"Oof!"
Aragorn felt the breath leave him in a whoosh and wondered why his head and feet still hurt. Wasn't there supposed to be a numbing quality to death?
"You're lucky I didn't go back for the other cake."
Cake? What? Through waves of pain and breathlessness Aragorn struggled to make sense of his situation.
"What…" he muttered, or meant to. It came out more like "Unnh…"
"Careful, now. Hold still." The voice that reached Aragorn was hardly recognizable through his hangover-clogged senses, but the view that plummeted away from him was clear enough. Sunlight warmed the side of his tower while far, far below, the cold hard cobbles of the courtyard remained in shadow. He felt his body thump up against the stone wall and it sent him into a writhing panic.
"Lemme go, lemme go!" Wide open air fell away beneath his boots.
"Hush, keep, quite or the guards will—
"Lemme go! Geroffame!"
"Aragorn—"
"Don't do it!"
"Aragorn!"
A hand seized Aragorn's chin and held it still.
"Aragorn, open your eyes."
Aragorn would not. He felt the warm stones on his back and the air beneath his boots and the firm arm around him. Even through the agony of his hangover he felt the warm breath on his face, and he was afraid. "It's only a dream," he whispered. Hating the words; fearing their truth.
"Aragorn." Then, softer still, "Elessar."
Slowly Aragorn cracked an eye open trembling without realizing it. And met twin pools of sky flecked with sapphire.
"This is no dream," Legolas said before Aragorn could protest. "If it were I would have let go a long time ago, rather than dangle here like carp on a Mirkwood rod. Come on, let us get inside." He smiled at the tears leaking from Aragorn's eyes, bent forward—as if to kiss them away, Aragorn thought. But at that moment the flash of sunrise on metal helmets glinted down in the courtyard and he hauled more urgently at Aragorn's bulk. "The changing guards will see us soon. Hurry."
Aragorn never saw how the Elf managed it, the maneuvering of both their bodies along with a sack Legolas had slung over his shoulder, up to the window—curtains still billowing—and in.
It was only when they thudded to the floor on the safe side of the windowsill that Aragorn thought of his appearance. Hastily he disentangled himself from the Elf where they had fallen, regretting more than the pain in his head as he did so.
"I'm sorry," he mumbled, throwing his hands up a the sty. "I haven't…I didn't…"
"You're in pain." Legolas rolled up onto his feet with a graced that tugged Aragorn to his core. "Here," the Elf said, tossing a small green pouch in Aragorn's direction.
The Man caught it, barely, and gave both it and the Elf a blank look.
"It will ease your headache," Legolas explained, stepping closer to retrieve the pouch and open it. Aragorn felt their proximity keenly as the Elf drew a few knotty roots from the bag and held them out. "Chew these," he said.
Aragorn had a fleeting image of Legolas feeding the roots to him one by one, but bowed his flaming face and took them before his fantasy could get out of hand.
"What's in the bag?" he asked lamely when the fast-acting roots began their work.
Legolas grinned. "Your kitchen's finest."
"My kitchen…?"
"What, you thought quick Elven hands could only be used for shooting arrows?"
Aragorn had to restrain himself from saying that he thought quick Elven hands would do him a world of good.
"Sit down, sit down. Careful, I snatched it right from the oven."
For the first time that morning Aragorn became aware of his ravenous stomach. In lunging for the nutcake his hand brushes Legolas' as the Elf tore off his own hunk of bread, and the two of them froze for a moment, fingers frozen over piping-hot cake like eagles waiting to dive. Then the spell snapped.
"Here, you fetched it, go ahead," Aragorn stammered, just as Legolas said,
"It came from your stock, it's yours."
Both looked to the ceiling, the walls, the floor shimmering under its carpet of glass. To his own surprise, Aragorn cleared his throat and spoke first. "I don't think this bread can be called mine any more than the rule of this country can."
Legolas looked away. "So I've heard."
"You…heard? Where? When?" It was all Aragorn could do not to cry out, why didn't you come to me?! But then, that would be being presumptuous. When the Elf failed to answer right away Aragorn floundered on, all too conscious of his tendency to probe. "So you're a merchant advisor for Lothlorien now, are you? You're quite the adept. First a prince, now a merchant…what next? Farmer?"
"A prince no longer," Legolas murmured to the window.
Aragorn cursed himself mentally for bringing it up.
"But here, the bread's getting cold. You look famished, Aragorn—do you spend much time up here?"
"Yes…well, no, I…" Aragorn gazed around the prison of a room. Two years a king, and this was all he had to show for it. "I'm usually, er, down in the city…"
"You would have made it so much easier on me to have remained there," Legolas laughed, gesturing to the window and its precipitous climb.
It was such a golden opportunity, and Aragorn couldn't stand it any longer. "Why did…you come? To me," he added hastily.
Legolas' eyes were throwing blue sparks when he turned back—whether of laughter or anger or something else altogether, Aragorn couldn't tell.
"Why do you think, Aragorn?" The Elf's voice was smooth and measured; no hint of his mood there.
"I don't want to think," Aragorn responded truthfully.
Legolas was silent for such a long time that Aragorn wondered whether even Elven ears had missed his strangled whisper. But before he could think of something to say, Legolas spoke for him.
"You were wondering, I suppose, at the delay? Why I didn't come earlier if I hadn't gone to the Undying Lands?" the Elf sighed. "I am sorry, Aragorn."
"Don't be—"
"No. I am. I have these silly ideas sometimes…" He turned sharply, struck by something, and caught Aragorn's eye. "They did tell you why I am no longer a prince, didn't they?"
Aragorn shook his head, grateful for the roots that kept the motion from being agonizing.
"They didn't? The contingent from Lothlorien? Not a word?"
"Nothing."
Legolas grabbed Aragorn by the shoulders suddenly; shook him hard. "But you knew, didn't you?" the Elf cried. "Tell me you knew!" Tears glistened in his eyes.
"Knew what?" Aragorn tried to remain aloof but his voice cracked on the last word. This was it, then. He was sure he didn't want to know what Legolas was about to tell him, and just as sure that the Elf was going to tell it anyway. Fool, Aragorn chided himself. You were better off believing this was a dream. What would burst his bubble this time? An immaculate conception with Gimli? With Arwen? A wasting sickness, the only one ever to befall the Elves?
"I love you, Aragorn."
It took a moment for those words to sink in. When they did, Aragorn leapt to his feet in a rage. "I don't believe you!" he howled, pointing an accusing finger at a broken-faced Legolas. "I don't believe you're even here!"
At this Legolas rushed to his side and clutched his arm beseechingly. "But you must believe me, Aragorn! I am real, here in this room, and I've wanted you ever since—"
Angrily Aragorn shook him off. "This is a dream! A dream born in a drunken stupor and the waste I've made of my life!" He stalked to the window, glass crunching underfoot.
"It is not," Legolas insisted from behind.
"Prove it!"
Slowly, slowly Aragorn felt light hands slip around his waist. Ignoring all instincts, he let them stay there.
"What could I do, Aragorn," Legolas whispered, his breath hot in Aragorn's ear, "to prove that all this—that I—that we are real?"