“Regret is a most powerful motivator indeed.”
“Regret for some, resolve for others. Hope for the rest.”
How many times had someone brushed up against her and she had stiffened, bracing herself for a hit that never followed? How many times had she heard a door close too loudly behind her and she whipped around to face a foe who was not hunting her? How many times had she taken her food away to somewhere private to eat because she was no longer comfortable eating amongst her kin out of fear that her meal would be taken or tainted? How many more times would she behave like an animal that had received too many hits from the hands of its master, and was now too frightened to be around anyone?
Mallossel had spent but a few days in Imladris already. With the aid of the company she had stumbled upon in Eregion, they were able to reach the Valley safely. Her wounds had been treated. Her clothes had been cleaned. She had been given a proper bed to rest in, yet she was restless. Amathlan was still in great danger, and the others were still anxious to leave and see him recovered. So she was also, but she knew it was not wise to leave just yet. Not yet. Not when she still could taste blood in her mouth.
The worst thing, she had decided, is when others approached her. They would approach dripping sickly sweet from their mouths like honey, with words of praise and honor like she was deserving of a statue in her name and a tapestry woven of her deeds. She would smile and nod, but she didn’t believe it. Did she not do what she had to do out of a sense of duty? She did it so that the others could continue to live. Her life was long enough as it was. She felt already like she was balanced on a pedestal but the very foundation of it was cracking beneath the weight of praises she did not deserve. That she did not want.
She had attempted to speak to her once-Lord, Glorfindel, about it. Attempted. He had waited for her to speak with a gaze sorrowful and expectant but she could not force the words past her throat. Like they were coated in the same sickly sweet honey and no matter how hard she tried, she could not cough it up. But the pity in his gaze was enough to answer her unspoken question. He had tucked a golden flower into her hair. As soon as she was far enough out of his sight, she tossed it listlessly into the wind. She did not want any painful reminders that Gondolin was more of a home to her brother than it ever was to her.
Her only regret, her only resolve, her only hope was that she still had the chance to save him. If she could just get Amathlan back, she could run again. If she could fit him back into the hole he had left behind amongst his fellows, she could fade away amongst the stars. She could sail if she wanted, or maybe she would stay with Cardanith, whom she had not seen so far upon her return. If she could get him back, she could fade back into the nothingness of renown she had known before. Just the way it was supposed to be.
