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I've put off discussing this for days, partially because of everything else that's happened since my return, but primarily because I prefer not to think about it at all. I've only spoken of those two days to Lúthien and more recently, Varda. But now that Elladan is gone, however indefinitely, the topic seems less stressful. Not by much, but less wearing all the same.
To explain where I had gone-- while on the inside of an invisible border encircling the Downs and Old Forest, I am completely immortal. As in the wider world, I can feel pain and be injured, to an extent. But I cannot die. When I announced that I was leaving, my mother warned me, "If you cross that border, your body will learn to die." I failed to realize the implications of this then. I knew what would happen if I were to die; such things weren't entirely unprecedented. It would be little more than a change of clothing.
I would return to the river, to my mother and the other spirits and creatures there. My interaction with the physical world would be severely limited, of course, but I had spent several millenia as a disembodied spirit, and the idea of returning to the state was undaunting. In any case, I would gradually regain physical form and be wholly corporeal within a thousand years-- the blink of an eye. I never thought about becoming close to on the outside, even those I already knew at the time. I didn't realize until far too late the risk involved: what it would be like to go on, existing and aware on the same plane as everyone I knew and loved, cut off, "dead" without the luxury of moving on, like a ghost trapped on earth. I'll only truly die when the river runs dry, or is destroyed.
When I was thrown from my horse in Bree, my neck was broken and skull cracked. I blacked out for a split second. When I came to, I was standing on the banks of the Withywindle. Realizing what had happened, I screamed and cursed; Old Man Willow was laughing. I hate that tree.
Tom could still see me, of course. He's also the only other physical creature I know of who understands river-"tongue", and conveniently so, since my sudden want of vocal chords left me unable to communicate through anything but. I went mad with frustration, it had been too long since I had last been noncorporeal. Time had ceased to exist. In the limbo that is the parallel spirit world, a millennium is nothing and an hour is an eternity. I worried and raged and cursed myself and my mother and any gods that were listening, and for the most part behaved like one of the crazed water spirits of the Bruinen.
Despite extremely limited access to physical objects, I could still control the waters, and froze large patches of ice to use as tablets. Tom was wonderful. Gratingly cheerful in the face of my depression, and had taken up the damned rhyming again, but helpful. As per my request, he copied the etchings onto paper and kept them. He sent me the papers yesterday. I may post some of the etchings later, translated and in heavily edited form.
In the meantime, my mother was of course still able to use her bizarre "computer," and reluctantly let me keep track of things here. She refused, however, to take dictation. "You're dead to them now. Let it go." The arguments were long and loud and dramatic, and became dangerous when ice floes began mysteriously appearing on the Baranduin.
I'm tired. More later, in smaller doses.
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amused
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uncomfortable
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awake
irritated
tired