"What can I say? This is torture and nobody coming to my rescue. I am a sole elf, needless of sleep and therefore restlessly roaming the night before the great battle that will surely hold the death of thousands of my companions.
Maybe even my own death, for even elves can die in battle ... or of a broken heart. It does not seem to matter which one will end my life after all. I lived for so long, I have seen so many die that death to me does not seem as a threat anymore. It is a natural consequence of life, a welcomed rest after a long journey that finally might be able to give me piece at heart where life has failed to do so. But it will not come to me easily.
What is frightening is the thought of losing him. He is a mortal, more endangered of death than one of my kind. For he could not only die at any time in battle, but eventually unalterably will when he grows old.
I thought I had lost him already, when he fell of the cliff. I thought that this was it, that he was gone forever and all that was left to me seemed to be the dull pain in my chest, the tears desperately felt, but never to be cried, and a single piece of jewellery that bond him to another forever.
It was her love that brought him back after all, wasn't it? Her love, where everything else failed to protect him. Where I failed to protect him.
It is left to her to cure him and it is her privilege to sacrifice her immortality out of love. For me this option has never been a possibility. I would do it without hesitation, but it is not meant to by the laws of elvish nature. A male-to-male relationship should not exist and this is why I am left to live eternally while he grows old. I cannot forsake immortality for him.
I love him, love Aragorn, with all my heart, but there seems to be no way that we could ever be together. He loves Arwen; they are perfect for each other, even though their relationship has suffered great difficulties to be accepted. But isn't this what make a love stronger in the end? She is beautiful, the perfect bride for a future king, how could I measure up against her?
He unmistakably loves her and yet... There are times when I see him watch me in a special way. And the wild hope occurs to me that he might, just might be feeling for me as I do for him.
That Aragorn might love Legolas. Not Arwen, not solely Arwen at least, as he should. But there is no way to make sure.
I am tired of fighting, of waking, of thinking. I feel so empty all the time, as if I am not really there at all. I try to make sense of what I am feeling, to figure out if I am full of hope or of despair, but it is no use. All my thoughts seem to clutch together in one messy pile and I am not able to draw out a single strand of it and understand. All I can feel is emptiness and longing.
I sometimes catch myself silently muttering his name to myself. It might be a prayer, but if it is, I do not know for what I am praying.
Loving him is the best and the worst that has happened to me all at the same time. It is terrible and it consumes me fully. In the end, there will be nothing left of me and I will have to perish.
But how could I stop loving him, when it is the most wonderful feeling I have ever experienced. When a tiny smile, the smallest wink out of his bright eyes show me a glimpse of heaven I never thought to be there before.
I watch him sometimes and think what would happen if I denied reality for only a moment. If I just leaned over to kiss him. I keep wondering what it would feel like, his lips on mine, holding him so close that I could perceive every breath of him, the steady beating of his heart. Would he kiss me back or would he withdraw? Would he recede muttering something noncommittal or would he even be furious.
The truth is I will never find out since we are never alone. And if we were, I would not work up the courage to just do it out of fear to be rejected. That would mean the end of all my dreams and what is life, if we cannot at least dwell on dreams of the impossible.
Oh, Aragorn, see what you do to me?
If he lives, he will be with Arwen in the end, not with me. But there is nothing that could keep me from his side as long as this mission goes on. It will not be much longer, it cannot be, and in the end there will be glorious victory or terrible defeat.
There is a battle to be fought tonight and right now; victory seems to be far away.
If it must be, I will die next to my king protecting him happily until the very end. If we live, I will see him go.
Then maybe for the first time the tears will come to me. It is rare for an elf to show emotions in form of a human outlet, but it does happen. It is always a special occasion to see an elf cry for every time it happens, it means that he gives up something of his soul never to be returned.
All this is not easy for me. Elves don't feel the way humans do. Physical attraction is seldom felt strongly and often is worn out with age. While humans love urgently and intensely, elvish love is more spiritual and calm. We have eternity, so why press on the moment?
And while therefore men easily commit sexual bonds and even love ties to other men of the same gender, elves mostly stay in conventional relationships, if at all.
I was slow to realise and admit my feelings for Aragorn... even to myself.
He surely is experienced to the lovemaking with other men; after all he is a warrior, who celebrates life in the face of death, while I just hold a dim, and certainly naïve, idea of it in my head.
I am not sure how it would work for me and the thought of this new, undiscovered and rare pleasure, even scares me a little.
But I know that it could work and it could be perfect, if it was with him.
I better return to the others now for they will need my help soon. But I will have to face him there and I need to control myself as usual. It is hard since it only takes one look at him and I am completely undone.
But maybe this is not the end after all. If we die or live, my heart belongs to him. That is what counts.
Even though I am not human I will go on living for the moment, every moment at his side. And hope will never leave me, come what may, hope against all hope for a better future with him.
A future, a life, a kiss.
Amin mela lle, Aragorn. Come what may."
The battle of helms deep had started. Two figures one dark and lean, the other luminous and graceful, where fighting side by side against the innumerable attackers not knowing what to think or feel.
But they were together and that was a beginning.
END
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Story notes: As always, I would be happy about your reviews. Screw that, I need them in order to gather up at least a little confidence. The story is kind of personal, so there you go.
