Malcolm was resistent to this whole, let's go through a door and on the other side is a whole new world ... thing. It seemed ridiculous. But it couldn't possibly be any more ridiculous than a book whose pages automatically filled when other people wrote in theirs -- as far as he knew, physical books weren't equipped with wi-fi. And it wasn't like he knew whatever weird language his voice knew. Elf of Mirkwood, he'd written to Jack, and when he googled it, he'd managed to put it together.
It was really not funny that his brain was host to the pretty blond thing from Lord of the Rings. Really.
But Legolas -- how ridiculous it was to even think it, but there was no escaping the truth, even when it was ridiculous -- was insistent. Demanding. He was going to go through that Door. It was critical. He understood Malcolm's resistance, but it was essential. And if there was pain afterwards, he promised that a doctor could be found -- a healer to tend to his wounds, he'd said, and that alone was ridiculous. What else could Malcolm do, though? The demands were impossible to ignore, disruptive. So early one morning, he slipped out, the key and book in his backpack, and got a cab to the address from which the parcel with both had come -- the Passages Hotel.
It seemed such a small thing, to turn the key and slip through. It was such a small thing. And when it happened, Legolas felt cleanly, mercifully, fully himself again.
The air smelled right, not foul with chemicals and pollution and smoke and smog. It was clean and crisp, with the taste of green woods and sweet water on it. The ground was soft beneath his feet, as if it cradled him gently. He was himself, tall and lean and strong, his Lórien bow on his back and the cloak clasped at his throat, his familiar leathers in place, his knives at his belt, prepared for anything. Only ... only this place was not Mirkwood, or the newly cleansed Greenwood. This place was not Ithilien, he thought, nor anywhere in Gondor, not that he knew Gondor so well as to be sure. Was this the green hills and old woods that dotted the road to the Grey Havens? Was the Shire at hand? He focused on that, on the Shire, because to think of the Grey Havens was to think of the sea, and he could not, he could not, he mustn't, because the longing would be too intense. He was needed here. Aragorn needed him. And he had promised Gimli that he would not abandon him, would not leave him as long as Gimli yet lived. He could not reneg on such promises.
He could feel where the West was. So he walked to the South, looking, humming a song beneath his breath that sounded rather like the call of birds, bright and brilliant on the air.