Walking on Starlight

I turn the stone over in my hands, hard and chill, but not as cold as my seat carved out of the crevice wall. Too long it has been since I felt at home.  Shoveled in this cell like a bucket of coal, door locked on me as if I were a beast too disgusting to roam free.  I am alone.
I trace the grooves in my stone then toss it back and forth out of boredom.  This journey is beginning to aggravate me.  It seems whenever our goal is almost in reach, just past arm’s length, a snag of brambles catches us by the ankles and we are dragged backward again.  Like some kind of twisted game the fates are playing with us as their pawns.

But then there is her.

Oh, she were the light that shines through the leaves in summer.  Her hair is the rich copper forged in the most fiery of foundries.  She fights with ferocity and skill, then can turn about and beam with flowing calm and beauty.  I have seen nothing like her.
Could she love someone like me?
I start to smile but then catch myself. Why am I thinking like this. It’s silly, it’s not…I shouldn’t dwell on such things.  Somebody so lovely and full of impossible grace could never even notice me, let alone care about me….
Could she?

“Kili?” My brother calls out from his cell.
I scoot closer to the elf-forged door and press my face to a gap in the bars. “Yes Fili?”
“Oh, good, you can hear me. No, I don’t want anything, I was just checking to see if we could talk to each other.  It’s good that we can, there’s no telling how long we’ll be in here.”
“Mm. Well between the lot of us somebody’s bound to figure out something, sooner or later.”
“Aye.”
“How’s your cell? I can fully stretch one leg out in mine.”
“Hahaha. Well I can stand, reach out both my arms, and still not touch the walls!”
We both chuckle and fade into sighing.  
“Fili?” I ask. My stone rests in my palm. Mother had given this runestone to me not long before Fili and I left her, on an autumn afternoon before the sun began to set.  She asked me to promise that I would one day return to her.  Her voice had been taut, wrinkled eyes curving in a careworn smile.  Mother was afraid for Fili and I and Thorin, her older brother. Thorin used to entertain us when we were barely lads.  Memories of warm nights by a fire, the sappy smell of pine-wood floating in the air, hearty laughter and fantastic stories dance in my mind.            

“Do you think we’ll ever go back home?”

There is a silence. Even the clatter of shouting dwarves ramming themselves against their doors is quieted.  In the hush, I can feel a small twinge at the outskirts of my mind--almost a premonition, too smoky to grasp, but still there all the same.  A feeling of cold, of hurt, of promise, and of peace.                  
I don’t have time to interpret the vision before it leaves as quickly as it came.

I sense Fili thinking of the best course of action he should go about taking for his answer.

“I think that,” he said, voice softer and more controlled, “I think that we are all meant to return to that place where we were always knew we would end up again.  For us, I don’t know if that be back at home, or here, on the mountain, or on the battlefield with an arrow in our hearts, taking our last breath there and thinking, I fought for what is right. And that’s all I need.”
Fili paused as he realized his thoughts after they were said out loud.
“All I wish is that we take back what is rightfully ours, and bring back the land for our people.  Whether that be the work of our own hands or our legacy’s, once that quest is complete, I know my heart can stop beating and rest until the world is no more.”

I almost shudder at the magnitude of my brother’s creed.  Being his younger, I had always almost automatically looked up to his beliefs, but this most recent statement was truly admirable.  Fili was right. Once this grand adventure reaches its peak, and the company is either triumphant or slain,--and in that case others have to start from the beginning as we did--until we win the battle, dead or alive we all will be fighting alongside our friends in spirit.  Our strength unites us, our goal drives us, and our determination forges our hearts together.  Because of that, we will win this fight.

Light footsteps barely echo off the cavern walls. After a few moments a figure appears at my door.
It is the She-elf. Though my heart  beats a step quicker, I decide to give her no notice.
“The stone in your hand. What is it?” she asks.
“It is a talisman.” By the look on her face, I see that she hasn’t come across such a thing before.  A cheeky idea crosses into my head. “A powerful spell lies upon it. If any but a dwarf reads the runes on the stone,” I pause, drawing out the mystery, then quickly flash the rock out at her, “they will be forever cursed.”
The Elf-maiden jolts back a bit. She stares at me for a moment, then continues on her way.
“Or not.” She stops and turns back.
“Depending on whether you believe that kind of thing, it’s just a token.”  I can’t help but grin.
Tauriel narrows her eyes at me, then her face melts into a smile; Well done.
I am satisfied. “A runestone.” I say truthfully. “My mother gave it to me so I’d remember my promise.”
The elf steps closer. “What promise?”
“That I would come back to her.”
She smiles a bit.
“She worries,” I continue, tossing my relic. “She thinks I’m reckless.”
“Are you?”
I shake my head. “Nah.” Though I know that it’s a lie.
Suddenly I miss my mark in catching and the token clatters through the bars and rolls out. But before it can topple down into the cavern, the elf steps on it with a fluid snap of her boot. She picks it up and holds the runestone to the faint light, feeling its smoothness and reading its message in Khuzdul. I stand, ready to strike if she decides to take it.
I recall the laughter and music I’d heard earlier, coming from the levels above. “Sounds like quite a party you’re having up there.”
“It is Mereth en Ngilith, the Feast of Starlight. All light is sacred to the Eldar. But wood elves love best the light of the stars.”
I lean my face against the bars. “I always thought it was a cold light. Remote, and far away.”
The elf is incredulous. “It is memory! Precious and pure.” She glances at my runestone. “Like your promise.” She holds it out to me. I gaze at her for a heartbeat, then take back my rock, pensive.  She looks upward. “I have a walk there sometimes,” she says. “Beyond the forest and up into the night. I have seen the world fall away, and the white light forever fill the air.”
Her words are so beautiful, I smile. “I saw a fire-moon once.” She gives me her full attention, curious.
“It rose over the pass near Dunland. Huge! Red and gold it was, it filled the sky. We were in escort with some merchants from Ered Luin, and they were trading in silverware for furs. We took the Greenway south, keeping  the mountain to our left…and then this huge fire-moon lighting our path! I wish I could have seen it for longer than I did.”
She sits outside my cell door, eyes alight with the awe and pleasure of a child. We tell stories of the magnificent weavings of our constellations, seen but having different names on both sides of our worlds.  She is playful, and laughs like a glittering stream.  
“Can I ask you something?” I ask her. I have new found respect for her, and it shows in my voice.
“Yes.”
“What is your name?”
She pauses, as though weighing whether I could use her name to hurt her somehow.
“Tauriel,” she says. She trusts me. “And yours?”
“Kili,” I reply. “At your service.”
Our hands are so close through the bars they could almost touch.  But I don’t dare, for fear she might flicker and vanish, a mere illusion.  Tauriel could tame the heavens and walk among the stars.              
I want to be near her always.
She has to leave me now, to go attend to the business she has so long put off.  She smiles at me once more before she glides away, leaving my heart aglow and my soul in summer.