Title & Chapter Number: Circles and Rings: Part 1, 3/?
Author(s): - Author's Index
Fandom: Tolkien
Rating: PG
Disclaimer: I couldn't even begin to claim ownership of any of the wonders of Middle Earth. I've borrowed them for some personal edification, and to get to know a few of the inhabitants better, but they aren't mine. No copyright infringement is intended. All content and original characters are the intellectual copyright of the author.
2nd Disclaimer: I don't speak elven; I wish I did. Therefore I claim no accuracy of the words and phrases I've used. What I've used, I pieced together using Dragon Flame, which can be found HERE.
Also, much of my understanding of things Elvish and Middle Earthen have come from many hours perusing The Encyclopedia of Arda
Warnings: None
Betas: Gypsy
Cast: Gil-galad/OFC
Timeline: Takes place before the Last Alliance and makes no reference to any events Tolkien wrote of.
Spoilers: Nope
Summary: Every course of action, every path chosen, affects the course of history, and, sometimes, changes otherwise unchangeable events.
Notes: My apologies for any errors; I'd be happy to work on rectifying them (within the framework of the story) if anyone can point such errors out to me!
Special Thanks to: Char for her beta help and all of the elven research she did and passed my way, not to mention the plot bunnies she kept throwing in my path. Also to Gypsy for her beta help, as well as a jolly good game of Grope-the-Elves.
Making every effort not to be caught in undignified pacing, Gil-galad turned from the window and ran his gaze quickly over the meal spread upon the table. Pheasant and an array of dried fruits, fresh baked bread and a dash of winter-stored vegetables. It seemed a meager feast compared to what he normally offered his guests, but even so, he fretted that she, in her inexperience, would see it as a lavish bid for forgiveness and resent the attempt. It was surely a more elaborate meal than she was used to.
Then again, perhaps she would expect more of him, something grander, with others in attendance, a proper introduction into the Mithlond society he had denied her.
Not knowing which would please her more, a large feast or intimate dinner, he had decided upon this compromise, feeling quite certain that no matter which choice he made, it would be the wrong one.
The sun had slid below the horizon now, the last of its glow having bled away from the dark sea so that the sky and sea merged into one entity. No longer a visible horizon, only unending blackness. Darkness did not frighten him, but still he shivered with uneasiness as the door behind him opened.
Melandur held the door and allowed Mithluin to enter. There was a young elf behind her, one who was to serve the meal, but Gil-galad waved both the servant and Melandur from the room. They obeyed, closing the door behind them, leaving the King alone with his guest.
She wore no off-white gown this time. Her dress was deep azure velvet, the color of the sea at mid-day, the same blue he often wore. It drew the blue from her eyes, dispelling the iciness they usually bore a little. The coldness that lingered, however, had nothing to do with their hue but rather reflected her state of heart and mind. There seemed to be no softening this time when she looked at him, no warming as she drank in the sight of the meal prepared for her and his own formal blue tunic and black breeches.
If she noted that they wore the same color she gave no indication of it.
Still, the affect of color upon her, his color, caused his pulse to quicken. Her hair was unbound, as always, and seemed to cast a golden halo about her head. She was barefoot and wore no jewels, no adornment of any sort beyond the gown, but in his eyes, she had no need of any. He wondered where she had gotten the dress, for he could not recall having seen it before. Surely if he had seen her so elegantly dressed, he would have remembered. The image of her in the candlelight tonight would forever replace the others of his memory.
Drawing his gaze away from her bare throat and shoulders, he left the window and came around the table. Normally, he might have kissed the guest's hand. He made no effort to do so with her. He pulled the chair back soundlessly and nodded at her. "Please. Sit."
She inclined her head just a little and replied, "Thank you."
He rounded the table again and drew out his own chair, sitting directly across from her, trying not to stare like an enamored youngster. Dishes of food were passed back and forth across the table in silence. He noted what she chose and what she didn't, how much she took of each offering. He gestured for her wine glass and filled it as she lifted the first forkful of pheasant to her mouth. The sight of the morsel passing her lips, her tongue touching it, guiding it, drew a shiver from his soul, such that he only filled the glass partway, lest his trembling hands spill it. He gave her the glass, hoping for a brush of her fingers on his but receiving no contact of any sort. Quickly, he dropped his gaze to his own glass, which he picked up and filled to a level similar to hers, hoping to make the amount in both seem intentional. He held his glass up to her. "I drink to you, my lady."
She mirrored his actions and his words, saying softly, "and to you, Te'Valishar," her words spoken in such a way that he wasn't sure if she meant them or was mimicking his toast. She drank when he did, set the glass down, and resumed eating. She watched him as they ate, waiting, he knew, but he did not know what to say.
"What do you think of Mithlond?" he asked at last, unable to bear the silence any longer. He wanted to hear her voice, as it would prove to his senses that she really was sitting with him now.
"I have seen very little. I came straight here when I reached the city."
That she had not taken the chance to see the city but had been solely focused upon him, made him giddy. "I am glad of it, that you came here that is. I would be honored to show."
"We shall see." Her curtness cut him off. Such impertinence from anyone else, save Galadriel and Elrond, would have been met with at least a stern look from the King. But his desire to atone for his sins, and the wish to keep her here, kept him silent and pensively calm. Any wrong step now and he knew she would leave and not return.
"It is I who should thank you, both for joining me for this meal and for gracing my house with your presence."
"Don't."
Again her interruption made him swallow back what he had been going to say. Mildly irritated, he began, "Don't thank you? But you have."
"Please."
A third interruption, and this time his irritation was enough that he missed the plea in her voice. "You come to me for answers, to hear what I may tell you, and yet every time I speak, you cut me short as though the very sound of my voice."
It was not her voice or words that stopped him this time. Rather, it was the slow manner in which she placed her fork upon the table, folded her hands upon her lap, and looked down at the barely touched plate of food. There was something painful in those actions and it was the notion of having hurt her once again that kept him from saying any more. What he wanted to utter were curses at himself for his stupidity. If something about his speaking, either his voice or his words, was causing her pain, he should remain silent for a while longer, at least until she asked whatever she would of him.
He reached for his glass to cover the awkwardness. His hand was trembling so that he paused and then withdrew it, leaving the glass untouched.
"Do not thank me for something you do not want, Te'Valishar," she said in a near whisper.
He meant to ask her what she meant but she continued of her own accord.
"If you had wanted me here, you would have bid it. My very existence brings you shame; you dare not even bid me dine with your family."
She stood up and walked to the window. She could smell the sea air but could not see the water in the darkness. She hoped she would be in Mithlond long enough to see the sea once, but was beginning to feel that would not be the case. She did not know if she could stand in his presence even long enough to learn what she wanted to know.
He watched her but did not rise. "I did this for you," he murmured. "And because.it seemed more conducive to dialogue, which is what you asked of me.is it not?"
"Yes. I suppose it was."
There were so many questions, so much she needed to know, wanted to know, but much of it now seemed of a far too intimate nature to be asked of royalty. What right did she have, after all, to ask him anything? He was the great High King. She was only an orphan he had kept from the clutches of death. She was only in his life, in this room, because he allowed it, had agreed to tell her what she wanted to know of her past. She squared her shoulders and looked back at him, noting the weariness in his blue eyes.
Always the weariness. She could recall very few instances when that weariness had not been part of him. Once again, she felt the powerful wish, the instinctual need, to lift that weariness from his shoulders, if only he would let her. But that was a wish that she kept buried deep within, for she did not want to frighten him away again.
The wounded bird he had seen in her had shifted back into the neutrality she had borne when she had entered. He thought of how her hair would look beneath the moonlight, ruffled by the sea breeze.and he wondered why every moment, every thought of her, always came back to her beauty.
"How did I come to be in Tawen's care?"
The question did not surprise him; it was a logical enough place to begin. But he had hoped to delay this conversation. Answering her would bring her once step closer to departure.
He could not avoid it, however, and believed that he had abused her trust enough for one lifetime. She deserved answers from him, just as she had said. He owed her. After a quick drink, he started, "I was part of a hunting expedition that day. We.I.found you amidst a thicket."
"Where were.I was alone?"
"When I found you, yes. We had heard a great skirmish and found a warg in the process of devouring.someone. I can only speculate that.the unfortunate individual was one of your parents, or a guardian. The sound of your crying led me to you." He waited to see if she would say anything. When she didn't, he added, "If it is any consolation, my party killed the beast."
She thought to ask him if that spot of earth he had touched in the forest had been where she had been found, but did not. Knowing that his moment of grief had been witnessed might make him less inclined to share his knowledge with her. She did not think the King would be pleased about being spied upon. "And you took me directly to Tawen?"
"There was little choice at the time. No one in my party was equipped to care for you and it was many days travel back to Mithlond. You needed to be fed and clothed properly for the weather. She was nearby and." he shrugged his shoulders slightly, "it made the most sense at the time."
"You chose to leave me there rather than come for me and bring me here. Perhaps find my family."
Whether they were meant as accusations or not, the words still stung. "I did seek your family. I had my advisors, my best men, seek out what relatives you might have had in the kingdom. Some went beyond our borders, into the lands of the Shirefolk and even as far as Lorien and Mirkwood, but there seemed none who could lay claim to you."
"Or who would."
He frowned at her matter-of-fact statement.
"Did you search among the cities of men as well?" That he flinched did not escape her notice. "I am peredhil, am I not? Only half elven."
In a tone perhaps a shade too harsh, he replied, "You are elfkind in all ways that matter."
"Why? Because you say it is so? You cannot change the facts of my parentage, even if you wish to. Your power as king does not extend to the baser facts of nature, Te'Valishar."
He glanced away from her at a vacant spot on the table. "You are elfkind because that is how you were raised. All those of mixed parentage are given the choice, to either walk the path of men or follow the path of the First Born. Your path."
"My path was chosen for me. I was never allowed a choice." Bitterness frosted her eyes again. "You made the choice to leave me with Tawen, thus setting me on a path I could not stray from. Not once have I been allowed to choose my way or."
Gil-galad pushed away from the table, but managed to restrain the flash of anger enough to refrain from standing up. "No one bound you to your path. You could have left it at any time you chose and."
"And gone where? Done what? Gone into a world where I knew no one, and was still only a novice, not yet an adult?"
"You could have come here. I would have."
"What?" she snapped, fire in her features "You would have welcomed me? You would have made me part of this world? If you had wanted me here, if I were welcome at all, you would have bid me come. Instead, you hid me away like a shameful secret, came to call when it suited your purpose or would not otherwise intrude upon your life.and when the day came that you had no use for me, you stopped coming altogether."
She saw the color drain from his face and knew that he had heard both her anger and her pain, and had undoubtedly caught the break in her voice. But she did not care tonight. "Your family does not know about me, do they?"
He cocked his head, his expression puzzled, and when the barest hint of a smile tugged at his mouth and she turned away from him in a huff, he rose at last. "I have no family. There was only my uncle, and since his passing and my ascension to the throne, I am alone."
She looked at him skeptically from the corner of her eye. "What of your wife and."
He shook his head. "I have never married, there are no children. There is no one."
"Why?"
The windowsill was wide enough that the two could stand side by side without physical contact; Gil-galad drew near and leaned his elbows upon it, staring out towards the sea. "Battle with the Dark Lord has been my life. I have had neither the time nor inclination to wed." He paused, frowning, wondering just how much he could say without angering or offending her. "Or rather.I was inclined once, but the opportunity passed. However much I might wish it, I doubt very much that opportunity will ever present itself again."
If he had hoped she would press him, ask what he meant, he was disappointed. She leaned upon the sill in a similar fashion, though her gaze was focused upon the shadows in the lamp-lit courtyard below. "I am peredhil, am I not?"
Gil-galad closed his eyes. "Yes. Or at least.there is the blood of men in your veins, though whether this is from a parent or grandparent, I know not. If.if you wish to forsake your elven birthright and walk the paths of men, you may still make that choice."
She breathed a defeated sigh. "Doing so would mean forsaking what Tawen has taught me, would it not?"
"The knowledge would not be lost to you, but as for the gifts.perhaps. You have power, gifts of your own but.I do not know. Tawen was the only one of her kind I have ever known. I think only she would know that answer."
"And now she is gone. There seems little use in choosing a different path. I am what I was trained to be.perhaps the only one to now carry this knowledge.and thus I must accept the burden of it." She looked at him directly now, studying his profile in the candlelight, noting the lines of care and worry around his eyes and mouth. His eyes were still closed so he seemed not to notice her perusal. His pensiveness called to her, bid her touch those lines, soothe them away.
"Just as you, on the day of your uncle's death, were forced to make a choice, to accept or deny the burdens you now carry. Sometimes, we are given no other road.and it is no one's fault but the Valar."
She had nearly given in to the temptation when he looked directly into her eyes. "Just so," he whispered.
He was staring at her mouth then, nearer to his own than it had ever been, and the desire to kiss her grew stronger by the second. She must have sensed it, or else something else had changed, because she tensed abruptly and turned her gaze back to something outside the window. Both grateful for the reprieve and disappointed at the lost chance, he drew back and returned to the table to eat of his now cold meal. She remained at the window, however, silent and sullen and lost in thought. He thought to ask her to sit once more, to dine herself, but he decided to leave her to her thoughts. It was likely what she needed, and wanted, more than a meal tonight. She was not a child. She would eat when she chose.
For some minutes, the only sounds in the room were the clink of utensils upon the plate and the far-off whisper of the waves. Thus, when she spoke, it was the sweetest of interruptions to the night noises. "Why did you not bring me here?"
"I told you." he began after swallowing a mouthful of bread. He glanced at her quickly; she was not looking at him, rather her expression appeared to be far away.
"You told me why you did not bring me that first morning. But one hundred and five winters have passed since that day, and you did not once ask me to come. Is my parentage a matter of embarrassment among elfkind? Am I somehow less than.what I could be? Should be? Or have I failed you somehow? Did you simply not want me here?"
There was a trace of moisture on her profiled cheek that reflected the lamplight back to him. A tear. He swallowed hard, having never seen her weep other than as an infant. "Mithluin," he whispered as he rose from the chair once more, watching the droplet reach her chin and fall onto the blue velvet of her sleeve.
He could not recall the last time he had called her by name.
What could he say or do to comfort her? The only thing he could think of was to speak the truth. He stood beside her but did not touch her. "The fault has never been yours. There is no shame in your ancestry; you are by no means the only child to be born by the parentage of both races. Nor does it matter that your lineage is unknown. At least, it does not matter to me. Any fault in this, if it exists, is my own."
He held up his hand to prevent her from speaking, and this once she capitulated. "There was power in you that day I found you, power that exists still, now stronger and well balanced. Though you do not recall it, I did bring you to Mithlond. When the hunting expedition was complete, I fetched you and brought you here. I presented you to the Seer, wanting to know what I should do with you, for I sensed that I had neither the power nor facility to train you as you deserved, but I wanted you here."
He did not dare continue that thought, dare not tell her just how sincerely he wanted her here. He brushed down the edge of his sleeve absently before continuing. "The Seer touched your lips with her finger and said, 'Behold. Everything that will change everything.' I do not know what she meant. Perhaps I will never know. It was she who recommended that Tawen train you.though I had sensed myself upon finding you that the Old One was the best person for your care, and Tawen herself claimed that what was best for you was not in the halls of Mithlond. So I took you back into the forest. I do not deny that I felt some measure of relief, for I had little desire to care for a child at that time in my life, particularly without a wife to aid me and myself constantly at war. However," he sighed, "if I am honest, I must also admit that leaving you as I did was one of the most difficult undertakings I have ever known, even though I knew you would be safer there than you would be anywhere else. You needed to be trained. You needed a family."
"I will never have a family, my lord. Tawen is gone. There is no one else. I must make my way alone."
Gil-galad came so close to saying that she would always have him, but the words stuck in his throat and his mouth snapped shut. To say that would only raise questions that he did not have answers to, and tonight, he was too tired to pursue those answers.
As though she sensed his sudden fatigue, she turned away from the window and said, "I am weary. Tonight I must rest."
"And tomorrow?" It did not matter to him if she heard the desperation in his questions. He needed to know what the future held. He needed to know that there was a future at all. "Will you."
She graced him with a soft smile, the first real smile he had scene since that day so long ago when she had declared her love for him without words, a tentative, shy smile, but a smile all the same.
"I will join you for breakfast, if you will have me, Te'Valishar. After that, we shall see."
He was certain that, if not for the physical confines of his body, his heart would have flown from his chest and burst across the sky like carnival fireworks. She bid him goodnight, but it wasn't until the door had closed behind her that he was able to find his voice.
"Goodnight," he murmured.
It would be a good night.
Tomorrow would take care of itself.
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