An Elf's Rose

AN ELF’S ROSE

AUTHOR: CELEBRETHIL

RATEPG/RPG/R Mild slash, lots of angst.

DISCLAIMER: All characters are mine except for the name of Orlando Bloom and the wonderful visage of Legolas Greenleaf. Thanks always to J.R.R. Tolkien for his incredible tale and my inspiration, and Peter Jackson (I kiss your Hobbit feet!) for bringing it to the big screen.

~*~

AUTHOR’S NOTES: In this fiction, Orlando Bloom is not an actor and looks like the character he portrays in LOTR, Legolas Greenleaf. It is set in current time in Los Angeles, California.

CHAPTER ONE

Orli stood by himself in sensei’s private office, preparing himself for battle. For battle it would be. Sensei felt he was now ready to take on a class of newbies by himself. Although he’d been a blackbelt in aikido for four years now, and assisting in the more advanced classes as sempai, his wise teacher had felt he had not had complete control over his impatience or his quick temper until now.

Orli undid his braid with long slender fingers that belied their strength. With the unconscious grace and sensuality of a cat, he brushed out the wheaten tresses until they lay on his back like a gleaming sheet of palest amber silk. As he re- braided, he meditated on the coming class and what he would say to the gaggle of new students to prepare them for the days ahead.

The problem was his face. It was either a curse or a blessing. People immediately made assumptions on the merits of his face alone; they either offered him things that they would not normally offer to anyone, or they were distrustful of his intentions or formed opinions of his sexual proclivities. Orli smiled ruefully. He had learned early on to be indifferent to all reactions, although he started taking aikido lessons at twelve to protect himself from bullies. He’d been beaten up too many times as a young boy for being “prettier that a girl.”

Braiding done, he folded the long braid in half underneath itself and taking a wide, butter-soft strip of leather, bound the braid in the Japanese fashion most of the way down its length in a pattern one customarily found on samurai sword hilts.

He was ready. He picked up the clipboard and walked purposefully out.

~
Ro
Rose stood waiting in the dojo with the other eager students. She had joined up because she’d fallen in love with the elegant and quick strength of the martial art as she stood watching through the front window one night with her friends. It had taken her a while to get up the courage to come by herself, since none of her friends wanted to join with her.

“That’s such a guy thing, Rosie,” they’d told her. But to her, if she could move that way so confidently and be that strong and fearless, it was worth enduring the taunts of boys and coming home with bruises. So she’d come and signed up after graduation, paying with her own money, knowing she had no more excuses.
ere ere were other girls in the class and she was rather relieved she wasn’t alone. Except they were acting like typical teenagers, obviously all friends, huddled together giggling at another group of boys. Rose grimaced in disgust. Some people have no dignity.

There were two young men dressed in the white aikido uniform at the back of the room flanking a large Japanese scroll of a man in a sparring position. They were silently watching them all, arms crossed against their chests. No one was paying any attention to them, but Rose suspected they were the teacher’s assistants and they would inform him of everyone’s behavior. She caught the eye of one of them and he gave her a tiny smile. They both suddenly straightened up, arms to their sides, and looked straight ahead. Rose turned to see a tall young man with his blond hair bound in a tight queue and wearing a white uniform, but with a black belt, striding purposefully towards the small platform in front of the mirrors. He held a clipboard. Rose caught her breath in surprised pleasure at the beauty of his face. She heard the indrawn breaths of all the girls in the room.

It’s an Elf! she thought. Her senior English lit. class had read J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings and it had caught her heart and imagination like wildfire. She’d so loved the story she’d even formed a Tolkien club at school where people could come and discuss the books, submit artwork or fan fic and have theme parties. It had degenerated into a social club, but it had been fun while she had been a part of it.

She stared enraptured at the young man, knowing he wasn’t an Elf of course but she wasn’t past the pretend stage quite yet.

~~~

Orli stepped up onto the teacher’s platform and stood at parade rest, silently looking out at the group of young people. He wanted to see how lit wit would take for them to become aware of him so he could gauge the level of their focus and distractability. A few were already looking at him with expectancy, especially the young women. One young woman stared at him with surprising intensity, more akin to curiosity than the desire he was used to. He stared back, an involuntary smile flickering at his lips. She was short and slight, a mop of dark brown curly hair framing a heart-shaped innocent face with the biggest, darkest eyes Orli had ever seen.

A Hobbit, he thought, amused. He held the stare until she flushed prettily and dropped her eyes.

A group of four boys still talked amongst themselves, laughing, until another student poked one of them and jerked his head in Orli’s direction. They looked up at him, and Orli was not surprised to see the looks of derision in their eyes. He smiled at them slowly, knowing they would battle him.

“Thank you for your attention,” he started out, without the slightest bit of sarcasm, voice pitched low and soft so they had to strain to hear him. “My name is Orlando, but you will call me sensei at all times.”

Rose was thrilled. He had the most wonderful English accent. He IS an Elf!

“What’s that mean?” one of the boys in the back asked. Someone loudly whispered an uncomplimentary epithet and the boys giggled.

Orli stared at the boy. “You will not interrupt me at any time. I will determine when questions are allowed.”

“How are we gonna learn anything if we don’t ask questions?” another boy asked derisively.

“You will find that we do things differently here in the dojo,” Orli replied, smiling at the boy. “If one more person speaks out of turn, they will be benched for the rest of the class.” He looked down at the clipboard. “Roll call. You will answer ‘here’ with a raised hand.” With a pen, he checked off each name as it was answered, entering each name with their corresponding face in his memory.

“Susan Ames”

“Here.” Tall blonde with blue eyes

“Rose Aragon”

“Here.” The Hobbit. Orli smiled. Her surname was even close to Aragorn.

“Derek Bailey”

“Yeah.” One of the problem children.

“Michael Clifford.”

“Here.” Muscular boy with freckles

“Sarah Evans.”

“Here.” Dark hair and green eyes, giving him a seductive look.

And on until the last one. Twelve in all. A large class, but by the end of three months there would be about half left. The ones who really wanted to be warriors.

Orli handed the clipboard to one of his sempai and turned bao tho the class.

“There are a few rules that need to be set down before we begin. These rules are graven in stone and there is no getting around them. You get three strikes for violation. The first time you are reprimanded, you will be benched. The second time – and not necessarily for the same offence – you will be removed from the class. The third time, you will be expelled. There are dojos with slacker rules, and you may go to one of them if you wish to continue learning aikido. Of course,” Orli gifted them with a feral smile, “we usually beat the crap out of them in competition.”

There were nervous giggles all around. Orli continued in his soft voice.

“Rule number one. I am sensei – and that means ‘teacher’ for those who are ignorant – and this is not a democracy. It is a regency and my word is law, supported by the Master himself, sensei Akamura. Therefore there is to be no talking at any time unless I call upon you to speak. You are here to listen to me talk because you are ignorant and have nothing to contribute.

“Rule number two. You are not ever to look at anyone else during the exercises to see what they are doing. They probaknowknow less than you about what is going on, therefore you will learn nothing if not bad habits. Your gaze will center only on me and yourself in the mirror.

“Rule number three and most important. None of you will ever demonstrate or try out anything you learn here on anyone who is not in your class or in this dojo. You will find yourself becoming over-confident as you learn and you may very well injure someone who cannot fight back. Am I understood? Any questions?”

Surprisingly, there were none so he proceeded to the next step. “When you first come to class, you will need to prepare your mind for the training. Our minds are generally like whirling dervishes, distracted by the myriad of things in the world. If you do not slow your mind to focus on the training, you will end up injuring yourself. Therefore, tradition has given us tools for this purpose. Do now what I do.” Orli gracefully dropped to his knees and leaned back on his heels, resting his hands on his thighs. All the students followed suite, some more skillfully than others. One of the sempai moved forward to correct one of the girls’ feet. “On your toes,” he told her.

“This position places you immediately back in your body and out of your head. I’m sure you are feeling the strain already on the soles of your feet. You will practice this position every day for fifteen minutes until it becomes second nature. This will be what the beginning of class looks like. You will be silent and in this position when I walk out to the platform. Anyone who is not will be benched. When I do walk out, you will bow, like this, and say sensei, oshieru wa kudasai,’” Orli bowed from the waist to a 45 degree angle and came back up. “That means “please teach me, teacher.’ Repeat please.” He made them repeat it until they got it right and were saying it in unison, albeit with varying degrees of sincerity.

“Are there any questions so far?” he asked

One of the girls raised her hand. “Yes, Jennifer?”

“Um, what if, like, this puts a bad strain on my knees? I mean, like, I’ve got weak knees and I don’t think I can sit like this very long?”

Orli looked at her incredulously. “Then I would suggest strengthening them on your own time. If they are weak because of an injury then you should think about why you are here. I will not be tailoring aikido to suite your weakness. You will eitherd yod yourself to aikido, or retrieve back your money.” The girl flushed hotly and there were snickers from the back.

“SILENCE,” Orli thundered, making everyone jump. He froze the boys with a withering glance. “You are to be concerned solely with your own behavior. Such as it is, it needs your full attention.” Orli closed his eyes. “We will now breathe deeply and still our minds.” There was complete silence except for the sound of breathing. Orli counted ten breaths and opened his eyes. A few of the teens were wriggling uncomfortably. He smiled, remembering his own first day and how hard it was for his skinny twelve-year-old self to keep still and listen to his own sensei.

“Very well,” he said softly. Everyone opened their eyes and Orli became aware again of Rose -- what a perfect Hobbit name – and her piercing coal-black stare.

“Use mus muscles in your buttocks and the backs of your thighs to get up.” In one fluid cat-like motion, Orli stood up without touching his hands to the ground. A few students had quite a bit of trouble getting up, complete with groans and muffled curses.

When they were all up, Orli told them, ”First rule of combat. Never let your opponent become aware of any weakness. Moaning and groaning instantly lets them know you are in a weakened condition and it will be taken advantage of, believe me.” He looked around again at them and smiled. “Now then. Let the games begin.”

~~~

Rose had never felt so exhausted in her life. She sat outside the dojo and gulped half her water bottle almost in one breath. Her muscles were jello and she wasn’t the only one. The rest of the students had staggered out of the dojo in a daze, going off to their respective rides.

Sensei had put them through their paces, not with anything difficult – what he’d shown them was quite simple to grasp – but the physical endurance needed was almost beyond her. She had stood in the stance required until her leg muscles trembled uncontrollably and still he would not release them. He walked between the students, adjusting shoulders, arms, hip placement. He had come up to her and adjusted a trembling arm. “Keep it below shoulder level,” he’d said to her in that velvety voice. She’d nodded in acknowledgment, her face flushed with effort. “Don’t worry about it,” he’d said. “Your muscles will strengthen. You are challenging them, and they will rise up to that challenge. I hope that you rise up to mine.” She’d looked up at him then, noticing that his eyes were the sparkling blue-grey color of the ocean. She’d smiled and thought, Elf. He’d smiled back and winked, as if he shared her secret.

She leaned her head back against the window and enjoyed the cooling evening breeze on her hot face, willing strength to come back into her limbs so she could get in the Civic and drive home. The students for the next class had entered the dojo and in a moment she would turn around to watch them. In just a moment. She closed her eyes for a bit. A shadow fell over her and she opened her eyes and saw it was sensei himself. She tried to stand, but he put out a hand to restrain her and instead squatted down next to her.

“Are you alright, love?” he asked kindly, concern etching his beautiful features, completely different in manner than he had been earlier. His eyes were the color of the deepening twilight.

‘Uh, yeah, I’m ok. I’m just a little wobbly. I don’t want to get in the car just yet.”

He smiled, making the dimple on his right cheek more pronounced. “if you’re all right then, I’m going back in.”

“Oh, please, don’t mind me. I’m fine, really.” He squeezed her shoulder gently and got up and went inside.

Rose’s heart was going like a trip-hammer. His touch had fired her whole body and she had no idea what to do with the sensations jolting through her.

She shook her head. He’s being kind. He doesn’t want me to pass out on the street. What would an Elf want with a Hobbit after all?