The Tale Of The Telerin Flute Player by Himring

Chapter 1

When Maglor’s wife first heard of that most famous work of her husband’s, the Noldolante, she pulled a face as if she had just bitten into an unripe lemon.

‘Men!’ she exclaimed. ‘Even when they indulge in regrets, it’s all about themselves! “The Fall of the Noldor”, forsooth! The Noldor! What about everyone else?’

And she refused to hear the Noldolante performed or even discussed, just as she continued to refuse to set foot in Tirion and just as she refused to perform for people who dared to introduce her as “Maglor’s wife” rather than as a musician in her own right.

However, one day she received an invitation to Valmar to meet the great Elemmire, whom she had greatly admired from afar for the longest time. Elemmire welcomed her most graciously, complimented her on her skill on the recorder and the transverse flute and invited her to stay for a small intimate concert at his house. Towards the end of the evening, a Vanyarin alto performed a hymn to Varda’s stars with such depth of feeling that she sat awestruck and silent.

When she regained her power of speech, she asked shyly: ‘I have not heard this hymn before. Was it you who composed it, Elemmire?’

He looked at her in astonishment and asked: ‘Are you really unfamiliar with it? But it is part of the Noldolante!’

She was astounded and abashed and Elemmire, perceiving this, quickly changed the subject and talked lightly of other things.

She departed from Valmar on the following day and, returning towards Alqualonde, she passed through a village where a festival was being held. The main square was hung with garlands, wine flowed freely, and the younger and less dignified of the villagers were partnering each other in a vigorous dance. She stopped for a goblet of wine, and the tune set her foot a-tapping.

‘I haven’t heard this dance tune before’, she said. ‘Is it a recent one?’

‘You’ve never heard it?’ they asked her. ‘But it is part of the Noldolante!’

She set down her goblet on the table half full and left in annoyance. These Vanyar really did not show the right attitude!

After a long and weary journey, she was finally approaching the gates of Alqualonde. She passed a lone Telerin fisherman mending his nets and, as he worked, he was quietly singing to himself, a sweet simple ditty all about the grief of a woman whose husband dwelt far away in foreign lands.

She turned aside from the road.

‘What song is this?’ she asked, looming over him rather menacingly.

He came out of his reverie, looked startled and bit his lip.

‘It is part of the Noldolante’, he admitted apologetically.

She entered the city and walked down to the quays of the harbour. She sat on the eastern edge of the longest quay, dangling her legs above the water and looking towards Tol Eressea. Then she took out her flute.

First, she played the tune of the hymn to Varda’s stars. Then, she played the dance tune. Finally, she played the tune of the short ditty about the lonely wife.

After that she put her flute away and sat in silence, listening to the waves.

Chapter End Notes

At the end of March, just when I had finished writing this story and was, so to speak, in the first flush of achievement, I received a mail which invited us to submit stories or artwork as thank you to Dawn Felagund for organizing B2MeM and everything else she does for the fandom.

It almost seemed as if it was meant to be--for I had just finished writing a story in which Maglor's wife was Telerin and a flute player and, of course, I had stolen these ideas from Dawn's Another Man's Cage and her character Vingarie.

So I dedicated the story to Dawn and posted it to Felak's Treasure on LJ.

I've now decided I would like to archive it here as well.

As for my rather unorthodox ideas about the Noldolante, I've written about them before, for example here.