The last weak shaft of sunlight fights its way through entangled branches.  The days are darkening earlier now; soon the last lingering leaves will be stripped away by cold winter winds.  I will need to stop for the night soon, and this place is as good as any.  I scan the surrounding forest for any potential threat – the habits of a lifetime die slowly – before dropping my pack and sliding down to rest my back against the bole of a moss-mouldered tree.

I should build a fire, for light if nothing else, but the rain I can feel is coming will only put it out.  I should eat, but I am too weary to hunt.  I can do without for another night, or longer, before the pangs of hunger become too fierce to ignore.  I pull the blanket from my bedroll, huddle beneath it with my knees up to my chest, and wait for the sleep I know, weary as I am, will be slow to come.

Above me, the last golden remnants of autumn's splendor sigh in the blustering wind.  How you would have loved this night, my prince:  the two of us alone in the deepening twilight, the encroaching chill a little-needed excuse to nestle together in a single bedroll before a crackling fire, sharing the heat that always burned between us.  My lips would find your ear in the kiss that always made you moan in wanton abandon, as your nimble fingers make short work of undoing the garments between us until flesh meets flesh.  I hiss with pleasure as you bend to nip at the coarse curls on my chest before taking a cold-tightened nipple between your teeth.  I reach for the silk-covered steel of your arousal, desperate to feel the bliss of you deep inside me…

The cold agony that pierces my heart cannot be eased by any fire.  Eru, when shall I find release from this bitter existence?  For you will never again wrap me in your impassioned embrace, and I shall never feel warmth again.  I let my head drop to my knees and the nightly tears begin to fall unchecked.

I lift my head at an approaching sound – again, habit – but it is only the croak of a raven, seeking its evening roost.  At least here I need not fear hearing the wailing cry of the gulls.  I will never forget the expression on your face when you heard them first, on the deck of the Corsair ship with the armies of the Dead whispering around us.  Wonder, and longing, and joy, and regret all mingled on your fair features as their keening echoed in the still air.  'Galadriel warned me,' you murmured, your sapphire eyes straining for a glimpse of the Sea far behind us.

'If thou hearest the cry of the gull on the shore,      Thy heart then shall rest in the forest no more.'

I wonder now if it was this end she foresaw after all.  Then, I feared only losing you to the Sea, to the call of Valinor where I could not follow.  I led you below deck and made love to you throughout the night, as the pull of the freed men at the oars carried us all too slowly up the Anduin towards Minith Tirith.  I kissed you and caressed you, licked and nipped and sucked and bit your flawless skin until you writhed and pleaded beneath me, begged me to take you and give you your release.  At last, as the first rays of Arien reddened the eastern sky, I gave us what we both ached for, sliding into your silken depths to slowly, oh so slowly and gently, join our bodies and souls.  As I rocked against you with desperate tenderness, I entwined my fingers with yours and stretched our hands above our heads.  'Open your eyes,' I whispered, 'look at me … see me … see the love I will bear for you always.'  'Always,' you promised.  'Always,' we vowed, lost in each other's eyes until ecstasy overtook us both.

I did not fear losing you in battle, even the last hopeless battle before the Black Gates themselves, for I knew if you fell I would have gone before you.  It was unimaginable to me, that you should fall and I remain alive.  When the Troll's hammer-blow felled me at last, as his massive weight crushed my ribs and squeezed the breath from my lungs, I saw you racing through the hordes of Orcs that separated us, unbearably graceful even in your killing frenzy.  I plunged my dagger into the Troll's foot with little hope of dislodging its bulk, but the sudden pain was just enough to unbalance it, to send it stumbling backwards, jerking its arms in an effort to regain its footing – and to drive its huge blade downward in the same instant you leaped forward to attack.  Even your speed could not evade that lethal blow.  I watched in powerless anguish as you fell, until against all hope the Troll suddenly lurched away.  I crawled to you brokenly, pulling you into my arms as the gates and towers of Mordor crumbled around us, blind to anything but the light fading from your vacant eyes.

'The hands of the king are the hands of a healer,' they had said; but though I had healed Éowyn, and Faramir, and Merry and unnumbered others, I could not save the one being in Arda that I loved above all others.  If I ever had the favor of the Valar, it deserted me that day.  Your life ebbed away beneath my hands despite my powers, my pleas, my prayers.  I do not even know if you heard my desperate entreaties to you not to leave me.  As the Eagles delivered Frodo and Sam from the inferno of Mount Doom, I closed your lifeless eyes and knew I was no king.

They fought me, of course – tried every appeal to logic, and duty, and guilt.  Only Frodo forbore entreating me.  He knew, as did I, the pain of losing what was most precious to him; knew as well the bitter guilt of being hailed as a hero while bearing the weight of his own failure. I do not think Frodo will remain long in the peace of the Shire.  For I could not remain in Minas Tirith.  I had sacrificed all the long years of my life to fighting the Shadow and eliminating the evil of Sauron.  Now that evil was ended, and I had nothing left to give.  Let Faramir rule as Steward, even as King in my stead if the people willed it – for the line of Elendil will end forever with me.  That much good, at least, would come of this – that Arwen, dearer than sister, need not sacrifice herself for me.  She was free to sail to the Undying Lands with Elrond and all the other Elves forsaking Middle Earth in this age of Men.  What good could come from another union of Men and Elves, with their power fading and their years ending?  Faramir's wedding to the White Lady of Rohan would unite the realms of Men far better than the Kingship of an unworthy pretender.

And so I dressed myself again in my stained Ranger garments, leaving Anduril and all the trappings of kingship behind.  I had hoped to slip away into the night unnoticed, but Gandalf was waiting for me at the stable gates, his ageless eyes filled with sorrow and compassion.  Long had he been my mentor, friend, impetus toward the final goal.  Would I have listened had I known the cost?  'They sent him back,' my heart cried bitterly; but now that the task was done and Sauron defeated, the tools were discarded.  We had served our purpose, and the Valar were deaf to my pleas.  I closed my eyes and fought against succumbing to the darkness.

'Where will you go?' he asked, and I realized that until that moment I had given no thought to my destination.  I could return North, to the lands I patrolled as a Ranger in my youth; but those lands would now be reunited with Gondor, and needed my protection no longer.  I could go South, but the lands of Harad and Khand were too near the Sea, and I would never endure the cry of the gulls, reminding me that you would never now take sail to Valinor.  I could go East, to the unnamed and desolate lands I had explored once before, and perhaps someday I would.  But for now, I realized, there was only one place I could go.

'Mirkwood,' I told him numbly.  'I owe it to Legolas to bring word of his … loss … to Thranduil.'  The Istari sighed, and placed his wrinkled hand on my head in farewell.  'May the blessings of the Valar go with you, Elessar,' he murmured.  But my faith in the Valar, like my claim to the name he used, I left behind me as I rode away.  I was Strider the Ranger again, nothing more.

I set Brego free in Rohan, for I had no further need of him, and I no longer had the right to bind any living thing to me when I had nothing to give in return.  I walked the rest of the weary miles to Mirkwood.  Perhaps I hoped Thranduil would order me slain, in retribution for my failure that cost the life of his son.  But he only stared at me as I stumbled through my confession, his eyes as cold and empty of emotion as my own must be.  He bade me go or stay as I chose, so long as I never crossed his path again.

And so I stay, wandering the woodlands you so loved, for there are still spiders to kill here, and I have nowhere else to go.  I do not know if the Elves have sailed, or merely shun me, for I have seen no one since leaving Thranduil's halls.  I spend my days seeking something to slay, and my nights in useless memory and regret.  Often am I tempted to put an end to this emptiness, but I know you would find it cowardly, you who always knew you would have to face the long ages of the world alone after my death.  So I endure, day after endless day.

The rain has begun at last, a cold and drenching downpour that will turn to snow before morning.  The icy drops fall on my head unheeded.  They are as nothing to the cold that penetrates my soul.

I am so weary of fighting.

If only I could sleep.

THE END