| Subject: Tears and lies |
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Aragorn and Arwen
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Date Posted: 13:27:50 05/25/02 Sat
Arwen kept her voice low, and her back turned as she spoke. "He told me, that just because we had chosen the same path as our ancestors, we should not expect the same end. For he believed that, he knew, the hearts of men are easily corrupted. Except...it took a ring of power with Isildur."
Neither one of them moved and yet he felt the distance between them grow. "I don't understand," he murmered. They stood there in silence, the void increasing with each moment that neither spoke. Searching his soul for the answer that would redeem him, he started "what do you mean..." but then he stopped. Namün. In the joy of their reunion he had forgotten the lovely servant girl who had shared his bed and his heart after he had accepted the truth-Arwen had left him. His mind protested that the facts didn't fit. There was no way Arwen could know of his weakness, his infidelity. Added to that hadn't Anaweil said the woman who stood before him was never coming back. Unless, his heart cringed as his brain realised the truth at last, unless the girl had lied to him and Arwen had had every intention of returning. Still his mind reasoned she could have no knowledge of Namün unless he chose to tell her. He stood, watching her back. Even in this light he could see the tears falling softly from her eyes, would the news he had betrayed her destroy what was left of her fragile spirit? It was not worth the risk. "Arwen I love you but I do not understand what you talk of. What do you mean by this?"
"If you told me that everything had been a lie, that nothing had happened, I would believe you. Aragorn, tell me the truth. What's happened between us?" She held unclasped her hands, showing the swirling blue mists inside the orb. "I also think you had forgotten about this."
He stared at the palantir in horror. The mystery of its disappearance was explained, partially at least. "Where did you find it?" he asked his voice breaking slightly.
"Maybe find is the wrong word. I borrowed it. After you had, after you had, I thought you were dead." A kind of anger rose in her voice, although vicious, it was more at herself. "You carried no pulse, and you did not breathe. I thought..." She faltered, familiar pangs of pain, "I thought I had lost you."
"You thought I was dead?" he stared at her. "You thought I was dead so you took my palantir and ran away?" He felt the anger growing inside him and he welcomed it as an alternative to the iron weight of the guilt that hung around his neck. "Couldn't you have waited? Checked I wasn't alive or something?"
"If you were not dead, you were beyond my help. I know not how you stand here now, for you were beyond the power of any elf to heal." She stopped, and reasserted the aura of calm around her. "I have dwelt in Middle Earth many years longer than you. Do not take me for a fool Aragorn, do not try and shift that which you blame on yourself unto me. I have always loved you, and that is more that can be said for you."
"And what do you mean by that, my lady?" he made his voice cold to hide what his heart knew: somehow she had found out.
"Do not pretend. I know what has happened here. Just because I am absent, I am not blind to the world. Do you love her?" She swallowed, not wanting the answer, for fear it would break her completely.
"Do I love her?" he paused considering the question. "I do not know. I believed I loved you and yet you abandoned me when I needed you most. Obviously I am not a worthy judge." He felt the words twisting in his own soul and yet he continued wanting to hurt her as much as her desertion had injured him. "If I love her you have only yourself to blame."
"Did you honestly believe I did not love you? When I chose a mortal life, did you not realise that I loved you more than life itself? I gave up everything to be with you. Still, it will all be over soon. What do you bid me do now?" He did not love her. Her heart seemed to crack inside her very chest, and there was taste of warm blood in the back of her mouth.
He found himself shouting "I thought you had gone; that you didn't love me. What was I supposed to do, spend the rest of my life as a hermit?"
"You could've looked for me!"
"How did you expect me to do that? You stole my palantir!"
"Well you didn't have to lie!"
He fell silent once more. Behind the form of his wife he could see the wind wracking the boughs of the white tree, pulling its blossoms away so the tree itself appeared to be weeping, feeling the pain of those who stood under its branches. "Arwen, I'm so sorry. I realise I can say nothing to make this better, but I would try. Tell me what I must do.
I love you."
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