Anc-en-Gurth

 



italics indicate thoughts

(elvish translations in parentheses)

This chapter un-Beta'd

Anc-en-Gurth (The Teeth of Death)

Leithian (Release from Bondage)

There was only darkness when he regained his senses; darkness, isolation, and pain. For the last, the sharp flaring agony shooting through his right calf was undoubtedly responsible for waking him to the noise of low moaning, a mournful sound that reverberated strangely, echoing around him in ghostly sympathy, a symphony of woe and languishing affliction such that his muddled mind thought other captives shared the void. This black obscurity must be the hell where Námo contained those most deserving of punishment for dire atrocities committed while still extant. Had he done something heinous, something to regret for the rest of time? His heart froze as an image of blood, the awful noise of strangling breath, and amber eyes wide in terror permeated his fragmented awareness. Immediately he shut it out; the Chief was gone, the Orcs were gone, and nothing else mattered. 



Dully, he wondered why he could not remember meeting the Vala of death and judgement, wondered how he could feel pain in a body he no longer possessed, wondered if Malthen's voice was among those haunting groans, wondered if he was permitted to look for him and shifted, thinking to rise. That's when he registered the water swirling round his waist, wet stone against his shoulder and head where he'd fallen against it. Cautiously, delicately, he tried to move, finding he was awkwardly folded over, legs bent beneath him, and instantly his calf erupted in a warning flare, hot and fiery in his mind. He stilled, braced his hand upon the stone wall beside him, waited for the jagged pulses to subside. The weary cries ceased at the same time and he heard instead loud and laboured respiration somewhere near at hand. He listened, straining his ears to determine where it originated.



The harsh, rasping gusts grew in volume and density until they became an unnerving source of ill-defined menace, the dead and damned hunting him. The sound expanded and contracted, rose and fell, gulped and coughed, circled and stalked him the way wolves worry an interloper. He thought of the countless elves lost to Shadow through the Ages: kin-slayers and betrayers all, and he was one of them. Lightless souls in a well of darkness. His pulse was thundering. Why this game of teasing intimidation? What intention did this ploy support? "Show yourself!" he shouted suddenly and the harried words blattered back at him, distorted, loud, multiplied a hundred fold, bouncing around the confines of the rocky tomb. He issued a startled and incoherent cry that assaulted him the same way and he recognised himself as the sole source of the windy bluster, embarrassed not to have known it all along.



After this breakthrough, reality asserted itself and he realised he was not yet dead but merely alone, his enemies only absent for the moment. It was enough to make him nearly mad with despair, for he must be in a dungeon deep beneath the mountains. He choked on the next breath; the odour of the air surrounding him was putrid, foetid. Now he felt the other arm trapped beneath him and and moved it, drawing it out from the weight of his body, so grateful no new agonies accompanied this motion that he gasped, or sobbed; he couldn't distinguish the difference anymore. With attempts at cautious manipulation that were in fact terribly sluggish and clumsy, he managed to shift his weight without setting off more than minor complaints from the leg, which surely must be broken. The implications of that had not surfaced as yet.



Thinking to sit, he found the position offered new and stinging reminders of all that had gone before this. He sighed, frustrated and weary, wanting to find means to get out of the water and lie flat. He manoeuvred to his left hip and leg and the corresponding shoulder grazed stone. His breath caught and his heart convulsed; the space was small. He set about exploring the bounds of his cell, finding it fit no such definition. Denial presented him an alternative in the memory of the tunnels in Thranduil's fortress; had not the dwarves delved this place, too? This must be something like that, an escape chute into which water had seeped; his fingers would soon detect those shallow grooves meant for hand and foot holds. But there was nothing. 



He panted under the pall of expanding panic and struggled not to aggravate the broken leg as he reached and twisted to feel around him, desperately praying for his fears to be proved wrong. Those entreaties never rose to the lofty mansions of the Valar. It was not a passageway nor anything a dwarf would have delved. It wasn't even a cell, but a crude pit little more than his arms' width in diameter. Legolas struggled to calm himself, suddenly frantic to stand up and learn the vertical limits of his confinement, fearing what he suspected. The fractured limb hindered him and he cried out twice, automatically trying to use it, but at least the misery quelled his terror. 



The rasp of his lungs working mingled with the vaguely melodious splash and swirl of the water. His stirring increased the noisome stench enough to taste it on his tongue, bitterly acrid, and Legolas' harried subconscious understood even before his thoughts could form the idea. He retched violently, clawing at the smooth rock to haul himself upright at last, shouting in disgust and fear. It was an oubliette reduced to receiving the filth and waste of the orcs and goblins dwelling here. As though to underscore the horrible truth, distant scuffling high above made him turn his face upward and his cheeks and chin were sprinkled with urine. He howled in outrage and mad laughter resounded overhead, buffeting around him in the confined space.



I cannot endure this.



Legolas cringed close against the wall and ground his teeth, trying to summon reason and calm himself. They could not leave him here forever, but thinking this only convinced him that is exactly what they would do. "Let me out!" he shouted suddenly, voice cracked and shrill in wild desperation. The words echoed in mockery and he wailed, ashamed of this outburst so soon after his capture.



Hours later, shivering with cold and shaking with fever, he felt no shame and called almost continuously for help, for freedom. He'd already had to relieve himself in the vile water in which he stood and the agony as his bowels moved left him weak and whimpering. The gashes ripped by the studded phallus were not sealed over and the grotesque stew in which he had been soaking was not fit to clean himself. His throat was parched yet he dared not drink. He leaned against the wall for support and wept. He did not want to die this way, here in this pit of filth, his body rotting until all that remained was its bony frame; his soul consumed to feed the malice of the Wraiths. He wanted to go home to Fearfaron and sleep in yellow pyjamas in Analdir's bed. "Ada, come and find me, please."



"Ada, Ada!" Coarse laughter enveloped him as the Orcs mimicked him, their taunting calls loud as he cowered closer to the rock.



"No one to hear Tawarwaith, no one coming."



"Tawarwaith die here."



"Slow, slow to die. Ha! Ada come, not know you." 



Something plopped into the water nearby and was followed by a veritable hail of excrement as the noise and stench of intestinal gases filled his nostrils. Gagging and cursing, he scrabbled at the walls for a means to pull himself up and found none. The stink faded into the general background stench to which he was already accustomed and he rested, his sound leg supporting him, the other bent awkwardly and propped against the stone shaft. He rested, waiting for what would come next, but nothing happened. He was alone in the dark.



It was impossible to calculate the duration of his imprisonment; he could not remain focused, or perhaps he did not want to count it up. He only knew the pit was visited numerous times and it became clear the Orcs could see him quite well and never failed to target him accurately no matter how he shifted and shuffled from side to side. He was coated with faeces, urine, and a slick, mephitic evacuation like diarrhoea, forced to plunge into the reeking slop to dislodge the worst of it. His thirst increased and his fever mounted and Legolas hoped he was nearing death. Surely he would lose consciousness and slip under the foul water, drown there. He shivered, but the notion held a strange allure for all it was an ignoble end and he fought it. He must not succumb, for what would become of his spirit then? He wished he had not released Fael'ur. Thought dissolved quietly, leaving him empty and still.



Time elapsed, unfurling as slowly as the petals of a flower opening to the sun, but Anor behaved in peculiar fashion, coming and going abruptly, glaring one moment, as now, then becoming fogged and hazy the next, absent for long stretches. He was awake in a place he did not recognise, leaning against the thorny stalk of a gigantic rose, its height equal to the mightiest oaks soaring to the dizzying top of Greenwood's canopy, the shadow of its leaves heavy and dark, the scent of its black blossoms foul and dank. Dew fell from it, sharply acidic, and a flock of crows roosted above him, defecating as they cackled together, insulting him cruelly. He did not like this rose, but knew he should try to climb and get into the upper branches. He found himself unable to move and looked down at his feet, surprised and amused to find them gone, replaced by thick roots anchoring him into an inky, viscous mire. He croaked out a laugh and the crows pelted him with stones.



Legolas drifted in delirium, only half realising that he was ill, listening to invisible orcs revile him, to himself trying to sing now and again without realising it was his own voice. The singing enraged the orcs and precipitated a volley of rocks. He lost consciousness.



Abruptly awakened when the broken leg jolted against the stone wall, he found himself slumped in the water again, unable to stand up. He stopped struggling and lay still, waiting for the pain to subside, incapable of realising his doom, emotionally inert in the lassitude of ague. He lapsed briefly into oblivion, waking with his face half submerged in the ordurous fluid. Snorting and retching, he turned his head away and thrashed about. The leg protested anew as he tried to rise and Legolas groaned, the taste of offal in his mouth, his heart beset by the ponderous suspicion that he had been here for Ages, a punishment for something he did not want to recall. 



It was devastating nonetheless, this corrosive guilt and grief, and the keening misery of his wailing cries shocked him. He opened his eyes wide, trying to understand why he couldn't see anything. Above, the muffled shouting of the Chief reached him but he could make no sense of any of it. Something splashed beside him in the water followed by the sounds of running feet slapping on the stone above. There was a peculiar scratching and scraping sound descending toward him, some creature creeping down the slick walls, tossing away muttered expletives as it neared. He saw two blind, miniature dragons with sharp, white teeth and black claws making for him, but their faces were those of Gwillith and Taurant, grimacing like demons, nostrils smoking, and he flinched, curling into a ball.



Scaly fingers grabbed him at the underarms, pulling him back and forth in an uncoordinated effort to drag him up, and he fought against them. His resistance raised only laughter from above, the sound unbearably loud and he pleaded with them, begging to be let go, incongruously demanding to be freed from the pit even as he hindered the goblins attempting to do just that. They yanked him this way and that as though fighting over which would retain hold of him, their curses in Black Speech an offence to his ears, their sour breath an affront to his nose. His legs and head swung and dipped and collided with the walls, but soon enough he was out and his helpers released him, expecting him to stand on his own before his captor. He could not and fell heavily as the broken leg buckled under him. Before he could orient himself to the new location a gloved fist cuffed him at the temple. It was more than enough to render him senseless.



The scene was transformed in astonishing opposition to the oubliette when next he gained consciousness. A single torch flamed brightly on the wall and after the absence of light he could hardly take his eyes from it, wondering if it was real or another hallucination. He reclined on a magnificent bed, the coverings rich and sumptuous, the hangings held open with tasselled golden cords, the canopy above him pleated in a radiating pattern held taut at the center beneath an elaborate oval shield. The devices on it were unknown to him, but he spared it barely a glance, too afraid the light would disappear if he took his sight away from it for more than a second. All was silent, his heartbeat the only sound, his breathing its only accompaniment.



Gradually, he noticed a second source of light and focused on it: a pale luminescent door, closed. Now the sight of it made him nervous; it seemed to grow and advance toward him and he struggled to shift away from it, finding his good leg unable to move, his left wrist clamped to the bedpost. In vain he hauled against these bonds.



"Baw! Nay!" he yelled aloud, frantic to evade the looming portal. Menace surrounded it; behind it lurked some unspeakable horror.



"Why do you resist? Beyond is rest and comfort for you," spoke a familiar voice. Legolas searched the room for its owner and gasped as the elf stepped closer.



"Lindalcon?" he cried, half in joy, half in dread. The young ellon looked strange with a dagger embedded in his throat.



"Of course," said the phantom, smirking, and shook his head, crossing his arms over his chest. "Did you think I would leave you?"



"Yes, you promised."



"I promised Adaren, not you," shrugged Lindalcon. Then he unwrapped his arms and pointed, his expression hard and cold. "You destroyed me; I will remain until you have paid the price for it."



"Price?"



"Aye. You are a kin-slayer, Legolas, under Judgement again. You must be punished before you can go through the white door," said the youth. He turned and moved toward it.



"Wait," Legolas cried, desperate for Lindalcon to stay; again he struggled to raise himself but was held fast. "Do not leave me; you said you would stay!"



"I'll return anon, after you've had a chance to undergo your Chastisement."



"No! I was forgiven! The Council…"



"I did not forgive you," Lindalcon halted and peered over his shoulder, eyes smouldering red in fury and hatred.



"Nay, nay, Muindor, you did!"



"Did I? Even so, you must earn your own Release," the spectre chuckled, an unpleasantly lewd sound. "When you have paid, then I will take you away from here." He smiled in condescending amusement, his gaze running over the prone form boldly before he resumed his stroll toward the glowing door.



"No, please, Lindalcon!" Legolas pleaded shrilly. "Take me with you! Take me now!" To his relief the ghost paused and turned, grinning, coming back to him quickly, so quickly it made Legolas' head spin. Now the young son of Valtamar hovered over him on the bed and a soft caress ran down his chest to his stomach. He shivered, revulsion and anticipation mingled.



"All right, if that is what you really want," crooned Lindalcon and in an instant had seized the injured leg and yanked it up and out. Into the gap he drove and the next thing Legolas knew was the piercing penetration of a rigid cock.



He screamed in disbelieving abhorrence as the fair visage screwed up in lascivious delight, rocking back and forth above him, eyes leering, the invasive organ advancing and retreating, delivering a sickening sensation of excitement, disgust, and fear. A grotesque black tongue slithering out from Lindalcon's smiling lips and lapped across his. Legolas blacked out as the phantom jerked and trembled in the throes of orgasm, Lindalcon's comely face and form dissolving until only the hideous tongue remained.









Reality mutated into a grotesque progression of conflicting images and sensations, smells and sounds, impenetrable darkness and shocking brilliance. He could not tell what was actually happening and what was a product of sorcery afflicting his mind, madness enhanced by the infection rampant in his overburdened body. The surreal environment of stone and velvet, ecstasy and torture, became his universe and his mind peopled it with figures he knew and loved, all turned against him in revulsion and hatred. They spoke to him in vile combinations of Black Speech and elvish and their words wounded him. Fearfaron condemned him; Malthen returned to violate and mock him; even his mother appeared and berated him for abandoning her. Lindalcon was a constant, associated with the plush red bed, the bright torch, the disgusting tongue, obscene pleasures. 



Deprived of adequate sustenance and water, he was beset by constant thirst that in his desperation forced him to drink whatever was put to his lips. At times this was mephitic water, at times urine, and still other times some form of strong alcoholic brew laced with medicinal herbs. The last he hated most of all for it preceded a level of lucidity that was an acute torment, moments when he knew who he was and where he was; what he had done and what was being done to him. The Wraith did not want him to die quickly or cleanly, it seemed.



The abrupt shifts from pitch darkness to dazzling torch light were disorienting, the shifting percipience of his senses bewildering. Absence of light gave his nose and ears a finesse that rivalled sight, yet in light his eyes seemed less perceptive. Unwashed for uncounted days, he had never before so despised the scent of his own person, and felt he must be rotting, becoming a living corpse like the Chief. The sour, pungent odour of semen clung to him and mingled with the stench of faeces, blood, urine, and bile. His hair smelled like he'd washed it in a sewer; he imagined it to be crawling with maggots, his pubic thatch infested with lice and other parasites. His skin itched interminably. Once he heard himself alternately demanding death or a bath. 



When light returned, he was shocked to see himself so diminished, oozing lashes crusted with blood and pus, his lower body coated with filth so that his skin was splotchy brown, his injured leg purple and swollen around the break. His right hand was the worst, for the Wraith's ring bit in deep and left an angry red welt on either side of it. He fancied he could feel the evil runes cutting into his flesh and was certain the horrid thing whispered anew the Wraith's incantations whenever he lapsed into sleep.



Not that he truly slept. He dropped out of one state of awareness into another, sometimes entering a deeper state of unconsciousness that robbed him of all perceptions, something he much preferred, though it was rare and so short, so brief. At times he saw the white door and made efforts to reach it, but always he was jerked awake on the red bed where Lindalcon awaited him. After these encounters, he found himself glad when the Chief arrived and unchained him, carrying him away to the upper cavern where the stone posts were always ready, the whips always handy. He would much rather the Wraith beat and rape him than his friend, his brother. He began to wish for the Chief's brutality rather than endure the lusty attentions of Lindalcon's ghost. From wishing to openly begging, he found, was a simple thing.



"Do not let him have me anymore. Am I not yours? Is this not your ring?" chained at the wrists, down on his knees in the circle of orcs, Legolas peered up into the empty hood with its bleary eyes.



"You are ready, then, to be my mate, Tawarwaith?" The Wraith fondled him freely, teasing firm nipples and toying with the elf's partially erect cock. He chuckled as his captive leaned into the touches and shivered.



"Oh, yes," Legolas whispered, head falling back as he fidgeted under the rough fingers' exploration. Slippery and hot, the black tongue lapped his chest and he groaned, arched into the lubrication, knowing teeth would follow and a sharp, jarring pain as it suckled him, drawing blood, drinking of him this way. He moaned impatiently, eyes closed, shifting in his bonds, rocking his pelvis into the loose hold. "Please."



"Please? What would please you?" The Wraith squeezed his balls just to hear him squeal.



"Don't…don't!" Legolas gasped, then cried aloud as tight compression surrounded his root and twisted his scrotum. The pressure increased and he screamed, feeling something wrap taut round him, pulling outward. He froze, afraid to move for it felt as though this device might rip his genitals off entirely if he did. Just as he began to tremble under the extreme tension, a delicate caress swabbed over the pinnacle of his organ, erect and rigid now, and he spontaneously pivoted toward it. "Ai!"



"Don't what?"



"Don't let Lindalcon…" His words trailed away into a long low wail as the tongue tickled across the slit.



"Was that good for you?" the Wraith wanted to know and repeated the stimulation.



"Yes, yes," groaned Legolas, shuddering. "More."



"More? What more?"



"Fuck me."



"As you wish, Tawarwaith."



Yet no penetration ensued. Instead, a flat narrow paddle smacked him across the nipples while the fingers played with the head of his penis, pinching, squeezing, rolling the foreskin back and forth. It was maddening and he heard his voice shouting in pain and frustration. The paddling ceased and his chest burned, icy hot and tingling.



"Please."



"Open your eyes."



"No!" He shook his head violently, then shrieked as the cincture snatched at his cock and balls. At that moment similar agony erupted in his chest as heat seared his nipples. He writhed in his chains, twisting to get away, and this increased the tearing tension in his groin. The burning diminished to dull flaring misery and he stopped thrashing, gasping for breath. The clever fingers returned, playing with his cock, picking at his abused nipples, a sensation of his very skin being peeled off. He whimpered, for the feeling was exquisitely terrible. "Fuck me."



"Open your eyes."



"No, no, don't want to see." 



He felt hands at his hips, smoothing seductively up and down his sides. The tip of a hard cock brushed his buttocks; he hobbled his knees apart as wide as he could, held his breath. Slowly the organ drove inward, burrowing in minute increments until he felt the dank, sweaty curls of the beast's groin against his flesh. He bucked back against it, recognising from its stink that this was an orc. He sealed his eyes tight. "No." The creature bit his shoulder and lapped at his blood, began to move inside him, clutching him in its claws. The force of its thrusts pressed the tip of his penis against something sharp and biting over and over, bright bolts of pain and pleasure exploding there. He heard himself screaming.



"Open your eyes." The Chief's command sounded above the grunting chorus of its excited minions, all of them eager to be next, struggling to stave off release as they masturbated wildly. "Open your eyes, or I'll give you to Lindalcon and make you beg and plead with him to take you."



"No!" Legolas cried; the orc spilled inside him and struck him on the back of the head as it dismounted, spitting on him for good measure as it stepped aside. Another took its place and rammed into him; the pricking at his cock grew more brutal but the demon was striking his inner core perfectly and he moaned, moving with it, shoving back every time it advanced.



"Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck," it chanted with every shove, gasping and gurgling in its pleasure, clawing clumsily at the restraints at Legolas' nipples, laughing when he shrieked and bent into the agony. Soon he was chanting along with it. "Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck."



"You like this one's technique?" laughed the Wraith. He leaned in and kissed Legolas, then slapped him sharply on the cheek. "Open your eyes or Lindalcon takes you next, Tawarwaith."



Reluctantly, Legolas did so, finding his sight focused on the empty hood, those rotting eyeballs, and the lolling, black tongue. He gave a strangled cry of disgust and desire combined as the orc rode him expertly. His eyelids fluttered down again but another blow to the face made him open them wide. The Wraith was pointing with its gloved hand and he followed the digit to discover the cause of the flaring pain afflicting his cock. His organ was bound and stretched straight out, held fast and taut so that the tip just barely touched upon a bizarre contraption set before him on the stone floor.



It was wooden, a sort of stand almost like an easel, but across it was attached a pliant canvas which formed a cavity in its center, a gaping slit studded with shiny, silver spikes glistening with ruby droplets. Into this pocket just the head of his shaft dipped and dove, and blood dripped from the resulting lacerations. He stared in fascination, mouth ajar, watching the sharp tines stroke him. 



Then the fingers captured his attention again, snapping in front of his face before directing him to see what had been done to his tender nipples. They were pierced through indeed, narrow collars of mithril wound round the flesh while a small ring adorned each, to which chains connected. The scarlet skin protruded from them, raw and aggravated, and as the orc moved him the chains tightened and pulled, jerked and twisted. As Legolas watched, the Chief bent low and lapped across them gently and in that moment, while he was alive with the sensation of pleasure this wrought, the orc came, growling and grunting, and pulled out.



The Chief straightened up and moved behind Legolas, kneading his buttocks, licking at his ears. "Do you want to come, Tawarwaith?" he whispered.



"Aye," Legolas whispered back, and swallowed, eyes falling to the spiny invagination poised to receive him.



"So be it, but only when you admit which of us fucks you best." So saying, the Wraith entered him, setting a blistering pace as he continued to lavish the elf's ears with languid caresses, cupping the bound balls tenderly in his gloved hand as he pounded into the seed-slickened arse.



"You!" Legolas gasped out, terrified the Chief would really let every orc in the room mount him, though he suspected many of them had done so more than once. "I want to come when you come," he pleaded.



"Ahhhhh," sighed the Wraith, redoubling his efforts. "Then we shall truly be bound, Tawarwaith."



And these words awoke him fully, cleared the fog of despairing acceptance from his mind, for of course this could never be. He was already bound, his heart given, and the face of his beloved broke upon his mind. The weight of his betrayal fell upon him next and Legolas moaned in denial, fighting his bonds with renewed strength, determined not to let this happen. Through all this the Wraith laughed in triumph as though arousing this very comprehension had been its goal from the beginning.



Legolas refused to give in to despair. He wanted Berenaur. There must be an avenue of escape, a means to reach Mandos and preserve there the love he harboured still for the seneschal from Imladris, a love that belayed his conversion to Shadow. And he remembered others who loved him and whose love he returned: Fearfaron, Mithrandir, his Naneth, his brother and sister. For them he must not permit this false bonding, becoming their enemy, their nemesis, and he prayed for death, eager to stop his heart and thus free it. He shut his eyes, ready for the glowing portal. Yet, he could not shut out the sensations escalating as the Wraith neared its peak. 



Fingers worked at the restraints round his cock and he knew the inevitable result. He bellowed and strained against the rising tide building with every thrust and just as he thought the unholy bond would be enjoined despite his repudiation of it, the Chief slipped a cord over his head and yanked it tight. If he'd been capable of it, Legolas would have laughed, for the Shadow King had given him victory. He needed oblivion in order to find the way out and strangulation was sufficient to cause it. Slowly his breath dwindled and his brain bloomed with explosive shocks of light and pain. Through it he glimpsed the door from afar and beside it a robed figure limned in glory and power.



"Legolas! Here, quickly, quickly!" The being called to him and the voice rang with the familiar tones of the Maiar, rich and regal.



"Mithrandir!" Legolas could not speak any longer but found their link as strong as ever and rejoiced. He went limp in his bonds, feä flying through that door, open at last and filled with bright, white light. It closed behind him with grim finality and the halo of illumination vanished from around it.



The Chief paused, uncertain what had happened, then hastily removed the ligature and withdrew, leaving Legolas bound to the posts, his excited organ still caught in the thorn-lined pocket. Stunned to have been cheated of his prize, the Wraith peered out into the horde of demons surrounding it, their yellow eyes glittering back in the torch light. From licentious fervour to absolute stillness, unnatural silence, and a growing sense of bewildered fear, the orcs stared, every breath suspended. The next instant the sounds of battle reached them, faint but growing, screams echoing along the halls, bold voices shouting in Quenya, the clashing ring of steel blades colliding. The beasts erupted in a furore, bellowing curses in Black Speech, stampeding every which way, racing from the entry to the cavern in hopes of escape, shoving and trampling one another in the haste of panic.



Too late the Wraith issued its orders and sought to deter the onslaught of elves and men advancing through the tunnels. The orcs were interested only in surviving and fled the chamber, leaving their master to face the Orc Slayers of Imladris, Celeborn's Galadhrim warriors, and Isildur's heir leading a determined and fierce army of woodsmen. The Chief elected to vanish and thus the rescuers poured into an almost empty room, its only occupant their friend hanging lifeless from the chains of the stone pillars. The rescuers piled into the cavern swords drawn and voices crying, eager for a fight and a chance to avenge their friends, but stumbled suddenly to halting silence.



At first, they could do nothing, too shocked by the raw brutality presented before them, unable to accept the truth before their very eyes. It could not be that they arrived too late. In dumb denial they drew closer and ringed the debased elf, swords dropped low, the fire of the fight quenched, their noble purpose rendered impotent. 



Then Haldir saw the rigid organ in its spiny confinement and turned aside in disgust. It was then he spied the source of the rotten stench permeating the place and cried out. He staggered as though to fall, hand clapped over his mouth, overcome by the sight of Lindalcon's bloated and decaying remains. One of his warriors ran to him and together they covered the corpse with the March Warden's cloak.



"Ai, Eru," Elrohir whispered, daring to move forward at last, sheathing his sword. He was afraid to touch the bound body, unwilling to be the one to confirm what appeared obvious. Then a spasm racked the battered frame and a ragged gasp sounded from the mouth so twisted in pain. "Alive!" he shouted, bounding the remaining distance, Elladan beside him, Aragorn right behind. In silence they regarded the sickening orientation of the body, the Twins internally debating the best means to remove such diabolical restraints. Aragorn sighed and took charge, having witnessed something of the archer's afflictions in the past.



"I am a healer; I will do it," he said and sheathed his sword, taking up his dagger instead and kneeling beside Legolas. "Elbereth," he whispered, pushing the grotesque frame out from the rigid, bloody penis. 



Quickly and carefully he cut the cords digging into the most sensitive regions of a male's anatomy. A faint but urgent whine escaped the Tawarwaith's lungs. Aragorn studied his fitful respiration as he removed the clamps and chains from the nipples, leaving the rings alone for fear of adding injury in his efforts to slip them free. "Hold him," he ordered quietly, indicating the narrow waist, and Elrohir complied. Then as gently as possible Aragorn took hold of the solid erection and carefully applied pressure, working his hand back and forth, letting the blood lubricate the motion, and as expected, ejaculation was nearly immediate, accompanied by a feeble cry that sounded more fearful than erotic. Legolas twitched once and fell limp again.



In haste the Twins proceeded to open the manacles, Elladan busy with the chains while Elrohir supported the archer, both pleased to find a simple steel pin securing the cuffs. Their eyes met; Legolas obviously had not been left in the bonds alone or he would have discovered this and gained his freedom. As soon as Elladan released the wrists, Elrohir gathered Legolas into his arms and hoisted him up, making for the passage out. Grabbing up torches, everyone followed, released from their scandalised fugue as the obscene tableau was dismantled. 



Now Haldir and his comrade wrapped Lindalcon's reeking body in the cloak and carried it away from the caves, out of darkness into the dusky light of the vanquished sun. Up into the stony hills they bore him away, chanting a solemn dirge as they went, an ancient lament in their ancient tongue. Passing through the carnage of war over bloodied ground they picked their way; past the dead and the fallen they marched in stately bereavement and hallowed approbation. Under the fading glory of Anor they proceeded, their sorrow and respect expressed in the formal posture of military precision: straight spines, raised chins, shoulders squared and set, grim pride in their staring eyes and veneration in their voices. 



Through Talagan's eclectic army of men, sylvans, Sindar, and Noldor they paced, bringing Lindalcon among them, and all the Wood Elves fell in with Haldir's warriors, adding their voices to the death song and their presence to the cortege, for Lindalcon was theirs and their mourning was raw and real. The Music swelled and filled the place, a majestic anthem to celebrate the courage, dignity, and innocence of Valtamar's son, and the notes cleansed the air of battle-born fear and fury lingering amid the molecules and the motes. To a small hillock unmarred by the ravages of the war they wandered, drawn there by instinct, an unconscious desire to seek a clean place for the interment.



A stand of trees crowned the knoll, drab, dull and dun, its carpet of summer grass and autumn leaves crushed and waterlogged from the heavy snows just melted, but the bland emptiness was fitting. The trees stood with naked limbs upraised, the branches swaying and creaking eerily as if in response to the mournful chorus. Indeed, many of the trees nearby responded in kind, and the elves sensed the rejuvenation of Tawar as the power of their music spread, and this was so. With the orcs gone and the Wraith forced to flee, the ailing hardwoods reformed the subterranean links through rooted soil. The impact of recent events rolled through the forest like a tide, both sorrow and rage in the writhing limbs as they railed against the death of Lindalcon and the breaking of their champion.



Amid the ring of oaks the elves dug the earth and made a grave so deep the shrouded husk rested on the mountain's bones, but Legolas' wish they could not know and neither Oropher's regal cloak nor Fael'ur's weapons went into the barrow, save the dagger. Over the body they made a cairn first, everyone bringing a stone to build the young warrior's final shield, the song spilling down into the humble crypt as they worked, and then they replaced the earth so that a mound was raised up over Lindalcon. 



Then the singing stopped and all stood silent, heads bowed and hearts heavy as they considered the cruelty of fate, the magnitude of what Arda had lost, and the injustice brought to bear upon the life of Valtamar's son. Many minds considered Meril's condemnation of her own child with dread, for what hope could there be for Greenwood when one of their own could become so corrupt? Many more considered what fate she had bought for herself by these actions, more than a few longing to see her forfeit her life in payment.



Aragorn wrapped Legolas in the panther skin; Elladan took up the archer's discarded weapons, and Elrohir gathered the battered, senseless ellon into his arms once more. Together, the three raced through the woods, determined to save the Tawarwaith yet, fearing to wait longer than required to attempt more than the most rudimentary treatment, all thinking the same thought: return Legolas to the stronghold where waited the one source of joy in his life. Nirmë and Namië met them and the Twins mounted their war horses, leaving Aragorn behind as they charged through the subtle cacophony of grieving trees and praying sylvans, urged on and flanked by a growing host of Wood Elves following in the canopy.



TBC



NOTE: OK, he's out.

 

 

 

Anc-en-Gurth

H



italics indicate thoughts

(elvish translations in parentheses)

This chapter un-Beta'd

Anc-en-Gurth (The Teeth of Death)

Leithian (Release from Bondage)

There was only darkness when he regained his senses; darkness, isolation, and pain. For the last, the sharp flaring agony shooting through his right calf was undoubtedly responsible for waking him to the noise of low moaning, a mournful sound that reverberated strangely, echoing around him in ghostly sympathy, a symphony of woe and languishing affliction such that his muddled mind thought other captives shared the void. This black obscurity must be the hell where Námo contained those most deserving of punishment for dire atrocities committed while still extant. Had he done something heinous, something to regret for the rest of time? His heart froze as an image of blood, the awful noise of strangling breath, and amber eyes wide in terror permeated his fragmented awareness. Immediately he shut it out; the Chief was gone, the Orcs were gone, and nothing else mattered. 



Dully, he wondered why he could not remember meeting the Vala of death and judgement, wondered how he could feel pain in a body he no longer possessed, wondered if Malthen's voice was among those haunting groans, wondered if he was permitted to look for him and shifted, thinking to rise. That's when he registered the water swirling round his waist, wet stone against his shoulder and head where he'd fallen against it. Cautiously, delicately, he tried to move, finding he was awkwardly folded over, legs bent beneath him, and instantly his calf erupted in a warning flare, hot and fiery in his mind. He stilled, braced his hand upon the stone wall beside him, waited for the jagged pulses to subside. The weary cries ceased at the same time and he heard instead loud and laboured respiration somewhere near at hand. He listened, straining his ears to determine where it originated.



The harsh, rasping gusts grew in volume and density until they became an unnerving source of ill-defined menace, the dead and damned hunting him. The sound expanded and contracted, rose and fell, gulped and coughed, circled and stalked him the way wolves worry an interloper. He thought of the countless elves lost to Shadow through the Ages: kin-slayers and betrayers all, and he was one of them. Lightless souls in a well of darkness. His pulse was thundering. Why this game of teasing intimidation? What intention did this ploy support? "Show yourself!" he shouted suddenly and the harried words blattered back at him, distorted, loud, multiplied a hundred fold, bouncing around the confines of the rocky tomb. He issued a startled and incoherent cry that assaulted him the same way and he recognised himself as the sole source of the windy bluster, embarrassed not to have known it all along.



After this breakthrough, reality asserted itself and he realised he was not yet dead but merely alone, his enemies only absent for the moment. It was enough to make him nearly mad with despair, for he must be in a dungeon deep beneath the mountains. He choked on the next breath; the odour of the air surrounding him was putrid, foetid. Now he felt the other arm trapped beneath him and and moved it, drawing it out from the weight of his body, so grateful no new agonies accompanied this motion that he gasped, or sobbed; he couldn't distinguish the difference anymore. With attempts at cautious manipulation that were in fact terribly sluggish and clumsy, he managed to shift his weight without setting off more than minor complaints from the leg, which surely must be broken. The implications of that had not surfaced as yet.



Thinking to sit, he found the position offered new and stinging reminders of all that had gone before this. He sighed, frustrated and weary, wanting to find means to get out of the water and lie flat. He manoeuvred to his left hip and leg and the corresponding shoulder grazed stone. His breath caught and his heart convulsed; the space was small. He set about exploring the bounds of his cell, finding it fit no such definition. Denial presented him an alternative in the memory of the tunnels in Thranduil's fortress; had not the dwarves delved this place, too? This must be something like that, an escape chute into which water had seeped; his fingers would soon detect those shallow grooves meant for hand and foot holds. But there was nothing. 



He panted under the pall of expanding panic and struggled not to aggravate the broken leg as he reached and twisted to feel around him, desperately praying for his fears to be proved wrong. Those entreaties never rose to the lofty mansions of the Valar. It was not a passageway nor anything a dwarf would have delved. It wasn't even a cell, but a crude pit little more than his arms' width in diameter. Legolas struggled to calm himself, suddenly frantic to stand up and learn the vertical limits of his confinement, fearing what he suspected. The fractured limb hindered him and he cried out twice, automatically trying to use it, but at least the misery quelled his terror. 



The rasp of his lungs working mingled with the vaguely melodious splash and swirl of the water. His stirring increased the noisome stench enough to taste it on his tongue, bitterly acrid, and Legolas' harried subconscious understood even before his thoughts could form the idea. He retched violently, clawing at the smooth rock to haul himself upright at last, shouting in disgust and fear. It was an oubliette reduced to receiving the filth and waste of the orcs and goblins dwelling here. As though to underscore the horrible truth, distant scuffling high above made him turn his face upward and his cheeks and chin were sprinkled with urine. He howled in outrage and mad laughter resounded overhead, buffeting around him in the confined space.



I cannot endure this.



Legolas cringed close against the wall and ground his teeth, trying to summon reason and calm himself. They could not leave him here forever, but thinking this only convinced him that is exactly what they would do. "Let me out!" he shouted suddenly, voice cracked and shrill in wild desperation. The words echoed in mockery and he wailed, ashamed of this outburst so soon after his capture.



Hours later, shivering with cold and shaking with fever, he felt no shame and called almost continuously for help, for freedom. He'd already had to relieve himself in the vile water in which he stood and the agony as his bowels moved left him weak and whimpering. The gashes ripped by the studded phallus were not sealed over and the grotesque stew in which he had been soaking was not fit to clean himself. His throat was parched yet he dared not drink. He leaned against the wall for support and wept. He did not want to die this way, here in this pit of filth, his body rotting until all that remained was its bony frame; his soul consumed to feed the malice of the Wraiths. He wanted to go home to Fearfaron and sleep in yellow pyjamas in Analdir's bed. "Ada, come and find me, please."



"Ada, Ada!" Coarse laughter enveloped him as the Orcs mimicked him, their taunting calls loud as he cowered closer to the rock.



"No one to hear Tawarwaith, no one coming."



"Tawarwaith die here."



"Slow, slow to die. Ha! Ada come, not know you." 



Something plopped into the water nearby and was followed by a veritable hail of excrement as the noise and stench of intestinal gases filled his nostrils. Gagging and cursing, he scrabbled at the walls for a means to pull himself up and found none. The stink faded into the general background stench to which he was already accustomed and he rested, his sound leg supporting him, the other bent awkwardly and propped against the stone shaft. He rested, waiting for what would come next, but nothing happened. He was alone in the dark.



It was impossible to calculate the duration of his imprisonment; he could not remain focused, or perhaps he did not want to count it up. He only knew the pit was visited numerous times and it became clear the Orcs could see him quite well and never failed to target him accurately no matter how he shifted and shuffled from side to side. He was coated with faeces, urine, and a slick, mephitic evacuation like diarrhoea, forced to plunge into the reeking slop to dislodge the worst of it. His thirst increased and his fever mounted and Legolas hoped he was nearing death. Surely he would lose consciousness and slip under the foul water, drown there. He shivered, but the notion held a strange allure for all it was an ignoble end and he fought it. He must not succumb, for what would become of his spirit then? He wished he had not released Fael'ur. Thought dissolved quietly, leaving him empty and still.



Time elapsed, unfurling as slowly as the petals of a flower opening to the sun, but Anor behaved in peculiar fashion, coming and going abruptly, glaring one moment, as now, then becoming fogged and hazy the next, absent for long stretches. He was awake in a place he did not recognise, leaning against the thorny stalk of a gigantic rose, its height equal to the mightiest oaks soaring to the dizzying top of Greenwood's canopy, the shadow of its leaves heavy and dark, the scent of its black blossoms foul and dank. Dew fell from it, sharply acidic, and a flock of crows roosted above him, defecating as they cackled together, insulting him cruelly. He did not like this rose, but knew he should try to climb and get into the upper branches. He found himself unable to move and looked down at his feet, surprised and amused to find them gone, replaced by thick roots anchoring him into an inky, viscous mire. He croaked out a laugh and the crows pelted him with stones.



Legolas drifted in delirium, only half realising that he was ill, listening to invisible orcs revile him, to himself trying to sing now and again without realising it was his own voice. The singing enraged the orcs and precipitated a volley of rocks. He lost consciousness.



Abruptly awakened when the broken leg jolted against the stone wall, he found himself slumped in the water again, unable to stand up. He stopped struggling and lay still, waiting for the pain to subside, incapable of realising his doom, emotionally inert in the lassitude of ague. He lapsed briefly into oblivion, waking with his face half submerged in the ordurous fluid. Snorting and retching, he turned his head away and thrashed about. The leg protested anew as he tried to rise and Legolas groaned, the taste of offal in his mouth, his heart beset by the ponderous suspicion that he had been here for Ages, a punishment for something he did not want to recall. 



It was devastating nonetheless, this corrosive guilt and grief, and the keening misery of his wailing cries shocked him. He opened his eyes wide, trying to understand why he couldn't see anything. Above, the muffled shouting of the Chief reached him but he could make no sense of any of it. Something splashed beside him in the water followed by the sounds of running feet slapping on the stone above. There was a peculiar scratching and scraping sound descending toward him, some creature creeping down the slick walls, tossing away muttered expletives as it neared. He saw two blind, miniature dragons with sharp, white teeth and black claws making for him, but their faces were those of Gwillith and Taurant, grimacing like demons, nostrils smoking, and he flinched, curling into a ball.



Scaly fingers grabbed him at the underarms, pulling him back and forth in an uncoordinated effort to drag him up, and he fought against them. His resistance raised only laughter from above, the sound unbearably loud and he pleaded with them, begging to be let go, incongruously demanding to be freed from the pit even as he hindered the goblins attempting to do just that. They yanked him this way and that as though fighting over which would retain hold of him, their curses in Black Speech an offence to his ears, their sour breath an affront to his nose. His legs and head swung and dipped and collided with the walls, but soon enough he was out and his helpers released him, expecting him to stand on his own before his captor. He could not and fell heavily as the broken leg buckled under him. Before he could orient himself to the new location a gloved fist cuffed him at the temple. It was more than enough to render him senseless.



The scene was transformed in astonishing opposition to the oubliette when next he gained consciousness. A single torch flamed brightly on the wall and after the absence of light he could hardly take his eyes from it, wondering if it was real or another hallucination. He reclined on a magnificent bed, the coverings rich and sumptuous, the hangings held open with tasselled golden cords, the canopy above him pleated in a radiating pattern held taut at the center beneath an elaborate oval shield. The devices on it were unknown to him, but he spared it barely a glance, too afraid the light would disappear if he took his sight away from it for more than a second. All was silent, his heartbeat the only sound, his breathing its only accompaniment.



Gradually, he noticed a second source of light and focused on it: a pale luminescent door, closed. Now the sight of it made him nervous; it seemed to grow and advance toward him and he struggled to shift away from it, finding his good leg unable to move, his left wrist clamped to the bedpost. In vain he hauled against these bonds.



"Baw! Nay!" he yelled aloud, frantic to evade the looming portal. Menace surrounded it; behind it lurked some unspeakable horror.



"Why do you resist? Beyond is rest and comfort for you," spoke a familiar voice. Legolas searched the room for its owner and gasped as the elf stepped closer.



"Lindalcon?" he cried, half in joy, half in dread. The young ellon looked strange with a dagger embedded in his throat.



"Of course," said the phantom, smirking, and shook his head, crossing his arms over his chest. "Did you think I would leave you?"



"Yes, you promised."



"I promised Adaren, not you," shrugged Lindalcon. Then he unwrapped his arms and pointed, his expression hard and cold. "You destroyed me; I will remain until you have paid the price for it."



"Price?"



"Aye. You are a kin-slayer, Legolas, under Judgement again. You must be punished before you can go through the white door," said the youth. He turned and moved toward it.



"Wait," Legolas cried, desperate for Lindalcon to stay; again he struggled to raise himself but was held fast. "Do not leave me; you said you would stay!"



"I'll return anon, after you've had a chance to undergo your Chastisement."



"No! I was forgiven! The Council…"



"I did not forgive you," Lindalcon halted and peered over his shoulder, eyes smouldering red in fury and hatred.



"Nay, nay, Muindor, you did!"



"Did I? Even so, you must earn your own Release," the spectre chuckled, an unpleasantly lewd sound. "When you have paid, then I will take you away from here." He smiled in condescending amusement, his gaze running over the prone form boldly before he resumed his stroll toward the glowing door.



"No, please, Lindalcon!" Legolas pleaded shrilly. "Take me with you! Take me now!" To his relief the ghost paused and turned, grinning, coming back to him quickly, so quickly it made Legolas' head spin. Now the young son of Valtamar hovered over him on the bed and a soft caress ran down his chest to his stomach. He shivered, revulsion and anticipation mingled.



"All right, if that is what you really want," crooned Lindalcon and in an instant had seized the injured leg and yanked it up and out. Into the gap he drove and the next thing Legolas knew was the piercing penetration of a rigid cock.



He screamed in disbelieving abhorrence as the fair visage screwed up in lascivious delight, rocking back and forth above him, eyes leering, the invasive organ advancing and retreating, delivering a sickening sensation of excitement, disgust, and fear. A grotesque black tongue slithering out from Lindalcon's smiling lips and lapped across his. Legolas blacked out as the phantom jerked and trembled in the throes of orgasm, Lindalcon's comely face and form dissolving until only the hideous tongue remained.









Reality mutated into a grotesque progression of conflicting images and sensations, smells and sounds, impenetrable darkness and shocking brilliance. He could not tell what was actually happening and what was a product of sorcery afflicting his mind, madness enhanced by the infection rampant in his overburdened body. The surreal environment of stone and velvet, ecstasy and torture, became his universe and his mind peopled it with figures he knew and loved, all turned against him in revulsion and hatred. They spoke to him in vile combinations of Black Speech and elvish and their words wounded him. Fearfaron condemned him; Malthen returned to violate and mock him; even his mother appeared and berated him for abandoning her. Lindalcon was a constant, associated with the plush red bed, the bright torch, the disgusting tongue, obscene pleasures. 



Deprived of adequate sustenance and water, he was beset by constant thirst that in his desperation forced him to drink whatever was put to his lips. At times this was mephitic water, at times urine, and still other times some form of strong alcoholic brew laced with medicinal herbs. The last he hated most of all for it preceded a level of lucidity that was an acute torment, moments when he knew who he was and where he was; what he had done and what was being done to him. The Wraith did not want him to die quickly or cleanly, it seemed.



The abrupt shifts from pitch darkness to dazzling torch light were disorienting, the shifting percipience of his senses bewildering. Absence of light gave his nose and ears a finesse that rivalled sight, yet in light his eyes seemed less perceptive. Unwashed for uncounted days, he had never before so despised the scent of his own person, and felt he must be rotting, becoming a living corpse like the Chief. The sour, pungent odour of semen clung to him and mingled with the stench of faeces, blood, urine, and bile. His hair smelled like he'd washed it in a sewer; he imagined it to be crawling with maggots, his pubic thatch infested with lice and other parasites. His skin itched interminably. Once he heard himself alternately demanding death or a bath. 



When light returned, he was shocked to see himself so diminished, oozing lashes crusted with blood and pus, his lower body coated with filth so that his skin was splotchy brown, his injured leg purple and swollen around the break. His right hand was the worst, for the Wraith's ring bit in deep and left an angry red welt on either side of it. He fancied he could feel the evil runes cutting into his flesh and was certain the horrid thing whispered anew the Wraith's incantations whenever he lapsed into sleep.



Not that he truly slept. He dropped out of one state of awareness into another, sometimes entering a deeper state of unconsciousness that robbed him of all perceptions, something he much preferred, though it was rare and so short, so brief. At times he saw the white door and made efforts to reach it, but always he was jerked awake on the red bed where Lindalcon awaited him. After these encounters, he found himself glad when the Chief arrived and unchained him, carrying him away to the upper cavern where the stone posts were always ready, the whips always handy. He would much rather the Wraith beat and rape him than his friend, his brother. He began to wish for the Chief's brutality rather than endure the lusty attentions of Lindalcon's ghost. From wishing to openly begging, he found, was a simple thing.



"Do not let him have me anymore. Am I not yours? Is this not your ring?" chained at the wrists, down on his knees in the circle of orcs, Legolas peered up into the empty hood with its bleary eyes.



"You are ready, then, to be my mate, Tawarwaith?" The Wraith fondled him freely, teasing firm nipples and toying with the elf's partially erect cock. He chuckled as his captive leaned into the touches and shivered.



"Oh, yes," Legolas whispered, head falling back as he fidgeted under the rough fingers' exploration. Slippery and hot, the black tongue lapped his chest and he groaned, arched into the lubrication, knowing teeth would follow and a sharp, jarring pain as it suckled him, drawing blood, drinking of him this way. He moaned impatiently, eyes closed, shifting in his bonds, rocking his pelvis into the loose hold. "Please."



"Please? What would please you?" The Wraith squeezed his balls just to hear him squeal.



"Don't…don't!" Legolas gasped, then cried aloud as tight compression surrounded his root and twisted his scrotum. The pressure increased and he screamed, feeling something wrap taut round him, pulling outward. He froze, afraid to move for it felt as though this device might rip his genitals off entirely if he did. Just as he began to tremble under the extreme tension, a delicate caress swabbed over the pinnacle of his organ, erect and rigid now, and he spontaneously pivoted toward it. "Ai!"



"Don't what?"



"Don't let Lindalcon…" His words trailed away into a long low wail as the tongue tickled across the slit.



"Was that good for you?" the Wraith wanted to know and repeated the stimulation.



"Yes, yes," groaned Legolas, shuddering. "More."



"More? What more?"



"Fuck me."



"As you wish, Tawarwaith."



Yet no penetration ensued. Instead, a flat narrow paddle smacked him across the nipples while the fingers played with the head of his penis, pinching, squeezing, rolling the foreskin back and forth. It was maddening and he heard his voice shouting in pain and frustration. The paddling ceased and his chest burned, icy hot and tingling.



"Please."



"Open your eyes."



"No!" He shook his head violently, then shrieked as the cincture snatched at his cock and balls. At that moment similar agony erupted in his chest as heat seared his nipples. He writhed in his chains, twisting to get away, and this increased the tearing tension in his groin. The burning diminished to dull flaring misery and he stopped thrashing, gasping for breath. The clever fingers returned, playing with his cock, picking at his abused nipples, a sensation of his very skin being peeled off. He whimpered, for the feeling was exquisitely terrible. "Fuck me."



"Open your eyes."



"No, no, don't want to see." 



He felt hands at his hips, smoothing seductively up and down his sides. The tip of a hard cock brushed his buttocks; he hobbled his knees apart as wide as he could, held his breath. Slowly the organ drove inward, burrowing in minute increments until he felt the dank, sweaty curls of the beast's groin against his flesh. He bucked back against it, recognising from its stink that this was an orc. He sealed his eyes tight. "No." The creature bit his shoulder and lapped at his blood, began to move inside him, clutching him in its claws. The force of its thrusts pressed the tip of his penis against something sharp and biting over and over, bright bolts of pain and pleasure exploding there. He heard himself screaming.



"Open your eyes." The Chief's command sounded above the grunting chorus of its excited minions, all of them eager to be next, struggling to stave off release as they masturbated wildly. "Open your eyes, or I'll give you to Lindalcon and make you beg and plead with him to take you."



"No!" Legolas cried; the orc spilled inside him and struck him on the back of the head as it dismounted, spitting on him for good measure as it stepped aside. Another took its place and rammed into him; the pricking at his cock grew more brutal but the demon was striking his inner core perfectly and he moaned, moving with it, shoving back every time it advanced.



"Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck," it chanted with every shove, gasping and gurgling in its pleasure, clawing clumsily at the restraints at Legolas' nipples, laughing when he shrieked and bent into the agony. Soon he was chanting along with it. "Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck."



"You like this one's technique?" laughed the Wraith. He leaned in and kissed Legolas, then slapped him sharply on the cheek. "Open your eyes or Lindalcon takes you next, Tawarwaith."



Reluctantly, Legolas did so, finding his sight focused on the empty hood, those rotting eyeballs, and the lolling, black tongue. He gave a strangled cry of disgust and desire combined as the orc rode him expertly. His eyelids fluttered down again but another blow to the face made him open them wide. The Wraith was pointing with its gloved hand and he followed the digit to discover the cause of the flaring pain afflicting his cock. His organ was bound and stretched straight out, held fast and taut so that the tip just barely touched upon a bizarre contraption set before him on the stone floor.



It was wooden, a sort of stand almost like an easel, but across it was attached a pliant canvas which formed a cavity in its center, a gaping slit studded with shiny, silver spikes glistening with ruby droplets. Into this pocket just the head of his shaft dipped and dove, and blood dripped from the resulting lacerations. He stared in fascination, mouth ajar, watching the sharp tines stroke him. 



Then the fingers captured his attention again, snapping in front of his face before directing him to see what had been done to his tender nipples. They were pierced through indeed, narrow collars of mithril wound round the flesh while a small ring adorned each, to which chains connected. The scarlet skin protruded from them, raw and aggravated, and as the orc moved him the chains tightened and pulled, jerked and twisted. As Legolas watched, the Chief bent low and lapped across them gently and in that moment, while he was alive with the sensation of pleasure this wrought, the orc came, growling and grunting, and pulled out.



The Chief straightened up and moved behind Legolas, kneading his buttocks, licking at his ears. "Do you want to come, Tawarwaith?" he whispered.



"Aye," Legolas whispered back, and swallowed, eyes falling to the spiny invagination poised to receive him.



"So be it, but only when you admit which of us fucks you best." So saying, the Wraith entered him, setting a blistering pace as he continued to lavish the elf's ears with languid caresses, cupping the bound balls tenderly in his gloved hand as he pounded into the seed-slickened arse.



"You!" Legolas gasped out, terrified the Chief would really let every orc in the room mount him, though he suspected many of them had done so more than once. "I want to come when you come," he pleaded.



"Ahhhhh," sighed the Wraith, redoubling his efforts. "Then we shall truly be bound, Tawarwaith."



And these words awoke him fully, cleared the fog of despairing acceptance from his mind, for of course this could never be. He was already bound, his heart given, and the face of his beloved broke upon his mind. The weight of his betrayal fell upon him next and Legolas moaned in denial, fighting his bonds with renewed strength, determined not to let this happen. Through all this the Wraith laughed in triumph as though arousing this very comprehension had been its goal from the beginning.



Legolas refused to give in to despair. He wanted Berenaur. There must be an avenue of escape, a means to reach Mandos and preserve there the love he harboured still for the seneschal from Imladris, a love that belayed his conversion to Shadow. And he remembered others who loved him and whose love he returned: Fearfaron, Mithrandir, his Naneth, his brother and sister. For them he must not permit this false bonding, becoming their enemy, their nemesis, and he prayed for death, eager to stop his heart and thus free it. He shut his eyes, ready for the glowing portal. Yet, he could not shut out the sensations escalating as the Wraith neared its peak. 



Fingers worked at the restraints round his cock and he knew the inevitable result. He bellowed and strained against the rising tide building with every thrust and just as he thought the unholy bond would be enjoined despite his repudiation of it, the Chief slipped a cord over his head and yanked it tight. If he'd been capable of it, Legolas would have laughed, for the Shadow King had given him victory. He needed oblivion in order to find the way out and strangulation was sufficient to cause it. Slowly his breath dwindled and his brain bloomed with explosive shocks of light and pain. Through it he glimpsed the door from afar and beside it a robed figure limned in glory and power.



"Legolas! Here, quickly, quickly!" The being called to him and the voice rang with the familiar tones of the Maiar, rich and regal.



"Mithrandir!" Legolas could not speak any longer but found their link as strong as ever and rejoiced. He went limp in his bonds, feä flying through that door, open at last and filled with bright, white light. It closed behind him with grim finality and the halo of illumination vanished from around it.



The Chief paused, uncertain what had happened, then hastily removed the ligature and withdrew, leaving Legolas bound to the posts, his excited organ still caught in the thorn-lined pocket. Stunned to have been cheated of his prize, the Wraith peered out into the horde of demons surrounding it, their yellow eyes glittering back in the torch light. From licentious fervour to absolute stillness, unnatural silence, and a growing sense of bewildered fear, the orcs stared, every breath suspended. The next instant the sounds of battle reached them, faint but growing, screams echoing along the halls, bold voices shouting in Quenya, the clashing ring of steel blades colliding. The beasts erupted in a furore, bellowing curses in Black Speech, stampeding every which way, racing from the entry to the cavern in hopes of escape, shoving and trampling one another in the haste of panic.



Too late the Wraith issued its orders and sought to deter the onslaught of elves and men advancing through the tunnels. The orcs were interested only in surviving and fled the chamber, leaving their master to face the Orc Slayers of Imladris, Celeborn's Galadhrim warriors, and Isildur's heir leading a determined and fierce army of woodsmen. The Chief elected to vanish and thus the rescuers poured into an almost empty room, its only occupant their friend hanging lifeless from the chains of the stone pillars. The rescuers piled into the cavern swords drawn and voices crying, eager for a fight and a chance to avenge their friends, but stumbled suddenly to halting silence.



At first, they could do nothing, too shocked by the raw brutality presented before them, unable to accept the truth before their very eyes. It could not be that they arrived too late. In dumb denial they drew closer and ringed the debased elf, swords dropped low, the fire of the fight quenched, their noble purpose rendered impotent. 



Then Haldir saw the rigid organ in its spiny confinement and turned aside in disgust. It was then he spied the source of the rotten stench permeating the place and cried out. He staggered as though to fall, hand clapped over his mouth, overcome by the sight of Lindalcon's bloated and decaying remains. One of his warriors ran to him and together they covered the corpse with the March Warden's cloak.



"Ai, Eru," Elrohir whispered, daring to move forward at last, sheathing his sword. He was afraid to touch the bound body, unwilling to be the one to confirm what appeared obvious. Then a spasm racked the battered frame and a ragged gasp sounded from the mouth so twisted in pain. "Alive!" he shouted, bounding the remaining distance, Elladan beside him, Aragorn right behind. In silence they regarded the sickening orientation of the body, the Twins internally debating the best means to remove such diabolical restraints. Aragorn sighed and took charge, having witnessed something of the archer's afflictions in the past.



"I am a healer; I will do it," he said and sheathed his sword, taking up his dagger instead and kneeling beside Legolas. "Elbereth," he whispered, pushing the grotesque frame out from the rigid, bloody penis. 



Quickly and carefully he cut the cords digging into the most sensitive regions of a male's anatomy. A faint but urgent whine escaped the Tawarwaith's lungs. Aragorn studied his fitful respiration as he removed the clamps and chains from the nipples, leaving the rings alone for fear of adding injury in his efforts to slip them free. "Hold him," he ordered quietly, indicating the narrow waist, and Elrohir complied. Then as gently as possible Aragorn took hold of the solid erection and carefully applied pressure, working his hand back and forth, letting the blood lubricate the motion, and as expected, ejaculation was nearly immediate, accompanied by a feeble cry that sounded more fearful than erotic. Legolas twitched once and fell limp again.



In haste the Twins proceeded to open the manacles, Elladan busy with the chains while Elrohir supported the archer, both pleased to find a simple steel pin securing the cuffs. Their eyes met; Legolas obviously had not been left in the bonds alone or he would have discovered this and gained his freedom. As soon as Elladan released the wrists, Elrohir gathered Legolas into his arms and hoisted him up, making for the passage out. Grabbing up torches, everyone followed, released from their scandalised fugue as the obscene tableau was dismantled. 



Now Haldir and his comrade wrapped Lindalcon's reeking body in the cloak and carried it away from the caves, out of darkness into the dusky light of the vanquished sun. Up into the stony hills they bore him away, chanting a solemn dirge as they went, an ancient lament in their ancient tongue. Passing through the carnage of war over bloodied ground they picked their way; past the dead and the fallen they marched in stately bereavement and hallowed approbation. Under the fading glory of Anor they proceeded, their sorrow and respect expressed in the formal posture of military precision: straight spines, raised chins, shoulders squared and set, grim pride in their staring eyes and veneration in their voices. 



Through Talagan's eclectic army of men, sylvans, Sindar, and Noldor they paced, bringing Lindalcon among them, and all the Wood Elves fell in with Haldir's warriors, adding their voices to the death song and their presence to the cortege, for Lindalcon was theirs and their mourning was raw and real. The Music swelled and filled the place, a majestic anthem to celebrate the courage, dignity, and innocence of Valtamar's son, and the notes cleansed the air of battle-born fear and fury lingering amid the molecules and the motes. To a small hillock unmarred by the ravages of the war they wandered, drawn there by instinct, an unconscious desire to seek a clean place for the interment.



A stand of trees crowned the knoll, drab, dull and dun, its carpet of summer grass and autumn leaves crushed and waterlogged from the heavy snows just melted, but the bland emptiness was fitting. The trees stood with naked limbs upraised, the branches swaying and creaking eerily as if in response to the mournful chorus. Indeed, many of the trees nearby responded in kind, and the elves sensed the rejuvenation of Tawar as the power of their music spread, and this was so. With the orcs gone and the Wraith forced to flee, the ailing hardwoods reformed the subterranean links through rooted soil. The impact of recent events rolled through the forest like a tide, both sorrow and rage in the writhing limbs as they railed against the death of Lindalcon and the breaking of their champion.



Amid the ring of oaks the elves dug the earth and made a grave so deep the shrouded husk rested on the mountain's bones, but Legolas' wish they could not know and neither Oropher's regal cloak nor Fael'ur's weapons went into the barrow, save the dagger. Over the body they made a cairn first, everyone bringing a stone to build the young warrior's final shield, the song spilling down into the humble crypt as they worked, and then they replaced the earth so that a mound was raised up over Lindalcon. 



Then the singing stopped and all stood silent, heads bowed and hearts heavy as they considered the cruelty of fate, the magnitude of what Arda had lost, and the injustice brought to bear upon the life of Valtamar's son. Many minds considered Meril's condemnation of her own child with dread, for what hope could there be for Greenwood when one of their own could become so corrupt? Many more considered what fate she had bought for herself by these actions, more than a few longing to see her forfeit her life in payment.



Aragorn wrapped Legolas in the panther skin; Elladan took up the archer's discarded weapons, and Elrohir gathered the battered, senseless ellon into his arms once more. Together, the three raced through the woods, determined to save the Tawarwaith yet, fearing to wait longer than required to attempt more than the most rudimentary treatment, all thinking the same thought: return Legolas to the stronghold where waited the one source of joy in his life. Nirmë and Namië met them and the Twins mounted their war horses, leaving Aragorn behind as they charged through the subtle cacophony of grieving trees and praying sylvans, urged on and flanked by a growing host of Wood Elves following in the canopy.



TBC



NOTE: OK, he's out.

 

 

 

 

Anc-en-Gurth

 



italics indicate thoughts

(elvish translations in parentheses)

This chapter un-Beta'd

Anc-en-Gurth (The Teeth of Death)

Leithian (Release from Bondage)

There was only darkness when he regained his senses; darkness, isolation, and pain. For the last, the sharp flaring agony shooting through his right calf was undoubtedly responsible for waking him to the noise of low moaning, a mournful sound that reverberated strangely, echoing around him in ghostly sympathy, a symphony of woe and languishing affliction such that his muddled mind thought other captives shared the void. This black obscurity must be the hell where Námo contained those most deserving of punishment for dire atrocities committed while still extant. Had he done something heinous, something to regret for the rest of time? His heart froze as an image of blood, the awful noise of strangling breath, and amber eyes wide in terror permeated his fragmented awareness. Immediately he shut it out; the Chief was gone, the Orcs were gone, and nothing else mattered. 



Dully, he wondered why he could not remember meeting the Vala of death and judgement, wondered how he could feel pain in a body he no longer possessed, wondered if Malthen's voice was among those haunting groans, wondered if he was permitted to look for him and shifted, thinking to rise. That's when he registered the water swirling round his waist, wet stone against his shoulder and head where he'd fallen against it. Cautiously, delicately, he tried to move, finding he was awkwardly folded over, legs bent beneath him, and instantly his calf erupted in a warning flare, hot and fiery in his mind. He stilled, braced his hand upon the stone wall beside him, waited for the jagged pulses to subside. The weary cries ceased at the same time and he heard instead loud and laboured respiration somewhere near at hand. He listened, straining his ears to determine where it originated.



The harsh, rasping gusts grew in volume and density until they became an unnerving source of ill-defined menace, the dead and damned hunting him. The sound expanded and contracted, rose and fell, gulped and coughed, circled and stalked him the way wolves worry an interloper. He thought of the countless elves lost to Shadow through the Ages: kin-slayers and betrayers all, and he was one of them. Lightless souls in a well of darkness. His pulse was thundering. Why this game of teasing intimidation? What intention did this ploy support? "Show yourself!" he shouted suddenly and the harried words blattered back at him, distorted, loud, multiplied a hundred fold, bouncing around the confines of the rocky tomb. He issued a startled and incoherent cry that assaulted him the same way and he recognised himself as the sole source of the windy bluster, embarrassed not to have known it all along.



After this breakthrough, reality asserted itself and he realised he was not yet dead but merely alone, his enemies only absent for the moment. It was enough to make him nearly mad with despair, for he must be in a dungeon deep beneath the mountains. He choked on the next breath; the odour of the air surrounding him was putrid, foetid. Now he felt the other arm trapped beneath him and and moved it, drawing it out from the weight of his body, so grateful no new agonies accompanied this motion that he gasped, or sobbed; he couldn't distinguish the difference anymore. With attempts at cautious manipulation that were in fact terribly sluggish and clumsy, he managed to shift his weight without setting off more than minor complaints from the leg, which surely must be broken. The implications of that had not surfaced as yet.



Thinking to sit, he found the position offered new and stinging reminders of all that had gone before this. He sighed, frustrated and weary, wanting to find means to get out of the water and lie flat. He manoeuvred to his left hip and leg and the corresponding shoulder grazed stone. His breath caught and his heart convulsed; the space was small. He set about exploring the bounds of his cell, finding it fit no such definition. Denial presented him an alternative in the memory of the tunnels in Thranduil's fortress; had not the dwarves delved this place, too? This must be something like that, an escape chute into which water had seeped; his fingers would soon detect those shallow grooves meant for hand and foot holds. But there was nothing. 



He panted under the pall of expanding panic and struggled not to aggravate the broken leg as he reached and twisted to feel around him, desperately praying for his fears to be proved wrong. Those entreaties never rose to the lofty mansions of the Valar. It was not a passageway nor anything a dwarf would have delved. It wasn't even a cell, but a crude pit little more than his arms' width in diameter. Legolas struggled to calm himself, suddenly frantic to stand up and learn the vertical limits of his confinement, fearing what he suspected. The fractured limb hindered him and he cried out twice, automatically trying to use it, but at least the misery quelled his terror. 



The rasp of his lungs working mingled with the vaguely melodious splash and swirl of the water. His stirring increased the noisome stench enough to taste it on his tongue, bitterly acrid, and Legolas' harried subconscious understood even before his thoughts could form the idea. He retched violently, clawing at the smooth rock to haul himself upright at last, shouting in disgust and fear. It was an oubliette reduced to receiving the filth and waste of the orcs and goblins dwelling here. As though to underscore the horrible truth, distant scuffling high above made him turn his face upward and his cheeks and chin were sprinkled with urine. He howled in outrage and mad laughter resounded overhead, buffeting around him in the confined space.



I cannot endure this.



Legolas cringed close against the wall and ground his teeth, trying to summon reason and calm himself. They could not leave him here forever, but thinking this only convinced him that is exactly what they would do. "Let me out!" he shouted suddenly, voice cracked and shrill in wild desperation. The words echoed in mockery and he wailed, ashamed of this outburst so soon after his capture.



Hours later, shivering with cold and shaking with fever, he felt no shame and called almost continuously for help, for freedom. He'd already had to relieve himself in the vile water in which he stood and the agony as his bowels moved left him weak and whimpering. The gashes ripped by the studded phallus were not sealed over and the grotesque stew in which he had been soaking was not fit to clean himself. His throat was parched yet he dared not drink. He leaned against the wall for support and wept. He did not want to die this way, here in this pit of filth, his body rotting until all that remained was its bony frame; his soul consumed to feed the malice of the Wraiths. He wanted to go home to Fearfaron and sleep in yellow pyjamas in Analdir's bed. "Ada, come and find me, please."



"Ada, Ada!" Coarse laughter enveloped him as the Orcs mimicked him, their taunting calls loud as he cowered closer to the rock.



"No one to hear Tawarwaith, no one coming."



"Tawarwaith die here."



"Slow, slow to die. Ha! Ada come, not know you." 



Something plopped into the water nearby and was followed by a veritable hail of excrement as the noise and stench of intestinal gases filled his nostrils. Gagging and cursing, he scrabbled at the walls for a means to pull himself up and found none. The stink faded into the general background stench to which he was already accustomed and he rested, his sound leg supporting him, the other bent awkwardly and propped against the stone shaft. He rested, waiting for what would come next, but nothing happened. He was alone in the dark.



It was impossible to calculate the duration of his imprisonment; he could not remain focused, or perhaps he did not want to count it up. He only knew the pit was visited numerous times and it became clear the Orcs could see him quite well and never failed to target him accurately no matter how he shifted and shuffled from side to side. He was coated with faeces, urine, and a slick, mephitic evacuation like diarrhoea, forced to plunge into the reeking slop to dislodge the worst of it. His thirst increased and his fever mounted and Legolas hoped he was nearing death. Surely he would lose consciousness and slip under the foul water, drown there. He shivered, but the notion held a strange allure for all it was an ignoble end and he fought it. He must not succumb, for what would become of his spirit then? He wished he had not released Fael'ur. Thought dissolved quietly, leaving him empty and still.



Time elapsed, unfurling as slowly as the petals of a flower opening to the sun, but Anor behaved in peculiar fashion, coming and going abruptly, glaring one moment, as now, then becoming fogged and hazy the next, absent for long stretches. He was awake in a place he did not recognise, leaning against the thorny stalk of a gigantic rose, its height equal to the mightiest oaks soaring to the dizzying top of Greenwood's canopy, the shadow of its leaves heavy and dark, the scent of its black blossoms foul and dank. Dew fell from it, sharply acidic, and a flock of crows roosted above him, defecating as they cackled together, insulting him cruelly. He did not like this rose, but knew he should try to climb and get into the upper branches. He found himself unable to move and looked down at his feet, surprised and amused to find them gone, replaced by thick roots anchoring him into an inky, viscous mire. He croaked out a laugh and the crows pelted him with stones.



Legolas drifted in delirium, only half realising that he was ill, listening to invisible orcs revile him, to himself trying to sing now and again without realising it was his own voice. The singing enraged the orcs and precipitated a volley of rocks. He lost consciousness.



Abruptly awakened when the broken leg jolted against the stone wall, he found himself slumped in the water again, unable to stand up. He stopped struggling and lay still, waiting for the pain to subside, incapable of realising his doom, emotionally inert in the lassitude of ague. He lapsed briefly into oblivion, waking with his face half submerged in the ordurous fluid. Snorting and retching, he turned his head away and thrashed about. The leg protested anew as he tried to rise and Legolas groaned, the taste of offal in his mouth, his heart beset by the ponderous suspicion that he had been here for Ages, a punishment for something he did not want to recall. 



It was devastating nonetheless, this corrosive guilt and grief, and the keening misery of his wailing cries shocked him. He opened his eyes wide, trying to understand why he couldn't see anything. Above, the muffled shouting of the Chief reached him but he could make no sense of any of it. Something splashed beside him in the water followed by the sounds of running feet slapping on the stone above. There was a peculiar scratching and scraping sound descending toward him, some creature creeping down the slick walls, tossing away muttered expletives as it neared. He saw two blind, miniature dragons with sharp, white teeth and black claws making for him, but their faces were those of Gwillith and Taurant, grimacing like demons, nostrils smoking, and he flinched, curling into a ball.



Scaly fingers grabbed him at the underarms, pulling him back and forth in an uncoordinated effort to drag him up, and he fought against them. His resistance raised only laughter from above, the sound unbearably loud and he pleaded with them, begging to be let go, incongruously demanding to be freed from the pit even as he hindered the goblins attempting to do just that. They yanked him this way and that as though fighting over which would retain hold of him, their curses in Black Speech an offence to his ears, their sour breath an affront to his nose. His legs and head swung and dipped and collided with the walls, but soon enough he was out and his helpers released him, expecting him to stand on his own before his captor. He could not and fell heavily as the broken leg buckled under him. Before he could orient himself to the new location a gloved fist cuffed him at the temple. It was more than enough to render him senseless.



The scene was transformed in astonishing opposition to the oubliette when next he gained consciousness. A single torch flamed brightly on the wall and after the absence of light he could hardly take his eyes from it, wondering if it was real or another hallucination. He reclined on a magnificent bed, the coverings rich and sumptuous, the hangings held open with tasselled golden cords, the canopy above him pleated in a radiating pattern held taut at the center beneath an elaborate oval shield. The devices on it were unknown to him, but he spared it barely a glance, too afraid the light would disappear if he took his sight away from it for more than a second. All was silent, his heartbeat the only sound, his breathing its only accompaniment.



Gradually, he noticed a second source of light and focused on it: a pale luminescent door, closed. Now the sight of it made him nervous; it seemed to grow and advance toward him and he struggled to shift away from it, finding his good leg unable to move, his left wrist clamped to the bedpost. In vain he hauled against these bonds.



"Baw! Nay!" he yelled aloud, frantic to evade the looming portal. Menace surrounded it; behind it lurked some unspeakable horror.



"Why do you resist? Beyond is rest and comfort for you," spoke a familiar voice. Legolas searched the room for its owner and gasped as the elf stepped closer.



"Lindalcon?" he cried, half in joy, half in dread. The young ellon looked strange with a dagger embedded in his throat.



"Of course," said the phantom, smirking, and shook his head, crossing his arms over his chest. "Did you think I would leave you?"



"Yes, you promised."



"I promised Adaren, not you," shrugged Lindalcon. Then he unwrapped his arms and pointed, his expression hard and cold. "You destroyed me; I will remain until you have paid the price for it."



"Price?"



"Aye. You are a kin-slayer, Legolas, under Judgement again. You must be punished before you can go through the white door," said the youth. He turned and moved toward it.



"Wait," Legolas cried, desperate for Lindalcon to stay; again he struggled to raise himself but was held fast. "Do not leave me; you said you would stay!"



"I'll return anon, after you've had a chance to undergo your Chastisement."



"No! I was forgiven! The Council…"



"I did not forgive you," Lindalcon halted and peered over his shoulder, eyes smouldering red in fury and hatred.



"Nay, nay, Muindor, you did!"



"Did I? Even so, you must earn your own Release," the spectre chuckled, an unpleasantly lewd sound. "When you have paid, then I will take you away from here." He smiled in condescending amusement, his gaze running over the prone form boldly before he resumed his stroll toward the glowing door.



"No, please, Lindalcon!" Legolas pleaded shrilly. "Take me with you! Take me now!" To his relief the ghost paused and turned, grinning, coming back to him quickly, so quickly it made Legolas' head spin. Now the young son of Valtamar hovered over him on the bed and a soft caress ran down his chest to his stomach. He shivered, revulsion and anticipation mingled.



"All right, if that is what you really want," crooned Lindalcon and in an instant had seized the injured leg and yanked it up and out. Into the gap he drove and the next thing Legolas knew was the piercing penetration of a rigid cock.



He screamed in disbelieving abhorrence as the fair visage screwed up in lascivious delight, rocking back and forth above him, eyes leering, the invasive organ advancing and retreating, delivering a sickening sensation of excitement, disgust, and fear. A grotesque black tongue slithering out from Lindalcon's smiling lips and lapped across his. Legolas blacked out as the phantom jerked and trembled in the throes of orgasm, Lindalcon's comely face and form dissolving until only the hideous tongue remained.









Reality mutated into a grotesque progression of conflicting images and sensations, smells and sounds, impenetrable darkness and shocking brilliance. He could not tell what was actually happening and what was a product of sorcery afflicting his mind, madness enhanced by the infection rampant in his overburdened body. The surreal environment of stone and velvet, ecstasy and torture, became his universe and his mind peopled it with figures he knew and loved, all turned against him in revulsion and hatred. They spoke to him in vile combinations of Black Speech and elvish and their words wounded him. Fearfaron condemned him; Malthen returned to violate and mock him; even his mother appeared and berated him for abandoning her. Lindalcon was a constant, associated with the plush red bed, the bright torch, the disgusting tongue, obscene pleasures. 



Deprived of adequate sustenance and water, he was beset by constant thirst that in his desperation forced him to drink whatever was put to his lips. At times this was mephitic water, at times urine, and still other times some form of strong alcoholic brew laced with medicinal herbs. The last he hated most of all for it preceded a level of lucidity that was an acute torment, moments when he knew who he was and where he was; what he had done and what was being done to him. The Wraith did not want him to die quickly or cleanly, it seemed.



The abrupt shifts from pitch darkness to dazzling torch light were disorienting, the shifting percipience of his senses bewildering. Absence of light gave his nose and ears a finesse that rivalled sight, yet in light his eyes seemed less perceptive. Unwashed for uncounted days, he had never before so despised the scent of his own person, and felt he must be rotting, becoming a living corpse like the Chief. The sour, pungent odour of semen clung to him and mingled with the stench of faeces, blood, urine, and bile. His hair smelled like he'd washed it in a sewer; he imagined it to be crawling with maggots, his pubic thatch infested with lice and other parasites. His skin itched interminably. Once he heard himself alternately demanding death or a bath. 



When light returned, he was shocked to see himself so diminished, oozing lashes crusted with blood and pus, his lower body coated with filth so that his skin was splotchy brown, his injured leg purple and swollen around the break. His right hand was the worst, for the Wraith's ring bit in deep and left an angry red welt on either side of it. He fancied he could feel the evil runes cutting into his flesh and was certain the horrid thing whispered anew the Wraith's incantations whenever he lapsed into sleep.



Not that he truly slept. He dropped out of one state of awareness into another, sometimes entering a deeper state of unconsciousness that robbed him of all perceptions, something he much preferred, though it was rare and so short, so brief. At times he saw the white door and made efforts to reach it, but always he was jerked awake on the red bed where Lindalcon awaited him. After these encounters, he found himself glad when the Chief arrived and unchained him, carrying him away to the upper cavern where the stone posts were always ready, the whips always handy. He would much rather the Wraith beat and rape him than his friend, his brother. He began to wish for the Chief's brutality rather than endure the lusty attentions of Lindalcon's ghost. From wishing to openly begging, he found, was a simple thing.



"Do not let him have me anymore. Am I not yours? Is this not your ring?" chained at the wrists, down on his knees in the circle of orcs, Legolas peered up into the empty hood with its bleary eyes.



"You are ready, then, to be my mate, Tawarwaith?" The Wraith fondled him freely, teasing firm nipples and toying with the elf's partially erect cock. He chuckled as his captive leaned into the touches and shivered.



"Oh, yes," Legolas whispered, head falling back as he fidgeted under the rough fingers' exploration. Slippery and hot, the black tongue lapped his chest and he groaned, arched into the lubrication, knowing teeth would follow and a sharp, jarring pain as it suckled him, drawing blood, drinking of him this way. He moaned impatiently, eyes closed, shifting in his bonds, rocking his pelvis into the loose hold. "Please."



"Please? What would please you?" The Wraith squeezed his balls just to hear him squeal.



"Don't…don't!" Legolas gasped, then cried aloud as tight compression surrounded his root and twisted his scrotum. The pressure increased and he screamed, feeling something wrap taut round him, pulling outward. He froze, afraid to move for it felt as though this device might rip his genitals off entirely if he did. Just as he began to tremble under the extreme tension, a delicate caress swabbed over the pinnacle of his organ, erect and rigid now, and he spontaneously pivoted toward it. "Ai!"



"Don't what?"



"Don't let Lindalcon…" His words trailed away into a long low wail as the tongue tickled across the slit.



"Was that good for you?" the Wraith wanted to know and repeated the stimulation.



"Yes, yes," groaned Legolas, shuddering. "More."



"More? What more?"



"Fuck me."



"As you wish, Tawarwaith."



Yet no penetration ensued. Instead, a flat narrow paddle smacked him across the nipples while the fingers played with the head of his penis, pinching, squeezing, rolling the foreskin back and forth. It was maddening and he heard his voice shouting in pain and frustration. The paddling ceased and his chest burned, icy hot and tingling.



"Please."



"Open your eyes."



"No!" He shook his head violently, then shrieked as the cincture snatched at his cock and balls. At that moment similar agony erupted in his chest as heat seared his nipples. He writhed in his chains, twisting to get away, and this increased the tearing tension in his groin. The burning diminished to dull flaring misery and he stopped thrashing, gasping for breath. The clever fingers returned, playing with his cock, picking at his abused nipples, a sensation of his very skin being peeled off. He whimpered, for the feeling was exquisitely terrible. "Fuck me."



"Open your eyes."



"No, no, don't want to see." 



He felt hands at his hips, smoothing seductively up and down his sides. The tip of a hard cock brushed his buttocks; he hobbled his knees apart as wide as he could, held his breath. Slowly the organ drove inward, burrowing in minute increments until he felt the dank, sweaty curls of the beast's groin against his flesh. He bucked back against it, recognising from its stink that this was an orc. He sealed his eyes tight. "No." The creature bit his shoulder and lapped at his blood, began to move inside him, clutching him in its claws. The force of its thrusts pressed the tip of his penis against something sharp and biting over and over, bright bolts of pain and pleasure exploding there. He heard himself screaming.



"Open your eyes." The Chief's command sounded above the grunting chorus of its excited minions, all of them eager to be next, struggling to stave off release as they masturbated wildly. "Open your eyes, or I'll give you to Lindalcon and make you beg and plead with him to take you."



"No!" Legolas cried; the orc spilled inside him and struck him on the back of the head as it dismounted, spitting on him for good measure as it stepped aside. Another took its place and rammed into him; the pricking at his cock grew more brutal but the demon was striking his inner core perfectly and he moaned, moving with it, shoving back every time it advanced.



"Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck," it chanted with every shove, gasping and gurgling in its pleasure, clawing clumsily at the restraints at Legolas' nipples, laughing when he shrieked and bent into the agony. Soon he was chanting along with it. "Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck."



"You like this one's technique?" laughed the Wraith. He leaned in and kissed Legolas, then slapped him sharply on the cheek. "Open your eyes or Lindalcon takes you next, Tawarwaith."



Reluctantly, Legolas did so, finding his sight focused on the empty hood, those rotting eyeballs, and the lolling, black tongue. He gave a strangled cry of disgust and desire combined as the orc rode him expertly. His eyelids fluttered down again but another blow to the face made him open them wide. The Wraith was pointing with its gloved hand and he followed the digit to discover the cause of the flaring pain afflicting his cock. His organ was bound and stretched straight out, held fast and taut so that the tip just barely touched upon a bizarre contraption set before him on the stone floor.



It was wooden, a sort of stand almost like an easel, but across it was attached a pliant canvas which formed a cavity in its center, a gaping slit studded with shiny, silver spikes glistening with ruby droplets. Into this pocket just the head of his shaft dipped and dove, and blood dripped from the resulting lacerations. He stared in fascination, mouth ajar, watching the sharp tines stroke him. 



Then the fingers captured his attention again, snapping in front of his face before directing him to see what had been done to his tender nipples. They were pierced through indeed, narrow collars of mithril wound round the flesh while a small ring adorned each, to which chains connected. The scarlet skin protruded from them, raw and aggravated, and as the orc moved him the chains tightened and pulled, jerked and twisted. As Legolas watched, the Chief bent low and lapped across them gently and in that moment, while he was alive with the sensation of pleasure this wrought, the orc came, growling and grunting, and pulled out.



The Chief straightened up and moved behind Legolas, kneading his buttocks, licking at his ears. "Do you want to come, Tawarwaith?" he whispered.



"Aye," Legolas whispered back, and swallowed, eyes falling to the spiny invagination poised to receive him.



"So be it, but only when you admit which of us fucks you best." So saying, the Wraith entered him, setting a blistering pace as he continued to lavish the elf's ears with languid caresses, cupping the bound balls tenderly in his gloved hand as he pounded into the seed-slickened arse.



"You!" Legolas gasped out, terrified the Chief would really let every orc in the room mount him, though he suspected many of them had done so more than once. "I want to come when you come," he pleaded.



"Ahhhhh," sighed the Wraith, redoubling his efforts. "Then we shall truly be bound, Tawarwaith."



And these words awoke him fully, cleared the fog of despairing acceptance from his mind, for of course this could never be. He was already bound, his heart given, and the face of his beloved broke upon his mind. The weight of his betrayal fell upon him next and Legolas moaned in denial, fighting his bonds with renewed strength, determined not to let this happen. Through all this the Wraith laughed in triumph as though arousing this very comprehension had been its goal from the beginning.



Legolas refused to give in to despair. He wanted Berenaur. There must be an avenue of escape, a means to reach Mandos and preserve there the love he harboured still for the seneschal from Imladris, a love that belayed his conversion to Shadow. And he remembered others who loved him and whose love he returned: Fearfaron, Mithrandir, his Naneth, his brother and sister. For them he must not permit this false bonding, becoming their enemy, their nemesis, and he prayed for death, eager to stop his heart and thus free it. He shut his eyes, ready for the glowing portal. Yet, he could not shut out the sensations escalating as the Wraith neared its peak. 



Fingers worked at the restraints round his cock and he knew the inevitable result. He bellowed and strained against the rising tide building with every thrust and just as he thought the unholy bond would be enjoined despite his repudiation of it, the Chief slipped a cord over his head and yanked it tight. If he'd been capable of it, Legolas would have laughed, for the Shadow King had given him victory. He needed oblivion in order to find the way out and strangulation was sufficient to cause it. Slowly his breath dwindled and his brain bloomed with explosive shocks of light and pain. Through it he glimpsed the door from afar and beside it a robed figure limned in glory and power.



"Legolas! Here, quickly, quickly!" The being called to him and the voice rang with the familiar tones of the Maiar, rich and regal.



"Mithrandir!" Legolas could not speak any longer but found their link as strong as ever and rejoiced. He went limp in his bonds, feä flying through that door, open at last and filled with bright, white light. It closed behind him with grim finality and the halo of illumination vanished from around it.



The Chief paused, uncertain what had happened, then hastily removed the ligature and withdrew, leaving Legolas bound to the posts, his excited organ still caught in the thorn-lined pocket. Stunned to have been cheated of his prize, the Wraith peered out into the horde of demons surrounding it, their yellow eyes glittering back in the torch light. From licentious fervour to absolute stillness, unnatural silence, and a growing sense of bewildered fear, the orcs stared, every breath suspended. The next instant the sounds of battle reached them, faint but growing, screams echoing along the halls, bold voices shouting in Quenya, the clashing ring of steel blades colliding. The beasts erupted in a furore, bellowing curses in Black Speech, stampeding every which way, racing from the entry to the cavern in hopes of escape, shoving and trampling one another in the haste of panic.



Too late the Wraith issued its orders and sought to deter the onslaught of elves and men advancing through the tunnels. The orcs were interested only in surviving and fled the chamber, leaving their master to face the Orc Slayers of Imladris, Celeborn's Galadhrim warriors, and Isildur's heir leading a determined and fierce army of woodsmen. The Chief elected to vanish and thus the rescuers poured into an almost empty room, its only occupant their friend hanging lifeless from the chains of the stone pillars. The rescuers piled into the cavern swords drawn and voices crying, eager for a fight and a chance to avenge their friends, but stumbled suddenly to halting silence.



At first, they could do nothing, too shocked by the raw brutality presented before them, unable to accept the truth before their very eyes. It could not be that they arrived too late. In dumb denial they drew closer and ringed the debased elf, swords dropped low, the fire of the fight quenched, their noble purpose rendered impotent. 



Then Haldir saw the rigid organ in its spiny confinement and turned aside in disgust. It was then he spied the source of the rotten stench permeating the place and cried out. He staggered as though to fall, hand clapped over his mouth, overcome by the sight of Lindalcon's bloated and decaying remains. One of his warriors ran to him and together they covered the corpse with the March Warden's cloak.



"Ai, Eru," Elrohir whispered, daring to move forward at last, sheathing his sword. He was afraid to touch the bound body, unwilling to be the one to confirm what appeared obvious. Then a spasm racked the battered frame and a ragged gasp sounded from the mouth so twisted in pain. "Alive!" he shouted, bounding the remaining distance, Elladan beside him, Aragorn right behind. In silence they regarded the sickening orientation of the body, the Twins internally debating the best means to remove such diabolical restraints. Aragorn sighed and took charge, having witnessed something of the archer's afflictions in the past.



"I am a healer; I will do it," he said and sheathed his sword, taking up his dagger instead and kneeling beside Legolas. "Elbereth," he whispered, pushing the grotesque frame out from the rigid, bloody penis. 



Quickly and carefully he cut the cords digging into the most sensitive regions of a male's anatomy. A faint but urgent whine escaped the Tawarwaith's lungs. Aragorn studied his fitful respiration as he removed the clamps and chains from the nipples, leaving the rings alone for fear of adding injury in his efforts to slip them free. "Hold him," he ordered quietly, indicating the narrow waist, and Elrohir complied. Then as gently as possible Aragorn took hold of the solid erection and carefully applied pressure, working his hand back and forth, letting the blood lubricate the motion, and as expected, ejaculation was nearly immediate, accompanied by a feeble cry that sounded more fearful than erotic. Legolas twitched once and fell limp again.



In haste the Twins proceeded to open the manacles, Elladan busy with the chains while Elrohir supported the archer, both pleased to find a simple steel pin securing the cuffs. Their eyes met; Legolas obviously had not been left in the bonds alone or he would have discovered this and gained his freedom. As soon as Elladan released the wrists, Elrohir gathered Legolas into his arms and hoisted him up, making for the passage out. Grabbing up torches, everyone followed, released from their scandalised fugue as the obscene tableau was dismantled. 



Now Haldir and his comrade wrapped Lindalcon's reeking body in the cloak and carried it away from the caves, out of darkness into the dusky light of the vanquished sun. Up into the stony hills they bore him away, chanting a solemn dirge as they went, an ancient lament in their ancient tongue. Passing through the carnage of war over bloodied ground they picked their way; past the dead and the fallen they marched in stately bereavement and hallowed approbation. Under the fading glory of Anor they proceeded, their sorrow and respect expressed in the formal posture of military precision: straight spines, raised chins, shoulders squared and set, grim pride in their staring eyes and veneration in their voices. 



Through Talagan's eclectic army of men, sylvans, Sindar, and Noldor they paced, bringing Lindalcon among them, and all the Wood Elves fell in with Haldir's warriors, adding their voices to the death song and their presence to the cortege, for Lindalcon was theirs and their mourning was raw and real. The Music swelled and filled the place, a majestic anthem to celebrate the courage, dignity, and innocence of Valtamar's son, and the notes cleansed the air of battle-born fear and fury lingering amid the molecules and the motes. To a small hillock unmarred by the ravages of the war they wandered, drawn there by instinct, an unconscious desire to seek a clean place for the interment.



A stand of trees crowned the knoll, drab, dull and dun, its carpet of summer grass and autumn leaves crushed and waterlogged from the heavy snows just melted, but the bland emptiness was fitting. The trees stood with naked limbs upraised, the branches swaying and creaking eerily as if in response to the mournful chorus. Indeed, many of the trees nearby responded in kind, and the elves sensed the rejuvenation of Tawar as the power of their music spread, and this was so. With the orcs gone and the Wraith forced to flee, the ailing hardwoods reformed the subterranean links through rooted soil. The impact of recent events rolled through the forest like a tide, both sorrow and rage in the writhing limbs as they railed against the death of Lindalcon and the breaking of their champion.



Amid the ring of oaks the elves dug the earth and made a grave so deep the shrouded husk rested on the mountain's bones, but Legolas' wish they could not know and neither Oropher's regal cloak nor Fael'ur's weapons went into the barrow, save the dagger. Over the body they made a cairn first, everyone bringing a stone to build the young warrior's final shield, the song spilling down into the humble crypt as they worked, and then they replaced the earth so that a mound was raised up over Lindalcon. 



Then the singing stopped and all stood silent, heads bowed and hearts heavy as they considered the cruelty of fate, the magnitude of what Arda had lost, and the injustice brought to bear upon the life of Valtamar's son. Many minds considered Meril's condemnation of her own child with dread, for what hope could there be for Greenwood when one of their own could become so corrupt? Many more considered what fate she had bought for herself by these actions, more than a few longing to see her forfeit her life in payment.



Aragorn wrapped Legolas in the panther skin; Elladan took up the archer's discarded weapons, and Elrohir gathered the battered, senseless ellon into his arms once more. Together, the three raced through the woods, determined to save the Tawarwaith yet, fearing to wait longer than required to attempt more than the most rudimentary treatment, all thinking the same thought: return Legolas to the stronghold where waited the one source of joy in his life. Nirmë and Namië met them and the Twins mounted their war horses, leaving Aragorn behind as they charged through the subtle cacophony of grieving trees and praying sylvans, urged on and flanked by a growing host of Wood Elves following in the canopy.



TBC



NOTE: OK, he's out.

 

 

 

 

Anc-en-Gurth

H



italics indicate thoughts

(elvish translations in parentheses)

This chapter un-Beta'd

Anc-en-Gurth (The Teeth of Death)

Leithian (Release from Bondage)

There was only darkness when he regained his senses; darkness, isolation, and pain. For the last, the sharp flaring agony shooting through his right calf was undoubtedly responsible for waking him to the noise of low moaning, a mournful sound that reverberated strangely, echoing around him in ghostly sympathy, a symphony of woe and languishing affliction such that his muddled mind thought other captives shared the void. This black obscurity must be the hell where Námo contained those most deserving of punishment for dire atrocities committed while still extant. Had he done something heinous, something to regret for the rest of time? His heart froze as an image of blood, the awful noise of strangling breath, and amber eyes wide in terror permeated his fragmented awareness. Immediately he shut it out; the Chief was gone, the Orcs were gone, and nothing else mattered. 



Dully, he wondered why he could not remember meeting the Vala of death and judgement, wondered how he could feel pain in a body he no longer possessed, wondered if Malthen's voice was among those haunting groans, wondered if he was permitted to look for him and shifted, thinking to rise. That's when he registered the water swirling round his waist, wet stone against his shoulder and head where he'd fallen against it. Cautiously, delicately, he tried to move, finding he was awkwardly folded over, legs bent beneath him, and instantly his calf erupted in a warning flare, hot and fiery in his mind. He stilled, braced his hand upon the stone wall beside him, waited for the jagged pulses to subside. The weary cries ceased at the same time and he heard instead loud and laboured respiration somewhere near at hand. He listened, straining his ears to determine where it originated.



The harsh, rasping gusts grew in volume and density until they became an unnerving source of ill-defined menace, the dead and damned hunting him. The sound expanded and contracted, rose and fell, gulped and coughed, circled and stalked him the way wolves worry an interloper. He thought of the countless elves lost to Shadow through the Ages: kin-slayers and betrayers all, and he was one of them. Lightless souls in a well of darkness. His pulse was thundering. Why this game of teasing intimidation? What intention did this ploy support? "Show yourself!" he shouted suddenly and the harried words blattered back at him, distorted, loud, multiplied a hundred fold, bouncing around the confines of the rocky tomb. He issued a startled and incoherent cry that assaulted him the same way and he recognised himself as the sole source of the windy bluster, embarrassed not to have known it all along.



After this breakthrough, reality asserted itself and he realised he was not yet dead but merely alone, his enemies only absent for the moment. It was enough to make him nearly mad with despair, for he must be in a dungeon deep beneath the mountains. He choked on the next breath; the odour of the air surrounding him was putrid, foetid. Now he felt the other arm trapped beneath him and and moved it, drawing it out from the weight of his body, so grateful no new agonies accompanied this motion that he gasped, or sobbed; he couldn't distinguish the difference anymore. With attempts at cautious manipulation that were in fact terribly sluggish and clumsy, he managed to shift his weight without setting off more than minor complaints from the leg, which surely must be broken. The implications of that had not surfaced as yet.



Thinking to sit, he found the position offered new and stinging reminders of all that had gone before this. He sighed, frustrated and weary, wanting to find means to get out of the water and lie flat. He manoeuvred to his left hip and leg and the corresponding shoulder grazed stone. His breath caught and his heart convulsed; the space was small. He set about exploring the bounds of his cell, finding it fit no such definition. Denial presented him an alternative in the memory of the tunnels in Thranduil's fortress; had not the dwarves delved this place, too? This must be something like that, an escape chute into which water had seeped; his fingers would soon detect those shallow grooves meant for hand and foot holds. But there was nothing. 



He panted under the pall of expanding panic and struggled not to aggravate the broken leg as he reached and twisted to feel around him, desperately praying for his fears to be proved wrong. Those entreaties never rose to the lofty mansions of the Valar. It was not a passageway nor anything a dwarf would have delved. It wasn't even a cell, but a crude pit little more than his arms' width in diameter. Legolas struggled to calm himself, suddenly frantic to stand up and learn the vertical limits of his confinement, fearing what he suspected. The fractured limb hindered him and he cried out twice, automatically trying to use it, but at least the misery quelled his terror. 



The rasp of his lungs working mingled with the vaguely melodious splash and swirl of the water. His stirring increased the noisome stench enough to taste it on his tongue, bitterly acrid, and Legolas' harried subconscious understood even before his thoughts could form the idea. He retched violently, clawing at the smooth rock to haul himself upright at last, shouting in disgust and fear. It was an oubliette reduced to receiving the filth and waste of the orcs and goblins dwelling here. As though to underscore the horrible truth, distant scuffling high above made him turn his face upward and his cheeks and chin were sprinkled with urine. He howled in outrage and mad laughter resounded overhead, buffeting around him in the confined space.



I cannot endure this.



Legolas cringed close against the wall and ground his teeth, trying to summon reason and calm himself. They could not leave him here forever, but thinking this only convinced him that is exactly what they would do. "Let me out!" he shouted suddenly, voice cracked and shrill in wild desperation. The words echoed in mockery and he wailed, ashamed of this outburst so soon after his capture.



Hours later, shivering with cold and shaking with fever, he felt no shame and called almost continuously for help, for freedom. He'd already had to relieve himself in the vile water in which he stood and the agony as his bowels moved left him weak and whimpering. The gashes ripped by the studded phallus were not sealed over and the grotesque stew in which he had been soaking was not fit to clean himself. His throat was parched yet he dared not drink. He leaned against the wall for support and wept. He did not want to die this way, here in this pit of filth, his body rotting until all that remained was its bony frame; his soul consumed to feed the malice of the Wraiths. He wanted to go home to Fearfaron and sleep in yellow pyjamas in Analdir's bed. "Ada, come and find me, please."



"Ada, Ada!" Coarse laughter enveloped him as the Orcs mimicked him, their taunting calls loud as he cowered closer to the rock.



"No one to hear Tawarwaith, no one coming."



"Tawarwaith die here."



"Slow, slow to die. Ha! Ada come, not know you." 



Something plopped into the water nearby and was followed by a veritable hail of excrement as the noise and stench of intestinal gases filled his nostrils. Gagging and cursing, he scrabbled at the walls for a means to pull himself up and found none. The stink faded into the general background stench to which he was already accustomed and he rested, his sound leg supporting him, the other bent awkwardly and propped against the stone shaft. He rested, waiting for what would come next, but nothing happened. He was alone in the dark.



It was impossible to calculate the duration of his imprisonment; he could not remain focused, or perhaps he did not want to count it up. He only knew the pit was visited numerous times and it became clear the Orcs could see him quite well and never failed to target him accurately no matter how he shifted and shuffled from side to side. He was coated with faeces, urine, and a slick, mephitic evacuation like diarrhoea, forced to plunge into the reeking slop to dislodge the worst of it. His thirst increased and his fever mounted and Legolas hoped he was nearing death. Surely he would lose consciousness and slip under the foul water, drown there. He shivered, but the notion held a strange allure for all it was an ignoble end and he fought it. He must not succumb, for what would become of his spirit then? He wished he had not released Fael'ur. Thought dissolved quietly, leaving him empty and still.



Time elapsed, unfurling as slowly as the petals of a flower opening to the sun, but Anor behaved in peculiar fashion, coming and going abruptly, glaring one moment, as now, then becoming fogged and hazy the next, absent for long stretches. He was awake in a place he did not recognise, leaning against the thorny stalk of a gigantic rose, its height equal to the mightiest oaks soaring to the dizzying top of Greenwood's canopy, the shadow of its leaves heavy and dark, the scent of its black blossoms foul and dank. Dew fell from it, sharply acidic, and a flock of crows roosted above him, defecating as they cackled together, insulting him cruelly. He did not like this rose, but knew he should try to climb and get into the upper branches. He found himself unable to move and looked down at his feet, surprised and amused to find them gone, replaced by thick roots anchoring him into an inky, viscous mire. He croaked out a laugh and the crows pelted him with stones.



Legolas drifted in delirium, only half realising that he was ill, listening to invisible orcs revile him, to himself trying to sing now and again without realising it was his own voice. The singing enraged the orcs and precipitated a volley of rocks. He lost consciousness.



Abruptly awakened when the broken leg jolted against the stone wall, he found himself slumped in the water again, unable to stand up. He stopped struggling and lay still, waiting for the pain to subside, incapable of realising his doom, emotionally inert in the lassitude of ague. He lapsed briefly into oblivion, waking with his face half submerged in the ordurous fluid. Snorting and retching, he turned his head away and thrashed about. The leg protested anew as he tried to rise and Legolas groaned, the taste of offal in his mouth, his heart beset by the ponderous suspicion that he had been here for Ages, a punishment for something he did not want to recall. 



It was devastating nonetheless, this corrosive guilt and grief, and the keening misery of his wailing cries shocked him. He opened his eyes wide, trying to understand why he couldn't see anything. Above, the muffled shouting of the Chief reached him but he could make no sense of any of it. Something splashed beside him in the water followed by the sounds of running feet slapping on the stone above. There was a peculiar scratching and scraping sound descending toward him, some creature creeping down the slick walls, tossing away muttered expletives as it neared. He saw two blind, miniature dragons with sharp, white teeth and black claws making for him, but their faces were those of Gwillith and Taurant, grimacing like demons, nostrils smoking, and he flinched, curling into a ball.



Scaly fingers grabbed him at the underarms, pulling him back and forth in an uncoordinated effort to drag him up, and he fought against them. His resistance raised only laughter from above, the sound unbearably loud and he pleaded with them, begging to be let go, incongruously demanding to be freed from the pit even as he hindered the goblins attempting to do just that. They yanked him this way and that as though fighting over which would retain hold of him, their curses in Black Speech an offence to his ears, their sour breath an affront to his nose. His legs and head swung and dipped and collided with the walls, but soon enough he was out and his helpers released him, expecting him to stand on his own before his captor. He could not and fell heavily as the broken leg buckled under him. Before he could orient himself to the new location a gloved fist cuffed him at the temple. It was more than enough to render him senseless.



The scene was transformed in astonishing opposition to the oubliette when next he gained consciousness. A single torch flamed brightly on the wall and after the absence of light he could hardly take his eyes from it, wondering if it was real or another hallucination. He reclined on a magnificent bed, the coverings rich and sumptuous, the hangings held open with tasselled golden cords, the canopy above him pleated in a radiating pattern held taut at the center beneath an elaborate oval shield. The devices on it were unknown to him, but he spared it barely a glance, too afraid the light would disappear if he took his sight away from it for more than a second. All was silent, his heartbeat the only sound, his breathing its only accompaniment.



Gradually, he noticed a second source of light and focused on it: a pale luminescent door, closed. Now the sight of it made him nervous; it seemed to grow and advance toward him and he struggled to shift away from it, finding his good leg unable to move, his left wrist clamped to the bedpost. In vain he hauled against these bonds.



"Baw! Nay!" he yelled aloud, frantic to evade the looming portal. Menace surrounded it; behind it lurked some unspeakable horror.



"Why do you resist? Beyond is rest and comfort for you," spoke a familiar voice. Legolas searched the room for its owner and gasped as the elf stepped closer.



"Lindalcon?" he cried, half in joy, half in dread. The young ellon looked strange with a dagger embedded in his throat.



"Of course," said the phantom, smirking, and shook his head, crossing his arms over his chest. "Did you think I would leave you?"



"Yes, you promised."



"I promised Adaren, not you," shrugged Lindalcon. Then he unwrapped his arms and pointed, his expression hard and cold. "You destroyed me; I will remain until you have paid the price for it."



"Price?"



"Aye. You are a kin-slayer, Legolas, under Judgement again. You must be punished before you can go through the white door," said the youth. He turned and moved toward it.



"Wait," Legolas cried, desperate for Lindalcon to stay; again he struggled to raise himself but was held fast. "Do not leave me; you said you would stay!"



"I'll return anon, after you've had a chance to undergo your Chastisement."



"No! I was forgiven! The Council…"



"I did not forgive you," Lindalcon halted and peered over his shoulder, eyes smouldering red in fury and hatred.



"Nay, nay, Muindor, you did!"



"Did I? Even so, you must earn your own Release," the spectre chuckled, an unpleasantly lewd sound. "When you have paid, then I will take you away from here." He smiled in condescending amusement, his gaze running over the prone form boldly before he resumed his stroll toward the glowing door.



"No, please, Lindalcon!" Legolas pleaded shrilly. "Take me with you! Take me now!" To his relief the ghost paused and turned, grinning, coming back to him quickly, so quickly it made Legolas' head spin. Now the young son of Valtamar hovered over him on the bed and a soft caress ran down his chest to his stomach. He shivered, revulsion and anticipation mingled.



"All right, if that is what you really want," crooned Lindalcon and in an instant had seized the injured leg and yanked it up and out. Into the gap he drove and the next thing Legolas knew was the piercing penetration of a rigid cock.



He screamed in disbelieving abhorrence as the fair visage screwed up in lascivious delight, rocking back and forth above him, eyes leering, the invasive organ advancing and retreating, delivering a sickening sensation of excitement, disgust, and fear. A grotesque black tongue slithering out from Lindalcon's smiling lips and lapped across his. Legolas blacked out as the phantom jerked and trembled in the throes of orgasm, Lindalcon's comely face and form dissolving until only the hideous tongue remained.









Reality mutated into a grotesque progression of conflicting images and sensations, smells and sounds, impenetrable darkness and shocking brilliance. He could not tell what was actually happening and what was a product of sorcery afflicting his mind, madness enhanced by the infection rampant in his overburdened body. The surreal environment of stone and velvet, ecstasy and torture, became his universe and his mind peopled it with figures he knew and loved, all turned against him in revulsion and hatred. They spoke to him in vile combinations of Black Speech and elvish and their words wounded him. Fearfaron condemned him; Malthen returned to violate and mock him; even his mother appeared and berated him for abandoning her. Lindalcon was a constant, associated with the plush red bed, the bright torch, the disgusting tongue, obscene pleasures. 



Deprived of adequate sustenance and water, he was beset by constant thirst that in his desperation forced him to drink whatever was put to his lips. At times this was mephitic water, at times urine, and still other times some form of strong alcoholic brew laced with medicinal herbs. The last he hated most of all for it preceded a level of lucidity that was an acute torment, moments when he knew who he was and where he was; what he had done and what was being done to him. The Wraith did not want him to die quickly or cleanly, it seemed.



The abrupt shifts from pitch darkness to dazzling torch light were disorienting, the shifting percipience of his senses bewildering. Absence of light gave his nose and ears a finesse that rivalled sight, yet in light his eyes seemed less perceptive. Unwashed for uncounted days, he had never before so despised the scent of his own person, and felt he must be rotting, becoming a living corpse like the Chief. The sour, pungent odour of semen clung to him and mingled with the stench of faeces, blood, urine, and bile. His hair smelled like he'd washed it in a sewer; he imagined it to be crawling with maggots, his pubic thatch infested with lice and other parasites. His skin itched interminably. Once he heard himself alternately demanding death or a bath. 



When light returned, he was shocked to see himself so diminished, oozing lashes crusted with blood and pus, his lower body coated with filth so that his skin was splotchy brown, his injured leg purple and swollen around the break. His right hand was the worst, for the Wraith's ring bit in deep and left an angry red welt on either side of it. He fancied he could feel the evil runes cutting into his flesh and was certain the horrid thing whispered anew the Wraith's incantations whenever he lapsed into sleep.



Not that he truly slept. He dropped out of one state of awareness into another, sometimes entering a deeper state of unconsciousness that robbed him of all perceptions, something he much preferred, though it was rare and so short, so brief. At times he saw the white door and made efforts to reach it, but always he was jerked awake on the red bed where Lindalcon awaited him. After these encounters, he found himself glad when the Chief arrived and unchained him, carrying him away to the upper cavern where the stone posts were always ready, the whips always handy. He would much rather the Wraith beat and rape him than his friend, his brother. He began to wish for the Chief's brutality rather than endure the lusty attentions of Lindalcon's ghost. From wishing to openly begging, he found, was a simple thing.



"Do not let him have me anymore. Am I not yours? Is this not your ring?" chained at the wrists, down on his knees in the circle of orcs, Legolas peered up into the empty hood with its bleary eyes.



"You are ready, then, to be my mate, Tawarwaith?" The Wraith fondled him freely, teasing firm nipples and toying with the elf's partially erect cock. He chuckled as his captive leaned into the touches and shivered.



"Oh, yes," Legolas whispered, head falling back as he fidgeted under the rough fingers' exploration. Slippery and hot, the black tongue lapped his chest and he groaned, arched into the lubrication, knowing teeth would follow and a sharp, jarring pain as it suckled him, drawing blood, drinking of him this way. He moaned impatiently, eyes closed, shifting in his bonds, rocking his pelvis into the loose hold. "Please."



"Please? What would please you?" The Wraith squeezed his balls just to hear him squeal.



"Don't…don't!" Legolas gasped, then cried aloud as tight compression surrounded his root and twisted his scrotum. The pressure increased and he screamed, feeling something wrap taut round him, pulling outward. He froze, afraid to move for it felt as though this device might rip his genitals off entirely if he did. Just as he began to tremble under the extreme tension, a delicate caress swabbed over the pinnacle of his organ, erect and rigid now, and he spontaneously pivoted toward it. "Ai!"



"Don't what?"



"Don't let Lindalcon…" His words trailed away into a long low wail as the tongue tickled across the slit.



"Was that good for you?" the Wraith wanted to know and repeated the stimulation.



"Yes, yes," groaned Legolas, shuddering. "More."



"More? What more?"



"Fuck me."



"As you wish, Tawarwaith."



Yet no penetration ensued. Instead, a flat narrow paddle smacked him across the nipples while the fingers played with the head of his penis, pinching, squeezing, rolling the foreskin back and forth. It was maddening and he heard his voice shouting in pain and frustration. The paddling ceased and his chest burned, icy hot and tingling.



"Please."



"Open your eyes."



"No!" He shook his head violently, then shrieked as the cincture snatched at his cock and balls. At that moment similar agony erupted in his chest as heat seared his nipples. He writhed in his chains, twisting to get away, and this increased the tearing tension in his groin. The burning diminished to dull flaring misery and he stopped thrashing, gasping for breath. The clever fingers returned, playing with his cock, picking at his abused nipples, a sensation of his very skin being peeled off. He whimpered, for the feeling was exquisitely terrible. "Fuck me."



"Open your eyes."



"No, no, don't want to see." 



He felt hands at his hips, smoothing seductively up and down his sides. The tip of a hard cock brushed his buttocks; he hobbled his knees apart as wide as he could, held his breath. Slowly the organ drove inward, burrowing in minute increments until he felt the dank, sweaty curls of the beast's groin against his flesh. He bucked back against it, recognising from its stink that this was an orc. He sealed his eyes tight. "No." The creature bit his shoulder and lapped at his blood, began to move inside him, clutching him in its claws. The force of its thrusts pressed the tip of his penis against something sharp and biting over and over, bright bolts of pain and pleasure exploding there. He heard himself screaming.



"Open your eyes." The Chief's command sounded above the grunting chorus of its excited minions, all of them eager to be next, struggling to stave off release as they masturbated wildly. "Open your eyes, or I'll give you to Lindalcon and make you beg and plead with him to take you."



"No!" Legolas cried; the orc spilled inside him and struck him on the back of the head as it dismounted, spitting on him for good measure as it stepped aside. Another took its place and rammed into him; the pricking at his cock grew more brutal but the demon was striking his inner core perfectly and he moaned, moving with it, shoving back every time it advanced.



"Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck," it chanted with every shove, gasping and gurgling in its pleasure, clawing clumsily at the restraints at Legolas' nipples, laughing when he shrieked and bent into the agony. Soon he was chanting along with it. "Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck."



"You like this one's technique?" laughed the Wraith. He leaned in and kissed Legolas, then slapped him sharply on the cheek. "Open your eyes or Lindalcon takes you next, Tawarwaith."



Reluctantly, Legolas did so, finding his sight focused on the empty hood, those rotting eyeballs, and the lolling, black tongue. He gave a strangled cry of disgust and desire combined as the orc rode him expertly. His eyelids fluttered down again but another blow to the face made him open them wide. The Wraith was pointing with its gloved hand and he followed the digit to discover the cause of the flaring pain afflicting his cock. His organ was bound and stretched straight out, held fast and taut so that the tip just barely touched upon a bizarre contraption set before him on the stone floor.



It was wooden, a sort of stand almost like an easel, but across it was attached a pliant canvas which formed a cavity in its center, a gaping slit studded with shiny, silver spikes glistening with ruby droplets. Into this pocket just the head of his shaft dipped and dove, and blood dripped from the resulting lacerations. He stared in fascination, mouth ajar, watching the sharp tines stroke him. 



Then the fingers captured his attention again, snapping in front of his face before directing him to see what had been done to his tender nipples. They were pierced through indeed, narrow collars of mithril wound round the flesh while a small ring adorned each, to which chains connected. The scarlet skin protruded from them, raw and aggravated, and as the orc moved him the chains tightened and pulled, jerked and twisted. As Legolas watched, the Chief bent low and lapped across them gently and in that moment, while he was alive with the sensation of pleasure this wrought, the orc came, growling and grunting, and pulled out.



The Chief straightened up and moved behind Legolas, kneading his buttocks, licking at his ears. "Do you want to come, Tawarwaith?" he whispered.



"Aye," Legolas whispered back, and swallowed, eyes falling to the spiny invagination poised to receive him.



"So be it, but only when you admit which of us fucks you best." So saying, the Wraith entered him, setting a blistering pace as he continued to lavish the elf's ears with languid caresses, cupping the bound balls tenderly in his gloved hand as he pounded into the seed-slickened arse.



"You!" Legolas gasped out, terrified the Chief would really let every orc in the room mount him, though he suspected many of them had done so more than once. "I want to come when you come," he pleaded.



"Ahhhhh," sighed the Wraith, redoubling his efforts. "Then we shall truly be bound, Tawarwaith."



And these words awoke him fully, cleared the fog of despairing acceptance from his mind, for of course this could never be. He was already bound, his heart given, and the face of his beloved broke upon his mind. The weight of his betrayal fell upon him next and Legolas moaned in denial, fighting his bonds with renewed strength, determined not to let this happen. Through all this the Wraith laughed in triumph as though arousing this very comprehension had been its goal from the beginning.



Legolas refused to give in to despair. He wanted Berenaur. There must be an avenue of escape, a means to reach Mandos and preserve there the love he harboured still for the seneschal from Imladris, a love that belayed his conversion to Shadow. And he remembered others who loved him and whose love he returned: Fearfaron, Mithrandir, his Naneth, his brother and sister. For them he must not permit this false bonding, becoming their enemy, their nemesis, and he prayed for death, eager to stop his heart and thus free it. He shut his eyes, ready for the glowing portal. Yet, he could not shut out the sensations escalating as the Wraith neared its peak. 



Fingers worked at the restraints round his cock and he knew the inevitable result. He bellowed and strained against the rising tide building with every thrust and just as he thought the unholy bond would be enjoined despite his repudiation of it, the Chief slipped a cord over his head and yanked it tight. If he'd been capable of it, Legolas would have laughed, for the Shadow King had given him victory. He needed oblivion in order to find the way out and strangulation was sufficient to cause it. Slowly his breath dwindled and his brain bloomed with explosive shocks of light and pain. Through it he glimpsed the door from afar and beside it a robed figure limned in glory and power.



"Legolas! Here, quickly, quickly!" The being called to him and the voice rang with the familiar tones of the Maiar, rich and regal.



"Mithrandir!" Legolas could not speak any longer but found their link as strong as ever and rejoiced. He went limp in his bonds, feä flying through that door, open at last and filled with bright, white light. It closed behind him with grim finality and the halo of illumination vanished from around it.



The Chief paused, uncertain what had happened, then hastily removed the ligature and withdrew, leaving Legolas bound to the posts, his excited organ still caught in the thorn-lined pocket. Stunned to have been cheated of his prize, the Wraith peered out into the horde of demons surrounding it, their yellow eyes glittering back in the torch light. From licentious fervour to absolute stillness, unnatural silence, and a growing sense of bewildered fear, the orcs stared, every breath suspended. The next instant the sounds of battle reached them, faint but growing, screams echoing along the halls, bold voices shouting in Quenya, the clashing ring of steel blades colliding. The beasts erupted in a furore, bellowing curses in Black Speech, stampeding every which way, racing from the entry to the cavern in hopes of escape, shoving and trampling one another in the haste of panic.



Too late the Wraith issued its orders and sought to deter the onslaught of elves and men advancing through the tunnels. The orcs were interested only in surviving and fled the chamber, leaving their master to face the Orc Slayers of Imladris, Celeborn's Galadhrim warriors, and Isildur's heir leading a determined and fierce army of woodsmen. The Chief elected to vanish and thus the rescuers poured into an almost empty room, its only occupant their friend hanging lifeless from the chains of the stone pillars. The rescuers piled into the cavern swords drawn and voices crying, eager for a fight and a chance to avenge their friends, but stumbled suddenly to halting silence.



At first, they could do nothing, too shocked by the raw brutality presented before them, unable to accept the truth before their very eyes. It could not be that they arrived too late. In dumb denial they drew closer and ringed the debased elf, swords dropped low, the fire of the fight quenched, their noble purpose rendered impotent. 



Then Haldir saw the rigid organ in its spiny confinement and turned aside in disgust. It was then he spied the source of the rotten stench permeating the place and cried out. He staggered as though to fall, hand clapped over his mouth, overcome by the sight of Lindalcon's bloated and decaying remains. One of his warriors ran to him and together they covered the corpse with the March Warden's cloak.



"Ai, Eru," Elrohir whispered, daring to move forward at last, sheathing his sword. He was afraid to touch the bound body, unwilling to be the one to confirm what appeared obvious. Then a spasm racked the battered frame and a ragged gasp sounded from the mouth so twisted in pain. "Alive!" he shouted, bounding the remaining distance, Elladan beside him, Aragorn right behind. In silence they regarded the sickening orientation of the body, the Twins internally debating the best means to remove such diabolical restraints. Aragorn sighed and took charge, having witnessed something of the archer's afflictions in the past.



"I am a healer; I will do it," he said and sheathed his sword, taking up his dagger instead and kneeling beside Legolas. "Elbereth," he whispered, pushing the grotesque frame out from the rigid, bloody penis. 



Quickly and carefully he cut the cords digging into the most sensitive regions of a male's anatomy. A faint but urgent whine escaped the Tawarwaith's lungs. Aragorn studied his fitful respiration as he removed the clamps and chains from the nipples, leaving the rings alone for fear of adding injury in his efforts to slip them free. "Hold him," he ordered quietly, indicating the narrow waist, and Elrohir complied. Then as gently as possible Aragorn took hold of the solid erection and carefully applied pressure, working his hand back and forth, letting the blood lubricate the motion, and as expected, ejaculation was nearly immediate, accompanied by a feeble cry that sounded more fearful than erotic. Legolas twitched once and fell limp again.



In haste the Twins proceeded to open the manacles, Elladan busy with the chains while Elrohir supported the archer, both pleased to find a simple steel pin securing the cuffs. Their eyes met; Legolas obviously had not been left in the bonds alone or he would have discovered this and gained his freedom. As soon as Elladan released the wrists, Elrohir gathered Legolas into his arms and hoisted him up, making for the passage out. Grabbing up torches, everyone followed, released from their scandalised fugue as the obscene tableau was dismantled. 



Now Haldir and his comrade wrapped Lindalcon's reeking body in the cloak and carried it away from the caves, out of darkness into the dusky light of the vanquished sun. Up into the stony hills they bore him away, chanting a solemn dirge as they went, an ancient lament in their ancient tongue. Passing through the carnage of war over bloodied ground they picked their way; past the dead and the fallen they marched in stately bereavement and hallowed approbation. Under the fading glory of Anor they proceeded, their sorrow and respect expressed in the formal posture of military precision: straight spines, raised chins, shoulders squared and set, grim pride in their staring eyes and veneration in their voices. 



Through Talagan's eclectic army of men, sylvans, Sindar, and Noldor they paced, bringing Lindalcon among them, and all the Wood Elves fell in with Haldir's warriors, adding their voices to the death song and their presence to the cortege, for Lindalcon was theirs and their mourning was raw and real. The Music swelled and filled the place, a majestic anthem to celebrate the courage, dignity, and innocence of Valtamar's son, and the notes cleansed the air of battle-born fear and fury lingering amid the molecules and the motes. To a small hillock unmarred by the ravages of the war they wandered, drawn there by instinct, an unconscious desire to seek a clean place for the interment.



A stand of trees crowned the knoll, drab, dull and dun, its carpet of summer grass and autumn leaves crushed and waterlogged from the heavy snows just melted, but the bland emptiness was fitting. The trees stood with naked limbs upraised, the branches swaying and creaking eerily as if in response to the mournful chorus. Indeed, many of the trees nearby responded in kind, and the elves sensed the rejuvenation of Tawar as the power of their music spread, and this was so. With the orcs gone and the Wraith forced to flee, the ailing hardwoods reformed the subterranean links through rooted soil. The impact of recent events rolled through the forest like a tide, both sorrow and rage in the writhing limbs as they railed against the death of Lindalcon and the breaking of their champion.



Amid the ring of oaks the elves dug the earth and made a grave so deep the shrouded husk rested on the mountain's bones, but Legolas' wish they could not know and neither Oropher's regal cloak nor Fael'ur's weapons went into the barrow, save the dagger. Over the body they made a cairn first, everyone bringing a stone to build the young warrior's final shield, the song spilling down into the humble crypt as they worked, and then they replaced the earth so that a mound was raised up over Lindalcon. 



Then the singing stopped and all stood silent, heads bowed and hearts heavy as they considered the cruelty of fate, the magnitude of what Arda had lost, and the injustice brought to bear upon the life of Valtamar's son. Many minds considered Meril's condemnation of her own child with dread, for what hope could there be for Greenwood when one of their own could become so corrupt? Many more considered what fate she had bought for herself by these actions, more than a few longing to see her forfeit her life in payment.



Aragorn wrapped Legolas in the panther skin; Elladan took up the archer's discarded weapons, and Elrohir gathered the battered, senseless ellon into his arms once more. Together, the three raced through the woods, determined to save the Tawarwaith yet, fearing to wait longer than required to attempt more than the most rudimentary treatment, all thinking the same thought: return Legolas to the stronghold where waited the one source of joy in his life. Nirmë and Namië met them and the Twins mounted their war horses, leaving Aragorn behind as they charged through the subtle cacophony of grieving trees and praying sylvans, urged on and flanked by a growing host of Wood Elves following in the canopy.



TBC



NOTE: OK, he's out.