#yes technically i should tag him as elessar but who even searches that

[eri-pl]

Silm Advent calendar 8: Roads**

**Edit: I messed up the prompt, today it should be a different prompt, sorry, anyway it's too late to write a new one, so enjoy!

Elros climbed. He should have thought of himself as Minyatur now, but this name felt stiff, like new shoes not yet walked in enough. At least his actual shoes were comfortable, even on this long road, and the air was pleasantly warm, but not hot.

The road spiralled up, the lower part of it clearly visible, bright in the sun, descending into the still-worked-on main road that cut straight from the east to the west of the island. Andor was beautiful. And yet, there was much to do, and fairly so: if nothing had been left for their work, it would not feel like a real home build with their own hands.

His thoughts went to the white sapling he'd recently planted and named after his grandmother.

It was partially a coincidence, partially an expression of longing. He'd never met her. Nor his great-grandmother, obviously. Everyone said she had been beautiful. Everyone — well, all the Eldar — seemed shocked when Elros made his choice, and not even out of love. How could he explain to them?

And yet the plant — a little echo of the Undying Lands, a reminder of days when the world had been new — was immensely beautiful.

And yet it would die one day.

How did this thought come to him? But it felt true: an echo was not the thing itself, and the tree too belonged to the world of things that passed.

As did Elros.

But before that would happen, he had much to do. Build roads. Find a queen and raise a heir. See the white tree grow. Decide whom to hate and whom to mourn. Build more roads.

Now, he climbed.

Tar-Palantir descended from the tower. It took longer than it used to, and when he'd been there, his eyes grew tired of staring at the fog-shrouded sea quicker than he would expect it. His days were growing short and cold—just as the days of the year—and yet there were many things he needed to finish.

He shouldn't have started this melioration project, it became more and more complex as new problems arose — usually ones needing more gold from the treasury — and there was barely time for anything else. Yet, he needed that time. Maybe if he talked with Pharazôn again... He had been so sweet as a boy, there surely was something left of that... Maybe if he made more speeches to the people... Or lowered the taxes—but the roads—

"Do you need everything, my king?"

Tar-Palantir blinked. He had been standing with closed eyes again, lost in thought. "No, I—"

Something stopped him mid-sentence and —as they sometimes used to— words came to him. "It is close. When Nimloth dies, our downfall shall come."

It then left, leaving him lost and full of apprehension.

The White Tree had been there for nearly three millennia, how could it die? Hadn't it been a gift from those who do not perish? But Númenóre had been such a gift too. And yet, it wasn't free of death. Quite the opposite. Everything on this side of the Sundering Seas was doomed.

No, there had to be hope. Somewhere. Some day.

But his sight was not keen enough to pierce thorough the fog and Tar-Palantir was left shivering in the darkness of a cold autumn dusk.

It was so high. Aragorn was accustomed well to heights and to contasts of temperature, but not so to stunning views. And definitely not to seeing white towers, now intensely repaired, and green hills cut by roads, and knowing he was— he was the king of this land.

And yet, was he? Or was he just a pretender whose claims would fade with his death?

Arwen wouldn't come, surely, he asked for way too much and it was not the time of legends anymore, it was the time of Men and the Fourth Age was dawning and yet he would not choose any queen from the race of Men unless— but surely she would not.

A forest filled his imagination and someone danced there, bright and beautiful and beyond—

Aragorn shook his head and resumed the conversation with his companion.

As he turned at Mithrandir's request, just at the edge of the snow he saw a sapling, its flowers as white in the sun as the untouched snow, its leaves silver like a memory he had no way of remembering, and its smell, the cold, the mountaintop above him— Aragorn halted.

"You can proceed," said Mithrandir softly.

The king took the sapling carefully and turned back to the lands—his lands—below.