The Sunset Princess

Rest and Reunion

An unsettled night camped out between Helm's Deep and Isengard turned into a grey morning. Few people had yet woken, but I spotted Aragorn and Éomer on the borders of our little camp, speaking in low voices.

Legolas was still asleep. His long lashes fluttered slightly when I stretched, careful not to wake him.

Seeing men die was bad enough, but seeing our own slain so brutally, both in Rohan and before, at home, was beginning to take its toll. We had seen Silvan elves die in Mirkwood; more and more as the war intensified and the Enemy grew to have so much power.

Somehow, Helm's Deep was even worse. They had died defending someone else's home; they would never see their own again. Lothlórien would fade away long before they were released from the Halls.

Legolas was on his back. He'd tossed and turned all night. I knew the uruk who blew up the wall was what plagued him, just as thoughts of the elves who had fallen in my name kept me from sleep.

My head was on his chest, my ear pressed to his heart. His arm was wrapped tight around my shoulders, long fingers tangled in the ends of my unbound hair. My hand was on the right side of his chest. I curled my fingers into my palm, caressing him, then uncurled them. The longer we fought this war, the greater the impact.

I wish we could have stayed home, and lay tangled in each other in the early mornings, watching the sun rise over the treetops. It was not the same here, watching the sky lighten slightly while he slept, exhausted, on dewy grass, his hood protecting his hair from the mud.

I shifted closer to him, but winced. There was a rock in a dip in the ground under my hip. Carefully, I took my hand from Legolas' chest and pulled it out from under me, managing not to wake him. I shuffled closer to him again and held it up to the sky.

My lips parted. It was not an ordinary rock. It's shape was indistinct, but jagged and sharp. The colour was most astonishing; it shone, jet black though almost opaque at the edges. Even the light of that grey morning seemed to shine through the rock. It had a certain beauty to it which captivated me. I smiled.

There was no point wishing for anything but that which we had. We were here, in this strange time of friendship and loyalty, of grief and hope, of horror and unexpected beauty. That would be enough.

The camp stirred gradually, but Legolas took nearly half an hour to wake. The men cast furtive glances at us, him fast asleep and me lying next to him, still examining the stone. Perhaps among the Rohirrim it was not common to see husbands and wives show affection. It made little sense to me, but men were strange folk.

Legolas took a deeper breath. I looked up. His arm tightened about my shoulders, then loosened when he prised open his eyes. I smiled at him. "I have a gift for you."

He smiled at the look on my face. His voice was husky from sleep. "You can't possibly have found a bottle of Dorwinion in the grass."

I laughed, kissing him and sitting up. "I wish. But I did find this. Don't you think it's beautiful?" I held out the rock to him. He took it with a grin.

"You Noldor have a strange sense of beauty." As he held it up to the grey sky, as I had, however, his brows lifted. "How does rock look so... fluid? It is like a wave on a dark night."

He spoke more of water than he ever had. However, he was right. I had not noticed the streak of blue down the middle. "You're right. Look at the blue." I traced my finger along it, then so did he.

Legolas sat up. "A little joy, in the midst of so much that is not." He smiled, leaning across to kiss my cheek. "I will treasure it."

"That is a pretty trinket!" Gimli strode towards us, three bowls balanced in his hands. Legolas took two, handing one to me, and the dwarf sat beside us, sharp eyes on the stone.