Title: Caverns Old
Rating: G
Word Count: 689
Fandom: LotR
Content notes: N/A
Author notes: I've been meaning to write this for a long time.
Summary: Legolas and Gimli in Aglarond.

Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap.

Legolas kept his eyes fixed on the Dwarf in front of him. Gimli's footfalls ought to be reassuring, but they only made him more cognisant of the weight of stone.

Gimli, no doubt, could read every pockmark in every stalagmite, but stone was silent to Legolas. Should something cave in, he could not catch a vine and swing to safety, or leap to another tree.

Tap. Tap. Tap.

Drums. Drums in the Deep, thought Legolas, with a thrill of remembered panic that almost caused him to stumble. For who knew what bred underground, far from the Sun?

But Moria was lost and the Balrog slain, and the Necromancer vanquished forever. He, Thranduil's son and one of the Nine Walkers, who had faced down a Balrog and felled dozens of orcs in close combat, was flinching at night sounds like a greenhorn.

He hummed a song under his breath, but the notes were dulled. In Mirkwood - Lasgalen, now - all he needed do was step aboveground to feel the night air on his face. Even the spiders clustered like gleaming blackberries under the canopy had been unable to inhibit all growth. Colonies of weaver ants had formed a luminous chain with the weight of their own bodies; rainfall had set mushrooms sprouting from arachnid corpses; tiny, toxic drupes dangled within easy reach of returning beetles.

Here, all was barren. No singing, no fires, no insect life, no birdsong, no streams, no green things. Save mosses and lichens, maybe, but what Dwarf would catalogue such tNow he came nearer to knowing why his mortal friends had been so frightened of the Dead.

Swish. Swish. Swish.

Gimli's lantern wavered. Before he knew it, Legolas's bow was nocked.

He thought he had been swift and silent, but Gimli turned at once, setting the lantern-light quavering. "If there were orcs hidden in these caves, my friend," he said, amused, "do you not think we would have heard them miles away, and flushed them out?"

"It is not orcs," said Legolas, trying to steady his breathing. Then he threw his pride to the winds, for Gimli, after all, had openly admitted his fear in Fangorn. "I do not know, Gimli, what I am afraid of. It was Moria, I think. I mislike these long, meandering caves, with hardly a tree or a river, and no sky above to steer by."

"Why did you not say so before now, daft Elf? We will reach our base presently. My architects have opened vents where light and air can shine through. I cannot promise greenery, but you may sing to the stars to your heart's content tonight."

Gimli's "vents" were all that Legolas might have wished for: not crude holes in the walls but beautiful round windows such as might have been found in any Hobbit-hole, save only that they were covered in the most delicate crystal and hinged and framed with gold and silver. To his delight, Legolas found that he could clamber up onto the little window seats and take in the night air.

And better still, there were three capacious copper perches fashioned like talans, with vine-embossed golden ladders leading up to them and silken curtains to screen off each one. Inside was a nest of blankets and pillows, and diamond-studded velvet hangings made to resemble the night sky. In place of a ceiling was a silver trellis, supporting both leaves hammered of the thinnest gold, and real beech and elm trees.

"I was wondering where you had got to," remarked Gimli, having clambered up with supper by means of a nifty platform that sent up plates - and Dwarves - with the touch of a lever. "I see you have discovered my little hideaway."

"I think," said Legolas, with a longing look at Gimli that made the Dwarf hide his face behind his cloak, "Elbereth is not the only one to whom I will be composing hymns tonight. Such artistry is worthy of song."

"That is no great compliment! Everything is worthy of song to you," teased Gimli, once he had recovered his equanimity - only to lose it again when Legolas fell upon him with kisses.