8. Flurry to Frenzy
Soon Arwen's elf-party moved on from where they had halted for the night, and started to ride up to the mountain's first slopes. She had wrapped up warmly, with more dresses on under her cloak, and she was very glad she did not have to carry her own lantern and get freezing fingers in the process. She rode Ninniach alongside Kelmeleth on Túlisle, and he held a lantern for them both. The other three elves rode ahead of them, Rúmil and Alquaran carrying lights too. In a couple of hours they would have to start searching for the hidden entrance to the elven path, but for now Arwen could talk freely.
"Do you know anything to cheer me up?" Kelmeleth asked her. She frowned and looked at him.
"Why? What's the matter?" she replied, hoping it was not that he had some how found out that she was going to leave him soon. Actually, it would have to be this evening. Tonight! That was much closer than she had anticipated. She had not realised it would be so soon. She felt herself cringe inside with a few nerves.
"Oh, nothing's wrong, it's just I'm freezing cold and stuck out here in the middle of nowhere in the pouring rain with howling winds and about to go up a snow-covered mountain." He grinned and turned towards Arwen. She smiled at his good-natured spirit.
"Sorry, you didn't have to come." She didn't say she sort of wished he had not.
"Ha! You think I would have stayed at my watch on the Wall? No way! To have you go off and leave me there alone, no! It's much better to come out on a little adventure like this, despite the measly weather." Arwen looked back ahead, at the dark figures in front. They seemed to be tilted slightly to one side, by the wind most probably, and the rain was really falling thickly now. It made it look like they were riding through a deep fog reaching its long fingers out to touch them. Not very nice, Arwen thought.
"Why do you have such a long hood, Arwen? I can't see your face." Kelmeleth's question made her jump, and she certainly did not want to tell him why her hood covered her fair face. The other elves ahead might hear, and her answer would certainly give it away that she was leaving them (well, going to try at least). She would have to make certain that they were out of earshot before she told Kelmeleth.
Therefore Arwen decided to ignore this question.
"Do you want that story, then?" she said, hoping he would forget his query.
"Ok, just as long as it isn't a fairytale-like one," he answered, whistling a little tune.
Arwen searched herself for anything. She could tell him something that had happened to her, or something that had happened when she had been with Kelmeleth. They were usually funny. She then remembered one and decided to re-tell it to him.
"I have one, but you should remember it already," she told him. "I think it's good anyway. It is not very long, so if you do not like it that doesn't really matter." Kelmeleth nodded, meaning for her to continue.
"Alright, hmmm, it was my birthday; I can't remember which. And we were sitting on that rock near the silver waterfall, you know, which we get to by walking along the fallen tree?"
"Yes, over Nimrodel, yes, I know where you mean. We used to go there quite a lot."
"Mmmm; so we were both sitting there, and you were plaiting my hair with some blue butterfly ribbons. We were talking about Aragorn, and how I wished he was there for my birthday. It was such a sunny day and I had such wonderful ideas of what we could do there. You thought some of the ideas were quite silly though!"
"What, like sailing in a little boat and then falling out accidentally-on-purpose so that he dives in and rescues you! That was hilarious! Did you realise that your dress would go all clingy and stick right against your skin? Then what would Aragorn think!"
"Shut up!" Arwen laughed, and leaned over to hit him playfully on his arm. "Excuse me, my ideas were very good!" But she kept on laughing still.
It was about then when the rain began to turn to tiny snowflakes, crystals shining white which settled on their cloaks. For a while they both watched it fall, the flurries making their vision blurry. Arwen did not have snow going in her eyes, because of her long hood, but Kelmeleth had quite a problem, seeing as his hood just rested over his long hair. He began to blink about five hundred times a minute.
"Right," Arwen said, trying to get back to what she had been saying before Kelmeleth's disruption, "then we went on to talk of the time I had led Aragorn to Cerin Amroth. He did not even realise what was bringing him there. I remember he looked so cute, following his heart's love there. And then I told you that when he saw me and we held each other at last, he said he would bind himself to me, forever." She fell silent.
Kelmeleth looked at her, and then away. "You said that you cleaved your heart to his, didn't you?" he said. Arwen nodded, her throat feeling rather swollen. Aragorn had been so sweet. She hoped he still was. "Yes, and then I explained how-" she stumbled over her words, feeling a little shy, "- how we kissed." She turned to see how Kelmeleth reacted.
"You actually gave me a very good impression of your kissing, Arwen," he said, trying to sound serious. "You appeared to have had such a brilliant time for you to tell me how his lips felt and what his tongue did." Arwen smiled. "You actually tried to describe the smell of his hair and how his hands felt when he held you." Arwen burst out into fits of giggles, and Kelmeleth raised his eyebrows briefly, "You really did love him to say that!"
"Kelmeleth, I still do!" she replied (with difficulty), "and I can remember how our kiss felt, thank you very much! It's more than you can say!" she teased him.
"That's not fair! You had a whole two hundred years head start!" He watched her in earnest. "You were bound-"
Arwen cut him off. "You have been constantly chased, actually chased, by elf-maidens, ever since you were born. You can hardly complain, Kelmeleth." There was a satisfying silence. She smiled and looked away into the mist of snowflakes. They were getting bigger in size now and the three elves ahead appeared as if they had actually fallen off their horses and rolled about in the snow for a few minutes, and then clambered back on like furry snowmen. Arwen honestly thought they looked quite odd. But the horses looked perfectly fine though.
"What happened next?" Kelmeleth asked, trying to veer away unnoticeably. "What did I do? Did I say I could sense your vivid happenings with Aragorn myself?" He knew he was nearing the edge again, but it was very funny when Arwen could not bear it any longer.
"Actually, you did say something. Don't you remember what it was?"
Kelmeleth frowned. "No, I… wait! It wasn't … no!"
"Yes!" Arwen laughed happily, "Yes, you did! You specifically said-" she took a deep breath, "- 'Did you make love with Aragorn?'!" She broke down helplessly, as Kelmeleth snorted and howled with laughter.
"And, then…" he said, struggling to talk at all, "then… well, what happened next was very simple: you fell into the river!" They laughed together, for seemingly ages, until their chests hurt and their throats ached. Arwen tried to wear a straight face and was determined to not look at Kelmeleth. He would only do something to crack her up again. She did admit though that even she had found it incredibly amusing at the time, though very shocking at his nosiness.
"You did actually have a problem with your dress after that, Arwen," Kelmeleth stated, with a broad grin on his face, leaving Arwen shaking her head to restrain herself from bubbling fits of giggles.
"Be quiet, Kelmeleth!" she hissed, as ahead Lirë turned round with a smile to look briefly at the two of them. "Shhhh! I don't want the whole of Arda to know about this! But my answer was No, as you should clearly have realised from my reaction. My love is actually something deep inside me, not a thing to talk about to other people uninvolved." She looked fixedly at Kelmeleth.
"I'm sorry about that," he said sheepishly, "I suppose being polite did not enter my head at that moment. I was just interested. Anyway, we are all here now and well. Aren't we?"
Arwen did not reply but stared ahead into the darkness littered with falling snow.
"Arwen?" She glanced down. It was then that Kelmeleth realised why she was hesitant.
"Sorry, Aragorn's not here is he?"
Arwen looked up. Maybe she should warn Kelmeleth now what she was going to do.
"Kelmeleth, I –"
But Arwen broke off suddenly. Rúmil had dropped back and slowed his horse down so that he came alongside Arwen and Kelmeleth. He turned to greet them with a smile.
"What was all that noise back there?" he asked, still smiling. Seeing he was not going to get a reply he carried on. "Lirë thinks that we should dismount here, for he says he recognises the high-rising cliffs. The entrance is near, and we will have to lead our horses up the path. I remember it being very narrow."
He pulled on his horse's reigns, and together the three of them halted and leapt down. Alquaran and Rúmil realised what was happening and they too jumped from their horses. Arwen found in surprise that the white snow had already settled, very quickly, and that when she began to lead Ninniach gently along, his hooves only skimmed the top of the snow, and no grass or stones underneath were uncovered. Her horse was blinking rapidly against the blasts of snow and finding it difficult to see.
Arwen was glad was not constricted by having to hold a lantern, as even though it was in her nature to appear graceful, she did like to jump on the snow and feel the soft but satisfying crunching underneath. She was pleased the others could not see her through the snowfall, for as her father would no doubt say, it was 'unladylike' to do such things. Arwen did not see why she should not enjoy herself while she could at any rate. To walk along normally was boring. And basically a complete waste of a brilliant opportunity.
The elves walked closer to the white cliff wall now, their three silver lanterns illuminating the snow very brightly. Lirë was looking closely at the rough wall, finding it hard to trace the small opening. Alquaran brought him one of the lamps and they both talked together in hushed voices. Meanwhile Arwen thought she could see Kelmeleth trying to write his name in the snow with one of his feet, but finding it rather tricky to keep up with the number of letters, and his own horse. Rúmil's tall form was barely visible a few metres away alongside, but she could just about see that he had one hand outstretched to catch the twinkling snowflakes. Well, she was not the only one to enjoy the snow then.
"Arwen?" Alquaran called, and she came up to him and Lirë, who had a confused look on his face. Behind, Arwen could hear Kelmeleth's horse neighing impatiently at his stumbles, and next to her Rúmil brought his horse nearby.
"I was sure it was somewhere around here," Lirë sighed, "it is just hard to see through the snow, and also there has been a disturbance very recently here." Arwen's eyes widened. A disturbance. The Rangers! They had passed by here! That was very good.
She did not bother to listen to Lirë anymore, she just followed the other elves along, basically like Kelmeleth, except he was drawing crude shapes with his feet in the snow and not thinking hard like Arwen. She really needed to plan what she was to do. She would have to do something very soon, otherwise the distance between them and the Rangers would be too great. She already knew she would not be able to take Ninniach – it would give too much away to the Rangers. And she needed to tell Kelmeleth.
"What time of the night is it?" she suddenly asked. Alquaran turned round thoughtfully.
"Erm, I think we are about halfway through the journey, maybe a bit less. We still have a few hours yet. We can have something to eat as we go along." He smiled and then turned back to Lirë.
She would have to be very careful then. As soon as she noticed the lights of the Dunedain party below, she would have to do something about half an hour or maybe slightly more afterwards. But she would have to get it exactly right, so that she was down on their road before sunrise, when the Rangers would stop, but not before, otherwise she would have a big problem. She needed them to find her, not her to find them.
"Yes!" she heard Lirë shout, "Ai! I have found it!" Arwen glanced up and even Kelmeleth stopped dancing strangely to have a look. There was a thin split in the cliff face, almost hidden by overhanging rocks like bundles of vines, except they blended in perfectly with the rest of the snow surrounding it. Only the shadows thrown by the lanterns revealed its hiding place, and as Arwen peered between the other elves' shoulders, she could just discern a worn flight of grey stairs disappearing under a sheltering archway.
Lirë lead the way up first, still with the horses, then Arwen followed with Kelmeleth behind her, and then came Rúmil with Alquaran last, checking that no one was following them. Arwen found herself in a sort of tunnel, except that it climbed steadily upwards, and it was not at all constricting inside, but still with fresh cool air and lots of room to move through; though admittedly the horses did not seem too happy. The walls were roughly cut out of soft grey coloured stone, but Arwen was not sure that if a proper bright light was shone on it, the hue would actually be snowy white. The steps were smooth and undemanding, and yet the elves found it very easy to climb up quite a height.
The tunnel was not long however, and Arwen soon stepped out into the open air again, and back to being sprinkled with snow. They were now on a ledge, quite a wide one, and it swept around the edge of the mountain like a creamy ribbon. The cliff face was much closer now in comparison to before, and the path was not very wide, just enough for two people and their two horses to walk abreast. The rocks above overhung some of the little road, but they did not do much in the way of shelter, for the snow was shooting at the elves and horses from the side, and at such a gathering force that the horses' manes stood up on end in the wind and their ears twitched to shake the tickling snow out.
Arwen was hoping that they would get back on their horses, but unfortunately Lirë did not say that they could, so instead the elves trudged along through the snow, the first elf cutting a way through the gathering drifts. It seemed much colder up here and more prominent to the wind. The chill was almost unearthly, for Arwen had never experienced snow when it was falling in this way. Usually it just lightly drizzled in Lórien, and when she had travelled over the mountains before, her party had escaped the heavy snowfalls and had an easy journey, in perfect conditions one might say. This was very different, and after a while the novelty wore off and Arwen's main priority was to keep her hands warm, as well as straining to think of how to escape.
Arwen's trailing and hopeless thoughts were disturbed by a snuffling sound. Kelmeleth appeared next to her, and gave a loud sneeze at the same time as his hood fell back. Arwen was quite relieved she now had a chance to talk to him, quickly before the others could change the situation. All Arwen hoped was that she didn't catch his train of sneezes.
"Kelmeleth?" she asked him, and he turned to face her with a surprising smile on his face. She had thought he would start frowning with the weather turning specifically against him.
"Yes?" he answered, "are you alright? It is not actually fair; you are nearer the cliff wall than me. I get all the blasts of snow in my face, and you hardly get any!"
"Kelmeleth," Arwen said again, "I need to talk to you quickly. The others must not hear, or I am living in foolish hope," she pressed on. Kelmeleth nodded slowly, his eyes showing a rather suspicious understanding, with anticipation of what was coming.
"Ok," she whispered, or spoke in as hushed a voice as she could get to reach Kelmeleth's elven ears (which was quite quiet at any rate), "we are not actually going to Rivendell." She looked at him anxiously to see what his reaction would be. It was certainly not what she had expected.
"Oooh! Goodie! Where are we going then? Are we going on an adventure, or going camping in the Wild?" he asked her with a happy grin on his face. "Or are we going to somewhere near Rivendell, or passing it by to go to somewhere like, I don't know, the Grey Havens perhaps?" Kelmeleth had barely poked a toe out of Lothlórien, and was now exceptionally happy to be going somewhere which he did not know where. That place was not hard to be, seeing as he had no idea where anything was outside of the Golden Wood, except which way was mountains and which way was river.
"Um, no Kelmeleth," Arwen said with sustained apprehension, "we aren't going near Rivendell. And we are not going to the Havens or any other elvish place." The smile on his face fell slightly. "I'm really sorry, but I have tricked you. I have tricked you all."
Kelmeleth looked at her with a very confused expression on his face. He had one eyebrow curved up and the other had sunk down. He looked lopsided really. A strange complexion on an elf. "Arwen, I don't actually get it. What's going on then? Did you just come to be in the snow?"
"No, Kelmeleth. Um, please promise me though that you won't tell anyone what I am just about to reveal to you. Please." She looked at him worriedly, and hoping he would react calmly to what she needed to tell him.
"Ok," he replied slowly, "but please don't make it sound horrible. I don't want everything to go wrong. And I'm very confused anyway, so please tell me!"
"Right. Here we go." Arwen took a deep breath and adjusted her hood over her face. "Right. I told my grandparents that I was coming to visit my father. That is also what Lirë, Alquaran and Rúmil think. But I'm not going there. They believed me that we are. I came because I… because I saw the Dunedain Rangers come through Lothlórien two days ago; and I saw Aragorn. Kelmeleth," she pleaded, "I have to see him! I have to be with him! I can not bear to stay apart from him any longer. He is me, he has my hope and my heart and my love. He is my dreams. I have to be with Aragorn."
Kelmeleth watched her. "I understand," he said softly, "I see now. But, when are you going? I don't particularly want to be here if you aren't. I may as well go home now, once I have built an igloo."
Arwen sighed and looked down at the swirling snow around her feet, like beautiful swan feathers. "I have to leave soon. Well, what I mean is, tonight. This morning. Before dawn, I will need to have left the camp. When I see their lights below, I will know I should leave us about half an hour later. I must climb down the cliff to their path and be there before they come. I suppose they must find me lying in the snow, as if I am injured. But I can not climb there too late, for I cannot survive out here for a whole night on my own. They have to find me."
Kelmeleth smiled and looked away at the thickly-coated mountain. "But," he said, in his 'cunning' voice as he liked to call it, "how are you going to get to him? Don't think that Alquaran won't notice that you have disappeared!"
"I know. I will need your help once I have gone, to say something like you think I have just gone on ahead, or fled home. You have to keep them docile for at least one day. I should be safe after that. I will just slip away once they aren't looking, which won't be too hard after tonight's hard work through all this snow." She brushed her feet through the snow, making it spray up in a fan shape in front of herself.
"Arwen!" Kelmeleth said, "have you not realised? You can't wait till sunrise! That's too late – the Rangers will all be asleep by the time you get down onto their path. You must leave before then!"
"No!" Arwen exclaimed, realising now her mistake. "Oh dear, that makes everything even more tight. It means that after I see them below, I have to somehow make us stop way before usual time and then escape without anyone seeing."
"I can see you go Arwen," Kelmeleth stated, rather obviously, and unnecessarily. Arwen looked at him scathingly.
"Oh, this is so hard, Kelmeleth!" she moaned. "All I want to do is see Aragorn, and I have all this to break through." She sighed, with basic exhaustion. "It's not even as if it is an easy journey. We have to follow along at this speed, which is fairly reasonable on normal lands, but in this deep snow which rises ever higher and seems to want to pull you over it is not fun. We can't ride the horses as it is too slippery for them and they would get even more agitated. It is pitch black and it is freezing and I am hungry and I am tired and my feet hurt. Is there really any hope for me?"
Kelmeleth looked at her with concern in his smooth face. He blinked his caring eyes and smiled weakly. "Yes," he said, quietly to her, "yes, I think there is hope." Arwen looked up at him and he reached out an arm. He brought her into a momentary hug and held Arwen close. She felt his comforting words seep into her tired self.
"Yes," he said again. "Arwen, you will be with Aragorn soon."
