Chapter Text
***
I am not resigned to the shutting away
of loving hearts in the hard ground.
So it is, and so it will be, for so it has been,
time out of mind:
Into the darkness they go, the wise and the lovely.
Crowned with lilies and with laurel they go;
but I am not resigned.
-Edna St. Vincent Millay,
Dirge Without Music
***
This is how it shall be, at the end of all things. The white of the air. The black of the earth.
The burden of the early winter storms was nothing to these ancient firs. Their branches reached like the arms of dancers, long and soft at the hands, perhaps about to spin in slow requiem. In that breath of stillness, right before a dark crescendo. Dís admired them, if grudgingly. Their iron stature, their low creak, the slow whisper to which a long life is meant to quiet. A deep life, fully-faceted, inner glow revealed. Trees lived well and long, in the Blue Mountains.
Deep, too, was the silence of these elders, for now Dís could hear nothing except for the occasional fall of a clump of snow, finally released from needle and bough. She had left her hunting party behind- dwarrow were not known for their stealth on land, after all. She could not hope to find game unless she broke far away, safety be damned. She knew these woods as well as her own chambers anyhow, having hunted with Vili and later Kili, long before it became common to do so, and certainly before the recent string of harsh winters demanded it.
“A time of plenty will again come to Gabilgathol,” Dís had argued with her brother one last time, the day he left with her sons to go across the world. “You need not go. One soft winter will turn our luck around.”
She’d insisted three hard winters in a row was impossible. She’d been wrong.
Whatever else she and Thorin couldn’t agree on that day, in this, at least, he’d been proven right.
Not that it mattered. She pushed thoughts of Thorin from her mind. She was here, and all was silent, and now that she was alone, her mind could be silent too. She’d been tracking a stag. She’d lost him- but now she was back on his trail. Deep, wide prints. One of the ancient race. A stag that size could feed two hundred dwarrow in a great feast, or several families for a whole winter. More importantly, it would bring fresh hope to her people. It would spur the other hunters. It would turn the tide despite the early snows.
You are not the only one who holds lofty dreams for our people-
Yet another moment, where Dís found herself arguing with her brother in her mind.
Mount Dolmed was a steady incline before her, and the sun was quickly falling behind its right shoulder. The trees scattered in every direction, each dark trunk like a corner of a maze. Dís cared not, feared not becoming lost. Dolmed gave away all the secrets of the woods. Knowing well this one mountain, no dwarf could lose their way for long.
Unexpectedly, the trees gave way to a glen, and Dís found herself drawn into its center, as though she needed fear no predator. The respite it gave from bark, branch and shadow was irresistible. Dís went to its center, took a deep breath, and lifted her gaze to trace its borders.
You know why I must do this, ‘Anai.
Dís shook her head violently, as though to shake her brother’s words from her head.
He had not sent word since defeating the dragon. Three weeks ago, that was. That beard-shaving, copper-fondling, arrogant… how dare he leave me in the dark, give no words of my sons on their ancestral thrones, as heirs and sister-sons-!!
“Thorin,” she allowed herself to whisper his name out loud, into the snow.
And that is when she saw it.
At the edge of the glen, as still as the deep blue firs surrounding it, the Stag she’d been trailing- silent and tremendous, antlers reaching far and high, a crown greater and heavier than any living thing could hope to bear. Spokes sharp and challenging. Dewdrops like diamonds from their edges seemed to dangle. The Stag himself had eyes as dark and deep as any cave that any dwarf had ever dared to delve. His head was already tilted just slightly to the side, regarding Dís with a deadly still curiosity.
Snow had begun to fall. The sun was sinking between the trees. Dís went utterly still.
If she moved, the Stag would scare off, faster than she could let fly an arrow. Her only hope was that it lost interest in her, looked away, even for a moment.
But it did not. It stared and stared, neither looking away nor running away. And still the snow fell, piling around them, filling the little glen. And still the sun fell, touching the roots of the trees off to the west so that its dying beams blazed sideways in its final moments. The dark was a deceptive grey, even to Dís whose eyes were meant for the dark.
And still the stag stared, and Dís could see its eyes glowing in the last strain of light, and the outline of its antlers was clear and strong, reaching into the air like lightning.
Dís, daughter of Frís the beloved of Thráin II- Dís, Princess of Durin’s Folk, was spellbound.
She dared not move. The snow piled up around her feet. She no longer felt her toes or fingers. True night was upon her. The full moon was rising in the east, and its sideways light lit the stag in a white fire once more. And still his eyes glowed, and his antlers reached, and a cloudy breath billowed out from his flared nostrils, like smoke from a dragon.
Dís fell to her knees. She did not know when the stag disappeared, but it was gone, and all around her was black shadow and moonlit snow.
The stag was clever, and she was dying.
Amád, Amád-
Her sons’ voices were clear as crystal in the night air around her. Her vision was clouding- but she could see them. Their worried eyes, their smiling faces.
“Am I…” She breathed. Her breaths were small, and she was so tired. “Am I dying?”
You can’t join us yet, Amád-
You have to stay, for now.
You have to wait for us. You have to wait patiently, do you understand?
You can’t come to us yet. You’re needed there.
“Fíli… Kíli… where are you…” Her eyes stung with cold tears. They froze before they fell down her cheek. “Why…”
Her voice was finding itself. It was becoming a low wail.
“Why are coming to me like this- where are you? Why are you not on your thrones? Your thrones, as my brother’s heirs… the bright Hall, the White Stone…” She was breathless, and yet she found breath for this. “Where is Thorin? Why are you not with him? Where are you… why are you here… and not with him…”
We’re sorry, Amád.
You will see us again, but for now you have to wait, do you understand?
We love you, Amád…
Dís roused herself, looked wildly around. There was nothing, but the silent snow-filled glen and the darkness.
“Fíli?? Kíli??”
There was nothing but silence and snow. Dís sank into its soft, cold oblivion, hearing the soft crunch of the snow as her cheek fell against it. How bright and soft it burned against her face. How the flakes teased at her lashes, beckoning her away from this new wild terror.
Do not worry, they tempted. There is no life where you must live without your sons. We can make certain of that.
The snow sang a tempting song indeed- soft and deep, deep as the life-long ache in her bones, that burned in her since she saw her own childhood burn. Later, Dís would have to admit: she was tempted, yes she was.
This was how Dís, daughter of Frís, learned that her sons were lost to her.
***