Tolkien Tales

Come Back

The golden brilliance of Anar(the sun) shone upon the silver waters of Mithlond and cast a blinding reflection at the watching elves. Many of them were incapacitated any way as they mourned for the return of the Lady of Imladris to Eldamar. 

Celebrían, the beloved wife of Elrond and mother of the twins Elladan and Elrohir and the Lady Arwen, had been found by her youthful sons. They never spoke of the discovery, but all knew from her state,  that it had been a harrowing experience. It must certainly have been branded into their minds forever.

The Lord of Imladris, son of Eärendil, had employed all his prowess in healing and every prayer to the Valar and Eru that he could comprehend, but it had not been enough. To stay her fading, to keep her from the Halls of Mandos, it became necessary to send her to Eldamar and to leave her with her people. She was leaving and only one elf had ever been known to return from Elvenhome.

***

" You should be with your father and family by the quay, Elladan." A wistful voice sounded behind him. He had known that she was there long before she had ever spoken. But as with all Elves, they can be in each other's presence and have no need for speech.

" How can he let her go? How can he knowing that she will--" He broke off, his own words strangled by the love of a son for a mother. " Will she come back, Lírëya(Elvish-Song)? Will Emil(mother) come back? Will she?"

Lírëya turned towards her friend and then sighed. " Elladan, do you not think that if she were to stay, she would have far more pain and madness thrust upon her than if she were to leave and find peace in Eldamar? Could you truly bear the disintegration of your mother? The fading of all that she ever was?" 

Elladan turned forcefully to her and then taking her hands, forced her eyes, creamy gray, to glance up at him. " Lírëya, will she come back?"

" Elladan, only one elf has ever returned from Aman. He was your tutor in the art of war. Do you think Glorfindel would have returned if not chosen?"

He cried out in pain,  " Ai! How can this be? Is this world so dark and full of evil that good must only ever leave it and never return? Why does Eru place us within His symphony of Endor if he must remove all the good things that we Elves have? The evil wrought in this land has taken from me my mother and because it remains she and others can never return. 

Lírëya felt the entire force of his lost passion. He was still a young elf, so young, and to find his mother after years and then to lose her again--that heartache was so extreme that his very fëa was at stake. If only he could comprehend the truth that all Elves who had lived at least a generation of men knew.

" Mellon-nín(my friend), you weep for yourself alone, your sorrow turning to self-pity. How can you so defile the day of your mother's healing with these tears of selfishness? Do you feel that you alone have lost her? What of your sister, Lady Arwen? So young when she was taken. She will never grow up in the knowledge of her mother as you and your twin have done. And what of her mother, Galadriel? She has none of her blood-kin.  And now, her own and only daughter has met a fate not unlike that of her most beloved brothers."

Elladan's grey eyes cleared and Lírëya rejoiced hoping that her words had entered into a reachable place of his heart. As he raised his head, however, she became afraid of the wrath and indignation that she saw being birthed there. She had seen it once before, when her father had descended into a wrath of murder and bloodshed. " Elladan, your features, nanyë sessëa(I am frightened)!"

He did not reply to her and  stood featurelessly looking off to East. He had become a statue, held in place by his own thoughts and designs. Then he spoke, metallic and empty, " This world, it drives out the good and destroys those who dare to stay. It is the evil in this place that has harmed my mother and its continuance is what will keep her from returning to me. How many more must we loose ere they can feel safe to return to these shores? How many must die before we begin avenging ourselves upon these dark forces and driving them out? Already rangers of the Dunédain roam, defeating those terrors which haunt the nights of all children." He grabbed ahold of her shoulders and pulled her to him, forcing her to look up into his face. It was a masque of white fury, black accenting his eyes. " Lírëya, I refuse to allow the crimes of evil against our people stand. I will make it safe for every Elf to return, and I will do so so that my own dear family will come back to me. They must come back to me!"