Chapter XXXVIII: The Cleft of Light

The first thing Lucy did was pinch herself. She reached for her arm, her nails digging in. Twisting the flesh again and again, she tried to will herself back to Gondolin through pain alone. Lucy worried at her arm until it was bruised and bleeding, but the valley remained static and unchanging. The summer breeze lifted up the ends of her hair, the stars above remaining bright and endless. It appeared to be twilight. When pinching didn't work, the next thing Lucy did was stagger to her feet, trying to run headlong in every which direction in an effort to stumble through a portal. No matter how many useless circles she turned—or how many times she fell—she remained in the same place, stuck in the same time. She didn't know what time she was in, or where, and the valley felt more like her dreams than Middle-earth.

The air was newer, and different. The colors were richer. In all directions as far as the eye could see was pristine wilderness, and all of a sudden the things she was feeling were much more potent. She could taste honeysuckles on her tongue as she took in great gasps of air. The musical clatter of sweet grass—undulating in flashes of silver as it rolled and dipped with the wind—overwhelmed her ears.

Then reality sunk in and Lucy fell to her knees, one hand braced to the ground while the other clutched at her chest.

Everything. Everything was missing.

The lust was gone, stripped away like a layer of paint, but without the all-ending, insatiable drive all that remained was an intolerable sensation of loss. Because there was a reason why she was so obsessed with having children, beyond the physical. There was a reason why she burst into tears every time she looked in the mirror and discovered nothing there. Lucy was lonely, and every fiber of her being was screaming that it didn't have to be this way. That on another plane of existence, it hadn't.

In her mind's eye, Lucy could see it: she saw herself in the secret garden, reclining on the stone bench and heavily pregnant. Her dress was pulled down to reveal a swollen breast, a pale-haired baby nursing hungrily at her nipple. Not too far off a toddler was playing with a set of blocks. His hair was golden too, his tiny ears pointed. Beside her sat Tommy. Her best friend was dressed in shades of grey, a deep cowl drawn over her hair like a monk's. Her face was tanned by the sun.

"How do you feel?" Tommy asked, and in this new version of reality Lucy had turned to gaze at the other woman, smiling serenely.

"Good," Lucy said, adjusting the baby. She pressed down on her breast so the milk would flow faster, her eyelids heavy with relaxation. "Glorfindel will be home soon. I finished my new project."

"The spinning lantern?"

"Yes, for the children." She had a workshop in the basement of Glorfindel's keep, and when she'd been more mobile she'd spent all her days there, tinkering with this and deconstructing that. It was her favourite thing to do besides spending time with her family. Not too far off the toddler laughed. Tommy watched her nurse with a strangely intense expression.

"Is something wrong?" Lucy asked. Tommy shook her head. In that moment—on another plane of existence—Lucy realized with unequivocal clarity that her best friend should have survived their fall into Middle-earth. That there had been another reality written just for her. The loss of the other woman was heart-wrenching.

"No," her best friend said, smiling in a funny way. "You just look so different now. How many are you carrying this time?"

"Twins," Lucy beamed. "They'll be born in the fall."

Tommy rolled her eyes. When Lucy had demanded to know what was wrong, her best friend had laughed.

"Only you, Lucy," she said. "Only you would want more children."

"Of course I do," Lucy declared, leaning down to kiss her baby's head with pride. "They make me happy." Lucy was more than happy. Tommy was back after a year-long excursion and Glorfindel would return soon. Life was relaxing and full of love. There was no war.

"Maybe it's something in the water." Tommy grumbled, rubbing at her brow in exasperation.

"When they're inside me, it feels like he's inside me too." Lucy explained, trying not to feel too defensive. Her swollen belly strained against the silk of her dress as she exhaled, her lips slightly parted from the weight on her lungs. She had a hard time articulating why she enjoyed it so much, but she needed to explain it. It was important to her that Tommy understood. "It feels like he's talking to me, even when he's not there. I'm never alone and the babies talk too. I fall asleep to their heartbeats."

"Yeah, but you already have two. It's an awful lot."

"Four, after these ones are born," Lucy corrected proudly. "And it's not a lot."

Tommy wrinkled her nose in distaste. In this version of reality she had a scar on her face that threaded through her hair. It was faint now, but still noticeable from their fall. After they'd been found on the mountain slope her best friend had been unconscious for weeks.

"I can't relate," Tommy admitted. "Wanting to be a housewife, I mean."

"Everyone has different ways of finding happiness," Lucy demurred. "Your way is books, mine are children." She looked at her best friend sitting beside her on the bench; dressed in grey robes with a satchel slung across her back, filled with scrolls from her latest travels. The two of them had diverged along very different paths, but both those paths had been right.

"You're weird Lucy," Tommy said. Lucy had laughed and smiled ear-to-ear.

"I know," she said. "But I'm happy. Are you staying tonight? Glorfindel would love to speak with you about Gondor, I think."

Tommy nodded.

"Of course."

Then the memory of what would never be disappeared.

In the present day—ripped from a reality that was no longer her own—Lucy screamed. Her body curled inwards, her mind going into shock as it struggled to cope with the realization that Tommy should have survived their fall. The loss of Glorfindel and her children made it worse. She'd always been able to feel him now, she realized; a gentle, cocooning presence that was akin to early morning sunshine, and that presence had been lurking on the edge of her subconscious ever since she'd fallen into Middle-earth.

On another plane of existence, she remembered how kind he'd been to Tommy. She remembered how he'd smiled softly and bowed before the woman, thanking her for her time. The ellon had never wanted more than one child—he'd been worried about her health—but Lucy did, so he'd acquiesced. Afterwards, he'd considered it a sign from the Valar.

"Should we move?" the elf lord asked that night after dinner, holding their toddler in his lap. Lucy was reclining in their bed, propped up by pillows as she'd nursed the baby.

"Move where?" she'd asked sleepily, her hand massaging her heavily engorged side.

"To Gondor, with Tomí," her husband said, using Tommy's Sindarin name. "You are happy when you are with her, and I think it would be good to stay with the Edain." He looked down at their eldest son, gently brushing back his golden curls. "I know I would miss my people terribly if I was not around them for a very long time."

Glorfindel always did what she wished, and in some ways his agreeable nature broke Lucy's heart. Perhaps it was because she took advantage of it.

In another reality, there were no children. In a third universe, there were even more. Sometimes there was an elf, tall and red haired that was gripping her hand. Briefly, Lucy caught a glimpse of a new dimension, strange and terrible. She saw herself dressed in black, sitting upon a throne and wearing a crown. There was a pale, glowing stone draped around her neck.

"You dare to defy me?" the new Lucy spat, her voice echoing along the obsidian walls as she stood in a flurry of ink-colored robes. She was a beautiful, terrifying thing, overwhelmingly sexual and lush. From the darkened corners of the throne room men watched her with hunger. A deep, crackling laugh like the rumble of a volcano sounded in response. "You, who took everything from me?! How dare you!"

"Stop," Lucy sobbed, curling up in the grass as she clutched at her chest, but the images kept coming. "Please stop."

In the current reality—the one she'd been ripped from—Lucy saw the grotto. She felt Glorfindel's loneliness and saw giant sheets of ice. Tommy was dead on the rocks. Somewhere above her there was an alien presence. If it could have felt pity for her, it would have.

Mortals are not meant to see it, the being told her, inside her mind and out of it too. This place is not for you.

"It hurts," Lucy said, and she didn't know what she was saying or whom she was saying it to. There might have been a hand on her head, huge and immaterial, but she couldn't be sure. "It hurts, take it away."

You have been touched by a future that must come to pass, the presence said. I will show you the path towards it, however. Have faith.

Then there was a sudden something in Lucy's brain, bright and brilliant and overwhelming. It was so strong she was struck dumb by it's light, her mind abruptly shutting down.

When Lucy finally regained consciousness, she found herself lying flat on her back, her tears dried to her cheeks and her hair fanning around her. The weather was warm, the stars still thick overhead. She had no recollection of the otherworldly presence or her conversation with it.

Immediately, her mind went to him.

"Glorfindel?" Lucy asked on a tremulous breath, her eyes filling with tears as she reached down to smooth her hand across her abdomen. When she thought of the past she recalled only one reality instead of dozens. She recalled a time where she had been hidden away in the grotto, Glorfindel's hand on her swollen belly, his expression soft at the sight.

Their fixation on children had been a mutual one, born of desperation, she remembered: the compulsion to keep her heavy with child so they would not be parted, the word mortal wielded between them like a weapon. She had forgotten, but Glorfindel had not. Neither had the person who'd kidnapped her.

Oh god, Lucy thought, her breaths speeding up as she clutched at her front. Oh god, what had happened? She remembered being taken away, even though it hadn't happened yet. She remembered being swallowed by darkness. Without knowing why, Lucy started to cry in earnest. She couldn't seem to stop.

There is still hope, something told her, and as it did a balm of peace slowly crept in and began to wash over her: a numbing sensation that began to calm her nerves. The tears didn't cease, but her fears of the past began to fade. Lucy started to think through the problem.

She'd jumped through time, she knew, but she could theoretically jump back: she'd done it before. Gondolin had not yet fallen, and there was no balrog. Glorfindel was alive and he loved her. Lucy hadn't been able to stumble through the portal when she'd been running in circles, but maybe she hadn't run far enough. She just had to find her way home herself.

Sniffling loudly and wiping her nose, Lucy sat up. Her hair tangled with cobwebs, her cheeks stained with tears, she staggered to her feet, looking towards the end of the valley where the mountains folded into a cleft.

Grabbing the hem of her dress to keep herself from tripping, she started walking towards it.

Lucy continued marching for a time. She walked for what seemed like hours, surrounded by nothing but sweet grass and a gentle breeze. Her hair drifted behind her in swirls of chestnut, her skirt twining around her feet as it pressed to her front. Lucy's hand stayed on her abdomen. If she thought back on it, her current scenario reminded her of her dreams: of the ones where she was wandering beneath a sky thick with stars, her belly large and her back bowed by its weight. Even still, she knew it was different.

Once she returned to her time, she would rectify the problem, she decided, but without the lust driving her forward her path was unsteady. She was less confident in herself and she didn't know where to go. Lucy was heading towards the cleft because it was the most visible landmark around her, but what if there was nothing there? What if she remained lost, or starved to death? There were no animals nearby, at least none that she saw. No insects either, or mice or voles.

There is still hope, she reminded herself, but the constant, overwhelming need had been a buffer for the other emotions she'd been feeling, and without it all her anxieties came roaring back in a wave. She didn't know if another baramog was waiting for her amongst the grass, or if she would be eaten by it. Lucy didn't sense anything nearby, but she hadn't sensed anything in the caves either, and the monster was hunting her. Mairon was hunting her, and there was no Glorfindel to save her this time. She didn't even have her knife.

Swallowing nervously, Lucy picked up the edge of her skirt and walked faster.

The cleft seemed close, but that was only because it was massive. Once she reached the three-hour mark of walking, Lucy began to veer off course. Slowly at first—drifting towards the mountains instead of the pass—but when her mouth began to dry with lack of water she turned and headed towards the cliffs, searching for something to drink. The peaks were different than the mountains surrounding Gondolin: just as jagged and snow-covered, but at least three times larger, their sides sheer sheets of rock. As she neared them the grass became less uniform, intermingled with buttercups and the small white flowers that Glorfindel adored. Eventually there were even trees, or something that looked like trees: stunted, scraggly pines that were shorter than Lucy herself, the tops of them barely reaching her shoulders. There was a hint of iron in the air. The best is yet before you, a voice reminded her, but when Lucy craned her head back—eying the sheer size of the mountains—she doubted the thought.

Above her there was the mournful shriek of the wind whistling through an alpine pass. Nothing could scale it. The only way out of the valley was through the cleft, and if she didn't make it she would be trapped.

The minute the thought crossed her mind Lucy tried to push it aside.

What would Glorfindel do? she asked herself, trying to manage her anxiety. There was a dip in the landscape just ahead. A little gorge of sorts that—while it didn't look like it went through the mountain proper—provided some protection. The idea didn't help much, because Lucy knew that Glorfindel would handle the situation with ease simply due to the fact that he was an elf.

What would Tommy do? she asked next, and Lucy knew that her best friend would consult her books, then play to her strengths. To be smart about what she could and couldn't do in order to survive and get through the worst of it. Lucy knew she should probably do that too, but she had a hard time thinking of herself as a separate entity.

Well, what am I good at? she wondered as she wandered into the mountain's shadow. She knew that she was pampered and had no survival skills to speak of. True independence terrified her, and even with her desire to drink blood she was physically weak and frail. Lucy was beautiful, however, and she was aware of it. She could sing and dance and act demure when she wanted something, and she loved children. The elves thought she was pretty. They also believed she was a seer.

As her hand brushed across her abdomen, she was hit with a vision so vivid it seemed like reality: with an image of a breathtakingly beautiful woman, fine-boned and laden with jewellery. The woman was reclining on a collection of pillows in the High King's court, a fan dangling coquettishly from her fingers and a gauzy veil draped over her face. Everyone was watching her, their eyes affixed to her swollen belly. Lucy watched them in return, her breaths shallow as her hand stroked her heaving side. She could feel their hunger wafting through the air like perfume.

May I present The Lady of the Golden Flower, some unseen voice announced, and in the vision Lady Lucy smiled, making sure to flutter her eyelids as a faceless someone kissed the back of her palm.

We do not allow those things here, something warned her, strange and immaterial. Abruptly the vision was cut off, and for the oddest reason Lucy decided that she was being judged.

She could feel what they thought of her, those immaterial beings that floated above her: how they saw her as a sad, tainted thing, all fleshy and carnal. They wondered if he had sent her, to tempt The Children away from the light. Even though she knew she was probably just hearing things, Lucy grew irrationally furious at the thought.

I am not tainted, she thought in return, and if the person had been there she would have spat. Why wasn't she allowed to have sex or want children? Why was it expected of her if she didn't want those things—forced upon her like a gleeful penance—but suddenly dirty if it was her choice?

It is a flaw in mortality, the immaterial presence sighed, but Lucy recognized the hypocrisy as deeper than that, even if she couldn't put it into words.

There was nothing wrong with being mortal, either, and inside her there was a growing determination to take control of her own destiny in her own image, by her own choosing. She wasn't physically strong like Glorfindel, or book smart and adventurous like Tommy, but that didn't mean what she did or what she wanted was worthless. She certainly wasn't tainted for wanting children for herself.

The dip in the valley was almost upon her, and as she neared Lucy began to hear the sound of running water, musical and bubbling. From where she was standing it sounded no bigger than a stream. Feeling her throat clench with thirst—and thanking her lucky stars it was thirst for water and not blood—Lucy picked up the hem of her dress and hurried towards it, trying not to trip over her own feet. In front of her the land tucked into a narrow, rocky ravine, covered in pale green lichen and dwarf-sized pines. Lucy made her way down the slope in a haphazard manner, her steps unsteady and her hand automatically going to her front to protect it as she attempted to navigate the gorge. Volcanic looking boulders—dark grey and porous—were dotting the valley. At the very bottom she could see the stream itself, thin and rapid and twining. To her right stood the mountains, barely seventy yards away. The water disappeared beneath them, it's entrance to the underwater reservoir a collection of mossy-covered debris.

Lucy braced her hand against one of the boulders as she reached the bottom, rubbing at her heart as her breathing grew laboured. Her breastbone felt tight in a familiar way, and there was a buzzing sensation in her limbs; a lightness to her fingers and a tugging, butterfly-like sensation in her gut that was telling her to go over and drink the water. It almost sounded like voices.

There's no one here, she reminded herself, shaking her head as she pushed herself away from the rock. You're imagining it. Bundling up the fabric of her skirt, Lucy hoisted it to her ankles and gingerly made her way to the stream-bed. She slowly sunk to her knees. The water was startlingly clear up close, but tinted green by all the grass around it. When Lucy cupped her hands beneath the water she jumped a bit, startled by its gentle warmth. It wasn't cool like the water that flowed in and around Gondolin. It almost didn't look like water, but her throat was parched and she figured she had nothing left to lose, so she drank.

When she did Lucy gasped in surprise, then brought another mouthful to her lips and drank more greedily.

The water was sweet. Addictively sweet in the most delicious way, and it reminded her of the tea that Morwen had fed her: bringing calm to her senses and making her nerves abuzz. She felt full of life. Lucy loved feeling full, so she drank some more. She drank for a while, slowly guzzling the water, and it wasn't until she began to feel an uncomfortable tightness across her front that she finally remembered to stop.

Leaning back from the stream, Lucy wiped her hand across her mouth. She looked towards the mountains. The light didn't change here, in this reality: from the time she'd fallen through the portal to the moment she'd reached the stream the atmosphere had remained a perpetual shade of twilight. There was no sun in the sky to set, and no moon to rise over the mountains. It meant that she wouldn't get lost in the dark—a comforting thought—but it also meant that her ability to judge time was tenuous.

What would Lucy do? Lucy repeated, and it was becoming a bit of a mantra: a way to cheer herself up and refocus her thoughts, and when she came up with nothing Lucy asked herself what Tommy would do instead. Her best friend wasn't there, but her personality was imprinted on her mind like a brand. Tommy was smarter than her, and more familiar with Middle-earth in general. It was an easy way for Lucy to think through the problem.

"She would stay here for a bit," Lucy told herself aloud, rubbing in discomfort at her now-bloated abdomen. She didn't know how to construct a shelter or make a fire, but the ravine was a sheltered place, tucked away from the openness of the plains with an easily renewable water source.

Leaning back, Lucy put her hands to her knees in preparation to stand, looking to her right for a pine tree or a collection of rocks she could use to rest by for a bit. She heard the snap of a twig to her left.

Startled, Lucy turned the other way instead.

There was a boy standing there, not ten paces away from her. A red-haired boy with sharply pointed ears that was as tall as she was but didn't look a day over ten. He was covered in expensive-looking robes, a slender hunting bow strung over his back. His bright grey eyes were so luminous they were akin to silver. A dark-haired toddler was clinging to his leg, his face slightly tanned and splattered with freckles.

Lucy simply sat there, blinking at them owlishly as she tried to process the fact that she was seeing children. Here, of all places. Was this really not a dream? She pinched herself again.

"Who are you?" the red-haired boy finally asked. He seemed strangely familiar, and definitely an elf. As Lucy stared at him longer, comprehension began to dawn. She hadn't thought about the ellon for a while—and he was much, much younger than when she'd last seen him—but she would have recognized that crimson hair anywhere. A vision flashed in her mind of a red-haired elf gripping her hand. Three volcanoes belching smoke billowed in the distance.

"Maedhros?" she hazarded on a guess, her voice unsteady. She hoped it wasn't true.

The red-haired boy frowned delicately. His features were intensely aristocratic, but there was an alien-ness about his aristocracy. An extreme tilt to his eyes and cheekbones that marked him as distinctly non-human, although his ears were not so pointed as Glorfindel's.

"My name is Maitimo," he said in strangely accented Quenya. As Lucy stared at him, the toddler clinging to his leg made a high-pitched whining noise that hurt her ears. He tugged on the edge of Maitimo's tunic, doing a jig. The toddler lifted his arms towards the larger child in an unmistakable gesture to be picked up.

"Nelyo, Nelyo!" he whined, pouting mightily. The freckles on his tiny nose stoop out in sharp prominence. "Nelyo, I go up!"

"Quiet, Macalaurë," Maitimo said softly, resting a slim hand on the elfling's head. The toddler's hair was the same shade as Lucy's, but very straight, curling into delicate wisps at the ends.

Macalaurë's lower lip wobbled. Without meaning to Lucy's instinctual urge to pick up the child came roaring to the surface.

"But Nelyo –"

"I said quiet. I'm talking to someone."

"What are you doing here?" Lucy asked in broken Quenya, still not sure she wasn't dreaming. The two children turned back to her, the eldest frowning at her butchered pronunciation and stilted accent.

"We are hunting with our father," he said. His nose wrinkled up further. "What is a Lady doing here? In her nightclothes?"

"I… I was thirsty." Lucy admitted. She wasn't really sure what else to say, and a surreal sort of feeling was taking over. She was still trying to process the fact that she was having a conversation with a pair of children in the middle of nowhere, and when she did she began to process everything else.

"There was no water on your estate?" the red-haired elfling asked, startling her out of her thoughts. Beside him the toddler began to hum, crouching down to pick up some rocks.

"You are shorter than I expected." Lucy blurted out. She'd always seen him in dreams before this. Never in the flesh. The boy called Maitimo glared fiercely when she commented on his height, his wine-coloured waves clinging to his temples with the heat. It was very warm where they were. A gentle breeze was winding its way through the plains around them, and the meadow was thick with flowers. Lucy kept on thinking of the vision that she'd had so many years ago with Glorfindel's lifeless body. She was thinking of how the red-haired ellon had gripped him by the collar; how he'd towered over her in the time jump, looming amongst the blood and snow.

For one ugly, terrifying second Lucy wondered if she could kill a child to stop him from killing Glorfindel in the future. The second after, she quashed the idea. Lucy had seen his mind in bits and pieces, and she knew he was miserable. She wanted a baby so badly that the thought of killing someone else's child made her reel with crushing guilt. Above them the sky was still cast in twilight, festooned with billions of stars. The entire thing was horribly disconcerting.

"I'm twenty," Maitimo said, as if that would explain away his height. Even still there was a pale pink flush to his cheeks that spoke of shame: a combination of adult understanding and childlike frustration at being stuck in a too-small body and knowing people treated you differently because of it. Lucy identified with the sensation immediately. She wanted to reach out and grab his hand and tell him I'm the same, but she could barely keep her thoughts coherent.

"Well I'm eighteen," she replied. She'd meant it to be comforting, but it came off as indignant. Maitimo's eyes widened with surprise.

"Really?" he said. Then in a rush, "why do you look so old, then? What's wrong with your ears?"

"I'm Edain," Lucy said, struggling to find the words. Their conversation was getting stranger and stranger the longer it went on, and she felt like an outsider looking down on the scene from above. This is a dream her mind said, but her body told her it wasn't. "I… our ears are rounded. I'm not the same as your kind."

Maitimo frowned, his eyebrows folding together in confusion. His gesture was mimicked perfectly by the dark-haired toddler clinging to his leg. They were brothers, Lucy thought. Their faces were shaped the same.

"You mean you're like the Teleri?" Maitimo asked.

Lucy swallowed deeply. Her mind stuttered. Her hands worried at the front of her dress as she came to the sudden, horrifying realization that she was talking to elves that had never heard of humans, much less seen one. She'd gone too far back.

Instinctively, Lucy knew that she wasn't supposed to be there, wherever there was. Oh god. Would she be punished?

"No, not really," she began. "Edain aren't Eldar. We're… we're Second-born." Speaking in Quenya was difficult.

"What's Second-born?"

"I'm second-born!" declared the toddler, pushing himself between Maitimo and Lucy in an effort to hold their attention. He held up five fingers, rocking back on his heels and jumping up and down on the spot. "I'm four!" he said, proudly waving his fingers towards Lucy. "See? You see?!"

Lucy watched the elfling with interest. "Ah," she said, speaking through a mental haze as she tried to process the lingering shock. Children. She wanted children. Glorfindel wanted children too. They'd been a steadying force in a world that Lucy had been unfamiliar with and hadn't been able to make sense of. Children were the only anchor that had made her feel like she belonged.

Lucy opened her arms and leaned forward a bit, gesturing towards the toddler for a hug. The child smiled shyly and began to walk forward. Maitimo frowned and tried to draw him back, but it was too late.

"Macalaurë, I said stop!" he hissed, his cheeks flushed bright pink, but already the little boy was crawling into Lucy's arms.

The child was big. Bigger than Erestor and distinctly Noldo. Up close he had the same aristocratic features as his brother; the same grey eyes and striking eyebrows and alien cheekbones. Lucy balanced him upon her hip and stood, stumbling a bit at the weight. The elfling was fine-boned despite his size, but Lucy was very small. She smoothed away his hair, rearranging it on his shoulder. It was so silky it immediately fell back over his forehead.

"And what's your name?" she crooned, her voice soft and dove-like. Lucy felt discombobulated. Without the child, her thoughts drifted even worse.

I shouldn't be here.

"Macalaurë," the toddler said. He held up his hand again, all five fingers. "I'm four!"

Lucy smiled benignly. "I see. Where are your parents?"

"Away."

"And why are you away from your parents?"

The child blushed, hiding his face against Lucy's shoulder. Lucy kissed his temple. In front of them the older child fumed.

"Macalaurë!" he said in an overly loud whisper. "You're going to get us in trouble!" The stream babbled and tossed behind him, the green water blending into the pale, lichen covered banks. Lucy began to rock the toddler back and forth a bit, readjusting his weight. She looked towards the older boy, feeling a bit like a bobble head. Maitimo was speaking a strange sort of Quenya that she was finding hard to keep up. Her response was halting in turn.

"Why?" she asked. "What's wrong?"

The elfling shifted uncomfortably on the spot, gripping his bow. He looked to the side. Lucy's breastbone felt tight in that moment. There was an intangible, silent snapping sensation in the air, like something was being torqued and tightened.

"Atar says we are not supposed to talk to strangers," the boy admitted, a tumble of wine-red curls falling down his front. There was a beauty mark by the right corner of his mouth, above the upper lip. "We should not have wandered so far."

"Why have you?" Lucy asked, bouncing the toddler up and down on her hip. Maitimo's expression became distressed, his hand clenching tighter around the strap of his bow. He was the giant from her dreams, but not. He looked less tired and drawn and haunted. He still had both his hands.

It's because he's a child, she reminded herself, but it hadn't sunk in yet that she was speaking to him in the flesh: that this wasn't a dream. She wanted to ask what year it was, but something prevented her. Her thoughts felt fuzzier the longer she held the toddler, but the anxiety was draining from her like a sieve. She didn't want to know, she decided. Here was where she was supposed to say.

Before the boy spoke the toddler did, one of his hands twisting in the front of his royal blue tunic. The other was absently kneading at the scar tissue trailing along Lucy's shoulder from her breast to her neck. It was a very baby-like thing to do.

"I lost my toy," he said. His hair was in his eyes again. Somewhat awkwardly Lucy reached up, brushing it out of his face. She'd never seen an elf with freckles before. "It got washed in—in the river."

"Down where, baby?" she asked. The toddler twisted in her arms, pointing to the babbling brook that disappeared under the mountain, past the lichen-covered collection of debris. There was a small opening along the top of the rock where the entrance and the stones didn't meet. Lucy eyed it in contemplation.

"Won't you get in trouble?" Maitimo asked abruptly.

Lucy turned back to the red-haired boy, her eyelids heavy as she gave him a once-over. He was the most beautiful elf she'd ever seen next to Glorfindel, and she was sure when he was older he would be lovelier still. It was a different sort of beauty, however. The words for what kind escaped her, but Lucy knew it to be true.

"You are not of my father's house," Maitimo continued, pouting slightly. "And Atar says that the maidens who are not of our house are weak."

"Maybe," Lucy admitted. She nodded her head a moment later. "I am not very strong. Glorfindel needs to take care of me."

"Glorfindel?" Maitimo said, his brows furrowing. He didn't seem to understand the name. A moment later, Lucy understood why.

"Laurëfindil," she said, using the Quenya version of it. Maitimo's expression grew slightly surprised.

"Is that not a Vanya name?" he began, but before he could finish his little brother cut him off.

"I think you're pretty," the dark haired toddler said, his tiny fingers fiddling with her braid. Lucy looked down at him with a benign expression, pressing a kiss to his cheek. It was an instinctual thing: a muscle memory from a life that hadn't happened yet. The child blushed and smiled, curling against her, his head flopping to her shoulder as his small hands pressed between them.

"Thank you," Lucy said, rocking him more slowly. "Would you like me to help you find your toy?"

"Unh."

"Macalaurë!" the older boy, finally taking a step towards them. "Atar will get mad!"

The toddler ignored him, and Lucy did too. She walked towards the entrance to the brook, carrying the child along the edge of the riverbank. After a moment of being ignored and an indignant huff, Maitimo followed.

It was a bit difficult to carry the child, but not unfamiliar. Despite his delicate appearance Macalaurë was large in comparison to Lucy, and heavy. Her back bowed a bit with the weight of carrying him, but the weight itself was comforting. The children probably knew a way out of the valley, she realized. Perhaps they could take her to the others, and they could help her find a way back.

As Lucy neared the entrance to the stream she adjusted the child on her hip. When they finally stopped she put him down, gently placing him on his feet amongst the soft lichen and dampened grass. Macalaurë stuck his thumb in his mouth and continued clinging to her skirt. Lucy straightened, then realized his older brother was standing directly beside her, watching the stream with a frown. Maitimo's hair really did look like wine up close, his face a statue's, the bone structure beneath artfully carved. Without thinking, she blurted out "you look nothing like him."

The boy turned to her, frowning. His skin the same porcelain complexion as Glorfindel's, but the red hair made it paler.

"I don't look like my Atar?" he asked, as if his father was the only person she could be referencing. Idril had told her who Maitimo's father was once, but at the moment Lucy couldn't recall his name. She blinked and shook her head, swallowing heavily. The boy watched the movement, staring at her very intently.

"No," Lucy said, swallowing again. She blinked and swayed a bit on her feet, rubbing at her chest as she tried to take a deeper breath. It felt so tight. The elf boy reached out, gripping her elbow to keep her steady. Lucy didn't bother to shoo him off. "No, like Laurëfindil."

Maitimo made a face.

"Of course I don't look like a Vanya," he snapped. "I'm Noldo."

"I Noldo too," the toddler said, speaking around his thumb, and Lucy smiled, turning to him and gently stroking the top of his head. He hummed happily and clung to her leg, burying his face against her skirt.

"What is your name?" Maitimo asked her.

Without thinking Lucy said "Nimeleth." The older boy nodded in confirmation and didn't press her further, stepping towards the river to retrieve the toy. When she realized what he was doing Lucy reached out, putting her hand to her arm to stop him.

"I'll do it," she said. They were eye-level, but she was slightly smaller than him. She was worried about either of the children getting hurt.

"Atar said maidens shouldn't," Maitimo protested, then added somewhat sullenly. "Unless they are of our house."

Lucy shrugged and de-tangled the toddler from her skirts, wandering past him into the stream. The water was warm, immediately soaking the ends of her nightgown.

"I'm smaller," she said, and the boy looked skeptical. "It will go faster if I do it. Trust me."

She turned back to the toddler when she was up to her calves in the water, clutching the front of her skirt as she sought to gather it around her. "What does your toy look like?" she asked. The dream-like quality to the meeting was beginning to fade, but she still felt like she was floating. After, she decided. After she retrieved the toy, she would ask Maitimo what year it was. She was sure he would know.

"A horse," Macalaurë said, twisting his hands in the front of his tunic as he pouted. "It's wood."

"Okay."

Lucy turned back and moved deeper into the stream. The water was very fast moving. There were pebbles along the bottom, and walking across their slippery surface made the crossing somewhat treacherous. Trying to balance herself, Lucy gathered up the bottom of her skirt to keep herself from tripping, but it was sopping wet so it didn't do much good. Hands outstretched, she gingerly made her way towards the entrance of the stream; a collection of oddly shaped boulders, greenish and covered in algae. When she put her hand to the biggest boulder to steady herself, the texture beneath her palm felt slimy.

"See anything?" the red-haired boy asked from the bank. Lucy shook her head and bent down to peer into the gap at the top. It was a black, mawing hole that was wider than it was tall. Through it Lucy could see nothing, but she could hear the rushing roar of the stream as it flowed beneath the hill. Lucy turned towards the bank, looking at the children. The water rushed past her ankles. She could feel pebbles between her toes.

"Are you sure it's in here?" she asked. The toddler nodded, but the boy frowned. He tucked a lock of red hair behind a sharply pointed, leaf-shaped ear.

"It does not look safe," he said.

Lucy gave him a small smile. "It's fine," she said, turning back to the entrance. "I'll figure it out."

At first Lucy tried to move one of the smaller rocks out of the way in an attempt to get inside. The boulders weren't too big and the streambed was shallow, but the rocks were so slippery she couldn't grip them when she tried to move them. When Maitimo stepped into the stream beside her to help, he couldn't move them as well. Lucy frowned, eyeing the opening at the top. Rather impulsively she moved forward, placing her hands to the entrance and her body to the rock as he prepared to slide in.

"What are you doing?" demanded Maitimo.

"Trying to see if I can get inside," Lucy replied. She managed to squeeze her head, hands and shoulders past the entrance; a little more wriggling and she was able to fit her swollen bust inside too.

It was a very tight fit across the top. Her breasts compressed so tightly they pillowed beneath her chin, making it hard to breathe. The sound of the rushing water was much larger inside the mountain and it was still pitch black, but a little bit of light slipped around her arm as she made her way through the opening. Squinting hard, Lucy looked down and side-to-side. She saw nothing at first, but as her vision grew accustomed to the gloom she spied what looked like a bump sticking out of the stream, stuck in the silt of the river. The toy.

"Found it!" Lucy called, but her words were mostly lost to the roar of the stream. Whatever Maitimo said to her was lost in turn. She felt him tug on her skirt a bit, but she shook him off.

"A minute," Lucy gasped, struggling for air. She shimmied forward, her breasts flattening painfully hard against the stone, her balance unsteady as she stood on her tiptoes to try to reach the object. When she stretched out her arm, fingers wavering in the open air as water speckled her hand, she found that she couldn't. She grunted and pushed herself forward a bit more, so her feet barely touched the ground.

Lucy heard the boy speaking through the hole beside her, raising his voice to be heard.

"I think you should come back," he said, sounding very unsure. Lucy was bent over the rock at the waist now, half in and half out of the hole. Although her hands wavered just above the water, she was still unable to reach the object. "You might fall."

"I'll… I'll be fine." Lucy gasped. There, amongst the silt: a pair of four upended legs sticking out like twigs. Her feet left the ground as she wriggled in further, one hand trying to brace itself against the algae covered stone as the other one reached for the water.

As she slid forward her dress dipped down across her front, so low that one of her breasts popped free. Gasping in surprise, Lucy reached up to cover herself. As she did she slid forward faster. Her balanced tipped.

Then it happened.

Lucy felt herself plunging down the rock, her hips moving past the opening. She let go of her dress to try to grab the boulder, but her palms slipped against the algae and a second later she was falling with a loud splash into the stream.

The water was warm and all around her, muffling all sounds against her ears. When she gasped her mouth filled with its weight. All was dark as she twisted and tumbled beneath it with the current, and she couldn't tell which way was up or down. Lucy choked.

Something hard struck her side, then her leg as she was tossed about under the rapids. In a panic she scrabbled at anything she could grab onto, which was nothing at all. Her hands dragged through silt and pebbles, breaking nails. Her skirts tangled around her legs, her hair floating around her in a halo.

When she finally managed to rise to the surface, gasping, she found herself floating down the stream forty feet away, the water getting deeper. Her vision was blurry, and everything was dark. The only source of light was a thin sliver of white where the entrance to the stream was, getting smaller by the second. Someone was calling her name.

"Nimeleth!" they said, and then the roar of the creek became overwhelming. Gagging on water, Lucy reached out, but the stream was so rapid she could barely stay upright.

Then there was a kock; something heavy hitting the back of her head, dull and heavy as she slammed into an overhanging stone.

After that, Lucy felt no more.

Author's Note

Hey all! Apologies for not posting for so long, and for not being on a constant update schedule. I've been distracted by original fiction and work, which has left little time for this story. I'll try to keep this A/N short, but just wanted to give a big thanks to everyone who reviewed/favorited/followed! To those of you asking for me to update soon: my sincerest apologies for not being able to do so. I hate making you wait but sometimes life gets in the way. A huge thank you to msg839 and to Trebia for beta'ing!

For those of you who I couldn't PM:

Kuro: your memory does not fail you. Turgon did ask Lucy about the second baramog, many, many chapters ago. At the end of Arc II, I believe. "More doomed than Turin Turambar" has a ring to it. You'll find out more about Morwen soon, and I'm glad you're enjoying the plot! The Ohtze Fan: thank you for the support. Means a lot to me. Tsurugaren: Sorry for the slow updates! Didn't mean to make everyone wait. I'm glad you're warming up to Lucy, and that her character development is coming across. I would never try to excuse her actions (or anyone else's either). She absolutely acts foolishly sometimes, and I don't want to minimize that or what happens when she does. Glorfindel will go through a rather large character arc too (and don't worry, I don't mind you being blunt about your feelings towards him). Fingon is a joy to write. And yes, he sort of came to the crown by accident. You're not the only Fingon x Lucy shipper reading this story, I think. Hope you enjoyed Maitimo.

Guest (who asked "If you were to describe Glorfindel's obsession and possessiveness, how would you describe it?"): one brought on by trauma and an inability to accept the nuances of immortality VS mortality. I don't think Glorfindel copes well with the idea of death, especially for the people he cares about. It makes him act out in terrible ways. Guest (asking about uploading pics of different characters): if you're on tumblr you can submit those images directly to my blog, or if you're on twitter you can tweet me with them (both links are in my profile). If neither works, AO3 allows you to include links to images in the comments section of the story, and The Hematic is mirrored on there. You can also find the link for my AO3 page on my profile.