~ Chapter 66 ~

Maybe, it has been appointed so, that by my loss the kingship of Men may be restored.  Therefore, though I love you, I say to you: Arwen Undómiel shall not diminish her life’s grace for a less cause.  She shall not be the bride of any Man less than the King of both Gondor and Arnor.

LOTR: Appendix A: Here Follows a Part of the Tale of Aragorn and Arwen

~oOo~

I am, atimes, as unmoored as a leaf upon the broad waters of the Bruinen.  I know not whither I am, nor where I shall be borne.  For I cannot tell should the days pass slowly or swiftly in this place, for they blend one tother without the marking of their passage.  

My lord is gone.  

I hope, one day, to hear the tale told of his journeys, but am uncertain whose voice shall bring the news so far north to tell me of it.  

Here in Imladris I am left behind in a place of beauty that is not mine, alien to me in a way beyond the reach of Men.  I move between its walls, eat and find rest in its halls, walk amidst its tall trees and along its riverbanks, but I cannot touch it.  It seems a tale of some far time and place my people have never known.  And I know not how my heart shall e’er find its way home. 

Even my dreams are strange.  They leave me with more questions than they answer.  For I dream again and again of a place I do not know.  I dream of the crying of gulls and the shadow of tall towers upon a lake so broad I cannot see the far shore, but the water dissolves to mist upon a far bank beyond sight.  Its moods are many, the water.  Atimes, I lean out o’er stone sills to catch the spray of foam as the waves batter the rocks below.  Snow whirls and rises upon the wind. The flakes catch one upon the other as so much featherdown ere they fall.  Others, the rising sun throws soft blues and pinks upon a broad pane of water like unto glass that ripples and laps at sand, chasing small piping birds up the shore, only for them run after its retreat.  

And through it all, around corners, and glimpsed as through a veil, I see a young woman; tall, with a strong nose and locks of long, black hair in many thin braids that swing from her head as she moves, skin the color of darkened bronze, and with the eyes of a woman I have not met.  I am too slow for her, and she laughs at me, her teeth flashing bright against her skin.  She pulls me by my hand up winding stairs to a high room of many windows bare but for a large, round stone of darkened glass set upon a pedestal. And though it is strange to me, I know it shall quicken with light and warmth should we set our will to it.  In the way of dreams, it seems I cannot recognize her face, though I should.  For my hands come to her face and there frame it, but my heart breaks when her name catches in my throat and I cannot call to her.   Such is the beauty of the joy that shines from her, it is as a beacon lit deep within the night.  

And I want… I want to hope.  

The winter has been dark, with its days of little light foreshortened by the stony heights that surround the House of Elrond.  I keep most to the inner rooms of those allotted to me.  My flesh cannot bear the cold so well as my hosts', and their rooms, open atimes to the wind and snow, fail of their welcome to a mortal guest.  Even the elder Halfling who has made these halls his home is little to be seen, though he seldom misses the comforts of table and hearth.  So I stay in my lord's rooms, again occupying a place his mother abandoned, and warm myself as I can in the light of my daughter's eyes.  

Yet, even so, I am restless.  In my home in the Angle, even were my lord away, while the land rested I would be caring for the sheep, working the wool collected in the past season, nursing our stores until the land bore fruit again, and tending to the care and comfort of my lord's people.  But no longer will my hands spin and weave the wool of my lord's dower.  No longer will I tend my lord's hearth and make his house a place of comfort for him.  And, greatly do I fear it, mayhap too, no longer will my lord's people require care, and word of it but waits for me to discover it.

In her kindness, Tithiniel found a coat of a thick wool lined with rabbit fur the color of cream for me, and I find I can bear the chill winds more easily for it.  So on this day not long past mid-winter, when the sun shines pale but full and brings a false spring to the valley, my feet carry me on new paths through the halls of Imladris.  The Hall of Fire, I know, and the feast hall in which I sit with my daughter under the Lord and Lady of Rivendell's keen gaze.  The gardens with their chattering canals, waterfalls, and walkways lined in stone I know in their green and gold seasons, but not the quiet of their sleep, and I find the carpet of snow and bracken, black boles and silver arms of trees have their own peace.  Such is the handiwork of the Eldar race that, from one moment to the next, I cannot always see where art begins, and nature ends.  

Much of the afternoon passes this way, my daughter in the care of Tithiniel, and I losing myself in the gardens of Imladris until I find myself wandering its halls again, passing beneath high curved canopies of patterned glass and across the colored shadows the throw beneath my feet.  I thought it first the silence of winter that had settled upon the vale, but even I have overheard talk of the Grey Havens and the ships that leave from there atimes.  I know not how oft a company might gather and then depart.  But, of late, the wind blows leaves or drifting snow through courtyards that are empty of folk where once they were busy.  The paths I walk are filled with the sound of the river but not much of speech.  When there is singing, it drifts in o’er rills and rivulets and under arches from the groves of beech and chestnut and pine, and comes less oft in the burst of voices raised within the Hall of Fire that had once sounded across the even’s sky.  With fewer eyes upon me, I have grown more adventurous in my wandering and wonder at the darkened doorways and cold braziers upon the terraces I pass.  

‘Twas then I turned a corner and found myself in a long hall filled with scrolls, books, and other things of metal and glass I have no words to describe.  Along one side the balustrade opens upon the vale and the ever-present sound of roaring water rising from the Bruinen as it flows beneath the hall.  Mist rises from the river and the stone of the balustrade is cold with its moisture.    

I turn my gaze upon the shelves, bewildered by the maze of volumes and scrolls to be seen carefully stored behind glass.  Strolling their length, I can tell little of what might be writ within, but the bindings and coffers are beautiful in their own right.  

"Do you find somewhat you would wish to read?" asks a deep, quiet voice.  

I whirl about at the sound to find the Master of Imladris seated upon a high stool behind his writing desk.  Parchment lies fixed to its tall angled surface, but he has laid aside his metal stylus.  He looks at ease, sitting upon the edge of his stool with one heel of his boot hooked upon its rung and the other foot resting upon the floor.  He is dressed in heavy silks the color of still waters beneath twilight as is his wont and his dark hair is held plainly from his face, which is grave as he looks upon me.   

"Forgive me," I stammer and make a quick reverence.  Only now does it occur to me I have stumbled upon the Master's private library and silently I curse my obtuseness.  

He frowns and rises from his seat as I step back.  We have bare exchanged two words since my welcome in Rivendell.  I can think only its lord finds my presence a vexing thing and so avoids it. 

But he comes to my side and says, "There is naught to forgive, Lady Nienelen, all you see here is free to any who wish its study."  

A breath later I realize what I am being offered and turn to the shelves in awe.  In the years we lived together in the Angle, I must have committed to memory the scrolls and codices in my lord's own small collection, the worn remnants of a much larger and more kingly library.  I have thumbed well my own leather-bound journal handed down from my foremothers until I know each line of the drawings and can turn unerringly to whichever list of ingredients, song, or pattern of heddle-wrapping I wish.  

Together, we look o’er the long shelves.  I know the coffers must hold scrolls of an age beyond my ken and gilt letters glow from rows of bound writings, but though I continue to look, I cannot decide.  Indeed, by their titles it seems they are histories of not just Elves and Men and Dwarves, but of the world as seen in the movement of the stars above our heads and the growing of the grass beneath our feet.  Treatises there are, too, of numbers and the study of metals and beasts of forest, mountain, and plains.  

And then I can read no more.  The letters upon their spines seem as foreign as had they been written upon the far western shores on which mortal men may not tread.  All this, when he came of the age for it, my son would have been set to mastering, and I would have been as quickly sundered from him in thought as in body.  

Master Elrond smiles a little at what must look like my confusion and asks, "Of what would you read?"

"I know not," I say, turning away from the titles of treatises upon war and the policies of governance from across the ages of Middle-earth, “somewhat of hope, mayhap."

He gives me a solemn, searching look and then touches the crook of my arm, leading me to a cupboard.  There he opens its doors and withdraws a small volume bound in a deep blue velvet.  Stretching out his hand, he motions me to a seat and table by the balustrade, where I can look out upon the waters and forests of Rivendell and read.  When I sit, he hands me the volume and strides across the library.  The book is a thing of beauty of its own, the velvet embossed with a single rayed star upon its cover.  The lord returns and, with a slight smile, hands me a page-turner carved of bone and nods ere retiring to his task.  

The binding is stiff, and the pages are a fresh cream as I open to the fly-leaf.  The parchment is unstained by time or the oils of handling.  He has given me the tale of Eärendil and, though the star of the Silmaril may guide the Eldar ever west, I must wonder what hope may be found in these pages for the race of Men.   

I turn the page and begin to read, the Sindarin tongue when used in art slow to form in my thoughts, but I repeat each line, murmuring the words to bring their meaning to mind.

It must be that I frown as I bend o’er the book, for next I hear, "Does it not bring you enjoyment?"

I blink and look up to find Master Elrond watching me from his desk.  What am I to say?  I would not have him think the wife of the Lord of the Dúnedain so untutored she cannot comprehend speech other than her own.  But, in truth, though I can read the words easily enough, I am clearly missing somewhat in the reading of its verse.    

"Mayhap because it is not meant to be read silently," he offers when I stare at him, but he does not ease my concern.  

I dare not read the words aloud.  My command of the Sindarin tongue is weak and I know best its vocabulary of rebuke.  Oft was my voicing corrected by my lord and it would no doubt pain the lore-master to hear my attempt.  As had he comprehended the source of my hesitation, Master Elrond rises from his seat and, coming to me, offers a hand for the small volume.  Taking it and the page turner, he seats himself across from me.  He faces the page, but his eyes focus not on the words.  Mayhap they see somewhat in between, some place or time I cannot perceive.  His voice is slow and deep as he recites.  

The winds of wrath came driving him,
and blindly in the foam he fled
from west to east and errandless,
unheralded he homeward sped.
There flying Elwing came to him,
and flame was in the darkness lit;
more bright than light of diamond
the fire upon her carcanet. ¹

His speech is as music, with clear tones no mortal voice can achieve.  It is a pleasure to hear.  I look out upon the vale and listen as he reads.  

The waters of the Bruinen pour from the mountainside and a silver light fills the valley.  We are as an island borne upon a stormy sea of Darkness.  Swifts float on the current of air above the river and seem as bright glints of light slipping along the streams of the even’s sky.  Soon, I cannot hear the words he speaks as separate notes.  They glide one into the other, losing their meaning.  But the images they evoke remain potent and I am filled with a sudden yearning at this tale of a cruel, cruel separation of husband and wife and parents and child that is the price of hope for those fated to live under the approaching Shadow.  

My hand presses my lips hard to my teeth as I gaze out upon the roaring waters, but I do not see them, for my eyes have filled with tears.  It seems to me there are no paths that lead to the light.  Failure ends in a defeat that would sweep all I know and love aside, yet even victory brings its own bitterness. 

When my tears fall, the song of the elf-lord's voice ceases, but it is not until he moves I take notice.  He leans forward, his face silent, giving me no means of discerning his thoughts.  I stiffen, not knowing what he intends, but he raises a hand and delicately takes a tear from my cheek upon his fingertips.  

"’The tears of the Children of Iluvatar number as the grains of sand upon the western shores’," he murmurs and gazes at the tear on his hand as were it a wondrous thing.  

"You are counted among the very wise, Master Elrond," say I.  "Have you the cure for the grief of a stubborn heart?" I know full well he does not but hope only to make light of my sorrow. 

"Not I," he says and rubs his fingers dry.  The smile he gives me in return is gently wry.  "My heart is as perverse, and seldom listens to my own counsel."  

I laugh and am surprised by the wretchedness I hear in its sound.  "I think my heart must be that of a mule, for I cannot tell it aught."  

"Think you it should be otherwise?" he says and closes the book.  "Should the coldness of pitiless reason rule our thoughts?"

When I do not answer, he proceeds.  "Our tears but do them honor, those we mourn.  Would you have it their loss meant so little as to not move you?"  

"No."

His voice is kind as he leans back into his chair, his hands resting upon the book in his lap.  "Then take comfort in your tears, but do not look too far ahead for griefs that may not be."  

We fall each into our own silence.  In it, I find memories of my lord and our son at their rising from their beds.  Their voices echo in the solar above my head as they dress, and their feet pound down the stairs.  My son races into the hall with his father not far behind, the promise that beams from their faces a painful thing.  

I emerge from my thoughts to the roar of the waters and the sweet chittering of the swifts as they swoop past the balustrade and climb upward into the air.  Their shadows fly across us.  The Lord of Rivendell watches me, his face sober and still.  

"I fear that Imladris holds little joy for you," he says, "and there are no kin here to give you comfort." 

“It is no matter.”  I shift in my chair and tuck my hands into the generous sleeves of my coat.  I am stiff with holding myself still and with the pain of remembrance.  “Your welcome has been most kind, Master Elrond.  My kin are gone and have long lain in our barrows.  I would find little comfort amongst them.  

“In coming here, I do not regret them,” I say and smile a little to sweeten the bitterness of my words.  “I fear you find me no man’s child.”

His brows quirk upward of a sudden, and long he looks upon me ere speaking. 

Then he frowns and shakes his head as were his thoughts arguing among themselves.  “A strange chance of the world it has seemed to me, that Aragorn cleaved himself to you ere his time and against my foreseeing,” he says.  “But, mayhap I was mistaken.”

Mistaken?  It seems my heart has stopped, frozen with fear.  Have I mistaken despair for hope?  Thrown away this thing I love for want of understanding?  

“What things have you foreseen?” 

“I see little and oft much confused,” Master Elrond says, his voice sharpening, “but some things I know for their having been plainly said.  Forgive me, Lady Nienelen, but Aragorn came to me when you broke with your vows to him.  Have you done this thing?”

“I have,” I say, my face heating beneath his intent gaze.  

He shakes his head and frowns as were he puzzling over a thing his mind knows but his heart cannot comprehend.  "Oft is it true," he says softly, as were he speaking to himself, "but here is a thing my heart does not understand, how Men can bind themselves one to the other without love."

I gasp a broken laugh and his frown deepens, but I can only look away.  In the past, I poured out words of longing to the empty night that seemed to me to be of a bitter eloquence.  Yet, now, where they might be welcome, I find I cannot give them voice.  They lodge in my heart as a brilliantly edged spear and, to my shame, all I have to offer the Lord of Rivendell in their place are my tears.  

When I remain silent, Lord Elrond sighs, his frown easing.  “And so, you weep,” says he and leaves me to my silence.

“And so, I weep,” I say when I can master my voice.  “Did not he also speak of my lack, that I can no longer bear him a child?”

“He did not,” he says and looks upon me solemnly.

“So, it seems he must set me aside, would you not agree?”

He stirs a little but says neither yea nor nay.

I wipe at my cheeks and swallow away the sorrow that threatens to spill forth in more tears. 

“Even so, I would not suffer my loss, Master Elrond, for any less cause than the renewal of the kingship of Men and the peace it shall ensure long after he is gone." 

He stares at me with somewhat akin to astonishment.  And then he laughs.  Though their echoes are rueful, great peals of mirth ring from him.  He does not look at me but gazes off into some distant place.  His laughter is not meant for me.  

When his gaze returns to fall upon me, it is with some sharpness of a fell humor with which he speaks.  “Nor would have I.”  

"Come," he says then, and rises, laying aside the small volume upon the table.  He smiles, inviting me with his outstretched hand to stand by him.  

We lean against the balustrade, our hair lifted by the breeze rising from the rushing waters.  My own gaze is drawn to the Master moreso than his home and the sight eases my sadness.  His eyes are bright and his face is clear, full of the light that pours through the valley.  His gaze softens and grows pensive as it falls upon his daughter sitting with her companions on a terrace below.  But soon he has raised his eyes and looks out upon the halls and balconies, the heights of the mountains and their swaying pines with a pride that seems to fill his heart to bursting.  He closes his eyes and breathes deep of the air.  

When he has released it, he turns to me with his eye alight, though there be tears that wet his cheeks.  I return his smile and then look out at the forest that covers the steep slopes.  The sun dips behind the mountains, laying their shadows upon the tops of the trees.  The hour grows late, but I give little thought to the ordering of the day and am reminded sharply again that time in this place does not mark itself to the rhythms I had once known.  

"I would be better kin to you, Nienelen," Master Elrond says and lightly rests his hand atop mine.    

His clasp is warm with a newfound fondness and I find I am at ease with him where once I stood only in awe of the years that had sharpened the penetration of his gaze.  

"I had thought, mayhap, you did not love him, Aragorn, and so could turn your back upon him when danger threatened.  It grieved me my son had bound himself to you, who had no regard for him."  He smiles sadly and presses my hand in his.  "And now I find, now I know your heart better, I am grieved anew." 

I had not thought to find understanding in the father of the Lady of Rivendell, but thus he offers it and I would not refuse.  I return the clasp of his hand and bow my gratitude.  He withdraws his hand.

"Should you know of any cause for my grief other than my fears, Master Elrond," say I, "I would not know it."

"I know of none. My heart tells me little but to both fear and rejoice."

"A fine pair we make, then, Master Elrond," I say and laugh.  "We know not which fate we fear shall befall us and in which gladness we shall rejoice, but are guaranteed to feel both pain and joy mixed in full measure."

"So the world ever is, is it not?" says he and smiles.  

Far below, I hear the high squeal of my daughter.  For the warmth of the sun, Tithiniel must have brought her out of doors to play.  She hides in the folds of the cloak of a tall elf with long golden hair I know but distantly.  He shakes his head while his companions hide their smiles, every line of his stance speaking of weary tolerance, but then bursts into pursuit, at which my daughter squeals and trips upon a corner of his cloak as he turns.  

Down she goes onto the stone of the walkway and, as expected, next I hear her wail.  Tears are shed and blotted with the rich cloth as he takes her upon his knee, but next he peers under elbows and knees, beneath hair, up noses and behind ears, checking all about for any minor hurt she may have taken, and she starts to laughing, pushing away at his hands.  

"'Findel!" I hear her call in protest, laughing so hard I believe she shall next take to hiccupping should he proceed.

I shake my head and smile, though my heart pains me at the sight.  Aye, keen is my daughter's delight in the world.  It is good the elves have the patience of thousands of years, else, very soon, she would wear her playmates thin.  For the highness of her laughter and calls, I think Elenir tiring swiftly and growing hungry, though she would never admit it.  

When I look away, it is to find the Master of Imladris beside me, laughing fondly at the sight.  I am unsure why this should surprise me, what with his words at his first meeting her, but I find I am caught by his delight. 

I should go to my daughter, I think, and, mayhap, speak a little with her companion.  It will be to put a halt to her play and she will not like it much, but should the elf-lord be of such power as to have been sent out against The Nine, no doubt he holds position of influence amongst the elves of the Hidden Vale.  

I have one last obligation to which I must attend ere I may go.  Though my heart beats in my throat at the fear I shall ask too much and only damage my cause, I must ask it now I have the chance.

“Lord Elrond? I have no right to ask this of you.  I can only beg of you your pity.”

He turns, and the light of mirth sparked by my daughter's foolishness shines yet in his eyes.  

At this, his face sobers. “What is it you would ask?”  

“The men of the Dúnedain of the North are few, and their need is desperate.  Would you not have pity on them?  They that would defend them have made of them a sacrifice by which all the Free Peoples may yet be saved.  They are alone and are your kin from afar.”    

“I have not forgotten them, Nienelen, nor has their lord,” he says and looks upon me gravely.  “Aragorn, too, made this plea ere he left.  But, do not you forget, I have my own Council with which to contend.  We are not invulnerable here and the numbers who may take up our defense lessen with each passing season.  And I am master, not king, and cannot command them to do what they will not.”

At this I bow and accept both his censure and somber pity.  "I am afraid I have distracted you from more important matters."

"I can think of none more deserving of my attention at this moment.    

"I do not know when you will leave my care, Lady Nienelen,” he goes on, “but while you abide here, I would wish you consider yourself as my kin, for indeed you are, both by marriage and of your own right."  

"My thanks to thee, Master Elrond," say I and bow again.

There I leave him.  His robes hang about him, swaying with his movements and the breeze as he leans upon the balustrade and looks about upon the folk gathered there.  Warm is the light that shines from his face, lit as it is by the fondness of his smile.

~oOo~

 ¹ J.R.R. Tolkien: LOTR: Many Meetings