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Chapter Text

October 20

As Asfaloth started down the steep path to the valley, Glorfindel watched the rest of the party approach the house ahead of him.  A group of his own people waited in front of the doors, not a cheerful gathering to greet guests, but a grim one to learn what doom awaited them.  Elrond approached the party first, followed by Mithrandir.  Glorfindel’s relief at seeing his friend was immense, and yet, he knew in his heart that there would still be a great battle to come if Maura was to survive.  And, as there was no foresight about the child that rode in front of him, he feared she would be forgotten, left to be his charge alone.

Many of the watchers went with their lord and the wizard, but a handful stayed there as Glorfindel rode down to the house.  He was offered assistance the moment he commanded Asfaloth to stop, hands offering to take the horse or to help him with the girl.  He handed the reins over and dismounted, sliding Rochondín’s body down carefully.  “Come, now,” he said softly to her, in case she could still hear and understand.  “This is the end of our journey.”

She did not respond or try to stand, so he moved her to lie on his arms.  Her eyelids fluttered, but they did not open.  Her breaths were shallow, and her lips were growing blue with cold.

A woman strode towards them from the door of the house: Laerin, a healer, who was never counted among those of great power but was very capable nonetheless.  Most of her battlefield experience was in the war against the Witch-King and Angmar, so she was familiar with the devices of the enemy.  Fortunately, she was also the type of person who would be good at handling Rochondín’s moods.  He could not have been more relieved to see her.  Elrond had not forgotten that he had a second patient after all.

Rochondín’s gelding, who had followed them along the path and across the bridge, snorted in concern and nudged Rochondín with his nose.  “Rest,” Glorfindel told him.  “You have earned it.  Go with Asfaloth, and I will take care of your rider.”

The horse allowed one of the stablehands to take his reins, and Glorfindel turned to Laerin.

 “My lord,” she said, a cursory sign of respect.  Her eyes remained focused on the body in his arms.  “I was told she could still ride.”

“She could, when I sent word,” he said.  “The end of her journey has been the most difficult.  I fear she has no strength left.”

Laerin touched the back of her fingers to Rochondín’s cheek, feeling the chill there.  “Can you hear me, my love?” she asked in Westron.

The girl moved slightly towards the warmth, but she did not make any obvious attempt to respond.  “I believe she cannot,” said Glorfindel.  “Though if she could, it would not matter what language you used.”

“My name is Laerin, love,” she murmured, still speaking Westron.  Then, to Glorfindel, she said, “Let me see her eyes.”

He turned Rochondín’s head towards the healer.  She lifted the girl’s eyelid and moved a finger across her vision, but her eye did not focus or move to track it.  She closed Rochondín’s eye again and touched the pulse at the side of her neck with two fingers.

She lowered her hand, her face deeply troubled.  “Come with me.  What is her name?”

They set off towards the house.  Though Laerin was a great deal shorter than Glorfindel was, she walked swiftly and kept up with his longer strides.  He was grateful she had not asked to take the child herself.  He feared what might happen if he let go of her.  “She would not tell me at first, so I named her Rochondín.  She later said it was Mellori, but it seems I mispronounce that.”

They stepped inside, and Laerin pointed the way.  “Rochondín, then.  Tell me about her.”

“I found her seven days ago,” he began.  “Two of the Nine followed her, but her hands were already cold as if she had met them before, and she was very ill by the time I came upon her.  She regained enough strength to ride, and we have traveled hard since then.  She barely speaks, except to her horse, and that is in a language I do not know.  At first, she understood everything I said, no matter what the language, but whatever power gave her that knowledge is fading as well, for she understands less every day.  She has episodes that I understand to be daelin, once or twice a day before today.  This has been the greatest matter of contention between us: she does not wish for others to witness her in that state, and I would not let her fall behind, for she would not be able to catch up.”  They reached the main staircase and started up, which forced Glorfindel to slow down.  “She accepts assistance only grudgingly.  Both Aragorn and I have tended to her, but she hardly improves.  It may be that she does not have enough desire to.”

“I may need Master Elrond to assist, then,” said Laerin, but the set of her jaw said that she did not intend to lose any patient to depression, whether or not Elrond could come.  They reached the top of the stairs and turned down the hall.  “Continue.”

“Last night, she called out to me, I believe from a dream,” he continued.  “She has been especially anxious today, and I cannot tell why.  Then, the Nine rode past us after the halfling.  She was not with us during the battle, so I do not know what she saw, but she was still shaking when I came to her afterwards.  We crossed the Ford when she was able.  As we rode along the path, she began to have another episode, but as it began to resolve, it suddenly worsened again, and then again.  She fell from her horse, and vomited, and wept, which she has not done in all this time.  She has slipped farther from me since, and I fear that I am now the only thing holding her to this world.”

They reached the room.  It was warm and well-lit, smelling of athelas and other herbs, and there was another healer, Nethril, waiting for them.  She looked at the unconscious girl with surprise and concern.

“I fear the same,” said Laerin.  “But you must lay her down so that we may care for her.”

Glorfindel placed the girl gently on the bed but kept his hand on her head, afraid to let go.  She looked very small and dirty against the clean white sheets, and her skin was cold.

“Wash her hands with warm water,” Laerin instructed Nethril.  Then, she placed her hand on the center of the girl’s chest and began to sing.  Glorfindel joined her, cradling Rochondín’s head between his hands and lending his power to the healing.  They went on for some time, but the color began to come back to her face, and she was breathing more deeply by the end of the song, as if she were merely asleep.

“Thank you for your voice,” said Laerin, finally looking up at him.  “And for bringing her all this way to me.  But she is stronger now, and you will want to speak to Master Elrond.  I relieve you.  Go.  I will send a messenger when there is news.”

“I thank you as well,” he said, stepping back.  He would not be a help to them now, and, as Laerin said, he had other responsibilities.  “I will visit later, if I may.”

She nodded, so he slipped out of the room.  It did not take him long to learn where Maura was to be housed.  There were several advisors and healers standing outside of the room when he found it, anxiously waiting for instructions.  But they let him through without a word.

Elrond and Mithrandir sat on either side of the bed.  Elrond was fully focused on Maura, who was deathly pale and hardly breathing.  The terrible knife-hilt lay on the table beside Elrond.  Bilba sat in a chair in the corner, and Ban and Aragorn stood on either side of him.

“I thought that they would be able to cure him here,” said Ban when he saw Glorfindel, terror evident in his voice.

Glorfindel looked at Mithrandir.  Had a judgement already been made that he was lost?

“Don’t give up hope,” said the wizard gruffly.  “I am glad to see you, Glorfindel.”

“Are you, indeed?” Glorfindel laughed.  “After you left me to do your job?”

Mithrandir scoffed.  “As if I have never done your job before!”

“I cannot remember any such occurrence!  But now is not the time to enlighten me.  What news?”

“He lives,” said Elrond without looking up from his patient.  “More, I cannot say.”

“We may have stayed the progress, at least for a while,” said Mithrandir.  “But we cannot reverse it yet.”

Glorfindel walked to the corner and put his hand on Bilba’s shoulder.  The perian was shaking.  “He is strong,” he said.  “You must trust his strength.”

“How is Malori?” asked Aragorn.

“Yes,” said Ban, making an effort to take his eyes off his master and look up again.  “We worried when you stopped, Mr. Glorfindel, sir.”

Ban was going to be a favorite in Imladris if he went on talking like that, Glorfindel thought, using familiar pronouns and calling everyone mister and sir.  His speech was even more strange than Bilba’s.  Still, the point of his question must have been to be able to make a better guess of whether Maura’s condition would improve.  “She is very much worse, I am afraid,” said Glorfindel.  “But she is being cared for, and I believe she will recover.”

That caught Elrond’s attention, though he still did not look up.  “What happened?” he asked softly.

“She took the sight of the Ringwraiths poorly,” he said.  He could share the details later.

“I might have been able to help,” said Aragorn.

“You might have,” Glorfindel agreed.  “But once I realized how bad matters were, I only thought to come here as quickly as possible.  I took her with me on Asfaloth, and she did not protest or argue, which was the worst sign of all.”

“Aragorn said that she does not speak,” said Mithrandir.

Glorfindel smiled.  “She does not, but she is perfectly well able to let me know when she is displeased.”

“She must be terrible indeed if she irritates you,” the wizard replied.

Glorfindel laughed.  “I believe many people feel the same way about you, Mithrandir.”

“She was nearly as sick as Maura, most of the time, wasn’t she?” said Ban.  The halfling’s thoughts ever returned to his master.  “The Black Riders must be terribly powerful to do that to him with such a small wound, and to her without any wound at all.”

“She was ill long before she met the Riders, I think,” said Glorfindel, banishing the smile from his face.  “And she was alone, with no friends and nobody to speak to except the horse she rode.  Also, she is still quite young.  Had she been wounded, she would not likely have held on more than a few days.  Maura will not give in so easily.  Besides, he is here now, with Lord Elrond and Mithrandir.  He could not have anyone better to take care of him.”

“And you must take care of yourselves,” said Elrond, lifting his head at last.

“I haven’t been traveling,” said Bilba.  “I’ve had plenty of sleep.”

Elrond raised his eyebrows at him, but he did not object.  Bilba could not stay awake all night at his age, but he would not mind falling asleep in his chair if he needed to.

Banshook his head.  “I can’t leave him.  Begging your pardon Master Elrond, and you too, Mr. Bilbo, but he needs me.  Besides, I won’t be able to sleep at all if I don’t know he’s all right.”

“I will go,” said Glorfindel.  He had not closed his eyes to sleep in eleven nights, and while he knew that he could go on that way for many more nights, it was not his preference.  He put a hand on Aragorn’s arm.  “Come with me.  Elrond and Mithrandir can manage without us for a few hours.”

Aragorn looked at the halflings.

“Oh, go on,” said Bilba.  “I’ll be all right.”

“I will return when I wake,” said Aragorn.  He followed Glorfindel out into the hallway.

“Perhaps not quite when you wake,” said Glorfindel, smiling, as they walked.  “You might be able to see Lady Arwen in the morning.”

“Stop it,” said Aragorn, but Glorfindel could not help but notice that he smiled a little at the thought.

“I will not!” said Glorfindel.  “You had best clean yourself up as well: she will not appreciate the smell of the road.”

“Now is not the time –”

“There is always time.  Now, go and sleep.  You need it.”

October 21

Laerin stayed by Rochondín’s side all night.  She and Nethril had changed her into a shift, treated her bruises and saddle sores, and washed her body as well as they could manage with a cloth.  Since it looked like it would be difficult to handle, they had not done anything with her hair except to check it for lice: they did not know where she had slept, and while the inns in the Bree-lands kept their beds clean, not all farmhouses did.  She had taken a few mouthfuls of medicine, though not as much as Laerin would have liked.  She was no longer cold, but her sleep had become restless and unsettled.

Elrond had sent them the only apprentice healer in the valley, Elanna, since she seemed to be unable to stay in the same room as the wounded halfling for one reason or another (one never knew, with Elanna).  Laerin was glad to have a messenger: she could not risk sending Nethril for medicine or food when she might need her help with the patient at any moment.

They had eaten breakfast, and Elanna was finishing the leftovers – sitting on the windowsill with her head behind the curtain so she could look outside – when there came a soft knock at the door.  Nethril set aside the dress she was altering to fit Rochondín and rose to answer it.

In the hallway stood Elrond, dressed in a simple, unadorned tunic and looking like an ordinary healer, not a lord.  His face was somber, so Laerin guessed that there was no good news from his patient.  “Come in, my lord,” murmured Nethril, bowing slightly and stepping to the side to invite him in.

He crossed the room and knelt next to Laerin’s chair at the head of the bed.  Nethril sat down but did not pick up the dress again.  “How is she?” he whispered.

“She is improving,” Laerin told him.  “But I still have to turn her mind away from dark dreams.  How does the perian fare?”

“Maura may be beyond our help,” Elrond replied gravely.  “Mithrandir believes there may be a fragment of Morgul-blade in his wound, but I cannot find it.”

Laerin shuddered at the thought.  The girl stirred in her sleep and began talking again in her strange language.  Elrond stood to respond, but first, he waited and listened for a moment.  Then, he bent over Rochondín and whispered in her ear until she settled again.

“Lord Glorfindel said that she may not have enough desire to heal,” said Laerin.  “I will have her sleep for as long as she is able to, but it cannot be forever, and if her mind continues to reach for dark places…”  She did not finish.  Elrond had seen that result more times than she had.

“She is here now, and that will help,” replied Elrond.  “She will, of course, need rest and time.  It will be best that when she does wake, it is during the day, when it is warm and bright.  But if she seems to be faring poorly when the time comes, do not have her go back to sleep.  Send for me instead.  If I cannot come, Mithrandir may be able to, or Glorfindel, though it sounds as if they do not get along.”

Laerin frowned at that.  She remembered that he had referred to contention between them, but he clearly cared very much for her.

“Is she otherwise well?”

“Yes.  There are only the minor injuries that are typical for someone who has been traveling.  Glorfindel told me that she vomited yesterday, but I see no reason that should happen again.  Of course, that means she has not properly eaten anything since that morning, but if she takes enough water and medicine, we can try to give her some broth instead.  She does have an interesting scar, though.”  She pointed to the spot where it would be on her own arm.  “It is certainly surgical, and I think she might have broken that bone once.  Perhaps a chip of it needed to be removed?”

Elrond, as both a healer and a scholar, was endlessly curious about such things.  He stood and took the girl’s arm, whispering of sleep.  His eyes widened in surprise as he felt along the length of the scar.

“There is metal alongside the bone,” he said, stepping back so his voice would not disturb her.  “More likely the pieces were fastened back together.”

“How is that possible?”

“I could not do that,” he replied.  “No matter how long I had to perform the surgery, I could not.”

Laerin frowned again.  Until that moment, she would have said that Elrond was the best surgeon in all of Middle Earth.  But there were some breaks that would never fully heal in a mortal body no matter how well the patient was treated, and it seemed that one such injury had been cured in this girl.

“Another mystery, then,” said Elrond thoughtfully.

“There is more, my lord,” said Nethril, who had astonishingly managed to hold back from entering the conversation so far.

They both looked at her, and then Elrond turned to Laerin, who swallowed nervously.  “There is,” she said.  “When we unpacked her belongings, we found a broken dagger, which is unsurprising, but we also found an object wrapped up in cloth.  We do not know what it is, as both of us felt fear at the thought of undoing the wraps, and Elanna will not touch it at all.”

At the mention of her name, Elanna ducked behind the curtain entirely.  Elrond was silent for a moment, his face sober.  “Do you believe it is dangerous?” he asked at last.

“I do, as Nethril and I are not usually given to foresight.  But it will be manageable as long as it will give us warning as to its danger.”

Elrond nodded, and a shadow passed over his face.  Then he looked up, his eyes clear again.  “I think you had best leave it wrapped and hidden until she wakes.  This may, at least, answer the question of what drew the Nine to her.”

Laerin nodded in agreement.

He glanced over at the curtain, where Elanna’s shape was clearly visible.  “And her?” he asked.

“If you wish to know whether she had recovered from whatever happened in the other room, you will have to ask her; frankly, I cannot tell the difference.  But when it comes to this item, she seems not to mind as long as she cannot directly see it.  And she does what I ask of her.”

He nodded and went over to the window.  He put his own head behind the curtain, careful not to let too much light in since the patient was sleeping, and asked Elanna a few whispered questions.  Then, he walked back over to Laerin.  “Do you mind if she brings a book here to study?”

“She can do that,” said Laerin, though she wondered whether there were any texts on herb-lore and healing that Elanna had not already read: given the lack of patients these days, she was never short of time, and with experience lacking, she seemed determined to learn everything she could through books.

“Good,” he said.  “I will take my leave of you now.  I intend to look through my records and histories to see what I can find to help with Maura’s case.”

Elrond had been writing books and records for as long as Laerin had been alive, but the more people who left Imladris for the Undying Lands, the more he became fixated on preserving their memories in order to keep their knowledge in Middle Earth.  Laerin doubted that there was anything about the War of the Last Alliance or any other battle against the Ringwraiths that Elrond did not already know, but even Elvish memories were not flawless, as facts that seemed unimportant could become buried.  “It sounds as if you will need my help,” she said with a small smile.

Elrond laughed softly.  “I have all the healers of Imladris to assist me.  I would prefer to know that my other patient is safe with you.”  He put his hand on Laerin’s shoulder.  “Be sure to rest when you can.  Send word to us often.  Glorfindel will be quite anxious, I expect.”

“I will,” said Laerin.

He nodded and left, closing the door quietly behind him.  Elanna slid back out from behind the curtain, her plate empty.  Nethril sighed.  “Ill tidings about the perian,” she said quietly.  “And less advice than I would have liked.”

“He was helpful enough,” she replied.  “Elanna, take the dishes back to the kitchen, and get yourself a book.”

“Kitchen, book,” she said in confirmation.

“Yes.  Nethril, help me give her more medicine.”

Chapter Text

October 21

Glorfindel woke and visited Maura’s room before the morning bells.  Neither Elrond nor Aragorn were present, but he received what news there was from Mithrandir, a nearly-asleep Bilba, and Gwaelethril, the healer who had stayed by the bedside in Elrond’s absence.  He was able to convince Bilba to come with him to the hall to eat the morning meal together.

There, they met the two younger periannath.  “You didn’t tell us that Bilba was here,” said Razar accusingly.  “We didn’t find out until he came to find Maura!”

“Neither did Aragorn,” Kali pointed out.

“Was I meant to?” Glorfindel asked.

“I expect he was busy,” said Bilba.  He added to Glorfindel, “They were just children when I left, you know.”

“We didn’t know if you were even alive!” Razar cried out.  “You could have sent Maura a letter.”

“He scandalized Hobbiton by celebrating your birthday every year,” Kali added.

“Of course he did,” replied Bilba.  Suddenly, the group of them looked sad.  He went on bravely.  “The Elves try to give me a party every year, but it isn’t the same as a hobbit birthday.”

“Is it not?” Glorfindel asked.  “Elrond will be terribly disappointed.”

Bilba spluttered until Glorfindel took pity on him and brought up a different topic of conversation.  There were guests today, and had it been a normal day, Bilba would have been excited to share the stories of his adventures with a new audience.  Glorfindel thought that it would have been a fascinating experience, considering the newest guests were from Mirkwood and knew the truth behind some of his embellishments.  Unfortunately, he was unable to draw out the storytelling side of the perian, though Kali and Razar had a few stories of their own for the visiting Elves.  Glorfindel himself, however, spent most of the meal speaking of more mundane topics.

Thranduil had sent his youngest son to them as a messenger, along with a small party of warriors.  Legolas was not yet a thousand years old, brown-haired like his mother and green-eyed like his father, and reportedly an excellent archer.  Glorfindel had met him once before, but he had never made the journey to Imladris, and he seemed quite excited to explore the valley.  Still, something clearly preyed on his mind.  Glorfindel did not ask, assuming it would come out at the appropriate time.  Legolas spoke of the increasing dangers in the south of the forest.  His eldest brother, it seemed, was leading their defenses against the growing darkness, while the king’s middle child, who had lost his sword-arm in battle some centuries ago, had gone as an emissary to Dale.  Glorfindel had not yet determined whether sending Legolas as a messenger had been his own choice or his father’s, but it seemed that this would be his first chance to stand on his own, taking his own initiative rather than simply acting as a lieutenant for his father or brother.

Glorfindel reflected that he had been younger than Legolas was now when he had left his parents to follow Turgon to Middle Earth.  On the other hand, it was possible that Thranduil's son had not even been fully grown before he had slain an enemy in battle.  The life of Elves in Middle Earth had always been different from that of Valinor, and these Elves grew up both more quickly and more slowly than they had when Glorfindel was a child.

Bilba fell asleep at the table before the meal was over.  Glorfindel asked one of the serving men to take him to his chambers, though the perian would not be happy when he woke to find himself there.  The two younger halflings followed him to Maura’s room.  When they arrived, they found that Elrond and Aragorn had returned and were tending to the halfling’s wound on the back of his shoulder.  Maura himself was half-awake and covered in sweat.  But Glorfindel found his eyes drawn to the ring of gold that he could now see on a chain around Maura’s neck.  He had not yet heard Mithrandir’s proofs, but he knew that this unadorned band could not be one of the rings given to the dwarves or the úlairi.  Surely this was the One Ring itself.  Elrond already held a Ring of Power, and it would not do for him to take another, but Glorfindel had watched him through the years.  Furthermore, though Mithrandir used Narya as rarely as he might, Glorfindel was among the only people to know who carried a ring at all.  Through them, he had the knowledge necessary to hold a ring of his own, as well as the strength of will.  If he took this to use, he might be able to put an end to the threat of Sauron at last.

Glorfindel frowned at himself and shook the idea out of his head.  Those were not his thoughts, no matter how well they disguised themselves.  He had come to Middle-Earth to resist this evil, and he would not fall prey to poisoned promises only because they came from a golden ring and not a fair guise of a fallen Maia.

He looked up to find Elrond’s eyes on him, waiting for him to wake from the fantasy.  “Do not worry,” he said as he pulled Maura’s sheet over his chest to hide the object.  “It has said much the same to us.”

Glorfindel nodded.  “Who put the ring on the chain?”  It had not been around the halfling’s neck before.

“I did, sir,” said Ban.  “Everyone else was scared to touch it!  And they said Mr. Bilba couldn’t see it, neither.”

“That is for the best,” Glorfindel replied.  If Elrond took it, even for a moment, he might not give it up, and that could be the end of the Elves in Middle Earth.  Ban would not be able to do damage on such a scale, and periannath seemed unusually resilient to such things.  Bilba, however, was best kept away from the thing.  It was good that he had succeeded in taking the elderly halfling out of the room.

“Is it really that dangerous?” Kali asked, coming over to stand by Aragorn.  “Bilba wore it all the time.”

“And it would be better if it was never worn again!” replied Mithrandir sharply.  “And so I told Maura.  But at least he hasn’t used it very often, even if he couldn’t listen to my instructions entirely.”

The wizard sounded angry, but not at Maura.  “You did all you could,” Aragorn reassured him.

Mithrandir grunted.  “Find the blade fragment, and cure him, and I will be happy.”

Rochondín stirred in her sleep again, not speaking this time, but showing clear agitation.  Laerin leaned forward to comfort her.  A few words and a hand on her arm or head were usually enough to calm her, but this time, it was no help.

Concerned, Laerin stroked her forehead and sang about calm and safety.  Nethril knelt by her side and joined her.

Some part of her was fighting back.  Her eyes opened, but she looked through the two healers.  She gasped, and suddenly, Laerin could hear her heartbeat even through the sound of her singing.

This was what was preventing Rochondín’s condition from improving.  This was what her body had been fighting to do despite the medicine, despite the sleep, despite the songs.  She had barely survived the panic attacks on the road.  This one would kill her.

Elanna grabbed Laerin’s arm to get her attention.  She looked at her with a question in her eyes.

Laerin needed help now, not when Elanna returned with someone else.  But Laerin also needed help that she did not yet know how to give.  Besides which, Glorfindel would want to be there if Rochondín died.  When he had left her, she had been improving, and Laerin had seen how difficult it was for someone to learn that a patient had died without first hearing that the situation had turned worse.

The moment she made a decision, before she had time to say anything, Elanna nodded and scampered away.  Laerin held up her hand to tell her to wait until she could write down a message, but the young Elf was already gone.  This was not ideal: Elanna frequently had difficulty making herself understood, and the fact that she found Glorfindel and Mithrandir intimidating and had already found herself unable to cope with being in Maura’s room would make it more difficult.  Then again, Elrond could usually figure out what she was thinking, and an agitated Elanna would attract anyone’s attention, regardless of what did or did not come out of her mouth.  In any case, it was too late to call her back.

Leaving Nethril to sing, Laerin touched the girl’s cheek, trying to earn a reaction and learn whether she was conscious.  “Mellori?” she asked.

Laerin saw no response.  Most people would react to their own name even if they were asleep.  Laerin had probably pronounced it too seriously incorrectly for her to recognize.  “Rochondín,” she said, but there was no response to that, either.  “Can you hear me?”

Nothing.  She was awake, certainly awake enough to have a panic attack, but she was not aware of what was happening around her.  Laerin could try to wake her fully, to let her try to take control of herself and help them, but it was more likely that she would be overcome by despair.  Regardless, she could not be allowed to remember this later.  If she was not conscious now, Laerin would take it as a blessing.

She began singing again.  She took her patient’s hand and was rewarded immediately with fingers tightening around hers.  But the fingers were cold, if not quite as cold as they had been – not yet.  She closed her eyes and tried to reach the source of the girl’s suffering.

Rochondín’s breaths were too fast.  If she had been lucid, she would have been lightheaded, and it was only getting worse.  All of Laerin’s and Nethril’s combined will was not enough.  She was glad that Elanna had gone, but she did not think that she could wait to see who came or when.

The hand clutching hers made her wonder whether the girl needed something to hold onto, or someone to hold onto her.  Pressure on her could just as likely make things worse as better, but then again, she had allowed Glorfindel to put his arms around her on the horse.

She pulled back the covers and sat on the bed next to Rochondín.  She lay down alongside her, wrapping her arms as tightly as she could around her body, careful at the same time to leave the girl’s forearm free so she could push her away if necessary.  She could feel her patient’s heart beating against her skin now.  She focused all of her will on the song and telling that heartbeat and breath to match her own, until she was aware of nothing outside of the bed.  Each minute passed by, beat by beat and breath by breath.  This struggle was the only thing that mattered, and she could not let go.

Nearly a thousand heartbeats passed, but at last, Laerin could feel the body in her arms beginning to slow down, to shift into the right rhythm.  That was a start.  Laerin kept singing, focusing with every bit of power she had.  Slowly, she began to feel her will prevailing.  Still, she continued, until at last the girl’s muscles relaxed and, in exhaustion, she fell back asleep.

Laerin lay there for a moment after the song faded, waiting to see whether her patient’s condition would hold.  Then, at last, she allowed herself to become aware of the people around her.  They took her hands and helped her to sit up, and she found herself looking into Glorfindel’s grave eyes.  “Well done,” he said.  “Are you all right?”

She remained still for a moment, analyzing her own heartbeat and breathing and level of fatigue.  “I am,” she said finally.  She stood and moved back to her chair without assistance.  “And for now, so is she.”

Glorfindel smiled and nodded.  Nethril straightened the covers on the bed, then rubbed herb-scented water over the girl’s hands again.  Glorfindel knelt down, stroking Rochondín’s forehead and murmuring reassurances.

Elanna brought Laerin a cup of water.  As she slowly drank it, Nethril came over to her.  “That was a risk,” she whispered.

“It worked,” said Laerin, finding herself uninterested in Nethril’s opinion.

“What if it had not?”

“Nonetheless, it did.”

Nethril looked unconvinced.

“When I make a mistake, tell me.  Do not talk to me about what might have happened.”

The other healer nodded reluctantly.  Glorfindel turned to Laerin.  “Do you wish for me to stay?” he asked.

The girl was sleeping silently and without movement, but she did not look as if her body was so weary that she could not go on breathing.  “A few minutes longer,” she said.  “Until she is stronger.  But, again, the immediate danger is past, and Elanna can find you again if needed.”

He nodded.  “Even on the occasions that she allowed me to help her, I could not do anything but comfort her and wait.  You stopped this, and I could not.”

“Good.  That means I did it correctly.”  Laerin went to the bed to check her patient’s pulse and temperature again, and then she sat down to give Glorfindel space.  He loved the girl, she thought, no matter what had happened between them during the journey.  It was not a dangerous love – from the way he spoke to her, it seemed he saw her as a child – but love nonetheless.  And she would live to see him again.  Laerin would make sure of it.

Chapter Text

October 21

Glorfindel returned to Maura’s room in time to hear a messenger informing Elrond of the arrival of dwarves from Erebor.  Other visitors came throughout the day: the halflings and several healers.  In the early evening, Elanna arrived.  She stood in the doorway for a minute or so, unwilling to enter the room.  Glorfindel was told that she had run from it in tears within minutes of arriving the night before, overwhelmed with awareness of three Rings of Power and the corruption of the Morgul-blade together in a small space.  Now, Glorfindel, whom she had always feared, was in the room as well.  It took a fair amount of encouragement from Elrond for her to cross the threshold.  She came close enough to the bed to give him the slate with her message on it, then stood twisting her arms around each other.

Elrond looked at Glorfindel with a smile.  “Laerin says that she woke long enough to throw off the blankets they had put over her, and she is sleeping peacefully.  She may have visitors, if you are careful not to wake her again.”

Glorfindel grinned and stood up.  “This is excellent news!  Thank you.”

Mithrandir stretched.  “I think I shall come with you,” he said.  “I would like to see this mystery girl.  That is, if Elrond will allow it.”

They both looked to Imladris’ lord.  “Go,” he said.  “There is nothing you can do for me right now.”

Elanna led the way back to the room, her quick, bare feet reminding Glorfindel of Idril.  When she opened the door, Laerin looked relaxed, if tired: an arm draped over the back of her chair, her legs stretched out in front of her and ankles crossed.  She sat up when she saw them, as if she was embarrassed to be caught resting by a lord and commanding officer.  Or perhaps it was Mithrandir she was worried about, as she had not had any difficulty telling Glorfindel what to do when he first arrived (and rightfully so).

Glorfindel went immediately to the bed.  Under the thin top-sheet, Rhochondín was lying on her side with her knees drawn up, a position he had seen her sleep in before, but the lines of anxiety in her face were gone.  If he shook her, she would wake, as she had done on the road.  But he did not do it.  She could finally rest, and he would not disturb her.

Glorfindel walked over to Laerin, and they retreated to the far corner of the room so they could talk.  “Does this mean she is out of danger?”

“I think so,” she said slowly.  “This feels akin to the moment when a fever breaks.  I do not believe she will go through another daelo while she is in the valley, but I cannot be sure, and it will be a few more days before this is truly behind her.”

“Do you believe that she will regain her ability to understand us now that the influence of the enemy is gone?”

She shook her head.  “I cannot guess at that.  I have not seen or heard of such a thing before, unless she was listening to your thoughts rather than your words, which is not a gift generally given to Men.”

She glanced at Elanna, who did indeed have that gift, though it was unfortunately unreliable.  "No," said the young elf, clasping her hands together and turning away from them.

“She was not,” Glorfindel said to Laerin, recalling the poetry.  “She may have learned a few words of our language – at least, I told her some, but she did not repeat them and may not remember.  But it will be difficult to speak to her.”

She frowned.  “Our language?  She may learn Sindarin more quickly than Westron, at least while she stays here, but she will leave, or so I assume.”

“I cannot say,” replied Glorfindel.  “She may travel onward, or she may return to her own home.  If she has no home, she will most likely be sent to live with the Dúnedain, who do speak Sindarin among themselves, and it is also spoken in Gondor, if only by the upper classes.”  If she had no rank, they would create one for her before sending her away.  In Mannish cities, even Gondor, the poor were not well-treated and often went hungry.  “But I feel that she will have more of a need to communicate with us than with speakers of Westron.”

“Then I will follow your lead,” Laerin said.

She had other questions for him then, ones that she had not had the time to ask before, about how the girl had been eating and sleeping, what her daelin were like when she was awake, and what her mood was like from day to day.  He answered as well as he could.  Afterwards, she and Nethril had a discussion among themselves, deciding that Laerin would go and rest for a few hours and leave Nethril and Elanna to watch Rochondín.  When she returned, they could try to send Elanna to help Elrond.  Finally, Laerin left, sternly reminding them not to wake the girl, and Glorfindel joined Mithrandir.

They sat next to her in silence for several minutes.  At last, Mithrandir stood.  “I want to see the package that you found,” he murmured to Nethril.

The woman looked at Glorfindel as if she thought he might contradict the wizard.  When he did not, she slowly walked over to the dresser and opened a drawer.  She withdrew a rectangular item wrapped in oilcloth.  It did not look at all dangerous, but Elanna immediately retreated to the wall on the other side of the room, sat with her arms around her legs, and began rocking forward and back.  Most likely, she felt some sort of power she could not understand from the item, as she had in Maura’s room, and the presence of an Elf-lord and a wizard would only add to her anxiety.  “Peace, Elanna, I will not ask you to hold it,” Glorfindel told her, but she only pulled her legs tighter to her chest in response to being addressed by an elf-lord.

The wizard took the object from Nethril.  “This was not brought for me,” he said.  He placed it on the dresser rather too quickly, Glorfindel thought.

“What frightens you so much?” Glorfindel asked, picking it up.  It was much lighter than he had expected.  It was soft, but it did not bend easily.

“Unwrap it,” suggested Mithrandir.

The moment Glorfindel began to follow the suggestion, he was caught by fear that paralyzed his hands.  He was entirely sure that he should not and could not remove the wrappings.  Why that was so, he could not tell, but he was certain it would be disastrous if it was done too soon.  He shook his head and laughed.  “Perhaps not.”  He turned it over and then over again.  “Do you know what is inside, Elanna?”

The young Elf shook her head.

“Well, I would not be concerned,” he said, returning it to its place in the drawer.  “It is a simple matter not to look.”

Nethril nodded, but she seemed to relax once she saw that she would not need to touch it again.

As they left the room, Mithrandir said, thoughtfully, “I think there will be a time we will need to know what that is, but it has not come yet.”

“In any case, it is better than that which Maura carries,” agreed Glorfindel.  “What do you think of her?”

He frowned, but more in confusion than anger.  “I can hardly read her thoughts,” he replied.  “Not because her mind is closed to me, but because it is largely incomprehensible.  She seems to spend a fair amount of time reading and writing, so she may be a scholar.  Otherwise, I can only understand that her thoughts return again and again to the Ringwraiths.  She remembers cutting at their robes and calling out the name of Elbereth, and in her mind is both recognition and surprise, as if she had long feared they would come but was not sure in what form.”

“That is not unexpected.  Others knew they were on the road, and I spoke of Elbereth.”

“If it was an accurate remembering of their battle – and it seemed too detailed to be a dream and ill-planned to be a fantasy – what you said would not have any bearing on it.  She might have had some warning of the dangers ahead of her, but Iarwain had rhymes and enchantments of his own, and he would not think to tell her to call out to one of the Valar.  And if you are correct and it is the confusion of a dreaming mind, I would ask whether you ever said the name Varda to her, or spoke of Manwe.”

Glorfindel stopped mid-stride.  “Then she may indeed be a scholar, but the people of Gondor speak both Westron and Sindarin, which she does not, and she seemingly has not visited any Elven realms.  I cannot think what other languages would have translations of our lore.”

“Indeed.”

Glorfindel started walking again.  “What do you think this means?”

“I think that she is not entirely what she seems.  Not in an evil way – in fact, I think the Ringwraiths saw the same in her and feared it.  But I do believe that there is more to her than we can understand now”

Glorfindel laughed.  “I do not need you to tell me she is odd.  I knew as much when I first met her.”

“Well, she is that.  I am glad she is here, because I do not think she would be safe anywhere else, but I also believe she is meant to be here now, as are the dwarves and the Mirkwood Elves.  There are forces at work here that are beyond even me and you.”

“Then they are beyond the Enemy as well.”

“Yes,” Mithrandir said, smiling.  “So they are.”

October 22

That night passed with no improvement from Maura.  Elrond used every measure that he could, but all his skill seemed only to maintain the halfling’s condition, not improve it.  And as it had been with Rochondín, he could not survive in that state forever.

Elrond was reluctant to leave his patient, even when there were capable healers present to help – Gwaelethril had dwelt in the Undying Lands and had herself taught Elrond some of his skill – but he understood that he sometimes had to go elsewhere to be able to think clearly.  It was more difficult to convince Mithrandir that his presence was not necessary at every moment, and still more to convince Ban that he should not always be by Maura’s side.  The perian ate his meals in the room and slept on the floor or in bed alongside his master when he could stay awake no longer.  Elrond and Mithrandir let him help to give Maura water or broth or sent him on errands so that he could feel that he was needed.  He was needed, of course.  A friend’s hand could drive away darkness as well as an Elf-lord’s power could.  Still, Glorfindel knew how helpless one felt when there was nothing to do for a beloved friend but to sit by his side and wait.

Glorfindel was quite interested in the halflings, remembering the small archers who had heeded the call to assist Arnor in the war against Anmar some centuries ago, and Ban was the most intriguing of this group of them.  He was immensely devoted to his master, and his first thought was always for his well-being.  But Glorfindel was also told that Ban loved Elves and had an ear for stories and songs.  This entirely explained the looks of curiosity and wonder he occasionally turned towards the people around him.  Yet he still found the courage to argue with Glorfindel, and even with Elrond, about Maura’s care.  What would happen to the determined little perian if his master did not survive?

“It has been some time since we heard news of Glorfindel’s companion,” said Elrond to Ban in the afternoon, after Maura had at last found his way out of one of his nightmares and all was quiet.  “Would you go and ask if she has woken again?”

They had last heard from Rochondín’s room in the morning.  Nethril informed them that she had woken up briefly and taken the full amount of the medication that Laerin had given her.  Glorfindel assumed that nothing else noteworthy had occurred, but it was a request the halfling would not refuse.  Furthermore, if there was good news to be had, it would raise everyone’s spirits.

“Elanna, take Ban to Mellori’s room,” Elrond said in Sindarin.  Gwaelethril’s apprentice had finally come to help them, but she still would not stand close to Maura.

Ban looked at her dubiously as she stood up from where she was sitting, in the farthest corner from the bed, and played nervously with a strip of fabric she had hung from her belt.  “She does not speak your tongue,” Glorfindel told him.  Her tutors had given up trying to teach her a second language several years ago, though she understood enough to read books written in Westron.  “But she does know her way through the halls.  Go with her.”

“Pardon me, Mr. Glorfindel,” said Ban.  “I’ll go.”

Glorfindel did not point out that he had not actually said anything to be pardoned for.  Elanna seemed not to have noticed, so it hardly mattered.  She ran out of the room, and the halfling walked quickly after her.

They returned a short time later.  Ban stood up straight with his arms behind his back, as if he was giving an official report.  “She’s asleep now, sir.  Miss Laerin says that she woke up and drank a cup of water.  And, er, she emptied her bladder.”

His skin darkened further with a blush at the last piece of the message, though he tried to remain serious.  Perhaps Glorfindel should have warned him how directly Laerin spoke.

“Good,” said Elrond, clearly pleased with the news.  “If this progress continues, she may be able to leave her bed tomorrow.”

That sounded very positive, but Ban only looked at the small figure in the bed.  “Better come and sit down,” said Bilba.  “He won’t get better from you standing there.”

Ban returned to his chair, and the vigil resumed.

Chapter Text

October 23

It was light out.  Mallory had overslept, again.  Only she hadn’t overslept last time, she’d been transported to Middle Earth.  And besides, she was sick, so she had a right to sleep in.  She was sick, wasn’t she?  Her muscles were sore and her mouth was dry and tasted weird.  Yes, of course she was – she remembered, there had been the Black Riders.

She felt like the past day had been a long, weird dream, except that some of it must have been real: being introduced repeatedly to a woman whose name she still didn’t remember, drinking something sweet, squatting down to pee like she’d done in the woods.  She hoped there had been a place for her to do that and she hadn’t peed on the floor or something.  But there had been someone helping her, hadn’t there?  So it had been all right.

She was at Rivendell, of course.  Or, she was supposed to be.  She remembered the Ford.  She remembered Glorfindel holding her on Asfaloth.  So she was alive… right?  Or was this the afterlife, or was she back home in a hospital?  Well, surely a modern doctor wouldn’t have been able to do anything for Black Breath, and she felt alive.  She smelled food, actually – bread, she thought.  She realized she was really hungry.  Also, she needed to go to the bathroom.  That wouldn’t happen in the afterlife, would it?

She cautiously opened her eyes.  She was not, in fact, in a hospital.  The sun shone in through a window, and there was a woman sitting next to her bed.  She was beautiful, slender, and tall, definitely an Elf, though not quite as “uncanny valley” as Glorfindel.  She had brown hair that was pulled back from her face and wore a long, green dress.  She smiled broadly when she saw Mallory look at her, but her eyes were serious and a little sad.  She said something that did not translate.

Mallory shook her head, uncomprehending.

She repeated herself once, but when Mallory still didn’t get it, she made a dismissive gesture and offered her hand.

Mallory took it, noticing that her own hand matched the temperature of the woman’s and wasn’t stiff or numb anymore.  She slid off the bed.  Although she was a little shaky, she didn’t need support.  She was wearing a white nightgown, or maybe a shift to go under a dress.  She didn’t remember changing clothes, so they must have done that when she was asleep.  Or she just couldn’t remember, but considering she’d apparently needed help to go to the bathroom, someone must have at least helped her with her clothes.  In other words, she’d been naked in front of someone at some point.

I was unconscious, she reminded herself.  Or barely conscious.  They didn’t have another option.  It still made her feel gross, though.

The Elf led her around a sort of wooden screen, where there was a bathtub and something that looked vaguely similar to the chamber pot in Bree.  She pointed at that.

Mallory looked at her, unsure.

The Elf pointed to herself and the door, then to Mallory and the bowl.  It was probably what she thought it was.  She had been squatting, after all.  But how was she supposed to know if she was right?  In principle, he had no problem with not talking to anyone, but she had no idea how to live here, and she was going to be able to ask what to do.

The woman repeated something a few times before resorting to charades.  Mallory had a bad feeling the translation magic was gone for good.  Finally, she managed to whisper the euphemism that Glorfindel had taught her for going to the bathroom.  The Elf smiled and nodded, and then she left to let Mallory do it.

The irritated skin on her legs where her leggings and the saddle had been rubbing looked a lot better.  Surprisingly better, for only one day.  They must have put something on it.  Stop complaining about people taking care of you when you couldn’t do it yourself, she thought.  Just be glad it doesn’t hurt.

When she was done, she stood up and looked around the room.  On one wall was a window with a wide ledge, covered with a thin curtain that let plenty of light in, with heavier curtains that were pulled back.  There was a rug around the bed, and a tapestry hung over it, showing a house in a valley that Mallory suspected was Rivendell itself.  A rug in a world without vacuums should have triggered Mallory’s allergies, but she could actually breathe, so that was all right.  In the opposite wall was a fireplace.  There was a dresser, too, with a small mirror and something that looked like a sink on it.  On the nightstand, she found a plate with bread, honey, and fruit, a cup of water, and a cup of something that was not water.  She assumed the food was for her.  Probably.  She hadn’t washed her hands, though, so she shouldn’t be eating.

Elves washed their hands, didn’t they?  There was something that looked like a sink on the dresser, and there was soap next to it, but she didn’t see any water.

She adjusted the dress at her chest, feeling uncomfortable.  Maybe she should go and put on her bra.

Someone knocked at the door, and Mallory went to open it.  It was the brown-haired woman again, with a second woman, even taller than her, who had black hair that hung loose down her back and olive skin.  Funny, weren’t Elves supposed to be the whitest white?  It wasn’t as if her skin was very dark, maybe Mediterranean or Middle Eastern, but she certainly wasn’t as fair skinned as Mallory had imagined, or as Glorfindel was.  And it wasn’t just her – the brown-haired woman and some of the Elves she’d seen at the Ford were more tanned than Mallory was.  She was happy that there was at least some level of diversity in Elves.

The new woman smiled warmly.  She was carrying another garment like the one Mallory was wearing, as well as a light blue dress.  She hung the white dress up by the bathtub and folded up the blue one and put in a dresser drawer.  Mallory could see her clothes from Goldberry in the drawer, too, also folded up, as well as the book in its wrappings.  She could only hope they hadn’t looked inside.  It had Tengwar letters in it, plus maps they would recognize, and it would raise way too many questions if they saw it.

The brown-haired woman handed her the cup of water, and Mallory drank it gratefully, sitting down again on the bed.  “Laerin,” the Elf said, pointing to herself.  It sounded vaguely like lie-din, and Mallory recognized it as the name that she had been told over and over while she was half-asleep.  Laerin pointed to the other Elf.  “Nethril.”  Then, she pointed to Mallory with her eyebrows raised.

“M-Mallory,” she said.  “Mallory.”

They both repeated the name, and then, the first woman said “Laerin” again and looked at her as if she expected something.

Mallory nodded again, confused.

“Laerin,” she repeated.

“Laerin,” said Nethril.

Then, they looked at her.  She was supposed to repeat it, too.  Her stomach twisted, but she’d have to start somewhere.  “Laerin?”  Her voice broke a little.

The Elves hesitated, and for a moment, she thought her pronunciation was going to be corrected, but then Laerin smiled and nodded.  “Nethril,” she said, pointing.

“Nethril,” said Mallory, swallowing hard.

They nodded again, and Nethril patted her shoulder.  Then, she left, and Laerin took Mallory over to the sink-looking-thing.  She turned something like a tap, and there was a thin stream of cold water to wash her hands in, running down a drain in the bottom.  They may not have toilets, but functioning sinks were going to be very helpful.  Of course, Laerin was looking at Mallory as if she thought this would be something she’d never seen before.  People theorized sometimes that Elves only seemed to be magic because of superior technology (smart technology in their camouflage cloaks, and so on).  So no, this might not be especially impressive to Mallory, but what would Ivy from Bree have thought?

Mallory dried her hands.  Then, Laerin sat down, opened the jar of honey, and gestured for Mallory to have some.  Mallory sat on the bed, and Laerin started cutting up the apple with a thin knife, not looking at her, and talked quietly about things Mallory couldn’t understand.

Mallory thought that this was one of the best meals of her life, though she didn’t know whether that was because Elves had made it or because she was just that desperate for fresh food.  She ate everything on the plate, which seemed to make Laerin happy.  Meanwhile, Nethril and a couple other women came in and filled up the bathtub.  Mallory felt a bit bad – even if they had hot water heaters downstairs, this must have been a lot of work, and she wasn’t paying them like she’d paid Ivy – but they had a lot of travelers, and they were probably used to it.  The chamber pot disappeared at some point, too, and reappeared clean.

Laerin pointed to the other cup.  Mallory took a sip.  It tasted like honey, but there were other flavors as well.  This was what she had been drinking yesterday.  Laerin gestured for her to go on, so she did – between her lack of Sindarin and the fact that she’d almost died, she wasn’t really in any position to argue about medication.  But she wished she knew what was in it and what effect, if any, it would have on her.

As she finished the drink, Laerin went around and pulled pins out of her hair.  God, her hair was going to be awful.  She hoped she could sort it out in the bath.

Of course, the bath came next.  Laerin pointed at soap and a vial of something that appeared to be for her hair, then at a towel and the clean dress and what looked like a pair of shorts, maybe underwear.  When Mallory nodded to show she understood, she pointed to herself and the ground, then to herself and the door, asking a question.  Mallory, guessing as to what she meant, pointed at the door.  Laerin nodded, went back out the door and left her alone.

The bathtub wasn’t big enough to lie down in, but it was deep, and it did its job.  Mallory scrubbed her body, then ducked into the water to get her hair wet.  It took several washings and almost all of the small bottle of “shampoo”, and Mallory still wasn’t sure if she was going to be able to get a comb through it.  The water was muddy by the time she was done.  She was going to miss having access to showers.

She found that her eyes were starting to close.  Apparently, she wasn’t entirely recovered.  She dried off and got dressed.  Then, she put the towel over her pillow so it wouldn’t get wet and lay down.  She just needed to rest for a while…

When she woke up, there was a blanket draped over her, there was another apple on the nightstand, and Nethril was sitting by the window.  She turned and smiled at Mallory.

Mallory got up.  She must have been asleep for several hours, because she needed to go to the bathroom again.  She crossed her legs and pointed to the screened-off area.  Nethril said something, nodded, and went out the door.

When she came back in, she beckoned Mallory over to the window.  Mallory was confused and a bit wary, but she sat where Nethril pointed.  She pulled back the curtain a little bit.  Her window looked out on a garden.  It was beautiful, like everything in the room.  She still wasn’t happy with her shift, so she tucked some of it under her breasts to help avoid sweat.

Nethril sat down behind her.  She took her hair and started working through it, picking out the tangles with her fingers first and then moving on to a comb.  She sang a cheerful song as she did it, something that sounded like water running over rocks.  Once she was able to run a comb all the way down, she showed Mallory something that looked like a pair of scissors and pinched the last inch or two of hair between her fingers.  She said something and looked at her questioningly.

Mallory froze.  She was several months overdue for a haircut, but if she came back and Mom saw her hair was shorter, what would she think?  Well, she didn’t really know how it was going to work.  If she went back to the same time she had left, she’d probably look exactly the same as she had when she left, and if she came back a month later, she could tell the truth and say that someone friendly had cut her hair for her.

So she nodded, and Nethril pulled the chair over so she could sit up straight.  It didn’t take long to do – she was probably cutting it straight across with no layering or anything else.  She sent Mallory over to the mirror when she was done.

Mallory hadn’t looked at herself in a mirror in at least three weeks.  She was definitely different, but not in a bad way.  Thinner, of course, but not starving, not dirty, not scared, and not sick.  Her hair felt way too short, but it always did after it was cut.  She turned around and did her best to smile.

Nethril handed her a thin strip of colorful cloth.  Mallory sighed.  She didn’t know how to put her hair up with that.  She’d have to use her elastic hair tie and use it until it broke.  She went to get it – she’d taken it off to take a bath – and put her hair in a low ponytail, which was all she felt like doing right now.

Her shift had come down again, but Nethril came over, straightened it out, and pulled a strip of cloth through sort of belt loops around her chest.  She tied it in the back, tightly but not so tight it hurt.  That held the shift where Mallory wanted it.  It was a lot more comfortable, but it wouldn’t work for running around.  She wasn’t anywhere near as flat-chested as the women she had seen so far.  But maybe she wasn’t supposed to run around in this.  She wasn’t sure what to think about that.  It wasn’t like she was an athlete or anything, but she didn’t know if she could act like a demure medieval lady.

Nethril sat her back down, took her hand, and trimmed her nails with a much smaller pair of scissors.  Mallory was very relieved: she’d never had nails this long in her life.  Then, Nethril showed her how to brush her teeth with what was basically a stiff-bristled toothbrush and some powder.  Mallory found enough energy to put some work into it, and although her gums hurt a bit afterwards, running her tongue over smooth teeth was worth it.  A week ago, she’d have been looking for smooth legs, too, but her hair had grown past the prickly stage, and the idea of not having to shave every day was appealing.  Besides, shaving in a bath sounded awful, and she didn’t even think she’d be able to have a bath every day, which would leave her with itchy legs all the time.  Armpits, though… well, as long as they didn’t have sleeveless dresses in the summer, she’d just have to deal.

The rest of the afternoon (because it was afternoon, she had figured out) was quiet, watching people walk through the garden and birds fly around.  Nethril told her a story, or maybe it was a poem.  Mallory didn’t mind staying in her room and resting, but she worried she would get bored if she stayed there too long.  She remembered Éowyn trying to get out of the Houses of Healing.  It wasn’t like she could get a book to read or something.  She missed her computer.

Eventually, Laerin came in with a tray of food, and Nethril tagged out.  There was fruit juice, bread, and two bowls of stew.  Laerin put one on the windowsill and another on the nightstand.  They were eating together this time, but Mallory wasn’t properly dressed, so it wasn’t like a formal meal.  Still, she waited to see what Laerin did before she ate anything, worried she’d have bad manners or there would be an Elvish version of grace or something.

There wasn’t, but before she started eating, Laerin pointed to the bread and said, “Bast.”

Was that the Sindarin word?  Or Westron?  She couldn’t remember Glorfindel saying bread, so she didn’t know if it sounded familiar.

“Bast,” Laerin repeated, looking at her expectantly.

She wanted her to repeat it.  Mallory swallowed.  Did she have to?

“Bast,” she said again, insistently.

“Bast,” Mallory whispered to herself.

“Bast,” she said louder.

“Bast?” Mallory said hesitantly.

Laerin nodded, smiling in satisfaction.  Then, she pointed to Mallory with a questioning look.

Mallory frowned in confusion.  She’d already said it.  Wasn’t the point of all this to get her to repeat the words?

Laerin said “bast” again, pointing to herself.  Then, she pointed to Mallory again.

Mallory’s heart sped up, hit with the anxiety of knowing someone wanted something from her, but not what it was.

Laerin pointed to herself and said, “Rochondín.”  Then, she pointed to Mallory and said, “Mallory.”

But both those names applied to one person.  That didn’t clear anything up.

Back to herself, Laerin said, “Bast,” then pointed at Mallory again with her eyebrows raised.

Oh.  It finally clicked: she wanted Mallory’s word for bread.

Mallory considered.  Laerin wasn’t someone who was mentioned in the books.  Maybe she was making too big a deal out of keeping things secret.  But she still didn’t know whether Frodo would survive, and she wouldn’t for several more days.  It was the twenty-second, she calculated, given that the Ford had happened on the twentieth and she must have been going in and out of sleep for an entire day.

Laerin repeated the word and pointed at her again.  She seemed to know that Mallory got the idea, and now she wanted her to say it.  And Mallory could already tell that she was not the kind of person who gave up easily.

“Bread,” Mallory said in a weak voice.  She cleared her throat and said again, “Bread.”

Laerin smiled.  “Bread,” she repeated in a very odd accent.  “Bast.  Bread.”

Mallory realized that she was shaking.  Laerin seemed to notice that, too, because she started eating and didn’t say anything else until Mallory started to feel better.  Then, she started on other words for the meal and their clothes, doing the same thing.  It did get easier to share words after the first few, but there were often things Mallory wasn’t sure exactly how to identify and translate – like the meat in the soup – which made it more difficult.  Fortunately, Laerin accepted a blank look and a shrug as an answer once in a while.

By the time they were done, the sky was getting dark, and since the window faced east, they sat and watched the stars appear.  Then, Laerin lit a candle, sat down, and turned Mallory’s head and got to look at her.  Her eyes seemed to reflect and magnify the light, which made the hairs on Mallory’s arms stand up.  But she pointed to her mouth.  “Laerin,” she said slowly.

Mallory repeated it, confused.

“R,” she said, pointing to her mouth and tilting her head back so Mallory could see it better.

Mallory tried to say it, but it clearly still wasn’t right.  Laerin showed her the middle sound a few more time by itself, then in some other words.  Mallory figured this was probably the Elvish r, which was the same as a Spanish r and sort of a quick d-sound, if she remembered right.  So the first part of the name was probably laer, which meant… song, if she remembered right?

Eventually, she came out with something Laerin was happy with, and then they went on to ae, which was a sound that Mallory did not understand at all.  Finally, the Elf pointed to her and said, “Mellori.”

Uh-oh.  Her turn.

She could do this.  “Ma-a-allory,” she said, drawing out the vowel.

Laerin tried it, holding out an eh sound and slowly turning it into something more accurate.

“Aaa,” said Mallory.

“Aa.  Ma-a-allory.  Gla-a-ass.”  That was another word Mallory had taught her.

“Glass,” Mallory said.

“Glass.”

That was a lot better, but there was still the r hurdle.  How had Mallory learned to say this?  She seemed to remember a lot of practice with Mom and some worksheets.  Showing Laerin the shape of her mouth might help.

“Rr,” said Mallory.

“Oo-w,” said Laerin.

This took a lot of practice, a lot of words, and a lot of Laerin sounding ridiculous, and even when she got the isolated r, she didn’t quite get how to put it together with other sounds.  But then, she said Mallory, if not quite perfect, then at least as close to right Mallory had heard it since she’d left Tom and Goldberry.  She took a deep breath, feeling something lift off her.  That was right.

By that time, it was entirely dark, and Mallory was feeling kind of tired again.  Nethril came in with more mystery medicine and took away the dirty dishes.  Laerin straightened the bedsheets and gestured for her to get in.

This was going to be awkward, going to bed with someone watching.  Then again, she’d done exactly that for a week with Glorfindel.  (Did Elves sleep?  Sort of, if she remembered right.)  And in the end, she was too tired to care.

She slept the night through, and if she dreamed, she didn’t remember it.

Elrond sat in silence that evening, bowed over Maura’s body, as he had done many times before.  But, suddenly, he looked up, his grey eyes uncharacteristically bright.  “I have found it,” he said.

“The fragment?” Mithrandir said, sitting up suddenly.

“It is not in the wound, as I had expected,” said Elrond.  “It is deep inside of him – and how else would they have thought to take him, knowing that the blade missed his heart?  But now that it is found, it can be removed.”

“What do you need?” Glorfindel asked.

“Aragorn should be here, as he was the first healer to tend to him.  Elanna, fetch him, and then go to another room.”  The instructions were given in Sindarin, but he returned to Westron after.  “The halflings will have to leave as well.”

Elanna went without objection: she knew better than anybody that she would not want to be present to see Elrond, an Elf-lord, and a wizard revealed in their full power.  However, Bilba and the two younger halflings, who were sitting on the floor, looked affronted.  “I will not!” Bilba said.  “He is my nephew, and I should be here.  I am not afraid of blood or anything else.”

“There will not be blood,” said Elrond.  “It is far too deep and close to his heart to risk surgery: in any case, having been there so long, it will not allow itself to be removed through such means.  My concern is that if you interfere, whether intentionally or not, we will lose him.”

Bilba would not understand this, but Glorfindel did: Elrond feared that the Ring might use its pull on Bilba to sow fear in his mind and cause him to strike out against them.

“Nonetheless, friendship and love will help him resist the evil,” said Mithrandir.  “You should at least allow Ban to stay.”

Elrond was silent for several moments, considering the request.  Then, he replied, “He may stay if he keeps out of the way.  The other halflings may not.”

“Thank you, sir,” said Ban.  “I can’t say I understand any of this, but I know Mr. Maura would like a hobbit to be with him.”

And so Glorfindel took a subdued group of halflings out into the hallway.  “What if we never see him again?” Razar whispered to Kali.

“I swear to you that we will do everything in our power to save him,” Glorfindel said, but they did not respond.

Glorfindel returned to the room, and Aragorn arrived only a few minutes later.  He and Elrond sang again over the blade, and then the four of them gathered around Maura’s bed.  Glorfindel put his hand on Elrond’s arm, ready to lend strength to his friend.

Aragorn sat on the bed and cradled Maura in his arms, and Ban took his cold left hand.  Elrond put one hand on the halfling’s head and pressed the fingers of his other hand onto the halfling’s chest, near his heart.  He began to sing a song of revealing, of light coming into dark places.  The room seemed to grow dark, but to Glorfindel’s eyes, rings blazed on Elrond and Mithrandir’s hands, and their spirits grew bright.  Ban’s eyes widened: though he could not see the changes in the light, he could see the faces of those around him and hear the song they sung.

The darkness gathered heavy around the halfling’s chest, and he cried out weakly.  Glorfindel drew on the memory of the light of Valinor.  If he had the ring that lay there in shadow, he thought, he could stand at a level with them and force the Ruling Ring to help in their cause instead of strive against them.  At least he should move it away from the center of their struggle –

Anger leapt up like fire inside his heart.  He had rejected the Ring once; it should not have made a second attempt.  But perhaps this only meant that it despaired of any other way to win this battle.

As Elrond sang, Glorfindel began to see a sliver of pale white near Maura’s beating heart, bleeding cold poison into the small body.  Glorfindel broke from the melody into a song of his own, telling a tale of light that Elrond and Aragorn and Maura had never known.  Mithrandir’s mind turned to fire.  Elrond reached out with his song, finding again the cold, white shard of Morgul-blade.

Maura struggled, crying out again as if in pain.  Ban took his hand and did his best to comfort him.  Glorfindel could see that the perian was trying to hold back tears, but he did not give in.  Threads of darkness reached out, but it found itself penned in by Aragorn and Ban.  The two forces strove for several minutes, Elrond’s will against the Witch-King’s, but Elrond did not stand alone.  And neither did Maura, as the shard changed its tactics and tried one last time to bury itself deeper.  Ban held fast, and Maura’s spirit with his, refusing the blade its victory.

At last, with a great effort, their song broke through, and light unseen burst into Maura’s body, light that a Morgul-blade could not stand against.  It dissolved, melting into smoke, and that smoke rose to Maura’s skin, passed through it, and at last dispersed.

The song ended, and there was silence.  Maura’s small body lay in the light of the stars that had risen since they began, but there was no more shadow over it.  Ban still held his master’s hand, but his face was pale and eyes wide.  Glorfindel let Elrond’s hand fall and knelt by the halfling’s side.  “Are you well?” he asked.

“I – I think so,” Ban began.  “I didn’t understand it any better, watching it.  Just some mist and – and I don’t think I want to talk about it, sir.”

Glorfindel nodded.  “You do not need to, now or ever.  But you should know that the mist you saw was the last fragment of the blade leaving him.”

“That’s the same as when the dagger melted, when Strider held it to the light.”

“Yes,” said Glorfindel.  “It is gone, forever.”

“Then he’ll be all right now, sir?”

“I expect that he will,” Glorfindel replied.  “But we will learn that in time.”

As the two of them spoke, Elrond let the other periannath into the room.  They ran to Maura’s bedside, asking questions and receiving reassurances.  Gwaelethril was with them.  It was good that she had stayed outside: while she could have assisted Elrond, she would have seen the ring on Mithrandir’s finger the same way Glorfindel had done, and that was not for her knowledge.

“Go on, and sleep,” said Mithrandir to the halflings.  “It is late, and Maura will need rest, which he won’t get with you lot disturbing him.”

They complained, but they went, except of course Ban.  The wizard paused as he opened the door.  “Oh, and let’s keep it secret that Bilba is here.  We will make it a surprise for him.”

Bilba looked up at him uncertainly.  “Do you think he will be well enough for that?”

“To see you?” asked Kali.  “How could he not be?”

“I think you will find that he will be much improved when he wakes,” said Elrond.  “And if he is at all like you, Bilba, he will be quite entertained by the trick.”

That was true, Glorfindel thought, but he wondered whether Mithrandir was more concerned that something might happen when they met again.  They had been cautious about his being in the same room as the Ring.

“Conspirators again, then,” said Razar.  He began to smile, hesitantly as if he was unsure whether he was allowed to be happy yet.  “Come on.”

The halflings left together, and Elrond stood.  “I will leave as well.”  He had not slept since Frodo had arrived, and putting forth his power must have exhausted him.  “Keep watch over him.  When he does wake, try to avoid talking about anything that may upset him.  It is important for him to rest and not to worry about anything.  Send for me if you suspect that anything is amiss.”

They all indicated their agreement.  “Go on,” said Glorfindel to Mithrandir and Aragorn.  “I will stay a while.”

Both of them hesitated, but then Aragorn took Mithrandir’s arm, and they left, talking quietly to each other.  Glorfindel sat down and smiled.

Chapter Text

October 24

Mallory woke up to the sound of ringing bells that morning and found herself alone.  She got up and went to the bathroom.  She was surprised to notice how easy everything was for her to do.  Questioning how well her hands were going to work had been her entire life for a week, and it was strange to let it go.

She started working on her hair, worrying.  What if nobody came?  She could put on Goldberry’s clothes, since she didn’t entirely understand the new ones, but she had no idea where to go after that.  And she was hungry again.

Fortunately, before she was done with her hair, there was a knock on the door, and she found Laerin carrying breakfast.  This meal was warm bread and smoked fish, plus a smaller amount of the mystery drink.  Maybe it was little enough that she wouldn’t sleep all day today.  While they ate, Laerin listed the words she’d learned from Mallory yesterday: bread, water, plate, glass, knife, bed, dress, you, me.  Mallory didn’t remember any of the Sindarin words except the familiar “nen” for “water”, so Laerin told her again, then went over “fish” and “window” and a few more.

Once they were finished, Laerin stood up and indicated for Mallory to stand, too.  She tied the strip of cloth around Mallory’s chest to hold the shift in place, then went to the dresser drawers and pulled out a pair of shorts and the blue dress.  Mallory understood the underwear and went back behind the screen to put them on, but the dress confused her.  She held it up, trying to guess which side was the front and which was the back.

Laerin finally stepped in to help.  She turned the dress around so the laces were at the back, had Mallory put it on, and then pulled the laces up, tightening it to fit her waist and chest.  She handed the laces to Mallory to tie at the back of her neck.  It fit well, and she felt more secure with the tight laces than she had with just the shift, though she still preferred her bra.  Laerin tied a blue embroidered sash around Mallory’s waist and gave her a pair of soft black shoes, more like slippers, to put on.  Then, she went and opened the door.

Going outside was good, but Mallory didn’t know where they were going or what was going to happen, and that made her anxious.  The soles of the shoes were soft and thin, forcing her to reach out and put her toes down before her heels, like a dancer.  She stuck close to Laerin, who talked to her without expecting a response, pointing out things around them.  There was art everywhere Mallory looked: tapestries, patterns in the stones, carved wooden banisters.  They also passed several Elves, who were all stunningly beautiful.  Mallory felt very small and plain, especially standing so close to Laerin.  Could be worse, though.  Mallory came up to Laerin’s shoulders, whereas she could never dream of reaching so high on Glorfindel.

They went downstairs and finally out a door into warm sunlight, then went down a path past what looked like stables to a fenced area.  Before Mallory had time to wonder what they were doing there, she heard a loud whinny, and Kaza galloped up to the fence.

Kaza!  Mallory beamed at him.  He neighed at them, pawing the ground on his side of the fence, unable to contain his excitement.  She wondered what he thought had happened to her.  Even if Elves could talk to horses, they probably couldn’t explain the details.  “She’s alive,” maybe, but not where she was or why she couldn’t come out.  And she was happy to see him, too.  He was a familiar face, so to speak.

“Hi,” she said, reaching over the fence to pet his forehead.  “Did you miss me?”

He nuzzled her shoulder.  Laerin produced an apple from her pocket and gave it to Mallory.  She pointed at Kaza, and Mallory held out the apple in the palm of her hand, fingers flat like she’d been told to do as a kid.  Kaza ate it, then pranced around some more.  She grinned.  A white horse came up to them, almost as excited as Kaza.  Asfaloth, she assumed, though he didn’t look familiar without his fancy tack on.  He nuzzled her, too.  Laerin laughed and produced another apple, holding it out for him.

They stayed there at the fence for a while.  Laerin pointed to herself and then Asfaloth, repeating their names.  She then pointed to Kaza, saying something and raising her eyebrows in question.

“Kaza,” Mallory said quietly, much less comfortable talking to her than the horse.

“Kaza,” she repeated, and the horse nickered in response.  She pointed to the two horses in turn and said, “Roch” for each of them.

“Roke,” said Mallory, sure she was mispronouncing it.  “Horse.”

“Horse,” Laerin repeated.  “Roch, Rochondín.”

Right, that made sense.  Rider must have the word for horse in it.

She named “fence” and “grass” (or at least, Mallory thought it meant grass).  And she talked some more.  Trying to get Mallory to pick up the sound of the language naturally, probably.

Once Mallory was starting to get bored, Laerin took her through the stables and then on a roundabout path that led to the garden under her window.  To her surprise, Sam was there.  What was surprising wasn’t that he had found a garden – he would definitely do that as quickly as possible – but if it was the third day of being in Rivendell, he should still be by Frodo’s side.

He waved at her, grinning.  They went over, and he talked excitedly, then asked a question that Laerin answered – the old “do you understand me,” most likely.

Mallory got more worried the longer she looked at him.  He was outside, happy, and trying to share news with her, so that meant Frodo was healed.  Which meant it was the twenty-fourth, not the twenty-third like she’d thought.  Unless Elrond had healed him a day early, which was just as bad of a problem as her losing a day, or worse.  Was there any way for her to know how long she had been asleep?  She couldn’t ask.  She had no way of finding out.  So what other events would she notice?  The Council.  But that would be tomorrow no matter what, because Frodo was awake.  Okay, Boromir.  If she saw Boromir tomorrow, she’d know.  But what if he just didn’t turn up anywhere she happened to be?  What did she do then?  How was she supposed to figure all this out on her own?

Laerin seemed to realize she was upset about something, though she had no way of knowing what.  She said something cheerful to Sam and led Mallory back towards the building.

This was strange.  It wasn’t that someone was paying attention to her: Mom and Sandra paid attention to her, and she had the occasional teacher saying, “Speak up, Mallory” and “Have you found a project partner yet?” and so on.  And it wasn’t that someone was recognizing that she was anxious, because Glorfindel had done that.  It was that right now, someone was not only paying attention to her, not only recognizing that she was anxious, but actually taking her out of the situation and bringing her somewhere else.  And she was practically a stranger, too!  This was just bizarre.

They ended up in a big, empty room on the first floor.  There were no windows, just a fireplace on one end, but it still took her a while to figure out that this was the Hall of Fire.  She’d always thought of that as a place for music after dinner, but no, the book had said it was left to be a place of quiet contemplation most of the time.  And that was exactly what they did: sat in silence, watching the fire’s light flickering on the walls.

She had to stop losing her mind over every little thing.  So she’d been unconscious for a long time.  So it had been longer than she’d thought.  She was just going to have to deal with it.

I am so bad at being a fanfiction OC, she thought.  So bad.

After a while, she managed to ask to go to the bathroom.  Laerin brought her to a sort of outhouse with several toilets – the public bathrooms, she assumed.  Then, they went back upstairs.  It was a relief to get back to familiar ground.  It was time to move on from memories of black breath and being sick.  Everyday life was going to be hard enough.

When the bells rang for the midday meal, Nethril came to meet Laerin, and the two of them took their patient down to the kitchens.  There was a table there for those who missed meals or could not go into the hall.  It was time for them to move Mallory out of her room, but Laerin did not think she could manage to be with the company yet.

Mallory walked downstairs without any trouble, but once they came to the kitchen and saw the people inside, her face changed, and she started to breathe more quickly.  “We are here with you,” murmured Laerin, although she knew the girl would not understand.

They sat down together.  Fortunately, Mallory began to relax again once she saw that none of the cooks were showing any interest in them except to bring them food.  After a little while, Laerin managed to draw a few words out of her, though she looked at the cooks as if she was worried about eavesdroppers.  But that behavior was also good: it meant that there was some amount of trust between her and the two of them, since they were allowed to hear her language.

When they finished the meal, Laerin walked Mallory back up to her room, but instead of going inside, she turned and led her down the hall.  She stopped at her own room.  “I sleep here,” she said, pointing to herself and then through the door.  Mallory would need to know where to go if she needed help.

They walked back, then repeated the journey.  Laerin taught her “left” and “right” as they went, but she still seemed very nervous.  Laerin could easily guess that she felt anxious about new places and people.  The entire valley was a new place to her, and even Laerin was still relatively unfamiliar.  Imladris was a place of healing, but healing of any kind could not come immediately.  She needed more time.  The decision Laerin had to make was whether she was well enough to go to the celebrations that night.  Elrond would not insist upon seeing her if Laerin told him that she was not able to do it, but he was not the only person who would be interested if she showed herself to the company.  New guests always attracted notice, and female ones more so, as there were fewer of them.  The mystery surrounding her, as well as the fact that she had apparently defended herself from a pair of Ringwraiths on her own, would only attract more attention.  They needed to restrict tonight’s meetings to only what was absolutely necessary.

They walked back and forth a few times, and then Laerin returned Mallory to her room and let her rest.  Nethril came to watch her for the rest of the day.  “I have asked several of my friends to put off meeting her until tomorrow,” she said quietly.  “They will pass the message to the others.”

“Good,” said Laerin.  “She will most likely be anxious about everything she encounters that is unfamiliar to her.  You will need to limit how much she has to learn at one time.  If she cannot relax, then you will have to take her back to her room, or somewhere else away from the company.”

Nethril nodded, and they took their leave of one another.  Laerin thought that she could find Arwen, if she was not occupied with running the household in Elrond’s absence (or had not, perhaps, gone off somewhere with Aragorn), but she learned that her own sister, Magoleth, and Magoleth’s husband, Gladhedir, had at last returned home.  The two of them had gone with a small group of warriors to help the Dúnedain in the Angle with their defenses in fear that the Ringwraiths might turn towards their land.  A messenger had been sent after the battle at the Ford, but it seemed they had not been in a hurry to return.

It was a half hour’s walk to get to the collection of residences that now housed many of the soldiers as the population of the valley waned.  Magoleth and Gladhedir had come to live there about twenty years ago when their families had sailed West.  Laerin had kept a room in the main house for several hundred years, though it was a different one now than she had once shared with another apprentice when she had first lived there, and so she had moved into that instead.

It was difficult to accept, at times, the changes that were occurring in the valley.  When Laerin had been a child, there had been several settlements within Elrond’s protection, and Laerin, Magoleth, and Gladhedir had grown up in a village a long way down the valley.  During her apprenticeship, there had been work to do every day: injuries for the most part, but also childhood illnesses (most adult Elves did not fall physically ill except in the most extreme circumstances of starvation, exhaustion, or emotional suffering, but children took time to learn how to avoid it) and a variety of problems in Men of all ages.  There had been time for her to study in between tending to patients on most days, but the infirmary had never been empty.  Now, it usually was, except for whoever had the duty of watching it.

There had been many children in those days, too, in the time between wars.  It seemed likely that the first years of the Third Age would be the last time period in which the population of Elves in Middle Earth would ever increase.  There were still elf-children east of the mountains, but none had been born in Imladris or Lindon in almost three hundred years.  Even the foundling Elanna was an adult of over one hundred, though everyone, including Elanna herself, seemed to forget that.  (The lack of patients in the infirmary did not help Elanna at all: even an herb-master, which she planned to be, needed to be able to treat wounds, assist other healers, and determine whether a medication was working.  Elanna could not leave her apprenticeship based on theoretical knowledge alone, so she still worked under supervision.)  Magoleth and Gladhedir would not change things.  They had loved each other since childhood, but they had married too early in their hurry to have a wedding celebration before their parents left, and they were not at all ready to have children.  No other elf of Imladris wanted children in a time when their family might be split apart by war, and Laerin would not marry anyone this side of the Sea.

So, the valley’s population moved in closer as their population waned.  With so many parties going West in the past years, only Gildor’s folk maintained their own halls separate from Elrond’s anymore, and they spent as much time on the road as not.  Laerin visited the abandoned village of her birth from time to time, but it was silent now.  One day, they would have to leave again to go to the West, where it was said they belonged, and when that day came, they would not be able to come back and visit the place they once called home.

But it was not that time yet.  For now, seeing her sister return home unhurt was a relief.  She found Magoleth unpacking and cleaning.  Gladhedir would be taking care of their horses and weapons.

“Idhrenel!” Magoleth said when she noticed Laerin’s presence, calling her sister by the mother-name she had used for the first half of her life.  “I was told you would be occupied with your patient.”

“She is with Nethril,” Laerin replied.  “We hope that she may attend the feast tonight.”

“I heard about the feast,” said Magoleth.  “It seems we arrived at the right time.”

Of course she had: she and Gladhedir would never miss a celebration.  “Was there any fighting in the Angle?” she asked.

“There were no attacks, but these past few days, we have hunted for wolves.  There were many other ways we could help the Dúnedain, though.  They lost many warriors at Sarn Ford, and they need them more than ever, and wandering folk coming to the Angle for shelter bring as many people to be defended as warriors.  Also, winter will be here soon, and this may be a hard one.”

The survival of the remnants of the Dúnedain had been in question since the fall of the north kingdoms.  Imladris, too, had fewer warriors and more need of them than ever before in Laerin’s lifetime, and they could only do so much to help.  Besides, the Dúnedain were a proud people, so even when he could offer assistance, Elrond was forced to approach the subject with caution.  People who maintained personal friendships with them, such as Magoleth and Gladhedir and Elrond’s sons, were valuable.

“There must be more cheerful news than that,” said Laerin.  “Marriages and children?”

“Of course,” said Magoleth, and she set out on a tale of people Laerin did not know, though in many cases she was familiar with their parents or grandparents.  Dúnedain lives moved quickly, if not quite as quickly as those of other Men, and Laerin did not ride with the rangers nearly as often as Magoleth did.  Much of her knowledge of the Dúnedain dated back to the war with Angmar, though she was occasionally sent to help the healers in the Angle when illness became widespread.

Gladhedir returned after a short while, smiling as always.  There was more news, until at last, they walked up to Elrond’s house together and Laerin went to prepare for the feast.

Chapter Text

October 24

Glorfindel came early to the meal that night, accompanying Elrond, as he often did.  Tonight, however, Mithrandir was seated at Elrond’s other side, which pleased Glorfindel: too often, Mithrandir avoided events like this entirely.

Elrond nudged Glorfindel and gestured at the door.  Glorfindel looked up to see Nethril walk in slowly with a young woman in a blue dress, her brown hair pulled back in a simple braid.  The woman looked around cautiously, staying close to the healer.  If it were not for her nervous demeanor, he might have doubted who she really was.  He might have asked Elrond whether someone else had found a Mannish girl out in the wild.  But it was her, washed and rested and well.

“Rochondín!” he called out.  He leapt out of his chair and ran towards her.  Nethril noticed him and put out her hand to stop the girl, smiling at him.

He nearly knocked them both over in his hurry, but he managed to stop himself in time.  He grinned broadly, looking at the girl.  There was color in her face, her hair was neat, and her dress fit her well.  She was actually quite pretty.  “Mallory!” he corrected himself.  “It is wonderful to see you looking so well.”

He was disappointed at her lack of reaction.  It was clear that she could not understand his words, but she could understand his voice and expression and gestures.  He took her hand and kissed it, as he would have during the happy days in Valinor or Gondolin.  In this case, however, it meant more than simply showing his admiration for her.  Her hand was warm in a way it had not been since he had met her.  He held it for a few moments, beaming.

She seemed embarrassed, but looking up at him, the corners of her mouth moved.  She wavered and pressed her lips together in the way she did when she was upset, but her smile would not be held back.  It grew a little more each time it broke through, until at last, it was unmistakable.

She had laughed once or twice during their journey, but never for more than a moment, and never with a true smile on her face.  He could not control himself any longer.  He threw his arms around her.  There was such a size difference between them that she came up off her feet as he did.  He set her down again and saw that she was grinning now, no longer afraid.

Nethril took Rochondín’s arm, laughing.  “Come along,” she said.  “We should sit down.”

Glorfindel returned to the head of the table.  Mithrandir looked amused from under his eyebrows and Elrond from behind his hand.

“Seven days we traveled together,” Glorfindel said, “And I never saw her smile.”

“All of Imladris witnessed your performance,” Elrond replied, laughing openly.

“After all the years you have known me, do you still think that I care about looking a fool?  She smiled at me.  Her hands are warm.  She looks lovely, as well.”

“You must thank Laerin, then,” said Elrond.  “Though I suspect it was Nethril who dressed her.  I am as pleased as you are to see her like this.”

“Why is she not at the high table?”  Laerin was seated there (not for the first time, sometimes at Arwen’s request and sometimes on the merit of her own deeds), as well as Maura, Legolas, and several of the other guests.  The girl might not have accomplished what Maura had, but if this was a celebration of survival against great odds, then she ought to have been with him.

“Arwen and I felt she would prefer to be somewhere she would not attract attention,” he answered.  “We can honor her another time if she wishes it.”

Glorfindel nodded.  Elrond was most likely correct in his estimation of her preference.  She appeared nervous as it was.

Arwen rose from her seat and walked quietly towards the head of the table.  She stopped at Glorfindel’s side and bent as if she had something important to tell him.

“Laerin said that her horse had the same reaction when he saw her,” she murmured.  “And she smiled wider at him.”

Elrond laughed at that, and laughed for a long time.

There were a lot more people in the hall at dinner than in the kitchen for lunch.  A lot more.  If Nethril hadn’t been there, Mallory wouldn’t have been brave enough to take more than a step into the room.  And once Glorfindel left to go back up to his seat, she started sweating.  She had no idea how she was going to manage the rest of the feast and the Hall of Fire, surrounded by Elves she’d never met and didn’t know how to talk to.  The long and miserable days with Glorfindel seemed easy compared to this.

Nethril led her to a table and pulled out a chair for her.  She sat down, too nervous to look anywhere but the plate and silverware in front of her.

Someone on Mallory’s other side said something and reached over to pour something in her cup.  She glanced up to see a woman with dark brown hair smiling at her.  The woman was tall, but she looked about forty, with lines around her eyes, and she did not have an elf’s voice.  She looked a bit like Aragorn, so she was probably one of the Dúnedain.  But she couldn’t be Aragorn's mother, could it?  She remembered learning that Gilraen had lived until much closer to the Ring quest than she had expected, but not this close.

Nethril pointed to the woman and said, “Lossithil.”

Not Gilraen.  Mallory was relieved that there wasn’t something in the book that she had misunderstood that badly.  It still didn’t explain what she was doing there, though.  Well, maybe it didn’t matter.  She muttered the name, feeling awkward, and looked at her cup.

The drink was reddish and smelled like alcohol: wine, of course.  Elves liked wine.  Mallory’s inexperience with alcoholic drinks was probably weird to them.  She took a sip.  The first taste wasn’t so different from fruit juice, and good fruit juice, but then the burn of alcohol kicked in.

She tried not to make a face.  Well, she could probably acquire a taste for this.  She just didn’t want to get drunk: she’d embarrass herself.  There was water, too, so that should even things out.

Lossithil and Nethril talked almost constantly.  It mostly went over her head, but Lossithil was very good at making sure she got food and showing her what she was supposed to do.  Once her plate was full, Nethril stopped to tell her a bunch of words for food and drinks.  Fortunately, she didn’t make Mallory tell her the English words back, but she did make her repeat the Sindarin ones.

There was a lot of food.  Chicken, roasted vegetables, soup, various desserts…  It was very good, but the ambiance was a bit overwhelming.

It took Mallory a while to get to the point where she could actually look around.  She’d already seen Glorfindel.  He was dressed up, all embroidery and glittery gems, red and silver and gold.  But the person she saw up at the high table didn’t exactly look like the Glorfindel she knew.  It wasn’t the terrifying warrior persona, either.  He was something in between, unearthly and powerful but not threatening at all.  This Glorfindel exuded joy.

Gandalf and Elrond, on the other hand, were intimidating.  She would have thought Gandalf would seem friendly, but he absolutely looked like he belonged up there with all the Elves.  He wasn’t hiding behind the disguise of being an old man: he was a Maia, older and more powerful than any of them.  Elrond, meanwhile, was noble in a way she’d never seen in anyone before.  She understood the sense of agelessness that Tolkien had described: it wasn't just that she couldn't say how old he looked, but also that he seemed to come from another time, as if he was King Arthur or someone else out of an old story.  Which he was, in a way, only instead of him walking out of the story, she had walked in.

There were other Elves up there, men and women.  Arwen was in an obvious place of honor in the middle of the table.  She looked quite a bit like her father, Mallory thought, the same hair and a similar face but lighter skin.  There was also a sense that she had come out of a story, but more gentleness in her.  She was ready to play the part of the woman that everyone fought for, not the part of a hero or king.  Mallory had never liked Book!Arwen for that exact reason.  Movie!Arwen wasn’t her favorite, either, even though she was powerful.  She’d take Galadriel and Éowyn any day.

Weird.  Éowyn was real now.  So was Faramir, but neither side of Mallory’s OTP knew the other existed yet, and out of everyone in the entire world, she was the only one who knew that they’d fall in love.

Mallory had to look several times before she realized that it was Laerin who was sitting next to Arwen, wearing a different dress with her hair hanging loose.  Elves really did look alike, so it was hard to tell.  And there was Frodo, she recognized him a lot more easily.  He looked healthy and alive, not pale and faded like he had before.  The bearded person wearing fancy clothes next to him must have been Glóin.  There were a couple of dwarves at her table, too.  She’d have to look at them up close sometime, now that she’d seen Elves and hobbits.  They looked like they’d fit her expectations better, but then again, dwarves were pretty basic: short people with beards.  Hard to screw up, though the Hobbit movies had somehow managed it.

The feast went on for a long time, long enough that Mallory started to get less anxious and more bored by the end of it.  She was also very full.  Strange to think that she’d been surviving on stale crackers and dried meat a few days ago.  But eventually, it ended, and people started to stand and move.  The Hall of Fire was next, and Frodo reuniting with Bilbo, and wasn’t the Ring involved somehow?  She didn’t want to see this.  A little voice in her head said she’d regret avoiding the story, but right now, having seen the Ford was more than enough for her.  Also, she needed to go to the bathroom.

She was being moved forward by several people.  Panicking a little, she grabbed Nethril’s arm and went back to the old standard of crossing her legs.

Nethril pulled her to the side and then made her say the right words.  Then, she sent her to the outdoor toilets with Lossithil, who apparently also needed to go.

Mallory dragged her feet on the way back.  By the time they got there, the music was already underway, the musicians playing something lively.  They sat by Nethril, and Mallory looked around for Frodo, even though she knew she’d regret it.  He was sitting with an older hobbit who must have been Bilbo.

She looked away, but a hobbit who was probably Pippin came running up to her like an overexcited child.  He babbled something that made Nethril and Lossithil laugh, and Nethril responded to him.  Then came the other one of the younger hobbits, who shook her hand enthusiastically, in what seemed to be congratulations.  That felt weird to Mallory, after the horror Frodo had survived, but Merry would end up having his own experience with black breath one day, and it was good for him to see that she’d survived.

Eventually, the hobbits moved on to talk to Gandalf.  The music changed to a slower song, and someone started singing.  Apparently, Glorfindel’s voice wasn’t even particularly good, for Elves.  This crossed over from “good singing voice” to “a literal angel”.

Before she had gotten into the room, she had promised herself that she wouldn’t fall asleep, but as the music flowed around her, it began to carry her away, and she found that there was nothing for her to hang onto to keep her footing.  She drifted through not-quite-sleep, coming back into awareness every so often, between dreams that slipped through her fingers.  One of the times she woke up, though, she looked around and noticed Gandalf and Elrond standing next to Laerin and looking at her.

She froze, her heart caught in her throat.  Random people talking about her was scary enough.  Really important, legendary people talking about her was so much worse.  But both Gandalf and Elrond’s faces softened when they saw she’d noticed them, and Elrond smiled.  Then, he beckoned her over.

Mallory’s eyes widened, and she could almost feel her pupils dilate in alarm.  She couldn’t say no.  You didn’t say no to people like him, even when he was trying to be friendly.  But she wasn’t anywhere near ready for this.  Even though she knew she had to see Gandalf, she wasn’t prepared to do it now.  She needed some warning.

But the Council was tomorrow.  She had to do it.  This was her job.  She was just useless at it.

Elrond whispered something to Laerin, and she walked over, smiling.  She said something in a friendly and reassuring tone and offered her hand.  Mallory took it, because she didn’t really have a choice, and they walked over to the Elf-lord and the wizard.

Elrond was still smiling when she got there.  He clearly had an “ordinary person” side, like Glorfindel, and she had the feeling that he was going out of his way to show it to her.  She appreciated that, because she was barely holding it together, and she didn’t think she’d manage that at all if he looked the way he had during the feast.

“Mae govannen, Mallory,” he said.

She flushed at hearing her own name from him.  He had pronounced it fairly well, too.  She would have assumed it was just that he was better at languages, except that Glorfindel had improved a lot, too, and so had Nethril.  Either Laerin had been busy or there was a secret Elf hive mind.

That was not a helpful thought for this situation.  She tried very hard not to laugh.  Her heart, which was already racing, sped up even more.  Was she going to have a panic attack?  This wasn’t something she used to have to worry about in stressful situations, but now…

Laerin introduced them as “Mithrandir” and “Elrond”, with something in front of Elrond’s name that must have been a title.  What was the custom here for meeting someone?  Did she bow?  Curtsy?  He wasn’t a king, but he was the closest thing they had to one.  She should show respect somehow, and Elves sure as heck didn’t shake hands.

Elrond eliminated the problem by offering her a seat.  She sat down, noticing how her hands were shaking.  She didn’t feel out of control or like she was dying, the way she did during panic attacks, but she had most of the other symptoms, and that seemed like a bad sign with the way things were going these days.  Maybe the daytime panic attacks were over, but she didn’t know.  If one started, she was leaving, no matter what anyone said.

Elrond sat next to her.  Laerin leaned against the wall, arms crossed, watching her.   There was an awkward silence between everyone for a few minutes.  Then, Elrond asked her a question.

She shook her head in incomprehension.  He repeated the words, slowly.  Then, Gandalf asked something.  They both nodded with resigned looks when she still didn’t get it.

Nobody said anything for the next few minutes, but everyone seemed to be looking for her to do or say something.

She had to give her message.  Elrond could probably hear, that might be okay, but she wasn’t sure about Laerin.  How secret was this supposed to be?  Better not to risk it.  She knew a lot of things she wasn’t supposed to, and if they figured that out, it would be better if they had already seen that she could exercise judgement about who heard.

She took a deep breath, and all three of them looked at her expectantly.  She went through the words again in her head.  She still had it perfectly memorized, even after everything.  She took another breath and looked up at Gandalf.

He caught the look and squatted down in front of her, which felt uncomfortably like he was an adult talking to a kid.  Oh, well.  She cupped her hands around her mouth and took another breath.

She forced out the first word, and then suddenly the message was coming without her even thinking about it.  Thank God.  She breathed again when it was over, this time in relief.

Gandalf looked at her sharply when she finished, then nodded and stood up.

Elrond smiled at her again and asked a quiet question, something along the lines of “Is that all?”  She didn’t know how to respond, so she just looked down.  Laerin signaled someone across the room, and a moment later, Nethril came over to them.  She motioned for Mallory to follow her, so she did, feeling the tension leave her body again.  She sat down and tried not to look back to see what Elrond and Gandalf were doing or whether they were still talking about her.

As she sat there, the music started to become almost a physical medium around her, lifting up her body and taking her away.  She didn’t remember much else, but she knew she wanted to hear it again.

Laerin all but held her breath through the meeting, as she was alert for any sign that Mallory needed to be removed from the situation.  “She should not speak to anyone else tonight,” Laerin said once Nethril came to retrieve her.  “We must allow her to rest.”

Nethril nodded and took her back to the side of the room.

“If you are wondering, the words were Sindarin, but memorized by rote,” said Mithrandir.  “I am not sure whether she knows what she was saying.  I must speak to Glorfindel.  It is no mistake that she met him.”  At that, he headed across the room, leaving Laerin with Elrond.

“You have done a good job with her,” said Elrond, smiling gently at her.

“I know,” agreed Laerin.  “But she is not entirely recovered.”

“Nor is Maura, though he may not understand that yet.”

That did not surprise Laerin: she knew exactly how serious wounds from Morgul blades were, both as a healer and a patient, and he had survived the wound without healing for longer than anyone she had ever seen.  “She may find healing here, but I cannot say for sure.  She will not be able to learn better ways to manage the panic when she does not feel it.  And I cannot help her with that at all if I cannot speak to her.”

“But for some people, the ability to live without the fear of losing control makes an enormous difference.”

“That is true.  But day-to-day life will not be easy for her here, even if her anxiety is better controlled.  There is the language barrier, and beyond that, there is so much that she does not know.  She needed help to dress, and I had to explain to her what a chamber pot was!”

“When our people visit Lórien for the first time, they are unsure how to live in a tree,” said Elrond.  “And that is within our own race and even our own families.  She is so different from us that we do not even know her language.  Her ways must be entirely foreign.  Perhaps her people do not wear dresses or relieve themselves indoors.”

“I suppose that is possible,” she said skeptically.  Most cultures she knew of had dresses for women, and even Magoleth, who preferred men’s clothing, could be convinced to wear a dress on special occasions.  “But she is going to need someone to be with her most of the time.”

“I agree,” said Elrond.  “I cannot guess how long she will stay here, but I imagine it will be some time – though she may have other plans, which she cannot or will not tell us.  Glorfindel and Aragorn will be busy with other duties, and she would be better cared for by women.  If you and Nethril will continue to watch her, and persuade some others to do so as well…”

Laerin nodded.  She had already accepted that duty.  But if war came, Laerin would not be available to continue helping her.  She was a soldier, not a teacher, and she would be needed.  Even now, scouting parties had begun to bring healers along with them.  The number of people who could fill that necessary space became smaller with each company who set off towards the Sea, and Laerin was one of the ones remaining.  She really should already be part of the rotation.

“But have some care of what is said in her hearing, by yourself or others.  Her power of comprehension may not come back, but she will quickly learn to understand much more than she says.  You may not know what she has made sense of.”

“I will.”  The Imladhrim were gossips, but not as cruel as Mannish women (or, indeed, some other groups of Elves).  More likely, someone would reveal secrets without intending it.

“Go, then, and enjoy the celebrations.  Some of this, after all, is for you.”

He looked at her with pride, and Laerin smiled in spite of herself.  Well, if there was anyone she looked to for approval on this side of the Sea, it should be Elrond.  Then, since she was dismissed, she went to find her sister.

Chapter Text

October 25

There was an uninvited guest at Elrond’s council, Glorfindel noticed.  Halflings were nearly as quiet as Elves, and Ban must have been practiced at hiding if he could escape even Mithrandir’s notice.  Considering that Maura had been at the table for nearly ten minutes, Ban had surely been in the corner for at least that long before Glorfindel saw him.

Glorfindel saw no reason to point him out: Elrond almost certainly already knew he was there, and if he did not, the fault was his.  Glorfindel did, however, find a moment to walk around the porch and ensure that no others had found a place in a corner or the bushes.  He returned to his seat, satisfied.

This meeting would have great importance in the days to come.  He had already spoken to all who were present, but he had not yet heard the details of their tales.  Boromir, son of the Steward in Gondor, had arrived most recently, having been discovered by the last returning rider that had been sent to seek out Maura and his companions.  Glorfindel had been summoned by Elrond early that morning to meet the Man, and he had been given little time to do anything but eat a meal before all were called to the council.

Glorfindel was not at all surprised that the Elves of Mirkwood or the dwarves of Erebor had chanced to come to them in the days just before and after Maura and Mithrandir’s arrivals.  Such was the way of the world.  He was even less surprised that Galdor had come from Círdan at the same time: Gildor had sent word to the Grey Havens of what was happening, after all, so he had been expected.  But the fact that Boromir, unhorsed and wandering with no certain knowledge of Imladris’ location, had found his way there in time for the planned council, spoke of the importance of what they were to discuss.

There was much to speak of: battles and famine, and both threats and poisoned honey from messengers from Mordor.  Glorfindel, however, was most interested in Mithrandir’s story and Maura’s, having heard only scattered pieces of each.  As Maura spoke, Glorfindel was caught by the fact that the periannath had met Iarwain Ben-Adar not so many days before Rochondín had.

Maura’s story went slowly, as there were many questions, not because he was a poor storyteller but because there was so much to discuss.  At last, he reached his meeting with Glorfindel.  He could not have remembered it especially well, considering how ill he had been.  (He had not revealed just how poor his health had been, but Glorfindel guessed that the halfling was not yet ready to speak of that.)  “We didn’t know who he was at first,” he said.  “But we saw he was an Elf.  And he was traveling with a Woman who was hurt, too.”

“That would be the young woman whom Laerin is caring for, correct?” asked Erestor, clarifying for the guests that she was known to them.

“It is, but we shall complete Maura’s tale before beginning a new one,” Elrond replied.

Glorfindel remained quiet for the most part while the Halfling spoke, though he did have to contribute to the tale when it came to the battle at the Ford.  Elrond returned to the topic once Maura’s story was done.  “He is a strange creature,” he said of Iarwain.  “But maybe I should have summoned him to our Council.”

“He would not have come,” said Gandalf.  “But he has sent a messenger, and you have not summoned her, either.”

“To what end?” asked Elrond.  “She cannot understand us, and I do not believe that she has any further messages to share.  But now is the time to speak of her, and that is Glorfindel’s tale to tell.”

So it came to Glorfindel.  He told Rochondín’s story carefully, the memory of her reproachful eyes clear in his mind.  It would not do to share the secrets she had tried to hide, and he saw no reason that anyone present who did not already know of her panic attacks had need of that knowledge.  He spoke, instead, of the strangeness of what languages she did or did not know.  He also spoke of the story he had learned from her cold hands, the dagger hilt the healers had found in her bag, Mithrandir’s understanding of her memories, and the behavior of the úlairi themselves.  It angered him still, that two Ringwraiths, separated from both their captain and his lieutenant, had seen an Elf-lord on a warhorse and tried to take a prize from right in front of him.  Had they forgotten who he was?  Or were they so confident, or so desperate, that their history with him no longer mattered?  Yet, later, they had fled from him into the Bruinen.  In that moment in the woods, they had wanted her very much and taken even the smallest opportunity to catch her, or whatever it was that she carried with her.

He turned to Círdan’s messenger.  “You may tell me, Galdor, whether there have recently been any ships, or wrecks, that have been in any way unusual.  She told me that she had not come across the sea, but she seemed hesitant.  She does not appear to come from any lands near to us”

“There have not been any that I know of,” he replied.

Though Glorfindel was not surprised by that answer, he was disappointed.  “Then I have no explanation for her, and it is up to Gandalf to complete the tale.”

The wizard related their meeting in the Hall of Fire.  “She was afraid to speak to me,” he said.  “But I think she would have been afraid no matter what she was asked to say, or whom she was to say it to, if she had not met them before.”

She would not have spoken any more freely to Glorfindel, whom she had met, but he did not say so.

“A fear of people does not make a good messenger,” said Erestor.  “Least of all when one does not share the language and must take risks to communicate.”

“Then she was clearly chosen for another reason,” said Mithrandir, who seemed perturbed that Erestor had interrupted his story without leave.  “Now, if you would like to hear what her message was?”

Glorfindel hid his smile.  He knew that the silver-haired counselor was a good friend to Elrond and perfectly well suited to his duties as diplomat and advisor, but Glorfindel did not appreciate his tendency to argue the opposing view in any discussion.  Erestor, for his part, had always had difficulty with Glorfindel’s position: he had refused to attempt to re-establish his own house in Middle Earth and had instead chosen to live as little more than a permanent guest in Elrond’s house, and he was also the only Elf to have traveled to the hither lands with the Valar’s blessing, which was against the order of things.  It was always quite satisfying to see him taken down by Mithrandir’s sharp tongue.

“Yes, we are waiting on your every word,” replied Erestor without hesitation.

Glorfindel smiled openly.  It was entirely the response that Mithrandir deserved.  The wizard scowled but went on.  “She said to me, a verse, taking care that others did not hear:

“Five crossed the sea

Two further still

The Huntsman recalls them

Through the Rider his will.”

There was murmuring from several around the table.  Another of Elrond’s advisors said, “I do not understand the first half, but the Huntsman, I imagine, is the one we name Araw, one of the lords of the West who once hunted the beasts of Morgoth.  The Rider must of course be the girl whom Glorfindel named as such.”

Glorfindel had met and spoken to the Hunter, whom he had called Oromë, in the days of the Trees and knew many people who had ridden with him, though none were at the table now.  He was well known to both Elves and Men by different names, as, like Ulmo, he had never abandoned Middle Earth.  He himself had discovered the Elves when they still dwelt by Cuivienen and had led them westward.

“But what is this about ‘five’ and ‘two’?” asked Galdor.  While being Círdan’s advisor, had never been part of the White Council, so there were many pieces of information that he did not have.

“Ah,” said Mithrandir.  “You see, there is more to my order of wizards than myself, Saruman, and Radagast.  There are five in total, although I know very little about the remaining two.  They went to the east, where I do not go.”

“Alatar and Pallando, they were named when I met them,” said Glorfindel.  “We traveled together for a time, but they were headed to another land than I, and we parted.”

He was cautious as to what he said.  His return from the West had never been secret, as it would have been difficult to hide that he was the hero of Gondolin, but the origins of the wizards were.  Until today, even the existence of the other two wizards had not been known in the west except to the White Council.  They had not arrived on the shores of Middle Earth with him, having disguised themselves as merchants in order to disappear among the Men in Númenor and book their own passage onward.

“I have not seen them since, though I hear rumors of them at times.  I think they would recognize me, and I them, but I cannot say if they still live, or where they might be.  There are many false rumors as well, that I have found to be speaking of others like them, false sorcerers and travelers dressed in blue.”

“And what of the Huntsman?” Círdan’s advisor asked.

“They were his servants once,” said Glorfindel.  “But he has not ridden these lands since the fall of Beleriand, and if they have turned against him or lost their way, he cannot do anything himself.  But I do not know enough to say what he needs of them.”

“If the Blue Wizards remain true, they may assist us in events to come,” said Mithrandir.  “But if they have turned against us, as Saruman has, they may make equally terrible enemies.”

“Then Iarwain has not sent her to help us decide what to do with the Ring,” said Erestor.

“I do not believe so,” replied Glorfindel.  “It is possible that the Blue Wizards could help us, but it may take a great deal of time to find them, more time than we shall have.  But I expect that is why he sent the girl to us, rather than asking the hobbits to carry the message.  They have a purpose in this war already, and they cannot take on another.”

“But could we not still send messages back to him and obtain other help?” argued Erestor.  “It seems that he has power even over the Ring.”

Glorfindel shook his head.  It would not do to ask anyone to keep the Ring.  Even if the owner was not affected by it, others would be, and he had seen what was done for the desire of such things.  However, Mithrandir spoke first.  “No, I should not put it so.  Say rather that the Ring has no power over him.”

The discussion went on.  Glorfindel was quite sure, as he knew Elrond was, that there was no way for anyone to hold the Ring against Sauron.  However, this talk was necessary.  Before they could answer the question of how to rid themselves of the Ring, everyone represented had to be in agreement that it had to be done, even Boromir and Erestor.

At last, the debate began to approach the conclusion that there was no path but to Mordor.  “This quest may be attempted by the weak with as much hope as the strong,” said Elrond.  “Yet such is oft the course of deeds that move the wheels of the world: small hands do them because they must, while the eyes of the great are elsewhere.”

So it would be.  The halflings would take the Ring: Elves had far too much power to do evil, as Fëanor had, and the avarice of the dwarves would lead them astray, whereas Men were too easily swayed by promises of immortality or power.  Halflings almost seemed to have been created for the task of carrying the Ring.  But Bilba could not travel anymore, and although Mithrandir had him in mind, none could ask this of Maura after what he had already suffered.  One of the younger periannath, then, perhaps?  Glorfindel was not sure that he could suggest the idea to them, either.

And so, silence fell at the council, until it was broken by a small voice.

“I will take the Ring,” said Frodo, “though I do not know the way.”

“Of course I knew that he was there,” said Elrond, speaking to Aragorn and Glorfindel after the Council.  “I felt that he would have a part to play in this, and it seems that I was correct.  Besides which, if neither Aragorn nor Gandalf felt the need to send him away, there was no reason for me to.”

“But it was quite a surprise for everyone else!” said Aragorn.  “I do not think Bilba or Maura noticed him until he spoke.”

Glorfindel laughed.  “And even he seemed quite shocked as to what came of it!  But we have real business to discuss.  We will need to decide who will go as scouts ahead of the Ringbearer, and in which direction.”

“I will be ready to leave as soon as you need me to,” said Aragorn.

Then his visit with Arwen had been short, Glorfindel thought with disappointment.  But the coming war was precisely what would determine whether or not Aragorn would be able to spend his life with her.  “And should I journey east?” he asked.

“Not yet,” replied Elrond.  “I think it will be necessary for us to send someone to seek word of the wizards and to learn more of what is occurring there.  There are still Elves in Dorwinion on the shores of the Sea of Rhûn, so Legolas says, and they may speak to us.  But I am unsure how they will take to a Golodh lord twice born across the Sea.”

Glorfindel frowned at the word Golodh, Sindarin for Noldo, but Elrond was correct that he was not universally loved among Elves, even his own people, since his return.  What was more, their main connection to Dorwinion was through Thranduil’s folk, who were wary of High Elves of any sort.

“Dorwinion is a long way away,” said Aragorn.  “And if you wish for any information gained there to be of use to Maura, the scouts will have to return before he leaves.  Elladan and Elrohir are the fastest travelers, and if nothing else, they do not have the light of the Trees in their eyes.”

Glorfindel considered.  The tall and grim sons of Elrond, moving in unison as if they shared one mind, would seem to most people to be far more intimidating than Glorfindel, and their Elven heritage were from High Elves – Noldor and Sindar – as well.  However, Aragorn’s arguments were reasonable.

“Yes,” agreed Elrond.  “I think you are correct.  We had best speak to them, and then we will decide on the rest of the scouts.  We will, also, have to discuss which of our guests will stay or return home.  Come with me.”

He set off down the hallway, and Glorfindel and Aragorn followed.

Nethril brought breakfast to Mallory that day.  (Well, she was pretty sure it was Nethril, anyway.  She still wasn’t confident in her ability to tell Elves apart, but she was tall, and had the right skin tone, and wavy black hair, so…)  They went through all the words for food again, plus a few new ones, and there was a bit of medicine.  Then, Mallory dressed in clean underclothes, but Nethril gave her the same dress.  The same one?  Well, it wasn’t as bad as wearing the same shirt twice in a row, since it didn’t really touch her skin.  And she had just finished a journey where she wore the same clothes, which were against her skin, for a week at a time.  But Nethril was wearing a different dress today.  Would wearing the same clothes two days in a row make people look down on her, the way it would at home?  Or would wearing a shirt and pants, which was her only other option, come across as weird?

Netheril showed her where she could clean out her chamber pot and then took her all the way downstairs to an area near the kitchens to drop off her dirty clothes.  Was it someone’s job to wash them?  Were there Elf-servants?  Surely there would have to be.  This seemed to be a general area for washing and bathing, and Mallory was fascinated when Nethril showed her some reasonably sized bathtubs and demonstrated that they could get hot water out of the tap.  How could they do that?  They didn’t even have electricity.

Afterwards, Nethril gave her a tour of the building.  Talking the whole way, she showed her the great halls, and the kitchens where they had eaten lunch the day before, and then what seemed to be the infirmary.  Then, they went to a room full of fabric, where people were sewing and weaving.  Everyone looked at Mallory, and then Nethril introduced everyone to her, which was painfully awkward.  But Lossithil was also there (or another forty-something Dúnadan woman, but she thought there was only one, and Nethril didn’t introduce her, so…).  She made Mallory try on an almost-finished yellow dress she was working on.  Was she making that for her, then?  Mallory felt bad for taking things without giving anything back, but that was what the people at Rivendell did.  Right?  She wondered what their thought process was.  “Poor girl doesn’t have any proper clothes, and we have to fix that”?  Or was it just a way of showing kindness?

Once she’d changed back, which was a bit of a production with all the laces, Nethril pointed out a loom with what looked like part of a tapestry showing a forest.  She indicated that it was hers.  Mallory was very impressed – it looked complicated, and she didn’t at all see how it was done.  But Nethril didn’t stop to show her.  They went on and came to a library.

Wow.  It wasn’t any bigger than her school library – smaller, really – but all the books would be new to her, and might include everything she’d ever wanted to know about Middle Earth.  Everything she wanted was right there in front of her, and she couldn’t read any of it.  Water, water everywhere, and not a drop to drink, she thought.

Nethril had been giving her intense looks every so often, which made Mallory uncomfortable, but suddenly, she understood what it was about.  She was looking for a reaction, some hint of what Mallory was interested in.  Now, she found it.  She walked over to a shelf and pulled out a book, then pointed to Mallory, asking a question.

Mallory shook her head unhappily.

Nethril went looking for something, and Mallory followed her.  They passed an Elf cleaning the shelves, who looked at them curiously.  Mallory looked away, embarrassed and hurried past.  Better not to hang around with dust in the air, anyway.

Nethril found something that was probably a literal piece of slate, like someone would find in a one-room schoolhouse in old books, and a bit of chalk.  She wrote a few runes on it, unfamiliar ones, not like the Cirth runes that Mallory remembered.  A different set of runes?  Or…  Uh oh.  She remembered noticing that the runes in the books looked remarkably similar to historical runes.  So the only conclusion was that Tolkien had translated that, too.  But she remembered more of Tengwar than the Cirth anyway, and Tengwar had probably been given in its entirety, like the Sindarin language was.

Nethril probably wouldn’t assume that Mallory could actually read and write, and the only way to show her that was to actually write something.  Not too much, of course, but something.  Anyway, it was slate and chalk.  She could just wipe it off afterwards, and nobody else would see.  So she took the chalk and wrote in her neatest handwriting, Mallory Sutton.  Then, carefully – chalk wasn’t a good medium for this – she wrote it again in cursive.

Nethril grinned at her.  Then, she pointed to Mallory and the runes and asked a question.  Mallory shrugged in incomprehension.

Nethril nodded and cleaned off the slate.  They went outside next, and Nethril showed her a number of smaller buildings that housed the messier types of crafts – things like wood, leather, and metalworking.  Mallory kept her distance from the actual work, but she did stay and watch for a while.  They ended up back at the stables, brushing Kaza together and combing out his mane and tail.  He seemed very pleased with the grooming, if a little disappointed that she didn’t have an apple.

Lunch came after that.  It wasn’t nearly as fancy as the feast from the night before, of course, and there were a lot fewer options for food, but they still sat next to Lossithil.  Mallory completely forgot to check whether Boromir or anyone else was there until Frodo, Sam, and Bilbo caught her attention by walking in late.

She looked around in a panic.  There was nobody else there but various Elves, her, and Lossithil.  No Boromir, but Elrond or Gandalf or Glorfindel, either.

Of course not.  They were at the Council.  She had completely forgotten about it.  She didn’t know how she’d managed to forget, but she was glad, or she would have worried all morning.  At least she didn’t have to be there.

Oh, God, she thought suddenly.  They must have talked about me.  About me!  It was a seriously good thing she’d forgotten about it.

At last, maybe fifteen minutes after the hobbits, the dwarves came in, along with a Man.  She tried to look at him without being obvious about it.  He wasn’t Aragorn.  She wasn’t entirely sure she would recognize Aragorn cleaned up – theoretically, she must have seen him in the Hall of Fire last night and not noticed – but he was heavier, with darker hair.

Boromir, then.  He was here.  Frodo was alive, and Boromir was here.  Things had turned out all right.  Thank God.

Was this the end of her adventure, then?  She wasn’t willing to go with the Fellowship, even if someone asked her to.  But they wouldn’t ask that, not after how annoyed Glorfindel had been with her.  That was good.  But the message, and the book… no, she was supposed to do more than just to travel here, and she didn’t know what it was or how it would be communicated to her.  God, maybe she would have to communicate it to them.  Well, at least she’d probably be here for a few months.  Until the Fellowship left, at least, maybe all the way until she could actually have a conversation with people.  How long would that take?

Laerin took Mallory with her after lunch.  She wondered if someone had a “Mallory babysitting schedule” written out somewhere or they were just trading off whenever they ran into each other.  First, they went upstairs and took a break.  Laerin was clearly still worried about Mallory, and Mallory was still taking medicine that she assumed was making her tired, so she guessed she needed it.

After maybe an hour of resting, they went back downstairs, and outside, and they found a group of about ten women gathered under some trees.  One was drawing, another was playing a sort of flute, some were doing embroidery, and others were just talking.  It didn’t look like the sort of group Mallory would want to be part of.  It looked, more than anything, like the cool girls of Rivendell.  Sandra would have been delighted by the invitation, but her little lunch group was all the socialization Mallory ever had.  But they were obviously giving her options, so this was just another one.

The dark-haired woman in the middle of the group smiled and gestured in invitation to them.  Laerin sat down, pointing where Mallory should sit.  She did, and Laerin said her name to the others, clearly as part of an introduction.  Then, she turned to Mallory, pointed to the dark-haired woman, and said, “Arwen.”

Mallory’s eyes widened.  Of course it was Arwen.  Black-haired, and gorgeous (although all of the Elves were gorgeous, to be fair), and based on the seating arrangements last night, apparently friends with Laerin.  And who else would be the leader of the local posse of cool girls?

Arwen smiled and put a hand on her arm, seemingly to comfort her.  Oh, God, she was basically a princess.  Mallory was sitting there with a princess who was trying to make her feel better.  Suddenly, she had an image of Arwen singing some dramatic song like “Let It Go.”  Or maybe “How Far I’ll Go” from Moana would fit an Elf better, since it was literally about sea-longing.  Besides, Elsa was technically a queen.  Then again, in about a year...

Some of the other women spoke, but none seemed to expect a response from her.  Laerin, meanwhile, produced a piece of parchment and a stick of something black and soft, presumably charcoal.  She slowly wrote out letters, sounding out Mallory’s name.  Arwen tried to correct one of them, and they argued for a bit, seemingly about what letter they should use to represent the r.  Once Arwen had convinced some of the other ladies to agree with her, Laerin gave in and handed the charcoal to Mallory to copy.

She did her best.  Arwen and Laerin both said things that sounded encouraging (though they might just as well have been “You’re really terrible at that” in a positive tone).  In the end, it wasn’t a bad way to spend the afternoon, hanging out with courtly ladies who all seemed to be doing things they enjoyed and were actually reasonably nice to her.  And now she sort-of knew how to write her name in Tengwar.  But it wasn’t the sort of group where she belonged.

Some part of her, somehow, missed being on the road.

Chapter Text

Late October

It saddened Laerin to see Magoleth and Gladhedir putting on their traveling clothes again the day after Elrond’s council.  They had been home for too short a time.  Magoleth was meant to spend several nights watching the entryway to the valley from the High Pass, but Gladhedir would be gone for much longer, seeking signs of the Ringwraiths down the river.  She complained to Arwen about it, walking through the gardens that morning.

“Magoleth says that I worry too much,” she said.

“You have every right to worry!” Arwen protested.  “I know how difficult it is to wait for the ones I love to return, and you are the eldest in your family now.”

Of course, Laerin had been considered too somber even when she had been the youngest in her family.  Her parents had always said that she had not learned how to play children’s games until she had been an adult and Magoleth had been born.  Outside of her weekly lessons, she had spent most of her time watching people and trees and practicing her dances.  It was the reason her mother had named her Idhrenel, “thoughtful”.

Arwen went on.  “And she should know how this feels.  Does she not fear for her Dúnedain friends when she is away from them?  When, for example, she knows they will give birth before she returns?”

“I think – forgive me – that the frequency and permanency of their deaths makes her think less of our own,” she replied.

Arwen did not answer that, and Laerin did not expect her to.  Laerin frowned as they walked on, thinking.  “I should have gone, as well,” she said at last.

“Then you must say so,” Arwen reminded her.  “You will be the last to be asked to join patrols if everyone believes that you wish to remain here.”

Laerin’s frown deepened.  She had never stopped traveling with parties of warriors, of course, but it was rare these days.  Since the Witch-King's defeat in Angmar, the only time that anyone had asked her to go with them instead of waiting for her to suggest it was seventy years ago, when an army from Imladris and Lothlórien had traveled to drive the Necromancer out of Dol Guldur.  Until Sauron brought his armies north, she would not be asked again.  “I cannot decide whether I am needed more here or there.”

“That only means that you will be of use no matter which you choose.”

“I suppose so,” she said cautiously.

“Would you like me to arrange for someone to teach Mallory to read?” Arwen asked, changing the subject.  “Perhaps she could have some formal lessons in Sindarin at the same time.”

“She might like that,” replied Laerin.  She, herself, did not know who to ask among the Elves who remained in Imladris: her own teachers were long gone.  “Though it will be another unfamiliar face.”

“I thought she managed meeting me rather well.”

“I think she would have done better if there had been a smaller group of people, but you were friendly enough, and not your father.”

“Oh, I do not think that he was the problem,” said Arwen, laughing.  “I expected Mithrandir to burst with impatience.”

“Then he would never have found out what she wanted to say,” Laerin pointed out.  “I do not suppose you know what it was?”

“Of course not,” replied Arwen.  “We will hear it if it concerns us.”

Laerin frowned again.  She was sure it would concern her, one way or another, before this was over.  But perhaps that thought was only due to her sense of uselessness.  “It sounds as if she will wait here, with the halflings, at least until the scouts return.  The time will be good for her, if we can keep her busy.”  Rest was necessary for a healing patient, but too much time with her own thoughts would make matters worse for her.

“I think Lossithil is glad to have another mortal woman here.  And you should introduce her to Elanna.  They would get along.”

“You mean they would be equally frightened to meet one another, and neither would speak,” said Laerin, laughing.  “Then again, she might be the only one who can understand her.”  Words did not come naturally to the young elf, which made her all the better at interpreting what people did not say.  Her foresight, limited in scope but frequent and uncontrollable, also helped her to guess what was in another’s mind.

“Indeed,” Arwen agreed.  Then, she added, “I could teach her, if you would prefer.”

“Would you like to?”

“I think that the new language will be difficult, but I have taught others to read and write, and I am willing to try.  I expect that I can find books to help.”

Laerin nodded.  “All right.”

“We will discuss when and how.  But right now, I think you had better see Magoleth before she leaves.”

That was a polite way to tell her she had to go: Arwen clearly had work to do or other people to talk to.  But she was not incorrect.  “I will,” she said.  “Thank you.”

Arwen smiled.

Nethril brought Mallory breakfast again that day.  There was no medicine today, which was good.  Instead, Nethril had brought the dress Lossithil had been working on, and the shift and underwear Mallory had worn the day before last had reappeared.  So she had all clean clothes to wear today.  The dress felt very comfortable, too.

They dealt with the chamber pot and Mallory’s underclothes.  They didn’t take the blue dress, but it didn’t smell, and Mallory hadn’t spilled anything on it, so it probably didn’t need washing.  Besides, when you did everything by hand – both in terms of washing clothes and making new ones when the old ones wore out – it was probably better to do that as little as possible.

After that, they went down to the sewing room again.  Mallory thought she should probably thank Lossithil for the dress, but she still didn’t know how to say that.  Today, Lossithil was embroidering something – a tunic, Mallory thought.  She wondered guiltily if she’d been working on it before Mallory came along and had been forced to stop work to make the dress.

Lossithil motioned for Mallory to come and sit by her.  She said a word, pointing to the seams on the inside of the tunic and making a sewing gesture.  She waited until Mallory repeated it.  Then, she added a stitch to the embroidery and said something else.  So she was saying sewing and embroidery.  All right.  Then, Lossithil pointed to her and repeated the words questioningly.

Did she sew?  Was that the question?  She wiggled her hand in a so-so gesture.  Yes, Mom had made her mend holes in her clothes a couple of times, and she’d done a cross-stitch thing she’d gotten for Christmas one year, but her tiny amount of experience would be worthless compared to people who actually sewed for a living.  (“For a living”?  Did people here have jobs where they got paid?  She couldn’t quite imagine Elves exchanging money.  But there had to be some system or else nothing would get done.  Were the Elves communists?)

Lossithil smiled and took a needle, thread, and some pins.  She taught her the words for those items and also what Mallory thought was cloth.  Then, she gave Mallory the needle and thread.  She took a scrap of cloth, folded it over, and put pins in it to hold it in place.  She ran her finger down the cloth along the line of the pins, as if telling her to sew it.

Mallory threaded the needle.  She started to tie a knot at the end, but she stopped and looked for confirmation before she pulled it tight.  Then, she poked the needle through the cloth, looking at Lossithil again.

Lossithil shook her head and pointed to a different place to put the needle.  Mallory put it through and started to make a stitch.  Lossithil corrected the placement again to make it straighter.

It was a slow process.  In the end, though, she had a straight and even line of stitches down the side of the cloth.  Nobody other than Lossithil really talked to her, or not that Mallory noticed, but she still felt like they were watching her, especially when she made mistakes.  All women in Rivendell probably knew how to sew.  She must look horribly uneducated.

After maybe a couple of hours, Laerin came to get her.  Lossithil showed her what they had been working on, and she smiled and said something that sounded encouraging.  The two of them talked for a minute or so.  Then, Laerin took Mallory up to her room.

She said a word, using a sewing gesture.  Then, she looked at Mallory.

That was the word for sewing, right?  But she’d already said it to Lossithil.  Why did she have to say it again?  Ugh.

Laerin repeated it and waited.  Mallory repeated it half-heartedly.  Laerin nodded and smiled, then pointed at Mallory.

Her own word for it.  Great.

They went through all the new words, along with Mallory’s best guesses for their meanings.  Then, she let Mallory sit in peace for a few minutes, until lunch.  They ate in the dining hall with everyone else, then went on a walk into parts of Rivendell that Mallory hadn’t seen yet.  There was another set of buildings down the road a while, and streams that fell down the rocks in little waterfalls.  Eventually, they walked down a steep, winding path to the river.  She wondered if the valley had been this pretty before the Elves came.  Had they chosen it because of the beauty?  Or had they sort of helped to cultivate it?

She got to see even more of the valley the next morning.  Laerin came in before Mallory dressed and took out one of her traveling clothes, laying them out for her.  “Kaza,” she said, and then some more Mallory couldn’t understand.

What about Kaza?  She knew she wasn’t leaving yet – she’d only been there a few days.  So what was the plan?  Not understanding made her anxious.

The shirt, leggings, and pants were comfortable and familiar, though she was a bit surprised by how the material felt different than her dress – and that she liked the texture and cut of Elvish cloth better.  She also had mixed feelings about the boots.  The soles were much thicker than her slippers, so she didn’t feel the impacts of her feet on stone, but wearing them immediately took her back to some of the most inconvenient and frustrating moments on the road, and it could never be entirely comfortable to walk with leather almost up to her knees.  She took her cloak, too – mornings were cold up here in the mountains – and remembered pulling it close around her when things had been bad.

They went down to the stables and found Glorfindel there, with Asfaloth and Kaza already tacked up.  Kaza had a new saddle blanket, she noticed, and the bridle was different – no bit on this one.  Asfaloth had a different bridle on, too, but just as fancy as the last one, with inlaid jewels.  No wonder there were so many jokes about elvish frippery.  His bridle didn’t have a bit, either, but he never had.  She was much more surprised to realize that they had also given Kaza horseshoes.  Well, shoes didn’t hurt a horse.  She was just used to the idea of Elves living in harmony with nature, not modifying it.

Laerin hadn’t given her any of her traveling supplies except one of her waterskins, so she knew she wasn’t going far.  She mounted from a wooden step, and Glorfindel and Asfaloth led the way out of the yard, leaving Laerin back at the stables.  They started up a winding path into a forest of pine trees.  It was almost all uphill, which made it difficult, but they went slowly, and she was sure Glorfindel was familiar enough with the terrain to make sure they would be safe.

Now that she was riding, her brain switched over from the worst memories of traveling to the best.  There was freedom in being out here, the same as running around the fields with Tom Bombadil.  The land was different, but even more beautiful.  She loved the look of the tall pine trees around her, a deep green, and the quietness underneath that was almost magical.  Magical.  She laughed at herself.  She still hadn’t broken her habit of thinking that way.

At last, they came out of the trees, and they looked out over the valley.  Everything she had walked around the day before was laid out in front of her.

Glorfindel grinned at her wide-eyed amazement.  She smiled back for a moment, then turned away, embarrassed.

They went back down a different path and reached the house just after the bells rang, which seemed to call people to meals.  She went to the dining hall with Glorfindel, dusty and still wearing her riding clothes, though of course they had washed their hands first.  Laerin greeted them with a smile and talked to Glorfindel for a minute or so before he went up to the high table and Mallory went with her.  She wished she knew what they were saying about her.

She changed clothes and brushed her hair after lunch, but she was glad to see that nobody had been staring at her for wearing a shirt and pants in public.  In the afternoon, Laerin took her to the library again.  They found Arwen with a slate and paper and a couple of books.

More writing, then?  All right.  She would probably be much happier if she knew their alphabet, though her comprehension of the words was a long way off.  But Arwen?  Really?  Didn’t she have better things to do than teach Mallory to write?

Apparently not.  She and Laerin taught her the words for the things around them.  Laerin made Mallory share her own words, as usual.  Then, Arwen taught her a few Tengwar letters, telling her the sound and making her copy them on the slate.  Like Lossithil with the sewing, she seemed to think that Mallory’s work was messy.  Mallory wondered how Arwen would feel if she saw how she wrote at school, with an alphabet she was familiar with.  And hers wasn’t even close to the worst handwriting she’d ever seen.

Laerin tried to unobtrusively get up and disappear at one point, but Mallory stopped and looked at her, and Arwen called her back.  Funny how Laerin and Nethril and Lossithil felt like safe people now, like the teacher or student she’d pick to follow around when she went on field trips so she wouldn’t be alone in a strange place.  In fact, they were better than that, because she didn’t have to worry that they might suddenly realize that they didn’t have to want her around and try to get rid of her.

After practicing a bit, Arwen tried to give Mallory a pen.  She loved it, a real quill pen, but she didn’t have the first idea how to use it.  Arwen helped her draw a few lines and circles, but it seemed obvious to everyone that she needed to stick to chalk for actually learning the letters.

When they were done, Laerin took her up to her room, and then they cleaned up for dinner.  When she saw Glorfindel, she was surprised to realize that it had only been that morning that they had been riding together.  It had been that morning, hadn’t it?  It seemed to have been ages since then, but not because she was bored.  There was so much going on and so much that was new.  She might actually like it here.

Glorfindel had spent the time since the council organizing scouting parties and making plans with Mithrandir and Elrond.  The dwarves, impatient to return home and fearful that the messenger from the Enemy had returned, planned to leave the following day to bring Elrond’s advice to their king and that of Dale.  Gimli alone had chosen to stay, so that there would be a dwarf present to lend his voice to any further decisions made.  Elrond also had a mind to send at least one member of each race with Maura on his journey, and Gimli seemed to be a good choice.  He was a formidable warrior and the youngest and fittest in his party, and he had stated that he wished to participate in a quest after having been left behind when his father journeyed to reclaim Erebor.

Galdor, likewise, would soon return to Círdan.  Legolas and his escort, however, had chosen to stay and assist Imladris’ scouts and messengers.  The two younger halflings, as well, would not leave until further decisions were made, both for their own safety and so that Maura could keep his friends close, and Mithrandir would remain with them.  Elrond had also determined that it was best for Boromir to stay for a time to recover from his arduous journey northward, and there was no question that Rochondín would stay for as long as was possible.

Now that he was sure that the girl was well and the halflings were comfortable, it was time for Glorfindel to leave.  He could not stay to watch the guests as Mithrandir would: he was concerned about the borders of their land and the increasing threat of orcs and wolves from the mountains.  He would be home often enough to see them, but now, he was required elsewhere.

Before he left, however, the five halflings sought him out.  “Lord Glorfindel!” Bilba greeted him.  “Would you be so kind as to share a story or two from Gondolin?  Ban would quite like it.”

Ban, who had appeared uncomfortable to begin with, looked stricken at the mention of his name.  “Oh, but surely you can’t be the Glorfindel, sir, the one from the stories.  And I’m sure you’re busy –”

“How can Elves all have different names from each other?” interrupted Kali.  “Wouldn’t you run out?”

Glorfindel laughed.  “Of course I am not the Glorfindel from Gondolin!  I could never bear to be around him.  He thought far too much of himself, and he stole my name for himself.”

“Glorfindel!”  Bilba scowled at him.  “I was being serious!”

Glorfindel laughed again.  “Nay, Bilba is correct.  Some of our names are shared, and there are many Elves who call themselves golden-haired, but the name Glorfindel was formed from an older mode of the Sindarin language, one no longer used, I am afraid.  You will have difficulty finding anyone else with a name constructed in that way, and we do not name our children after one another the way that Men do.”

“Then you are the Glorfindel from the Gondolin stories?” asked Ban.

“Aye, I am,” he replied.  “Gondolin is no more, but I would be happy to tell a tale of it.  Perhaps you would like to hear of Eärendil when he was young.”

Bilba blushed.  His song of Eärendil, shared after the feast, had been one of his best writings, but the subject matter had been quite beyond him, and he must have known that.  He would not hear the end of it for a long time yet.

“Well, only if you want to, Mr. Glorfindel, sir,” said Ban, shuffling his bare feet.

“Oh, stop it,” Razar interrupted.  “We all want to hear this.  Don’t talk him out of it.”

“Come, then, and I will tell you whatever you like,” said Glorfindel.

They sat by the fire, and he began a story of the infant Eärendil.  He talked into the night, until the halflings were at last forced to retire to their rooms to sleep.  He left with Asfaloth the next morning.

Chapter Text

Late October

A couple more days of reading and sewing lessons passed before the morning that Mallory woke up and found blood on the underwear she’d worn overnight.

She stared for a moment, blankly, as if she didn’t know what it was.  But just because she hadn’t had her period since she’d gotten to Middle Earth didn’t mean it was gone.  It was just late.  She started counting days in her head.  Her period had never been regular, and pretty much always more than twenty-eight days, but even so, it should have started when she was still traveling.  She hadn’t even thought to consider that, even in all her worry about how long the journey would take and how she could make her food last.  The food hadn’t even been a problem in the end, if only because she practically stopped eating, but she had no idea what she would have done about this.  She’d been lucky, in a backwards way: with all the physical and emotional stress, her body must have shut that function down.

Now what?  What did people do when they got their period here?  She couldn’t just go and buy disposable pads.  She was going to have… well, reusable pads.  Like cloth diapers, only washing out blood was marginally less gross than washing out poop.  But where would she get them from?  She didn’t know a single word related in any way except “underwear”.  Not blood or month or uterus or whatever.

She was afraid to sit down, in case she got the blood on her shift, which would be more work to fix than the underwear.  Should she put the dirty pair back on?  Could she get dressed and go to Laerin’s room to get help?  But what if Laerin was downstairs getting breakfast or somewhere else entirely?  She hadn’t missed home this much since she’d arrived in Rivendell.

It was, in fact, Laerin who came that morning.  She walked in to find Mallory still standing in her shift with her underwear in her hands.  She frowned and put the food down.  Mallory, having no idea how to communicate and getting increasingly worried that blood might be running down her leg, held her stained underwear up for Laerin to see.

“Ah,” said Laerin in understanding.  She took it and set it down on the dresser, making sure the bloody side didn’t touch the wood.  Then, she opened the drawer with Mallory’s clothes.  She took out a clean pair of underwear and a square of undyed cloth.  She made Mallory hold the underwear while she folded over the cloth and lay it over the bottom, then pinned it in place at the front and back with a rudimentary safety pin.  Then, she sent Mallory back behind the screen to change.

Mallory felt incredibly relieved once the makeshift pad was on.  She put her dress on and came out to eat breakfast.

“Naeg?” Laerin said in a questioning voice.  She pinched her arm to demonstrate.

Mallory had no idea what she was saying, though the word sounded vaguely familiar.  She had found over the last few days that some words were easier to remember than others.  Maybe it was something she’d read when she was trying to learn Sindarin back at home, or maybe it was something that Glorfindel had said when she could still understand.  But she couldn’t place the actual meaning of naeg.

Laerin put her hands on her stomach, making a face as if it hurt.

“Hurt?” Mallory suggested.  “Pain?”  Pain sounded right, according to that vague memory.  “Pain,” she repeated.  “Naeg.”

“Pain,” Laerin said.  Then, she pointed to Mallory’s stomach.  “Pain?”

She shook her head.  Once it got heavy in the first day or two, she would get a bit of cramps, but not like some people.  She’d never had to do anything about it.

Laerin smiled.  They cleaned up, ate breakfast, and went to class – class? – with Arwen.  There was time to rest afterwards, and Mallory tried again to count the days and see exactly how late her period was.  It wasn’t that she was worried about it, but she had realized that she wasn’t entirely sure how many days she had been in Rivendell.  She’d woken up on the twenty-second, right?  No, she’d worked out it was the twenty-third.  Then, she’d spent the first day in her room, and she went out the next day, the twenty-fourth, and that was the feast.  Then, the twenty-fifth she’d started sewing.  No, that was the twenty-sixth.  On the twenty-fifth, she’d met Arwen, and the twenty-sixth was sewing.  Then, on the twenty-seventh, she’d gone out riding and met Arwen in the afternoon.  The twenty-eight, she’d… what had she done?  Had it been two days after the first one that she’d had lessons with Arwen, or three?  Two, right?  Yesterday, she’d had it in the afternoon, because Laerin had taken her to have a bath in the morning, down in the building where they had running water, with divided stalls that contained much bigger bathtubs than what she had in her room.  The day before, the lesson had been the morning, and Nethril had tried to teach her to tie ribbons in her hair in the afternoon.  So today was the thirtieth.  She thought.

This was how Elvish places were.  Bilbo had said that he couldn’t count the days in Rivendell, and in Lothlórien, the hobbits had thought the whole month had only been a couple of nights long.  This wasn’t as extreme as the thing in Lothlórien, which had a very strong air of the legends where someone spent a few days with a fairy queen and then went home only to find that a hundred years had past, but something was happening, and she had no phone or teacher’s whiteboard to check the date on.  She couldn’t herself lose track of days.  She needed to know what was happening and what was going to happen next and how much time there was left.

She didn’t have anything to write on.  What was she supposed to do, carve marks into her bedpost or make tallies in her damaged Return of the King?  She didn’t have a pencil, anyway.  She needed some writing materials she could keep with her in her room.

She hadn’t actually asked anyone for anything yet.  She’d been given a lot of gifts, so she really didn’t have the right to.  But she also really needed this.

She must have been obviously upset, because Laerin asked her something in a concerned tone.  Mallory frowned, feeling self-conscious.  “Paper,” she said, then pointed to herself.

“Writing paper?” Laerin asked.

She nodded.

“Yes.  Night?” she asked.

That should be all right.  Mallory nodded.

She went to the toilet and found that her period had gotten going for real, and there was enough blood on her cloth that she’d have changed it if she’d been back at home.  But she couldn’t be casual about it, considering that she had a limited number of cloths.  Then again, she also had a limited number of pairs of underwear, so she couldn’t risk bleeding through.  And it would only be heavy for about two days before it trailed off.

Laerin had stacked up the cloths behind the screen so she didn’t have to go back and forth.  She managed to change it and fix the pins herself, then folded up the cloth.  She went back to Laerin, and they walked down to the washing area.  One of the rooms was full of tubs where they washed clothes.  They found Lossithil there, who smiled and came up to them.  She was probably the only other person in the whole valley who got periods, Mallory realized.  Unless she’d already had menopause.  She could only guess at her actual age – Dúnedain lived longer, after all.  Well, she’d be the only person who knew what having a period was like, anyway.

As she reached out to take the cloth, Mallory caught sight of Lossithil’s wrists for the first time.  So far, Mallory had only seen her wearing dresses with reasonably tight, wrist-length sleeves, but now, she had them rolled up, clearly showing a heavy scar almost straight across her wrist.  Mallory stared for a moment.  She’d never actually seen a scar like that, just fainter marks from the one kid in her classes who didn’t care enough to hide them.  But she had a very good idea what it meant.  So both the female mortals in Rivendell had mental illnesses.  Interesting.  She tried to catch sight of her other arm, wondering if Lossithil had cut that wrist, too.

Then, Lossithil noticed what Mallory was doing.  Her entire face changed, and she turned away with a look that was almost betrayed.

Laerin put a hand on Mallory’s arm comfortingly, and she followed her away, feeling terrible.  She knew better than to stare.  How would she feel if she had scars from the worst moment of her life – from the Ringwraith attack, maybe – and people wanted to stare at them?  Maybe she’d gotten too comfortable here.

She was still beating herself up over it as they went to lunch.  Nethril took her with her in the afternoon, and that was worse, because Lossithil was mad at her, wasn’t she?  It wasn’t as if she could apologize, and even if she could, Lossithil would know that she’d seen it.

But Lossithil smiled at her when she came into the sewing room.  She had started working on a drawstring pouch yesterday, and Lossithil helped her get out her materials and start.

Mallory spent the afternoon waiting for the sign that the woman was upset, but it never happened.  She knew that the curse of social anxiety was remembering mistakes forever, while other people forgot them, but she didn’t think Lossithil had forgotten this.  Maybe she’d decided to forgive and move on.  Or maybe she just didn’t want to have an argument with someone who didn’t speak the same language as her.  Or she might have been doing another anxious-person thing and wrapping up her hurt inside and blaming herself.  But whatever was happening, Mallory had no idea what to do about it except to make sure to smile gratefully every time Lossithil helped her.

She started thinking about all the things she could do wrong here.  Wrong words, getting lost, mistaking one Elf for another, saying something culturally inappropriate once she learned to speak Sindarin, and so on and so forth.  Just thinking about it gave her a stomachache.  Hopefully this was a more minor misstep, and if she was careful, she might avoid anything else.  But Lossithil didn’t deserve this: she was always so nice to her.  Ugh.

After dinner, Laerin and Nethril took her outside to the porch, which had bright lanterns to see by.  Laerin gave Mallory a small book made of a few pieces of paper folded over and sewn like a composition book.  There was a charcoal pencil to go with it.  Mallory smiled at her.

Laerin enlisted Nethril to create a little pantomime of giving each other things and saying “please,” “thank you,” and “you’re welcome.”  Finally, she knew what to say (and it wasn’t “le hannon”).  Then, Laerin mimed pushing her and saying what must have been “I’m sorry.”  Well, all right.  She’d included that for a reason.

Some Elves started singing, and Mallory sat down to write.  The book wasn’t very big, and she didn’t know how long she’d be there.  She also had to be careful that she didn’t make mistakes, because she didn’t have an eraser.  She started back at her arrival at Tom Bombadil’s house on October 1 and worked forward, writing down one or two events per day.  She felt nervous writing in front of people, but Laerin had never made her teach her the English alphabet, so nobody could read a word of it.  She was going to like this, actually.  She’d always sort of wanted a secret code that she could write in and not have to worry about people looking over her shoulder.

Lossithil always went to bed early.  She passed by Mallory on her way back.  “Um,” said Mallory, going blank on how to catch her attention.

She turned.

Mallory could feel herself sweating, even in the fall air.  “Goheno nin.”

Lossithil looked surprised, then gave a little laugh and waved her off.  All right.  That made her feel a bit better.  She went back to writing.

She had unintentionally attracted the hobbits’ attention, too.  Bilba looked delighted to see her writing and wanted to see.  He was talking nonstop.  From the looks everyone else was giving him, Mallory guessed it was about his own book.  She wondered how they’d feel if they knew how big a deal that book was going to be.  They were a distraction, and the flickering candlelight started to bother her after a while, but she managed to finish.  Now, she just had to put a note every day, and she’d be able to keep track.  Finally, she walked out onto the grass and looked at the stars in the clear sky.  If she ever went home, the stars would be the thing she missed the most.

The next day, the cloths from the day before were clean and dry and amazingly not stained, though she couldn’t manage to get blood completely out of her clothes even back home with soap.  She wondered what they had used to clean it.

In the morning, she practiced her writing and learned some verbs – not the conjugations, she hadn’t learned pronouns yet – with Arwen and Laerin.  Then, Laerin took her to the door of what she had thought was the infirmary.  She was confused about what she was doing there at first, but Laerin pointed into the room and then to herself, the same way she had done when she was showing Mallory her bedroom.  So this was… her workplace?  Unlike Nethril, Mallory hadn’t actually seen her working.  It would make sense if she was a doctor, considering she’d been the one watching Mallory when she woke up from what turned out to be over two days of unconsciousness and semi-consciousness.  She’d even been there, if Mallory’s memories were reliable, when she kept waking up and falling asleep again.  And here she’d been worrying about whether Elrond or Aragorn was going to heal her, as if there were no other healers in all of Rivendell.

They went inside and found a man Mallory didn’t recognize.  Laerin talked to him, and he left.  Shift change.  Mallory followed her as she walked around the room, looking in corners.  She had no idea what they were looking for until they found it.  There was a girl curled up with a book in the small space between a cabinet of what looked like containers of medications and the wall.  That looked like an uncomfortable place to read.  Was she hiding from someone?

Laerin said something, and the girl got out, reluctantly, and stood in front of them.  She was only a couple inches taller than Mallory, shorter than any of the Elves she’d seen, with long black hair.  She was wearing a white dress trimmed in green that was short enough to show that she wasn’t wearing shoes.  She held the book in one hand (Mallory was very, very jealous of her), shaking the other one as if she was nervous, and looked at Mallory out of the corner of her eyes.  Mallory looked back in confusion.  Was she an Elf?  Something about the way she’d moved when she stood up said yes.  But she was so small, and there was something just off about her compared to everyone else.  Maybe she was a teenager.  Of course, the Elves would have to have children somewhere.  Why hadn’t Mallory met one yet?  Was she the only one here?

“Elanna,” said Laerin, pointing at the girl.

“Elanna,” Mallory repeated.

“Mallory,” she said to Elanna.

“Rochondín,” Elanna replied, looking away from them.

“Mal-lor-ee,” Laerin said slowly.

“Rochondín,” Elanna insisted, and she shook her hand faster, looking agitated.

Laerin shrugged at Mallory in a “nothing-I-can-do” gesture, and Mallory shrugged back to show she didn’t mind, but something was bothering her about the girl, something she was missing.  What made her feel so weird?

Suddenly, it hit her.  The thing she was doing with her hand, that was what people called “hand flapping”.  She was stimming.  She was autistic.

How was that even possible?  She was an Elf – her voice said so for sure.  Maybe she was a half Elf?  But having extra half Elves running around Rivendell would be almost as surprising as an Elf who had autism.  It didn’t compute.

Then again, when she thought about it, why didn’t it?  If there was one thing she’d learned so far about Elves, it was that despite all their skill and beauty and magical abilities, they were, in fact, human.

Elanna looked at her for a second, then turned her head again.  “Mae govannen,” she said suddenly, squishing the two words together like she was trying to get them out before she lost her nerve.

“Mae govannen,” Laerin whispered to Mallory.

“Mae govannen,” Mallory muttered.  Elanna looked at her again, this time with a shadow of a smile.

Laerin said something to Elanna that made her frown.  But Laerin beckoned to them both, and Elanna put her book down and followed her, stimming with both hands now.  They went out the back door, past a fountain, and into a walled garden.  “Matha,” said Laerin to Mallory, putting her hand on a wall.  Then, she touched Mallory’s arm and said the same thing, and took Mallory’s hand to put her shoulder.

“Touch?” Mallory guessed.

“Touch,” Laerin accepted.  Then, she pointed to a plant and said, “No touch.”

She probably could have guessed that rule on her own, she thought.  You didn’t touch random plants.  But there was a new word for her.

“No… touch,” muttered Elanna, pointing to herself.  Then, she frowned, and Mallory got the distinct impression of an attempted joke that hadn’t come out right.

Laerin nudged Elanna and pointed to the nearest plant.  The girl winced, pressed her palms together, and squeezed her fingers around hands.  She didn’t say anything.  She very clearly did not want to be there, and Mallory didn’t blame her.

Laerin whispered to her, waited a moment, and then whispered something else.  Finally, after a painfully long time, several different unhappy faces, and twisting her arms entirely around each other, Elanna said a word.  Laerin poked Mallory and made her repeat it, though she didn’t ask for a translation, which was good because she had no idea what the plant they were looking at was.  Then, there was another long pause, and Elanna burst out with a list of things that Laerin didn’t ask Mallory to repeat.

The next plant didn’t take as long, and then finally Elanna started talking on her own.  Mallory was surprised how relieved she felt as Elanna got more comfortable, as much as if she had been the one who was being forced to give what was basically an impromptu presentation.

The only plant name that Mallory recognized was athelas.  She was interested to see what it looked like when it was fresh and growing.  By that point, Elanna was going strong and actually seemed enthusiastic about it.  Laerin even managed to go back into the building without Mallory even noticing – she just turned around and found her not there.  Once they were done with the garden, Elanna took Mallory by the wrist and led her back inside.  She pointed to the jars in the cabinet, naming them again, and running through a list of something every time, which Mallory guessed was the uses of the plants.  Some of the plants were the same as outside, Mallory noticed, but these ones were dried.  The rest were new words, maybe from trees or something else entirely.  Laerin half watched them as she organized things, looking pleased with herself.

When she was done, Elanna picked up her book and pointed out a bookcase to Mallory as if she was offering her something to read.  That was very thoughtful, and exactly what Mallory would have wanted someone to do if she’d been able to read, but she couldn’t.  She looked at Laerin for help.

Laerin explained something, then made what sounded like a suggestion, which Elanna shook her head to.  Instead, she went off to a different corner, one by the fireplace, and curled herself back up.

So Laerin talked to Mallory for a while about things around them, teaching her a few more words, until the dinner bells rang.  But she was very glad that she and Elanna had met.  In some way, it was actually nice to be around someone else who felt terrified sometimes.  And she even liked to read.  With her, Mallory didn’t feel quite so strange and alone.

Chapter Text

Early November

Laerin felt equal parts relief and anxiety when she saw Magoleth’s horse in the stables.  She only relaxed when she saw her sister in person, safe and unhurt, though she had not forgotten that she might not see nor hear word of Gladhedir for weeks yet.

Magoleth, as usual, was cheerful.  There had been no injuries in her party, and she now had a week or two to stay home.  She was full of ideas of things to do with Mallory in the meantime.  She, like everyone else, was very taken by the idea of an adventuring woman coming to the valley.  There were always one or two Dúnedain maidens who fought alongside the men, and Magoleth had made a point over the years to know every one of them, but no other mortal women had visited in a great many years.  (Barring any dwarvish traders and adventurers who may have been women, that was.  It would not do for an Elf to ask a dwarf’s gender, and Laerin was told that they were near impossible to tell apart.  However, she was also told that dwarf women were few in number, and those who married would remain at home to raise their children and never be seen by outsiders, so it was not very likely.)

“We can see what she knows of fighting,” Magoleth suggested.  “If she is not skilled with a dagger, she ought to learn.  If she is, she might be interested in learning archery, or how to use a shortsword.”  Magoleth had plenty of experience in teaching young women near Mallory's age how to hunt, track, and fight.  There was no one better to teach the girl.

“Perhaps you should meet her first, before you try to make her fight you?” Laerin suggested.

Magoleth laughed.  “Of course, Idhrenel, we shall do something else first.”

“I hope you understand that she may not want to do any of this,” said Laerin.  However, she was impressed at how willing Mallory had been to try everything she had offered her so far, even the sewing that she did not seem particularly interested in.  Despite warnings from Glorfindel about irritability, her chief problem was with unfamiliar people.  Of course, she was suffering from much less strain and fear in Imladris than she had been on her journey.  “But I am interested to see what she is capable of.  She is still largely a mystery, after all.”

“Tomorrow, then?”

“All right.”  Laerin walked back to the house smiling.

Laerin came to Mallory’s room early the next day, wearing something that looked more like a long tunic than a dress and showed her leggings and boots underneath.  She opened the drawer and pointed to Mallory’s traveling clothes.

Riding again, then.  With Laerin this time, presumably.  Where was Glorfindel, anyway?  She couldn’t remember having seen him for days.  Oh, well.  He was probably tired of her.  She got dressed, but as she put her hair up, she heard a sound she had been dreading for weeks: the snapping of elastic.

She looked at her hair tie.  It had broken right next to the glue where the two ends came together, as usual.  The woven cloth around it had held together, but it would always be loose now, because that piece of empty cloth wasn’t stretchy.  Plus, her hair could catch on the glue or the elastic.  She’d tried to keep on using them as long as she could when she was younger and they didn’t have money, but these days, she usually threw them out when they got like this.

She’d known this was going to happen, since she was using it every day, but she’d really been trying to be gentle.  This little blue piece of elastic and cloth was her only modern convenience, and besides her book, the only thing she had with her that had come from home.  She wished she hadn't left her pajamas with Goldberry.

If she’d known that she was going to Middle Earth, she’d have brought packs of these.  And all her Tolkien books.  And maybe some extra books to read for fun, if she could fit it in.  And underwear.  And potato chips, if she could fit anything else in her bag.  But nobody had warned her what was going to happen.

There was a lump in her throat as she pulled her hair up again and put the tie back on.  Laerin looked a bit confused at what was going on, but she said something sympathetic.  It would be hard to explain why she felt so upset even if she could talk.  They ate breakfast, then went to the kitchen.  Laerin took a couple of bags that smelled like fresh bread.  Lunch?

Out at the stables, they found a man Mallory didn’t recognize.  He was about Laerin’s height, with auburn brown hair in a long braid.  He turned and grinned at them.  Laerin introduced Mallory to him.  “Mae govannen,” he replied.

“Magoleth,” Laerin said, pointing at him.

“Magoleth,” echoed Mallory.

“Muineth,” said Laerin, pointing to him, and then repeated it while pointing to herself.

Muineth.  Mallory had learned some basic family words yesterday: mother and father, son and daughter, brother and sister, and husband and wife.  Muineth meant sister.  Was that right?  Well, it couldn’t be brother, because Laerin had used the same word for both of them.  She stared at Magoleth for a moment.

Mallory was confident at recognizing Laerin, Nethril, and Arwen now, and she thought she was getting better at telling Elves apart, but now, she realized that she had been identifying people’s genders entirely by their clothes.  After all, they all had long hair and generally pretty faces, and there didn't seem to be as much variety in body types.  Sandra would be disappointed in her for making assumptions, she thought.  Who else had she identified as the wrong gender?  At least she hadn’t called anyone by the wrong pronoun.  That was one benefit of not being able to talk, not saying the wrong thing.

Magoleth laughed, as if she knew what Mallory was thinking.  They tacked up the horses, and the two Elves each took one bag of food to put on their saddles.  They went down the hill, across the bridge, and along the other side of the river.  Mallory rode in the middle of the line, with Magoleth in front and Laerin behind.  After they crossed the bridge, the two Elves started singing.  Somehow, she always understood songs better than speech, as if there was some remnant of Tom Bombadil’s magic in them, or the Elves themselves could send meaning into her head.  Eventually, she worked out a rough translation of the words.

“Fleet hoofbeats and hearts astir

We tread the earthen road

Manes blow in the westerleys

Ride, edhil, ride!

“Galloping west before the sun sets

Take the bridge and sing

Follow the path carved for you

Ride, edhil, ride!

“Bruinen rushes past as we ride forth

Grass springs beneath our feet

The valley provides and we reside

Ride, edhil, ride!

“Heather beneath and sky above

The falls are drawing near

We'll break our bread and we'll sing

Ride, edhil, ride!”

They rode for most of the morning before they finally came to a pool under a waterfall and stopped.  The horses wandered around while they sat down on a rock and laid out the food.  They had a picnic there, with bread, fruit preserves, sliced hard cheese, cold spiced chicken, and some variety of pear that were way better than the bland ones Mallory had never liked back home.  And it was just fun to eat a meal outside, watching the water come down and the horses grazing and the occasional fish swimming by.

She smiled the whole way back.  When they got to the stables, they put away their tack, brushed down the horses, and went to bathe in the bath house.  Mallory spent more time washing than the two Elves, and when she came out, she found that they already had their hair straight and shining.  Mallory felt bedraggled in comparison.

It was a bit of a let-down to go to dinner afterwards and think about an ordinary day tomorrow, even if it was a day in Rivendell.  But the food was amazing, and they listened to poetry after the meal, and she could understand a bit of it, and she was surrounded by Elves.  She used to dream about doing things like this.

The next morning, she had language lessons as usual, and then they went outside to a field surrounded by low fences.  Magoleth was there, and she greeted Mallory with a wide grin, as if they were old friends.  She was wearing a tunic again, though Laerin and Mallory had dresses on, so maybe that was just her style.  It was nice to know that Elves were okay with that.

Magoleth handed Mallory a dagger.  It had a worn hilt, and the edges were blunt.  It wasn’t something that would cut into skin, but it was real metal.  Mallory didn’t hesitate to take it, but she wasn’t sure what to do with it.

Laerin picked up on her uncertainty and corrected her grip.  Then, Magoleth demonstrated stabbing a bag of what seemed to be hay.

Okay, this was good.  If she could actually learn to use a dagger, from someone who actually knew how to do it, that could be really helpful in the future.  Assuming she was going to leave again.  And have a dagger when she did.  Well, of course she’d leave eventually, she just didn’t know when or where.  She wished she’d had some training before she’d left Tom and Goldberry.  This and reading were the two things she really needed to learn while she was here.

They practiced for the rest of the morning.  Mallory felt very clumsy, and Magoleth and Laerin made it pretty clear that she wasn’t hitting hard enough.  But Laerin, as usual, wasn’t about to let her quit, and Magoleth seemed to be just as stubborn as she was.  She got more excited when Mallory got things right, though.  Comparing the two, Mallory realized that she sort of liked Laerin’s reliability.  On the other hand, Magoleth reminded her a bit of Sandra.  She wondered what their childhood together had been like.  But didn’t Elves wait for one kid to grow up before they had another?  So then Laerin (she had to be the older one) would have been more like an aunt.  Not a cool aunt, presumably.  Or maybe she’d been different when she’d had a baby sister around.

Despite the fact that she clearly wasn’t good with the dagger, there was quite a bit of praise from both of them, and Mallory felt accomplished when they went to lunch.  When she saw her, Lossithil smiled and said something that sounded complimentary.  Then, she reached over to pull back some of Mallory’s loose hairs.  The gesture reminded her very much of Mom.  Lossithil was probably about Mom’s age, too.  Suddenly, sadness replaced pride.

Mallory thought of her family all the time, of course, but lately, the memories had only been passing moments.  Between Magoleth and Lossithil, she suddenly remembered the truth: she had no idea when she would see them again.  And when she did, if she did, she'd never be able to tell them what happened while she was gone.  They'd never believe her.  Would they even know she'd been gone?  It was better for them if they didn't, but then she'd have changed and they wouldn't know how.

And if she didn't make it back, they'd have no idea what happened to her.  They wouldn’t know about her riding through the mountains and learning the best way to stab her enemies.  They would think she’d been kidnapped, or murdered, or abducted by aliens.  And she'd be leaving them to think that forever.

The hair tie was getting to her, too.  There were so many other modern things she’d never see again.  Computers.  Ridiculously salty foods.  Cars that went sixty miles an hour if you needed to get somewhere.  Books in English.  Oh, God, books in English.  All the things she’d never get to read…

Lossithil noticed her sudden sadness and squeezed her hand, then set to work getting their plates filled.  Mallory didn’t have Mom and Sandra here, but she had more people helping her than she’d ever had in her life.  Were they friends?  Did she, for the first time she could remember, have actual friends?  Could she say that?  Or were they babysitters and teachers who thought she was a child who needed their help?  After all, they were all way older than her, even Lossithil.  Well, maybe she could count Elanna as her age.  But the thought that Arwen herself, future queen of Gondor might count as a friend…  No.  There was no way.  But she did like her, didn’t she?  Well, she chose to spend time with her, anyway.  The future queen of Gondor chose to spend time with her!  Along with the balrog-slayer and a few other thousand-year-old Elves.  Not to mention Tom Bombadil and Goldberry.  And Ivy, who was more of an admirer but actually thought she was cool.  This was like being famous.  It was weird.

She imagined going back home.  Could she go back to school and live with Mom, all the boredom and emptiness?  No.  She wanted to go horseback riding in beautiful scenery and learn to fight from a warrior woman.  She wanted to have maybe-friends.  But even if she could do that, she'd hurt the people she loved.  And she'd never have hair ties or potato chips again.

Oh, God, potato chips…

“Mallory mystifies me,” said Arwen.  She and Laerin were sitting on a bench overlooking the river.  That morning, they had spent the better part of an hour trying to teach the girl how to write with a pen.  “What is the purpose of learning to read and write if she cannot write anything that will last?  What did she do with her knowledge of letters?”

“She is confusing,” agreed Laerin.  “There is so much that she does not know, and I cannot imagine how she lives at her home.  Also, have you noticed how her pronunciation changes?  She always uses a variation of her language’s r sound with your name and Glorfindel’s, but the same sound in my name – and most words – tends to come out as d.”

Arwen frowned.  “I had not noticed, but I think you are correct.  Maybe our names sound similar to words in her own language.  Also, accents can be difficult.  The common folk of Lothlórien were nearly incomprehensible to me when I was young.”

Laerin nodded.

“But you wished to speak to me about something, did you not?”

Laerin nodded again, though her breath caught in her throat.  “Magoleth is going out to the borders again, and –”

As the words came out of her mouth, Laerin felt fear sweep over her, like wind rushing through the trees during a storm.  She knew what was coming, so she took a deep breath.  Breathe in, breathe out.  She could stay in control.  She pressed her hands on the wooden planks beneath her and looked at the waterfalls and rapids of the river.  Arwen also knew what it looked like when the fear-flood came over Laerin, having seen this many times.  She rubbed her back, repeating “It will be all right” over and over.  Breathe in, breathe out.  She was home.  She was safe.  She was in control of her body.

Her head cleared quickly.  The daelo lasted about five minutes altogether.  This was not at all like what she had suffered when the trauma of the war with Angmar first began to set in.  During that time, when a memory rose up, she could be lost for hours at a time, screaming herself hoarse, only able to return to reality when her parents or Arwen or a healer pulled her back.  For several years, she had not been allowed to be out of earshot of another person, even when she slept, for fear that she would leave her body and escape her pain in Mandos if nobody was there to comfort her.  During most of that time, she had been unable to reliably perform even the most basic tasks in the infirmary, and traveling had been out of the question: she would not have lasted more than a day outside of the valley.  That was when she had learned to bake, making lembas with Arwen and more mundane bread with the women in the kitchens when she was physically well and felt the need to contribute to the household.  There had been talk of her sailing West, but at that time, everyone she had known either dwelt in Middle Earth or the halls of Mandos, and she had not wished to live among strangers, even if she had survived the journey.

Eventually, she had healed.  That time had ended nearly a thousand years ago now, and Laerin’s life had changed in profound ways since then.  She had faced the Witch-King again, however briefly, at Dol Guldur, and she had gone through both love and heartbreak.  She knew how to manage her occasional panic attacks now, though she still felt that she was defined by her role in the war.

“What was that?” Arwen asked once she saw that Laerin had recovered.  “I have not seen you with a fear-flood for decades, if not a century, not even after your parents sailed West.  Was there an incident I do not know about?”

Laerin shook her head.

“Then what is it?  Is it your parents?  Or Mallory?”

“Not Mallory!” said Laerin quickly.  “I enjoy teaching her.  It is…”  She took a slow breath.  “Magoleth is going to replace someone who was injured.  It was not a terribly bad injury, but I cannot stop thinking that it could have been her.  Or Gladhedir – I do not know when he will return, and if something occurs, I will not know about it.”

Arwen took her hand.  “Do you want Magoleth to stay here?” she asked quietly.

“I cannot ask that of her!  This is her duty.  She would only resent me if I took it away.”

“Do you wish to go with her, then?”

She shook her head.  “I cannot do that, either.  You need me, and Mallory needs me, and Elrond needs me.”

“Nobody needs you so much as to be worth this.  Do you wish to go?”

“I do not know.”  Laerin looked out at the mountain peaks above her.  “This is one time that I wish I could read the signs the way you can.  I know they are there, but I cannot make out what they are telling me to do.”

“Have you spoken to Father about this?”

“No.  I told that my anxiety was returning, but that was years ago, and this feeling is new.”

“People come from all over the West to seek Elrond’s council, but you do not ask for it when all you have to do is step outside of your door to find him?”

Laerin frowned.  “Do you ever wonder what your mother’s reaction was to learning that you had chosen to become mortal?”

Arwen was silent for a moment.  “I am not mortal yet,” she said.  “I will not be until I marry Aragorn, or until my father sails and I stay behind.  I am not sure which, but if we win the war, I do not think the two events will be far enough apart to make a difference.  So she does not know for sure that it will, in fact, happen.  But I wonder if that makes it worse for her, waiting to find out.”

“Could I have asked your father that?”

“No,” she admitted.  “But, Laerin, if Magoleth does die, it will not be the same as if I marry Aragorn.  You will see her again before the world ends”

“I would still have to tell my parents.”

“And she will have to tell them if you die, but you do not worry about that.”

Laerin did not respond.

“How will they feel when they learn what you are doing to yourself for their sake?  When they left, you were well.  Will they be grateful that you tormented yourself, not over war-wounds or Ringwraiths or a failed betrothal but over the thought of explaining yourself to them?  I understand that you have become the eldest member of your family and Gladhedir’s, and I know what it is to have people you love take great risks.  But you cannot make yourself sick over it.”

Laerin sighed.  “I will try.”

“Good.  I love you, too, you know.  I do not want to see you hurt yourself, and neither would Magoleth.  Now, perhaps we can speak of Mallory again?”

Mallory looked up to the high table pretty much every day, noting Gandalf, Arwen, and Elrond.  In the back of her mind, she knew that Glorfindel was supposed to be up there, that she hadn’t seen him or Aragorn in days.  But she never wasted much time thinking until he showed up again, seated at Elrond’s right side, grinning at her when he saw her looking.  Where had he been?  How had she gotten so comfortable with Laerin and Nethril and Lossithil that she didn’t mind not having him around?

After the meal, he came to see her and Laerin outside.  She was shocked all over again at how big he was.  He was, she realized, still the tallest person she’d ever seen, still a giant even in a land of six footers.  And now that she had more Elves to compare him to, she realized he was actually relatively muscular.  She also noticed that, even though his eyes were very bright in the darkness outside, he didn’t creep her out nearly as much anymore.  After all, Laerin and Nethril and Arwen’s eyes also shined in the darkness, just not to the same extent.

The three of them sat down.  Glorfindel talked to Mallory, and Laerin talked back on her behalf.  She caught a word here and there, people’s names, but she didn’t know what they were discussing.  Oh, well.  She trusted Laerin not to say anything she didn’t want her to, and she was not going to think about the fact that people could talk about her right in front of her face and she wouldn't know what they said.

Over the next few days, he showed up often.  One time, he came and watched her practice fighting (Magoleth was gone, but she had introduced Mallory to some other female warriors) until Laerin chased him off.  Another day, he spent the morning teaching her how to build a fire and light it with flint and steel.  She liked having him around, but also, she liked that she didn’t need to have him around.  She could survive without him, and that helped a lot.

Chapter Text

Mid November

Over the first month, Mallory established a sort of routine.  In the morning, she ate breakfast with Laerin or Nethril.  Then, she had an hour of lessons, or maybe two – she could never tell how long anything really took because of the lack of clocks.  Then, Laerin would take her to practice self-defense or see the horses or do something with Glorfindel or Elanna.  After lunch, she would go with Lossithil and Nethril, usually to work on sewing.  That was always exhausting: hours of being in a social group where, unlike in school, people actually talked to her.  Laerin always took her somewhere to be alone after that, her room or the Hall of Fire or somewhere on the grounds that nobody was hanging out, and she would rest until dinner.

It was always dark by dinnertime.  Afterwards, there would be singing under the stars, or storytelling, or enchanting dances that Mallory didn't quite understand.  That was when she usually saw the hobbits.  They seemed to have some idea that she was one of them, or they were responsible for her.  Bilbo did the most talking, since he spoke fairly fluent Sindarin.  Frodo could manage a bit, but for the other three, Laerin or Nethril would have to try to come up with some simple translation that she could understand.  They all seemed to enjoy being at Rivendell, but Frodo would go quiet every now and then, looking at her as if he was contemplating what they had gone through.  She wondered if it was unhealthy for him to be around her, but everyone seemed fine with it, unless she got annoyed or stressed out.  If that happened, Laerin or Nethril sent them away, and Glorfindel (when he was around) or Arwen or someone else would come by.

She was learning a lot.  She could understand about half of what people were saying now, if they talked slowly, and could guess at a lot of the rest.  She was also beginning to correct some of the words she’d gotten wrong originally, like me instead of I.  She was also learning self-defense, sewing, basic cooking skills from Elanna (they met in the kitchen most of the time), and whatever else came up.

She learned a lot about the people around her, too.  The sewing and weaving women liked to talk as they worked, and as Mallory started to understand more, she realized that it was mostly gossip.  It was largely about the visitors, especially the hobbits, but once they realized she understood them, they started sharing stories of past guests and embarrassing moments and who was courting whom.  They seemed to be excited to tell all of it to her: they must have been waiting years to have a new listener.

Some of it was actually interesting, though.  Elanna, she learned, had been found as a toddler in the foothills of the mountains, alone and near death.  There was a lot of disagreement on how long she had been there or whether it had contributed to her disability – the “autism or feral child?” argument that Sandra had mentioned when telling her stories of mysterious people – and whether starvation was the reason she was so small or if she had just come from a shorter subgroup of Elves.  Elanna seemed decidedly strange to Mallory – she didn’t talk much, and she would flip between struggling to get one or two words out and answering people before they even finished speaking – but she was very good at figuring out what Mallory needed, and she was always excited to see her.  Apparently, she used to struggle a lot more.  Mallory felt bad that Elanna had had such a hard past.

Nethril, meanwhile, was in love with someone but apparently wouldn’t act like a four-thousand-year-old woman and actually do anything about it.  (At least, Mallory thought they had said “four thousand”.  She couldn’t imagine that kind of age in someone who usually didn’t act like she was much older than Sandra.)  And there were some stories of things Laerin did in the war against Angmar, both for the defense of Rivendell and in service to the king of Arnor: performing heroic rescues and standing in defense of the wounded, even when she herself was injured, as well as healing seemingly impossible injuries.

Not that it was anything compared to the War of the Last Alliance, said a few of the women.  This did not go over well with the rest of them, who seemed to consider her a war hero.  “I may not like her, but I would never say something like that,” protested one of Nethril’s friends, Aeril.  She had eerily white skin and black hair, and she had once talked about the amazement she had felt at seeing the light of the moon and then the even brighter light of the sun for the first time.  She was old.  “She is a child of the Third Age, and she fought a Third Age war.  Had she been born in the Second Age, she would have fought in any war she had to, then, and would have done just as much good for our people.”  Mallory felt sort of proud of Laerin to hear that, even though she had no real reason to.

One day, they started telling her what seemed to be a terribly scandalous story about Arwen.  It took about ten minutes for Mallory to realize that they were talking about how she had fallen in love with a Man and was going to break Elrond’s heart, and her mother’s too – which immediately resulted in a lot of shushing, because apparently, Celebrían was completely off limits.  Mallory had to fight to keep a straight face for what must have been most of an hour as they explained to her why it was such a big deal, until they finally got sidetracked into the story of Beren and Lúthien.

And sometimes, they talked about serious things.  “As long as the westward roads are open, we can leave if need be,” said one of the women.

“I will not do so,” replied another.  “If I am to go across the Sea, it will be through the Halls of Mandos, surrounded by as many dead orcs if possible.”

“They say that the time of Elves will be over when this war is, for good or ill,” said Aeril.  “We will have no choice but to leave.”  She looked longingly towards the west for a moment, then turned back to her work.

Lossithil looked at Mallory as if to say, just you and me, in the middle of all these Elves…  This was definitely their conversation.  Lossithil wouldn’t get to leave Middle Earth if things got bad, and Mallory wasn’t sure what would happen to her.

“I will go when Sauron is defeated,” said Nethril.  “But not before.”

“There is no purpose in staying if he does not know that you love him,” said Lossithil quietly.

Everyone knew exactly who she was talking about.  “Yes, what if he rejects you?” asked Aeril.  “Or worse?  You will be left behind, perhaps with no way to leave.”

“That is not –” Nethril began.

“He would never reject her,” said Lossithil in a don’t-be-ridiculous tone.

“Still,” a third said.  “I would not make decisions based on my feelings for someone I have not even kissed.

“I do not stay for a man,” said Nethril sharply.  “I may not wield a sword or bow, but wars need healers, and I will stay to be one.  And do not think that I do not know what a war is!”

For a moment after she spoke, she changed.  Her face darkened, but her eyes flashed, and she looked tall and beautiful and very inhuman.  Struggling to parse the sentence, Mallory realized that if she was four thousand years old, then she had actually survived the War of the Last Alliance.  If someone had told Mallory yesterday that Nethril had been part of the war, she wouldn’t have believed them, but suddenly, she knew it was absolutely true.  Nethril had been there, and she had tended to the wounded (because of course she was a healer, most of the women in the room were), and she knew precisely what she was getting into by deciding to stay in Middle Earth.

If sunny, cheerful Nethril could pull this out, what would Laerin look like if someone pissed her off?

Lossithil looked at Mallory again and said dismissively, “Edhil.”

Mallory understood that perfectly.  Elves.  That was just the way they were: silly and childish in one moment, full of the memory of ages in the next.

There were a few mumbled apologies, and Nethril went back to looking normal.  Mallory focused back on her work.  This was a reminder, she thought.  A reminder that she had wandered into fairyland, and no matter how friendly its residents were, or how kind, or how interested in her life, they still weren’t like her.  They were… what was the word?  Perilous.  Yes, she was sure Tolkien had said that.  Fair and perilous.

Then again, Mom would have loved to hear Nethril stand up for herself.

Glorfindel found that, in the time since Elrond’s council, Erestor had taken Boromir as his charge.  The Wood-elves stayed together as a group, as did the halflings, and Rochondín had been given caretakers, but the dwarf and the Steward’s son were on their own.  Some craftsmen had taken an interest in the former, but Erestor was the best guide for the latter.  There was an elderly Dúnadan man at Rivendell, but Boromir showed little interest in him, either because he was too ill to walk or because the Gondorian did not yet understand that not only Aragorn but all of the Dúnedain were more than simple wanderers in the wild.  He preferred Erestor, who was of a similar station to him.

Erestor told Glorfindel that he spent hours at a time working with his sword, alone or with others.  War seemed to be his only interest, and even when he listened to stories, it was only of battles.. So it was little surprise when the Steward’s son asked for a council with him.  They met in the main library.  Boromir stood frowning at a shelf of histories.

“My brother loves books,” he said.  “He will be envious when he hears of this house.  Maybe I ought to have let him take the journey, after all.”

It should have been his brother who came, Glorfindel believed, but he also knew that this Gondorian would have a part to play.  “If the war is won, he may still have the opportunity to come here,” he replied.  “You now know where the valley is, and it will be easier to find the way again.”

“If the war is won?”  Boromir shook his head.  “I hoped that I would find a way to win the war here.”

“If the Ruling Ring is destroyed, we may yet have victory.”

“I will trust in Elrond’s wisdom,” he said, but his voice was weary, and Glorfindel could not help but be concerned at what might be in his mind.  “But I would like to speak to you about Minas Morgul.  Everyone I have spoken to tells me that you know more about fighting the wraiths than anyone else alive.”

“You have spoken to Elrond, I suppose.  He was Gil-Galad’s herald through the Last Alliance, and he fought the Witch-King with me in the siege of Imladris.”

“Yes, but I will take advice from everyone I can while I am here.  And he told me that you are his general.”  The Gondorian looked at him appraisingly.  Glorfindel knew that Men often found it difficult to understand the age of Elves.  He likely looked younger than Boromir himself did.

“Like Elrond, I have fought in several wars since the First Age,” he said.  “In fact, it is his father’s grandfather whom I first served, and whom I followed across the Ice to Middle Earth.”

The Man shook his head.  “I can’t get used to the age of the people here.  The First Age is a legend to us.  The halflings look like children but are not, and Aragorn seems to have the long life of our ancestors in Númenor.”

Glorfindel laughed.  “For us, it is the opposite.  We cannot understand how you could be so young and yet be an adult.”

“I am not so young.”  He frowned.  “And boys will become men even younger, far too young, as the war goes on.”

“Do not despair,” Glorfindel said.  “There have been many times when it seemed inevitable that evil would prevail, and always some hope remained.  What seems to you like a war to end the world is only one battle in a war that has lasted since before Men first awakened.  You only have one small part in it.”

“Many of your people have said something similar to me,” Boromir said slowly, then stopped.

He did not seem to be able to finish his thought, and Glorfindel took pity on him.  “I will advise you on the defense of Gondor if that is what you wish,” he offered.

“Yes,” said Boromir.  “I would be grateful.”

Early December

As the days passed in Rivendell, Mallory became less and less worried about recording them in her journal.  Often, Laerin or Nethril would have to bring it to her in the evening to remind her of it.  And she didn’t always have anything to write in it.  Sometimes, it was just “ride with Glorfindel”, but sometimes it was nothing but “Elanna” or “Magoleth” to remind her what she had done in the morning.

Which was why it took her by surprise when her period appeared again.  She had to go and count the days in her journal.  Apparently, it was December 1.  She’d been in Rivendell for more than a month, and it would only be a bit more than three weeks until the Fellowship left.  How had that happened?  And what was she supposed to do next?  She knew she wasn’t meant to stay here forever.  Who did she even ask, and how?  Would they just tell her what to do?  She didn’t even know how to start to figure it out.

She knew how dangerous it would be to admit where she was from or that she knew the future.  If they found out about Gandalf and the balrog, for example, and came up with a way to cross the mountains a different way or sent Glorfindel with them, then they would never have Gandalf the White, and she didn’t want to think about what might happen to Glorfindel.  So if she had to say something – absolutely had to – she would wait until after the Fellowship left.  Then she would hurt things the least, because the Ring would already be out of Rivendell.

But then what would happen to her?  They might think she was nuts, might think she was a spy, and what would the consequences be?  Just the thought made her sick.  She really hoped it didn’t come to that.

Relax.  She needed to stop getting so upset over every little thing.  She still had three weeks before she had to make a decision, after all.  A lot could and would happen in that time.  She’d wait and see.

Chapter Text

Early December

Mallory began to notice Men showing up at meals after that.  Rangers, she assumed – Lossithil would go and talk to them whenever she could.  After a couple of days, Aragorn appeared.  That was a bit confusing at first, because Mallory not only had never seen him cleaned up, but she actually hadn’t seen him in so long that she’d almost forgotten about him entirely.  Suddenly, there was a tall and handsome middle-aged man with dark hair asking about what she had been doing and complimenting her comprehension of Sindarin like Glorfindel would do whenever he came back from a few days away.  She guessed quickly enough who he was, but it wasn’t confirmed until that evening, when the hobbits were talking about how good it was to see him again.  It was a good thing nobody expected her to address him by name, because she wouldn't have been brave enough.

If Aragorn was back, the Fellowship would be getting together soon.  Everyone was here.  (At least, she assumed Legolas was around.  He was the only one she didn’t recognize yet: she hadn’t actually been introduced to Gimli or Boromir, but they were hard to miss as the only dwarf or Man who had stayed for the past month.)  But it was still early.  And she'd checked her dates!  She couldn't be wrong again, could she?  Ugh.

The next day, someone new came with Magoleth to their fighting lessons.  He had dark tan skin and brown hair, and she was sure she’d never seen him before.

“This is Gladhedir,” said Laerin.  “Magoleth’s husband.”

Magoleth was married?  Not just in a relationship, that she could believe, but married?  Maybe the problem was that Mallory didn’t have any of the cues she would have at home, like whether she was Mrs. or Miss or Ms.  She didn’t seem to be wearing a ring, which she should according to Elvish custom, but Mallory never really saw her when she wasn’t fighting or riding, and maybe she took it off then.

He didn’t seem to notice her confusion.  “Ah!” he said, beaming.  “Magoleth has been talking about you.”

Of course she had.  Everyone in the entire valley was probably talking about Mallory.

“Go on,” he said, waving his hands at her.  “Do not let me stop you.”

They started off with just Mallory and Magoleth, but Gladhedir eventually got into the ring, once they figured out that Mallory wasn’t scared of him.  He was all right, she thought.  He was friendly, though she didn’t follow what he said very well, and like the other two, he happily fell down when she made the right moves, even though she was sure that she wasn’t strong enough to actually unbalance an Elf.  And he seemed to fit in well with Magoleth and Laerin.  It felt like everyone was where they belonged, except Mallory.

Glorfindel listened to every report given by each group of scouts.  There was no sign of any agents of the enemy except for wolves, and the scouts who had gone down the river had found the bodies of horses and remains of their Riders, which suggested that they were well and truly gone, and probably would take another month or two to regain their strength.

“The longer we wait, the worse the weather will be, and the more likely for the Riders to return to Mordor and be re-horsed,” said Aragorn as he took council with Glorfindel, Mithrandir, Erestor, and Elrond.  “We must leave as soon as possible.”

“But none will expect us to make our move in the middle of winter,” said Mithrandir.

“It is winter already,” said Glorfindel.  “If you left tomorrow, you would still travel through the coldest days of the year, and we cannot wait until spring.  Mordor will have grown in strength and will seek to move against us.”

“There is no reason to say that I will go,” Aragorn countered.  Glorfindel raised his eyebrows at him, but he went on.  “And if Maura left tomorrow, he would be in warmer climes during the coldest days of the year.”

 “I would like to hear the remaining reports before anyone leaves,” Elrond said.  “While there may be nothing of import, there may be knowledge that will change our plans entirely.”

“And who will you send with the halflings, if not Aragorn?” Glorfindel asked.  “Mithrandir, I suppose, and Gimli, else he would not still be here.  Then, you will need a Man and an Elf, and as the Man will apparently not be Aragorn…”

Aragorn sighed and rubbed his eyes.  “I never said I would not go.”

“But even following Lord Glorfindel’s suggestion, that only comes to five,” Erestor pointed out.  “You must send a larger company.”

“Secrecy is of the first importance,” Elrond replied.  “But more than five shall go.  Boromir will have to return south in any case, and Aragorn most likely will go with them, though we have not decided yet.

“And there must be an Elf,” Aragorn added with a meaningful look at Glorfindel.

Glorfindel laughed.  “Not if you value secrecy!  I am not accustomed to traveling in shadows, nor do I often leave the valley.  Legolas is quite eager to prove himself, and he lives in that direction, so he can return home if he changes his mind.  In any case, I expect to be needed elsewhere, though I will not know until the sons of Elrond and the scouts to Mirkwood return.”

“I will not like you to leave, regardless of where you go or why,” Elrond replied.  “Sauron’s forces will seek to reach us from south and east, and we will be the last refuge if Gondor and Rohan and Lórien fall.  I am loath to send away the captain of my armies.  But that decision is some weeks away yet.”

“Is there any possibility that this is a scheme to draw Glorfindel away from the valley?” Erestor asked.

“There are far easier ways to do that without any need for subterfuge,” replied Glorfindel, shaking his head.  “And you are not lost without me.  Elrond, too, is a captain, and an entirely capable one.”

Elrond looked out the window, southward, eyes distant with the memory of Gil-Galad and Elendil.  “Not in this age,” he replied.

“And will Mallory go with you?” Aragorn asked Glorfindel, in a clear attempt to change the subject.

“That, too, will be decided when Elladan and Elrohir return, but we still know little about her, and I think we had best be cautious.”

“I thought that you trusted her,” said Erestor.

“Enough to bring her here,” said Glorfindel.  “Enough to allow her to ride away from the house and to see the rest of the valley.  Not enough to ride with her into enemy territory.”

“If she is a spy, she was either very poorly chosen or the best I have ever met,” said Aragorn.

 “It is better to learn her secrets here than in some dark place,” said Elrond.  “But she will speak to you when she is ready.  And I do not believe that this is the time to press her, considering that we can make no decisions yet, no matter what she says.”

“Very well,” he said with a sigh.  “We will wait.”  He looked at Aragorn.

“Yes,” said the Dúnadan.  “We will wait.”

Unsurprisingly, Mallory didn’t really see Arwen outside of the morning Sindarin lessons after Aragorn got home.  But one night, Laerin and Mallory gathered in a garden with her and her friends.  It was cold at night now, and it got dark early, but the Elves never seemed to mind the temperature.  Mallory wore her leggings under her dresses to keep her legs warm (the brainwashed part of her mind was disappointed that she had regained all her lost weight and fit into them perfectly again), and Lossithil and Nethril were working on winter clothes for her.  There was someone playing music tonight, though Mallory didn’t see them, which wasn’t unusual at Rivendell.

“Our scouts are returning, but most of our guests have not yet left, and it seems likely they will before midwinter,” Arwen explained.  “So, we will have a part of our midwinter celebrations early this year.”

This earned a mixed reaction: some of the women were excited for a feast, others disappointed that what might be their last midwinter in Middle Earth wouldn’t be a typical one.  “Do you celebrate midwinter, where you are from?” one asked Mallory.

This wasn’t someone who talked to her much, and questions about home made her more nervous, but she nodded.  Christmas was just a remake of the midwinter holiday, after all.

Arwen looked at her, too.  “I would like to ask whether you would like to sit at the high table, as an honored guest.  Maura did that in the feast after you first arrived, but you did not.  You could sit by Glorfindel or myself, or we may be able to convince Elanna to sit at the high table, if you wish it.”

Definitely not.  She didn’t need to call attention to herself.  She shook her head.

“Very well,” Arwen said.  “Next, I must ask you: do you know how to dance?”

Mallory shook her head again.

“Not at all?” she asked.

Mallory shook her head again, worried.  Going to a party was all right – she didn’t expect them not to take her – but if she had to actually dance there, she was not going to be happy.

“Then you must learn,” she said.  “There will be dancing in pairs and groups if it is to be a solstice celebration, and if I know Glorfindel, then he, if nobody else, will want to dance with you.”

“Glorfindel dances with all people who will agree to it,” explained Laerin.  “It does not mean anything.”

And if she didn’t agree to it?  Would he listen?  Maybe he would, now.  Or maybe Laerin would make him – that sounded more likely.

“Come,” said Arwen, standing and offering her hand.  “I will show you.”

Mallory sighed and took her hand.  They stood in the grass in front of all the women.  Arwen showed her steps, and Mallory did her best to imitate her, but she knew she was doing a terrible job.  She wasn’t good at physical skills, and she wasn’t a fan of having an audience.  Even if they were only giving her advice and encouragement, the feedback reminded her that they were watching her.

What made her feel better was that Arwen was also having a hard time keeping her feet straight.  The women kept shouting advice at her, too, telling her that she was going the wrong way and reminding her that she was supposed to be playing the male part.  “You should wait until Aragorn is available to help,” said one of the women.

Finally, Laerin stood up and said in exasperation, “Let me do it.”

Everyone stopped what they were doing and looked at her.

Laerin didn’t react.  “You do not know how to do this.  Let me.”

“I was trying –” Arwen began.

“Do you want her to learn or not?”

Arwen hesitated again, as if she wasn’t sure if this was the right thing to do, then stepped back.  Laerin took her place.  Suddenly, there was a lot less talk, just Laerin giving quiet instructions, but it didn’t feel much more comfortable.  And Laerin was definitely better at being her partner than Arwen had been, but Mallory still struggled.  Finally, annoyed that she was still making mistakes, she complained of exhaustion and Laerin took her up to bed.

She sat in her room, trying to figure out what had happened.  There was something about Laerin dancing that everyone knew but her.  Something about romance?  Magoleth was married, Nethril had a hopeless crush on someone, Arwen was engaged, of course, and Lossithil was a widow, according to Nethril.  So Laerin was the only woman she interacted with a lot that she didn’t know about.  There was always something sad in her, even when she acted happy, and it might just have been war-related PTSD, but…

Something terrible had happened, hadn’t it?  Was she widowed, too?  But death was different for a race that could reincarnate, and Laerin hadn’t lived through any of the big massacres.  So if there was a story, there was something else to it.

Mallory practiced a sentence and waited until Nethril brought her breakfast and they were alone together.  “Um,” she said hesitantly.

Nethril stopped talking and looked at her with surprise.  Mallory suddenly remembered how rarely she volunteered to speak when she didn’t need something, and she felt guilty.  If the two of them were friends, she wasn’t a very good one.

She went on anyway.  “Is Laerin married?” she asked.

“Oh, that is a sad story,” said Nethril.  “You should ask her, not me.”

Mallory raised her eyebrows.  Was Nethril actually choosing not to spread gossip?  That wasn’t like her.

“Well, if you really want to know…”

There it was.

“Some years ago, Laerin fell in love with an elf-maid from among the Wandering Companies.  Her name was Menelír, and she returned her love,” Nethril began, as if she were telling a story.

Mallory processed.  Had she heard that right?  An elf-maid?  A woman?  So there were gay Elves!  Or maybe it didn’t make sense to talk about things like gay and straight, if Elves only fell in love once or twice throughout their lives.  Maybe she should say: there were Elves who fell in love with people of their own gender.  The fanfic writers would love this!  And it made sense: the issue wasn’t her dancing, it was her taking the leading role, which out of all of them, only she would know how to do.  Had that always been her part when she and Menelír danced, or had they traded off?  Was there a protocol in Elvish culture for that?

Wait a second.  She had seen Mallory naked.

God, what kind of B.S. homophobic thought is that? she thought.  Even if Laerin was lesbian in the same way Men could be, which was unlikely, and even if she thought mortal women were as attractive as Elves, which was even more unlikely, she was still a doctor.  She wouldn’t see patients in a sexual way.

“There have always been women and men that marry within their own gender,” said Nethril defensively, abandoning her storytelling voice.  Apparently, Mallory had shown some disapproval on her face.  “I know it can be different among Men –”

“No,” said Mallory.  “My sister –”  She stopped and shook her head.  She didn’t know how to explain pansexual or transgender people.  She was sure they didn’t have a concept of being transgender… except that, five minutes ago, she would have said they didn’t have same-sex marriage, either, or autistic people a couple months ago, or brown skin before she met Nethril.  Still, it was too complicated to explain America’s relationship with queer and trans people: the way the younger generations went out of their way to support them, but at the same time, everyone was conditioned to believe violating gender norms was bad.

Nethril looked confused, but she went on.  “Even so, such relationships are hardly common among our people.  There is at least one pair of men living today in Lothlórien, and there are a few Dúnedain almost every generation.  But there have not been any in Imladris – or Lindon – in Laerin’s lifetime.”  She slipped into the other voice again.  “It might have been better if there were.  As the years passed, they courted and became engaged.  However, Menelír desired children, and she could not accept marriage to someone who could not give her that.  So, she broke her engagement with Laerin – which is near unheard-of among our people – and followed our kin across the Sea.”

All the way to Valinor?  God, that was an extreme way to run away.  Poor Laerin.

“There are so many of our people now living in Elvenhome that she might have thought she would find a man to love, or she might have hoped that she would forget Laerin with distance.  But I fear that distance will only make the pain worse.  It has done so for Laerin.  All she wants is to see her beloved again, but she cannot know whether she is already married to another.”

Mallory frowned.  Breaking up over the ability to have children seemed petty.  “What is the word, like Elanna?  Or Elrond and Aragorn?”

Nethril looked confused again, but she figured it out after a moment.  “You mean a fosterling?  Elanna is a fosterling, and Aragorn is Elrond’s?”

Mallory nodded.

“Laerin would have been happy to foster a child, but it is one thing to raise a child and another to conceive one, at least among Elves.  I do not mean that Elrond loves Aragorn any less than his own children.  I mean that when one desires to have a child, the desire is to create something, like one creates a tapestry or song.”

Mallory had known that Elves had to choose to have children, but she’d always thought of that as more of an ability to control their fertility than something mental.  Consciously creating children.  She never knew when to expect the next shock of Elves are not like us to come, and it was so much more confusing because there were so many ways that they were like Men.

“A child would be the greatest creation of one’s life, and that is what Menelír wished for.  She is an artist.  Laerin is not, or not anymore.  Not in many centuries.”

That was new information.

“She used to dance.  Not like what she taught you – she still does that, of course, everyone does, though I cannot believe it means anything to her now that Menelír is gone.  She used to dance like one sings a song.  To tell a story, or to create an image.  You have seen this.”

Mallory nodded.  Dancing was less common than music at Rivendell, but it was just as enchanting and captivating to her.

“She stopped… after she was wounded in the battle to defend the valley, it must have been.  She lost something then.  But I do not think that changed her mind when it comes to children.  Laerin is nothing if not practical.  I cannot imagine her worrying about how she came to have a child: they would be hers either way.  I hope that Menelír will meet other women in Valinor who live happily together and will think of Laerin differently.  But if she has changed her mind, we cannot know.  Laerin will not sail until the war is over, and possibly not even then, if her sister will not leave.  I only hope she will find joy in the end.”

Mallory thought of Sandra.  She was fairly sure that Zee was still able to have children, but taking hormones would probably take away Sandra’s fertility, and besides, there was no guarantee she would end up living with Zee or anyone else with a uterus.  And what about herself?  Would she ever find someone who was okay with her being asexual?  Or would she go home at all?  She knew that it could be dangerous to be an old maid in medieval times, but then again, so being married to a man was dangerous, too, and it would be even harder to find someone here than back home.  It wasn’t like she could explain to her partner that she was asexual and wasn’t attracted to them, either.  Maybe she could just stay in Rivendell.  Clearly, being an unmarried Elf wasn’t weird, so they probably wouldn’t mind.  And she could always be single in modern times.  But she felt like she'd be missing out on something if she lived alone.

“You do not talk about your family,” said Nethril, pouring more water for herself.  “I did not know that you had a sister.”

Of course not.  She still barely talked at all.

“What is her name?”

“Sandra,” Mallory said.

“Is she older or younger than you are?”

“Older.”

“Do you have any other sisters or brothers?”

She shook her head.

“What about parents?  Do you have a mother and father?”

“Mother.”

“What happened to your father?  Did he die?”

She shook her head.

“Did he leave you?”

“We leave him,” she answered.

“Ah,” Nethril said, as if she understood.  “I am sorry.”  Then, “Do you expect to see them again?  Your mother and sister?”

She didn’t know how to answer that.  What if she couldn’t go back?  What if she didn’t survive?

“You are not alone in your uncertainty, even among Elves,” Nethril said.  “Death is not always permanent for us, but our fallen relatives may choose not to return to life, or may not be permitted to.  Others may not return for a very long time.”

And Elves might suffer their grief for thousands of years, too.  She wouldn’t go through that.

“Did you live in a city?” Nethril asked.

There was no way Mallory could answer that.  She was obviously not from a farm – anyone could see that – but she also wasn’t from any Middle-Earth city.  It wasn’t worth the risk of opening up that topic of conversation.  She kept her mouth shut.

Nethril sighed.  “Are you finished?” she asked.

Mallory had forgotten that she was eating.  She thought about it, then nodded.

“Come, then, let us clean up.”

Laerin found out, of course, probably because Nethril couldn't keep her mouth shut around her, either.  "Next time you have a question, ask me, not Nethril," she said.  But other than that, it was just another day, another checkmark on the way to the day the Fellowship would leave.

Chapter Text

Mid December

The year was deepening into winter when Glorfindel at last received word that Elladan and Elrohir had crossed into the valley and would be home by nightfall.  He went out to wait for them, sitting in a tree overlooking the path from the mountains.

When at last they arrived, it was on foot.  Their horses were the best in Imladris, but even animals like that would tire after a journey of nearly two months, and the path was treacherous.  The horses walked behind the twins with their heads down.  Glorfindel smiled to himself and sang out from his perch in the tree.

“Into the valley, down from the hills,

Coming home bobbing like sweet daffodils.

Hi-deedle-dee Hi-diddle-dill!

“The moon shan't set, the sun stands still.

Til the twins come home whenever they will.

Hi-deedle-dee Hi-diddle-dill!

“Elladen, slower than moss on a sill!

Elrohir wandering even slower still!

Hi-deedle-dee Hi-diddle-dill!”

Elrohir glanced up.  “Glorfindel,” he said to his brother.

“And here are the Sons of Elrond at last!” Glorfindel called down.  “You are late.  Everyone else is already home.  No wonder, if you walked all the way!”

“Glorfindel, indeed,” said Elladan.

Glorfindel jumped down from the tree.  “What did you find?” he asked.

Elladan was the one to respond.  He had always been the more sociable, but in recent years, Elladan nearly always spoke for the two of them.  “We will tell our father that,” he said.

Mithrandir, with impeccable timing, picked his way through the rocks with his staff.  “I, too, would like to hear your report,” he said.

“We will tell our father,” Elladan repeated.  “He will decide who else should hear our news.”

Glorfindel frowned, but did not argue.  He and the twins had argued too many times since Celebrían’s death, and he tried to avoid conflicts with them now; in any case, it was possible that they had learned something that they truly needed to be careful about sharing.

The four of them walked back to the house together, discussing the events in the valley.  Glorfindel let the twins take their horses to the stables.  “I suppose their refusal was in part my fault, for mocking them,” he said to Mithrandir.

“I would say it is,” the wizard replied.  “But I have never heard them speak so shortly to me.”

“They have changed, of late,” said Glorfindel.  “And they are weary.”

“Hmph,” Mithrandir said, frowning in disapproval.

“Do not worry,” said Glorfindel.  “Elrond will manage them.”

It was two hours later when a messenger found him.  “Lord Elrond would like to speak to you,” she said.  So Glorfindel followed her to Elrond’s study, a private place to talk.  Elladan and Elrohir turned as one and nodded in greeting.

“In a better mood, are you?” Glorfindel asked.

“Glorfindel,” said Elrond, quietly but sternly.

Glorfindel sighed.  “All right.  Will Mithrandir be here?”

“No,” Elladan replied.  “There is no reason for that.  He will not travel with you.”

“He has always helped me to follow any news of the Blue Wizards, true or false.”

“I think that this is your task now,” said Elrond.

Glorfindel sighed.  “Go on, then.”

“There are indeed Elves in Dorwinion, though few enough,” Elladan said.  “They speak of East-Elves who bring trade goods across mountain and desert.”

“East-Elves,” murmured Glorfindel.  In Imladris and Lindon, “East-Elves” referred to the Silvan folk east of the mountains.  Across the Sea, the Imladhrim themselves would fall under that category.  He had heard tales of Elves who had never traveled westward at all, either at first when they were invited by Oromë or afterwards on their own, but those peoples were beyond his knowledge.  It was near unimaginable that the easternmost group of Elves he knew of would have East-elves of their own. 

“There is a hunter who is known to travel with some groups of them, who is said to be neither Man nor Elf nor Dwarf, who has power over evil things, but they have not seen him in several years.”

“Her,” Glorfindel corrected him.  “Alatar is a huntress; I expect they are speaking of her.”

“Their ‘East-elves’ would know more about her than they do,” Elladan said, giving a shrug.  He went on, “They are expected to come to Dorwinion in the winter, as the weather is kinder there than in mountains or wastes.  If Alatar is not with them, they may be able to lead you to her.  However, as the East becomes more dangerous, it becomes unlikely that they will be able to make the journey.”

“Then I will find them,” said Glorfindel.  “Did you speak to the Men who lived there?”

“Some,” Elladan replied.  “They are in much the same position as Dale and Erebor: they do not ally themselves with the Enemy, but they know that they will be the first to be conquered.  Nearly all of the Men, as I understand, wish to surrender.  The Elves do not, but they are outnumbered ten to one, or more.  We counseled those who would listen, but I fear that we are not enough against the threat of Mordor.

“So there may not be any Elves remaining when I arrive,” said Glorfindel.

“Then if Dorwinion is typically a sanctuary for the folk of the desert, there may be a large number of people moving farther westward in search of help,” Elrond said.  “Thranduil may welcome his trading partners, or even a group of Dark Elves that bring experienced warriors.  However, I do not believe that Lothlórien will take them in: it will be too much disruption in such an uncertain time.”

“I want to go, and go soon,” said Glorfindel.

“I agree,” Elrond said.  He looked at his sons.  “And you?  Will you accompany him?”

The twins were silent for a moment, looking at each other.  “No,” said Elladan, speaking for both of them.  “We prefer to assist Aragorn, or you.”

Elrond nodded.  “Speak to Mallory,” he said to Glorfindel.  “And begin to plan the journey”

One morning, after lessons, Glorfindel appeared and asked for Mallory to come with him.  She had a bad feeling about this, but Laerin said she should go and promised to take her for a walk if they finished early enough.

Glorfindel took Mallory over to a room full of scrolls and papers.  There was a big table in the middle of the room.  Aragorn was there, with a map spread out over the table.  “Well met,” he said, smiling.

“Well met,” she mumbled.

“We wish to speak to you,” said Glorfindel.

Of course.  She crossed her arms.  At least she’d been free from questions for a little while.  There was one benefit of not understanding what other people were saying.

“There was a council a few days after you came here,” explained Aragorn, speaking slowly and clearly so she could understand him.  “There were many people.  We spoke of many things, and all of the guests here told their stories, except for you.  You were not able to speak yet, so you were not there.”

Thank God, Mallory thought.  She hadn’t even realized it had been an option for her to go to the Council of Elrond.  There was no way she could have survived that.  That was another benefit to losing her translations.

“But we would like to hear your story of how you came here, to Elrond’s house.”

She hugged herself and pressed her mouth shut.

Aragorn pointed to the map.  “Here is Imladris,” he said, pointing to a spot marked in the mountains.  “The Ford of Bruinen.”  He traced backwards.  “The Last Bridge.”  He went on until he came to a collection of four towns, which he named in Westron.  The one by the hill must have been Bree, but she didn’t volunteer that she’d been there, even when he looked at her expectantly.

“The halflings say that Iarwain lives here,” he added, pointing to the hills near another river.

She nodded.  It had been near a river.

“And what about before that?” he asked, his finger still on the river.  “Where were you before?”

She shook her head.

“We are trying to help you, Rochondín,” said Glorfindel.

Right.  He was always trying to help her, whether she wanted it or not.

But she actually needed help.  Glorfindel wasn’t the problem here.  The problem was this secret she’d been forced to keep.  It was her being sent on this ridiculous quest in the first place without even being told what she was supposed to do.  Why hadn’t she just stayed with Tom Bombadil until he gave up and she was sent back home, rested enough to face life again?  Why had she come at all?  Whose bright idea had this been, bringing a depressed, socially anxious, panic-ridden teenager to Middle Earth?  What good could she do?  All she’d done was slow Glorfindel down when Frodo needed him.

“I know of your message to Mithrandir,” Glorfindel explained.  “We sent riders out to seek further information.  The sons of Elrond traveled east.  They believe that they have information about the wizards.”

Elladan and Elrohir had gone to try to help her?  She hoped they hadn’t been taken away from somewhere they were needed more.  She couldn’t remember any details about the scouting missions.

“Elrond and I must decide where our guests are to go and when – or even whether they will leave at all.  However, we are having difficulty when it comes to your situation, as we do not have all of the information to make a decision.”

In other words, they were having the same problem she was.  But they didn’t know all the details, and couldn’t tell them.  Not yet.  She was going to have to wait at least until Frodo left.  At least until then.

“Where do you expect to go after this?” Aragorn asked.

She shrugged.

“Do you wish to stay here?” Glorfindel asked.

She shrugged again.  Of course she wanted to stay – well, she’d rather go back to Tom and Goldberry, but that would require another journey – but that wasn’t the point, was it?  This wasn’t about what she wanted.

“Then let us make this decision together,” said Glorfindel.  “Tell us your story, how you came to be here, and what you know of what you are meant to do.”

“I cannot,” she said.

“Why not?” Aragorn asked.

She shook her head.  She couldn’t answer that.

“Have you been forbidden to speak of it?” Glorfindel asked.

She shook her head.

“Are you unable to put together the words to say it?” Aragorn asked.

That was closer to the truth, but not quite there.  She frowned, thinking.

“If Laerin was here, would you use your language to tell her?”  Laerin understood English about as well as Mallory understood Sindarin.  She wasn’t surrounded by the language like Mallory was, but she almost never needed to be told the same word twice, so she learned more quickly.  “Or if there was someone who spoke your own language, would you tell that person?”

Mallory shook her head.

“Why not?”

“Um,” she said finally, struggling to remember the word that would be used in warnings sometimes.  “Danger.”

“Danger?  In what way is it dangerous?” Glorfindel asked.

She shook her head.

Glorfindel frowned.  Aragorn sighed in resignation.  “If there comes a time when you feel you can, or must, share this with someone, or you decide what you want to do, please let us know.”

She didn’t respond.  So they gave up and let her go, and Laerin did get to take her on a walk down to the river.  But mentally she was kicking herself.  Someone finally offered to help you like you wanted, and you said no!  But what else was she supposed to do?  She couldn’t risk everything by telling them the truth.  It was Frodo who was going to save the world, not her.

Apparently, she wasn’t the only one who had a conversation that day.  She ran into the hobbits out on the porch that evening.  They all seemed to be unhappy about something, and Merry and Pippin in particular looked upset.

“They say that Elrond will not allow them to travel south with Maura,” explained Laerin, translating the Westron into Sindarin.  “He wants them to return to the Shire.  That is their home.”

So they were at that part of the books.  Mallory wished she knew what day it was supposed to happen.  There was a gap in the Appendices between the Council of Elrond and the Fellowship leaving Rivendell, and it had been a good four or five months since she’d actually read this part of The Fellowship of the Ring, so she didn’t have all the details in her head.

Sam said something.  “Ban said not to worry, he will take care of Maura,” said Bilbo.  “His family has worked for us for generations.  Good people, they are.”

Frodo said something that seemed to be a translation of Bilbo’s comment back into Westron, and Sam blushed.  Then, the hobbits all started talking, almost at once, and Laerin tried to translate.  “Kali says that it is not fair, that the two of them get to go on an adventure and while he and Razar have to stop at Imladris, and Maura said that they still do not understand, even after the black riders, and it will not be like Bilba’s adventure, but Razar says that they want to stay with Maura, even if it is difficult, and –”  She broke off and said something sharply in Westron.

“She said that if they want to talk to you, they will have to slow down, or she will not be able to translate anything,” Bilbo said, amused.  “She will make a good mother, that one.”

For a moment, Mallory thought she saw Laerin’s face tighten the slightest bit.  She guessed that Bilbo didn’t know about her history with Menelír.

They went on, slower, about how annoyed they were about the whole situation and that even Gandalf was on their side, and the numbers were just right for them to go along, but Elrond still said no.  Mallory wished she could tell them that they didn’t have to worry, but as it was, she just kept her mouth shut and nodded in sympathy.

Eventually, Bilbo was talked into performing some poetry – not that he took much talking into – and Mallory sat and listened to Laerin translate the Westron into Sindarin and Sindarin into Westron so everyone could understand.  But something was bothering her.

She checked her journal before bed.  It was the seventeenth or eighteenth, she thought.  If they were going to leave on the twenty-fifth, that was a reasonable amount of time to get ready.  Everything went slowly in the books.  So that was all right.

But still, something was wrong.

She sought out the hobbits herself the next night.  She and Nethril found them outside listening to some eerie singing from Elves that she couldn’t see.  Pippin was very mopey, she noticed, a bad sign.

“Master Elrond has chosen the last two members of the fellowship,” said Bilbo, translating for Frodo, whose Sindarin was about as broken as hers.  “He will send his sons, Elladan and Elrohir.  And I suppose he is correct, if you want my opinion – they are warriors, and they have traveled far and wide.  I wish that I could go on some of their journeys with them, to tell you the truth!  But I suppose I am too old now, and Kali and Raz are too young.  Perhaps – what is the matter, dear?”

Mallory tried to take deep breaths and calm her heart.  The niggling something isn’t right feeling had burst into full-blown mental alarm bells.  Elladan and Elrohir weren’t supposed to be part of the conversation about the Fellowship.  They had never been part of that conversation!  They had such a small part in the books that she’d actually completely missed the fact that they existed her first time through (an oversight that fanfiction had enthusiastically corrected), and she knew that they hadn’t been mentioned here.  They hadn’t even been brought up and immediately discarded, like Glorfindel.  Gandalf and the hobbits had said that they wanted to go, and then Elrond had said he would choose someone else, and Pippin had insisted, and Elrond had given in, and that was the end of the decision-making.  She couldn’t remember all the details, but Elrond had never decided on someone else, and he had never brought up the twins.  The two of them had stayed back in Rivendell or the mountains, and then they had ridden down to meet Aragorn with the rangers, bringing Arwen’s banner to give to him.  And Merry and Pippin had gone with the Fellowship.

This was much worse than a few different words being said here and there.  This was a change that could be disastrous.  Had she caused this?  Had she been the butterfly flapping its wings?  Was this her fault?  Or was this a sign to her, saying that she should have told Glorfindel and Aragorn when they had asked?  Was she supposed to do something?  Was she supposed to fix it?  Shit shit shit –

“Do you want to go inside?” Nethril asked.

Mallory took another deep breath.  Calm down.  She really liked the music tonight, and it would be a shame to miss that.  She shook her head.  “No talk,” she whispered.

“We do not have to talk,” said Nethril.  She said something in Westron to the hobbits, which Pippin promptly ignored.  Nobody bothered to translate what he was saying, but she didn’t need a translation for Frodo’s response: something along the lines of, “Didn’t she just tell you to shut up?”

They were mostly quiet after that.  Sam was completely enraptured.  Mallory tried to let the singing take her away, but it was hard to listen to the music and keep her mind away from the thought that something was wrong.  Something was really, seriously Wrong.

Nethril sat with her arm around her shoulders, and when it got really hard for her to breathe, Frodo put his hand on her arm.  It was his left hand, she noticed, the one whose shoulder had been hit by the Ringwraiths.  Nazgûl victim buddies, she thought.

God, she was going to have to do something about this, wasn’t she?  If it was her fault, then it was her problem to fix, and if it wasn’t, then she was still the only one who knew that this was the wrong choice.  She was going to have to do something.  To Do Something.

Shit.

Chapter Text

Late December

Mallory kept thinking that if she just waited, everyone would change their minds and things would be straightened out.  Maybe if she held back for another day, or another… everything would have to be right in the end, wouldn’t it?  So far, even when things were a bit different than she expected, they still followed the book when it was important.  This might just be a small change after all.  It might just be a matter of Frodo simplifying the discussion over Merry and Pippin into one conversation when he wrote the book.

But it might also be enormous, because Merry and Pippin might not go at all.  And she had a time limit here.  If it came to the time for the Fellowship to leave, and she hadn’t done anything, she wouldn’t have a chance to fix it anymore.  An entire day had already passed between her two conversations with the hobbits.  This was dangerous.

Keep moving forward and everything will turn out all right.  That was what she always did.  But what if it didn’t?  What if she had to make a decision this time?

“Mallory?” asked Laerin when they were done with their lesson with Arwen the next morning.  “Is something wrong with you today?”

Mallory was embarrassed at how obvious she must have been, but actually, this was good.  Laerin couldn’t fix things, but at least Mallory wouldn’t have to start the conversation on her own.  “I,” she started, then swallowed.  She spoke English: Sindarin would be too hard.  “I need to talk to Glorfindel.”

Laerin repeated the sentence in Sindarin, or something close to it.  She did that whenever Mallory spoke English.  Mallory was never sure if that was because she thought Mallory had forgotten the words or she just wanted to make her practice it.  Then, she replied, “I expect we could find him.  Come along.”

Mallory followed Laerin through the halls, her heart pounding.  Laerin found someone and sent them to find Glorfindel – was that a job, being a messenger in a building without phones or radios?  After that, they went to the Hall of Fire to wait.

Mallory stared into the fire.  She needed to figure out what to say.  What were Merry and Pippin’s real names again?  Has she ever actually said them?  She’d definitely heard them.

When Glorfindel finally arrived, he looked like he had been hurrying, which made Mallory feel bad.  But he's right to think it's important, she scolded herself.  But that put pressure on her to be important.  He sat down next to her, taking a moment to settle himself there.  “What is it?” he asked.

“Kali,” she said.  She was sweating already.  “And Razar.  They need –”  She got stuck there.  The only relevant Sindarin word she could think of was walk, but that would let on that she knew something about their plans.  She turned to Laerin.  “To go?” she asked in English.

“Mena,” Laerin answered.

She went back to Sindarin.  “To go with…”  Now she’d forgotten Frodo’s name, and Glorfindel was already raising his eyebrows in a way she didn’t like.  “M-Maura.”

Glorfindel looked at Laerin.  “They did complain to her that they wanted to go with him,” she said.  “They seemed to think that it would be an adventure.”

“And that is an excellent reason why they should not travel with him,” he replied, turning back to Mallory.

“No,” she said.  “They need – please.”

Glorfindel looked at her for a long time.  She started to hyperventilate.  “It will not help to tell me that,” he said.  “You will have to speak to Elrond.”  He paused again, looking at her as if he expected her to refuse.  When she didn’t say anything, he took her arm.  “We will go to him, then.”

This time, they didn’t have to wait, which was good, because Mallory was beginning to doubt herself as they walked.  Glorfindel took them directly upstairs, knocked on a door, and slipped inside, leaving Mallory and Laerin waiting in the hallway.  A moment later, he opened it again and invited them in.

It was the room with the maps in it.  Elrond sat in a chair, with Gandalf standing next to him, rolling up a scroll of some kind.  It was sort of good that Gandalf was there: after all, he was on her side of the Merry-and-Pippin debate.  On the other hand, he was Gandalf.  Elrond wasn’t going to be easy, either.  He was looking at her thoughtfully, a slight frown of concern on his face.  Not threatening, but not entirely welcoming, either.  Laerin stood next to Mallory, one hand on her arm.  Mallory was already shaking and nobody had even said anything yet.

“To save Mallory from the trouble of finding the right words again,” began Glorfindel, “she feels that it is necessary that the two younger halflings to go along with their friends.”

Two serious, stern, and ancient faces turned towards her.  “Is that correct?” Elrond asked.

Mallory nodded, swallowing nervously.

“I know that they wish to go: you do not need to tell me that.  Should I understand that you believe that there is a reason for them to do so?”

She nodded.

Gandalf grunted and looked at the other two men.  “Why?” Elrond asked her.

“Maura needs them,” she said, looking at the floor.  “Friends.”

“They may be his friends, but that does not mean that it is a good idea for them to go with him.  They may be of much better use elsewhere.”

She shook her head.

Elrond sighed.  “Sit down.”

Glorfindel pointed to a chair for her, then pulled another one over and sat down, too.  Laerin stayed standing, looking nervous.

Elrond leaned forward and folded his hands in his lap.  “How much do you know of what Maura and Banazar have been asked to do?”

Mallory was confused over the second name, but she understood everything else.  “South,” she said carefully.  Elrond frowned slightly.  “With you.”  She pointed to Gandalf.  “Aragorn.”  Then, she stopped.  She couldn’t name Legolas, Boromir, and Gimli, and she did not like the way everyone was looking at her.  “Nine?”

He looked at Laerin.  “They mentioned this to her the night before last,” she said, and he nodded.

“Do you know why they are going to go south?” he asked.

She shook her head, and so did Laerin, but Gandalf’s frown deepened as if he knew she was lying, and Elrond looked doubtful.  “If that is true, why do you think I should do as you ask?  You do not have enough knowledge to make any decision.”

She had come up with one thing, and only one thing, to say as an excuse.  “I dream in… in Iarwain house, about Maura and…”  Sindarin was exhausting.  Hopefully they got it.

“You dreamed of the halflings in Iarwain’s house,” Gandalf rephrased.

She nodded.  That was true, after all.  It just didn’t explain anything.

“You are doing whatever you can to avoid telling the truth,” said Elrond in a measured voice.  Mallory’s heart started to race again.  He’d seen right through it.  “If you expect me to do as you ask, we need to know what you know and how you know it.  You cannot give ‘Iarwain’ as the answer to every question.  Do you understand how this seems to us?  We do not even truly know who you are.”

He didn’t believe her.  Mallory put her face in her hands.  She’d already given too much away to expect them to just forget this all, but she still couldn’t tell them.  She couldn’t even ask anyone for advice without telling them what was really going on.  Why hadn’t she asked Tom Bombadil?  It hadn’t even occurred to her that this would be a problem.

And it shouldn’t have been.  She should have just kept her mouth shut, no matter what.  What had she really expected to happen in this conversation?  She really expected Elrond to just listen to her?  Of course the elves knew much more about dreams than she did.  How could they be fooled by her?  Even if it was technically true –

“Mallory,” Glorfindel said.

She looked up.  He never called her that.  Did this mean he was angry with her, or was he trying to be kind?  He didn’t look angry.

“I understand that you feel that speaking to us will be dangerous.  But we are accustomed to dealing with dangerous information.  The fact that you were brought into this discussion may be a sign that it is time to share what you are hiding.  Do you not think so?”

She had thought so.  But then why was she so terrified?

“Do you want to take time to think about it?” Elrond asked.

Mallory nodded.

“Then you may think about it.  But it will not be long before I speak to you again.  Not more than a day.  Do you understand?”

She nodded again, trying to breathe slowly.  But she didn’t feel better until the door closed behind her.

Glorfindel paced.  “It is clear that this is deeply important to her,” he said.  “She has never spoken to me except when she felt that she had to.  In fact, I think that she may have said more words today than I have heard from her since we met.”

“That does not mean that what she said was correct,” Mithrandir replied, chewing on the stem of an unlit pipe.

“She agrees with you!” Glorfindel protested.

“She does,” he acknowledged, frowning.  “And I would like to know why.”

Elrond, who had been silent since the girl left, replied.  “As do I.  And yet, so long as only she holds this knowledge, only she can tell whether sharing it will be dangerous.”

“Then are we not to ask her about it?”

“I intend to ask, just as I told her,” Elrond replied.  “But I cannot make that decision for her, and neither can you.”

“If she understood what dangers we face –” Glorfindel began.

“Perhaps she does,” Mithrandir said grimly.

“If she had been present at our council and heard what secrets others shared, it is possible that she would have told us the truth,” Elrond agreed.  “And we may come to regret that it was impossible.  But nonetheless, this is her decision to make.  No matter how you wish to help her, you cannot take that burden from her.”

Glorfindel sighed.  That was a difficult fact for him to accept.

“And you certainly cannot force her to decide based on your curiosity and impatience.”

Elrond’s voice was mild, but his words hurt.

“Elrond is correct, I am afraid,” said Mithrandir.

“You, too, my friend?” Glorfindel protested.

Elrond stood.  “I will ask Nethril if she knows anything,” he said.  “And you, Mithrandir, need to speak to the halflings about keeping secrets.”

The wizard scowled.  “I have plenty to say to them.”

Glorfindel stayed after they had gone, lost in silent thought.

Laerin regretted taking Mallory back to her room.  Now that she was there, it did not seem as if she intended to ever leave again.  She spent nearly an hour curled up on her bed, hugging her pillow to her chest, occasional tears dropping onto the blanket.  At last, she got up for a few minutes, and Laerin convinced her to drink some water, but then she lay down again, face up this time, staring at the ceiling.

She was not in any state for Laerin to leave her alone, and someone had to be there in case she wanted to talk.  So she sang songs, one after another, to comfort her.

At last, the midday bells rang.  “Wash your face and we can go down to eat,” said Laerin.

“No,” Mallory said.

“Do you want food?”

There was a pause, as if she was considering.  Then, she said, “You go.”

Laerin weighed the relative risks of forcing her into a room full of people when she was upset or teaching her that she could simply refuse to get out of bed.  “No,” she said.  “I do not mind staying with you.”  They would not be allowed to go hungry in Elrond’s house, after all.

Mallory rolled over instead of answering.  Laerin went back to singing.  After an hour or so, as she had expected, Lossithil came to the door with food for both of them.  The Dúnadan woman set it down on the dresser and then went to sit on the bed next to Mallory, fixing her hair where it had come out of its braid.  “I do not know what you have gotten yourself involved in,” she whispered.  “I never questioned why you had come here.  But if you know something that will help us, you should say so.”

Mallory stared at the ceiling.  “I did,” she whispered.

They did not need Elanna’s help to understand the words behind what she had said: I already did that, and it was not enough.

Eventually, Lossithil left.  “Come and eat,” said Laerin to Mallory.  “And then we can see Kaza, if you like.”

Mallory struggled up.  She wasn’t hungry, but she knew she should be.  It reminded her of when she was sick on the Road, but in this case, she had real food to eat, and she knew that she needed to try.  So she sat on the windowsill, eating mushroom pie.  The hobbits must have loved it, she thought, which reminded her of the problem that was facing her.

“I do not know what is in your mind, either,” said Laerin.  “But I know that it is important, so I am glad that you are taking it seriously.”

Somehow, that felt to Mallory like the nicest thing anyone had ever said to her.

Once they were done, she followed Laerin silently through the halls.  They stopped by the kitchen to drop off the dishes and get carrots for the horses, and then they went out to the stables.  Kaza whinnied and ran up to them, as usual.  Mallory fed him the carrot and scratched his forehead.  Then, she hugged his neck and whispered – hoping that if she said it quietly and quickly, Laerin wouldn’t be able to make it out – “What am I supposed to do?  What did Tom want me to do?”

Kaza nickered and nuzzled her shoulder.  She sighed.  He couldn’t give her an answer.  She knew that.  But he was the only person she could talk to.

The Elves knew she knew something now, but they weren’t going to torture her for information or anything.  They could ask her a million times, and they could make her life difficult, but Elrond had let her leave when she was upset.  So her choice was to put it off and see if they changed their minds about the hobbits, or to try her best to convince them.  For sure breaking with the book by sending Elladan and Elrohir was worse than maybe breaking with the book by telling them information – a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush, and so on.  And if they kicked her out, or decided she was insane, or found some dungeon to put her in, it was better for her to suffer than for Middle Earth to fall to Sauron.

Of course, they weren’t going to torture her to tell them what was going to happen in the future, either – all she had to do was hold out on the information until the Fellowship left.  But they could still manipulate her, refusing to let Frodo leave until she talked.  Besides, the thought of their reaction terrified her.

Kaza pulled away from her, tossed his head, and ran around the field and back.  She climbed onto the fence to watch him.

Being scared isn’t a basis for making decisions, she thought.

Finally, she looked at Laerin, swinging her legs between the slats of the fence.  She took a deep breath and said in English, “I’m ready.”

Chapter Text

Late December

It took a little while to gather everyone again, long enough for Mallory to get really nervous.  She had managed to ask for a slate and chalk, knowing how hard it would be to explain all of this in words, but then, she had nothing to do.  Laerin tried to talk to her, first to distract her and then to encourage her to take deep breaths to calm down, but she didn’t want to be distracted.  She needed to think about what she was going to say.

This time, Elrond was in a different room.  This room had a warm fire, which made it feel friendlier than the room with the maps.   (In that room and the library, the fireplace was hidden away, and they just had tapestries to insulate the walls.)  There were several chairs around a desk, but Laerin didn’t sit down, so she didn’t, either.

Glorfindel arrived with Aragorn by his side.  “Are you all right?” he asked her almost as soon as he opened the door.  His face was full of concern.  She nodded, but of course, she wasn’t.  She was scared to death.  She was bothering Elrond and Glorfindel again, and now Aragorn was involved (because of course he was), and Laerin had sent someone to look for Gandalf, so she couldn’t just back out again.  They’d be rightfully angry with her for that.  It put even more pressure on her.

Gandalf arrived before she was ready.  He seemed to be out of breath, and almost in sympathy, her heart started racing.  They really cared about hearing what she was going to say.  She stared down at the slate to avoid looking at him.

“Mithrandir,” said Elrond with a smile that Mallory was sure was meant for her benefit and not the wizard’s.  “I believe Mallory has decided to speak to us.”

“Have you?” Gandalf asked her.

She swallowed and nodded.

“I should not be here,” said Laerin suddenly.  “This is well beyond me.”

Above her pay grade, Mallory thought, then tried not to break into nervous laughter imagining Rivendell as a corporation.  Or maybe a hotel?

“I am afraid you cannot leave yet,” Elrond replied.  “It is equally beyond Nethril, and you are more skilled in her language.”

That was true.  Nethril knew some English vocabulary but not its grammar: she only learned individual words, not sentences.  Arwen was there when they discussed verb conjugation and so on, but Laerin spent more time with Mallory than Arwen did, and she usually translated when Mallory used English.  So Laerin could stay.  Good.

“Speak,” said Elrond to Mallory.

Mallory took a deep breath, then another.  She picked up the chalk, and they gathered around her to look.  On the left side of the slate, she drew a circle.  “Arda,” she said.  Then, she drew a short line going west: the Straight Path.  She hesitated before drawing Valinor: she was pretty sure it was flat, but what was she going to do, draw it as a square?  Instead, she just made a smaller circle.  “Valinor,” she said.  She’d pronounced that wrong.  “Vah-lin-ohr,” she said, trying to make the right r sound.  She’d never heard it said out loud: the Elves talked about West and the Sea, not what was actually over there.

Elrond looked at Laerin, who raised her eyebrows and shrugged.

“You mean Aman,” Glorfindel corrected Mallory, looking at her pictures with his arms crossed.

“Oh.  Aman.”  Her voice broke.  Then, her hand shaking, she drew a circle on the right side of the slate.  She pointed to it.  “Earth,” she whispered.

“What was that?” Laerin asked.

Mallory cleared her throat.  “Earth,” she said.  She pointed to herself.  “Earth.”

Gandalf’s eyebrows snapped together.

“I do not understand,” said Elrond, looking back and forth between her and the slate.  “If you do not come from Arda, then you come from… where?  The stars?”

Was he asking if she was an alien?  Elves knew about the possibility of aliens?  Well, this was someone whose mother was a bird and whose father was a star, so it wasn’t all that weird.

She shook her head and drew a bigger circle around Arda and Valinor – well, Aman.  “Stars,” she said.  Then, she drew a separate one around Earth.  “Stars.”

“What do you mean?” Aragorn asked.

Glorfindel had not taken his eyes off of her drawing.  “Then you are not from any part of this world,” he said.

She shook her head.

“I thought…” he began.  “When the world was curved, lands were cast down and new ones called up.  Sailors found the new lands to the west of these and returned here with plants never before seen.  But some were lost.  I thought, perhaps, that some of the lost Men had settled there and made their own language and customs.  But I could not understand how you had crossed the seas and made your way across the land without attracting anyone’s notice until you were nearly in Bree.”

Ugh.  She wished she had known that.  She wouldn’t have been able to explain how she’d gotten across the ocean, but it was a lot less weird than what she was actually saying.  And it was oddly close to the actual truth: compared to where Tolkien had lived, she was a descendant of colonists in the new lands to the west.  She was surprised that the Middle Earth people hadn’t actually done that yet.  Maybe they weren’t organized enough right now.  Maybe Aragorn’s kingdom would do it.  If Aragorn was still able to get his kingdom, that was.

“How did you come here?” asked.

Mallory shrugged awkwardly.

“She does not know,” muttered Gandalf.  Then, he said out loud, “You do not believe her, do you?”

“She is not lying,” replied Elrond.  “You know that.”

Mallory looked at Laerin.  “Lying,” said Laerin.  “To lie.  To say things that are not right, on purpose.”

Mallory mumbled the word and then repeated it in English.  At the same time, Gandalf said, “Then she is insane.”

“He thinks that you cannot understand the difference between what is and is not right,” explained Laerin.

Probably meaning crazy, she figured.  That was what she’d think if someone showed up in her world saying the reason that they couldn’t speak English and didn’t know how to use electricity was because they were from Middle Earth.

“Is she?” Elrond challenged him.  “Do you think that she is insane, yet in all of two months, none of her caregivers, teachers, or friends realized that?  Laerin and Glorfindel are here.  You may ask them.  Or should I call Elanna?  Or my daughter?”

“Then you do believe her.”

 ”Not yet.  It is entirely possible that she is mistaken or that we still do not understand.”

Mallory shrank down.  They were arguing, just like she’d been afraid of.  She desperately wished she didn’t have to do this.  Could she just reappear back in her bed in her own house and not have any more secret knowledge or world-changing decisions?

“Tell us of your home,” said Elrond.

That was a test, she thought.  A test to see if she could tell a story that made sense, and maybe also to see if he could figure out another explanation based on what she said.  She swallowed past the lump in her throat.

“Different,” she managed.  Then, she turned to Laerin, grateful she was still there.  “The water downstairs?” she asked in English.  “It is like that everywhere.  But the water is hot, not cold.  There are other things like that.”  She had no idea how to describe electricity, but she could describe its effects.  “I could travel – I mean, I could ride from Bree to here in a few days, but without a horse.  I write to people on the other side of – of the sea, and they can write back in – um – in only a minute.”

Laerin struggled through a translation.  Mallory glanced up when she felt brave enough, seeing looks of incredulity and confusion.

They wouldn’t believe her.  She actually did have some proof of what she was saying, but the book with its evenly printed letters was up in her room, and she still hadn’t let them in on that.  Instead, she pulled her hair tie off her braid.  “Look,” she said.  The elastic was sticking out of the fabric at last, even though Nethril had tried one morning to help her get it back in.  She wondered if there were rubber trees in the new lands Glorfindel had talked about.  That was a New World plant.  “It’s broken, but you can see…”  She pulled some of the intact elastic to show how it stretched.

Glorfindel took it as Laerin translated, and he looked at it intently.  “Nethril said she did not know what cloth it was made of or how it was woven so tightly,” Laerin added.

“And your arm –” Elrond began.

Her arm?  She frowned in confusion, then realized what he was talking about.  She touched the scar and nodded.

“How was that done?” he asked.  “Fixing the bone with metal?”

How did he know that much detail about the injury?  Well, there was no point in questioning the abilities of Elves.  “I was asleep,” she said as Laerin translated.  “I didn’t feel it.”

“Even so,” he said.

“I don’t know how it works.  I’m not a – a healer.  I mean, I do not work in an infirmary.”

“Did you know how to ride a horse before you came here?” Glorfindel asked.

She nodded.  “Yes, but it was for fun.  I mean, it was… it was because I wanted to, not because I had to.  We used to use horses, and daggers, and – and slate, and pens, but not now.  We did it that way years ago.  We also don’t sew or wash clothes like you do, not now.”

“Then what do you spend your days doing?” he asked.

“Me?” she asked.  “I have lessons.”

“Is that common, to do that at your age?” Aragorn asked.

She nodded.  “In my home, we have lessons until we are eighteen years old or more.”

“Are you not an adult yet?”

Mallory looked at Laerin.  “Adult,” she said.  “Not a child.  Fully grown.”

Mallory repeated the word and added, “I won’t be an adult until I’m eighteen.”

Laerin translated, looking surprised.  “Lord Glorfindel was correct, then, in believing that you are still a child.”

Mallory looked down.  She didn’t feel very comfortable with that.

“Like Razanar, perhaps,” said Elrond.  “Older than a child, but not fully an adult.”

A “tween”.  Tolkien had been forward-thinking, putting that in the story, when the concept of teenagers must have been new.  She nodded.

Gandalf had started to look less angry and more thoughtful.  “I… I think I understand,” he said.  “I saw some of your dreams while you were healing.  You were reading and writing, and everything was metal and stone...”

Glorfindel looked at Gandalf and smiled like he thought he had won.  So she should smile, too, but she didn’t feel it.  He had seen her dreams?  That made her very uncomfortable.  What else had happened that she still didn’t know about?

“Are there lands… worlds… other than these ones?” Elrond asked, pointing to the picture.

She didn’t understand that.  “Is there a third circle?” Laerin asked.  “More than Earth and Arda?

Mallory shrugged.  She hadn’t thought of that.  There probably were.  There were probably a lot, actually.  Was Harry Potter real in one of them?  Or the Jedi?

“You do not understand this, either,” said Glorfindel.  “This is not known, where you are from.”

She shook her head.

“What happened when you left your home?” Elrond asked.  “Did you travel?  Did you walk or ride?”

She shook her head.  “Sleep,” she said, pointing to Earth.  “Morning.”  She pointed to Arda.

“You woke up here?” Laerin asked in surprise.

She nodded.

“Where?” asked Glorfindel.  “With Iarwain?”

She nodded.

“Now I understand why you would not answer my questions,” he said.  “You would not tell me where you had been before you met him because there was no answer.”

She nodded.

“Let her speak for herself,” said Elrond.  Of course: he wouldn’t want Glorfindel to feed her ideas.  He turned to her.  “You did not know you would come here until you woke?”

She nodded.

“Was there anything unusual about the day before?”

Laerin defined unusual for her, and then she had to figure out how to tell them.  “It was the day I turned sixteen years old,” she replied.

“It was her… um… not ‘begetting day’…”  She gave a word that had the harsh sound of Westron.

“Birthday,” Aragorn translated for her.

“Yes, birthday.”

“That does not offer any explanation,” said Glorfindel, frowning.  “So one mystery replaces another.”

She nodded, grateful at least he believed her.

“Then we will return to the matter at hand,” said Elrond.  “What do you know about the halflings?”

Oh, no.  Elrond and Gandalf hadn’t exactly been thrilled by her first revelation.  They were going to lose it over this.

“I cannot think what you will say that will be more difficult to understand or accept than what you have already told us,” said Glorfindel, noticing her reaction.

“I can,” Gandalf muttered.

“Mithrandir, enough,” said Elrond.  He turned back to Mallory.  “You were not with Iarwain when the halflings visited.  Did you come after them?  Or did you leave before they came?”

“After,” she said in Sindarin.

“Then it has been less than three months.  If you have only lived in Arda for such a short period, I understand less how you could know of Maura’s quest.  Can you tell us?”

Mallory pressed her lips together and stared at the floor.  Laerin put a hand on her arm.

“Rochondín…” Glorfindel began.  He started to say something else, but then he sighed and looked away.  “Do what you think is best,” he said.

Why?  Why would he trust her to make the decision?  He hadn’t before.  Not like that.

No, it wasn’t that he trusted her, necessarily.  It was because he couldn’t do it himself and couldn’t ask anyone else.  It was only her.  Only you can prevent forest fires, she thought (and an actual forest, Fangorn, was at stake), only in this case, there actually wasn’t anyone else available.

She swallowed and tried Sindarin.  “Here.”  She pointed to Earth, her hand shaking.  “This.”  She pointed to Arda.  “Is a story.  A, a book.”  She gestured with her two hands together like two pages.

Aragorn and Gandalf both frowned.  “What do you mean?” Glorfindel asked.

“I thought it was only a story,” she continued in English, struggling to talk in words that Laerin would understand.  “Not true… not real.  I did not know that there were really Elves.”

“You had heard about elves?” Laerin clarified.  “But there are none in Earth?”

She nodded.  “Hobbits, too.”

“You knew about halflings?” Glorfindel asked.

She nodded.  Her heart raced.  She took a deep breath.  For a moment, she had enough courage, but she was already second-guessing herself, so she had to hurry up and say it now.  “I know everything,” she said.

There it was.  Only it wasn’t out in front of everyone yet, because they had to translate.  Laerin paused to pick through the words.  “Every?” she repeated.

Sweat pricked her forehead, and she was shaking.  “Everything.”  Her voice squeaked.  “All of it.  Il.”

“She says she knows everything,” said Laerin slowly, not taking her eyes off her.

“I know more than they do.”

“She says she knows more than you do.”

Mallory looked at the floor, sweat prickling on her skin.  “I know what is going to happen in the future,” she whispered.

“She says that she knows the future.”

There was utter silence, except for the occasional crackling of the fire.  Everyone was staring at her.

“Laerin, wait in the corridor,” said Elrond suddenly.  His voice was cold, and when Mallory looked up, he was standing so straight that he looked like he could rival Glorfindel in height.  Aragorn, also, stood stiffly, his face closed off.  Mallory shut her eyes.  She had lost them, and now she was losing Laerin, too.  She would have tried to argue – with Laerin, anyway, not Elrond – but she had already asked on her own to leave.  Mallory wondered if Laerin regretted taking responsibility for her now that she realized what Mallory was involved in.

Mallory was shaking so badly that her teeth were beginning to chatter.  “Sit down,” ordered Elrond sharply.

She had forgotten that there were chairs.  She sat in one and squeezed her hands between her knees.  Elrond turned away and went off to another table to pour something, and he came back with half a glass of wine for her and a much calmer demeanor.  Mallory was getting used to drinking alcohol at dinner now, but she hadn’t noticed it helping her nerves much.  Maybe he just wanted her to have something in her hands.  She took a sip, and he pulled his chair around the desk to face her.

“You said that you read about Elves in a book,” he said.  “Is that book here with you?”

She nodded.

“What story, exactly, does it tell?”

She swallowed.  She didn’t remember the word for ring, and nobody had taught it to her.  She traced around her finger.

“Do you mean cor?” Elrond asked, his voice surprisingly light.  “Like this?”

He pulled a ring off his finger and held it out.  It was golden, with a pattern of leaves carved into it.  She stared for a moment.  It’s not Vilya, she thought.  It couldn’t be.  For one thing, it didn’t have a jewel, which all of the Three Rings had.  For another, he wouldn’t casually show her a ring of power.  He had several rings on his fingers, she realized.  None of them looked like Vilya, but then again, she probably didn’t have the ability to see it.  Elves could keep things hidden.

She had stared too long.  The four men passed a confused look between them, and Aragorn’s jaw tensed.  What was he angry about?  That she hadn’t told him this?  Or did he think she was lying?

She pushed that out of her mind and nodded hurriedly.  “And Maura,” she said.

“Rings and Maura,” summarized Gandalf.

She nodded.

“Do you mean to say that you have read the story of Maura and his ring?” Glorfindel asked.  “The story from beginning to end?”

She nodded.  She took a bigger swallow of wine this time.

“Events that have not happened yet?”

She nodded.

Glorfindel closed his eyes.  “You have carried a written record of what is to occur with you all this time?”

She put her cup down.  “Three books,” she said, holding up three fingers.  Then, she shook her head, correcting herself, and held out all five fingers.  “Five.”  Her hands were shaking.  She tapped her thumb.  “Valar, Silmaril, Númenor.”  She didn’t look at them to see their reaction.  She touched her index finger.  “Bilbo – Bilba.  Erebor.”

That one earned an audible sound of surprise from someone.  She swallowed and held her last three fingers together.  “Maura, ring.”  Finally, she took her pinky finger by itself.  “This one.”  She pointed to the floor.  “Here.”

Gandalf’s eyebrows came together again in a frown.  “You are speaking of Bilba’s books,” he said.  “The tale of his adventure, and his translations from Sindarin to Westron.”

Yes, The Silmarillion must be his “Translations from the Elvish”.  She hadn’t thought of that before.  She nodded.

“The book he is still writing,” Gandalf elaborated.

She nodded.

Glorfindel’s eyes were open again, and he was staring at her.  “If it is the tale of Maura, then surely you knew what would take place at the Ford of the Bruinen,” he said in shock.  “You knew when you met the halflings – nay, before that.  When I came to you, you knew that I would bring you back to the Riders.”

She nodded.

“Ai,” he whispered.  “Had I known…  You were so frightened, the last day, and I could not understand why.”  He took a breath and let it out slowly.  “This is why it sometimes seemed that people were familiar to you.  And you knew precisely what the Riders were capable of.  You knew – you –”

She could see the wheels turning in his head, re-interpreting everything that had happened on the Road.  He sat down, his hand over his mouth.

“Why did you not say anything?” Aragorn asked, sounding angry.  “You could have helped.  You could have given us warning.”

Mallory’s eyes stung.  He couldn’t blame her for that.  She slid down in her chair, her shoulders up.

Glorfindel reacted entirely differently.  He sat up straight, a hint of his warrior persona in his face as he turned to Aragorn.  “What warning?” he asked.  “That the Nine were both behind and ahead of us?  I knew that, as did you.  Would you like for her to have informed the halflings?  How would she have done that without the ability to speak any of our languages?  And as for assistance, she was not in any fit state to do that, and you know it.”

Aragorn didn’t look at all satisfied.  “And do you understand how dangerous it was to carry that book on the road?  I mean to say, do you know what would have happened if one of the Riders had caught you?  What would have happened to all of us?”

“Did you not listen to her?”  Glorfindel stood.  “She may well know better than any of us what would have happened.  You told me, as did Elrond, that I could not know what was in her mind.  Now I understand – but I think that you have forgotten.  You cannot tell her what she should have done.  And again, how could she have told us?”

“She could have shown us.  And she could understand our questions perfectly well, then.  I trusted her not to put the halflings in danger – or, rather, I trusted you, and you trusted her.”

“Would you have preferred for me to leave her alone where the Riders could find her?”

Aragorn began to answer, but Elrond held up a hand, and he closed his mouth.  Glorfindel sat down again.  Mallory was afraid to look at the two of them, but Elrond spoke next.  “You will have to forgive me,” he said to Mallory.  “But I do not know you as well as Glorfindel does, and your tale is difficult to understand.  What do you know of Maura’s ring?”

She wasn’t so bad at Sindarin that she didn’t notice how careful they were being about how they referred to the Ring.  Elrond wasn't going to give anything away.  She wished she knew the Sindarin words for the rings poem, but all she could think of was ash nazg, which she was pretty sure was the Black Speech that Gandalf had pulled out at the Council, and that wouldn’t go over well.  She took a few deep breaths.  At least Glorfindel is willing to defend me, she told herself.  And Elrond is listening.  She picked up the wine glass and drank some more, then put it down.  “Three ring for Elves,” she said.  “Seven ring for…”

She realized that she didn’t know the word for dwarf.  She held her hand flat at chest level to show someone short.  “Not halfling,” she clarified.

“Hadhodrim,” suggested Glorfindel.

“Hadhodrim,” said Mallory.  “Dwarves.”  Wait, she didn’t have to translate herself with these guys.  Oh, well.  She went on.  “Nine for Men.  Nazgûl.”

All three of them looked at her sharply.  She went cold.  Was that a Black Speech word, too?  Had she said something forbidden?  No, she was sure that people had said it in the books.

“One for – for –”  She dropped back down to a whisper.  “Sauron.”

“You may say the name of Sauron,” said Elrond, his voice terrifyingly calm.

“Bilba finds ring, gives to Fr – Maura.  Maura carries here.  Maura walks to Mordor.  Walks with you.”  She didn’t trust herself to get Gandalf’s name right, so she pointed at him.  “Aragorn, Ban, Kali, Raz, Boromir, Legolas…”  Gimli was probably a translated name, too, and since she hadn’t been introduced to him, she didn’t know his real one.  What was the word for dwarf that she had just learned?  “Hadhodrim?” she finished.  She swallowed and held up nine fingers.  “Nine.”

There was a pause.  “She might have learned that from the halflings,” said Gandalf.

“I certainly hope not,” said Elrond acidly.  He added to Mallory, “The only true proof of this would be for you to make a prediction of what will occur in the future, so that we can see it come true.  However, there is no time left for that.  All we have is Glorfindel’s belief that you were aware that the Nine waited at the Ford.  Is there anything you may tell us that the halflings will not know?”

Something they wouldn’t know that Elrond would?  She blanked for a moment in panic.  Think, think, think.  Saruman is evil.  No, Frodo knew that.  Anything discussed in the Council was unhelpful.  It had to be something that the hobbits hadn’t discovered yet.  Nobody here knew that there was a balrog in Moria, so it couldn’t be that.  She’d been straight up told the story of Aragorn and Arwen, so obviously not that.  The Three Rings.  Yes!  That wasn’t spoken of in the Council.  In fact, the Elves had specifically refused to talk about it.  And she’d already partly given away that she knew about it.

Easy enough to think that, but now she had to say it.  “Three ring,” she said.

There was a moment’s pause, and then Aragorn abruptly said, “I am going to speak to Laerin,” and left.

He didn’t sound angry right now, but he didn’t sound happy, either.  Nobody moved to stop him as he walked out into the hallway.  At least if he was still angry, he’d be angry out there.  Unless Laerin was angry, too?  She had just as much reason to feel betrayed as Aragorn did, and Glorfindel had even more.  But Glorfindel was defending her.  Defending her.  Why?

“Go on,” said Elrond, interrupting her thoughts.

Now, she had to gather herself again.  They all knew what she was going to say.  She just had to say it.  She swallowed.  Then, she swallowed again.  She pointed to Elrond, her hand shaking.  “Vilya,” she said, her voice cracking on the word.

The men looked at each other, then back to her.  Elrond nodded slowly.

“Galadriel,” she whispered, amazed that she could hear her own voice.  “Nenya.”

Elrond nodded again, but nobody said a word.

Her heart pounding (could the Elves hear that?), she turned to Gandalf.  Her mouth moved, but for a moment, nothing came out.  The room had gone dead.  None of the three men moved.  The silence pressed down on her, and she wondered whether she could speak at all.

She licked her lips and tried again.  “You,” she said.  What was his Maiar name?  And how did she pronounce it?  “O – Olor –”  She licked her lips and looked at the tip of his beard to avoid his eyes.  “Olórin.”  “You.  Narya.”

There.  It was out.  She held her breath and she waited for them to respond.

Chapter Text

Late December

In the silence, Mallory’s mind began to spin.  What if she was wrong?  What if she’d mixed up the names or the facts written in the book had been recorded incorrectly?  What if she’d just made herself look like an idiot, treating that like some big piece of information when –

Elrond spun around, opened the door, and snapped at Laerin and Aragorn, “I want to speak to Elanna, and then Nethril and Bilba.  Find them.  Now.”

He almost slammed the door, then walked over to the window.  Gandalf hit the table with one hand, anger almost radiating off him.  Glorfindel stood up again.  “Aragorn is correct that you could have told us this days or weeks ago, or even on the road, if you had tried.  What made it so difficult for you to make a decision?”

How did she explain that?  “Danger,” she muttered.

“For you or for us?  It is much more dangerous for you if we do not know.  We would have had to make decisions for you without all of the knowledge.”

“Both,” she said.

“How?”

Mallory tried to focus on him and ignore the other two people in the room, especially since Gandalf's death was one of the bad things she was going to just allow to happen without trying to stop it.  “In the book,” she said.  “Bad and good.  No bad, then no good.”

She stopped and looked at him, her heart racing.  He nodded in understanding.  “Tragedy leads to joy,” he said.  “We know that.”

How could she explain?  “If I say – if I say –”  She waved her hands helplessly.  “Bad will happen.”  She wanted to throw up.  “If you say no, not happen, then Sauron – and the ring –”

Tears stung her eyes.  She couldn’t do this even in English, definitely not in a foreign language she barely spoke.  She never thought she’d feel this way, but if she went home, she’d be happy to talk to anyone at all if she could just do it in her own language.

“Is that not what you are doing now?” Glorfindel asked.  “Warning us of something ‘bad’?”

“No,” said Gandalf gruffly.  “She means that if she tells us of something that occurs in her book, and we choose to change it for the better, we might find that we changed it for the worse.”

“And then Sauron will win the war,” Elrond said heavily.  He turned away from the window, his anger gone.  “We know how little hope there is, Mallory, and how much we will have to sacrifice.”

“Yes.”  Gandalf’s sharp eyes bored into her.  “But are Kali and Razar bad things or good things?”

“Bad, then good,” she answered, looking away.  Pippin would indirectly lead to him dying, which couldn’t be pleasant, even though he came back after.  “You say good.”

“And if I send them home instead?” Elrond asked.  “What will that be?”

Well, there was the scouring of the Shire.  For the first time, it occurred to her that Elrond might have had foresight about that.  He might have a reason to want to send them back to the Shire.  Maybe they could stop it from happening… but maybe they couldn’t.  She had no way to know.

“Ring is – is more…”

“Important?” Glorfindel suggested.

She nodded.

Elrond sighed.  “Tell me directly: in your book, which you have brought the final volume of, does the free world defeat Sauron?  Is he cast down forever?”

She nodded, looking at her hands in her lap.

“Yes?”

“Yes,” she said.

“Then we would not ask you for warning,” he said.  “There would be no purpose in changing a story that ends in our success.  Middle Earth has paid dearly for victory in the past, and it will again.  Still, I would like some proof before I make any decisions based on what you say.  Would you go and let in Elanna for me, Glorfindel?”

Glorfindel went to the door and waited almost a minute, looking out into the hallway, until Elanna ran up to him.  She stood in the doorway, squeezing her hands together with a look that screamed I don’t want to be here.

“Come in,” said Elrond.

She stepped cautiously into the room, pulling her hands tightly to her chest.  Glorfindel beckoned to Gandalf, and they slipped out into the hallway.  Mallory stood up, feeling like she should do something to help her friend, but she didn’t know what.

What followed was the sort of strange conversation that was typical for Elanna.  “Did you –” Elrond began.

“No,” Elanna replied before he finished the question.  She started flapping her hands.  Mallory wondered if that helped, and whether it only worked on autistic people or neurotypical ones as well.  She could use something to manage stress right now.

“Then did you –”

Her hands were getting higher and faster.  She did not look happy.  “No!”

“Did she ever –”

“No.”

“Did you ever feel that -”

“No!”

“Are you entirely sure?”

She nodded quickly and emphatically.

“All right,” he said.  He put his arms around her and hugged her tightly.  “All right!  I believe you.”  He held her for another moment, then let go.  “You may leave.”

Elanna looked at Mallory, squeezing her hands again.  She looked like she felt sorry for her, which was exactly what Mallory was feeling towards her.  Suddenly, she threw her arms around Mallory, squeezing so tightly that it was hard to breathe.  Then, she ran away, leaving Mallory alone again.    How long would it be until Laerin would be back?

“She did not share any secrets,” Elrond told Gandalf and Glorfindel as they came back into the room.  “Nor was she aware that Mallory knew.”

“Can you trust her?” Gandalf asked, frowning at the door.

Elrond looked mildly offended.  “Her foresight may be unreliable, but her memory is not.  And she cannot tell falsehoods, least of all to me.”

“You must know that it will not matter what Bilba says,” said Glorfindel.  “Nor Laerin and Nethril.  None but Elanna, and those of us in this room, could have told her the identity of the third ringbearer, and I doubt that Elanna knows the names of the rings.  I see no reason why she would know the name Olórin, either.”

Interesting.  Mallory had suspected for a while that she could read minds, at least some of the time.  That felt very invasive, but she was still willing to hang out with Mallory, so it couldn’t be that bad.

“I would like to know whether any of her information has a source,” Elrond explained, glancing at Mallory.  “If she has put together several pieces of –”

“From whom?”

“Does it seem more reasonable to you that she had learned it from a book that has not yet been completed?” Gandalf asked.

“Certainly!  If there comes a time when such things do not need to be kept secret –”

“You believe her because you want to believe her,” Gandalf argued.

“You know as well as I do that she is not lying to us, and you have no right to accuse –”

“There are possibilities other than lying, Glorfindel,” said Elrond in exasperation.  Fortunately, they were interrupted by a knock at the door.  “Enter,” he said.

It was Laerin and Nethril.  Nethril looked worried, but Laerin seemed unconcerned.  Mallory wondered whether that was real or a mask.

“Are you all right?” Laerin whispered to her, putting a hand on her shoulder.

Mallory nodded.  She sat down again, turning the wine glass in her hands.

Elrond asked them what they had told her about Rings of Power – nothing – what Bilbo had told her about his adventure, and whether she knew who Galadriel was.  “I think so,” Nethril replied to the last one.  “But it can be difficult to tell how much she understands.”

“Have there been any times when you did not know where she was?” he asked.  “I mean times when you could neither see nor hear her, and she could have gone off by herself?”

“We do not keep a watch on her room at night,” Nethril pointed out.  “She is not a prisoner, or so I was led to believe.  But someone would have noticed her if she went wandering.  And occasionally, Lossithil takes her to wash or some such thing, but only for a few minutes.”

“I trust her,” Laerin said, barely waiting for Nethril to finish before she interjected.  “I have spent more time with her than anyone else here, including Lord Glorfindel.  It is possible that she occasionally heard something she should not have, though I was careful, as you asked me to be.  But she does not sneak about on her own, and she is honest.  If she does not wish to tell the truth, she simply refuses to answer the question.  Whatever evidence she gave you should be enough.”  She frowned.  “But if you must know, I have only ever left her in her own room at night or in Nethril or Glorfindel’s care.  Even when she was with Elanna, Arwen, or Magoleth, I was never so far away that I could not hear them speak.  I was asked to watch over her, and I did.  I cannot imagine that Nethril or Glorfindel did any less.”

Something twisted in Mallory’s chest.  On the one hand, Laerin had just chewed out Elrond – Elrond! – on her behalf.  On the other, she had confirmed that watching Mallory was her job, not something she did because she wanted to, and that Mallory was basically banned from being alone.

“Thank you for your opinion,” said Elrond, a little stiffly.

“Is that all?” Laerin asked.

“Who do you believe hold the Three Rings?”

Laerin and Nethril glanced at each other, then back to him.  Nethril giggled nervously.  Laerin opened her mouth, then closed it again, all her attitude gone.

“Go on,” Elrond said, unperturbed.

“Well, everyone thinks that one is in Lórien and the other is here,” said Nethril, fidgeting with her sleeves.  “Which I suppose means that they are held by you and Galadriel.  The third might belong to Círdan, but then he does not use it.”

“Or it might belong to another person in one of those places – Celeborn, for instance, or Glorfindel,” added Laerin.  “Or possibly a leader of one of the Wandering Companies.  Or it may be lost.”

Nethril nodded in agreement.  She straightened out her arms and shook down her sleeves, as if she was trying to shake off her nerves.

“All right,” he said.  “That is all.  Wait outside, please.”

They needed a revolving door in this room, Mallory thought.  The final person to come in was Bilbo, accompanied by Aragorn.  She didn’t look at them.  Bilbo greeted her politely in Sindarin, but the conversation was in Westron, so she couldn’t follow it.  She could only tell that the hobbit was a bit confused and annoyed at the whole thing.

At last, it was just the five of them again.  “I apologize for what I said earlier,” said Aragorn.  “I was afraid.  I think all of us were, except possibly Glorfindel.  But I should not have spoken to you in that way.”

Mallory still couldn’t look at him.  She wasn’t sure how she was supposed to respond to his apology, either.

“And I do believe you,” he added.

“And you?” Glorfindel asked Gandalf.  “Are you convinced?”

“I suppose so,” said Gandalf, frowning.

Elrond considered it, looking into the fire.  “It seems that she has learned a large amount of information, including facts that are known to very few people, without any source that I can find.  If she could do that, then it is entirely possible that she also knows of the future.”  He turned and looked at Mallory with a slight frown.  “But how can we know if your information is correct?  Bilba is known for embellishing, and Kali and Ban are his kin, whom he would wish to praise.”

“Um,” said Mallory, unsure whether she was supposed to answer.  Nobody shushed her, so she went on.  “Many people write,” she said.  She didn’t think that gave too much away.  “Not all Bilba.  They correct…”  She couldn’t remember the word for mistakes, so she trailed off.

“He is also more accurate in describing events which he was not part of,” Aragorn pointed out.

“That is true,” admitted Elrond.

“I cannot believe that all of your stories of this world came through Bilba,” Gandalf said, suddenly laughing.  “Even the history!”

“That means that he is doing good work in his translations,” Elrond said with what appeared to be a genuine smile.  “But I imagine that you did not read about yourself in these books.”

She shook her head.

“And you do not wish for that to change.”

She nodded in agreement.

“I expect that it will be easy to explain to him that it would embarrass you to be included in his story.  He has met you, after all.  I will mention it next time I see him.”

Mallory blinked at him.  He has met you.  Had she just been made fun of by Elrond Halfelven?  Was that him teasing her?  The kids at school didn’t care enough about her to include her in their occasional roasts (thank God), but Elrond, six-thousand-year-old lord of Rivendell, wanted to get into it?  Well, at least that meant he wasn’t struggling to control his temper anymore, but… God.

“I think that you have heard us argue long enough, and it is nearly dinner,” said Elrond.  “Go now.  We will make our decisions and speak to you again soon.”

They weren’t even done?  No wonder the Council of Elrond had run on through lunch.  They were as bad as Ents.

“You have had a difficult day, I am sure,” said Glorfindel kindly.  He offered his hand, and she took it and followed him to the door.  Nethril and Laerin were still outside, and Nethril looked at her guiltily, as if she had just been talking about her and wasn’t sure if she’d been caught.  Mallory avoided her eyes.  “Go,” he said.  “That is all for today.”

That was it?  Just being dropped off with her “caregivers”?

Laerin took her arm.  “You should clean up for dinner,” she said.  “We will go to the hall for the meal.  Then, you may return to your room, or whatever you like.  I can give you a drink to help you sleep, if you want to go to bed early.”

Drugged sleep actually sounded like a great idea right now.  She nodded.

“You want to sleep?”

She nodded.

“Dinner first, and no more wine, or it will interfere with the medicine.  Then I will get the medicine for you, or send Elanna with it.”

Mallory nodded, but she had a question, and she had a feeling that if she waited, she’d never get around to asking it.  “Um,” she said in a very small voice.

“What is it?” Nethril asked.

She went on in English.  “When I came here, when I was sleeping, what happened?”

“When you were ill?” Laerin asked.

She nodded.

“She wants to know what happened when she first arrived and was asleep,” Laerin translated for Nethril.  “I do not think we have enough time before dinner.”

“I can answer your questions this evening,” said Nethril.  “Is that all right?”

Mallory nodded.

“Good,” said Laerin.  “Dinner first, then you and Nethril will talk, and then you will sleep.”

She nodded again.

They arrived at her room.  “Mallory,” said Laerin, pausing at the door.  “You did well today.”

Mallory looked at her.  That mess had been her doing well?

“You made a very difficult decision.  You showed courage.”

Mallory’s stomach clenched, but not with fear.  She didn’t know how to handle a compliment like that, and after the sort of day she’d had, it was overwhelming.

Laerin smiled and said in English, “You were good.”

Glorfindel did not attend dinner that night, and neither did Mithrandir, although Elrond and Aragorn eventually left to take their places at the table.  Until the dinner bell, however, they discussed the situation at hand.

“Do you still wish to take her east?” Mithrandir asked.

Glorfindel frowned.  “If she is found by the Enemy, the knowledge she holds… It seems to me that her book brought the Ringwraiths to her, and may do so again for other evil things.”

“The book holds power in Arda,” said Elrond.  “That does not mean that it will attract all that is evil.  Some creatures may very well fear it, as we did.”

“Yes,” said Glorfindel.  “But it will make the journey more dangerous.  And she will have to manage her anxiety better than she did before.”

“That you will need to speak to Laerin about,” said Elrond.  He frowned.  “I understand how cruel this will sound, but if she must leave our protection, it is better that she goes east than south.  Even if they are drawn to her, orcs and Easterlings will not know what to do with her in the way that Saruman or the Nine might.”

That was indeed cruel: Elrond knew perfectly well what orcs did to their captives.  But the torment of orcs would eventually end, whereas – considering that he could likely learn the means of both Sauron’s defeat and his own from her, and thus find a way to avoid it – the Witch-King could keep her until the world was changed.

“At least we know that she will not reveal her secrets willingly,” Aragorn pointed out.

“She will be more circumspect than the halflings, at least,” said Glorfindel.

“However, she may find another elf-lord who cannot rest until he unravels her mysteries, and that will be terribly dangerous,” said Elrond dryly.

Glorfindel shook his head, and the wizard laughed.

Chapter Text

Late December

That night, Mallory learned the words for panic attack and black breath , among others.  And she learned that even more people had seen her having a panic attack than she had thought.

“Elanna is the last person you should worry about,” said Nethril.  “She was only helping us at all because she had a panic attack in Maura’s room.”

That didn’t really work, because Mallory hadn’t seen her having her meltdown to even things out or anything.  And Laerin and Nethril had been there, too.  But it was better to know than to wonder.

At last, Laerin gave her a cup of the sleeping medicine, and she finally let go of the day.  She slept all night without waking up, and for the first few minutes after she woke up, she didn’t even remember what had happened the day before.

Things were back to normal.  She had breakfast with Nethril, Sindarin lessons, fighting lessons with Magoleth and Laerin, and sewing (which she was getting reasonably good at).  Nobody mentioned what had happened – at least, until after dinner.

Glorfindel called her over to him in a room where some musicians were setting up instruments.  He was with Elrond.  Mallory hoped they wouldn’t notice that she was sweating.

“How are you today?” Glorfindel asked.

She tried to smile.

“She is well,” said Laerin, who had gone with her.

“I am glad,” he said.  “Elrond has agreed to do as you ask and allow the halflings to travel together.”

He had?  She smiled for real, and Glorfindel smiled back.

“Now, you must make a decision.  Do you know the meaning of the message you brought Mithrandir?”

Mallory nodded.

“I have chosen to go East to find…”  He glanced at Laerin.  “Those of whom your message spoke.  East is a dangerous direction to travel, but I feel that it is necessary.  You do not have to continue on.  You have done what was asked of you.  You may return west, or stay here.  Or you may come with me.  What do you wish?”

Finally!  Finally someone knew what to do.  She felt a stab of disappointment at the thought of leaving, though.

You could refuse, she thought.  You could stay here until you go home.   But she couldn’t.  People’s lives were on the line.  If Glorfindel went alone, and she was supposed to be there with him, it might be his life.  Then again, did he really want to have to take care of her again?  Did she want to?

It didn’t matter.  "East," she said.  "I must."

“You understand that this will be as dangerous as your journey here, if not more,” said Elrond.  “There will be no choice but to cross the mountains in winter, and you may already know of the danger of Taur-e-Ndaedelos , which stands in your way.  Are you sure that you are willing to do this?”

Taur-e-Ndaedelos ?  The forest of… what, fear?  That must have been the Sindarin word for Mirkwood.  Ugh.  Giant spiders were not on her list of adventure milestones to hit.  Well, she still had to do it.  “Need me,” she said.  The Elves should understand the idea of fate.

“I may well find that I need you,” said Glorfindel.  “But do you wish it?”

Mallory frowned at him.  Nobody had asked her whether she wanted to do this.  They didn’t really have to: she had volunteered, after all, by wishing to leave.  She hadn’t known what she was volunteering for , but she had volunteered.

Both of them were watching her with worried expressions.  She looked down.

“Have you considered what you want?” Glorfindel asked.

“I have to go,” she said in English.  “That’s what I’m here for.”

Laerin translated quietly.  Elrond shook his head.  “We are given choices in our lives,” he said.  “Even if it will be impossible for Glorfindel to succeed without you, you may still decide not to do it.  You are welcome to stay here with us.”

Could she stay, really?  Or would she just be sent back home if she said no?  But on the other hand, why did she have to leave now , when she had finally found people she liked to be around and was learning the language and was beginning to feel happy again?  Why did she have to leave everywhere she liked?  Was this a Monkey’s Paw sort of thing?  “Your wish is granted, but now you’re cursed, too?”

“Consider it,” said Glorfindel.  “I will await your response.”

She was more than a little confused as Laerin led her away.  But suddenly, in the hallway, Merry and Pippin grabbed her.  “Mallory!” Pippin said, mispronounced, of course.  He chattered something.

“He has been looking for you,” Laerin translated.  “He says that Elrond changed his mind, and they are going to be allowed to go.”

Merry talked next, and Laerin laughed.  “He said, we won’t be sent home in a sack ,” she explained.  Then, she shrugged as if to say he’s weird .  But Mallory knew exactly what he was talking about, even though he had no idea that she did.  She smiled and nodded at him.

Pippin led her back to the other hobbits, still talking.  “Bilba found someone to sing the song of Beren and Lúthien for them,” translated Laerin.  “It is a song of the First Age.  It is rarely performed now: you should join them.”

“I – I know,” she whispered in English, though it felt strange to admit it.

“Of course.  Would you like to hear it?”

She nodded.

They found Bilbo and Frodo sitting together on some cushions.  Bilbo invited Mallory to sit by him.  “I imagine that you had something to do with changing Elrond’s mind,” he whispered to her in Sindarin.  “I do not know how you did it, but I wanted to say thank you.”

She nodded.

“And I had no idea you were worried about my book!  I wish you had said something before.  I will have to change a few scenes, of course, but I am sure I will be able to work it out.”

“Thank you,” she mumbled in Sindarin.  I will have to change a few scenes.   She hadn’t really done all that much to affect the story.  He could just not mention her.  What if Frodo just wrote that Elrond had given in when Gandalf asked him to?  Or one of the scribes thought he was being unnecessarily complicated and shortened two scenes into one?  Maybe the book would end up exactly the way it had been when she read it.

God, maybe it had always been this way.  Maybe she had always been part of the story.  Maybe all of her worrying was pointless, because she’d just end up creating exactly what was supposed to happen.  She shivered at the thought.

Bilbo patted her shoulder.  Laerin slipped away and was replaced by Nethril.  And then the minstrel, who had been trying to gather an audience, started singing.  Songs were always easier to understand than speech, when she could stay awake, and so Mallory finally learned the full story, the song that Tolkien had never finished writing.  And she was sad sometimes, and happy at others, but she didn’t worry about anything else for the rest of the night.

Laerin returned to Elrond after she left Mallory.  He was sitting alone now – Glorfindel had gone somewhere with Mithrandir.  It was on a night like this, after she had learned that Angmar was gathering strength again after the centuries of peace that followed the siege of Rivendell, that she had asked Elrond to allow her to help the Dúnedain kingdoms in the battle.  He had given his leave, and she had spent most of the next hundred years with Men, until at last she joined the armies of Imladris and Lothlórien under Glorfindel for the final, decisive battle.  She had nearly lost her life several times over because of that decision, and she had not even saved the kingdom she had served, but she still considered it to be worth the suffering.  “My lord,” she said.

He smiled at her.  “Laerin,” he said.  “Have a seat.  Is there something you need?”

She took the offered chair.  “You cannot send Mallory and Glorfindel east alone.  If she decides to travel with him, I will go as well.”

Elrond frowned thoughtfully at her.  “You understand that you do not have to do that,” he said.  “I do not expect you to.”

Laerin laughed.  “Have I ever done anything I did not want to do?”

“No,” he admitted.

“It is more than responsibility.  I like Mallory, and even if that were not true, she will need me.  Besides that, a healer is required in battle, and if diplomacy is needed – as I expect it will be – a healer’s presence can show good will and is nearly always welcome among Men.”

Elrond waited silently, as if he expected her to go on.  Laerin frowned.  “I have been trying since the battle at the Ford to understand where I am supposed to be,” she said.  “The signs I could not read, the feeling that I should go with the patrols but that I was also needed here… I think I understand now.  I am meant to go with Mallory.  I could not decide what to do simply because the option had not been given to me yet.”

He nodded in understanding.  “And Magoleth?”

“I have not had the chance to ask her, but if she is willing to leave the Dúnedain, she would be an excellent guard and escort for a young woman.”

“She would,” he agreed.  “I will relay your request to Glorfindel, but I think that he would be glad of your help, with or without Mallory.”

“Thank you,” she said.  She left feeling less anxious than she had been in months.

The next day, Imladris got ready for another feast.  Laerin knew that Arwen was too busy for lessons, and Mallory would only be underfoot in the kitchens; besides, Elanna usually hid from commotion on days like this, so she would not be able to work there with her friend.  Instead, Laerin took the girl riding with Magoleth that morning.  It was cold, but Mallory had some new winter clothing, along with her cloak.  She seemed to be all right with the temperature, which was a good sign, if she was really going to cross the mountains in the dead of winter.  After lunch, Laerin gave her to Nethril and went to help Arwen.  Then, she changed into clean clothes and combed her hair for the meal.

Laerin was in the inconvenient position of having a different status within Rivendell than the rest of her family.  For informal meals, she could choose to eat with Magoleth and Gladhedir or her lower-ranking friends, but during formal occasions, she belonged elsewhere.  It was uncomfortable to be placed above her own sister.  Tonight, she sat with several other of the senior healers.  The hall was as full as it ever was these days.  Aragorn sat at the high table with Arwen tonight, as well as the twin sons of Elrond, Glorfindel, a few of the guests, and the lords and ladies of the house.  Mallory sat with Lossithil and Nethril, as she did most evenings.  The Mannish women, being guests, could sit wherever they liked, and so Arwen had put them where they would be most comfortable.

Nethril had put some extra effort into Mallory tonight.  The girl still only owned two dresses, and she was wearing the yellow one, but Nethril had lent her a necklace that looked very nice with it.  Also, her hair was different.  Normally, Mallory would tie it back or put it in a simple braid, or Nethril would weave ribbons into braids for her in the fashion of unmarried Dúnedain women.  Tonight, she had two thin braids tied together at the back of her head, and the rest of her hair was down, in Elvish style.  She almost looked like a young Elf.  True, her height and weight suggested a Man, but in some way, she fit in with the folk of Imladris tonight.  Laerin thought back to her first night in the hall, when she had barely been able to walk to her seat, and smiled.

The food was not different tonight than any other winter meal, but there was more of it.  Laerin had heard plenty of fussing from Arwen and the cooks about whether they had enough.  Even with little in the way of fresh fruit or vegetables, a meal like this so close to midwinter would be unthinkable in most Mannish communities.

At last, everyone filed into the Hall of Fire, and Laerin looked for her sister.  But instead of Magoleth, she caught sight of Glorfindel, and she stopped short, her heart in her throat.

The elf-lord was standing as if he were made of stone, staring at Mallory.  He had never seen her dressed like this before.  With the revelations of the past few days, his thoughts about her must have changed, and just at that moment, when he looked at her through new eyes, he found that she looked like an Elf.

Glorfindel liked to flirt: everyone knew that.  But he did not have an audience now.  Even Mallory did not seem to have noticed him.  And yet, he appeared as if he thought there was nobody else in the room but her.  Laerin knew that look.  The girl was too young, of course, but Elven romances often grew over time, and five or ten years would be nothing to Glorfindel.  The problem was not what would happen now, it was what might happen in the future.

Laerin glanced over to Elrond.  He had seen Glorfindel, too.  His eyes were fixed on his friend, and he looked stricken.

Laerin took a deep breath, trying to decide what to do.  But just then, to her relief, the moment passed on its own.  Glorfindel walked up to Mallory with a characteristic grin, offering his hand, acting entirely like his usual self.  Laerin would be lucky if he didn’t dance with her by the end of the night, too.  She was capable of partnered dances, but they were meaningless without Menelír, and she would prefer not to participate.  Elrond glanced at her, acknowledging that they had both seen what had occurred, but then, he looked back at Aragorn, and all was well.

She supposed that this would be the time to enjoy the music, before Mallory got overwhelmed and she had to rescue her.  After all, she may never have another night in the Hall of Fire at all.

Magoleth beckoned her over, and she went.

It was strange to see the Hall of Fire so busy.  Usually, there were only a few people performing for a small audience, or it was empty during the day.  Tonight, it was full, with many groups of musicians and pairs of people dancing.

Glorfindel looked absolutely delighted at the prospect of dancing.  Mallory was not.  Laerin might have taught her the steps, but she still didn’t feel comfortable with them.  Plus, Glorfindel was at least a foot taller than Laerin.  As he led her out to the space where other pairs were dancing, she realized again how much he towered over her.  She felt like an eight-year-old dancing with a full-grown adult.

“Your hair is beautiful tonight,” he said.  “You ought to wear it that way more often.”

Mallory blushed and tried not to awkwardly fidget with Nethril’s necklace or her earrings.  Fortunately, there weren’t really a lot of chances to talk.  Glorfindel spent a lot of time reminding her of the steps and dodging her feet when she accidentally went forward instead of back.

Finally, to her relief, the song was over.  “Thank you for this lovely experience,” he said with a slight bow.  “You did well, for your first time.  We can try again later, perhaps to a slower song?”

Well, she could dream of doing only one dance… 

In fact, Gladhedir danced with her next, and then Aragorn.  Aragorn was very gentlemanly and kind, and she wasn’t really upset with him anymore, but he was still Aragorn , romantic hero of the Lord of the Rings.  It was horribly awkward, especially with Arwen right there.  She, of course, seemed perfectly happy with the situation, which meant Mallory had no way out.  Meanwhile, in between songs, she had to listen to Nethril’s friends try to convince her to ask her crush to dance.

“You have been looking at him for fifty years!” Aeril protested.  Aeril was ancient, as far as Mallory could tell, but still in the middle of all of the drama.  “If not now, then when?”

“This may be your last chance,” Lossithil pointed out.

Nethril covered her face with her hands.  “Please!  I can’t!”

“Why not?”

“I just can’t !”

It was like being in a high school movie.  Mallory couldn’t help feeling grateful that she never had to deal with this sort of drama in her own life.  And she was even more grateful when Laerin tapped on her shoulder.  Arwen was standing with her, which was surprising, considering she could have spent the time hanging out or dancing with Aragorn without raising any eyebrows for once.  “Come with us,” Laerin whispered.

Mallory got up, and they pulled her over to a quieter corner.  Mallory was relieved to be away from the crowd.  Laerin and Arwen stood together, both looking as if they had something important to say.

“I have waited for the right moment to give you this gift,” Arwen said, her tone formal.  “I believe that time has arrived, and now I offer it to you, that it may help you on the road to come.”

She held out something wrapped in cloth.  It was roughly rectangular and about a foot long, resting on both of her hands.  Mallory took it cautiously.  It was heavy.  She pulled back the cloth – and froze.

It couldn’t be.

Wrapped up in the cloth was a dagger, but not just any dagger.  Mallory immediately recognized the leather hilt and sheath and the metal crossguard.  It was her dagger, the one she had broken in battle with the Black Riders.  She had almost forgotten about it.  She had certainly never asked what the Elves had done with it.  And if it was being given back to her as a gift, and it was this heavy, then there must be…

She held the scabbard in one hand and pulled the weapon out with the other.  The firelight shone on the pale silver blade and glittered along the lines of runes carved into the metal.  The edge was so sharp that it seemed to fade into invisibility.

The dagger she had broken against a Ringwraith, in that moment that had almost killed her – that dagger was back with her, new and whole.  She had a re-forged weapon, like Andúril.  She had an Elven blade of her own.

Her eyes burned.  She pointed to the runes.  “What does it mean?” she whispered, not trusting her voice.  She had learned a few different variations on Tengwar, and she had spent hours practicing her penmanship, but she hadn’t gotten to runes yet.

“‘I stand against spirits of evil,’” Laerin replied.

Of course.  Mallory swallowed through the lump in her throat.  She was shaking.  Over the years of suffering from depression, every feeling other than fear had gotten a bit dull.  She was surprised by the intensity of the emotion that this gift brought, and she had forgotten how to handle it.  She was more than a bit overwhelmed.

She slid the dagger back into its sheath.  “Thank you,” she whispered, not trusting her voice.  But that wasn’t enough.  Impulsively, she hugged Laerin.  Arwen was too queenly for that, but Laerin wasn’t.  Laerin hesitated for a moment, then patted her back.  Mallory pulled away and wiped her eyes with the back of her hand.

“We should put it in your room,” said Laerin, smiling.

Mallory nodded.  Sitting in the Hall of Fire with a sharpened dagger was maybe a little weird, and she wouldn’t mind taking a break.

Leaving the noise and crowd of the room brought instant relief.  Maybe it wasn’t a surprise that when she and Laerin turned the first corner away from the hall, they ran into Elanna.  She was singing under her breath and spinning in a circle with her arms out, watching the way her skirt flared.  She stopped when she saw them and stood, looking down and swinging her skirt with her hands.  “No dancing,” she said.  “I like singing.  No dancing.”

“There are plenty of people singing,” said Laerin.

“Glorfindel,” Elanna responded.  Then, she glanced at Mallory.  “Elrond was afraid,” she said, almost accusing.  “You made Elrond afraid.”

What was that about?  For a second, Mallory was worried.  Then, she remembered that she hadn’t seen Elanna since that conversation two days ago.  She nodded again.

“You…”  Elanna let go of her dress and shook her hands.  This was obviously going to be a moment when she would have a hard time getting words out.  “You… foresight?  Like me?”

“She means that you can tell what is going to happen before it does,” said Laerin.

Mallory shook her head.

“Not like you, no,” said Laerin.  “But she can guess at the future.”

Elanna looked disappointed for a moment, but then her face lit up.  “Come to the roof!  I can show you stars!”  She paused, then added, in a hurry, “Do-you-want-to?  Show you stars?”

Mallory nodded.  “Only for a few minutes,” said Laerin, but Elanna had already grabbed Mallory’s arm and was running ahead with her, telling her the story of Elbereth creating the stars and how the Elves had seen them when they woke up at Cuivienen.

They ended up on a long and steep staircase.  Elanna let go so that she could run ahead while Mallory walked more slowly, her legs shaking.  At least she knew that Laerin was behind her and wouldn’t let her fall.  After a few painful minutes, they came to a trapdoor that led up outside.

The cold air instantly bit into Mallory’s face and hands.  She wasn’t dressed for the weather tonight.  But she looked up.  She saw the stars often enough here, but she thought they were especially beautiful tonight, with Elvish song drifting up from below.  The sky was very clear, and the roof was a fantastic vantage point.

Elanna was adjusting what looked like a telescope.  A telescope was such a Noldor sort of thing, Mallory thought.  “Only for a few minutes, all right?” Laerin repeated.  “It is very cold, for Men.”

“Only for a few minutes,” Elanna agreed.  Then, she pulled Mallory over and showed her how to look.

Elanna had the telescope pointed to Orion.  Mallory saw a fuzzy shape of light.  The nebula.  Orion’s Nebula was in Middle Earth, too, and the Elves knew about it.

Mallory took a step back and crossed her arms to hold in warmth, squeezing her dagger to her chest.  She looked up again at the bright silver of the crescent moon.  With their telescope, what did they see up there?  She suddenly remembered that there was an actual Maia traveling on or with the moon.  She couldn’t remember his name, but the Maia of the sun was Arien, so the same thing there.  But of course that wasn’t true, was it?  It was just a myth.

No.  It wasn’t a myth.  The story of how the world had been created was true, here.  Eru and the Valar and Melkor, the Lamps and the Trees and the stars being created by Elbereth.  In fact, she’d seen the darkness that predated the sun and moon for herself, in her dream of the Wild Hunt.

Yes.  There was a real person up there.  But if the sizes were the same as back home, he’d be too small for even an Elf to see with a telescope.

This hurt her mind worse than anything had since she’d considered alternate universes back in Tom and Goldberry’s house.  The moon looked just like her moon, but it still had a spirit, an angel, piloting it.  The sun did, too.  And the morning star, which should have been Venus, was in fact a Silmaril, and it wasn’t just carried by some random Maia but the father of Elrond himself.  The father of someone she had met, and not just met but spoken to, and made afraid.  And no, this wasn’t a myth or metaphor, it was true.  Every time she thought she’d gotten used to Middle Earth…

But then again, wouldn’t Laerin and Elanna find it just as strange if she explained that there were people who had walked on the moon in her world?  That mortal Men had flown up there and left a flag and footprints?  Wouldn’t that seem just as impossible to them as the mythical explanation did to her?

Mallory shivered with cold and awe.  And there, looking up at stars, listening to ancient stories, thinking about myths and reality, remembering Tom Bombadil’s house and her dreams, and feeling the weight of her dagger in her hands, she realized that she did want to go east.  Not just because she was afraid of what would happen if she didn’t, although that was part of the reason, and not just because she felt responsible to Glorfindel, although that was another part of the reason, and not even entirely because she was afraid of going back home early.  She wanted to go because that was the only way for her to know how the story that she was part of was going to end.

When the cold was finally too much, Laerin took her back inside.  Elanna stayed on the roof, insisting that she wanted to avoid Glorfindel, which, Mallory thought, was definitely a mood.  Laerin and Mallory went to Mallory’s room to put away the dagger, and then they went back downstairs.

“Do you want to ask someone else first so you can practice?” Aeril was suggesting.  “It would also help you to say that you didn’t really mean anything by asking him, if that’s what you want.”  Her tone implied that this was absolutely the wrong choice, however.

Mallory couldn’t believe they still hadn’t sorted things out.  Why had she let herself get into a group of people who acted like this?  Apparently, Laerin agreed with her.  She threw up her hands.  “This is ridiculous!”

Instantly, a look of absolute panic crossed Nethril’s face.  “No, please, Laerin, I don’t need –”

But it was too late.  Laerin had already stalked off towards another group of elves.  Nethril covered her face.  “Mallory, this is all your fault,” she moaned.  “She would never have known if not for you.  You know how she is!  She might say anything to him!”

Well, that was just great.  Even if she avoided getting involved in drama, it was still her fault.

“You cannot say that to Mallory!” Lossithil scolded.  “You know she will think that you mean it!  If it is anyone’s fault, it is mine, for not talking to him myself.  Sometimes, I wonder how the Elven race can survive at all, the way all of you act!”

Laerin delivered her message quickly and then disappeared into the crowd.  A tall man with light brown hair came out of the group and over to them.  Nethril lifted up her head and straightened her hair, dignified again.  The man bowed and extended his hand.  “Miss Nethril, would you like to dance?” he asked.

It was impossible to tell if Nethril was blushing with the dim light and her dark skin, but she was clearly flustered.  “Um, yes.  Yes, thank you.  Um.”

She took his hand and walked out to a spot on the floor, and everyone breathed a collective sigh of relief.  Mallory could see her begin to smile.  The song ended after a minute or so – they had started their dance in the middle of it – but the two of them stayed, waiting for the next one.  There was a quiet cheer from Nethril’s friends.

Then, by accident, Mallory caught Elrond’s eye from across the room.  He nodded, and she knew that he understood that she had made her choice.

A new song started, and suddenly, Mallory was looking up at Glorfindel.  He offered his hand.  “This music may be more to your liking.  Would you join me again?”

Mallory could have said no: she had already given him his dance.  But tonight, she felt like she could do anything.  She smiled back, and stood, and took Glorfindel’s hand.