Author's note: Hey all, thanks for reading. Here's a little short story while I try to get my life and writing back on track. This takes place in the second age so technically it is Unfinished Tales but there is no section for that so I've published under LOTR instead. Rating is for rough language.

He had ridden out in the morning with a small troop to scout Sauron's position, the sun beating hot and heavy on his armor until it seemed nothing more than a sweltering cocoon of metal. It was both fortunate and unfortunate that it was a far ride before they saw the black, greasy plumes of smoke rising slowly to the azure sky where they dispersed to float like dark harbingers of doom amongst the white clouds: fortunate because that meant that Sauron's forces were still far away, far enough to buy them time to join with Gil-galad, to reinforce the fledgling colony of Imladris; unfortunate because that meant the ride back would be long, and it was hot.

Elrond sighed, wheeling his horse about and signaling to the scouts to follow, the unpleasant sticky sensation of sweat traveling down his spine, caught between armor, and tunic, and skin, further agitating him. In a clatter of hooves, a jingle of armor, and shouts of encouragement to the horses they were traveling back north, banners beating a rhythm against the sky. Elrond glanced up, his eyes following the stream of colors; he was Gil-galad's herald after all so it was appropriate that he have an interest in heraldry. But the banner that caught his interest most of all did not belong to him, or to Gil-galad - a spray of silver stars on a background of blue as deep and dark as the night - Doriath's banner.

He eyed it with no small measure of unease. Doriath's banner made him almost as uncomfortable as Doriath's prince. In irritation, he wondered why Celeborn even bothered having his soldiers fly that banner at all. "He has a hard time letting things go," the Lady Galadriel had said of her husband with a kind smile and a twinkle in her eye the first and only time she had visited her kinsman Gil-galad in Lindon.

Doriath was long defunct, nothing more than a memory, even a fable, or so the younger elves said, elves who had not lived during the first age, elves to whom Doriath was nothing more than a story their mothers had told them before bed. But though Doriath had stood for millennia as a massive empire, sole sovereign of the elves of Middle Earth, last bulwark against Morgoth, there were few now who truly remembered her, even fewer those who had once walked in her forests or beheld the golden age of her majestic capital city, Menegroth.

Elrond shifted in his saddle, uneasy, and this time not from sweat. Technically, he was Thingol's heir, he was the heir of Doriath, he was the son of Elwing who was herself the daughter of Dior, son of Lúthien, Thingol's daughter. But those were just names to him, something he might find, that he had found in history books. He'd never actually known his ancestors; he couldn't even remember what his own parents looked like. And he'd never actually been to Doriath, or Menegroth, nor would he ever now that she was beneath the sea, not that he ever could have anyway: Doriath had fallen before he was even born. He felt like an imposter. Celeborn made him feel like an imposter.

Well…that wasn't quite fair. It wasn't like Celeborn was trying to make him uncomfortable. Celeborn couldn't exactly help it that his hair was silver or that he towered over Elrond. He was, after all, only two generations removed from Cuivenen, and he was, after all, Sindarin nobility, and he was, after all, very old, which all meant that it was, after all, only perfectly natural that he would be so much taller, and so much more powerful, and have silver hair. Elrond felt almost robbed as he glanced down at his own dark brown braids. He was Sindarin nobility too, technically, he was of Thingol's house too, technically, only you never would have known it by looking at him. People knew who Celeborn was at a glance; Elrond had to remind people of his own name. The hint of a frown from Celeborn made the infantrymen nearly shit their pants but Elrond couldn't even force his injured patients to stay abed.

And then there was the way he walked around in the evenings quietly singing old songs in Doriathrin. Elrond couldn't speak Doriathrin or even understand it and he didn't know those old Sindarin songs either, though he felt he should have learned them. He surely would have had he been raised by his own parents, but instead he had been raised by his abductors, by Maedhros and Maglor, who had known nothing of the language, or culture, or customs of the people they had slaughtered. But they were just two more people who made Elrond feel horribly conflicted and so he tried to push the thoughts from his mind.

He had expected Celeborn to hate him for that, for having been raised by kinslayers, by the very people who had destroyed his kingdom, slaughtered his family, and doomed his people to exodus. But then again, Elrond had heard the rumors, so had they all, of Celebrimbor's incessant romantic overtures towards the Lady Galadriel and yet it had been Celeborn who had plunged into the thick of battle against Sauron at Ost-in-Edhil to pull Celebrimbor's broken and beaten body - if you could have called it a body - it resembled far more the pieces of what had once been a body - down from the enemy's standard. It was a move that had terrified Elrond when in that split second he had realized that if Sauron killed Celeborn he would be left alone to lead the army - he and his vastly inferior military experience.

"You could have been killed!" Elrond had yelped after the battle was over, after they had retreated to the hidden valley where they were now slowly building Imladris, after he had bandaged Celeborn's multitude of wounds. There were a thousand other things he could have said - you could have left his corpse, what of your wife and daughter, you must be out of your mind - but the one time Elrond had ever dared to challenge an elf older than him of course he had chosen the stupidest thing to say: of course Celeborn knew he could have been killed.

He'd only seen Celeborn twice before the battle, once from afar when he had been very young as Maedhros's army, traveling west, had passed by the exiles of Doriath going into the east. The second time had been in Lindon after the war but then they had only exchanged nods of acknowledgment for Celeborn and Galadriel's business had been with Gil-galad and not his young herald. But he'd certainly heard the rumors.

He's rude, horribly rude, crass, curses, terrible temper - Thingol had a temper too.

- Terrible temper? That hardly seems adequate to describe upending a banquet table and shouting curses so filthy that an orc would have been ashamed.

Gil-galad's banquet table no less, high king of the Noldor. Who does he think he is? Doesn't he understand that the Noldor rule these lands now?

- The Sindar never learned their place and he's the worst of the lot of them. She could have done better than a Moriquende. It wasn't a word one usually heard in polite conversation, but then gossip wasn't really polite conversation.

He doesn't worship the Valar, none of them do: strange rituals, worshipping trees, odd beliefs, blasphemous heretics, savages. They didn't even know that elves could be reincarnated until the Noldor came to these lands and brought the teachings of the Valar with them.

You know how dark elves are… The rumors drifted through corridors and parlors and open windows, into ears and out of them.

Elrond only listened. No, he wanted to say, No, I don't know how they are. They were my mother's people but I know nothing of them! Tell me! And yet, as ever, he had been too shy to ask, and no one had ever bothered to tell him, not even Gil-galad, who was his friend besides being his lord. But he knew Gil-galad would tell him if he only asked…but that was the problem…he hadn't the courage. Then again, Gil-galad too had been mostly raised amongst the Noldor…so had everyone it seemed.

Because there aren't many Sindar left. They were exterminated like animals, driven from their homes, forced on a long and painful march eastward. The unpleasant thought had cropped up unexpectedly, like bile in his throat. Maybe that was the real reason none of the Noldor liked Celeborn…just the sight of him was a vivid visual reminder of their sins. Elrond swallowed.

And so, sitting in the field tent after the battle, heart still pounding wildly after only so narrowly escaping, bandaging the older elf's wounds, was the first time Elrond had ever come so close, face to face with a real Sinda, an old Sinda, one of the ones from Doriath, someone who had known his ancestors, and of course he had had to go and say something stupid like, you could have been killed!

He wished he could have said something wise, something that would have impressed the older elf. He wasn't even sure why. He'd only been around the Lady Galadriel two times but he had so desperately wanted her to like him, and not just because her beauty was enough to knock even the most level-headed of men into an idiotic stupor, but because something about Galadriel made you want her to like you. It wasn't the same with Celeborn; Elrond didn't want him to like him necessarily. It was maybe that he felt that all the secrets to his past, to his heritage, were locked up in this one elf who was about as approachable as a dragon.

Given the rumors, after his stupid comment Elrond would have expected Celeborn to divest him of his spinal column as easily as he had seen him do to countless orcs just a few hours before, but the older elf had merely raised a silver brow as if Elrond's strangled exclamation had amused him and, green eyes twinkling with merriment, snorted with laughter. Elrond flushed bright red with embarrassment. Perhaps it would have been better if Celeborn had killed him instead of laughing. Elrond liked to be taken seriously.

The older elf seemed to have noticed the red flush on the younger one's face and his grin softened a bit. "These scars…" he said, his voice a low rumble like thunder, the kind of voice that came from the diaphragm rather than the throat or lungs. Elrond knew because he was a healer as well as a herald and it was his business to know the anatomy. Elrond knew a lot of things; but he still felt like he knew nothing. Celeborn stretched and the white lines stretched with him, a constellation of scars that crisscrossed his body. They had to have been deep cuts to leave scars on an elf, and they must be old cuts, some of them older than Elrond…most of them. "Sauron has been trying to kill me for thousands of years," Celeborn laughed, "and Morgoth before him, but he hasn't succeeded yet. I'd say the odds are in my favor, wouldn't you?"

He laughed again as if this was some great joke but Elrond didn't know what was funny about it; he thought it rather unwise to tempt fate. Celeborn fell silent, perhaps having noticed the way Elrond had pursed his lips, the spidery, nervous way that his hands worked at the bandages. "You are a healer," Celeborn remarked, "but you know nothing of healing." That. That had been the moment when he had really started to make Elrond uncomfortable. He hadn't said it unkindly, but Elrond already felt like he didn't know anything about anything and it didn't help to have people pointing that out, especially people who were older and wiser than him.

But what does Celeborn know anyway? He had thought to himself later that night, heart stewing in ruined pride. Celeborn talks to trees like they're people. He has conversations with them for Valar's sake! He's completely mad! But Lady Galadriel didn't seem to think him mad. She had received a packet of mallorn seeds in Lindon, which Gil-galad had lamented saying they would never grow outside of Valinor. But the Lady Galadriel had only smiled fondly, as if her thoughts had suddenly drifted far away, and said, "if Celeborn sings to them they will grow."

Elrond sighed again as the scouting party dropped into a single file line; it was the only way to enter the valley. At least it was a relief to be returning home, even if it was but an unfinished home, a home that might be overrun by Sauron's forces in a few weeks time. Imladris: he hoped it would be the refuge it promised to be. Dusk was falling now, the hot sun hid away at last, as their horses clattered to a halt, sweaty and tired, and they dismounted. Elrond freed his hands from his gloves, handing them along with his horse's reins to a page, and turned toward the encampment, but what he saw only served to put him in an even fouler mood.

The sounds of hammers rang throughout the valley and here and there in the gathering dusk he saw elves, elves he had ordered to stay abed, elves who were supposed to be resting and healing were instead working on the construction of Imladris, clambering about on scaffolds, raising structures and walls. His heart exploded in a rare burst of anger, dark brows furrowing, gray eyes flashing with ire. This was it! This was the final straw; he had completely had it with the Lady Galadriel's rude, impertinent, deliberately antagonistic husband.

And there he was, all the way up one of the grassy paths that ran up the craggy side of the valley, seated on an outcropping of rock, silver hair glinting unmistakably in the light of the rising moon. I see you up there, Silver Tree! Elrond thought, fuming mad. And there's no escape unless you want to jump down! Elrond would not ordinarily have lost his temper at a superior but Celeborn had tried his patience one too many times and, as Elrond was extraordinarily patient, that was really saying something. He marched up the path, boots scuffing noisily over stones, but when he arrived Celeborn only looked up at him with a very mild expression, a quirk of an eyebrow, and a grin, thereby ruining what Elrond had thought would be a very serious and commanding entrance. He'd never witnessed a quicker, simpler, or more effective disarming. It was as infuriating as it was brilliant. Maybe that's why they hate him.

"Evening, Elrond," he said, drinking from the cup he held, which even from where Elrond stood smelt strongly of alcohol, and returned his attention to the moon. He had said it as if there was nothing wrong at all, but everything was wrong.

"Why don't you take me seriously?" The words burst forth from Elrond's mouth before he could form them into something more diplomatic and he stood trembling with suppressed anger. Celeborn merely turned back and regarded him with mild interest and that same small, inflammatory grin.

"I do take you seriously, Elrond," he said before taking another long slow drink. "But it seems to me that you don't take yourself very seriously."

There. A master tactician. He had done it again - laid all of Elrond's fears and insecurities out in the open so adroitly that Elrond felt his anger dissipate as quickly as wind going out of a sail. "Sit," Celeborn bade him, patting the grass beside himself, eyes still fixed on the moon. Elrond sat obediently, feeling rather like a child being reprimanded, and despite the fact that he was far older than a child, it was somehow appropriate considering that acting like a father seemed to come effortlessly to Celeborn. Well he is a father, Elrond thought. He almost felt relief at the thought. A father was the one thing he had never had and yet had so many of; he knew how to relate to fathers.

"You are angry with me," Celeborn said with a small smile, the corners of his eyes crinkling as he looked down at the elves who were still working though twilight had descended upon them. The sounds of hammers rang out, echoing off the sides of the cliffs, and here and there torches flared. Elrond cleared his throat, glancing up again at Celeborn, who sat with one leg folded up against his body, the other dangling over the edge of the ledge of earth, holding the rim of the cup in his fingertips.

He hardly looked a lord now, wearing nothing but a loose shirt and an old pair of breeches, his body bound here and there with bandages, well, not a lord of Eregion at least. But a king of Doriath…a king of the Sindar…yes, sitting there in the twilight with hair the color of the moon reflected in a river, his physical presence itself bore some mark of ages long past, ages before the sun, before the moon. There was something disconcerting about being in the presence of such an ancient elf, Elrond felt, and he could not help but feel slightly intimidated, his anger slinking away like a dog with its tail between its legs.

"I ordered them to rest," Elrond said, a bit sullenly.

"And I told them they could go back to work, if they wished it," Celeborn replied.

"How can they heal if they do not rest?" Elrond's anger returned, barking. "How can I ever be taken seriously by anyone if you contradict my orders behind my back?" His first thought after the words had left his mouth was that he ought to apologize but Celeborn didn't seem offended and merely nodded slowly, sipping from his cup.

"Do you think they are only building a house?" Celeborn asked, looking down at where the others were still hammering away, intent on their work. They had only been building for a few days and yet a great house of sorts was already coming into shape.

"If they are building something other than a house then I cannot see it," Elrond said. "It looks like a house to me." He was still agitated.

Celeborn laughed long and hard at that until tears leaked from his eyes and he slapped Elrond hard on the back. It hurt. "I didn't mean it so literally," he gasped at last. And, when he finally managed to collect himself again he explained, "you are a healer. You rebuild the body, the house of the soul, Elrond, but how does one rebuild the soul?"

"I…" Elrond stammered, falling silent. He feared that whatever he said would be wrong, that he would disappoint Celeborn with his ignorance.

"That is what they are doing right now," Celeborn said, gesturing at the elves below, "rebuilding their souls. The body may want rest but the spirit, the spirit longs to be useful, to be productive, to actualize the fruits of the body's labor." He fell silent for a moment and then said, "my brother's wife, your great grandmother, taught me that once upon a time. It was after the dwarves had ransacked Menegroth. I was frustrated with my soldiers because they wanted to spar and I wanted them to rest. 'Let them practice,' she told me, 'that is healing too.'" He smiled at Elrond. "They are building now because it gives them hope and that, I think, is another sort of healing." The two elves sat in silence for a while and then Elrond spoke.

"What…what was she like?" He asked at last, turning with a bit of trepidation towards Celeborn, hoping he was not dredging up unpleasant memories, but Celeborn smiled, his eyes fixed on the moon once again, but softer now, as if he was lost in reminiscence.

"She was a marvelously gifted healer," Celeborn said, "and very kind, two traits I have never possessed myself which is, perhaps, why I admired her so much." A smile flitted across his face. "You remind me of her in many ways, not only the dark of her hair, but her concern for others. My brother loved her dearly. He and I were quite different…Galathil." Some great melancholy came over him then but he continued speaking. "I never took much of an inclination to book learning but Galathil thrived on scholarship and lore. I practically lived on the battlefield and he in the library. I used to make fun of him for it when we were young," he shook his head and grinned, "but you should have seen the way his eyes lit up every time he heard the old tales and songs."

"I…I'd like to learn them one day," Elrond said in the silence that followed and Celeborn smiled, turning to meet his eyes.

"I can teach you if you'd like," Celeborn said quietly, "although I'd never wish to impose. To tell you the truth, I've been afraid to offer. I never learned all of that business very well and I haven't half the singing voice my brother had, or your great, great grandmother," he laughed softly, "but of course Lúthien could never be matched in anything. I was too busy playing at axes, and knives, and pretending I was some great captain to learn any of the things that really mattered and now that they are gone all that is left for me is regret."

But there's no one else to teach me, Elrond thought.

"But I suppose I'm the only one left," Celeborn said with a smile, echoing Elrond's thoughts. His green eyes were filled with that strange, mysterious merriment again.

Elrond nodded. "I would appreciate it," he said.

"Well then you're going to have to learn to be less tense," Celeborn said. "Here." With a broad grin he thrust the cup into Elrond's hands.

"What is it?" Elrond asked, trying to keep the distaste from his voice.

"Medicine," Celeborn said with a chuckle.

"It's whiskey," Elrond said with a grimace as he took a whiff that made his eyes water.

"Exactly what I said," Celeborn laughed. "Medicine." Elrond thought about saying that whiskey wasn't medicine but he decided Celeborn would take that as him being too tense so he took a small drink, choking on the fiery liquid as it burned its way down his throat.

"See, you're learning," Celeborn quipped and Elrond grinned, his heart feeling a good bit lighter, but he wasn't sure if that was because of the whiskey or because of what Celeborn had said.

"What did you mean," he asked, "when you said I don't take myself seriously? Everyone always says I'm too serious." He took another drink of the whiskey, almost certain now that this boldness was the alcohol working on him.

"You are uncommonly serious," Celeborn mused with a nod, "but you don't take yourself seriously. You're always caught up in what others think of you and you think too little about what you think of yourself."

"I think I'm not worthy of my heritage," Elrond said. There. It was out at last. The silence lingered and Celeborn took the cup back and drank.

"You've doubtlessly heard the things people say about me," the recently deposed Lord said with a little laugh, as if he thought the things people said about him were amusing rather than demeaning, "that I'm rude, disrespectful, crass, crude, primitive, that my temper is out of control, that Celebrimbor flirted with my wife beneath my nose, that I don't deserve her."

Elrond nodded numbly, ashamed to admit he had heard such things although of course everyone had. "It doesn't get to you?" He asked.

"It used to," Celeborn said, "when I was young, but not anymore."

"How?" Elrond asked.

"I remember something Thingol said when I got all upset about the things Fëanor's sons used to say about him," Celeborn said with a grin. "'Celeborn,' he said, 'I am the king of Doriath and so whatever I want to be is what the king of Doriath is. What they say doesn't matter.'" He paused. "So they can say that I don't deserve my wife but I am her husband. And they can say I don't act like a prince but I am a prince. And you are Thingol's heir, no matter what you think Thingol's heir should be. It isn't something you earn. It's something you are. Be who you are. Make the role fit you. Don't try to make yourself fit it."

Elrond nodded, feeling like maybe, for the first time, he was beginning to understand. "But I do want to learn the old songs, and the old stories, and the culture and history of our people," Elrond said, turning to look at the older elf and Celeborn studied him for a moment, his eyes oddly piercing and keen. Our people, he had said: our people.

"Then I will teach you," Celeborn replied, "but just because you don't know them doesn't mean you're not worthy.

"I feel like I'm always torn between them," Elrond said with a small laugh, his heart actually feeling lighter now, "between Sindar, and Noldor, and Men, like I have to choose one."

Celeborn laughed and took a long drink from the cup before handing it to Elrond. "Finish it," he said and Elrond did. It didn't burn so bad this time. In fact, he almost liked it.

"If you met my daughter I think you would get along quite well," Celeborn said with a smile. "She often struggles with the same matter, feeling ever torn between her mother's people and mine. Always feeling like she has to prove herself to everyone, always feeling the sting of prejudice because she doesn't look like a Noldo. She tried to dye her hair once but the dye didn't quite take and then she was screaming, and cursing, and crying…blaming me." It was rather a personal story to relate but Celeborn grinned and then chuckled. "The hair isn't the only thing she inherited from me. She has the temper too," he said with a conspiratory wink.

"Is that so?" Elrond grinned. He'd heard the stories about Celebrían - that she drank grown men under the table, that she had wicked skill with a knife, and, of course, that she was fabulously beautiful. Just because Galadriel was a proper lady now people liked to act like Celebrían's antics were all due to Celeborn's faults. But, Gil-galad had regaled Elrond one drunken night with tales passed down from the Lady's Noldorin relatives about how in her youth in Valinor Galadriel had wrestled with the boys and gotten in more than a few fistfights so Elrond suspected that Galadriel had had her part after all in raising such a wild daughter.

"Perhaps one day your children will find themselves asking the same questions," Celeborn said with a twinkle in his eye and Elrond nodded.

"Perhaps," he said, yawning, feeling oddly at peace, beginning to think he ought to sleep soon. "You were right," he said, raising the empty glass. "It is medicine."

Celeborn laughed, a rich booming sound so loud it could never possibly have been false. "I'm glad it has healed you then," he said.

"But who will heal you?" Elrond asked, one last question born of the whiskey's courage. It was then that Elrond could see that though the lord had spoken of rebuilding, of healing, the scars in his soul ran so deeply that Elrond could hardly fathom them, much less cure them. He has already had to rebuild so many times, he thought.

Celeborn looked pensive for a moment and then said, "I imagine that when spring comes again I shall walk out into the forests, beneath boughs hanging heavy with honeysuckle, and magnolias, and dogwood blossoms unfurled, feeling the coolness of moss beneath my feet, the warmth of the earth, the smell of springtime." And Elrond wondered that an elf whom he had only recently crush an orc's windpipe with his bare hands could now speak of the scent of honeysuckle and the leaves of trees in the spring. "Perhaps," Celeborn said with a small smile, "I shall encounter Galadriel there, or later maybe, in the depths of autumn."

It was a cryptic answer and Elrond took it as a sign that Celeborn wished to be alone now so he rose and took his leave, saying, "I think I'll turn in. It was a hard ride today." And he did feel tired as he began the trek back to his tent, but he also felt strangely content, strangely hopeful, and in the corner of his mind was nagging curiosity over whether Celebrían would come to visit her father…if she really would understand as Celeborn had said she would.

"Until tomorrow then, the songs!" Celeborn called and Elrond grinned with a thankful nod before continuing his trek. Celeborn watched the younger elf make his way back down the steep path to the lantern-lit tents below with a smile on his face.

You scheming, conniving, wretched…

Good evening my love, he spoke to his wife in his mind, grinning at her obvious displeasure.

It isn't funny, Celeborn! Galadriel hissed. He's too delicate for her!

Oh I think they'd make a fine match, Celeborn mused, there's more mettle to him than he lets on. Besides, she's nearly a thousand now. You just don't like the idea of her growing up and moving away.

She's all I've had for the past 300 years! Galadriel exclaimed and then went silent. I…I haven't seen you, even in his mind her voice sounded frail now, as if she was near the verge of tears, since that day we were deposed by Sauron and Celebrimbor. He remembered that night well, how he had sent Galadriel and Celebrían alone on a mad dash to refuge through Moria and into Lórien, hoping they would make it to safety in time, knowing the soldiers were already coming to arrest him. It was the only time he had ever seen Galadriel beg. It was the only time he had ever prayed.

"Celeborn they'll kill you!" She had been near hysteria. Celebrían had been sobbing too hard to say a word.

"Not if I play my cards right." But his heart had been thundering in his chest, his throat drier than the desert. "Amdir owes me his allegiance. He will give you refuge in Lórien."

"The Silvan elves hate me! They hate my people!" Her hands were shaking so badly she could hardly hold the reins.

"When they see Celebrían they will know whose daughter she is! They may hate the Noldor but they will harbor you for her sake, for mine." A desperate whisper.

"I don't want to leave you…"

"Ada! No! Ada!" Celebrian was crying, reaching for him.

"Galadriel you must!" The memory lay heavy upon both their minds and Celeborn clasped his hands together, still shaken by it after all this time. They dwelled for a moment in the silence, thoughts running together and over one another like a confluence of waters slipping over stones in a stream. It was Galadriel who broke the silence.

…Celeborn…I need you… It wasn't often that she admitted that.

Come to me, he whispered in his mind, his words filled with the hollow ache of wanting. Come to me in the spring. Walk with me beneath the plum blossoms and beside the river. I have nearly forgotten your smile, your eyes, the touch of your hand.

The ring…it has changed me… she began.

Damn the ring! He interrupted before she could finish. I don't care about the ring. Do you think this war hasn't changed me as the ring has changed you? Do you think I don't still love you?

I wasn't sure… She said, but the hints of doubt in her voice were dissipating.

Come to me, he implored her again and she paused for a while before she answered but, when she did, he was relieved to hear the roundness of happiness in her voice and knew she was smiling.

How can I refuse you when you sound as if you will die without me? She said, wily thing; he still didn't have his answer.

I will die without you, Galadriel. Every moment I am without you is a desolate eternity. Every time I think I've caught a whiff of your perfume only to turn and find you are not there I think I will crumble to dust. Every night I pass alone, every morning I wake and find that you are not beside me is anathema.

That's macabre, Celeborn, she said, but he could hear the coy lilt in her voice. He knew she liked when he talked to her like that, when he let the desperation of love bleed through to her, not that he would ever let anyone else hear him say those things. He had an image to maintain after all, that of a very surly and disgruntled elf who tore out orcs' hearts with his bare hands and turned over banquet tables. He couldn't let people know what a lovesick fool he turned into around Galadriel.

Will you come? He entreated her a third time.

I will, she said and he breathed a sigh of relief, but only if you promise you'll whisper all of those sweet things in my ear every night.

I'll say them a thousand times, he said, and then a thousand more.

Then I will come to you, she said, I'll come.