After leaving her mother, Gellwen climbed the wooden stairs leading to the loft bedroom she shared with her girl cousins. Assuming it would be a long sleepless night, she settled into the corner of the window seat, a pillow propped behind her and a thin blanket over her legs. She intently studied the stars, large and sparkling like clear and gentle eyes in the indigo sky stretching above the silver birches, as though all the answers she sought were written there. It was difficult for her to grasp how in the course of one woodland night they had moved from a shy ballet of understated flirtation to becoming lovers in every sense but the most primitive.
Gellwen thought of how, when he was but a skinny Elf-child, somewhat small for his age, she had loved him, at first simply because she thought he was beautiful. (Or perhaps because he was tranquil? The emotional intensity of a household of Elves, each with a notoriously strong fëa, could be wearying at times, even for an irrepressibly vital Elf-child like Gellwen.) To her childish eyes, Legolas had seemed to glow in the sunlight — golden and, oh, so bright! — and at dusk to reflect what remained of the sun around his head in a nimbus of pearly light.
He watched her as well, with serious wide eyes, while she clowned and flirted. Too well-schooled to speak to older boys directly, she used what methods she could to be noticed. Gellwen observed that he spoke little but thoughtfully during lessons. While she and her brother argued and challenged their teachers, he listened, waiting patiently for the end of a tale or explanation of a precept. Only then would he ask a question, usually an insightful one, not one of those questions that are a sign of careless reading (or much less the reckless passion to express every half-finished thought so common in her home).
Gellwen's grandmother had listened patiently to her confession of childish infatuation. "No. He is little different from you or your brother," she said, and then with a dry laugh, as though amused at a private joke, had added, "Oh, what I could tell you of radiant golden elves, some good and many exceedingly bad. But you are too young for most of those stories. The sunlight and moonlight may love his hair because it is such a bright color. Such an accident of birth is in no way the measure of an Elf. Even if you grow as fair as Luthien, my little one, that will not give you virtue or wisdom. Every Elf-child has the gift of luminous beauty and adults also, if I am to believe the opinion of other races."
Years later, only a few seasons ago, she had again consulted her grandmother explaining she still was fascinated with him and that he was highly regarded by others as well, hoping for her encouragement. That time her grandmother said, "No doubt Legolas Thranduilion carries much good and bad within him as we all do. He is innocent enough now. Perhaps he is a little more cautious than you and your siblings, so at times he may seem less foolish to you! But prudence can be a fault, my dear, just as your impulsiveness can be a virtue. I thank the Valar every day that I did not bind myself to my first love. What terrible suffering that would have brought my family! And, of course, then I would not have had your mother, your aunts, you or any of your cousins, nor spent all those blessed centuries with my dear husband."
Determined, Gellwen told her she was sure Legolas was a decent person. Gellwen guarded her observation that she had repeatedly sensed a surprisingly strange strength in him--astonishing enough that she chose not to speak of it, but consider privately what it might mean. Her grandmother had answered, "I do not doubt his goodness. But remember he is young and has made few choices in his life, which to this point has been simple. Watch and wait, my dear, if you must, but do nothing." She went on to explain that it was perilous for one to consider such attachments at an early age and that perhaps Gellwen listened too much to her older cousins talk nonsense about dances, pretty gowns and courtships. She cautioned her that impetuous choices could be tragically wrong and, for all the heart-wrenching songs and tales, real life tragedy is not romantic. Disquieted that Grandmamma, who had always seemed to know everything, had erred, had mistaken stillness for weakness, Gellwen pushed no further. Neither did she wish to hear more stories of family tragedy and misfortunes thousands of years past.
Gellwen had instead complained that she could not understand why her father guarded her with an energy that seemed incongruent with her by and large successful efforts to behave as her family wished. Truly she was not old enough for betrothal, much less bonding, but she felt she had been protected from even the most naive of flirtations. There had been no privacy for the lighthearted dalliances engaged in by virtually all but the most shy of other girls of similar age and background. There had been no stolen kisses or walks under the stars. Gellwen had pouted saying that one would have thought she was being raised in the midst of barbarians rather than a secluded Elven community where the age and lineage of her family would grant her respect. Her grandmother only shook her head sadly and said, "Your family has suffered many things, fomented by passion and excessive self confidence, that they would prefer not to see repeated, cherished one."
It was not long after that conversation that her grandmother announced to the family that she had grown weary and longed for her grandfather, and left to go West. She told them that she had waited to help her daughters with their families, especially during those years following the loss of so many husbands and brothers, but that she was satisfied she had done her duty and now it was her time to look to herself.
Drawing her knees to her chest as she sat in the window seat, Gellwen thought, "How I wish my grandmother were here with me now to answer my new questions. Did I push Legolas across some line or did he pull me? I wanted his kisses and caresses, but I had not intended to steal his soul, or perhaps unknowingly I did. I know nothing now except that it is too late for caution."
Feeling remote and in need of reassurance, she wondered if she could reach him now. She had heard it could be done. Gellwen strained to focus, to find him. There was no touch, but utter emptiness and the silence of the stars broken only by the whispering of the trees. Finally defeated, she stopped. "How silly!" she thought cynically. She relaxed and let her mind drift, and then, she felt him. He loved her, with an ardent tenderness she now recognized. She responded with a fierce flash of hope, with it arose her joyous longing for him, reaching him in the forest where he watched while, heedless, her brother slept nearby. Unaccustomed to such power, he reflexively hit her back with an ecstatic blow that took her breath away. In the enchantment of this first touch from a distance, Legolas found solace and Gellwen, reassured, drifted into restful unconsciousness.
Rather than suffering an extended and fretful night, Gellwen had awakened refreshed to the homely clatter of cups and pans and the voices of her parents conversing softly in quiet contentment. They stirred themselves before the rest of their household to gain an island of peace for themselves at the start of each day. She caught her name mentioned in melodious ancient Quenya, which Cálale and Aranwë occasionally used when they wished for confidentiality, accustomed as they were to being surrounded by inquisitive Elf-children.
The older children did understand and even speak Quenya. Their grandmother had frequently spoken it, her first tongue. It had remained for her, despite the passage of millenniums, the language of home and family. But even the most fluent speakers of the older youngsters could not follow an overheard conversation without concentration and never, from a distance, so muted an exchange as the one in the kitchen that bright morning. Gellwen thought, "I do not even want try to listen." For the moment, she was at peace. She was satisfied that, although her parents were speaking of her, they did not sound agitated by her late return of the previous night. She was willing to wait for the lecture that she doubtless would receive later.