Prologue:
Rega wiped a tear out of her eye.
She stood next to her two older brothers as they said their final farewells to their dead father. Fíli, the eldest, put his arm around her and hugged her tightly while she cried into her brother's shoulder.
"Why, Fíli?" she sobbed in a barely audible whisper. "Why would he leave us?"
Fíli studied his sister's face, her blue eyes dull, yet shining with tears. "I don't know," he finally breathed, then lightly kissed her pale forehead, brushing aside her long blonde hair, so much like his own.
Kíli turned towards them and quickly embraced them, then turned and walked away, covering his face. Rega had never seen her brothers cry.