A/N: *TRIGGER WARNING - depictions of bodily harm*
I had slept in a dreamless, supine state for an unknown amount of time until I somehow found the strength to sit up.
As I half crawled, half dragged myself to the wall, I heard the telltale clinking of the chains that bound me.
"Really?" I muttered irritably. Even in my current state, I still was tethered to the floor in a room I couldn't escape from anyway.
I pushed myself against the wall and breathed heavily, as if the air around me was made of lead.
Was I no use to them? Since the obvious attempt to drain me of whatever small power I had been bestowed had failed, I shuddered to think I would forever be kept here.
It seemed that as soon as I began to fully function again, I heard footsteps and was met by the person I most expected and least wanted to see.
"Can no lady rest from her trials without interruption?" I scowled, glaring up at Falcon from my current spot on the floor.
"Trials?" he said, confused.
"Oh, I'm sorry, was being mercilessly harassed by you and subjected to physical and emotional abuse at the hands of your men not trial enough for your standards?" I hissed in a low voice.
Falcon considered this as if it required a great deal of thought. "Oh, that is hardly worth mentioning considering the other...difficulties...in the near future. At any rate, none of us had the slightest idea it wouldn't work. It likely would not have hurt you so much if we had been able to fully remove your affliction."
"'Affliction'?!" I exclaimed with incredulity. "Honestly, what a stunningly inaccurate statement. And I suppose you think I should be blaming the Valar for this entire thing to begin with."
"Well, yes, that is the most obvious response to your current predicament," he agreed, nodding slightly.
Even in my tired state I felt an immense and ravaging anger, partially amplified through the moonstone around my neck.
"Get out of my sight, coward," I snarled. "You have no idea what the Valar have done or will do, but I hope it is to rid the world of you and others who insist on harboring pure evil."
His gaze hardened. "Then there is no reason to put off your eternal captivity," he murmured accusingly, narrowing his eyes ever so slightly. "If you had agreed to stay loyal to me you could have lived here in great plenty."
I had a sudden image flash into my head of dancing women behind tables heavy with food.
"I care nothing for you and never have. You have been no better to me than the dirt that I walk on." I said abruptly, then adding: "Worse, actually, since the dirt I walk on doesn't try to assault me every five minutes."
"As you wish," he said with a failed attempt at cordiality. "Then nobody shall love you ever again, not until the world is remade and evil is restored so you may suffer in other ways."
And what of Legolas? Our parting words had been a kiss. At this thought, I slowly grew cold.
"Him least of all," Falcon gloated with haunting satisfaction, reading my thoughts, as usual. "He will never know your touch again."
Of course, I didn't really accept that fact until he continued.
"Is that evil enough for you and your precious Valar, Gianna, dearest?"
"You have no power to execute such an oath," I scoffed, though it felt as if a stone lay in my chest rather than a heart.
"I have grown strong in my powers, and they have not been idle," he said smoothly. "Now you will submit to me as you never have."
He drew a short dagger, the blade of which shone with a flickering light. In a short motion, he flicked it at me and it flew, directly near my hand. I gasped and pulled my hand away, seeing that it cleanly sliced the chain in two.
"What are you doing?" I said, my eyes darting to his hand fearfully, my breathing quick and empty.
"I'd rather you be completely unbound for this," he said smugly. "Do not move, now, I don't want to accidentally cut you. This weapon is lethal."
"Have you ever heard about this thing called a key?" I muttered.
He ignored me, raising the dagger again and I closed my eyes and leaned heavily against the wall as if I could melt into it.
If that dagger should be destined for me, let it take me with no pain, I prayed silently to any who would hear me.
"It won't be my dagger that will concern you," Falcon said in a dark, quiet voice.
I opened my eyes to see that the other chains had been severed and I was, in the barest sense of the word, completely freed.
He strode towards me again and I was seized by the same paralyzing fear as before.
"I have waited long for this, to see you feel the same pain I feel every day, and I will delight in knowing of your plight."
I narrowed my eyes.
"Repeat my words," Falcon said, honey dripping off of his voice like poison. "The deepest bonds should be torn from me and I forsake all who would love me in greater kinship that that of a comrade."
"No." I said faintly, and then more loudly, "No, I will not."
"Say it," he commanded, more force in his voice than I had ever known.
"Make me," I said, rising with difficulty and facing him.
"I will delight in doing so," he countered, mildly amused. He raised his hands and thrust me against the wall.
He had sent his dagger after me as well, and it hovered, point facing me, inches away from my face.
"Say 'The deepest bonds'," he began.
I gritted my teeth.
"No," I said.
"That necklace doesn't protect you from flesh wounds," he purred, almost seductively. "How long will it take to get you to speak?"
I didn't answer, bracing myself.
"Where will it matter the least?" Falcon mused over my body, considering. At long last, he artfully swiped his hand and the dagger slashed against my abdomen, tearing through the thin fabric and my skin underneath.
I inhaled sharply, but said nothing, vowing to stay as silent as possible and give him the least satisfaction. The delayed pain came in a dull, numbing fire.
He asked again and I denied his request. Another slash, this time on my arm.
Again, this time it was my thigh.
Again, my other arm.
Again. I couldn't even tell where.
There was blood dripping onto the floor and still I had not uttered a single cry.
Falcon relented, considering that fact, and finally said, "Perhaps another type of coercion would be of use."
He turned on his heel and stalked out, wiping my blood from his dagger with careless abandon.
As soon as he exited the room, the spell was lifted and I again sank to the floor. The cold floor stung my many wounds and I tried not to move excessively.
I knew it would heal sooner than later, but as Falcon knew, I didn't care. I could not care less, in fact, for myself.
Legolas.
How did he ever become so important to me?
For the first time in a long time, I cried, tears mixing with blood.
***********
What I would assume was the next day, although it was impossible to tell, soon arrived, heralded by Falcon. I was tired of him, tired of his black heart and arrogant countenance.
"What?" I spat, as soon as he materialized.
"You will speak and it will be soon," he said without an ounce of mercy.
He signaled behind him and two masked, hunched over men (I would assume they were men, although they very well could be goblin-people or Orcs) who were dragging a limp figure behind them.
I sat up suddenly, rigid and filled with another cold panic.
As best I could, I stood, ignoring the scabs that cracked as I moved.
"Perhaps you'll speak if you notice the blood on someone else," he said smugly. He beckoned and the prisoner was displayed to me like some sickening museum exhibit.
Raven black hair dragged on the floor like a cascade of midnight.
It was Faewyn.
I stifled a scream and instead quietly, disbelievingly, murmured her name.
"I will have my vengeance," Falcon smirked.
I tried to run to her desperately but I was stopped by an unknown invisible barrier I could not pass.
I always told myself that if I were in this sort of situation, I wouldn't freak out and start screaming the person's name alternating with the word "No" like in every movie I had ever seen.
But, oh, it was hard.
It was hard when I remembered her laugh and her smile and all we had done together, it was hard when I thought of all that had happened since I had fallen into the Greenwood as an innocent ten year old.
It was hard when I realised she was here because of me.
I desperately looked for a way to escape my prison, though there was no escape. I looked for Faewyn's rescuer and there was not a soul in sight.
There was only one small hope to save her.
Falcon turned to me with a smirk, ready to plunge it into Faewyn's back.
I took a breath. "The deepest bonds should be torn from me..."
**********
After that, I remember nothing. At one point Falcon was laughing with uncontainable glee, and at another I was slumped against the wall again like a coward, a weakling, a child.
I had no idea where Faewyn was, and I doubt I would ever find out.
Now, of course, that I had said Falcon's oath, she was safe. But I had no idea what that meant anymore, and I wouldn't consider Falcon a role model for the word.
I opened my eyes briefly to find something shining in my face.
It was Falcon, speak of the devil (but actually, the literal devil).
"Get up," he commanded.
"If I cannot, it is your fault entirely," I said with malice, looking him dead in the eye.
"I didn't refuse to say it initially," Falcon said smugly. "But anyways, that's all fixed now."
His tone implied he was telling me he had patched a hole in my roof.
"Now get up." he said again.
I took a deep breath and slowly pushed myself up, wincing at the feel of my skin tearing again.
As I moved, the bruises on my back and ribs from being tossed around so much throbbed intently, and the knowledge that in a few days they would be gone did not matter to me at all.
Falcon took me by the arm and quickly steered me towards a sudden opening in the wall in front of me. Dizzyingly, we were suddenly outside, the cold biting my skin and the sun startling my eyes to the point where all I saw was white.
It was no surprise. For the past few days all I had seen were dark dungeon walls, of course I was blinded by the snow.
"Suffer in peace," Falcon said. "At the very least what you never gave me you cannot ever give to another."
He roughly thrust me forward and I fell to the ground from the force, along with the dizziness that overcame me.
He vanished, leaving me in the icy cold with little energy to rise anew.