A/N: For Mythopoeia, in honor of her birthday.
The days must seem so short to you, young Estel says. His face is still the round face of a child, his eyes do not yet know sorrow. Elrond gazes deep, deep, and wonders what worlds this boy will end and save.
Immortality of mind and might brings with it memory of all.
All time passes under the same sun and moon, Elrond tells him. It is I who must last longer, not the day.
.
He held his brother's hands as they cowered before the sons of Feanor, long ago. Elrond remembers the cold, the bitter winds that howled through the havens of Sirion, bringing the proud faces and the long, flashing swords.
We are going to die, Elros had chanted, trembling. We are going to die.
And what had Elrond said? What had there been to answer, when the doors were broken down?
They are half-elven—had they any right to expect to live forever?
He remembers the terrible and beautiful face of Maedhros, looking down on him from a great height. His hand—not the right hand, the hand already sacrificed on the steeps of Thangorodrim—held a long, cruel blade. Elrond remembers the blood on the sword, remembers fearing that it was his mother's blood.
But Maglor, with hair like the wings of a raven and eyes like the sea, had mercy. And in time, so had his brother with him.
The sea could be merciful.
Elrond remembers.
.
We are going to die, Elros had said. But it was Elros who wished to be counted among the mortals. Elros, who lived five hundred years and no more.
There were years—there were centuries—when Elrond's hands stretched out in quiet darkness, reaching for his brother's. There were years—there were centuries—when he whispered his name aloud at the rising and setting of the sun, as though he were in danger of forgetting.
No danger, truly, is there of that.
For always, always, he is the one who lasts.
.
Celebrian, he loves. All beings closest to Illuvatar love with a burning. (Did not the Silmarils burn?) Feanor loved power and beauty, and even the Valar loved their works.
Long does Elrond wonder if he is different. If he, not Elros, is closest to mortal man after all—for his love feels simple in his heart, simple under the tall trees that live and die far sooner than he ever will. His love warms without burning.
Half-elven. Perhaps he escapes the fate of his kin. But immortality gives time enough for every kind of ending.
Later, he finds that it only burns when he loses her.
Sail west, my love. The sea can be merciful.
.
The days must seem so short to you, young Estel says. He says it because he marvels, as all men do, at the ageless grace and the starlit eyes of elves.
And Elrond smiles, smiles at the child-face and child-eyes. He feels some of Maglor's mercy, as sure as he has felt the grief of the Noldorin.
Aloud, he answers one part; in his heart he asks, how could the days seem short to one who has known ten thousand?
And how could a heart keep burning?
.
But it burns when he loses Celebrian.
It burned when Gil-Galad, his beloved king, fell before the horror of Morgoth's deadliest servant.
It burned when Isildur blackened hand and heart with so small a thing.
.
Elrond endures. It is he who must last, even when his heart is burning.
But when Arwen stands firm on mortal earth, seeking not the endless West—
His heart breaks then.