Morning Mist
somewhere between the Trollshaws and the Weather Hills, September 18th & 29th TA 3021
Raven's POV
The night I had returned from Joy's pack and entered Rivendell I had been afraid to approach Gildor. I did not feel frightened now, but very nearly. Awkward. I went in search of Faire, knowing we were about to move on at dusk to a near glade where there was more room for a camp. I found her in a pine forest, which was redolent of resin heating in the afternoon sun. Light fell in shafts through the high canopy, making the forest seem larger than it actually was. Late midges danced in the streams of light. This was a slow, leisurely travel, without fights and scouting tours. Faire's long mane and tail flowed smooth and silky, streaming in the wind of her speed when she ran. The paler fur gleamed white, while her dappled legs, rump and shoulders seemed like a shadow about her. In the light and dark play of the forest she looked unearthly, phantom-like as her name, as if she were really two beings.
She was not alone. Gildor stood beside her, looking away into the forest across her back. He wore flowing, silver-grey robes of the kind his people seemed to favour, and he did not do it graciously. More than once I heard him mutter and swear under his breath when he tripped on the hem, rising too fast or catching it on bushes. Why he still wore them I could not say, but I suspected. Running with a pack I would fur if I had the choice – travelling with his people, knowing he would have to stay with them, maybe Gildor was trying to blend in as well.
Gildor and his people sat up during the night. I crouched in the shadows of the forest, away from the faint silver moonlight illuminating the clearing. In long, long years this was the first time that I thought that again. Gildor and his people. The difference between us was clearly visible now, and growing with each step we came closer to the havens.
Whatever they were debating, whatever memories they were sharing, it was things I knew I could not begin to understand. I was as frightened as I had only been once in my life. I was losing my hold again, it seemed, slowly but steadily.
Light wind rustled in the branches. I glanced up at the black net of leaves and twigs swaying in the breeze. It was the same wind that touched the speakers in the clearing, I knew, but somehow it felt as if it blew from another world. One that I was in alone.
Glorfindel's POV
We travelled slow and comfortably, making long camps and enjoying the fair weather. We encountered no danger, except the scars and remains of the long war. The only one always wary and looking for telltale traces was Raven. He relieved most of his tension in hunting, and was always in front, behind and around our company, following trails, bringing back prey, gathering whatever edible things he could find. We never had a night without a sound meal.
Gildor spoke little, but Raven was silent as stone. He avoided any chance that someone might speak to him, and when we rested he was there only during the evening meal. He and Gildor sat side by side then silently, and if they spoke, it was in Raven's own hissing language. When the travellers drifted off into groups, Raven melted into the night and only reappeared either in the morning or if we continued our slow march towards the sea.
Night after night passed. Gildor sat with us, his head bowed, listening. If he was not addressed by name, he would not speak at all. He also kept his own mind carefully shut against us. Though he was nursing more than doubts he never said as much, never tried to stall for time as many others did, slowing the journey to say farewell to what had been our home for centuries. He was torn in two and I knew it, but there was nothing I could do. That was a battle only he could fight. But I feared to think of the outcome.
Then one night, there was a shadow at the edge of the clearing, and the wolf came towards us. He lay down beside Gildor, and rested his head in his lap, closing his eyes. I saw Gildor's hand dig into the thick ruff, but he did not stir otherwise.
When I could bear it no more, I went out at night alone, walking into the high, ancient trees that surrounded us until I was far from the camp. Through the lightening canopy, I could see the clear night-sky, full of stars. There was a time when I had been able to walk out of the light of the Two Trees through a high cleft in the surrounding cliffs, right into the starlit dark over the seas. Soon, there would be such a time again. Regret and relief kept their balance. I, at least, wished to go.
I knelt at the foot of large oak, and let my mind drift until I could feel my own quiet like the calm of a still pond. With my eyes closed, I could see those starlit cliffs. The path was easy to walk.
"Orome…" I whispered "Varda… I plead your counsel. My friends suffer. Is there a sign? Is there hope? Help me, so I can help them"
And then I waited. The quiet surface of the pond that was my mind was not stirred. Around me, fog gathered, swirling thicker and thicker until there was only velvety greyness. I stood in that greyness, and absolute silence. Out of the mist, beyond the mist, I could see shapes, and the shadows of shapes. It was like looking at a tree in dense fog. The span of its branches was visible, but the true shape remained hidden. When I looked down, there were tracks. A straight line, vanishing in the fog, the way a hunting wolf walks. And they were paw-prints.
Late the next morning I intercepted Raven and Gildor as they came down to the stream near our current camp.
"May I have a word with you?" I said "Both of you"
Gildor made a very strange gesture, one I had never seen with him. He turned his head to the side and looked down. It might have been irritation, but he lacked the defiance for that. I reached out to make him raise his head, meet my eyes.
"The future is veiled" I said abruptly "The age of our people is ending, and beyond that, all lies in fog to me. But I speak true, because I saw not for myself but for you. You walk that path into the fog together. But there is only one set of tracks leading to that goal. Wolf tracks. There is hope. Keep to that, both of you"
Gildor swallowed "A shape in the mist…" he whispered "Vague hopes often deceive. More cruelly than despair from the beginning could be"
"Gildor" I almost begged "For once listen to me with an open heart"
"I do" he said quietly after a moment "But I am afraid"
"I…I think so. You must walk that path yourself, and walk it to the end. Go to the edge of the sea, and only then you will know. Face this together. There is no other way. There is only that vague hope of which I cannot see the heart. I only know this: in the end, it will be to your joy"
Gildor looked at me for a long moment, standing there with his arms around Raven. For one moment then, I saw and knew that he was still Calathaura of Valinor as much as he was Kil'thor of wolf clan. He gave a small nod, and finally spoke the ancient words "I hear you. I will heed you"
Raven's POV
I left the camp while everyone else was still asleep. At least, everyone who was not elven. I was fleeing, and would have admitted it had anyone asked.
So far no one had got a chance to do so. There was nothing to say.
Far from the camp I stopped, undressed and shoved the garments into the forked branch of a beech. As wolf, I went further away from the camp without disturbing the quiet of the early morning. Greyish light lay on the land, and a few first birds started to sing.
Between the scattered knolls of trees where we camped were meadows. In the afternoon, these were full of chirping and rustling insects, but right now, the high grasses were glittering with dew, and thick mists curled over the ground.
In the middle of one of these meadows a white horse grazed, leisurely, hardly visible when the light breeze stirred the mist and blew them in shreds across the meadow. I stopped, looking towards Fairё with a feeling of desperation.
Phantoms of the mist and shapes of the night, that is what we have become I thought darkly That is all that will remain.
Glorfindel had spoken of hope, Gildor of despair. I wanted the one as strongly as I felt the other. I considered approaching Faire, but decided against it. She was having her own troubles, her own decisions. The mare was so deep in thought she did not even notice me drifting past her meadow, though the wind was in her favour.
We were both following him, I realized. With the one difference that she could go with him across the sea, and I wouldn't.
Interminable time later we approached the sea. Interminable time later, the sun set.
Our last night.
We had been here before, not so long ago.
Do you forget the hawk, even for a while? –
I had forgotten it, both the hawk and the sea, willingly and with a vengeance. Had wanted to forget it.
Ravens don't cross the sea. Seldom the bent ones, never the straight. That last night we walked away from the others, away from the camp, until we were out of sight of the towers as well.
In silence, without speaking, without thinking as well.
There was nothing to say, no words to say what could be said, maybe should be said.
Wolves seldom ponder. But not even the black could face this without horror, without fright. Before him, before me, everything was dark.
That was a thought, and a threatening one. I cut it off, and stopped thinking again.
Nothing mattered anymore, not what the others thought, not what they might think, see or assume. Anything of that was pointless, worthless, when it was the sea we were facing.
We made love in the dunes, desperately, defiantly, lying together until the sun rose.
There was never a break in the continual, regular roar of the sea. The sun rose, and we had to leave.
Silently once more, clutching each other's hand.
Ravens don't cross the sea. Neither did wolves.
I did not remember reaching the quay, letting go of Gildor's hand, I did not even remember the others walking towards the ship.
At one time I was just standing there and wondering if I should feel despair or hate for the circumstances, because I could see no hope, no matter how I stared into the fog threatening to strangle me.
Ravens don't cross the sea, Fingal had said.
He had been definitely right with that.
The Valar are not fair, so he had also said.
And so far, he had been painfully right with that as well.
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