Glorfindel ran a brush through his hair and braided it with quick, familiar fingers, pulling the front few locks back from his face while leaving the rest to flow down his back, almost to his waist. He grinned as he reached up behind his back to touch the loose ends. Somehow he never grew tired of that. He was never normally vain, but he was fond of the long golden hair for which, after all, he had been named. That was his little weakness.

The maiden with whom he intended to watch the sunrise liked it too – why was a mystery; her hair was black as a moonless night, thick and straight, beautiful. Glorfindel was no poet, or he might have found a better way to describe her, but he contented himself with ‘vanima’ – beautiful.

Still, he grinned a little to himself at the thought of her smile. She always smiled when she saw him, and ran her fingers through his hair, calling him ‘Laurëa’. She was a poet, and would sing of everything she saw as they walked together: the sun, the white walls of their fair city, the bright fountains…

She was already waiting in their accustomed meeting place in the square when he arrived, sitting on the edge of the fountain, trailing her hand in the water, humming something under her breath. Her voice floated lightly across the square and a small smile crossed his face as he ran his hand over his hair again to make sure it was tidy.

“Melda!” he called and she looked up, smiling in greeting, then she laughed.

“Laurëa, you braided it!”

He hurried over to sit beside her and kissed her on the cheek. “I wonder sometimes whether you’d no longer love me if I were to cut my hair.”

She scowled at him. “Only because that would be so very unlike you, my Laurelin.”

“Laurelin?”

“Yes.” She kissed him softly. “I’m sure you can guess why.”

He frowned as if in thought and she laughed, standing up and taking his hand.

“Come on, Laurëa.”

“Only if you’ll let me talk about your hair.”

She raised an eyebrow. “Mine?”

“Yours.” Glorfindel looked around frantically, at the moon and stars, searching for something to say that wouldn’t sound silly. “Um…” Damn it, why did he always stammer when he tried to think what to say to her? “Your hair… I bet that before Elbereth made the stars and set them in the sky, it was as black as your hair. In fact, if I didn’t know why she made them, I’d wonder why she wanted to spoil that perfect blackness. And then I think that that might be the only thing that would make your hair more beautiful: if I could somehow set stars like jewels in it. And… and then they’d shine, and it would be… beautiful,” he trailed off lamely.

She was smiling a little, softly, looking at his face. “Not bad,” she said quietly. “You’re learning.”

“In fact,” he said, emboldened by this encouragement. “Maybe I don’t need to find some way of making stars, because of the way the moon catches it. Like starlight caught in a net, like the way the fountains catch the light.”

Her smile broadened.

“So when you stand in the moonlight like this,” he continued, “I think I understand why Elbereth made the stars: because then there was light amid the darkness, and the sky looked blacker for it, and…” Where was he going with this? “And that made the stars look brighter. Like diamonds. So you don’t need stars for your hair, vanima Mornië, because… it catches the moon, and that’s brighter, and that makes the shadows darker…” And oh, Elbereth, he was talking in circles, “And it all comes back to beautiful, in the end.”

She stared at him for a long moment, the moon in her hair, her eyes shining, a smile on her lips. Her fingers caressed one of his braids, then she kissed him on the lips and whispered in his ear, “We’ll make a poet of you yet.”

“Really?”

“Yes. And I will demonstrate by describing your hair, which is as the glory of the morning sunrise as it caresses the walls…”

Glorfindel sighed and let the adjectives and similies wash over him. After all, he was proud of his hair…

***

As they waited for the sunrise in the half-light before the dawn, standing in companionable silence on the walls, Glorfindel took a deep breath and ran a distracted hand over his braids. Right. Now was the time. He’d waited many years and it was finally time to say what was on his mind – had been there since he was but a gangling adolescent and his childhood friend had just been blossoming into the beauty she was now.

“What is it, Laurëa?” she asked softly, turning her head to look at him.

“Tauralindë,” he said softly, and she raised an eyebrow at his use of her name rather than one of the epithets he’d used up until then. “Tauralindë, you… you know I’ve loved you since we were children.”

“Yes.”

“Well…” He wasn’t going to try poetry. He just turned to look at her and took her hands. “Would you like to marry me?”

He felt a small thrill of triumph as she realised that she was stunned out of poetry. He’d never seen that happen before.

“Glorfindel…” she whispered, using his name as he’d used hers. “You…” A small tear trickled down her face. “You’ll have to speak to my parents.”

“I know.”

For a moment more they stood, looking into one another’s eyes, then as one they turned back towards the east, his arm around her shoulders, hers around his waist, looking at the sun, and as the morning breeze blew around them it blew tendrils of their hair across their faces, the sun picking out dark shadows in the gold and bright gleams in the black, mingling as one.

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