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It looks like the end of the world.
Thangorodrim lies in ruins, that implacable fortress fallen, those impassable walls broken. No more will its gates release new terrors, or swallow down prisoners into its maw.
You stand in awe, your men beside you. The Valar are taking Morgoth to judgment, dragging him from the depths in chains. Their figures are huge against the horizon, brighter than the darkness of any shadow. A cloak of storm enfolds them. Then they are gone like a dream, Morgoth is gone, save for the wreckage in his wake.
Thangorodrim lies in ruins, but so does Beleriand. The battlefield is a desolation where nothing will ever grow, not even thorns. The landscape laid waste, no food, no shelter, only graves for the dead.
In the aftermath, the herald Eönwë comes. The messenger of the Powers, who are themselves servants of the One. Before the assembled peoples, he delivers his proclamation.
Eönwë says, "The Eldar are summoned to return into the West. The Edain are granted a new land appointed for their home. And to the Peredhil, there will be given a choice."
*
You learned as a child what immortality means.
The day men with swords came to your home. Not Men, but Elves. Inflamed with bloodlust, haunted by oaths.
Later, when you are much older, you will think about how the gift of years was thrown away, and the gift of wisdom was trampled underfoot.
But on that day, there was only the sound of your brother weeping, and your hands trying to wake the nurse who once cradled you in her arms, and your voice trying to wake the guard who once carried you on his shoulders. No one wakes, no one at all.
You learned immortality means little.
*
All the days of your youth are war, the endless war against Morgoth.
You fight alongside both Men and Elves. And death on the battlefield comes to mortal and immortal both. Burials, burnings, and building of cairns. Rites of mourning, songs of lament, words of farewell.
You ask your companions, many times, "What do you believe about death?"
The Elves say, "We go to dwell in the Halls of Mandos, for a time. We go to rest, and reflect, and eventually, return."
The Men say only, "We go somewhere else."
*
"Thank Eru that you came!" the villager says, when you and your men drive off the attack by the Orcs.
Is this what Eru intends? Children who will not endure a massacre of their families. But why did you happen to be here today to stop it? Why this village and not that village? Why are they spared when you were not? Are they spared because you were not?
"Thank Eru that they came!" the people say, when Vingilot brings down Ancalagon, the brightest of stars against the blackest of nights. "Thank Eru!"
Later it becomes legend, Eärendil the Mariner and Elwing the Fair, flying through the heavens together, their plea bringing the hosts of the Valar. The sacrifice of their old lives. Nothing less.
A legend to most. But your world turns upside down and inside out again, time running backwards in your mind. Children who endured a massacre. A jewel won from a crown. An oath sworn on the dark. Links in a chain, strands in a web, threads in a tapestry. Joining one moment to the next, until the moment when a dragon falls onto a mountain.
You wonder:
Do we all serve your purpose?
What is your purpose?
*
"You are given a choice," Eönwë tells you. Both of you.
Beside you, your brother stirs. Neither of you has dared to think of a future beyond this war. A world without Morgoth. All your lives you have been cast upon the winds of fate. And now, not just the glimmering prospect of a future, on the edge of the horizon, but your choice of future. Amid the smoking ruins, fires not yet doused, carrion birds crying, something gleams like a star through cloud. You think it might be hope.
All of this is impermanent, everything you have ever known. The enfolding arms of your father and mother. The havens that should have been a home. The hills and valleys that even now are being swallowed by the sea. The world is made of the same essential dust as your body. The only thing that is eternal is the Flame Imperishable. The only promise that is forever is the Gift of Men.
*
"The two of you are still so young," Galadriel says. "Are you sure you wish to make the choice so soon?"
She is older than the Sun and the Moon, having walked in a land you will never set foot in now. The Elves left Aman: for vengeance, for justice, for glory. Immortality did not make them more wise, and they made war not only upon Morgoth but upon each other. Now, wounded and scarred, they are still bound to the earth, until the world's ending.
"I know my own heart," you answer. "Fifty years, or five thousand, it doesn't matter. My choice is made."
Galadriel knew Lúthien, your foremother who went beyond the circles of the world. Now she watches Lúthien's descendant make the same choice. You see in her eyes the shadow of the centuries to come, with how many more farewells beyond a final farewell?
"We've lost so many," she says.
"I'm not lost," you say. "I will never be lost, because Eru carries me in his hand."
*
You already know his choice.
You have fought side by side with the Houses of Bëor and Hador and Haleth, noble of heart and valiant in battle. Elrond has fought under the banner of Gil-galad and beside the folk of Círdan, and he takes counsel of Galadriel and Celeborn. He is keen to learn all their lore; you hope he will also learn wisdom.
"You will not be alone," you tell him, as you embrace for the final time. He will have company and guidance through the long centuries.
"And what about you?" he says.
"I am not alone either." Thousands of Men are walking the way with you. And the One.
Lúthien made her choice for love. You make your choice in spite of love. Knowing you choose a path different from the choice of your father, your mother, your brother. That the choice will sunder your fates and sever your futures.
But it was never a hard choice, though it brings hardship in the parting. Of all Elves, to have this choice! Of all Men, to be able to choose! The blessings of both kindred, bestowed upon you.
"I love this world," your brother says. "Its hopes and its cares are mine also. I will not lay them down, not as long as we both endure."
It will not endure forever, and nor will he. You both know this. But perhaps he will be glad enough to lay the task down then, for eternal rest.
"I love this world too," you say. "But there is more than this, beyond the circles of the world."
And it occurs to you, that someday you will see Lúthien, and she is not lost to you and your kin, and you can ask her what she made of her choice. And she will see you, her many times son, and perhaps all the sons and daughters after you.
*
The new land lies between Middle-earth and Valinor. Your ships set sail, guided by the star, led by the birds. You are following a promise, and you will find it fulfilled. You will continue to follow another promise for the rest of your life.
You used to have many reasons for doubt, and no reason to believe. You were born into a fragile sanctuary. You grew up in the shadow of dread. You have seen death close up.
Your father left seeking hope and your mother left finding despair, but from their acts came aid out of the West. You lived many dark days and darker nights, when no dawn seemed possible, and yet Morgoth was defeated. You understand that there are things you cannot understand, even though reason rails against it.
One day you will know. That is enough for now.
*
You did not mean to be their leader, let alone their king. Only to take part in the great work, in however humble a fashion. To build houses or tend gardens. All your skill so far has been in the business of war, and you long for nothing so much as to lay down your sword and watch it rust upon the wall.
But your men swear to follow you, in war and in peace, and the other captains and chiefs look to you rather than any rival, and besides that, there is a rumour, spoken of in hushed whispers.
"They say you gave up your immortality to become a Man."
The question comes to you today from a man working on the harbourside. Yesterday it was a woman who brought the bread to the workers. Tomorrow it will be a curious child in the meadows watching the sheep.
"No, that's not quite right," you answer, patient and kind every time. "I was born Half-Elven. The blood of Elves and the blood of Men are both my heritage."
"But not anymore," says the mason.
"But you chose to come with us," said the baker.
"But you're going to die now," will say the shepherd.
"Death is not the end," is your answer, now and always. "It is only a threshold."
*
You dared ask Eönwë once, what he knew of Eru. He said only, "It is for you to take thought and find him. He made this world for a purpose, which he has not revealed, save that you are part of his plan."
You walk daily upon a miracle, your feet buoyed up from the Great Sea by this Land of the Gift. It exists by the grace of Eru, peaceful and bountiful. You were born in a land broken by war and riven by destruction, dominated by tyranny and evil. This is the new beginning, clean and fresh and full of promise. With your own hands, you can build a better future.
The peak of the Meneltarma is not the domain of kings but the Hallow of Eru, for all his people to commune with his glory. Those who make the climb can see far into the distance in all directions, as though they stood at the centre of the world, looking upon its wonders.
In all the seasons of the year, all the hours of the day, have you visited it. At the setting sun and the rising moon. In the richness of autumn and the rebirth of spring. You know well its colours and its moods, but there are still mysteries unrevealed. How to learn the mind and will of Eru? How to discover what he purposes for you? In the silence of the mountaintop, you try to hear the words in your heart.
*
Sometimes you dream of a darkened hall, covered in tapestry, woven by a weaver whom you cannot see. It seems to you that you recognise some of the images from your own life, and others are unfamiliar, events great and terrible, but no less real. And your heart sinks at the thought that all your striving and all your sorrows, and all the striving and all the sorrows yet to come, are mere stitches on cloth, and where is the purpose in this?
You follow the tapestry to its end, and then you see that it hangs upon a wall, and the wall is set with windows, and the windows look upon a world beyond.
The tapestry is only a tapestry, and you are still you, and look!--there is an open door.
*
You climb the mountain, and the people follow your path.
"I want to give thanks," you say, and even though you have been here many times before, alone and in company, in solitude and in fellowship, this is the first time in so great a multitude, possibly everyone on the island, moved by the same spirit, needing only the impetus of your words. The procession winds up the spiral stair, feeling like a festival. Some are wearing garlands of flowers that never grew elsewhere. Some are singing, the songs that carried your ships over the waters, and the songs that were born in this land. Everything, everything feels profoundly connected. You are a note in a symphony. You are a wave in the sea.
The songs hush to silence, as does all speech, as you approach the highest ascent. This hallowed place inspires reverence. This is the summit of the pillar of heaven. You kneel, and you sense the people all around join you. The sky is impossibly blue. The light is like a warm embrace. How can you even find words to express your gratitude and awe? But somehow you do.