Disclaimer: I don't own these characters and I make no money from this writing.
(Sorry about the slight delay! I am hoping to continue. If there's anyone out there still reading I'd be delighted to hear from you.)
Estel
The kingcups in the marsh are big, gold dinner plates. No, they're like suns. No, that's not the colour either. They're so large I want to hold one in my hands but Papa tells me not to keep picking the flowers. I want them to live and become more, so I try to reach one and hold my hands round it without breaking the stem.
"Estel."
I look behind me and there is Mithrandir, smiling at me.
"Yes?" I say, hoping he has something to tell me. He knows so much and I want to know everything there is to know. Everything.
"If you have to change your clothes before you start your journey, your father will not be pleased. Everything is packed now. Do you want him to have to unpack again?"
I think I must look puzzled. My head is still full of the shining yellow flowers.
"Look down," he says, and I do, automatically.
"Oh." My feet are already sinking. I step back, then back again, pulling my boot slowly out of the mud. Then I feel like laughing as I nearly get unbalanced and Mithrandir saves me. He pulls me up and suddenly I'm flying, only to fall and be caught in his arms. Now I really can't stop laughing.
"My boy," he says as he sets me on my feet. "And what do you want to know now?"
We spend a good part of the morning together. He finds a flower which is already broken and very carefully takes it to bits, naming each strange shaped piece for me.
"How does each bit – how did they get to be made like that? I mean, did they all fit together like that in the first flower ever? Or – or – like, this piece here, I mean, the flower wouldn't be that shape if this bit was bigger."
He lays each piece across my hand and begins to answer some of the questions, though he asks me what I think, too, until I can't think any more for all the questions.
When that happens, he lets me sit close by and be quiet.
The stream is silvery, the kingcups are gold. The pimpernel at my feet is a bright ruby.
Ruby died so long ago. Death is a long going away. The young man, the one who was dying while I was being healed has gone now, and I went to his funeral. Papa went too, though they put a chair for him because he wasn't quite well then but he is now. That's why we're going home.
The camp ground has large brown round patches across it where the huts were. Most of the people have gone, and I helped pack up and load the animals and do anything useful that I could. I was thanked in lots of ways and I have some presents to take home, one from every family, which was very kind of them. I really didn't do that much to deserve presents but I couldn't give them back, could I? Papa supervised me and told me how to write good letters to thank them.
Before my troop went all different ways we patrolled together and Halbarad made everyone stand properly and then they presented me with a new belt, with a place to put my knife and a pouch for medicine and things like that. Halbarad said I was always going to be their captain and in the autumn we can train together some more. He's going to come and stay in three or four weeks, too, if his new duties allow. He's learning to be a Ranger properly. I hope he'll help me train when I see him. I would have liked him to have ridden back to Rivendell with us but he couldn't.
He is a good friend.
Ruby. I look into the water and see him, strong and yet so gentle. He looked after me and then he died for me. Elrohir, who never has any patience with me, said it was all right for me to mind about that, and that it would take a long time for me to feel less sorry about it. I know that my horse dying took something important away from me but that I am better now.
I turn and hug Mithrandir, taking him by surprise.
"Am I your boy too, Mithrandir? Gandalf – is that what they call you? Am I your boy as well as Papa's boy?"
"Yes, Estel. For now, you are my boy too. But you are growing up fast. Come now, it must be nearly time for you to go. It's going to be a warm day, I think."
I stand up and look around. Grandmother's hut is nearly the last to be taken down. Now it's a neat pile of poles and cloths, and they are strapping the furniture onto a cart, one of the only carts in the whole camp. She really must be an important lady.
I asked her yesterday if she was going to see my mother. She said she was. So I wrote mother a letter inviting her to come back to Rivendell, if she wanted to come. I want her to come, but I am happy. I have Papa and my brothers and my pony and my puppy, even though the puppy went yesterday with his mother. I'll see him again when the leaves change to gold, Elladan said. I'll be able to keep him then.
The clearing is brown and green and gold, and the sunlight fills the world up to the brim with brightness. Steam goes up from the last fire as they throw water over it and then scatter the ashes. It is time.
I walk beside Mithrandir. Elladan comes over and helps me to put on my new coat, one made to be the right size. Then my pack, with my own food and a blanket and a change of smallclothes, and a water bottle hanging from the side.
"I want a walking stick," I tell him.
Elladan looks at Mithrandir and though they don't say anything they both smile.
"Please," I say, hoping this is indeed the magic word, as I've been told often enough that it is.
"We'll see," said Elladan. "Now come, I'll help you saddle your pony. He's as round as a barrel. We'll have to walk that off him."
"I'm going to find him a new name, Elladan," I say, as I pull and pull at the belly strap to tighten it. "Grandmother doesn't like Spider. But I like it, and I like little spiders and the different webs they make. All the different shapes."
"It is your choice," Elladan says, making sure the pony has breathed out before checking the girth then tugging once more. "There are good spiders in this world and there are harmful ones, though each has its own place in the scheme of things. Perhaps she thinks it is bad luck and you should ride a pony with good luck in its name."
I scratch the back of my head. I've been thinking about this question for a whole week and I still don't know the answer.
"There. That seems safe enough. Now, go and get the saddlebags. Father is nearly ready."
I tie on the saddlebags carefully then go and stand in front of Spider. I give him the bit of carrot I've been saving for him, and rub his nose. If he could speak, he could tell me his real name. I wonder why he can't speak to me. I'm sure Legolas could understand him but I haven't seen Legolas for ages now.
I try to clear my mind of all the thoughts flying around in there, as busy as bees. Golden bees. The perfect new name must be there somewhere. I am sure he should have a baby name and a grown up name, and all he has so far is the baby name. Spider.
I look around for inspiration. Ash. There's a big ash tree, still covered in great black buds long after the beech has put out its carefully folded green leaves. No. Still too sad.
Kingcup? No, that's too silly. He'd hate that.
"Estel! Come and say goodbye to your grandmother!" Papa calls.
I pat Spider, and then wipe my hand on my jacket. Then I brush down my jacket. My boots are muddy and I begin to worry about them but Papa is calling again, so I run over to him. He is standing tall now, and his eyes tell me he's well again.
"Are you ready?" Grandmother asks. "Are you looking forward to going home?"
I nod and reach into my belt pouch for my letter to mother. "Please," I say. "Could you give this to her?"
She takes it and looks at the name I have written on the outside, in my best script. Even Papa didn't know about it.
"I will. Never give up your hope, my child. You will see her again."
I so want to, suddenly. I remember her, her dress and the way she held me. But it is all right.
"Thank you," I tell her, and I feel Papa come to stand behind me. He puts one hand on my shoulder.
"Thank you for my puppy, and for looking after me and Papa, and I am very glad I met you."
Somehow that's not quite what Papa told me to say but Grandmother looks as if she's pleased.
"I am very glad to have met you, too," she says. "At the end of the year, in another place like this, we may meet again, I hope. Your puppy will be a dog, then, and fit to come into your service."
"I am going to give Spider his grown-up name when I can think what it is," I tell her.
"That would be a very wise action," she says, smiling in that grave way of hers. "I know you will choose well."
I even remember to bow, but I find I am being hugged, and then she moves away, a tall lady, with her long skirts and cloak moving around her as she walks.
The ride is fun. The weather is so good and Papa and Elladan and Elrohir make the time fly with stories and guessing games and things for me to look at. I practice all the new names over and over until I know them. The wayfaring tree, with its big, light green leaves. When the wind moves them, their white undersides show and the whole tree seems to be on the move. Papa says they have bright red berries in the autumn. I am going to look for them when we come back this way. Then we stop for lunch by an evergreen oak, the holm oak, which is just putting out its new leaves.
I start asking questions about why some leaves stay on the trees and some don't, but then I am given a large piece of bread and some cheese and I have to stay quiet to eat it. I listen instead to the robin that is singing in a tree nearby. It begins creeping closer through the bushes. When I throw it some crumbs it flaps down and begins to peck at them. Its legs are so thin compared to its round body. Why don't they freeze, I wonder. Do they keep them tucked up, like a cat, or like – like I don't know what.
We rest for a while and I doze, lying on my back and watching the clouds laze across the blue sky. Each day they change, yet they are the same. Each day comes and goes, and does the world know of me? The question seems to come not from my head but from right inside me, in that place I visited when I was being cured. Does the world know of me?
I am quiet for a while even when we begin to ride again, until Elladan pulls his big horse next to me and asks if I am well.
"Is the world too big a place to know about us?" I ask, feeling a little foolish.
Elladan is silent. Then, quietly, he says, "I believe the world knows of us."
I am happy with his reply and feel less small than I did before I had that answer.
We camp just as the sun is beginning to slip down over the horizon. Tomorrow we will be home. Mithrandir disappears for a while then comes back with a walking stick for me. It is the height of my shoulder, and it still has its bark. He says he will work on it for me and when it is ready, it will be mine. I want him to start on it straight away but he sets it aside. I look at it for a while, longing for it to be ready but he shoos me away and fills his pipe.
My brothers make my bed for me between them, then Elrohir decides it is time I understand the craft of making a fire. When we have gathered kindling and some different sizes of sticks and branches, he shows me the firestick he carries, with its blackened holes. I try to get the wood to glow but I am tired before I can make much of it.
"That's all right," he says. "Practice, and you will soon be able to make fire even if you have only two sticks and some kindling. "Here," he says. "I will give you my flint and steel. Try that."
He puts some pine shavings close and I strike, and I am lucky, for in a couple of minutes my brother is blowing carefully on the little fire. He sets the flame in the middle of the fire and I feed it with small twigs. I watch them closely as they catch, the bark first then the heart of the wood. I put the small, thin pieces into the flames until I can feel the heat in my fingers.
It makes me very happy but I don't know why. It is something I can do, make fire, to drive away my enemies and to give me and my family heat and light, hot food and home comfort.
As I lie down between my big brothers, knowing they will be there all night in case I need guarding, I understand that this is a moment I will remember all my life. Whatever happens, I will not lose this time, when I was made well again.
I look at Mithrandir, who is talking quietly with Papa. They will be up a long time, telling each other things they already know. Mithrandir has my walking stick in his hands, and he is slowly twisting the bark from it with his big, strong hands.
The summer is calling me. New times and new adventures. And at the end of that time, Hú to serve me. What an odd way of putting that! Well, Grandmother said it so it must be right.
"Sleep, brother," Elladan says. "Do not think so hard on the mysteries of the world that you keep yourself awake."
"I was thinking about the summer," I say. "I want to be able to swim better and use my bow better and – grow. I want to get taller."
"Sleep, Estel," Papa says. "To grow, you need lots of sleep."
I stay awake a few moments more, turning this new idea over in my mind. Is there no end to new ideas? I hope not. When I grow up – when I do …
tbc