For Tobiramamara, YellowWomanOnTheBrink, Caelhir, Hawaiichick and PhantomBard.
This is just to show I have not abandoned ffnet for as long as you are reading my dears.
This is an edited version for ffnet ratings. For a fully explicit version please go to Archive of Our Own and search for ziggy.
BETA: Anarithilien (although some time ago my dear! Only just round to publish it here)
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Notes- you don't need to have read anything of mine prior to this but there are a few references to other events
In chapter 52 of Seven Stars (Elrohir and Legolas wed in the elvish sense of bonding)
Swanfleet: Aragorn, Legolas and Gimli were attacked by werewolves in chapter 7 of Seven Stars
Dúvenbâd =the Silvan's name for what Gandalf calls the Elf path. This means Western path (as in a beaten track rather than the Great East-West Road that cuts straight through the Greenwood.
Original Characters
Anglach: one of those guards Legolas tells the Council of Elrond of, who were 'taken or slain.' Anglach was Legolas' childhood friend and the subject of many stories in my own Tales of the Wood series.
Laersul- Legolas' oldest brother. Commander of the Woodland armies
Thalos- his middle brother.
Chapter 1: Through the Wood
June 3020
Elrohir glanced over at Legolas. His beloved seemed lit with the deep green of sunlight that filtered through the trees and he felt suddenly over awed by the connection Legolas had with the earth, the forest, the air. He felt suddenly heavy, flesh too dense, blood too thick, too mannish, mortal, with its corruption of the flesh.
Peredhel. Would that be what they called him in the Wood? An epessë that was only about his blood? A hint at his unworthiness for their pure silvan prince?
Legolas suddenly laughed and flashed Elrohir that blazing smile that had him gasping and completely, totally besotted.
'What are you thinking, my beloved? You look like you are on the way to Gundabad to fight an army with only your sword at your side. Or perhaps only your fists!'
Elrohir shook himself. 'I was …miles away,' he said evasively.
'Hm.' Legolas gave him an astute look but did not pursue it. He reached over and clasped Elrohir's hand- an intimate, unashamed gesture. It went some way to reassuring Elrohir that at least whatever the reaction, Legolas was at his side and would not abandon him whatever the perception of others.
They had left Imladris almost two weeks ago, accompanying a caravan from the Ered Luin going East for a while. The merchants, grateful for their protection, had paid them well and fed them better. In this company, they had crossed the Hithaeglir without incident and without fear of attack from goblins for since the War of the Ring, the paths had been made safer and the goblins driven north. More trade travelled along the Great East-West Road. The Beornings and Woodmen, friends of the silvan Elves, were making good trade out of guiding such caravans through the Forest and Legolas said that he and Elrohir would leave the caravan at the Carrock and travel Northwards and then cut through the forest on the Silvan Path.
This time together, simply journeying, hunting and foraging for their food, talking or sitting in companiable silence had been good for Legolas and Elrohir. Mostly they had travelled in company or with purpose, battle or quest, and this seemed a rare indulgence.
'It is better, is it not?' asked Legolas that first night after parting from the caravan and cheerful Woodmen. He was leaning on one elbow and snapping twigs for kindling. The firelight washed his hair to a rose-gold and his eyes reflected the firelight eerily. But Elrohir was breathless with desire, adoration and could only draw in a sigh that made Legolas laugh. Carefully he brushed a small spider from the twigs, letting it dangle from his finger for a moment before placing it on the grass, and then threw the bare twigs onto the fire.
'To be alone, I mean,' Legolas clarified, looking up at Elrohir.
'To be alone with you is always my chiefest delight,' said Elrohir earnestly and Legolas laughed again.
He shuffled over towards Elrohir and tipped his face up for a kiss, reaching up with one hand and drawing Elrohir towards him. Elrohir felt his heart almost rise up to meet Legolas'. Ever since they had spoken their vows to each other that night in woods of the Andrath, he had felt a green-gold glow suffuse his whole being, like he walked beneath the forest canopy, like he was immersed in forest pools, like there was air beneath his feet….
Legolas was laughing again, his teeth clashing slightly against Elrohir's as he did. 'Are you going to just stare at me all night or are you going to fuck me?'
Elrohir shook himself. 'Oh, I am going to fuck you,' he said quickly.
Legolas laughed again and pulled his tunic and shirt off over his head in one movement although his head got stuck for a moment as he pulled it off. Elrohir stared at him as if seeing Legolas naked for the first time. He let his gaze linger on the rich colours of the yaré-cármë inked over Legolas' skin; the coloured spirals and curlicues merging into the abstract pattern that Elrohir knew now was the Dragon peering over Legolas' shoulder, inscrutable, long-gone but never forgotten, snaking about Legolas' waist like it embraced him, trailing about his hips, down one thigh.
Firelight glinted on a small gold ring in his nipple.
Elrohir opened his mouth in mild astonishment; he had never seen that before. A barbaric practice he had heard of amongst the Dwarves but never Elves.
'When did you do that?' he asked, staring at it.
'One of the merchants had rings in both his nipples,' Legolas said. 'Not just his nipples either. I thought it would be exciting.' He grinned and Elrohir did not ask how Legolas had seen them- he did not want to know.
'It is still a little tender,' Legolas continued unaware. 'And new but… it doesn't hurt exactly… well, not in a bad way.' He smiled slightly, looked knowingly at Elrohir and balled up his shirt and shoved it near their packs. He looked down at himself admiring. 'At the time, it did hurt, more than I expected actually…but…' He shook his head slightly. 'It was oddly erotic as well.' He bit his lip again and met Elrohir's eyes with his own slightly anxious excitement. 'Why don't you touch it?'
Elrohir could see how red the skin was, for something very sharp and fine must have pierced the nipple through to have made such a hole that a fine gold ring had been inserted through the pierced skin. The healer in him wanted to take the ring out, to heal it with gentle hands and soothe it with salves and Song. But Legolas dragged his fingers over his nipple, tugging the ring lightly as he did.
'Touch it,' he said again. More insistent.
Elrohir lifted one hand and very lightly traced around the piercing. 'It must be sore still,' he said but Legolas' eyes were wide and fixed upon Elrohir and he bit his lip and then shuffled closer to Elrohir, pressing close to him.
He pulled Elrohir's head down towards his breast and arched up, pushing his nipple up into Elrohir's mouth.
Smiling, Elrohir caught the ring very lightly with his tongue first but then he heard Legolas half cry half moan and tugged the ring gently between his teeth. Legolas caught at him then and dragged him upwards so he could kiss him hard, pressing his chest against Elrohir.
'You love me.' Legolas smiled. It had almost become a litany in their love-making. The words burst like stars in Elrohir's head, and he knew the synapses of his brain were firing with the sensation, the intensity of his physical reaction to his beloved's touch.
Afterwards, they clung together for a while, still entwined, gazing and lost in each other, delighted with each other as new lovers are. For the briefest moment, something strange, eldritch seemed to stare back at Elrohir from Legolas' eyes …And then he pressed a kiss onto Elrohir's bare shoulder and leaned his cheek there.
'By Eru Ilúvatar,' Elrohir whispered into Legolas' hair, 'I swear I will love you for all of Time, even when the stars fail and the Gates of Night open, I will be at your side.'
Legolas merely laughed and swatted him. 'Romantic fool,' he said fondly. 'Of course you will.' His certainty was unshakeable. 'You do not need to say that every time we love.' He nestled against Elrohir's chest and looked up at him. 'It is in every note of your Song, in every breath and every look you give me.' He gave a soft laugh. 'My family will be astonished that anyone can feel like this about me!'
A little knot of tension tightened in Elrohir's belly; Legolas' famously mercurial and difficult family were only days away. Thranduil's reputation amongst the Elves of Imladris, and Lothlórien was cause enough for anxiety. What would he think of Elrohir seducing his child away from the Wood, he thought. Peredhel. Elrondion. Galadriel's grandson.
Elrohir wound a long tendril of Legolas' hair around his finger contemplatively. 'What are we going to tell him? Your father I mean?'
Legolas pushed himself upright. 'What do you mean?'
'Well… are you going to tell him that we are lovers? Or… best friends?...Or something else?'
'I will not need to tell him anything- he will see it,' Legolas said with a happy smile. 'And you are all I talk or write about.'
He gave a lovely smile that blazed its way through Elrohir to kindle in his belly, warming every part of him so he understood why the poets talked of basking in their lover's presence, or radiance or love or whatever. Elrohir had little time or truck with poetry, for all that Legolas said different.
'The only surprise will be how long it has taken me to bring you here.' He pulled a face. 'He has already admonished me for it. He asked why you had not been to the Wood so that he might thank you in person for your MANY rescues of my foolish person. I told him I had not asked you,' he added quickly, seeing Elrohir's dismay. Then he dropped his head. 'I am sorry I had not done so sooner. I have just been so busy in Ithilien and he would like me to come home more often. It is hard to leave when I know our time together is shortening with the years.' He did not mean his time with Elrohir, but Thranduil. His brothers.
He was silent then and Elrohir knew that Legolas was thinking of the Sea, of Aragorn, Gimli… the real reasons he dd not come home. And for both of them, it was an anguish to think on.
'When we arrive, do not let Galion put you in another room,' Legolas said suddenly. 'You are in my bed. He thinks I am still a child.' But he spoke fondly and Elrohir knew that Galion had been as much of a mother as Legolas had known.
Legolas rested his head upon Elrohir's' strong shoulder and Elrohir leaned his cheek against the top of Legolas' head with tender affection. 'What do you think your brothers will make of me?'
Legolas shifted and pressed his face upon Elrohir's chest. Smelling him. 'They will love you for your own sake,' he murmured against Elrohir's skin and pressed a kiss upon his shoulder. He paused for a moment and then said very quietly, 'It feels like… worlds colliding. My life before….and my life after.'
Elrohir grunted quietly agreement; he felt the same. Before Legolas and… not after, but with. It was then that he realised something; HE was not the defining moment for Legolas.
What was then? The Sea? The Fellowship? Gimli?... Anglach?
He thought it was all of those, and him too perhaps. Not one moment then but many.
'Are you thinking of all the reasons why I should love you less, my beautiful warrior?' Legolas was laughing at him, mocking him gently and Elrohir shook his head, smiling in return. 'Or reasons that I might not love you at all?' Legolas gave him a sharply knowing look.
Elrohir kissed him instead so he did not have to answer.
They made love again, more slowly, tenderly and kissed and stroked and loved each other under the watchful stars, lying amongst the whisper of the long grass and leaves. There was no danger here, no dissonance in the Song, only the Moon, stars and the clouds pulled out into long skeins like silver grey silk. The only sound was the faraway cry of curlew over an expanse of water somewhere out in the wilds at the edge of the Wood.
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While Elrohir slept, Legolas hunted silently, so that when Elrohir awoke, there would be a duck roasting and he found a few wild burdock roots and yarrow that he tucked into the edges of the firepit. He had learned of the importance of seasoning from Sam and now he took from his satchel a beautifully made little silver acorn cellar that had salt in one half and pepper in the other. Gimli had made a similar cellar for each of the Fellowship the previous Yule and this was one of Legolas' great treasures. The other was on a slender chain around Elrohir's neck; a mithril oak leaf given Legolas by his father when he left for Imladris, and which Legolas had given Elrohir at the end of the War when they had first become lovers.
Legolas hummed softly under his breath. He put the salt cellar away carefully in his pack and built the fire a bit more, looking at each stick carefully and rescuing insects before setting it onto the fire.
Anglach had always insisted they do that.
'Think how easy it is to save a little spider's life,' he would say, 'Or a woodlouse. And how easy to take it when you are careless.'
And so Legolas had always taken care. For Anglach's sake.
He thought about Anglach now, the familiar heaviness in his chest, the loss. Unresolved grief. It didn't matter how happy he was to find Elrohir, the gap left by Anglach would never, ever close. The guilt he carried for not being there, for not getting there in time, for not being there instead… all of the endless possibilities, could not be assuaged whatever he did.
He stared into the fire, still attuned to the wilderness around them, and leaned his cheek against his forearm. He did not weep. He did not think he had any tears left.
But he still wanted revenge.
He wanted to go to Gundabad and find each of the Orcs responsible and slit their noses, their lips, cut off their ears, gouged out their eyes with his own fingers…As they had done to Anglach and left him hanging from the tree that Gollum had climbed.
It had been Mithrandir who had stopped him from hunting Gollum down when they became aware that he was following them through Moria. If Legolas had been allowed he would have…
He took a breath.
…he would have done to Gollum what he had done in Dagorlad at the end of the War when he had ridden with Eomer and Gimli to pursue the fleeing orc bands across the wastes. But he had been stopped then as well…by Eomer. And then by Gimli.
And Gimli had been shocked by Legolas' violence towards the werewolves that had attacked them in the ruins of Tharbad.
He took another breath and rubbed his hand over his eyes. The thirst for revenge had grown upon him slowly. In the immediate aftermath of Gollum's escape, he had been sent to Imladris and from there been almost catapulted into the War, thrown into the company of mortals and heard the gulls. And met Elrohir too. Since the end of the War he had barely returned to the Greenwood, and when he had, he had not lingered.
Now he admitted to himself that he could hardly bear to be home. Anglach's ghost was in every corner, he expected to see him at every turning, to hear him…
He could not forget. He would never forget. He did not want to.
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Elrohir followed Legolas through the trees, marvelling at his lover's faultless purpose. There was no discernible path and the trees seemed thick and impenetrable and yet, Legolas walked with unerring purpose and the trees almost seemed to part for him, to make a path. As he walked, he hummed lightly, and the darkness and shadows that seemed the draw close like a shroud, lay less heavily on Elrohir. He felt that as long as he stepped in Legolas footsteps, nothing could harm him- nor did it. Their journey was exceptional in its uneventfulness and not so much as an acorn dropped on Elrohir's head…. And yet he felt eyes upon him.
Not hostile. But not friendly either.
As if the Wood itself were judging him, weighing his worth in the balance.
His senses prickled and his rich blood stirred as if with an ancestral memory- Melian perhaps. As if his ancestor was present somehow in the sap of the wood, in the earth and water. It was a strange eeriness quite unlike Lothlorien, which he found suffocating.
In spite of the prickling, Elrohir could see no change in the darkness, in the shape of the trees, of the path. All he could see was the faintly glimmering shape of Legolas ahead of him the impenetrable dark canopy of the trees or hear an occasional rustle as some small creature leaped above them. But Legolas was animated, let his hands trail over the trunks of trees, looking up now and again as if watching some creature above. Sometimes he stopped, head tilted to listen, smiling.
At last there was the sound of rushing water ahead and even Elrohir knew enough to guess they had reached the ford of the forest stream, enchanted it was said, by the Elvenking, to stop anyone crossing into his kingdom with hostile intentions. Elrohir wondered how his intentions would be judged.
Legolas glanced back at him over his shoulder. 'We have reached the boundary of my people's realm,' he said unnecessarily. 'In Lothlorien, they would bind your eyes.' He laughed brightly. 'But here we will walk unhindered for this is the realm of my folk.' He shouted something up into the trees in a tongue that Elrohir did not know but he thought it must be some ancient silvan tongue for the trees seemed almost to lean in and listen, and he thought the leaves shimmered so sunlight filtered through, gold amongst the bright green leaves for it was Summer.
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