There is a figure huddled over a campfire. Maitimo can see the flames, red and angry, outlined against the dark.
He approaches slowly, hesitantly. He knows who it is, of course. Older, careworn, filled with the desperate sorrow that seems to fill them all, now. But still the same.
The figure doesn't turn at his approach. A thin black braid had fallen from under the hood of a dark cloak. A gold ribbon shimmers in the firelight.
"You'll burn yourself," Maitimo says, softly.
"I'm cold," the figure says.
"It is not that cold," Maitimo says, and then curses himself.
Findekáno turns. His eyes are dark and desperate. "I can feel Helcaraxë in my soul."
Maitimo does not know how to reply. His throat aches with words unsaid.
There is too much between them, now. Has been for a while. They cannot go back to the easy peace of before.
"Do you regret it?" Maitimo asks. He wonders why. He does not want to know that Findekáno regrets it, does not want to know that he wishes he had stayed behind, away from Maitimo and the pain he has caused.
Findekáno is silent for a while, staring at the fire. Maitimo cannot look at it, can only look at him. He remembers burning ships and the sacrifice of all that once was.
"I don't know," Findekáno says, quietly. He does not look at Maitimo.
Maitimo doesn't know either. He thinks of the pain and suffering that he has caused. He thinks of the defeated looks of his uncle's people, thinks of Findekáno's hopeless face in the wastes of Thangorodrim, sees him huddled before the fire, desperate for warmth. He thinks that maybe he does regret it.
Findekáno doesn't repeat the question. Maitimo thinks that he already knows. He has always known Maitimo better than Maitimo did.
Neither has moved. This is what they are reduced to, now. There is so much space between them, so much distance. They cannot cross it.
This is what they are. A huddled, desperate figure in front of a fire, unable to forgive. The hopeless shell of a man haunted by the past, unable to forgive himself.
This is not forgiveness. It is not understanding. It is, perhaps, resignation.