Song of Souls by Raiyana

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Chapter 9

The first time he saw her, it was a glimpse, blurry and imperfect, but unmistakeably Narví. For a long time, he believed it purely imagination – he had heard her, since his burial, but only ever accompanied by images conjured up by his own memory.

 

 

 

The Orcs had been repelled, though bands of Sauron’s army kept roaming Eriador; the reinforcements Glorfindel had talked about had arrived, and their fortified camp up north by the Bruinen – they called it Riven Dell – was used as a base by their riders, going out to harry Sauron’s forces and prevent him from bringing all his power to bear against Lindon. Durin had even sent a few gangbûh up there, when the fighting was worst, and Narví had wondered if Khalebrimbur could see how close their people had grown in such short time. They had been friendly before, of course, but infrequent trade and diplomatic visits between neighbouring kingdoms was something quite different to the current intermingled military situation.

 

 

 

The second time he saw her, however, she was standing next to Durin in what could only be a wedding ceremony, smiling broadly as she watched her brother marry a different blonde-haired Dwarf. Celebrimbor had learned enough about her race to know that the Dwarf was considered beautiful, though to his mind she couldn’t hold a candle to the beauty of his golden Dwarf.

The next thought that hit him was a curiously numb shade of despair that grew sharper the longer he watched. He considered, as he saw her dance with some nobledwarf or other, whether he would ever see her marry someone, have dwarflings of her own, and the idea was heart-breaking.

But he wanted her to be happy.

The desire to have her heart for his own warred with the wish to see her happy in ways he could never make her, no matter how much it hurt.

 

 

 

Narví preferred to remain deep in Khazad-dûm, and though she tried to tell herself she ought to be stronger than grief, she knew that watching the Elves she had known perish like the keeper of her heart would eventually break her. Already, she had received news of more than one casualty to tear at her wounded heart; the kind Loremistess Nyarmë, for example, whose son had been a secret favourite of Narví’s among the younger elves, had been killed during the evacuation. It was wrong, a deep part of her knew; they should have been immortal, just like she had always known that Khalebrimbur would outlive her – and yet they could be hewn down and ended by cold metal just as easily as a mortal.

Durin had asked her, once, if her heart had been given in vain, but Narví did not think so. She did not know how she could not have loved her elf, after all, how she could have avoided feeling that change in herself that grew from fondness to friendship to love as deep as the roots of a mountain. Durin had simply sighed, patting her shoulder, but Narví had known that he pitied her loss.

 

 

 

She had gone north, once, to help build a new fortified home for her displaced friends, and though many of the Eregion survivors had fled to the Golden Wood on the other side of the Mountains, most of their fighters had joined Elrond and Glorfindel at Riven Dell. Most of those who had made it out of Eregion were still filled with the same rage that burned in her heart for their slain Lord, and Narví had not hesitated in offering the Elven warriors the use of their Deeps Roads to reach the Valley without running into any of the roaming orcs. Some of the Roads had had to be expanded, being little more than old mining tunnels, but they did a brisk trade of goods with the camp now, bringing up food from the south and the east to supply them, along with weapons and smith-work to arm them.

Erestor had refused to stay behind, the stubbornness on his face almost Dwarven in intensity, and Glorfindel had caved after only a few minutes. Narví had laughed at that, though she was quietly pleased they had managed to cleave to each other through everything. She ignored the pang she felt seeing them together, as sharp as the first time she had realised what she had lost, even if she had never truly had it in the first place. Whenever she wondered what might have been, wondered if she could have had that kind of happiness, if she had been braver, Narví reminded herself that she would see the silly elf again, no matter how long the separation.

She just had to be patient.

Narví was not good at being patient.

More than one night, thoughts of his terrible fate found her roaming deserted tunnels, until the morning bell rang; more than once she had spent a night locked in her room with nothing but her regrets and a bottle of uisge to warm her. Waiting for Arda Remade was a bleak way of living, however, and Narví did her best to banish such thoughts, filling her waking hours with work and the happy smiles of her little niece.  

 

 

 

As time passed, his visions grew keener, and it became a mantra, watching her laugh – always from afar, though he could often hear her words – and dance, and play with her tiny nephew – niece? Celebrimbor couldn’t tell. Be happy, Narví, he would whisper, though he knew she could not hear it.

 

 

“Why aren’t you married, Auntie?” the Dwarfling asked one day, but only Celebrimbor saw the sadness that flickered over her face at the innocent question.

“I suppose… I was not asked,” she smiled, though he could see the strain. “I don’t think anyone wants to marry me, sweetling.”

“Lord Brago wants to marry you! Adad said so.!” the dwarfling protested, entirely unaware of the way those words became knives through Celebrimbor’s heart. Would he have to see her marry this Brago? Bed him? Bear his dwarflings? Panic whirled through his mind, revulsion and utter hatred towards this Brago filling him to overflowing. Watching her marry someone else – even though he knew he was dead, and had never mustered up the courage to ask her for anything even close to what he truly desired – would break him, he was sure, feeling guilty for not wanting to see her wed someone, worried that his selfishness would keep her from finding love.

Narví laughed, picking up the small dwarf and placing him – her? – on her lap.

“Aye, so he does,” she agreed, nodding, tickling the little one. Celebrimbor screamed into the void, rage consuming his thoughts. “But I have never loved Brago, my sweet one,” she murmured, but the dwarfling nodded solemnly.

“And we only love once,” she – he? – replied. “Will you find someone you love?”

“Ahh, no, kafnith, I lost the one I loved… a very long time ago.”

Narví’s words were coloured with old grief and Celebrimbor felt his heart break at the wistful look on her face. Seeing her marry someone else, love someone else would have been unbearable, yes, but not as unbearable as knowing that she had loved someone else. The tears that slid down his cheeks weren’t really there, but he felt the warm wetness nonetheless as he stared at her. Narví, he called silently – sometimes, he pretended that she could hear him, talking to her like he had that first day in her workshop, but she never reacted – wanting her to look at him, smile at him, allow him to pretend that he was the one she loved.

“Was he nice?” It was not the question Celebrimbor wanted answered, and yet he hoped that Narví would say yes, hoped that she had not thrown her heart away on someone unworthy of such treasure.

“Yes, kafnith, I think he was very nice,” Narví smiled, tugging on a tiny braid and receiving a gap-tooth smile in response. Some part of him rejoiced in the fact, though he also had to wonder why she had never told him of this dwarf, but perhaps it had been too painful for her as it often had been for his own Atto to speak of Ammë, even centuries after she had perished.

“It’s too bad he’s dead,” the Dwarfling – Celebrimbor wondered why he had never heard the name of Narví’s newest kinsman, but it was a distant thought – said quietly. “I want cousins.” Narví’s laugh – he loved her laugh – rang out through the small room, though her eyes were still sad.

“Well, I’m sorry about the lack of cousins, wee Dori,” she murmured, looking up at the sound of the door opening. By chance, she was staring straight through Celebrimbor, and for a single infinite moment he pretended that her smile was aimed at him, those blue eyes fond and welcoming. The dwarfling’s happy cry of ‘Amad!’ soon made it obvious that she was really looking at the person behind him, shattering his illusion, though he fought to keep hold of it; filling his world with those vivid blue eyes as his soul warred with itself whether to be happy about her remaining unattached or grieved that she had lost her love – even if it meant there had never been hope that she would be his to begin with, and all he had felt since before he died had been entirely one-sided.

 

 

 

Sometimes, Narví thought she could still hear him, hear his voice whispering her name, but she carefully did not look up, fearful that if she was to look for him, he would appear as she had last seen him… and even more fearful that he would not be there at all.

Every so often, she would leave the capital, go through the Doors that remained heavily guarded, and sit beneath Khalebrimbur’s tree, telling him stories of her home, of Durin’s little girl who was growing up to be as pretty as her amad. She did not tell him how much the Dori’s innocent questions hurt her, made no mention of the image of a tiny being with pointy ears and her adad’s dark hair in combination with her own eyes that had once haunted her dreams. She spoke no words of love to him – it felt cowardly, somehow, to tell him when he could not respond – but she never stopped feeling it.

 

 

 

His Narví was growing old, Celebrimbor realised, watching her hair slowly whiten. Once, he had feared such a thing, feared what he would do when she finally left for a place he could not follow, but now it only made him sad that he was missing it; missing the chance to tease her about the white hair, wondering if it was as soft as the golden and tell her that she was as beautiful in his eyes now as she had been when he first realised that he considered her lovely to look at.

He tried, at times, to speak to her, but he had resigned himself to the idea that she would never hear him and kept his murmured words to rare occasions, quietly fearful that if he persisted in speaking to her, whoever was in control of the greyish nothingness would decide that he did not deserve to look upon her at all and should return to that… void. The thought made him shudder. He didn’t know if he could survive that, returning to that place that held nothing; he never wondered if he would simply become a sad ghost, doomed to haunt the depths of Khazad-dûm until the remaking, certain that madness would be inevitable. Just as he never wondered what would happen to him when Narví finally joined Mahal’s Guard, he refused to consider how she would die. Once, he had told himself that watching her leave him so permanently was reason enough never to reveal his heart, that if she did not know, losing her would somehow matter less, hurt less.

 

 

Lying in her bed, Narví felt tired. Durin had gone some years before, and Brynhilda even before that, leaving only King Halldora and her small family to witness the slow wasting of Narví’s body. Her hair had turned white many years before; the elders claimed it must be a mistake, for Narví remained as healthy as she had been, and a Dwarf looked much the same at 40 and 240; such signs of aging usually only appeared a few years before the Dwarf was called to Itdendûm. Narví knew better. Her hair, once the colour of gold and wheat, had gone white with grief, pure and simple. She considered it proof that she had loved and loved truly, though she kept that knowledge to herself.

 

 

She slept more, these days, and Celebrimbor didn’t know if he was grateful for the long uninterrupted hours of watching her, or terrified that they meant she was slowing down, her body’s candle nearly burned down, her stone all but chiselled away.

 

 

 

It was time, she knew, when she began catching glimpses; an ear here, pointy like a leaf, dark hair there, falling straight across a nicely rounded shoulder. Narví smiled to herself, fingering the white locks that adorned her own head and wondering what Khalebrimbur thought of the wrinkles. She made no sign that she had noticed, knew that those around her would say he was no more than a figment of imagination, a product of a mind slowed by age, but Khalebrimbur felt real to her, and Narví wanted to hold on to that feeling.

 

 

 

"Amrâlimê..." Narví whispered, her head turning slowly on her pillow. Celebrimbor simply sat on the chair in the corner that he quietly considered his, watching her wrinkled face move into a soft smile filled with love. He wondered who she was seeing, knowing the word: My own Love.

"No, Auntie, it's me, Halldora," the younger dwarf replied shakily. Narví stretched her arm out slowly, for once looking straight at him.

Celebrimbor wanted to weep. He had heard that this could happen when mortals grew old, heard of dwarrow losing touch with reality in their final days. Narví’s uncle had suffered that fate, though his eccentricity had resulted in a marked preference for walking around naked, rather than hallucinations. 

“You're a good girl, Dori," Narví murmured tiredly, but she was still reaching for him. Celebrimbor hadn't dared try to touch her since the first terrible day in Durin's council chamber. "I will be sad to leave you," Narví coughed, her breath rattling in her chest, "but he is waiting for me, the silly sod." When the cough subsided, she fell back onto her pillow, still reaching towards him.

"Then you should go when you feel ready, Auntie," Halldora croaked. Celebrimbor could hear the tears in her voice. Reaching across Narví’s aged body, her niece took the hand that wasn't stretched towards him, patting it gently. "I will miss you."

"We will meet again, kafnith," Narví mumbled, squeezing Halldora’s hand but smiling in his direction. "Amrâlimê," she whispered, "take my hand."

Celebrimbor thought he was crying, but he could not deny her plea, even though he knew she was simply seeing things. For this once, he would believe that she meant that word for him, believe with all his heart that she was reaching for him. When he stretched it out, he expected his own hand to move straight through her hand, but his fingers closed warm and solid around hers.

Narví smiled, closing her eyes for the last time. 

Celebrimbor knelt by the bed, his forehead resting against the mattress as he clung to her hand, feeling his heart break more thoroughly than he had ever expected. 

"Khalebrimbur, look up." The words were a whisper, a plea, but Celebrimbor shook his head, keeping his eyes firmly shut. He could not bear to see her corpse, no matter how much he called himself a coward for it. The speaker sighed. "You always were contrary," she huffed, chuckling under her breath.

"Please," he begged, though he wasn't sure what for. A hand raised his face, but he kept his eyes stubbornly closed, his tears escaping beneath the lids to tail down his cheeks.

"Khalebrimbur! Open your eyes, you stubborn fool of an elf!" 

"I don't... I can't," he babbled, gasping the words through sobs. "Please don't make me watch her..." The tears came faster now, flowing down his face and across the hand that cupped his jaw. 

"I won't," she whispered gently; the hand wiped the tears off his cheeks. "But I have not seen your eyes in many years, and I would look once more upon that which is dearest to me if I may." Celebrimbor shook his head. A sigh floated across his hair, and then he found himself leaning into a solid body, with warm arms wrapping themselves around his shoulders and a gentle voice humming in his ear. "I had not expected to find you here," she whispered, and Celebrimbor felt the lightest of touches running along his ear. Jumping up and away from her, he hadn't even realised that he had opened his eyes to glare at whomever dared take such liberties with his body.

He stared.

Narví laughed joyously. 

“Narví…?” Celebrimbor sank down to his knees, reaching for her in disbelief. Narví smiled, holding out her hand for him once more.

“I am glad to see you truly, mellon,” she whispered, tears forming in her own eyes, “I have missed you so much since you…” she swallowed heavily. Celebrimbor nodded, getting to his feet slowly.

“As I have missed you,” he croaked, feeling hoarse. Bending at the waist, he pressed his forehead gently against hers, “though I have been with you every day since.”

"I still think this should be impossible," a different voice grumbled, making Celebrimbor whirl around to stand between his Narví, looking just as she had when he’d been alive, and whomever was speaking.

“…Atto?” he whispered, clenching Narví’s hand in surprise. Standing next to a being who could only be Aulë, Curufinwë – looking more like the father he remembered from Valinor than the hardened general who had forced him to remain in Nargothrond and forswear their kinship – waved sheepishly. “What… what’s going on?” Celebrimbor whispered, feeling Narví’s fingers warm and solid around his own with a sense of unending wonder.

“You’re not Námo, Curufinwë,” Aulë rumbled, though Celebrimbor thought he was amused rather than angry, “and this was the only thing that could happen.”

“Don’t you think I know that?” Curufinwë sighed, “I told Tyelpië and Káno it was a silly story; you realise how much your ammë is going to laugh at me when she hears about this?” he asked, directing the last at Celebrimbor with an annoyed gesture. Celebrimbor laughed, almost not believing that any of it was real and wondering if he was really stuck in Narví’s bedchamber losing his mind and self. Curufinwë’s lips twitched into a wry smile.

“I don’t understand, Atto,” Celebrimbor said, squeezing Narví’s work-roughened hand – suddenly fearful that Atto had come to fetch him to the Halls of Mandos.

“The Song of Souls, Tyelpë,” Curufinwë said quietly, reaching out to stroke his cheek gently, wiping away a single tear. “You sang the Song, but you… you never did understand how it worked, I know.” Sighing again, though a small smile played around his mouth, Curufinwë stepped towards Narví, catching her free hand with ease and bending to press his forehead against it. “The Song of Souls can send word to the one soul you love, yes…” he explained, straightening once more and looking at both of them, “but it has a price. If this soul does not belong with you, it will not work at all, and you will die, regardless of whether you return to yourself within the allotted time – which depends more on your strength of spirit than an arbitrary measure of time as it is.” Wearing a look that strongly suggested he did not approve of such willy-nilly magic, Curufinwë let go of Narví’s hand, stepping back beside Aulë.

“But I did die,” Celebrimbor protested, gripping Narví’s hand tighter as he worried whether Aulë would take her from him so soon.

“But you did not leave Endorë, Tyelpë; you tied your soul to the one who could hear your Song… this dwarrowdam.” Curufinwë nodded at Narví, who wore the frown she always wore when she was working something out.

“What did you do, you silly elf?” she whispered, staring up at him. Celebrimbor shrugged. In truth, he had had no plan, no purpose other than to see her one last time and bring warning if he could; he had not even known if his desperate act would work at all when he hurtled his fëa out of his body.

“He married you… daughter.” Curufinwë’s face remained solemn and serious; otherwise Celebrimbor would have assumed he was joking.

“…” Narví stared, looking as baffled as he felt.

“Tyelpë tied his fëa to yours as though he had Joined with you in a bond of marriage… though you had not.” He chuckled. “You gave his untethered soul an anchor – a fixed point in space to hang on to; you… made yourself the soul the Song could reach, essentially.”

“That makes no sense, Atto,” Celebrimbor said, reeling. Curufinwë chuckled.

“Your Ammë would be much better at explaining, I know,” he admitted, “or even Káno, but… forgive me, Tyelpë, but I wanted… I wanted to see you.” Running a hand through his hair like he alwaysdid when he was agitated, Curufinwë paced across the floor. “Bonding of fëar is not bound to time, not really. I am no less married now than I was when I first bound myself to your mother, though I am dead, and she has been reborn for many years; my fëa will know hers through all ages and all times.”

“Nuttûn,” Narví said, frowning slightly, but looking like she at least, understood what Atar meant, “the one left behind in the marriage is still married.” Aulë nodded.

“What happens now?” Celebrimbor heard himself ask, his mind whirling. He felt too shy to look at Narví – his wife – who was still holding his hand, her thumb rubbing in tiny circles.

“Now… well, Námo said ‘choose’,” Aulë replied, though he too seemed confused, “though he made no further comment.”

“Maralmizu.” Narví spoke clearly. Celebrimbor turned so swiftly his neck twinged.

“You… you do?” he whispered, falling to his knees the second time, staring at her as he mouthed the word.

His golden dwarf nodded softly, reaching up with her free hand to stroke his ear slowly as she stepped into his hold, raising his face for a kiss.

“Maralmizu, Khalebrimbur,” she whispered softly.

“I love you, too, Narví,” Celebrimbor murmured, pulling her close as he pressed a soft kiss to her lips, nearly laughing when Narví pulled him closer to deepen it. Her fingers tangled in his hair, tightening when he wrapped his arms around her and got to his feet, lifting her easily.

“Congratulations, son,” Curufinwë whispered, but when Celebrimbor thought to look up, they were alone once more, together in the airy stone room that reminded him both of Narví’s bedroom within the mountain and his own in Eregion at once, a finely wrought door at either end; one carved with vines and the star of his father’s house set against the holly-leaves he had made Eregion’s sigil, and the other carved in stark lines and angular shapes, with a clearly defined anvil and hammer beneath a crown and seven stars.

“You may pass through to either side, and back again.” A strange voice suddenly said, filling the room. “Though only together. Where one goes, so too the other. This is the Doom of Telperinquar and Narví.”

 

Chapter End Notes

All Khuzdul courtesy of the Neo-Khuzdul dictionary with appropriately archaic grammar for the time ;)

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