---Mornanalta---

She had a brother once.

Noble and wise, fair and strong, valiant and loyal: eldest of the Children of Finarfin and hailed as a High Prince of the Noldor in Aman.

And then they rebelled, and then they were cursed; then they wept, and then they grew frail, weary and weak, and then they fell (not one by one, but by the thousand, in the wake of flames and ruin).

Finrod Felegund swooned before Sauron's throne and his fea fled from his body in defense of Beren son of Barahir; while she knew no risk or peril, nestled safely away in Doriath.

Older he had been, although he never treated her as anything other than an equal (unlike Maedhros, who Caranthir had often complained had fallen into the habit of treating him as if he had stopped growing at the age of thirty). Often had they taken counsel with one another in times of importance (and often she had wished for his wisdom in later times), and many a time, despite being siblings, and by default rivals as children, they had a tendency to prefer one another's company to that of any other. (well, almost - Turgon and Finrod were rather close, and there were simply some things she was simply more willing to discuss with Aredhel.)

And what would her beloved brother do now? His council was impossible to obtain now, but she did not need it to know what his course of action would be. Her brother would have marched out against Sauron (alone, if none would dare to march with him), and let his name and presence be known; even now, during the fading of the eldar and the rise of men.

Perhaps she would have done the same. Not as the Lady of Lorien but as a Princess of the Noldor, before she knew of Celeborn Prince of Doriath or the works of Melian the Maia.

But it was not in the hands of elves now, the fate of Middle-earth. And she wept, wept for the first time in thousands of millennia in The Years of the Sun; for another death alone by the hand of the wolf, and for the rise of another Dark Lord.

(But there would be no rebirth for Frodo Baggins - and this time, the Valar would not come.)