Chapter Twenty: The Weft and the Warp
Once again the oval tub had been called into service. Gilraen floated peacefully, lost between the spicy waters and Milia's bewitching song. Lynael had a foot and Larat a hand, rubbing and squeezing, pressing at moments upon special points. The girl sighed softly, and a tear slipped from beneath her eyelids. Larat pointed it out, briefly, and shifted her rubbing to the forearm.
"Mother of all Light," sang Milia in Sindarin staves, "we revel in thy gifts…"
Lynael released the foot and came around to Gilraen's ear. "My daughter," she whispered, "is true sleep upon you?"
After a moment, the girl replied faintly, "Not deep, not far… here, in this pass of ecstasy…"
"Then you must return, and rise from the healing waters." Each thumb and finger and toe had been rubbed and pressed, arms kneaded and calves, long slender thighs. Now shoulders, as she sat forward the final moments of her bath and rubbing. Her spine emerging from her bent back, Lynael rubbing and pounding softly along both sides of the vital cordon. "Fragile, yet strong, as the twins have sentenced," she mused, as her hands went into the water in search of Gilraen's tailbone.
"From here," she said at the girl's small jump, "from here must come your strength, from here you must pull up from the sweet face of Arda. Rise, daughter." The three elven women guided her out of the bath and into the sunlight still pouring through the balcony doors. "Open the tiny doors of your skin," whispered Lynael. "Summon the warmth and light of our Lady Arien, to enter you through each opening of your body, from the smallest to the largest, and even the hidden ones."
Gilraen bent obediently, turning and twisting her limbs so that every inch of her skin was bathed in the light and warmed in the great fire of the Sun. "This must be done every day, my daughter. While the warmth of autumn is with us, you will take it in, to keep you through the winter months."
"And you must stretch your body and put forth effort, so that strength returns," said Larat seriously. "You are a girl, barely a woman, and your body is still far from its turning-point. Horse, and forest, and water and mountain, these await you."
"I desire this," Gilraen rose from an inverted position, flushed and gasping. "My body wants to be well."
Milia observed from the side. "Your heart is of your body, and it, too, is striving to return to life. Your mind, perhaps, is the one that is straggling behind."
Gilraen knelt before her, seeking the eyes always smiling. "It is difficult to master the mind, dearest lady. Much easier to command the body, even to wondrous steps and stances." She lowered her voice and drew nearer. "Nienna has come to my dream time, again. She has spoken of these things to me."
"Do you keep in your mind her whisperings?" Milia stroked the girl's cheek softly.
"I do," Gilraen answered. "She has enlightened me on the hidden nature of sorrow."
"It is of the greatest importance that you register these precious words, my love," said Larat. "They must find their place among the wise letters of Imladris."
"So has my uncle requested, ladies," Gilraen rose and went to a chest inside the room. She knelt and opened it, and took from within a large parcel wrapped in a fine white cloth. She removed the coverings and presented the sisters with the wonderful box of many fine woods, the gift of Elrond. Cooing in admiration, they touched and explored each block and bottle, each fine sheet of paper.
The brushes and stylus drew Lynael especially. "I have seen none finer, in years uncounted. The Master desires of you a work of supreme importance and beauty."
"The dream visits of Nienna are as good a place to begin as any," mused Milia. "From there you may wander, and each day deliver words from your mind to the good sheets of parchment. Then you may rest from them, and release them… these memories, large and small, of joy and of sorrow… and live only this, now, your moment… Thus will you arrive at healing and peace."
"We bear another gift, my daughter," Larat had withdrawn for a moment and now returned with a soft bundle cradled in her arms. "From the weavers, to welcome you to Imladris and to the hearts of all." She shook out the bundle and spread out a gown of autumn beauty.
"They have taken into the weft and warp countless colors from the light and shade of these golden days before winter-sleep," said Lynael, scrutinizing the fabric. "Regard the ascending threads of the warp, as tree-trunks and slanting shadows, and here the river rising. Across, the weft carries both the final reds and golds, still the greens, and the soft wind that moves all. It is exquisite."
Gilraen was speechless. "Never have I seen such a dress, my ladies," she whispered, approaching shyly. "I know not even how to name this color… these many, many colors, that are no one and yet all."
"Yet," said Milia happily, "the covering is not of greater beauty than that which must now go hidden." She ran her hand along Gilraen's side and down her hip, over the curve of her buttock, and they all four laughed.
"I shall attire myself in this autumn dream at once," said the girl. "Please assist me, my dear ladies." The dress was practical and versatile, for all the elegance of its fabric. There were, however, basic ties and laces unknown to her that, once secured, would deliver the wearer to great comfort.
"Here, if we desire freshness," explained Lynael, pulling gently on a lace from within the sleeve to join with its mate on the shoulder, one of several adorning ribbons.
"This is for warmth, otherwise an overskirt," said Larat, lifting a large half-moon of silky fabric to cover Gilraen's back and shoulders. "The cloth is so fine that you will not feel the weight of both pieces more than you would any skirt."
"Both faces of this wonderful cloth are equally perfect," said Gilraen, observing front and back of the piece now serving as a shawl. "And visions fleet by from one direction and another, as I incline it in the light."
The three sisters sat back, delighted as much as the girl herself. Truly the weavers had outdone themselves, and the gown was a rare beauty. How not to raise spirits from drooping, both the jewel itself and the love so patently expressed in its making.
"Is there something else?" the girl asked suddenly. "Something more, deeper, woven into these fine threads? My mother once whispered of such things to me, long ago."
"I believe there is nothing deeper than love, my dear," said Milia. "No charm of greater power, no incantation supreme above it. It is for love that Eru created the vision of Arda, and the Valar the making of it. It is for love that we are here, and you and your wonderful boy."
"So I must step out and dance along the paths of Imladris clothed in a gown whose every thread has been laid in love for me." Gilraen smiled, but the sisters saw clearly that something was shaken deep within her.
"May I say," said Lynael gently, "that the threads of the weft, ascending, mean to lift and carry your spirits, your thoughts, high above: to the treetops, to the mountains, to the clouds and even to Varda's stars."
"And the cross-threads of the warp," added Larat with sly humor, "seek to stretch out your tendrils all about you, to revive your vows to every living creature, however tiny or hidden, even to rocks and sands and crystals."
"Goodness!" said Gilraen. "Indeed, this is a garment of great reckoning."
"It is," said Larat. "Armor, of a sort. To protect and sustain you, and to give you joy. Also to enhance your loveliness, for well you know that we Eldar give ever the greatest importance to this rare gift: to beauty such as yours, my dear daughter."
"The garden, my dear ladies," the girl beseeched her caretakers. "I would have the breeze from the mountain and the song of the river." The healers perceived still the anxiety riddling her, and conceded at once. The four trotted down the hall to the side door and let themselves into the garden. The sisters allowed Gilraen to take the lead, as she seemed to have a site in mind; and this sprout of decision was in itself an act of healing.
They came at last to the terrace of the council, and Gilraen stood beneath the rowan tree of the red berries. She reached her finger out to touch a large bunch hanging from the lowest branch, and said, "This is heart of red. The very sight of them sends joy coursing through my entire being."
The healers guessed at once that the girl had much on her mind, and required no conversation. Each withdrew into her favorite nook and sat in contemplation of the day, Milia not refraining from the fine strings of her little harp.
Gilraen climbed onto the balustrade and settled comfortably, her eyes roaming the valley from the high tumbling waters to the secret closing way that was the entrance to Rivendell. Many years, in her humble mortal account, had passed since the joyful summers spent here as a small girl. "And why we came," she mused, "why my dear father and mother brought me… I simply have no idea. I never asked. Such was the bliss and wonder, all else mattered naught."
The noontide turned to the westering Sun, and the girl went now to laughter, now to tears, striving to open her thoughts and her memories. "We must do this. I must find our way. What else is there, what else do we have? Days here are not as ours… I must keep track of them in our own count. No rest for me, no time to drift away in memories." She sighed, the great laugh of Arathorn so plain in her ear, his hands on her shoulders, on her waist… A tear slipped down her cheek and splashed on the rock wall. "I will be allowed to speak of him, of us… when how many snows have passed?" She shifted nervously. "My boy is a man-child, not to forget. They must all keep this in mind. Time to them is nothing, a flutter, a sigh. And then it passes, it all passes.
"And I will pass, also. Good, yes, but there is much I must do first. For this great work I must eat, for this I must sleep and heal and rise above sorrow." She wrinkled her nose and considered. "Rise, yes, but not forget the seed of compassion that sorrow allows to grow in us." She traced the amblings of an ant on the rock wall. "Long will I labor, like you, little one, and only then I will rest. Days pass, and many around us are solving each small question as it rises… I must not sit back and let others do all: I must keep the course under the stars of Varda. When Aragorn is to learn of the Atani, he must come to me in faith and confidence. He must see me strong now, these years, while he is still small… and as he waxes, I may wane, and finally rest."
Gilraen stretched her arms above her head and arched her back, seeming to form a living funnel through which the golden rain of heaven could flow. The sisters sat up and observed attentively. Milia conveyed to the harp-strings her view of Gilraen's action, and in response the girl lifted her sweet voice to the airs above.
"Oh, my fingers will give beauty to all things," she sang, "shaping and plucking and tracing and placing, all things…" She smiled at the sisters, and chanted on, "I know each gift bestowed upon me… I have been blessed, so blessed… Now I call on them, my gifts, to be, to make... to inspire eye, ear, touch… even smell and flavor-taste…"
Larat and Lynael raised their arms entwining and lifted their feet in dancing steps to the music of harp and song. Arien's warmth moved on, and slowly all were still. The four finally came together in the center of the terrace and embraced in a huddle, their heads touching, and Larat said, "A marvelous sweet song, yours, my daughter."
"There is more, but this as yet Mother had no time to show me… Mother…" Gilraen exhaled softly.
"Of course, my little Ivorwen…" Lynael shook herself joyfully, the little band coming apart and each woman loosening her joints and muscles in blissful relaxation as they took the path up to the gallery and the great doorway.
"Aragorn is learning much, every minute of every day," Lynael said seriously as they reached the corridor at last, "things entirely new and wondrous. You must have him tell you all, so that in recalling he will fix in his mind these singular bits and pieces of his new life."
"Also," added Larat, "you will be in his confidence, seeing what he sees, knowing what he learns, sharing the new visions on which he will build his notions of Arda and Ea."
"Indeed, my dear ladies. I regard and heed your words of depth, and your wisdom." Gilraen smiled to herself. The sisters. They love me so, and I them. And Mother will come!