Destiny's Arrow

Trine

(The Hearts of Men)

The red sun rode low and stained the sky its bloody hue by the time Elessar’s party sighted Osgiliath. Horns sounded from the guard towers on either side of the gate. Their low, hollow voices seemed to fill the entire plain. At the gate stood Faramir, tall, brimming with dignity despite the shining scars across the knuckles of his right hand and along the high crest of his left cheekbone—these, souvenirs from the flames of his father’s despair. As they approached, Aragorn watched him raise his hand and heard him call in a loud, clear voice,

“Hail Elessar King! Hail Evenstar, Lady of the White Tree! Welcome all to Osgiliath!” Aragorn found himself smiling at the titles. He continued to gallop his steed apace until he had all but reached Faramir. Then, he reined the animal in and it stopped in a few short strides just in front of Faramir, who made no move to get out of the way. The king dismounted a little stiffly.

“Well met Faramir, Lord of Ithil,” beamed Aragorn. Faramir bowed low to the monarch. “Oh, bow not to me, brother,” said he, motioning for him to stand. The other stood, looking a little puzzled, but then held out his arms. Aragorn did likewise and they embraced like brothers long parted.

Faramir, then, went to Arwen where she sat still astride her horse and offered a hand to help her down. Her smile sent a thrill through him and raised gooseflesh on his arms. The touch of her hand prickled the hairs on the back of his neck. “You are lovelier than your reputation, more even than I had imagined, my lady. I am pleased to meet you at last,” said Faramir once Arwen had gotten to the ground. He bowed his head and kissed her hand that he still held as if it were little sturdier than a cloud and might evaporate if he jostled it too much. To all he said, “Forgive the state of my poor house. It is rather in disarray as we work to put it back in order after it has been all torn asunder by the passing of the eastern Darkness. But come in and we shall all dine together and sleep tonight under what solid roof is left.”

“There is no need to make such apologies Lord Faramir,” smiled Arwen as she took Aragorn’s arm. “But where is your Lady Eowyn? I have much desired to meet her. I am a great admirer of hers,” said the Evenstar quietly. Eowyn, a woman, had shown courage equal to—surpassing that of most of her kin. The lords of Rohan and Gondor now bowed to her as though she were a man herself. And Arwen was truly keen to meet such a woman.

“She is seeing to the preparation of your quarters. We are woefully shorthanded yet,” said Faramir. He was still awed almost to speechlessness by Arwen’s beauty and quiet, gracious manner. Then, three stablemen appeared at the gate accompanied by several other attendants who unburdened the horses. “Show everyone to their chambers,” he instructed the servants. “Aragorn, if you’ll with me, I’ll show you to your own room and we shall have some talk before dinner.” Aragorn nodded wordlessly. He released Arwen’s hand, leaned and kissed her cheek and then turned to follow Faramir into the city, leaving her to be shown to her own chamber.

The pair entered the city. Piles of rubble lay at the base of new masonry. A few walls still lay broken on the ground, but reconstruction was clearly underway. Great epic relief sculptures obviously crafted by skilled artisans stood out half finished from the white stone. He spoke with Faramir for several minutes about the rebuilding schedule and the rapidly approaching wedding. At last, they reached the door leading to the king’s guest accommodations.

“Good evening, my friend. Until dinner?” Faramir spoke cordially.

“Indeed. I look forward to it,” Aragorn answered. His companion bowed as he excused himself.

The heavy door opened into a long, damp corridor, lit on either side by torches set in high wall brackets and but a few small windows. It was a rather dreary little hallway leading to another door. On this door was emblazoned the emblem of Gondor, the White Tree. In the torch light, the twisting, twining white limbs seemed to dance as if in a gentle breeze. The design was a little worn about the edges. Clearly, these had always been the King’s chambers. The door swung open easily.

Inside was a room of far more sumptuous furnishings than he had expected. Rich red velvet hangings surrounded the high bed. Soft carpets covered the cool flagstone floor. A few comfortable looking chaises sat around the room and in one of them sat a figure. A woman. Golden hair fell in loose waves over her shoulders. Her pale eyes were placid against her sharp, somewhat heavy features. Her forehead was high and regal, and the blush of her fair cheek was like the first breath of love.

“My Lady Eowyn,” said Aragorn stiffly. She stood gracefully, seeming to grow up out of the ground. Her large blue, unblinking eyes were serene as she walked slowly toward him.

“Yes, my lord?” She purred the question as she continued to saunter towards him. “What do you desire?” She stopped, finally, and stood uncomfortably close.

“I desire nothing of you,” he said firmly.

“Of me?” she asked innocently. “I think, perhaps, his majesty presumes too much,” her tone soft and coy. “I simply wished to know if there was anything I could do to make my lord…,” she laid her hand on his chest, “more comfortable.” Her eyes and fingers moved downward over his dusty tunic. He caught her hand a little roughly when it reached his belt.

“If you wish to know what will make your lord more comfortable, you should go and ask him. I am sure he is yet but a little way from my door,” Aragorn growled, throwing her hand away from him and taking a step back. Her eyes blazed.

“Coward,” she hissed. They stood glaring at one another a moment longer before she made to storm out, furious at his rejection. Aragorn did not turn to watch her go. He had not even heard the door open when he heard another voice. “Beloved?” it said. He turned, and there at the door stood not Eowyn, but Arwen. He stared agape. But then the haze of confusion condensed into anger.

”Witch!” he cried. “What foul sorcery, what deception is this?” he spat. Rage swelled in him like a hot tide. His fingers itched to encircle the neck of whatever demon stood before him, a counterfeit of his love. “Do you dare come before me clad in a cheap wisp of scullery magic, Eowyn? Masquerading as her that I love above all el…”

“But I am she,” said Arwen, unmoved by his fury. “I am she that you love above all else. And as you love me, so do I, you,” she said in her mourning dove voice. The sound of it in his ears disarmed him and the wave of his anger was reduced to a feeble ripple that broke as upon a shoal. “I had to be sure. I had to know for certain that you would not be so easily tempted astray. I am sorry for deceiving you. But I had to be sure, my love,” she said apologetically.
“Of course,” he answered slowly. “Forgive my temper.”

“It is forgotten,” she purred. “And now, we are alone at last,” she said, her eyebrow twitched once suggestively. Arwen moved gracefully back to him. Her hips undulated smoothly as she glided toward him. “We shan’t be disturbed for some time, Elessar. You have been away so long,” she lowered her eyes demurely. There was a long fragile pause as he waited to hear what she would say next. Anticipation grew in him. It swelled and rushed as the blood in his ears and elsewhere. She could feel the heat radiating from his entire body as he fought back the urge to take her lips fiercely, to possess her fully. “…Will you take me to your bed?” she whispered, at last meeting his gaze again. Her eyes were painfully, achingly innocent, like the depths of a glassy, still lake on a crisp, dewy summer morning.

“I cannot. Not yet. We will be married in but a short few days. I am content to wait until then for tradition’s sake,” said Aragorn, exhaling shakily. He took her slender hand and kissed it gently. It took every speck of restraint he could muster to resist her, but he was determined. She sighed heavily.

“Will you lie down beside me then, at least?” she asked, sounding defeated. His weathered face split into a wide smile, deepening the wrinkles at the corners of his weary eyes. “This place is unfamiliar to me, and I do not wish to be alone.”

“Of course,” he whispered. In one quick move, he swept her off the floor. She was somewhat heavier than he remembered, but he barely noticed. He carried her to the tall bed, and laid her gently upon it. He circled the bed and crawled from the other side across the expanse of crimson and gold brocade to lie next to her.

“Will you take off your tunic, beloved?” Wordlessly, he undid the hooks at the front and shrugged it off. Her skin was cool on his chest through the linen shirt.

“Will you take off your boots, beloved?” she asked after a moment.

“Of course,” he replied, and slowly kicked them off. The soles of her bare feet were soft against the callused tops of his. Arwen turned to face him, her icy, blue, unblinking eyes smoldered with lust like the white hot coals at the heart of the fire. “Arwen, my beloved Evenstar, I will not shame you so. When, three nights hence, your lovely Eärendil shines in the deepening dark, then will I come to you and all through the night will I teach you my love with such kisses and caresses so soft as these rough hands can manage. I swear it. Please now, let me lie by you knowing you are as content as I simply to lie together after so long a time apart.” She turned her back to him again.

“Are you afraid? Have your years begun to take their toll on your body?”

“Your years are greater than mine. Are you so impatient after so many thousand years that you cannot wait three days to make our love? And would you have it in a strange bed, in a house that is not our own?” he answered.

“I would have you. You, Aragorn, and you only matter. Where, and how, and when mean nothing to me. Just your body and mine. Our hearts and souls twined together into one. Do you blame me for not wanting to wait three more days to experience what I have waited all these thousands of years for?”

“Arwen. Please, my most beautiful and cherished love, let me lie by you in peace.”

“Can it be that you have reconsidered? Do you no longer want me as you once did?” she breathed.

“I want you…more than the air I breathe,” he sighed. Aragorn’s voice was husky with desire and she doubted him no more. Every muscle in his body seemed to contract suddenly as her fingers pressed into the inner part of his thigh just above his knee. He held his breath as she dragged her fingers upward toward the inside of his hip, missing the yearning flesh of his manhood by only the merest span. His swelling desire began to ache as it strained against the leather of his breeches. “Please, Arwen, cease this torment. I beg you,” said the king, but he made no move to stop her as she softly brushed her lips against his.

“Of course I will,” she purred once again. Deftly, she loosened the laces of his breeches and the ache that had been growing steadily worse eased a little. It grew painful once again when, slowly, she slid her body down along his. He felt her warm breath against his neck, then his chest. Down along his belly toward his waist she moved, trailing her fingers following the path her mouth had taken. Her long fingers tugged at his waist and, slowly—agonizingly slowly, his breeches slid down over his thighs. She met his eyes smiling. “I have imagined this moment for a long time.”

“Is it everything you hoped for?” asked Aragorn.

“More,” purred the elf. She kissed the tip of his penis and, with an inward sense of satisfaction, felt him jolt beneath her. “May I, at least, do this much for you?”

“This much…,” he whispered his consent. And with a long moan he laid back as her tongue began to caress his thick member. He too had longed for this encounter. Relaxing, his hands found her. He knotted his fingers in her long, dark tresses.

Pain had, for so long, been the only sensation he was accustomed to, that the intensity of the pleasure she caused came as something of a shock to him, and he found himself struggling to master the urge to succumb completely to it. Arwen seemed not to notice. He watched as she pursed her full lips around his shaft and began to suck gently as she worked the rough flat of her tongue against the prominent vein on the underside of his manhood. He felt his body reacting unbidden to her cunning ministrations. His hips rocked rhythmically with her. As she moved faster, so did he. She led him to the brink, testing, and pushing him as she went until, finally, she stopped, leaving him unspent.

“May I kiss you, Elessar?” asked the elf innocently. Aragorn sat up. He gazed hungrily into her blue eyes.

“You are so beautiful.”

“Now, surely, you must see that beauty is not all I have to offer,” she said, smiling. She watched as the desire faded from his eyes and was replaced by something else—something much more akin to sorrow.

“Have you believed all this time that beauty and pleasure are all that you mean to me?”

“Kiss me,” she commanded. He continued only to look at her.

“I love you…more than time. More than all of this Middle Earth. And it is not only because you are the most fantastically beautiful woman who has ever graced this hateful world. I love you because you gave me a reason to embrace my destiny…to become the man I was meant to be. For that, I thank you and I love you,” he finished. As he spoke he watched her move smoothly to a new position. She gathered her skirts up about her hips. Her legs straddled his waist and she sat lightly on his lower abdomen with her warm, full buttocks torturously close to his throbbing member.

“And I love you,” she leaned closer. Aragorn could feel her breath. “With all…,” she pressed her soft lips against his forehead, “…my…,” her mouth caressed the side of his neck as she raised her hips, “…heart,” she breathed the word sensuously onto his parted lips as she slid down, slowly letting his thick shaft part her warm, soft lips. He gasped, unprepared for the ecstatic jolt that shot through him like a lightning bolt. The muscles of his pelvis convulsed once and as she moved he was almost overcome. He gripped her hips tightly, holding her in place to give his heart time to slow and his blood time to cool.

Slowly, she began to rock against him. Their bodies moved as one—inevitable and reactionary as rolling waves. Her pleasure broke over him, irresistibly bearing him to greater heights. She held his gaze with her ice blue eyes, undulating her hips so that he moved smoothly in and out of her. Her eyes fluttered closed for a moment as the king clutched at her hips, pulling her down hard upon him.

“Tell me. Tell me now that you love me,” she breathed shakily.

“I love you more than the stars, Arwen. Call me by my name,” he said.

“Estel,” said a voice. But it was not the voice of the woman astride him. Aragorn’s gaze jerked abruptly toward the door and he stopped cold at the sight that met him. Arwen stood framed in the doorway. Her grey eyes were sad. Her pale skin was not flushed with anger and she had not yelled his name. He blinked and shook his head as though trying to clear blurred vision. But when he opened his eyes again, there she still stood.

A lock of hair brushed his chest and when he looked, it was not ebony, but golden. He felt his eyes widen wildly as he looked up into the face of Eowyn, Lady of the Mark—Faramir’s wife. A look of shock that resembled his own greeted him.

Fury flared in him as though a spark had fallen amongst dry leaves.
“Demon!” he bellowed. Aragorn thrust his arms under her thighs and threw her from him onto the floor.

“I’m sorry,” whispered Arwen, tears welling in her eyes. “I was mistaken in you, Estel.”

“No! Beloved, I thought she was you. I was deceived. I would never…I wish only to be worthy of you. Of your trust.”

“It appears, my lord,” said Eowyn from the floor as she tried to compose herself, “that you have failed in that aim.”

“Silence, witch!” Aragorn barked. “Arwen…,”

“Peace be yours. Rule your kingdom well.” And without so much as a farewell, she turned to leave.

“No!” his shout stopped her, her hand on the door latch.

“What more is there to say? You’ve shown me how…mortal your love for me is. I cannot stay.” A millennium ago, she’d have given anything for such an excuse to have the life she’d wanted, but now—now she had accepted her destiny. She loved Aragorn. And she felt as though her heart was being torn in two. It was true that the larger part belonged to Legolas, but she had ignored it for so long that now the man held more sway than the elf.

“Please, Arwen. I am mortal. I was deceived as mortals sometimes may be,” pleading in his voice.

“You could only have been deceived, my lord, if some part of you wanted me,” murmured Eowyn.

“I…,” he sputtered, but he could not say it. Much as he wanted, much as he needed to deny that any part of him desired her, he could not. And he would not lie to his Evenstar.

“You saw what you needed to see to pacify your conscience,” smiled the honey haired woman, making no offer to depart.

“Be gone, witch!” he roared, “Before I tell your husband what you have done. I want no part of you.”

“But you do,” said Arwen quietly. “I know little of the magic of the field, but I know that it is not true magic. It is mostly concerned with the twisting of the senses. With telling fortunes from the waves the winds make in the grass as they roll across the plains. And rarely does it come to any good for any but the one who weaves the spell.”

“At least it comes good for someone. Your cowardly brand of tree witchery comes to naught but misery for all,” spat Eowyn, contempt on her face and in her voice now that she spoke to the elf rather than to Aragorn.

“Farewell,” said the Evenstar simply.

“And where will you go? I dare say…,” began the Lady of Ithil

“You dare more than say,” shot the elf.

“I dare say you will not return to Minas Tirith.”

“No. Never again will I look upon its white battlements, they will ever be dull in my eyes. Fare you well, beloved,” and Arwen made to leave.

“Please, Arwen…Undomiel…Tinuviel, I beg you. Is there nothing in your own long life, no blemish, no fault that can forgive me?” implored the king.

“I shall say again, that you could not have been deceived if you had not wanted me,” Eowyn interjected. Aragorn suddenly sprang from the bed with a growl, his face flushed and contorted with anger.

“You have said enough!” he yelled as he grabbed a fistful of her golden hair and maneuvered her roughly across the room, opened the door wide and flung her into the drafty corridor. She turned. A blue flame danced in her eyes as she spoke,

“Tell me, Aragorn, one thing. When you gazed loving into her eyes, as you moved inside me, what color were they?” He slammed the door. Her words rang in his ears. He had been pierced by Eowyn’s icy eyes, not captivated by Arwen’s grey ones. He realized it now.

“They were blue, Arwen. I was a fool. Please don’t go. Please. I beg you, stay with me.”
She could not speak. Legolas filled her mind completely.

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AN: So here’s the latest. I told you I wouldn’t let it die. ~DR