Seeking Sunlight by

Seeking Sunlight

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She was so young, Annael thought, watching Rían with her son. Even by the measure of Men, she was young—young and small, fine-boned and dark-haired, with the soft grey eyes of the people of Bëor. He had feared for her when it came time for the birth, but the midwives had told him she’d done well—she and the baby. Tuor, he was called, the son of Huor of the House of Hador, who had gone to war and never come home.

It was winter, and the sunlight that came into the caves was cold and pale, but Rían still sought it out, bundled up in all of the furs and blankets that they could give her. Annael often thought of her as a flower, doomed to wilt if she did not see enough sunshine. The cold did not seem to trouble her, or her young son. He was big, for a newborn—to the surprise of no one who had met his father. Annael had, once, some time before the doomed battle that folk were now calling the Nirnaeth Arnoediad. Huor had been tall and broad-shouldered, with yellow hair that shone in the sunlight of Hithlum, and his laughter had been deep and warm. He had spoken of his betrothed, then, of a dark-haired beauty with a voice like a meadowlark.

Rían’s voice was sweet, though softer than a lark’s now as she sang lullabies to Tuor in the tongue of her own people. Annael went to sit by them in the sunlight. When Rían’s song was done, and Tuor slept, she looked up at him. “I do not know how long my people will remain in these caves,” Annael told her, “but you are welcome here. And when we depart, we will go south, down Sirion to the Bay of Balar where Círdan now dwells. I would have you both come with us, out of the reach of the Enemy.”

“No,” Rían said softly, distantly, hollowly. “I will never see the Sea.” There were deep shadows behind her eyes, and Annael did not know how to banish them. “But it will call to him,” she added, her tone shifting a little, taking on the weight of foretelling as she looked down at the slumbering babe in her arms. “I do not know if that is a blessing or a curse. All is shrouded in darkness.” She shivered, and Annael moved closer, adding his warmth to that of the furs and blankets. Rían leaned against him with a soft sigh.

“There is yet hope,” Annael said. “The sun yet rises each morning, and the stars still shine in the heavens, even when we cannot see them.” It was hard, though, when one could not see the stars. The clouds drifting south from Thangorodrim were growing ever thicker. Better to think of other things, brighter things that lay yet within their grasp. “Will you teach me the song you were singing?”

Rían’s smile was small, but she nodded and began to sing again, the lilting notes of the Taliska lullaby filling the cave with sweetness and a warmth that felt like a reminder that spring would come again, in spite of everything.