"If you didn't tell each other who you were what did you talk about?" Bregon wondered.
"We didn't do a great deal of talking in those days, Little Brother," Beren answered with a reminiscent smile.
"We sang and laughed or held hands in silence gazing deeply into each other's eyes," Luthien explained with a dreamy smile of her own.
Bregon's left eyebrow rose slightly in the quizzical expression seemingly common to the entire House of Beor. "Forgive me, but didn't that get a trifle monotonous?
"No." said Beren and Luthien in unison, echoed by Adanel and Emeldir, their eyes bright with memories of their own courting days.
Beren smiled a little condescendingly at the younger Man. "You'll find out for yourself someday, Little Brother."
"I certainly hope so." Bregon answered.
...
"My Lord I would take oath there is naught in that wood save the beasts and birds who dwell there," a decidedly harried Captain Mablung told his King.
"Oh he's there," Luthien said confidently and turned to her father. "Your Men will never find him, but I can." She paused to make sure she had his full attention. "And I will, providing you promise me you will do him no harm. Anorion never meant to break our law, it was my fault not his."
Thingol struggled with himself a moment, then nodded stiffly. "Very well, Daughter, I accept your Man meant no harm. His life is safe."
"And his freedom," Luthien prompted and got another stiff nod.
"And his freedom. Now bring him to me!" Thingol finished in a near roar.
"As you wish, Sire." she said lightly, dropped a courtsey and then a kiss upon her father's purpling cheek and danced out of the room.
Thingol's glittering eye fixed on the shrinking handmaidens. "As for you two -"
"My dear," Melian laid a gentle hand on his arm, "bethink yourself. Their service and first loyalty is to Luthien, of course they kept her secret." She smiled coaxingly. "Surely you don't expect girls to tell tales on one another?"
Was there nobody in all of Menegroth he could take his temper out on? Thingol wondered in something like desperation. "Very well, we will say no more about it. Have either of you seen this Man?"
Both handmaidens shook their heads. "No, my Lord," said Runen, "Even when we accompanied Luthien across the Esgalduin he never showed himself until we had left her."
"I did wonder, my Lord, my Lady," Duveleth said in a rush, "if perhaps this Anorion might not be some kind of phantom or delusion." She flushed even redder. "I mean nobody but Luthien has seen or even sensed him. Is that possible?"
"No phantom or sending could pass the Girdle," said the Queen. "If this is a delusion it is one formed out of my daughter's own mind."
"You mean Luthien is mad?" Duveleth asked round eyed.
"Melian -" the King began, equally appalled.
But the Queen shook her head. "I do not. I believe this Man exists, shielded by some great doom or power beyond mine."
"I do not find that reassuring." Thingol said drily.
...
Luthien was still in the forest of Region, she hadn't even reached the bridge she usually used to cross the river into Neldoreth, when with a rustle of leaves Anorion dropped onto the path in front of her and clasped her gratefully in his arms. "Tinuviel! Thank Our Father and Our Lady you're safe.(1) The beech-wood is crawling with Elven warriors of some kind -"
"I know. They're my father's men looking for you."
He pushed her back to arms length to stare, "Your father?"
"Thingol King of Doriath. The Beechwood is part of Doriath," she explained.
"Doriath," he repeated even more blankly. "You're Luthien Thingolien? But - but the Hidden Kingdom is supposed to be defended from intrusion by the power of the Maia Queen."
"So we thought." Luthien agreed. "My mother says a greater power than hers must have guided you through the mazes of the Girdle."
"Your mother," he echoed. "Of course if you're Thingol's daughter then Melian the Maia is your mother." He sat down abruptly on a convenient root and put his head in his hands. "Your father is going to kill me."
"He will not!" Luthien cried horrified. "Truly, Anorion, I have his word - he knows it was all my fault - I explained everything -"
"Gently, Sweetheart, gently." he interrupted, reaching up to take her hands. "I only meant that King Thingol was like to be very angry with me. And justly too."
"Not justly" she said, heart still thumping. "You haven't done anything wrong."
"Not on purpose." he agreed ruefully and got to his feet. "You'd better present me to your father."
They'd only gone a little ways up the path back to Menegroth when they came face to face with Captain Mablung and a half dozen of his men. "This is Anorion." Luthien said, enjoying the astonished expressions on their faces.
"Beren." the Man beside her corrected. It was her turn to be astonished and she stared at him. "My name is Beren son of Barahir," her Anorion said misinterpreting her blank expression. "I am grandson of that Bregor who was Lord of Ladros in the North. We held our land from King Finrod Felagund -"
"Yes." Mablung broke in, "Your name and lineage are not unknown in Doriath, my Lord Beren."
"They aren't?" the Man looked puzzled a moment, then shrugged. "Well that'll save some explaining anyway."
...
Beren gratefully accepted Captain Mablung's offer of a bath and change of clothes before his audience with King Thingol. It would definitely help his case if he looked a little more the lord and less the vagabond. The Captain clearly agreed, Beren arched an appreciative eyebrow at the splendor of the garments the Elf offered him.
"Contrary to appearances, Captain, I do know the customs and usages of civilized Men and Elves," he said as he pulled the tunic over his head. "Unlike your Princess, I realize all to well just how outrageous my behavior has been," he gave Mablung a wry smile. "I have three sisters and I hate to think what my father would have done had he discovered one of them was meeting some nameless wanderer in the woods!"
"You are far from nameless, my Lord," the Captain responded.
"No, but I gather your King is not much impressed by my kind. I know Men are forbidden entry here." Beren sighed as he fastened a golden belt around his waist. "I did not knowingly break your law - indeed I don't understand how I came to do so knowing or unknowing."
"That puzzles us as well," Mablung admitted. "Where did you think you were, my Lord?"
Beren shrugged. "Some woodland in Himlad. I took your Princess for another holdout like myself with the rest of her folk either fled or dead."
"And she didn't tell you otherwise."
"She did not!"
...
Luthien waited in the outer chamber of the aparment assigned to Anorion - Beren - together with Runen and Duveleth.
"Beren son of Barahir! no wonder he had no difficulty concealing himself from our men after all those years spent hiding from Orcs and Wargs and Werewolves!" Duveleth murmured awed.
"I should have known he was somebody, that no common Man could have such skills," Luthien brooded.
"You were right about him having a terrible time Outside," Runen reminded her with a shudder. "His father and companions dead, his whole country destroyed!"
Duveleth shivered too. "No wonder he was so glad to find peace and safety in Neldoreth!"
The inner door opened. Luthien looked up and her jaw dropped. Beren's hair and beard had been washed and trimmed and shone like polished bronze in the lamplight. He was attired in shades of blue; tunic, robe and mantle, with a golden belt clasping his slim waist, a golden collar round his neck and a thin circlet holding back his hair with a sunburst upon his brow.
"You're right, he is beautiful!" Runen murmured appreciatively into her ear. Duveleth seemed beyond speech.
Luthien was wordless too. Beren Barahirion, Lord of Ladros in Dorthonion, seemed a very different Man from her Anorion - until he smiled at her and asked; "Well, Sweetheart, do I clean up well?"
She stood up holding out her hand to him. "If I had realized how much more beautiful you are clean and properly dressed I'd have brought you home long ago."
...
1. I will explain this later, but Beren is *not* refering to the Virgin Mary.