Hee everybody,
First up, HAPPY NEW YEAR! Make it your best so far, live for all that's worth it, laugh, be crazy, love and don't let anybody hold you back!
Then, I'll try to post more frequently, but I'm afraid I won't be able to do that, for my exams are rapidly approaching, as are other things, such as a national dance competition and I still have an awful lot to do before I'm done with secundairy school. I do, however, promise not to stop writing, it just might take a while.
Anyway, love and peace for this year!
Love,
BitterStrength
"Lucy, Susan, the both of you are not coming with us to the Black Gate," Peter stated the second they were alone together.
"Oh no! You're not leaving me behind!" Susan protested.
"I will stay here," Lucy said softly, not wanting to take any part in the discussion that was starting to arise between the eldest siblings.
"Thank you, Lucy," Edmund said.
"You can't come with us, Su! It's far too dangerous! The chances of survival are seriously small," Peter half-yelled at his sister.
"All the more reason for me to come along! I won't stay behind to await the news of your deaths if I can perhaps safe you, or at least die alongside you!" Susan argued.
"I promised Mom I'd always take care of you," Peter said. "How can I let you come with us to die?"
"You also promised to take care of Edmund, yet you don't mind him coming along to meet his possible death."
"He'll follow me if I leave him behind."
"And what makes you think that I won't?"
"You're a woman! It's not normal here for women to fight in battle, thus the men in the city will hold you here if I ask them to."
"I am not staying behind!"
"Please, Su. For the sanity of his mind, will you not stay?" Edmund asked.
"Don't ask me to let you go without me, Ed. I will not survive waiting for the news of your passing. My heart won't be able to take it."
"But –" Peter started.
"Besides, you know as well as I do that I'm just as capable of fighting as the two of you. And you're greatly outnumbered. You need every arm you can use."
"Are you determined to join us?" Edmund asked.
"Yes."
"Fine," Peter said, grudgingly, storming off in the direction of the room they'd been staying in until now.
"You should go and rest up before tomorrow," Lucy kindly told her brother and sister before strutting of to their room.
Edmund followed her immediately, but Susan could not yet face the disappointed and angry face of her older brother. Instead she went to sit out on the battlements of the square with the Tree of the King.
It was dark in the throne room and eerily quiet.
As soon as Aragorn noticed this, he cast away the thoughts telling him it was a foreboding of danger.
He had made all guards stand outside the room, so that he was all alone and nobody could be tempted to touch the palentir where it laid at the foot of the stairs leading up to the throne.
He swiftly pulled the cloth concealing the seeing stone off.
For just a second he pressed his eyes closed, determined to fight of the fear that was rising up inside of him. Raising the palentir in front of his face, he opened his eyes again and stared into the eye of Sauron.
Tendrils of the Black Speech of Mordor seemed to slip their way into every crevice and nook in the room.
Before his determination failed him, Aragorn spoke to the stone.
"Long have you hunted me," sounded his strong yet somewhat angry voice. "Long have I eluded you. No more. Behold, the sword of Elendil," Aragorn called out while drawing his sword in front of the palentir.
An image appeared in Sauron's pupil. Aragorn watched as he saw Sauron raise the hand the Ring had been cut off only fractions of time earlier and he could feel Sauron's anger, yet also a slight bit of some other emotion.
However, before Aragorn could determine what said other emotion was, the image changed.
A new face appeared.
Arwen's face.
Fear filled Aragorn's senses. His eyes widened and his grip on his sword slackened, causing him to slowly lower it.
Meanwhile, Arwen's face got clearer. She looked sickly pale, her eyelids bluish and her hair had lost its usual shining quality. She was lying on her back, her legs pulled up slightly and her arms fallen back alongside her, her hair spread out widely and her eyes closed.
Could it be she was dead?
That thought caused Aragorn to drop the palentir in utter terror.
As he dropped it, however, he also accidently dropped the Evenstar. The necklace shattered against the marble floor.
For several long moments the Númenorian stared at the shattered pieces. The necklace was a symbol of the Grace that had been given to the elf he so dearly loved, which she had given him to remind him of a promise of love. And now the Grace had been shattered.
It could really only mean one thing: the end of Arwen Undumiel.
Grief and despair came upon Aragorn so quickly that he could only just fall to his knees to keep him from keeling over.
Surely she could not be gone from this world? Because if she was, what reason did he have to keep on going?
Holding his head in his hands, the man sat there for what seemed like an eternity, the tears flowing freely from his eyes.
"It's your fault," a voice called to Eragon in the darkness.
"What is?" he called back, looking around to find the source of the voice.
"It's your fault, yours and all of the Vardens and the Elves and Dwarves and Men of Surda. You caused this. You could have just given up."
"What did we do?" Eragon shouted.
"You killed them, you killed them all!"
Suddenly faces swarmed through Eragon's mind. Every soldier he killed, even the Urgals. And new faces joined in, faces of the men of Gondor and Rohan who lay dead or dying on the fields of Pelennor, of the orcs and Men of the South. Faces of people he killed himself, or had simply died because he had not been able to save them.
Hundreds of faces swam before his eyes, blinding him, suffocating him from the guilt he felt.
"Eragon, you did this!" the voice called again and suddenly the voice sounded very familiar. "You should already have stopped the war! You should have defeated the Mad King!" Brom called.
"I wish I could have!"
"You should have worked harder! I'm ashamed to call you my son! You've let people die for you; you've let me die for you!"
"No!" Eragon screamed.
Suddenly it was no longer dark around him and in front of him he saw Arya's face.
"Eragon," she called softly. "Are you awake now?"
"Arya?" he asked, confused.
"You were screaming and yelling. What did you dreams show?" she asked carefully for she knew he was not one to talk of his fears. He really was starting to become more like an elf.
"Thank you for waking me," Eragon told her as soon as he realized it was all just a dream. "You can go back to sleep now."
"You do know I would not think less of you if you confessed your fears, right?"
Eragon sighed. "You know I dread killing as much as your people do. Perhaps my reasons are sound, but the war has lasted too long already. It can't go on much longer."
"No, it can't. A hundred years our land has suffered from the reign of that Oath-breaker. We will stop him. You can defeat him, I am certain of it."
"Yet not everybody believes that I can do it, including myself. Can I truly kill one of the last of my Order?"
"What else can we do?"
"I don't know."
"What did you dream about?"
"Brom," Eragon answered.
"He would be proud of you, you know. You've come so far is such a short time."
"I'm sure he would have wanted me to do more."
"There isn't much more you could have done. You've got the people of the Varden to actively join in the war, the people of Surda to join us, the Urgals to come to our aid, the dwarves to fight with us, the elves to come out of Du Weldenvarden, all by simply become the best Dragon Rider you could possibly be. You've worked really hard and you've changed a lot. There is no doubt in my mind that all of the people who know you are proud to fight alongside you."
Not knowing what to say, Eragon simply looked at his hands, which were folded in his lap.
"You are still young, Eragon, but you have become wiser than most humans will ever become. You have learned the value of all life, which is why killing haunts you so. It will always haunt you, but you don't have to deal with it alone. You have people around you who will help you bear the burden you carry simply by being who you are. You are compassionate and just. You're not a bad person. You're the exact opposite. You're an incredibly good person, who simply happens to have no other choice but to fight. It'll get better, just you wait," Arya said.
Eragon nodded at her, silently thanking her before he went back to sleep.
Thank you, little one,Saphira told Arya.
"Of course, Saphira," Arya replied as she too went back to her waking dreams.
A slight chill ran up Susan's spine as she looked into the night.
It was a clear night and the stars looked as though they were trying to shine the brightest any star could ever shine.
It seemed to Susan that the stars were saying goodbye to all those who would leave their homes in the morning to fight in a battle most if not all would not return from.
Tomorrow she would most likely die.
The chances of that happening had never been as high as they were now and this time, if she would die, there would be no potion that would bring her back to life for she would not allow Lucy to stay after they had died. And yet, she had never felt so peaceful. She had lived a good life. She had stopped an evil Queen, saved the people of a land she had never known existed, shared an amazing experience with her lovely brothers and sister, met Aslan and she was on her way to try to save yet another people and their land.
The only thing she had not yet experienced was a lover's love.
This was the only thing she regretted if she would die tomorrow.
"Oh Aslan," Susan sighed, gazing up at the moon whose shine reminded her of the great lion. "You've given us so much, and I wouldn't trade it for the world, so thank you. My only wish now is that, if we are to die tomorrow, you will safe Lucy. Bring her home to our parents and keep her safe for us when we no longer can," she whispered.
"The stars are ever a place for advice and peace, are they not?" someone asked behind her, startling her.
"Oh! Legolas! You scared me," she scolded the elf when she finally calmed her heart enough to turn around.
"My apologies, dear Queen," he said with a slight curve upon his lips as he came over to sit beside her. "I merely came over to see why you are not yet resting. What is keeping you awake?"
"Ah, it's just me being a bit sentimental, I'm afraid. If I should come to die
tomorrow–"
"You won't! If it's the last thing I do, I will see to it that you will live," Legolas interrupted her, as he could not stand the idea of her dying.
"If I should come to die tomorrow, I merely wished to remember why I'm not upset about that," Susan finished. "Should I die, I will have known that my life has been worth every second of it, and that I'll leave this world with no regrets in my heart."
"You will not die, Susan. I won't allow it," Legolas said. How could she sit there so calmly talking of her own ending when she had so much more to live for?
"Legolas, I won't let you or anyone else risk their life to safe mine. I have seen a wonderful life. I don't fear dying now, for if I die, I will live on in Aslan's country in his care. And I will see my little sister again there, and my brothers. And besides, what better way is there than to die whilst trying to save a world?"
"Are you determined then to die?" Legolas asked. An endless sadness seemed to overtake him as he listened to her talk about the end of her life.
"Oh no, off course not. I will fight with all my heart and for all that I'm worth. I will fight for the people of Middle Earth, for my siblings, for Aslan. But I will go into battle prepared to give my life if that's what is asked of me, and I will happily give my life to save those I love" she replied, her voice strong and confident and without doubt.
"Promise me you'll do whatever you can to survive this war," the elf begged her.
"I will promise you I'll do whatever I can to end this war, for that is the only thing I can promise," Susan answered truthfully. "Don't be saddened if I die, dear Elf. Live merrily and with determination if you live through the war for that is the best way to remember those who have fallen." She softly grasped his hand as he looked at her.
"How would I do that, my Queen?"
"By living to the best of your abilities and remember that they have died to grant you the chance to live."
"You yourself questioned how people would live on after their loved ones are gone, yet now you expect people to do just that. What changed?" Legolas asked, remembering their conversation at the end of the previous battle.
"I found what I'm willing to live and die for," she answered.
"And what is that?"
"Hope."