I enter the palace, my eyes instantly adjusting to the dimness. A pair of shining, blue eyes watching me from across the hall is the first thing to catch my vision. Legolas is stationary by his father's side but when I meet his gaze, he starts.
I feel my stomach drop. Not now.
I quicken my pace, turning my back to the prince as I head toward one of the many staircases leading to the upper levels of the palace. It is not long before I feel the tremor of his steps through the stone pathways as he follows.
"Celé!"
My name echoes through the deserted hallway and I freeze. Every muscle in my body is taut, straining to continue walking. Despite this, I am somehow calm as I turn to face him.
He stands a length away, his brows knit and jaw set.
"We need to talk."
I shake my head, turning.
"There is nothing to talk about," I say quietly. "I'm leaving. Asfaloth awaits me in the stables."
His hand catches my wrist.
"Celé, please."
The strain in his voice tugs at my heart. I hesitate but turn back to face him, raising my gaze to his. I find a mix of emotions clouding his eyes, but one shines through more starkly than the others.
Fear.
I frown to myself. Fear of what?
He doesn't release my wrist, searching my gaze.
"The betrothal." He speaks softly. "You know."
I nod. "As did you. Long before I ever did."
Though I don't mean for it to, bitterness seeps into my words. Legolas catches it immediately, but no retaliation rises to his face. Guilt stains his eyes.
"Yes," he concedes. "I had my suspicions."
Surprise washes over me. I hadn't expected this.
"You suspected?"
He lets out a bitter chuckle, finally releasing my wrist, no longer expecting me to run. "It became more and more obvious the longer you stayed here." His eyes darken. "The longer you were forced to stay here."
"I knew who you were the minute I saw you. You are the spitting image of your grandmother."
He pauses, eyes roving over my face. "A true daughter of Lothlórien."
"And I knew my father saw it too." A knowing smile touches his lips. "You cannot possibly be mistaken for anything less. Your bearing demands it."
"So, when he asked me to duel you to confirm your bloodline, I was confused but obliged. It surprised me to learn how matched we were, not only in skill but in temperament, in wit-." He pauses, gaze darting up to mine. "And in heart."
Something twists in my chest, and I tear my eyes away.
"As time passed," he continues, "I couldn't help but begin to feel myself drawn to you. Everything about you felt right, like you filled a missing part of me."
His voice darkens. "We were almost too well-matched, as if something more than fate had guided us to each other. And as your visit continued to extend, keeping you here, beside me, I began to suspect. So, after the feast, I confronted my father. And he told be everything."
Silence follows his confession. I let it fill the space around us.
He had known. The whole time, he had suspected.
The realization threatens to engulf me, but I force myself to remain calm.
I voice my next thought.
"But you didn't think to tell me."
"And lose you?" There's such an unconcealed plead in his voice, begging me to look at him, but I keep my eyes carefully trained on the stony ground between us.
"Celé, I had just found you. Was I to find and lose you all in one day?"
At a loss for words, I can find nothing to do but scoff, throwing my hands up in the air in defeat. He catches my wrists, forcing me to meet his gaze.
"What would you have had me do, Celebríel?" He searches my face, eyes bright beneath his knitted brows, painfully earnest in their plead. "My hands were tied in this. To tell you would have only driven you further away. I-"
He breaks off, the fire fading from his eyes as he drops my hands, turning his face away.
"I didn't want to lose you. Celé." His voice is pained. "I can't lose you."
"I can't-" He takes a shuddering breath, tugging a hand through his hair and getting it caught in his braids. "I need you."
My heart pangs painfully in my chest.
He looks so lost, helpless, as he stands unable to face me, that I almost curse the words that next fall from my lips.
"But not enough to trust me."
His gaze snaps back to me, wounded. I feel my resolution quaver but somehow manage to hold firm.
"Legolas, don't you understand?" My voice trembles as I watch the hurt flicker through his eyes, threatening to send me into tears. "My entire family hid the truth from me. They didn't trust me, not one of them."
Tears blur my vision and I bite back a sob. "I thought you were the one person I could trust. But not even that turned out to be true."
He takes a step toward me but I'm already moving away, blinking the tears from my eyes.
"Do you love me?"
The words surprise even me as they fall from my lips. They are hardly more than a whisper, yet they freeze him in his tracks.
"What?"
I straighten as I find his gaze, strengthening my voice as I repeat the question.
"Do you love me?"
He stares at me, his eyes wide, and pain stark in their icy depths.
"Love you?"
The words escape his lips in a rush of breath, as if my question had knocked the air out of him.
I watch him carefully as he stares at me, disbelief written across his face.
"Celebríel," he whispers, "You had completely shattered my life and put it back together in the span of a month. My every waking moment was devoted to you. I was utterly and completely yours."
The light in his eyes gutters and his voice breaks.
"Love you? Celé, you held my heart in your hands, and you never even realized it."
The words pierce my soul, sharp as a blade. In their wake lies a deep hollowness. And it aches.
A tear slips down my face.
"Oh, Legolas."
Approaching him, I raise a hand to his cheek, and cautiously brush away the tear that shimmers there.
"I would have willingly accepted the betrothal because I wasn't in the least afraid of marriage." The smallest of smiles pulls at my lips. "Not when I was to be wed to you."
He searches my gaze. Then, bringing his hand up to where mine rests on his cheek, he tugs it to his lips, murmuring my name against it as he presses a soft kiss to my palm.
"Celebríel." He repeats my name like a prayer, slipping a finger underneath my chin and gently lifting my gaze back to his. The touch sends a shiver down my spine.
And then he dips his head and places his lips on mine in a searing kiss. My body instantly melts under his touch. His hands are at my waist, pulling me into him as his kisses become more insistent. My mind is ablaze with the feel of him, every renewed touch of his lips to mine slowly burning through my resolve.
We finally break apart, and he rests his forehead against mine.
"Tell me you love me," he breathes against my lips.
The words jolt me, and my hand falls from his cheek only for him to catch it in his own. I falter, my tongue like lead in my mouth, no words rising to my lips.
"Tell me you love me, Celé," he repeats, and I hear the slightest bit of hopefulness steal into his voice.
It pierces my heart, but I force myself out of his embrace.
"I can't."
The light in his eyes shatters.
My voice trembles. "Perhaps in years to come, we could have grown to love each other."
His brow furrows. "Do you not believe that to be possible any longer? Is that what is stopping you now?"
"That's not it, Legolas..." I murmur. "But how can I marry a man I do not trust?"
"I have faced more heartbreak in these past six months than I have in my entire life." Pain streaks my words.
"I can't do it anymore," I whisper, my voice breaking, pleading with him. "It hurts too much."
I turn from him, unable to hold that broken gaze, but he catches my wrist, pulling me back toward him.
"We can fix this Celé." He searches my gaze, desperation building behind his eyes. "Please. We were meant for each other, even our mothers knew it!"
His eyes search mine, almost childishly hopeful.
"You were born for this forest. I see it every time I look into your eyes."
His forehead comes to rest against mine.
"Please," he whispers against my lips, heartbreaking in his gentleness. "Be my wife."
I ache to lose myself in him all over again, my heart begs it of me, but I simply shake my head.
"I can't."
I pull myself away.
"Let me go, Legolas." My eyes find his again. "Please."
He simply stares and stares, his gaze desperately searching mine for something that I know he will not find. And fear rises, once again, in his wide eyes. Terrified of what it would mean to let me go.
A moment passes, a tear slipping down his cheek. And then slowly, one by one, his fingers loosen on my wrist, and he releases me.
I leave him standing alone in the hall.
And even though my heart tugs at me and weeps, begging me to stop, to take one last glimpse of the only man I'd ever come to love, I do not look back.