Prologue – The Heir
Something was wrong, and it wasn't just her sorrow speaking. For years, she had stood over the graves of her ancestors, asking their guidance, and though they never answered, she felt comforted by the kind gaze of their stone faces. This was different; these faces were new, and were not meant to join the Old Ones so soon. She wasn't foolish; she was 20 now, and understood that one day even she would join their cold, immobile number, to look over those who would come after, but still the certainty remained that these new faces had appeared in stone too soon. She wasn't ready to be without their mortal guidance yet. An unchecked tear slid down her cheek; she wasn't ready to be without them yet.
"Lady Arwen, come away. It cannot be good for you to dwell here so long." The sound of her faithful companion registered in her ears, but she did not stir, didn't even move to brush away the strands of dark brown hair which the breeze tossed in her face and left clinging to her parched lips. "Lady Arwen, my – my Queen, please..." It was the use of that title which drew the girl from her near trance. She blinked her pale blue eyes, empty of emotion for yet another moment before she narrowed in anger, turning to face her mother's best friend.
"Do not address me so, Lady Ysthera. I am no Queen." Feeling her throat tightening, she refrained from saying more for fear of betraying how close she was to breaking down entirely. She didn't want anyone to see exactly how raw she felt; the three weeks since her parents' passing had done nothing to numb the pain, and the tingling sensation in her spine, the whispering in the back of her mind that their deaths were not the accident they were believed to be, had only increased over time.
She turned to fix her gaze on the statue of King Aragorn, the hero who led Gondor back into times of prosperity, as if the answers to her questions could somehow be found there. It was the expression depicted upon his face which set her course: that combination of kindness and resolve. She would not write off these inner warnings as mere folly; she needed to find a place to think things through, away from the eyes and ears of those who would try and use their young and untrained Heir.
She would slip quietly out of Gondor tonight. Where she should head, she knew not.