Trick or treat!
Thanks for trick-or-treating in my inbox! <3 Here's a snippet I thought of on my bike ride home yesterday. In the spirit of Halloween, the thinning of the veil, and all the delightful Tolkien Horror Week stories I've seen floating around my dash these past few days, I decided think a little about what might go on beyond the circles of the world, and how characters who are there might perceive time and the things that happen to those characters that are yet living. This is not particularly polished, but it was a really wonderful little exercise. I've been thinking a lot recently about intergenerational dynamics between Morwen Steelsheen, Théodwyn/Théoden, and Éowyn/Éomer/Théodred. I've got a whole set of headcanons that are yet to fully set in my mind, but I decided it might be fun to muse a little on Morwen in the afterlife. Originally I intended this to be more about her perception of her grandchildren, but it became what it became. I hope you enjoy! ----
Time is strange, beyond the circles of the world. No longer does it flow in a straight path, a current tumbling over stones from source to sea, from cause to effect, from today to tomorrow. Instead it seems to flow in all directions at once, spilling over an endless fall that never ceases. It reminds Morwen of the fountain that once stood in the courtyard of her grandfather’s home in Dol Amroth. She can picture it clearly now, the memory undiminished by the limits of a mortal mind: the water bubbles upward at the center of a blue-tiled bowl and then cascades over the edges in one single glass-like sheet, to the basin below. Indeed, she is there now, in that courtyard, in front of that very fountain. She reaches forward, to touch the flow of the water. She expects the glass sheet to part around her hand, the way it always has done, but it flows on, untroubled by her presence. She sighs, though there is no breath in her lungs, and she allows herself to be moved elsewhere.
The movements are not always under her control. Sometimes she has but to think of a place– as with her grandfather’s courtyard– and then she finds herself there. But other times, no matter her will, she cannot perceive what she wishes. Indeed, she has often tried to cast herself into the presence of her son, her daughters, her grandchildren… but her efforts avail her little. When she does see them, it is usually by chance alone, and not by her contrivances, and even then, she cannot usually ascertain the timing of what she witnesses. Sometimes she sees her son as a child, holding a bright blossom in his hand, laying on white stone under sunlight, sitting atop the walls of the White City. Other times, she sees him bent and worn and old, wrapped in mouldering furs under the weight of heavy shadows in the hall of Meduseld. Still other times, she sees him riding to war, mature in years, but yet hale; he charges forth on white steed, spear in hand and the fire of war and death in his eyes. Morwen is certain that she is perceiving these images out of order, but she has ceased trying to understand. There is little point to that now, and after a lifetime of continual striving for the betterment of her family and for the success of her children, she has finally relinquished any desire for influence. She merely lets the images come, lets the knowledge of what has been, what is, what will be… she lets it spill over her like so much fountain water.
