…Know all ends, and even the final fate of the Ring-bearer can be a tool in the hands of the Valar. This piece takes place between “The Ring Goes West” and “The Mirror of Galadriel.”

Minas Tirith, July 3019.

Amidst the joyful celebrations in that summer of newborn hope in Gondor the Queen’s brooding was not lost to those who knew her well.

Of course she had motives, they thought. Even if she had reached the end of her long wait -and that was cause for great rejoicing- it also meant a bitter parting from her loved ones –a parting that would stretch beyond the circles of the world. And she loved her father dearly.

But those feelings did not dampen her joy permanently, and if from time to time a brief cloud of thoughtfulness crossed her fair face, it was soon put down by her subjects to the Elven well-known contemplative nature –or to the impending separation that would no doubt weigh upon her.

Until one night in the Merethrond, when her wise grandmother thought she had found a clue to unveiling the nature of the ponderings that occupied the new Queen of Gondor, as the minstrel sang an old lay and the guests enjoyed.

“Again she fled, but swift he came.

Tinúviel! Tinúviel!

He called her by her elvish name;

And there she halted listening.

One moment stood she, and a spell

His voice laid on her: Beren came,

And doom fell on Tinúviel

That in his arm lay glistening.”

It was fast as a bolt of lightning escaped from a summer storm, yet for a brief moment Galadriel met Arwen’s bright, knowing eyes across the hall, and felt the sudden jolt of determination that shook her granddaughter, mixed with a soft tinge of amusement that was the mark of her Sindarin ancestry, she thought with passing aggravation as the Queen gave her a brief nod and turned her attention back to her company.

“That I should live to see one of the House of Oropher displaying such tact and diplomacy!” a deep voice tickled her ear. She smiled. Apparently the son of Thranduil was having some convincing words with the over enthusiastic minstrel, judging by the swiftness with which said minstrel switched to completely different matters for song and entertainment.

“And your granddaughter is brewing some secret joke,” she whispered in return, studying the annoying little smile that now twitched irrepressibly at the Queen’s lips.      

“She looks indeed like one of the Thoronniath sitting on a nestful about to hatch…”

“And here I thought that she looked as smug as her grandfather when he finally manages to order the world to follow his whims!”

“That too, my lady,” he rumbled with an amused chuckle that made her shiver and then wince as she remembered their approaching parting.

And yet she could feel how it cost him, too, day after day, to keep his light front before the rest, steadily supporting Elrond while at the same time shunning all thoughts regarding their impending separation. Surrendering to his searching hand she followed her lord meekly out of the stifling walls of the great hall and under the soothing vault of Varda’s stars.

                                                                        ~*~*~*~

Dawn found Galadriel alone, strolling dreamily amidst the rose beds in the King’s gardens. The stars had provided what comfort they could offer, but come morning Celeborn had left her side to seek Elrond. All his friends were doing their best to distract the peredhel from sad thoughts, and it was only fitting that his father-in-law joined in the effort, he had claimed seriously. Somehow, Galadriel suspected this not to be the whole truth, but she approved earnestly nonetheless.

“May I join you?”

She turned slowly to greet the Queen of Gondor, fairer than that glorious summer morning. Joy suited the Evenstar, Galadriel thought with a mix of pride and resignation as she nodded and bowed with a warm smile.

“These are your husband’s gardens, I am told,” she said, recalling a similar encounter with the King a few days ago. Unconsciously, she cast a fleeting glance at the second ring that now graced her fingers and sighed so minutely. “I would welcome your company, Arwen,” she added, noticing the small frown that marred her brow briefly.

“Let’s walk, then,” the Queen said, dragging her grandmother playfully along the stone-lined paths.

“I would also listen to your concerns, if you cared to share them,” Galadriel ventured after a pleasant enough stretch of silent, leisurely walk. She could feel the turmoil inside the Queen, but also her firm decision deep below the layers of doubt and hesitation. She would have thought, after last night’s spark, that Arwen had finally found the answer to a riddle that had troubled her; but what that riddle might be about was a complete mystery to Galadriel.

Arwen stopped on her tracks to check a budding bush. “I would ask another boon of you, Grandmother,” she finally said, her face half hidden in the depths of a blooming white rose.

Daughter of Elrond is she, Galadriel reminded herself warily.  Not a word is dropped idly –or misplaced- in her speech.  “Another?” she asked, raising a quizzical brow.

A laden silence sat between them. Finally, Arwen released a deep sigh and lifted her face from the rose.

“When Thingol set that price on Luthien’s hand he was giving Beren a hope, even if wholly unintended,” she began in her deep, slow voice. “He gave Beren something to look up to for strength and determination…”

Fearing what was coming, Galadriel closed her eyes so her pain and guilt would not show.

“You did the same to Estel…and to me, when you garbed my lord in elven silver and mithril and sent him to me in Cerin Amroth, so I would see him not as a mere mortal but as the great one he could become. I knew the joy of Lúthien -and also her anguish- since then, and he found his star of hope to hold on to through those long years of hardship and war.”

“Love was already there, Arwen…” she whispered almost pleadingly.

“I never denied that, Grandmother! And I never thanked you enough.” In two elegant strides Arwen was beside her, holding Galadriel’s hands in hers and pressing them comfortingly. “Do not think that I am not aware of your sacrifice, or deeply grateful for it,” she said reassuringly, “and yet I still need your help one more time!”

“Speak then, child! What is it that you would have of me that can be so difficult to ask for?”

“I know I owe you much of what I have now…and yet there is one who was dragged into our fate, entangled with doom…and is now bereft of everything while the rest of us rejoice… I worry for Frodo, Grandmother, for while Estel and I have reached the end of our toils and found happiness, Frodo suffers still, and I fear that he will not heal…He was dragged into a war that was not his, and pitted against a foe that was beyond his powers to defeat, and yet he marched into darkness out of love and duty….He hopes that he will recover but I can see that he will not… I wished that his sacrifice would not be left unrewarded!”

"Such is often the fate of many noble deeds, to pass out of memory unacknowledged and unrewarded,” Galadriel retorted bitterly, freeing her hands and wrapping them around her waist, as if warding off a sudden cold of dread. Arwen’s words had -for the second time in a few days- reopened her deepest wound. She turned her back on her granddaughter and took a couple of steps away while fighting to stop burning tears from coursing freely down her cheeks, as memories hit her again with the force of almost three ages of the sun. 

“But it is unfair!” Arwen insisted, following her grandmother eagerly. “I think there must be something that I could do, at least! The children of Elrond were granted the privilege of withholding our choice until our father passes west. I surrendered mine that night in Cerin Amroth when I pledged myself to a Secondborn…I know I am not Lúthien, but I wish there would be some way that I could pass my rights to that ship down to Frodo…”

Stunned, Galadriel stopped to cast a grave look at her granddaughter. “That is nonsense you are speaking, Arwen! The gift of mortals is not one to be withdrawn from them! Not even the Valar meddle with that!”

“But Frodo would surely find healing in the West, were he allowed to dwell there even for a brief while!” Arwen went on beseechingly as they reached the small stair that led up to the ramparts. “Have I not heard you talk about the gardens of Lórien, where pain turns into wisdom and world weariness into deep, quiet joy and acceptance?”

“Except for Mîriel…”

“But she had lost her will to live, if the tales that I have been taught are true. Frodo has not, Grandmother. He still hopes to live on happily, and even if I cannot grant him that, I would that all the good that he has done for the sake of Middle-earth would not in the end result in a lifetime of guilt and failure to him… Is there nothing that you can do?”

“Your good heart moves me, Arwen, but Frodo’s fate is not your fault...or your responsibility,” she finally said in a tense voice, hurrying up the narrow stairs and leaning on the walls, seeking comfort in the sight of the wide plains of the Pelennor and the silvery ribbon of Anduin that rolled south to the sea. “And that what you ask for is beyond my powers to grant…”

“But you can talk to them, Grandmother; you can ask the Valar for mercy!”

I should have known that she would not give up so easily, and that is surely Celebrían’s stubbornness in her, Galadriel thought, not meeting Arwen’s pleading eyes.

“You could take him with you and vouchsafe his passage!! You are Galadriel daughter of Finarfin, greatest among the Exiles, returning to the lands of her youth!”

“After a long banishment,” she reminded her granddaughter sternly. “No mortal is allowed into the lands of the West, and you would that I returned to the Blessed Realm under the banners of rebellion yet again?” But she was smiling softly now, suddenly amused by the very thought.

“Please, Grandmother,” Arwen insisted. “I could not live with the knowledge that my happiness was bought at the price of someone else’s…”

That gave Galadriel pause. For a while she twisted the ring that now adorned her finger beside Nenya; the ring of Barahir… The ring of Finrod, which had once belonged to Finarfin.   

“Many lives are needed to make a life, Arwen. You said you are not Lúthien… yet you are descended from her…and from Beren, too. And they lived their lives with the knowledge that their happiness had been bought with the life of an innocent,” she sentenced severely. “This ring stands testimony to that sacrifice…”

“And also to a promise of friendship and service between our kin, and everlasting alliance. Do not forget that I carried it for years, Grandmother,” Arwen retorted in a grave voice. “The tie between the two kindred has been renewed, the ring returned, the oath fulfilled, the debt cancelled. Would you not pay this last service to a descendant of Beren, on behalf of the Faithful?”

“Where did she get that stately demeanour from? Her adar, no doubt,” she wondered dryly. Watching Arwen before her, stern and demanding as the queen she already was, a queen of men, Galadriel was suddenly reminded of Beren’s grave dignity at their last meeting in Doriath, when she had refused the ring that the man had offered to return to her, committing herself in turn to keep her brother’s oath of help and friendship to the line of Barahir down the ages. “And this I tell you, my lady, for I am no stranger to foresight either, that your line and mine will become entwined as the serpents in this ring, and that by his sacrifice a great good will come to Middle-earth,” the young man had predicted then; and she had believed him. Aware that fate had finally caught up with her, she sighed deeply, closed her eyes briefly and acknowledged her obligation to this offspring of both lines.

“Let me think of it, daughter. Perhaps there is something that I can do…”

                                                                            ~*~*~*~

For all that day Galadriel glided over her chores, wearing a calm front while she internally debated in the throes of a bitter struggle. All of a sudden, the weight of three ages of hopeless fight was too much for her to bear, so that tiniest of favours, which Arwen had asked of her, stirred an uncalled-for storm of outrage and grievance as she measured Frodo’s losses – and the recompense that was asked on his behalf- against all the unrewarded sorrow and bereavement that paved her long defeat.

Sunset found her standing again on the ramparts in the King’s gardens. A soft breeze cooled the heat radiating from the stones. It also carried chirping voices and laughter from a terrace below. Leaning over the wall to look down, she caught a glimpse of the irrepressible Halflings, all of them, sitting on the walls sharing a well-provided basket and an earthen jar among them and with Gloin’s son while they chattered endlessly. Not far from them, Legolas stood on the parapet, his gaze fixed west.

“They are recovering fast. Their good spirits are a blessing,” a soft voice observed beside her. She acknowledged the bright presence without turning. Since his return from the timeless lands, Mithrandir did nothing to veil his true nature from her wise eyes, and she was almost always glad of it.

“But this is going to be a deep blow for Thranduil,” she pointed out thoughtfully. Legolas had turned briefly to join in some joke but almost immediately his gaze was drawn back to the west; to the sea and what lay beyond. And she felt a sudden twinge of pity to think of the brave, stubborn woodland king and of that last blow that fate was about to deliver to him, just when he hoped that light and joy had at last returned to his beloved forest.

“Something good may yet arise from that, though,” Mithrandir said, as she expected he would; and she knew better than to object, even if she could not find it in her weary soul to agree, or even to hope that it might be so. Yet Mithrandir’s next words shook her. “Much must now pass away;” he pronounced solemnly. “And the power of the Rings also is ended, and many fair things will fade and be forgotten with their passing, yet it is said that all the Elves would willingly endure this loss if by it the power of Sauron could be broken, and the fear of his dominion be taken away for ever…”

“He who said so surely did not have to endure loss in his life,” she objected, levelling a scorching glare on the Maia, who nodded blandly and acknowledged her grief.

“It was Glorfindel, if I remember rightly,” he murmured. When she would not answer, he went on cautiously. “Small hands freely accept to carry a task that is beyond their skill to fulfil, and in doing so they are confronted with an evil that is beyond their power to defeat –and on they carry still, even to the brink of self-destruction, out of love and duty…Do they not deserve a high reward for all their labours?”

“Others nobler and wiser went even beyond self-destruction and were rewarded with an eternity in Mandos,” she reminded bitterly, because for all that day the fate of her beloved brother had been weighing heavily on her mind.

“But their fortunes are not in your hands, my lady. And yet you would refuse to perform a small act of kindness, which you could grant easily for the benefit of one who has already lost so much, because you deem that others are more deserving of Eru’s compassion?”

“Did Arwen talk to you?”

“Not openly, but she somehow let me know what she was pondering…”

“Then why is this required of me, who have not the power to grant it? Have I not passed my test, lost far more than Frodo has, endured this long defeat to its bitter end? Why don’t you call up to the Valar yourself, beg them for this mercy for Frodo if they deem it fitting?”

“The One demands of each of us within the measure of our own strength. This intervention was asked of you, my lady, and so it is not in my power, but in yours, to present it to a higher authority...if you would consent. It is not for us to judge the rewards granted to others, only to hope in His immeasurable compassion, and trust that it will be extended upon us as well, when our time comes.”

“Do not talk of estel to me, Mithrandir!” she retorted harshly, tears now glistening on her pale cheeks despite her efforts. “What did it serve him in the end? What good would it do to me, who have already lost so much?”

“I am not talking of estel, my lady, but of what lies beyond estel and sustains it… The knowledge of Eru’s endless pity and compassion, of which each of our small acts of mercy are but a reflection, that will be returned ten-folded to our lives…and our deaths. Not even the wise know all ends…”

“Were I to be offered recompense for all my toils, surely I would choose other prize before redeeming Frodo’s suffering, deserving though he is…” she rebelled, for in that time of fruitless victory her grief and her longing clouded her wisdom.

“Ponder your words carefully, daughter of Finarfin. Payment and reward are not for any of us to grant, as are not judgement or sentence. You are offered another chance for atonement, and for giving away pity liberally in the same manner that you expect to receive it...What would Finrod the Faithful do in your place?”

That gave her pause. She kept her silence for a while; then finally relented. Defeated, she bowed her head and closed her eyes, battling conflicting feelings and a weariness that was beyond comprehension.

“But I have lost so much already, and have yet so much to lose, and still mercy and compassion for others are demanded of me?” she murmured in a thin voice that came out quivering, for she worried greatly about the uncertain fate of her husband and her grandsons. “Who cares for my losses and my grief? Sí man I yulma nin enquantuva?” she chanted softly, recalling the words of her farewell to Frodo. And yet as she sang she suddenly remembered her astonished gratefulness towards the frail Halfling, who had dared carry the fates of Middle-earth in such hopeless quest and had succeeded, though at a high cost for himself. As if a passing veil of darkness had been thrown aside from her soul, she found again the wisdom and compassion that she had learnt in her youth, and all her doubts and all her grievances were appeased as she gladly, humbly, conceded what was asked of her.

“May the Valar accept my plea,” she sighed finally, lifting to Mithrandir a teary face barely lightened up by a wan smile, “for I will yet again challenge their decrees,” she joked tremulously.

“They already have,” Mithrandir said softly after a brief pause, tilting his head as if he were listening to a distant voice and smiling openly. “Your granddaughter will be glad to know,” he added, pointing towards the entrance of the gardens, where Arwen watched them with curiosity. “And your gesture will not remain unrewarded, even if it may pass unnoticed amidst the great deeds of this dawning age,” he promised quietly as Galadriel hurried to her granddaughter, for he knew who would be waiting for her at the quay in Alqualondë.

A/N

The whole idea for this new instalment in the apparently never-ending story of the Ring of Barahir came out of Letter 246, in which Tolkien discussed Frodo’s final fate and how he had been granted passage in that last ship. The professor guessed that Arwen might have gone to Galadriel or Gandalf or both.  And I wondered what such request would have meant for Galadriel, at the end of her endurance and when all her loses were plain before her, to be asked for yet another service, another act of generosity towards another.

The minstrel’s verses are taken from “A knife in the Dark,” LOTR

I told Galadriel’s encounter with Beren in Droplets: “Nor shall anything of my realm endure…”

Mithrandir is citing Glorfindel’s words in “The Council of Elrond.”

“Sí man I yulma nin enquantuva?” “Who shall now refill the cup for me?” Taken from Galadriel’s parting song in “Farewell To Lórien” LOTR.