Crowned

Chapter Eight

Erelos stared at the elf then back at Thranduil. Steam was practically billowing from his ears, and he quickly walked down the steps. "Qeal, what is this?" He demanded. She laughed and looked at him. "It's sweet to still call me by an old pet name." Thranduil looked around the room at the different faces and his cheeks turned red. Erelos wondered who this elf was and why she spoke in such a loose speech, and why she spoke in the common tongue and not the elves' tongue. And she wondered what a pet name was. "Everyone calls you that." Thranduil whispered harshly. Qeal bit her finger and smiled. "But who started it?" Thranduil stood up straight. "Leave us!" The elves occupying the room all started to leave. Tauriel still stood by Qeal. "Tauriel, I said leave us." "I feel it would be dangerous-""Leave us!" He slammed his sceptor on the ground. She quickly turned and left. Erelos still sat in the corner of the room. He slowly looked towards her, and she jumped up and left. As she stood and waited she could hear Thranduil yelling. "Tauriel?" Erelos looked at her, who was holding her bow and ready to run if needed. Tauriel didn't look back at her. "What?""Who is that she-elf who sits there?" Tauriel shrugged. "An old memory." Suddenly Thranduil walked from his throne room. "I want that creature out of there and in the dungeons." Tauriel bowed and went to retrieve Qeal. Thranduil continued to walk, and Erelos had to run to keep up with his long strides. "Father, who is Qeal?""Qealoria." He corrected. "I thought though-""Qealoria is her name. Qeal was just her more common called name.""Alright." Erelos coughed. "Who is she?" Thranduil stopped and put a hand on her shoulder. "No one that you will have the misfortune to meet again." He strode past her and left her in thought."Legolas!" Legolas turned to see Erelos in his doorway. "I need your help!" She whispered. He walked towards her and gestured for her to come in. "Which is what?" Erelos smiled. "May I have the key to the dungeons?" Legolas shook his head and frowned. "Why would you need those?" Erelos rolled her eyes. "I want to speak with the she-elf." Legolas turned and thought about it. "Please Legolas?" She took his arm. "If father finds out I'll say I took the keys from your possession." Legolas shook his head again. "Fine. Although I have to get them from Tauriel." The two met outside the dungeon and Legolas unlocked the door with the large set of keys. "I shall stay here. Just in case." Erelos shrugged and walked down the stairs. There was different bandits in different cells, but Erelos found the one she was looking for. "Qeal." In the cell, Qeal sat with her legs crossed and she was drawing something into the ground with a rock. They were just random patterns and shapes that meant nothing to Erelos. Qeal didn't look up from her task. "Hmm?" "I would like to speak with you." Qeal looked up with her dirty face and Erelos wondered why she wore the coal around her eyes and on her eyelids. It made her look more, intimidating she guessed. "Who are you?" Qeal asked."I am-""Wait!" Qeal stuck out her hand. "Let me guess." Erelos sighed. "Can you please speak Elvish? You obviously understand it or else you wouldn't understand me." Qeal looked up at her. "Well, you obviously understand the common tongue, so why don't you speak that? Anyways, you are someone Thranduil likes because not just anyone would be allowed to laze around his throne room." She scratched her scar with her sharp looking nails. "Arwen? No, no..Arwen is more graceful. No, Legolas is a guy. Umm...ooh!!!" She started to snap her fingers. "You're that little brat that always hung around. Ef, no...Eke...No! Er..Erek...Erelos! Erelos! That is who you are!" Erelos frowned and was in shock. "And how would you know that? I have never met you." Qeal laughed, her unusually sharp teeth showing. Her laughter was one of mocking, and it echoed through the dungeons. "Oh, well. I spy." Erelos frowned then shook her head. "Alright. What I wanted to ask was who are you? And how do you know Thranduil?" Qeal picked up her rock again and continued to draw. "You don't know?" Erelos shook her head again. "I have nothing to hide." The bandit stretched her arms. "Quite a long time ago, I was probably a little younger than you, I was a lady of Rivendell. I came here to Mirkwood for some sort of celebration. Thranduil was a young prince at the time, and we met. Yeah, we were to be married. We fell in love." Erelos gasped and quickly sat down. "And?" She prompted."And," Qeal continued. "It might be hard to believe, looking at me now, but I was quite different back to that time. But anyways, everything was set up for the wedding, but we had bad weather and it was postponed. One of the guests of the wedding was the one he was going To end up marrying. We had fought a bit, the two of us. He was convinced I was laying with another, so he left me. For that sweet, gentle, stupid whore! He left me!" Qeal slammed her fist into the ground. "..I was with a child..." Erelos put her hand over her mouth. "I cut it out." Qeal lifted her tunic to reveal and large, jagged scar. "That seems drastic, but it would have died anyways. It's buried by a large, beautiful tree in the forest. The tallest one." A tear slipped down Qeal's cheek and onto the dusty ground. "Thranduil doesn't know." She wiped the tear away and laughed loudly. "Anyways, I was banished because I attacked Thranduil, and then the baby happened, and then I met with the other banished elves who you know as the bandits, and I became their..leader." She relaxed again and dropped the rock. "So that's the story. Anyways, I must be off. I bid you a good day." Erelos frowned, and suddenly Qeal chanted something in a dialect Erelos didn't recognize, and the drawings around Qeal lit up and engulfed her. Erelos stood, dumbfounded. "Legolas!" She yelled. He came rushing down the stairs and looked in shock at the empty cell. "She said something in another tongue and disappeared!" Legolas opened the door carefully and held his ready bow in his hand. After deciding she wasn't in the cell, Legolas leaned down and touched the drawings. "This is an evil magic. Come with me." He quickly left the cell but stopped. "Erelos." He gestured to the other dungeons. All the other bandits were gone, and the ground on each cell had similar drawings. They both stood there, but then went back up the stairs. "I will go inform someone who would perhaps know more about this. I will not tell father you were down there, so do not say anything either." He quickly jogged down the corridor and around a corner. Erelos turned around and collided with a large, muscular chest. She looked up to see a handsome face smiling at her. "Marculus." She walked right past him. "Where were you during the attack? I couldn't find you." He said as he walked beside her. "Fighting." She replied with a smile. Marculus stopped but then kept walking. "Fighting? A young lady like yourself, you? I wouldn't see you-" within a flash Erelos pulled Marculus' sword out from his belt and had it pointed at his throat. "Are you insinuating that I could not fight?" Marculus shook his head. "Only that I didn't see you as the type." Erelos leaned in close and put the sword back. "Well, I am." Later, Erelos walked up to Thranduil's door, knocked, but there was no response. She quietly opened his door and found him looking at his desk. His shoulders shook lightly, and suddenly Erelos felt a horrible feeling in her. She tried to leave the room but he sat up in his seat and turned to look at her. Erelos couldn't bring herself to look him. Half his face was engulfed in torn flesh. His left eye was grey, and she could see everything that was under his skin on his cheek. "Forgive me Erelos." He said, turning away from her. "I drop the illusion when I am alone." Erelos stepped forward. "Illusion?" She questioned. "Yes.." He said. "When I am in company, I set an illusion of perfection. If you and I were to look into the same mirror, you would see nothing but me. Yet I would always see it. It is never hidden from my view, but I can hide it from anyone else. The illusion of perfection, for I am anything but. That is why it is an illusion." It made sense to Erelos, but she couldn't imagine having to keep that up every day. "It doesn't bother me." Erelos said as she sat on his bed. "I think it's better to show the truth than an illusion." He looked up at her and smiled lightly. "It is too much for some." And he looked back at his reflection in the mirror. Erelos knew the real reason why it was difficult for him. It happened the day his wife died. The Serpent's attack in which the two of them were injured. Thranduil didn't emerge from his quarters for weeks. "Erelos." Thranduil said, snapping her out of her daze. "Soon, there will be terrible times. I have seen it. You must remember to never worry about me or anyone else. for instance, when I said earlier to stay put and you instead fought. Do you understand?" Erelos bit her lip to stop herself from saying something stupid. "Yes father."