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Moonlight filtered translucently through a high window cut with neither care nor an eye for design. Prone and crumpled on the floor, Isorfir blinked as the glow caught his eye like a glimmer of mithril.
Shaking nightmares from the fog behind his unsleeping eyes, he stood, his lengthy, picturesque frame caught in the light, catching the angle of his memory, the edges blurred with the silvery echo of the moon.
Without a sound, he stepped across the cold stone, every muscle in his body concentrating on complete oblivion, untraced silence. Upon reaching the wall, he looked up towards the source of the light that interrupted his unseeing rest.
If the guard were still standing in the musty hall, he may have seen his unspeaking prisoner stretch soundlessly to the ends of his toes, his dark hair spilling onto his broad shoulders like a curtain hiding a furtive criminal.
The guard may have laughed at the helpless elf, like a child too small to reach his mother to beg. If he were there, however, his laughter would have quickly been swallowed if he witnessed the elf take two purposeful steps back, and jump the impossible distance to pull himself level to the light, his face completely illuminated in an expression of set determination. Before he could yell for help, or fumble for the keys, the once-prisoner had pulled himself out and sideways, clenching his ribs between the unforgiving stone to scrape through the window, sealing for a brief snatch of time the entrance of the glowing moonlight, like a key fits a lock.
Soft, carefully paced steps turned the hallway corner to peer into the cell, just as the moonlight returned to awash the truth in an ethereal glow... but too late to see it.
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His breath caught in an adrenaline-fueled gasp in his throat as Isorfir padded quickly down the twisting corridors, further and further into the stone-carved hallways that were Rivendell. Stone faeries and statues of elves long faded into the mist watched his descent into the east wing, seeing into the motives that kept his heart beating and unbroken.
After several rotations of the clock, Fiothiel's mahogany door stood formidably before him, looming and foreboding. Deciding quickly against knocking, he pushed the door open with two long fingers, stepping in sideways so the door needed not to be opened fully.
Her bed was empty, but his gaze was drawn to the floor-length gauze curtains rippling in the wind's chill breath, like the flags of the Rivendell guard snapped smartly every day. Her silhouette was pronounced from his vantage point, strong-shouldered yet weakened at the same time.
Her mind wandered from thought to thought, like a warrior in a weaponry. Some she dared not linger on, but some tantalized her senses so that they could not be so simply discarded, and instead waited patiently to be fully considered, knowing their full power and their need to be pondered.
The journey of her thoughts was cut short by a hoarse, desperate whisper.
"Fiothiel."
Her hands shook, but from his viewpoint he could see nothing but her unmoving back as he listened to her quiet response.
"An lema, Isorfir? Mani nae lle umien?" Long journey, Isorfir? What took you so long?
Trying hard not to profess shock at her indifferent tone, he continued to close the distance between them.
"Mankoi lle irma sint? I believe you know very well where I was." Why do you want to know?
She turned then, and took in the full sight of him- ragged, with holes torn along the sides of his once magnificent Guard uniform. His cheeks were smeared with dirt and his hair matted, but there was no concealing the aura of regal pride and ethereal beauty that can never be hidden in those of elfkind.
Closing the final length between them, she took his shaking hands in hers and met his unwavering azure glance with a fiery green one of her own.
Again, she spoke, her whole being frozen but her lips.
"Ed' i'ear ar' elenea,by the sea and stars Isorfir, I knew it could never have been you. Astalder,valiant one, we have fought side by side in more battles than I can remember, brought down more foes together than either of us could accomplish in six lifetimes alone."
He brought up a hand in protest, but she gripped it in her own and cut him off with her own commanding voice before he could utter a word.
"Amin caela lle, I know you, and I have spent my days looking for further proof that I am correct in the assumption of your innocence. We do not have much time, and I gather that you have much to tell me, aratoamin, mellonamin. my champion, my friend"
No more words of confirmation needed to be spoken, any emotions left were buried as the two elves embraced fiercely, both gathering bits of strength, basking in the knowledge that they would always have the other by their side, for elven friendships are forged to last forever, to withstand the test of time, and linger for ages, kept even when the call of the ever-persistent sea is answered.
Amin khiluva lle a' gurtha ar' tharI will follow you to death and beyond.
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