Nimuviel’s Diary: Page 5

Iavas day 3, I Randír Îdh So we returned from Duillond this evening with only flour and honey. No ghosts were there, only friendly merchants on the sunlit marketplace and the sparkle of the light on the fountain. Upon approaching I Randír Îdh we found Nathoruil in the garden under the cherry trees with two others: one an Elf lord with auburn hair and kind eyes, who goes by the name of Gildin, the other a maiden whose eyes and hair are dark as the night sky, and she seems somewhat cooler in attitude, and her name is Ashareth. They had arrived with weapons and with travelling equipment, but these things were all cast aside under the trees, so that the lord and the maiden could lie in the grass without their burdens and they were clothed in cool cotton garments and linen. We exchanged introductions and I was made to feel welcome also by these two, for they have been part of Hiril Aldalin’s wandering company for a long time and call her halls their home. We enjoyed our evening meal outside and, there being five of us now, we felt like a merry gathering, although all of us are tired from our journeys, and Hiril Aldalin from her long hours at administration, and we mostly desire rest. Afterwards we retired to the riverbank to drink wine, and my four companions exchanged news of their travels, and I listened to them. The maiden Ashareth spoke not much, but kept to herself with some degree of reservation, though I do not believe this to be from unkindness, but rather from fatigue. The lord Gildin told me that he and the maiden had travelled ahead of their company of six, and that they expected at least one other of their companions to arrive at these halls in the next two or three days. He bears himself with so much confidence and dignity that I wonder what his history is, from whence he came and with which background, for he seems in stature much like a nobleman, although he is gentle and not proud like others, and why he would be wandering the lands like he does, instead of rule them. Yet I have not yet known him for an evening, and I dare not ask. It is striking how much these people have given me already without asking anything of me. Here I sit writing in a clean, warm room by the light of no less than five candles, and Nathoruil’s gentle tunes on the harp reach my ears through the open window from where he is sat outside underneath the oak trees in the moonlight, and the lady and the maiden speak softly to each other in the room next to me, and the lord is singing to himself a song of waves and of the sea in the room next to that, and I dare not think of all this too long for fear that this evening is like a bubble of soap that will pop as one tries to touch it. So I shall not think of it, and take this sweet evening to be truth, and believe that all of the past season was only a dark dream that does not affect me now. There will be more of this, more bread, more honey, more fruit, more company, in the morning.