"Do you think she could have loved me?"
Tauriel stared down at Kili, her heart pounding in her chest. Her fingers brushed his, curled around them and clung for a moment. He was half-delirious still; coming back from the brink of death took time. He didn't think she was real, didn't realize she was actually standing right beside him. And because of his delirium he couldn't see the way his words shot through her like an arrow.
"Any woman would be privileged to stand by your side," she murmured. A lump in her throat caused her to swallow hard. She turned away, the sheer injustice of the situation making her want to scream. Here was this man, a good man, she thought, who didn't realize he had just asked her if she could have loved him. It was a thought she had tried desperately to quash in the short time since she'd met him. It was a dangerous thought in part because it was so tantalizing. Here was a man who was real, who it was now obvious felt something for her, and there was no cold, remote king warning her away from him.
But the obstacles that did stand in their way were perhaps just as insurmountable. They were different people from different worlds. When he was able, she knew he would rejoin his fellow dwarves in their quest to reclaim their homeland. And she would return to Mirkwood, if Thranduil would have her. When, she wondered, would their paths ever cross again? How could you love someone you never had a chance to see, to touch? The love would either drift away to be claimed by the starlight, or it would claw at a person until they went mad. How could anyone live like that?
His fingers brushed hers again. "Tauriel…" he whispered.
She turned back to him, but his eyes were closed, his body still. His eyelids fluttered, so she reached up and brushed her knuckles gently across his brow. "Rest," she said. "Rest and regain your strength."
She left him lying as he was and stepped out onto the rickety balcony outside Bard's home. She closed her eyes and breathed deeply of the cool night air. Kili would live…she hoped. She had done everything in her power to stop the poison spreading slowly through his veins. The athelas has been essential; she didn't think she could have saved him without it. And the thought of not being able to save him terrified her.
Could she have loved him? She thought she could have, and could still. Why else would she have risked everything to save him? She had almost assured the wrath of Thranduil with her actions, and Legolas...she had left him out there, fighting the Orcs on his own. Exactly what he had told her she could not do. She had betrayed Legolas in order to save Kili's life. She didn't think noble intentions would matter in the end. She had left the sanctuary of the halls at Mirkwood, knowing that Legolas would follow her into the wilds, risking his own standing with his father. And even if he was the best fighter she'd ever seen, he was still out there, alone. Because of her.
The sudden sound of a footstep had her whirling, reaching for her daggers...which she had left inside. Her heart thundered, but calmed just as quickly when she saw not an Orc, not a threat, but one of the other dwarves from inside. It was the young, pale-haired dwarf with braids in his beard. Fili, she thought after a moment.
"Is my brother going to live?" he asked.
"You're brothers," she repeated dumbly, struggling to get her rioting emotions under control.
He stepped out of the doorway and onto the walkway, nimbly avoiding a stretch of wood damaged by the Orcs. "I've been looking out for him his whole life. This is the closest I've ever come to losing him. So tell me, is he going to live?"
She looked down at him. "If he has a chance to rest, there is no reason why he shouldn't heal."
"Then we will see that he rests." He turned to fully face her, his head held high. "I owe you a debt. We all owe you a debt, for saving Kili's life."
"You owe me nothing." She gripped the rough wood of the railing in front of her. "I made the choice to come here. I made the choice to help heal Kili's wounds."
"You don't sound happy about that," Fili said. "You sound like you wish you'd made a different choice."
"That is not what I meant. I…" She shook her head and sighed, looking up at the star-speckled sky. She felt no warmth from the sacred light tonight. "We're all at war, in one form or another. With our enemies, our friends. Even ourselves. I don't regret coming here and helping your brother. But I did it without King Thranduil's permission, and when I return to Mirkwood, there is every chance it will be to occupy Kili's former cell."
"He would punish you for saving a life?"
"He would punish defiance. But it's not Thranduil I'm worried about right now. Legolas was only here tonight because of me. I owe him my loyalty, and I left him out there to fight the Orcs alone."
Since Fili was not overly fond of the elf prince Legolas, he sought a change of subject, something to lighten the mood. "Kili shot me in the foot with an arrow once."
She swung her head around. "What?"
"It was a long time ago, when he was first learning to use a bow. I was practicing with a sword at the time, paying no attention to where he was aiming."
"He actually aimed for your foot?"
Fili chuckled. "No. He was aiming for a tree three feet up and to his left."
Tauriel laughed, and it felt wonderful and alien at the same time. She could picture the scene easily, a younger but still impish and charming Kili glibly apologizing as his brother hopped around on one foot. "I imagine that sort of thing happened fairly often when he was young."
"He never shot anyone again, mostly because nobody would stand anywhere near him when he was practicing, but he got into his fair share of mischief. He still does sometimes; the only difference is that he's much more skilled with a bow."
Tauriel's laugh dwindled into a silent chuckle, but she held onto it for as long as she could, savoring the lightness and ease of the moment. Such moments had been too few of late.
"Can I ask you something?" Fili said.
"Yes," she said, giving him her attention again. She liked him, she thought. She admired his obvious loyalty to his brother, and that he wasn't afraid to talk to her as an equal. She felt a growing companionship toward all of the dwarves she had once helped imprison.
"Inside," Fili said, "After you healed him, Kili didn't seem to know you were really there."
"No," she agreed. "The poison from a Morgul arrow can be excruciating. By the time it was over, he was exhausted and delirious."
"Right. But if he hadn't been, if he had realized you were there and what he was saying and asking, would you have answered him the same way?"
Tauriel was quiet a moment. The question answered one of hers, whether or not the others inside had heard what Kili was saying as she wrapped his wound. "Yes," she said quietly, meeting Fili's eyes. "I would have."
He nodded, as if a debate had suddenly been settled in his head, but before he could say anything, Bofur stuck his head out the door. "He's waking up."
"Too stubborn to rest, I suppose," Fili said with a shrug, and went inside.
Tauriel lingered outside the doorway, inexplicably nervous to go back inside.
"Kili, stay where you are," Fili said. "Don't undo all the work that's been done to help you."
"I dreamed…" she heard him say, his voice still groggy but clearer than it had been. "I dreamed Tauriel was here. She was surrounded by light and she took the pain away."
"You didn't dream it. She was here, and is still. She came with Legolas, and after they fought off the Orcs, she stayed to heal you."
"Where is she?" Sounds of a struggle could be heard from inside the door. "Where is she?"
"Here," she said, stepping into the doorway so he could see her. He had raised himself to a half-sitting position on the table, but he was too weak yet to shake the holds of the other dwarves. He went still when he saw her, their eyes connecting and holding across the space of the room.
"Tauriel," he murmured.
"I believe you've been told, more than once, to lie still," she said, coming to stand next to the table.
"Since when do I do as I'm asked?" he wondered with a ghost of the smile she was growing so fond of.
"Almost never," Fili said, and then he and the other dwarves quietly drifted away from the table as Kili finally subsided. Tauriel looked down at him. His hand reached out for hers, and she slipped her fingers around his. "I thought I would never see you again. I thought the last image I would ever have of you was a pack of Orcs trying to take off your head."
"They failed," she said, absently stroking her thumb over his knuckles.
"Why did you come back?" Kili asked.
"I was hunting the Orcs that survived the battle by the river. It felt wrong to leave them roaming our lands, causing destruction wherever they went. And…" She trailed off, unsure how to express what she was feeling. She'd never felt the like before. She'd thought she had once, for Legolas. Now she knew differently. The affection she felt for Legolas was something else. What she was beginning to feel for Kili was entirely new. It was frightening and exhilarating all at once. She knew to reach for it could mean the end of her standing with Thranduil. But how could she not? How could she let something so rare and precious slip through her fingers? There had to be a way to forge something real with him.
"And what?" Kili urged.
She gazed at him. "After your friends floated down the river, we captured one of the Orcs. It told us that you had been shot with a Morgul arrow. Morgul poison is always deadly if not caught in time. Thranduil was willing to suffer your loss. I was not. I hunted the Orcs hoping they would lead me to you."
"And they did." He smiled. "I should thank you for saving my life, and for risking so much to do so."
Tauriel turned and accepted a chair from Bard's eldest daughter, who turned away with a smile and left them in peace again. Tauriel sat down near the head of the table. It put her more on a level with Kili, and thus felt more intimate than standing over him. "At some point," she said, "we all have to decide what we stand for. What Thranduil does after this is his choice. I made my choice, and I would make it again. I could not let you die, no matter the cost."
Kili reached out and brushed his knuckles across her cheek. She closed her eyes. The simple contact made her heart ache. She reached up and closed her hand over his. "I was so frightened," she whispered. "When I saw how close to death you were, I thought I was too late." She turned her head and kissed his hand. Her eyes she kept tightly closed, for she was afraid if she opened them now, helpless tears would fall. Still her hands trembled, and she had to breathe deeply in an effort to calm herself.
"Are you going to cry over my non-death?" Kili asked impishly.
She chuckled softly, taking a deep breath as she opened her eyes to look at him. "You and your questions."
"I think you don't mind my questions as much as you let on," he said. "On a more serious note, I think I've come up with a way to thank you for helping me."
"Have you now?" she wondered, not trusting that he was being serious at all. It seemed not even nearly dying could kill his spirit.
He nodded. "Lean closer and I'll tell you. I don't want any of the others to hear this."
Her lips twitched, and her heart sped up a little as she leaned in. "So tell me," she whispered.
He wrapped his hand around the back of her neck and pulled her down until her lips met his. They both stilled, the first moment of the kiss holding them in thrall. It was as though the rest of the world vanished in an instant, leaving only the two of them in an endless moment of surprisingly sweet intimacy. She cradled his face in her hand. His lips were soft yet firm as they molded to hers, the rough texture of his beard gently abrading her palm. Distantly she felt his fingers leave her neck to stroke through her hair.
They pulled back just enough so they could breathe but kept their faces close together. "I've been wanting to do that since the first moment I saw you," he said.
"We didn't exactly have the friendliest of introductions."
"And yet somehow, here we are." He leaned up for another quick brush of his lips against hers. "When this is over, I want to walk in the starlight with you."
"All right," she agreed. "We'll walk in starlight later, if you promise to rest right now."
He pulled the rune stone he still carried out of his pocket and held it up so she could see it. "I will rest now, if you promise to be here when I return."
She covered his hand with hers. "I promise."