The Last Dance
By Voldie on Varsity Track

Happy fifteenth birthday, Evanescent Dawn! pinches your cheeks like a rabid grandmother Awe, Karys is such a big boy! I hope you get this (I know you're taking a break from the Internet)... Jenny should give you this for me if you don't see it otherwise. And happy birthday once again, you awesome friend, you!

I don't own anything I mention or use. It's all Professor Tolkien's and I practically worship him for creating Middle-earth. And this is my first Aragorn/Arwen fic (out of seventy-something fics, you'd think I'd have written one of these already) so please be constructive if you can. Flames will be used by Feanor and I to burn ships at Losgar.

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Aragorn and Arwen sit atop Cerin Amroth amongst the white niphredil and golden elanor, alone at last. She lays her head on his shoulder, sighing. She will miss him dearly.

"You must leave in the morn," she murmurs to Aragorn. "You cannot avoid it, can you?"

"No, I cannot. There is much I know I must accomplish in the years to come," Aragorn leans over and whispers in her ear. "But I leave tomorrow and we still have time, Arwen, and I would spend it here with you for as long as we can manage, oblivious to the terror rising in the east."

"And I as well," she answers. "I shall miss you, Aragorn. You know I will wait, even if it must be for an eternity."

"We do not have an eternity," Aragorn says. He gazes into her clear grey eyes and sees in them sadness, perhaps for denying the life of the Eldar, or perhaps for having to see him depart. But no matter what upsets her, Aragorn cannot bear to see her upset. He takes her hand in his and holds it firmly. "I would be happy if I were to only be with you for a year."

She nods. "As would I."

Aragorn is silent for a moment, then he turns to Arwen. "Arwen, will you not dance with me?"

"Why?" she asks, confused.

"I truthfully do not know," Aragorn replies, helping Arwen rise. He puts his hands on her slender waist and begins to move to the silent music. They are free.

"I have not danced since I was a girl," Arwen looks at her tender hands, which are wrapped around Aragorn's neck, and smiles for the first time in years. She has not shown anyone the same smile since the day he called her in Imladris decades ago.

"And I have never danced before," he laughs softly. "I have always wished for my first and last dance to be with the only one I love."

"Then it shall be so," she says, sealing the promise that will bind them for eternity.

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Decades have passed. Lothlorien is not what it was in the past; all of its splendour passed as the seasons went by until it became forsaken and forgotten. Golden leaves litter the ground or cling to the desolate branches of the majestic trees, and the sun no longer shines. The Elves left long ago, and with them went the joy and songs of the Elder Days. But there is still a solitary figure moving in the clearing between the trees.

Queen Arwen dances alone on the barren, lonely ground of Cerin Amroth to the tune of a lament only heard inside her heart and soul. She moves to the inaudible music cautiously, almost mournfully, her heavy heart weighing her down. Arwen has always remembered the night she spent here with Aragorn, though the memories of everything else from that time have left her forever.

In reality, she dances alone. But Arwen knows she has never been alone, not since the day she met Aragorn. She twirls around, though not as effortlessly as she could before, knowing that Aragorn cannot dry her tears now. And so she dances with the spirit of the man she still loves inside her burdened heart, ready to set the both of them free now that the promise has been fulfilled.

Arwen finishes her dance and leans against the trunk of an old tree, her tears unstoppable now. She breathes heavily and with much difficulty, and she can feel her spirit leaving her body. The time has come for more sorrow and waiting, things Arwen believes are inevitable, yet she will be free at last.

"You had the last dance, Aragorn" she whispers to the sky. "You had the last dance."

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Questions? Comments? Call 1-800-I-CAUGHT-ARAGORN-WEARING-WOMEN'S-LINGERIE...

Or you can review and then go review Evanescent Dawn's fics. That works, too.