What did you think of the first chapter? Just a reminder, you pronounce her name like Celeial (Cell-Eee-al). Enjoy!
Love In The Time Of Dragons: Chapter Two
When Elrond received notice from Legolas that his plan was going to be seen through, he was quite surprised. Legolas had often come to visit Rivendale, and on his most recent visit, he had been asking about his mother. He had questions that Elrond could not answer, so he proposed a solution that would allow Legolas to get the answers he desired, while still enabling Thranduil to remain silent on the matter. Elrond knew there were risks, the main one being that if Legolas could not handle what he felt or saw in his father's memories, then his mind would become lost and he would never wake up. The letter that Legolas had sent was asking him to come as quickly as he could, and he would not disappoint the young prince.
He send a messenger to find his sons Elladan and Elrohir, he told them that he was leaving for Mirkwood immediately and that he was leaving Rivendale in their capable hands. With that dealt with, he left, he took only two guards and the fastest horses they had. By his expectations they would reach Mirkwood in a day and a half.
A day and a half later in Mirkwood...
Thranduil received word that Elrond had safely arrived, he breathed out a worried sigh. He almost could not believe that he had agreed to this ridiculous plan, but he knew that Legolas needed this to truly finish grieving his mothers death, something even Thranduil hadn't done himself. Every time he closed his eyes he saw her standing in front of him, in her warrior garb with black blood smattered on her face, chest heaving from breathing heavy, but yet she smiled. That is how he remembered her, not in the fancy dresses she hated, but as a warrior. He was taken from his thoughts as Legolas, accompanied by Elrond entered the room, Thranduil turned to face Elrond and gave a short bow which Elrond reciprocated in kind.
"Are you ready to begin my son?" Thranduil asked. Legolas simply nodded.
"Then we shall begin" Elrond said, "Legolas, you will experience your father's memories as he remembers them, you won't be in his body exactly, but you'll be close by. You will feel everything he felt, see everything he saw... Are you sure you are ready? For if you are not ready to face the pain you may encounter, we may lose your mind to limbo" Elrond cautioned Legolas once more, but a determined Legolas replied back.
"I am ready, I know the risks". Thranduil and Elrond glanced at each other, neither believing that they were really going to go through with this, but yet, they had gotten this far.
"Lie on the bed, and we shall begin" Elrond told Legolas. Legolas did as he was told and lied down on the bed, Elrond and Thranduil took chairs next to the bed.
"Before we begin, I want you to know that the most pain you will experience inside my head will happen right away, probably only a few minutes into my memories, be ready" Thranduil said to Legolas, who nodded.
"Here we go" Elrond spoke before he started muttering the words to the spell that would temporarily bind the minds of Legolas and Thranduil together. At first Legolas thought it was not working, but then suddenly he was blinded by a brilliant flash of white light.
Legolas opened his eyes to see a battlefield, the bodies of dead elves were laying around, but what really caught his eye was the giant dragon in the centre of the carnage, Legolas came closer to the main fight and noticed his father, who looked slightly younger than he did now. Thranduil was fighting beside a woman who was almost certainly his mother, she was wearing a helmet, so it was a little hard to tell, but Legolas would know those dark blue eyes anywhere.
Suddenly, the she-elf made her move while the dragon was distracted by Thranduil, she gracefully jumped upon the dragon's wing and ran up onto it's back where she plunged her long blade into it's back, it was most certainly a killing blow, but not right away, the dragon still had time for one more burst of angry fire as it flipped the she-elf off it's back and right next to Thranduil, who looked down concernedly at her, her helmet came flying off her head, and in that moment Legolas had no doubt it was his mother. She groaned and as she got to her knees and looked towards the dragon, she could tell that it would be dead soon, but it was eyeing them with rage, she glanced over at the Prince next to her, and realizing that the dragon was about to burn them to a crisp, she lunged towards him and pushed him on the ground. She landed on top of him as the dragon breathed its last fiery breath onto them.
The viewing Legolas watched in horror as the dragons fire engulfed his parents, but he had little time to dwell on that as pain like he had never felt before began to engulf him. He fell to the ground screaming and clutching his face and neck, the pain began to fade slightly, and then stopped completely, Legolas looked around confused, but then realized that it must have stopped because his father must have fallen unconscious, and Legolas too began to feel the pull of darkness around his eyes, but before he fell unconscious he saw the dragon fall dead to the ground, and he saw many elves run towards his parents.
Meanwhile In Mirkwood...
Elrond and Thranduil watched over Legolas carefully, for the first few minutes, he seemed okay, but then his face contorted in pain and he let out a pained scream. At this Thranduil stood up and started pacing, he ran his hands over his face.
"I should have never let him do this" he said quietly, but not quite quiet enough that Elrond couldn't hear.
"What's happening right now?" Elrond asked, even though it may not seem like it, Elrond was actually younger than Thranduil, and so he did not know about many of the things Thranduil did in his youth.
"This was when I lead the army of Greenwood against a serpent nest in the north, we had been told that there were only baby dragons, that their mother had abandoned them, so we went and we killed all of them, and just as we had won, their mother returned" Thranduil glanced at Legolas on the bed, whose screams had stopped, "Celeial saved my life, she was the one that killed it, but we were both terribly injured, her more than I..." Thranduil trailed off as the illusion that covered his face started to falter and Elrond got a brief glimpse of what had happened. Of course Elrond had heard of this incident from others, but seeing the damage was different, he was surprised that he had survived that ordeal. And if Celeial truly was injured worse than him, Elrond was even more surprised, since he had seen Celeial many times, and she never gave the appearance of many scars, certainly not extreme burns, but perhaps she had also had a similar illusion cast over her, this would not surprise him as she was known for her strength in those sorts of things, she had taken after her mother in that way.
Thranduil watched over Legolas, and sat back down once he saw his son's face relax, but he couldn't help but feel like he had made a mistake by letting his son do this.