B2MEM

[dreamflower]

A drouble (200 words)
Rating: PG for angst

E: LIKE AN EVIL ELROND

Frodo’s thought swam upward. The world swirled about him in a freezing mist of pain and weariness. Over and over he relived that instant, the pale face, its eyes cold and empty, frightening and filled with an awful blackness, looming over him with the knife, but ever the memory stopped there, before the pain, and he was once again thrust to the beginning, as he so foolishly placed the Ring on his finger. And now a pale face, frightening and filled with a terrible light in the eyes, unlike the cold dead eyes of his first memory. But looming over him with a knife, thrusting the point into his shoulder--

Pain! Agony lanced through him--surely he would die! Ai! His thought faded away and fled into blessed silence once more…

“I have it,” said Elrond, looking in disgust at the shard of the Morgul-knife, such a tiny foe to be so fell and loathsome. “I am afraid that at the last he perceived me. I hope that he will not remember when he awakens the pain I had to inflict upon him.”

“I do not think it will seem more to him than an evil phantom of delirium,” replied Aragorn.

Comments

[telperion1.livejournal.com]

Ooh, nice moment! Not the one that I would have thought to use (what with all the examples movie!Elrond gives us), but this is masterfully told and very nice job of redeeming him.

[dreamflower]

I have a real problem in imagining Elrond "kind as summer" Half-Elven, as Evil, but I could see how a delirious Frodo might percieve him that way...

[fafojoy.livejournal.com]

I am so glad this was only a perception of Evil!Elrond, or I'd have to come and find you and make you write 'kind as summer' 1,000,0000 times....

PJ is still working on this assignment

[dreamflower]

*grin* I hope he will remember that! (I still wonder what he thought Elrond was going to do after he was left all alone at the camp of the Rohirrim...)

I couldn't think of any other way to use the prompt: a nightmare, a dream, a delirium...

[i-o-r-h-a-e-l.livejournal.com]

Oh, I love fics telling about the surgery Elrond does to Frodo. Thank you.

[dreamflower]

You are welcome! 8-)

[periantari.livejournal.com]

Wow i love the angst--i especially loved how you used the prompt to say that Elrond seemed to Frodo, a phantom...
very powerful.
And i love fics that fill in that time before Frodo awakes in Rivendell. ;)
awww Frodo! ::goes to huggle him::

[dreamflower]

Well, it was a hard prompt, since I don't believe in Evil!Elrond, so I had to get past that somehow.

Poor Frodo, *sigh*

[lilybaggins.livejournal.com]

Oh, very nice! And captures Elrond's kindness beautifully.

[dreamflower]

Thank you! I had to go with how he might be *perceived* as evil, when Frodo was delirious, because, well, it's hard to imagine an Evil!Elrond.

[claudia603.livejournal.com]

oh, this was beautiful. It really shows Elrond as a "person" with "feelings" instead of this lofty Elf.

[dreamflower]

Yes, Elrond does come off sometimes as rather "above it all". Yet you know he had to have some very deep feelings to have kept going after all the dreadful things that happened in his family. Have you ever read Nilmandra's "History Lessons: the Third Age"? Her Elrond is just stunningly wonderful! And he has some wonderful h/c interaction with Frodo.

[surgicalsteel.livejournal.com]

Perfect moment for that phrase - because I know for a fact that lots of patients perceive their surgeons to be evil at some point in their treatment. Just perfect.

[dreamflower]

Oh, wow! I didn't know that--I just thought that being cut into where the Nazgul had done it might cause some confusion in his mind!

[surgicalsteel.livejournal.com]

Well, I've personally been called evil, psychopathic, and sadistic by the better educated trauma patients as I'm popping in chest tubes and doing other painful things - and a recent drunk in the ER called me a mean psycho bitch when I stapled his head.

You do painful things to patients, esp if they're drunk or have other reason to be confused, and they'll perceive you to be evil even if your motives are for their good.

[aspenjules.livejournal.com]

"...called me a mean psycho bitch when I stapled his head."

*blinks*

*giggles* I don't know why that line struck me as so funny... though I imagine I might be inclined to do the same if somebody stapled MY head as well.

Of course, I know his was probably gaping open or some such horrible thing... but it just sounded so funny.

*wonders if someone can get drunk on too much sleep*

[surgicalsteel.livejournal.com]

He was drunk and had lost about a liter of blood from a 10 cm scalp lac - but I've sort of learned to laugh off most of the things that drunks say in the ER. ;)

[aspenjules.livejournal.com]

Dreamflower... wow. I could just picture the slow morph from the Witch-King to knife-wielding Elrond. It's a brilliant comparison of the two, both 'stabbing' him in the same shoulder. I wonder if any of that showed on Frodo's face as he 'perceived' Elrond and that caused Elrond's concern.

Great way to get around the difficulty of that prompt. *Salutes*

[dreamflower]

Thank you very much! I'm glad you could see it that way!

I'm having fun with these prompts.

[coriandra.livejournal.com]

That's powerful! Poor Frodo! I can understand him thinking that's Elrond's evil, but hopefully as Aragorn said it'll just seem like a delusion when he wakes up. Very well done, thanks for posting this. :)