Chapter Five

"Your people are different than I imagined," Hylin breathed, leaning heavily on his arm.

"Different? How?" Haldir replied.

The pair were taking a painfully slow attempt at walking the circumference of the flet's outer porch. She hung on his right arm, her hands clutching his tunic sleeve in a white knuckled grip while he supported her as best he could with his left hand. Hylin had refused the aid of a well-crafted cane, declaring she was not dead yet.

Finally, they had agreed that she could only exercise as long as Haldir was her aid. Roswyth, grateful for a moment of respite from the sick young woman, went about her duties as the pair began the tedious task.

"One hears tales of elves of course," Hylin explained stopping to catch her breath, "Of witches and warlocks amongst the elves. Enchantments and spells and so on."

A smile traced Haldir's lips, "And you're disappointed not to find our homeland riddled with sorcers?"

"Magic," she corrected.

Her eyes lingered a moment on his face and she looked away flushed. The effort of the walk must have been too much for her, Haldir removed his arm from her grasp and supported her around the waist.

"Don't argue," he said quickly, "Give me your hand."

Hylin bite back whatever objection she was ready to give and laid her left hand in his and her right atop his where it rested on her waist. His hands were big and warm on her, the palm showing evidence of centuries of toil. Yet his touch was safe, unthreatening. Their eyes met briefly and he looked away, ahead where they were going to walk.

"If you're too tired today," he began.

"No!, No, I'm well enough," she said quickly. "Come along."

He resettled his hand on her waist, "You were saying?"

"Magic," she repeated, "I expected to see your food prepared with magic and fire begun with a snap of the fingers."

"And what do you find instead?" he helped her forward a few more feet, "That we live much as your people?"

She laughed, "Hardly, none I know live as you. Even the Lady Gilraen does not live with such richness."

"What then?"

"A magic of a different kind. Deeper, richer, than anything I imagined," she lifted a foot to nudge a leaf to the edge of the flet, "I see it in everything here. In Roswyth's stitching, the sound of the wind through the leaves—even the sound of your foot on the stairs coming to see me every day. I feel the art it breathing in it all. It doesn't appear to in a burst of stars, but is runs through the forest. An enchantment of the soul perhaps."

Haldir looked down on her face as she spoke. Her combative tone slipped away and she sounded like the child she had seemed when he had first found her in the wood. Her eyes glimmered blue and grey with wonder. She lifted her eyes to his and he looked away again.

"Then you are more like one of us then I expected," Haldir said, "You feel the truth of the place."

"Is it the place? Not the people?" she asked.

They came to a pause on a view that showed over the river that flowed bright and cold through the trees. Below, the quiet murmur of elves at work rose in a gentle hush toward them. Haldir looked down on his kin with a fresh eye. Everything here was familiar, but seen through her human eyes, it seemed to glow with a special light. The glide and lightness of movement as his brethren went about their tasks looked like dancing, the light catching on the soft polished metal they wove in their clothing and hair, the sunlight illuminating their skin wherever the shadows fell away in the Autumn afternoon.

"It is all one and the same," Haldir smiled down at her. Not a child, his mind told him, a woman.

"You're staring at me," she gasped a little and tried to laugh, "You're gaze it quite piercing."

"Pardon me," he jerked his eyes on her face and turned his attention to their walk once more.

They walk slowly in silence for several minutes, the air a little tense between them. He was suddenly sensible of her body in his arms, the shape of her hips and the delicate grip of her fingers in his hand. The color had risen in her cheeks and her breath was irregular.

"You're fatigued," he said.

"No," she instantly objected, "Maybe a little."

Without a word, he lifted her in his arms, her hands reaching around his neck to hold herself up.

"Forgive me" he said softly.

"None needed," she whispered.

Below, a little bubble of activity drew their attention. A rider had clearly just arrived, their cloak covered in the dirt of travel, a look of determination on their face. They were headed toward the quarters of the Galadhrim no doubt with news to convey from the outside world. Haldir was about to make his excuses when he felt a light touch tracing his left ear.

Hylin flushed to her roots when he caught her jerking her hand away.

"I'm sorry," she said, "Your—you are-you're so different."

His breath caught in his chest and for a moment he allowed his gaze to drop to her lips.

"I have to go," Haldir said hurriedly. He swept into her flet and gently laid her on her usual couch. He left without another word or look, his feet almost flying down the steps from her home. He thought he had heard her call after him, but if she had, he would not, could not have answered her. If he had stayed, Eru knew what might have happened.

As his feet meet the packed earth of the paths below, Haldir shook his head. He was spending too much time with the girl. Her romance of Lothian was clouding his judgement and his normal duties were being neglected. He turned his face toward the Galadhrim headquarters and allowed his natural swiftness to carry him away from Hylin as fast as possible.

It was late.

In the small hours before dawn, Celeborn found his way toward his wife's garden. She had been away the whole night. It happened from time to time, that Galadriel would slip away after the evening meal, to peer into her mirror. Untold hours would pass without her returning. He never followed her. The magic was hers alone; the gift of it and the burden.

But tonight, was different.

He felt her calling to him, pulling him to her across the night.

He found her, stooping over the mirror, her face in her hands, weeping silently.

"My love," he enveloped her in his arms, his lips against her hair, "My love, what is it?"

"Oh Celeborn, such joy! Such pain." She buried her face in his chest, "The mirror speaks to me of wonderful, terrible things to come to those we love."

"Who dear heart?"

"Our beloved Arwen, Elrond and Haldir-and those who will cross their life paths."

Coleborn's arms tightened around his wife, "Is it war then?"

She lifted tearful eyes to his, "Yes. And no. There is death, but there is life—new life to come that will change the world."

He caught her face in his hands, "New life? Narwen, what are you talking about?"

A brilliant smile broke through her tears as she gripped his wrists and answered.

"Hylin, our human guest, is key to it all."