Author's note

Honestly, it's not a plot spoiler that Rhodri and Glorfindel marry by this point, but that's what's here. I wasn't really sure if I should put in or leave out explicit sex scenes, so I played it safe and left it out, but I finished the chapter in such a way that it could be added next chapter if people want it. Drop a comment if you do, otherwise I'll happily just skip to the next bit.

FriendlyNeighbourhoodHufflepuff: Oh my god these two kill me! :D

earthdragon: I'm glad they got together, too, tbh. Took an age, but it's nice that Rhodri's brain kicked in at the eleventh hour. I reckon Aiwendil would be a very likeable sort as well- at least, as much as he can be given that he gives far more of a fig about animals and plants than he does about people. We all have that friend... :P

pineapple-pancake: Ohhh, your comment made my day! I do try to keep it reasonably academic (discounting the fluff you're about to read here, of course). I kind of hope to chuck in a few interesting facts that make people think. I know I like tidbits and especially loved yours about spiders :D I think Gandalf will stay pretty humble, to be honest. If there's a change in behaviour there, we'll know because he'll probably get about Middle-Earth looking like the Monopoly Man. Also, very random, but every time I read your username, I think of that song Pineapple Pen. That's a mighty fine earworm to get :D

It was coming up to the last two weeks before the wedding now, and there was no unanimous answer available as to how the preparations were going. Had anyone asked Glorfindel and me, they were terrific. Bregedúr and Legolas would probably have shrugged and said it went quite fine. Nobody would have been able to reach Elrond to make an enquiry on his opinion, because he was running around like a blue-arsed fly, agonising over tiny things about this wedding that never would have occurred to any of the rest of us.

And so it had been the last little while. It was probably one of the only time I wished I were a psychiatrist, so that I could have put my almighty doctor's foot down and ordered that Elrond spend the entire lead-up to the big day zonked out on benzodiazepines. Never, in all my born days, had I seen someone get so stressed about colour schemes.

"Elrond," I said to him as we two and our partners plus Bregedúr and Legolas sat on the balcony, nursing a wine, "If you were a human you'd have had a stroke by now." He had spent the last fifteen minutes worrying that suitable flowers might not be in season in two weeks' time.

"To be perfectly honest, Rhodri, I think someone stroking my hair would be highly desirable right now," croaked Elrond.

"That's not what a stroke is in that context," I returned, "but I suppose that's neither here nor there." Celebrían put a hand on his knee, and he softened a little as he went quiet.

I sighed. "Look, Elrond, much as it might sound like a platitude, let me assure you that the things we really care about are already taken care of. You good folk will be here," I gestured at everyone present, "We'll say the magic words, there'll lots of food and dancing, and that's essentially all there is to it."

Glorfindel nodded happily. "You should spend more time enjoying yourself like we are, mellon-nîn," he said with a jaunty smile at his friend.

Elrond goggled at Glorfindel like he had just asked him to invent the television. Elrond was a darling, but it was common knowledge among his loved ones that it was Celebrían's life's work as his spouse to get him to stop stressing so much over the little things. And what a relief it was that she had stepped up to do it, because before that it had fallen to Glorfindel and me, and the two of us were nowhere near as effective at it as she was.

"Let me say it again, Elrond, just to make it explicitly clear," I said gently. I held up my index finger. "One: we do not need flowers. We are happy for them to sit in the fields and attract the bees. There will be food on the tables, and if people are paying attention to other things than the food or how fabulous we'll all be looking, they are probably at the wrong event."

Another finger came up. "Two, the colour scheme is unimportant for the same reasons."

Up shot the third finger. "Three, there is plenty of room for everyone, and nobody really minds where they stay. They just want to be out of the elements."

"And finally, four," I raised my little finger, "even if they were important, we wouldn't want you to be getting so stressed about it. We know you love to organise and sort things," I added as Elrond opened his mouth to protest, "But it's not good for you when you get this het up about it."

Elrond looked every bit the type-A personality as he sat there, brow furrowed, chewing his lip and tapping his fingers nervously. I could see he wasn't going to let this go easily. I glanced at Glorfindel, who seemed to have noticed much the same, and we both knew that we could not afford to not care about these things any more, otherwise Elrond was going to have a conniption.

It wasn't that he was genuinely caught up in things like seasonal availability of flowers or inspecting the matchy-matchiness of colour schemes. Elrond had never shown any especial interest in interior design like this before. No, his fixation on these details was how his anxiety manifested when he worried the day wouldn't go perfectly.

Normally, when people start to worry like this and they devote more focus than is necessary on things that are, relatively speaking, inconsequential, it is a sign they would benefit from a little help with putting things into perspective. It felt awful knowing that Elrond was getting eaten up like this by such small details.

Unfortunately, Elrond had remained staunchly resistant to entering any sort of psychotherapy, which was fair. It was entirely his choice, but it meant that I was not able to be of any assistance to him in a meaningful way, because he presently had very little insight. Informal suggestions would not work. He needed to be sat down, properly assessed, and to hear some very uncomfortable clinical truths. As a friend, I could not provide any of these things. All I could do to assuage him was to waylay concerns by helping with things that cropped up now and then. Band-aid solutions at best, but at least they kept him fairly level. And it seemed now that another band-aid solution was needed.

"But look, Elrond, honestly, if having an opinion on these things will make you stress less, we'll give you some ideas."

Glorfindel nodded fervently. "I like sunflowers best," he said with a broad grin.

"Yes, they're lovely, and sunflowers are abundant right now," I chimed in with a nod. I didn't really care for most flowers in general, but if it kept Elrond calm at this point, I would have been happy to sleep in the garden bed.

"My favourite colour is blue," I continued, "And we know Glorfindel's is gold, so colour scheme is sorted. The flowers even match the colours!"

"And we still have plenty of rooms left in the house up here, but still not all of the houses in Imladris are occupied, and many are still in perfect condition to move straight into, so we are not lacking for space, either," Glorfindel added.

"I think that's about everything that is left to sort out, actually," I murmured, drumming my fingers on my knee. "Can any of you think of anything else that needs doing?"

I could practically hear the swishing sound as everyone shook their heads.

"Excellent," I said with a smile. "All sorted, then. Gee, we should take up careers as wedding planners, shouldn't we?"

Elrond was rendered apoplectic for a short moment before I added quickly, "Don't get too excited, Elrond, it's not really a viable career option here yet. Give it a few yén and maybe then we'll have enough to think of starting up a business."

Elrond gave me a playfully withering look and took a mouthful of wine. Before he could swallow it, he started to make a noise and pointed at something over the balcony on the ground. We craned our necks to get a good look. Someone was coming up the path. A tall, grey, bedraggled-looking someone.

"Well, well," I said loudly, so the traveller looked up. "Would you just look what the wind blew in!"

The grey figure waved at us, and a few minutes later he was on the balcony with us, holding a wine of his own.

"So, where have you been, Olórin?" Glorfindel asked eagerly.

"I had intended to take the mountain pass through Caradhras, but I made the acquaintance of one Durin the Fifth some short way from the mountain range. It seemed he had been ambushed by some wayward creatures whose name escapes me now. I sent them off, and he, being quite pleased with me, invited me into his home in Khazad-dûm to enjoy the hospitality of the Dwarves."

I laughed inwardly. This guy was off to a flying start. He seemed to have no idea how mistrustful the Dwarves could be, so he had made incredible progress.

"There I stayed for a good while," he continued. "It would seem that the Dwarves are also displeased with Sauron, so they were quite pleased to find an ally- especially one that wasn't Elven," Olórin added, raising his eyebrows at us.

Ah. Perhaps he did know about their mistrustfulness. The entire Elf-Dwarf story was a sticky one at best, and it was one I was happy to leave up to Elrond to relay.

"It would seem that Aiwendil passed that way earlier on, though," Olórin observed. One of the Dwarves informed me that someone like me, all in brown, had sped by on a vehicle of sorts, driven by Rhosgobel rabbits."

"Ah, so he's settling in well," I commented, struggling to keep a deadpan face as Elrond and Bregedúr's eyes widened in shock and confusion. "Did you come across any of the other Istari on your travels?"

"I did not," Gandalf admitted, "but further on in my travels, I found myself in Lothlórien, where I had the pleasure of meeting with the Lady Galadriel and Lord Celeborn. Lady Galadriel, it seems, is aware of the five of us."

"Did she have much to say about it?"

"She was particularly interested to learn more about Curumo, but he is the most powerful of us and was appointed the leader, so that is hardly surprising."

I sat quietly after that, leaving the interrogations over to the other five. I turned Olórin's words over and over in my head, wondering if there was a chance Galadriel harboured even the smallest suspicion about Curumo. I couldn't be the only one, surely, who had gotten bad vibes from the guy.

The conversation continued until dark, after which we made our way to dinner. I decided I would have to think about how to broach this with Elrond and Olórin, because maybe this was all a misunderstanding and there was nothing to broach. Perhaps Curumo was just a tad childish and would make up for it in doing a terrific job of eradicating Sauron. One of those insufferable types who is so because they are right, they know it, and they have no time for the perspectives of others. I didn't want to put unfounded suspicions in their head.

The worry kept nagging away at me over the coming days, and though finding accommodations for the wedding guests who had started to trickle in from all over distracted me somewhat, it never fully stemmed the concern.

Eventually, I made a compromise with myself. I would keep my opinion to myself until either Curumo showed up, or there had been talk of concerning behaviours.

Had I not placated myself with this, I would have brooded over it at my own damned wedding ceremony, and I found myself positively incensed at the idea of this repellent old fart spoiling the mood for that day.

It ended up being one of the smarter things I had done through my time in Middle-Earth, because when the big day rolled around, I was cool as a cucumber. I'd gotten up at the usual time, had a small breakfast, and chatted with a few guests. It was all going quite smoothly.

Much like the couple have a specific outfit for the wedding, Glorfindel and I both had a special set of robes made up for the occasion: mine were deep blue, with gold trimmings and the embroidered seal of the House of the Golden Flower peppered all over it. It was customary to have the partner's house's emblem on one's clothes or damascened on a piece of jewellery on the wedding day. It was lucky Elrond had essentially adopted me as part of his own house, so I got to have his own emblem as well. Had I been required to supply one of my own, I knew I would have come up with something tasteless or would be an inside joke for me alone (such as insisting that my traditional family heraldry was the McDonald's Golden Arches).

When I was fully dressed and appropriately groomed, I headed out to where the feast was, and when I arrived, I was greeted with a sight that both made me laugh and catch my breath all at once.

Glorfindel, in some kind of freakish matchy-matchy moment, stood in robes of gold with deep blue trimmings, with Elrond's sigil stitched on in thread of the same colour. He had a wrought gold circlet on his head, and in all, looked absolutely stunning.

He saw me come in and immediately strode over to me, beaming.

"You look perfect," he whispered to me, taking my hands in his.

"You most certainly do," I breathed back, feeling my face heat up.

He blushed gently, and together we went to the top of the table where we were expected to sit during the feast. I noticed Glorfindel was squeezing my hand fairly hard as we walked.

"Everything all right?" I asked quietly.

Glorfindel smiled. "Oh, yes," he replied calmly.

"Are you sure? You're squeezing my hand rather tightly. It's all right to be nervous, you know."

He lifted my hand to his lips and put a soft but slightly lingering kiss on it, not taking his eyes off me the entire time.

"It's not nerves," he murmured, putting my hand back down.

Oh.

We sat down at the table, and our eyes nearly fell out of our heads as we saw the food in front of us. This was a veritable banquet. There were no fewer than 10 types of breads, a supermarket's worth of vegetables, and more main course dishes were being brought out by the minute.

Most people had already arrived and taken their seats by the time we entered the hall, so it was a mercifully short wait until we got to start loading our plates.

After everyone had eaten their fill, Elrond caught everyone's attention as he rose to his feet and went to the front of the hall, followed closely by Celebrían and Bregedúr. That was our cue. We got up and went over to where they stood. The hall was silent.

Elrond turned to face us and he gently asked, "Are you both ready?"

Glorfindel and I glanced at each other and with smiles a mile wide, nodded fervently in synchrony. The excitement was so intense I nearly bounced on my toes.

"In which case, let us begin." Elrond took Glorfindel's hands, and Bregedúr and Celebrían each took one of mine.

"In the name of The One, Almighty Iluvatar," Elrond declared, "I call on Manwë, Lord of the Breath of Arda, to witness the blessed union of Glorfindel of the House of the Golden Flower and Rhodri of the House of Elrond. Glorfindel, if your desire is to seal yourself to Rhodri in the indissoluble bond of marriage, make it known now."

"It is," said Glorfindel clearly, beaming at me as the words came out. Elrond and Bregedúr each joined one of our hands together.

"And in the name of the One, Almighty Iluvatar," Celebrían followed, "I call on Varda, Lady of the Stars, to witness the blessed union of Rhodri of the House of Elrond to Glorfindel of the House of the Golden Flower."

"Rhodri," Bregedúr continued, "If your desire is to seal yourself to Glorfindel in the indissoluble bond of marriage, make it known now."

"It is," I said through a broad smile, nodding happily. Celebrían and Elrond joined our other hands together.

"In which case, you may give back your betrothal rings," Elrond said.

We slipped our silver rings off and handed them back to each other.

"And you may now adorn each other with your wedding rings," said Bregedúr as Celebrían handed each of us a gold ring, which we each placed on the other's right index fingers.

Elrond stepped away a moment and returned with a deep blue sapphire on a gold chain. He stood behind me and carefully fastened it around my neck. "For you, Rhodri," he said, "I give a sapphire, the symbol of wise judgement, kindness, and strength."

Bregedúr and Celebrían retrieved a chain, but instead of a sapphire, a bright aquamarine was encrusted on it. "And for you, Glorfindel," said Celebrían, "we give the aquamarine, the symbol of happiness, eternal youth, and courage."

Glorfindel and I both had a hard time keeping our emotions in check at that point. There was already the requisite overwhelming set of feelings that came with us marrying, but on top of that, we felt the love and care of these people- our family and best friends- more keenly in that moment than we ever had (which was saying an awful lot). I could see my vision grow bad as my eyes started to water, and when I glanced at Glorfindel, he looked back at me with similarly moist eyes.

When we looked at Elrond, Celebrían, and Bregedúr, we could see they were also experiencing difficulty holding back tears. In the next moment, presumably seized by identical feelings, Glorfindel and I both snatched the three of them up in a bone-crushing group hug.

"You fools," choked Bregedúr, "you're not supposed to hug the officiants when you marry!"

Her bitey humour was just what was called for at that moment, otherwise I firmly believe we all would have both broken down into a collective, blubbering mess. It was enough to get us to laugh and put our friends back down on the floor.

"And so," Elrond announced to the hall as he dried his eyes, "Rhodri and Glorfindel are wed, and the houses of Elrond and the Golden Flower are joined!"

This was met with cheering and applause so loud that I could almost feel the vibrations on the air. With one fairly chaste kiss for the approval of the crowd, Glorfindel and I invited everyone to proceed to the ballroom for dancing, music, and desserts.

Everyone filed into the next room, and Glorfindel and I trailed behind them, walking together in much closer proximity than we had before. For the first time, he had a hand resting on my hip, his thumb stroking the small, soft padding there. My own hand was in the same spot on him, and I had to exert considerable effort not to squeeze there. I ventured one look at him and saw that he was smiling at me shyly. My face got hot for a moment, and we picked up the pace and went into the ballroom.

Everything about the rest of the evening was great. The music was terrific, the desserts were dangerously good, and the dancing was full of energy and joy. I don't think anything could have dampened the mood that night.

"This has gone absolutely perfectly," Glorfindel said to me some time close to midnight as we waltzed around the room with the same vigour as we had at the start of the evening.

"Oh, yes," I replied with a cheerful nod. "Flawless." I paused and briefly looked him over. "And the wedding's been great, too," I added with a wicked grin as I raised my eyebrows at him.

Glorfindel bit his lip as he suppressed a laugh, a blush creeping onto his cheeks.

Neither of us said anything to the other, but we slowed down and started to look around the room. Everybody else was busy dancing, chatting, or attacking their nth round of dessert. With one glance, we quietly slipped out of the ballroom and as lightly as we could, ran along the corridors to my quarters, which were closer.

I stopped just outside the door as I recalled the day Glorfindel stood there, screaming with laughter at my dreadful gaffe with the toothbrush. I'd had to drag him into my room so that he wouldn't attract too much attention.

I opened the door, turned on an oil lamp, and we went inside, and the memory continued to play out. His enchanting smile as he suggested we go swimming in the rain, those eyes sparkling with the same delightful, contagious joy that now sent my heart rate skyrocketing.

Glorfindel slipped off his robe and hung it over the back of a chair, and when he turned around, he saw me staring at him.

"What is it, Rhodri?" he asked, smiling tenderly.

I went over to him and slipped my arms around his waist, gently pulling him toward me as I searched his face.

"How on earth did I not see it sooner…" I murmured, shaking my head in disbelief.

Glorfindel smiled softly as he carefully unhooked my arms from around him and slid my top robe off.

"For my part," he said as he put my robe on top of his and walked back to me, "I did not mind the wait. I am just happy to be yours." He cupped my face in his hands and brushed his lips over mine. "My Rhodri."