Where the Ocean Meets the Sky and the Land by StarSpray

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Chapter 3

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Elwing had never been plagued by boredom before. She’d had to sit through dull lessons and dinners and meetings—but they’d never lasted more than a few hours, and in Sirion there had always been something to worry about, something to do. She’d been glad for snatches of time when she could sit and breathe for a time without doing anything.

In Tirion, though, it seemed all she had was time to sit and breathe. There were no real demands on her time at all, and the lack of anything to worry about paradoxically made her increasingly anxious. She was reminded of the bitter stories told by some of the Gondolindrim, how they had trusted so completely in their hidden city that when the Enemy had finally come they’d been caught off guard and utterly unprepared. It felt like that was happening in Tirion—except she knew it was different, knew there was no Enemy to fear, not here.

However, knowing did not, unfortunately, make her feel any better.

Ëarwen was the first to notice Elwing’s discomfort, and her solution was almost absurdly simple: “No one is forcing you to stay in Tirion. Why not see for yourself that there are no orc hordes hiding in the hills?” She leaned against the door leading out to the balcony where Elwing had retreated, looking amused. “I can tell you don’t like Tirion.”

“I don’t…dislike Tirion,” Elwing protested. Ëarwen laughed. “I suppose I just feel as though I should be doing something.”

“I can’t imagine what it must be like in the Outer Lands, then; you make it sound as though you’ve never had time for leisure.” Ëarwen sobered as she came to sit beside Elwing. From there they could see most of the city, bright and almost blinding in the late afternoon sun, and bustling with activity. It reminded Elwing of a beehive, never still. It was so hard to imagine it as Eärendil had described, empty and silent, his footsteps echoing as he passed through. Even from this high up in the palace Elwing could hear distant shouting, screaming children, the occasional chiming of bells. “There are many who want to meet you, to hear all that has happened since the Exiles departed,” Ëarwen said. “Anairë most of all, but she’s lingered in Valmar with Indis.”

“Áralossë and Elencalimë say that there are Sindar returning out of Mandos,” Elwing said. “That they are gathered in Lórien.”

“I’m told some went to Valmar for the festival, though they remained apart from the Noldor and Vanyar gathered there, except to pay their respects to Lúnamírë.”

“Why did they go, if not to mingle with the rest of the Elves?”

Ëarwen shrugged. “I cannot say. I was not there, else I might have tried to ask them. But they’ll have returned to Lórien, or wherever they’ve decided to settle, by now. Don’t you think they would welcome a visit from their queen?”

Elwing sighed. “I’m sure they would, but I’ve not heard anything about Melian.”

“You know what I mean.”

“I am not the queen they want or expect,” Elwing said.

“But you are the queen they have,” Ëarwen said. “You can have your pick of horses from our stables. And if you would like an escort…”

“I cannot believe Elencalimë has failed to mention that I don’t know how to ride,” Elwing said.

“Then we shall have to teach you! If nothing else, it will be a very Noldorin remedy for boredom.” At Elwing’s quizzical look, Ëarwen smiled. “Learning a new skill, I mean.”

 

Horses made Elwing nervous. They were big and powerful, and in Sirion she had seen more than once the result of falling from the back of one. But Áralossë and Elencalimë both volunteered to teach her. “We taught Aniswë and Analimë to ride, and Aniswë was positively terrified, at first,” Elencalimë told Elwing while intro ducting her to a sweet and docile mare. “But they’re still small enough for ponies—you can imagine her relief.”

“I almost wish I was small enough to be given a pony,” Elwing said, and Elencalimë laughed.

In the end, though, learning to ride was not as difficult or as painful as Elwing had feared, and she passed several pleasant weeks riding all about the countryside around Tirion with Elencalimë, and sometimes with the young twins as well, who were eager to show Elwing all of their favorite picnic spots, and to introduce her to some of their friends among the farmers and herders.

One afternoon, Arafinwë asked Elwing if she would join him for a ride. “I fear I have been a poor host,” he said as they left the city gates. “Ëarwen tells me you are unhappy in Tirion.”

Elwing raised her eyes skyward. “I am not unhappy,” she said. “But I admit I miss the sea—which is something I never expected to hear myself say.” Arafinwë laughed. “You must promise never to tell Eärendil. He can be insufferably smug.”

“You were not fond of the sea in the Outer Lands?”

“I hated it,” Elwing admitted, “for a very long time. I still prefer the forest to the shore. But after spending nearly my whole life by the shore, it’s strange to come so far inland that I cannot hear the waves anymore.”

Arafinwë nodded. “I know what you mean. I used to spend more than half my time in Alqualondë with Ëarwen and her family. Our children spent as much time there as they did in Tirion, growing up.” He smiled ruefully. “And at the end it was a place to escape to, away from all the tension in Tirion.”

“Have you been back, since…?” Elwing asked before thinking better of it. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to—”

“It’s all right. I’ve only been back once. I have personally reconciled with Ëarwen—obviously—and most of her family, but between our peoples there is still a great deal of tension, as I’m sure you’ve noticed.” Elwing nodded. “Speaking of tension…” Arafinwë sighed, his gaze shifting to the road ahead of them, where a pair of travelers approached on foot. They were both women, tall and dressed in traveling leathers, more like to the Laegrim of Ossiriand than to anyone Elwing had yet met in Valinor. “There is Minyelmë, and her mother Lady Elunis. She was wed to Elmo…”

“I have heard,” Elwing said. “Do you not get along?”

“I’ve only spoken with Lady Elunis once,” Arafinwë said, “at this past festival in Valmar. As for Minyelmë—well, she used to be great friends with our family. But since the Darkening she has not set foot in Tirion. I imagine she and her mother are here now because of you, Elwing.”

“Ai! Lúthien, is that you?” one of the women called out suddenly. Elwing stiffened, and her mare tossed her head and snorted.

“Lúthien?” Arafinwë repeated, glancing at Elwing.

“Elwë’s daughter,” Elwing said. “My grandmother.”

“Ah.” Arafinwë nodded, his smile returning. “It seems you take after her.”

Elwing shook her head. “I really do not.” She dismounted as the women drew closer, the one who had called out—Elunis, no doubt—breaking into a run.

“Ah, not Lúthien,” she said upon reaching Elwing. “You are not so tall—oh, but you look like her!”

“Lúthien was my grandmother,” Elwing said. “I am Elwing, Dior’s daughter.”

“The mariner’s wife,” said the other traveler to her companion, before turning back to Elwing. “Well met, cousin. I am Minyelmë, and this is my mother Elunis. And, Ammë, you remember Arafinwë Finwion?”

“I do remember.” Unlike Minyelmë, who remained stern and apparently unhappy to see Arafinwë, Elunis smiled up at him.

He smiled back, before looking at Elwing. “I must return to Tirion. Shall I leave you to walk with your cousins…?”

Elwing nodded. “I will see you later this evening.”

As Arafinwë cantered away back toward Tirion, Minyelmë looked sidelong at Elwing. “So is it true that you are an enchantress of the Avari who can change shape at will and bewitch the heart of even the most noble of the Eldalië?”

“Am I what?”

Minyelmë laughed. When she smiled she looked more like Elunis, and not so stern. “There is little for the Elves to do here but gossip,” she said. “It leads sometimes to outlandish stories.”

Elunis laughed. “Not so outlandish,” she said. “You have never heard Lúthien sing.” Her smile faded. “Even the Lord of Mandos was moved by her song—I remember, it was so astonishing to hear her there. But she did not linger long, and what became of her after, I do not know. She was not returned to life here.”

“I can tell you what happened,” Elwing said. “But it is a long tale.”

They started walking back towards Tirion. Elwing’s horse nudged her shoulder until she reached up to stroke its nose. “Are you headed to Lórien?” she asked. “I’ve heard the Sindar newly come from Mandos have gathered there.”

“Yes,” Elunis said. “We have not decided yet whether we wish to join ourselves to Olwë’s folk, or find somewhere else to settle—except those of the Falathrim, who have already gone to the coast. I think most wish to find a place to await Elu’s coming.” She glanced at Elwing. “We know his spirit resides in Mandos, but no one can say why. There are rumors of Melian’s return to the Gardens of Lórien, but she has not revealed herself to us—even the nightingales have fallen silent.”

“I’d wondered why that was,” Minyelmë murmured.

A nightingale chose that moment to flutter down and land on Elwing’s shoulder, chirping a greeting before settling down to enjoy the walk back to Tirion. Minyelmë stared, but Elunis laughed. “She recognizes you!”

“You should come with us to Lórien,” Minyelmë said after a few minutes of walking. “In the absence of my father and uncle, they will look to you for leadership.”

Elwing thought that when Elmo returned from Mandos she would quite happily cede authority to him. She may be Thingol’s heir, but she was not Thingol—she did not even resemble Lúthien in more than coloring, no matter what Celeborn liked to say.

She missed him, suddenly, so greatly that it made her chest ache. He and Galadriel, and everyone else she’d left behind in the fires of Sirion who had known her from childhood.

But she couldn’t just hide away in Tirion or in Alqualondë. Especially if she was expected elsewhere. “I had thought of going,” she said. “I’ve only really seen Alqualondë and Tirion—and Valmar, briefly—since coming to Valinor. I would like to see more of it.”

“I only wish I could have seen it under the Light of the Trees,” Elunis said.

As they approached Tirion’s walls, Minyelmë slowed. “This is where I leave you,” she said. “I prefer to camp beneath the stars.” With a wave and a smile that did not reach her eyes, she walked off, leaving the road for the fields.

“Don’t mind her,” Elunis said, slipping her arm through Elwing’s. “She’s not been to Tirion in years, but it isn’t because she is angry or resentful—not anymore. But she won’t tell me the full story—and neither will Lúnamírë, though I know that she knows it.

“But enough of that—I want to know everything you can tell me of Beleriand, what happened after I died. How did you come to marry the mariner, and come to Valinor?”

Elwing swallowed a sigh. The tale was long and painful enough that she did not relish telling it again—and again, and again, as she knew she would, until enough folk heard it to retell it themselves. “Of course,” she said.

Elwing found a boy who happily accepted a few coins in exchange for taking her horse on to the palace, and then she and Elunis found a small, quiet tavern where they could sit in an even quieter corner to talk over glasses of sweet wine without being disturbed.

Elunis listened to Elwing’s tales quietly, her dark eyes never wavering from Elwing’s face. She did not interrupt, even to ask questions. When Elwing finally finished, Elunis sighed, and drained her wineglass before speaking.

“I knew it would not be good news,” she said finally, after a smiling barmaid came and refilled both their glasses for them. “But I did not think…ah, Elu! He always had his pride, but I never thought it would grow so much that he would be deafened even to Melian’s counsel.”

“The Silmaril did strange things to people,” Elwing said. “And people did terrible things in order to possess it, or keep it.”

“It is clear to me that it was meant to come to you,” Elunis said. She covered Elwing’s hand with hers, tanned and rough with callouses. “If it had not, we wouldn’t be sitting here together now, and the Valar would not be preparing for war against Morgoth.”

“Everything seems Destined in hindsight,” Elwing said, “especially if it all happened to someone else.”

Elunis laughed quietly. “Perhaps. But that doesn’t make it untrue, even if it is little comfort—and speaking of comfort, will you come to Lórien with Minyelmë and me? I can see you are not happy here. It might be different among your own people.”

Elwing did not answer right away. She’d left her people behind to burn in Sirion. But it was such a relief to speak her own language even for one afternoon that in the end she nodded. “Of course,” she said. “I have been wanting to see more of this land, in any case.”