Thank you to those who wished me well… and here's your chapter!

Not much longer than the last, if at all… But like I've said before, this story is giving me fits for chapter length!

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Lunian smiled as she heard a soft footstep behind her. He'd let her hear him on purpose. "About time you showed up, Egola. I've been waiting all week."

He chuckled softly and slid his hands around her from behind, linking them at her waist. He kissed her temple with a soft sigh. "And I've been waiting to do this since I left."

She turned to face him, pulling away. "Then maybe you shouldn't have been gone so long."

"I'm here as often as I can be," he replied, his tone giving away his desire to be near her more often even as he kept his hands determinedly at his sides.

"You have a kingdom to see to." She tossed the comment over her shoulder as she began walking, knowing he would follow her.

"My Father sees to that." He fell into step beside her, easily keeping his stride to match hers.

"And how does he feel about this? I know you cannot have kept it hidden." Just as she knew he had told his father about her after he realized he had grown to love her. But they had fallen into a routine, him and her, which they followed every time he arrived. She would comment that he shouldn't be there so often, he would say something about his father taking care of it, she would ask after the king, and he would tell her how his father felt about her mortality.

"He knows the heart chooses for itself." He finally stated, as he always did, in one way or another, catching her hand as they walked from the glen to the waterfall behind which the statue of her mother was hidden. "How have you been, my love?"

"It has only been three moons, Egola." He came to visit about six times in the year, always for at least two weeks. Longer, if he was allowed.

"Has it? It has seemed an age."

She smiled faintly and allowed him to lift her hand for a kiss. "It has been three years that we have known each other."

"Yes," he agreed, his voice content and yet surprised. "It seems it cannot possibly be such a short time."

"Short for the elves, perhaps, but a lengthy time for mortals. Have you finally turned your heart from mine?" She stopped and faced him, the question completely serious.

His smile was small and pained. "I am afraid I must admit I have failed in that, Milady. Of course, I never desired to do so, though normally I would do anything to please you."

"Are you happy, loving me so hopelessly?"

He squeezed her hand and gazed out upon the land. "A bird is happy when it flies, a fish when it swims. A flower knows joy when it blooms." He turned to face her, holding her still with a gaze that spoke only of love. "A heart is happy when it loves. However it must be, hopeless or joyful, I am happy loving you."

She sighed and looked at the path, rolling her worry stone in her free hand. "In the hopes that when I die you shall live, it would be wise for me to never love you in such a way."

"I shall be gravely wounded when you die, whether you come to love me or not."

Whenever he said something like that, so perfectly accepting of that which she still refused to believe would happen, her heart clenched and swelled at the same time. She cared for him so much, but he would be hurt by that feeling. Or would he? Was it merely enough for him to love her to be at death's door without her?

She shivered and started walking once more, hoping movement would help keep her thoughts at bay. "What if your father has you marry a she-elf?"

"He would not."

"But if he did? If you married an elf—"

"Do not speak of such!" he turned to her, his hands closing over her shoulders. He shook her softly. "Do not even consider such a thing," he said more quietly, his hands gentling as the fire in his eyes began to dwindle to manageable levels. "My Father would never force me into a loveless marriage, for such it would be. Nor would he doom another to that fate."

"Doesn't he wish you to produce an heir?"

He shrugged it away and turned her back down the path to return to the waterfall. "Even the elves of Mirkwood shall pass into the undying lands. Not five generations of men shall pass before the world no longer sees us walking upon Middle-Earth. For us it is a short time, and he can remain here until then."

"You say he can remain. You cannot?"

"You knew early on that I hear the call of the sea. It fades when I am near you, when I think of you. When you die I shall hear it again, and there will be nothing left to hold me here."

"Not Aragorn? Nor Gimli?"

He smiled faintly and drew gentle lines up her arms with his fingertips. "You are half elven. You shall have a longer life than most humans, even if you refused to admit it at first. Already you have shown proof of this. You have not aged since I arrived three years ago."

"So you may get eighty years with me alive. Gimli shall live longer than that."

"My love, a dwarf is no compensation for you." She would have laughed, except he kissed her forehead.

She lowered her eyes and sighed faintly. Why did he always have to remind her how unconditionally he loved her? How selflessly, how utterly perfectly? Even if she wished to, she could never love him like that. It wasn't in her human heart to do so. Better to never test those waters. She would only end up hurting him.

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