Do Not Go Gentle

What Are Emotions, Anyway?

I gulped audibly and paused in my place for a second. In the end, I decided my fate would not be to go down so easily, and I plopped down in the other chair while pushing my cloak into my body to have it lay nicely.

"You wanted to talk to me about something?"

Elrond looked at me from the side of his eye as he glided around the desk, and took his spot on his well-worn chair. "Indeed."

Goldilocks, however, didn't move a muscle or say a word.

My lips pursed and immediately my arms crossed in front of me as I allowed myself to lean back and prepare to take the brunt of whatever lecture was coming. "What did you want to talk about?"

Elrond placed his hands on the desk in front of him, kindly folded the same way Arwen does when she is about to talk about something controversial. Gods, why does this always happen to me?

"Well, Persephone, what do you think you have been called here to discuss this afternoon?" He asked, peering over at me with more knowledge than I could bear.

I sighed. "I know you want to talk about the feast and what happened. But I'm better now, and I swear it won't happen again."

Goldilocks coughed, and I turned to look at him, seeing his gaze still set on Elrond. "What was that, Lord Goldfish?"

A wry grin appeared on the blonde's marble face, and I did my best not to blush as he turned to lock eyes with mine. "It is worrying that you lost control of your powers at all, Milady Persephone."

My hands covered my face as I tried to hide the embarrassment that immediately took over my body. "Oh, gods, I know! That's never really happened before... I mean, it has happened before, but never when I was in a public place like that- oh wait, well, that's a lie, but-"

Elrond lifted a hand up to ease my blabbering. "Peace, Persephone. We are not mad at you."

Both my mouth and my hands dropped simultaneously. "You're not?"

Glorfindel shook his head as well, smiling brightly (as per usual). "No, Gwingil, we are not."

I turned to gauge Lord Elrond's reaction, and he was looking at Goldilocks knowingly. "We are hoping to help you figure out how to control your powers so something like last evening does not happen again."

I slowly nodded, still a little unsure if they were going to say "just kidding!" and start yelling at me.

Goldilocks looked at me knowingly. "We are not joking, either. Lord Elrond and I want to make sure you are okay after what happened yesterday."

I definitely blushed.

"Arwen spoke to me before you came in, and told me you were experiencing muscle pain?" Elrond asked, furrowing his brow.

Glorfindel's eyes widened slightly. "What would that be from?"

I shrugged, trying to avoid his bright eyes by turning back to Elrond. "Power exhaustion, most likely."

Elrond tipped his head to the side. "What do you mean by power exhaustion?"

I scratched my neck. "When I overuse my powers, usually after doing something rather explosive, I become really tired and it's like energy is pulled from my muscles to complete those actions. It's been worse than this, that's for sure," I explained. "One time I was out for a week."

Goldilocks looked concerned. "What did you do to put you out for a week?"

I smiled slyly. "I blew up a volcano."