A/N: Written for Trick or Treat 2017 as an extra treat for NancyBrown.
There is no sea-longing within her. Tauriel stares at the waves crashing before her, the awesome majesty of the sea, ever restless, ever changing and mutable and feels absolutely no desire to sail upon it. The cries of the gulls on the shore provoke no longing within her, no desperate need to see the light of Aman.
She had hoped seeing the sea would awaken something within her. Some desire to see others of her kin. Something she can work towards. A path. A journey. The kind of journey that promises rest at the end, rather than more hardship.
She is so tired of death. Yet it seems all this world will give her is more death.
Still, for all of the noise of the waves and gulls, it is peaceful here. The wind is fresh and brisk, a constant pressure against her body that is somehow reassuring, as is the salt spray smell that permeates the air.
Tauriel closes her eyes to let the sun warm her. As deep in the heart of the Greenwood under the leaves and branches as she has been most of her life, she has rarely felt the sunlight so directly. The few times she ventured away from the forest have always been too busy to truly appreciate the sun. Though she holds the stars dearest to her heart, she rejoices at the sunlight too. Too long has she been under the shadow; the warmth of the sun feels cleansing.
The sound of the sea changes. If she listens closely, it becomes almost a melody. The song of creation, an echo of the great Song that brought about the world and all its troubles. And all its beauty.
She opens her eyes, blinking at the glare of the light on the waves. For a long moment, nothing changes. Then it comes again, a haunting song that pierces her heart with the grief carried within. The voice comes from below the sea cliff she is standing upon, at a narrow beach at the water's edge.
She inches closer to the edge, mindful to not disturb any stone or blade of grass. The singer is an Elf. She's not quite surprised - there are few mortals who could sing with such grace, to make it almost one with the sea.
He is tall and dark haired, with the look of a Noldor. That is faintly surprising. She had not thought any of her distant kin would be so far to the South, beyond Gondor's borders. She has wandered far in her exile and had not expected to find any other elves nearby. Especially not Noldor.
Tauriel wants to speak with him. It surprises her just how much. She had not thought herself in want of company. It is why she has wandered so far afield. But the sight of another like her, lost and grieving, stirs her compassion. She wishes to let him know he is not alone, even if for a moment.
"I had not thought to find another Elf so far South," she calls down to him once he finishes his song, "Hail and well met."
She does not offer her name. It does not seem important. And it would...hurt to not have her homeland put at its end. There are none who know her this far from her home, few who know of her exile even in the west, but she does not want to lie. So has mostly kept silent and never to let her name slip past her lips.
The elf startles, whipping around and finding her unerringly. Tauriel's breath catches in her throat. He is beautiful, like all of the Eldar, but the light that shines from him! He has gazed upon the light of Aman and the Trees. Tauriel has never met an Elf who has done so, had half thought the stories of their light to be just that. Stories.
His eyes are a dark grey, stormy with emotions, never still and ever changing, much like the sea he was singing his grief into.
"Nor I," he finally replies and his voice is like music and the brush of waves against the rock.
"Will you join me, daughter of the forest? It has been long since I have spoken to any of my kin."
There is a wealth of sadness in his words, and a strange bitterness. Not directed at herself, she thinks. What has he done to loathe himself so?
Still, Tauriel descends the cliff on nimble feet and is soon standing before him. He is tall, far taller than her. His hair, long and unbraided, uncoils back from his face in dark tendrils as the wind carries it. It lends him the same restless quality as the rest of the ocean.
"How did you know I was a woodland elf?" Tauriel asks. Though it is not true any longer, it has been true for most of her life. Exile has taken many things away from her, but it cannot take away her roots.
"The way you looked at the sea, as though you have never seen it before," he says, a small smile playing across his face. It softens his face into something more approachable. Tauriel smiles back. It is small and faded, but more than she has given in many a day.
"Indeed I have not. It is…" she trails off, unable to describe the disquiet in her heart at the thought of it.
"Beautiful?" he prompts, turning to look out at the sea.
"Yes," she says. But something in her tone makes him look back to her, staring at her as though he can divine her soul. Perhaps he can. Those who have gone to Aman and returned oft have strange gifts.
"It doesn't call to you?" he asks, a tinge of incredulity within his voice and a slight widening of the eyes.
"No," she says, pulling her chin up to stare right into his eyes. Let him read whatever he wishes in her. She has nothing to hide.
"Would that I had your strength," he says, the intensity of his gaze subsiding. His proud bearing falters a little bit, apologetic. It leaves her flat footed, expecting a confrontation and receiving none.
"My strength?" she almost scoffs, "When all say that to hear the song of the sea is to hear the music of the Ainur and awaken a longing within our spirits to it?"
"There is no shame in being bound to the troubles of this world more than the idea of peace," he says, "I have seen in your heart, elleth. You will sail, or won't, at a time of your own choosing. There is strength in that. Would that the Valar be so kind to grant us all the same grace."
Tauriel stares at him for a long moment, then glances at the sea. His gaze had turned to it again during his speech. He seems unable to look away.
"Why haven't you sailed?"
"The path is barred to me," he whispers. His hands clench at his sides and his face is a rictus of pain.
How do you know the path is closed to you, she wants to ask, but doesn't. Instinct draws her eyes to his fists. One of them isn't closing properly. He holds it more like a claw than anything else. She can see the inside of his palm and fingers are a deep scarred red.
Tauriel has seen injuries like that before. Burns that look barely healed, even though the injury is long past. There are few things that can scar elves so.
She reaches for his hand, ignoring his small startled flinch. His hand is cool in hers. There is something vulnerable in his expression, a fear and hesitation she does not like.
"Perhaps not forever," she looks into his face, "Maglor."
His hand spasms in her own. She holds his gaze until his hand unclenches, the fingers straightening, showing the red burns on them.
"Who are you?" Maglor asks. He sounds afraid. She shakes her head with a laugh and lets go of his hand. She has grown bold in her exile. Never before would she have dared touch an elf of such nobility (no matter his actions) so.
"Tauriel. Just Tauriel."
"Why do you not run from me?"
There is a wealth of sorrow in that question. Pity stirs in Tauriel's heart for him. Has he been so afraid, all this time?
"Would you have me run? Your deeds are long past, long before my birth. It is not my place to judge or forgive."
He exhales in a long shudder, eyes filled with unshed tears.
"That is a kindness I do not deserve," his voice is rough.
Tauriel smiles.
"It is a kindness freely given, nonetheless."
He touches his hand to his chest in thanks, unable to speak.
"Is this what you have done since? Sang and wandered the shores?"
Has he truly spent all this time torturing himself with a longing he thought he could not fulfill? Wanting, waiting. It is a wonder he did not Fade into nothingness. He looks away, back towards the sea. Maglor shrugs, pushing a dark strand of hair behind his ear.
"Not always. I...I do not even remember how long it has been. The first years after were...just were. I can recall nothing of them."
Tauriel can sympathize. Her sorrow and memories are nothing compared to his own, but she knows well the haze that can descend in the first moments of grief. She has had to climb out of it once before.
She is still climbing. It does not seem like Maglor has even started. How does one even start after so much death and grief? How do you continue after that?
"The sea holds nothing for you now," she says, as gently as she is able. He still flinches.
"You have already let go that which most ailed you," she brushes a finger lightly across the back of his palm. He grimaces.
"You know not of what you speak," he says, voice ragged. Her eyes harden. Perhaps not. But she is not the one wasting away at the shore of the sea. Not anymore.
"Do you long for the song of the sea or what is in its depths?" she says, less gently. He rounds on her, anger blazing his light into a brightness that almost hurts to see. She does not flinch.
Maglor's anger lasts only a moment. He stares at her in disbelief. Then laughs. It is a full body laugh and his head is thrown back, showing his long lean throat as he shakes with the force of it. It is a lovely laugh, like the sound of a rippling brook over pebbles, light and musical.
"What else would you have me do, Tauriel of the forest?"
What would she have him do? She can hardly say 'stop grieving, alone and sad', much though she would wish it. She has not the words. Words have not been her strength of late; too much sorrow and too few people to share it with. She blinks.
"Come with me," she says, so quickly she almost blurts it out. He looks stunned.
"What?"
She smiles, full of radiant joy that she had hoped to find on these shores. She has, only not in the way she had expected to. She reaches out her hand to him.
"Come with me. Away from this place. Let me show you the beauty still in this world and the sorrow. The woods where I walked as a child and the deserts I have never crossed. The light and shadow both and the brilliant, but brief lights of mortals."
For a horrible, heart wrenching moment, she thinks he will reject her. Then his cool hand slips into hers. She squeezes his fingers as she feels him tremble.
"I suppose the sea is one thing that shall always be here," he says. With one last lingering look at the water, he turns away from it.
Together, they climb the sea cliff and head into the East.
END