Title: The Pride of Princes
Author: Etharei (west.for.winter AT gmail DOT com)
Find my stories: My LJ 'A Single Shard upon the Shore', TiM
Rating: NC-17 overall
Disclaimer: None of the recognizable characters, names or places featured here belong to me. This is based on a work of fiction by Professor JRR Tolkien, and regardless of what present-day legalities say, in my mind they belong first and foremost to him.
Archive: OEAM, LoM, AFF; anyone interested is welcome to ask
Feedback: Will be greatly appreciated.
Beloved Beta: Anorielle- the big sister of my heart!
Summary: All things must change, for good or ill, and not even an elf can stand against it. A shadow has begun to grow in the mighty forest of Greenwood the Great; the King's Heir, Legolas, comes across a stranger wandering in the woods.

Omnia vincit Amor; et nos cedamus Amori.
- Virgil

Chapter 1

Celebrian strolled through the cosy hallways of the Last Homely House alongside her daughter Arwen- who, despite her relative youth in the reckoning of the Eldar, was already being praised as Luthien come again - carrying a set of freshly embroidered tunics. As the twosome passed the Master's study, the Lady of Rivendell tried the knob and found the door unlocked. Taking this as a sign that no business of a secretive or unpleasant nature was taking place within, she promptly pushed the door open slightly and assayed a peek inside.

To her surprise and slight anxiety, she found her husband not behind the desk, which was his customary work-place, but standing by the fireplace and frowning at the leaping flames. He was frowning so fiercely that one could be led to believe that the sputtering of the fire was due to his expression rather than the soggy firewood. Where others would be intimidated by such a forbidding look, Celebrian only smiled and handed her pile of tunics to her daughter. Arwen, having also stolen a glimpse of her father over her mother's shoulder- she was nearing her brothers' height and would undoubtedly stand eye-to-eye with them in the fullness of time- nodded in understanding and continued on with her increased load.

Slipping into the welcomed warmth of the study, Celebrian calmly strode towards her husband and slipped her arms around his tapered waist. Despite being primarily a healer since the Battle of the Last Alliance, Elrond had never lost his warrior's form, and she could feel the slide of hard muscles beneath the thick fabric of his robes. Resting her head against his broad back, she consigned herself to be patient until he felt ready to speak. She had learned early in their marriage that it was quicker and less trying to allow her husband to choose his moment of sharing, rather than attempting to ferret explanations out of him.

"I worry for them," he whispered eventually, large callused hands sliding over her smaller, paler ones.

She sighed, and planted a light kiss on his shoulder blade. "It is unwise to keep them together at all times, beloved. They are no longer elflings, even amongst full Elves, and they cannot grow to their full strengths when they are so closely cloven to one another. There will be times in the future when one may not be able to accompany the other; better they learn to be alone now, when they are sufficiently experienced to survive on their own yet green enough to adapt quickly to solitude."

Elrond's fingers interwove with her own. "Yet they have never been separated for so long, without a guardian to watch over them." Celebrian heard the unspoken words: I was never separated from Elros, until that fateful choice which sundered us for all of Time.

"Arnor should be safe enough," she said. "But why the Greenwood?"

A strange expression ghosted over his ageless features. "If this had to be done," he replied in an abashed tone, "then I deemed it might as well serve a double purpose." At his wife's questioning eyebrow, he explained, "I have had… troubled thoughts of late."

Knowing well of the foresight that manifested in her husband at unpredictable intervals- her mother had a form of it, also, but the ability had not been passed down to Celebrian- the Lady of Rivendell nodded sombrely and waited for Elrond to elaborate.

"Of late I have felt a… disturbance in the winds. There is an unknown peril abroad in the world, though it seems to have yet neither shape nor form. It may be a new evil of this young Age, but my heart whispers that we shall soon have to pay for Isildur's weakness before Mount Doom." The Master of the Last Homely House glanced out of the arched window on the far wall, which overlooked the swift Bruinen. His eyes were fastened on some vision that only he could see. "For a few years now this has been a weight in my mind, but a light one, and naught more. Then I began dreaming of Thranduil- my last memory of him, a grief-stricken new King leading the remainder of his people home, walking beside the ash-covered shroud draped over his father's body. A small gust lifted one edge of the cloth; I saw that Oropher's crown of leaves, wrought from gold and silver, rested still on his head." Celebrian tightened her grip, wondering as she always did when grief contorted Elrond's face, if she would ever learn the secret cure for a fighting husband's unseen wounds. "I hear that Thranduil refused to remove it, later. It is said that his wife ever weaves a fresh crown out of the living forest for him every season."

"So you send your son to see if this disturbance is in Thranduil's realm?" Celebrian asked, sounding aghast in the hope that it would pull his mind from the past.

Elrond returned his eyes to the fire, the guilt therein dancing alongside the reflection of the flames. "I would have gone myself, but Thranduil will always see me as the High King's Herald." She remembered, belatedly, that he hated asking others to do that which he could not do himself. "He is impulsive and headstrong, but not unkind, and he has been a fair ruler to his people. He can hardly hold our son responsible for the past. Elrohir may be even safer in the Greenwood than Elladan is in Arnor. I am sorry for not telling you of this sooner, my heart, but I did not wish to worry you needlessly. I may have misinterpreted the signs completely; so much of foresight is educated guesswork."

The Lady of Rivendell frowned for a moment longer, then sighed and rested her head against his back, inhaling his scent. He smelled of Rivendell; for her, he was Rivendell. "You have forgotten whose daughter it is you have married, Peredhel; I daresay I am familiar enough with the complexities of your family's gift." Elrond blushed a most becoming shade of red, at least to her loving eyes. "Though I wish you had been more forthcoming about it, I feel that you did right in sending Elrohir to the Greenwood. At least you know your sons well; can you imagine how Elladan would deal with Thranduil?" This elicited a chuckle from her brow-heavy husband. "And this may start the healing of relations between you and the Greenwood King."

She stepped in front of him and gently drew his head down so she could kiss his brow. "With all the sorrow you have suffered, my heart, you have earned the right to worry about our sons. But you cannot shield them from the perils of the world forever. Come, sing something for Arwen and I, and think of your father watching over our sons."

~*~

The trees directed him, though by the time he came within half a league of it he could pinpoint the location of the battle by sound alone. Coming to the edge of the chaotic wrestling of bodies and blades, Legolas paused for the single heartbeat necessary in order to assess the situation, and place in his mind's eye the positions of all his warriors. Then he grimly entered the fray.

Like a fey spirit of the early woods, he left the safety of the trees with a great leap, the string of his bow singing even as the powerful muscles on his deceptively slender legs launched him from a sturdy branch onto the hairy back of one of the great beasts assaulting his fellows. So swift was he that three arrows had been sent off before he made his landing, and his movements quickened still as he shifted to firing downwards. Thick green blood splattered up from the swollen abdomen of the spider, some landing still warm on his shoulder and head. From beneath the creature an even more generously coated Elf crawled out with a call of thanks to his prince and rescuer before picking up his blade and going to the aid of another warrior.

Knowing that he was much more suited to his bow- though he was acclaimed as being just as skilled with his long knife- the eldest son of Thranduil stayed atop his unwitting carcase-hill, his high vantage point easing his work in sending bolts of sudden death down onto the remainders of the spider nest. He poured all of his concentration into the marking of targets and delivery of arrows, occasionally calling out orders to direct more warriors towards a spider that showed more resilience than others, or to rescue an unnoticed form trapped underneath one of those oversized corpses. This was what he excelled in- the winning of a battle, ensuring the survival of his people, the more obscure pleasure gotten from the successful completion of a task. For a moment, the delicate face of his naneth crossed his mind's eye, radiating disapproval at seeing what bordered on bloodlust in one of her own, she who loved and honoured life above all. But he quickly pushed it away; he had lived with that guilt for too long, so it was not overly difficult. Yet it remained ever present.

He scanned the impromptu battlefield. It took no expert to notice that the spiders were growing bigger with each passing year. No more than half a decade ago, they certainly never reached the size of the one he was currently standing on, and it was by no means the largest in this brood. The proper spider-nest was actually a few paces on one side; the battle had taken place at the edge of it. Had the spiders sensed the presence of the Elves, and scuttled out to meet them? Or had one of his warriors decided to start shooting at an egg sac lying temptingly close on the periphery of the nest, thereby alerting the spiders to hostile intruders? Neither would surprise him, and both had happened before. Nonetheless, he hoped it was the former, because otherwise one of his warriors had disobeyed a direct order to await his return.

There was a shout. Legolas saw that a young spider had pinned an elf down onto the ground and was looming over her, its pincher-mouth opening and closing. Mindful of the distance and the elf's proximity to the creature's head, the elf-prince sent his first arrow towards the spider's abdomen, giving it enough force to cause the beast to rear back a little from its captive. A second arrow was sent upwards, and it arched gracefully over arachnid remains to descend, metal tip down and gathering speed on the way, until it pierced a glittering black eye, the uppermost of eight.

The other warriors reached the spider at that point, and white blades hacked at it even though it appeared that the shaft now embedded in its head had dealt the death-blow. Seeing that none of the beasts were left living, Legolas ordered for all the wounded to be grouped together and assessed on the extent of their injuries and directed the five most hale to see to the destruction of the remaining eggs. He was about to hop off of his spider to help in the latter when, too late, he picked up a movement from behind and saw a look of alarm appear on the face of the warrior closest to him.

He turned as he fell, feeling the bulky black body following him down. His left hand flung away his bow and drew out an arrow, even as his right pulled out his knife. The underbelly of a spider was its thinnest area of skin; vicious warmth spread over his left arm as he manually pushed the arrow through the furry hide. The knife was not quite so effective- he managed to lodge it into the joint connecting leg to thorax, but it lodged onto something and would not be pulled out.

A cry of pain seemed amplified by the enclosed space between his body and the larger mass of the spider on top of him; it was with some surprise that he realised it had come from him. For, in turning to face the spider that had managed to creep up on him, he had not looked at where he was falling. He heard the faint ripping of his breeches, followed by a dual sensation of searing pain and leaden numbness in his left leg. The spider on top of him prevented him from seeing his injury; the wound on its belly seemed to have only enraged it. Pungent blood continued to flow over him as he fended off pinchers and thorny limbs, stinging mightily when it touched the wound on his leg. He tried to take hold of his knife again, but his hands were slick with fluids. Presently he remembered the spider's sting, but the creature seemed more intent on killing him outright than putting him to sleep.

Shouts of alarm managed to reach his ears, though he could not distinguish the actual words. Legolas suddenly wondered why no one had yet come to his aid. He turned his head briefly, and tried to see past a great black leg. A flash of shadow, a faint hiss; had more spiders come?

"Such a sting you have, but soon you will only be meat for the cold-time!"

In his shock, the elf-prince momentarily forgot about struggling and could only stare in sheer disbelief at the spider on top of him. More surprisingly, the spider did not take advantage of this lapse, instead making a throaty sound that, given some imagination, could be taken for chuckling.

"Has the pretty elf never heard spider-speech before?" it cooed mockingly, the words intelligible enough despite their breathiness. "You will hear more of it, I warrant. Or would, if you weren't going to be food."

It moved a little, and Legolas finally saw that his fall had driven half of a large branch into his lower thigh. Blood covered his breeches, vital red mingling with sickly green. Then a spider leg stepped onto the branch and jerked it to one side, and the elf let out a pained yelp before he could press his mouth close.

A distant thought flitted past, wondering if his father would search for them. No failure marred his record as a captain; it would be some time before Thranduil would realise that their lateness was due to disaster rather than a slow journey.

He wondered what it meant, for a spider to be capable of speech and a semblance of sentient thought.

Then what felt like a needle jabbed him in his injured leg, and troubled shadows pulled him under a black surface.

~*~