Happy holidays!

Chapter 27

Three days later, the sound of hooves once more raced to my window and there were voices too, and cheerful calls. I rose at once and went to the window, and the great relief that washed through me brought my shoulders down and a broad smile to my face.

Elladan was swinging off his horse, black hair gleaming in the sunlight, and he looked unharmed. And there was Elrohir, still ahorse but giving orders with ease, and if he were in any way wounded it did not show.

Many were gathered in the courtyard as I came there and luggage and weapons were being carried off.

"Father!" Elladan spied me on the stairs and he came to greet me. His boots were dusty and his breeches were worn and soiled around the knees.

I caught him in a fierce embrace and only afterwards looked into his face. He was smiling.

"Are you returned unscathed?"

"Aye," he said. "And Elrohir, too." He threw a glance over his shoulder at his twin. "But many orcs we have slain and burned."

But now Elrohir was joining us and though there was a smudge of something dark on his cheek it appeared Elladan had spoken truthfully.

"See, father," he grinned, "here we are, ere Midsummer. As was your command."

"I see that and I am glad," I told him, and embraced him long. "Stay a while, will you not?"

They exchanged a look and just when I thought they had returned only to leave me again, Elladan nodded.

"We will," he said. "For Aragost's rule remains mostly unthreatened. This time, our paths took us rather nearer to the roots of the Mountains than into open fields."

I eyed him closely, recalling the mutterings of the dwarves ere they hurried off. Precious little had I learnt from them, though it was not for lack of trying. "You went into the Mountains?"

"Not underground, father," said Elrohir, and visibly shuddered. "I have no desire to see their feet. But we traced their ankles, you might say. And there we found many cracks in the rock, and empty hollows, before we at last came upon a band of goblins, hewing down trees and scarring the stone. No longer do their cruel blades sing in that place."

"We will speak more of this," I said. "It seems to me that many strange tales come out of the Misty Mountains these days."

"You have heard of it, then?" said Elladan.

"Of what?"

A line appeared between his dark brows. "Something moves beneath the rock," he said quietly. "I could never name it for we have not seen it. But there are whispers in the cracks and crevices of something new… Something…" He visibly searched for words. "Something… unlooked for."

"I do not like the sound of this," I told him. "And we shall compare stories and trace the rumours. But not now."

I flexed my fingers, felt Vilya like a buzzing band against my skin, and though it was a vision hidden even to me, I could sense the golden haze that lay around my Valley and kept us safe.

"Come," I said. "There are others who will wish to greet you." Then I drew a deep breath. "And there is a matter of a different nature I would like to speak of with you as well."

But ere I had got much further, Elladan's eyes fastened on something behind me and he grinned.

"Glorfindel!" he cried. "I see you are awake."

My Captain's laugh sped down the stairs to fall around us.

"Aye," I heard him say, and then he was by my side, and in the sunlight greeted my sons with firm embraces. "Survived, have you?"

"We have," grinned Elrohir, as brightly as his brother, "and with great valour as well."

"I severely doubt it," said Glorfindel.

"We have plenty of tales to tell," said Elladan, and his grey eyes glimmered. "And you may tell yours in turn: of how you have perfected the buttering of bread or the sorting of my father's scrolls in the library. Or any such deeds of valour as you have accomplished of late."

"Go!" cried Glorfindel, but he was laughing. "Now that I have looked upon your faces I am ready to see your backs again."

"Nay," said I, with a firm shake of my head, "you shall not chase them away so soon. I forbid it."

"As you command, Elrond," he said, with a bow of his head and a smile. "But I fear I shall suffer for it."

"You have known worse," I smiled at him.

"I was younger then."

"Father…"

Elrohir was looking around the courtyard. Their horses had been led away and those of my household that had come out to see them return were now drifting off.

"Where is our sister?" His eyes fixed on mine. "And Legolas? Do not tell us he has left for we looked forward to seeing him again."

"He has not left," I said, and there rose in my breast a sudden nervousness.

"I last saw them in the gardens," said Glorfindel, and half a glance skidded my way. "Great friends Arwen and Legolas have become."

"Have they so?" said Elrohir, and he exchanged a new look with Elladan.

I saw in their faces the first stirring of surprise, and there came into their eyes questions of a kind that had no answers. I would have to speak soon, I knew, else they would spin of this such a tale as had no grain of truth in it whatsoever. But I was given no chance to right this potential wrong for once again their attention was diverted and Elladan raised a hand in greeting.

They left us to speed up the stairs and when I turned I saw that Arwen stood in the archway that opened onto the balcony which led around the house and Legolas was beside her. In that moment, it was as if I saw them with other eyes and they appeared to me like a couple. Like Thingol he stood, though his hair was of gold rather than silver, and Arwen, her hair flowing like midnight and her eyes like the stars, was Melian by his side, and they were a King and his Queen.

Then the vision was gone and they were again my daughter and my lover, and they were greeting Elladan and Elrohir with many smiles.

"Elrond?" Glorfindel's eyes were on me and concern churned in them.

I shook myself, indeed, forced myself to feel again the stone step under my feet and the warm rays of the sun on my back.

"How do I do this?" I asked him. "I fear I come poorly prepared to meet this challenge for it is one I never expected."

But Glorfindel smiled softly. "Yet sweeter than most, I think."

"It is so," I admitted. "Yet frightening."

"Yet worth it?"

That drew a smile from me as well. "Aye."

Then he was serious and his blue eyes sharpened on me. "Tell them, Elrond. Let them know what is in your heart and do it swiftly. Send then word to Thranduil. Or, better yet, go thither with Legolas and speak with him directly. And I will go with you, it you so wish, and stand between you and the Elvenking, and he can take his rage out on me."

"You will not duel Thranduil in his own halls on my behalf," I told him, but the edge in his eye would not be blunted.

"Nor will I see you attempt to hide your love beneath the webs of secrecy. It does you no good," he said sternly. "Nay, I say to you: bring out your horse and face your fears. For you have proven a poor keeper of this particular secret, Elrond, and soon enough rumours will spread, even to the tangled branches and mouldy leaves of Taur-nu-Fuin."

"No doubt you are right," I sighed. "And it is better that he should hear it from me."

"Indeed," he said, "especially if…" He hesitated and some of the sharpness melted from his eyes as he beheld me. His voice, when he continued, had softened considerably. "Especially if you intend to lay a claim on Legolas… And name him unto yourself."

Unbidden, memories of my last conversation with Thranduil resurfaced in my mind. "If he could consent to a life here… though it will be different from that which he has always known in the Forest," I said slowly. "If he will have me."

"Elrond…" He shook his head and finally he smiled. "I am beginning to think that Legolas has been yours since he first laid eyes on you."

I looked to my children and Legolas, still deep in converse under the arch around which a honeysuckle had twined its slender branches.

"Then you read him better than I did, in the beginning," I admitted.

But Glorfindel laughed. "Nay, I did not," he said, "but I will not argue the point for I do not mind being framed as one perceptive. But no, too easy it is to view the past in the light of the present."

"It was ever so," said I.

"And ever shall be. Therefore, you must now cast off the dark shrouds of the past and instead consider the future," he said firmly. "Come, let us go to them and I will watch you pretend for a while longer yet that your heart does not take flight for the heavens before the face of Legolas."

And before I could defend myself, he was ahead of me, climbing the steps with great haste. We joined them in the archway and I knew no mercy for Legolas' eyes immediately fixed on my face and the light in them caused a swirl of longing to rise through my chest. His smile was soft and I wished I could kiss him. But keen were the eyes of my sons and so, with great effort, I turned my face away and looked instead to them.

"Have you now boasted of all your feats?" I asked.

"Not all of them," grinned Elrohir. "For Glorfindel was not here to listen."

"Ah, once upon a time I knew peace and quiet," said Arwen, and there was a wry twist to her lips. "Indeed, as I think back, it was only this morning."

"Legolas, have you not entertained our sister with stories of battle against the wicked creatures in Mirkwood?" said Elladan. "That is disappointing."

"I have not," said he, but there came into his eyes a merry gleam. "But had I known, my lady, that such talk pleases you, I certainly would have."

"You are becoming just as terrible," she informed him. "Father, I beg of you: send my brothers to the bathing chamber for they smell and take Legolas with you to your study and fill his head with other things."

"The study?" Elrohir shook his dark head. "That sounds awful. Is that the fate you would condemn him to, sister? You should know," he then said to Legolas, "that it is said that all who enter father's study come out weary and aged, and they have lost all will to ever set arrow to bowstring again."

"Is that how you see me?" I asked him, raising an eyebrow.

"Yes," he said, but his eyes glittered cheerfully. "But you are my father and Lord and so I suppose that is how it should be. But Legolas here I think has not asked for that."

"I have not seen it," said Legolas, and his eyes glittered, too, when they met mine, but it was less of glee and more of something which ran much deeper and which burst my heart fully open. "Truly, my lord, I have not seen it in you."

My hands burned, I was sure, for to reach for him and pull him close.

"Then I am glad," I told him. "And you," I said to Elrohir, "shall indeed take your brother with you to the bathing chambers. You may clean your mouth as well as your hair."

But while Glorfindel laughed, Elladan looked first to me and then to Arwen and lastly to Legolas.

"Many riddles I perceive here," he said slowly. "But we shall solve them ere long. Come, brother, let us find water."

And as I watched them go, I knew he had spoken truthfully.

TBC