Glorfindel and I find plenty of time to converse over the next few days, and much of it is unfortunately interrupted—or at least observed—by Alëaren, Telamír, or both. It is usually just Tel, but even his quiet and typically unproblematic cousin seems to be finding opportunities to irk me recently.

Right now is the first time in days that Glorfindel and I aren't riding alongside one another, and the first time he has struck up conversation with someone other than myself.  He's riding a little ahead of me while animatedly reminiscing with Fírion about some comical memory they have of Imladris—something involving Erestor, a fountain, and a large plant pot.

Meanwhile, Fíria and Tauriel are conversing ahead of them.  Telamír's in his own little world as he trails behind Alëaren and myself, likely thinking about his Silvan sweetheart Eirwen, utterly oblivious to the beauty of the rolling landscape of the kingdom of Rohan through which we're passing—and have been passing for days.  Even I must admit, it's started to all look the same, but word is that we're nearing Rohan's northern border and will be back in Elven lands again soon.

Alëaren notices me watching the back of Glorfindel's head, and I catch her smiling to herself.

'What?' I say innocently.

'Nothing.' She tries to dismiss me, but the hints of a smile still linger on her lips.

'How are you finding travelling with the esteemed hero of our childhood bedtime stories?' I ask her.

She gives me a knowing look. 'I should ask you the same question.'

'I asked first.'

She glances at Glorfindel, who says something that makes Fírion burst into laughter.  'Well, it's interesting,' she replies, 'he seems almost disconnected from his past. His real past, I mean.  Before the rebirth.  It's almost like he's... lost.'

'You think so?'

She nods thoughtfully. 'I do. How powerful do you suppose he must be, seeing as he was forbidden from joining the Fellowship?  I would have thought the Valar gifted him with powers as great as my mother and uncle, if not greater, yet... yet he's shown no sign of using any magic.'

Perhaps not to you, I think to myself. For Glorfindel's magic hasn't left me alone since he arrived. It's as though he knows full well that only I possess powers great and sensitive enough to notice what he's doing, and he's seeing how long I go without mentioning it.

'Nor have any of us, really,' I say truthfully. 'There just hasn't been any need for magic so far. All we're doing is riding.'

Telamír rides into the corner of my vision. 'Strange to see you actually talking to someone other than Lord Flower,' he comments dryly.

'Drop it, Tel. He might hear you.'

He throws a hand up to his chest in mock horror. 'My Valar, did you just speak to me? For the first time in days? I feel so honoured. Most of the time, it's like Lëa and I just don't exist.'

I look away quickly. 'What do you mean?' 

'I mean,' Tel drawls, 'you and Glorfindel can't take your eyes off each other. It's as though you're the only two people in this entire world.'

'You both look at each other when the other's not looking,' Alëaren says quietly.

I shoot her a glare as if to say, not you, too.

Tel presses on, 'And don't even get me started on those times you gaze into each other's eyes like some lovesick—'

'Tel!' I hiss, 'he's right over there!'

'So you're not denying it?'

Valar, I am about two seconds away from blasting him right off the back of his horse.  Fighting to calm the electric rage within me, I grip the reins and focus my attention on a patch of sky up ahead.  'I can find handsome whomever I wish to find handsome,' I say nonchalantly, 'I find Glorfindel handsome, and that is the furthest extent to which my feelings will go.'

'Feelings?'

A sudden thunderclap prevents Tel from exclaiming anything more. All of our heads whip to the source of it, where a livid army of storm clouds advances from the western skies, crawling over the distant peaks of the Misty Mountains like a pack of grey wolves. The thick pattering of the rain curtain fills our ears as it lurches down the craggy slopes in the wake of the clouds, and proceeds to hammer the sprawl of trees coating the foothills. A couple of the horses whinny uncomfortably.

'We can't stay here. We must find cover,' says Glorfindel, gathering his reins.

I glance around. Indeed, we are in the middle of an open plain, a few miles in every direction from the nearest tree cover. The closest feature to us is the roaring river Anduin a little way to our right, a guidance to us on our path northward. Huddled out here without shelter and protruding dangerously from the swaying grass, we will be little more than target practice for lightning.

'And where do you suggest we go?' questions Fíria. 'The river cuts us off to the east, the storm advances from the west, and when last I looked, there has been nothing south of us except open space for hours.'

'We could make for the forest,' suggests Tauriel.

'Fangorn forest?  That's several miles west, and the storm will surely meet us before we reach the cover of the trees,' Fíria says.

A glance westward, and the distant tangle of Fangorn is utterly engulfed by the approaching tempest.  So much for that, I think to myself.

'It's moving so fast...' Alëaren mutters, trying to steady her fretting horse.

'The forest is out, we can't outrun it, and we have no shelter...' begins Fírion. 'I say we double back.  Search for a village somewhere in this plain.'

'Ah, yes—the famed hospitality of Rohirric peasants in their hardy wooden huts will save us,' Fíria says with dripping sarcasm. 'Excellent idea, brother.  Faultless, even.'

'Most of us have magic.  Isn't there something one of us can do?' asks Telamír.

'Against that?' Fírion gestures to the wall of rain rolling across the plain. 'That's out of the realm of night magic.  Unless one of you two possess the power to hold back a storm.' He looks expectantly at Glorfindel and I.

'Star magic will have no effect,' I say quickly.  No, Star magic won't help at all.  But the layer beneath that, the great abyss of power inside me... that might be a different story altogether.

'You know that is beyond me, mellon,' Glorfindel says to Fírion, 'I'm sure I don't need to remind you of the tempest of 2948.'

Fírion chuckles. 'It wasn't my fault you were stood on a roof during a lightning storm.'

'Really not the time,' says Fíria tartly.

Looking exasperatedly between her husband and sister-in-law, Tauriel gathers her reins and says, 'If no one has any better suggestions, we ride south and look for cover.  Let's move out, quickly.'

'It's hopeless,' moans Telamír as we set off in a gallop. 'We know there's no shelter out here for miles and miles. My hair's going to be ruined.'

I fail to stifle my snort.

We tear across the plain at breakneck speed, faster than I've ever ridden before, yet the storm is still breathing down our necks.  The very air around us begins to sizzle and crack ahead of the rain, which threatens to loom over us in a mountainous shadow.  Glancing over my shoulder, I realise the storm is chasing us.  Chasing us southward, despite the winds blowing eastward only minutes before—unnatural.

It's only when I hear the voice that I realise it's not natural at all.

It's magic.

'There is a fell voice on the air,' I say—though I fear no one heard me over the howling gales and the thundering of hooves.  The voice is remarkably deep as it chants some kind of spell, and comes booming across the sky as though borne on the clouds themselves.  It's not a voice I've heard before, yet the air of powerful magic around it tells me that it belongs to someone whose name I recognise.

This is the voice, the magic, of Saruman the White.  The very essence of his power has been poured out into this storm, the incantation for it carried through the stratosphere, and surrounding me like a coil of rope.  His magic is brushing the edges of my own, challenging me—and my Valar, it's vast.  More vast than my mother, than Glorfindel, than Elrond, than any of the night magic... even more vast than that of Mithrandir.  But is it more vast than my own?

The rain curtain rolls over us, and the abyss opens.  The full force of Saruman's magic comes hammering down, but it doesn't touch me—the rain doesn't touch me.  It's as though, without me even meaning to, my magic has formed a bubble, a shield against the storm.  Whatever power festers within me is trying to protect me.

And it keeps trying.  The others riding beside me are all drenched, all oblivious to my invisible rain shield, and all thrown from their mounts as a lightning strike bores into the ground just ahead of us.  But me... I'm unaffected.

For my horse, however, I must say otherwise.  Spooked by the lightning, she rears, sending myself and my bubble of magic toppling to the ground.  I land crouched on the wet grass, looking up just in time to see my steed careering away across the plain, following the other bolting horses.  Cursing, I clamber to my feet and make for the sprawled figures of my companions on the ground, who have all been tossed in different directions and strewn across the plain like discarded napkins.  One of them must be awake—

A sudden surge of magic stops me in my tracks.  Saruman's voice comes bellowing in my ears, his power battering relentlessly at the shield formed around me.  The rain pummels its surface with the sound of a thousand war drums, while targeted lightning strikes attempt to penetrate it one after another—none of them successful.  His power is strong enough that I cannot move my feet, nor my arms, nor cry out for help—but I remain dry, and still cannot feel so much as a trace of the wailing winds.  I can do nothing but stand, my eyes closed and my hands over my ears, and hope that my shield will hold.  Hope that my strange and deep power is enough.

Realising that his efforts are having no effect, Saruman's voice grows angrier, his thunder louder.

I grit my teeth. Come on, Erainiel. You know you're strong; maybe this is your strength.

The storm attacks and attacks, circling me like a predator. But I am not prey. I will never be prey, not to a wild and beautiful force of nature—not even one controlled by a wizard. He thinks he can strike me down? He'd be surprised to know that not even I know how much it would take to subdue me.

And I don't plan on being subdued today.

***