Gondor, S.R. 1425
Idly Kiearâ ran her fingers over the fine workmanship, feeling the small carvings that had designed the old wooden table for generations it seemed to her. To her side she heard Emariara cough slightly. Kiearâ turned to glance and then watch her elder sister solemnly.
Her sister's golden brown hair was pulled back making her bright emerald eyes stand out more than usual. She was tall and slender; her face well defined with thin lips and pale lily-white skin. Kiearâ sighed.
On the other side of the table Brachet, Kiearâ's mother and Emariara's, whose looks echoed their mother's more closely than Kiearâ's, set a small pot of tea down in front of them.
The steam rose from the small pot filling the air with a sweet fragrance.
'Would you like any dear?' her mother asked. Kiearâ raised an eyebrow.
She had thought her mother had wanted to discuss this matter immediately. Marcie squirmed impatiently. Not able to stand the silence, her elder sister replied rather bluntly.
'Come now Kiearâ tell us. We're family. You can trust us.' Marcie paused a moment. 'Is mother right? If she is…' Here Marcie faltered. Shaking her golden head she blurted out. 'Tell us who did it Kiearâ!' Her eyes grew angry for a moment, a dark light shining in her green eyes.
Kiearâ didn't answer right away. Then she laughed, loud and long letting it bubble over from inside her.
'Kiearâ!' her mother gasped. It was a highly indecent sort of laugh for such a question, at least by Brachet's standards anyway.
Shaking her head Kiearâ finally looked up at them, her mother and sister, and she was smiling up at them, her eyes glowing with amusement and something else neither could place.
'Kiearâ.' Brachet said, a warning edge to her voice. If Kiearâ wasn't really with child and had been playing…well, that would be a horrible affront to their family in Brachet's mind.
Kiearâ shook her head.
'No Mother, you're right. No doubts there.' And here Kiearâ's smile widened, her eyes shining.
Marcie looked at Kiearâ with suspicion.
'And that's a good thing? Excuse me if I don't quite understand.' There was a hint of sarcasm in her tone.
'I just wouldn't be so happy to discover that some rather indecent act with an un-named man had produced a child when I had previously been married with no children to show from it.'
For a moment Kiearâ's eyes darkened. Then she blinked, smiled and laughed again.
Grabbing Kiearâ by the shoulder Marcie insisted. 'Kiearâ what is wrong with you?'
'He wasn't…a Man…you see…' Kiearâ sputtered out between gasps as she laughed softly in-between each phrase.
Brachet took hold of Kiearâ's hand suddenly causing Kiearâ's laughter to falter a moment. Her mother's eyes hardened as though trying to see down to her daughter's soul.
'What do you mean he wasn't a Man? What in the world was he then?'
Kiearâ looked thoughtful.
'Is. He is. He isn't dead yet.'
Marcie and her mother exchanged a glance and waited impatiently.
Kiearâ sighed again pulling her knees up to her chest. Her mind wandered back to their first night together, back up in the Shire in his home in Tookbourough. It made her smile to remember. She couldn't help it. It had been one of the single happiest times of her life.
'At least he doesn't call himself a Man, though there aren't many differences physically except for a few obvious attributes.' Kiearâ paused. She watched her sister and mother's faces. They look strained, especially her mother, Marcie on the other hand looked partly on edge more than anything else, though both appeared almost at the end of their patience. They looked as though they were beginning to get quite fed up with her.
Kiearâ coughed slightly.
'He calls himself and his kind…they call themselves actually…Hobbits. I'm sure you know what the differences are that I mentioned.'
Marcie gapped at her. Her mother looked somewhere halfway between shock and disgust. Kiearâ sighed.
'Erm,' Kiearâ grinned wryly at them. 'His name is Pippin. Peregrin Took.' She raised an eyebrow. 'You remember him? He was down here during the War of the Ring?'
Marcie was still gaping at her. Her mother coughed stiffly.
'Are you trying to tell us that this child's father was…is…a…a…Hobbit?'
Kiearâ nodded.
'Kiearâ dear,' her mother began, 'did you ever think of what it would be like for the child. There is…a possibility…of various…oddities in the child.'
Before Kiearâ could respond to that comment, Marcie blurted out.
'They're so small!'
Kiearâ stared at her as she blushed back at her younger sister in response.
Grinning, Kiearâ leaned her chin on the palm of her hand, looking slightly amused.
'Merry and him are the tallest of their kind.'
'Merry?' Her mother asked faintly.
'Meriadoc Brandybuck. He's Pippin's first cousin on his father's side and one of his best friends.'
Marcie gaped at her again. 'What?'
Kiearâ grinned solemnly at her sister
'It's like I said, his cousin is Merry and they're good friends.'
Marcie seemed amused, tilting her head slightly, watching Kiearâ with a strange blend of love and bemusement. Kiearâ's mother gasped, seeming quite horrified by the whole matter. Kiearâ sighed wearily.
§
Later that day Marcie came to see Kiearâ in her old room in their mother's home. The light of the day was just beginning to fade from the world as the fiery light of the sun sunk into the growing blue-black twilight that was growing in the sky.
Settling down next to her on her bed, Marcie laid down across the width of the bed, while Kiearâ sat at the end and watched her elder sister solemnly.
Marcie watched Kiearâ a moment before muttering dryly.
'You're much too serious sometimes Kiearâ.'
Kiearâ shook her head but said nothing.
Sighing, her sister stared up at the ceiling, seeming to trace the small etchings in stone over head.
Turning to look at Kiearâ, Marcie placed her chin against her folded arm, peering up at Kiearâ.
'I know I didn't quite show it, but I am glad for you whether you realized it or not.'
From her startled expression Kiearâ guessed Marcie could tell how much that had surprised her.
Curiously Kiearâ asked, 'Then why were you so stunned.'
Marcie grinned at her. 'It was partly for Mother's sake. When she told me I knew something beyond her comprehension was going to occur. So I thought I'd help her along a bit.' She winked at her sister.
Kiearâ smiled, feeling extremely grateful for her sister. She was one of the few people who understood her, or at least understood her enough so that Kiearâ didn't alienate her like with many others of Gondor, Vërtainir notwithstanding.
Shrugging more to herself than Kiearâ, Marcie rose from the bed stretching.
'I'll see you tomorrow then and maybe we can talk about this Pippin of yours.' She waved over her head as she headed for the door. Kiearâ grinned slightly in spite of herself.
Stopping suddenly, Marcie turned slowly as though remembering some small tidbit of knowledge that she had recently forgotten, asking in a rather quiet voice.
'Wasn't that the same hobbit who knew Boromir just before he died?'
She asked it slowly, almost wearily. Kiearâ bit her lip. Boromir, the late brother of the last Steward of the White City, had been one of the dearest people to her sister, almost a constant companion until he had become too busy with the threat of Mordor to see her. The word of his untimely death had shaken her more than she had cared to admit.
But there was a strangely reflective look in her sister's emerald eyes.
'How strange…that you should fall in love so deeply with one whom Boromir died to protect.'
Stunned, Kiearâ realized Marcie was right, there was a certain strangeness to it because she knew her sister had deeply loved Boromir, though her love for the proud man was that of loving, devoted sister instead of what Kiearâ felt for Pippin…a love of romance stronger than she had known, and that they should have known each other, yet Kiearâ herself had never been close to Boromir and Marcie had never even met Pippin. Before she could comment, Marcie replied rather quickly.
'Fate's strange that way.' She smiled thinly. 'I'm glad you found this Pippin. Because if he makes you this happy he's worth everything.'
Deeply moved Kiearâ watched in silence as her tall, bright sister departed the room.
§
Wandering outside her mother's home, Kiearâ walked out into the darkening night as the sun's rays faded from the western sky. She sighed wearily. All these talks the last two days had tired her out more than she would have thought. At least her sister understood, which was more than she could say for her mother.
Brachet just didn't understand. She loved Pippin. It wasn't as if she didn't know what she had been doing. She felt no regret, and she knew she would always treasure the time they had together. No one could take that away, not Aragorn, not Brachet. No one except themselves could put an end to what they shared. Of that she was quite certain.
Feeling content she wandered through the streets watching the stars begin to come out shining down like small jewels in the ink blue sky.
She let her mind wander also; as she let her feet lead her where they wished. In her half dreamy state she nearly passed a figure standing also along the road.
Surprised, Kiearâ turned to the figure, whose features where shadowed in the twilight of the evening. Calling out gently she asked, 'Who are you? And what reasons do you walk about at this hour?'
Kiearâ did feel genuinely curious about this person since her questions were quite true. Not that there was necessarily anything to fear in Gondor in the night, just that one did not usually find many people standing alone at dusk as though waiting for someone.
The figure did not answer right away. The figure was tall yet with a graceful air to them with wisdom and a queenly elegance that was far beyond anything Kiearâ would ever have.
She heard herself sigh.
As though thinking that to be an invitation, the figure moved across the moonlit street to peer into Kiearâ's eyes. This mysterious figure was obviously female but Kiearâ wondered if her cryptic acquaintance was truly human at all.
In her eyes was the light of many years, dark and bond to wisdom, yet Kiearâ saw a sorrow in her eyes, a sorrow that moved her heart for its strange beauty. In later years Kiearâ could never explain what she saw that night in the Queen Evenstar's eyes, except an irreplaceable sorrow rung with a bright joy which had been given to grace one of her kind, the Elven people, ere the world changed and the Evenstar of her people would fade from mortal memory. In the years that followed Kiearâ always looked back upon this strange meeting with a gentle repose as though something deeper in her than she knew understood more and saw clearer into the elf-maiden's bittersweet eyes than even she realized. What Arwen saw as she looked into Kiearâ's eyes she never learned.
'Arwen.' Kiearâ acknowledged her Elven Queen.
Arwen said nothing, but sighed.
'Aragorn tells me that you are acquainted with the Hobbit Peregrin Took of the Shire.'
It wasn't a question, it was a statement and Kiearâ recognized that. Feeling quite positively that it was none of Arwen's business yet aware that she should probably keep some of her opinions to herself.
There was what Kiearâ could only process as sadness in the Queen's eyes as she watched Kiearâ in the growing moonlight.
'Why do you force yourself to suffer?'
Taken aback, Kiearâ peered icily almost at the clear eyes of her Queen.
'What do you mean?'
Watching her solemnly, Arwen replied. 'Because…' she paused suddenly, as though unsure how to continue. 'What could he possibly have for you?'
Kiearâ stifled a dozen responses that leaped to mind right off but settled instead on a very simple response.
'His love. My happiness. He has those.'
Arwen seemed stunned by the response, then her eyes soften.
'I'm not saying your love is any less but truly he is meant to be with his people. Certainly you see that.'
Struck by a strange emotion Kiearâ felt sadness well up inside her heart for this beautiful Elven-maid before her. She had suffered so much and loved so much yet she could not see Kiearâ's love for Pippin.
'The same could be held true to you my dear Queen.' She said it softly, gently, not wanting to hurt Arwen yet desiring for the Queen to understand.
Arwen blinked back in surprise. Seeming unsure again she murmured, 'But he is a Hobbit'
'And I love him'
Arwen peered deeply into Kiearâ's eyes as though trying to perceive with her clearer sight some means with which to comprehend this strange bewilderment before her.
'I do not understand you.'
Kiearâ grinned wanly at her.
'It doesn't matter if you do.'
Arwen nodded accepting that for what it was as she turned her face away from Kiearâ to gaze up into the shining stars that had began to grace the dark sky.