He found her by the
stream. It was almost too fitting. Sunlight and clear water, those were what he
thought of when he thought of her. For
all the splendour of Nargothrond she had seemed ill-placed there, like a lily
in a cave. Sunlight and water, he had
dreamed of seeing her free again to live those things. Sunlight and water. Faelivrin. Finduilas.
She was singing, a soft
wordless song, mingling with the waters.
Not a song of innocence, not joyous, not bitter
either, merely the echo of the waters, ever-changing, old as Valinor. Although he stepped silently she sensed him,
and looked round.
For a long time they did
not speak. He came, and sat down on the
grass beside her, and still remained silent.
He could think of nothing to begin with that might not sound wrong, even
her mere name could seem a challenge. It
must, he thought, be for her to break the silence if she wished.
At last she did. “You were long in the Halls.”
“There was much to heal,”
he said. And little wish to come forth.
“I was sorry for
that. I always wished you healing.”
He believed her. But he did not wish to rest on her pity.
“It is a strange thought,”
he said, “if I had died in the great battle, as so many did, how would things be for us now?
What would we be to each other?”
“I have not stopped loving
you.”
“I know it. But are lamps enough, when one knows that
there are stars? They are not, Finduilas. I should
know.”
In Morgoth’s mines he had
carried the thought of her, locked away in the depths for even the memory of
such fairness did not deserve to be brought into the dark pits. But the knowledge of the memory had been
there, and it had given him the courage to keep hoping.
That she had loved Turin
more than him would not have mattered if he had not seen the love. But he had seen it.
“What would you have me
say? That I was a fool? That I was faithless? That I turned from the good and the true,
which I had, and got nothing in return?
I know all that. I knew it then.”
He cupped a little of the
water, let it fall though his hand.
There was a patch of stillness at the stream’s edge, where he could
catch the merest glimmer of his own reflection.
Hale and fair once again, the image of his young self, save for the
eyes.
“I am not angry. I never was.
You betrayed nothing, we were not even betrothed. And I did not think you a fool, although I
thought your heart had chosen ill.”
“I never denied that. Gwindor, it was not that you came back worn
and changed. Had it not been so, it
would have made no difference.”
“That does not help.” He could see the glimmer of her hair in the
water. “Nor does the knowledge it was I
brought him to Nargothrond, and doomed my people, and
you…. He did not save you.”
“No.”
“I thought he might.”
“He could never save
himself. The blame is not yours. Nargothrond was doomed to fall, for we were
all beneath the Curse.”
“And would the Unnumbered
Tears have been lost without my rashness?
I should not speak hardly of Turin for bringing Doom!”
“You both paid.”
“So did you, and many
other innocents.” He looked towards her
then, and her eyes too were changed, bearing the weight of hard sorrow, and
horrors known and remembered. This was
not innocent Faelivrin of his youthful love. He laid his hand on the water and let the
flow run beneath. “Enough. I did not come to bring you hurt or grief.”
“Why did you come?”
“To see
you and be seen, once more. To make an end of the old
tale between us.”
“I had hoped you came to
forgive me.”
“There was never need for
that.”
“Will you come again?” Finduilas asked.
“The old tale, as you say, is ended, but it would do my heart good still
to see you healed.”
And mine to see the same
in you, he thought. Although not all griefs could be healed in Aman it was good to see Finduilas alive.
“I may come,” he said.