high in the halls of the kings who are gone by Arveldis

high in the halls of the kings who are gone

Written for @polutrope's prompt, "any character(s) + Nargothrond + old and forgotten."

Nargothrond’s silence rang loud in its empty halls. 

Once, these halls had been filled with the music of harps and lutes, the bubble of laughter and conversation, and the sweet songs of nightingales. Once, fair tapestries had hung upon every wall, and warm light had spilled from jeweled lanterns.

Now, the halls were dark and cold, and no light pierced through the gloom. The lanterns that had hung upon the walls and pillars had been torn off, plundered for their jewels, and the tapestries hung in scorched tatters. The once-graceful carvings etched upon the floor were rent with gashes from the dragon’s claws.

No birdsong spilled from the shadows of the Hall of Song, and no music carried from the Hall of Harps. The Cave of Deep Water, where luminous fish had once swam, sinuous and serpentine, in the dark depths, was clogged with fallen stone. The Hall of Memory, where tapestries of Valinor, as beautiful as if Vairë herself had woven them, had once hung upon its walls, lay in ruin.

And upon everything hung the lingering reek and dread of Glaurung, a foul pall cloaking grief with horror.

All this Gildor saw as he sought the innermost halls, where stood the king’s throne, where Finrod, and Orodreth after him, had once sat, the silver crown of the King of Nargothrond glittering bright upon their brows in the light of the jewel-netted lanterns that hung from the ceiling. 

Rats and mice scuttled about the corridors, fleeing from his passage, and he watched the ground closely as he walked, for the rotted armor and bones of Elves and Orcs alike littered the floor. And everywhere was the scent of decay, noisome and rank, and the dread of Glaurung’s spirit grew.

The Great Hall opened before Gildor, lined with mighty pillars whose arching crowns disappeared into the gloom overhead, now cracked and broken from the passage of the dragon. Gildor stopped upon the threshold of the hall, his heart in his throat. 

At the end of the hall, the carven throne where Finrod once had sat and ruled with wisdom and justice stood cloven in two, and the tapestry behind it depicting the foam-washed shores of Aman had been rent by great claws. In the center of the hall, spreading from pillar to pillar, Glaurung’s hoard glinted dully, illuminated faintly by a crack in the ceiling.

Here, where Glaurung had long lain in pride and greed, sated by the death and ruin he had wrought, the reek and dread of the dragon lay heaviest, marring what had once been the fairest hall in Nargothrond. 

Gildor passed quickly through the hall to the cloven throne at the end, which stood proud still, even in its ruin. The emerald eyes of the carven serpents that twisted together to form the chair’s back glinted in the gloom, looking down upon Gildor as he approached. 

He knelt before the throne, as he had so many times before when Finrod and then Orodreth had sat upon it and received Gildor’s reports of the city and the surrounding woods. Withdrawing the sword at his side, he laid it at the foot of the cloven throne and bowed his head. “I am the last of the Knights of Nargothrond," he said, "and though I would have served my city and my king unto death, both have fallen and are no more, and my life yet lingers. I now lay down my sword, having fulfilled my final duty given to me.” Raising his head to look up at the serpents’ emerald eyes, he murmured, “ Savo hîdh neñ gurth .”

With a heavy heart, he turned and made his way back through the hall, until a glint of blue caught his eye and he stopped.

There upon the dragon hoard lay the blue brooch Finduilas had once worn glittering upon her shoulder—Finduilas, who had ever been generous with her smiles and laughter. Finduilas, whom he had been charged to protect—until in the madness and horror of that day, she had become lost in the panic and press of bodies, and in the chaos, one of the lords of the city had grasped his arm and bade him to escort Celebrimbor, who had little knowledge of the secret paths through the woods encircling Nargothrond, to safety and to guard his flight from the city.

Gildor had heard her cries as they fled, and he had thought he would never cease to hear them in the depths of the night, when the memory of her terror woke him.

He knelt before the hoard and picked up the brooch, running his thumb over the delicate filigree surrounding the blue stones. They were the color of bright flax flowers in the sunlight or shimmering butterfly wings and shone even in the dim mirk of the hall, as fair as the lady who had worn them.

“Forgive me, my lady, for failing to protect you,” Gildor whispered. “But I would keep this in memory of you and of the fair days before the end, for such a thing should not be left here to molder, forgotten, and your memory should be honored, as long as there is one left to guard it.”

He pressed the brooch tightly in his hand and left the hall.

Chapter End Notes

Translations (courtesy of Real Elvish dot net):

Savo hîdh neñ gurth: "Have peace in death"

Gildor was the perfect blank slate for this fic. We don't know anything of his history, except for the fact that he is one of the Exiles of the House of Finrod, which meant I could create whatever backstory I wanted for him. For the purposes of this fic, I went with Tolkien Gateway's idea that he might have been one of the Knights of Nargothrond.

For sharp-eyed readers who caught this, yes, Finduilas' brooch is meant to be the same brooch that Tom Bombadil later finds in the Barrow-downs. Finduilas being the owner of the blue brooch was an idea that came to me while writing this and is by no means one of my hard and fast headcanons, but I'd like to think that she was remembered both by those who were left after the Sack of Nargothrond and by those who never knew her, like Tom and Goldberry. It seemed fitting that a character whose story was so needlessly tragic and whose life was tragically cut short might be able to live on in some small part, thanks to the actions of one person.