Alas, For Captains No Hope.

Chapter 5

Alas, For Captains No Hope

Chapter 5

Warning: Contains angst.

Funny how time could change life so dramatically. Until he was fifty years old, nobody found him worthy enough to take one, simple look. Then suddenly everyone wanted his attention, for they found him adorable, sweet and felt deep down guilty. They shoved the fact away that they had threatened him as dirt, nothing more. “The poor elfling.” They all said. They would come over and grasp you out of the hands of your rescuer. You would be hugged, while being told they would be there for you.

Five years later after the terrible attack, elves would watch your back when you walked past. They would glare, murmur insults under their breath and one or two would throw something in your direction. All because you were the elfling without a parent, without a happy family. Without someone reading you bedtime stories, without someone telling you “I love you.” To them, you were an intruder in their community. You were the cause for all their problems. In some cases, you had not even been born yet. But you were still the cause of their misery. Even when you tried to satisfy them as much as you could, they would still chose an arrow over spending time with you. Deep down you knew that five years ago, you had it better.

Look at yourself. Sitting in the pouring rain, staring as a wild animal to the cold, mud strained ground. Your tunic is ripped open, showing your bare skin with open, bleeding and infected wounds. Behind you lay several of your comrades, dead to their surroundings. Far away you hear the echoes of a battle going on. Yet you do not move. You stay crouched on the ground, staring in the distance. You prefer the company of dead fellow warriors and cruel orcs than helping elves out who still got a chance to survive. The same elves who had left you to die a lonely, slow and painful death. Only because you were an outsider. Only because you were different.

You close your eyes again and return to that memory in the back of your head of the childhood you once had.

That same year in the Third Age, year 2946, you started school. Faervel helped you dress and made you a lunch packet for at school. In those short years, she had changed drastically. Her eyes did not shine the way they used to. They were cold, deep orbs. Although she still loved you dearly, you were no longer her biggest interest. Around the time of the attack, her fiancé fell.

You remembered that night it all happened so well. You were sitting on her lap as usual, pointing at animals in one of the children books. Faervel would tell you about them, about who they were and what they did. As wood elf, it was one the things you needed to learn. You took great delight in learning the animals of the woods. One day, you would visit them and learn their secrets, their interests and befriend them. You were determined to do so.

Suddenly, your beloved guardian grasped to her heart. She started to breath with trouble and shifted to all kinds of directions. Her face was pained, her eyes filled with tears. You remember reaching out to her, only to be turned down. She forcefully pushes you off her lap, resulting in you hitting the ground hard. You cried out in pain, in confusion. You try again, only to be pushed in the shoulder. You try over and over again, until your body has enough of the pain. Defeated you crawl to the far end of the room, clutching yourself tightly. You lull yourself in a vain attempt to make everything disappear. But to no avail, you are still in the same situation.

Faervel was crying out, thrashing around on the cradle chair. She is scratching her arms, leaving long and deep cuts everywhere. Her eyes had turned to a dark colour, without hope in them. She keeps crying out a to you unfamiliar name. You blink in confusion and observe her reaction. But to what? You wonder. You ponder about getting help, but decide against it for then. Should I try again? You ask yourself. You take another look at the elleth, who looks lost.

Out of nothing, she grabs your most beloved book and throws it to the wall besides you, destroying it to pieces. Tears stream down your face, although you try to hold them back as much as possible. You try to reach out to the pages, but were hindered by more books flying in the direction. Book by book they hit the walls, damaged for the rest of your life. You can only stare at the trial happening in front of you. Your eyes are fixed on watching them shred to pieces. All you deeply loved is being destroyed by the one you trusted so much. Those books you had collected on your own, in the time other elves were a mystery to you. You would spend nights wandering around looking for new ones to add to your so loved collection. You remember every book you collected, how it got into your possession. You remember trailing with your finger over the beautiful pages.

The tears are shining in your bright eyes again. Slowly you reach out to the worn out rucksack behind you. You pull it closer to you, until it is besides you. Carefully you insert your right hand into the pack, touching a piece of a smooth book cover. With closed eyes, you take it out. After a long moment, you open them once again and admire one of your treasures. In your hand is one of the things that made your childhood worth. You hold one of the books you were able to fix over the years. It took a lot of patience, blood, money and tears but you finally succeeded. It was one of the little accomplishments you had made in your life. But you could not be gladder; This treasure of yours was restored. Even though everyone found it garbage, it was one of the most beautiful things in life for you.

You held it close to your heart and kissed it. If there was one thing you would fight for, it was things like this. But you hoped it never happened. Memories came back once again and you got lost. Lost in the pains of the past.

The rain continued to fall. You did not feel it, nor you cared about in the first place. You did however feel every shock the earth underneath your feet received. Once in a while, you felt a wave pass through your body. Whenever that occurred, you smiled sheepishly. For you knew that it only could mean one thing.

Elves hitting the cold forest ground without much chance to survive the bloody battle.

If they were still alive, was the question. For all you knew, they had been stabbed or beheaded and the shock was nothing more than their corpse hitting the ground. Whether it was an alive or dead elf, you simply did not care.

All you cared about was the amulet clutched in your left hand and the books spread on a cloth. Nothing more and nothing less.

After all, they deserved it. Each of them.