Note: This is set somewhere in northern Eriador, sometime before the War of the Ring. It is actually a scene from a much longer story that I will post eventually (at some point...once I've filled in the gaps...). Who the Rangers are doesn't really matter. For those who have read "Not All Those Who Wander Are Lost," the woman is my OC, Miriel, though you don't have to have read that story to enjoy this one. For those who have, this takes place about ten years later. As for the identity of the man, well, I'll leave that for you to guess :-)
"When winter first begins to bite,
And stones crack in the frosty night,
When pool are black and trees are bare
'Tis evil in the Wild to fare."
The Fellowship of the Ring
"And when the new year's sunshine blazed awake, they shouted, reveling...All the long echoes sing the same delight this shortest day." Susan Cooper
The weather remained clear, and they made good time over the hills, their clothes and gear gradually drying until they were almost warm at night. But they woke on the third morning to thin clouds gilding the sunrise, wisps that thickened through the day to a solid gray roof. The wind rose and turned cold; whipping gusts grasped at their cloaks as twilight drew down early over the land. They crested a ridge on the edge of a valley, deeper than any they had yet crossed, and running in roughly the direction they wished to go. A storm was clearly rising, and they would be more sheltered in the valley than up on the bare hills.
They went down, and were soon among trees, scattered wind-writhen juniper at first, then leafless aspen and birch, smooth bark gray in the fading light, and at last cottonwood and willow by the stream that ran gurgling along the valley floor. It would rise quickly in rain, so they made their camp a little way up the slope, under a thick cluster of juniper. There was a clear space large enough for them both beneath the gnarled boughs, the ground prickly with fallen needles. They did not try to make a fire; even had they been able to keep it alight, the gusting wind would have carried the heat away. Instead they fastened a blanket over the junipers, a feeble block against wind and rain better than none. Cold drops began to fall as the last light faded from the sky. They crawled into the resinous shelter and piled their packs in the opening, wrapped themselves as well as they could, and ate what could be eaten cold.
The wind rose to a wail, lashing the bare trees. The low, stocky juniper weathered the gusts with hardly a shudder, but now and again a branch broke in the darkness around them, crashing to the ground or clattering away on the wind. Yet it did not seem to rain much. A few cold drops made their way through the thick needles, but huddled close together under their cloaks, they remained dry, and tried to sleep.
At some time in the night, a sharp crack startled them both into wakefulness. When her breathing had calmed, she said with a forced chuckle, "Feels like we've been here before."
"Might be." Muffled by his cloak, but she heard the smile in it. "No mice this time, at least."
"I'll try not to wake you with a bad dream."
"Maloseg," he murmured. "I wouldn't care if you did."
She knew it was true, and though still she was a little shamed at the memory, she smiled in the darkness. She found his hand and clasped it, and in his warmth, even the shrieking wind could not disturb her rest.
They woke to silence. Faint light filtered in, but it had a strange, luminous quality that was not the ordinary light of a pale late-autumn morning. She stirred, shifted round, heard him groan and gasp a little as he woke. Her feet were numb, and frost rimed the edge of her hood where she had breathed on it in the night. She rolled over, pulled her knees beneath her, and shoved awkwardly at the packs blocking the way out; they moved, but with a strange crackling sound. She pushed forward, the air on her face keen and cold after the faint stuffiness within—and then she stopped, and her soft gasp of wonder was loud in the stillness.
The sun had not yet risen over the mountains to the east, but cold clear light lay on the valley, and on every branch and stone and blade of grass, ice glimmered like glass.
She crawled out and stood up, feet crunching as they crushed minor jewels and tiny fortresses of crystal. She stood still, breath clouding the air, turning her head from wonder to wonder.
In the stillness, movement beneath the bush behind her, joints creaking in the cold, and she heard him shiver, groan softly—and then pull in a breath as he rose to stand beside her. And neither spoke as they gazed at the gleaming valley.
With difficulty they pried the frozen blanket off the bush and shook the ice off it as best they could. They ate a little, sitting on their packs, for there was nowhere else that was not covered in ice. And as they ate, they looked neither at each other nor at their food, but at the wonder of the glittering trees. Branches had broken under the weight, fallen and lay scattered on the ground all about them, and some of the smaller trees were bent nearly to the ground. Suddenly in the stillness, a crack so loud they both started, a shattering as of glass, and they turned to see a leafless gray aspen broken from its trunk, jagged ends pale in the dawn.
They shouldered their packs at last and set off down the valley. As they walked, the sun rose behind them, and every branch and twig and blade of grass glittered with golden light. She felt her breath tight in her throat, felt as she walked under a trailing willow that had become a curtain of crystal that she was not any longer entirely in this world.
Every least thing was made new, every cattail a glittering staff, every berry a jewel with a heart of fire, and she looked at everything and marvelled that the world she knew could be so transformed. And as they walked under an archway of bent birches, and saw before them a swell of tall grasses by the river with plumed seed heads turned to frozen silver, he said, "Miriel. It is all miriel." For that was what her name meant, in the old language: shining like a jewel. She laughed softly, and did not know that in his mind the beauty of that day became miriel, and in his mind it was forever hers, and hers alone.
Notes:
maloseg - my entirely made-up Sindarin word for gorse; in this case, used as a nickname
silivren penna miriel - white-glittering, slanting down sparkling like a jewel; from the Elvish Hymn to Elbereth, which Frodo hears in the Hall of Fire
I was twelve years old when I first felt in an ice storm a glimpse of the high beauty of Middle Earth in our world. I'm nearly forty now, and I remember it as if it were last week.