1. Evenstar
AN: the feast here is the dinner in Many Meetings, Felowship of the Ring.
[Bilbo] turned to Strider. "Where have you been, my friend? Why weren't you at the feast? The Lady Arwen was there."
Strider looked down at Bilbo gravely. "I know," he said. "But often I must put my mirth aside. Elladan and Elrohir have returned out of the Wild unlooked-for, and they had tidings that I wished to hear at once."
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And now, on with the story:
My beloved has returned from his journey for the wizard and my brothers from their hunts in the Wilds, yet I am alone under the canopy. Upon the dais, Glorfindel and Mithrandir flank my father, pillars of white birch, slender and beautiful beside the towering oak that is Elrond Halfelven. Yet I feel like the evenstar they name me, alone in the stillness of the dusk. The Halfling who was hurt is up and about again, and that is the reason we feast tonight, but he does not sit close enough to talk.
There are those who would say that we should not be feasting with the Enemy practically staring at us. Yes, even I feel his eye, a shadow of dread that makes me wish again for my beloved. I say let us feast; let us dance in the moonlight and catch the stars that the Great Eye can only look upon. Let us love and live, and die singing. For we will all die, in time. Long or short, our lives end. Even mine.
My father sees too much of his brother in my beloved. Elros the hasty, Elros the unthinking. Elros the ages dead king of long drowned Numenor. Aragorn is not Elros, though he be the last of that fading line, the only son of an only son. My father would have me live, unfading, beyond the Seas, where the shadow cannot go. Where it is always evening, so the Evenstar will shine all the brighter. I must go when he leaves Middlearth, or fade with the night.
Yet my beloved and I, we are morning, not evening. The start of a new age, not the last of the old. In us are Elros and Elrond reunited, the line or Eärendil whole once more, human and elf-kind. I gaze into my grandmother's mirror and see the sunrise in Ithilien, and the white tree of Gondor in flower. Golden are the hours of eventide, but the morning will burn with a new heat.
Mornie utúlië (Darkness has come). And I have made my choice.
This is a work of fan fiction, written because the author has an abiding love for the works of J R R Tolkien. The characters, settings, places, and languages used in this work are the property of the Tolkien Estate, Tolkien Enterprises, and possibly New Line Cinema, except for certain original characters who belong to the author of the said work. The author will not receive any money or other remuneration for presenting the work on this archive site. The work is the intellectual property of the author, is available solely for the enjoyment of Henneth Annûn Story Archive readers, and may not be copied or redistributed by any means without the explicit written consent of the author.
