Transmitting Chapter Six, In the Hidden Valley.
And here is the third chapter for this month!
Transmitting Chapter Six
PG15
Word count 2675
Dream Ithilienne’s hand was still almost absent-mindedly caressing his ceryn, and he was sure that non-dream Legolas’ bedroll would show the evidence of the flight they had taken together on their dream path which had included his bed in Master Elrond’s home.
“It is a beautiful valley,” she said. “Have you seen all of it yet?”
“Not yet, we will venture further tomorrow. I think, before we set off over the mountains, we will stay here for a few more days yet. A rest will be good for Gimli, even though he does want to get up into the mountains.”
“Show me what you have seen so far; is it really like Imladris?”
“I think so… yes. I think it must look as the Hidden Valley must have looked when the elves first saw it.”
He thought of himself gazing down from the first place where the valley opened before them, and then of the place where they had fished in the river, looking towards a waterfall that was about twice his own height, before bringing his thoughts back to the glade in which he slept.
“I only visited Imladris once with Naneth and Adar,” Ithilienne said, “but I think, yes, it must have looked like that to start with.”
Her caresses became slightly less absent minded and a little more purposeful. Legolas could feel his ceryn tightening in her hand and his grondithen, which had been semi-erect since they had joined earlier on the dream path, begin to rise again.
“It would be nice to go starlight bathing in the pool under the waterfall,” Ithilienne suggested.
“Alone? Others have already had the same idea, before you joined me here.”
“Alone, I think. Unless the memory of others is so clear in your mind that they kind of drift into the dream.”
He tried not to think of her parents who had still been in the pool together when he went to sleep. Dream Ithilienne giggled.
“They will not be there now,” she said, sounding certain, “unless the water is warm.”
She was right. Legolas’s ‘small sister’ did not like to spend long in pools where the water had come straight from the mountains. It was easier, now, to imagine the pool empty.
“I have brought oils,” she said, “and camomile for your hair…”
And, sure enough, they were now both naked beside the pool, and at their feet was a small basket with all the usual things for starlight bathing.
“Can we talk first? In case I forget, in the pleasure, or get too tired and have to leave.”
“If you are too tired we don’t have to bathe…” he said, hoping that he did not sound too reluctant to forego the pleasure.
“I’m good. It is easier, now, to walk the dream path with you.” She paused briefly. “But I still don’t quite know how it works, and what I can or cannot do. So I think I will need to try with someone else. Now, whilst you are going to stay in the valley for a few days, would be good. And, to see if I can talk this way across the distance with anyone but you, I think I will try to talk to one of the others who are with you.”
That sounded sensible. “Who?”
“I wondered if it had to be someone I had joined with - but then it also has to be someone who knows about The Key, I think, to save explaining unless a time comes when I really need to. That would make Tharhîwon the best as we have shared our bodies, and he knows about The Key from when Naneth and Haldirin rescued him.
“But it would be more useful to know if I could do it with someone who I hadn’t joined with. I’m pretty sure it did help me to reach you the first time, but I think it might be that I needed a really strong picture of us in my mind, and I remembered being told how Adar used bodily pleasure as a strong memory to prove something about fëa links before he and Naneth were bound.”
Legolas remembered that, too. Quiet, solemn-seeming, Rumil almost bringing the less experienced Tindómë to flight in front of Aragorn, to prove his point. Afterwards he had wondered exactly what mental image Rumil had used. One day he might ask one of them.
“Now that I know what I am doing,” Ithilienne continued, “and I can reach you within a couple of minutes if you are asleep, I thought about people I hadn’t joined with; Orophin and Galanthir both know about The Key - and Lithôniel too.”
“Why not Haldirin, or Tindómë? Or your Adar?”
“I thought that they are as much in tune with my fëa as you are, and I have strong memories with them, too, just different ones. And Naneth and Haldirin have their own Keyness and I didn’t know if it would make it easier or we would clash…
“But, actually I think I am going to see if I can reach Naneth after all. I really want to talk to her about it. But don’t warn her, because that might make it easier. Especially if you can just try to get her to sleep during the second watch, too.”
Legolas was relieved he was not to mention it to Tindómë in advance; he could imagine he might get ribbed at least a little by her once she knew he had been having dream assignations with Ithilienne, but on the other hand he was quite relieved at the idea of her talking this new skill over with the Original Key.
Ithilienne continued speaking. “So, if we go starlight bathing on this dream path, now, and you are going to stay here in the valley for a while, I will try to reach out to Naneth in two days’ time, and then meet you here by the pool in two more after that.”
“Would three not be better, as we have done this time?” he wondered.
“I think I’ll be fine with two-night gaps, honestly, and I really, really, want to talk to Naneth now I’ve made up my mind. And if you sleep in second watch as usual, if I am too tired after another two night gap, try to stay there for one more night and I will try then. But right now…”
She leant down to the basket and brought out a bottle of oil. Soon he was rubbing mint infused oil into her breasts and down her stomach, whilst she had gone back to stroking his ceryn with it. As they changed position and she took his grondithen into her warm mouth he found himself wondering whether his hröa would smell of mint and have damp, camomile rinsed, hair when he woke up.
…………………………….
ceryn- balls
grondithen - mild slang term for penis.
............................
It was a bigger valley than she had realised last time she had been here. Of course, on that first occasion she had been recovering from being knocked off her horse by a rock fall, and they had been in a hurry to press on with the quest to find the entrance to Mandos Halls. This time there was much less sense of urgency, and everyone wanted to explore a little.
There were a series of waterfalls coming down the steep sides of the valley, each with a pool at the bottom where they met the main stream. All too cold for bathing for pleasure in Tindómë’s opinion, after the first time a couple of nights ago, but others were certainly taking advantage and there were enough places that they could choose privacy if they didn’t want to share a pool. Fortunately Rumil was as happy for them to share the desires of the body (even be swayed by them, she thought with a giggle) out of the water for the most part.
Rumil was sitting on a nearby fallen tree trunk, sketching a waterfall, Haldirin had set off with Orophin, Haldir, Malbeth, and two others, at first light to see just how far the valley extended. Haldirin had taken materials to sketch; so very like his father. He seemed to be getting on better with his older uncle on this trip. Tindómë had a feeling this might be because she had reached a better place in her relationship with Haldir in the past year.
Tharhîwon had told her that one of Frodo’s greatest joys had been the discovery that mushrooms of one sort or another grew all year round here in The West. Today Tindómë was on foraging duty and was happily filling a basket she had woven from rushes with a mixture of flat caps and morels. She had already picked sorrel leaves, and some peas to shell later. Legolas and Galanthir had gone hunting for the pot as it was their night to cook.
For a minute her mind drifted back to formal events in Minas Tirith where Legolas was ever ‘His Highness Prince Legolas,’ Galanthir his faithful servant. Very few people ever realised that Galanthir was his best friend. It seemed a long time ago, now.
Somewhere not too far away Lithôniel was working with Mirieth, the Galadhrim healer, cataloguing all the useful healing plants for, as Mirieth had said, even though there were no wars to fight, accidents were always going to happen - as well to know what you have available, before you need it.
Half way up the steep side of the valley Gimli and Tharhîwon were looking at the rocks. Truth to tell Tharhîwon was really Gimli’s apprentice in smithcraft but, as Gimli said, it was a poor craftsman who had no idea where his materials came from and the young ellon was genuinely interested, even if he had no intention of taking up mining as a long term occupation.
Almost as if her passing thought about them had conjured them up, she suddenly heard their voices.
“Rhuks!” Gimli’s cry, dwarfish for ‘orcs!’.
Tindómë first thought of it as a warning cry and her hand had gone to her knife by the time she realised it had sounded more shocked than angry as she would have expected.
And as Tharhîwon’s “Huitho!” reached her she mentally reminded herself that there were no yrch in Valinor.
Her mind might know it, but it took her a second or two to remind her emotions that “Rhuks!” was Gimli’s strong expletive of choice, just as her own was still “Ceryn Manwë!” despite the possibility of Manwë overhearing her taking his genitals in vain.
“Huitho! Huitho! Huitho!”
Tharhîwon’s Adar Frodo would probably not have approved, Tindómë thought, rather inconsequentially, as she couldn’t remember him ever saying anything much stronger than ‘Bother!’. There were also a couple of rather pained grunts from Gimli. There was clearly some sort of problem.
Rumil was already on his feet, sketching material left beside the tree trunk, and the next voice was his, calling to Tharhîwon who was more likely to hear him than Gimli.
“What is wrong? Do you need help?”
“Thank you, yes… yes please. It is Gimli’s foot. It is caught and twisted.”
‘Huitho!’ Tindómë’s thought echoed Tharhîwon’s exclamation of a couple of seconds earlier. ‘At least he hasn’t had a heart attack or anything, but what if he’s broken it? What if it is held so firmly that we can’t free it? What if… infection! Are there bacteria and things here? Yes, there must be some sort of things because… yoghurt, blue cheese…’
Well there was no point in standing here worrying. Rumil was already scaling the steep slope.
“Shall I come with or get one of the others?” she called to him.
“I will go to help, and I will call to Legolas. Go for Mirieth, we may need her skills if he is injured.”
“M’kay,” she was already heading in the direction the two ellyth had gone.
By the time she had found them, and they reached Gimli, Legolas and Galanthir were already there having been alerted by a piercing bird-call from Rumil.
Gimli’s foot was jammed in a crevice in the rock they were standing on, and his body was supported by two large stones which had, clearly, just been placed behind him. The angle of his leg did not look right at all.
“What happened?” asked Mirieth.
Before Gimli could answer Tharhîwon did. “Master Gimli took a couple of steps back to point at something higher up and his foot slipped into the crack in the rock, which made him fall, and he twisted his leg.”
Gimli grunted in agreement. He looked well and truly stuck.
“I will give you something for the pain, then we will need to use your tools on it,” said the healer briskly and, for a moment, Tindómë thought she meant to cut off the foot. Then she realised Mirieth intended to increase the size of the gap in the rock, and she almost laughed out loud at her own misunderstanding.
As the poppy syrup from Mirieth’s pack began to take effect, the dwarf’s last clear words were “Show Rumil, lad,” addressed to Tharhîwon.
Using the small chisels and hammer that Gimli had been carrying the ellyn soon made the hole in the rock large enough to work his foot out.
“Don’t remove his boot,” Mirieth warned, “bring me a good straight branch to immobilise his knee, then we will examine the leg properly when we get back to the camp.”
Soon Legolas and Galanthir had improvised a stretcher and the party began to make their way back down, very carefully.
“What are you to show me, Tharhîwon?” asked Rumil.
“Above us. Gimli stepped back carelessly because he had just spotted coloured streaks in the rock. They will make good pigments for you and Haldirin. Although,” he continued with a hint of a smile, “he has explained to me in the past that such pigments in the rock often mean there is metal ore around somewhere too, so please do not worry that his injury is solely because he thought of your needs.”
What Tharhîwon said was doubtless true, but Tindómë thought it likely that her husband would still think a badly injured dwarf was too high a price to pay for a good shade of green or yellow.
Once back in camp Mirieth declared, after a careful examination, that whilst both ankle and knee were badly wrenched, the major bones were not broken. Galanthir and Lithôniel went to collect comfrey, already ‘catalogued’ earlier, to make suitable poultices, and Rumil went with Legolas to continue hunting for the pot.
“He will be in a lot of pain,” the healer said. “I will give him more poppy syrup and someone will need to sit by him at all times.”
As the evening moved on into night Tindómë took her turn. They had moved Gimli’s bedding a little away from the others so that he would not be disturbed by the sounds of cooking, eating, and general conversation.
She was suddenly all too aware of the old dwarf’s mortality, his hold on life. Her mind went back to ‘What if he has a heart attack? Or a stroke? What if he gets an infection?’ over and over again.
She wondered if somewhere one of the maia, possibly even Mithrandir, kept an invisible eye on them, or whether they were really alone out here. Perhaps they should have left Gimli back at Master Elrond’s, for he knew most about dealing with the physical needs of mortals. Not that she didn’t trust Mirieth, who had actually trained in Imladris for a while, and had treated Tindómë herself once, in Caras Galadhon, but she didn’t have Master Elrond’s experience.
Such a shame the cell phone she remembered from back in her California days hadn’t made it to Middle Earth… or Valinor. They could have just rung him for advice.
Eventually Legolas came and insisted that she looked very tired, and it was almost second watch; she should find her husband to keep her warm, and sleep.
....................
Disclaimer- the concept of The Key belongs to Mutant Enemy, Middle Earth and non-original characters belong to the estate of JRR Tolkien.
......................
This month of picowrimo has been very good for me!
Transmitting Chapter Six
PG15
Word count 2675
Dream Ithilienne’s hand was still almost absent-mindedly caressing his ceryn, and he was sure that non-dream Legolas’ bedroll would show the evidence of the flight they had taken together on their dream path which had included his bed in Master Elrond’s home.
“It is a beautiful valley,” she said. “Have you seen all of it yet?”
“Not yet, we will venture further tomorrow. I think, before we set off over the mountains, we will stay here for a few more days yet. A rest will be good for Gimli, even though he does want to get up into the mountains.”
“Show me what you have seen so far; is it really like Imladris?”
“I think so… yes. I think it must look as the Hidden Valley must have looked when the elves first saw it.”
He thought of himself gazing down from the first place where the valley opened before them, and then of the place where they had fished in the river, looking towards a waterfall that was about twice his own height, before bringing his thoughts back to the glade in which he slept.
“I only visited Imladris once with Naneth and Adar,” Ithilienne said, “but I think, yes, it must have looked like that to start with.”
Her caresses became slightly less absent minded and a little more purposeful. Legolas could feel his ceryn tightening in her hand and his grondithen, which had been semi-erect since they had joined earlier on the dream path, begin to rise again.
“It would be nice to go starlight bathing in the pool under the waterfall,” Ithilienne suggested.
“Alone? Others have already had the same idea, before you joined me here.”
“Alone, I think. Unless the memory of others is so clear in your mind that they kind of drift into the dream.”
He tried not to think of her parents who had still been in the pool together when he went to sleep. Dream Ithilienne giggled.
“They will not be there now,” she said, sounding certain, “unless the water is warm.”
She was right. Legolas’s ‘small sister’ did not like to spend long in pools where the water had come straight from the mountains. It was easier, now, to imagine the pool empty.
“I have brought oils,” she said, “and camomile for your hair…”
And, sure enough, they were now both naked beside the pool, and at their feet was a small basket with all the usual things for starlight bathing.
“Can we talk first? In case I forget, in the pleasure, or get too tired and have to leave.”
“If you are too tired we don’t have to bathe…” he said, hoping that he did not sound too reluctant to forego the pleasure.
“I’m good. It is easier, now, to walk the dream path with you.” She paused briefly. “But I still don’t quite know how it works, and what I can or cannot do. So I think I will need to try with someone else. Now, whilst you are going to stay in the valley for a few days, would be good. And, to see if I can talk this way across the distance with anyone but you, I think I will try to talk to one of the others who are with you.”
That sounded sensible. “Who?”
“I wondered if it had to be someone I had joined with - but then it also has to be someone who knows about The Key, I think, to save explaining unless a time comes when I really need to. That would make Tharhîwon the best as we have shared our bodies, and he knows about The Key from when Naneth and Haldirin rescued him.
“But it would be more useful to know if I could do it with someone who I hadn’t joined with. I’m pretty sure it did help me to reach you the first time, but I think it might be that I needed a really strong picture of us in my mind, and I remembered being told how Adar used bodily pleasure as a strong memory to prove something about fëa links before he and Naneth were bound.”
Legolas remembered that, too. Quiet, solemn-seeming, Rumil almost bringing the less experienced Tindómë to flight in front of Aragorn, to prove his point. Afterwards he had wondered exactly what mental image Rumil had used. One day he might ask one of them.
“Now that I know what I am doing,” Ithilienne continued, “and I can reach you within a couple of minutes if you are asleep, I thought about people I hadn’t joined with; Orophin and Galanthir both know about The Key - and Lithôniel too.”
“Why not Haldirin, or Tindómë? Or your Adar?”
“I thought that they are as much in tune with my fëa as you are, and I have strong memories with them, too, just different ones. And Naneth and Haldirin have their own Keyness and I didn’t know if it would make it easier or we would clash…
“But, actually I think I am going to see if I can reach Naneth after all. I really want to talk to her about it. But don’t warn her, because that might make it easier. Especially if you can just try to get her to sleep during the second watch, too.”
Legolas was relieved he was not to mention it to Tindómë in advance; he could imagine he might get ribbed at least a little by her once she knew he had been having dream assignations with Ithilienne, but on the other hand he was quite relieved at the idea of her talking this new skill over with the Original Key.
Ithilienne continued speaking. “So, if we go starlight bathing on this dream path, now, and you are going to stay here in the valley for a while, I will try to reach out to Naneth in two days’ time, and then meet you here by the pool in two more after that.”
“Would three not be better, as we have done this time?” he wondered.
“I think I’ll be fine with two-night gaps, honestly, and I really, really, want to talk to Naneth now I’ve made up my mind. And if you sleep in second watch as usual, if I am too tired after another two night gap, try to stay there for one more night and I will try then. But right now…”
She leant down to the basket and brought out a bottle of oil. Soon he was rubbing mint infused oil into her breasts and down her stomach, whilst she had gone back to stroking his ceryn with it. As they changed position and she took his grondithen into her warm mouth he found himself wondering whether his hröa would smell of mint and have damp, camomile rinsed, hair when he woke up.
…………………………….
ceryn- balls
grondithen - mild slang term for penis.
............................
It was a bigger valley than she had realised last time she had been here. Of course, on that first occasion she had been recovering from being knocked off her horse by a rock fall, and they had been in a hurry to press on with the quest to find the entrance to Mandos Halls. This time there was much less sense of urgency, and everyone wanted to explore a little.
There were a series of waterfalls coming down the steep sides of the valley, each with a pool at the bottom where they met the main stream. All too cold for bathing for pleasure in Tindómë’s opinion, after the first time a couple of nights ago, but others were certainly taking advantage and there were enough places that they could choose privacy if they didn’t want to share a pool. Fortunately Rumil was as happy for them to share the desires of the body (even be swayed by them, she thought with a giggle) out of the water for the most part.
Rumil was sitting on a nearby fallen tree trunk, sketching a waterfall, Haldirin had set off with Orophin, Haldir, Malbeth, and two others, at first light to see just how far the valley extended. Haldirin had taken materials to sketch; so very like his father. He seemed to be getting on better with his older uncle on this trip. Tindómë had a feeling this might be because she had reached a better place in her relationship with Haldir in the past year.
Tharhîwon had told her that one of Frodo’s greatest joys had been the discovery that mushrooms of one sort or another grew all year round here in The West. Today Tindómë was on foraging duty and was happily filling a basket she had woven from rushes with a mixture of flat caps and morels. She had already picked sorrel leaves, and some peas to shell later. Legolas and Galanthir had gone hunting for the pot as it was their night to cook.
For a minute her mind drifted back to formal events in Minas Tirith where Legolas was ever ‘His Highness Prince Legolas,’ Galanthir his faithful servant. Very few people ever realised that Galanthir was his best friend. It seemed a long time ago, now.
Somewhere not too far away Lithôniel was working with Mirieth, the Galadhrim healer, cataloguing all the useful healing plants for, as Mirieth had said, even though there were no wars to fight, accidents were always going to happen - as well to know what you have available, before you need it.
Half way up the steep side of the valley Gimli and Tharhîwon were looking at the rocks. Truth to tell Tharhîwon was really Gimli’s apprentice in smithcraft but, as Gimli said, it was a poor craftsman who had no idea where his materials came from and the young ellon was genuinely interested, even if he had no intention of taking up mining as a long term occupation.
Almost as if her passing thought about them had conjured them up, she suddenly heard their voices.
“Rhuks!” Gimli’s cry, dwarfish for ‘orcs!’.
Tindómë first thought of it as a warning cry and her hand had gone to her knife by the time she realised it had sounded more shocked than angry as she would have expected.
And as Tharhîwon’s “Huitho!” reached her she mentally reminded herself that there were no yrch in Valinor.
Her mind might know it, but it took her a second or two to remind her emotions that “Rhuks!” was Gimli’s strong expletive of choice, just as her own was still “Ceryn Manwë!” despite the possibility of Manwë overhearing her taking his genitals in vain.
“Huitho! Huitho! Huitho!”
Tharhîwon’s Adar Frodo would probably not have approved, Tindómë thought, rather inconsequentially, as she couldn’t remember him ever saying anything much stronger than ‘Bother!’. There were also a couple of rather pained grunts from Gimli. There was clearly some sort of problem.
Rumil was already on his feet, sketching material left beside the tree trunk, and the next voice was his, calling to Tharhîwon who was more likely to hear him than Gimli.
“What is wrong? Do you need help?”
“Thank you, yes… yes please. It is Gimli’s foot. It is caught and twisted.”
‘Huitho!’ Tindómë’s thought echoed Tharhîwon’s exclamation of a couple of seconds earlier. ‘At least he hasn’t had a heart attack or anything, but what if he’s broken it? What if it is held so firmly that we can’t free it? What if… infection! Are there bacteria and things here? Yes, there must be some sort of things because… yoghurt, blue cheese…’
Well there was no point in standing here worrying. Rumil was already scaling the steep slope.
“Shall I come with or get one of the others?” she called to him.
“I will go to help, and I will call to Legolas. Go for Mirieth, we may need her skills if he is injured.”
“M’kay,” she was already heading in the direction the two ellyth had gone.
By the time she had found them, and they reached Gimli, Legolas and Galanthir were already there having been alerted by a piercing bird-call from Rumil.
Gimli’s foot was jammed in a crevice in the rock they were standing on, and his body was supported by two large stones which had, clearly, just been placed behind him. The angle of his leg did not look right at all.
“What happened?” asked Mirieth.
Before Gimli could answer Tharhîwon did. “Master Gimli took a couple of steps back to point at something higher up and his foot slipped into the crack in the rock, which made him fall, and he twisted his leg.”
Gimli grunted in agreement. He looked well and truly stuck.
“I will give you something for the pain, then we will need to use your tools on it,” said the healer briskly and, for a moment, Tindómë thought she meant to cut off the foot. Then she realised Mirieth intended to increase the size of the gap in the rock, and she almost laughed out loud at her own misunderstanding.
As the poppy syrup from Mirieth’s pack began to take effect, the dwarf’s last clear words were “Show Rumil, lad,” addressed to Tharhîwon.
Using the small chisels and hammer that Gimli had been carrying the ellyn soon made the hole in the rock large enough to work his foot out.
“Don’t remove his boot,” Mirieth warned, “bring me a good straight branch to immobilise his knee, then we will examine the leg properly when we get back to the camp.”
Soon Legolas and Galanthir had improvised a stretcher and the party began to make their way back down, very carefully.
“What are you to show me, Tharhîwon?” asked Rumil.
“Above us. Gimli stepped back carelessly because he had just spotted coloured streaks in the rock. They will make good pigments for you and Haldirin. Although,” he continued with a hint of a smile, “he has explained to me in the past that such pigments in the rock often mean there is metal ore around somewhere too, so please do not worry that his injury is solely because he thought of your needs.”
What Tharhîwon said was doubtless true, but Tindómë thought it likely that her husband would still think a badly injured dwarf was too high a price to pay for a good shade of green or yellow.
Once back in camp Mirieth declared, after a careful examination, that whilst both ankle and knee were badly wrenched, the major bones were not broken. Galanthir and Lithôniel went to collect comfrey, already ‘catalogued’ earlier, to make suitable poultices, and Rumil went with Legolas to continue hunting for the pot.
“He will be in a lot of pain,” the healer said. “I will give him more poppy syrup and someone will need to sit by him at all times.”
As the evening moved on into night Tindómë took her turn. They had moved Gimli’s bedding a little away from the others so that he would not be disturbed by the sounds of cooking, eating, and general conversation.
She was suddenly all too aware of the old dwarf’s mortality, his hold on life. Her mind went back to ‘What if he has a heart attack? Or a stroke? What if he gets an infection?’ over and over again.
She wondered if somewhere one of the maia, possibly even Mithrandir, kept an invisible eye on them, or whether they were really alone out here. Perhaps they should have left Gimli back at Master Elrond’s, for he knew most about dealing with the physical needs of mortals. Not that she didn’t trust Mirieth, who had actually trained in Imladris for a while, and had treated Tindómë herself once, in Caras Galadhon, but she didn’t have Master Elrond’s experience.
Such a shame the cell phone she remembered from back in her California days hadn’t made it to Middle Earth… or Valinor. They could have just rung him for advice.
Eventually Legolas came and insisted that she looked very tired, and it was almost second watch; she should find her husband to keep her warm, and sleep.
....................
Disclaimer- the concept of The Key belongs to Mutant Enemy, Middle Earth and non-original characters belong to the estate of JRR Tolkien.
......................
This month of picowrimo has been very good for me!