"God, how do you stand dealing with Oropher?" I asked Elrond, Bregedúr, Glorfindel and Gil-Galad over a small, private breakfast on Elrond's balcony the next morning. "What kind of person talks that way about their grandchild?"
"We wonder about that ourselves, from time to time," admitted Gil-Galad as he drizzled honey over a slice of bread. "Though, the trade deals are important for both realms, and I doubt many Mirkwood residents behave like their king, so refusing to continue deals would more likely hurt them than it would effect a change in Oropher's behaviour."
"Was that fellow sitting beside Oropher the grandson?"
"Yes," said Glorfindel with a nod. "He is Legolas, son of Thranduil, who was the Elf sitting on the other side of Legolas."
"Thranduil did nothing to defend his son, either," I added, failing to keep the indignation out of my voice.
"No, Thranduil, much like his father, has a very… distinct way of showing affection," said Elrond, shaking his head a little before popping a cherry tomato into his mouth.
"Legolas is rather pleasant, though," said Bregedur off-handedly. Her comment was met with unanimous agreement there.
My experience of Elven parents in Imladris had been wonderful; discipline here was gentle, constructive, and did not involve causing any physical or mental pain, and it was so effective that it was seldom called for at all. Children were empathetic, well-mannered, thoughtful, and communicated well from a very early age. It would have been a social worker's heaven.
I had, it seemed, grown so used to such wholesome parenting that it was particularly jarring to encounter the dysfunction I had seen the night before, and it had made me surprisingly angry.
"Why are they like that?" I drummed my fingers on the table in an attempt to displace some of my growing displeasure.
A collective sigh came from my four companions, and they all made some variant of a shrug.
"Some have said it is the conditions in Mirkwood," said Elrond after a moment. "It is a dark sort of place, right in the heart of the forest. Little sunlight comes through, and all manner of aggressive creatures dwell among the trees in there."
"God, you're not going to tell me that sort of parenting practice is a common thing in Mirkwood, are you?" I blurted out in disbelief.
"Not from what I have seen, no," replied Elrond as he scratched his chin.
"They may also be hardened by loss," mused Gil-Galad. The others murmured in agreement, slowly nodding. "Thranduil married quite young, to the protégée of his mother, who herself was a skilled warrior. Shortly after Legolas' birth- Thranduil would have just reached his 50th year, if I recall correctly- Thranduil's wife and his mother were going alone through the forest and were killed in an ambush."
A collective silence fell over us as Gil-Galad's words hung in the chilly morning air. That sort of loss is unimaginably tragic, and I had helped many patients move past that sort of debilitating grief in my time. Extreme grief that requires professional intervention has usually reached a stage where the affected person acts out of character to a worrying degree, rarely in ways for the better.
However, an explanation for bad behaviour is not the same as an excuse, and no matter how badly Thranduil and Oropher had been affected by these horrific incidents, their grief did not entitle them to lapses of decency.
I chewed over all this information later on in my office, and noted everything on a scrap of paper that would later go into Legolas' file, if he chose to come to me.
As I wrote the last few words down, a knock came at my door. In the brief moment before I looked up from my work, I had presumed it was Legolas, and felt the same smug satisfaction that happens when one opens a particularly large book to exactly the page one was after. How perfectly things had tied in, I thought to myself, only to look up and see Glorfindel standing there. He smiled broadly and gave a little wave.
"Oh hey there!" I greeted my buddy with a grin. "What's happening?"
"I know you might be expecting Legolas today, but I just walked past the training yards and saw him practicing archery," Glorfindel jerked his thumb behind him, "so I had enough time to stop by and update you about my dreams; it has been a while since last we spoke of them."
"Oh, good, good!" I said happily, taking his file out from the drawer behind me. "Come on in and tell me all about it."
He stepped inside, closing the door behind him, and sat down as I poured him some water.
"How's your sleep been?"
"Mostly excellent," he replied. "Well, when raging warfare hasn't interrupted it," he added as an aside. "But I have not jerked awake in quite a number of months now."
"Jolly good," I enthused. "How about that dream, then? It's the first time I've heard you call it that, instead of a nightmare."
"Indeed," Glorfindel said with a smile. "The trampoline treatment seems to have worked very well. I visualised bouncing up and down as I fell asleep, and now… well, that is where it becomes interesting." He gave me a curious half-excited, half-nervous look.
"Oh?" I said, intrigued.
"Well, I no longer fall to my death in my dream. That is excellent. I bounce up, and it's a very happy ending indeed."
"Great!" I enthused. "Just what we were hoping for."
"Yes, but now it seems to have… spread," he said a little hesitantly.
"Spread? What, as in you're bouncing on trampolines in all your other dreams too, now?" I enquired.
"I could if I wanted to, but I meant that since I took control of that part of my dream, now I can control everything, in all of my dreams. I realise I am in a dream almost straight away, and then I can make anything I want happen, and stop anything I tire of," he said a little hesitantly.
"Ah, so you've discovered lucid dreaming!" I said, giving Glorfindel a thumbs-up. "Fantastic!"
Glorfindel's shoulders immediately slouched, and his face slackened in relief. "Oh, thank goodness, it's normal?"
"Well, it's a good thing to have, but certainly isn't something that that many have. Think of it as a skill. Can't ever hurt to have power over your dreams, really."
"No," he mused, smiling into his hands. "Now I can dream about whatever I wish."
"Sure can! Now, how's your mood from day to day? And what about concentration?"
"Oh, it's fine," he said sunnily. "I have no need to mask anything any more. I am as happy and energetic as ever, and can collect my thoughts without trouble."
"Ah, now that's absolutely excellent to hear, Glorfindel," I beamed at him. "Now, going forward, I need you to keep something in mind."
Glorfindel nodded attentively.
"You may still experience nightmares, including the one with the Balrog, in the future- albeit much, much less often than you used to. But it is important not to be discouraged!" I stressed, holding up a finger emphatically.
"The imagery rehearsal therapy that you have had is a tool, not a cure. A hammer will knock nails into wood, but it will not necessarily stop the nail from coming loose again in the future. However, it very effectively will hit the nail back into place. This is your hammer. Does that make sense?"
He nodded again happily. "Oh, yes," he said with a smile. "Perfect sense."
"Well, then, a toast!" I declared, filling our glasses again and lifting mine. "To good tools and great dreams."
Glorfindel grinned. We clinked our glasses and drained them.
"Well, I suppose I had better go for now," Glorfindel said after a moment. "I imagine I will see you at dinner."
"Hah, the only thing that could keep me from dinner is death," I said half to myself, half to him. He giggled and got up, making his way to the door.
"Oh, and Glorfindel?" I said just as he was about to reach for the door handle. He turned around.
"Mmm?"
"See if you can't dream up a way to make a mechanically viable trampoline, eh? I haven't had a bounce in years."
His eyes widened and a determined, keen smile crept over his face as he nodded, gave me a thumbs-up, and left the office.
I sighed contentedly. It is a very satisfying thing to see people flourish- not just because it makes oneself feel better, though it naturally does, but also because people deserve to flourish. They deserve the assistance needed to remove any roadblocks in their development. Humming to myself, I put Glorfindel's file away and made to take out my chicken comic, when I heard another knock.
I glanced up and this time, saw who I was expecting to see: Legolas. He was alone, his shoulders hunched enough to make him look like he was cowering a little. His deep blue eyes were shining like alarm beacons, and one glance at his face told me he would have liked nothing better than to turn invisible right now.
"Hello," I said warmly. "Won't you come in and have something to drink?"
Legolas nodded, and almost crept into my office, like he was afraid anyone would catch him here. He stood very still by my desk, his quiver and bow hanging off his shoulders, not game to do anything without my inviting him to do so first.
"If you like, you can set your things just over there," I pointed to a coat rack off to the side, "and you can sit down and take a load off your feet."
He nodded again quickly, and strode over to the coat rack where he hung his bow and quiver. His gait was powerful and full of purpose, but his palpable nervousness made his steps uneven, which I saw again as he came back over and sat down.
"That water is for you if you want it, by the way," I said, pointing at the glass closest to him. "Help yourself to more at any time."
Offering water has a number of benefits, aside from the obvious one of quenching thirst. It provides a distraction, so that when there is nothing left to say, one can make the silence appear intentional as they pick up the glass and take a sip. It is hospitality, which creates a positive first impression and makes one feel more welcome and relaxed, and so will open up more easily.
Perhaps the least obvious benefit, though, is that it can reveal otherwise very subtle physical symptoms. I noticed that Legolas was trembling ever so slightly. I'd never have picked it up when he was mid-movement, or standing at the doorway with his hands behind his back, but now that he was still (shaking aside, of course), the water jittered infinitesimally in the glass as he brought it to his lips.
He placed the glass down and looked up at me.
"It's nice to see you again," I said with a smile. "My name is Rhodri. I'm the psychologist here in Imladris."
Legolas nodded. "I am Legolas," he answered softly. "You spoke with my grandfather last night."
"Ah, yes, I did indeed," I replied, nodding. "Tell me, what brings you here today, Legolas?"
He looked surprised. The confusion evident in his tone, he started to say, "Well, my grandfather last night- he mentioned-"
I gently held up a hand to stop him there. "Yes, I remember what your grandfather said, but what I want to know is why you are here. Let me explain a little about how I keep things private, and what you can expect from talking with me, and then we'll start talking, yes?"
Legolas nodded, blissfully unaware of what a boring five minutes he was in for, and the session began.
Psych Notes
Lucid dreaming
A phenomenon (not a psychiatric disorder) that has been observed and studies across cultures since ancient times, in which a sleeping person becomes aware that they are dreaming, and is able gain varying degrees of control over what happens in the dream.
Voss et al. (2009) proposed three main criteria for a lucid dreaming state: control (being able to exercise control over what's going on in the dream), dissociation (not experiencing the dream from your own perspective- instead, for example, on a screen as in a film (derealisation), or maybe looking down on yourself from above (depersonalisation)), and insight (the most important criterion: being aware that you are dreaming).
Voss, U., Holzmann, R., Tuin, I., and Hobson, J. A. (2009). Lucid dreaming: a state of consciousness with features of both waking and non-lucid dreaming. Sleep 32, 1191–1200. doi: 10.1093/sleep/32.9.1191
