Echo of the Music by janeways

Echo of the Music

He writes of nightingales under the glimmering light of Telperion, of nightingales and true love. How her voice is like song; her touch, as light and graceful as the flutter of feathers. His brothers tease him for being overwrought, and his sister is too young yet to understand. His cousin of the golden voice only smiles encouragingly.

She does not come with him, and on the ice, songs of nightingales haunt his dreams.

In this new land, there are still nightingales, and he is grateful for this, their melodies like a promise. He still writes of her, but as the years pass, the memories slip through his fingers, leaving only echoes in their wake. He listens, hoping for some sign of her, but hears only nightingales, their song keening in the night.

And then he meets his brother’s not-yet-never-can-be wife, and all the song in his heart stills. He hears only the rippling of water, the sound that woke his grandfather on the shores of Cuiviénen. The sound that calls him home. The wisdom of her heart is deep as the Aeluin, and she is steady as the waves that beat upon its shores.  When he picks up his pen now it is to write of her, that her words will flow down the ages, tumbling over the years.

She dies. His brother dies. He writes no more of nightingales.