The rainbow

Fíriel

Another wet day. It almost always rains here – at least it seems to have done since I came – a grey rain that leaches all colour from the landscape and all joy from the heart. The waters of the lake are muddy grey and choppy; lashed by a vicious little wind. There are two swans on the lake; even their whiteness is dimmed. I don’t know how they can bear it.

It never rains like this at home. Usually our rains are gentle, feeding our streams and little rivers and greening the hills and woodlands. Sometimes we have sharp storms that bring the rain in great torrents, but they never last long, and after them comes a  freshness. Often, during a storm, we see the lightning leap up from the mountains behind the City, blue lightning on the white snow-peaks, and it is beautiful and terrifying to watch. The older people hate it; in the old days they believed thunder and lightning was work of the Enemy. Father never believed that, and because he was never frightened of storms, I wasn’t either.

I don’t think they can ever have such storms here in the North. There isn’t enough spirit in the air. It can only weep and drizzle. There’s no strength in the sun here, either; the summers are grey and chill, like the winters. The sun never deserts Ithilien altogether, even in the winter. Even when the days are shortest, he sets only slowly and leaves a long afterlight, and it’s seldom really cold. On clear winter evenings I used to walk with Father in our orchard, or sit in the courtyard, when he had the time, and we would read or talk, or he would teach me, until Mother came and chided us both for staying out in the chill air. Precious moments that seemed of no importance at the time.   

Sometimes it does turn cold at home, but never for long, and it’s a crisp, tingling cold, never the dull sleeting cold of the North. One night, I remember, an icy wind swept down from the mountains and froze everything, so that when the sun rose in the morning every tree and bush and even fountain looked as if it had been carved out of diamonds.

Cold evenings, when Father was at home and not too busy, were the best times of all. We would gather in Mother’s little sitting room, round the apple-wood fire (no other wood burns as sweetly), and Father or Mother would tell stories. Their stories were very different – even in different tongues, since Mother always spoke in the tongue of Rohan and Father in the elven-tongue – but always enthralling. Even Túrin listened, though he pretended not to. Sometimes Elboron would tell a story, but he always preferred the bloodthirsty ones about battles and wars and I didn’t like them. Mother did, because she has a warrior’s heart. And so did Father, even when Elboron tried to sing, although he has a voice like a crow with a sore throat (his own description). Father liked it because it reminded him of Uncle Boromir. I’m glad Father has Elboron with him now that I am so far away.

Sometimes we sat in silence, and that was best of all. You don’t need words to love people.

I would love Eldarion if I could, but you can’t love people by wanting to, or because they want you to, or because they love you. I give him what I can. My body above all, because I know how to go away from it while he is using it and be somewhere else. I don’t know if he knows that I do this. I have to do it, it’s the only way I can bear it. I dine with him and walk with him and ride with him. I even dance with him, and with other lords if the festivities require it, but it’s hard. Your feet can’t be light if your heart is heavy, and you can’t dance under the stars and the moon when the skies are always cloudy and grey.

Of course I sit beside Eldarion when he holds court, and smile and speak graciously to all comers; when he is away I do this alone. It’s easy to do because Father always insisted on courtesy until it became second nature to me. I can smile and be gracious even to people I don’t like – even all the ladies who think Elboron should have married one of their daughters and not a mixed-blooded upstart from the South. Not that they ever put it that way, of course, but I wouldn’t be Father’s daughter if I couldn’t read thoughts as transparent as theirs. It’s more difficult to be gracious and stately with people I do like, such as the dear hobbits. Sometimes, when they are with me, I laugh and chatter and feel that I am really here. The rest of the time it’s only a shell of me that is here. The real Fíriel is wandering about seeking the way home, and never finding it. I dream that almost every night, and wake up to find my face wet with tears. If Eldarion notices he never says anything. Perhaps he thinks the shell is the real me, but I don’t think he is so easily fooled.

I can still feel Father, of course. I know when he is well, and when he is tired or anxious or unhappy. And of course he knows the truth about how I feel. I would hide it from him if I could, because I know it grieves him almost past bearing, but I can’t.

The strangest thing of all is that he still thinks that I’ve done the right thing, and deep, deep down, I think so too. I don’t know why, because I am not happy and I’m sure Eldarion isn’t happy either. I try to think of it like a lesson, a very difficult lesson, so difficult that you give up trying to understand what your teacher is saying and just accept it, until a time comes, years later perhaps, when the whole thing comes back to you unexpectedly and you do understand. Until that happens, I just live from day to day and do my duty, as Father does.

***

I can hear footsteps approaching. Someone is coming to summon me. Eldarion must be back from his hunting. I must banish the real me and polish up the bright, smiling shell that everyone here except Eldarion thinks is the real me. I’m good at that; I’ve had plenty of practice this past year.

That’s odd; when I came in here it was quite dark, but now the sky is brightening, and I think the sun is struggling to show himself. Yes, here is a gleam of him, catching the swans’ plumage and turning it dazzling white, like the swans on the River at home. The clouds are turning to silver, and there’s an answering brightness on the water. And now, strange and wonderful for the end of a dark, northern winter’s day, there’s a scrap of rainbow in the sky over the lake, the colours so bright and pure you’d think they had only just been made. Perhaps it’s a sign – though of what, I don’t know.

Perhaps it’s a sign of hope.