Trying to Fly
by ALC Punk!

I gave up immortality for him. Ageless, unending life to be by his side. Sworn to love him eternally. And he makes sport with her.

Faramir is blind to it, but I see. Have seen. The quick glance, the hastily hidden caress. He no longer wants me, perhaps preferring her passion to mine.

He sees life in her, ice in me. It might have been my fault. But I never let go hope. I never stepped away from responsibility. Some would say it was only for an instant. To my kin, a moment when he let the mantle fall--he resisted, shirking.

And the seed was planted, the feelings grew in him.

I was heavy with child when I first discovered disgust in his eyes. As if my pregnancy were a lowering of myself, a desecration.

Once our child was born, it seemed to pass. But he avoided me--until he was so sotted with drink his body fumbled its responses, and I had to help him along, hands doing things I didn't know they could.

As if his inactivity made my body more fertile, our second child was born nine months later.

Nine months. I used to blink and the time would pass me by, dancing like the wind upon water. Now it creeps, as if the world clings to its days. The heavens reluctant to let them go. Mortal time, my father would have said.

Mired in seconds and minutes, dredged hours following each other so slowly.

Once it had been a comfort and joy.

Now it is merely pain as I watch him come and go, fulfilling himself with her. She watches me, sometimes, her eyes almost mocking. You won him, I think. My love was not enough.

I betrayed my people for him, escaped when they would taken me with them to Valinor. My love so sure and bright as I travelled mile upon league. Countless dangers faced or avoided until at last, I beheled the Citadel of Orthanc. Saruman's tower rose from the vast circle of stone that is the Isengard. Water filled it, as soup fills a bowl. The basin a large pool for strange creatures to bask and bathe in.

Looking closer, I could see the bringers of this doom. Tall tree-like beings--Ents-- which roared as they moved through the wreckage of the White Wizard's home. My elven eyes found two young hobbits riding upon one of the more wizened of the Ents. They laughed and cheered at this routing of Saruman's creatures.

Clouds of steam rose into the mid-day air, some billowing with noxious fumes, others strange colours unknown until now.

I considered approaching, but decided the concern was none of mine. Aragorn was elsewhere, his life pulsing steadily through my beins.

A day passed. Two. And I was caught up within the toils of men, riding past villages burnt and desolate. The pain and despair echoing through the land would moved even unfeeling and autocratic Elrond.

My detatchment deserted me in Enhar, where I found a child, burnt. Her eyes blackened and shriveled, her terror still there to be felt as a tangible thing. The Dark Lord's forces cared for naught, and it angered me.

I could not be like them, wrapped and apart in my ivory bower. If I was to be mortal, I should embrace mortality.

My path diverged from Aragorn's, then. No longer was I content to be the pawn of Fate, following a trail to my Destiny. Instead, I followed a trail of fear and pain until I came to the place they call Cair Andros.

It was occupied by the men of the West, stalwart defenders all. They greeted my appearance with surprise and caution. I could not blame them.

What help or hope had they of the elves of Middle Earth? We had for so long distanced ourselves, as if it would never touch us. Folly. Such flagrant folly on our parts.

The army of Sauron rolled over us like we were merely a few pebbles in the Anduin. Even such magics as I commanded availed us not at all. Men died around me, fighting to the last. Their courage in the face of certain doom touched me.

When all was lost those few of us left fled south and west to the Druadan Forest. The trees there sheltered us for a time while Mordor marched on Minas Tirith.

The army of foul creatures marched past us and down to take Minas Tirith, the trees began to whisper amongst themselves. Words in a language not even I understand, so long forgotten was it. Some of the rear-guard of the army set fire to the edges of the forest, and I tried not to scream as the trees died.

The fires spread, and we ran further into the wood, some 50 men and I. Flame claimed the less-mobile. All of us were wounded--even I was streaked with blood, some of it my own. My hair, so long sleek and composed was a tangled mass of blood and dust. A borrowed leather thong secured it at the base of my neck.

It has been long since I went through my memories of the Druadan. As I touch them, I recall the innocent elf-maiden, suddenly shattered upon the harsh reality of her world.

My world changed. Gone was the doting father, the steadfast beloved. In their places were doomsayers and betrayers. I was so young.

The men of Minas Tirith and Gondor tolerated my presence as we regrouped and began to make our way back to Cair Andros. There, under cover of darkness, we retook it, slaughtering the orcs left to guard it.

Once we held the fort, time was taken for licking our wounds, healing. And generally awaiting the next assault. We were convinced there would be one.

The sudden appearance of a mixed company of elven bowmen and dwarfs startled us all. But Aethwyn, my distant kinsman brought news: we were needed for the battle of Minas Tirith. Half the contingent with him joined us, and we left within the hour for that far away place.

It would be a long time before I understood that my father had known my inevitable hoice. The company had been commissioned at his behest.

We flew with all speed, yet arrived in time to merely harry the fleeing enemy. Their master would be unpleased at the day's work. Many did not survive to tell him of their crushing defeat at the hands of the armies of man and elf.

The aftermath of a gigantic battle is almost as hard as the battle itself. So many were wounded or dead. I joined a burial detail, ignoring the few protests (something about the elf-maid digging graves disturbed Aethwyn's men) and dug graves. We buried so many men that day. Some were unrecognisable, their faces and bodies nothing more than bits and pieces.

As for the orcs, wild men and Ururk-Hai, these we burned, the fires shining up into the night, long columns of smoke blackening the sky above, obliterating the stars.

I became immune to the stench of death, the sounds of the dying and the feel of lifeless bodies. A part of me ran screaming from the experience, and I let her bury herself along with the men. When there was only the cold elf left inside of me, I was pulled from the detail.

Chance, more than design.

They pulled half of us away, to be sent into the city for rest and food. Some were wounded, hobbling as they made their ways between the broken gates of the White City. I followed them, nearly mindless from exhaustion. It wasn't until I was halfway through the many gates of the city that I was reminded, and asked where Aragorn might be found.

I was directed to the Houses of Healing, and so I made my way there, drifting through the streets as a ghost.

The Houses of Healing emenated a sort of calm peace as I drew near them. I let the energy wash over me as I stepped inside.

An armed young man pointed my way to Aragorn and I wafted along the corridors, the ghostly innocent elf inside slowly beginning to re-awaken from her premature burial. Around us, men lay wounded, some dying, others possibly healing. Physicians moved among them, bringing comfort and water.

My beloved was in a small room, leaning over the woman before him. Everything about the way he stood spoke volumes of tender regard for her as he called her name over and over. His hands lightly touched her face, sketching gentle fingers along her cheekbones. My own tingled, remembering the softness in his touch. And jealousy flared, bitter and furious at finding him so.

"Beloved," I called, the elven words sounding strange in thie building of man. "I am here."

So simple. So utterly assinine. But he was mine, and I wanted desperately to remind him of that fact even as I struggled to understand the changes I sensed in the both of us. I smiled as he turned to me.

"Beloved." He sounded so very tired, as if the very earth were wearing away his life.

I moved towards him.

And he truly saw me for the first time--I truly saw myself in his eyes. Blood and viscera covered me from head to toe, stuck into my hair and under the edges of my broken fingernails. Ashes topped the blood, and I suddenly felt horribly dirty and gritty.

"My Lady..."

"Battle." I supplied, trying to keep the smile on my face.

The woman on the bed moaned softly, distracting him from me. He turned to her, almost grateful, I think. His fingers gentled her brow, "Eowyn, shhh."

She groaned and I saw her pale blue eyes slit slowly open. There was so much deadness in her, I couldn't help but feel pity. I moved towards the bed and set a filth-covered hand on her brow.

This, I could do. Comfort the sick. I was supposed to be doing it, away from the world and the mess that life really was. And something in me dragged me back to it, away from my new awareness of the death that was life. I clung to it as a falling tree clings to its brethren on the way down.

"You..." She could barely speak as she stared at the both of us, something in her eyes unsettling me when she turned to Aragorn. And anger. There had been anger, too.

I didn't understand it, then.

"My name is Arwen, child." I was the calm, resolute elf-maiden again, gracious and kind. I glanced at Aragorn, surprised to see in his eyes the love he felt for the woman before us.

He touched her cheek and smiled softly. "Rest. Heal."

"Yes, my lord." She tried to smile, but she was so tired. "Thank you for calling me back from the cold."

"My pleasure, my lady."

Eowyn was asleep a moment later--this time, restful sleep. No longer was she cold and lost, dead as some of the men on the battlefield had been. I touched Aragorn's arm, "Come away, beloved."

"Yes. There is one other." He slowly got to his feet.

I followed him to the next room where one of the young hobbits lay, body as cold as her's had been. This hadn't quite been what I'd meant, but I understood his ties to his friends. But he was mine, and I wished to show him that. Foolishly, I thought neither of us had changed.

Or maybe I knew.

While he knelt next to young Meriadoc, I placed my hand on his shoulder. He called for the youngling, and I joined him, my mind sliding away, intent on proving that I could heal.

Time moved over us, it felt like days to my drained self. Merely hours, however. The seconds ticking away to minutes and we were as pebbles in the Great River, turned over and over by the tide as it surged.

I was probably working well on blinding myself to the reality around me. Burying what I had seen and felt. It would serve me well during the years of our marriage. I would ignore the signs presented me and believe we were all right, until I couldn't do it anymore, so dead inside that there was nothing but a hating jealousy.

Right then, before I knew he'd be fine, I was jealous of Merry. For he had my love's undivided attention and I did not. And it should have been mine.

Hadn't I come all the way to Minas Tirith for him? Through fire and flame, death and destruction.

And he ignored me for a halfling.

I was lucky, then, I was so busy hating him, I didn't actually stop him from waking.

Part of me wishes he had died that night. I wish I could ignore that part, but it eats at the insides of my mind, wishing release. To rend, to tear. Destruction would at least make me feel.

I've put my beloved through so much, over the years. All little, subtle ways, so that he knows he is mine. And I would stop it, but I can't.

Ten years since he's touched me. We barely look at each other anymore. As if silence is our only agreement.

Bearing it, after what had been before, is difficult, but hurting him again is not within me now. I feel a drained husk of what I was, a woman bereft of her kith and kin, destined to live long years in desolation. Even my children bring me no joy.

--

I cannot bear it any longer.

"Why?" I ask, when affairs of state are done for the evening. We are retiring to our apartments, separate chambers that once had a connecting door. He boarded it long ago.

He pauses to look at me, almost sad. "Why what, wife?"

Bitterness shriveled the faint hope I might once have had. But I have to know. "What changed in you, Aragorn?"

"War." He looks grave. "The deaths around me changed me."

"It, too, was changed--am changed--by death." I half-reach for him, then let my hand fall to my side. Silence, I think. My watchword.

"Yes." Something slides across his features. Disgust?

"I changed." I repeat, startled by the idea that slides into my mind. "And you do not like it."

"No. You should never--" He cuts himself off, hand chopping through the air with a contained violence.

"Have what?" I demand, feeling something inside cry at the revulsion I see behind his eyes. His very body is leaning away from me, as if it is revolted to be near me. And I didn't know rejection could still cut me so hard, like a knife that's dulled over time, yet strips the skin from bone. The power he holds over me is breath-taking, and I feel my body sag slightly, and reach for the door as he turns away.

Dismissed.

The Elf-Stone, the revered King of Anor wishes his wife were another woman. And I cannot blame him, even as anger touches me, long buried, sliding up my bones.

I stand again.

"So you would rather a whore." My voice sounds ragged to my ears, pain falling through the holes in my soul.

"Yes." he replies simply, as if shame doesn't touch him with sticky fingers. "She is warm."

I shiver, hands grasping each other behind me, my knuckles whiteneing. "I--"

"Don't." He says, and turns back, brutal in his sudden honesty. "After long, frozen years, do not try to appease me."

"Years spent loving you." I ignore the derision springing into his eyes. "I loved you so long. That day. You should have let me go. I should have let me go. Let you--I should have--" But I stop, unable to contemplate what I am saying.

Already mortal, I would have watched him marry another. I couldn't have--and yet, knowing what I do now, would I have still been so grasping.

He was holding her the day before our wedding, atop the battlements of Minas Tirith. Their long hair drifting through the wind, the differing colours entwining into an array of strange colours. I was broken inside, grasping at the familiar, what I thought was real. And he was mine, not hers.

The blackness of despair touches me as I realised what I should have then. He was no longer mine. Maybe he never had been.

I could have given him up, then, let them both be happy and gone to Valinor with the last of my kin. There would still have been time. But my pride would not allow it.

Years of misery and silent desperation.

And all for nothing.

He is watching me now. Eyes cold and dark. I feel as if I can no longer face him. But I must. To live like this forever will be horrible. Trying to fix it--worse or not--will at least give me peace of a sort. "I should have let you go, beloved."

He flinches, the word hurting and a part of me smiles viciously. As he can hurt me so I can hurt him.

The bitterness inside tries to free itself and I fight it, unwilling to turn myself to such evil. Mortal or not, I chose. I was never tricked.

"Yes." He rasps.

"Better for all. Would she have had you?"

"I had but to ask."

Pain, again. And he is enjoying this, I think.

"She--" He stops, and an odd light touches his eyes. "It would have been fleeting, momentary."

I step back from this, unwilling to grasp what he is trying to say.

"Had you let me go, I would have returned to you, no longer needing comfort elsewhere." He steps towards me, reaching for my hands. And I have nowhere to go but the doorjamb, and he is very earnest now, as if he wishes not to hurt, but must. "We were both so changed. And there was no time to become used to the new people we were. It was so much simpler, to--"

"Go to her." I say, my voice breaks at the enormity of our folly.

"Yes."

I stare at him, feel almost as if there is nothing left for us. We have said our pieces.

The silence stretches out, both at a loss for where we go from here. This devestating honesty has changed so much. It is so very new to be talking, to realise what we have created together. For so long there were merely bitter silences and glances. I will not allow myself to believe all will now be well. But this is almost a beginning.

He is nodding and I realise I have spoken my thoughts aloud. "I. I am sorry, Aragorn." The admission is hard-won, as if my pride, my folly, is still so hard to lend credence to.

There is almost understanding in his eyes as he nods. "I can not say my forgiveness is easy to grant. But, for my part, I plead for pardon as well."

I open, then close my mouth, unwilling to as the question that plays across my mind.

But my eyes speak it to him and so he turns, shakes his head. "Do not ask it of me."

"I shall not." I move, touch his shoulder, he turns back. "I forgive you as I can." For a moment, laughter touches me. "Do not expect it to last, sadly. My pride." I look away, then turn. His eyes bore into my back. "But I shall try."

"Try." There is derision again and I feel like crying suddenly. One step forward, ten back. "You would overcome the pride that has destroyed us for so many years. In one moment, I nearly hope."

Anger flares in me again. This was not all my doing. He came willingly, if reluctantly. I whirl back and smile bitterly. "Yes. As do I."

He blinks. "I--"

I shake my head. "We were but children."

"Arwen..." He looks torn, as if he suddenly believes there is something to save.

But I refuse to hope anymore. I turn from him and step into my room. "She is probably waiting for you, my king."

Stillness touches the space where we are. "I deserved that." He is weary now. Tired beyond reasoning as he was that day in the Houses of Healing.

I glance at him. "As did I."

For a moment, he sees the hurt and anguish inside, then I am serene again.

"You--" Hoarse now, shock and something else in his eyes.

"I will not go back to silence." Indeed. I might jump from the tower if it continues. "I hope no more. But I refuse--" I stop.

"Whose bed would you have me share?"

"Mine." It slips out before I can stop it. And I hate myself for the sudden interest that flares through me. Ten long years, and I am still his, body and soul. I chafe at it, but there is no way to stop loving him.

I startle him with my honesty and he appears to be considering it. But he shakes his head, his eyes sad. "Not yet. But I will not share my bed, either."

Relief. I feel like laughing and don't, knowing I may never stop. "Good night, Aragorn son of Arathorn."

He bows, amusement in his lips. "Good dreams to you, Arwen Undomiel."

It's merely a beginning. There is much I do not think we can overcome. Yet I feel hope again as I close my door. We are speaking.

It just might be enough.

-finis-

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