Title: Dealing With It
Author: Marie Kenobi
Rating: PG
Time Period: Pre-, during, and post the Quest of the One Ring

Summary: Short vigenettes of four characters and their ordeals
in life. Response to fic challenge.

Disclaimer: I do not own Lord of the Rings nor the rights to "I'm
Moving On" by Rascal Flats. I'm only borrowing them. As always, song lyrics are in *'s.  Enjoy!  ^_^ ~~~~~~ Dealing With It **I've dealt with my ghosts and I've faced all my demons

Finally content with a past I regret

I've found you find strength in your moments of weakness

For once I'm at peace with myself

I've been burdened with blame

Trapped in the past for too long**

Careless, they used to call me.  A spoiled Elvish prince with a sour demeanor; concern only for myself.  But there was one who saw beyond the mask, one who taught me better.  Amoreth's gray eyes never lost sight of who I was on the inside; never lost sight of the Elf not even I had discovered yet.

Always there, always giving.  She asked, "What can I do?"

I turned the other cheek.

One day home became too unbearable to my teenage mind.  Those were my righteous days, the days when I held the key to the World's knowledge.  None could say differently, none could prove me wrong or usurp my wisdom and fortitude.

Except one.  And she was as fleet footed as I.

We argued, the two misunderstood creatures that we were, and I spoke words that are only nurtured in the heat of anger.  We went separate ways.  Later, I would realize an apology was in order.  But no one had seen Amoreth.  Search parties marched away.

The sun rose and the sun set.  The following morn her body was carried through those ancient gates.  Killed…by only the Valar knows what.  Her prints had been tracked, leading away from mine to her doom a mere few hundred yards away.

The death of her immortal soul ripped my own to shards; the memory haunted my dreams for many a century.  I was longing to die, to inflict Death upon myself…if grief did not achieve such a goal first.  But somehow she got through…a dream perhaps.  Amoreth was not dead as long as she was not forgotten.  The blame for her death was not mine, nor anyone else's.

I'm stronger than I once was.  I'll need it—need it all—for the journey ahead.  I dealt with my ghosts and drew strength from my weakness, content that my past and guilt cannot rule me.  The past is behind, the future ahead.

My journey will lead me to Rivendell where the Council awaits.

Now, finally, I am free.

**I'm moving on…**

~~~~~~

** I've lived in this place and I know all the faces

Each one is different but they're always the same

They mean me no harm but it's time that I face it

They'll never allow me to change

But I never dreamed home would end up where I don't belong**

Timeless…like etched in stone.  Their faces: everlasting portraits that never appear to change.  Though the aging eyes that see them appear more weary with the passing of time.  Father stripped me of my Elven dreams so many, many years ago.

"Estel, you are Human."

Then again just days past my coming to manhood.

"You are Isildur's heir."

I could not come to terms.  I would not.  In beautiful Imladris, there was no room for a gangly future King of Men.  Aragorn was awkward.  Estel flowed like the gentle Bruinen.  I had been tossed in the cold with not but shattered dreams to still my chattering.

The Rangers passed through one dark night.  Come morn I disappeared into the foggy horizon, blinded in a haze, now one of them.  I was neither Estel nor Aragon.  Neither Elven boy nor King of Men.

I was Strider, homeless wanderer of the wilds, a Ranger.

But I am back again; the Quest has called me home.  These faces, so familiar, so unchanged—they smile, but they don't see me, not as I would want them to.  'Home' is somewhere I don't belong anymore.

The Quest calls and the Council adjourns.

If I can no longer be whom I desire, I will settle on the identity with which I was born.  I am Aragorn, yes.  But I am Estel and Strider both, as well.  I choose to no longer wander in the haze of Unknown.

I'll find my place.

**I'm moving on…**

~~~~~~

**I'm moving on at last I can see

Life has been patiently waiting for me

And I know there's no guarantees but I'm not alone

There comes a time in everyone's life

When all you can see are the years passing by

And I have made up my mind that those days are gone**

~~~~~~

** I sold what I could and packed what I couldn't

Stopped to fill up on my way out of town**

"There is no hope," says he.  But love speaks louder than words.  My heart sees what he does not—cannot—chooses not to see.  There is hope; there is always hope as long as there is love.  My Hope speaks from a distance.  His spirit is weary and thrums in rhythm to mine.  In his heart he knows my pledge, what I have sold for Us.  Hands turn cold and inner luster dims: the Valar's grace has gone.

I am weak now.  The Darkness suffocates even a soul without its immortal flare.  Memories fill the lungs that should burst with breath, but find it so hard to expand on air alone.  Light seems far off, but Hope stands strong still.  There is happiness on the horizon if only one would look.  And before I meet you there, I'll stop to fill up…on memories of love.

~~~~~~

**I've loved like I should but lived like I shouldn't

I had to lose everything to find out**

To my children, their immortal souls lost, I leave my undying love.  They know the pain their choices spring within me.  But oh!  Their love for the Man King is strong, a thread of purest fibers.  If I have taught them not else, it is how to love.  My heart has always been giving, though it took the loss of many for true, unchecked devotion to come about.  Elros…Celebrian…Elladan, Elrohir, Arwen…Estel…

So I have loved as I should, for to have hardened my heart to these would have proven a stronger blow than to not have.  But for perhaps all my years, I've lived as I shouldn't.  A life taken for granted, the wonders and splendors of the world forgotten all too soon.

How the Sea calls…

Alas that I should have had to lose it all to see it clearly…finally…For there are no second chances, even for the Firstborn.

~~~~~~

**Maybe forgiveness will find me somewhere down this road

I'm moving on

I'm moving on

…I'm moving on…**

~~~~~~

el fin