#and then it's just Finrod taking Amandil (who probably still dies before the Downfall but that's a few months to go) under his wing

[edennill]

So there he was, standing before the Powers of the World, breathlessly spilling the truth of his errand on the sand, word racing word, as if his breath could run out at any moment. Him, a mortal on this shore that he was forbidden to set foot on, who did not want to break that ancient law, unsure whether it was virtue or sin — he said that last part loud —and the words kept flowing, the incoherent ramblings of an older man, he guessed, but hoped it didn't matter. He had come with no prepared speech, or maybe he had tried and forgotten it all when the moment came, did Eärendil prepare his words, he wondered — and again he was speaking this loud, his thoughts rushing through his lips in the order that they came — and then one of the Lords; the Elder King he thought — and trembled, how could he be speaking to the Elder King — raised his hand, and Amandil felt rather than heard the command to cease, and so he did. With a last desparate effort he opened all the barriers of his mind, breathed rather than shouted "See!" and, exhausted, fell upon the ground.

He felt someone, he did not know who, brush over his mind, feather-light, and then he opened his eyes and saw the Lord of the West had crouched in front of him. It seemed incongruous. He did not have the strength of body and spirit to get up and change the tableau.

“Child.”

He was heard and answered.

~ part of a fic I will probably never finish that I found in my notes app