Updated. Hopefully, less confusing. :)
Cirwen hobbled to the bank just as Legolas finished securing his deceased companions to his ship. He was as beautiful as the day she met him, fair beyond measure. But she was not. The years had not been kind to her physically, but her memories were full of love and joy. One thing remained with her as she watched him descend the grey ship he built by the sweat on his back. She had always hoped that he would know how she felt about him, how she had always felt about him though she had never spoken the words. Had she been wrong not to do so?
His smile warmed her heart as he approached her, greeting her as he always did. How he joked that she was the fairest! He would always insist that it was true, but she knew better. When he took her hand and set his lips upon it, she shivered.
"Are you cold, my dearest Cirwen?" He asked, concern creasing his flawless features. Fearing for her, he removed his cloak and draped it around her. He then helped her to the chair that stood in the sand waiting for her.
"My prince, thank you, kindly." She would have to tell him how she felt for soon she would never see him again.
"Dearest Cirwen," he said, searching the seashore, "will your daughter and son be joining us? I should very much like to see the little one."
A pang in her chest tugged awfully at her heart. The elven prince had never been so handsome. Sorrow filled her heart and then anger followed at what could have been. "My prince, I must confess something." Now or never. Her heart swelled with emotion. "I love you, I always have."
There was no disgust in his gaze as he perceived her. It seemed to her that this was something he had been waiting for. Oh! The life they would have shared if she had spoken sooner. He knelt down to her and pressed his hand to her knee. His blue eyes brimmed with tears.
"I know, I always have. I must confess something as well."
She knew what he would say: he did not feel the same. He never wanted to hurt her, so he never said anything. But she could not watch him leave her without ever telling him that she had loved him all her life.
"I love you as well," he admitted with a heavy sigh. Had she heard him correctly? Her hearing wasn't as it once was. "I have loved you since the moment I laid my eyes on you all those years ago." A tear fell from him and landed in the sand.
"Why did you not say anything? We have lost everything," she cried in anguish. She felt her heart break. Her mind trailed to when the moment she'd first met him. He, as he was known to do, was paying homage to her king and his friend. At the time, she was a handmaiden to the queen. Cirwen lost her mind to love and longing for Legolas though she never felt the courage to confess what lay in her heart. Their friendship had blossomed quickly, but it never went beyond playful teasing and peace in each other's company.
"My words could not be spoken because of how much I loved you then as I do now." He watched as she frowned at his words. "Dearest Cirwen, we have lost nothing. We have gained so much. Your friendship and love are something I shall cherish for all eternity."
A shaky breath filled her lungs. "We could have had a family. My prince, my heart is so heavy." She wept at her sorrow.
Moved by her woes, he gently took her into his arms. "I shall tell you how much I love you and explain how I've told you every day of my feelings."
Cirwen eyed him suspiciously.
"You have made a family, although not with me, and it has made you happy. I loved you the instant I spied you, but I knew it could never be," his voice trembled. The quiet, early morning added to the severity of their parting confessions. "My dearest, my heart yearned every day to love you, but the pain I would have caused you was not worth satiating my own wants. I loved you so much that I wished never to hurt you."
He helped her stand once more and offered his arm. They walked slowly along the shoreline. Seagulls cried above them, they echoed her sorrow. She listened as he continued.
"I saw your loneliness, and it pained me. By chance, I met Thorongel. He was just a boy at the time; he was utterly smitten with you." Legolas laughed at the memories flooding his mind. "He was training for the court, but he could focus on nothing but the beautiful maiden always in the shadow of her great queen."
Cirwen remembered the boy: clumsy and careless. She thought back to all the times he was chided for his addled brain and daydreaming. But he was sweet and always found a way to corner her into a conversation. How long ago it seemed since she met Thorongel. It was Legolas who had encouraged her to speak with the boy. Her prince had given her such a wonderful friend.
"Thorongel was such an enigmatic boy," Legolas continued. "He had such a thirst for life and his service to the king could be matched by no one else. But it was the love he had for you that was unparalleled, even by me. Dearest, I loved you so much that I pushed you into the arms of another."
A love had blossomed quickly between Cirwen and Thorongel. When he established himself in the King's court, he proposed to Cirwen. She remembered the days she had spent agonizing over whether she would accept. Giving into despair that Legolas did not love her, she accepted the boy. She was rewarded with the great and pure love of a boy who made her a better woman.
"I watched the woman I love carry the children of another man. I watched her dot over them with the care I knew she would have shown for our own children. It hurt every day to see it, but I loved you. But look near the ship, your family approaches."
Cirwen followed his gaze to his ship. Trudging through the damp sand was her daughter, her son, and her grandchild. Joyous was the day her daughter brought her grandson into the world. Joyous was every day with them.
"I have watched the woman I love grow old, knowing that she would leave me in the end. It is a blow to my ancient heart that you will once again be with a man who is not me. You shall be surrounded by his love and leave me to mourn you. That is why I have chosen to leave this day. I cannot watch you die, Cirwen, when I have watched you love another, become a mother, and lead a life with someone else. That is how much I love you."
He stopped her and watched as she wept, allowing her memories to dance before her eyes, savoring every blessing she had been given. Legolas felt at his ease with his decision to give up a life with her, for he could have never given her anything better than what she had lived through.
"I gave up a life with you so that you would not mourn the loss of your youth while I remained unchanged. I gave you up so that you would never know jealousy or grief over our brief time together. I gave you up so that you could have the love I may never know. Dearest Cirwen, every day I told you I loved you and every day you told me the same. I shall leave with a light heart knowing that your children and grandchildren are the results of our love as well as the love you shared with Thorongel. Those children are the result of how much your happiness has meant to me."
Cirwen spoke then, tears clouded her eyes. "I have known unimaginable happiness, and I have done so without ever realizing the pain you felt. No greater love could I have been given than what I have known by knowing you. Legolas, my prince, I have the greatest treasure in all the world, thanks to you."
The life she had known with Thorongel would never have existed without her prince. She conceded that he had indeed told her every day that he loved her, in the way he embraced her on her wedding day; in the way he held her children as infants; in the way he sang Elvish songs of mourning for her departed husband. Knowing he had given up his happiness for hers filled her with love such as few have ever felt.
"I have lived a full life. I made a family; loved two people and had my love returned. I have watched my children grow and I have known what many spend eternity searching for. I thank you with all of my heart, my love."
"I have one request, fairest maiden in all of Middle Earth," he declared softly. "Do not let me watch the woman I love die. Let me carry the memories we have shared across the sea."
Cirwen was then joined by her family. They helped her take a seat once more on the shore and bid Legolas a tearful farewell as he ascended his ship. He waved to them from his ship as it slid through the currents. As she watched the grey ship disappear beyond the horizon, Cirwen smiled. She took her last breath when she could no longer see the vessel bearing away her elf prince. But she would not be alone. At her journey's beginning, she found Thorongel, smiling as he had the first time they met.
"My wife," he greeted with his boyish grin, "let us go on to the next adventure."
With her age gone, and nothing of the sort intact, she ran to her husband, relishing in her happiness. She would never be alone again. Her elf had given her everything she had desired and unknowingly, she had given him the same.