A/N: I am so sorry for not updating quicker. Thank you so much for reading this, your support and feedback means so much to me! ❤ ❤
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"So can you work it out?" Lily asked Gandalf the next day, they all sat in a locked room in the Citadel archives gathered round the letters.
"I think I can work it out." Gandalf replied cryptically, holding the letters thoughtfully.
"You need some time then?" Legolas asked. Gandalf replied that time is exactly what he needed. "How long?" He inquired, Gandalf flicked through the letters.
"A day should do well." He told them both, that was pretty quick.
"Should we tell Aragorn?" Lily asked them.
"No, not until we know what it says." Gandalf replied, before he closed his eyes and started chanting as he ran his hand over the letter. They took that as their cue to leave and went back up into the citadel. As they walked along the corridor, Legolas and Lily were laughing over one thing or another when they ran into someone.
"Prince Legolas...and the lovely Lily." Neddon crooned, oh Lord.
"Hello there." Legolas replied, not even attempting to hide his contempt which was unlike him. He must be seriously pissed off.
"How are you?" Neddon asked Lily.
"Fine." She shrugged, was he getting at something here? Did he know about the letters? Or that she'd hid in his wardrobe for several hours.
"How are you?" He repeated.
"Fiiiiine." Lily replied, mimicking his tone. Neddon tutted at her.
"Directly then, how's the child?" He asked coolly. Legolas wrapped his arm around Lily's waist protectively, she didn't know whether it was subconscious or not but the gesture was not lost on Neddon.
"Sorry what?" Lily asked him, trying to deflect his attention.
"You're having a child, correct?" He asked directly.
"Well yeah...however it's not really your business." Lily told him angrily, glaring at Neddon, Legolas looked between them.
"Everything is quite well, would you excuse us Lord Neddon." Legolas nodded, moving him and Lily along and out of the citadel. She was glad he'd been able to keep some composure because hers was long gone.
"He's repulsive." Lily stated as they walked back home.
"Falsely pleasant." Legolas conceded. "Now what you like to do for the rest of the day? Something to cheer you up?" He offered, Lily grinned up at him, that sounded perfect.
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"Mattress surfing!" Lily enthused as they got through the door, Legolas raised his eyebrow at her. "Oh right..okay we can do some baking," She amended, that was baby safe.
"Baking?" Legolas asked sceptically.
"Is Prince Legolas afraid of getting his hands dirty ?" Lily teased, he playfully bashed into her and she laughed.
"I would love to bake actually." Legolas retorted, marching off to the kitchen. "We are making..." He asked as he flipped through Lily's recipe book. "Brownies, we're making brownies", He looked her confidently before looking back to the book. "Actually I'm not certain I want to eat a food that is named after the colour brown." Legolas backtracked.
"They taste better than they sound." Lily promised, as she began getting everything everything ready. "Pass me those eggs." Lily called, as she got the mixing bowl and whisk out.
"Who put you in charge?" Legolas questioned lightly.
"Oh please, you don't even know what brownies are!" Lily protested, throwing flour in his face. Legolas looked shocked, turning his gaze back to the recipe book.
"So what do we need first?" Legolas asked turning back to Lily.
"Okay, first comes the sugar and butter" She told him perkily. He looked at the book and then put the recommended amount into the bowl.
"Are you alright?" He asked, softly placing a hand on her back.
"Yeah, I'm fine." Lily looked up at him, confused as to why he was suddenly asking how she was. "Is this about Neddon?" She raised an eyebrow, she was already sick of that guy's name and she hadn't known him long.
"Yes," Legolas conceded, he began to mix the butter and sugar. "I can feel that..." He trailed off.
"What can you feel?" Lily asked softly, winding their hands together.
"That he's-" He's what? Finish your damn sentence, Legolas. "I'm not really sure." Legolas exhaled lightly.
"Wow, what an interesting insight." Lily smiled softly, going back to recipe before being distracted by a knock on the door. Legolas went to answer it straight away, Lily quickly followed.
"Lord Neddon is a traitor." Gandalf stated when Legolas opened the door, Lily was not even slightly shocked.
"Come in." Legolas offered, standing to the side and letting everyone's favourite wizard in.
"So you cracked the code?" Lily guessed.
"Yes," Gandalf replied, getting the letters out and putting them on the table. Legolas and Lily cast each other a glance before looking at Gandalf. "During the war, Neddon passed information about Gondor to the enemy." He told them gravely.
"Information?" Legolas quirked an eyebrow up at Gandalf.
"Gondor's weaknesses, their plans, anything of use." The wizard told him, Christ on a bike.
"What a fucker." Lily exclaimed, Gandalf looked slightly shocked by her choice of language but Legolas didn't bat an eyelid.
"We have to tell Aragorn." Legolas said, fiercely loyal to Aragorn, as usual. Lily was pretty sure if she hadn't come to Middle Earth and Arwen hadn't stuck around, Leggy and Aragorn would be straight on it.
"We will tell him...at the right time." Gandalf told them, what did that mean? Why was he always so cryptic?
"The right time is now, Aragorn must know." Legolas replied. Lily completely agreed with Leggy, Aragorn deserved to know more than anyone.
"If Neddon realises the letters are missing, he'll be straight out of here. Legolas is right, this can't wait." Lily reasoned, Legolas gave a gentle smile before turning back to their friend.
"If Neddon leaves then there will be no place in this realm where I will not find him," Gandalf told them. "I am asking you to trust me." He said simply, of course they trusted him...it was Gandalf.
"I trust you." Lily smiled, Gandalf gave her a grateful nod.
"I trust you, with everything." Legolas replied apologetically, Gandalf gave him a warm smile and held his shoulder.
"Justice will be done upon him." Gandalf promised, giving them a parting nod before leaving.
"That's just…", Legolas shook his head for a moment.
"Wow." Lily nodded in agreement, before they fell into silence.
"So...brownies?".
"Yeah!" Lily agreed, quickly heading back to the kitchen.
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"Am I doing this correctly?" Legolas asked her, as he poured the mixture into the tin.
"Yeah, think like Mary Berry, we don't want any soggy bottoms here." Lily smiled, licking some of the chocolate off the spoon.
"Soggy what?" Legolas raised an eyebrow and smiled, Lily simply waved her hand at him. "Have you thought of any names yet?" He asked.
"If you get your way then it'll be Aragorn Jr." Lily laughed, Legolas flicked some flour at her and laughed. "Gimli?" She grinned, Legolas gave her a 'not a chance' glare. "It'll probably just be something elvish that means like magical leaf or something." Lily shrugged, putting the tin into the stove.
"It should be a name from your homeland." He told her. Lily felt herself tearing up and she realised how soft Middle Earth had made her, how soft he'd made her.
"Okay." She replied excitedly, thinking of every possible name. She'd always wanted to base her child's name off of pop culture and now she could without it being 'tacky', as her mother had previously suggested. "Katniss?" Lily asked hopefully.
"Like the plant?" He asked, continuing to follow the recipe.
"Yeah...the plant." Katniss was a plant, who knew?
"You want to name our child after a plant." He repeated, a bit rich coming from someone named after a leaf.
"Fine...Hermione?" She asked tentatively, he thought about it for a moment before shaking his head. "Elsa?" No. "Anna?" No. "Mulan?" No. "Tiana?" No. "Megara?" No. Lily was exhausting the Disney list and Legolas was turning them all down.
"I cannot help but notice they are all female names...are we having a girl?" He asked teasingly.
"Fine we'll move on to male ones. Tom, Ron, Remus, Sirius, Severus, Albus, Arthur…" Lily trailed off at the last name.
"What is it?" Legolas asked, enclosing his hand in hers.
"Nothing, it's just...my dad's name is Arthur," She shrugged. Lily was hit by the weight of how much she wanted them there, to help her and to be with her. They would never see their grandchild, never know it even exists. "And he'll never know about our baby." Lily mumbled, Legolas wrapped his arms around her.
"I know they're not here, neither is my mother but we will love the baby enough for all of them." Legolas promised, kissing her forehead and going back to the baking.
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"What's going on?". Lily asked Legolas as they approached the main hall of the citadel. There seemed to be a lot of commotion going on, Lily looked around curiously.
"Aragorn." Legolas called, striding over to his friend. Aragorn looked around angrily but his glare softened when he saw Legolas. "Lady Arwen." Legolas smiled courteously, she nodded in return. "What is happening?" He asked, looking around the hall.
"Gandalf told me about Lord Neddon, what you found out". Aragorn gave Lily a grateful smile before looking severely pissed off again. "How could he do that, to his own people?" Aragorn lamented, looking sorrowfully at the ground. "How many lives did his treachery endanger?" He asked again. Lily understood how Aragorn felt, he wanted justice for his countrymen. She wondered if Neddon would be killed for his crimes.
"Where is he now?" Legolas asked coolly, it seemed Neddon was the most unpopular person in Gondor.
"Gandalf put a spell of confinement on his chambers, he will detained there until his execution." He promised. So he was to be killed then, Lily couldn't say she felt that sorry for him.
"How's the baby?" Arwen asked softly, Aragorn looked a little ashamed that he had neglected to ask.
"Absolutely fine." Lily smiled in response. Arwen took her arm and they began walking away, giving Legolas and Aragorn the chance to talk.
"How far along are you now?" She asked warmly.
"Four months now." Lily replied, obviously excited to which Arwen smiled. "What about you and Aragorn?" She probed, wondering if that was an off limits topic but that didn't usually stop her.
"As proven today he's very focused on being a leader right now, a child deserves undivided attention." She smiled benignly.
"He has a gift for leading." Lily replied, thinking of all the times Aragorn had saved people's lives with his decisions. He had the exact balance between action and logic.
"Everyone is gifted with something." Arwen stated. Lily felt like Arwen had several gifts whereas she had none, not that she was bitter of course.
"Legolas and his faithfulness, Gandalf and his wisdom, you and your positivity." She offered, there were a few times Lily felt the opposite of positive but not lately. Lately things had been very good, no lives had been hanging in the balance like usual.
"I came here during the war and I'm still incredibly new to the ways of Middle Earth so I have a question. During peace time, is it truly peaceful? Where do all those orcs, goblins and other freaky things go?" Lily asked. It was hard to be completely at ease when a goblin might still be about to jump out of a bush at any moment, okay maybe not that scenario exactly but you get it.
"They go back to the dark recesses of this world." Arwen replied calmly.
"Like caves and mountains?" Lily asked, she had no idea what a 'dark recess' was, she wasn't sure she wanted to either.
"Yes and other desolate places, I would avoid mountains, caves and the like at night time." Arwen noted. Oh yes, those night-time cave walks that Lily definitely went on. "Lily, Sauron was one type of evil in this world. Orcs, goblins and the such are another. Men like Neddon another. Saurman is another. Darkness is ever present, there are many types of evil in this world, complete and undisrupted peace will never be an option in this life." She finished, that was unbelievably depressing.
"I never thought I would say this to you Arwen, because you are a wonderful and radiant lady but you just briefly made me want to kill myself." Lily told her, Arwen took her hand and smiled lightly.
"I just want to protect you, you're like the younger sister that I never had." Arwen gave her a benign smile and looked back to Aragorn, "Excuse me". Lily thought about what she'd said for a while and began to understand. The same fear had been present in her world: violence, terrorism, hatred and the such, Middle Earth just had different dangers. The war was over but was it safe, was somewhere like this ever truly safe? What if something happened to Legolas, or their child, or her. Hands gripped her shoulders and she was pulled from her thoughts.
"What is it?" Legolas asked, frowning slightly. Lily didn't know how to explain that she was being pulled into an existential crisis.
"Just thinking." She smiled, waving her hand and trying to seem positive.
"What is it?" He repeated gently.
"It's just...something Arwen said." Lily began hesitantly, as her and Legolas left the hall and walked through the courtyard. "She said that complete and undisrupted peace is never an option, how dangerous is it here exactly?" She asked. I mean orcs and battles and creepy men are something she could live with on a very short term basis, but the idea of them being present for their entire lives was not a pleasant thought.
"It's dangerous in it's own way, as I'm sure it was in your world. Sometimes there is peace, sometimes conflict, sometimes joy, sometimes sorrow. That is simply what happens in Middle Earth, but despite all the negativity you have been through, you have chosen to stay. Because in your heart you know that being here, with those we love is worth the risk. Choose to hope instead of to fear and the threats and shadows will not linger." Legolas told her, pulling her close to him and kissing her lightly on the head. As she looked out onto the sun setting on the horizon and felt Legolas' arms holding her securely she felt a wave of peace overcome her. Yes there would be danger, but above all she had people who she loved and who loved her in return and despite the fear of darkness, they would always have hope.