Part VI: Diurnal Solstice

The sunfire is fading

Our tale is half complete

Yet with every passing second

The lovers long to meet.

Though once they have enjoyed

The silence of the night

Their desire burns the stars

To new plateaus of bright.

Cerise's almost nonexistent weight and the pallor of her bloodless cheeks frightened Legolas into oblivion; he ignored the curious stares of the women and children, and rushed her past the attacking orcs into the cave-chambers behind the fortress. She was cold and limp as he laid her on the ground, sucking in breath at the line of blood mimicking her spine in its position. He could not treat this through two layers of cloth and one of chain-mail, he realized.

Glancing surreptitiously around, Legolas lifted the damp, clammy blue and green and silver fabrics over her ribs, pulling them gently past her head before he slid them down her arms, trying to look away and finding it impossible. He had dreamed of returning to Rivendell, then, in some shadowy, candlelit chamber, doing just this. But instead of lying silent and still, Cerise would be warm with the innocent anticipation that made her irresistible; her green eyes would stare affirmatively up at him.

Though a dark bruise was blossoming at her hip, Cerise's torso was still as he remembered it, alabaster skin with the texture of rose petals and the scent of water. Her breasts, high and firm beneath her dropped arm, had grown even in the spare months he'd been away, and it was all he could do to stop himself from reaching out to them at that moment. Not now, he told himself, his breaths coming shallow and fast. There will be a time for that later.

The blood was still running fresh across her back. Legolas took the green shirt with the ripped hem and soaked it in the cavern's pool, then pressed it along her back to staunch the flow of blood. For now, he simply had to hold her through the initial bleeding, and then he would fashion bandages from the tunic and treat her more adequately. The wound was not deep; it seemed as though this was simply a snatching, farewell blow from the brutish orc who'd attacked her, but the quick touch of a knife was especially painful. As Legolas ran the cloth down the sides of the wound, cleaning the blood from Cerise's skin, she winced and convulsed in pain.

Water would not suffice.

Legolas reached inside his robe for the tiny bottle of dark liquid, given him by Pippin when they reached Lothlorien. "Here," the tiny hobbit had said, handing it to him shyly as a child does to a mother. "I've a feeling you might need it more in the future than I shall, n Merry gives it to you as well. It's from his father's stores, the ones that gave em the name Brandybuck, eh?" He winked audaciously, then skipped off. Legolas was hesitant to apply this mortal liquor to the wound, but knew he had to sterilize it, and he knew he was lucky to have even this with him.

The vial's reflective, red-tinted contents were menacingly calm. Legolas tore off a piece of the tunic, then poured a few drops of the almost pure alcohol onto it; it flowered dark and gruesome on the cheery blue cloth. He pressed it quickly, straight to the incision, and bent his head as Cerise shrank away and her eyes opened, wide with agony. She did not speak, merely hid her face in the rock, as though attempting to pretend she was not there.

Legolas could not say anything to her to dim the pain, and so did not speak at all. The next few minutes passed in silence and stillness, broken only by her involuntary shuddering whenever he applied fresh liquid to her back.

The sounds of the battle outside had slowly softened, but Legolas was so enthralled with his work that he did not notice as Aragorn approached him, boots clanking noisily on the stone ground.

The Ranger drew in breath and looked politely away, and Legolas almost laughed as Aragorn spoke to him while gazing at the wall. "The battle is over," he said solemnly. "We have won."

"Congratulations," Legolas replied sincerely as he began to rip Cerise's tunic into bandage-sized strips.

Aragorn seemed to be trying to keep from smiling as he turned his gaze from the wall to Legolas, eyes darting to Cerise's bare chest and hidden face. "And what of your activities, Legolas? Who is this fair" He glanced at her ear, noting its deliberate, sloping point. Then he completed the puzzle and had his answer.

"The elf was a woman," he said quietly, and Legolas, placing the first sodden bandage over her wound, felt her skin heat beneath his fingertips. Aragorn smirked. "And not just any woman, either, I presume?"

Legolas sighed, but before he could speak, the elf-stone continued. "You abandoned your post to care for an injured soldier? You know better than that, Legolas, I-"

"It was my fault," Cerise whispered from beneath her hair. "I should not have come, I am a simple maiden, and-"

Legolas, feeling a little indignant now, coughed loudly.

Cerise blushed, and when she spoke again her voice was even softer than before. "I am sorry, Estel."

Aragorn looked surprised. "You know me?"

"I- I know of you, yes," Cerise answered. "Lady Undomiel was kind enough to give me her counsel earlier this year."

"Give her my regards, of course," Aragorn said after a moment, a faraway look in his eyes and a stray hand fingering the white-jeweled pendant at his neck.

Eomer joined them now, also blushing and turning away at the sight of Cerise's naked breasts. "Erkenbrand wishes to meet with you and my uncle," he said, his head bent in apology to Cerise.

"I wish you well, my lady," Aragorn said in farewell to Cerise. "Until we meet again." Then he strode away without a backward glance.

Cerise waited an embarrassed moment before speaking. "Well, that wasn't humiliating at all, was it?" she said scathingly to Legolas.

He traced a finger over the finished bandaging, testing for strength. "I am sorry."

"This isn't how it was supposed to be," she said suddenly, sounding as though she were biting back tears. "You were supposed to- to kiss me, and-"

"That can be arranged," Legolas answered, and Cerise peeked out from her curtain of hair. "But not here."

He reached beneath her, bearing her up and cradling her against his chest, then headed for the ramp.

There had to be a bed somewhere in this fortress.

~*~

Cerise reveled in the scent of Legolas. The clashing musk of blood and springtime air fairly emanated from him, and she took long, gulping breaths of it, pressed to his chest as she was. God, she'd waited so long for this. It seemed like years. But none of that mattered, because she was here, in his arms. It wasn't like the other times. He wasn't engaged to someone else. She wasn't posing as a man. It was just Cerise and Legolas, yin and yang, fire and water, sky and sea. Two pieces of a whole.

They turned the corner, and Legolas let out breath with relief. The king's bedchambers sprawled before them, a velvet-upholstered mound of pillows lit softly by the two torches in brackets on either wall. The door clicked closed.

Legolas laid her upon the bed, and Cerise sunk slowly into the sumptuous fabrics, feeling them silky and cool against the bare skin of her back. Before he even thought of himself, though, Legolas reached for her belt and deftly unfastened it, then swiftly did away with the trousers and the muddy boots that had weighed so heavily on her feet. She lay open before him, and the blush that had come upon her so vibrantly that night long ago was not so red now, simply a rosy pink tinge that made her all the more appealing.

"This is how it was supposed to be," he whispered, staring at her as a desert nomad does at water.

He discarded his quiver on his own, removed his boots, then slowly lowered himself to Cerise's level; his eyes darkened with need as he slid a hand around her neck and pulled her close to drink the thirsty kiss that had been dripping from his lips since he departed from Rivendell. Cerise gasped into his mouth at the longing passion that stirred within her, and then in pain as he gently moved atop her.

Quickly, Legolas withdrew, eyes searching and concerned. "My- my back," Cerise breathed, hating herself for sounding like an elderly woman.

"I'm sorry," he said, dropping his lips to her neck and cradling her beside him. "We'll have to switch positions, then, I suppose"

Cerise almost giggled. Did he mean Oh, she thought with a sly smile, and pushed herself up, hands against his chest and arms extended. Her hair fell in an undulating sheet of crimson-gold, obscuring his face to anyone but her.

"You're so thin," Legolas observed, running a hand over her ribs. What did she go through to come here?

Cerise sighed. "Don't worry, I gain weight easily."

"Just make sure you do." His eyes twinkled, then widened as her hand traced over his abdomen, swirling closer to the platinum curls that trailed up from between his thighs.

"Oh, I will," Cerise assured him bravely, then slid down. Her hair drew across his chest, golden blood on the pale skin, and Legolas closed his eyes in content satisfaction.

For the first time in three months, he was happy.

~*~

"WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN?"

An extremely red-faced and unusually passionate elf-maiden strode from the entrance-hall of Rivendell to confront Cerise. Medeasel looked more angry than upset at her absence, and Cerise knew this was probably because they had shared chores, and her friend had been left the entire load.

"Away," she said simply, trying to keep the smirk off her face as Medeasel's eyebrows slanted in fury.

"For a month? You frightened everyone horribly, Cerise. You know that Lord Elrond feels responsible for your safety."

"I am safe, aren't I?" Cerise finished unsaddling Naharendil and knelt to fix the lace on the shoe one of the Rohirrim women had lent her.

Medeasel regarded her suspiciously for a moment before stepping closer. "Why are you hunched over?"

"N- nothing," Cerise said quickly, intent on her lacing.

"You're hurt!" Medeasel hurried toward her, wrenching her from the ground. "We're taking you to the medicinal hall."

Cerise sighed in defeat. "Can we hurry? It has been a month since I have bathed."

After a quick examination of the carefully bandaged wound on Cerise's back, the elf-doctor shook her head. "You have been well-treated," she said. "I could not have done a better job, but I will replace the bandages, as they are older than I would like." She paused, and came around the side of the stool Cerise was sitting on. "Your records say you are"

"Thirty-one," Cerise finished. "Why?"

"Yet you have not come of age," the elf-doctor mused, almost to herself. "It looks as though your time should come soon. I will alert Lord Elrond to prepare the ceremony. Lucky girl," she commented, shaking her dark head at Cerise. "I remember how I yearned to come of age, but mine came late- I was nearly thirty-five."

The belt delivered to Cerise's room the following week was a sparkling confection of spun gold intertwined with mithril, and it shimmered weightlessly as, trying it on, she fastened it about her hips with a sigh of satisfaction. Finally. No longer would she be Ceriselen the elf-maiden, the girl-child with no perception of the world around her. No longer would she reside in a child's quarters; she would have her own pavilion, as befits near-royalty, across the city in the shrouded realm of the elven women.

And it would be time for Elrond to consider marriage for her.

Cerise was extremely wary of this. The Lord of Rivendell did not know of her love for Legolas, nor his for her, and would most likely choose, if not one of his own sons, a royal Elf of his own city.

Not that she would have normally minded Elladan or Elrohir as a suitor. Both were tall and dark-haired, with the slender, fit physique that Legolas shared, but were told apart in that Elladan's eyes were dark as coal, flashing almost sinisterly in the moonlight, and Elrohir's were pale, pale grey-blue, almost wet with their idealistic shine. The two heirs of Rivendell had often been a topic of much giggling and whispering among the maidens.

But for Cerise, the mere thought of loving or wedding anyone other than the Prince of Mirkwood made her shudder with revulsion. Hating the idea, she folded the belt and shoved it in a drawer petulantly.

Lord Elrond was waiting for her.

The king sat in the wood-lace throne set high in the receiving hall, where the shadows behind him threw his strikingly hollow cheekbones into illumination and made Cerise kneel in awe.

"It is time, Lady Ceriselen," he began, assuming she knew of what he spoke.

Cerise sighed. "Yes, yes, the ceremony and all. What do you require of me, Lord?"

"No." Elrond looked sternly at her. "That is well, but I do not refer to those preparations." He cleared his throat. "It is common knowledge that my daughter, the Lady Undomiel, and Lord Estel are to be wed. The date has been set for Midsummer, if the trouble in the South can be settled by then."

"I know this," Cerise said after a moment, recognizing that he wanted her affirmation.

"My daughter wishes you to be included in her entourage of elven-women at the marriage ceremony," he said finally, with a sort of reluctant sadness that tore faintly at Cerise's heart.

"Of course, my lord. I will be happy to."

The next month passed in a whirlwind of busy planning and preparing for the two coinciding events: the confirmation of the maturity of Lady Ceriselen, and of course, the wedding of the Lady Undomiel. Though war raged in the south, there was barely any concept of that here, where bough upon bough of white flowers filled the halls, and the Seamery was ever occupied by Arwen and her entourage, being fitted for their marvelous dresses. Cerise wondered at the exquisite detail of her pale, violet gown, hung with glittering yet subtle gems at the waist, and looked around: Arwen was surrounded by elven seamstresses, pinning and stitching and hemming at her feet, and was clad in a white, flowing garment cut straight and low and tight at the bodice that flared at the hips into a confection of ivory organza embroidered with silver. Her various other elven women, all at least a thousand years Cerise's senior, were being fitted for their violet handmaiden's gowns as well. None of them needed theirs hemmed a foot, she noticed bitterly.

A tall Elf strode through the doorway to the right, and Arwen did not even need to turn to know it was her younger brother. "What is it, Elrohir? Do you now wish to be one of my handmaidens as well?"

"If that entails spending time around such lovely maidens as these, then of course," Elrond's son said smoothly, and shot a long glance at a blonde whose dress had been finished. She caught his gaze in the mirror and blushed.

Arwen glared. "What is it?"

"Ada wishes me to speak with one of your handmaidens." Elrohir leaned closer and stage-whispered, "I can't remember which."

Arwen rolled her eyes quickly. "Ceriselen?"

"Yes?"

"My father wishes this oaf to have a private audience with you. Will you grant it?"

Cerise looked nervously from the imposing Princess of Imladris to the dashing, dark-haired Prince. "Of course."

A/N: I know it's not as long as my chapters usually are. Bear with me! I wanted to update soon, so I didn't spend as much time on it. I hope it's keeping you interested! Please tell me your concerns, ask your questions, and give your advice freely in a review or email. I love y'all and your reviews! Please keep reading!

~*goldenberry*~