Twentieth Entry - But a Mistake

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It wasn't different: but if we died

It was not an accident but a mistake

(But an easy one for anyone to make.)

A month later Legolas sent word that he would not be able to return immediately. Another Hobbit now carried the Ring of Power, and Legolas had volunteered, among eight others, to assist him in reaching Mount Doom to destroy it.

I sank heavily into my armchair when Thranduil handed the letter to me, my spine and shoulders drooping in. "When will he return?" I asked, the letter fluttering from my fingertips.

"There is the chance he will not."

I caved in with my head upon my arms at the edge of his desk. Thranduil's hand rested against my hair and he lightly kissed the back of my head. Our pain recognized that of each other. He knew I appreciated honesty even if we knew it would hurt me. It was better to choose harm than to be surprised by it.

Months passed when we did not hear from him. Our forest was, despite the increasing attacks of spiders and occasionally orcs, for the most part quiet of the wars brewing elsewhere. Lothlorien sent soldiers to support Rohan at Helm's Deep.

Then Lothlorien was attacked herself.

"Thranduil."

"They upheld themselves well, Inladris, they do not require my help."

He was right, and as it was unlikely the orcs would throw themselves upon the faultless trees of Lothlorien's enchanted forest again, I stayed my arguments again, standing to rub the accumulating tension from his bowed shoulders.

Lothlorien then suffered a second assault.

"Thranduil, they need aid. Most of their army is in Rohan or Gondor, and they cannot repel another attack without our help!"

"Is it your army now too, Inladris?" he calmly asked, at his desk with a quill in his hand.

"Some days perhaps it should be."

"If you will recall my previous opinions on the matter-"

"Oh I recall them," I said calmly, though quavering inside as I stood beside him and he virtually ignored me. " 'Those who cannot protect their own cannot be defended.' "

He dipped his quill. A drop of black ink ran down the inside of the emerald glass. "And to that I hold."

"Then did you not defend Nelide when she fell?"

He was on his feet in an instant, expression frigid and eyes of thunder. "Do not speak of what you do not know."

I held my ground, head tipped back to keep my eyes fixed into his. "Nelide was one of the greatest fighters this realm ever saw and she fell. Would you say she did not deserve to be protected in her final hour? Or would you say that circumstances sometimes work against us?"

"You do not understand-" he began in a shout but I overrode him.

"I do not need to! You cannot hold yourself and others to vicious standards that you yourself will not uphold! Would you say then that I too deserved no protection when your son and I suffered our own assault millennia ago? Not everyone is as strong or as militaristically proficient as you are, Thranduil. Or have you forgotten that the entire purpose of the army is to protect those who cannot protect themselves?"

"Never speak of her again in this manner," he seethed to me. "She is not a tool for you to throw upon me in support of your idealistic opinions."

"No," I agreed. "Because her army could not protect her." With that I spun and departed before I could crumble in on myself for having been so cruel to someone I so loved. Just because I believed the shove was warranted did not mean I had to do it with a knife in my hand. But what if without it he would never be swayed? For now I could only pray that this time he would heed me. I would lose his faith entirely if I commanded his army without him, as I knew by now that I easily could. And I did not have the military knowledge to do so without ruining us all.

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