tolkien marginalia

arwen, at the dawning of the third age

When she is no longer a child, yet not quite anything more, Mithrandir bends down and cups her face in his thin hands. He peers deeply into her eyes, and then he smiles. 'There is more than just the likeness of Lúthien about you,' he tells her gently. 'You would have her wildness, and fire, and bitterness too.'

She keeps that under her tongue for long years, waiting to give it voice. 

Her brothers wander afar with the Dúnedain sons fostered in Imladris; she is permitted only to read the letters that come later, proclaiming the death of yet another son of Númenor. Her naneth teaches her the politesse of a lady and mistress, as well as all the private efforts which feed the illusions ease and hospitality. But when her ada welcomes princes and warriors to his chambers for counsel, she is left alone, on the cold side of the doors.

So she waits, as Lúthien did in Doriath.

Galadriel summons her to Lothlórien when she is come into womanhood--there, she sits at her daernaneth's  knee and learns statecraft and prophecy in the guise of a secretary. But while she turns the head of princelings and marchwardens, none would heed Undómiel's voice when the mightiest and fairest of her elders presides. She is humored, not heard--that much, the age has taught her to know.

She can do nothing but have patience, and wait.

(One day, she looks up, and sees a king.)

finduilas of dol amroth, within the walls of gondor

She is not unhappy. This is the place of her sons' birthright, of her husband's rule--to know joy she need only cradle Faramir to her breast as Boromir plays in the courtyard, or gaze upon Denethor's noble profile as he hears council. Among the people of Minas Tirth she is called the Hope of the Sea, sent to the House of Húrin to crown it with elvenfair beauty and the grace of Dol Amroth. A reminder, in these greying warlike times, that somewhere Gondor was green, and dwelt in brightness.

(It is a sweet untruth, when all of Belfalas cries out at the brazen pillaging of the Corsairs, and the Swan Knights' sparring has taken on an urgent edge. But it is comfort to Minas Tirith, and so Finduilas does not try to dissuade them.) 

She is not unhappy. How could she be?

Only--at night, she dreams of white cliffs stretching before her, waves crashing and curling against them like her breathing. The dreams are worse, when the Great Council does not sit and Imrahil leaves for Dol Amroth again. Without her brother's familiar face to gaze upon, she spends the day feeling salt-rimed and aching, listening for gulls.

Denethor comes upon her, the doors to her balcony thrown open and her leaning over the parapet. 'I thought I smelled the sea once,' she tells him. 'The wind was southerly, and I thought...'

He holds her about the waist, and kisses the nape of her neck, so that he might not see how she weeps.

young aragorn, chieftan among the northern dúnedain

He is very young when he comes to them, these grim proud men who are his to rule by right. (His name is still Estel then, though he is getting used to the feel of Aragorn, son of, on his shoulders and tongue.) There is hard-won wisdom in the visages of the Dúnedain, and--he knows without asking he is found wanting in their eyes. At best, he is a raw and untaught king, an unknown element; at worst, an elf-cradled princeling who would presume to command men twice his worth. 

He practices holding his tongue, bowing his head; gathering men about him who are honorable and respected, so as to gain the same by showing them deference. He endures the chilly silences as much as the ingratiate praise, and treads the careful line between respect and his right. He seeks out ways to prove his quality as tracker and rider, soldier and man.

He says only to Valandil, who has been commander since Arathorn's death, I am come to claim my birthright, the kingdom that once was and shall be again. The others may whisper as they like--gossip will starve without meat to feed it.

(Each dusk, he lifts his gaze to the west and waits for the evenstar to rise above the darkening earth. It is no more within his reach than she is, but the distance does not seem so terrible in the starlight.)