It had been centuries since he last slept.
At night he lay awake next to his fair lady, listening to her delicate breathing and weaving patterns in the moonbeams that danced upon her skin. He would listen to her dream-murmurings, divining the whispers of the future through the words that stumbled off of her tongue. He found immeasurable comfort lying beside the being who knew him best (for who could know him fully?), living off of her scent and the warmth of her body. And when she woke, oh when the River-maid woke she would melt his lips with her kisses and drown him in waves of heated pleasure...hours later he would surface on the shore of sanity and beg her to keep him from breathing, just once more.
Those were his sleepless nights, and they were good. All of it was good.
Mornings were made of jolly songs, good food, a kiss or two, and loud laughter. In the sunlit hours there were foxtails, sweet breezes, lazy afternoons basking naked in the sun. There were honey cakes, heady wines, and the hearth-fires to warm his toes. What greater pleasure was there in the whole of Middle Earth, than that of a well-kept home, both safe and unsettling, and eternally wild? What greater pleasure than feeling the water in your veins and the sun in your palm and the wind in your hair? What greater pleasure than the knowledge that you are the wilderness? That the water is your life-giving blood, and the sun is your sustaining spirit, and the wind is your impervious breath?
Winding river, Withywindle, weary spirits not yet departed. Lonely howls, loving touches, lacy fabric on his lady's dress. Fertile soil, fresh grown herbs, fearsome terrors in the Barrow-Downs.
These lands were his...he knew them more intimately than a mother knows her baby's cry, more intimately than a lover knows his partner's caress, more intimately than a bee knows how to make honey. He, Eldest and Fatherless, belonged to the land just as much as the land belonged to him. For he was the land, and the land was him, and they gave life to each other.
Those were his days, and they were good. All of it was good.
He had been watching beyond his borders for years.
The unfolding of a new age, and the death of the old one. The changing of seasons, of kings, of allies, of enemies. He witnessed from afar the birth of the elves, brilliant and wise as starlight, the dwarves, hard-wearing and forceful as stone, and men, adaptive and quick learning. (For with such short lives, they had to be.) Those were the strange lands, places he had never seen in person and would likely never set foot in. They were full of mysteries and intrigue, senseless death and bitter hatreds. They had their joys, of course...their happy times, their peaceful ages, their bountiful harvests, their shared bliss and wonder.
Yet, their way of life was alien to him. He, the Master, wakeful in a way no earthly being could ever be, young and yet old and wise beyond all understanding, could not see the entire tapestry of time and history and things yet to come that blanketed those lands. Beyond his borders, the world was unsafe in an entirely foreign way. The unknown.
And it was good. All of it was good.
For what did it matter? Time would pass, empires would be created, dictators would be slain, brothers would fall. Everything that was had passed, everything that is would pass, and everything to be...well, how was he to know? (And yet he knew; those lands changed in a way that his realm scorned). No...he was content and merry and furious and seething all at once. Everything and nothing between his borders was personified in his being. He had no interest in the affairs of the wild lands beyond his border, so unsure and unwelcoming and unstable. No...he had far more important things to take care of, for Old Man Willow was often cranky, and Goldberry was waiting.
Later that night, while humming along to the tune of his lover's breathing, he had to admit to himself that, perhaps, just perhaps, the wildest lands were the ones he called home.