Chapter XXI: Elf of the Wand

For a long time I wandered. I walked over softly crafted slopes where the final rays of the sun touched before they descended behind the rolling hills. I met peculiar folks and journeyed through mysterious villages - dwellings that belonged to both the men from the woods and dwarves travelling east. They were nice enough folk, but I always made sure to keep a fair distance and never drop my suspicion. I made small earnings with my writing. Nothing big - a nickel here for a poem and a silver coin there for letters that lovers wanted to send but did not know how to write. It wasn't much but it was enough for me to buy food and find a place to rest during the night against the cold. Sleep never came easily for me though, for I would dream about things that had been and then I would be back at the wharf all over again as if I had not already left five months before.

(I spent a single night in a quiet inn before leaving Esgaroth. Bard insisted on accompanying me and I did not try to dissuade him, for I felt even lonelier after my meeting with Aunt Maude. We did not speak much, for words failed to describe how either one of us was feeling. Fortunately, the inn keeper did not seem to notice. He was far more preoccupied turning away the drunken fishmonger who had wandered up to the front door of the inn not long after we had arrived.

"It is strange isn't it?" I remember asking Bard during one of our brief conversations.

"What is strange?"

"Time has changed us forever, yet it seems that nothing else is truly different. Does it not feel like we are stuck in a wheel that never moves forward?")

I continued my passage past the Brown Lands, crossing bent and wide streams. I persisted forward even after the man-built paths waned away to dirt before dissolving into green grassland. The purposefully placed signs were all but gone as I ventured closer towards Lorien. The only indications of life before I entered the forest were in the wild horses that grazed peacefully and the strange hawks that stopped over the cliffs. It was a funny thing though, for the more I wandered and covered land, the more I felt trapped. I felt his eye on me, and the burn of his breath on the nape of my neck even when I walked under the protection of the night and the light from those lonely stars.

(The next day I managed to convince a rather brusque bargeman to carry me across the lake at the first crack of dawn. Bard wanted to see me off, but I begged him not to come. I knew if he was there, my heart would force me to stay at Esgaroth. I cannot imagine how I would ever forget the pained look on Bard's face and the tightness of his hold on me as we embraced our farewell to each other. I remember thinking how selfish of a person I was, how I was no different to the beast that fed on innocent girls and lay brooding under a mountain of dead gold.

But that morning I left was significant in another way. As I arrived at the wharf and waited for the bargeman to return with his raft, a voice sought for me from the early risers who were getting ready to start the day.

"Lari, wait!"

My head swirled around at the urgent cry. I was surprised to see Aunt Maude running towards me, her hair was out of its usual tight bun and was instead blowing wildly in all directions.

"Aunt Maude?" I asked, taken aback and surprised how she had even found me, "what are you doing here?"

Aunt Maude ignored all my questions and did not speak until she had stopped right in front of me. Her lips were dry and pale from running, but the ends of her cheeks were tinged like roses.

"This is for you," she spoke in a voice that was slightly out of breath, "your father wanted to see you before he passed away. When he became ill he claimed to see you in the room when you were in fact not there. He wrote this letter for you while at his deathbed, even though we all believed you to be gone forever. He would have wanted you to read it now. I...yesterday when you came to see me I didn't want you to have this letter...But I will never be able to live with myself if I don't pass this onto you today."

In her hands she held a small piece of paper. It was folded into an envelope shape, the edges were old and covered in dust marks.

"…My father…he wrote this for me?" I asked, choked with emotion.

Aunt Maude paused for a moment before continuing, embarrassed, "I am sorry I found the humility to pass this onto you so late. As much as I would like to deny it, I have acted cowardly towards you, on so many occasions."

I could think of no words to say to spare my aunt as I took the yellowed paper from her trembling hands without further questions. Aunt Maude stared at me for a long time, as if trying to figure out what to say next. Finally, just when I thought the pain of the silence would slice me open, she reached out and patted me awkwardly on the shoulder.

"Be free now," she said the words with such sincerity I felt tears well up unexpectedly.

With that, before I could say anything in return, Aunt Maude turned around and trudged away back towards the town center. I let the hot tears roll down my cheeks and blur my eyes as I watched her thin silhouette disappear into the crowd.)

I decided to rest the night under the protective shadow of the trees that guarded Lorien. Their trunks were thick and roots so large my body fitted neatly in between them like a crab finding a perfectly sized shell. The leaves hummed gently under the moonlight that washed all the stress and tiredness from my body, leaving me with only calm and peaceful emptiness.

The letter my aunt had given me remained folded in my pocket, slightly crumpling around the edges because I had opened it to read my father's message so many times. Almost out of habit, I pulled the neatly folded letter from the pocket of my trousers again, the corners of the paper tickling the tips of my finger. I had read the words multiple times already, but scanning the letter again was enough to bring the painful lump back in my throat.

'Dear Lari,

I am writing down the words that I should have told you years before today. They are the words that have been strangling my heart ever since your mother passed away. It appears as though they will also be my last words expressed before death, which seems fitting for a shameful man as myself.

You reminded me so much of your mother. The way you crinkled your nose slightly whenever you were concentrating on something. Or the way you tossed your hair behind your shoulders when the wind grew particularly playful. Everything you did, it was like she was in the room. And at times, it hurt to just look at you. There were days where it was easier to simply distance myself from everything around me, including you - my only child.

I know I lost you over the years. Maybe I even wanted to blame you for what happened, although the real truth is that it was all my fault. The signs were there and I let your mother's soul wane away in front of us like an over-burned candle. In the end it was her heart that gave in and she chose to end her own life rather than to bear living with the guilt of losing you to a dragon. I am so sorry, my daughter. I am so sorry for doing nothing, even when I knew of such darkness.

When your mother left, I felt lost. It was as if a part of my own body had been ripped off with her, and everything turned grey. And in my self-pity, I failed to be a good father to you.

You were so young then, and you deserved a better childhood, one full of songs and unconditional love that could only be given from a parent to their baby.

But I want you to know that none of those things ever changed my love for you.

My daughter, you were the reason I raised myself out of bed every morning. Watching you grow into a self-aware, compassionate young woman has been the biggest blessing in my life.

After the world took your mother away, I still had you. I still had you, regardless of whether I deserved it or not.

I wanted to make amends before I would lose you forever, but you were upset and did not wish to talk to me. I do not blame you, I truly do not. How can I, after all, when even I cannot forgive myself for abandoning you like that? I finally learnt, that morning when the guards arrived at our house to take you away, that I had already lost you many years before, and that it is not so easy to tie back together a severed relationship.

I cannot be forgiven for what I have done, for I know I am beyond years too late to dare hope for any second chances. Everyone tells me you are gone, and that the girl I see as I lie in my bed are nothing but wasted fragments of regretful memories.

But please know that I am sorry, my little girl, for everything.

I am sorry, and I loved you more than I ever showed. And that, in a lifetime of mistakes and regret, you were never one of them.

You will always be my beautiful daughter.

With all the love and regret,

Your father'

My father's last words to me both broke and healed my heart simultaneously. I was relieved, however, to notice that it hurt less each time I unfolded the piece of paper and read the fading ink. My guilt over father and mother's death gradually waned away, like the prints on ancient scrolls lost on bookshelves. I began to slowly remember the fonder memories, the days filled with laughter.

'And perhaps,' I whispered inside my head wistfully as the sleep finally arrived to take me away in its arms, 'this is how we find the strength to move on.'

I woke in the middle of the night. The air around me was cool and calm, and the trees were silent. I felt refreshed and awake, even though it would be more than a few hours before the sun was to rise over the forest.

I felt the fire of his eye still watching me, but it seemed far away and as if I was under a dome where his witchery could not reach me. All of a sudden I noticed that the trees glowed silver and the dew drops sparkled blue and magenta as a pure, white light radiated out from the path. I sat up straight to get a better view and gasped at the wondrous sight that awaited me.

A party of elves glided through the woods in a long line. Their silver hair flowed down their shoulders, caressing their milky skin. I stared astounded at their beauty, for each and every one of them was equally fair. The forest that had been silent before now began to have its empty spaces filled with soft music and the elvish chant.

'Ú i vethed nâ i onnad.
Si boe ú-dhanna.
Ae ú-esteli, esteliach nad.
Estelio han, estelio han, estelio,
estelio han, estelio veleth.
Esteliach nad, estelio han.'

I could not understand a single lyric, yet tears welled up in my eyes at the depth of their beautiful voices. One of the elves amongst the group looked up towards my direction. Her fair skin shimmered under the starlight, and her blue eyes crinkled into a smile when she saw me. I heard her voice in my head, but unlike his eye that made me feel trapped and powerless, her words were soothing and caring.

"Sleep, child," she said gently, "Let the stars be your ally and the breeze be your messenger."

The moss covering the roots of the trees were soft and cool. I felt my body sink into its comfort, and my legs became so limp they seemed detached from the rest of my body. I did not try to fight back as I fell once again into a blissful sleep.

It was not until late morning when I finally awoke from my dreamless sleep. The sun was already high in the sky, the rays slipping through the gap in the turquoise leaves. I felt refreshed and even satiated, the memory of elves from last night still fresh on my mind. I was so distracted with the serene air around me and the happily chirping birds that it was not until I sat up to stretch that I noticed a man sitting not far from me.

He was an elderly man, yet he appeared taller than any of the older men I had come across while living in Esgaroth. His grey robes were frayed and softened down by the beating sun and rain. On his head the old man wore a pointed hat, sewn from the same material as his gown.

He was peering down at me as he sat on the edge of a long tree root. I pulled myself up quickly, surprised to see the old man watching me as he smoked calm, smoke rings from his wooden pipe.

'How long has he been watching me?' I asked myself inside my head.

"Good morning, young lady," the man greeted me cheerily as if I was a long lost friend he had met while on the road instead of a complete stranger.

"Good morning to you too, sir," I replied politely enough, "although I am far from a lady, as you can see from my attire."

"Is that so?" He asked, blowing out another smoke ring.

I waited for it float above into the air and disappear with the rolling, white clouds. My initial surprise to see the old man was quickly replaced by annoyance at his compete vagueness.

"I do apologize if I come across as rude," I began as the man smiled at me encouragingly, "but I am rather confused as to who you are and why you wish me good morning."

"No harm has come in greeting another person with kind intentions," the man replied in an amused voice.

"Well, yes. That is true," I agreed reluctantly and the man chuckled.

"The adventure on the road can be dangerous as it is exciting. You may never know what is waiting for you past the next corner or behind the nearest valley. And under the cloak of the night, who knows what beasts lurk under its shadow."

The old man lowered his gaze to the ground as he said these words. I followed his eyes and gasped when I saw large footprints stamped in the moist earth no more than thirty feet from where I was sitting.

"As thick and slow trolls are," the old man continued in a light voice, "they can be as silent as an elf when hunting under the stars."

The only rational explanation as to why I had not been mashed into troll stew was that I had been blessed with a protector in the middle of the night. And that, he was in fact the old man sitting right before me.

"Thank you," I said earnestly in gratitude and embarrassment at my brash attitude before, "you saved my life last night."

"There is no need to thank me, child," the man replied with a smile, "I have not introduced myself. I am Gandalf. Gandalf the Grey."

I bowed my head humbly, grateful for my savior.

"My name is Lari," I replied back and the edges of Gandalf's eyes crinkled as he smiled.

(A simple name for a simple human.) I quickly ignored Smaug's voice as it rumbled inside me head amusedly.

"Why are you here, Lari? Why choose to stay in the fog when your path is clear?" Gandalf asked kindly, although I could not ignore the concern shining in the corner of his eyes.

"I fear the path set for me back home is a life sentence. To lose my freedom - that thought keeps my mind awake at night and leaves me shaking when the darkness creeps in," I replied honestly after some thought, "So...so I have to keep moving. I have to be ready at all times. I have to be ready to escape the nightmares when they find me."

The man stared ahead at my words, his hat pointing down slightly so that the rim slightly lay over his thick eyebrows. He drew in a deep breath from his pipe, some of the smoke escaping out of his nostrils. He held no match yet a small flame, no larger than that of a candle, burned from the tip of his finger which he used to relight the end of his pipe.

"And where does it end? When do our shadows truly leave?" He asked curiously as I fidgeted with my fingers uncomfortably.

"I have been away for so long now, I guess five months is a long time to wander alone," I admitted, "I only wish I knew the answer to that question. It would give me courage to face the dark and monsters inside of me."

Gandalf turned his head and I followed his gaze. We stared at the endless row of trees with their trunks that twisted and turned around each other to compete for the sun. They were in all honesty, not a pretty sight individually, but together, they created a harmonious mural and haven for the little critters that dwelled in the forest. After a while Gandalf finally replied, his face smiling and so kind I felt my guard crumble away.

"It is our darkness that shape our being, as much as the light."

His words rang true inside my heart. All along I wanted to forget Smaug, and my time under the mountain. I wanted to erase the memory of the fire and evil gold. But now I realized they were all the reasons I had grown into the person I was today. I had to accept that although I would never stand face to face with the firedrake again, the warmth of his breath was embedded on my flesh, and the fiery orbs would visit me in my dreams from time to time. It was not important that those memories would stay with me forever, but more so that I forged new ones. Happier moments awaited me, and I could only think of one person in my life who I wanted to share them with. And he had promised to wait for me, because he had figured that out sooner than I had.

"I have been drowning for so long I forgot how to breathe. But now I am ready. Home is waiting for me, and home is not a place but a person. I cannot know for sure, but my heart tells me he is waiting for me just as he promised he would. It is time for me to go home," I said confidently and Gandalf nodded approvingly.

He stood up and dusted the soil from his robes gently before offering his hand to help me up from the ground.

"You are a brave young woman, Lari," He said cheerily, his eyes deep with wisdom I could never be able to hold, "and yet you are braver still to trust fate and love one more time. Now, we cannot waste time no further! I can make a fair guess that the Rohirrim will ride through the edge of these woods by late noon today. If we move quickly we may be fortunate enough to cross paths with them. Perhaps they may spare us a horse to guide our journey. Allow me to join me your company and lead the way!"

Hello my readers!

Thank you for reading. The final chapter will be uploaded soon~

Translation for the Elvish song in this chapter is below:

-Evenstar (in Sindarin)-

'It's not the end, it is the beginning.
You mustn't falter now.
If you don't trust it, trust something.
Trust this, trust this, trust,
Trust this, trust love.
You trust something, trust this.'