Shadow and flame. His precious city, burnt to the ground by Morgoth's creatures. Cries of distress, pain, despair for his men bleeding into the merry summer ground. And he, falling to his death as the Balrog yanked upon his hair. Burnt it in its malevolent fist, the will to vanquish his opponent stronger than that to live.
The sickening noise of bones cracking upon impact, of his skull meeting the harsh, sharp rocks of Gondolin's cliffside, cries and yells of his brethren fleeing the dark wave of destruction. And the eagles circling, sharp squeaks rising to the heavens as he died.
Beeeeeeeeeeeep !
Glorfindel started in bed, eyes frantic as he searched for the shadow. Sharp pain ran down his back, irradiating to both skull and hip. The elf groaned, crippled by pulsating agony. Several set of footsteps echoed in the corridor, harsh to his ears. Nurses burst into his room, hands gripping him to twist him back. Pain, pain, more pain digging into his back, like an overwhelming wave of anguish.
Suddenly, warmth infused his veins and the pain lessened.
"There you go, you'll be fine, young man."
Glorfindel opened bleary eyes, finding an older woman with a sincere smile and a syringue in her hand. Fine. This was a word he understood now. Fine, and good. She said more things, flared that blasted light in his eyes once more before she patted his forearm and tucked him into bed again. Glorfindel took a long, shuddering inhale and closed his eyes anew.
A nightmare. Just a nightmare.
But for a second, he was quite sure he had died.
The door eventually closed, leaving him in relative peace despite the incessant buzzing and beeping of hospital machines and vehicles in the street. He longed for the silence of winter nights, when a blanket of snow covered every white cobblestone of his fair city. Prayed for those peaceful days when he and Echtelion shared dinner, and his dearest friend would sometimes grace him with a piece with his flute.
Echtelion...
Tears slipped down his cheeks, hot trails of despair. If the Valar had seen fit to send him into this nightmarish world, he was quite sure that Echtelion had not been revived by strange machinery. For he'd seen with his very eyes the broken and burnt body of his best friend, flung into the very fountain that gave him his title. The King's square, battered and slick with the blood of their troops. And even more than the loss of Ondolindë – Gondolin in Sindarin, the city which music came from the waters springing from its rocks, he could not reconcile with the end of that friendship.
Centuries shared in companionship, defending their city at day, and creating beauty at night. Poems and songs burnt to the ground with its inevitable fall. How many of their house, massacred in the assault ?
Elves were no stranger to change. Arda itself changed before their very eyes, season after season, rivers carved their path, seas shaped the lands, mountains levelled when others rose, while they remained mostly unblemished by time. But to witness such destruction... To see his beautiful home crumble to dust, his inhabitants scattered and terrified. It reminded him all too well of the destruction of the trees in Aman.
The scars of that event, preceding the fall of Gondolin by thousands of years, were embedded deep in his feä. Scars gouged once more by the battle of Unnumbered tears.
But, back then, elvish medicine had closed frayed edged of skin and knitted his soul together. Young to his people, he still found merriment in the world, his light bright and carefree. The memories of death and destruction still existed, soothed away by the beauty of the world. Arda, itself, pulsed its life into the elves, transferring its strength and happiness into the firstborns.
But now, who would wipe the traumatic images away ? The memory of Echtelion's body ? Of the King's demise ? Or Idril's terrified cries – their princess - as she tried to protect her son, fleeing for their lives in the tunnel ?
Who indeed.
This human medicine was good enough; bones mended, pain taken away by strong and powerful chemicals. But none to sooth and heal his Feä. His body had used what remained of Arda's fluid to repair his body. But the magic was absent here; when he interrogated the earth beneath the building, there was no response. Only dull, broken earth that did not seem conscious enough to respond back. Would he age and die like them ? The people that took care of him ?
Probably.
To say the thought brough him relief was shameful; if the Valar had willed him here, who was he to refuse a second life ? But, in the deep recesses of his mind, he could not help but wonder. Had Morgoth, himself, trapped him in a dead world, only for him to perish in misery ? A fitting punishment for the Lord of the Golden flower who had opposed, and killed one of his mighty lieutenant. In that case, what fate befell Echtelion, he who had slained Gothmog ?
The though caused what remained of his pride to swell in his chest. At least, middle earth was now devoid of two of its mighty foes. In death, both he and Echtelion got their beloved world from two Balrogs.
Rest in peace, my friend. I have yet to understand why I did not follow you in death.
The thoughts of better days accompanied the elven lord while he drifted back to sleep, his dreams taking him high in the mountains that surrounded Gondolin. Its shimmering towers, white as snow, glimmered in the moonlight. And in that scenery, while the flute played its soothing tunes, Glorfindel found some measure of peace.
Many hours after dawn had broken through the horizon, the fiery haired woman appeared in his room again. Her smile, tentative, reminded him that he had yet to find a way to communicate properly. Most importantly, did he really want to ?
Young nurses, here, sometimes flocked him with smiles and reddening cheeks, calling him 'beautiful'. At all times, the second born had been vulnerable to the eldar's appearance. He usually kept away; the fight against Morgoth had certainly siphoned all his resources that he did not have to venture outwards the city of Gondolin. Until the arrival of Tuor, many years before the assault of Melko's beast, he had not met a human for centuries.
How his princess had fallen in love with that beast of a man was a mystery. But again, so had Lúthien succumbed to Beren's charm and courage. Despite having a few misgivings about the race of men – they were devoid of magic and their link to Arda was weak - Tuor had taught him much of the resilience of the second born. He hoped, dearly, that he, Idril and their son Eärendil had escaped the sack of Gondolin through the tunnels. Memories of that bright child brought warmth in his breast; he would be exceptional, just like his parents.
"Hello."
Her voice was soft, reminiscent of that lovely tune she's used yesterday to shake him out of the pain. Perhaps he could allow a bond to form, if only for him to understand where he was. Her drawing, yesterday, had thrown him into a fit. The confirmation of what his erratic senses tried to tell him; this wasn't Arda. He needed a way back.
He inclined his head gently in a traditional elvish greeting, testing the word as he responded in kind.
"Hello".
The sounds felt strange, but the woman's face brightened at once. Light hazel eyes sparkled so gaily they shone almost golden, her long braid catching fire in the timid sunrays. And despite his very new aversion for the flames, he found her beautiful... for a human. His keen eyesight spotted freckles upon fair skin, little dots playfully dusting her nose and cheeks.
His natural response sent her into a flurry of words he could not understand, and she darted to his side with excitement. Until he shook his head. Her expression fell at once and she swallowed. Then resolve set in, and he marvelled at how easy it was to read on the young woman's face – how old was she, really ? Her soul vibrated with an old song, but humans' lives were too short to even notice them before they were gone.
She grabbed a set of paper squares from her purse, coated in a strange fabric that caused them to shine in the sun. Crude drawings and symbols littered them and she slowly set them down in his lap. Eyebrows rising in surprise, the elf interrogated her with a look.
The young woman picked up a flower, and told him.
"Flowe'"
He nodded, watching her expectant expression until she motioned for him to return the favour. Then, he understood; the woman wanted to teach him the basics of her language, and offered to learn his in return. Stunned, he wondered how a human would fare with Quenya. Perhaps he ought to teach her Sindarin instead ? If was, after all, taking over middle earth quickly enough. But he held much fondness for his mother tongue after all.
"Alma," he responded in Quenya.
She wrote the name down with her strange letters on the card on the top, then a second thing at the bottom. His nose scrunched in disgust; the ink stunk of chemicals he'd never had to face before. Oblivious, the young woman pointed to each letter in turn.
"F-L-O-W-E-R"
Then she handed him the strange quill with replenishing ink and, motioned for him to write Alma. He did so, a little awkwardly because his shoulder still pained him. Her sharp intake of breath caused him to become suspicious; he only found her eyes wide, awe painted upon her features as she watched the symbols he'd just transcripted.
"Beautiful", she said.
He recognised the word, he'd heard the nurses use it way too often in his presence, giggling included. But she wasn't boring holes into his skull, this time; her attention rested solely upon the symbols of his mother tongue.
And thus began a thorough language lesson that distracted him, at least for a few hours, from being scooped up in this noisy and smelly environment. Numbers, letters, sounds, everything was so different that they had to start from scratch. A tedious affair, but one he relished in if only because it kept him from the utter loneliness that crept upon him at night.
She was a good teacher, neither overly enthusiastic nor haughty for she considered them on an equal foot. Both student and master, they found an easy rhythm filled with genuine expressions – without any ounce of flirting – and many silences.
My house for herbal tea and honey cakes.
As Eleanor – for that was her name – taught him about days, years and months, she wrote down her age in numbers – 29 – and with a series of lines that he could count. Only then did he realise how utterly young she was. And when, in return, she asked for his, he puzzled over the way to do so. Elves did not count years as acutely as men, if only because time flowed differently for them. As a being born in Valinor under the light of the trees, he had lived many centuries basking in their light. What ensued...
The kinslaying, a difficult crossing over the ice, and years wandering Beleriand before their King built Gondolin. Five more centuries, at least, before the moment of his dea... demise ? How old was he, really ? Probably a little over a thousand years old, from a human perspective.
Brow furrowed, he looked for the pictograms, and found the one she'd taught him earlier. Already, he had forgotten how to pronounce it, but not how the numbers arranged themselves: three little rounds following like duckling after a greater spear, standing proud. A thousand.
Eleanor's eye rounded comically, allowing him to spot flecks of gold around her irises before her brows scrunched and she sighed. She uttered a dismissal, her tone defeated.
Was it the sheer number throwing her for a loop, or did she think him mistaken in his apprehension of the words ? This world, after all, felt dull and sick. How would elves sustain themselves if the earth itself did not feed them ? He probably was an anomaly, an old soul residing in a deceptively young looking body, at least from a human point of view.
If that little misunderstanding took the wind out of his companion's sails, Laurefindelë was reluctant to let go the only sane distraction offered to him. Unfortunately, fate worked against him – again – as a matronly nurse opened his door with such force it was a miracle the hinges held fast.
From the tray she brought, smells of dead flesh and poorly boiled vegetables rose. Chatting in her native tongue, the sturdy woman dragged a wheel contraption to deposit the unappetising tray in front of him. He recognised the word 'food', his giddiness immediately crushed by smell of badly treated meat. Did they not realise how badly the animals they served him had suffered, both in life and death ?
Hazel eyes watched his reaction with a spark of recognition, and he wondered if the young woman hunted her own meat, or refrained from consuming it altogether.
Eleanor stood, unwilling to disturb Laurëfindele's repast, only to be interrupted by the nurse.
"You need to tell your husband to eat his meat. He has lost a lot of blood, and will never resplenish his red cells if he keeps skipping it."
The young woman's cheeks turned fiery red at the implication, but the distress rolling from her new friend pushed her to dismiss the misconception and attack another angle.
"My FRIEND is a vegetarian", she blurted out.
"Too bad", the nurse chuckled, and Eleanor wondered to what, exactly, she was referring to. "But he doesn't have this luxury. He will never heal if he doesn't eat his meat."
One glance at Laurëfindele told her he was seconds away from vomiting upon the tray. Hence, instead of running away, Eleanor nodded and decided she would speak to Myriam; perhaps they could hook him with iron instead of trying to force feed him ? The nurse exited, satisfied, and Eleanor shifted on her feet. Seeing that the golden man picked, with difficulty due to his injuries, at the stewed apples, she dug into her purse for food pictograms.
Laurëfindele's features brightened when he spotted fruits and nuts. Eleanor nodded; it seemed like, aside from gaining an otherworldly friend, she also was about to feed him. When she left to teach her classes, Eleanor made a detour into an organic shop and dropped her quarry back to Myriam before she headed home.
This very evening, a famished elf feasted upon delicious fruits, dried nuts and fresh vegetables.