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Olórin walks the winding paths of the garden until he sees the solitary figure sitting on a carved bench surrounded by scented poppies that bend their heads in the evening breeze. The man is wrapped in a heavy cloak that would be suitable for venturing into a frozen wasteland, although the night air is warm, and its folds shroud his face and hide his folded hands.
He settles himself down on the other end of the bench. The two of Nienna's servants who attend the man are still nearby, walking together under the overhanging cedars, though they have drawn away far enough to let them speak in private. Except when they have need of hands, Nienna's servants are more spirit than flesh, like beams of moonlight if moonlight could embody calm grace.
"Master Celebrimbor," Olórin says when the man does not look up.
Celebrimbor raises his head at that and looks round, although his eyes do not find Olórin's face. He is struck by the man's beauty, which is somehow part and parcel of the pain that speaks in every motion. "They tell me that is my name," he says, frowning.
"Would you rather have some other?"
Celebrimbor lifts his eyes to Olórin's for a moment, confusion sharpening to something like curiosity, but he does not answer. His hands lie very still in his lap, and even when a lock of his hair strays into his eyes, he does not brush it back into place.
"My name is Olórin," he begins again. "I am to be sent to Middle-Earth, across the sea. I am trying to find out what I can about its dangers before I set out. Particularly the devices of the Enemy."
"Middle-Earth," Celebrimbor says, but not with any certainty.
He takes a deep breath. "What can you tell me about the Rings of Power?"
He has been warned that Celebrimbor may be loath to answer his questions, but he is not prepared for the way the man flinches away from him, his whole body stiffening.
"I won't tell you," he says. "There's nothing worse you can do to me. I won't tell you." He takes a shuddering breath. "There's nothing worse you can do," he says, as if that is a victory.
"I am not here to hurt you," Olórin says. "And I did not mean to frighten you, or cause you pain. It is only that I thought if I knew something of the devices that the Enemy has used and their making, it might help me prepare for what is to come. And you are the master of that craft."
"Who are you?" Celebrimbor asks. "I don't know you."
"My name is Olórin, Master Celebrimbor."
He frowns in confusion. "They tell me that is my name."
Nienna said he might find Celebrimbor forgetful and easily troubled. He feels now that she might profitably have said more.
"I am here because Nienna says that you are the greatest of jewelsmiths," Olórin essays.
"I think you are confused," Celebrimbor says, as if trying to be kind to someone who is raving.
"Can you tell me nothing of how the Rings of Power were made, and how Sauron uses them for his purposes?" They are the most dangerous weapon he feels that he faces, and the one that he understands the least. There are plenty of dead men who will tell him all he wants to know of the hazards of arrows or dragons.
Celebrimbor goes very still. He lifts his head to stare at Olórin without meeting his gaze. "You don't know how they were made," he says finally, slowly as if working out a complicated problem in mathematics. "Therefore you can't be him."
"No," Olórin says very gently. He wishes now that he had thought to take some other form, but he is accustomed to looking much like an elf, as are many of the Maiar; he must seem all too much like Sauron when he walked Middle-Earth in fair disguise. "I am not your enemy."
"My enemy," Celebrimbor says, but distantly, as if wandering into a dream.
"Master Celebrimbor. What can you tell me of the One Ring?"
"I did not make it," Celebrimbor says, shaking his head.
"I know."
"The others I made under his teaching. Nine, and then seven more, and his hand was on them all. But the last one he made himself, in secret. As I …"
"As you made the Three," Olórin says.
"I won't tell you where they are. I won't tell you."
"Tell me about them. I do not ask you where they are hidden. Only tell me of your craft."
He is afraid for a moment that Celebrimbor is going to deny that he is a craftsman, but then the man begins speaking. "The Ring of Fire. That one I made for myself in the beginning. It makes, creates, kindles fires, fuels the forge. I wore it once. Before he made the One. When I had hands." His hands are folded in his lap, but he does not look down at them.
"The Ring of Air. For quiet kindness, and enduring patience." He is looking past Olórin, as if he sees some inward vision, but a better one now. "The Ring of Water. It protects and defends against death and the ravages of time. That one I made for her, bright and fierce as a mother swan." He still does not smile, but something lights his face. "Have you ever seen a swan defend its nest?"
"I have not," Olórin says.
"They're more dangerous than you think," Celebrimbor says. "When something they love is threatened." A shadow crosses his face again, and the next words come with an effort. "He does not know where they are. I never told him." His hands twitch in his lap as if he yearns to reach out to pluck at Olórin's sleeve, but he does not lift them. "Tell them that," he says. "Tell them that I never told him."
Olórin does not remind him that he has no idea who he should bear the message to. "I will tell them if I can," he says.
"I did not know he was making the One Ring," Celebrimbor says. His voice is hoarse, as if the words were painful to speak. "To bind all the others. I never knew until it was too late."
"He does not have the One Ring," Olórin says. "It was lost long ago. Perhaps lost forever."
Celebrimbor shakes his head. "What was lost can be always be found. And he will search until he finds it." He raises his eyes for a moment to Olórin's face. "You are afraid," he says.
"Yes. I am afraid." He had hoped that knowledge would make him feel better armed, but seeing what Sauron has made of the greatest jewelsmith who ever lived has chilled his blood even more.
Celebrimbor nods, unsmiling. "I expect you should be."
*****
Gil-galad's apartments in Tirion look out over the sea, and the morning sunlight gleams up from the water. The last time Olórin spoke with him, centuries ago, Gil-galad still dwelt in the Halls of Mandos, dressed in the simple gray robes of the dead. Now he is a living man dressed again in embroidered finery to suit a king of the Noldor, though he wears no crown.
"I am told I am to be sent across the sea to Middle-Earth," Olórin says. "To combat the devices of the Enemy as best I can."
"I will help you in any way I can," Gil-galad says soberly.
"He has relied greatly on the Rings of Power to work his will," Olórin says. "And so I thought I should learn more of them while I can. I have spoken already to Celebrimbor."
"And much sense I'm sure you got out of him."
"He is disturbed in his mind," Olórin says.
Gil-galad lets out a breath in a humorless laugh. "He always was, or he would never have made the damned things."
"Where the Nine and the Seven went, I think I know," Olórin says. "And where the One Ring is, it seems no creature living or dead can say. But the fate of the Three is still a mystery to me."
"I can at least tell you where they were when I died," Gil-galad says. "Two of them came to me, and one of them I carried with me when I fell in battle. That was Vilya, the Ring of Air. I don't know who took it after my death. Most likely Elrond. That would have been my choice. But it might have been one of the other elf lords who survived the battle. If they debated it, and Celeborn claimed it by right as the eldest, or Thranduil in recompense for his father's death, I think Elrond would have relinquished his claim."
"What can you tell me of them?"
"Celeborn was always sensible and measured. A good fighter, if slow to commit. You always had to light a fire under him to get him to advance. Not like Oropher, who thought 'stand and hold' meant 'charge and get all your men killed.' Oropher's son I barely knew. I gathered that he shared his father's dislike of civilization."
"And Elrond?"
"Elrond I loved well," Gil-galad says, his expression softening. "I put my trust in him always, and you would do well to do the same. He had no love of war, I think, although he was skilled enough at it in need. He preferred books, and collecting lore of herbs and healing." He shakes his head as if he finds that inexplicable. "But I can't fault his skill at arms, since I am fallen in battle and he is not."
"Even the strongest warrior may fall if he engages a great enemy in single combat," Olórin says. "That was bravely done."
"There was no other choice," Gil-galad says. "And at least it provided a distraction." He frowns as it at the memory of pain, a shadow that passes quickly across his face and then is gone. "But we were talking of the rings."
"We were. What became of the other two?"
"The Ring of Fire I gave to Cirdan the Shipwright. He is another one of the Sindar -- he never came across the sea. But he keeps the Havens, and we have been driven back to those shores before, in wartime. Cirdan has always been dependable, and I hoped the ring might help him defend Mithlond if it was besieged. As far as I know, he has it still."
"And the third?"
"It went to Galadriel, my kinswoman." He cannot place the name, but it has been long since the Exiles departed Valinor. "Finarfin's daughter."
That woke a flicker of memory, a fearless young maiden running barefoot over the grass, bright as a flame. "Artanis?"
"Yes, that was her father-name."
"Tell me of her."
"Her I would not advise you to trust. She is both captivating and dangerous. And likely to take your side exactly as long as her interests coincide with yours. She was never satisfied that the Noldor made me High King instead of turning to her, when she was the elder, but they would not have a woman rule them."
"I see," Olórin says. And clearly it had been no easy task for a young man to rule over his resentful great-aunt.
"As far as I know, she has her ring still as well. She had gone south to live in the forests of Laurelindorinan, although I do not know if she lives there still. They tell me a thousand years has passed since I died, although it does not seem so long." Gil-galad shook his head. "I hope you will find what I am telling of any use to you."
"I hope so," Olórin says. "I am told I may not remember much of my life in this land when I pass into Middle-Earth."
Gil-galad tilts his head to one side. "Then what is the point of asking?"
Olórin shrugs. "If I fail to ask for advice, then there is no hope that I will remember it at all."
*****
It seems to Olórin that it is worth getting a second opinion on the greatest among the elf lords of Middle Earth, even if he has heard all he is going to about the Rings of Power. He finds Oropher at the edge of Oromë's forests, a dead deer slung across his shoulders.
Oropher drops the deer at his feet and considers him. "And what do you want?"
"I am sent across the sea to Middle-Earth," he says.
Oropher lets out an unamused bark of laughter. "No one sails to Middle-Earth from here," he said. "Believe me, I've tried."
"Nevertheless, some few of us are to be sent," Olórin says. "To combat the schemes of the Enemy."
"Good luck with that," Oropher says.
"I seem to be collecting advice," Olórin says. "Would you have any to give me?"
"Yes," Oropher says immediately. "The worst thing you can do is assemble an enormous army, march it out onto a flat plain, and make a frontal assault on Sauron's forces. Like some high and mighty kings of the Noldor we won't name."
Olórin has heard the rumor that Gil-galad and Oropher had to be separated from each other in the Halls of Mandos after having a screaming match that devolved into a brawl. He is beginning to suspect that the rumor is entirely true.
"He's too powerful for that," Oropher says bluntly. "All you'll do is get yourself killed. I hear Gil-galad got himself set on fire. Really shows his grasp of military strategy there. No, the way to do it is to take a small force, just a few men, sneak up on him, and stab him in the back."
"Assuming that he has a back to stab," Olórin says, but Oropher waves a hand to dismiss the problem of stabbing non-corporeal persons between the shoulder blades as the least significant obstacle.
"Don't march out in a horde he could see coming from the other side of the mountains. Take a few people and go quietly. That's how Luthien did it, but these days no one remembers more than that she was beautiful and that Beren lost his mind over her. They don't sing about how she was a conniving bitch who made Sauron cry for his mother. Not that he had a mother." His tone is entirely admiring.
"I will keep that in mind," Olórin says. "Anything else?"
"Don't trust the Noldor. They're a backstabbing lot. If you have to trust anybody, my kinsman Celeborn is sensible enough, although he married one of them. And there's my son, although he's a cautious creature. Or was. It's hard to know now, being dead and forbidden to go back and do anything useful."
"I will try to be useful if I can," Olórin says. "Although I am not sure why I was chosen."
Oropher looks him up and down. "You're scared to go."
"Yes, I am," he admits.
"What's the worst that could happen?"
"I could die in lengthy torment at the Enemy's hands, and wind up so broken in mind and spirit that I am hard-pressed to remember my own name."
There is a momentary pause. "True enough," Oropher grants.
"I expect that will not happen," Olórin says, but he does not feel at all well-armed for the journey ahead.
*****
Nienna's halls are always quiet. Olórin walks until he finds her sitting by her window looking out over the dark sea toward the Door of Night. Behind it Morgoth is imprisoned until the end of time, and unlike Nienna, Olórin cannot bring himself to regret that.
Her skirts spread out around her like night, stars caught in her hem. Olórin kneels at her feet, and her hand rests in his hair. "So, what have you learned?" she asks.
"A great deal about the Rings of Power, and a certain amount about the elf-lords of Middle-Earth. Most of which may not be of any use to me, and some of which I think I would prefer not to have learned at all." He turns his face up to her. "You might have warned me that Celebrimbor was so troubled."
"If you had known how much it would pain him to answer your questions, you would not have asked them," Nienna said. "Dear Olórin. You have learned the lessons of compassion well, but you must also learn its limits. A man must run on a broken leg if his house is afire."
"It is not his house that is aflame," Olórin says.
"Is it not?" Nienna puts her head to one side and looks at him, as if he is missing something obvious. Probably he is.
"I still do not know why I am chosen for this mission," he bursts out, "when there are many among the Maiar with greater power and wisdom. Not to mention greater courage."
"Perhaps because you have thought to ask for advice before you go, rather than trusting that you are wise enough to know everything already," Nienna says.
"I am only asking questions because I know how little I know."
"That was my point," Nienna says.
"I do not want to go."
"You have said so already," Nienna says, not unkindly, like a mother whose child is weeping over a tumble learning to walk. Her dark eyes consider him, compassionate depths of night. "You fear Celebrimbor's fate," she says.
"Yes, Lady. I do."
She strokes his hair. "Celebrimbor had the strength of the Eldar," she says. "You will take the form of a mortal man when you go across the sea, and although you will not age as men do, you will have no more strength of body than a mortal man. You would die long before you endure what he endured."
"That is some comfort. I think."
"It is meant as a comfort. And he is better. For long years he would not leave the Halls of Mandos even after we restored him to living flesh and urged him to go, insisting that he was dead and could not move from his bier. He could have remained there sleeping, as some have chosen before. But he has come back out into the open air, even if he came protesting at every step. Now he walks out with attendants to guide him if he wanders, and takes some pleasure in music and starlight and the beauty of the gardens. He remembers little, and strange fears torment him, and he makes nothing with his hands. But I have hope for him still."
"I am pleased to hear it," Olórin says, although he strongly suspects that Nienna has not entirely given up hope for Morgoth chained in his solitary prison, and is therefore less reassured than he might otherwise be.
She gives him a stern look, as if she follows his thoughts but is forbearing to scold him for them. "Most of all, you must understand that this fate was not something inflicted on him without any choice on his part. He could have been spared this if he had told Sauron what he wanted to know. I should like you to consider why he did not."
"Love, I think," Olórin says slowly. "At least one of the rings he made for someone he loved. And beyond that, he loved his people, and did not want them to suffer at Sauron's hand."
"This is what he chose instead of breaking faith with those he loved," Nienna says. "It was a brave choice, and he does not deserve your pity for it, but your respect and admiration."
"I do respect him," Olórin says. He respects many people, and likes many people, but he is not sure he knows what it is to feel such enduring love. He finds himself wishing for that comfort, like a candle flame he could carry with him into the dark.
"The desire to kindle that flame is a beginning," Nienna says, as if he has spoken aloud. She seems about to say more, but one of her servants comes in upon her words, a swirl of robes and moonlight that resolves itself into a young woman with a kindly face.
"Your pardon, Lady, but Master Celebrimbor says that he desires to speak with Olórin again."
"Go, go," Nienna chides him when he does not move quickly enough for her liking. "If Celebrimbor is asking to speak to anyone, that is a marvel, and we will not keep him waiting."
*****
Celebrimbor is once again sitting under the trees, or perhaps he has not ventured from that spot in all this time. "You asked me of the One Ring," he says without preamble. He speaks hoarsely but quickly, as if the stream of words might dry up at any pause, and Olórin does not interrupt him, sitting down beside him quietly. "It was forged in the Sammath Naur, in Orodruin. Only there can it be unmade. No ordinary fire can destroy it, and no weapon can mar it. "
"I understand," Olórin says.
"No. There is more. He has bound a piece of himself into the Ring, and while it exists …" He falters, his gaze drifting unfocused away from Olórin's face in confusion, and then wrenches it back. "I have to remember," he says raggedly. "You have some measure of power. Can you ..."
Olórin rests a hand on his shoulder to steady him, sharing what strength he can. He aches to spare the man pain, and to tell him there is no need to say more, but he is aware that he is witnessing an act of courage, and must honor that. "Tell me," he says.
Celebrimbor shudders at the words, but he begins speaking again, forcing out the words with an effort. "He has bound his life into the Ring. That's what you do, when you make things. You put pieces of yourself into them, and then those pieces live … even after you don't. But he put … everything into this one creation. While it exists, he cannot truly die. If it is destroyed …"
"He cannot live," Olórin says.
"Yes. Yes." His voice is ragged, his brow damp with sweat.
"I understand. But the One Ring is lost to us. Isildur meant to destroy it, that much I know, but he did not."
"It does not want to be destroyed," Celebrimbor says. "Like all things, it will fight to live."
"Isildur was slain trying to bear it homeward, and that is as much as I know. He is gone from the Halls of Mandos now, gone to wherever men go, and I did not speak with him while he lingered here."
"It betrayed him," Celebrimbor says. "He could not have used it. A mortal man could not bend it to his will. It would destroy him, whether quickly or slowly. An elf lord might be able to use it to master others, but it would master him in the end. If I put it on …" He falters again. "But I couldn't put it on, could I? Because I don't have hands." His hands lie folded in his lap, his long fingers unmarred.
"You would not put it on regardless," Olórin says, as he suspects there is no useful answer to that question. He can't entirely repress the pricking of curiosity. "It was made for one of the Maiar," he goes on slowly. "If it were worn by one of us …"
"You might master him," Celebrimbor says. "I think you might. You might even manage to use the Ring to destroy him. But you would become him."
"Ah," Olórin says, and closes his eyes for a moment.
When he opens them, Celebrimbor is looking at him with knowing eyes, an expression that speaks of a quick wit and generous nature still alive within the prison of his pain and confusion. "Is that what you are truly afraid of?"
"Yes," Olórin says, although he had not understood it until this moment. "I am afraid because I know that once he was … as I am."
"I thought so," Celebrimbor says, and there are depths of pain in the words.
And Celebrimbor was cruelly deceived. Annatar was then already beyond all desire for change or redemption, and Olórin would be glad now to see him scattered on the winds or banished into the outer darkness. And yet some part of Olórin remembers a time before time, when there was no difference between singers and their song, remembers a creature of light who turned as firmly as he away from the disharmonies of Melkor, to sing of order and peace. He cannot say that they were made differently, in the beginning. It would comfort him if he could.
"He chose to become what he is now. And it frightens me to understand that I have the same choice before me." And yet it is a relief to say the words, the thing less frightening when he looks at it than it has been curling unspoken in his heart. "But I suppose that is the lot of all creatures that can speak and understand the difference between good and ill. I can hardly expect to be spared it."
"Choose better," Celebrimbor says.
"I will certainly try."
Celebrimbor nods as if finally satisfied, and then frowns. "There was something I meant to tell you, but I've forgotten now." His frown deepens, and then he flinches as if at horrible and unwelcome memory. "You asked me of the One Ring," he says. "It was forged in the Sammath Naur, in Orodruin. Only there …"
"You have told me already," Olórin says gently.
"Have I?"
"You have. And I will remember your wise advice." He hopes that is true. "Rest now, and think of other things."
Celebrimbor's expression is bleak and all too knowing. "How can I?"
Olórin rests his hand on Celebrimbor's forehead. "All things that were lost may in time be found," he says. "May it be so for you."
"That's very wise," Celebrimbor says.
"It was good advice that was given to me," Olórin says. "And I am grateful for all the advice I have been given." Three good men have done their best to help him. If nothing else, it helps him to believe that among all the sorrow and evil in Middle-Earth, he will find also generous hearts.
Celebrimbor considers him, dark humor alight for a moment in his eyes. "I expect you're going to need all the help you can get."
"I expect that you're right," Olórin says, as if they share a secret, and looks to the east, where the sun will soon be rising over the mountains that shelter them from the wide sea.