A/N: I am most displeased with my current standard of fic-writing. Maeglin currently missing, presumed Idril-chasing, and the Fëanorians having family squabbles and refusing to be nice. So... this came into being. The plot? Haldir mourns for the fading of Lothlórien. Post-'Rings.
Disclaimer: All JRRT's, and I hope I have not destroyed his characters too much... :)
Lórien of the Blossom
He sat alone, perched on a grey rock that jutted out into the cold stream. The rock was smooth, carved out by the gentle caresses of the water over the millennia uncounted that it had lain there. It was just low enough for his bare feet to skim the surface of the water, the icy droplets beading on his white ankles. The sound of the interruption of the flow around his feet would have mingled with the song of the stream, the sweet bubbling laughter, had it not been silenced.
He opened his hand, to reveal a young white niphredil which lay there, the stem cleanly severed by a swift knife. He turned it over in his hand, cradling the delicate flower in his fingers. Were nature allowed to take its course, it would wilt and die, cut off from the nourishing soil and water that gave it life. Its loveliness would be lost forever, and indeed none would know it had ever existed.
Carefully, he picked one white petal between finger and thumb, and let it fall, spiralling through the still air, until it made contact with the surface. Its ripples spread out soundlessly, to be lost in the flow of the stream.
Farewell to Lórien of the Blossom. Farewell to beauty, and peace, and the immortal flowers growing on the golden hill... Ah, Cerin Amroth the fair, now barren and cold... How we used to sing of you, our harps and flutes ringing at sunset when the light was golden in the treetops, and now only silence reigns on your throne...
The voice of the stream was dulled with winter and age, its song now lost to memory. He wondered if, in a thousand years, anyone would wander by these shores, and recall the myriad of colours that shimmered in the stream in new-come spring, or the countless shades of tone in her ever-changing melody.
He thought not.
Leaves were falling all around, carpeting the forest floor with cloths of gold. Some landed in the stream, sinking to the bed, or were carried along on the cold bosom of the water to who-knows where. These he watched, until they had drifted beyond his sight.
Another petal fell. Another realm lost to the march of time. Another child of the stars, left behind in the forsaken lands.
Goodbye to you, Land of the Valley of Singing Gold, where even the song of the water is silenced, and the leaves fall as golden rain... Goodbye to you, last memory of the age of glory, now left to the wind as a handful of scattered leaves...
The flower slipped from his grasp as he laid his face in his hands and began to weep, his broken sobs the only sound in the dead forest. Soon, his falling tears added their own ripples to the medley of leaves and petals in the stream.
Oh, Lothlórien, home, mother-land, friend... The only land East of the sea where the mighty Mellyrn* grow, reaching almost to the sky with their slender limbs of silver and fingers of gold... Do you remember how we used to run, our young feet eager to find paths untrodden beneath your kindly shade? Do you remember how we laughed, mock-battling with sticks on the warm evenings, and how we used to collapse exhausted on your soft blanket of leaves? Do you remember how we grew, tall like young saplings, until our childhood games were for real?
A line of soldiers, at the foot of Caras Galadhon. "Do you swear your fealty to the Lady and the Land?"
An answer, as one voice. "We swear."
A ring that could stop the marches of time. A kingdom built on the unsteady foundations of mithril and adamant.
A white flower drowning in the icy waters.
"Our love for this land is deeper than the deeps of the sea... Our regret is undying...**" How we had sung of you, how we had loved you! And now, Lórien of the Blossom, where do I turn? Shall I follow my brothers west, even as my heart resides beneath your trees and your shimmering pools? Shall I stay here until I, too, fade into dust and am forgotten, just as you are?
A last cold tear of diamond fell, its splash like shattering glass.
On the gentlest breath of wind, the last golden leaf of the mallorn came to rest on the ground, glimmering as a final tribute to Lórien the golden.
End
*Elvish plural for "Mallorn"... I think...
** Uggh. Gave in to temptation and used words from the FoTR soundtrack. Sorry, sorry... Please don't eat me...
Disclaimer: All JRRT's, and I hope I have not destroyed his characters too much... :)
Lórien of the Blossom
He sat alone, perched on a grey rock that jutted out into the cold stream. The rock was smooth, carved out by the gentle caresses of the water over the millennia uncounted that it had lain there. It was just low enough for his bare feet to skim the surface of the water, the icy droplets beading on his white ankles. The sound of the interruption of the flow around his feet would have mingled with the song of the stream, the sweet bubbling laughter, had it not been silenced.
He opened his hand, to reveal a young white niphredil which lay there, the stem cleanly severed by a swift knife. He turned it over in his hand, cradling the delicate flower in his fingers. Were nature allowed to take its course, it would wilt and die, cut off from the nourishing soil and water that gave it life. Its loveliness would be lost forever, and indeed none would know it had ever existed.
Carefully, he picked one white petal between finger and thumb, and let it fall, spiralling through the still air, until it made contact with the surface. Its ripples spread out soundlessly, to be lost in the flow of the stream.
Farewell to Lórien of the Blossom. Farewell to beauty, and peace, and the immortal flowers growing on the golden hill... Ah, Cerin Amroth the fair, now barren and cold... How we used to sing of you, our harps and flutes ringing at sunset when the light was golden in the treetops, and now only silence reigns on your throne...
The voice of the stream was dulled with winter and age, its song now lost to memory. He wondered if, in a thousand years, anyone would wander by these shores, and recall the myriad of colours that shimmered in the stream in new-come spring, or the countless shades of tone in her ever-changing melody.
He thought not.
Leaves were falling all around, carpeting the forest floor with cloths of gold. Some landed in the stream, sinking to the bed, or were carried along on the cold bosom of the water to who-knows where. These he watched, until they had drifted beyond his sight.
Another petal fell. Another realm lost to the march of time. Another child of the stars, left behind in the forsaken lands.
Goodbye to you, Land of the Valley of Singing Gold, where even the song of the water is silenced, and the leaves fall as golden rain... Goodbye to you, last memory of the age of glory, now left to the wind as a handful of scattered leaves...
The flower slipped from his grasp as he laid his face in his hands and began to weep, his broken sobs the only sound in the dead forest. Soon, his falling tears added their own ripples to the medley of leaves and petals in the stream.
Oh, Lothlórien, home, mother-land, friend... The only land East of the sea where the mighty Mellyrn* grow, reaching almost to the sky with their slender limbs of silver and fingers of gold... Do you remember how we used to run, our young feet eager to find paths untrodden beneath your kindly shade? Do you remember how we laughed, mock-battling with sticks on the warm evenings, and how we used to collapse exhausted on your soft blanket of leaves? Do you remember how we grew, tall like young saplings, until our childhood games were for real?
A line of soldiers, at the foot of Caras Galadhon. "Do you swear your fealty to the Lady and the Land?"
An answer, as one voice. "We swear."
A ring that could stop the marches of time. A kingdom built on the unsteady foundations of mithril and adamant.
A white flower drowning in the icy waters.
"Our love for this land is deeper than the deeps of the sea... Our regret is undying...**" How we had sung of you, how we had loved you! And now, Lórien of the Blossom, where do I turn? Shall I follow my brothers west, even as my heart resides beneath your trees and your shimmering pools? Shall I stay here until I, too, fade into dust and am forgotten, just as you are?
A last cold tear of diamond fell, its splash like shattering glass.
On the gentlest breath of wind, the last golden leaf of the mallorn came to rest on the ground, glimmering as a final tribute to Lórien the golden.
End
*Elvish plural for "Mallorn"... I think...
** Uggh. Gave in to temptation and used words from the FoTR soundtrack. Sorry, sorry... Please don't eat me...