An hour later, Legolas rose, and though his face was wet with tears, he no longer shed them. Rather had a terrible blank mask been brought down over his features. His eyes saw nothing and, when he hailed his companions, his voice was as expressionless as if he were counting his toes. "We must transport her quickly. It is not fitting for her to be laid to rest in this place. We must bear her to Lothlorien, the place where she learned how to use the power which killed her in the end."
Gimli hefted his axe and felled a dying pine tree, for Galadriel would not allow him to kill one which was still living, and from it the good Dwarf fashioned a casket to fit the Elf maid's small body. In death she seemed even more fragile than she had in life, and Legolas placed her reverently inside the casket.
With all the speed that could be mustered, the company rode for the Golden Wood. At night as the company gathered around the campfire, Gimli sat himself down next to his friend and offered him a hearty slice of bread with butter. Legolas looked down at it as if he did not recognize it. For a long moment he observed it, then turned his head to the side, mutely rejecting the offering.
Pippin saw the exchange and thought that if the Elf was not ready to eat, surely he would drink some water. The young Hobbit picked a water sack off of the dusty ground, and carried it around the fire pit to his friend. Again Legolas merely looked at the sack with unseeing eyes, then he reached out his hand and gently pushed Pippin's extended arm away.
Rising to his feet, Legolas moved outside of the ring of light that shone from the campfire. Resting his back against a tree, he sat down next to Nimoë's casket. With gentle fingers he began to stroke the pine lid although, looking at his face, it could be wondered whether he was aware of his actions at all. The expression which resided there was utterly blank, like an empty piece of parchment.
As the rest of the company dropped off to sleep, the Elf Prince remained where he was, not sleeping, yet unable to rouse himself from the mind-numbing sorrow that beset him. Memories of her clear, bell-like laugh rang through his mind, and in front of his eyes he could see her smile. Although he knew the vision was not real, he stared at it in fascination, wondering if there would ever come a time when the grief would lessen, and with it the memory of love lost.
There he remained the whole night through, and when the company awoke in the morning, they found him so. Galadriel pulled Gandalf aside and said, "I fear for Legolas. He will not eat, drink, or sleep. I am afraid that he has lost the will to live."
Gazing over at the valiant Elf, Gandalf could not but agree. "We must do all that we can to pull him through his suffering. Perhaps in time he will once again turn his thoughts to the living."
Galadriel was unconvinced, but she nodded. Celeborn stood close to her, and she reached out her hand to him for reassurance, for her grief was also great. Lothlorien! How she longed to return there. Once within her realm, and able to consult her mirror, she would be able to truly study the lock of hair which Nimoë had given to her, as well as a new lock she had taken from her dead body, for it would hold more knowledge within it. Although the maid was well and truly dead now, Galadriel still wanted to understand exactly what had happened when Eomer had been saved.
The company again mounted up and took to the road. Finduél dragged Nimoë's casket behind him on a makeshift travois, and his head hung low, understanding that something was wrong, but waiting for his mistress to return to him, to comfort him in the dark of unknowing.
Gimli rode by Legolas' side, attempting to engage him in conversation. To all of his words of comfort, feeble jokes and plaintive pleading, Legolas' only responses were yes, no, and, more often than not, a blank stare, as if the Dwarf's voice were merely the buzzing of an insect. Finally, Gimli gave up on getting Legolas to respond, and he rode in a worried silence.
When, days later, the company finally reached Lothlorien, the Elf Prince appeared almost like a wraith. Not once during the journey had he partaken of food or drink, nor had he slept. Dark circles ringed his eyes, and his face was sunken. The skin, which had once been luminous, now was a dull, sallow grey, and the flesh of his body was wasting away.
To his friends it seemed that the only reason he had not lain down and surrendered his life to the Halls of Mandos was his desire to see Nimoë laid to rest before he departed. Galadriel dreaded that interment now, for she feared that it would be followed soon thereafter by another.
Her thoughts strayed to the death of Elves. When an Elf dies, either by injury or grief, his spirit departs from his body and is summoned to the Halls of Mandos, where it rests for a time. If the soul then chooses, it can be reborn into the world. There it would be given a body identical to the one it had left behind and, although they would have no memory of their previous life for many long years, as time passed they would come to remember it.
On the other hand, the spirit is not required to take life again, and can choose to remain in the Halls of Mandos. Galadriel sighed, for she feared that Legolas would choose the second path, and never again on the face of the world would he be seen. Still even in death, an Elf could not truly cease to exist, for their fates are bound to the world, and their spirits must continue to live until such time as the world came to an end.
Only to Men had Ilúvatar given the gift of death, and what awaited them was a mystery, thus greatly feared. Sweet Nimoë, thought the Elf Queen. What awaits you now?
Once inside the Golden Wood, the company traveled with haste to Galadriel and Celeborn's city. The guests were made comfortable and Galadriel set the day of Nimoë's interment for the next morning.
As night settled over Lothlorien, unearthly voices began to sing, a plaintive melody with ancient words, mourning the passing of the young Elf maid. Legolas, who was sitting in the moonlit glade near Nimoë's casket, wanted to clap his hands over his ears to shut out the lament, but there was no place to escape. Tears which he had thought dead within him leaked from the corners of his eyes, and he found he had not the energy to wipe them away. So he buried his head in his arms and allowed the Elves' lament to give voice to his boundless sorrow.
Galadriel moved past the glade on silent feet, and she looked down on him in pity. Only once had she seen an Elf die from grief, but she recognized the signs in him. He would not survive many days more.
Wresting her gaze from the doomed Elf, Galadriel continued on her way, reaching the glade where her mirror resided. With the radiant moon glow and the ancient lament as a backdrop, she dipped her pitcher into the fountain, filling it with clear water. At the bowl of the mirror, she poured the full ewer slowly, speaking words of summoning over it. Once the mirror was full to the brim, she set down the silver pitcher and opened the small pouch at her waist. With trembling fingers she pulled forth the locks of pale hair that rested safe within it. She held them only for a moment, then dropped them into the waters of the mirror.
All through the long night Galadriel remained there, whispering words of power, staring into the mirror, hoping that some light could be shed on the powerful magic which had been used to save one life, at the expense of another. Image after image sped across the surface of the water, each a chapter of Nimoë's life. Her youth in Mirkwood had been joyful, and visions of long past adventures, high in the towering trees, played like leaves in the wind.
Naldor and Glorfiane stared out at the Elf Queen, their faces kind, but unseeing, for they were also memories contained within the lock of Nimoë's hair. For hours on end the story flew by, and Galadriel learned more about the Elf maid than any other had seen. When the dawn began to break, Galadriel did not move from her place. The battle of the Pelennor Fields was beginning.
With her heart in her throat the Elf Queen watched as the transfer took place. As Nimoë collapsed on top of Eomer, Galadriel saw a brief flash of light, so quick as to have been unnoticeable to those around. Within the light she saw a small, but perfect, replica of the Elf maid. As she watched, a strange transformation occurred. The tiny figure split into two separate pieces, one holding all of the light and vitality of the original, the other dark and desolate, bent low with agony.
The figure of light reached out to embrace the figure of dark, to pull it back into itself, but, on touching it, the light recoiled, as if burned by the consuming shadow of the dark one. In the space of a heartbeat the moment was over and both manifestations sank back into Nimoë's broken body, the dark figure growing to be of a size with the true life maid. It melted into her, consuming her with its heavy shadow. The figure of light also fell back into her body, but it shrank to such a size that it was like a grain of sand when compared to the other. It lodged itself within her heart, and there it rested, emanating cold from itself, trying to save her body from the consuming death which was the doom of the figure of dark.
Tears filled Galadriel's eyes as she saw how close the figure of light had come to gaining sway over the darkness. Yet it had not been enough to save Nimoë. Only to delay death for a short while.
Relentlessly the memories continued to flood past, and Galadriel wept in earnest when she saw how the figure of darkness had pervaded the gentle maid. Deep melancholy had sat heavy on her for her last days, and even the company of her true love had not been enough to truly raise her out of the dark oblivion. It had been more than simply becoming mortal. Nimoë's fëa, or spirit, had been separated from her body, the hroa. The two separate halves lived still within the same space, but the hroa held sway, ever conscious of its own mortality, while the fëa struggled to find its way back to the wholeness it had left behind.
The sun was almost halfway to its zenith when at last the memories came to the meeting with Saruman and Grima. Galadriel flinched as the poisoned dagger struck the Elf maid, but she forced herself to keep watching, searching for any small thing that might shed more light on what had truly happened.
As Nimoë lay dying in agony, the figure of dark, which lay over her like a shadow, convulsed with her, suffering the same torment. All the while, however, the small figure of light continued to shine strong, seemingly aware of what was happening, but unable to fight it. When finally life had fled from Nimoë's body, the figure of dark began to crumble, falling away like dust into the earth. The life it represented was well and truly gone.
But what happened to the figure of light was what drew Galadriel's attention, for it did not fall away into death. As soon as life had fled, the small glowing form detached itself from her body, and it hovered for a moment over her head. Then, as if gifted with wings, it flew off towards the sky, diminishing in size as the distance grew greater.
The last thing which Galadriel saw in her mirror was a sight that filled her with awe. The small, brilliant figure of light approached a set of doors, so tall as to be higher than the mountains. As the figure drew nearer, the doors swung open as easily as if they were of no weight at all. Blinding light sprang forth from the opening, and music the likes of which Galadriel had never heard in all her long years sprang forth to greet the newcomer. With speed and joy, the figure of light entered through the doors. She was home.