MIRKWOOD RPG

[Gilthalion]

Sauche jabbed the large elf sharply with her elbow and might have made a run for it, had not another elf swiftly appeared before her as she turned.

She blew a pinch of dust from her palm into Sauche's face....


....wicked knives curved like the Moon.... Mother! ....Father! ....NOT AGAIN!! NOOOOOO!


The wild elven girl woke from disturbing half-remembered dreams to find herself in near darkness. A torch burned steadily in the narrow hall outside her stone cell.

As her elven sight adjusted to the dimness, she saw that her cell was clean and sparsely furnished. Clean water, bread, cheese, and grapes were on a table. She saw that the cheese had already been cut. Clearly, she was not to be trusted with a knife.

She sighed. Sauche was of a mind to refuse to eat their food, but the bread was still warm and it smelled delicious. If she ate it, then they would bring more. She smiled at the thought, for that might be her opportunity to escape.

~~~


Lhunaglar was weary of waiting. The men talked, but so far had only complained of their idiot commander, complained about each other's smell (the elf was inclined to strongly agree with all of the terrible things they said about each other), and gotten into a fight when their meal was brought to them.

He heard the wild girl awaken and stir in her cell. Lhunaglar smiled to himself, for of course her raids on Thranduil's preserves were known. It was a shame about her life, but she seemed to prefer living in the wild. Unfortunately, to her, that included the King's Preserve. Thranduil had set aside the place long ago and had forbidden all hunting, trapping, and harvesting within its bounds.

"I would that there be a place in Greenwood that remains untouched," he had said. "Let a guard be set so that no creature that goes about with two legs disturbs this place. Trespassers will be imprisoned until it is my pleasure that they be released." Thranduil had said these words long ago, but no elf of the Woodland Realm had forgotten them, as they remembered all of the laws of the realm.

But this girl was different. Ignorance of the law was no excuse, but surely she knew that the place was guarded and she was not welcome to hunt there? The king would rule justly, Lhungalar was sure.

The men were talking again, speaking the Common Tongue with their peculiar accent. The folk of Dorwinion spoke oddly enough, but these men spoke still more strangely. Now that they had finished fighting and eating (better than they had in sometime, the elf reckoned) their conversation became less guarded.

"I tell 'ee, they's something in the Forest Mountains that the top boys wants. But the Lieutenant was too stupid to get us there!"

"Ar. Yer right about that. I says we should've just kept to a straight line and followed the rise of the land."

"But noooo! The Lootentant sees the nice path and decides to save his precious feet a few steps. Well he won't be steppin' with them no more!"

At this, the three men laughed without the slightest compassion for their erstwhile hated leader. Perhaps it made their own dubious fate easier to bear, for they, at least, were not dead, like their Lieutenant.

But here, finally, was news. While the trusty elf did not know what was in the mountains that men from the East would be seeking, Thranduil surely did....