#telperiën is the favourite sister he mentions in passing

[anghraine]

“the gift of men” - fic

The fic is three pages long and has taken yeaaaars to write. Anyway: some cheerful Eldarion fic!

He did not choose the marriage. He did not choose the bride; he did not even choose the day. He assented to everything, decided nothing. Yet though he wed not of his own desire, he never regretted his marriage, nor his fair and laughing princess.

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1

Eldarion had no queen.

His folk knew better than to press him on this. For one, the traditions of Gondor discouraged him from seeking marriage now, however much they might have wished it. The matter might have been different, and indeed alarming, had he no heirs; but he had many of them, son and daughter, sister-sons and sister-daughters under the law, their children and his own grandchildren, all beloved.

For another—though he now reigned alone, king without queen, he had not always lived so. Once, he had been a prince; and once, long ago, there had been a princess.

She died of old age almost a century before the kingship fell to him.

2

Certainly, none of Eldarion’s people could say he had neglected his duty. At their will, and his father’s, he took a wife before his thirtieth year.

He did not choose the marriage. He did not choose the bride; he did not even choose the day. He assented to everything, decided nothing. Yet though he wed not of his own desire, he never regretted his marriage, nor his fair and laughing princess. 

But then, he knew her well, long before the wedding-day. 

3

Eldarion always expected that he would marry Morwen of Ithilien or Gilanor of Dol Amroth.

Both, eldest daughters of princes, came from the greatest houses in Gondor; he could not say so of himself. His father might be heir to Isildur and Elendil, his mother a peredhel of the blood of Elros Tar-Minyatur and the Lady of Lórien, the two of them sprung from the highest lineages still remaining—but not from Gondor. And coming as they did on the heels of nigh on a millennium of the Stewards’ rule, Lord Denethor and his sons beloved of the people— 

Well, by then the handful of plots had long since subsided, but he knew he must marry a lady of Gondor; ideally, a kinswoman of the Prince of Ithilien. As Morwen and Gilanor were near Eldarion in age (a more pressing concern for him than anyone else), he supposed his wife would be one or the other. 

And yet she was not. 

4

In his more fanciful moments, well before his actual marriage, Eldarion cherished vague hopes of Aravain.

It was not a great love-story, nor even a great tragedy; at that age, he did not wish to marry—but he would have rather married Aravain than anyone else. By then, she was a great knight, a faithful protector, a dear friend, indeed dearer than any woman but his mother and favourite sister. But she was not at all what Gondor expected of a princess.

Always a creature of contradictions, she was, in fact, a princess: at once the most Dúnadan of Queen Lothíriel’s daughters—she had been fostered in Ithilien for that reason—and very much the Lady Éowyn’s niece. But after years in Gondor, she regarded herself as more Aravain than Athelflaed, more akin to Morwen, Glóredhel, and Gilanor than her own sisters, more Dúnadan warrior than Rohirren princess; after the first shocks, so did Gondor regard her. 

He knew she would not have accepted him even had he dared offer, yet no man could have asked for a more faithful captain or friend; she remained at his side for nigh on a century—until old age took her, and then, she too died. 

5

Throughout Eldarion’s childhood and youth, he knew his father best as a victor of distant triumphs, the great Elessar who brought glory and riches to Gondor, an occasional towering presence. In his early years, it was very occasional; Gondor had many enemies, eager to try her battered armies, and from the first, Elessar declared himself determined to recover all that the Dúnedain had ever lost, but for Rohan and drowned Númenor. 

The Queen, Eldarion’s mother, did not reign in these absences; the Steward Faramir did, by law and—though Eldarion did not understand it at the time—policy. Gondor knew and loved Faramir, and found so many changes easier to bear with the Steward ruling from Minas Tirith. 

But by good fortune, Faramir and Arwen held each other in the highest regard; he always requested her counsel, she accorded him every honour, and Eldarion only ever knew them as close allies and friends.

Indeed, he thought it perfectly natural that the Steward and the Queen should rule Gondor together, for he remembered little else. And as a boy, he thought it perfectly natural that they should rule over him, too.

6

As a young man, he did not think so quite as much, but he had a mild temper, and appreciated that his mother simply asked him about Glóredhel. 

Eldarion had never thought much about Glóredhel one way or another, though he had seen her many times. She was several years his junior, of an age with his sister Telperiën; indeed, Glóredhel and Telperiën used to laugh and whisper together when they were in company in either Minas Anor or Emyn Arnen, and remained faithful friends. She had a lighter temper than her sister Morwen and her various cousins, including Aravain; she enjoyed songs, and dancing, and tales of victory; she had a pleasant voice and a fair face. Eldarion, without ever imagining her as a bride, had always liked her well enough. 

He said as much to Arwen, who nodded thoughtfully, and said nothing more; but Eldarion understood what went unsaid, and soon found himself easily assenting to a marriage.

So did Glóredhel; she listened as he stumbled through an explanation, then laughed and said yes, of course.

7 

Over the year of their betrothal, Eldarion took pains to acquaint himself better with Glóredhel, finding her as fearless, frank, and curious as he remembered her. 

“It will be an adventure,” she said once, and he could not help but smile—a weakness, if weakness it was, that often beset him around her. He could not quite say that he loved her on their wedding-day, not as he did later, but he was happy to take her hand in his; happy to hear the King call her daughter; happy to bury his fingers in her golden hair.

It turned white with a terrible quickness, yet not before her time. Their son and daughter were grown with children of their own, and Glóredhel’s sister-son, taken into their household in his youth, had become a renowned loremaster, and Éomer of Rohan had come to grieve over his sister with them. Yet it all seemed impossibly fast to Eldarion, each moment passing instantly onto the next, until he stood weeping between Faramir and Elessar as Glóredhel was borne into Rath Dínen.

She had lived over seventy years, and Eldarion had lifetimes ahead of him.