Knowing

Glorfindel was unsure what woke him, but he knew instantly that something in the calm order of Imladris was amiss – and the only person whose distress would be enough to make the atmosphere of serenity resound with discord was the Master of the Last Homely House.   His eyes narrowed, adjusting to the subdued light, and he dressed swiftly.  Whatever had happened, it was not urgent enough to drag him from his room in little but his skin – and had the tang of a pain attacking the heart rather than the body. 

He was not in his rooms – that was, in itself, significant.  Elrond’s occasional surges of grief for his wife tended to draw him to the parts of the house where he could still, in memory at least, scent her hair and see the bright warmth of her smile.  Glorfindel paused.  He was unlikely to be outside.  On this night of all nights, there would be elves wandering beneath the stars and entertaining themselves in various quiet nooks.  Even Celebrían’s gardens of fragrant roses and sweet honeysuckle were unlikely to be entirely unoccupied on this night of solstice.

The door to Arwen’s room was ajar and the opened shutters allowed the moonlight to shimmer on the silken bedcovers and gleam on the polished mirror.   Awareness of what might have occurred hit him like a punch that left him short of breath and aching.  Not this, he thought fleetingly.  Not now, when the Vilya’s bearer needed all his wisdom and strength.

Elrond raised his head, his eyes in the glass meeting Glorfindel’s.  ‘She has chosen,’ he said.

The tall golden-haired elf’s jaw tightened.  ‘You told him that he must not do this,’ he said in a tone that promised retribution.  ‘That he must offer himself to none, let alone bind the Evenstar to him.’

‘He did not.’  Elrond closed his eyes and raised his face to the ceiling, folding his arms in front of him defensively.  ‘I am not fool enough to think he did.  Estel did not understand then how I could ask him to wait until his time had come and his path shone clear before him – but he has spent enough years fighting in the shadows to know now.  My daughter has done this – she has bound him.’

Glorfindel stared searchingly at his friend, considering his insight in fulminating silence for a few minutes.  ‘Does she know what she has done?’

‘Does it matter?’  The aching loneliness in Elrond’s voice made Glorfindel want to hit something.  ‘It is done.  She will stay here and wed him – accept mortality and pass beyond the circles of the world and I will never see her again.  She will never dance with her naneth on the white shores of the west and her song will fade into silence while we are left to mourn her until the end of days.’  His head dropped and slow tears fell, each one like crystal in Ithil’s white light.  ‘I have endured this separation before, my friend.  I thought that nothing could be worse than losing my brother – but I find that it cannot be compared to the prospect of losing my child.’

‘Where is Mithrandir when you want him?’ Glorfindel sighed.  ‘I cannot speak of what awaits the Secondborn, Elrond.  I can talk of Námo’s Halls – I can tell you of being rehoused – but I cannot comfort you when it comes to Ilúvatar’s gift.  But,’ he approached and looped his strong arm round Elrond’s shoulders, ‘it is a gift, my friend.  Arwen would long for Estel with every fibre of her being – just as you yearn for Celebrían – without hope of reunion, were it not for this choice that has been granted her.  Do not begrudge her love, Eärendilion.’

‘I begrudge her nothing, Glorfindel.’  The elf-lord ran his hands over his face, brushing the tears away.  ‘As well you know.  But I would want her to have so much more than a few decades of joy.  She knows not what she will have to endure – and how much the ending will pain her.’

‘We cannot prevent the young from stepping in the water, my friend, merely because they might find it too deep.  Arwen is no fool – she has thought on this long and hard before coming to a decision.’ 

Elrond turned to take in the neat remnants of the room in which his daughter had dwelt as she grew from child to adult.  ‘I have feared many times that my sons would be reft from me.  That their torn bodies would sprawl lifeless on some field of battle while their fëar flew to the Halls – with no certainty of when, or if, we would be reunited.  But I always hoped. . .’  His voice trailed away as Glorfindel’s grip tightened.  ‘I shall not see it,’ he murmured.  ‘For, if Estel should come into his own and be free to join with Undómiel, my time will be done and I will have to sail.’

‘I will not leave her, my friend,’ Glorfindel assured him.  ‘While she might need me, I am hers.’

Elrond fixed his sea-grey eyes on his friend’s fair face.  ‘I would endure if I could,’ he said, ‘to see her happy and watch her children grow.’

‘She understood why her naneth sailed,’ the golden-haired elf stated, ‘and she will understand why you, too, will be able to remain no longer.  But,’ he smiled gently, ‘if you want my advice, you will send for her to return now to Imladris, so that you might spend what time you have together.’

***

Aragorn stood like a king easy with his power, in robes of silver-embroidered blue.  Not as tall as the elf confronting him, but straight, apparently relaxed with his head held high and nothing but a slight crease between his brows as he faced the fury of the Evenstar’s daeradar.

‘You would have had him insult me?’ Arwen demanded.  ‘Reject me?’  She crossed deliberately between the two, drawing the eyes of both.  ‘It is my choice, Daeradar.  Do not delude yourself with the belief that my fate is in any other hands than my own!  I have known since I outgrew childhood that my destiny lay in the realms of men – and I will not have you denigrate my right to choose through some foolish male need to treat me as if I do not have the intelligence to make my own decisions.’  She met his eyes unflinchingly.  ‘If you would pity anyone,’ she added with an attempt at humour, ‘pity Aragorn – he has no idea of what he will have to endure.’  She stepped forward and closed her fingers round Celeborn’s arm.  ‘Please, Daeradar,’ she said.  ‘I have done no more than is necessary.’

His frozen stillness melted suddenly and he raised a hand to run his fingers through her ebony hair.  ‘Oh, Undómiel,’ he said, his voice cracking as he pulled her into his arms.

‘Be happy for me, Daeradar.’

Galadriel studied the Dúnadan as the emotion hanging in the air made him swallow convulsively.  ‘Of course,’ she remarked with a calm that seemed out of place, ‘the time for this is not yet.’  Her star-kissed eyes seemed warm with sympathy.  ‘Elrond told you your path would be long and hard – and you have not yet reached its end.’

‘I cannot be sorry that this has happened.’  Aragorn kept control of his tone, but the tightness in his throat made it difficult.  ‘But I would not dream of taking the Evenstar from her family to live the life of a homeless vagabond.  All I have ever asked is to be permitted to love her.’

‘And she has given her consent to that.’  Celeborn’s eyes gleamed sharp as polished steel.  ‘But I will not have you remain longer under these trees.  You must return to Imladris and tell Elrond Eärendilion what you have done.’

Aragorn drew an unsteady breath and his eyes darkened, but he bowed his head in acceptance.  ‘I will, my lord.’

‘And you, too, my granddaughter, must return to your adar’s house and ask his forgiveness for the pain you will cause him.’

She raised her hand and touched his cheek gently.  ‘I will,’ she promised.

A glint of green caught his eye and he took her hand, drawing it down to examine it.  ‘Barahir’s ring,’ he pronounced, glaring at Isildur’s heir.  ‘You are sure of her, indeed, to give her this heirloom of your house.’

Galadriel withdrew her granddaughter’s hand from his clasp and looked at the ring with interest.  ‘It was my brother’s once,’ she remarked.  ‘Worn by him in days long past at my grandfather’s court and gifted to Barahir, who saved his life.  It is fitting that it should, for a while, adorn the finger of a daughter of Finwë’s house as a symbol of a union between the two.’

‘Nothing about this is fitting,’ Celeborn snapped.  He closed his eyes briefly and inhaled.  ‘What is done is done,’ he said finally.  ‘And I will say no more.’ 

‘But I will say,’ Galadriel intervened, ‘that, when your fortitude has led you to the end of your striving and all turns out as it should, you will be blessed.’

Her husband’s frown failed to subdue her. 

‘And until then,’ she declared, ‘you must be patient.’

***

‘Why does Mithrandir have you watching these borders?’ Elladan enquired.  ‘Can he think of no better use for you?’

The young Ranger shrugged.  ‘It is a pleasant enough posting,’ he said.  ‘Perhaps he feels it makes a change from the bleakness of the Ettenmoors.’

‘I doubt that is his first thought,’ Elrohir commented.

The broad ribbon of the Baranduin wound lazily between fields of bright green, butting on the east against a towering forest of ancient trees, while to the west hills and orchards interrupted the neat pattern of farms interspersed with villages.

‘They are a curious people,’ the Ranger offered.  ‘They seem oblivious to us – but every now and then we will come to a campsite to find a farmer has left a parcel of cured ham or a cheese wrapped in muslin, all safely secured against animals – or a halfling will look to a grove where we have taken refuge from their sight and bow a greeting.’

Elladan grinned wickedly.  ‘Perhaps they think they are giving an offering to some protective spirits – creatures that come out of the darkness to see off unimaginable dangers, yet which exist only in the mind.’

‘If that is the case, they think that the mind has a healthy appetite,’ the Ranger said stolidly, ‘for they offer enough food for double our number.’

‘Do you travel among them?’ Elrohir asked, his eyes dreamy.  ‘It looks a good place.’

‘We stay near the road, my lord, or keep beyond the bounds.  The Captain has told us to keep our distance.’  The young man hesitated.  ‘We have, on occasion, seen elves in the groves and heard them singing in the moonlight.  If you chose to wander, we would not stop you.’

Elladan’s lifted eyebrow said that he would like to see the men try, but his brother batted him lightly to keep him silent.  ‘I know not what you think, my twin, but I would like to follow the river for a while.’

His brother returned the blow.  ‘As you wish, Elrohir.’  He tilted his head to examine the countryside before him.  What do they call this place?’

‘I do not know about west of the river,’ the Ranger told them, ‘but the land between the water and the forest is named Buckland.’

It was the slap of wood on water that drew the brothers’ attention from their study of the small and jewel-like land.  Ithil gleamed on the still water, deluding any who watched into thinking that the water was as kind as it was beautiful.  The disturbance of the water would have gone unnoticed by any whose hearing was less than elven and the spreading ripples would have remained unobserved.  As it was, by the time Elladan saw the upturned hull of the small boat, its occupants had disappeared, tangled helplessly in the grasping weed that reached up towards the light.  A small oar drifted downstream, turning in helpless circles.

Elrohir stripped off his outer garments as he ran, his dive skimming the surface of the water.  The river pushed him back: unexpectedly powerful, it seemed determined to keep him away from the site of the boat’s capsize.  ‘Go further up,’ he gasped, coming up to breathe.  ‘The river wants to keep them.’

Long minutes passed in a desperate trawling of the resistant waters.  Finally, Elrohir’s fingers tangled in a trailing mass of what could only be hair.  Taking his knife from his belt, he slashed at the clinging weed, even as he dragged the small figure free of its clutches.  He was gasping as he broke the surface, but there were no signs of life from the halfling.

He reached the muddy bank to find his brother working urgently to clear the mud and weed from the mouth of a pale female form, but ignored him in his own frantic need to try to save the dark-haired halfling in his own arms.  Ithil dropped below the horizon and the steel-grey dawn had begun to flower when finally he sat back on his heels.

‘It is no good,’ he said, the hopelessness of failure colouring his voice.  ‘He is gone.’

Elladan rubbed his hands over his mud-stained forehead.  ‘She, too,’ he agreed desolately.  He gently straightened the wet dress and closed the staring eyes.  ‘We were too late.’

The sun rose, bringing colour back to the world, but to Elrond’s sons the small river beach remained grey, and only the distant sound of distressed cries stirred them.

‘They do not need to find us here,’ Elladan said.  ‘There is nothing we can do for them.’

Elrohir rose.  ‘We will wait in the trees,’ he suggested.

Stiff and still wet as they were, they had barely retrieved their belongings and taken cover before the first of the rescuers arrived.  They carried lanterns with candles still burning in the fresh early-morning sunlight, but they were not needed.  Dressed haphazardly, like those who had been dragged from their beds to seek some who had not returned home, their curly hair dishevelled over pointed ears, their feet bare in the mud, the faces of the halflings showed despair and confusion.  Quite why the river had chosen to give up its burden on this quiet strand, they could not tell, but its victims rested here, a gentle mist rising from them as if they breathed.  But they did not, and they never would again.  A stout halfling cried out and dropped to his knees beside the bodies, while the others crowded round.

Too preoccupied to notice, they did not see a slight dark youth behind them.  Elrohir touched his brother’s arm, but, short of leaping into the middle of the group and frightening them out of their wits, there was nothing they could do.  The lad crept forward, silent on careful feet, only to freeze as he realised what was holding the eyes of his grief-stricken elders.  He swayed, a pale hand moving to his throat.  The twins could not see his face, but his scream stayed with them, an echo their naneth’s agony, joining a hundred similar denials that lived in their memories.

‘Take him away from here!’  Even as the stout hobbit commanded, one of the watchers swept the lad into his arms and bore him off past the tree that sheltered the twins, curls framing a face as pale as the two by the river, leaving a haunting impression of a pair of wide eyes dark with horror. 

***

Elrond had kissed his brow and embraced him as an adar would his son – and all Aragorn could feel was guilt. 

How could he even consider wresting away his adar’s only daughter – not only for his lifetime, but for all eternity?   How could he live with himself if he allowed her to sacrifice herself for him?  Their mutual love – that had seemed such a certainty under the golden boughs of the mellyrn – had become, he felt, no more than self-delusion.  She could not love him.  He deserved it not.

The elf-lord sighed.  Much as it grieved him to admit it, he could understand his daughter’s reasoning.  Estel – Aragorn – had still so much to do, and he would find it impossible to endure without the strength afforded by her staunch love and support.  He let his fingers linger on the face of one who was as dear to him as a son.

Aragorn met his eyes briefly and drew an unsteady breath before slipping from his hold to drop to one knee before him.  ‘My lord. . . ’ he began.

‘No, my son.’  Elrond spoke firmly.  ‘You have nothing to confess that I cannot forgive.  Come with me now – and we will talk over a glass or two of wine.  You are a man full-grown and have accomplished much of which I would hear – and the evening will be soon enough to talk of what is on both our minds.’

Glorfindel smiled.  It would do Estel no harm to believe that Elrond possessed the omniscience he had always suspected of his adar.  He found it rather touching to see the love and trust of the boy in the face of the man – and his anger had definitely been defused by Aragorn’s expression of ecstatic incredulity.  Whatever Estel felt for Arwen, it was she who had claimed him – and he would save his displeasure for her.

Imladris’s lord raised the Dúnadan to his feet.  ‘Welcome home,’ he said simply, drawing him inside the airy halls.

‘I will see to his horse, then, shall I?’ Glorfindel muttered.  ‘And carry his baggage – such as it is – to his chamber?’

It was worth any indignity, he reflected, to see Elrond’s mischievous grin.  He would not have thought that his friend would be able to suppress his grief at this meeting, but it seemed that he was wrong.  It was a pleasure to realise that, even after all these centuries, Idril’s grandson could still surprise him.

‘No biting,’ he commanded the weary horse as he took hold of the reins, ‘or I will feed you an excess of green apples.’  Brandor followed him meekly, responding to the gentleness of his hand rather than the sharpness of the words, and the tall elf patted his neck in approval.  ‘Estel will check on you later, I have no doubt.’

It seemed smaller, Aragorn thought.  The corridors were not as long or the doors as imposing – but it was more beautiful than he had remembered – and Imladris glowed in his mind as the epitome of beauty.  And this was home in a way that no other place ever could be – the home of his childhood. 

‘My naneth?’ he asked. 

‘She is well,’ Elrond told him.  ‘She will be happy to see you.’

The man’s serious grey eyes met his resolutely.  ‘Later,’ he said.  ‘There are words that must be spoken before I give her the opportunity to scold me.’

‘I meant what I said.’  Elrond shook his head.  ‘We will leave it for now – speak after Gilraen retires.  An hour or two will make no odds.’  He reached out to close his hand on Aragorn’s shoulder.  ‘We will say no words in haste, my son.  Greet your naneth and spend some time with her – she has yearned for you over too many years to keep you from her now.’

***

‘When I left your care, I knew I was a man,’ Aragorn said, ‘but I thought like an elf.  I spoke like an elf – I even dressed like an elf.’

‘You fought like an elf, too,’ Glorfindel interrupted.

Aragorn’s quick grin was appreciative.  ‘I fought like an elf,’ he agreed, ‘and, as far as those around me were concerned, that made up for the rest.’  He leaned forward, resting an elbow on each knee and studying his hands.  ‘And I was young,’ he marvelled.  ‘Younger than I could have believed – even growing up here among elves many thousands of years my senior.  I had been shielded from the harsh realities of life as one of my people.  I had never gone so hungry that I had ceased to want food, or done without sleep until I could barely stand.  I had never slept in the dirt through bone-aching cold, or had any looking to me to save them from the fears that come in the night.’  His face reminded Elrond suddenly of Gil-Galad, resting in his tent on the bleak plains of Dagorlad.  ‘And, suddenly, I was no longer a child, no longer an indulged little brother – but a man, and a chieftain and the hope of a whole people.’

Glorfindel’s hand rested on his shoulder.

‘We wanted to give you time to grow,’ Elrond sighed.  ‘And keep you safe until you were skilled enough to defend yourself – but we could not keep you here indefinitely.  Gilraen insisted for several years that we needed to release the ties that held you here and send you out to learn to take your place, but . . .’

‘I was so rude,’ Aragorn apologised, ‘when finally you told me all.  My naneth took me to task and her truth was so much more blunt – and unflattering.  And beneath the surface, I resented what you said.’  He smiled ruefully.  ‘I rode off in arrogance and soon learned that I was nothing remarkable – the world was not going to come to me and beg me to save it.’  He sat up and admired the unchanged grace of Elrond’s private sitting room.  ‘I could not come back,’ he admitted.  ‘Not until now – for I know not if I could have brought myself to leave again.’

‘And there was Arwen,’ Elrond said.

The branch of candles that lit the hearth on this warm night flickered in a soft breeze that brought with it the scent of night-blooming flowers.  Aragorn dropped his head again.  ‘Yes,’ he said, his voice low and strained, ‘there was the small matter of your daughter.’

‘I understand,’ the elf-lord stated, choosing his words carefully.  ‘I do not blame you, my son,’ he said.  ‘I do not blame Arwen.  It is not as simple as that. Years come when hope will fade, and beyond them little is clear to me.  It may be that your love has been determined since the beginning of time and that by my loss the kingship of men may be restored.’  He held up his hand.  ‘But,’ he stressed, ‘but Arwen Undómiel shall not diminish her life’s grace for any less cause.  She shall not be the bride of any man less than the king of both Gondor and Arnor.  To me then even our victory can bring only sorrow and parting – but to you hope of joy for a while.’

‘Do you think for one minute,’ the man said, his words dropping into the silence like pearls into a pool of unimaginable depth, ‘that I would consent to any less?’  His eyes, silver-grey as Elrond’s own, met his gaze unfalteringly.  ‘I would not ask even that of her if I could persuade her to take another path.’

Elrond reached out to place a hand on Aragorn’s wrist.  ‘Alas, my son,’ he said, clearing his throat.  ‘I fear that to Arwen the Doom of Men may seem hard at the ending.’

His foster-son turned to clasp the pale hand and they both fell silent, contemplating the fate chosen by the Evenstar.

***

Had she grown smaller, Aragorn asked himself, or was it that he had grown?  She was thinner – he could swear she was thinner – and her stillness gave the impression that she was waiting for something.  He realised, as he had never done throughout his childhood years, that, for all her apparent tranquillity, she was not at home here.  She seemed, he thought, like appleblossom set among orchids: sweet and fleeting in the midst of elegant exotics, and he wondered what kept her still beneath the roof of Elrond’s house, when she so clearly would prefer to withdraw to the halls of her kin.

Her eyes inspected him minutely – seeking out each line, each scar, each callous, striving to absorb each experience that had kept him battling in the world while she waited in the hope of his return.  He told her tales of far distant places, of adventures in which he had played a less than glorious part, of people he had known over the years of their separation.  He spoke most of his time learning to be his father’s son among the kin she had left to keep him safe.

‘Your uncle speaks well of you,’ she said, her voice sounding as if she used it but little.  ‘As do your cousins.’

‘My uncle is a good leader,’ Aragorn commented.  ‘A skilled fighter, but a wily one, too.  I am amazed how well he has done in defending the northlands with so small a force.  I enjoyed my years among the Dúnedain patrols – and would have been happy to remain longer among them, but Mithrandir . . .’  He fell silent.  Did it matter to her why he had abandoned his duties in the north to serve Gondor’s Steward?  Or merely that he had returned?  ‘My uncle, too, seemed to think it a wise move – and said that there were always those among the men of the north who would spend some years coming to know the southern realms.’

‘It is so,’ she agreed.  ‘My own father did so – and so did Arathorn, although he was not gone as long as you were.’  She stopped.  ‘He was called home,’ she finished, ‘when the Fell Winter was followed by the floods that emptied Tharbad and devastated the northlands.’

Aragorn watched her lift her needle and set it carefully in the fabric on her lap.  ‘Naneth. . .’  He drew a deep breath.

She smiled.  ‘You need not tell me,’ she told him.  ‘I can see in your eyes what I saw in your father’s – long before I was old enough for him to say anything.’  She hesitated and raised her chin to settle her gaze on him once more.  ‘I saw it before you left – for all I told you it should not be.  And now. . .’   She looked at him with eyes in which he saw an unexpected depth of knowledge. ‘What did Lord Elrond have to say?’

‘That we must wait – until my time comes and I have proved worthy of such a prize, for he will not consent to her marriage with any less than the king returned.’

‘As it should be,’ Gilraen declared. 

‘In my youth I might have argued the case – for that day may never come,’ her son said dryly.  ‘But I hope I am wiser now.  I would not take her to wife should she come to me in despite of her adar’s words.  She is to me the star that appears at the summit of the highest mountain – almost beyond the reach of man, yet offering a promise that inspires the climb.  I will work for her until my last breath – but I would not reave her from her family for a lesser place than that of the Queen of Men.’

His naneth smiled at him.  ‘My son,’ she said proudly.  She held out her hand to him and he took it, slight and frail in his strong fingers. 

‘And if – when – that day arrives, you will be there,’ he said confidently, although his eyes were filled with doubt, ‘to see it happen.’

***

Elrond refilled his glass and blinked at the ruby wine.  ‘I do not know how much choice Beren had in the matter once Lúthien had made up her mind.  Or Elu, come to that.’

‘He probably thought he had.’ Glorfindel smiled wryly.  ‘When he decided to incarcerate his daughter until the presumptuous man had been removed.’

‘But she would not stay caged.’  The ruler of Imladris raised his goblet, then lowered it without drinking.  ‘I wonder what Beren thought,’ Elrond mused, ‘when his delicate, fair nightingale turned up in Angband’s dungeons to wrest him from Morgoth’s grasp.’

‘I would imagine he was terrified,’ his friend said, ‘and knew better than to resist.’

‘I am surprised Elu did not recognise her determination.’  Elrond stretched his feet out in front of him and crossed his ankles.  ‘He had, after all, been entranced by Melian for who knows how long – until he surrendered.’

Glorfindel sniffed elegantly.  ‘You cannot talk, my friend.  You should have seen yourself when Celebrían’s eyes met yours.  Her adar was beside himself.  I am sure that only Galadriel’s strong grip on his sword arm saved you.’

‘And then there was Idril.’  Elrond shot a glance at his friend.

‘She made the decision,’ Glorfindel admitted, a pleasantly reminiscent smile on his face.  ‘Tuor adored her at first sight – much like Maeglin, in truth – but he asked nothing of her.’  He shook his head.  ‘She, however. . . Nothing would have stopped her.  As tenacious as a . . . Noldo.’

‘That is my daernaneth you are insulting!’

‘Is tenacity an insult?’  Glorfindel looked down his nose with mock hauteur.  ‘You have it yourself, so you should be able to tell me.  Turgon grieved for her,’ he added more seriously.  Not because he would lose her, but because he knew that Idril would be parted from Tuor – her adar knew the pain of such a separation.’  He contemplated the glass in his hands, turning it so that the wine caught the light.  ‘You come of a long line of strong ellyth,’ he said.  ‘They know their own minds and they will not give in.’

‘I never had a chance of changing her mind.’  Elrond placed his glass on the table beside him.

‘And Celebrían will know that, my friend,’ Glorfindel reassured him.  ‘You can count on it.’

***

Aragorn met their eyes steadily.  It was not, after all, the first time that his foster-brothers had confronted him, shoulder to shoulder.  It was, however, the first time that they had turned on him the full impact of their power – and the first time that they had looked on him as a potential enemy.

‘Adar said,’ Elladan remarked in a pleasantly conversational tone that contradicted the threat in his ice-grey eyes, ‘that Arwen made the decision to claim you as hers.’

‘It seems unlikely,’ Elrohir chimed in.  ‘The last I recall, a certain Dúnadan was writing bad poetry about our sister, while she was telling us to be kind to him.’

Elladan smiled dangerously.  ‘Perhaps we were too kind,’ he suggested.

‘Perhaps we allowed him to think that we would not tear him to shreds and feed him to the crows if he ever did anything to hurt her.’

‘Perhaps we let him believe that we would not mind having him wrest our sister from her family and subject her – and us – to the pains of mortality.’

‘Perhaps he feels that being Isildur’s heir entitles him to an elven bride.’

‘Perhaps he is of the opinion that being our foster-brother will make us welcome him as a brother indeed.’

Aragorn drew a deep breath.  It was as well, he reflected, that his years of dealing with Ecthelion’s son had taught him to control his tongue, for it was very tempting – and would probably be foolish – to respond in kind.  

‘You cannot stop me loving her,’ he said reasonably.  ‘Your sister is clearly worthy of all the love that any can offer.’

‘True,’ Elladan conceded.

‘I adored her the moment I saw her – and I will love her until I die.’

‘Understandable,’ Elrohir pronounced.

‘I did not claim her,’ Aragorn sighed.  ‘Adar made it plain that I had no right to do so – and I have learned enough to agree with him.  But, when she placed her hand in mine and pledged herself to me, how could I resist?   Rather than hurt her, I would offer myself to you in the full knowledge that I deserved to be fed to the crows.’

The brothers contemplated him.

‘Adar says that you cannot claim each other unless you become king,’ Elrohir remarked.

Aragorn inclined his head.

‘We had better put our great minds to bringing about that end, then,’ Elladan sighed.  ‘For Arwen has her mind set on you – for some reason I cannot fathom.’  He looked over the Dúnadan with a jaded eye.  ‘You have always been an entertaining little brother, Estel, but you are no prize when it comes to looks.   I do not know what she sees in you.’

The man looked at the twins warily.  ‘So I am in no immediate danger from you?’

‘Are you mad?’ Elrohir asked.  ‘Arwen would have our hides if we hurt you.  As long as she continues to be besotted by you, you are perfectly safe.’  He smiled pityingly at Aragorn.  ‘Just bear in mind, Estel, that – should the occasion arise – Arwen has first claim on our loyalty.’

‘And we will remain by her side as long as she might need us.’

Aragorn closed his eyes at the easing of a worry he had not even realised he felt.  ‘Thank you,’ he said sincerely.

‘She will never be alone as long as we live,’ Elrohir promised.

***

She walked straight into her adar’s arms and held him as if she could never bear to let him go.  ‘I am sorry, Adar,’ she said in the end, her voice no more than a pained whisper from her tight throat.  ‘I am sorry.’

He cupped the back of her dark head in his hand, even as he had when she had been young enough to believe that her adar could set right all the wrongs in the world, and held her softly to him, but he did not speak.

‘He was in pain and alone – and his fate bore down on him.  It was more than any man could endure.  I could not leave him to face the coming years alone.’

‘Tell me you have not bound yourself to him merely because he needed you, my Evenstar,’ he adar pleaded. 

‘Oh, Adar!’  Arwen twined one of his braids round her finger like a jet ring.  ‘He lightens my heart.  He is so sober – and so driven, yet he is as humble as a fresh loaf and as necessary to me.  He will not see that he is part of me as I am of him – and persists in thinking that I am making a great sacrifice in caring for him.’

Elrond said nothing, but tightened his grip on his daughter.

She leaned back to look into his face.  ‘You have known this would be the end,’ she said gently.  ‘It does not make it hurt less, but we can none of us pretend we did not know.’

‘You are my child,’ Elrond told her.  ‘I would have you be happy.’  He caressed her cheek.  ‘But your years of happiness will be short, my daughter, and you will know grief and fear before the finish.’

‘Better to share his fate than to be left behind – to live in pain and ignorance until the end of days,’ she said.

‘Your naneth will sorrow for your absence.’

‘I have known since before the division of Arnor that my fate was intertwined with the heirs of Elros’s line,’ she said.  ‘Naneth and I discussed it many times.’  She shot an amused glance at her adar.  ‘It is not only the bearing of a ring of power that brings wisdom.  We knew I would never sail.’  She hesitated.  ‘It is partly why she tried so hard to remain, even when she had come to know that she would not heal.’  Arwen closed her eyes as the pain of those days lived again in her memory.  ‘We said our farewells then, knowing we would not meet again before the world is remade.’

Elrond considered her words.  ‘You could not speak to me of this?’ he asked, hurt that his wife and daughter had kept from him something so important.

‘If you did not know then,’ Arwen said, shaking her head, ‘it was better for you to remain in ignorance.  Too many of the Dúnedain needed your care.  You did not need to feel suspicious of their motives.’  She smiled sadly.  ‘And I did not wish to be sent from Imladris – to protect me from the inevitable.  When Naneth sailed. . .’ she paused, ‘I wished to rebel against a fate I had no part in choosing and withdrew to the Golden Wood, where Isildur’s heir would concern me not, but in time I came to see – to accept – that I, too, have my part to play.’

‘You are home now,’ he said.

She laughed.  ‘There is little point in my being elsewhere.  Aragorn needs us all, Adar.  We are his family.’  She rested her head on Elrond’s shoulder.  ‘And the end approaches,’ she whispered.  ‘We choose no longer which of a dozen paths will bring us to the moment of decision.  All hangs by a thread and it may be that none of us will live to see what will come of all our endeavour.’

***

Arwen joined Gilraen in an arbour of white roses, sitting beside her silently.  Gilraen seemed distant in the soft light of evening, her gown of dove grey overshadowed by the gleaming petals and her pale face faded among the dancing branches of bright blooms.  In contrast, Undómiel shone.  Clad in silver-embroidered white, her dark hair catching and reflecting the light, she looked like a star come to earth.

The woman of the Dúnedain studied Elrond’s daughter for some time before speaking.  ‘It would destroy him if you were to change your mind,’ she said abruptly.

‘I will not change,’ Arwen said tranquilly.  ‘I have had long enough to make my decision.  This match was decided ages before I was born – and I have accepted it.’

‘You love him?’ Gilraen asked.  ‘I would not wish on him a marriage based on duty only.  He is worth more than that.’

‘I did not love him when I left Imladris,’ the Evenstar said honestly.  ‘He was no more than a lovesick boy – but time brings changes to all things.  When he came to me in the Golden Wood, the boy had become a man – and that man stirred my heart.’  She looked at Gilraen and her silver-grey eyes shone.  ‘I did not expect that,’ she said candidly.  ‘I expected to feel affection for him and do my duty.  You understand.’

‘I do.’  Gilraen moved her head and Arwen caught sight of silver hairs glinting among the dark.  ‘When Arathorn declared himself and asked my adar to let him wed me, I had no way of knowing how deeply I would care for him.’  She smiled wryly.  ‘He was so much older than I was – and rather frightening – but Naneth told me it was my duty and persuaded my adar to permit it.’  She fell silent.  ‘He will leave you,’ she warned.  ‘Time and again over the years.  He will go into battle and leave you dreading the day that he will not return.  And, one day, you will be left bereft, to mourn him until you follow him into death.’

‘I have never marked the days.’  Arwen took a deep breath.  ‘But I will count each one a joy that we might spend together.’

‘Your time may never come.’

‘We are treading softly at the edge of the world,’ Arwen agreed, ‘and success or failure are on a knife’s edge, but he will not fail for the lack of anything I can do.’

Gilraen gazed at the elleth’s face for some time before she nodded.  ‘It seems a poor reward to Lord Elrond for all his care,’ she remarked wearily. 

‘The defeat of the Dark Lord is an end he has long sought.’  Arwen raised an opening bud to her nose.  ‘He would sacrifice himself willingly to attain it.’

The woman smiled sadly.  ‘But you are more than even he would offer.’

‘It is not up to him to constrain my choice,’ the elleth said mildly.

‘I shall not see it.’ Gilraen turned her head away.  ‘And, like your adar, I shall not see my grandchildren.  I am sorry for that.  I would like to see those dark-haired children with eyes like stars.’

‘You are young yet,’ Arwen told her.  ‘There is no reason why you should not be there to see your son take his birthright.’

‘No,’ Gilraen agreed, taking the elleth’s hand, ‘there is none.’  But, as they sat in the darkening evening beneath Celebrían’s roses, they both knew that Aragorn’s naneth had handed to Elrond’s daughter the care of her son, and that she would not endure to see him succeed or fail.