Into the Shadow
By The Last Evenstar
A/N: Sorry I took so long getting this chapter up! Unfortunately, I've been struck with a horrible case of writers' block. I won't give up, though – and your reviews, especially those containing ideas, are extraordinarily helpful.
Luckily, school is out, and my goals for the summer include: (1) Finish Into the Shadow, (2) Design a web archive for my stories and ME132's, (3) Reformat and edit all of my existing stories – maybe even add a chapter or two, and (4) Get nominations for the Aníron Awards (anironawards.741.com – go nominate!)
However, this may prove to be no more than a pipe dream, what with all the hours I'm scheduled to work this summer.
Thank you so much, all who review – I can't name you by name; there's too many. But if you keep on doing it, I promise I'll thank all of you individually in the last chapter.
This chapter is dedicated to Sadie (b-witched83uk) for the idea, and to Terreis, a wonderful writer, friend, and fellow rambler. You're both fantastic.
Chapter Fifteen: Strength for Tomorrow
Escape.
When she woke, when she slept, when she dreamed – it was always there, filling with images long subdued. She fought against hope, for it was naught but an enemy in this barren land.
But throughout days and nights of indiscernible darkness, it came unbidden to her mind. Lying still in a dank dungeon, she had naught to survive on save the crumbs of ideas that invited themselves into her head, forming plans and reasoning against her will.
In the back of her mind, she had always hoped for rescue. Her father, her brothers, Estel – one of them would come for her. But as the months passed, long and weary in this immeasurable vortex of days and nights, she finally had to accept the truth.
No one was coming.
Fight fire with fire. It was a saying known to Men and Elves alike. In Mordor, in the Land of Shadow, she knew that her only chance of escape would mean becoming a shadow herself.
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
"Back again." Elrohir surveyed the woods of Lórien from his faunal perch. "And I cannot say the circumstances have improved."
Aragorn and Elladan simply nodded, not knowing what an adequate response might comprise. Aragorn was sure he had spoken less on the past months' journey than he would have in a day back when . . . back when everything was right. Back when the ones he loved were safe, and his future lay just on the horizon.
Now, all the hope and aspirations of years past had plummeted downward into an unending cycle of grief and loss that he did not even wish to consider. Once he had fought for the perfect future – now all he wanted was to reach tomorrow unscathed.
As they walked through the glades of Lothlórien, memories came unbidden to haunt his weary mind. He saw within his mind the gay laughter and rustle of silken gowns moving all around the glade; dancing phantoms, and one infinitely more beautiful than the rest.
In a whirlwind of white silk, silver rainment, and the swirl of deep blue lace she was there, his light, his Evenstar. It was her, always singing louder and shining brighter than any other elleth there, that drew your gaze.
In a flurry of erethreal light she had disappeared behind a mallorn, dragging him relentlessly, until at last he could hold her in his arms. The taste of her kiss three summers ago still lingered like honey on his parched lips.
A sharp jolt on the arm brought him back to reality. Elladan looked at him in concern, but all he could see were ghostly memories reflecting in his clear gray eyes.
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
It was a summer much like this one, clear and green, with a sky that went on for leagues. As a boy, such summers had been ideal for catching small green frogs in the pond by the Last Homely House, frogs that often found their permanent homes somewhere in Lord Elrond's quarters. That summer, though, he had managed to obtain something more beautiful, more desirable, and more wonderful than any pond inhabitant, frog or otherwise: Arwen, a name that did her no justice at all.
Years of watching her from afar had convinced him that love was respect, a one-way adoration that ate you alive. But lying in the grass, unshod, on the great hill Cerin Amroth, he knew for certain that love bought no amount of pain or longing. Love was in his arms, laughing, smiling, and lying in silence to gaze up at the sky.
He looked down at her, perfect in every way, and could hardly dare to believe that she was his.
He closed his eyes, and felt himself slip off into a blissful state of peace and darkness . . .
Darkness . . .
She was slipping away, screaming, clawing, yelling noiselessly into the night. The stark, abject terror in her eyes burned him with the pain of a thousand needles as he fought to see her . . .
One.
Last.
Time.
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Haldir met the travelers with a grim face. "The Lady has been expecting you," he told them, his eyes hollow and devoid of expression.
Elrohir nodded. "Hannon le, march warden."
Rúmil nodded as they walked past. "I'm glad to see you alive, sons of Elrond. I fear ever more that you would fall victim to the darkness."
Aragorn had never seen Haldir's merry brother so grim. Dark times and sad happenings did not suit the Galadhrim.
As he made his way past, Haldir's arm snaked out and caught his own. "I have something for you." He handed Aragorn a sheaf of parchment, worn with a year's creases and care. "From the Lady."
Aragorn's heart leapt miles in his chest. "The Lady Galadriel?" he asked, trying to quell his desperate hope.
Haldir looked him in the eye. "You know which Lady I mean."
It took every ounce of self-restrain the possessed not to rip the letter from the Elf's hands. Instead, he took it coolly, his heart beating a mad rhythm of suspense and relief.
Haldir held him once more second before letting him go with these words of parting: "I shall never understand why she loves you so, yet all that I can comprehend tell me this: do not let her go, for it shall be the undoing of you both."
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Galadriel spoke softly, her tone conveying more anger than the loudest of exclamations. "Elrohir, Elladan, as your Queen and your grandmother, I refuse to let you continue this folly."
"Folly?" Elrohir demanded, his voice a perfect match for the woman before them. "You call rescuing Arwen folly?"
Galadriel sighed, gazing beyond them into some unseen world. "Arwen will not be rescued, whether by you or all the hosts of Middle-earth. This I have foreseen from the very moment she passed my way." Her voice softened at the shock in her grandsons' eyes. "Arwen's doom was laid upon her before any one of us took heed. Fate wove her fragile web about your sister, entwining her forever with Isildur's Heir, and the great road that she has paved before him."
"What are you saying?" Elladan cried, leaping from his chair in a fit of anger. "That we should abandon all effort simply because you have foreseen our failure? That we should simply stand by and watch her go without sorrow or regret?"
Galadriel's eyes flashed sharply. "Sorrow is expected, and regret is only normal. But I will not have you wasting your lives to chase after her memory on a useless tirade."
Elladan sat, stung.
The Elf Queen sighed. "I do not doubt that you and Elrohir have done Middle-earth much good in your ventures. But both of you are misled in directing your focus." She turned to her other grandson. "Elrohir, do not pretend that your agreement to come with Elessar meant that you were moving on." Her eyes softened as she looked upon him with pity. "You have saved countless thousands in your life. Fighting to the end will not bring your naneth back."
"But -"
Galadriel shook her head. "There is no need to fight, young one. You will see Celebrían in the Ages to come. Now is your time to live."
Elrohir sank back, defeated. "You are sure that we would fail?"
Galadriel's eyes conveyed nothing. "I know only what I have seen."
Elladan looked sadly over at his brother. "I suppose we're going home."
"No." The voice rang, resonant, from the back of the room. A man strode forth with new determination, a tear-stained sheaf of parchment clutched in his hands.
"Estel." Elrohir shook his head. "We cannot change the future."
"But the future would change us," Aragorn cut back, losing none of his esteem. "I have two choices: to live and die a broken man, or to go down fighting in her name."
"Think sharply," Galadriel told him. "Are your kingdom and your heritage worth forsaking? Will one maiden alter the course of our history?"
Aragorn held his chin high. "She already has."
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
As Arwen worked in secret, she thought of naught but her ancestor Lúthien. She lived and died for love, she thought to herself, knowing for certain now that her own fate would be the same.
"Now long and longer grew her hair,
And fell to her feet, and wandered there
Like pools of shadow on the ground . . .
. . . Of cloudy hair
She wove a web like misty air
Of moonless night, and thereof made
A robe as fluttering-dark as shade
Beneath great trees, a magic dress
That all was drenched with drowsiness,
Enchanted with a mightier spell
Then Melian's raiment in that dell . . ."
J.R.R. Tolkien, The Histories of Middle-earth, Volume III: The Lays of Beleriand