Where the Ocean Meets the Sky and the Land by StarSpray

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Chapter 6

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The Gardens of Lórien were beautiful. Flowers seemed to be everywhere, like a rainbow had descended from the sky to carpet the ground, and the air was heavy with the scent of lavender and violets. Silvery willows and tall beeches lined paths well-worn by years and years of wanderers. Elwing felt as though she were walking through a dream as she followed Minyelmë down the winding paths, crossing over small arched bridges across laughing books and trickling streams that glimmered in the dappled sunlight that filtered lazily, green-tinted, though the boughs overhead. There were fountains, occasionally, arcing up from the living rock that no Elven hand had carved, to cast a mist over clearings where rainbows danced.

It seemed like there was faint music playing everywhere, though Elwing saw no musicians. "This is where I woke up," Minyelmë told her as they paused beside a pond, where tadpoles darted about the shallows. "By this very pond, I think. It was night, and for a moment I thought I was beside the waters at home." She offered a crooked smile to Elwing. "Then I opened my eyes to Telperion's light. It was a bit of a shock." They walked around the pond, following a string of niphredil blossoms. "Oh, there's Ammë! Wait here, I'll see if she's found anyone yet." Minyelmë leaped away lightly through the flowers, sending a cluster of butterflies fluttering away toward the canopy.

Elwing watched her go, and then turned at the sound of a whisper just behind her. No one was there, except for a path she had not noticed before, lined with more niphredil, thicker now, like a dusting of snow. They had grown like that in Doriath beside the Esgalduin, and on Tol Galen wherever Lúthien danced—which had been everywhere. With a glance over her shoulder to see Minyelmë and Elunis just on the other side of the pond, Elwing turned to follow the path, curious to see where it led.

It led to a small glade, filled with fragrant ferns and shaded by great trees of a kind Elwing had never seen before, with smooth silver trunks and silver-green leaves. Niphredil blossoms in scattered bunches across the ground swayed gently in the whispering breeze. Elwing blinked, and across the glade stood a woman, her hair falling like shadows around her, long enough to touch the ground. She was tall, clad in dark grey, and her face was pale in the gloom, shimmering with the reflected light of the long-gone Trees. Her eyes were brighter still, like stars in a twilit sky. For a moment the breeze sounded more like someone singing, faint and far away, a broken-hearted lament in a voice like the Esgalduin in spring and the nightingales in Hírilorn and the echo of dancing footsteps in the thousand halls of Menegroth.
Then Elwing blinked again, and the woman was gone, the music only the wind through the trees. Rubbing the chill from her arms, Elwing turned back down the path, to meet Elunis and Minyelmë beside the pond. When she reached them, she found they were not alone. "Elwing," Elunis said, taking her hand and drawing her over, "this is Tavron, and this is Helegil; they have just come from Mandos."

"And have learned there is no hope of returning across the Sea to our home," Helegil said, not a little sourly, as she and Tavron bowed to Elwing.

"There is no home to return to," Elwing said. "Doriath is gone, and Mithrim and the Falas overrun long ago."

"Then why do we keep hearing of preparations being made for some great journey east?" Tavron asked.

"No one is returning to settle there again," Minyelmë said. "The Valar are marching forth in war. And you'll find no Nelyar in that host."

Elwing looked at her in surprise. "Why not?"

"We have not forgotten the blood spilled on our quays or the theft of our ships," Minyelmë said.

"Then how will the Vanyar and the Noldor cross the Sea? They cannot cross the Helcaraxë as Fingolfin did."

"I would go back to fight," Tavron said. "I fought before, and I would do it again, whether Doriath still stands or no."

"That is your choice," Elunis said gently, "but if I were you I would think long and hard on it. You have only just returned from death—are you so eager to go courting it again? I am not." Tavron shrugged.

They wandered a little with Tavron and Helegil, until they met other Sindar gathered in a glade with blankets spread out for a picnic. Maiar flitted among them, sometimes visible, sometimes not, and Elwing was not quite sure if the others were able to sense their presence as she was, or if this was some gift of her own Maiarin blood. She sat beside Elunis and reveled in the sound of her own language being spoken by more than one other person. There were very few Sindar now alive in Valinor, and nearly all of them were in this glade. They were both delighted to have Elwing among them and grieved at the reasons for her coming. And perhaps because Elwing was there, they were reluctant to simply go to Alqualondë to mingle with the Teleri there.

"What would be best," laughed a woman, Orondis who had greeted Elunis like a sister, "would be to build another Menegroth. But that will have to wait. A thousand caves would be far too many for such a small number."

"It may even have to wait until Elu returns to us," said Elunis.

"What about Lúthien's son?" Tavron wanted to know. "Lúthien is lost to use forever—alas—but what of Dior Eluchíl?"

"My father was Halfelven, like me," Elwing said. "The Valar decreed that Eärendil and I and our children should choose which kindred to be counted among, but that was mere months ago. My father died long before any choice was given to him."

"Does that mean he died as a Man?" Elunis asked.

"I do not know. And Mandos will not speak of it."

"No, Mandos won't share what goes on in his halls," Minyelmë said. "It is likely the only way we shall know if Dior will return is if he does return, but we cannot count on it. And in the meantime—why not join with with Olwë's people in Alqualondë?"

"There are Falathrim who have already left to do so," said Helegil. "For the rest of us—we prefer forests and streams to the shores of the sea. But we do not know where we can go that has not already been claimed by another people."

"Come to Alqualondë," Minyelmë repeated. "You need not stay there, and perhaps Olwë will have ideas where you can settle more permanently. In any case, that is where Elwing will be."

For a while, at least. Elwing supposed that where she would settle now depended on where these people decided to go. It was a little disheartening; it seemed likely they would want to live somewhere west of the Pelóri, and she did not like the thought of dwelling far from the shore—she was happy to travel and explore this new place, but her home should be where Eärendil would come, and that was Alqualondë, or somewhere close to it. If only Elu Thingol were returned from Mandos! But it would be many long years yet before he walked beneath the sun again.

In the end, it was decided that they would all travel back to Alqualondë. Lórien was lovely, but it was not a home, and in Alqualondë they would be among their own people, though they had been so long sundered. But there was no hurry; after all, Elwing had only just come to Lórien, and there was much that Minyelmë wanted to show her. Around every corner, it seemed, there were wonders—butterflies with wings brighter than gems, and birds to match with the sweetest songs, and berries that burst on the tongue with sweetness.

But she could not forget the coming war for long, and at last they departed Lórien, heading east again, toward Tirion and toward Alqualondë. They went slowly, as most of them were on foot, and there was no set schedule; sometimes they rested during the day and walked by moon or starlight, and sometimes they did the opposite, or traveled in the afternoon through the evening. Every night there were songs sung to the stars; most were familiar to Elwing, but others were new—or rather, very old.

As they passed the mansions of Aulë, their forges ringing with hammers and the songs of his smiths, a messenger from Tirion met them. "Well met, Tatharon!" Minyelmë said as the rider slowed down to greet them. "Where are you going in such a hurry?"

"To find you!" he replied with a grin. "Or rather, to find Lady Elwing. Your counsel is looked for in Tirion."

It wasn't a surprise, really. Her journey to Lórien, as lovely as it had been, had probably been ill-timed.

"I will ride with you," Elunis said as Elwing swung onto her horse.

"I will guide the rest," Minyelmë said cheerfully. "Tatharon, will your grandfathers mind if we camp in your orchards a night or two?"

"I don't think so," Tatharon said. Elwing did not hear the rest of the conversation; she and Elunis called their farewells over their shoulders as they set off at a brisk pace for Tirion. They stopped one night with Cullasso and Lámion, and reached the city in the middle of the afternoon the next day. It was much busier than it had been when they had left. The rest of the Noldor had returned from the festival in Valmar, it seemed, and with them had come a great number of the Vanyar. The forges here were as loud and as busy as Aulë's.

Ëarwen was in the courtyard to greet them. "Welcome back," she said, smiling. "How was your journey?"

"It was lovely," Elwing replied.

"Did you meet your people in Lórien?"

"Yes, and they are traveling to Alqualondë now," Elunis said. "Though they would rather dwell in a forest somewhere. But there is no real hurry to find a place."

"No," Ëarwen agreed. "There are more pressing things to discuss—such as how we are to move our armies across the Sea. I think my father would agree to at least provide ships, but there is a great deal of grumbling in Alqualondë—no one has forgotten the theft of the ships or the blood spilled there. I was hoping that Minyelmë would return with you."

"She remained with the others," Elunis said. "But Elwing and I can speak to the Teleri as well as she—better, even."

Elwing didn't even know how widely known her presence in Valinor was among the Teleri; she had kept mostly to the palace while she had been there, until she'd left for Tirion with Ëarwen.

Inside the palace, there were a great many introductions to be made. Arafinwë, Ingwion and Lalion she knew already, but now she met Ingwion's sisters Maltariel and Lintanis, as well as his wife Nallossë. Indis was there also; all of them were tall and golden and bright-eyed. And there was Anairë, Fingolfin's wife and Eärendil's kinswoman, a dark Noldo with sapphires wound in her hair and ink stains on her fingertips.

And Nerdanel was there, no longer hazy and distracted by her art, but keen-eyed and looking a little abashed upon recognizing Elwing from their previous meeting. Beside her was a smaller, slender woman with stains on her fingers not unlike Anairë's; she was introduced as Nerdanel's daughter-in-law Telpaltië, though if anyone said which son she had married Elwing did not hear it.

Telpaltië did not stay long, though. She had work to do, she said, and departed as soon as it was polite. Everyone else wasted no time in drawing Elwing and Elunis into their councils and plans. A map they had already, but there were other questions. What should they expect from Sirion at different times of the year? Where were all the old Elven strongholds in Beleriand? What kinds of creatures did Morgoth have in his service?

Elwing could say little of the old strongholds—she knew where things were, but they were only dots on a map to her. Sirion she could say a little more about, and she knew many tales of the monstrous things often encountered on the battle field—orcs, balrogs, trolls, and werewolves and vampires. And dragons, worst of all. It had been Glaurung that destroyed Nargothrond and Brethil, and dragons had come to Gondolin, too—sometimes Eärendil dreamed of them.

"How did Doriath fall?" someone asked once. Ëarwen looked worriedly at Elwing, who found she could not answer, not with Nerdanel sitting just down the table, listening to everything. She stammered something about being very young at the time, and Elunis quickly and abruptly changed the subject to numbers.

Afterward, it was late enough that Elwing could plead weariness and escape to her room. Gone was the calm she had found in Lórien, and her dreams that night were filled with fire and smoke and blood.