Erda
By: Calyspo
Summery: As Arwen lies dying she is confronted by two ghosts, the first is her mother's memory… the second is her heart.
Author's note: This was originally written as a monologue, but the monologue didn't flow right. It's sort of a moment in time fic but then it's not exactly that either. It can be read as a one shot or as the companion piece to Just One Breath. Once again, this was written for the My Immortal Evenstar's Tears Website. Enjoy!
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The morning sunlight did not shine very brightly, those few shafts of light that managed to penetrate the canopy of leaves were immediately swallowed by the fog which had formed long before the early hours of the down. On the forest floor, a form lay still amongst the leaves, its dark coffee colored hair spread carelessly around it. A sharp contrast to the virgin snow in which it lay. She had not expected to survive the winter night. Had not wanted to. In the morning stillness, she opened her eyes painfully. Before her, hidden by the morning mist, stood a delicate shape clothed in white.
"Mother? Is that you?" Arwen's lips curled into a sad smile. Her eyes unable to focus on the form so close before her.
"I knew you'd come. I knew you wouldn't leave me here. Alone. I'm so afraid of being alone." No one replied, but the wind blew across her cheek like a mother's caress. To Arwen, it was her mother's touch. The mother of her childhood.
"Mother, they're all gone. Father left to find you, he couldn't stand being away from you for so long… so Elladan and Elrohir went after him. Mother, please don't go away again. Please? I was so little when you left us. I was so scared." The white form moved, as if with the breeze – Arwen couldn't tell if it moved towards her or away from her. She only knew that the movement was so very graceful, so like mother.
"Mother, he's gone too." For a moment, Arwen's throat was filled by the sob that threatened to escape it. "They warned me that he'd go. That even he wouldn't stay forever. But mother, why didn't take me with him? Why did he leave me alone? He knew I was afraid of being alone... he must have known I was afraid." Two very real tears rolled down her cheek. In her head, she heard her mother's voice murmuring something unintelligible but comforting. A memory from her childhood. A memory without words.
"I guess I've always been afraid. Afraid to love, afraid to choose, afraid of so much more than everyone else!" The admission came in a torrent, bursting forth from where it had long been concealed with her, within Arwen. Arwen, the fearless queen. Arwen, the bravest of wives. Arwen, the loneliest of daughters.
"Mother… did I make a mistake? Did I choose wrong? Oh mother… I loved Aragorn… at least… I knew that loving him was safe. That loving him would be alright because it didn't mean forever. But I didn't realize that a century passed so quickly. That pain fades so slowly…
"Mother? I… I choose wrong didn't I?" Anwen's voice began to break, torn from in a way she didn't understand. Suddenly, it was all too clear, all too real to her.
"I never should've been afraid. I should never have been afraid of eternity. I shouldn't have been afraid to really love. I shouldn't have been afraid to love him." Arwen looked up at the form she thought was her mother, uncertain if she understood. Uncertain if she truly knew.
"Oh mother, he left! Just like you…he left." Arwen's voice began to fade, her strength draining away.
"Even him… he took a ship across the seas. He's gone away to eternity. Mother? Oh mother… don't go… please? I don't want to be alone." It was a small child that spoke from within Arwen. A small, frail, fading child.
"Mother? Why is it so cold?"
"Mother?" Arwen received no answer and had not the strength to speak again..
The fog began to fade slightly, loosing its battle with the coming sun. As it faded, a graceful white Birch tree became visible where the mother of Arwen's memory had stood, its branches swung in the morning wind, as if unaware of what had just transpired. As if unaware of the life that had just fled. From behind Arwen's still form, a shape clothed in green emerged from the woods.
It stood still for a moment. The person to whom it belonged had caught sight of Arwen lying on the forest floor. Her form frozen in its beauty, a tear drop turned to ice upon her cheek.
"Arwen?" He stepped forward from the woods, towards her. Already, he knew that he had come too late. He had returned - but not nearly soon enough. He blamed himself, for being too enthralled by the sea, by not turning away from its temptation soon enough. As he gently lifted her into his arms, he refused to acknowledge that he was not a day too late - but centuries too late. That her decision had been made long before. "Arwen." He murmured her name into her hair, regretting that she had died alone. Holding her in his silent grief.
A dozen feet away, Gimli stood and watched. Saying nothing. Too late, ran through his head as well. Too late to stay here, too late to be crying. He knew now that Legolas would pass to the undying lands, that there was nothing more to hold him to middle earth. Silently, from the shadow of a white birch tree, Gimli grieved for the friend who kneeled in the snow and for the woman in that friend's arms. A woman who had always been alone. Alone. Erda*. Always.
~ Fini ~
*Erda is the elvish word for alone, but it also has the connotation of abandonment.
Erm… do I deserve reviews? *Looks hopefully and makes shameless puppy-dog eyes.*