Chapter Eight

Erestor knew he was summoned without having to hear the words. He had met her first, giving way to her curiosity towards Glorfindel. She looked at him first though, seeing his turmoil and it was not long before he felt her calling to him. He found her sitting in the gardens, beneath the statue that was modelled on her brother Finrod.

"Sit," Galadriel ordered him gently, gesturing towards the two cups of wine that sat on the bench beside her. "It is him, or rather once it would have been."

"He has changed," Erestor murmured.

"I did not mean that, mellon nin. It was a question. He was the one you lost in Gondolin. You told me once why you did not dance or even smile when you first took refuge with us. Glorfindel was the heart you lost that night. Or the elf he was before his death. Tell me what troubles you now, take my counsel as I have taken yours before." It was only after the Fall that Erestor and Galadriel met, when they both took refuge with Círdan during the war. He knew she had crossed with them, in the ice but he had been nothing then and did not meet with the kin of kings. Yet in the darkness after the Fall she had been there, first in Beleriand then Eregion. His place had been to advise from the shadows, both to her and Celeborn, becoming a friend as well as servant.

"My heart was hardened, he was dead and I knew that I would not meet him again. I turned away in exile, willingly postponing any chance of seeing him in Aman, if I had not given them up completely. I was, prepared for that."

"Not for this." Erestor sighed, rubbing his temples.

"No. This- What can I do? His memories are there, yet so are mine. He is to stay here, to walk these halls for the indeterminable future. Isowen was reminder enough, I do not think I can bear this." Watching over Isowen as they fled from haven to haven in search of a home had harrowed him down, looking at the sister of the elf he had loved was at once a cruel reminder of his own little sister and the golden lord who had perished on the cliff. Erestor had left her at one point, seeking solitude from the past only for her to find him again, in all innocence in Imladris.

"There is a place for you in Eregion," Galadriel told him gently. "Always." The thought tempted him, to escape the pain of seeing Glorfindel again. Her smile however, betrayed him.

"You know I cannot leave now."

"No. I have seen you with him, without speaking you are always just out of sight. He must turn to you, and turn he does. You stay away, Isowen does not. If you hated this pain you would not put yourself in the same room as him, you would not stay in the chamber when he arrives. My offer is there, if your strength fails you." That anyone would pay so close attention to him as to notice that had never occurred to him as he watched Glorfindel. He told himself it was merely the presence that had come with him, the true sense of having been returned from the West.

"I have never had much to begin with," he murmured.

"Time will bridge the gap that has been created. Perhaps not what could have been, but you shall not always look at him in pain."

"What do you know?" She laughed softly.

"Many things. Have faith, Mellon nin." He sighed, suspicious of her certainty. Of course she knew more than she would tell him, like Elrond she could see ahead but took more pleasure in being cryptic than Elrond did. "You wish to see."

"No." He sighed. "No, I do not wish to see. I know what trouble comes with that." Erestor stood up. "I think some things are best left alone."

The nightmares that had plagued him since Gondolin, always the same, had gone. He had not seen Glorfindel fall into the abyss in his dreams for two months, which from his limited knowledge of the sea would have been when Glorfindel's ship set out. Erestor did not like the logic in that. Instead of seeing the balrog on the cliff, he spent the nights walking through a city of shadows that he could not quite name. Not Gondolin, but not Imladris or Mithlond either. Always at the end of the street was a fountain but he had yet to reach it. It was not unpleasant, indeed, he clung to it in the hope of reaching the water, yet he always woke as if the dream had spanned the entire night.

He did what he could, not avoiding but not seeking out the golden elf's company. They had agreed to leave it alone, not perhaps a vow on both their parts to be silent on the matter, although it was close. Galadriel did not tarry in Imladris, she had come to sate her own curiosity, nothing more. Erestor did not quite dare ask her why there was frost between her and Glorfindel and she did not say. Only Celeborn gave away some small detail. They had not parted on good terms when Turgon led his people to build Gondolin and Galadriel went instead to Doriath. Before, Glorfindel had been of a lesser standing than her, now he held the power equal and above any. Erestor found himself staring occasionally, in the dining hall or through his office window as it overlooked the training grounds. Glorfindel shone. It was not poetic and he could find other ways of describing him if he tried. The simple fact was that as Galadriel and the High Elves reportedly shone with the light of Valinor in which they were born, Glorfindel was brighter. As bright as they day by the sea, when Erestor had first caught sight of the golden lord. At Alqualondë, when he had been too young to take part, and grateful for that. His cousins, Ecthelion and the Lady they marched under whose name had not been spoken since she went down to the water's edge to slay the Teleri had gone but his parents had held back, watching in horror. When slowly the others had trickled back, covered in blood only one lord had stood out from the rest. Sheathed in gold and free from any stain he was held in Turgon's arms, crying but innocent. Erestor tore his eyes away from the figure down on the grass and looked instead at his lines of curved runes.

"Speak with him," murmured Galadriel from the doorway. "Now or later, eventually you will." Erestor answered with a non-committal shrug. Doubtless he would, when he was no longer blinded by pain or brilliance.