Aragorn didn't know if he had Beregond's, Verilas', or Faramir's efforts to thank for but he was very relieved that Legolas was being brought before him straight away, shielded by several soldiers, just like Aragorn had been earlier. In his friend's expression, he'd already seen it from a distance that another catastrophe must have happened. Hadn't they had all been hoping badly that after the horrible news of the causality in the Marshes, it was over? That had been very naïve. Understandable words of anger from Legolas would have made the situation in Minas Tirith even worse.
For now, though, the elf didn't seem to be capable of anything but silence anyway. Aragorn had to doubt he even really realized where he was.
Faramir, too, stared away in embarrassment as if he was standing in a tomb, not in a sick room.
Aragorn couldn't take that into account right now. That there had been almost nobody in the city when Arwen and he had been assassinated, was something he was mostly responsible for himself, he and his enemies' ingenious plan. At some point in the last few days, he had grown tired of talking people out of feeling guilty for everything happening around them.
This was something Faramir would have to try and deal with on his own. The two of them had a couple of other things to sort out that had taken place while the Stewardaides had been able to strike in the Citadel almost unhindered. Starting with the question of why a group of unarmed elves had been sent out into the darkness of the Dead Marshes with the soldiers just watching.
Since Faramir didn't seem to notice Aragorn's impatient look, it was Beregond at last who told him, once Aragorn had dropped onto a bed on Ioreth's instruction and the woman started unfastening his bandages. The captain's words were incoherent; he ran a hand through his hair repeatedly that was completely dirtied with mud, as if that could help soothe what was going on inside of him as well.
Though the sight of the new arrivals had made Aragorn half and half expect it, it was almost unbearable for him, too, knowing for sure now what had happened to some more of the elves; which was why he turned to Legolas to try and show him his support before the report was even finished.
"I will send a pigeon to Imladris immediately. In one of your letters, you once told me, there are some relatives of your friends still living there. Their parents will be able to feel whether there is any hope still left for them or not. If there is, I will initiate a rescue mission at once."
Without this certainty though, such an attack on a fortress currently impossible to assess was a risk far too big for a number of soldiers strongly reduced as it was. Therefore, Aragorn was relieved to see Legolas show at least the hint of a nod while still stubbornly looking everywhere but towards him. They were both very aware that actually, this inquiry would unfortunately not even be necessary as for prisoners of hostile orcs – especially in their current vengeful, uncontrolled status –, there was usually nothing that could be done.
That at least, they could agree on; but as soon as Beregond had stopped talking and Aragorn had briefly summarized for the others what had happened in the Citadel earlier, Legolas addressed him, cold and repelling as he never had before, not even back then at their first bumpy meeting.
"So what I'm hearing is that murderers are no longer being brought to justice here. How many more will have to die before you change your mind?"
"Do I need to remind you who you're talking to before you stop snapping at me like I am the enemy? Before you remember where you are?"
While Aragorn understood the elf's wrath, he couldn't and didn't want to let anyone talk to him like that. He was this realm's King; his decisions were law, including the ones that his closest friends might not like. He could deal with critique, he even welcomed it when it was due, for that was the only way for him to grow as a ruler and always be certain that he was doing his best. But the provocative way Legolas was voicing it right now was bordering on insolence.
And first and foremost, Aragorn was Legolas' friend. That counted even so much more. He wanted to find a solution for this disagreement suddenly arising between them and not be forced to start a serious dispute.
Ioreth cleared her throat, quite shy suddenly because she felt out of place. "Your Majesty, I really need to start sewing your wound or you're going to risk further infection. If I use large stitches, I'll be faster but the scar will be bigger then. Small stitches will take longer."
"Scars have never bothered me. Just hurry up." Aragorn sat up a little straighter on the mattress, tucking one leg under him to make the woman's work easier for her.
His eyes remained fixed on Legolas, even when the healer started to probe him and he had to clench his teeth. "Can your reproaches wait five more minutes? I tend to be quite a bad conversation partner while being patched up."
"Don't you think you have upset Your Majesty enough?" On the other side of the room, Verilas immediately used the chance to intervene. "He's already collapsed earlier. He needs rest!"
"We are aware of that but this matter needs to be resolved before it can cause even more damage. Once we got this over with, His Majesty can recover while I initiate further steps." Faramir felt visibly uncomfortable. His right hand couldn't stop tugging on the glove on the other side.
"Albeit we should better not have this conversation without your other advisors, Aragorn. Why don't you call them …?"
"No."
Aragorn startled when Legolas spoke up once more, with a suppressed moan when stinging agony radiated from his shoulder down to his chest once more. In spite of some pain-relieving tinctures, his body more and more refused to put up with all this. The wound started to throb, new blood started to drip. Clenching his fist, Aragorn forced himself to focus on the conversation, no matter how badly he felt like throwing anyone out who wasn't working here right now.
He'd already been sitting idle long enough. The realization hit him with an ice-cold shock as he eyed his friend thoroughly for the first time since Legolas had helped him free Arwen from the Stewardaides' clutches. They hadn't been meeting for far too long; ever since then, Aragorn hadn't taken any time to visit his closest ally at least for a few hours, to make sure that he was doing alright … That neglect might take its toll now. All that stress of the last few months had kept him from noticing how far Legolas had really been thrown off course.
In fact, he'd almost not recognized him at first sight, neither by his haggard appearance nor by his voice, once so grounded, that revealed nothing but unbridled hate tonight. To be exact, Legolas' current condition reminded him strikingly of the elf's wife who should rather not be seen by any of her friends in Lórien right now either, or someone might dump her on a ship going west by force after all.
Tarisilya though very rarely expressed her dark emotions with such aggression as the Prince of Eryn Lasgalen just did. "I don't need even more people discussing this matter endlessly instead of making decisions. I thought your meeting with these rebels would have taught you that, Steward. If you plan to keep these criminals here under your care and protection, Aragorn, riots in your folk will not even be necessary. Then it will be the elves who will make their way inside the prison to exact vengeance."
After everything that Legolas and he had gone through together in the war and afterward, Aragorn would never have expected such a threat from his friend. In the weak firelight, Legolas' eyes turned into dark, glowing sapphires. Only the soft glistening in them was still revealing life. His hands were buried in his upper arms so firmly as if he had to keep himself from grabbing his daggers to emphasize his words any moment.
"If you do not have the will to do it, leave it to others. Why don't you banish them, as so many citizens are demanding it? I think that's a brilliant idea. They will meet their fate as soon as your soldiers won't guard them anymore. The elves have already had patience with men who have absolutely no respect for life and innocence for far too long, regardless of them belonging to certain Dunlending-tribes or misguided supporters of the Steward."
Aragorn got up with a jerk, ignoring both the pain in his chest and the healer who wanted to hold him back. In spite of this day having lasted for far too long, his shock granted him the necessary strength to look Legolas in the eye.
His hand was shaking when he pointed at the door. "You better leave this room right now. And do not approach me again before you got your senses back together, Legolas Thranduilion. It is you who just made sure that I cannot stand before you as a friend right now. If you utter something like that within these city walls once more, you will have to suffer the consequences, Prince of Eryn Lasgalen. I will accept that here just as little as you could in your realm. Before you have understood something so simple, you should not be talking to another leader as a representative of your people." Aragorn hoped that the clear distance that the presence of far too many witnesses of the ugly scene demanded alone, would help Legolas see at least the most necessary reason.
While the elf, naturally, had been carrying the formal title of a Prince since birth already, safe for harmless diplomatic visits, he'd never had to act like one. That was showing more than ever right now.
It was his father who orchestrated matters in Eryn Lasgalen. If his offspring would ever be ascending to the throne at all, had been written in the stars since the construction of the elf settlement in North Ithilien at the latest. After all, for an immortal like Thranduil, there was no compulsory need to ever abdicate; not to mention that the King, just like most of his people, would probably go west at some point anyway, and then that realm would be another one that stopped existing. Therefore, it seemed, Thranduil had never prepared his son sufficiently for an unlikely emergency.
Legolas was being on thin ice right now. And he didn't even notice.
There was no way Aragorn could suffer that, no matter how much he hated not being able to offer Legolas help in his grief in this night of all times.
What made things worse was that he wasn't innocent about this whole misery himself. Aragorn should already have stepped up a lot louder when on their journey back from Imladris, Legolas and he had run into that one Dunlending when freeing King Éomer, who had confessed to the elf massacre in his lands. On that day, it had still been fairly easy to calm Legolas down, sure … But they still had left the man to die; and Aragorn had personally tasked the dwarves in Moria to hunt down the rest of these bastards. Back then, he had not been King yet, and these people had not belonged to his folk. But he should still have tried to be a good example; maybe then, this thing wouldn't be happening right now.
In the first few weeks after the war's end, he'd just been far too mentally unstable himself to remember the first lectures that both his foster father and Mithrandir had drilled into him most insistently back then: that you couldn't be careful enough with the decision of taking someone's life.
It seemed like no one ever had instilled that knowledge in Legolas. This was a matter Aragorn had to handle not only in the interest of the people but also to protect Legolas from what he wanted to unleash here.
"How much has the war numbed you?" Instead of giving in though, Legolas backed away from Aragorn, retreating towards the window, visibly perplexed about getting to know this side of him. "Was it the many soldiers who fell in Rohan and at the Black Gate? When did you stop counting the bodies? Tell me, what would you have done to the Stewardaides who kidnapped Arwen if we had found her dead? Would they have been judged just as mildly as people who send members of other folks to their death, too cowardly to raise a sword on their own? How quickly can one forget their roots, not caring about the fate of elves anymore who raised you like one of their own?"
"Don't talk about things you don't understand!" Now, at the latest, Aragorn had become too upset for calm words. "Unlike me, you are not a leader, and you've never been one! Right now, I'm doubting that you ever really held leadership of Eryn Lasgalen's defenses. You don't the slightest idea what it means to be responsible for the lives of others. Didn't you usually prefer to let others decide? In the beginning, what was the Fellowship for you? An adventure to prove something to your father? It wasn't you, in any case, who had to take care of the others and to choose a path after Mithrandir had fallen into the shadow, or who had to live with it that we lost even more people or had to leave them alone because of that. Such decisions are part of a command. For you, battles were a playground. It's not the number of fallen enemies that makes a warrior but the lives he saves."
Aragorn approached Legolas angrily when the elf started to turn away, torn between his pain and a voice, too weak yet, that hopefully tried to whisper to him that Aragon was being right. "Will you kindly look at me after screaming things like that in my face? This is how little you know me, mellon? Yes, the blood of my people is on my hands, but that was the only way I could save this world. Without resistance, everyone in Gondor and Rohan would have died an agonizing death or been enslaved. Where would you have been then? Where would you have built Ilya a home? In the middle of Sauron's realm? I doubt it. You would have saved yourself along with the rest of your kin. Me on the other hand, I have fought for my world. I remember all the dead whenever I look down on the fields from the city walls, glad that all of this is finally over. Now you want me to watch an elf executing a man, starting a new conflict between our people that would never come to an end? It was you who personally stopped me from following my hate in Ithilien, wasn't it? And yes, you even could have done so if Arwen couldn't have been saved. Why exactly am I supposed to not try and do the same for you?"
Only now that he was still looking at a face all but petrified, of someone who was lost too much in his despair to accept anything, Aragorn's voice began to tremble. He could only hope that Legolas would think about all of this long and hard because Aragorn wouldn't find the greatness in him to do this all over in the foreseeable future.
"How dare you doubt my love for your kin! I call one of you my father, another one of you my betrothed, two more of you my siblings. Many others of you, I love like my brothers as well. All my life, my heart has belonged not only to Men but also to your folk. With how you're acting right now though, I have to wonder if maybe I was wrong."
Bitter laughter escaped Legolas' lips. "You're right about one thing: Before the War of the Ring, I was never granted the honor of a big fight. If that makes me a worse Companion in your opinion, you should have expelled me from the Fellowship when you had the chance. Before I was faced with the cruelty of your people in the rubble of Helm's Deep, there was still a way out for me. I did not need any order for my path to lead me away from my family, to support Men in their fight. Pain, humiliation, and violence were my reward, even now while the last of us are trying to make this world better for your folk. My wife is being openly attacked on these streets and our wish for justice remains unheard. You're not the only one getting a lot of doubts in a situation like that."
"You underestimate Men if a few bad experiences already make you judge all of them, even those who always stood by your kind. If you see in me one of those who harm you or support the ones who hate you, I should really have sent you away back then. Our friendship during the war doesn't seem to have meant anything more than the acquaintance before anyway."
Aragorn sat back down on the bed. He had rarely felt so drained before. There wasn't even a single word left in his mind, nothing that could have defused the situation. With his hand placed over his eyes, his posture slumped, he didn't manage anymore to hide the deep grief about Legolas of all people revealing such a dangerous mindset. One that must already have been building in the elf for a long time, but never in such a self-destructive amount, and never so bad that he didn't let anyone help him.
A knock at the door interrupted his next words.
"Your Highness?" Visibly intimidated by the loud voices that people must have heard even at the end of the hall, one of Faramir's soldiers stuck his head in at the door. After quickly bowing to Aragorn, he turned to Legolas. "The men are ready. Have you been able to arrange …?"
"Not yet." Legolas forced himself to lower his arms, not because he was suddenly sharing Aragorn's point of view but because apparently, he had to ask him for something, after this conversation of all times.
"If my King allows, the survivors will now gather for a memorial ceremony for their murdered friends. A fire shall light the celebration yard in front of the White Tower tonight, so no one in this realm will forget what happened in North Ithilien."
"Gondor's thoughts will be with the fallen as well. You can have everything you need for the ceremony. The guards are at your disposal."
Aragorn didn't make it to look up. Something in him had broken earlier when Legolas' eyes, clouded by hate, had suddenly turned to him. There had been a time when nothing in his life had been so important to him as finally fulfill his destiny as a King. Now how wondered what a realm was really worth if he had to sacrifice a friendship for it.
"You have the gratitude of my people." With a plenty impersonal bow, Legolas left the room, waving the soldier along.
There was probably a lot that Faramir had to say, but unlike Legolas, now at least, he saw how weak the King really was. He managed to usher Beregond and Verilas outside when he left, falling back into his role as Aragorn's substitute, insincere as it might be right now.
Aragorn stayed sitting there motionlessly for a moment. Then he called the healer back inside who had excused herself to go to an adjoining room at some point in the last few minutes since those words had been none of her business. Maybe in his chambers, Aragorn would be at least safe from requests for decisions that he simply couldn't make.
He hardly even felt his shoulder finally being sewed close. It felt as if both his body and mind had frozen. There were many difficulties he had expected in the course of his regency but not a rift with one of his Ring Companions of all people.
Legolas had actually expected his wife outside but although Tarisilya had had to be informed about his arrival in the city and could impossibly have missed the tragic news either, he couldn't spot her anywhere, and not in the courtyard either.
Which was why he was in much of a hurry to tell the soldiers what to prepare and in which way exactly before he hurried to the chambers in the guesthouse opposite the King's House that Aragorn had provided Tarisilya and him with after their common journey to the west.
Given how distraught they both were right now, entirely unable to even begin concentrating on the mental marriage bond between them – something they didn't know how to handle so far anyway –, he could only guess. But just as feared, he did indeed find his partner in the bedroom, in front of closed shutters. Just like when he had come back to Minas Tirith after that unnerving search for Arwen back then. Only back then, there had been a proud warrior of Imladris with her to support her. This time, she was completely alone.
And this time, she was seeing him, too. For the first time since their wedding, Legolas had the feeling that Tarisilya was really looking at him, not at grief, pain, anger, self-reproaches, but at her husband, and even while she was wrapping her arms around him with a sob, she was smiling.
"What happened to you?" The catastrophic argument earlier could never have distracted Legolas too badly for him not to notice how much his wife was trembling and that she had lost even more weight since their last meeting at Cair Andros. The grief for their friends alone couldn't be responsible for bringing her down so much; Tarisilya and he were being close enough to know that.
He found the answer on the windowsill, in the shape of a book that Legolas knew only too well. At one of their first meetings hundreds of years ago, Tarisilya had left it with him for him to read. Back then, he had had to be extremely careful about always keeping it on him, to not risk his father possibly finding it, given some of the things written down in it. And now one of the pages that had frightened him so much was being open.
So this was why people in the city were euphorically talking about a miracle. One had happened indeed, but it wasn't what many men called magic in the absence of a better term. It was a miracle that could destroy Tarisilya.
That made it official: This day could definitely not get any worse.
"I'll take care of you, Ilya." Legolas finally pulled Tarisilya closer to him, trying to let her know that he was not recoiling from the things that she had had to do in the last few days, especially that he was not recoiling from her. "I will keep you from becoming what you are so afraid of."
"Oh, will you?" she asked, so cynically that she startled herself. "Even when it's about someone that you don't want to die? Will you ask me then to let them go too instead of getting them back? I will be haunted by this forever, Legolas."
When he silently caressed her cheek, with trembling fingertips, searching for words, in vain, she knew he had understood. There were certain things that no one could change. And today, his own demons sapped Legolas of too much strength to try anyway.
"I just wish I could talk to ada about it." She broke away from him, gently enough to signal him that she wasn't being angry with him. Dropping onto the bed with the book, she crossed her arms on it as if that could make it vanish, undo that she had let the words in it guide her. "He taught me everything. He would know what to do. I can't ask Lord Elrond. I already couldn't bring myself to when Ninor died. Lectures won't help me right now."
When Legolas took her by her upper arms, she shivered, not knowing why. She had never shied away from any of his touches … Then she realized that it was his expression. In the war, this had been exactly how her twin brother Tegiend had always looked when he had pushed her to give up her life on Middle-earth. "Don't."
"I have neglected you for far too long, Ilya. I hurt myself by hurting you. If this the only chance we have left, we'll leave it all behind. We can ride to Mithlond immediately." Now it was him backing away, confronted with open rage where he had probably excepted gratitude and happiness.
"Did you hear anything I just said?" Tarisilya raised to her full height, the strains of the last few days forgotten. Now she just couldn't shut up anymore. When had it happened that Legolas had stopped understanding her to her very core? "I'm already trembling from a temptation that can destroy both our lives, and now you're offering me another? Yes, I want to sail into the west, to my family! I miss them so much, I don't know when I last woke up happy! But I want to be with you as well, and I just can't have both right now. Just let it be! Never suggest that again as long as your heart is not ready for it!"
It hurt, seeing every one of her words hit him deeply, seeing the following silence make him collapse on the bed.
She couldn't even hug him, no matter how much she wanted it. She couldn't apologize for something when she was being more serious about as than about hardly anything else before. She could only nod when he stammered that he didn't recognize her.
"I already told you: I won't leave it to others anymore to fight for our happiness. I don't want anything to stand between us anymore, especially not problems that only exist because I don't dare to tell you something."
Still keeping her distance, she grabbed his hand at least that he had painfully buried on his lower arm, so she could be sure, he was listening. "This time, think before you answer. I am aware that you don't really want to leave, but can the two of us really start over? On a world that only recovers from the war so slowly? As long as our fate might allow us to accompany our friends on their way? Or have we bitten off more than we can chew? Because unless you ran out of hair ties in North Ithilien, you look suspiciously like you've given up."
In similar situations in the past, it had already been Tarisilya's dry humor that had melted the worst tension when none of them had known what to say. Now, too, she thought to see the hint of a grin on Legolas before he shook his head in helplessness. "I don't know, Ilya. I guess, the next few days will show. And you're right, this is nothing that we can decide on a whim. Please get changed, elwen. This day isn't over yet."
Since they'd told her what had happened, it had been clear to Tarisilya that the night wouldn't pass by without Legolas honoring the victims; so she followed his request without comment, though they had actually not even started to sort things out. But today, they wouldn't get a chance for that anymore either. Attending the mourning ceremony was the least she could do for her friends who had entered the Halls of Mandos – all four of them, as could be told with almost a hundred percent certainty –, and for their relatives, too.
She just took a brief look back over her shoulder while changing her dress, to watch Legolas search for something appropriate on his part, in the big bundle from Eryn Lasgalen that had arrived for him in Minas Tirith a few weeks ago. As he got rid of his dirty clothes, the far too thin sight of him had her swallow deeply.
Once her husband had put on a black, crystals-adorned robe that had fit him well 20 years ago only, she stepped closer to him, still busy tying up her hair to hide its lousy condition. And to stop Legolas from sadly staring at its reduced length every two minutes, at the symbol of how much Tarisilya was ready to sacrifice for him if need be. And that he couldn't keep her from it. "I remember that one. You last wore it when we celebrated the new millennium of Men. I've already hated it then."
There had been a time when she hadn't been able to get enough of Legolas' rare smile being aimed at her. As these days, it was mostly spiked with bitterness, she almost preferred him to stay serious. "I asked ada to send it in my last letter, not knowing how quickly I would need it."
When Legolas' third failed attempt at redoing his simple hairstyle failed due to his hands shaking, Tarisilya stepped behind him and did it for him. When some crimped strands grazed her skin that had been thin braids at his temple not too long ago, shivers ran down her arms. Just like that, it should all be over, including a hero's legend thought immortal after the war? She just couldn't and would not accept that.
But she couldn't even begin to think about how to possibly support her husband in this bad situation before the two of them hadn't got the most difficult task on this day over with.