Waiting on the Brink

She had been waiting for three hours now, and was growing sick of it. Looking far into the east, she saw nothing but some lazy clouds walking up on the sky, almost touching the ground somewhere in between. It was a day to be outside and to join her brothers with the hunt, but she was stuck in the castle gazing out on the meadows for a sign of them coming back. They had gone out with the first light of day, and now the sun was about to give her way to moon. Its rays were dying down from a bright, vivid yellow to a noble, golden one that seemed to make anything look beautiful and yet so sad. Dusk was a time to feel blue even for young Lothíriel, whose spirits were never down and eyes always shining like the sunlight dancing on the water in idle days of summer; and for a moment it seemed to her that the dusk was coming after her brothers and Prince Imrahil, her dear father: Eyes cold as the rocks of Bay of Belfalast when facing the foe, but like the forest dew freshening the soul upon looking at the daughter. She thought of the stories her eldest brother Elphir told to kill time, and the times she went with Erchamion to see whose horse would go faster. A cold breeze departed her from the memories, and she looked into the east once more.

There they were: A tiny cloud among the big lazy ones, approaching faster than anything else around.

A smile spread on her face as she watched as the tiny, greyish cloud become a pack of galloping horses, all brown except a white one, Rhawon. It was Elphir’s horse and it was safe to say they had grown up together. She thought of her pony which was now locked up in the stable, and if she will ever be able to ride his horse with her father just as proud as any of her brothers was. As they came closer she slowly stood up to welcome her father and brothers, and the gatekeepers announced their coming back at the same time. The men slowed their horses down as they came nearer. Elphir was the first to come near the stairs the girl had been sitting on. He got off his horse, looking quite weary, but he smiled at his young sister and opened his arms wide. Lothíriel jumped straight into his arms, making him waver a bit and they both laughed. “You are late,” said she, and continued: “I thought the dusk caught you this time!” The eldest, though only twenty at the time, put her down and patted on her head, smiling: “Fear not, my dear sister, for no evil dusk will ever send after us can ever take the Men of Gondor down.”

She would have believed that at the time.