there was only me and my disgrace

[dirth]

WHO: Solas and Thranduil
WHAT: Something a little like this
WHEN: After Morrigan's report has been handed to Thranduil
WHERE: Solas' rooms
NOTES: Some Trespasser spoilers, if anyone is worried about them!

It's rare that anyone comes to Solas' rooms - there are a few people, enough to count on one hand and little more, who might know to seek him out here if he was not in the library, but it is few and far between. Most people, if they seek his council or his wisdom, are content to wait for him to emerge from his sleep with whatever new memories and fond visions he has captured from the Fade, with whatever it is that he's learned that evening.

The knock shakes him from his ready and he frowns, considering for a moment. The very fact that someone has come here without contacting him first - as would be the case for Galadriel or Gwen, for example - makes him think that it might be some kind of emergency, even if he's not entirely sure he wants to deal with those sorts of issues right now. Given the state of Kirkwall... It's hard not to get yourself entangled in it all.

In the end, good intentions - or, rather, bad ones, depending upon the person - win out and Solas moves forward, putting his book down on his desk. It's an easy walk to the door and his surprise is evident once he sees who is waiting there for him, his head tilting and his eyebrow raising just a little. He's surprised but not altogether unhappy to see his friend on his threshold.

"Thranduil. I did not expect you." Slowly, stepping back, Solas motions him to enter the room.

Comments

[rowancrowned]

He enters with a smile and a swish of his robes against the floor, turning to close the door after himself.

“I apologize for the surprise,” he murmurs, making for the window. Open or closed, it does not matter; the likelihood that they will be overheard is so slim as to be zero. A benefit of the sparsely populated Gallows, but he enjoys the view of the harbor well enough.

Thranduil looks Solas over searchingly as if to prove to himself that nothing is new. No, his friend looks like he always has, calm and scholarly in a very particularly homegrown way. And he cannot really blame himself for missing signs, for the elvhen, though alike, are not mirrors to the quendi.

“What was it like, when you woke from uthenera?”

[dirth]

It takes some time for Solas to feel settled and comfortable again.

He had not been prepared for anyone to find him out so soon in his planning. While the whole truth may not be known - he is not without some secrets, at least, for which he is glad - there is enough for more connections to be made, more theories to come together, more secrets to unearth. If anyone would be capable now, he thinks to himself, it would be Thranduil, who had gone so far and learned so much already.

It takes almost a week for him to seek out his friend once more; he imagines that Thranduil might think him prepared to skip their weekly meeting with one another, but Solas is learning that there is some strength to be found in courage and, for the moment at least, he cannot run from this problem. It is already there - the most that he can do is accept it, allow it to exist and keep a close eye on it, fearing what might happen should anyone else find out.

(He has been told to tell Galadriel, but he does not have the faith, the confidence, the courage to even begin to explain it all to her, not when he can feel the gentle, phantom feeling of her hand upon his shoulder, comforting and warm and filled with something unsaid.)

Coming to Thranduil's office, he hesitates at the door before he breathes out, gathering himself. He moves inside, as he has done for many weeks now, and stands upon the other side of his friend's desk, eyes careful and measured, betraying nothing.