"Ever heard of Mandos?" he asked in the Common Speech.
"Who?" the other elf asked.
Glorfindel winced and cast around for something else for them to discuss. He should have known better than to try to talk about Mandos with a Dark Elf.
Death was too depressing a subject anyway, especially in their situation. Correction - especially in his situation.
They were trapped. Alone. Just the two of them. At the bottom of a smooth sided pit a few miles southeast of Northern Mirkwood. First it had been Glorfindel. He had realised his error whilst falling and so had managed to orientate himself so as to land with as few bumps and bruises as possible.
But then, a few hours later, just after sunset, another elf - a Dark Elf who he had later found out came from the lands further east - had landed on top of him; right on his head, and done something that felt awfully nasty to the top vertebrae of his spine.
Now he was lying on the floor of the damp pit, the strange elf sitting with arms around his knees beside him, both of them gazing up at the star-lit sky far above them. Elbereth, his neck hurt.
And his thoughts kept on drifting back towards Mandos.
"Are you hungry, Flame Eyes?" the other elf suddenly asked. He reached into the knapsack that he had brought down with him and drew out two pieces of what looked like way bread. He bit into a piece and then, holding that bit in his mouth, waved the other bit at Glorfindel. "Or thirsty?"
"No." Glorfindel watched Vingilot, the ship of Eärendil, appear in the bottom left part of the sky and decided that the Star Of High Hope was distinctly unhelpful in certain circumstances. Maybe if the crew dropped down a few fishing nets...
Oh, what he would give to have Elrond looking at his back right now. Oh, those healing hands.
"As you wish." The elf stuck the spare way bread back into his bag. "So, what is this Mandos? A dance?"
Glorfindel smiled. "No," he said. "It is a place. A place far from here to where your spirit, your fëa, travels after you die. There we are allowed to recreate our bodies as we remember them and are reincarnated as we were before we died. Then we may return, if we so wish, to our family."
"Oh."
"Do you have your own version of Mandos?" Glorfindel invited.
"No," the elf said. "I believe that when we die, we leave and do not come back. Some say, more depressingly, that when we die, we disappear and we live from then on only in others' memories."
Glorfindel hesitated. He wanted to reassure the elf with what he knew was truth. After a pause, he ventured. "I have died once," he said. "Long ago, in another land which now lies under the sea to the west. I went to Mandos, was resurrected, and chose to come back to these lands."
The other elf said nothing.
The ensuing silence was suddenly broken by the sound of a low birdcall, a call familiar yet strange to Glorfindel, who knew little of the birds this far east. The Dark Elf straightened and, cupping his hands to his mouth, called back in similar fashion.
A few moments later, Glorfindel saw the silhouette of two heads appear on the edge of the pit; two elves and apparently acquaintances of the Dark Elf as they now spoke to each another briefly in their own strange tongue. Then the two elves left and they were once again alone.
"Those are friends of mine," the Dark Elf said then. "They will come back shortly with help to bear us back up to the surface."
"Thank you."
"Oh, it is no problem," the elf said. "But you should try to talk less; it stresses your body."
Not long afterwards, Glorfindel saw the elves return to the top of the pit. Others were with them. They lowered ropes down to them and the Dark Elf, after helping Glorfindel take ahold of one of them, climbed up another one whilst Glorfindel was pulled up.
Once he was out of the pit, the strange elves laid him on a bed made of rushes and then started to discuss amongst themselves what they should do with him.
"I am responsible for his injury; I hit his head when I fell down there," the Dark Elf said to his fellows. "He is growing steadily more ill. Already he is deluded, raving and saying things about already being dead."
"Perhaps he is mad or you sent him mad," another elf suggested. "His eyes have a strange glow to them."
"Whatever he is," the Dark Elf said, "we had best get him back and quickly to his own people. There is an outpost that is always well attended by the elves of Northern Mirkwood a few miles northwest from here. Let us take him there." He now looked at Glorfindel with a smile. "How does that suit you, my friend? Unless you would rather come with us, that is?"
"If I was in better health, I would like to accept your second offer, my friend," Glorfindel said, smiling, "but I shall have to take the first. Thank you."
"Good. Sleep now," the Dark Elf told him. "You are in safe hands."