Wild Monster

by Matthew Harrington

  "Because you'll be nothing but a Regular in the West – a soldier," Glorfindel's chin rose. "You are aware your father was a soldier, and that, at heart, is what you are."

  The Elfking's eyes flashed, his chest rose with sudden quick breaths. There was no shame in opposing evil. And Thranduil's father had done so as a King. Lusis watched the sudden sputtering of white flame amid blue, and how it was pressed down, as if by force of will. Curious. Effort had been necessary to contain that detonation.

  Glorfindel was succinct and pitiless, like clock hands. "Only the fondness of the Silvan saw more in you. And when you set foot in the West with your thousands of subjects, then a great Vanyar, or Noldor Family, or a powerful Teleri will call you to court to take up a position among the house staff, beside your father's brothers. You will belong to them, as we will all have a place or position waiting among our kin. You will end your days in some trifle. Mighty Thranduil, guarding a door, cleverly, ravishingly, for the rest of your existence."

  All the elves reacted to this, except, curiously, for the Elfking himself. His brows rose a fraction, and his expression smoothed. That was all. It did not become glassy, or pleasantly enraged. He wasn't even mildly surprised by this judgment. Which meant he had suffered this thought before. Often. It was Raineth who stepped back from Glorfindel and turned her head away. She looked at the water, as if she could not bear his presence, she had been had so disgraced.

  Nimpeth made a sudden stride for the grand, great elf of Rivendell. When she spoke, it was through her teeth, and her voice was harsh. "If you think we will get on a boat, cross that forsaken ocean, and arrive in the West to hand you our King – that we are not preparing the way for his arrival – you have lost your senses! If the Three Kindred have so desperate a desire for a block of wood to pin their castle doors open and shut, I suggest they take you!" She stepped free and took her place between the Noldor and her Sinda King again.

  Amathon exhaled slowly and stepped to his wife's side.

  Glorfindel's face flashed a sudden spasm of irritation he quickly smoothed over. This was only just notable, forgettable, in fact, beside the open shock of the Elfking. He backed up. His smooth face appeared as it must have when he'd been a child. His pale pink lips pursed under wide, silvery eyes. He stared at Nimpeth in undisguised astonishment, whose long eyes blinked rapidly. He was so luminously transformed.

  "My King, please ask adar," she bowed to him and glanced at her father on the end of that. Ewon was a pair of bright eyes in the dark, distressingly close behind Glorfindel. With him stood deeply glowering Redd. The massive Ranger looked as if he would have preferred Glorfindel if he'd been a bit shorter, and was willing to make the necessary adjustments himself.

  But now Nimpeth's father, the Elite Silvan, Ewon, stepped forward to bow. "I make no apology, my King," he said. "You have given us your entire life. In the West, your people will give it back to you." He straightened, his ageless Silvan face suddenly immodestly proud.

  The Elfking's hands closed over his chest. The banked fire in that furnace spat white sparks wildly against his mother-of-pearl flesh. It was fascinating to witness. Something stood in the way of its natural behavior. Lusis glanced aside at the dampener on the brass fire bowl suspended over the side of the boat. Something kept the King's fire from exploding into the throat of him as it should have done upon learning something like this. The Elfking began to incline his head to Ewon, but the Elite stepped back and bowed, because he was unable to endure the obeisance of his King.

  "You can accomplish nothing before the Three Kindred." Glorfindel breathed at the King. "Surely you know."

  Lusis felt her lip curl, "Clearly, you don't know them – how they operate." She glanced aside at the dark-haired seneschal who seemed content to look on. "You're so enamored of rules? Laws here do not allow for dismissal of the Silvan."

  "Ah," Glorfindel's brows arched, "The infamous ava-Moriquendi of Thranduil Oropherion – gods, the arrogance of this elf. We are all subject to the system. It cannot be helped. It will not be."

  Lindir spoke up then, his voice low with quiet power. "It can be helped. It is helped within this land, Glorfindel. I am directing you now, not to trouble these good elves with things that may never come to pass."

  A few heartbeats of silence endured.

  The Elfking's melodic voice spoke, "Glorfindel…. They do not have you at heel yet. There is yet time to mark this world, and let it mark you in ways that matter. Profoundly." He turned his white-golden head to consider Glorfindel and as he eased forward a fraction, his chin dropped slowly. It was an appeal to the golden Noldor to try to understand.

  Glorfindel stared at the Sinda Elfking for a long moment, and then suddenly inclined his head.

  The disagreement was settled, yes, but Thranduil looked sapped. His blue fire shrunken down so low it glowed below the muscle of his chest. He glanced as Aric poled the second boat to a proper distance alongside, it was thick with the small black bodies of bats. "Ah. Bats in the Great Greenwood. We have a few natural kinds. Even a large dog-faced sort of creature in the South, who will eat only fruit. Competition." He said lightly. "But these are blood-drinkers."

  Aric pointed meaningfully at the blood dotting his bare arms and Lusis huffed with amusement.

  Glorfindel stepped between the boats and prodded one with his longsword, "Orc's blood, from the smell of them. They would never feed on Orcs naturally."

  "Only if there was no other source to be found." Lindir said softly.

  "Very possible, if you are a bat in a cavern thick with Orcs," said Thranduil. "I am glad we go into the Greenwood. It is difficult for dark beasts here. Few would survive. None, thrive."

  "Spies?" Lindir asked the Elfking.

  "It depends." The Elfking's shrewd head sank to one side, "Tell me what you know."

  "He had mail." Lindir said suddenly. "Elrond. Carried in by messenger men. I'm sure it's nothing… just that they smelled not of autumn, but of winter itself."

  Northern men. Lusis shook her head and looked at Elsenord and Remee, who stopped kicking bats into a pile on the floor of Aric's boat to hear this. She glanced between the King and Lindir. "Messenger men? Like Buckmasters?"

  "I did not know them," Lindir admitted with a small incline of his head to her.

  Aric shook bits of leathery wings out of his overgrown hair, which did nothing but make Steed laugh. This could only stymie Aric Awnson even more. He slammed down the boat's long pole, which had the effect of stopping the gold-wood boat beside them very sharply in the eddy pool in which they'd come to rest. He said, "Accuse the Buckmasters of what you will – well, excepting the ones with us, that is. They're all right."

  "My thanks," Lusis told him.

  "Don't be finicky, Lusis Buckmaster," his tone was cranky. Then he pointed at the deck behind him, where Remee and Elsenord, even now, were completing an orderly, fetid pile of furry bodies. "And don't take it in your head that I'm going to be riding on the… the boat full of flying vermin. You can forget it. I'd rather swim behind you." He shuddered and then showed her his arms, in case she needed more convincing. Icar couldn't help grinning.

  The King's cheek began to show the shadow of a dimple, but he caught himself and kept his serene expression in place. He swept his hair into one hand and wrung it out from the drizzle settling upon them. "Tie up the other boat, and let them come aboard. We are close to the markers now, Lusis. Then I will tell them I am home."

  She had no idea how.

  As they regrouped, Redd quickly rescued the teapot. There was enough for the King, Lindir, and the great Noldor warrior, Glorfindel, who refused his cup in favour of giving it to Ewon.

  Forest rolled violently over undulations in the river along this stretch. Amathon took over the pole of their vessel, and Nimpeth threw a three-pronged hook ashore. Its points were not sharp, but Lusis watched the line wrap a tree and the hooks fold down along the elven rope. She started to pull, and Raineth got up from her spell of resting on the deck to he
lp bring them to shore. Redd dusted-off his hands and nudged Aric. "Get up you clod. We should spell the elves."

  The younger Ranger groused, "They don't get tired."

  "Then try another tact," Redd told the young man. "Be a gentleman."

  Icar was already on his feet, "There's no hope of that." He shoved his brother with the toe of his boot and then glanced aside to where Remee climbed to his feet. Elsenord was sleeping, but the larger of the Buckmaster men was nothing if not willing to lend a hand.

  "Sit, humans," said Raineth. "We have this in hand."

  Redd extended a hand to the rope and pulled it so that the boat skipped through the prevailing current and Raineth's great, blue eyes looked at him in astonishment. Nimpeth managed to swallow her amusement as she said, "It is best to let the big one help." She clapped Redd on the ribs and he laughed at her.

  "The rest of us are just pretty faces," Icar jabbed a thumb at himself.

  Upon hearing this, Raineth raised a dark eyebrow at him. She stepped back and let Redd and Remee take the rope. When Nimpeth stood aside, Icar joined in. The Silvan talked them through steering the boat through stones to touch shore. Then she opened her hand at the white, graven tree-stump some distance uphill. "This is our mark. You have brought us to shore aright. Well done."

  The young elf woman, Raineth, hopped from the boat to shore, and took the rope that Amathon tossed from the aft. The elven boat tied up on the bow and stern and the Elfking stood smoothly from where he had been sitting with Lindir. They were mid-conversation, both of them speaking Sindarin, it sounded like. As a Noldor, he knew Quenya, of course, but it seemed appropriate that he'd chosen to speak the King's own native tongue with him in private. Not many of the Silvan knew it well enough to understand it fluently, though it was clear that nearby Ewon did. That argued for Nimpeth, though not necessarily Amathon, understanding it.

  But the King switched to Westron. "So the contents of the message are a mystery. But it may be more important that the messenger came from the North."

  "Not so unusual," Lindir's Westron was unaccented and properly paced for a human's ear, unlike the Elfking's. "There are ties between Imladris and the Northern Rangers, as you know."

  "Imladris' Rangers of the North are a little closer to home, these days," Lusis interjected from her position beside the plank that Amathon folded out to shore.

  "Of course they are," Lindir paused beside her. "When we leave, they are the natural heirs to Rivendell. The Tatharion are so much our blood," he gestured at Steed, where he stood guard at the bow of the boat, his body fitted against the bowsprit in an irritatingly elvish fashion. "I suspect we shall not head for the boats before we've made sure that Ellethiel and Elivor have brought their families to take residence in our abode."

  "Well, they have a lot to gain by you leaving." She said. "Practically a Kingdom."

  "Nothing can take the place of the elves," Redd said softly, which was a tone that was somehow impressive coming from such a large man.

  "Something can if you are greedy," Lusis told him bluntly. "Their lands… and I imagine a place like Rivendell amasses a huge amount of wealth across the Ages." She glanced at the Elfking, who almost imperceptibly nodded in reply. "Elf blood inclines one to the good, I believe – it's tied to Eru. It is human blood that is really free to choose."

  Lindir cocked his head, "What do you suspect?"

  "Panic," Lusis shrugged and reached out a foot to test the ramp to shore before the King stepped on it. "Elves are so important in this world, you have no idea. You couldn't know. You are elves." She looked up at Lindir's curious blueberry eyes. "If you leave they gain Rivendell. If you stay on… that would be better. That would be safer. The King and Gondor are far away, so a great weight is about to fall upon a small number of Men of the North. They will be called in your place, and there are very few of us. I don't think you understand the politics, and I don't mean to elves tying up at dock in the Undying Lands. You… for better or worse, you understand that," she inclined her head in Glorfindel's direction and his pale blue eyes followed her, "but to Men, here. Men left behind with the light going out of the world."

  Lindir made a small, fond, moue. "We are not the Two Trees."

  "No man ever saw the light Eru allowed them," Lusis said to him patiently. "We see you. Don't underestimate the disturbance among my kind."

  "Istari?"

  "Human." Her chin rose, "The Northern Rangers whose blood is thinner in what qualities elves add, they are in a kind of turmoil right now." She went down the ramp and pressed the edge of it firmly to the grass with her boot. "Elsenord, can you-"

  His eyes widened at the thought of talking to Lindir, and he bowed tentatively. "Lord seneschal… those with more elf-blood in them draw down from the heights and wait in places like Tatharion House. There is a steady flow out of the North. Some love you and wait to go with you, I suspect. They pray for your invite. Some wait for what is yours to become their own. I don't know the full extent of the rest." He glanced to the Elfking.

  The King stepped to shore with Lusis following him out of habit. A shared habit. She could feel Ewon just steps behind her, in fact. He exhaled slowly, and went several yards into the clearing to stand beside the tree stump marker. He turned toward the Halls, and a sudden breath of damp wind caught up his hair and clothes in a gentle riffling.

  She saw light go out from him, seeming to glare, momentarily white, in the low part of his chest, such that one star-like ray touched the ground. A pinprick in the earth glowed. Light shot across pinpricks in the forest floor of Mirkwood, and the light shot into the throne room in seconds. It came along one spoke in the great wheel of white stones the King had had buried, long ago, in trenches in the forest. The Kingdom's-seneschal could scarcely contain himself to the antlered throne as he felt the spark shoot up through his body and into his chest.

  He inhaled and rose up from the antlered seat, and then turned Westward. He knew, by this system, exactly where his King was. A section was within minutes of him.

  But, leagues away, the Elfking sagged to rest against the white marker. For a moment, he had felt Eithahawn's heart race with relief. He smiled softly. When he opened his eyes again, he was, strangely enough, pressed to Ewon. The Elite's arm was around him, and pinned him to the tree. His forehead had dropped to the man's injured shoulder. But Ewon's hurt was still too fresh to weather this kind of handling. The Elite was pale and strained, he panted for air. He might have cried out if Lusis hadn't been there to add her support.

  Amathon reached them, directly, with Glorfindel and Nimpeth close behind.

  Glorfindel's deep voice thrummed a quiet, "What happened?"

  "Adar, let me," Amathon stepped in for his wife's injured father.

  Nimpeth pulled Ewon aside to her, out of Lusis' line of sight. "Nimpeth. He's hurting."

  "I… I'll look at this injury of the King's." Lusis' lips pulled tight and she pressed the flat of her hand against the center of the King's chest. His pale hands reached for hers and she shook her head. "Don't try to distract me with those lovely things, my King. I know how you work a little too well for that now." She inhaled deeply, her eyes on the lowest, bluest flame she'd ever seen in him. It was the same sort of sooty version of its nadir-colour that Lord Elrond's fire of burnished red had been reduced to. Someone was doing this. She was sure of it. But no one knew her Istari eyes could see it. She believed her Istari will could also change it. Her fingertips flexed on the silk and muscle.

  He said vaguely. "You must let me be. My sections will close… on us, soon." He faded in and out.

  "You look, to my eyes, as Lord Elrond did when he could no longer wake. The time is too late for whatever game you hoped to play." She shut her eyes and felt the fire of him as if she'd put her hand up to his chest. She jumped, because it felt cold. How faint he had become. Almost spent. She shut her eyes and focused on the trace-work of blue flame.

  She could snuff it out by closing her fist over it. She could close it in her p
alm, with just enough air to scarcely exist, forever. Such power… Lusis gasped. Her blood went cold. Fires. Stars and gods. As her fingers reached for the Secret Fire of him, she could hear the attention of them all turn to the miracle they had created. She could feel vibrations in his bones and being, like from some magnificent concerto. Her own mind told her calmly: He is meant to be. She started to quake, because she didn't know where the words had come from.

  She was alone. Unreservedly without guidance, particularly since she'd been too much a fool to try this when he'd been stronger. When he could have – would have – tried to be there for her. When he would have helped her face this terrible risk. There was no one else in the dark waters through which they plunged. And he was little more than a glass vessel she carried in her hand, with a fading spark in its center.

  That's how alone she was.

  Then she plumbed her mind for anything that Radagast had told her about using her own forces. Her 'magic'. But nothing came. She was falling down through a void, and dragging him with her. She soon realized she could be the cause of his death. The thought ripped a sob of breath out behind it. Dear gods, don't let me harm this thing I love out of artlessness.

  A voice spoke beside her ear. An old voice, grizzled with the tone, she thought, of comfort and good humour. My-my. Young one. Little firefly. When you know the terrible force of what you are… you are charged with the gentleness of what you, in an ideal world, could be. All you have to do… is choose. She felt herself steady at these words. She could choose to hurt him. She wasn't going to choose that. Her fingers opened instinctively, so as not to smother the flame she held. She didn't touch the fire, she breathed on it.

  It remained low, at first. Deep blue. But then, almost as if she could stand before it in a hearth, she saw it begin to lighten. It grew. She sheltered it from the tossing winter wind trying to extinguish it, the wind now doubling its efforts. She nursed the flame, and when the wind drew down onto her, she extended her hand into it and yanked it aside like a curtain. For a moment, she saw eyes.