.|. Book of Days .|.

2. Falling Deeper In

* * * * *

Both Legolas and Estel thought they knew happiness already. And unknown to the other each thought such feeling could not came to him if they were apart. Yet, nothing they’d felt before could ever compare to the bliss of being in love and together at last. Each day would be one of love and light for them, no matter how darkened the world was becoming under the slowly waking menace of Mordor. There were no more tears in Legolas’s long nights, that were not long at all anymore now that he was free to live them with he whom he loved, and that loved him back. And when night gave way to the morning, each was both the same and yet a surprise. The fair Prince of Mirkwood had always deemed the instants barely before dawn as the gloomiest, because he would have to release Estel, leave his private dream of everlasting love and slip back on his mask of mentor and friend, his true feelings for the boy locked away.

But now those moments were the ones he cherished and loved the most.  Moments in which Estel would be released from sleep, and still lost in the haze human dreams bring he would hold Legolas even closer to him, inhaling his scent as thought wanting to commit it to memory. And when he opened his eyes at last, he would gaze at him with such love to take the Elf’s breath away. In those moments were time came to a breathless halt, Legolas could feel love radiating from the young Man in waves, waves he could almost see and touch and sense. Because there was no mask on the Man’s face. No restrain dictated from either decorum, duty or position. And when the spell broke, it was because Estel had moved at last, and smiled and kissed his love with a touch full of promises.

That was bliss. If happiness had ever had a face or shape in the Music of Ilùvatar, it was this shape, Estel and Legolas’s faces, their love and promises.

* * * * *

There were no such things as winter and bitterness in fair Imladris. Even if there were, they would pass unseen by the strange Elf and the Man, lost as they were into each other, warm and safe in a world of their own. Yet, the sun was unusually pale that morning; dark clouds hang like wisp of smoke on the usually pristine blue sky, and it was beautiful even as it was ominous.

“The wind grows cold.” Legolas had whispered softly, his fingers treading themselves through Estel’s hair, now longer than it was when he’d been first allowed to show his love in such way. The Man gave a soft murmur in response, twirling about the fragile blossom he held between his fingers. Legolas smiled, blinking in the pale radiance that shone down on them. He looked back toward the Man laying with his head in the Elf’s lap, and inspected his face as he himself inspected the flower. He looked young, innocent despite the sun-darkened skin and the rim of stubble grazing his chin. Beautiful, despite the worn clothes and dishevelled hair. And Legolas loved him. Loved him with a force that brought tears into his eyes, be them of joy or foreboding.

“Estel…” he whispered quietly. Feeling the lingering sadness in his love’s tone Estel looked up, his hand and the bloom it held placed gingerly onto his belly. He gazed at Legolas silently, studying his face as thought wanting to impress it with fire in his memory and keep it there till the end of time. Legolas smiled at him, running one slender fingers on the lips he wished to kiss. “…I love you.” He said simply, and then lowered him mouth on the one raising to meet him, and they kissed, gently, until Estel laid back down on the Elf’s lap.

“I love you too. For always.” The Man whispered quietly, and the Elf’s eyes glazed over with ancient pain.

“Do not make promises you cannot keep, love.”

Legolas expected the Man’s spirits to darken then; expected to see him recoil and stood up offended by his bitterness, but Estel did naught but smile. And it was a smile so bright that Legolas could not suppress a gasp.

“I’ve thought about promising you forever since we first kissed my love, but I was loath to make a vow I was so likely to break. It took me three long years, but then I saw it. I saw it as it is.” One of his hand sought and found Legolas’s own, intertwining their fingers together even as with his other hand he placed the blossom in the Elf’s hair, caressing the fair mane softly. “I may wither like a flower while you’ll always be an ageless star. I may grow weak and old and then die, but that would be just my body.” He said softly. And then, after the shortest pause, “My spirit would go on, and so would my love. You’d keep me within you forever, and I’d be by your side always, waiting for you beyond this life.”

Legolas felt both the smile tug at his lips and the teardrop sting in his eyes, but he tried nothing to stop them, sure he would be powerless against their stubborn strength. However, even if he’d been able to tame them he would have capitulated swiftly in the light Estel’s next words.

“Marry me, Legolas. Be mine for all eternity as I’ll be yours.” The Elf nodded, not trusting his voice, and then their lips met in a kiss that sealed their fate.

* * * * *

Fate, it has funny ways to intertwine people’s paths. Unfathomable and strange, if not maybe for those who posses magic mirrors of icy water. But I did not posses such a pretty tool, nor did Estel and Legolas, even thought they’d by and by gaze into the eyes of she who alone on Eä had such privilege.

Unknown to them, doom was descending swift and blind like a blade on them and their love. And funnier even it is that such doom started when I first entered their lives. Quiet as a thief, but powerful, powerful as storm my coming was.

Their promise of eternal love came to happen in great secrecy whilst I still resided in Lothlòrien with my grandmother the fair Galadriel. I clearly remember how she wouldn’t leave her mirror’s side in those days. My senses may be not keen as they were when I was immortal, and many of my memories may have faded into blurred voids, but I’ll never forget the sense of foreboding that hung in the air like low mist in these days. For weeks already the Mirror had been calling for her, and not even once she forsook its call; spending days and nights alike filling her basin with clear water and watching it blur into images of a possible future.

But the night when I first stepped onto the cruel stage something unusual happened. The mirror called for her, and she called for me, after days and weeks and months and years spent leaving me to wonder. Never had I been admitted to gaze into the mirror, knowing only from other Elves’ words that my fate was too precious to let me gaze at it. That it was linked with someone else’s fate – the only one of our kin that could rival with my beauty, the beauty of fair Tinúviel, and that I’d only glimpsed few times from afar.

Legolas of Mirkwood. He who was the embodiment of a Star even as I was called like so. He who would take part in the destruction of the rising Shadow in the Est. He who would share with me, or so I was told, the same love.

Having been raised up with his fairness and our bond in mind, even my immortal’s heart filled with girlish dreams of an eternity of love and joy to spend with him.

Oh, how wrong I was. I, who caused him the most pain.

But I was still so ingenuous at that time; still lost in my sweet dreams and still one with them. So it was with trepidation that I first stepped into the clearing where the Mirror of Galadriel stood. Trepidation and the sureness, that would soon crumble, that from that moment on my life would be but joyful.

* * * * *

On the edge of the clearing, where looming trees turned into open air and swaying baby grass,  Arwen stood for long moments, gazing at her grandmother with a feeling much akin adoration flowing her heart. She watched her collected moves, so graceful and hypnotically lingering. Moves that should not take her breath, being she an Elf raised among many and many with the same ethereal grace. Yet take her breath those moves did, for Galadriel was the epitome of that grace and fairness, mighty and old among the Eldar.

The glittering waters she’d collected in her silver basin reflected in her eyes like myriads of stars as she breathed on the water and made it ripple. Then she straightened, her hands clasped loosely before her, and turned to where Arwen was taking cover – because that’s what she was doing, cowering and not merely waiting, though she may have not known it – and smiled. But it did not reach her eyes, that smile, two shadowed voids in the hollows of her face.

“Come to me, child.” She ordered softly, and held a hand out for Arwen to take despite the distance. The younger maiden moved closer, nodding her greetings to the wise being there standing, and stepped on the foot of the pedestal. She leaned over the mirror with an excited smile, and Galadriel lowered her lids to see in her mind what her granddaughter would with her eyes. Like twilight giving way to dawn, the dark waters in the mirror swayed and opened to a hazy light. First to appear in the flowing depths was a face so fair it made Arwen’s chest constrict. Her hand went to her chest, and merrily she laughed as she watched Legolas of Mirkwood and she herself embrace like old friends would. Like siblings; or lovers even, and for the latter her heart hoped.

They stood in the green gardens of a city that was not of the Elves, and yet so magnificent that more than one would be fooled into thinking otherwise. It had slender white walls, and standards of a White Three flowed in the warm wind. A crown was upon the Three and Seven Stars stood about it like adorning jewels. It was a symbol that puzzled the Lady even as she smiled still, for she recognized it at the emblem of Gondor. She stood looking at the figures locking gazes in the water for a long moment, and then the vision shifted. Legolas stood now alone, perforating the looming shadows with his keen eyes, and many stood beside him, rows and rows of blonde humans, and even a Dwarf came forth and laughed with him. The vision shifted again, and Legolas stood now in fair Lothlórien clad in garb of silver. And so vivid was his image that she barely restrained herself from running to the glade where he stood to greet him.

Like the currents of the Ocean the surface of the mirror rippled and shifted, and indeed there was she again the water. She was enthralled with a mortal this time, and her gaze was sad and ominous as she walked the greens of Cerin Amroth by his side. Arwen’s smile faded into a frown, not understanding the vision and all but aching to see the fair Legolas again, for a feeling of love and devotion had blossomed in her heart since she first laid eyes on him. But when she did see him again, he was laying on the cold ground, his tunic red from his own blood and a feathered arrow embedded on his chest – an arrow that bore the sings of her native lands and of the House of Elrond. The symbols of her own family.

She gave a cry and stumbled backwards, a hand pressed against her mouth in silent shock.

Her Grandmother’s voice came to her then, like all the times she needed reassurance and help. But this time, it did not bring aid, and the bitter taste of dread coated Arwen’s mouth.

“Such a pity that a warrior as fine as he must be lost so soon.” Galadriel said ruefully, giving her head a slight toss. “One of the Stars of our kin for not only beauty but also skill and soul, gone to waste so young. Alas! He will likely not see the dawn in three months hence.” Galadriel spoke softly, pain clear in her dulcet tones. Why did her voice bite into Arwen’s skin like bitter wind, then?

“But I was told…” The Lady of Rivendell fought for words for the longest moment. She’d been told she was bonded to that fair creature. That she’d been brought to Lòrien to wait for the moment chosen by the Valar for their meeting. That the greatest love on Eä would have led them to meet. Then why had she just witnessed his death? She tried to ask this. This and much more, but she found her mouth dry, and nothing but broken words escaped her lips. “…we would meet because of love… but the arrow… the *arrow*…” She looked up with the lost eyes of the child she’d never been, the ageless daughter of the Elves. Galadriel smiled at her, her own eyes flashing cold like blue gemstones.

“And love will lead you to meet him. For he loves someone that you’ll steal from him.” Arwen gave a horrified cry, seeing her hopes all crumble like castles of sand in the rage of a storm. Galadriel stepped forward, and Arwen felt arms encircle her like bounds of ice. She wanted to break free but was powerless: rarely does a lost soul choose who takes her in.

“My Mirror shows only one future child, for only one is the tomorrow waiting for us. At times it shows the unbiased truth, at times just petty illusions to fool the poor of heart: illusions that will come to be the moment they try to prevent them from happening.

“It can choose what to show, truths or dreams, but never it offers more than one vision. This is its rule.” Galadriel’s arms tightened around her, and leaning closer still she let her whisper fan against Arwen’s ear, her soft voice inebriating like the sweetest wine. “Yet when it comes to you and the fair Prince my child, the Mirror shows more truths and more futures among which we can choose. All that is sure is that a Man will come, and through love will bind to him one of you. His heart made its choice already it seems, for the Man and the fair Prince of Mirkwood are bounded by a love barely within the reach of words. But the Man has yet to meet you, has he not?” Arwen nodded, dim in her understanding, and found herself shivering in the embrace that so many times she’d sought. Galadriel pulled back some, smiling her appreciation. But for first time the kind token did not make Arwen think of golden flowers and endless Spring.

Abruptly and yet gracefully –always gracefully- the elder Elf stepped away and the hands she’d pressed against Arwen’s back were now held clasped loosely before her.

“Bitter shadows are awakening in the East my child, and it is in your hands that lies the destiny of us all. In your hands, and in the choices of your heart. I know your heart does not sing for this one Man, and that you’ll find cruel what I’ll ask you to do. More than once you’ll be tempted to step away from me hence on, but I warn you: there’s more at stake than the happiness of one or two, and I alone known of everything that might come to be. Much blood will be shed, and many lives lost, but each and every dream blanches in the light of Eä’s sake.” Then she turned to stare at Arwen. Something incredibly sad wafted by her gaze, and her voice became suddenly lower and incredibly powerful, as anything that holds the ring of truth. “I know your heart’s desire child. And you’ll be granted it and praised for your choice even, if you’ll do what I ask you.”

* * * * *

I remember clearly how my breath caught in my throat. I know of your heart’s desire. That’s what she told me. And I was filled with dread, because I desired the one thing an Elf should never wish for, and should never obtain.

Death.

Mortality.

The freedom to choose and feel and never let go, and that the passing of time brings.

I did not understand what would happen then, so I agreed to obey her.

Like she prophesised that day I came close to hate her at one moment in time, due to what she asked me to do. Elves do not hate, I know it; but I was never Elf enough to be that perfect. So I hated her. With a passion. And desired to have the strength to break free from the spider web she had wound around me and the two lovers. But how that hate came to be, and what I feel for her now is no matter of importance at this point of my tale. It will be revealed later, if enough strength there’s left in me to write so long. Will it suffice for you to know that if there was someone that was hurt in this tale, it was her. If someone bled, within or without the stage, it was also her.

Either way, for good or bad, that was my beginning. And that was also my end. True to my Grandmother’s wishes I went to Rivendell, and found it void of Legolas and Estel and both my siblings, who were gone running the wilderness to accomplish great deeds. Knowing from before what I had to do, I stayed in my Father’s house waiting for the day in which Estel would fall for me. In those days of peace and wordless wait I would often question how could he choose me over Legolas, since I saw the depths of their bond in my mind and heart. The Lady of the Woods showed it to me, their love. And it amazed and moved like I never thought possible, making of me its willing slave. So questions and guilt bothered me as I prepared myself to come in between the two lovers. They eat at my heart with cold fangs, vicious and unpitying, adding to the confusion inside my mind. And when I saw torturing myself brought no answer to me, I merely settled for quiet hope, knowing very little of what was to come.

But Legolas… he must have known somehow.

What was about to happen… even if he had not the gift of foreseeing, he must have known it. The urgent kisses, the way his touches became suddenly bolder, warmer, almost scorching with passion over Estel’s skin. And the way he finally consented to become one with his love the night before they left Rivendell, after stating he was still too young for three years – an excruciating eternity for a human such as Estel, but a mere heartbeat to him.

He must have sensed it. To a deeper level than consciousness he must have known it all along, and better than me who saw it in the mirror of Galadriel. And now that tragedy was about to strike, he was powerless against his own desire to prove to Estel how deep their bond ran. Deeper than friendship, deeper than companionship and deeper than love. A bond that went beyond words, be them the simple idioms of mortals or the ageless melodies of Elves.

And with this feeling in mind, and tears again staining their eyes, though not of grief anymore, they took the ultimate step in proving they were one. But when it was time for words again, after the time for loving had come and gone, once more there was grief in the air. Soft and sweet as a melody; the same sweet pain than comes hand in hand with each tender love, but painful nonetheless, for Elves and Men alike.

* * * * *

“Legolas, promise me something.”

“Anything, my hope.”

“If… *when* I’ll be gone, please, keep on living. For me. For *us*. Go to the West if you will, but never stop living, and doing it with hope and love.”

“You’re my Hope, Estel. Once you’ll be gone, I won’t have any hope to myself. And love, you say? None can love without his heart. And when you’ll leave me, you’ll take my heart with you. So this is my promise to you, Estel: my heart with yours, forever.”

“Legolas…”

“Estel, why do you smile so? Don’t you believe me?”

“I believe you. That’s why I smile. But please, *please*, promise me you’ll live. When we’ll be forced apart, rather than the sorrow of farewell, try to hold on all the memories of us you’ll have inside your heart. And if you should still fall into despair, remember that I my love for you will continue on beyond this world. No matter where you’ll be, though it may be a distant land, if you listen hard, you’ll hear my voice. Always.”

And the Elf surprised the Man with an embrace then, and naked skin kissed naked skin, hot and slick, as Legolas committed the feel of his love to memory.

“Amin mela lle.”

“…Legolas?”

“Amin mela lle.”

* * * * *

I wondered once if there could exist someone that would be moved not by such a deep emotion, such devotion; this complete lack of conceit and negative thoughts, all drowned in the light of the other’s sake. I think… no, I know that even Sauron -even Morgoth himself- would have been driven to unconscious tears by such purity. I wonder then, I still do, why weren’t the Valar moved? I think they were not moved, because they never saw this love. And if they did not see it, it was because they never looked its way, lost as they were gazing into the shadows of Mordor in foreboding wait.

Nothing of what happened afterwards would have ever come to be, had the Valar seen this love. Because they would have discarded every thought of war, forgotten about Eä whole, to protect it. But alas! They did not turn in time, and what was sacred and precious was all too soon lost in hate and blood. I hope they’ll see it now, this one wonderful love, with my words’ help.

That’s the reason why I’m writing. Not the only one, but the most important indeed: with the secret hope to see a miracle come to light this tale of mine.

Because this is where my tale tinges with the darkest black, all thoughts of pure love and sweet kisses forgotten for now. Tragedy struck the two Princes while they were away from the Last Homely House. An arrow with the symbols of my own Father was shoot and found its mark. Cries that shattered the skies, ominous and hurtful, were let loose. Blood befell a lonely battlefield like fine rain. Thought was drowned and rage let loose. Love was tested and love was lost. Love prevailed and love fell short.

And as the twins ran against wind with the burden of a hopeless hope heavy in their arms, Estel grieved and hurt and forgot, and Legolas… Legolas fell deep in the darkest of slumbers; fell into it and would have never woken up, hadn’t I followed Galadriel’s commands.

* * * * *

Elbereth looks up from Arwen’s book, gazing expectantly into her husband’s eyes. She silently inquires him about his thoughts, but he avoids her stare and with a thoughtful frown beckons her to read on. And read on she does, giving a small nod born of respect and courtesy. But not before she lets the wind of Lòrien carry these words:

“I need not to read more. I think the son of Arathorn is worth. I know it now: his love for the Elf was pure.” But Manwe shakes his head and sighs, and turning he gazes long into the West even as his wife begins reading again.

“I wish to know more. I need to know more, before I choose.”

*has a coughing fit* Damn influenza… *sneezes* *looks up sheepishly* Uhm… yeah. I tried to be all mysterious-like and yet hint at what will happen in the next chapter(s). I hope I did good. And I hope this wasn’t too short and lived up to your expectations, too. What I’ve in mind is twisted. Oh, I *love* plot-turns, and nothing in my fics is ever what it seems.

I admit I’m thinking about writing a version of this in my mother tongue now, but this may be just a stupid idea driven into my mind by the fever. *sneezes again* If you’ve got time, please drop me a review and tell me what you think of this fic  - your reviews keep me going. =)