Exiled

So – punishment?  Or promotion?  Doubtless there were many – most, even – to whom this posting in the remote forests far west of the Pelori would seem punishment indeed.  And the Aratar would be glad to be rid of a small thorn in his dignified flesh – and use her as a Dreadful Example of what happened to those who persisted in independent thinking.  But, she considered, looking round her at the deep greens and lush grasses of this remote valley, where crystal streams tumbled in a rainbow-kissed haze to swirling pools of opal waters, it did not seem much of a penalty to her.

Of course, she conceded, that was partly because this new guest house, built of silvered wood and set among the trees with such care that it looked like part of the forest, was set here in this spot that rested somewhere between the realms of the Sindar rulers – and had been welcomed graciously as providing a service needed by those who would return to life among their kin.  Lord Elrond had provided generous supplies of food and equipment.  King Thranduil had sent skilled foresters to ensure that the forest would be helped to provide for them, while Lord Celeborn had directed his engineers to establish suitable housing and outbuildings both on the ground and high in the trees.  And their ladies had subtly provided so much more – aware, as their lords were not, of the practicalities of serving so far from the hub of the parent order’s organisation.  And none of them were averse to bending rules – or even, if necessary, disregarding them altogether.

She had been most surprised at first when it had become apparent that she was moving beyond the Aratar’s authority – and wondered why the Sindar lords had been so insistent on keeping this house free of his interference.  Until, of course, she had watched the Lady Galadriel in the endless discussions between High King, Aratar and Sindar Lords, and realised that, no matter what, the rigid enforcement of traditional beliefs would not be tolerated west of the mountains.   By consenting to a very nominal nod to his wisdom, the Aratar had, at least, retained the appearance of making this decision for himself – and if, in private, he had washed his hands of the affairs of the unenlightened, he had the sense to know that his life would be a great deal more comfortable for accepting his powerlessness.

And it had seemed so little to ask.  Herself.  A sister or two, if any wished to come – books containing knowledge gathered over many centuries.  Formal consent to start a house in a place where it was sorely needed.  A house where she could train some among the forest elves to provide the service needed to rehabilitate those to whom their new life was unfamiliar.  She had not even registered herself, until she began to settle into this quiet haven, that she had become by default the head of her own order, one with none of the restrictions imposed on her by custom, changes apparently approved of by the Valar and backed up by the will of these grey elves.

Yet it was far from easy.

Ages of habit pushed her towards repeating the pattern – into making life here exactly the same as it had been there.  Everything, even things as simple as deciding what to put on the table, needed to be thought out – to be looked at with the potential for change in her mind.  It made her realise that she had become lazy.  It had been easier to complain about the constraints of her role than try to change them – and having to think about each action was wearing, but, at the same time, she found herself rising each day filled with excitement about the prospects before her.

‘Amillë?’ 

Ulbanís looked up from her detailing of the day’s tasks that had become a habit over who knew how long and smiled.  ‘I keep wishing to call you ‘Seler’, Cúraniel.  Old habits, it seems, die hard.’

The elleth smiled.  ‘If you wish, you may call me what you like.’

‘It would not be suitable,’ Ulbanís decided, shaking her head.  ‘Any more than it is for you to call me Amillë.  We are here for those who would not be comfortable returning to a realm in which Quenya is the common tongue – it must be another of those things to which we seek an alternative.  And you are not a sister – you are here as a friend, for as long as you wish to remain, but you are under no obligation to make that any longer than is right for you.’   

Cúraniel raised an eyebrow.  ‘It sounds, Amillë, as if you are making me just as much a project as if I had but newly returned.’

‘The longer I have been doing this, child, the more I am convinced that everyone needs a shoulder to lean on and a willing ear to provide a hearing.’  Ulbanís sat back. ‘And, in truth, that many of those who sailed need a care similar to that provided for those whom Lord Námo has released.’  She shook her head.  ‘I have seen some who need – badly – to shed burdens they have borne too long.’

‘And have you no burdens of your own?’  Cúraniel asked.

She felt as if the air had been squeezed out of her.  ‘What could weigh on me, child?’ she asked.  ‘I have been serving the Lady Nienna since before first Anar rose – I should be comfortable enough in my own skin after all this time.’

‘Should be is not is.’  Cúraniel folded her arms in front of her, rubbing her upper arms as if she was cold.  ‘Had you been entirely contented in your duties, why would you have come west?’

‘Obedience?’ Ulbanís smiled wryly.  ‘Service to those who need more care than the forest can offer?’  She hesitated.  ‘And you are right – the chance to try something new, something that is not constrained by long yeni of custom.’  She looked at the younger elleth.  ‘What can I do for you?’ she asked, gently reminding Cúraniel that she was distracting her from her work.

‘The morning meal is ready, Amillë,’ Cúraniel said promptly, ‘and there is a messenger from Emyn Ovornen, bringing letters and spices.’

‘Spices?’ Ulbanís’s eyes brightened.  Pleasant as the fresh forest produce was, the thought of spices to flavour the food was – mouth-watering.

‘Salt, for one thing,’ Cúraniel told her, ‘and peppercorns.  Nutmeg and cloves.  Some seed, so that we can set others to sprout for us here.’ 

Ulbanís sighed with pleasure.  ‘You do not realise how much you use some things until they are not there,’ she said.  ‘And then you wonder how you will manage without them.’  She placed a large rounded pebble on top of her work and rose.  ‘Have you offered the messenger tea and food?’

‘I have,’ Cúraniel nodded.  ‘But he said he would wait and share his meal with you.’  Her eyes twinkled.  ‘He seems to know you,’ she added.  ‘He said he has not seen you for a very long time.’

The Amillë froze briefly, a startled look on her face, and then turned and headed towards the long room beside the kitchens where the tables were set without another word.

‘His name, Amillë?’ Cúraniel murmured in the full knowledge that Ulbanís could not hear a word.  ‘Laurefindë, or so he claims.  He said you would know it.’

***

He leant on the tree that offered its support to the roof beam of the building, one leg crossed casually over the other and his face raised to bask in the dappled light.  He looked relaxed – serene and certain and in control of himself as he most definitely had not when last she had seen him.

‘Poser,’ she accused him, then flushed slightly at the sharpness of her tone.  How could she have greeted him so … so abruptly … so insultingly … after so long?  He would think that he was unwelcome!

He smiled, a slow smile that made him shine like one of Lady Elbereth’s stars.  ‘I have missed you, too,’ he said.

‘You waited long enough to pay me a visit.’

He opened his eyes wide and assumed a hurt expression.  ‘I remembered what you said,’ he told her.  ‘My visits were damaging – and I needed to think of your reputation.’

‘And what has changed?’

He grinned and gestured to the towering trees, whispering softly in the golden light.  ‘You are no longer under the inspection of those who would take pleasure in accusing you of impropriety,’ he said.  ‘We show our respect to the Valar in doing rather than being – and there is no point in following custom just for the sake of it.’

Ulbanís’s face softened.  ‘You found a place to belong, then?’ she asked.  ‘I hoped, when I met Lord Elrond, that you had – but I could not be sure.’

‘I found more than a place,’ he said.  ‘I found a family.’

‘But not one of your own?’

He shook his head.  ‘I was not looking for that.’  He sounded disconcertingly sober and unlike himself.  ‘Some things you cannot have.’

Ulbanís stepped past the lean figure to wrap a cloth round the handle of the tea kettle and pour out two cups of the steaming liquid.  ‘Breakfast?’ she asked, keeping her attention on the cups.

He accepted one.  ‘Oatmeal?’ he asked.  ‘With pine nuts?’  He smiled.  ‘Some things never change.’

‘Acorn meal,’ she corrected him.  ‘One must make certain concessions to dwelling in a forest and providing a refuge for the Silvan.’

‘It has never been a favourite of mine.’

She turned to meet his eyes.  ‘What brought you at last?’ she said.  ‘I did not think you would leave while Turgon’s descendants still lived in the Hither Lands.’

‘Nor I,’ he said seriously.  ‘My plea brought me a task – a task I had thought incomplete, but apparently …’  A slight smile touched the corners of his mouth.  ‘I had thought to ensure Elrond’s sons were on the ship heading west – roping them to the mast, if that was what it took – before returning to Gondor to watch over Arwen’s descendants, but somehow … it appeared that my time, too, had come.  I was assured that it had never been intended that I should remain indefinitely east of the sea – and that the Age of Men did not require the efforts of a solitary elf to ensure its future.’

She waved him to a seat at the nearest table and, despite his protest, filled a bowl of meal, sweetening it with a dash of birch syrup.  He was too thin, even for him, and she would not see him go hungry.  The recovery of the spirit depended on the strength of the body – and she had fed far too many resentfully restored elves to take much heed of their complaints.  He lifted an ironic eyebrow at her, but accepted her insistence gracefully and took a spoonful of the cereal.

‘Lord Námo, it would seem, had no desire to welcome you back to his halls – although I am sure you offered him every opportunity.’  She inspected him more intently.  This was not the same elf that she had last seen, mud-stained and hopeless, kneeling over the bodies of a couple of score rats.  This elf had found a purpose.  The Valar had done well by him.  ‘You must have caused him more trouble than he wished to repeat.’

‘I protest,’ he said mildly.  ‘I took no more chances than were absolutely necessary.  I had this constant voice echoing in the back of my head reminding me that it was my duty to survive to be a thorn in the flesh of those who would find the ordered pattern of existence easier without me.’

‘I am sure that your idea of absolutely necessary and mine might well differ.’

‘Possibly,’ he conceded, ‘but I am here now – and my days as a warrior are behind me.’  He sounded more contented than she would have thought possible.

‘What do you do to entertain yourself in these staid lands?’ she marvelled.

He looked out at the trees before returning his clear gaze to her face.  ‘There is so much to see,’ he said.  ‘So much to learn.  And a home to which I can return – and be welcomed.  A Lord and Lady I love as brother and sister – and sons, not of my body but of my heart.’

For a fleeting moment, Ulbanís regretted the leagues that separated her from the fosterling who was the son of her heart, but she suppressed the feeling.  Time and distance were nothing to an elf.  Rostaro would visit her here in beyond the Pelori when he was able – and nothing would change the love she bore him.

Laurefindë’s face tensed.  It had been a very long time since he had departed without a word.  Perhaps the tenuous recognition of which neither had ever spoken had existed only in his own mind.  Perhaps this servant of Nienna mourned the absence of someone else whose courtship had still not been able to displace her devotion to this vocation.

‘I know what you mean.’  He watched the soft play of expressions pass over Ulbanís’s face.  ‘When Lord Elrond brought me your letter, I was caring for a little one who had been released into our care.  He is, to me, the son I never had.’

A faint breath sighed from the Vanya.  ‘Do I know him?’  Laurefindë asked.

‘Perhaps.’  Ulbanís dropped her chin.  ‘He is a lore-master now – I believe Lord Elrond uses his skills at times.  Although poor Rostaro is not, at present, in favour with the authorities in Alqualondë – all my fault,’ she added guiltily.

Laurefindë smiled.  ‘Your authorities,’ he said.  ‘I doubt Olwë made any objections to your – er – unconventional treatment of a very difficult case.  He is, I am told, a practical elf, as those whose business is the sea tend to be. And those who dwell here are deeply grateful to you.’   He scraped his dish clean and swallowed the final spoonful.  ‘Am I permitted to refuse any more?’ he asked lightly.  ‘Its flavour does not improve, I find.’

‘Will you remain with us a while?’ Ulbanís refused to look at him as she relieved him of the container and placed it with hers in a bowl of water, brushing them round with a ball of moss and standing them to dry.

‘Have you rats for me to slay?’ he asked.  ‘I have made sure to keep my hand in.  You never know when you might need an alternative profession.’

‘No rats.’  Ulbanís kept her voice serene. 

‘But plenty of those seeking an understanding of what it is to live again?’

‘I do not see me running out of guests in the next age or two.’  Ulbanís turned to him.  ‘I am needed,’ she said.

‘You are,’ he agreed, drawing a steadying breath as their eyes met and they stared at each other briefly.  ‘Needed and valued and honoured and wanted.’  He looked away and indicated the settlement.  ‘It is well-built,’ he remarked.  ‘I see the hand of the Galadhrim in the design.’  He grinned.  ‘It is probably just as well that your guests will be Wood-elves – I cannot imagine what a staid Noldo would think about being expected to dwell in a tree.’

‘There are plenty of places where the conventional can be cared for,’ she told him firmly.  ‘We are intended for those to whom the houses east of the Pelori seem a prison rather than a home.’

Laurefindë stretched – and Ulbanís was reminded of his dangerous, cat-like qualities. She must be cautious – this was an elf incapable of accepting no as an answer.  Persistent was a word that barely began to describe him.  He could lay in wait, scarcely visible against his camouflage and hold still until his target had almost forgotten he was there – and then pounce.

‘I would think they, at least, are running short of custom,’ he said.  ‘There cannot be many still left to return from the War of Wrath – and many of those of Noldor descent who perished at Dagorlad must have been freed by now.  The victims of the Third Age were largely Silvan – and Sindar.’

‘Those returning now are not the simple cases,’ she said absently.  ‘They require skill – and careful treatment if they are to be ready to resume interrupted lives.’

They lapsed into silence.  There was too much to say, really.  Too much, probably, that should not be said.  A burst of laughter from the sun-filled glade came as a relief, drawing the attention of both outwards.

‘Would you like to look around?’ Ulbanís asked, determinedly cheerful. ‘I am still relishing the facilities we have been given here and enjoy the chance to show them off.’

Laurefindë smiled. ‘It is not home as I remember it,’ he said affectedly, ‘but, where my Amillë dwells – that is where my heart rests.  Lead on, my lady, show me your kingdom.’

***

‘My lord?’

Glorfindel looked up from the water he was splashing over the small sprouts of green hazing the neatly-tilled soil.  ‘Do we not know each other well enough to dispense with all this my-lording, Cúraniel?’ He tipped out the last of the dish-water with a flourish.  ‘After all, we spent the best part of an ennin as almost-kin!’

She dimpled.  ‘If you wish,’ she said.  ‘I would not want to take liberties – after all, what is an ennin to an elf of your … experience?’

He looked offended.  ‘I am not as forgetful as a greybeard among men,’ he informed her.  ‘I know my friends, I thank you very much – and I count you among them.’  He glanced at the plants emerging from the seedbed.  ‘What am I cultivating here?’ he enquired. 

Cúraniel grinned.  ‘Do you not know?’  She looked swiftly at the wispy leaves.

‘It looks like grass,’ he admitted.  ‘But I cannot see Ulbanís bothering to cultivate something that grows in such profusion.’

‘Ginger,’ the elleth said briefly.  ‘It looks rather like grass – at the moment, anyway – but it is useful enough to be worth tending.’

Glorfindel inspected the fresh growth.  ‘I suppose so – I always make a rather unpleasant association between ginger and an endlessly rocking ocean.’  He dismissed the subject and smiled at her.  ‘How can I help you, Cúraniel?’ he asked.

‘I was hoping you could …’ she began, then stopped and sighed.  ‘I miss them,’ she said starkly.  ‘I would have stayed to see how their lives developed, but …’

Stepping carelessly over the small plants, Glorfindel took her hand and drew her to him, embracing her gently – much as he had, on many occasions, held his friend’s daughter.  ‘I know,’ he said soothingly.  ‘I know.  But it would not have been wise to remain,’ he murmured.  ‘Arwen knew – Gondor was no place for elves.  You had already stayed too long – become too closely involved in their lives.’

‘You stayed,’ she accused him. ‘You and her brothers and my lord.  You stayed with her until the end – and then you remained through centuries more.’

‘But not in the White City,’ he parried.  He released her and sighed.  ‘I think this is a conversation that calls for tea – since I doubt you keep anything stronger.’

‘It needs wine?’ she said.  ‘One of those conversations where we drink and share memories and cry and give in to our sorrow?  Ulbanís would say it was overdue.’

‘I do not cry.’  Glorfindel put his foot down.  He looked at Cúraniel sideways to be sure she had noticed his assumption of dignity, and grinned when she rewarded him with a laugh.

His assertion was untrue, though.  By the time he had recounted Arwen’s departure and told her friend of Eldarion’s grief and his sisters’ prostration at the ending of an era, both he and Cúraniel were weeping, buoyed solely by the knowledge that only great love brought with it such great sorrow.

‘I always knew Eldarion would make a great king,’ Cúraniel sniffed, her voice roughened with tears.  ‘Their children absorbed the best of both heritages – they were grandchildren of whom Lord Elrond and Lady Celebrían could be proud. Every bit as proud as they are of their sons’ children.’ 

Glorfindel patted her hand.  ‘We know,’ he said.  ‘We both know.’

‘There are not many of us here who do,’ Cúraniel mourned.

‘That does not make it any less true.’  He rose to pour boiling water on another pot of waiting leaves and turned, leaving them to steep.  ‘Why are you not at Emyn Ovornen, child?’ he asked.  ‘Among those who would treasure you?  Or in attendance on Galadriel in the company of your kin?’  He looked across the glade to the elves sitting in peaceful contemplation.  ‘This is hardly the place for one of the Galadhrim.’

‘Why are not you, my lord?’ she countered.  There was a strange and knowing similarity to the two faces, despite their differences in features and colouring.  Cúraniel lifted one shoulder no more than a whisker.  ‘You cannot go back,’ she said.  ‘Your home is your home no longer – for you are not the person you were.’

Between them hung silence so deep that even the whisperings of the trees dulled to nothing, until Glorfindel finally looked away and poured more tea.

‘She should not have asked it of you,’ he said harshly.

‘She did not need to ask.’  Cúraniel’s voice was firm.  ‘I would have gone with Arwen whatever Lady Galadriel said.  I could not let her spend her remaining days in a city of men without at least one to whom she could speak of things men cannot understand.  And,’ her gaze was almost accusatory, ‘there is no reason why males should assume all the rights to make choices that leave them changed.  Is there?’ she demanded.  ‘Is there?’ 

There was no doubt, Glorfindel thought ruefully, that he would prefer to do so.  ‘No,’ he replied.  ‘I suppose not.’

***

They looked good together, Ulbanís told herself fiercely.  The elleth’s pale hair, her air of fragility, of not being altogether present – they were bound to appeal to the protectiveness in Laurefindë’s nature.  She should not be surprised that he was taking an interest in Cúraniel.  She should not find that it hurt.  She was, after all, devoted to another path – one that did not admit the possibility of caring for an ellon.  Not in that way.  They were friends, nothing but that.

She took the hand of the confused elf who had paused to stare blankly before him, unable to control his body as his mind strove to pin down a wisp of memory, and led him gently to settle on a green bank studded with fragrant flowers of purple and gold. He continued to cling to her fingers for a moment, then released her to sink into a smiling reverie.  She watched him for a while, but abandoned her plans to coax him into talking of his memories.  He was not ready yet, this one.  The sheer wonder of the natural world around him was almost too much for him – it would take a while longer for the different strands of his being to begin to twine together.

‘It is not what you think,’ Cúraniel’s voice murmured almost inaudibly behind her.  ‘We share a part of our lives that few others know much about – but it is nothing more than that.’  She settled on the grass next to Ulbanís.  ‘We loved Lord Elrond’s daughter, that is all.  I dwelt with her after she had made her choice, while Lord Glorfindel and her brothers visited regularly.’

Ulbanís suppressed her urge to protest that she had not been thinking anything in particular.  This was the closest Cúraniel had come to opening up – and if Laurefindë’s presence was enough to help the elleth release the pain that festered within her, then, as Amillë, Ulbanís should be grateful to him.  She leaned forward and inclined her head, but did not speak.  It was better not to push.

A smile flickered across Cúraniel’s face.  The trouble with dwelling among those who dealt with the difficulties endured by elves who returned from Námo’s care was that it did not take long to recognise the techniques used to encourage them to speak of their anxieties.  ‘Lady Galadriel suggested to me that I should accompany Arwen,’ she said obligingly. 

It was no wonder the elleth was still finding it hard to let go of the past, Ulbanís decided as she listened to the softly-spoken words.  Watching your friends die – watching their children born only to grow to the height of their powers and age and wither.  She could not imagine a harder duty than to love and hold the faith and let go.  It would create a bond, she thought, with others who shared the experience.  A bond, perhaps, that would transcend differences in age and culture. 

‘I still believe,’ Cúraniel sighed, ‘that the hardest thing was that Arwen decided, in the end, to send me away.  She thought to save me, I know.  Elessar had left her and she knew she could not endure – but she felt it would hurt me to watch her fade.’  She looked up from her entwined hands to meet Ulbanís’s gaze.  ‘I think she was wrong,’ she said bleakly, ‘but what can you do?  I could not insist on staying with her for my sake, when she wanted solitude and time to mourn.’  Her eyes looked into the past.  ‘But I think, when her brothers came and told me of her end, that my part in her life never felt … concluded.  Her children were, to me, as beloved as a son and daughters of my own – and yet we parted in haste knowing we would never meet again.  I sailed – as they asked.  Sailed with the news Lord Elrond dreaded.  Sailed to tell him that his sons would not come – not yet.’  She dropped her chin again, then put back her shoulders and sat tall.  ‘I look on Glorfindel as a beloved uncle,’ she smiled.  ‘Much as did Queen Arwen.  No more than that.’  Her grin turned impish.  ‘And I am not deluding myself, I promise.’

If Ulbanís had been able to do so, she would have forbidden the colour to flush her cheeks, but at least she retained enough wisdom not to comment.  After all, what could she say that would convince this elleth that the servants of Nienna did not look at ellyn in the way that Cúraniel obviously thought she responded to Laurefindë?  A heavy feeling – as if she had eaten too much porridge – spread from her belly to numb her insides.  She would have to ask him to leave.  She had been so pleased to see him – fully restored and contented within his own skin – that she had allowed herself to overlook the folly of letting him remain.  But folly it was. 

He would have to go.

***

Laurefindë had taken it better than she had thought he would.  This ellon was in command of his emotions – he knew his value and he bore with the restrictions of convention better than his younger self had ever done.  She had told him – with more difficulty than she had thought would be possible – that it might be better if Lord Elrond found another messenger to travel between his lands and the guest house.  He had nodded with a quiet acceptance, as if he had expected this.

He had, however, continued to spend time in conversation with Cúraniel – and she had told herself fiercely that she should be glad of it.  The chance of speaking of those she loved to one who had looked on them as family had lightened the aura of gentle mourning that had yet to disperse – and laughter had become more common between them than tears.

She had avoided him – spending time with him only in the presence of others – but she could hardly refuse to bid him farewell.  Could she?  But, even if she could, she did not want to. 

Ulbanís pushed her plans for the refuge to one side and rose as he stood in the doorway, a golden aura surrounding the shadowed figure.  She walked with him into the light, neither of them speaking of what hung between them.

His horse, a rather splendid grey, wore a simple head collar equipped with reins stitched with little golden bells.  She raised an eyebrow – even she knew that it was not common for elven horses to be burdened with such trappings.

He grinned.  ‘We like the music the bells make,’ he said cheerfully.  ‘And it irritates some people intensely.’

‘You do not grow up.’  She shook her head at him disapprovingly.

‘Why should I?’ he asked.  ‘When I have you to keep me in line?’

Her breath caught.  ‘I cannot …’ she said.  ‘You must not …’  She forced herself to speak steadily.  ‘I am not your mother,’ she said firmly.

‘I do not want you to be my mother.’  The words were spoken.  Urgently.  Demandingly.  And they could not be put back in their box.  He let his lashes fall over the question in his eyes.  ‘I want more than that.  My fëa calls out to yours, Ulbanís.  It always has – and I wish to court you.’

She swallowed.  How could she respond to such a … bare-faced request?  This was not a game – a dance where they could step cautiously round what should not be said. ‘Nienna’s servants are traditionally unwed,’ she declared firmly, ‘and I have no intention of giving up my duties.’

‘A tradition is only a tradition,’ he said.  ‘Do something different and in time that, too, will become traditional.’  When she did not respond, he carried on rather hesitantly.  ‘It is a long time since I have been a patient in your care, Ulbanís.  This is not an emotional response to the wave of sensation that comes with being reborn.  This is more than friendship, more than the affection of old acquaintances.  I have waited a long time for to speak of this, my Lady Tiutalë – and, even if you tell me to leave, I will continue to wait on the off-chance that, one day, you will consider your work done and be looking for a project that is even more challenging.’  

She squared her shoulders and lifted her chin, but he raised his hand to touch it briefly to her lips.  ‘Say nothing,’ he said.  ‘I should not have spoken.  It was foolishness.’ A slight smile lightened his expression.  ‘But – were I to beard the Lady Nienna in her brother’s realm and gain her affirmation that there is no reason why celibacy is required of those who serve her …?’

Ulbanís sighed explosively.  ‘I thought you said that you had retired from placing yourself in unnecessary peril!  It seems to me that you are as reckless as you have ever been.’

He laughed. ‘Oh no,’ he said.  ‘I have learned much from Elrond Eärendilion – and even more from the Lady Galadriel.  I no longer charge directly at a challenge, sword flailing.’  His eyes sparked at her. ‘You have provided me with a quest, Ulbanís – and I will fulfil it – if you wish it.’

She drew silence round her like a cloak.  ‘It is too much,’ she said finally.  ‘I am not like you.  I do not know.’  She looked at him defiantly.  ‘I am happy in what I do.’

He nodded.  ‘But would you regret it if I were to leave now and never return?’

‘You have been absent over forty yeni – and you expect to walk in and, within a matter of days, ask questions like that?’  His eyes dropped before her scorching stare.  

‘You know I am a fool,’ he said deprecatingly.  ‘Yet this question is not new – it has been hanging between us over all that time.’

The glade around them faded before their intensity and the absence of sound deepened until there was nothing but the two of them and the rhythm of their pulse.  ‘Fool that I am, too,’ she said, her voice so low that he felt her response more than heard it.  ‘You know I would.’

His smile blazed, like lightning splitting a lowering sky.  ‘Then that is all I need,’ he said.

They did not touch.  They did not need to.  Laurefindë stepped back and swung himself onto his horse’s back, his eyes still firmly fixed on hers. 

Ulbanís swallowed.  ‘Be well,’ she demanded.  ‘Be careful.’

He raised his hand in salute as his horse began to move.  He would make no vows of undying devotion.  Not now.  They would not be appropriate and she would not accept them anyway.  But there was one pledge he could make, one that she might be glad to hear.  He smiled, an expression with all the bright promise of a spring morning.  

‘Do not worry about me, Ulbanís.  I will be back.’

****

ennin (singular) yeni (plural) – periods of 144 years

tiutalë (Quenya) – consolation

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