Himling by Luxa

Chapter 1

“Do not go, Elrond. The Third Age is upon us, and the time for this sentiment is long past.”

There were times when Elrond did not particularly enjoy the company of his mother-in-law. She was rarely wrong, and she knew it. Elrond usually knew it too, though, so he was never annoyed unless it involved him.

“Ignore her, dear. You have to do this. For your sake.”

And so, following the advice of his lovely wife, he commandeered a ship.

Truthfully, it was not nearly so romantic as that. It was more borrowing a ship rather than commandeering it. It was not Elrond standing stoically at the front, taking the wheel and steering the boat to his destination, but a complete crew sent with him by Círdan, the most hardened he had to take Elrond to the long abandoned island of Himling.

He had to see it. He had to see it at least once.

He would be leaving soon (in their years, for mortal Men counted so differently, and it was harder and harder to believe he was kin to them as he grew older), and he would never come back to Middle-earth until the ending of Arda itself. He had to see it.

When they arrived on the small island, only Elrond went onto land. The sailors could have used respite on shore, but they refused, whether out of respect for Elrond or some deep fear of this remnant of Beleriand he wasn’t sure.

The island was no more than a couple miles any direction you went; if it had been flat you would have been able to see all the way across it. But Himling had been a hill back when it was Himring, and a hill it remained.

Elrond was pleased to find the remains of an old staircase that lead to the fortress in days of old, built directly into the hill. He climbed them, fingers clutching at the soil and grass next to him as he climbed. The stairs were millennia old and crumbling now, even step more dangerous than the last.

He was one of the oldest beings in Middle-earth now, and this place was older than he was. It was almost liberating, the feeling. Being a bastion of peace and hope in a hostile world was no easy feat, especially not when Galadriel and all the other Elves were closing their borders. He would not be able to leave lmladris again.

It was a long climb to the top of the steps, but his stamina was enough to make it without resting. He took a moment when he was at the top, looking back the way he had come. He could see Círdan’s ship with its white sails on top of the sea. He glanced up, half expecting to see the Northern Star.

He turned back again and examined the view in front of him. There was not as much as he’d secretly hoped for. The ruins were just that- ruins. Beautiful ones, nonetheless, with trees and shrubs intertwining the stone. As he stepped forward, he could see the shape the fortress must have had, could approximately see what it had looked like. In his mind’s eye it built up around him, a ghost castle for his heart’s shadows to live in.

There were only three remnants of the walls bigger than him, but all of them had some sort of carving on them, weathered by time. He peered closely at one and thought he might be able to see an image of the Silmarils, but that might just be wishful thinking.

He stood examined the area for several hours, eating lunch from a satchel he’d brought, sitting under an old oak tree right in the middle of the top of the hill. He liked that life still grew here. Nature abandoned the ground where evil things had been, and Elrond did not believe that the Fëanorians had been evil.

The idea of Maedhros living here so long, of Maglor and the other brothers visiting in days long past, when the world was young, made Elrond feel both old and young again. He had been alive for the last of the Elder Days, but he had not been there for the greatest follies of his chosen kind, and he could not be sorry for it, even if the loremaster in him half wanted it. He thought it better to be ignorant of pain until there was no other option.

He stood in the midst of a living monument and remembered his earliest days until the sun went down. If any had seen him they would have thought him a part of the ruins.

When the sun began to go down he finally stirred, standing and stretching his limbs. A long journey there and back for one day, but it had been worth it, even if he was leaving feeling a little stranger inside.

As he began to heads towards the steep steps, his boot hit something hard. He paused, reaching down and using the last light of the sun to dig through the soft soil, spending several minutes searching before he finally found what his boot had hit.

He pulled several long metal strings out of the ground, staring at them for a long moment before jolting slightly, recognizing what they were. Harp strings. He’d found harp strings in the ground. He stood quickly, clutching the wrapped metal. He couldn’t know, of course, whether the harp it had once belonged to one of the court’s musicians or Maglor himself. Either way it was a sign of Elvish life from before the fortress had been lost, from when Himring was the solid, bleak barrier between good and evil. If only it had been able to protect Maedhros and Maglor from their own deeds.

He laid the metal in his satchel, one last thought occurring to him as he descended the steps. The harp strings could have landed there much later than he’d first thought. Maglor was, after all, still out there.