Inspired by the Silmarilion.

Caranthir rose from his stone chair taking the knife from Lathwinn's hand. With smooth movements of his fingers, he flipped it to grip its hilt holding it ready to strike. Sarnin shrank back from him.

She felt, as well as saw her niece stay as she had been as if Caranthir was not glaring through her. Lathwinn was not perfectly still before Caranthir, but she seemed unmoved by his movement like a tree whose leaves and branches move in the wind, but not away from the great bear approaching to sharpen its claws in its trunk. Sarnin held her breath. Her gaze darted from her niece to the ruler of this fort. She became keenly aware, though she didn't look at them, they stood surrounded by elven warriors pledged to obey this ellon's orders, the one so staring down her niece.

Caranthir continued to stand before Lathwinn watching her while holding the blade made by Celuant. He did not even glance at Sarnin. Then he spoke with a voice smooth and hard as the polished obsidian he held, "You have played a dangerous game, elleth …" He flipped the knife in his hand again and held it by its blade once more while holding the hilt out to Lathwinn, "But you have played it well. Go now, a servant shall guide you to a room prepared for you and your aunt. Stay there and refresh yourself till the sun it high tomorrow and our enemies hide, so you may travel safely back through my kingdom to your own." Then he sat back in his throne still staring at her.

Lathwinn gave a buoyant bow, like a fruit dunked under water only to rise again to the surface. Then she turned and walked away with a smile upon her lips. Sarnin turned and followed swiftly behind. Her face was pale enough to please even these elves from Western shores.

. . .

It was not until they were safe in the room Caranthir had provided for them temporarily, and Sarnin felt only empty halls around it, she turned to her niece. Her eyes were still wide and mouth still open in a small "o" just before she asked, "Lathwinn, what happened? Why was the ruler of this fort so angry with you?"

Lathwinn sat in the mattress near the head of the bed, her legs crossed before her as she answered. "Since, I have traveled much and spoken to many Noldo, he probably knew I knew the laws forbidding elves who escape the fortress of our joint enemy from being spoken of in any of their realms."

"So, speaking of …" Sarnin paused. The face of the Noldo she loved, scarred, hard, but concerned, rose up in her mind. It felt odd to purse her lips and hold the thought of him inside rather than speak of him aloud. Lathwinn nodded up at her. "Indeed, but we sang, not spoke earlier of him …"

Sarnin's eyes grew round. "It was still a great risk young one …"

"It was, but he was vividly, exceedingly angry, not just sad, as a ruler who must uphold a law, whether he like it or not, is. So, I would say we are in the right fort and among the right elves. They know the one we sang about. I felt the fear and wonder among them as we sang of him, and when I presented the blade he made. We are in the right place."

Sarnin shuddered. "So, they know of him ... What now? Apparently, we take our lives and put them in the merciless ones of these elves of the West if we speak of him among them."

Lathwinn's eyes went from laughing and bright to soft and deep as she stared at her aunt. "Speak not of them that way Aunty. Had we been on their shores in those days, I know what I would have done: hunted even so great a foe as the Enemy of All, for spoiling Trees of Light even against the counsel of the wise. And you may well have had even your gentle heart burn at the thought of such stones as the Silmarils with the Dark Lord. Let us not judge these elves we are among, or the foolish choices 'we' might like have made, and how those choices have formed them now. We have lived not their lives but let us learn from them as I said we would."

Sarnin sat on the edge of the bed, her niece stared at her with like softened, but still fearful eyes. Then her aunt asked her. "What shall we do then?"

Lathwinn shrugged. "We can always first stay, then leave, as Caranthir suggests. They know now where to find both him and us if they want. They have likely understood the song we sang well enough to know he is well, or more well than could have been expected, when they saw him last … So our mission is done."

Sarnin frowned. Her gaze left her niece. Her head bowing as her thoughts ventured inward.

This was not what she had planned when she'd left her homeland determined to go on this long journey. She had expected to speak around seeking the kin, these brothers of her Celuant, and speak to them face to face about him. She'd wanted to see the fear leave them as she eased their concerns, watch the uncertainty melt away into joy. She must instead be content at the thought music alone had communicated to a crowd, what she wanted strictly his family to know through her words instead? Was it enough?

Her shoulders fell as she sighed. "I suppose Lathwinn, my love, to keep you and myself safe till we return to our own realm, where we may speak freely of such things, I must submit to following all of your instruction on these matters, as I already agreed to. But I must say, for being told I am more Noldo than Laquendi by many, I am not more comfortable among them."

Lathwinn laughed. "You will be home soon, Dear Aunty, and tell all our kin that yourself. They will be glad to know we are not soon to lose you to them for certain!"

. . .

Celuant and Lathwinn's brothers, Sarnin's nephews, had paused in their long run over plains and alongside mountains going in the same direction they sensed their kin, or companions as Celuant was concerned. They ate to retain their strength. Mostly their meal was nuts, dry-fruit, and honey-covered versions of both, along with a few herbs in the grass they'd paused to sit in.

During this time, the youngest among them put his face in his hands bowing both head and back as he did so. "It is hopeless. Lathwinn rode that horse of hers over this land. They are leagues before us by now!"

Lastanann turned angry eyes upon Manpalan. "As long as we get there before they do anything they shouldn't, we shall save them."

His closest brother in age sniffed. Then he gave Lastanann a dark smirk, "And you expect it to be so? This is Lathwinn we speak of, and Sarnin, who has never ventured beyond our beloved land of rivers since our people settled there."

Melarbeth raised his head and looked to Ranthalion, "Lathwinn is not so foolish as you all seem to surmise. She knows the ways of others beyond our land better than any of us. And who among us questions her love and care for our aunt?"

Celuant closed his eyes and bowed his head a bit, his words were harder and sharper than those of any of the brothers, but seemed deep and soft for him, "If they know not the law, they will break it without knowing it and be punished just the same."

Lastanann turned to stare at him intently as a deer might a predator that had not yet attacked. "And why should speaking of you be such a crime?"

Celuant snorted. "I was captured. That is enough. Merely speaking of me is enough. 'Those captured by Melkor Morgoth must not even be thought of again, lest they be used as means of war against us. Merciless must we be too, to win this war against him if he seeks to use our mercy against us.' That is how it is among the Noldo. Fools. They think they can win anyway even by doing thus?"

Melarbeth tilted his head and stared at him with wide, grey eyes. "You think it is hopeless either way?"

"You and your people have only escaped so far because he has so little interest in you. When he has razed every city of the Noldo, and slain all who fill them, he will come to and destroy you too."

"And you are certain of this?"

Celuant nodded his head. "I have seen and felt his armies, his forges, the vastness of all that lies in and beneath his fortress while I was there. There is no hope."

Lastanann continued to gaze at this elf who held his aunt's heart. "Then why do you help us? Why do you seek to save our aunt only to be killed later by a greater foe or more merciless and greedy armies?"

Celuant raised his head. "I do not know." Then he rose to his feet, brushed his hands against each other, and looked to the north again. "But will you all come with me?"

First the eldest, and then all the others, a hair behind, rose and stared into the north with him. "Always, for our kin."

Celuant sighed. "If only 'all' my people thought and felt like you, perhaps we would not have gotten into this fix we are in, but stayed together on the other shore."

Melarbeth raised an eyebrow. "I thought it was your unwillingness to let your brothers come here alone that brought you here with them in the first place?"

Celuant nodded. "Yes, but we left our parents let alone aunts, uncles, and cousins behind, when we came." Then he sprang forward and all five ellon ran on together again like they would never tire.

. . .

Sarnin and Lathwinn were not occupied with anything, but thinking, when Lathwinn noticed it first. She sat up in the bed she'd been lying on while Sarnin perched only on its end. The younger elleth sat up gaze intent though it was her ears causing her to pay attention. "Do you hear that?"

Sarnin turned widened, but still not very wide, eyes upon her niece. "Hear which thing? There is much music, talk, and water splashing in fountains inside these walls."

Lathwinn stood. "Our song, our song we sang, but sadder plays on a harp somewhere nearby."

Sarnin frowned and listened. In the chaos, she discerned such now like her niece did. She rose to her own feet and listened more intently still. Lathwinn came up beside her and took her hand. Together, they went out the door. It opened on silent hinges. They were well-oiled. Then they stepped even more soundlessly through the shadows.

Fear seemed to have gripped the fortress. Most noise came from behind closed doors. The halls were empty as if all hid from something or someone. Still, Lathwinn paused not outside the door Sarnin heard the music coming from. She went on instead.

Sarnin looked back at it, and then to the back of her niece's head in question. They went down a flight of stairs and around a corner. Then, Lathwinn stopped before a thick tapestry and swept it aside, revealing an arched doorway built into the wall. Sarnin's eyes widened. Her niece pulled her through this entrance after her.

They found themselves before the bottom of a winding staircase. From its top, the music played on. Lathwinn ascended pulling her mother's sister with her. The latter's hand gripped hers furiously. She came to a door and pushed it open without knocking.

An ellon she swore was younger than her stopped playing and blinked at the sight of Lathwinn after she entered the room he played in. Another ellon standing near him turned to see her too. Sarnin opened her mouth behind her niece.

With the elf playing the music, it had been noticeable. But this … Why, 'this' face newly turned to hers seemed so exactly like what she thought Celuant's would be without the scars, she blinked. It was a handsome face too, but sad, very sad, and serious. A movement from the corner of her eye caused her to turn. She blinked again.

Two elves stood there, side by side. Both had quivers of arrows on their backs. Their faces too resembled Celuant's and those of these other elves', but not so much as they resembled each other.

"Twins," Lathwinn said while shutting the door behind her. She looked to the one holding the harp. "Keep playing."

Before starting, the ellon looked, not to her, but tp the ellon standing over him. This ellon gave him back a look both grim and tender, before nodding. The musician went on his music both sadder and sweeter like honey spilled into a deep pit the bottom of which you cannot reach.

Lathwinn glanced back at the twins. On closer inspection, their expressions were as alike as their features, hard as well as grim. There lips were pursed and eyes slightly narrowed at her and Sarnin. There was a tension to their bodies those of the other two lacked.

Lathwinn nodded to herself. Like my own second-eldest brother ...

Yet, she did not think either of them the second eldest in their own sibling-order. She greatly suspected … Indeed, it seemed proven by the ellon moving toward her now while his brother played on covering whatever noise he made in his movements with his music. This ellon approaching her now was dressed in muted red. His brown eyes were wide, sad, and fearful as they stared into hers, bored into them even. His mouth formed, but breath barely voiced the words as the music grew louder "How is our brother Narkal?"

What do you think now?

God bless

ScribeofHeroes