faderift | (no subject)

It was not something widely known, even in Arda, but a resting elf, even one stood upright and staring into the distance, was a creature quite easily taken unawares. True, it was something of a challenge to sneak up on one of the Eldar, but it was not unheard of, especially if their rest was peaceful and they were at ease.

Galadriel had partaken in sleep and dreaming since she had come to Thedas but both were new, in practice and concept. They were unusual activities, by their very nature, and she often forgot they were even options. When she tired in Skyhold, her first inclination was not to seek out a bed or slumber. As she was wont, she found something of beauty and allowed her mind to rest as she watched it. Thus far, she found that she preferred standing on the walls of the fortress. The distance beyond Skyhold was calming and ageless, no matter the time of day; she found great beauty in the colors of the winter weather above the Frostbacks, and it was a simple thing to lose herself in the quiet majesty of them.

As it was, she was stood on the battlements, tall and unmoving. It would have been easy to mistake her for a statue, if not for the gentle, listless swirl of her light gowns or the occasional shuffling of the heavy, plain cloak she wore atop them. She was not at the edge of the battlement, but her gaze was set outward, locked on the distant, misty horizon. Cole's quiet arrival was not enough to stir her from her waking trance, even as he obscured the view, but his words managed it quickly enough.

Galadriel's gaze had not been unfocused, not exactly, but it had lacked a certain presence of mind. She blinked quickly as she came back to herself, like a daydreamer caught in the act. With a speed that belied her surprise, she drew herself up just a bit taller and her gaze snapped to Cole. There was a moment of silence as her faculties returned to her, like someone roused from a nap and thrown immediately into an urgent task, but her politely startled expression didn't darken.

In fact, despite her surprise at being woken (insofar as it counted as waking), she seemed nearly delighted. A confused but honest smile quirked her lips upward and she tilted her head forward to better peer beneath the brim of his wide hat.

"A fine sentiment," Galadriel said, at last, "and something I continue to be glad of, myself."

There was something about him that felt almost...familiar, but she could not place it.

Curiously, she had a great deal of trouble placing him.

She knew she had seen him before. She could recall the shape of him, in passing if nothing more, but only just. Memories of individual moments, of instants where he stood starkly against the stones of Skyhold or the scenery of Thedas? Those eluded her grasp like shapes in fog.

It should have been worrisome, that.

There were precious few creatures who could evade her sight, and fewer still who could conceal themselves from her so utterly, but she couldn't quite muster any actual concern.

It was odd to think it, much less experience it, but he felt like an old friend.

"Have we met before, mellon nin?" The question was, perhaps, more blunt than it ought to have been. She was certain the answer was 'no,' but something in her refused to agree.

He had caught glimpses of her that first day, on the field near Haven. White light, not obscuring the light of the mark but glowing alongside it, gentle and steady and strong. That day had been chaos, no time to stop and admire. Barely enough time to question.

He'd been hesitant to approach her since then. Too bright, so beautiful it almost hurt. He knew the light wasn't meant for him, but he still felt it. The same way he felt the meaning of those words, though his ears didn't understand them: mellon nin. Friend.

It actually didn't hurt to look at her. Not his eyes. He felt the pull more in his heart.

"We haven't spoken," he clarified, "but — I see. I was there when the sky brought you here. I helped send the demons back to the Fade."

He didn't know whether she had managed to see him in turn. He should be so lucky.

It would have been a simple matter to accept his answer, to simply allow the incongruity of him to slide past her and forget that it had ever been. She had seen him in combat, while disoriented from her fall, and Skyhold was far too vibrant and lively for her to have picked him out of the crowd. The logic seemed to fill itself in; words welled up in her mind and tried to carry him off, to steal the very idea of him away.

He was a reflection in a river; if she grasped for him, she would achieve nothing. The waters would simply flow through her fingers, unhindered by her efforts, and she would be left with little more than distorted shapes of shifting light.

He was not the first of the ainur that she had met, but it had been a very, very long time since her last introduction.

Galadriel's expression relaxed, her surprise ebbed quickly and her smile eased as she considered him. If one was still and patient, even reflections on rolling water became clear. She didn't strain to place him and, without the distraction of it, he was far easier to see.

"Then I owe you thanks," Galadriel said after a long pause. "Had our company been less fit, we would have been overcome. I would not have survived that place...and, as you might guess, I am quite fond of living."

Her smile was polite.

"Tell me, what is your name?"

He sensed the thought of ainur more abstractly than the words she spoke earlier. It sounded holy, reverent, and like something that should have felt more familiar than it was. As if he'd dreamed it, once. A second later, he saw the way that word seemed to fall over him, in her eyes.

He looked down toward the stones in something that could be taken for a nod of greeting, but conveniently hid his blush.

"Cole," he said. "I'm Cole."

"Cole," Galadriel repeated as he ducked his head. "It is a pleasure to meet you."

She pressed a hand over her heart and, though they were stood quite close, hazarded a short bow as she introduced herself.

"I am called Galadriel," she replied in kind. "Did you require something of me, mellon nin, or did you simply wish to congratulate me for my continued survival?"

It was asked with good humor, if nothing else, and Galadriel watched the wide brim of his hat as she awaited her answer.

He hadn't had any particular plans when he'd approached her. He was checking in on all the people from the rifts he could find. It was the best reason he'd found yet to speak with her.

So he found that when she asked, he had no particular business. But he wasn't keen to leave her side yet, either.

"You're very tall for an elf," he observed.

His observation was apropos of nothing, issued innocently and with the flavor of a question but lacking the direction one would require. Galadriel's smile widened and she restrained it; she wouldn't want him to think she took her amusement at his expense.

"Yes, I am," Galadriel agreed. Her brow quirked and, at once her tone was more conversational. "Though I find that the difference is much greater in Thedas than it has ever been."

She had met many elves and all of them, the Dalish as well as those who claimed no clan, were head and shoulders beneath her. It was a novelty, if somewhat distressing, but she had grown accustomed to it.

"I have known more than a few elves who were taller than I," Galadriel told him. "And in these lands I have met Tal Vashoth who are taller even than the ancient High Kings. It is quite a change, looking up so often as I speak."

Ancient. She was that, too, he could tell. The light was bright, but also enduring.

There was nothing odd about that. Most things died, sooner or later. Some merely took a much longer time than others.

"Do your elves keep growing as they get older?" Now that the topic had been brought up, he was curious. His head tilted and his eyes widened a bit further as he caught a brief glimpse into the world she had been pulled from: shadows against the glow. "Is that why some of them are so short?"

Galadriel was very skilled in both the opening of thoughts and the obfuscation of them, it was an art she excelled at above any living being in Middle Earth, and perhaps even in Aman. There were precious few who could touch her mind, fewer still who could manage it without invitation, but Thedas was strange, it seemed, and she was not so fortified here as she was accustomed to. Had his glimpse been more banal he might've gone unnoticed; that fact alone should have been horrifying, and yet it was not.

It was an inexplicable feeling, being listened to as he was listening to her; it was quiet and very nearly cold, like the barest draft rising against her heart. She was uncertain how he had found a way in but, given the feel of him, she could conjure no ire at the brush of thought.

"Alas no, though I would that we shared such things with our tree-born neighbors," Galadriel lamented, but without the bite of true grief. "The Eldar change very little once we are grown, though some of the very oldest occasionally grow beards."

She regarded him with a reflection of his curiosity.

"I have not, however, so I cannot say whether it is truly a thing that takes with age, or if it is a falsehood Cirdan has spun for us all."

Her pause was brief enough to be polite, but only just; it was fortunate she had never managed to offend one of the maiar with eager questions. True, it had been two ages since she had asked one a question so abruptly but, if anything was unchanging, it was the ways of ageless beings.

"I exhausted myself so easily reading into the hearts of men, does this world not strain against you?"

"No," he says at first, but then. Well. "Sometimes." Only not in the way she meant, he thinks.

"Sometimes the world becomes too much. Sharp and glittering. I strain to see it. That's only in places when the Veil is thin. Then I can hear the spirits on the other side, see them shimmering. Blinding. But I breathe, and try to remember what's real."

Back to the what she was actually asking about, though: "Hearts are easy to hear. Some more than others."

Galadriel was accustomed to insight without context but she had rarely encountered insight so...specific. Under other circumstances, she would have stayed silent and held Cole's account in her mind, something to piece together privately when she was not engaged in conversation, but her circumstances grew less and less normal as the days trickled by. That he could hear hearts easily was, somehow, not surprising...but that knowledge only held her interest for a moment.

Thus far she had only spoken to mages about the veil. Their answers had been helpful to her, at least in understanding magic as a concept, but they were ultimately...lacking. Each was only a partial description, and she hadn't yet learned enough to understand how this world fit together. She was not aware of just how unique Cole truly was, but she had known enough similar beings to appreciate their perspective and wisdom. To see the world from the outside was a truly rare feat, one she had not yet managed in Thedas, but Cole's account came near enough....

"I have never known a Veil before coming here," Galadriel admitted. "But I can almost feel it, like heavy clouds overhead or fog. It is very strange to me."

It was a testament to how comfortable she felt, that she was so free with her words so soon after meeting him. She nearly asked how he tolerated the Veil, if there was some secret to it, to reaching through it or around it, but she stopped herself. It was knowledge Cole might have, true, and knowledge that he might share if she pressed him, but she did not desire to cause him distress. He had simply come to check on her well-being; it was an act of kindness and one she would not repay with discomfort.

If nothing else, his account had sounded rather uncomfortable.

"I suppose it is fitting, given how strange I am to the people here," Galadriel said, a polite redirection. "My heart is not so easily read, or at least it was not in Arda, but if you must listen to it, I ask you: do not delve too deeply. I have seen much darkness that has no kin in Thedas; I would not inflict such shadows, even in memory, on those who need not know them."

He could delve very deep, if he wished. The life behind her was cavernous; most things within it were so distant and echoing that he could not hear them clearly. Only the recent past made itself readily known, and even that was longer than many ever lived.

But he would heed her advice. So long as those same shadows didn't come seeking him. They did that, sometimes.

"You give the light to banish shadows," he observed, "but to banish means to touch, and push against the darkness."

On the subject of the Veil: "There are places where the clouds part. Have you found them yet?"

"I have not," she admitted. His observation regarding her was not wrong, in another time she might've taken it as a compliment, but she was too old and his comment too precise. Yes, the sentiment was encouraging, but it also carried one of her deepest fears.

She did not comment on his words and, instead, chose to ask about the veil.

"But I shall keep an eye turned skyward," she assured him. "Can you tell me what I might look for? I have made a pasttime of...watching would be the best word, I suppose. Of watching the ripples in the veil, where I can. If I know the signs, I might find such a place more easily."

That, he could easily explain. His hand raised above the battlements, toward the sky: to the place where the Breach used to be, used to hang over Skyhold and the whole of Thedas.

"The Breach was the biggest, but it was too big. Most places are finer, filtered. Sunlight through the clouds. Glittering, but not blinding. Watch, and you will be able to see them... I think."

Galadriel followed the line of his hand and, for a long moment, stared at the scar in the sky. She had seen it when she arrived, looming over Haven, but even if someone had told her what it was, she wouldn't have understood. To know that it was a warp in the veil, a thin place, was far more interesting than it ought to have been.

"I hope I will," Galadriel told him and turned her gaze back to him. It faltered, tried to pass across the surface of him, but she stilled and was able to focus upon him again.

"This world is beautiful and it has been so long since I have seen so many new things."