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Greenleaf & Imladris 30 - Finale: Just Reward	By : MPB Category: -Multi-Age > Slash - Male/Male Views: 4743 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own the Lord of the Rings (and associated) book series, nor any of the characters from it. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

Chapter List
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Interlude: Rough Going

Taur Galen, Lotessë FA 235

“Muindor! How fares our golden prince?”

Elrohir all but scowled at his twin’s greeting. At Nimeithel’s behest, Elladan had agreed to move to Taur Galen for the duration of Legolas’ unexpected, indeed thoroughly shocking condition. While his wife and law-mother fussed over the archer, Elladan had set himself to consoling his oft-beleaguered brother.

It was still early in the day and Elrohir was on the porch going over a list of requisitions drawn up by his steward when Elladan came sauntering down the shaded walk.

“Not too well,” Elrohir replied tartly. “Need you ask?”

Elladan looked at his twin sympathetically. “Sick again, I dare say?” he murmured.

Elrohir heaved a frustrated sigh. “And as black of mood as a Troll on a diet of meatless bones!” he burst out as they entered the house. “I slept in a guest chamber last night rather than bear an endless litany of my failings!”

Elladan whistled. “Fie, he is even worse than Nimeithel ever was,” he remarked.

Elrohir shook his head. “I cannot fault him for this. Legolas has never been sick in all his days. To now empty his bowels every morn and find himself beset by fainting spells now and then is embarrassing to say the least.” He gazed wistfully at Elladan. “Would that I had never made that ridiculous wish!”

Elladan draped his arm around his twin’s drooping shoulders. “As you said, you could hardly have known it would be granted.”

“The Valar have a questionable sense of humor if this is a sample of it!” Elrohir said somewhat sourly. “And here I had thought myself free of the travails of an expectant wife.”

Elladan looked at him wonderingly. “If you did not wish to shoulder such a problem, why in Aman did you wish for children? It isn’t as if you did not know you could not have them without enduring the other.”

Elrohir pursed his lips. “Because I knew Legolas wanted them,” he growled.

Elladan stared at him. “Legolas wanted—”

He was cut off by a plaintive cry from above. “Elrohir!”

The Elf-knight abruptly left his brother in the middle of his sentence and the main hall as he sped up the stairs to his bedchamber. Elladan stared after him then sighed and shook his head.

It had been like this from the start. Legolas had always been a recalcitrant patient. He was even worse now that he was in this most unlooked for and certainly unprecedented position. Aye, one had to wonder about the Valar’s sense of humor. At least from the pair’s shared point of view, it was not particularly funny!

A few hours later, Nimeithel came along to see how Legolas was doing. She came upon him reclining upon the lounging chair in the back porch, morosely viewing the garden behind the house. With an understanding smile, she sank down on the edge of the chair and reached out to tuck a stray strand of silver-gold behind his ear. It was apparent her brother had not even had the energy to plait his hair. Or the forbearance to have Elrohir do it for him.

“I take it you have had an unpleasant morning?” she ventured.

Legolas snorted. “Unpleasant does not begin to describe it,” he snipped. “Horrendous would be nearer the mark.”

“What ailed you? Aside from the usual sickness?”

Legolas scowled. “I could not stand the scent of our soap!” he huffed. “I entered the bathing chamber and retched just from the odor of it. ‘Tis a fortunate thing I had nothing left to empty out of my wretched belly else our bath would have been a horrid mess.”

Nimeithel bit her lip to keep from giggling. “I suppose Elrohir is searching this very minute for a suitable replacement?” she murmured. “One that will not offend your nostrils?”

“Aye,” Legolas admitted. “Though Elbereth only knows what I can endure.” He glared at his sister. “How long does this confounded problem last, muinthel?”—sister?

Nimeithel shrugged, coolly ignoring his piercing stare. “It is not the same for all. I only suffered this for the first half of my pregnancy. But Nana”—Mama—“has told me she experienced sickness and extreme sensitivity to scents for the whole of her term when she carried Brethildor.”

Legolas looked at her in horror. “Valar! The whole of it?” he groaned. “I will not last that long!”

Nimeithel regarded him thoughtfully. “So you said when you lost Elrohir,” she mildly reproached him. “Yet I hear you treat him as little more than a lackey when the sickness overtakes you.”

Legolas had the grace to flush at the gentle reprimand. “‘Tis not I who made such an outrageous wish,” he said defensively.

“One wish of two,” she pointed out. “The other restored him to you afore his time. This one—” She folded her arms in the manner of a teacher lecturing a intractable student. “Are you so displeased with your situation that you would forego this unheard of chance to have a family with him?”

Legolas stared at her. At length, he shook his head. “If I am fractious with him, ‘tis not because I love him less or care not to beget children with him,” he sighed. “‘Tis only that I am sore at heart at having to bear this – this humiliation.”

Nimeithel clucked chidingly at him. “I do not recall any of the women who have brought forth children referring to their lot in life as humiliating,” she said.

“Forgive me, that is not what I meant,” Legolas hastened to say. “But I am no woman, Nimeithel. Not even an ellon”—male Elf—“who has spent his days within the confines of a house and naught else. I have lived a warrior’s life all my years and know nothing of such domestic matters. And I cringe at the thought of others ogling me as if I were some odd creature sprung from Sauron’s lairs. Even now...” He looked down unhappily at his no longer trim waist and taut belly. “When I venture forth, I can feel everyone’s eyes on me and it – it smites me to the core! I cannot bear their amusement or pity.”

It was Nimeithel’s turn to stare at him. “Amusement? Pity?” she gasped. “Is that what you thought they regarded you with? Ai, Legolas, there is none who sees you as anything less than the most wondrous miracle to have yet graced Aman.” At his startled reaction, she nodded vigorously. “Believe me when I say that all Elfdom is awaiting the outcome of this blessing with bated breath. And many with not a little envy.”

“Envy?” Legolas repeated incredulously.

“But of course,” his sister retorted. “How many couples have no little ones to brighten their lives? And I do not speak only of couples of the same kind. Nay, brother, you have been chosen to receive this gift. Why, only the Valar know, but ‘tis a gift no matter the circumstances of its bestowing.”

Legolas gazed at her in wonderment. “You are grown eloquent, thel neth”—young sister—he murmured after a while, a small smile tugging at his lips.

Nimeithel grinned. “I am only so happy for you,” she said. “But not so felicitous for Elrohir if he must bear what you subject him to.” She grinned even more widely at Legolas’ frustrated sigh. “I do not expect you to behave so sweetly throughout toward him. Your condition will not allow you to. Elbereth knows how unruly my tongue was when I carried my sons. Elladan can relate to you the variety of curses he never thought me capable of uttering!”

Legolas laughed, remembering the older twin’s troubles during those calamitous months when his ordinarily mild-tempered wife had turned into a veritable shrew. He suddenly shuddered. Eru forbid but he was bidding fair to turn into one himself!

“I will do my utmost to curb my temper,” he said. “But I cannot promise that I will always succeed.”

His sister chuckled. “No one expects that of you,” she said. “But it will hearten Elrohir were you to treat him with some tenderness.”

The talk with Nimeithel bore fruit that very night when Elrohir walked into their bedchamber with the expression of one who expected a tongue-lashing and found a biddable spouse awaiting him in bed instead. He gazed at Legolas uncertainly.

After their unusually quiet evening meal, he had escaped to the royal pavilion and sought Elladan’s company for a spell to fortify him for what he thought would surely follow. Legolas’ silence during dinner surely did not bode well. Again. His warrior’s instincts urged him to lash back at his oft-unreasonable mate but his ever-calming reason reminded him why he could not. As such, he was seldom at peace and almost always in a pother. A pother he could not show the archer.

Now he eyed said archer warily, wondering what new charge he would bring against him. To his surprise, Legolas only reached out an inviting hand. Unsure whether it was safe to feel relieved, he joined his mate in bed.

“Am I rendered so unbeautiful that you no longer seek my company?” the prince murmured, laying his head on the Elf-knight’s shoulder.

Elrohir started then stared at him. “Of course not!” he objected. “Where in Arda did you get that notion?”

Legolas sighed. “My perceptions,” he admitted.

“Of what, Calenlass?”

Mindful of his sister’s admonishment, Legolas repeated to his darkling spouse what he had thought was the general opinion of Edhil regarding his admittedly bizarre condition. Immediately, Elrohir was up in arms over the prince’s confession.

“Who has dared to treat you thus?” he demanded. “They will know my steel for demeaning you so!”

A thrill of delight coursed through Legolas’ body at his mate’s reaction. His heart and soul soothed by so instant and vocal an expression of his Elf-knight’s affection, he laughed and ardently kissed his startled spouse.

“Nay, none has done so,” he assured the warrior. “Save in my foolish imaginings.” He pressed another kiss to the Elvenlord’s sinuous lips. He drew back to find the response he sought. The pewter eyes were darkly glittering and a hand had made its way to grasp him by the hip and pull him closer. “Now, I should very much like to be convinced that you still find me to your liking. Despite my expanding girth.”

He said no more. Indeed, he could not have uttered a word. Not when the Elf-knight kept his mouth and other sundry body parts wholly and most effectively occupied for the rest of the evening.

**************

Glossary:

Lotessë - Quenya for May

Calenlass - Greenleaf (Elrohir’s pet name for Legolas)

Edhil - Elves

To be continued…
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Greenleaf & Imladris 30 - Finale: Just Reward