.|. Seeking Harmony .|.

3. Aníron Estel (Elven for “I Desire Hope”, or “I Desire Aragorn”)

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* * * * *

One day it's heaven, one day it's hell

It's no fairy tale, take it from me

That's the way it's supposed to be

You will fly, and you will fall

God knows even angels fall

No such thing as you lost it all

God knows even angels fall.

- Jessica Riddle, "Even Angels Fall"

The Golden Halls of Rohan were a marvel of white and gold. The glimmering snowy walls arched into a high ceiling that seemingly wanted to reach out to heaven, finely chiselled columns stood still and proud as ancients knights, shimmering under the light spilling from above. The magnificent dining room was gleaming, and servants hurried across rivers of light to attend the King’s guests at their table: the Three hunters and Gandalf Greyhame.

Legolas didn’t quite feel at ease, and kept scanning his surrounding nervously as if feeling like his impending doom was looming within the light. Trying to banish his discomfort Legolas told himself no danger was lurking in such splendour, like it hadn’t since their arrival some days before. Yet, even as he tried get rid of his unease, it took him every ounce of his willpower to release the breath he didn’t know he was holding in.

In his wonder Legolas rested his eyes a long moment on the proud form of the Aragorn, sitting opposite him and just few seats further toward the end of the table. And the Elf was left breathless when the Man turned and their eyes met. Aragorn smiled at his comrade, but the Elf did not see it, for as soon as they gazes had met, he’d whipped his head around and down, a distressed flush claiming his cheeks.

Aragorn narrowed his eyes at the Elf’s antics. He’d noticed Legolas’s growing discomfort in the past days, but even though he knew better than question him, he couldn’t banish his growing worry. Careful not to be noticed the Man shifted slightly in his seat to better face the Elf, his eyes never leaving his lithe form.

The Prince of Mirkwood could feel Aragorn’s eyes on him, and his heart skipped a beat. It had never happened before, and Legolas pressed a hand to his chest, scared, yet trying to feign nonchalance. Was he falling ill? It could not be, for Elves did not catch diseases. Yet he worried. Sensations he’d never felt before ran through him in waves, and the Elf reacted with silent wonder and small trembles. He did not felt at ease. Not ever, when Aragorn was near. His heart pounded so wildly Legolas feared anyone around them could hear, and yet a quick glance at the other guests told him it was not so.

What was it? What was it? What was it?

What were those alien sensations claiming his mind and body and heart? Legolas did not understand. Again he was lost in a plethora of answerless questions, just like when Boromir had died, but this time the only one he knew could help him was the very cause of his distress, and source of wonder. Aragorn blinked, sensing clearly that his friend was struggling with a some kind of inner turmoil, and bit his bottom lip as he fought the questions rising within him, wishing desperately to be asked for help.

At the end of the table, the Lady Éowyn brought a finger up to her lips in a silent gesture of wonder. Catching a glimpse of the exchange between her guests at the corner of her eyes, she’d turned her gaze toward the Prince of Mirkwood a little wonderingly. Her eyes flashed with some unnamed emotion, and widened briefly, before narrowing again. Her eyes were somewhat distant, and a bystander could be fooled into describing her gaze as cold, but emotions rippled in the bottom of her look, dancing like the currents of the Ocean. Understanding, realization, kindness, sympathy; pity even. Admiration, sadness and affection. But none of those emotion would be voiced, and she averted her gaze and took a small sip from her golden cup.

Then, the very Doom Legolas had been expecting came.

Théoden the King beckoned to his guests they could leave the table, if they wished.  Éomer immediately stood, and bowed low to Aragorn before clasping his forearm and guiding him to his feet in all thoroughness. A sharp intake of a breath pinpointed Legolas’s reaction to the sight, and Éowyn’s eyes narrowed at her brother’s behaviour.

“Aragorn son of Arathorn, I missed you much during our parting. With my King’s permission I readied a chamber where we can spar, if you please, and cross our swords before letting them sing together in the battlefields.” Aragorn’s eyes gleamed, and Legolas’s heart constricted when the Man accepted the invitation gratefully and excused himself from the other guests without much of a glance at him.

Both Gimli and Gandalf glanced worriedly at their Elf companion when a small sniffle came from his direction, but Legolas had ducked his head, letting his hair fall like a curtain and hide his face from his friends’ scrutiny. He’d been asked, plainly, to never touch Aragorn in such fashion; to stay as far from him as possible while in front of other Men. Why was Éomer free to, then? Gandalf had told Legolas rumours could spread; malevolent lies and unproductive marvelling could be born if Aragorn and the Prince of Mirkwood kept laying together, singing to each other and sharing hugs and touches as often as they could. Albeit painfully Legolas had agreed to distance himself from the Man; confused, yet conscious it was for Aragorn’s sake. But the Man seemed to care not for the sudden change in Legolas’s behaviour, and this nonchalance of his troubled Legolas more than the distance itself.

Abruptly, Legolas rose to his feet, announcing that he felt fatigued from the day’s antics and that he would be taking a stroll in the gardens to find solace in the beauty of nature. Then, wordlessly, he headed off, out of the room and as far from the aching inside him as his legs could carry him. Gimli and Gandalf shared a look then, a long, worried look, both knowing the cause of Legolas distress and both wondering how to cure him. In her seat, Éowyn closed her eyes, sighing almost inaudibly, for she too knew.

A tear was halfway down her cheek, and Legolas already out of sight, when Éowyn rose, gliding through the light as if weightless, and left the Dwarf and the Wise to their silent worry to locate and aid the elven Prince.

And locate and aid him she did.

* * *

The dining room’s doors closed behind him and in an instant, Legolas’s calm façade shattered, his pacing evolving into running. Instinctively, he covered his face with one hand, attempting to stop the tears that were just beginning to sting the back of his lowered eyelids. But he knew that – no mutter how far he went, how swiftly he ran - for him there was no place to hide. For what chased him, scaring him even, was inside of him.

The Elf ran blindly down the course until he crashed, violently, against the breastwork on the upper walls. He leaned fully against it wishing, desperately, to be out of breath, but, inexorably, his breathing was steady and even. He would force irregular mouthfuls of air down his throat then, feigning breathlessness, and burning moisture gathered behind his closed eyelids when even such last resort proved vain.

Legolas wasn’t mortal.

He would never be.

Overhead clouds fled at his sight and sunlight bared its fangs at the Elf as his breaths caught and rose in the cool air. Every breath he took –be it slow or forcefully uneven- made his chest and eyes burn. The air felt suddenly heavier, almost as though the sky itself was descending upon him. The parapet seemed to loom taller than it had first looked to him, casting oddly long and cold shadows upon him when he could have easily looked over it to the plains below few moment before.

The breeze blew again, echoing like rushing water in his ears, and gracefully swaying tendrils of gold rose to dance with the wind. Legolas took a deep breath in, willing his heart to stop aching. He held his breath for a moment, squeezing his eyes shut before letting it out in a loud sigh. The Elf opened his cerulean eyes just a crack, looking at the dark shadow lapping his feet, and it was in that moment that he saw he’d slid down almost to his knees, knuckles still white around the edges of the breastwork, arms stretched above his head painfully.

Unable to support himself any longer, Legolas felt all of his muscles sag without warning. His knees finally connected to the ground, his forehead rested on the breastwork, and yet he could not uncurl his fingers, instead tightening his grip until he felt burning scratch appear on his palms.

He couldn’t understand! What was the feeling claiming him so strongly, filling his heart and mind with ache? It could not be… it could not be… and yet in his confusion Legolas was left with only one certainty. He was jealous. Jealous. Jealous. But why? It had never happened before. Not even when he’d seen the Lady Arwen pledge her life to Aragorn her Lord. He’d felt something then, but the icy grip clenching his heart now was different than the dull pang, the wondering feeling, the brief brush of cold he’d felt then. It was as if a different person was inside of him.

And Legolas did not like this other person, if all of its emotion were to pain him so much.

Distraught, Legolas ducked his head, allowing his hair to slide forward and obscure his features, and heaved a weary sigh. He was tired of this silent clashes taking place inside of him. Tired of the voices in his head, tired of fighting, tired of everything in general. Tired of needing someone he could not…

“Master Elf?” Legolas’s back straightened with seemingly painful quickness, and he whipped around, surprise and distress mixing over his fine features. When Éowyn’s grave countenance met his eyes, he felt himself shiver. Whishing to have some control of his actions, Legolas twisted his head away, letting golden tendrils fall to hide his dismayed features from the woman’s eyes. Only afterwards, when the silence had become unbearable, he fought to stand, and let his gaze flicker over the misty outlines of the faraway mountains.

At this point Éowyn moved too, walking toward him as he fought to keep from further showing his suffering. Finally she stopped, hands clasped together against her bosom. She was so close to the Prince that her vest brushed lightly against his legs, yet she relented touching him, and for that he was grateful. Taking a deep breath in Legolas glanced at the Lady out of the corner of his eye. She had come seeking him out because she wanted to help. It wasn’t hard to sense, but simply too hard to accept. Legolas was too proud to ever seek aid, lest of all when his soul and heart were concerned.

Legolas’s back straightened with a shiver. Heart…?

He turned away from her, hoping she’d leave him his solitude.

She didn’t.

But if he was expecting her to tell him in honeyed tones of how he should stifle his distress for the sake of their quest, he was disappointed.

“Tell him how much he means to you,” her voice was soft, barely audible even, but on Legolas it had the effect of a battle cry. Startled, he turned toward her, and Éowyn fixed him eyes so intense that seemed to hold worlds in them. “For he won’t know until you admit it – to yourself before than to him.” He let out his breath, only then realizing that he’d been holding it.

“Aragorn?” Legolas’s voice was genuinely dubious, as if he’d never even considered the notion before. “He’s my king and comrade. I care for him for certain, and he knows.” The woman flickered her gaze over the flaxen Elf, unable –or unwilling- to suppress the glint of amusement in her eyes.

“Is he the one your heart thinks I was speaking of?” Legolas looked away, and following his lead Éowyn turned her gaze eastwards.

Heart…

It was in that moment that, low down under the walls, Aragorn came into view. He had entered the gardens while discussing animatedly with Éomer about some issue or another, and Legolas’s eyes widened at the sight. The Elf studied the Man’s ragged beauty for a long moment as he came to a stop directly under the walls Legolas was on, while the Lady beside him shifted her gaze carefully from one to the other in silence.

At last Legolas nodded, not meeting the Lady’s eyes yet.

“Aragorn is…” Legolas hesitated and moment, and then began again, his tongue tracing a wet line across his lips. “Aragorn is the only one in the World who understands me completely, and I love him dearly, like a brother, but even more. He’s the one I’d follow into the very fires of Mordor: my friend, my brother, my Liege. The one who holds all my trust and thoughts. He’s…” It has been like the mere sight of Aragorn had summoned words he could not find before to his lips; but now hesitance made itself known inside Legolas’ voice. The Lady Éowyn glanced at him, a small glance, as if expecting to see the cause of his uncertainty chiselled within his eyes, but the Elf still wouldn’t look at her.

“Is the Elven Legend of the Harmony known in these lands, my Lady?” Legolas questioned at last, and the small nod he caught with a brief glance at her was all that he needed to go on. “Aragorn… Aragorn is my Harmony.” Her eyes widening briefly Éowyn leaned slightly forward, and Legolas forced himself to relax: the golden Lady of Rohan wasn’t the enemy. “Since the day I discovered this he became my teacher in my quest to understand human’s emotion, correcting me with kindness and always willing to take me back with a smile if I ever stray. But now…” Suddenly Legolas’s voice sounded so weak, so tiny. A nearly inaudible cracked sob. He shivered under Éowyn’s pale blue gaze, chest heaving arduously as he inhaled through sharp gulps of air. What had Aragorn taught him? Be sincere, Legolas, with yourself before than with others. And admit to the World the content of your heart, as often as not.  “Now… I’m lost inside my heart, for I don’t know what it is that I feel anymore.” He said after a breathless pause.

Legolas fell silent for a moment, then. Trees willowed and fluttered in the slight breeze, and faraway birds chirped in discordance to the new wave of gravity that had fallen over the Elf and the Woman. Golden hair rose in the breeze and fell across the Lady’s visage, clouding over her eyes as she gazed unseeingly at the horizon. At last she spoke, and when she did her voice was slow and even.

“I think, Master Elf, that you choose but a poor teacher, for Aragorn forgot to teach you the most important lesson about human’s feelings. The most sacred and painful; the very one lesson he should have taught you first. It seems that you’re learning it though, but I foreseen grief for you if you’re to learn this lesson on your own.” Legolas turned toward her, eyes wide and lips parted as he searched for words to defend Aragorn, but he soon gave up and turned away again, aware that Éowyn’s eyes fell on him as soon as he turned.

“I asked him to teach me, but sometimes the lessons we most desire bring us enough pain to kill.” Éowyn acknowledged this with a nod, her hands clenching tighter together.

“You speak true words, noble Elf, but I still hope that you could come to know this lesson in any other way but this.” His grip tightened on the edge of the parapet and he nodded her his permission to go, to explain him and teach him, willing now to accept the help she was offering him.

“You love him.” She said at last, and albeit certain her voice sounded pained. Its power reached into his very soul. It was not loud, but soft; not commanding, but pleading; not angry, but firm; impossible to ignore, as if it held the ring of truth. Legolas focused on her, blue eyes doubtful.

“I do.” He said carefully. “He’s dear to me, and he knows it.” Éowyn shook her head, dismayed, and the Elf paused in is speech.

“Elves, it’s said, know only one kind of love. They love both nature and other living creatures as they love themselves. The sharing of a song with the trees of a wood is no less to them than the sharing of their soul with another. Yet, for humans, there are two kinds of love. The love you’re speaking of, Master Legolas, is what we human call Affection. But the other kind of love, the one that has no other name but its own but that we can name Passion, it’s what really binds you to Aragorn.” The Lady Éowyn paused, grave, and Legolas could only stare at her, aghast. Passion? Love was… different from affection?! His eyes fell immediately on Aragorn, but for some reason he couldn’t bare to look at him, not right now, and turned back toward Éowyn in surprise and wonder.

The Lady had turned to the pair in the garden now, and as she spoke her eyes remained trained on them, as if hypnotized.

“You’ve no shame in admitting that you love him, and for this I’m glad. But now you must endure a further admission to really learn the lesson you yearn for. You do not only love him, Master Elf, but you’re in love with him also, and always will if he’s your Harmony as you told me.” Legolas eyes grew wide, and he looked down at his hands, then at Aragorn, small trembles wracking his body. Love…? Such a possibility had never entered his thoughts. I’m in love with… Aragorn? He felt a knot form in his throat and clenched his fists.

Aragorn and him shared a bond that ran deeper than any friendship, any brotherly love, any lovers’ affair. Aragorn was Legolas’s Harmony too, and this made him even more special to the Elf. In fact Legolas couldn’t bear to think of a life without the Man. The sudden realization that Aragon was, after all, mortal and would have to leave him one day, stabbed his heart with incredible force and Legolas reeled back a step, as if physically wounded.

Aragorn was the most loyal friend he’d ever had. And something more than that. He was the reason why he’d decided to take part on the Quest for destroying the Ring in the first place. The reason why he’d stood up against Boromir at the Council, mindless of the rage he could stir in the Man or the shame he could bring on his own Realm. Aragorn was the reason why he’d kept on fighting; the reason why he kept on believing, because with him by his side Legolas felt like everything was and would always be all right.

But whenever Aragorn was near now, feelings different from the affection and admiration and friendship he’d always felt for him stirred inside the Elf. Only thinking about the Man made his heartbeat speed up. His vision ruled Legolas’s dreams and had done so since they had first met in Imrails so long ago…

Was that love? Did that count as love?

Yes…

Yes, it did.

That was the truth. He’d fallen in love with Aragorn. He’d felt affection for him, an almost brotherly kind of love… but he hadn’t known desire and passion until he’d seen the depths of the Man’s heart after Boromir’s death.

As realization swept through him Legolas felt refreshed, purified, renewed. And yet he felt dirty. He’d betrayed Aragorn with his feelings, and the knowledge the Elf himself hadn’t been conscious of them did not lessen the guilt. One of Legolas’s hands rose and stretched toward Aragorn, as if in a mute call, and the Man’s name left his lips in the form of whisper. Aragorn loved him, this much Legolas knew, but Aragorn loved him the same way he loved any of his comrades. But Legolas couldn’t help –or change- how he felt. He loved Aragorn. The Man, the Ranger, the leader, the King, everything he was, had been and would ever be. This time tears won their struggle for freedom and one quivering drop leaked down his cheeks, and the Lady Éowyn felt guilt surge in her heart. She’d stirred grief inside of the Elf. A feeling that was lethal for those of his kin, and she found herself hoping Legolas was different from other Elves.

Almost if sensing Legolas’s gaze on him Aragorn glanced up at last, and upon seeing the Elf gazing out him a radiant smile curved up his lips. A smile Legolas couldn’t restrain from mirroring, thankful for the great distance that stood between them and masked, somehow, his tears. But Aragorn felt them, even without seeing them, and his expression turned pained. Slowly he raised his hand, letting his thumb slide down through the air softly, as though drying Legolas’s tears despite the distance. And the Elf tipped his head, leaning into a touch he couldn’t be feeling and yet shuddering at it.

It’s all right, Legolas told himself, and suddenly tears were gone, and his eyes were as dry as if they’d never known the moisture of tears in all his life. In the gardens Aragorn angled his head slightly, sensing the minute change in the Elf, and dropped his hand. A servant entered the gardens then, and told something to Aragorn who immediately glanced at him, then back at Legolas, before smiling to the Elf and going back inside the Castle.

Aragorn disappeared in a lurking shadow, and Legolas released the breath he was holding. It was not all right, it would never be. He wanted to run, but he couldn’t. And in a moment of peculiar clarity he saw it wouldn’t have changed anything. It was too late for him, and now he knew.

“I love Aragorn.” He admitted a last, so softly that the Lady Éowyn almost didn’t hear him. “I’m in love with him.” And for the first time that truly felt wrong. Éowyn placed a comforting hand on his face, and Legolas looked down at her with sad eyes.

“Will you be all right?” she questioned gently, and Legolas was suddenly aware of the countless emotions wafting by her seemingly cold gaze. Pressing a hand to his chest Legolas bowed his head, caught in a magnificent feeling of awe and respect for the golden Lady in front of him.

“I will be.” He assured, and she smiled at him, the first smile to graze her features in days. A smile that died swiftly, when the Elf spoke again. “But my feelings for him are wrong.”

“Feelings are never right or wrong.” She retorted with gentle severity. “They just are.”

“Yet I must forget him.”

“Why?” She questioned, her features darkening in a frown.

“Because he will reject my love if he ever gains knowledge of it, and even if I’m told I’m strong within my kin, I could not bear to lose him: not now that I know I love him. I’d rather be merely a friend to him till the end of his life than risk what we have.”

“Do you think so lowly of him?” Éowyn was surprised, and Legolas smiled at her.

“No. I think highly enough of him to know he’d never accept my feelings if they could go against Gondor’s sake. And he also loves another, and her happiness come first to him, as it is right.” Taking Éowyn’s hand away from his face Legolas touched his lips to her soft skin. Asking the mute permission to keep holding her hand he guided her back inside, to where Théoden and Gandalf were having counsel.

“Don’t deny yourself love, Master Legolas, I plead you.” Éowyn said at last. “And don’t let your eyes wander far from your own self when searching for the object of Aragorn’s affection.” Legolas smiled, but the meaning of it was for him alone to know, as well as the deepest meaning of Éowyn’s words was known just to her.

Later that day, when Gandalf, Théoden her King and the Three Hunters took their leave from Rohan at the head of three-thousand horsemen, Éowyn stood in front of the Golden Hall’s doors, a glittering sword thrust in the ground before her.

Tears were in her eyes as the warriors disappeared into the dawning light, and while some of her tears were for her King, her bother, and Aragorn her impossible love, most were for the Elf and for the painful feelings he held. And when Legolas looked up one last time, smiling gloriously up at her, she raised one of her hands in wave, and let her tears fall.

Legolas wanted to forget Aragorn. And even thought Legolas was her rival for her beloved’s affection, Éowyn found herself praying the Valar to stop such a thing from happening. For she felt –she knew- that more than one heart would broken if Legolas were to succeed.

Aragorn’s own before any other.