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The Mariessë, Elendil’s ship that was supposed to bring them safely home to Númenor, rocked violently across the sea. The Queen Regent and the survivors of her army had left middle-earth three days prior, after Míriel had promised Galadriel that they would return with a vengeance.
Now, after the Queen Regent had had some time to let events settle in and run them over and over in her mind, she wasn’t so sure if she could keep that promise. Acting now from a vantage point of defeat would make it difficult to justify her cause in court and rally up new troops. Much more so considering her own physical state.
The large ship lurched again and Míriel braced her hands against the sides of the bed that was built into a nook of the cabin.
The whole day the sea had been wild and pushed the ship from one side to the other, making it hard for everyone to keep their footing. Míriel was not foolish enough to try to ride the waves standing. She stayed seated on the bed in the captain’s cabin which she inhabited for the voyage back. Leaning her back against the headboard, she struggled with accepting that she was anchored to her current location not just by the storm, but also by her blindness, which made the rolling of the ship underneath her even worse.
She heard the shouts of the sea guard outside doing their best to keep the ship on course. In between the captain’s voice barked a command, sometimes passing close by her door while doing so. Hearing Elendil’s voice was like a light in the dark for her and she kept listening for it, holding on to the sound in her mind. Míriel desperately needed something that kept her anchored to the present to avoid getting sucked into her own personal abyss again. She had visited this abyss far too many times these last days and feared that at some point she would not be able to escape it anymore. Her mind seemed to calm when the captain’s voice brushed her ears, she drew some comfort from it she couldn’t quite explain.
Elendil checked in on her several times, making sure she was secure, informing her about the developments on deck and on the weather.
During his first visit she hit her head hard on the side of the bed as the Mariessë leaned violently to the side. Míriel’s hands were groping for something to hold on to when she felt one hand on her shoulder, steading her and his other hand take hers, pressing it shortly, reassuringly.
“Are you all right?” He sounded worried. “We have weathered worse storms, my Queen. We will get through this one.”
She wasn’t sure if he really meant the storm or whatever else they had been through, but she managed a nod.
“Here, that will help.” Leaning slightly over her, Elendil guided her left hand to a small nook in the wall which just left room for a short, carved handle. “It has saved me quite a few times from a tumble out of the bed when we encountered unexpected turbulences.”
His familiar scent of water and salt almost overwhelmed her. She wanted to reach out and pull her trustful companion and guide over the last days closer, wanted to hold on to him for dear life as if he could somehow make everything that had happened disappear and wake her from this hellish nightmare.
A “Thank you,” was all she managed, her fingers gripping the wooden handle instead, wondering why she had’t detected it before.
Too soon his scent and warmth left her as his hand slipped away and he stepped back from the bed. Her right hand felt the damp spot he left on the sheets from the ocean spray and rain that clung to his clothes.
“Do you need anything else, my Queen?”
There was genuine concern in Elendil’s voice. Míriel shook her head, the small movement causing it to throb violently.
“Thank you, I’m …fine,” she managed and was almost surprised that her voice sounded relatively calm compared to the turmoil she constantly felt raging inside of her.
The captain’s footsteps moved closer to the door, and she heard him throw his rain cloak over his shoulders. “I’ll come back later; we should make it through this storm front soon.”
Before Míriel could answer the door clicked shut as another wave crashed agains the ship’s hull and pitched her sideways.
Silently she prayed that no one would go overboard.
Tar-Míriel had always prided herself with having solid sea legs, normally nothing would make her feel queasy. The rise and fall of the sea used to be something soothing and as a child she had loved the races with the smaller boats that bounced over the waves, the higher the more fun it was. The sea had always been a part of her, of her island, of her people. Now it seemed it had turned against her. Just like the gods seemed to have turned against her. She had thought she had acted in their will by following the elf into the foreign lands. Apparently, she had read the signs wrong.
While trying to keep her balance and not lose the grip on the handle, the last image she had seen came back to her again in an endless loop. The burning hut that buried Isildur while he, Valandil and herself tried to save some of the people trapped inside. She could still taste the ash in her mouth from the volcanic eruption of Mount Orodruin, could still feel the hot sparks sear her flesh. She remembered Valandil pulling her back when the roof crashed down, half protecting her with his body. He had saved her that fateful day, the way she had not been able to save Elendil’s son.
Her eyes had hurt so much, the burning pain all that she could feel for horrible long moments. They had watered with tears when before she had thought the searing heat had dried up every drop of water inside of her. For a while Míriel had hoped that the tears would wash away the burning and clear her sight as she had felt Valandil’s hands pull her away from the debris and up on her feet. She still had his voice in his ear, shouting for Isildur, shouting to her, but she couldn’t remember the exact words, only that she could not let go of his arm, could not let her grip stray from his shoulder while he had finally led her away to find the other survivors.
With effort Míriel forced her focus back into the present. She noticed that the ship’s violent movements had lessened. Listening to the voices outside, the barking commands had also lost some of their edge.
Exhausted from the exertion of keeping her balance, Míriel closed her eyes for a moment.
Over time the violent rocking slowly gave way to a more regular sway, until it evened out at some point, and everything became calmer. The Mariessë then glided gently through the waves, only softly rising up and down. The sea was relatively quiet now it seemed, only a slight breeze pushing the great ship forward. They must have broken through the edge of the storm, and the weather had calmed down considerably.
Only then Míriel dared to stand up, bracing herself against the wooden wall of the cabin, stretching her legs a bit, testing her balance. It felt good to stand after having been cramped up on the bed for the duration of the tempest.
Was it dark yet? Probably. She had lost track of time.
Turning her head towards the window above the table, she didn’t notice a change in the shadows before her eyes. There were still only small differences in the shades of grey she perceived, no matter how bright the light was. In the relative dark of the cabin, she did not wear the blindfold the healers had told her to cover her eyes with for the first days, especially when at sea, to protect them from the bright light. Not that it made a difference. With every passing day that brought no change in her vision she lost hope that it would ever return.
The pain had lessened a little, but that was the only comfort she experienced. Deep down she somehow felt that she would never get her sight back completely, but she still prayed for at least some progress, even if it was only shapes or colors, anything that would make orientation a bit easier. Just a little bit of light to comfort her, to guide her.
She closed her eyes to stop herself from straining them too much in the desperate attempt to make something out.
After concentrating on the now regular rhythm of the great ship beneath her feet for a few moments she dared to let her hand drop from the wall to find the table a few paces away. Her fingertips brushed the tabletop. The surface in front of her still held the map she and the captain had studied together on their journey towards middle-earth, planning and plodding to find the best and quickest way to arrive to Tirharad. Why it had not been pitched on the floor was a miracle.
Then Míriel remembered that it was fixed to the table as her fingers skimmed over one of the short strings knotted to a ringed eye on each end. The strings were fixed to small hooks at the table legs.
Fiddling with the corner of the waxed paper she had to resist the urge to crumple the map in her hands, much good it would do for her now with her useless eyes. It was so frustrating and debilitating. How would she be able to lead her people now if she couldn’t fulfill the simplest task alone anymore just because she could not see?
She sighed and pulled back her hand. Míriel knew that those thoughts would lead nowhere.
When had she become so petty that she only thought about her own discomfort, and not about how much the rest of her people suffered? The losses they dealt with. Some far greater than hers. How must Elendil suffer from the greatest loss a father could ever experience and still carry out his duties and even care for her?
A knock on her cabin door brought her reeling mind to a sudden stop. The Queen Regent shook her head and pulled herself back to the present. She turned to face the door.
“Come!” She answered simply, recognizing the knock.
“Queen Regent,” the young man greeted her, and she heard the insecurity in his voice because he was sent to disturb her. The crew was very aware of her reclusion these days.
“What is it Valandil?” She tried to gentle her voice, reminding herself that no one was to blame for what had happened, much less the young man of the sea guard who had guided her to safety.
“I’m supposed to inform you that the captain will join you for dinner shortly.”
“And why can the captain not inform me about that himself?” She inquired.
“Because he is…” Valandil’s voice broke off as another voice cut in.
“… getting the tray with the food from the galley,” the deep baritone of Elendil finished the sentence. He smiled at Valandil, and the young man bowed his head in the direction of Míriel out of a habit before retreating.
“Captain, I’ll be at my post.”
Míriel heard his soft treads walk away, wondering if he and Elendil had shared some kind of look between them.
“Elendil.” She nodded in his direction. Her gaze was focused somewhere below Elendil’s chin. “What a surprise to be served food by the ship’s captain himself,” the Queen Regent remarked levelly.
“You must eat something.”
“Hm. Must I?” she raised a challenging eyebrow.
“Yes,” he answered simply not raising to the bait. He pressed his luck. “If you don’t mind, Queen Regent, I will join you for dinner.”
“Yes, so I was told.”
Elendil had wondered if it was appropriate to suggest dining with the Queen Regent. Most of the trays that had come back from her the past days had still held most of the food. He asked himself if some company might get her to eat something.
Her voice cut through his thoughts. “Surely you have more pressing matters to attend to.”
Elendil was not sure if that was meant as a dismissal, but he simply answered: “No, everything is under control again.”
At least here it is, Míriel thought bitterly, but pushed the feeling aside and forced a very small smile on her lips.
“Well, then please eat with me,” she conceded.
She wasn’t too keen on being watched while trying to eat. This had become a whole new level of difficulty if one couldn’t see what was being served. But a part of her wanted him to stay, wanted some distraction from her dark thoughts. Also, as she was not able to see his face anymore Míriel concentrated more on Elendil’s beautiful voice. It had become her anchor. For that alone she wanted him to stay.
He was the only person, maybe besides Valandil, whom she tolerated near her, as both of them had shown a practicality regarding her infirmity where others had only shown pity. She could not and would not tolerate pity.
“Then let me set the table.” Elendil stepped inside, holding the tray in one hand, closing the cabin door with the other.
Not wanting to get into his way in the small space she felt for the chair next to her and sat down. Folding her hands in her lap she listened to the captain placing the tray on the table in front of her.
Elendil then lightened a ship lamp, or so she thought from the sounds of the striking match and the clinking the lamp made when he hung it on the hook above the window. So, it must have been dark already. Not that it made a great difference to her, but he would need the light to see.
Míriel heard him then slip off the strings of the map, sliding it off the wooden surface from under the tray. He rolled it up and stored it in a small shelf behind the door. The chair next to her on her left scraped against the wooden floor and creaked slightly as the captain folded his long frame into it.
He placed two plates and cups on the table, one each in front of her and one where he had sat down.
The liquid in the cups smelled of red wine, and the food… was that cheese? And fruits?
Míriel had always hated to ask for help, even as a child she had always tried to find a solution herself first before requesting support. She hated being helpless and dependent on someone, even though as a Queen Regent she needed staff and counselors. But she had always had the choice. To listen to them or to be waited upon - or not. And during the course of the years with her father’s health declining she had led blessing ceremonies, had run Númenor’s politics, had led an army across the sea into foreign lands. Now she couldn’t even find her way around a simple plate of food.
Over the past days she had begun to realize that she would need a lot of help in the future even for little things. It also dawned on her that now she would have to teach the people close to her to understand her needs. For that, she had to speak up and ask the uncomfortable questions. And she absolutely refused to probe the content of the plate with her fingers before knowing what it was. Míriel desperately wanted to maintain at least some of her dignity.
She swallowed her pride. “What is on the plate?”
Elendil looked up from his own food and regarded her closely. He understood that the question had not come lightly over her lips.
The ships lamp cast a warm glow on her still beautiful face. The burns she had suffered from the eruption were mostly superficial and would probably heal without scars. That her eyesight had not improved yet, however, did not bore for good news. Just like her he still had to learn how to deal with the consequences of her injuries and what they meant for her daily life. He had to remember that she needed so many more verbal cues now when information could have been transmitted by a single glance before.
Míriel waited for his answer. She could still hear him breathing, otherwise she would have thought the captain had miraculously vanished from the cabin.
Finally, the captain seemed to have found his voice again. He cleared his throat and explained matter of factly: “Two slices of bread are on the left side of the plate, two pieces of cheese on the bottom, a sliced apple to the right. Apologies, for the simple meal. No chance for the galley crew to cook a warm meal as long as we sketched along the storm front throughout the day.”
“No apologies needed, Captain. This is just fine.” Míriel was glad about the choice, it meant for her that it was easy to eat without worrying to spill the food.
“There is a cup of wine on the upper right side behind the plate.” Elendil added when he watched her slide her hands slowly along the rim of the plate to familiarize herself with its location on the table.
“Thank you.” Her right fingertips connected with the cup. The wine smelled of ripe cherries and oak. Míriel took a sip and let the rich liquid slide down her throat. She had always liked the local, dark red wine they grew in Númenor.
Placing the cup back in its former place to easily find it again she then broke off some bread and bit into a piece of cheese. Only then she noticed that she was actually a little hungry. She chewed slowly, savoring the taste on her tongue.
The captain took a hearty bite from his food, relieved to see the Queen Regent actually eating something.
“Have we cleared the storm front completely or is there another to be expected?” Míriel asked before Elendil could think of something to say.
“We are clear so far, my Queen. The weather should be relatively calm for the rest of the voyage. I hope you have not been tossed about too much. There were some heavy waves. How is your head?”
“Call me Míriel.” She simply stated. She did not feel much like a queen these past days and while she still couldn’t understand what she was feeling for the captain, she knew she didn’t want titles to stand between them. Before he could react to that, she added: “My head is fine. The food will certainly help with the queasiness.”
“Míriel.” He acquiesced.
It sounded like he tasted her name on his tongue like a new and precious dish, savoring it, letting it delicately slip across his lips. In no other voice vibrated so many different emotions than when the captain pronounced her name with his deep baritone. It sent a shiver down the regent’s back and she drew in her breath, hoping he wouldn’t notice her reaction.
“Actually, I’ve always liked the simple food best,” Elendil tried to continue the conversation. Then he wanted to bite his tongue. Surely the queen was used to much better food and elaborate dinner affaires, but Míriel just threw a small smile in his direction.
“I know what you mean.”
“Oh!” Now the captain was actually surprised.
“What? Did you think I only preferred five course meals from golden plates?” She teased him, biting into a crispy piece of apple.
“No, I… um, I just…” he stammered, not sure what to answer.
She turned her face towards the captain as if wanting to study him. “I’m sorry, I didn’t want to make you uncomfortable with my remark.”
The blatant observation surprised the captain a second time. Only now he recovered before opening his mouth.
“Well, I guess I never really thought about your dinner choices before,” he then chuckled.
The sound tickled Míriel’s ears and she felt her heartbeat accelerate.
“Actually, this food,” she pointed at the table, distracting herself from her still confusing physical reactions towards the man sitting next to her, “was the food my father took with us on the rare occasions that we were able to spend time together. I was still a child then, but once in a while he took me riding and we made a picnic. We always had fresh bread, cheese and some kind of fruit to eat, something easy to carry along on the horses. No wine for me of course, though my father always would let me have a tiny sip if I nagged him long enough.” Míriel smiled fondly at the memory.
Elendil studied her. She looked livelier than when he had entered the cabin. For a short moment he saw the regal mask slip, and caught a glimpse of the woman Míriel could have been. Carefree and happy, had she not been born to the path that now lay before her.
“I remember Anárion always begging me and my wife during supper to let him taste the wine or beer, depending on what we were having. He was still so little then, but always wanted to have the grown-up drinks,” Elendil offered this glimpse into his past with a chuckle and the queen regent smiled with him. She was grateful that he had shared one of his memories with her.
“It is always special what you can’t have, it seems,” Míriel answered then wistfully.
“That it is,” Elendil murmured, almost to himself.
The happy memories faded, and both were pulled back into the present.
Part of Míriel observed the whole scene wondering how she could talk of such banalities as picnics and forbidden drinks, but another part of her knew she would need such lighter moments now and in the future in order to keep her sanity.
Way to soon the lightness she had felt faded, and the now familiar heaviness settled on her heart again.
Darkness would await her; her father had warned. But that was not all. The despair that came with it was so much worse than the gray curtain before her eyes.
The desperation and guilt about everything that had happened seemed to grow every day, with every inch they came closer to Númenor. The six days it roughly took for the fast Númenorean ships to sail the distance had not seemed fast enough on their way to Middle-Earth. Now, Míriel was not so sure that this was time enough to get ready to face the consequences of her decisions – and the people who had lost loved ones in this battle.
She had not even found the courage to ask Elendil how he was feeling, how he was dealing with the loss of his other son. He would never be able to make any future memories with Isildur. All this sorrow her decisions had caused!
Suddenly it became hard to bear the captain’s presence.
Míriel stood up abruptly and held on to the back of her chair, while turning away from Elendil, swallowing hard.
“Thank you for the food, Captain.” She managed. If he was surprised at her sudden change of mood, she didn’t want to know.
His chair scraped over the wooden floor as he stood up and collected the plates. He knew when he was dismissed. Still, he wondered what had caused the dark shadow to be cast over the Queen again when she was smiling a moment ago.
His rich baritone washed over her. “Will you need anything else?”
Such a simple question with such a complicated endless answer.
She needed so much….
Belatedly she remembered to answer him with a small shake of her head. She averted her face, not wanting him to see her and waited until his steps receded.
When she heard the click of the door all strength seeped out of her body. She had yet to cry, even though the feelings had tried to overwhelm her ever so often in the past days, she had willed herself to hold the tears at bay.
Now, the conversation with Elendil, hearing him fondly speaking about his surviving son, brought back all the losses, the devastation, the destruction, the despair, the physical and emotional pain. The fragile barriers she had erected to keep them at bay broke like toothpicks in the hand of an orc.
The knot in her stomach tightened and pushed the last resolve she had out with a silent scream. The shock caught up with her and she heard a dry, raspy sob escape her throat. And another.
Míriel managed to find her bed, curled up into a tight ball and let the tears run freely. Soon she was sobbing uncontrollably, her body shaking and cramping, making it hard for her to breathe. An iron fist squeezed her heart, pulling at her, dragging her down into a darkness so deep that Míriel was not sure she would ever find her way back to the light.
Light.
What had been a feeling shrouded in doubts over the past days, became now a conviction. Besides everything else she had to come to terms with, she now knew that she would never see again.
She would forever feel locked inside her body, would never be able to experience the outside world with her own eyes again, the beauty, the colors, the people, the faces, the conversations only relayed through a look or a gesture…
The realization of what this meant, especially in her position, with all the political pitfalls surrounding her, knocked the breath out of her. Her arms slung around her knees she pressed her legs harder and harder against her chest, unable to control her sobbing or making the tears stop. She wanted to melt into herself, disappear from this world and its darkness.
Míriel did not disappear, much as she wished it at that moment. Instead, an understanding dawned on her at some point.
The Valar let her live - but not without a price. At least it should not be made easy for her. This blindness was her punishment to serve as a constant reminder of the consequences of her decisions. Stripped of every visual distraction and though burdened with the impracticability of it, her path seemed clear now. She was still alive to go back to Númenor and lead her people further on to fight against this rising evil.
Coming to this conclusion almost felt like a relief.
………..
Emotionally and physically exhausted, she must have fallen asleep against her will at some point.
The next thing Miriel knew was that a strangled scream jerked her awake.
She sat up, panting, her hands frantically brushing against the tangled bedspreads, turning her head from left to right trying to orient herself, to make some sense of her surroundings.
Finally, after agonizing moments, the pictures of the dream faded, and reality started to sink in. She heard her own labored breathing. She registered the texture of the woolen bedspread beneath her fingers, the beads of sweat rolling down her back, the light sway of the ship beneath her. Míriel sank back into her pillows forcing her breath to slow down, her racing mind to calm.
She realized that it must have been she herself who had screamed. Relieved she noticed that apparently no one outside had heard her. She strained her ears but didn’t hear anyone moving around. It felt like it was still in the middle of the night as no typical noises from the ship deck reached her ears, no footfalls on the wooden deck or shouts of the sailors.
She felt no desire to go back to her dreams, they were the reason why she had avoided sleep for as long as possible. She couldn’t find rest. The nightmares would come, they always came.
Míriel pulled herself up and sat on her bed. She just stared unseeing into the dark, lost in her thoughts again, the world tuned out around her, letting herself fall deeper and deeper into the welcoming abyss.
……
As the morning light etched along the Eastern horizon, Elendil knocked on the Queen Regent’s door again. Neither then nor later came a reaction.
Worried he stepped inside the cabin when the sun had risen above the ocean and closed the door.
“Queen Regent,” he spoke to her gently.
Sitting on the bed Míriel seemed awake but was not reacting to him when he addressed her.
“Queen Regent.” He tried again. There still came no reaction from her.
Elendil wondered what he should do.
Ever since being reunited with her after the volcanic eruption and the discovery that she had lost her sight he tried to support her whenever possible.
He couldn’t imagine how she must feel about everything that had happened since the victory of saving Bronwyn’s people; of being on the verge of installing Halbrand as the re-found king of the Southlands and then everything being turned into death and defeat in the blink of an eye by the explosion of that god damned mountain.
She had always seemed strong and sure of herself. Even after her injury, once they had reached the encampment, and she had an overview of who had survived she had started to divide people into work groups. Some were helping to tend to the injured, others taking stock of their materials and food, another group was responsible for securing the grounds and surroundings. She had made sure that tents, medical care and food where distributed between the survivors, no matter if Númenoreans or Southlanders.
The queen regent had shown to be a true leader, knowing the people needed someone to guide them through this disaster. He never heard her complain once about her own injuries or what she was personally going through.
Only after arriving on the Mariessë, when for the first time in days there was nothing else to do for her, Elendil had seen her shoulders sag under the invisible weight she carried, a forlorn look about her while she stood at the railing by herself.
He had guided her into her cabin shortly after they left the Bay of Belfalas and entered the open sea. That was the last time she had left it. Whenever he visited her, her face looked gaunter, pain seemed to be etched deeper into her features. Elendil worried about her and that she would break under the weight of it all.
The captain knew he could not take the burden away from her. They could not make anything that happened undone. But he swore to himself he would try to help her carry that weight and hoped he would also learn to live with his own horrible loss over time.
The events had created a bond between them. He could not quite describe which quality that bond possessed, but he knew it was there. He was tied to the queen regent on some higher level that escaped his words.
Casting his gaze on her, noting that she had still not reacted to him, he sat down and spoke to her again. He did not dare to touch her without warning to pull her back from whatever depth her mind had fallen into. He kept talking.
Míriel registered at some point a soft, well-known voice that found its way through her fog. She fought it at first and didn’t want to follow it, she wanted to stay in that realm where everything seemed so far away and could not touch her. But the deep baritone vibrated in her ears and her chest, pulling her back to her surroundings.
“Míriel…my Queen…”
Míriel’s eyelids fluttered. Slowly, very slowly she turned her head towards him, looking as if coming out of a deep haze. She took a couple of ragged breaths.
Míriel knew that she could not stay in that void forever, even though the horrors seemed so far away there, the pain and devastation was at least dulled to a level she could bear. It was hard to let go of that place, but she forced herself and took stock of her surroundings again.
The captain was sitting besides her on the bed, she felt the dip in the mattress. She didn’t know for how long he was already there, but she registered that the back of his hand slightly touched hers.
Slowly Míriel wrapped her fingers around his. She didn’t even ask herself if she was overstepping boundaries here. In this moment Míriel needed something to hold on to. Something – or someone who kept her anchored so she would not let her mind slip back into that place where everything hurt less.
“I…I…” she was at a loss of what to say, how to explain.
“You don’t need to say anything. I understand.” Elendil tried to sooth her.
“No. No. You don’t understand,” she said tiredly, shaking her head.
Elendil looked at their entwined hands and waited for her to continue.
“I… You can never understand the guilt I will carry for the rest of my life, the burden I must carry for all the deaths that I caused with my decisions. Your son is dead, Elendil! He will never come back because of decisions I made!” Tears burned at the corner of her eyes and then spilled again down her face when she thought she had none to spare anymore. “I’m so sorry,” she whispered. “So sorry.”
“I know,” he answered equally as quiet. “I know you are.”
Míriel lifted her hand, let it hover for a moment at the height of his chest, as if unsure what to do with it. Elendil looked down at it and as if sensing his gaze Míriel pulled her arm back. She didn’t know what she had expected, but certainly not this calm answer. How could he not rage against her in the face of his tragedy?
She so wished she could see his feelings reflected in his eyes, so she would know what to expect. He offered no more words, but he didn’t retreat either.
“How long have you been here? I didn’t hear you come in,” she then asked, wiping the tears from her cheeks with both hands.
“Apologies my Queen. I didn’t mean to intrude, but you didn’t react to my knock or call. I was worried…”
“It is all right. I’m grateful you are here.” She took a deep breath, weighing how much she could reveal of herself, but then came to the conclusion that Elendil had already seen her at her worst. “I have never experienced something like that before. It felt like my mind wanted to stray to a place where nothing hurt anymore. It was hard to come back.” Her voice sounded hoarse, and her eyes burned from all the crying.
Elendil wished he could look her in the eyes and assure her that she was not alone, that he was still here for her. He wondered if he should take her hand again but stopped himself, before he said: “You need to give yourself time to grieve.”
He paused for a moment, before he acknowledged: “We both do.”
There, he’d said it. He could not keep up his hopes that Isildur was still alive. It would ruin him. He needed to accept the inevitable truth, as hard as it was.
Miriel gave a nod and sensed he wanted to add something.
“And in your case...” he stopped, not sure if he should continue, but Elendil figured they were past being just a loyal subject and his queen. In this whole new situation, they found themselves in, from whatever it was that grew between them to facing the aftermath of the events in Middle-Earth, Míriel now more than ever was in dire need of someone she could trust to speak the truth and to speak openly.
She seemed to have the same train of thought. “No need to gloss over words. Not between us.”
Elendil took a deep breath before continuing. “You in addition have to learn to cope with the loss of your vision. That is no small feat either. Even though I still hope that you’ll regain your sight.”
“No.” Míriel shook her head. “I don’t think that will change. Because one thing I understood in all this chaos is that this the way it’s supposed to be. It is my punishment. The punishment for the wrong choices I made, the deaths I caused.”
“No!” Elendil did not want to believe that. He took a breath to answer, but the Queen Regent held up her hand to stop him.
“How could I live on when so many others died, Elendil? When I led them there into this hell? If for whatever reason the Valar let me live, then they had to shoulder me with that burden. This will be my reminder of what happened, every single time that I will open my eyes to darkness. It will help me to make better choices in the future.”
“You cannot think that the Valar caused this, my Queen! Why should they punish you, us, if they sent the signs in the first place to make us leave and side with the elf? No. I cannot and will not believe it!”
He could not and would not pronounce Galadriel’s name. After all, it was because of her that they ended up where they were now. Wounded, dead and decimated. And worst of all, if someone should feel guilty, then it was him.
He, who had pulled her out of the sea in the first place.
He, who had set everything into motion by bringing her to his – their homeland!
The captain stood up and brushed an agitated hand through his hair. “It was me who started all of it, me! The gods should have punished me, if anyone. Not you!”
“But they have,” Míriel whispered softly. Your son is dead, she thought, not being able to say it out loud again.
Slowly she scooted towards the edge of the bed and placed her feet on the floor. Unsure if she could keep her balance, she reached out and was relieved to find the captain take her hand as she stood up.
“We both have to carry our losses.”
“Yes, we do,” he answered looking into her eyes. “But where does that lead us now, Míriel?” He asked softly. It felt still strange to address the queen regent by her first name.
Míriel stood for a while, keeping hold on Elendil’s hand and concentrating on the roll of the ship beneath her. Both felt strangely comforting, and she felt something shift into place inside of her. The blissful void held no force on her anymore. She knew that she would stay rooted in the present for all that was to come.
For the first time in days, Míriel felt some clarity smooth over her tumbling thoughts and emotions. Some strength seemed to flow back into her, her posture straightened and ever so slightly she tilted her chin up in defiance. Míriel finally understood she still had some agency. Much as she loathed others to pity her, she was done pitying herself. There was much to do.
“Elendil, we both have to learn to live with everything that happened. But we have seen the evil that arose, we have seen the unthinkable. We need to help stop this at all costs for I believe that it will not end before it has conquered every kingdom. And while we might still be out of harm’s way for a while in Númenor, it will not halt at the edge of the sea. This evil will cross the waters sooner or later and it will find us. We have to keep vigilant! We have to make our people understand what is coming. We need to be prepared! My darkness is nothing compared to the darkness that awaits us then.”
Elendil studied her. The shadow that had surrounded her those past days had somehow lifted from Míriel’s brow. She seemed more like herself again, more like the leader he knew her to be, the champion for her people.
Whatever fueled the queen seemed to spill over to the captain. Her words rang true in his ears, he felt having found his purpose again when all this time he did not know what would come after their defeat. Glancing at her, he noticed that the look of defeat and dread on her face was now replaced by a look of determination.
This was his Queen, his leader he would pledge allegiance to, no matter what.
When they finally drew close to their harbor after three more days on the calm sea, they fastened their vows below deck. It was a promise to each other to keep faith, to keep serving the gods, and the people of Númenor, come what may.