I loved the times when Olórin came to visit us in Imladris. These days, he seldom brought glad tidings with him, but he was such a top-notch bloke that even hearing bad news didn't feel quite so dreadful when he was there.
He stopped by to say hello a few months after we'd parted ways at Dol Guldur. On his visit this time, he'd brought me a souvenir from the town he'd accompanied his friend, one Bilbo Baggins, back to from Erebor.
"A pipe! So cool," I enthused as I ran my finger along the pipe's long, wooden stem.
"I saw you eyeing mine off on our journey to Dol Guldur," he said, his eyes twinkling.
"I don't smoke, to be honest, but I've always wanted one as a prop to make me look all pensive and intellectual," I confessed as I admired the shape of it.
Elrond snorted at this admission.
I slowly turned my head and looked at my friend. "I'm sorry, Elrond, did you say something?" I enquired politely.
"Nothing at all," he said through a smile.
"If I didn't know better," I said haughtily, "I'd say you were a little… jealous, perhaps, that Olórin didn't bring you an accessory to make yourself look clever, too." I raised my eyebrows at Elrond, who rolled his eyes at me.
"Not to worry," I continued. "I'll gladly share with you." I passed him the pipe, which he took with an amused look.
"Please, be my guest. Have the first use of it," I made an inviting gesture.
His eyes shifted between me and the pipe, and he eventually shrugged and popped the end in his mouth.
"Feel smarter?"
Elrond went to speak but the pipe fell out of his mouth, which he caught mid-air. Before he could reattempt to express himself with an unobstructed oral cavity, though, Glorfindel plucked the pipe out of his hand and stuck it between his teeth, fixing us with a smile as he winked roguishly.
"I feel like a genius," Glorfindel mumbled with relish as he sprawled in his chair.
I chuckled. "Well, Olórin, between these two," I jerked my thumb in the direction of my spouse and friend, "I might not see my present until next year, but thank you all the same. I look forward to giving the impression of cleverness one day in the distant future."
Olórin laughed and shook his head gently.
"Tell me, Olórin," Elrond continued after taking a sip of wine, "while we're vaguely on the topic, what news of the Shire?"
Olórin's face remained totally expressionless except that his brows knitted together. We watched him closely, waiting for him to say something. After a short while, his expression softened a little and he looked at us with intense scrutiny before permitting himself to begin.
"This must stay strictly between us," he stipulated. "No mention of it to the White Council, even."
We exchanged glances for a moment in bewilderment but then nodded in agreement.
Olórin, satisfied, began to speak.
"Young Mr. Baggins showed me an interesting item that had come into his possession during his travels. A ring. A 'magic' ring, as he described it to me."
Elrond, Glorfindel, and I all raised our eyebrows.
"Is it-" asked Elrond, before Glorfindel cut him off.
"Do you think it's-"
Olórin raised a hand calmly. "I do not know," he said. "Nothing about its properties were disclosed to me, nor did I pursue the matter with Bilbo, as he had kept it hidden from me for some time."
"Where did he get it?" I spoke up.
"By Bilbo's account, if he is to be believed, he won it from a creature named Gollum in a cave somewhere near the High Pass of the Misty Mountains," he answered, tapping his staff on the ground thoughtfully. "Again, I do not know what this ring is, or to whom it originally belonged. I intend to keep half an eye on it all the same, though."
"Keep us abreast of what happens with that, would you," I grumbled worriedly, drumming my fingers on my chin. "We need to do what we can to keep Curumo well away from the Shire, too."
"And Sauron," Elrond added pointedly.
"Oh, yes, him… quite right, Elrond, yes…" I conceded in playfully feigned absent-mindedness. "I wonder where he went, anyway. Back to Mordor, maybe?"
Everyone, including me, shrugged.
"I would hazard a guess that he went there, yes," Olórin murmured. "It would be a reasonable thing to expect; he has dwelled there before."
"His spies wouldn't know to look further west yet, would they?" Glorfindel asked Olórin nervously.
"I very much doubt it, unless any of you decide to go against your word and distribute my news," Olórin replied, his friendly smile conflicting with his eyes as they flashed with warning.
"I don't think that's on the cards, pal," I reassured him as I pat his shoulder.
Glorfindel and Elrond nodded in agreement, and Olórin promised to provide updates before we lapsed into a discontent but companionable silence.
I'm not sure if it was better that we knew about this potential One Ring floating around rural Eriador, or worse. Olórin, being the intrepid vagabond that he was, didn't stay long in Imladris, instead setting out to the west again, perhaps on the hunt for more obscure populations to impress with his fireworks display. He didn't return to provide one of these assured updates before we got official news that Sauron had moved to Mordor.
And wouldn't you know it, the news reached us on the exact day of Estel's 20th birthday. I couldn't believe our luck. Glorfindel and I had been helping Elrond, Gilraen, and Erestor get the hall ready for his party that evening. The birthday boy was due to return at any moment from a trip away with Elladan and Elrohir, and we were surprising him with a huge banquet. Tables had been put all around the room, already starting to load up with food. I was in the middle of putting some fruit into a huge bowl when a messenger came in the door beside me silently, soaked with sweat and white as a sheet. He looked like he was about to pass out.
"Uh oh," I said as he teetered a little on the spot, his jaw slackening a little. I knew that look from when Estel was a small child and had eaten some rotten berries. The others, hearing my foreboding sound, turned around just in time to see me quickly tip the fruit out of the bowl and hold it under this Elf's chin as he proceeded to violently empty his stomach in front of us. The others, alarmed, jogged over to where we stood, Glorfindel closing the door behind us to give the poor sod a little privacy.
"There there, mate," I said, holding the bowl in one hand and patting his back with the other as he retched noisily. "Get it all up, that's the way."
I frowned a little to myself. Elves never fell ill, so this had to be an emotional reaction. What could get an Elf so het up that they vomited straight into the good fruit bowl like that?
When he came up for air, I passed him some water, which he took shakily and knocked back.
"Sit, Silivros," Elrond said kindly, guiding him into a chair. "What happened?"
Silivros took a few deep breaths before he spoke in a shaky voice. "My Lord Elrond, I receive word that Sauron has re-established himself in Mordor."
We exchanged concerned glances. That wasn't terrific news, but it wasn't really something to lose your lunch over. Glorfindel made to say something, but Silivros spoke again.
"The Nazgûl had been preparing it for him," he continued, getting a little stronger now. "Now they have spread far and wide over the land in the south-west- searching, I am told, but for what, I do not know."
I bit my lip. This was a more worrying development, and I could start to see the cause for the stomach-turning, but he held up his hand as Elrond went to speak.
"And he has allies," he said finally. "The Corsairs of Umbar."
Ah. Okay. Well, now we were getting into the scary shit. Umbar was the capital of Harad, where I was presumed to have passed through when I had first arrived in Middle-Earth. The population of Harad was huge- more than enough to overwhelm the neighbouring Gondor along with whatever evil things Sauron had working for him, especially if Rohan wasn't interested in coming to its aid (it wasn't).
"I see," Elrond said tensely. "Have you heard anything more?"
Silivros shook his head and advised that he had not.
"How about I take you to the hospital wing, Silivros," I offered. "We'll get something in you to settle your nerves a little, eh?"
"Do that, Rhodri," Elrond said with a nod, opening the door for me as I propped Silivros up on my shoulder and took him out of the hall. Glorfindel left the room, too, with the newly-decorated fruit bowl in hand to clean up.
When we both returned, Elrond, Gilraen, and Erestor were back on their setup tasks, albeit rather more slowly now. When they heard the door open, they drifted back into the middle of the room, and Glorfindel and I went up to them.
"Silivros is fine," I told them. "I gave him a spoonful of sugar in a nip of brandy and he was right in no time."
The others nodded in acknowledgement. Gilraen, who wasn't especially involved in the business with Sauron, went back to preparing the hall.
"This is a very worrying development," Elrond said to us quietly. We all nodded.
"Listen," I said to them, "Let's just get through tonight first, and we'll pick this up tomorrow. The party's an hour away now, and we can't put it off. We won't have too much harm from leaving discussions for a few hours when our minds are clear."
The party wasn't any ordinary birthday celebration: today was the day that Estel came of age. His world was about to be shaken up beyond what he could have imagined, because it would also be the day that he learned about who his father was and thus about who he was. He was going to become Aragorn today.
It was hard to know if concealing the truth for two decades was the right thing. In one way, they seemed not to have a choice, afraid that revealing who he was might expose him to danger. I, personally, thought that they should have been upfront with him about his heritage much earlier. This was all such a lot of information to dump on a 20-year-old, and drip-feeding information over the years would have made it all much easier for him to deal with. At the same time, though, perhaps the poor kid deserved an idyllic sort of childhood before he was thrown out of the feelgood Elven world, one that never was his to begin with, into the harsher, grittier human world.
In any case, the time to make conjectures over such things was long gone. Elrond and Gilraen would be taking him aside after the feast to give him 'the talk' (about his father's career, to be clear, not about what his father and mother did in their free time to produce him).
An hour of decorating and stocking later and the hall was decked out with a feast fit for a king (or heir apparent, as the case may be). Satisfied, we left the hall together to get our Sunday best on, and with impeccable timing, the three lone rangers strode down the hall, caked in dirt and looking like they'd had the time of their lives.
"Ah, hello, you three!" Elrond greeted them fondly. "How was your expedition?"
"Brilliant," Elladan replied with a grin. "Estel was magnificent-"
"He killed a whole pack of Orcs single-handedly!" Elrohir added excitedly.
Estel blushed a little, but looked thrilled with the effusive praise all the same as the twins continued to wax lyrical about him.
"I wish to hear about these triumphs in greater detail shortly," Elrond said after a short while, holding up a hand gently to steady his eldest two. "For now, though, I wish for you three to clean yourselves from top to toe, dress in your nicest outfits, and then meet us back here."
With nods all around, they disappeared, and we all went to our separate quarters to get fabulous.
Upon re-emerging, we made our way back to where we were meant to meet. Elrond, Gilraen, and Erestor were already there, all tarted up, and Elladan and Elrohir arrived shortly after, followed by Estel.
"There he is," Gilraen said as he came up to her. She put an arm around her offspring and gave him an affectionate squeeze.
"This way, Estel, if you please," Erestor said with a fond smile at his pupil, leading us all to the entryway to the dining hall. He opened the door and inside was a very large collection of Elves, all of whom had been touched by Estel's presence in some way or another. They heard the door open, and turned to face him, breaking into loud, joyful applause.
"Happy birthday, my boy," I heard Estel's mother whisper to him amid the noise as the five of us started to clap as well. Estel looked taken aback but filled to the brim with excitement as he turned to us and said, "Is this for me?"
"No, Estel, it's for your Uncle Glorfindel because he managed to fit three bread rolls in his mouth at once last night," I said in a deadpan voice, looking at him with loving disbelief. "Coming of age is definitely second place in terms of priorities, don't you think?"
My nephew laughed and rolled his eyes gently. "I was just checking, Auntie," he retorted with a smile.
"Ever the prudent one," I said with a chuckle, pulling him into a hug. "Happy birthday, sprout."
"Now," I said as I gestured grandly at the interior of the hall, "where will you sit, and what will you eat?"
"Ah, yes, the big questions," Glorfindel acknowledged.
Estel picked a spot, loaded his plate, and with that, the party had started.
And it went on.
And on.
And my god, on further still.
I shit you not, the festivities went on until the next morning. It had been ages since we'd last had a celebration that big, and people were well keen to get every bit of joy they could out of it. There was a seemingly endless reserve of energy in all the partygoers, musicians, dancers, and the birthday boy himself. It was hard to describe to Estel how much of a joy he was to all of us, and I hoped that this event would communicate at least an inkling of that.
I think he got the message well enough. The kid danced and mingled and mingled and danced the entire evening long. As the sun started to rise, the guests began to slowly trickle out, and eventually, Estel, quite tired from dancing at this point, came back to where Glorfindel and I were sitting with Gilraen, Erestor, and Elrond. He drew up a seat and sank into it, his dark hair flopping into his eyes.
"How are you enjoying yourself?" Gilraen asked with a smile.
"This has been excellent," Estel answered breathlessly, looking immensely pleased with himself. "I am a little weary now, though, I must admit."
"In which case you should come with us now," said Elrond, rising from his seat. Estel looked at all of us, confused. I smiled and nodded at him, and he got up. Together, Gilraen and Elrond each rested a hand on Estel's shoulders and led their child out of the hall before they could be missed.
Erestor, Glorfindel, and I all heaved a sigh. It was a strange feeling, getting wistful about an arbitrary moment in time like that. Estel had matured into an adult over long years. It wasn't as though his birthday had suddenly seen him sprout a beard and grow almost 7 feet tall. And yet, everything seemed to have come to a head in this bittersweet moment.
Erestor had an even harder time coming to terms with it, being Estel's main tutor. He had spent hours a day over many years teaching him, and Erestor's pride in what a remarkable person his student had grown to be was constantly evident.
Glorfindel put an arm gently around a tearful Erestor's shoulder and smiled at him.
"You've done a wonderful job, mellon," he said encouragingly.
"And I doubt it will be ever fully over," I added. "Even when matured, we float back to the people who gave us comfort and education in our early years. He'll be back, you'll see."
Erestor sniffed and nodded, a wet smile coming over his face.
"We should start clearing things up," Erestor said after a moment, clearly not pleased with his departure from his usual gravitas and keen for a distraction.
Glorfindel and I nodded, and thus began the mammoth process of making the hall look like nobody had ever been in it before.
It took a handful of hours to get it looking usable again, but we were eventually able to file out of the hall feeling satisfied with ourselves and ready to go to bed, just like the rest of the population who had gone to the party.
Erestor waved goodbye in the corridor and made his way to his own quarters to cry in peace, leaving Glorfindel and I to amble along to our room. Along the way, I got a brainwave for part of that research project- the one that Sauron's shittiness had interrupted multiple times now. Excited, I excused myself from Glorfindel and scuttled away to my office to write it down before I forgot about it.
I entered my office, shut the door, grabbed the first clean piece of paper my hand could reach, and started frantically scribbling the idea down. I was on a roll for a while there, but a strange noise coming from outside interrupted the silence. It almost sounded like gasping. Frowning, I put down my pen and slowly got up, making for the window behind me, murmuring to myself, "I swear to god, if someone's been stabbed outside my window…"
When I opened the window and looked out, there was nothing, but then I glanced down and saw a sprawled-out Estel, sitting on the grass and leaning against the building. His eyes (so far as I could tell) were wide as dinner-plates, fixed on something way out in the distance, and he was the source of the noise, his deep, breaths getting rapid now.
"Estel?" I said gently, reaching out the window and putting a hand on his shoulder. "It's Auntie Rhodri. What's going on, darling?"
"I'm going mad, Auntie," he choked, looking up at me desperately. "And… and my head is too light… why are my fingers tingling?" he shrieked now.
Oh dear. It sounded like that talk had overwhelmed him. And now, here he was under my window, moments away from passing out from hyperventilation and thinking he was losing his mind. The poor kid was having an panic attack.
I quickly grabbed a book, propped the window open with it, and climbed out of it, sitting on the grass with him.
"Estel, honey, you're not going mad," I said to him patiently, taking his hands in mine. "I want you to slow your breathing right down for me. Breathe in," I gestured for him to take a breath, "and now slowly out again." I repeated the process until he was steady enough to get to his feet, and together, we walked around the building into my office.
"What on earth happened back there, Auntie?" he asked me, still very shaken up as I handed him a glass of water.
"That was a very normal reaction to hearing shocking news, kiddo," I said, raising an eyebrow. "It's called a panic attack. Makes you feel like you're losing your mind, can't catch your breath, and you started breathing much too fast, which was why you got lightheaded and your fingers started to tingle."
"Oh," he said numbly, looking at his hands.
"Doesn't help that you haven't slept in a day and a half," I added.
"Two and a half days, actually," he confessed under his breath.
"Definitely not wise," I affectionately scolded. "Have you ever had a panic attack before?" Estel shook his head.
"All right, well, come back and find me if you have any more of those and you want some help for that, because I've treated that problem a few times. Do you want to talk about what's going on, though?"
"Not with a psychologist, I don't think," he answered softly.
"How about with an auntie?" I replied.
"I'd like that," he said with a weak smile.
I nodded and motioned for us to sit on the couch together.
"Tell me what you're thinking, kiddo," I invited.
Estel sighed as he tapped his fingers together, and slowly started to speak.
"Ada- well, Elrond, I suppose-" he winced, stung by his own words. "And my mother, too, they both told me about who my father is. They- I'm an heir, Auntie." Estel shook his head in disbelief. "I've lived here all my life. I was going to grow old here with my family, but it seems that that isn't the life path that lies ahead for me after all. It's all so overwhelming. I've lost everything." He clutched the sides of his head for a moment, and then set his hands back on his knees, looking defeated.
"What have you lost?" I asked gently.
"My father," he said bitterly. "My home, my plans, my identity, too."
"Are you sure they're gone? Or have they simply been modified?"
"What's left of them?" he lamented miserably.
"Well, for a start, your Ada does not suddenly cease to be such because you became an adult and received background information of your father," I said.
"There's no undoing all the years you two put into building the relationship you have, and it's not void now. So that's one thing," I ticked off one finger.
"Nobody is forbidding you from living in Imladris, and you will always have a place here if you want it, so that's still on the table, too," I ticked another finger.
"I suppose," he murmured. "But what if Ada doesn't treat me the same way any more?"
"Well, kiddo, he's known since you arrived that you're not his own biological offspring, so I don't think this comes as a shock to him. He's going to start treating you like an adult now, though, definitely. Because that's what you are. That takes a bit of getting used to, but it's a normal part of life. Your mother will do the same with you, too."
"That is not especially reassuring either," he grumbled.
"Oh, so you want your parents getting on your arse to make you go to bed at a reasonable hour until you're in your 80s, do you?" I retorted coolly, looking at him in amusement.
Estel scowled. He was a good kid, but by all accounts, Elrond and Gilraen had had the devil's own job getting this rugrat to turn in for the night over the years, and it wasn't a pleasurable experience for any of the involved parties.
"Not particularly," he admitted after a moment.
"Yeah, see, there's good and bad in both options. Now, they can only advise you rather than give you an order and expect you to comply. At the same time, they expect you to make responsible choices like all the other adults. Don't worry, they'll always be looking out for you. Parents can't help but do that. You'll always have them."
Estel nodded, calmer and more mollified now.
"What has definitely changed," I continued, "is the life you had expected to lead. You now have new options, and while they're not obligations, it's certainly recommended you take them up at some point. You were brought here in much the same way as other heirs of Isildur were, and your Ada prepared them for their role as monarch precisely the way you have been."
"And as for your identity, my love," I said, putting an arm around my nephew now, "that is something that changes over time for everyone, heir apparent or not. Do you know how much work your Uncle Glorfindel and I had to put in so that your Ada would stop shrieking at us whenever we did something risky?"
Estel smiled. "It's just so… daunting, I suppose," he said with resignation.
"Sure is. Being a king is a big job," I said openly. "But you have been given the tools to make good, wise judgements. You're a clever kid, and you've got terrific morals. What's more, you're learned in many ways thanks to all of the laborious hours you spent churning out essays for Erestor."
He snorted at that. "Do you think I can do this?"
"Oh, yes, definitely," I replied, waving a hand as though it was obvious.
"I don't feel ready," he murmured.
"That's because you're not ready," I answered with a small shrug. "You've spent your whole life here. You need to go and see a bit more of the world, learn about your country, your people, get a feel for what needs to be done. Then you'll feel ready, I think. Don't worry, there's plenty of time. Just start having a think about what you want to do. You're an adventurer at heart and will get bored before too long here. It'll come. And of course, you know we'll always be here to help where we can." I looked at him affectionately. "You'll be all right, you know, kiddo."
Estel looked back up at me, calm at last, nodded, and gave me a dopey smile. His jaw quivered and eyelids fluttered as he stifled a yawn. Without another word, he started to slouch and lean over to the side of the couch with the armrest.
"What are you doing there?" I asked suspiciously.
"Just resting my eyes a moment, Auntie," Estel replied placidly as he curled his feet up.
"Oh, no you don't," I said quickly and picked him up, propping him on his feet. "I've got stuff to do. I don't want you snoring like a cow while I'm crunching numbers."
He gave me a wicked grin and made his knees buckle, slowly flopping toward the ground.
"I see how it is," I muttered, rolling my eyes as I clamped my hands on his shoulders, holding him upright and frog-marching him out of my office and down the hall toward his sleeping quarters.
"Good lord, anyone would think you were three again- just like your brothers, I swear to god- exactly the sort of thing they'd make me do," I whispered, passers-by watching on in amusement as I made this cooked spaghetti of a human glide through the air back to his own room.
I opened the door, stepped inside, dropped him on his bed, and as I made to leave again, I made sure to say, "Honestly, kids today…" just loud enough for him to hear.
