TADers Vignettes: 'Captain Legolas and the Pirates'
I blame Elb for this, or rather I blame Patrick O'Brian. It's entirely down to reading books about sailing and sailors. I mean this Vignette contains words such as 'larboard', 'bosun' and 'salt beef', for goodness sake!
Anyway, as was mentioned in the last TADers post, once upon a time, Legolas came face to face with some Caribbean pirates when he was already very pissed off and they very stupidly suggested that as he was such a pretty thing they might do 'interesting' things to him before they killed him... and thus was the legend of The Blond Demon of the Caribbean born, which lasted well into the early twentieth century and with which sailors would scare their children.
THIS, then, is that tale...
In late 1908 Legolas was nicknamed 'Ratty' by his closest friends. It was, of course, the same year that Wind In The Willows was published, someone somewhere had read it and remarked upon the similarity and thus the name had stuck. For while they all lived the lives of the ridiculously rich and well-to-do and, thus, could easily afford their own yachts, barges, indeed whole ocean sea liners if pressed (and there was that famous occasion of Fingolfin's begetting day in 1923 when he had done exactly that - bought his own liner just for the party: a two week cruise round the Med which would have been all well and good apart from that nasty squall off Cyprus that very nearly sank them, the oysters giving anyone who ate them a severe attack of the runs, the champagne running out before they had even reached Italy as well as the moment when Celebrimbor, drunk as a lord, had marched into Galadriel's cabin wearing nothing but a party hat and a very large, if lopsided, smile only to be met by a Celeborn so furious he barely escaped without his unmentionables being introduced to the trouserpress), if there was anyone amongst them who truly lived that adage of there being nothing half so much worth doing than messing about in boats - who was that very phrase incarnate, as it were - then it was Legolas.
Legolas had long had the sea longing, this was well known. Like most, however, he had stayed on after the War. The end result had been so calamatous, so tumultuous, that for those left behind, those who had not been sent West by blade or bullet, arrow tip or several pounds of explosive, felt that the West would not be quite so welcoming and warm to those who had been involved, even if they had been those to have led the rebellion and exposed Tulkas's Fall. And besides, there was a hell of a lot of cleaning up to do and many who were grieving and needed to be comforted. For Legolas in particular, however, there had not only been the laying waste of Ithilien in the final, most brutal stages of it all, but half of Mirkwood had been burned and ravaged. His Father needed him, his people needed him but more than that, more than all of it put together, Falle needed him.
Not that Falle could be found for long years immediately afterwards, it was true, and even when tracked down at last by Gandalf, it was clear he wanted no or little company, but Legolas could not, would not leave with his baby brother wandering, lost, grief-stricken, near mad with his pain at all he had so nearly won and then lost at the very last. He could not do it. Falle knew it also. He had tried to speak to him about it once, when nearly a thousand years had passed. He had got as far as saying his name quietly, staying his arm, but then found he could not even begin to express his gratitude, nor his sense of guilt for he knew if it had not been for Legolas's concern for him he might have sailed long ago.
"Hey," Legolas had said quietly, "What are big brothers for?" Then simply smiled and walked away.
None of this stopped Legolas building boats, however, and, over time, becoming quite the accomplished sailor. He had learned from the best, of course. Cirdan gave a four year course at what he said was a very reasonable rate 'considering'.
"Considering what?" Thranduil had asked, raising his eyebrow archly.
"Considering I provide one of the wisest and most experienced mariners this side of Aqualonde, Orophinion my lad."
Thranduil had bridled, caught Falle and Legolas stuffing their fists into their mouths in an effort not to snigger out loud and glowered.
"It's extortion, Cirdan."
"No, no. It's business, Orophinion."
"Look, Ada," Falle then said to his father after they had left Cirdan snoozing after the sumptuous blow-out lunch they had held in his honour. "It's this or Legolas builds his own raft. Again. And you remember how successful THAT was last time."
Thranduil paled.
"Sweet Elbereth, no."
"Well, exactly. Cirdan might be a money-grasping, miserly git, but he does know the sea."
A voice floated down the reception chamber to them from the pile of cushions beside the roaring fire.
"I heard that young Thranduilion. I am outraged. My feelings are sorely wounded." Cirdan opened one sharp eye in Thranduil's direction. "Let's add on, say, another two chests of gold... or perhaps some suitably rich ornamental bejewelled something or other and I will try not to bear a grudge, yes?"
Thranduil turned his head sharply to glare in Falle's direction but he had already fled, the barest wisp of silver just disappearing through the open doorway.
And so it was: Legolas was sent back with Cirdan to The Grey Havens to be a sort of 'apprentice' for a tidy sum that, well invested, stood Cirdan in good stead for the next several centuries at least. Cirdan was as good as his word - he worked Legolas hard and taught him much, from ship-building to sailing, from the smallest, meanest craft up to a great bruiser of a ship that could easily hold five hundred aboard.
Throughout the ages Legolas never passed up the opportunity to be out on the water, be it river, lake or sea and no matter the size of craft. When once it was clear that Falle was as near to his old self as he was ever likely to be until Elb finally returned to him (if she returned, but no one ever dared say that 'if' anywhere within Falle's earshot, though he himself was painfully aware she might not return from the West and even if she did might not feel the same), he went off on his own in his turn for a while, sailing up and down the shores of Arda, even to the West and back.
Many were the peoples that benefitted from his skill and knowledge. Just as in the far East Falle in his turn helped to establish and spread the martial arts, so one could tell where Legolas had spent any length of time by the superiority of any given people on sea. He spent some centuries in Scandinavia in the early part of the first millenium AD since, he said, the Romans bored him immensely (and Galadriel would insist on lavish 'orgies' in the Roman style at her grand villa near Bath with everyone wearing very short togas and not much else). In later years he advised the Naval Authorities of the British Empire, and indeed fought in one or two campaigns against Napoleon's ships, much to Ecthelion's irritation. It said much that while the crowning glory of Ecthelion's achievement in the campaign was to tell the French to invade Russia, Legolas's lasting legacy on the war would be his advice to Nelson regarding a sorry little stretch of water called 'Trafalgar.' To this day Ecthelion would stil bridle at the mention of it and insist on calling Trafalgar Square in London 'King William the Fourth's Square' (to which everyone said he was 'anally retentive prick', and by 'everyone' I mean 'Elladan', of course).
It was some fifteen years prior to the Battle of Trafalgar, however, that Legolas's sailing prowess had gone down into legend. He was Captain of a fair-sized frigate, his own personal property, and by which, in between the occaisonal foray into the British navy, he transported goods across the Atlantic for various elves who would prefer to not have their business dealings and affairs too closely looked into by mortal authorities, especially not with political and diplomatic matters as they currently stood with France and America amongst others.
This particular trip had not gone well. They had hit storms off Africa, followed by a calm that lasted a fortnight mid-trip. By the time they reached Virginia they were running low on water and down to salt beef and biscuits. Legolas's mood was not improved when he was met in port by Finrod and Fingolfin insisting they had to go to Brazil. It was a matter of the utmost urgency, apparently, involving a 'rather pretty young thing' (Finrod) or a 'thieving harlot of a witch' (Fingolfin) depending on which version Legolas could bear listening to. Something about an orc's horde's weight in gold, a bag of rubies, some rather interesting etchings that Finrod had hoped to sell to Anaril for a princely sum and more South American silver than you could shake a stick at.
"The chase is on!" Fingolfin had cried (he could get somewhat theatrical when over excited), "To sea! TO SEA!" and marched aboard without so much as by your leave.
To add insult to injury he had then insisted on having an entire suite of cabins for himself, Finrod, and their huge retinue of servants (far more than was necessary and ridiculously impractical for a sea voyage), including Legolas's cabin, and it was only because Legolas owed Elrohir a tidy sum from a game of cards they had had just before he had left Portsmouth that he did not turf Fingolfin out onto the quayside then and there. The rubies would be his, he was told, so long as he got them to Brazil safe and sound, and as fast as the wind could take them.
Within a week he was regretting his decision.
Fingolfin at sea was unbearable. When he was not throwing up, he was being bellligerent and surly to anyone and everyone in sight, including Finrod, his man servants, the officers of the ship all the way down to the men who swabbed the deck. Having travelled in a boat all the way from the West alongside the several Noldo that had come to join Tulkas at Imladris apparently made him an expert and every decision Legolas made regarding his sales, rigging, course or assessment of the wind and weather was criticised, usually in a bellowing, sneering tone that the entire ship could hear. The wine was not good enough, the ship was too slow (though twelve knots was a speed any man-of-war or Indiaman of the Empire would have been rightly proud of), the cabins too pokey, the weather too hot, too wet, too blowy... indeed it took all Legolas's self-restraint when he found him leaning over the side one morning, bringing up the remains of his breakfast, not to sneak up behind him and give him an almighty shove overboard.
"How do you bear it?" he asked Finrod late one evening as they shared a bottle of Legolas's finest wine (which Fingolfin had declared was fit only for use in gravy, if that).
"Hmm? Oh, old grumpy-drawers, you mean?" Finrod shrugged. "You get used to it, old man. Water off a duck's back." He grinned. "Let's hope the wind picks up and he's confined to bed once more, eh?"
But a vomiting, groaning, roaring expletives, flinging the bedpan at servants' head Fingolfin was nearly as bad.
Then, to cap it all, two weeks sail out of port, the bosun, in a towering rage, explained to Legolas that, yes, he had indeed called 'Lord Fitzherbert' (aka Finrod) out, and he did not care two figs if he was the best sword in all of Europe, Africa and China to boot - 'the man has been making eyes at my wife, sir! MY WIFE!' (Mrs bosun was indeed on board ship, in the capacity of cook).
It was then, as Legolas pinched the bridge of his nose, took a depth breath and determined he would happily throttle the pair of them, that there was a shout of a sail having been sighted.
Pirates.
"Oh, this is ALL I need," Legolas muttered.
He was less than impressed when, on hearing it was pirates, Fingolfin decided he would take one of the small boats with Finrod and as many of his servants as would fit in it and 'row to one of those small Caribbean islands not too far distant.'
"Fight your battles for you, Legolas? Dear me, no. No, no, I shall wait in port for a sailor who can take me on my journey without drawing attention to himself on the high seas, thank you very much. NO, NO, DAMMIT! LOAD ALL MY TRUNKS INTO THE BOAT, DAMN YOUR EYES!"
The fact that he had managed to undermine Legolas's authority in the eyes of enough of the crew for them to steal away in the night in all but one of the remaining boats did little to improve Legolas's mood when he awoke with the dawn to find his one remaining midshipman shaking him from his reverie to say the pirates were but an hour's sail to larboard and the decks were cleared for action, sir, but we've barely enough men to man three of the fourteen guns.
'Remind me,' he thought to himself, ' never to sail without at least one other friendly ellon on board.'
The pirate vessel had them outgunned. For the sake of the men (the few women aboard had gone in the boats though they had needed little persuading - a wink from Finrod was all that had done it and all three had crammed themselves in with Fingolfin's servants, the bosun's wife never once looking back at her near apoplectic husband), Legolas saw little point in firing. Rather he insisted they cram into the one remaining boat and flee while they could while he defended his precious ship. Given the freedom to behave like the warrior ellon he was without his crew to watch him he knew he could give a boarding party of pirates something to think about, though it was probably his adrenalin and sheer bloodminded rage at the events that had led to this situation that were calling the shots in his brain at that particular moment.
That the remnants of his crew refused point blank said much for the respect Legolas had in the eyes of any man who had been under his command long enough to know the sort of captain and worthy seaman he was. Indeed they were perfectly correct when they said it was madness to stay and try and face a whole pirate ship alone, and out of the loyalty and love they bore him they would not let him do it.
"I'm sorry, sir," murmured the master's mate.
Legolas turned to him, wondering what he meant, in time to see the telescope come down on his head before he could stop it. Then, out like a light, they tied him up as best they could and dragged him into the small boat with them, pushing off and away but not before they set fire to the ship - The Greenwood - in an attempt to make their escape by cover of the smoke as well as deter the pirates.
Legolas came to just as the powder kegs on deck exploded. The language that issued from his mouth as he watched his precious ship, parts of which he helped to handbuild himself some forty years before, burst into smithereens, the aft sinking quickly into the foaming brine, hissing and sizzling as the fire dampened, taking the the last of his best French bordeaux, his second-best bow and a fine Japanese sword that Falle had given him as a begetting gift some years previously with it to the bottom of the sea, would have been enough to turn the midshipman's hair white... had he understood Sindarin, that is. It was a damn good job they had tied him up as well as they had. Even so he very nearly capsized them with his wriggling in fury. The glare in his eye told them they had better untie him and FAST, but even as they did so the pirates were bearing down on them, two small jollyboats full, roaring in fury at the destruction of their prize but swearing gleeful revenge on the survivors who they would either enjoy killing or could prove useful as new hands on board ship given they were several men down following a bout of Yellow Fever a few months before.
It all meant that by the time they had Legolas on deck, his hands tied behind his back and on his knees, he was so angry it was a wonder he did not do himself some sort of internal injury. The Pirate Captain was a cocky, lasivicious sort and was, frankly, none too picky about what he did and to whom (or what) be it by way of sadistic injury or carnal satisfaction.
"Why ain't you a pretty thing?" he purred, his breath stinking into Legolas's face as he bent down. "Whadya think, lads? Pretty as a picture, dontcha reckon? I think he'll do us very nicely." There was wild cheering and wide, leering grins. "I gets first pickings, though," he said turning back to Legolas with a gleam in his eye, stroking one grimy finger down Legolas's cheek even as he licked his lips. "They only gets ya when I'm done with ya, see?"
The glare in Legolas's eye was such that it should have warned the Pirate Captain what was coming and that he was playing a very dangerous game indeed, one that in fact he had already lost, though he little knew it, the moment he had caught sight of Legolas's sails and changed course to 'board and be damned, lads!' Legolas's hands were a blur as he whipped them free from the fastenings round his wrists, grabbed the cutlass of the nearest pirate's scabbard and sliced it clean through the neck of the Pirate Captain in front of him even as he leapt to his feet in one quick movement.
What followed does not perhaps bear repeating in detail, but suffice it to say the few pirates that survived (by jumping overboard - preferring to risk shark attack than stay on the ship and face one very pissed off ellon in full battle fury) could barely bring themselves to speak of it for long years after it. A demon, they said, a sea demon with a face as fair as a clear spring dawn but as savage as a hurricane, merciless, brutal.
"The deck awash with blood, I tells ya; men screaming, limbs flying: a massacre. I's seen blood 'n' gore a-plenty, but nothin' like this, nothin' like. A sword in each hand, twirlin' and dancin' like a sea funnel and fast? - faster than the eye could blink, damn 'im! Fuck me, when I's seen the cap'n's head fly past my ear, I swear I near soiled m'self and I know old Scabbie Joe did 'xactly tha'. I could smell it on 'im and he was crying like a babe and I've seen Scabbie Joe tear a man's ear off wi' his bare teeth but he knew, fuck, we all knew we was in serious trouble then. Even his own men were scared: could see it in their faces - pale they was and the boy with them sick to his stomach, it were comin' through his fingers with his hand to his mouth. It was every man for hisself, though some was foolish enough to stand to 'im and paid for it dear. Shrimpie Jack and Harris - you remember Harris? Could fuck a bull for breakfast that man, but he cut through 'im like he was butter before as he could even draw breath..."
The Legend of the Fair Demon of the Carribbean, a figure with hair the colour of living gold bedecked head to foot in the blood of his victims, a gleam in his eye that made any man run in terror, would render any sane man mad if he so much as looked him in the face, lived on for well over a hundred years and was told to sailors' children at night to scare them to sleep for many generations.
And the moral of the story?
Never upset a warrior ellon, or if you ever unfortunate enough to meet one, never EVER suggest that you are going to bugger him over the biscuit barrel and then let your friends do the same. You might not have time to live to regret it.
Anyway, as was mentioned in the last TADers post, once upon a time, Legolas came face to face with some Caribbean pirates when he was already very pissed off and they very stupidly suggested that as he was such a pretty thing they might do 'interesting' things to him before they killed him... and thus was the legend of The Blond Demon of the Caribbean born, which lasted well into the early twentieth century and with which sailors would scare their children.
THIS, then, is that tale...
In late 1908 Legolas was nicknamed 'Ratty' by his closest friends. It was, of course, the same year that Wind In The Willows was published, someone somewhere had read it and remarked upon the similarity and thus the name had stuck. For while they all lived the lives of the ridiculously rich and well-to-do and, thus, could easily afford their own yachts, barges, indeed whole ocean sea liners if pressed (and there was that famous occasion of Fingolfin's begetting day in 1923 when he had done exactly that - bought his own liner just for the party: a two week cruise round the Med which would have been all well and good apart from that nasty squall off Cyprus that very nearly sank them, the oysters giving anyone who ate them a severe attack of the runs, the champagne running out before they had even reached Italy as well as the moment when Celebrimbor, drunk as a lord, had marched into Galadriel's cabin wearing nothing but a party hat and a very large, if lopsided, smile only to be met by a Celeborn so furious he barely escaped without his unmentionables being introduced to the trouserpress), if there was anyone amongst them who truly lived that adage of there being nothing half so much worth doing than messing about in boats - who was that very phrase incarnate, as it were - then it was Legolas.
Legolas had long had the sea longing, this was well known. Like most, however, he had stayed on after the War. The end result had been so calamatous, so tumultuous, that for those left behind, those who had not been sent West by blade or bullet, arrow tip or several pounds of explosive, felt that the West would not be quite so welcoming and warm to those who had been involved, even if they had been those to have led the rebellion and exposed Tulkas's Fall. And besides, there was a hell of a lot of cleaning up to do and many who were grieving and needed to be comforted. For Legolas in particular, however, there had not only been the laying waste of Ithilien in the final, most brutal stages of it all, but half of Mirkwood had been burned and ravaged. His Father needed him, his people needed him but more than that, more than all of it put together, Falle needed him.
Not that Falle could be found for long years immediately afterwards, it was true, and even when tracked down at last by Gandalf, it was clear he wanted no or little company, but Legolas could not, would not leave with his baby brother wandering, lost, grief-stricken, near mad with his pain at all he had so nearly won and then lost at the very last. He could not do it. Falle knew it also. He had tried to speak to him about it once, when nearly a thousand years had passed. He had got as far as saying his name quietly, staying his arm, but then found he could not even begin to express his gratitude, nor his sense of guilt for he knew if it had not been for Legolas's concern for him he might have sailed long ago.
"Hey," Legolas had said quietly, "What are big brothers for?" Then simply smiled and walked away.
None of this stopped Legolas building boats, however, and, over time, becoming quite the accomplished sailor. He had learned from the best, of course. Cirdan gave a four year course at what he said was a very reasonable rate 'considering'.
"Considering what?" Thranduil had asked, raising his eyebrow archly.
"Considering I provide one of the wisest and most experienced mariners this side of Aqualonde, Orophinion my lad."
Thranduil had bridled, caught Falle and Legolas stuffing their fists into their mouths in an effort not to snigger out loud and glowered.
"It's extortion, Cirdan."
"No, no. It's business, Orophinion."
"Look, Ada," Falle then said to his father after they had left Cirdan snoozing after the sumptuous blow-out lunch they had held in his honour. "It's this or Legolas builds his own raft. Again. And you remember how successful THAT was last time."
Thranduil paled.
"Sweet Elbereth, no."
"Well, exactly. Cirdan might be a money-grasping, miserly git, but he does know the sea."
A voice floated down the reception chamber to them from the pile of cushions beside the roaring fire.
"I heard that young Thranduilion. I am outraged. My feelings are sorely wounded." Cirdan opened one sharp eye in Thranduil's direction. "Let's add on, say, another two chests of gold... or perhaps some suitably rich ornamental bejewelled something or other and I will try not to bear a grudge, yes?"
Thranduil turned his head sharply to glare in Falle's direction but he had already fled, the barest wisp of silver just disappearing through the open doorway.
And so it was: Legolas was sent back with Cirdan to The Grey Havens to be a sort of 'apprentice' for a tidy sum that, well invested, stood Cirdan in good stead for the next several centuries at least. Cirdan was as good as his word - he worked Legolas hard and taught him much, from ship-building to sailing, from the smallest, meanest craft up to a great bruiser of a ship that could easily hold five hundred aboard.
Throughout the ages Legolas never passed up the opportunity to be out on the water, be it river, lake or sea and no matter the size of craft. When once it was clear that Falle was as near to his old self as he was ever likely to be until Elb finally returned to him (if she returned, but no one ever dared say that 'if' anywhere within Falle's earshot, though he himself was painfully aware she might not return from the West and even if she did might not feel the same), he went off on his own in his turn for a while, sailing up and down the shores of Arda, even to the West and back.
Many were the peoples that benefitted from his skill and knowledge. Just as in the far East Falle in his turn helped to establish and spread the martial arts, so one could tell where Legolas had spent any length of time by the superiority of any given people on sea. He spent some centuries in Scandinavia in the early part of the first millenium AD since, he said, the Romans bored him immensely (and Galadriel would insist on lavish 'orgies' in the Roman style at her grand villa near Bath with everyone wearing very short togas and not much else). In later years he advised the Naval Authorities of the British Empire, and indeed fought in one or two campaigns against Napoleon's ships, much to Ecthelion's irritation. It said much that while the crowning glory of Ecthelion's achievement in the campaign was to tell the French to invade Russia, Legolas's lasting legacy on the war would be his advice to Nelson regarding a sorry little stretch of water called 'Trafalgar.' To this day Ecthelion would stil bridle at the mention of it and insist on calling Trafalgar Square in London 'King William the Fourth's Square' (to which everyone said he was 'anally retentive prick', and by 'everyone' I mean 'Elladan', of course).
It was some fifteen years prior to the Battle of Trafalgar, however, that Legolas's sailing prowess had gone down into legend. He was Captain of a fair-sized frigate, his own personal property, and by which, in between the occaisonal foray into the British navy, he transported goods across the Atlantic for various elves who would prefer to not have their business dealings and affairs too closely looked into by mortal authorities, especially not with political and diplomatic matters as they currently stood with France and America amongst others.
This particular trip had not gone well. They had hit storms off Africa, followed by a calm that lasted a fortnight mid-trip. By the time they reached Virginia they were running low on water and down to salt beef and biscuits. Legolas's mood was not improved when he was met in port by Finrod and Fingolfin insisting they had to go to Brazil. It was a matter of the utmost urgency, apparently, involving a 'rather pretty young thing' (Finrod) or a 'thieving harlot of a witch' (Fingolfin) depending on which version Legolas could bear listening to. Something about an orc's horde's weight in gold, a bag of rubies, some rather interesting etchings that Finrod had hoped to sell to Anaril for a princely sum and more South American silver than you could shake a stick at.
"The chase is on!" Fingolfin had cried (he could get somewhat theatrical when over excited), "To sea! TO SEA!" and marched aboard without so much as by your leave.
To add insult to injury he had then insisted on having an entire suite of cabins for himself, Finrod, and their huge retinue of servants (far more than was necessary and ridiculously impractical for a sea voyage), including Legolas's cabin, and it was only because Legolas owed Elrohir a tidy sum from a game of cards they had had just before he had left Portsmouth that he did not turf Fingolfin out onto the quayside then and there. The rubies would be his, he was told, so long as he got them to Brazil safe and sound, and as fast as the wind could take them.
Within a week he was regretting his decision.
Fingolfin at sea was unbearable. When he was not throwing up, he was being bellligerent and surly to anyone and everyone in sight, including Finrod, his man servants, the officers of the ship all the way down to the men who swabbed the deck. Having travelled in a boat all the way from the West alongside the several Noldo that had come to join Tulkas at Imladris apparently made him an expert and every decision Legolas made regarding his sales, rigging, course or assessment of the wind and weather was criticised, usually in a bellowing, sneering tone that the entire ship could hear. The wine was not good enough, the ship was too slow (though twelve knots was a speed any man-of-war or Indiaman of the Empire would have been rightly proud of), the cabins too pokey, the weather too hot, too wet, too blowy... indeed it took all Legolas's self-restraint when he found him leaning over the side one morning, bringing up the remains of his breakfast, not to sneak up behind him and give him an almighty shove overboard.
"How do you bear it?" he asked Finrod late one evening as they shared a bottle of Legolas's finest wine (which Fingolfin had declared was fit only for use in gravy, if that).
"Hmm? Oh, old grumpy-drawers, you mean?" Finrod shrugged. "You get used to it, old man. Water off a duck's back." He grinned. "Let's hope the wind picks up and he's confined to bed once more, eh?"
But a vomiting, groaning, roaring expletives, flinging the bedpan at servants' head Fingolfin was nearly as bad.
Then, to cap it all, two weeks sail out of port, the bosun, in a towering rage, explained to Legolas that, yes, he had indeed called 'Lord Fitzherbert' (aka Finrod) out, and he did not care two figs if he was the best sword in all of Europe, Africa and China to boot - 'the man has been making eyes at my wife, sir! MY WIFE!' (Mrs bosun was indeed on board ship, in the capacity of cook).
It was then, as Legolas pinched the bridge of his nose, took a depth breath and determined he would happily throttle the pair of them, that there was a shout of a sail having been sighted.
Pirates.
"Oh, this is ALL I need," Legolas muttered.
He was less than impressed when, on hearing it was pirates, Fingolfin decided he would take one of the small boats with Finrod and as many of his servants as would fit in it and 'row to one of those small Caribbean islands not too far distant.'
"Fight your battles for you, Legolas? Dear me, no. No, no, I shall wait in port for a sailor who can take me on my journey without drawing attention to himself on the high seas, thank you very much. NO, NO, DAMMIT! LOAD ALL MY TRUNKS INTO THE BOAT, DAMN YOUR EYES!"
The fact that he had managed to undermine Legolas's authority in the eyes of enough of the crew for them to steal away in the night in all but one of the remaining boats did little to improve Legolas's mood when he awoke with the dawn to find his one remaining midshipman shaking him from his reverie to say the pirates were but an hour's sail to larboard and the decks were cleared for action, sir, but we've barely enough men to man three of the fourteen guns.
'Remind me,' he thought to himself, ' never to sail without at least one other friendly ellon on board.'
The pirate vessel had them outgunned. For the sake of the men (the few women aboard had gone in the boats though they had needed little persuading - a wink from Finrod was all that had done it and all three had crammed themselves in with Fingolfin's servants, the bosun's wife never once looking back at her near apoplectic husband), Legolas saw little point in firing. Rather he insisted they cram into the one remaining boat and flee while they could while he defended his precious ship. Given the freedom to behave like the warrior ellon he was without his crew to watch him he knew he could give a boarding party of pirates something to think about, though it was probably his adrenalin and sheer bloodminded rage at the events that had led to this situation that were calling the shots in his brain at that particular moment.
That the remnants of his crew refused point blank said much for the respect Legolas had in the eyes of any man who had been under his command long enough to know the sort of captain and worthy seaman he was. Indeed they were perfectly correct when they said it was madness to stay and try and face a whole pirate ship alone, and out of the loyalty and love they bore him they would not let him do it.
"I'm sorry, sir," murmured the master's mate.
Legolas turned to him, wondering what he meant, in time to see the telescope come down on his head before he could stop it. Then, out like a light, they tied him up as best they could and dragged him into the small boat with them, pushing off and away but not before they set fire to the ship - The Greenwood - in an attempt to make their escape by cover of the smoke as well as deter the pirates.
Legolas came to just as the powder kegs on deck exploded. The language that issued from his mouth as he watched his precious ship, parts of which he helped to handbuild himself some forty years before, burst into smithereens, the aft sinking quickly into the foaming brine, hissing and sizzling as the fire dampened, taking the the last of his best French bordeaux, his second-best bow and a fine Japanese sword that Falle had given him as a begetting gift some years previously with it to the bottom of the sea, would have been enough to turn the midshipman's hair white... had he understood Sindarin, that is. It was a damn good job they had tied him up as well as they had. Even so he very nearly capsized them with his wriggling in fury. The glare in his eye told them they had better untie him and FAST, but even as they did so the pirates were bearing down on them, two small jollyboats full, roaring in fury at the destruction of their prize but swearing gleeful revenge on the survivors who they would either enjoy killing or could prove useful as new hands on board ship given they were several men down following a bout of Yellow Fever a few months before.
It all meant that by the time they had Legolas on deck, his hands tied behind his back and on his knees, he was so angry it was a wonder he did not do himself some sort of internal injury. The Pirate Captain was a cocky, lasivicious sort and was, frankly, none too picky about what he did and to whom (or what) be it by way of sadistic injury or carnal satisfaction.
"Why ain't you a pretty thing?" he purred, his breath stinking into Legolas's face as he bent down. "Whadya think, lads? Pretty as a picture, dontcha reckon? I think he'll do us very nicely." There was wild cheering and wide, leering grins. "I gets first pickings, though," he said turning back to Legolas with a gleam in his eye, stroking one grimy finger down Legolas's cheek even as he licked his lips. "They only gets ya when I'm done with ya, see?"
The glare in Legolas's eye was such that it should have warned the Pirate Captain what was coming and that he was playing a very dangerous game indeed, one that in fact he had already lost, though he little knew it, the moment he had caught sight of Legolas's sails and changed course to 'board and be damned, lads!' Legolas's hands were a blur as he whipped them free from the fastenings round his wrists, grabbed the cutlass of the nearest pirate's scabbard and sliced it clean through the neck of the Pirate Captain in front of him even as he leapt to his feet in one quick movement.
What followed does not perhaps bear repeating in detail, but suffice it to say the few pirates that survived (by jumping overboard - preferring to risk shark attack than stay on the ship and face one very pissed off ellon in full battle fury) could barely bring themselves to speak of it for long years after it. A demon, they said, a sea demon with a face as fair as a clear spring dawn but as savage as a hurricane, merciless, brutal.
"The deck awash with blood, I tells ya; men screaming, limbs flying: a massacre. I's seen blood 'n' gore a-plenty, but nothin' like this, nothin' like. A sword in each hand, twirlin' and dancin' like a sea funnel and fast? - faster than the eye could blink, damn 'im! Fuck me, when I's seen the cap'n's head fly past my ear, I swear I near soiled m'self and I know old Scabbie Joe did 'xactly tha'. I could smell it on 'im and he was crying like a babe and I've seen Scabbie Joe tear a man's ear off wi' his bare teeth but he knew, fuck, we all knew we was in serious trouble then. Even his own men were scared: could see it in their faces - pale they was and the boy with them sick to his stomach, it were comin' through his fingers with his hand to his mouth. It was every man for hisself, though some was foolish enough to stand to 'im and paid for it dear. Shrimpie Jack and Harris - you remember Harris? Could fuck a bull for breakfast that man, but he cut through 'im like he was butter before as he could even draw breath..."
The Legend of the Fair Demon of the Carribbean, a figure with hair the colour of living gold bedecked head to foot in the blood of his victims, a gleam in his eye that made any man run in terror, would render any sane man mad if he so much as looked him in the face, lived on for well over a hundred years and was told to sailors' children at night to scare them to sleep for many generations.
And the moral of the story?
Never upset a warrior ellon, or if you ever unfortunate enough to meet one, never EVER suggest that you are going to bugger him over the biscuit barrel and then let your friends do the same. You might not have time to live to regret it.