Of Ingwë Ingweron by heget

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Of the Names of the Valar

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Now it was accounted in various manners and places of the Vala Oromë and his first meeting among the elves. Knowledge he shared and lasting friendship, the names of creation and the one whom had created, new skills with which to enrich the lives of the elves, and most precious to the three that had discovered him, the perpetrator and motives behind the Dark Hunters that had so plagued their villages.

The three elves watched the figure dismount from the giant silver horse, landing softly in the loam of the forest floor with a hunting cat’s grace. His form looked like that of the Kwendî, standing tall and upright on two legs, and the empty hands he held out in front of his body with open gestures signalling unarmed and wishing no harm were no different from those of any elf. In the shadows of the forest it was hard to discern details, but as the Vala knelt to the ground, numerous fireflies floated up from the underbrush, and the greenish tint of the light that the insects emitted brightened everyone in the glen. In their light the figure was clearly a man in shades of brown from his hair and skin to his tunic and leggings that tucked into a pair of soft fur boots. Only his eyes, bright green and shining like the fireflies, and the white of his smiling teeth, were different. The stranger unclasped the cloak, which when he first entered had seemed to be a mass of budding branches flowing behind him but was in the glow of the fireflies only an ordinary length of green and brown felt, and folded it underneath his body to give a comfortable and dry seat. That was a signal on its own, for felt, especially so soft and richly dyed, was for the garments of the Minyar leaders and carefully treated. He sat as a storyteller might, as one of the first to awaken eager to explain a new skill or discovery to the rest of the tribe. As Oromë quietly waited for the elves to move, the fireflies settled onto his hair and shoulders, casting strange shadows on his face, but his gentle smile was easy to see.

Ingwë knew this was no Dark Hunter, that this rider would never harm him or his friends, and so he undid his own cloak and sat on the ground, folding his arms and legs in the position one took when ready to listen to a long song of many deeds and a lengthy hunt. More fireflies floated over and settled in his golden hair, twinkling like netted stars. Elwë and Finwë cautiously followed their friend’s example and lowered their spears and knelt before the strange figure.

“Greetings,” said Oromë. "We have questions to answer."

Ingwë laughed.

With that unexpected and rare sound, his friends relaxed. If wise and solemn Kwendë was unafraid, then his example they would follow. Finwë cupped two of the fireflies in his hands gently, and Elwë repeated their most pressing concern, for like his Minyar friend, he could feel in the sight of the mind that the figure kneeling before him was no elf, no matter how closely his appearance matched that of the Kwendî.

The Vala could easily answer his own question of who the three elves were, that they were the long foretold and eagerly awaited Children of Ilúvatar, the second melody of the design for creation that had been Sung into being. Who Oromë was, and what, could be answered by the titles of ‘Hunter’ and ‘Lord of the Forest’, though to explain in words everything that those simple titles encompassed and that of the Powers, the Valar, was harder. That there was a One responsible for the planning of the universe and its creation, from every grain of sand to the bright stars to the passage of time to the world itself was not a difficult concept to grasp, for the vastness of such a thought matched the vastness of Ilúvatar itself. Eä was fitting, the three elves thought, for the very first of the Kwendî to awake had been Imin, and he awoke with the cry of Ele! It was a cry to behold the world in either case. And that there was many people under Ilúvatar that worked as a tribe did to carry out the needed tasks, each appointed by personal aptitude and interests, made sense. What Finwë found incredulous was that Ilúvatar, and beings such as Oromë before him, had created the world and everything vast or minute in it through singing.

“You mean if you wanted a clay jar you could just sing a tune and -elâ!- a pot appears in your hand?” Finwë questioned, a skeptical look on his face as his calloused potter’s hands mimicked a fire sparking to life or a solid object needing several hours worth of labor poofing into existence like smoke.

“Not I,” said Oromë. “I am no craftsman, creator of tools from the earth and stone. For that song you would want the one more powerful than me who is skilled with his hands, a most creative mind, whose delight and domain is the rock behind our feet.” The eldest of the three elves felt the faint pressure against his mind while Oromë paused, brushing against their thoughts like a cool breeze for more words the elves could understand. “Mbartanô perhaps would be the name you would call him, the World-Artificer. His are the plates of stone upon which everything rests, and his hammer makes the mountains and valleys.”

“Must be a large hammer,” Finwë jested.

“He has many hammers,” the Vala corrected, “and some are hammers and some are ideas one uses like a hammer. His works can be small objects as well, not only the mountains. The stone axes you knap into useful shapes, that is him.”

“Aulë,” said Ingwë.

“Yes,” replied the Vala gravely, “the Inventor. And in our own language, if we did not desire to sing the full extent of his name, the shortened form would sound aloud similar to that.”

“Your own language?” Finwë questioned. Elwë shoved him with a half-exasperated grin.

The Vala opened his mouth to speak, and strange syllables poured out, harsh as breaking rocks and logs popping in bonfires layered over the cries and roars of animals and the crashing waterfall. The creature behind them that looked like a tall horse with a coat as silver as Elwë’s long hair flicked its ears and snapped its tail against its flanks. Elwë and Finwë winced, and the man that would be Ingwë Ingweron wondered why he could not discern the meaning of any word. He felt that if he but listened long enough he could have.

Elwë, raised in a tribe of singers, had no difficulty believing songs’ power. He had watched new shoots rise from the river mud to the encouraging voice of his brother’s wife and how Nowë never had a net unravel if he sang over it. Visiting the nearby village of his friend, he had seen how Finwë and the other Noldor sang to track the time for the kilns so the leather-soft pots covered in wood ash came out hard and shining with green and brown glaze. Therefore he had found Finwë’s doubting question about singing a jar into existence silly, for from one angle that was exactly what the potter did. A song could describe an object or place never seen, or bring out any emotion in the listener, or strengthen or change what was already made. It was the Void that confused Elwë, that song alone drew out from nothing the creation of everything. He wondered if an elf could learn those powerful songs, the songs the Valar had used, and hearing the harsh and layered language of the Valar, he believed those powers.

When the three asked the Vala his name, Oromë sighed like the wind through dense leaves. “If I were to describe my name...the sound of horns,” he said and hefted a white object from his belt that none remembered being there. In his hands was the horn of a large auroch capped with rims of gold, and he brought the object to his lips and blew softly through the narrow end.

“The sound we heard,” Elwë said with soft wonder. “Arâmê.”

Elwë’s new word closely matched the sound the horn had made, which was richer than the reed flutes of the Nelyar. As gentle as the sound had been, it still recalled the brightness of lightning. The Vala smiled and nodded. “Arâmê you may call me. And what may I address the three of you as?” he asked in polite formality.

“Elwê, for the stars,” answered the tall and silver-haired Elwë.

“Phinwê,” said his friend. “And it is the same ending as Elwê; don’t listen to them if they tease otherwise. Phin is like the sound we use for a tress of hair, but I do not know if my parents named me for anything, hair or otherwise. It is not remarkable; the color is very common in both my tribe and in the third tribe from which Elwê comes from, not like his silver color or Mahtân, who has hair like a fox pelt.”

“Might it be you were born with a lot of hair on your head already?” teased Elwë. “My brother was born with very little, but his good friend entered the world with a full thatch of hair atop his head.”

The Vala turned to face the last of the companions.

“My friends address me as Kwendê,” he said.

The Vala laughed. “How appropriate, for you were first I heard to speak.”

Again there was that feeling of another mind, no more invasive than the sensation of meeting another person’s eyes squarely. ‘Your name is Ingwë,’ the voice that was not spoken words said.

‘Yes,’ Ingwë thought.

‘But if it the other name you wish to be spoken aloud, I shall, if I am accounted a friend.’

Ingwë could not help the smile that spread across his face. The joy from sharing his name, the secret that had sustained him during the lonely and dark years, almost prompted him to foolishness. Aloud he spoke, “We know you are not one of the Dark Hunters, for all that you are a Power and no elf and that you perch atop a horse as it runs.”

“Riding,” Oromë corrected. “When Næchærra grants me, for his speed is greater than my own, and together we can outrun and catch the monsters we hunt.” His hand motioned to the silver horse behind him. The animal raised its head from where it had been grazing at the ferns, and from the light of its eyes it was obviously no more a mere horse than Oromë an elf. “But it is the name of the Dark Hunters you want, the ones who have taken forms in mockery of me as to hurt the Children of Ilúvatar and undoubtedly blame me for it.”

“Yes,” Elwë hissed.

Oromë’s face grew dark, as if thunderclouds covered what should have been the bright lightning of his eyes. “Mailikô,” he said in a voice with no less venom than Elwë’s, “the Greedy One. He was one of us, in some ways the greatest and most powerful. The brother of my leader. But he rebelled against the One, jealous and hateful of the world Ilúvatar bade us create and protect, and he has sought ever since his first rebellion to destroy or maim to his own purpose all that we hold dear."

Of Melkor and his misdeeds the Vala Oromë had many words and none were kind. In return the three elves told of Dark Hunters and how many from all three tribes had been abducted, until the chieftains forbade their people from leaving the safety of the village bonfires. Of this Oromë had divined from their thoughts, but the confirmation of how dire the problem and how many had already been taken troubled him. His self-appointed task was to hunt Melkor’s foul creatures and prevent tragedies such as these from happening, and his grief at his failure was palpable. “We had refrained from war against Mailikô in fear that our struggles would have inadvertently harmed your people still sleeping. Never did we imagine that you would wake and our enemy find you first. It is our failing that you were harmed, your parents taken.”

Elwë refused this guilt. “You did not know. Did not know where we were or that we were here awake or that this Mailikô was here and preying on us. I would not blame Tata for the fish my brother did not catch. And you are an enemy of Mailikô and his Dark Hunters and have vowed now to help.”

Politely no mention was made of the undercurrent to Elwë's words, that resentment would return threefold and caustic if promises were not kept, vengeance not rendered.

“More than just I,” said Oromë. “But first I request you take me to your villages, let me see the rest of the Children and speak to your leaders. And point me in the direction of where you best guess these villains of Mailikô ride in imitation of me and steal your kin. That,” Oromë hissed, “they shall do no more.”

Nahar behind him raised his silver head from grazing and flattened his ears, then gave off a high-pitched scream that Ingwë recognized from following the horse herds on the open plains. The head stallion’s warning call to approaching predators that was, and Nahar’s golden hooves suddenly looked much sharper and heavier.

The three elves agreed to lead Oromë back to Elwë’s village and from then onto the other villages, especially those of Imin, Tata, and Enel. Finwë in particular was nervous to take the Vala to someone with authority who could ask and approve the right questions. Elwë was worried for his brothers and the rest of his people, wishing to reassure them, and the young man that even now thought of himself as Ingwë thought of his mother and sister.

 

As the three elves guided Oromë and Nahar through the pine forest back to Elwë’s village, Finwë tentatively seeing if he could rest a hand on Nahar’s flanks and pet the giant horse as they walked and Elwë introducing the notable trees to the Lord of the Forest, the man that would be Ingwë observed the Vala. Something about the Power unsettled him, though his great soul shone out clear as lightning and as pure as freshly unfurled leaves. Finally the Minyar youth identified the cause of his hunter’s instincts prickling all the hairs across his neck and arms to stand alert.  

The form of Oromë, that seemed to be a brown-haired Kwendi in soft leathers and the finest bow and hunting horn, was not steady. The flesh around his eyes was shifting, pulling in the most miniscule ways to change the shape of the eyes. Those green eyes, imbued with divine light, did not change, but the manner in which the lashes lengthened and eyelids folded transformed his eyes into unfamiliar forms. The nostrils of his nose were flaring, not in the act of taking breath, but because his nose was another feature of his face shifting to a new appearance. Oromë’s face twisted subtlely not as one did under the sway of emotions but through shifts of bone and muscle, his cheekbones rising and falling, chin lengthening to mimic Elwë, then broadening to be as square as Finwë, then shifting again. As the man that would be Ingwë watched, the facial features finally settled into a slightly aquiline nose and wide eyes, with oddly familiar broad lips. “Have you chosen a face to your full satisfaction now?” the elf said to Oromë, teasing.

Solemnly the Vala nodded. “We did not remember clearly what forms the Children would have, in all the minute details and proportions. This is an excellent form, well-balanced and agile and strong. And many pelt variations, more than what I see here, if your friend Phinwê is to be understood.”

The description made the man that would become Ingwë Ingweron smile. “We are of all three tribes, my friends and I, and it was these small differences in appearance that the first awoken used to divide themselves, as well as temperament and which of the three first couples they liked best.”  

“How appropriate,” said Oromë. “Yes, I have decided since I shall walk among the Children, I shall share your shape, and thus corrected my appearance. Odd though, for both Aulë and I recalled that your lower faces would also have hair. I rather liked that, those beards.” Oromë rubbed at his chin.

“So what shape would it be, if you were not among us?” the elf asked, his mind groping for understanding. “If you were to visit horses, would you look like Na-” here Ingwë stumbled over the strange name, finally settling on the abbreviated ‘Nahar’. “Or would you shape yourself to another form?”

Oromë smiled. “Nahar? So be it. And yes, I could if I wish take the same of a horse, though to run on four hooves I prefer the great elk. The wolf, the panther, the elephant, or the weasel, those shapes I find pleasing. And,” the Vala winked, “if I was feeling particularly lazy, I would take the form of a sloth.”

The other two elves turned to listen to this discussion, though of the three, only the older two had seen the giant lumbering creature Oromë spoke of, the giant sloth with its clawed front paws. Slow and strong, ponderously heavy with fat and muscle, the ground sloths would easily feed two or three villages, if spears could evade the claws and pierce the thick and armored skin. The Minyar hunters chose other prey, knowing there were faster animals but safer and easier to hunt.

“So what do you really look like? Your true form?”

Oromë laughed, for even Ingwë perceived that such a question had as answer that which Finwë would not understand, at least not after only one conversation. Had Finwë the skill to see phaja as well, the other boy would not expect spirits could be easily described like concrete objects. The Vala attempted anyway. “Vibrations.”

“What?”

“So much of this world is but vibrations of essence. Light and song. They are vibrations. I am no different.” The white teeth and green eyes on that shifting face smiled.”I am Arâmê, and I look exactly how I choose to look. That is my true form.”

 

Light discussion among the three elves on which animal they would choose to be if they could like Oromë shift their physical forms preoccupied the remainder of the walk back to Elwë’s village, until they were close enough to see the palisade illuminated by firelight. A great outcry there was in the village at the return of Elwë and his companions, greater still for the three were accompanied by an unfamiliar man and a horse that shone bright white in the firelight and did not shy or run from people. Unlike the wolves, horses were flighty creatures and rarely seen so close by the fishermen and reed-weavers. Oromë and Nahar held back from entering through the village gate until the crest of fear dissolved away. He that thought of himself as Ingwë waited beside them as Finwë smiled and shouted appeasing words and Elwë’s firm and repeated proclamations calmed the crowd. “He is the Good Hunter,” Elwë explained to his village, and it was the stern glare of their new leader that quieted the uproar more than the goodly light from Oromë’s eyes. “He is not of the ones that harmed us, but he that hunts them. He has come to help us.”

Convinced so, the Nelyar raised their voices to the songs of welcome, and lit more torches and sentry fires so the light could reveal the details of the new arrivals. Delight and excitement rose out of their withdrawn alarm. Olwë and Elmo pulled away from embracing their elder brother and stroking his face in relief at his return to bellow out that a path be opened in the crowd so this Good Hunter could enter.

Arched neck and hooves prancing, Nahar trotted through the gate to gasps from the elves, basking in their wondering admiration. “Smug insufferable servant,” the Vala murmured. Ingwë swallowed another laugh, for Oromë's tone had no harshness. The Hunter followed the stallion into the village, smiling in wonder at the circular huts and the lines of salted fish hanging from wooden frames, at the bright torches and the hands that held them, and most of all to the faces of the elves that stared up at him. “Greetings, Children. I am Arâmê,” and with an indulgent sigh, “and he is Nahar.”