III.
The bell tolled, and for a moment, all of Tirion held its breath. Then life resumed.
In his playroom, Fëanáro sat with his hands resting upon the wooden horses one of his father's lords had carved for him. He was sleeping--well, not exactly sleeping, but if he didn't leave his hands upon his toys, the nursemaid would believe he was sleeping and make him nap, which he loathed. In fact, his eyes were open, unseeing, and his mind played far from this city, this room, these toys. He wasn't sleeping. The bell disturbed him, but only slightly. In the place where he was, he saw the sound of it wavering across the air from all directions, converging upon him. At the head of each thread of sound was a man upon a horse, undulating gently at a canter. Each man carried a shimmering banner of a slightly different hue, beating the air behind him.
His father told him once that, on the day he was born, his mother had scarcely pressed her first kiss to his brow before the "air was alive with the bells"--those were his father's words. He remembered them well, he told Fëanáro. The towerkeeper hadn't even waited for the bell to fall before pulling the rope again, so great was his excitement at the messenger's tidings. This time, there was space between the tolls of the bell. Fëanáro could hear the clop of a horse's hooves in the street outside, moving at a canter.
As the sound subsided, the messengers alighted on his arms. In his imagination, the rustle of silk against his arms became the tiny hooves of their horses. They began their climb to whisper their news. He strained his ears to hear what they would say.
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