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English
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Published:
2014-05-06
Completed:
2014-05-06
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450
Chapters:
2/2
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It's a Puzzle

Chapter 2: Pollination

Summary:

Also, why did Galadriel depart for the West ahead of her husband?

(This double-drabble was written for the first person who solved the puzzle when it was first made public, with_rainfall on Livejournal, who requested an answer to the above question. It is not -- I repeat, it is NOT -- any sort of puzzle. Phew.)

Notes:

(See the end of the chapter for notes.)

Chapter Text

Galadriel was brushing her hair at her vanity table when Celeborn walked in and sat down at his. She heard the clink of removed braid-clasps.

“Well,” Celeborn said eventually. “It was nice to see Treebeard again, if only briefly.”

“Yes!” Galadriel smiled at this good, novel topic. “Shame that he is so unhappy, though.”

“He misses Fimbrethil.”

“Yes, evidently. Although… It is amusing, is it not? Remember how he used to grumble about her repetitive anecdotes?”

“Well, they did take a day or three to tell... Which might be too much even for an Ent, on the thousandth telling. Also… Did he not complain that they had both lost interest in… pollination?”

“Yes. But then, they had been married for a long time.”

Their eyes met. Galadriel saw Celeborn’s widen, and looked away quickly.

“Have you,” she said, “heard the poems he has written in her absence? They are rather fervent.” She set down her brush. “You know, Cirdan offered me a berth on the next boat to Valinor. I believe I shall accept.”

“I cannot possibly leave now. The woods--”

“I know.”

She knew she would not have to explain further. They had been married for a long time.

Notes:

And now, the solution to the acrostic of the first chapter!

As I mentioned, it is all about the sentences. Taking the first letter of each spells out the first phrase, a clue: "FIFTH AND LAST."
This is not a reference to Galadriel's place in the Finarfinian birth order (well... perhaps a little...), but it suggests that the actual solutions may be found by looking at the FIFTH word of each sentence, and the LAST.

 

Spoiler Alert...

 

As a reminder, the question was: So, what was Galadriel doing near the end of the First Age, as her kinsmen died and their realms fell into ruin?

The first answer, constructed using the first letters of the fifth word of each sentence, is "STAYING ALIVE."

The second answer, constructed using the last letter of each sentence, is "ALSO, CELEBORN."

...and that is all, folks!