31_days | 08-01 [Silmarillion] Be indomitable, o my heart.

Title: Walls
Day/Theme: August 1st - Be indomitable, o my heart
Series: Silmarillion
Character/Pairing: Dior/Nimloth (obscurity, ahoy!)
Rating: PG

The fire crackled in its place, sending sooty drafts up through the chimney, baked clay molded and shaped into the twining branches of an old and gnarled tree. Dior stretched to reach the smooth hearthstone with his feet, leaning back, his weight braced on his hands. The wide, arched windows of the banquet hall were filled with moonlight and the shadow of waving leaves. Beyond that there were stars, twinkling with deceptive brightness against the black sky. Dior heard a burst of laughter like bells from beyond the walls – his mother’s laugh. He could see her, in his mind’s eye, spinning on the grass with her arms flung open, his father waiting for her at the edge of the clearing. The world closed in around them when Luthien danced, and even their son could not break down those walls.

He closed his eyes, but it wouldn’t banish the image, or the laughter. Her beauty burned brighter than any sun or star, enough to make his eyes ache sometimes. It lit the land of The Dead That Live like a comet fallen to the earth. Dior rose from the rug and went away from the fire, not feeling the chill of the night air as he stepped out onto the nearest balcony. Here the sound of his mother’s laughter was dimmed by the fall and run of a great waterfall, a sparkling pale arc.

There were footsteps behind him and he half-turned from the view, leaning into the hand that reached out to him. Nimloth cupped her fingers around his jaw and gave him a demure smile as she stepped up beside him, and for a moment he thought, maybe, he could build his own walls.