Full of Wisdom and Perfect in Beauty by Gadira

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Ancient Ceremonies I

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Amandil stared at the horizon, where the sun was about to plunge under the waves in a majestic blaze of red. Set against this conflagration, the silhouette leaning against the railing looked small and dark to his eyes. It stood perfectly still, its shadow-veiled gaze fixed on an unknown course, and not even the sound of his heavy footsteps over the wooden planks seemed to elicit a reaction.

He hesitated.

“You have my leave to approach, Lord Amandil” her voice, uncommonly hoarse, addressed him. Slowly, he covered the distance that separated him from her, and set his own hands over the railing, though he did not lean on it. It would have been a carefree move, almost too familiar, and he wasn’t yet sure of whether it was appropriate.

“I did not wish to disturb you, my Queen. But dinner was getting cold, and I did not know if you liked it like that.”

Eärnissë snorted.

“It will not be the first time I eat a cold meal aboard a ship. Do not worry, Lord Amandil.”

From a closer distance, he could distinguish part of her features. As usual, her long grey hair was gathered in a simple knot behind her back, allowing a clear view of her face. Her angular nose and cheekbones, which sometimes reminded him, a little unpleasantly, of her brother Zakarbal, were not tempered by any warm look or smile. Instead, her forehead was creased in a deep frown, and her sea-grey eyes were the colour of storm.

Since the start of their journey, it was not the first time he had caught himself wondering what thoughts could be hidden behind this unusually taciturn exterior. At first, he had thought that maybe she had not wanted to come, for the voyage was long, and the political and ceremonial duties tedious. The official foundation of a city (even, as in this case, a refoundation, as the Court pompously called it) was no small matter, and though Pelargir had been up and running for years now, the King had not been satisfied until he managed to unearth ancient ceremonies and feasts to fill a fortnight. Those ceremonies, however, had never been undertaken outside of Númenor, as far as anyone could tell, and this had posed the problem of the King’s role in them, for the wielder of the Sceptre had not left the Island for thousands of years. Sending his heir had also been out of the question, so in the end, Queen Eärnissë and Prince Vorondil had been sent to stand for them in a compromise solution. A fleet carrying additional settlers from the West of the Island had accompanied them, and Amandil had been pronounced in charge of the expedition. This had angered Prince Vorondil, as he believed that he was higher ranked and therefore should be trusted to manage everything himself. Amandil had spent two uncomfortable weeks trying to avoid stepping on his toes, which were figuratively large and hard to miss.

Eärnissë, however, had not voiced any of her opinions, either on her own presence or on his, or even on the whole idea of this expedition. Loud and talkative by nature, the Queen of Númenor had become quieter and quieter since their ship lost sight of the harbour of Sor. As days passed, she barely engaged others in conversation anymore, and went out in the evenings to stare at the horizon in silence, ignoring both the wind and the rain. Mere displeasure at a certain turn of events was an inadequate explanation for her behaviour, Amandil had realized after a while, but he was at a loss as to how to continue this deduction.

“If my calculations do not fail me, we will reach the Bay of G… the Bay of Belfalas tomorrow or the next day at the latest”, he ventured, catching himself in time before the accursed name of the lost city fell from his lips out of habit. “So, it would be better if we were all rested and ready to face the crushing weight of ceremony.”

“Tomorrow.”

The word came even before he had stopped speaking, and in the resulting confusion he almost thought that he had imagined it. But then she turned towards him, and he realized that he had not.

“We will arrive tomorrow. I can smell the land from here.”

Before Amandil was even born, the Lady Zarhil of Forostar had been a sailor. Apparently, old habits died hard, even those that were sealed behind the great walls of the Palace of Armenelos.

“As you say, my Queen. No one in Númenor would do well to doubt your expertise.”

In the very last glow of dusk, a sudden yet deep sadness became clearly visible in the woman’s features. Amandil was tempted to reel back, as is physically struck by the intensity of this feeling, but a moment later it was gone.

“Is something wrong, my Queen?” he asked, before he could check his impulse. She shook her head, as if in denial, but for a while after that she remained silent.

“I know I have not been a very good passenger, Lord Amandil, and I wish to apologize for that”, she finally spoke. “In my discharge, it is the first time I have been on a ship without being the one to run it, and I did not trust myself to be able to stand out of your way for long. You already had my son-in-law to contend with, so I did not think it would be fair to add more troubles to your plate.”

Amandil’s eyes widened in surprise. It had been the longest speech she had given to anyone since they boarded the ships, and it was not at all what he had expected to hear. When he opened his mouth to reply, he tried to make his voice as matter-of-fact as possible; fortunately, a thick veil of darkness had descended over their faces by now.

“You do not have to apologize for anything, my lady. I was merely concerned for you. As for Prince Vorondil, it is not…”

“Bullshit” she interrupted him, rather crudely. “If this had been my ship, I would have put him in a boat and abandoned him to the waves long ago.”

Amandil wished to laugh at this, but he dared not.

“He is still husband to the Princess of the West.”

“All the more reason. Some other ship would feel bound to take him onboard, so his life would not be in danger.”

This time, Amandil did laugh. For a moment, he felt as comfortable as when they used to meet in the Palace, as if the last two weeks had not happened at all. But he had seen her look from before, seen it clearly, and deep inside he was aware that this was but a fleeting illusion.

“To be entirely honest, Lord Amandil, I was wondering if I could disappear in a boat myself. But I guess you would also feel bound to find me, would you not?”

He did not know what to answer.

“I did this much better. I was good at it, if I may say so myself. Perhaps that is why I loved it so much”, she continued. “I cannot say the same for all that came afterwards.”

Amandil took a long, uncomfortable breath. It is your fault, a stern voice spoke in his head. You pried, you were indiscreet, you did not keep your distance.

“Duties are … sometimes… onerous, especially when they take us away from the pursuits that we love,” he ventured. “I have also had those fantasies, my Queen, in which I left everything behind and returned to an unremarked life far away. But there is always something which keeps us anchored to our present lives.” A spouse’s love, he thought, would not fool anyone here; if rumours were true, the Queen’s marriage bed was as cold as his own. But there were other kinds of love to be had in this world, hanging as if as many ropes to cling to in the fall. “Family, for instance. I do not think I could bear to abandon my family again.”

Eärnissë let go of a sharp, impatient breath, like someone who had been puzzling over an unsolvable problem only to be distracted by a fool who was trying to help. Or maybe that comparison had been a little too coloured by his imagination.

“I will go and have my dinner before it goes from cold to frozen”, she announced, gathering herself up from her leaning position in the railing. As she brushed past him, Amandil realized that she was almost as tall as he was. “Wake me up early tomorrow, so I will have enough time to get into my queenly robes before noon.”

“As you wish, my Queen”, Amandil recited to the already empty air.

Far above his head, the stars of Varda were shining brightly over the clear sky. Alone, he watched them in silence for a while, his brow creased in a thoughtful frown.

 

*     *     *     *     *

 

As he crossed the threshold of the private quarters of the Andúnië mansion in Armenelos, Elendil thought that he was learning to understand his father better than ever. Unlike what might have been expected, however, this did not bring him any happiness or satisfaction, but rather an all-consuming feeling of dreariness which, he suspected, also matched Amandil’s perfectly well.

With the lord of Andúnië absent in the mainland, his duties in the Council had fallen to his son at an especially difficult time. There were no wars now and Middle Earth was at a tenuous peace, if slightly punctured by some disturbing rumours coming from the court of Phaleris I of Arne -which Lord Hiram had pronounced “malicious lies spread by the Prince Pharazôn’s minions”-, but the same could not be said about the Island itself. For a long time now, the delicate issue of relations between the Palace and the Temple of Melkor had been at a standstill, with their respective representatives refusing to budge an inch from their respective positions. After many years of rule, the King had decided it was time to stop contemporizing to avoid ruffling the feathers of the powerful clergy and their followers, while the High Priest of Melkor had persisted in his uncompromising attitude. A year or so ago, he had been summoned to the Palace to answer for his slanderous words about the Princess of the West and the royal line; whatever had transpired in this meeting, neither Elendil nor Amandil knew, but Yehimelkor had continued his activities as if nothing had happened. What was worse, his words in the last Festival of the King had been more aggressive than ever, accusing the King openly of betraying the holy legacy of his ancestors, and of becoming the pawn of the godless sect which had long spread its venomous roots from the West of the Island. Elendil could not help but wonder if at least part of this hatred for his line came from his own father’s perceived betrayal long ago, but Amandil himself disagreed with that appreciation. Yehimelkor’s ire was not fuelled by petty slights, this was not how his mind worked, he had told his son more than once. How could he still be so sure that he knew him, so many decades after the High Priest had become nothing but an enemy to them, was something that defeated Elendil entirely.

In any case, Yehimelkor’s words at such an important event had not passed unremarked, which was surely what he had intended. The King had called for his resignation, to which the Temple had replied that for a High Priest of Melkor to resign for any other reason than death or severe illness was unprecedented and therefore impossible. In retaliation, the Palace had finally stopped sending them any funds, which left the Temple in a state of considerable impoverishment. Yehimelkor, however, did not fear poverty, and he had diverted the remaining money and goods destined for the clergy to the celebrations and sacrifices. He was free of the sin of pride, he said -Elendil had to laugh at that-, so he was not afraid of begging at the doorsteps of the citizens of Armenelos for food and clothing. Of course, he did not have to do it, for they had flocked to his doorstep themselves to deposit everything that he needed. Many were real believers, Elendil was sure, but at least part of them must also be perversely interested in the outcome of this unheard-of rebellion.

Tomorrow, the King had gathered the Council for a session where this issue would no doubt be brought to the fore again, and in preparation for it, a smaller council had been gathered that morning. There, all of Tar Palantir’s close kinsmen had thrown abuse at the absent figure of the High Priest, without suggesting a viable solution other than the usual calls for blood and destruction. The King had waved all this away, reminding them that it would be tantamount to playing into Yehimelkor’s hands. For a moment, Lord Zakarbal had been on the brink of calling him weak, and though he had managed to restrain himself in the last moment, Elendil knew that Tar Palantir had heard the unvoiced words in his mind.

He had tried not to speak much, himself, aware that he was merely standing for his father, but Tar Palantir had asked for his opinion several times, perhaps to avoid listening to the others. His father’s contributions to this topic had usually consisted on insights on Yehimelkor’s thoughts and possible reactions to their planned moves, for which he often received looks of deep suspicion. Elendil, however, did not even have that much to contribute. He could agree with the King’s assessment of the situation, but he had no workable solution to propose. And so they sat, and sat, racking their brains, repeating the same things over and over, fighting, digressing, until his head hurt and he almost could not remember why he was there anymore.

When the meeting was called off, he even felt physically tired, though he had not moved from a chair for the entire day. If this was what Amandil had to go through -Amandil, whose restlessness far outstripped his own-, Elendil could not blame him from being unable to hide his eagerness to sail off to the mainland.

As he strode past the corridor, his thoughts were interrupted by the familiar, ear-splitting noise of screams mingled with laughter. Turning on the spot, he sought for their source, and headed towards it.

From his standing position on the doorstep, he was greeted by the sight of Eluzîni and their younger son. She was lying on her back on a rug in the floor, throwing the child in the air and catching him back when he fell. His face was flushed by the exhilaration of engaging in this dangerous pursuit, and his screams became louder and louder as he was tossed higher and higher.

Elendil winced at the sight, feeling an involuntary shock of alarm across his spine. Her hands were so small. Too small for this, by far. But if he came in unannounced now and said something, she could be alarmed and drop him.

“You look terrible”, she said, suddenly pressing Anárion to her chest and pulling herself to a sitting position. He struggled in protest at the interruption. “Don’t complain, you have had enough for now!”

The child disentangled himself from her grasp, and struggled to his feet with a scowl. His balance, he observed, was growing less and less tenuous by the day.

“Hello, Anárion.” Relieved that he was not going to cause an accident anymore, Elendil entered the room, and sat on the floor as well. The child stared at him in silence, then picked up a toy horse and offered it to him solemnly. Eluzîni laughed, ruffling his curly hair before crawling next to Elendil and kissing him.

“Thank you. Your gift is much appreciated.”

Anárion did not answer, but knelt again, and picked up a different toy, a ball this time, which he also offered to him.

“Oh, now you are doomed. He will entrust all his possessions to you, and then he will expect you to play with them.”

“That could well be the most productive thing I do today” he retorted, absently twirling the ball in his fingers until it fell on his lap. “Is Isildur still with your family?”

“Only barely”, Eluzîni picked the ball up herself, and gave it back to Anárion, who shook his head firmly and gave it to Elendil again. “Today he wanted to leave their residence because they were being mean to his friend, and I was put in charge of the peace talks. It was hard diplomacy, but I succeeded in the end. In their defence, I have to say that Malik did break the branch of my uncle’s prized pear tree. Or maybe that was Isildur, but I guess we will never know for sure.”

“You should be the one to parley with High Priest Yehimelkor on the King’s behalf. Maybe you could get them to reach an agreement.”

“Are you joking? That priest gives me the shivers. I would not stand there listening to his talks of doom and destruction even for the King himself.”

By now, a good half of Anárion’s toys were gathered on a pile in Elendil’s lap. A book came to lean rather precariously over the top, bringing them all down with a crash. In a hurry, Elendil began to rearrange them before the child could burst in tears; thankfully, the crisis was averted just in time.

“Is it true, then? Will he be forced to resign in tomorrow’s Council session?”

“He will never be forced to resign. I believe he would rather die. The King can remove him from his post, but as this action, as he puts it, ‘has no precedent’, the clergy and their faithful will be free to ignore it. Short of killing him, imprisoning him, or exiling him to the mainland, I do not think we can be rid of him.”

“And that would not work because in prison he would still be the High Priest, in exile he could join hands with the Prince of the South’s son, and dead… remind me, what could go wrong if he was dead? It does seem like the simplest solution.”

“His death would fire the embers of a large-scale revolt against the Sceptre, the King says. That is why he may be trying his utmost to die, but he will not be given the pleasure.” Anárion had finished in his task, and was now staring at him expectantly. With a sigh of resignation, Elendil picked up the ball and threw it several times into the air to catch it, then passed it to him. The child tried to imitate him: somehow, the ball ended up in the opposite end of the room.

“I will go” Eluzîni proclaimed, standing up. “You look so dreadful that I am feeling sorry for you.”

Elendil could not see why Anárion could not go himself, as he had been picking things from the floor until a moment ago, but apparently his game followed a mysterious set of rules which stated that this was no longer his responsibility.

As he was pondering this, the child suddenly sat on his leg without a warning, sending a painful jolt up his spine. Smothering a groan, Elendil tried to rearrange his weight away from his nearly dislocated knee. Anárion promptly started to cry and fuss, as if he had been the one to be hurt.

“What if his death was made to look like an accident?” Eluzîni shouted above the noise, from the other side of the rug. Elendil’s eyes widened. Sometimes, he was not quite sure whether she was being serious or not.

“That is something that the Former King would do. Tar Palantir does not want to be like his father in any way. And nobody would believe in that accident to begin with, so we would be having the same problem in the end.” He frowned at her. “Eluzîni, you know that my father would not be pleased to hear you making such suggestions.”

“I will never understand how he could grow up with that man and not hate him.”

“Perhaps because he was the best choice he was offered.”

“The only choice.” The child’s whining became quieter; he was obviously falling asleep, very much in spite of himself. Elendil hesitated between handing him over to his mother and risk upsetting him again or waiting it out. In the end, he chose the second option.

“Precisely. When all the other choices are death, how can you not be grateful for the only one who offered life?”

“That reminds me. “Eluzîni sat at his side again; her hand started tracing circles on the young child’s back. “If it had depended on him, you would not have been offered life, would you?”

Elendil did not reply.

 

*     *     *     *     *

 

They did see land on the following day, just as Queen Earnissë had predicted. Shortly before noon, they were crossing the island where the former colony of Gadir once stood, now a mass of charred ruin where only a small population of fishermen had remained. The sight of it was something that Amandil would never grow used to, he thought, trying to avert his gaze as much as he could but somehow failing in his purpose. He was not the only one: everyone, from sailors to soldiers to members of the retinue, seemed to have grown collectively distracted. The volume of their voices abated, and the resulting quiet seemed to be brimming with unsaid things.

Or mostly unsaid.

“That is what happens when you put a ruthless butcher in charge of the situation”, Prince Vorondil remarked aloud. Amandil had been given weeks of practice on biting his tongue, so it barely hurt anymore.

In his stead, it was the Queen who spoke. She had just appeared on deck, looking quite uncomfortable in a blue and silver robe whose folds trailed behind her steps, and a crown of sapphires in her head.

“It was found to have been an accident. The Prince Pharazôn did not mean for the city to be destroyed.”

“Oh, yes, because he has never destroyed anything, has he? He is a peaceful sort.”

“Only the enemies of Númenor.” Eärnissë’s tone brooked no argument this time, and even the Prince was able to perceive it. She shook her head.

“Are we risking the journey upriver on these ships, Lord Amandil? I have never tried it. Back in my day, we did not have to go past Gadir, though the King says that it was done in the past, and that the river is wide enough until Pelargir.”

“It appears that it can be attempted without problem, my Queen”, Amandil bowed. “For prudence’s sake, however, we will go one by one, and our ship will be the last.”

She was so fascinated by the manoeuvre that she remained on deck as they fell in formation and entered the mouth of the Anduin. If she could, he had no doubt that she would have climbed the mast, too, to have a better view. After the words they had exchanged on the previous night, he could now recognize her look as that of a woman who chafed under the restrictions that her robe, her dignity and ceremony had placed upon her.

The sun was beginning to decline as they finally reached the place where the new colony of Pelargir was ensconced in a fork between two rivers. Amandil took a sharp breath as it appeared in full view, remembering the desolate ruins where he and his men had arrived years ago, and the makeshift fort they had been painstakingly building for a year, only to have the minions of Sauron attack it as soon as his back was turned.

None of this was visible now, and it almost seemed like it could have not existed except in a nightmare, of those that showed the world falling apart in abject decay. In partnership with his father’s Elvish friends, Pelargir had been rebuilt exactly as it had been in its heyday, as Amandil had seen it in the King’s crystal model once: full of white houses, high towers, beautiful, meandering channels that criss-crossed the town centre like streets, and an imposing harbour where many different types of merchandise was unloaded from ships and river barges.

As they entered the harbour, however, those activities had largely stopped, and a large throng of people had gathered on the docks, awaiting their arrival. The city council of settlers was at the front, gathered around the captain of the first ship of the expedition, who seemed to be updating them on their progress. Queen Eärnissë wordlessly beckoned at Prince Vorondil, and both walked towards the forecastle, where they stood conspicuously under the eyes of a thousand Númenóreans. Someone cheered, and the cue was picked up by others close by, until the echo of welcoming cries reverberated across the entire harbour, echoed by the passengers of the ships themselves.

It was a grandiose, joyful sight, Amandil thought. It almost made him forget how many men had died here, and how many others had died in the island beyond, some fighting in their ships, others lost to the merciless flames. Perhaps this city of Pelargir had been built as a testament to this sobering truth: that to build something beautiful and enduring much needed to be sacrificed. And thus sacrifice is the beginning and end of all things, and nothing in this world can exist without it, Yehimelkor would have nodded triumphantly, standing under the dome of his temple. The King claims to deny it, but deep inside his heart, he knows.

Wondering how even the most momentous occasions could trigger such morbid thoughts in his mind, Amandil swallowed a curse and shook himself awake from this momentary stupor. They would be anchored in a moment, and then he, too, would have to leave the ship under the stares of many. Though the new city was largely unknown to him, he was well-known in it: many of the settlers had come from his lands, and his father had been a frequent visitor since the beginning of the building process. Many would want to greet him, or even catch a glimpse of him, so he would have to stand tall and proud, and bury his misgivings so deep inside him that even he would forget they were there.

Quietly, he raised his eyes to meet the challenge.

 

*     *     *     *     *

 

“This is the city hall, where the Council meets. Of course, we are not constituted in an official capacity yet. We are merely a provisory authority until the city’s foundation ceremonies are achieved.” The head of the city council seemed quite apologetic as he showed them around, as if actually afraid of having usurped an authority to which he had no right. Even after the Queen had smiled at him several times, and told him that the King understood their need to organize themselves on the spot to deal with the most pressing concerns of the city’s running, he still seemed to need reminding them of the issue every once in a while. Amandil wondered how long it would take for him and the others to grow as proud as the Merchant Princes of Gadir, who would ally themselves with the Dark Lord to wage war against the Sceptre.

Gadir, again. For a city whose name was so little mentioned, it seemed to be very much present in everyone’s mind still. Most of the survivors from the broken city had settled in Umbar, but some had gone back to Númenor, to live in Sor, and a number of them had chosen to settle here, in the new city whose very construction they had so bitterly opposed. Amandil was not able to prevent himself from asking about it.

“We leave in peace and harmony with each other in this city, no matter what our origins are or the nature of our beliefs” the city councilman replied, proudly. It had the air of a rehearsed answer, but not necessarily an untrue one. Tar Palantir had wanted the city to be settled by the Faithful, but on his way there Amandil had seen a small temple of Melkor that had probably not been there in the original Elven design.

It figured. As long as they were a minority, they would be well-behaved and respect those that they had once persecuted, lest the situation became reversed and they were persecuted themselves. In time, they might even abandon their habits from a former life to mingle better in their new society, or so Tar Palantir must have thought. This model of peaceful assimilation had been his cherished dream for the Island, as Amandil knew, but there it was proving to be far more difficult to achieve. And here, it was only so easy because of the devastation that had been wrought in the past.

“I would have forced them to abandon those barbaric gods of theirs if they wanted to settle here” Prince Vorondil said. The city councilman looked chagrined, so much that Eärnissë took pity on him.

“This cannot be done in certain territories only”, she argued. “You cannot forbid something in Pelargir and allow it in Umbar or in Armenelos. We are one kingdom, under one Sceptre.”

“The day this decision is left to me, I will forbid it everywhere”, he retorted. For a moment, a flicker of something passed through the Queen’s eyes, giving Amandil pause.

“The decision will be left to Míriel”, she said, in a cold voice.

“So”, The head of the city council felt that it was his duty to break the tension somehow. “What will be the Queen’s schedule for tomorrow?”

“The Queen’s schedule will involve meeting her guests of honour” Eärnissë said herself, before Amandil even managed to open his mouth. “Tonight, Prince Vorondil, Lord Amandil and myself will dine with the native envoys, and tomorrow we will be meeting them one by one. I trust my chambers are equipped with an adequate room for audiences.”

“Of course, my Queen.” The man bowed. “I will send word to the delegation from the Kingdom of Arne; the Queen Valentia arrived only this morning.”

“The Queen Valentia?” Vorondil asked, rather pointedly.

“Oh, yes, my lord prince.” The man did not seem to interpret the meaning of his tone correctly. “She is in quite good shape, in spite of her age. For a barbarian, at least! A formidable woman, indeed.”

Vorondil crossed glances with Amandil, who smiled mirthlessly. Perhaps the rumours, whatever the source for them had been, were not so ludicrous after all.

“We will go and ready ourselves for the evening. “Eärnissë said to the councilman. “Thank you for showing us around.”

“It has been a great honour and pleasure, my Queen!” he protested, with a deep bow. “Should you be in need of something, anything at all, send word to me and I shall be very glad to provide it for you!”

“Then send cheese and wine to my quarters, so I can dine there and not in a long table with Queen Valentia” she muttered just within Amandil’s earshot, as they made their way through the stone stairways. Prince Vorondil was incensed, as usual.

“She should be Queen Dowager Valentia, if she must be called a Queen at all. And she has no business meeting with us as if she was the ruler of her kingdom!”

Amandil had the brief temptation of reminding him that none of them were rulers of their kingdom, but he withstood it. He did not want to offend the Prince, and he also had to admit that the concern he had raised was a valid one.

“My Queen, I trust you know that there have been rumours…” he began.

“…spread by the circle of the Prince of the South, whose son wants to occupy Arne and rule it himself…”

“…but worth taking into account nonetheless, given the circumstances…”

“…which claim that Valentia has given a coup and is ruling Arne illegally, against the will of the Sceptre”, Vorondil finished. Queen Eärnissë blinked, then shrugged.

“I do not think that is very likely, is it? If it was, we would have heard something more definite. After all, we have an alliance…”

“Last time, we were allied with them as well, and it managed to escape us that they had made a deal with the Dark Lord, my Queen”, Amandil reminded her. Eärnissë shook her head.

“But Phaleris is alive! We would have heard of his death.”

“There are many ways of usurping a throne without killing” Vorondil claimed, darkly. “I believe it would be of great service for our realm if we used this meeting to try to glean some information from the Arnian delegation.”

Amandil had to agree with him.

“Perhaps you could extend your hand in friendship, my Queen, and get her to talk to you.”

Eärnissë laughed.

“She will not fall for that, not in a million years! From what they say about her, she has been ruling for a long time, so I am sure that she knows every trick by this point.”

“She is only a barbarian! You were Queen before she was even born.” Vorondil snorted in contempt. Amandil shook his head.

“The Queen is right in this, a woman such as her should not be taken lightly. She will try not to surrender a word of compromising information.”

“And what if she is ruling?” Eärnissë laid her hands on her hips; not a very queenly pose, but she seemed to be done with stateliness for a while. “Would that be such a disaster? Phaleris was young and unexperienced when he was put on the throne; perhaps with him there, the kingdom would have been torn apart. If this arrangement serves us, what is the problem?”

The Lord of Andúnië stared at her, in shock. He had not expected this kind of talk from her.

“She is still a usurper! The King named Phaleris King of Arne after his uncle, this woman’s brother, not to say the foul word husband, lost all his rights on the battlefield!” Vorondil hissed. “If what they say is true, it cannot be tolerated under any circumstance!”

“We do not know what has happened there, my Queen,” Amandil explained. “The Arnian court has quite an infamous reputation, and if the rumours are true, Phaleris could have been imprisoned, or drugged, or threatened. He could have been forced to marry his cousin…”

“…which would be incest in the eyes of the Valar!”

“… and as soon as he has two children who can marry each other, as his people’s former customs demanded, he still could lose his life.” Amandil finished, forcing himself to nod politely at the Prince’s interruption. Eärnissë looked at him, thoughtfully.

“I see” she conceded. Her eyes, however, still seemed slightly unfocused, as if she was pondering something. “Well, I can certainly try to speak with her. Perhaps our imagination is running ahead of us. She might be here only because the King of Arne cannot leave his capital, just as the King of Númenor cannot leave the Island.”

“It could be” Amandil nodded. “She is, after all, a member of the King’s family.”

“But then, why was this man calling her Queen?”

To this question, Amandil had to admit that he did not have an answer.

 

*     *     *     *     *

 

That evening, the hall where the Council used to meet was transformed into an enormous dining room. Long wooden tables were dragged there, together with thrones, chairs, and benches of many shapes and sizes. Embroidered tablecloths were set to cover them, and above them dishes and dishes of the best Middle-Earth could produce, including some exotic dishes from the guests’s own lands. In a raised throne at the head table, Queen Eärnissë was presiding over it all. Now and then, she smiled to the people who greeted and addressed her, but as soon as she was left alone, she went back to the taciturn expressions that Amandil had grown used to see since they were aboard the ship.

Valentia was the last of the foreign dignitaries to enter the hall. After she was announced, she crossed the threshold with a slow, even pace that conveyed the majesty of her station. Her outfit was as ornate as the gold and silver embroidered mantles of the Lady of the Cave, and it dragged heavily behind her footsteps as she walked, while her head was covered in a long silvery veil, whose folds fell over her countenance and her hair. If the idea of this had been to shield her from the looks of strangers, however, it had not succeeded very well: the fabric was so transparent that, as she approached them, Amandil could see even the tiniest wrinkle upon her forehead. Her face, handsome enough in the distance, bore the telltale signs of heavy makeup in close quarters, and he guessed that her black mane of hair had probably been dyed as well.

What had Pharazôn told him once about this woman? That she had thrown herself at him before her husband’s body had even rotted, he remembered. That she had wanted to rule Arne by his side -or rather, rule Arne, using him as accessory. She had been good looking enough back then, his friend had also admitted, but he would not have bedded her if she was the only woman left alive on the face of Earth.

“Queen Eärnissë” she said in a vibrant voice, prostrating herself on the floor. In this position, she suddenly reminded him of someone he thought he had forgotten, her traitorous brother, in that first meeting they both held in the harbour town on the banks of the Anduin. “Prince Vorondil, Lord Amandil. I come into your presence in the hopes of obtaining your favour and your goodwill towards the people of Arne.”

“You are the Lady Valentia.” Not Queen Valentia, Amandil remarked, but she did not seem foolish enough as to challenge this title. Her gaze remained fixed on the floor, like that of the pilgrims that knelt on the sanctuary of the Forbidden Bay begging for the Lady’s forgiveness of their sins. “Please, rise. I welcome you to Pelargir in the name of the Númenórean Sceptre. Bring her a chair!”

In a smooth move, Amandil slid over to the left, leaving enough room for Valentia to be seated at the Queen’s side. On her other side, Vorondil did not seem very happy with this, but he seemed to be ready to take it stoically for the sake of the higher purpose. Eärnissë nodded encouragingly, pushing a goblet of wine into her guest’s hand. They could not strike a deeper contrast, Amandil thought, as he watched the two queens smile tentatively at each other: the tall Númenórean, with her bare, open face that was not even able to hide her own discomfort, and the short, devious Arnian, with all her makeup and her veils.

Drinking a long swallow from his own cup, he leaned back and briefly pressed his fingers against his forehead, forcing himself to discard the memories of Noxaris.