This just needed to happen, okay?


He was bruised, he was bleeding, he had no air in his lungs. The world spun in a dizzying whirl of sound and sensation and he tried to focus on one point long enough to make everything just stop. He could smell death and despair around him, thick and oppressive as it closed in its ranks around him and crushed the already scant air from his lungs. Bright blossoms of blinding white light began to scatter across his vision, adding to the chaos and thundering pain in his head. He could hear the clanging of metal as swords collided and shields were broken, could hear the screams of his men and the cheers from the enemy, could feel blood that wasn't his sliding sickly, sticky wet against his exposed skin.

He would die here, he realized, amid the putrefaction and the rot, left to die by those that thought him lost already, or those that wished him to be. He tried to call out, to make his last vestiges of breath worth something, but words failed him and his body began to grow cold. Death gripped him with talon-like claws and carried him deeper into the dark and the silence, deeper into the earth and further from the sky, further from the nightingales that sung to sweetly in the twilight…

What he first noticed when consciousness returned to him was the scent of earth and water and growth. He could smell the colors on the air, the perfume of the forest unmistakable even with his eyes still closed. Birds sang softly amid the trees, and somewhere close by there was another voice that joined them, a voice he recognized but could not believe he was hearing again.

"Elen sila lumenn omentilmo…" The voice lilted softly with the words, the greeting such a blessed change from the farewells he had heard before, the dying cries of his comrades. "Nae saian luume'…" He tried to chuckle, the irony of the words not escaping him even in his current state. "Oio naa elealla alasse'…" A hand alighted to the side of his face, the touch like that of a bird's feather against his battered skin. "Cormamin lindua ele lle…" The voice wavered slightly, choking off on the last word as the singer stopped abruptly. The hand shifted from his face to his shoulder, and he felt the faint brush of lips land against his forehead. "Aaye, Haldir, Heruamin…"

"I promised, did I not?" The words were spoken without the command to do so being given, and Haldir realized she had not been expecting it, because she jumped back as though burned, her hand flying from its perch on her shoulder. He willed his eyes open and found her wide silver eyes staring back at him. The world fell away in that moment, their surroundings now superficial as they looked at one another and could do nothing more than stare.

Tinuviel finally broke the silence, her voice less frail than it had been when she had sung to him. "Yes, you did."

"And here I am." He tried to smile, tried to take that fear out of her eyes, but he only succeeded in making the pain in his head worsen.

She finally snapped then, her face splitting into a grin as she descended on him, laughing till tears formed at the corners of her eyes and resting her forehead to his. "Please do not scare me like that again, Haldir… My heart cannot take it."

He let his eyes drink in the sight of her face, the shimmering eyes and bright smile, the laughter on her lips and the way her hair caught the light. "I will do my best not to." He promised softly, his tone sincere. "It did no good to my heart either, to say farewell."

She pulled back slightly, putting a little space between them, and chose her next words carefully. "Then, the solution would be to never say farewell again."

His eyes sparked, the hand closest to hers sliding sideways to twine their fingers together. "Aye, Tinuviel, I believe I could do that."


See? Just needed to happen.

Roughly translated, Tinuviel's song reads: "A star shall shine on the hour of our meeting... It has been too long... Ever is thy sight a joy... My heart sings to see thee... Hail, Haldir, my lord...". Had waaaay too much fun putting all that together. XD

Anywhozen. I know a few of you had asked for another chapter, so I hope you enjoyed it.

I know I certainly did!


The song "You Know We're All So Fond Of Dying" belongs to: Children 18:3