Winnowing

Thanks to everyone who stuck with me for this fic. I appreciate all the feedback and criticism I have gotten, both privately and publicly and I send heartfelt thanks to you all. ;) I know some of it was a long wait and thanks for sticking around. This really didn't turn out to have as high a rating as I thought it would when I began it, and I'm not sure if it fits on aff.net, so I will remove it from aff.net in a week. If you've enjoyed my writing, I do post at Waters of Cuivienen (www.groups.yahoo.com/group/waters_of_cuivienen) and am also found on OEAM slash (www.ofelvesandmen.com).

I have many people to thank for making this story unfold as it did, Larian and Xandri for betaing, Sue, Alex, and Elfscribe for the encouragement, and all for canon help. Also, once again, I'd like to thank Trinity for the artwork she did for this story.

The reference to Thranduil, Celeborn, and the wine is a direct reference and homage to Alex's fic, "Blame the Wine" that can be found at the above mentioned OEAM archive.

And now, on with the show. I hope you enjoy it, I know I did.

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Chapter 6

Legolas stood at the bottom of the stair leading to the main house of Imladris. He was freshly washed and dressed in his traveling clothes. Lord Elrond stood at the top of the stair and took a moment to gaze down at the Prince before descending.

Things had changed for the Prince ever since his meeting with the children. He had opened up slowly over many long nights of talking, weeping, and laughing. Elrond cherished those nights of gentle comfort, when he depended on Legolas for support as much as the Prince had depended on him.

And now Legolas was ready to go and fulfill the promises he had made. Ready, Elrond knew, to be one of the last Elves on Middle Earth.

The Lord of Imladris smiled and extended his hands as he reached Legolas. The Prince took them and leaned towards the Elf Lord for one last moment of support. Their foreheads touched gently and Legolas could feel the skin-warmed metal of the mithril circlet Elrond wore.

“We will not see each other here again, will we?”

“No,” Elrond shook his head and kissed Legolas just below the hairline before he pulled back.

“I will miss you...” He trailed off, and unspoken words hung in the air between them. The world would soon be without the Lord of Imladris and that thought made his heart ache.

The Elf lord quirked half a smile and extended his hand to touch Legolas’ cheek. “I have no doubt that Arda will be safe in your hands. It is time for the old ones to move on. Middle Earth belongs to a different time now. There is no place for the Elves here.”

Legolas lowered his eyes. “I have not the words to thank you for what you have done for me.”

“Then do not,” Elrond smiled, “It is I who should thank you for your promises...about my children.”

“I stand by my word, I shall see them all through. Whatever choices your sons make, I will be with them, I will not leave.”

“I thank you for that,” Elrond said, “I cannot leave them alone. It comforts me that you will be there, that you will tell me what passed when you at last come to Valinor.”

“I will remember everything,” Legolas promised, and they were silent once more.

“The sun growgh,”gh,” Elrond broke the silence, “it is time for you to be off.”

Legolas nodded and embraced the Lord of Imladris for a final time, hugging him tight. When they separated, Elrond brushed his lips gently against those of the Elf Prince.

As he rode away from Imladris, Legolas turned his head back a few times. Always he could see Elrond, a spot of deep red in the distance, watching.

*

Legolas rode for a long time, reveling in his own thoughts and memories until hacheached Ithilien. Gimli had stayed there in his absence, growing rather spoiled with the royal treatment he received as a member of the Fellowship and a hero of the War of the Ring. Legolas laughed when he saw the dwarf hurrying down the stone path that led to the stables, sporting a bit more thickness around the middle than when he had last seen him.

“Obviously you have been well taken care of,” the Prince teased as strong arms wrapped around his waist and he embraced his friend.

“They treat me well enough, but I have grown soft here. My blood sings for the adventures we promised each other when this war ended.”

“Indeed you shall have them, Master Dwarf, but I promised Prince Faramir I would aid in the rebuilding of his city and plant a few gardens. How is the young Prince?”

“You and your trees!” the Dwarf grumped. “He is far better than when you left. His pain has receded greatly and he and the Lady Eowyn are very happy with each other.”

“I had guessed they would be,” Legolas smiled, clapping his hand on the Dwarf’s shoulder. “Come, let us see them and then we shall talk more of adventure.”

Legolas spent many happy months in Ithilien with his friends, making himself useful and adding Elfin architecture to the city. He planted several vast gardens which flourished under his touch and care. But Gimli grew restless and Legolas itched to travel again, and so they departed Ithilien for a time, fulfilling the promises they made to each other.

They went first to the Glittering Caves, climbing and exploring, reminiscing about the last time they had been there. Legolas often sang, and his rich voice echoed from the walls, adding a chorus to his words.

Gimli was not happy about returning to Fangorn Forest. The thought of walking, talking, trees had upset him. Yet he had promised this to Legolas and so they went and tarried for a short time. The Dwarf put up with the Elf’s frolickind tnd tree climbing and communing with nature and kept his axe low to the ground.

After most of their traveling was done, they went to Lonely Mountain, for Gimli was bound for the Glittering Caves and wanted a host of his own to accompany him to the undelved stone. Legolas spent many long nights by the fire, watching Gimli at the forge. Often as he watched the flames, he thought back to the Hall of Fire and Lord Elrond.

Legolas extended an invitation to Gimli to come to his own homeland before departing and it did not surprise him when the dwarf accepted. He was concerned at first about how his father would react to the presence of a dwarf in his underground halls. Thranduil was renowned throughout Arda for his opinion of the race. He had never quite forgiven the company of dwarves that had long ago escaped his dungeon, floating on casks of his favorite wine.

Gimli and Thranduil met each other in a rather stony silence. The King of Mirkwood looked the dwarf up and down and raised an eyebrow at his son. Legolas recounted for his father many tales of Gimli’s heroism, noting all the times the Dwarf had saved his life in battle. Things were going quite well until Gimli felt the need to remind Thranduil that his halls and all his precious treasure had been delved and crafted by Dwarves and he was beholden to the race. Thranduil’s shouting nearly brought the stone halls down and Legolas saw the wisdom in cutting Gimli’s visit short. He escorted his friend back to the Lonely Mountain and after Gimli left with his company, Legolas returned to Mirkwood before journeying back to Ithilien.

The Elf prince had been pleased to discover that his homeland was becoming good and green again, with the canker of Sauron removed from the land. Later, Thranduil and Celeborn would meet to share some wine and rename the wood Eryn Lasgalen in a final restoration of its former glory. Soon after the renaming, Thranduil sailed for Valinor and Celeborn made for Rivendell and his grandsons.

Legolas slipped into a routine in Ithilien. He taught the local artisans Elvish designs, he taught the gardeners new ways of caring for plants, he advised Prince Faramir and Lady Eowyn, and he lived in the forest with a small group of his people.

Still, in the dark of night, fear would come to Legolas. He marked the swift progression of time more than his human friends. H. He saw it on the lines that appeared around their eyes and mouths, in the greying of their hair, the slowing of their bodies. He would find himself wishing desperately sometimes that he could take them all to Valinor, give them the immortality of the Elves, have them forever.

He comforted himself with what he knew Elrond would say. He pictured the Lord before him, stately in his robes, and giving him that gentle half-smile.

“They are mortal,” Elrond would say, “they know not how short their time is. To them life is rich and full...and finite. Few, if any, would go with you even if you offered. They are loyal to their people and their roots are in this earth.”

“But they will die...” Legolas would protest.

“They will die.”

Then he would feel Elrond’s arm about his shoulders, and hear the Elf Lord sigh. “They know they will die. They do not fight it. But they will go on, in the halls of their ancestors, in the memories of t peo people. They must die, Legolas, in order to be human. Their people would resent them were they to run away from their fate.”

And Legolas would understand somewhat, comforted by his imagined conversation, of his memories of Elrond. He would continue on with his friends and he would not reveal his fears to them. But like Elrond the Loremaster, he would make inquiries when he could about where the race of men went when they died, and he would find further comfort in that.

One by one, his friends left him. Legolas stood before pyres and burial mounds, bowing his head in grief and offering up Elvin songs in their memories. And he would comfort their children with tales of the Quest, of the War, of how young and brave their parents were. And he brought some peace.

It was Aragorn’s death he dreaded most, and even though the King was longer lived than many of his race Legolas could see age begin to take its toll. So when Aragorn finally loosed his hold on life he was not surprised, but his heart broke all the same.

Even in his grief, he had not forgotten his promise to Lord Elrond and after Aragorn was entombed, he left Gimli with the grieving Eldarion and followed Arwen silently away to Lothlorien.

He would never have been so bold as to make his presence known in all those long days. But he hunted for his queen, left food where she could find it, and kept good watch. She must have known it was him, for only an Elf could keep so silent, but she never called to him, never asked for comfort.

Legolas mourned deeply for Lothlorien itself. The fair Golden Wood was a shadow, the magic of the Elves gone from it. The forest had grown over the once elaborate talans, bringing the city of Caras Galadhon back to the wood. For many long nights Legolas lay in the boughs of the mallorn trees and remembered what it was like when the voices from his people echoed in these branches. He would have sung the old tunes or made a lament but he would not break Arwen’s wanted silence.

It was in the winter cold that she finally slipped away. To be with Aragorn, he hoped. Legolas bore his Queen’s body to the heart of Caras Galadhon and raised a cairn to her.

After some days alone with his own grief, Legolas returned to Gimli and traveled westward to build a ship and write a few final letters. His thoughts turned to the land across the sea and to all those that had gone before him.

They waited for awhile in port, for the letters to be delivered, read, and responded to. Legolas knew that this would be the last ship for Valinor.

Gimli grew impatient, and when the last of the small party finally arrived he grumped and growled, eager to be on with it.

“We thought you’d never come! Thought you’d changed your minds. Then we’d be stuck here!”

“We nearly did.”

“But we realized that this earth is no longer the Ardaknewknew.”

“We are long tired of the deaths of our companions.”

“The grief would become too much to bear...were we to stay.”

The luck of the Valar was on him when he cast out the bow line and he, Gimli, and a final few watched the shoreline of Middle Earth disappear in the distance. There was no one to watch them go, no one to mark the passing of the last of the Elves, the last of the Fellowship. But he thought about the part of Middle Earth he had brought with him, pressed carefully between the leaves of a favorite book were the remnants of a flower garland.

Many days later, Legolas’ boot touched the soft earth of Valinor. He looked to the crowd that assembled to greet them, and embraced his father first before finding himself hugged by three Hobbits. Dimly, he heard Elrond and Celebrian’s joint exclamation of delight when their twin sons disembarked and walked into their arms. After much time being jostled around, and a brief moment of sheer mirth when Gimli encountered Galadriel again after so many years, he found himself face to face with Elrond.

The two studied each other for a few long moments, and Legolas drank in the sight of the Elf Lord before him, looking almost exactly as he had on the day the Elf Prince left Imladris.

“I have kept my word to you,” Legolas touched his heart lightly. “Elvenkind resides no longer on Middle Earth.” Out of the corner of his eye, he saw tears slip down Celebrian’s cheeks, and he saw Elrond’s head bow before him.

“I thank you, Legolas, for all you have done.”

Their eyes met again and Legolas leaned forward to embrace Elrond, lightly resting his forehead against the Elf lord’s.

And Legolas Greenleaf smiled.

-Fini-
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