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He shook and shuddered, pleaded and begged, but nothing changed. The outcome was still death, still misery, still ruin, and as he laid there, across his father’s shoulders, openly weeping, the knife just kept twisting, deeper and deeper into his gut. He desired so many things, yearned to say so much, and naught could be farther away – his jaw clenched but his sobs were unrelenting, pouring from his lungs until he seemed to drown in them. The prince could barely glance up as others began to arrive, first Thranduil, with his words and his cloak, felt the brush of wolf fur clinging over his father’s lifeless form, protecting the beast that had always guarded everyone else. He might’ve murmured thank you, but it caught in his throat and tore apart his heart, ears twisting just a little more to hear the funeral dirges from Mortuus Nox’s lips, incapable of controlling and composing himself into something befitting a noble, regal stature – and he was still just a boy, just a small, stupid insignificant boy who wanted his father back. Enna’s withered petals, a crown befitting a King, settled over his figure, over his listless, languid essence, was nearly enough to send Erebos into condemnation; he looked them over and thought of Loth, gone too, everyone gone, gone, gone and he had nothing left to guide him to where he was supposed to go and the only thoughts echoing through his head were beating drums of inept, insipid tunes: it wasn’t supposed to be this way. He couldn’t picture himself without the great, noble Lord casting his all-knowing eyes towards him, towards the mountains, towards all the shapes and figures he protected and sheltered, a weapon to his men, a shield to his country.
And as they all stood there, crestfallen and sorry, he wished he could muster something, anything, other than a stupefied rage or an overwhelming sadness – but the bitterness, the rancor, distorted his bones and carved at his insides, and he was so angry, so cross with them. Why couldn’t they have said these things to the Reaper when he lived? Why couldn’t they have offered their blessings when he spent all his hours, all his days, tending to their mishaps, their misdeeds, their misfortunes, their great, falling kingdom withering and dying at their feet? Why couldn’t they have done something other than wag their crooked tongues and complain, charge their snooty noses into the air and whine about the most childish, nonsensical matters? He quivered and trembled again, trying to keep the wrath, the contempt, and the overwhelming depths of despair to himself, but it was no use, because he was weak and useless, ineffectual and ridiculous, and everything had changed for the worse. He thought he felt the scorching heat of something else too – otherworldly, ethereal, a vessel igniting beyond his shoulder, but even as he turned to look, that was gone as well, and the emptiness shriveled his veins, left him just as listless, just as lifeless, just as forbearing as his father had been.
“I can’t leave him here,” was all he could say, muster, into the crowd, a whisper flickering above the Reaper’s skin, the Prince’s mouth barely removed from it. He couldn’t remove him from the plain, couldn’t wash him away in the arms of the rain or the lake, couldn’t burn him to ash and soot and dust, like he’d been nothing at all to this god damned kingdom, couldn’t ignite him on a pyre’s edge. He deserved something better, but the youth’s mind was warped, channeled into mere grief, incapable of giving a name, a solution, beyond the granules of despair and desperation. The vivid slate of his gaze fell briefly to Enna, like a tether, like a lifeline, then flickered away, because he didn’t know where else to turn, couldn’t provide a single guide for himself or for anyone else.
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