Chapter 21: Recuperating
Since the great battle, the main building in Rivendell has been used as a hospital and nearly everywhere you could see an elf or two trying to sneak out of bed and walk around. Most of the soldiers were in fact healed and wanted to get out of their beds, but few still had serious injuries and were pushed back into their beds. In the far room of the building held two beds filled with the only two unconscious forms in all of Rivendell.
In the corner by one of the beds stood five hobbits talking and hoping for the best for their two friends, and one of the hobbits worrying about her son. Sitting beside one of their beds was a woman elf with two others on either one of her sides. She looked over the hobbitlass's sleeping form.
"They say she should be able to pull through it," Arwen said brushing back her hair that fell in her face.
"How long will she stay asleep like this, Arwen?" Adrielle asked touching her shoulder.
"I don't know. It could be a while yet," she stood up and looked down at the jewel that laid on the girl's chest. The jewel was now cracked in many places and the gold binding no longer looked like roots, but more like a melting mass of gold on either side of the jewel.
"She risked everything, Arwen. She deserves a life she chooses," Philon looked down at her.
"And a choice she shall have," Arwen turned her head toward them, "I will explain the circumstances later to you both. You two must go and tend to the others in the halls and I will stay with them both."
"What about the other hobbits, what are we to tell them?" Philon asked her starting to walk to the door.
"Take them with you and tell them all we know. Hope will shine brighter in their eyes then in mine."
Philon and Adrielle nodded and walked over to the group of hobbits situated next to Drogo's bed. They whispered a few words and the group was lead out of the room, leaving Arwen alone in the room with Aubrey in front of her. She walked around the bed and walked over to Drogo's bed to see how he was fairing in his unconscious state. She checked on the injures that he had gotten from his fight with Carond and saw if they made any process from the night before.
Aubrey started to come to as she shifted her head from side to side and squinted her closed eyes. She groaned a few times and alerted Arwen to her side. The woman elf was surprised that she was waking up so soon and wondered how this hobbitlass can pull through nearly everything thrown at her, "Aubrey? Aubrey can you hear me?"
"Just five more minutes, Adrielle . . . Don't open the curtains yet . . . We can skip the glitter today, can't we?" Aubrey waved her hand in front of her face and turned on her side. She pulled the covers over her shoulder and buried her head deeper into the pillow.
Arwen looked at her with a little pathetic look on her face and shook her head in an amused fashion. Arwen bent to Aubrey's side and started to shake her lightly out of her sleep, "Aubrey, wake up."
"Just five minutes is all I ask. Is that too much to ask?" Aubrey opened one of her eyes and looked at the person rudely awakening her from her sleep and turned over from facing the wall. Once she spotted Arwen she tried to sit up straight, but after she tried it she found it quite difficult not to mention painful. Arwen pushed her back into the bed and let her lay in the bed.
"Morning Aubrey," Arwen smiled with a sympathetic look on her face, "How are you feeling?"
"Like everything in my body is about to explode or has already," Aubrey rubbed her stomach to try and release the pain that she experienced by trying to sit up at the sight of Arwen.
"You are sore, and I don't doubt it. You used the power of the amulet, using it all up," Arwen picked up the ruined amulet and showed Aubrey, "By all accounts both you and Drogo should be dead."
"Where is Drogo?!" Aubrey's eyes grew with worry.
"He is fine," Arwen said in a reassuring tone and kept her from hurting herself by keeping her shoulders down in the bed, "He is still unconscious, but should be fine."
Aubrey let out a sigh of relief and looked in Arwen's eyes, "What exactly happened? When I used the power. . ."
"All the magic that was in the amulet; that was stored in the amulet was used. When it fed off of your love it turned into the energy and cooled the magma that fueled the fire pits. Then it spread all over the land of Mordor and restored the barren land so that it is now in bloom with flowers, trees and grass. You did all that, Aubrey with the power and energy flowing through both you and Drogo . . . I would think that with all that power coursing through both of you, you would have both burnt out. . . died. But my best guess is that with both of you inputting your energy and emotions it didn't kill one of you, but knocked both of you out."
"What about the girls?"
"The girls?"
"The girls that were captured and changed, like me . . . What happened to them, they had no where to go."
"When the power spread, they were transported back to your world, like they were never missing."
"But wouldn't that mean that I . . ."
"No, not necessarily. You once told me that you had chosen what you were, didn't you?"
"Yes . . . I did actually. When I think back on it, I felt an energy flow through me and I knew that I couldn't go back, even if I wanted to."
"There is your answer. The amulet didn't take you back because you were not a human. You didn't have the will, and you didn't have anything or anyone there that you wanted as much as you had here. Even though the other girls were changed, they were not truly the creatures they had the forms of. They were still human and wanted to go home."
"I know how they feel," Aubrey looked at the amulet and stoked the cracked jewel in the center. Arwen watched her face and knew what she was thinking.
"Aubrey, when you decided or chose who you were, what did you say?"
"I said to myself that I have chosen to be now and forever a hobbitlass in the Shire. Why?"
"Well, that would mean that that was all that you were, wouldn't it?" she gave Aubrey a smile, but Aubrey still didn't know what she was getting at, "You didn't choose to be a princess . . . which means that you were only princess by the power of the jewel . . . and now that the power is gone . . ."
"You mean, I can go back to the Shire? To Hobbiton?" A great smiled spread across her face as Arwen nodded her head at her. She couldn't believe it, she was free to go and live where she wanted. Free to go back with Drogo and the others and see the Shire again. See Frodo and the other hobbits again . . . but that also meant that . . .
"Arwen, wouldn't that mean that you would have to stay and rule here, keeping you from your husband? I couldn't ask you to do that."
"There is another part to this, Aubrey. The elves of Rivendell have decided to leave for the Undying Lands. You were right when you said that there was nearly nowhere for the elves to go. The age of man is growing and they are becoming dominant, which means even with our immortal lives, we would not really be able to live. Even if you were still in power, you would still have to go to the Shire."
"So they are all leaving Rivendell? Forever?"
"The elves here are leaving as soon as the wounded are healed well enough to travel. And so are you," Arwen smiled, "I was right. You were a great leader. Even though your reign was the smallest ever known to elf kind, you showed these people more courage than they have seen in a long time."
"I thought that this was their home."
"It is, but sometimes you have to leave your home behind to make a new one somewhere else, with someone else . . . don't you?"
Aubrey remembered that she had to leave her home in her old world behind- maybe not intentionally- to make a new home in this world. And now, she wouldn't give it up for anything.
"Thank you, Arwen."
"For what?"
"Believing in me. I don't think I could have had the courage to even address the people without you backing me. Thank you so much."
"Well, now you don't have to worry about it, do you?"
"No, I don't. Now I have to find a way home."
"And a way to get your gentelhobbit out of his sleeping state."
"Leave all of that up to me, Arwen. I will find a way, but let him sleep for a while longer. With almost being killed time and time again, I think that he deserves it."
"I would say so," Arwen started to walk out of the room.
"When are you heading back to Gondor?"
"As soon as the last of the elves leave from Rivendell," she opened the door and closed it softly after her.
Aubrey looked at the bed on the other side of the room and its occupant silently breathing in breath after breath. She held on to her pillow and looked down at the amulet that was lying on the white material of the bed. She knew that she wouldn't feel the warmth that the amulet gave her when she knew her parents were thinking of her, but she knew that one day they would be together again. And she could still hear them in the soft stories told by the stars. She will always know that they were still thinking of her and protecting her, even without the amulet.
***
In the middle of the night Aubrey stirred from her sleep and shot her eyes open realizing that she had fallen asleep again while watching Drogo. She wanted to stay up as long as she could so she could watch him wake up and help him if he needed her. She wiped the sleep out of her eyes and for the first time since Arwen was by her bedside tried to sit up. She pushed up from her bed and felt the slight pressure on her muscles to go back into the bed, but kept pushing until she was sitting straight up. She grabbed the side of the bed and swung her legs gently over the side.
She looked down at the ground to focus away from the pain in her muscles. She kept reminding herself that the pain wasn't as bad as it was when she originally tried. She placed her feet on the cold ground and tried to apply her weight so she could walk, but almost collapsed.
"Ok . . . maybe that is going a little too fast," Aubrey said placing herself back on her bed. She looked at her amulet and held it in her hand. The cracks and splits in the jewel caught the reflection of the moonlight coming into the room and it looked like silver streams on a blue tinted world. 'A sliver lining,' Aubrey smiled at it and let it fall back on her chest.
Aubrey looked over at Drogo's bed, but didn't see his form sleeping in it. Aubrey panicked and nearly jumped from her bed. She fell flat on her face gritting her teeth against the pain in her nose and stomach. She looked up again and tried to push off the cold floor. Her dress that was put on her for recovery went only down to her knees and her legs were cold by the constant contact with the floor below her. She pushed herself up to the point where she was on all fours and she looked up at the empty bed where Drogo was. She started to crawl, but it hurt even more then the first time she tried to move. She placed her hand on her knee and put almost all her weight on that one knee. She pushed and strained her muscles to listen to her brain as she struggled to get up. She finally reached the point of standing, maybe a little feeble in the legs, but she was standing.
She felt herself about to fall, until she felt a warm arm wrap around her and kept her up. She heard a low grunt and looked behind her to see Drogo holding her up. He walked her back over to her bed and fell on the bed so that both of them were at least off the floor. He rubbed his arm as he sat up and looked down at her.
"And just where we you going?" he smiled at her. She gave him a disapproving look and hit him the arm, "Hey! What did I do?"
"You made me get out of my bed! I didn't see you in yours so I got up- well at least tried to- to see where you were," she hits him again in the arm.
"Ow! Ok, I'm sorry for worrying you," he held her hand, "I'm sorry. I got up so I could release some of the pressure off my legs and tried to take a small walk outside the doors. I wasn't going anywhere."
"You better not have gone anywhere," she looked at the arm that was holding her and noticed that he was still rubbing it, "Drogo, did I hurt you?"
"No, it's just that every joint in my body seems so sore," he rubbed the back of his neck and turned to her.
"Same here," Aubrey unhooked the amulet from around her neck and placed it in her hand, "According to Arwen when I used the power . . . instead of killing me, it passed through both of us and just pretty much blew us out. So, in a way you did save me."
"I don't really care what happened . . . I'm just happy that you're back and you are fine," he leaned over and kissed her cheek lightly.
Aubrey smiled and looked into his eyes, "I can go back."
"What are you talking about?" Drogo looked at her almost utterly confused.
"I can go back to the Shire. I'm no longer a Princess," her smile just grew larger, "The elves are going to the Undying Lands . . . all of them. They don't need a leader anymore. I can go back with you and the others."
Drogo's face grew with the smile and the joy that over came him, "Aubrey . . . you're serious? You can come home?"
"Finally," she was almost on the verge of happy tears when he kissed her and they both fell back into the soft covers and sheets of her bed.
She wrapped her arms around his neck and brushed her fingers through his hair. He held his hands behind her holding her back, sometimes pulling her closer to him. Aubrey dropped the amulet from her hands on the table next to her bed and the resulting noise surprised her.
She broke away from the kisses and looked Drogo in the eyes, "I love you."
"I know," he smiled at her, giving that smart look to his features, "And I love you, too," he added hastily so he wouldn't get hit in the side, "Oh-"
Aubrey watched him as he rolled on his side and sat up pulling on something on his hand. She held the question in her mind and waited for him to explain as she rolled on her side. He looked over his shoulder at her and stopped pulling on his finger, apparently getting off what ever he needed to.
"Aubrey . . . Um," he rubbed the back of his head, apparently very nervous with whatever he was going to ask, "How old do you have to be to get . . . well, get married in your world?"
Aubrey was a little surprised by the question, but at the same time excitement flared in her being, "I don't know, Drogo. I guess in my world, as long as the parents were ok with it . . . two people could get married at age seventeen."
She was breathing oddly and couldn't believe that she was talking about marriage to him. I mean, they were only sixteen and seventeen years old. They- he couldn't actually be thinking about it now, could he?
Aubrey shook herself out of her daze and looked down at her hands, "But for me . . . I kind of want to wait to get married when I know that I'm ready. I want to live with the person and be their girlfriend for a while and know for sure that that is the person I want to spend the rest of my life with."
She didn't see him move or anything, but she could feel the tension and him stiffen up. She crawled across the bed and hugged him from behind, wrapping her arms around his waist and resting her head on his shoulder, "At least that is what I thought would happen . . . I do want to wait to get married, but I already know who I want to spend with the rest of my life with. I love you and I promise you that nothing will ever change that."
Aubrey kissed him on the cheek with her eyes closed and placed her head back on his back starting to rock from side to side with him. She felt him hold her hands and then she felt him take her left hand and slip something on her ring finger. She stopped rocking and her eyes popped open. She took her head off his back and unwrapped her arms from his waist. She looked down at her ring finger and saw a gold band with a small jewel shining in the middle of it. She slowly placed her other hand over her chest and found it quite hard to keep breathing.
"Oh my God . . ." she crawled over beside Drogo and let her feet dangle over the side of the bed, but all the time keeping her eyes on the ring on her finger.
Drogo watched her reaction with a smile on his face, "I was hoping to give you that after the battle," he started to explain, "It took me nearly three months to save up for it. And even longer to get the courage to give it to you. I know that we are young, but I wanted to ask you to know that no matter what it was always in our future and we never had to worry. I will wait as long as you want to . . . because it is a very big thing in two peoples lives and I just want you to be happy. I mean if it was the other way-"
Drogo's rambling was stopped as Aubrey's lips crashed into his nearly throwing him back down into the bed's surface. She let him go after a few seconds and looked him in the eyes, "Drogo . . . This is . . . I have no idea how to describe it. I can't explain how I'm feeling. I-"
"All you have to do is say yes or no," he smiled and held her hand.
"Drogo, you already know my answer," Aubrey smiled kissing the top of his nose and then moving back to his mouth, "Of course I will- but with time. With a lot of time."
"You don't think that I'm ready for married life, do you?" he asked her, crossing his arms in front of him.
"Are you saying that you aren't looking forward to it, Drogo Baggins?" Aubrey asked, keeping a disappointed face on.
"No . . . that's not what I'm saying at all," he said hugging her from the side, "I just don't think we should rush into it, you know?"
"Yeah, I know," she smiled and they both fell back into the bed. Drogo held her in his arms and kept his face nuzzled into her neck.
She could feel his breath wash over her neck and chest and the small, delicate kisses that he planted on her neck. She smiled and turned on her side putting her arms around his neck and spreading her fingers out as she looked at the ring shining in the pale light of the moon cascading into the room from outside the windows. She locked eyes with Drogo and started to kiss his lips softly, but started to kiss more aggressively.
Both didn't make any moves to stop, but restrained themselves from going any further. Aubrey smiled countless times against Drogo's lips, as she now knew that they were going to be together until the end of time. It was set in stone as far as she was concerned. This promise, this bond could never be broken . . . no matter what. He would be hers and she would be his forever.
***
The next morning Drogo was the first one to wake up in the bed. He watched as Aubrey's face went from happy to contorted as she went through her different dreams. All he could think of was that he would be able to spend nearly every morning with her like this. To wake up in the morning and see her face first thing . . . he didn't want anything else. He kissed her on the tip of her nose and watched her as her face went back to content.
Aubrey squeezed closer to Drogo and rubbed her head on his chest. Her left hand was placed over his right shoulder and her head was comfortably on his left. He held her left hand with his right and rubbed the gold band with his thumb. He knew that he would have to get up soon and get back to his bed or go for some food. Arwen or others may come in to see how they are doing, and he didn't particularly want to surprise them with this picture.
He kissed her hand and started to shake her awake, "Aubrey, come on, time to wake up."
Aubrey tried to keep her eyes closed to go back to sleep, she didn't quite want to wake up just yet, "Not yet, I just don't want to get up just yet; I just want to stay here and be with you." She used the same thing that he had that morning when they had first used the tents.
He smiled and kissed her on top of the head, "That is not going to work on me, Miss Aubrey Cander."
"Hey!" Aubrey felt him roll out of the bed and felt the cold air replace where his body was. She threw a pillow at him, but it never reached the end of the bed because she didn't have enough strength. She pushed herself up as she watched him put his shirt back on, "I told you never to call me Miss!"
"I forgot," he said pushing his hair out of his face, "Forgive me, M' lady." He gave a deep bow and stood back up.
"You can bow all the way," Aubrey said somewhat surprised.
"Yeah, I have been known to do that when I'm in the presence of a lady," he said giving her his smart smirk.
"That's not what I meant. You aren't as sore anymore," she put her legs over the side of the bed and let her feet touch the ground. She pushed off the bed and steadied herself on the floor, "Yes, I'm not so sore anymore."
"Maybe the jewel's injuries just heal faster," Drogo shrugged his shoulders and started to make his bed in the corner. Aubrey walked over to him almost skipping and hugged him around the waist from behind. He smiled and touched her hand, "Come on, you need to make your bed too so we can get ready to go home."
Aubrey let go and took a deep breath as she made her way over to her bed. Home . . . what a great word and meaning that it held for Aubrey now. It isn't someplace where she had to be, it was someplace she wanted to be. Out in the fields and in the leaf bed, running and learning with Frodo. She was going home.
A/N: Almost done. I'm sorry I really thought that the story would have ended here, but my idea ran long, so the last chapter coming up next update. Pretty much just going to say what happens when all is done. Maybe even bits and pieces of Aubrey's new future. Just sit tight and . . . yeah . . . well, sorry again I guess my unconscious mind is trying to make up for the first chapter. : S
And no, Aubrey and Drogo did not . . . um . . . how to put this? Oh- they did not have relations!!!!!! You sick people!!!!