Author's Note: On the prompt "…because there the trees were loved." In honor of Celeborn, Ents and Earth Day.
After
Imagine that at last the Ents are gone; a tall silver-haired figure stands cloaked in grey, catching the dusty sunbeams with weary-widening gaze.
For ages uncounted they passed through this wood, pausing years, decades, centuries; each time he hoped they would stay; each time he knew that the time must come for them to leave again.
Standing there in the shadows of the great silver-skinned trees, feeling the forest wither, he asks the question: why here?
The answer comes as a sigh, a rustle in the aspen-leaves, the dry wind in the ash: because here the trees were loved.