The Song of Our Making by Tilperiel

Prologue: The Hidden City

Gliding on a draught of hot air as he took off from his eyrie on the Crissaegrim, sharp eyes flitted over the people on the plains below as they worked in the fields in the fashions of their kind. Some were tending to neat rows of vegetables, gathering fruits from orchards or, at this time of the year, cutting hay where the grass had grown long. He made note of their actions, the Eldar who had long years ago made this place their home. Their voices carried up to him, although he did not understand them from where he flew, for his hearing was not as well-honed as his sight and he was several leagues above the great plains of Tumladin, made smooth through years of labour.

He wheeled about, taking wing now over the white city of Ondolindë, named Gondolin in the Sindarin tongue. It shimmered in the summer light that Arien blazed down, unhindered in her goal today by the grey clouds that oft rode over the encircling mountains. Many more people were visible there amidst the many tall shining towers and turrets and the open spaces of hewn stone. Many fountains had been wrought, making good use of the waters from deep within the mountain from which the city was named. Here it was much noisier, the height of the city bringing its inhabitants closer to where the great eagle flew.

A flash caught his attention and he looked with idle curiosity as at the same time a sound of joyous music came to him. He spied a figure in the southern district sat one leg across the other on the rim of the largest stone fountain; the light he’d noticed coming from a shining silver instrument held to the musicians’ lips and the tune he played mingled in harmony with the music of the water behind him.

Being of very little interest to the eagle, he turned and swooped down into the plains once more and turned his attention back to his reason for alighting; a hunt for coney.