Aurora as in the oncoming dawn, and not the Northern Lights
O.o.o.o.o. .o.
He stood on the top of the hill, as close to the
edge as he could manage without falling off or having the dwarf yell at him. Feeling about as swept up in his infernal storm of emotions as the leaves who jetted past him within the clutches of the winds cruel grasp. His hair longed to follow, and apparently most of the rest of his body too.
It felt like his very soul did.
He stared to the sky he had never once expected to see again, admiring the last glimpse of the stars before they twinkled into oblivion in the light of the morning sunlight. He had always admired the stars but never before had he ever felt like one quite so much.
Stars were things of impossible wonder and excitement, but they depended on the overwhelming darkness of their world in order to matter. They were only to be noticed when the rest of the world was too dark to hold any wonder or beauty of its own, they were only of consequence when the world needed them.
When they had something to offer.
The sky just beyond the horizon began to explode with colors and majesty, staining the bottoms of the sky and the clouds more colorfully than any artist would ever dare to attempt. It sang of dawns and days spent laughing.
It echoed with the silent, unnoticed, and unmourned death of the stars.
He cast his eyes upwards again, unmourned by all but one perhaps.
He should be happy, he should be bursting at every seam that Eru gave him with joy. He should be shining brighter than any star, or perhaps even the sun itself with the weight if his joy. But he wasn't, in fact, in this moment he felt like the weakest star of them all.
The Fourth Age dawned before him, the one goal that had cast a shadow of his entire life finally cast aside.
Yet he did not feel like the sun or the colors in the sky. He felt like he had grown to need darkness in order to shine. In order to be of consequence.
In order to have something to offer.
He turned his eyes away once more from the sky, and towards the camp much below his feet. Watching as the celebrating continued, as the men who each held their own personal sun's danced and sang and glowed with every single color of the sky above them.
He suddenly regretted coming up so high up on this hill, so far above them they would not yet be able to see him with their night vision. So far above the faint flow of his skin would look exactly like a star.
Dwindling and pointless in light of the upcoming sunrise.
He heard the scuffle of Gimi's foot against a stone, much closer than he usually managed to get before he noticed him. He smiled a bit at the thought, the dwarf had learned much in their time together.
He did not turn but just listened to the dwarf's drawn-out approach, waiting for him to speak. He did not have to wait long, "What are you doing out here all alone like this?"
0o0o0o0o0o
"Being a star," Legolas answered simply, still observing the swirling mass of men below them, a strange sense of melancholy haning around his head darker than the night sky.
In Gimli's opinion, with the shadow of the night still cast above him and the lights of the coming morning throwing themselves across the elf's face, he could have been a star. But something told it was not in the same way that Legolas had meant it.
He walked forward farther and came to stand next to his friend on the hillside, he had sensed that something was wrong with Legolas much earlier in the evening. His joy seemed hollow, and his optimism faked.
"A star, huh?" Legolas nodded nearly imperceptibly. Gimli looked back up the the real stars, and then back down to his friend, "Nah, I don't think so."
The elf's expression changed a fraction, but it was enough Gimli knew that was not the response he had been expecting to hear. Legolas took his eyes away from the men, the sunrise, and the stars for perhaps the first time in hours to turn to him and asked simply, "Oh?"
"From this angle, you look more like a sunrise to me than a star."
Legolas blinked and the hint a sly smile touched his lips, he crouched down, sat, and threw his legs across the edge the small cliff, "How about now that we are nearly eye level?"
Gimli rolled his eyes at the short joke but sat next to Legolas anyways, "Still more sun-like to me."
He contemplated that for a few moments, and Gimli let him, content to admire the colors that continued to unfold before their eyes. A new day, a new age, free from darkness.
"Gimli, have you ever felt happiness so big it felt liked sadness?"
This time, it was his turn to contemplate his answer and Legolas let him, swinging his legs idly while he waited. "Yes. At least, I think I have."
"When?"
"A few times. Usually in light of an event I had been looking forward to for some time. I would spend so much time and energy looking forward, thinking, picturing what it would be like and feel like that when the moment came it felt more fleeting than a breath. So quickly my head and my heart did not get even have the time to properly prepare myself, and I am left feeling guilty for reasons and things I don't understand other than I should be happier but I'm not."
Legolas looked over to him with surprised delight, and Gimli assumed that meant he had managed to guess the elf emotions correctly, "Like being a star during a sunrise."
Gimli patted his hand, "Then its important that you remember you only feel like a star. You are not one."
"Hmm, perhaps." Legolad said mildly.
"You also need to remember to be more patient with yourself. Two thousand years is a long time to anticipate something. Give yourself at least two to come to terms with it."
"And in the meantime?"
"In the meantime, my absurd elf, we are going to go back down among the men and let their enthusiasm bleed into your veins until you can almost fake it to end your own."
O.o.o.o.o.o
