All it takes by Lyra

All it takes

Even now, she found herself drawn to the mountain.

It was still a mountain, in a way. Even after the greater part of the island had collapsed onto itself and been swallowed by the sea, the broken remains of the Pillar of Heaven reached up high from the ocean floor. At low tide, the upper ring of the caldera rose just above sea level, a sad reminder of what had once been. At high tide, the water covered and caressed and soothed the burnt and broken rock, as it covered the rubble at its feet - the cities and forests, fields and villages that had once been Númenor. As it covered the many, many dead bodies that had once been people.

Perhaps it was the horror of what was at the mountain's feet and in its belly that made her seek out the high top. Perhaps it was nostalgia, a longing for the ceremonies of her childhood, for what could have been. Perhaps it was guilt, trying to relive the last moments before the Fall, when she had tried to reach the holy place. She had not tried to escape. The cloud of black ash, the hail of pumice, the trails of fire boiling down the mountain's sides had made it quite clear that the hallow had become a deadly place. It had reminded her of the sacrificial fire in the Temple of the Zigûr, where she'd had to preside over too many sacrifices, unable - no: not daring - to intervene. Ashamed of her failure, she had sought to burn on the rightful hallow, as if one single sacrifice to One greater than the Zigûr's Lord of All could have put an end to the dying.

"Nothing would have been gained if you had burned," Uinen said. She did not speak with words; no bubbles were rising from her lips. Yet it felt as though she was speaking to Míriel, no longer Tar-, no longer Zimraphel. She could hear the words in her head as though they had been spoken.
"It is not how Father operates," Uinen continued, and more hesitantly, as an afterthought: "At least, I don't think it is. It didn't use to be."
Míriel wasn't certain if she'd been supposed to hear the last part. Of course, she was certain of nothing anymore.
She had not prayed for salvation as she had rushed up the mountain, towards the fire, towards death. She had not thought that anybody would care to save her, not after the turn things had taken. She knew the stories of her far-distant ancestor, of course: Elwing had cast herself into the sea, and instead of letting her drown, Ulmo had given her wings. But she, Míriel, had expected no such rescue.

And Ulmo had not given her wings. Ulmo had not been there. However, Uinen had been there, in the turmoil of the deep, and she had given Míriel gills and webbing between her fingers and her toes, which had felt marvellously strange. The sudden ability to breathe again as she had been on the verge of drowning had been, perhaps, the greatest sense of relief she had ever felt: like re-emerging after diving for too long and hungrily sucking in the sweet air, but a thousandfold, and without emerging.
She still did not know what she had done to deserve it.
"Neither do I," Uinen responded, "but I was there, and I pitied you. Sometimes, that's all it takes."
Míriel looked at her, then lowered her eyes. She could not help but wonder if others hadn't been more deserving of pity.
"Possibly. But I did not see them until too late," Uinen said, or thought, or made Míriel think.
"Would you have saved them if you had?" Míriel could not help asking, using her mouth out of habit and producing a string of undignified gurgling sounds.
Uinen understood her regardless, or more likely, understood the thoughts behind the words, and smiled wanly. "I would not have had the strength," she explained matter-of-factly. "I would have tried, but I would not have succeeded."

Míriel thought of the bodies at the foot of the mountain, ripped from every stage of life, and the sadness of it was like a brutal grip that squeezed her chest until she was unable to breathe, gills or no gills. Everything was death and despair and insurmountable grief; it was enough to drown her.
Uinen held her until it passed, or at any rate, until the grip on her heart was no longer quite so strong. The tide rose and sank. The sun and moon and stars wheeled over the waters. A grey whale swam by, expressing its surprise at the changed topography. Shoals of silvery fish flitted around them and disappeared again.

"Please do not think that I am ungrateful," Míriel said, or thought, although she wasn't entirely certain that she was grateful.
Uinen smiled gently, stroking her hair that drifted in the current like fine stringy seaweed. "It is terribly unjust, I know. I know. It pains me, too."
"It just feels so meaningless," Míriel agreed. "I wish I could have done something. Anything."
"Sometimes there is nothing we can do," Uinen observed, and Míriel wanted to accept the wisdom in her words. Sometimes there was nothing that could be done. If even somebody like Uinen, for all her Maiarin powers, had to accept defeat, then surely Míriel did not have to blame herself if she did the same. Sometimes one had to take the world as it was, and move on. In a way, that was what she had been reduced to all her life - accept and navigate the world as it was - and she had never felt that she was any good at it. It was part of the human condition, perhaps, this inability to accept the inevitable, no matter how useless it was to rebel against it.

She thought again of all the people swept from their lives - good or bad, long or short, rich or poor, mundane or exceptional - before their time. Surely many of them had been guilty. Surely many had been innocent. And she, their queen, had failed them.
Again, the pain of the realisation washed over her like a black wave, but this time it did not render her incapable, and it would not have taken Uinen's gentle arms around her to pull her out of the destructive grip of despair.
I will bury them, she thought.

"You will do what?" Uinen asked, not incredulous, but uncomprehending.
"I will bury them," Míriel answered. "It is something we do with our dead. Did. We bury them in the earth, a little like tucking children into bed. In the old days, I think we let the bodies decompose and become earth. More recently, we embalmed them so their bodies were preserved even after death, but I do not know how to do that. But I can bury them, at least."
"There are thousands," Uinen pointed out, her grief turning the water a little colder yet.
"I know," Míriel replied. "And I am their queen. I could not protect them, ultimately, but at least I can bury them. I can mourn them, each of them. I know it isn't enough. But it's something."
"It will take years and years," Uinen said.
Again, Míriel replied, "I know." She met Uinen's eyes firmly now. "I better begin now."
Uinen took her hands, still slightly alien with the new webbing that connected her fingers, and stroked them softly. "Let me help," she said.
Feeling gratitude after all, Míriel smiled; and they left the broken remains of the mountain top and swam to the bottom.

It was a beginning.

Chapter End Notes

Zigûr is Sauron's Adûnaic name, in case that wasn't clear from context.