Walking in the Gardens by Raiyana

---

Chapter 5

---

5

The helini in Findis’ hairpieces have sparked a fashion among the ladies of the house, and I find myself pestered endlessly with requests for this colour or that; it makes me even more certain that none of these ladies – a few are clearly Vanyarin and should know – are aware of the meanings attributed to certain flowers.

I’m quite sure Indis’ First Handmaiden is not secretly married, for example, though the sprig of myrtle in her hair is usually an emblem of marriage and wedded love.

Those of us among the servants who do know, have made a sport of it; it is slightly funny to manage getting these ignorant Noldor to wear flowers with the most outrageous meanings simply because they find the combinations pretty.

Cormo laughs when I tell him, but humbly asks me not to play such tricks on Ecetindë. I don’t tell him that I’d never dare; she is only now beginning to warm to my presence, almost four months after arriving at the house. I have, however, made him swear her to secrecy; it wouldn’t do to ruin our fun by giving away the game. Instead Ecetindë is the recipient of carefully chosen white hyacinths because she is quite lovely, even though she still scares me a little.

She doesn’t seem to believe that I have designs on her husband anymore, though, and we’ve even managed a few tentative chats when I come to the kitchens for meals. She is quietly funny, I’ve found, possessing a scathing wit that fits well with the rest of us and her willingness to take a joke, even at her own expense, has made her much more well-liked than most of the people who arrived from Tirion with Lady Indis. Of course, being a more than capable swordswoman who has a tendency to do drills in view of the kitchens – she knows Cormo likes to watch her train, and we all like to tease him about it – made us more leery of her in the beginning, but she is slowly becoming one of the household.

Maybe we’ll be friends one day. I’d like that.

 

I’ve added random flowers to the usual helin I bring for Findis’ trays, but she only seems to want to wear the helin – I tell myself to feel less pleased than I do about that fact – though she will wear other colours, too. I give her yellow ones, though some have different centres – I used to give her only white-and-yellows, but as I get to know her better, I feel more confident in adding colours to the mix even if I keep from giving away anything more than fondness belonging to friendship; with the house-wide game, the other Vanyar are watching everyone’s hair carefully, trying to spot the combinations that change the meaning of a single flower, and Findis is not exempt from scrutiny.

She still sings for me every morning, though, or I tell myself she does it at least partially because I like it; my own secret gift. I know she has seen me tending the indili, pruning the tree, cutting the hedge maze, weeding, and any number of tasks that leave me within earshot of her window. If she didn’t like me listening, she would close it, wouldn’t she?

 

Altorno finally arrives, greeting me with a peck to my forehead as usual. I loop my arm through his, taking him on an extended tour of my efforts; I am proud of my work here, the things I have managed in the short time these gardens have been mine to keep. Altorno laughs, looking at me like the daughter he never had – his lover went off with Ñolofinwë and never returned – and lets me babble about plants and flowers, adding advice here and there.

I end up telling him about Findis.

We’re standing by the bed of helini, and he looks at me like I am silly – I am – for wanting to keep the pumpkin where it is; it is larger, now, though not yet too large to be moved. It might survive replanting, though it would end up smaller than the other pumpkins by harvest time if I moved it now.

Altorno smiles at me, and I appreciate that he doesn’t chide me for my fanciful notions more than I can say. Instead, he chuckles, shakes his head, and sets his mind to the task at hand.

I want Findis’ pumpkin to thrive, to look the best it possibly can. It will be a gift for her, some day, I think, a half-formed idea in my mind as we work with fertilizer and irrigation.

I spend several days working with Altorno – I am showing off, because it feels good to have my work appreciated by someone who knows how much effort it actually takes to make such a beautiful garden – feeling transported back yeni to the time when he was my Master. He still has things to teach me; a gardener’s work never ends, and I don’t realise that I’ve been missing Findis’ singing until more than a week has passed by. I have been bringing the flowers to the kitchens dutifully – I keep Findis’ flowers separate from the basket I use to cut the ones the ladies of the house order – but I haven’t seen her at all.

Altorno smiles at me, reaching out to squeeze my hand gently, his encouragement silent as it so often is, when I abandon him around the time Findis usually brushes her hair to pretend that my indili need tending.

The windows never open.

They don’t open the next day either.

Gossip being what it is, I learn that Findis is staying in her room, or sitting with Indis, neither of them speaking. The though hurts me more than I expected, feeling guilty for taking away the small moment of brightness from her day; somehow I feel at fault, as though she needed my half-hidden presence to keep singing.

I miss her singing.

 

I haven’t seen Findis for more than week when I finally bump into her on my way from the kitchen – I was made to abandon my muddied boots – carrying an armful of raindrop-dotted flowers destined for Lady Lavarë’s room.

“Good morning,” I say, giving her my best smile, but Findis does not respond, turning down a side corridor without even acknowledging my presence.

That, too, hurts more than I thought it would.

I’m not even cheered by the thought that Lady Lavarë’s room will be telling any Vanyar who enters that she is expecting. Coimasiel had laughed hard enough to make Ecetindë ask what the bouquet meant, joining in our mirth at the thought of the unwedded maiden’s unintended announcement.

Looking after Findis, her soft steps making no sound on the carpet of the corridor, her dark hair carefully plaited into her hairpiece, I feel my mood sink further.

She’s not wearing the helin anymore.

 

Altorno tries to cheer me up, but my mood is as dark as the heavy rainclouds above our heads – I am hurt, and angry, and angry that I feel hurt, feel slighted, but I can’t help but feel like I’ve done something wrong, something to make Findis sad. Her face has returned to that strained grief she wore so familiarly when she arrived here, not even a glimmer of a smile, of sunlight, in those lines, as though the absence of the yellow flower has a meaning too.

I bring the flowers faithfully, still, even though I know she doesn’t wear them; even Cormo remarks that the vases used to have only one flower when the tray was removed from Findis’ room.

 

I try to catch her, apologies lining up behind my teeth, but – even though I didn’t see her that often before – Findis seems to have vanished from any place likely to contain my presence. My heart still clings to that stubborn longing for her real smile, even as I try not to remember it, try to tell myself I knew this would happen; why would she care for me, after all?

I miss her.

 

 

Of course, then she does vanish from the house. Gone to visit Ingwe, so they say.

 

The rains continue, matching my bleak mood.