CLOSED: Drakonis Rifter Arrival

[faderifting]

WHO: New rifters & Solas
WHAT: Arrivals and returns
WHEN: Drakonis 20
WHERE: The Dales
NOTES: This log is slightly backdated and closed to new rifters and Solas. However, it is safe to assume that everyone (a) survives and (b) is led by Solas to Skyhold by Drakonis 25, so you're free to make new logs and begin playing at Skyhold when you're ready to do so.

You were asleep--deeply or fitfully, for the last time or just resting your eyes for a moment-- and then you were not. And wherever you were was not, anymore, replaced by nothing but the sensation of falling, tumbling into endless, bottomless nothing. If this were still a dream, you would wake before you hit the ground. You can't die in a dream, they say. In some worlds.

But there's no waking here, just a flare of green-white light and a jarring impact onto cold dirt and long grass. When your breath returns and the light's after-image fades from your eyes you will find yourself beneath a canopy of trees, illuminated deep green by moonlight in the distance and brighter green by the crystalline tear in reality hanging suspended above you.

You are also not as you were: in the palm of your left hand there glows a narrow splinter of light the same sickly green as whatever brought you here. It aches, a bone-deep pain that gnaws even through all the distractions. Like the fact that you're being attacked. Surrounding you and the rift through which you arrived is a circle of six ghostly, humanoid figures, shifting colors in the dark like iridescent gems and throwing fire, ice, and bursts of physical force at whomever catches their attention.

Luckily, you are not on your own. Around you others are rising from the ground, equally confused, with the same green lights flaring from their hands. And not far is a lone figure, coming to help.

Comments

[parkourprince]

The confusion was mirrored in Legolas's features. Why did Thranduil not know? Legolas had spent days recounting the journey to him when he returned for a time to Mirkwood, all their adventures, the dangers and the griefs, but also the joys and the beauty of the world he had witnessed. They had spoken at length about it, what blocked it in this memory now?

"The Fellowship that had set out from Imladris to destroy the One Ring," again, he choose to speak in a tongue that was more familiar to him, such that provided them privacy as well. "And with it, to once and for all destroy the Enemy." Still, years later, and with Sauron destroyed, Legolas did not feel comfortable speaking his name. "When the War had come to an end, at long last, with your leave I have lead those who wished to go to Ithilien, to heal these lands and live among their beauty."

And the, he watched, awaiting to see recognition in Thranduil's eyes.

[rowancrowned]

What Legolas waited for did not come, though Thranduil did understand the words. The Enemy, dormant for so long (never mind his suspicions) had awoken again. What he had feared since he had become King had come to pass, and Legolas- Legolas had been, from what he grasped, though faintly, on the front lines.

"Gorthaur-" he managed. "The Enemy, he is truly defeated ?"

Not as he had been during the Last Alliance, when all good had been twisted and burn, and the dirt saturated to mud with the blood of the fallen.

Shock and confusion turned quickly to something south of anger, Thranduil fierce with his questions. "And why were you on this quest? Why did this Fellowship need to contain my only son, my only child, when my people have spent more blood than any other to defeat Gorthaur?"

[parkourprince]

It didn't shock him that Thranduil had such a negative reaction to this news - they have had a similar conversation upon his return, just as fierce - but instead what did shock him was that they were having it all over again. As if Thranduil did not recall any of it, the journey or the war, the peace after and the way Mirkwood flourished so, so much it deserved its true name back: Eryn Lasgalen.

"I had not been made to shed a drop of blood in all that time, but instead drew a lot from the enemies standing in my way," he assured, speaking softly in contrast to Thranduil's sharpness. "It was a choice I made, to protect you and our people, so that what had to be done would be done, lest all of us were to fall to the Enemy's darkness."

There were better candidates, for sure, elves older, more powerful than himself, but he had thought he did well enough.

"I had hoped to make you proud, ada, rather than angry."

[rowancrowned]

Legolas’ response cooled him, and the harsh anger dropped from his face as Legolas spoke of wishing to make him proud. He relaxed—forced himself to, and shook his head.

“My anger is not with you, Legolas. I am proud beyond words, for you have done well when others had failed. The fault lies with those who would send you, my son, my only child into the pits of Mordor.” On this side of the sea, he was all Thranduil had left to him that was not the Elvenking’s too.

“There are countless others, your equal in everything but bow and beauty, but you are my son, and they know that. Did they wish to punish me, admonish me? I am the last Sinda king in Middle-earth, alone among Noldo, widowed, surrounded by shadow—by Sauron—and it is what is most precious to me that they sent into danger.”

[parkourprince]

What all could he say to that? This guilt that had been roused when they first had this conversation returned full force, after he had already soothed it, learned to live with it. In the end, what Thranduil could fear the most did not come to pass, and he had returned safely. But it was the knowledge of the future, and what had his father felt when he had first found out about it? Most likely from some messenger from Imladris, from the Lord Elrond.

And though it was but a year, nothing more but a speck of dust in the life of an elf, it was a year of living in uncertainty and fear.

"When I volunteered, I had not thought of the effect it had on you. I only understood upon my return, when I saw the build up of all those months of pain and uncertainty." The darkness of the night was a veil that hopefully afforded them but a shred of privacy, and Legolas used that. He reached for Thranduil's cheeks, one hand then the other, to urge him to lean low right as he climbed to his tip toes to rest their foreheads together. "For that, please forgive me, ada."

[rowancrowned]

He closed his eyes, accepting the affectionate gesture, gripping Legolas’ shoulders for a moment before releasing him. Thranduil welcomed the attention, but could not justify keeping them embracing for longer than a beat or two.

“You are no longer an elfling. You have the right to make your own choices. I am no Thingol—I witnessed what happens when a father holds too tightly.” Not that he would ever lose the urge to keep his son by his side. “You need not ask for forgiveness. It is granted, always. And now, when we return, I will have the comfort of knowing you will be gone but a year, and return to me whole..”

He would not consider the alternative.

[parkourprince]

Legolas understood completely. It was but a moment they could allow themselves out here, and the moment came and went, he was satisfied. Had to be, after all, and Thranduil seemed comforted as much as was possible.

"In a world free of the Enemy," comforted Thranduil might be, but Legolas still wished to urge him to see the bright spots, to know what good future awaits them. "Where we will be able to restore our home to what it was, once upon a time, and it will be worth to carry the name of Eryn Lasgalen. The cries and laughter of elflings will be heard again, and no great spider or orc will dare step a foot near our trees."

Legolas did not entertain the notion that they would be unable to leave this new world. He could not, would not, there was no other option but to find a way back home.

[rowancrowned]

There was another matter to consider, one he had put so far from his mind that the return of it to the front of his mind took a moment.

“And after our trees are green and healthy again, we might finally sail.” All his obligations in Middle-earth would be fulfilled, and no one could say that he had shirked his duties or performed unadmirably. He closed his eyes, and squeezed Legolas’ shoulder. “I will see your mother again.”

Finally, finally—after so many years of waiting, of being without her. He gazed down at Legolas with fondness in his eyes. “My son, who defeated the Enemy. It will be all thanks to you.”

[parkourprince]

It warmed Legolas from within, to hear Thranduil speak like that. Though rare it was that he mentioned mother, whom Legolas himself had known but briefly. Few were his memories of her, all from his early childhood, but they were still vivid, still crystal clear in his memory when he recalled them.

But then his eyes widened in surprise, and he had to bite back a sheepish chuckle.

"I played but a small part, it was the two brave hobbits that deserve the honour to hold that title," he shook his head, smiling fondly still, "We will sail, we will all be reunited again."

[rowancrowned]

"You will bear it anyway, at the insistence of your proud father." Legolas' almost-deaths would sit on his heart for months yet, but he would hide his concerns for the sake of his son. He brushed his fingers down the side of Legolas' face, tucking an errand lock behind the point of his ear. His son. His wife's son.

"Come, Legolas. It seems that we are to leave this place soon." The other elf- Solas- seemed to be gathering everyone with the intent to move for a holdfast of some sort. Possibly his own. "Is Bill in good health?"

Not to carry goods, of course. Bill was wholly unsuited for such a task.

[parkourprince]

There was no arguing Thranduil there and then, Legolas could tell at a glance. He smiled, shaking his head, and did not insist anymore. Instead there were other, more pressing matters, that demanded his focus.

Solas indeed seemed to be gathering everyone, and so they ought to get ready to set out as well. His arrows were all already in the quiver, every single one he spent during the battle, and none of them damaged, thankfully. That was as much as he had with him, anyway, so it wasn’t like he had a whole lot to pack.

“”He is nervous, disconcerted, as we all ought to be,” given where they were — in a world wholly foreign and dangerous — and how they found themselves here. “But he will follow my lead, I think, he knows me still though I have difficulty hearing him.”

What used to be clear, if simple, now became nothing more but garbled nonsense. It saddened Legolas.