She was so close – so close to the place she had once called home.
It wasn't her home anymore. No place in this world was. It was on the other side of stars, where their light was eternal, where nobody and nothing could die. Not like he had died.
She had left soon after his body had been lain into the ground, next to his brother and uncle's. She couldn't face her pain in front of all those Men, Elves and Dwarves. They knew nothing of her pain. They didn't know what she had lost. She had left without telling anyone, quietly before they could notice, so nobody could follow her. Where she had intended to go to, she could not tell, not even today.
But here she was again, in the place she had met him for the first time. He had wanted her to throw him a dagger so he could defend himself against a giant spider.
If you think I'm giving you a weapon, dwarf, you are mistaken! She had shouted at him at the time, throwing the dagger herself to kill the beast behind his back.
She regretted ever calling him any differently but his name. She hated that memory. She hated herself because she couldn't remember if she had ever actually called out for him, if his name had ever crossed her lips. She knew hers had crossed his. She remembered it like it had been yesterday; when she closed her eyes, she could see his face, pale in fever caused by poison.
Tauriel. He had whispered, so softly, so desperately.
It hurt. Memories always did. That one especially.
Do you think she could have loved me?
"Kili." She murmured, imagining him standing right in front of her right now, just like at the day they had met. But this time there was no spiders, no Dwarves, no Elves around. There were just the two of them, her hand in his, his eyes looking at hers.
But he wasn't there. He never was. Since the day he had died, she has been wandering through Middle Earth, trying to find a place where, when she opened her eyes, he would be there, with that small smile on his lips that had snatched her heart all those years ago and a spark far more beautiful than that of any star in his eyes.
But he was never there. She was always alone.
She made a few steps forward, wondering if she should allow herself to go back. If she should visit the halls of what had once been home, the corridors that she had used to know like the back of her hand. She wondered for a moment if they had changed.
Then another sight appeared in her mind – a sight of a prison and a Dwarf standing behind bars, talking about a red moon.
She knew she couldn't go back. Her soul hadn't healed enough for her to visit that place.
Those halls were forever lost to her. If she ever found a way to heal her soul, if she ever let herself forget, then she could come back.
You will never heal. It seemed like her own heartbeat was whispering the words into her ears. A part of you has gone with him. Until you find him, you will never find yourself.
She felt tears appearing in the corners of her eyes.
Haven't I cried enough? She asked herself for a thousandth time, still unable to blink away the wave of tears. I can't live like this anymore. My life is too long to bear it. I can't. I'm too weak.
For a moment – and there had been a lot of those moments in the years that had gone by – she wished they had never crossed paths. That she was still the Captain of the King's guard, fighting for her King and kin. It would have been so much easier. Maybe she would have died honourably, in a fight, like a true warrior. She wouldn't have wasted away all the long years of her immortal life, looking for something that couldn't be found.
But she couldn't erase the past. She couldn't become the same Elf she had once been. She couldn't forget him. She loved him. And he loved her, even in that distant place beyond stars. She knew he would be disappointed if he could see her now. He knew she was stronger than this. For his sake, she had to be.
But the grip of sorrow was so tight. She couldn't free herself. She needed help, she needed him. But he was out of her reach, cruelly taken away from her. Without him, she was only half alive, just a shadow of the person he had fallen in love with.
You took my heart with you. Could he hear her? Could he see the pain he was causing her? Did he even care? Give it back to me and I will be alive again. Release me, Kili. Please, let me let you go.
But he didn't and he never would. She would wander until the end of time, burning up in the flames of love that destroyed her and healed her at the same time. All because of him, who dreamed of her somewhere she couldn't reach him.
Cold breeze suddenly caressed her skin, making her shiver. She had been standing there for so long that she hadn't even realized the night had fallen.
I always thought it is a cold light; remote and far away.
Suddenly, she ran. She climbed up the closest tree as fast as she could. When she found herself above the highest branches, she could see it.
It is a memory. Precious and pure.
Tears froze on her cheeks in the coldness of the night breeze. For so long she had been running away from those words, because she had thought they would hurt more than any other. She had been trying to forget them, but now she finally understood why she had come here, why she had to come here. To remember.
It had taken all those long years for her to open her eyes to the light again. Even if it was a sad light.
But there it was. There he was. In the memory. In the starlight.