Wait and See

This time, when I awoke in my dream realm, I didn't feel threatened. On the contrary, everything was familiar, like a warm blanket wrapped around my shoulders. No birds hanging motionless in the air, no Morgoth. That was something, after all.

I began to take a look around. Legolas had been right: All around me was the library, just as I remembered it and where I had spent so many hours. The wooden bookshelves nestled against the round wall, a fireplace that I had never once seen in action, and several rows of tables with old-fashioned chairs whose hard seats I still remembered well. Even the cup stain that had pressed into the coaster on one of the tables over the months I had worked here was still there.

With a shake of my head, I chased the thought away. No, I wasn't really here. What I saw were my memories. In the real world, in the real library, this coaster had long since disappeared from this spot. My surroundings were an image, frozen in time. I couldn't forget that.

Carefully, I let my hand glide over the wood as I roamed the library. I was alone, no sign of the elf. Perhaps he had not found me yet? Or my imagination had not been accurate enough? Part of me wondered at what point this should start worrying me and whether I wasn't already back in a dream realm created by Morgoth - but my gut told me that wasn't the case. I would know, or at least I was hoping so.

Just as I was about to pull one of the books off the shelf to see if my memory even mapped its contents, or if blank pages were waiting for me, a voice in my back said, "The way the light falls reminds me of Eryn Lasgalen, but everything else seems otherworldly."

With a small sound of surprise, I whirled around. Legolas was leaning against the fireplace, his arms folded in front of his chest as he let his eyes roam over the shelves. "I have wondered for some time now what your world might be like." He threw me a mischievous smirk. "The idea of exploring it in a dream never occurred to me. We should be grateful to Morgoth."

The name sent a cold shiver down my spine and I lowered my eyes. All at once I was afraid that he might appear among the tables after all, lying in wait for us, at a moment when we did not expect it. "Is this all tied to my memory? Can we only visit places I know myself... or have known?", I asked, trying to distract myself from the thought of Morgoth.

"Yes," he pushed himself away from the fireplace and stepped toward me, "the dream realm in which we move is interwoven with your memory. The better you knew a place, the closer to reality it will be. I may not notice this, but you will."

"But... as accurately as all this is depicted... I don't remember it," I interjected. Even though I had stared at those shelves for a long time, trying to make sense of the sources I was working with... only someone with a photographic memory would be able to remember the titles of each spine - which I didn't have.

"Your subconscious fills in the blanks in the way that makes the most sense to it. All the more interesting," he replied, and I could see the mischievousness flashing in his eyes again.

"Why do I get the feeling that this is going to be a study of my mind and that you like being able to look inside it so deeply?"

The elf stepped behind me and placed his hands on my shoulders. With that, he was as close to me in the dream realm as he was in the waking world. The shiver that ran down my spine this time was warm. "You extremely rarely let me see behind your exterior, Aspen. Forgive my curiosity."

With a quick movement, I turned around. We were now standing right in front of each other, so close that I could feel Legolas' breath brush across my cheeks. "You don't have to apologize," I said softly. "I know sometimes I'm... cautious. Too cautious perhaps. But I had to be, in a world that wouldn't have believed my true story."

"Of course," he replied. "But maybe in situations like this, you'll let me see who you really are. Or... were, before you came to Middle Earth."

A small smile played around my lips. Then I said, "You just want to see the planes."

"Probably."

"I knew it."

With a swerving gesture, I pointed to the library, "And now, Master Elf? Here we are, in the 21st century, as we call it. Is this just going to be a sightseeing trip or do you have something else up your sleeve?"

Again he laughed and let his fingers slide down my shoulders. "As Maglor said, Morgoth could try to invade your dreams again at any time. You must learn to protect yourself against that. I'll teach you, and we'll get started right away. Do you notice anything?"

Raising an eyebrow, I looked around, but couldn't see any changes. "No."

"Good, I haven't tried to yet."

"You mean change things in the dream?"

"That's right." He spun me around. "Morgoth will try to pull you out of your own dream realm, which he can't directly affect, and into one where this is possible."

"And that shows in what way exactly?"

"Your surroundings will seem wrong. Like the last time you mentioned." He stepped aside and walked through a row of tables to one of the shelves. "It will start slowly, with a feeling. Eventually you'll notice things you don't remember, but it will change so subtly that you'll question your own perceptions. He will place items, animals, or objects from his dream realm in yours - until he has your mind on the wrong track. And eventually, he will pull you over. Then it will be too late." Legolas had stopped. His gaze wandered over the spines of the books. "How about we go for a walk and you tell me when or if I will try to take you to my dream realm?"

I had been listening to him, and with each word he said, it had become more clear to me that it was going to be much more difficult than I had thought to detect Morgoth's attempts at manipulation. Nor did I know how restful this kind of sleep really was for me. While Legolas had been talking, I had remembered an article I had once read about lucid dreaming - and I was doing just that.

In it, the authors had referred to studies that suggested that lucid dreamers did not have restful sleep and that permanent lucid dreaming could lead to long-term and short-term problems. But since this was the only way I had to even notice if Morgoth was trying to lure me in, I had to take this risk for better or worse. The question was how long my body could hold out in this state.

"Aspen?", Legolas snapped me out of my thoughts.

"Yes, of course."

He approached me, slowly. "You're worried."

Not a question, a statement. Still, I said, "Are you surprised?"

"No." Legolas stopped in front of me. "This isn't a game, and it never was, even when we didn't know how deeply connected you were to all this. My father asked me to look into the reawakening of the dark creatures of Eryn Lasgalen long before we met, I never thought it would lead me to an even worse enemy so soon after Sauron's fall. You did not grow up in Middle Earth, in many parts this world is still foreign to you. So I can hardly imagine how overwhelming the pressure is that weighs on your shoulders."

His words had made me gulp, and I didn't know what to say in response. Because of that, and because the library was getting too cramped for me all at once, I said, "Come, I'll show you London."

We left the complex. It was a strange feeling to walk through my past while my present kept pace in form of Legolas. After we left the main entrance and the majestic columns behind us, the elf sucked in a sharp breath. "A truly regal building," he said. "If only a library is housed in such a structure, what might the others be like?"

Legolas was right: the British Museum was located in an impressive building. The neoclassical style never disappointed, all the more so because it must have seemed as alien to the Elf as his father's Elven Kingdom had seemed to me when I had first stood before its gigantic doors.

I let him marvel, watching him take in the entire building as if trying to memorize every detail, before saying, "The library is only a small part of it, the museum and its exhibits take up the majority."

"I remember," the elf murmured, and then, "I'm going to have a hard time changing anything, I didn't expect your world to be so different."

And he hadn't even seen the real skyscrapers yet, of which there were quite a few in London as well. "Then maybe we'd better go back inside," I suggested, but he shook his head firmly. The curiosity in his gaze betrayed him as he replied, "Absolutely not."

With a grin, I directed him toward the fence that surrounded the property and out onto the sidewalk. "There's a park near by," I said as I led the elf past cars, red phone boxes, and construction works. In my memory, it was autumn and most of the leaves had already fallen from the trees. They lay on the side of the road and on the roofs of the cars. People passed us, but their faces seemed blurry on closer observation. Just another day in the city I had experienced at some point, or a conglomerate of many that my brain pieced together into one. "It's strange to be back here, especially knowing that none of this is real."

"It is real," the elf responded. "But I admit that it can be a little unsettling to create a new memory within the old one, as we are doing right now." With a frown, he looked after a woman who was leading two small Chihuahuas in pink raincoats on a leash. "And I wonder if you're the one testing me."

I raised an eyebrow. "In what way?"

He stopped and nodded at the woman with the dogs, who was already a good distance away. "This is a part of your memory? A real, unchanged part?"

"Yes," I said, suppressing a laugh as I saw the look of disbelief on the elf's face, his eyes glued to the rain capes. "You'll see a lot of things here that you'll think are, uh, unusual."

"Apparently." Pause. "What kind of animals are they?"

"Rats," I replied, watching Legolas turn around with a jolt, only to understand immediately that I was teasing him. He shook his head and then had to grin himself.

"Sorry, it was just too tempting." I latched onto him. "Come on, it's not far to the park."

The elf had adjusted to his new surroundings surprisingly quickly. I could see a thousand questions piling up behind his forehead, but he didn't overwhelm me with them. Instead, he decided to observe first. Waiting. Some things caught his attention for an instant longer, then he asked a question, which I answered, others he simply accepted. As the park appeared before us, he said, "How big is this town?"

"I can't really say, but...very big. This neighborhood is one of many. In total, London has just under nine million residents and..." I stopped. The Elf stopped with me. If I had just been thinking about how many square meters the British capital stretched over, I now sensed that something was wrong. It wasn't the same feeling as what I had sensed with Morgoth, but... I looked around and then into Legolas' face. "You've changed something."

He nodded.

"And you distracted me so I wouldn't notice right away."

The corners of his mouth twitched.

"I guess I deserved that."

"You might," he replied, and I playfully pinched his forearm. "Now you just have to figure out what."

That wasn't hard. The feeling in my chest was stronger than I had anticipated. On the one hand, that was reassuring because I wouldn't be as easily fooled by Morgoth as I feared I would; on the other hand, it scared me. Then I saw it: the flag that stood in front of a store and should have flapped in the wind was frozen.

Legolas let go of the control he had over it, and no sooner did the flag return to its normal state than the feeling faded as well. "It's very simple," he said. "The more conscious you are about dreaming, the more likely you are to notice an intervention. On the other hand, if you are distracted or, as in Lothlorien, unconscious, you have no control over what happens to you. Your mind wanders freely and without protection."

We had reached the entrance to the park. "So I have to dream like this for the rest of my life?"

"No, only while Morgoth still has access to Arda. That will change when we close the cracks left by the destruction of the Silmaril." The elf stopped beside a large oak tree. It stretched its branches proudly into the sky and had to be one of the oldest trees in the park. Legolas held out a hand. "I wish I could listen to its story."

"You speak to trees?"

"Elves taught them to talk in the first place." His fingers ran over the bark. "But humans don't hear them."

"Which is why you can't understand it now, because this is my memory," I said, and he nodded. We sat down on a bench and watched two squirrels jump across the grass. At one point Legolas asked, "Why did you leave this town?"

"It's a long story."

"And we have time." Out of the corner of my eye, I saw him turn his head. "But you don't want to tell it."

"I..." I broke off, narrowing my eyes. The reason I had left London was a deeply personal one that I had never shared with anyone other than my family, not even my ex-boyfriend. He had met me later and whenever we had come to talk about it, I had dodged or answered vaguely. Something told me this wouldn't work with Legolas. He would see through any flimsy white lie as if they were glass.

The squirrels were now chasing each other up a tree and I took a deep breath. Finally, I replied, "I left because my grandparents were dying."

Legolas was silent. I didn't know if he did it because he wanted to give me the space to decide for myself if I would tell more or because he was uncomfortable with having asked. But now that I had started talking about it, the words just tripped over my lips. "I loved the city and worked on my thesis, which is a scientific work, while I was living here. My mother supported me, financially. Then when my grandmother was diagnosed with a serious illness, she not only needed her means to be able to pay for the treatments, but she also needed my help. To this day I don't know why, but the cost of the... Healers were only partially covered - that...", I licked my lips, which were all at once completely dry, "that is unusual where I come from."

The wind freshened and with it my memory of the day I had learned from my mother that both my grandparents had died shortly after each other. Their deaths had been preceded by two years of uncertainty.

"We were caring for them together, I was looking for a well-paying job, and it seemed like... like things were going to start getting better again." I felt the lump in my throat, but swallowed it down resolutely. Now I wanted to finish what I had started. "Then the pandemic hit and took my grandmother first, and then my grandfather, within a few days. They were among the first victims."

There was silence for a brief moment before Legolas put his arm around me. I was grateful to him for not saying anything, nor did he seem to expect me to speak further. Carefully, I leaned my head against his shoulder. "I shouldn't have brought it up, this topic isn't…"

"No," he cut me off, "I'm glad you did. I sometimes forget how often humans are confronted with death. Maybe that's why you see it differently. And I know now why you're so attached to this place." He caressed my hair. Part of me wanted to close my eyes and fall asleep, until I remembered that I was doing just that. I would have given a lot for the merciful oblivion of a dreamless sleep. But thanks to Morgoth, I had to do without that for a while now.

"Will we make it?", I asked quietly from within my thoughts.

Legolas hesitated. "I don't know," he finally said. "But I will do whatever it takes."

I had no doubt about that. But whether that would be enough, whether any effort on our end would be enough, was another story. I sighed and stood up. "Enough moping for today. Let's keep practicing. Maybe I'll show you the subway afterwards."

"Subway?" he asked. The curiosity in his gaze was back and something in me never wanted it to go away.

"It's underground. You'll love it."

"You're mistaking me for Gimli," he replied dryly.

I smirked. "Wait and see."