FIC: Title: "Blood Trust" 
Author: Lavingaround
Rating: "R"' Dark AU
Pairing: Gimli/Legolas
Archive: LOM, Slashlords, All others Archives or Sites OK, Take it but 
let me know OK? 
Setting: Sometime after 'The War of the Ring'
Disclaimer: Characters are not mine and this story is just for fun and not 
for any commercial
use or gain.
Setup and Add Notes: Darkfic. Vampire. Consensual Blood. Tinkering 
with Book Canon
(not easy trying to reconcile Gimli's dark behavior) Comments 
appreciated. 
Author's Additional Notes: Inspired by LOM's Gimli/Legolas Challenge
Summary: Dark. AU. An alternate view of the Gimli/Legolas friendship.



Gimli's dark eyes glittered with wild preternatural fire. 

His friend Legolas, whom he had grown to love more fully than he could 
have imagined, pushed him to reveal the dark secret. He had pleaded with 
him to refrain from his curiosity, but this only enflamed the elf's desire all 
the more. In the end he relented, and Legolas took part willingly. Knowing 
that it could kill him, but that, perhaps when it was over, if he survived, he 
might forever be bonded to Gimli, his friend and lover. Joined completely, 
inextricably linked in mind, body, and soul. 

"Baruk-Almenul Legolas. The axes are upon you!" Gimli cried.

The body of the elf was before him, his feet bound, knees resting on the 
ground. His smooth white arms were stretched wide, restrained and 
tethered with leather bindings to the two poles that were staked on either 
side of him. His eyes widened with terror as he watched his beloved friend 
Gimli move toward him, white hot fangs gleaming in the pale moonlight.

With abandon Gimli grabbed his friend by his blond locks and thrusting 
his head back, lowered his mouth to feed.

The Elven blood gushed hotly into his mouth. Sweet and pungent, he 
gulped greedily at the open wound, spreading his lips wide to completely 
cover the gash. He sucked at Legolas, pulling the warm blood more fully 
into him. He was Gimli, Son of Gloin, Keeper of the Ring. The Ring the 
Elves called Aha-Anga. 'Jaws of Iron' from the old tongue. The Ring that 
was not lost. The Ring that needed blood.

Gimli opened his eyes to watch his friend, his mouth still covering his 
throat. His eyes so full of blood that it seeped onto his cheeks and beard. 
Gimli no longer fed now but held his mouth still, stemming the blood flow 
with his tongue. Already, he felt the wound beginning to heal and close. 

Legolas, eyes first shut, opened them briefly, flicking and darting them 
nervously until, out of the corner of one, he saw Gimli's face covered in 
blood. He swooned and fell back. Gimli held him, not letting his bloodied 
mouth and tongue slip from his friend . 
Gimli had killed Elves before, caught up and held fast in the Ring's need 
for blood. When he fed then it had been remorseless and savage. Draining 
them completely until no drop was left. Of the great mistrust between Elf 
and Dwarf, he ascertained, the Ring played no small part. The Elves, after 
all, were immortal beings and it was suspect for any to come up missing. 
The only reason he had been able to curtail his blood lust on this occasion 
was due to this particular elf . He had stirred his heart. For this Gimli was 
glad. He had, indeed, not wanted to kill his friend.

The Ring's dwarfish name was lost millennia ago. What he knew of its 
gifts now, he had learned from Gandalf. How it had not been lost at Dol 
Guldur. The art of the Ring was in metalcraft and in artifice, giving the 
Dwarves advantages in the making of axes and other weaponry. Gandalf 
had learned that Thrain had made himself a copy, and that the original had 
been given to Thorin Oakenshield, who relinquished it to Gandalf at Bree.

From there, after 'The War of the Five Armies', he had enlisted Elrond to 
help him mitigate The Dark Lord Sauron's hold over it. Gandalf and 
Elrond had nearly been successful in their attempt, when, during the last of 
their incantations, a raven bore itself through an open window to smash 
into a candlestand, splattering its blood over the magic altar. The Ring had 
absorbed a small part of this blood. For his part, Elrond, had lessened its 
negative effect. Save only this. The Ring will require a sacrifice of Elven 
blood. In the 7th year, in the 7th month, and 7th cycle of the moon. When 
the moon is full overhead, The Ring will make its call to its wearer. It 
needed to be the "Blood of an Elf", Master Elrond said, as the Elves had 
crafted the Ring in the first place.

Deemed too evil to be used, Gandalf and Elrond were determined to keep 
it hidden. Galadriel, ever gifted with foresight, counseled for the Ring to 
be taken to Gimli in the Iron Mountains. For his people to use it's gifts in 
preparation for a gathering dark. In her counsel, she saw of the Ring's need 
and deemed it a necessary sacrifice of the times. 

All of this had he related to Legolas. Still his friend would willingly risk 
himself. So Gimli reluctantly acceded to it, partly out of his friend's 
request, and partly from his carnal desire to be bonded to him in this way.

Years later, when all would remark at their strange friendship, when others 
would say, "Now look at that, an Elf and a Dwarf with their arms around 
each other. That is certainly something you don't see everyday," Gimli 
would turn to Legolas and wink, and Legolas would smile with a cold new 
fire.

And later still, at the Grey Havens, standing beside Legolas, they would 
all admire Gimli's devotion to his friend. "Look he is going so that he can 
be with his friend...__Legolas is going,... so must Gimli."


When in truth he had to go, for where the Elven blood went he must 
follow, and Legolas had no choice.



---end---