I borrow characters and situations from Tolkien but they are his. I draw no profit other than the enriched imaginative life that I assume he intended me to gain.

Many thanks to Nilmandra for beta reading this for me.

*******

1.  Home

Legolas rode through the dusky evening light toward his father’s stables.  He had been a warrior for many years now and had come home on leave countless times, but this was the first time he had been home since he had been posted to the Woodland Realm’s chaotic south, and he had never been more dazed by the contrast between the peace surrounding Thranduil’s stronghold and the ugliness he had left behind.  Elves were returning home from their day’s pursuits singing snatches of song and lingering for a moment in the cool evening of the early spring that had tentatively begun to put in an appearance after the longest winter in memory.  This is why we battle as we do, he reminded himself, so that people can live in peace like this.

“I will be leaving you now, Legolas,” Beliond said from behind him.

Legolas twisted to look at his bodyguard, who had halted his horse and now looked ready to be off.  “Why do you not come home with me for a day or two?” he asked, although he already knew what Beliond would say.

His keeper shook his head. “Thank you for the invitation, but I would rather spend some time alone in the woods.  This is good weather for camping.”

Legolas nodded. “I will see you in a week then.” Beliond raised a hand and then turned his horse and rode back toward the woods they had just left.  Legolas smiled to himself. Beliond had seen him almost to his father’s doorstep before feeling it was safe to leave him.  Legolas supposed he could understand the other Elf’s caution. Thranduil had charged him with Legolas’s safety, and Beliond had no wish to fail at that charge.

He chirped softly to his horse and rode on into the stable yard, where an attendant came running to take charge of his horse.  “Welcome home, my lord!” he cried, as Legolas slid to the ground.

“Mae govannen,” Legolas returned, pulling his packs off the horse’s back.  “I was just thinking how good it was to be home.”  He left his horse in the attendant’s capable hands and started along the path that ran through the palace gardens to the bridge leading to the Great Doors. The gardens were only just beginning to show the buds and green shoots of spring. The Forest River, which ran along one edge of the garden, had evidently flooded like just about every other waterway in the realm when the deep snows of winter had finally melted, and he found a gardener’s helper cleaning mud it had left on the high stone wall that gave the garden privacy.

“Am I less interesting than a stone wall?” asked a familiar voice, and he spun to find his brother Eilian regarding him with amusement from his seat on one of the garden benches.

“Eilian!”  He dropped his packs and pulled his brother to his feet to embrace him.  The last time he had seen Eilian, his brother had been lying on a litter, half-conscious and waiting to be carried home with a wound to the hip that would not stop bleeding because of the poison that the Orc who made it had spread on his scimitar.  The letters from home that Legolas had since received had been guarded in what they said, but it had been obvious to him that Eilian’s survival had been a near thing and that those at home had sometimes been close to despair.

Suddenly recollecting himself, Legolas drew back hastily.  “Are you allowed to stand?” he asked.  “I am sorry. I did not think.”

Eilian laughed. “Do not worry, Nana. I am allowed not only to stand but also to take walks, so long as I am careful not to alarm Adar or the healers by looking as if I might outpace an elfling.” He hugged Legolas again and then surprised him by saying, “Thank you, brat. I was not coherent enough to say so before I was sent home, but it is abundantly clear to me that I would have died had you not been with me.”

Not knowing how to respond, Legolas shrugged in embarrassment. “What are brothers for?” he asked lightly, and they both laughed.  It was a phrase they sometimes shared when they had cooperated in an action that their father might not have wholeheartedly endorsed.

Legolas picked up his packs again, and they began to walk toward the bridge.  From the corner of his eye, he watched Eilian make his way along and was pleased to see that his brother walked with only a very slight hitch to his step, one that an observer probably would not even have noticed if he had not known enough to look for it.

They emerged from the gardens and turned to cross the bridge to find Thranduil waiting for them at the top of the steps.  Legolas laughed and ran up to give a perfunctory bow and then throw his arms around his father.  “I should have known you would hear I was home before I did,” he joked.

Thranduil grasped his shoulders and held him at arm’s length. “You are too thin,” he decided.  He drew Legolas into the palace and toward the corridor where the family’s apartments were. “Would you like to come and have wine now, or would you rather bathe and rest first?”  He looked over his shoulder.  “Mind the steps, Eilian,” he said.  Legolas glanced back to see his brother make a face and had to smother a laugh.

“I had better bathe and put on clean clothes anyway,” Legolas told his father.  “I probably smell as if I have spent the last three months in the company of warriors and horses.”

Thranduil laughed.  “So you do,” he admitted.  “Take your time.  Ithilden is not home yet, and Alfirin has told the servants to wait evening meal for you.”  He left Legolas at the door to his chamber and went on to the family’s sitting room.

Eilian had followed them in and now clapped Legolas on the shoulder.  “It is good to have you home, brat,” he said.  “It seemed unnatural for you to be fighting Orcs while I was not there to protect you.”  Then he followed their father.

Legolas stood for a second looking after them.  Sometimes the sheer normalcy of home was the most shocking thing about it.  He opened the door to his familiar chamber, and almost before the door had closed behind him, he began shedding clothes to take a hot bath.  The thought very thought of it made him groan with anticipation.

An hour later, when he finally managed to pull himself out of the bath and dress for evening meal, he found his family waiting for him in the sitting room, lacking only his nephew, Sinnarn, who was away with the Northern Border Patrol.  Thranduil and Eilian remained seated, but Ithilden got up to clasp arms with him, and Alfirin planted a kiss on his cheek.  “Are you ready to eat?” his sister-in-law asked. “Or would you prefer to wait a while yet?”

“Whatever you prefer,” Legolas told her. In truth, he was hungry, but the Long Winter had brought short rations and he was cautious about admitting it, lest he look as if he were asking for more than his share.

“Come then,” she said and took his arm to lead him to the dining room. They waited for Thranduil to take his seat and then they all sat down.  Servants put rather sparsely filled plates of fish and wild mushrooms in front of them and then withdrew.  No one commented on the food supply, and Legolas was simply grateful for how excellently it had been prepared.  He could ignore the shortages for a few more weeks, he thought. Game birds were beginning to appear again, and when the flooding receded, the Elves would plant spring vegetables. They would not starve.

“Did you hear anything more about the flooding downriver today?” Ithilden asked Thranduil.  Legolas listened with interest to see what his father would say.  The Forest River could be troublesome after a winter of heavy snow.

The king shook his head.  “The area most likely to be in danger is that settlement a league or so from the forest’s edge. The river banks are low there. But you know how those settlers are. They are likely to believe they can manage on their own until they become desperate and then demand that we provide immediate help.”

Seated next to Legolas, Eilian made a wry face.  He was courting a maiden who lived in one of the settlements scattered throughout the forest and had reason to know that the settlers could be difficult.  Or rather, Legolas amended, Eilian was trying to court the maiden.  She had been refusing all contact with him, even to returning his letters unread. But Legolas knew that Eilian had recently gotten a letter from her that was more encouraging.  Indeed, he had half expected to find Eilian away from home visiting her, but perhaps his brother was not yet well enough to travel.

“Have the healers given you permission to ride yet?” he asked Eilian.

“Not yet. I will see Belówen tomorrow and intend to ask him about it then.”

Thranduil frowned.  “Do not try to do too much too soon, Eilian,” he instructed.

Eilian sighed.  “No, Adar.”

Legolas smiled down at his plate.  Eilian sounded as if he had been home and under their father’s eye for a little too long. Thranduil tended to fuss endlessly when one of them was injured.

“Have an extra piece of fish, Legolas,” said Thranduil, causing Legolas to lift his surprised gaze in time to see his father moving a piece of fish from his own plate to Legolas’s.  “I am not hungry, and you are too thin.”

Legolas opened his mouth to protest and then shut it again when he saw the set of his father’s jaw.  He looked at the fish and then raised his eyes to trade looks with Eilian.  “Has he been like this the entire time you have been home?” he asked.

“Yes,” Eilian responded gloomily.  “And it was worse for me because I was bedridden. It was like being an infant at the mercy of an overly concerned nurse.”

“You two need to show more respect,” said Thranduil severely, but no one at the table was fooled.  The king was deeply contented to have all three sons home and more or less intact. And if they wanted to tease him, that was all the better, so long as Legolas ate the fish and Eilian obeyed every stricture the healers set for him.

***

Eilian shifted impatiently.  He had arrived at the infirmary early this morning only to find that Belówen was busy with an elfling who had broken his wrist, and he was going to have to wait.  How much longer was the wretched healer going to be with the inconsiderate elfling?  Unable to resist, he took a tattered letter from his belt and began to read, although, in truth, he had read the letter so often that he had it memorized and did not need it before him to know what it said.

My Dearest Eilian,

I begin this letter by calling you “my dearest” and then find I do not know how to go on.

You will no doubt be surprised to hear from me, for I have told you often enough not to visit me or even write.  I had reasons to tell you to stay away, of course, sensible reasons that could not be doubted. You and I had duties that called for us to live apart in a dangerous time that could see either of us called to the Halls of Mandos at a moment’s notice.  I did not want to leave you alone for all of time and did not want to be left alone myself.  It would kill me to bond with you and then lose you, my love, and I knew it.

But I am not so sure I would have kept you away for so long if I had not also been angry. And I have been angry; I confess it.  I have always known that you liked the company of other maidens, but I had convinced myself that in seeking them out, you were only playing a game and that everyone involved knew the game’s rules.  And then I found I had not convinced myself at all.  I heard you sought the company of another, and I burned with jealousy and anger.  And when you stopped writing to me, I added despair to my anger and vowed that if you could cease to care, then so could I.

But in this terrible winter, I have been unable to stop myself from thinking of you.  I had learned to accept the fact that you throw yourself into danger as a warrior, but somehow I cannot bear to think of you as cold or hungry. How odd.

I miss you.  Whether I will be alone for all of time seems less important to me now than that I be with you for the time that I can.  I would rather risk losing you than never see you again. It is selfish of me, I know, but I cannot help it.  Indeed, I find I have no choice but to risk overwhelming grief.  I am already lost to reason.

If you have indeed ceased to care about me or have given your heart to someone else, then I do not wonder and I do not blame you.  I would never wish you to be anything but as happy and as well loved as you deserve to be.   But, Eilian, if you still care about me as you once did, then please come.  Surely we are entitled at least to see one another. Surely we have earned that.

Yours in truth, whether I wish it or not,

Celuwen

Eilian felt a hot flare of anger as he dwelled for a moment on Celuwen’s despair because she thought he had stopped writing her. He had written and his letters had been returned unopened, and Celuwen was not the only one who had felt despair.  And then, of course, he had stopped writing. He was reasonably sure where the blame lay for the undelivered letters.  Celuwen’s father had never liked Eilian and had done all in his power to prevent him from coming near her.

The door to the room opened and he hastily put his letter away as Belówen entered. “Let us see how you are doing,” the healer said, as Eilian slid his leggings off his left hip and shifted to lie on his right side.

He twisted his head to watch as the healer inspected the scimitar wound.  Belówen prodded the angry red mark, and Eilian flinched and then frowned impatiently.  What could possibly be taking so long?  Any fool could see that the gash that had taken so long to heal was still closed, just as it had been a week ago when Belówen had told him he might begin going out of the palace.  “You see that it has not started bleeding again,” he said. “So I should be allowed greater freedom of movement, do you not think?”

Belówen gave a noncommittal murmur and then straightened up from his examination.  Eilian pulled his leggings into place and began fastening them up. “How is the pain?” Belówen asked.  “Has it grown worse as you moved about more?”

Eilian shrugged impatiently. “The pain is nothing.”

Belówen raised a skeptical eyebrow.  “Do you need the herbs at night to sleep?”

Eilian hesitated. “Yes,” he admitted, “but no more than I did when you were insisting that I be carried everywhere.”  He knew he sounded disgusted, but he had found it humiliating to be carried from his bed to a chair in the sitting room or dining room, even when Thranduil or Ithilden had been the one to do it.  But he had been on his own two feet for three weeks now, and while that was better than being carried, he had had about enough of being limited to easy walks around the area near his father’s stronghold.  He had things he wanted to do and was eager to be about doing them.

Belówen sighed.  “The poison on the Orc’s blade was strong, Eilian, and the wound is going to be slow to heal completely.  In truth, you are lucky to still be alive.”

Eilian knew that. If Legolas had not been with him when the Orc came out of nowhere, Eilian would certainly be dead, but his younger brother had been there, and to Eilian’s mind, there was no use in dwelling on the tragedies that might have happened.  He had never seen much point in that.

“Can I ride?” Eilian asked.

Belówen grimaced and then with obvious reluctance said, “You can try it. Take someone with you the first time, in case the wound reopens and you need help getting home. If your hip pains you more afterwards, come and see me.  Otherwise I will see you in a week.”

Eilian could feel a grin spreading across his face as he slid off the examining table to stand facing the healer.  “So I am not yet fit enough to go back to my patrol?”

Belówen looked confused by Eilian’s failure to protest that he was ready to hunt Orcs, Wargs, and whatever else the Shadow bred in the southern reaches of Thranduil’s realm.  On previous occasions when he had been injured, Eilian had driven the healer to distraction by nagging him for permission to return to active duty.

“No,” Belówen responded, “you are not, and I will tell Ithilden that, so you need not go to the trouble of trying to convince him to send you anyway.”

Eilian laughed and slapped Belówen on the shoulder.  “I would never think of doing such a thing.” 

Belówen snorted. “Of course not,” he said dryly and then left the room with Eilian in his wake. The healer turned left down the infirmary hall and Eilian went right to go out into the cool spring morning.  For a moment, he closed his eyes, lifted his face to the warmth of the sun, and inhaled deeply to draw in the scent of mud and new grass.  The weather itself told him how long he had been bedridden and then confined to the palace, for when he had been carried home, the longest winter in memory had still had the Woodland Realm in its grip.  And now spring was here, with new life and new hope stirring the blood of all the forest creatures, including the Wood-elves.

With purpose in his every move, Eilian set off along the path the led back toward the palace, scanning the Elves who lingered near the various warrior training fields along the way as he did so. Finally, he spotted the person he was looking for watching an advanced archery class.  I might have known, he thought, with a small smile. At that moment, Legolas caught sight of him and came trotting toward him.

“Can you ride?” he asked.  Eilian had earlier invited Legolas to wait for him this morning, hoping that they could ride together.

“We are about to find out,” Eilian told him and with shared smiles, the two of them headed toward Thranduil’s stables.  They brought their horses out into the yard, and Eilian was aware of Legolas hovering near him as he mounted his horse for the first time in three months.  He felt a slight stiffness in his left leg as he leapt onto the animal’s back but was pleased to find that he could move well enough to both mount the horse and guide it with pressure from his thighs and soft words, just as he had always been able to do.  He grinned at his younger brother. “What are you waiting for?” he demanded and urged his horse into a trot, leaving Legolas to scramble onto his own horse and catch up.

Eilian led them into the forest, reveling in the chance to be among the trees again.  They were murmuring their spring song of awakening and seemed to him to be glad to see him again after so long an absence.  He was in no hurry just now, for he desperately wanted to prove that he could spend time on horseback without reopening his wound, and he was sensible enough to know that a slower pace would be easier on him.  So Legolas soon caught up, and the two of them rode side by side chatting companionably.

“How have things been with my patrol?” Eilian asked. Thranduil and Ithilden had refused to tell him anything about the Southern Patrol’s activities, and in truth, for a while he had been so ill that he could not ask.

Legolas turned and grinned at him, presumably amused by the way he claimed the Southern Patrol as his own property, but he answered placidly enough. “We have been busy, as usual.  The Orcs are hungry, for they feel the shortage of game as much as we do.”

Eilian grimaced and after a moment said, “You seem to have done well, Legolas.  I am proud of you.”

His brother smiled slightly and hesitated. Then he asked, “Eilian, I do not mean to pry, but are you perhaps planning to try to see Celuwen again?”

Eilian bit his lip. “How much of her letter did you read?”  He had been too ill to read his own mail and Legolas had been the one to open Celuwen’s letter.

“Not much,” Legolas responded.  “I read only enough to know I should not be reading it.”

“I am going to see her,” Eilian said soberly.  “And I will not allow her to send me away again.”

“How are you going to do that?” Legolas asked.

Eilian grinned. “I have charms for her that I do not have for you,” he said blithely.

Legolas laughed. “I suppose you do.”

“What I need,” Eilian went on, “is for you to tell Adar that I am fit to ride.”  He looked at Legolas steadily.

His brother met his gaze. “Then we had better find out if you are,” he said and urged his horse into a gallop. After a moment’s pause, Eilian could only follow.  Trust the brat to take his responsibility seriously, he thought in dismay.

I borrow characters and situations from Tolkien but they are his. I draw no profit other than the enriched imaginative life that I assume he intended me to gain.

Many thanks to Nilmandra for beta reading this for me.

*******

2.  Trouble in the Settlements

The long spring afternoon was waning and rain clouds were gathering when Eilian and Legolas rode back into the stable yard.  Eilian could not remember ever having been so glad to reach the end of a ride.  Legolas had soon slowed his from his initial gallop, but he had then led Eilian on a lengthy jaunt through all the nearer parts of the forest.  At first, Eilian had thought that his brother was intent on putting Eilian’s ability to ride to as thorough a test as possible, but when Legolas threw back his head, laughed aloud, and began to sing, he had realized that his younger brother was also reveling in simply being in a healthy forest where the trees sang in contentment.

With a grimace, he had remembered that Legolas had just returned from his first posting in the realm’s south where the forest moaned with distress or worse, stayed silent altogether.  It had been many years since Eilian had experienced the shock of what the south was like and then come home to the further shock of normal life.  Judging from his own experience, he knew it would take Legolas a day or two to learn to live normally again, to relax from constant vigilance and accept the slow way time flowed when battle and death were not daily companions.  In many ways, it was a change that Eilian still had difficulty accepting, which was why he constantly insisted on being posted back south again.

For a while, Eilian had enjoyed being out in the woods again too. He had been confined for far too long, first to his bed and then to the palace.  But then his hip had begun to throb, and with every jolting stride his horse took, the pain had gradually intensified.  He had controlled his movements and the look on his face as carefully as he could, but he had still worried that Legolas would notice his discomfort and tell their father that Eilian should not be riding.  If that happened, Eilian resolved, he would not accept Legolas’s judgment and would ride anyway, but he would have to either deceive Thranduil or defy him to do it, and the consequences of either course of action would be unpleasant enough that he would prefer not to take them.

A stable hand came running to take their horses.  Ordinarily, Eilian preferred to care for his own horse, but this afternoon, he wanted to get back to his chamber, check his wound, and then soak in a hot bath before he subjected himself to the sharp eyes of his father.  But when he slid off his horse, the pain that stabbed through his left leg surprised him enough that he could not entirely suppress a gasp. Legolas turned abruptly toward him from where he too had just dismounted.

“What is the matter?” he demanded sharply. “Does your wound hurt?”

“No,” Eilian lied quickly. “You would be groaning too if you had not sat a horse in three months before the ride we just took.”

Legolas’s eyes narrowed, and Eilian was hard put to meet them, but he forced his face into as cheery an expression as he could manage and returned Legolas’s gaze with what he trusted was a steady look.  At length, Legolas sighed and looked away, with one hand absently patting his horse’s neck.

“My lords?” the attendant said tentatively, and Eilian surrendered his horse.

“Come,” he prompted Legolas. “I want to see what hot water will do for my sore backside and then I want to talk to Adar before evening meal.”

Legolas joined him in walking toward the palace. “You will ask him for permission to go and visit Celuwen?” he said in what was more statement than question.

Eilian nodded, all his concentration on keeping his walk as normal as possible. When Legolas said nothing more, Eilian glanced at him and found him regarding the path thoughtfully.

When they had almost reached the bridge, the storm that had threatened increasingly all afternoon suddenly broke loose.  A few fat drops of rain struck their bare heads and plopped onto the ground, and then the skies opened and a waterfall of cold spring rain poured down on them.  Eilian braced himself, assuming that Legolas would run the last hundred yards or so to the shelter of the Great Doors, but his brother kept walking at a steady pace. As if feeling Eilian’s quizzical gaze upon him, Legolas raised his eyes to Eilian and smiled faintly. “A little rain will not hurt us,” he asserted.

Eilian blinked.  Like most Wood-elves, he usually enjoyed rain, but under ordinary circumstances he would not have chosen to be out in this freezing downpour.  Before he could say anything, however, they had crossed the bridge and entered the palace with water dripping from their cloaks and hair.  They surrendered their cloaks to the attendant who came toward them with a cry of dismay as soon as they entered the family’s wing and then started down the hallway toward their chambers.

“Good luck with Adar,” Legolas said, opening the door to his own room.  Eilian nodded, too preoccupied with making it to his own room to respond.

Once in his chamber, he hurriedly unfastened his leggings and shoved them down to inspect his hip.  The wound was aching enough that he was almost surprised to find that it looked the same as it had when Belówen had examined it earlier in the day.  It is just pain then, he thought.  A bath will help.  And he made his way toward his bathing chamber, shedding wet clothes as he went.

***

Thranduil looked up from the dispatch he was reading at the sound of a knock on the door to his office. “Come in,” he bid, and Eilian entered the room.

“May I speak to you for a few moments, Adar?” he asked.

“Of course.” Thranduil waved him toward one of the chairs in front of his desk and watched as Eilian walked steadily across the room and seated himself.  He had been expecting Eilian to approach him like this for several days now, ever since his son had begun to be more mobile.  He sat back in his chair and waited for Eilian to begin.

Eilian drew a deep breath.  “I would like your leave to go and visit Celuwen.”

Unsurprised, Thranduil nodded.  When Eilian had first come home, he had had a letter from Celuwen clutched in his hand, but he had been too weak to read it.  In the frightening days and nights that followed, Thranduil had been at his bedside almost constantly, and to his immense gratification, he had been the one whom Eilian asked to read the letter out loud to him on those occasions when he was able to ask for anything at all.  He had known for years that Eilian loved this maiden, and her letter had made it clear that she loved him in return. The only question now was what they should do about it in the face of the duties and dangers surrounding them both. Or rather, that was the only question if one assumed that Eilian was well enough to travel to the settlement in which Celuwen lived.

“I spoke to Belówen after he saw you,” Thranduil said. “He tells me that you may not be able to ride any distance for a while.”

“I did well this afternoon,” Eilian asserted. “I will probably have a few sore muscles because I have not ridden in a while, but my wound looks just as it did.”

Thranduil studied his son’s set face and decided that he needed more than Eilian’s word for his readiness to ride. “Legolas rode with you, did he not?” he asked. When Eilian nodded, he instructed, “Ask one of the servants to fetch him.”

Eilian opened his mouth as if to protest and then thought better of it and went to the door to speak to a servant in the hallway. He resumed his seat to wait in silence until there was a brief tap at the door and Legolas entered in response to Thranduil’s command.

“Did you want me, Adar?” he asked, eyeing Eilian questioningly.

“Yes,” Thranduil said crisply and then turned to Eilian.  “Eilian, would you wait in the hall for a few moments, please?”  Eilian looked startled and then slowly rose and made his way to the door.  Thranduil did not miss the fact that he rolled his eyes at Legolas as he passed him.  Legolas started to grin and then suppressed it when he saw Thranduil watching him. The door closed behind Eilian.

Thranduil turned to Legolas. “You observed Eilian as you rode together today?”  Legolas nodded.  “I want you to tell me whether you think your brother is ready to ride as far as the settlement in which Celuwen lives.”

Legolas hesitated.  “I saw nothing that would indicate otherwise,” he finally said. Thranduil raised an eyebrow and waited in silence, and Legolas grimaced. “I think his leg pains him,” he added reluctantly, “but the settlement is only a day’s ride away, and it is inside the area patrolled by the border guards, so he is unlikely to run into any problems.”

Thranduil considered this answer.  “Very well,” he nodded.  “You may go. Send Eilian back in.”  His youngest son bowed slightly and then left the room. A second later, Eilian entered with a cautiously hopeful look.  Legolas had undoubtedly given him some sort of encouraging signal, Thranduil thought. He gestured Eilian back into his chair.

“So may I go?” Eilian asked.

Thranduil paused.  “What is it you intend to do when you get there, iôn-nín?” he asked gently.

“See Celuwen,” Eilian said immediately. “Tell her that I did write to her and that I have not found another maiden.”  The resentment he felt for whatever Celuwen’s father had told her and had done was obvious.

Thranduil picked up the jeweled dagger he used as a letter opener and began toying with it.  “Is that all?” he asked.

“I will have to see what she says before I know what else I can do,” Eilian said.  Then he drew in a deep breath. “Would you object to a betrothal, Adar?”

Thranduil put the dagger down and regarded him in silence for a moment.  “No, I would not.”  Eilian’s anxious face dissolved into joy, and he opened his mouth to speak, but Thranduil put up his hand to stop him. “I would not object to a betrothal, Eilian, so long as I know that you have thought seriously about your actions.  You know as well as I do that such a betrothal would probably have to last longer than the customary year.  You are away for all but a few weeks during a year, and bonding would be most unwise under those circumstances.”

“I do not see why,” Eilian protested.

“Then you are not thinking,” Thranduil responded sharply.  “What is Celuwen to do when you are away?  Is she to live here by herself?  Is that fair to her?  Would she stay with her parents?  How would you feel about that, Eilian?  You and her adar are hostile enough to one another. Moreover, you might recall that a marriage is the joining of two houses as well as two people.  Her parents have to approve of this match too, unless she wishes to break from them, which I assume she does not.  Are you prepared to do what is necessary to make yourself acceptable to them?  For that matter, are you sure there is anything you can do that would make you acceptable?”

Eilian’s mouth was set in a stubborn line.  “Her parents would come around,” he asserted.

Exasperated, Thranduil brought his palm down hard on his desk. “That is exactly the attitude I was afraid you would take.  You have no right to force Celuwen into such a situation.  And there is another consideration that should shape your action too,” he went on. “You know that the Elves in the settlements are sometimes difficult to govern.  As my son, you must take care not to push them further away from my care.  I have a responsibility to them, and, because of who you are, so do you.”

Eilian’s eyes were on the floor.  “Are you denying me permission to ask her to wed?” he asked without raising them.

“Have you heard me at all, Eilian?” Thranduil asked sharply.

“Yes.”  He still did not meet Thranduil’s eyes.

Thranduil hesitated for a moment and then sighed. “You have my permission to ask her to wed if her parents will consent.”

Eilian let out a deep breath and then rose.  “I will get ready to leave immediately,” he announced.  His face was impassive.

“You will leave tomorrow,” Thranduil interposed.  “In case you have not noticed, it is raining and you have been ill.  A good night’s rest will not come amiss, especially since you are obviously in pain and you will not want to take herbs to dull it enough to sleep while you are in the forest.”

Eilian grimaced but nodded.  “Yes, Adar,” he said, sounding almost suspiciously submissive.

Thranduil watched him leave the room and fervently hoped that his mercurial second son might finally be mature enough to sort matters out with this maiden.

***

Legolas started hurriedly down the hallway toward the dining room.  He had overslept and was late for morning meal. His bed had seemed unbelievably comfortable after sleeping for the last three months first in hollowed out mounds of snow and then on blankets spread over wet ground.  When he reached the door to the dining room, he met Eilian coming out.

“Good. I did not want to leave without saying goodbye,” Eilian said.

“You are leaving for Celuwen’s settlement then?”

“Yes. And, Legolas, thank you.”

Legolas did not have to ask what Eilian was thanking him for.  Legolas had told their father that he had seen no problem with Eilian’s ability to ride, and that was true. And while it was also true that he had not looked very hard, Eilian had done well enough the previous afternoon that Legolas did not have the heart to stop him from going on this trip.  He grimaced now. “What are brothers for?” he asked lightly.

Eilian laughed and went off toward his chamber to collect his belongings while Legolas entered the dining room.  “I am sorry I am late,” he apologized, but Thranduil seemed unconcerned.

“You must have needed the rest,” he said.  Legolas could not help smiling to himself as he recalled the years of his childhood and youth when lateness to meals was an offense for which he had often been scolded. Apparently a warrior home on leave merited different treatment.  He helped himself to porridge, ignoring how thin it was.

“There is honey for the porridge,” Alfirin told him, holding the ceramic bowl out to him with both hands as if it contained something precious.  Legolas took it from her gratefully.  During this winter with the Southern Patrol, he had eaten many meals consisting of porridge alone, and honey was a luxury unheard of there.

A servant entered the room with a message that he gave to Thranduil.  “I am sorry, my lord,” he said, “but the Elf who brought the message said it was urgent.”

Thranduil broke the seal, read the message, and groaned.  “Last night’s rain apparently swelled the river enough to do real damage at the settlement near the forest’s edge.  And just as I predicted, they are demanding our help.”  He looked at Ithilden.  “The help they are asking for will not be easy to provide. I will need to meet with my advisors this morning.  Will you see to it that they are summoned?”

“Of course,” Ithilden answered and rose immediately.  He bent to kiss Alfirin’s cheek. “By your leave,” he said to Thranduil and left the room.  Legolas had always been grateful that it was Ithilden and not he who had to sit through meetings with Thranduil’s advisors.  He had occasionally been required to attend for some reason or other and when the meetings were not excruciatingly boring, they were tense with arguments. It used to amaze him that his notoriously impatient father managed to survive them, but he had gradually come to appreciate the considerable amount of wily diplomacy that Thranduil exercised at these gatherings.  Thranduil was not bored at the meetings because, whether the advisors knew it or not, he was always in control of them, and he was never bothered by the arguments because he simply ended them whenever he chose.

“What are you going to do today, Legolas?” Alfirin asked, as the rest of them were finishing their meal.

He could feel a smile spreading over his face. “I am going to visit Annael and his family.  He is off duty this morning.”

When Legolas had sent word to his friend that he was home, he had gotten an immediate invitation to call as early in the day as he could manage because Annael had to ride out on a Home Guard patrol in the afternoon.   Thus, he set off for Annael’s cottage immediately after leaving the dining room.  Although there were worrisome clouds in the west and north, the storm of the day before had passed, and watery spring sunshine was now filtering through the branches of trees that were just beginning to leaf. Legolas sang to them as he walked along, rejoicing in their company, just as he had done the previous afternoon when he had ridden with Eilian.  After the twisted forest of the south, the woods here were startlingly alive.  Legolas could feel tension draining from back muscles that he had spent the last three months tensing again attack from any direction at any time.

The door to Annael’s cottage flew open before he had a chance to knock on it, and Annael’s mother stood on the doorstep with her hands out to greet him. “I saw you from the kitchen window,” Elowen smiled, pulling his head down to kiss his cheek. “How are you?”

“I am well.”  Legolas embraced her fondly and then stepped back to look at her.  Like nearly every Elf in the realm, Elowen was somewhat thinner than he remembered her, but the contented look on her face had not changed. “You look wonderful,” he told her, and she laughed and drew him into the cottage.

As they entered the hallway, Annael came from the sitting room to clasp arms with him.  “Mae govannen,” they said simultaneously and grinned at one another. They had been friends for as long as either of them could remember.

“Go on in,” Elowen urged. “I will get tea.”

“Do not bother,” Legolas told her hastily. “I just finished morning meal.” He certainly did not want to consume any of Elowen’s supply of tea.

The three of them went into the sitting room, where Annael’s wife, Beliniel, sat sewing.  Legolas greeted her as happily as he had the others.  The only family member missing was Annael’s daughter, Emmelin, who was one of Thranduil’s foresters. “Where is the third female who governs your life?” he asked his friend.

Annael laughed.  “Emmelin is out checking some of the fish traps they have been able to set since the streams and ponds began to thaw.”

Legolas sat down to pass the morning with these friends, sensible once again of how strange it felt to be so at ease.

***

Thanduil entered the small council chamber and seated himself, signaling to his advisors as he did so that they might take their chairs too.  “I received a message this morning from the settlement that lies on the Forest River just inside the realm’s borders,” he began without preamble.  Last night’s rain drove the river over its banks there again, and a large tree whose roots had been loosened by the previous flooding toppled over.  Unfortunately, when it fell, it knocked down a second tree that had been thought far enough from the river to be safe, and in this tree was the flet where the settlers had stored their food supplies.  By the time they realized what had happened and waded through the water to rescue what they could, most of their supplies had been swept away.  They now have food for only a few meals and have asked us to send what food we can spare, particularly for their children.”

He swept his gaze around the table, noting his advisor’s reactions to this unwelcome news.  Their dismay was only too evident, and they sat in stunned silence for a moment.

“My lord,” Galivion finally said, “we have no food to spare.  Indeed, the supplies we have are scarcely enough to feed those living here near the stronghold until we can count on having game and grain enough to replace them.”  It had been Galivion’s task to manage the centralized food store that had been established when the winter had stretched on and the scarcity of their supplies had become evident.

“But we cannot just ignore the settlers’ request,” Thrior objected.  “We have worked too hard to bind them to us to risk alienating them now.”

“It does not matter what risk we take by ignoring their request,” Galivion objected.  “We cannot meet it. We do not have the resources.”

“How much food do we have?” Thranduil interposed before his two advisors could begin arguing with one another rather than attending to the problem at hand.

Galivion did not even hesitate before he began reeling off an inventory of the amount of acorn meal, dried meat, and root vegetables stored in the caverns.  “That would constitute about three weeks’ supply,” he added, “assuming that we continue to ration it out in the same way we have been doing.”

Thranduil grimaced.  He had known what their supply levels were, of course, for Galivion reported them to him each day, but somehow hearing them spoken about in such a plain manner made their paucity more evident.  They all sat for a moment in grim silence.

“Will we need to continue supplying people in the same way?” Thrior finally ventured.  “Fish are available again now, as are geese and ducks.”

“We might be able to supplement our supplies with hunting,” Galivion conceded.  “Indeed, I had counted on our doing that soon because we have so little left in any case. But we would be taking a great risk, for we cannot be certain how plentiful game will be after the hardships of the winter.”

“I could ask the Home Guard to send some of its warriors out in hunting parties,” Ithilden suggested.  “Doing so would thin our defenses, of course, and the Orcs are hungry too.”

“Do so,” Thranduil directed, grateful as always for Ithilden’s sensible presence.  He turned to Galivion. “Can the rations be reduced for a few weeks?”

Galivion looked distressed.  “The adults would probably be able to manage for a few weeks,” he said, “although in truth people are on short enough rations as it is. But we could not reduce the amount for the children.”

“Of course not,” Thranduil agreed, “but there are children in the settlement too.”

“We cannot send as much as they have asked for,” Galivion maintained.

“How much could we send if we reduce rations for adults and assume that hunters will bring home meat each day?” Thranduil asked.

Galivion hesitated.  “Not knowing how successful the hunters will be, it is hard to say,” he said reluctantly, “but we could perhaps send as much as two-thirds of what they request.”

Thranduil nodded. “Do so,” he instructed.  “You will deliver it to them yourself.  Ithilden will send guards as well.”  His oldest son nodded and added to the list of notes he always kept at these meetings.

“My lord,” Thrior said in distress, “we will need to make an effort to convince the settlers that we have done all we can.  They must not see our failure to send them all they ask for as a sign of neglect on our part.”

Thranduil considered Thrior’s claim and came to the reluctant conclusion that he was right. He would have to make some gesture to demonstrate how much he cared for the well-being of the Elves in the settlement.  A possibility suddenly occurred to him that made him flinch.  And yet he could not see that he had much choice.

“I will send Legolas with those who deliver the food,” Thranduil said slowly.  “He can explain our position, and the fact that I send one of my sons to them should convince them that I am taking them seriously.”  Ithilden’s head turned sharply toward his father at this piece of news, but he said nothing, and the other advisors too considered the idea in silence for a moment.

“Legolas has shown himself to react well to stress when acting as a warrior,” Thrior allowed.  “He has no experience in diplomatic situations though.”  He glanced toward Ithilden.  “Would it be possible for you to go, my lord?” he asked.

“Ithilden is needed here,” Thranduil said before Ithilden could answer.  “The defense of the realm is his first responsibility.  Legolas will do well, I believe, and for everything, there is a first time.”

He rose, drawing everyone else to their feet too.  “See to it that the supplies are ready to be sent by tomorrow morning,” he told Galivion.  “These people will be hungry.”

His other advisors bowed and withdrew, but Ithilden lingered. “Adar,” he said carefully, “Legolas has only a single week’s leave, and he needs the time to rest.  I cannot extend the leave without delaying that of someone else in the Southern Patrol, and that would be unwise and unfair.”

“I am aware of that,” Thranduil said heavily, “and I regret it, but I am afraid it is part of the burden Legolas must bear because of who he is.”

Ithilden looked as if would say more but did not. “I will go and start the hunting parties,” he finally said, and then formally saluted and withdrew.

Thranduil sat down again for a moment or two.  He had been speaking the truth when he said he regretted having to send his youngest son to deal with flood and hunger when he was supposed to be recovering from service to the realm that had already worn him down so that he wondered at the small joys of everyday life.  Thranduil had seen how Legolas reacted to the tiniest of comforts in the last two days.  The thought of taking him away from them was almost unbearable.

I borrow characters and situations from Tolkien but they are his. I draw no profit other than the enriched imaginative life that I assume he intended me to gain.

Many thanks to Nilmandra for beta reading this for me.

*******

3. Diplomacy

Legolas rapped on the door of Thranduil’s office and entered at his father’s bidding.  He was surprised to find Ithilden, Galivion, and Thrior with the king.  If his father’s advisors were there, then whatever Thranduil wanted him for was not simply a family matter. He put his hand over his heart in formal salute to both Thranduil and Ithilden and then stood respectfully until Thranduil gave him permission to sit.

The king came right to the point.  “I am sorry to do this, Legolas, but I must interrupt your leave by sending you on a mission for the realm.”

Legolas felt a flood of dismay.  He needed this leave. He was just beginning to feel normal again.  He glanced at Ithilden. His brother’s expression was guarded, but Legolas knew him well enough to tell that he was not happy about whatever course of action their father was about to take.  So far as Legolas knew, Ithilden had decided how he was to spend his time since he had become a warrior. If Thranduil was taking some decision out of Ithilden’s hands, then the matter must be an important one.  “Of course, my lord,” he said, suppressing his disappointment and returning his attention resolutely to the king. “How may I serve the realm?”

He was rewarded by an approving look in his father’s eyes.  “You will remember that I received a message this morning that the settlement on the Forest River had suffered more flooding in the night.”  Legolas nodded.  He also remembered being glad that the settlement in trouble was not the one in which Celuwen lived.  He would have hated to see Eilian’s plans to visit her disrupted by flooding that would certainly have absorbed the full attention of every Elf who lived there.

“What I did not tell you this morning was that the settlement’s food supplies have been destroyed,” Thranduil went on.  “They have asked us for aid, and we are sending them as much food as we can spare.”

This time it was Galivion’s face that caught Legolas’s eye.  Legolas could guess that the amount of food that could be spared had been a topic of debate at his father’s council meeting that morning.  He had seen how sparsely the Elves around Thranduil’s stronghold were fed; indeed he had seen it at the king’s own table.

“You will lead the relief party, Legolas,” Thranduil finished.

Legolas could feel his mouth drop open and shut it again. He father was directing him to use his precious leave time for a routine delivery mission?  “If you wish it, my lord,” he said weakly.

Thranduil frowned slightly as if puzzled and not altogether pleased by his tone. Then abruptly comprehension seemed to dawn. “The mission is a delicate one, Legolas,” he said gently. “We are not able to give them all the food they have asked for, and I am sending you to explain that.  The fact that you are my son is meant as a sign of how highly I value the well-being of this group of my people even though I cannot give them all they need.”

Suddenly, Legolas was aware that there were far more dire problems than a warrior’s interrupted leave.

Thranduil turned to Thrior, who was eyeing Legolas apprehensively. “Legolas has not had to deal with these matters before, Thrior,” he said smoothly. “Would you explain how our relations stand with the settlements?”

Thrior leaned forward eagerly.  He had obviously been itching to make sure that Legolas understood exactly what was at stake. “You must know, my lord, that the Elves who live in these small enclaves in the woods are all Silvan.”

Legolas nodded. He did know that. His mother had been Silvan, and he thought of himself as Silvan as well.

“Perhaps the fact that your father and grandfather have ruled these Elves seems so natural to you that you have never wondered why Silvan Elves are led by Sindarin kings,” Thrior went on.

Legolas frowned. Surely Thrior knew that history had been part of his lessons as a child.  “They chose to accept my grandfather,” he said stiffly. “The House of Oropher rules with the consent of the realm’s people.”

Thrior nodded.  “Yes, that is so.  And Wood-elves continue to accept your father as king because they believe that he will order matters better than they could do themselves and thus will allow them to continue to live as they prefer to do in a simple relation to the natural world around them.  Many have chosen to live near the caverns, of course, and enjoy the comforts that come with the life that has been crafted there, but I think it is fair to say that almost all of your father’s people regard the life lived in the settlements as their true way of being.”  He looked inquiringly at Legolas to see if he understood thus far.

Legolas nodded. He had not thought of this explicitly before, but what Thrior was saying accorded well with his own sense of how Elves were meant to live.

“However,” Thrior went on, “these settlements are very difficult for the realm to serve and protect in these troubled times, and the Elves who live there sometimes doubt the good intentions of the king.  Their doubt creates unrest and, if it were shared by too many of your father’s people, would make the realm ungovernable altogether.”

Slowly, Legolas nodded again.  He had known of the tension between his father and the Elves from the settlement in which Celuwen lived, but he had rather assumed it stemmed from the fact that Celuwen’s father, Sólith, was one of the settlement’s most influential members, and Sólith hated Eilian.  “So you are saying that the loyalty of the settlement Elves is both particularly important and particularly difficult to gain,” he said, and Thrior looked pleased with his understanding.  Legolas felt the sudden weight of the trust his father was placing in him.  He could not help but be gratified by it, but he was also a little alarmed at the thought of the importance of this task he was being asked to do with no previous experience.

Thranduil took charge of the conversation again.  “Galivion will be going with you, and he will be able to tell the settlers exactly what our stores were and how difficult it was to send even a portion of what they requested.  You will express my deepest concern for these Elves and let them know how close they are to my heart.  If you see any other need we can supply, you will report that to us when you return.”

“Yes, my lord,” Legolas said, although he could not suppress a tiny smile at the memory of things he had heard his father say that suggested that if the settlements were close to his heart, they were occasionally making it burn.

“I am sending two of the Home Guard with you, Legolas,” Ithilden said.  “I have asked their captain to make sure that Annael is one of those who go.”  Legolas gave his brother a grateful smile.  It was obvious to him that Ithilden was trying to salvage as much of Legolas’s leave as he could by sending his friend with him.

“You will leave early tomorrow morning,” Thranduil told him, rising to signal that the meeting was over.  “But you should go with Galivion to supervise the assembling of the supplies.  It would not do for you to appear ignorant of what we have sent or of what we have on hand.”

Legolas saluted again. “Yes, my lord.”  He had had as much leave as he was going to get, he thought ruefully.  He could only console himself with the thought of the confidence his father was placing in him.

***

With great satisfaction, Eilian slung the rabbit carcasses across his horse’s neck.  In these days of scarcity, it would be the height of rudeness to arrive at Celuwen’s cottage without bringing food to be shared.  And as Thranduil had told him, he needed to do all he could to recommend himself to Celuwen’s parents if he wanted them to allow him and Celuwen to become betrothed.  He set himself carefully on his injured leg and leapt up onto his horse’s back.  His hip was aching, but in his excitement at the meeting that was close upon him, he did not care.

Still, he could not help feeling a little apprehensive.  His father’s lecture had not lessened Eilian’s determination to bind Celuwen to him in some way, but it had certainly made clear all the obstacles that lay in the way of their betrothal.  Thranduil’s words echoed in his brain:  “Are you sure there is anything you can do that would make you acceptable to Celuwen’s parents?”  He was all too aware that the answer to that question might be ‘no.’ Sólith would take a great deal of coaxing to accept the idea of Eilian and Celuwen bonding, and Eilian was not sure he was capable of doing the coaxing.  He was willing to do anything he could to make his betrothal to Celuwen possible, he thought, but he also knew his own limitations, and what he could do might not be enough.  He glanced at the string of rabbits on his horse’s neck and blew out his breath. He would start with a gift and see what happened after that.

The day was fading when he saw the first little cottage nestled among the trees.  These Elves had once lived further from his father’s stronghold, but they had consented to move here when they finally accepted the fact that they needed to be within the ring of protection provided by the border guards. Eilian had been to this location twice before and neither visit had been a success. The first time, he had been able to stay only briefly and Celuwen had cried when he left.  The second time, her father had greeted him with the news that Celuwen found his visits painful, and she did not want to see him any more. He had reluctantly gone away.  He wondered now if that had been the truth or one of Sólith’s efforts to keep them apart.

With his heart beginning to beat wildly, he made his way through the widely scattered cottages to the one where Celuwen lived with her parents.  Drawing a deep breath, he took his courage in hand, slid from his horse, approached the door, and knocked.

For a breathless moment, he waited while the trees around him seemed to murmur at his presence. Then the door opened and Sólith stood before him. Eilian could feel dislike flare instantly in his gut.

“Mae govannen, Sólith,” Eilian said, controlling his voice as best he could.

Sólith stood staring at him in startled silence.  “You are not welcome here, Eilian,” he finally said.  “I have told you before that my daughter does not want to see you.”

It was all Eilian could do to keep from shoving him out of the doorway.  “I have had a letter from her inviting me to visit,” he snapped, feeling vengeful satisfaction at the dismayed look that this piece of news produced on Sólith’s face.

“Who is it, Sólith?” asked a soft voice, and Celuwen’s mother appeared behind her husband.

“Mae govannen, Isiwen,” Eilian greeted her.  He held out the string of rabbits.  “I encountered good hunting on my way here.”

She froze for a moment, with her eyes on Sólith. Then she turned back to Eilian with a determined look on her face.  She reached around her husband and took the rabbits. “Thank you, Eilian.”

“Celuwen is not here,” Sólith told him, still barring the doorway.

“Then where is she?” he demanded.  He knew he sounded rude, but his short supply of patience was already at an end.

A gasp from his right made him spin toward it, and there, coming around the corner of the cottage with freshly gathered wood in her arms, was Celuwen.  She stopped where she was and, for a moment, so did he. Then he started toward her, breaking into a run for the last few feet, as she dropped the wood, threw her arms around his neck, and burst into tears.

“I thought you would not come,” she choked out. “I thought you had gotten my letter and there was someone else and you would not come.”

“Hush,” he murmured stroking her hair and holding her trembling body close. “I came as soon as I could.  I would come from the ends of Arda to you.”

From somewhere far away, he heard Isiwen say, “Come, Sólith. Let them be now.”  Then he heard the door to the cottage close.

Birds sang softly in the early evening light, calling to their mates and warning off their rivals.  The faint sound of new leaves slowly uncurling rustled overhead.  The smell of Celuwen’s hair filled his nostrils, and the warmth of her body against his was as intensely sweet as anything he had ever felt.  At length, they pulled apart, and he looked down into her pale, tear-streaked, beautiful face.

“How long can you stay?” she asked anxiously.

He had no obligation other than appearing in the infirmary again in a little less than a week.  “Five days,” he told her, and she gave him a radiant smile.

“Come in,” she urged.  “You must eat with us and stay here too.”  He was not at all sure he was as welcome in the cottage as she seemed to think, but he allowed her to take his hand and lead him toward the door. They had gone only two steps when she stopped.  “What is the matter with your leg?” she demanded.

He blinked.  After his day’s ride, his hip did hurt, but he knew from encounters he had had with other Elves in the last two weeks that his walk looked almost normal and that most people noticed nothing.  “I was wounded,” he told her. “That is why I could not come sooner.  But I am better now.”  She frowned but said no more and they went into the cottage.

The cottage was tiny, with a small central room in which the family cooked, ate, and worked during the day, and doors to the right and left that he knew probably led to two very small sleeping chambers.  Isiwen sat at the table, in the process of preparing the rabbits for cooking, and, Sólith sat near the fire with his arms crossed over his chest. They both looked up, and in unison, their eyes went first to Celuwen and then to him. Isiwen’s look was guarded, but Sólith’s face was red and his lips were pressed tightly together.  There was no mistaking his hostility. Eilian was suddenly aware of how inescapable Sólith’s presence was in the little cottage.

“Sit down,” Celuwen urged him, and he looked at the chair near Sólith, the only vacant chair in the room.

“Did you bring the wood, Celuwen?” Isiwen asked.

“I will get it,” Eilian said immediately. “And then I must see to my horse.”

“Thank you,” Isiwen said.  “It will be a while before evening meal is ready any way.”

Feeling like a coward, he bolted out the door and went to the corner of the cottage to gather the wood that Celuwen had dropped.  This is not going to work, he thought rather desperately. Adar is mad if he thinks I will ever be able to get Sólith to approve of a betrothal between Celuwen and me. He drew a deep breath.  Get hold of yourself, he counseled.  It is Celuwen who matters, and she was glad to see you. You can deal with Sólith later.  The thought of Celuwen’s unrestrained welcome sent a flood of warmth through him, and his heart beat faster at the simple sight of her when he carried the wood inside.

Celuwen was helping her mother with the rabbits. In the little room, he had to brush past her to put the wood near the fire, and the light touch of his hip against hers made them both jump slightly. She smiled at him uncertainly and then lowered her eyes. Eilian’s blood began to sing, and then he turned to see Sólith glaring at him.  He froze for a moment and then hastily made his way back outside to see to his horse.  “We are not worried about sitting in a tiny box of a room with Sólith without drawing our dagger, are we?” he murmured to the horse, as he brushed him down.  The horse flicked his ears casually in response and showed no sign of worry at all, but then he was eating out of doors.

At length, his desire to see Celuwen outweighed his repugnance at being in the same room with her father, and he went back into the cottage.  With as casual an air as he could muster, he took the chair next to Sólith and settled back to ignore him and watch Celuwen help her mother cook their evening meal. 

Celuwen was, as she had always been, a pleasure to watch.  With her thick braid swinging down the center of her back, she moved from fire to table to cupboard, her slender form bending and stretching to lay out the plates and tend the roasting meat. And to his delight, she kept stealing little glances at him and then smiling and looking away. From the corner of his eye, Eilian could see Sólith frown, but he did not trouble to suppress his own widening grin.

Yet, as he watched Celuwen, he was also naggingly aware that something was wrong.  There was something altered in her appearance.

Then Isiwen surprised him by saying, “Sit down, Celuwen. You have done enough now.”

“I am not tired, Naneth,” Celuwen protested. Isiwen looked doubtful but said no more.

Celuwen did look tired, Eilian decided, more tired than either of her parents. He knew that life in the settlement could not have been easy in the past winter, but there was something about Celuwen’s appearance that alarmed him.  Her face had a transparent, luminescent quality, as if her fëa was very close to the surface.  A memory of a very small Legolas in the days after their mother’s death flitted across his mind, and suddenly, Eilian recognized what he was seeing and started in alarm. The look that Celuwen had now was the one that Legolas had had then, and Eilian was suddenly filled with the same terror he had felt when he feared his little brother would fade away from grief.

As if in response to his start, she turned toward him.  A faint flush spread over her face, and she took a step in his direction.  “I am so glad you are here, Eilian.”  Isiwen scanned her daughter intently and then glanced at Eilian and something in her face eased.  Even Sólith uncrossed his arms, as if he was relaxing slightly, and let out a long breath.

“We are ready to eat,” Isiwen announced.  Celuwen went out the front door and brought in a stool that had stood just outside it.  She set it by the table so there would be enough places to sit, and although she objected, Eilian hastened to take it and hold one of the chairs for her.  Still worried by what he had seen, he kept an anxious eye on her as the platter of roast meat and the salad were passed from hand to hand.

At least her appetite is good, he thought, watching her help herself to the food.  “Now that is an improvement,” said Isiwen approvingly, looking at her daughter’s plate. “We should hunt for more rabbits tomorrow.”  Eilian looked at Isiwen and then at Celuwen.  Then the state of things tonight was better than usual, he realized.  And a sudden, joyous thought occurred to him. What if Celuwen were better because he was there?

As if feeling his eyes upon her, Celuwen turned to him.  She had opened her mouth to speak, but when their eyes met, she seemed to have to stop to catch her breath. “You were wounded?” she finally asked.

He nodded. “Yes, just before I got your letter.”  He threw a smug glance at Sólith, who was watching them with his eyes narrowed.

“But I wrote that three months ago!” she exclaimed. “It was three months yesterday.  Have you been healing all this time?”

He saw that Sólith looked suspicious.  “Yes, I have,” he said emphatically.  “The scimitar was poisoned, but the healers say I am all right now,” he hastened to add, seeing her look of alarm.

She put her hand on his forearm, and from the spot where she touched him, heat radiated through his body. He held absolutely still, lest she remove her hand, and she tightened her fingers.  “Must you go back to that?” she asked, anguish in every word.

And now they were at the heart of what had always been their problem. “Yes,” he said simply. “I must.”  He put his hand over hers, holding it in place.  “But I am here now,” he said.  They looked at one another, and he suddenly found himself fighting for breath. For a moment, there was no one else in the room. Then he became aware that her parents were both watching them, Sólith with disapproval and Isiwen with what appeared to be amused dismay. He released Celuwen’s hand, and she pulled it quickly away. They turned their attention back to their meal, careful not to touch again.

When they had finished, he insisted on helping Isiwen wash the dishes. “Will you stay for the night?” Isiwen offered politely when they were through.  “We have no bed to offer you, I am afraid, but there is space in front of the fire where you could sleep warmly.”

He looked at the spot on the floor near the fireplace, ten feet from Celuwen’s sleeping chamber on one side and ten feet more from that of her parents on the other.  The thought of sleeping so close to her left him slightly dizzy. “I think I will camp outside,” he finally managed. Everyone in the room let out simultaneous sighs of relief.

“Good night,” he said and opened the door.  His eyes swept over Sólith and Isiwen to stop for a long moment on Celuwen.

“Wait,” she said.  “I will come out with you for a moment or two.”

He stood aside to let her pass him and go out first, aware of the fact that even the brush of her skirt against his legs made him tremble.  He had his arms around her as soon as the door had closed behind them.  She wrapped her arms tightly around his neck, and he bent to kiss her. There was nothing playful or light in the meeting of their lips.  He pressed his mouth hard against hers and then slid his tongue along it, begging for the entrance she was quick to grant, as if she had longed as much for his taste as he had for hers.  Then he pulled her to him and planted a string of kisses down her neck toward the base of her throat.  Beneath his mouth, he could feel her pulse beating as wildly as his.

After much too short a time, she put her hands on his shoulders and pushed him away.  “Five days,” she said. “We have five days.”  And with a laugh of pure joy, she turned and ran back into the cottage, leaving him to find his pack and blankets and such sleep as he could when his whole being ached for her.

I borrow characters and situations from Tolkien but they are his. I draw no profit other than the enriched imaginative life that I assume he intended me to gain.

Many thanks to Nilmandra for beta reading this for me.

*******

4. The Young Lord

Legolas handed his pack and bow to the servant who would stow them on his horse, looked around his chamber to see if he had forgotten anything, and then went out into the hall and down it to the door leading into the palace’s public rooms.  In the antechamber before the Great Doors, he found Galivion waiting.  “Mae govannen, my lord,” the advisor greeted him.  His eyes flicked quickly up and down over Legolas’s appearance, and Legolas thought he read approval in the other’s face.  In his role as his father’s representative, he had dressed carefully this morning, eschewing his usual tunic and leggings for loose black trousers, a long silk shirt, and a surcoat with ornate silver buttons.  The bottoms of the trouser legs and his cloak would all be covered in mud by the time they reached the flooded settlement, but if Thranduil wanted the settlers to see a king’s son, then a king’s son was what they would see.

“Mae govannen,” Legolas returned, and then the two of them waited in silence.  They had spent the previous afternoon together, sorting through food supplies, and Galivion had taken the opportunity to tell Legolas far more than he had ever thought it possible to know about how these central stores of food had been gathered and the principles upon which they were now being distributed.

“The king is determined that we will not be caught short like this again,” Galivion had said.  “We are working on a plan to have a constantly renewed stockpile of food that will be large enough to last through a winter like this one or a siege, for that matter, if such a dreadful thing should ever come upon us. We have always stored some food, but the shortages this winter have made us realize that we have not kept enough.”

Legolas had nodded and taken in all that he could.  Galivion would be with him to answer any difficult questions, but the extent of his own knowledge was likely to be taken as a sign of the king’s concern for his people.  He was determined not to fail in the trust his father had placed in him by assigning him to lead this mission.

He was aware now of being slightly nervous.  I will feel better once we are under way, he thought, and shifted his weight from one foot to the other. Fortunately, he and Galivion did not have to wait long before the king emerged from the hallway from which Legolas had just come.  Legolas put his hand over his heart and saluted, as did Galivion. Thranduil nodded his head to Galivion and then turned cool blue eyes appraisingly on Legolas, who was instantly glad he had taken trouble over his appearance. His father smiled approvingly, and then came forward to embrace him and hold him close for a moment.  “I have every faith that you will do as well with this task as you have with everything else I have ever asked you to do, Legolas,” Thranduil murmured in his ear and then released him.

“Thank you, my lord,” Legolas said, with a flush of pleasure. “I will do my best.” He had very seldom been able to disguise his feelings from his father and had apparently not succeeded in hiding his apprehensions today either.

Thranduil patted him on the shoulder and, with no further ado, led them out into the early morning light and descended the stairs toward where the rest of the relief party waited. Legolas kept a careful step behind him on his right, and Galivion walked a further step behind on the king’s left.

At the foot of the steps, grooms held his horse and Galivion’s, along with three pack horses laden with supplies.  Legolas’s eyes went from them to Annael, standing ready with his own horse. His friend saluted Thranduil and then flashed a grin at Legolas, who once again mentally thanked Ithilden for including Annael in this party. They would at least have some time to talk as they rode.

Then Legolas caught sight of the other warrior waiting with Annael and could not suppress a quick breath of dismay.  The other Elf turned at the sound.  “Hello, Legolas,” said Tinár.  “You are certainly dressed up today.”  He pointed to Legolas’s bow, which was hung with his packs on his horse’s back. “I see you are still using that hickory bow.  I am surprised you have not switched to one made of yew.” From the corner of his eye, Legolas could see Annael looking amused, but Galivion stepped in immediately, radiating disapproval.

“Are all your packs here, my lord?” he inquired, scowling in Tinár’s direction.

“Yes, they are,” Legolas said.

“Then we await your pleasure,” he said, and Legolas took the hint and leapt onto his horse’s back as the others in the party also mounted.  As if eager to be off, his horse pranced a little under him when he turned again to face his father.

Thranduil saluted the whole party. “Go and take the concern of your king to our hungry people,” he said.  His gaze lingered for a moment on Legolas, and then he stepped back.

“Thank you, my lord.  We will.”  Legolas returned his father’s salute, gratifyingly aware once again of the trust that Thranduil had placed in him. Then, feeling as if he had somehow slipped into the wrong position in line, he led the party away from Thranduil’s stronghold.

The path they followed was the one that Thranduil’s people used to go to Esgaroth.  It followed the Forest River eastward, into the pale face of the sun, which was slowly climbing above the treetops.   There were dark clouds behind them, and Legolas worried that there would soon be more rain, an aggravation of their woes that the Elves in the settlement did not need.   The river he now rode beside was still high and fast, and its water ran brown with dirt it had picked up from runoff and flooding further upstream.

For a while, Legolas rode next to Galivion, with Annael and Tinár trailing behind, trading off leading the pack horses and serving as the company’s guard.  Once they were out of the territory of the Home Guard, Legolas too strung his bow and carried it in his hand.  He had been a warrior for too many years not to feel responsible for the safety of any party he was with, even if he was acting now as Thranduil’s son.  Galivion glanced at the weapon, but made no comment.  Legolas was sure Galivion carried a weapon about him somewhere, but it was not visible.  A dagger in his boot would be Legolas’s guess.

After an hour or so of riding, he looked back to see that Annael had charge of the pack horses, and he dropped back toward his friend.  “Tinár, why do you not ride with Galivion for a while?” he invited.

Tinár’s face brightened.  He clearly liked the idea of leading the party. “I have been in this part of the forest frequently,” he said.  “I am very familiar with the path.”  He urged his horse forward and took up a place next to Thranduil’s advisor, who threw an unhappy glance back at Legolas.

Legolas grinned at Galivion and then turned to mutter to Annael. “Tinár?”  They both had served with the self-absorbed Tinár before.

Annael laughed softly.  “Our captain decided he could spare him.”

Legolas spluttered.  “I will wager he did.”

“Ah well,” Annael conceded, “Tinár is good with a bow.”

“Just not as good as he thinks he is,” Legolas snorted.

They both laughed and then Legolas asked Annael about the addition he was planning to build to his family’s cottage once the weather grew a little warmer, and they rode for a while chatting easily like the old friends they were.

As they drew nearer to the settlement, the banks of the river grew lower, and there was evidence of the water having recently been over its edges. They had to pick their way carefully around uprooted bushes and small trees, and the path had been washed away with the river bank in places.  Legolas noted where the gaps in the path were so he could pass the information along to his father. The horses were soon muddy past their knees and, as Legolas had anticipated, he and his companions were well spattered too.

The sun was high overhead when they finally spotted the first flet, well up in an oak tree.  And it was a good thing the flet was placed high because the evidence of flooding here was everywhere.  Water still stood in pools, and as they rode on a short distance, they found a cottage with its door standing open and mud staining its walls to a height of two feet and more.   Near the cottage, an adult Elf and a half grown youth were using axes to cut up a small tree that had fallen on the cottage roof when too much soil had been washed away from its shallow roots.  They straightened up when the riders approached them.  As they approached the cottage, Legolas somewhat self-consciously urged his horse past Tinár, who actually seemed about to speak.  Legolas threw him a cool glance that apparently startled him for he closed his mouth again.  Legolas turned to face the two Elves on the ground.

“Mae govannen,” said the adult.

Legolas drew himself as erect as he could and took a deep breath. It was time for him to begin doing what he had been sent here to do. “Mae govannen,” he replied, sliding from his horse.  He took a step toward them and found that he had to ignore the way his boots stuck in the mud that squelched under foot.  So much for dignity, he thought.

“I am Legolas Thranduilion,” he introduced himself. He gestured toward their pack horses. “On behalf of the king, we have brought you food to replace that which you lost.  Where might we find Anyr?”  His father’s advisors had told him that Anyr was the leader of this settlement.

The Elf’s face brightened.  “You are most welcome, my friends.”  He turned toward the youngster.  “Run and fetch Anyr. He will want to greet these visitors.” As the youth ran off, he turned back toward them and then started toward the pack horses. “Can I help you unload the supplies? I can show you the flet we plan to use to store them.  We have children who would have gone hungry tonight had you not arrived.”

Legolas hesitated.  Of course the Elf would want the food made available as soon as possible, but Legolas wanted Anyr to see the food while it was still grouped as assistance from the king rather than scattered onto the plates of many Elves where it might simply seem like their due.  Moreover, the task that Thranduil had set for Legolas made it crucial for him to talk to the settlement’s leader as soon as possible.  He and Galivion needed to make sure that these Elves understood that Thranduil had sent as much help as he could.  There must be no opportunity for resentment to flower.

“I would wish to place these goods in the hands of Anyr himself, as a token of the king’s respect,” he finally said.  From the corner of his eye, he could see Galivion’s shoulders drop slightly, as if he was relaxing a little.

“Of course,” the settlement Elf answered. “Here he is now.”  The youth he had sent to fetch Anyr now came trotting back with a tall adult striding in his wake.

The adult came forward to greet Legolas.  “Mae govannen,” he said fervently.  “You are well met indeed, my lord. I am Anyr, the leader of these hungry people.”

Legolas inclined his head, noting that the youth had wasted no time in informing Anyr of who Legolas was.  Thranduil had apparently been right to believe that the settlement Elves would read his sending one of his sons as a significant gesture.

“We have brought all that we could,” Legolas said.  “If you like, these warriors can take the pack horses closer to your storage flet.  And then, Galivion and I beg audience with you to talk about your needs.”

“I would be only too glad to speak with you, my lord,” Anyr replied. He turned to the two Elves whom they had first met. “Nelad, will you and your son show these good people where to take the supplies and see that they are properly stored?”

“With pleasure,” Nelad assured him and turned to where Annael waited with the pack horses.  “This way,” he bid, and Legolas gestured for Annael to follow him.

“Yes, my lord,” Annael said easily.

“You may go and help put the supplies away too, Tinár,” Legolas said, trying to sound as natural as he could.  He had never given an order to either of these fellow warriors before.  “And please take care of my horse and Galivion’s too, while we speak to Anyr.” Galivion dismounted, and Annael called to his horse and Legolas’s and moved off immediately, but Tinár hesitated.

“Surely it is not a good idea for Galivion to be left without a guard, Legolas,” he said. “He is unarmed.”

From the corner of his eyes, Legolas could see Anyr stiffen.  “We are among friends here,” Legolas said, a trifle sharply.  “You may go now.”  Tinár hesitated for a moment, but when Galivion glared at him too, he led his own horse slowly off in the direction taken by Annael and Nelad and his son.

Looking mollified, Anyr motioned for Legolas and Galivion to follow him.  “We will go to my flet,” he told them and began to lead them through the trees.  Legolas spotted a number of flets overhead, although none of them seemed to be occupied at the moment, and they also passed several badly damaged cottages.

“Do your people live in both cottages and flets, then?” he asked.  Near Thranduil’s stronghold, Elves lived in both kinds of dwellings, although the flet dwellers normally moved to cottages during the Woodland Realm’s harsh winters.

“We prefer to live in cottages in the winter,” Anyr answered, confirming Legolas’s surmise.  “But when we saw the snows this winter, we knew the river would be high once it melted, so we moved anything we deemed necessary to flets as spring drew near.”  The noise of running water had risen as they walked along, and through the trees, Legolas could now see that they had drawn near to the river again.  Its banks were still submerged beneath the lapping muddy water, but he could see the ends of wooden posts and broken boards emerging to suggest that dock had once stood on this site.

Anyr paused for a moment to contemplate the scene. “We will have to rebuild the dock,” he said.  “It is necessary if we want to go on trading with the Lake-men.” He resumed walking, and Legolas and Galivion exchanged quick glances.  From Galivion’s startled look, Legolas suspected that Thranduil was unaware of the trade between the settlers and the Lake-men.  His father normally regulated trade with the Lake-men by means of agreements, and the Elves charged the Men a toll for using the waterways that they guarded and kept passable.  Legolas doubted that any toll was being collected here.  Thranduil would not be happy about unauthorized dealing.  Legolas was grateful that it would be Thranduil’s advisors and not him who would have to contend with the king when he found out about it.

Their path now veered away from the river and climbed slightly to an area the waters had evidently not reached, for the omnipresent mud was absent here.  And suddenly, a squeal of childish laughter made all three Elves look through the trees off to their left.  “Do it again, Tuilinn!” shouted a child’s high voice.

In a clearing amidst the trees, Legolas now saw a group of ten or so small children jumping up and down in excitement.  An elf maiden who seemed to have charge of them was laughing, as she held aloft the frame of a fishing net that was missing its mesh.  “Are you ready?” she inquired.

“Yes! Yes!”

She dipped the frame in a flat pan of frothy water and then swung it into the air and waved it back and forth with such vigor that a lock of her curly brown hair came loose from the clasp that held it away from her face.  Rainbow tinted soap bubbles flew off, and the little ones ran about trying to catch them in their clapping hands.

Legolas smiled at the sight and was about to set off after Anyr again, when something about one of the children caught his eye. He looked sharply and saw to his surprise that he had been right: Although the child wore Elvish clothing, he was of the race of Men. Moreover, now that he looked, he could see that several other children were also the children of Men.  He hastened to catch up with Anyr and Galivion, who had already moved on.

“You have Mannish children in your care here?” he asked.

Anyr looked back at him. “Yes, they are from the Men’s village that is just beyond the forest edge.  The flood devastated their fields and homes.  Indeed most of us are there today, helping to build shelters for them.  We have kept the children here so they will be out of the way.  It would not do to have any of them fall in the river while it is so high and fast.”  He smiled a little condescendingly.  “The Men did not seem to realize that the river needs space to live too.  They built walls to try to keep it out, but the river wanted to wander this year and would not be kept at bay.”

Legolas turned this cooperation between Men and the settlers over in his mind and tried to guess how his father would react to it.  He did not see how Thranduil could object, but his father was sometimes reluctant to have Men influence the affairs of his people.

“This is my flet,” Anyr said, pointing to one in a birch tree. The three of them climbed through the branches and emerged on a platform with a pallet and a small box of Anyr’s belongings off to one side.  A tarp was folded along one edge of the flet, ready to be pulled up and attached to the branches if its occupant needed shelter from bad weather.  Anyr folded his legs and sank to the floor, and Galivion and Legolas followed his example.

“I would offer you refreshments, but we have none,” Anyr said cheerfully.  “Thanks to you, we will soon be having a midday meal however.”

“Thanks to the king,” Legolas corrected, with a smile.  He hesitated. He had been planning the words he would use for this explanation during the morning’s ride, but he knew that his task was a delicate one, and the care with which he gave Anyr his news might determine its success or failure.

“Anyr,” he began, “the king bade me tell you how grieved he is at what your people have suffered.”

Anyr shrugged. “The river is a difficult neighbor sometime,” he said, “but since it cannot adjust to our ways, we must adjust to its.”

Legolas could not help thinking that in this case it was the Elves who lived near Thranduil’s stronghold who had been asked to adjust to the damage the river caused.  “Indeed,” he murmured.  “This has been a difficult winter for all the king’s people, and we all have had to adjust to what Arda has sent us.”  Anyr nodded in response, and Legolas could sense Galivion shifting his weight slightly as he waited for Legolas to deliver the bad news.

“When word that you had lost your food supplies reached King Thranduil,” Legolas went on, “he sent Galivion and me to take from the food that was in store as much as we could to bring to you so that your children might not go hungry. And he charged us to do so in such a way that the children who lived near the king’s stronghold also had enough to eat, for they too are dear to his heart.”

Anyr had now focused sharply on Legolas’s face.  He evidently heard some sort of warning in his tone.

“The stores were small,” Legolas went on, “but we knew your need and decided that we could ask the adults who depend on those stores to take less from them.  We also asked the Home Guard to send some of their warriors to hunt so that more of the stored food could be sent to you.”

Anyr nodded, a little stiffly.

“In short,” Legolas finished, “we did all that we could, for the king values the people of this settlement.  I am pleased that with our efforts, despite our own very short supplies, we were able to bring you two-thirds of what you asked the king to send.”  He held his breath and waited for Anyr’s reaction.

Anyr sat in silence for a moment.  “You tell me that Thranduil did not have enough in his vast stores that he could send us enough food to last us the few weeks until the forest begins to give us more of its bounty again?”  His tone was faintly disbelieving.

“I am telling you that,” Legolas asserted firmly.  “Galivion will tell you the same. He has been in charge of the central food stores that were established this winter. He can tell you to the last carrot and strip of dried venison exactly what the king had on hand.  He can also tell you how many people those stores must feed in the area around the caverns.   The Elves there eat sparingly and will eat more sparingly still that they might give some of what little they have to you.  I eat at the king’s table, Anyr, and I tell you that the king himself has little food on his plate sometimes.”

He looked earnestly into Anyr’s face.  The settlement leader’s eyes bored into his for a moment, and then suddenly Anyr sighed and looked away.  “If we must make do, then we must make do,” he said a little grudgingly.

Legolas felt the tension in his back ease slightly. “If there is any other way in which my father, the king, can help you, he charged me to learn of it and take word to him,” he said.

Anyr shook his head. “We can manage on our own quite nicely. We asked for what we needed, and if the king cannot provide it, then we need nothing else.”

Legolas could not help feeling exasperated.  A word of thanks would not have come amiss, he thought. Anyr was not hostile, but he was not particularly grateful either.  He seemed to take the aid Thranduil had struggled to give his people as no more than their due. And in a way, Legolas supposed it was their due. They were his father’s people, after all, and it was Thranduil’s role to serve them.

“Anyr!” called a voice from beneath the beech tree. They all looked down. The youth whom they had first seen cutting up the fallen tree stood there.  “My adar has taken some of the food to the children,” he called. “He bid me fetch you and our guests to come and eat too.”

Anyr rose, and Legolas and Galivion followed suit.  As Anyr disappeared over the edge of the flet, Galivion caught Legolas’s arm. “You did well,” he murmured, and then went after their host.  Legolas raised a skeptical eyebrow but could not help being gratified.  Then he climbed to the ground and followed Anyr back to the clearing where they had seen the children playing.

Nelad and his son were already there, and Annael and Tinár were just arriving.  Tinár paused on the edge of the clearing. “I brushed down your horse, Legolas,” he said, somewhat sulkily.  “You can take care of mine on the way home.”

Galivion seized Tinár’s arm and jerked him back out of the clearing.  Tinár looked startled by the strength of the advisor’s grasp.  Annael glanced back but kept on walking.  Legolas could not move without walking around Galivion and Tinár, so he stopped where he was.  “On this mission, you will address the son of your king as ‘my lord,’” Galivion snapped.  “And you will take care of his horse and anything else he needs tended to while he does the task he was sent here to do.”

“Legolas does not mind if I call him by name,” Tinár protested, trying unsuccessfully to shake himself free. “We have been fellow warriors.”

“You are not fellow warriors now,” Galivion told him. “It is important that these Elves see him as the representative of Thranduil himself, and I will not have you making it more difficult for them to keep that in mind.”  He released Tinár, who rubbed his arm resentfully, and then, with a scowl at Legolas, turned to enter the clearing.

Galivion resettled his cloak on his shoulders.  “Come, my lord,” he said with dignity, and led a bemused Legolas into the area where the maiden whom the child had called Tuilinn appeared to be portioning out a stew that had been quickly concocted of dried meat and vegetables.  The children were digging in with almost animal relish.

Legolas accepted a bowl from the maiden’s hand but allowed her to put only one ladleful of the stew in it.  “I am not hungry,” he told her.  She leveled large grey eyes at him, and he suddenly felt like one of the elflings she had been tending who had stretched the truth a little. “Really,” he protested.  She raised a delicate eyebrow and then turned to tend to a child who had called to her. For a second, he stood and watched her as she bent to listen to the little one, her hands absently catching at the hair that kept falling forward into her face.  Then he suddenly became aware that he was eyeing the curve of her backside, and shook himself into diplomatic mode again.  I have been isolated among warriors too long, he thought in exasperation.  I am evidently ready to pounce on the first pretty maiden I see.

He wanted to sit next to Annael, but he reluctantly went to eat next to Anyr, who had Galivion on his other side. “When the river is within its banks, this must be a beautiful spot,” he offered, and Anyr rose happily to the bait and began to praise the loveliness of the area.

Legolas listened with half an ear, watching Tuilinn, who had seated herself not far away with an elfling on her lap.  “You must eat the carrots, too,” she was coaxing, but the child had pressed his lips together and was resisting her efforts.  Legolas smiled slightly to himself, recalling his sister-in-law dealing with his stubborn nephew at a similar age.  The children will be fed, he thought, and that makes this all worthwhile.

He focused on the maiden again, and it occurred to him that he had not seen her eating yet.  He rose, took the few steps toward where the maiden sat, and scooped the child from her lap.  “What is your name, little one?” he asked.

The child looked at him with big eyes.  “Ródien,” he answered.

From behind him, he could hear Galivion talking to Anyr.  “Legolas has just returned from the south where our warriors have spent a cold and hungry winter,” he was saying. “The needs are great all over the realm.”  The maiden’s eyes flicked momentarily to Galivion and then back to Legolas.

“This one is destined to be a warrior, Tuilinn,” Legolas told her hastily.  “He should come and eat with me.”  He reached out his hand, and she put the bowl with the few lone carrots in it.  He glanced at her.  “And perhaps you would like to have your hands free to eat too, mistress,” he said.  She gave him a smile of immeasurable sweetness.  She was really quite pretty, he thought.

“Thank you,” she told him, rising again. “I believe I will take advantage of the opportunity.”

Legolas carried Ródien to his seat near Anyr, who was watching him with a small smile on his face.  “Now, Ródien,” he said, “look at these quarrelsome carrots. I think they are enemy carrots and need to be destroyed. What do you think?”  The child giggled and leaned back in Legolas’s lap.  “Perhaps they could be chopped up by your horrible big teeth,” Legolas suggested.  Ródien looked at him slyly from the corner of his eye, but made no move to open his mouth.

“Or perhaps not,” Legolas conceded.

Anyr laughed.  “You surely do not expect to win all of your battles, my lord,” he said with good humor, and Legolas relaxed and watched Tuilinn return to her place with a small bowl of the stew.  Things were going well, he thought. His father should be pleased.

*******

AN:  I’m leaving early Tuesday for a business trip to San Antonio and won’t be back until Sunday, so the next chapter won’t be posted for a while. Sorry.  :-)

I borrow characters and settings from Tolkien, but they are his, not mine. I gain only the enriched imaginative life that I assume he intended me to gain.

Many thanks to Nilmandra for beta reading this chapter. 

*******

5.  Campaigning

Eilian stretched carefully.  His hip was aching after his long ride of the day before, and between the pain and his restless thoughts about Celuwen, he had not slept well.  He untangled himself from his blanket, rose, and began to hobble around a bit, hoping that the exercise would warm his body enough to ease his stiffness if not his pain.   A step sounded behind him, but before he could disguise his gait, he heard Celuwen’s alarmed voice.  “What is the matter, Eilian?”

He whirled to face her and found that he was so off balance that he would have fallen had Celuwen not rushed to his side and steadied him.  Her touch sent such a jolt through him that he nearly flinched.  “I am just stiff,” he said self-consciously.  “The wound in my leg is still troublesome at times.”

“It is taking so long to heal,” she worried.

“The healers say it is on the mend now,” Eilian assured her, gratified by her concern.  “But I cannot go back to my patrol just yet. Are you not glad?”  He smiled at her, but instead of smiling back, she met his gaze with a serious look.  He could feel his smile fading as their eyes met and held.

“I am indeed,” she said, with an earnestness that took his breath away.  “I wish you never had to go back.”  Confused by her tone, he lifted his hand to touch her face, and she seemed to come to with a start.  “I am going to check our fish traps,” she told him, speaking quickly and lifting the basket in her hand.  “Will you come and help?” Without waiting for an answer, she slipped away from him and started off through the trees.

He stood immobile for a moment. What had she meant by saying she wished he never had to go back to his patrol?  She was concerned for him, and for that, he felt a rush of satisfaction, but she had backed away from him in the past because their duties would keep them apart. Her letter had suggested she was willing now to enjoy the time they had together and bear the time apart.  He hoped she had not changed her mind upon actually seeing him.  He started hastily after her.

When he caught up with her, he took the basket from her, grasped her hand, and tucked it into his arm.  Even this light contact sent an agreeable shiver down his spine, and he was pleased to hear her draw a deep breath.  “You are up early,” he ventured, still trying to read her mood.

“I woke early and could not go back to sleep.”

He wanted to ask her if thoughts of him had brought her awake, but she seemed so serious that he hesitated.  If she had been thinking of him, he was a little afraid of what her thoughts might have been.

They walked in silence for five minutes or so, with Eilian enjoying her touch, until they emerged from the trees at the edge of a small pond. She led him around the side to a point where a tree limb overhung the water.  He could see the top of the woven fish trap just beneath the water’s surface.  “Let me get it,” he told her and ran lightly out onto the branch.  He reached down to grasp the trap and pull it up. It had been weighted with rocks and was heavy, but there were several fish in it.

“Wonderful!” she cried.  “We will have them for morning meal.” He smiled at her enthusiasm. Despite waking so early, she looked better this morning, less tired.  He would have liked to believe that it was his presence that made her look so, but perhaps it was only because it was early in the day yet.  He slid the fish out of the trap, reweighted it, and then dropped it back in the water. Then he squatted down at the edge of the pond, took out his knife, washed it, and began cleaning and gutting the fish.  She crouched next to him and worked with her own knife.

Still thinking about her apparent fatigue, he looked sideways at her. “Have you been ill, Celuwen?”

For a moment, she did not look at him but stared at the fish in her hand. Then she turned her face to him. “I wrote you three months ago, and I am afraid I had so little faith that it took only a month for me to lose hope and conclude that you were not coming. I found I could not bear it.”

His breath caught in his throat.  She had grieved over his absence. Despite the tragedy her grief could have caused, his heart sang at the thought.  She might still conclude they should not marry yet, but if she loved him enough to fade at the thought he would not come to her, then surely she would give in eventually. He wanted to take her in his arms but they were both holding dead fish, and it seemed too ridiculous. “I would have come as soon as you asked if I had been able to,” he said.

To his surprise, she frowned a little and then turned back to her work on the fish. “I know that now,” she said, not looking at him.

He regarded her for a moment, unsure of how to read her reaction. If she loved him, and he would have come when she asked, then what was she upset about?  He decided not to push the issue for now.  If he asked her to say what she felt for him too soon, he might frighten her into the same cautious behavior she had shown in the past, and he had a little time to make sure that her love would spur her to act more precipitously when he had persuaded her parents to accept the idea of a betrothal.  He tossed the last fish into the basket, and they both rose.

As they walked back to the cottage, he wondered if she was hesitating because she was offended by his failure to write her even if his wound prevented him from visiting. Not for the first time, he tried to decide if he should tell her that he had not written because he thought Sólith was intercepting his letters.  His stomach tightened with fury at her father.  She could have died of her grief, he thought angrily, and she certainly had suffered. A letter from him could have spared her all that.

But Thranduil had said that Eilian needed Celuwen’s parents to consent to their betrothal, and indeed every Elven custom would demand it.  To do anything else would be taken as a sign of deep disrespect for their parents, and while he did not particularly care if he looked disrespectful of Sólith, Celuwen probably cared if she did.  And then there was Thranduil.  Life would be infinitely easier for Eilian if he did not infuriate his father by acting without her parents’ consent.  So he wanted to placate Sólith, not start a quarrel between him and his daughter for which Sólith would only blame Eilian.

They entered the cottage to find Isiwen prodding the fire and Sólith nowhere in sight.  Eilian jumped at the chance to impress Celuwen’s mother with his good qualities.  “Let me do that,” he said.  “We have fish we can fry for the meal.” He took the poker out of her hand and was soon busy tending a pan of fish.

He grinned at Isiwen.  “You are brave to put up with a warrior’s cooking after the splendid meal you made of the rabbits last night.”

She laughed.  “You never change, do you Eilian?  I thank you for the rabbits though. I do not think I said that last night.”

He shrugged. “I will hunt again today.  If you would like to eat rabbits again, I think I am enough of a scout to find them for you.”

Isiwen glanced at Celuwen, who was laying the table.  “A little meat would be most welcome.”  She smiled slightly and moved to help her daughter. “Your cheeks are rosy today, child. Did you sleep well?”

To Eilian’s great interest, Celuwen actually blushed a little.  “I was long falling asleep, but then I slept well.”

Eilian grinned at her over her mother’s head.  “I was long falling asleep too,” he said innocently. “I wonder if it was for the same reason.”  He did not think it would hurt his cause at all to remind Celuwen of how strongly they had both reacted to their few moments alone together the previous night.  She laughed slightly but kept her eyes on her task.

At that moment, Sólith came in, carrying another load of firewood.  “You are just on time,” Eilian told him cheerfully. “The fish are ready.”

Sólith looked startled and a little suspicious at his pleasant tone, but he simply put the wood down and took his place at the table.  Eilian slid the fish onto a platter and handed it to Isiwen, who started it around the table.  “Eilian says he will hunt for more rabbits today,” Isiwen told Sólith.

“Good,” said Sólith.  “I will go with him.”

The other three all paused with forks halfway to their mouths.  Apprehension flaring, Eilian tried to picture himself and Sólith in the woods together with weapons in their hands.  “I will go too,” Celuwen said hastily, evidently picturing the same scene.

“You will rest,” said Sólith.  “I heard you tossing and turning in the night.”

“Only for a while,” Celuwen protested.

“And you were up before daylight this morning,” Sólith said.

Isiwen looked steadily at Sólith.  “Perhaps it would be best if you stayed home this morning, Celuwen.  Your adar and Eilian might like some time alone to talk.”

Eilian stared at her, and she smiled at him encouragingly.  He smiled weakly back, glad of her support but uncertain of the wisdom of the enterprise. He had the impression, however, that Isiwen might have spoken to her husband, and perhaps this would be an opportunity for him and Celuwen’s father to start building some sort of mutual respect or understanding.

When the meal was over, Isiwen shooed Eilian and Sólith out the door.  “Celuwen and I will clean up,” she said.

Celuwen stood uncertainly watching them go. “Take care,” she called after them.

Eilian retrieved his bow from his campsite and then came back to meet Sólith, who had gotten his own bow.  “This way,” Sólith said, pointing east, and Eilian allowed himself to be led into the woods.  Sólith ignored Eilian and appeared intent on hunting, as well he might, Eilian thought, given the dearth of the recent winter. Concluding that it might be easier to talk to Celuwen’s father after they had finished their hunt, Eilian turned to concentrating on the task at hand.  The two of them searched the brushpiles and fallen treetops in which rabbits tended to shelter, and Eilian could not help but take satisfaction in the fact that he brought down half a dozen rabbits, while Sólith shot only two.

“That should be enough for tonight’s meal,” Sólith finally said, in the first words he had spoken since they entered the woods. “And now I can tell you what I really brought you out here to say, Eilian.”

His tone was not friendly, and Eilian braced himself.  It was going to take every ounce of self control he possessed to try to win this hostile Elf over.

“I want you to break things off with my daughter,” Sólith said.  “Then I want you to go away and leave her alone.  You have driven her close enough to despair already.”

Almost instantly, Eilian could feel himself sliding into dangerous territory. “From what I have seen and heard, she was in despair before I came here,” he said stiffly. “Isiwen seems to think she is better since my arrival.”

“She was in despair over you,” Sólith said hotly.  “You did not see it.  You cannot know how frightening it has been.  I have watched her fade these last few months, and, while she would not tell me or her naneth what pained her, I suspected it was you. And then I saw her face last night.  Your very presence is enough to disturb even her sleep. But she really suffers when you come and go again. And you will leave this time too.  You said it yourself last night.  You will go away and leave her hanging again, unable to get on with her life.  If you broke cleanly with her, she would get over you. She would find someone else and have a husband, a home, and children of her own.  Other Elves have courted her, you know.  You are not the only one to see her worth.”

Eilian felt a sudden panic at the idea of Celuwen being sought by someone else.  He would not allow it, he vowed to himself.

“She needs a husband who will stay with her,” Sólith went on, “not some warrior whose love of adventure outweighs his love of her. End it now, Eilian. It is this eternal uncertainty and endless waiting that eat at her and have finally made her so unhappy that she cannot bear it.”

Before Eilian had time to think, arrow-sharp words flew from his mouth. “She despaired because she wrote asking me to come and then did not hear from me.  And I ask you, Sólith, whose fault is that?  I could not come, but I would have written if I thought there was the slightest chance she would get my letter.”

Sólith flushed.  “I did not know she had written you, or I would have been in no doubt at all as to the source of her despair.  But she has been unhappy for a long time, and you cannot blame that on me.”

Suddenly recollecting his purpose, Eilian bit back the hot words that trembled on his lips at the unfairness of this accusation.  “I do not wish to blame anyone,” he said.  “What I wish is to become betrothed to Celuwen.”  The minute the words were out of his mouth, he regretted them.  His timing could not have been worse.  If he had made such a tactical mistake in captaining his patrol, he would not have blamed Ithilden for relieving him of his command.

Sólith stared at him for a moment and then gave a short laugh.  “You must be mad. Did you not hear what I just said?”

“A betrothal would end the uncertainty,” Eilian argued. Now that the mistake had been made, he might as well press on.

“Would you cease chasing after danger?” Sólith demanded incredulously. “For that matter, would you cease chasing after other maidens?”

Eilian was deeply insulted. “I would never be unfaithful to Celuwen, and surely it is up to her to decide if she can tolerate my being a warrior.”

“Have you spoken to Celuwen about becoming betrothed?” Sólith asked. “Are you so sure she will want to become betrothed if you are to continue your present reckless life, a life that would make it imprudent to bond for years yet?”

Eilian suddenly recalled Celuwen’s unreadable behavior at the fish pond. In truth, he was not at all certain she would agree to a betrothal, despite the fact that he thought she loved him. He had proposed to her before and been turned away.  He had no intention of telling Sólith that, however.  “I have not spoken to her yet,” he said.

“Then do not,” Sólith commanded. “Break off your relationship and go.”

Eilian struggled for self command.  “What if she wants to pledge herself to me? What if her despair returns because I break with her and leave?”

Sólith hesitated.  “I do not believe that would happen.”

“But what if it did?” Eilian persisted.

“I would have to decide what to do then,” Sólith conceded.  “But I tell you, Eilian, my daughter is precious to me, and if I think you are harming her, I will not be responsible for my actions.”

“Celuwen is precious to me too,” Eilian said.

Sólith snorted but said no more.  They had reached the edges of the settlement now and walked to Sólith’s cottage in uneasy silence.  They found Celuwen and Isiwen both at work over looms in the cottage’s common room. Isiwen cried out with pleasure at the sight of the rabbits. “So many!” she exclaimed. “We will have a feast!”

Celuwen looked from Eilian to her father, and a small crease formed between her brows.  Eilian gave her what was meant to be a reassuring smile.  He did not want Celuwen to know that he and Sólith had quarreled.  He wanted her to be as open as possible to his advances.

Isiwen now scanned them too.  Her eyes narrowed as she focused on Sólith’s flushed face, and Eilian was suddenly sure he had an ally.  “Celuwen,” she said, “perhaps you would like to show the meadow to Eilian.”

Celuwen jumped up immediately and reached for her cloak, pleasing Eilian by her apparent eagerness to be with him. Sólith sent him a warning look as he and Celuwen went out the door. Eilian knew exactly what Sólith wanted him to say to Celuwen.  He also knew he had no intention of saying it.

When they got outside, he reached for Celuwen’s hand, but she moved out of his reach.  “Eilian,” she said, “I have something I need to ask you that I have been thinking about all morning, and I need to be very brave to do it, so please just let me speak.”

For a moment, his heart sank.  She sounded so sober.  Surely she was not going to send him away, not now.

“Would you have come to see me if I had not asked you to?”

He blinked.  This was not what he had expected her to ask.  He started to say that of course he would have come but then realized that that was not true.  He paused, trying to think of how to give her a truthful answer that would not sound as if he were maligning her father.

He had opened his mouth to respond when she jumped into the silence.  “Never mind,” she said in a wobbly voice.  “You do not have to answer.  I have no right to expect anything of you, and when I asked you to come, I thought I would be happy if we could just see one another again.  I thought I could let you come and then go again if you liked, and it would be all right.  But then you came, and I realized I wanted more than that.”  Now she was crying, walking just out of his reach.  “I am sorry to be so difficult.  You do not owe me anything. I told you that in my letter.”

This would not do, he thought desperately, and caught at her arm, drew her into the shelter of a large oak tree just coming into leaf, and turned her to face him. “I would have come years ago, but I thought I was not welcome,” he declared.  “Celuwen, how could you doubt my feelings after the way we kissed last night?”

“Eilian, you kiss other maidens.  You know you do.”

“No more,” he declared, drawing her to him, “and not like that, not like this.”  He brushed small kisses at the tears that had run down her cheeks. Then he touched his mouth tentatively to hers.  For a moment, he thought she was going to pull away, but then, with a faint moan, she wrapped her arms around his neck and parted her lips for him to enter. Fire flickered through him, and almost without meaning to, he slid his hands down the curve of her back to rest on the flare of her hips and draw her closer.

For a moment, they stood in an embrace that felt as intimate to him as anything he had ever experienced.  Then, with a desperate wrench, she pulled away, leaving him bereft.  “Eilian, if you care for me as you say you do, then why did you not write to me?  I know I told you that I found your visits painful, but we have written to one another since we were children.  Why did you stop?”

He drew a deep breath.  Should he tell her about the returned letters?  He could not bear the thought that she believed he had stopped loving her.  And suddenly it occurred to him that it might be useful if she were to become angry enough with Sólith to challenge him.  “I would have written if I thought you would get the letter.”

She blinked. “What do you mean?”

“I wrote to you repeatedly over the years,” he said, “and the letters always came back unopened.”  He looked at her again, and she was staring at him uncomprehendingly. “I thought you had refused to read them and wanted nothing more to do with me.”

“Your letters were returned?” she asked blankly, and then abruptly, understanding flared on her face.  “My adar,” she said in a tone that bespoke certainty.

“I do not know that,” he said carefully, “but it is what I suspect.”

Her posture grew rigid with what Eilian knew from long experience with her was anger.  “He cannot be allowed to interfere like that,” she said.  He was encouraged by her apparent willingness to view her father’s actions as ‘interference,’ but he was still worried by the fact that Thranduil expected him to get her parents’ consent if they were to become betrothed and marry.  He opened his mouth to caution her not to anger Sólith so much that he would deny them permission, but realized that he had not yet said anything to her about becoming betrothed and should not assume that she would agree to it.  Her ardent response to his kisses suggested that she would be willing, but it would be a mistake to take her consent for granted.

Celuwen was staring at the ground, her fists clenched and her breath coming quickly.  “I will go and speak to him now,” she said.  She looked up at him, and he cringed a little to see the determined set to her mouth.  “Perhaps it would be best if you stayed away from the cottage for a while.”

He nodded, and she turned and marched back the way they had come.  Eilian was deeply glad that it was Sólith she was angry with and not him.  Celuwen seldom grew angry, but when she did, she was a terror.  On one occasion when they had quarreled as children, she had put a snake in his bed.  He still did not know with certainty how she had gotten into his chamber, but he suspected that his mother had helped her.  The quarrel really had been his fault.

He wondered if he should try to stop her.  If she told Sólith off, would that help or hurt his cause?  He did not know, but his attempt to get along with Sólith had certainly not met with much success.  He might as well see if Sólith would be more responsive to his daughter’s anger.

He decided he would walk on toward the meadow that Isiwen had mentioned.  His hip was begging for rest, and he would be happy enough to spend the day in a spring meadow surrounded by the whispering trees.  He looked toward the north, where distant storm clouds were piled high in the sky.  There will be rain closer to home, he thought.

I borrow characters and settings from Tolkien, but they are his, not mine. I gain only the enriched imaginative life that I assume he intended me to gain.

Many thanks to Nilmandra for beta reading this chapter. 

*******

6.  Making Trades

Legolas could not help but eye the black storm clouds to the west as he and Galivion followed Anyr around the settlement, supposedly listening to him explain how the settlers planned to build more substantial shelters on the flets and move to them permanently.  “Living off the ground really would offer us protection from a number of dangers,” he said, and Legolas could not help but agree.  He found he rather longed to live in a tree himself.  But just now, he was worried about the possibility that rain might cause the still high river to overflow its banks again.

His concern finally drove him to interrupt Anyr, “Are you prepared for the possibility of more flooding?” Galivion grimaced slightly, and Legolas suddenly realized that he had been rude.  “I beg your pardon for interrupting,” he added hastily.

Anyr seemed to have taken no offense, however, and answered placidly.  “Oh yes. We have all our supplies on the flets. The Men’s village might be in trouble, I suppose.”

Legolas was glad that the Men’s village was not his responsibility.  These rather feckless Elven settlers had strained Thranduil’s resources quite enough.  The sound of a raised voice suddenly caught his attention, and Galivion and Anyr turned toward the noise too.

Anyr frowned.  “Pardon me,” he said and started off through the trees in the direction from which the commotion came. With a warrior’s reaction to possible trouble, Legolas put his hand to his sword hilt and followed, with Galivion trailing behind him.  And suddenly he heard another voice, not shouting but certainly speaking in an imperious tone, and he could not help but groan, for he recognized the voice of Tinár.  He, Anyr, and Galivion rounded a mass of bushes to find Tinár gripping the arm of a Man who was holding a small bundle.  Two obviously frightened children clung to his cloak, the smaller one so upset that she was in tears.

Annael stood facing Tinár and was speaking calmly as they approached. “Let us hear what he has to say,” Annael said. When he saw Legolas, he stepped back out of the way.

“What is going on here?” Anyr demanded.

Tinár turned to him.  “This Man was stealing food,” he cried in an outraged tone. “We were bringing the last of the stores, and we caught him climbing down from the flet where it is stored, and you can see for yourself that he has food in that bundle.”  And just as Tinár claimed, when Legolas looked, he could see vegetables protruding from the open top of the bundle.  Galivion’s indrawn breath told Legolas that he had seen them too.  Legolas felt a quite uncharacteristic flare of rage at this Man who had dared to help himself to these precious supplies that Thranduil had scraped together with such pain.

To Legolas’s surprise, Anyr simply laughed.  “Ethau is not stealing,” he said. “I told him he could take some of the food back to the Men’s village.”  Legolas felt his mouth drop open and saw similar shock on Galivion’s face.

Suddenly Tuilinn appeared.  As had been true earlier, her hair was coming loose and drifting in curls around her face.  “Astiaa!” she cried.  “We have been waiting for you.”  She detached the teary-eyed little girl from her father’s cloak and scooped her into her arms. “You too, Talet.  Come and play a game with us.”

“That bad Elf is hurting Papa!” cried Astiaa, flinging her arms around the maiden’s neck.

Tuilinn glanced at Tinár and then threw a reproachful glance at Legolas.  He actually felt himself flinch under her accusatory glare and, for a moment, resented it.  But then he looked at the weeping little girl and the boy, who was scarcely older but was glaring threateningly at Tinár, even though his lower lip too was trembling.

“Let the Man go, Tinár,” he ordered.  Tinár opened his mouth as if to protest, and Legolas hardened his face in a deliberate imitation of Thranduil at his most intimidating.  Tinár stared at him and then pressed his lips together and let the Man go.  Next to Legolas, Galivion shifted uncomfortably.

Tuilinn reached for the little boy’s hand and drew him to her. “See?” she comforted both of the little ones. “Your papa is safe.  We should go and play so the grown ups can talk. I think they want to do that now.”  She turned to lead them away, but as she went, she looked back over her shoulder and gave Legolas a radiant smile.  To his utter surprise, the bottom dropped out of his stomach.  He looked after her in bewilderment for a moment.   He had scarcely spoken ten words to this maiden with untidy hair.  What was wrong with him?

“My lord,” said Galivion, touching him lightly on the arm to catch his attention.  Legolas looked at him with unseeing eyes.  “You will undoubtedly want to discuss this matter and come to some understanding with Anyr as to the need to give the supplies only to the king’s people.”

With an effort, Legolas pulled himself back into the present situation.  “Indeed,” he said, turning to face Anyr. 

“The matter is really quite simple,” Anyr protested.  “There is no need for a fuss, but if you insist on talking, then we should include the Men’s leader too.”  He looked at the Man, who still stood there holding the bundle of food, with Tinár hovering a foot from his elbow.  “You may go, Ethau, but please ask Crydus if he is free to come and meet with the king’s representatives.”

“Wait!” Legolas cried.  He felt as if the situation were slipping away from his already precarious control.  “We need to speak among ourselves first.”

“Nonsense,” Anyr said briskly. “Crydus will be useful. Go on, Ethau.”

Ethau threw Tinár a scathing look and walked away, not only going to send the Men’s leader back despite Legolas’s objections, but also still clutching the bundle of food.  Legolas could feel Galivion’s tension and found that for once he sympathized with Tinár, who obviously wanted to snatch the bundle from the Man’s hands as he passed.  But short of allowing Tinár to seize Ethau, there seemed to be no way to prevent Anyr’s bidding from being carried out.  And in any case, it was not part of Legolas’s mission to annoy Anyr by contradicting his orders.  They needed to talk to Anyr in private as much as they could and as soon as they could.  “We will talk on your flet,” he said to Anyr.

“Just a moment,” Anyr said and turned to Tinár and Annael.  “Please watch for the arrival of the Men’s leader and tell him where we are,” he said. Tinár gave a tight-mouthed nod, and Annael threw Legolas a sympathetic glance and then led him off in the direction Ethau had gone.  Anyr, Legolas, and Galivion made the short walk to Anyr’s flet, and the three of them again settled on his floor just as they had that morning.

Legolas knew that there were things that desperately needed to be said before the Men’s leader arrived, but he found himself groping for words.  His father’s advisors had prepared him well to explain the amount of food that he had brought, but they had never anticipated that he would have to convince the settlers to keep the food once he delivered it.  “Anyr,” he finally began, “we have told you how scarce the king’s food supplies are and how he asked the Elves near his stronghold to reduce the amount they ate so that he might help your people. If you give this food away, he will not be able to send you more, and Elves near his stronghold will have done with less food so that Men might have something to eat.”

Anyr shrugged.  “We have helped the Men before, and of course we will help them now. How could we do otherwise?  Their children are hungry.”

Legolas grimaced, realizing that he had seen the Mannish children being fed only an hour or two ago.  In his mind’s eye, he saw again the charming scene of Tuilinn feeding and mothering the children.  And even as he pictured it, he felt the slightly dizzy sensation he had felt when she smiled at him.  He shook himself a little reproachfully.  Perhaps he had been so struck by the maiden that he had simply not thought about the fact that food Thranduil had sacrificed to provide was being given to the children of Men. The children had been only hungry children being tended by a pretty maiden.

Then he glanced at Galivion and read the dismay in the advisor’s face. He too had been present when the children were being fed and had failed to recognize what was happening right in front of him, so the maiden’s presence was not the only explanation. Galivion had been married for as long as Legolas had known him.

And of course, Legolas suddenly realized, the Mannish children had to be fed even if that had not been Thranduil’s intention.  Legolas certainly was not willing to allow them to go hungry.  Perhaps the food could be shared only with the children, who were, after all, fed in the Elven settlement. That would at least keep the supplies in the Elves’ hands, and there were not so many children that it would cause undue hardship. 

“I can understand that you might wish to feed the children, especially when they are here,” he said cautiously.  “But surely the adults should fend for themselves.  Elves are going hungry to provide this food for you, and we did not bring enough that you can afford to give it away.”

“Men are surprisingly needy creatures,” Anyr told him earnestly.  “Even the adults suffer from reduced amounts of food far more than Elves do.”  Legolas was dismayed by this argument, for he knew it to be only too true.

“Anyr!” called a voice from the ground, and Legolas looked over the edge of the flet to see a broad-shouldered Man standing below them, with Tinár and Annael just behind him.  Legolas felt a flood of panic at how swiftly the Man had arrived.  Now he would have to reassert the Elves’ sole ownership of the food with the Men’s leader present.  He was not sure he could do it, especially since Anyr had reminded him of the Men’s vulnerability.

“We will come down,” Anyr told the Man.  He looked at Legolas and Galivion.  “He would not be able to climb up here,” he explained and disappeared over the edge.

As Legolas moved to follow him, Galivion touched his arm.  “The king will not be pleased if Anyr and his people give his gift away to Men as if it had no value,” he warned in a low voice. Legolas nodded unhappily.  He knew that already.  Thranduil was not hostile to the Men who lived near the lake, but he had sent the food at least partly to bind these settlement Elves closer to his rule.  If they gave it away, they would certainly be hungry again themselves and might resent Thranduil’s failure to send them more, no matter how much Anyr protested that he understood the situation now.

And Legolas was not surprised at Galivion’s point of view either. The advisor had managed the central food supplies for Thranduil in this lean winter. He knew exactly how much had been sacrificed to feed the settlement Elves.  But Legolas still did not see how the Men could be left to starve.

For a forlorn moment, he thought about the trust his father had placed in him and the satisfaction he had taken in thinking that the mission was going well and Thranduil would be pleased.  Then he dismissed the thought of his own desire for approval.  I am in charge of this mission, he reminded himself.  I will just have to act in the way I think best and deal with the consequences when I get home. He and Galivion followed Anyr to the ground.

“This is Crydus,” Anyr told them.  “Crydus, this is Legolas, who is the son of our king, and this is Galivion, one of the king’s advisors.”

Legolas put his hand over his heart and then stretched it out to grasp the hand the Man extended.  He had seen Men before in Thranduil’s hall and recognized the form of greeting, which the Man now repeated with Galivion, who was looking decidedly uncomfortable.  He looked over the Man’s shoulder at Tinár’s angry face and decided that he did not want to talk in front of him. 

“Go and watch the river for signs it is rising,” Legolas ordered. “If it is raining upstream, we are likely to have trouble again.” With obvious reluctance to miss what was happening, Tinár obeyed.  Annael moved in a little closer and began scanning the area around them.  His observation was low key, but Legolas knew he would make sure they had privacy for this talk, and as had so often happened in their long friendship, he was grateful to Annael for his quiet support.

Legolas turned back to Crydus, rapidly trying to order his thoughts.  “Anyr tells me that he has arranged to share the food we brought for his people with you,” he said, as neutrally as he could.

“Yes,” Crydus said, with a broad smile, “and I cannot tell you how grateful we are.  When the river broke through the barrier we had built, we had time to save very few things before we had to flee.  We lost much of what little food we had.”

And suddenly, Legolas knew that he could not tell this Man that the Elves refused to help him.  There must be some way to make this at least palatable to Adar, he thought desperately.  He wondered what the Men made of the situation and decided he would try to find out.  Drawing a deep breath, he gave Crydus a rueful look. “I only wish we had been able to bring enough to satisfy the combined needs of both villages.  As it is, you will be able to feed your children well enough, but if the adults are to have enough to eat, Elves will have to go hungry, and that was not the king’s intent when he sent this food from his own sparsely filled larders.”

Crydus blinked and turned to Anyr.  “You did not tell us that, Anyr,” he said, much to Legolas’s surprise.

Anyr waved his hand airily.  “Arda will provide,” he said.

Crydus frowned.  “I am sure it will, but it would perhaps be best if we could find some way to help Arda along.”

Legolas could have wept with gratitude for the Man’s sensible attitude.  After dealing with Anyr all day, he had not expected it.  “Do you hunt?” he asked, groping for some solution.  “Game is beginning to return and perhaps you could increase the number of your hunting parties. That is what the Elves near the king’s stronghold are doing.”

“We do hunt,” Crydus acknowledged, “but we have been too busy rebuilding our houses in the last few days to do much of it.  Our families do not do so well as Elves when exposed to the early spring weather.”

“Perhaps you could make do with temporary shelters for now and hunt until the spring advances far enough to make more food available in the forest,” Legolas suggested.

Crydus pursed his lips and nodded.  “That would be wise,” he said.  “I did not realize that Anyr’s people’s supplies were so low.  I believed they had plenty, or I might have thought about hunting more before now.”

“My lord, may I speak to you?” Galivion suddenly interrupted.  Legolas had been aware of him in his peripheral vision, shifting from foot to foot and looking more and more dismayed.  He resigned himself now to being given advice that he did not want to take.

“Of course,” he said and followed Galivion to an area that was screened from view by undergrowth.

“My lord,” Galivion said, with anguish in every word, “surely you are not going to consent to Anyr’s giving away the food.”

“I cannot see that we have any choice,” Legolas argued.  He liked Galivion and would value his support and advice if the advisor could see his way clear to give it.  “Anyr will share the food, no matter what we do, so it seems to me that we must find a way to salvage as much of the situation as possible.”

Galivion bit his lip and hesitated. “Please do not think I am impugning your judgment, my lord, for you have done very well on this mission, but allow me to ask you if your argument might be affected by wanting that pretty maiden to smile at you again.  You must remember that you are not supposed to be acting on your own wishes here but are the king’s representative and should instead do as he would wish.”

Legolas stiffened. Galivion might not intend to question his judgment, but it seemed to Legolas that that was exactly what he was doing.  The fact that Legolas had also wondered about the maiden’s influence was irrelevant.  “I understand your reluctance to lose scarce resources, Galivion, but I will say again that I do not think we have any choice here.  And the maiden has nothing to do with it.”

Galivion flushed slightly and was silent for a long moment. Then he drew a deep breath. “Very well,” he said, with obvious effort.  “Then if I may give you a piece of advice, the king will not be happy about this no matter what we do, but he will be less unhappy if you are able to negotiate some sort of benefit to him or at least to the settlers from this. And you must be careful not to make any promises on Thranduil’s behalf.  I have seen him become very angry when he thought Eilian had done that. Remember that you are undoubtedly being seen as the king’s son even when you do not intend to act in that capacity.”

Legolas nodded, feeling a flood of both relief and gratitude at the assistance Galivion was now offering. “Thank you,” he said as warmly as he could.  “And if you notice something I am missing in the discussion, please join in.  I need all the help I can get.”

“You will do fine,” Galivion said.  “They will be able to tell you are sympathetic.”  He gave Legolas a wry smile.  “And in all truth, I do not know how Thranduil will react to the news that we are feeding the Mannish adults, but he would never have allowed the children to go hungry.”  Legolas smiled gratefully back, and the two of them made their way to where Anyr and Crydus were waiting.

Legolas thought for a moment about the advice that Galivion had just given him and then spoke to Crydus.  “Anyr’s people are good neighbors to you,” he observed tentatively.

“They are,” Crydus agreed without hesitation.

“The king would be pleased to know that you are also good neighbors to them,” Legolas said.  Galivion nudged him slightly, undoubtedly reminding Legolas that he was not to speak for Thranduil.  Legolas grimaced.  This diplomacy business was harder than it appeared.

Crydus suddenly looked cautious.  “What are you suggesting?”

“As I recall, Anyr told us that you have fields near your homes,” Legolas ventured, and Crydus nodded.  “You grow grain perhaps?”

“Yes,” Crydus said.  “Anyr knows that because we have sometimes traded it to him for the rights to some of the dead fall in the forest. He will not let us cut living trees, of course.”  He smiled fondly at Anyr, who looked placidly back at him.

Legolas cringed and saw Galivion doing the same thing.  “I cannot speak about that kind of trade,” Legolas said hastily, “because it is in the king’s control. I am sure Anyr has conferred with him about timber rights and trade tariffs.” He was actually sure that Anyr had done no such thing, but it did not hurt to be tactful. He glanced at Anyr, who looked both vexed and a little embarrassed.  Legolas supposed that unauthorized trading, especially of anything from the forest, would be at an end once his father heard about it.  At that point, embarrassment would be the least of Anyr’s problems.

“However,” Legolas went on carefully, “a little informal trading of present food from the Elves for future food from you might be a neighborly way to solve the current problem.  And if the Elves help you to build temporary shelters, you can send out more hunters and supplement the inadequate supplies you have.”

Crydus pursed his lips.  “I would have to consult with others,” he said. “The fields do not belong to me, and the farmers would have to consent. But I think there is a good possibility I can work things out.”

“Why do you not try to do that?” Legolas said.  “And in the meantime, I think the food we brought should stay in the settlement, at least as long as Galivion and I are here.”  Legolas knew that there was no hope of keeping the food in the Elves’ hands once he and his party left. They would have to stay as long as they could in the hopes of working out some sort of reasonable arrangement. There went the last few days of his leave, he thought regretfully.

“We will feed the children when they are here,” Legolas went on, “and if your adults are in great need, you need only to ask us for help.  Ethau took food you can have tonight. And once you have some sort of agreement on what will happen when your fields are flourishing again, other plans can be made, I am sure.”

Crydus gave him a long, level look.  “You are Thranduil’s son,” he said dryly.  “No one could doubt it.”  Legolas blinked.  The comment seemed slightly insulting to his mother but was evidently intended as a compliment.  He did not always understand Men very well.

“I will do as you suggest immediately,” Crydus said. “I should be ready to speak to you about this tomorrow.”

“We will be happy to help you build shelters,” Anyr put in.  “Will your party also be willing to assist the Men tomorrow?” he asked, turning to Legolas.  Legolas nodded, although he could not help but think that Anyr was exacting a bit of revenge in asking for his party to help.  He would have to speak severely to Tinár, he thought, if he expected him to work with Men building shelters.  He grimaced a little at the prospect. He and Tinár could very well wind up in the same patrol as fellow warriors again, and this stint as Tinár’s superior would make for complications.

“We will look forward to seeing you in our village tomorrow,” Crydus said.  “And now I will bid you good evening.”  He bowed slightly to Legolas and took his leave.

Legolas turned to Anyr.  “I trust the arrangements are acceptable?”

Anyr shrugged.  “I suppose, although really I think you are making a great fuss over nothing.  You must excuse me, though. I need to see to our own arrangements for the communal evening meal.”  And he, too, took his leave of them.

Legolas glanced over his shoulder. “Did you hear all that, Annael?”  His friend nodded.  “I think I will delegate to you the task of telling Tinár what we will be doing tomorrow,” Legolas said.

Annael laughed.  “It will be my pleasure,” he asserted.  “Do you need me any more today?”

Legolas shook his head. “I think not.  I will see you at evening meal.”  Annael saluted and went off to find Tinár, looking as if he did indeed look forward to informing his fellow warrior that he was to spend the next day building Mannish shelters.

Legolas turned to Galivion. “What do you think?” he asked.  He fervently hoped that Thranduil would be reasonably pleased with what he had done.  He valued his father’s good opinion of him, and he flinched at the idea of disappointing him.

Galivion shrugged.  “I am still not sure how the king will like it.  He will certainly be irate over the unauthorized trading that has been going on, but you did not add to that and have made it clear to Anyr that it cannot continue.  I myself think the arrangement you have suggested is a sensible one.”  He smiled at Legolas.  “And the maiden will like it too.”

Legolas laughed.  “Thank you for your advice, Galivion.  Diplomacy is amazingly stressful. I do not know how anyone can do it all the time as you do.  I believe it will be a relief to go back to battling Orcs again.”

Galivion patted his shoulder.  “I advise you to spend a little time with the maiden first.  You may find there are compensations for diplomatic missions after all.”  And smiling to himself, he left Legolas alone to follow his counsel or not, just as he chose.

I borrow characters and settings from Tolkien, but they are his, not mine. I gain only the enriched imaginative life that I assume he intended me to gain.

Many thanks to Nilmandra for beta reading this chapter. 

*******

7. Night meetings

Legolas drifted silently along the path, listening to the murmur of the trees.  They were content enough with the juices of spring flowing through them, but they were also wary of the nearby river rushing noisily along between banks that barely contained it.  Legolas could feel their desire for the river’s water at their roots and their fear that that water might embrace them in a death grip that would wash them away.  I feel it too, he assured them, patting a beech that seemed particularly troubled. But the river stays in its place yet. We do not have to worry yet.

Unfortunately, he thought there was a very good chance they would have to worry the next day.  The clouds he had seen in the west were moving steadily toward them, and enough rain had already fallen upstream that the river was rising again.  He could not smell rain on the cool night breeze, and that was some comfort at least.  Perhaps we will escape yet, he thought hopefully, and then put thoughts of flooding out of his head as one of the things he could do nothing about and would deal with when the time came.

As he would deal with Thranduil when that time came too, he thought, a little forlornly, wondering for the hundredth time how his father would react to the news that Legolas had not been able to stop the settlement Elves from giving away some of the food the king had sent.  Would Thranduil believe that Legolas had not tried hard enough or had been inept in his efforts?  Would he think Legolas had interfered in trade arrangements?

If he does think that, he will be furious, Legolas thought unhappily.  When Thranduil was angry, he could be sharp-tongued enough to flay the offender’s sensibilities raw, and he might very well demand that Legolas do something very unpleasant to correct the error he had made.  Thranduil had once forced Eilian to apologize to Sólith for some imagined slight that was making relationships with the settlement difficult.  Something like that would be distasteful, but the thought that he might have lost his father’s trust or respect was nearly as painful.

From ahead came the sound of light footsteps, and he could not help reaching for his sword and sliding into the shadows off the path before realizing that the steps were Elven.  If peace ever comes, he thought, I wonder if I will be able to stop reacting like a warrior.  He was a little afraid that the answer was no, that he would forever see danger in the world around him.  He grimaced.  Anyr would undoubtedly think he was profoundly un-Elven, and in truth, Legolas sometimes thought that himself.

From around a bend in the path, a slim figure came into sight, wrapped in a cloak with the hood up against the evening chill.  For a moment, he did not realize who it was, and then suddenly he smiled and his heart accelerated as the curls drifting out from around the edges of the hood told him that Tuilinn was walking toward him.  He had followed Galivion’s advice and looked for her earlier, but he not seen her, and now here she was before him.

He stepped out onto the path and spoke immediately so that she would not be alarmed by his sudden appearance.  “Good evening, mistress,” he greeted her. “You are out late by yourself.”

She stopped abruptly at the sight of him and then laughed in evident relief when fear faded as she realized who stood before her.  “Good evening, my lord,” she said, pushing her hood back to see him better.  “I walked some of the Mannish children home.  Their parents are so busy building shelters that they do not have time to fetch them.”  Although he knew she had no particular feeling for him, her voice was warm.  He wanted her to speak to him some more.

“Are you very tired?” he asked hesitantly.  “I am restless and I thought I would walk a bit before going to bed.  I would welcome some company if the children have not worn you out.”

She considered for a moment.  “I am not too tired, and I would enjoy a walk before bed.  I like being out at night. There is a path ahead that leads to an apple orchard where the children were playing this afternoon. Shall we walk that way?”

He turned to walk back in the direction she had been taking when he met her, keeping a careful distance between them so as not to seem presumptuous by touching her. “Did you ever get my friend Ródien to eat his carrots?” he asked.

She looked as if she would laugh, just as he had intended her to do, but then some other thought evidently occurred to her and her face sharpened.  “No, but it was no matter,” she said a little stiffly. “Other children wanted them.  Nothing is going to waste.”

“I did not mean to imply that it was,” he protested.

They walked along in silence for a moment. “I am sorry,” she said. “I should not have assumed you were criticizing.  After all, I could see today that you were really trying to understand Anyr’s position, and you did agree to let us feed the Mannish children.”

He blew out his breath in exasperation. She made him sound like a hidebound bureaucrat.  “Neither the king nor I would let children go hungry if we could help it,” he said.

She stopped abruptly and put her hand on his arm, and he was immediately aware of his skin tingling under her hand, despite the fact that both a fold of his cloak and his tunic sleeve lay between it and his arm.  “Truly, I am sorry,” she apologized again. “You have done your best to help us, and I thank you for that.”  She was looking earnestly into his face, and he felt a sudden, nearly irresistible impulse to kiss her.

Remember who you are, he reminded himself sharply, and as if she sensed something amiss, she removed her hand and turned to begin walking again.  After a second’s hesitation, he followed her, vividly aware that there was danger here of a sort he had not thought of when he reached for his sword at the first sound of her footsteps.  In a short time, they reached the orchard, and in wordless accord, they seated themselves on a bench that had been crafted from a fallen tree and turned their faces up to the few stars that were visible in the cloudy sky.  With a valiant effort, Legolas made sure there was a good foot between them.

“Your companion said that you were newly returned from the south,” she said. He nodded wordlessly.  “Tell me about it,” she invited.

He hesitated. In his years as a warrior, he had found that he did not like to talk to those at home about what he had seen and done while on patrol.  They did not always understand, and it seemed cruel to force the horrors of battle upon them.  Moreover, they sometimes recoiled at the savagery in which warriors engaged just to survive.  “The Shadow lies heavily there,” he finally settled for saying.

She considered that in silence. “When you come home again,” she finally asked, “can you leave it behind or does it follow you?”

He sat stock still, unable for a moment to answer.  And then, to his shock, he found himself responding to her honestly.  “It clings to you,” he breathed. “It soils you, and you grasp at every beauty of Arda, every person you love, every innocent child you see, to try to find clean happiness again.”  What am I saying? he asked himself. He had never spoken like this to anyone before.

She turned her face to his, and at that moment, the clouds covering the moon parted, and he saw her face glowing with its pale light.  His hand was resting on the bench between them, and she put her hand over it. “Your adar must be very proud of you,” she said.  “He is fortunate to have a son who will venture near to Shadow so that all those clean and innocent things can survive.”

As if spellbound, he reached with a tentative touch to brush her hair from her face.  “You need a ribbon,” he murmured, “a green ribbon.”  And because he could not help himself, he bent his head and brushed his lips gently across hers.  As he did so, he was aware of his body humming in concert with hers, and with the trees, and with the spring grass pushing through the muddy ground beneath them.

“I have been waiting for you to do that,” she said softly.

An hour later, Legolas climbed as quietly as he could on to the flet he was sharing with Annael on the excuse that he and Galivion each needed one of the guards with them at night.  His friend lay wrapped in a blanket, apparently asleep, but he lifted his head when Legolas gathered his own blanket and lay down next to him.  “You look pleased with yourself,” Annael observed sleepily.  “You must have persuaded Anyr to act as if he had some sense.”

Legolas laughed.  “You must speak more kindly of these settlement Elves,” he said.  “I have decided I like them.”  Annael snorted and then rolled over to go back to sleep.  Legolas lay with his head pillowed on his arm, feeling himself slipping away to the dream path almost instantly.  It had been a very long day, filled with frustrations to be sure, but with its good moments too.

***

Eilian scraped up the last of the mush he had made by boiling the acorn meal that Alfirin had sent with him.  It had a pleasant enough nutty taste, and he supposed he should be glad he had it, but he had eaten enough of it this winter that he would celebrate if he never saw it on his plate again.

He had spent the afternoon in the meadow and then gone back to his campsite, which was along a stream a half mile or so outside the settlement. All the while he had wondered what was happening in Celuwen’s cottage and had watched for her return.  He had finally decided it would be foolishly optimistic to think he was going to get any of the rabbits he and Sólith had shot that morning, but he had been unwilling to leave his camp to hunt for more in case she should come while he was gone. Hence he had resorted to fixing what felt like his thousandth meal of acorn meal mush.

He rose, stretching carefully.  His hip felt better after his rest in the meadow, but it still ached a little.  He gathered his dishes, and carried them the short distance to the stream to wash them.  Then he added a few more sticks to the fire.  He was returning to his seat beneath an oak tree when a light step sounded and, without looking, he knew it was Celuwen.  He turned to see her emerging from among the trees, carrying a bowl with a plate set over the top of it to cover it. 

She held the dish out to him.  “It seemed only fair that you should get some of the rabbit.”

“I have already eaten,” he said, taking the dish from her. “I will set it in the stream to keep cold for tomorrow.”  He used one of his spare bowstrings to tie the plate over the dish and then carried it to the edge of the stream and set it in the cold water, making sure the water was shallow enough that it would not lap over the edge of the bowl.  When he turned back to the campfire he found that, in the circle of the fire’s warmth, a sober-looking Celuwen had removed her cloak and seated herself on it leaning against the oak.  He went to sit next to her, put his arm around her, and pulled her against his side. She nestled her head against his shoulder and let out a long, wavering breath.

As had happened each time he touched her on this trip, a shock ran through him, and he felt the beginnings of arousal. “What happened with your adar?” he asked hastily, trying to take his mind off the growing pressure in his groin.

“He admitted he kept your letters from me,” she said grimly.  “He has promised he will not do so again.”

Eilian pondered this answer.  He supposed life would be better if he and Celuwen could write to one another, but even as he thought that, his body told him that he, at least, would have a difficult time accepting letters as the only contact between them.  I may have to accept it, he thought desperately.  After all, even if Sólith agreed to let them wed, the customary betrothal period lasted a year, and Thranduil had said it might have to be longer.  But perhaps he could placate his increasingly urgent desire for her if their betrothal were arranged so he knew there would be an eventual end to waiting.

But how could they become betrothed?  Thranduil had insisted that Celuwen’s parents would have to agree to such a step.  Eilian did not think getting Isiwen’s consent would be a problem, but he was much less hopeful about getting Sólith’s.  He stroked Celuwen’s dark hair, reveling in its silky texture and trying to ignore the soft pressure of her breast against his chest.

“If your adar is allowing us to write to one another, does that mean he is willing to let us become betrothed?” he asked.

She turned her face up to his.  “Betrothed?” she asked a little breathlessly.

He nodded.  “I came here to ask if you would agree to bond with me.”  Her lips parted slightly and her breath quickened.  In fear she might refuse, he hurried on before she could speak.  “I know you worry about my being a warrior, and I cannot leave my adar’s service.  As the king’s son, I have an obligation, and I would want to defend the realm even if I were not who I am.  But your letter said you thought you could be content with the time we could have together even if I did have to be away most of the year.”

She put her hand to his lips, stopping the flow of pleading words, and then she stretched toward his face and kissed him.  In an instant, every effort he had made to curb his desire for her was burned away by the heat that flowed through his body like molten metal in a forge.  Without breaking the contact of the kiss, he put his arms around her waist and drew her onto his lap, only too aware of the sweet agony of her bottom pressed against the increasing swell of his arousal.  In the tiny portion of his brain that was still responding to reason, he knew that she had not answered his question. He pulled his mouth an inch away from hers and she let out a soft sound of protest. “Would your adar consent to our betrothal?” he asked again.

She bit her lip. “Not yet,” she acknowledged. “But he will eventually. I know he will.”

Eilian touched his forehead to hers and groaned. Thranduil’s words echoed in his ears: “Are you sure there is anything you can do that would make you acceptable to her parents?”  In all truth, he knew that the answer to that question was no, and suddenly he could not bear it. He pulled her more tightly against him.

“I cannot wait for ‘eventually,’ Celuwen. Do you want to do that?”

She looked at him uncertainly. “What do you mean?”

“Bond with me here and now, my love.  Once it is done, it cannot be undone, and our parents will have to learn to live with it.”

She wet her lips, and he found himself staring in fascination at the tip of her tongue sliding across them.  She tried to speak. “I …” she began and then stopped with a shudder when he bent to kiss her ear.

“Even if your adar allowed the betrothal, we would have to wait at least a year.  Do you want to wait that long, Celuwen?” Deliberately seductive, his hand moved to brush her breast and then cup it.  She made a small sound and leaned into the caress. He rubbed his thumb over her nipple, feeling it harden underneath the soft wool of her gown. “A whole year?”

“But where will we live?” she managed to gasp. “What will we do?”

“Let me take you home,” he urged. “We will live together when we can and write to one another when we cannot and rejoice in one another always.”  His hand now moved to her skirt, sliding it up so he could caress her calf.  “Bond with me, Celuwen,” he urged. “Let us do it now. We have waited long enough.” With determination, he spoke the words of the blessing.  “As Manwë is my witness, Celuwen, I bless you and promise that I will treasure you and not harm you.  I will love you and be faithful to you for all of time and perhaps beyond.”  He held his breath to see if she would respond in kind.

She stared at him for a moment with her eyes wide and serious.  And suddenly, something in them shifted, and his heart leapt in anticipation.  She drew a deep breath. “As Varda is my witness, Eilian, I bless you and promise that I will treasure you and not harm you.  I will love you and be faithful to you for all of time and perhaps beyond.”

“In Eru’s name,” he breathed, all but weeping with relief and wonder over what they had just agreed to do.  He bent his mouth to hers again, slipping his tongue between her lips and reveling in the taste of her.  His hands moved to fumble with uncharacteristic clumsiness at the lacings on the front of her gown, and he realized with a start that she was unfastening his tunic.  He tugged the front of her gown open and slid it off her shoulders to reveal the thin straps of her lace-trimmed chemise.  He ran one finger delicately along under a strap, down to the top of the chemise and exulted when Celuwen arched her back to try to bring his hand into closer contact with the warmth of her breast.  He slid his hand into the chemise and was rewarded by hearing her moan, and he suddenly realized that he was moaning too, reveling in the unbelievable softness of her breast under his touch.

He had to let go of her when she pulled his tunic and silk undertunic over his head in a single tangle of clothing but then was immediately tugging again at the shoulders of her gown, sliding it down from her arms and then pushing it down her legs until she kicked it off and her shoes with it.  She lay in his lap now, clad only in her stockings and the thin chemise that reached to the middle of her thighs.  Her hands moved over his naked chest, exploring his muscles and making him dizzy when she touched one of his nipples.

“You are so beautiful,” he choked out. She flung her arms around his neck and drew his head down to kiss him again, while one of his hands supported her and the other crept up beneath her chemise to caress her thigh and then slide around to cup her bottom.  With their mouths joined, her gasp was lost in his indrawn breath.

The almost painful pressure in his groin told him that he was not going to be able to wait much longer. He slid her off his lap to lie on her back on her cloak, yanking the chemise off over her head as he did so.  And then he stopped and stared at her. In the firelight, she looked almost wanton, naked except for her stockings and holding her arms out to him.  How could they have waited for so many years? he suddenly wondered. How could they have considered waiting for more? She was the most beautiful creature he had ever seen, and he wanted her with a force that was almost beyond his control.  He shoved his own shoes off and then unfastened his leggings and slid them down his lean hips to stand naked in front of her.  Her eyes went to his erection and then suddenly slid to one side.

“Oh, Eilian,” she cried, and he realized that she was looking at the wound on his hip.  She sat up, making his mouth go dry at the way her breasts changed shape as she moved, and she ran her hand gently over the wound, causing him to draw in his breath sharply.  Then, impulsively, she leaned to kiss the angry, red mark.  Her hair brushed against him, and the touch of it was the straw’s weight that broke his restraint.  He grasped her shoulders, pushed her onto her back, and lay down with his body covering hers.

“I love you, Celuwen,” he murmured into the crook of her neck as he trailed kisses down her throat.  He despaired at how inadequate the words were to tell her what he felt.

She put her hands on each side of his face and drew it up to look at hers. “I love you, Eilian,” she said and pulled his mouth down to hers.  He nudged her legs apart with his knee and was suddenly aware of the heat that was coursing through her body too and coming to a focus where his body was straining to join hers.  He could wait no longer, he knew, and with a heart singing at this moment of joining of bodies and fëar, he entered her.

She gasped and moved her hands to his shoulders to push him slightly away for a moment.  Then her eyes met his, and as she looked at him, the alarm in them eased and he could feel her relaxing a little, trusting herself to his care.  He could have wept at the love that was evident in her face.  With a supreme act of will, he held still for a moment, allowing her to adjust to this intimate contact, the sign and means of the bonding they had agreed to. Then, as he began to move again, she slid her hands down his back and onto his buttocks, to guide the rhythm of his movements. Eilian’s muscles tightened at her touch and then, nearly overwhelmed by the intensity of the sensations sweeping through him, he lost himself in making love to this maiden who now was a maiden no more.

Place and time faded away, and only he and Celuwen in the here and now mattered.  He touched her body with an intensity that threatened to drive all reason from him, and suddenly he realized that he was also touching her mind, her heart, her whole being.  He could sense the pleasure he was giving her and the love she felt for him and the fear and anxiety that were slowly melting from her in the heat of their joining. Their eyes met in wonder, and he knew that she must be sensing him in the same way. 

And then, Celuwen suddenly seemed to tense beneath him and draw her brows together as if she were concentrating.  She tightened her hold on his buttocks and pulled him closer to her as she lifted her hips to meet him. And then she dissolved in a series of small, soft cries.  And as she tightened around him, he too felt his world explode and lost all knowledge of where he was. He was falling; he was flying. He was lost; he was found.  He was home.

I borrow characters and settings from Tolkien, but they are his, not mine. I gain only the enriched imaginative life that I assume he intended me to gain.

Many thanks to Nilmandra for beta reading this chapter. 

*******

8.  Flood

A hand shook his shoulder gently.  “Legolas,” Annael’s voice urged, “wake up.”

Legolas’s eyes snapped suddenly into focus, and he saw Annael bending over him, looking concerned.  “What is it?” he demanded, years as a warrior who needed to come alert instantly standing him in good stead now.

Annael grimaced.  “Galivion sent me to fetch you. You need to come at once.  Some of the food has been stolen, and there are signs that the thieves were Men.”

For a minute, Legolas gaped at him, unable to take in what he was being told.  “What do you mean, ‘stolen’?  How could Men possibly have stolen food out from under the noses of Elven guards?”

“It seems there were no guards,” Annael told him, somewhat dryly.  “Anyr told Galivion that it never occurred to him that anyone would steal from them.”

Legolas was normally even tempered, but he suddenly found that events in this settlement had been too much for him, and he wanted to take someone by the throat and shake sense into them, although he was not yet quite sure who it would be.  He spat a word he had learned from his bodyguard, Beliond, who possessed a spectacularly large and colorful vocabulary.  The corners of Annael’s mouth quirked, and he raised an eyebrow as he stepped back to allow Legolas room to rise. Legolas flung his blanket aside, pulled on his shoes, picked up his weapons, and followed Annael down from their flet toward the one where the food was stored.

“Have I overslept?” he asked Annael, seeing that there were Elves stirring on the flets around them.  The sky was so dark with clouds that it was difficult to judge the time from the position of the sun, but his innate sense of time suggested that it was not much past dawn.

“No,” Annael answered.  “Anyr has been rousing his people early because the Men have asked for help in building another barrier against the rising river.  I told him to leave you alone because you are supposed to be on leave after all.”  Annael’s tone was full of the sympathy and indignation that one warrior feels for another whose leave has been cut short, and even through his rising anger, Legolas felt grateful affection for his friend.  “Beside,” Annael added, sending a sly sideways glance at Legolas, “you were out late last night.”

Legolas could not help smiling but he offered no explanation, and Annael contented himself with an answering smile.  They were approaching their destination now, and Legolas sobered as he looked ahead and saw a tight-lipped Galivion standing between Anyr and an angry Tinár.  Several other Elves from the settlement were watching the scene uneasily.

“The Men would never have stolen our food,” Anyr was protesting. “They are our neighbors.”

“Then what do you make of the tracks?” Tinár demanded.  “Surely even you are competent enough to see that they are Mannish?”  An indignant murmur arose from the onlookers.

This could not continue, Legolas thought irately, hearing their anger and seeing the beginnings of resentment even on Anyr’s placid face.  “Silence!” he snapped, and Tinár turned to him in surprise.

“Did Annael not tell you what this fool has allowed to happen?” Tinár asked.

“I said ‘silence,’ and I mean that you are to hold your tongue!” Legolas cried, stepping close to Tinár and leaning into him as he had occasionally seen Ithilden do when reprimanding warriors, and indeed as his brother had, on rare occasions, done to Legolas too.  The technique seemed to work on Tinár, just as it always had on Legolas, because his mouth dropped open and he blinked at Legolas in astonishment, but he did stop talking.  Legolas had the fleeting thought that he was going to have to tell Ithilden what had happened and ask him not to assign Tinár to any patrol in which Legolas was serving.  He did not see how they could go back to being fellow warriors after this little episode.

He glanced at Galivion, who looked none too pleased himself but had a diplomat’s sense of what should and should not be said.  Galivion gestured toward Anyr.  “Anyr will tell you what has happened, my lord,” he said in a neutral tone.

The settlement leader’s brows drew together in perplexity.  “When the Elves who were to fix the morning meal went to get the supplies, they found that the two large sacks of dried meat were missing.  I cannot understand it. Perhaps they have just been misplaced.”

Tinár snorted but said nothing, and Legolas could see Galivion’s mouth tighten as if he too were having trouble keeping quiet. “Were there signs of an intruder?” Legolas demanded.

“Tinár and I found tracks,” Annael told him, gesturing toward the side of the flet where the forest was thickest.

Legolas started to follow Annael in the direction he had indicated but halted when Tinár began to move with them.  “Wait here, Tinár,” Legolas said, his irritation growing even further. “We do not want the tracks any more disturbed than they have already been.”  Galivion caught at Tinár’s arm and held him, or Legolas was not altogether sure that the obnoxious warrior would not have followed him despite his orders.  Legolas went to where Annael was waiting, crouched over a muddy spot behind the bushes near the flet where the food had been stored.

As Legolas approached, Annael pointed to the ground.  “Here and here, you see?”  Legolas squatted next to him to look at the marks that lay at the edges of some of the previous year’s fallen leaves.  “Two people, I think. They were trying to be careful, but they were not careful enough,” Annael observed, “and you can see, the prints are Mannish.”  Legolas had to take only one look to know that Annael was right.

“Have you followed them at all to see where they lead?” he asked.

Annael shook his head.  “I was with Galivion and Tinár, coming back from washing in the stream, when we found the excitement by the food storage flet.  Galivion sent me for you right away.”

They both stood up, and Legolas looked off into the woods with his face grim.  Someone had stolen food that Elves had sacrificed to provide.  Children needed that meat.  The muscles in the backs of his shoulders tightened as his fury rose.  The thieves would not be allowed to get away with their offense, and Legolas did not care if they were Anyr’s neighbors.  It was one thing if the settlement Elves chose to share what they had been given, although that was still a problem, but it was quite another if the Men were helping themselves.

“Take Tinár with you and find out where they went,” he ordered, hearing the tightness in his own voice.  “Galivion and I will go to the Men’s village with Anyr and see if we can learn anything.”  Annael nodded and beckoned to Tinár, who came toward them at a trot with his gaze fixed resolutely away from Legolas.

“Let us see where the tracks lead,” Annael told him, and Tinár nodded with obvious satisfaction in his face.  Legolas suspected he had wanted to go after the thieving Men without waiting for orders from anyone. He supposed he could ask Galivion if that were true, but he was not sure he wanted to deal with knowing anything more about Tinár’s difficult behavior.  Annael and Tinár immediately disappeared into the trees going north from the settlement.

Legolas returned to where Galivion and Anyr were waiting.  “They will track the thieves,” he told Anyr.  “Galivion and I will go with you to the Men’s village.”

The settlement leader nodded, apparently dismissing all thoughts of the theft from his mind as something for which Legolas had now taken responsibility.  “Morning meal is being served in the clearing where the children play,” he said. “Let us get something to eat and then we will go. The Men are trying to keep the river out,” he added with apparent amusement as he began leading them away.  “They want us to help in filling bags with sand to build a barrier. I do not think it will do much good, but it makes the Men happy to try.”  Behind Anyr’s back, Galivion actually rolled his eyes, making it clear to Legolas that he, too, was nearing the end of his patience with the whole situation.

In the clearing on the small rise, a large pot stood over a fire and an Elf was ladling porridge from it into bowls for Elvish children and adults alike.  As Legolas approached, Tuilinn entered the clearing with four Mannish children in her care, including the two little ones Legolas had seen her detach from Ethau’s cloak on the previous day when Tinár had accused the Man of stealing the vegetables. Legolas wondered now if he should have paid more attention to Tinár.  That thought did not improve his testy mood.

He got a bowl of porridge and was turning away from the campfire when Tuilinn approached him, having sent the children to get their morning meal.  For a moment, warmth rushed through him and he smiled at her hopefully, but her face was serious this morning.  “Is it true that you think that Men have stolen some of the food?” she asked without preamble.  The tone of her voice made the question sound like an accusation.

He was even more annoyed by her lack of response to his smile than he was by her tone.  “Two bags of dried meat are missing and there are Mannish footprints near the flet,” he snapped. “What would you think?”

She flushed.  “I am very sorry that the food is missing, because I know the king sacrificed to send it and people here need it.  But I do not believe the Men from the village would have taken it.  That is just not like them.”

“I will not accuse them without proof,” he said stiffly, “but if they did take it, then I can assure you that they will regret their actions.”

“But they would not do it,” she persisted.  “It has to have been someone else.”

His patience was at an end.  “I do not know that and neither do you,” he said sharply.  Then he stepped around her and went to sit next to Galivion.  Only his awareness of how precious food was made him choke down the porridge in his bowl.  How could he ever have thought that Tuilinn was gentle and sweet? he asked himself angrily.  She was as stubborn and foolish as Anyr, and he wanted nothing more to do with her.  He glanced to where she was making sure the children were eating and found her turning her head sharply away as if she had just been looking at him.

“Are you ready?” Anyr asked, coming to stand in front of Legolas and Galivion.  The other adults and the older children were all gradually leaving the clearing on the trail to the Men’s village.  Legolas nodded grimly and rose.  He intended to question the Men thoroughly about the theft.  Anyr and Tuilinn might be both soft-hearted and soft-headed, but he was his father’s representative here and no one had ever accused Thranduil of being either of those things.

At that moment, the skies opening and rain began to pour down upon them. Wonderful, he thought.  That is just what I needed.  He pulled up the hood of his cloak, and without a backward glance at the maiden, he followed Anyr toward the Men’s village with Galivion close behind him.

The walk took over half an hour, and by the time they got to the Men’s village, Legolas’s cloak was soaked and rain was dripping off his hood.  He was so absorbed in his own anger and discomfort that it took him a minute to realize that they had emerged from the forest onto the edge of the grasslands where the village lay.  He stopped dead in his tracks, and next to him Galivion sucked in his breath.

The devastation before them was beyond anything Legolas could have imagined.  The banks of the river were even lower here than they were at the Elven settlement, and the flood waters of three days ago had evidently risen high and fast when the barrier holding the river back had been breached.  Directly in front of Legolas, lodged against a large rock, was what had once been a small wooden cottage.  It lay with its walls collapsed in upon one another and its roof in pieces on top of the other debris.  As he looked at it, he realized that the force of the rushing water had torn it from wherever it had once stood and swept it to rest in its current location.

Despite several days of cleanup efforts, debris still lay everywhere.  Uprooted trees mixed with washtubs and broken benches and the rubble of rocks from the river. Legolas saw a child’s cot tangled with the pieces of a wagon.  Moreover, mud covered everything, although it was now washing off in streaks in the pelting rain.  Muddy water still stood in pools around the cleared area where the Men had been trying to put the pieces of their lives back together.

To their right lay the river, and Legolas could hear its warning roar from where he stood. It had risen alarmingly since he had last seen it, and only the barrier the Men had erected along its edge now kept it from sweeping through the village again.  Elves and Men worked together in feverish haste, shoveling sand into bags and then piling them along the edge of the rushing water.

“Shall we look for Crydus?” Galivion asked, sounding for once uncertain.  His eyes met Legolas’s, and Legolas saw the same dismay he felt.

“We can look for him later,” he decided.  “Just now, I think we need to help these people.”

“I could not agree more, my lord,” Galivion answered, and the two of them hastened to the river’s edge to join the others.  Legolas picked up a shovel and Galivion seized one of the roughly sewn bags that lay in a nearby pile.  Then the advisor held the bag open while Legolas shoveled sand into it.  When the bag was full, Galivion tied the top in a knot and heaved it into place on top of the wall of bags that stood about three feet high, and they started again.

For an immeasurable amount of time, Legolas labored at building the wall that was meant to protect the Men’s village.  He shoveled and then he traded places with Galivion and handled the bags while Galivion shoveled.  All the while the rain fell and river rose.

As he worked, he found himself thinking about Tuilinn with regret.  I should not have snapped at her, he thought.  She was only saying what she thought.  She was concerned about these people, and she knows them far better than I do, after all. A hand touched his arm, and he jerked around to find Annael standing next to him with Tinár just behind him.  He had been so absorbed in his thoughts that he had not heard them approach. Galivion drew near to hear what they had to report.

“We followed the tracks,” Annael told them.  “They led north and then disappeared in a stream. The thieves apparently waded in it in an attempt to hide their trail.  We looked for a mile or so in either direction and could not find them again.”

Legolas frowned at him.  “So they did not come in the direction of this village?”

Annael shook his head. “Not that we found.”

“But they could have come here,” Tinár insisted stridently.

And suddenly the strain and frustrations of the last two days became entirely too much for Legolas. He rounded on Tinár almost gleefully, glad of having a likely target for his anger.  “We have no evidence that any of these Men took the food, Tinár,” he spat, “and until we do, you will cease speaking of them with anything other than the respect due to allies of your king.”  He moved in closer, narrowed his eyes, and dropped his voice to a hiss.  “You will cease accusing them and being rude to them, and if I see you so much as looking at them with a sneer on your face, I will report you to the troop commander for disrupting a mission that your king has decided is vital and for refusing to follow orders. And,” he added, seeing that Tinár was about to protest, “the orders you will follow are mine, because I am in charge here.  When we go home, the situation will be different, but here you are to act as if when I speak to you, I am speaking with the voice of Thranduil himself. Do I make myself clear?”

Tinár must have seen something of the fire Legolas felt in his eyes because he swallowed convulsively.  “Perfectly clear.”

“Good.  Now get a shovel and start making yourself useful.”  With that, Legolas turned his back on Tinár and picked up his own shovel to start work again. When he glanced back a few seconds later, Tinár was scooping sand into a bag that Annael was holding open.  He did not look happy, but he was doing as he had been told.  Legolas found that he felt better.  He was still wet and two bags of meat were still missing, but those were things he could not remedy at the moment, whereas it turned out he could remedy the annoyance he felt at Tinár.

Galivion held a bag open for Legolas. “Well done, my lord,” he murmured.  “Lord Ithilden could not have done it better.”  Legolas threw him a surprised look.  He admired his oldest brother’s self-assurance and authoritative manner, and he never thought of himself as being even remotely like him.  He bent to his work, feeling better than he had felt all day.

As his thoughts drifted to Tuilinn again, a sudden question struck him.  “Galivion,” he asked hesitantly, “do you know if Anyr left anyone to help Tuilinn with the children?  Surely he did not leave her with them by herself.  The river must be rising there too, even if the ground is higher than here.”

Galivion frowned. “I do not know. In truth, though, Anyr’s strong point does not seem to be planning for possible problems.”

Legolas gave a rueful smile at this understatement.  “I think I may go back to the settlement to check on her and the children.  You stay here though.  The Men need all the help they can get.”  Galivion nodded and moved off to take a shovel from an obviously exhausted Man.  Legolas had been startled today to see how easily the Men tired compared to the Elves.  He glanced at the rising wall of sandbags that was so far holding the river at bay. The rain was easing, and that should help somewhat, but they still had to survive the flow of water from upstream.

He started back along the path leading to the Elven settlement.  Now that he thought about it, he was really worried.  By this time, the water must surely be over the banks at the settlement. The children usually stayed on somewhat higher ground, but it was not all that high.  They could take refuge on a flet, of course.  If they had not done so already, he would suggest to Tuilinn that it might be a good idea.  His heart beat a little faster at the idea of seeing her. He would apologize for being snappish earlier, he thought.

The path sloped down slightly, and suddenly he was wading in water up to his ankles.  He stared at the water in dismay.  He could not see very far down the path here because it turned, but he could see that dark water was lapping at the trees on either side of it. Increasingly concerned, he lifted himself into a nearby oak and climbed until he reached a spot where he had a clear view of the scattered parts of the settlement.

He looked first toward the river, and although he knew where it was, he could no longer see its borders because its waters had overflowed and spread to either side in a wide, brown lake.  Judging by how high it reached on a cottage wall, the water was more than two feet deep and was rising fast. Even as Legolas looked, it swept a fallen tree limb past the cottage, tearing off one of the shutters in the process.

For a moment, he stood on the oak branch, frozen in shock. Because the sandbags were keeping the water out at the Men’s village, he had not realized how high it would be here. Then he began to move hastily through the trees, jumping from branch to branch in the direction of the clearing where Tuilinn normally cared for the children.  He judged that he was about half way there when he heard a child crying from off to his right, and he immediately veered in that direction.

As he approached the sound, he slowed, scanning to both sides.  Through the screen of branches, his eye was caught by movement, and when he drew close, he saw that he was nearing a flet occupied by four small children.  Three of them were Elves, but the fourth was the little girl he had seen clinging to her father’s cloak on the previous day.  It was she who was crying.

“Tuilinn!” she sobbed.  “I want Tuilinn, and I want Talet too.”  One of the Elvish children, whom Legolas recognized as Ródien, had his arms around her, but his eyes were big with fear.

“Tuilinn is coming back, Astiaa. She said so. We have to be brave.”

Legolas descended hastily to land on the flet, startling them all.  Astiaa stopped crying and they all turned quickly toward him with alarmed faces.  Then Ródien brightened.  “It is one of the warriors who came from the king,” he said in an awe-struck tone.

Legolas smiled at them as reassuringly as he could.  “Where is Tuilinn?” he asked.  He was astounded that the maiden could have been so careless as to leave these little ones here by themselves.

“She went back to get Talet,” Astiaa blurted.

“And the other Mannish children too,” Ródien added.  “They cannot climb very well, and they cannot travel through the trees, but then we are too little to do that yet either, and Tuilinn says they can do other things, so we must be kind.”

Legolas looked down at the quickly rising water and felt a sudden stab of fear.  He had seen Tuilinn with four Mannish children that morning, and only Astiaa, the smallest of them, was already on the flet.  He could not imagine how Tuilinn was going to get three children through the flood on her own.

He looked at the four children who were watching him with round eyes.  Astiaa was hiccupping a little.  He hated to leave them on their own, but he did not see what else he could do. He felt faintly guilty for his earlier judgmental thoughts about Tuilinn.  He could only image what she must have felt when she had gotten these little ones here and then had to leave them to go back for the others.

“I will go and find Tuilinn,” he told them. “You must all stay here and take care of one another.” For a moment, he thought that Astiaa in particular was going to protest, but Ródien nodded.

“Yes, captain,” he pledged for all of them. Legolas could not quite suppress a smile at the promotion Ródien had just so generously given him.

“I will be back very soon with the other children and Tuilinn too,” he promised and then took to the trees again, moving toward the clearing where he had seen the children that morning.  He had traveled most of the way when he caught sight of Tuilinn. She had a child on each arm and a third one, whom he recognized as Astiaa’s brother, Talet, clinging to her waist as she struggled through the water that was swirling around her halfway up Talet’s chest.  When Legolas spotted her, she had stopped and was trying to shift the children so she could pick up Talet too.

He scrambled hastily to the ground and waded toward her. “Tuilinn!” he called, and when she turned toward him, her face sagged with relief.

“Take Talet,” she nearly sobbed, jerking her head toward the child.  Legolas scooped up the little boy and then took a second child too from Tuilinn’s arms.  Talet was shaking and wordless with terror.  He flung his arms around Legolas’s neck and buried his face in his rescuer’s shoulder.  The other child was a little girl. Her lower lip was trembling, and she was biting it in an effort not to cry.

“Can you go carry that child through the trees?”  Legolas asked.

“Not safely,” Tuilinn said, her voice shaking. “She is too little to hang on by herself, and I need both hands to go that way safely.”

“Then we will walk,” he said, his voice as reassuring as he could make it.  “Go!”  He waited until she had started moving and then followed behind her, keeping an eye on her and his arms tightly around his two precious burdens.  “Astiaa is waiting for you,” he murmured to Talet, rubbing his cheek against the child’s hair. “I will have to tell her how brave you are being.”  The little boy lifted his tear-streaked face for a moment and then buried it against him again.

Ahead of him, Legolas could see Tuilinn dodging out of the way of a broken tree branch being swept along in the flood and threatening to knock her down.  The water rose steadily, and by the time they reached the flet, it had reached the top of Legolas’s thighs.  He looked up to see four small, pale faces peering over the edge of the flet.  “Talet,” Astiaa cried.  Her brother looked up at her but said nothing.

“Wait!” Legolas called to Tuilinn, who was shifting the child she carried in her arms, plainly making ready to try to climb to the flet with her.  He handed the little girl he carried to Tuilinn.  “I will take Talet up and then come back for you and the others,” he said and was away before she could protest.

He emerged onto the flet and then, carefully, he bent and set Talet on his feet. For a second, he thought he was going to have to pry the little boy’s arms from him neck, but abruptly, he let go and stumbled into the arms of his little sister.  “Do not worry, Astiaa,” he said, in the first words he had spoken since Legolas had picked him up. “I will take care of you.”

Legolas did not linger but made his way to the ground again as quickly as he could and snatched a second child from Tuilinn’s arms.  The water was tugging at all of their legs, and he felt a stab of panic that, burdened as she was with the last child, she might not be able to keep her feet.  He put his free arm around her shoulders and steered her toward a fork in the trunk of the tree.  “Brace yourself in the fork,” he ordered and made sure she was securely wedged before he took the child he was carrying to the flet. 

By the time he got to the ground again, the water was swirling at Tuilinn’s waist. He jumped into the water and took the last child.  “Go!” he ordered, prodding Tuilinn, whose anxious eyes were still on the little girl. “I will bring her.”

Tuilinn looked at him with huge grey eyes, and then turned to clamber up the tree, her soaked gown clinging to her legs.  Legolas came up right behind her and set the last child down.  He turned to see Tuilinn sink to the flet as if her legs would hold her no more.  For the moment, he ignored the children and crouched next to her and then sat and put his arms around her shaking shoulders.  “This was my third trip,” she gasped.  “I was so frightened for them.”

“They are safe,” Legolas crooned, stroking her wild hair.  “They are safe and so are you.  They were lucky to have you. No one could have been braver.”  He looked up to find seven small faces watching them solemnly.  He smiled at the children as brightly as he could.  “She will be all right,” he assured them.

Immediately, Ródien nodded. “When she is better,” he said, “will you show me your sword?”

With her face pressed against his chest, Tuilinn suddenly laughed.  She looked up at Legolas. “What will Anyr say?” she asked in mock dismay. “You have turned one of the children into a would-be warrior!”

Legolas smiled back at her.  He had decided that she was sweet after all, even when she was soaking wet and still shaking with the after effects of terror.

I borrow characters and settings from Tolkien, but they are his, not mine. I gain only the enriched imaginative life that I assume he intended me to gain.

Many thanks to Nilmandra for beta reading this chapter. 

AN:  I’m going to quote from Tolkien’s essay “Laws and Customs of the Eldar” to clarify some of what is happening in the Eilian part of this story.  He and Celuwen are actually married now. That’s what that little episode in the woods was all about.  Here’s what Tolkien says:

“It was the act of bodily union that achieved marriage, and after which the indissoluble bond was complete.  In happy days and times of peace it was held ungracious and contemptuous of kin to forgo the ceremonies, but it was at all times lawful for any of the Eldar, both being unwed, to marry thus of free consent one to another without ceremony or witness (save blessings exchanged and the naming of the Name); and the union so joined was alike indissoluble.” (p. 212, Morgoth’s Ring)

Additionally, I make use of the fact (drawn from the same essay) that Elves can tell if another Elf is married by his or her eyes and voice.

*******

9.  Celuwen’s Parents

Eilian stirred slightly, aware that something was not quite as usual and, for a split second, unable to identify what it was.  And then suddenly, his eyes focused and he realized that Celuwen was asleep beside him, her warm and nearly naked body so close to his that he could hear her heart beating.  It was not a dream, he exulted. They were bonded and not even death itself could change that immutable fact.  He should have been sated by their repeated lovemaking of the night before, but he found that he was aroused by the very thought of what lay under the blanket and cloaks he had wrapped around them when they had finished.  I should let her sleep, he thought regretfully. There will be other times, he reminded himself. We have eternity now. The thought dazzled him.

He lay for a moment wishing she would awaken but willing to watch her sleep, with wonder washing over him.  Her eyelids were half lowered, and her breathing was long and slow.  And something else was different too, he abruptly recognized.  Within his own restless mind, there was a calm place that was the sleeping Celuwen.  He held his breath, exploring that place slightly and marveling at it.  Having Celuwen in his bedroll and in his mind were both equally foreign and equally astounding experiences.

The morning was cold, he thought, and their fire had died down in the night.  He did not want her to be cold when she awakened in their makeshift bed.  He did not want her ever to be uncomfortable or unhappy in any way.  Cautiously, he slipped out of the bedroll to pad barefooted toward the fire, his skin prickling with the icy spring air that also went a good part of the way to dampening his desire.  His hip ached a little but felt remarkably good for once.  Moving rather gingerly because of his nakedness, he added sticks to the fire and poked at it to bring it life again.

When he turned, intending to crawl back into the blanket, he was startled to find that Celuwen was sitting up, watching him. Her eyes traveled down the length of his body and back up again, with something like possessive satisfaction growing on her face.

He grinned.  “Stop that,” he commanded. “You will embarrass a shy elf like me.”

She laughed.  “Good morning, husband,” she said, and he found he was thrilled by the word.

“Good morning, wife.”  The blankets had slid down to her waist when she sat up, and he started toward her, his body making his predatory intentions all too clear.

She hastily pulled the blankets up to her chin.  “Eilian, if my parents have not already realized that I did not come home last night, they soon will, and my adar will come looking for me.”

Eilian stopped abruptly, considered this idea, and came to a reluctant conclusion.  If Celuwen’s father was to arrive at his campsite, it would be much better if both Celuwen and he had clothes on.  Eilian found he did not relish facing an enraged Sólith clad only in his skin.  “We should get dressed,” he acknowledged, and she nodded.  “Are you sure we do not have a little time yet?” he asked longingly.

Celuwen laughed.  “Throw me my chemise,” she instructed. “No! Do not bring it; throw it.  And see if you can find my stockings.”

He had been happily intending to help her into her chemise, and he tossed it to her without enthusiasm.  “You are still wearing your stockings,” he told her.

She peered under the blanket. “I left them on?” she inquired in a scandalized tone.

He smiled smugly. “You did not want to take time to take them off,” he told her.  She let out an exasperated exclamation, seized a shoe that was within reach, and threw it at his head.  He grinned and then began to pull his leggings on, watching her struggling to dress within the confines of the blanket.  After a few moments, she emerged triumphant, lacing up her gown, just as he pulled on his shoes.

She drew a deep breath.  “I will go and tell my parents,” she announced.

“No,” he said firmly. “We will both go.”

She hesitated. “That may not be a good idea.”

“I am going with you,” he repeated.  “I refuse to leave you to face your parents alone. Besides, I am not ashamed of what we have done. Are you?”

She turned to him with a serious face. “Never. I could never be anything but proud of being bonded to you, Eilian.”

Deep gratitude washed over him, and he planted a kiss on her brow. “Come,” he said, and hand-in-hand, they walked to her family’s cottage. The door opened just as they approached, and suddenly, they were face to face with an anxious looking Sólith.

“Celuwen,” he breathed, in obvious relief, and then, abruptly, he stilled.  He stood looking into his daughter’s eyes, with shock gradually growing on his face.  Then he whirled to face Eilian. “You,” he choked out, his face turning crimson. “What have you done?  What have you pushed her into?”  For a moment, Eilian thought Sólith was going to attack him, and he braced himself, but Celuwen stepped between them.

“Eilian did not push me into anything,” she said. “I made my choice. I chose Eilian because I could not do otherwise, and bonding with him has left my heart so much at peace that I could never regret what I have done.  Can you not be happy for me, Adar?”

Eilian was utterly amazed.  What had he ever done to deserve her?  He looked over her head and found that Sólith was ignoring his daughter and glaring at him with an intensity that made him take a small, astonished step back.

Isiwen now came up behind her husband. “There you are,” she said, her face relaxing a little. “I was worried.”  Then seeming to become aware of the tense silence in which the other three stood, she turned her eyes full on her daughter.  What she saw made her draw in her breath. She pulled the door open further.  “Come in,” she said soberly. “We should talk.”

Sólith looked at her with his face rigid. “What is there to talk about? He has finally gotten what he wanted and there is nothing we can do about it.”

“We should not be holding this conversation on the doorstep,” Isiwen protested.  She turned to Eilian and Celuwen. “Come in,” she said. “I will make tea.”

“You and Celuwen go in,” said Sólith. “I want to talk to Eilian.”

“No!” cried Celuwen and Isiwen in unison.  Eilian was a little embarrassed to have the two of them protecting him so obviously, but he was forced to admit to himself that he had no wish to be alone with Sólith.  He had no doubt that he could pound Sólith into the ground if he so chose, but Celuwen was almost certain to object, so he was left without any course of action available to him.

“Come inside, Sólith.” Isiwen’s voice was sharp now.

With obvious reluctance, her husband obeyed, and Celuwen too followed her mother inside.  Eilian paused for a second on the doorstep, and then gathered all his courage and walked into the little room.  Sólith had seated himself near the fire, where he had been when Eilian arrived for this visit only two days ago.  His eyes bored into Eilian, who hesitated and then moved to lean against the wall next to the front door.  I am not afraid, Eilian assured himself, but he had no intention of taking the seat next to the Elf who was now his father-in-law.  He shuddered faintly at that thought.

Isiwen was bustling around making tea. “There is porridge,” she offered in a strained voice, pointing to a pot near the fire.  “Get some for yourself and Eilian, Celuwen.”

Celuwen had been standing near her father, looking at him with pleading eyes that made Eilian want to grab Sólith by the collar and shake him into responding to her.  Her pain was obvious to Eilian. Surely it must have been equally evident to Sólith, who continued to stare at Eilian.  Eilian looked back at him, willing him to pay attention to his daughter. At her mother’s bidding, Celuwen turned away to get the porridge, biting her lip as she did so.

Suddenly, there was a sharp, cracking noise.  They all jumped and turned to look at Isiwen, who had just slapped her hand down on the table. Eilian blinked.  Isiwen was normally a quiet person, but she had drawn herself up to her full height and now placed both hands on her hips.  Her mouth was set in a determined line. She was plainly angry, and the person she was angry with was her husband.

“What is wrong with you, Sólith?” she demanded.  “Do you not remember that only three days ago we feared our daughter was going to die of grief?  I do not care if Eilian is the last Elf in Arda you wished her to marry.” Eilian grimaced but held his tongue.  “She has made her choice, and in so doing, she has chosen to live! Is that not good enough for you?”

Eilian slid his gaze to Sólith, whose face had darkened.  “What chance do you think she has for happiness?” Sólith barked, and to Eilian’s surprise, he looked near to tears.  “He will go back to his patrol. You heard him say it.  He will be as careless as he has ever been, only now he will be being careless with our daughter’s heart.”

Celuwen gave a small cry, put down the two bowls of porridge she had been holding, and went to crouch at her father’s knees.  “Adar, try to understand. I love Eilian. I think I always have.  It may not be wise, but it is right for me. And in any case, I cannot do otherwise!”

Sólith’s hand settled on his daughter’s head, and when he spoke, his voice was full of despair.  “What will you do now, little one? Where will you live?  What will you do with the empty hours and days and weeks when he is away?”

Celuwen hesitated.  “I am not sure,” she said unhappily.

Eilian stirred from the spot near the door where he had been frozen, seeing a side to Sólith that startled him.  “I am taking Celuwen home,” he said with determination.  “We will leave today.”  He could not imagine staying in this cottage for even a single night.

They all turned to look at him.  Sólith’s face was grim, and Isiwen looked as if she might cry.  But Celuwen’s face was the one that filled Eilian’s vision.  She looked frightened, as if it had only just dawned on her that her life had changed completely. Eilian froze.  Was it possible that Celuwen regretted her decision already?  Then, suddenly, she smiled at him, and his heart lifted, and he smiled tenderly back at her.

“We should eat first,” Celuwen told him, rising and going to get the bowls of porridge. “Then I will pack my things.” She brought one of the bowls to him, and he touched her hand when he took it from her and felt, as always, a tremor of excitement at the contact.

Sólith snorted.  “You have made your bed, daughter, and now you must lie in it.  I fear in this case that that is only too apt a description of what happened.” Celuwen flushed, but she smiled up into Eilian’s face before she went to get her own morning meal.

Isiwen was in motion again, apparently determined to behave as if this were a normal family gathering.  “Here is your tea,” she said, handing a mug to Sólith.  She patted his shoulder.  “She will be all right, my love,” she said bravely.  He grimaced at her and then put his hand comfortingly over hers.

***

Eilian led his horse slowly back toward the cottage.  He had gone to pack up his gear, while Isiwen helped Celuwen gather her possessions.  He had feared for a moment that Sólith was going to come with him to his campsite, but Isiwen had asked her husband to help them find a missing satchel that Celuwen needed, and he had backed away from Eilian to go to his daughter’s aid.

Eilian found that he was suddenly a little worried about the magnitude of the change that he had asked Celuwen to make in her life.  She was leaving her family and the settlement in which she had lived for years, believing that in doing so, she was helping to hold back the Shadow.  His life would go on much as it always had, except that he would have Celuwen in his bed when he came home and in his heart always. But she would have to adjust to living in Thranduil’s household, and she would have to do it mostly on her own.

He paused for a moment at that thought.  By tonight, they would be in his father’s stronghold.  He felt a tightening in his stomach, and shied away from that idea a little.  Thranduil was not going to be pleased with him.  It was true that Eilian had asked Thranduil’s permission to marry Celuwen, but he had then done so without a decent betrothal period and without a public ceremony.

And that did not even touch the questions of whether Celuwen’s parents had consented or whether, in truth, the betrothal should have been longer than a year because of the uncertainties of Eilian’s role as a warrior.  And if Sólith chose to make trouble between the settlement and Thranduil because of Eilian’s actions, then Eilian was going to be in very hot water indeed.  He had not confided any of these worries to Celuwen, and now he turned his mind determinedly from speculating on what his father’s reaction was going to be.  It did no good to worry about what he could not help.

He led his horse into the clearing in front of the cottage to find Celuwen and her parents waiting for him.  Isiwen drew her daughter into an embrace, and Sólith came quickly across to Eilian, carrying Celuwen’s satchel and another pack that Eilian took from him and put across his horse’s back.

He turned to find that Sólith had inched closer to him and could not help stiffening defensively.  “Smile,” Sólith said, twisting his own mouth into a dreadful smirk.

“I beg your pardon?” Eilian asked uncertainly.

“Smile.  We are having a friendly conversation.  My wife and yours are both watching us.”

Eilian glanced across the yard and saw Isiwen and Celuwen both looking at them in some alarm.  He turned back and turned the corners of his mouth up in the direction of his father-in-law.

“I have something to say to you, and this is probably going to be my only opportunity, so listen attentively.  If you ever do anything that makes my daughter unhappy for even a single second, I will filet you like a fish.  Do we have an understanding?” He grinned horribly, and Eilian bared his teeth in response.

“I believe we do,” Eilian answered.

“Good.  Send my daughter to visit us in three months.  You do not need to come.”

“Thank you. I will stay away as much as I can,” Eilian promised.

Celuwen and Isiwen came toward them, and Sólith turned his back on Eilian to embrace his daughter.  “You can always come home again, Celuwen,” he told her. Eilian bristled slightly but also could not help flinching a little at the reminder that he was asking Celuwen to leave her home and family.

To his dismay, Celuwen was actually weeping a little, but she came to him willingly enough and allowed him to lift her onto his horse’s back.  He leapt up behind her, and put his arm around her waist.  At the last moment, his eyes met Sólith’s, and suddenly, he was stuck by how bleak the other’s face was. “I will take care of her,” he said, much to his own astonishment.

Sólith nodded grimly. “See that you do,” he said, and Eilian chirped to his horse and they started the trip back to Thranduil’s stronghold. For a few moments, they rode in silence, except for occasional deep, wavering breaths from Celuwen.  Eilian drew what comfort he could from the way she leaned trustingly back against him, but he found he was frightened by her tears.

“I am sorry, Eilian,” she finally said. “I do not want you to think that I regret my choice. But I will miss them and living in the forest too.”

He tightened his arm around her and rubbed his cheek against her hair. “It will be all right, Celuwen.  I will be home for a while yet because of my wound, and then I will come home as often as I can. And you know my family.  They will make you welcome.”  She nodded wordlessly.

It was certainly true that Celuwen knew his family. She had lived near Thranduil’s stronghold until she was almost of age before her family moved to a settlement.  And she and Alfirin were nearly the same age, so they had known one another as children, although, so far as Eilian knew, Alfirin had not spent much time with Celuwen.  Rather Celuwen had played with Eilian and his friend Gelmir, although she had never gone along with some of their wilder adventures.  Thranduil had always said she had more sense than Eilian and Gelmir combined.  Eilian found he was reassured by the memory of how much Thranduil had always liked Celuwen.

As they rode along, however, he could not help wondering just how his family was going to react to the news he was bringing.  He felt a tremor of worried anticipation.  It will be all right, he assured himself, just as he had assured Celuwen a few moments earlier.  I can make Adar understand, I am certain.

Because Celuwen had needed time to gather her possessions, they had not left the settlement until late in the morning.  Isiwen had given them the last of the rabbit stew to take for their mid-day meal, and when the sun was high, they stopped to eat and to rest Eilian’s leg.  He built a small fire to heat the stew, and then they sat nestled against one another to eat.  He could feel the small motions of her breathing and smell the woodsy scent of her hair.

He put his empty bowl down and reached around her to take hers and set it on the ground next to his.  Then he wrapped his arms around her and bent to nuzzle at her neck.  She squirmed a little in his grasp and then, to his utter delight, she giggled.  Celuwen never giggled!  His heart leapt, and he decided that whatever awaited them at home would be trivial compared to the deep joy he took in his wife.  He pulled her onto his lap, lowered his mouth to hers, and, for a while, forgot their families, his wound, the Shadow, and all else in the dazzling intensity of the touching of bodies and fëar.

By the time they were underway again, they were both more contented, but the afternoon had worn on.  They stopped only briefly to eat some dried fish for evening meal, but even so it was late by the time they dismounted and led Eilian’s horse into Thranduil’s stables.  A very sleepy stable hand took charge of the horse. They took their packs and Celuwen’s satchel, and as they made their way through the palace gardens, Eilian’s stomach began to tighten again. Then he felt Celuwen slip her free hand into his, and he glanced at her.

“It will be all right,” she said and squeezed his hand reassuringly.  It suddenly occurred to him that she might have guessed what he was worried about.  Perhaps she had even felt his worry though their bond, he thought.  It was going to take some time before he became accustomed to being so intimately connected to someone else, and for a second, he wondered if there might not be disadvantages to being so open to Celuwen’s knowledge. Then he looked at her calm, loving face and decided that he did not care if there were.

They crossed the bridge to the palace, entered the Great Doors, and went down the hall and through the door that led to the family quarters.  “Good evening, Captain,” said one of the guards stationed at the door, his eyes sliding curiously to Celuwen for a second before snapping back to well-trained discretion.  From the corner of his eye, Eilian could see Celuwen flush.

“Good evening,” he responded crisply.  “Do you know if the king or any of the rest of the family is still up?”

“I think they have all gone to bed,” the guard told him.  It was his job to know such things despite any need the royal family might feel for privacy.  Eilian felt a flood of relief at the news that he would not have to face Thranduil that night, and next to him, Celuwen let out a soft breath.

He led her down the hall and into his chamber and closed the door behind them. They stood near the door for a moment, looking at the room that was lit only by one of the night lanterns that were always lit in every inhabited room in the caverns.  Next to him, Celuwen was surveying the room.  She had not been in his room for many years, not since they were children. He looked at the chamber, seeing it through her eyes.  Servants had tidied it while he was gone.  All of his clothes were put away in the dark, ornately carved cupboard, and the books stood in leather-covered rows on the shelves near the desk. Two bows and a sword that had belonged to his mother’s father hung on the wall.  The big bed was neatly made, with its dark green cover pulled smooth.  When he saw Celuwen standing in the midst of all this, the room suddenly struck him as masculine.  In his mind, he compared this room to the sitting room in Ithilden and Alfirin’s suite, where the colorful hangings she wove hung on the wall and bright silk cushions were scattered on the chairs.

Celuwen walked slowly over to his desk. The top of the desk was bare except for three glittering stones, stones he now recalled that Celuwen had found one summer at the river’s edge years ago and given to him.  She touched one of the stones with a delicate finger and turned to him. “What now?” she asked simply.

He dropped the packs he was carrying, walked across the room, and drew her to him in a tight embrace.  Then he stepped back, looked at her tired face, considered his aching hip, and grinned.  “I think the first thing you need is a hot bath,” he told her. “In fact, I am sure of it.”  He scooped her up in his arms and started toward his bathing chamber. And to his enchanted amusement, she giggled again.

I borrow characters and settings from Tolkien, but they are his, not mine. I gain only the enriched imaginative life that I assume he intended me to gain.

Many thanks to Nilmandra for beta reading this chapter. 

*******

10.  Good Neighbors

In the circle of Legolas’s arms, the maiden had finally stopped shaking, and, a little reluctantly, he let her go and moved slightly away.  She drew a long breath.  “They need dry clothes,” she said.

Legolas surveyed the row of wet, shivering children who were regarding him and Tuilinn with solemn eyes.  The Mannish children in particular were looking blue about the lips, and even the Elvish children were huddled in on themselves in the sharp spring air. Adult Elves could withstand cold far better than Men could, but these children were not yet so resilient.   All of their clothes were wet, although those whom Tuilinn had been able to keep out of the flood waters were simply damp from the rain.  At least the rain has stopped, he thought thankfully.

“They do need dry clothes,” he agreed, “but I do not see how we are to get them.”

Tuilinn rose gracefully to her feet and walked toward the storage chest that stood near one edge of this flet, as was true of all the flets Legolas had seen here. “I am staying on this flet,” she told him. “We can probably find something for them to wear among my things.” She opened the chest, removed the bedroll and towel that were on top, and began sorting through the surprisingly small store of garments.  Pulling out a simple white night tunic, she turned to Talet.  “Here is a tunic for you, Talet, my heart,” she said.  “Legolas will help you change your clothes.”  She handed the tunic and towel to Legolas and then went back to her search.

Legolas drew the little boy closer to him and began to pull off his soaked clothes.  The child was still shaking.  He had had a very near call, Legolas thought, seeing him again, clinging to Tuilinn’s waist while the flood waters knocked his feet out from under him. No wonder he was still frightened.

“Come, little one,” he murmured, rubbing the small body briskly with the towel.  “We will get you dry and warm.  You were very strong and clever to hang on to Tuilinn like that.  That was the best thing you could have done.  When you are dressed again, you can help Tuilinn with Astiaa.” As Legolas talked, the child drew deep breaths and rubbed his cheek against the wet wool of Legolas’s cloak.  Legolas drew the tunic over the boy’s head and then wrapped him in a blanket.  By this time, Tuilinn had finished dressing Astiaa in an embroidered chemise that Legolas eyed curiously for a moment before turning hastily away when he felt heat rising in his face.  Tuilinn tucked the little girl into the blanket next to her brother, who put both arms around her, although it was hard to say if he sought most to give or receive comfort.

“Everything is all right now, Astiaa,” Talet declared, and she nodded her head trustingly, cuddling up against him.

Legolas turned to help the next child and found himself dealing with Ródien.  “Now how wet are you, my young warrior?” Legolas asked, and Ródien grinned at him.

“Not very,” he declared. “I just got rained on, but mostly my cloak got wet.  I can climb very well, so I did not fall into the water.  May I see your sword?”

“After everyone is taken care of,” Legolas laughed and moved to dry off the last little girl and dress her in a knitted jacket.  He turned to look at Tuilinn, who stood holding her hair away from her face and running her practiced eye over the children.  “You should put something dry on too,” he said.  He was soaked himself, but he did not have much hope of her pulling anything for him out the chest, not anything he would consent to wear anyway.

She eyed him a little skeptically for a second, then shrugged, went back to the chest, and pulled out a gown.  She raised an eyebrow at him, and he hastily turned his back on her, sat down next to Ródien, and unsheathed his sword.  Distracted by the idea of what was happening behind him, he rested its hilt in the child’s hand so that he could feel its weight for a moment.  Ródien could not actually lift the weapon, but he held it as carefully as if someone had put a fragile piece of glass in his hand.  “Look, Tuilinn,” he cried, peering around Legolas.  “I have the warrior’s sword.”

“Be careful with it,” she said in a voice whose muffled quality suggested that she was speaking through a layer of fabric.

Ródien continued looking behind Legolas. “She cannot really see me,” he said, obviously disappointed.

Firmly resisting temptation, Legolas resheathed the sword and took his bow from his back to dry and check it too.  He showed Ródien his packet of bowstrings, wrapped in a protective layer of waxed cloth to protect them.  “When you are bigger, you will learn to hunt with a bow like this,” he told the child, “and then you can help to feed our people.”

Ródien nodded. “That will be good,” he said, much too soberly for one so young.  Legolas could not resist hugging him and kissing the top of his head.

“Shall we play a game?” Tuilinn asked briskly, stepping into the circle of children. “Or would you like me to tell you a story?”

“I am hungry,” proclaimed Talet, to Legolas’s satisfaction.  The little boy looked much calmer, and if he was hungry, then his fear must have abated somewhat.

“I am afraid we have no food here,” Tuilinn said.

“If you can manage them alone, I can go through the trees to the flet where the food is stored,” Legolas offered.

Her face lit up. “Please do,” she responded.  “They really must be hungry.  We did not have mid-day meal, and the time for it is long past.  I do not mind caring for them by myself.  I am used to it.”

Legolas thought the Elves and Men were asking a great deal of her.  “How long have you been doing this?” he asked, trying to keep the disapproval from his voice.

“Just since the flood,” she said, looking surprised.  His irritation with Anyr and Crydus eased a little at that.  Her complete responsibility for the smallest children was a temporary measure then, brought on by the emergency of the flood.

“I will be back quickly,” he promised and set off through the treetops toward where the food was stored.  He scanned the waters below him as he went.  The rain had stopped, which should help matters some, and it seemed to him that the level of the water was dropping a little.  It is probably flowing into the Men’s fields further downstream, he thought grimly.  At least it was early enough in the spring that the Men would not have planted yet, so they would not lose their precious seed stock to the flood.

He was drawing near to his destination when he heard a sound that for a moment he could not identify because it seemed so out of place. Then he realized that it was the sound of oars splashing softly in the water. At the same moment, he heard a male voice speaking quietly.  “It is the one in that tree right there,” the voice said.

For a second, Legolas froze.  The voice could belong to one of Anyr’s or Crydus’s people, come to get food for the workers in the Men’s village, but the furtiveness with which the voice had spoken made the hair on the back of his neck prickle. Something was wrong here. He moved silently forward to try to get a look at the boat.

Suddenly he caught a glimpse of it through the newly leafing tree branches.  Two Men were edging their boat toward the tree where the food was stored.  Legolas did not recognize either one of them, but that did not mean much. He did not know Crydus’s people.  He hesitated and had just decided to hail them and ask them their business when one of them rose and moved cautiously toward the fork in the tree.

“Be careful, you fool!” the other Man snapped as the boat rocked precariously. “These bags of meat will be worth a lot less if you tip this boat over and dump them into that dirty water.”

“Hold the boat still then,” the other frowned.  “I don’t know why we have to get more food anyway.   That meat will bring the best price in Esgaroth.  Nobody is going to want the vegetables or that acorn meal, and we should be getting on our way before anyone finds us.”

The Man at the oars snorted. “You’d be surprised what people will pay for when they’re hungry enough.  We’ll go as soon as we have the rest of the food.  Hurry up.  Now that the rain has stopped, Anyr’s people might decide they’ve done enough for Crydus and be back any minute.”  The other Man stepped from the boat into the tree and slowly began to climb toward the flet.

Legolas could not believe what he was hearing. These Men were stealing the precious food that Thranduil had sent, not because they were hungry themselves, although they might have been, but because they wanted money.  He almost could not comprehend it, and yet he could see the two missing bags of food in the boat.  Rage made his muscles tighten, but his hand was steady as he seized his bow, strung it with one of the protected bowstrings he had just shown to Ródien, and fitted an arrow to the string.  So far as he was concerned, these Men merited hard retribution, and he was its bearer.  He walked further out onto the branch until he was sure he would be visible from below.

“Stop where you are,” he ordered.

Both Men turned toward him with surprise writ large on their faces.  Then the right hand of the Man in the tree jumped toward the knife on his left hip.  Before he had touched the hilt, Legolas had sent an arrow through the loose edge of his sleeve to pin his right arm to the tree and nocked another arrow.  He felt grim satisfaction at the shock on both Mannish faces.  These Men had thought they could rob Thranduil’s people with impunity.  Legolas intended to make sure they understood just how mistaken they had been.

“You wouldn’t kill us for simple thieving!” the Man in the boat protested.

“I would kill you in an eyeblink if thought you were going to leave the Elven king’s people to starve to death,” Legolas said coldly. “But as I have stopped you from doing that, I am going to allow you to live.”  The Man in the tree was reaching cautiously to pull the arrow from his sleeve. “Leave it until I tell you otherwise!” Legolas snapped, turning to point his bow at him. The Man in the tree froze, but the Man in the boat reached for the oars. Legolas planted an arrow on the edge of the boat between the Man’s outspread fingers.  He paled and turned his face up to Legolas, who already had another arrow pointed at him.

“Didn’t you just say you were letting us go?” asked the Man in the boat uncertainly.

Legolas gave a short laugh.  “Not likely,” he snorted.  “I said I was letting you live. I am going to turn you in to one of the authorities. I am simply trying to decide if it should be the captain of the guard at Esgaroth or King Thranduil.”

Both Men turned ashen.  “You,” Legolas jerked his head at the man in the tree, “use your left hand to take the knife from your belt and drop it into the water.” With his eyes never leaving Legolas’s bow, the Man obeyed.  Legolas scanned the Man in the boat, looking for weapons but seeing none despite the fact that he thought it extremely unlikely the Man was unarmed.

He turned back to the Man in the tree.  “Pull the arrow out.” The Man complied, still watching Legolas.  “Have you any other weapons?”  The Man shook his head.  “Get back into the boat and disarm your friend.  And,” Legolas added as the Man edged back toward the boat, “know that when you have finished, I am going to search both of you, and if I find any weapon at all, I will immediately use it on you.” He felt a surge of malicious satisfaction at the fear on both the thieves’ faces.

The Man in the tree moved toward the one in the boat, looked at him apologetically, and then took a knife from a concealed sheath in his belt. He looked at Legolas.  “Drop it overboard,” Legolas ordered. The Man obeyed.  “Take off your belt and give it to your companion,” Legolas said. The Man looked at the arrow pointed at his head and once again did as he was told.  “Now, turn around and let your companion tie your hands with the belt.”  The Man turned slowly around and put his hands behind him.  His companion worked at the belt for a moment and then let it go.

Never deflecting his arrow an inch from its aim at the Men, Legolas descended into the fork of the tree, within touching distance of the prow of the boat.  “Come here,” he ordered the Man with bound hands.  The Man was beginning to move toward Legolas, when suddenly there was a whirl of motion in the boat.   The other Man grabbed the bound Man with one hand and held him in front of him like a shield. With the other hand, he snatched a dagger from the bound Man’s boot and flung it at Legolas’s chest.  For a Man, he was amazingly fast with a dagger, because although Legolas dodged, the blade still nicked his left shoulder, infuriating him no end.

Shoving the bound Man toward Legolas, the Man in the boat leapt into the waist high water and began to wade as fast as he could toward the surrounding trees.  The bound Man stumbled forward and then lost his balance and fell overboard, disappearing into the murky water where his bound hands were going to make standing again difficult. But what really made Legolas’s heart leap was that the boat lurched so violently that it tipped over, sending both bags of meat flying.

With a gasp of dismay, he ignored both Men and lunged into the water, reaching for the bags.  In the hand that still held his bow, he caught one almost before it hit the water, then waded a quick step and snatched up the other. The bag was dripping, but he was almost certain it had not been in the water long enough to ruin much of the meat.  He hoped not. If the food had been ruined, the Men would pay he vowed viciously. Only when he had stowed the food safely in the fork of the tree did he shoulder his bow and wade to where the bound Man was trying to surface.  Enjoying himself more than he liked to admit, he grabbed the Man by his hair, pulled him to his feet, and shoved him against the tree.  He stretched the Man’s bound arms through the fork in the tree, seized one of the oars that was floating nearby, threaded the oar through the bound arms, and then wedged the oar on the other side of the tree, leaving the Man hopelessly stuck.

Then he turned to start after the fleeing Man, seizing the second oar as he went. The Man was considerably shorter than Legolas and was floundering in the water, not yet having found shelter in the trees. Not that the trees would have hidden him from me anyway, Legolas thought in disgust.  He reached the Man in a few easy strides and then cocked the oar back over his shoulder and swung it at the Man’s back.  With a loud and very satisfying yelp of pain, the Man stumbled forward and fell face down into the water.

Legolas grabbed at the dazed Man, dragged him close, and ran a hand over him, searching for weapons and finding none.  “You are Orc dung!” he spat. “You are spider filth!  You are greedy enough to take food from children for money!”  The Man blinked at him, apparently not quite taking in the last insult.  Legolas shook him in disgust, then yanked off the Man’s belt and used it to bind his hands behind him.  Then he dragged him back toward the tree where the flood was perched, where he had left the other thief.

He was nearing the tree when someone startled both him and the thieves by dropping from the higher branches to one just above the head of the thief who was fastened to the tree.  Legolas gaped, unable to believe what he saw. “Beliond!” he exclaimed. “What are you doing here?”  He glanced up to see Annael and Tinár in the trees, their bows drawn and pointed at the two thieves.

His bodyguard, too, stood with an arrow nocked in his bow.  “Looking after you, as it turns out,” he snorted, “although I confess I did not expect to be doing it when I heard about the flooding and came to see if I could help. What is the source of that blood on your shoulder?”

Legolas recalled in surprise that the dagger one of the Men had thrown had nicked his shoulder. “It is only a scratch,” he assured Beliond hastily. The last thing he needed was Beliond fussing over his injury.

Beliond gestured with his bow toward the thief whose arm Legolas still grasped.  “Who are these two?”

Legolas felt hot fury rise again when he thought of what the thieves had been doing.  He tightened his grip on the thief’s arm and jerked it, feeling a flush of satisfaction when the thief stumbled slightly.  “They were stealing food that the king sent to the Elves in this settlement.  They intended to sell it.”

Beliond looked scornfully down his nose at the two thieves.  “Do you want to take them to the king?”

The Men’s alarm flared visibly, and for a moment, Legolas pictured how much he would enjoy seeing his father wreak vengeance on these two creatures.  And then, unexpectedly, he found himself hesitating, repelled by his own reaction and even by the satisfaction he had been taking in handling the thieves roughly. He looked at Beliond, who awaited his decision, and was conscious of how rarely his keeper had ever behaved as if Legolas were in charge. So far as Beliond was usually concerned, Legolas was a warrior with far less experience than himself and for whose safety he was completely responsible, and usually that was what Legolas was. But I am not that here, he remembered. Here I am the son of the king.  He drew a deep breath.

“No,” he said. “They are Men, and Men should decide their fate.” The thief he was holding sagged slightly in relief. “Besides,” Legolas added contemptuously, “I do not want to have to put up with their company for a second longer than I must.”

Accepting Legolas’s decision without question, Beliond nodded.  He would be entirely sympathetic to any desire to avoid the company of Men if possible. “Annael and Tinár can take them to Esgaroth,” he announced. “I will stay with you.”

“Legolas should take them,” Tinár protested. “I hate going to Esgaroth.”

Beliond turned a disgusted face toward him.  “I see you are as great an idiot as ever, Tinár,” he said.  “Legolas is not taking these vermin to Esgaroth because, as I understand it from Galivion, he is Thranduil’s representative here.   Would you expect the king to take the prisoners to Esagaroth?  Do not make me climb up there and kick you down from your perch to do as you have been told.”

Tinár blinked in astonishment, and Legolas could see Annael grinning as he dropped down from the tree into the water.  He waded toward Legolas. “I will take this one. You get the one pinned to the tree, Tinár.” He took hold of the thief’s arm.  “Are you planning to go home soon, my lord?” he asked Legolas, stressing the title a little and then winking at Legolas.

Legolas smothered a smile. “I do not know. I still need to speak with Crydus about whether the Men will promise food from their fields in exchange for what Anyr might give them now.”  He left unspoken his wish to spend a little more time with Tuilinn.  “How are things in the Men’s village?”

“The sandbags were holding when we left,” Annael said, “and the river level was dropping. Crydus may be ready to speak to you now. Galivion bid us ask you to return to the village as soon as you could.”

Legolas nodded. “He would want this settled so he can get food for his people today.  I have to take some food to the children, but then I can go.”  He thought fleetingly about Tuilinn, regretting that he could not simply go back to her flet to stay for a while.  I can come back, he reminded himself. I know she is here now. The thought warmed him.

Tinár had come low enough in the tree to remove the oar that held the second thief in place.  He paused, grimaced fastidiously, and then jumped into the slowly ebbing water.  “Come, Annael,” he said resignedly. “Do not dawdle. Let us do this as quickly as we can.”

Annael gave a wry half smile at Tinár’s back. “If you have left for home before we return, we will follow as soon as we can,” he told Legolas and then started after Tinár, keeping a firm hold on his prisoner’s arm.

Legolas jumped into the fork in the tree, retrieved the two bags of dried meat, and climbed to the flet, with Beliond right behind him.  Beliond seized his arm and pulled at the torn spot on the shoulder of his tunic, assuring himself that Legolas had been honest with him about the slightness of his wound.  Legolas tugged his arm away impatiently.  “Are you happy now, Nana?” he asked.

Beliond frowned.  “Watch your mouth,” he said, with no apparent consciousness at all of Legolas as his king’s son.

Legolas shrugged and turned to their task. “We need a meal for seven small children and their caretaker,” he told Beliond, who began helping him pick through the supplies to find something that would not need to be prepared before the children could eat it.

“What was Galivion thinking to let you come here on your own?” Beliond complained, pulling out and then replacing one of the strips of dried meat.  “I have already told him what I thought about his carelessness.  For that matter, what was the king thinking in sending you on this mission without me?”

Legolas spared a moment to sympathize silently with Galivion and then ignored the rest of the grumbling.  If Beliond chose to scold Thranduil too, that would be Beliond’s worry.  Legolas only wished he could watch the confrontation – from a safe distance, of course.  “How did you get here?” he asked, interrupting his keeper’s complaints about others’ lack of good sense.

“I was camped not far away, and I came across two Men from the village who were hunting.  I asked them what they were doing, of course.” Legolas suppressed a grin. He could only imagine the manner in which Beliond had challenged the Men’s presence in the forest.  “They told me there was flooding here and that Elves were in need of aid.  They directed me to the Men’s village instead of the Elven settlement though, which I believe must have been deliberately deceptive of them.”  He frowned.  “If I ever see them again, I shall certainly speak to them about it.”

Beliond tossed a bag of dried vegetables aside.  “Children are going to have trouble with most of this unless it is stewed.  I have waybread with me. They can have that. Where are they?”

Legolas led the way to Tuilinn’s flet. She had apparently been watching for him.  “I heard some sort of commotion,” she said worriedly when the two of them dropped to the flet.  She eyed Beliond but seemed undisturbed by the arrival of an Elf she did not know.

“The thieves came back,” Legolas told her.  “This is Beliond,” he added, indicating his keeper, who had already opened his pack and was pulling out waybread.  The oddly dressed children were crowding around him, hunger overcoming any shyness they might have felt. “Beliond, this is Tuilinn.”  Beliond nodded to the maiden and continued handing out waybread.

“Were the thieves from Crydus’s village?” Tuilinn asked anxiously.

“I do not think so,” Legolas answered. “They were going to sell the food for money.” He still found that unbelievable, and the look on Tuilinn’s face showed that she shared his incredulity.

“Did you capture them, Captain?” Ródien demanded excitedly.  Legolas could see Beliond suppressing a surprised grin.

“Yes, I did,” Legolas told Ródien.  “Some other warriors are taking them to Esgaroth to be punished.”  Ródien nodded with satisfaction and then settled down to enjoy his waybread.  Legolas turned to Tuilinn. “I am sorry I cannot stay,” he apologized. “I must go back to confer with Crydus about the exchange of food.”

She smiled, but he thought she looked regretful.  “That will be good,” she said.  “You were clever to think of it.”

Legolas returned her smile.  “Perhaps we can talk later.”

“I would like that,” she said.

He looked up to find Beliond watching him shrewdly. He could feel a flush creeping up his neck.  “Are you ready?” he asked a little brusquely.  Beliond made no reply but simply gestured for Legolas to lead the way.  With a wave of farewell to the children, Legolas started back to the Men’s village, moving quickly through the treetops.

The trees eventually thinned, and he and Beliond dropped to the ground for the last bit of the trip, emerging into the village just as both Elves and Men appeared to be collapsing in exhaustion near the small tents the Men were using for shelter.  Beliond looked around with a scowl.  “They were fortunate to have Elves to help them,” he said, and Legolas could only nod his agreement.  He was beginning to think, though, that Anyr’s people might also be fortunate in their neighbors.

Legolas asked a nearby Elf where Galivion was and then went to find him, seated with Anyr and Crydus around a small fire in front of Crydus’s tent.  All three of them rose to their feet as Legolas and Beliond approached, and Legolas realized with a start that they were standing on his account.  He took the stool Crydus offered, and they all sat down again.

“Before we begin,” he said, “someone should be sent to help Tuilinn with the children.  The settlement is flooded, and she is all alone with them.”

Crydus rose and went to speak to a nearby Man, whom Legolas recognized as Ethau, the father of Astiaa and Talet.  Ethau trotted off hastily toward the Elven settlement and Crydus resumed his seat. He came straight to the point, as Legolas had come to expect the Mannish leader to do.  “My lord, the owners of our fields have agreed to trade food they grow this summer for some of the supplies that King Thranduil has sent to Anyr.”

“I do not believe we should think of this as ‘trade,’” Galivion put in hastily.  “This is simply a matter of one group of people helping another in a time of need and then those who have been helped showing their appreciation by bestowing a gift later.” The rest of them turned to look at the advisor in various degrees of surprise and puzzlement.

Suddenly, Legolas grinned.  “I believe Galivion is right.  The king regulates any trade in which his people engage, of course, but such matters of mutual assistance are usually none of his concern except as they merit his benevolent approval.” Behind him, he could hear Beliond snorting in faint derision at this dancing around about words. He smiled to himself. If Legolas knew anyone who would be more impatient than Beliond over the niceties of diplomacy, he could not think of who it would be.

Anyr still looked a little puzzled, but Crydus smiled appreciatively. “That certainly makes sense to me.  I also sent out two hunting parties this morning to try to supplement the amount of food on hand.”  For a few moments, they talked about the amount of food the Men would give to Elves at harvest time. Legolas pushed a little, thinking that Thranduil might want a better bargain than he himself would have been happy with.  From the corner of his eye, he could see Beliond watching him appraisingly.  When the bargain was concluded, Beliond and Galivion gave simultaneous nods of approval, leaving him flushed with satisfaction.

The discussion of the future having been completed, Crydus turned to more pressing concerns. His people and Anyr’s both needed to be fed that night.  He turned to Anyr.  “If you are willing to send some of your people with mine or send out hunting parties of your own, we can probably also share the meat we bring down.”

Anyr immediately brightened. “Of course.  It will be much better if we pool our resources because that way a bad day’s hunt for one group will be less likely to leave them hungry.”

Legolas could not help feeling a certain admiration as he watched the leaders of two different peoples cooperate so easily.  He only hoped his father would also approve.  A sudden idea occurred to him.  “Crydus,” he intervened, “given the uncertain state of the river, perhaps it would be better to store the meat from the hunts on the same flet with the food that the king sent.  I am sure Anyr would be happy to allow use of the space, and perhaps in turn you would supply guards for the food.  In a time of famine, there will regrettably be temptation to thievery.” In a few words, he told Crydus about the thieves he had just caught.

“Of course we will be happy to provide guards,” Crydus exclaimed.  He glanced at Anyr, who was shaking his head in bewilderment at the wickedness of the thieves, and then looked back at Legolas.  “I would be only too happy to relieve my friend Anyr of the burden of guarding the food, my lord,” he said with a wry little smile.  Legolas suppressed his own smile. Crydus was apparently well aware of the limitations his “friend” might exhibit in anticipating such matters as theft.

“Then I think we have an agreement,” Legolas said. “Were your hunters successful today?”

“They brought down some small game,” Crydus said.

“If you agree, we can cook a communal meal here tonight,” Anyr put in, rising to his feet when Crydus nodded. “The flood is too deep in our settlement to allow us to eat there, but I will send someone to fetch food from our stores. Where are your hunters?”

“Yes,” said Beliond, rising to go with Anyr. “Where are they?  I wish to speak to two of them whom I met earlier today.”

“I need you here, Beliond,” said Legolas hastily.  Beliond threw him a suspicious look but sat down again.  Crydus directed Anyr to where the hunters were skinning the game they had brought down, and the settlement leader departed. Crydus turned back to Legolas.

“I gather that the king may have some interest in the past trading of food and timber in which Anyr’s people and mine have been engaged.”  He cocked on eyebrow at Legolas.

Legolas could feel Galivion tensing next to him. “I suspect he will,” he said.  “His people maintain the safety and navigability of the river after all.” Galivion relaxed.

Crydus nodded resignedly.  “When should we expect to hear from him?”

“We will leave for home in the morning,” Galivion said, making Beliond nod approvingly.  “I do not imagine you will have to wait long after that.”

Legolas did not imagine they would either.  He was a little startled by how soon Galivion wanted to leave, but when he thought about it, he knew that his mission here was completed.  Moreover, he had to return to his patrol in three days. If he was to have any time at all with his family, he needed to get home.  For a moment, he pictured Tuilinn, holding her hair away from her face and contemplating the children. Then, regretfully, he put the picture aside, and, as he had done earlier, he reminded himself that he could come and see her again.  Moreover, he could sit with her during tonight’s meal. He happily held onto that thought as he tried to look interested while he listened to Galivion delicately extracting from Crydus news of exactly how much unauthorized trading had been going on between the settlers and the Men.

At last, Crydus called a halt to the conversation. “I believe our evening meal is waiting,” he said, and he, Legolas, Galivion, and Beliond made their way to where Elves and men were gathered around a campfire.

Legolas looked eagerly for Tuilinn, but to his dismay, he did not see her.  He supposed she was busy with the children somewhere.  I should have expected that, he thought disappointedly.  It is unseemly to be so impatient. There will be time yet. But despite the good advice he gave himself, he found Anyr and Crydus very poor substitutes for Tuilinn as companions for the meal.

Legolas and Beliond slept that night on the flet that he and Annael had been using, but Legolas was up early.  He wanted to see Tuilinn before they left.  He pulled on his shoes and was just rising when he realized that Beliond too was getting up. “You do not need to come,” he protested.

“I do,” answered Beliond and picked up his bow.  “The fact that you are an excellent representative of the king only makes it that much more important that I watch your back.”

Even as he marveled at the compliment Beliond had just given him, Legolas let out an exasperated sigh. He knew better than to argue however. “I assume you can watch it from a respectful distance,” he said a little acerbically.  Beliond smiled but made no answer.  A foot or so of water still lapped around the bottom of the trees, so Legolas led the way through the branches to Tuilinn’s flet. To his surprise, she was not there.  He had not realized the maiden’s day started quite so early.

He wondered where the children might be being cared for that day and concluded that the Men’s village was the most likely place.  As he turned to break the news to Beliond that they were going there, he caught a glimpse of Anyr seated in a nearby maple tree, watching the sun come up.  Legolas moved across the tree limbs and dropped down onto the branch next to him, with Beliond hovering a little above them.  “Mae govannen,” he said politely.

“Mae govannen, my lord.”  Anyr looked supremely peaceful, and maddening as the Elf was, Legolas could not help admiring him.  There was something very Elven about Anyr.

“Can you tell me where I might find Tuilinn this morning?” Legolas asked.

“Tuilinn?” Anyr asked vaguely.

“Yes.”  All admiration fled, and Legolas had to smother his exasperation.  “The maiden who watches the children,” he prompted.

“She went home,” Anyr said.

Legolas blinked uncertainly. “What do you mean?  She is not on her flet.”

“Her family sent for her late yesterday afternoon and said she was needed at home, so she left.”

“Is this not her home?” Legolas could feel his stomach beginning to tighten in panic.

Anyr laughed and shook his head.  “She is from somewhere north of here, I think.  She came to help when she heard about the flood. We have had many Elves come to help us, much like your friend there.”  He smiled up at Beliond, who was looking soberly at Legolas.

Legolas stared at him.  “Where north of here?”

“I do not know.”

Legolas felt an almost overwhelming desire to seize Anyr by the throat.  Beliond dropped onto the branch next to them. “Come, my lord,” he said gently. “We need to get ready to go home. Galivion will be waiting for us.” He touched Legolas’s arm lightly.  “There is nothing you can do here,” he said softly.

Even in his fury, Legolas noticed that Beliond had addressed him as ‘my lord,’ something he very rarely did.  He is reminding you of who you are, he told himself in despair, and you would do well to remember it too.  Legolas glared at his keeper for a moment, burning with unreasonable anger that was only made worse when he saw what looked like pity on Beliond’s face.  He realized that Anyr was looking at him curiously and drew a deep breath.

“I bid you farewell, Anyr,” he said as evenly as he could.

“Farewell,” said Anyr cheerfully and went back to watching the sky.

*******

AN: I thought readers might find it useful to see the time line of the story so far:

Day 1.  Legolas arrives home in the evening

Day 2.  Eilian sees healer and gets permission to ride. Rides with Legolas. Rain in the night leads to flooding that knocks down the food flet at Anyr’s settlement. Eilian gets permission to become betrothed to Celuwen if her parents agree.

Day 3.  Eilian leaves to visit Celuwen and arrives with rabbits. Thranduil gets request from Anyr.  Legolas helps Galivion to gather food from the palace’s storage.

Day 4.  Legolas arrives at settlement around noon. Eilian tells Celuwen about her father intercepting her letters. He and she bond in the evening. Legolas walks with Tuilinn.

Day 5.  River floods again.  Eilian starts home.  Legolas rescues Tuilinn and the children and catches the thieves. Beliond arrives.  Business is concluded.

Day 6.  Legolas starts home.

I borrow characters and setting from Tolkien. I gain no profit from their use other than the enriched imaginative life I believe he intended me to gain.

Many thanks to Nilmandra for beta reading this chapter.

*******

11.  Thranduil

Eilian’s eyes came gradually into focus.  He lay for a moment, looking at the familiar sight of the weapons hanging on his chamber wall and hearing someone’s soft breathing behind him. Celuwen! he thought and rolled over to find his wife asleep next to him, clad in a sea green night dress with silver leaves embroidered around the neckline. He could not resist reaching out and brushing her unbound hair from her face.  “I love you,” he murmured, and her eyes slid from side to side a little and then came to rest on him. A slow smile spread over her face.

“I love you,” she said, and he laughed for pure joy and put his lips to hers.

She slid her hand over the bare skin of his back, sending shivers down his spine.  “Do you never wear a night tunic?” she asked with her mouth still against his.

“Not usually.  When I am on patrol, I sleep in my clothes, and I enjoy being in bed while out of them when I am home.”

She laughed softly.  “Do not change on my account,” she said, sliding her hand lower.

He sucked in his breath sharply. “What a wicked female you are,” he said, continuing to drop small kisses on her mouth while he tried to undo the far too numerous tiny buttons at the top of her night dress.  His fingers were clever, but he was far too impatient to undo the fiendish little things.

With a cry of frustration, he grasped Celuwen around the waist and rolled onto his back with her on top of him. Then he began tugging at the night dress, pulling it up around her waist.  Her hair hung around their faces, making a curtain that shut out the rest of the world.  She lowered her mouth to his and slid her tongue between his lips.  He moaned and caressed her warm bottom, making her arch her back in response.

A knock sounded at the door, and they froze with their eyes locked.

“Eilian?” came Ithilden’s voice. “Eilian, are you there?”  The door knob rattled, and Celuwen had time only to roll off him and drag the covers up to her chin before Ithilden entered the room.  He came around the open door and then, for a moment, stood staring at them, apparently unable to take in what he was seeing.  Then he flushed and hastily turned his back.

“One of the guards said you were home,” he stuttered. “Adar wanted to know if you were coming to morning meal.”

Before Eilian could answer, Celuwen spoke up.  “We will be there shortly, Ithilden,” she said.

Ithilden paused.  “You two have bonded?” he asked cautiously, without turning around.

“Yes,” said Eilian.

There was a second’s silence and then, with amusement in his voice, Ithilden said, “I have never questioned your nerve, Eilian.  Congratulations, brother. The Valar have truly blessed you. I only hope you survive to enjoy your good fortune.”

Eilian could see Celuwen looking uncertainly at him, and he smiled reassuringly at her.  “I gather that the guard did not say that Celuwen was here,” he said to Ithilden’s back.

“No, he did not.  I assume he did not want to be around to see the fireworks when Adar heard that particular piece of news. No offense, Celuwen,” he added. “Welcome to the family.”

“Thank you,” said Celuwen.  She was looking worried though, and Eilian reached to take her hand.

Ithilden moved toward the door. “If you do not mind, I think I will not tell Adar about Celuwen either.  You can tell him yourself, Eilian.”

“Of course,” said Eilian, trying to sound braver than he felt.  If Ithilden was too cowardly to tell Thranduil what he had found in Eilian’s chamber, then he was anticipating an even stronger reaction from Thranduil than Eilian had been worried about.  Eilian’s breathing tightened.  “I will be there soon.”

As soon as Ithilden was out the door, Celuwen slid from the bed and started toward the bathing chamber.  “Wait,” Eilian protested, untangling himself from the covers. “You should stay here, Celuwen. It would be best if I spoke to Adar alone.”

“No,” she said firmly, starting the water running for a bath.  “You came with me to speak to my parents. I will go with you.”

Eilian’s dismay rose. “My adar is going to be very angry, Celuwen.  Even apart from any offense he takes from the fact that we bonded without ceremony, I was supposed to get your parents’ permission before we became betrothed, and Adar said he thought the betrothal should last more than the customary year.”

She looked startled for a moment.  Then she shrugged. “Your adar was wrong,” she said, and then pulled her night dress off over her head and stepped into the bath.

Eilian stared at her, almost as struck by her dismissal of his father’s orders as he was by the beauty of her body.  Then, with a desperate need he had not known he was feeling, he climbed into the tub after her and reached for this amazing female who was now his wife.

***

Holding Celuwen’s hand in his, Eilian opened the door to the dining chamber and led his wife into the room where his family sat.  They all turned to him, their faces ready with cheerful welcomes home, and then, abruptly they froze, and he saw knowledge blossoming in their gazes.  He scanned them worriedly.  Legolas was not here, he noted immediately and realized from the dismay he felt that he had been counting on his younger brother to be an ally.  Legolas was the least likely of any member of his family to criticize Eilian’s behavior at any time.

Of course, Ithilden’s earlier words suggested that he might be sympathetic too.  Eilian glanced at his brother, who had drawn his chair back a little from the table and was watching everyone else’s reaction with a slightly ironic look. 

Next to him, Alfirin had risen with a puzzled look on her face, as if she intended to welcome Celuwen as an unexpected guest.  Then she had stopped, looked from Celuwen to Eilian and back again, and abruptly sat down. Ithilden took hold of one of her hands and began to stroke it lightly.  Eilian looked at her a little pleadingly.  He was not certain how his sister-in-law was going to react to the news he brought.  She had high standards of behavior and tended to be traditional.  She sat now, with her eyes wide, biting her lower lip.

Finally, reluctantly, Eilian’s eyes moved to his father, seated silently at the head of the table. A flush was creeping up Thranduil’s neck, and his face was immobile and shuttered. His blue eyes were cold as he looked straight at Eilian.  “I suppose I should not be surprised, although I had hoped you were at last growing up, Eilian.” Celuwen’s hand tightened on Eilian’s.

“I present my wife to you, Adar,” Eilian said with determination. He would not quarrel openly with his father if he could help it, but he rejoiced in his marriage and he would not deny that.

Thranduil’s mouth pressed in a thin line, but then he looked at Celuwen.  Eilian glanced at her too. She stood erect, and while she did not look defiant, she did not look cowed either.  Yet to Eilian it was obvious that she was upset by the tense atmosphere into which they had just walked.  Thranduil seemed to sense her discomfort too, and his face softened.  He rose and beckoned to her, and she let go of Eilian’s hand and walked tentatively toward him.  “I wish it had been done with more ceremony, but Eilian could not have chosen better.  Welcome, daughter,” Thranduil said and kissed her brow.

Eilian suddenly relaxed a little. It was obvious to him that his father was still seething, but whatever Thranduil had in store for Eilian, he did not intend to take his anger out on Celuwen.  His father had always liked her, Eilian knew.  He just had not thought that Eilian was in any position to bond with her.

Alfirin was in motion now, going to the door to summon a servant to set an extra place.  “Sit here, Celuwen,” she invited, motioning her to a chair next to Eilian’s normal place.  She suddenly paused in her bustling about, and, rather shyly, darted up to Celuwen and embraced her. Eilian felt a flood of gratitude for the effort that Alfirin was making, for what he could only assume was his sake.  From the tense look on her face, he did not think that she was accepting this precipitous bonding easily.  Celuwen looked startled but pleased and sat down, turning her head to look at Eilian, obviously waiting for him to sit beside her. Alfirin returned to her own place, and Ithilden smiled at her and patted her hand.

Eilian stood alone now, looking at his father, who had reseated himself but kept his gaze on Eilian.  “Sit down, Eilian,” Thranduil finally said, his voice cool.  “I will speak with you after the meal.”  Eilian moved slowly toward his chair.  He would sit, but he doubted if he would be able to eat, not until he and his father had had things out.

Celuwen glanced at Eilian anxiously as he seated himself next to her.  “If this is about Eilian and me, my lord, you should speak to both of us,” she said.  And aware as he was of the tension in the room, Eilian could not help breaking into a wide grin at this brave, foolish female he had married.

Thranduil looked at her from under half lowered eyelids.  “This is not about Eilian and you, my dear. It is about Eilian and me.”   Alfirin began serving porridge from the tureen in the middle of the table.  She ladled some into a bowl, started to offer it to Celuwen, and then suddenly looked intently at her and added another ladle of the thin stuff before she set the bowl down in front of her. She put the bowl of honey down within Celuwen’s reach and began to fix a bowl for Thranduil.

“Where is Legolas?” Eilian asked.

“I sent him to deliver an emergency share of food to the Elves who live in the settlement along the Forest River at the eastern edge of the forest,” Thranduil answered, accepting a bowl from Alfirin.

“But he was on leave,” Eilian could not help protesting.  He knew only too well how serving in the Southern Patrol wore on warriors, and he had seen how much Legolas was enjoying the small pleasures of home.

“I know that, Eilian,” Thranduil said sharply.  “But it could not be helped.  I needed to send him to show my concern for the settlers. Legolas knew his duty and was happy to do it.”  Eilian heard the stress his father put on Legolas’s name and knew that Thranduil meant him to hear the approval for Legolas, in contrast to the displeasure his father was feeling with him.  Celuwen looked back and forth between them, and Eilian forced himself to smile at her.  She still looked uncertain, but then she drew in a deep breath.

“Is that the settlement that Anyr leads?” she asked.  She seemed determined to behave as normally as possible, as if that would somehow ease the tension she was probably feeling around her.

“Yes,” said Thranduil, turning to her. “Do you know him?”

She nodded.  “They used to live closer to us, but many of those people loved the river’s song, so the entire group moved to be near it.”  She smiled at some memory.  “Anyr is completely impractical, but he does have a deep love of Arda.”

Thranduil grimaced. “He is difficult to deal with,” he said shortly.

“Yes, he is,” Celuwen acknowledged. “You have to know how to approach him, or you will get nowhere.  And there are some things you can simply never expect him to do.”

Alfirin offered Eilian a bowl of porridge, but he shook his head.  He knew he was too tense to eat it, and wasting food was unthinkable.  He could feel Thranduil glance at him, but he kept his eyes resolutely away from his father.  He did not need to see Thranduil’s face to know that he still looked angry.  Eilian could hear it in his father’s voice.

There was a moment’s silence, and then Thranduil said, “I have not seen your parents in some time, Celuwen.  They will undoubtedly miss you.”  Eilian glanced at Ithilden, who grimaced a little. Both of them had spent too many years watching Thranduil in court not to recognize that their father was questioning Celuwen, even though he was not asking questions.

Celuwen nodded. “I think they will. I will miss them too.”

“They will be reconciled to your loss if they think you are happy though,” Thranduil said. Eilian looked at his father sharply now. 

Celuwen’s brow puckered slightly.  “They are worried about what I will do when Eilian is away, I think.”

Thranduil continued spooning up the thin porridge and looking sympathetic.  “I expect they are. I am a little surprised they consented to your marrying without the betrothal period, because that would have given you and Eilian some time to work these things out.”

“They did not consent,” Celuwen said simply. “My naneth was willing, but I do not think my adar ever would have agreed to a betrothal.”

Thranduil put down his spoon with careful control and turned to Eilian.  “You did not seek her parents’ consent?”

“I did,” Eilian protested.  “But as you said yourself, Adar, there was no way I was ever going to be acceptable to Sólith.”  Across the table, Ithilden flinched, and Eilian suddenly realized that he had allowed his tone become sharp.

Celuwen turned toward him, evidently startled by his tone.  Thranduil drew a deep breath and rose, drawing the rest of them to their feet too. “Perhaps we should go to my office and talk now, Eilian,” he said, his voice tight.  Eilian’s stomach muscles tensed, but he nodded as calmly as he could.  He did not want to alarm Celuwen. He wanted her as far away as possible when his father made it clear exactly how displeased he was with Eilian.

Celuwen seemed ready to protest, but Thranduil cut her off firmly. “Celuwen, you and Eilian cannot live in his current chamber. You need a suite of some sort.  Alfirin, if you are finished eating, would you show Celuwen rooms that you think could be made suitable?”

“Of course, Adar,” Alfirin said immediately.  It was plain to Eilian that, like him, she was eager to keep Celuwen away from the confrontation that she knew only too well was about to take place. “Come,” she invited gently, putting her arm around Celuwen’s waist and coaxing her out the door.  “I am so glad that I will have another female around.”

Celuwen looked back over her shoulder at Eilian.  He smiled reassuringly at her, and she stood for a moment looking at him with a level gaze.  They were not fooling her, Eilian realized.  “Please,” he said, knowing that he was asking something difficult of her. She paused briefly, with her eyes still on him.  “Please,” he repeated, and she seemed to resolve to trust him, for she nodded and allowed Alfirin to lead her away.

“Ithilden, will you tell my advisers that I will be delayed?” Thranduil asked, and Ithilden nodded.

The three of them went to the door together, and when Eilian and Ithilden stood aside to allow Thranduil to pass through first, Ithilden caught at Eilian’s sleeve and spoke softly.  “Hold your tongue, Eilian. Let Adar say what he has to say and look as respectful as you can while he says it.  He likes her, and he wants the best for you, but you have to refrain from provoking him further.”

Eilian looked at him gratefully.  Ithilden himself was responsible to a fault and believed that the needs of the realm easily outweighed his own desires, so Eilian had not known how he would react to Eilian’s hasty bonding.  He could not quarrel with the wisdom of the advice Ithilden gave him; he only doubted his ability to follow it. I will do it for Celuwen’s sake, he thought determinedly.

With a last sympathetic look at Eilian, Ithilden went off toward the door leading out of the family’s living quarters, and with his breath quickening slightly, Eilian followed Thranduil into his office. His father shut the door behind them and walked across the room to stand in front of the fireplace.

“On your knees, Eilian,” he ordered grimly.

Eilian drew a deep breath and obeyed.  He had been on his knees to his father before over matters that were far less important to him than Celuwen was.  He had stood it then and he could stand it now.

“Do you have any memory at all of what I told you before you left for the settlement?” Thranduil asked, beginning to pace with what Eilian recognized as the fury his father had restrained only with difficulty for the last half hour.

“Yes,” Eilian answered.  He kept his eyes lowered.  He intended to look as submissive as he possibly could.  No matter what happened, nothing could undo the bond he and Celuwen had formed. Beyond that, nothing mattered very much.

“Then what were you thinking?” Thranduil demanded. “Surely it has not escaped your notice that you have a duty to tread carefully with our people because you are my son. This is not just a matter of avoiding scandal that the gossips will pick over, Eilian. You have a duty to behave as if the desires of those you defend are important to you, as if you would never dream of abusing the position you are in by taking from them that which they would not wish to give!”

“But what about Celuwen’s and my wishes?” Eilian could not stop himself from asking.  “We are not children, Adar.  Were we to have no chance at happiness because Sólith refused his consent?”

Thranduil flung himself into the chair behind his desk. “And if there is trouble in that settlement because of this, if they break with us, am I to say it matters not because your wishes have been fulfilled?” he asked forbiddingly.

Eilian bit his lip.  “I do not think that will happen,” he said unhappily, “but I cannot be certain. I was not there very long.  Sólith made my ‘unacceptability’ clear quite quickly.”  Eilian could hear the bitterness in his own voice and suddenly realized that he had been hurt when Thranduil had implied that he could never be acceptable as a suitor for Celuwen.  He pushed the feeling aside.  It did not matter if Thranduil and Sólith both thought he was unacceptable; Celuwen had accepted him anyway, and that was all that counted.

Thranduil grimaced and to Eilian’s utter astonishment said, “Sólith has always been blind to your worth.”

Eilian felt a sudden surge of hope.  “Adar, there is something else, too,” he went on pleadingly. He looked earnestly into Thranduil’s face, wanting his father to understand. “Celuwen was fading.”  Thranduil looked at him sharply, and Eilian could see him searching his memory of how Celuwen had looked that morning and suddenly recognizing the truth of what Eilian was telling him.  “You saw her,” Eilian urged. “You can see that she has been ill.”

“Yes,” Thranduil murmured, with his brows drawing together in dismay. “I can.”  Then he shook himself and compressed his mouth in a thin line, and Eilian could see how angry he still was.  “I acknowledge that you may have had reasons to bond without Sólith’s consent, Eilian, but were you in such haste that you could not even wait to have the ceremonies performed here at home?”

“I did not think of that,” Eilian sighed.  He shifted his weight a little.  The kneeling position was beginning to make his hip ache.

“You did not think,” Thranduil agreed. “And you have simply never seen any reason you should not have something you wanted. Eilian, how can you be so consistent and trustworthy as a captain of this realm and so unpredictable in your personal life? Do you not think of the consequences of your actions? Do they not occur to you? Must you leap into action without counsel?”

Eilian hesitated.  “What would you have counseled if I had come home with Celuwen unbonded, Adar?”  In Eilian’s opinion, Thranduil would have put Celuwen in one of the palace’s guest rooms and left her there for the foreseeable future.

“I do not know,” Thranduil declared, “and neither do you.  But we would both at least have had time to consider the wisdom of your bonding now.  You have acted in haste your whole life, Eilian, and you alone know how many times you have lived to regret that.   Can you not learn from experience?  Explain to me how your mind works, Eilian, because you frustrate and confuse me!  You are so like your naneth at times that it frightens me!”

Eilian stared at his father in surprised silence. What was this about his mother?  Thranduil too seemed startled by his own words, for he drew a quick breath and seemed to withdraw into himself.

Someone knocked on the door. “Who is it?” Thranduil demanded, rousing himself.

“Ithilden.”

“Come,” Thranduil bade him, and behind him, Eilian heard the door open and Ithilden enter the room.

“Your advisers are waiting in the Great Hall, Adar,” Ithilden said.  “And a message has come from one of the border patrols that I need to speak to you about.”

“I will be there momentarily,” Thranduil told him, and Eilian could hear Ithilden withdrawing.  Thranduil rose. “We are not finished yet, Eilian, but I must go. You may get up.”

Eilian rose stiffly to his feet, keeping his face impassive. Thranduil looked dismayed. “Is your hip hurting you?”

“It is nothing,” Eilian said. He did not want his father to think he was complaining in an attempt to earn his sympathy.

Thranduil sighed.  “Go and rest,” he ordered and started to leave the room.  Suddenly Eilian found that he could not let his father go without trying to make some move toward peace.  “Adar, I cannot say that I am sorry that Celuwen and I are married, but I am sorry I offended you,” he said unhappily. Thranduil turned to him, his face unreadable.  “I accept all the blame for this,” Eilian went on.  “And I hope we can we keep Celuwen out of any further…”  He groped for a word. “Discussion,” he finished.

Thranduil raised an eyebrow.  “Celuwen has never struck me as someone who will allow others to dispose of her very easily. You may find that she insists on being here.”

“Nonetheless, I would like to try,” Eilian said.

Thranduil nodded with something like approval in his face and then followed Ithilden from the room.  Eilian drew a deep breath.  His father’s anger was not spent yet, but the worst was probably over.  He went out into the hall and then went in search of Celuwen.

As he started down the hall, he found himself wondering what his father had meant in saying he was like his mother and that fact frightened Thranduil.  He knew he was far more like his mother than he was like Thranduil.  She had understood his restlessness, his impulsiveness, and his love of adventure because she had shared those qualities.  He missed her more than he could say even now.  When he thought of it, he supposed in some ways it was those shared qualities that had led to her death when she had been too impatient to wait for the escort Ithilden was sending and had ridden out with only two warriors and met a troop of Orcs. It had never before occurred to him that his father might be alarmed at seeing those qualities in him. He was a warrior after all. He could take care of himself. And if those qualities did frighten his father, he did not see how he could change, he thought a little despairingly. He was what he was.

He found Celuwen and Alfirin near the door to his own chamber and put thoughts of his mother and father aside.  Celuwen looked a little anxious, and she hugged him fiercely.  “Are you all right?” she asked.

He suddenly realized that she must have felt his distress through their bond.  “I am fine,” he assured her and found that her presence made it so. “Did you find a likely set of rooms?”

“I cannot imagine living in any of them,” she declared. “What would we do with all that space?”

“Have elflings?” he suggested and then grinned when she blushed.

“Celuwen should rest now,” Alfirin said firmly. “She is tired. Why did you not tell me she had been ill, Eilian?”

Celuwen looked surprised. “How did you know that?” she asked.

“My naneth is a healer,” Alfirin said.  “In these dark days, I have seen her caring for far too many sad people not to recognize what was wrong with you.”  She glanced at Eilian and smiled slightly.  “I take it you have found good medicine?” she asked Celuwen.

Celuwen laughed. “Yes, I have,” she said.

Eilian put his arm around her. “Come,” he said. “We will nap.”  He started to lead her toward his chamber, feeling happier than he had all morning.

“Eilian, she should rest,” Alfirin said, stressing the last word.

“Eilian needs to rest too,” Celuwen said firmly.  “His hip is hurting.”

Alfirin threw up her hands. “Very well,” she conceded laughing. “I was a newlywed once too.”  Eilian grinned and drew Celuwen into his chamber, closing the door behind them.

I borrow characters and setting from Tolkien. I gain no profit from their use other than the enriched imaginative life I believe he intended me to gain.

Many thanks to Nilmandra for beta reading this chapter.

*******

12. Home Again

With Galivion and Beliond close behind him, Legolas rode into the area in front of the palace and then slid from his horse as attendants came running to take the party’s mounts.  “Welcome home, my lord,” said one of them.

“Thank you,” Legolas said.  “Is the king still in the Great Hall?”  His father normally received his advisers and petitioners of various sorts in the mornings, and the sun was now almost directly overhead.  Legolas wanted to deliver news of his mission as soon as possible so that any unpleasant reactions from his father could be over and done with, and he could enjoy the remaining day and a half of his leave.

“He is indeed,” said the attendant with a faint raise of his eyebrows.  He glanced at his companion, who was holding Galivion’s horse, and they grinned at one another.  Legolas’s heart sank a little.  The look they had just exchanged suggested that the king was not in a good temper and was making life difficult for those who were so unfortunate as to actually have to venture into his presence.

Resignedly, he turned to Beliond.  “You do not need to come,” he told his keeper, and Beliond nodded.

“I will speak to Thranduil later,” he announced and led his own horse away, apparently not willing to trust him to any of the attendants.  Legolas wished again that he could be in hiding somewhere nearby when Beliond told Thranduil that the king should not have sent Legolas on a mission without him, but at the moment, he had his own problems.  He slapped at his cloak to try to rid it of the worst of the mud it had accumulated on the ride home and then glanced at Galivion to see if he was ready.  The adviser nodded and the two of them made their way across the bridge and into the antechamber before the Great Hall.  No petitioners waited there, which was a sign that Thranduil’s morning court was nearly over.

Even with the doors to the Hall closed, Legolas could hear Thranduil speaking. His father had not raised his voice – he almost never did – but he was speaking emphatically and clipping off each word.  “I want that bridge repaired immediately.  Hunting parties need to get north of the river, and they should not have to go five leagues out of their way to do it.”

Legolas could not hear a reply, but a moment later, a harassed looking Elf came out of the Hall and went out through the Great Doors without looking around.  “Has something upset the king?” Galivion asked one of the guards in a low voice.

“Yes,” said the younger guard with a grin. “Lord Eilian--”

“We could not say,” interrupted the older guard, with a glance at Legolas and a frown at his chattering companion.  The younger guard clamped his mouth shut, but his eyes danced with amusement.  Legolas groaned to himself. What could have happened?  When Legolas had left home two days ago, Eilian had been visiting Celuwen.  How could he have gotten home and landed on their father’s bad side already?  Legolas hated it when his father and brother were engaged in one of their all-too-frequent quarrels. He had never been able to understand why they could not get along when he loved them both and it was obvious to him that they loved one another.

“Shall I announce you, my lord?” the older guard asked, and Legolas nodded unenthusiastically.  He knew from experience that tension between Thranduil and Eilian could go on for days, so he might as well deliver his news now.

The guard opened the door and stepped through.  “Lord Legolas and Galivion,” he said and then withdrew again, closing the door behind him.  Legolas advanced part way into the room and then dropped to one knee, with Galivion beside him. Several courtiers hovered near Thranduil, who looked up from the dispatch over which he was scowling. Immediately, his face cleared, and he stood, motioned them to their feet, and then beckoned Legolas to him and advanced to embrace him.

“Welcome home, iôn-nín,” he said warmly.  “Mae govannen, Galivion. Come and tell me how things went in the settlement.”  He seated himself in his great carved chair and looked at them attentively.

Legolas drew a deep breath.  On the way home, Galivion had offered to make this report, but Thranduil had put Legolas in charge of the mission and thus Legolas believed he should be the one to tell his father about the tangled situation they had found at the settlement.  “We delivered the food,” he began, “and I believe that we were able to reconcile Anyr to the fact that we brought less than he had asked for.”  Next to him, Galivion nodded his confirmation of Legolas’s claim.

Thranduil smiled in satisfaction.  “If that is the case, then you did well, Legolas.”

Legolas felt a glow of pleasure, and then reluctantly, added, “There were complications we had not anticipated however.”

Thranduil’s smile faded, and he sat back in his chair looking wary. “What sort of complications?”

“The Elves in that settlement have apparently been cooperating rather closely with the Men who live in the village just outside the edge of the forest,” Legolas began, watching Thranduil frown at that news.  “They insisted on sharing the food we brought with the Men.”

Thranduil looked stunned, and then a flush began to creep up his neck.  “Are they fools?” he cried in exasperation. “There was not enough even to meet all of their own needs.  Did Elves who live close to our stronghold make do with less so that Men could eat?”

Legolas winced and then hurried on, trying to stem the rise of his father’s anger.  “The Men were in great need, my lord, and they formed hunting parties with Elves from the settlement in order to supplement the inadequate supplies.  Moreover, they offered to show their appreciation for Anyr’s generosity by giving the Elves some of the food from their fields at harvest time.”  He looked anxiously at Thranduil, hoping his father would accept the arrangements he had managed to make.

As if he had heard something in Legolas’s voice, Thranduil sat immobile for a moment, studying him.  His eyes flicked briefly to Galivion, who had stood silent during Legolas’s explanation.  From the corner of his eye, Legolas could see Galivion smiling slightly.  Then Thranduil looked again at Legolas.  “The arrangements sound equitable under the circumstances,” he said, and Legolas could feel the knot in his stomach easing.

“How much influence do the Men have on Anyr’s people?” Thranduil now asked in a businesslike fashion.

Legolas considered, trying to make sure that he gave his father his best judgment.  “It is difficult to say how much influence anyone has with Anyr,” he finally said.  “He is somewhat unpredictable. But I think that Anyr and the leader of the Men’s village are close friends. And, my lord,” he ventured, “I do not think that is necessarily a bad thing.  Anyr is not particularly good at planning for difficult times, and the Men’s leader seemed to be very sensible.”

Thranduil drew his brows together in a small frown.  “It would not be well if Anyr’s people were to attend to the wishes of the Men rather than to ours.”  Legolas bit his lip at this censure of his opinion, but he knew better than to argue.  Thranduil drummed his fingers on the arm of his chair.  “These settlements are a perpetual problem,” he finally said with irritation in his voice.  “I only hope they are not about to become more so.”

Legolas hesitated, unsure if his father was implying that his actions in Anyr’s settlement might have created more problems for the king.  If so, Legolas could not help it now. “My lord,” he pressed on resolutely, “there is another matter too.”  Thranduil looked at him sharply and waited.  “The settlers and the Men have been engaging in some unauthorized trading,” Legolas told him.

“They what?”  Thranduil’s voice had suddenly gone from vexed to menacing.

“I made it clear the practice was not to continue,” Legolas said hastily.

“I can provide you with the details of how much trading went on, my lord,” Galivion added.  “I think both Anyr and Crydus understood that it was to end and that they would be hearing from you about it.”

Thranduil drew a deep breath.  “Indeed they will,” he said with a glint in his eye.  “Have the details for me by this afternoon.” Galivion nodded.  Legolas momentarily considered telling his father about the thieves, but he had already laid out a string of unfortunate events, and it seemed to him that the thefts had nothing to do with the settlement really.

Thranduil looked from Galivion to Legolas. “You have done well,” he said, and Legolas could not help smiling at the hard-earned praise.  Thranduil smiled back at him. “Go and clean up, Legolas,” he said. “I will see you at mid-day meal.  And I will hear from you this afternoon, Galivion.” He waved his hand, dismissing them both.

In the antechamber, Legolas turned to grin at Galivion. “Thank you for all your help.”

Galivion smiled back.  “You are quite welcome, Legolas. My task was an easy one, for I would say you are a natural at diplomacy.”  He went on his way out of the palace, and Legolas went happily off toward his family’s quarters.

He was walking along the hall where his sleeping chamber lay when the door of Eilian’s chamber opened and Eilian and Celuwen came out, his arm around her waist and his face nuzzling her hair.  Legolas had not seen Celuwen since just before he came of age, but he certainly recognized her.  As he looked at the two of them so obviously on intimate terms, confusion swept through him followed closely by shock. What in Arda was Eilian doing? Thranduil would kill him if he was compromising Celuwen in any way, and in his own sleeping chamber in the palace no less!

Then Eilian lifted his eyes and saw him. “Welcome back, little brother!” he cried.  “I have been wishing for your presence.” Celuwen turned and smiled at Legolas, her face flushed but contented.  Something in her eyes caught his attention, although for a moment, he was not quite sure what it was.  Suddenly, enlightenment dawned.

“You are bonded!” he cried, astonished that it should be so but unable to deny the plain evidence of his own eyes.

“Yes,” said Eilian happily. “We are.”

“But, when?” Legolas was bewildered. “Were the ceremonies at Celuwen’s settlement?  I am sorry not to have been there.”  He was hurt that Eilian could have excluded him from such an important event.  “Could you not have waited?”

Eilian’s smile faded a little. “That is more or less what Adar asked,” he said dryly.  He sighed.  “Celuwen’s adar would not give his consent, Legolas, so we bonded without ceremony.”

Abruptly, Legolas realized what his father was so upset about.   Thranduil would see Eilian’s hasty bonding as verging on contemptuous of him and the rest of the family.  And his father’s speculation that the settlements might be about to become a bigger problem suddenly made sense too. Then, through his dismay, he saw the increasingly unhappy look on Eilian’s face as his brother waited for Legolas to say something, and he recalled the joy he had seen on it when Eilian had first looked up and seen Legolas.  Celuwen leaned back against Eilian’s chest, his arm still around her waist, and there was something about the sight of the two of them together that sent a stab of loneliness through Legolas, and a fleeting memory of Tuilinn.  Then he put his own desires aside and thought of Eilian.

Slowly, he smiled.  “It is about time,” he said, realizing that he meant it.  “I cannot ever recall a time when you two were not in love.”  He stepped forward to drop a kiss on Celuwen’s brow and then embrace Eilian and slap him on the back.

Eilian’s face broke into a broad smile. “Thank you, brat.”

“I need to clean up now if I am not to be late for mid-day meal,” Legolas said and went on down the corridor still marveling at Eilian’s news.

By the time he returned to the dining room, the rest of the family was already seated. The room was oddly silent, and the tension was obvious to him the minute he stepped through the door. “I am sorry I am late, Adar,” he apologized, but Thranduil simply waved him into a chair between him and Ithilden.  Legolas seated himself rather awkwardly.  Celuwen was sitting in his usual place next to Eilian, and Alfirin had moved around a corner to the foot of the table.

Alfirin began serving plates of fish and early spring greens.   The meal looked like a feast to Legolas, and he began to eat enthusiastically.  The silence caused him to look up from his plate and around the table, however.  Eilian and Thranduil had each accepted only small servings of the wonderful meal and were now picking at it dutifully.  Legolas grimaced.  They were both obviously tense.  Across the table from him, Legolas could see Eilian glancing occasionally at their father, evidently trying to gauge his mood. Thranduil was studiously ignoring him, which Legolas thought was probably just as well, given that Thranduil was silent and appeared to be brooding.

Alfirin had put a large serving of food in front of Celuwen, who was eyeing it doubtfully. Alfirin was eating in thoughtful silence, and Ithilden was the only person besides Legolas who was giving the meal the appreciative attention that Legolas thought it deserved.  Very little disturbed Ithilden’s appetite.

“Legolas, I have not seen you since you came to help fight the forest fire near our settlement,” Celuwen said, apparently trying to ease her new family’s mood.

“I am afraid my memories of that time are not entirely clear,” Legolas said ruefully.  “As I recall, a tree fell on me.”  They all laughed a little, and Eilian looked at Legolas gratefully.

“You were dazed,” Celuwen agreed with a smile. “Do you remember falling off your horse?  You were appalled to have done it at all, let alone in front of me and the warrior Eilian had sent to fetch us.”  Legolas froze with his fork halfway to his mouth. He did indeed remember that event, hard though he had tried to forget it. And he had certainly not told anyone in this room about it.

Ithilden, Eilian, and Thranduil all looked at Celuwen in surprise. “He fell off his horse?” Ithilden asked, sounding amused.  Legolas could feel the heat rising in his face and knew he must be blushing.

Eilian turned to him with a wide grin.  “You did not mention that in your account of the fire, brat. But perhaps Celuwen is wrong, and you were merely practicing one of those fancy dismounts you used to like to do to impress the maidens.”

Legolas glared at him, and Celuwen looked at Legolas in dismay.  “I am so sorry,” she apologized.  “I did not mean to break a confidence.”

“That is quite all right,” he assured her.  “Their minds are small, so they are easily amused.” Eilian and Ithilden both laughed.

“Were you riding that rather wild stallion you used to have, Legolas?” Thranduil asked “Pilin, I think his name was.”

Legolas turned to his father, glad to hear the amusement in his voice as well as the excuse Thranduil was evidently trying to provide.  “I was, and a spark landed right at his feet and frightened him.  I was still half out of my wits and lost my balance.”

“We will have to get you a gentle old mare to ride back south,” Ithilden said, plainly enjoying himself.

“Or a pony,” Eilian put in enthusiastically.  “I am not sure you have all your wits about you yet, brat.”

Legolas rolled his eyes and was suddenly aware that they were all much more relaxed. This might not have been the way Celuwen intended to lighten the mood, but the mood had lifted anyway.

“Adar, I have been thinking,” said Alfirin.  “We should have a feast tomorrow night to celebrate Eilian and Celuwen’s bonding.”  They all turned to look at her rather doubtfully.

“But my parents are not here,” Celuwen ventured. “It seems somehow disrespectful to celebrate without them.”

“There need to be ceremonies,” Alfirin declared, “and we should hold them before Legolas’s leave is over.”  Her face had gone slightly pink, and it occurred to Legolas that, despite what looked to him to be gracious treatment of Celuwen, she was rather scandalized that Eilian and Celuwen had not been married in a proper ceremony.

“A public acknowledgement of their bonding strikes me as a good idea, Alfirin,” Thranduil said slowly.  “What would you do for food?”

“I have been thinking about how to manage the food,” Alfirin told him. “As it is now, everyone gets their daily ration from the central stores. We can put all of that food together and make a stew.  We would invite everyone, of course, so they all would be fed.  The servings still would be meager, but we would have music and dancing and some sort of blessing from you, Adar.”  She looked anxiously at Thranduil.  This celebration was apparently important to her.

Legolas looked across the table at Celuwen’s exasperated face and felt some sympathy for her.  She was not used to having her actions put on a public stage as part of the pageant of royalty.  He saw her turn to Eilian, apparently seeking his support, but Eilian was looking at their father.

“I think that is a fine idea,” Thranduil said after a moment, and Eilian drew a deep breath.  Celuwen bit her lip and looked down at her plate.  “I will send one of my fastest couriers with an invitation for your parents, Celuwen,” Thranduil told her.  “He would arrive after dark tonight, but that would give your parents all day tomorrow to travel, which should be enough time.”

Celuwen looked at him gratefully, and Legolas could not help smiling to himself.  His father missed very little of what went on around him.  “I am not certain they will come,” Celuwen said.

Thranduil smiled at her. “I think they will,” he said, and Legolas wished he could read the message that Thranduil planned to send.

“I will make the arrangements,” Alfirin said, and Thranduil nodded.

“Eilian, I have more than I can eat,” Celuwen said. “Would you like some of this?”  Eilian hesitated only a second before accepting a piece of fish from his wife, which he then ate more easily than he had the rest of his meal. Alfirin frowned a little but said nothing.  She was obviously in a hurry to begin making the multiple arrangements that would be necessary for a feast on the following day.  She had been organizing both public and private gatherings for Thranduil for many years now and knew exactly how much work was involved.

When they had finished their mid-day meal, Alfirin rose and then turned to Celuwen.  “Would you like to help with the planning, Celuwen?”

“Yes, I would,” Celuwen answered promptly and went out of the room with her.  Legolas wondered for a moment how the two of them were going to get along.  Until now, Thranduil’s family had simply left the management of their household in Alfirin’s capable hands.  Celuwen, however, was undoubtedly accustomed to deciding many matters for herself.  Eilian’s bonding was affecting the whole family more than Legolas had realized it would.

Eilian sidled up behind Legolas as they left the dining room.  “Perhaps what you need is a saddle and bridle like Men use,” Eilian murmured in his ear.  “I understand they make it easier to stay on your horse.”

“Shut up, Eilian,” Legolas said, as rudely as he could.  But he could not help rejoicing over his brother’s easier mood.

***

Celuwen trailed Alfirin into the vast labyrinth of the palace kitchens and storerooms.  Elves were busy at the moment cleaning up after the mid-day meal that had been served not only to the royal family but also to various servants, guards, and attendants who lived in the palace or spent the day there.  “That was an excellent meal, Amolith,” Alfirin told the Elf who was apparently the head cook.  He beamed under her praise.

“This is Lord Eilian’s wife, Celuwen,” Alfirin introduced them, and the cook bowed to Celuwen, a smile creasing his face. 

“Congratulations, my lady,” he said.  “May the stars shine on the path that you and Lord Eilian now walk together.”  Celuwen found herself unexpectedly touched by the obvious warmth of his words.  During the day, she had been repeatedly struck by how happily Thranduil’s people reacted to her marriage.  She attributed it to the amused affection they plainly felt for Eilian.

“We have a very large favor to ask of you,” Alfirin went on. “The king wants to hold a feast tomorrow night for everyone around the stronghold.  It will be a celebration of Eilian’s and Celuwen’s bonding.”

“For everyone?” Amolith asked, looking a little dismayed. Then he seemed to get hold of himself.  “Of course, my lady.  What will I have for supplies?”  He and Celuwen and Alfirin sat down at a table, and Alfirin explained her plans.  Celuwen sat in silence, feeling rather useless.  She had never planned a feast of this size and had had no desire to.  She could not help but wonder if such an elaborate affair was really necessary, but Thranduil seemed to want it, and it had been more than clear to her that Eilian wanted to please his father.  She understood his feelings.  She hardly dared to hope that her own parents would come and add their blessing to Thranduil’s, but if they did, her joy in her marriage would be increased by more than she could say.

Alfirin rose now and led Celuwen back along the maze of corridors. Celuwen had never been in this part of the palace before and was not sure she could find her way back here again.  “We can go to my apartments,” Alfirin said, and then caught the attention of a passing servant and asked her to send someone named Nawien to her.  They entered the suite that Alfirin and Ithilden shared, and Celuwen looked around, trying to picture the rooms that Alfirin had showed her that morning converted into something like this for her and Eilian. A sewing basket was on the floor next to one of the chairs near the fireplace, and papers and books were piled next to the other chair.  She pictured Alfirin and Ithilden sitting together and felt almost dizzy at the idea of sitting so cozily with Eilian.  Except he would go back to his patrol and she would mostly be living in the palace alone, she remembered suddenly, and then pushed the thought away.

She walked across the room to look at an elaborate woven hanging on the far wall.  The scene was of night in a forest and the blues and purples and silver of the sky were framed by the black skeletons of trees.  “Did you make this?” she asked Alfirin.  She knew that Alfirin had a reputation as an artist, but she had never seen any of her work before.

“Yes,” Alfirin came up beside her and looked at the hanging with a critical eye.  “The blues need to be softer,” she said.

“I think it is beautiful,” Celuwen told her honestly.

Alfirin smiled at her.  “I will make you a hanging for your new quarters as a bonding gift.”  She looked at Celuwen seriously.  “I want to do anything I can to help you feel at home.  I cannot imagine living so far from my own parents. I do not think I could do it.”

Celuwen blinked at her in surprise. “You would have done it if Ithilden had asked you.”

“I hope so,” Alfirin answered, “but I think it would have been very difficult for me.  I have never had your independent streak, Celuwen.”

Celuwen was at a loss as to how to answer but was saved from having to say anything by a knock at the door and the entrance of an Elf whom Alfirin introduced as Nawien.   Then they sat, and Alfirin and Nawien began planning how to decorate the green for the next night’s feast.

An hour later, Celuwen walked wearily into Eilian’s empty sleeping chamber and sat on the edge of the bed.  Alfirin had sent her to rest, correctly perceiving that she was rapidly tiring.  She was still in the early stages of recovering from her overwhelming grief at what she had thought was the loss of Eilian, and she tired easily.  She lay back on the bed, thinking.

If her family had been giving a feast for their neighbors in the settlement, she would have known every person who was invited and would probably have gone round to their cottages to invite them herself.  She would have cooked at least part of the meal, have tended some of the vegetables in their garden, and possibly even have hunted for the meat.  She would have helped to clean their cottage and hang the lanterns in the trees outside their door.  Here, neither she nor Alfirin did any of those things.  Instead, Alfirin capably supervised a staff who carried out plans that were far too extensive for any one or two people to do on their own.

What am I doing here? she suddenly wondered.  And even more, what am I to do here? She loved Eilian with all her heart and had had no choice but to bond with him. But how was she to make a life for herself now?  Where was she to feel at home?

*******

AN:  Legolas fought the forest fire and fell off his horse in a previous story called “The Tide of Times.”

I borrow characters and setting from Tolkien. I gain no profit from their use other than the enriched imaginative life I believe he intended me to gain.

Many thanks to Nilmandra for beta reading this chapter.

*******

13.  Family Matters

Legolas pulled the book down from the library shelf and checked to be sure it was the one he wanted.  It was a book of tales of the First Age that he had heard the first time when he was very small and Eilian had read them to him.  He must have been learning to read himself at the time, because he remembered his brother coaxing him to read some of the passages out loud too.  As that memory came back to him, he was surprised by a sudden sense of loss.

What is wrong with me? he wondered, but even as he asked himself the question, he knew the answer:  He had always assumed without doubt that he was the person whom Eilian held most dear, and now he knew he no longer was. This will never do, he thought in dismay.  He gave himself a resolute shake and then went out the door and started down the hallway.  He turned the corner that would take him to the door leaving the family’s quarters and found Celuwen, coming out of Eilian’s chamber and settling her cloak around her shoulders.

“Are you going out?” he asked.

Startled, she spun to face him and then smiled when she saw who it was. “Yes, I am. I have an errand to which I must attend.”

“I was planning to settle into a tree and read, but if you will let me, I will walk with you.”  He was glad of this chance to talk to Celuwen, not so much because he had anything in particular to say as because she was now important to someone who had always been important to him.  It mattered to him a great deal that she should make Eilian happy, and for Eilian’s sake, he wanted to be on good terms with her.  He was not certain he had made a good impression on her the two times they had previously met: Once he had been an injured youth who was far more concerned about his dignity than her feelings, and the other time he had been an elfling who was jealous of the maiden who had drawn Eilian’s attention away from him. And maybe that is what I still am, he thought ruefully.

“I would welcome your company,” she said.  As they left the palace, she directed their steps toward a path that led along the river, and he remembered that she had lived near the palace for most of her childhood. He glanced at her and then offered her his arm, and she smiled and took it, leaning on it lightly.  For some reason, she looked frail to him, although he could not quite put his finger on what might be wrong with her.  Perhaps she had been injured in some way.

“I am sorry I told your brothers something you did not want them to know, Legolas,” she said contritely. “I should have known better, but I have no brothers of my own and did not even think about the delight they would take in teasing you.”

He smiled wryly. “They would have found something else to tease me about,” he assured her.  “If you do not know it already, I am afraid you will soon learn that your husband in particular can be merciless.  Ithilden holds back sometimes, at least with me.  I think he worries that he should not be teasing one of the warriors he commands.”

She frowned. “Things are more complicated in your family than in most.”

“They are,” he agreed, noting without comment that she had said ‘your family’ rather than ‘our.’  They walked along in silence for a moment, while he marveled at the way spring had crept further into the trees here during the short time he had been away.

“Do you think that your adar is very angry with Eilian and me?” Celuwen asked, breaking his reverie.

He hesitated.  “I do not think he is angry with you at all,” he said cautiously. “Perhaps you should ask Eilian if Adar is angry with him.”

“I did. He evaded the question, but I can see that he is unhappy, and I think it is because he is at odds with your adar.”

Legolas sighed.  “They will make up their quarrel. They always do.”

She was silent for a moment. “I think your adar is too hard on Eilian sometimes,” she said soberly. “I know Eilian can be provoking, but he has sacrificed a great deal in the service of the realm, and it hurts him when your adar does not seem to value him.”

“Adar values him,” Legolas protested. “He loves him.  He just thinks that Eilian sometimes acts without thinking of the consequences.”

Celuwen grimaced a little. “I suppose he does act impulsively sometimes, but he is also warm, and brave, and generous, and I do not always think your adar values that enough.”

Legolas found that he could not argue with her.  In truth, he rather agreed with her.

They walked along quietly.  Then she steered them off the path they were on and down a smaller one.  At the end of this path lay the home of a goldsmith, and he was pleased when he suddenly realized what her errand must be.  “Are you going to buy a ring for Eilian?” he asked, picturing his brother’s ringless hand as he had seen it at mid-day meal.

She nodded, smiling to herself.  “Eilian does not know,” she said. She grinned at Legolas. “He goes among Men sometimes, and I think he needs to be wearing such a ring when the pretty girls come around. Do you not agree?”

Legolas laughed and then thought of the simple way she had been living.  “You do not have to do this, you know,” he said. “Adar would certainly allow you to take a suitable ring from his storeroom.”

“No,” she said firmly. “I want this to be from me, and I can afford it.”  He blushed a little at the way she had apparently read his mind.

They paused outside the cottage.  “You do not have to come in with me,” she said and then stretched to kiss his cheek.  “Go and enjoy the bit of your leave that is left. But I am happy to have talked to you a little, Legolas. I know how dear you are to Eilian, and I want us to be friends and more than friends if we can.”  She hesitated and then gave him a tentative smile.  “I hope you can be happier to have me in Eilian’s life now than you were the first time we met.  As I recall, you threw a tantrum and kicked Eilian’s shins.”

Legolas laughed. “No tantrums this time,” he promised.  “I am too glad to see Eilian so happy. And if I kicked him now, he would knock me flat on my back in the dirt.”

She laughed in response.  Then she knocked on the cottage door, explained her business to the goldsmith, and disappeared inside. Legolas stared after her for a moment, and then slowly smiled and went on his way to find a friendly tree.

***

“So far as I know, that is everything,” Galivion said, tapping the list detailing the trades that Crydus had admitted making with the Elves in the settlement.  “The timber would seem to be most problematic, although he and Anyr both swore that the Men never cut living trees.”

“I hope for both their sakes they are telling the truth,” Thranduil said grimly.  “But no matter where the wood comes from, they need to be paying tariffs and abiding by trade agreements we have made.”

“Of course,” Galivion agreed.  “Do you plan to try to collect what would have been owed on these already accomplished trades?”

Thranduil considered the question. He and Galivion were in the small council chamber behind the Great Hall.  “I suppose that would be difficult to do,” he finally said.  “Neither group appears to have much to spare.  I wonder if we can use my forgiveness to get them to promise to behave better in the future.”

“I think we might be able to do that,” Galivion said.  “They were in reasonably cooperative moods when we left them.  Anyr and Crydus both liked Legolas,” he added, with a smile.  “Your son did very well for a novice diplomat, my lord.”

Thranduil tried to keep the satisfied smile off his face but knew he failed to do so.  “I gathered as much from the report he gave me in the Great Hall,” he said placidly and then returned his attention to the matter at hand. “You can wait until the day after tomorrow to return to the settlement to deal with them,” he said.  “I would like my advisers to be present for the feast tomorrow night. I expect that some of the Elves from my new daughter’s settlement will be there.”  He could feel the black mood that had come home with Eilian sweeping over him again.  “I may need your counsel on dealing with them.”

Galivion nodded without comment.  It had not escaped Thranduil’s notice that everyone around him firmly intended to stay out of the quarrel between him and his second son. 

“There is one other matter, my lord,” Galivion said, his tone growing sharp.  Thranduil raised an eyebrow inquiringly.  “One of the guards who accompanied us behaved most inappropriately,” Galivion said indignantly.  “He was rude to the Men, but far worse, he did not seem to comprehend that your son was in charge of this mission and should have been treated as your representative.  He was disrespectful to Lord Legolas.”

Thranduil sat back with his eyes narrowed.  He knew that his sons sometimes had a difficult course to navigate, and that matters had been particularly slippery for Ithilden and to a lesser extent Eilian before they had become officers with authority that came from their own roles rather than their positions as his sons.  Ithilden’s status as his heir had made people sometimes obsequious and sometimes determined to show they were unimpressed.  His oldest son had had a hard time even having simple friendships.

Eilian’s more gregarious temperament and lowered likelihood of ever ruling had made his course a slightly easier one.  His second son made friends easily, Thranduil had to admit, angry as he still was with Eilian.  Of course, his impatience also meant that he sometimes inadvertently insulted people, and when he was younger, he had driven those in authority over him mad.

Legolas’s route had seemed to lie between those of his two older brothers.  He had close friends and got along easily with most of those with whom he came in contact, although he tended to be reserved with those he did not know well.  And, Thranduil decided, his concern here lay with his son, not with the disrespectful warrior.

“How did Legolas manage?” he asked Galivion.

“He behaved with far more patience and dignity than I would have been able to do,” Galivion answered promptly.

Thranduil nodded, gratified again by Galivion’s praise of his youngest.  “Tell Ithilden what happened,” he said, dismissing his adviser. “He will take care of the matter.”  The king had complete faith that Ithilden would make the warrior in question rue the day he had been conceived.  Galivion apparently shared his faith, for he wore a satisfied smile as he bowed and took his leave.

“My lord,” said one of his attendants, “Beliond is here to see you.”

Thranduil groaned to himself as Beliond pushed his way past the attendant and entered the room before the king had had a chance to grant -- or deny -- him entry. He strongly suspected that Beliond intended to make him be the one to rue a day, this day probably.  He could see the attendant smothering a smile as he left the room, closing the door behind him.

Thranduil did not invite Beliond to sit, but the warrior was evidently too agitated to mind, for he stood with his chin thrust out aggressively, waiting for permission to speak.  “Did you have something you wished to say to me, Beliond?”  Thranduil asked wearily.  He might as well get this over with.

“I have something I wish to ask,” Beliond replied. “When did you dismiss me from my post as Legolas’s bodyguard?”

Thranduil scowled.  Really, Beliond was sometimes too much.  “You know very well I have not dismissed you from that post,” he said frigidly.

“Then why did you send him on a mission without me?” Beliond demanded.  “I can only do my job if you will allow it, my lord.  Legolas was managing the thieves quite well on his own. There were only two after all, and he is a Wood-elf warrior, but I shudder to think what could have happened if there had been more of them.”

Thranduil had suddenly come alert and sat bolt upright in his chair. “What thieves?” he demanded, torn between concern that Legolas had evidently been in danger and irritation that his son had not told him about any thieves.

Beliond blinked. “The thieves who were trying to steal the food from the settlement,” he said. “The Men who were going to sell it in Esgaroth.”

“Tell me about these thieves,” Thranduil demanded.

“They were Men,” Beliond shrugged.  “Legolas sent them to be dealt with in Esgaroth.  He pushed them around a bit first,” he added with a satisfied smile. “There is more of you in him than I had thought.”

Thranduil became aware that he was staring at Beliond with his mouth slightly open. He snapped it fiercely shut.  “I take it I do not need to be concerned about these thieves returning to the settlement?”

“I doubt it,” Beliond agreed.  “I am still concerned that you sent Legolas on this mission without me, however, my lord, and I want your promise that you will not do something like this again.  Against all odds, I have become attached to the impudent cub and would not want anything to happen to him.”  He lifted his chin at Thranduil as he waited for the promise he had demanded.

Thranduil drew a deep breath and readied himself to put his son’s bodyguard in his place, but as he looked at the belligerent face before him, he suddenly saw the anxious lines around the eyes.  Beliond was frightened, he realized.  He was telling the truth when he said he was attached to his charge, and he was afraid that something would happen to Legolas if he let him out of his sight. It was a fear that Thranduil understood, for his own version of the same fear was what had led him to appoint a bodyguard for his son in the first place.  Touched by Beliond’s concern, Thranduil hesitated, and then, to his own surprise, said, “I promise you I will not do so again.”

Beliond visibly relaxed. “Thank you, my lord,” he said.  “Have you further need of me?”

Thranduil leaned back helplessly and shook his head.  Beliond was completely incorrigible. And also completely loyal to Legolas, he thought with a small smile.

Beliond paused at the door and turned back for a moment.  “From what I have heard since we got home, I gather that you are displeased with Eilian, and I would certainly make his life unpleasant for a while if he were mine, but I rather like what I have heard of his wife.”  Then he was gone, leaving Thranduil gaping and exasperated.

And then suddenly, he laughed, relaxing for what seemed like the first time all day, aside from when Eilian and Ithilden had been teasing Legolas at mid-day meal.  Thranduil had enjoyed having his sons all home at once, safe and sound and joking with one another as he had so often heard them do.  He picked up the list of illicit trades that Galivion had given him and tapped it lightly on the table as his thoughts wandered from Legolas to Eilian.  He sighed. What was he going to do about Eilian?

At that day’s morning meal, when Thranduil had first realized the full extent of Eilian’s unconsidered actions, he had been so angry he had scarcely been able wait until he had Eilian alone before letting his son feel the weight of his displeasure. The hastiness of the bonding alone had infuriated him. It spoke of disrespect for him and even for his other sons and Alfirin. Thranduil had no objections to Celuwen. Indeed, he thought she would be good for Eilian and had spoken truly when he said he thought that Eilian could not have chosen better. But bonding was irrevocable, and it affected not just the two people who were being married, but everyone in both houses.  It should be done with all solemnity and with both families present to support and rejoice with the newly married pair.

And then it had become apparent that Eilian and Celuwen had not only married without ceremony, but actually without her parents’ permission, and because of Sólith’s influence with his settlement’s leader, that could have serious consequences. Thranduil doubted very much if the impromptu bonding had been Celuwen’s idea, and he had been incensed beyond measure with Eilian.  If Ithilden had not interrupted their confrontation that morning, Thranduil knew he would have said and possibly done things he would have regretted later.  For a moment, he wondered if Ithilden had interrupted them on purpose.  Ithilden had an unruly son of his own and knew how quickly scalding words could bubble forth.

And when he thought about it, of course, he knew that it was not only Ithilden’s entrance that had stopped him.  His own words about Lorellin had shocked him into silence before Ithilden had even knocked on his door.  Alone now in his council chamber, he cautiously examined what he had heard himself say: “Explain to me how your mind works, Eilian, because you frustrate and confuse me!  You are so like your naneth at times that it frightens me!”

And for a moment, he saw again the dark-haired, slender form of his wife, her hand raised in gay farewell as she set off on the visit to her family from which she had not returned alive.  He saw her running barefoot along a tree branch and then leaping daringly to one just within reach, laughing at the gasp of dismay he had not been able to suppress.  He saw her dancing with an elfling in the snow, as she had been doing the first time he laid eyes on her and lost his heart in the instant.  He had loved the way she embraced life without holding back and had been made a happier person when he followed after her.  And then her foolish bravery had killed her.  Even now, years after she had died, his heart contracted with a pain so overwhelming that the hand holding the list of trade offenses trembled slightly.  He sucked air into a chest that felt paralyzed by sorrow.

And what had this to do with Eilian? he asked himself and knew the answer at once. Eilian was his mother’s true child.  He was generous, impatient, brave, and eager for any adventure life might choose to bring him.  And Thranduil was frightened beyond bearing that one day he would make the kind of unconsidered choice his mother had made.  Why could he not see the need for more caution in almost everything he did? Thranduil thought, anger flaring again at his own helplessness. Surely there must be something he could do, some penalty he could exact that would encourage his son to check his tendency to rashness, to be more patient and careful.  And Eilian must be brought to recognize and acknowledge the problems he had created for his family and his king.

Thranduil rubbed his temple wearily. He would wait until the morrow to decide the consequences of Eilian’s actions.  He would not act in haste.  He rose, gathering papers that he would give the attendant on his way out.  He had time to ride now and the exercise would help him to regain his balance before he joined his family for wine and a few moment of ease before their evening meal.

***

Eilian rose to his feet when his father came into the family’s sitting room, eyeing Thranduil anxiously to see what kind of mood he was in.  All day, he had been waiting to be summoned to his father’s presence so that Thranduil could finish saying exactly what he though of Eilian’s actions, but the peremptory invitation had not come.  His father was apparently biding his time. Eilian was not sure what he thought about that.  He had never been good at waiting. Thranduil poured himself a cup of wine and waved them all to their seats.  Celuwen slipped her hand into Eilian’s and leaned against him as they sat back down on the padded bench a little distance from the fire.  Grateful for her silent support, Eilian dropped a small kiss on the top of her head, and she looked up at him and smiled, lightening his heart considerably.

“Beliond came to see me today, Legolas,” Thranduil said.

Legolas grinned.  “He told me he would.  Did he threaten you with dire consequences if you ever again let me go out of the palace without him?”  Eilian laughed at the image and rather suspected from the look on Thranduil’s face that Beliond might have done just that.

“More or less,” said Thranduil dryly.  “He also told me something you had not, which was that two Men had attempted to steal some of the food we had sent to the settlement.”

Legolas immediately looked guilty. “I am sorry, Adar. I would have told you, but after everything else that had happened, the thieves seemed almost incidental.  They were not really connected to the settlement or the Men’s village either.”

“Mannish thieves got into the settlement and stole food?” Ithilden asked incredulously.

Legolas grinned at him. “Anyr did not set any guards on it.”  Ithilden’s jaw dropped at this news.

“No, that would not occur to Anyr,” Celuwen put in with a tolerant smile.  “He believes that everyone else is as good as he is.”

“He believes in a dream world!” said Legolas emphatically. “What Anyr needs is for someone with some sense to tell him how to organize his settlement. I actually suggested that the Men guard the food in return to having access to a flet in which to store the game they brought down.”

“And I will wager Anyr accepted the idea,” Celuwen said. “He is not always prudent, but he is happy to cooperate with other people, and he gets along well with Men.  He is open to help from others and open to helping them too, and that is important in the settlements because they are so far from help from the palace.  The leader of my settlement always liked Anyr for that reason, but he knew that Anyr was not always wise enough to realize that someone might try to take advantage of him.”

Legolas rolled his eyes.  “Anyr is not always wise enough to realize that the wet spot on his head has been caused by the rain falling on it.”  They all laughed, including Celuwen.

Eilian suddenly noticed that his father had brought his keen gaze to rest on Celluwen.  Thranduil’s face was thoughtful as he eyed his new daughter-in-law.  What is he planning now? Eilian worried.  Then his father’s gaze rested briefly on him too, making Eilian hold his breath. He could not read his father’s face at all tonight.  Thranduil turned to Legolas, and he began questioning him about the Men who would be guarding the food.

Eilian stroked his wife’s hair, enjoying its scent and wishing rather wistfully that his father could simply be happy for him. He knew he exasperated Thranduil, but surely his father could understand that he could not have walked away from Celuwen no matter what her father wanted.

***

Ithilden banked the fire and set the screen carefully before the fireplace before he followed Alfirin into their sleeping chamber.  She had already donned a night dress and sat on the bed brushing her hair. He dropped into a chair and wearily pulled off his shoes.  “I must say it has been a long day,” he said.

She smiled at him, revealing the dimple that had been one of the first things about her that had charmed him.  “It is often a long day when Eilian comes home, but he rather outdid himself this time.”

Ithilden laughed.  “I am glad to see you smiling about this,” he said. “I was not sure how you would like their bonding without any ceremony.”

“I do not like it,” she said promptly. “They need the blessing of their families, which is why we are having the ceremony tomorrow. You can see how hard this change is on Celuwen already, and she still has no real idea of what living in the palace is like.  I love Eilian. You know I do. But he can be thoughtless sometimes.” She brushed at her hair with such energy that it crackled.

Ithilden pulled his tunic over his head and then began to unbraid his own hair.  “Let me do that,” Alfirin said and hopped off the bed to stand behind him and begin working his braids free from their tight weave.  “Is your adar very angry with Eilian?” she asked.

“Yes,” said Ithilden briefly.  He had no intention of telling her about the scene he had walked in on in Thranduil’s office.  Her fingers raked through his thick hair, loosening it gently, and then began to massage his scalp, making him moan softly in appreciation.

“Is this going to make complications for you too?” Alfirin asked.

“It might,” he sighed. “But that is for another day, when Eilian is a warrior under my command, and not a brother whom I love.”  Or not only a brother, he thought.  He knew how hard it was to separate the parts of his life cleanly.  He reached up, caught her wrists, and drew her around to sit on his lap.  “Do you want to know what I thought when I walked in on the two of them this morning?”  He had not had much time alone with Alfirin that day, but he had had enough to describe the scene in Eilian’s bedchamber.  Her eyes had widened, and she had given a shocked little giggle as much at Ithilden’s position as at that of the pair in the bed.

“Yes,” she breathed, as his mouth brushed hers.

“I thought, Ah, my brother! You do not know what happiness the Valar have seen fit to drop in your arms.”  And he put one hand behind her head and kissed her long and deep.

I borrow characters and setting from Tolkien. I gain no profit from their use other than the enriched imaginative life I believe he intended me to gain.

Many thanks to Nilmandra for beta reading this chapter.

*******

14.  Conversations

Ithilden walked into the small building in which his office lay and greeted the aide seated behind one of the three desks in the outer office.  The aide rose to his feet.  “Good morning, my lord,” he said.

“Good morning, Calith,” Ithilden nodded in response. He was late getting here despite the fact that he had been awakened early when Alfirin climbed out of bed at what must have been daybreak.  She had been eager to get to the tasks she still had to finish before that night’s feast, and Ithilden had chosen the better part of valor and risen to eat early and escape to his office from the furor that was bound to have the whole household in its grip.  But his father had stopped him on his way out of the palace and they had spent some time in conversation.

“I need to see both Eilian and Legolas,” Ithilden told Calith. “Eilian first.”  He silently apologized to Eilian for summoning him to his office early.  Legolas had been up when Ithilden left home, but the door to Eilian’s chamber had still been firmly closed.  “Send messages to the palace.”

The aide nodded and then said, “Tinár is here, my lord,” and indicated the Elf who stood just outside the door to the inner office where Ithilden’s desk stood.  Ithilden had been expecting him.  He knew that Tinár and Annael had reached home the evening before and had sent word to the Home Guard captain that Tinár was to wait upon him first thing in the morning.

Ithilden handed his cloak to the aide and went into his office, beckoning Tinár to follow.  The aide closed the door discreetly behind them.  Ithilden seated himself at the desk and watched with grim amusement as Tinár started for the chair in front of the desk but then realized that he had not been given leave to sit and turned rather awkwardly to stand facing Ithilden.

Ithilden let the silence lengthen while he sat immobile and looked unsmilingly at Tinár.  Tinár met his look longer than most of those whom Ithilden summoned did, but eventually he shifted his weight from one foot to the other and flicked his gaze to one side without turning his head away.

Satisfied, Ithilden began, “Galivion came to see me yesterday. He was most unhappy about the manner in which you conducted yourself while serving as one of the guards who escorted him and Lord Legolas to the settlement.”

Tinár drew himself stiffly erect.  “I do not know what he could be referring to.”  He still did not meet Ithilden’s eyes, but his mouth tightened resentfully.

Ithilden raised an eyebrow. “Do you not?” he asked.  “According to Galivion, you were rude to both Anyr and Crydus and thus endangered the success of the mission.”  Tinár opened his mouth as if to protest, but Ithilden pressed on.  “Moreover, he says that you actually argued over following orders you were given.” Ithilden could hear his own voice hardening.   The behavior that Galivion had described had struck Ithilden as both intolerable and shocking in an experienced, well-trained Wood-elf warrior.  He rose and walked around his desk to stand no more than a foot in front of Tinár, looming over him.  Surprised, Tinár inched backward but Ithilden took a step and closed the distance between them again.

“I suppose Legolas complained,” Tinár said, astounding Ithilden by his nerve.

“You will keep silent until I give you permission to speak,” Ithilden snarled, well and truly angry now.  “Legolas said nothing about you.” For a split second, Tinár looked disappointed and then his lip curled in disbelief.  Ithilden’s eyes narrowed.  “Legolas was concerned about representing the king to the settlement Elves. That was his task and, so far as I know, that is what he talked to the king about.  He did not talk to me about the mission at all.  Your task, on the other hand, was to provide security for the king’s adviser and his representative, and to aid them in any way you could. I am embarrassed that one of my warriors was so lacking in discipline that he let personal pique interfere with his duty.”

Color rose in Tinár’s face, and he fixed his eyes on the wall behind Ithilden’s head.

“This is not the first time I have had complaints about you, Tinár,” Ithilden went on.  “But I have always believed that your undoubted skill with weapons outweighed your lack of good sense, and I do not have so many warriors that I can afford to dismiss one unless I have concluded there is no hope that he will ever be able to be made useful.  I am beginning to think I was mistaken in my judgment about you.  I thought you had enough pride to control your pettiness if only to avoid the scorn of your fellow warriors.  I am driven to ask what is wrong with you.  It is plain that you crave the respect of others, yet you continually behave in a way that makes it impossible for them to give it.  If you have an answer to that question, you have my permission to make it!”

Tinár drew a deep breath.  “Others have always been jealous of me because of my skill,” he said through stiff lips.

Ithilden gave an incredulous snort.  “Orc dung,” he snapped, making Tinár’s eyes widen in disbelief.  “Do you think Galivion is jealous of you?  Use the brains you undoubtedly have to think about what you might be doing other than being wonderful that would provoke your companions.”  He eyed the stubborn face before him, wondering if he might have been too generous in giving Tinár credit for having brains.

“I will tell you what I am going to do for you,” Ithilden said, and Tinár braced himself apprehensively.  “I am going to take you off the hands of my captains and give you the benefit of my personal supervision.”  Tinár’s eyes widened in alarm, and Ithilden felt a rush of satisfaction.  “As of this morning, you are no longer in the Home Guard. Instead, you will serve as one of my messengers to and from the border patrols.  As you know, messengers usually travel alone, so your skill with weapons will be useful, and at least while you are carrying dispatches, you will not have the opportunity to annoy others.  While you are in the office here, you will make every attempt to curb your less pleasant impulses, and I will let you know you when you fail to do so.  Believe me, Tinár, there will be no questioning of orders while you serve in my office. You will do exactly as I say and will be as pleasant as you are able to be while you do it, or I will see to it that you are extremely sorry.  Am I making myself clear?”

“Yes, my lord,” Tinár replied woodenly, his face stony and his eyes on the wall. Ithilden very much doubted if anything he had said had penetrated the Elf’s thick wall of self-absorption, but he would have plenty of opportunities to try again.  Except in his dealings with his father, Ithilden was not accustomed to losing a battle of wills, and he was grimly determined that he was not going to lose this one.

“Good,” Ithilden said.  “Because I warn you, either you live up to the training and discipline you have been given, or I will send you home permanently to plague your poor wife instead of your fellow warriors.”

Much to Ithilden’s satisfaction, Tinár flinched a little at that threat. He would not find it pleasant to have to explain to his family and neighbors why he was no longer a warrior.  Ithilden could only hope that his dread of shame would help teach him to curb his arrogance.  “Report to my aide within the hour,” Ithilden said. “He has a dispatch that needs to go to the northern border patrol.” Tinár saluted, spun on his heel, and left the room, his back stiff and his face as impassive as he could make it.

Ithilden seated himself at his desk and blew out a deep breath.  Raking Tinár over the coals had certainly been a bracing way to start his day, but now he had the arrogant fool on his hands.  Ah well, only time would tell if he could succeed where his captains had failed. He turned his attention to the supply requisitions lying on his desk.  The food shortage around his father’s stronghold seemed to be easing a bit with the addition of the meat from the Home Guard’s hunts, so he might be able to send some of the dried meat and vegetables to feed the border patrol warriors.  He would have to talk to Galivion about the matter.

His aide rapped lightly on his half-open door.  “Lord Eilian is here.”

Ithilden braced himself again.  This next discussion would need to be handled carefully.  “Send him in,” he said, and Eilian came in, looking a little exasperated.

“You have terrible timing, brother,” he said, as Ithilden waved him into the chair, “and this is the second morning in a row that you have proved it.”

Ithilden grinned.  “Alfirin would have been knocking on your door soon anyway. She wanted to talk to Celuwen about whether she had a suitable gown for tonight.”  Eilian rolled his eyes.

Ithilden brought his attention to the matter at hand and sobered.  “Belówen says that he will probably release you for restricted duty the next time you see him.”

Eilian nodded, looking suddenly cautious. “I thought he would. Have you been talking to him?”

Ithilden hesitated.  “Adar did,” he finally said and watched as Eilian stiffened.

“And what else has Adar been doing?” Eilian asked resentfully.

“What I am about to tell you is not something that Adar has imposed on me,” Ithilden said sharply.  “I confess he suggested much of it, but the decision was mine and I agreed with what he said or I would not be acting on it.”  He resented the way that Eilian’s question suggested that Thranduil had been riding roughshod over him.  It was true that he answered to the king and that was appropriate, but he had been deciding matters to do with the Realm’s forces for a good many years now, and his brother would do well to acknowledge it.

Eilian made a face. “I am sorry,” he said with some effort.  “What is my fate to be then?” He was trying and failing to sound nonchalant.

Ithilden ran his hand over his hair.  “Your restricted duty will be served in my office. Your experience will make you very useful in fitting together the news from various patrols and seeing a large picture of how our forces are doing.  There will be routine work too, of course.”

Eilian looked aghast. “Routine paperwork you mean!  Tell me that is not a means by which Adar intends to punish me!”

Ithilden shrugged and smiled a little.  “He did say it would not hurt you to do something requiring patience. But you cannot expect to be running around while you are still healing. You would have to put up with some level of inactivity no matter what your restricted duty was, and you can be genuinely useful to me here.” Ithilden was not certain that Eilian would actually be inactive while doing paperwork.  Eilian had served in Ithilden’s office while recovering from an injury once before, and Ithilden could still picture him pacing around the office and even around the outside of the building as he read dispatches and made notes about them.

Eilian opened his mouth and then shut it again, as he struggled to accept what Ithilden had just told him.  “How long will it be before I go back to my patrol?” he finally asked.

Ithilden looked at him keenly.  “Is that what you want to do?”  He was truly curious about how Eilian would answer him, given what he had just left in the palace.

Eilian hesitated, evidently taken aback by the question.  “It is what I am good at,” he said slowly.  “And it is something I can do for the realm so in that sense, it is my duty to go, and,” he sighed, “I have to confess, the constant excitement makes my blood sing.” His voice resonated with the most ambivalent tone about serving in the south that Ithilden had ever heard him use.  Somewhere under the desires he voiced, a note of uncertainty sounded.

Ithilden sighed.  He hoped that single note was going to make Eilian more receptive to what he had to say next, but he rather doubted it.  “Belówen will decide when you are ready for active duty, and when you are, you will spend at least a year captaining the Home Guard. After that, I will probably have to send you back south because, unfortunately, you are the best captain I have for that patrol.”

Eilian’s mouth dropped open.  “A year in the Home Guard? Why? What about Elorfin?   Does he know you plan to replace him as captain?”

“Elorfin is going to help train the novices in matters of command and strategy.  I have increasingly thought that those were matters to which we needed to give more attention, and he and I have discussed his doing it.”

“But a full year?” Eilian protested.  “Ithilden, that is a waste.  You know it is.  You have other captains who would do well with the Home Guard, but in all modesty, as you just said, you really have no one else who will do as well as I would with the Southern Patrol!”

Ithilden looked away for a moment and tried to find the words for what he wanted to say.  “You need time to heal, Eilian.  Even once you are fit for active duty, that wound is going to trouble you for a while.  And even more, you need time to court your wife, time to make a life with her, time to support her while she makes a life in the palace.”

Eilian stared at him, and then his face flushed.  “I do not see that my marriage is any of your affair as my commander,” he said stiffly. “So I conclude that this is Adar’s doing too.  I thought you said that you had approved these orders.”

In exasperation, Ithilden slapped his hand on his desk. “You know as well as I do that I try to accommodate the needs of my warriors’ families.  I cannot always do it, but I try.  Why should I not accommodate you?”

“We both know why,” Eilian responded almost as sharply.  “We are the king’s sons.  We cannot shirk the danger and sacrifice that the king asks of others.”

“No one could accuse you of shirking,” Ithilden said. “You have spent years in the south. And if you think that is what Adar will accuse you of, then you can think again. He wants you home less because he is angry than because he is concerned about your well-being.”

Eilian looked startled. “Really?”

“Really,” Ithilden confirmed. For a moment, they regarded one another with bemused faces.

Eilian made a helpless gesture. “I suppose he has kept me home before, although it has been a long while.  Has it ever occurred to you that Adar wants you and me and Legolas to do our duty and remain safe too?  And that it can be difficult to do both at once?”

Ithilden smiled. “It has actually.  But this has to do with more than keeping you safe, Eilian.  This has to do with Adar’s deep belief in the importance of bonding and family.”  He shrugged. “He struggled to give you this year, and I think he is not sure himself whether he intends it as a reward or a punishment, but in the end, he decided it was not too much time for something so important.”

Eilian sat back in his chair, looking for a moment at his hands, long and elegant, but marked with an archer’s callouses.  Then he looked up, and Ithilden could see that he had accepted what was going to happen.  “I confess that, since we arrived home, I have become increasingly worried about leaving Celuwen. I had not sufficiently realized how hard this would be for her. She is so competent and self-sufficient that I thought she would simply manage somehow. And,” he smiled at his brother, “there will certainly be compensations for staying home.”

Ithilden laughed. “There will,” he agreed.  “I believe that time in bed with one’s wife is particularly useful in healing a hip wound.” Eilian laughed, and Ithilden rejoiced that they were so comfortable together when he had just given Eilian orders that might at one time have made him furious. He rose, drawing Eilian to his feet too.

“Adar asked me to send you to him when we were finished,” he said.

Eilian grimaced.  “I have been waiting for him to send for me.”

“He is calmer today,” Ithilden observed.

“He would have to be,” Eilian said. Then he saluted and went out the door. Ithilden sat for a moment, suddenly remembering Eilian as an elfling, marching out the door of a room in which Ithilden sat, on his way to see Thranduil over some childish misdeed.  Their mother had been there, he recalled. She had stroked Eilian’s hair and assured him that his father would understand.  Ithilden sighed. If Thranduil had understood, it had undoubtedly been Lorellin’s doing.

He rose and went to the door of the outer office, where his aide made to rise. Ithilden gestured that he should remain seated.  “I apologize, Calith.  You are about to acquire Eilian and on occasion Tinár as office mates.”

Calith blinked and then grinned and shrugged. “Then things will not be boring,” he observed. Ithilden laughed and went back to his desk and began reading dispatches.

“Lord Legolas is here,” said Calith.

Ithilden beckoned to Legolas, who was visible behind Calith.  “Come in and sit down,” he invited.  Legolas settled in the chair that Eilian had recently vacated, and Ithilden pulled a sheet out of the welter of paper on his desk.  Legolas looked at him with some of the same apprehension that most warriors showed when summoned to Ithilden’s office, and Ithilden could not help grimacing a little. He looked down at the report on his desk.

“I have a dispatch from Sórion about your patrol’s latest battles,” Ithilden said. “I suppose you and Beliond brought it when you came home. Sórion tells me the same thing about you that all your captains have told me.” He tapped the paper with his right index finger, making his gold wedding ring flash in the early morning sun coming through the window. “You fight with discipline and courage. You get along well with your fellow warriors.  You are a quiet but trusted leader.”

A slow smile spread over Legolas’s face, and he blushed with pleasure. “Thank you,” he said. “Sórion is generous.”

Ithilden leaned back in his chair, enjoying himself. This meeting, at least, promised to be an easy one.  “I gather you also did very well in leading this mission to the settlement for Adar.  You have served in every patrol in the realm except the Home Guard now, Legolas, and you are developing well as a warrior and a leader.  I believe it is time you were promoted.  When you go back to the Southern Patrol tomorrow, you will go as its new lieutenant.”

His brother blinked at him and then drew in his breath and broke into a delighted grin. “Thank you, Ithilden!  I do not know what to say. I will not disappoint you, I promise!”

“I do not imagine you will.”  Ithilden grinned too.

A sudden thought seemed to occur to Legolas.  “What will happen when Eilian comes back to the patrol?” he asked. “Will I stay as its lieutenant then? Or will I go elsewhere and will Sórion go back to being its lieutenant?”  He looked anxious.  He had served under Eilian for just a short time before Eilian was injured, and he probably wanted to go on serving under him.

“Eilian is going to captain the Home Guard for at least the next year,” he said gently, watching Legolas’s face fall. “So Sórion will be your captain. After that, I do not know.”

“Does Eilian know?”  Legolas was well aware of how much serving in the south meant to Eilian.

“Yes, I told him a short while ago.”

Legolas sat thinking for a moment and then looked up and smiled tentatively.  “I like Sórion, and I would do my best for you even if I did not.”

Ithilden felt a sudden rush of affection for his youngest brother, for whom personal ties mattered most but who tried to live by the duty he believed was his.  He stood and came around the desk to clasp arms and then embrace Legolas, who had come to his feet when Ithilden did. “Congratulations, Legolas. You deserve this.  Now go and enjoy what is left of your leave.”  Legolas stepped back, saluted, and left the room, his step light with the knowledge of his superiors’ approval.

***

Thranduil paused for a moment in the doorway of the sitting room where Celuwen sat sewing lace on the edge of the collar of a pale green gown.  As if feeling his eyes upon her, she looked up and then made to rise when she saw him.

“Do not get up,” he said, taking the chair across from her. “I do not want to disturb your work.  Where is Alfirin?”

Celuwen gave a small grin, which he returned. They both knew what the connection was between the ‘work’ that Celuwen was doing and the presence or absence of Alfirin. “She is supervising the decoration of the green,” Celuwen said.

Thranduil leaned back in his chair.  “She is determined to see that you and Eilian are properly blessed on your new path,” he smiled, and Celuwen nodded without comment.  There was a moment’s pause, while she resumed her sewing.  “Alfirin knows from experience how difficult it is to adjust to living in the palace when one has not been born to it,” Thranduil observed.  “She has grown into her own role over time, and we have all benefited from her efforts to care for us, but she had to learn the management of the household on her own, with help from my steward, of course, but also with him looking over her shoulder as she took on areas he once controlled.”  He paused, and Celuwen lifted her eyes from her sewing to look at him.

“She is very competent,” Celuwen observed slowly.  “She does not seem to need much help.”

“She does not,” Thranduil agreed.  He regarded her.  “I was interested in your comments on Anyr’s strengths and weaknesses,” he said, and she blinked at what must have seemed an abrupt change of subject.  “They were very acute.”

“I have known Anyr a long time,” she said.  “And what I said was no more than what anyone who had lived in one of the settlements would have said.”

“Nonetheless, you offered an insight that none of my advisers had given me,” Thranduil said.  “It has occurred to me that it might be useful if you were to attend my council meetings when matters to do with the settlements were under discussion.”

She looked startled.  “If you wish it, of course I would be happy to.”

“If you are willing,” Thranduil went on, “my advisers Galivion and Thrior can apprise you of some of the concerns over the settlements from our point of view.  I am sure they would be happy to wait upon you when you have time.”

Celuwen nodded again.  “Of course.”

“And then, when you are well enough, perhaps you would even be willing to visit the settlements on a regular basis and serve as a liaison between them and us.”

Celuwen put her sewing down and regarded him levelly.  “Are you asking me to become one of your advisers, my lord?”

He smiled at her blandly.  “You must call me Adar. And yes, I believe I am, assuming that you and I find we understand one another, of course.  And you must wait to take up any very heavy task, I think.  You are still not well.”

She smiled wryly. “Apparently I look more ill than I had realized.”

He laughed. “You look beautiful, my dear, but you also look tired, and you should certainly rest before tonight’s feast.”

“Alfirin will see to it,” said Celuwen dryly.  He laughed and rose, gesturing once again for her to remain seated.

He bent and kissed her forehead.  “Eilian did indeed choose well in you, Celuwen, and I believe he is likely to find that he has more than met his match in his wife.   I, for one, look forward to seeing him discover that.”  She laughed, and he went on his way, both of them satisfied with the future they had been constructing between them.

I borrow characters and setting from Tolkien. I gain no profit from their use other than the enriched imaginative life I believe he intended me to gain.

Many thanks to Nilmandra for beta reading this chapter.

*******

15.  Celebration

Thranduil left the sitting room, satisfied with the results of his conversation with his new daughter-in-law, and immediately met Eilian, who was obviously seeking him.

“Ithilden said you wanted me, Adar,” Eilian said, caution on his face and in his voice. Thranduil grimaced a little.  Had it always been so between him and this son? he wondered in despair.  Surely there had been a time when his child’s face had lit up with joy at the sight of him.  How could things have gone so wrong between them?

But Thranduil knew the answer to that question, for he had sat up half the night contemplating it.  The Wood-elf lightness of spirit that had delighted him in his wife had frustrated him in the son for whose discipline he held himself responsible, and as Eilian had grown old enough to want independence, they had clashed with increasing frequency.  And then, when Lorellin had rushed headlong into danger and left them all bereft, Eilian had been a young warrior, engaged in his own flirtatious dance with danger, and Thranduil had trembled and grown angry nearly every time he saw him.   Thranduil had always seen his own impulsive father in Eilian, but yesterday, for the first time, he had admitted to himself that what truly terrified him was the way that Lorellin looked out at him through her son’s dark grey eyes.

“I want to speak to you,” Thranduil said, gesturing toward his office door.  His face still guarded, Eilian stepped aside to let his father precede him and then followed obediently.  Thranduil seated himself behind the desk, while Eilian waited uncertainly.  Thranduil sighed. “Sit down,” he said, indicating the chair before his desk and noting the relief in his son’s face as he accepted the invitation.

Uncharacteristically at a loss how to start, Thranduil fingered the emerald-studded handle of the dagger he used as a letter opener.  Realizing he was fidgeting, he put the dagger down and began determinedly.  “Ithilden undoubtedly told you that he and I agreed you were to serve in his office until you were well enough for active duty and then were to captain the Home Guard.”

“I would be willing to wager that Ithilden had very little to say about it,” Eilian answered, his mouth tightening with automatic resentment.

“Under the circumstances,” said Thranduil sharply, “helping your brother with paperwork and then forgoing a little excitement in the south would seem to me to be the least you could expect by way of penalties.  You disobeyed me, Eilian, and you excluded your family from something that is important to them and affects them.  And even aside from that, you need, as you have always needed, to learn more patience!”   Eilian bit his lip and lowered his eyes, and Thranduil suddenly brought himself up short.  This was not the path he had wanted this conversation to take.  He drew a deep breath and leaned forward a little, willing his son to look up.

“Eilian,” he pleaded, “you do need to learn patience, and you need it now more than ever for you have just bonded with someone who obviously loves you beyond reason and thus have added to the number of people who would be devastated if anything happened to you.  You nearly died of that wound that still troubles you, iôn-nín.  Even now, my heart freezes at the thought of the first glimpse I had of you, so still and pale, when your companions brought you home.”  Eilian’s eyes were on him now, widening a little at what Thranduil knew must be an unfamiliar tone in his voice.

“I am a warrior, Adar. Warriors are wounded sometimes.”

“But warriors can behave with some discretion, some care!”

“I was not wounded because of carelessness,” Eilian said sharply. “Ask Legolas. He was there.”

Thranduil paused and glanced down at the dagger again for a moment.  “I believe that you have become more careful over the years,” he acknowledged with some difficulty. “Ithilden tells me that you are without peer as a scout and as a scourge for the enemy in the south.  I believe that having a captain’s responsibility has helped you there. You would not knowingly lead others into unreasonable danger, even if you were tempted to go yourself.” He looked up and was startled to find a bitter look on his son’s face.

“Thank you,” Eilian said sarcastically.  “I can see how much it cost you to admit that.”

“Do you believe I do not value you as a warrior who has served this Realm well?” Thranduil demanded, stung by his son’s tone.

“I believe you expect me to behave irresponsibly and are shocked when I do not,” Eilian retorted.

For a long moment, they sat in silence, regarding one another.  Had he really hurt his son so badly? Thranduil wondered in despair.  Did Eilian really believe that he thought so little of him? And then, even more painfully, he wondered if perhaps Eilian’s accusation was an accurate one.  Did he expect the worst from Eilian?  And in a flash, he knew: To expect the worst was to prepare for the worst, to try to guard himself from the unbearable pain that would consume him if he lost this child, who was so like his lost mother.

Thranduil drew a deep breath.  “I know how good a warrior and captain you are. I know that you are eminently suited to lead the Southern Patrol, and I am deeply grateful that the Realm has you in its service.”  He could see Eilian’s hands tightening on the arms of his chair as doubt flickered across his face, and then his son relaxed slightly.

“Thank you, Adar.”

Thranduil felt a momentary shame that his son was so grateful for a simple statement of the truth.  Had he really been so chary with praise for Eilian?

“That is what I feel as a king,” Thranduil went on and was startled to hear the slight tremor in his voice. “But as a father, I worry, for I see you tearing so impulsively through life, and I know that caution is a struggle for you, as it was for your naneth. It was a struggle she lost, Eilian, and I cannot help but fear that you will lose it too.  You are so like her, my child.”

Eilian sat staring at him, with his mouth slightly open. He licked his lips, and then suddenly he rose and came around the desk to put his arms around Thranduil’s shoulders.  Immensely gratified, Thranduil rose to embrace him.  “I am sorry, Adar,” Eilian said.  “I do not mean to frighten you.”

Thranduil cradled the back of the dark head in his right hand and put his lips to his son’s hair. “I loved your naneth’s bravery and the way she embraced life with such enthusiasm, and I love those things in you too, Eilian.  But those very qualities killed her, and sometimes even now, I am angry that she was so careless, for although I know it is not rational, it feels as if she left me willfully.  I am sorry that sometimes that anger spills over onto you.” He pulled back and looked beseechingly into his son’s face.  “But you must take care, iôn-nín.  If you will not do it for me or your brothers, you must do it for Celuwen.”

Eilian patted his shoulder, and Thranduil felt suddenly absurd at being comforted by his son.  He was the parent here after all. “I will take as much care as I can,” Eilian told him. “But I am what I am, Adar.”  His face too was beseeching.

Thranduil drew a deep breath. “That is as much as I can ask,” he said, a little sadly.  He let go of Eilian, who stepped away.

“I have a request to make of you, Adar,” Eilian said tentatively.

“What is it?”

“In the storeroom, there is a particular ring I want to give to Celuwen tonight.”

“Which one?”

Eilian hesitated very slightly.  “The one you gave naneth when I was conceived.  The one with the eye stone on it.”

Thranduil held very still, remembering the day he had given his wife the ring.  They had seen a rainbow in the sky above the meadow where they lay, and he had come home and sought for the ring in his storeroom, for there had been a rainbow of colors gleaming in the gem that he later placed on his wife’s hand.

“Naneth always called it my ring,” Eilian hurried on in explanation, evidently fearing his father’s silence meant he was hesitating.  “She said the rainbow in the stone stood for me.”  He looked a little embarrassed at offering this child’s tale.

“Of course you can have it,” said Thranduil, with tears stinging his eyes. “Your naneth would have rejoiced in its serving as a sign of your love for Celuwen.”

Eilian rewarded him with the gleaming eyes and wide grin that had charmed everyone around him from the time he was an elfling.  “Thank you, Adar. Do you know where Celuwen is now?  Is she busy with Alfirin?”

Thranduil eyed him levelly.  “She is in the sitting room.  I believe Alfirin is still on the green. If you hurry, you can probably escape.  I would wedge a chair under the doorknob if I were you.”

Eilian laughed. “I will take your advice! By your leave.”

Smiling, Thranduil waved him out of the room and then sat down again, thinking about the ring and the day Eilian had been conceived.  Lorellin had always liked Celuwen.  Thranduil made a wry face.  Lorellin would probably have approved of their son’s impromptu bonding.  He could not help but believe that his wife would be present somehow that night when the couple’s union was blessed.

***

A soft rap sounded on the door of Thranduil’s office, and at his bidding, Alfirin entered the room.  Thranduil had been expecting her. It was almost time to dress for the feast and for the family gathering that would take place beforehand.  Alfirin had probably been watching the time and worrying that he would leave it too late.

But it was not of the lateness of the hour that Alfirin brought him word.  “Celuwen’s parents are here,” she announced, a little breathlessly. “I put them in one of the guest chambers.”

“Both of them?” he demanded.  She nodded, and he smiled with slightly narrowed eyes.  Sólith was his guest now, he thought with satisfaction.  He would see what he could make of that, for the Realm’s sake, of course, but also for the sake of his son. He rose.  “I will go and dress now.  We should have the family gathering soon.” She nodded, obviously excited.  The feast would start at the hour of star opening, and she was eager to see the results of her handiwork.

When Thranduil entered the family sitting room a half-hour later, he found Ithilden, Alfirin, and Legolas sitting in awkward silence with Sólith and Isiwen. They all stood as he entered the room, and he was faintly amused by the relief that was plain on the faces of Alfirin and Legolas.  Ithilden shot him a look that suggested he shared his father’s expectation of entertainment, but then, he had heard Thranduil voice his opinion of Sólith at numerous council meetings.  Thranduil regretfully supposed he would have to stop being so frank, now that Celuwen would be at the meetings. Isiwen looked anxious, as well she might. Sólith’s chin was thrust out, and Thranduil would not have been surprised to learn that he had come only when his wife threatened him.

“How delighted we are to welcome you to this celebration of the bonding of our son and daughter!” he exclaimed, crossing the room to place a kiss on Isiwen’s brow and turn a smiling face to Sólith.

“They left it late enough,” Sólith grumbled.  “Families usually celebrate before the couple are bedded.”

Thranduil raised an eyebrow.  “Early or late, we treasure this bonding, for the sake of our children, who so clearly love one another.” Sólith glanced at him and then pressed his lips together tightly.

The door opened and Eilian and Celuwen entered the room.  He was dressed in the silk robes and circlet appropriate for a formal occasion, and Celuwen wore the green gown she had been trimming when Thranduil spoke to her that morning. But what really clad them was the glow of happiness in which they walked. Thranduil was stabbed with a sudden memory of what that newly wed joy felt like, and a quick glance showed him that Isiwen was blinking away tears and even Sólith appeared to be swallowing some sort of lump in his throat.  Ithilden took Alfirin’s hand.

With a cry of delight, Celuwen ran forward to embrace her parents.  “I am so glad you are here!”

“We would not have missed it, child,” Isiwen assured her.  Sólith embraced his daughter, glaring at Eilian over her shoulder, but Eilian’s suddenly troubled eyes were on his wife, wrapped in her father’s arms.  Celuwen pulled free and turned to smile at Eilian, who managed to smile tenderly back.

“Daughter,” said Thranduil, and after a moment, Celuwen seemed to realize he was talking to her and turned to him, with a slight blush for her slowness in responding. Thranduil approached her.  “As your new adar, I have a gift for you, Celuwen.  It is not a particularly traditional one, but then you have never seemed to me to be particularly impressed by Noldor-inspired traditions.”

She smiled at him tentatively, and he could see Sólith grimacing. Around her neck, he put a silver chain from which depended a small medallion.  “This is the symbol of office that all my advisers wear,” he told her, “and you are a particularly welcome one.”  He kissed her brow and then turned to her parents. “Celuwen is going to advise us on the needs of the settlements, for their interests are dear to our heart and we would understand them better if we could.”

They both looked startled.  “You would do well to listen to her,” Sólith said stiffly.

“We intend to,” Thranduil assured him, with a serene smile.

He was suddenly aware that Isiwen looked embarrassed. “I am afraid we have nothing for you Eilian,” she apologized.  “But we welcome you to our family anyway.”  Sólith snorted.

Eilian roused himself from surprised contemplation of the medallion around Celuwen’s neck.  “You have already given me that which is most precious,” he said hastily, approaching his mother-in-law and bending to allow her to kiss his forehead in welcome.

“You took it, you mean,” Sólith snapped. There was a moment’s silence. Thranduil could see the shocked look on Legolas’s face and the sudden stiffening of Eilian’s. Enough is enough, he thought.

“Do you mean to insult our son?” he asked frigidly. The silence in the room deepened even further, as all of his children except Celuwen tensed, recognizing his tone for the menacing one it was.

Then Sólith turned to him.  “He did not have my permission to bond with Celuwen, but I suppose he did not tell you that.” The fool had apparently missed the warning edge in Thranduil’s voice.

“Of course he told us,” Thranduil said. “They both did.  We repeat, do you mean to insult our son?  We ask because that is something that we could not allow any more than we could allow someone to insult Celuwen.”

Sólith blinked, and from the corner of his eye, Thranduil could see Eilian’s almost equally startled face.  The Elf hesitated.  “They should not have bonded without permission,” he maintained.

Thranduil narrowed his eyes. “We cannot allow anyone to insult our son or daughter,” he repeated, letting the tone of warning deepen to one of threat.

Sólith met his gaze for a moment and then, suddenly, looked away. “I suppose not,” he said. Thranduil waited to see if he would say anything else, and when he did not, decided that that admission was as much as he could expect.

He smiled pleasantly, and his children all relaxed. “Good,” he said. He gestured to them. “Let us go to the feast then.  You two should lead the way,” he told Eilian and Celuwen.  Blowing out a tensely held breath, Eilian took Celuwen’s hand and started out the door without a backward glance.  Thranduil came immediately behind, offering his arm to Isiwen.  Sólith followed, and Thranduil was amused to notice that Legolas evidently preferred to walk alone behind Ithilden and Alfirin rather than go near Eilian’s father-in-law.  Alfirin glanced back at him and then extended her free hand to him, which he took, tucking her hand through his arm and bending to whisper something in her ear that made her open her eyes wider and giggle.  Ithilden grinned and shook his head. Thranduil patted Isiwen’s hand and hoped his children were going to behave themselves.

Alfirin had stationed a watcher to notify the musicians on the green when the king’s family was approaching, and as they walked through the Great Doors, the musicians began to play and a murmur of approval and welcome rose from the assembled guests, broken suddenly by enthusiastic and faintly bawdy cheers.  Ahead of him, Thranduil could see Eilian break into a grin as he spotted a group of his friends who were evidently responsible for the noise.  Thranduil looked quickly at Isiwen and was relieved to see that she looked amused.

Eilian did as he should have done and led his wife and his family to their places at the table at one end of the green, and the guests moved to the other tables, seating themselves after Thranduil sat.  Servants lifted the coverings from the tureens of stew and the other platters on the table.

“I do not understand,” said Alfirin suddenly, from two places to Thranduil’s left.  He turned to see her beckoning to his steward, who was hovering nearby with a broad smile on his face.  “Where did this food all come from?” she asked him, sounding bewildered.

Thranduil looked at the table and suddenly realized that the stew was accompanied by a plate of fried fish, a salad of spring greens, a flat cake made of acorn meal and studded with what looked like walnuts, and a dish of shimmering strawberry jam.

“The guests brought it, my lady,” said the steward happily.  “Lord Eilian has many friends.”

Alfirin paused for only a second to absorb this information and then rallied to take action. “The extra food should be shared,” she declared.

“It already has been,” the steward said. And Thranduil realized that the other tables too were laden with extra platters of food, making what looked like an incredibly lavish meal after this winter’s dearth.  He glanced to his right to see Eilian’s startled and then grateful face.

“It would seem you are loved by more than your family, iôn-nín,” Thranduil said, loudly enough to be certain that Sólith would hear him from where he sat at the right end of the table.  Eilian was blinking rapidly, and Celuwen took his right hand.  “Enjoy the gifts your friends have brought,” Thranduil told them and put some of the fish on Eilian’s plate as Isiwen fussily served Celuwen.

The food was good, and Thranduil ate with pleasure, aware as he always was of the activities going on around him.  Alfirin was glowing at the success of her plans, and Ithilden had his arm around her.  Legolas was constantly scanning the crowd, apparently looking for someone whom he was not finding.  Isiwen dithered a little, plainly worried about Sólith, who sat sullenly beside her.  Eilian and Celuwen ate in silence, touching one another at every opportunity. The musicians wandered and played as people ate, and the night slowly darkened to show a thick spangling of stars.

When most of the guests appeared to have finished eating, Thranduil signaled to the musicians, who stopped playing as he rose.  The crowd gradually fell silent.  Thranduil had planned this part of the evening carefully.  He motioned for those at the head table to follow him and led them all to the center of the green, so that the guests could see them.  Eilian and Celuwen had already exchanged the blessings that lay at the heart of the bonding ceremony, and they would not repeat those tonight.  What the couple needed was a public acknowledgement of their bonding and the belated blessing of their parents, and Thranduil intended to see that they had both things.  Isiwen had a firm hold on Sólith’s arm, so Thranduil assumed that he stood near the newlyweds with some reluctance, but at least he stood there.

“We gather tonight to celebrate the bonding of Eilian and Celuwen,” Thranduil began.  He smiled at his son and daughter-in-law.  “I believe they have gifts to give to one another.”

Almost shyly, Eilian and Celuwen turned to one another.  Celuwen fumbled for something small that she had knotted in the sash of her gown, and Eilian fished something from an inner pocket of his robe.  He took her right hand and slid onto her index finger the ring that had belonged to his mother.  Even by starlight, the eye stone glowed with pearlescent colors, and Thranduil’s throat caught.  “So you will see the rainbow in the stone and think of me even when I am far away,” Eilian said in voice that Thranduil knew was probably too low to be heard by most of those there.

Celuwen was blinking rapidly, but her voice was steady as she placed a slender band of worked gold on Eilian’s right hand and said, “So you will see the sign of my love and know that it is strong even when you are far away.”

A pleased murmur swept through the crowd.  Thranduil smiled.  “The bonding of Eilian with Celuwen pleases us more than we can say, all the more so because Celuwen is one of the Elves whom we honor for having lived bravely in the forest.”  He turned to look blandly at Sólith and gestured that it was his turn to speak.  Sólith looked startled, for he had undoubtedly expected Thranduil to invite Isiwen to speak, as she would have done had this been an actual bonding ceremony.  But this was a celebration of an already formed bond, and Thranduil intended to force Sólith to at least appear to celebrate. All eyes turned to Sólith, and Thranduil had the satisfaction of seeing him in a spot from which he could not easily wiggle free.

Sólith stood for a second in silence, and then he looked at Celuwen, who looked back at him with her face pleading.  Eilian stood with his hand on her shoulder, and Thranduil noted approvingly that his face was carefully blank.   His second son was capable of tact after all.

Sólith cleared his throat.  “I rejoice in my daughter’s happiness,” he said, “and in the way this bond will draw the king closer to those who need his help in the settlements.”  Good enough, thought Thranduil and signaled the musicians to begin playing again before Sólith could say anything more.

At the sound of the music, guests swept out from behind the tables to the clear area in the center of the green and began to dance, and Thranduil smiled benevolently on those around him as he made his way back to his place, stopping to accept congratulations along the way.  Someone suddenly clasped his arm in a warrior’s grip.  “He has done a good thing, my lord,” Maltanaur said approvingly. “She will be the making of him.”

Thranduil broke into a delighted grin at the sight of Eilian’s bodyguard, who had been spending the time during which Eilian was recovering from his wound in fighting with the Southern Patrol. “I was not sure you would be here on time,” he said.

“I rode all night,” Maltanaur said, shrugging off the fact that such a night ride was so dangerous that he would never have allowed Eilian to make it.  “I would not have missed this celebration for the world.”  He glanced to where Eilian and Celuwen were dancing in a ring that included several of his friends and, surprisingly enough, her parents, although Eilian and Sólith had as many dancers as possible between them.  “By your leave, though, I will go and greet him.”

Thranduil waved him on his way and returned to his seat in satisfaction.  He poured himself more wine and sat back to watch the dancers for a while.  Memory pulled at him, showing him other celebrations and other dancers, many of whom he would not see again until they met in Valinor.  He looked at Celuwen and Eilian, who both were now barefoot as he clasped both her hands and spun her around in a laughing whirl.  And suddenly, he found he could not bear to watch these two Wood-elves, who were so obviously in love, and had to turn away.

Someone sat down beside him, and he turned to see Beliond filling his own wine cup and then refilling Thranduil’s.  “We old ones need to step aside for a while and keep our memories and losses to ourselves, I think,” he said.  Thranduil made no answer, thinking of Beliond’s son, dead at Dagorlad, and his wife, who long ago sailed west.  “They say that the Lady Galadriel has the gift of foresight,” Beliond went on.  “And I ask you, who would want such a thing?”

Thranduil looked at the dancers again.  Eilian had drawn Celuwen close and was whispering in her ear.  Legolas was dancing with the wife of his friend Annael, his eyes still scanning the crowd.  Off to his left, Thranduil could hear Ithilden and Alfirin talking to her parents about the last letter they had gotten from their son, Sinnarn, who was with the northern border patrol.  Who indeed? he wondered.

***

In the pale early morning light, Legolas flung his pack over the back of his horse and wondered if he had been wise to have that last cup of wine the previous night.  He had been stupid to hope that Tuilinn might be there. Ah, well. The ride south would give him a chance to work off the remnants of the celebration of Eilian’s bonding.  He smiled to himself.  His father had outdone himself in putting Sólith right where he wanted him.  You had to hand it to Thranduil: He was as wily as they came.

“Legolas,” spoke a voice at his elbow, and he jumped as his father seemed to materialize out of his thoughts.

“Good morning, Adar,” he said.

“Good morning.” Thranduil’s voice was warm.  “Before you left, I wanted to tell you again how well you did with Anyr and how much I appreciate your giving up your leave to do it.”

Legolas could feel himself flushing with pleasure. “Thank you, Adar.  I did not mind, truly.”

Thranduil drew him into a close embrace.  “Take care, Legolas.  You will make a fine lieutenant, but you must take care and come home again whole.  I have had enough of wounded sons for a while.”

Legolas smiled. “I will be careful. Beliond will see to it that I am.”

Thranduil laughed, and the two of them led Legolas’s horse out into the stable yard where Beliond and the rest of the family were waiting for them.  Legolas found himself being hugged by person after person, ending up with Eilian.  “I can hardly stand to let you go back by yourself, brat,” Eilian said, his face showing the real pain that he felt. “It seems unnatural that I should stay home while you ride off into danger.”

“He will not be riding into danger if I can help it,” Beliond snorted.  “He is going to behave like a sensible warrior.”  They all laughed, and Legolas leapt lightly onto his horse.

For a moment, he paused, scanning the much-loved faces turned up to him.  Alfirin looked motherly and anxious, and a serious-faced Ithilden put his arm around her shoulders. Legolas knew that it had always pained him to send his brothers into battle.  Eilian stood unhappily near Legolas’s left side, his hand still on Legolas’s leg, and Celuwen waited a little behind him. But it was Thranduil upon whose face Legolas focused.  His father looked grave, but when the moment came, he raised his hand in farewell and let his son go.

Legolas led Beliond away from his father’s stronghold, glancing back only once to see the little group of those whom he held most dear.  Then he urged his horse on, and the two of them rode off to face whatever awaited them.

The End

*******

AN: My apologies that I couldn’t fit Tinár’s wife into the party scene. She’ll have to come on stage another day.  An eye stone is another name for an opal. "Eilian" is the Sindarin word for rainbow.