Disclaimer: I don't own LOTR. I also don't own Caleniel, Cadunír, Rodwen, Thinedhel, Elvellaswen, Gaenír, or Aearoniell; they belong to Tador and Aearoniell, who have given me permission to use their characters for my own twisted ideas.

Lady Caleniel

By: Mika Saito

Chapter 11- Confession

Legolas stepped past Caleniel and into the room; she closed the door and quietly turned to face him. He was standing by the window, his back to her. Observing him for any reaction she approached him, her mind made up to start off with an apology.

"I'm sorry," she said softly, standing directly behind him now.

"About what?" Legolas forced his voice to be calm, but it sounded strained.

"About this whole thing." Legolas didn't reply; he didn't seem to have heard her at all.

"Could you at least listen to what I have to say, without being rude?" Caleniel snapped angrily and Legolas turned to face her.

"Why should I listen to you explain why you've a mind to marry Gaenír? He tried to kill your father Caleniel, doesn't that show you that he is not worthy of you?" Caleniel smiled at the desperate tone in his voice.

"Because I don't have a mind to marry Gaenír, if anything I've a mind to kill him." Caleniel crossed her arms across her chest and looked away, her mind once again bringing up every little thing that could possibly go wrong. When Legolas didn't say anything she looked back up at him. He was watching her, his eyes darkened in thought.

She shifted nervously. The way Legolas was looking at her set her on edge, so she did what she would normally do when she was nervous, she allowed her anger to take over.

"Staring isn't going to help anything, Prince," she growled at him.

"What is there to help?" Legolas asked, his voice just as angry sounding as hers.

"Will you at least allow me to tell you the truth about what is going on?" The anger slipped out of Caleniel's voice, maybe he would let her explain.

"What is there to tell?"

"Idiot of a Prince who can't even shoot an arrow straight." Caleniel mumbled angrily.

"We've already been through the whole 'can't shoot straight' argument before."

"Really? I don't believe we ever got it figured out. You couldn't explain why you almost shot me, you kept saying that your aim is fine!"

"It is fine! If you hadn't been in that area I wouldn't have almost shot you!" Legolas argued back.

"Obviously," Caleniel glowered, "if I hadn't been there the whole incident wouldn't have happened Prince."

"That's not what I meant!" Legolas snapped. "I meant that if you hadn't been where you were your beauty would have caught my eye so that I was looking at you instead of my target my aim wouldn't have been off!" Legolas shouted, not noticing the slip until he noticed Caleniel's silence. Reviewing his words he ducked his head, muttering curses under his breath.

Caleniel was unsure of what to say. What could she say to the partial confession? True, she did have her own confession that she should have been making right now, since Legolas had, however inadvertently, gone first, and yet she found herself hesitating. What if Gaenír was listening to the conversation? She wouldn't put it past him to try it, just to make sure she wasn't doing anything behind his back, which she was already, but she didn't want him to be suspicious of her yet. So she just stood there, watching as Legolas all but beat himself up over the slip. Sighing to herself she moved toward him, he didn't notice her movements until she placed her hand on his shoulder.

Legolas looked up at her, confused by the quiet gesture. Instead of talking Legolas chose to head toward the door, planning on leaving before he made a bigger fool of himself, but Caleniel's voice stopped him.

"Wait. Please, explain what you meant." Turning to face her he found her standing in the middle of her rose colored room, a pleading look in her eyes.

"I love you," Legolas whispered. Dropping his gaze to the floor he waited for her reaction, waiting for her to start laughing at the confession, but she didn't. Caleniel was smiling. If what he had just confessed to was true than he would help her, if he would just listen to her explain.

"If you love me then listen to what I have to say," Caleniel whispered softly, catching Legolas off guard. "If you would just let me explain what this whole thing is about… I need your help!" She pleaded softly.

"Explain." Legolas sank into a chair, still avoiding looking into her eyes.

"Convincing Gaenír that I was going to marry him was the only way I could get back here, where someone could help me," she started, seating herself in another chair. "Elvellaswen came up with the whole idea really. The plan was to trick Gaenír into coming here to get Fathers blessing for the marriage, while really we were going to talk to Father alone and tell him what was really going on. I don't want to marry Gaenír, Legolas, I'd rather die than be married to the likes of him. But it is necessary that he thinks I'll marry him until Elvellaswen and I can come up with a way to kill him, or something." They sat in silence after Caleniel stopped talking. Legolas was thinking over what she had said. Finally, he broke the silence.

"Do you have any ideas of how you're going to prevent yourself from having to marry Gaenír? Surely you aren't thinking of actually killing him!" He looked into her eyes.

"If that is the only way, then yes. I don't think he'll leave me alone otherwise," was her truthful response.

A knocking on the door interrupted the conversation. Caleniel glared at the door. It was probably Gaenír coming to see why she wasn't at dinner, or more likely, to escort her to dinner. Either way she didn't want to open the door, so Legolas stood and opened it. Cadunír stood outside, dressed as he normally would be for a dinner in the company of a royal family. Legolas stepped aside and let him in without a word.