Child of Kings by singing-sorrowless  

Galadwen

“The world is indeed full of peril, and in it there are many dark places; but still there is much that is fair, and though in all lands love is now mingled with grief, it grows perhaps the greater.”

--The Fellowship of the Ring

Gil-Galad was an elven-king,

of him the harpers sadly sing

Galadwen—

Galadwen had never expected to be married to one of the Noldor, newly come out of the west, fair and haughty, glowing with a light she had only heard of in rumor. Yet here lay one of their princes by her side, on the grass by the riverbank. He looked less imposing in sleep. His head, so often crowned in ribbons of gold, rested on her chest, gilded strands unraveling from long braids, black against her pale skin.

Yet even when he was awake, Galadwen no longer found this particular Noldor prince imposing in the least. The fell kind of fire in the eyes of all his kin burned in Fingon’s gaze too, but, Avari as she was, she had not wanted to look away.

Theirs had been a fast, reckless kind of wedding—they had married under the stars, the wild things of the forest the only witnesses. Fingon, despite being counted among the wise, had little plan for their future together.

It had been chance that brought them together in the first place, he exploring east of the Blue Mountains, she running westwards through Eriador with her tribe. Fingon had strayed far from his companions while hunting; Galadwen had left the shelter of the forest to scout out the lands ahead.

She had heard him singing as he walked and came to listen, creeping softly in the shadows. But he saw her and called out to her, lost. She had no idea where the other Noldor might be, but she had stayed with him until morning, not wanting to leave a stranger alone in the wilderness. In the light of the moon and their small fire, they had tried to talk, though their languages had long been sundered.

As Galadwen continued traveling westwards with her people, she had continued to run into Fingon and the other Noldor while hunting, or while plotting the next night’s route in the gray of early morning. Before she realized what was happening, she was falling in love with him, then, married.

Now, she had no choice; she had strayed and found the one her soul loved. She would have to follow him, back to wherever his people were living. Galadwen laughed at herself, a pale moth chasing the splendor of the morning. Fingon stirred, and she lay still again, running her fingers lightly over his hair, watching the constellation of the Hunter sink in the gray of early morning.

They were to leave today, as soon as the sun began to set, to make it easier for her. Galadwen had said her goodbyes already, far sooner than she had wished, to her mother and grandmother. She needed to travel with the strange party of Noldor. Even one of the Avari, for whom surviving in the forests and wild places was as natural as breathing, could not hope to cross Beleriand alone, not with the shadow in the North.

Fingon had promised they could make a home in Taur-na-Fuin, a dark forest much like this one, though half his time would have to be spent in the mountains of Hithlum with his father, the High King. Galadwen would not dare to come to the Noldorin palace. She was Moriquendi; she belonged in the twilight of the woodland, in a world of soft semi-darkness, not with the Noldor in their kingdoms of bright banners and glittering stone, fire and shining metal. But she would go with Fingon, and make her home in Beleriand, and dwell in his light.

Chapter End Notes

"Galadwen" could mean either "tree-woman" or "radiant woman" in Sindarin.