Impurities

Chapter Twenty Three: Unconstraint

"Cooperate and we won't kill you immediately", a guard ordered. The elves had taken Ezra and Annawrete by surprise. Arrows were pointed now at both of them. Pregnancy had slowed the couple and now it was clear that this particular village couldn't hide them. They were trapped, surrounded, in the back room of someone else's house. Ezra stood and rose his hands into the air, but Annawrete remained sitting at the makeshift dinner table. "You've stolen from the great king of the Woodland Realm. Tell us where you've stored his treasure". Annawrete stared down at herself, unable to face anyone. Particularly  Legolas and Charlotte who were among the ambush. "Answer quickly, our patience is thin", Legolas reinforced. "You wouldn't shoot a woman with child", Ezra began, "You shouldn't shoot her husband and leave the baby without a father". The prince raised his aim from the man's chest to his face, "I'd be doing the child a favor in making it a bastard".

Ezra pointed to the small stove oven in the corner.  Seeing that this was the end of his rope, that he could stall no further, Ezra opened up his mouth to confess. "Annawrete", he said without looking to her. A guard found the chest inside the oven, revealing the necklace and what remained of the other riches. "We are going to die---sooner or later", Ezra was certain, "I love you---believe me, I do". He looked then in her direction, but she was not looking back, "But I lied to you about everything".

The chest was soon given to the prince for safe keeping before the multitude began trickling out. "Neither you or your descendants are ever to return to our realm", Legolas ordered the frightened pair. Charlotte had convinced Legolas to take it into his own power and extend mercy regardless of what his father had commissioned for them to do. If Annawrete and Ezra were taken back, surely the king would kill him and punish her. "If you care for your lives, you both will heed to this warning". 

It may have been better for Annawrete to be dead, because she could no longer stand the presence of her supposed 'husband'. Ezra tried to comfort her after the last of the guards had gone, but she felt disgusting as he put his arm over her. "Who is Stella to you?" was all she had strength to ask. Though Stella had gone her separate way long prior to this night, Annawrete wanted to know which of them was his mistress. Of all that had been untrue to Annawrete, nothing hurt more than believing she might have fully belonged to someone. Ezra sighed, "We worked together thieving from people. I slept with her sometimes".

The guards that were among the ambush swore to Legolas their secrecy. The story delivered was that Annawrete and Ezra chose to both throw themselves over a cliff rather than be taken back as prisoners. Though Thranduil recovered from his spell after some time, it didn't change anything within him. If anything, being made to believe Annawrete was dead made things worse. He would disappear sometimes, even as long as several hours, and nobody would know where to find him. He would go to Annawrete's chambers.

Whenever he entered her space, the heaviness of falling for her flooded him---like a roof caving in under an amount of snow; slowly, then all at once was how it happened. Grieve came with regretting her. As Thranduil laid upon her bed, a mixture of emotions continued to drown him. Loving her had been like listening for the sound of a coin dropped into a bottomless well. Indefinite. Forgetting her was like hiding in the corner of a circular room. Impossible. Thranduil couldn't feel any emotion elsewhere in the kingdom, that was why he came to her former room. Her presence was there and it made him feel pain, anger, and sadness. But feeling meant that he was still alive, which was what he wanted to be.

The door unexpectedly opened and a servant entered. She looked surprised to find the king in the room and was to exit, but he stopped her. At first, he had assumed she came to clean, but Annawrete's room has been unkempt for months and the servant girl carried no cleaning supplies. "You've come to steal from this room", Thranduil suspected. It was likely because jewelry, clothing, and all others of Annawrete's possession remained there unsecured. The elleth hung her head. It had been her intention to borrow for a length of time. She deserved to be reprimanded, to be stripped of her job, for she could be thieving from others as well. However, Thranduil bid her to come near. "Come here, child", he waved her to him. He saw an immediate use for her. "I will permit you to take what you wish from this room, without fear of persecution,  if you do for me a simple thing", he eyed her. Burdens are easier to carry when shared with someone else. The elleth accepted his offer without hesitation before she was made to swear her confidentiality. "I was in love with Annawrete", he confessed. He went on further to confess things he couldn't and wouldn't tell his son. Things that brought tears to his eyes and rouge color to his cheeks. He talked for several hours.

He concluded with, "Do not reveal any of what I have said until I have passed away". The elleth gulped with a struggle as if she were swallowing a heavy stone, then nodded. Thranduil then dismissed her, "Take now what you came for and go". She abruptly stood from where she sat beside him on the bed and went over to the dresser. She collected a necklace of pearls and diamond earrings and proceeded to make her awkward exit. She shamefully bowed to Thranduil at the door before uttering quivering words, "Long live the king".