Beyond Reasoning

Part 1:  Imladris

“We’re nearly there, my heart,” Pippin murmured, brushing soft curls back from his daughter’s pale face.

“The house of the elves..?”

“Yes, darling.  Shall we take a look?” he said, lifting her gently from the narrow cot in the wagon’s jouncing bed.  Parting the canvas that sheltered its weakened passenger from wet and weather, he felt Amber’s small arms tighten about his neck and heard her breath catch in childish excitement.

“Oh, Da…  It’s so pretty!”

Framed between Diamond and Estella where they sat to guide the hardy ponies that had brought them this far, the narrow valley of Imladris opened out below, green and glorious, and glowing in the light of the midday sun. Summer blooms filled the air with their scent, but the fair dwellings seemed hushed beneath the low wash of the river.  It was clear that the heart and soul of the Last Homely House was gone, and a thread of fear prickled in his mind; with Lord Elrond long since departed for Valinor, would this last recourse be in vain?

Amethyst wormed her way under his other arm to gaze at the sight, her hand instinctively seeking her sister’s.

“Elves!” the six-year-old whispered into her ear, and his heart tightened.  This had to work…

“Yes, my darlings…  This is where the elves live,” he said, giving them both a little squeeze.  

Brightened by awe and curiosity, Amber’s eyes glimmered green, green as the single hope that had drawn them so far.

Aragorn met them in the empty courtyard, and he forced a welcoming smile to cover his uneasiness.  The sound of the ponies’ hooves had echoingly announced their arrival, and he had turned from his consultation of the many texts within the prodigious library to greet them.  Pippin’s letter had been laced with a worried fear that was compounded by the state of his messenger.  Merry had reached him in Minas Tirith, forgoing rest and food to first deliver his cousin’s plea.  More than weariness gazed from the hobbit’s dusty face, and the urgent pace he set on their journey north bespoke his concern.  However, nothing in the hastily penned letter or Merry’s calmer description had prepared Aragorn for the sight of the girl-child in Pippin’s arms.  She looked truly ill, her face drawn and pale save for the bruised shadows beneath her eyes.  Yet she smiled shyly, tucking her face into her father’s neck and peeking back again at him with bright curiosity.

“It is a pleasure to see you, my friend,” the king began, “though I could wish it were under happier circumstances.”

Pippin offered a brittle smile as he walked closer, and it became obvious that his seemingly inexhaustible spring had been sapped by this too heavy burden.

“Likewise, my lord…” the hobbit responded with awkward formality. 

“Pippin…” Aragorn started to protest the address as he always did, a little game they had long since begun to play each time they met, but now the time seemed ill-suited for such light talk.  He leaned down to greet the lass perched upon the hobbit’s hip instead.  “Well met, Miss Took,” he said softly to the child.  “I have heard much about you in the last few years.”

The little one smiled again, face half-hidden in the folds of her father’s shirt.

“This is Amber,” Pippin said simply, and as a second youngster peeked from behind his legs, he gently drew her out with his free hand.  “And this is her twin, Amethyst.”

Aragorn could not entirely suppress his surprise, though he quickly masked the sinking dread that rose in him as he noted the world of difference between the two little hobbits.  The same deep emerald green gaze peered at him; pink lips bowed into identical shy smiles between sharp chin and pert nose, but there the similarities ended.  Amethyst’s round cheeks and glossy auburn curls made a stark and ghastly contrast to her sister’s gaunt appearance.  Words of greeting left his mind entirely.

“You are here at last!” Merry said, emerging from the cool halls beyond.  He strode past Aragorn to embrace his cousin and gently tousle the little one’s hair.  The short distraction was enough for the Man to recover his composure.

“Be welcome to Imladris, friends.  We have had rooms readied for you,” he said, gesturing that they should follow.

It was in strained silence that they all entered the quiet dwelling, and Aragorn followed on quiet feet.  The task before him was most dire and dear, and he deeply hoped that he would not fail his friend or the cherished soul whose fate had been placed in his hands.

~~~~~~

Aragorn paced the low-railed balcony outside the neat quarters where Pippin’s family had been staying since they had arrived, finding neither comfort nor inspiration from the fair view below.  The last week had been full of wonder and frustration, and he was loath to end the suspension of time that had seemed to prevail as they all waited, with breathless hope, for his pronouncement.

His little patient had been by turns charmingly mature and restlessly fitful; she had easily captured his care and his worry, much as her father once had, and it was with a sinking heart that he had, on the first day, heard Estella’s detailed report of the sudden illness. 

It had come on slowly, discretely, as simple fatigue at first, but within a month, it had become obvious that something unusual was going on.  Yet all the remedies and cures had done nothing to revive her waning appetite or reverse the strange pallor that had replaced the rosy glow of health in her cheeks.  When the pain in her limbs had grown beyond the reach of simple willow-bark tea, Estella had known the mystery beyond her and encouraged Pippin to seek aid outside the Shire.  Messages had left for Minas Tirith, Annuminas and Imladris ahead of the slower wagon, hope making fleet those that carried them.

The quiet hobbitess had spent the week at Aragorn’s side, assisting with all the calm and efficiency of any healer from the Houses of Healing, though the love she bore the little lass was writ in every gesture and smile, seeming to buoy the child’s flagging spirits as much as her rambunctious twin.  But even Amethyst had been more subdued in the last day, curled upon the bed beside Amber and occasionally whispering into her sister’s ear.

It had been hard to sustain Amber’s frank gaze when, yesterday, she had given him a sudden childish hug as he listened close to her quiet breathing.

“What was that for, little one?” he had asked, regretting his question a scarce few seconds later.

“You’re nice, even if I am just too awful sick to be any fun,” she had replied, her little voice a tired whisper.

“You’re very nice too,” he had managed to return, finishing his examination with uneasy speed.  The hurried healing of the battlefield, with all its gore and hopelessness, was nothing to the dagger pain a sick child could spring upon the heart; he had never felt so powerless.

The light slap of bare feet broke him from his unhappy thoughts to face the child’s father.

“So, how long until she gets better?” Pippin asked, guarded hope shining in his eyes.

“I…  I am sorry.  I can make her comfortable, but…  Lord Elrond himself would have no cure for her.  I am so sorry.”  He reached a sympathetic hand to clasp the hobbit’s shoulder, but Pippin stepped back, shaking his head.

“No.  I have seen you pull others worse off from Death’s very door.  Frodo, myself…  How is this any different?”

“I can set bones, encourage a body to heal itself…  Even share what light I have been given to push back darkness and fear, but I cannot teach a body to live when it has forgotten how.  None in Middle-Earth could.”

“What is that supposed to mean?!” Pippin cried, bewildered anguish widening his eyes, unconsciously mirroring the pain-filled gaze his child had thrown to the skies earlier that day.

Aragorn searched for some way to explain something he had never put into words, an instinctive knowledge acquired in a lifetime of watching the world with a healer’s eye.

“Every living thing holds within its heart the path to its growth and life, the way the smallest acorn knows to become a broad oak.  Sometimes, something goes wrong.  No one knows why, and no herb or draught or surgery can mend it…”

“No.  There is a solution, you just don’t have it.”

“I wish that were true, Pippin, I truly do.  But it is not.  Amber will only get weaker with time; I will give Estella what medicines I have to ease the pain, for that will likely increase too.  I am sorry there is nothing else that can be done…” he continued, but Pippin wasn’t listening anymore.  He paced desperately to and fro, seemingly trying to recollect some buried memory, for his brow was furrowed in intense concentration.  Aragorn watched him wordlessly, having no more words of wisdom or comfort for his friend.

Pippin suddenly froze mid-turn, staring fixedly into one of the many wooded spaces that dotted the valley.

“Yes.”  The whispered word barely reached Aragorn’s ear, but it was laced with desperate triumph.

“Pippin?”

The hobbit turned from him, striding back towards the rooms where his wife and daughters waited.

“Pippin, what it is?”

“I’m sorry,” he replied, stopping to face the tall Man.  “You have done all you could, and I couldn’t be more grateful for that, and for your hospitality in this fair house.  But if I may ask one last favor, on my daughter’s behalf?”

“Anything.”

“Your fastest horse and a guide south.”

“What?  Why?”

“I have to find Treebeard as quickly as I may,” Pippin replied, striding off again.

“Slow down, Pippin!  Why do you…” Aragorn paused as the answer struck him.  “Ent draught.”

It was something he had not considered, yet he doubted still that it would work to do more than prolong the little hobbit’s life a short while, and even that depended on it being brought back soon enough.  Aragorn was not sure how much time Amber had left.

He followed Pippin into the empty bedchamber that he and Diamond shared.

“It could take weeks to get there, not to mention finding the Ent in all of Fangorn…  Shouldn’t that time be spent with her, while you have it still?”

“I’ll not sit about while there is something I can yet do!” the hobbit snarled back, angrily shoving clothes and odds and ends into his pack.

“This is a hunt with little hope of success!”

“We staked much more upon a fool’s hope before, my Lord.  That will not stop me.”

More than willfulness or denial pierced him from across the room.  Pippin’s sudden reversion to formality was telling and tense stillness wound itself like a line between them.  It had been bitter to fail his friend in this most precious task, and despite his reservations, Aragorn found he could not dash this last and most unlikely of hopes right out, for kindness, love or duty.

“I will guide you myself.  But you may well miss her last days in this quest, days you would regret forever.”

“I am bringing Amber with us.”

Aragorn choked back every sound argument against it, fighting instincts that cried out within him that this was more than the little one would be able to bear.  He knew there would be no gainsaying her father’s determination to save her any way he could; desperation had driven reason from his thinking.

~~~~~~

Estella watched anxiously from Amber’s bedside as the King delivered news she knew could bring her cousin no joy.

What hope she had had that King Elessar would find some cure for little Amber had fled within the first three days since they had arrived.  Though the child had been made somewhat more comfortable than she had been before, Estella had soon seen the same helpless frustration in the Man’s eyes that she had felt these last months.  The final sign had come that morning, when in the face of a sudden surge of pain, he had brought out something Estella had only read about in her lore-books, a medicine so strong it was only used to ease those who would soon pass the bounds of this world.  From across the bed, she had watched him carefully dose the potent sedative, silently grateful for the compassion evident in his decision, even though it marked his acceptance of defeat.

Outside, upon the balcony, that acceptance now warred with the stubborn ferocity of a parent’s love for his child.  Pippin would never relinquish hope, he simply didn’t know how.  Estella gazed unhappily at the exchange, reading upon their faces the emotions behind the words she could not always hear.  But for all his denial, Pippin would have to face the truth, sooner or later, so she turned her eyes away from her cousin and his King, gathering her own quiet strength to support Diamond when her sleeping friend must wake to hear the news.