Endless

She gripped his hand and brought it to her lips, kissing each fingertip tenderly. She looked up at him on the verge of tears. He smiled at, tears threatening to spill over the floodgates of his own eyes. Women and children flowed passed them as they stood unmoving in the midst of it. He ran his fingers through her long blonde hair.

"I won't ever forget you," he whispered softly above the wails and moans of the others.

She tried to smile, but failed miserably. "You mustn't speak like that. We will always be together," her voice began confidently but began to crack at the end. "We can never be separated."

He smiled at her as she wiped his eyes with her sleeve.

"I know," said he.

She stood on her toes and gave him a light kiss on his mouth. She meant to pull away and join the others, but he pulled her into a longer kiss, filled with passion unfulfilled, longing and desperation. She wrapped her arms around him tightly, never letting him go for the ten seconds that they were together. She tried to remember all of the happy times when they were together, the times when she had laughed, and he had blushed with embarrassment. Nothing stayed, and she could not stop thinking that he went to his death.

He pulled away and gave a final kiss on her brow, soft and lingering perhaps a little longer than usual. His helmet scraped uncomfortably against her skin, making her cry all the more, screaming inside her head that it was not his fault.

"I love you," he murmured.

"I know," she cried, "I know."

He began to extricate himself from the situation, walking toward the battlements, leaving her standing unmoving in the middle of the throng of people passing into the caves.

Then unexpectedly changing her mind, she shouted after him, "Don't ever forget!" He gave one last smile and departed, and she did not see him again.

"Don't ever forget!" she said in a hoarse whisper, almost to herself. She gave one last glance to the spot from which she had seen him disappear, and turned around and walked into the darkness.

The End

AN: Just a little deviation from the main characters at Helm's Deep. And as always, review.

Yours,

Regnet