A Maze of Games
A Maze of Games
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Series: Folly of Starlight; prequel to "Kilmessi," companion piece to "Bid My Blood to Run."
Synopsis: The last High King lays eyes on the Peredhil for the first time
Pairing(s): Gil-galad/Elrond preslash angst
Rating: PG 13
Not mine, no harm intended, the sheep are lying through their teeth! Thanks to Emma for the beta job.
Comments are always cherished.
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"From the air I see your loneliness
You carry on despite your fear
Inside a box you keep your sanity
And it will never seem clear, to me
Over the hills, the light, it flows
It shows the angels laughing
But where is the love that we're supposed to find?
Lost in a maze of games so very dark and overwhelming
Lost in these thoughts that seem to rule my mind"
- Ra, "Walking and Thinking"
Anor's rays glisten off the white boards beneath my feet, nearly blinding in the heartlessness of their intensity. Our ship cuts through the fickle waves, masterfully coaxed in the correct direction by the Shipwright's steady hand. I stand at the bow, staring out at the emptiness which surrounds us. Behind us lies the recent sanctuary of Tol Morwen, beneath us the watery grave of lands I once walked. Before us is uncertainty and doubt, 'tho I do not voice my concerns to the silver-haired chief of this vessel. He and I have weathered far too many sorrows for me to rob him of the hope he wears like a fine cloak.
Eastward we sail, the wind at our back, our sails full and billowing above our heads. The joyous murmur of the crew hums around us, soft and steady as the bees of summer. They trust their king and his counselor to lead them to a well-deserved safe haven - I am under no such delusion of my own skills and fortunes. All I can say with the surety of my office is that we approach an unfamiliar coast and an equally uncertain reception.
An unruly burst of wind blows my hair into my face. I brush it aside without thinking. I hear a deep chuckle reverberate behind me.
"If the king cannot win the respect of his own hair, how might me win the confidence of those who have never known him as their sovereign?"
A smile rises to my face at that playfully chiding remark. I turn and acknowledge my friend's arrival at my side. It warms me to have Cirdan here, my longtime confidant and counselor, my courage and my wisdom in dark days when I thought hope evaded all this land. I reach out a hand and warmly clasp his shoulder. "I love the feel of the wind in my hair." I feel it most welcome after the stifling monotony of our island prisons, as I have felt them thus. I manage to hold my tongue, knowing it would seem insult to he who loved Balar as if it were a living entity. "It makes me feel - free," I simply say. Free, as I have not been these long years. Yes, I have ever felt as a prisoner - to the restriction of the small landmass, to the haunting legacy of my bloodline, to the wearisome burden of my office.
"I know that feeling well, my friend," the mithril-haired captain says with a sigh and a smile. "It comes to me at moments such as these, when the soft swell of the waves flows through me as the sweetest lullaby."
I cannot help but smile even broader, nodding in understanding even though I cannot pretend to truly comprehend. Cirdan loves the sea like no other, knowing its subtlest moods. He reads the changeable thoughts of the very waves as if they were a plain text open for all to see. He hears and heeds the call of the waves as it is said haunts all of Teleri blood. Although that blood flows in my line, the song escapes my ears. Perhaps I ignore it, knowing the sea cannot bring me peace nor rest nor salvation.
No, the sea means only destruction in my mind. Ulmo had unleashed his wrath, wiping away the last foul residents from Thangorodrim with his cleansing waves. In the fury of Morgoth's defeat it had swallowed them all - the realms of Doriath and Gondolin, Eglarest and Brithombar, Arvernien, and even the deep caves of Nargothrond, the hideaway of my youth.
Valleys rose and hills sank, rivers ran dry or ran wild -- such was the fury of that final battle between the host of Valinor and the Dark Lord. Even Balar, Cirdan's beloved sanctuary, was overcome by the wrenching of the world. If it were not for the warning granted us by Manwe's eagles, untold numbers would have been lost. As it was, the refugees of all those kingdoms of Man and Elf which had been lost in this age barely escaped to the ships in time.
Tossed about by the watery maelstrom, our ships became scattered, some landing on one meager mountain now turned into an island, some on another. Cirdan and I found ourselves at a site known well in song - the graves of Turin, Nienor and Morwen, the Stone of the Hapless. What irony that the most cursed of all families of Man came to save some of their own kind, and mine, merely by the height of their tomb.
Yet the fate of Turin's line is not so separate from that of my own. Did not my sister give to the Adan her very heart, only to be rudely brushed aside? I recall so vividly the fall of her heart, as mine fell along with it. I had seen barely twenty winters when Adanedhel arrived at our fortress home. Adan he may have been by birth, but there was more of him that seemed Eldar than seemed not. Dark of hair and equally so of mood, his sorrow seemed a beauty of its own. He spoke with the tongue of one born in Thingol's realm.
Finduilas turned her eye from Gwindor and her heart soon followed, until she was utterly lost in her affection for the dark-hearted Adan. Turin held my father's ear more tightly with each passing day, yet he seemed to turn a deaf ear to my sister's sweet words of love. I could not blame her for being drawn to Turin as a doomed moth to a fire's flame. I found myself stealing glimpses of the warrior, even timing my strolls through certain parts of the fortress to coincide with the Adan's own routine. He thought of me as nothing but a child, but my fantasies were not so easily dissuaded. The very first time I touched myself in that pleasure-provoking way his face was in my mind, his name upon my lips. To this day I feel the heat tingle in parts of my flesh when I recall the majesty of his figure and the beauty of his face. Neither brought my sister anything but pain, and loyal Gwindor found his heart and hope destroyed as well. In the end, Turin's surety in his own strategy proved the death of my family, save myself, and his sister as well, and the destruction of my home. It is thus just that we found ourselves there, at his grave, as Turin perhaps finally makes amends for all the sorrows his follies caused.
An unexpectedly fierce wave rocks our ship, the craft swaying bow to stern in response. The cold, clean spray splashes my face, its taste as bitter as the past long years. I slide the jeweled circlet from my brow and wipe the droplets from my forehead. I stare at the tangible sign of my office and think of if it as a collar, a burden. For the briefest of moments I consider tossing it into the waves, as if that could release me from the weight of my bloodline. The royal title has brought naught but ruin to all of my kin who have borne it. The House of Feanor is certainly cursed, but who can say those of his brothers are not equally so.
Cirdan reaches out a hand and clasps the smooth rail of the ship, gently stroking it as one would to calm a frightened steed. I watch in wonder as he closes his eyes and soaks in the experience, the unmistakable allure of ecstasy on his face. Now I see why he takes no pleasure with our own kind - he has no need. Some say Lord Ulmo comes to him in the night, in some watery form, but I have neither seen evidence nor felt the right to ask.
The moment passes, the spell is broken, and Cirdan opens his eyes. "Finally, land approaches," I hear him cheerfully say. I glance upward toward the distant horizon and I spy it as well, replacing my crown upon my head. It is before us, a wide expanse of newly formed coastline, where once the hills and plains of Beleriand once stood. Cirdan takes command of the ship once more and steers it due east, toward a break in the coastline. I walk back toward my old friend and stand by his side as we sail closer toward solid land. Within a short time we pass through a narrow inlet, widening into an angular bay. Cirdan warily surveys the nooks of the shore, a contented smile springing to his face.
"This will be a fine place to harbor ships, a fine place indeed," he affirms with satisfaction. I smile in return, finding hope and strength in his resiliency. Cirdan had lost his beloved Falas to the hand of Morgoth's orcs, then his precious island to the wrath of the Dark One's defeat. If he can find some good in this new beginning, I should certainly follow his lead. My old friend has ever seen farther than others, in time as well as distance. If only my father had heeded your warnings, oh Wise One, had listened to the words carried from Ulmo's lips to your ear and faithfully rendered by our distant kin. But prideful is the line of Finwe, the lines of all his sons, not merely the first.
Our attention is drawn northward, toward a natural harbor, the glint of Anor's rays reflecting off shield and sword catching our eyes. It was the host of Valinor and the refugees of Beleriand, assembled at the shoreline awaiting our arrival. Mighty and terrible they looked, their numbers much reduced from when they sailed passed Balar all those long years ago. On a small hill stood their captains, the greatest assemblage of bloodlines ever to grace the East. Fionwe, scion of Manwe, the beloved son of the Lady of the Stars, stood two heads above the rest. By his side stood golden-haired Ingwion son of Ingwe, a face not unknown to my sight. I find I dread his imminent company, knowing the first question to come from his mouth will be the hardest to answer. He will voice concern for the welfare of his wife and daughter, entrusted to my care, and no doubt will not find total comfort in the answer. Nay, the completeness of truth can wait his return to their side. Both are hale and whole - there is no need to burden Ingwion with the marriage of his daughter to one not of the Blessed Lands, and the birth of her son.
I sigh, loudly enough that my friend notices and turns to me with concerned expression. "I hope Oropher can convince Ingwion of the worth of his love for the Lord's daughter," I explain before being asked. "But he has never been known for the silver of his tongue." I strain my sight and search for Ingwion's heirs. They should stand by their father's side, yet they are strangely absent. Not so strangely, as their father's sorrowed expression makes clear. They fell in battle, along with so many others. Now Thranduil, conceived in the secrecy of an illicit love and marriage, is the heir to Ingwion's line.
<<He should be happy to have such a luxury in times as these,>> I chide to myself. My line has no such treasure. Even I was conceived in desperation, my parents feeling the pressure to provide a male heir after his ascension to the throne of Nargothrond. Now I am the last of Finwe's heirs to walk these shores, save the Dispossessed, if they even haunt these lands still. No, our line ends with me, as is fitting of a family cursed by its own pride and folly.
Many have urged me to take a wife, concerned with the loss of the stability the kingship represented in times of turmoil and war. There are those I have found fair of face, but none to whom my heart would bind. No fire burned within my heart, save at the memory of my childish longing for Adanedhel. No, 'tis my doom to spend the next age as I have my first - alone in my heart and in my bed.
Cirdan walks back to the bow, his eyes searching the assembled host for familiar faces. "Finarfin, your father's grandsire, stands before you for the first time," he cheerfully announces, pointing out a fair-haired elf standing a head above a band of darker Noldor. The shipwright smiles broadly at me and beckons me to his side. "He will be eager to meet his only remaining heir and see him safe at last."
I reluctantly join my counselor, the weight of hesitation slowing my steps. How small might I seem to one who has seen the light of the Trees, walked the jeweled streets of Tuna, heard the songs of the Vanyar and the Valar raised in harmony. The true King of the Noldor catches my gaze, and locks it with painful intensity. His eyes bear the fire of one who has seen the Trees and dwells in the Blessed Lands. 'Tis the same light my mother claimed to have seen in my own eyes, ere she named me after the radiant starlight. If only she could have seen the truth of the bright eyes of Eldamar, she would have never defamed their sight by my pale comparison.
I look away, unable to withstand the intensity of his scrutinizing gaze for another moment. My eyes train their attention closer to the shore, and come upon two figures standing apart from the throng. My heart leaps into my throat, for the briefest moment I believe that the Valar have rescinded the Gift of Man just this once. There, standing at the water's edge, was the very vision of Adanedhel returned to me. I blink hard, and the vision shifts. I study the beauteous features and realize I see only an echo of Turin's face, yet something uniquely lovely in its own way.
"'Tis Elwing's sons, Earendil's heirs. Praise the Lady, they have survived!"
I find I cannot believe the words Cirdan utters in his joy. "The Peredhil? They live after all?" Guilt floods through me, remembrances of the fall of Arvernien and how we arrived too late to protect the line of Earendil from the kinslayers. I study one face and then the other, and realize it is indeed the heirs of the Houses of Tuor and Beren which stand before us, the blood of Luthien and Idril Celebrindal flowing through their veins as well. Twin faces they were, yet still somehow not so. One expression burns with the contorting poison of bitterness, the other softened with the mantle of sorrow and regrets. The best of both Adan and Eldar could be found in their form, the beauty and grace of the Eldar and the strength of the Firimor. But one was more lovely still, a reflection of Luthien in male form. He is attired as one of the Firstborn, his hair long and carefully braided. Which is he - Elrond or Elros, the younger or the elder? That I cannot tell, as I have never laid eyes upon them until now.
He catches my careful study of him, and locks my gaze to his, no less powerfully than Finarfin had before, yet without motive. "His sight is keen for a Man," I hear myself whisper.
"The Peredhil are neither Man nor Elfkind," Cirdan reminds me gently.
"What are they, then?" I find myself replying in wonder. Can it be they
have the best of both kinds while avoiding the faults of both lines? I
find my thoughts become less clear, the blood rising to my cheeks, and
other parts of my flesh I had long considered cold and passionless. The
ship comes to rest in the shallows just before the beach and a joyous throng
of Elves hastens to receive us into their victory celebration. Cirdan accepts
their sincere welcome, but I pay no mind to their words nor their faces.
My eyes have found their own vision of the Blessed Lands and will not be
coaxed to relinquish that treasure. Ai, Finduilas, if you could see your
brother now. You lost your heart to the spark of the Edain's mighty houses.
Is it not supreme irony that I should now do the very same?
The End
Notes:
Detailed notes on the canonical statements (few as they are) concerning Gil-galad's early years will appear in "Kilmessi" and will not be reproduced here. They can be found online at http://www.ithilas.com/fos/notes.html. Just one quick word of explanation - I take as canon what Christopher Tolkien explained was his father's definitive word, that Gil-galad was the son of Orodreth, not Fingon (as appears in "The Silmarillion").
1) The story of Gil-galad's sister is a sad one. Foster (179-80) succinctly
sums it up: "She and Gwindor loved each other, but when Turin came to Nargothrond
Finduilas fell in love with him. Although Turin loved her not, Gwindor
at his death laid on him the duty to protect her, prophesying that she
alone could save the Adan from his fate. Finduilas was captured by Orcs
during the Sack of Nargothrond, but Turin, deceived by Glaurung, went to
Dor-lomin after Morwen and Nienor [his mother and sister]. Finduilas was
slain by her captors when they were ambushed by the Haladin of Brethil
at the Crossings of Teiglin."
Turin was tricked into marrying and impregnating his sister, and both
died of suicide after learning the truth. Turin was the first cousin of
Tuor, Elrond's grandfather. We find a very detailed description of Turin
in "The Silmarillion" (251): "dark-haired and pale-skinned, with grey eyes,
and his face more beautiful than any other among mortal Men, in the elder
days. His speech and bearing were that of the ancient kingdom of Doriath,
and even among the Elves he might be taken for one from the great houses
of the Noldor; there many called him Adanedhel, the Elf-Man." This sounds
like a rather nice description of Elrond, or rather a pre-choice Elrond,
who was neither truly Elf nor Man.
2) Gwindor warned Finduilas about giving her heart to Turin, saying "It is not fitting that the Elder Children of Iluvatar should wed with the younger; nor is it wise, for they are brief, and soon pass, to leave us in widowhood while the world lasts. Neither will fate suffer it, unless it be once or twice only, for some high cause of doom that we do not perceive." (The Silmarillion: 252)
3) "Laws and Customs" (Morgoth's Ring: 212) explains that "in the begetting, and still more in the bearing of children, greater share and strength of their being, in mind and body, goes forth than in the making of mortal children. For these reasons it came to pass that the Eldar brought forth few children; and also that their time of generation was in their youth or earlier life, unless strange and hard fates befell them." Elves apparently have some conscious decision to produce children and give of their strength and will in order to do so.
4) It is said that after the fall of the Falas Cirdan and his followers escaped to the island of Balar and established a safe haven there for refugees. He "kept a foothold also at the Mouths of Sirion, and there many light and swift ships lay hid in the creeks and waters where the reeds were dense as a forest." (The Silmarillion: 233)
5) In the upheaval of the world in the final battle of the War of Wrath, much of the westernmost part of Beleriand, including Balar, was submerged. There remained at least three small islands off the new coastline, all of which were formally highland areas: Tol Fuin, Himling, and Tol Morwen. Tol Morwen was the remnant of the hilly area which was crowned by the graves of Turin and Morwen, and their tombstone, the "Stone of the Hapless." Glirhuin, a seer and harpist of Brethil sang that "the Stone of the Hapless should not be defiled by Morgoth nor ever thrown down, not though the sea should drown all the land; as after indeed befell, and still Tol Morwen stands alone in the water beyond the new coasts that were made in the days of the wrath of the Valar." (The Silmarillion: 275-6)
6) A short essay on Cirdan (The Peoples of Middle-earth: 385) states that he saw "further and deeper into the future than anyone else in Middle-earth." He was of noble blood, claiming close kinship with Olwe and Elwe (Thingol), the original kings of the Teleri. Presumably the close relation with Elwe explains Cirdan's hair color, although it does nothing to clear up the mystery of his aged appearance and beard in the Third Age.
7) Of Cirdan's words of warning to Gil-galad's father we have the following: "Now it came to pass, when four hundred and ninety-five years had passed since the rising of the Moon, in the spring of the year, there came to Nargothrond two Elves, named Gelmir and Arminas; they were of Angrod's people, but since the Dagor Bragollach they dwelt in the south with Cirdan the Shipwright. From their far journeys they brought tidings of a great mustering of Orcs and evil creatures under the eaves of Ered Wethrin and in the Pass of Sirion; and they told also that Ulmo had come to Cirdan, giving warnings that great peril drew nigh to Nargothrond.
'Hear the words of the Lord of Waters!' said they to the King. 'Thus he spoke to Cirdan the Shipwright: "... Say therefore to the Lord of Nargothrond: Shut the doors of your fortress and go not abroad. Cast the stones of your pride into the loud river, that the creeping evil may not find the gate."'" (Silmarillion: 253-4)
8) Tolkien changed his mind as to exactly who led the host of Valinor.
According to "The Silmarillion," the Host of the Valar was led by Eonwe
the Maia, the herald of Manwe, while in the earliest versions he appears
as Fionwe, son of Manwe, which I have used in my series. It is said in
"Quenta Silmarillion" ("The Lost Road": 226) that Tulkas, the warrior of
the Valar "has great love for Fionwe son of Manwe."
References:
J.R.R. Tolkien (1987) The Lost Road and Other Writings (NY: Ballantine Books)
J.R.R.Tolkien (1993) Morgoth's Ring (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company)
J.R.R.Tolkien (1999) The Silmarillion, 2nd. Ed. (NY: Ballantine Books)
J.R.R.Tolkien (1994) The War of the Jewels (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company)
Robert Foster (1978) The Complete Guide to Middle-earth (NY: Ballantine Books)
Karen Wynn Fonstad (1991) The Atlas of Middle-earth, revised ed. (Boston:
Houghton Mifflin Company)