Those words followed the skin-changer as he was led away from his friends, the she-elf's grip strong and bruising on his tanned skin as she dragged him through the winding corridors of the woodland realm. Nymmril had been expecting to be taken back up to the throne room but apparently that wasn't going to be the case, unless they were taking a different route. It was highly unlikely though, as the platform on which he had stood earlier was high up in the centre of the cavern and currently he was being pulled down and down, descending deeper into the heart of Mirkwood.
"Where are we-" Nymmril began to speak, but was silenced by a glare from the auburn elf, her eyes burning. He swallowed, throat still scratchy. "I thought I was going to speak with the King..."
"You are."
"Then why am I-"
"I would keep quiet if I were you," the she-elf said. "Elves do not like their choices being questioned and Thranduil is no exception. He has chosen to meet you... elsewhere."
"Yes, I can see that," the shifter muttered, flexing his wrist beneath her iron grip. They turned a sharp corner, the taller man stumbling as he knocked his head against a sudden dip in the ceiling and missed a step. He went to reach up to rub at his forehead, but frowned as the elf restrained him from doing so with her tight grip. Nymmril sighed. "Where exactly is 'elsewhere'?"
"I have been commanded to take you down to the lowest levels of our realm."
"Why?"
"Did I not just tell you to keep quiet?" the she-elf hissed, her head snapping towards the shifter. Nymmril's eyes glittered in the dim light and he watched her expectantly. The elleth let out an irritated groan. "I am not supposed to speak to prisoners, so be thankful you have been given such a warning."
The skin-changer let out a musical laugh at her words. The heads of elves peered at the shackled man and his escort from their quarters at the sound, smiling irresistibly. Youths were not common, nor was such joviality often heard in the increasingly dreary realm. Even the auburn guard felt a small smile tugging at her lips, catching herself just as it began to spread on her face. She tightened her grip, which had loosened sometime during the journey down into the depths.
"If that is the case then I am glad I have been blessed with your words. You have a lovely voice," Nymmril replied finally as they again turned into a meandering corridor.
The she-elf was at loss for words, eyes wide. "Thank you."
The shifter hummed thoughtfully. "Do you sing?" he asked.
"I used to. But not anymore," she replied softly, features drawing into a small frown as if memories had been drawn up that she wished not to remember.
"That's a shame," Nymmril told her. "I would've liked to hear you - I'm sure you used to sound wonderful."
And with those words hanging in the air between them, the pair came to halt at the end of their final narrow hallway. The she-elf removed her hands from Nymmril's wrist and shoulder, biting at her lip as if she were contemplating something. They stood at the top of a long, stone staircase that carried down into the basement of Mirkwood.
"My name is Tauriel," the elleth exclaimed finally, her voice quiet. She picked up the shifter's hand and held it limply in her own, examining the faint purpling on his wrist. "I am sorry for using such force on you. It does not seem to have been required."
"I am Nymmril. I am pleased to make your acquaintance, but I beg you; fear not. You have done me no disservice." His hand was released and the she-elf once again placed a hand between his shoulder blades.
"It is a shame for us to have met in such a situation, Nymmril," Tauriel spoke softly once more, pushing him forward gently to begin their descent.
"Yes," the young man replied, smiling gravely in the low light. He placed a fanned hand on the walls to steady himself as he climbed down. "I should have liked to become your friend. I feel we would have been a rather fierce pair."
Tauriel felt her face fall at the solemn words and she knew they had been spoken from the heart. She did not reply, too busy within her own thoughts, and they were delved into a companionable silence as they crept onwards.
It wasn't until they reached the bottom of the stairwell that Nymmril began to understand what was happening. There was a door at the bottom, heavy and carved from the stone of the cavern itself, and when Tauriel lifted her skilled fist to knock three times upon the centre of it the skin-changer's veins began to flood with foreboding dismay. There was a soft creak and it swung open on invisible hinges and Nymmril was faced with a large, hollow out room - at the back of which was a wall of bars jutting down from the length of the ceiling to the ground. Before them stood the King with his son, both dressed in fine robes, and the shifter sought out any semblance of kindness in their eyes, finding only a single flicker in the younger elf - he assumed, however, that it was for Tauriel. They had seemed particularly close to the shifter from what he had seen after the capture of the dwarrow and the fighting of the spiders. Friends, possibly more.
The warmth of the hand on his back was the only thing providing what little comfort the skin-changer could string together in the situation, but Tauriel was soon dismissed and sent to stand sentry in the shadows. Nymmril was left all alone to face the icy stares of the Mirkwood royalty.
Seeing their perfectly straight hair of yellow silver held in place by plain, kingly diadems, the shifter felt for the first time in his half a millenium what could only be described as inadequate. He had to resist the urge to reach up and touch his shaggily shorn, flaxen locks in an attempt to quell the self consciousness that arose being around such unearthly beings. Nymmril's tongue darted out to wet his lips uncomfortably, shuffling under Thranduil's gaze. The King was the first to speak:
"It has been many years since I have looked upon one of your kind," he said. "You are far from your savannahs in the South."
"I- I have never been to my homelands, your Majesty. I know not of where you speak."
The high elf raised a single, perfect brow, contemplating the shifter. Beside him, the Prince stood with confused eyes and Nymmril felt more content knowing he wasn't the only one in the room who was in the dark at the King's words.
"It matters not," Thranduil said once more, waving a hand in remission of his precious statement. "What I wish to know is why you are here. A Rauro has not stepped foot inside the borders of the Mirkwood for millennia."
"I..." Nymmril shivered at his words, green eyes flicking to the shadows but catching no sight of the she-elf. He felt well and truly alone beneath the calculating stare of the King.
"What price has the King under the Mountain offered you, for you to take such reckless action?"
"Thorin has promised me nothing," the skin-changer said defensively.
"He is making a fool of you then, I see," the King brushed off simply. "There is a bounty beneath the rock he wishes to reclaim. Will you be receiving no share for the part you are to play in helping him obtain it?"
"He did not bribe me with gold and gems, for I want them not. My greed is only for freedom and my heart's desire for adventure," Nymmril offered up truthfully. He did not need the riches of Erebor to lead a rich life. At his words the Prince's eyes - which were beginning to wander in apparent boredom - snapped straight to the young man, intoxicatingly blue and frosty.
"You say you long for freedom. But from what?" the young elf asked. His father looked at him, vexed.
"From my Keeper, from my home. From regulations and rules and rulers." There was emphasis on the last word, as if the skin-changer was trying to insinuate something, but Thranduil chose to ignore it. The Prince's face, however, turned grim and his gaze felt as though it were piercing into Nymmril's very soul.
"And yet you travel in the company of royalty. You are a hypocrite. Tell me... Do your childish dreams fit with the world today?"
"I can't say I'd know. I have seen too little of it since the dragon's shadow fell over the land."
All it took was for Smaug to be mentioned and the King, who up until that point had seemed amused as if he were toying with a kitten, became hard and infuriated.
"You speak of the fire drake as if it's removal would alleviate all your problems. It will not. Not only are you a fool, but you are a naïve one. And that deserves a punishment in and of itself."
At his words, the Prince's eyes widened as he turned towards his father: "Wait, Adar, you said you wouldn't-"
A hand came up to silence him.
"Hothron," the King commanded. The auburn elleth stepped out from the shadows, standing faithfully and ready to carry out his demands. "The prisoner is to be locked up down here. He is too dangerous to be kept with the others. I want someone down here to watch him at all times."
"Yes, my Lord," the she-elf answered, coming forward to grab at Nymmril. The young man yanked his arm from her gentle grip, backing away. Tauriel's eyes looked saddened as she reached from him again. "Do not fight me," she whispered.
The skin-changer looked at a loss of what to do, torn between fighting and succumbing to his fate. In his moments of unsureness, the elleth took the chance to lunge forward, wrapping the young man in her arms and pinning his hands behind his back. He did not put up a struggle, simply stared at the ground with sad eyes as he was pushed - as gently as was possible by the she-elf - towards the back of the room. His new jail was to be bigger and better, with room to stretch his legs but no chance of escape.
Nymmril settled to the floor as soon as he was allowed to, legs crossed and hands in his lap as he stared dismally ahead, vision chunked by the multitude of bars that restrained him. Thranduil sneered at him:
"Let this be a lesson to you. You will live long as your species does, but your heart's desire will never be fulfilled. I will keep you here for all your years. You will never see the sun again." And with those parting words, biting and angry for reasons Nymmril did not understand (he really didn't have the faintest clue as to what had caused the elven King to snap), he swept from the room.
"Mellon," a voice said quietly. It was the Prince, lingering behind and addressing the auburn elleth. "As Captain of the guard you are entrusted to create the schedule for who will be watching the prisoner when. Go, now, to debrief those under your command on this new... situation. I will watch over him until you return."
The she-elf nodded shakily, backing away from the cage. Nymmril stared after her, finding, somewhere, the courage to speak up.
"Tauriel," he called out. She blinked at him, coming forward to grip at the rails of his confines. "Don't tell them- Make sure my friends do not worry for me," he begged her, voice cracking. The Prince watched their interaction with narrowed eyes.
"You told him your name?" the blonde elf asked in disbelief. Tauriel ignored him, nodding hastily to the skin-changer and rushing from the room.
And so Nymmril was left alone with the Princeling.
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Updates are going to be coming less regularly from now because its exam season at my uni! Sorry about that folks, but i'll try and push chapters out whenever I can x