Pólemos
pánthoon mén pathér ésti, pánthoon
dé basiléus, kai toús mén edéixe
theoús,
toús dé anthropoús, toús mén
epóiese dóulous, toús dé
eleutheroús.
(Herakléitos,
53B
Who are you? Why
are you speaking to me? Oh, I see, you are Elves; Wood
Elves, I
believe. Well, then ill met, my friends, ill met. No, do not stare
at
me so, I never meant to be unkind. ´Tis only that my heart is
broken.
He left me at sunrise. He kissed me goodbye at dawn,
leaving his newly wed
bride to choke her tears in a frozen bed. I
begged him to stay with me, to see the fruit of our fulfilled love
grow, but no, he denied
me that. And now, I will not see him ever
again.
I see you are now beginning to understand, your
compassionate looks tell
me. Or to think you understand.
Tell
you my story? Why? Do you want to torture me even further? No,
you
say, you want to help me. Help me!
As if you could.
My
name is Rían. I am a woman of the Édain, the daughter
of Belegund son of
Bregolas, of the house of Bëor. The House
of the Faithful we call
ourselves. The father of my great
grandsire was the man that King Finrod
Felagund befriended, and my
father´s cousin now shares his mortal fate with
the most
beautiful of Elven women, the fair Tínuviel.
I
was a
gentle child, or so they told me, always picking flowers in
the meadows to
put them in my hair, or feeding the birds in my
hand so they would sing to
gladden my heart. Animals were never
frightened of me, as they are now
when they cross my path as I
wander by the woods and the hills, mad with
grief. They fear me,
now. Last morning, as I lay weeping, I tried
to stretch my salty
hand to a bird. I wanted so desperately to have his
comforting
little presence to warm my cold fingers! But it did not come. It
flew
away, afraid of my sobs.
Forgive me. I never meant to bother
you with my nonsense, but you asked me
to, so I will
continue.
Huor was the youngest son of Galdor, the son of
Hador Loríndol, a renowned
hero among my people. He was
dark haired and very tall, and his eyes shone
with a wondrous
light from another world. This was, they said, because he
had been
among the High Elves, and befriended them, although he never told
me
anything about that. He was my husband...
Oh, but wait! I did
not tell you how I met him, forgive me. I am so distraught! I saw him
for the first time in my cousin Morwen´s wedding, because it
was
Huor´s elder brother she was marrying. We spoke a few
words, concerning the
couple that they would make. "The two
are just as headstrong. I wonder
what will happen when they
quarrel!" Huor was saying to me, and I blushed.
Afterwards,
he told me that he had decided to begin courting me at that
same
moment.
Still, we did not marry until six years later.
Huor was brave and valiant in
warfare, but in daily life he was
just as shy as I was, so it was very hard
for him to make
advances, and as hard for me to accept
them. At last, he managed
to propose me, and my father was not
displeased. The wedding was
merry, with plenty of wine and dancing, as is
the custom among my
people.
That same night, however, the hideous shadow fell
over our lives, and joy left our land
forever. And all because of
a meaningless and horrid war, which
was not even our own mistake,
but the mistake of a wholly different people.
Your own people.
Now you are really eyeing me in wonder. Surely nobody
has dared to speak in
this strain before. Surely all of you feel
bitterly about the war, but none
says it is meaningless. The Dark
Lord must be destroyed! You
cannot think beyond that.
I can, for grief helps me see.
Listen! Your fight against the
Dark Lord, or Morgoth as you call him is really
meaningless. Why?
Not only because you cannot win, but also
because, if by a remote
chance you really did win, what then? Would you live in eternal
bliss
and happiness? Could
you?
If
the Dark Lord was no more, your eternal lives would lose
their
meanings. You would become as restless and rebellious as we
Edain,
who never knew nothing but hardships, were taught that your
kin was, in
that land of eternal beauty and peace that they
forsook willingly. I have read all
the chronicles of the Noldor,
but I never found a clue as to why they
rebelled. Were they fools,
that they preferred war and death to peace? No,
not fools, I know
now, but something worse: they needed the war to be
united, as
they were falling apart; they needed it to feel they
were a
people, a mighty and independent people, and not toys for beings
more
powerful. And they needed it, too, to learn to admire and
respect
their leaders as they had done in the land under the
shadow.
Yes,
dead,
enthralled, diminished...but proud and, as they say,
"free". And they- you
too, but especially they- pretend
they are protecting us, instead of
acknowledging the truth...that
we are dying for all this! Dying for the war that they need!
Huor
went to fight beside his Elven King in the battle of Unnumbered
Tears.
I begged him to stay, but he paid no heed to my words, the
very first time
that he refused me anything. "Rían"
he said, with a very serious
countenance, "Rían, I
would like to stay, to watch our child´s birth, and to be
with
you. Believe me, I do not wish anything else. But I must go and
fight
the Black Foe with my king. It is our last chance to defeat
him, they have
said, and I...I made a promise long ago. Do you
want me to
disappoint my brother?
"Well, then, go with
them! Your Noldor Elves! They only need you
to fight for them in
their wars. If you are killed, who will take care of
me?"
"My brother and his wife will." he said, and he left. Left me with child.
And, then, he died. His brother disappeared, too, and
my
hard-hearted cousin, who does not think as a woman, but as a
war- hardened
man, was very angry at me because I was not able to
hold my grief as she
could. So I went away, in search of my
husband. Well, of his corpse. No,
I am not that mad yet.
How
do you stare at me! Your gazes make me feel as I was on the
verge of
tears again. I forgot you were but Grey- Elves that live
in the forests,
tender and compassionate. I am sorry...I did not
mean to cause you pain.
Forgive me. Our lives are so short, and
our destinies so uncertain, that
war is a far greater bane for the
likes of us than for the likes of you. We
mortal women cannot see
it as a passing event, but as a monster that
swallows the lives of
those we love most so we never see them again.
Do not call it
poetry. Do not call it philosophy. Call it just madness. I am
mad;
and I do not want to live any longer.
So you are horrified,
now. What? To stay with you? To give birth to my child
in this
darkened world ruled by war and misery? And I thought that
you
understood!
Leave me alone. It is a plea, a request, a
threat! I do not want my child to live, for I think he deserves
better than that. He, or she, will probably be turned into a
thrall,
or killed.
Oh, you say that you swear to protect him with your
lives. What will he be
then? A warrior, a valiant warrior blinded
by duty and promises of honour
and glory, like his father and his
uncle. And, if it is a woman, then she
will give her love to one
of those, and despair.
Promise me that you will teach him or
her to be as wise as his poor mother was
before she died. Promise
it. As soon as he can understand, repeat for him, or for her, the
words you have just heard. Will you promise me that, please?
I
see you will do anything to save the child´s wretched life. You
have
promised, so now I must stay here until I give birth. But,
when I am finished, I will go, and you will not know where. You may
follow
me, but you will lose my trail. You will grow afraid of the
darkness, and,
finally leave me alone. Do not despair then, for it
was meant to be so from
the beginning: I have no other path to
tread. Did you know one thing? Elves are
not the only ones who can
die of grief.
And we never return.
(The End)
Note:
Rían stayed for a while under the protection of the Wood Elves
of the
tribe of Annael, a Grey Elf. She gave birth to Huor´s
son, Tuor, who was to
be so important for the fate of Middle-
Earth, but, then, she left him and
went to the place where the
Nirnaeth Arnoediad had taken place. There she
lay alone, crying,
and died shortly afterwards.
The meaning of Rían
is "queen" in Sindarin speech ( and in Celtic speech,
I
believe.)
My apologies to all who know ancient greek, but I
am myself very grieved
for the sheer butchery I´ve been
forced to perpetrate with my most beloved
and studied language,
because stupid unlettered doesn´t accept
greek
characters. The meaning is something like this: "War is
father and king to
all ("War" in Greek being a masculine
noun), and it turns some into gods,
others into men; some into
slaves, and others into free people."
(Heraclitus, 53 b)