached his hand up and grabbed Legolas' chin. Then drawing up close to the Elven face of his captive he asked hoarsely"where are your weapons"

Legolas could not hear the question and so he could not answer, he simply tried to twist away from the other's grip. Luckily for him Darcíl stepped in and said"we will take him to Prince Dorrag. If he is weaponless then he is harmless enough and our prince can do the interrogations himself."

Sarchel snorted"I don't trust him as far as I can shoot him." He backed away from the blonde Elf and Legolas glared up at the men darkly. He was more than angry at his treatment, though he couldn't really blame them. He and his Elves would probably do the same thing to one of them if they caught him. It was something to be expected.

Captain Darcíl shifted his scimitar and then told Sarchel"run and tell the prince we bring what he has been seeking." Glaring down at Legolas, he snapped"now put your boots on" Legolas didn't hear what the man said but as soon as the spear was removed from his throat and he was allowed to rise the Elf slipped his suede green boots back on for the sheer fact that they were far more comfortable than going barefooted on this terrain. He felt uncomfortable under the scrutinizing eyes of the Haradrim captain. They gave him an eerie feeling of vulnerability.

The tickle of the scimitar never left his back as he was forced to stand with his hands in the air. One arm was twisted behind his back and then the other and Legolas winced in pain as much as with contempt as he felt cords being tied tightly around his wrists.

Shoving Legolas forward he commanded"walk and no tricks Elf. We have sentinels all about and none are afraid to place a bolt in you" he added as a reminder that Legolas was the captive and was not above the threat of death.

O0O0O0O

Aragorn gazed angrily at the man to his left. "That Elf betrayed you and now we are being sent to our deaths. If I were you and I saw him again, I would slit his filthy little throat." The man spat. "So much for Elven loyalty."

"Damn it" argued Aragorn sternly. "He didn't do it! I saw him fall! He was killed, same as our comrades." His wound was hurting badly and he was hardly in the mood to deal with the stupidity and stubbornness of some of the men.

Young Sirith sat to his right and his eyes were on his boots. He missed Legolas, who had befriended him even though he was the outcast. He knew Legolas was loyal at heart and would never willingly let himself or Thorongil get hurt.

The man to Aragorn's left snarled"you just can't admit that even your friend betrayed you, can you Captain Thorongil" The ranger watched as the other's face turned into a bitter scowl. "He even betrayed young Sirith who trailed him around like a lost puppy. He has no heart, or if he has he can't find it."

"Just leave Legolas out of this" snapped Aragorn fiercely. "I am still your superior officer and I don't want to hear anymore, am I understood" A stab of vehement pain ran through Aragorn's wound and scored his chest. Crumpling his face in pain, the man said testily"I don’t want to talk about it"

Sirith looked at his captain and he felt ill.

Aragorn knew now all the men would believe that he thought Legolas was a traitor, but he couldn't help that. He as greatly disturbed that a great deal of evidence was against Legolas. But he could never believe that his friend had sold him out.

He knew that if Legolas were taken captive and threatened with anything horrible under the sun; the greatest torment an Elf could endure, he would suffer it to spare his friends.

Sirith suddenly shook Aragorn gently with his bound hands and said"Captain Thorongil, sir, they bring forth a new prisoner"

Aragorn opened his eyes with a jolt, as though he had been struck by lightning. He looked and saw Legolas walking stiffly towards the tent where he knew the Prince of the Haradrim was staying. There were harsh and quick words traded with the guards at the tent flap and then Legolas was shoved in.

Legolas stared with contempt at the man before him. He was responsible for all the death and destruction he had seen, all the hurt and turmoil. Anger seethed in Legolas heart and he narrowed his eyes at the Haradrim royalty before him. Seeing the expectant facial expression of the Haradrim lord, Legolas squared his shoulder in a way that resembled his father's form of carriage and observed with a sneer of loathing"You look disappointed. Too bad for you that I will bend my knee to no one, save my king and those I deem worthy of respect."

A sharp blow to his back with a spear shaft and Legolas found himself on his knees before the man with his head bowed in pain despite his recent words. This was a position -he decided quickly- that he didn't like very much. His blonde hair had slid to cover the slight pain on his face. He was glad his face was covered, because on top of being ready to go rabid with anger, he was humiliated. The cold humiliation only served to make his livid temper rise in a way that would make any sane person want to flee in terror or at the least feel very uncomfortable as long as Legolas still possessed his crystalline and icy blue eyes.

Prince Dorrag stood up and walked around too stand before Legolas. "You will bow on your knees before Prince Dorrag, Elf" demanded Sarchel with a sneer that equally matched Legolas' for malice and spite and he nodded to his lord as Legolas stayed knelt on the ground. Legolas felt this was kind of ironic considering he was a prince himself.

"You may be dismissed Sarchel. Captain Darcíl, stay if you will" stated the Haradrim prince as he leaned back against a large chair. The Haradrim captain nodded obediently and stepped back into the shadows, watching his liege from the darkness.

A small frown garnished his face as he watched Dorrag stare down the Elf he and Sarchel had brought. Sarchel was a stupid soldier, thought Darcíl dryly. He could follow orders, but really he was worthless when it came to plans and thinking ahead. Lazily, the captain looked at the lantern the provided some light in the tent, casting off an orange glow. He imagined that it was most likely Sarchel would have slain the Elf without thinking twice and regretted it later.

The prince of the Haradrim brushed the long blonde hair away form the captive's face with his large hand. Legolas glared up with venomous eyes that were still an understatement concerning his frame of mind.

Dorrag smirked calmly as he sank his muscular frame slowly into the comfort of the large chair. Fingering his overly large signet ring thoughtfully the man said"do you know why you were not killed"

Legolas could not hear the question except for a strange muffle sound. Well -he thought grimly- some of the hearing as returning anyway. Shifting his weight he raised his chin proudly and his eyes connected with his subjugator's in a clash of wills.

Dorrag continued scornfully"well, if I told you then it wouldn't be a surprise. " Turning over his plans once more in his head, he smiled at the thoughts that seemed so perfect. But even the most perfect plans could go astray. That is why he could suffer no errors, everything must be done delicately and flawlessly.

Of course with his idiot men, he highly doubted that was going to happen. His thought filled purely with scorn as he thought what morons he governed. Well, Captain Darcíl was not all that much of an idiot. He could lead men well, and not only that, conceived the mortal prince, he was excellent with creating splendid little plans that could escalate to huge disasters for the enemy.

He had wanted to capture a Firstborn since his men first shot one that for some unknown reason had been traveling south. He knew that they were in alliance with the men of Gondor. That was the entire problem. If the Elves were quiet like they used to be and continued to stay hidden in their little trees that would be fine, Sauron the Great would deal with them later. However they were coming abroad.

He had spies in many at least three out of Four Corners of the world. A disturbing message had come from the North saying that the Elves of the hidden fortress of Rivendell were with the Rangers, dying beside them and aiding them. Giving them Lembas bread and other strange attire. They were lending them their keen sight and hearing.

He had heard of two identical dark-haired Elves that were always with the rangers and abroad in Rohan, helping to keep Sauron at bay. They were supposedly the sons of Elrond but he had not the time or resources to capture them now.

The Haradrim could not afford these Firstborn to make a treaty with the Gondorians again and go to war. Their hearing and eyesight were too sharp and found the snipers Haradrim had set in trees. They discovered ambushes and found ways around them and they never tired. He also knew that they had the annoying ability to slay the oliphaunts without such much as getting their hair out of place.

He knew it was highly unlikely that the Gondorians were going to stand by and let these men he had taken remain prisoners. He also tossed over the idea in his dark mind that perhaps they would come for the Elf as well. Men who had relationships with Elves seldom broke them off unless they were forced to, unless they had a dangerous and terrifying reason to.

But Elves were even more incredulous of men, far more incredulous.

This Elf he now had in his clutches seemed to be the key to breaking the allegiance between Elves and men. But these things must be done delicately to get the proper feelings of mistrust between the races and feelings of anger…disdain.

Making an example of this Elf would be something to definitely consider, but first he had to know his name and where he came from. How else could he send a message to his King telling the Elven ruler that one of his warriors was in his clutches about to be cruelly executed?

Conceivably the young captive ranger could be the key to this bound immortal's undoing and the undoing of an alliance made long ago. Not only that, it had been long since they had held a proper Elf-friend sacrifice. One must break first, however, but where they were heading that was not going to be difficult. As a matter of fact, it would hardly be an obstacle. He had captured and broken many slaves in his time of forty years and these would be no different.

Legolas finally could not bear this man's unwavering and proud eyes staring at him as he was forced to kneel and he asked sourly"why was I brought here" His voice sounded so muffled in his own ears he could hardly believe it was his.

"So you have a voice" asked the Haradrim Prince with a mocking tone of shock. "You have been being so quiet, are you frightened?"

Legolas had been watching the man's mouth carefully and his returning hearing, though muffled allowed him discern close enough to what the man had asked. "Not of you" answered the Elf quietly but hard and in insurgence. "I have met beings that merit dread and I regret to inform you that you are not among them." His tone had changed swiftly to a sardonic and scornful utterance.

The man raised his brows and then said"I honestly didn't think you were. You carry yourself in a high manner." He was wondering if this was a mere warrior that he had captured or some sort of Elven lord. Sighing, Dorrag called Captain Darcíl forward and inquired "did you find anything on him when he was taken"

"Nothing, my lord. He appears to be weaponless" answered Darcíl forwardly. He watched as Legolas sighed with annoyance and all but rolled his eyes.

If they were going to kill him or torture him, what ever they had in mind, he wished that they would hurry up and get started. He hated this waiting for something that he knew was going to be a nightmare. What made it worse were the scorn and the lustful happiness he saw in all the men's faces. Well, the human that was behind him he knew was different.

He just looked hard, as though carved in stone. His dark eyes were alert and honest. He had nothing to hide and yet he was secretive.

"Captain, did you find out his name or where he is from" asked Dorrag with aggravation. He hated having to pull information from anybody. It was a tragic waste of time.

Darcíl frowned and said"We thought it would be best for you to do the interrogating since you know the exact information you wish to obtain and we didn't know if you wanted him harmed…"

"You mean you thought it was best, Captain Darcíl." Dorrag smiled. "I know you. You have not served me well for many years for me to blow you off." He frowned. "However, I think you have the better affect on prisoners, they seem to melt…"

A disdainful scowl came across Darcíl's face and he replied. "I have no experience with Elves. I have heard they are harder to…"

"They are, I am certain. But the only requirement that I leave you with is that he must be able to stand on a gallows when you are through with him."

Darcíl wished he was anywhere but here and he sighed inwardly. He didn't enjoy torturing prisoners. He did it because it was his lord's will -no other reason. If it were up to him, he would have left this place long ago and been a simple woodsman.

"What would you have me do with him now" inquired Darcíl quietly, dark eyes flickering.

Dorrag thought for a moment and he looked at Legolas degenerately. They had no time for drawn out 'sessions' now. He wanted the ranger to be with the Elf during the interrogation. If one didn't break under physical pain, the emotional pain would be enough. "You may place him with that ranger. But Captain, if he gets free your family will answer for you."

Darcíl nodded blankly and gripping Legolas by the upper arms he tugged the Elf to his feet. The Elven prince gave Dorrag a defiant and scathing glare before being dragged out.

Once they were clear of the tent Darcíl grabbed Legolas and slammed his back against a tree, pressing his arm threateningly across the throat of the Elven prince. He put his weight into Legolas' neck, causing the Elf to widen his eyes as he stared at the man. "Elf, let me make this as plain as I can." He drew a deep breath and then snarled"if you escape or cause a disturbance, any tricks from you…I will thrash you within an inch of your life." He was about to let Legolas away from the tree and guide him to where he was to spend the rest of the night when he halted.

"If you cause my family to suffer, I promise you, I will find you and I will capture you alive and then I will make you wish you were dead before strangling with my bare hands whatever is left." Darcíl then released his choking grip from the prince's neck and snapped"come on."

Legolas had not heard even half of all that was said, but he guessed from the dangerous light in the man's eyes and the way he was nearly strangled that he had just been threatened. He didn't know with what or for what reason, but he knew that he had better be careful.

Legolas stumbled after Darcíl's quick pace much to his utter irritation and before long, after being weaved through numerous and various tents and campfires, he found himself standing before the Gondorian prisoners. Their looks were so dark and menacing that he nearly took a step back, aghast. He knew they had hated him or at the least mistrusted him, but what he saw now was pure malice.

Eru! He was in bonds too! What more did they want? Probably him lynched, but that was too bad, at least so far. But from what he had managed to make out with his dulled hearing was that they were planning to execute him at some point. However he wasn't exactly certain as to their plans, not enough for them to make a bit of sense.

He searched the men he had earlier called his comrades for a single friendly face, but to his dismay he found none. Darcíl stopped, watching the way the Elf looked hurt slightly and lost…alone. He smiled hollowly and said"being ridiculed by your own, Elf? What was it that you did to make them hate you so" he scoffed with a disdainful jeer.

Legolas didn't reply. First of all he could barely hear, secondly, he was didn't care much about the scornful little comment and felt that it was hardly worth the breath to answer. But his heart skipped a beat when he could not find the familiar and comforting face of his best friend. Had he been killed or died? Or were they…torturing him? Legolas winced at the thought, not very happy about the reminder that he was likely to face that himself.

Darcíl shoved him and said"do not worry, you aren't staying with them anyway. We can't afford to lose you." Smacking the Elf on the back of his head, he succeeded in increasing the potency of the headache Legolas already considered nearly blinding thanks to Sarchel slamming his head into the ground and nearly fracturing his skull.

He at least knew one thing. His father was correct when he said he was thick headed. Stumbling forward again, Legolas watched the faces of the men as he passed. They were cold and hard now, anger burned in their eyes. And as much as Legolas liked to think it didn't hurt, it did…a lot.

Darcíl suddenly kicked the back of Legolas' knees and caused him to fall forward. Crumpling to the ground, the Elf grit his teeth and resisted the urge to wince as his knee scraped the rough dirt. Water seeped through the knees on his leggings, a result of the previous torrential rains that the Elf found eminently uncomfortably. He felt the captain's strong hands on his shoulders, pressing to ensure that Legolas remained where he had fallen. He then gripped Legolas' suede tunic collar and flipped the Elf backwards so he was lying on his back. A slight bit of fear sparked forth but he was quickly replaced with sorrow.

Legolas looked about him and at first was dismayed, and then he heard a soft murmur that sounded very familiar. "Captain, its Le-" Aragorn stifled Sirith's mouth.

Muttering under his breath, the ranger growled"we will be lucky if no one heard that."

He knew that chances were Legolas' real name must never be given. However, he at least knew that Legolas was here with him. He didn't know why he found comfort in his friend being with him at this time, for it meant that Legolas was going to go through the same torment, but perhaps that was the answer. It was a twisted thought in a way, but in a way it was welcomed too. They could draw strength from each other's pain and hope.

Darcíl took some rope and placed it about Legolas ankles, drawing it painfully tight and Legolas felt the compassing of his blood to his feet severed as though they had been cut off. The knot was made inescapably tight so the only way to undo it was to cut it.

Legolas grimaced and then he felt the captain's foot on his back and he held still for a moment, wondering what was going to happen next. The Haradrim man hissed venomously"remember my promise." Legolas attempted to jerked away and without warning the foot was gone.

He found himself alone with Sirith and Aragorn. The other prisoners had not seen it fit to be around the Elf, whom they loathed. Legolas wriggled over to where Aragorn was before sitting up and he said in a serious tone"let me see your wound."

The ranger shook his head"it is fine." What was Legolas going to do anyway? He was bound harshly hand and foot.

"Which definition of 'fine' are you using? May I hear it in a sentence" asked the Elf bitterly, as he looked Aragorn in the eyes with his darkened blue ones. He hadn't even heard what Aragorn had just said, but he knew that the ranger had claimed to have a perfectly fine wound. It was always the same and he didn't have to hear it, he knew it.

It was then that Legolas knew it was stupid to ask to hear it in a sentence and he slapped himself inside. Without his hearing he was missing a lot more than he ever thought he could. You could not possibly know what the full disadvantages of losing your hearing were until it was lost.

He suddenly felt Aragorn's bound hands on his shoulder and they turned him to look into the concerned silver eyes that looked Elven. Though this was not surprising considering that he was raised in a home of Elves. He saw Aragorn's mouth speak his name in a low murmur so no one else could hear it.

When Legolas didn't respond Aragorn felt his anxiety rise and he asked"Legolas? Whatever is the matter other than being bound like a convict" Legolas looked away and Aragorn was not going to have his friend hiding anything from him. Bracketing Legolas' pale face with his bound hands he rotated the Elf's head to face him. "Legolas"

Legolas knew Aragorn was saying his name. But he could not hear it and that hurt…a lot. His eyes looked at the damp ground and then at a trampled plant. He muttered quietly so Aragorn could barely hear"its not important. I am hale, really."

"But you're not" pointed out Aragorn. "And I know you well enough to know that whatever is on your mind right now is extremely troubling to you." This persistence on Aragorn's part would normally be annoying. Legolas wished to the powers at be that it was, he missed his friend's lectures. He missed the persistence that was like a constant poke in the chest telling him he was wrong.

Legolas forced a false smile and he tried to place a laugh in his voice"no. I am just weary from trying to catch up with you." Legolas knew it would sound a whole lot more authentic if he could actually hear himself and that in itself was a little humiliating. He scrutinized the frowning face of his friend for any sign that his devious attempt at lying had been well received.

If a scowl and narrowed eyes were anything like happiness and belief then he would have succeeded. However that was not the case and he winced as he realized that Aragorn knew he was in horrible discomfort.

The young Dúnadan spoke softly and Legolas knew that much from the slow way his friend's lips moved. "Legolas, I will help you, but you have to tell me." Legolas pulled his face free of Aragorn's now trembling hands.

Aragorn grabbed Legolas' face again and said firmly"Would you just look me in the eye" Legolas sighed and when he tried to pull free again Aragorn held him tightly. "I just want you to know you aren't alone. You have friends. I know you are no traitor."

The knowledge that his friend was speaking words of comfort and he was unable to hear them stung Legolas' weakening heart as affectivity as any venomous wasp might. He sighed before he shivered violently, his whole frame shaking. Sobs longed to come forth as he finally realized with bitter clarity that he was frightened without his hearing.

Choking back the tears and creating a festering lump in his throat Legolas murmured in a low and unstable voice"I can't hear…"

"Legolas…"said Aragorn in a soft and friendly voice that offered his condolences. He believed his friend. This wasn't a joke. The image of the lightning nearly turning Legolas into a charred Elf raced through his mind. It had blown Legolas' acute hearing, Aragorn realized as his heart dropped right down to his boots with a sickening draining sensation that made his stomach sick.

Scooting closer to his friend he let his actions speak louder than his words. There was not much he could do here, especially with his hands bound as they were. Gently he pressed Legolas' head down into his lap, so that one ear, his left, was facing up. He was surprised and greatly alarmed at the lack of resistance that the stubborn prince displayed.

Gingerly in the fear of causing acute pain he shifted the blonde hair away form the slender and pointed ear. Legolas winced at the touch, anticipating the pain. But none came and Aragorn's hands were very gentle. He carefully inspected the ear and found swelling. Legolas' eardrum had most likely only suffered temporary damage, but until the swelling went down he was liable not to hear a thing for days.

Legolas felt his friend's circumspection and calming fingers massaging his ear, trying to help with the loss he knew Legolas was feeling. Closing his eyes, Legolas permitted the gentle and caring feeling of his friend's love and fellowship lull him to sleep though he really didn’t feel like sleeping at all.

Aragorn listened to his friend's soft and deep breathing as he worked the ear with care not to cause anymore discomfort. He smiled and Sirith came up by him, staring at Legolas carefree face.

"Will he be well, Captain" asked the young boy as he looked at the ear that was being rubbed cautiously and vigilantly.

"He would be if he was anywhere but here" answered the ranger darkly as he stared into the night for a moment. He looked back down at Legolas and saw a dark spot on the Elf's forehead, a growing bruise flecked with dried blood.

In the light of the watch fire he stopped working the ear and his fingers carefully touched the purple blotch that was set against the otherwise pale features. Legolas jerked a little and then he stopped and opened his eyes with a start. They swirled upward and he looked into Aragorn 's comforting face.

Legolas frowned and as Aragorn placed a finger to his lips"Thorongil, you shouldn't be doing this, it is I who should be seeing to you." He began to get up and Aragorn pushed him down and scowled him benevolently.

His own deep wound was throbbing with every slow and minute beat of his laboring heart. It sent thrills of prickly and concentrated pain through every fiber of his awareness. He wished his brothers were here or someone with a knowledge in healing. For a brief and actually exalted moment he felt a stab of longing for home, his brothers, his room with its warmth and comforting blankets and crackling fireplace. Above all, he longed for his Ada to wrap his arms around him and reassure him about how much he loved him and that everything was going to turnout well in the end.

It was a lonesome thought that he had not seen the old Elf in near four years since he and Legolas had been down in the South fighting; seeing and spilling so much crimson blood. They were staining their clothes with their own blood and the blood of their enemies. Now it seemed like all their labors were at an end and they would die far away from home and be missed, their fathers never knowing what became of them.

Legolas looked up at Aragorn, watching the pain on his friend's face and the moisture coming into the silver eyes, giving them a strange and misty effect, like a heavy fog over a cool and beautiful stream with dew drops hanging in the air. Suddenly the Elf realized that his vision had blurred and he felt a burning in his own two eyes.

Aragorn looked down; realizing that Legolas had seen his pain and he smiled even as the tears he felt threatened to spill. Shifting some of the blonde Elf's long hair away from his face, he pressed the head back down into his lap. "You just get some rest, Legolas." His voice was soft. Aragorn was feeling so far away and surprisingly the agony shooting through his shoulder and chest was welcomed.

He had only one wonderful thing to be extremely grateful and glad for: Legolas, who was thought to be dead, was alive.

CHAPTER FOUR

Only the Beginning

Sitting upon the broad shoulders of the large oliphaunt with captain Darcíl to his left, holding the end of the rope halter that laced tightly around his neck, with large knots that when twisted just right, bit and pinched the flesh in an annoyingly painful way, Legolas was careful about breathing.

He was quickly finding out that if he stepped out of line just a little bit the effects could be far less than lovely and as a matter of fact they could be downright painful. One of the knots, two actually, must have been on either side of a nerve in his neck and when twisted, they sent a jolt up his face that actually burned.

He also noticed Darcíl had no qualms about letting the captive Elf know in no uncertain terms exactly whose hands he had fallen into and what rules he was expected to submit to. The Haradrim captain nudged the bound Elf with his shoulder and hissed, "we approach our destination and your waking nightmare."

Legolas shivered as he achieved the ability to discern what was said. Aragorn's ear massage had helped some and now everything said was just fuzzy but audible. If Aragorn was beside him he might not be feeling so down hearted and lost. But his friend was on another oliphaunt before him, sitting with Prince Dorrag and being guarded ceaselessly by Sarchel and a few more men.

Darcíl watched as Legolas sat up a little straighter and shifted uneasily. Smiling he hissed in the Elf's pointed ear, "isn't it lovely?"

Fences and walls of stone loomed ahead, bleak, and already looking painful. The sun beat down on them mercilessly, making them hot and miserable. Squinting his eyes into slits of bright blue, Legolas could see the walls of a castle or palace, but they were not finished and as he looked closer, he saw with blurred clarity the numerous slaves that were hauling stone with the heat of the sun battering them down.

Finally he found his tongue and muttered incisively, "charming.” The blonde Elf now felt a dark foreboding that was hardly suppressible spiking up in a way that made him sick. Actually, he had been feeling sick the entire trip. Now he was feeling really sick.

Darcíl smiled and said slowly as though he relished what he was saying, "glad you like it." He reached over and patted Legolas' back in a mocking way that made the Elf twist away and glare daggers at him in annoyance.

"Do not touch me," he said in a flat and emotionless tone that was strangely lethal. His eyes turned from a dreading look to a hard one of ice and steel. As the wind pulled his hair aside, Darcíl stared leeringly at the Elf and then shook his head with a smirk.

This blonde being was so naive about how things worked. This Elf was a slave, a captured prize. He was vanquished, at their mercy. What part of defeat did that egotistical Elf not grasp? He would learn in due time though, however Darcíl did not want to think about that. Tormenting captives was not his favorite thing to do. It still angered and pestered his normally quiet or suppressed conscience.

Legolas blinked as they turned into the sun to follow the road into the Haradrim death camp, or so Legolas perceived it to be. What else would they be sent to with such vast fences of bladed tops where climbing them would rip an unfortunate escapee to ribbons?

Aragorn said for what had to be the fifth time since he had started talking with the Haradrim prince, "I will not tell you anything my friend has not already agreed to talk about." His tone was flat and slightly dangerous in his mounting anger.

He remembered something that Erestor had once told him about negotiations. If you give in, even the minutest bit, you will find yourself losing more and more ground. He was not even going to give them Legolas' name or anything concerning the Elven prince. Something deep inside his heart warned him telling them even where Legolas came from was potentially fatal.

"You know what fate you bring upon your friend and yourself?" asked the Haradrim ruler with a raised eyebrow as he stared at the ranger, who was looking stiff from his wound. "If you are more reasonable, I will make sure his neck breaks when he falls and he doesn't have to endure the…suffocation process." A cold smile, as brittle and fell as a December dawn crossed his face.

Aragorn instantly growled thickly, "what do you have planned for him?" The man's eyes turned into dark grey orbs or turmoil and his brows were drawn together. A slight touch of grey paled his skin as he realized what this man was saying and the full impact of the offer hit him. And the ranger had distinct feeling that the grey touch was turning a sickly green as his stomach began to churn uneasily.

Dorrag slowly eased himself back in his large throne like chair uniquely strapped upon the oliphaunt's back with a shade providing canopy over it. He took off his large ring and rolled it around in his fingers leisurely and then looked at Aragorn. "We cannot afford an alliance of Elves and Men to form against us."

A knot, hard and cold formed in Aragorn's stomach as he listened to the words of the plan made for his friend and most likely himself. His blood seemed to lose its warmth and he shivered without even thinking about it.

"This Elf-spy of yours was not one we honestly expected to catch. As it turned out all we needed was you for bait. He walked right into the camp searching for you," the Prince of Harad watched Aragorn's face calculatingly for guilt and sorrow. "But now that we have him I have come to the conclusion that he will make an impressive little example of what happens when Elves mettle in the affairs of men…he and any envoy sent for negotiations of his release."

Aragorn did his best to keep a stony face. Feeling like he had lost his voice completely the ranger affirmed, "you mean to put him to death…" The man worked his jaw and glared at the Haradrim prince in disgust.

"Indeed, but I can't do it properly until I know his name and where his home is. I am sure his lord would mourn to know a fine warrior of his has been captured and is about to executed along with several of his Elven emissaries that I am sure he will send for negotiations of his release." Dorrag twirled his ring before he set it on is finger and he studied with scrutinizing eyes the face of the captive ranger before him.

If he was looking for weakness he was sorely disappointed. If anything the man's face hardened and though it had become more grave it seemed stronger. "And if I am not told who he is willingly…"

"You will persuade us to tell you," finished Aragorn resentfully, "I know." His grey eyes seemed to dull and his wound's throbbing increased.

"Not I," the tattooed man replied thoughtfully. "Captain Darcíl will. But here I give you one more chance to give me the information I seek willingly." Narrowing his eyes into dark and sinister slits of malice, greed, and power hungriness, the man stared down the ranger. But Aragorn's will was disturbingly more stubborn than he had given it credit for and the man withstood his piercing gaze while delivering one of his own.

"You will pay in this world and/or the next for every scream, or moan you tear from his throat," promised Aragorn rigidly. He whispered ominously, "every drop of blood you draw from his body." The man's eyes held Dorrag's for a minute that seemed an eternity. "Do I make myself clear?"

"Crystalline." His captor's voice was filled with mockery and scorn. "But you and that Elf won't live to see it." He looked back to the oliphaunt behind them that held Legolas and Captain Darcíl along with other warriors, for he had not allowed Legolas to be placed with the other prisoners for fear of a little mutiny or murder.

"Perhaps not, but we will die knowing justice will eventually be dealt out," retorted the dark-haired ranger confidently and soberly. "So let your men do their Orc-work and may it be their worst."

"You know not what you willingly walk into, ranger," admonished Dorrag with disbelief that this man had the strength to not break down under these threats. It angered him that he was being told to prove himself. The threats were not enough. "You know not what you drag your friend into," he added with a bitter snarl.

"Oh, but I do," answered Aragorn calmly. "And I know I speak for both of us." His voice went hard and he clenched his jaw.

"One of you will break," promised the Haradrim prince. "You have my word." He looked to his palace that was being built for his glory. The sun brightly reflected off the cold marble of the quarries and the new walls still being hauled into place.

As Aragorn looked morosely at the looming palace that was under careful construction he saw the proud and hard looks in the man's black glittering eyes as he sat enthroned above him. The ranger quickly sent a silent and swift prayer to Illuvatar pleading for strength.

He shifted his gaze to his annoyingly calm captor. "Your word? Of what sort of worth is that I wonder?" he asked mockingly as he pretended to weigh the truth of the Haradrim prince's words mentally.

"It is worth more than you think. I can assure you ranger."

O0O0O0O

It was some time later when Prince Dorrag sat upon his throne. With his father's absence abroad on the battlefields, he was in full power. Everybody answered to him and he to nobody. It was a rather great feeling now that he thought of it. He could certainly get used to it, which was a good thing because he planned to.

Smiling he called Captain Darcíl forward briskly. "Where is the Elf and ranger?" he inquired in a weary voice. His glittering and questioning eyes fell upon the steady eyes of his first captain. "Are they enjoying themselves?"

Darcíl smiled coldly and without emotion as he answered his liege humbly and yet with a touch of frosted over pride. "They will learn to love their cells," came the assuring answer. "Right now however, I find our guests are a bit ungrateful."

"Tell me, how is the Elf doing in the dark below?" he scoffed grimly and he looked into his most trusted captain's eyes.

He did not welcome how Darcíl was a free thinker, but he knew that the man would do whatever he was told, for his family's sake but never his own.

Bowing submissively before his lord, Darcíl lowered his eyes in quiet respect and said discreetly but at a leisurely pace, "he is…adjusting."

"Bring him to me. Tell him I offer him…a proposition..." instructed Dorrag with a degenerate look and yet one of an intense expectation with a mysterious glimmer in his eye that was haunting.

"May I advise you, my lord?" Asked the captain cautiously, knowing the perilous mood Dorrag more often than not possessed. The Haradrim prince nodded with reluctance and slid his signet ring back onto his finger irritably. He hated being given advice and taking it even more, but he knew that Darcíl had far more wisdom than he often let on.

"Elves' weakness lies not in their body or spirit, but their emotion. A broken heart can slay them if the tales of old hold faithful," he enlightened his sovereign as to the potential way to shatter the blonde prince below. "I think, if you harm the ranger, this Elf's emotion will sack his wisdom and he will impart to you everything you want to know."

"You know this?" asked the ruler skeptically as his fingers drummed in a slow rhythm vigilantly upon the armrest of his large golden throne. The pace at which they beat against the precious metal sped up in frustration and he demanded harshly before he gave the captain a chance to hardly gather breath to speak, "where did you learn of this?"

Gripping the edges of his chair he went tense as a bowstring and then drew a deep breath as he massaged his temples to try and get control of his temper that was beginning to flare. "Never mind. I don't care. Bring him up here." Taking a drinking vessel from the table near at hand he cast it angrily upon the floor, a loud booming clang of metal upon marble resounded eerily.

O0O0O0O

Legolas sat -if it could be called sitting- against the wall with the heavy chains about his ankles and wrists. He hated the dark. He could not see his friend and could hardly hear him. "Thorongil?" he whispered fearfully into the deep darkness of the dank dungeons.

"Legolas, I am right here," came the cool response. Aragorn reached his cold hand as far as he could with the restricting chains and found he could barely retain a faint grip upon Legolas' quivering one. "Fear no darkness, mellon nin," he said softly in an promising voice from which he hoped Legolas could gather a little strength.

"I do not fear it, Estel," he whispered hoarsely, surprised he had been able to hear his companion. "But I don't trust it and I certainly do not enjoy it." His normally strong and fair voice sounded strained and Aragorn knew Legolas was making a great effort to keep his growing anxiety down.

"Just hold my hand," said Aragorn to his friend. He smiled softly in the night of the prison as he felt Legolas squeeze it tightly. A light shown ahead in the dark corridors and catacombs of the castle like fortress. The fire of the brand sheened on the walls and glowed as the flames danced and struggled for life in the damp darkness.

Legolas watched it with narrowed eyes and he looked sidelong at Aragorn with a dispirited look all over his features.

Aragorn listened intently and to his growing dismay he heard the solid and rhythmic tramping of many booted feet. One would hope they could be left to rest after their journey and talk. But of course it would be folly for any conqueror to let his prisoners recover their strength.

He looked at Legolas and through some deep sense they both knew what was about to transpire and it wasn't going to be anything fun. It was only obvious that Legolas would be taken up for questioning and a 'session' would follow, immersing them in both in an acrimonious struggle with their emotions. And logically, Aragorn would be next.

"Be strong, mellon nin," encouraged Aragorn with a bright smile as he watched Legolas smile twistedly back with a abstruse glimmer in his eyes that looked very devious, as usual.

He is a Wood-Elf, reminded Aragorn to himself slowly. Of course his smile will be dangerously devious, especially considering he is a prince among the Wood-Elves. Knowing Legolas' crafty personality the only thing the blue-eyed prince was probably revered for was his twisted smile that he was capable of casting at anyone at anytime.

"It was you who taught me. How could I fail?" asked the Elf as he slowly released his friend's hand after giving it another quick squeeze that was a short farewell. "You are stubborn, Estel."

"You are insane and an idiot, nothing more." Aragorn watched and he honestly used nearly all his strength to push aside a sharp wince when the rusty iron key was slammed into the rusty lock with a sickening screech that resembled what Aragorn would imagine as a nazgul in its death throes.

Legolas didn't respond and instead turned a bright and precarious gaze upon the three men entering his small cell. He made an effort to remember not to scoot backwards in the least or do anything that could give his tormentors any reason to think he was weak or craven. But in reality he wanted to shrink into the stone wall and be completely hidden from everything.

A sinking feeling began to feel like it was pulling him to the core of the earth by his stomach's center and he had never realized that even lifting a single finger of clenching your fist could be such work. It was as though everything had slowed down and become heavier. He dreaded this little confrontation, deep down in his heart that was beginning to accelerate against his mind's silent commands.

Darcíl smirked down at the chained Elf and his two companions fixed Legolas with a -do-not-fight-us-or-we-can-make-your-life-a-whole-lot-more-miserable look. Legolas looked at their hands for no real reason other than the fact it wasn't a sneering face and saw the clubs they bore. Metal strips ran on opposite sides and the rest of it was a very hard oak wood as opposed to ash.

Legolas smiled grimly to himself, realizing how silly he was to be thinking of the different types of trees at this particular time. If he hadn't known better it would have appeared to him that the clubs were a rather blood thirsty lot. But they couldn't possibly have minds, could they? What a stupid question to ask.

Shivering against the cold wetness of the dank dungeon that seemed to bite through his clothes and into his bone's core relentlessly, the Elf looked Darcíl in the eye and he raised a slender brow as he informed them, "I find it hard to believe that you came this far just to see if we were well and comfortable."

Darcíl smiled hesitantly and said with a curt nod regarding the Elf shackled before him, "you are right." With a minute and nearly unnoticeable frown, the man said, "Prince Dorrag requires your presence, therefore I have been told to escort you that way."

"Well you can inform your prince that I am disinclined to venture into his charming halls," came the acidic reply as Legolas discerned what had been said from the muffles he could hardly hear. He felt an aggravating pain on his wrists and realized that the rusty shackles wound about them were working their way painfully deeper into his already inflamed skin.

"I thought you would be in that frame of mind," came to cool reply as Darcíl watched Aragorn glaring daggers at him. "So I arranged for an extra escort." He twisted his eyes back to the two men pointedly.

Legolas undetectably shifted his weight in an attempt towards relieving the annoying pain from his shackles but his crystalline blue eyes never left the tall Haradrim captain. Aragorn glanced sidelong at his friend and noticed the blonde Elf's breathing was struggling to stay steady and not give away his growing fear that was beginning to gnaw hungrily at his mind.

Darcíl took an additional red-brown corroded key and used it to unbolt Legolas' iron manacles from loops in the cold stone wall while keeping them around his wrists and ankles.

The two men came and gripped either one of Legolas' arms tightly, digging their surprisingly strong fingers into the soft flesh of the captive Elf, pinching it and leaving small bruises that actually throbbed for a split second. Legolas felt grateful that was the most painful thing he was experiencing at the moment.

Forcing the Elf to his feet, they proceeded to try and drag the blue-eyed Elf from his cell, which the more Legolas thought about it, was rather comfortable and welcoming. The prince jerked and grappled in their strong and relentless grasp, knowing perfectly well that his attempts at freedom were futile and that he was wasting his time. But he was going to make them work at least to make him do something he didn't want to. If he was lucky, he might leave a bruise or two, though breaking a nose or something might serve him better and be far more gratifying.

Slamming his elbow into the soft stomach of one of the men ruthlessly dragging him, Legolas nearly broke free. The Haradrim guard doubled over and grunted with a satisfying amount of difficulty, "you…damn…Elf."

Darcíl watched with an amused curl of his upper lip and mirth glittering in his eyes. This Elf was stronger than he had originally thought. But that was to be expected from one of the Firstborn race. They were stubborn, wise and with tender hearts that though they appeared weak were strong as weaved Mithril. It was quite an odd combination, thought Darcíl calmly as he watched the intense and frivolous struggle ensuing before him.

In the end the blonde being was kicked and threatened into submission. And that in itself only lasted a meager amount of roughly two minutes and then Legolas found his verve and attacked his captors again with an astonishing amount of effect.

Unfortunately for the Elf he was finally pinned to the ground and his arms were twisted behind him. Then they were clasped into a set of hand-cuff like manacles that were set an extraordinarily tight setting and cut off the circulation of his hands in a way that could be called painful.

Standing now before Dorrag's throne. Legolas met the man with pure and unaltered contempt seething in his narrowed eyes.

The Haradrim prince scowled with an equal amount of loathing in his black eyes. Glaring at Darcíl, who was studying the tile on the floor he screamed fiercely, "get him on his knees before me! Now!" His look of abhorrence changed to one of scorn and amusement as Darcíl came and kicked Legolas in the small of his back just below his chained hands.

Legolas felt a brief amount of pain that was hardly worth the confused and momentarily surprised look that flickered across his face and against his will his knees bent and the blonde prince fell forward. He winced as he was smacked harshly in the back of the head by the open hand of the obedient Haradrim captain.

"Look at the floor, Elf. Show some respect," he demanded as he ran his tanned fingers along the edges of the metal pinned to the club, debating on whether or not it would be a wise decision to use it just yet.

Legolas waited a fleeting moment before raising his head slowly up, a hard and grim look on his fair features. He glared stonily at the Haradrim prince who was rubbing his chin thoughtfully with his fingers as he took into account how this Elf showed no fear…at least not yet. It was something that annoyed him greatly -a prisoner not begging for mercy- but it would be beautiful when this fair Firstborn was reduced to tears. The harder they were to break, the harder their downfall was and all the more interesting for himself.

"So," he began in a drawn out way that the chained Elf found highly irritating. "Have you been informed yet as to what I spared your life for?" He met Legolas' eyes and said, "your life is much more tenuous than you would like to think." He looked at Legolas calculatingly bored expression.

"I could order your slow and painful death," he reminded with a small laugh that was nearly to himself, as though he was remembering some old and much treasured memory. Legolas wrinkled his nose in disgust.

He was quiet a minute as he untangled the words from the muffles he had heard. Then the blonde Elf said angrily, "I was never told, Edain, about anything concerning why I have been thus singled out for your abuse and contempt except hints and riddles." His own words pulsed in his ears and he found it disturbing that he could hardly hear them or feel how much of his emotion was slipped into their tones.

Dorrag sighed in sick disappointment. He then smiled wryly and waved a heavily decorated hand about him in a broad gesticulation before he asked Legolas proudly, "and what do you think of all this?"

The Wood-Elf smirked haughtily, "of what? This room? Your ill-earned wealth? Or how I was dragged here like a whipped cur and have yet to be given a decent reason?" He knitted his brows and straightened up, squaring his shoulders antagonistically. Glancing to his right, he glared at Darcíl with malice and then turned stonily back to the ruler of Harad.

"'A whipped cur'? We shall see about that later, Elf," he stated ominously. "Of course," he added. "That actually all depends on what you tell me now." A perilous and mysterious glimmer flickered in his dark eyes as he watched Legolas' face contort with nothing but pure and unaltered contempt.

"What do you want to know?" asked the Elf carefully thinking about what to say. He longed for defiance. But he was smart enough to know that would bring him nowhere at this point. He must get as much information from this Haradrim ruler as possible before he could make a half-wise decision about what to do.

"Tell me, what is your name? Surely not something that frivolous you will withhold from me?" Dorrag watched with mounting frustration as Legolas raised his chin defiantly and his eyes went the color of dark sapphire stones set in a cold silver piece of metalwork. It reminded him of a bright starry night in bitter winter without the light of the moon.

"What would you want to know my name for human?" the blonde Elf asked, a question for a question. His never lowered his chin or let his façade of calm defiance falter for even a moment.

Darcíl glared at the Elf with repulsiveness and rumbled a threatening growl in detestation. He was about to strike Legolas across the face with his open hand but Dorrag raised his right hand to prevent it. Obediently Darcíl stopped and his hand fell clenched to his side.

"You are a prisoner here, I have every right to know it."

"Ah," said Legolas with scornful understanding. "So it is on general principal then?" He smirked with laughter playing in his eyes. This Hadarim prince must take him for a fool, or he was a complete idiot himself. The words Dorrag said shouted liar! So loud that Legolas was surprised the man didn't just say it outright.

"If you like," answered the Haradrim Prince. He leaned forward and whispered, "things will go easier for you if you but tell me this little trivial piece of knowledge. I may change my plans…"

"So whispered the spider to the fly as he called him into his web," laughed Legolas scornfully as Dorrag leaned back. "A 'trivial piece of knowledge' you call it. Why then do you seek it with lust in your eyes?" Legolas met Dorrag with a knowing and piercing gaze. "You would use me against my own people."

Legolas felt a slight twinge of happiness as he realized his hearing was coming back finally. But it was still hardly perfect or above average.

"So Elves really can perceive things from afar. I thought that was a fairy tale," the ruler mused quietly. He rested his chin on his hand thoughtfully. "Where do you come from?" he asked in a pressing voice.

Legolas smiled slowly at the thought of an arrow in this man's throat and with the knowledge that Dorrag was getting frustrated and angered. It was a twistedly pleasant thought. It was also a mixture of suicidal insanity that was still exceptionally satisfying.

A sharp pain hit him across his face and he fell to the tiled stone floor of the palace with a small cry of pain that he regretted the instant it passed his lips. He opened his eyes and cursed himself inwardly for closing them. Blood, salty and coppery and bright red filtered into his mouth and outlined the corners. A swelling sensation was at work on his right cheek and the Elf gingerly brought his fingers to touch the large bruise that was forming on his pale face.

Darcíl gripped the club he had just smashed the Elf across the face with tightly. He watched as Legolas got back up slowly and stared at all of them with indiscrete anger. He sucked the hot blood that was coming form his cracked lip bitterly and felt his face burning with humiliation as much as with the blood rushing to the swiftly forming welt.

Brushing some golden-hair away form his face by rubbing his undamaged cheek on his shoulder, the Wood-Elf narrowed his eyes as he tried to find his tongue, which appeared to be twisted and tied up. He felt like he could not speak. Darcíl whispered to Legolas, "let that be a lesson, Elf."

Legolas, even without the ringing that insisted on throbbing through his ears, would not have been able to hear a murmur that low. He twisted his face away sharply as he was pulled to his feet aggressively by the chains on his wrists. They tore at his skin and he felt his wrists burning as they became raw and blistered.

Dorrag growled, "take him away and see if you cannot convict him of reason." He waved his hand in disdain as he spoke, "quickly now and then report to me when you are finished."

Legolas pulled on his bonds as he was dragged from the room. He knew he was never going to get away, but he wasn't going to let them torture him willingly. He wondered what was happening to Aragorn and he sent a swift and silent prayer to Manwë that his friend was not facing the same pain and horrors that he was about to.

Darcíl waved his two men off as they struggled with the blonde Elf in tow. "Take him away to the further room below in the East Wing and secure him. I will join you soon," he commanded shortly.

Darcíl came and stood before Dorrag's throne calmly, his sharp eyes watching his liege's face for signs of his mood. "My lord, might we take counsel?" he asked carefully with an unpretentious bow. As he raised his head he saw the Haradrim prince look off to the windows.

"Captain Darcíl, the ranger, he is wounded, correct?" asked Dorrag mindfully.

Darcíl nodded, "badly so."

"If the Elf refuses to break, I want you to take that ranger and see if we don't get better answers to our questions. However, report to me first."

"As you wish, my lord," answered the captain. He then sighed wearily and said, "Prince Dorrag, how do you expect to send an envoy to this Elf's homeland without them being shot on sight?" He wrinkled his brow and spoke sternly. "I do not expect the vigilance of the Elves to allow such an emissary to pass..."

"We will have tokens that they will not want to cast aside…tokens of their friend. There will be tidings that they dare not miss," explained Dorrag as he stared beyond his captain at the tapestry on the curtains.

"Dead men are easier to search than live ones," cautioned Darcíl firmly. "With all due respect to a lord of your stature, your father would never do such a risky action. I am beginning to wonder if we have made an error. If we put this Elf to death now, word will get out soon enough."

"But the statement I wish to make will be unclear," growled Dorrag. "You are wise Darcíl. Do not question my authority or my decisions, lest your children should find themselves as orphans, serfs in the streets!" he threatened.

"Leave my family out of this!" he warned. Then went silent with anger that he was working to suppress for his beloved family's sakes. If it had only been his own life he was playing with he might have been a little more rash and careless. He could say with all certainty his body would be swinging on the gallows as a feast for the black crows. "What do you propose?"

"We shall keep one of the emissary they will send alive and make him watch as his fellows are hanged, one by one, first being that golden-headed menace you managed to capture. Then, after thrashing him within an inch of his own life and branding him we will send him quaking to his lord." He smiled coldly and his voice turned steely. "The alliance will break and they will leave Middle Earth like the craven slaves of the Valar they are."

"Surely the Elves will retaliate against us, they will not be silent after the slaying of their own who came in peace," began the Haradrim captain urgently as he sensed a dangerous mistake being made. "If they retaliate they will level this palace and everyone in it. Not even you shall be left standing, though many fall for your sake-"

"But they will not retaliate. They have seen too much war and their sorrow will run deeper than their lust for revenge," reasoned Dorrag sharply.

"What of their friends?" asked Darcíl urgently.

"They are few and even if they dared to requite we would crush them," retorted Dorrag defensively. "Now are you my right hand or not?"

"I am because you force me to," answered Darcíl forthrightly. "And I tell you this only because you ask it of me." He stared into his lord's eyes grimly. "With your leave I shall go and…attend to the Elf."

"You have my leave."

The prince of the Haradrim watched as his captain walked out. This one could be trouble. His father had been right. Darcíl was far wiser than he let on and was a talented warrior. For this Dorrag respected his captain, but his mistrust became darker.

O0O0O0O0O

Legolas lifted his head from where it had fallen numbly upon his bare blood-covered chest. He had not even remembered letting it fall now that he thought about it. It had just slipped down quietly in weariness. His blue glazed eyes watched unblinkingly as Darcíl stood before him with the club in hand.

Legolas stared at the sanguine liquid that coated the metal of the club dully but not without interest. It was his blood, lots of it, trickling on the cold iron in red rivulets. How could he lose so much? It was fascinating how much blood one had in their body and how much one could lose without dying. He felt his own hot blood dribbling down his bare chest where his tunic had been opened and the club ruthlessly applied, beating the flesh mercilessly. At one point he had been certain he would pass out and now he wished to the powers at be that he had.

Every heartbeat that kept him alive was a torment. Every breath was a complete agony as it pressed against his badly bruised and battered rib cage. Yet, he found it odd that not a single rib was cracked. Darcíl had been careful not to break a single bone and dimly guessing the dark purpose behind it Legolas shivered slightly. But he guessed that if he withheld the information wanted too long nothing would be spared.

Sweat dripped into Legolas' eyes as he worked to suppress and hide the horrible pain that was pulsing through his awareness in intense and relentless waves of sheer misery. He swallowed down a lump of anxiety that was manifesting in his throat. The blonde Elf hissed, as he became aware of what he had thought was going on for a long time; his thrashed body was screaming.

Instantly he felt ashamed and he felt his waxen face wanting to flush a bright red in mortal degradation. Willing it to show no emotion only made it drain further of all pigment, making it contrast white with the darkness of the room. But their was one spot that was not pale, but black and purple, a deep and extremely sensitive bruise on his cheek; the place where he had been stricken in Dorrag's halls.

Darcíl frowned and said, "are you ready to tell me such a simple thing as your name, master Elf?"

Legolas frowned and then he growled in a low and hoarse voice, "I have nothing to say to you save this: that you will die for what you are doing, whether it be in my time or not and you will meet a blacker than black ship one of these days."

He could endure this torment for some time, but not long. It was too harsh. His spirit would live but his body was more than willing to go ahead and beak right now. He found that highly annoying and rather frustrating. Forcing a hard look to crystallize in his eyes, the blonde prince raised his chin as best he could in insurgence. He had seen worse, hadn't he? Surely he could see his way through this and he had a feeling this was only the start of worse things to come.

"It is a shame that you cannot end this nightmare by telling me your name and your homeland," taunted the Haradrim captain. "Know that if you do not, the ranger will not be spared either." Darcíl watched with vigilant eyes as Legolas jerked in his bonds, clanking the iron of his manacles against the metal of the pole at which his hands were tied behind.

"I am Rúmil son of Cúthalion!" Legolas spoke suddenly out of fear for Aragorn, not knowing why those names came to mind. They were old names from old tales of long ago that he had not heard since he was an Elfling sitting at the fireside. His eyes were still defiant but with a spark of fear behind them.

The Haradrim man came and pressed the club against Legolas' sternum, deliberately where a dark bruise was. The rounded tip of it stabbed dully into the bruised tissue of Legolas' chest and the Elf bit his bottom lip in what could be considered a harsh way, chewing it in thus far silent agony. He felt his bones compressing against the pain and pressure and he felt the air leaving his lungs, leaving him breathless.

"It is easy to make up a name and why would you tell me this now?" asked Darcíl as he ground the club point into Legolas' chest, causing a small moan to somehow sneak past the parched and bleeding lips of the immortal.

Darcíl watched as the Elf's body trembled and the blood speckled the darkened chest. He looked into the eyes of the Elf searchingly with his own sharp dark ones. He had interrogated many a prisoner and never had found one that hadn't given in after the first round of clubbing.

The more he thought about, the club was almost a bluff to see if they were really serious about withholding the information he wanted and needed. This strange blonde Elf had, despite the fact he looked younger and less experienced with war than others Darcíl had known that had buckled, held control of himself remarkably well. It was slightly disturbing and he wondered if they were taking on a project that might very well mean their demise in the end.

Legolas regretted very much that his hearing had returned and yet he was still grateful it had. He was so tired of having the same question hurled at him and he was so tired of the pain he had been enduring for what had been two hours though it seemed like an eternity.

Darcíl gripped Legolas' chin and burned his own eyes into the dimming eyes of the bound being. "You lie, Elf. I am no fool." Taking the club, he slammed it into Legolas stomach violently and with strength Legolas found to be alarming not to mention excruciatingly painful.

Giving Legolas' chin a downward thrust, he withdrew the club and stepped back. The Elf's clammy chest was covered in blood where the club had hit same areas numerous times and broken the skin. In other places black bruises were swelling into large welts. But unlike people such as Sarchel, he received no true gratification from this sort of work. In his mind, people like Sarchel, if he could call them people, were sick.

His wisdom told him he could beat this Elf within an inch of his life and he had a feeling it wouldn't change anything. That feeling was rather…well…unsatisfying.

Legolas saw the look in the man's eyes that he knew so well. A hard knot twisted in his stomach and he felt himself trembling. Anger that he had been feeling turned on himself and he tried his best to will his body to stop. But it was slipping into a reluctant state of shock.

Darcíl placed the club down on the wooden table top with a small clatter as it rocked and going over to another table he picked up a rope, thin with metal wound into it and with iron balls placed an inch apart from one end to the other. They were rough and had parts that were especially sharp. It still had a indirectly innocent look to it.

Looking at his men expectantly, whom he had placed in the shadows when he did not need their help, he commanded of them briskly, "unbind him and strip him of his tunic."

"I told you my name!" he argued as they undid his chains and grabbing his tunic, all but tore it from his body and flung it in the dirt in a heap. He was not only dreading the pain which he knew would be horrible, because things that usually appeared innocent in these kind of places were often extremely hurtful, but because he didn't want them to drag the so far forgotten ranger into this mess.

It was interesting how Legolas' front contrasted sharply with the unabused skin of his back. One of the men twisted the Elf's arm sharply behind him and the other gripped a fist full of Legolas' golden hair and wrenched it, forcing the captive to fall back upon him.

Legolas drew in a sharp breath and Darcíl glanced at him as he ran the rope with the metal spheres through his fingers leisurely. "Place his back against the pole again but tie his hands above his head this time."

With two quick nods, both of the men hurled the Elf against the mast almost happily and while one held him by his neck to keep him in place the other wrapped tight cords about his wrists and attached those to the top of the metal post. Cold, angry and frustrated, the blonde Elf was fast losing his last nerve with these people.

Legolas felt fear rushing through his very veins and he realized with growing alarm that his feet did not touch the ground. Darcíl stood before him and said with a shake of his head, "you did not give me your name, Elf. You gave me a name."

Legolas glared and said, "you don't know that." He walked backward with his toes until he felt the back of his boots against the post and then he dug the toes into the dirt floor as a brace to try and relieve some pressure off his wrists.

"I can give a fairly accurate guess," responded Darcíl coolly and with a glimmer in his eyes.

Taking the rope, he slid it about Legolas' middle then went behind the Elf and wrenched it tight so that it squeezed harshly and the iron spheres dug into the poor Elf's helpless and battered breast and stomach. Darcíl then tied it and placed his chin on Legolas' shoulder. "Ready to talk?" he asked tauntingly into the pointed ear of the victim.

"You know I'm not," breathed Legolas as he jerked his shoulder from beneath the Haradrim captain's head in abhorrence. His footing nearly slipped and he drew a quick breath as he anticipated all his weight bearing down on his chafed wrists again.

He stared ahead in the darkness, away from the men and the flickering light of the torches that were set in scones on the walls of stone and earth. He saw slime on the underground walls, mold and lichens growing pale and nearly luminescent in the night of the dungeon. The dampness chilled into his ones and this was one of the few times that he felt himself feeling cold when it was extremely hot outside.

Suddenly he gasped as the rope was twisted tighter and pressed into his bruises, the metal weaved into the rope scraped his abused flesh and the iron balls pinched and created new bruises or worsened the other ones. An acute and tense pain scored his body in a blinding flash of white and caused his senses, especially his sense of consciousness, to falter and nearly give out. His body was fast becoming spent in a way it had not been in a long time.

"How about now?" hissed Darcíl in a low tone, wiping some blood that he just realized was on his nose but never once relenting the rope's close grip.

Legolas grit his teeth and spoke around his clenched jaw. "Sorry." If this Haradrim man thought he was going to break this easily he was wrong. His body may be breaking but his spirit was still going strong.

All the same though, he knew the vicious wound weakened Aragorn. But he knew what Aragorn would want him to do. Aragorn would want him not to give in, not surrender and be strong. Frowning as he struggled not to cry out, Legolas looked stonily ahead as his chin quivered.

Darcíl twisted the bond that went around the Elf's slender waist harsher and jerked it backwards, letting it cut into Legolas' defenseless stomach. Blood seeped out from around it, the result of burning shallow wounds that hardly broke the skin, scrapes. But the captain was careful not to let it go too far and kill Legolas through internal bleeding.

He still took out his frustration and anger towards himself and Prince Dorrag on the captive Elf. He would have left Dorrag long ago or killed him if he didn't think his innocent family would pay the expensive expenditure of his rash actions.

Twisting the rope again, he ground it into the already inflamed skin and pulled back even tighter still. Legolas gave a small cry and then closed his eyes for moment to blot out a few tears that somehow had managed to sneak into the corners of his eyes. He drew as deep a breath as he could and then let it out slowly.

Just breath in an out, concentrate on your breathing and everything will be okay. It will ease this passing pain. Of course this cannot last forever, it has to end at some point, just survive until that point. Now there was the trick. Surviving until that special and blessed point…

Darcíl said loudly so Legolas had little trouble understanding the words though they were still muffled a little, "you aren't ready to talk and I am not ready to give up."

"Funny how those feelings seem to be mutual," sibilated Legolas around his pain before his teeth sank into his lower lip again that was already split.

"Isn't it though?" said Darcíl. It was actually more of a statement than it was a question.

O0O0O0O

Aragorn sat in the dark of the cell alone. He was beginning to get rather irked with this eerie and rather apathetic place already and the sad part of the ordeal was he had only been here for some hours, not even a day. The water was dripping from the wall and the damp cold seeped through his clothes and froze his marrow in an imminent way.

Fingering his wound gingerly he felt the crusty dried blood and withdrew his hand in disgust. Sighing, he leaned back against the wall with fatigue and finding a pebble on the ground with his hand groping the floor in the lightlessness he tossed it into the blackness.

Hearing it hit the ground with a small clink of stone on stone, the ranger grimaced as it echoed through the empty and cold halls and cells. He had never felt so forlorn in all his life.

He had thought nothing could ever be worse than listening to Legolas scream or seeing his pain, but Legolas was in a room faraway and he could hear nothing. He found the silence to be even harder to bear. He just didn't know what was going on. He would rather know his friend was alive than face this tense and agitated uncertainty.

He didn't know what was happening to his dearest friend whom was wanted as an "example". He didn't know what was going to happen if Legolas broke. But he knew with a stab of assurance that Legolas would never break, never ever. That was somewhat a comforting thought. But he hated to think of the tortures that the prince would go through before he would most likely get killed.

Footsteps in the hall and a light in the dark made Aragorn sit up and he squinted his eyes with curiosity. Perhaps they were bringing Legolas back, but he doubted it. They only had the prince for two hours and from black memories he had of past interrogations, he knew that they normally took much longer and appeared to last to the limit of eternities piled upon eternities.

Aragorn watched as three men appeared with Legolas stumbling behind them. Widening his eyes in surprise and gratitude that his friend hadn't had to endure anymore long hours alone and in agony, Aragorn nearly breathed a sigh in relief. But he was not looking forward to seeing what injuries that stubborn Elf had sustained at the hands of his cruel hosts.

The door was swung open and Legolas shoved in before them. The Elf was then chained to the wall swiftly. Aragorn noticed as the men left that they left the torches in the cones on the walls.

Being no fool, Aragorn knew immediately why they had done so. It would be obvious to an idiot. It was a sick game they played with the two captives. The light of the torches was left to flaunt Legolas' injuries in Aragorn's face to make him weaker in fear and to sicken him.

Aragorn felt his stomach turn violently once they left and he looked to his friend, who was breathing heavily as he leaned back against the wall. It felt so good on his hot and sweaty cheeks, gently and sweetly cooling them…soothing them.

"Legolas?" he asked quietly.

A murmured, "what?" resounded. Legolas looked at his human friend with dimmed eyes. His slender hands went to his tunic that was open and he promptly closed it, fumbling with the buttons. He was amazed they had bothered to give the thing back. It wasn't like it was cold.

Aragorn noticed his friends hands were shaking and he reached over to place his own chained hand on top of the Elf's to still the quivering. He saw the deep and ugly bruise on Legolas' left cheek and he ran a gentle finger over it, wincing in sad sympathy when Legolas winced and withdrew his head. "What ever did they do to you, my friend?" he asked as he squeezed the blonde being's cold hand.

"You really don't want to know," answered Legolas glumly with a twisted grin lurking in the corners of his bloodied mouth.

"But I do," argued Aragorn as he began to peel back the ensanguined tunic flaps.

Legolas grabbed his hand and said, "I don't think so, human."

Aragorn sighed.

That stubborn, cocky, know-it-all, anger-provoking, stupid, reckless, meager-brained, sorry excuse of an Elf! He was going to see those wounds if it was the last thing that he ever did. If he had to knock Legolas out stone cold! Smiling at the thought, the ranger said adamantly, "Elf, I will see what horrors they did to you!"

Legolas laughed despite his horrible pain that only was provoked to further violence by his mirth and said, "Um…no." He wrinkled his eyebrows and narrowed his eyes. Looking darkly at Aragorn in a way christened by the ranger as the let-me-see-that-wound-I-know-you-are-neglecting-and-is-potentially-deadly-for-humans look.

"Legolas, I am well," he began to ward the persistent Elf off.

"Liar," accused Legolas benevolently as the ranger shuffled as far back as the shackles he bore would allow.

"That’s like the pot calling the kettle black!" disputed the wavy-haired man in a pleading voice that Legolas thought was close enough to a whine to be called one.

"I never claimed to be well-"

"This time," interrupted Aragorn incriminatingly as Legolas' fingers began to massage his shoulder wound as they inspected it. The Elf's face was grave and Aragorn let the prince scrutinize the wound for his peace more than anything. Legolas would never rest unless he had a chance to see what injuries were bestowed.

Legolas hissed in sympathy as he felt the hole the javelin had left. Aragorn suddenly jumped and Legolas smiled dryly. "Did it hurt there perhaps?"

Aragorn was still getting over the jolt of the pain his friend's probing of his wound had made. He said vapidly if not satirically, "just a little."

The Elf grinned slightly and said, "I know these sort of things." He stopped and asked ludicrously with a raised brow, "better?"

Of course it had done nothing to heal the wound, but it had made it less stiff and easier to bear. Legolas rued the fact that he had no medical supplies of any sort. It was just another reason to hate this place.

Aragorn muttered dingily if not in a mordant voice, "I bet you just know everything." He crossed his arms and drew his knees up about his chin as he leaned against the stone. "Know-it-all Wood-Elf."

Legolas gave a small frown and then he grinned as he leaned back against the wall as well, "I think I like the sound of that…almost." He sighed and said into the air, "but it is lacking something…replace 'Wood-Elf' with 'Legolas' and I think I could live with it."

"Legolas?" inquired Aragorn apathetically.

"Hmmm…?" asked the addressed blonde Elf as he closed his eyes for a little rest.

"Shut up."

"Grumpy ranger," retorted the fair being nebulously. He swirled his blue eyes down to look at his aching wounds in the glimmering light of the torch.

As he looked at the bloody results of his torment he wondered if that really was his skin. It seemed to belong to someone else. Dark purple and black blotches marred the fair-skinned abdomen among dried blood splatters. Although there wasn't as much blood as he had thought, he mused grimly. Most of the moisture that he had felt had been perspiration. He hadn't realized he could sweat so much. He had seen men doing it and younger Elves in warrior training, but never himself.

Aragorn looked over and his eyes immediately fell upon the ugly rope burn mingled with strange and twisted bruises that wound around the Elf's lean waist one top of the ones created by the barbaric use of the metal flanked club.

"Legolas…" he breathed quietly. "Elbereth! Whatever did they…" his silver eyes were large and darkened with commiserating pain in the dim light of the brands.

Legolas snapped his head up and his eyes locked with Aragorn's. "It really isn't as bad as it looks. Honestly…" Legolas suspired and looked at the floor then glanced back up at the incredulous ranger. "Have I ever given you a reason to disbelieve me?" His tone was one of seriousness that was a little frightening to hear, coming from the nearly always comical Wood-Elf.

"Recently?" asked Aragorn. "Do you really want an answer?" he catechized incisively. He looked at the raw wounds and he reached a trembling hand forward to move the tunic aside so he could get a better look. Legolas' hand gripped his and the Elf's voice was threatening.

"Do NOT touch those!" he said perilously with the fire of battle gleaming in his blue eyes that came from fear of the pain it would incite. Aragorn could have sworn he heard the sound of them catching fire.

"Sorry, Legolas," murmured Aragorn, taken harshly aback. He withdrew his hand and turned away, fighting back hot tears in his eyes and a swelling feeling in his throat.

Legolas was immediately apologetic as he realized how he must have sounded in Aragorn's ears. "I am sorry. I know you only meant to help. I shouldn't have spoken to you thus." He looked at Aragorn with a mortally worried face. "Estel?"

He couldn't believe he had been so stupid! How could he have possibly said that so cruelly? Inwardly slapping himself and asking over and over again what in all of Arda his problem was, the Elf willed himself to stop verbally clouting himself upside the head long enough to plead his apology again.

"Estel…?" he asked in a quiet and nearly frightened voice. "You know I didn't mean it…they do hurt rather badly…I need you, you aren't angry, are you?" he finished in a defeated way. He felt his stubborn Elven pride rising up along with his temper.

"You know what, you stubborn, filthy human? I am trying to apologize!" he growled bitterly.

Aragorn turned around said, "there is nothing to apologize for, my friend." He whispered, "It is I who should be sorry. I never realized the full extent of what you have been through." Legolas realized with a stab of remorse that his friend's eyes were wet…damp with collected tears that had yet to spill over. "Forgive me, Legolas."

"There is nothing to forgive, my friend," he answered slowly. "However, I still forbid you to bring one healer-happy finger near my wounds!" But when he said this there was teasing twinkle in his blue eyes.

Aragorn was disturbed to see the hard pain behind the smile and he wished he could convince Legolas to let some of it go. He would gladly steal his friend's pain away.

O0O0O0O

Darcíl stood before Dorrag grimly and his eyes watched with slight alarm as his liege's face changed from a calm tan color to a angered crimson as he wrinkled his forehead in sudden wrath. "Most break under that sort of pressure." He found it odd and slightly disturbing that a face could change colors so easily and quickly, like switching masks. And those eyes that had been sober could flare up into a perfectly evil glow in split seconds were capable of what they did.

Darcíl asked quietly as he pushed his alarming discoveries out of his mind, "may I remind you, my lord, that I told that Elves are stronger?" he twitched back his cloak and gripped his sword hilt imperceptibly for some comfort.

"I recall that you said that, now. Now you recall the words I said, if the Elf doesn't break, have a try with the ranger," said the Haradrim prince testily. He ran his fingers along the rim of his golden goblet in monotony and dark brooding thought.

Getting up with a small frown of besetment, he rose up slowly and said, "Captain, would you follow me?"

The men went to large balcony and Dorrag placed his hands on the rail, holding it tightly as he gazed out at his kingdom. He spoke softly as he unraveled his thoughts in a way he felt he could convey them to his officer. "This is my kingdom, it is my job to make it better."

Darcíl felt a stab of alarm at Dorrag saying this was his Kingdom when his father still lived, but he pushed it down and said nothing. Nodding he gazed off at the palace being erected on the horizon like a golden ray of sunshine.

"I can be a better ruler than my father ever was. I can make this a better place for our people." He looked sidelong at Captain Darcíl, who returned the gaze evenly. "We have always waged war with vengeance and pride, but ever our costs grow more extreme. The Elves are waking up from their long sleep and have realized they can't be neutral in these wars of men. To protect my people I must prevent the Elves from raising their armies."

"I owe my people that," he finished quietly.

This prince's actions screamed liar! At Darcíl so compellingly that he wanted to shout it aloud. But he held his peace and simply said, "an impressive and honorable intention, my lord." He could not keep the disbelieving and incredulous sound out of his voice.

Dorrag turned on him and asked with slight annoyance, "why is it you always seem to sound…questioning…about everything I do? You were never that way with my father," he commented wryly.

After a moment the Haradrim captain muttered, "I suppose I have been trying to impress you." He looked his liege square in the eye and then narrowed his own.

"An interesting motivation and an even more interesting way of trying to reach your objective," he remarked as he stared at his captain with scrutinizing eyes.

"Indeed, my lord," muttered Darcíl nearly under his breath.

He snorted air through his nose and stared out at this place he called home. It was dreary. The sun beat down hot now in the afternoon but as soon as night fell the monsoon rains would return and he knew that they wouldn't leave this time. The nasty weather had come and its grand appearance was going to be tonight, he was certain.

There was something peaceful about that harsh weather though. Perhaps it was looking at the sky and seeing its awesome might in the bright lightening streaking across the sky in lethal strands of purple, gold, or white.

"Where is Lieutenant Sarchel?" asked Dorrag in a strangely silky voice that Darcíl found slightly alarming to hear from his snake-like lord's lips. An imperceptible shiver sprinted up his spine.

Fearing some sort of a snare he answered carefully, taking no small cautions, "he is out with the Overseers, my lord."

Darcíl kept his eyes watching the world before the balcony, rather than let Dorrag know he was seriously listening with vigilant intent, thinking that if his luck got better the prince might stumble and say something that would give away any…potentially harmful plans.

"When you leave, Captain, go and tell him I wish to see him immediately. Tell him it concerns the Elf and ranger," ordered Dorrag quietly, the silkiness beginning to fade from his voice. It turned to scorn rather and he muttered, "he is a fool, but a advantageous one."

Darcíl felt a stab of suspicion spike up in his inner thought and it began to wrap itself around him like a cloak, and yet for being shrouded in his misgiving he felt extremely susceptible to some sort of denunciation that was going to be ever imperceptible. It was not a feeling he had often and one he certainly meant to never get attached to.

He had suspected for quite sometime now that Sarchel was going to try and undermine his meager hold on his position granted power, but if Dorrag was behind it the contrivance might very well prove to be more than he could master.

This private talk with Sarchel had to have something to do with his death. But perhaps he was being paranoid over absolutely nothing.

"As you will, my lord." In that moment he knew he had better take a cue and leave.

Giving a slight bow to his liege he said, "good day my prince."

Darcíl walked down the decorated and banner covered corridors stiffly and hastily as he wondered about the captive Elf and ranger below. He also was still disturbed over the recent tense conversation with his mealy-mouthed liege.

Narrowing his eyes he surveyed the brilliance of the halls. The banners, laced with gold and silver inlayed oliphaunts blew in a cool and refreshing breeze that ruffled his dark hair slightly. Narrowing his black eyes, the man drew in a calming breath as he brought his temper that was struggling to rise under control.

The halls were strangely quiet and as he traveled through the eerie vacancy of the once musical and full foyers.

When Dorrag's father, Dorlomin, had been in here (before they signed the treaty with Sauron to aid in his crushing of the Gondorian realms of Middle Earth) the halls had been more full as he was always one for entertainment. Darcíl smiled at the memories. Ah, those were better times; he mused to himself as he blinked over a ray of strayed sunshine seeping through the clouds and managed to find a way past the tapestries on the windows.

A noise before him made him squint and he heard an abrasive thick voice ask, "Is Prince Dorrag in his throne room or is he not?"

"Interesting," greeted Darcíl stiffly as the tense feeling in his muscles escalated. "I was just sent to find and inform you that you are wanted in there, Lieutenant Sarchel." He stopped his forward motion and vied with his junior officer in a hard glare of daggers.

"Are you challenging me, Lieutenant Sarchel? That tone in your voice sounds hardly respectful. Say 'captain' when you address me," finished Darcíl, unable to keep the mounting tension out of his voice as he stared down the other. Clenching his jaw, the dark-haired Harad man pressed his lips into a thin white line of displeasure as he watched Sarchel's instantaneous reaction to his question.

"Me, sir?" asked the Lieutenant innocently as he raised his brows in mock surprise of the accusation. "I would never dream of such a thing, captain."

Darcíl's inquisitive glare concentrated and Sarchel looked slightly uncomfortable and it was obvious to an idiot he was trying to not to squirm like a worm on a hook. The captain's glare began to cede to a look of slight amusement at that particular thought. "See that you don't."

He raised one of his furrowed brows and the answer he received was to be expected.

"Have I given you reason to distrust my word before, sir?" asked Sarchel uneasily as he began to find the woven black and red rug they stood on quite intriguing. Though it was very ugly, now that he looked more closely at it than he had ever considered doing before.

Darcíl smiled tensely as he thought to himself: The idiot is asking for it. I could take this chance to shred his confidence and pride and put him to such humiliation as has not been seen around here for years. Rocking back on his heals he stammered mockingly, "I do not believe so. At least, not recently, Lieutenant."

He was not quite ready to go to the extreme and humiliate this man mortally. That would be too much too fast and with the perilous mood Prince Dorrag was in he figured that he had better play it on the safe side. However, he wasn't about to let Sarchel get away form this so easily still.

"Do not forget your position, Lieutenant Sarchel," he advised ominously as he watched the younger man begin to try and slink away like a whipped dog. His eyes followed the skulking junior officer as the man mumbled a scornful and forced answer.

"I will do my best, sir." Saluting he said in an agitated tone, "good day, Captain." And Darcíl watched Sarchel's back as he slinked into the throne room, his pride lowered down a few pegs. It was rather satisfying.

CHAPTER FIVE

Blood,Insights, and Smoke

Legolas hung limply from his bonds in weariness. He was weary of this pain, weary of the darkness of these deplorable cells and corridors and he was just plan weary or being weary. Now that he thought about it, that lowly cell that he had loathed seemed to be quite comfortable if you disregarded the water that now flooded it nearly ankle high due to the monsoon rains. With a stab of irritation, the Elf jerked his head since his hands were immobile, to try and rid his vision of a few strands of pale blonde hair that hung before his pale and sweaty face.

These interrogations were inconvenient, annoying, frustrating and above all very hazardous to ones' health, Legolas affirmed mentally, more to get his mind elsewhere than to for reasons of knowledge.

"Elf," addressed Darcíl as he came around from behind the blonde prince who was bound on his knees, his hands tied to a large iron post before him. "I think you are getting as tired of this as I am. You could end both our trouble and tell me such a simple thing as your name and where you come from."

Legolas's sane side immediately instructed him to not respond to the arrogant taunting. Looking at his own blood which had fallen from his back and chest onto the floor, he whispered hoarsely, "I think my pain is far worth seeing you in your frustration, edain. And isn't it odd that there never seems to be a dull moment in here? More than I can say for those…accommodations you gave me and my companion."

Legolas resisted the urge to wince as the Haradrim captain's thick and strong fingers pressed into his large bruise on his cheek. Twisting Legolas' head so the Elf was forced to look over his shoulder, the man said, "if I didn't think I would get carried away, I would make you eat those words."

Legolas scoffed and taunted back as well as he could with the man's tight grip on his cheeks, "go ahead. I hardly doubt a man of your obvious…self-discipline, would go beyond what he intends." He then twisted his face free of the man's grasp and spat angrily on his boot.

The response was as to be expected and Legolas withheld a cry as the boot toe collided with his already broken lips, bruising them further and creating another small runnel of blood. Sucking on his upper lip, the blonde being glared with a frosted over and permeating stare at his subjugator.

Darcíl bit his lower lip thoughtfully in mounting frustration. He growled in a thick voice that was heavily accented with a waning self-control as his last shreds of patience seemed to be fading abruptly, "Elf, seeing you ripped apart would be too much fun."

Legolas snorted and mumbled under his breath belligerently, "liar."

The Elf's eyes rotated to try and see as much as was permitted from their corners, not wanting to lift his head, as Darcíl stepped forward and said in a smoothed over voice that still sounded turbulent beneath the masquerade of calmness, "if you have something to express to me, why don't you say it so I can hear it?"

Stooping over, he brought his face inches away from Legolas' and said without any patience and overly much expectance, "well?"

His eyes pierced Legolas' dully and his mouth's corners curled up in an irritating sneer that was grating on Legolas' nerves.

Feeling the Harad man's hot breath on his cheeks, Legolas resisted turning his head away in disgust. He said stiffly as he met his captor's gaze evenly, "liar."

"Explain yourself," Darcíl commanded in a malevolent voice that sounded like the tone alone was a threat. Legolas found that to be slightly disagreeable but he ignored it.

"Your eyes speak volumes about you," he began, as he looked the Haradrim captain squarely in the eye. "You hate what you do and yet you lie to yourself, trying to say you enjoy it because this is your life and you think it is inescapable."

Darcíl narrowed his eyes and Legolas saw the anger glittered behind the darkness of them as they turned hard, like midnight colored gems. The veins on the man's neck stood out in a way that made evident his frustration and wrath.

Legolas saw his hand raised in slow motion, like everything was drenched in thick and cold molasses and he saw it heading for his face, but he didn't move. He just glared and psychologically prepared himself for the devastating strength of the blow he more than expected.

The force of it knocked his head to the side and he felt his neck nearly break and most certainly heard something snap precariously. For a moment he felt nothing, nothing at all then a hot blazing pain on his cheek and he felt the blood flushing to his face. Forbidding the few tears of pain that clustered in his eyes to fall, Legolas raised his chin in mutinous hostility.

Darcíl said nothing and Legolas watched as he went to the table in the corner and selected a small knife, gleaming like finely polished silver. Fingering the blade in quiet observation and inner reflection, he mused whether or not it needed sharpening for its purpose. Most likely not, he decided and gave it one last brief look over before walking in long strides back over to Legolas.

He then declared grimly, "tell me what I want to know."

Legolas hissed, "not while I still have a shred of contumacy left in my body." His eyes locked on the knife and Darcíl twirled it casually.

"Then we shall have to rid you of your…defiance, won't we?" Walking behind Legolas he pressed the knife's sharp tip into the Elf's bare back until it pierced the skin, "remember this, Elf?"

Legolas said nothing and Darcíl pressed the blade further, watching the red that spurted from underneath it. Then, he began to draw the blade down in a slow motion, rocking it and creating a huge laceration its wake. Legolas jerked slightly under the stinging pain that this decidedly favorite torment of Darcíl's inflicted.

Darcíl looked with unsatisfied and scrutinizing eyes at the other cuts, one…two…three…four…five in all. And that was not including the one he was working on creating now. He pushed the blade in a bit deeper and Legolas attempted to arch his back in smarting pain but the bonds restrained him.

Darcíl ran the knife backwards up the new wound in a bored formality and then yanked it free ruthlessly. Legolas felt as though all his breath left his body and he gapped for a moment before he remembered where he was and masked his pain contorted face over with a false face of calmness.

Picking up a pitcher of salt water from the ground (just out of reach of Legolas' feet), he poured some over the inflamed wound knowing the damage it would cause. Legolas could not help but shiver slightly and then he pressed his head against the pole as he tried to concentrate on better things than the pain smarting in waves up and down his marred back.

"Talk to me Elf," jeered Darcíl as he ran his hand along the wounds, brushing then with his fingertips none too gently and infuriating their pain ten fold. He felt Legolas draw a deep and pain filled breath before he let out a low and drawn out hiss escape his tortured lips.

Taking his knife, Darcíl placed it above Legolas' right shoulder blade in a bare spot where there wasn't yet a cut. He pressed the ensanguined blade and Legolas tried to twist away out of instinct he could not control that reaction and concentrate on breathing. He felt more blood trickling down his shoulder in hot little rivulets. And he saw it hit the floor like a scarlet tear.

"I will never tell you. You can torture my body to its death, but my mind is firm in its decision and refuses to waver for anyone," spat Legolas confidently as he gripped the metal of the pole with his and so tight that he was sure that be it iron or glass it would shatter.

He could feel his muscles along his back and shoulders spasming and twitching as they felt their flesh being mutilated cruelly. As his muscles shuddered of their own accord, the Elf grit his teeth and he felt the muscles in his jaw knot.

He didn't even realize right away that Darcíl had come before him and was removing Legolas' bonds from the post. Legolas looked up and realized that he was free…temporarily. He staggered up onto his feet with some strong reluctance on his body's part and forcing his weakened knees to stand and hold his trembling frame the Elf knew he had no chance of escape.

Well, he thought matter-of-factly, I have nothing really to lose. I can't just let him think I enjoy these 'sessions'. He looked at Darcíl with venomous eyes of cold steel before lunging at him and quickly being blocked and slammed against the wall of unrefined stone. The harsh stone and grit ground into his back wounds and blinding pain hit the side of his head moved forward in a wave as he realized his right temple had grazed the rock of the wall and was bleeding profusely.

Darcíl tossed him to the ground with disdain and gave him a sound kick in the chest, slamming the force of his boot against the bruises. "Perhaps tomorrow bring you a change of mind. Pain has a way of changing things Elf. Especially if it is constant."

Legolas gave the man a confused expression before he could stop himself and Darcíl placed his knife on the table top before traveling back over to where Legolas knelt on the floor, his blood around him. Gripping him by his arm, the man suddenly looked over his shoulder as he heard the heavy grating sound of the thick wooden door being opened and men entering.

Legolas looked and saw they had in tow a very much alive and resisting Estel. The ranger's leggings were soaked up to the knees from the water flooding into their cells and when the man saw Legolas, his face paled. His silver eyes broadened and he began to try and walk towards the blonde Elf who was being dragged to his feet.

"Take this Elf and hang him from his wrist by the chain until I see fit to have him released. Make sure there is at least two feet between his feet and the ground."

Aragorn watched in horror as Legolas was shoved out. Their eyes met and Aragorn read past the furious pain Legolas was experiencing. He saw the glimmer of hope and the shimmer of defiance that was a slowly fading spark in the crystalline blue orb's depths.

But he also noticed the blood of his friend on the floor and the red liquid that ran down Legolas' sweaty chest and trembling back. It burned his heart like a hot brand set to its flesh.

Darcíl gripped Aragorn and shoved him into a corner while contemplating where to start the whole ugly process. His darkened thought was suddenly interrupted by Sarchel, who came in rather haughtily and sneered, "Prince Dorrag says since you had no success with the Elf I am to take over here."

Darcíl glared, "and of what sort of mind set is his majesty?" The Haradrim captain glared at his junior officer as though his piercing eyes could literally burn holes in the head of the younger man. If Dorrag was in a good mood, he had nothing to worry about, at least not immediately. But if he were in a mood to be feared, then he would have to mind everything he said and be on his toes.

"Go find out for yourself, Captain Darcíl," scoffed Sarchel as he stared at the bound ranger in the corner.

Aragorn looked at the floor and realized that he was standing in his friend's blood. The water from his clothes dripped into the small sanguine puddle dolefully, he noticed, and diluted the pureness of the Elf's silver-crimson vital fluid. It made his stomach turn and he wondered how much blood Legolas had lost. He realized with a painful clarity that he as not going to be placed under any less painful circumstances. His wound began to throb again, responding to the moisture and the festering of a creeping infection that was worsening by the day.

O0O0O0O0O

Scowling, Darcíl turned and began out of the door. He had a sinking feeling of fear for his family stabbing his gut. The betrayed sense he had before spiked to a higher level and it made him feel sick. He would rather die than have his wife and daughter put to death. He didn't care how painful, just as long as it was himself in their place.

Once inside the throne room, he came and bowed humbly before the feet of his liege. "My lord, you gave Lieutenant Sarchel leave to interrogate the ranger. I assume this means you have another purpose for me?" He tried to seem calm and meek but he felt his hot temper beginning to flare and as he gazed back up at his lord there was a fire in his eyes.

"Captain, the Elf is not breaking. This is unacceptable. You know the price of failure, I assume," said Dorrag grimly as he bid Darcíl rise. "Your family will have to suffer for your lapse. And after they are dead, you can hang with that damned Elf!" he seethed. Casting a drinking vessel at the door, he was so enraged he didn't even hear the banging noise that echoed throughout the refined corridors in loud waves that reeked of anger.

"Sir, he is an Elf. I can break him, but I need more time. He is weakening, my lord," explained Darcíl as he felt his hands clenching at his side. Sweat began to build on the palms in slippery pools of salty moisture.

Dorrag looked Darcíl up and down with disgust and spat in a voice nearly stuttering with impatience, "well if you want a second chance, you had better start asking now while I am in the mood to hear it!" His eyes flashed with a perilous look of tension that was about to be unleashed.

"Then I do ask it of you. I seek your pardon. The Elf is as good as broken, my lord," Darcíl ground out between his grinding teeth as he lowered his pride in a way he would never forget. "By an means, I will shatter his confidence and dissolve his strength."

"Very well. You have my pardon," answered Dorrag tensely and a bit annoyed. He was coming extremely close to surely losing his temper. "And gladly I give it, for I would hate to lose an advocate and friend." Smiling in a unpalatable and loathsome way that made Darcíl's stomach go for a wild ride, the prince of the Haradrim said, "think of the men we lost, because of that ranger and that Elf. But for the scouting skills of the Elf, they might be alive."

Darcíl resisted the urge to jerk away as he felt his liege's hand grip his shoulder, massaging it in a hard way that was anything but comforting and soothing. It made his skin crawl in a way that sent his hair raising and he said, "my full gratitude towards your mercy."

Mercy! The man was totally bereft of it and he couldn't believe he as lying through his teeth like this. Dorrag would see the captive Elf hanged along with his deceived emissaries and Darcíl knew exactly what would befall the ranger. Dorrag was not one for old-fashioned ways; he despised them, all save one. He did not mind the sacrificing of Elf-friends, not in the least and the more blood the more they pleased his unsound mind. But that was not the true problem, at least not the immediate one. The immediate one was the lives of his family that hung in the delicate balance.

Stiffly the captain pulled away and spoke slowly, "I think that I should be below to oversee the interrogation of the ranger. I also have other responsibilities, my lord."

"You are not a prisoner, captain," said Dorrag smoothly.

I wish I could believe that, thought Darcíl though he didn't dare to say it out loud.

O0O0O0O0O

Aragorn jerked as he felt the club impact his already battered chest and sent brightly blazing pain through his senses. He closed his eyes as he felt his ribs creak and scream. Rubbing his face against one of his bound arms, Aragorn wiped it clear of the thick layer of sweat that covered the pale features.

His shoulder wound throbbed as he twisted in his bonds and pressed his toes against the dirty soil that they barely touched. He looked with dazed eyes at Sarchel who tossed the club aside, bored. He gripped Aragorn's face and drew it close, squeezing harshly so that his finger's left minute bruises.

Aragorn tried to twist his head away and when he found that impossible, he let his eyes turn hard as steel before he managed out in defiance of his subjugator, "you will pay a heavy price for this. Retribution inescapable will be sought on you and your lord." Aragorn felt the anger transfer from the other man's grip to his tightly clenched face.

"Ranger, you know not what you are in for," said Sarchel and he looked at the blood crusted wound on the sore and stiff shoulder of the ranger. "I think I found a fun activity for the both of us." Patting Aragorn's cheek in a mocking way, he backslapped the pale face, before he began to walk over to the table where all the instruments of torture were held.

Aragorn felt his neck nearly snap with the force of the blow and hot blood tricked from his nose and lip. He licked his split lips and tasted his own coppery blood distastefully. His cheek burned and he felt tears smarting in his eyes oddly enough. He wasn't near ready to cry, but the force of the blow had been enough to make his eyes burn. Inwardly shaking his head, he wondered how long he would be here.

Sarchel came and placed the blade of the knife under Aragorn's nose and slid it until it came to the tip. The ranger's heart skipped a beat as he realized it was Legolas' blood that damped the unclean blade and trailed on his pale skin just above his upper lip. It was enough to make him sick and his stomach lurched violently.

Sarchel smiled and said, "your friend's blood is on you now. Disturbing, isn't it?" he inquired as he fingered the blade and looked at the red taint that came off on his fingers.

Then, he went over to a small fire the burned on the far side of the room in a tiny fireplace, much like on in a blacksmith's shop. Aragorn watched as he took the blade and placed it in the fire, just so the hilt stuck out, giving him a way to pull it free again.

The color transforming of the steel blade within the next few moments was remarkable, thought Aragorn was it watched it with narrowed eyes, already guessing the reason for its heating. It went form a shade of dull grey, to one of intense red and then white. But the thing that struck him the most was the smell of Legolas' blood, burning and drifting out of the fire in black smoke. It was nauseating odor and as it filled Aragorn's nostrils he felt vomit rise in the back of his throat. Closing his eyes as the black smoke drifted his way, the dark-haired man tried to block out the smell of his friend's charred vital fluid.

Sarchel suddenly kicked out, surprising the captive ranger and slammed his boot into the ranger's defenseless stomach with a soft thudding sound that seemed to be tens times louder in the small room. The younger human doubled over in sickening pain but his wrists were caught up in his bonds and the cords bit sharply into the already irritated flesh. It was only a few seconds before he could draw in a breath, but those few seconds felt like an eternity, a dark eternity.

Sarchel then looked at the blade before thrusting it suddenly into the wound sustained earlier by the javelin. Aragorn felt screams shatter the calmness in his mind and bright, hot white pain seared his senses and threatened to send him into a blackout. He grappled with the agony that pulsed through his shoulder to gain control of his body, which was attempting to convulse as it, felt the hot blade probe through his wound.

He felt more flesh compromising against the searing, sharp edges and blood ran down his shoulder in streams. He could smell his own blood now, metallic and placing a bitter and acidic taste in his mouth as his senses already connected the smell to the taste he had known before.

Sarchel smiled and dug the hot blade in deeper, feeling it going against the bone and tormenting the flesh of the previously torn injury.

Aragorn felt the heat of the blade burning like a fire on his raw skin and he hissed in agony. Withdrawing the knife for only a moment, the other man looked into Aragorn's face and asked, "so, what is that pretty little Elf's name and whence came he?"

Aragorn tightened his mouth into a thin tight line of pain and morbid anger. He forced his eyes to stay grimly focused on Sarchel's sneering face. Knowing his silence would irk his captor all the more, the ranger kept his mouth shut and narrowed his eyes, sparring with the dark-eyed tormentor before him in a benevolent scowl.

He smiled inwardly as he saw it work as well as he could have hoped and Sarchel's jaw clenched and unclenched in convulsions as he felt hot anger pulse through his system. Gripping the knife tightly, so that his knuckles were white, and then with his other hand he molded it into a hard fist.

"Wrong answer, ranger!" he fumed with frustration and pulling his fist back, he slammed it into Aragorn's right temple, rocketing the man's head back so it banged sharply with the back of the iron pole he was bound. A staggering headache palpitated behind his eyes and he blinked slowly in narcosis of the blow. But he had little time to recover before another one struck him in the chin, snapping his head up and pulling his throat so it was taut. The back of the captive's head brutally hurled against the pole yet again and he felt a welt forming on his skull.

"What is the Elf's name?" snapped Sarchel as he got up in Aragorn's face and sneered resentfully.

Aragorn said, "I am no traitor!" He spat in the mans face and was rewarded by another kick to his abdomen. He clamped his jaw and his muscles all went stiff in pain as he struggled with pressing need to maintain at least a faint grip on his raw emotions. He wished that he would go unconscious. That would be much more comfortable.

"You have made a horrible mistake," declared Aragorn's tormentor as he looked at the knife with anger glinting in his eyes. One eye twitched in annoyance and feeling of disappointment. It was nearly humorous as far as the bound and battered ranger was concerned.

He strode over to the fire and placed it in the flames again. However, he made a detour to the table where his tools lay and looked them over, stroking his chin thoughtfully. There was one rope not too unlike the one used on Legolas. But worse, because the metal spheres had spikes on one side, meant to bite into one's flesh as the cord was tightened but not cause any true lasting damage. This could possibly be fun and could be what he had been looking for to break the captive ranger anyway.

Picking it up he ran it through his fingers, looking at the dried blood of some other poor victim with a strange sense of satisfaction. Smiling wryly Sarchel walked haughtily before Aragorn and taking the rope with the spiked spheres, he suddenly struck Aragorn across the abdomen as though the cord was a whip.

That was not is true purpose, but Sarchel found it to be much more intriguing. Amused at Aragorn's contorted face, he struck out again.

Aragorn felt the steel balls slam against this abdomen and their spikes bite his flesh. It seemed to draw his breath away and he grunted slightly in the pain. But he would never betray his friend. That was not an option. He would rather go through this than see Legolas' dangling form the end of a noose.

The ranger saw the amused and almost satisfied look in Sarchel's eyes. Hissing through grit teeth, the bound man snarled spitefully, "you are sick." This was not meant to be an insult, it was the honest truth. Aragorn knew, of course, that this was not going to help his deplorable predicament, but he had to say it and somehow it felt rather good.

The response was exactly the opposite of what any would have thought and yet it might have been expected in some strange and twisted way.

"You have no idea, ranger," said a smooth voice that sounded like it belonged to a talking snake. Sarchel fingered the metal and hemp weaved rope thoughtfully as he looked at the ranger and saw the bleeding wounds he had created on the shivering and sweat soaked abdomen where the barbs had pierced the skin and caught before being torn free. The spines were small, so the wounds looked like enlarged cat scratches but bleeding more and reaching far deeper.

Suddenly, the Haradrim soldier's eyes glanced down at his fingers as he felt moisture, Aragorn's blood, a shockingly bright red, stained them. It wasn't much, but it was enough to make him smile in a slow and dark way that sent the powerful want to shiver through Aragorn's system. He felt the hair rising on the back of his neck in a cold fear.

"So," Sarchel went back to the fireplace and taking tongs, pulled out the heated knife. Holding the now whitened blade up and inspecting it he asked, "shall we continue?"

CHAPTER SIX

Through These Eyes

Darcíl went to the window in an isolated and small hallway before he stopped and stared out of it glumly. His dark eyes narrowed thoughtfully as he looked towards the sun and watched the new palace being erected against the horizon. He could hear the trumpeting of the huge oliphaunts as they were driven to haul huge loads.

He remembered Dorrag when he was younger, much younger and even then he was ambitious. However, now that his father was off to war with some of his best men the prince had taken it to his bigoted mind to try and leave the kingdom better off than when his father had left it.

Of course, as it has been with many in history he was failing miserably. The people were tired of it as well, though none dared to oppose him for very obvious reasons that had been painfully learned. The Haradrim captain remembered that with vivid clarity. It was not an event to easily be lost from memory and cast aside. He was ashamed to say that he himself had a hand in it and without him it may have perhaps never happened.

But he would rather not think about that now, it brought back too many painful memories that made his heart far heavier than it already was. Running his fingers through his black hair that had a red band about the brow to hold it away from his eyes he drew a heavy sigh of displeasure and annoyance. He shut his eyes and noticed absentmindedly that he could not feel the hot beams of the sun upon his face and dark hair.

The rains had come and they would not see the sun for some time. That thought alone was enough to depress him and principally at this time in his life. Opening his eyes he looked out the window again and saw the dark clouds coming, ominous and blotting out the light with their bulk. And yet they were eerily beautiful and they held him in awe for a reason he could not grasp.

Drawing out his sword, he held the blade in his hands and looked at its edges with furrowed brows as though he was staring at the lengthy letter of explanation from a lost lover. There was innocent blood on this blade, and it cried out to his conscience in wails of sorrow.

He felt a breeze pick up and looked to see the tempest moving closer at a rather high rate of speed. Lightening and heavy rain came in its front, announcing its terrible arrival. Sheathing his sword he placed his hands on the sill and gripped it tightly as he leaned out to look below.

There was nothing as their once had been and it made his heart bleed. He could not forget the countless time he had looked down to see children practicing fighting and tearing around, causing havoc. They had always lightened his heart, but now they were gone, pestilence had swept the land. Many believed it was a curse out of the West, given to them in cruel scorn of their contempt. For this they hated the Valar and Elves much more and considered any who were friends with Elves to traitors of Middle Earth and of their tribe.

He himself had believed this once, but he was questioning it now. Notwithstanding he knew that this would do no good for the captives. The Elf and ranger were doomed as assuredly as if the powers at be had written it in the sky for all to marvel and behold. He knew that once an Elf was placed on the gallows and the people had a chance to release their bitterness on a tangible object and not just a myth out of reach, then things would get a bit crazed in the village.

Perhaps at the Elf and the emissaries' execution he should order an extra garrison of troops to help keep a decent order to things. After all, he thought with a twisted smile, it was supposed to be a solemn event. But his smile quickly dispersed from his face, being replaced by a grim frown. Dorrag would turn it into a celebration though, uplifting himself and his might. And who would question it after an example was made of the Elves and the ranger was later sacrificed at Dorrag's dark request.

Then there was Sarchel to consider, Darcíl recalled tenebrously. He still wondered what in all of Middle Earth had been spoken between his lord and that cursed upstart of an officer in his abrupt absence. He was sure that Sarchel was trying to usurp him of his position as head Captain and most trusted infantry adviser.

The man was a fool, however.

Sarchel would never be placed in a higher position unless he really screwed something big up and was executed. Darcíl knew he was invaluable to Dorrag, though he was sure Dorrag was extremely jealous of his position and resentful of his wisdom that far exceeded his own. Darcíl backed away from the window as he felt the rain blow in and sprinkles down upon his hands in cold droplets that also proceeded to speckle his clothes.

Going in quick strides that easily closed the space between himself the door to the dungeons. He went quickly down the winding stairs of thick wood and turned into the first set of dark and apocalyptic corridors where the Elf and ranger were being held. His feet splashed through at least tow inches of water, due to the rain of the monsoons.

Drawing a key from his pocket, the Haradrim captain stood outside of Legolas cell door, watching with narrowed eyes of displeasure through the bars as the Elf dangled from his right wrist, all his weight pulling against the manacle.

Legolas heard the key enter the lock with a nerve-grating creak and he opened his glazed blue eyes to give the man a dull stare. He instantly became painfully aware once more of the screaming pains that coursed through his shoulder and arm under the cruel tension they were forced to endure. His archery was going to be ruined forever, thought the Elf wryly and as he mused to himself. Though it was stupid to be thinking of that sort of thing now when it certainly was not the immediate problem.

"Elf," he approached with mock caution. He couldn't get over how the blonde being's eyes still shone brightly through the glaze that had settled over the large blue orbs that were now narrowed in a considerable amount of wrath. Most prisoners, at least form his own experience, never kept their bright eyes long after the film began to gloss them over with spiritual death and real agony. This Elf was different and he hadn't gotten a chance to see the ranger yet. But things had been going strangely and it wouldn't surprise him in the least if the other captive were just as bizarre.

"Human," addressed Legolas in turn through grit teeth, having nothing else to say. He closed his eyes as pain blinded him for brief moment and nearly forced him to cry out. He wanted to make up a further insult but some how, conceivably because of his intense pain, the words simply didn’t come. But perhaps that was best; after all, those sorts of things had a discouraging efficiency at enhancing his discomfort.

"You know, you shouldn't be suffering thus," Darcíl stepped up to Legolas and placed his hand on one of the Elf's flushed cheeks feeling the heat in them and the sweat that covered the clammy features like a thick and frothing film. Legolas could not believe he was suffering this man to touch him thus, but there it was and he was in far too much pain to care enough to put a stop to it. And it also didn't help that even if he wasn't in the pain he was and did care enough to put a stop to it, there was nothing he could do but endure it. As well as if he hadn’t been near the point of passing out he might at least make some sharper comments about his personal space. That thought was slightly encouraging.

Just because he was encouraged that much the prince had to make comment. He simply was helpless not to. It was most likely not the smartest thing to do in this situation if past reactions to this sort of thing were any manner of a guide.

"I know and you along with your men will pay for it," spat the Elf and then he arched his back as pain rippled through his body, causing it to convulse and take control of itself. Legolas worked to regain control of his nerves, trying not to show his weakness to this human that he scorned bitterly as he had not scorned a man in a long time. It was anger inspiring and annoying all at once. He found it remarkable how those two traits often came together, annoyance and wrath.

"That was not what I meant and you and I both know it so don't play those deceitful games," growled Darcíl irritably as he placed his hand on Legolas' right shoulder and began to press down as he squeezed it, putting more weight on the iron manacle that had already cut into the pale skin. He could see a faint outline of blood beneath the cuff. It wasn’t satisfying, but it was the deliberate effect that had been pursued and the way the Elf’s breathing was slowly but surely accelerating was a plus as well.

Legolas blanched noticeably. He drudged to keep his eyes open to face the human before him rather than let him think him weak. But he finally decided that he didn't care what the man thought, he could make whatever assumptions he wanted, and they didn't matter. Closing his eyes, the blonde Elf clenched them tightly so that his brow furrowed. He wondered why he was doing this when it frankly didn't do a thing to ease his growing misery. As a matter of fact, it only served to cause the growing headache he possessed to strengthen in potency and nearly blind his vision.

"Now let us try this again," the Haradrim captain said as he applied a bit more pressure, knowing that in this particular case a little went a long way. Legolas' felt his skin tear some more beneath the manacle that began to feel like it was burning him. His arm felt as though it was ready to disconnect from his quivering body. His whole body was feeling quite detached from itself actually, which was a rather disturbing and puzzling thought. "What is your name?" Darcíl asked the fair being in a cold and calculatingly voice.

Legolas reached inside the depths of his spirit to gather up what defiance he could spare which was a surprising quantity. "None of your…business…murderer." He honestly didn’t think that comment would go unpunished but as it did, Legolas began to feel a bit bolder. But he also began to feel a bit suspicious…some thing wasn’t connecting…was not right…but he didn't know enough to say for certain. This mystery raised his state of irritation a notch higher.

Swallowing down a hard lump of agony that stuck in his throat, the prince forced his eyes to open so he could see the reaction of his captor, hoping to see some sign of ire. He knew he was being an idiot, wanting to see his subjugator enraged and thus risking more pain. But it was strangely his delight and he couldn't think of a real reason why. Perhaps he really was insane. It was a definite possibility, he mused oddly. After all…he had been around Aragorn long enough for the ranger's antics to rub off on him.

"But it is my business Elf and until you speak your misery is going to be unrelenting," Darcíl threatened and his heart was in it. It was a strange change in tone and Legolas knew that Darcíl's heart and soul was in this omen and that he had better be careful about his choice of words. Legolas shivered as the man went behind him and ran his finger along the still bleeding lacerations made by the cruel knife. A few more shivers tried to follow the first but he put an abrupt and definite stop to them.

As Legolas tried to draw a deep breath he found it was impossible with his bruised chest being stretched and his muscles spasming. Choking on his want for more air, the Elf managed to get a meager amount of ventilation into his hungry lungs. But it was hard to cough as well and Legolas pulled his free arm around his battered rib cage, trying to ease the swiftly rising pain that made him feel as though his chest would explode into millions of tiny pieces.

Darcíl jabbed his finger into one of the wounds and Legolas stiffened and then his feet beat slightly as he jerked against the pain. His muscles seizured and he could not avoid it. More sweat pooled on his damp and hot brow. Darcíl rubbed the Elf's silvery blood between his fingers in disgust before he gave Legolas a smarting pat on his cut shoulder blade meant for a jeering comfort. Legolas didn’t respond, as he had expected.

"You and I both know you will never make it out of here alive, Elf or that ranger. You can go easy or be tortured to death," he explained with a slow relish. "There is no where left to run." He tangled his hands in the golden tresses and tipped the blonde being's head backwards, causing Legolas to pull more on the single manacle.

Stars plagued the prince's vision in bursts of odd color mingled with a bright white light and he felt himself spinning while everything seemed to remain strangely still and at ease. He felt like he was leaving this cruel world and entering into a new one though he couldn't be dying because it was still harrowingly painful. He grimaced and then forced himself to keep a calm façade though it was conceivably the hardest thing he had ever done in his life. But behind his eyes a growing fire of intense fury was slowly building to a point where it may not be able to be contained.

Darcíl jerked his head from side to side and thus caused Legolas' tortured frame to swing from side to side as well, the chain and cuff sawing into the inflamed skin. "Are we ready to talk yet?" inquired the Haradrim captain as he released Legolas' head of his hold and took a step back, observing as the Elf swung in his misery from side to side like a pendulum.

Legolas heard the water of the small flood slosh behind him as Darcíl went and retrieved a chair from the corner. He put it beneath Legolas' feet, allowing the prince to have a rest. Legolas found breathing to be so much easier and if he didn't know the comforts of a finely stuffed chair or a soft feather down bed he would call this extremely comfortable. But he still cast a puzzled look at the piece of furniture beneath him. He didn’t know what it was for but he was sure his pleasure and comfort was not even vaguely on reason.

He tried not to show how relieved he was for the temporary ease of his agony but his body gave his mood away and for that he resented it all the more. His blue eyes fixed on the man of Harad and he asked in an icy tone, "what is your game? You care not for my pain and suffering, so why abate me?" Legolas made sure that his eyes hardened as he asked the question just to emphasize his mounting anger and doubt.

"I am doing the interrogating master Elf," said the captain and he braced a foot against Legolas' chair as the prince watched his face. Suddenly he kicked the piece of furniture out from beneath the Elf's booted feet and Legolas fell hard against his bond that suspended his body from the ceiling. The chair tumbled into the water with a splash.

A mixture of confusion and slight fear crossed Legolas face before he fell and the chain went taut with his lurching weight. A small cry passed through his tortured lips and the prince winced as he heard it, his shame stabbing him as painfully as any dagger through the heart might have. But he could not stop himself from hissing in ascending agony and he chewed on his lower lip until it bled through freshly opened cracks in excruciating suffering.

Darcíl stood back and watched a moment before asking, "how about now?" He taunted in almost a chant, "all I want is something so simple as your name, just your name and where you live. How hard is it to say two words, three at most? Certainly you would be relieved of your pain?"

Legolas' voice was hard and cold as he retorted unyieldingly, "it would be simple indeed…but two words or even one can be as fatal as many. I know enough of your purpose." He was not an idiot. Committing to these men his name and where he lived was a fool's errand. Valar, even f he told them, what were the chances that they would believe his identity, Legolas Greenleaf Thranduillion, Prince of Mirkwood? They would probably punish him more for 'lying'.

"Very well, Firstborn," he consented. Picking up the chair, he set it beneath Legolas' feet again. Forcing the Elf to stand on it. Legolas could not very well resist for the pain his body was already in and Darcíl knew it and wisely played upon the Elf's vulnerability. “But you don’t know the half of my purpose.”

Legolas looked down at the water moody and silent and at the red taint to it, realizing his back was bleeding and it was dripping into the water to turn it sanguine beneath him as he had been suspended. Darcíl reached up and inspected the stretched and bloodied wrist of the Elf nearly displeased that it had not dislocated yet But torture was not something he took pleasure in an so the other part of him was somewhat grateful the Elf's body was this strong. Legolas continued his scrutiny of the dreary flooded floor of his cell. He may not know half the purpose but he wasn’t sure that he entirely wanted to anyway even if eventually he would have to.

The Haradrim captain glanced at Legolas' white face and then he took the Elf's pulse by placing his fingers none too gently along Legolas' jugular vein. The heartbeat was erratic and strong as Legolas' fear pulsed through his veins. The Elf was afraid, but he was trying to hide it. Well, he could bring it out in due time.

Legolas jerked his head away, not wanting this disreputable man's fingers anywhere near his neck, especially the vein that held his life source. And it was rather uncomfortable to have someone fingering you neck and poling you. As far as Legolas was concerned he was going through enough and didn't need to take the slightest bit more. Not that his feelings on his issue were going to even be counted but he felt the need to try and display them.

Darcíl looked at Legolas' body, trembling in pain and weakness, in quiet contempt. He placed his boot with indifference against the chair backing and then struck again, knocking it from beneath Legolas feet. The blonde being's legs beat the air helplessly as all his weight was thrown against his defenseless wrist once more, sending vilifying anguish through his awareness.

O0O0O0O

Aragorn cried out softly as he tried to breathe. His ribs felt as though he had an oliphaunt sitting on top of them, breaking them, pressing the air out of his lungs. As he lay on the floor, the ranger stared morosely at the boots of Lieutenant Sarchel, who stood gloating above. A lot of things were grating on Aragorn's nerves. The dark, cave like room with hardly any space to walk and lit by a few meager torches, the cruel and taunting methods of torture being used that were more than completely painful. But the most of all he had really and truly began to loathe Sarchel with a passion. Well, that was not entirely accurate, he pitied the mixed up man as well, but it was more scorn than it was pity. Sarchel was more than sick, he was totally sick.

Aragorn did not remember much of what had happened, it had been extremely painful and he knew he must have gone unconscious at some point. For there was a black spot in his mind of frightening emptiness after the knife was put to use probing his wound once more and maiming the already tortured flesh. He had felt it dismember flesh from bone and puncture deeper. That had been the most alarming part, smelling his own burning flesh and feeling his skin burning as well as being torn.

There had been stars, he remembered feverishly. And they had been bright and the white light of them had burned his eyes with its radiance. Then he remembered everything spinning in disoriented directions and he remembered falling into nothingness (thankfully).

Shivering as he realized that he was shirtless and the stone tiling that he was lying on was as cold as a bitter ice, the man debated whether to try and rise. He felt sharp pain when he tried to move and his ribs throbbed. Legolas, he thought resentfully, I am sorry I brought you into this mess. I am so very sorry. I should have never let you come with me. You could have lived to be an old and wise Elf of many many, many summers and winters. But for your friendship with me you might still be yet enjoying life.

Aragorn managed to get up to his knees one minute movement at a time. As he hunched over them, shivering violently he clutched his sides, trying to ease the shocking pain that shot through his consciousness with headache stimulating results. Sweat took his body warmth away as his clammy skin began to dry a little bit at a time. He was also trying in vain to remember when he had last been in this much pain. It had been a long while, he thought gloomily. He didn't know whether it was depressing or not. It all depended on how you looked at it.

Sarchel delivered a heavy kick to the man's chest, throwing him backward, before asking in a detestable sneer, "so what is the Elf's name, ranger?"

Aragorn felt dizzy and he whispered, "by me you will never know." Wiping his mouth with the back of his trembling hand, Aragorn noticed with alarm that a red streak crossed his pale flesh. Then he suddenly felt it come back into his mouth, filling it with a coppery feeling. But from the way it flowed in he knew it a miniscule amount.

"I think I will," returned Sarchel as he gripped Aragorn intentionally by his wounded shoulder and dragged him to his feet. But Aragorn's strength was sacked from his earlier torment and whatever new one was planned he deeply feared it could be too much. He didn't care so much for his sake, but for Legolas'. He had dragged that insane Wood-Elf into this mess and he felt more than obligated to drag him back out and not betray him.

Pulling Aragorn to where a chair was in the corner, Aragorn guessed the man's intent and he decided that if he was going to be tortured in this new fashion, then he was going to let Sarchel know he certainly did not enjoy it.

Kicking out, he made sure to land his boot's hard toe into the shin of the Harad man's leg. Sarchel stumbled and fell, bringing Aragorn down beneath him with one of his elbows crunching into Aragorn's most injured rib and causing the ranger to give a curt cry of intense and quick pain that lingered after the hard end of the elbow was removed, leaving Aragorn short of breath. Who had ever thought a simple elbow could inflict such damage and pain?

Sarchel then gripped Aragorn by his hair and pulled the ranger quickly and decisively to his feet. He forced the ranger to stand upon the chair and clamped one manacle that hung from the ceiling about his left wrist. With a cruel light glimmering in his eye he brightened up deviously. "I bet you are wondering what your friend is going through right now, that miserable Elf in all his beauty," he scoffed as he watched Aragorn's face drain. "Well I thought I would help you see things more clearly."

He then kicked the chair out and Aragorn had only enough time to look down and see his feet falling and beating against the air before the chain went taut and he felt a sharp and spreading pain in his shoulder creeping up his arm. A blinding light burned his eyes, as he literally seemed to see his anguish.

Legolas I am so sorry if they speak the truth and you truly are experiencing this torment. You don't deserve it. Aragorn swung like a pendulum from the cuff and he felt it bite and tear into his wrist as his weight was hurled against it. It was the most miserable thing he had ever experienced since the clubs.

Sarchel slid the toppled piece of furniture beneath the ranger's kicking feet again. Aragorn was surprised how even a minute in that hanging position hurt him so deeply. He kept his grey eyes analytically hard so his thoughts could not be read easily by his subjugator. "And to think that poor Elf is enduring the suspension portion of this process so much longer. He is very strong. You wouldn't want to see that great strength…broken, would you? Would you not rather he die proud, not after he is crushed and a shadow of what he was?"

"You are going to regret those words later," said Aragorn as he felt a shiver creep up his spine. "My friend's strength will out last your wickedness plans. He doesn't fade!" spat the wavy-haired man around his swollen lips. Fury was mounting in his eyes as he realized that this man was talking about his best friend as though he was no more than some worthless animal. But then again he felt a satisfying feeling creeping into his thoughts as he realized that these cruel and heartless men had at least admitted that Legolas was strong.

"In your last dreams," replied the Lieutenant tersely and the chair fell from beneath Aragorn's feet again.

With a cry, Aragorn fell once more and his battered chest stretched, as did every muscle in his body. He writhed for minute and then felt a sickening pop as his shoulder dislocated. Bright and furious pain dazzled his senses and he screamed as he felt the joint sliding about outside of its socket with soft sickening noises.

O0O0O0O0O

Legolas had remained silent, hanging limply by his wrist as Darcíl taunted him rigorously. Legolas felt no need to talk, or open his eyes. He couldn't hear that well still from the close encounter with the lightning bolt. So he could let his thoughts drift away without much harassment from sound. Indeed, his body was captured but his spirit could soar and it was with the stars, floating in the air between the stars and the earth. But he couldn't tell whether his hearing loss was a good or bad thing. It depended on the predicament he supposed.

He had been placed on the chair and had experienced the grueling and harrowing pain of having it yanked from beneath him several times so that blood ran down his arm in a small river, flowing then down his chest in an annoying trickle. He was surprised the main artery had not been slit in his wrist but he doubted Darcíl would let him die just yet. He knew that he was still valuable and that if he came too close to death this torment would end and he would be given a healing reprieve. For how much he knew that swine of a prince wanted him alive…for now…he wouldn't be surprised if the best healers were told to keep him alive.

Darcíl placed his face up by Legolas' pointy ear and murmured, "I think your friend just screamed. Something horrible must be happening to him."

The Elf turned his face towards the man and spoke haltingly because of the pain he was in, "he did no such thing!" Pressing his lips into a thin white line that blended in remarkably well with his pale set features; Legolas expressed his obvious disdain and wrath at the man before him. He blinked as he struggled to remain awake long enough to let this man know exactly what he thought of him.

"You are a liar," snarled the Wood-Elf as he dangled from the manacle. "And you are a crooked fool. A suck up to that half-witted bovine that I believe you call a 'prince'." Darcíl's hands tightened noticeably at his side and he glared daggers at the Elf while he regained the last shred of his patience.

He knew very well that Legolas was right if you disregarded the liar comment. That made that little lecture all the harder to bear and he slapped Legolas sharply across the face, drawing blood from the blonde Elf's nose. He felt inward anger at himself building and if he had into the self control needed he might have actually beaten the Elf into a pulp for daring to bring to light what he had hidden in the dark. "And you are a nosey Elf who needs to learn to mind his own affairs and stay in the forests!" he hissed. "And your friend did scream, you can trust me on that and know I don't steer you wrong, Elf."

Legolas said nothing, he didn't need to. The darkened blue eyes spoke very verbose volumes about his thoughts on the situation. His gaze was compellingly scrutinizing, as his sharp Elven eyes seemed to pierce through Darcíl's heart. Even though they were glazed over they were vexatiously strong, reflected the Haradrim captain as he stared back into their depths. Indeed, he saw a hidden strength that he perceived would be extremely impossible to break. That alone was enough to make him want to stamp his foot in frustration though that would be rather immature he reminded himself glumly.

Legolas knew more or less what the Haradrim man was thinking about him and he really didn't care. Raising his chin even in his torment, the Elf snorted and turned his gaze into the darkness, giving Darcíl the impression that he didn't think the human was worth his time. Which wasn't just a show, he truly believed the human was not even worth the effort he was putting into remaining awake simply to gather the man's ire.

Every breath Legolas drew was a torment and he coughed raggedly as he tried to drag a full amount of air into his voracious lungs. But at most he could draw half of a breath before the pain of his bruised and swollen chest squeezed it out again, begging for more. His feet were limp now; tired of useless kicking that only succeeded in draining him of vital energy. He now wished he had saved his strength to kick his tormentor and let him know full well that he was not as helpless as he seemed.

Darcíl knew that slowly this blonde Elf would wear down in time and then he would break. The ranger might break sooner though and that would be all the better. Smiling coldly with ice and steel weaved cleverly into the brightness of the grin he gave a Legolas a little shove, letting him swing in his bond. This was one of the few things he did that Legolas found so difficult to endure…at least one of the few things so far. Legolas wasn't so stupid or naive as to think that this was the worst he was going to receive. No matter how much he wished this would be the worst, he knew very well that it wasn't going to be by a long shot.

Turning his back on the dangling prince that had ceased struggling when this happened some time ago, Darcíl made his way to the door, sloshing through the filthy water and exiting the small cell. Legolas watched him go and as soon as the man was gone further down the hall and into the darkness, most likely to go and check up on Aragorn, Legolas reached up his free hand and gripped the chain. He used what strength he could muster and pulled his own weight up and held himself up, giving his wrist a break.

The short reprieve was so refreshing that it made Legolas nearly terrified of falling again. But it also made him content and feeling lightheaded and very nearly giddy with relief. Smiling to himself for moment in his meager and short lived victory the Elf began to shake as his nearly diminished strength faded further.

He felt his arm trembling after a few minutes. The prince willed himself to hold on just a little longer and then his hand let go of its own accord and Legolas plunged back down, his wrist chaffing even more. He winced and stifled an abrupt wail at the same time his arm burned with renewed vigor.

Panting, the Wood-Elf reached up again and pulled himself up once more. His whole body began to tremble like a leaf in a gale after less than six seconds and then his grip loosened and he fell once more. Legolas drew in half of a quavering breath and then leaned his head against his stretched arm as he felt his world spinning. He knew that only caused more pain but he was disturbingly too tired to think of or do much of anything else.

Wiping the sweat from his brow against his bloodied arm, the Elf whimpered slightly as the action infuriated his torment and it became harder to bear. Sighing in near despair, the prince wondered when he would die. Immortality was overrated at times, he concluded in his weariness as his dulled blue eyes scrutinized his prison before they found an oddly intriguing interest.

Looking at the water below he watched it swirl in small whirlpools below his slack feet. It was something to do anyway. But it only made his stomach lurch and so the Elf closed his eyes, though he knew sleep was impossible in this position. Smiling grimly he thought to himself, you never could get a decent sleep can you?

Darcíl opened the door to the room named by most as the 'torture chamber' and as he thought of the cruel sounding name it fit quite well. Placing his hand on the handle, he slowly pulled the door open and prepared himself for the gruesome scene he knew would unfold before his eyes.

Sarchel stood in the corner, screaming at Aragorn, who was swinging from his wrist, attached to the manacle in turn attached to the chain in the ceiling. His feet were beating the air in spasms as he jerked in his pain.

"What is the Elf's name?" asked Sarchel again as he delivered a solid punch to Aragorn's jaw, pitching the ranger's head backward upon the hard impact. Aragorn's dislocated shoulder screamed at him and he felt blackness creeping upon him. Blood ran from his nose and mouth where his face was broken in several spots.

He felt his mind swirling and everything was merged into bleary images. Black spots mingled with yellow ones danced before his vision as he felt himself sliding quickly into refreshing unconsciousness. He didn't fight it in the least. This unconsciousness was a blessing in disguise if ever there was one. Curious, this was what it was like to be in the air amid the stars… But then he remembered this feeling was not entirely new.

He closed his eyes and felt the pain lessen slightly, much to his relief. But his ears picked up on the conversation between Sarchel and captain Darcíl that was quickly escalating into an all out argument.

"He is ready to break!" yelled Sarchel in frustration at his captain's decision and Aragorn felt the Lieutenant's hand against his hot and clammy shoulders shake with anger. He willed himself not to shiver beneath the ungentle touch though all his muscles wanted to tremble.

Darcíl snapped, "he is getting narrowly close to death! Lieutenant," he stressed the other man's position angrily. "If he dies then I am accountable, as you are under authority from me. That is called responsibility, something you know nothing of. Now, I order you to get him down and place him with that cursed Elf!"

Sarchel knew that he was bested. He was a weak man when it came to physical strength and weaker still when it came to mental strength. He did not have the courage to challenge his superior officer, not yet. He carefully said, "As you wish, sir." But there was a dark malice weaved nearly undetectably into his voice that made it seem more like the growl of an angered and humiliated dog than the reply of a man.

Darcíl found that comparison moderately amusing and resisted the stanch desire to smile at the thought of Sarchel crawling around on all fours and perhaps panting a little as well. But he knew it was too much to hope for.

Sarchel did as he was bid solemnly and sulked as he undid the ranger's cuff and the captive fell against him. With disgust, he let Aragorn fall to the floor and curl into himself in agony. With a sneer the lower officer rolled him over onto his back and Aragorn opened his glazed eyes wearily to see the dark ceiling wavering above him.

He felt relief flow in to every part of his body as he came to the recognition that he was on solid ground and pain was not lancing through his left arm and neck. However, his bruise mottled chest still felt congested and broken into many fragments, each with its own type of pain, throbbing, constant or dull.

"Now you will take him to his cell," growled Darcíl. "And I don't care how he gets there, just as long as he is there before I finish counting to fifty!" His eyes narrowed and with his furrowed brows he looked convincingly commanding.

Gripping Aragorn by his bleeding shoulder and letting the dislocated one drag against the stony floor, Sarchel began to drag Aragorn out of the door.

Aragorn didn't resist as he hit every rut in the floor and his out of kilter shoulder took the brunt of his pain. He let himself by dragged along towards he and Legolas' cell while strange shapes and stars whirled about him as he felt himself falling into a black abyss of nothingness.

He wondered what Legolas reaction would be to this incident. Smiling inwardly, he knew that the Elf would be irate and most livid being on the face of the earth. Then Aragorn experienced an acute stab of worry, realizing that Legolas would be the most irate and livid being on the face of the earth if he were conscious.

He wasn't worried about them breaking Legolas. He had known the Elven prince long enough to know that was a hard feat that had only been reached once and he knew Legolas had learned to be stronger from that experience. But he did worry about the pain his friend was experiencing or had been experiencing. Legolas felt pain the same as anyone else. He also knew that Elves died just as easily as the other races and that was a thought that was alarming and caused his mounting headache to sharpen to an unbearable height.

He felt water slosh around him and soak him, freezing him to the marrow, as they went down the slightly lower inclined hallway that was flooding. The cold water only served to worsen his already morbid and pain-racked state of mind. The ranger shivered as he heard the grating of the iron door being swung open with a screech that irritated his nerves.

The dirty, cold water splashed in his face, causing him to choke on it. His dislocated shoulder throbbed and then went numb. He felt a strange tingling sensation in his fingers that meant the arm was going dead from the lack of circulation. That was anything but a calming thought and most definitely not optimistic but he saw no reason to skate around the inevitable truth.

He became blearily aware that he was being dragged further and being placed in the sorry excuse even for a dungeon. If they were going to keep he and Legolas prisoner then they could at least give them a half-decent dungeon to be held in. It was in such decay that if they were not chained, unconscious or in too much pain to think straight, a easy escape plan wouldn't be too hard to conjure up. He smiled again inside, especially with Legolas' devious wood-Elf brain. But then again the plan such an Elf might come up with could quite possibly be far too reckless to even slightly be considered foolproof.

Aragorn winced and allowed a small groan of instant and brief agony as he was hurled into the prison and grimaced as the door was slammed shut with a loud clattering bang as the metal locks connected.

Legolas woke as water splashed against his hot flushed cheeks, feeling so cool and refreshing. He blinked stupidly and scanned the room for the cause of the splash. Nothing had fallen from the decaying ceiling, nothing from the barred door, nothing had collapsed in from the walls. Strangely everything seemed normal, but then his eyes fell upon a form lying half-submerged in the water.

His heart nearly stopped as he came to the sudden insight that the limp, cold, forlorn, blood leaking form was Aragorn. The man looked like he was nearly dead and Legolas watched as the water around the shirtless ranger was turned a disturbing sanguine color as his wounds bled freely in the filth of the mucky water.

"Estel," Legolas half spoke half croaked. He raised his head slowly from it rested on his restrained arm. He hadn't honestly thought that they would bring his friend back this soon. He kenw that chances were they were going to pay dearly for that later but he was more than willing if it mean ta few moments of 'happiness' with some one who could give him enough comfort to carry one for just a little longer.

Aragorn opened his eyes slowly and gave a feverish smile that was so hollow it made Legolas feel empty. "Hello mellon nin," he breathed around his pain. "You shouldn't have came for me…s-stupid."

Legolas frowned and rolled his eyes as he hung from his arm, "well if that I wouldn't have been captured, then everything would have been alright!" rationalized the Elf as he dangled in misery. Not coming back for Aragorn was hardly an option that he was willing to even glance at and dismiss.

Aragorn raised himself slowly and fell down into the water again in his weakness. His dislocated shoulder fell beneath him and shot pain through his collarbone and chest. Legolas narrowed his eyes and said in a surprised cry, "Valar, Thorongil! You are practically dismembered!"

"No…I am-"

"You are not 'fine' or even close to being 'fit', Thorongil!" seethed Legolas in a low whisper. He winced and his feet jerked as a pain spasm blinded him and he felt for a second like his heart would stop beating. But no, life was too unfair for that to happen yet. He would have to be tortured some more first.

"No…" began Aragorn but he never finished.

Legolas reached up with his free hand and gripped the chain tightly as he tried to pull himself up and relieve the torturous pressure on his wrist. As a little pressure was removed from his arm and the cuff lifted slightly, hot blood ran from beneath it, trickling down Legolas' bare arm.

"Ranger…" he breathed in a gasp, "you are NOT fine!" His grip slipped and he banged against the manacle with a cry that he wished to goodness he had suppressed. But he was wise enough to know it was no use crying over what was over and done and plan foolish when it was something that trivial. Shuddering, the blonde prince said under his breath in a gasp, "and apparently, neither am I."

He closed his eyes for a moment, gathering his strength and willing his heart to calm down to a normal beat.

Aragorn finally forced his body to comply with his commands and he rose up to his knees, looking at the water that dripped from his clothes. As he looked at Legolas he felt a sickening lump squeezing his throat shut and cutting off the cry of horror and anger at his friend's treatment. He could not believe men were so cruel even though he was right here, watching it. It was disquieting and he forced the thought form his mind…or tried to.

Legolas was too weary to hold his head up and he let it fall against his arm while he was in the company of his friend. He suddenly felt extremely thirsty and looking at nothing but water was torturous in and of itself. Well, not exactly, this water wasn’t unerringly good and clean looking. It had blood, he noticed, lots of bright red blood mingled in its murkiness. His lips were cracked and parched with blood doting them, for his body had lost a lot of water content during his cold sweats that he was still experiencing. His feet beat the air again as they jerked of their own will.

Aragorn crawled through the two-inch water towards his friend and as he got closer and saw the bruises all over Legolas cheeks he was immediately made painfully aware of the torture his Legolas had been placed under. He saw the muscles of Legolas' arm straining, as they were wretched taut by Legolas' own weight.

"Eru, my friend," breathed Aragorn as his eyes rested on all the fresh bruises and blood on Legolas' body. As the Elf spun slowly on the chain, he saw the cuts cruelly carved into his back some deep and some shallow, all bleeding. Aragorn shuddered in abhorrence at the wounds.

He didn't even realize Legolas was looking at him and the strange way he carried on arm, as though the slightest jolt was a severe torment. Legolas was sure it was a torment, as was everything else they were going through at the moment. He saw the javelin wound in Aragorn's other shoulder, ripped and looking as though it had been probed with a hot knife, which he was sure that it probably had. But he saw some other strange lacerations on his friend's body of which he could not identify.

It disturbed him to see the deep purple welts on Aragorn and some of the cuts that marked up the clammy chest of his friend. Knowing more than something about his friend's pain and what he had truly gone through it only served to make him further sympathize with his friend. The water had cleared the blood away and he saw them clearly, obviously made by the metal strips of the club. Memories of his own horrible pain seemed not so distant and he felt his stomach muscles tighten ever so slightly even as he worked on calming them. It made his head hurt even more to know that Aragorn was going through the exact same thing at that very moment and he closed his eyes in stabbing despair.

The water had strangely refreshed Aragorn and cleared his thoughts, exactly the opposite effect he had though the frigid liquid would have. As he looked at Legolas he suddenly became extremely scared as the Elf's head lolled sideways and his body stopped spasming. He nearly shouted Legolas' name but remembered that was one of the things he must never utter here. Instead he felt his heart accelerate his breathing hitch. "Don't leave me," he begged in a breath as he was unable to say another word without giving Legolas up.

He crawled over, holding his limp and immovable arm to his side. Aragorn struggled to rise, but he was too weak and trembling, he sank beneath his bleeding friend and looked at his numb fingers of his dislocated arm with despair. He wished he felt numb, but he felt nothing but hurt and doubt inside. He wished he could do anything but he was helpless, a feeling he had not come across in quite some time, and he didn't think he wanted to get used to it anytime soon.

Thunder rumbled outside and it seemed to shake the palace down to the roots where they were placed in cold darkness. Aragorn didn't notice and in fact, even if he had, he wouldn't have cared. His body was breaking and as he watched his friend begin to crumble and struggle to live and hold strong his spirit was breaking too. But there was enough fire, the fire to want to live and bring Legolas him, that kept him alive.

CHAPTER SEVEN

You Never Know…

It was bleak, very bleak even as birds sang freely and some minute rays of glistening sunlight fell to the forest floor. Thranduil noted with depression how Legolas would have very much enjoyed a day like today, with its warmth and visiting sunlight. Legolas always liked the sunlight more than the strange darkness of Mirkwood's forest. He supposed that was one of the reasons that he always was coming and going and if he was there, he had to be with friends or in trees where the sun’s light could leak in and penetrate the vast dimness. Legolas missed what Mirkwood had been before she fell.

Thranduil watched as a leaf turned golden and reminded him of seeing Legolas' hair caught up in a ray of sunshine. Having not heard from Legolas in two years had worn on the Elvenking's bearing. Worn on it much indeed, more than he liked to readily admit to anyone, especially himself.

He no longer looked as proud and his eyes were almost always narrowed and more often closed now days. He didn't throw many feasts anymore and he let Rothinzil and Celebalda deal with the affairs of his people. It was nearly safe to say he was no longer governing the Elves and that Rothinzil was acting as the royal personage. But no one would go so far as to say that, especially while Thranduil was in ear shot. It was not that they feared he would object, they feared he would agree and his spirit would be damaged some more. They didn’t want to lose their king, after all, with Dol Guldur growing into ever more of a menace to them and their way of life.

Thranduil stopped walking on his well-worn forest trail and stood for a moment, lost in memory. He sighed quietly and smiled knowing that whatever happened his son would be well. Legolas always managed to pull himself out of trouble. Of course he was convinced the trouble was caused by the ranger that his son often accompanied to the dangerous places the man was bound to go. He had taken counsel with Elrond once or twice but they both had come to the same aggravating conclusion: there was no way to stop the friends from being together.

Thranduil had tried everything, even commanding Legolas to stay, which Legolas would, but not for long. He knew that in a way Legolas was becoming old enough that he could take care of himself, but he still considered Legolas a child in his heart, though he was nearly an age old. However, he was king here and that meant that Legolas would have to obey him whether he was his father or not and that was where the problem came in. Legolas would not simply comply with what he felt to be very rash orders that were more or less meaningless and had no sway over his train of thought other than driving him away.

Shaking his head, he decided not to think about Legolas' disobedience. It was depressing and it hurt deeply, more deeply than he would readily admit. It was hard to think that the only rebel he had in his kingdom was in fact a member of his house hold, his own son, his own flesh and blood!

He didn’t like to think that perhaps the reason Legolas had become so hard headed and strong in foolish ideas was his fault. But he couldn’t help but turn the idea over in his head every now and then. It was impossible to completely push aside, he realized with a stab of disappointment and slight aggravation.

Thranduil began to explore the notion that he had driven Legolas from home and actually began to wonder what his son was doing at this very moment. Perhaps he wasn't that far away. But having not heard from the blonde prince in two years was a little disturbing and nearly alarming. He must not lie to himself; it was alarming and actually frightening. Legolas usually came back after a few weeks or even maybe two months. He would never deny him word like this unless he was really gone. Unless he had been killed.

Thranduil just could not bear the thought that his new regulations on Legolas' life had driven his own son into self-appointed exile. He was not going to even regard that thought, he promised himself. But it was a fruitless promise. Being Legolas’ father, his son was all he thought about and right now his son was all that haunted his dreams and thoughts.

When Legolas came back, he thought wryly, he would hug him and tell him how much he loved him first and then after that he would lock him in his room until the next millennia. Frowning, he wondered what escape his son would manage to conjure up this time. He usually came up with the most devious, reckless, spurious, exasperating and clever escapes ad pulled them off before he could be found out and stopped.

Perhaps the dungeons would be a better place to keep his son. He could make it into a comfortable room and still keep Legolas chained to the wall. Thranduil smiled at the thought of Legolas giving him his -you-have-warranted-death-by-this glare. Legolas hadn’t used that look in a long time, at least not directed at him. The last person he ever saw Legolas cast that glare at was that young ranger and that was after the man had cut a piece of Legolas' hair as the prince slept to let a bird weave it into her nest. He remembered his son had been livid while the rest of the palace, including him, went up into roaring laughter.

It was also very odd that ever since the humiliation of their prince, Aragorn had been more accepted by the Wood-Elves. Normally the price for the humiliation of a Firstborn was high to pay, but this time everyone felt that it was called for.

The brief memory of the joy that had been faded and Thranduil felt sorrow fall over his heart once more as he realized he may never see Legolas laugh, lose his temper or even come back in need of stitches again. And realizing that he missed his son so much he would welcome him with lacerations in dire need of stitches, the blonde Elvenking suddenly understood just how much he wished he had back. It was true: you never know what you’ve got until it’s gone.

O0O0O0O0O

Helluin walked the cave like corridors of the Palace of the Wood Elves. Her steps were soft and nearly Elf-like. Her long red hair was loose and fell about her graceful shoulders in lengthy auburn tresses that swished when she walked. Her blue eyes were glittering with a youthful appearance though she was close to forty. Even though she was mortal her life among the Eldar had kept her looking slightly younger than she was. It was a phenomenon that really wasn’t to be expected, but the fact that it had happened wasn’t a bad thing at all, so she really couldn’t complain all that easily.

Straightening out a wrinkle in her dress's skirt, she stopped and stared mournfully out of a deep-set window that she honestly had no idea why it was called a ‘window’ considering how small and dark it was by the time you reached the glass part of it so far back was it set. She loved being with the Elves and her dear Rothinzil but she missed her own people greatly-more than she had originally thought were ever vaguely possible. She felt like time didn't move here and that she was passing everything by. Everything was always the same and she needed a change. Her life was short and she felt she needed to be moving on.

A pair of hands on her shoulders made her spin around to meet the calm and amused eyes of Roth as he smiled at her with the same sweet and sloppy grin he had possessed for practically forever. "You always have to sneak up on me, don't you?" she asked curtly as he pulled her close into a warm hug.

He laughed softly and chided in a tease, "no. You just need to be more alert when you live with Wood-Elves, especially when one of them is Legolas."

She reached up and touched his pointed ear, laughing when he jerked back. He was still ticklish behind his ears, just as she had found out years ago. Pulling away she asked quietly referring to their twin children, "where are Telperion and Ilwë?"

Rothinzil snorted softly at the mention of his daughter and son and muttered, "Telperion is with the other maidens working on her embroidery and Ilwë is out working on his archery." He smiled brightly and said, "you know exactly how he, he is just like Uncle Legolas, he will not show up until dinner. I think he spent too much of his toddler years trailing that spoiled prince around."

He thought of his children happily. Ilwë looked like a mirror image of himself only he was very graceful like his mother and loved to be out in the woods, practicing archery, which was his favorite weapon.

Telperion was his lovely daughter with his hair and her mother's crystalline eyes whose idea of a good time was teasing her brother (using tactics taught to her by Elladan and Elrohir when they visited) to no end and weaving enchanting tapestries of old tales that she loved to hear again and again. And she did have a talent for that sort of work. Her fingers were long and her hands were strong but delicate coupled her hand eye coordination that was unsurpassable. She had never tried archery but he guessed that she wouldn't be half-bad at it.

Both had pointy ears and looked Elven but had not decided yet to be counted among the Eldar or Edain.

Helluin looked out the window and Rothinzil came up behind her. Both stared out of it thoughtfully. "Rothinzil, have you ever thought of going back?" she asked calmly.

Rothinzil frowned and inquired in astonishment, "do you want to? It is beautiful here and safe from disease and most hardships. My family is here," he added. "I could never leave Legolas." But he knew that Legolas was gone, he hadn’t left Legolas, Legolas had left him. But certainly his best friend and near brother had not left him on purpose? Legolas would never leave him or his father for ever would he?

She turned around slowly and looked at him, "but I feel trapped. I see everything staying the same while I change." She watched a torn look came into her husband's hazel eyes.

Rothinzil looked the polished stone floor they stood on and said, "I can't leave, not even for you. I want our children to grow up here, I want to die here." The Elf's eyes narrowed and he added, "you really can't ever realize what you have until it is gone."

Helluin knew that he referred to his immortality that he had given up to die with her. There wasn't a day that went by where she didn't regret forcing him to make such a hard decision and in the end allowing him to choose death over life. His face was still looking very young, like he was in his early twenties. Even though he was mortal now, he still didn't appear to age and was as childish and Elf-like as ever.

"I am sorry, Roth, so sorry," she murmured as he looked out the window serenely.

"For what?" he asked sharply, feeling more than a bit disgruntled at her words. "You did nothing wrong. Now," he changed the subject. "I have to go abroad tonight with Celebalda and Caranfëa along the borders near Dol Guldur."

"Are you bringing Ilwë along like you promised?" she asked tersely, staring him in the eye with a -don't you-dare-back-out look that made him feel rather uncomfortable. Actually now that he thought about it, he felt more threatened than anything else, which was foolish.

He shook his head in answer and said, "It is too dangerous. I know what it is like to get captured by orcs." Swallowing hard at old memories he said, "I would not place our son in that sort of danger." The Elf's face looked unmistakably troubled and actually could be called miserable. "Ilwë is an Elf, do you know what they would do to him? And he is so young."

Roth's eyes plead for understanding. He could not bear to let his son be captured by one of the most horrible things to walk the face of the earth. Orcs along Dol Guldur's borders did not kill unless they had to; they captured and tormented for information. An Elf had already been lost to them this week, which meant that they were active and certainly getting bolder. It was no place for an Elfling hardly trained.

"I know you wouldn't let anything happen to him," Helluin encouraged confidently. She leaned against Rothinzil who pulled away.

"He is only twenty years old! For an Elf that is young, very young. I am young for an Elf!" he confirmed as he back-stepped towards the door out of the corridor, nearly tripping in the process. Time had made no improvements, however so miniscule, on his balancing skills. The Elf inclined his head slightly, his dark hair sliding over his shoulder and covering a pointy ear. "Do you not understand? I will make sure he is not on those borders until he is one hundred at least. Preferably four hundred to five hundred."

"Rothinzil, he doesn't even know if he is mortal or immortal yet! How can you say that? You aren't going to go scout tonight, just sit in a tree and watch for patrols of orcs that come too close. Why can't you simply take him with you?" she argued with her temper beginning to rise and her eyes turning into narrow slits of flame.

She was finding it impossible to believe that she didn’t understand. This was her husband, this was her son they were talking about and if she didn’t know them both by now she had to question her intelligence. Roth was being far more difficult than need be and she was ready to truly lose her temper, which wasn’t something she particularly wanted to do.

A fairly accurate description of her was the look of a dragon before it spat fire, mused Rothinzil. He felt his anxiety and anger spiking and told himself that he had to stop coming up with these depressing comparisons or he would turnout just like Legolas or Celebalda. Not that he didn’t admire his superiors but there was the slight inclination to be a bit wary of their…bizarre habits.

"Dearest…" he began but he stopped and sighed in despair. He was losing the argument. But she just simply did not understand the precarious situation Ilwë would be placed in. He finally snapped, "I have already lost Legolas! I have already lost another dear friend of mine that you only had the privilege to meet once! I can not; I will not lose my son!"

"You do not know Legolas won't be coming back!" she seethed, becoming angrier by the minute.

"You do not know him and Estel the way I do! They could be in the Nath of Lothlorien (the most peaceful place in Middle-Earth) and still manage to find someone who hates them and is out for blood, be killed and then brought back to life by Galadriel herself only to be captured and tortured within an inch of their lives by some insane something that is out for their blood. All that in the time frame of half an hour or less!" Rothinzil shook his head. "We haven't heard from Legolas in two years, if anything he would have written a letter to me."

"Unless he is someplace where he can't write letters," Helluin reasoned with the irate Elf before her.

She had never seen Rothinzil angry before save once but since Legolas had run away without even saying farewell to him he had been depressed and his laugh was seldom heard in the forest. She knew as well he was feeling the weight of the world, as he never had before, though she could not possibly hope to understand it. It was burden they could not share.

"My point exactly."

Rothinzil sighed and rubbed his temples unconsciously with his fingers as he felt a tension headache pressing its painful way into his awareness. He felt like he had lost everything while he had gained the world. For the first time he thought that he was beginning to understand what a bird felt with a broken wing. It was a painful feeling even though it certainly wasn’t physical.

He wondered for a moment what he would look like with wings and one being broken at that. But quickly cast the thought aside as he didn’t really think he had the time to think of such things at the moment.

The Elf missed the company of his prince that was like an older brother to him and without him he felt alone even though he had everything he had ever wanted: a family and a place to belong.

Helluin relaxed and patted her husband's back comfortingly. "I will get some tea made for you and you can rest." She pulled his long and dark hair away from his paled face. He looked at her with his hazel eyes looking once like a fawn, a façade that she loved when he let it show through. She knew he was still strong as steel and wiser than many she had met.

"No, I will be fine. I simply need to clear my head," said the dark-haired Wood-Elf as he forced a shaky smile to pull at his lips' corners.

Helliun looked grimly at her Elven husband before she argued, "you need tea. Stop by the healing ward later and get some."

"Helluin-" Roth started before he was cut off by one of Helluin's long slender fingers pressing against his lips.

"Shhhhh…" she chided in a soft voice as she pulled him close and looked into his eyes with a dreamy gaze. His face turned back to a warm radiance and he pulled her close, pressing his lips to hers in a quick kiss.

She took him by the hand and said in a soft commanding voice, "come with me." Roth didn't argue with her. After all, besides being his wife, she was healer and was very capable of making his life miserable if she so chose.

O0O0O0O0O

Legolas opened his eyes and bit back a quick yelp of pain as consciousness returned. He looked blearily around the small dingy dungeon that was he and Estel's luck of having been placed in and noticed that everything lay in shadows or was indistinct. The prince felt rather disoriented but he had enough of his wits left unmuddled to know that this reprieve they were being given was only temporary. Uncomforting, that’s what that bit of knowledge is, he told himself.

He looked beneath his feet and saw Aragorn hunched over his knees in the shallow water. The Elf whispered hoarsely, "Thorongil…" Legolas felt slightly annoyed at the weakness of his own voice. He was prince it was supposed to be commanding, calm…dignified if not without some sort of devious ring to it. Instead it sounded broken.

Aragorn became aware of Legolas' voice and he lifted his head slowly so as not to set off the throbbing headache had only just now managed to rid himself of. He smiled thinly, "I wondered if they had gone too far with you my friend."

The ranger inclined his head minutely and glanced up at the Elf who gave a thin smile back, trying to ignore the waves of pure anguish through his arm and the thunder he realized was rumbling overhead. "They don't want us dead, Estel. For what comfort that is," he muttered.

Aragorn noticed how Legolas strained against the bond he swung from and he winced openly. "Stand on my back, mellon nin." He doubted that Legolas would actually do such a thing, but it was worth a try anyway. Well…maybe…

Legolas glanced down with a small frown of wrath and snapped contemptuously, "and cause you more pain? I think not." To Legolas’ way of thinking at the moment it was completely and unchangeably out of the question. He honestly could not believe that Aragorn had dared to ask such a dumb question. His mind was obviously fogged and badly so. Unless, no wait, this sort of selfless stupidity was a regular occurrence in this type situation. Typical, Legolas told himself mentally.

"You stubborn Wood-Elf!" growled Aragorn sternly. "Just do it or I will force you to!" he threatened darkly. He got on his hands and knees and began to crawl into position beneath Legolas' booted feet.

"Strider!" said Legolas, forgetting to use Aragorn's current alias. "You are impossible. But I will not stand on your damaged back and cause you further injury." He narrowed his eyes and stared curiously at the ranger's oddly placed shoulder. "You dislocated your shoulder!" he accused in a hiss.

"No, Sarchel did," corrected Aragorn grumpily. He was not in the disposition to argue with Legolas whom he knew was about as stubborn as a literally stupid mule. He shrugged and said, "Fine. If you do not want to stand on my back and ease your pain that is causing your body to twitch and shudder, then don't."

Legolas chuckled wryly and said in a sneer that Aragorn would have thought looked comical had he not known Legolas to be in complete agony, "either way, it is dislocated and you are too obstinate to do anything about it." He muttered under his breath, "stubborn human. Typical."

"Stupid Wood-Elf," rebutted Aragorn a bit savagely. He watched as Legolas used his spare hand to grasp the chain and pull himself up to ease the pressure on his wrist. Legolas had been doing this off and on before he went unconscious from the pain it caused when he lost his grip and jerked back down and it didn't make Aragorn sad, it infuriated him to know that his friend was in such pain. And his anger was not entirely directed at his enemies either, he was the one who had allowed Legolas to follow him.

He should have forced Legolas to home for however much good that would have done. Legolas was every bit as stubborn as he was if not more so and the more you pestered him about doing something, the more he resisted. Legolas was also annoying in the sense he had an impossible way of being able to completely ignore you if he didn't want to hear what you had to say. Something that the ranger guessed he had learned early in life, a result of living with constantly chattering Wood-Elves and being a Wood-Elf himself. Of course that really didn’t make too much sense, but when you actually thought about it you could vaguely understand it.

Legolas began to shake and his breathing accelerated as he felt his meager grip on the links slipping slowly free. Anticipating the pain he was about to experience, Legolas bit his lower lip silently as he felt his last bit of strength that was too weak to hold on for long give.

The fall was brief but the pain lasted longer. Looking up at the ceiling as he tried to hold his composure after falling and jerking against the bond, Legolas realized what a decayed place they were in. In the light of the spluttering torches that gave the room a horrid and suffocating smell he saw he beams above were fallen into complete disrepair. Particularly the one his chain was attached to.

Spiders had made their numerous sticky homes above. Of course living with much larger, crueler and insidious relatives of these little beasts gave him the understanding that these infinitesimal things were more or less harmless. He was hardly frightened of them. Though that didn’t mean that he didn’t find them to be totally disgusting.

Swallowing hard, the Elf looked back down at Aragorn, who was glaring up at him with a look that reminded him all too much like one he imagined Elrond would give in this sort of situation. And the unbelievable thing was that Aragorn was not one of Elrond's sons by birth. If one saw the looks they used he would think that Aragorn was the son of Celebrian for certain.

Legolas smiled at the thought and then he catechized, "would you please stop giving me that you-are-a-stubborn-idiot glare…I am going through enough at the moment." It was a rough jest, but anyone else who heard it wouldn’t understand unless Aragorn turned his nearly evil glare upon them.

"Would you rather I give you the you-are-incredibly-annoying-and-will-pay-later stare?" inquired the ranger as to Legolas preference. He watched Legolas's dimmed blue eyes darken further in a scathing glare of his own that made his face strongly resemble a sky before a storm broke. Aragorn started inside at the sharp resemblance between Legolas and Thranduil, though he knew he should not have been surprised.

"Don't push your luck ranger," warned Legolas in a flat voice while he worked on keeping his muscles under control. He was getting alarmed at how they continually wanted to jerk and convulse. As a matter of fact, stark fear was beginning to inch its way into his heart, like a vine slowly choking a tree.

"Too bad you can't get down, I might get scared," teased the human, trying to make his friend laugh.

Legolas didn't laugh, he just muttered hazily around a set of grit teeth, "wait and see you filthy human." Leaning his head on his arm and letting his hair fall over his face, the Elf wheezed and muttered, "if someone offered to kill me, I think, I might take them up on it."

His tone was almost sarcastic but more corrosive, determined Aragorn as he looked upon his dangling friend, watching him draw ragged breaths that were a torment.

He was in great pain himself but surprisingly the water of the cell had helped revive him. Something which he was still trying to figure out. But Legolas was flushed from fever and his wounds were still blood covered. His battered chest was being stretched as well as his arm and Aragorn wouldn't be surprised if the prince ended up dislocating his own as well.

"I really should have forced you to go home," Aragorn murmured remorsefully as he looked sorrowfully at the water surrounding him.

"Are you really going to go on another guilt trip?" asked Legolas, raising a brow behind his curtain of lose blonde hair. His voice was barely audible. "You know as well as do I that anything and everything you say concerning why this is all your fault is mostly all figments of your over-whelmed imagination."

"Legolas, you do not understand…"

"Excuse me?" asked the prince with some heat. "Human, if you think you could have run me off and continued on your own, you are out of your mind. And, if I wanted to, I could follow you without you so much as guessing I was anywhere nearby. Don't flatter yourself."

Aragorn shook his head and continued most adamantly as he struggled to stand, "Elf, you have to be the most stubborn creature Illuvater ever created!" He mumbled darkly, "you get it from your father."

Legolas was about to make a sharp remark back but he thought better of it. Glancing with repulsion at the slimly, filthy, disgusting, unappetizing, cold, dark and foreboding wall, The blonde Elf wrinkled his nose and said in abomination, "you would have thought they could give us better lodgings!"

Aragorn snorted and accused grimly, "you are changing the subject mellon in."

Legolas raised both of his eyebrows and smiled. Slightly inclining his head to the right he said sardonically, "and I was working so hard to hide that fact." He then stuck his nose up and mumbled in mock pride, "but I have my reasons. The fact is that trying to make you understand you are wrong about anything is like trying to tell a blind mule that it’s about to walk off a cliff!"

"But you can't speak mule."

"My point exactly."

Aragorn glared, "that was harsh, Greenleaf, very harsh."

"And well earned." Legolas’ answer was generally to be expected but it still got on Aragorn’s nerves just a little.

Then an eerie silence fell between them and both looked at the iron barred door with small frowns on their faces.

CHAPTER EIGHT

What You've Got Until It's Gone

If there was a more perfect day in the world called Middle- Earth, he had yet to find it. The sun shown lazily down upon his dark head, filtering down through the leaves in little flecks of yellow mingled with a dim orange. A gentle and totally ominous free breeze rippled through the mild air in a peaceful way. Rolling over onto his back as he lay beneath the shadow of a large elm tree, Elladan narrowed his grey eyes to scan the green leaves above.

In spite of all the serenity of the place he was in, Elladan Peredhil felt oddly restless. It had been a full two years since they had even seen Estel and just as long since they had heard from him. His brother was getting older, so he knew that chances were he was capable of looking after himself, for the most part. But every now and then some part of him gave the Elven twin a sharp reminder that he was still needed by his human brother. Of course, he thought with a weary sigh, Aragorn would tell him he was simply being paranoid and needed to relax.

Elrohir could be a little more understanding to the ranger, but he too felt the obligation of an older brother to the human that could not be shaken off no matter how hard he tried.

Elladan turned his head and looked sharply at the said Elrohir, who was sitting with his back to the tree beside him, his eyes closed over as he dozed lightly. “Elrohir?” questioned the elder twin impassively. He knitted his brows and blinked as sunlight shone bright on his fair features as the wind shifted some leaves free of its rays’ path. “Elrohir!” he nearly shouted, not wanting to break the peacefulness of the moment but feeling he had no other choice.

The younger twin didn’t even open his eyes and mumbled lazily, “what?”

“Do you ever wonder about Estel? It’s been two years. You know,” reminded Elladan with a small frown of displeasure at the thought. He sat up and asked firmly, “Are you even listening to me? Elrohir!”

The younger twin muttered back, “Yes, yes. You are obnoxious enough to make the dead listen to you!” His voce sounded annoyed and Elladan shot a scathing glare at his younger brother.

“Very funny,” he growled back tensely. “Can’t you be serious? I am!”

Opening one eye, Elrohir, son of Elrond, gave Elladan and incredulous look before opening both of his silver orbs and allowed reluctantly, “Very well, brother. But you woke me from one of the most peaceful naps I have had in a long time.”

Elladan’s glare didn’t relent and Elrohir shifted uncomfortable before his elder brother finally began to speak. “Estel hasn’t been seen in two years! He usually sends us word.”

“He usually doesn’t go so far South either,” reminded Elrohir quietly. He sat up straight and yawned before saying, “he probably is too far away to send word that would reach us before it is far out dated.”

“Do you think I do not know that?” inquired Elladan in edginess. “But you at least think he could have let father know he was alive,” reasoned the elder twin, obviously slightly angry at the absent human.

Elrohir knew his twin’s frustration came not out of literal anger, but out of fear. He argued back in Estel’s defense, “We don’t always send word.”

“You don’t always send word,” retorted Elladan as he started to stand up. The dark-haired Elf felt weaker, most likely from his attempted nap that he was a bit envious of Elrohir for. In a minute bit of disappointment and annoyance, the Elf sank back to the ground. “I will bet anything he got that horrible habit from you, Elrohir!” accused Elladan flatly. He stared darkly and forbiddingly at his younger sibling who raised his hands in a miniscule attempt to ward off his brother’s oncoming wrath.

“Surly not I,” argued Elrohir. “Estel is too stubborn to do anything I advised (or anyone else) and in the first place, Elladan Peredhil, I would never advise such a thoughtless deed!” Elladan could feel the rising anger begin to push its way into Elrohir’s usually calm and totally impassive temperament.

Elladan backed off abruptly and then mumbled, “This is the meanest thing Estel has ever done.” Even if he didn’t do it on purpose, thought the dark-haired Elf to himself nebulously as he glared daggers at the new spring grass.

Elrohir watched his brother thoughtfully and then laid back against the tree to continue his rest. Aragorn was always fine in the end, it was in-between time that worried him. The beginning usually worked out reasonably well and the end was never as bad as it could be but in-between Estel managed to find the most alarming sort of mischief he thought a young human could find. Estel had barely lived in the Middle Earth as far as Elven years went and yet he had created more enemies than one could ever imagine he would find in that short amount of time.

There had to be some sort of an award for such a high and unbroken record, thought the younger brother wryly. After all, he and Elladan and lived more than twice as long and not found a fourth of as many enemies. But then again, most of the enemies they would find were not immortal and would therefore die. But Legolas was the exception to the rule as he was to most things.

That prince had found ways to make more enemies than any Elf Elrohir had ever heard of or known, except maybe Fëanor and/or his sons. But Legolas was also just a very odd Elf, he reasoned as he began to doze off once more, feeling the warmth of the sun on his face lulling him into a wonderful little reverie.

It seemed he had hardly closed his eyes for more than a few seconds when an annoying and yet calm voice chided, “you have both been sleeping here the majority of the day, are you going to be here forever?”

“Go away, Glorfindel,” Elladan muttered as he continued his spar of glares with the innocent spring grass. As far as he was concerned at the moment, it was deviously innocent looking.

“I think that I should take you with me,” mused the Gondolin Elf as he walked smoothly up and stood before the elder twin before casting an amused look towards Elrohir with his deep blue eyes. “You probably have forgotten how to use some muscles; you have been lazing around Rivendell long enough.”

Elladan’s dark head snapped up as he took obvious interest to what Glorfindel was saying. “Pardon?” He looked up at the interested face of the Balrog-Slayer, who smiled back dryly.

“You heard me,” Glorfindel said with a small incline of his head, allowing his golden hair to slide over his shoulders. “I am going to Lorien.” He shook his head. “I would expect such adventurous young Elves to want to come along.”

“Adventurous? Young? We don’t need your pity, Lord Glorfindel!” Elladan warded off with annoyance. If it had been the perfect day a little while ago, it certainly was anything but now. “And anyway,” reproached Elladan carelessly. “You should know by your age to always expect the unexpected.”

He then remembered an earlier remark of Glorfindel’s and mumbled with some heat, “We are not lazy.”

The golden haired Elf merely arched a brow in a way that showed he was beyond incredulous about that particular statement. Choosing not to comment on it, the older Elf said, “well if you don’t need my pity, then there is no need for you to come is there?”

He knew exactly what he was doing and he knew exactly what Elladan and Elrohir had been looking for. They had wanted to get out of Rivendell for a long time and all the inhabitants were getting quite annoyed by the pacing and unrest of the identical brothers. Glorfindel smiled with self-importance as he realized what a favor he was doing the local community.

“We will come,” allowed Elladan as he looked up at the Elf-lord, fighting off the urge to jump up and start to follow. After all he was not a puppy or a little Elfling and that would look so foolish and be so humiliating that he would rather die. “Of course, it is because one should not travel alone.”

“Are you questioning my capabilities to protect myself?” asked Glorfindel with narrowed eyes and a small frown pulling at his lips.

“Of course not,” said Elrohir lightly. “We just think that it is unfit for one of such obvious importance to travel alone. There are kidnappers out there in that wide world.”

Glorfindel scowled darkly at the younger twin and said tensely, “your concern is touching, Elrohir. I know you must have seen all there is to know of that ‘wide world’.”

Elrohir smiled and opened his eyes as he said quite seriously, “I haven’t yet, but I am working on it."

Glorfindel shifted his calculating glare down at Elladan and said, “I will feel rather protected knowing that if there is any danger, you will be the ones to find it first and all the orcs within a ten mile radius will run at the sound of your insufferable voices far across the mountains.”

"Very amusing, Glorfindel! You insult Lord Elrond Peredhil when you say that," apprised Elladan while fighting an uphill battle to keep a lurking smile suppressed.

"I am well aware of that, Young One," assured Glorfindel as he chuckled to himself more than anyone else.

Elrohir and Elladan exchanged amused looks and Elrohir said with an apathetic sigh, "your funeral."

Elladan peculiarly at a book held in Glorfindel's hand -almost behind his back. "Curious," he said in an inquisitive voice. "That reminds me sharply of one of Erestor's books." He glanced up at Glorfindel's face with narrowed eyes, as the Gondolin Elf looked shocked at the accusation.

"I am merely borrowing it," stated the golden-haired Elf-lord nonchalantly.

"Of course," stated Elladan as he stood up and gave Elrohir a hand up as well. "I think we have to be someplace." Elrohir grinned and then nodded enthusiastically, reminding Glorfindel sharply of a child trying to please a parent or a young warrior Elf trying to please his captain.

"Yes. I believe father wanted to talk to us about Estel and preparations for his homecoming," the younger twin stated off the top of his head. He knew Glorfindel would be hardly fooled, but it was better than nothing.

"You mean the stocking of the Healing Ward, especially in the department of stitches and sedative herbs?" asked Glorfindel while pushing a laugh down his throat and trying his best not to choke on it. After killing and being killed by a Balrog, choking to death on a laugh sounded undignified indeed.

"Something to that effect," replied Elladan curtly. With a slight tilt of his head towards the Last Homely House he said to his identical brother next to him, "Elrohir, we wouldn't want to keep Ada waiting."

"Admit it," said Glorfindel with a smirk. "You are terrified, absolutely petrified, that Erestor will catch you with me while I have the book and make corpses of you both." His scrutinizing gaze went from one to the other of the twin's uneasy faces.

"Well he doesn't exactly take kindly to thievery and embezzlement anyway. If it is a piece of his property, however trivial, he has been known to seek rather let us say…harsh retribution." Elladan looked sidelong at Elrohir with a slow grin and saw that his brother was losing a struggle to remain calm and not burst out in laughter at Glorfindel's plight. It had been long since Glorfindel had dared to tease Erestor or provoke him anyway what so ever. This was refreshing, if nothing else.

"So you would leave me to face his unrelenting wrath by myself?" questioned the golden-haired Elf as he stared at the brothers.

"Incase there is any doubt on your part," advised Elrohir. "I suggest you watch closely for that is exactly what we are about to do." They began to walk away and could have sworn they heard Glorfindel actually laughing behind them. Quickening their steps so as to put as much distance between themselves and the said Elf-lord in about as little time as possible, they came to the well-known conclusion that Glorfindel was psychotic.

O0O0O0O

The room was darkened and all the other Elves were out, merrymaking and things of the like, leaving their king to sit in dark though they had asked him if he would join them several times. The flames in the great fireplace were low as was Thranduil's mood. He watched them with morose vigilance, with his eyes half closed.

Sighing, the Sindarin ruler rose slowly and began to pace the room. If Legolas was here he knew that he wouldn't be feeling half so lonely. His son always managed to make things bit brighter. Perhaps it was his young spirit, or perhaps it was his love of life completely. The Elvenking could not say for certain.

Rubbing his temples unconsciously, the older Elf mumbled, "Legolas when will you stop being so stubborn and come home?" He knew that his son was headstrong enough to put a mule to shame, but he never imagined that they prince would take it thus far. It was more than alarming and he began to pace some more.

He was going to give that princling a piece of his mind when he got home. After he had hugged him to death of course and let him know how much he had missed him. But then Legolas was going to wish he had stayed home. The dungeons still sounded particularly appetizing to him but he wondered if Legolas would somehow manage to escape the same way those dwarves and that…hobbit -had.

A soft voice behind him inquired cautiously, "my lord?"

He turned around to see Rothinzil standing behind him, watching curiously. Forcing a grim smile that was about as hollow as an empty mug, the Elvenking asked, "Rothinzil, what brings you hither?"

"Which reason would you like first, my lord?" asked the dark-haired Wood-Elf with a small frown of obvious displeasure at finding his liege thus.

"There is more than one?" asked Legolas' father somewhat incredulously as he raised his brows. "Which ever you prefer," he decided with little thought.

"Well first of all everyone can hear you pacing and I am pretty sure that those working in the cellar are frightened that you will wear a hole in the floor," Rothinzil answered truthfully. All the inhabitance of Mirkwood had seen or heard their lord pacing and it was alarming not to mention annoying after some time. But they were too polite and sympathetic to mention it.

Thranduil gave the dark-haired Elf an inquisitive look before he asked, "Are you sure?" Sighing he expelled the breath slowly. "I shall have to remember that."

There were a few brief moments of silence in which Rothinzil listened to the pacing of his king without speaking.

Then the dark-haired warrior reluctantly broke it. "You are still pacing, my lord."

Thranduil halted abruptly and cleared his throat. "Sorry, my good Rothinzil. It’s Legolas." The addressed Elf watched with some pain of his own as anguish and loss flickered across Thranduil's usually calm façade. It was very distressing and he certainly wished to see no more of it than he had to.

"I know, your highness," answered the captain quietly as he watched with dismay as Thranduil nearly started pacing again but stopped himself. He was soundless for a few minutes, save for the miniscule sounds of his breathing. "I was sent here by Celebalda to see if you are ready for us to go abroad."

“Of course, as soon as you are ready to depart sounds well to me,” answered the elder Elf quietly. It almost sounded like he didn’t care, but Rothinzil knew that was not true, it simply couldn’t be. But his king had greater worries to be thinking about.

“Pardon me, my lord, but you worry far too much. Legolas is coming home. He is just being stubborn…again.”

Rothinzil did his best to sound sympathetic, but he had the distinct feeling that he was failing miserably. The truth of the matter was that he was getting annoyed with his liege's dispirited demeanor. This feeling made him uncomfortable and he resisted the urge to stand on one foot like a nervous Elfling. Instead, he just shifted his eyes to study the stone floor intimately until he heard Thranduil start to speak once more.

“Rothinzil, you have known Legolas for years, but I am his father and I am telling you he is not going to come back this time if he continues to be as stubborn as I know he is,” the Elvenking’s voice was grim and hard.

Speaking of stubbornness, thought Rothinzil darkly. Outwardly he answered, “my lord, I do not think he would have stayed away this long on purpose, even to spite you (which he wouldn't do anyway).”

Thranduil was a wise Elf and needed less than half a second to realize exactly what his obviously uneasy captain was hinting at. “You think he is in trouble.” It was a statement, not a question.

“He went out with Estel,” reminded Rothinzil impassively as he looked Thranduil in the eye. Any other time Roth's words might have provoked a twisted jest, but this time they struck fear into both of the Elves' hearts.

Thranduil had suspected that Legolas had gotten more than he bargained for, but he had honestly hoped that for once Legolas had not managed to find the strangest and most difficult sort of trouble…again. He should have known that had been too much to hope for, but now that Legolas was solder, he seemed to have thought his son had grown out of that unfortunate and unhealthy habit. Obviously not. He had been naive to even begin to think in those terms.

Inwardly shaking his head, the king observed slowly as though he was reluctant to say what he had noticed a long time ago, "yes, that is true. Ever since that human and my son became friends there has been nothing but trouble it seems."

Rothinzil felt he immediate need to jump in as Estel's defense. After all, Aragorn had done it for him before and he knew how much Legolas valued that friendship. As much as he agreed with Thranduil's statement, he could not defend it with a clear conscience knowing Legolas would have fought to persuade his father the other way to the very end. "My lord, Legolas and Estel are the best friends that they could ever have."

He narrowed his eyes in alarmed concern and asked cautiously, "would you will that they give that up?"

"It depends," answered the Elvenking as he watched Rothinzil's expression carefully. "I would rather my son did not come home needing bandages and stitches every year or so. I am sure the healers agree with me."

Roth laughed slightly and said, "I bet they do, my lord. But their friendship does a lot of good as well. I have a better understanding of men than you do, with all due respect, and I think that their friendship is truly something magnificent."

"Rothinzil, I know what you are saying, for it has often crossed my mind," the Elf-lord spoke in a far away voice. "But I know as well that Legolas would become unmanageable if I denied him camaraderie with the ranger." A sparkle came into Thranduil's grey-blue eyes and Rothinzil didn't think he was far wrong when he thought he noticed a slight glimmer of near gratitude that Legolas had such friends.

"That he would be, my lord," allowed the dark-haired Elf calmly assenting with the allegation. Rothinzil inclined his head minutely and affirmed, "If the past is any guide then they will come out well in the end."

"If the past is any guide, then yes," replied Thranduil wryly as he tried not to smile. Two emotions were grappling in an amusing and hard struggle for dominance: mirth and anger. It was truly a bizarre combination to have at this time, he thought to himself, but nevertheless that was what was transpiring.

He noticed with spiking sympathy how Roth's fair face flickered with a slight bit of pain of loss and he asked obligingly, "Roth? Are you well?" He knew as well as did anyone that Rothinzil was now mortal and therefore not a one in the underground Elven palace was sure what he was now susceptible to.

"Perfectly," came the prompt answer.

It was a lie and what was more Rothinzil knew it, but he raised his head and squared his shoulders. Smiling a smile that seemed to stop before reaching his eyes he grimaced when Thranduil did not appear to be amused or fooled in the slightest.

"If you think you need to stay home, stay. There is plenty for you to do here," the blonde elder Elf supplied his younger warrior with a suitable alternative that sounded moderately appeasing.

"No, I am fine, my lord," argued Rothinzil firmly.

"Legolas' definition or your own?" asked Thranduil, raising an incredulous eyebrow.

"My own, rest assured," Rothinzil humored grimly. "I fear that if I linger here any longer though Celebalda will skin me alive. You know as well as I how he is very punctual."

Nodding the Elf-lord dismissed the dark-haired warrior with a warm warning, "you look after yourself Rothinzil. The orcs have grown much more bold and fierce as of late."

"I will my lord. Thank you," Rothinzil's response was smooth and sounded fair and noble as he gave a slight bow and turned to leave.

Thranduil watched the younger Elf's back with concern as he left and hoped with all he had that his young Elf who was like a second son to him did not fall prey to the cruel forces of Dol Guldur. If Rothinzil went, so would the last bit of his sanity and he knew the kingdom might very well go to shambles.

O0O0O0O0O

Darcíl felt his skin crawl at the content of what he was carrying and the cold blood that was drying on the soft, supple material. Looking at the tunics and cloaks, covering belts that were sure to be immediately recognized by an Elf that saw them, he wrinkled his nose in disgust.

He had been sent by Dorrag to go and fetch the garments from the dungeons and the torture chamber before they were destroyed by neglect. These tokens were needed as a means of persuasion concerning the will of the Elves of the blonde captive's realm. Darcíl doubted that they would help much. He didn't know Elves, but he sensed that they were not easily negotiated with and even less willing to agreeably surrender emissaries to a land they considered threatening or dangerous. They may be insane at times but he very much doubted that they were suicidal.

But it was the incredulousness of the Elves that was going to be their own undoing. Anyway, that was if his lord's plan went through without a hitch, which he doubted it would. Such things hardly ever did. And the more he thought about it, the more he thought he might have to hinder it.

That was not going to be from sympathy to the Elves. Never, he loathed them. He considered them to be annoying, stubborn and from experiences he had been unfortunate enough to encounter in battle, they were far too fast and skilled.

The only good reason he could find for hindering his lord would be difficult to explain. The fact was that Dorrag was trying to gain more power than he had and usurp it from his own father. Though this was not an uncommon occurrence in history, it was very dangerous and alarming.

If Dorrag was going to gain more followers and publicity than he already possessed by the death of the Elves then there was his problem. Darcíl knew that once the hostage Elves were put to death and the Firstborn broke their alliance with Gondor, the people would flock around Dorrag like flies gathering around honey. What they wouldn’t realize until it was already too late was that the honey had a toxic taint to it. The people wouldn’t know until after he had already usurped (with their help) the power from beneath his father’s nose. If he pleased the people by making them feel safer and hanging the Elves, Dorrag would do it. He was the kind that gained power by any means necessary.

He was the kind of man that was dangerous and needed to die, Darcíl decided without too much thought. He was the kind of man that Darcíl hated with a passion. But at the moment he was no position to be questioning the authority of the madman he was forced to call ‘lord’…at least not yet. But things might change. And then he would call the man an insane bovine to his face.

Pushing these rebellious thoughts from his head so as not to say something that might very well give Dorrag cause to make him literally lose his head, the dark-haired man quickly opened the door to the throne room before he had a chance to think things through logically. He was sure if he was given the time, he would see the uselessness of what he and his prince were working to achieve.

Prince Dorrag was walking by a window, scrutinizing his kingdom with cold calculating eyes. When he heard the heavy doors open he immediately spun around and said with expectation, “ah, Captain Darcíl! Do you have something to show me?”

The captain resisted the strong urge to grimace at the voice he loathed and said as politely as he found the heart to say, “indeed. The tunics, belts and sheathes of our prisoners? Correct, my lord?”

“I can always count on you,” said Dorrag with a triumphant smile as he walked towards the Haradrim captain with a style akin to a swagger.

“So it would seem,” muttered Darcíl briefly under his breath before his lord came close enough to hear.

Taking the tunic of Legolas, a dark green, bloodied and crinkled, he flashed it before his liege’s narrowed and haunting eyes before tossing it into a heap at the mortal prince’s feet. Then he took the ranger’s, more ripped than the Elf’s and stained totally sanguine with blood, and tossed it on top of the Elf’s. Lastly he produced the belts and scabbards of the two captives.

“These will be what will convince them more than anything,” he smiled as he drew the small dagger that had been nestled inside the sheathe of one of Aragorn’s belts. It was Elven and it made the accusation that the ranger was an Elf-friend all the more believable, much to the disadvantage of the prisoner.

Darcíl then unwrapped the decorative belt of Legolas and said, “this effect will be remembered well, I believe, for Elves each tend to make their own things or have them specially made. Like a trademark of themselves, really. What they make reflects who they are…or what they are…or so is my theory…”

“Are you hinting at something captain?” asked Dorrag in an anxious voice that sounded akin to a child waiting to be told a secret but with a more demanding and pressing tone behind it that an innocent child could never bear.

“I am just wondering if perhaps we have an abnormal Elf in our hands. I am hardly familiar with Elvish runes or customs, my lord. But this belt has leaves, a certain leaf, actually, all around it followed a sun burst emblem with a silver sort of tree set in front. I think he might be of an esteemed family,” finished Darcíl cautiously, watching his lord’s reaction.

“Is that the only basis you have for your assumption?” Dorrag began to seethe as he felt his patience waning. If it was, he was going to have a hard time restraining himself from hitting this captain upside the head. But the past told him that Darcíl was smarter than that and so he waited for an answer.

“Indeed not, my lord. That would be foolish,” the Haradrim officer said rather in a self-aggrandizing way. “When you work with a prisoner, you began to get to know them, after a fashion. This Elf bears himself in a regal manner and he fears humiliation and shame more than anything else, I believe.”

“So he is more than what he seems?” questioned Dorrag tensely as his eyes seemed to catch fire and his brows furrowed in a crease of interest in the new information that could be very useful in the near future.

“So it appears,” replied Darcíl uneasily. He had expected this sudden spark of interest from his lord, but it still made him a bit nervous. Not that he had anything to fear from it yet, but he knew when the pressure was on.

“I want to know for sure, captain,” explained Dorrag as he fingered his ring pensively, turning it over in his hand.

“The Elf is still in no mind to talk, though that is changing,” responded Darcíl to his liege’s comment, which was as good as an edict. “I might be able to find out from the ranger…”

“Did I make a preference to how I wanted it found out?” growled the Haradrim prince in wrathful annoyance, clenching his hand abruptly in a sign of coming anger.

Darcíl quickly warded off his lord’s rage with a calm and courteous response that nearly stuck in his throat to say. “No, you did not, my lord. I was merely letting you become aware of my plans…”

“If I want to know your plans I will ask you about them!” seethed Dorrag as he looked at the garments and tokens on the floor with a look of disdain. “Take care of these and then I want to know as soon as possible who that Elf is! If he is of royal blood things could go in two directions: better or worse depending on where he is from!”

“I understand, your majesty,” Darcíl tried to sound smooth and consenting but that was like trying to sound like a canary when you were in a fact a bug eyed croaking frog. It was hopeless and a bit of his contempt shown through, briefly and hardly noticeable, but he felt that it was most assuredly there.

“I will get Lieutenant Sarchel to see if the ranger’s answer has changed on anything…” he stopped abruptly and said in a rushed and apologetic tone, “sorry, my prince.” Well, he wasn’t really sorry, but right now, the stakes were high enough and he didn’t feel that he could afford to risk anymore at the moment, as much as he wouldn’t mind gambling overly much with his life. The lives of his family were not his to gamble with.

“I know,” answered Dorrag in strangely friendly voice, which was when Darcíl had decided he was most dangerous. “We may err among friends, who bear no ill will towards eachother,” he allowed with a tense smile, if 'smile' was the right word, which Darcíl felt it most certainly was not.

“Yes, friends,” Darcíl returned in a voice just as calm and with a smile that was just taut, if not more so.

He bent down and his hands gathered up the tokens and garments of the prisoners quickly, as he wanted to be out of this room as quickly as possible. It was one of those weird situations where he wanted to be anywhere but where he was. Inwardly shrugging, the dark-haired man stood himself back up and squared his shoulders proudly bit within his limits before his lord.

“My liege, that is all I have to say. So with your leave, I would go and attend to the business below.”

“Of course,” Dorrag answered as he walked towards his golden throne, which Darcíl felt, was less than deserved and tacky to boot. It was enough to make him shudder and he did without realizing he had done so until Dorrag asked with concern that sounded unreal, “are you well, Captain Darcíl?”

“Yes, quite, my lord. Thank you.” Darcíl lowered his eyes to the floor quickly, feeling hot anger at himself for being so careless. Carelessness meant mistakes, mistakes meant death, death was not only your death but also everyone associated with you. He could not understand why he had become so inattentive to his actions. The fact that he had a lot on his mind did not bear thought as an excuse.

“Very well, I was just looking out for the well being of my best captain and closest friend.” Dorrag narrowed his eyes and said wistfully, “you have my leave to go. But come back and do have dinner with me.”

“Yes, and thank you, my lord.”

O0O0O0O

Legolas didn't glance at the door as he heard the rough and nerve grating sound of the key twisting in the rust lock. He didn't give much thought to what was going to happen next and wasn't even going to honor these men with his attention. Hanging in the single bond that was sending fiery agony through his very bones.

Aragorn opened his eyes from where he had gone to the corner of the cell and brought his knees up to his chin to rest. He as still soaked and the sounds of the stormy weather above were not doing any better to help his frame of mind. As a matter of fact, he found the noises of dripping water and thunder downright agitating.

Looking at the door, the ranger took grim notice of the gathering of men on the opposite side preparing to enter. Sarchel, Darcíl, and other men bearing clubs and staves stood uneasily. Aragorn could very easily compare them to horses champing at their bits to kick an annoying groomer around the stable. Chuckling slightly at the thought of the men having bits and kicking like mules, the ranger bit his lower lip and chewed it to keep from bursting out laughing as Sarchel asked sharply, "something funny, ranger?"

Aragorn swallowed down his laughter and went quiet. Not answering was the best thing he could do. He feared to make things worse for Legolas and making things worse for himself didn't sound to appealing either. He gave the stone walls of this unaccommodating prison a caustic glare that made Legolas surprised that the stones didn't actually leap back.

Sarchel snorted and answered, "I didn't think so." Fingering his stave he looked with a grin at Aragorn and said, "But do not worry, things will get a little more interesting." Aragorn was going to have to remember to explain to Sarchel the difference between being funny and being completely obnoxious not to mention being less than the least bit amusing.

The door clanged open and all the men filed in. Darcíl stood before Legolas, eyeing the blonde Elf's hand and the purple tinge it had taken. "If you hang there any longer you could lose that hand, Elf." He reached up and pulled on of Legolas' fingers. "Don't tell me you felt that."

"I am not going to tell you much of anything, human," retorted Legolas readily as he met the dark eyes of the Haradrim captain steadily. “Except that you will pay for this. Someone will come for us. We will be set free and that neither of us will break of our own accord.” A slight cold smile pulled at his mouth corners and it was all he could do to suppress it. Biting his tongue, the captive quirked an eyebrow and asked incredulously, "what did you come here for?"

Raising a brow to match Legolas' the man said, "I think you know." He ran his finger along a bruise and pressed it slightly with his finger. Legolas was shocked by the amount of pain the small quantity of pressure created. Hiding his shock and distress, the Elf remained impassive.

"I can never be certain," Legolas said as he watched nervously as the other men, lead by Sarchel walked over to where Aragorn was and surrounded him. He restrained himself from asking what was about to happen, but he could not hide the curiosity and uncertainty in his eyes.

"Elf, what is your name and where are you from?" asked Darcíl pensively. He looked over at Aragorn, who was watching Legolas with intense grey eyes from where he sat in the corner. Legolas knew that Aragorn was not only frightened but coming dangerously close to truly losing his temper.

"That information is classified," Legolas said steadily, as his eyes watched Aragorn, wondering what the men were doing. He could feel his breathing beginning to speed up indefinitely as he guessed what was about to take place. "I have told you once and I will say it again if it still isn't clear."

"Its clear, clear that you will suffer greatly, Elf," said Darcíl evenly. Then he glanced over his shoulder at Aragorn and turned back with a wicked grin. "Or your friend will. However, the outcome will be the same: you will die."

"That may be, but you will die as well," said Legolas bitterly. "You and your insane swine that for reasons unbeknownst to me you call a 'prince'."

"That prince is going to break you Elf, one way or another, and then you will tell all he wants to know and more besides," the Haradrim captain declared forebodingly as he nodded for the men to drag Aragorn out. He commanded over his shoulder in a loud and firm voice, "take the ranger and place him in the other cell. I want to see how he likes listening to his blonde friend scream." Turning a fierce and knowing gaze onto Legolas' face he added sinisterly, "and you will scream, Elf."

Aragorn jumped up in consternation before he could be seized and took a wavering step towards Legolas. "What? You can't do this!" he protested. Sarchel who slid a cloth between the man's teeth to act as a gag and yanked it back harshly before tying it, stopped him in his tracks and yanked him back. The other three men grabbed his arms ruthlessly and began to pull him out of the cell, Darcíl following reluctantly behind.

Aragorn felt his dislocated shoulder shrieking at him as he was jerked and tugged towards the cell door with Darcíl following. Legolas shivered and watched as his best friend was taken away but he felt a small comfort, it was himself who was going to be tortured and not Estel. But the fears of screaming flooded his thought. He knew Aragorn would be able to hear him and he wanted to be stronger, for the ranger's heart's sake. Of course he also was certain his ego wouldn’t appreciate it if he dared to scream for anyone.

Darcíl said something to Sarchel who fell back and stayed behind with Legolas as the door was slammed shut behind him, its echo bouncing off the walls eerily. The man watched the Elf dangling by the chain and smiled in a way that made Legolas feel sick and a green tint come to his face as he noticed the man hitting the stave against the palm of his other hand thoughtfully.

Darcíl ordered Aragorn chained to the wall of this new room by his wrists and after this was done he smiled and said, "This should only take a few minutes. Lieutenant Sarchel has a way of getting carried away that can be very efficient."

Aragorn felt his heart sink in his chest and right down into his stomach before hardening to form a tight knot. He shivered as he sat in the ankle high water and tried to force himself to go deaf. A very hard thing to do and he wished to the Valar that it was easier.

Legolas stared at Sarchel levelly. He didn't know this human too well yet, and never really hoped to or wanted to, but he knew that he was not as smart as Captain Darcíl. That in itself was some relief, but in some cases the dumb ones that were mean as well were the worst to work with.

Sarchel looked at Legolas and brandished the stave beneath the Elf's nose before asking in a sneer, "Do you know what this is?"

Narrowing his eyes as well as knitting his brows in mock thought, Legolas raised his eyebrows and said as though he had just reached a paramount decision, "This is a long shot but let me guess… A stave!" The scorn of the sardonic triumph in his voice could not be mistaken and Sarchel's smile melted away and was replaced by a small frown.

"Well, whatever else you may be, I can rule out idiot," he mused as he looked the wooden stick he held in his hands over, turning it slowly.

"Too bad I can't say the same for you," Legolas muttered imperceptibly and scornfully under his breath. He cocked his head and watched as Sarchel came closer and went behind him, inspecting his back grimly.

"Poor little Elf," he teased cruelly as he gave Legolas a pat on his back that made him go taut under the touch. It was a reflex he could not help and he resented the man for it.

Suddenly Legolas arched his back and hissed as the stave came into hard contact with his already marred back. He was lurched forward and his body came swinging back. Blood seeped out in a small trickle from beneath the manacle winding around his wrist.

"You have no idea how good that felt," purred Sarchel in Legolas' ear as he grabbed a lock of hair and yanked Legolas' head back.

Legolas snarled and said in an angry and thick voice, "Well don't get used to it." He tried to jerk his head away but he had to admit it hurt a whole lot more than expected and he didn't get far.

Sarchel smiled and seeing Legolas' slender pointy ear a frown crossed his face. Then, without warning Legolas felt the man's teeth nip his ear, one of the most sensitive parts of his body. But they didn't just nip his ear, they bit down, not hard enough to bite the point off or break the skin, but hard enough to hurt terribly and cause him to hiss and he strongly resisted the nearly overwhelming drive to beat his feet against the air as a way to vent his pain.

He would have cried out more but at the moment he was still contemplating the fact that this man had just bitten his ear. It was more than just a little abnormal in occurrence and Legolas found himself more than confused and nearly cast a bewildered look at his tormentor. But he was so torn between confusion, rage, and pain that his face was utterly expressionless for a few brief seconds.

Sarchel smiled and withdrew from the Elf for a moment, watching to see his reaction, which to his irritation was not so much fear as anger. He was hoping to see at least a tremble on the blonde Elf's chin or perhaps a wide-eyed look for mercy. He continued to grip Legolas' blonde hair fiercely, forcing his head to remain held back. He knew that he shouldn't have expected so much.

"So how did that feel?" he whispered hoarsely to the chained prince, who did his best to meet his enemy's scornful glare due to the difficult position he was placed in.

"What do you think?" Legolas spat angrily.

The captive grimaced as the fingers twisted and burrowed deeper into his hair before Sarchel bit down slightly harder on his ear's tip, causing the fair-haired being to shiver. Saying that this man was insane was a definite understatement. "You know, Elf," Sarchel remarked with a slow relish. "I usually don't go for blondes but in your case I might make an exception."

Legolas nearly shuddered and felt himself beginning to feel sick and he could feel the green color coming back to his face. "You are wasting your time," he growled lethally around a hard-set jaw. And he was hardly trying to be smart about his comments. Legolas was being totally serious.

He did not like how the man's last remark had sounded honest and nearly in likes to a purr of a satisfied and devious cat. If he looked closely enough at the well-shaven man he could actually picture a few long whiskers. Not only that if he hadn't been under the threat of worse torment that he unfortunately was the prince might have laughed out loud. But he felt a strong sense of dread as the man released his hair and allowed him to lift his head upright.

He lifted his head slowly, hoping not to create his headache anew. But he felt himself losing that battle quickly as his head ascend and his skull felt compressed not to mention like his brain was swimming inside. It was a bleary sensation and it made his stomach turn and a swelling feeling came under his tingue as he felt like he was going to vomit.

"Well if you refuse to tell me what is needed or your friend does, I may have to break my rule and get to know you better," he threatened and Legolas felt his breathing want to speed up as the man's eyes seemed to catch fire with a lust. How sick could a person get?

Wanting to give up but with a spirit that would not allow it, Legolas said thickly, "you will never know me, human. You are a sick, perverted coward and will die a sick, perverted coward!" He felt a throbbing ache run his arms length and fill his marrow with a horrible pain that was undeniable.

As Legolas watched the man with eyes glazed over with suffering, he realized how remarkably close this mortal was to an orc. Lustful, corrupt, ugly, cruel without need, and cold-blooded; he was the most Goblin like human Legolas had seen in a long time and he was surprised that the man was not blue because of the ice that had to flow through his veins. As a matter of fact, if Legolas looked closely he was certain he could see blue-ish tainted blood shifting under the seemingly translucent skin. It made his skin craw and caused undeniable and unpreventable shivers to wonder slowly up his spine, causing his hair to rise on the back of his neck.

"That may be, but not before you or that ranger get to know exactly how sick I am," he imperiled to the Elf.

"You wish your lord would allow it," Legolas taunted. As much as the sane part of his mind said that he needed to shut his mouth while he was ahead, the hopelessly insane half commanded him to use the old tactic of -frustrate-and-annoy-your-captor-to-no-end. Although the bound Elf knew that this tactic would only lead to more pain and could also prove to make the man carry out his threats, he could not help himself but be as thoroughly obstinate as he was able.

"Elf," Sarchel growled and his face seemed to turn scarlet and then grey with anger. "I am getting tired of your lip!" As he spoke he struck Thranduil's son across the mouth, hitting the old bruise and breaking the swollen lip anew. The force of the blow snapped Legolas' head to the side sharply and Legolas was bewildered as to why his neck had not broken though he was that much relieved.

Legolas had little time to even realize he had blood running down his chin before he noticed that Sarchel had the stave raised about the shoulder of the arm he was hanging by. His eyes went wide in terror of the pain he knew would follow and he could only gap. The stave came down in slow motion, as though obscured in cold honey.

Legolas screamed despite himself as he felt the hard wooden club come in contact with his shoulder and then there was a creaking sound above. The rotten beam gave where the chain was wrapped around and a chunk of decaying wood came tumbling down on top of Legolas with the chain, freeing him from the pinching, torturous manacle's agony though it was still attached to his wrist.

Legolas tried to stand and came to the realization with growing dread that he could not. He was too weak and the wood made his movements awkward. The Elf was on his feet but his knees wobbled and he collapsed back into the filthy two-inch water with a soft and defeated splash. Looking at his all but maimed hand that rested in his lap, the Elven prince watched as the purple tint began to disappear and circulation returned.

The pain of his own blood flowing back into his hand coupled with the nerves that had gotten slightly pinched was sharp and unrelenting. Little needles of pain pricked his skin and he felt like he had stuck his hand in a hornet's nest and was being attacked with a vengeance. The tingling affliction spread like fire up his arm and through out his stretched chest, hurting especially in the bruises areas.

Sucking on his bleeding lip thoughtfully, the Elf flexed his fingers slowly to encourage blood-flow and looked up at Sarchel with hurting but fierce eyes. And Sarchel noticed with agitation that he could not get the cold defiance and life out of the eyes, though he could add pain to their list of strong emotions. It was more than unsatisfying it was frustrating. He lived to see the broken look in his victim's eyes and when he was not able to see that it was enough to evoke paranoia.

Without saying a word he walked closer to the fallen Elf and clenched his fists at his side. Legolas had no time to even realize he had a boot being driven in full throttle towards his battered chest before it struck him and knocked him so that he was on his back in the cold water. Too tired to get up and try to fight back, Legolas just lay there, looking up at his tormenter bitterly.

Sarchel came and roughly tore the manacle free of the Elf.

The man then reached in his pocket with his hand and pulled out something. It looked like a sliver of silver, a sharp sliver of silver. Holding it up before Legolas he hissed with a low and venomous tonicity, "This is a spike."

Raising a brow, Legolas said mockingly, "you don't say. I wish I knew that."

Ignoring the comment made by his captive, the Lieutenant continued with a slow relish. "But it isn't an ordinary spike. It is extremely sharp, like a sliver of glass and tiny so no lasting damage is done." Twirling it leisurely in his fingers, the human suddenly stopped and pressed it against one of his fingers with very little effort. Blood oozed out of a small laceration made by the spiny tip. He smiled and inquired, "Now what is your name?"

Aragorn sat on the floor hopelessly as he was chained to the wall. His head was bowed and he didn't know how much longer his nerves could stand this. He wished that he would die. Another strangled and tormented cry filtered through the stone walls before choking off abruptly as he knew Legolas gained control of his emotions once more.

That was the third cry he had heard come from his friend in the hour and more choked than the last two. He could not help but wonder what they were doing to his friend. It frightened him to hear Legolas scream. Legolas was always controlled, always calm or at least for the most part. To make him scream took a lot of pressure and a lot of pain. He always liked to think that when he and Legolas got themselves into trouble, it was always going to be Legolas who was the strong one, Legolas who was the protecting defiant one. But he was reminded of the fact he had always known: that everyone, even Elves, had his or her match. Even Elves could die and break. But the ominous prophecy of Mandos from long ago was now becoming all too clear.

He wished, for what had to be close the thousandth time that he had not dragged his friend into this mess. If he had not brought Legolas down to the South with him, then Legolas would not be in this sort of pain and the world would not be in the danger it was in. If either of them broke and Dorrag's masterminding plan came to pass then Middle Earth would be doomed. He knew his own race was too weak to face Sauron without some aid from the Elves.

As he shifted the ranger's dislocated shoulder begged for attention and it was becoming more difficult for him to ignore it and push it aside every time. Another weaker and shivering cry rent the air and he choked back a suffocating sob as he heard it slowly wither and die.

Darcíl looked at Aragorn as he listened with disdain to the cries of the tormented Elf. "Only someone with ice in his veins could standby and listen to his friend being tortured without trying to give him a way out of his pain." Crouching by the captive ranger he whispered in his ear, "he followed you here, he came for you. Such a loyal friend you have. Isn't it a shame that it is the person he trusted most and cared for most that caused him to be captured and endure such pain?"

Aragorn looked up at the Haradrim captain with angered eyes flecked with hurt. Darcíl nodded, "yes, he endures, for now. He is strong. You chose your friends well, ranger. But his attempts to hide his identity and homeland are going to prove futile."

Raising his chin, Aragorn glared, "My friend will never break. Don't flatter yourself, your men or your insane prince."

Laughing dryly, Darcíl muttered, "they are always so confident in the beginning."

Aragorn felt his already drained face go cold as he heard a suffocated wail rise and fall without warning. A dreadful silence fell and the hard knot in Aragorn's stomach moved up to his throat. The uncertainty was a torture to his mind and spirit. The ranger felt his hands shaking and he hoped that Darcíl did not notice. "Please, stop this! He will die! He is little than a child in the years of his own people!"

This was only a half-truth because Legolas had come to majority at six hundred years of age. However, the truthful part of the statement was that Legolas was a young Elf and only two thousand eight hundred and eighty five.

"Tell me who he is and where he came from and I might consider it. But no, he will not die, human, not until I get out of him what my lord wants. Now will you not end his suffering and tell me?"

Aragorn's will hardened as though on cue and he snarled with inner frustration, "he apparently is not gagged. If he wants to stop his pain he will tell you himself! Besides, if we are going to die one way or the other, you tell me which is more honorable and worth our time!"

"He may tell you he doesn't want you to say anything, and you both may have made a compact with each other earlier, but once he is in there his strength will begin to buckle, as will his mind." The Haradrim captain stopped as one of the Elves' louder cries hung in the air, adding to the ghosts of the screams still echoing in Aragorn's ears and mind. Aragorn felt his stomach churning and acid rising in his throat as his anxiety made him feel violently ill.

Green faced he looked at Darcíl, who shook his head sadly. He hated being placed in this position, but he had originally been assigned to torture the captive Elf so this was slightly better. However, if it were up to him he would simply put the Elf and the ranger to death and have done. He despised them, yes, but he felt no need to torture them. As long as they were dead and made an example of as soon as the means of their demise was uncovered by the Elves and their friends. "He will want to speak," Darcíl asserted emotionlessly. "But he won't be able to open his mouth without screaming or simply gapping in pain."

"I will never betray him to you," Aragorn promised angrily. He was angry that he was being asked and nearly blackmailed to back stab his friend. "If I were to betray him, then all that he had suffered would have been in vain and I could not bear that, not after hearing his screams. You may win for a day, but in the end your mission will fail." Aragorn let his cold silver eyes clash with the baleful glare of the captain. His lips were a thin white line as he pressed them together in emotional anguish as much as suppressed anger.

"So you say, wait until you see what he has thus far endured," responded Darcíl coolly, leaning back against the wall casually. "Then make your decision." Shifting his weight uncomfortably as last strangled cry tainted the air and was cut off abruptly. "You know, if what I command of Sarchel doesn't work, I can always let him have his way with the Elf. Though I wouldn't want to do that, it would damage his mind and then he could get his information confused. Not only that, it would be a nasty business."

Aragorn resisted the want to jump up and choke Darcíl with his good arm only. But even if he had decided to leap up and choke Darcíl unrelentingly, the chains would hold him back. Lucky for the Haradrim captain. "You wouldn't…" began the ranger as he guessed the sick meaning of the hints.

"I wouldn't want to, but I would if I were forced." He sighed, as the dungeons were eerily quiet. His eyes became concerned and a bit anxious. "I think he might have gone too far," was all he said as he walked quickly for the door and towards Legolas' cell, where the screams had ceased and so had the shouting. Aragorn felt his heart rise into his throat and stick there.

CHAPTER NINE

Close Enemies

"Keep your friends close and your enemies closer."

Unknown

"Move over!" hissed Elrohir in his twin brother's ear as he tried with little success to peer over Elladan's shoulder, which was chiefly due to the fact they were identical and that meant that they shared the same height. Both were leaning over the rail of one of the balconies of Rivendell while hiding behind a curtain so they were invisible to anyone below except for Elladan's face peeking around the edge and his fingers on the frilly borders.

"Shhhhh…"the elder brother growled under his breath. ”He will hear us!" He swirled his eyes back to glare with annoyance at his anxious twin. Then after sparing with Elrohir in a baleful glower, he turned his attention back to Glorfindel, who was walking with his white horse along the banks of the pond.

"If you don't move over and let me see what is happening, Elladan Peredhil, I will cast you over the edge…"

A hand over his mouth stifled any further conversation or threats by the younger twin as Elladan whispered harshly again, "shhhhh…" Elladan suddenly jerked his hand back with a cry and turned fully around to ask the younger dark-haired Elf who was glaring and wiping his mouth, "did you just bite me?" The elder identical brother wiped his hand with disdain on his breeches before saying. "Act your age, not your shoe size!"

"Brother, may I remind you your shoe size is the same as my own, and are you implying that I have small feet?" Elrohir reproached with an arched brow as he crossed his arms obstinately and bit back a laugh. A smile lurked in his mouth's corners and was slowly turning them up into a grin.

Elladan quirked an eyebrow and returned the look evenly. He then spun back around on his heels and watched with amusement as Glorfindel patted Asfaloth's neck and leaned on the horse, giving it a warm hug. "He treats that horse better than he does his own!" grumbled the dark-haired Noldo in a nearly whining voice like a child. "No wonder the Valar sent him back!"

He blinked as the sunlight hit his eyes, blinding him for a moment.

When he saw Glorfindel again the Gondolin Elf was sitting underneath the tree Elrohir had been sleeping under, with his eyes closed and his hands still holding the book he had taken from Erestor's study. A content smirk graced his lips and a dangerous look adorned his features. Asfaloth was eating grass quietly nearby.

Elrohir finally got annoyed enough and gripping Elladan's tunic collar, pulled him back as he pressed his way forward to take what he felt was his rightful turn peering around the drape. He snickered quietly as he took in the scene by the pond's edge.

A serene voice behind both of the brothers made them spin around try to hide exactly what they were doing. "What is amusing you so?" asked Erestor as he came forward, holding a quill that Elladan guessed he had used earlier and forgotten to put down but that Elrohir supposed he carried around as a weapon.

"Well, it s certainly not something you would find amusing," Elrohir tired to ward off Erestor looking out over the balcony knowing that Glorfindel might very well die from the piercing glare he would receive as soon as the dark-haired counselor set his eyes on the book being held hostage.

"Whatever do you mean?" Erestor narrowed his eyes, obviously curious. Amusement glittered in his calm grey eyes as he walked forward, only to be stopped by Elladan stepping swiftly in front of him to obscure his view. Normally they wouldn't care if Erestor ripped Glorfindel's hair out or vise versa, but they wanted to put themselves out of harms way first. Elrohir strongly suspected that if Erestor was provoked and frustrated enough, he might actually stab one of them to death with his quill just to vent his wrath.

But of course the way they were trying to cover up Glorfindel and the purloined book the insane counselor might think that they were conspiring with Glorfindel and that could be slightly more risky and definitely bloodier because if Erestor was going to kill, he would kill all three of them. Erestor was the kind that was unnaturally enthusiastic about murdering those who committed one of the three top crimes (in his opinion): messing with paperwork, wrongfully filing paperwork and stealing said paperwork or other works of literature. Glorfindel had done all three at some point in his life.

Elrohir was contemplating whether or not to hurriedly explain to Erestor about the book and their innocence before the adviser had a chance to murder them. But Erestor suddenly said in a provoked and prying tone, "This doesn't have to do with a certain book that has been missing since exactly four in the morning, does it?" He furrowed his dark eyebrows for emphasis and he nearly looked like the Lord Elrond save for the fact that he was shorter in stature and a bit more intimidating.

Elrohir looked appalled and he asked in shock, "what sensible person is up at four in the morning when they have the privilege to sleep in?" He looked at Erestor as though the adviser had just sprouted a second head or said he planed to negotiate with Sauron over a cup of hot tea. But the younger twin doubted that Sauron would want to meet Erestor unless he absolutely had to.

"I do," declared the counselor quite seriously as he glared at Elrond's middle child. "And when I went to read another chapter in my book The Union of Meadhros: Great Negotiations of the First Age it was conveniently missing!" Elladan knew he was supposed to help Elrohir, him being his younger brother, but when confronted with a practically seething Lord Erestor, as a general rule of thumb it was everyone for themselves.

"If you are planning to murder my dear, insane brother that is fine. But please don't kill me in your wrath," Elladan begged incisively. Erestor's look became more incensed and Elladan moved aside, pointing down accusingly to the golden-haired Elf below before Erestor slew him in cold blood. "Glorfindel did it!"

Erestor went to the edge of the balcony and gripped the railing tightly as he leaned out to look scrupulously at his opponent. Gray eyes narrowed in what could be called a provoked way, and the counselor's lips pressed into a discreet and thin white line of visible fury. "That lummox,"' he ground out through grit teeth as his eyebrows knitted in his growing wrath.

Looking at the horse that grazed faithfully nearby Erestor smiled wryly but his eyes still burned with a sort of fierceness that was not easily described. "I think if it were not for Asfaloth he might actually try to get married." Shaking his head he said with a sigh, "he loves that horse far too much than what is good for him. Its disgusting." But he said this with a smile and so of course he wasn't serious for the first time in a long time.

Elladan and Elrohir simply exchanged grins with one another. Both knew as did the rest of Rivendell's inhabitance that Asfaloth was Glorfindel's horse, but he liked Erestor far better. This often lead to strange battles of wills between the two Elves and they were often amusing to watch as well. Not to mention that they didn’t make very much sense and no one ever tried to unravel anything further. Not that either of those Elves loved the horse in the most affectionate way but neither of them hated the animal. And they were about the only ones who did not.

Quietly, the dark-haired counselor smiled in a fashion, which made the twins think of a scheming and deranged alligator and then, turned to head for the stairs. His footsteps were soft and slow, and it was obvious to anyone who saw him he was an Elf on a evil mission and was working to restrain any rash actions that could cost him the objective.

In a few moments he was standing before Glorfindel, with his arms crossed, waiting patiently for the golden-haired Elf to wake-wake to his living nightmare.

As if on cue Glorfindel's glimmering blue eyes fluttered open and he yawned lazily, simply to annoy the adviser who he knew to be already livid.

Erestor's smile broadened tensely and he asked in a thick voice, "Have a nice nap, did we? You know, it is unwise to bring books near the edge of a pond."

Glorfindel stood up and smiled back innocently, sliding the book behind his back, "what book, Lord Erestor?" He looked like a child who had just stolen something of supreme value and had no intention of giving it back without some sort of a scuffle.

"Unless I am mistaken, you have my copy of The Union of Meadhros: Great Negotiations of the First Age, and I really would appreciate it back. That is, of course, if you are finished reading it," his smile turned to a calculating glare with a hint of amusement somewhere in his eyes. And strangely enough, Glorfindel was not that hard pressed to find it in their grey depths. "However, you certainly chose an odd time to take it. Who steals a book to read at four in the morning?"

"Well, what were you doing looking for it at four in the morning?" countered Glorfindel as he took a step backwards before Erestor advanced much closer. He really didn’t feel “safe” within a four foot radius of the livid counselor as long as he was in possession of the wanted book. Actually he didn’t feel totally safe as long as Erestor was within his sight. Erestor had been known to be rather drastic about measures he took to get his assets back.

"That," said Erestor firmly. "Is none of your business." He stretched out his hand and held it open before Glorfindel as though he expected to see the Gondolin Elf drop the book into his hand and apologize ruefully.

Glorfindel spun around to run or at least start to walk away quickly and then he abruptly saw stars. Blinking, he shook his head stupidly. Erestor nearly laughed at the golden-haired Elf's gapping mouth and blue eyes widened in shock. Keeping his composure to the best of his ability, Erestor let a thin smile melt across his face in pure and unaltered amusement.

The confused and utterly bewildered expression on Glorfindel's face was priceless as it was, but the reason for the expression and the black and blue knot forming on the Gondolin warrior's forehead was invaluable as far as laughter at other's expense went.

He could hear Glorfindel's excuse vividly in his mind: the tree branch didn't move out of my way. Snatching the piece of literature from the stammering Elf's hand, Erestor said stiffly, "serves you right."

Glorfindel staggered backwards a few steps before giving his head a quick and terse shake as he tried to jolt his blurred and much confused senses back. Blinking a few more times he looked at Erestor and asked dimly, "what happened?" It was then he knew that he was out of his right mind; otherwise he might have pretended nothing had happened at all.

Erestor finally let his grin break through and said, "It would appear that your forehead connected with a low hanging tree branch."

Looking his red-covered book over for any lasting or even temporary damage, the dark-haired Elf frowned minutely as he discovered a dog-eared page that looked vaguely like it had come into contact with some form of moisture. A thin stab of anger bristled his even temperament and he glared at Glorfindel, satisfied as he saw the humiliating purple knot growing over the other's right eyebrow.

Glorfindel frowned and then held his head high and tried to appear unconcerned about the recent accident. But his felt a slight pain blaze through his awareness and grow into a throbbing headache all in about fifty seconds, give or take a few.

O0O0O0O0O

Darcíl walked as quickly as he could without tripping over his own feet in his anxiety. His heart was beating quickly to some extent and he wondered with mounting dread if he would find the mutilated corpse of the Elf lying in the water on the floor surrounded by a growing red stain. He should have stayed there to make sure that everything went according to the plan instead of waiting with the ranger watching the man's face turn from white to red; horror to abhorrence and anger.

He knew the answer to why he had chosen to see the ranger's show of emotions over interrogating the Elf. Though he was loath to admit it, there was something inside that twisted and burned whenever the Elf looked at him with those sharp eyes that seemed to penetrate his conscience and see clear through him in a way that made him feel very exposed. It was like that blonde wretch knew what he was all about. That thought was disturbing acknowledged the man and he swung open the door of the cell with one quick twitch of his hand and swing of his arm.

The sight he saw threatened to turn his stomach and made him flex his fingers convulsively in imaginary pain but the sight of the Elf alive also sent waves of pure and complete relief to break over his senses like waves on beach.

The blonde being was on his knees with a gapping mouth that opened and shut systematically and a white face. His lips had even assumed a chalky color striped with red cracks where they were dry and bled. All calm demeanors seemed to have dissolved from the fair-haired Elf's face as Darcíl watched him clench his eyes tightly shut and his lips move wordlessly as he tried to dispel his pain. It was more than obvious that his attempts were far from achieving their goal. Dark rings encircled around the immortal's eyes and one eye in particular had clearly been punched at a point where the captive's defiance must have irked Sarchel.

Sarchel had Legolas' wrist in his hand and was working on popping it from its assigned socket. And from the mutilated and distorted way the immortal's fingers looked it seemed to Darcíl's narrowed eyes that they were all dislocated or broken on his right hand, but the Haradrim Captain was not sure. He didn't think he had the stomach to examine them long enough with his eyes to find out. The only thing that kept this captive from resisting strongly enough to escape or create a tumult was the fact that his energy was stolen due to his time hanging from one wrist and that arm's strength was spent for now. Otherwise the Haradrim captain was sure that the Elf would have proven to have been a very resistant captive as he had in the beginning.

Legolas had heard the door bang open and he slowly opened one eye and it was then that Darcíl noticed the other was almost swollen shut, but a sliver of anger could be seen glowing from beneath the inflamed lids. But in the single eye that was wholly opened he saw more contempt and pure loathing than he had ever thought he would see in one orb. It was truly fascinating when one thought of it. Darcíl spent nearly a whole minute studying the emotion the one eye possessed. As he did he saw it also had scornful pity mixed in with the abhorrence that glittered defiantly. It was the pity that shocked him the most and pierced him deeply. But it also served to flare up his temper and frowning he glared at Sarchel critically.

"Lieutenant!" he snapped abruptly. "Is this as far as you could get?" His tone was thick and commanding not to mention a bit over bearing. But Sarchel guessed that was the entire point and wasn't too surprised but he was alarmed. Legolas felt Sarchel's fear run through his arm like an electric shock and glanced up at his tormentor with laughing eyes. Probably not the best thing to do but it felt good to see the one who had caused him so much pain squirming like a worm on a hook. "Did he tell you asingledamnthing?"

Sarchel released Legolas' wrist and let the arm fall into its owner's lap. Legolas resisted the urge to wince and cry out all at once, so he bit his tongue and worked on keeping his chin defiantly up. He felt like the room was merging and swimming in all sorts of odd shapes and colors, which he was finding refreshing and sort of enjoyable at this point. At least they temporarily took some of the pain away. Not to mention that his head felt strangely like it weighed as much as a single oliphaunt and his neck trembled as he struggled to hold his head up high, causing a throbbing headache to attack his senses with a vengeance.

"He didn't tell me anything, Captain," Sarchel answered readily but unable to keep a slight and nearly imperceptible stammer from his voice as he confronted his superior officer who seemed ready to throttle him. Glancing at Legolas he smiled tauntingly, "but he does have a voice."

Intensifying his bitter and hard glare to the best of his ability, Legolas aimed it straight for junior officer and his lips pressed into a thin line. Sarchel looked down and he took Legolas' damaged hand none too gently before folding the dislocated fingers in on each other and then giving it a tight squeeze. A cold smile crossed his face.

The pain of the fingers being folded after their dislocation was enough to put into question Legolas' strength to hold back another scream, but the harsh squeeze that was given caused him to jerk back and he hissed loudly before giving a quick and bitten off cry of intense agony. His other hand clenched until its knuckles were bright white and his own finger nails nipped his palm. Sarchel applied a bit more pressure and Legolas could not help but give a muffled scream slightly before getting emotions under control. His chest was heaving in his desperate efforts not to scream again.

Darcíl had to mentally keep his fingers in check so they would not coil at his side and so he would not flinch. "I see, Lieutenant. I also see that weak Elves are too much for you to handle, so you can play with the ranger next time. But this conversation is over." He watched as Sarchel grimaced noticeably at the insult.

As Darcíl looked at the captive Elf he noticed small puncture wounds in the Elf's joints. They were not much more than the size of a pen-head but they were between the ball and socket. Little blood ran from them or if more of it had the water had washed it clean. He looked in disdain at the floodwater in the cell as though the blood that he knew flowed in it was going to poison him.

"Before you leave, bring in the ranger so he can see the damage done to his friend," commanded the Haradrim captain as he moved away from the door and began towards Legolas. "Perhaps his pity and sorrow will move him to reason."

Sarchel looked like he was about to object as he half opened his mouth and then shut it with a snap as apparently he thought better of it. His face went stony and Legolas guessed he was suppressing a grim and definite anger towards his captain. At least that was entertaining, depending on how you looked at it. Curious, he thought in the darker part of his mind, curious that I actually feel cold. It was one of those uncomfortable feelings he had not felt in a few years. But he felt more than cold, he felt miserable.

Yes, 'miserable' was the only way to describe it. Then again, he amended quickly, some other words or phrases like, 'severely agitated ' came to mind but other than that he could not think of all that many adjectives to describe how he felt at that moment.

After watching Sarchel slink out of the room, Darcíl looked gravely at Legolas and addressed him calmly and firmly, "Elf, I know you are in horrible pain, but this could all end so easily, and you wouldn't have to suffer the tiniest bit more…at least not until your death and even that will be relatively quick." Taking Legolas' mangled hand in his own he slowly spread the crooked and swollen fingers, noting Legolas' sharp intake of breath and the moans that escaped the blonde immortal's parched and bleeding lips. "And all you have to do is tell me your name, just your name and where you live. Then you can be at peace until execution day."

"Not…in your…most beaut…iful fantasies," Legolas managed and hardened his face around the pain to fix Sarchel with a relentless glower. He spat out one word spitefully, "never."

"Have it your way," Darcíl said in a smooth voice as he looked at the nearly blood shot eyes and the pale face that was within a little ways of being transparent. "But next time you are off limits, it’s the ranger's turn. Your best friend gets to be tortured, for your sake." The thing that frightened Legolas the most was that there was no taunting in this man's voice, he was being honest and simply informative.

Legolas unexpectedly snapped his head up to look at Darcíl with wide eyes and his face had become even chalkier if that were possible. "What?" he asked breathlessly. "You can't do that!" the fair-haired immortal managed to protest for what little he knew that it was worth.

"Oh yes I can and I can assure you, I will," bending one of Legolas' fingers he felt the being shudder. "So as you wait here in agony for tomorrow, I suggest you think about whether you want your friend enduring what you have or not." Releasing the distorted finger, the man said emotionlessly, "have a nice night."

As Aragorn was lead in his eyes fell full upon his best friend, taking in the ghost like face and the way Legolas was bowed on his knees in the ankle-high floodwater as though he was some slave and not the proud Prince of the Wood-Elves. His tussled hair was falling about his face hiding the dark bruise surrounding an ugly black eye aside from other numerous bruises on his battered face and hammered chest.

Gaping in shock and sympathy for the bleeding Elf, Aragorn ran forward as fast his manacles would allow and kneeled by the blonde Elf's side, offering his companionship. Darcíl smirked even as he felt something inside his heart bleeding so to speak and that little inner voice that he hardly ever listened to anymore trying to convict him of guilt for the prisoners' blood. Pushing down all thoughts of sympathy, the man slammed the door and left the friends to themselves.

Aragorn locked eyes with Legolas and asked in a stammer that was half choked with shock in itself, "My friend whatever did they do to you?" Aragorn found it amazed he found his voice because his throat felt swollen and dry. His heart labored to beat as it found a deep commiseration with his friend who looked like death.

Legolas finally began to shiver and his breathing became dangerously uneven and shallow. Aragorn followed the strangely dropped gaze of the azure eyes to Legolas' lap, where his hand with the damaged fingers lay. The sight made Aragorn's heart skip a beat and he knew what devastation this meant for Legolas, pain aside. The prince would never be able to use his bow properly again if they were not quickly set back into their joints and mobility returned.

Legolas looked at Aragorn tiredly and said in a soft voice dripping with regret, like spoken tears, "I am sorry. I tried not to scream, I knew you could hear me." His eyes fell to the floor in anguish of the situation and his unneeded apology ended in a forlorn whisper. He didn't want to make things harder on Aragorn than they already were. But knowing that Aragorn had been able to hear every cry…that hurt, a lot.

Aragorn gently took the Elf's all but mauled hand and tenderly held it. "You have nothing to be sorry for, my friend. Nobody could have done any better than you did," he added to try and reassure his companion that he was still just as brave and strong as before. Legolas tried to pull his mangled hand away but Aragorn only had to apply a tiny bit more strength to still the prince's movements. Even Aragorn was surprised and disquieted.

Legolas sighed dejectedly, "Oh, I don't know. I feel so…crushed." He glared then at the ranger threateningly. "And if you ever tell the twins or anyone for that matter that I said that, you are a dead man walking." He winced as Aragorn gingerly took his forefinger and began to straighten it as considerately and painlessly as he might. Groaning, the prince bit his swollen bottom lip until it began to bleed before giving a slight cry that tore at Aragorn's heart.

But because of his own dislocated arm that was hurting severely and feeling like it was ready to drop off, the man could not hold Legolas' hand and get the fingers straight. Sighing dispiritedly, he said, "Mellon nin, you are going to have to be strong and hold your hand out while I fix it. My arm is unwilling to cooperate at the moment." He connected his own disquieted silver eyes with the pain glazed blue ones that stung his heart. "Can you do that?"

Legolas breathed nervously, "of course."

Aragorn knew that Legolas might think he could, but the agony he was briefly going to feel was going to test every ounce of strength he had. He felt Legolas lock his arm and turn away so he didn't have to look at his own disfigured fingers being cracked back into place. It was bad enough to hear them popping and feel them snapping into their correct joints.

Legolas knew that this had to happen; otherwise he would have rather let it alone. But if he didn't get his fingers fixed then not only would he never string an arrow, he wouldn't be able to relocate Aragorn's shoulder. It was his friend's wounds from the ranger's previous session that were in the front of his mind and thinking about what the man had been promised next made Legolas feel like he was going to pass out.

He felt a sharp pain and grit his teeth as his face contorted and his eyes clenched tightly shut so that it looked like they were nearly nonexistent. Hissing as he sensed with acute pain his finger being straightened, the blonde Elf pressed his tongue to the rough of his mouth. He suddenly gave a hoarse cry and then bit his lower lips to silence himself.

How he managed to retain some form of consciousness while pain blinded his vision he would never know and in truth he didn't really want to. But when the last finger was in place he breathed and a sigh of relief and slowly flexed his hand stiffly in disbelief. It still caused minor pain but nothing compared to what he had been experiencing. The minute twitches of his fingers relaxing were ending quickly as his body began its quick recovery rate. But still, it was going to take a long time for them to heal into normality once more.

Legolas was thinking about all that had transpired and about whether he would be the same again when he felt a hand touch his shoulder delicately. He looked at saw Aragorn staring at the small puncture wound in his shoulder and the other in his elbow. Grimacing at the memories, the Elf smiled thinly and it never touched his eyes.

"That was where he drove a small, sharp pin between my joints and their sockets before twisting it," explained the blonde immortal openly as he rotated his shoulder slowly to help get it working better. In his opinion Sarchel's name was like a vile curse: never to be uttered if it could be helped. If a 'name' must be given the phrase 'insane excuse for a goon' would have to suffice. "It leaves no lasting damage it is so small, but the agony it produces is surprising, trust me."

Narrowing his eyes into slits of unmitigated concern, the grave Elven prince suggested seriously, "let me pop your shoulder back into its socket before it is too late. Elrond would kill me if I didn't attempt as much and kill you if you didn't let me," added the Elf succinctly.

"You are trying to draw attention off your own wounds," accused Aragorn darkly as he started to stand up but was stopped by Legolas' eyes catching fire and a smoldering glare returning to them, taking over the pained look.

He found it annoying that Legolas could have that much power over a person with just his eyes. The look he was giving was commonly known around both Mirkwood and Rivendell as the Glare of Sudden Death, because usually if you didn't comply your death was certain. However, nobody had ever dared not to comply so really that was only a theory that had somehow become a legend.

"No I am not," stated the blonde Elf tonelessly as he motioned for Aragorn to sit back down. Aragorn looked with disgust at the water and then complied reluctantly. It was cold, wet and he knew that in it mingled Legolas' blood as well as his own. A slight rumble of thunder echoed form overhead as another storm approached.

"Wonderful," muttered Aragorn half to himself as he slumped down next to the frowning prince. His sardonic tone was not lost on Legolas and the Elf quirked an eyebrow before swirling his blue eyes up for a quick, pointless look since the ceiling and lack of windows prevented him from seeing to outside world.

"Splendid." Legolas' sardonic remark was to be expected and the Elf sighed before rolling his eyes dramatically back down to look grimly at Aragorn's dislocated, more like mutilated shoulder.

As Legolas began to feel the joint to see which way he should set it, he became aware that he was grinding his teeth in his fury at the treatment of his friend. Of course it was to be counted upon but he still had every right to feel furious about it, did he not? Of course he did. What a stupid question. It wasn't bad enough that Aragorn had his shoulder stabbed and the javelin that skewered it was wickedly twisted out, but then it was probed with an obviously hot knife. But on top of that, as though one shoulder being mauled wasn't bad enough, his other was cruelly dislocated and left untreated nearly too long. Legolas was still debating the last part of his observations. The way the swelling around the joint looked made it seem like it indeed had been too long since it was tended.

Well if that was the case decided the prince smugly and with a thin smile, then the men would have to pay double for their evils. But as he felt the wound further with his good hand, the Elf narrowed his eyes and then came to realize, although it wasn't too clear, that the ball still had a chance at being replaced back into the socket. However, it was going to be a tricky business and Legolas knew that there was a chance Aragorn would pass out before it was all over. Riding the pain out simply wouldn't work with this sort of wound.

Legolas said quietly as he kept his eyes locked on the ugly deranged joint. "I think I can replace it. But I do not think you will be able to remain conscious. It has been left untended far too long." Aragorn noticed Legolas' hands were drawn and shaking slightly as they rested lightly on the shoulder. However it was from hunger and mounting weakness, not fear. Legolas was beyond fear at the moment.

Aragorn drew a heavy breath that hurt his battered chest and Legolas could have sworn he had felt it rattle as it entered the weary lungs. Glancing down at the man's chest and torso, where the torment had chiefly been delivered, Legolas noticed it looked uglier than his own, though that was to be expected since he healed faster (though even that was rather slowed). But, he smiled inwardly, at least the men had been 'good enough' not to even consider using whips of any kind yet. But how long could that last? Experience told him not to trust this would last forever and to keep his hopes of getting through this time without feeling the cruel smack of a whip at a minimum.

"Legolas," whispered the ranger, now that no one was around to hear the Elf's real name. "Are you sure? You don't have to try if you don't want to."

"Don't even try to talk me out of it," Legolas growled under his breath as he removed his hand and sized up the wound once more, deciding on exactly how the intense procedure should be carried out.

Aragorn knew that Legolas' warning or more like threatening-advice, was legitimate and he had known the Elf long enough to understand that crossing him in these kind of situations was not the wisest nor the more rational thing one could do…if he wished to live. However if he had a death wish he should keep traveling that road. Biting his lower lip in frustration at knowing the pain he was about to experience and not being able to evade it after already going through so much, Aragorn allowed reluctantly, "very well. But try to leave me with some arm left when you have finished," he teased with a weak grin meant to try and make the moment less intense than it was.

Legolas nodded slowly and in deep thought as he continued to plan out how things were going to turn out. But of course, in these sort of unfortunate circumstances, plans, even the most guarded and thought out, often went awry. And really, Legolas had heard that your initial thoughts and plans were usually correct or the best choice. So pushing aside his debate, the prince glanced nervously at his friend and resisted a want to gulp in anxiety.

O0O0O0O0

The captain sat at the table rather stiffly as he stared at the food on the white porcelain plate set before him by one of the many slaves of Dorrag's household. He had strangely lost his appetite, no, not strangely, it wasn't really any surprise at all. After seeing the blood and general gore down below he didn't think he would be eating for some time to come.

Of course, it wasn't really the gore or the blood, but whom the gore and blood belonged to. He had never had a true problem with tormenting prisoners before, but perhaps, after years of this type of career, his conscience, the small voice he had so long pushed aside, was returning with a vengeance. You are an absolutely worthless idiot! it chided non-too gently. And he had to agree.

But then he frowned inwardly. His career was not the usage of the finer points in tormenting anyone. He was a soldier, a warrior, honorable, strong, and dignified. So he had to ask himself, as he had so often before, why had he allowed himself to fall so low?

Unable to answer the question and not wanting to debate it within himself anymore he merely inclined his head as he looked up at his host. "My lord, you serve a gracious table."

"And this is poor fare," boasted Dorrag regretfully. "But we are at war." He gestured his salves and servants away so he and his captain could discuss things without ears all about.

"Yes, lord," answered the Haradrim officer levelly as he continued to stare at his plate darkly. He just didn't feel hungry. Another thought touched his mind and didn’t help to encourage his appetite. It was no secret and he and Dorrag didn't see eye to eye and it was also no secret that Dorrag was not beyond murder and assassinations. The food could be poisoned.

"Why do you not eat?" inquired Dorrag as he took a bite of the roasted pig on his plate. His eyes watched Darcíl's reaction closely, looking for a sign of mistrust or uneasiness.

"I seem to have lost my appetite," explained Darcíl as politely as he could, though he was not really in the mood to be questioned about his health or doings that evening. He looked darkly and conspiratorially at the two great hounds that his lord had near at hand. They were beautiful creatures, slender and muscular. He knew they were used in hunting fugitives as well as deer.

"Doe it have anything to do with conditions things have undergone below?" asked Dorrag with a small frown or misgiving and displeasure and a single brow arched in skepticism.

"No, my lord. It is more a matter of timing, I think. Your concern is appreciated, but really I think I am well..." he commenced to try and ward off his liege's suspicious probing to the best of his ability. If the Haradrim prince sensed the slightest weakness he would not hesitate to have him assassinated or even publicly executed along side his family.

Darcíl's dark eyes scanned his lord's face for signs of anger or suspicion that could prove fatal. Finding none visible…yet, the Haradrim captain shifted his feet quietly and uneasily beneath the table, making tranquil rustling noises against the stone floor with their soles.

"As you like, Captain," answered Dorrag with a unmistakably false shrug. Or at least, that was how Darcíl thought of it. The Haradrim prince sighed dramatically as he looked into his captain's darkened eyes seriously, with a nearly grave look to their glimmer. "So have we learned anything new from the…guests."

"Not a thing," Darcíl answered cautiously as he narrowed his orbs and knitted his brows with concern towards his liege's mood and where this small talk conversation was talking them.

"Pity.. well, not really," Dorrag reproached as he thought things over. "But it is still a problem. We need to kill them soon or the momentum our example will make will diminish to nothing. Captain, you recall what I told you…"

"My lord, they are not regular prisoners!" Darcíl nearly begged for his liege's understanding, which he hated with passion right now. His eyes flashed and he stood up to address his prince. "That Elf has been put through a lot today and at most we could get a muffled scream or two and then he blacked out or clamped his jaw shut!" Darcíl sighed and spoke wearily, "he seems to continue to draw a new strength from somewhere."

"Elves have their gods, the Valar, well perhaps he draws strength from them," suggested Dorrag as he watched his captain curiously.

"We cannot touch his soul-"

"Can't we?" an evil glint came into Dorrag's eyes and he nodded even as his most trusted officer gaped before him in shock. "We can, trust me. Put him through enough and we can do whatever we want. He will pretend to be strong but in the end he will fall, or the ranger will. It is my belief that if he disavows his gods then he will lose the strength he thinks he has."

"He has been through things that would break an ordinary man," protested Darcíl with more heat than he had initially wanted but it didn't seem to change matters.

"Has the ranger?" asked the Haradrim prince, his eyes turning back to a cool shade, giving him an eerie facade of sereneness that seemed filled with deceit and a hidden malice.

"Not exactly, my lord." Darcíl was afraid this answer would tip the scales in his liege's thus far amused disposition. It seemed to have no affect, at least openly. Standing uneasily, the Haradrim captain stared at the floor and then raised his chin slightly, showing he was still in disagreement.

"There lies our answer, Captain," proposed Dorrag as he wiped his mouth on a napkin. "You should have done this a long time ago," he reprehended sharply, drumming his fingers against the table in irritation with no particular rhythm.

"There is one more thing I must tell you, my lord," approached Darcíl cautiously after his appraisal and rebuke. Dorrag nodded and the captain of Harad continued. "The water has flooded below. I do not know how strong the prisons are. We must move the prisoners. I fear their escape or if some part caves, I fear their deaths. If they are desperate enough they could collapse the dungeons and not only take their own lives but cripple us as well."

"How high has the water risen?" asked Dorrag with keen interest as new fears jumbled themselves in his head and he began the weary task of trying to sort them into justified fears and worthless ones.

"It is beginning to get above the ankles," informed Darcíl anxiously. "I do not trust them not to use it to their advantage." Militarily speaking, he would have found a way to get free by now and if he had men with him they would be getting out as well. It was getting on his nerves that this Elf and this ranger had no yet tried. Perhaps it was because they were to busy staying alive or perhaps they had forgotten. But he suspected that they knew they could use it to their advantage and were abiding their time until the opportune moment to strike and break out or destroy them.

Thunder rumbled as though on cue, making the situation seem even more grave. Lightning flickered in the room as it reflected from outside and Dorrag sighed in deep thought. He could not allow them to escape under any circumstances. And if they killed themselves here, then they would be martyrs. But the sudden thought that if he put them to death they would appear as martyrs suddenly crossed his dark train of thinking. He could not have that. It could bring a cause for the Elf-friends to use as a bonding tie that would unite them against him. And yet without putting the Elf and ranger to death he would never rise to power.

These thoughts were temporarily pushed aside as he heard a tap at the door and muttered a testy, "enter."

"My lord," an unsure voice asked carefully. Darcíl watched the young messenger carefully and with a glare on his face. "Captain," the younger mortal addressed him in turn with a curt bow to both of his superiors. "Prince Dorrag, your father sends word from his campaign in the North." Dorrag nodded expectantly. "All goes well with him and he will be here within the next few months."

"Thank you," responded Dorrag coolly. False joy showed in his face and he smiled. But the light never touched even the lower rims of his eyes and they actually seemed to darken. "You may be on your way."

As soon as the young messenger had left, the prince turned to his guards and said, "make sure he never leaves these palace grounds. Dispose correctly of the body." Nodding, they sprang away from their posts to commit their liege's bidding or lose their lives in consequence.

Darcíl pretended not to be appalled and really he wasn't in too much shock. He had known about this side of Dorrag for quite some time, since one of his messengers never came back he had figured that this had been his fate. Now he knew for sure and keeping a uncaring façade on his features he tried to disguise his displeasure with the disagreeable situation.

"Sorry captain," apologized Dorrag grimly as though the business disgusted him as well.

Darcíl nodded, "I understand, my lord. Now what of the Elf and ranger? Shall I have them moved?"

"Indeed, but do not do it until tomorrow. Let them have their little reprieve. Tomorrow will be different."

O0O0O0O0O

Legolas wiped the cold sweat form his brow with the back of his swollen hand as he gazed at Aragorn's waxen face. He was out cold, having passed out halfway through the tedious process of relocating his shoulder joint. Legolas himself was now glistening with sweat from the extent of his energy use in getting the tricky bone back into its proper place.

Aragorn had taken it rather bravely for a human, he told himself. The ranger had hardly cried out though his face had frequently changed colors from a white consistency to a green and then to a grey one. It wold have been amusing had the circumstances been anywhere near resembling desirable, mused Legolas as he shifted Aragorn so the man was resting in his lap and not in the frigid water that was slowly rising to an even more uncomfortable height.

It was not up to their knees but in the deeper places above uneven ground it was three fourths of the way there, the Elf noted grimly as he scooted with his blacked out friend against the wall. Sleep was impossible and so he wasn't even going to try. Besides, he didn't trust Aragorn not to fall into the water and drown.

His weakness that he was experiencing was disturbing yet it was fully expected. He was being starved and brutally tortured, what else was he supposed to expect from this plight? He had seen his share of pain before so this was nothing new, just another adventure Aragorn had dragged him into that they both were going to have a great deal of trouble coming out of. But even though he knew all of this and more beside it was still annoying and the pangs in his gut were beginning to hurt just enough to be considered painful.

He began to wonder if it would better if he was dead. If he was dead then he was no longer of use to them and thus they would not need to know his name and Aragorn would not need to be put through torment anymore. But he had a sinking suspicion that Aragorn might be put to torment anyway because these men were cruel, selfish and had ice water for blood in their veins.

Having not seen his father or Rothinzil in two years he began to wonder what was transpiring back at his home. The strange want to get up and pace about the cell came to his mind and if he had not been keeping the self appointed task of keeping Aragorn's face and upper half out of the water so the man would not drown, the Elf might have paced a little. For some reason it was a comfort and he didn't know why.

But then again, in water it might not be as much of a comfort as he would like to think. One of the many things that got on his nerves was slushy boots and right now there was plenty of that going on.

Looking with boredom at his friend's wounds, Legolas took in the dark, blotches on Aragorn's chest and back. Bruises deep bruises that had to have reached the bones. They were even tinted red in some places were the ruptured blood vessels were especially close to the skin. There were also puncture wounds in his torso that were crusted over with dried blood.

In these dark, wet, and dreary conditions Legolas sent a silent prayer to the Valar that they would not get infected and that his friend wouldn't die of some strange disease that so often captured mortals' under these treacherous conditions.

Sighing and leaning back against the wet stone wall, Legolas closed his eyes and muttered, "Ed' i'ear ar' elenea! Tua amin Manwë!" He needed all the help he could get to face what he knew was coming. He knew what he was going to be forced to listen to tomorrow; he knew what horrible things he would face he knew that there was a sparse chance he might now be strong enough.

Translations:

Ed' i'ear ar' elenea! By the sea and stars!

Tua amin Manwë Help me Manwë!

CHAPTER TEN

The Beast

The large purple bruise just over Lord Glorfindel's right eyebrow was exceptionally hilarious. And it was also rather satisfying how the eye beneath it was not fully open as the swelling spread down to the eye lid and created a rather lopsided glare, Erestor decided with am amused smirk adorning his lips in the form of a small smile. Nearly laughing at the other's well-deserved plight, the adviser, said in a suppressed voice, "that is an ugly bruise…looks good on you though. "

He wasn't going to snicker, he wasn't going to snicker, and he wasn't going to…

"Go ahead and laugh yourself half to death…everybody else did!" seethed Glorfindel as his eyes narrowed in glistening slits of blue flame that kindled brightly. His golden brows were knitted tightly together in notable aggravation. Obviously he was on the verge of perpetrate a murder or two without any immediate regrets. And knowing Glorfindel the way he did, Erestor imagined that he was at the top of the golden-haired Elf's 'maul slowly' list.

Erestor simply let his smile broaden as he thought of these things before suddenly sniggering loudly, which turned into an all out roar of laughter as he stepped backwards, rocking back on the heel of his farthest foot. Glorfindel, he told himself silently, was going to kill him.

Glorfindel looked at the mountains beyond the window, afraid that if he watched Erestor laugh at him much longer he would choke him within an inch of his life and if he went that far he might as well finish it off because afterwards Erestor's retaliation was not something he wished to endure. That stuck up, nosey, stiff, dull, boring, devious excuse for an Elf-lord was not as stupid as he would have liked and actually had quite a cruel mind when he chose to use it. Glorfindel was sure Elrond was fully aware of this and that was why Erestor was in the position he was in. Glorfindel, along with the rest of Rivendell knew that even though Elrond Peredhil was kind at heart, he also had a slightly devious and insane side that could come up with some very…interesting…forms of retribution. Of course, Elrond claimed he never sought revenge, but Glorfindel was convinced otherwise.

Growling under his breath he glared at Erestor, "you can stop now. It wasn't that funny!"

"Your right…it wasn't that funny, it was that funny that it happened to you!" chuckled the adviser as Elrond came in, carrying some sort of vile smelling herbal poultice. Glorfindel noticed with a disgruntled frown that the twins were hot on his friend's heals, keeping their distance and smirking all the while. At some point he was going to have to end that laughter dancing in their eyes. And wiping that smirk off would be a bonus too.

Elrond placed the small wooden bowl by Glorfindel and dipped a cloth into the ointment before preparing to set it against the relatively small but ugly welt accumulating on his golden-haired friend's forehead. Even the Lord of Rivendell could not hide a smile. But he was thinking of Glorfindel standing before the Lady Galadriel and the Lord Celeborn with the knot on his head.

Glorfindel jerked his head back abruptly and protested, "that stinks! What ever did you put in there?" he asked, aghast. His nose wrinkled as he inhaled some of the sickening fumes. Glaring at his dark-haired friend, the blonde Elf winced as his raised voice caused his head to throb sharply for a moment before the pain faded away temporarily. He could have sworn seconds ago that the world was spinning around him in odd merging images…

"I put things that are good for you in there. It will reduce the swelling, if you want to know and ease the pain…"

"I am fine. Never better," argued Glorfindel as he tried to stand up from his sitting position on the edge of a bed in the healing ward. Everything blurred, Glorfindel noticed irritably, and it took a few seconds to reasonably clear up.

"Would you rather I get an Elf-maiden healer in here to take care of you and make you take a nap in front of my sons?" he asked as he raised a brow and watched Glorfindel's appalled face with keen eyes. Holding the cloth near Glorfindel's face, the Lord of Imladris commanded sternly, "let it sooth you."

Erestor stood in the corner, looking smug as he thumbed through pages in his book. Dark pieces of hair hung in his face and he brushed them aside before looking up, grinning at Glorfindel and shaking his head before chuckling again. Glorfindel frowned even more darkly and hoped that if Erestor were going to laugh this much that he would laugh himself sick. Now that would be funny. Or what would be even more amusing, delightful even, would be if he choked to death on a laugh.

Elladan and Elrohir exchanged very amused and identical glances as they watched Glorfindel jerk slightly when the cloth touched the bruise. Having been through such antagonizing and humiliating treatments themselves, they were an expert when it came to knowing exactly what the golden-haired warrior was experiencing. But that only served to make it all the more catching to their interests.

When Elrond was finished he pressed Glorfindel back down and said, "you must rest until the world stops spinning." Glorfindel tried to look innocent and completely confused, but it was pointless. He managed to get the completely confused part minus the innocence. "When you thought you were looking at me, you were looking at the door post, or relatively close. Mellon nin, I think you are seeing double," Elrond accused, not being able to hold back a small snigger, even with all his years of experience.

"Me?" asked Glorfindel virtuously and curiously all at once.

"Do you see anyone else who nearly got his skull fractured by getting to know a tree a little better?" asked Elrond wryly as he cleaned up his supplies, watching Glorfindel with verbatim for escape attempts from the corner of his eye.

"None in particular," answered Glorfindel with a wince as his headache continued to throb and he felt hazy. Small frown returning to his face, the Gondolin Elf nodded and said, "I guess I do need a slight rest. But I want to be in my own room. Healers make me nervous." Realizing in whose presence he had just spoken, Glorfindel flushed slightly and finished lamely, "but you’re an exception, my old friend.'

"I don't know whether to take that as a complement or…" from the glare Glorfindel was shooting at Elrond, the Lord of Imladris figured the rest apparently need not be said. Smiling he said like he was soothing a child who was having a temper tantrum, "now lay down and get some rest. You have to begin your travel to Lorien in a few days."

The reminder of that aggravating trip to come did Glorfindel's mood no favors and a small snicker escaping Elrohir's lips in the corner was not exactly accommodating to the situation either. Glorfindel all but whined, "I do not need rest, I simply need time alone…"

"Rest," Elrond said firmly as he pressed on Glorfindel's broad shoulders when the Balrog-Slayer had attempted to rise and walk out. Glancing over his shoulders he called to the chief adviser, "Erestor, please gather my sons out and yourself as well." He knew all too well that the twins were not helping and Erestor's smirking was only serving to make Glorfindel's temper flare.

"Lord Elrond, I can't believe you would do this to me…"

"What? Try to heal you?" asked Elrond in a voice that sounded suspiciously like laughter was building up in his voice. He smiled as Glorfindel rolled his bright blue eyes and sighed in exasperation.

"You know what I meant!" he seethed as Elrond continued to hold his shoulders and try to calm him down. Glorfindel's voice became a lethal hiss. "Especially in front of them." He gave a gesture with his eyes towards the healers standing by watching with helpless laughter as one of their lords was being forced to more or less take a nap like a little Elfling. Most of the healers being maidens, of course.

Elrond gave a small frown as he realized that humiliating Glorfindel before these maiden healers whom he was sure that one or two attracted his friend's attention, was not a good idea, at least if he wanted to live. He gestured to them with his hand to leave and then he looked back at Glorfindel. Gesturing his head towards the door he asked, "better?"

Glorfindel smiled and then tried to rise again, taking advantage of Elrond's minute distraction. It was a wasted attempt and Elrond smiled, "nice try. My sons are better than that."

Glorfindel sat back against the pillows, finally giving up as his headache pulsed violently and the room seemed to swirl. He groaned and then growled, "I might lay here, but I refuse to sleep."

"Don't make me drug you. I really don't want to do that…again."

"You have never drugged me!" protested Glorfindel, sitting up with alarm.

"Then please do not make me start now," plead Elrond as he began to walk out, not caring to argue. His look was one of weariness and amusement. However, Glorfindel could tell that Elrond was tiring of this arguing.

Glorfindel looked at Elrond with an expression consisting of nothing but seriousness when he spoke in a quiet tone; "you miss Estel." It had been two years after all and anyone in Rivendell could say that on one occasion or another that had heard his or her lord up late at night, pacing and muttering to himself. As Glorfindel looked closer he could tell that Elrond's eyes were tired and slightly red-rimmed.

"Glorfindel, lets not talk about it," Elrond suggested somewhat maliciously as he turned to leave. He drew a heavy breath and then stopped as he thought about where his foster son was right then. Two years was a long time, even if you were an Elf, two years was a long time to never see someone you cared for and not hear a single thing from them as to their whereabouts. He had never thought time could truly move so slowly or make him feel so tired.

"No, we are going to talk about it, mellon nin," Glorfindel promised as he stared at his old friend's back with sharp eyes. Elrond thought he could feel himself getting run though by their intensity.

Elrond turned around and said calmly, "I am going to leave you to get your rest." He turned to leave and as he did Glorfindel called out after him in a promising tone.

"Very well, but we will talk about it!"

OIO

Elrohir was bored.

He had been sitting in the same place for more than two hours and could find simply nothing else to count, study, glare at or ogle at that he hadn't already done something to ten times over or more. He had honestly lost track. His dark hair hung over his shoulders and he flipped it back with annoyance. The small frown on his face spelled trouble with capital letters, but no one was paying enough attention to read it.

Elladan was perched on a windowsill that made a very interesting and oddly comfortable roost. His had an arm draped across a single knee and one leg dangling down to the floor as he gazed out with bored grey eyes to the gardens, watching the maidens sniff, pick, plant and trim the flowers and other various sorts of plants. It had been amusing at first, but to him maidens and flowers were only so exciting. Every now and then an occasional bee would buzz around the Elven women's sweet smelling hair and they would get annoyed or alarmed and cause him to smile, but other than that it was about as dull as watching paint dry. Actually, as far as his living memory went there had been a time when watching paint dry was far more intriguing. It wasn't that these maidens were ugly, not at all! It was the exact opposite, they were like slightly less fair versions of his sister but with height, build, hair and eye color differences.

He smiled at the memory of Glorfindel walking right into a tree only a few hours ago. He honestly wished he had gone in the room and tormented the golden-haired Elf just a little. But he had learned at a young age that you didn't tease Glorfindel and live to feel wicked satisfaction about it afterwards, much less gloat. And if you couldn't do that there really was no point. Unless there was some fun in standing before Mandos and while rattling off a list of things you had done, irritating Glorfindel, whom Mandos had sent back mind you, was a good thing.

But then again, Erestor often drove Glorfindel to beyond the insane point he had already reached some yén ago. And somehow the raven-haired counselor lived to tell the tale before he found himself to be the center of a carefully planned prank of Glorfindel's. It had to be because deep down inside they enjoyed torturing each other, Elladan decided with a laugh that he honestly hadn't known had been out loud.

"Care to enlighten me as to what is so funny?" asked Elrohir dryly as he cocked his head minutely and looked at Elladan with a curious expression. "Brother, it is impolite to chuckle to yourself before others' presence, you know."

Elladan smiled broadly and said, "I just was recalling Glorfindel's little…"

"…Misadventure," finished Elrohir for his identical brother with a light laugh of his own. "Yes, indeed, that was a rare occurrence, refreshing if it was nothing else." A small burst of laughter erupted again and Elrohir didn't try to stifle it.

"I couldn't agree more," said Elladan wistfully as he looked out the window and sighed. He was really becoming bored now, even though his little laugh had been invigorating, it had been temporary at best. The day was slightly hotter than others were and the air was thick, making it easy for one to fall asleep. It was easy to do that in Rivendell anyway, if you weren't an Elf, and sometimes even if you were. It had to draw from a heavy feeling of safety and sereneness that was inescapable.

Elrohir stretched out sideways in the chair, dangling his long legs over one of the arm rests casually. He clicked his boot heels against the side of the piece of beautiful furniture absentmindedly. Elladan turned around and glared a moment before saying, "Ada would kill you if he saw you sitting in one of our oldest piece's of furniture thus." He narrowed his eyes and then turned them back out the window, watching the wind ruffling the delicate leaves.

Elrohir merely raised a brow and looked at the chair beneath him incredulously. "The oldest?"

"Well if you disregard the one you broke last yén…" Elladan chided impassively as he watched Wilwarin intently. She was so swift and delicate on her feet and her eyes… But he knew he couldn't rebuild their broken relationship. They were friends only, though they were close in that regard.

Elrohir saw the sloppy and absorbed look slipping into his brother's eyes and a smile crept across his face. Still sitting like a homeless and sloppy vagrant, the younger twin said smoothly as he watched Elladan's narrowed eyes, "Ada says I get your room too and you have to sleep out on the balcony."

After waiting moments all was still silent.

But Elrohir was persistent and to say he was very amused wouldn't be a lie either.

"Word reached Ada that Estel has met his doom and that you are needed in the Lonely Mountain to delegate a meeting between the people of Dale and Dain's trusty people…"

Elladan nodded dryly and said in an absorbed voice, "that's good," before stammering, "-what!" Glancing back over his shoulder at his younger brother who was grinning like a daft lemur he started, "Elrohir! …You…I…that was mean…"

"And funny too…"

"I protest: it was not."

"Oh, but it was!" Elrohir laughed.

Elladan just shot his brother, who was laughing with a renowned hysteria, a scathing glare and his eyes turned to slits of annoyance. "Looks like you aren't so bored anymore," he commented tightly as he watched Elrohir lean back and stare at him from an upside down position, all his blood rushing to his face. "You look like an idiot."

Elrohir obviously didn't hear him, or at least gave no sign of such comprehension and continued with his frenzied laughter.

His reddening face and chuckles were amusing Elladan and he leaned back to laugh heartily.

But there was a slight problem…

There was nothing to lean back against.

Brief confusion, surprise, fright and humiliation crossed over Elladan's face in less than the three seconds he was up on the windowsill and felt himself plummeting downwards the entire seven feet that separated the window from the ground. Nothing was beneath him.

Things might have been terrible but the thorn bush below covered with large bright yellow roses broke the fall. No problem really, except that there were dozens of the barbs and stickers pricking his skin just in places where he was unable to reach. They were in his hair, scratching his face, pricking his fingers and ripping his clothing as he struggled before realizing that it was pointless and he might as well just relax.

But that was impossible and he felt his face turning white and then scarlet, as he became the center of the Elf-maidens' hysterical laughter. It wasn't that funny, he thought as he watched Wilwarin leaning on Ivrin and giggling helplessly. Her musical voice would have been welcome any other time, however it was at his loss this particular moment and he felt his face burning.

Elrohir leaned over the edge of the window and smiled down at his twin once he realized with all certainty that nothing of Elladan's was hurt other than his dignity. Grinning like a fool again, the younger twin called down, "got a thing for yellow roses have you? I like the red ones myself…"

Glancing up at his younger brother, who had made a grave mistake, the eldest son of Elrond smiled twistedly and snarled back up in a thick voice, "I've heard the thorns on yellow roses were less painful to the touch."

"Really?" taunted Elrohir as he leaned over the edge of the windowsill and placed one booted foot upon its edge as he looked down on the dark-haired and livid Noldo below.

The maidens smiled. This was interesting not to mention rare and more than laughable.

"Come down here and I will prove to you they are not," Elladan seethed as he struggled to untangle himself once more, only becoming more caught up in the painful vegetation that he was lying helpless in.

"I will take your word for it," Elrohir chuckled as he stepped back into the room and began to jog out of the chamber and into the decorated corridors.

Their father was going to be more than angry and it was for more than one reason, perhaps more than two. Yes, it would be about three reasons, Elrohir concluded. "First of all," he told himself openly. "Elladan shouldn't have been sitting on the windowsill; secondly, Ada loved that bush; thirdly, those thorns have some kind of slight venom in their barbs. Elladan's face will be swelled up to at least twice its size for at least this evening and maybe the majority of tomorrow morning."

"Have you taken to talking to yourself, then?" asked a soft voice that Elrohir recognized almost immediately. It still sounded smug and strangely like the mind behind it was scheming deviously.

"Erestor, I may be insane at times…but not that insane," Elrohir stopped walking and stared with a smile lurking on his mouth. Erestor gave him a questioning look and that was all it took for Elrohir to nearly lean on him and gasp between laughs, "Elladan fell out the window and landed on Ada's rose bush!"

Erestor smiled, knowing the named bush. Giving a whimsical laugh of his own, the raven-haired counselor nodded, "does your father have any idea?" he asked, feeling stupid as soon as the question had left his lips.

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