No Home Here

Chapter Sixteen: Unsure

Elladan rolled over in his bedroll. ‘How is it that I somehow manage to pick the one spot where the sun shines directly into my eyes early in the morning?’ He thought to himself, trying unsuccessfully to open sticky eyes. His acute hearing picked up the sounds of someone with a high, squeaky voice chuckling, but immediately dismissed it as his brother’s insanity rearing its ugly head.

With a sigh he untangled his arms from his blankets, lifted his hands to his face, and manually pried his eyelids open. When he could finally see, he kicked off the rest of the bedroll and sat up, taking in the camp that they had pitched last night. Elrohir, who had taken the second watch, was laughing at someone.

It took Elladan’s slightly sleep-clouded mind a moment to realize that his twin was most likely laughing at his sluggish attempts to wake up. Right then however, the elf didn’t really care. He clambered to his feet and surveyed the small camp. The horses were standing close bye, Estel’s tack on the ground next to them. The sight of the worn leather brought Elladan’s attention back to the sleeping form of his brother.

The child looked as if he’d had a rough night: his face was too pale and his breath still rattled ominously in his chest. The elf began to feel quite guilty indeed. ‘Elladan, what have you done now? You knew that we shouldn’t have ridden so hard yesterday, but you just had to continue on until nightfall! You know that he’s not an elf, so why do you push him as if he has the stamina and resilience to illness of one of the eldar?’

He glanced over to his twin, asking with his eyes whether the boy had been like this all night. A quick, pained nod was the only answer that he received from Elrohir before the other elf turned back to the fire he was rekindling. Blame washed over him in waves, and Elladan simply stood there, watching his brothers while he mentally berated himself.

‘You are the oldest,’ he told himself, ‘the one who is responsible for their safety. They trusted you, and what did you do? You let them down!’ Abruptly, however, his mental tirade ceased as Estel opened bleary eyes. The young man sat up in his bedroll, and Elladan immediately moved to be with the sick child.

Elrohir, though, was closer and inevitably reached his little brother’s side before the older elf had taken more than a few strides in their direction. The elder twin sighed and stood a few feet away while his brother comforted Estel.

“Dan? The boy asked sleepily, looking up at his brother’s fuzzy face.

At this, both of the elves gave each other scared looks. Estel had been able to tell them apart from almost the day that he had arrived at Rivendell. Elrohir surmised that the boy must be very sick indeed if he was confusing the two elves.

“No Estel, it’s me, Elrohir.” He said in a soft voice. Estel nodded sleepily, obviously not really comprehending what his older brother was saying. Elrohir frowned slightly, but tried to keep his voice light.

“Estel, can you tell me if you hurt anywhere?” He asked. The boy took a deep breath, and then chewed his lip for a moment before waving his hand vaguely in the direction of his chest.

“Does it pain you when you breathe, tithen pen?” //little one. // The boy’s dark head bobbed up and down briefly, and Elladan moved over to crouch beside his twin. Knowing that their younger brother spoke but a few words of Westron, the eldest of the group spoke to his brother in that language. “What do you think he has?” The elf asked with a frown.

“I’m at a loss for exactly what is wrong with him, but whatever it is was probably caused by his riding through that storm and all day yest…” Here he trailed off, looking at the ground guiltily. Elladan winced and skirted around the statement.

“Do you think that we should move him?” He asked, glancing at the bleary fifteen-year-old, who was still sitting up in his bedroll. Elrohir looked uncertain and fiddled with one of his braids for a moment or two before answering.

“Staying here surely cannot help him. It might be best to continue on to Rivendell. Then we can all sleep in our own beds.” The last part was a sorry attempt to add a bit of humor to the situation, but all that it managed to do was stretch out an awkward, guilty silence that seemed to permeate the very essence of the quiet clearing. Elladan sighed wearily.

“Let us return to Rivendell then. Ada will help.” Elrohir nodded to this, and the twins set out to break camp. The younger elf sat down on the ground and dragged his pack over to his position. Searching through it, he frowned, jingled the bag, and rummaged through the canvas pack some more. Elladan paused in rolling up his bedroll and grinned.

“So what is this latest victim that has fallen prey to the impenetrable depths of the Peredhil pack?” He asked with a small smirk. Elrohir only rolled silver eyes and ignored his brother’s remark.

“Socks.” He stated shortly. “I could have sworn that I had packed an extra pair.” Elladan clucked disapprovingly. As he tied off the cord that was keeping his bedroll rolled, he made his way over to his own bag.

“Well, since neither Estel nor I have any desire to travel with you when you haven’t changed your socks, you can borrow a pair of mine.” The elf said rather smugly. Elrohir muttered something under his breath, causing his twin to chuckle. A moment or two later, however, and the eldest brother was no longer smiling.

“I know that I had more than two pairs on this trip: after that incident with Glorfindel I always pack extras.” A collective shudder went up from the twins as they recalled that particular event, but they both were soon distracted by Estel muttering something.

“What was that, little brother?” Elrohir asked, masking his concern with a cheery voice.

“I said that I am not deaf, and can still hear you!” The young man stated grumpily. At this both of the elven twins looked rather sheepish, and Elladan scuffed his bare toe in the dirt.

“Well, yes, we shall be going now Estel…” He countered lamely. “Rivendell shouldn’t be more than a few hours down the road now.” Estel nodded sleepily and began to untangle his limbs from his bedroll.

The brothers (with Estel doing more bleary blinking than working) quickly took down the rest of their camp and were mounted. A rather grouchy young man rode in front of Elrohir as the three set out, and soon the Peredhil children were back on the road, heading towards home, warm beds, and a lecture to last a lifetime.