Summary: On a visit to Minas Tirith, Legolas tends to the palace garden and thinks of his friends who helped him to restore it after the end of the War of the Ring.
Rating: PG
Disclaimer: They belong to Professor Tolkien; I'm just borrowing them.
A Gardener's Tale
I kneel upon the grass, the early morning dew still lingering enough to dampen the knees of my leggings. The sun is just beginning her long climb into the bright sky and much of this garden is still in shadow, but the spot where I am kneeling is already basking in her warmth on this early summer morning. I survey the flower bed before me with a critical eye. Estel's gardeners have kept it well, but I can still see a few plants in places where they are not entirely happy, and a few weeds beginning to show their leaves. Everything grows so quickly this time of year.
That was one blessing, when Samwise and I first began to restore this garden, neglected as it had been under the Shadow of evil and of Denethor's madness. Spring was in full march and we found that everything we planted, transplanted, moved and grafted grew with the slightest encouragement. It was as if even the plants knew that the Shadow had passed at last, and were rejoicing at the banishment of evil. The quiet, rewarding work helped us to recover after our respective ordeals; Sam filled out again and began to lose the haunted look in his eyes, while I felt my soul responding to the new-found peace like the flowers we were liberating from the choking grip of weeds, turning to the sun and drinking in her comfort.
As the garden became more habitable, others of our friends began to venture out of the palace and find us. Frodo was first, sitting quietly on a bench under a tree and breathing in the clean air. He wanted to help us, but Sam wouldn't hear of it. So he just sat and watched, soaking up the sunlight and occasionally falling asleep. Soon the colour began to return to his cheeks, too.
Gimli came next, mumbling something about seeing what we were up to while he was off breaking his back helping with the stonework down in the city. We ignored his grumbling and let him help despite his protests that he was not exactly a garden person. Used as he was to rock and stone, even he found some satisfaction in clearing and digging. He brought us chunks of masonry, too damaged to be reused, and made them part of the garden, ensconcing them in flowerbeds and planting little mountain plants in their crevices.
Merry and Pippin came looking for Frodo, and brought a very large flagon of ale with them. Not much work got done that day. Still, the following days saw one or the other, and often both, pottering with us and lending a hand where it was needed. And Mithrandir came in the evenings, and sat on the bench to smoke his pipe.
Estel, of course, was too busy to come and find out what we were doing, although he heard all about it every evening over dinner. Dear Sam, he just could not keep himself from talking about his beloved plants, the gardener finally in his element again. I said little, but then that is my way. I listen and observe, and that is enough for me.
Dear Sam. I love all my companions dearly, for we shared something that changed us all beyond measure and forever set us apart from our fellows. But Sam...his quiet bravery took my breath away, when I finally understood all that had happened out there in the forsaken land of Mordor. Sam would talk to me, a little, as we worked in the garden, although I gleaned more from what he did not say than what he did. His gentle, self-effacing ways saw off any attempts to call him a hero, though hero is surely what he was. We all had to face our own darkness on our quest, but Sam, perhaps of all of us, was most unfamiliar with what he came up against. And he, of all of us, stood up and faced it down, even when all hope seemed to have fled. Frodo filled in the gaps for me, in quiet evening conversations under the trees, and I began to realise just how much there was to simple Samwise Gamgee.
I recollect myself, reaching to pluck out a few opportunistic weeds. At this early hour almost nobody is up and about, and it is almost quiet enough for me to hear the voices of the plants as they sing their endless song of harmony and balance, the never-ending cycle of life. I whisper a plea for forgiveness to the little plants between my fingers, untwining a length of bindweed from the flower it is strangling, and coaxing its roots out of the ground.
It is indeed peaceful in this garden. I am glad to be back, after so much time. I have had a colony of my own to found in the woods of fair Ithilien and I have not visited Minas Tirith for several years. Estel and Arwen have children now, and their laughter echoes along the corridors of the palace. They come here sometimes to sit with their mother, who still comes here for her moments of quiet contemplation. It is somewhere that feels close to home for her, she told me once, a little bit of Imladris within the stone walls of the city. Not quite, I said, for there is no running water, no waterfalls, no river. And the next thing I did was to persuade Gimli to help me build a fountain, to ease the ache of homesickness in the heart of the Queen of Gondor, who had given up so much in order to take up her destiny by the side of the one she loved more than anything. The water flows still, and in my mind I can see the waterfalls of Rivendell, the roofs of the Last Homely House rising above the treetops. The song of the fountain is soft, musical, and yet within it still I can hear the roar of the Sea, tugging at my heart and yet strangely comforting, for I have found a way to stave off the sea-longing for now, and for now the Sea holds no fear for me.
I thin out a few seedlings, move a few plants from shade into sunlight, and vice versa. I untangle more bindweed and gently remove the faded blossoms I find. The sun continues her ascent, but she is still far from her zenith when a soft footfall on the grass alerts me to the presence of someone else in the garden. I do not look round; I know full well who it is by the singing of my heart.
"I might have known I would find you here, my love," he says, amusement colouring his deep voice, and I smile to hear it. "Has all been well in your absence?"
"Well enough. But it needs the hand of an Elf every now and then to tend it and keep it just as it should be." Or a Hobbit, I add silently, but Samwise is far from here now, settled in his life, Mayor of Hobbiton and father of several little Hobbit-lads and lasses, by the last report. And so it is up to me to keep an eye on the garden whenever I visit.
"I know, my love. Would you care to tell an old man about what you are doing?"
I smile again. Imrahil is far from old; indeed his hair is still not grey, more than ten years after the wedding of Eomer and Lothiriel when first we became lovers. He likes to play on it, though, in my company; he likes to be humoured by me, ageless as I am, and older by far than him. I reach up and take his hand, pulling him down to sit beside me as I tell him the story of this garden and of all the plants and flowers and trees that live here. There is, after all, a tale behind all of them and though Imrahil has heard most of them time and time again, he never seems to tire of hearing them once more. His gentle patience is a balm to my soul, still scarred and burned by the horrors of war and tired beyond measure from a lifetime battling the darkness that overran my home; and his intense passion fires my heart and body, keeping me safe on the shores of Middle-Earth and quieting the aching longing to sail West. I have been afflicted with the sea-longing since the day I heard the gulls at Pelargir, and for long I indeed found no peace beneath the trees as the Lady Galadriel had warned me. Yet the love of the Prince of maritime Dol Amroth has proved stronger than the Sea, and I am at peace to do as I wish for as long as he shall live.
I kiss my Prince at the conclusion of a tale and begin upon another one, settling back against him. His arms slide around me and we sit in the sunshine, telling stories until Estel and Arwen bring the children out to sit with us and tell us stories of their own.