Disclaimer: The Lord of the Rings is property of Tolkien and there are many references throughout to Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series. I only own what you do not recognize. The character Chinky is not meant to cause offence and is named after a real horse whose name has been shortened from a Fiat Cinquecento (Chinky – Chento).
Chapter 8: Amy daughter of Onlee
After she had recovered, Amy had felt pretty embarrassed. Once she had stopped crying she decided not to remove herself from Legolas's embrace. Turning her head away from his cool chest she looked at Aragorn.
"You see why I don't want to go back? I couldn't, I hate my old life. Since coming here, I have felt relief wash over me. I mean this is the first time I've had proper friends since I was nine!" Amy said somewhat reluctantly.
"Come Little Warrior, it is nearly dinner time, we wouldn't want father to get angry now would we?" Aragorn said changing the subject, as he noticed the girl's discomfort.
Amy went to stand up and walk off, but before she had taken even two shaky steps she felt someone grab her arms. She gasped and shut her eyes as she felt her legs getting lifted off the floor. Opening her eyes she looked at her captor and smiled as she breathed in the clean, sweet scent of Legolas.
Legolas had been somewhat disturbed by her story. He had known she didn't have a very happy life but he had never thought the memories of it would have brought her tears.
Once he saw her start to cry, he had instinctively sat up and wrapped his arms around her before he had realised what he had done. He could not get the feeling of her body next to his out of his head. It had felt so right, her oddly cool back curved into his stomach as she had sobbed into his shoulder.
Once he had released her from his embrace he instantly missed the feel of her against his body. All he wanted to do was hold her again. He had seized his chance when she had been slightly wobbly getting up. Placing his right arm round her back and his left arm under her legs he lifted her up effortlessly. She had automatically placed her arms around his neck and leaned into his shoulder. He tried to wipe the smile off his face as they walked to the dinning hall. Apparently he didn't try hard enough.
"Legolas melonîn, do you know what you are doing?" Aragorn said in elvish to his friend.
"I can't help it; there is nothing I can do." Legolas replied in the same fluid language looking down guiltily.
"You promised, never to look at another female like that again, and yet in these past two weeks, so much heat has been present in your eyes, even I can perceive what you are thinking."
Legolas looked at the girl in his arms, it was true, ever since he had had his heart broken he had sworn never to love another, yet as he said he could not help himself. He knew what the consequences would be of loving her, it was impossible and he risked having his heart broken again.
"I know my friend yet I can't help it. I can't help feeling for her more than is appropriate. Come there is nothing you or I can do. Let us feast!" Legolas said walking into the dinning hall.
Amy frowned at the conversation at hand. She didn't understand much elvish but she knew enough to know that they were talking about her. Sighing she went back to playing with a lock of Legolas's silky hair and smiling as she felt him shudder at her touch.
Aragorn shook his head silently at his friend. Legolas knew the consequences of loving her, braking his promise to himself, about not courting another. He also knew there was no way to discourage his friend, as he knew all to well, that love finds ways of its own.
BREAK
"Come Amy, Galadriel wants to talk to you now. Estel, Legolas stay away from my study." Elrond said this with a hint of steel as he looked towards the two young men. Taking Amy's arm he led her towards his study where Galadriel waited.
BREAK
Amy sat down in a soft velvet lined chair in Elrond's study opposite Galadriel. The only other people in the study were Elrond and Gandalf.
Galadriel rested her chin on her hands and looked at Amy, almost as if she was waiting for a question. When none came she started talking in her soft melodious voice.
"Amy you have not been in Middle Earth long enough to know about the Dragon, and I very much doubt that the story has been told to you." Galadriel started. She looked for some recognition on her face, but received none.
Amy's cheeks flushed red. Her embarrassment stemmed from the fact that she did not know what Galadriel was talking about, and she wasn't used to not knowing things.
"Do not worry child it is quite expectable that you do not know, in fact it is only really the elves that tell the stories to their newborns. Mortal men do not seem to care much for history any more. The story starts at the beginning of the first age of Middle Earth, in Beleriand." Galadriel started.
A glimmer of hope spread through Amy's veins. She had read the Silmarillion and knew a bit about the elves of that time.
"I was the youngest of five brothers; I didn't like being the youngest. So every night I used to lie down on the soft grass dreaming of having a younger brother or sister. One day my mother came out to see me. She found me easily enough, lying next to the river. I told her of my dreams. No sooner than I had said this but we heard gentle sobbing. Getting up and walking to the very bank of the river we saw a child. A babe of no more than six months. My mother and father took him as their own, and I finally got that little brother of my dreams.
"We took him to be a human child, and reluctantly I realised that his life was no more than a day to mine. The years past in a blur. Soon Onlee – for that was what we had named him - reached his sixteenth summer. Over that summer things changed. He changed. His brown hair went as dark as night and started growing at an alarming rate. And his dark hazel eyes went black. We were worried but didn't think anything of it, as he was still lively and healthy. But he was changing more than we realised. He became light on his feet, his eyesight improved along with his hearing, his once slightly chubby appearance left and he became thin and lithe.
"One morning he ran into my parent's room in great joy. After ten minutes he calmed down enough to say what he was so excited about. All he did was point to his ears. They were pointed. After the commotion died down my father did checks on him. After he finished he came to us with a smile wider than Arda on his face. Onlee had no human blood left in him. He was an elf; or so we thought."
Amy sat with her mouth wide open as she listened to Galadriel's tale. Her mind tried to register everything while Galadriel took a quick drink of wine. Her father had been an elf, had her mother known? 'Don't be stupid' she said to herself, 'that can't have been my real mother I was living with.' This thought cheered her up more than she expected. If her father was an elf, then what was she? Galadriel started talking again before she got chance to ask.
"After the initial shock died down it finally hit us. Our sixteen year old human boy had turned into an elf, how? You don't just turn into an elf; it just didn't happen like that! I spent more and more time with my little brother, we bonded. I knew everything about him just like he knew everything about me.
"One day he came to me looking quite forlorn. He asked me why his eyes were black. I had to tell him the truth, I didn't know. Elves do not have black eyes, or rarely brown for that matter. Never had an elf had the same colour eyes as him. He then broke down and cried. Not knowing what was wrong I questioned him. He told me about his power. I smiled thinking he was talking about his weapon skill, but he wasn't.
"He told me he could make flame appear out of nowhere, make lightning rain from a clear sky. He could make lights appear and juggle with them. Of course I didn't believe him until he showed me. He sat crossed legged in front of me and held out his hands, three balls of light appeared, he juggled them gradually making more appear until he had seven. Sometimes one would wink out as he lost concentration for a minute but it would wink back in seconds later.
"I didn't say anything until he had finished, I couldn't say anything. I didn't know what to say. He told me he could pull gold from the ground in the same way, he would feel it and locate it, and then pull it out of the ground. He told me he practiced late at night with the five elements, he called them Water, Air, Fire, Earth and Spirit. From then on I trusted and believed everything. We were never separate. We got into so much trouble together, he could undo locks from the other side of the door, this offered endless amounts fun."
Amy nearly choked as she heard about the lock trick, but she managed to refrain herself. Galadriel smiled as she saw Amy try and stop herself choking.
"Well that is enough talk about my childhood I think. Now to the legend." Galadriel said.
Amy looked around her to see Elrond with a thunderstruck face. He knew about Onlee, but he didn't know that Galadriel was his foster sister. Gandalf was looking as thought nothing was new. Sighing Amy looked out the window behind Elrond and Galadriel. For a fleeting second she could have sworn she saw a flash of gold hair followed by a glimpse of wavy brown hair under the windowsill. Smiling to herself she should have realised that Elrond's warning wouldn't keep Legolas and Aragorn away. Quickly she turned her attention back to Galadriel with an interested look on her face.
"As the years went on Onlee's elemental strength grew. I spent so much time around him that some of his powers rubbed off on me, especially the Spirit. At this time Morgoth was in power controlling most of the North of Beleriand. The final battle was close at hand, I could feel it. Onlee had born many children by that time, though all of which had died save one.
"As he left to fight with my brothers he left me in charge of his child, promising he would come back for it. The battle was long and hard, Onlee fought with all his might not to use his power, but finally all was lost. Less than 3000 elves and men remained all lost to the power of Angband. They lost hope and faith, but retreating was not an option. In the hour of darkness a lightning bolt came. There was one elf left who had more fight in him than all the rest. I stood and watched. That scene branded into my mind forever. Onlee, my brother standing on a high ridge, clad in nothing put a pair of breaches.
"He cried aloud as lightning crashed to the ground around him. Throwing orcs leagues into the air. The earth was shaking as earthquakes tore the earth asunder. The men who were all ready to give up their lives found a new strength as Onlee threw himself off his ridge. He plummeted to the earth; moments before he landed he swooped up in a ball of flame. A dragon was formed around him, a dragon of fire. The ground all over Beleriand was shaking the ground was breaking. The more power Onlee drew, the more the world broke. The orcs were forced back into Angband by balls of flame from the dragon's mouth. Once all evil was in the fortress, the Dragon screeched as Onlee cried as he directed his lightning bolts to the mighty stone fortress. Victory was near.
"Onlee flew over to me, for I was watching from the nearby mountains with the rest of the women and children, and took the babe out of my arms and into his own.
"'Galadriel,' he said, 'this child is my heir, and in time of need I want you to train her. You saw how I trained. Train her, she will be needed in the final battle, I can see it, in ages to come, my child will be the dragon. Here send her to the future with my sword, I have made it especially. Now hurry go. The world is breaking.'
"I kissed his cheek as I watched him soar in the air, encased in the dragon of flame. He soared right over Angband then flew into it. The fortress fell; the world was cast apart as my brother sacrificed himself for the world. My brother the Dragon. Afterwards I came across the mountains and located in Lothlorien. I did as he said and sent his child into the future; she would not come back until the time was near."
Galadriel finished her story somewhat tearfully. The memories of her brother still strong in her mind.
Amy sat there stunned. What did this all mean? Well she knew what it meant but she didn't want to admit it. She slowly looked up at Galadriel; she felt her hands go to her eyes then to her hair. Her black eyes, her black hair.
"No, this cannot be. I can't be!" She finally stuttered out.
"Amy, would you kindly hand me your sword," Galadriel said holding out her hand to the young girl.
Looking slightly confused she stood up and pulled the sword out of its scabbard. Tossing it slightly in the air, she caught it at the base of the tang and handed it handle first towards Galadriel.
She took it with a smile before running her long fingers along the inscribing. The elvish standing out on the black handle, the dragons almost seemed alive as they snaked their way down to the tip of the blade.
"I present this sword to Amy daughter of Onlee. Child of the Dragon."
