Title: Miles to Go
By: Ring Red
Disclaimer: I own NOTHING! (pout)
Rating: R
Note: Sorry for the wait. I won't bother you with excuses. Life happens. I'm just going to post up the new chapter. I hope you enjoy it. I did enjoy writing it. I'm excited now because we're getting to the fun part (or fun for me to write anyway). We're almost at the conclusion of the first book and there should be lots of action coming up in the next few chapters. This chapter is more build-up but we're getting there.
Thank you for all the feedback I've gotten. Every time I get a new review it just makes my day. It also gives me a kick in the butt that tells me to keep writing. You guys are great. I hope you're still out there and want to keep reading.
I would love to know what you guys think of this chapter. I loved writing it, but I'm also worried that I might have rushed things a little with Buffy and Legolas. Buffy does some…revealing…and I need to know if it came out okay.
Okay, here goes! I love you guys. Hope you enjoy…
Chapter Twenty-Two
The company spent the next morning discussing which path they should take as they went forward. The sisters listened but didn't contribute. Several times other companions would turn to them for a vote, but they just shrugged and held their silence. The arguments went around and around and always came back to Frodo. The poor little ringbearer didn't know what to decide.
Willow frowned and leaned toward her sisters. "I wish they'd stop picking on him. Why does he have to have all the answers?"
A list of answering quips came to mind, but Dawn couldn't bring herself to voice them. "Unfortunately the decision is his, Willow. Most of them are set to follow him."
The witch looked down sadly at her feet. "I wish I could follow him." Her heart ached at the thought of allowing Frodo and Sam to go off alone. Part of her wanted to throw caution to the wind and go with them, but she couldn't make herself leave her sisters.
"We all do, Willow, but we can't and you know that." Buffy had had enough of sitting around and brooding. She pushed herself to her feet. "I'm going for a walk. My spidey-senses have been off the charts all day and I'm about to lose it."
Willow and Dawn nodded their understanding. The younger sister spoke. "We'll come get you when anything happens."
Buffy met their eyes. "Watch Boromir. When he leaves you know it's begun." She turned and headed out into the forest. Looking around her, the slayer couldn't help but feel annoyed. Trees, trees, and more trees. What she wouldn't give for a mall right about now. Hell, with her current state of mind she would have settled for a cemetery with lots of the undead to pummel. She was SO not the wait patiently girl. She wanted to get this over with, to get this done. She was tired of knowing too much and not being able to help with that knowledge. Buffy was coming to realize that all-knowing was way overrated. Leave the visions to the Seers...just give the Slayer something to kill.
"Something comes."
Buffy froze. She should have felt him approach. She had to be majorly wigged to zone out that much. Even now her senses jerked back to life and she could feel his concern for her through the soul bond. Buffy warily met her mate's eyes. "Really?"
He lifted one perfect brow. "You and your sisters know more than you should. You know what comes."
Shaking her head, Buffy turned away. "I don't know what you're talking about."
Legolas sighed and walked forward to stand behind her. He laid his hands gently on her shoulders. She slumped at the contact and a wave of fear and dread rushed through the soul bond. "Long have I known that there was something special about you three, dagnir nîn. With our bond the answers to my questions come more easily. Your anguish is my own." He paused as he read a new surge of guilt sent his way. He sought the words he needed to ease her pain. "I asked in Moria that you share this burden and now I ask again. You are my mate and I would not see you face this pain alone. Allow me to lighten this load, dagnir nîn." Now fear became the most powerful emotion and he began to understand. He pushed as much reassurance and love as he could back through the bond. "Never would I turn from you, Buffy. Have no fear of my rejection."
Buffy snorted. "Easy for you to say. Just call me 'turned from' girl in the love department." But he knew that verbal sparring was her way of lightening the mood and changing the subject. He didn't respond, but waited. Finally she sighed. "I don't know if I can tell you this, Pest. I want to - I SO want to - but I don't know if I can chance it."
"You must do what your heart tells you is right, dagnir nîn, but know that I will not betray your trust."
"I know that." And some of the tension within her eased. She made her decision. "You know we're not from this world?" He nodded lightly against the top of her head. "Well, in our old world Middle-Earth does exist but only through books and fantasy. Some guy wrote a series of books about Middle-Earth. The most famous are 'The Hobbit', and the trilogy called 'The Lord of the Rings'." Legolas stiffened. Buffy snorted. "Thought that might get your attention."
The Prince struggled to digest this information. He had assumed the sisters possessed some kind of sight of the future such as the Lady Galadriel possessed. Never had he believed their world to be a work of literature. Still, he would not back down. Buffy still needed his comfort and he would give it. "Please continue."
The slayer sighed in relief and let her eyes slip closed. "Well, a few years before we died they made the trilogy into movies. Movies are a form of entertainment with moving pictures that tell a story." She explained. "I had never read the books because I'm not much of a book girl, but they were classic literature and just about everyone else had. Willow and Xander loved the books and they drug me, Dawn, and the rest of the Scoobies off to the theater to watch the first movie 'The Fellowship of the Ring'."
Legolas stiffened in shock again and Buffy reached up to rub his hands resting on her shoulders soothingly. "Can you handle this? Cause we can totally stop now if you can't. I can finish explaining later when you're ready."
Legolas shook his head. "Continue."
Buffy smiled sadly. "To say the movie hooked me is an understatement. I was completely fascinated. Here was this group of people who couldn't really stand each other and they were all coming together to go fight against the Big Bad of their world. Since I had to lead my group of people who could barely stand each other against our Big Bads year after year I could kind of relate." She paused and smirked. "Not to mention there were these totally hot Elves running around in the movie and I just couldn't get enough of them. And hey, Aragorn and Boromir weren't looking bad either - even Frodo and the Hobbits were cute."
His hands squeezed lightly on her shoulders and she felt his smile. "Not Gimli?"
Buffy rolled her eyes. "Hey, be quiet you. Gimli's attraction is in his personality and his over-sized heart. He's a sweetie. Those dwarf women are crazy if they don't snatch him up. Hell, Celeborn better watch it or Gimli might make away with Galadriel."
Legolas beautiful laughter filled the air. As always it made pleasant little tingles run up and down Buffy's spine. Damn, why was everything about him so beautiful? She was used to being the pretty one in her relationships.
"Buffy?"
"Huh?" Then she remembered their conversation. "Oh, uh, right." She fought a blush and pulled herself a little further away from him to clear her mind. He was seriously dangerous to rational thought. "Anyway, I watched the movie and I was hooked. It would be another year before the next movie came out so I decided to go buy the books instead. I could have borrowed them from Willow, but..." she smirked, "I was embarrassed. I'd ragged on her and Xander so bad about their Lord of the Rings fixation and here I was actually READING to find out more." She lowered her voice as she told him her guilty little secret. "I told them I was doing an early patrol and snuck down to Books-A-Million. I bought all the special copies with pictures from the movies on the front. 'The Fellowship of the Ring' had Frodo, 'The Two Towers' had you, and 'The Return of the King' had Aragorn. Then I snuck back home and hid them in my room. I read them at four o'clock in the morning when I came in from patrol before going to bed."
The mental images Buffy's words evoked had Legolas shaking with silent laughter. He shook his head. "The pursuit of knowledge is nothing to be ashamed of Buffy. It is a noble undertaking."
Buffy snorted. "Maybe in this world. In our old world if you read too much you were a geek. This was fiction, Legolas, or not supposed to be real. Middle-Earth didn't actually exist and neither did any of the characters. Yet I knew a guy who could speak perfect Sindarin and Quenya. He bragged about it. Willow taught herself once we landed here, but Andrew just learned it for fun. THAT was geek."
Legolas smiled. He saw no fault in those actions but decided not to debate the point. His mate had strange views on such things. "But you read these books?"
Buffy nodded. "I read the trilogy and then went back and read 'The Hobbit'. Then I read them all again as each new movie came out. I even read about half of Willow's copy of 'The Silmarillion'," Legolas stiffened in shock again and Buffy reached up to rub his hands, "which was another harder book about Middle-Earth and the history of the Elves. I was a bit on the obsessed side. I bought all the extended versions of the movies and they were each about four and a half hours long. I just loved everything about Middle-Earth. It was the perfect escape from my world."
"Then you truly do know what we shall face." Legolas' voice was tinged with awe.
Shrugging, Buffy turned to face him. "That's just the thing. I know what happened in the books and what happened in the movies but things can change, Pest. My sisters and I weren't in either. Now the Valar volunteered us to join this fellowship and we're trying to keep things as close as possible to how we remember them, but we're not perfect. Already we've made changes." She reached up and stroked his cheek. "You were never supposed to take that blow from the cave troll. If Willow hadn't saved you..." Buffy winced and looked down.
Legolas lifted her chin and met her eyes calmly. "I would do so again to protect you."
"You better not!" The slayer growled. Just the thought of losing him terrified her. She'd lost too many. She couldn't live through it again. It would break her. "The Valar also made me damn near unkillable, Pest. I don't age, I heal uber-fast, and I've still got all my slayer skills. I can damn well take care of myself and I'll kick your ass if you pull something that stupid ever again. Do you understand me?"
"I understand." And somehow she knew that he wasn't saying he wouldn't do it. Annoying pointy-eared pest...
Then the Prince frowned. "The day we spoke in Moria, the day this weighed on you before...it was the day Gandalf fell." Buffy broke eye contact and realization dawned. "You knew." Buffy nodded and waited for his rejection. It never came. "Who falls today, Buffy? Have you found a way to stop it?"
The slayer's eyes snapped back to her mate's.Desperate hope flooded through the soul bond. "You don't blame me?"
Legolas shot her a chiding look. "I know you, dagnir nîn. If you could have saved Mithrandir then you would have - even at the cost of your own life. You would not lightly sacrifice lives to stay true to your books."
Tears of relief filled Buffy's eyes. He didn't hate her.He still believed in her. She stepped forward and hugged her mate tightly - laying her head against his chest. Legolas' arms came up to wrap around her. For a moment Buffy just enjoyed the embrace but then she spoke. Her voice was husky with emotion. "Boromir is supposed to fall. He's tempted by the ring. He tries to take it from Frodo. Frodo gets away and ends up running off with Sam and they head for Mordor alone." Legolas froze and Buffy pulled her head back and met his eyes. "It has to happen, Pest. The time of the Fellowship is over. The ring would destroy each of you one by one until it found its way back to its master. Frodo and Sam have to go alone. It's the only chance we have of defeating Sauron."
The Elf's eyes flared with angry denial.
Buffy sighed and pulled away. "I shouldn't have told you."
"Ai! Buffy..." He pulled her back against him into another hug. "I am sorry but this is grave news indeed. You cannot expect me to accept it lightly."
Buffy shook her head. "No, of course I don't." She took a deep breath and laid her head against her mate's chest. "Sorry, I'm kinda wigged today. First I have to let two hobbits I've really come to like run off into the bad part of the world by themselves, and then we have to find a way to save Boromir from himself and a pack of Uruk-hai."
Legolas gave her one more hug before stepping away. The time for comfort was over. They put away the lovers and became warriors once more. "Uruk-hai?"
Buffy nodded. She pulled herself up straight and locked away her shifting emotions. "Saruman's new breed of orcs. They're bigger, tougher, and the sun doesn't stop them. They'll attack right after Frodo takes off. Boromir tries to protect Merry and Pippin but gets himself killed."
The slayer tried to skim certain facts but her mate was not fooled. He lifted one brow. "And Merry and Pippin?"
"Are another thing you'll just have to trust me on." Buffy told him calmly. Legolas did not look reassured. She rolled her eyes. "They live, okay? If things go as planned they'll live to be really old little short men. I would not let anything happen to them unless I had a good reason. I would hate myself if I cost them their lives."
That he did believe. He nodded. "When does this happen?"
"BUFFY!" Both slayer and Elf turned as Dawn and Willow ran through the forest toward them. The sisters' eyebrows shot up at the Elf's presence. Willow spoke first. "Frodo and Boromir are gone. Frodo did his little 'going off to think' thing and Boromir snuck off about five minutes ago."
"I was going to tell you that Legolas vanished too," Dawn's voice was curious as she eyed the Elf and then her big sister again, "but obviously you know that."
Buffy ignored Dawn's unspoken question and focused on Willow. "We know what's coming. Are you ready?"
Willow's eyes were sad. "I...I don't want to let them go, Buffy."
Buffy sighed. They really didn't have time for her to convince Willow not to follow Frodo and Sam.
Legolas met the witch's eyes calmly. "Does this have to be done?" It was clear that the question was for Willow's benefit alone and the Elf already knew the answer.
Willow stared at him wide-eyed. Dawn gaped at Buffy. "How much did you tell him?"
Meeting her little sister's eyes Buffy shrugged. "Enough. You can cuss me for it later. We have to find Boromir." She took off running back in the direction of the camp. The other three followed closely behind.
The camp was in an uproar. Aragorn and Gimli were trying to keep the hobbits from running off alone to find Frodo. They failed and Merry and Pippin ran off in one direction while Sam ran off in another. Aragorn ran after Sam. Gimli ran after the other two hobbits.
Buffy's mind began to race. She wanted to panic. She fought the emotion away and gave herself over to her instincts as the slayer. She looked to her sisters and her mate. "Willow, make sure Frodo and Sam get off okay. I don't want you going with them, but you have to do what you have to do."
The witch nodded, grabbed her staff, and disappeared into the forest after Aragorn and Sam.
"What we have to do is find Boromir NOW." Buffy told her remaining companions. She pulled her scythe from its sheath strapped to her back.
Legolas nodded and moved to his pack grabbing his bow and arrows. He strapped them into place and checked his daggers before rejoining the slayer.
Dawn pulled out her favorite crossbow and her Celtic dagger. She jogged back over to join Buffy. "Ready?"
Buffy looked them over and nodded. "Let's move." She turned them in the direction Merry, Pippin, and Gimli had disappeared and ran back into the forest. They hadn't gone far when the path split. Buffy cussed. She looked to Legolas and Dawn.
"I go with you." The Elf forced.
Dawn's eyebrows shot up. Buffy rolled her eyes. "We have to split up, Pest. We don't know which path they took."
Legolas opened his mouth to argue, but Dawn beat him to it. "I'll take the second path."
Buffy's eyes widened. "Dawnie no!"
Rolling her eyes, Dawn stepped up to face her big sister. "You have to let me go, Buffy. You have to let me grow up. Time to step out of your shadow, remember?" Buffy did not look soothed. Dawn smirked. "Besides, I have the whole healing thing too. I'm not in danger of dying here. Worst case scenario, I get shot or stabbed and heal in half an hour." She threw Buffy's earlier words back at her. "This is not dire."
Biting her lip, Buffy looked from her baby sister to the two paths again. She accepted the inevitable and sighed. "Scream if you need me. I'll be there."
Dawn threw her arms around the slayer and hugged her tightly. "You always are. I'll be careful, I promise."
Buffy hugged her back and smirked as they pulled away. "If you die, I'm telling."
Dawn laughed at the familiar threat. "Same goes here." She shot Legolas one more assessing look. "Take care of her." The Elf nodded. Shaking her head, Dawn turned and jogged down the second path. "Willow is never going to believe this. She picked the wrong damn blonde."
Hoping she'd heard her little sister wrong, Buffy looked back to Legolas. "Let's go Pest. Keep those pointy ears open for the Horn of Gondor. When he sounds it things are bad." They ran down the first path.
End of Chapter
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Ring Red
