Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

By silent agreement Legolas and Gimli traveled along the Limlight through Rohan and then up along the east side of the Anduin in the direction of both their homes, and soon they must decide which way to turn, whether east or west.

They were close to the southern border of Mirkwood, yet Gimli knew they would still be going around the forest for a while yet, either way. He knew what fortress lay in those woods, and that even though the lands were safer now, neither of them would want to venture close to Dol Guldur. If they were going to Mirkwood, they would take safer roads from the western or eastern side, nearer to the Elven-king’s halls; Legolas would know better which way was best.

Gimli did not want to go too close to Lothlórien, and for that alone he would go east. He would not pass through or near that forest again. In this way the memory of it would remain golden and not fade, though the forest itself had already begun to.

Still now the question must be raised. They had avoided it long, and not without reason, but they could no longer.

Gimli got a fire started in their camp and sat close to Legolas, listening to the quiet lands around them. It was a more peaceful journey than their last along this river, though he still missed the companionship.

Yet the night was warm and the companion he had left was the best of them all. And he did not want to tarnish the peace of the night.

Legolas knew anyway. “Something troubles you,” he said.

Gimli shook his head, smiling to himself. “I hope I never have to hide anything from you,” he said. “It would be a wasted effort.”

“Were you trying to?” said Legolas. “It seemed instead you wanted to say something, and I have just made it easier.”

“Peace!” said Gimli, laughing. “Yes, you are correct again.” He sighed. “We must decide which way to turn.”

“Oh,” said Legolas. “I thought—east. To Erebor. Did you not think so?”

Gimli stared at him now, for this was the least likely decision in his mind. “You do not want to go home first?”

“First?” said Legolas.

“Before—” Gimli shook his head. “Legolas, there will be much to do once we reach the Mountain. If—when—my family gets used to the idea of you, we will need to begin planning for a wedding at once.”

Before they change their minds, he thought privately, but mostly in jest. Dwarves did not easily go back on their decisions, once they were made. Of course the whole problem was their stubbornness, but that also did not need to be said aloud.

“Yes,” said Legolas. “You have made this clear.”

“And you don’t—want to speak to your father first?”

Now it was time for Legolas to stare at him. But Gimli did not speak, and instead watched him struggle to find words.

The ones he found were stiff, reminding Gimli unpleasantly of the Legolas he’d met in the early days of the Fellowship.

“I don’t see a need, no,” Legolas said at last. “He can come, or not.”

His tone was flat. If it had been the Legolas he’d first met, one or both of them would have turned and walked away, and that would have been that.

But Gimli knew better now, and they both had changed. He thought perhaps the stiffness in Legolas’s voice was not to do with him, and so he gave silence, tending to the fire instead of letting any of the words in his mind overtake his good sense.

At long last Legolas sighed. “I’m sorry,” he said. “You’re right. I should go home first; he will be difficult enough as it is, and inviting him from Erebor will only make it worse.”

Gimli turned to look at him, raising an eyebrow. “We can do so if you like,” he said. “I didn’t say no. It would certainly make things interesting.”

Legolas laughed. “Only remember that it was your idea to meet him,” he said.

But Gimli shook his head. “It’s your home. And your family. We cannot alone mend all the ills between Elves and Dwarves, but neither can we make a beginning if we do not try.”

Legolas nodded slowly. “You could go home alone,” he said. “And I could meet you there, after going home myself.”

Gimli let out a long, slow breath. He had hoped this possibility would not occur to Legolas.

They had received hard news of the battles that had taken place in his homeland; Gimli knew already that something horrible had happened in Dale, and that the King under the Mountain, Dáin Ironfoot, had been slain. Yet they had not learned much more from the messages that came, and Gimli had thought it best to wait until he returned home to hear the full story.

He was anxious to hear it; the messages did not say who else had been lost, and he worried.

Still he did not want to go alone. “Would you prefer that?” Gimli said, steadily.

Legolas gave him an uncertain look. “I do not know,” he said. “It would be easier on you. My father is—” he stopped, looking down and away. “He does not like Dwarves.”

Gimli looked long on Legolas’s bowed head, thinking. “My family does not like Elves,” he said at last, abruptly. “Yet you will walk into their halls with me.”

“Yes,” said Legolas. “But perhaps if we went alone first, it would be easier to speak to them?”

Gimli thought of long dark days in the mountain, surrounded by family members and epithets about Elves, and no warm Elf beside him.

“No,” he said emphatically, and Legolas looked at him, surprised. “No,” he said again. “They will not get us alone. When ever upon the field have we fought better as such?”

Legolas smiled at last, a slow smile that brought relief to Gimli’s heart, sweet and cool like fresh air when you surfaced from a dangerous tunnel. “Only when in competition—and even then you are right, for we were better when we counted our victories as one,” Legolas said.

Soon this would be a vow; Gimli did his best not to blush at the thought. “I would not be parted,” he said, to make the rest of his meaning clear.

“Then we will not be,” said Legolas, and in the end, Gimli supposed that was all that needed to be said.

Legolas did not want to journey around Mirkwood and enter it from the eastern side; actually he did not want to enter Mirkwood at all, and had looked forward to traveling past it.

It was not, he thought, as though he did not love his home. It was only that when he though of the dark halls of his father’s fortress, he remembered the darkness in his own mind when he had been there. He did not want to return.

Still Legolas missed the woods themselves; he missed them even on the days when he was sure he could never find peace under them again. And he grew anxious when he thought of what might have happened during the war. Gimli was right that he must go home.

“Neither way was safe, when last I came,” Legolas told Gimli, knowing he grumbled like a Dwarf, knowing Gimli would not care and would perhaps even find it reassuring. He was not ready to go home and hide all his emotions again. “I cannot say which would be better now. To the west maybe, now that Saruman’s spies are gone from the land. But it would be closer to the old fortress—and to Lórien.”

“And to the east is a wasteland,” Gimli said. “And many other lands which we do not know as well. But we would not have to go so far through the forest.”

Legolas shook his head. “That is no matter,” he said. “I know safe paths through it; and with Sauron’s power removed from it, it will already be growing less dark.” He sighed. “I think we will go west, and then through. I like not the wilderlands to the east. Change will come more slowly to them. I would rather follow the River of Gondor.”

Gimli smiled at him. “It is a good plan,” he said, and Legolas felt warmed through, then glad, that if he must return to cold and dark halls, that he would not do so alone.

They set out west, and Legolas tried not to dread every step.

Gimli thought that Legolas had chosen their direction well, for lands to the east of the Anduin but west of the great forest of Mirkwood were more peaceful, with less spies of the enemy to contend with.

Yet news of the fall of this enemy and the peace in Gondor was still new to the people living there. In the settlements of Men where Legolas and Gimli stayed to find rest, they were often met with sideways and suspicious glances.

Vagabonds also were coming north to these lands, so Gimli supposed they were in part justified for their suspicion. Aragorn had not had time yet to make all the land about Gondor safe, to the north and east, and so the unrest was not over.

The looks would subside somewhat when they put the sharp weapons at their side to good use, and dispatched ruffians from the towns in which they stayed the night. But they could not stay long and protect these places forever, and neither of them liked it when Men tried to push money into their hands in thanks; or when they angrily asked what kind of reward the two strangers would now demand.

They never, ever killed any of these Men. Much could be accomplished, without resorting to death. Still it wore on them both.

“We are not the only ones who do not know how to stop being at war,” Legolas said one morning as they left one such village, and whatever Gimli said in response and agreement, he did not remember later, except that it was tired.

They camped most nights after that. They didn’t speak about it; it simply seemed easier. Gimli thought privately that he’d spent so many nights on the road now, that he did not mind a few more. Especially nights alone, in the privacy of the woods or a river embankment. They would be returning to stone halls and the eyes and words of others around them soon enough.

The thought of these halls and eyes loomed large in Legolas’s mind also, for not long after they began camping nearly every night, he began having an alarming new conversation, or set of conversations, with Gimli, both during the day and at night.

Gimli had expected to be told a measure of information about the Elven-king’s halls, and Legolas did tell him some things he needed to know. But what he did not expect was for Legolas to begin to run through every possible conversation they could have with Thranduil.

Gimli could appreciate the need for strategy, but he soon realized that this was not only a matter of strategy. Legolas wasn’t only thinking of his father’s likely reactions—he was trying to think of every reaction.

Every word, every sentence, every gesture. If Thranduil became angry with a specific tone of voice, or if he asked a pointed question with a raised eyebrow.

Gimli had not seen Legolas do this before, yet he seemed to not think it odd. And so he said nothing of it, for it was not his place to comment on the ways of Legolas’s home, or his relationship with his father.

Still his alarm grew. Days of this passed by, until a day when they walked on a riverbed of shale; Gimli remembered this not because this rock gave him any kind of courage, not like granite or limestone, but because he had not walked on shale in many days.

His eyes wandered over the colors and patterns and layers of compression where the river dipped and fell over it. As such, he did not hear everything that Legolas said, and Legolas did not notice that his attention wandered; and this had not happened in a long, long time.

His attention returned when he heard Legolas say, “Yet until now I have assumed my father will let us tell our story first, and of course that may not be so. We must also think of what to do if he demands an explanation immediately, and will not wait to hear the tale in full.”

Gimli blinked; he did not know that this was only the beginning of the strategizing. At once he was more worried than ever, though still at a loss as to what to say. He found himself looking at the shale again; he had never thought much of it before, so easily broken in single layers and not really made to be crafted. Yet with no other stones around him now he saw what he had not before: that perhaps he could not craft it, but the water over time exposed the layers.

It was the way of things that over time the water determined what happened to the stone. Yet still it revealed beauty. Still it was a mistake to think that even brittle stone had no strength, when layered together.

Gimli would not have said, later, that thinking any of this led to what he said next. But there was a cave in his mind, water over stone, slowly revealing, slowly changing, when he said it.

Evolve, said his hands.

“Legolas,” he said, interrupting whatever Legolas was saying—he did not know. “Does this help you?”

Legolas looked at him with surprise. “Does what help?”

“This—this endless attempt to anticipate what your father might say. Do you feel better for doing it?”

Now Legolas almost gaped, an expression Gimli might have found funny on a dignified Elf, were it not for the odd sick feeling in his heart. “I—suppose? Only—it helps to be prepared, with my father. You never quite know what he will say.”

The sick feeling grew. Gimli shook his head. “Is it truly so bad?”

“Bad?” said Legolas, and now Gimli stared.

“I have never seen you like this,” he said. “We have faced Orcs and trolls, servants of Sauron and even a Balrog, and only now do you seem to me afraid.”

Legolas was silent for a long moment, and Gimli watched the river running over shale. Sometimes a leaf was caught in the water and briefly swirled in it before being carried downstream. Gimli considered this trivial in comparison to thinking about what he might find were he to examine the shale more closely so that he could see or sense its components, but Legolas had taught him to see these things.’’

“I do not know what to expect,” Legolas said at last. “I suppose I never have. Only that too much time to think in the moment is a mistake; he will move on to something else. He is busy.”

Gimli did not like this, any more than he liked the rest of it; that Legolas should be so afraid in his father’s presence sat ill with him.

“Before now I would have said you spoke too quickly, or not at all—or let me do the talking,” Gimli said.

“It was different with the Fellowship,” Legolas said, after another long moment. “No one watched my words so carefully, or had so high expectations of me. But at home—I fear what he might think. What he might say. Or do. If I do not prepare you for every possibility, too, what might happen to us both?”

Now Gimli looked at him. “I fear what my family will say, too. Legolas, do you know what I will do if they will not give you a chance?”

“What will you do?”

“I will find somewhere secret and private, where we can say the sacred Dwarven vows,” Gimli said. “And then we will leave.”

Now Legolas stared.

Gimli took a deep breath. “I do not ask the same of you, for to walk out on your family—it is my last resort and I could not ask you to do such a thing, but—”

“Gimli,” said Legolas, and to Gimli’s ears he sounded astonished, almost breathless.

“Yes? What is it?”

“Why didn’t I think of that before? We can just leave,” he said.

“Well—yes?”

“Why haven’t I thought of that before?” Legolas said. “No one has ever thought to do such a thing, Gimli. No one. Well, except—”

Gimli huffed a laugh. “My family,” he said, and Legolas smiled at him, his first smile in days.

“Yes, but that is why he was so furious; they wouldn’t follow his rules. The Dwarves have their own rules—well, why can’t we?”

“I would have said that we already do,” Gimli said, more wryly than he intended.

“I forgot that,” said Legolas. “You are right. I thank you for reminding me.”

Gimli smiled back at him. “I will go on doing so,” he said. “For as long as you’ll let me.”

“A very long time,” Legolas said, and stooped to kiss his temple. Gimli regretted wearing his helmet again; the roads were dangerous enough that it was warranted, but it was a barrier between them and his patience with it was wearing thin.

There was no one there to tell them they could not stop now and continue this pleasant conversation, but Legolas seemed intent on advancing their journey—and leaving the rocky portion of the river, and reaching the Gladden Fields well before Gimli would have liked. He suppressed a sigh, but Legolas’s improved mood still had advantages.

“Now tell me,” Legolas said, “what is it about this river—or its stones—that has you so fascinated?”

And of course Gimli brightened, for he thought even Legolas might find his thoughts about shale interesting.

As they crossed the Gladden Fields and neared the forest, Legolas tried his hardest to let Gimli distract him; he did not want his mind to travel in circles of anxiety either.

Gimli saw his mood and even began to teach him more secret signs, though he forbade Legolas from saying the name of the language aloud. This was the most useful distraction of all, for he delighted to learn anything that Gimli would teach him. He picked up the words quickly, finding that muscle memory made the learning easy.

Still there were times when he could not help it. It was an old habit, nearly as old as Legolas himself, and not so easily abandoned. He did not know how to walk into a meeting with his father with no idea of what to say.

He did stop speaking of it at night; he did not want to think of it, anyway, and Gimli was distracting. After a long day of struggling through marshland that turned out to be made of water more often than it was land, he did not want to think so much of home. Gimli was tending to the fire, and he had taken his helmet off; Legolas would rather openly admire how his red hair glowed in the light of it.

It was much better than thinking too hard of home.

Something in his face must have told Gimli that he was struggling to put his thoughts aside; he came to sit by Legolas, he leaned his head on his shoulder in a way that had become so familiar and comforting, Legolas could almost be convinced not to worry.

“Whatever happens,” Gimli said, “I will not think less of you, or hold anything against you. I will be with you always.”

Legolas was not sure, at that moment, why he said this, or why his eyes stung to hear it; why it felt like there was a band around his heart. But he stared into the flames, and listened to the wind, and let himself hope.

Gimli had heard tales of Mirkwood long before he joined the Company of the Ring, yet he did not know what he would find when he entered the forest for the first time. When he and his father had traveled west to Rivendell, they had gone around the northern edge, deeming it safer than traveling through the woods, which rumor told them had grown dark again. That northern journey had not been safe either; but Glóin had seemed to prefer it to risking another passage through Mirkwood.

In fact Glóin did not often speak of that dark journey, unless another Dwarf of Thorin’s Company was with him, and only after a few tankards of ale. Even then he would say few words of it, but the grim look on his face was enough to tell Gimli all he needed to know.

Yet Legolas had come from this place, and he was full of light not darkness. He spoke of the woods in the time before the Enemy’s coming in tones of fondness and longing, so much that Gimli did wish to see them.

He did not know, however, if that desire extended to visiting the forest that had nearly killed his family. He did not know which forest they would find when they arrived.

Gimli did not speak this aloud to Legolas, who grew ever more anxious as they neared Mirkwood; he spoke in one breath of excitement to come home, and in the next of fear of their welcome. From this Gimli could guess that Legolas also did not know what the state of his home would be.

What they found, when they at last approached the borders of the forest and entered underneath its eaves, was a forest already in transition. Mere months it had been since the fall of Mordor and the end of the influence of the fortress of Dol Guldur over the forest, yet already even Gimli could see that a darkness over the woods had lifted. The trees still grew thick and the air was still, but he did not feel the same weight or heaviness that his father and Bilbo had described. Even in the low light the forest was verdant, rich, with a green earthy smell that was not quite like Fangorn—but only because it was not old or musty enough.

The leaves hesitated between green and yellow, not all turning yet, but they were about to. It would not be as beautiful as the Golden Wood, when it did turn, but Gimli thought there would still be enough gold here, of its own kind.

Gimli chanced a glance at Legolas, once his eyes had adjusted, and caught a look of sadness that surprised him.

“Are you so upset to be home?” he said. “The forest seems less gloomy than I had heard tale of.”

Legolas blinked, looking at him. “Yes, some of the sickness is gone,” he said, after a long moment. “But do you not see? There is devastation everywhere.”

Now Gimli looked around again, and with new eyes he thought he saw what Legolas meant. Branches were torn, bushes trampled, and areas of moss and bracken were stripped, in some places even burned. He had not noticed any trees ripped down, for no large holes were made in the canopy to let light in, but now that he looked again, there were far, far too many stumps for what he had come to associate with a healthy forest—whole trees ripped up and lying on the ground, well before their time.

“I see now,” Gimli said. “There must have been some battle here. Oh, Legolas. I am so sorry.”

Legolas took a deep breath, and gripped his shoulder tightly, saying with one touch many words that Gimli did not need to hear aloud to know their meaning.

“I feared worse,” Legolas said at last, quietly. “Will I find the whole forest burnt?”

“In all that I have heard tell, it is strong enough to resist such a fate,” Gimli said.

“So was Fangorn, and yet whole sections of it burned.”

“Then you will plant it again,” Gimli said, and watched as the words sunk into Legolas. He set his shoulders with determination.

“Yes,” he said. “Yes, and yet never forget the trees I have lost.” He stood for a moment in silence, before turning back to Gimli. “We should go on. We have much ground to cover today.”

Legolas had not known how he would feel when at last he stood in the halls of his father. He had traveled so long and so far away from home, and had missed every leaf and branch of the trees he had known so well, some since they had first pushed their way through the earth. Sometimes he had even longed for the companionship of other Elves, though he could admit that he had mainly wished to fight with them; Legolas had always fought alongside more people than he spoke to outside of battle.

Long he had dreamed of walking in these woods again, though he had borne patiently the strange passage of time that had led to this moment. Yet now he hardly saw them. Small details only he noticed; a fallen tree, a tree that had grown more than he thought it would in such a short time. New plantings he did not recognize, or know whose hand tended to them.

It was odd indeed, to walk on a road so familiar yet so strange. And Legolas could not help but wonder if he had changed too much to walk it at all.

Always in the back of his head was the sound of the roar of waves crashing on the shore; always he pushed this aside, for it could not yet be.

They had passed through most of the western and eastern parts of the forest, nearly to the Elven-king’s halls, before they were discovered by any of Legolas’s kin. He found himself glad it took so long, for he did not know how to answer their questions, or what to say in the face of their disbelief.

The company that found him was familiar to him, but much smaller than it had been before he left. Their leader, Magalad, was a good soldier, who cared much about his home and keeping its borders safe; yet he and Legolas had never had a long conversation, and Legolas did not know what he would think now.

His face now was a portrait of shock, stunned that it was Gimli who bowed first, in Elvish-fashion, and gave a polite greeting—in perfect Elvish, for he had learned it in Lothlórien. He had only learned a few phrases; but they were enough to render these Elves speechless. Legolas was struck with a wild desire to laugh.

He dared not look at Gimli’s face as he made introductions, making sure to stress that Gimli had traveled with him from Rivendell all the way to the very gates of Mordor. The company of Elves, Magalad included, remembered to bow and respond politely, though they still looked astonished.

“You are lucky you came upon us,” Magalad said when he had regained his power of speech, but Legolas frowned; he had said it in Elvish, though Legolas had spoken in the Common Tongue, a clear signal of how they should proceed. “We can go ahead and tell your father you are here.”

So the battle lines would be drawn already; for this Legolas had no patience or time. Now he did look at Gimli, and saw that he was already looking back at Legolas, face impassive; Gimli would leave this decision of how to react in Legolas’s hands. And if that was so, it was an easy decision after all.

They looked back at Magalad together, and Legolas shifted his weight back onto his heels, waiting. Much had been said about the stubbornness of both Dwarves and Elves; well, now they would say much about the patience of Legolas specifically. He was careful not to move a muscle, in his face or anywhere else. If Magalad would speak in a language that one person in his company could not understand, then he would find that Legolas did not understand him either.

At first Magalad looked confused, and repeated his question; but Legolas continued to gaze at him silently, and knew that Gimli did the same. Then he stammered, and flushed, but still Legolas said no words, and waited.

At last Magalad cleared his throat. “My apologies,” he said, this time in the Common Tongue. “It has been long; I have lost my skill at this tongue.”

It was a lie to save face, for he had always been fluent in any language he set his studies to. But Legolas said nothing, though he knew Magalad felt his eyes on him.

Gimli, however, bowed once more. “It is nothing,” he said, but added no other words. He still left the speaking to Legolas, who continued waiting.

At last Magalad repeated himself, in words Gimli could understand.

Legolas unbent, but only to a small degree. “This will not be necessary,” he said, for he had now had time to think of a response. “We will make good time, and reach him soon.”

Magalad stared at him in astonishment again, perhaps seeing that they were weighed down with the gear of traveling, and wondering how Legolas with a Dwarf and much gear intended to outpace a company of Elves traveling light, in their own territory.

Now Legolas did chance a look at Gimli to see the amusement in his own eyes reflected back at him. They had taken their time for several weeks, but even their slow pace would have been very fast for many Elves. The Elves of his country did go on swift marches into battle and out, but only for a few days at a time; never did they travel long yet speedily across hundreds of miles for weeks at a time. And to outrun two of the Three Hunters, who raced the Orcs across Emyn Muil and into Rohan!

During that hunt, Legolas had thought his mortal companions slow; now he knew this had been borne of his frustration and helplessness. The truth was that even with their heavy burdens, there were very few in the world who could outrun them both, especially after traveling so far and so long together.

Again he nearly laughed aloud, when Magalad tried to insist that some of his company at least escort them to the fortress of the Elven-king, while some went ahead. Such a thing would probably slow even the hobbits down, after so much time on the road, and Legolas did not intend to slow down.

“It is a kind offer well meant,” said Legolas, meaning the opposite. “Still we cannot accept. We do not need protection in the forest, and do not wish to deter you from your errand. In Gimli’s company I will be escorted in the highest honor, for there is no one else I would rather travel with.”

That truly stunned the Elves to silence, and now Legolas let himself smile at their expressions. “When we arrive at the fortress tonight, I will tell my father that I saw you, and that you were performing your duties as ordered.”

“Tonight?” said Magalad. “You cannot have been gone so long that you do not know it is a two day’s journey!”

Legolas looked at Gimli, now openly grinning, and Gimli grinned right back. “How long has it been, since we entered the forest from the western side of the Old Forest Road?”

“Perhaps four days? We were going slowly, and I did not carefully mark the time,” Gimli said.

A company of Elves could make the journey in a week on foot, if they moved quickly.

Before Magalad could protest again, Legolas turned to him and bowed, almost an apology. “You see we are two of the Nine Walkers, as I said. We have passed through battle and war, and many traps and designs of the Enemy. Now we are returning home, but unless you must warn me of dangers ahead in the forest, it will be better if we walk alone for now.”

Magalad stared for a moment longer, but finally shook his head. “No, there are no dangers—none that you cannot face. We have destroyed all the spiders, and driven out out most of the Orcs who are still left. We are on our way to take care of a very small band of them, rumored to be far to the west of here.”

“Then there is even less need to come with us,” Legolas said, and knew that Magalad wavered at last. And then, because he could not help it, he bowed deeply—in Dwarf fashion—and added, “Namárië, my friends. We will see you again.”

The language of High Elves was not often spoken in the Greenwood, and never at all from an Elf bowing in the way of a Dwarf. Beside him, Legolas knew that Gimli shook with suppressed laughter, even as he also bowed, and they turned away, walking swiftly as was their habit—but also because Legolas had no desire to prolong the conversation, not even to hear Magalad’s stammered, awkward goodbyes.

Only once they were far, far away—out of earshot of even Elves, a distance which Gimli now knew also—did they finally burst into helpless laughter.

If Gimli lived a thousand more years, he would never forget the looks on the faces of the Elves who attempted to insult him, when Legolas refused to acknowledge them. It was a clumsy and strangely timed insult; they must have known he was a Dwarf of Erebor, and he was traveling with one of their own people. In war Elves and Dwarves had always been united against the Enemy; why then would they risk such hostility? Had this war been the exception? Had they returned so quickly to old fighting as soon as it had ended?

Or was it simply that no Dwarf, let alone of Gimli’s family, had set foot in this forest in a long time? Perhaps the uneasy peace between them had rested delicately on the tacit understanding that they were not welcome in the home of the Woodland Elves. And now Gimli was here to upset it.

He spared a glance for Legolas, who had seemed entirely unconcerned about the thoughts of his kin. In fact he had only looked to Gimli for his reactions, and had protected him, without softening any of his words for the sake of the Elves. The only thing he had not done was reveal their true relationship, introducing Gimli only as his “companion;” but Gimli knew that this was so that Thranduil would hear the news first, and from no one else.

So that was the way of things, and now Gimli knew it. To cause an upset, and see what would settle when they were done. And Legolas seemed content to do the upsetting.

Yet he worried. There was a stiffness in Legolas’s shoulders, an uneasiness when he looked around the forest, that should not have been in the eyes of one returning home after journeying so long and far.

The forest was not so dark as Gimli had heard, and the Elves more clumsy and cowardly in their rudeness than he had expected. But he had heard tales of this forest even so, and did not think that what he had seen so far was all it had to offer. Perhaps there would be more to worry about, once they entered the Elven-king’s halls; and not only for his own sake.

They reached the fortress before nightfall as Legolas had predicted, and they moved fast, but not as speedily as they could have. Gimli had not noticed until Legolas spoke of it, that they traveled much more quickly than before, though their pace did not feel punishing. They had journeyed so long with the Rangers and especially Aragorn, that he had become used to going many miles well before sunrise and stopping long after nightfall. But such had been their task in the dark days.

That time was over, yet now Gimli felt he would rather go into battle after another journey down a river through darkness than face what might be behind the stone doors ahead of them. Legolas’s mood, which had been troubled enough as they had traveled through the gentler forest that lay on the outskirts of the fortress, got worse when they began to pass through the small settlements, treehouses and houses, right outside of it.

Gimli had looked with curious eyes at these houses, so different from Lothlórien in design yet so alike in the construction itself—yet every time he turned to Legolas to ask a question, the words died in his throat.

He could only guess that these houses were now inhabited more than they had been in the past; but he could not say for sure.

Now they halted outside the great stone doors to the fortress, and Legolas hesitated. When he turned to Gimli he saw the wariness on his face at last.

“You do not need to be afraid,” he said. “Whatever waits for us in there, I will not let them hurt you.”

“I do not worry about that,” Gimli said. “More do I worry for your sake, for how they might hurt you—but right now, I worry to enter those halls at all.”

“We can still leave,” Legolas said, but Gimli shook his head.

He could see the fortress now in the way his father and his family never saw it; the great doors, crafted by Dwarves, and not so ominous as they and Bilbo had made them sound. On either side two trees grew, and from them vines and branches nearly covered the archway.

Carved into the stone itself were many designs, Elvish script mingled with a few Dwarvish runes of protection. Yet here it was not like Moria; the Elvish flourishes drowned out the Dwarvish touches, and the plants wore away at the carvings, so that they were almost unseen. The Elves had tried to erase all traces of their former alliances. The doors did not loom so large as they did in Bilbo’s memory, but the truth did not make Gimli feel more welcome.

“Bilbo said the doors work by magic,” was what he said to Legolas. “He could not get in or out, going unseen as he did throughout the halls. They do not like unwelcome visitors.”

But Legolas shook his head. “Great injury we did to the Dwarves, when we treated them so in a fortress they helped to build. The doors will not keep you in or out, even if my father wills it otherwise; if you come with me, I will show you.”

So they drew close together, and Gimli saw that there was no guard posted outside. “It is what we do during peaceful times,” Legolas explained when he asked. “A friendly visitor would—well, they would simply ring the doorbell.”

He smiled back at Gimli’s amused expression; the idea of ringing the doorbell to a large, underground Elven fortress felt ridiculous; but indeed, outside the large carved doors there was a larger, shining bell—Dwarf-made.

The Elves of these woods did not craft with metal; he had long known that, but seeing so much that was made by his people here shocked him. Metalwork like that could have been done by Men of Dale; yet still the Elves went to the Dwarves for the best work. And in all the long years of suspicion against each other, they never once replaced that bell.

What, exactly, was waiting for him behind these doors?

He did not have long before finding out. There was a glint in Legolas’s eyes as he led Gimli to the threshold.

“Now watch,” he said. “For I am not a stranger here and need not ring a bell; and you are not anymore, either.” And saying this he stepped on a place that Gimli could see was only faintly marked by a rune, and hidden cunningly; he knew immediately that it could only be seen if you knew it was there, and the door would only open if you stepped there knowingly. It was old, clever Dwarven art that made it so. And as soon as Legolas stepped there, the doors opened silently, into cavernous darkness.

They looked at each other.

“I am honored,” Gimli said at last, and Legolas bowed.

“Welcome to my home,” he said.

Legolas was not surprised that no one greeted them at the door; he knew by the hour that it was a mealtime, and they did not enter in such a way that would raise any alarms. He and Gimli would have eaten much later on the road, waiting until the light was swiftly fading to stop walking and build a fire if needed. Even today at their journey’s end they did not need to stop, and could travel on if they must.

Legolas was glad of this. He did not wish to meet his father while hungry, tired, and low on supplies.

Because of the time, the halls were emptier than they would have been otherwise, and Legolas was glad of this also. He did not want to be announced.

He had never planned so far ahead and so strategically about anything, and he did not like the feeling. Yet it felt necessary. It felt safer. He also felt as though he was ready to give up on everything he had planned in a heartbeat, if it went ill.

He was terrified, when at last they stepped into the great dining room of the fortress of the Greenwood. And he could not grip Gimli’s hand tightly.

Legolas had waited many days and weeks to see his father again; long had he worried about what he would say, had pictured his face when they saw each other again.

Now they stood in front of each other at last—a thousand scenarios ran through his mind at once, of what could happen now—and yet somehow he could not move, frozen on the spot as his father looked up, saw them, and met Legolas’s eyes.

Legolas caught the flash of shock, then an expression he could not quite place, followed by more shock; before Thranduil’s expression smoothed out to polite blankness.

He resisted the urge to close his eyes and breathe long; of all outcomes, that expression was perhaps the one he could tolerate least.

They were in public, Legolas reminded himself, and forced his own expression into something passable, to meet his father’s gaze. There were words in his mind, but they were stopped on the way to his lips. And he wished he could grip Gimli’s hand.

He did not expect Thranduil to carefully set down the cutlery he was holding, remove a napkin from his lap and fold it neatly, then stand up and stride over to him—and embrace him in the tightest hug Legolas could ever remember his father giving him.

“Ioneg,” he said, and then repeated it in the Common Tongue: “My son.”

Legolas returned the embrace, feeling stunned, but also worried, for a part of his mind would always wonder what his father said that was real and true, and what was for others to see. Still he could not imagine that after all this time, such a thing was a performance only.

The thought nagged at him anyway, as hard as he tried to push it aside.

Still he could not grip Gimli’s hand.

Thranduil let him go at last, and stood back, hands on Legolas’s shoulders, seeming loathe to look away from his face.

“I’m sorry,” Legolas said at last. “I did not know I would be gone for so long.”

His father shook his head. “You have returned, and the days of waiting for your return are over. It does not matter.”

Legolas knew this would be the answer, for his long absence was low on the list of things there were to be angry at him about. It was worth saying, but not lingering on.

“Yes,” he said, and gently drew back. The next thing to say, he must say now, before it was too late. “Father,” he said, and now he put a hand on Gimli’s shoulder. “I must introduce you now to my companion.”

Companion. It was the wrong word, but he would not use it for very much longer.

Thranduil at last looked at Gimli, but whatever he would say, Legolas did not wait to hear it.

“This is Gimli, son of Glóin, of the Dwarves of Erebor, and one of the Nine Walkers set out against our enemy Sauron, to destroy the One Ring,” Legolas said, and did not care if anyone flinched to the hear the name of their enemy, for he was defeated and there was no horror left in the name; not to him.

Legolas took a breath, but only one, and quickly, for he would not have anyone speak over him. “He has traveled with me long, and he is my friend.” Now he glanced down at Gimli, who read his look at once; he reached up to take Legolas’s hand, and without hesitation laced their fingers together. At last, Legolas thought, and felt some part of him settle.

“I do not know what news has reached you,” Legolas continued, and here Thranduil made a gesture that he knew too well—they did not need fluency in the secret sign language of the Dwarves to say, silently, stop, but Legolas did not mean to obey him. There were more words in his throat, ready to spill out, but Thranduil spoke before he could it.

“We have long to discuss that,” Thranduil said, and somewhere else was implied, but Legolas shook his head.

“No,” Legolas said, for he knew at once that if he did not say it all now, he would somehow never get the chance. It would become something to be controlled, to be managed; and that he would not have. “It must be said now. Gimli is my friend; and my husband.”

The word dropped into silence that rang like bells in Legolas’s ears; the rest of the hall had been watching carefully, but now they froze, and no one took so much as a breath.

“I tell you this now,” Legolas said, into that terrible silence, “because I will not hide my joy.” Now he lifted his chin, for it was defiant, but a fact. Now he spoke another one: “And I wish for you to share in it.”

Gimli took a breath next to him; he’d learned to be very quiet, for only Legolas’s own sharp ears could have caught it, and he was certainly the only one who knew what it meant.

But now Legolas fell silent, for he had said what he meant to say, and would let the rest fall where it may. But he held Gimli’s hand tightly, and did not—would not—let go.

The silence lasted long, and Legolas thought that his father let it go on longer than was needful, yet he said nothing. He would wait in the silence, for even if it held danger, he no longer feared it.

At last Thranduil cleared his throat. “We will talk of this later,” he said. It was an evasion; Legolas had no doubt they would never share a single word about it, at any time, if not forced. “But right now you must be tired, in need of food and rest. We will find a room for the Dwarf, and—”

“No,” Legolas said. “No, my rooms will be enough. Gimli does not need his own.”

Thranduil hesitated. “We must find an extra bed, then, and—”

“No,” Legolas said again. “We will share, as we have done for many nights on the road and off it.”

There was another long silence. When his father only looked at him, but did not meet his gaze, Legolas did not move a single muscle in his face, but dropped his eyes, and looked at Gimli, who nodded ever so slightly back.

And so, still hand in hand, they both turned and left the hall.

There was a stir of mutterings behind them, but no word from Thranduil, so they continued on their way without speaking, yet perfectly in sync.

They were halfway to the exit before an elf, whose name he knew was Iuithrien, caught up with them. Legolas nodded to her, but did not break his stride until she stopped in front of them, blocking their path.

“Legolas,” she said, and bowed, but not to Gimli. “Your father begs you to return; he promises to speak to you long tomorrow, and resolve these matters, but he asks for a night to rest and think on them first.”

Legolas looked at Gimli. Gimli shrugged, and that was answer enough. He would let Legolas decide; but Legolas already knew what his own response was. “My thanks, Iuithrien,” he said, with his own bow. “I am sorry he has used you as a messenger instead of coming himself.”

But he had nothing else to say, and after looking at her for several moments, she swallowed visibly and moved aside. This time, she bowed to both of them before she disappeared back down the corridor.

“An improvement?” Gimli muttered, and Legolas stifled a laugh.

“Perhaps,” he said. They resumed their walk towards the exit.

Someone caught up with them more quickly this time. Legolas recognized Celegon; Iuithrien must still be catching her breath. Again he kept walking until Celegon blocked his path, and did not fail to notice that their strong features were twisted into a severe expression.

They did not bow.

“Legolas,” they said without preamble, “your father asks you to return. He will let the Dwarf share your room and—” he stopped, and visibly steeled himself. “—and your bed. He still asks to speak with you long, but he will allow this concession.”

“Concession?” Legolas said, and looked at Gimli, who only snorted. Celegon wrinkled their nose at the sound. Once it would have made Legolas wish to rearrange said nose; now he only fought a laugh.

“No,” said Gimli, and Legolas nodded.

“Please excuse us,” he said, and brushed past Celegon without another word. There was a brief pause of silence, and then, they could hear their footsteps retreating rapidly behind them.

“How long will they prolong this?” Gimli said, and he sounded as amused as Legolas felt.

“We shall see,” Legolas said cheerfully.

They were at the exit, poised to step over it and leave his father’s house in the Greenwood behind, when Iuithrien caught up with them again.

This time, she did not block their path, but said, just before they left, “Please! Please, will you listen?”

They turned, and she bowed immediately, to both of them, without hesitating. “I am sorry,” she said. “I am sorry to waylay you once again. But I bring another message—your father says, he wishes to welcome the Dw—my apologies. He wishes to welcome Gimli into his home. He will provide food and rest, and tomorrow he will hear your story together.”

Now when they glanced at each other, Gimli’s eyes were dancing with laughter, and Legolas could not help his smile. “Shall we negotiate further?” he said, not caring if Iuithrien heard.

“Hm, but I am but a simple road-weary Dwarf,” Gimli said. “What else could I possibly ask for?

“I do not know,” said Legolas. “You are the expert in these matters, melethen. I must defer to you.”

He did not look at Iuithrien’s face to see her reaction to the endearment. He did not care.

“In that case, I suppose it will do.” Gimli bowed at last to Iuithrien, in the Elvish fashion, and she looked quite surprised.

“I—yes. I will—I will go bring back the news. I—I thank you,” she said, and bowed back, swiftly, before disappearing again.

“Now we must go slowly,” Gimli said. “Or we will arrive before everything is ready, and scare them half to death.”

“I am afraid that even walking slowly, we will both outpace even the swiftest Elves,” Legolas said. “But we shall try.”

Gimli smiled at him, and deep in Legolas’s anxious heart, he felt a measure of peace.

Gimli did not think much of the fortress of the Greenwood, for the most part; and he had not expected to. He thought even less of Thranduil, who looked similar to Legolas, except far more serious. It showed most of all in his eyes, which were less likely to laugh, and thus very nearly made them look like strangers to each other.

This Gimli had expected, but the fortress itself was was worse than he had feared. It had sturdy walls, built by Dwarves and unmarred by time, but that was all. In the halls especially, it was a gray, dimly-lit, wandering maze, with very little cheer to warm it.

The great banquet hall alone had not been so terrible, to Gimli’s eyes. There were high, echoing walls, but the Elves had carved windows into the ceiling so that light could stream in, and they had hung many lanterns, so that even at night they could have merry feasts. He could see that the windows could be quickly and easily covered in wartime, but now they were open to light and even cool air, if they wished.

There were great pillars, not carved as they would have been by Dwarves, but he thought the Elves here had been very sensible, in their way; they had arranged for trailing vines to wrap around the pillars, climbing up and down and branching out from them. They must have chosen vines that would not damage the stone; Gimli would expect such wisdom from Elves.

Summer had mostly waned, but Gimli thought that in the warmer months, they must bloom with many flowers. He thought also that the leaves would turn soon, and the hall would be filled with golden and red vines, catching the sunlight and lantern light.

There were many other plants also in that room, growing along walls, spilling out over pots, and hanging from the ceiling. He could almost believe he was in the forest itself, in that great room. From speaking to Legolas he knew that these plants must all thrive in the low indoor light, yet still the Elves had been clever in their growing; to Gimli’s eyes they all looked healthy and strong.

Yet the Elves did not take so much care to grow things in the halls of this place, and they were worse for it. Gimli could see as they passed other rooms, that there were bits of greenery in them, but he did not know what any of the rooms were used for, and did not care to ask.

It was a dreary walk in the dark.

To Gimli’s surprise, Legolas’s rooms were not so different from the halls. They were simple, mostly unadorned, and quite dark, even with all the lanterns lit and the fire stoked. Skylights opened up to the setting sun, the sound of trees, and soon the stars; but that was all.

Only when the door was closed and locked tightly did Legolas collapse. He had been holding himself very tightly, and it was a relief to Gimli’s eyes to see him sit down, even though he sighed heavily and put his head in his hands.

“It was not so bad,” Gimli said, to lighten the silence.

“Yes,” Legolas said, but he did not move, and finally Gimli sat next to him, and let Legolas lean his head on his shoulder.

Gimli did not wish to speak of Thranduil, not yet; he did not have anything kind to say, and did not like the look on Legolas’s face when they spoke to each other. But harsh words now would not help the situation, and many things could change before their time here was over. He had heard many times, from Gandalf and Bilbo and others, that the Elven-king of the Greenwood was not cruel or heartless. And so he would rather wait to form an opinion.

Legolas must have read his mood, or mirrored it at least, for after a moment he straightened up, and looked at Gimli with a faint smile. “Well, we are here. What do you think of my home?”

Gimli hesitated. “The woods are beautiful,” he said finally. “Just as you described.”

Legolas huffed a laugh. “You mean to say, that you hate it.”

“No!” said Gimli. “No. It was built by Dwarves, and built well. There is beauty in it, in that aspect alone.”

“And yet,” said Legolas, and Gimli sighed.

“And yet,” he repeated. “I have only found the great dining hall to be very beautiful, so far. Legolas—” he stopped, wondering how to say what was in his mind.

“It is too dark for you,” said Legolas, because when did he not read Gimli’s thoughts?

“Yes,” said Gimli. “You should hang many more lanterns, and fill this place with light. But also—I wonder. I wonder, why are there no plants in this room?”

Now Legolas stared at him long, until, finally, he said, “I…never thought to put any. I was so often away, out in the forest protecting it. When I was here, these rooms never seemed very important.”

Gimli shook his head. “You cannot have slept well, with no plants, and no starlight; the windows are uncovered now, but they must have been closed for many nights in the past.”

“They were,” Legolas said, and it was his turn to look surprised that Gimli knew his mind. “I cannot say that you are wrong. I did not rest well at all, in these rooms. I did not…I did not like to be in them. I would always rather be outside, among the trees.”

“Of course,” Gimli said gently, laying a hand over Legolas’s, and Legolas laced their fingers together and squeezed tightly. “But this place is your home. It must at least be second best, to sleeping on the ground in the starlight.”

Legolas gave him another long look, before, finally, laughing softly. At Gimli’s expression, he said, “Gimli, ever you surprise me. I had expected to talk long about my father and his welcome—or lack of welcome, if you would rather. But instead you only lecture me on my own well-being—no, do not unsay it,” he added, when Gimli moved to protest.

“You are right. Of course you are right. It is late in the season for new planting, but for indoor plants that will not be so much of a problem; we will find some already grown, and move them. And we will put plants in this room—together. They will be tended to, when we are gone, and they will be ready for us whenever we return. If we return.”

Gimli smiled at him. “Good,” he said. “I deem that you have spent too much time in misery, in this place. I would wish that your home would bring you joy.”

Now Legolas swallowed, and his eyes glimmered, though he did not shed any tears. “Gimli,” he said, but that was all he could manage, and Gimli thought he knew why. Legolas cupped his face gently, and after a moment, he did not need any more words. He kissed Gimli, softly at first, but soon it became deeper, and Gimli did not mind that Legolas clung tightly to him. He felt exactly the same.

They both slept well that night, at least.

Legolas rose early with Gimli, earlier than all the rest of the fortress. He had grown used to ending the day at the sinking of the sun, and beginning anew at the first light of dawn. They could travel on long into the night, but had not done so for many long months, and both preferred to walk in daylight and rest in starlight.

The Elves of his father’s house did not keep such a schedule, when they were not on the march into battle. They would wander in the woods late into the night, or remain the halls at feasts; or they went out for hunting and other expeditions, and never come back at all for many days.

Legolas might return to this after many days at home, but for now he rose with the daylight. He did not intend to wait for anyone else to wake up, and Gimli, already dressed and looking thoughtfully at the skylights, did not seem to mind.

“You are talkative,” Legolas said after a long moment, smiling at him.

Gimli looked over at him, meeting his smile, with a soft expression that he never seemed to direct towards anyone else.

“Since you ask, I confess I was wondering what you might plant and grow here,” Gimli said. “But I suppose you would know better than I.”

Of course he was still thinking of this, and giving none or very little thought to what they must say to Thranduil. The warmth in Legolas’s chest expanded, filing every corner.

“There are more than a few that we could put here,” Legolas said. “Plants that grow in low light, and do well in pots. I will show them to you, and teach you about them, and you will help me choose them. But we must feed you first; they can live on water and sunlight, but you certainly cannot!”

“Neither can you, or I would know!” said Gimli. “That is a secret of Elves that you would not be able to keep!” He followed Legolas through the door so they could find something to eat, and begin the day. The halls were lit by lanterns, and by the growing daylight in the places where there were windows, but they were empty, and so Legolas did not lower his voice or moderate his expression.

“I might have been pretending all this time, and you would never know,” Legolas told him, but he was laughing, and gave away the joke.

“Yes, I would,” Gimli retorted. “You would have shown off the ability long ago!”

Legolas shook his head, ruefully. “Or boasted about it,” he admitted. “You have no idea, how much I wanted your attention, then.”

“At least as much as I wanted yours,” Gimli told him. “If only we’d known, then, what it meant.”

“To always want your eyes on me?” Legolas laughed. “It seems obvious now. At least we were not too slow in the realization.”

“Slow enough,” Gimli said; very nearly grumbled, if it wasn’t for the softness in his eyes.

They found enough food for both of them—from long experience Legolas knew where and how to obtain an early breakfast without disturbing anyone—and had entirely finished breaking their fast when the rest of the house began to stir. But by then they were deep in conversation and Gimli wished to explore the woods with him, so they left the fortress and went into the forest.

The green halls of the beech tree soothed his mind; not until they stepped out into them did Legolas realize how scattered and anxious he had been. But now in the woods of his homeland, the breeze sent the trees whispering and the morning light filtered through the leaves in beams, brighter than he’d seen the Greenwood in years. The leaves were slowly turning over into yellow, though it was still mostly green.

Gimli beside him looked astonished as he gazed around; he would have heard stories of a black and impenetrable forest, and now that peace had returned, it had become once again a place of light and green things. To Legolas it was a warm welcome, made bright twice over by the chance to show it to Gimli.

It was likely foolish to leave and wander like this, not for fear of danger but because Legolas knew his father would be looking for him. Still all he could think of was how green the forest had become, and the light in Gimli’s eyes when he looked at it.

In the contest of his duty to his father and his duty to Gimli…

Legolas hoped there would never have to be a winner. But he thought he knew who would.

Gimli wanted to hear about plants that would grow in dark places, and when Legolas kept dismissing the ones they were seeing—this one was too wild, this one would be stunted in a pot, this one needed to spread its roots too far—he at last sighed.

“I suppose the only thing for it is to go back and get the plants there,” Gimli said.

They had not really come here looking for plants, nor expected to find any. But Legolas nevertheless appreciated the pretense. He did not want to think too deeply about why they would both rather roam the forest than—do otherwise.

And he did not want to return. But when he inhaled deeply, smelling the deep green smell of the forest, Legolas thought he also did not want to spend another night locked in a stone tomb; even one with skylights. So he said, “I suppose you are right—and we had better go now, or we will be here all day, and return well after dark.”

They would need to talk to other people to obtain what they needed; pots, plants, soil, tools to water—all of it required help. And he and Gimli had not wandered out into the woods because they wished to meet and converse with strangers. Legolas would not say it was to avoid them; only, he did not know if he was ready to answer questions and meet stares.

He glanced sidelong at Gimli as they walk, and got a half shrug as a response. Legolas knew, without the words, that he meant: this cannot last forever, and perhaps this way is easier. Perhaps if we decide ourselves how to do it.

Still there would be stares; perhaps words. Still Legolas did not want to meet them, not yet.

Gimli had spent a good portion of his life within a journey of a week or less to Mirkwood—the Greenwood—and observing the uneasy trade relationships between his people and Legolas’s. He’d spoken with Lake-Men who dealt with them directly, and heard much snide commentary from his own people about the dishonestly of Elves. How they cheated, skimped, or even refused to pay.

He had now traveled far, met more Elves than he’d ever known to pay mind to, and was partnered forever with one of their kind. Yet he still could not say for certain that he knew how one went about buying something in this Elven kingdom.

In the end he only stood back and observed; watched as Legolas’s eyes grew tight and he insisted in speaking in the Common Tongue, though Gimli would not have minded a conversation in Elvish over his head. Yet he said nothing, and heard everything. How an Elf asked in derision if “the Dwarf would try to pay,” and Legolas stared at him in silence for a long time, before unpacking everything he’d just chosen and turning around leaving.

Gimli did not know why paying would be an insult; did not the work of hands have value?

But he said nothing; none of these words were crafted to hurt him. They were for Legolas, who only went cold and angry when he was asked what sorcery “the Dwarf” had worked on him; why he had changed; what had led him to this betrayal.

Their eyes met at the last accusation; Gimli felt a strong urge to throw the pottery at the Elf’s head. “Betrayal,” when these lands only still stood because of their sacrifice—but Legolas did not hit the other Elf, as he would have deserved. He actually—laughed?

It was cold, with no mirth, but it was a laugh. Still Legolas said nothing; he only turned, and with Gimli, left.

In the end they strayed farther than Legolas said he had meant to go, and found a craftsman out on the edges of the forest. He was broad-faced where some of the other Elves were not, but with dark hair and skin, and the same single-lidded eyes as every other Elf Gimli had met and seen here. He said very little but gave them exactly what they asked for without comment, though without often meeting their eyes. The few words he said were about the plants only. It was, perhaps, the best they could ask for; but Legolas’s face was still drawn and unhappy when they finally retreated back to his rooms.

“They still do not know what you have done,” Gimli said, thinking of their disbelieving and angry faces.

Legolas shook his head. “It should not matter,” he said, but his voice and eyes were tired. He sighed, and sat down, slumping in a way Gimli had never seen before. “I did want to come,” he said, after a long moment. “Even when I feared it, I wanted to come. And yet I did not; for the darkness I knew I would find. I once loved this place. But that was long ago.”

“Long ago” was long indeed, in the years of Elves. Gimli did not like to think how many years he meant.

Yet he said nothing, only sat down beside Legolas, and let him lean his head on Gimli’s shoulder, and weep, as he had not done since the ending of the war. All Gimli could do was gently run a hand over Legolas’s hair, letting the touch speak the words he did not have.

After many long moments Legolas sat up, no longer in tears, though his face was still full of sorrow. “I must tell them,” he said. “I must call for my father and do it, and soon. They will never believe me about who you are until I do.”

Perhaps not even then; but neither of them said so aloud.

“Yes,” said Gimli, moving his hand now to Legolas’s back; he did not think either of them were ready to give up the touch. “But first we should take care of these plants. We cannot leave them as they are, and arranging them will settle your mind.”

Now Legolas at last lifted his head, and while the light did not return to his face, he smiled faintly. “You are right, of course,” he said. “They must not suffer for our own failings.”

It was only the work of a few hours, then, to begin arranging everything to Legolas’s satisfaction. There were vines and trees and trellises, and large pots to move around and fill with both plants and dirt. By the end they were both sweating and their hands and arms were covered in dirt, but they were also laughing. If Legolas still felt an ache somewhere deep down, it no longer showed so openly, and Gimli could not help but feel satisfied even as he was being lectured about watering techniques and sunlight.

Neither of them would have chosen this moment for what happened next, but in the end it was not their will that prevailed. For it was then that Thranduil knocked on the door, and opened it before they could give a response.

Legolas had wished many times, over and over throughout his life, that he could learn how to read his father’s face. Always he seemed to keep it carefully and deliberately blank, no matter who he was speaking to.

When he opened the door, they were sweeping up the remains of the soil on the floor. Legolas had just thrown his head back in laughter at some comment of Gimli’s, and Gimli had stopped cleaning to lean on his broom, grinning widely at Legolas. When the door opened, they both stopped abruptly, and Legolas could not help but meet his father’s eyes, trying to read his expression, fruitless as the endeavor may be.

There was something strange there; something he had never seen before. On anyone else, Legolas would have said it was regret.

Yet that was impossible.

Legolas swallowed hard, trying to find words to say in greeting, but Thranduil found his own words first.

“I am sorry to interrupt,” he said, and now Legolas stared in open astonishment; of all things he had never expected any apology. And still he continued. “I can see you are busy—perhaps I should come by again later.”

The words were almost deferential; Legolas was entirely at a loss.

But he was not alone, and Gimli as always found the words that he could not. “We are almost done,” he said, bowing. “If you do not mind the wait of a few moments, we can finish quickly, and talk properly.”

Thranduil actually bowed in return, and sat nearby, out of their way. “The fault is mine, for imposing. Please, take as long as you need.”

Gimli actually smiled. “Then with your permission, we will even take an extra moment to wash our hands,” he said. Legolas almost gasped, but his father returned a small smile of his own. To hide his disbelief, Legolas turned quickly away and finished sweeping, trying not to make eye contact with Gimli. He feared what he might say or do if he did.

When they were done and properly cleaned up, they returned to Thranduil, and Legolas did not stop himself from gripping Gimli’s hand hard, once they sat down. He thought perhaps he could be forgiven for feeling so tightly wound.

“You have come to hear our story,” Legolas said, before his father could open with some remark that would ruin the moment they had created.

But Thranduil’s gaze was on the rest of the room, on the vines that would soon frame the windows; the trees clustered in each corner; the plants that would bloom in time. It was a long moment before he looked at Legolas again.

“Yes,” he said at last. “But—” he began, and then Legolas had the strange experience of watching his father hesitate, then shake his head. “You have never grown anything in these rooms before,” he said finally. “You are right about why I came, but I did not expect to find—” Thranduil gestured.

Was he as much at a loss as Legolas himself?

“It was Gimli’s idea,” Legolas said. “I think now that it is finished he is also thinking of all the ways we might hang more lanterns here, for the plants and to fill the room with light for its own sake; for Dwarves love the light.”

“It is true,” Gimli said when they both looked at him. “Though I had not said so, not yet.”

“You were looking at the ceiling with the look you get on your face when you are thinking of working some kind of craft, melethen,” Legolas said. “It is not hard to read.”

Legolas did not look at his father when he called Gimli this, either. He had decided he would not censor himself around any Elf; he did not need to know whether this was a poor decision. He would do it anyway, if it was.

Gimli huffed a laugh. “For you.”

They had not yet earned the trust they needed in order to be bold about exchanging fond looks right in front of Legolas’s father; yet he could not help it, any more than he could have let go of Gimli’s hand.

Thranduil was watching them, and now his face was blank and unreadable again; yet somehow Legolas feared it less.

“You must tell me this tale,” he said at last. “I can see that there is much I do not know, and I would hear all before I go on.”

“It is long,” Legolas warned, but that could not be helped, and so he began. Gimli spoke little, only adding input when Legolas asked, or when he faltered in the telling, for it was as hard a story as it was long.

He had once feared what his father would say about certain parts of their journey; where he would reprimand Legolas for a mistake, or what he would disapprove of. He had spent long days rehearsing the story in his mind, deciding which parts to soften or change, and which to leave out entirely. It had never crossed his mind to tell all of it, start to finish, changing and omitting nothing.

Yet now, as he found himself in this moment, Legolas realized how little all of it mattered. Whether his father approved or disapproved, whether he looked grim when they spoke of Moria, whether his face was rigid with tension when he talked about the fall of Boromir and the weakness of men; none of it was really worth worrying about, not after all that they had been through.

The tale wandered all the way to Rohan and to the edge of Fangorn Forest; if Thranduil stared in open wonder at the account of their chase, Legolas did not notice, for he lost himself in the telling. Only when he came to Helm’s Deep did he falter, for the memory of that first battle with Gimli on his side was dark, but carried memories he was not ready to share. He knew with perfect clarity now that he had almost kissed Gimli on the stairs; and again after the battle was over; and again several times after that, before he finally found the courage.

But this story was about saving Middle-Earth, not swiftly falling in love with Gimli, and so he managed to only tell the most important details of their friendship, and only lightly explained how it eventually grew to be more. Yet he did not hide the depth of feeling there; could not have, if he had tried. Legolas left out nothing that was not private, save that he spared Gimli in the telling of the Paths of the Dead, leaving out the description of his brief madness. Instead he told his own tale of woe, of hearing the gulls and being pierced by the sudden longing he’d been carrying ever since.

Thranduil would have interjected here, but to say what, Legolas did not know, for he was too caught up in the story now to stop, for any reason. He carried on all the way through Gondor, through the destruction of the Ring; all the way to their wedding, before he finally stopped.

He thought it was a pause, but his father could seemingly bear it no longer; he made a noise of exclamation, and when they both looked at him—for Gimli’s eyes had been on Legolas—he was staring openly.

“Two of the Noldor blessed this union?” he said.

“And there were other Elves in attendance,” Legolas said. He now looked at his father warily; Thranduil did not often speak ill of the High Elves, but he sometimes grumbled that they were too far away, too removed, to truly understand the peril and hardship of other folk. Legolas did not think so, especially after visiting them; but even before, to him they had always been his kinfolk, who lived far away but were not forgotten.

At this moment, Thranduil had nothing critical to say; he only looked stunned.

Legolas waited a moment, but when he said nothing, he continued, telling the story of seeing the Glittering Caves, and taking Gimli to Fangorn. His father’s expression did not change; each development seemed to send him into greater shock.

That was very nearly the end of the tale, until they arrived in the Greenwood; and there Legolas stopped, and let the silence hang in the air.

He had not let go of Gimli’s hand, and now he noticed that Gimli was making small circles over the back of his hand with his thumb. Legolas was suddenly grateful, for his strong silent presence; for everything about him, even now. Especially now.

Once, the silence in the presence of his father would have left Legolas scrambling for words, his mind racing to find the right ones to say. He would have considered and discarded several sentences before choosing the right one, and it would have been wrong.

Now, as before when they had first arrived in these halls, Legolas said nothing, and waited. This he had learned from Gimli almost as soon as he had met him; now it came easily, after so much practice. He was done with his tale, and he would say nothing.

“And it was Gimli’s idea,” Thranduil said finally. “To fill this room with plants.”

“Legolas does not rest well, in rooms of stone with no trees and no starlight,” said Gimli when Legolas did not respond. “I would not have known these rooms were his at all, by looking at them.”

Legolas noticed that Gimli said “rest” and not “sleep,” and could not resist the impulse to give him an amused look; it was returned, but only briefly. His husband chose to have decorum in this moment, it seemed. It was unfortunate, but likely prudent.

Though he did not scramble for more words, Legolas was beginning to be nervous about what his father would say; whether good or bad, he wished he would say something in reaction. Yet he only continued to stare at them, as if still reeling.

At last, he stood, and Legolas reluctantly let go of Gimli’s hand to do so also. He did not know what to expect—and so he was entirely surprised when Thranduil stepped forward, and embraced him tightly, for the second time in so many days, and only now with full knowledge of Legolas’s story.

Legolas hesitated only for a moment, before wrapping his arms and returning the hug. He did not weep, but it was a near thing; he realized all at once that it was the only homecoming that he’d ever really wanted.

“Legolas, I am sorry,” Thranduil said when he finally stepped back. It was Legolas’s turn to stare in shock, but his father was not done. “I am sorry, that you could not find peace at home; that you needed to go through such trials to find it.”

“Father—” Legolas started, but his father was not finished.

“Yet I am also—I am also glad,” Thranduil said, and he may have been forcing the words out, but Legolas thought he meant them. “I am glad for your happiness. I—cannot say that I expected this—”

Gimli snorted a laugh at this, as if he could not help it. At the sound, Legolas smiled widely; he could never help it either, when Gimli laughed.

“But I only wanted you to be happy,” Thranduil continued; he wore a faint smile of his own. “And—” he looked around the room, as if he still could not believe it. “I see now that you were not. Yet I think that has changed.”

Legolas couldn’t help the incredulous look on his face; and he no longer felt the need to try. “Because of the plants?”

Now Thranduil laughed, and Legolas and Gimli both jumped at the sound. “Yes,” he said. “Yes, I believe a Dwarf who convinced you to fill your room with plants, at last, after hundreds of years, may have indeed made you happy.”

“It wasn’t hard,” Gimli mumbled.

“It was,” Thranduil told him. “I think you must know something I don’t.”

They both looked at him in surprise; this, of all things, Legolas had not expected, or dared to hope for.

He really had not thought very much about whether he should plant anything here. If it had worried his father, he had never said so. Why did it now change Thranduil’s mind so abruptly?

Legolas did not know how to ask, and it didn’t matter, for now Thranduil turned to Gimli. “I will not relive the past,” he said. “Though I know we both remember it. Still, I will say now: you are welcome in my home. I ask your forgiveness, for not saying this sooner.” He then bowed, though not in Dwarf-fashion; Legolas supposed no one was ready for that, not yet.

Gimli looked at him long, then returned the bow; and he did bow in the manner of Dwarves. “Gimli, at your service,” he said.

Thranduil nodded, and after another long pause, said finally, “Thranduil. At yours and your family’s.”

He looked as if he would leave, after saying this, and so Legolas had to think quickly.

“Wait,” he said. “There is one more thing. Will you tell us what happened here? We had news of Erebor and Dale, but all I heard from the Greenwood was that you lived, and that evil had been driven out.”

Thranduil nodded. “Of course,” he said, and sat down again; they both resumed their places as well. “I did not have much time to send longer messages, and I apologize. Yes, I will tell you, but it is not so long a story as yours, and I would not keep you all night.”

“The day has been long,” Legolas said. “But I thank you for the time.”

If this sounded stiff and rote, Thranduil did not say anything of it. “It was not long after you left,” he said. “Maybe a season. But a darkness began to pour out of the fortress of Dol Guldur, such as I have never seen, not since—since much darker days.”

He spoke of an enemy long defeated, who was Sauron’s master before he was defeated and Sauron rose. Even now his name was not often said aloud, by anyone.

“It was an invasion,” Thranduil continued. “The spiders were only the beginning; there were Orcs, and goblins, and trolls, and other creatures too terrible to name.” He paused. “They were all creations or corruptions of Sauron. Nothing was awoken from ancient days, that we saw. From that at least we were spared.”

At this he nodded at Gimli, and it was respectful; he had spoken no word of censure about the Balrog, and he did not do so now. Legolas could only feel a small measure of relief; the rest of him was filled with horror.

“It was the most we could do to keep them out,” Thranduil said. “We were cut off from everyone else—from the east and west, from both Dwarves and Men. Long have we defended ourselves in this fortress, but now the enemy used our solitude and his corruption of the forest to isolate us entirely. Many of our folk were lost. He would have burned the forest to the ground, save that filling it with darkness and evil served his purposes. It brings me great sorrow that other woods were not spared.”

“Much was lost,” Legolas said. “Not all of it will be regained.” They were both thinking of Fangorn, and the Ents; it was too painful to speak for too long of the loss of trees.

Harder still was the loss of their people. Now Gimli asked about it: “Is there a count of how many were lost?”

“Yes,” Thranduil said. “Their names are written in our records, and are sung often. They will never be forgotten. Yet we do not have an exact count. Too many perished and were consumed, for though the enemy did not wholly destroy the forest, he still used fire, and there was something unnatural about it. Our people were caught in it immediately, before they saw the source; and it burned too hot, and too quickly. I do not know what it was.”

“Blasting fire,” Gimli said. “We saw it at Helm’s Deep. It is some kind of powder, that explodes and then burns. If he used it on Elves—” he stopped, and swallowed. “Small wonder that the bodies could not be recovered. Many perished this way in Rohan and Gondor.”

Thranduil shook his head. “We could not stop it,” he said. “We never figured out how. If your friend had not destroyed the Ring, we all would have died, by the fire or by the sword.”

A silence fell. Legolas had no words for it; he felt too much dismay, and sorrow. Yet he was the only one who could speak; Gimli would not break this silence.

“I thank you for telling me,” was all he could think to say. “I—I am sorry I was not here, to help.”

These were not at all the right words; he had done his own part. Yet he could not think of better ones.

Gimli rescued him. “And I am sorry for your losses,” he told Thranduil. “And for the horrors you endured. I cannot speak for all my people, but we have ever been allies against great evil, and I am sorry that you were abandoned, though it was by the design of the enemy. You must believe that it brings me sorrow to see your home so destroyed, and hear of such grievous losses.”

“I thank you,” Thranduil said, nodding gracefully at Gimli once more. “And do not be sorry, Legolas. Without your help we would not still be alive. I am—I am proud. That you helped to achieve this thing.”

Legolas had only rarely given thought to whether his father was proud of him; except that he hoped to do the right thing, and that there would be no quarrel about his choices.

Now he realized this was only because he never expected Thranduil to say such a thing; or to feel it.

He was rendered speechless, and could only swallow, and nod. His eyes were stinging.

Thranduil sighed heavily. “I fear it is late, and I must go. There are many plans to make tomorrow, for I think we must hold a feast,” he said. “It is time I welcomed you both properly.”

Legolas managed a smile. “It would be our honor to attend,” he said.

Thranduil nodded at this, but he did not say another word; he stood, and swept out of the room.

There was a long moment, in which Gimli hardly dared to breathe, before Legolas slumped over, as if he had been wounded; or more likely, all the tension was drained out of him. Only now did Gimli dare to let go of his hand, and wrap his arms around him instead. Legolas did not shed tears, but he did cling to Gimli in return, for a long, long time.

Gimli had not known what to think of Thranduil’s words; now he was starting to have some opinion. He was as kind as he possibly could have been, and it made Legolas shake in his arms. The Elven-king was stern, and just; this he knew, and he knew that this was not the same as cruelty. But that he put this kind of fear into his son’s heart; this Gimli did not think well of, not at all.

“I’m sorry,” Legolas said into his shoulder. “That was not so bad as it could have been—it was the best it could have gone. I don’t know why it has gotten to me so.”

“You were so afraid,” Gimli said, and he did not move either, but began to rub circles into Legolas’s back; it made Legolas shudder, then sink further into his embrace, so he did not stop. “You were afraid for so long, and now it is over, and you don’t know what to do. And your father does not often say anything emotional, and now he has done so all at once.”

“Yes,” said Legolas, after a moment. It was a few moments more, before he sat up and pulled away. He managed a faint smile; it did not relieve Gimli’s fears. “I did not know to expect any of that.”

“He should be proud of you,” Gimli said, almost sternly. “I only wish you had known it sooner. You did great deeds, and he is lucky to have you home.”

But Legolas shook his head. “There is still time to leave, if you wish.”

Gimli smiled faintly in return. “And miss the feast I have been promised? When I have heard so much about how the Elves here in the Greenwood can throw a celebration?”

Now Legolas actually laughed, and shook his head. “You will not find the food to be so impressive, not after eating hobbit cooking. Especially at our wedding.”

“It has not been very different so far, than what we would eat under the mountain,” Gimli said. “But I have heard much about the wine.”

“You cannot believe Bilbo about the wine,” Legolas said, now with a true smile, for of course talk of their friends brought light back into his face. “It should have been watered down!”

“Hmm,” Gimli said, feigning suspicion. “And yet Aragorn only went through the trouble of importing hobbit beer for his wedding—perhaps he knew something even you did not.”

“He knew everyone would love it,” Legolas said immediately. “And that it would make him seem mysterious and oddly skilled, for to this day no one knows how he obtained it.”

“From Saruman’s stores,” Gimli told him. “I thought it odd, that he would keep enough on hand to supply the wedding of a king, until I tasted it.”

This was an argument that they’d had for many days now; indeed, a debate that the whole Fellowship had been having. “So much of his stores must have been washed away,” Legolas said now, as he had before. “It was not a small wedding, and the drink never stopped flowing.”

“However he did it, it would have been easier to get Dorwinion wine, and he didn’t,” Gimli said. “I think it was because he did not want Elrond drunk and crying at his wedding.”

Legolas laughed again, and louder, as Gimli had intended; and Gimli joined him, for the image was funny to him, too. “If my father gets drunk and cries, I will owe you, as an Elf has never owed a Dwarf.”

“I could argue that,” Gimli said, but it was teasing. “But what will you owe me? Since money is not used in your realm.”

The reference to their morning dampened some of the light in Legolas’s eyes, but he waved this away. “It is different here, and they are fools. If they had any respect for Dwarves, they would not grumble so, for we all know that we do things differently here than in the realms of Men or even hobbits. They do not care about it then. You should not listen to them.”

“I do not,” Gimli said truthfully. “Though I wonder if this was the source of an ancient fight between our peoples; it is well known among mine that the Woodland King did not pay for work done by the Dwarves. I wonder now if he perhaps thought of payment quite differently.”

Legolas stopped for a moment, and seemed to think. “Do you know, in all the long years since that trouble, I never once thought of that? Even though we have traded many times with Men and Dwarves since, with no misunderstanding of payment. Yet maybe he learned from it, and would not admit it afterward.”

Gimli shook his head. “It is an old fight; we will not solve it now, if ever. But you have not answered me; what will you owe me?”

Now Legolas took his meaning, and smiled, the slow, curling smile that Gimli had been hoping for, the one that belonged to him and him alone. “Well,” he said. “It must be your choice, melethen.”

“The last time we made a bet, it was for bragging rights only,” Gimli told him. “Are you asking me to think of something better?”

“I am,” Legolas said, and did not waste any more time; he leaned forward at last, kissing Gimli exactly the way he had been waiting for, and they did not speak any more of unpleasant things.

Legolas did not expect that anyone would change their mind about Gimli, whether his father held a feast or not. Thranduil was the only family he had, and the only person he ever hoped to convince; among the other Elves he had no friends such as he had made among the Fellowship, and he had very little care for their opinions.

Gimli frowned when he said things like this, but Legolas could only protest helplessly that he had been away often, leading other soldiers in skirmishes. They were battle companions, and little else passed between them.

Still he found that they had allies they did not expect.

Iuithrien, whom his father had used as a messenger when they first arrived, was the first to approach him. Legolas had forgotten that she was often chosen as an envoy to the Dwarves in Erebor, and had negotiated trade with them for years. He only remembered when she surprised them both by bowing in Dwarf-fashion the next time she greeted Gimli.

They were at a meal, sitting next to each other and intending to leave soon to walk once more in the woods; once Gimli was done criticizing the spices used in Mirkwood, and declaring the bread to be even worse than that in Rivendell. “At least the meat is fresh, if tough,” he kept saying. “Do your hunters not know their art, in these woods?”

Legolas only laughed at him, and knew his expression was fond. Had any other Elf asked, Gimli would have rained down silver-tongued compliments on all the food, and he would have meant all of them. He only pretended to criticize to make Legolas smile, and bicker with him.

When Iuithrien found them and bowed politely, it did not at first set Legolas’s mind at ease. She worked with Dwarves often; should she not know and respect their customs? Yet she had roundly snubbed Gimli the first time they met.

Gimli was perfectly polite to her, but Legolas watched her warily, even when she offered her service in the correct manner of a Dwarvish introduction. Even when she took a seat directly across from Gimli, and apologized for her earlier rudeness.

At last she said something that surprised them both.

“Forgive me if this is rude,” she said to Gimli. “But in all the hundreds of years I have worked and traded with Dwarves, I have never met one who did not wear mail, and also a helmet, even at peace. Yet I have not seen you wearing any since the day you arrived, and I have wondered why.”

There was a moment of silence, in which Legolas hoped for both their sakes that she meant the question, and did not hide some secret, unkind jest. He also wondered what Gimli would say; Legolas knew the truth, but the truth was secret. He could only hope that Gimli’s answer would satisfy and not draw suspicion.

“Ah,” said Gimli. “It is a bold question, but well meant. You do not tread on any sacred secrets.”

She did, of course. Chainmail and helmets were part of the daylight faces of Dwarves among people whom they did not trust. Gimli had left it off often in Gondor, after the war was over. Yet the Dwarves under the Mountain would not do so in trading with Elves, even when they were at peace. That Gimli walked without armor in the fortress of the Greenwood was a high compliment that none of the Elves save Legolas could understand.

“It is ceremonial,” Gimli was saying, and Legolas kept his face blank. “Dwarves have many formalities; after so long in exile, many of them are used to help us remember who we are even when we are far from home. They are never intended to insult.”

“I was not insulted,” Iuithrien assured him. “Nor am I now. I only—well, I only thought it seemed uncomfortable. You reassure me; and I do not think formalities are unnecessary. Indeed it seems to me they are used to keep peace.”

“That is the intent,” Gimli said gravely. “Yet I have never found my armor to be uncomfortable. You see, to Dwarves, steel is as soft as silk; we are wrapped in mail when we are young, so that it never chafes or feels heavy as we grow.”

Now Legolas had to stare fixedly at a point in the distance, so as not to laugh. It was a joke but also a test, such as he had used on the Elves of Lothlórien; whether Iuithrien passed or failed, he could not interfere.

Iuithrien passed. She burst out laughing. There were few other Elves in the hall, yet every head there turned towards her; and then quickly away, to avoid causing offense.

Thranduil must have said something stern, when he publicly declared his support of them; no Elves had given them any more rude looks or made any muttered comments. Legolas was deeply grateful, though he did not trust it entirely.

“I have met enough Dwarves to know when they are trying to deceive me in jest,” Iuithrien said. “Indeed, your own father once tried to convince me that Dwarven fingernails are so strong that Dwarves in deep mines grow them out long so that they can extract precious metals with their hands alone. You do not fool me!”

Now they both laughed. “She did better than any Elf we met in Lórien,” Gimli told Legolas. “They all believed that story; they believe it still.”

“Yet I had not heard anything about Dwarven fingernails before,” Legolas said. “Did you neglect my instruction?”

“No,” Gimli said. “I was hoping my father would try that one on you. I wanted to see your face when he did.”

“Oh, I did not mean to spoil his joke,” said Iuithrien, but Gimli dismissed this.

“He has many others,” Gimli said. “And he will try every single one of them on Legolas, who will struggle to keep a straight face, just as he did now. But you must tell me: are there others here who believed him?”

“Yes,” said Iuithrien, with a wide smile. “There are a few who with me go to the Dwarves often. It is still debated among them. With your permission, I will not tell them that you have confirmed it as a lie.”

Gimli laughed. “I do not think you need it,” he said. “But no, I will not spoil my father’s joke. You must have seen him more recently than me; I hope all is well in Erebor?”

He must have been waiting to ask this since the moment Iuithrien introduced herself, but refrained for courtesy’s sake. Legolas thought he would not have probed at all if he did not have some hidden worry.

“All is well,” Iuithrien told him solemnly. “War found us all, and we all fought; yet Erebor still stands. Your family lives; your father, your mother, and the Dwarves still alive who reclaimed the mountain. Yet I fear King Dáin Ironfoot is dead; he was lost in the Battle of Dale, which was a siege upon the Mountain.”

Gimli shook his head. “This news we heard in Gondor,” he said, and when Legolas looked at him, he shrugged. “Gandalf told me, and I believe he told the hobbits. It fled my mind, for there was a great deal else to think of. But we did not receive word of anyone else.”

“So you have carried the question all this way,” Iuithrien said. “I am sorry.”

“I have news also, and I do not know if it was sent from Gondor,” Gimli said. “Balin was lost in Moria, along with Óin, and Ori.”

“That is ill news indeed, and it had not reached us at least,” Iuithrien said, her face grave. “For my part I am sorry; Balin was kind, and wise, and so were the others. Would you have me carry this news there, or will you take it yourself?”

Gimli shook his head. “They will hear it soon; Thranduil knows, and as the tale spreads, every Elf here will know also. My family should not be the last to know. Yet it should not reach them as a rumor.”

“Thranduil may have some thought on this matter, yet I will also confer with him and make sure the news is delivered correctly,” Iuithrien said.

“I thank you,” Gimli said, but Iuithrien shook her head.

“It is the very least that I can do,” she said. “I am truly sorry; I should not have behaved so, when I met you. I was in shock, and I fell into old, bad habits. Still that is no excuse.”

“It is forgotten,” Gimli said. Legolas looked at him, surprised; and so did Iuithrien, who must also know what it meant for a Dwarf to forget an injury.

She swallowed, looking visibly moved. “Then I thank you twice over,” she said, and stood to bow again. Gimli also stood, to return it, and Legolas stood so that they might perhaps finish their meal. It was nice to make a friend; but there were trees he wanted to show Gimli.

They parted ways, but it was not to be; on their way out they were waylaid by three more Elves, all offering their apologies and polite Dwarvish bows.

The third Elf surprised Legolas; it was Galion, who had once gotten the chief of the guards so drunk that they had not noticed their keys were missing, and thus allowed thirteen Dwarves to escape their halls. If Legolas were to guess, he would have thought Galion still held a grudge; yet it seemed he did not, for when he was finished bowing to Gimli, he embraced Legolas, hard, and with loud laughter.

“Congratulations!” he said, the first time any Elf in Legolas’s home had said so, to either of them. “I couldn’t believe the news when I hear it, and now here you are! It was well done—now maybe Thranduil will forgive us for losing all those Dwarves!”

“Unlikely,” Legolas said, but he couldn’t help smiling. Galion had always been full of laughter; except when he was hungover on strong wine from the king’s tables. Also Thranduil had never blamed anyone for the Dwarves’ escape. At first they’d only been confused as to how it happened, and later they were too worried about the dragon and the destruction of Lake-Town. Galion liked to joke about it, but until now Legolas had thought him much more serious about than it seemed he truly was.

“I hope I will not need to escape in a barrel this time,” Gimli said, reading correctly the mood of the conversation.

“I hope I will not need to check them all twice before I let them out the door!” Galion told him. “And that you will enjoy your stay enough to not feel the need to escape, of course.”

“That remains to be seen,” said Gimli, but he smiled, and got another laugh from Galion.

“These woods are much more wholesome than the last time we entertained Dwarves,” Galion told him. “But I think you are on your way to go see it for yourself?”

“We are,” said Legolas. “Yet we thank you. You are the first to congratulate us.”

Galion shook his head. “You must give them time,” he said. “Too many of us are altogether too serious.”

“We have all been at war for too long,” Gimli said. “Perhaps laughter will return to these halls, as the days grow brighter.”

Galion bowed to him at these words, and did not look surprised that a Dwarf could say something so graceful. Legolas found his opinion of him rising, and it rose further when he said, “I will take your leave. And if you like, I can arrange a distraction, so that you are not stopped five more times on your way out.”

“Another time,” Legolas said, laughing. “I fear we have already caused too much chaos in these halls.”

“I shall save it for the feast, when you’re ready to make a quick exit, then,” Galion said, and actually winked before he left them at last.

“I think you do have some friends here,” Gimli said, as they turned to continue on their way out of the fortress.

“I think I am making new ones,” Legolas told him. “Galion had never said more than a few words to me before, and he is not shy.”

But these were the only words they could exchange before they were stopped again. This time it was the chief of the guards, who smiled at them with nearly as much warmth as Galion, and also passed along their congratulations.

When he was gone, they were waylaid once more by someone who surprised them both: it was the Elf who had given them the pots, who lived on the edges of the forest and who had not said more than a few words to them.

He did not say many more words now. He introduced himself as Gwanurion, told them that he hoped the plants he had given them brought them joy, and wished them well on their union, for he had rarely met anyone so kind as they were.

Then he bowed politely, yet strangely; for it was in neither Dwarf nor Elf fashion but rather in the way that many Men bowed to each other. Legolas wondered if perhaps it was the only way he could think to bow that would give no offense to either of them. Still it was an odd choice, and one that no other Elf had yet made.

And then he left. Legolas did not even have time to thank him before he was gone, likely back to his quiet home in the forest.

“I must find a return gift for him soon,” Legolas said, into the silence that followed his departure. “I did not know he was so kind; or that he thought we were. I hardly said anything special to him.”

“You struggle with speech sometimes too,” Gimli said. “And so do I. Maybe it is even harder for him.”

“Perhaps,” Legolas said. “His pots were the highest quality I’ve ever seen; he must have been perfecting the craft for his whole life, while doing little else.”

“We have learned much today,” Gimli said. “And you are not the only Elf who is willing to learn. It is a good surprise.”

Legolas shot him a look. “I hope that the kindness of these Elves does not make you think you have made a mistake, or that you could do better,” he said.

“Never,” Gimli said. “Do not ask foolish questions.”

“I only say, that while I know I compete with the Lady Galadriel for your affections, that it would be best if there was no other Elf—”

“Get down here,” Gimli told him, and, always ready to obey orders, Legolas stooped so that Gimli could kiss him soundly, as though he did not care what Elf might come upon them and see.

“No more of that,” Gimli said sternly when he pulled away, after not nearly enough time had passed. “I told you once already that I love what is mine. I will not keep saying it.” This was a lie; he would say it as many times as Legolas asked. But Gimli continued. “Now tell me, before we are ambushed again—did the Dwarves who built these halls put in a back way? Or a secret passage?”

Legolas laughed. “We will return another way,” he said. “But the front door is near. If we keep our usual pace, we may escape before anyone else can catch up to us.”

“Then let us go, and quickly!”

In the end, they managed it, and Legolas could admit that he was not upset about the kind words, which were welcome and well-meant. Yet time alone in the woods with Gimli was far, far better.

It took several days to prepare for the feast Thranduil had promised. In this time Gimli did not keep score of which Elves approached them with kind words, which ones avoided them, and which gave them nasty looks whenever they crossed paths.

He very nearly wanted to keep a tally, or write it down in a book. It was the habit of Dwarves to track debts this way, when they dealt with folk who were not friendly to them. Gimli had known Dwarves who would track grudges also, if only to remember who was safe and who was not.

The idea of actually doing so filled Gimli with a sense of deep exhaustion. Too long had he been at war; yet in that time he had found allies and friends in unexpected places, fighting for a cause much larger than a single look or wayward comment. These were his neighbors, whether they willed it or not; they should be allies at least, if not friends. Those who wanted to fight could fight with someone else. Gimli would not be drawn in.

He let Legolas handle the unkind Elves; he was much better at glaring them with Elven dignity, letting them feel the full weight of his disdain and disappointment without saying a word. Let all the Elves say that the Dwarf in their halls never spoke a single harsh word! Gimli was content with the arrangement, and to continue to invent tales for the Elves who did speak to them, and see whether they would laugh or try to take him seriously.

By the time the feast was ready, they had made several new friends. All of them kept remembering new dishes they thought Gimli should try; he expressed once that he was looking forward to trying the best of Elvish food, and they all took it upon themselves to make sure he had a list of recommendations that he was sure to never complete, especially in a single meal.

All Legolas would say was that Gimli must not sit too near to his father, lest he lose the bet about getting him drunk, for Gimli would be sure to interfere if he was allowed.

From this Gimli knew that Legolas did not much care for the prospect of a feast, either; it was appropriate that there should be one, and that they were welcomed in this way. And yet in all other ways it felt hollow; not least because they would both be wishing all the time for better company; that of their dear friends that they had departed from too many days ago.

Gimli could see now why Legolas was so lonely in this fortress. Even their new friends were cautious and wary, in the way of people who had not yet learned how to have trust in anyone; not even their allies, or their friends.

They did not even ask very many odd, invasive questions; they were too careful. Even Iuithrien, so used to the ways of Dwarves, was cautious. The question about the helmet was as far as she ever pushed, and she and the others all fell back before asking too much.

Gimli had not known how rare Legolas was among his folk. He was now almost painfully grateful for his frank and kind curiosity.

There were no more snide comments, that Gimli ever heard; if anyone still muttered against him, it was not in his or Legolas’s hearing. Gimli would have borne it, if he was asked, but he also did not like to see Legolas look so angry and sad, when Gimli was insulted. For both their sakes, he was grateful that at least there was no open hostility anymore.

In the end, they did not have a choice about where to sit at the feast in their honor, whether with friends or otherwise. They were at the high table with Thranduil, where no one else sat, in full view of everyone. Therefore, at a celebration in their honor, they must maintain serious expressions, speak softly, and not say anything that would make everyone wonder why they were laughing too hard.

Gimli longed for the company of the four hobbits. Merry and Pippin, at the very least. It would have been much harder not to laugh; but everyone else would have laughed, too, and the gathering would have been merry.

It was lonely, and Gimli did not feel very hungry, with so many eyes on them. Yet he ate as politely as he could, and spoke to Thranduil as though he did not worry daily about Legolas’s peace of mind in the presence of his father.

“I was sorry to hear about the deaths of your kin,” Thranduil said, after many other awkward topics of conversation. “Perhaps now is not the time to say so; but I have not had another chance.”

Because he and Legolas had been daily leaving the fortress to wander the forest, so that Legolas could show him trees—among other activities that they could engage in away from prying eyes and interruptions. Gimli did not say this out loud.

“There is no fault,” Gimli said. “And I thank you—it was a hard loss. Perhaps they were foolish, as Gandalf said, but that does not ease the pain.”

But Thranduil shook his head. “Many foolish attempts to regain what was lost the Dwarves have made, and they were not all a failure. Sometimes it is given to Elves to know the right time to act; but not always, and for the most valiant among us, there is no way to know except to try.”

Thranduil had said many shocking things to him, yet this perhaps was the most surprising of all. Long had he censured the Dwarves for trying to take back Erebor, and for the war that followed; yet now he very nearly said it was the right thing to do.

Still, Gimli had been shocked so many times in the last few days, that he could only give a grateful smile in return to this. “That is kindly said. For my part, I would love for Moria to rebuilt; but I do not know if I will ever go back there. Too much darkness lies in that mine.”

“Still it is well that a great evil was destroyed,” Thranduil said. “None of you should regret that.”

Gimli glanced at Legolas, who was showing his shock much more openly than Gimli; he had stopped with a fork halfway to his mouth and was staring outright at his father.

“I thought all along that you would never approve of going into Moria,” Legolas said, and set down his fork, when Thranduil also looked his way. “You must excuse my surprise.”

Gimli bit his lip, trying not to give away his thoughts; for all Legolas had been worried about how to speak to his father perfectly, now that they were in his presence, he seemed to have given up trying to censor himself. Not entirely; for there was still much he did not say. But there was much Gimli never would have expected him to say, that he spoke of anyway.

Thranduil shook his head. “I would have advised against it, of course,” he said. “But you must remember: I was not there. I did not see the Ring destroyed. And yet it was, and the great evil of this time has been banished from the world. How then can I say anything? It was your deed; yours, and your companions’.”

“You have changed,” Legolas said. Now Gimli wondered if he had drunk too much of the wine; but a glance at his face, and the small bowl next to his plate, said otherwise. Maybe it was Gimli himself, for he was pressing his leg hard against Legolas’s, to remind him that he was still here. It brought him comfort and strength; he hoped it did also for Legolas.

(He was grateful also that someone had thought to put a box under his seat, so that his legs did not dangle, and so that he could do this without discomfort. He had spent far too much time sitting cross-legged in chairs, in these halls.)

Thranduil sighed heavily. “So have you,” he said. “Yet for the better, I think. I do not know if I can say so for myself; the war was hard on our people, and I have not seen so much death in an Age. Not even since—” he stopped, glancing at Gimli.”

“Since the Battle of Five Armies,” Gimli said. “It hangs heavy on my people as well; I guess that this war does, too.” He wished he could hold Legolas’s hand; for reassurance, and for comfort. The conversation was not easy, and the touch would settle him.

Almost as soon as he thought it, Legolas found and gripped his hand; and Gimli felt a part of him relax. What would happen, would happen.

“It does,” Thranduil said. “Yet the Dwarves fought well. I am glad that they did not fall.”

There was a pause, in which Gimli searched for how to say what was in his heart. “I did not come here as an envoy for friendship between our people,” he said finally. Legolas interlaced their fingers; Gimli guessed that no Elf in the hall missed the gesture, even if not all their eyes were on them at once. “But I wish for it.”

Now Thranduil smiled, and he glanced at their hands, and his smile did not fade. “I do not think that is so strange a wish, Gimli son of Glóin,” he said. “Before you go, I would talk with you about how to achieve it.”

“You must also talk to Legolas,” Gimli said, softening these words with a smile. “He has gained much wisdom in the ways of Dwarves.”

“Strange as they are,” Legolas told him, grinning. He had not yet returned to his food, so Gimli did not either. He did not want to let go of Legolas’s hand.

“Stranger still are the Elves,” Gimli retorted. “Yet even in strangeness there is comfort; and kindness.”

“You have said so, and still you sit at the highest table of the Wood Elves, and nearly refuse to eat what has been so generously been given; is it that bad?” Legolas gestured at his plate, pretending not to smile; Gimli was not fooled. “I had thought you might find it better than our everyday fare, but I see you have given us more insult.”

“Yes, that is the reason,” Gimli said. “You have used precisely the same spices as they do in my homeland; it was all prepared in a very similar way to Dwarven food; and you have provided so much fresh food, a rare delight on the Mountain, that I fear for your stores; but you are correct, after all. I aim only to insult. Will our grievances never end? Will we never find peace? Will the—”

Legolas laughed loudly, and Gimli found that he no longer cared if every Elf in the hall was offended by the sound. “Now I find your true thoughts; you cannot find any true insult at all!”

“And your deception is unmasked,” Gimli retorted, and when Legolas did not stop smiling or drop his gaze, he wished very much that he could kiss him.

That could not be. After a moment, Thranduil cleared his throat. When Gimli looked at him, an apology on his lips, he stopped before he could speak it aloud—he couldn’t be entirely sure, but he thought that Thranduil’s eyes were more red than before, and perhaps watering at the edges.

Gimli exchanged an astonished look with Legolas, who said, “Father—are you all right?”

Thranduil did not look at them for a long moment, and in that moment all of Gimli’s fears returned; but he only swallowed, and said, “Yes. Yes, it is nothing. Only—I did not ever think you would find this joy. It is more than I hoped for.”

Gimli looked at Legolas; something in his face told him immediately that he should speak, for Legolas would not find the right words. “We thank you,” he said. “Truly. It was unlooked-for on both our parts; yet strange as it is, we would not have chosen any other way.”

Legolas squeezed his hand, and Gimli was glad he did not misspeak.

Elves were clearing away the tables now, leaving only the wine behind. Gimli had managed to eat much more than Legolas had teased him about; still he was not sorry to see the dishes taken away.

“There is one thing,” Thranduil said, after a pause. At their expressions, he said, “I should have asked this before the feast, but—”

“You could not find us,” Gimli said. “You must forgive us; I am not so opposed to wandering in the woods all day as I once was. I fear I could not say no, and Legolas missed this forest.”

That, and Legolas’s favorite thing was to try and get him to describe how beautiful the trees were, while thoroughly distracting him. He had done it before in Ithilien, and it was even better in the Greenwood. Gimli thought it very possible that Elves fell in love with words before they even began to notice anything else about another person. Aragorn had said the same, though at the time he had been speaking of Arwen, and Gimli had not known why he had looked at Legolas meaningfully when he said it.

He would never, ever say this out loud, to anyone, least of all to Thranduil.

“There is no fault,” Thranduil said, repeating Gimli’s earlier words and smiling. “Yet I wished to ask—we will end this feast with your story, for though it has spread, I would prefer for all of us to hear it in full, and with you here. A song has been prepared, to sing the tale, but I wonder if you, Gimli, would tell it instead. In the style of Dwarves.”

“We have told the story many times already, so we are neither one of us new to the telling,” Legolas said, but he frowned. “Still I wonder—can you do it in the form of Dwarves, with so little notice?”

But Gimli smiled. He would have to tell everything when he went home, and he had already begun to find the right words. It would not be hard at all, except for the stares of the Elves; and he would weather that.

“I can,” he said, and that was all that he need say. At Thranduil’s signal, the hall quieted, and Thranduil introduced him and told all who listened that they would now hear the story of the Destruction of the Ring, from Gimli Glóin’s son. And if anyone was astonished, they did not show it, or Gimli did not look closely enough to see.

He only stood, and took a place where they could all hear him, and began.

“Our long tale begins in a land far away, over mountain and under hill, across deep rivers and through forests old and new. Deep though Dwarves may delve, far though Elves may travel; still further is this place, and still most will never find it at all.

“And though few folk will ever find this place that is known as the Shire, the inhabitants there have their own ways, and they live in peace. They call themselves hobbits, and to hear them tell it, the majority of their folk never have any adventures or do anything unexpected.

“Until one day, a hobbit of the Shire went on a journey he did not expect; and on that journey, he found a Ring.”

Gimli lost himself in the telling after this; the words flowed from him as though he had said them many times before. He knew he would refine the story further the next time he told it; already he knew places he would change words, or leave out details; or add more details in.

Yet he thought he did well; at least, no Elven face glared at him, or said any word at all, until it was finished, and his voice died away into silence.

In a Dwarf hall, or at a hobbit party, the whole room would have burst into applause, if they thought he had done well in the telling; if they did not think so, they at least would have clapped politely.

Instead it was so silent that Gimli did not dare to breathe.

But everyone was smiling, and there were still no unfriendly faces; so Gimli turned and took his seat next to Legolas, hoping his legs were not shaking. Dwarves loved and lived in silence in the right moments, but this was not one of them, and he could not understand how he should feel. He looked over at Legolas, for an explanation or reassurance; but Legolas was looking at his father, who was standing once again, and holding up his small bowl of wine.

The rest of the Elves in the hall reached for their own wine, and lifted their bowls in the air. Without a word, each Elf in the hall drank deep. Gimli started to do the same, but a hand on his arm stopped him; Legolas was shaking his head.

“It is in our honor,” he murmured, quietly.

“So Elves do toast,” Gimli murmured back.

“No,” Legolas said. “But Dwarves do.”

Now Gimli stared, at Legolas but also at the surrounding Elves. He thought, for the first time, that they had given silence because any other reaction might lessen the impact of his tale. This would be an Elvish way of thinking; and even a Dwarven one, if the story was heavy enough.

Not knowing what else to do, or how else to show his gratitude, he stood once more, and bowed so deeply that he did not think anyone would care whether he bowed in the way of Elves or of Dwarves.

Then he sat again, feeling very strange. Faintly, he remembered Legolas once saying that the reunion of Elves involved a song; and telling him in return that Dwarves would take a cup of parting and also of reunion.

These Elves had given him a Dwarven welcome home.

The toast seemed to be the end of the official gathering; talk resumed in the hall, and some Elves began to leave, while other stayed, pouring more wine. For a long moment Gimli looked at Thranduil, not knowing what to say; he had no words left.

“Thank you,” Legolas said, before Gimli could think of something. “I feared coming home; but I will never fear to come here again, or to bring Gimli with me. Thank you—for making it so.”

Thranduil only stood, and bowed, as deeply to them as Gimli had just done. Then Legolas stood as well, and they embraced. And it seemed no more words were needed, between Elves or Dwarves, for Legolas took Gimli’s hand, and they left the hall together.

“Galion did not have to make a distraction after all,” Legolas said when they were alone again; but Gimli was not thinking about that. He grinned at him.

“You have forgotten already,” Gimli said. “So much for the memory of Elves!”

“Forgotten what?” Legolas said. “There was so much that happened at once.”

“Your father,” Gimli said. “I distinctly saw him cry.”

There was a long pause, and then Legolas laughed. “Well, you are right. Have you decided on what your winnings will be, Master Dwarf?”

“Have I decided?” Gimli said, in mock outrage. “I have thought of nothing else. Come here, and I will show you.”

They were both tired from a long day, but Gimli did not find this to be much of an obstacle; there had been longer days in the past, and those nights were no less full of joy.

It was a few days later, when Thranduil pulled Gimli aside, and said he wished to speak to him; not of strategy, or of diplomacy, but about Legolas.

Legolas was not there to protest this; he was in what Gimli would later learn was a long conversation with Iuithrien, about Dwarvish and Elvish trade, and various policies that he wished to discuss. Gimli would never know if Thranduil had arranged it this way; he could only follow the Elven-king into a deserted chamber, and sit when he was bidden.

The chair was not made for Dwarvish height, and no accommodation had been made; Gimli had to let his legs dangle. For all their words, these Elves were still not used to him.

It was long before Thranduil spoke, but Gimli as ever was patient.

“I have apologized to Legolas,” Thranduil said finally. “But not to you. For the insult done to you in my halls, when you arrived. I am sorry.”

He did not even hesitate before saying it; Gimli was impressed. He inclined his head politely. “It is forgotten,” he said; it was the most gracious way he could accept, though it was not true. He would not forget; he only hoped it would become a story to be told lightly with no pain, if not a funny one, in time.

Right now, the chair was harder to forgive; he shifted uncomfortably.

Thranduil noticed at once, and stood without words to bring a footrest. Perhaps he would get used to Gimli, eventually.

He sat down again, but did not speak for another long moment.

“Did he tell you how unhappy he was?” Thanduil said, after such a long silence that Gimli wondered why they were still here. “Before he left these woods.”

“Yes,” said Gimli, startled into honesty. “Yes, I know he wished to—be elsewhere,” he finished, not sure how else to say it without insult. “If you would hear the truth, I felt the same,” he added. “I had wished to go to Erebor with my family, for different reasons. And later, I wanted to be useful, once the shadow in the East began to grow.”

Thranduil nodded again. “So you are even more alike than I knew,” he said. “That is well.”

“I was making nails,” Gimli offered, and nearly grinned at the confusion in Thranduil’s face. “They are easy; I could not focus on anything else.”

“Very alike,” Thranduil murmured, understanding passing over his face.

There was another long moment.

“It was his mother,” Thranduil said finally. “When he was young, it was his mother who helped him to tend to the plants in his room. After she was—lost.” He stopped, and visibly swallowed. “After, he gave them all away. He never replaced them.”

Gimli stared. “He has never spoken of this,” he said, after a very, very long moment of his own. “Or of his mother at all.”

“Yes,” said Thranduil. “He remembers very little. I do not know if he remembers that. The memories of Elves are long; yet sometimes we can forget if we wish to, or if we do not try to remember. I only recently recalled it myself, when I saw what you had done.”

Gimli let out a long breath. “So that is why you no longer—worried,” he said. It wasn’t really what had changed in Thranduil, but the other ways he could think to describe it were not kind.

“It is why I had no more reason to dislike you,” Thranduil said; he could be more direct about his own thoughts. “Or to fear you. How could I? When it is so clear how much my son loves you. And also the thing we have in common: how much you, in turn, love him.”

It was a gray day when it was time to leave the Greenwood. Legolas had spent many days speaking with his father, and he kept those conversations to himself; there were things he did not wish to discuss with Gimli until the right time.

There were other things he would never speak of at all. There were messages that must pass between the Woodland Realm and Erebor, that Legolas must deliver; and Thranduil still did not quite know how to speak to Dwarves. Gimli had discussed some of it with him, but Legolas had heard much more; and he did not want to speak of the discussions, or how often he had struggled to correct his father.

Not least among their conversations was Legolas saying, over and over, that the Elves had turned away far too many strangers. That in their pursuit of safety they had hurt many people; Ranha who was Araneth’s partner (and perhaps now her wife) weighed heavily on his mind. He could not change all the policies of his homeland in a day; yet he begged his father to reconsider, and was glad that Gimli was not there, when Thranduil would not say for certain what he would do. Only that he would consider it, and that the ending of war would bring many changes.

All Legolas could do was keep trying, and hope that his father would see the value in change soon, even if he would never speak as freely as Legolas wished he would. Even if he still sometimes said odd things about Dwarves. Even if he refused to comment on whether he had misunderstood the way Dwarves expected to be paid for the work of their hands.

Still Thranduil had the wisdom not to ask, in front of Gimli, about the question that loomed over them both: when a mortal loved an Elf, what would happen to them both, at the end of the mortal’s life?

Legolas did not wish to speak too much or too often about it; it was too solemn a decision to speak of aloud. But his father must be given some answer, to assuage the worries he yet carried.

In the end, all he had said was, “Gimli was named Elf-friend, by the Lady Galadriel herself, at our wedding.”

His father had given him a long look. “You have a plan,” he had said at last. “To do something foolish.”

“It will not be foolish if it works,” Legolas had replied.

“Foolish yet valiant, then,” Thranduil had said, smiling.

They spoke no more about it. Legolas still did not know whether his father felt the same call to the Havens and the sea; whether he would sail away too, in time. He did not know how to ask.

Thranduil had promised that he would attend their second wedding, if the Dwarves did not object; and Legolas said that he and Gimli would have him there, whether there were objections or not. He felt his father had earned that, at the least.

In the few weeks they spent in the fortress of Legolas’s home, the plants they had begun to grow had flourished; the rooms would be a bower, soon.

Still Legolas had no regrets about leaving them behind. The return home had gone much better than he expected, and some of the darkness in his mind that came with being home had cleared. Yet still he wished to take to the road again. He wanted to meet Gimli’s family, as himself and not the son of an Elven-king; and to see the Lonely Mountain, and any of its secrets that he was allowed to see.

And he wished to finish getting married. He knew it wore at Gimli more than it did at him, but that was no comfort, for he wanted Gimli’s joy to be complete, too.

Legolas thought that time might resume its normal pacing, once he was home. He expected to feel again the slow wearing of years, and the passing of seasons, rather than the moment to moment anticipation of the future he had experienced once he left. It was not so; instead, the anticipation remained, and all he could think of was what he must do next, what the days ahead could hold for him.

He thought perhaps now that when each day could hold something brand new, a blossoming forth of plans made and fulfilled, that he had been living too slowly before. That perhaps now time moved the way it did because he had found happiness he did not know he could have.

Legolas did not wish to spend his days in the dark anymore. Gimli had created a light, and held it up for him, and what he could see of the path ahead was full of potential.

Therefore when they set out at last, after many goodbyes and partings to their friends, Legolas did not turn to look back. He looked ahead to the road, hoping it would sweep him off his feet; and of all things, he was glad to journey on with Gimli again.