It was not that the only daughters of the sons of Finwe misliked each other.
It was difficult to mislike Artanis - with her it was either adoration or loathing, and few dared to loathe her. She had many friends, many partisans and followers among the noble maidens and young apprentices of the Noldor.
Always there was a new matter of study that held her in utmost passion, always she held herself apart, high-minded and bright-eyed. Neither of them were easy to tame , though from the beginning Nerwen was alive to the importance of light, refraction, reflections and symbols - went about it in clear sight of their people, with her mind always to the eyes on her, the words spoken, the wills to be mastered and hearts to be guided.
In the impetuous days of her youth, when all things left her impatient, and there were not enough moments between Minglings for all her projects and studies, the fire of her spirit burned fiercely from its own kindling. She preferred none so well as her brothers, and among them Finderáto, who was in her eyes as an older and gentler and paler shade to her power and foresight.
And as for Írissë - No creature was as strange to Artanis as her girl-cousin, born and raised in tandem with herself and so unlike herself.
Fierce and deliberate and in love with the most esoteric mysteries of the hunt and the wandering trances, Írissë perfected the art of walking through cities and forests undetected to avoid being perceivable, and kept to the wild places as much as she could; she had no wish to be known.
She made no displays, cared little for competitions. That which she sought was a less defined mastery. Her studies was no lesser, but stranger and altogether indifferent to laboratories and pulpits.
Artanis was keen of eye, even then, eager to see where others would not. She knew when her almost-sister grew so wise to the arts of patient stillness and encompassing existence, that time itself seems to bend a little to her. The reality of things lost its edge, had its sharpness bent just enough that she might move through them undetected
Most often, Írissë found freedom in the woods and high cliffs, riding wildly deep in Aman or walking the deep forests where few Eldar have dared to tread. The White Lady, her cousins called her, for her great skill in hiding from the world, making herself indistinguishable from even in the darkest groves and caves, wearing the brightest of clothes as a dare, and a boast: no one would see her that she did not wish to be seen, no prey could escape her relentless hunt.
Artanis alone ran as swiftly as she did, and guessed at the mysteries of her wanderings; Artanis alone could find her, when she did not wish to be found. In days to come, long after their youth, she would think on that - she might have found Aredhel, perhaps, where none could.
They spoke little to each other; but long after Aredhel was bones under stone, and the stone sank into the salted sea, Galadriel walked in her hidden domain through the long nights and felt the keen-edge of longing for a great darkness, a more perfect concealment, the hunter’s challenge of a flash of white amidst the silver and gold.
