My name was Vanlanthiriel. My hair, caught in spirals and waves was as pitch as the night without any moon or stars and my skin was white as new milk. Long lines and bones for my beautiful hands, which time had never touched.
It could be said that I was the epitome of beauty, the cliché of elven standards. And I did not care, as a piece of me had been irrevocably torn from me.
I was one part of two, one half of one whole--a twin for my brother, Valdaglerion. A spear, a silly little piece of metal was all that it took to shatter the bond of two minds entangled since the womb. My days of having my words finished for me, of laughter, of childhood secrets with heads bent together were no more.
All that I had left was the echo of words and thoughts which belonged to me. They lacked any life without him, they lacked color. Everything I did in the time after his death became a gray smudge of memory I will never recall.
Like my namesake, I have always been drawn to water. The peace of the slow winding river, the glitter of evening sun on waves. So it was that I chose the lake my brother and I spent our childhood. Here, the willow, the spruce, the oak and the ash seemed to bend down in quiet respect to the beauty of the water in fresh morning mist. No wind stirred a leaf to sound, only to bob and sway, reflecting little bits of golden sun in the endless sea of green before me. How sweet that the forest mourned me already.
Barefoot, dressed in white as if a bride, I knew that with my heart turned lead all that I must do is walk forward; I would sink forever and no more would this hole left by Valdaglerion's death ache. So I sank my feet within the cold water and did not think to look behind me, not once, not even when the clear lake eagerly lapped at the edges of my eyelids, wiping away tears I did not know I shed.
Beneath the water the sounds of the world rushed passed in muted currents, so too were all the colors. I thought this befitting and suitable for my sorrow and was confused for a moment as all of it went away--to the now harsh brightness of day once again. My spine and my shoulders hit something harsh enough for air to leave me, above me sky stretched on forever.
It was Darson, still in his mithril armor from Valdaglerion's funeral. Our protector, a friend of father's from his younger days. The dwarf, to me, shone so brightly as that I mistook him for a star fallen a moment. How ridiculous, for no star held sun baked skin, long brown beard proudly woven, grizzled features, or tear filled blue eyes--
"My lady," his voice shook as he berated me. He said things, things which were awful and true. He asked of me if I thought this was Valdaglerion's wish. If I thought this is what he would have wanted of his legacy, what he wanted for his sister. There were little red flowers on the ground as I rolled from him to sob shamelessly into the grass, the same color as the bloom of red upon silk. He bade and begged me to listen, his rocky voice wavering between choked and angry. I did not want to hear, but it was when it sounded as if he would go--that I wailed like a child and caught his hand.
"Please, don't leave me alone!" There was no music in my words, my voice did not sound like my own.
It must have been what Darson wished to finally hear, for through the tears in blue eyes, he sat with a great rattle of metal right upon the ground near me and took my hand to his breast. There, he enfolded it in both of his, battle-scarred paws which swallowed the white of my own.
Shivering wet, sprawled upon the lake of my almost-death, it was there that we both spoke of Valdaglerion, and my sorrow was no longer selfish.
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And then I woke up. Most vivid, realistic dream I have had in ages.
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Shawn Pence
4 months ago
