He cannot grasp the fathoms of light and wisdom, darkness and mirth, that glide from that steadfast gaze.
He cannot touch her there.
“Lúthien...”
Her name is harsh upon his human lips, and so she sings to him to mar the sound.
Her joy is great, her song whispers. It tickles his ear and a smile touches the careworn canvas that is his face.
But beyond the light, there is a growing fear, and she wraps a spell about herself.
He cannot reach her there...
He does, however; he sees her naked, alone, and bare... as bare as the unfading, brittle blades of grass that they embrace upon.
They hold each other close.
He finds his strength is fleeing, there is little left now to understand the form so tightly bound to him.
For it weakens him to crawl into the space that wavers so frigidly between them; to shed light upon their very being.
“I do not know you,” he breathes into the evening shadow that is her hair, thinking of the smoldering embers of her soul.
“Thou knowest me,” she replies.
She predicts it is enough.
---