Dying Leaf of Love (LOTR A/L Slash Fanfiction)

Chapter 2

Aragorn mounted his horse, and the guards followed him as he tried to reach Gimli. When he did, the king waited for the gates to open.

"Gimli," Aragorn called as he passed through the gates. The dwarf, still on his slow-moving pony, irritated the king.  Elessar had an offer for his friend, "Come, ride with me.  It will be faster."

Gimli looked at him, and then he said in a disgusted voice, "I would rather ride with one of the guards than you."

Aragorn was surprised by his friend's tone of voice and yet he could understand why. Gimli noticed this as well.  Aragorn’s lover was far away from them.  They had no way of knowing if Legolas bothered to take his weapons with him or not.

The hills were no longer safe. The orcs kept butchering those who walked without guards and Aragorn feared that Legolas would find his death before he reached the sea.

"I do hope that he at least took his weapons," Aragorn mumbled. "I do not know what I will do if I lose him to the cruel Orcs.”

"I believe that he took his weapons, or at least his knives and sword. I did not see the bow, though," Gimli said as he remembered.

"Thank you, Gimli." Aragorn replied.

"Do not thank me, yet.  You need to save him first and convince him that you do love him." Gimli reminded him.

……………...

They rode through the hills, riding fast and hard as they pushed their horses to the limit; to catch Legolas and bring him home.

All of a sudden the king stopped as he smelled something odd in the air; and yet there were only tracks in the sand.

"Aragorn lad, what it is?" Gimli asked as he noticed the king had found something hidden in the sand.  Gimli tried to ignore the awful smell.

Aragorn dismounted from his horse, and knelt in the sand; seeing something shining on the ground.  He picked it up, held it, and looked it over.   

"It is the knife that I gave Legolas on our 1st anniversary," Aragorn replied. "It’s covered with blood."

"We should move ahead," Aragorn replied, as he looked back at the sand. His eyes caught something that he had not seen before. "Gimli, oh Valar… He was crawling and bleeding…"

"How do you know that he was crawling and yet bleeding?" Gimli asked in wonder as he thought that it could be orc blood, but how the man knew that Legolas was crawling made him very uncertain.

"Gimli, can you see Legolas's tracks?" Aragorn asked. “Can you see the leaf marks on the sand?” When he realized that Gimli had not see them, Aragorn pointed at them, noticing that the dwarf nodded.  "If you will follow his tracks, you could see blood seeping from his stomach, from the middle of where he is crawling."

"Oh, now I understand lad," Gimli mumbled, "Let us hope that Legolas survived this."