When they returned to the house, they were greeted by Arisae.
She also had taken the time to bathe and eat; she stood in the shadows of the terrace, with Sthenn close behind her, watching and saying nothing. She was leaning against a column, and her arms were folded as she watched them come up the walk.
Celebrian tensed as they drew nearer to Arisae, Elrond observed; her tension affected him as well, for he realized he had been unconsciously scanning Arisae as a threat. A threat. His own daughter. And he had not picked up a weapon in decades….but that was how Celebrian was regarding her, and he could not help but do the same.
Arisae bowed deeply, mockery in every line of her form. "I just heard the news. Congratulations, Banner-General Briande Duchen Paendrag."
"You heard?"
"Oh yes." She gestured, and a young—very young—morat'raken came forward, out of the deepest shadows at the back of the terrace. It was a human female, with her helmet off and held in her hands; her hair was short-cropped and firy red over blue eyes. Another morat, probably her backrider, knelt behind her; it was so dark where she was that she was almost indistinguishable from the wall of the house behind her. The one in front looked painfully young and eager, and as Elrond glanced at Celebrian, he saw her air of weariness increase as she confronted the youth.
The morat'raken dropped at once into a kneel, eyes to the ground; she was breathing hard as if she had run the entire way there from the barracks. Celebrian regarded her for a moment, then with the air of someone picking up a heavy burden, said quietly, "Rise and be sei'taer, morat."
"Yes ma'am!" the morat replied smartly and did just that, though she kept her eyes still respectfully low as she got to her feet.
"You are?" Celebrian asked, her voice calm and quiet; she seemed to be deliberately delaying.
"Morat'raken of the Second Flight, First Talon Risha Dumai, ma'am!"
"And your backrider?" The form in the shadows gave an unintelligible squeak.
"Morat'raken Deanna Sing, ma'am! She's nervous, ma'am!" Risha added, sounding nervous herself.
"I see." She sighed. "For what purpose have you sought me out here, Morat Dumai?"
"I bring a message from the Empress, ma'am!" she announced eagerly. "It just reached Daughter of the—" She saw Celebrian's frown. "My apologies, I know she's under the veil. I mean, it just reached High Lady Riyath's entourage this evening, but it was thought to be important enough to send someone ahead with the information, ma'am!"
"And what is this message?" Celebrian asked quietly.
"Ma'am!" The little morat pulled herself up even straighter if possible. "I am instructed to tell you that the Empress has given her assent. In addition to retaining command over the Forces of the Air, you, Briande Duchen Paendrag, have been officially promoted to the rank of Third Banner-General to the Crystal Throne of Seanchan, the first der'morat ever to be made so in the history of the Empire!"
Celebrian did not move. She held herself still, carefully controlling her features so that no hint of emotion appeared on her face, but at the little morat's words Elrond saw her eyes flicker to the side, to where Arwen—Arisae—watched from the shadows. Arisae looked back at his former wife, her own gray eyes glimmering, and exposed the edges of her teeth in something that could technically be called a smile. Behind her, Sthenn did not move, except to fold his arms.
The little morat was still speaking; she was saying, "I was instructed to tell you that the official investiture ceremony will occur tomorrow or the next day, ma'am, when the Daughter—when High Lady Riyath's entourage reaches Rivendell Garrison—but it was thought that you should be told tonight, ma'am, so that—" Celebrian cut her off with an upraised hand.
"Thank you, Morat Dumai," she replied. "You may return to the barracks now, and Morat Sing with you; tell the garrison commander that I have received your message."
"Yes, ma'am!" Risha responded at once. Deanna Sing rose from her position in the shadows and came forward at Risha's gesture; she was slightly shorter than Risha, Elrond noticed peripherally, with hair as black as a crow's wing and anxious black eyes. The two of them bowed, deeply and painfully correctly, first to Celebrian, then to Arwen, who acknowledged them with a smile fractionally warmer than that she had bestowed on her own mother; Deanna squeaked again in nervousness and Risha scowled at her. The two of them hurried from the terrace; as soon as they were out of sight, he could hear Risha saying, "Honestly, Deanna, I can't take you anywhere!"
"Sorry, Risha!"
Then they were gone.
Among those who remained, the tension was thick enough to cut. It crackled almost visibly between Arisae and Celebrian across the empty flagstones of the terrace. Sthenn looked coldly at Celebrian over Arisae's shoulder.
"So now you're Banner-General." Arisae's voice was so quiet that even with Elven hearing it was difficult to make out her words.
Celebrian said nothing, nor did she move; she stared only at the Supreme Der'Morat, locking eyes like swords. Elrond moved without conscious forethought, to take up a place at Celebrian's side, against Arisae and Sthenn. Arisae—he found it impossible, suddenly, to think of her as Arwen, with that look on her face—did not acknowledge his movement with so much as a glance. Celebrian did; he saw her eyes shift fractionally in his direction and her features softened briefly in an expression that might have been gratitude. It was only there for a moment; then it was gone, replaced behind a stony façade. But Arisae had seen that weakness, and she smiled again.
"And what about me?" the younger Elfmaiden asked now, her voice low and ominous.
"I will of course do all that I can to see that you are made First General of the Air—"
"Second, of course, to Third Banner-General Briande Duchen Paendrag." The words were clipped far too short.
"I did not ask for this, you know," Celebrian replied—no, Briande, he realized; the woman he had known as wife was slipping away under his eyes, to be replaced with the cold, correct Seanchan officer he had met for the first time a thousand years ago. Her voice was soft with careful threat.
Arisae gave a short, sharp sound that might have been considered a laugh. It crossed his mind distantly that he had never heard a sound so ugly come from Arwen's throat. "Did you not?" Behind her, Sthenn smiled.
Now Elrond spoke, unable to bear such hostility between his wife and she who was still his daughter. "Arwen—"
She spoke past him as if he were not even there. "I'm growing tired of always being second to you, Briande," she said now. "I've been second for over a thousand years, and I'm growing tired of it. No matter what I do, no matter how hard I try, you're always in my way." The almost undetectable trace of petulance in her voice on the last few words was welcome to Elrond's ears if for no other reason than it disrupted the air of menace that hung between the two women.
"Arwen, please." He spoke again, more sternly. "There is no need for this—"
"There is." She cut him off again without taking her eyes from Celebrian.
Now Celebrian spoke, her voice as soft as if she were dealing with a wild and dangerous beast. "Arisae….you will not always be second to me. You have my word."
Arisae's smile was sharp enough to cut. "Do you plan to retire?"
"Eventually." But Celebrian looked down as she said it, and Arisae saw.
"I don't believe you." The words were almost whispered, and Elrond could have sworn he heard hurt in them as well as anger. "No," she continued more strongly, "how can I? I would not retire, were I in your place—how could I? Retire, and give up the skies? My lands of Minabet are nowhere near attractive enough to compensate me for such a loss--"
"Nevertheless, Arisae," Celebrian repeated intensely, "I—I promise you that you will not always be second." She stepped closer to her daughter, as if by movement she could convey sincerity. "I swear—one day, I will leave the ranks of the raken-riders, and you will be free to rise. You have my word, Arisae," she added in a whisper.
Arisae shook her head now, and closed her eyes. Her hurt was rising to the surface, but when she spoke, her voice was hard. "You've been saying the same thing for the past thousand years. When, Briande? When? When will you get out of my way?"
"Eventually, Arisae," Celebrian could only repeat. "Eventually I will. One day I will—will leave, and you will be free."
Arisae looked at her mother. Elrond might have been wrong, but he thought her eyes looked overbright. "You will leave," she said scornfully, mockingly. "'Someday you will leave.' I don't believe it. I have seen Duchen. Its lands would be even less compensation for the skies than Minabet." She closed her eyes. Drew a deep, steadying breath, and then looked back at her mother coolly. Distantly. "There is only one thing I can think of," she said, each word as deliberate, as dangerous as the keen edge of a knife, "that could be compensation for such a loss."
Elrond froze. He felt a chill run down his spine. Quickly, he looked at Celebrian and found she had stilled into immobility as well. She stared at her daughter. Her daughter stared back, determined.
It was his voice that broke the silence, though he barely recognized it and certainly had not intended to speak. "Arwen….what do you mean?"
Arisae swallowed. She cut a glance briefly back over her shoulder at Sthenn, who said nothing but smiled a dagger's smile. Then she drew herself up. Her spine straightened, her eyes chilled, her head came up.
"The Crystal Throne of Seanchan."
Briande felt the blood chill within her. Behind her she heard Elrond's sudden intake of breath, but could not spare a thought to look at him. Her eyes were locked on Arisae's, and had to remain there; to look away was to show fear, and though it had bloomed within her, she dared not. Not in front of her subordinate--not daughter. She could not believe that her daughter would ever—could ever—threaten her in the way that Arisae was trying to threaten her now.
"You know nothing, little girl," she heard herself say through lips that felt as if they had been iced; the contempt she heard in her voice was thick enough to curdle milk. Thick enough to hide her fear. "Not one thing."
Arisae's own lips curled up in a smile the likes of which Briande had never seen save on the faces of those trying to kill her. Her voice was the slightest bit unsteady when she spoke. "Do I not? I know that you have been planning since the Second Jianmin Incident—"
"You know nothing!" Briande snarled as if at the cut of a lash.
"I know that you are involved in the rise of the Fai Angan movement in the Western Provinces—that you have been helping their leaders to find money and weapons—"
"Lies," she hissed, snakelike.
Elrond spoke—almost shouted—at exactly the same moment. "Arwen, that is enough!" Arisae did not so much as glance at him.
"—and that your ultimate goal is eventually the downfall of the—aaaiihh!!"
Briande moved with a speed born of fright, covering the distance between them in one leap, her sword in her hand; she was clutching it so tightly that her fist ached, although she did not remember drawing it. She saw, as if in a dream, Arisae raising her hand, a look of fear crossing her face; then Briande had thrown her back against the wall behind her and laid the keen edge of the blade to her subordinate's neck. Behind her, in another world, she heard her former husband shouting, ordering them both to stop at once, that he would not have such things happen within his house, but she paid him no heed. Sthenn moved off to her left; she could hear him start forward, then stop—probably in the knowledge that there was no way he could get there before she did. Briande paid him no heed either. She glared into Arisae's eyes from a distance of less than six inches, seeing the fear there, very real.
By the time she finally spoke, both Elrond and Sthenn had lapsed into silence.
"You breathe one word of these lies to anyone," she hissed, "and I will see you beg for the Death of Ten Thousand Tears."
There was no sound on the terrace except for their labored breathing.
Briande shook Arisae slightly. "Do you understand?"
Arisae swallowed. "Y-yes," she whispered.
"Do you?!"
"Yes, F-First General," she replied more loudly.
"Good," she snarled.
She released Arisae and stepped back. Arisae raised a trembling hand to her throat, where a trickle of bloodran; Briande had apparently nicked her without noticing it. Briande was trembling herself though she dared not show it; she felt awful inside, both shaky and very, very tired. Her sword was suddenly so heavy she could barely hold it.
Elrond was staring at both of them with wide eyes, and Sthenn, but it was Arisae that had her attention. Because she could see, in Arisae's eyes, that this wasn't over. Not only that, she thought, with a weariness that left no room for any other emotion, but I think I just made things worse. She did not have the energy to think of how, in that moment; there was only the realization that she had.
Slowly, unsteadily, she sheathed her sword at her back and turned away, toward the terrace archway. Elrond caught her eye as she did so; she shook her head slightly as she passed him. "Too long," she murmured under her breath. "I've simply lived too long."
After Celebrian left, the terrace was still, save for Arwen's—Arisae's—harsh breathing. She had sunk to her knees, holding one hand to her throat where a trickle of blood flowed; she was trembling, Elrond could see it from where he stood. He was trembling himself. Not even during the first War of the Ring had he seen anything that had shocked him as deeply as when—Briande—had laid her sword to the edge of Arisae's throat. He hoped never to see anything like that again. And the worst of it was, he could not blame Briande. Not at all. He had seen how drastically she had paled when Arwen had revealed her own weapon. He had seen the fright in her eyes. And he knew—he knew just how justified it was. The idea that Arwen could even think of threatening her mother in that fashion chilled his blood.
The punishment for treason to the Crystal Throne was not called the Death of Ten Thousand Tears for nothing. Or so he had heard.
Sthenn Kimail moved, going to where Arwen knelt on the ground; Elrond's command halted him in his tracks. "Stop," the Elflord ordered harshly.
Sthenn and Arwen froze and turned to look at him, Sthenn as Aragorn might have looked, had Aragorn ever borne the expression of a sullen, disobedient child. Arwen—was Arwen at that moment, he saw, her gray eyes as wide and vulnerable as if—as if she were again his beautiful, precious, most-loved daughter. Distantly, it occurred to him that he would rather have lost her to Aragorn than see her like this now.
He looked at Sthenn now. "Leave us," he commanded.
Sthenn glanced at Arwen and started to say something, but Elrond cut him off. "No. Leave now." The human hesitated a moment longer. Elrond stared at him, until, abashed, Sthenn dropped his eyes. He turned, and went off through the terrace arch, leaving father and daughter alone together.
His daughter. She sat, hand to her throat, looking at the floor in front of her; she had looked so as a child, when he or Celebrian had caught her in some wrongdoing. Such times had been few. She had always been so well-behaved as a girl, he remembered, exceptional even among Elven children for her quietness, her docility, her gentle humor. In the evening starlight and the shadows of the terrace, he thought he saw a reflective trail of tears trace its way down the side of her face; he longed to take her in his arms and comfort her, as he had when she was a child, to tell her not to worry, that he would take care of everything.
Except she was no longer a child, and he could not protect her from this.
The Sickness of Men, he thought to himself. It is the Sickness of Men.
When he spoke, it was in Sindar, though he scarcely realized it; his voice was low, quiet. "Is this how things are done among the Seanchan? In the Court of the Nine Moons?" She did not answer; she took her hand away from her throat and looked at the red stain on her fingertips. "Is it customary there for children to threaten their mothers?"
"You do not understand." She did not look at him.
"Ah. You are correct. I do not understand. Perhaps I am not Seanchan enough to understand what justification there might be for a daughter to threaten her mother with—" But he faltered; he did not even wish to name that fate. "Perhaps you might enlighten me, Supreme Der'Morat'Raken Arisae Minabet Paendrag." There was no anger in his voice, only a sort of leaden distance.
"Father, it's not like that," Arwen said; she closed her eyes for a moment, then looked back at him. "I—she—She is planning to betray the Empire. It is my—my duty to inform the Empress—"
Elrond did not even bother to dignify that with a response; he simply stared at her levelly until she looked away.
"Please, Father…don't make this harder than it is," she said, pushing herself to her feet.
"Make what harder than it is?" he asked quietly. "Make it harder for you to threaten your mother? I say, threaten, because I refuse to entertain for one moment the possibility that my daughter would ever actually attempt such a thing." She did not answer. Elrond's heart chilled within him. "Would you?" he demanded.
"You don't understand how it is among the Seanchan."
"I understand you," he said. "I understand my daughter—"
"No you don't." She looked back at him with the faintest hint of a smile—a contemptuous smile—lurking around her lips. "You understand Arwen, perhaps, but you do not understand Arisae."
"They are both my daughter. And I cannot believe," he said sternly, "that my daughter, be she Arwen or Arisae, would—would threaten her mother with death by torture for the chance to rise in rank."
Arwen or Arisae sighed and threw her hands up in frustration. "Father, I—You have never left Middle-Earth. You have barely left Rivendell Garrison—"
"Imladris."
"Rivendell Garrison," she repeated. "You have never been to Seandar, never seen the Empress, or the Court of the Nine Moons, you have—you don't understand. There's no way that you can. But I—I have been in the presence of Empress Yi-ming. I have felt the awe and power of the Crystal Throne—" her voice grew soft and her eyes misty as she spoke, he observed in amazement; he had seen such an expression before, on the face of Celebrian when she had spoken of the Crystal Throne "—I have been permitted to gaze on the Empress! I have crossed the Aryth Ocean to Paendrag's Home—I have seen Tar Valon, Caemlyn, Cairhien—the Island of Tremalking with the great saidar Choedan Kal—"
"All mortal. All transitory," he interrupted her, his voice growing harsh for the first time. "And—"
She raised an eyebrow. "The Choedan Kal predate the Breaking of the World," she said only, ironically. Elrond blinked—he had no idea what the Choedan Kal were, nor the Breaking of the World—then dismissed it.
"You would betray your mother to a fate worse than death for—for a transitory honor gained at the hands of these dying mortals—"
"Yes!" she exclaimed fiercely, dropping back into the slurring Seanchan speech in her anger; she looked at him, her gray eyes—so like his own—burning.
He stared at her for a long moment. "Why?"
She closed her eyes for a moment. "I am a der'morat'raken, Father," she said quietly. "I want to go far. As far as I can. That's all, I swear. No more. But—while Briande is there—" She glanced at him and he was amazed to see tears in her eyes. "While she is there, I can't," she said in a whisper and looked down. "And I have worked hard—so hard—and waited so, so very long—and she is always—always—" She broke off and raised one hand to cover her eyes.
He was silent, thinking, then said in a softer voice, "Arwen, Arwen….could you not at least….find….something….else to do?" The concept was somewhat foreign to him; even in these degraded times, it was hard for him to conceive of an Elf actually doing anything. "Perhaps you—you could go to—Lothlorien," he suggested tentatively. "Galadriel still rules there—here, at Imladris, I—"
"No!" The word was almost a shout. "And give up the skies?" she demanded, turning on him fiercely. "And give up the world? To be—to be trapped in one place, like a—a—a rustic, backwoods, ignorant dirtcrawler who knows nothing more of the world than what they can see between their front door and the horizon?" He flinched, both at the anger she turned on him and at the words. She softened. Slightly. "Father," she said quietly, "don't you understand why I left in the first place?" She drew a breath and composed herself. "For me, as for Briande, there is only one path out of the ranks of the der'morats. One path."
He stared at her for a long moment. Her words still rang in the air between them.
To be trapped in one place….like a rustic, backwoods, ignorant dirtcrawler….
"Perhaps you are right," he said quietly, and now it was he who dropped his eyes before her. "Perhaps I do not know my daughter after all."
And he turned and left, leaving Arwen—Arisae—in possession of the terrace.