5. We Will Go Home Across the Mountains

"Home is the place where, when you have to go there they have to take you in."
The Death of the Hired -Man Robert Frost (1914)

Just before Calderas, Misty Mountains May 7/40 Tuile 2966 III Age

Sitting cross the fire next to Elladan Buffy felt much more at ease than she had since they had left Imladris. For the last few months she had had a strange feeling, one that she couldn't place at all. It was strange. She knew that Whistler had told her all those years ago that she would 'feel' when her mission was about to start but this didn't quite feel the same.

No not at all.

It felt more like she wanted home. Like she wanted her mother. And as much as she loved being with the rest of her family for the last fifteen years she knew it was time to go back to Lorien. To be around the calming influence that was her naneth and the strong stability that was her ada.

So here she was, in the middle of the mountains with the closest thing to brothers she had ever had, making her way back home to her foster mother and father. But she knew that she had two homes now. One full of a peace and calm that would give her strength when needed and another full of life and vigor.

The two were so very different in her eyes. Lorien represented calm, comfort, reflection, and peace. It was the closest thing to heaven she had ever felt. Though the feeling of complete calm was not there often. In her years there she had been busy and active but on those weeks when Haldir took her with him she had felt it most. Sitting under the stars on her talan she had found more peace that she had felt in years. It was a peace that had somehow made her grow and change, a peace that had made her let go of old loves and hates and had begun to make her into someone new and slightly more whole.

Rivendell however was hardly a place of complete peace. While calm surrounded it, always, there was always a sense of life in the air. As though a fresh breeze flowed through it always bringing in happiness and smiling faces. While in Lorien she had found peace, in Rivendell she had learned to live again. To be young again. And for that she would always be grateful. The gwenyn had made her revert to her youth again and allowed her to feel like she had had the time now that she had lost to being the slayer. It made her feel so much less bitter about her past and it gave her the space and chance to have the freedom she needed and craved before her responsibilities here decided to creep up on her.

She could feel Elladan's eyes on her as he studied her. While both of them were unholy terrors when at home they were also seasoned warriors who could read others very very well. Which bothered her on many different occasions. Deciding to ignore him until he decided to get involved, as he always did, Buffy remembered a song that she had once heard Tara sing before she had died and began to sing. The song seemed so appropiate to her now though when she had first heard it, it had made little sense to her. Now though, it was a remineder, both of a great person that had been lost and of a family she had somehow managed to gain.

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Elladan watched his kinswoman and friend across the fire as she began to sing softly. Her face had an expression on it that he couldn't quite read. Which was very unusual, after so many years he prided himself on his ability to read her and know exactly when to and not to push. She seemed almost sad and yet happy and calm at the same time. Most would not have been able to hear her voice more than ten feet away from her, but he could and he was certain his brother could as well from his place keeping watch.

Land in shadow
Land forsaken
Stone and fable
Past is hidden
Darkness clouds the road's safe haven
We will go home
We will go home
We will go home across the mountains

Land of home
Land of family
Land where all our hope is found
We will go home
We will go home
We will go home across the mountains

Elladan listened to the words and could feel the longing and hope in them. Glancing up to where he knew his brother to be they shared a look that spoke volumes.

Land of the Bear and
Land of the Eagle.
Land that gave us birth
And blessing,
Land that pulled us
Ever homeward.
We will go home
We will go home
We will go home across the mountains,
Hear our singing, hear our longing,
We will go home across the mountains.

Elrohir spoke up from his position in the trees, his voice soft in the night but still easily heard my the two other sets of sensitive ears not far from him. "Why did you sing that pen neth? (young one)

Buffy looked into the fire for a moment before replying. Her expression complative but with a sort of contented smile. "Because I have two homes now. And as long as I travel between them I will be going home across the mountains." she told them in a voice that seemed utterly serene.

The two watched as she moved to her bed roll and could not help but feel relief. Over the years they had seen the occasional haunted look in her eyes and worried about her time before she came to the Golden Wood. A time that she couldn't or wouldn't talk about to them. They knew that Arwen knew the whole truth but their sister wouldn't tell them and Buffy seemed very much inclined to pretend that her past was not a part of who she was.

Now, after over two decades of being among the Eldar, she finally knew where home was. And they knew that she had finally let something inside herself go.

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