The mountains rose tall. Though they guarded the greatest secret since the days of the Catastrophe, they knew no fear.
A single pool. A single door. A land of wonders once and no more.
And then, a body. A body five feet tall, broader then any five foot tall man's chest should be, and glistening with a long white beard.
The pool didn't shimmer or gleam. It's waters were blank, soft, hard. Like an ax couldn't scratch it, but a single pebble would destroy its peace forever. It mirrored only metal and flesh. Around it, the rocks domed. Sunlight, starlight, moonlight, firelight. Through the embattled rocks nothing could slip. It finished traveling, drifting under a mountain like a bubble in gelatin.
The door did shimmer and gleam. It's metal etching disappeared into the rock at all times, save one. The night. And its brilliance had waned as its creator slept.
Speak "friend" and enter.
None could see it for its age.
Memory had passed by, and story was waning.
Through the shadows of the mountain, past the forgotten doors, into a cave which was no cave. Neither was it a hall, for it was a tomb. A tomb where dust alone resided. The floors were thick with it; even the ancient weapons had disappeared in time. Stone was smooth and crumbling; the great door at its farthest end was a mass of dusty rubble.
Life slept below.
The floor whirled.
The boy laughed at joyful silver.
He was young, and his brown-nearly- black eyes sparkled. He spoke the only word that seemed to fit, though he had never heard it. "Mellon." The doors swung open slowly, showing the glory of the hall reborn.
The stones were fresh and new, the pillars were tall, and the earthy patterns on the rocks were restored. But instead of a door, at the far end stood a wall with a bench. A wall with a bench and a body.
A phantom flitting life-born by. The sounds of hammers' tintinnabulations mingling with the rhythmic pluck of a thousand golden harps. The room seemed a gateway into many times when hammer fell and harp was rung deep in the bowels of the earth, as oft was sung.
The phantom faded. The air and stone shimmered, bringing a memory of millennia to the fore.
The mountains stood tall, their needle sharp points tickling the wispy clouds, their slopes a brilliant green till they faded into the poofy clouds. A vein of mithril shimmered in the milky softness of the night. The clouds tumbled apart like laughing giant- children, and the round orb of the unblemished moon shone through, it's perfect silver face shining with the rays of sunlight.
The plain was grassy, like soft, ruffled butter in the moonlight. But words didn't ever seem to quite fit them; not till the wanderer would come to name them. A stream trickled just within earshot, dropping into a subterranean tunnel with a gentle whisper. The splash could be heard only by standing over the hole down which it fell.
Beauty flew on wings like an eagles.
Dancing life revolved around fiery sphere.
Gleeful moonbeams skittered across silky grass.
The chest of the body rose and fell. His granite eyes opened, glittering with joyful life. His toes curled and uncurled inside his boots. He stood, sweeping the beard into two great lengths, and set the double- bladed ax on his chest to his shoulder.
In the pool, a crown floated in the center, waiting for the king to come to it. The rocks opened and sunlight reached the Mirromere.
The hall shook with his laughter, for he had seen the child, standing there with his brown eyes open and his curly black hair as uncoiled as it possibly could be.
It was good to be alive.
The world was young,
the mountains green,
no stain yet on the moon was seen,
no words were laid on stream or stone,
when Durin walked and walked alone.
He named the nameless hills and dells.
He drank from yet untasted wells.
He stooped and looked in Mirromere
and saw a crown of stars appear.
As gems upon a silver thread above the shadows of his head.
The world is grey, the mountains cold,
the forge's fire is ashen cold,
no harp is wrung, no hammer falls,
the darkness dwells in Durin's halls.
The shadow lies upon his tomb
in Moria in Khazad-Dum.
But still the sunken stars appear
in dark and windless Mirromere.
There lies his crown in water deep till Durin wakes again from sleep.