-THE GAMES OF THE GODS-
-Disclaimer:-
CS: I own nothing.
...
CS: What are you still here for? I said I own nothing. Now go away and leave me alone...
Rachel: Someone's lost the Christmas spirit...
CS: *turns Rachel into a frog* Shut up, I have a headache.
Glorfindel: O.o
Glorfindel: *opens his mouth to say something, recieves an Author!Glare*
Glorfindel: *shuts mouth, shrugs, and gives Frog!Rachel a smooch*
Rachel: *returns to normal*
Glorfindel and Rachel: *edge away from CS carefully*
...
Haldir: Well this was a boring disclaimer...
-36: Preparing-
The next two days were spent with preparations, or hanging out with the hobbits and Boromir. Elladan and Elrohir were gone from Rivendell on the second day after the council, so my spars were temporarily suspended to help the hobbits learn more about how to use their swords. With Frodo better, Sam was more amiable to hanging out with us, and Boromir and I taught him and Frodo some basics about how to use their daggers/swords - that is, after Boromir finished drooling over the workmanship on the weapons. Apparently, besides a few of the ancient Elven-forged swords, Boromir had not seen anything like the hobbits daggers in quite awhile.
The night of the third day after the council - October 28th, for those of you keeping track - I ventured into the Hall of Fire one last time, and pulled Elrond off to one side to talk about the journey, with an intention to talk to him about something else entirely if I got the chance - there was one thing that would happen no matter what I did, and after how nice Elrond had been in putting up with me, I wanted to help him deal with it somehow. I got the chance when Arwen stood and sang a slow love ballad, her eyes fixed on Aragorn the entire time. Elrond was scowling by the end of it, and I had to catch his attention with a snap of my fingers.
"Stop scowling, it makes you look old." I told him. Elrond gave me a withering look. "As does that." I added.
"Perhaps that is because I am old, Rachel?" he replied somewhat testily.
"Yes, and you have been far away from your wife and her sensible influence for far too long." I replied promptly. Before Elrond could say anything more, I continued. "Arwen loves him, Elrond, and there is nothing you can do about it. Even if you convince her to leave him, and go into the west, she will still love him. In time she will come to - well, if not hate, then resent - you for making her leave him. If she survives that long. Love of that depth is the type that causes even humans to die from heartbreak if it is denied." Elrond stared at me for a few moments, absorbing what I just said.
"And how would you know anything about my daughter and Aragorn?" he said angrily.
"The same way I know of everything of the future." I said softly, looking straight at Elrond. "You cannot pull them apart - fate has decreed that they are to be together, for better or for worse. It is up to you to accept that, and treasure what time you have left with your daughter." Elrond was, by now, looking at me in a combination of panic and hate. His face was marvelously expressive tonight, for a wonder.
"I will not leave my daughter to die." He finally hissed. Inwardly, I cringed - getting Elrond mad was not on the list of Things You Do If You Want To Live, and Elrond was most definitely mad. I didn't even know Elves COULD hiss - though I suppose it makes sense that they could, since it's really just a tone of voice.
"She will die if you do not leave her." I replied blandly, hiding my inner fear as best I could. Elrond glared at me for a moment, and I looked right back. Finally, he sighed, breaking the staring contest.
"I do not want to lose her." he said darkly, staring out over the Hall at Arwen, where she sat next to Aragorn, talking and laughing with him.
"No parent wishes to lose their child." I said softly. "But before this war is ended, many more parents who have had far less time with their children than you shall lose them. Be glad you have had several millennia with her and that you are not losing her to the ravages of war." Elrond sighed, and nodded, then gave me an appraising glance.
"You hide it well, Rachel, but you do have wisdom within you." he commented.
"Sh, don't tell anyone!" I said, then grinned, and Elrond chuckled. "Though I'm sure I'm only stating ahead of time what Galadriel would say if she knew what was going on."
"I doubt she wants to lose her granddaughter." Elrond said, arching an eyebrow.
"She may not, but she is a smart cookie about what fate has in store." I replied primly.
"Even if she is creepy?" Elrond asked dryly, and I grinned back and nodded.
"Yep." I said. "Now I'm going to go get some sleep - Glorfindel informed me that he wanted to leave bright and early tomorrow morning, but somehow I doubt it will be the former, even if it will be very much the latter." I heard Elrond chuckling behind me as I skipped off. I paused in the hallways to make faces at random Elves, but eventually got to my room - and found Boromir waiting.
"Mir! How are ya?" I asked cheerfully as I bounded over to where he was sitting in a chair in my sitting room, reading a book.
"Good." He said with amusement, closing the book and looking up at me. "You are in a good mood. Did you find some more wine in the Hall of Fire?" I made a face.
"No, I stay away from alcoholic beverages now. They're too dangerous. Sugar is another matter, though." I said, and Boromir chuckled. "So what're you doing here?" I asked.
"I came to tell you that I have made my decision - I will be going with the company to Mordor." Boromir replied, and that dampened my mood considerably.
"Well, good luck, then." I said with false cheeriness. "Don't do anything I wouldn't do, and be sure to squash a few orcs for me!" Boromir looked at me carefully for a moment, and I forced my smile to look more sincere. He nodded, apparently accepting, if not my cheeriness, then the fact that I wanted him to believe I was cheery. Abruptly, he stood and pulled me into a hug. After a blink of surprise, I returned to hug fiercely. Though really, it wasn't as if this was going to be goodbye - I'd see him in Lothlorien. If Kari didn't strangle me.
"I will miss you, Rachel." Boromir said softly when we broke the hug.
"Same here, 'Mir." I replied, smiling softly. And with that, Boromir cleared his throat, gave a little bow, and turned and left the room. I sat down in the chair he had recently been in and bit my lip, trying not cry, for several minutes after he left. Then I slowly got up and went to bed.
---
As I had predicted to Elrond the night before, it was very early, and very dark, the next morning when there came a knock on my door. It was Gandalf, who informed me that it was time to leave. I quickly got dressed and shoved my night clothes in my pack - I was taking all my clothes with me, since I knew I'd be in Lothlorien for at least a year or so while the War of the Ring occurred. I grabbed Gandalf's hat, from where it sat on my bed, and handed it to him as I lifted my pack, and he nodded in thanks before putting it on his head. Then we headed out of my room, with Gandalf leading, and soon we were at the main courtyard of Rivendell. To my surprise, Merry and Pippin had roused themselves out of bed to say goodbye to me, and latched onto me when I appeared.
"Good-bye Rachel, we'll miss you!" they said, almost in unison.
"And I'll miss you." I said with a smile. Merry and Pippin let go, and backed off as I headed over to where Aratelpe was already waiting for me. Glorfindel was waiting slightly beyond on Asfaloth, and Gandalf was now standing next to Elrond near the exit from the courtyard, apparently waiting to say goodbye to both Glorfindel and I. Other than them, the courtyard was empty - Glorfindel and I had both said our other goodbyes yesterday (though the hobbits were proof that that didn't necessarily mean that someone we'd said goodbye to wouldn't show up anyways). In the eerie pre-dawn silence, broken only by the quiet sounds of nature, I strapped my pack onto the back of Aratelpe's saddle - I had decided to use one, since this was to be a long journey - and then mounted up.
"Namarie. May the Valar go with you." was all Elrond said before moving out of the way, and Glorfindel eased Asfaloth into a walk. I gave a small salute to Merry and Pippin - I'm not sure if they even knew what it meant - and then followed him, resisting the urge to grab Gandalf's hat again as I rode past.
Not any surprise, the entire day that followed, Glorfindel and I remained silent, looking forward and not at each other. For my part, I was still trying to figure out how to fix things between Glorfindel and I - this would be a very boring trip if we didn't talk to each other. Glorfindel's face, the one time I looked over at him, was impassive, with no emotion showing.
And when I looked again later in the evening, when he told me in as few words as possible that we were setting up camp, his face hadn't changed. It was odd, to say the least - but it was better than the moodiness that there had been before when I met him by chance in Rivendell some where. Then he had gone from annoyed with me to relaxed and joking, just like we'd been before, in a matter of seconds, and then back again in half the time.
Still, if the entire trip was like this, I was going to be bored out of my skull. So, as I sat across the fire from Glorfindel - who was currently showing the most emotion that he had all day by frowning slightly at the fire, which didn't seem to want to give off any heat - I watched him and contemplated what to say to broach the topic. I decided soon that this probably would have been a whole hell of a lot easier if I'd done it earlier, and that I might as well just be frank about it. After all, I hadn't been circumspect about anything before - it would seem odd if I was now.
"This silence is going to drive me crazy." I announced. Glorfindel looked up, briefly, and then went back to prodding the fire with a stick. I had noted earlier, with some amusement, that Glorfindel kept a healthy distance from the fire. Perhaps more healthy than normal. Ah, the side-effects of Balrogs. But that didn't help with the fact that Glorfindel was continuing to prod the fire as if I had never spoken.
"I'm going to poke you with a stick if you don't say something." I commented. Glorfindel rolled his eyes this time before returning to prodding the fire. So, I stood up, went a short ways to the copse of trees that had supplied our firewood tonight, found a long-ish stick, returned to the fire, sat in my normal spot, and used my new stick to poke Glorfindel. He scowled at me, and returned to the fire. I prodded him again, and the stick was yanked out of my grasp.
"Don't." was all he said, and I sighed. Maybe it would just be better to talk tomorrow - Glorfindel was obviously not in a very talkative mood. I had my courage up now, though, and opened my mouth to say something more - only to have a very scathing look from Glorfindel silence me. Yep, he definitely didn't want to talk. So I gave up on him - for that night.
----To be continued...with silence!----
(Never knew silence could be exciting, hm?)
-Authors Note:-
Ah, it seems Kari is a more missed character than I thought...ah well. She shall be back shortly. Not in a large amount at first, but she's going to join the honoured ranks of Glorfindel and Bob with her first appearance. (free giant-sized candy canes to those who guess what honoured ranks those are) And then...I'm thinking some Haldir torture is in order. And maybe a kidnapping or two...*evil grin* Oh the plans I have!
Anyways. Merry Christmas, Yuletide, and whatnot to all my reviewers. Or perhaps I should just say Happy Holidays to avoid any trouble? Well, whatever, have a happy next few days, and I hope you get presents that will amuse you muchly. Because unless I see RotK, I won't be updating until New Years. I'll probably do it then at Midnight, or as close as possible, just to say that I've done it...yeah. Alternatively, y'all can go read The Fresca Files by Dreamstrifer if you get bored and want good fanfiction. Just be ready for strange looks from people as you laugh.
And on that note, thank you to all my reviewers, you're great. Especially the few that I seem to have picked up recently and have read this story from beginning to...the currently posted chapter in a matter of days. Believe me, I feel your pain with the whole addicted-to-a-story-and-can't-stop-reading-even-though-it's-midnight-and-I-really-should-go-to-bed deal. I've run into a few stories like that, and I would probably end out up to 2 am reading them if my parents let me...I am honoured, though, that my story inspires that type of sleep-rejecting - mm, shall I call it loyalty? Or addiction? *ponders* Ah well, either way, it's all good.
All my reviewers get a dozen Ninjabread Men, and a clone of Nazgul #8 to do with what they will. Just don't try and use him to kidnap Aragorn - he's still traumatized from being lit on fire, and will run away and never come back if you suggest he goes near Isildur's Heir.
Now I'm off to translate some more of FotR into Yoda grammar!
~Crimson Starlight
-Disclaimer:-
CS: I own nothing.
...
CS: What are you still here for? I said I own nothing. Now go away and leave me alone...
Rachel: Someone's lost the Christmas spirit...
CS: *turns Rachel into a frog* Shut up, I have a headache.
Glorfindel: O.o
Glorfindel: *opens his mouth to say something, recieves an Author!Glare*
Glorfindel: *shuts mouth, shrugs, and gives Frog!Rachel a smooch*
Rachel: *returns to normal*
Glorfindel and Rachel: *edge away from CS carefully*
...
Haldir: Well this was a boring disclaimer...
-36: Preparing-
The next two days were spent with preparations, or hanging out with the hobbits and Boromir. Elladan and Elrohir were gone from Rivendell on the second day after the council, so my spars were temporarily suspended to help the hobbits learn more about how to use their swords. With Frodo better, Sam was more amiable to hanging out with us, and Boromir and I taught him and Frodo some basics about how to use their daggers/swords - that is, after Boromir finished drooling over the workmanship on the weapons. Apparently, besides a few of the ancient Elven-forged swords, Boromir had not seen anything like the hobbits daggers in quite awhile.
The night of the third day after the council - October 28th, for those of you keeping track - I ventured into the Hall of Fire one last time, and pulled Elrond off to one side to talk about the journey, with an intention to talk to him about something else entirely if I got the chance - there was one thing that would happen no matter what I did, and after how nice Elrond had been in putting up with me, I wanted to help him deal with it somehow. I got the chance when Arwen stood and sang a slow love ballad, her eyes fixed on Aragorn the entire time. Elrond was scowling by the end of it, and I had to catch his attention with a snap of my fingers.
"Stop scowling, it makes you look old." I told him. Elrond gave me a withering look. "As does that." I added.
"Perhaps that is because I am old, Rachel?" he replied somewhat testily.
"Yes, and you have been far away from your wife and her sensible influence for far too long." I replied promptly. Before Elrond could say anything more, I continued. "Arwen loves him, Elrond, and there is nothing you can do about it. Even if you convince her to leave him, and go into the west, she will still love him. In time she will come to - well, if not hate, then resent - you for making her leave him. If she survives that long. Love of that depth is the type that causes even humans to die from heartbreak if it is denied." Elrond stared at me for a few moments, absorbing what I just said.
"And how would you know anything about my daughter and Aragorn?" he said angrily.
"The same way I know of everything of the future." I said softly, looking straight at Elrond. "You cannot pull them apart - fate has decreed that they are to be together, for better or for worse. It is up to you to accept that, and treasure what time you have left with your daughter." Elrond was, by now, looking at me in a combination of panic and hate. His face was marvelously expressive tonight, for a wonder.
"I will not leave my daughter to die." He finally hissed. Inwardly, I cringed - getting Elrond mad was not on the list of Things You Do If You Want To Live, and Elrond was most definitely mad. I didn't even know Elves COULD hiss - though I suppose it makes sense that they could, since it's really just a tone of voice.
"She will die if you do not leave her." I replied blandly, hiding my inner fear as best I could. Elrond glared at me for a moment, and I looked right back. Finally, he sighed, breaking the staring contest.
"I do not want to lose her." he said darkly, staring out over the Hall at Arwen, where she sat next to Aragorn, talking and laughing with him.
"No parent wishes to lose their child." I said softly. "But before this war is ended, many more parents who have had far less time with their children than you shall lose them. Be glad you have had several millennia with her and that you are not losing her to the ravages of war." Elrond sighed, and nodded, then gave me an appraising glance.
"You hide it well, Rachel, but you do have wisdom within you." he commented.
"Sh, don't tell anyone!" I said, then grinned, and Elrond chuckled. "Though I'm sure I'm only stating ahead of time what Galadriel would say if she knew what was going on."
"I doubt she wants to lose her granddaughter." Elrond said, arching an eyebrow.
"She may not, but she is a smart cookie about what fate has in store." I replied primly.
"Even if she is creepy?" Elrond asked dryly, and I grinned back and nodded.
"Yep." I said. "Now I'm going to go get some sleep - Glorfindel informed me that he wanted to leave bright and early tomorrow morning, but somehow I doubt it will be the former, even if it will be very much the latter." I heard Elrond chuckling behind me as I skipped off. I paused in the hallways to make faces at random Elves, but eventually got to my room - and found Boromir waiting.
"Mir! How are ya?" I asked cheerfully as I bounded over to where he was sitting in a chair in my sitting room, reading a book.
"Good." He said with amusement, closing the book and looking up at me. "You are in a good mood. Did you find some more wine in the Hall of Fire?" I made a face.
"No, I stay away from alcoholic beverages now. They're too dangerous. Sugar is another matter, though." I said, and Boromir chuckled. "So what're you doing here?" I asked.
"I came to tell you that I have made my decision - I will be going with the company to Mordor." Boromir replied, and that dampened my mood considerably.
"Well, good luck, then." I said with false cheeriness. "Don't do anything I wouldn't do, and be sure to squash a few orcs for me!" Boromir looked at me carefully for a moment, and I forced my smile to look more sincere. He nodded, apparently accepting, if not my cheeriness, then the fact that I wanted him to believe I was cheery. Abruptly, he stood and pulled me into a hug. After a blink of surprise, I returned to hug fiercely. Though really, it wasn't as if this was going to be goodbye - I'd see him in Lothlorien. If Kari didn't strangle me.
"I will miss you, Rachel." Boromir said softly when we broke the hug.
"Same here, 'Mir." I replied, smiling softly. And with that, Boromir cleared his throat, gave a little bow, and turned and left the room. I sat down in the chair he had recently been in and bit my lip, trying not cry, for several minutes after he left. Then I slowly got up and went to bed.
---
As I had predicted to Elrond the night before, it was very early, and very dark, the next morning when there came a knock on my door. It was Gandalf, who informed me that it was time to leave. I quickly got dressed and shoved my night clothes in my pack - I was taking all my clothes with me, since I knew I'd be in Lothlorien for at least a year or so while the War of the Ring occurred. I grabbed Gandalf's hat, from where it sat on my bed, and handed it to him as I lifted my pack, and he nodded in thanks before putting it on his head. Then we headed out of my room, with Gandalf leading, and soon we were at the main courtyard of Rivendell. To my surprise, Merry and Pippin had roused themselves out of bed to say goodbye to me, and latched onto me when I appeared.
"Good-bye Rachel, we'll miss you!" they said, almost in unison.
"And I'll miss you." I said with a smile. Merry and Pippin let go, and backed off as I headed over to where Aratelpe was already waiting for me. Glorfindel was waiting slightly beyond on Asfaloth, and Gandalf was now standing next to Elrond near the exit from the courtyard, apparently waiting to say goodbye to both Glorfindel and I. Other than them, the courtyard was empty - Glorfindel and I had both said our other goodbyes yesterday (though the hobbits were proof that that didn't necessarily mean that someone we'd said goodbye to wouldn't show up anyways). In the eerie pre-dawn silence, broken only by the quiet sounds of nature, I strapped my pack onto the back of Aratelpe's saddle - I had decided to use one, since this was to be a long journey - and then mounted up.
"Namarie. May the Valar go with you." was all Elrond said before moving out of the way, and Glorfindel eased Asfaloth into a walk. I gave a small salute to Merry and Pippin - I'm not sure if they even knew what it meant - and then followed him, resisting the urge to grab Gandalf's hat again as I rode past.
Not any surprise, the entire day that followed, Glorfindel and I remained silent, looking forward and not at each other. For my part, I was still trying to figure out how to fix things between Glorfindel and I - this would be a very boring trip if we didn't talk to each other. Glorfindel's face, the one time I looked over at him, was impassive, with no emotion showing.
And when I looked again later in the evening, when he told me in as few words as possible that we were setting up camp, his face hadn't changed. It was odd, to say the least - but it was better than the moodiness that there had been before when I met him by chance in Rivendell some where. Then he had gone from annoyed with me to relaxed and joking, just like we'd been before, in a matter of seconds, and then back again in half the time.
Still, if the entire trip was like this, I was going to be bored out of my skull. So, as I sat across the fire from Glorfindel - who was currently showing the most emotion that he had all day by frowning slightly at the fire, which didn't seem to want to give off any heat - I watched him and contemplated what to say to broach the topic. I decided soon that this probably would have been a whole hell of a lot easier if I'd done it earlier, and that I might as well just be frank about it. After all, I hadn't been circumspect about anything before - it would seem odd if I was now.
"This silence is going to drive me crazy." I announced. Glorfindel looked up, briefly, and then went back to prodding the fire with a stick. I had noted earlier, with some amusement, that Glorfindel kept a healthy distance from the fire. Perhaps more healthy than normal. Ah, the side-effects of Balrogs. But that didn't help with the fact that Glorfindel was continuing to prod the fire as if I had never spoken.
"I'm going to poke you with a stick if you don't say something." I commented. Glorfindel rolled his eyes this time before returning to prodding the fire. So, I stood up, went a short ways to the copse of trees that had supplied our firewood tonight, found a long-ish stick, returned to the fire, sat in my normal spot, and used my new stick to poke Glorfindel. He scowled at me, and returned to the fire. I prodded him again, and the stick was yanked out of my grasp.
"Don't." was all he said, and I sighed. Maybe it would just be better to talk tomorrow - Glorfindel was obviously not in a very talkative mood. I had my courage up now, though, and opened my mouth to say something more - only to have a very scathing look from Glorfindel silence me. Yep, he definitely didn't want to talk. So I gave up on him - for that night.
----To be continued...with silence!----
(Never knew silence could be exciting, hm?)
-Authors Note:-
Ah, it seems Kari is a more missed character than I thought...ah well. She shall be back shortly. Not in a large amount at first, but she's going to join the honoured ranks of Glorfindel and Bob with her first appearance. (free giant-sized candy canes to those who guess what honoured ranks those are) And then...I'm thinking some Haldir torture is in order. And maybe a kidnapping or two...*evil grin* Oh the plans I have!
Anyways. Merry Christmas, Yuletide, and whatnot to all my reviewers. Or perhaps I should just say Happy Holidays to avoid any trouble? Well, whatever, have a happy next few days, and I hope you get presents that will amuse you muchly. Because unless I see RotK, I won't be updating until New Years. I'll probably do it then at Midnight, or as close as possible, just to say that I've done it...yeah. Alternatively, y'all can go read The Fresca Files by Dreamstrifer if you get bored and want good fanfiction. Just be ready for strange looks from people as you laugh.
And on that note, thank you to all my reviewers, you're great. Especially the few that I seem to have picked up recently and have read this story from beginning to...the currently posted chapter in a matter of days. Believe me, I feel your pain with the whole addicted-to-a-story-and-can't-stop-reading-even-though-it's-midnight-and-I-really-should-go-to-bed deal. I've run into a few stories like that, and I would probably end out up to 2 am reading them if my parents let me...I am honoured, though, that my story inspires that type of sleep-rejecting - mm, shall I call it loyalty? Or addiction? *ponders* Ah well, either way, it's all good.
All my reviewers get a dozen Ninjabread Men, and a clone of Nazgul #8 to do with what they will. Just don't try and use him to kidnap Aragorn - he's still traumatized from being lit on fire, and will run away and never come back if you suggest he goes near Isildur's Heir.
Now I'm off to translate some more of FotR into Yoda grammar!
~Crimson Starlight