Peculiar by Ada Kensington

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The Lightless Shore

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Peculiar

The Lightless Shore

“My son, perhaps you could try to cheer Finwë by engaging him in a little game of chess?”

Those were his father’s words, uttered in a furtive whisper over his shoulder. Right away, Ingwion nodded and obeyed, excusing himself from conversation with his mother and aunt, because his father’s words were troubled. Ingwion knew this because his father had forgotten himself and had called the Noldóran by his name and not his title.

Crossing the drawing room, he approached king Finwë, who sat by the fire on a chaise longue, his back turned to him. He coughed politely, and the king turned, fixing him with an inquiring look.

“Yes?”

Suddenly nervous, Ingwion thrust his hands behind his back and wrung them tight together so that king Finwë could not see them shake, and ventured, “I wondered if your Majesty would like to play a game with me?”

And so he found himself staring across a chequered board at king Finwë, the Noldóran’s cool grey eyes meticulously scanning his formation, searching for a weakness in his defence. Occasionally, king Finwë would pause, as though considering something, and then would look up with a satisfied smile, his eyes alight with secret knowledge which seemed to say, “I know something you do not.” Ingwion was certain in that moment that king Finwë knew many things he did not and that his eyes could see right through him if they wanted to.

King Finwë’s eyes were odd to Ingwion. Very odd. They were not a colour he saw often, and he wondered what his aunt Indis saw in them. They were not the warm blue colour of that belonging to his family, or even the warm, dark amber-browns of that of most of his people, but the grey of an angry sky before a storm, like when he went to Alqualondë on a visit and first saw lightning.

He did not know why, but sometimes he was a little afraid of the Noldorin king. Ingwion knew that it was silly, knew that king Finwë was very well-mannered and courteous, taking care to speak to and show extra kindness and patience to those of lower status who would perhaps be awed by him. He knew that king Finwë was funny, because he often made his father laugh and his father was quite serious and did not laugh that much. He knew also that king Finwë was forgiving because his sister had told him all about what had happened when she went secretly to see the king in his chambers (and Ingwion was not sure he would have forgiven his sister for saying something about him like she had said of Curufinwë, even though Curufinwë deserved it.)

Despite all those positive qualities, however, there was one king Finwë possessed which always unnerved Ingwion. It was the Noldóran’s ability to speak and smile oh-so-very calmly, while behind his eyes it was clear he was thinking about something else entirely; that he was calculating, considering very carefully his next move. To Ingwion, it seemed that king Finwë was always playing chess. 

He had mentioned this to his father one day, not long after the king had left betrothed to his aunt Indis, and his father had replied, “King Finwë is cleverer than most. Sometimes he forgets to hide it.”  Then Ingwion had wondered aloud, firstly, why anyone would want to hide cleverness, and secondly, why anyone would want to marry someone who was forever engaged in a perpetual game of chess, for it would always feel like you were ten steps behind them. His father had to think about that one for a moment, then said, “Sometimes it’s easier to hide your cleverness than to deal with it. And some people like chess.” 

“Aunt Indis doesn’t,” was his immediate reply, to which his father countered with, “Some people, though they cannot play themselves, admire those with skill enough to play as well as king Finwë.”

King Finwë was clever.  Far cleverer than his father, he knew that. If there were a point of discussion in which knowledge of an esoteric fact escaped them, with recourse to king Finwë, the fact would trip easily and cheerfully from his tongue and the matter would be settled and a new topic would rise to take its place. The Noldor were clever, generally, at least about something in their lives, whether it was building or farming or crafting  or kinging. Kinging? Was that even the right word for it?  King Finwë would have known, but Ingwion did not want to ask and look foolish doing so.

There was a movement at the end of the board, and Ingwion flinched as king Finwë’s hand darted out and shifted his knight into position alongside one of Ingwion’s few remaining pawns. Then the king sat back in his chair and smiled a sly, enigmatic smile that startled him because it reminded him so much of Curufinwë.

“Your move, Ingwion.”

He had played Curufinwë at chess only once. It was during the same long, confusing week that had seen his aunt promised to the Noldorin king and the same week that the Noldorin king’s son had called his kind and gentle sister a useless bitch (the revelation of which had made him furious – he was angry Ingwen had not told him before.)

In order to amuse Curufinwë, who had been found curled up in a ball on the ground in a distant corner of the gardens, the chess board was brought out and Ingwion had been forced into a chair and told to play. Curufinwë’s face hadn’t even been washed. Smudges of dirt had marred his pale skin and blades of grass had caught in his hair and had stained his plain clothes with ugly, green smears. Ingwion remembered thinking that if his mother had seen the state Curufinwë was in, she’d have had a fit! But as he had been busy considering Curufinwë’s appearance, the other boy had swiftly and silently set up the board and was watching him, waiting for him to realise he wished to begin. With a start, he had gathered up his pieces, his haste rendering his hands clumsy as they clattered his players into place.

“You will not win,” Curufinwë had said, tonelessly, as he made his first move, not giving Ingwion a second to think.

And he had not.  Not once.

They had played ten brutally quick games, and each time Curufinwë had ruthlessly and systematically destroyed Ingwion’s every attempt to oppose him. At the end of the tenth game, by which point Ingwion had begun to feel embarrassed and frustrated (which only worsened his strategy) Curufinwë had sighed, pushed back his chair and said, “I think we’re done here...”

Ingwion stared at the board, contemplating the game in front of him, racking his brain trying to find out what was making king Finwë smile like that. Was it the pawn? Was king Finwë going to take it with a view to sacrificing the knight to let his priest take the tower? Or was it a feint disguising how close his priest was to his own—?

And he saw it. His stomach gave a disappointed lurch. King Finwë’s knight and the priest were in range of his king. Checkmate. He sighed, hoping he didn’t look as despondent as he felt while inside his heart crushed under the weight of frustration. Then king Finwë said something that made his insides wrench with embarrassment.

“I think we’re done here. Thank you, Ingwion, for a most entertaining diversion. I cannot tell you how nice it is to win for a change.”

“Do you play your son often?” he asked hollowly, knowing to whom king Finwë referred.

“Of late, less often,” the king answered, choosing his words carefully, “but before I married your aunt, we would play at least twice a week.”

“Did you ever win?”

“On occasion, yes,” the king replied, with the ghost of a smile. “Our games are always hard-fought and hard-won. I find it is the one thing in which I can push him to the very edge of his talent, and you may be assured I will cling to it until the very hour Arda is broken and remade.”

Ingwion let slip a short laugh at the king’s remark. The king was good enough even to butt horns with Curufinwë. It was stupid of him, really, to have expected to beat someone who was always playing chess. But still...

“I propose we set aside the board for now, at least in the context of competition,” king Finwë ventured. “You have the beginnings of a fine game within you, but it will need to be drawn out. How about I teach you what little I know, so that when next you face my son across the board you will not lose ten games to none?”

He knew.  The king knew. He hadn’t told anyone, yet somehow he knew. Ingwion’s face burned with shame.

“I only know because Fëanáro came breezing into my chambers and recounted the entire sorry ordeal, move by move,” the king said, gently. “To be honest, it struck me as rather unfair, like a guard clanking around with mail and plates and armed with a club engaging a baker in a duel.”

“I am a baker to his trained soldier,” Ingwion said morosely, “and all I can do is throw buns at him and watch them bounce off his helm while he cuts me to pieces.”

It was a silly thing to have said, and the king’s mouth twitched a little, as though he wanted to laugh, but to his credit, he did not.

“Well, with my help, maybe you can stuff a little fluxweed in the buns, and distract him long enough to work towards something profitable,” the king said, slyly. “What say you, Ingwion?”

Staring into the clever, grey eyes of the Noldorin king, Ingwion didn’t think for one moment that he’d ever be able to beat Curufinwë, or even king Finwë himself, but that the king offered at all caused a tiny, furtive ray of hope to pierce his despondent heart.

But why would he offer?  Why would he want his son at a disadvantage? Had he meant it when he said he thought match unfair, or was he angry with Curufinwë?

He wasn’t supposed to know, but Ingwen had overheard a conversation between his mother and aunt Indis and told him that it was Curufinwë who was responsible for the Painted Man, and not only that, but he had also run away in the company of a Loremaster of the School in Tirion, who was loyal to Queen Míriel, and who hated king Finwë and his aunt.

Apparently, Curufinwë often ran away. If that was the case, he imagined king Finwë would have been angry.  If it had been him, his mother and father would have been furious! He wondered why, and also how he could do it, for he was certain the guards would catch him within the hour if he ever dared attempt an escape.

He wondered where Curufinwë was now and what he was doing.  He wondered if he even knew about his sister.

He wondered, too, about king Finwë and how he felt.  Surely he must have been sad that Curufinwë kept running away and would want to try and help him?

Or maybe that was the problem.

Maybe king Finwë wasn’t angry at all.  Maybe he wanted to help him because he could no longer help his son.

Perhaps, even though the king could play very good chess, like him, he was still always running ten steps behind.

The thought made him sad.

oOo

Eight days up front in the mail cart, helping haul sacks of parcels and supplies to various backwaters along the foothills of the western Pelóri and anyone would have been glad for the bed and board at Mettanúmen. Rúmil hadn’t been expecting pay for the work, so he had been pleasantly surprised when Norno, the head coachman, knocked on his door in the morning while he was working and handed him twenty pieces of silver, ten each for him and Fëanáro.

Not that there was anything to do with the money around here. Mettanúmen was the last stop on the western edge of Aman; the furthest outpost. Any further and you would have had to mount an expedition over the Pelóri. He did not know how Cullo and Calassë could stand living here. Aside from their rather impressive herd of longhorns, who grazed freely upon the miles and miles of frozen grass, they relied entirely on the mail cart and other supply trains to survive.

Not to mention the cold. Stars, it was cold here. He’d opened the sash window and the shutters to let a bit of air in this morning and had immediately regretted it, the icy blast of wind that had rushed in chilling his bones with a tang of frost on it that stung his nose.

It seemed that warmth did not belong this far north. It was so cold and grey that Laurelin looked out of place, the sky like a bruise with angry grey clouds broken here and there with sparse patches of sickly yellow where the clouds parted. The outpost of Mettanúmen looked far better when they had arrived last night when Telperion’s cold sheen had complemented the frost-dusted grass and bare trees.

It seemed sometimes to Rúmil that even light struggled to gain a foothold as well. Jammed up close to the western edge of the Pelóri, as they were, Mettanúmen was so far west it seemed to stretch the boundaries of Ezellohar. At the right time of day, Cullo had said, you could see hints of the true darkness that lay beyond the mountains.

They were also very close to the sea, but Rúmil wouldn’t have thought it unless he’d been told. He thought it odd to be so close to the sea but not be able to see it. He could hear it and smell it, distant on the wind, but the mountains stood in the way, impassive and unyielding. Here, more than anywhere else in Aman, the Pelóri felt like a cage. There were no passes through like the Calacirya anywhere on the western coast, and it was impossible to sail round because Ulmo forbade it. Few had managed to scale the western peaks – reaching the top and no further – and what they reported was a long expanse of nothingness: true darkness, countless stars, and a lightless shore upon which no life could be found.

The thought of scaling the western Pelóri was horrifying, but still... he desperately wanted to see beyond them. Perhaps it would be similar to what their ancestors would have seen when they awoke upon the banks of Cuiviénen...

Bang!

Rúmil started as the door clattered open and Fëanáro backed through it, a mug of hot tea in each hand. “Tea, Rúmil!” he said urgently. “Take it out my hands, quick! I spilled some coming up the stairs.”

“Thank you very much,” he said, gratefully, relieving Fëanáro of his burden and feeling the warmth spread through his chilled fingers. “How did the shoeing go?”

“Not as bad as I thought,” Fëanáro said, as he wiped his hands on his trousers. “Getting them into the frame was the hardest part – especially the older ones because they knew what was coming. I think I’m getting the hang of it now. Norno said if I can shoe a longhorn, then I can shoe a horse no bother, though I don’t know about that. You don’t have the frame to protect you from a horse kick. But then I suppose if a longhorn wanted to kick you, then the frame wouldn’t matter all that much. They only let me do the docile ones, anyway. How’s the tea?”

“Pleasant, thank you. What’s in it? It tastes a little different today.”

“You can thank me for it,” Norno’s voice called out as he clomped into the room, boots dripping. “I nicked a bit of spice from the delivery to Valmar. Perks of the job. You got those letters, by the way? I’ll load them into the cart while I remember.”

“They’re stacked on the desk,” Rúmil said, stretching across the bed to grab the neatly tied pile of letters he had written out for Cullo and Calassë in thanks for generously permitting two unannounced, extra bodies into their home.

“Is there anything else we can do?” Fëanáro asked, as Norno made to head outside again.

“Don’t think so, Curvo. Not Unless Cullo and Calassë have something that wants doing.”

“Then is there anything else we can do that is not a domestic chore of some kind?” Fëanáro pressed. “Anything of interest round here that would be worth a walk? I don’t mean to sound like I have ants up my arse, but if I have to stay in and play another game of chess, I think I might go mad.”

“You could always try finding a way over the mountains? That’s always a favourite of the folks who come to stay here.”

“We don’t have any climbing gear, Norno. It’s not going to happen,” Rúmil said waspishly, wanting to nip that particular idea in the bud before Fëanáro had the chance to latch onto it.

“Well, I suppose there’re a couple of things some strange folk might call interesting,” Norno mused, scratching his chin in contemplation. “Mandos ain’t far from here. You could always go poking about, if you had a mind.”

Rúmil felt a sudden frisson of excitement. “Mandos?” he asked eagerly.  “Where?”

“Due west,” Norno replied. “Just keep walking and you’ll get there eventually.”

“Could the trip be made in a day?” Fëanáro asked.

“Should think so.”

“What I really meant was, could someone in Rúmil’s condition make it in a day?”

“Course! It’s really not that far,” Norno said, as Fëanáro laughed and ducked the pillow Rúmil sent flying at his head. “Why do you want to go there, though? Awful place. Gives me the shivers.” 

“Have you been?”

“Yep. Ómandil – that’s the man who trained me to drive, by the way – dragged me there when I first started out. Bastard. Still gives me chills thinking about it.”

“What’s it like?”

“You’ll know when you get there. Of course you can’t see Mandos proper, none of the living can, but there’s a stone circle – that’s to mark it so’s folk don’t go tramping in by accident, not that you could, though, I’d wager.

“Anyway, Ómandil thought it’d be a good idea to trip me up and shove me in the circle. Thought it was pretty damned funny ‘til I said I saw something moving in the arch in the centre and he near shat himself.”

“You saw something? Really?” Fëanáro asked, arms folded, looking sceptical.

“I bloody well did, no matter how much Ómandil keeps telling me I’m talking out my arse! When he shoved me, I stumbled for a bit, fell flat on my face, got a mouthful of dirt for my trouble, looked up and I was right in front of it. There was a flicker and then it was like... like a dark, lump turned in the air. More than seeing anything, though, I felt like there was something there. It wasn’t angry, or frightened, or happy or anything. It was just there. Watching me.”

“Of course...”

“You can doubt me, Curvo, but that’s what I saw,” Norno said with a snort, then adding, “Well, if you’re both intent on it, then good luck to you, but I ain’t coming with you. Make sure you get back in one piece. I wouldn’t mind the company on the way to way back to Tirion, though not if you’re going to bring back any of the disembodied with you, haha! Now, I’m going to load these letters before I forget. If you’re heading off, make sure you wrap up warm and I’ll see you when you get back.”

And with a wave, the driver turned and clomped out the room and down the stairs, leaving a trail of watery boot-prints in his wake.

Rúmil knew Norno was joking about the last part, but still... he felt an odd flutter of nerves. He looked over at Fëanáro, whose eyes were glittering strangely, and he knew that Fëanáro was intent upon going.

“Are you coming?” Fëanáro asked.

Rúmil felt a brief moment’s hesitation, as though it felt like something he shouldn’t be doing, before his rational mind told him to stop being so foolish. Rúmil? Missing out on Mandos, the prize that had eluded him for so long because of a mail-cart driver’s tall tales? The thought was abhorrent and ridiculous.

Therefore, with a wide smile full of bravado, he leaned forward and said to Fëanáro, “I’d like to see you try and stop me.”

oOo

It was getting more and more difficult to tell whether they were heading due west, as a chilly fog had risen, rolling down from the peaks of the Pelóri to impede their swift march across the bare foothills.  Rúmil was glad he had brought a scarf and a hood, as the frosty air was merciless, seizing and gnawing upon any vulnerable patch of exposed skin. Giving it a tug, he pulled the scarf further up and over his nose, so only his eyes peeked out.

As ever, Fëanáro walked ahead, a ghostly shadow in the fog, pressing ever onward.

It really was getting difficult to see, more difficult by the second.  If they didn’t find it soon, they would have to turn back.

“Fëanáro!” he called out, his voice strangely muffled. “If we do not come across it in the next five minutes, we are turning back.  I’m not getting stranded out here. Not on a day like this.”

“It should be here,” Fëanáro insisted, without turning round. “We have walked due west and are on the foothills. We are nearly on the Pelóri! It won’t be far...”

“I mean it,” Rúmil pressed.  “Five minutes and no more!  I can already feel my scarf freezing fast to my face. If we get stranded here, it’s probably a mercy we’re not far from Mandos, as our fëa won’t have far to go once the frost ousts them for our bodies—Argh!”

Fëanáro had stopped dead in front on him, and Rúmil collided with his pack and bounced off it.

“Watch where you’re going!” he snapped. “If you’re going to stop like that—!”

“It’s there,” Fëanáro said, cutting him off. “Right there, off to the left. Can you see it?”

Fëanáro pointed and Rúmil followed the direction of his gesture.  At first he couldn’t see anything for the wretched fog. Then, gradually, as his eyes adjusted, he began to pick out the tops of a few dark, brooding, monolithic shapes.

His heart raced with excitement.

Mandos... at last!

“Come on, let’s go,” Fëanáro said, his eager eyes alight, before taking off at a run.

Huffing and puffing, Rúmil followed after, angrily calling out at him to wait, but to no avail.

“Rúmil, this is it! This is it!” he heard Fëanáro call out.  “Come quickly!”

There was a short but steep incline to negotiate before the land dipped suddenly and revealed exactly what Norno had described to him. Stopping at the top to catch his breath, he took in the sight of it. Two large stone circles, one enclosing the other, were wreathed in an abjuring mist that looked almost alive as it curled around the feet of the ancient standing stones. At their centre stood a circular dias upon which a black arch rested, thin and crabbed and looking old. Very old. As though it were rough-hewn from a single massive piece of rock long before their people were even a thought of the Valar. No, it was probably much older than that, he told himself. Older than starlight. As old as Mandos. Even Eru himself.

He took a step back, suddenly afraid but not knowing why.

I don’t want to go...

Then Fëanáro’s voice cut though the air. “Aren’t you coming? There are carvings on these rocks. If we’d thought, we could’ve brought paper and wax and made rubbings of them. I think I might have a roll and some charcoal somewhere—” He trailed off, his keen eyes searching Rúmil’s face.  Then he smiled and said, “You’re scared, aren’t you?”

“I am not...”

“You are. You don’t even need to pull your scarf down for me to tell.  I can tell by your eyes. Norno’s tall tales have got to you—”

“I am not,” he hissed, pride overcoming his fear as he picked himself up and swept past Fëanáro, down the banking and towards the outer ring.

But for all his bravado, when he passed between the first set of stones, he thought he heard a sound like that of a whisper – a clutch of voices muttering together – and his heart began to race.

“Go away...” he mumbled, under his breath, as Fëanáro rummaged in his pack a few paces away,  hauling out a roll of paper and a broken shard of charcoal.

“This’ll have to do,” he said briskly.  “Can you hold the top half of this while I take a rubbing of these carvings? The symbols are like nothing I’ve ever seen before.  I’d like to paint them into my notebook later, if I have the time.”

“Fine,” Rúmil huffed, reluctantly slapping the paper onto the rock and pinning it there with one hand as Fëanáro set to work.

“You should see your face right now,” Fëanáro said with a grin, his hands already covered in charcoal dust. “You look like you’ve swallowed a wasp.”

“You should see yours,” Rúmil retorted. “Your cheeks are so red with cold it looks like someone’s given them a good, hard slap.”

“I thought you wanted to come?”

“I did!”

“But now that you’re here, you’re scared of the dead?”

“I am not scared of the dead, alright?” Rúmil hissed, his eyes flashing. “There is nothing here.  Nothing! All we are doing is hanging around a bunch of old rocks in the freezing cold.  I do confess I thought I heard a whisper when I first passed through the stones, but it was probably the wind – even though I have felt not a trace of it – and I have heard nothing since that initial panic over what I presumed was a whisper.  It was all in my mind, Fëanáro!  All in my mind, and I know you were going to say it! For why would the dead even whisper?  They have nothing to whisper with—”

It was in that moment Rúmil chose to glance around and saw something that almost made his heart stop in terror.

Letting out a piercing shriek that shattered the eerie quiet of the circle, he almost ripped Fëanáro’s paper in two in his frantic scrabble to dive behind the stone.

“W-WHAT IS THAT?  WHAT IN THE NAME OF ALL THAT IS HOLY IS THAT?”

Fëanáro, who had dropped his charcoal and paper to the ground in surprise, fixed him with a steely glare.

“I swear, Rúmil, if you are trying to scare me—”

“F- Fëanáro, come away... turn round...” Rúmil begged, reaching out and grabbing Fëanáro’s cloak with shaking hands.

“What the—?” Fëanáro exclaimed, batting away Rúmil’s hand with a indignant snort.  “Honestly, Rúmil I don’t know what you’re thinking but I expected better—”

“There is someone in the arch, Fëanáro!” he choked out. “There, right there!”

With a put-upon sigh, Fëanáro whipped round. The impatient expression he wore vanished instantly, replaced by one of open-mouthed shock.

In the middle of the ancient archway, someone was watching them.

It was a man, tall and thin with long, trailing black hair. He leant casually against one of the rough supporting piers of the arch, and Rúmil was sure he was smiling.

“Rúmil... how long has he been there?” he heard Fëanáro whisper.

“I don’t know!” Rúmil hissed, frantically. “I just looked up and he was there!”

“Do you think he’s dead?”

“He has a body...”

“He might be undead?”

“Why would an undead be here in Mandos?”

Then a voice crept into Rúmil’s mind, a soft, low voice that made all the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end. It said, “I am not dead.  And don’t you know it’s rude to talk about others, especially when they are in earshot?”

Rúmil flinched, looking around, terrified, trying to figure out where the voice had come from. Was that the strange man’s voice? His nails dug into the cold stone, clutching at it like a lifeline.

“...then are you a Maia?” he heard Fëanáro venture carefully, which meant that he had heard the voice too.

“Perhaps...” it replied, evasively.  “Come closer, so I might know to whom I speak.”

Fëanáro stepped forward and Rúmil grabbed him by the wrist, pulling him back.

“Don’t!” he pleaded, his eyes wide and desperate. “You don’t know what it is! It could be a foul wraith of Utumno, for all you know.”

“Now you are being rude,” the voice remonstrated, in a much colder tone. “And needlessly. You need not fear.  The residents of the Halls of Námo Mandos cannot move beyond these stones. This is the entrance, you see,” the voice said, as the man in the archway patted the rough black arch stones that marked the limits of his power.

“Who are you?” Fëanáro demanded, his voice ringing out bright and clear through the fog.  “Are you Mandos?”

There was a pause before it answered.  Then the voice said,

“I am a resident.”

“You claim to be resident, yet you are not dead?”

“Correct.”

“You lie.”

“I do not.”

“Then you are Maia.”

“I am not.”

“Then who are you?”

“If you come closer and speak to me properly, I might tell you. I despise rudeness and being spoken to as though I am some sort of disgusting worm to be kept at arm’s length.”

Another more considered pause, then it added,

“And I also despise cowardice.”

With a snort, Fëanáro squared his shoulders and Rúmil watched in agitation as he marched determinedly through the stones towards the stranger.  In desperation, he tried to call him back, but found to his horror that his throat had closed.

Panicking, he tried speak, but something was stopping him.

Then the voice came again.

This time, it sounded much nastier.

“Your young friend is braver than you. If you will not walk, then I will make you.”

Then he felt a horrible sensation, as though something lithe and muscular were coiling around his chest, and before he knew it, he was jerked forward so rapidly he was lifted clean off his feet and passed Fëanáro in seconds, the tips of his toes scraping along the frozen ground as was compelled by an unseen force towards the centre of the circle...

“RÚMIL! RÚMIL, HOLD ON!” he heard Fëanáro shout, and the crunch, crunch, crunching of the boy’s pace quickening as he sprinted to his aid.

... and before he knew it, he had drawn level with the dais, and the force that had supported him gave way. His trailing feet caught the edge of the platform and threw him hard on his knees to the ground.

Suppressing the awful jags of pain that shot through his knees, he gritted his teeth and looked up through watery eyes.

He had fallen upon the dais, and he could see the man clearly now. He was no longer leaning casually upon the pillar, but stood back a little on the other side of the arch. It was bizarre, because although Rúmil could see right through the arch to the other side, it was equally clear that had he walked round the other side to meet the man, right at that moment, he would have seen nothing but the grass and the empty grey sky and the stones stood still like sentinels.

It was as though within the arch, the laws of Arda did not apply. Perspective warped: the man, standing at the other side of the archway, but also obvious that he was somewhere else completely, in some cold, colourless and grey place far beyond their perception, trying his hardest to push into their world of colour and life.

Then Rúmil noticed something that made his blood run cold and left him in no doubt as to whom he spoke.

There were chains. Chains everywhere. Around the thin man’s wrists, around his neck, around his chest and ankles. Chains that trailed out behind the tattered remnants of once splendid purple robes that stretched and faded into a far off place he could not see.

He flinched as he felt Fëanáro’s hand land heavily on his shoulder.

“Rúmil, are you alright?”

“Stay back,” he croaked. “Get away from here!” Then, clearing his throat, he addressed the stranger, trying hard to keep panic from colouring his tone.

“I know who you are,” he said, in a small voice. “You are Melkor.”

The man in the arch’s smile was sickle sharp.

“Correct,” he replied.

For the first time in his life, Rúmil looked, aghast, upon the Lord of Utumno.

He was tall – far too tall – with thin, jet black hair rippling down his back like a slick of oil. And thin – so thin Rúmil could see spidery traces of blue veins underneath his bone-white skin, and his eyes were like ice.  It seemed everything about him was designed to set one on edge. Too tall. Too thin. His features too sharp, his fingers too long and brittle and tapered at the ends in perfectly manicured points. And he was calm. So very calm. But his calm was not that of Manwë Súlimo, who loved all life on Arda, but that born of serene indifference. Melkor did not care for life. Rúmil knew that as soon as he saw the way the Vala watched him, looking down his nose at him, regarding Rúmil as one would a curious insect.

“Then what do you want with us, Vala?” Fëanáro demanded, with a hard and insolent edge to his tone. “We do not consort with criminals.”

The edges of Melkor’s bloodless lips twitched.

“To talk, young one,” came his reply, with a casual wave of a hand, “there was no need to have wielded such distasteful words.  I find the company in our brother Námo’s home increasingly unbearable, you see, and I felt you drawing near. I do not often sense the living within Mandos, therefore you piqued my curiosity.

“So tell me, young one,” the Vala went on, casting a sidelong glance at Fëanáro, who coolly returned his gaze, “why is your fëa so disgustingly loud? It screams and screams and screams without ceasing. It is worse than the dead.”

At that remark, Fëanáro’s hard resolve faltered.

“What do you mean, it is worse than the dead?” he retorted, uncertainly. “What are you talking about?”

“Why, can’t you hear them?” Melkor said, turning round and peering over his shoulder at something perhaps that stirred in the Halls. Rúmil shivered. The dead were so close...

“I cannot.”

“I am surprised,” the Vala went on. “Our brother’s Halls are growing by the hour as more and more suffer and die overseas. They weep. Some are deranged. Twisted. They make lots of noise; mindless, snarling, ugly beasts—”

“The dead cannot scream,” Fëanáro said curtly, his earlier bravado all but dissipated, replaced by a defensive sort of anger. It was clear the Vala had gotten under his skin, and Rúmil knew why, though he hoped against hope that Melkor did not.

“You think so, young one?”

“How do you know?” Fëanáro demanded, his eyes flashing. “Tell me how you know!”

“I am a Vala. I am Melkor, and I know many things,” the Vala replied smoothly.

Then Melkor turned his flinty gaze again upon Fëanáro and said, “but then, you know who I am. I would like to know who you are. I find you incredibly rude, not only in your intrusion upon my solitude, but in the foul words you have spoken against me and in your insolent demands of my knowledge...”

With a clinking of chains, Melkor stepped forward.

And to his horror, Rúmil suddenly found he could not move. Every part of him was rigid, weighed down as though he himself were loaded with chains. His jaw locked so tightly he felt his teeth cracking, and he began to shake uncontrollably as he watched Melkor approach Fëanáro, whose feet were also rooted fast to the ground.

“You demand my name, young one,” Melkor whispered, the face he wore a mask stretched in a rictus grin as he dragged his impossibly heavy chains across the stone dais, “but you have not offered me the courtesy of yours, and your silence will not protect you.  I know for a fact that your pathetic, shuddering friend is Rúmil, a Loremaster of the School in Tirion. Mooching like a dog around the entrance to our brother’s domain, waiting to devour the scraps he hopes he will cast you. Pathetic. And you, you with the shrieking, clamouring fëa—”

Melkor stopped short. His cold eyes widened.  Then...

“Wait... I know you,” the Vala muttered, almost absently, as he began again to approach the young prince, though this time with an odd expression, one almost curious.

“Yes... it is you,” Melkor said, coming to rest with a heavy clank of metal right in front of Fëanáro, who looked up at him, rooted to the spot but his eyes burning with anger. “You are Curufinwë Fëanáro.”

“Why does your fëa call to me?” Melkor said faintly, almost to himself, as he reached out and took between his spider-like fingers a lock of Fëanáro’s hair, which he inspected closely. “Why?”

Melkor’s hand then slipped and drifted down to rest upon Fëanáro’s chest.

The Vala’s eyes grew wide and he flinched, as though stung by something, and his face he wore twisted for the briefest of moments into an ugly sneer.

Then, slowly, Melkor leaned into Fëanáro’s ear and said, without tone, “I will tell you this, and you will listen. You are like me, Curufinwë Fëanáro. The others, they do not understand your mind. They cannot and never will. You, an oddity, your mere presence in their perfectly ordered world, stagnant and unchanging, is an unhappiness. To them, to your father, your step-mother, your sister and all their unborn children who will ever come to be, you are a product of Arda Marred. And perhaps you are. Perhaps they are right. After all, your mother died giving birth to you. You created suffering and unhappiness. You create them still. Such a thing should not be in Arda Unmarred.”

Fëanáro was shaking now, and Melkor smiled a sickle-sharp smile, knowing his words had found their mark. Slowly, he raised a hand and wound his unnaturally long fingers though Fëanáro’s hair, and when he had gathered enough, he crushed his fingers  into a tight and merciless fist. Fëanáro hissed in pain and Melkor smiled as he gave a tug and forced Fëanáro’s head upwards, forcing the young prince to stare right into his eyes.

“Your mother screams, too, in his Halls,” Melkor said quietly. “I have heard her, and it is constant. Every day, she curses your name and rues the day she conceived you, you disgusting, murdering parasite—”

Rúmil watched as a tear slid down Fëanáro’s cheek. The boy now trembled from head to foot, his eyes wide and staring, not at Melkor, but behind him, as though searching for the sight of his mother and the dreaded confirmation of Melkor’s poisonous lies.

A hot and unlooked for anger twisted Rúmil’s guts and in that moment he did not care whether Melkor was a Vala or a lake-worm, he would tolerate no more.

“Enough!” he shouted, though the effort almost tore his throat in two. “Enough, you poisonous snake!”

With a start, Melkor turned, clearly not anticipating an interruption. His concentration broken, the spell that held them vanished, and Fëanáro, who had been held in place only by Melkor’s foul magic, let out a cry of despair and ran from stone circle and into the thick, encircling fog.

“There!” Rúmil croaked, triumphantly. “Your plaything is beyond your reach.  What will you do now?”

Urgently, desperately, Rúmil tried to will movement back into his legs as Melkor’s cold eyes followed Fëanáro until he disappeared out of sight.  Then, with an ugly scowl he raised a hand and incanted, “Crawl into the darkness, you vile, Noldorin worm, and may you rot there in despair...”

Dread crept into Rúmil’s heart and he asked, his voice wavering, “W-What have you done? What have you done to him?”

“You will find out soon enough, for you will be joining him,” Melkor said, his wolfish smile wide and rigid.

The Vala raised his hand again and with a clanking of chains began to advance.

Rúmil’s heart clenched in terror as Melkor stopped in front of him, towering over his prostrate, powerless form. Melkor’s lips moved, but the words seemed to come from somewhere else.

I am going to die here, he thought suddenly.

I am going to die...

“Earth, I beg you open. Open the old road under the mountain and guide this wretched worm to the lightless shore.”

I am going to—

oOo

 

He awoke to true darkness and to the sound of waves drifting lazily to shore.

Overhead, countless stars sparkled. He thought of trying to count them, but gave up when he realised that everything ached, including his eyes and his head, and that maybe getting up would be a good idea.

With a groan, he sat up, and his head spun dangerously. He closed his eyes and willed the nausea to go away and leave him alone.

When the world stopped turning, he opened his eyes and realised that everything was back-to-front.

The Pelóri were behind him, and above the impassable, sheer face of the mountains, Rúmil could see just above their jagged summits the dying light of Laurelin as it bled into the dark and was extinguished.

He swallowed and tried desperately to calm the rising panic.

It was clear. He was on the other side of the mountains, a feat none of their people had ever before accomplished. The reason for their becoming stuck on the summits were now clear.  There was no way down.  Therefore, it followed logically that there was also no way back up.

There was also absolutely nothing and no one as far as he could see in any direction.

Before him was the vast expanse of the Ekkaia, its black water sucking at the shore like a blind, toothless creature from the depths, sentient but mindless. On either side, a narrow coastline stretched for thousands of miles, with gnarled, twisted sodden driftwood crowding the black gravel sand, looking like bones with spare seaweed flesh clinging to them.

It was completely different to the shores of Tol Eressëa. They were busy. Noisy. Full of life, gulls and activity. This was a private place. An untouched place. A dead place.  No gulls cried here. No sailors swore. No women sang. It was as though the years that had passed since Eru Illúvatar created the world had not touched this place.

And no one would ever likely touch it again, he thought, with a pang of despair.

Melkor knew that. He had sent them here to die.

Curling his knees up into his chest, Rúmil tucked his head in tight and thought very, very hard for a long time. Chief in his thoughts was the puzzle of how far away the dwelling of Nienna lay. He thought and thought, and the more he did, the more his heart began, tentatively, to hope. It was a gamble, but even so, it was a much better prospect than lying down and accepting the horrible fate Melkor had designed him.

Taking a deep, shuddering breath, Rúmil hauled himself upright, not even bothering to shake off the sand that clung to his hair and face. His mouth grimly set, he knew the first thing that had to be done. He had to find Fëanáro.

He took one determined step and yelled in surprise, as his foot sank alarmingly into the soft sand. Shrinking back, pulling his foot away, he watched as the sand began to shift back into place as soon as his intruding foot had left. It almost looked as though the ground were breathing, like the land was alive and erasing his boot-prints as he walked because he had trespassed, was an intruder and should not be here. Rúmil shuddered.

“I hate this place,” he said, in a broken, wavering voice. “I hate it. I know no one is listening, but, still... I feel it has to be said. If this is the first and last thing ever said on these shores, then I think, by all accounts (which is mine and mine only at the moment) that my sentiments would be universally shared.”

Then he shouldered his pack that had fallen a few feet away, folded his arms to keep the chill at bay, and began to walk.

He walked for quite a long time before he saw Fëanáro. 

Rúmil had never walked under true darkness before, and he found it made things you wanted to find quite difficult to pick out. You never knew what was coming up until you were right on top of it, which he learned rather quickly after he kept slipping on seaweed and tripping over rib-like protrusions of driftwood. He was a few mere feet away when he spied a motionless body-shaped something lying on the sand, the tide rushing back and forth about it.

His heart soared.

“Fëanáro!” he shouted as he ran towards the young prince, his feet sinking deeply into the sand. “Fëanáro, are you alright?  Thank goodness I found you. I have a plan as to how to get out of here, and I want to know what you—”

He slowed to a halt, tossing his pack to the ground, suddenly concerned.

“Fëanáro?”

Fëanáro lay on the sand on his back, the freezing water rushing about him, dragging seaweed through his hair. He lay still, motionless, though his eyes were open and he stared up at the stars.

“Rúmil...” he murmured, with a faint smile. “I didn’t really want you to find me, but I knew you would. ”

“What are you talking about? Did Melkor dump you in the water?  Have you swallowed some?”

With an oddly serene smile, Fëanáro closed his eyes and shook his head.

“No. I walked here and lay down.”

“Why? Were your clothes marred with dirt? I’m sure there is a better way to remove sand from a tunic you know.”

“There is no better means than water to remove a foul stain. That’s why I’m waiting for the tide to come in.”

At first, Rúmil was puzzled, not sure what Fëanáro was getting at.  Then came the slow, sinking realisation and an odd sense of hurt anger that he couldn’t quite place.

He threw himself down into the wet sand beside Fëanáro with a little more force than was strictly necessary and said, “Well that’s a fucking stupid thing to do, isn’t it?”

“Is it?”

“It is,” Rúmil asserted, shooting Fëanáro a stern glare. “I don’t know what you’re thinking about, but honestly, I expected better. Melkor’s tall tales have got to you.”

The echo of his own harsh words coming back to haunt him made Fëanáro laugh just a little. Then he turned and looked at Rúmil with an utterly desolate expression and said, “But they are not tall tales. They are not. Every word he said was true.”

“Don’t be ridiculous—”

“They are,” Fëanáro insisted. “I am sure others think the same. I have often thought the same. Sometimes. Especially when I’m caught in a dark mood, when I’m lying in bed at night and cannot sleep for fear of awful dreams in which she curses my name and wishes me in her place. I would trade places with her, Rúmil. I would do it if she wanted to.  It is not her fault I am a murdering parasite—”

“That is enough!” Rúmil said forcefully. “I do not want to hear another word. You are not a murdering parasite, no one thinks the same, and your mother would never wish you in her place. I know for a fact that she loved you because she told me so before she died. And she—” he said, his voice hitching suddenly at the memory, “—she said was very tired and that I had to make sure your father gave you a good education and sent you to the School at the earliest opportunity because she was sure you would be clever, and that if you weren’t sent to the School you’d be bored to tears in the palace and your father should have listened to your mother because look what’s fucking happened because you have nothing to do and no one to talk to...”

Trailing off, Rúmil angrily wiped a tear from his eye.

“She would not have said that if she did not love you and want the best for you,” he muttered, perching his chin on his knees and staring out across the dark ocean.

“I have caused so much unhappiness...”

“And none of it your fault!” Rúmil snapped. “You did not ask to be born. You did not mean for your mother to die, and you certainly did not ask for your father’s remarriage. I do not know why you are the only one in Aman to have suffered so cruelly, but let me tell you, none of it is your fault! Do you understand me, Fëanáro?”

Squeezing his eyes shut, Fëanáro shook his head.

“Alright!” Rúmil cried, throwing his hands in the air. “Let us say that it is your fault. Every single miserable bloody thing that has ever happened to anyone you care about is all your fault. Even if that were the case, there is at least one person in the world that I guarantee would not give a rat’s arse about it and would defend you to until his very last breath.”

“Don’t...”

“How do you think your father would feel if he knew that you had died here?” Rúmil went on, mercilessly. “How do you think he would feel? Answer me.”

“...he would get over it.”

Rúmil snorted in derision. “Utter shit. You think it’s that easy? Well, I’ll tell you what, Fëanáro, it isn’t. You know how hard it is because your mother’s death affects you still. Do you want your father to feel that way about you? Do you want to hurt your father?”

Fëanáro shook his head.

“Then why are you doing this?”

“Because I cannot live with myself.”

“You’ve been doing fine since we left Tirion,” Rúmil answered. “Why the sudden change of heart? Is it because a Vala has held up a mirror and shown you your reflection?”

Fëanáro snorted and turned his head.

“Well, let me tell you right now, Fëanáro, that Melkor’s mirror is warped.  It is dark and twisted, and his poisonous words could make anything fair seem foul. Since your situation is already unhappy, getting under your skin was probably the easiest thing he’s ever had to do, for he didn’t even need a warped glass.  All he had to do was lay all your insecurities out in front of you like a spread at feast and show them to you.”

Fëanáro lay very still and quiet, which meant he was listening.

Then Rúmil added, “I’m disappointed in you. You let him win so easily. You never normally let people win and you certainly fight much harder at chess.”

“This is not chess, Rúmil.”

“Melkor probably thinks it is. Everything is a fucking game to that vermin, and you’d bst never forget it. Now, are you going to get up, or are you going to be like everyone else and let a Vala tell you what to think?”

“What’s the point,” Fëanáro muttered. “We cannot get out.”

“Well, what I was about to tell you earlier, before you frightened the life out me, was that I had actually come up with a plan to get out of here.”

“And what is that?”

“We walk to the dwelling of Nienna and throw stones at her window,” Rúmil answered a little defensively, folding his arms turning his nose up.

There was a moment’s puzzled silence. Then, to his relief, Fëanáro began to laugh an exhausted but genuine laugh. He laughed so much that his shoulders began to shake and he covered his face with his hands. Then with a bit of effort he sat up, and fixed Rúmil with a very odd look, his clothes soaked through and his dark hair wet and sticking to his face.

He said, “Why did you have to make me laugh, Rúmil?”

“I didn’t mean to.”

“You did. I know you did,” came his accusing reply. “So why?”

Rúmil sighed and sloshed through the surf on his knees towards Fëanáro. When he came to rest beside him, he placed a hand on Fëanáro’s shoulder and, looking him straight in the eye, said, “Because you can throw harder and your aim is better than mine.”

He let out a shout of laughter as Fëanáro snorted and shoved him into the water.

“You are prick, Rúmil. You know that?”

“That’s me!” Rúmil said, with a grin. “Guilty. Unrepentant.”

Fëanáro sighed in a put-upon manner and Rúmil was relieved to see a hint of a smile on the boy’s face.

“So how far is it to the dwelling of Nienna?”

“You’re coming with me then?”

“I suppose so.”

“Then I have no idea how far it is,” Rúmil confessed. “I just figured it would be roughly in this direction. I could have turned south and would never have found you. I know it’s slightly north of Mandos – and yes, before you say anything, I know that rat-bastard Melkor could have dumped us anywhere, but since the temperature is pretty much the same as it was on the other side of the mountains, I figured north was a good bet.”

“So you had no idea where you were heading?”

“Not a single clue!” Rúmil said happily. “The thought of lying down and taking what Melkor had dished out to me was a horrible prospect. And you know what I’m like with authority, so I decided to walk. Even if I died in the end, at least I would have died doing something.”

“Hmm...” came Fëanáro’s sparse and enigmatic reply, which Rúmil took to mean that he was listening.

“So, are you going to get up, or are you going to continue to sit there and absorb sea-water?”

With a derisive snort, Fëanáro held out his hand and Rúmil did a lot of theatrical huffing and puffing as he pulled the boy to his feet.

“Do you have any spare clothes in your pack?” Rúmil asked.

Fëanáro nodded.

“Then change and dry yourself off with this,” he said, unwinding his scarf from his neck and tossing it at Fëanáro. “Then when you’re done, give it back to me and I’ll rid myself of these wet trousers. With any luck, we’ll find Nienna and will be back at Mettanúmen by tomorrow morning - just in time to tell Norno he was right.”

“Except that we’re never going to talk about what happened here,” Fëanáro said quietly.

Rúmil nodded. “Yes. Exactly that.”

oOo

Thump, thump, thump, thump.

The footfalls of his heavy boots echoed hollowly on the warped driftwood boards, as Olórin the Maia hastened to answer the call of Lady Nienna.  He hastened because there was something very strange about her request. Something about two Noldorin elves throwing stones at her windows – which was, of course, impossible. The Ainur had deliberately closed the passes and raised the peaks of the western Pelóri so as to be impassable. He wondered if he had misheard her. After all, he had been working very hard when her voice had arrived in his mind like a whispering breeze and uttered its very strange request.

At the door to Lady Nienna’s chamber, the Maia Olórin stopped and rapped upon its salt-crusted surface with his staff.

“Enter...”

Stepping smartly through the door, Olórin bowed in greeting.

Lady Nienna’s viewing room was like every other room in her house that had windows which opened onto the Ekkaia: grey and weather-beaten, with tall windows, all thrown wide open, the brisk sea breeze battering through them, torn curtains flapping. The Lady Nienna always wanted the windows open so she could see out wherever she happened to be. As a result, sea-spray often travelled in on the wind and brought salt with it, the stuff caking in corners and crusting over what little furniture the room held. The whole place stank of the sea and seaweed and wet, crumbling wood – and Olórin would not have had it any other way.

At the far end of the room, right at the window (which of course was thrown wide open) sat Lady Nienna. Alone, and draped in grey veils, she stared out over the endless dark ocean and wept for all the evil in the world.

Without turning round, she said in her soft, broken voice, “Olórin. Have you found them?”

“I have not been down to the shore yet, my Lady,” Olórin answered. “I must confess to having thought I’d misheard you—”

Olórin bushy eyebrows shot upward when the small pebble went whizzing past his face and cracked a glass pane in a battered cabinet behind him.

There followed a distant, triumphant cheer from down below, and Olórin could hardly believe it. Silly, bloody Noldor. How in all the circles did they get down here?  Had they finally forged a chain long enough?

“I will see to them, my Lady,” Olórin muttered, as he stamped out of the room in an ire.

oOo

“HAHA! I GOT IT!” Fëanáro shouted, punching the air. “Did you hear that crack?”

“I did,” Rúmil said, laughing. “And I saw a shadow moving inside. I think someone will be down shortly to tell us off.”

“You were right,” Fëanáro replied with a wide smile, his eyes alight with a mischievous glee.  “This is fun.  I wonder if I could hit that woman sitting there at the window...?”

Rúmil darted forward and grabbed the pebble out of Fëanáro’s hand.

“That is enough,” Rúmil said silkily. “The stone-throwing part has done its work. Lest you forget, the Vanyarin authorities would love to get their hands on you for defacement, if they could. If you were arrested for it here, too, you’d probably end up waiting on Nienna for two years, then scrubbing the floors at Ingwë’s palace for another two once you get out.”

Fëanáro sighed.

“It’s not like you to be sensible, Rúmil.”

“I just don’t want to be dragged down with you.  Fëanáro, no! That is enough—!”

Crack!

With a blistering over arm throw, Fëanáro spun on the ball of one foot and hurled another pebble through the window. Inside, Rúmil heard something shatter.

“Oops,” Fëanáro said, with a wicked grin. “I hope that was fixable.”

Muttering darkly, Rúmil turned around and walked over to a clutch of granite boulders and sat, glaring out across the ocean. He heard the crunching of Fëanáro following him and the boy leapt atop the rock and sat down beside him.

“You know, Rúmil, now that I’ve had time to take a proper look at this place, I’ve realised that I’ve been here before.”

“Utter shit,” Rúmil snapped, still in a bad mood with him for throwing the extra rock.

“No, I have,” Fëanáro insisted. “I really have.”

“When, in your dreams?” Rúmil retorted acidly.

“Exactly.”

Wrong-footed, Rúmil opened his mouth in surprise.

“Oh...” was his eloquent reply.

“Now that I think about it, this place looks exactly the same,” Fëanáro went on. “All I need is my boat.”

“Ah, but if the boat was there, would you take it?”

Fëanáro thought about it for a long moment. Then he turned to Rúmil and said, his eyes glittering strangely, “I always take the boat. No matter what. And I wonder if I did take it whether Eru would be waiting for me at the other side?”

Rúmil shrugged.

“Probably,” he said. “He got all his creating done at the beginning of time. Not much else to do after that. Sitting around waiting for you would likely be the most exciting thing that’s happened to him in millions of years.”

Fëanáro snorted with laughter, and Rúmil joined in, feeling a little less rancorous.

After that, they fell for a while into a companionable silence as they waited for help (and a reprimand) to arrive. Rúmil watched as Fëanáro skimmed stones, the boy having just picked up another one and sliced it through the air. It skimmed across the surface of the water and bounced, one, two, three, four, five, six, seven times before it sank into the sea.

“That is now my new record,” Fëanáro announced, as he bent down to retrieve another suitable stone.  “I shall now attempt to go for eight.”

But Fëanáro did not attempt to go for eight. He stopped just as he was about to throw and peered into the horizon.

“What is that?” he said, his brow furrowed in puzzlement. “Rúmil, come see this. It’s like... What the—?”

In the distance, very gradually, pin-pricks of starlight began to appear in the mirror-dark surface of the ocean. First only one or two, then followed by clusters, and more and more, until the entire surface of the water was aglow with a ghostly, eerie blue light that very slowly floated towards them.

Dumbfounded, they watched in open-mouthed silence until the tiny glowing stars reached the surf and began to break in rolling waves against the shore.  At that point, Fëanáro broke the silence with a loud whoop of joy, and he kicked off his boots, rolled up his trousers and ran crashing into the surf.  Laughing, he splashed around, his delighted eyes alight with wonder, and Rúmil was exactly the same, laughing and pointing and calling out like a child.

“Ahh, Fëanáro, your legs! Look at your legs!” he cried.

Fëanáro looked down. His bare legs and feet were illuminated by the strong, ghostly blue glow of the tiny sea-stars. It was so bright, even his face was cast in it. With a smile, he cupped his hands in the water and picked up a handful of starlight.

“What are they? Where did they come from?” Fëanáro said quietly, almost to himself, trying to touch the tiny pinpricks of light as they slid from his hands and back into the ocean.

“From the sea?” Rúmil suggested, peering over Fëanáro’s shoulder. “But I have no idea what they are. They look like little sea-stars.”

“They’re beautiful.”

“I agree,” Rúmil said, stooping to let his fingertips brush the surface of the glowing waves. The sea-stars swirled about them, his hand glowed blue, and he felt a warm burst of happiness.

“I would stay here forever if this is what happens every day,” Fëanáro said sincerely.

“But it does not happen every day,” a gruff, unfamiliar voice replied. “And it is not every day that two Noldorin elves appear on the lightless shore bouncing rocks off the windows of Lady Nienna’s dwelling!”

Startled, Rúmil and Fëanáro whirled around.

Before them stood a man. He wore a wide-brimmed hat and grey travelling gear, and carried a staff and a lantern. Long white hair trailed down his back and his face was ageless and stern-looking, with a pair of white eyebrows that were so bushy, they trailed into the man’s dark eyes that were set deep in their sockets and glittered like gimlets.

“Well?” the stranger demanded.

Rúmil stepped forward with a winning smile, throwing his arms out wide.

“Hurrah, Curvo!” he exclaimed. “Help at last! We were beginning to think no one would ever come.”

“You are unlucky to have strayed so far from Tirion,” the stranger said, eyeing them suspiciously. “How did you come to be here? Speak quickly!”

“We jumped over the Pelóri,” Fëanáro said bluntly.

Rúmil couldn’t help himself and burst out laughing. He didn’t know why, but he was sure the intense feeling of relief that accompanied the realisation that he was probably not going to die anymore had something to do with it.

“Don’t look at me like that,” Fëanáro said to the stranger, with mock outrage. “It wasn’t from a standing start. That would be impossible. We took a run at it.”

“Run all the way from Tirion, did you?” the stranger said sceptically, raising a bushy brow at them.

“We ran very, very fast,” Rúmil said, trying to stifle a snigger and failing.

“Indeed,” the stranger said, not believing a word of it. Then he pointed at the glowing water full of sea-stars and said, “And did you bring these with you?”

Rúmil and Fëanáro shook their heads.

“They appeared in the water when I was skimming stones,” Fëanáro said, honestly. “They’re beautiful. Do you know what they are?”

“Not the faintest clue,” the stranger said, bending down to peer at the ghostly blue, starlit waves which crashed about his big, black boots. “I shall ask Lady Nienna. Perhaps she’ll know something.”

“You are a Maia?” Rúmil inquired. “Do you live in her house?”

“I have lived in many places,” the stranger answered. “But at this precise moment, yes. I do. I am a Maia, I serve in the house of the Lady Nienna and you may call me Olórin.”

“Then I am pleased to meet you, Olórin,” Rúmil said, smiling. “More pleased than you could ever know. I thought we’d never get out of this place alive. Oh, and I am Rúmil and this is Curvo.”

Beside him, Fëanáro nodded in greeting.

“Pleased to meet you too,” the Maia Olórin replied, “and forgive my rough manner, but never have any of your kind set foot on the Lightless Shore. Your appearance has caused something of a stir.”

Then Olórin leaned in, his eyes glinting with amusement, and muttered, “Don’t do it now, but if you look up right this instance, you’ll see them all gawking out the windows at you.”

Carefully, Rúmil raised his eyes above Olórin’s broad shoulders and immediately had to choke back an undignified snort of laughter.  From each of the windows of Nienna’s mansion peered several clusters of curious Maiar, whispering to each other and pointing, fascinated, some at the two intruding, stone-throwing Noldor and others at the beautiful sea-stars that had congregated upon the surf.

“Rúmil, the Maiar are looking at us,” Fëanáro whispered.

“And more than just Maiar,” Olórin said, pointing with his staff to a large window which gave way to an expansive carved balcony. The same window that had earlier proven such a successful target.

Rúmil’s eyes widened as he made out the outline of a veiled figure, who raised a hand and beckoned.

Lady Nienna...

“Yes,” Olórin said, correctly deducing the cause of Rúmil’s apprehensive expression. “You broke the glass in one of her cabinets and put a mighty crack in a window pane.”

“Ah...”

“Oh, there’s no need to worry overly much about it. The Lady Nienna is famously forgiving, after all.”

Rúmil nodded weakly.

“Come,” Olórin said, turning and trudging back the way he had come. “The Lady Nienna awaits. She’s very keen to speak with both of you.”

Rúmil shot Fëanáro a look of trepidation. Fëanáro did not return it, however, and instead shrugged his shoulders before he strode after Olórin with his hands stuffed in his pockets. Rúmil rolled his eyes and followed behind. He could not shake the feeling he was about to be told off and he didn’t much like it.

Above him, he could still see the groups of Maiar crowing the windows that faced the sea. It was surprising that even they, who had likely lived here a long time, had never seen such a display before.

Strange, really, that it had occurred the very hour they had arrived.

Smiling, he glanced behind to have one last look at the sea-stars.  They were beginning to fade a little now, floating away, back into the depths whence they came, but Rúmil followed their progress, following them to the very edge of the horizon where... where the Painted Man stood, watching them, smiling.

Rúmil’s heart gave a jolt of fear, but as soon as it did, he was gone.

He shook his head and blinked owlishly for a moment.

Must’ve hit my head when I landed, he thought, dismissing the apparition as a waking daydream. It’s the stress, he told himself. The stress of meeting two Valar in one day, almost being killed by one and waking up on the other side of the western Pelóri. Yes... that’s it. And he was tired, too. He needed some sleep, that’s all. It had been yet another very long, very strange day and he was beginning to wonder if Fëanáro’s nightmares were contagious.

The sea-stars had been worth it, though, he thought with a small smile. He knew that Fëanáro probably would have thought so too. They had certainly cleared all the dark thoughts from the boy’s mind – at least for the moment – and for that he was glad.

“Thank you,” he whispered, hoping his words would carry over the horizon to the Painted Man, who he knew waited at the very edge of the darkness and smiled.

And up in her viewing room, the Lady Nienna watched them too. She watched one figure in particular very carefully and she remained silent a long time, seeming deep in thought as she considered what to do.

Then she raised a hand and called for an attendant.

“My Lady?” the attendant inquired, with a curtsey.

“Send word to Finwë Noldóran,” she instructed, in her soft, broken voice, “and tell him that I have found his son.”

 

---

Chapter End Notes

Names:

All courtesy of the Quenya Name Generator.

Mettanúmen - end of the west (the outpost Rumil and Feanor visit.)

Cullo - golden red (the man who owns the outpost with his wife. Named because of his hair.)

Calassë - clarity (the woman who owns the outpost with her husband.)

Ómandil - abundant voice (Norno's ex-boss.)

Thanks to all those who are stilll reading. ^_^