By Stars' Light by Erfan Starled

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Chapter 10

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*** Five years later ~ River Narog below the High Faroth ***

 

Calyaro had settled himself at the top of a rise in ground with his mandolin. Just beyond, the path dipped out of sight in its disguised wending to the Ginglith ford. Silhouetted by moonlight, he was taking no notice of anyone else.

 

Finrod’s gaze strayed to the player. He had filled out in the years of building and better fare, more a matter of health than size. Finrod had grown used to the sight of him on Tol Sirion; they had even talked at times. He had proved to have a good eye for detail, though his structural expertise fell far short of the experienced elves. But when it came to small touches of inspiration in design to do with best use of space, perhaps in placing a stairwell or setting an extra embrasure in a too dark hall, those in charge found he had a knack for fresh ideas, despite – or perhaps because of – his lack of formal training.

 

Still spare of speech, his withdrawn appearance had improved after the Mereth Aderthad, leaving him merely thoughtful instead of deadened; not an unusual trait in a minstrel. He continued to play, though he never sought the same wide stage he had claimed at Eithel Ivrin. An audience always gathered anyway and if he sometimes played the Nainië Elenion, Finrod and he had an understanding; he could sing of Fëanor all he liked – so long as he respected the King’s edict regarding the kinslaying. Findrod had ordered a watch set on Calyaro’s public playing to emphasize the point.

 

True to his word, Calyaro never ventured even the instrumental piece that invoked the Noldor’s secret shame. Finrod sometimes saw him quirk his brows on noticing whatever sober guard was appointed to the task, and give Finrod a wry nod. In turn, the Prince was satisfied that Calyaro knew himself to be – not exactly kept on sufferance – say rather, without the least leeway on that one matter.

 

Calyaro’s life on Tol Sirion stood out in one further regard; sometimes, when Maglor had travelled to Barad Eithel, he made the extra journey to Minas Tirith to see the musician. The former tutor and his outstanding pupil knew each other well. More than that, they had in common their shared love – and loss – of Fëanor.

 

Seeing them together had drawn Finrod’s fresh attention to Calyaro. The prince was the spitting image of his father – when he bent close and their grey eyes met in talk, it was as if Fëanor had returned to see his bard.

 

Calyaro started one of his preferred history ballads and Finrod was recalled from his contemplations.

 

“How long has he been here?” Glorfindel broke in on his thoughts curiously. Recently arrived himself, they were eating with the rest of the working parties on the flats of the path outside the caves.

 

Finrod shrugged. “Nearly three years ago. He came down with the first of those the King my uncle let me bring from Barad Eithel and Minas Tirith to balance the dwarves’ advice with our own experience. Thingol says his elves did a great deal at Menegroth so I’m hoping the Sindar might contribute too, if I’m persuasive enough.“

 

Glorfindel snorted. “By what I hear, if you’ve any jewels left after paying the dwarves I’m sure you’ll have no difficulty. If anyone ever reads Galadriel’s letters she’ll be thrown out for blatant disrespect. According to her, they’re not elves over there, they’re magpies.”

 

“Oh, that’s a touch of the pot calling the kettle black, don’t you think?” The Noldor in Tirion had loved their jewels and embellished the city with them wherever they could and he – and Galadriel – were as guilty as the rest.

 

Glorfindel did not answer that but his eyes gleamed in humour. “Yon Calyaro? He doesn’t look much like a builder, picking away at that dirge.”

 

Finrod’s smile twitched unwillingly. It was certainly mournful. Their eyes met. Finrod cracked a laugh at the truth of it. “He’s been picking the guides’ brains for tales of Thingol’s first battle. Orcs, wolf-types and worse routing Círdan to the coast, driving the Laiquendi east or into Doriath, costing Thingol so many lives – it’s not going to be for every occasion. But he’s here with the architects, not as a musician.”

 

“I thought he would give up the other work once he started playing again…”

 

“He never asked. He plays, but as if for himself alone, though he’ll oblige if people ask. And he still composes.”

 

Even so, when Calyaro played, no-one disturbed him.

 

His performance at the Mereth Aderthad had served notice of his skill but it had done far more than that. Under the falls of the Narog’s source, it was Calyaro’s song that broke through Finrod’s numb wasteland. He was used to feelings eluding him save those flashes of anger and hollow sadness that came and went from their buried lairs. That night, his grief had come alive at last and over the years since, it had faded into a weight easier to carry, its corners rounded, its edges less abrasive.

 

Slowly, he had become able to hold thoughts of Amarië with gentle love, of Tirion with the affection of happy memories. The end of all Hlápo’s youthful joys still brought him to tears at times – a cloud scudding overhead could do it, or a flashing turn of some brown-haired youth, braids flying, calling out to a friend – small things at odd moments might set him off. The worst of it, the hard ugliness in him over Fingon’s fall into kinslaying, resisted such gentler transitions, but he found time lent him a softening of its effects. Even that curdled knot of grief and anger no longer distanced him from what he had once taken for granted: the solid warmth of Galadriel’s edged affection, the ease of casual laughter, the light of the stars moving him to peace.

 

Calyaro should have been the last person to touch him and yet… While that very private epilogue to Stars’ Lament, offered to the solitude of a wild waterfall, had breached his heart and opened him to healing, other moments too lingered in his memory. Their bitter meeting. A hand on his shoulder when he stared into another of the Helcaraxë’s heartrending traps. The image of him mud-ridden and tangled on Mithrim’s shores, no longer blank but moved to amusement, grief, resignation – above all the haunting guilt that spoke to Finrod’s own dark anger.

 

He had been so dishevelled in those days that Finrod was surprised on first seeing him neatly garbed. Early trade was reserved for urgently needed tools and raw materials, so for a time they all wore the simple cloths that the land yielded most quickly. The cream linens and brown wools suited him.

 

Glorfindel and Finrod ate their meal by starlight and talked with the music washing over them. But when Calyaro walked away northwards – perhaps to practice without trespassing on others, or perhaps just to be alone – Glorfindel returned to the subject of the singer.

 

“You look upon him with peculiar interest, Aro.”

 

“What? No! I never…” He heard the denial rising in his voice and broke off. “I was thinking about him,” he said, more calmly, “We seem to have coincided over the years when things mattered most. Even here, building this fortress, he sits there singing of the battle that warns of a future I guard against. I can’t help noticing him.”

 

“Have you seen much of him, then? Since he’s been here??”

 

“More than I did in Minas Tirith.” Glorfindel was observant, but Finrod did not know himself what he felt.

 

“Has anyone ever tempted you since the crossing?” Since Amarië, he meant.

 

“There were one or two who seemed eligible…”

 

“And did you favour them?”

 

Glorfindel’s persistence was unusual. Uncomfortably, Finrod looked away.

 

“Amarië is a long way away,” Glorfindel said gently. “And we are never going home. To think of another would be no betrayal.”

 

Finrod prodded the ground with the stick he had used to poke the fire. “I know that.”

 

He did know that. But – who more unsuitable could he have discovered to stir him? He wanted to dismiss Glorfindel’s perception as mere appreciation of fine music and a shared history. Calyaro had an undeniable skill for moving others with a tune, but Finrod knew that was not all. Even cast into turmoil, Calyaro had seemed to accept more than rail. The grey eyes seemed to hold a world beyond the everyday, windows to a mind searching far horizons. They drew him in, left him wanting to find out more.

 

He had used to like – admire – the older member of his cousins’ household. When he grew up, he had still enjoyed his music. Then came Alqualondë and cold anger had gripped him. It was not that he had forgiven him – or anyone – but the past did not hold his thoughts in the same way, or grip his heart fast.

 

With his own family exuberant and out-spoken, Amarië’s quiet strength had appealed to Finrod. He could not deny it appealed to him in Calyaro. He did not know what it was he felt, but when his eyes followed the path the musician had taken he was glad that Glorfindel said no more.