I own only Lathwinn, her Aunt Sarnin, and Sarnhael Celuant.
Sarnin's niece was led by the Noldo elf into another room with a long table. There, three more Noldo ellon sat staring at parchments laid on the table's surface. One sat at the head of the table, two others sat on either side of him. They were speaking in low tones. As she drew closer, Sarnin saw the parchments were maps. The elf who had led them there stopped and her niece stopped about a half-pace behind and at his side. She stopped behind her niece and watched.
The elf sitting at the head of the table turned to looked at them around the high back of his chair. The ellon had sharp features and a sharper gaze. His voice was low and hard. "Lathwinn the Great."
Sarninr watched him rise from the table and stand beside his chair staring at her niece. The other two elves remained in their seats, perhaps because their own stares were unimpeded. Lathwinn gave a slight bow and smile to him. "Caranthir."
"Why have you come?"
"To apologize."
Caranthir raised an eyebrow. Sarnin felt his surprise in The Song more than she saw it on his face. "And why have you come to apologize to us then?"
"I didn't really understand nor appreciate the gifts and talents you brought to our shores to help us fight our shared enemy. I have come to appreciate them far more of late. I would like to deliver my message of new understanding and appreciation to your folk in the great hall tonight."
"With my appreciation, you may. Have you anything else to say?"
"Can I know what you've observed of orc movements out of their dark lord's fortress of late?"
Caranthir looked back to the maps and sighed. "My patrols catch sight of many far away. They then charge, and the monsters dispel. I'd like to believe them the cowards they seem, but one trap in which we lost some five warriors not long ago, and like traps and losses before that make me believe they are as cunning as they seem cowardly. You should not travel in the dark without armor."
Lathwinn bowed slightly. "Thank you for your advice. Perhaps I will depart in the daylight as I came."
A bark, if not bite, was in Canranthir's reply, and he made it with his back turned to her. "If you do not wish to wear fine armor, my strange ally, despite your newfound appreciation for our devices, then you may indeed spend the night in the fortress we also constructed." He turned his face away to match the rest of his body and downward to the table and parchments upon it again.
Lathwinn gave a bow to his back a lower one than her others and replied, "Thank you for your time, counsel, and hospitality Caranthir."
He gave a brisk nod. "If there is nothing else Lathwinn, I must look to the safety of my kingdom."
"The safer your kingdom is, the safer is mine. I will allow you to do so and go on my way."
As Lathwinn departed, Sarnin walked briskly by her side. Soon they were walking about the fortress out in the yard, up and down the walls, and inside again and through the halls. Sarnin mostly kept silent following behind and a little beside her niece, who seemed to know where she was going the whole time. Many an elf paused in their own steps to greet Lathwinn and ask after her own identity at first. Eventually, though the new faces started to ask, "And this, then, is your aunt Sarnin?"
Lathwinn mentioned unlike many Green elves she, her own beloved aunt, loved stone and rock as well. Soon Noldo were asking her about her interest and her craft. She showed them a few of her works and saw the light fade a bit from their eyes as they viewed them. She heard the interest sink in their voices afterward. However, when Lathwinn pulled out her blades made by the hands of Sarnhael, and she did the same, the Noldo's faces greyed and eyes became like light reflecting off pond water telling nothing of the water's depth.
Lathwinn said little of the blades other than her appreciation of their fine craftsmanship and their contribution to her new appreciation for such. She had learned from using these blades against their shared foes the importance of keen eyes and steady hands that were skilled at carving stone. The Noldo nodded and often found some polite way to depart, when she was through speaking to them. All the time, Lathwinn mentioned her desire to share with all of them her grand apology and newfound love of stone and stone-working that night.
Soon it seemed the light had faded. The evening meal was served in a great hall as the stars shone bright. Sarnin found herself staring at the fire built in a great maw of the stone wall on one side of the dining hall. She knew in her heart, the wood that burned there was already long dead and all living wood, what there was of it growing inside the fortress, was not endangered by the embers floating upwards in this "chimney." Still, she glanced nervously away from her meal, parts of which seem as carefully crafted and sculpted as all else there and toward the devouring flames again lighting everything in the room.
"Fire takes some getting used to doesn't it, Aunty?"
Sarnin looked away from the glow coming from the end of the room and blushed. Another voice spoke lightly from the other side of and down the table. "When we first built such a blaze near Lathwinn the Great, she and her brothers stood guard over it glaring, though, there was nothing but scrub-brush for leagues!"
Lathwinn grinned at the speaker. "Well, we had to guard the scrub-brush. You were not going to."
Laughter came from many throats gathered around the table. Sarnin tried to drink wine from her goblet, at the same time, in order to cover up the fact she was not laughing. Indeed, she had not been comfortable ever since they began wandering this fortress. She admired the use of stone to form it, and particularly the care and detail obvious in every line. She understood why her own efforts caused so little excitement to bloom from these elves' hearts. Their polite nods and comments seemed chill like frost on mud after they saw Celuant's fine work though. There was a fear here too, even among the elves they weren't speaking to. It sucked the laughter from the people as sand sucks in drops of water leaving its surface still dry.
Lathwinn seemed able to coax smiles and even laughter from them. She had not heard a single chuckle come drifting to them over the air from elsewhere, though, nor did these elves constantly sing together. She had heard some melodies drift out of workrooms and from forges underground. Though she was glad such things were kept away from growing, green things she could not imagine spending so much time indoors as they must when it wasn't winter, but summer. She sighed and wished she could go home, and wandered why her niece had not yet told Celuant's story to anyone.
After the meal, servers came by and gathered up their plates. That was something else she didn't understand. Why did others have to take away and wash your dishes? At home, she rinsed and scrubbed her out her own bowl, if she used it, on the riverside. She did the same with her deer-antler fork and the river oyster shell she used like a great spoon. These people insisted they needed metal armor and weapons, and then used the precious material to make forks, and spoons, and plates. Though … she studied the goblet in her hand with its pattern of leaves around the rim. They were lovely … very lovely …
Caranthir's voice echoed down the hall and he asked their guests to come and make their mission known to them all at once as they had requested. Lathwinn managed to stand before all the murmurs faded away, but Sarnin did so a moment too late. The sound of the seat, she wasn't used to resting in such, moving echoed loud in the great chamber and sudden silence. She blushed as she walked after her niece and managed to overhear a whisper about how pink Green elleth faces were. She was afraid a moment later it only looked all the pinker.
Lathwinn then stood before the ruler of the fortress. He studied her from his seat in a far more awesome chair. Sarnin thought it looked like it was not made to move at all. His tone was like the chair. "Now, guest of mine and this fortress, Lathwinn the Great, tell me of your reasons for coming to us now."
"I have come to offer apologies for my mockery of your many shiny devices as I have come to better understand the uses of carefully carved stone."
"Indeed. You may begin then."
"As is the way of my people, I would rather my aunt and I sing of it instead of merely speaking, great one."
The sharp, intent face before them smiled. "Go ahead, elleth of the singing land, and sing for us."
Lathwinn turned a smile of love, warmth, and admiration upon her. Sarnin felt her heart and soul respond like a leaf to the sun. The great hall and stares of the elves in it seemed to fade away. Her niece was almost laughing as she said, "Sing that song of the mountain you made while wondering it searching for me.
Sarnin's own smile almost fell away. That was a sad song. However, she did begin to sing it. The way the music echoed off the walls of the building they were in reminded her a little of how it had echoed off the mountains.
Lathwinn began to sing her song of the eagle, high and distant, with long, swooping, and then climbing notes. There were also notes like sudden screeches, but sweet as they were proud.
Lathwinn switched to sing a different song. The melody in Sarnin's own throat stopped a moment at its sound. Then she remembered what she was supposed to be doing and continued with her song of the mountains.
Lathwinn, however, sang with and of despair and anger. Interspersed with this new melody was the song of the eagle. It was as if someone was yelling at the Great Bird. Then she did the same with the song of a river. Sarnin herself began to sing of a river winding through stone mountains as the song of the eagle seemed entirely left behind. After that the song of the river they both sang overwhelmed everything, but Lathwinn brought in sad notes of quieter despair. Sarnhael realized what she was doing in time to add herself into the song. Her music was that of searching out, first in hope, and then in joy, and then hearing and responding with concern to the sound of despair in the water and following that despair to its source.
Lathwinn sang of orcs with their notes of harsh laughter. Sarnin sang of both courage and love. Lathwinn sang the parts of her and her brothers and finally Celuant himself. Sarnin sang the parts of the canyon, and river, and her own continual chiding, guiding, and pushing. They sang together the song of their people in greeting. Then Lathwinn sang of trees and beasts while she sang of rivers and stones.
Lathwinn, at first, also kept the melody of anger and bitterness going, but eventually it grew softer and less. It became mixed with a rhythm of chipping and then exclamations of joy and a song of sparring among warriors and their pride. The song of bitterness and anger became both calmer and took on a note of pride itself.
Finally, a song of pomp, very reminiscent, Sarnin thought, of their own surroundings but with a beat of horse hoofs and tinkle of bells that made her think of the visitors to their land she had followed, and which had caused her to visit here. The melody of anger swelled shortly thereafter and then ended. At the same moment, Lathwinn stopped.
Sarnin did soon after letting her note fade away gradually. Lathwinn then took out her longest blade made by Celuant and presented it to Caranthir. "Much has been learned by my people and others in recent years, oh Noldo, and we thank you for that …"
What do you think?
God Bless
ScribeofHeroes
