...
~One~
The wind had picked up that morning, which she was glad of, for it came warm and clear out of the West. She gazed forward toward it, her lambent hair flapping against her back and shoulders in the slow breeze gleamed softly in the morning sun, which shone dim through ocean mists that fell sweet upon her face. For a moment it lifted the grief that lay heavy on her heart.
They had been drifting upon the sea for a few weeks now. The weather had been holding up rather pleasantly so far. Some of those who chose to accompany her were of her mother's kin that were ready to return to the land from where they had come many ages ago. The excitement among them to reach the ship's destination grew by the day.
On the open sea the sun glittered off the little peaks of the tiny hills that stretched endlessly in every direction. Their blue green color kept a dull sheen except at times of rising and setting of the sun, when they would display hypnotizing beauty, shining with the bright white of the legendary Trees of old then glow gold and orange and red and purple before the stars came out at twilight, twinkling faintly over the shine of black glass splashing softly against the lonely white boat.
As the ship crept toward the Undying Lands the memories that haunted her slowly began to lose their power. The flashes of them grew more dim as the days passed, and she shuddered less frequently when she closed her eyes, as the shadows she left behind in Middle-earth grew further behind. She had never seen their destination before, her mother's homeland, but soon she felt as eager as the others to take in its healing vision of uplifting and everlasting beauty.