the season will not wait by quillingmesoftly

the season will not wait

Read the season will not wait

Not for the first time, Elwing was irritated with her great-grandfather. 

Yes, alright, Grandfather Elu had not wanted to be killed by Dwarves. She’d grant him that. She would grant, also, that after that incident, having Grandmother Melian as the Queen of the reborn Doriathrim in Aman was not ideal either. Melian would always be respected and loved by the Doriathrim, there was no doubt about it. But to trust her as their Queen…no. Not anymore.  

That meant that with Grandfather Elu, Nana and Ada in the Halls, and her brothers’ fate still unknown, that Elwing was Queen of the Sindar in Aman. And that left her with the appalling stack of paperwork on her desk that she was glaring at, hoping that if she glared hard enough, it might leave her alone, and leave her to more enjoyable things, like the pile of correspondence from her family in Alqualondë.  

She hadn’t asked Melian why. Elwing had sensed the answer in her blood. Had seen it in her own actions, for she had set foot on the Undying Lands alongside Eärendil, knowing that it might be both of their deaths. If he dies, will I not die also, even if I remain? As well as ask her to cut her own hand off. I have only now been reunited with my heart, and now shall I leave him? 

Although, of course, her heart was not fully here, even now that Eärendil was. Now it was in Númenor, with Elros’ descendants, and that grief was still a stone in her throat; it was in Lindon, with Elrond, who had only been able to send a message and letters with the returning hosts from the War of Wrath; it was sailing the skies above her, a blazing gem bound to its brow. 

 It was six hundred and two years into the Second Age, and still, the full healing had been found for her heartache. Indeed, it had deepened, as Elros went on beyond the bounds of Arda, just as Grandmother Lúthien and Grandfather Beren had, living only in memory and forty precious letters, carefully preserved in the top drawer of her desk. Elros, and his son, her grandchildren: Vardamir, and his son, Amandil, and Tindómiel, and Atanalcar, just gone this past year. Of the first generation of her grand-children, only Manwendil had chosen the Elves. 

She sighed, and looked at the top of the stack. A request for an introduction to Ecthelion of the Fountain; apparently Tamindir had met his match, a maiden of the House of the Fountain, and he wished to go with her to Tirion. Well, that was easily enough done. She’d have to remember to tell Eärendil; the Lord of the Fountain featured prominently in the snatches of recollection that he had of Gondolin, although he had far more than she did of Menegroth. Elwing had taken the tales that others told, and memorised them to try and engrave it on her heart. It had not worked, save only to fool the Edain, who did not have Elven memory, and who could easily forget that she had been three years old when Menegroth had fallen. 

She continued to work through the stack by the warm, hazy light of the candles and the moonlight that spilled in through the window. She would sleep when Eärendil came back with the dawn, Arien’s rays turning the beaches of Eldamar to gleaming with their many hues of red and silver and dark, dazzling blues and purples. She had not risked life and limb to come to Aman for her husband to sleep all day and sail all night, and for her to work all day and sleep all night. So, that left her with paperwork by moonlight. 

Several petitions for the Queen to officiating marriage ceremonies; news of pregnancies, and women who wished their Queen’s blessing upon their new children; even some informal correspondence, from great-uncle Olwë and his household. She wrote messages scheduling the available dates, and pushed away wistful thoughts of how Tindómiel’s granddaughter had wed, and she had not even found out until two years after the fact, since letters came from Númenor so rarely.  

She finished reading the letter, and heard the quiet thumping of foot-steps on the stairs, and outside the study. He always tried so hard to be quiet, and failed so miserably. He had not had brothers who would hide behind bushes and ambush you and tickle you senseless, if you walked past them unawares.

Elwing stood, smiled at the memory, and went to the door. The rest of the paperwork could wait. 

Eärendil stood there, the extra layers he wore sailing Ilmaren now shucked and half-folded up over his right arm, and grinning at her, bright and joyful. She leaned up and kissed him in quick greeting, and felt something being pressed into her hands. Glass bottles. She broke the kiss and looked down. Was that paper inside the bottles? 

Eärendil’s eyes were filled with hope, when she glanced up at him, seeking an explanation. “The lady Uinen greeted me when I brought the ship down to the waves again. There are letters from Elrond and Manwendil in there.”  

From Lindon? 

Letters came from Númenor, sometimes, by way of sailors returning to Tol Eresseä, who might then make the trip to Alqualondë. When they did, they came in thick packets, with letters the size of long treatises, that packed perhaps a decade of news into one go, as though it might vanish if they didn't set it down into paper. Each letter had to be carefully studied, to keep the whirls of names straight.  

But they did not come from Lindon. Not since the Host of the Valar had all returned home. The journey was far too long, and most of the Exiles or Teleri who occasionally sailed to Elenna did not usually wish to continue back to – how had that silly Vanya poet put it? – the lands of weeping and war. But here Eärendil stood, with messages from Lindon. Messages in bottles. Such a fantastical idea, such a fragile notion. And yet they were there, in Eärendil’s hands.

 Elwing took one of the bottles, grabbed Eärendil’s newly-freed hand, and pulled him into the study, quickly going to the bell-rope to pull on it.

"We should start keeping corkscrews in here," Eärendil said. "Just in case..."

Just in case it happens again. That was her optimistic love all over, wasn't it?

Elwing grinned at him, and turned the bottles over in her hands, as he tugged her over to sit on the divan. The paperwork could damn well wait.

---

Chapter End Notes

This story is set in the same universe as 'For the First Time in Forever.' Manwendil is the third of Elros' children, but I have the first generation of Elros' descendants able to make their choice of the peredhil, just as Elrond's children could choose. I have Manwendil choosing the Elves, and coming to Lindon with the first voyage of the Númenoreans returning to Middle-Earth. So Elrond gets a nephew who won't die on him. *bittersweet peredhel feels*