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Though no records are to hand, Legolas does not think there can have been a more blood-laden day in their annals than the Third day of March, in the year 3019 of Third Age. As the sun rises on the Fourth, the pre-dawn light reveals rivers of blood running through Helm’s Deep - enough to fill lakes, oceans. The blood of men and elves and orcs all run together - what a surprise to find it all runs the same shade of red, so that no one can tell from whom the blood came. There is no time to dwell on such things, for battle continues; with the dawn comes Gandalf and the Rohirrim, and thus victory. Sweet, unexpected victory.
It takes from when the sun reaches its peak to when it finally sets to count the bodies, treat the injured, and feed the living; thus, Helm’s Deep can breathe once more, the rattling inhale of a fragile bird that must once again learn to fly.
For Legolas, the elation of triumph gives way to the despair of loss. He steps around the bodies of so many fine men, fine elves, with the light stolen from their eyes and their hearts lost to death. The living elves spirit themselves away before the sun sets, as if they could not bear to witness another dawn in a place so filled with despair, and so he finds himself again amongst the Secondborn; perishable, fragile, wonderful creatures, who nod as he passes and clap him on the back as if he were one of their own. In spite of their weariness, from battle and from lack of sleep, they still find ways to stand tall - the men and women alike, and the sound of their weary laughter gives him hope.
There is one of the Secondborn he wishes to see more than all others, for it has been many hours since he last set eyes on his closest friend.
Legolas looks from room to room for Aragorn, and instead finds Gimli, alone in a makeshift bedchamber. There are two single beds, crammed into a room no bigger than a closet, and Gimli reposes on one, his feet free of his heavy boots, but otherwise still fully dressed in battle armour. The dwarf nods to him, eyes barely open. “Eomer offered you and I this chamber. Aragorn has another, a few floors up, next to the armoury.”
“You have seen Aragorn? He is well?” Legolas asks. Though his feet desire to go find his Ranger friend, the stiffness Gimli’s armour makes him ache in sympathy, and so he forces himself forward, sitting beside Gimli and unlatching the plates that rest upon his shoulders, starting with the right side.
“Hm.” Gimli nods. He leans forward, giving Legolas room to continue removing the plates. “He is uninjured, and that is what is most important,” Gimli replies - evasive, slippery as an eel, and Legolas leans back to pin him with a haughty stare, the kind his father had taught him when he was no taller than a deer. Gimli huffs, and acquiesces with a roll of the eyes. “He is… pent up.”
Legolas mouths the words - a strange way to describe anyone, let alone Aragorn, who outside of battle seems as stoic as the Misty Mountains. He sets upon the other shoulder plates, unlatching them and easing off the chest plate shortly after. “What can we do to help?”
The laugh that comes from Gimli is brash, like a horse. “I can do nothing, my friend. You, however, may be able to assist.” Gimli falls silent for a long while, and just when Legolas might curse at him to spit it out, Gimli speaks, hushed, “He needs to ride out his energy, if you can pardon the pun.”
Ah. This, Legolas can understand, in the abstract - indeed, he has heard about how the blood of men might boil after battle, though he admits to himself that he thought Aragorn above such things. He knows from conversations through the years that Aragorn had not retained elven chasteness after he left Rivendell, and yet Aragorn has about him an otherworldliness, as if mortal thoughts do not run through him. “I fail to see how that involves me.”
Gimli does not respond, just looks at him long, until Legolas feels his cheeks heat and looks away. Gimli sighs. “He will not push for it, if you do not wish for it. I know you elves are strange about such things.”
Strange is indeed one way to put it, for laying with Aragorn is not something Legolas had ever thought possible. Indeed, laying with a male, though it intrigued him, was not a consideration, for copulation among elves was saved for the begetting of children in the marital bed. A solemn vow of chastity - for even within marriage, a wedded couple might only pair a handful of times, and only with the intention of begetting life.
“Perhaps you should lie with him instead, since dwarves are so liberal about such things,” Legolas replies eventually, ready for an argument, but it hits with no force, for Gimli's bones sink into the bed in relaxation, and the wry smile upon his face makes Legolas want to spook him.
“He likes pretty things,” Gimli says, “I am plenty handsome, but pretty is not a word they use for me, my friend.” Gimli sighs, and closes his eyes to rest. “Forget I mentioned such a thing. I can see I have upset you.”
Legolas does not respond immediately, for the thoughts that run through his mind are numerous and as rapid as a river. He knows what the begetting of children involves, for he has seen the stag and deer together in the woods, and been in enough mannish ale-houses to understand their innuendos, but what two of the same sex might do together remains a mystery to him.
Legolas buys himself time to consider so strange a thought by wrestling the chainmail over Gimli’s head, dumping it to the floor in a satisfying waterfall of clinks. Gimli lets out a breath, satisfied and lax, leaning back to enjoy his new freedom.
“What might two of the same sex even do?” Legolas asks.
Gimli snorts, as if it were obvious, and then frowns as Legolas feels his own cheeks redden. “You do not jest?” Gimli asks, disbelieving. “The teachings of elves are lacking, it seems,” Gimli chortles, shaking his head. “There is another orifice, laddie - though you must use oils to ease the way. Elsewise, hands and mouths can suffice.”
Legolas thinks on it long, though not so long that Gimli might fall to rest, for though his eyes are closed, the familiar rattle that leaves him in slumber does not yet ring through the room. Legolas takes the chance to remove the Rohirrim armour from his own shoulders, which sits heavy like a corpse. To be relieved of it frees him, and he feels more himself; more elvish, and yet less, for what he considers. Eventually, Legolas finds the only question left in his mind, for there is nothing he would not do for Aragorn. “He will feel better, once the act is done?”
“He will sleep like a well-fed mutt in a patch of warm sunlight,” Gimli confirms, eyes still closed.
“Surely he might find some other partner.”
“His eye lingers on you alone.” Gimli sighs, and opens his eyes, looking to Legolas. “Legolas. His eye has lingered on you for many months. Indeed, I expect it may be years, though I was not around to observe it then.” Legolas’s stomach sits heavy and light all at once, as if it does not know how to feel. “I have seen how you look at him, also,” Gimli says next, and Legolas sits up straighter.
“I am certain I do not know what you mean,” Legolas replies primly. Gimli’s face morphs, and Legolas knows that the next words from dwarven lips will only irritate him, so he stands. “I am going for a walk.”
“Hm.” Gimli nodded, letting whatever he was going to say float away into the ether, as he closes his eyes once more. “I will nap, while you walk. Do not wake me on your return, I have earned a good long rest.”
Legolas dallies on it, walking the halls of Helm’s Deep until he fears he has seen every open inch of the keep. He passes through the kitchens and the washrooms on his way, acquiring sustenance and cleaning off the haze of battle, but speaks to very few men, for his mind is otherwise occupied.
As an elfling, he heard of a swimming race across the Gulf Of Lune, where hundreds competed and the winner was rewarded a laurel which shined with pearls. He had begged his father to let him travel to compete in the swim, so that he might win so coveted a trophy, and Thranduil had laughed, for his child had swum in rivers before, but this was an ocean. Even if he were to traverse the whole distance without being plucked from the water by a boat, he was a part-grown wood elf - competing against Numenorans with a foot of height on him and an arm-span measured in leagues. His father had been as kind as possible - had argued that even he himself could not win such a race, and Legolas was better focussing on the things beneath his nose, rather than dreams that lay across the earth.
As Legolas grew older, he wondered if his father had other motives; whether he had feared his only son might be driven mad by the call of the sea and attempt to swim to Valinor, and be lost to the crashing waves between one breath and the next. He, too, began to fear the sea - that the gulls might call him away from his home and all he held dear, or that the waves would prove too powerful and drag him beneath their currents.
Legolas had given up on ever winning the laurel, for it was foolish to waste time on the impossible.
He can admit to himself, and himself alone, that he has long held a flame for the Ranger once known as Strider. A strange desire with no destination - for it was impossible for them to be together, and so he spent no time dwelling upon it, riding the waves of emotions as if he were a sturdy boat atop the swell, letting the thoughts cast over him without letting them drag him too deeply beneath the water.
Fifty years of latent desire, unwound in a few coarse words from a dwarf, for now Legolas can acknowledge the truth of the matter: it would be no foul thing to lie with Aragorn.
His thoughts might differ if he were somewhere other than Helm's Deep, but the men he passes in the halls are noble and honourable. They carry themselves tall, and are no less brave for what actions they might take in the dark of night, in private chambers. Had the Lorien elves remained, Legolas suspects his will may have faltered; but here, amongst the Secondborn, he starts to consider that perhaps the act would not be as ignoble as his people might think.
The more he thinks upon it, the more sense it makes to lie with the man. To give Aragorn, his closest, most handsome companion, a little relief - to be a port in the storm, somewhere to rest his weary head. Legolas will not seek his own pleasure from the experience - that would surely be unelven - but to offer pleasure, relief, intimacy to his most beloved friend could be no foul event, no matter what elven norms might suggest.
Legolas does not think on it further. Indeed, he cannot, for he stands at Aragorn’s door, and knocks gently upon the wood before he can let a doubtful thought creep in. At the call, he enters, and locks the door behind him, for regardless of outcome, he would rather they were not interrupted.
Aragorn sprawls upon the bed, hair wet from washing, dressed only in his leggings, and stares up as if the ceiling had done him a great injustice. His brow wears a heavy crease, but he is resplendent, even as he sulks, the light of two small candles engulfing him in golden contrast. A threadbare blanket rests over the end of the footboard, ready for the restless man's eventual sleep. Find your strength, elf, Legolas commands himself, and kicks off his boots and stockings, then approaches the bed slowly, though Aragorn does not move from his sullen repose.“You have not slept,” Legolas chides.
“Neither have you.”
“It is different, for elves,” Legolas responds, and Aragorn huffs in response. Legolas comes to the narrow bed frame, sitting beside Aragorn’s hip. The single bed makes for a tight squeeze, and Aragorn makes no attempt to move over, but Legolas makes it work, pressing the curve of his bent hip against the flat hip of Aragorn.
Despite the small point of contact, Aragorn twitches at the press of their bodies together, and Legolas marvels at it - that he could receive so great a response for so little. “What brings you here, elf?” Aragorn asks, gruff.
“I have an offer,” Legolas responds, and then falls silent. Aragorn looks to him, one of his fine brows raised, his handsome grey eyes crinkling. “Like fresh rain on a blistering summer’s day, I am here to soothe you, my friend,” he says, and Aragorn frowns, as if searching for meaning in an ocean of mystery.
You are being too vague, Legolas chides himself, but cannot coax the words out, cannot invite Aragorn to take his fill and fuck him roughly on the thin mattress, as if he were a comely barmaid in a tawdry tavern. Action is the way he can show his hand, he decides, and so gently, slowly, he rotates himself on the bed so that he faces Aragorn, and slowly, with intention, lowers his hand to rest on the mannish stomach, mere inches from where Aragorn’s desire lies.
Aragorn’s hips buck into the air and a curse is ripped from his lips, and it sparks something within Legolas - not a reflected desire, but a warm charge, that his touch could have so great an impact on the man. He pets the stomach beneath his palm; its concave shape furrows his brow, for he likes Aragorn well-fed and rested, a luxury his dear friend has not had since they left Imladris months earlier. The travel has thinned him out, and now his spirit, too, wears thin.
When he looks away from his palm, Aragorn examines him with wide, unsure eyes, pupils large and dark in the half-lit room. “You do not want this.”
“You have known me many years; surely by now you know that I have no issue in saying no when I wish to say it,” Legolas replies, voice light.
“This is unheard of amongst elves,” Aragorn says, scorn in his voice, though Legolas does not take it personally, and instead smiles.
“The Lorien elves have departed. I am amongst men now.” Aragorn does not speak, and the silence eats at Legolas. He withdraws his hand, unsure. “If you wish for me to leave -”
Aragorn’s own hand snaps out, capturing his in a firm grasp and returning it to its resting place. The stomach warms beneath his palm, and when he sweeps his thumb across the skin, it flexes pleasingly beneath his touch. “Ai, I am weak,” Aragorn replies, squeezing the hand encased in his own. “I wish for the fire within me to be quelled,” He confirms, and Legolas nods, for he can be the water that dulls the flame. “If your people find out, they will shun you.”
“Do you intend to write to my father, to tell him what happens within these four walls?” Legolas asks, a smile within his voice, and Aragorn shakes his head, his own hand falling away and grasping at the sheets. “Well then, my friend. I think I am safe.”
“Have you ever even - with yourself -“
“You know that is not our way.” Legolas lets his hand ghost up and down the hollowed stomach of Aragorn, and plans the feast he will cook, once all this is through. “Does it bother you, that I am untouched?”
Aragorn lets out a shuddering breath. “It does not bother me, so long as you are willing.”
“I am willing, but I must admit, I am curious,” Legolas starts. His gaze strays downwards, towards Aragorn’s leggings, where his desire lies. The length tents his trousers now, though Legolas has barely touched him. “Why not take care of the matter yourself?”
Aragorn sighs, deep and long and heavy. It is a whole body sigh, and shifts Legolas’s hand, where it rests upon the man’s stomach. “Ai, that is like drinking a glass of water when you are craving wine,” he replies. His eyes fall closed, lashes fanning across his cheek, and he looks like a painting made real. “It sates the thirst, but still you hunger.” Aragorn sits up now, and Legolas lets his hand fall from stomach to thigh, where he has never dared touch before. Their faces are close, so close that Legolas can feel the man’s panting breath upon his cheek. “I wish to remember that I am alive, Legolas. That cannot be done alone.”
To see the man so intimately tempts Legolas greatly, and then Aragorn’s eyes drop to his lips, gaze lingering. Legolas lets his own gaze drop also, looking to Aragorn’s lips, and they remain there, as if connected by a string, holding them close.
The tension is agonising.
Legolas cannot stand it any longer.
He closes the gap.
Aragorn kisses like he fights, putting his whole spirit into the embrace, leaving nothing left upon the table, and Legolas matches his force, putting in the same tidal wave of enthusiasm that he brings to battle, every time he fights alongside Aragorn, hoping his ardour cancels out his inexperience. His hand tightens on Aragorn’s thigh, and the man hisses into the kiss, as if Legolas’s touch burns.
Aragorn’s own arms wrap about him tightly, curled around him and unrelenting. Their chests are pressed together, and as the kiss deepens, Legolas feels the man’s heart jump against his own.
Legolas pulls away and takes a fortifying breath, for his own heart attempts to jump also, and he must regain control, for passion is a mannish trait, reserved in this room for Aragorn alone. Instead, he focuses on his hand, where it rests on the thigh of Aragorn, and moves it further up the leg, until his fingertips are brushing against Aragorn’s most private place.
“Gods, Legolas,” Aragorn mutters, and it makes Legolas bold. He cups the bulge, and Aragorn’s eyes close, and Legolas massages it, gently but thoroughly, and Aragorn’s head drops in pleasure.
Legolas watches him, enthralled by each reaction his touch evokes. It is like learning to use a bow, seeing what adjustments make the arrow sing, and he watches Aragorn grow as tight as the bowstring, flexing in his grasp.
Though Legolas could happily continue his exploration, Aragorn seems to come back to himself, and reaches out, pulling him in for another kiss, hot and wet, and then pulling at his tunic, insistent. “I wish to see you.”
Legolas removes the tunic, and Aragorn’s eyes roam across his torso as if it were wide open plains. The candlelight flatters, Legolas is pleased to see; at least, Aragorn seems pleased with the view it affords, and greedy mannish hands follow his eyes. He plucks at Legolas’s nipples, smiling to himself as they redden and stiffen. Surprise hits to see his own body react in such a way, but Legolas pushes the spark down and lets Aragorn continue his exploration. Aragorn offers out two fingers, and Legolas takes them within his mouth, understanding the symbolism, sucking and licking and letting his teeth graze the skin, until Aragorn’s eyes are wholly black, and he withdraws his fingers with a lewd pop. The man brings his wet fingers down, and rubs the spit into Legolas’s nipples. It cools as soon as it hits the skin, and makes his body sing like a lark.
He lets out a shaky breath, and turns the attention to Aragorn, for this is for him.
The mannish nipples are surrounded by a scruff of hair, the whorls framing them like snow on a mountaintop. Legolas dips in and takes the left into his mouth, lathing it, and it punches the air from Aragorn. Not one to leave his hands idle, Legolas lets his nails drag gently down Aragorn’s sides, and it makes Aragorn arch into his mouth. From there, manoeuvring Aragorn to lie down is no burden, and Legolas leads him down and straddles his thighs, never releasing the captive nipple from between his lips.
He takes cares to control his arousal, to dampen the flames that would build in his spine and spread to his cock. He thinks of the disapproving faces of the elders, and lets it dull his own desire so that he can focus entirely on Aragorn.
Aragorn’s leggings come off next, Legolas dragging them from his hips and then Aragorn kicking them down his legs until they are freed. Aragorn’s sex lies heavy and thick, and seems to thicken as he observes, even more so as he reaches out to touch, petting at the silken head. Legolas has never seen a cock to attention - not even his own, for he had long been trained to reject such bodily actions - and it looks as perfect as the rest of Aragorn, a bead of liquid resting at the tip like a pearlescent laurel.
Aragorn’s hips raise, a pleasing sight, and then he rolls up, reaching for his pack, where it lays beside the bed.
He returns with a jar of ointment, scentless and familiar. Legolas opens the jar, and looks at the viscous liquid within. “It will ease the way.” Aragorn says, taking the jar, and Legolas nods, for he remembers the words of Gimli.
Legolas decides he will face away for the act, for he suspects Aragorn will take his soft cock as an affront - a folly, for the effort it has taken to remain soft is a great compliment to Aragorn. Legolas has never struggled so hard for control before. Arousal bubbles just beneath the surface, and he fights to keep his head above water, for its enticing call drags him down, dragging him closer and closer to Aragorn.
Aragorn sits up, and Legolas prepares to turn away and remove his leggings, but before he can, Aragorn rotates beneath him, arching his hips up so that his plump behind bumps against Legolas’s front. The man’s fingers are covered in ointment now, and much to Legolas’s confusion, Aragorn reaches behind himself, petting at his own entrance.
It is a sight beyond imagination, and Legolas takes a moment to compose himself, imagining still, cold water. Once his arousal dampens, he places a hand on Aragorn’s rear, which the man leans into. “I thought I would be the receiving party.”
“You have not done this before. It is not something to be rushed, the first time,” Aragorn pants back, no room for argument. Legolas does not respond, but drags his hand from Aragorn’s rear to his entrance, using the ointment he finds there to push in a little, beside Aragorn’s own fingers, until Aragorn withdraws his own fingers and Legolas takes over.
As his fingers pump into warmth, he considers his options.
He cannot remain passive if he is to do as Aragorn wishes. Arousal would be a necessity; the strange distance he has tried to maintain must be shattered. It is unelven, what he would do; but then, he thinks idly to himself, was his elven-ness not already in tatters?
“Legolas?” Aragorn calls, and Legolas realises his fingers have stilled, deep within Aragorn. Aragorn looks at him, over his shoulder, brow furrowed. “We do not need to go further, if you do not wish it,” he offers, “We can stop altogether, or we can remain as we are.”
Legolas does not need to think on it, for he knows the truth of the matter.
He wants this. More than anything. Damnation to the elders, who might tell him to turn away from temptation.
Legolas nods to himself, and lets the arousal flood his veins. His control shatters like the breaking of a dam, pleasure quickly takes over, his cock filling rapidly, and now desperation to be inside Aragorn overwhelms everything. “You are warm, inside, like a hot spring,” Legolas replies, turning his fingers a few times and then removing them. “I am cold, and wish to be heated.”
Legolas stands to remove his leggings, and revealing himself to Aragorn’s heavy lingering gaze. The man’s eyes are dark as the night, and he looks at Legolas with an unfamiliar hunger.
“You will need to stretch me more,” Aragorn mutters, gaze intent on Legolas’s length. Legolas looks down, for even he has not seen himself in such a state before, straining upwards in pleasure. Liquid paints his tip, also, though he finds himself less entranced by it than he had with the pearl upon Aragorn. “Stallions in the paddock would weep with envy to see you.” Aragorn reaches out and palms him, and Legolas understands the hunger of Aragorn now, for the touch of Aragorn awakens something inside like nothing he has felt before, leaving him desperate for more.
Like Valinor, it calls to him.
He is ready to sink under.
Legolas peels the hand from his crotch and kisses its palm, then rests his cheek within it. It is not something Legolas imagines men do when they rut against one another in the aftermath of war, but Legolas thinks Aragorn will not mind. Indeed, Aragorn pets at him, long-held fondness evident in his touch, before he turns back to kneeling.
“This will need to be slower than I intended,” Aragorn says, and he sounds almost apologetic, which Legolas cannot understand.
“Close your mind to worries, Aragorn. No harm will come to you.” His fingers re-enter the man, and he stretches him with intent now, spreading his fingers as much as he can. The noise it makes when his fingers push in, wet, unlocks some primal need within him; to hear what other noises Strider might make, what moans and cries he might fall from reddened lips as Legolas takes him.
He splays his fingers once more, but this time, his fingers hit a different texture within Aragorn, and the man freezes. Legolas, too, stills himself; waits to see if Aragorn is well, but then Aragorn pushes back, impaling himself once more, panting ever heavier.
Legolas curls his fingers intentionally this time, pads rolling past the patch. A shiver runs down Aragorn’s spine, and then he bows his back, his head falling forward. “This will be over far too quickly if you continue to press there,” Aragorn warns, and Legolas laughs, straightening his fingers and pumping a few times.
Legolas indulges himself next, plastering himself across Aragorn’s sweat-slick back to kiss at his shoulder, which shines in the candlelight. “Who could have suspected such a strong man might be so sensitive?”
Aragorn tilts his head to look at him, and Legolas smiles back, for a red flush paints his cheeks, as if Aragorn had imbibed twenty ales, and his pupils are as wide as the sea. Legolas reaches forward with his clean hand to brush the hair from his forehead, and blue eyes brush closed under his touch, and Aragorn leans into his hand.
Aragorn is heady and heated, his eyes intent on Legolas, and he turns his head to catch the fingers in his mouth, kissing at them and sucking obscenely, until Legolas pulls them away, leaving Aragorn panting.
"I am ready now,” Aragorn says, bracing himself.
“A little longer,” Legolas asks, but Aragorn shakes his head, lowering himself to his elbows, and so Legolas nods, withdrawing his fingers. “I do not wish to hurt you.”
“More oil - upon yourself this time," Aragorn instructs, and Legolas obeys, until his length drips with oil, slippery soft. “Do not push in all at once.” He implores, and Legolas nods, aligning himself, and imagining he is the tide coming in.
Entering Aragorn heats him like nothing he has ever felt before, and he wonders at why his kin would be so adverse to such pleasures as he dips in and out, deeper with each push. He pumps forwards slowly, meticulously slowly, even as Aragorn complains that he could move a little faster, until at last, he is fully buried, and Aragorn’s complaints give way to heavy breathing, rhythmic and intentional. “Aragorn?”
“Are you sure it is your cock that you pierced me with, and not the battering ram the orc wielded at the gate?”
Legolas laughs, and lets his hands roam across the back of Aragorn as he waits for him to adjust. He massages at the tense shoulders, squeezes at the trim waist, and finally, palms at the firm buttocks which he is buried between.
The carnal pleasure might be new, but the fondness in his heart is old and well-established, and he wonders if Aragorn feels the same, if that same fondness is matched in his own heart.
"This is not how men rut after victory," Aragorn mutters. His words are slurred from where his mouth rests against his own bicep. "It is fast and rough - usually against a wall."
"Hm," Legolas intones. One of his hands comes round to Aragorn's stomach next, for he enjoys how the skin there feels - soft and lightly furred, despite the hollowness. "I fear I am too tired for such a coupling today. If you wish for such a rut, I am sure there are plenty within the keep that would indulge you."
Aragorn shakes his head, and he shifts to his left, so that his right hand comes free, covering Legolas's hand where it rests upon Aragorn's stomach. "I did not mean it that way. This - this is better."
Legolas smiles at that, and lets their entwined hands come lower, until together they are petting at Aragorn's cock. The tension in his shoulders melts away like snow in Spring sunshine, and his back flexes and arches.
His behind, too, flexes, and Legolas breathes through the intensity of it. Aragorn, ever a Ranger, does not miss such a sign, and flexes again. Aragorn's hand falls away so that he can once again rest on both elbows, and Legolas lets both his hands come to Aragorn's hips, for he expects the next instruction shall be to move.
The instruction does not come, for instead Aragorn takes matters into his own hands, moving forward and back and impaling himself on Legolas's cock. It takes Legolas a moment to understand the rhythm of it, but soon enough he finds his pace, and then they are moving together, as smooth and in sync in the bed as ever they have been in battle.
The feeling is beyond imagination, a feast for the senses; the warm clench of Aragorn around him, the sight of strong muscles beneath him, the slick sounds they are making together, and the heady smell of sex that fills the air. Were it anyone else beneath him, Legolas suspects he might be repulsed; and yet here, with Aragorn, it feels a spiritual experience, one that Legolas fears he will never eclipse in the millennia left of his sorry existence.
“Aragorn…” He mutters quietly, kissing at the man’s shoulder until Aragorn turns his head, curious. “Do you near the end?”
“I have been holding off from the end since you first entered me.” Aragorn reaches between his own legs, to where Legolas cannot see, and though Legolas expects the man to play with his sex, he instead reaches further, petting at where their bodies meet. “You fit so well within me, as if you were built for this alone,” Aragorn praises, and heat coils in Legolas's belly.
“Perhaps it is you that was built for me, to take me so well,” Legolas praises in return, and enjoys how the back of Aragorn's neck flushes deep enough to be seen in the candlelight. “It is time, Aragorn. Show me that you live.”
Aragorn pulls away, until they are entirely disconnected, which makes no sense to Legolas, but then he rolls to his back, granting Legolas a view of his entirety. He takes Legolas by the hips and leads him back between the crux of his legs, but now Legolas finds he can see all the better - Aragorn’s flushed nipples, his tensing muscles, his swollen, reddened cock and drawn tight testes, which look as if they ache.
This may be new to him, but Legolas has sparred and wrestled and trained enough to know how bodies might sit together, and so he pulls one of Aragorn's legs up, until Aragorn grasps it himself as he lets the other leg splay wide, holding himself exposed and open. Legolas looks to his face, wondering if Aragorn might be flushed to be in such a position, but the man merely raises an eyebrow, and Legolas huffs a laugh, sliding forward to align them once more.
Once he has guided himself inside the warmth again, Legolas lets his hips piston in of their own accord, one hand entwining with Aragorn's and resting on the thin mattress for balance as he brings the other, still a little slick, between Aragorn’s legs, forming a tight grip around the length and pumping. The angle now lets him find that strange space within Aragorn that had spurred such a reaction with fingers; he reacts again with a similar wildness, panting and pushing into it freely.
It is clear to Legolas that Aragorn tries to hold the pleasure at bay now; as if he no longer wishes for the finish to come, to reach whatever dizzying peak is promised at the end of all this. He pushes his head back into the bedspread, as if trying to escape, even as his mouth cries out for more, for Legolas to fuck him harder, for his hand to move faster. He holds himself back admirably, a man battling against a tide of pleasure and pressure, chest red and heaving from the effort, cock somehow even firmer than it had been before, and his voice, as it cries do not stop, is reedy and breathless.
And then, Aragorn reaches the summit, crying out Legolas as he reaches his crest.
Every part of Aragorn clenches and pulses as he spills across his own stomach, Legolas guiding him through it with firm hips and a tight hand. It is the most beautiful thing Legolas has ever seen; more than Lorien, more than the rivers of his homeland, more than any piece of art in Imladris. Aragorn's hand tightens impossibly in his own, his forehead coming to rest against their joined wrists as he pants and his cock pulses its last, a wet mess against Legolas's other palm. Legolas stills his hips, still hard within Aragorn, and marvels at the look on Aragorn's face, content and relaxed and beautiful.
Legolas thinks, perhaps, that it would be more elven to not reach the climax. It is so close now - a handspan away, tickling at his fingertips - and now that he has seen such an experience through Aragorn, he wants it for himself, so desperately wants to tip over the edge, but he cannot justify it to himself, not now. Aragorn is done, his pleasure is spent, and so Legolas slides his hips back, and laments that he was born an elf.
Aragorn's leg stills his departure, and then pulls closer, easing him back in to that warm heat and then clenching about him. "I want to feel you fall apart," Aragorn mutters, as if it were so simple.
"You are spent," Legolas reminds him, and uses every ounce of restraint not to rut into Aragorn, for Aragorn clenches again, pulsing inside, his chin tilted in a challenge.
"I wish to see you fly," Aragorn says, "You would deny me this?"
The fight within Legolas weakens. He wants it more than words can express. He wonders if perhaps he was a changeling at birth - a long-lived Secondborn disguised as an elf, for surely an elf would have more restraint than this. "I would deny you nothing," He promises, and lets his hips begin to move once more.
Aragorn releases his own leg, keeping it there with the strength of his hips alone, and offers out his other hand, which Legolas grasps desperately. When they squelch together, Legolas remembers the hand drips with Aragorn's spend; he goes to apologise, but before he can, Aragorn brings their hands to his mouth, and licks at the mess, sending a fresh cascade of heat down Legolas's spine.
Legolas shifts forward, as far as he is able, and yet not far enough, for his lips remain too far from Aragorn's. Aragorn curls up, just enough for their lips to meet, and Aragorn's lips are salty and bitter but Legolas finds he does not mind, and curls his tongue around Aragorn's regardless.
Aragorn tilts his head, so that their foreheads rest together. "I did not expect you to last so long, given your inexperience."
Legolas smiles. "I am well-versed with restraint." It spurs a huff from Aragorn.
"Restrain yourself no longer, Legolas, for what follows is beyond imagination," Aragorn promises. "I am sated, and wish only to see you sated also. Come, Legolas."
Legolas nods, for the last fifty years have involved following Aragorn blindly into the next adventure, and tonight would be no different. He thrusts harder now, letting his body move how it wishes, for it seems to understand what pleasure he chases better than his mind can hope to comprehend.
Legolas looks between their bodies, an area almost wholly in shade, and can see only the outline of Aragorn's softening cock, and the sheen of his spend, where a few drops lie across his belly. I have done this to him, Legolas thinks, a wave of unjustified possession overtaking him and sharpening the pulse of his hips. It is my name he called tonight, no one else's.
That thought, base and greedy, tips his body into the final pleasure, a hot pulsing tension that starts in his hands and ends in his cock, where it is buried within Aragorn. His hips stutter from their rhythm, his hands clench, and he gasps out Aragorn's name like a prayer, for this feeling soars beyond belief, beyond imagination, beyond measure. His entire body erupts, back curling, cock straining against it all, the pleasure punching its way out.
He wants to close his eyes as he rides the pleasure, but to lose sight of Aragorn would only be punishment, and so he forces them to remain open, taking in the sight of his dearest friend as the pulses in his groin drift further apart. Aragorn’s heavy and sated gaze sparks from him the final flush of pleasure, and then he is fully spent, deep within Aragorn.
He goes to withdraw, but Aragorn’s legs curl about him and hold him still. “Just for a moment,” Aragorn promises from his repose.
“As long as you would like,” Legolas offers back, for though the stimulation now borders on too much, he would not leave Aragorn bereft, and he wishes to remember every moment of their embrace, and how hot Aragorn had been inside. "How can a married elf experience such pleasures once and not wish to experience them a thousand times over?"
Aragorn looks at him, considering. "Before tonight, I thought that elves must experience such acts differently; that perhaps it was duller for them, and thus uninteresting," Aragorn ponders, brows quirked above sleepy eyes. "Did you find it uninteresting?"
Legolas laughs. "Ai, like watching paint dry," he agrees lightly, and then shudders when Aragorn clenches around him again for revenge. He leans forward once more and waits for Aragorn to meet him there, and they kiss, soft and sated now. "Perhaps it is uninteresting for other elves, and I am a poor elf for enjoying the act."
"I am glad, then, that you are a poor elf."
Half a minute passes before the grip around his hips loosens, and Legolas pulls out. A handkerchief is abandoned on the nightstand, and Legolas uses it to clean the both of them up, whilst Aragorn lies upon the bed, energy now spent, eyes unfocussed and aimed at the ceiling.
My duty is done, Legolas thinks to himself, and goes to stand, but as soon as he lifts a knee, Aragorn’s attention shifts to him, and his hands reach out.
The man’s eyes are as soft as goose-down pillows, his hands as feather-light as silk, and it is not the war hero Aragorn in the bed now, but Estel, the young man who sang romantic songs at the top of his lungs and touched flowers as if they were precious gifts, whispering their names like prayers. He gathers Legolas in, until they are entwined once more - though now the heat of earlier has departed, for Estel has all the force of a gentle stream.
I have fucked the fight out of him. Legolas keeps the thought to himself, for the room warms with affection, which would only be sullied by such coarseness. Estel’s eyes are heavy now, and Legolas comes forward to kiss him, closed mouth and chaste, as if they had not just spent the last half hour rutting against one another. Estel takes one of his hands and holds it close to his chest, as if the hand itself were beloved.
Estel holds him there, close and warm, and when he finally loosens his hold a little, Legolas does not pull away. He nuzzles his face close to Estel, letting his lips trace the handsome jawline, until he can kiss at where ear meets jaw, revelling in the small hitch of breath it evokes, and the taste of his skin, as salty as he imagines the sea to be. The bed is too narrow for them to lie side by side, so he remains partly atop Estel, heavier than any blanket, but Estel does not complain, though Legolas knows he is no light leaf.
“Is it always like this?” Legolas asks, though he knows his own answer to the question already, for no one else would have felt so lovely, would have made his heart so warm.
A smile colours in Estel’s voice as he answers No, and he does not elaborate further. “You will stay the night?” Estel asks, and Legolas nods, settling into his place sprawled across Estel. He reaches over and pulls the thin blanket on the footboard over them both, settling in. “My mood is always improved by your presence.” He kisses as Legolas’s fingers, then brings the hand within his grasp to his cheek.
The stubble grazes his hand roughly yet pleasantly, and Legolas runs his thumb against the bristles soothingly. "Rest, Aragorn."
"Soon, I promise," Estel pledges, though his eyes remain stubbornly open. “There are many battles still to come,” he says, and Legolas frowns. “Many more times when it might be pleasant to be soothed by you.”
In spite of himself, Legolas feels his heart jump at the suggestion, and at the fragile hope that rests on Estel’s brow. “Every part of my body is at your service, always.”
Estel considers him with sleep-laden eyes, and the next words that slip out are ones that Legolas imagines Estel would not dare voice by the light of day. “Even your heart?”
Estel asks too much. Still, Legolas answers truthfully, “Ai, even my heart.”
Estel nods, and smiles, turning his head to kiss the palm on his cheek, which warms under the attention. "I have lain with many men, and every time, I have closed my eyes and imagined you. It was unfair to the men to think they could approximate you," he says, gentle and sure, and Legolas feels as if he is gliding through water, like a swan. Estel yawns, sinking into the thin mattress. "There is more that I would wish to say, but I fear words escape me right now."
Legolas pets at his cheek, fond. "Rest, Estel. We can talk more when the sun rises."
"I shall take that as a promise, that you shall remain in my bed until the sun emerges from her sleep," Estel states, and Legolas nods, an easy promise to make. "Let me look at you, one more time."
Estel lifts the blanket for a moment, looking down upon his body as if it were fine art. The candles are nearly burned to cinder now, but give off enough light for Estel to see what he wishes. The dim light shines brightly enough for Legolas, too - he looks down at Estel, nude and golden, and where their skin presses together to form shades of bronze and copper that glow in the candlelight.
Estel lowers the blanket, and looks to Legolas's face one final time, touching his chin with gentle fingers. "I have admired your face many times, but your body is new to me. I shall dream well tonight," he pledges, and then between one breath and the next, falls to slumber, head lolling in peaceful sleep.
Legolas, too, feels suddenly tired, as if sleep's waves will drag him under in a heartbeat. He lowers his head to Estel's chest, which is warm and slightly furred, and still glistening from the vigour of their activities.
Estel would suit a pearled laurel, Legolas thinks. The impossible seems more in reach, now - they could swim the Gulf of Lune side by side, and share their winnings over kisses on the shore. The gulls could hold no power over him now, not with the promise of his love beside him, calling him to the earth.
Such thoughts are midnight wishes. Legolas casts them aside, for he needs no far off Gulfs that night, and commits to dreaming of the impossibility sharing his bed instead.
Legolas turns his face towards Estel, whose fair face is outlined by the near-dead candle, and lets himself fall to rest.