By Bubbles

in_parallax_lie@yahoo.ca

Another tear caressed his skin, wandered unhurried from cheekbone to jaw line and then down the pale column of throat. Another silver tear, an endless torrent. The river would not dry, and around him the forest watched, curious.

There. His first tired steps along the perimeter had been taken there, sorrow still wrenching itself from him in the sobs that had since diminished to shivers, had since faded still more until all that remained was the tears. And they would surely remain for eternity. He stopped, studied the rocks and the dark earth, listened to whispering trees and the stars that promised him their eternal friendship. Their eternal love. The promises warmed him not, nor eased the ache in his breast.

Where was his pride? He was an Elf, an Elven warrior, yet his tears sought to overwhelm him, his sorrows eternal. Where was the anger that should have fuelled him, made unimportant the Ranger’s actions and the meaning they so obviously held? He was Legolas, Prince of Mirkwood, and he had been egregiously harmed, had he not? For simply leaving the camp, leaving the borders within which the Fellowship rested, and while another indeed held watch? No risk had been presented to them over it, no risk but to himself, and he had returned with valuable information. Surveillance of a nearby band of Orcs and their Uruk-Hai masters, detected by his own keen ears while watch he had held. He had allowed the Fellowship advance warning of a nearby threat, warning that had been relevant enough for Aragorn to order they decamp hence, and so they had, and had moved on to safer ground. He had fulfilled his duties, and the Fellowship had benefited thus.

Yet had he been harmed for it, immediately upon the settling at their new camp. Aragorn had rounded on him, anger and disappointment flashing in his shadowed eyes. Had scolded him as though he were a misbehaving child, and in front of the others. Legolas had responded with the pride of his station, head set high, had denied Aragorn’s anger, Aragorn’s disappointment. Aye, he had left without warning, and had he been captured, there would have been no help come to him before the Orcs and Uruk-Hai could have their way. Aye, he had perhaps acted foolishly, and under the Ranger’s tirade had he come willing to admit such. In truth, uncertainty and regret had shadowed his indignation, but had Aragorn not been unreasonable? Had Aragorn not done him harm?

Legolas had stared, confusion and unease settling in his breast, when the Man had abruptly turned from him, strode away toward the forest’s edge. So much anger in those strides, the set of shoulders. So much anger for what he had done, a decision made with hardly a thought but for the good it would bring. Had he been rash in giving no word before his action, or had he known that permission for it would not come? Had he, in spirit, disobeyed Aragorn? Gazing after the Man, he had felt the first burn of tears in his eyes, and had fought them and wondered at how this could be mended.

He had not wondered long. Aragorn had returned, his strong fingers wrapped around a slender length of…something. A branch? Oh no…Legolas had felt confusion yield before the advance of shock, of incredulity. Of dread. When the Man had grasped his bicep and pushed him forcibly over to a flat rock at the camp’s edge, he had twisted away, fear driving him. He had considered flight, considered fighting the Man right there. But Aragorn had merely seized his arm again, tighter, had ground the details of his sentence out through a clenched jaw. And the others had intervened not, had indeed voiced their agreement. So much anger.

So he had yielded, had stripped upon command and lain himself silent down over the rock, had closed his eyes and rested his forehead in the cradle of his own folded arms. And the sentence had been carried out, pain filling him, his tears spilling in silver torrents onto cool stone. He had wordlessly begged for Aragorn’s mercy and had received it not. And eternity had thus passed.

Then the end had come, had come when Legolas had ceased to believe in anything but pain and sorrow, and he had been given just time to calm himself, to rise and dress. His mind, thoughts fractured and reeling, had fixed itself on a memory, one memory among many. Hobbits and their tricks. Hobbits and their delightful infuriating troubles. The fuss they made when caught, when sentenced. And then the end to their pain and sorrow, the end punctuated with a soothing hand ruffling soft locks, a soft voice and a warm embrace to dry their spilling tears. Aye, that was needed after such brutality, such needed and unwanted brutality. His mind settled in that memory, rested in its vague peace; his heart longed for such an end.

But, like mercy, he had received it not. Aragorn’s eyes had sought other sights upon which to settle, had fled from the sight of this disobeying Elf. Aragorn’s voice had held only chill as it ordered him from their keep, ordered him out into the cool forest to take watch, to resume his duties. His pride had left him unmourned; no anger had seethed in his heart. All had yielded as had he, all had bowed before the sorrow and the grief. The torrents of it, spilling. His Fellowship, that which he held so high, that which he sought to guard with his very life, had forsaken him, had turned its eyes to other sights. His fellows, those for whom he would fight and die gratefully. His comrades. His friends.

So had he yielded to the command, head down, grief spilling, and removed himself from their sight. So had he walked the silent perimeter as dusk massed. No Orcs in the distance, no threats to those he loved and who loved him no more. Silent as the gathering dark he had made himself, silent as the sentry he would always be, the one outside, the one alone. And had he fulfilled his duties, as would he always fulfill his duties. His pride yielded, gone.

He would take second watch, and see it done. Settling himself for rest but no sleep - nay sleep would not come for him this night - he pondered the observing stars and wondered what they believed in their ice and their fire, what they believed of the happenings in Middle Earth and beyond.

Ache. It settled in him as he himself settled. It swelled in his breast, filled him like the scent of a lover, anger and accusation flung about during jealous arguments, filled him like the waft of chill that remained after the lover was gone. An enemy to peace, to sleep…Elbereth, it was heavy. A heated prickling behind his eyes warned him of coming tears, and he let them come, and was silent.

His arm was still tired, still tired though it had no reason to be. The throbbing echo of a lost limb, a lost sorrow. His hand still felt the slender rough line of a switch, a brutality bound in green wood; his ears still heard the torrents of grief spilling, river-water spilling its cage, from his friend. And he let his own tears spill as though they held the past in their sway, as though they could now erase sorrows come and gone, unshed those tears that were not his.

Through the dark unreached by those unreachable stars, he gazed, and absently wiped the tears away. He shook himself gently, the weak loose shake that seeks to return feeling to a deadened limb, that tests to see if bones have broken or if the ache runs not that deep at all. He sought to return to himself, the Ranger. The leader who would see this Fellowship through its dangers, its challenges. The Man, the future King, who held such weight on him, who held the tears of others in his sway. And he gazed out, out to where Pride must still walk, where anger must still seethe, tears spent. The river dry.

Nay - he had not been unreasonable, had not been unreasonably brutal in the fact of it. They were all his charge, his mission, and upon his swift action their lives relied. Upon his judgement, his strength. That one of them had intentionally strayed, intentionally gone forth to act alone, this was untenable. That nothing more had befallen the precious one than a switch, this was to be celebrated, for anything else was unthinkable. Oh, the pride of an Elf.

Aragorn gazed into the ebony wood, star-sought and still dark, and knew that, when time came for second watch, Legolas would not come for him. Would not return to the scene of his humiliation so soon, creep silent among those who had borne it witness only hours past, and wake the one who had wrought it upon him. He would not, Aragorn knew, return so easily, but would seek the darker quieter reaches of the sympathetic trees, would seek their counsel and their healing touch. Legolas would wish - nay, would need - to return to himself, the proud Elf. The sentry, the keen eyes and ears that had more than once saved them all. His river of tears now only a bitter-dry bed, he would need to shake off the broken, weeping creature that had lain over a rock and spilled wordless torrents of apology while the switch fell and rose and fell again.

And there was the reason of it, the Man’s curt immediate command for the Elf to go, just go. Just dress himself and return to his patrol, his perimeter. While Aragorn had ached, had strained against the need to go to Legolas, to hold him and murmur soothing words into a delicate ear, to enfold him until those silver tears ran dry, he had not. Had instead uttered the command, dropping the accursed brutal instrument of all that pain into the fire. Flame and smoke that held nothing in their sway. The already done could not be undone with the burning of a branch. He had stood and not watched, not intruded further, further than such public and brutal intrusion, on his friend’s pride, and had studied the fire, the rock-stricken earth. Legolas had to be given time, distance, the knowledge that he was still trusted to keep his watch, to carry out his duties. And Aragorn had given that trust, would give also that time and distance though the instinct to comfort still raged, still spilled its torrents over his heart.

He would take second watch, though, and when he walked out into that darkness, when he hunted by the light of observing stars for an almost nonexistent track that would lead him to the Elf, then they would speak again. A word, perhaps, or two.

~Are you alright, Mellon nin?~

~I am fine, Aragorn…there is no cause for concern.~

~Yet it is felt, and love. Deeply, and you know that.~

~Aye. I know that.~

The wounds would heal, the distance no longer needed. The trust and pride mended.

He would take second watch, and see it done.

The End