Summary: She was unlike any other human they had met. Was she mortal or was she elf? She had the physique of a human girl-child barely on the cusp of adulthood, yet the languages of the Old Firstborn tripped fluently off of her tongue. Better still, she claimed to be the daughter of the Noldor and seemed intent on driving Glorfindel mad.
Disclaimer: I own nothing that the estate of J.R.R. Tolkien lays claim to and am making no monetary profits out of this.
Author's Note: So I'm supposed to be studying and writing research papers and getting ready for examinations. Or, barring all the insanity that law school bring, updating my other fics. However, I was (at the unfortunate hour of four in the morning) hit with a very strong urge to begin this story and so here I am some 16 hours later.
I feel obligated to warn all of you that the original character protagonist here seems rather Mary Sue-ish, even to me, at first instance. But the girl my whack imagination has dreamed up is, most assuredly, flawed (and no I don't mean in the she-has-an-incredibly-sad-and-emo-past-and-thus-has-trauma-and-trust-issues way). I am also grappling with the odd writing style my brain seems to have adopted and the fact that this is my first LoTR fanfiction. I am not a fanatic so any errors have to be pardoned, pointed out and pulverized. I beg forgiveness in advance.
That said, I hope you enjoy this rather strange tale that I have begun to spin. This is predominantly a romance served with the side dishes of adventure, family, drama and some humour (I hope). There will be a twist or three that some of you will hate and others may enjoy. Feel free to review, to flame, to tell me how much you hate (or love) me. I will take it in my stride the best way I know how to and use it to kindle the flame of enjoyment that writing brings.
Also, this is (hopefully) the last A/N you'll see from me in this fic. Reviews will be responded to via email where possible. Enjoy!
Chapter One: Stranger from a distant land
Year 15 of the Third Age, Iavas (Early Autumn)
It was a battlefield that they had come across, riddled with the bodies of orc and man alike. In the midst of the carnage, four figures stood back to back, surrounded by a circle of advancing menaces. The air was filled with a tense and fearful silence, broken only by the harsh pants of the few survivors as they stared in helpless terror at the grotesque faces before them that spelled a certain death. One of their number uttered a hoarse prayer, to the evident amusement of the monsters who mocked them with leers and guttural laughter.
Then, without warning, the smallest of the four lashed out with a blade, knocking over the nearest orc after slashing its vulnerable neck. An unlikely battle cry sounded, soon drowned out by the determined yells of the other humans who leapt forward as if on cue, weapons raised and aiming to kill than to be killed.
And yet the initial cry rang loud in his ears, long after it had been muffled by the desperate yells of men as Glorfindel suppressed the shudder that curled in his lower back and crept swiftly up his spine. Raising his sword with one arm, he gave an unspoken command and his company of ten warriors drew taut their bowstrings.
"Fire with care," he ordered, placing utmost trust in their abilities to seek out the enemy with their arrows while leaving the innocents unharmed.
Their aim was true and it was with grim satisfaction that the golden-haired elf watched the dark figures join their kindred on the ground, each one hitting the hard earth with a loud thud. Those that the elven archers did not kill, the humans quickly took care of. Just ten minutes following their intervention, silence once again descended upon the deserted road. This time, it was broken by the despairing wail of a survivor who fell to his knees and began bemoaning the loss of his kinsman. Two of the remaining three were quick to share his grief but the last of the group – the one who had launched the first attack and the only hooded one – merely surveyed the damage, his back to the elves that stood but fifty meters away.
Allowing the company to lower their bows, Glorfindel watched the curious figure with narrowed eyes, quirking a fair brow as it tugged one of their arrows free from the sickening flesh of an orc to study it. The arrow was replaced after a moment, almost gently, onto the ground, before the person started the walk forward and away without nary a backward glance.
Immediately, the Imladris guards tensed, ready to leap forward at his command. But the elf lord merely issued orders to aid with the cremation or burial of the dead before spurring his steed forward and taking only one of the guard with him.
"Halt," he called out twice in the common tongue, his voice ringing across the deserted road. But still the figure pressed forward, unheeding, until Glorfindel cut into his path and blocked it off with his horse.
With the sun behind him, the tall elf loomed over the figure who seemed much smaller in stature up close and was startled (though he would not admit to it) when the vivid green eyes of a female met his own piercing one unflinchingly.
"Why do you walk away from us?"
The hooded head tilted to the side, like the bobbing head of a curious bird, as she regarded him thoughtfully with a slight frown to her brow.
"Will you not answer me?" He demanded after several moments of silence, pitching his voice in a low and threatening tone. The girl was mad if he thought he would simply let her walk away after engaging in a fight so close to an elven sanctuary. Had she stayed behind to help with the dead, he might have dismissed her with the surviving humans, perhaps even after offering them a night of hospitality in Imladris. Now, however, her behaviour was too strange to let pass.
But still she stared at him, with that perplexed expression on her face, even as she huddled slightly into the material of her worn travelling cloak as though she could hide away in it and disappear until he had left.
"…Ú-hanyanyel…" she finally expressed, biting down on her bottom lip when Glorfindel intensified his glare. A glare that swiftly melted into a closed-off expression as the golden-haired elf digested this new piece of information.
I don't understand you.
It was a tongue he had not heard for centuries, save for academic discourse which several elves tried, and continued to try, to impress him with.
"Quetilyë Quenya?"
You speak Quenya?
It seemed a daft question for both her battle cry and reply had been in that dialect, but she did not mock him for it. Instead, a small smile lifted the corners of her lips as she responded affirmatively – Náto – and inclined her head in what could only be a respectful nod. The hood fell across her forehead, and she pushed it up slightly, though not enough for her hair to be exposed.
Glorfindel's lone companion had stiffened in his seat upon his mount when the girl uttered her first words, but now stared in open curiousity and bafflement at the girl who spoke in an elven dialect that had fallen out of use almost an age ago. She looked young, perhaps no more than twenty-five summers, and lacked the build and aura of an elleth. Surely she was of the Eldain. Yet the very words she spoke said otherwise.
"Ma esselya ná? Mallo nalyë? Man nalyë sinomë?" Three quick questions, asked in rapid succession. What is your name? Where are you from? Why are you here?
The girl laughed, a cheerful human sound quickly stifled behind the material of her thick cloak. She ignored his first two questions but answered the last readily enough. It was a simple tale, really.
Travelling East along the Old Forest Road towards the mountains of Mirkwood, she had chanced upon the band of orcs who had ambushed a travelling party of merchants. Naturally, she could not leave them to their doom and had charged (foolishly, she admitted with a trace of sheepishness) straight into the fray.
"What little skill I have I have offered," she lamented with a regretful sigh. "Twas not enough. It pains me so for fragile is the human life."
Glorfindel nodded his acceptance of her tale, noting that his men were starting the pyre even as he continued his study of the girl.
"Your actions are honourable. But I'm afraid I cannot let you leave thus."
"Why?"
"You are a stranger. And we are still coming out of dark times," Glorfindel responded frankly, ignoring the guard's restless shifting on his horse. "Failing that, it goes against my honour to allow a maiden to roam the lands alone, so soon after a skirmish with the yrch."
That expression of open perplexity was back, and it seemed that she found his words somewhat consternating as a torrent of questions and arguments spilled past dry lips to counter Glorfindel's apparent wishes.
So what if she was female? Had she not been travelling the lands by herself the past decade? She was, most assuredly, a capable fighter. Had she not already proven so? She had no intention of even setting foot into Imladris, would he manhandle her into going? Was she a threat? Did she look like a threat? A slight girl who stood only to his chin? Was she to be guest or glorified prisoner?
It seemed like she cared very little that she was contradicting herself, and Glorfindel's guard could not help the amused curving of his lips. He knew very little Quenya, and barely understood the gist of the words being exchanged between his fair Captain and the queer woman-child. Glorfindel, however, was as unmovable as the Misty Mountains and the girl soon caved, albeit with a frown firmly in place.
"Ú merinyes," she stated, somewhat sullenly as she turned to take a look at the grieving men amidst stoic elves. "I do not desire it. But since you insist so adamantly, I can do little but follow you and prove my trustworthiness as you see fit."
Satisfied with his success, the fair elf lord nodded and swung his faithful steed around, leaving the exasperated girl with his soldier while he saw to the rest of the clean up. She had evaded a few questions of his today, but there were plenty more where those came from and she would find ignoring them a rather futile course of action in time to come.
The guard-turned-escort offered a hand to the girl, gallantly hoisting her onto his horse before retracing his Captain's steps. She said nothing to him, murmuring faintly under her breath in a strange language that was neither Quenya nor any other tongue he had heard before.
Three men and one girl had settled into Elrond's halls, partaking gratefully in his hospitality. Few elves, however, caught sight of the Secondborn guests, for they chose to remain in their rooms for meals and never ventured far beyond their doorway. They were grieving, it was said, for two and twenty of their number had perished at the cruel hands of orcs. Beyond providing them with food, baths and lodgings, the elves saw no reason to interfere with their pain.
But on their third, and last, day there, Elrond sent a chambermaid to their rooms to inform them of his desire to see them at the evening meal for there was to be songs sung in remembrance of their fallen friends. The men agreed, not daring to turn down an elven request, but the girl merely stared blankly back at the maid with a question in her eyes.
"Do you not understand me?"
Apparently not, for the girl merely blinked. Muttering an unbecoming curse in Elvish, the elleth broke off only to stare in wonder at the slight female when she interrupted with a polite "Man pedannel?" What did you say?
"Heniol!" The made exclaimed. The girl spoke Sindarin! "Do you understand me?"She asked again, just to make sure. A slight hesitant nod had the elleth shaking her head in wonder. The human girl spoke Sindarin but not the common tongue! Her speech was slightly accented, though with what the elf could not place. How so very strange. She did not look like she was of Gondorian nobility. In fact, she did not look like she was from any place the maid could name.
"The Lord of Imladris requests your presence at this evening's meal and at the night's festivities in the Hall after that."
"Oh,"the girl murmured, reaching up to worry at the ends of her hair. The elleth – Ninimmeth – noted the dry ends with some disapproval. "You have my thanks for informing me."
"I am only fulfilling my duties," Ninimmeth demurred, giving the girl's attire a once over. "Do you require help with your dressing, Miss?"
A pale brow rose, and Ninimmeth wondered if she had offended the human, although her expression was one of surprise than indignance. She seemed to consider the offer for several moments before she smiled a little wryly and shook her head, her hands falling into a clasp in front of her even as she rocked back restlessly onto the balls of her feet. Like all humans, she was probably disconcerted by the stillness of the Firstborn.
"That will not be necessary, I thank you."
With that, their exchange ended, and Ninimmeth was left to return to her duties, bursting to tell all who would listen about the strange human girl with bright green eyes and strange coloured hair who spoke formal Sindarin as though it were her mother tongue.
When the chambermaid had left, the human girl returned to her seat in front of the small vanity. For several long minutes, she stared at her reflection in the mirror, and wondered how she had managed to land herself in such a fantastic situation. Her only intent had been to seek out the Silvan woodelves of Mirkwood and pass a message on to their King as instructed; not to impose on the hospitality of the elf who was once the High King's Herald.
"What am I supposed to do now, ammë?" she whispered in her first language, addressing a mother that was no longer by her side. "Do I hope against hope once more? This is driving me crazy."
Reaching for a hair brush, she began to methodically run its bristles through her hair, humming a soft, melancholic tune as she unknotted and untangled the dry strands. Had she any at hand, she would have worked some oil into it for it was getting dry. But Elrond's household had not provided any and she was loathe to make the request. With nimble fingers, the girl made two short braids each down the sides of her head before gathering all of her mane into a tail high atop her head. The ends now brushed the nape of her neck, and she bound it together with a thick leather cord that looked as though it may once have been a fastening on her shoe.
There was nothing she could do about her clothes – a pair of plain breeches and an equally plain tunic held together by an unadorned leather belt from which several pouches hung – for she carried only a spare set that looked identical to the one she had on and even that was currently hanging to dry on her balcony. She had on no jewellery but a silver pendant that lay hidden behind her tunic and the finest piece of clothes she had on were her soft leather gauntlets and sturdy suede boots.
With a slight shrug to herself, the girl turned away from the mirror and began sorting through her meager belongings. Though she looked nowhere near fit to be in the presence of an elven lord, she was, at least, neat and clean. It was the best she could do given her current situation.
She was carefully cleaning one of the twin blades she wielded when there was a knock at her door. Startled, she dropped the oiling rag onto the table and quickly put her weapons away. Had evening fallen so fast?
But where the chambermaid had stood earlier in the day, an armed soldier awaited. Sketching a short and informal bow to her, he bade her to follow him as his lord had requested an interview with her.
Nodding her acquiescence, the girl slipped from behind the heavy door and out of the small room, closing and locking it with the key that had been lent to her for the duration of her stay. She carried nothing with her, though the familiar weight of daggers in both boots reassured her somewhat
As she followed the soldier through what seemed to be a maze of corridors, the verdant-eyed girl wondered what the elven lord wanted with an insignificant being such as herself. Unbidden, an image of a fair, golden-haired elf came to her mind's eye and she shook her head. What a meddling old eldar, she thought with a surge of mild displeasure. She had no doubt that he was more than a few millennia old, for even his cold, guarded gaze could not completely mask the whirlpool of pain in his golden eyes. This, however, did not give him leave to detain whomever he wished to detain. Why, neither she nor the men they had saved had done nothing wrong!
Only years of training to keep a fiery temper in reign kept the building frustration from creeping onto her purposefully blank expression. Once upon a time, the mortal would have lashed out with harsh words and futile fists, but now she merely waited to see how events would unfold. Although many lessons her beloved ammë had tried to teach her flew leagues above her head, this was one that had been caught and drilled relentlessly into her head – Rash actions led to rash consequences.
It was a good ten minutes later that they came to a stop in front of the Lord's study, which was no surprise as the guest wing was at the opposite end of the nobles' residences. A tenor invited her in after the soldier had announced her, and it was with some trepidation that she pushed open the door.
The room was bright, spacious and warmed by the rays of the setting sun. Like everything about this elven haven, there was beauty to behold at every turn. A small smile curved her lips as the girl compared this to her home from long ago. It seemed to her that no matter what it was the elves were dealing with, as long as matter touched their hands, it turned into something beautiful.
"Welcome, Miss," a dark-haired elf greeted her from where he sat comfortably behind a large desk laden with papers. He gestured her towards an empty seat in front of him with a polite smile and nod. A familiar golden-haired Captain lounged against the wall to his right while a brunette elf rose politely in the seat next to her indicated perch. "I apologise for not speaking with you earlier, but other matters held my attention at arrest. I am Elrond of Imladris."
"Well met, my Lord,"she greeted in accented Sindarin, thanking him politely before seating herself without further preamble.
"I trust all is well?"
"Aye, you have my thanks for your kind hospitality."
"Yet my seneschal informs me that you had no wish to be here," the formidable elf lord remarked without malice, covertly studying her with a sharp gaze. Glorfindel shifted on the spot where he stood, eyeing his kin with some unnamed emotion. Elrond had forbidden him to speak directly to her unless given leave and he had acquiesced in favour of remaining in the room.
"Indeed, for I belong not to the party of men who were ambushed by the orcs," she responded honestly, lifting and dropping slender shoulders in a careless shrug. "I was East-bound and intended not to partake in your kindness."
"Unless you give me reason to decide otherwise, it is not within my power to detain you. I merely wished to offer you rest and respite before continuing your journey," Elrond assured her, a polite smile on his fair features. His curiousity, however, had been aroused by the girl that sat before him – The human girl spoke flawless Sindarin in one of its most archaic forms, with an accent that indicated her preference for Quenya. Gossip had also further corroborated Glorfindel's claim that the girl spoke neither the common Tongue nor Westron.
Added to her strange colourings and aura, she was a most curious thing.
For the most part, the green-eyed woman-child did not look like she was particularly taken in by his words, recognizing them for the mere polite words that they were. Still, she nodded, smiled and murmured her thanks as decorum indicated she should.
"I am Erestor, Advisor to Lord Elrond," the dark-haired elf seated beside her introduced himself, filling in the silence that threatened to fill the too-formal atmosphere. "We have not the pleasure of knowing your name."
She hesitated, and considered the request for a long moment. But when she spoke, it was with clarity and quiet certainty.
"I have been named Quelindiel Lérwë, Lady of the Ruins of the House of the Fountain."
A loud crash rang out in the room, and Lérwë half-turned in her seat to stare in concern at the golden-haired elf who had been oddly silent up until he broke a fine porcelain teapot on the ground. Elrond and Erestor were gazing at both in turn, neither willing to break the hush that had descended so abruptly upon them.
Gold met verdant and clung on, as though attempting to bear holes through the bright irises to read the mind of the consternating individual before him. Lérwë swallowed, subconsciously terrified as Glorfindel's complexion shifted gradually from sheet white to an angry red. The elf lord was furious, that much was evident, so much so that he broke tea cup with a clenched fist, drawing thick, crimson liquid from fair skin without so much as a wince.
To Be Continued…