I decide to stay in Legolas's rooms that night. His fever concerns me and I have made enough errors already in his treatment. I need to atone for them if I can. In the end I fall asleep in front of the fire and it is yet another error. It seems where Legolas is concerned I can do nothing right.
I am awoken by the banging of a door in the wind. A restlessness surges within me, taunting me, pulling at me. Not now, I don't need this now, and I suppress it, driving it away. As I am awake I realise I should check on Legolas. It is dark, how much time has past I cannot tell but the sedative I gave him may well be wearing off by now. It is no surprise to me really when I see his bed empty. I have been sleeping too soundly and he has left.
To my relief he has not gone far however. The banging door which woke me is the one to his balcony. Back and forth it swings in the wind. I step through and sure enough he is there, sitting in the rain and wind. His hair whipped across his face. Water trickling in silver rivers down his face, and he is lost.
"Legolas!" I cry with alarm. He should not be here in this wet and cold. I can think of nothing worse for him and I must keep him safe, for my brother's sake, not my own.
He does not answer, does not move. His head is lifted to the sky and I know it is the sea which holds him. He has surrendered to it. I call his name again but to no avail. I need more desperate means to reach him and to drag him back. I know I must do it. He needs to be inside and warm. I run the risk I will lose him if I leave him here alone. What I do next goes against all my healers instincts, I resist the idea in my mind but I have no choice.
I place a firm hand upon his injured shoulder, not gently. I know it causes no small amount of pain and I am successful. He cries out in agony and flinches away from my touch turning to look at me his eyes wild and confused. He is back.
"I am sorry," I say by way of explanation. "You were lost, I needed to reach you."
"I was not lost." He says, "I knew where I was. Leave me to wander where I will."
"Come inside Legolas." I try to keep my voice low and gentle as my sisters was, try to keep the frustration and annoyance to a minimum. I am not sure I succeed.
"It is not a good place for you here. You are not well."
"I do not care." His tone is flat and monotonous and I know he speaks the truth. He does not play games with me.
"I care." I reply and he laughs at that, a bitter, hard laugh, a mile away from his usual light and joyous one.
"Do not lie." he says.
I see enticing him inside is going to take some time and energy and so I sit beside him, I cannot afford to leave him here. I am not in the mood to sit in this wild weather and yet it seems I have no choice.
"My brother cares." I seek to remind him of those who love him. "Both of them, and I care for them. I do not lie." and it is the truth. I must do what I can to keep him intact until they return. If I fail my brother's grief will overwhelm him. I cannot let that happen.
We sit in silence while I struggle to think of how I can get him to move against his will. Perhaps I should send for my sister?
In the end to my surprise it is he who speaks first.
"The sea is calling to me." He says. "It is insistent. I am awash with it, I cannot resist. It has been this way since the Havens but tonight...tonight, I can feel it on the very wind. I must be here, I must listen."
"I understand." I say and as soon as the words are out I regret them. I have been careless, but I am tired and anxious. Being responsible for his wellbeing when he is so uncontrollable, such a mystery to me is a heavy burden. It is as if the weight of my brothers future happiness, his very life itself presses upon me.
"You do not understand anything...Noldor!" He spits the words out in anger. My heritage used as an insult against me. I do not reply. He does not deserve a reply to that.
He does not apologise.
The rain stings as it beats against my face. The wind pulls at my hair. Tugging, tugging at my very soul. He is right. It sings tonight and for once I allow myself to listen. It is a strange and alien feeling to release myself to its call. Usually I expend much energy denying it.
"It is a yearning..." I whisper, despite myself. Why do I say this?
"It is always there. It is beautiful."
I feel him still beside me. I sense his head turn and feel his gaze, intense and inquisitive, strip down to the heart of me.
"Why are you here." He asks bluntly.
I break the hold the wind has over me, regretting its absence even as I do so.
"Because I am a healer and you are ill." I say. Is that not self evident?
He shakes his head in frustration. That is not what he meant.
"Why are you not with Elrohir...in Dol Amroth? Why do you tarry here?"
"I wish to see my sister." I say, and it is true for the most part. "Elrohir spent much time with her while he was here with you, I have not had that chance."
His gaze beats down upon me, unwavering. His strange hypnotic eyes glint in the moonlight bright with fever. He stares in amazement, as if he looks at me for the first time, as if he has never seen me before. His lips part, soft and enticing.
"You cannot go there." He murmurs.
I say nothing.
"You cannot go there," he repeats it. "It is too near the sea."
He has caught me. He has seen it. My deception is undone and to be honest it is a relief.
Legolas stares at me in wonder, as if I am a jewel to be cherished, a treasure. He has never looked at me this way before, as if he truly sees me. I wonder if this is how he looks at my brother when they are alone and loving. How lucky is my brother to be on the receiving end of such a look.
"Elladan...you do understand." He breathes. "You have no idea what it is...to have someone who knows!"
As quick as it arrived the look is gone and he frowns.
"Elrohir does not know this." It is a statement not a question.
I consider denying, diverting him with accusations, beginning an argument to lead him off my path but why would I do that? If I am truly honest with myself I wanted to be discovered.
"No, and Aragorn and Arwen neither. I would appreciate it if you did not tell them." My voice is clipped and angry sounding, harsh to my ears.
He nods,
"I understand, It would hurt them. Elrohir...he would not cope well." He understands my brother perfectly, I give him that for if he ever knew this Elrohir's fear would defeat him. I will never tell him. I feel his eyes upon me watching and it makes me uneasy. What does he look for?
"Does Glorfindel know?"
The question takes me by surprise, Glorfindel! The sound of his name uplifts me. Glorfindel, glorious, beloved, he has my heart. With his image in my mind even Legolas's wild beauty fades to insignificance. I will never understand what it is Glorfindel sees in me when he looks beyond my ordinariness.
"Glorfindel knows everything." I say, and he does. I have no secrets from him. I wish he were here now. He would help me manage this woodelf, help me manage myself as I did so.
"Does he know about us?"
The question is shocking. We do not speak of that. We never speak of that, Legolas and I.
"Yes." Glorfindel has always known but I won't tell Legolas that.
"Ah, well, you have that then." He sighs forlornly.
I turn to look at him. It is an odd response. What does he mean? He is dejected. He sits, head upon his knees cradling his injured arm against him. He must be in pain, perhaps I should offer something?
"I cannot do this any longer." He says and I frown with concern. I don't like the sound of this.
He raises his head to look me in the eye.
"The guilt strangles me. It is a weight upon my chest, it presses so I cannot breathe. An axe hangs above us and when it falls it will destroy us, Elrohir and I."
I hold my breath, gripped with horror. He cannot mean this. I had no idea he suffered thus.
"Legolas,"I say, for I must say something. "The guilt for that lies with me not you. Do not punish yourself like this. It is not deserved. It was I who wronged you, wronged my brother." I have never admitted this to any but Glorfindel before. It is strangely freeing.
But he simply laughs and it is hollow and empty.
"You have it all wrong Elladan. I am everything you have said I am. Do not feel sorry for me."
"I don't."I am quick to say it, "I don't feel sorry for you."
"I knew what I was doing." He says and I am confused for that is not how I remember it.
"You said his name." I counter, trying to get him to see the sense of it all.
"In the beginning, yes, I was confused, briefly."he says slowly. " But I knew it was you, you are so like him and yet so different. I was curious I admit it, I had always wondered...and angry. He doubted me. He always doubted me, why not be what he accused me to be? I just did not want to admit it. I can now."
He knew it was me! I do not understand why that knowledge elates me when it should anger me. So long has he let me believe I was the one at fault. He had wondered about me? It is a strange idea for me to grasp and I play with it in my mind.
"I cannot bear this," he repeats, "It tortures me endlessly. I must tell him."
I am horrified. This is fever and grief talking surely. I can feel the heat of his fever from where I sit. I must get him out of this rain.
"Legolas," I touch his arm. "Elrohir is happy. When he returned from Ithilien...I have not seen him this happy since..." since our mother I want to add but I don't and I don't know why. It is true my brother returned from his time away radiant and glowing. I had thought all was well between them.
" I know," he says, "We are happy...but it will not last. It cannot last."
I have had enough, in his current state I can see this conversation going nowhere good. I will stop this. I stand and haul him to his feet and to my surprise he does not resist.
"You are not yourself." I say firmly. "You have a fever and you will let me treat you. That does not include sitting here getting wet." I steer him away from the rain and into the dark warmth of his room. I redress his shoulder and give him something for his pain and all the while I am thinking, he cannot tell him, he cannot. I must help him come to terms with this but I have no idea how to do that. Perhaps simply telling me the reality of it will be enough? I can only hope.
He sleeps for a time but I do not. I am not making that mistake again. As the dawn rises Arwen arrives with food for both Legolas and I. I do not tell her of our night and I work hard to protect the depths of my mind lest she stumble across my errant thoughts. If she tries and fails she says nothing. She knows I am still angry about her intrusion the night before. She will assume that is why I erect these walls against her. She sends me to wash and I go, relieved to get away. I need to be on my own to think and consider. I take my time but eventually I must return.
What I find when I get back is chaos. Legolas on his feet, delirious. Pleading with my sister to let him out. This is what happens when you sit in the rain with a fever I tell him in my head.
"Where is Elrohir?" he cries distraught
"He is in Dol Amroth Legolas," my sister says calmly "You know this."
"I must find him." He struggles against her, I see he will soon overwhelm her and I stride across the room and hold him firmly in my arms. The heat of him burns against me.
I drop my voice low and quiet in his ear.
"He comes to you Legolas, we have called him. You must stay here so he can find you."
"My father is gone, I cannot feel him!" He is in tears.
I hold him tight as he fights against me. I will not let him get away and in the end he cries his grief into my shoulder. A memory flashes across my mind, the evening my mother left, holding my brother as I hold Legolas now. As he screamed and cried and raged his hurt against me. Pushing my own pain down, burying it, hiding it, losing sight of it so I could help him, so I could save him.
Losing myself so I could save him.
It is what I do. It is what I have always done.