Title: Someday and Beyond
Characters: Lothíriel, Legolas, Éomer
Rating: K+
Summary: Queen Lothíriel of Rohan and Legolas Greenleaf discuss the death of those they love most.
Disclaimer: I own neither Lord of the Rings nor Hamlet.
"To die: to sleep;
No more; and by a sleep to say we end
The heart-ache, and the thousand natural shocks
That flesh is heir to, 'tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wish'd."
Meduseld gleams in the late autumn sunlight as it has ever done, but his heart is heavy. Behind him Gimli is silent; his ever-exuberant friend has spoken only bare, sparse words since they set out some days ago just mere hours after the Queen's messenger had reached them, eyes wild and frantic.
His Majesty wishes to see his friends, she had written, circumspect as ever, for Lothíriel of Rohan was a woman born to caution, and he thinks of the King and Queen as he likes to remember them, standing together, her arm tucked in his, eyes bright with laughter and life, their future full before them.
But they both understood the message.
Now she stands before them on the steps and for a moment the sun dances about her and Legolas sees her in his mind's eye as she had once been years ago: young, her face smooth and unlined, though even then her eyes had been old. They had been friends of a sort following the war, for she was a child of Mithrellas, the blood of the Elves running so faintly in her veins. He remembers her sudden, quick smile, hidden and hooded, the suspicion of her eyes, the lilt of her voice when she sang of the desert, the bright gem that gleamed at her throat.
My mother's, she had explained.
He braces himself.
She is as proud as ever, her chin raised, but her hair is silvering, and lines trail from her eyes and mouth, and she is not as lithe on her feet as she had once been. The smile on her face is brave and unflinching and terrible: a farce.
Legolas is infinitely grateful for Gimli's solid, unwavering presence, though he has seen the mark of the years on his friend's face, too. It seems that he is destined to outlive the world and all his friends, who around him grow grey and withered, while he remains young and bright.
"The king," rumbles Gimli, a question in his voice, and Legolas hears hesitation and grief, for the two, man and dwarf, had been good friends. Are good friends still, he thinks. Surely death cannot change that.
"He will be glad to see you," says the Queen. It is a mark of her grief and her weariness that she has dispensed with formality; he sees her preoccupation in the trembling hands that smooth her skirts, but then she and Éomer have been each other's strength for so many years, perfectly balanced counterparts- where he was day, she was night; where she was secrets and shadows, he was golden light and full, bright laughter. He had seen and understood her darkness and had anchored her to the world, while she had fiercely and valiantly guarded him from those who sought to take away his light.
Now she looks suddenly vulnerable, as though her other half is disappearing.
With sudden dread Legolas thinks what that might mean for he and Gimli, when his friend, dear as any he has ever had, fades and passes into death, when Legolas is left alone and empty.
Gimli hesitates, but Legolas waves him on. "A moment. Go on."
Silence.
"He is not long for this world?" he says.
"No," she says. "No, he is not." Her voice does not quaver but her eyes sweep across the plains in a caress, her mouth tightening. "He is dying-,"
He reaches for her arm and she lets her weight sag onto him. "What will you do?"
"Wait," she answers.
"You could return to Gondor," he says. "Aragorn would be glad to have you-,"
"This is my home," she says sharply. "I will stay. Think you that I am so fickle as to leave once he is gone? I have my children, and my grandchildren, and these people-,"
She does not say his name.
So he does. "Éomer would want you to be happy-,"
"I am a fool," she says, her voice soft and bitter, "I am a fool to have loved him, if I had not, if I had never married him, it would not hurt so much- how do you bear it, to watch those you love best fade?"
She is a child of Númenor and she will live on, for though she is no longer young she might live to see one hundred, perhaps more, just as her cousin will live to see his beloved wife wither away and die.
Impatiently the Queen swipes at the tears that trickle down her face and her grip on his arm is painful, but he does not flinch. His own heart weeps with her, not for the man who lies dying within the hall but for those left behind.
For himself.
"I do not know," he whispers. Gimli. Aragorn. He will outlive them all, he knows, will watch them pass into death, will watch the Queen of Gondor fade into darkness, and still he will remain. He will watch Eldarion come to the throne and then will bear witness as he too passes and the next, and the next. He will see the changing of the world, the shifting of the lands, the rising of new powers and death of the old, the ambition and greed of men, the passing of altruism and good, and he will be alone, the last of the Elves; his grief will join those who are left of his brethren, Celeborn of Doriath and Glorfindel and Elladan and Elrohir, yet he will always be alone with only the memory he loved best.
Firmly he pushes aside his grief. "But you will outlast this storm."
"Storm?" she says bitterly. "How can you call this a mere storm?" Her chin quivers and he knows she fights tears (tears are weak, she had said, and I will not be weak) and if he were Éomer she would cry; he is her strength and with him she can be weak, but Legolas is not he.
"Cry," he tells her firmly and when she stiffens, he says, "It is not weakness, Lothíriel. You will not falter."
"No," she says and then the dam breaks and she weeps, her shoulders shaking, and he sits with her. If he can bring her no relief, he can at least bear witness. "It hurts so much- I never thought-,"
She never thought she could hurt so much.
"I know." And he is used to hurt, thought nothing could hurt him anymore until Gimli, grinning, had plucked a silver hair out of his beard very proudly; lookie here, laddie, what do you know? and Legolas had understood mortality.
The Queen draws in a deep, shuddering breath, and then she looks at him. Legolas is pierced by her unwavering gaze. "There is a world beyond this one," she says with sudden surety, and he wonders how she has turned to comforting him. "And Ilúvatar loves his children dearly. He will not see us suffer, not you, and not I. Not for long."
"Mother?" It is Elfwine, already a grown man of five-and-fifty; his eyes grow wide to see his mother's tear-streaked face, as though he has never seen her weep. Most likely he has not.
But Lothíriel's tears are spent and she dries her face, arranging her mouth in a ghastly semblance of a smile. There is new calm in her dark eyes.
"He wants to see you and Master Greenleaf."
.
They are alone.
His hair is snowy-white, the lines of his face mapping the years of his life- laughter and pain and love.
Most of all, love, for he is a man who seizes the world to him and finds laughter and joy everywhere he can. She does not have his gift; she is Lothíriel, quiet, watchful, clever Lothíriel, the girl-woman who was caught between lands and loves and languages. He had seen her and understood her as no one else had, but that was who he was.
"Thiri," he says.
"I know."
There are no need for words between them, not anymore, and gently, she strokes his face.
"The others," he says: Elfwine and his two brothers, their children, all fourteen of them, Éomer's pride and joy, the laughter that usually echoes through all of Meduseld.
"I will bring them." In the doorway she turns and he smiles at her with the promise of a beyond, and it soothes her heart.
She does not know what comes next, but she would be a fool to think that death is the end. She draws on the memories- his hand on hers, their wedding, the hooves in the courtyard when he would return, standing together as Elfwine was married, their first grandchild- and knows that she will survive.
And someday- something waits for them beyond this world.
A/N: Thanks to Deandra for catching my mistakes. Edited 13 August 2011