After their vigorous training session, Sybil's big battle that evening was not falling asleep at the dinner table. It was an uphill battle, too. The last time her stamina had been pushed to this extent – with the training in general, not just Boromir's own unique way of doing things – was when she'd first come to live with Bera. Even back then, young as she was, she hadn't complained, too aware of the precarious nature of her position. She'd caught up quickly, no longer battling each evening with heavy eyelids and clumsy hands, but it had taken a good year or two before Bera stopped making comments as to the life of leisure she must once have led.
In her work with Ilaria, she'd gotten through that constant-exhaustion phase rather quickly, but the events of the morning brought it back now with a vengeance. But Sybil saw it as adopting future struggles, so they might not plague here out there in the wild – she was robbing herself of further hardship and taking it on now, where it was safer to do so. At least to some extent.
But right now, that looked a whole lot like falling asleep between forced bites of broccoli. The exhaustion had also rid her of her appetite. The arrival of the hobbits, however, seemed likely to aid her with both of those dilemmas.
"Hullo!" Pippin greeted cheerily, falling into the seat beside her. "Word is you'll be joining us for training!"
"What he means to say is hello, Miss Sybil, how are you?" Frodo added as he followed his kin to sit by her at the table.
"I'm well, thank you," she smiled, sliding her arms from the table and straightening. "And you must call me Sybil. Word has travelled fast, I see."
There were a few not-so-subtle glances in the direction of Sam, and when she followed their eyes to him he flushed.
"I wasn't spying," he said. "I was walking – and I came across the two of you."
Hopefully not during one of the occasions where she decided a quicker way to reach the bottom would be to simply tumble down the steps.
"I didn't notice you."
"We hobbits are light on our feet, and good at escaping notice," Frodo explained. "As I'm sure all became aware of at the Council."
Sam was the only one who flushed at that, Merry and Pippin smirking their pride.
"Well, I'm glad you did see, Sam" she reassured, "I would hate for my presence to be an unwelcome surprise, come the morn."
"Not at all! It's about time we had a fair face amongst us for it," Merry grinned, and Sybil couldn't help but laugh at his charm.
"You must promise to go easy on me, then."
"If you get paired with Sam, you'll be safer if he's trying to hit you. It's always anything but the target that his blade finds," Pippin teased, earning an eyeroll from Sam in response.
With a smile – one she hoped Sam would understand was at their antics rather than at his expense – she was content to sit and witness their camaraderie from the sidelines, but that was when Merry seemed to decide a change of pace was in order.
"Here – Sybil, have you tried the chicken? It's very good. Have some."
She had no chance to profess her lack of appetite before the hobbit was piling some onto her plate for her.
"No, Merry, it's the pork that's best. Here, this one – it has this sort of sage seasoning that's particularly good."
Again, her plate was loaded.
"I-" Sybil said.
"What about the duck, Pip? You really should try some of the duck, my lady, I don't think we'll be getting much of that out on the road," Merry countered.
Any protests that she was not a lady fell on deaf ears.
With that addition, her plate looked fit to feed a mountain lion rather than a woman, and they only stopped when she bodily pulled her plate away so they could not heap more atop it. Sam was shaking his head, but Frodo watched the ordeal with a knowing sort of look – followed by an apologetic smile when she caught his eye.
"Eat! I have no idea how you Big Folk get so big considering none of you know how to feast properly," Merry insisted.
"This isn't a feast, it's a meal," she said.
"Every meal is the opportunity for a feast in the Shire," Frodo replied.
There was a fondness in his voice that could be construed as homesickness, and her heart went out to him – memories of what she'd seen at the Council only adding to that fact.
"Sybil isn't very big, though, is she? Almost closer to our height than, say, Strider's," Pippin replied to Merry's original point. "Maybe that's why."
"You're exaggerating," Merry shook his head – but only after squinting at the top of her head as if her height was written there.
"I don't think I was ever destined to end up as tall as Aragorn, regardless of what I ate," she chuckled.
"I wouldn't say that, miss, or else they'll wish to test your theory," Sam said.
It appeared they were already determined to do so. Sybil did not finish her plate – she never could manage that, even had she been given a week to do so – but she listened happily to the hobbits' tales of home and picked her way through what she could in order to be polite, pushing the plate away the moment they left to harangue the kitchen workers for a second round of dessert. She emphatically rejected the offer to join them, feeling quite sick after their constant prompting that she eat more.
When another took the place Pippin had vacated, she tensed at first, worrying they were back to turn dinner into supper, but she turned to find Legolas watching with undisguised amusement, a smile on his fair face as though he could read her thoughts. He showed no interest in any of the food, and appeared to have come to talk rather than eat.
"I don't suppose you've also fallen victim to sudden force-feeding at the hands of the halflings?" she asked.
He chuckled, seemed to hesitate for a moment, and then confessed quietly.
"Your travelling companion asked them to do so. Although they may have overdone it a touch."
"My travelling com-" Sybil stopped short and then sighed, eyes fluttering shut – stinging from tiredness as they did. "So now I cannot be trusted to feed myself properly?"
Legolas weighed her words thoughtfully, and then replied. "I think it was well-intended. And that he feared the sentiment would be unwelcome, were it to come from him directly."
It was kindly said – and delicately, too. And, despite everything, it made her feel terrible. Not so much for her own behaviour towards Boromir, he'd certainly gone out of his way enough times to warrant that, and none could not blame her for ascribing malice where there truly was none, but because she was constantly reminded that it had not always been this way. It would be so much easier if it had. If they'd met for the first time at the Council, and he was just yet another person who took a swift disliking to her for reasons she could not help, deserved or no.
Now, though? Now every hint of awkwardness, every unpleasant moment, only served to remind her of what had come before. And the fact that she missed it. Sorely.
They had been…well, they had been allies. If not friends. Had he not spoiled everything with his cruel words, with his true feelings as to her presence (whether she'd made any progress at disproving that outlook or not), things might be very different now. While the others were lovely, too, she hadn't quite taken to any of them as she had with Boromir, she could hardly recall a time when she had clicked with any other the way she had with him, and so she felt the loss all the more keenly.
"You have done well, to make the progress that you have," Legolas offered, apparently sensing something of her thoughts from her face.
"Ilaria was a good teacher."
"That was not the progress I was referring to," he said. "I hope I'm not overfamiliar in saying so – but this Fellowship cannot go forward with open hostility in the ranks, and I find it admirable that you have set them aside so to work with the son of Gondor."
Then, he added sourly. "I say so with full awareness that I have my own battles to face, in that regard."
Ah. Gimli.
"You'll overcome it," she said softly – without thinking.
She might've gotten away with it, it could have been waved off as an empty but friendly gesture of support, if not for how she tensed immediately thereafter, and the way her eyes flew to him, widening as if expecting dismay and reproach. For, as always when things like this slipped out, she had no idea where it had come from – only that the source was not her own mind.
Legolas' head turned quickly and he regarded her in silence for a moment. But then a smile pulled at his fair face, and he nodded slowly.
"Thank you. It reassures me to hear that."
All she could do was blink back in surprise, his reaction seeming too good to be thoroughly true. He took his leave then with as little fanfare as he arrived, seeming more thoughtful than perturbed by her slip. When he was gone, Sybil's shoulders slackened and she exhaled softly.
Training the next morning followed a night of sleep that was not quite poor, but certainly interrupted. Every time she so much as shifted in her sleep, the resulting protest of her muscles awoke her – and Eru forbid she sought to do something as adventurous as roll over. She awoke already pining for her regular scalding-hot bath after training. Of all the comforts she'd miss when it came time to depart, that would be chief among them.
She dressed, bound her hair back from her face into its usual thick plait, then took up her rapier and her pack and left to find the others. Nerves prickled at her as she did so, stirring unease in her chest and setting restlessness about her limbs, leaving her overly aware of how she held her arms and how she walked. It would be fine. Yesterday had shown that. If they could get through a one-on-one lesson, this would be far easier. Little could be awkward with Merry and Pippin about. The fair golden morning lifted her spirits further.
Ordinarily she liked to be ridiculously early to anything and everything, but here she made sure to arrive precisely on time – and was rewarded when she found all were already there on the flat, spacious terrace when she arrived.
Boromir, she greeted with a polite smile and a nod, not only for his benefit but to show the others that everything was fine. Whether that was true or not. She wasn't even sure of that last part herself, but comforted herself with the fact that all was certainly better than it had been. And then the lesson began.
The matters of the hobbits and their training had been of some curiosity to her. They'd met foes on the road, after all, and while Sybil knew she could scrap if required, this was a different matter entirely. Ilaria was a good teacher, and she knew that if her progress concerned her the elleth would say so, but there had still been a sort of niggling worry at the back of her mind that perhaps the others were making leaps and strides far ahead of her – that she'd come here and find herself laughably outlearned by the other non-warriors of the Fellowship.
That was not the case.
It took a little while to understand the sort of shorthand they'd developed when it came to various instructions being called out, but she caught on quickly and often found when she looked to Boromir that he was nodding his satisfaction at her work.
The problem lay in her footwork. Not in general, but on this day – for every time she moved, the stiffness in her muscles made itself known. She gritted her teeth through it and refused to allow herself to make any allowances, but it showed – she knew it showed – making her steps clumsier, her saves more haphazard and based on luck than they might ordinarily be. Worse still, when she looked to Boromir she knew he had noticed, for those were the times when the reassuring nods morphed into thoughtful frowns, his eyes pinned on her legs and how she moved them. It only grew worse when they practised with their packs on, her hips in particular shrieking in protest against the added weight until she felt like they little better than rusted hinges within her.
She was busy reassuring herself that she'd do better tomorrow when he asked that she linger to speak with him a moment at the end of the lesson.
"Are you injured?" he asked.
Well, at least he didn't merely think her incompetent.
"No," she said.
She'd almost left it at that, not wanting to complain nor make excuses, but then sighed at the idea of appearing too churlish and added.
"Sore, that is all."
The responding nod he gave suggested he expected as much.
"Did your Elven instructor teach you any stretches? Or perhaps your knowledge as a healer would lend itself to…"
His questions betrayed an eagerness not to assume she knew nothing, and it was far too endearing, softening her manner as the tension trickled from her shoulders. He only wished to help.
"Some. None that help this, though – it's…it's my hip. Here, the right one in particular," she motioned with the side of her hand, to the joint where her thigh met her hip. "I stretch my legs nightly, but little seems to help that."
A furrow worked its way into his brow, and he listened more intently than she expected. Mostly because she thought he'd just shrug and announce time would help more than anything.
"Humour me a moment?"
Sybil's eyebrows drifted upwards in surprise, and then she nodded and gestured with both hands for him to continue.
"Kneel," he said, "on one knee, the right one – as though you mean to pledge an oath. We'll attend to the other thereafter."
She did so, albeit with some clumsiness, not noticing the hand he'd offered to help her down until it was too late. The action made their difference in height truly laughable then, and he pressed his lips together to ward off what might have been a smile before lowering himself to the ground, too, so continued instruction wouldn't have the feel of the absurd.
The ground was unforgiving beneath her knee, and her tired muscles threatened to send her wobbling before she tensed her thighs against it, dearly hoping this wasn't to be another lesson in endurance.
"Now, keep your back straight and your core strong…may I?"
There was a tentativeness about him that she had not seen in a while, not since before, as he gestured vaguely to her person. Now it was her own turn to fight back a tired smile as she nodded. He had corrected her posture once or twice during training, it was not something to get flustered about – she was a healer, was she not? Growing sheepish and flustered over close proximity wasn't something she could indulge in. And they'd certainly been forced to overcome that on the road here, in any case.
At her permission, he rested a hand at her back, keeping her upright and steady before continuing.
"Stay upright, but lean forward, straightening your back leg while moving your weight to the front."
She obeyed, guided by his hand, and the tightness at her hip quickly gave way to a deep burn that had her breath catching in her throat, and renewing the wobble in her balance. Boromir steadied her, the hand not at her back catching hers when she flung it out to try and regain her balance. He wore no gloves, and yet his hand was warm despite the autumn chill. It practically dwarfed hers.
Sybil steadied herself, squeezing his hand as she did so, and then she let go. Not so quickly as to suggest distaste and renew this uneasiness between them…perhaps too slowly, if anything. Her hand moved to the leg bent before her, her thigh muscle begrudging even that small amount of pressure, and his fingers flexed a little in her peripheral vision before he dropped his hand to his side. She ignored the sparks that had gathered in her palm, eyes downcast.
"The-" he paused and cleared his throat, "the temptation is to rush through the motion – and the discomfort – but you must move slowly, lean into it, and breathe through it. You'll thank yourself for it afterwards."
Taking in a deep breath, she exhaled slowly through her mouth and nodded her determination, closing her eyes and slowly easing further forward despite the pain. He breathed a whisper-soft chuckle that almost, to her treacherous ear, sounded fond.
A/N: We might see more stretching-instructor Boromir in the future, I'm not sure. Just want Boromir to tell me to kneel besties x
We're reaching the end of the Rivendell arc! Only a few more chapters left here. Probably around two? I also have the next chapter already half-written so it'll probably end up being quick, I'm very excited about it. And from the 20th onwards we have three Sybil/Boromir flufftober fills in the mix over on tumblr (two of which take place in an established relationship utopian future), so if that strikes your fancy keep an eye out!
Tumblr – esta-elavaris
