The tale of Feawen

Chapter 11- blood

We went through the Mirkwood forest, but on another road that reached really deep into the forest, and not all of it was good. The atmosphere seemed to poison my mind and I felt so tired that I almost fell down the horse.

At some point, the night was so dark and silent and we decided to find a place to sleep. I got off Límdú. "Esta sinomé*", said Legolas. "I am going to search for a better place." And without another word, he ran away. I looked around- the trees were so close and high that I could barely recognise the sky. I felt weaker and weaker, and before I could do something, I collapsed.

A slight light of candles. The smell of old wood. I opened my eyes and saw that I was not in the forest anymore- or at least not in the pure wilderness. I found myself in the bed in a house. I had been kidnapped.

Why would anybody do that? Legolas would never find me, I had no idea how far I would be away from the place where we had decided to rest. Slowly, I got afraid. Who kidnapped me? An evil witch? Or even worse- orcs that tried to kill me? But in that case, I would not be in such a nice house. And I would have chains around my arms.

Suddenly, I heard some steps near the door and a young man entered the room. He had dark brown hair that almost reached his shoulders, and warm brown eyes looking at me gently. "You are awake", he said. "Uhm.. who are you? And why am I here?", I asked him carefully. He sighed. "I am a ranger of this forest and a relative of the king of Gondor, Aragorn Elessar. My name is Eorl. When I was walking through the forest a week ago, I saw you lying unconcious on the ground. You had fallen- and I thought that I should help you, so I brought you here. Another thing that I had noticed is important- your crown. I looked at it and knew who you were, Feawen."

"How do you-"     "A propecy mentioned you."  A propecy? What did he mean?  "One of the magician elves of Lórien had a vision and wrote it down. I have a copy of the propecy he wrote. I never knew that it was true... the children of Elbereth.."   "What? No, I do not know of relatives. I am her only daughter."    He shoke his head. "Lá*, Feawen. It is written that there is another child apart from you that is given power, even more powerful and stronger power by her. A hauta sinomé*", he said and went into another room to search the book.

After a minute he returned and opened a grey book.

"The child of Elbereth, reflexing her beauty of pure starlight, will live on earth- and so will her responsibilty, the person she has to watch over; because her responsibilty has power of pure strength- power to rebuilt broken ruins, to heal the hearts of men, to cure the scars of old battles. But not only the gift of Elbereth is given to Feawen, the daughter of stars. She is a descendant of Eru, of the Valar, and given to her is the strength by her mother Varda, by Vaná, the ever-young, and by Este, Lady of healing."

I looked at him, totally confused. "So I have a little sister or a little brother I do not know about?", I questioned curiously.  "Do we know where he or she is? How do we find my sibling? And the gifts... that would be the explanation for my abilitys.. that I can cure animals!"    "That is why I am here. I want to help you."   Suddenly, his eyes widened. "Your crown", he asked.  "Oh", I replied, and decided to tell him about almost everything, but I had totally forgotten to mention my ally.

"I am going to help you", he said honestly. "I know some spells from other elves, but I dont know if they will help. I am going to research. I think its the best if we first solve your issue and when you are save, we will talk about your relative."

Eorl and I had talked about everything important so we could help each other. A day passed and he was very gentle and gave me to eat and to sleep. The next day, he came to my room and talked to me about his nearer plans. We were in the middle of a conversation when suddenly the door flew open.

Legolas came quickly run into the room, yet his bow aiming exactly at Eorls heart. He surely thought Eorl was a bad and evil ranger and that he had kidnapped me to kill me. He was even wearing armour on his shoulders; which I guessed from that he had thought he would be facing orcs or worse.

Eorl whipped out his sword and Legolas began to talk loud and slowly in a way I had never heard him talking before. "Let her go", he said magisterially. His eyes stared angrily straight in Eorls. I had to do something or they would kill each other.

"NO!", I screamed, standing up from the bed I had sit on. "Las! Do not shoot at him! He is trying to help me!" Now he looked at me in a confused way, but still aiming his bow. "Who are you?", he asked, now looking at Eorl again. "I am Eorl the ranger of this forest. And you are..?" "Legolas Thranduillion. Prince of this forest and the Woodland Realm." It was terrible- how angrily and fighting they looked at each other, still holding their weapons. I looked at Legolas- he must have run days through the forest just to save me. I would have liked to run to him and hug him- I was so thankful for everything he had ever done for me. But for that, the situation was bad and he was way too angry. "And what does she concern you, if I may ask?"  

Oh no. Eorl should not have asked that- I could almost sense the anger of Legolas. "Because", he replied. "I am her protector and I am the one who will find the way to save her. It is my task." He seemed so different; maybe it was just his armour, but I was kind of terrified. I did not want him to change for me! The way he was had always been the way I had been in love with, and he would just change that in a negative way. They let down their weapons and Legolas came to me and stayed between me and Eorl protectively. "Really?", Eorl asked, not believing a word he said. "It is true", I said. "He came with me all the time."

Eorl left the room to leave us alone for a moment. Legolas immediately came to me, looking very worried, and glad that he had found me. He stood close in front of me as my hand moved over his silver armour that I was looking over. I went a few steps back and turned my back to him. "He wants to help me", I tried to explain. "He took you away from me!", Legolas replied, almost shouting in a scared way, and I had never heard him speak like this before. As I turned around to look at him, he came closer again and took my arms, and he leaned forth so our nose touched. I did not want to love him, but I did. I did not want to because I knew it would not end good for either of us.

We quickly went back through the forest but rested there to sleep anyway. When Legolas was finally sleeping, I ran away. We were quite close to south Mirkwood, and I knew what there was standing; the castle of Dol Guldur, now called Eryn Lasgalen, after Galadriel had cleansed it and mostly destroyed it. But something pushed me to run there, to take my sword with myself; It must have been the dark, evil, grieving side of me, and had now fighted my good side. I ran through the forest and suddenly, I arrived.

It had totally changed. Dol Guldur was not grey and dark anymore, but a white, rebuild castle of the elves, where elves of Lórien would live soon. It would be east Lórien; but I did not want that. Not that I would not want them to find another home, but Dol Guldur had been bad, too bad, to remain; even if it would be cleansed and rebuild. The place held too many bad memories.

I went towards the gate, my sword in my left hand, pure anger in my eyes; I heard somebody run through the forest behind me but I did not really notice; anger had taken over me, I wanted to destroy everything of Dol Guldur what remained. I raised my hands and spoke a spell; My eyes were filled with blue light again, I was possessed; And with every word I spoke, the fortress broke apart, more and more. My body got colder and colder, my hair that flew around me, turned black, and the more I said, the worse a terrible pain in my heart began to feel.

Suddenly, I felt something drop down my right eye, something warm and hot; my eye was bleeding, and it was because of the task I was satisfying, but I did not stop. I just went on, but after seconds, I felt weak, as if my heart was frozen in some way, and I saw nothing but shadows, when I heard someone shout behind me as I collapsed.