{"I did play for you, after all."}
Mallossel giggles despite herself as she stumbles her way down the darkened pathways of Gondolin. Night had long since set in, and she can still smell the wine on her own breath as she laughs. The pavement is cold beneath her bare feet - she was not quite sure where she had left her shoes, but she was thankful her golden dress was long enough to hide the indecency.
Lantern after lantern illuminates her path. She hums along softly to distant music being strummed on lutes and harps from landings above by the few minstrels still playing so late. Had she been wandering earlier she perhaps could have caught more lively tunes, but the softer melodies of things gone by, and times yet to come, and their laments for love and everything in between, made for most acceptable songs to which she could pace her steps. Songs that echo down from gardens and balconies soothe her slightly aching head (and her worry of what would happen were she caught out so late and so dizzy on wine).
She turns a familiar corner to cross beneath a silver archway, and she feels herself stop suddenly. For in her path stood an elf with hair silver like the lines of the sky before dawn, with the pride she’d only seen perfected in statues of heroes and soldiers in their ideals of such bloodshed outside of Gondolin. Mallossel froze, the warmth of the nearby lantern helping to further sober her. The unfamiliar elf stood with his head tilted as if straining to hear the music she was so accustomed to. She notices then the lute slung across his back; it was almost unbefitting, the instrument in stark contrast to the way he carried himself. His posture is taut, rigid, and quite unlike the looseness with which the minstrels carried themselves. His hands are clasped in front of him, and his shoulders pulled back - certainly not the way she expects one to carry themself if out for a pleasant nighttime stroll. Mallossel clears her throat softly before calling out to speak to him.
“You are late, hir, I fear,” she speaks with clarity startling even to herself. Her breath catches in her throat as he turns, even though he is distracted in fitting the strap of his lute over his shoulder. He studies her in silence for a moment as she studies him before manners overcome them both and they share a bow.
“Do you play?” Mallossel asks out of curiosity borne by a wine-stained tongue, gesturing to his lute as she takes a few steps from the lantern light. She watches closely as he suddenly straights up, further reinforcing the idea of a soldier in her mind.
“Only a little,” answers the male. “My mother taught me when I was a child.”
She lets a brief pause linger between them before offering him a smile.
“Mallossel, also known as Gilher, of the House of the Golden Flower,” she says, introducing herself with as much poise as she could muster, and hoping that it would be enough to fool him of her tipsiness.
“Cardanith,” he replies in turn, “of the House of the Tower of Snow.” As he says this, Mallossel tilts her head and takes a step closer to him, with a finger resting on her lips in thought.
“You are not from here, are you?” She questions, but after taking another quick glance at his posture, she offers her own guess without giving him the chance to answer. “A soldier!”
The fact that it pulled a laugh from Cardanith’s lips was enough to make her smile as well. He answers:
“Yes. I am a Visarch under Hir Valeris’s command in the Host. What gave it away?”
“At ease, soldier!” Mallossel teases, laughing as she notices the way he holds himself with sudden attention. “I am jesting. You have that standing about you. Simple and proud, yet you have not the bearing of one of the City Guard, hir. Thusly, I deduced.”
He lowers his head with a slight smile. “Indeed, I am not one of the Guard.” He raises his head, then, to look and see if he can catch sight of the minstrels. “Perhaps I should see if I can catch one song in full.”
“You are not here to play?” She questions in turn, her eyes widening in surprise. She could have sworn that the fact he bore a lute did imply that he would play.
“I… had no plans of doing so. Not tonight.”
“Then why bear a lute across your shoulder, hir?” As she asks this, he seems to shrink in on himself slightly, averting his gaze from her eyes.
“Would you believe me,” he began, “if I told you that it was not mine, and I was simply bearing it for a friend?”
Mallossel cannot stop herself from shaking her head with a wry smile; she folds her hands in front of herself. “No, I do not think I would. But, please, let it not stop you.”
“I bear it for a friend, then,” he repeats, trying to bite back another chuckle. Mallossel beams at him despite herself - she thought his smile lovely, yet she could tell he did not share it very often. Maybe it was the wine dizzying her thoughts, and that is why she presses on him.
“Is your friend amongst the players? Oh! Is it a replacement? In case some great calamity occurs which will require your friend to switch instruments?” she asks in such a rapid way that she is grateful her tongue does not twist and trip on itself. Her questions cause him to pause, and she wonders if perhaps she has overstepped her boundaries with the soldier. That thought is quickly dismissed as she realizes that he is standing there, dumbfounded, gaping like a fish as he offers a few ums and ahs before settling on a very simple…
“Yes.”
Mallossel laughs, “Very well! A most noble purpose!” As she chuckles giddily, her face flushing red from her glee and the wine, she does not notice the way Cardanith studies her. His gaze is averted as she sighs and speaks again. “You are not a very good liar, you know.”
“I…” he begins in protest, raising a finger to emphasize his point before he draws it back. “I suppose I shall take it as a compliment, hiril Mallossel.”
“I suppose we should go find your friend, then?” She asks, offering a hand towards him as she gestures to the stairs nearby into the gallery. “Assure that no calamity has befallen him?” Again Mallossel gives him no time to answer, turning away already to try her hand at making it down the stairs without falling. As she does so, she hears the hurried footsteps of the Visarch following behind her.
The stairs gave way to a large courtyard of stone and silver, though in the dying light of the stars as they began their descent, many of the musicians had already packed up their instruments and left. Some remain, sitting on the marble staircases, or murmuring to themselves over the last of their drink as they stumble over the slick flooring.
Mallossel opens her arms dramatically as they step onto the scene; she turns once, twice, thrice, twisting the fabric of her dress around her ankles before stopping to look at Cardanith with a lop-sided grin. She is careful to kick out the twists in the fabric so she does not trip when she tries to walk again.
“So, hir, where is your friend?” She asks in an airy tone, her mischievous silver eyes darting over the form of her newfound companion as he squirms under her gaze. The soldier scans the near-empty courtyard, before his own sheepish gaze falls back on her. When he does not answer, she ambles her way back over to him.
“How about a song, then?” Mallossel asks, setting herself down on the stair where he stood. He casts her an uncertain glance, before sighing in resignation.
“One tune,” he relents, unclasping the leather strap of his lute as he sat down next to her.
“One tune… hir,” the elleth giggles, lying flat on her back on the wide stone step. Cardanith rests the instrument neatly across his knee, but a fickle, uncertain hand is raised to adjust the strings. Mallossel’s silver eyes stay on him as he does so, and he oft glances her way as he works.
She notes the slight tremor in his hands as he adjusts the strings and the tuning of the instrument; it was not the confident manner in which most trained lutenists handle their instruments, that which she is most familiar with seeing. Cardanith musters a deep breath before picking tentatively a few notes; his gaze then turns to her once more, as though asking permission to start. Mallossel simply beams at him - an assurance that she was listening, and she slips further back onto the stone slab with a clap of excitement.
“Please, begin!” She exclaims, her tongue still tripping over her words. The Visarch offers her an awkward smile, plucking at the notes once more.
“I am no singer, hiril, so I fear I shall only play what tune I know,” he says, and then stifles any further messy excuses and he plays the song he has promised her.
His fingers are numb from the cold and messy in their stride, (and even years after he knows not how he reached the end of the tune). If any other player has remained to hear it, surely, he will be laughed out of the gallery, and forbidden to pick the lute ever again, for it is certainly the worst of all songs any living soul has ever witnessed.
But she, be it out of politeness or softness of heart, sings along with it, her voice glad and clear as the morn. “Hail, Queen! O, Varda, O Varda, O, Varda...”
Mallossel sang, and it calms his fickle fingers.
The tune came to an end, but Cardanith looks down at the lute still, thin strands of silver hair draping across his brow.
“It would not be as beautiful had you not lent your voice to it, hiril.”
She gives no answer. “Malossel?” Cardanith lifts his gaze, only to find her settled, sleeping quietly, locks of bronze splaying against the chiseled stone. Behind her, dawn begins to stretch its tender fingers between the jagged peaks of the Echoriath.
The Visarch smiles, and sits beside her, deciding it was most unfit to leave her alone and disappear before she stirs.
