12: Lessons in Compassion

Glorfindel woke the next morning feeling refreshed, and discovered he no longer cared what the future held. He would face it when it came. For now, all that mattered was that he learn as much as he could of what he needed to know before his release. He and Sador spent many hours talking about their former lives and how they had died. Glorfindel held Sador in his arms while the ellon wept after telling the golden-haired elf about fleeing Doriath and then dying at the hands of one of Maedhros’ warriors.

"I-I didn’t even know how to use a s-sword," he stuttered between tears. "A-all I wanted to do was to pr-protect my sister." Sador looked up with hurt and confusion in his eyes. "Wh-why would anyone want to hurt a child? Ninniach was only thirty."

Glorfindel shook his head and held the ellon closer, sorrow filling his fëa. "I don’t know, meldonya. I don’t know."

They sat there in companionable silence for a long time until one of the Lóriennildi found them and reminded them they had to eat.

Over the days and weeks that followed, Glorfindel began to interact with the other Reborn. He discovered that they were all expected to attend lectures detailing the history of Aman after the Flight of the Noldor.

"You need to know who is who and why things are as they are here," one of their tutors explained. "Even those of you who were born here will find that much has changed since the Darkening."

Glorfindel learned of events in Middle-earth from the other Reborn who died after him, for the Lóriennildi refused to speak about it. Glorfindel asked Sador and a few others about the fate of the survivors from Gondolin and learned that Idril, Tuor and their son had indeed made it to the Havens of Sirion, but as to their ultimate fate, he could never get a satisfactory answer. Not even Irmo, when Glorfindel sought the Vala out one day and asked, was forthcoming.

"They are no longer your concern, Glorfindel. Your death severed all responsibility towards the House of Turgon. Let it go. Let them go. It will only cause you grief otherwise."

Glorfindel, however, was not convinced and when Olórin paid him a brief visit, he opened up to the Maia as he had not to any other.

"Lord Irmo says my responsibility towards my king and his family died with me on the slopes of the Echoriath. He says my duties lie elsewhere, but he does not say where. Do loyalty and service and oaths die with the hröa? Are they not eternal, like the fëa? If these do not survive death, why should anything survive, even love?"

"Your questions are weighty, and require an answer," Olórin said after a brief pause, "but I cannot answer them for you."

"Cannot or will not?" Glorfindel retorted, beginning to feel anger and frustration. It seemed as if the Powers were intent on denying him simple information about those whom he had loved and served. What harm was there in knowing their fate?

Olórin sighed. He had feared this day, they all had. Manwë, himself, had warned him it was coming.

"He will ask questions for which he is not ready to hear the answers," the Elder King had told him. "You must stall him as best as you may. Eventually, he will come to me and I will answer all his questions, but not before that."

"Cannot, child," Olórin answered. "If you would know the answers to your questions, you must go to Lord Manwë for them, but only when you are ready to be released. Show that you have matured enough and you may leave Lórien and journey to Taniquetil... if you can."

"If I can?" Glorfindel asked, perplexed.

Olórin smiled. "It is not always easy to reach Taniquetil, Glorfindel. And if you go, do not go alone."

With that the Maia took his leave and Glorfindel was left to ponder his words, yet, in the exigency of living, he soon forgot them or his wish to know more about the fate of Turgon’s family. In the meantime, the Lóriennildi encouraged him to explore the different arts and crafts in the hopes he would find some employment suitable to his temperament.

Sador tried to help, but feared he wasn’t the right person for the task. "My adar was a potter," he said one day. "I was his apprentice before I died. I think I would like to be a potter again. Even in Aman they need potters. Perhaps you could learn as well and we will go into business together."

Glorfindel had to laugh at that, the image of himself covered with clay trying to get something to form on the potter’s wheel was just too funny, for he knew his strengths and weaknesses. "I’m afraid I would make a dreadful potter, Sador, but I thank you for the offer. I think it’s a very good idea that you have, though. You should pursue it for yourself."

"Oh, I just thought it was something we could do together when we left here so we could still be friends." Sador said somewhat diffidently.

Glorfindel placed his hands on the ellon’s shoulders, his gaze intent. "We will always be friends, never doubt that, whatever we end up doing. You must not think for a moment that we would ever cease to be friends."

Sador looked mollified at Glorfindel’s words and the golden-haired elf realized just how incredibly young the Sinda was. He suddenly felt protective of the younger ellon, reminded of how he had felt towards Eluréd and Elurín. He hoped that when the time came, they would be released together so he could continue watching out for his young friend.

Glorfindel’s one regret was that he did not see any of the friends he remembered from his time in Mandos. Either they were still in the Halls of Waiting, or had already been Reborn and sent to live in Aman. He also heard rumors that Tol Eressëa was occupied again by the Noldor, Sindar and Nandor who had elected to return to the Undying Lands after the War of Wrath, but he could get no clear confirmation.

"Perhaps some of your family survived and moved there," Glorfindel told Sador, hoping to cheer the ellon up, but Sador merely shrugged, half-resigned to finding that he was alone among strangers.

"Not alone," Glorfindel told him. "You have me and as long as you have me, you’ll never be alone."

Days fled and Glorfindel found he did not mind the company of others as much as he had before. Often he and Sador joined the other Reborn in the evenings for singing and dancing, trading stories and jokes, or just watching the stars as they danced their stately and eternal pavane across the heavens. Glorfindel would bring his harp and the others would also bring various musical instruments or would just join in the singing and they would make merry into the night.

During the day, he was allowed to wander as he willed if he was not attending a class or speaking to one of the Lóriennildi. These elves were there to help in the transition to life in Aman, though sometimes Glorfindel chafed under their seeming condescension. The Lóriennildi were unfailingly polite and ever helpful, yet Glorfindel had the distinct impression that he and the other Reborn were looked down upon as somehow inferior by some of them because they had had the ill luck to die, surely a sign of Eru’s displeasure towards them. He feared that if these elves who served Lord Irmo in the task of helping the Reborn felt this way, what did that bode for their reception among the other Once-born, as he tended to think of them?

"At least you’re a Noldo," Sador had commented when Glorfindel had expressed his concern to his friend. "I’m a Sinda. My people refused the call to come to Aman. Your people called us Moriquendi, never knowing what an insult it was to us who had fought against the Dark before ever you and yours arrived on our shores to lord it over us. How do you think they’ll treat me?"

Glorfindel found his friend’s words disturbing and pondered them for a long time. He thought to seek counsel but in the end decided against it. What, after all, could anyone say? It would be as it would be. He was unlikely to change anyone’s opinion about it.

Unbeknown to him, others pondered those same questions and had the same concerns. Námo often took counsel with Manwë about the treatment of the Reborn by the other elves. Irmo had to admonish some of his servants more than once when he noticed their condescending attitude towards their charges. Varda was heard to comment somewhat acerbically that even in the Undying Lands Melkor’s taint could still be felt and wondered if the Once-born (Varda had found Glorfindel’s name for the elves of Aman too amusing not to use herself) had gotten off too easily.

"I’m tempted to send most of them to Mandos to see what it feels like. It might cure them of their arrogance," the Star-Kindler had said in a fit of pique.

Námo had given her a wry look. "Just give me sufficient warning before you do. I’ll need to do some housecleaning first. You know how fastidious some of these elves are."

That had brought gales of laughter from both Varda and Manwë and even Nienna had smiled at the jest. In the end, though, they knew the changes in attitude could only come from the Children themselves.

"It will be up to the son of Arafinwë and our favorite Balrog-slayer," Manwë said. "It is for this that they were destined to meet in the Halls of Waiting, so that when the time came, they would come to a solution together."

"And if they fail to find a solution?" Irmo had asked, for he was skeptical that any solution would be forthcoming.

Manwë merely smiled. "Even in failure they will have achieved something," and he would say no more about it.

****

While day and night sped by, Glorfindel did not bother to keep track and could not have said how long he remained in Lórien. His harping improved and he learned several skills he had never learned before: bee-keeping from Yavanna’s people, the crafting of fine jewelry from some of Aulë’s, even ribbon embroidery from Vairë’s handmaidens. Yet, his greatest skill, according to Lord Irmo when he spoke to Glorfindel about it one time, seemed to be the most difficult for him to accept.

"Your greatest skill is compassion, child," the Lord of Lórien said. "Use it to the fullest."

"How?" Glorfindel asked, puzzled and not a little annoyed. What good was compassion to him? It wouldn’t put food on his table. He couldn’t sell it on the streets of Tirion for lodgings. What was he supposed to do with it?

Irmo, however, merely smiled and shook his head. "That’s for you to decide. In the meantime, if you want lodgings and food, I suggest you increase your repertoire of songs for your harp. That will stand you in better stead. And I might also suggest you use some of that compassion on yourself."

Glorfindel squirmed at that, for he had been having difficulty coming to terms with what he considered his failure: he could not yet forgive himself for dying. Míriel, the Lóriennildë who was most often his counselor tried to help him come to terms with his feelings about this but was unsuccessful. It was Sador, oddly enough, who helped him.

"You didn’t fail, Glorfindel," the Sinda said. "You succeeded. Idril and Eärendil survived. If anyone failed it was I."

"You?"

Sador nodded. "You were a warrior. You fell upon the Balrog without thought for yourself, only for others. I think you went into battle knowing you would die, didn’t you?" Sador’s glance was shrewd and Glorfindel ceded the point with a reluctant nod.

"So you see, you knew the price for your actions before you took them. I...I think every warrior knows that the... the consequence of picking up a sword is that they could die."

Glorfindel nodded, looking thoughtful, realizing at last that what Sador had said was the truth. It was as if a great weight was finally lifted from his shoulders and he felt he could breathe properly now, the past finally laid to rest and put into perspective.

"But why do you say you are a failure?" he asked his friend, for he did not think of Sador as one.

Sador blushed and looked down. "I’m not a warrior. I couldn’t save anyone, not even myself."

Glorfindel put his arms around the younger ellon and whispered in his ear. "That’s not true, Sador. You’ve just saved me." Then he kissed him on the brow. "Ci hannon, mellon nîn. Uin enedh e-gûr nîn, ci hannon."

He looked up just then and found himself staring into the calm eyes of the Lord of Lórien. No words passed between them, but he knew.

It was time to leave.

****

Adar: (Sindarin) Father.

Ci hannon, mellon nîn. Uin enedh e-gûr nîn, ci hannon: (Sindarin): "Thank you, my friend. From the depths (literally, "core, center") of my heart, I thank you." Glorfindel, of course, uses the second person familiar when speaking to his friend.

Note: The reference to Glorfindel learning ribbon embroidery from Vaire’s handmaidens is taken from Nilmandra’s story, History Lesson: Second Age, chapter 7, "Healing". The reference to bee-keeping is from my story, Tâd Edhil a Firion, chapter 7, "Into the Taur of No Return".