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Chapter Text

This is the last Tale of Ereinion Gil-galad,

High King of the Noldor,

Scion of Kings.

A Tale of Love and Loss.

Love, which, like light, only shines truest in the darkest hour.

Chapter Text

    "High King?"

He opened his eyes at the sound of Elrond's voice.

Only then did he remember where he was.
Only then did he begin to feel the wind upon his skin again. He knew again that he stood on the highest balcony, overlooking the lands and the people of Lindon. His hands, which had tightened around the sandstone railings, relaxed. For a moment he stared down, where fog hid what lay in the deep. He walked slowly along the railing as he watched the dense fog over the rocky depths swirl into and out of itself. Only then did his eyes travel and find the ring on his hand. But as quickly as his eyes had looked upon it, did they release it. Where he had gone that he had forgotten where he was, he did not want to remember. Trying to retrace the steps of his mind would lead to a path that would so very suddenly vanish before his feet.

He blinked once, granting the landscape a last lingering gaze before he looked over his shoulder, at his Herald.
Only as he did so did Elrond look up to meet his eyes. On his right cheek was a bruised, purple and red cut that was yet to heal. The blue of his eyes were dark with sorrow. The High King turned his body to face him fully. The Herald was dressed in black, just as he himself was. They, and all of Lindon were in deep mourning.

The hour that lay upon them was dark.

It had only been two nights and a day since the Fall of Eregion. Word of Celebrimbor's passing had reached ears before any soul had returned to the kingdom. The horns of Lindon were sounded the second night and all Elvendom had stood under the tree that had been carved in his remembrance. They sttod together in the dark of the night, each holding a candle. From hig up, it looked like a river of stars. By dawn, all Elven Lords had ridden and sailed to the Kingdom, come to assess the damage that was done to the fallen city... and the danger that, too, was already on its way.

It was not going to be a calm meeting.

    "...they await you, High King." Elrond's voice was steady, but there was a tremble in his eyes as he'd spoken. 

Gil-galad nodded, stands of his dark hair falling over his shoulder as he did. It was all let down, neither tucked behind his ear nor held back by his crown, for he was not wearing it. The sorrow he felt in the wind and in his own heart demanded to be weathered in bareness.

    "Let us go." he said. Elrond nodded and followed his step as he left the balcony and led the way to the King's Council.

    "Echuio i magol lín an i Hîr Vain! Raise your swords for his majesty!"

Silver blades flashed in the shadows of the long and dim hall. The King walked on without halting. The Herald followed close behind him, his eyes following the rays of sun that shone on the King's head each time they passed under a window in the ceiling. 

As they approached, Elrond could see the Elven Lords in their seats. Their words too, were growing louder, with each step he came closer. And the harsher they sounded.

Gil-galad, too began to hear them. He could feel his blood begin to heat with anger, but he knew he'd have to control it. Elrond took a deep breath and closed his eyes before his next step brought him into the light. 
The words of the Elven Lords dies at the sight of Ereinion, who marched across the circular marble floor. Between each seat that sat against the wall was a window that almost touched the ceiling, leaving the elves to under the shadow of the walls.

Elrond stayed behind, his left hand tight around the letter carrier by his hip. He could feel the cut at his cheek sting.

The King took his seat, the seventh among thirteen. Elrond watched as silence reigned and none among them dared to speak, before the last strand of hair on the King's head stood still. Gil-galad, too, kept his eyes low before looked up.

Just as he did, did the first voice raise. 

    "Your Majesty....where are Eregion's survivors?"

He turned is head and looked at them, before spoke: "They have been safely led to a hidden valley not far from the dwarven Kingdom of Khazad-Dûm, where they are being tended to by our kind and the dwarves sent by King Durin."

    "And what of the scrolls in Eregion's library? It guarded age-old secrets of our Smithery. The eldest of secrets!" 


The council erupted into a storm of accusations that flew like the enemies arrows.' Elrond flinched at their sudden rage and lack of understanding. His eyes darted around, always finding the King again. He saw Gil-galad's hand raise to press against his temple as he closed his eyes. At the movement of his head, Elrond, for the blink of an eye, saw the bruise at the King's shoulder blade that hid behind the collar of his garment.

     "...What have I missed?"

Elrond looked to his side and found the kind eyes of Cìrdan, before he felt his comforting hand upon his shoulder.
He tried to speak, but he felt a lump in his throat he could not overcome.
His eyes, which Cìrdan then followed, led to the King, who seemed as if he wasn't there anymore.



Gil-galad drew a deep breath as bright red flame appeared behind his eyes' lids, breaking and reforming in bright and dangerous hues. At the center of the vision lingered a deep black center, flashing, disappearing and reappearing like the blinking eye of a terrible creature, etching its mark into his memory with burning pain. His grip tightened around the arm of the throne. A voice, terrible and thunderous screamed words in a dark tongue only his heart could understand, for it only spoke to fear and terror.
The shouting match that was unfolding in the council sounded like the furthest noise, replaced by the harrowing sound of thousands of feet, stomping the earth and grass beneath their feet, ravaging forest and river, and killing everything in their path.

Cìrdan furrowed his brows, his eyes wandering over the elves before they fixated on Gil-galad. Concern made his gaze linger when he saw the Elven King's eyes restlessly move behind the lids, as if he was was being shown something. Things; Past, present and to come.

He knew because he himself had seen, even felt it to his bones.

    "This is a disaster!" said one of them, "We have lost our strong-point! How will we now be able to wage war against Sauron if the city that made our strongest weapons is no more?"

    "Plenty of Elves have shed their blood and lost their life, trying to save it! Any of it! And there is nothing??"

    "And the rest of the armies," Injected another, "wasting the journey to Mordor, where the evil was not to be found!"

The Herald watched them and felt tears begin to sting in his eyes.
Since it all happened, he hadn't found a way to let himself breathe again. He hadn't found sleep or rest, instead nightmares and flashes of memories that made the left hand he once held his feather with tremble in shock at the haunting sensation of the sword it bore not long ago. Hearing instead the voices of the dead in his wake and his sleep, forced to see remember their lifeless eyes and hear the death's cursed silence infest a once living place. 

    "And what of the treasonist?!"

Very suddenly and quickly all other voices died away. Many, in shock at the implication, sat back down. Both Cìrdan and Elrond gasped at the insult, and took a step backwards, eyes wide in disbelief.

    "This tragedy! This defeat," they spoke,

    "would never had happened if he had not gone behind the King's back to forge in secret with unknown alliances and thereby putting all of Elvenkind at risk! That he shall never be named again, in these halls or outside of them!"

    "Silence!"

the King's voice thundered, bouncing off the walls and resounding up to the high ceiling over their heads. All heads turned to look at him as he suddenly rose and stood tall, towering over the rest of them. He had balled the hand that bore the ring into a trembling fist as his dark eyes now, full of rage, fixated the one who had so mistakenly spoken out of turn.

    "I will have you know that the elf you speak of used his genius to save our kind in its darkest hour! 
Three Rings, bearing forces we only believed to be attainable in Valinor itself, did he craft by his bared hands! Three Rings for his kind, our kind, untouched by the evil that slayed our kin and the rest of middle earth! Three means to vanquish Sauron once and for all! This is the Elven Smith you speak of."



Cìrdan's eyes found Elrond, who, with glassy eyes, held his breath. Rage fired up inside his bones at the careless words. A rage he thought he alone felt so bitterly. Witnessing it in Gil-galad, who had since their return to Lindon seemed unaffected, soothed it so quickly and suddenly and yet, turned it into an intense feeling of loss so unbearable he felt as if trapped underwater, airways filling with choking fluid that would now and forever never let the name of the one he should have saved come off his lips again.

    "Celebrimbor was his name. A son of Fëanor... one of our best and most cunning. None among you!" he exclaimed, his voice growing louder ang angrier with every word,

    "Will dare sully His name in his death!"

The King's last word echoed on and complete silence followed. But in Elrond's ears the last word grew louder. In the end, a single tear fell from his eye, before he turned his back to them and left.

Gil-galad's eyes shifted and only found Elrond's back before he disappeared into the hallway, his steps echoing only faintly, before he heard them no more.

He exhaled as shuddered breath,

before he reached the flower's stem, gently pulling at it until he heard it snap off. He knelt in a field of grass, the cloak of his black garments draped over the blades of grass, gathering flowers not faraway from the tree statues. The forest was without sound, and the setting of the sun had blued the sky, making the airs hues turn cold.

Silently, he picked the white Chrysanthemums that grew by the roots of an old tree. Seven were gathered and an held in his right hand, when he saw a drop of water fall upon the white petals of the eight, in his other. But there was no rain... the tear belonged to him. 

Elrond looked at it for a long moment, before he sniffed, transferring the blossom to the others he had picked. Another fell from the tip of his nose. He plucked one more before he slowly rose to his feet. Silently, he walked away, taking to direct path towards the carved statues.

He paid no attention to his surroundings and only looked up when he arrived at the feet of his statue.
His tearful eyes rose to meet the wooden face of a friend. A tear rolled off his cheek when he finally saw it. 
The night before during the burial ceremony was a blur to him. He did not know whether he'd cried. 

But what he did remember was his shame.
His confusion.
And his guilt. 

He remembered he had never lifted his head to look up, to see. He did not understand why all there ever was too see when he looked up...

...were the things that he lost. 

His eyes wandered over the details of the statue's face, stayed until the made him remember his friend's smile. He looked away quickly, two tears falling as he did. He exhaled, lowering himself onto his knees before he laid down the flowers.

He bit his lip, before he wiped away the tears with the edge of his sleeve.

    "...It will begin to hurt less in time." 


Elrond's eyes shifted to his left, before he turned his head only slightly, 
finding Gil-galad. His brown eyes were focused and mysterious, as they always seemed. Still, he sensed a genuine care behind them. Never had he seen those eyes shed a tear.

     "...Not this time."
Elrond whispered, before he turned his gaze back to the flowers.

The wound of this loss would not heal this once.



Gil-galad lowered his eyes for an instant, feeling the Herald's words cut deeper than he may have wanted them to.
For they were not his own, they belonged to all Elvenkind.

He then looked out into the sky, where somber clouds approached, bringing the darkness of the night.
Only did he pray the ones that were coming for all of Middle Earth would depart like these would...in the morning.

Without another word, he left Elrond's side.

Chapter Text

    Sound was what first found him in his dream.


It were the murmurs of the West Wind. He listened as it blew, combing through the tree's crowns... as he had many times before. Under sun and moon, under day and night, as he'd stood on the old hills of Ossiriand.

    It was how he knew its sound had grown strange with the howl of sorrow. 

Its lament made him open his eyes. 

A grey and faded sky reigned above him. Cloudless, without a celestial body in sight... no longer as he remembered it. 
Only then did he sense the sudden cold rising up against his back. Slowly he rose from it, to find he'd awoken on a table forged of stone. It seemed to him now, alike the strangest realization, that he'd lain on it for what had to have been an eternity. It stood alone, on a desolate cliff East of the golden forest. In the distance, he could see the glowing crown of the High Tree bending to the wind. He then looked on. As his eyes shifted, they found the eerily still waters of the Lhûn, devoid of the deep blue hue and shimmer it once held.

His eyes travelled over the body of water, finding familiar pieces of hill and land surrounding it. Just like the sky, the forest, too, had lost all its color, down to the blades of grass. And as he looked further, it soon became clear to him that it was Lindon he was looking upon. The wind in his back suddenly grew stronger, sharp, and cold against his skin. Leaves that drifted by in the breeze, carried by it, caught his eye.

    All of them welted and dry...dying.

Until now, he had formed nor thought or word. But emotion was present. And though it, the strangest feeling of distant sorrow, nested deep inside him, it never broke surface. Somehow, he felt that it couldn't, that it was too late. And he knew not why.

In this place, it seemed as if time itself no longer was.

    The wind was lamenting every dying thing. He listened not only with his ears but with heart, and he felt it so deeply a tear trailed down his cheek. The drop fell onto his hand. Only then he looked down, and felt that the grip of what must once have been a spear had rested in his hands ever since he'd awoken. 

Dazed, he stared at it and at his hands and wondered why all this time he hadn't felt it between his fingers. In that moment, like the lowest whisper, the wind uttered his name. As if destined, his eyes found the beginning a scar, in the middle of his thumb. He shifted his wrists, slowly, almost cautiously turning his hands to open towards the sky. 
The wind grew more vigorous, howling as if it was crying out in pain. And there, suddenly, and out of nothing, dread sprung inside his chest as his hands suddenly moved by themselves. His grip loosened, his palms opened and with eyes that slowly grew wide, he perceived a river of scars on them. The broken piece of weapon fell from his trembling hands and landed in the dead grass. The West Winds released a haunting howl as it blew forth with it a hundred dead leaves, falling forward like tears.

All that remained was the terrible sight of his hands, riddled by mottled, deep wounds...

...burned by terrible fire.

    He awoke in the depths of night as he rose from his bed, breathless. His eyes scoured through the darkness of his chambers, until he found the gentle light of the moon seeping in through the window. Only then, when he truly knew he was no longer dreaming, did he remember he could breathe. So he drew breath, closing his eyes as he did, placing his hand over his heart to feel its restless beat.

He exhaled. And as he heard his breath escape him, his ears continued to listen...and they found silence. The quiet that surrounded him grew pregnant with the sound of the wind outside, blowing over the treetops and drifting between every tree that stood. Every thing but him seemed at rest. 

His eyes fluttered open... and found his hands. 
He looked at them under the silver streaks of moonlight. He found no wound, no scar...

    ...only the golden sheen of the ring on his finger.

Gil-galad stood by the rails of the terrace, looking out onto the distant shadows of the blue mountains, their usual blue color almost black in the night. The light of a thousand stars faintly glowed in the dark heaven, but his eyes did not seek out their light. Strands of his long, dark hair blew in the gentle breeze. His eyes wandered from the yonder to his hands that rested on the sandstone rails, to at last end back on the ring around his finger.

    Vilya.

The sapphire jewel reflected its mysterious blue sheen back to him. It made him remember Elrond's words at the High Tree in that moment...and the decision he'd made to dismiss them. 
At that moment, he knew he'd had no choice but to use them. 

The ring had revealed many things to him... entrusted him with the unknowable, and things yet to pass. They all revealed themselves to be the truth, though most of them, he felt, were never meant for him to know. It was there, then, that he began to feel its weight. Slowly, one ring after the other parted from his hands as the weight grew...until only one remained. Until now, for a reason he now no longer understood, he had trusted that the ring was free of Sauron's wicked hands.

But that trust... was no longer.
Yet and still, for the sake of Elvenkind, it had to remain on his hand...no matter the toll it was taking on him. No matter the cost, even if deep within him, he knew it could mean his undoing. His eyes watched its mysterious blue glow dance under the moonlight as he moved his finger. The nightly breeze grew stronger, and as he heard its sound, it called his gaze back to the blue mountains, black in the night.

    Seemingly so far away... when they truly weren't.

    "...Ereinion."

The sound of Círdan's voice resounded out of seemingly nowhere. Gil-galad turned to look over his shoulder. He found him standing off to his left, in the shadow. Gil-galad stood there, before him, in his nightly robe and his hair let down, falling over his shoulder and along the sides of his face. Círdan caught the shadows his features cast over his face under the faint moonlight, shadows that could have only been drawn by dark thoughts.

    "Why do you stand awake in the deep of the night?" 

He met the peaceful blue eyes of the old elf, even if he held his gaze for only a moment. Almost pained, he turned away from him and closed his eyes. The question demanded a sincerity and vulnerability he felt he could not honor.

Círdan felt his breath catch in his chest as he observed him a moment longer. Then Gil-galad heard his almost inaudible steps approach... to then halt right beside him. 

Silence returned. Círdan followed the trail his eyes cast into the dark distance. He asked himself what it was, there in the distance, that caught his eyes, before he spoke.

    "I have seen you many a night before keeping watch over this kingdom." His eyes wandered back to Ereinion, who still had not said a word.

    "For some reason I assumed you would change your mind and rest... after fighting a war."

    "I fought a battle." He corrected him. "The war... is still on its way."


Círdan, waiting for him to meet his eyes, observed him. When Gil-galad remained immobile, he hummed gently, remembering the many times he'd refused before. Strange, how far away the memory of the fatherless boy sent into his care suddenly seemed, almost as far away as the mountains.

And yet, they were as visible as the undrying river blood ran over the map of time. Traces the past left on the present like the haunting presence of a familiar long gone... or so it seemed. As the oldest being among the young, it was his constant companion. Círdan felt it, always.... especially next to him.

    "I too, have not slept for some time now." he admitted, his tone suddenly more serious.

For the first time, Gil-galad shifted his eyes to the elder. This time, Círdan was the one who did not meet his eyes.

    "Things have woken me in the deepest hour of the night... and they have kept me awake." he continued,

    "The likes I have not seen before." 

Gil-galad remained silent. Upon hearing those words, he felt the weight on his shoulders ever so lighten. It was not he alone who was being shown and entrusted to what otherwise would have remained secrets of time and the universe itself. He shifted the weight of his body off his arms and straightened his body, lifting his hands off the rails.

    "I saw what happened at the meeting of Lords in the council today." Círdan changed the subject.

Gil-galad exhaled.

    "I was there." the old elf continued. "...Elrond seemed most hurt by the words that were raised against Celebrimbor."

    "...Yes," Gil-galad crooned, "He will need time. He has lost a dear friend. Someone who was close to his father... and mother."

    "...I saw you, too."

Gil-galad fell silent again... felt his chest tighten at Círdan's words. His old guardian raised his eyes to meet his own after a long moment of silence had passed.

    "How did you know to send troupes East of Eriador?" he inquired. "Not a soul could have known orcs were roaming those lands."

The king felt an almost asphyxiating heaviness widen in his chest at the memory of the visions that overcame him in the council. Remembering all the force they cost him. Stirred, he shifted within himself, pulling the hand that bore the ring out of sight, under the shadow of the other.

    "You know how I knew." he uttered, casting his gaze out into the distance once more.

Círdan was the one who feel silent in turn, secretly burdened by the confirmation of what he had hoped would not be. He diverted his eyes, then spoke, suddenly grimmer than Gil-galad knew him to be:

    "You should not wear the ring all the time, Ereinion." he said, "We have never encountered a force of magic alike those rings. The effect they will show to bear can easily overwhelm the spirit."

Gil-galad turned to look at him at his words, words that could not hide their concern.

    "...I am strong enough to bear it." he said. 

The elder held his gaze, unable to keep himself from searching his eyes. Eyes that had learnt to hide what the soul left unsaid. And yet, still, as they stood there on the terrace, and as the nightly wind whispered a soft lullaby, he remembered that they were not there alone. Right between them stood the haunting ghost of the past. Memories so strong they sometimes grabbed a hold of the present.

And in that moment, he saw two people at once.

He turned away one last time, a sudden sadness overcoming him.

    “Morning is still far away.” he said, his voice barely above a whisper. “The nights seem so much longer, here in Lindon.”

    “...Dark skies must fade,” Ereinion responded as he stared on into the black night, his tone suddenly colder than it had been before.

   “.... Yes," the old elf said after a beat,

   "They must.” 

He watched Círdan leave his side without another word, his gaze upon him lingering as he watched the deep blue fabric of his robe swaying in the wind before it disappeared back into the darkness, with him.

    And almost like a dam breaking under the pressure of water, he felt the dread he'd held back suddenly break free and befall him like a flood. His eyes fluttered shut as he was overcome by the cold sensation, claiming every inch of his body, up into his fingertips. His trembling hand, bearing the ring, rushed up against his stomach, where he could feel the dread twisting in his gut. It cut his breath. 
He knew he had lied. He knew he should have told Círdan about the dream. 
But something had stopped him. 
Something deep inside of him, something he loathed and wanted to part from in a moment like this one, long ago, made him hold back. It was another kind of fear than the one he was feeling now. He could never show a wound.

And the dream had wounded him. He knew it had come to him to tell him of something. But it was something he knew he was not ready to know. In him bled a wound, a cut... and the heavens above him had wielded the knife.

    He lifted his eyes for the first time in that long night, finally finding the sea of stars that reigned above him. There, between him and them, caught in the distance, rested the secrets, and wishes he had entrusted them with. Wishes he would never utter to another soul were held in the distant beams of light, many among the unending. In all his life he'd learned the skies and come to know each star, remembering each one he had whispered to and wished upon.
This night, he felt as if there were none left for him to bare his soul to... so his eyes sought out the brightest among them. 

And then his lips parted, murmuring a most intimate and inaudible wish before he lowered his gaze and turned away.

As Ereinion walked away, the star he had wished upon began to radiate ever so brighter, almost as if it had heard him and was now calling out to him... as if it itself wanted to return a wish. 
Then suddenly at its brightest moment, its white light extinguished in the distance,

          vanishing out of the night sky.

Ereinion stood beside the High Tree, right at the mouth of the waterfall. There, he looked down, letting his eyes follow the water pouring into the depths to end at the bottom, where it merged with the waters of the Lhûn.

    Silence reigned still, for the night had only begun to fade... and every thing that lay still under the nightly spell of slumber was yet to wake. Every thing but him.

It was only he that stood awake in the night. A night, which unlike those before had grown most unfamiliar. The once comforting silence among the tall trees, a silence which had been his companion countless nights before, had suddenly turned deafening with dread. 

It was not because he found himself alone. He had welcomed the night at every setting of the sun. The night and the dark had been his solace... the solitude, a gift. In her, he'd awaited the first rays of sunlight, before another set of eyes perceived them, and welcomed the warmth of the sun over his people and his kingdom. With closed eyes he would feel the first beams bestow his crown, and he would utter a prayer of gratitude to the Gods, for another day. 

Now, he stood in the night without a crown, clothed in the deepest garment. Robes of gold and silver seemed far away in the past. He was a King in mourning. Lamenting not only the dead, but the death of an Age. He could feel the East Wind encroaching upon the skies and the lands of Middle-Earth. Raindrops threatened to turn into flakes of ash, and the breeze would carry the choking smell of smoke and rot.

    It was the end of an Age that waited upon the horizon, like a new day.

But this once, he knew not whether he wanted the sun to dawn. 
It meant that he was another day closer to the darkness he perceived at the end of what was to come. His gaze upon the river dived past the fishes and the foliage, halting only to fixate on the mysterious blackness at the bottom, feeling his heart almost twist at the thought of what found itself there. And whether it was what soon awaited him and all of Middle-Earth.

          Darkness.

He lifted his dark eyes to perceive the change of color beginning around him. 
The air was beginning to blue.

    The hour of twilight encroached. The earliest birds were beginning their songs high in the tree crowns, between the branches, intoning mystical melodies that thickened the very air with magic. It was the blue hour in which the veils that kept worlds apart wore thinnest, the hour of the dream realm. The solemn road that let the paths of Gods and Mortals touch... 

... between the Moon and the Sun.

Buried within himself, the sudden feeling of a flake befalling his skin like rain pulled him out of his mind. His eyes shifted to his right hand, upon which he had felt it fall. He untangled it from the other and raised it for his eyes to see clearly. But there was nothing. Just as he was about to lower it again, the sensation of another on his thenar withheld his gaze. The King's breath caught in his throat as the sensation suddenly spread across the entire back of his hand. Bewilderment overcame him as he felt it begin at the fingertips of his other hand, spreading to his arms... only to end at the last inch of his body. A shiver ran down his spine as he slowly raised his eyes to the sky, only to see that nothing alike was falling from the heavens.

Suddenly the wind picked up, blowing stronger than it had before throughout the night. He followed its current with his eyes, watching as it combed through the trees before it passed him, brushing past his ears like a whisper. Its unexpected warmth touched his face alike a kiss, and as his eyes fluttered shut, he felt his heart's beat tremble.

    In that moment he knew not how or why, but in his bones he knew it was the earth beneath his feet that had drawn breath. 

      Then, She, too drew breath for the first time.

      She felt the breeze's kiss upon her skin as the dark earth sunk beneath her feet,

      felt life throb in her fingertips and smelled air with Gardenia's scent sweet',

      to with a tearing eye look up at the last stars in the sky,

      before she knew her heart's first beat.

      And in that moment as the tear rolled from her cheek,

      she knew sorrow as she knew joy,

      for she remembered what her heart had come to seek.

     
      Love.

    As her lips parted, her heart, broken and mended at once, they brought forth an orison she whispered for none but the Valar to hear. 


The King heard a hum erupt from not afar, harkened a melody that raised the hairs on his skin and stopped the very beat of his heart, for the shiver it sent through him travelled to the marrow of his bones. 
Turning his head, he shifted his entire body to the waiting mouth of the forest.

    It was the voice of a woman coming from the heart of the forest, humming a tune alike no lamentation or solemnization he had heard before. A vibration graced the atmosphere that seemed to have stopped time itself. Everything else around him fell silent, as if bowing to the same spell.

With a trembling heart, he took the first step into the forest, surrendering to her otherworldly song. Following the sound of her voice, he soon walked among a sea of fairy flowers, his black garment brushing against their blue petals as the earth silenced his steps. The closer he came, the stronger he began to feel an indescribable feeling of profound elation... and inconsolable sorrow.

    She opened her eyes to see the last star in the night sky fade out. 
With it, she bid farewell to what had been her home since the earliest Age. 

In her birth and death, she had been granted her wish. 
Whatever was to come, ardor and desolation, she was willing... for love was now within her reach. Her hands caressed the fragile veins of a maple leaf, as red as blood. Her dark brown eyes lifted to the heavens one last time, before she began her walk. The hem of her dress brushed over the dewy blades of grass as she traversed the sea of flowers, blue as the Mid-heavens were themselves. She halted in a clearing where the trees' crowns parted, revealing the pale moon. 


Nanwen. 

The moment she lifted her eyes, 

His found her in the clearing. And he froze at the sight of her. 

An otherworldly being.
She looked out into the distance, up at the moon, with eyes full of longing. 

Her hair fell past her shoulder in black curls. 
Her skin, brown like fine clay made from rich earth, glistened as if had been adorned by stardust. Her voice, warm as the sun and soft as the kiss of feathers, carried within it a world apart from his. In her hands, she carried three maple leaves the color of blood. 

 
The Elven King, as if bound by a spell, could not look away from her. He stood in the trees' shadows, completely still, afraid he would frighten her. Her song filled him with emotion, stealing his breath as it pierced through the shell he'd wound around his heart, unearthing things he hadn't let himself feel in an eternity, soothing his deepest wounds. He stared at her, asking himself where she had come from... and inexplicably feeling as if he had always waited for her. 

Moved like he had never been before, he lowered his eyes when tears threatened to fall. Somewhere, he wished that he could meet her eyes. And he knew that he would remain there, waiting for an eternity if he had to.

The woman ceased to sing when she sensed the beating of another heart beside her. Her gaze lowered, her eyes filled with emotion. Serenely, she listened to its rhythm... remembering the nights she had yearned to hear it beat again, to hear it with ears and feel it beneath fingers made of flesh and bone. 

      It was the heart she had come to save.

      His heart.

It was just as beautiful as the first time it had found her ears. She turned her head, eyes aglow with tears as she found him closer than she had ever believed possible. 

   
    "Ereinion." 

He heard the snap of a twig. When he looked up, she was right in front of him. 
Looking at him. 

Her cheekbones were high, her full lips the color of rosewood. The bow of her brows was gentle, leading to her almond shaped eyes, underneath which gentle folds drew lines of wisdom. Her eyes, so close to his own, were dark as ebony. Only as he stared into them did he realize that they glistened under the moonlight that bled through the hanging leaves of the Willow they stood under. 

They were filled with a boundless love he had never found in another's eyes. He followed their trail over his face, along the lines of his jaw and the bow of his nose, to the deep ocean of his eyes, and watched her lips quiver before they drew the faintest smile. His eyes trembled with emotion, unwilling to believe that what she held within hers were meant for him. Just as he wanted to divert his eyes, she reached up and molded her hand against his cheek. He startled at the sudden shiver her touch sent through his body, bringing back the sudden memory of a love only his soul had known. A Love that had found him in another life. 

A Love as old as the first hour. 

In an inaudible gasp, his lips parted, and his eyes filled with tears. She looked into them, letting hers say what both knew could not be spoken. 

Dawn was upon them. 
A new day was to begin and yet, their hour was late. 

The words at the tip of his tongue died away, for in her eyes, he found her seeing all he was.

      His bravery, his sorrow. His wishes and dreams...

      And his fears. 

A bittersweet tear trailed across his cheek as he leaned into the warmth of her touch, accepting her unspoken consolation. His breath caught. Then he surrendered, letting another tear unburden his soul. Her thumb, warm against his skin, feathered across his cheek, brushing it away. Overcome, his eyes fluttered shut, and as he found the shadow behind his lids, he hoped that in the darkness he would know warmth... the like of her embrace. He felt the sudden pull of magic in the air, felt the threads of fate begin to weave themselves around them, finding himself not only between day and night, but between earth and heaven. 


Wishing for the sun to stay away. 

But just as he did, the snapping of a twig forced him to open his eyes. 
And where she had stood, she was no more. Gutted, as if he had woken from a dream before its last hour, he turned, looking out into every direction. But she was not there.

A tear fell from his eye, as he found himself alone.
Wondering whether he had dreamt a dream. 

Chapter Text

Lómë fuinë, eleni ú-vanwa,

aina undómë,

ar melmë nainyanya.

Dark night and starry Skies, 

Blessed twilight,

for love's become my birthright.

Chapter Text

He'd leapt through the woods, never lifting his gaze. Frantically, he bent leaves and branches out of his path as he held back his breath, for it seemed each he'd draw anew would deepen the pain that weighed down his heart... and threaten to bring him to his knees. So he walked, almost fled from what only he knew to fear. And in all the time he had walked, the sounds of snapping twigs and dead leaves crumpling under his feet had seemed the only sounds in the world. 


In truth, they were the only sounds that he wanted, could bear to hear. 

He knew not where he walked to, his feet seemed guided by nothing but dread. Soon the twigs bent and snapped until they didn't, and the sound of crushing leaves beneath his steps ceased.

Only a moment after, tall blades of grass began to brush up against his knees. Then, as he continued on, gentle fibres began to feather against his fingertips.
A gust of wind, blowing against him, found his skin. Cold against his face, he felt the current embrace him, felt it slow his steps.
In that moment, as if it had whispered a soothing word for only him to hear, he felt what had been brewing inside him shift... and the weight on his heart lighten.

Solely then did he allow himself to breathe.
The Prince drew in a deep breath, startling himself as he air entered him in a shudder. He held it in his chest, kept it there to keep from feeling his heart bleed just underneath.

In an instant, the lids lifted from over his eyes... to reveal them glistening with tears. 




He was alone.


Far out, upon raised ground, where a scarlet maple tree bloomed in the midst of a golden field of wheat that stretched into the distance. The sky above him, replete with clouds, held back the rays of the sun. In his ears, the rustling of a thousand leaves sounded as the wind combed through the high crowns of trees that were now long behind him.

Just as lay behind Balar's haven. 
He felt the wind in his back... still heard Círdan's voice echoing in his ears.

Uttering words he could never forget.

"Turgon," Cirdan's voice faltered as he began his speech upon the hill,

"Ruler of Gar Thurion,", his eyes wandered over the sea of elves that looked up at him. 

He remembered looking up at him. Remembered how, at the Shipwright's words, an unnatural stillness spread in his chest like mist creeping over land. 

"King," Círdan spoke,  finding Ereinion's eyes among the many as  the word parted from his tongue.

"Over the City of Seven Names..."

" is dead."



His dark eyes, the picture of his father's, lowered in sorrow.
They found the fabric of his garment, black against the golden wheat that surrounded him. As he was reminded of the reason he bore them, a tear, robbed of its warmth by the cold wind, trailed down his cheek.
How they marked him, in the refuge, among all others.


Orphaned.


Death had claimed peoples and kingdoms all through his lifetime. 
But something had changed. 

Very suddenly and coldly had he found it risen over him, engulfing him like a shadow... and claiming, as all already seemed lost, what he thought one could never lose.

A Mother.

The curse of Death had befallen his bloodline, ended his father and father's brother. 
And the Prince felt that, in what awaited him, it sought him out for last.

His teary eyes lifted again, watching a solitary raven cross the heaven.

It was the day before his coronation.
At the rise of the next Sun, the life he had known, the safety and hope he had harboured in the shadow of his elders, would be no more.

He would be King over a nation in its darkest hour. 
His eyes were to see akin the eyes of a hawk, far where no other could, to find the Sun and return its light and warmth over the Elves.

But he could not see it. 

And it frightened him.

Ereinion raised his trembling hand over his heart, closing his eyes to murmur a prayer to the Gods, to be carried to the Heavens by the wind. As the words freed themselves from his tongue, the Prince felt the burden lift from his body...and weariness claim him. 

When he lowered himself onto the ground and his eyes stared ahead into the sky as the blades of wheat bowed in and out of his periphery, slumber claimed him.

He dreamt a dream, 

that as he slept he felt a presence beside him, right in the field where he laid . The sensation of a hand taking a hold of his hand and another gently placing itself over his heart.  

Then a warmth so gentle engulf him, it could only have radiated off another's being. Growing closer and closer, until it settled beside his face. Under his closed lids, he shifted his eyes its way as he thought hearing a whisper under the guise of the current. 

... And then a kiss as warm as sun-rays against his cheek, feeling the spirit of a love fill him to the tips of his fingers.

He awoke thereafter, a tear falling from his eye as he sat up,

finding himself under a sky darker than he remembered.  The Sky was turning, night was coming. He looked down at his hands, folding them into themselves before opening them again, wondering how a dream could have felt to true. 

If something in the ether had heard him.

But as he remembered that the heavenly bodies had not stopped themselves in the sky next to the other, had not stopped time... the hope he'd awoken with vanished. 

And he decided to believe, for his best, that it must have been the wind.

Chapter Text

A Elbereth Gilthoniel,
Bân I Dôl Vîn!

Le linnon i galad lín,
ar prestathon i 'lass lín,
an lastad i nawed nín.

Pedin naneth nín,
pedin galadh nín.

Gwaith nín dant Anar ,
madant dad i Aear.

A adel laer i neth nín tôl,
min aran i chaered hain boe nin no.

Anno nin bellas,
anno nin hen,

An hirad i galad aerlîn.

O Elbereth Star-kindler,

Queen of the Night Sky!

I invoke Your Light, and petition Your grace,
to hear my orphan cry.

I have lost my Mother, I have lost my Tree.
My people lost the Sun, fled crossing Sea,

And ‘fore the summer of my Youth has come
In the morning their King I must become.

Grant me Strength
Give me Might

To find again the Sacred Light.

Chapter Text

The King had stayed behind in the Willow's shade, staring out into the trees' midst... where she'd stood only a moment ago, afore she'd vanished before his very eyes. 

His eyes darted back and forth as he remained there, unable to breathe due to the strange and novel weight he felt in his chest. He knew not how long he'd stood there, questioning what his eyes had perceived... hoping for something he could not voice. 

It was the bright song of a Nightingale that startled him out of his trance. His teary eyes lifted into the tree's crown, where the winged creature, strangely still, stared at him through the foliage.

As if it, too, had seen what had transpired. 

Gil-galad then caught a beam of sunlight find the branch it sat on, before it, too, departed. His eyes followed the flapping of its wings as it took off, soaring higher and further away, until it passed the tree-tops.

Only then did his gaze fall. And when it did, it found a solitary maple leaf lying among the bluebells, of a hue as pure and deep as blood. He fixated it for a moment, feeling the tips of his fingers itch with a strange curiosity, before he lowered himself to the ground, where he picked it up by its stem. 

... he believed to have seen one just like it among many, within her grasp. 
He turned it over, holding onto it as if he could still feel the warmth of her hands on it. Then, in a swift but careful movement, he tucked it away in a fold of his garment... before he rose up again. A-last, he turned to look over his shoulder at the small clearing amidst the trees.

The sun had returned over the Kingdom of the Elves.

By its light, it had dawned a strange morning.

Elrond awoke when beams of sunlight hit his face.
When his eyes fluttered open, he turned his head to look around his chamber.

He was alone.

The Herald sat up slowly, propping himself up on his hands as he listened to the outer world. Everything, even the wind, was still. The only noise he heard was the one in his mind.

He was up not soon after, dressed and with a scroll under his arm, journeying through the forest. Wordlessly had he greeted the archivists carrying books and scrolls to the library, cutting their meeting gazes when they lasted too long. 
Keeping his eyes close to the ground... ever since the burial.

The world around him had lost its colour ever since Eregion fell. The lively sound of the people had faded into the background. The crumbling stone of the city's towers still filled his ears in his wake and sleep. He had passed by the guards without acknowledging them, just as he had passed by the servants. He was in another place in his mind, so far away he had not seen any of them.

Elrond now walked the path to the Golden Tree. 
As he took the corner, he could see the High-King standing beside the High Tree, looking up at the clouds as they stretched into the distant sky.

The King had made his journey back to his chambers after the sun had risen. He'd walked through the trees, and as he'd walked, observed each passing thing. It now seemed everything he'd known as the back of his hand had ever so gently shifted, transforming the path he had taken into a novel road, walked anew by someone who, too, was no longer the same. He turned a last time to look back at the clearing over his shoulder, now far away. In his ears, he could still hear her voice, saying his name. 
He then crossed the threshold, taking the road to the palace as he felt the wind's breath in his back.

Silently he entered, keeping his gaze low as he passed guards and servants in fear that they'd see the story his eyes told, even if he didn't want them to. His hands gently pushed the doors of his chambers shut. Then he turned to look about the room. Only as he found the disheveled sheets of his bed did he recall how this long night had begun with a nightmare. He stepped up to his window. But he did not look out: he reached into the fold of his garment to unearth the foliage he had picked up. He stared down at it, turned the leaf at its stem under the sunlight: Touched by only by her... and now his hands.

As his eyes followed its veins, he recalled the way her eyes had wandered over his face... and the way she'd seemed to know him.

Elrond ascended the stone cases, coming to a halt a short distance behind the King. Now so close, Elrond felt his brows furrow when he noticed Gil-galad was not wearing his crown, and that his hair was let down. The rumbling and trickling sound of the waterfall seemed to have masked his steps, for he hadn't turned to face him as he would have. He humbly bowed to kneel before his lips parted to greet him.

"High King." the Herald said. 

Gil-galad turned, almost flinched when Elrond's voice broke through the veil of his thoughts. When the same lifted his eyes again, he found his look of surprise, followed by a second of irritation that vanished faster than it had come... before it was replaced with an air of confusion. Immediately, the half-elf tensed up.

The King's stern eyes seemed troubled, and yet gentler than he knew them to be.

"... Elrond." he returned, 
uttering his name as though he'd slipped into another trail of thought before he'd fully acknowledged him. Elrond suddenly felt his breath catch in his throat, caught off guard by his response. He found himself staring at the King, staring at something he not only saw but felt in the air around him. Something he could not name.

He seemed somber, distant. Scattered.

Elrond felt his head tilt ever so slightly as his gaze continued to linger. Yet, before his eyes returned to the ground beneath them, they caught on the vivid red foliage that rested in Gil-galad's hands.

It was the leaf of a maple tree. 

Its sudden apparition and image, scarlet as they stood surrounded by golden leaves, would have imprisoned the attention of any being. But Elrond, its vision suddenly freed from the bewilderment that had befallen him. The Herald then diverted his gaze from the object as quickly as he had found it.

"High-King," he began, nodding gently,

"I... have brought you your speech for the meeting of the Lords." he spoke slowly, as he suddenly found himself weighing every word before it passed his lips.

"It is finished.". 

Gil-galad remained silent, his eyes fixated on the scroll that was tucked under the Herald's arm, ere they wandered away once more. His lips then parted, and he tried to find his words, but they escaped him. He felt strange seeing Elrond before him as he'd always had, when no thing no longer seemed what is was. 
Felt strange watching every thing around him continue as it always had, when he, too, no longer was who he'd known a night ago.

"...You may," he began,

"Depose it on the council's table... thank you." 

Elrond briefly glanced up at him, before he looked at the foliage again. The maple trees were almost in the other half of the woods... a far distance from where the Palace was. His brows furrowed.

Where had it come from? 

He knew the maple trees lied almost in the heart of the forest. Why had he wandered so far?
Elrond rolled his shoulders, eyeing the leaf for as long as he discretely could, only letting his eyes return to the ground when he hear the King say his name.

"High King?" he briefly glanced up at him, trying to keep his brows from creasing.

"You are to go to Imladris." his Majesty responded, "Tend to the wounded and of need. Expand the encampment... into a stronghold."

Elrond, sensing a shock ripple through his entire body, lifted his eyes to Gil-galad. And for a moment that followed, any thought he'd garnered escaped him. 
It was not fear nor resistance he felt... it was confusion. He'd never expected to be entrusted with a task such as this. But as he'd looked up, he'd found the King's dark eyes fixated on him, awaiting  his affirmation.

 “Nai, aran veleth.”  he nodded, rising from his knees. "... I shall go at once."

They silently looked at one another, Elrond's eyes lingering longer than the King's did, before the Herald quickly bowed and began his way back. Then, too, Ereinion turned away, his eyes returning to the leaf he held in his hands. And his mind and heart, wondering, searching for someone to confide in.

As Elrond passed the stairs, he stopped at the verge of the forest, his heart heavy with a question he himself did not know. He turned a last time to look over his shoulder, at Gil-galad's solitary figure beside the tree. Recalling the image of the leaf he held, before he walked away.

Círdan stared out of the council's elongated window, his hands folded behind his back. 
He hadn't been in Lindon for a long time. Finding a sea of vivid leaves instead of the far-stretching waters of the Lhûn was a view he never thought he'd missed. Here, beside tall shelves full of old books, beside Ereinion, he felt strangely at peace. 

Absent mindedly, the tips of his fingers brushed over the rough carvings of a dust jacket, when he suddenly felt a presence in his back. When he turned to face them, he found his son.

"Ereinion?" 

The King lifted his eyes to meet the ones of his elder.  

"Why are you here?" Círdan asked.

Gil-galad did not respond, only stepped into the room. Slowly, he approached... with a strangeness in his eyes the shipwright witnessed for the first time. 

Ereinion felt his heart race as he halted in the middle of the room, biting his words even though he did not  have them ready. Deciding if he was to admit to something he knew not to have truly transpired. Seeing her image in his mind, feeling her warmth still upon his skin as he prolonged the moment,
now, strangely in doubt.

"Last night..." he began,  

Círdan's brows furrowed. He put down the book in his hand, then slowly approached. Ereinion looked at him for a beat, catching a glint in his old, blue eyes, before he diverted his own. 

"What did you see?"

He once more did not respond, which made the old elf inch closer, until he was right before him. 

“....the stars…” .

“What about the stars?” the shipwright attempted to catch his son's eyes.

Gil-galad fell silent, seeming as if the words upon his tongue disappeared by his trailing thoughts. Círdan felt his brows crease further at Ereinion's familiar, yet strange image. He bore not his crown, nor his golden robes. The garments upon his body were the same with which he'd stood waking in the night. And in the way his dark eyes stared, it seemed they had witnessed something unseen in all the ages they had perceived before.  Círdan began to circle him, looking him over from the top of his head to his feet. The elf straightened his back and lowered his eyes, feeling his heart, which lied underneath the leaf he'd tucked away in his garment, quicken with Círdan's eyes on him. The old shipwright, silent after having observed him for a long time, suddenly spoke:

“...The look you bear in your eyes,”

Gil-galad stiffened upon hearing his words, realizing that his eyes had already betrayed him, already transmitted what he wanted to hide away. Círdan grew silent for a moment, realizing that the King hadn't come to speak to him of what he'd expected... even hoped for. No, it was a novel, mysterious thing. 

“.. it's as if the night's stars stared back at you.” 

As Gil-galad's eyes found his keeper, the same one's eyes narrowed onto Vilya, the ring on his finger. He followed his eyes onto his own hand. Instinctively, he placed his bare hand in front of it. Suddenly, he felt his heart recoil in trepidation, realizing that he was not ready nor willing to bear what was upon his mind or his heart. 

"I must go." he whispered, withdrawing with a step.

Círdan watched him leave almost as quickly as he had come. 

Elrond stood upon a hill, looking out over the people gathered in the valley.

A gentle breeze blew.  He watched the children hurry past the soldiers and tents to each get an apple from the carriage full of sustenance the dwarves had ridden here.

"What is on your mind, commander Elrond?"


He looked to his left and found Arondir gifting him a kind, knowing smile.

"... Nothing that I can say," the Herald said dourly, lowering his eyes, "not at the moment."

Silence lingered between them for a while and both listened to the wind, when Elrond suddenly lowered himself onto his knees and dug his fingers into the dark earth.

    "Lord Celebrimbor," he tilted his head in curiosity, watching the smith heap dark earth into his hand "what are you doing?"

He watched a grin appear on the elf's lips as he rose up from his knees. "Do you know what building truly means, Elrond?"

They stood on the grounds destined for Eregion's new forge, surrounded by working dwarves and elves. 

    "Healing." Elrond, who had been distracted, looking up at the sun through the tower's wooden frame that erected itself towards the clouds, looked at Celebrimbor.

    "Borrowing the ancient materials of the earth to build is alike a ritual of thanksgiving and honouring; Every time you touch, shape and use whatever of this earth finds itself between your fingers, it shapes you, the creator, in turn."

    "You must surrender to the wills of the material - listen to feel it. It becomes something spiritual." Celebrimbor smiled, drifting his thumb through the heap of dirt. Elrond watched in humble wonder.

    "Building is healing."

"All I know is that we have been tasked with transforming this refuge into something new," he uttered, his thumb drifting through the earth just as Celebrimbor's did,

"Build it." he said, as he felt his eyes fill with tears.

"... Do so we must."

Chapter Text

Alassëa nar i melir i cala lómëo ; Aistana nar i melinwë i elenion.

"Fortunate are those who revere the night lights;

Blessed are the ones who in turn are loved by the stars."

She was in the eternal.

In the boundless Oversky.

There, Varda witnessed the happening of the earth through the ears of her children. 
The Calafëa, with closed eyes, listened for the voices of mortals resounding like whispers trough the first realm...

...for only at night were they granted the sight to look upon the world and its creatures.

Then it was, on a day cold clouds walked a faded sky that she heard a whisper apart from all others. 

Echo did the forlorn prayer of an elven boy, orphaned at the eve of his youth. Motherless, calling out to the Great Mother as he, in fear, awaited the dawn of his Kingship, for it would dawn under a sky devoid of the Sun, over a people in the shadows of war and ruin.
Immeasurable grief were bound not only in his words but in his heart. So much that she, an eternal being without body nor heart, sensed their weight.

And yet, within the darkness that imprisoned his heart... she found courage, the measure of a hundred noble men, persevering in defiance.

In that moment, Arwafëa, afloat in the unending celestial tapestry among countless other beings of light, defied the laws of the Valar to cast her eyes upon the soul that had enraptured her.

As she opened them, she found herself in the midst of a golden field of wheat that stretched far out into the distance. Upon raised ground, where a scarlet acorn tree bloomed.

... Only mere feet from him. 

Dressed in white she stood, before him and yet invisible to his eyes, as he stood robed in black. 

And when she laid eyes upon his face,

he was the most beautiful being she'd ever beheld. 

She watched him slowly raise his hand over his heart as he entrusted his whispered prayer to the wind; A wind which was to go forth, further than he himself could, into the sombre sky above them.
Arwafëa felt her eyes tear at the sight of him... for she could see his future on the horizon. 

They were devoid of shadow. 
She foresaw a King who in himself carried an ardent flame, the likeness of the most radiant Sun of the Age.

"Ereinion, son of Kings. Son of Stars." she uttered as she watched the tear trail from his eye,

"The Heavens have heard you..." 

His gaze rose, coming to stare right into her eyes.

"... I have heard you." 


As the words freed themselves from her tongue, the Prince felt the burden lift from his soul.
The weariness he'd veiled behind his bravery surfaced: She watched exhaustion claim him. He lowered himself onto the earth he stood upon, his eyes staring into the sky as blades of wheat bowed in and out of his periphery.

When he closed his eyes and slumber claimed him, she approached to kneel beside him. As he slept and she admired his beautiful features, she wished for a heart to feel what she knew within herself.

It may have been the first time she beheld him, yet not the first instance she'd known the soul before her.
Gazing into his eyes had awoken a memory as old as the first hour, as ancient as the darkness from which the Valar bore the Moon and the Sun... and began the Earth.

So old was her loving him.

And love him she would forevermore, until the last light in the unending Heaven extinguished.

Borrowing the wind, she moved to lay her hand upon his heart. With the other, she took a hold of his hand. Slowly did she inch closer, turning the air warm and sweet, until her face was beside his.

"Never shall you walk alone," she whispered.

"for I have found an earthly star to admire from the Heavens." she bowed her head to plant a kiss of consolation and devotion to his cheek. And as her lips touched his skin through the wind, they caught a tear which trailed from his eye.

Upon the arrival of night, she vanished.

Chapter Text

I thought to have climbed the tallest mountain,
I felt to ‘ve crossed the widest sea

A journey past my youth’s fountain,
to quieten the soul’s eternal plea

Just when I’d thought to find it ne’er,
There hope rose up from the horizon

Warm wind across green moss crept near.
A voice then came up nigh to whisper

A tiding, meant for only the heart to hear:

Love is coming.
Love is coming.