Chapter 90: Intermezzo

Third millennium of the Third Age, Lothlórien

It was a timeless period of grief.

Galadriel went to councils, at least she thought she did, and saw to matters under her purview with such detachment she could not say what the state of affairs was if someone asked her.

She held up the barrier at the borders of Lothlórien, but that was the most she could do.

She was not sure what was happening in the outside world – or even inside, to be truthful.

Celeborn was not speaking to her, and neither was Elrond. They were both drowning in their own grief, she supposed – but she did not have enough capacity to truly think about it.

Her grandchildren no longer travelled over the mountains.

And her daughter and Avorneth, of course, were gone.

Every moment, waking of sleeping, was filled with the images of Celebrían's suffering, with what Galadriel had felt in her mind and the wounds her daughter had received and her haunted eyes.

Resonating in her thoughts: "I always knew I was weak," said in that hollow voice, that death sentence articulated now, but first pronounced before Celebrían was even born.

Her daughter, her own daughter, and all because of her.

It was a constant, unavoidable chorus in Galadriel's mind, the mind she closed to everyone else.

She sometimes forgot why she did not let go, why she did not let the darkness engulf her completely and take her away. She only remembered – the one clear thought in the sea of pain – that she must not.

After some time of this – a decade, perhaps? A century? - Olórin came to speak with her in person.

He talked of dragons and dwarves and horse-lords, but she did not hear him, not truly. She sat and nodded as he spoke, and when he asked her what she thought would best be done, she merely shook her head.

He gave her a look. It was probably a worried one. "My friend..." He said. "You need help. Assistance."

She wanted to laugh, hysterically.

"Lord Olórin," she said hollowly, "would have been able to help me."

He merely sighed. "Yes," he said, "but then, I am not him."

He departed, then. Had she offended him? She could not tell.

She sunk back into her nightmares.

Some other, indeterminable time later, Feliel came.

Galadriel did not remember what she said. She offered to help, probably. She mentioned how Galadriel had helped her some centuries ago. Galadriel only sat, silent, until Feliel left again.

Birik and his wife tried, then, and Tugu, whose method of nearly shouting at her was at least new. It at least registered.

It did not help.

Banja came as the last of them.

"Forgive me, my lady," she said. "I know I hardly know you and that this is deeply personal pain, but...my wife is worried about you.

Galadriel only nodded.

"I would help, in any way I could," Banja said.

And she did help, a little.

She was a talented healer, Galadriel seemed to remember, and in her presence, all the burdens seemed a little lighter, a little more distant, as if there was a veil over them. It gave Galadriel a little time to breathe, at least, until the darkness descended again.

One day when Banja came to her, instead of sitting down, she took her arm and led her to the edge of the forest.

Galadriel gave her a mildly questioning look.

"Someone wishes to meet you," Banja said simply.

Galadriel walked on, disinterested. Whom she saw just beyond her borders gave her a pause, however.

"What are you doing here?" She demanded – or it would have been a demand had there been enough force behind it.

"Your friend the Grey Wanderer told me to come," Macalaurë replied.

"Why?" She asked blankly.

"It seems, from what he says, that you are fighting with some degree of guilt."

She only laughed.

"For some reason," Macalaurë continued, "he thought it could be a field I am an expert in."

"Was that not more your brother's provenance?" Galadriel asked, her archness with a bitter tinge. She was aware, ina distant sort of way, that she was being cruel, but it seemed impossible to do anything about it.

"It was," he replied simply, unperturbed. "I learned from the master."

There was a silence.

"What happened?" He asked then, insistent, still simply standing before her.

"The Grey Wanderer did not tell you that?" She was sharp, pointed, she knew. It seemed appropriate.

"He told me your daughter was attacked and tortured, and had to sail," Macalaurë replied. Galadriel flinched, at hearing it so bluntly spoken of, and looked away from him. "What I do not understand," he went on, "is why you feel guilt for that. Grief would be expected. But guilt?"

Galadriel shrugged, still looking over his shoulder. She was not going to tell him her darkest secret. They had never been close friends, and until recently, she had not seen him for thousands of years.

He smirked, of all things. "What," he said, "you believe that your crime is so terrible it cannot be spoken of? How many people have you murdered, dear cousin?"

"More than you," she replied. "More died because of me than because of you."

"This again?" He asked, mocking. "Truly? Did you plunge a sword into their hearts? Did you cut off their head? Did you watch them bleed out on the white sand?"

It was his voice that had a cruel tilt to it now, and she could not bear it. "Stop," she whispered, closing her eyes, seeing the images on the inside of her eyelids, seeing Celebrían in Brannor's place or by Brannor's side on the shore of New Havens.

"Then do not say that you murdered people," he replied in a hard voice that bore into her. "You do not know what that is like, to kill an elf. You do not understand the horror, the change it wreaks in you."

She shook her head, her eyes still closed, balancing on the edge of despair. "Is there truly such difference? If my daughter was captured because of me, is it not as if I myself plunged the knives into her?"

"So you set up the trap, then?" He continued prodding, provoking. "You drew her out into the mountains and arranged it with the orcs that they meet her there?"

"It is because of me that she could be captured at all!" Galadriel shouted, finally looking at him again.

"So you set the trap after all," he said archly.

"I made her weak," Galadriel replied, quietly this time, willing him to understand with her look. "My selfishness made her weak, and she paid the highest price for it."

He frowned. "What are you talking about?"

And so Galadriel, lacking the will to resist, crubmled to the ground where she stood and told him.

When she finished the story, he laughed, of all things.

"My father," he said when he stopped, "dragged all seven of his sons into an oath that destroyed their lives and made them murderers, never feeling an ounce of guilt for it, as far as I can tell. You are destroyed by guilt because you refused to give yourself up like my grandmother. Forgive me if I find that deeply amusing, in the darkest, bitterest way."

"I could never have done what your grandmother did," Galadriel replied, looking up at him. "But I could have done more."

He only shook his head. "Have you forgotten all the evil my grandmother's choice led to?"

"Do not tell me you blame her," Galadriel said with a tinge of irritation.

"No. But I do believe her story is a warning. Self-sacrifice is not, always, the best path to follow."

"There is a large enough space between giving all and giving nothing," the Nolde pointed out.

"Had you given nothing, Celebrían would have died in your womb," Macalaurë replied harshly.

Galadriel winced. "Still, I could have..."

He shrugged. "Yes, you could have probably done more. But do you not see how laughable it is to me that you would think that comparable to my crimes?"

"She is my own daughter," Galadriel insisted.

"And we are our father's own sons. Many of the Teleri of Alqualondë were my friends, or at least acquaintances. I knew you and Celeborn dwelt in Doriath, and in the Havens, there were so many...Artanáro, Itarillë's grandchildren..."

"None of them your own blood."

"Are you determined to make yourself the worst criminal of all?" He crouched in front of her to look directly and intently into her eyes. "Unless you would have plunged your sword into Celebrían yourself, I will always only laugh at you."

She could only hold his gaze for a short moment before looking away. She sighed, resigned and too tired to argue. "You may well be right, but it does not really matter. It does not matter what I think about it. Celeborn knows – he saw my memories – and he blames me."

Macalaurë raised his eyebrows. "Does he?"

"He has not spoken to me, not like husband to wife, since he found out."

"And have you spoken to him?"

Galadriel only looked at him blankly.

"I have lived with my guilt for millennia now," he said, "and I know that the only way to survive is not to get engulfed. It will never go away, but you must not drown."

She scoffed. "This is not a very useful advice. If you told someone thrown into the sea that they must not drown, they would hardly be thankful to you."

"No," he agreed, "but that is not what I am telling you. I am telling you to take the help you need to get out of the water."

"Did you?" She asked pointedly.

"After a time," he replied, "and enough of it that I can survive." He smiled bitterly. "Of course, I have a very compelling reason not to wish to fade. The thought of encountering my father again keeps me firmly grounded in this world."

Galadriel's mind was finally clear enough that she could remember, and she said: "I have a good enough reason too. I must not fade until this war is over. I promised I would see Sauron undone, and I will."

He nodded. "Then take the help that is offered. I hesitate to treat your guilt like mine, so absurd it seems, but if it is anything like it...it cannot be managed entirely alone." He nodded towards the forest behind her. "I cannot enter that realm," he said. "But go in and talk to Celeborn."

"He will not speak to me."

"Then talk to someone else, first. But do."

Reluctantly, hesitantly, she nodded. He rose and offered his hand, and she took it, standing up.

He turned to leave, but paused and added: "Remember that Celeborn was able to accept my brother and me, back in the First Age at your wedding, when the news of the Fist Kinslaying was still fresh to him. I would be very much surprised if he could not forgive you."

With those words, he departed, and Galadriel looked after him for a moment before she, too, turned towards home.

She found out that he had been right about Celeborn soon enough. When she returned to Caras Galadhon, her husband was waiting for her in their flet.

"I spoke to Lord Círdan," he said hesitatingly instead of a welcome. "Mithrandir told him to come."

It seemed that her friend had been very active indeed.

"I..." he trailed off. "Why did you not tell me?" He asked at length.

She only stared at him.

"You berated me, once," he remembered, "that marriage was about openness and that I kept the true state of affairs of the Select in Doriath from you. But what you kept from me..."

"What should I have said?" Galadriel asked. "How could I have told you? You had dreamed about a child for over a millennium at that point, Celeborn. Should I just have come to you and told you I wished to kill it?"

He flinched. "No," he replied. "But you could have talked about how it drained you. I...even if I know, in theory, that this is what happens in pregnancy, it is very different from realizing the actual enormity of the matter. You could have shared your feelings, your mind, with me."

"I didn't wish to hurt you."

"But you did."

Galadriel acknowledged it with a nod. "I'm sorry," she said, her words hollow for their inadequacy.

"I'm sorry you didn't feel you could tell me, not even after centuries," he offered in turn.

She shook her head vehemently. "Please don't feel any guilt for that. These were my choices, all of them. You bear no responsibility."

"But I do," he insisted. "As I said, we're married. That means something. I know you're not inclined to keeping secrets from me, or had not been until then, at least. Your shared the worst of yourself with me when we barely knew each other. I must have made you feel like you couldn't trust me with what you felt in pregnancy."

Galadriel thought of Macalurë, and of her fears for Arwen. She should tell Celeborn, she knew. He was right. There should be no more secrets between them, if there was any hope of rapairing the breach. But with them both so wholly engulfed in grief and despair, she could not. It was unthinkable.

"I'm sorry," she said instead, "for pushing you away after..." she swallowed. "After Celebrían was attacked. That was cruel of me."

"And it was cruel of me to judge you so harshly for what you showed me," he returned. "But it was..." he shook his head. "I was...beyond any measure of control."

She only nodded, and then, tentatively, looked at him an extended her hands towards him.

He took them, and stepped into her arms.

And from then on, they grieved together.