Chapter Seven: Olos
She dreamed she was dozing somewhere warm. Sunlight dappled across her closed eyelids and filled her half-asleep mind with soft gold. She felt herself smile, and someone behind her moved closer and put their arm around her.
Azshar sighed and edged back so his chest was flush against her back. She felt him press his face into the crook of her neck and sigh.
'I didn't hear you come in last night,' she whispered sleepily.
'You were sleeping. I didn't want to wake you,' he replied, his lips moving against her skin.
'Did you sleep at all?'
'A little.'
'You should sleep more, melda,' she chided, half-opening her eyes. She was lying in a soft bed that faced an open balcony. She could see snow-crested mountains, and the gentle breeze that blew in was cool. 'I worry for you.'
The arm thrown over her found her hand and tugged at it. 'Turn around,' he said.
Smiling, Azshar wriggled around in the bed to face him, and before she could draw breath, he was kissing her, his arms drawing her into him until she felt they'd become one creature.
'No one has ever worried for me as you worry for me,' he breathed against her lips.
She was woken by a knock at the door, and she sat up in the bed with a gasp, disoriented and grasping for the dagger at her hip. Then she remembered she was in Rivendell, and she exhaled shakily.
She rubbed her fingertips together. The memory of warmth had remained from her dream, and it was slowly ebbing from her now.
Another gentle knock came at the door, and she got up to answer it, pushing her hair back in an effort to make it look less like she'd just woken up. Erestor was waiting outside, carrying a tray of food and a pile of garments over one arm.
'Ah,' he said, his eyes crinkling with his smile. 'She wakes.'
Azshar blushed. 'I'm sorry. I think I might have been more tired by our journey than I let on.'
'No need to apologise,' Erestor said. 'Might I come in?' Azshar stepped back to let him through the doorway, and he placed the tray of food on a table before laying out the clothing.
'I tried to wake you an hour ago to invite you to the dinner Lord Elrond is holding for your friends the dwarves,' Erestor said, only the faintest hint of snideness in the word friends, 'but it seemed you were sleeping too soundly. I thought you might prefer to eat here.'
'Thank you,' Azshar said, looking at the food longingly. But she did feel a pang at the thought of the dwarves eating without her; she hadn't done a thing without them for weeks on end now, and being alone was… frightning.
'I brought clothing as well. Perhaps tomorrow we can get you to a seamstress, but in the meantime, these should fit.'
She nodded her thanks, suddenly feeling overwhelmed. Clothes from the seamstress, because she was staying here. This beautiful, quiet place was supposedly her new home. She had a room, a bed, a fireplace and no memories. She sighed. She had too much to think about.
Erestor seemed to sense as much, because he smiled again, the movement crinkling his eyes in a way that showed his good-naturedness. 'I will let you be, Azshar,' he said. 'Ask for me if you need for anything.'
'Thank you,' she murmured. 'I will.'
He left the room, closing the door behind him. Quiet fell. Azshar collapsed into one of the chairs at the small table, staring at the food. The small amount of sleep she'd had since getting to the room had done very little to ease her exhaustion, and her eyes itched with the urge to close again.
But…
Sleeping meant dreaming, and she was still reeling from the memory that had just unveiled itself. She hadn't just had a family, she'd had… a person. She wished she had caught a glimpse of his face before he'd kissed her. Had she been married? Betrothed? Simply in love?
Even though she knew they were empty, she held up her hands to check her fingers for rings. There was nothing there, of course – but she'd never felt anything more real than the embrace of the faceless man in her memory. She shivered, recalling his fingers trailing across her belly, his face pressed into her shoulder. She'd felt loved.
With a pang, she wondered if he was out there looking for her. If he missed her, if he wondered where she'd been all these years.
Suddenly, she remembered the elf she'd seen in Bree. He'd recognised her, and his reaction to seeing her again had clearly been emotional. She inhaled sharply. What if he was the man who loved her? What if he'd been looking for her all this time? What could have happened between them to have gone from the warmth and love from her memory to the panicked, affectionless meeting in Bree?
She pushed the food away, her appetite gone. She was too tired to contemplate this now; instead, she got up and went back to the bed. This time, she paused long enough to take off her boots and her belt before throwing herself down and closing her eyes.
Her last lucid thought was the realisation that the empty feeling in her chest still hadn't returned. She felt… just fine.
She was hanging from the top of the cliff, pain the only thing she knew. It was raining, but she barely felt the icy drops drive into her skin. All she felt was agony. She wanted to die.
She could hear someone next to her, groaning, but she didn't have the strength to look up to see who it was. And suddenly, unbelievable pain shot like bolts of lightning through her arm and shoulder to the rest of her body.
The man next to her was screaming, and she joined him, their voices rising into a crescendo of agony.
She woke with a ragged shout, her dark room illuminated only by the dim light of the crescent moon, shining through the window. It was near dawn, so she'd been sleeping for hours. Her throat was raw, and wincing, she realised that she'd been screaming aloud.
She sat up in bed, feeling like crying. Her hands were shaking, and she thought maybe her right shoulder ached. She ran a hand over her face and turned to the side –
And froze. Something had glinted in the moonlight.
She lunged over to where she'd tossed her belt and scrambled to draw her knife, spinning unsteadily to face her would-be attacker. Her breath was caught in her throat. An elf stepped out of the shadows, in his hands the naked blade that had caught her eye in the silver light. It was one of the elves that had formed the welcoming party to Rivendell, the one with the dark eyes. She couldn't remember his name.
Azshar fell into a ready stance, her heart thumping in her chest. 'What are you doing here?' she hissed.
The elf bent and laid the long knife on the ground. 'I didn't come here to hurt you,' he said. His voice was deep and totally devoid of emotion. She blinked.
'Forgive me if I do not believe you,' she said, not moving. He took a slow step forward, further into the moonlight. His face was like a mask, as unreadable as his voice.
'I heard screams.'
She blushed, suddenly understanding, and lowered her dagger. 'Oh.'
'I didn't realise you were – dreaming,' he said. She winced. 'If I had, I wouldn't have come.'
'Right,' she said. 'Of course. I'm sorry to have woken you.'
He nodded once, accepting her apology, but his eyes didn't stray from her face, and he made no move to leave the room. She sheathed her dagger, beginning to feel uncomfortable under his scrutiny.
'What is your name?' she asked quietly. He blinked.
'Glorfindel.' Golden hair, Azshar translated in her head. His hair was blonde, although it appeared more silver in the moonlight. It wasn't long and tied back like many of the other elves' hair, but cut short to curl above his shoulders. 'Who are you?'
Azshar started at his question. 'I… don't know.'
'You don't know?' Glorfindel said, his lip curling with something like faint derision. She shook her head.
'I have no memory. I really don't know.'
A flash of surprise showed on his face, and he took another step closer. He was quite tall, Azshar noticed, and even if he didn't mean to be, he was a threatening presence. He had an aura of power that unsettled her.
'How did you come across a Gondolin-forged knife?' he asked. She glanced down at the dagger in her hand.
'How do you know it isn't mine?' she asked, almost defensively.
'Because I lived in Gondolin,' he replied flatly, 'and I don't know you.'
Azshar looked down. 'I found it in a troll-cave,' she said, holding it out to him. 'It was collecting dust, so I took it. But if you want it, it's yours.'
Glorfindel stared at her for a second, then he shook his head. 'Better you have it than a troll,' he said coldly. Then he turned on his heel and left the room, closing the door behind her. Azshar stared after him, frowning in bewilderment.
Unable and reluctant to try sleeping again, Azshar washed in a tub she found tucked away in her room, weeks' worth of dirt coming off in the cold water. Belatedly, she realised it was the first time she'd washed since she'd left the cave. That thought made her shudder, and she scrubbed until the water was brown.
Then she donned one of the dresses Erestor had left for her and wandered the corridors of Rivendell until the sun rose. A little after dawn, she finally found the dwarves. They had all woken and were glancing hopefully around for breakfast.
'Is that…' Bofur whispered as she rounded the corner to the patio where they were camped.
'Azshar!' Ori exclaimed. The thirteen dwarves and one hobbit all craned their necks to get a look, and Azshar put her hands on her hips.
'What?'
'You look different,' Kíli said thoughtfully.
'I washed,' she replied drily.
'And she's got on a dress,' Glóin added. Óin made a face of disgust.
'She looks elvish,' Dori remarked. There was a mutter of agreement, and everyone went back to discussing breakfast. Azshar sighed and went to sit down next to Bilbo.
'Good morning,' the hobbit yawned. Even after weeks of travelling, he was still something of a late sleeper. 'You're not getting along with your new elf friends?'
She blinked. 'I haven't really had the chance to make any elf friends, to be honest.'
'We all thought you must have been with them last night when you weren't at dinner,' Bilbo said. When she shook her head, he shrugged. 'Nothing very interesting happened anyway. It was terribly awkward, because Thorin wouldn't stop glaring at the elves. Gandalf and Elrond got along just fine, and I thought most of the elves were very friendly, except the blonde one who looked like he wanted to murder us all. But he was an outlier.'
'Glorfindel, no doubt,' Azshar muttered. She supposed she could consider it relieving that he seemed to hate everybody, and not just her.
'Then Thorin, Gandalf and Elrond went off to read a map or something,' Bilbo went on. 'And the scary elf – Glorfindel, you said? – left. And we had a food fight.'
'The poor elves,' Azshar said.
Bilbo nodded. 'Anyway, we've been invited to a late lunch again today, and I'm looking forward to it. You know, dwarves don't seem to eat badly as a rule, but there's something about elvish cooking – a touch more delicacy, perhaps – that I think makes it…'
He began rambling about food. Azshar listened in good faith for ten minutes before patting the hobbit on the shoulder and going to sit next to Nori. The dwarf greeted her with a raised eyebrow and a gruff nod.
'How lovely of you to grace us with your presence after abandoning us at dinner last night,' he said with a smirk.
Azshar smiled. 'It wasn't by design,' she said. 'I fell asleep.'
'Unsurprising, considering how long you managed to go without it on the road,' Nori said. 'I don't suppose you had any… scary dreams?'
She winced. 'I had the nightmare. I, uh… was screaming, and an elf came into my room with his knife drawn, thinking I was being attacked,' she told him in a low voice. The memory of it made her cringe with embarrassment.
'That's hard, lass,' Nori said sympathetically. 'Did the elf say anything?'
'Not much,' she replied. 'Have you met Glorfindel yet? Short hair and a stare that could curdle milk?'
'Aye, we ate with him last night. As sweet and amicable as an itchy dragon, he was.'
'And now I'm expected to live here, with him down the corridor listening to me scream like a frightened child.'
'So you're staying,' Nori said, raising an eyebrow. 'When were you planning to let us know?'
'I was only told yesterday, and I haven't seen you since,' she retorted.
'I suppose the elves think they can help you recover your memory?'
She sighed, burying her face in her hands. 'Not really. But…' she trailed off, and Nori nudged her.
'But what?'
She lowered her voice to a whisper so they weren't overheard. 'Gandalf and Elrond know who I am, and they're keeping it a secret from me.'
Nori tugged at his beard. 'So… what are you gaining from living here, then?'
'I don't know.'
'Hm,' he said, sitting back and looking thoughtful. Azshar put her face back in her hands.
She'd expected too much from Rivendell. The relentless craving to find the missing parts of her memory, and the constant bewilderment and discombobulation from not knowing who she was, hadn't abated. It wasn't that she wanted to remember her past, but that she needed to.
But in Rivendell, the place where her problems were supposed to have been solved, she'd been told that she had to wait decades, perhaps centuries, so that her memories could return by themselves. It made her want to cry.
If she left Rivendell with the dwarves, she wouldn't have to tiptoe around Elrond and the unknown number of elves who knew her, who were keeping her identity secret. If she was travelling, she might come across something that would trigger a dangerous influx of memories, it was true – but half of her was wondering if it would be so bad after all.
Besides, Elrond hadn't said it would definitely kill her.
'Look, one day living amongst the elves and she's depressed,' Dwalin sniggered. 'Let this be a lesson to us all.'
Azshar lifted her head out of her hands and couldn't help but smile. 'At least they smell better than you.'
'How rude,' sniffed Bombur.
'She has a point, lads,' Balin said. 'Anyone for a dip in that fountain down there?'
Everyone – except Thorin, who was much too regal – was for it. Azshar was treated to the horrifying sight of dwarves beginning to undress before she turned away with an undignified snort of laughter. Thorin merely raised an eyebrow before pulling out a map and studying it intensely.
To their credit, the dwarves smelled and looked a good deal better after their fountain bath. Bofur had decorated Bifur and Bombur's beards with little yellow daisies, and Dwalin's bald head shone like burnished copper in the midday sun.
The company trouped to Elrond's lunch together when Erestor came to find them. He shot Azshar a smile when he caught sight of her among them, and she stepped around Balin and Fíli, who were discussing the best way to conceal a knife in one's sleeve, so she could talk to the elf.
'Hello, Azshar,' Erestor said. 'I'm glad you were able to find your friends.'
'I hope you weren't looking for me,' she replied. 'I woke early.'
'Not at all,' he said with a smile. 'But I hope you are hungry. Lord Elrond is looking forward to speaking with you again at our meal… as is Glorfindel.'
Azshar's heart skipped a beat, and she almost stumbled on the smooth walkway. Erestor was watching her surreptitiously, as though trying to gauge a reaction. She tried not to frown. Had Glorfindel told him about her screaming in her sleep last night?
'I haven't… properly met him yet,' she said carefully, and the curious light in Erestor's eyes faded into something like pity.
'Well, you will have the pleasure today, Valar willing.'
'Is Glorfindel someone I ought to know?' Azshar asked casually.
'Glorfindel is a very great elf,' Erestor said, his easy smile back in place. 'He is very old and very powerful, and though he has a… harsh demeanour, he is a good man. Don't let him scare you away.'
'Of course,' she said, remembering Glorfindel's cold stare from the night before, and still unsure as to how much Erestor knew about what had happened when he'd broken into her room to… save her? Stop her? She decided to change the subject.
'Could you tell me what language we're speaking?'
'Right now?' Erestor asked, taken aback.
'I can't quite seem to remember what it's called, or how I know how to speak it,' she said with a slightly aggrieved smile.
'We are speaking Sindarin, the language of the elves of Middle-earth,' Erestor said.
'So… not Quenya?'
'Quenya is a much older language, from which Sindarin formed, but it isn't spoken much by anyone who remains in Arda.'
'Arda?' she asked, frowning.
'Middle-earth, that is.'
She nodded slowly. 'Right. I don't know how my mind has decided which things I can remember and which things I don't, but it can be hard keeping up.'
Erestor smiled at her. 'Any time you have a question about anything, find me and I will be more than happy to answer you.'
Despite the fact that she suspected he was hiding something from her, Azshar couldn't help but return Erestor's smile.
Their conversation ended when they arrived at a wide courtyard, surrounded by stone archways that were covered in flowering vines. Like everything else in Rivendell, it was beautiful. Elrond was already seated at the head of a long, rectangular table, and Gandalf was sitting at his left, their heads were bowed in conversation. They looked up quickly when the group entered.
'Welcome, my friends,' Elrond said, standing and gesturing to the chairs that lined the table. 'Please be seated.'
Thorin predictably chose the chair at the opposite end of the table to Elrond, the position from which he could best glare at his host. The rest of the dwarves filled up, and Nori beckoned for Azshar to sit between him and Ori – until Gandalf cleared his throat.
'I've saved a seat for you here, Azshar,' he said, gesturing to the chair next to him. Azshar resignedly made her way up to sit down beside him. She hadn't forgotten what she'd overheard at Elrond's door the day before, and she certainly wasn't ready to meekly accept Gandalf's secret-keeping.
'Hello, wizard,' she said, and his lips twitched into a smirk.
'How did you sleep?' he asked, and she schooled her expression into one of casual indifference, wondering exactly how many people Glorfindel had told about her screaming episode.
'As well as I could manage, thank you,' she replied, and turned to face the table. Erestor had sat at Elrond's right, and the only empty chair left at the table was directly opposite Azshar.
Seconds later, Glorfindel strode in, eyeing the dwarf-filled table with cold apathy. He stopped when he reached Elrond, not noticing Azshar – or perhaps simply not bothering to acknowledge her. She frowned.
'You summoned me?' he asked in quiet Sindarin. Elrond gestured to the chair opposite Azshar.
'Only to have lunch. Please, sit down.'
Glorfindel held Elrond's eyes for a moment, as though silently begging him to rescind his invitation. But Elrond held his ground, and after a beat, Glorfindel turned and went to sit down. Azshar thought of how Erestor had described him as a very powerful elf. Glorfindel did move with a certain grace that hinted he could hold his own in battle.
He looked up and caught sight of her. For a split second his mask was down, and Azshar saw a flash of… confusion? Wariness? But then his shields came up again. He blinked and looked away.
Azshar decided to ignore him and eat. She served herself an assortment of tomatoes, cucumbers, little carrots and salted potatoes, noticing with a smile that the dwarves had elected to ignore the greener options and had taken nearly all the rabbit and venison. Bilbo was eating potatoes with a dreamy smile, his eyes closed in bliss.
She looked up from her food when Gandalf drew his sword – the one he'd taken from the trolls' cave – to show Elrond, who took it and held it up to the light, examining the blade and the hilt carefully.
'This is a very old sword,' he said, turning it over. 'Very old, but beautifully made, and still perfectly functional.'
'All of which I could tell myself, my friend,' Gandalf said. 'What about the runes? And who do you think forged it?'
Elrond examined the blade just underneath the hilt, where the sword's name was written in runes. 'Glamdring,' Elrond said. 'Foe-hammer, this sword is called. Glorfindel, do you recognise it?'
Azshar glanced across at Glorfindel, who looked supremely uninterested in the conversation. 'Yes,' he said. 'It belonged to Turgon.'
'Turgon was the king of Gondolin, an elven kingdom in the First Age,' Gandalf explained to Azshar. She realised that he, Erestor and Elrond were watching her to see what she would say – or, perhaps, to see if it recalled any memory in her. She racked her brain, but there was no sensation of memories returning, or torn pieces of her mind knitting back together.
'That blade was forged by Ecthelion of Gondolin, Lord of the House of the Fountain,' Glorfindel spoke up, his dark blue eyes trained on the sword. 'It had a sister called Orcrist.'
'Thorin,' Gandalf called. 'Did you bring your new sword to lunch?'
Thorin barely refrained from rolling his eyes at the silly question. He drew his sword and passed it to Balin, who passed it to Óin, who passed it to Kíli, who passed it to Bifur, who nearly dropped it before passing it to Glorfindel. Glorfindel stared down at it in silence for a moment before nodding.
'This was Ecthelion's,' he said quietly. 'Someone must have ransacked the city after Morgoth drove us out and burned it to the ground.'
He passed the sword back. Then his eyes darted up to find Azshar's, and she suddenly remembered the dagger that was sheathed at her hip. She reached down and drew it out, wordlessly offering it to Glorfindel. He took it, and to Azshar's right, Gandalf and Elrond exchanged a glance.
Glorfindel examined the knife with a faraway expression, tracing his thumb over the topaz embedded in its hilt. Then he passed it to Elrond, who brought it closer to his face.
'Picarca,' he read. 'It means "little tooth" in Quenya.'
'Odd for a dagger to have a name, no?' Gandalf said.
'And odd for it to be in Quenya,' Elrond said, handing the knife back to Azshar. She stared at it for a moment before putting it back in its sheath. 'Is it also the work of Ecthelion, Glorfindel?'
Glorfindel shook his head. 'I don't think so,' he said emotionlessly. 'Same forge, same metals, but a different smith.'
'It seems you are no stranger to swordplay, Azshar,' Elrond said. 'I know my sons will welcome you should you wish to spar with them.'
Azshar nodded numbly, the cold reality of her situation returning. She was expected to live in a settlement of people who knew who she was, but who were keeping it a secret from her. She was expected to stay there for decades. Centuries. She curled her hands into loose fists under the table.
She couldn't do it. She couldn't bear the pressure.
The rest of the lunch passed smoothly, with the exception of Thorin continuing to glare at Elrond, and two potatoes being thrown – one at Bombur for burping especially loudly, and one at Dori for swearing.
The sun was low in the sky when Elrond finally stood. The dwarves tramped off back to their patio, discussing another dip in the fountain. Bilbo asked Erestor shyly if he might be shown where the library was.
Azshar moved to stare pensively out over the valley, fingering the hilt of the dagger at her side. The setting sun bathed the waterfalls in golden-orange light. There was a faint breeze, and she could smell the sweet perfume of the flowers that were growing on the vines around her.
It eventually registered that the sounds of conversation had faded into silence, and she was alone in the courtyard. She closed her eyes for a moment, feeling the soft, late sunlight on them – just as she had in her dream the night before. The dream about someone she'd left behind. Someone from before.
Sighing, she opened her eyes and turned to leave the courtyard – only to inhale sharply and freeze as she realised Glorfindel had been there the whole time, watching her.
He didn't move as she waited for her heartrate to ease and then slowly made her way towards him. 'What is it?' she asked warily.
His stony face gave nothing away, and there was a long moment before he spoke. 'Have you really lost your memory?'
She blinked. 'I… yes. I have.'
'How much of it?'
She frowned at him. 'How much?'
'You remember how to speak both Sindarin and Westron,' he said quietly, almost accusatorially. 'You know that you're an elf, you clearly have some instinct of how to fight. How does that come from a person with no memory?'
She paused. He was right. 'Elrond said that we are forever shaped by what we have experienced, even if we forget it,' she said hesitantly. 'Perhaps it's… that. Shadows of my past.'
Glorfindel took a step closer to her. His eyes still betrayed no hint of emotion – except, now, a touch of suspicion. 'What shadows, then? What do you remember?'
Her instincts were telling her to reach for her dagger, but she held her ground, deciding she had nothing to lose by being honest, if only partially. 'There are – flashes. My early childhood in a city. The voice of my mother. My brother, lifting me up. That's all.'
He held her gaze for a breath before pursing his lips. She exhaled quietly; it seemed he believed her. Then she remembered all the pointed looks she'd been receiving, and she narrowed her eyes at him and took a step forward, deciding it was her turn.
'How many people did you tell about last night?' she asked, her voice hard. 'About the nightmare, and the – the screaming?'
He blinked at her. 'No one,' he said quietly, looking down at her. 'I didn't tell anyone.'
She stopped short, taken aback. 'Oh,' she whispered.
He studied her face in silence for a beat, the sunlight gradually fading around them. The iciness about him thawed just a little, and again he seemed confused by her. Then he drew in a breath, turned on his heel, and left her standing there alone.
That night, Azshar returned to her room and closed her door firmly. Belatedly, she noticed that there was a bolt to lock the door from the outside, but not from the inside. She could be locked in, but she couldn't lock anyone out. Some part of her understood the use of the use of it, if her memories were to suddenly return and she needed help.
The rest of her remembered being trapped in the cave. She felt sick.
She took her knife and sat before a circular mirror that was on a table against the wall. She stared at herself. Her eyes shone in the candlelight; they were blue-grey, not dark like Glorfindel's, but like the sky before a storm. Her cheekbones were high, her nose long and straight, and her chin sharp. She was beautiful, she supposed, but there was also a sorrow that was written into the contours of her face. She wondered how old she was, how many years that face had seen.
She undid the long braids in her hair, and let it fall, curling, almost to the floor. Then, without hesitation, she took her dagger and began sawing it off. When she was done, her dark hair fell midway down her back. Giving her reflection a satisfied nod, she re-braided it and pinned it up out of the way.
Then she went through the pile of clothes that Erestor had brought her. She found a tunic, and she put it on over the man's shirt and trousers she still had from Hobbiton. There were elvish boots and a good cloak in the pile as well, and Azshar fished them out and put them near the door.
From her pack, she took her water skin and refilled it with the water in the room. She set the pack at the door with her cloak and boots.
She didn't want to stay in Rivendell. She couldn't stay in Rivendell. Going with the dwarves may be dangerous, but anything was better than sitting around for a hundred years, waiting for her memories to return of their own accord. She was going to leave, and she was going to do it whether Elrond approved or not.
Finally, she blew out the candles she'd lit and laid down on the bed. Although she'd slept just the night before, she felt worn out, and after only a few minutes, her eyes began drifting closed.
She fought it, afraid of what she might dream, but after an hour, she fell asleep.
The nightmare came again.
She was hanging from the cliff from the rope. Her whole world was agony.
She wished the rope would break so she could fall. She wished for a knife to reach up and cut herself loose. She wished she were free. She wished she were dead.
A wave of pain hit her, and she screamed.
She woke up still screaming, and she thrashed under the blanket for a few seconds before she realised that she was safe. She clapped a trembling hand over her mouth, and discovered her cheeks were wet with tears. She brought the bedsheet up to wipe her face.
She hated that she screamed in her sleep. She hated the phantom pains that were fading in her right shoulder. She hated how weak it made her feel.
She wondered if anyone had heard her this time, or if she'd woken up quickly enough. By the raw feeling of her throat, she hadn't – but to be sure, she slipped out of bed and padded to the door.
She opened it. In the corridor, opposite her door, Glorfindel was leaning against the wall, half hidden by shadows. He glanced up at her, his face characteristically blank, and she stared back at him, at a loss for words.
'I heard you again,' he said flatly, when she said nothing.
'I'm sorry,' she whispered. He shrugged and pushed off the wall, still watching her. She wiped a shaking hand over her face. 'It was… just a dream.'
He nodded once, his dark eyes almost black in the low light. Then a flicker of a frown crossed his face. 'Why are you dressed for travel?' he asked.
She met his gaze, obstinately refusing him an answer. He knew Thorin's Company was leaving tomorrow, and she didn't doubt that he would draw the right conclusion, but… something in her didn't think he'd stop her.
His jaw clenched, and he walked away without another word.
Thank you for reading! Next chapter is full of talking to horses, a bold escape plan, Azshar being compared to a duck, and Glorfindel dealing drugs. See you there!
S
