We Can Make It If We Run

Chapter 3: Lights in the Fountain

Part Two

Okay, so a few things that I've got to say before we can get to the story. Firstly, I am not a doctor and have no medical expertise beyond having watched a lot of House. I'm assuming that warm water would act to increase circulation, which is a good thing (you'll see what I mean in this chapter). I may be wrong about this, so take any medical parts in this story with a pinch of salt. It's fantasy, people, it's fine.

Secondly, apologies if this is late for you! I was out babysitting and couldn't find the wifi code, so only just got internet back. And thirdly, the discussion that happens between Belhadron's parents, Belhadron and Rhavaniel is slightly based on the discussions that can happen around my family dinner table. My dad and my sister will occasionally launch into heated discussions over politics/current events, whilst my mum and I sit there and try to mediate so nobody ends up shouting too loudly or saying something stupid. It's quite a hard thing to do- normally I just don't say anything and let them run their course. So whilst my parents are definitely not as estranged from me as Belhadron's parents are from him, the discussion/argument in this chapter is based a little on my family.

As always, reviews are very welcome.

0-o-0-o-0

It was dark, the rain still falling, when they finally reached Belhadron's family home. Belhadron rode straight into the courtyard and all the way up to the front door, which was flung open at the sound of hooves outside. Warm light spilt out from the doorway, and Rhavaniel winced at the sudden brightness.

Belhadron quickly vaulted from his mare and moved to Rhavaniel, reaching up to offer her a hand. Rhavaniel, who was now shivering constantly and swaying slightly with each throb of pain from her arm, took the hand and let him catch her as she slid from her horse. She stumbled slightly as her arm was jarred, and Belhadron wrapped a solid arm around her waist for a few moments, supporting her until her feet came underneath her. It was only once she shook him off, turning to her gelding to get the first of their bags, that Belhadron then turned to the figure silhouetted in the light from the doorway.

"Mother," he said in greetings, and allowed himself to be pulled forwards into a brief embrace. "How are you?"

"I think it is more apt for me to ask you that," Belhadron's mother replied, standing back and looking up at her son. Rhavaniel stepped forwards with a bag over her shoulder, and Belhadron's mother greeted her with a kiss to the cheek. "Come inside, dear, you're soaked through," she said. "Your father will deal with the horses," she continued, looking over to Belhadron. "Come inside before I pull you in by force."

A fire was burning in the hearth inside, and Rhavaniel stopped in front of it to see if the flames could push out the chill that seemed to have settled into her bones. She almost jumped when Belhadron's hand landed on her shoulder, and Belhadron noticed. He didn't say anything at first, merely untying first his cloak, and then Rhavaniel's, and hanging them in front of the fire.

"How is your arm?" he asked abruptly as Rhavaniel shivered again, her teeth clenched to prevent any sound slipping past her lips. "Can I look at it?"

"Because you have such comprehensive healing knowledge," Rhavaniel muttered. She saw Belhadron's expression crumple slightly, and she sighed. "Sorry, that was unfair," she said softly. She gripped his shoulder in apology, and shrugged out of her sling. "Have a look at it. You've been paying enough attention to the healers for the past month or so to know what you're looking for."

Belhadron huffed a soft laugh, and Rhavaniel relaxed, knowing it meant he'd accepted her apology. He gently took her arm and began to undo the bandages. "Your arm is freezing," he muttered as he turned it over, checking the scabs now healing into scars, the cobweb of red raised lines that cut deep into her flesh, ever so slowly fading into white. "I'm going to assume that it's not good for it to be this cold, so we should probably do something about that."

Rhavaniel watched, slightly apprehensive, as Belhadron heated a kettle over the fire and filled a large, shallow bowl with water. He seemed slightly out of place in the house, having to turn to his mother to ask where she'd put the spare linen or the bowl he needed, and Rhavaniel found herself wondering how long it had been since he'd last returned home.

His mother sat at the other side of the table as Rhavaniel sat, and gingerly placed her arm in the warm water. At the sudden heat she nearly whimpered, her arm screaming in pain. Belhadron grabbed her shoulder, his fingers digging into her and keeping her from curling up over the bowl of water. "I know," he murmured. "I know it's painful, but it's the better option."

"Obviously," Rhavaniel muttered through gritted teeth. Belhadron merely snorted in amusement, and steadied the bowl of water as Rhavaniel's arm hand spasmed and shook.

Rhavaniel bit back another moan as pain clawed up from her hand to her chest, her hair falling across her face as she bit her lip, and Belhadron took his hand from her shoulder to offer it to her, palm out, on the table. Rhavaniel paused, and then reached for his hand, gripping it tightly enough for his fingers to turn white. He didn't say anything, just took her hand and gripped it back until the worst of the pain had passed. Finally she slumped down into a chair, resting her arm in the water, and let go of Belhadron's hand.

"I still have all my fingers," he said with a wry grin as he flexed them. "Don't worry about it."

Rhavaniel hissed a laugh through her teeth, gingerly stretching out her fingers, and then curling them as much as she could. Her fourth and fifth fingers barely straightened, and then only curled a little. Rhavaniel frowned at them in displeasure. It would be a lot easier if she could just will her broken and twisted body to do what she wanted it to do, regardless of the damage deep within.

Belhadron's father came inside, shaking the droplets of rain from his cloak, and for the next little while the room was filled with talk, harmless talk between Belhadron and his parents of the news he had missed since he'd last visited, the idle gossip that sprung up out of the barest whispers, wells in what looked like dry land to one who didn't know the terrain. Rhavaniel stayed seated at the table, slowly clenching and unclenching her hand, and she watched, and she listened.

Belhadron was at ease with them, on the surface, but she didn't miss how he tensed slightly when his mother occasionally paused, waiting for a different type of question to the one she would eventually ask each time. She didn't miss how his father hovered, not quite sure how best to talk to his own son. Rhavaniel wondered whether she would have been like this, with her parents. But then she'd never had any siblings to lose, and her parents had understood the necessity of sacrifice.

Belhadron's hand brushed hers, and Rhavaniel looked over at him, leaning back in the chair next to her, his other hand idly flipping his short knife between his fingers. She was almost sure he was doing that on purpose, to antagonise his parents or provoke them into speaking what she and Belhadron could both see they were thinking, beneath the small talk and gazes that pointedly avoided her ruined arm.

Dinner was put on the table, and Rhavaniel resigned herself to eating far slower than usual, her left hand unused to doing everything and her right barely able to hold a knife. Belhadron arched an eyebrow at her, but didn't offer to help until she nodded with a resigned sigh, and then he leant over with his own knife.

"How did that happen?" asked Belhadron's father, sat opposite her and toying with his cutlery. Rhavaniel knew, of course, what he was talking about. Beside her, she saw Belhadron tense out of the corner of her eye.

"I was in the wrong place, at the wrong time," she replied simply. "When the tide of the battle turned, I was close to the middle of the valley, in the midst of the fighting, and I was caught in the riptide." Belhadron's parents offered murmured condolences, and Rhavaniel nodded in thanks. "There's little I can do about it now. I am lucky, compared to others."

Belhadron's jaw worked, and his head briefly bowed. "Do you remember Thenidon?" he asked his parents. "One of the other captains. He stayed here once, when he was travelling up north and the weather became too bad to ride. It was only about a century ago, I think."

His mother nodded first. "Yes," she mused. "He has a wife, doesn't he?"

"Had," Belhadron said, his voice falling flat in the room. "He died outside Erebor."

"I'm sorry to hear that," his father replied smoothly, a frown creasing his brow. He paused, weighing his next words. "How many were lost?"

Both Rhavaniel and Belhadron paused, looking at each other for a moment. "Surely you have seen the official statement?" Belhadron asked. "We wrote it pretty much as soon as we got back and took stock of everything, and it was sent out three weeks ago, including the number of the dead. Adar, you must have read it."

"We've read it, and heard it from others as well," his mother replied. "But you and I both know that those statements are little more than a carefully written front. What actually happened?"

Belhadron sighed, and then began to tell a brief tale of what had happened since they'd left the realm. Rhavaniel mostly stayed silent, only filling in when Belhadron's knowledge didn't extend to the larger situation. For the most part she watched his parents, cataloguing their reactions to each event as Belhadron told them. They didn't like the fact that Thranduil had marched to Erebor in the first place, and their dislike of his actions only seemed to deepen, if Rhavaniel was reading them correctly, as Belhadron recounted their alliance with Bard, the siege of Erebor.

His mother caught Rhavaniel's gaze a few times, but Rhavaniel had been playing the game for a very long time, and it was second nature to her now to curtail her expression, make it look as if she was only paying a little attention to them. She flexed her hand, the ruined fingers twitching, and winced slightly at the throb of pain that it caused.

Belhadron finally trailed off, skipping quickly over the aftermath of the battle and the journey home. He slipped his hands into his lap, and Rhavaniel quietly reached for one, squeezing it in reassurance. She was lucky, in that her memories of the aftermath of the battle had been left foggy and muted by pain and fever. Belhadron had been mostly unharmed.

"Were you hurt?" his father asked abruptly, his gaze fixed on his son. Belhadron shrugged slightly, the barest of wry smiles tugging at his lips.

"A little," he replied. "But then I don't think anyone walked away totally unharmed. When I was hunting down some of the orcs with Legolas and our impromptu company I was knocked out, but only for a few minutes." He shrugged again. "Wrong place at the wrong time. It just happened to be a better time and place than Rhavaniel's."

Rhavaniel huffed a laugh at that, which put a real smile on Belhadron's face for a few moments. His mother studied Rhavaniel for a second, before her gaze flickered away. "So why did the King ride for Erebor in the first place, if he was not intending to head for Esgaroth when you set out?"

Belhadron shook his head, his fork toying slightly with the food on his plate. "We thought the Dwarves were dead. I cannot speak for Thranduil's motivations, but Legolas did think, when I asked, that it was more than just treasure."

"And that marched you straight into trouble," his mother replied. "The King should have stayed out of it."

"We all knew there was something more," Rhavaniel said quietly, clumsily tearing off a piece of bread with one hand and popping it in her mouth. "We could all see the clouds gathering. I don't think that any of us were unaware of the risks we were taking."

"Maybe so, but you still didn't know that the orcs would be coming," Belhadron's father pointed out. "And that cost lives."

"You do not need to remind us of that," Belhadron shot back quickly, his voice slowly growing colder. "We were there. We saw it happen."

His mother frowned, watching her son from across the table with surprisingly sharp eyes. Rhavaniel watched Belhadron out of the corner of her eye, and she subtly pressed her leg against his, a wordless reassurance and a message to not get annoyed too quickly and say something that went too far. After a few seconds Belhadron's mother sat back.

"Regardless," she said. "I think it's a little worrying how involved the King seems to be in outside affairs. This strengthened alliance with Esgaroth is bad enough, but the Dwarves as well? That is worrying."

Belhadron raised one eyebrow, and Rhavaniel felt inclined to copy the slightly incredulous look on his face, even if she didn't and remained quiet, watching carefully. "That alliance is with Bard, not Esgaroth," Belhadron pointed out. "And will be with Dale once it is rebuilt. And we had a cordial enough relationship with the Dwarves before Smaug came anyway. This alliance will strengthen the eastern areas of Rhovanion considerably, and by that extent, our own realm."

His father shook his head. "Why should we get involved?" he asked. "We do not owe anything to this Bowman. For centuries we have looked after our own affairs before looking to any other realm. We should not suddenly change that because a dragon is dead."

"I do not know how old you are, Rhavaniel," Belhadron's mother said. "But you cannot be old enough to remember the years after the Last Alliance, am I correct?" Rhavaniel dipped her head in a nod.

"Neither are you," Belhadron pointed out.

"My mother was, and most of her family," his mother replied smoothly. "And they returned from war with two thirds of the army, their friends, dead. That is what happened the last time we got involved in things outside of our own realm. And I'm not saying we shouldn't have been involved then, but perhaps we could remember the lesson we learnt from that. We protect what is ours before looking to help others protect theirs."

"Forces beyond our realm are moving," Rhavaniel said softly. "If we do not look beyond our borders, then how can we be ready when they strike?"

"And will they strike?"

Rhavaniel tilted her head, and shrugged slightly. "Ask some, and they would say they already did. But what happened outside Erebor was merely the beginning."

"That is what we all think," Belhadron added. "From all the information we've been gathering, from all that we have seen, we think that we have only just started. More will come before this Age ends."

"But still, becoming so involved could be damaging to us," Belhadron's mother pressed. "We should be concerned over our affairs, our problems. You don't see the problem here, Belhadron. The system is already damaged. It doesn't work, not perfectly-"

"Which you would of course know, because you have been so involved with it for the past centuries," Belhadron snapped, eyes narrowed. "You don't know how it works anymore. You've been out for too long."

"We still have friends," his father interjected. "And we listen. The point your mother would have made, if you hadn't interrupted her, is that the system does not work perfectly, and forcing us, forcing you and your companies and some of our strength to look out beyond our own interests and our own values that need protecting, that could damage it further, to the point where we are weakened."

Belhadron scoffed. "And if we hide behind our borders, the world might fall to ruin around us without us even noticing!"

"You're being dramatic," Belhadron's mother said sternly. "We may have been out of the system for a long time now, but we still know how it works. And the world will not fall to ruin if we focus on protecting ourselves first."

"Won't it?" Belhadron bit out, a cold edge to his voice. "We've been blind to plenty of things before, and they will come back to catch us sooner or later."

"Events in Gondor or Eriador do not concern us," his father said, resting his arms on the table. "They have not concerned us for thousands of years."

Belhadron, judging from the way he suddenly bit his cheek, was holding back a curse. He put his fork down with a clatter. "Not everything is hundreds of miles away. There's so much that you don't know, or that you can't understand because you're not there. You don't see the grim picture we have to keep a handle on, because nobody else can do that job. So you can't say anything to us, anything at all, about what we need to do. You don't know. You aren't there."

"We are a larger part of the world," Rhavaniel added. "Whether we want to be or not."

His parents still looked sceptical, as if they didn't quite want to believe him, and Belhadron pushed his plate away with a shove. It clattered across the table. Rhavaniel reached out and caught the knife before it rolled off the side and fell to the floor.

"You have no idea what we do, or what we know," Belhadron hissed. "Do you even know who the Nec-"

Rhavaniel cut him off with a hand on his arm. "Not the time, or the place," she murmured, her voice stern even though it was only a little more than a whisper. "Also, that one is a state secret."

Belhadron looked like he was going to argue for a moment, but then ducked his head in a short nod. For the rest of the dinner he hardly said anything, and even Rhavaniel's well-skilled diplomacy only just kept a conversation going. Beneath the table Belhadron's hands were shaking slightly, his gaze becoming just a little distant, and Rhavaniel watched carefully until he let out a breath, and slipped his hand into hers.

0-o-0-o-0

Rhavaniel paused, listening. She was in her room for the night, attempting to get undressed with only one functioning hand, but even in the relative safety of this house, even injured and near useless, she could not help but be alert. Some part of her was always scanning for the next danger, the next threat, and the voices in the kitchen had caught her attention.

She heard Belhadron's mother first. "It's such a shame, what happened to Rhavaniel," she said amongst the clatter of plates on the side. "Will she step down from her position as captain?"

There was a pause, and then Belhadron's low voice. "I don't know if she has thought about it," he replied. "We haven't talked about it yet. I don't think she would want to give up her captaincy, but I suppose we'll have to wait and see how well her arm heals."

"And what about you?"

Rhavaniel winced slightly at the steel tone in Belhadron's mother's voice. There was the sound of clattering plates again, and then Belhadron answered.

"I don't know what you mean," he said slowly.

"You know exactly what I mean," his mother replied. "I've seen that look on other's faces before. For how much longer are you going to let the system, let the King, take pieces of you that you won't ever get back?"

"You have no idea what you're talking about," Belhadron snapped. "I'm not losing anything."

"You could get out," his mother said, the faintest bit of pleading in her voice. "You could walk away. Haven't you given enough? Haven't you given far too much already? After everything you've just been through, there would be no shame in walking away."

"No," Belhadron said firmly. "Not for anything. I could never abandon Legolas like that."

Rhavaniel heard a sigh from his mother. "That Prince," she muttered. There was a pause. "You do know that you don't owe him anything at all?"

There was a sharp clash, as if Belhadron had slammed a plate down. "I owe him everything," he replied sharply. "He has saved my life in more ways than you could know. I've done the same for him. He is my commander, my friend, my brother in all but blood." For a moment, Rhavaniel thought he would add family to that description, like he did when talking to others about Legolas and her and the other captains, but that blow would be too harsh, and Belhadron had enough sense to refrain from adding that final word.

"And one day," his mother snapped in reply, her voice growing heated. "One day, that Prince will be the death of you."

Belhadron went silent for a long pause. Rhavaniel could imagine how he looked, the rare moments when his hot temper froze into ice and he stilled, furious.

"You are so blinded by your loyalty to that Prince that you'd follow him straight to your own death," his mother said, anger and desperation and contempt in her voice. "And the worst thing about it is that for him, you would walk into it gladly."

Rhavaniel openly winced, and then darted back to grab a handful of supplies from her bag in the room. She pushed the door open, loudly enough that they would hear it, and walked into the kitchen.

Belhadron was standing by the window, purposefully not looking at his mother as she watched him. They both turned around as she entered, and she held up the bandages and salve in her hand.

"I can't wrap a bandage on myself with only one good hand," she said, a wry smile on her face that fell soft as she saw the raw edges Belhadron was trying so hard to hide.

Belhadron swallowed, and then nodded. "Sit by the fire, so I can see what I'm doing," he said. Rhavaniel, for a moment, was impressed with how steady his voice was. She took a seat at the end of the table near the fire, her ruined arm resting out in front of her. In the orange light, the shiny red skin of the slowly healing wounds flickered, light dancing across the cobweb of scars.

Belhadron sat opposite her, reaching for the supplies she'd dumped on the table. His mother hovered, for a moment. "Do you need anything else for it?" she asked, nodding at Rhavaniel's arm.

Rhavaniel shook her head, when it became apparent that Belhadron wasn't going to answer. "Thank you, but we have all the supplies for tending to it," she replied. His mother nodded, and then left the room. Belhadron let out a breath.

"I take it you heard all that," he said, head bent low over her arm as he checked each wound, fingers light across the ruined skin. Rhavaniel nodded.

"I'm sorry," she offered. Belhadron huffed a laugh, and scooped some of the salve from the pot. He began to spread it over her arm and hand.

"It's nothing I haven't heard before," he replied. "But thank you."

"They can't see it in the same way anymore."

Belhadron looked up, eyebrows raised, and Rhavaniel elaborated. "Your parents," she said. "I think they became disillusioned with the system, as they call it, a long time ago, and they can no longer see it the way that we do. They resent the system for taking you away from them, for taking your brother even more permanently, and then because you are part of the system, they find themselves resenting you for it. And then of course you resent them back, and it all goes round and round." She shrugged, careful not to jolt her arm. "I think sometimes they feel they lost two sons, instead of just the one."

Belhadron stiffened. "As perceptive as always," he muttered, smoothing the last of the salve into her skin before reaching for the bandages. Rhavaniel studied him.

"I may be injured and useless, but I still know you," she said softly. "Do you want to get out?"

"No," Belhadron said shortly, pulling on the bandages around Rhavaniel's arm. Rhavaniel flexed her fingers as well as she could, the pain throbbing up to her elbow.

"Let me rephrase that," she said coolly. "Do you ever think about getting out?"

"No," Belhadron repeated again, his face shadowed where he turned away from the fire to best see Rhavaniel's arm in the light. Rhavaniel huffed a brief laugh.

"You're lying," she said easily. "I can tell that easily enough."

Belhadron looked up, catching her gaze. "What about you?" he asked. "Do you ever think about getting out?"

Rhavaniel shook her head. "No," she said. "I don't."

Belhadron looked at her for a long moment, and then suddenly laughed bitterly, the sound falling flat in the room. "You know, it's funny," he said. "I can't actually tell if you are lying or not."

Rhavaniel arched an eyebrow as Belhadron laughed bitterly again. "You know everything about me," he said. "You know exactly how to talk me down from nightmares, how to stop me getting angry enough to lose my temper. Out of everyone, only Legolas knows me better than you."

"Yes, I get your point," Rhavaniel said, trying not to snap at him. "I know you very well. What is your actual point?"

Belhadron gritted his teeth. "My actual point is that I can't tell if you're lying. I can't tell if you are coping or not. And sometimes I feel like you know everything about me, when I hardly know you at all."

He finished the bandage, tying it off at Rhavaniel's elbow, and stood up. His chair scraped against the stone floor with a screech. "We'll leave in the morning," he said abruptly. "Good night."

Rhavaniel watched him leave, stalking out through the kitchen door. She wondered if his parents had heard their argument, if it could be called that. She hoped that they hadn't, if only to stop them having more they could use against their son to try and keep him safe. Her arm throbbed, and she resisted itching it, just like she'd done for the past month now, ever since she'd come back home from Erebor with a ruined arm, a hollow ache in her chest and the feeling that the path had suddenly disappeared from beneath her feet.

So, the beginning of the angst. This is setting up for a big argument that's coming later, so you've got that to look forwards to! I'm working on other parts of this sequel now- Elladan and Elrohir, and Gandalf, in two separate oneshots. I'm also pretty excited because I'm going to go see Star Trek: Beyond tomorrow, which should be great fun!

Next week might be a little interesting- I'm away competing with my horse on Saturday, so we shall have to see what happens with regards to wifi, but I will try my best to put up the next chapter.

As always, reviews are very welcome.