Pallando & Alatar: never have I ever... by Anérea

The persistent mist thickened on the fourth day to the point that they could barely see fifteen feet in front of them. Usually the one with the keenest sense of direction, Pallando now had to admit he no longer knew how far along the escarpment they were, or even in which direction it lay, let alone where the pass was. Taking a breath, he stilled his thoughts, and with them, his uncertainty. He felt a fresh breeze on his face. That way. Wind blows up the sides of mountains during the day. With renewed confidence, the pair continued their journey.

Chapter End Notes

This is basically a very truncated description of a time a friend and I were almost lost in the mist in the Drakensberg Mountains, unable to see more than a few meters and no indication of where the sun was. As we walked I kept lining up three markers—bushes or stones or clumps of grass—at a time to ensure we would not walk in circles. It required intense concentration and after hours of this it became exhausting to the point my mind eventually let go and I even forgot which direction we'd been walking in. Panic crept up and started choking my mind and I wanted to cry. After a while it was my friend who said "The wind! It blows uphill during the day and downhill during the night!" So we turned our noses to the wind and soon enough found the edge of the escarpment. We still had no idea where the pass lay, but we knew if we kept to the cliff edge we'd come across it. Which we did. Two days later. After a midsummer snowfall. In "sunny" South Africa!

He knew he hadn’t always done his best. His best would have been to resist taking on the position of power the Men of the East had foisted upon him. He could have continued to influence them in a humbler role as Pallando had. But the allure of their adulation had been too enticing. However, that was of no consequence now. In the end, his life and death had served the greater purpose, just as Eru once had said. As Alatar’s spirit sped towards Valinor and the Máhanaxar, he welcomed the rest that would come, regardless of the Valar’s judgement.