The Lucky One by grey_gazania

FA 35

Linn was hunting with her brothers on the day she died. It was early autumn, and the sun kissed tops of the trees with gold as she walked on silent feet beneath the cool canopy of leaves. Overhead, squirrels busily gathered seeds, their chittering joined by the occasional cheep of a finch.

There were pheasants in abundance in this part of the forest, and Linn had three already in the rough sack slung over her back. Smoked and seasoned, the meat would help see them through the coming winter, and tonight they would share their bounty with their neighbors.

Perhaps the handsome Orn from across the river would join them. Perhaps he would ask Linn to sing.

She smiled to herself at the thought before turning her attention back to the forest. It was best not to lose focus. Dangerous things dwelt under the trees -- bears and wolves, and wild boars like the one that had killed her mother when Linn was just a child.

Bel, Aras, and Tor were spread out in a crescent ahead of her, but it was her sharp ears that picked out the sound of something following them. She whistled a three-note bird call, and her brothers froze in their tracks, each readying his bow.

“What is it?” Aras breathed in her ear once she had joined them.

“We’re being followed,” she murmured, her spine prickling uncomfortably.

Bel jerked his head toward the nearest tree and made the sign for climb, and Linn nodded. Dropping her sack beside the mossy trunk, she grabbed hold of the lowest branch and pulled herself upwards, careful not to snag her bow or quiver as she went. When she judged herself to be high enough, she stopped and peered out from between the leaves.

Her breath froze in her lungs. There was a pack of monsters behind them, moving low and quiet through the underbrush. Linn was young; she had never seen an orc. But she had heard the stories, and she knew what she was looking at. She whistled a warning, a shrike’s shrill shriek, and dropped to the ground to join her brothers as they ran. It was their only choice. They were outnumbered, armed only with light bows, but they knew the forest better than the orcs did. Hopefully they could lose them in the trees.

Linn had heard the stories. Orcs were vicious. Orcs were wicked. Orcs reveled in bloodshed and death. If orcs found you and you could neither kill them nor escape, you should pray that they killed you, because if they carried you north to the Iron Mountains you would become an orc yourself.

The stories didn’t mention that orcs were fast. The four elves ran and ran and ran, but the orcs were gaining on them. With each foot Linn and her brothers lost, escape slipped further and further away. As Bel and Aras ran ahead, Tor grabbed Linn by the arm, pulled her around behind the thick trunk of a tree, and boosted her up into the branches.

“Hide,” he hissed.

Linn climbed, her heart pounding in her chest as she watched Tor dash after their brothers. He’d almost reached them when he stumbled and fell to the ground with a pained cry. An arrow had struck him in the calf, and blood bloomed across his breeches, dark and wet.

Bel whirled around, an arrow of his own already nocked, and fired back at the orcs, striking their leader in the eye. It fell with a cry of its own, but its death only seemed to enrage the others. Even as Aras joined Bel in his attack, the orcs swarmed forward, trading their bows for heavy blades of iron.

Wounded, already grounded and vulnerable, Tor fell first, nearly hewn in two. Linn swallowed a scream and reached for her own bow, only to find that the string had snapped during her climb. She was unarmed. Her brothers were being slaughtered before her eyes, and she was unarmed and helpless to intervene.

Aras continued to fire, but his quiver was soon empty. He tossed his bow aside and threw himself at the orcs, only to be slain by the same blade that had killed Tor, his blood mingling with his brother's on the dull iron.

As she watched Bel struggle with the creatures, Linn made a decision. She would not let her brother stand alone. She leapt from the branches, landing squarely on one of the orcs. With a desperate grab, she wrested its dagger from the sheath at its waist and plunged the knife into its back.

It stumbled and dropped its sword, but quickly regained its footing and turned on her with a growl, knocking the knife from her hand and forcing her to the ground. She screamed and clawed at its face, but it only laughed. Then it grabbed her by the wrists, pinned her arms, and sank its teeth into her throat.

She struggled, but the creature was holding her tight enough to bruise, too tightly for her to escape. Again and again and again it tore at her flesh, ripping her neck to shreds. She soon went limp beneath it, choking on her own blood as she gasped for breath.

The leaves above her wavered and blurred. She could feel the earth shake beneath her, thump thuh-thump thuh-thump, but she didn't recognize the hoofbeats for what they were until a man charged past her on a horse, firing at the orc as he went.

The monster abandoned its attack on her and plucked the arrow from its arm, but before it could finish rising to its feet, a second man appeared, russet-haired, with eyes that shone like stars. He swung his sword and removed the creature's head with one blow.

Dropping to the ground beside Linn, he pressed his hands over her bloody throat. His lips moved, but she couldn't hear what he said. She couldn't hear anything at all. The world grew dim around her, until all she could see was the stranger's shining eyes.

Soon, the darkness swallowed even that.

"Thíniel! Tathor!" Amras shouted, calling for his healers as he desperately tried to stem the bleeding of the woman who lay choking on the ground before him. Not even a woman -- a girl, really. By the looks of her she was younger than he was, and he had yet to reach his hundredth begetting day.

Tathor was a few yards away, bent over the man who had still been on his feet when Amras and his people had arrived, but Thíniel was beside Amras in seconds, her eyes widening when she saw the girl's injuries.

"It was eating her," Amras said, sickened by the memory. "It was eating her alive."

"Monsters," Thíniel muttered. "Morgoth has much to answer for." Her hands never stopped moving as she spoke, first slipping her fingers under the girl's shredded skin to hold her windpipe closed, then rinsing the wounds with water.

"Lord Amras, I don't know that I can heal this," she said, looking at the blood, at the girl's ashy skin and dull eyes, at the way her chest heaved as she struggled for air.

"Try," he ordered. It was the least they could do. If only they'd caught the orcs a few moments sooner, they might have been able to save all four of the elves who now lay dead and dying beneath the trees.

Thíniel obeyed and set to work with needle and thread, doing her best to patch the girl's cartilage and blood vessels back together, pushing her own energy into her patient's tissues as she had been taught in Valinor.

A few minutes later, Tathor joined them. "The man?" Amras asked him.

Tathor shook his head. "The orc's blade struck his heart. I couldn't save him."

"Try to save the girl, at least," Amras said, moving out of his healers' way.

The order wasn't born of empathy alone. Amras knew that Maedhros had sent him and his twin to Ossiriand to gain the trust and goodwill of the people who dwelled there. Sitting back and letting one of the Nandor die would do nothing to further that goal.

As Thíniel and Tathor worked, Amras and his men carried the bodies to the edge of the forest. The orcs they piled up and set ablaze, but for the men they dug three graves. They were Quendi, and a proper burial was their due.

Dusk was creeping over the golden treetops when Amras returned to Thíniel and Tathor, his skin streaked with sweat, dirt, and ash. The healers had spread a blanket on the ground and laid the girl atop it, propping her feet up on a saddlebag. Her neck was bandaged and her chest still rose and fell weakly beneath her tunic, but her skin was pale as wax.

"Will she live?" he asked.

Thíniel shrugged. "Perhaps, if she's lucky. We've done what we can, but she's lost a lot of blood."

"Then we'll camp here tonight," he said. "If she's still with us in the morning, you can tell me whether we should stay here or continue on."

The girl survived the night, and after some deliberation, Thíniel and Tathor decided that it would be best to head back to Amras' and Amrod's fortress as planned.

"You've seen what orcs' mouths are like. If infection sets in, we'll be able to treat it better there," Tathor explained.

With saplings and a blanket, they were able to make a stretcher on which to carry her, and the band of elves began to make their way home. But luck was not on the girl's side; she didn't wake, and within two days she had begun to burn with fever. Despite the healers' best efforts, the flesh of her throat grew inflamed and began to leak pus, and she struggled to breathe when lying flat.

"Lord Amras, she's not going to make it," Thíniel said that night as she tried once more to clean the girl's wounds. "We're almost out of the herbs we need, and at this pace we're still three days out."

"What if you and Heledir took her and rode ahead?" Amras said. Heledir was the best rider of the group, after Amras himself, and three would be able to travel more quickly than twelve.

Heledir looked over from where he was picking a stone from his horse's hoof. "This is important to you," he observed.

"If you were wounded and among strangers, wouldn't you hope they would do all they could to save you?" Amras said. "Besides, you know why my brother sent us here. This is a chance for us to forge a relationship with some of the Nandor."

Heledir nodded. "I'll take her. Just let me-- Ah, there." His pick knocked the stone loose, sending it tumbling to the ground, and he patted the horse's leg before letting go. Once he was back in the saddle, Amras and Tathor passed the girl up to him, and he and Thíniel departed.

Linn woke to an unfamiliar light, blue and steady in a way that flame never was, and a woman bending over her and wrapping something around her throat. She tried to pull away, but the woman stopped her with a hand on her chest.

"Lie still," she said gently. "I'm changing your bandages. My name is Thíniel. I'm a healer."

Where am I? Linn tried to ask. But no sound came from her mouth, and she felt her eyes grow wide as panic bubbled up in her breast.

"Lie still," Thíniel said again, her hands still working deftly. "Don't try to speak. You've been badly wounded, and you need to rest." She stepped away, returning a few moments later with a cup of water, and then helped Linn to sit up enough to drink.

The water was flavored with a strange herb, and Linn made a face before sinking back down onto the bed. Thíniel continued to move around her, but the woman's figure soon grew fuzzy and dim. The pain in Linn's neck receded, her eyelids fluttered closed, and whatever medicine Thíniel had given her sent her falling back into slumber.

When she blinked her eyes open once more, she saw that she was in a room built of smooth hewn stone. The blue light was still present, emanating from a crystal that sat on a carved wooden table beside her. She was lying on a low bed near a half-open door, covered by blankets and propped up against several soft pillows. Reaching up, she slid one finger beneath the bandages she bore. She could feel stitches crisscrossing her aching neck, and she frowned. What had happened? She had been hunting with her brothers, and--

Orcs. Orcs had found them. She remembered now, remembered seeing Tor and Aras die, remembered the orc's teeth tearing into her flesh. She remembered, too, that she hadn't seen Bel fall, and she tried to climb from the bed to look for him. But her limbs were weak and shaking, too weak to support her, and her efforts left her short of breath. As she collapsed back against the pillows, she heard footsteps and a voice echoing outside the door.

"--woke briefly last night," a woman said. Linn thought from the accent that it might be Thíniel. "She's going to survive, but she's still quite frail, and she can't speak."

"Is it permanent?" a man asked. His voice had the same odd cadence as the woman's.

"I think so. Honestly, my lord, she's lucky to be alive at all. Heledir and I only barely got her here in time."

Permanent. Linn felt a chill run through her, and she tried once more to say something, anything, but to no avail. Her voice was gone.

More blue light flooded into the room as the door was pushed fully open. A man walked inside -- the same man who had slain the orc and saved her life. "You're awake," he said in surprise when he saw her open eyes. He stuck his head back out into the hall and said, "She's awake."

Thíniel's reply was inaudible, but when the man turned back to Linn he said, "Thíniel says you should eat. She's gone to get you some food."  He offered her his hand and, once she'd taken it, helped to pull her fully upright before adjusting the pillows behind her to support her back. "She also tells me that you can't talk," he added apologetically.

She shook her head.

"My name is Amras," he said, sitting down on the end of the bed. "If I bring you paper, could you write your name for me?"

She shook her head again. She couldn't write at all; none of her family could. What use did they have for it? They were hunters, not scholars like King Thingol's people. And even if she could, what would she write? Linn? That name was laughable now. She would never sing again.

Amras gave a pensive hum. "Well, we'll have to figure something out until we can find your family," he said. "You've been with us for nearly three weeks. I've had my people spreading the word that we found a wounded Nandorin girl, but we haven't encountered anyone who seems to know of you."

Nandorin? What was Nandorin? She'd never heard the word before, and she looked at Amras in confusion.

It took him a moment to discern the source of her puzzlement. He repeated the sentences to himself in a mutter, and she saw the moment his mistake slotted into place. "Danas," he said. "Not Nandorin. My apologies; I'm still getting used to your tongue. In my language, your people are called the Nandor. I'm one of the Noldor -- the Golodhrim."

She'd never heard of the Golodhrim. She'd never even seen anyone like Amras or Thíniel before. She would have asked Amras what he and his people were doing in Ossiriand, and how they had found her, and whether Bel, too, had survived. She would have told him that she wasn't fully one of the Danas, but she couldn't, and she felt her skin heat with frustration.

Amras looked at her with worry in his face, but they were both distracted by Thíniel's return. She bore a tray that held bread, a bowl of stew, and a wooden cup filled with water, and she placed it in her patient's lap before retreating.

"Eat," Amras urged. "You need it."

The girl complied hungrily, and he waited to speak again until she had finished her meal.

"Your people have hand signals for when you hunt, correct?" he said. "I think my brother knows them."

At the word brother, she nodded vigorously and hit her closed fist against her chest, hoping that he would understand and would tell her what had happened to Bel.

"My brother?" Amras said.

She shook her head and repeated the gesture, striking herself three times.

"Not my brother... Your brother?"

She nodded again and held up three fingers.

Comprehension dawned on Amras' face. "The men you were with." He shook his head, his bright eyes turning sad. "I'm sorry. Two of them were already dead when we arrived. My healers tried to save the third, but he was too badly wounded."

She thought she felt her heart stop. If she still had had a voice, she would have screamed. As it was, she hunched over, bit down on one fist, and began to weep.

"I'm sorry," Amras said again, resting his hand on her shoulder. "If it's any comfort to you, we buried them just outside the forest." He paused and then added, "We nearly had to bury you as well."

If only they had. Perhaps Amras meant to make her feel better, but how was she supposed to live without her brothers? They were all the family she had. How could she live without Bel's gentle teasing, or Tor's warm hugs, or Aras' honey-rich voice in counterpoint to her own?

She pulled away from Amras' touch. He seemed to understand, and he withdrew, closing the door behind him. Once he was gone, she sank back onto the blankets and curled up on her side, her body shaking as she cried.

Her brothers were dead. Her voice was gone. Even her name was no longer hers. She was alone among strangers, and she had nothing and no one left.

For three days she lay in a grieved stupor, refusing food and drink, as memories of her brothers wound in and out of her head. They were the sum total of her family. Her father and his hunting party had vanished when she was still a babe, and she hadn't even been fifteen yet when her mother had been killed in the dark years before the rising of the sun, leaving Bel, Aras, and Tor to raise their younger sister. Now they, too, were dead, and she was alone.

Even if Amras managed to find her people, what did she have to return to? Her neighbors would likely take her in, but they would pity her -- a voiceless, kinless, half-Moerbin child. And they would continue to sing. She would be surrounded by music, but never able to join in.

She couldn't live like that, alone and trapped in silence. She couldn't.

Her eyes were closed, but it seemed to her that she could suddenly see her brothers' faces waver before her. She wanted desperately to go to them, but they were shaking their heads. Their mouths opened, and she could almost hear them speak.

Would you die like this, hidden behind stone walls? Tor seemed to say. Would you forsake the life we fought to give you?

Would you leave your debts unpaid? Aras asked. Amras and his people saved you. You know what is due to them.

You are stronger than this, little sister, Bel said. We taught you better.

Then they were gone, their presence bursting like a soap bubble. She blinked her eyes open and stared at the blue-lit wall as her brothers' words echoed in her head. A spark had flared up inside her, and she made a decision. She would not die here, boxed in by stone. She would not let her brothers' deaths be in vain. And she would not enter the land of the dead with debt on her soul.

Stumbling to her feet, she grabbed hold of one of the blankets and wrapped it around herself for warmth before making her way to the door on shaking legs. The corridor was bathed in the same blue light as the room, but she could smell fresh air, and she turned towards it, steadying herself against the wall as she walked.

Within a few minutes she had reached a set of wooden doors. One was propped ajar, and a breeze trickled through the gap. She shoved at the wood with her shoulder until she could squeeze between the doors and, stumbling through, she found herself outside on a sort of stone platform. It was dusk; the moon had risen, but the sky was too light for the stars to be visible yet. Still, she closed her eyes and turned her face upward, breathing deep as the cool evening air caressed her face.

She stayed there, losing herself in the waning light, the smell of the air, and the sound of the bats and owls as they took flight. So intent was she on reacquainting herself with the world outside that she didn't even realize she was no longer alone, until someone spoke behind her.

"You must be our guest," a man said quietly. "I didn't expect to see you on your feet."

She started at the words, and her knees buckled. She was only saved from falling in a heap by the quick hands of the man, who caught her by the elbows and lowered her slowly to the floor. She thought at first that it was Amras, but when he sat beside her she saw that his hair was a few shades too dark.

"I'm Amrod," he said, evidently noticing her moment of confusion. "Amras is my twin. He tells me you're something of a mystery."

She gave a one-shouldered shrug. From his perspective she supposed that would be true. After all, she couldn't speak for herself, though there was much she wished she could say. The frustration made her jaw ache and her eyes sting, and she pulled the blanket around herself more tightly, shrinking into its folds.

"I know some of the hunting signals the Danas use," Amrod said. "Can you tell me anything?"

She thought for a moment and then signed, River.

"Your people live near the river? Which?" Amrod asked. "The Legolin?"

She nodded and signed, North.

"North of the Legolin." Tilting his head, Amrod studied her with eyes that were just as bright as his brother's. "Are you one of the Danas at all? Amras assumes everyone is, but you look more like the Hwenti, or the Kinn-lai."

Her eyes widened in amazement that Amrod knew those words. Even the Danas couldn't always name their neighboring peoples' tribes, and some didn't try, but simply called them the Moerbin, as the Iathrim to the west did. Half, she would have said to Amrod, for her mother had indeed been one of the Kinn-lai. Several of her neighbors had never let her or her brothers forget it, had never stopped seeing her mother as a Morben, an outsider, someone with strange ways and a strange tongue. But Linn and her brothers would still properly be counted among the Danas, like their father, so she settled for nodding once more.

"It was just a thought," Amrod said, his eyes searching her face. "I hope I haven't caused any offense."

Again, she shook her head, and he smiled at her, warm and friendly.

"So, we should be looking for a group of the Danas who live near the northern bank of the Legolin," he said. "That's where the rest of your family will be?"

At that, she shook her head more vigorously. Dead, she signed.

He frowned. "All of them? Your parents, too? You have no living kin?"

She shook her head again. Unbidden, tears came to her eyes, and she hid her face beneath the blanket as she began to cry.

Amrod didn't speak, but neither did he leave. Instead, he sat beside her in silence until she had regained control of herself. "How old are you?" he asked, once she had emerged from her blanket cocoon.

She held up four fingers and then six.

"Stars above, you're still a child. We'll have to find your people. We can't just send you out alone."

She didn't know how to answer. She couldn't go back to her village. She knew what she owed Amras for saving her, but she had no way of communicating it. And she was tired. She closed her eyes and leaned her head back against the low wall behind her.

"Should I take you back to your room?" Amrod asked quietly.

Again, she shook her head. Stay, she signed. Sleep.

"What, here?" Amrod said, raising his eyebrows. "Thíniel would have my head if I let you sleep out in the cold."

She frowned. I need the air, she wanted to say. I don't want to be walled in. But there were no signs to convey that, so she reluctantly took the hand he offered her and rose to her feet. Swaying, she realized that the walk had tired her more than she'd thought it would, and she had to lean heavily on Amrod as they slowly made their way back down the corridor.

"I'm going to get Thíniel," he said once he had helped her back into bed. "You're exhausted."

She nodded tiredly, letting her eyes fall closed. But she had a plan, and when Thíniel arrived she feigned sleep. She could hear the woman set something down on the bedside table, and then she felt a cool hand on her forehead. But she was careful not to stir, and when Thíniel left, she waited for two hundred heartbeats before moving. Then she sat up. There was a pitcher of water on the table now, but she didn't drink, afraid that it might have more of Thíniel's medicine in it. Instead, she gathered the blankets around herself, climbed shakily to her feet, and tottered out into the deserted hallway.

Slowly, silently, she struggled towards the outside doors. She didn't quite make it before her knees gave out, but she forced herself to crawl the last few yards. The plan had been to return to the stone platform, but it took all of her remaining strength just to push the door ajar. A breeze crept inside, carrying with it the smells of the night forest, and she breathed deep before curling up right there on the floor and falling asleep.

Chapter End Notes

A note for readers who may be unfamiliar with some of the terms used in this chapter: Hwenti and Kinn-lai are two of the attested tribes of the Avari, the names of which can be found in "Quendi and Eldar" in Volume 11 of HoMe (The War of the Jewels). Morben (pl. Moerbin) is also discussed there. It was a word used by the Sindar and Nandor to denote anyone who lived outside of Beleriand or who entered Beleriand from the east. At the time this story is set (FA 35) it was mostly used to refer to the Avari, though it would later be applied to some Men as well, particularly the Easterlings. Its connotations are rather derogatory.

“I guess the girl doesn’t like being inside,” Amras said over breakfast, a smile tugging at his lips. An exasperated Thíniel had just informed him of where she’d found her patient that morning, and he couldn’t deny being a little amused – not to mention relieved. For the past few days it had seemed as though the girl was poised to die of grief, despite Thíniel’s work healing her physical wounds.

Amrod shrugged. “The Nandor live in the trees,” he pointed out, once he’d swallowed his mouthful of eggs. “She may not have ever been inside a building like this before. Besides, I think communication is a bigger problem than where she sleeps. There are quite a few Nandorin settlements by the Legolin, and riding to each one and asking if they’re missing a few people isn’t really the best use of our resources. It would be better if we could put out the word with a name attached. But Nandorin hand signals are designed for hunting; they’re limited in what they can express.”

“Yes, I’ve been thinking about that,” Amras said. “I thought of asking someone to sit down with her and go over the alphabet. Obviously she won’t be able to learn to read overnight, but if we show her which tengwar make which sounds, she might be able to spell out her name for us, at least. Perhaps Istonion could do it. He’s patient.”

“That’s fine by me,” Amrod said. “And I should teach you the hand signals I know. Now that the construction on the fortress is almost done--”

“Thank the stars,” Amras interrupted.

Amrod grinned. “Now that it’s almost done, you’ll be able to spend more time getting to know the land and the people,” he finished. “That’s what Maedhros sent us here to do.”

Amras made a face. “I hate that name,” he confessed. “I mean, I understand why he doesn’t want to be called Maitimo anymore, or even Nelyo, but what was wrong with Russandol?”

Amrod shrugged again and took a sip of milk. He thought he understood, at least a little, but he didn’t think Amras would. The name Russandol belonged to Valinor, to a different time -- a happier time, before any deaths or oaths, before their eldest brother had been forced to endure years of torture at the hands of their grandfather’s murderer. The time spent in Morgoth’s clutches had changed Maedhros, however much he tried to hide it. Perhaps he felt that Russandol simply didn’t fit him anymore.

“It’s his name,” Amrod finally said. “He can change it if he wants to.”

With a discontented snort, Amras turned back to his meal. Amrod didn’t comment. He knew his twin was still chafing a little under the family’s Sindarin names, though he personally didn’t mind them. They lived in Beleriand now, and the people of Beleriand spoke Sindarin. It made sense for the Noldor to adopt the same tongue.

Linn eyed the man in front of her warily. She was back in bed, at Thíniel’s insistence, and she wasn’t happy about it. At least her chest ached a little less today than it had yesterday, but the room’s dead air was hardly worth breathing.

You inhaled blood, Thíniel had said. Your lungs have an infection. It will heal, but you need to rest.

Then let me rest outside, Linn wanted to say. Maybe she was being ungrateful – after all, Amras and Thíniel had saved her life – but how was anyone supposed to heal when they were walled in behind stone, kept away from the sun and the breeze and the stars? How could anyone live like this, sequestered inside day after day?

These Noldor were a strange people indeed.

The one who sat beside her now looked much like the others she had met – tall, black-haired, and pale, with bright shining eyes. He held a rolled-up sheet of parchment in one hand, and he greeted her with a smile.

“My name is Istonion,” he said. “Lord Amras has asked me to teach you the alphabet, in the hope that you can use it to tell us your name.”

Instantly, he had her full attention. Maybe she had had no use for reading before, but circumstances had changed. If she learned the alphabet, she could learn to write, and then she would be able to say what she needed to say – that she had no home to return to, and that she owed a debt and would repay it.

Istonion unfurled the parchment and laid it across her lap, and she leaned forward eagerly to study it. But what she saw was an incomprehensible series of lines and curves, and her excitement quickly turned to dismay.

Her teacher didn’t seem to notice. “Each of these is called a tengwa,” he said. “Each tengwa represents a sound.” Pointing to the first symbol, he said, “This is tinco. It makes the tuh sound. This one next to it is parma. It makes the puh sound.”

She stared at the symbols in utter confusion. They looked identical, and she wondered how she was supposed to tell which was which. But she couldn’t ask, and Istonion simply kept going.

“Calma makes kuh. Ando makes duh. Umbar makes buh…”

There were thirty symbols in all, and they made no more sense when Istonion was done than they had before he began. Too many of them looked alike, and Linn struggled to distinguish them from one another.

Istonion looked at her expectantly, but she simply shook her head. This time he didn’t miss the confusion written on her face, and he started over from the beginning. “Tinco makes tuh,” he repeated, this time going more slowly. “Parma makes puh.”

He went over them again, and again, and again. The tengwar didn’t become any more comprehensible to Linn, but she soon had memorized the order of the sounds, and it occurred to her that, even if she couldn’t understand the symbols, she could put the sounds together into words by counting. So when Istonion asked if she was ready to try to spell her name, she nodded.

Linn, her mother had named her. Singer. But she couldn’t sing, not anymore, and if she couldn’t sing then she couldn’t be called Linn. She needed a new name, one that wouldn’t be a constant reminder of what she had lost.

She’s lucky to be alive at all, Thíniel had said to Amras. Linn hadn’t felt lucky, with her voice gone and her brothers slain. But she was still here. If the orcs had attacked on any other day, she would have been killed, her body defiled and left to rot in the underbrush. Thanks to Amras, that hadn’t happened. She couldn’t sing anymore, but she was alive. In that respect, she was lucky indeed.

Painstakingly, the girl who had been Linn counted to the symbol she wanted and pointed to it. Then she slowly moved on to the next, as Istonion mouthed along. Anga. Osse. Lambe. Vilya. Yanta. Óre.

“Galwen,” Istonion said when she had finished. “Your name is Galwen?”

Galwen nodded, and he smiled at her.

“It’s nice to meet you, Galwen,” he said. Then he rolled up the parchment and held it out to her. “Would you like me to leave this here with you so that you can practice?”

Again, she nodded. She didn’t understand the tengwar, not now, but she was determined to study them until she did.

Amras and Amrod were pleased to finally have a name for their guest, but their people had still failed to find any Nandorin settlement near the Legolin that was missing a girl named Galwen. Amrod had to admit that he wasn’t completely surprised; the Nandor made beautiful music, but they were also secretive and good at hiding, and not all of them were eager to befriend the newcomers from the West. It was possible that his people had passed right by Galwen’s home without even realizing it was there.

“What are we going to do with her?” Amrod asked his brother. While Galwen had grown strong enough that she was no longer confined to her bed -- much to her obvious relief -- Thíniel hadn’t yet deemed her fit for travel.

“Let her stay here until she’s fully healed?” Amras suggested, raising his eyebrows. “She’s hardly a burden.”

“That’s not what I mean,” Amrod said, shooting his brother a glare that was mostly for show. “What if we can’t find her people? What if they’ve all packed up and moved on, or been killed, or simply won’t show themselves to foreigners?”

All three were possibilities. The Nandor did not always remain settled, nor did they always reveal themselves to outsiders -- sometimes not even to their Avarin neighbors. And while Amrod and Amras had worked hard to clear their new home of orcs, some of Morgoth’s servants still remained hidden in the mountain caves and the deep parts of the forest.

“Then I guess we’ll look for a family here who will take her in,” Amras said. “We can’t send her off on her own; she’s a child.”

He was uncomfortably aware that he and Amrod were barely more than children themselves, at least in the eyes of some, but they were still sons of Fëanor and lords of the Noldor. Their people were loyal and would support them in their decisions. If they said Galwen needed a home, someone would surely be willing to adopt her.

As she recovered, Galwen spent much of her time sitting on the terrace near her room and poring over the tengwar chart Istonion had made for her, trying to unravel its secrets by sheer force of will. But she was having little success. She still could not reliably discern tinco from parma, ando from anga, nor any number of other similar pairs. And when Istonion had brought her a short text the day before, a poem he called “Tinfang Warble,” the strangest thing had happened.

She had sat beside him, peering intently at the parchment, trying to see if she could puzzle out even one word as he read the poem aloud, but the tengwar had refused to stay still. They shifted on the paper even as she stared at them, rotating and trading places with their neighbors, and she wondered if they were imbued with some foreign magic that only the Noldor understood. Perhaps that was why their pale eyes shone with such light – because their words were enchanted.

Perhaps that was why she could not learn to read the tengwar.

The idea filled her with dismay. She could communicate, after a fashion, using the same counting method she had devised to spell her new name, but the process was slow and laborious, and it was complicated by the differences between the Noldor’s speech and the speech of her own people. She couldn’t express anything with any nuance, either, and she was left feeling frustrated and slow-witted.

She could hear Istonion’s footsteps in the corridor, and when he joined her she saw that he carried yet another roll of parchment. Her heart sank. She still hadn’t mastered the alphabet, and she’d made no progress at all on “Tinfang Warble.” She couldn’t possibly move onto something new already.

But what he held out to her was simply another tengwar chart. “I noticed the old one is getting tatty,” he said.

He wasn’t wrong. Though Galwen was careful with it, she did carry it with her during the day, and it had started to accumulate some grime and creases. Carefully, she folded it up and tucked it away in her tunic before unrolling the new one and laying it across her knees.

“I think we should go over the basics again, before we take another look at the poem,” Istonion said. “Spell your name for me, please.”

Galwen glanced at him out of the corner of her eye. Something in his voice was different today, off, like the faint odor of rot that revealed food just starting to go bad. It made her uneasy. But spelling her name was something she could do, so she complied with the request despite her discomfort.

“Hrm,” he said. “Now spell my name.”

That was a new task. In her head, Galwen broke his name down into its component sounds and counted out where each would go. Then she carefully pointed to the tengwar that she wanted.

He didn’t comment. Instead, he took the chart from her, pulled out a pen, and drew two symbols on the back. “Which of these is parma?” he asked.

She hesitated, and then pointed to the one on the left. It was a wild guess, and she could only hope that it was correct.

But Istonion shook his head. “That’s what I thought,” he said, seemingly half to himself. Then he rolled up the chart and held out his other hand. “May I have the old one back?” he asked. “I think it would be best if we stopped for today. I need to speak with Lord Amras.”

Reluctantly, Galwen pulled the original out and handed it to him. Dread had curdled into a heavy dumpling in her stomach. She wasn’t stupid; she knew that she had just failed some kind of test, even if she wasn’t sure what the test had been. Giving Istonion the tengwar chart meant giving up her primary way of communicating with the people around her, too, slow and imperfect though it was.

Istonion smiled at her as he left, but Galwen was not comforted by the expression at all.

Chapter End Notes

Galwen - "fortunate woman", from the root galu (good fortune, blessing)

Istonion is teaching the alphabet using the mode of Beleriand, which represents each vowel with its own tengwa, rather than with the diacritics (tehtar) found in other modes.

Amras looked down at the two sheets of parchment that Istonion had laid on his desk. Each bore a chart of the alphabet, but on one the tengwar were out of order, and he looked quizzically at the man seated across from him. Istonion looked unhappy, almost defeated, and Amras wondered what had happened to exhaust his usually indefatigable supply of patience.

“What am I supposed to be seeing here?” he asked.

Istonion tapped the chart on the left, the correct one, and said, “When Galwen uses this, she can form words. It takes her a long time, and her spelling isn’t always correct, but she’s intelligible. I thought that meant that she was beginning to recognize the tengwar.”

“I sense a ‘but’ coming,” Amras said with a frown.

Istonion nodded. “Yesterday, I brought “Tinfang Warble” with me. I thought it would be a good text to start with -- it’s fairly simple and it has a lot of repetition. But it was clear that she couldn’t make out a word of it. So today, I devised a little test.” He pointed to the altered chart. “I gave her this, and asked her to spell her name. I got gibberish; she pointed to where the letters should have been instead of where they were.”

Leaning his elbows on the desk, he grimaced and said, “I don’t think she can actually recognize a single tengwa. I think she’s memorized the order of the sounds. But I don’t understand why. With the amount of time she’s spent studying, she should have figured the alphabet out by now.”

“So you think what, exactly?” Amras asked, turning Istonion’s words over in his mind. “That she’s slow-witted?”

“No,” Istonion said, his voice firm. “I don’t think that at all. She plainly understands everything I say to her. It’s reading that gives her trouble. I think…” He broke off with a sigh and ran a hand through his hair, pushing it out of his eyes. “I think there’s something wrong,” he said, “but not with her mind. With her eyes, maybe -- I don’t know. It’s as if she looks at the words and sees something completely different from what I see. And that’s going to be a problem. Spelling things out sound by sound is slow, Lord Amras, and it’s obvious that she finds it frustrating. If you’re going to offer to let her stay here like you and Lord Amrod have discussed, we need a better method.”

“Do you have a suggestion?”

Istonion hesitated, and then nodded. “I do,” he said. “Your father was a brilliant linguist. I know I didn’t get to study with him for very long before-- before he was slain, but I still learned quite a lot. It’ll take me some time, but I think I might be able to take the Nandor’s hand signals and construct a sign language around them.”

“Then do it, by all means,” Amras said, sitting back in his chair. “Ask Amrod to show you the signs he knows.”

The idea was intriguing, and it could prove to be useful for the Noldor at large, not simply for Galwen. Silence was always valuable when hunting, and here in Beleriand they had more to hunt than simple game. Anything that could give them an advantage over Morgoth’s servants was worth looking into.

The next afternoon, Galwen waited for Istonion to come so that they could return to her lessons, but when he arrived, he held no parchment. “Lords Amras and Amrod would like to talk to us,” he said, offering her a hand to help her to her feet.

She accepted his assistance, but she was filled with foreboding. This had to be related to what had happened yesterday, and that meant nothing good could becoming. She did her best to hide her apprehension as she approached the door to Amras’ office, shaking a wrinkle from her tunic and squaring her shoulders, but inside she was awash in a sea of dread.

Amras and Amrod were not alone. An unfamiliar man and woman also sat inside the room, resting in high-backed wooden chairs. Two identical seats stood empty beside the them, and Istonion led a Galwen to one before seating himself in the other.

“Thank you for coming, Galwen,” Amras said. “We want to speak to you about-- well, about several things, actually. But the most important, I think, is that we’ve been unable to find your people. I’m sorry. Amrod and his men have been looking ever since we brought you here, but they’ve had no success.”

Of course they hadn’t. They were asking about Galwen, not Linn. But Galwen wasn’t about to correct them. She did not want to go back to her village, not if her brothers were no longer there.

“Amrod tells me your family is dead,” Amras continued, his voice quiet and full of sympathy.

Galwen nodded, biting her lower lip to stop it from trembling. Her body was healed, mostly, her stitches removed and her fever gone, but thinking of her brothers pained her immensely. Her memories of her mother’s death, too, still stung, and though she couldn’t recall her father at all, she knew what happened to men and women who vanished in the forests. They were taken north to be tortured and corrupted, forced to serve the dark power that dwelt there. Her father might still live, but it would not be in a form anyone who knew him would recognize.

“Our own father was slain only a few decades ago,” Amrod revealed. Galwen snapped her gaze over to him in surprise, and he said, “We know how difficult it is to lose the people you love and find yourself far from home.”

“We’d like to offer you a home here,” Amras said. He gestured to the strangers who sat beside Istonion. “This is Heledir and his wife Faeldis. They would adopt you, if you agree.”

“We would be glad to take you in,” Faeldis said. She was lithe and long-fingered, with high cheekbones, and Galwen had expected her voice to be clear and musical, like Thíniel’s. But it was low and smoky. “Our own children are grown and live far away, and our house feels empty without them. Heledir and I would care for you and help you find a trade or craft to study.”

“You needn’t decide right now,” Heledir said. “Take some time to think it over. But know that if you accept, you will be more than welcome in our home.”

Think it over. She did not need to think it over, though this was not at all what she had expected to hear today. She owed Amras her life. If she could stay here, she would.

“This brings us to our next issue,” Amras said. “If you stay with us, we need a better way to communicate with you. Istonion, would you explain your idea to Galwen?”

“Yes, my lord.” Istonion turned to face Galwen, and she saw that he looked a little nervous. “Your reading lessons,” he said. “They aren’t going very well, are they?”

He wasn’t wrong, but Galwen wasn’t certain if it would be better to agree or disagree, so she simply stared at him.

“I saw how much trouble you were having with the poem,” he said, “so I made a small test for you yesterday.”

He lifted two pieces of parchment from Amras’ desk, and Galwen saw that they were the two tengwar charts. Her eyes narrowed. She knew that something had been wrong during her lesson yesterday. She could tell from his voice alone.

When he spoke next, he sounded apologetic. “When I made the new chart, I put the letters in the incorrect order,” he confessed. “You didn’t notice. And when I asked you to spell your name, you selected the wrong tengwar. You’re having a very difficult time with this, aren't you?”

Galwen didn’t answer. Angry tears had welled up in her eyes, and she snatched the old chart out of his grasp. Her hand shook as she pointed to the sounds she wanted. Trick, she spelled. Liar.

Istonion winced, but he didn’t dispute her words. “I wasn’t trying to hurt you or humiliate you,” he said. “I just needed to know how many of the tengwar you actually could recognize.”

Ask, Galwen spelled, jabbing her finger emphatically at the letters.

Amrod lifted one hand to cover his mouth, but he wasn’t quite fast enough to muffle his laugh. “She has a point,” he said to Istonion. “That would have been easier.”

Galwen wasn't amused. She continued to blink back tears as she glared at Istonion, trembling in her seat with anger at having been deceived, and when Faeldis reached over and rested one delicate hand on her arm, it took all of her self-control not to pull away.

“I was worried that you would be afraid to tell me the truth,” Istonion said. “But you and Lord Amrod are right; I shouldn’t have tricked you. I’m sorry.”

“The good news is that Istonion has thought of a solution,” Amras said, his voice calm and level. “He’s going to create a sign language, and we’re all going to learn it together. Not just you -- everyone.”

Her eyes widened, and she stared at Amras, distracted from her anger by sheer shock. She’d never heard of anyone making a language, and she’d certainly never imagined that someone would do something so incredible specifically for her.

Amras smiled at her. “My people are here to stand against Morgoth,” he said. “Having a silent language won’t just allow you to speak. It will give us an advantage against his servants, too.”

Morgoth. Black foe. Galwen looked at Amrod, raised her eyebrows, and signed, North?

Amrod nodded. “Yes,” he said. “The evil being who lives in the north. The master of the orcs. He murdered our grandfather, his servants slew our father, and he robbed our family. We are here to fight against him, until he returns what is ours and pays for his crimes.”

His voice was grave, his jaw was set, and his bright eyes were hard. For the first time, Galwen found herself feeling frightened of him. She, too, hated the orcs and their master, but Amrod looked murderous.

“Amrod.” Amras nudged his brother in the ribs, and Amrod seemed to come back to himself, the anger melting from his face.

“I’m sorry,” Amrod said, seeing Galwen’s disturbed expression. “What happened upsets me deeply, but I don’t mean to scare you.”

“Think about our offer,” Amras said. “Let us know what you would like to do.”

Galwen didn’t need to think about it. She looked Amrod square in the eye and signed, Stay.

“You would like to stay here, with Heledir and Faeldis?” he said.

She nodded emphatically and repeated the sign.

Faeldis beamed. “Wonderful!” she said, as Heledir got to his feet and held out his hands to Galwen. Galwen gripped them firmly, feeling his calluses beneath her own, and stood. Faeldis moved to stand beside her, and Amras and Amrod smiled.

“You have my brother’s and my blessing,” Amras said. “Istonion will keep you informed on the progress of his sign language. Heledir, Faeldis, why don’t you show your new daughter her home?”

At the word daughter, Galwen stiffened. She was grateful that Heledir and Faeldis wanted to help her, but she was not their child. She may not have been Linn anymore, but she was still the daughter of Kissith and Amar. She would not forget that.

“You don’t have to think of us as your parents,” Heledir said as Faeldis wrapped her arm around Galwen’s shoulders. “We know we can’t replace your mother and father. But we will consider you our kin, at the very least, for we are all children of Ilúvatar.”

Galwen didn’t know what Ilúvatar was, and she didn’t bother trying to ask. She was just relieved that she wouldn’t offend Heledir and Faeldis if she didn’t call them her parents. She went with them willingly as they left Amras’ office, and her heart lifted when they led her out of the fortress entirely.

“We live in the town,” Faeldis said. “I’m a potter. Heledir trains horses, when he isn’t hunting or scouting for our lords.”

Galwen still didn’t entirely understand the concept of a lord. She knew that Amras and Amrod were the leaders of the Noldor here in Ossiriand, like the council of elders were the leaders of Galwen’s old village. But the elders were just that -- old, with great wisdom and experience. Amras and Amrod were very young, yet the other elves seemed to obey them without question. Perhaps it was because they were brave.

The town wasn’t far. Galwen had seen it from the walls of the fortress. It stood on the open land to the south, and from above it seemed to be an orderly grid of buildings laid out along paths that were covered by smooth stones. But up close, the buildings seemed more like the deepest part of the forest, where the trees grew close together, wild and tangled. And it was noisy. Everywhere she looked, there were people talking -- some in the speech she knew, and others in a lilting tongue that she couldn’t understand. She thought it might be the same language that Istonion sometimes muttered to himself in.

A few people stared as they walked past, and Faeldis tightened her arm around Galwen’s shoulders. “Don’t be afraid,” she said softly. “We Noldor are still new to this land, and you and your people are unfamiliar to many of us, but no one here means you any harm.”

Galwen nodded. She knew Faeldis was trying to comfort her, but she wished she would let her go. Her hold was starting to feel suffocating.

They turned down one side street and then another, past building after building, until Heledir and Faeldis came to a halt. “This is where we live,” Faeldis said, gesturing to the house in front of them.

Wood. Thank every star in the sky -- the walls were made of smooth, familiar wood, and Galwen paused for a moment to press her palms and cheek against the sun-warmed planks before following her hosts through the door.

Inside, Heledir spread his arms wide. “Welcome home,” he said.

Galwen smiled.

Chapter End Notes

Kissith - 'feather woman'

In the standard Sindarin of the books, this name would be rendered as Pesseth, but as Kissith was one of the Avari, I've taken the sound shifts shown in the change from Quendi to Kinn-lai and applied them to the Quenya word for 'feather' (quessë) to get a speculative approximation of what the name would be in Kissith's Avarin dialect.