hello everyone!
Thank you so much to all who are reading, following, favoriting and especially reviewing. REVIEWERS: you guys are a treasure, and how quickly this story is progressing and being posted isn't just for you, it is because of you. Thank you for sharing your time and thoughts with me.
RL is still wild - good wild, but time is so scarce now and I may need to go on an indefinite fanfic hiatus again soon (so much of my original work has been neglected by my distractions and I know I should be better about prioritizing monetizable activities, hahaha). But this story will be finished and is a matter of fact is almost fully written at the moment. I just hope the quality is still good :)
At any rate - C&C's are as welcome and treasured as always. Please feed the writer if you can and even if you couldn't, I sincerely hope you enjoy the reading as much as I enjoy the writing :) Thank you again, and I wish everyone a lovely weekend!
Without further ado:
# # #
19: Promises
# # #
Mirkwood, T.A. 2851
# # #
The bodies of the dead uruk-hai were left where they were, but Rochanar's sons were dragged to lie beside each other and arranged in dignified poses with their arms crossed at the chest and weapons in their hands. Muted prayers were murmured for them, before the group left them alone.
Silon's body on the other hand, Legolas had picked up himself. He adamantly refused any help in its handling. If the movement dealt his grievous wound a blow, Glorfindel couldn't tell for his fine face was set like marble. Legolas took the body in his arms and held it tightly in an embrace, and then climbed with it up a tree to settle amongst some of the branches. It was meagre protection from any wild beasts that would be lured in by the stench of corpses, but it was the best they could do for Silon in that moment.
Legolas emerged from the foliage bearing Silon's sword, and one of the warrior's braids that had been framing Silon's face. These were memorial keepsakes; they all knew there was a high likelihood that nothing much would be left of the body by the time they returned.
# # #
It wasn't so much a walk as it was a miserable trudge forward.
Of the children, no one was wholly healthy because each of them were in a spectrum of exhaustion, minor injury, and trauma. But only nine could ride and two had to walk, and that was simply how it had to be.
The halest amongst them were put to the task on rotation. But even the best of the bunch were exhausted, and the gods knew how long they have been walking with the abusive uruk-hai by now. The whole group was thus, slow going.
Legolas, Glorfindel and Istor each led a horse bearing an older child holding two smaller ones, while the two strongest children struggled along with the three of them. As for the elves, they were continuing on for the nth night without real rest, and none of them were at their best.
It was a bedraggled, pathetic procession indeed.
Legolas was at the head, leading one horse bearing three riders. Directly behind him was Glorfindel with his own lead and the two older children assigned to walk, and behind them was Istor with his own burden, holding the rear.
They moved forward quietly. When one of the children walking by Glorfindel faltered and his knees buckled, the ancient warlord caught him by the arm and slung it over his shoulder to support the exhausted youth moving forward. They barely broke stride, and Legolas determined at the head, barely glanced at them.
When the other child faltered too, the group finally took a moment of rest. Water skins were passed along and the horses were allowed to eat and drink. Even the elves sat on the ground.
"At least the sun is out," Istor said out of the blue, his mild tone and voice suddenly loud because everyone was still too tired or too stunned to talk much.
Glorfindel nodded in agreement; the sky was blue and bright, and the plains looked empty and safe, stirred by gentle winds. It was - not counting the devastation they had left behind them - an almost insufferably, perversely beautiful day.
Beside Glorfindel, Legolas was quiet, clasping his slightly trembling, scarred hands together as if conserving strength, even as his leg bounced slightly in restlessness. His eyes were still sharply focused and intense, but there were small creases of strain at their edges now, and around his tightly set mouth. He was pale too, and on his face was a sheen of sweat. He swiped at his forehead and eyes in annoyance.
"The bleeding's stopped?" Glorfindel asked him, faux-casually, for he remembered the last time he had tried to tend the ernil.
"You have forfeited any right to concern yourself with my well-being," Legolas had told him venomously, "You will not touch me..."
"Yes," Legolas replied stiffly, and he rose to his feet as if to illustrate so. Again, he swayed – he might not have been feeling pain, but his body was slowing down either way. But like before, he steadied himself. Glorfindel had reached for his elbow, but grasped at nothing but air.
"We need to leave," Legolas declared.
# # #
They reshuffled the children, so that two of those who had been on the horses would now do their turn walking. There would be no such relief for the three elves who simply had to trudge on.
Mid-morning stretched to high noon, and they did not stop. They knew they had to maximize both the extent of Legolas' waning strength, as well as the safer travel in daylight.
Glorfindel watched Legolas walk ahead of him, alert for any sign of distress. He watched with a pit in his stomach as the assured steps of the prince softened, around the same time as the glaring daylight overhead softened into the afternoon.
He walked apace with Legolas, then. He shifted the hold of the horse lead to his left hand, so that Legolas would be walking on his free, right side. Legolas did not glance his way.
When he stumbled and Glorfindel caught him by the elbow, he jerked off the ancient warlord's hold and steadied himself, walking onwards.
By the time the skies turned into the golden hour though, the prince was holding the horse he guided not by the rope, but with a palm to its side, borrowing some of its strength and at times, even leaning upon it.
He finally fell when the sun started setting.
Legolas' legs folded beneath him, such that he fell almost in the way of the horse's hooves. It neighed softly in disapproval and shifted away, protecting its riders but leaving Legolas to collapse on his side on the ground. He curled around himself and groaned quietly.
"Boy!" Glorfindel yelled as he threw the lead he was holding at one of the children walking beside him. The other child ran for the line that had slipped from Legolas' hands. Glorfindel then skidded to his knees at Legolas' side, and braced him at the shoulders as he tried to rise.
Legolas pushed the touch away. It was still unwanted. He couldn't seem to stand it, Glorfindel's touch and all that it meant – pity, sympathy, worry, apology?, love. He was still too angry from the loss of Silon, and Glorfindel knew he was still being blamed. He knew he was still unforgiven.
Glorfindel shifted to face him, and raised his hands up in surrender and appeasement, even as Legolas glared.
It was, however, a temporary rally. The elven prince turned away and he retched at the ground, on all fours. It was a small thing, but Glorfindel pulled his long golden hair away from his face, and this Legolas allowed, at least. That, or he did not notice it in his misery. He trembled uncontrollably, and from what Glorfindel could see of his lowered, shadowed face, he was gray and sweating, and his eyes were tearing and his nose ran as he emptied his stomach. Glorfindel glanced at the sickness on the grassy ground. There was no blood, to his relief. But this fall was only the beginning of a certain and steep decline.
Legolas continued to gag until there was nothing more to turn up, and initially his body tilted as if to lie on the ground, but he re-directed his weight and sat on his rump miserably instead. He wrapped his arms around his belly, drew his legs up, and lay his head over his knees.
Glorfindel, hesitantly, released Legolas' sweat-damp hair. His own stomach was twisted in knots too, in concern over the other's injury because he knew that not only was his help not wanted, whatever he could give was also not going to be enough. Rossenith's potion was wearing off, and Glorfindel did not know what else he could do for Legolas.
The elven prince shook, almost violently, for a long moment. But eventually he gathered control of his body, and it faded to a fine tremor. Only then did he lift his head, and he looked around him blearily, with fever-bright eyes. Everyone had fallen silent and still, in apprehensive waiting for him to settle. They were all done with death, and wondered if they would be dealt one more blow here and now - in the fields, beneath the raging sunset.
"It looks like Silon's hair," Legolas said quietly as he looked up at the horizon, as if noticing the time of day for the first time. Glorfindel's heart skipped a beat at Legolas' weary, dark-rimmed gaze. His eyes were so sunken they looked bruised.
"We're not far now," Glorfindel said in a clipped tone, because he was suddenly very, very afraid. "The settlers will have a healer of some sort. But we must go."
Legolas murmured something in Silvan, and Glorfindel did not understand it. His heart constricted at the other's drifting mind.
"Legolas," Glorfindel said, trying to keep his voice even. "We need to-"
"I know," Legolas hissed irritably, and as he unfolded himself, he pounded at the ground in pain and frustration. He grit his teeth, and made to move but ended up biting back a cry. His face blanched and crumpled, and he tilted right into Glorfindel's arms.
Still, he bucked as if burnt. And Glorfindel did not give up his hold, this time.
"I will help you rise," Glorfindel told him carefully, "and if need be, I will help you walk. I know you are still angry, and whether or not you have just cause to be is a conversation for another day. For now - I will help you, and you will accept it. It does not have to mean anything."
Legolas stared at him warily and his brows furrowed but after a long moment, he gave in: "It doesn't... mean... anything," he repeated slowly.
Glorfindel huffed out a breath in relief. He reached out to touch Legolas' scarred, icy palm, and he closed his eyes to share some of his strength and light.
Legolas gasped at the surge of power, but he would – could? – only accept so much. He was closed to Glorfindel, who was still unforgiven. You will not touch me, he had said, and in both his hroa and his fea, he had meant it.
Glorfindel wrapped his arm about the other elf instead, and lifted him to his feet, carefully. Legolas fell dizzied and panting against Glorfindel's chest, but with one arm about Glorfindel's shoulder and in locking his legs, he was upright and moveable again.
Glorfindel held onto him tightly, knowing they would now have to walk this way. He glanced back at the rest of their traveling party. The child he had thrown the lead to his horse still had it. The rope Legolas had dropped when he collapsed was taken over securely by the other. They were all as ready as they were going to be.
"We have it, my lord," one of them told him reassuringly.
They were young, tired, hurting and afraid. But their gazes were fiery and determined.
"Let's go home," said the other one.
# # #
Night fell.
The sun sank over the horizon and with the failing light, fell the last of Legolas' strength.
His legs all but vanished beneath him, and when they tangled heavily against each other, Glorfindel let the both of them fold to the ground in a controlled fall.
Legolas was breathing harshly, awake and in pain. But his brows were furrowed, and he kicked at the ground in frustration. His shoulders slumped, his chest heaved and his nose flared with exertion and sheer anger, anger at a will disproportionate to the abilities of his body. He exhaled a breath that sounded too much like a sob to Glorfindel's perceptive ear.
He reached out for Legolas' back tentatively to rub it. The younger elf squirmed away – a less fervent rejection than before, but Glorfindel reckoned it was probably only because he was weakening.
"Would another dose help you at all?" he asked urgently.
"Not... if I want... to live," Legolas replied hoarsely – his mouth was dry from breathing from hours on it. He coughed, and Glorfindel handed him his water skin. Legolas took it and drank just a sip or two before it made him feel ill and he shoved it away. He groaned and bit it back, but he held his stomach and lowered his head, hiding his face.
"Would it react poorly with any other medicine or herb, or perhaps - miruvor?" Glorfindel asked.
"Rossenith...does not allow it," Legolas replied, voice muffled from his lowered head.
Glorfindel sighed heavily, and he chewed his lip in thought. "What you are suffering now – is it from the stimulant fading, or from the wound becoming worse?"
"I don't know," Legolas mumbled, unhelpfully.
"You've had Rossenith's potion before, yes?" Glorfindel pressed. "You said coming off of it is misery. Is this that misery or is the wound worse? I want to look at it. Would you lie down now and subject yourself to this?"
Legolas lifted his head at Glorfindel miserably, and he looked at the rest of their group – again, stopped because of him. He shifted uneasily in embarrassment, and unsuccessfully tried to rise again.
He fell back, and leaned away from Glorfindel to urge out the meagre contents of his stomach to the ground. He only brought up the water he had just drank. Glorfindel grimaced in worry and disappointment; Legolas needed that. When he finished, he was shaking uncontrollably again, and huddled into himself.
"You will lie down, now."
"I wouldn't b-be able to g-get up," Legolas admitted, quietly.
"You're unable to get up anyway," Glorfindel pointed out, to which the prince gave out a soft, weary, snort. But he let Glorfindel lower him to his back on the ground.
"Istor," Glorfindel called out to his second-in-command, "Let us give these horses a breath or two, eh?"
"Yes, hir-nin," said the Imladrian, who took quick charge of the group and the animals. He also started going about re-shuffling the children again, so that the previous walkers could take their turn riding.
Legolas sighed and closed his eyes, anticipating pain from Glorfindel's probing. But Glorfindel was gentle, and imparted the strength and warmth of his fea with every careful touch. He also had no intention of doing anything invasive – to either's Legolas' fading body, or his closed, reluctant soul. Glorfindel only took a peek at the bandages, which were no longer spotted red. The bleeding has stopped, and he was grateful it was at least one thing they did not need to deal with, not that he was qualified to do anything more.
He reached for Legolas' pulse at the neck, and the elven prince opened one weary eye, and then the other. His gaze was slightly sharper and less hazy; lying down to rest was reviving him a little. But he was still shaking.
"You're freezing," Glorfindel told him softly, as he removed his cloak to place it on the ground beside Legolas. He would wrap Legolas in it later, when he was done - whether or not it was wanted.
"You look worried," Legolas drawled out, almost deliriously. "Don't be. You will see... I am always the one who lives...at the end..."
Glorfindel did not know what precisely he may have meant, and he said nothing else to expound. Legolas' voice drifted off, and he stared up at the starry skies overhead. His gaze rove, and Glorfindel looked up too. Legolas was following the path of a shooting star. His lips parted in wonder, as if his pains were momentarily forgotten, and he murmured dreamily in Silvan. Glorfindel felt the creeping despair in his heart bloom to a fuller devastation now, at the thought that the bright being before him was almost gone.
Glorfindel looked up at their traveling companions. Everyone was tired, but from how restless the children looked, he suspected they weren't too far away from the settlement they called home.
"How close are we?" he asked them urgently.
"If we continue on the way that we have," said the older girl he's come to rely on, "We will be there by midnight. My lord – my mother is a healer, and I swear to you an injury like that she has seen times before. We are woodcutters, you know, and hunted by the orc. Penetrating wounds are not uncommon. She will know what to do, if you can only get him there..."
She did not say the rest; If you can only get him there in time. If you can only get him there alive.
"Istor," Glorfindel called out determinedly, "We're moving out."
"Aye, my lord!" came the prompt reply. Around them, the group bustled into place and prepared to depart.
Glorfindel started bundling Legolas into his cloaks, and Legolas groaned with the jarring movements, but he was at least drawn back into the world, back into the situation, back to attention.
"We are near," Glorfindel told him sternly, "I will get you help in time, I swear it."
Legolas tsked weakly. "Promises..."
"I've not made you one that I've broken yet," Glorfindel muttered at him. Satisfied that Legolas was as warm as he could make him, Glorfindel then announced, "I will have to carry you."
"No-!"
Glorfindel rose for the both of them and Legolas, dizzied, quieted and helplessly shrank into Glorfindel's chest and shuffled close. Glorfindel tightened his hold on the shivering body, which jerked mindlessly against him with the cold. Legolas growled under his breath, angry that he was being manhandled, and angry twice over because he was in desperate need of it.
"I know, I know," Glorfindel told him gently. "You can be angry."
"This... d-doesn't mean a th-th-thing," Legolas reminded his protector. "It's just too goddamned c-c-cold."
"I know," the other murmured, and it was true.
Glorfindel knew.
He knew it to his bones, how much he had lost here. When Silon died as a direct cause of Glorfindel's efforts to save Legolas' life, he had lost Legolas. But Glorfindel held him anyway, and they clung to each other – like a leaf shivering in the autumn wind on its final connection to a withering tree, before winter came to sunder them.
"Y-y-you are ssssstill unforgiven," Legolas stuttered, even as he nuzzled at Glorfindel's warm, sturdy shoulder.
"And I am still not sorry," Glorfindel whispered near the top of the younger elf's soft, golden head. He could never be sorry for having a part in saving Legolas' life.
He felt a wild - and unwelcome - sympathy for Rochanar's sons, then. For their mindless compulsion to reach their father at any cost. For the selfish love that brought them all here.
I am not sorry, Glorfindel knew.
He held Legolas, tightly. Not just because tomorrow would come and bear him away, but he held him only for holding him, he held him just because he was cold.
I do not need you to be mine, he thought, I do not need you to forgive me. I do not even need you to love me...
... Right now, all I need is for you to feel warm again, and that is all.
# # #
Even when you hold someone so tightly, Glorfindel reflected, they can still slip from you. You can only know the precise weight and feel of them, as they go away.
Night deepened.
Legolas, conscious and shivering violently, was light but unwieldly, making unpredictable, jerking movements. He was also noisy – his teeth chattered, and he huffed out breaths from between them, and sometimes he cussed – it was a good cover for whimpering in pain, but in their proximity Glorfindel couldn't miss it even if he tried. They were wisps of air against his collarbone.
Legolas, conscious and still, was silent and heavy. The shivering stopped to an occasional shudder, but this was by no means reassuring, for he was still freezing and now just strengthless. Spent. His cold, heavy skin rested against Glorfindel's shoulder. Boneless, he melded against this and all the rest of Glorfindel's body, and his limbs flopped with every movement Glorfindel made. But his glazed eyes were still open, and his lips were moving – mouthing soundless Silvan somethings Glorfindel could not understand. He would look down at his ailing charge often, and once caught Legolas staring at him, gaze half-lidded and soft, unreadable, raking over Glorfindel's features as if memorizing and lazily contemplating all the planes and shadows of him. It was the last Glorfindel would see of the blue, blue gaze for a while.
Legolas, silent, unconscious with his eyes closed, was unbearably, devastatingly weightless. Unsubstantial. He was so profoundly absent he had the negative weight of a deep hole, through which things fell and disappeared forever. Glorfindel could not bear it. He fell to his knees, and scrambled for the stuttering pulse at the younger elf's neck.
"You do not have this luxury," he reminded Legolas, voice broken but tone firm. He shook the frail body gently in his arms. "Come on now, Legolas..."
He closed his eyes, and gave up more of his strength, his warmth, his light, into the inert form, into the black hole that he had become. Glorfindel felt he was throwing torches down a bottomless well, where every spark of light only showed how deep it was, though the tongues of flame could never reach the bottom, much less light it all the way through. But he tried, and he felt he could empty himself for all of his trying.
He fed the emptiness with the hunger and calling of his love, his soul. He threw down snatches of memory, beginning with scenes of Legolas' magnificent home. The lush canopies of golden leaves on the treetops, and a thick carpet of them on the ground; of a black forest stirring in the wind welcoming a dance of starlight; of pinpricks of small, candle flames lighting in hope one by one, in a dark night; of sunsets the color of a beloved friend's hair, of mornings that held the sun so high there were no shadows. Of the dawn creeping up and breaking through a swirling horizon.
He sent down too, weighty snatches he had caught of a father's love – of that small, uncontainable smile; of pride, frustration, worry, wonder and utility battling in the sharp, calculating eyes as he pondered his gifted and headstrong son; of a king, one of the most formidable ellon in all of Arda, reduced to begging for help for his only child.
Glorfindel threw in his own feelings, of hesitant fingers ghosting over the collarbone; of desperate kisses that stole the wind; of quiet conversations by a raging fire; of the tender joy of one minute in a day spent, simply walking companionably beside someone as they grew from friendship to love -
"My lord!" Istor called out, breaking Glorfindel from his trance. "We are near enough to fend for ourselves," he said. "Look! Look, my lord! Take a horse and go!"
Glorfindel lifted his head and found in the distance, a light flickering in the dark.
The settlement.
His breath caught in his throat, and he turned back to his companions to find one of the mighty horses had already been emptied of its child-passengers. The young ones looked at him with their war-wizened, battle-scarred eyes. They stood tall with chins raised as if to say – We can take ourselves home, now.
It was not necessarily true in these dark days, and good gods, Legolas would be devastated if more people got hurt for him to live. But the truth was, Glorfindel could barely think beyond Legolas' weightlessness, beyond his absence, beyond the emptiness of the world just because his eyes had closed.
Damn it all, he thought. All of it.
All of it.
Glorfindel hurriedly gathered Legolas up into his arms and deposited him into Istor's, so that he could mount the rider-less horse. It was only for a second, but his arms felt the air sting, with Legolas not being encased in them. It almost physically hurt.
He reached for the prince, and rode the horse hard toward the nearing settlement where he hoped they would find salvation.
He did not even look back at those he had left behind.
# # #
Glorfindel kept his promise.
He got Legolas to the Woodmen settlement alive, and thanks to the efforts of Istor and the children who had given up their horse, he was in time for life-saving measures to still bear fruit.
They thundered into the village and were met with hardy men, armed with spears; they had recently come from an attack after all and their children were taken. The village still smelled of fire and blood.
But Glorfindel quickly informed them of two things – that the young ones were still alive and on their way back; and that Legolas needed their help. The villagers mobilized quickly. A small party of men were gathered and hastily dispatched to meet Istor and the children partway. Another party immediately tended to Legolas. They not only assumed the elves were to thank for their children's safe retrieval, be he was also recognized as a high-ranking soldier in Thranduil's army. Legolas was apparently a familiar figure here, when there was more trade between their peoples, and as a Captain whose duties sometimes brought him to their aid.
It was a woman healer who took charge of Legolas' health, and Glorfindel recognized in her sharp, intelligent gaze, the same eyes of the young female child whom he had been relying upon on their road here. The familiarity of her was slightly dizzying for Glorfindel, who was physically and mentally exhausted from the last few days.
His mind whirled with all the tangled lives and circumstances of this benighted part of the world, for Legolas had been injured standing in defense of Rochanar's son; Rochanar's son was protecting the children of the village hiding in the trees; and now it was the villagers saving Legolas' life.
Glorfindel staggered, and one of the able-bodied men wrenched Legolas from him with little effort, while he was ushered to a chair in a humble kitchen that was somehow supposed to be an improvised surgical theater.
The healer and her cohorts had hurriedly emptied a long, wooden table of its contents, ran a soaking rag of fragrant, boiling hot water over it, and then laid Legolas' blanketed form over the cleaned surface.
"Tell me what ails him and what aid he'd already been given, my lord," the healer told Glorfindel sternly, while she cut at Legolas' clothes.
Glorfindel felt himself answering as best he could, but his voice was dull and muffled in his ear. She understood him somehow though, and nodded to herself as if in formation of a plan. She barked orders from everyone around them and they scampered. Soon, someone even gave Glorfindel a strong spirit. He downed it with a wince, and even for the eldar it was potent. His senses sharpened, and he revived enough of himself to be able to rise.
He walked to where Legolas lay. The healers were focused around his torso, and there was room for Glorfindel only by the elven prince's now-bare legs. Glorfindel held the ice-cold flesh at the ankle, and imparted him again with strength, warmth, light, song, memory, love.
Anything and everything he could impart, he shared.
# # #
Istor and the children of the village returned before the healer was done treating Legolas.
The doors of the humble home burst open, heralding the arrival of the capable young girl who was among the rescued, leading Istor behind her. The healer lifted her head, and her eyes lit with the fire of a mother's love – volcanic, blinding, like the sun. But the look was only a momentary indulgence. She lowered her eyes back to her work.
"Are you well, Alina?" she asked, tone clipped.
"Yes, mother."
"Then wash and help."
The eager young girl nodded and did promptly as she was told. The healer then spoke to Glorfindel, sounding determined and absolutely certain, even though she did not even look his way.
"You have restored my daughter to me," she said as her adroit hands worked over Legolas' broken body, "And so I will promise you this – I will restore your prince to you."
# # #
The healer kept her word, too.
By the time the sun rose and its light started peeking between the slats of the wooden walls and between the spaces of the threadbare curtains on the windows, she had finished her surgery and Legolas emerged from it alive.
Marble-white and stone-still, he lay slightly tilted toward his uninjured side on the table, clad only in bandages, his smallclothes and a thick blanket. He didn't move, barely breathed, and remained cold to the touch.
But he was alive.
Glorfindel felt the axis of the world shift to surround only this one single, powerful fact. Legolas was alive, and he knew that nothing else would matter to him for some time.
# # #
For a while, the days and the nights looked the same.
Legolas lay unmoving, barely alive. Glorfindel sat on a weathered wooden chair beside him at vigil, the exhausting monotony of waiting and worrying broken only by other repetitive things, like the healer making her periodic checks, and at points commandeering Glorfindel's attentions to more productive affairs than just sitting anxiously by. She needed his help in changing bandages, in helping to nourish Legolas' body, in helping to clean it, in carefully shifting his limbs to stimulate circulation and prevent sores.
Glorfindel was no stranger to caring for the severely injured, but he was used to large households and armies with compartmentalized tasks. This was not his line of expertise. He also did not have the fluidity of movement and certainty of Elrond in tending someone – few did, really – but his warrior's hands often felt large and stiff and unwieldly as he helped, and he feared hurting his charge, that he was inadequate in his help.
The healer soothed him as she did Legolas – she was informative and firm, but encouraging. They both did the best they could, and she watched in satisfaction with some tasks she left to him alone, like washing Legolas' hair, or running a cleaning cloth carefully down his body.
"Why won't he wake?" Glorfindel asked, and his voice was gravelly, and he couldn't for the life of him remember the last time he had spoken before this, or what he had said, or to whom.
"It is a grievous wound," she told him mildly. "Lucky in some respects from the angle, but his body is weary from fighting as long as he had before reaching help. He has farther to go, and though it does not look that way, he is fighting still. It is a delicate situation. Things can still make a turn for the worse, after everything."
Glorfindel sighed as he looked upon the elven prince's slack, still face. Still beautiful, he reflected, but that was not Legolas' main strength. It was his light, and it was down to embers at the moment. He brushed back stray strands of damp, clean, golden hair from Legolas' forehead.
"Is he dreaming?" Glorfindel murmured. "I cannot tell. He is closed to me. He is prone to violent nightmares. I would hate it if he should suffer them in so long a sleep."
"He is beyond dreaming," she told him, which was both worrying and comforting. "It is a deep rest, and it is perhaps better at this stage. When he recovers some of his strength, his body will remember other things – and you must prepare for another moment of crisis may strike."
Glorfindel rubbed at his eyes wearily. "Another...?"
"Gut wounds are unclean, tricky," she said. "You are a warrior, my lord, you know this. Ruptures and further bleeding are still possible. Infections and fever, almost inevitable for cases like his. Even in scarring he could have obstructions inside in the long-term. Even in healing there could be swelling enough to compress his other functions. But who's to say – he is of the eldar, apparently stronger than most, and he has been very lucky so far."
Glorfindel couldn't believe his ears. "Lucky." He huffed out a dark laugh. "Lucky..."
She looked at him carefully. "You are exhausted. You need to have a care for yourself, too. Get some air. I will watch him."
Glorfindel shook his head mournfully. "If you know him, you will know it is a bad idea to take your eyes off."
She did not push. "Suit yourself."
She moved around Legolas' makeshift bed, toward a few cabinets. She prepared herself some bread; Glorfindel had forgotten they took over someone's kitchen, someone else's continuing life here. He watched her eat, bewildered at the normalcy of it all. She prepared another, slathering a slice of stale bread with something that smelled of spice and honey. She handed it to him, and absentmindedly, he took it. She nodded encouragingly at him to take a bite, which he did.
It was heavenly, and he was starving, and life went on somehow. The colors of the room brightened with every bite he took.
"I'd forgotten we have commandeered your home," Glorfindel said with a nod of apology. "We thank you for your hospitality, over and above your healing hands."
"And you haven't even asked me my name," she told him gruffly – but her eyes were teasing.
"I do know your name," he teased back, mildly, "You are Alina's mother."
She smiled genuinely then, with love for her daughter and pride at the distinction. She looked decades younger. "Yes, that is exactly who I am. Buy you may also call me, Sara."
# # #
The crisis came, in the form of a hard, swollen stomach and a blistering fever that the still elven prince couldn't even be bothered to tremble or thrash from. He lay as still as before, except with his cheeks flushed and his skin shy of scalding.
Alina's mother, by the grim set of her thin lips, was worried. But because she was, Glorfindel decided he couldn't be.
I don't have that luxury...
They became more aggressive in their tending – keeping Legolas as cool as possible, draining his wound, plying him with medicine. And Glorfindel determinedly stood by the deep black well that had become Legolas' soul, sending him bursts of light - no matter where they landed, no matter if they were wanted, no matter if they were even heard or received, no matter if it emptied Glorfindel. Loving always was, an act of faith.
The fever left after a harrowing half day and Legolas, though he was as still as before, emerged worse. Severely weakened, almost gray, and of a state so uncertain Glorfindel did not dare take his fingers from the pulse at the younger elf's wrist. He held him there, and imagined his grip as if they were shackles.
"You will stay with me, my lord Glorfindel..."
Legolas had told him that the first time they met, and it was Glorfindel barely tethered to the living world. The younger elf, he recalled, had said it with such earnest certainty.
"You will stay with me," Glorfindel told him now, and he leaned in close by the other's delicately pointed ear. He said it with his voice and his soul - "You will stay with me."
TO BE CONTINUED...
Thank you for your time. 'til the next post!
