" Request denied."
Annaien looked at the implacable face and kept her own expression neutral. Even though she wanted to scream at the one who had just dashed her hopes...For the fourth time.
" May I inquire what is the reason given this time?" She asked, unable to keep the tightness from her voice.
" You lack the skills needed to be a guardian of this forest." He stated, flatly.
At that, the tenuos hold that Annaien had kept on her temper broke at last.
" I can shoot a bow better than most of your guards and I am just as skilled with the knives!. I have proven that I can keep up in the forest and you know I move as silently as any elf!"
The Marchwarden gave her an icy stare.
" You will never be able to move as silently as an elf. Your human heritage prevents it. There is a possibility that you could come to harm as a result. I will not allow that."
Her spine went rigid.
" There is always the possibility of harm, Marchwarden. These woods are my home, and I would gladly give my all in their defense. My elven heritage demands it."
The look in her eyes was equally frosty as she gave him a prepemtory bow, before exiting the office with her head held high.
Once outside, her facade crumbled and Annaien's lovely features contorted with rage. She stalked off down the path, heading away from the barracks and from the cursed bane of her existence, that spawn of a crosseyed goblin known to all others as Haldir, Marchwarden of LothLorien.
Haldir...
The very sound of his name set her teeth on edge. Gods! How she longed to punch that superior upper lip of his!
Various scenarios played in her mind as she continued on towards the city proper. All of them ending with the arrogant Marchwarden knocked down on his arse, preferably onto a fetid mud puddle, while she stood avenged and victorious over him.
The very absurdity of her imaginings caused her to break out into a fit of giggles, a tinkling sound that dissipated the black cloud of anger over her head.
{ No doubt he'd say it was the dubious product of my human side.. }
Her lips curved up in a wry smile as she had to admit to herself that this was the truth of it.
She had been found many years ago, wondering at the edge of the Golden Wood, apparently abandoned. A small, scruffy girl wearing a tattered dress over a body that had obviously never been introduced to the concept of bathing.
Her mouth proved to be equally filthy, as the elven patrol soon found out, much to their shock. The leader, called Haldir, had looked down at her with ill-concealed disgust. At which point the little girl had called him a pointy-eared, ill-gotten, son-of-a-warg and informed him that just because he smelled like a pampered courtesan, it was no reason to look down on anyone else.
That had been the first display of her famous temper and it had been greeted with a chorus of choked coughs as the elves around this 'Haldir' tried valiantly to conceal their mirth.
Needless to say, their budding aquaintance had gone straight downhill from there.
Haldir had stood, with his fists clenched at his sides, as his desire to place one boot on her rump in a kick that would send her all the way to Mordor, warred with the innate sense of elven honor that urged him to take the child to safety, no matter whose spawn she was.
It was his brother Rumil, that ended up making the decision.
With an amazing disregard for his own olfatory senses, the kind young elf had knelt before the defiant child, offering her a wafer of Lembas and a drink from his water skin.
The little girl had hesitated but a moment before snatching the bread from his hand and stuffing it into her mouth, as if she feared the elf would deny the morsel at the last minute. She then took a drink from the water skin, eyeing the elves warily all the while.
" What is your name little one?" Rumil asked, his voice gentle.
She looked at him with eyes that were much too hardened for such a small child.
" Don't have one." She tilted her chin up " No one gives names to half-breed slaves. No point in it."
The elves were horrified. The concept of slavery was abhorrent to their race and their hearts softened as they beheld the dirty child before them.
" How came you to be here?" Haldir asked.
She cocked an eyebrow as she eyed him up and down.
" Well, I'll tell you, pretty..." She gave him a nasty smile. " My last master was a few rolls short of a dozen, and careless of his possesions to boot. So last night, after setting up camp, I spiked the idiot's ever-present vine skin and escaped."
Haldir found his newly-kindled compassion for the little urchin rapidly evaporating in the face of her insolent manner.
" Well," He said, " Perhaps we should see about returning you to his care. No doubt he is looking for you by now.."
He finished that statement with a look that would have sent any of his troops scurrying up the nearest tree in abject terror.
She stared back at him, unimpressed.
" I suppose you could do that... If you were a heartless, yellow-bellied, son of a one-eyed orc."
She clasped her little hands behind her back, looking up at him with wide-eyed innocence.
" You are not a heartless, yellow-bellied, son of a one-eyed orc...are you?"
The rest of the elven patrol was suddently seized by another collective coughing fit as their leader stared back down at the little hellion, a vein begining to throb prominently upon his brow.
" Rumil" He barked. " You are in charge of her."
And with that, Haldir turned and disappeared back into the forest.
The little girl clasped the younger elf's hand.
" You are nice." She said, beaming up at him. " What was your name again?..."
TBC...
" Of all the persistent, thickheaded, annoying, disrespectful, stubborn..."
Haldir stopped in the middle of his diatribe, turning his eyes to the form seated in his office.
Rumil stared back at his older brother with an enigmatic smile.
" Well, she is one of the best archers in Lorien..."
" Just because she can shoot at a target, does not mean that she is qualified to be a guardian." Haldir groused.
" Well, she has bested me in hand-to-hand combat..."
" Sparring in no way compares to real battle situations." Haldir grumbled
" Well, she can maneuver through the forest just as silently as Orophin..."
" Why in Mordor are you in my office." Haldir growled.
" You sent for me."
The Marchwarden gave his unperturbed younger sibling a black look.
" Aye, because I thought that you, of all elves, would understand why I cannot allow her to join the guard!."
" Oh, believe me brother, I understand perfectly. The question is... do you?."
" What is that supposed to mean?." Haldir's eyes narrowed.
" Only that all this grumbling and growling is just a way for you to cover up the fact that you..."
" Get out!!."
Rumil did so, his mouth twitching with surpressed mirth. For all his quick-thinking as a warrior, his brother could be as stubborn as a dwarf when it came to his own feelings.
Haldir sat back down behind his desk, just as the door to his office closed behind what sounded, suspiciously, like chortling. The Marchwarden dropped his head into his hands as he thought about the blasted female who was the blight of his existence...
The auburn-haired, blue-eyed little girl had been welcomed with loving compassion by all in the city of Caras Galadon. But especially by the Lady of Light who, Haldir was appalled to see, suddently turned into a cooing ' Mother-Hen' at the mere sight of the filthy raggamuffin. As Galadriel ushered the foundling inside her's and Lord Celeborn's personal quarters, the pint-sized hoyden had looked back at the Marchwarden and stuck out her tongue, before giving him a saucy parting wink.
His fervent hope that the child would be turned over into the loving care of a human family, preferably in the farthest reaches of Harad, was dashed when it was found that the other half of her ' Half-breed' was elven.
Needless to say, his life had gone straight downhill from there...
Galadriel had named the child ' Annaien', a word that meant ' Gifted Maiden' in the elven tongue. Haldir had snorted upon hearing that, telling a grinning Orophin and Rumil that the only gift the little hellcat possessed was her unequaled talent for trouble-making. And he could vouch for that, being the one she most often gifted with said talent.
There was the time she dumped a pile of burs inside his favorite pair of boots.
Then the time she somehow managed to put indigo dye in a bottle of his favorite hair soap.
And the time she glued his favorite knife to his favorite sheath.
Not to mention the time she absconded with his towel and clothing as he soaked in his favorite bathing pool, leaving him to walk back to the barracks with naught but his hands, strategically placed, for modesty.
Many more such pranks he endured at the hands of that little orc. But then she went and commited the worst one of all. One day, out of the blue, she...she...
She grew up.
Into a beautiful female.
And his existence became a living hell.
Then, she suddently decided that she wanted to be a Guardian of the Golden Wood. He had denied her initial request, appalled that she would want such a dangerous occupation, one where she could be hurt, or worse, killed. Though he would have gladly tickled a Balrog, rather than admit to any worry over her. She had responded to his denial of her request by starting a strict training regiment, aided by Rumil and Orophin's expert tutelage. And eventually she become so skilled, that he truly no longer had any grounds for his continued refusal to allow her to join.
Not that he was letting that stop him.
Just thinking about it all made him...uncomfortable. Haldir suddently felt the need to leave his office and decided that having a solitary lunch in his talan would be a welcomed break. So he headed back home and found, upon entering, that a plate of his favorite sweets had been left on the table. Thinking it to be a gift from Orophin's mate, who often left such things for Rumil and himself to enjoy, Haldir proceeded to do just that. As he savored the treats, he found himself growing tired and so decided that, since he had some time before he was due to meet his brothers for training, it would do him no harm to go and take a little nap..
TBC...