The Valinor Trail. Chapter Eleven
Haldir and Tindómë continue their travels ever further westward. In the last chapter she had just pointed out, very firmly, to her brother-in-law that being dead did not mean that he had been forgotten.
Now to
Chapter Eleven; The End of The Road
Rated PG
Word count 1,675
Beta Speaker-to-Customers.
Disclaimer as at Chapter One
Previous chapters are here.
It would have been quite possible to simply remain where they were, and camp there, as it was late afternoon by the time Tindómë finished giving Haldir both an account of his brothers’ sense of loss on his death and a sizeable piece of her mind.
However it made sense, especially as the rain had not eased all day, to ride on and hope to reach some sort of settlement belonging to those who clearly forested the trees.
“Charcoal burners, I guess,” Tindómë said.
“Why would they be charcoal burners?” Haldir asked.
“Because it looks as if the Noldor smelt the metal out here before they move it back towards Tirion and wherever else they need it,” Tindómë answered.
Haldir looked as if he did not really see the connection.
Holding back the ‘duh!’ that was on the tip of her tongue she explained further. “Charcoal - they use charcoal to smelt metal because it gets hotter than wood.”
“And how would you know this?”
“Duh!” It slipped out this time. “Gimli -you know? Dwarf? Master metal-smith? And it’s hardly a deep dwarven secret that charcoal is better for smelting. Did you never wonder about the metal for your sword?”
“No,” he answered, stiffly, “I was too busy wielding it in the defence of the Golden Woods to wonder beyond whether it was sharp and fitted my hand well.”
“M’kay. Fair point. I guess it’s what Lord Celeborn called my bright, enquiring, mind… I just ask lots of questions.”
Her husband-brother looked at her with the patented elven raised eyebrow. She almost expected him to say “I had noticed” but, rather to her surprise, he actually said “I had not noticed - you have asked me very few questions since we met.”
She was slightly taken aback. “Uh - you don’t give the impression you’d want to answer them… You seem to be more about the telling than the answering!”
Was that a hint of a smile? Tindómë thought it might almost be the hint of a smirk.
“Well,” Haldir said, “let us find out if you are correct about the profession of those who nurture these trees, for I hear sounds of voices ahead.”
………………………………………………………..
The voices spoke in Sindarin; these elves were, rather to the surprise of both Haldir and Tindómë, not Noldor but Sindar, and were very happy to show the two travellers the way to their village. Or, rather, it was more a small town. A well established small town, with all the amenities you might expect, not dissimilar to the settlement at Eryn Ithil. There had been no need to ask about an inn; recognised as fellow Sindar, the pair found themselves invited to the home of one of the group they had first encountered.
It was a pleasure to be warm and dry.
Tindómë introduced herself as peredhel, and sworn sister of Legolas Thranduilion; Haldir gave his own name, and that he was ‘of Lothlórien’. Their hosts nodded, but none had ever been to The Great Greenwood, or to the Golden Wood. Their only points of recognition with Haldir and Tindómë were memories of Celeborn and Galadriel, and of Oropher, for these elves were almost all reborn former residents of Doriath.
To Tindómë it was like meeting characters from history books and, later, Haldir admitted their hosts had had the same effect on him.
They learnt that these elves did, as Tindómë had predicted, harvest the trees, burn the wood for charcoal, and then supply that to the Noldor, who lived another two days ride away, to fuel their furnaces so that they could smelt the metals they mined. Their hosts also mentioned, almost in passing, that the great Sindar King Elu Thingol had been reborn, reunited with his wife, and lived quietly in a small city amongst the forests that lay between the coast and the mountains of the Pelóri, some distance south of Alqualondë.
But this group, and others they occasionally travelled to visit, felt no need to join him, they were happy here.
Back on the move next day Tindómë asked Haldir if he had known about the city of King Thingol. He admitted he had not. But then, he also admitted, he had taken little notice of anything outside her Ladyship’s estates and the area near Alqualondë since he had travelled there to be reunited with his brothers.
It occurred to Tindómë that this trip was as much about Haldir adjusting to no longer being the Marchwarden of the Golden Wood as it was about Spike.
………………………………………………………..
They continued their journey, not on the main route to the mining town, but using paths through the trees as explained by the Sindar foresters. Haldir seemed a little less forbidding than usual and, when Tindómë spoke to him of Eryn Ithil, he asked questions rather than cutting her off as she had half expected.
She was pleased at her own level of knowledge as she spoke with familiarity about the land, as it had been straight after the Ring War, and the ways in which the elves healed it (not with magic, as some of the mortals had thought, she said, but with the right plants, bees, chickens, composting toilets… and a lot of love).
She spoke of the compromises made by the Galadhrim who had joined the enterprise as the trees could not support talans large enough for family homes, let alone ones that could be used as meeting places, and mentioned how hard winter had felt to the Galadhrim after Her Ladyship could no longer protect her people from the worst of the weather. Even they, she said, had agreed with the elves from Eryn Lasgalen that walls and a proper, shingled, roof made sense both in Eryn Ithil and in East Lórien!
And so another day passed, to be followed by a night spent in the company of another small group of foresters.
………………………………………………………..
Tindómë was not sure what she had expected the mining settlement to look like. Maybe a bit like a Californian Gold Rush town, at the time of the Forty-niners, rather than the steel mills of Pittsburgh, or possibly even something a little like Gimli’s Aglarond where the settlement was within the mountain. She had certainly not expected what she now saw in front of her.
The buildings were graceful, with the pillars and balustrades of Tirion - or Imladris. They were made from the grey stone of the surrounding hills - presumably blocks cut as the mines were excavated - and there was decorative metalwork, statues, and flowers. Smelting clearly took place a little way from the houses, as there was no immediate sign of it, and neither could the entrance to the mine be seen from where they first saw the town.
“Elo!” she said, “this is a bit more civilised than I expected.”
“Well,” Haldir answered, “they have had a long time to build it - and why live in anything less beautiful? Although I still prefer the dwellings we have shared, these past two nights, to those of stone.”
“Yeah, Haldirin said that he felt as if he had been struck deaf when we moved into the house in Alqualondë because the stone didn’t speak to him. Minas Tirith had the same effect on him,” Tindómë said.
Haldir nodded his understanding before speaking again. “Anyway, there is bound to be accommodation available for visitors in this place; let us seek it out.”
The first person they approached seemed to think they were seeking employment, but his companion, who had clearly noted the quality of their horses and possessions, interjected and directed them to what was a guest house not unlike the one in which they had stayed in Valimar.
After a bath, over an excellent meal, Tindómë spoke to Haldir of life in Minas Tirith. Of the time she spent injured, cared for by Orophin and Rumil, of the King’s House within the citadel and, as she spoke to the guest-house keeper in a mixture of Quenya and Sindarin, of the difficulties of communicating with them using a similar mixture of Sindarin and the Common Tongue. She counted it a victory when, as she explained the phrases the twins taught Rumil ending with ‘please take your hand off my knee, I prefer females’, Haldir actually laughed.
………………………………………………………..
They stayed in the guest house for another night, to enable them to have clothing washed and refresh their supplies, because, as Haldir told Tindómë after talking to a couple of the residents, they had reached the end of the road.
She thought, at first, that he meant he had decided to go no further on their journey, but realised he meant it quite literally; there was no more road. From here onwards there were occasional paths further into the hills and mountains - but no road leading to anywhere.
“They really are pretty unadventurous, aren’t they?” Tindómë commented to Haldir, once she realised he was simply stating a fact. “It does look as if all the Noldor with an ounce of curiosity, or wonder about the world around them, either sailed on those infamous stolen ships, or crossed the Helcaraxë, and if any of them headed this way when they returned, one way or the other, they had had all that curiosity satisfied by that venture!”
He didn’t actually say anything but the slight inclination of the head was, she thought, accompanied by the distinct hint of a smile.
Sure enough, where their journey so far had mainly been on a road designed to take large horse-drawn wagons, and deviation from it had been their own choice, once they left the town heading west there was nothing more than a track taken by picnickers. By the time they had ridden into the hills for a whole day there was little sign that anyone had come this way in the past half yén.
As they made camp for the night Tindómë thought that if, so far, this quest had been rather like following the Oregon Trail, then now it would be more like making it.
Feedback is like manna - and lower in calories...
Now to
Chapter Eleven; The End of The Road
Rated PG
Word count 1,675
Beta Speaker-to-Customers.
Disclaimer as at Chapter One
Previous chapters are here.
It would have been quite possible to simply remain where they were, and camp there, as it was late afternoon by the time Tindómë finished giving Haldir both an account of his brothers’ sense of loss on his death and a sizeable piece of her mind.
However it made sense, especially as the rain had not eased all day, to ride on and hope to reach some sort of settlement belonging to those who clearly forested the trees.
“Charcoal burners, I guess,” Tindómë said.
“Why would they be charcoal burners?” Haldir asked.
“Because it looks as if the Noldor smelt the metal out here before they move it back towards Tirion and wherever else they need it,” Tindómë answered.
Haldir looked as if he did not really see the connection.
Holding back the ‘duh!’ that was on the tip of her tongue she explained further. “Charcoal - they use charcoal to smelt metal because it gets hotter than wood.”
“And how would you know this?”
“Duh!” It slipped out this time. “Gimli -you know? Dwarf? Master metal-smith? And it’s hardly a deep dwarven secret that charcoal is better for smelting. Did you never wonder about the metal for your sword?”
“No,” he answered, stiffly, “I was too busy wielding it in the defence of the Golden Woods to wonder beyond whether it was sharp and fitted my hand well.”
“M’kay. Fair point. I guess it’s what Lord Celeborn called my bright, enquiring, mind… I just ask lots of questions.”
Her husband-brother looked at her with the patented elven raised eyebrow. She almost expected him to say “I had noticed” but, rather to her surprise, he actually said “I had not noticed - you have asked me very few questions since we met.”
She was slightly taken aback. “Uh - you don’t give the impression you’d want to answer them… You seem to be more about the telling than the answering!”
Was that a hint of a smile? Tindómë thought it might almost be the hint of a smirk.
“Well,” Haldir said, “let us find out if you are correct about the profession of those who nurture these trees, for I hear sounds of voices ahead.”
………………………………………………………..
The voices spoke in Sindarin; these elves were, rather to the surprise of both Haldir and Tindómë, not Noldor but Sindar, and were very happy to show the two travellers the way to their village. Or, rather, it was more a small town. A well established small town, with all the amenities you might expect, not dissimilar to the settlement at Eryn Ithil. There had been no need to ask about an inn; recognised as fellow Sindar, the pair found themselves invited to the home of one of the group they had first encountered.
It was a pleasure to be warm and dry.
Tindómë introduced herself as peredhel, and sworn sister of Legolas Thranduilion; Haldir gave his own name, and that he was ‘of Lothlórien’. Their hosts nodded, but none had ever been to The Great Greenwood, or to the Golden Wood. Their only points of recognition with Haldir and Tindómë were memories of Celeborn and Galadriel, and of Oropher, for these elves were almost all reborn former residents of Doriath.
To Tindómë it was like meeting characters from history books and, later, Haldir admitted their hosts had had the same effect on him.
They learnt that these elves did, as Tindómë had predicted, harvest the trees, burn the wood for charcoal, and then supply that to the Noldor, who lived another two days ride away, to fuel their furnaces so that they could smelt the metals they mined. Their hosts also mentioned, almost in passing, that the great Sindar King Elu Thingol had been reborn, reunited with his wife, and lived quietly in a small city amongst the forests that lay between the coast and the mountains of the Pelóri, some distance south of Alqualondë.
But this group, and others they occasionally travelled to visit, felt no need to join him, they were happy here.
Back on the move next day Tindómë asked Haldir if he had known about the city of King Thingol. He admitted he had not. But then, he also admitted, he had taken little notice of anything outside her Ladyship’s estates and the area near Alqualondë since he had travelled there to be reunited with his brothers.
It occurred to Tindómë that this trip was as much about Haldir adjusting to no longer being the Marchwarden of the Golden Wood as it was about Spike.
………………………………………………………..
They continued their journey, not on the main route to the mining town, but using paths through the trees as explained by the Sindar foresters. Haldir seemed a little less forbidding than usual and, when Tindómë spoke to him of Eryn Ithil, he asked questions rather than cutting her off as she had half expected.
She was pleased at her own level of knowledge as she spoke with familiarity about the land, as it had been straight after the Ring War, and the ways in which the elves healed it (not with magic, as some of the mortals had thought, she said, but with the right plants, bees, chickens, composting toilets… and a lot of love).
She spoke of the compromises made by the Galadhrim who had joined the enterprise as the trees could not support talans large enough for family homes, let alone ones that could be used as meeting places, and mentioned how hard winter had felt to the Galadhrim after Her Ladyship could no longer protect her people from the worst of the weather. Even they, she said, had agreed with the elves from Eryn Lasgalen that walls and a proper, shingled, roof made sense both in Eryn Ithil and in East Lórien!
And so another day passed, to be followed by a night spent in the company of another small group of foresters.
………………………………………………………..
Tindómë was not sure what she had expected the mining settlement to look like. Maybe a bit like a Californian Gold Rush town, at the time of the Forty-niners, rather than the steel mills of Pittsburgh, or possibly even something a little like Gimli’s Aglarond where the settlement was within the mountain. She had certainly not expected what she now saw in front of her.
The buildings were graceful, with the pillars and balustrades of Tirion - or Imladris. They were made from the grey stone of the surrounding hills - presumably blocks cut as the mines were excavated - and there was decorative metalwork, statues, and flowers. Smelting clearly took place a little way from the houses, as there was no immediate sign of it, and neither could the entrance to the mine be seen from where they first saw the town.
“Elo!” she said, “this is a bit more civilised than I expected.”
“Well,” Haldir answered, “they have had a long time to build it - and why live in anything less beautiful? Although I still prefer the dwellings we have shared, these past two nights, to those of stone.”
“Yeah, Haldirin said that he felt as if he had been struck deaf when we moved into the house in Alqualondë because the stone didn’t speak to him. Minas Tirith had the same effect on him,” Tindómë said.
Haldir nodded his understanding before speaking again. “Anyway, there is bound to be accommodation available for visitors in this place; let us seek it out.”
The first person they approached seemed to think they were seeking employment, but his companion, who had clearly noted the quality of their horses and possessions, interjected and directed them to what was a guest house not unlike the one in which they had stayed in Valimar.
After a bath, over an excellent meal, Tindómë spoke to Haldir of life in Minas Tirith. Of the time she spent injured, cared for by Orophin and Rumil, of the King’s House within the citadel and, as she spoke to the guest-house keeper in a mixture of Quenya and Sindarin, of the difficulties of communicating with them using a similar mixture of Sindarin and the Common Tongue. She counted it a victory when, as she explained the phrases the twins taught Rumil ending with ‘please take your hand off my knee, I prefer females’, Haldir actually laughed.
………………………………………………………..
They stayed in the guest house for another night, to enable them to have clothing washed and refresh their supplies, because, as Haldir told Tindómë after talking to a couple of the residents, they had reached the end of the road.
She thought, at first, that he meant he had decided to go no further on their journey, but realised he meant it quite literally; there was no more road. From here onwards there were occasional paths further into the hills and mountains - but no road leading to anywhere.
“They really are pretty unadventurous, aren’t they?” Tindómë commented to Haldir, once she realised he was simply stating a fact. “It does look as if all the Noldor with an ounce of curiosity, or wonder about the world around them, either sailed on those infamous stolen ships, or crossed the Helcaraxë, and if any of them headed this way when they returned, one way or the other, they had had all that curiosity satisfied by that venture!”
He didn’t actually say anything but the slight inclination of the head was, she thought, accompanied by the distinct hint of a smile.
Sure enough, where their journey so far had mainly been on a road designed to take large horse-drawn wagons, and deviation from it had been their own choice, once they left the town heading west there was nothing more than a track taken by picnickers. By the time they had ridden into the hills for a whole day there was little sign that anyone had come this way in the past half yén.
As they made camp for the night Tindómë thought that if, so far, this quest had been rather like following the Oregon Trail, then now it would be more like making it.
Feedback is like manna - and lower in calories...