A Shadow and a Mist of Dreams by Lingwiloke

Chapter 1

Late crosspost for B2MeM 2019, Prompts: Poetic Language N42: Synecdoche, Poetic Language O72: Rhythm, Hurt/Comfort 2 B12 Tragic Misunderstanding

This grew out of my reading the description for Synecdoche - "a figure of speech by which a part is put for the whole" and somehow immediately thinking of Beren's hand with the Silmaril being dug out of Carcharoth belly. Then when I started writing, I got derailed by thinking to much about Carcharoth, and this happened.

It creeps onto him slowly; a twilight song, a subtle rhythm dancing on the edges of his awareness, barely audible beneath the howl of the harsh winds over the cliffs, the far-away clink of steel on steel and the thump of heavy boots on stone from within the fortress behind him.

A spirit tethered to flesh more by Master's will and sorcery than by the laws of nature, he never sleeps; he is always watchful, ready to rip apart Master's enemies at a moment’s notice. Now, there is a moment when his ears perk up and a growl crawls up the back of his throat as he tries to make out the source of the foreign sounds - Yet, the veil is too smooth, slipping over him almost unnoticeably, a lilting melody that wraps around him velvety and soft and smothers his Master's flames within him, lets him glide from wakefulness into deepest slumber so gently he does not even mark the transition. And so, for the first time in this embodied life of his, he sleeps.

And as he sleeps, he dreams.

There is a new scent on the breeze - strange and sharp and fresh, too different from the ash-acrid bite of the plain winds, from the sickly sweet prey-smell of blood and rot and fear that entices him down into the bowels of the fortress at times, or the scorching-hot-iron smell of his Master's forges, too different to be familiar, and yet - and yet...

There are echoes of laughter in the air, too, echoes of voices, of song, from far, far away, faint whispers on the biting cold wind sweeping over the soot-darkened plains of Anfauglith where the sun is forever obscured by the fumes of Thangorodrim. They awaken something in him, some long-lost memory that skirts the edges of his consciousness, skips across the surface of his thoughts, never quite close enough to grasp. Briefly, he hesitates, his Master's orders a constant buzz in the back of his mind that begs to be heeded. But with the peculiar clarity of dreams he knows that nothing of that does not matter now, not the gates, not his orders, not his Master's voice - now, the hunt is on. Decision made, he jumps into action, one great leap as twenty in this dreamscape, carrying him further and further away from his post as he follows the lure of sound and scent.

Then, one voice raises above the others, soaring higher and higher and then spiraling downwards, notes falling through the smoke and ash like drops of rain, washing over him in a cascade of sound. They wash away the acrid fumes, the gloom, the stench of death and decay, even the earth below his paws, and then he is floating - floating -

Slowly, the world filters back in around him, vague and muted at first, shapes and sounds hidden in a mist of grey. Below his feet, emptiness, that somehow bears him nonetheless. Step by step by step he walks forward, and suddenly the planes of memory unfurl around him like new leaves after a spring rain. There arise the lush plains of Almaren-the-lost, dew-strewn grass cool beneath his feet and the air as clean and fresh as spring rain. There are the hallowed halls where they would gather for celebration and revelry, where they basked in the joy of this world newly made and jubilantly praised the wonder of creation. The verdant forests, where once he rode with Orome his lord, and oh! how well he remembers the exhilaration of the chase, the sweet taste of victory, and the wild joy of their celebrations thereafter! He remembers, too, more tranquil times, times of wandering alone below the yet unlit skies of the world, roaming the lands as a spirit unbound and sometimes, if he so desired, in the flesh that feels the world so much more intimately.

And then he sees her - radiant and glowing as ever, her spirit shining bright through the delicate corporeal raiment she clothed herself in for the sake of the Children, and her smile feels like coming home.

"I miss you“, she says, and he smiles, and reaches out to take her hand in his.

"You needn't miss me anymore" , he answers. "I am here now." I should never have left.

She returns his smile, yet there is a sadness in her eyes that puzzles him. He means to ask; but before he can do so, she lets her fana dissolve, drawing him in, and everything he meant to say falls away as they merge and become one, soaring up, up, up into the infinite heavens to dance amongst the stars.

***

He is thrown into painful wakefulness with a jolt, and it is dark, it is cold, and he lost, and scared, and alone. The stars are gone, and in the suffocating dark he feels the walls close in, thrown back suddenly into a body of flesh that is not raiment, not home, but a cage, a prison, the spell-chains that bind him a violation to his spirit even though he must once have accepted them willingly (though did he truly ever want -this-?).

'He wants to scream, to cry, and cannot; a low whine escapes his beast-throat and he stumbles in the dark on paws suddenly made clumsy.

That is when he sees the light - so like the light of her, of home, coming closer, and in desperation, he lunges forward and-

[The agony inside erases everything, and when finally death brings release from his prison, what little is left of him will not remember]