Post by Admin on Jan 2, 2021 23:40:29 GMT
Author: Finfinfin
Summary: While waiting with the Fellowship in Lothlorien, Gimli discovers the beginnings of an unexpected friendship. How an Elf and a Dwarf first began to conquer the divide which lay between them.
Ranking: 3rd place
“We are all travelers in the wilderness of this world, and the best we can find in our travels is an honest friend.”
― Robert Louis Stevenson
Elves see time differently from the rest of us.
I have decided this during these long days of waiting in Lothlorien. We have tarried here longer than we should, I know it, and yet I cannot remember exactly how long we have been here. The time stretches out endlessly and the elves meander their way through it.
Aragorn seems unfazed by this, he is unconcerned by the wasted days. Perhaps because of the years he has spent in Imladris he is used to this dawdling of time. The hobbits are happy, they are glad for some respite I think, relieved to be off the road. It is only Boromir and I who chafe at the enforced rest. Day after day we complain, Boromir more loudly than myself, but it gets us nowhere. We are forced to sit idly by.
There is one more of our company of course, Legolas, but he has abandoned us. Of him we see little sign. He comes and goes, that is true, nodding to Aragorn as he does so, but he stays with us so infrequently I almost forget he is one of us. So fickle is his elven heart, so quick to walk away. I suppose this long time waiting does not bother him, he spends his days playing with his newfound friends, but what of us? I do not know why I expected any different, he is an elf of course, and they cannot be relied on.
That is why I am surprised to see him waiting for me when I return from my breakfast. At first I assume it is not me he wants, why would it be?
"Aragorn will be here shortly." I say curtly, I am not in the mood for pleasantries, especially with an elf as flighty as he.
But he does not even blink.
"It was not him I was waiting for." he says, "It was you."
"Why would you wait for me? What business could we possibly have together?" I think it is a fair question. Even before this tedious elven delay we have not been friends, have not sought out each other's company. We tolerate each other for the sake of our fellow travelers, it is a necessary evil we must bear for the greater good.
"I thought you might accompany me," He replies and though I wait for some elaboration there is none.
"Accompany you where?" Eventually I am forced to ask the question myself.
He looks at me quizzically then, head tilted to one side as if he finds me strange.
"To where ever we might go of course," he says and I see I will get no sense out of him at all, so I sigh heavily and give up. Perhaps a stroll, no matter how unpleasant the company, might help the day go quicker.
"If I come with you now will you then leave me alone?" I grumble, it would not do to be seen to give in too easily and he gives me yet another of those strange looks.
"Well, yes, there would be no reason to do otherwise then."
He dismisses my complaints and doesn't wait for me to make more. He is off instead towards the forest, up into the trees. I presume he thinks I follow but I have no chance of following him when he is up so high. I know he is there but I cannot see him.
"You will have to come down Elf," I call, "I cannot see you and I have no intention of climbing trees to follow you. Do you want me on this walk of yours or not, because I have other things I would rather do."
The leaves rustle slightly and the branches part in front of me, then with barely a murmer he drops from the trees above my head, landing softly in front of me.
"You wish me to walk on the ground?" he asks me, as if it was not self evident and I begin to wonder, not for the first time, at his intelligence.
"Of course I wish you to walk on the ground, as any other normal mortal would."
"I am not mortal."
"But you can walk!" I snap. We have been only a few steps and already I am regretting agreeing to this escapade.
He turns his back to me and strides off without answering, but at least he stays with his feet on the floor. I will take that as a victory even though I must hurry to keep up with him. This is the strangest walk I have ever been on.
"Legolas!" I call to him when I have been struggling through the forest for what seems like an age, although who can know in the midst of the warped, sluggish movement of time these beings live in. I do know I am sick of this and he ignores me, we have not spoken a word in hours. My patience is at an end.
"Legolas, where exactly are we going? why do you ask me here? I am sick of walking when I do not know where it is we go."
He turns then and looks almost surprised to see me, had he forgotten he had invited me? He is so strange, so alien, I do not know how to begin to understand him. I do not know why I would want to understand him, I remind myself, he is nothing to me after all, just another elf.
"Forgive me." He says suddenly, "I was lost in my thoughts. We can stop here. It will do well enough."
"Do well enough for what?"
He does not answer me but instead pulls himself up onto a branch near my head so he is looking down upon me. It is most disconcerting.
"Must you do that?" I complain, and I wonder what it is about him that makes me always so intolerant. Why must I let him annoy me so?
He ignores me, as he so often does and continues instead with his own agenda, whatever that may be.
"Shall I leave?" He asks abruptly and I do not understand him.
"We have only just got here, you have made me walk all this way for no good reason, why then would you leave?"
"I did not mean that," he shakes his head in frustration and drops his voice low,
"Shall I leave the fellowship, that is what I mean."
I am horrified. At first I think I must have misheard him but I know I have not. He thinks to leave us? Our journey is only just begun and he would walk away? I know we have come as far as we swore to, he and I, but I did not ever truly think he would desert us.
"You are really that shallow, that fickle?" I cry, "You would leave us behind? Abandon us to our fates?"
He hangs his head in shame and I am not surprised. He should feel ashamed.
"I have nothing to offer." he says eventually, so quietly I have to strain to hear him.
"If that is all you can come up with to excuse your cowardice you should try harder!" I shout the words at him with bitterness for I am angry, not for myself but for the betrayal of my companions.
"I make no excuses," his voice is so soft, so filled with grief, "I have failed, I failed Gandalf."
"We all failed Gandalf. Why do you think you should get special mention?"
I do not want to think of Gandalf for I know all too well I was an accomplice in his death. I do not need the elf to remind me of that fact. Faced with that hideous creature of fire I was terrified and I did nothing.....nothing. I know too, it was I who pushed for Moria, Gandalf did not want it. They all have suffered because of my pride. But it seems the elf is too consumed with his own failings to consider mine.
"I dropped my bow," he whispers. There are tears hovering in his eyes but he does not shed them, and I realise, perhaps too late, that he has anguished over this.
"It does not matter, Legolas, there was nothing you could have done against.......that..... There was nothing any of us could have done."
I seek clumsily to ease his burden but I fear I am not successful. I do not know why I care, why should it matter to me that he is unhappy? Because he should not take the blame for your mistakes, my conscience whispers to me, because you are perhaps more guilty in this than he.
He takes a shuddering breath and I watch as he struggles to keep his control.
"They argued over my inclusion in Imladris, do you know that?" he says in the end, quite matter of factly. "There were others more deserving than I who should have represented the elves. They thought me too young, too uneducated, too wild."
I had not known that, had not known he was not a unanimous choice, although I have wondered, why him? Why Thranduil's son? It has seemed, at times, they chose him simply to spite me.
"I have proved them right." The elf interrupts my thoughts as he continues,
"They should have sent Glorfindel! He would not have quailed before a Balrog. He would have done something and I should at least have tried! Others have, before me. Great elves, illustrious elves, elves of legend. If I leave now there will be someone here who can take my place, someone who would be better for the fellowship than I."
"You are too hard on yourself Legolas." I wonder then, is this what he has been doing all this time here, brooding on this? Is this why he isolates himself from us?
"You need to speak to Aragorn about this," I say determinedly, for I think it is an inspired solution. "He will help you see sense."
Aragorn is wise when it comes to listening, to dealing with others troubles, this I have noticed. He will be able to soothe the elfs worries and convince him of his worth. Why he speaks to me, I do not know for I have no idea how to help him.
But Legolas shakes his head sadly
"Not Aragorn, he will not tell me the truth." He looks at me solemnly, his beautiful face grave. "He will seek to spare my feelings, he will not wish to hurt me. He would never tell me to step aside even though he might wish I was not here. That is why I have asked you, because you will be honest. You have no reason to protect me.......I know you do not like me."
He has asked me here, asked me to walk with him, to listen to this because he believes I despise him, because he believes I will not try to make him stay for politeness sake, because he thinks I will have no hesitation in telling him all his shortcomings if there are any. That realization stops me in my tracks.
Is he right? Do I dislike him?
"I need you to tell me Gimli," he says finally, and I think it is the first time I have heard my name from his lips, "Would the Fellowship be safer without me? Should I step aside for a better choice?"
I stare at him then, huddled on his branch, arms around his knees as his chin rests atop of them. He looks miserable and oh so young. He believes he has nothing to offer us. Is that true?
I think back upon our time on the road, his lightness, his positivity, the brilliance of his smile, his strength when we have needed it, I picture him running on top of the snow, on that cursed mountain, and I think of the courage that he, himself, cannot see. The courage that has bought him out here, with one he thinks is against him, to hear in detail of his failures.
If he thinks he has nothing to offer us, he is wrong.
Still he looks at me and he awaits an answer. That answer when it comes to me is not the one I expected when I began this walk.
"Legolas, I would much rather go forward from here with you by my side, than not. No matter how illustrious your replacement."
He is astonished. His face awash with surprise, and that surprise is nothing compared to my own when I realise what I have just said is true.
I do not want him to go.
"You think I should stay?" He does not believe his ears, why should he. Have I ever said anything to him that was not an insult?
"I think you should stay. I think you will have chances aplenty to prove yourself worthy and I do not doubt you will face them with courage. I have no fears for my safety with you at my back. Let us return to the others, for you have been too long apart from us. Come back with me now."
I hold out my hand to help him down. He does not need my help of course. He can leap nimbly from that branch, it is child's play for him and I know it. But I hold out my hand in any case, I hold it out in friendship, because I think he needs it and for some strange reason, I find I want to give it.
And without hesitation he takes it.
Summary: While waiting with the Fellowship in Lothlorien, Gimli discovers the beginnings of an unexpected friendship. How an Elf and a Dwarf first began to conquer the divide which lay between them.
Ranking: 3rd place
“We are all travelers in the wilderness of this world, and the best we can find in our travels is an honest friend.”
― Robert Louis Stevenson
Elves see time differently from the rest of us.
I have decided this during these long days of waiting in Lothlorien. We have tarried here longer than we should, I know it, and yet I cannot remember exactly how long we have been here. The time stretches out endlessly and the elves meander their way through it.
Aragorn seems unfazed by this, he is unconcerned by the wasted days. Perhaps because of the years he has spent in Imladris he is used to this dawdling of time. The hobbits are happy, they are glad for some respite I think, relieved to be off the road. It is only Boromir and I who chafe at the enforced rest. Day after day we complain, Boromir more loudly than myself, but it gets us nowhere. We are forced to sit idly by.
There is one more of our company of course, Legolas, but he has abandoned us. Of him we see little sign. He comes and goes, that is true, nodding to Aragorn as he does so, but he stays with us so infrequently I almost forget he is one of us. So fickle is his elven heart, so quick to walk away. I suppose this long time waiting does not bother him, he spends his days playing with his newfound friends, but what of us? I do not know why I expected any different, he is an elf of course, and they cannot be relied on.
That is why I am surprised to see him waiting for me when I return from my breakfast. At first I assume it is not me he wants, why would it be?
"Aragorn will be here shortly." I say curtly, I am not in the mood for pleasantries, especially with an elf as flighty as he.
But he does not even blink.
"It was not him I was waiting for." he says, "It was you."
"Why would you wait for me? What business could we possibly have together?" I think it is a fair question. Even before this tedious elven delay we have not been friends, have not sought out each other's company. We tolerate each other for the sake of our fellow travelers, it is a necessary evil we must bear for the greater good.
"I thought you might accompany me," He replies and though I wait for some elaboration there is none.
"Accompany you where?" Eventually I am forced to ask the question myself.
He looks at me quizzically then, head tilted to one side as if he finds me strange.
"To where ever we might go of course," he says and I see I will get no sense out of him at all, so I sigh heavily and give up. Perhaps a stroll, no matter how unpleasant the company, might help the day go quicker.
"If I come with you now will you then leave me alone?" I grumble, it would not do to be seen to give in too easily and he gives me yet another of those strange looks.
"Well, yes, there would be no reason to do otherwise then."
He dismisses my complaints and doesn't wait for me to make more. He is off instead towards the forest, up into the trees. I presume he thinks I follow but I have no chance of following him when he is up so high. I know he is there but I cannot see him.
"You will have to come down Elf," I call, "I cannot see you and I have no intention of climbing trees to follow you. Do you want me on this walk of yours or not, because I have other things I would rather do."
The leaves rustle slightly and the branches part in front of me, then with barely a murmer he drops from the trees above my head, landing softly in front of me.
"You wish me to walk on the ground?" he asks me, as if it was not self evident and I begin to wonder, not for the first time, at his intelligence.
"Of course I wish you to walk on the ground, as any other normal mortal would."
"I am not mortal."
"But you can walk!" I snap. We have been only a few steps and already I am regretting agreeing to this escapade.
He turns his back to me and strides off without answering, but at least he stays with his feet on the floor. I will take that as a victory even though I must hurry to keep up with him. This is the strangest walk I have ever been on.
"Legolas!" I call to him when I have been struggling through the forest for what seems like an age, although who can know in the midst of the warped, sluggish movement of time these beings live in. I do know I am sick of this and he ignores me, we have not spoken a word in hours. My patience is at an end.
"Legolas, where exactly are we going? why do you ask me here? I am sick of walking when I do not know where it is we go."
He turns then and looks almost surprised to see me, had he forgotten he had invited me? He is so strange, so alien, I do not know how to begin to understand him. I do not know why I would want to understand him, I remind myself, he is nothing to me after all, just another elf.
"Forgive me." He says suddenly, "I was lost in my thoughts. We can stop here. It will do well enough."
"Do well enough for what?"
He does not answer me but instead pulls himself up onto a branch near my head so he is looking down upon me. It is most disconcerting.
"Must you do that?" I complain, and I wonder what it is about him that makes me always so intolerant. Why must I let him annoy me so?
He ignores me, as he so often does and continues instead with his own agenda, whatever that may be.
"Shall I leave?" He asks abruptly and I do not understand him.
"We have only just got here, you have made me walk all this way for no good reason, why then would you leave?"
"I did not mean that," he shakes his head in frustration and drops his voice low,
"Shall I leave the fellowship, that is what I mean."
I am horrified. At first I think I must have misheard him but I know I have not. He thinks to leave us? Our journey is only just begun and he would walk away? I know we have come as far as we swore to, he and I, but I did not ever truly think he would desert us.
"You are really that shallow, that fickle?" I cry, "You would leave us behind? Abandon us to our fates?"
He hangs his head in shame and I am not surprised. He should feel ashamed.
"I have nothing to offer." he says eventually, so quietly I have to strain to hear him.
"If that is all you can come up with to excuse your cowardice you should try harder!" I shout the words at him with bitterness for I am angry, not for myself but for the betrayal of my companions.
"I make no excuses," his voice is so soft, so filled with grief, "I have failed, I failed Gandalf."
"We all failed Gandalf. Why do you think you should get special mention?"
I do not want to think of Gandalf for I know all too well I was an accomplice in his death. I do not need the elf to remind me of that fact. Faced with that hideous creature of fire I was terrified and I did nothing.....nothing. I know too, it was I who pushed for Moria, Gandalf did not want it. They all have suffered because of my pride. But it seems the elf is too consumed with his own failings to consider mine.
"I dropped my bow," he whispers. There are tears hovering in his eyes but he does not shed them, and I realise, perhaps too late, that he has anguished over this.
"It does not matter, Legolas, there was nothing you could have done against.......that..... There was nothing any of us could have done."
I seek clumsily to ease his burden but I fear I am not successful. I do not know why I care, why should it matter to me that he is unhappy? Because he should not take the blame for your mistakes, my conscience whispers to me, because you are perhaps more guilty in this than he.
He takes a shuddering breath and I watch as he struggles to keep his control.
"They argued over my inclusion in Imladris, do you know that?" he says in the end, quite matter of factly. "There were others more deserving than I who should have represented the elves. They thought me too young, too uneducated, too wild."
I had not known that, had not known he was not a unanimous choice, although I have wondered, why him? Why Thranduil's son? It has seemed, at times, they chose him simply to spite me.
"I have proved them right." The elf interrupts my thoughts as he continues,
"They should have sent Glorfindel! He would not have quailed before a Balrog. He would have done something and I should at least have tried! Others have, before me. Great elves, illustrious elves, elves of legend. If I leave now there will be someone here who can take my place, someone who would be better for the fellowship than I."
"You are too hard on yourself Legolas." I wonder then, is this what he has been doing all this time here, brooding on this? Is this why he isolates himself from us?
"You need to speak to Aragorn about this," I say determinedly, for I think it is an inspired solution. "He will help you see sense."
Aragorn is wise when it comes to listening, to dealing with others troubles, this I have noticed. He will be able to soothe the elfs worries and convince him of his worth. Why he speaks to me, I do not know for I have no idea how to help him.
But Legolas shakes his head sadly
"Not Aragorn, he will not tell me the truth." He looks at me solemnly, his beautiful face grave. "He will seek to spare my feelings, he will not wish to hurt me. He would never tell me to step aside even though he might wish I was not here. That is why I have asked you, because you will be honest. You have no reason to protect me.......I know you do not like me."
He has asked me here, asked me to walk with him, to listen to this because he believes I despise him, because he believes I will not try to make him stay for politeness sake, because he thinks I will have no hesitation in telling him all his shortcomings if there are any. That realization stops me in my tracks.
Is he right? Do I dislike him?
"I need you to tell me Gimli," he says finally, and I think it is the first time I have heard my name from his lips, "Would the Fellowship be safer without me? Should I step aside for a better choice?"
I stare at him then, huddled on his branch, arms around his knees as his chin rests atop of them. He looks miserable and oh so young. He believes he has nothing to offer us. Is that true?
I think back upon our time on the road, his lightness, his positivity, the brilliance of his smile, his strength when we have needed it, I picture him running on top of the snow, on that cursed mountain, and I think of the courage that he, himself, cannot see. The courage that has bought him out here, with one he thinks is against him, to hear in detail of his failures.
If he thinks he has nothing to offer us, he is wrong.
Still he looks at me and he awaits an answer. That answer when it comes to me is not the one I expected when I began this walk.
"Legolas, I would much rather go forward from here with you by my side, than not. No matter how illustrious your replacement."
He is astonished. His face awash with surprise, and that surprise is nothing compared to my own when I realise what I have just said is true.
I do not want him to go.
"You think I should stay?" He does not believe his ears, why should he. Have I ever said anything to him that was not an insult?
"I think you should stay. I think you will have chances aplenty to prove yourself worthy and I do not doubt you will face them with courage. I have no fears for my safety with you at my back. Let us return to the others, for you have been too long apart from us. Come back with me now."
I hold out my hand to help him down. He does not need my help of course. He can leap nimbly from that branch, it is child's play for him and I know it. But I hold out my hand in any case, I hold it out in friendship, because I think he needs it and for some strange reason, I find I want to give it.
And without hesitation he takes it.