Remember: Legolas is five, Ceretín nine, and Relfían ten (equivalently).
Chapter Two: The Promise of Adventure
"Legolas!"
The elfling grinned broadly as two young elves pulled away from the arriving contingent and ran towards him.
Like their fathers (who were brothers), both had dark hair and eyes. While Ceretín was the older at forty-four, Relfían (who was thirty-eight) was the taller by an inch or so—which made him a bit clumsy at times.
"How are you?" Relfían asked enthusiastically, dropping to one knee more to be closer to eye level with his friend than out of formal decorum.
"I am well," the prince replied with a grin.
"Legolas!" Ceretín called, running back out to the lawn. "Watch this!" With some difficulty, the older elfling managed to do a handstand and hold it for a few seconds before falling onto his back. With a laugh Relfían was soon on top of him, and the pair wrestled for a moment in the grass.
Running down to join them, Legolas grabbed Ceretín about the neck and clung to his back, giggling when the older elfling pretended to try to shake him off.
"Oh," Relfían sighed, falling to his back and laying in the grass, "I am so glad we are finally here."
"The village is no fun at all," Ceretín agreed, letting Legolas down so they could lie beside Relfían. "We are not allowed to go anywhere alone anymore. My Ada says the forest has grown too dangerous."
Legolas thought about this for a moment. "Ada says the palace is not always safe," he ventured.
"Yeah, but the palace so big!" Ceretín exclaimed. "Even if we have to stay inside it is still bigger than the village."
Relfían sighed again, loudly, making Legolas giggle. "Ceretín and I saw the perfect climbing tree when we were coming in," he commented. "We should climb it."
The prince frowned sadly. "I do not know how," he replied. It was true, there wasn't any tree within the grounds that he could climb.
"We'll teach you," Ceretín decided. "It's just outside the walls...we'll be perfectly safe out there...if Relfían remembers not to fall out of the tree!"
The younger elf growled playfully and attacked his cousin, and soon all three elflings were tussling on the grass.
Relfían grabbed a handful of grass and proceeded to stuff it down Ceretín's shirt, leaving the older elfling to gain "retribution" by recruiting Legolas to put a handful of dirt in Relfían's hair. Legolas hesitated, his nurse's almost constant criticism that he was always too dirty (when he tried his hardest to keep clean) echoing in his mind.
"Legolas!" Ceretín shouted as Relfían tried to wriggle out of his grasp.
He immediately forgot about his nurse's words, grabbing a handful of dirt and grass to aid Ceretín in his retriubtion.
Poor Relfían never stood a chance.
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Thranduil smiled quietly as he watched his youngest son playing with his friends. Beside him someone gave a rather opinionated snort. "Yes, Belegdur?" he asked with an air of patience.
"Do you not think he should be acting more...appropriately?" the prince asked his father. "He is a prince...he should not be allowed to roll around in the grass like a common vagabond."
"Let him be young, Belegdur," Thranduil said. "He will have time enough to grown up in years to come."
The prince nodded in reluctant agreement, turning from the window to face the papers on his father's desk. "Shall I run this trade agreement down to Aranion?" he asked.
"Yes, thank you," the king replied, tearing his gaze away from his youngest son back to his study. "The delegates should be arriving in a few days...make sure that their guest quarters are properly prepared."
Belegdur tapped the stack of papers on the edge of the desk to straighten them and nodded again. "Yes, Adar."
The prince opened the door to the study and nearly ran into the elf standing on the other side. "Pardon me, Thilator," he said smoothly, stepping aside to let the older elf into the room.
Dark-haired with pale blue eyes, Thilator nodded and smiled briefly. "May I have a word with you, My Lord?" he asked Thranduil.
The king's eyes narrowed slightly. Thilator was Legolas' tutor...what could he want? "Of course," Thranduil gestured at the empty chair in front of his desk and studied the elf carefully. Had he been more paranoid he might have thought the tutor was listening at the door...but that was a ridiculous thought for an elf of his age and status. "Is something wrong?"
Thilator sighed regretfully. "Truly, Highness, I do not know. I am concerned about your son."
Thranduil held in a rather un-kingly gasp. "Why?" he asked, a bit shortly.
In reply the tutor pulled a small roll of parchment out of his tunic. "Today I assigned him a few letters of the alphabet to copy, to practice his penmanship," he explained, unrolling the parchment.
The king leaned forward and studied the paper, his brow furrowing. The first few lines on the parchment were fairly straight and legible, but toward the end the letters grew more and more sloppy until they were not even recognizable. "And you say he wrote this?"
Thilator nodded. "I have been giving him assignments like this for the past few weeks, but he shows no improvement. In fact, he has been downright rebellious and refuses to do the assignment unless I force him. I left the room here," he added, pointing to the place where the letters began to grow sloppy, "and when I returned he told me he had filled up the rest of the parchment."
"I see," the king said wearily. Thilator was quiet, waiting for the king's decision. "His friends have just arrived," Thranduil finally said. "Perhaps he was merely excited to greet them."
Thilator frowned and looked as though he wanted to argue, but held his tongue.
"If he is still this inattentive to his lessons in a few days I will speak with him," the king concluded.
The tutor stood and bowed. "I am sorry to have brought you this news."
Thranduil waved away the tutor's apology. "Thank you for bringing this to light. My son should not take his studies so lightly."
Thilator bowed again, and exited.
The king sighed, standing and walking back to the window. The elflings were no longer in sight, which probably meant they were "exploring" some hall of the castle. He frowned when he thought of the tutor's report...Legolas had always seemed to eager to share what he had learned that day.
He had trouble picturing his youngest son rebelling against his tutor. Surely there must be something else going on.
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Later that night, nearly exhausted from his afternoon with his friends, Legolas lay curled up in bed in a miserable ball waiting for his brother-in-law. Gilfaroth had taken up telling the elfling's bedtime story a few months ago, when it became apparent that his nurse was somewhat less than imaginative.
He had quickly discovered that Gilfaroth did not like the conventional stories and resorted to making up his own. The stories were important not so much for the comfort they provided the elfling, but because Legolas was still too young to have full control over his dreams.Hearing a story before going to sleep would help him learn that control as he would try to picture the story as he fell asleep, and then thestory would naturally carry over into his dreams.
The door to his room opened and Legolas heard Gilfaroth crossing and felt the bed shift as the dark-haired elf sat down.
"Legolas?" he called quietly, placing a hand on the elfling's arm. "Are you all right?"
The prince nodded, sniffing back a tear that threatened to leak out. Gilfaroth gently pulled on his arm, rolling him over onto his back to look at him. "Is something wrong?" the elf asked, concern coloring his features.
Legolas knew what he looked like. His face was still a little red, and as Gilfaroth gently felt his forehead for a fever one tear leaked out of his eye. His nurse had said nothing was wrong with him, but he still felt miserable.
Amarthwen had drawn his bath tonight, as usual, only this time she had made the water too hot. She'd made it so hot that it hurt, and she wouldn't let him have cooler water.
But that wasn't what was wrong. Amarthwen hadn't been very nice because he'd been dirty from playing with his friends, and had said some very mean things. But when she saw he was upset she told him it was a silly thing to get upset about, and that he would be a baby if he told anyone about it.
"Is something wrong?" Gilfaroth asked again, having gotten no answer from the elfling.
"N-no," Legolas finally said, rubbing his face with his sleeve.
They were just names, right? He would not really turn into a dirty little orc if he didn't keep clean...was he?
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The next morning, Legolas had regained some of his happy spirit as he sat copying letters down on a parchment. His mind wandered as he did so—he'd been stuck copying letters for years, it seemed (even though Thilator hadn't been teaching him that long, only a few months). And every day it was the same thing, even though his letters looked all right to him.
"Are you finished?" Thilator asked kindly, lifting the parchment away. The tutor smiled at what he saw, a pleased expression on his face. "These are very nice."
Legolas brightened. "Can I learn words now?" he asked hopefully. He could write all his letters...maybe Thilator would finally teach him some words and he could really have something to show Ada.
"Not yet," the tutor said smoothly. "You need to work on your letters more."
The prince slumped just slightly and frowned. Why could he not at least try?
"Now," Thilator took down the large history volume, opening it up to the marked page, "what are you and your friends doing today?"
Legolas beamed. "Ceretín and Relfían said they knew a good tree we could climb."
Thilator glanced up. "I did not think there was any such tree on the palace grounds."
"No," the prince shook his head. "The tree is just outside, right up against the walls. They said we could go that far and still be safe."
The tutor nodded. "And do you know how to climb?" he asked.
Legolas shook his head again, wondering why Thilator was asking so many questions. "They're going to teach me," he said brightly.
Thilator smiled. "That is good," he commented, turning his focus back to the book. "Let me see...what did we read yesterday? Ah, yes..."
He waited patiently while Thilator skimmed the book. "Well," the tutor said, "it seems we are a bit ahead in here, so I suppose we could skip the history lesson for today."
With a twinkle in his eye, Thilator replaced the heavy volume on its shelf. "Unless you wish to stay and write more letters, I would suggest you go find your friends."
Legolas beamed and jumped up, pausing just long enough to thank his tutor before he was out the door to find his friends and their promised adventure.
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