Finally, it is done. Well, this chapter is done. If this was the real end, we'd be in trouble. I want to say thanks to everyone who was so very patient in waiting for this update. I'll be quiet now and let you read it. Pheona

Chapter Nine: Of nestings and Keepers

Quite some time had passed, and Tony had indeed led the Regulars in several rounds of Cabin Fever,' when the two Elven craft came nigh unto the storm. The sun that had seared the path between Eldír's soul and the imminent future hid behind a shifting, rolling, darkling veil of shadow that stretched from the black, boiling ocean into the eternal heavens like a wall. Spears and forked tridents of blue-white lightning split the brewing sky, crackling as fat on a fire. The subsequent thunder crashed, echoing, over the tossing waves.
"Great," Sivi said darkly, watching the rising storm from her position on the pitching prow.
"What is it, Las—er, Lady?" John asked gruffly from behind.
"The Sundering Seas," Gil-galad supplied in a dead tone.
"Come again, Lad?"
"The Sundering Seas are the barrier between Ea and Aman, a great storm that denies passage all mortals, and formerly, the Noldorin Exiles," Sivi explained flatly.
"Don't the elves sail through it all the time?" John demanded.
"Elves do, but I didn't say Elves, I said mortals, which applies to you and your friends, at least for the moment, as well as most of mine," Sivi replied testily.
"What about that guy—oh, whatsisname—Earendil?" Orlando queried, having just come up the steps with Andrea, Peggy, and Tony all in tow.
"I see the storm interrupted family time," John remarked caustically, being in a rather foul mood.
Orlando shot his friend a half-angry, half-wounded look, but chose not to reply.
"Earendil had possession of a Silmaril, and we don't," Sivi told them with a sigh.
"But something else he had, that we do, is Sivi!" Andrea piped up cheerily.
"Really, it was mostly Ulmo," Sivi said modestly.
"Is this a part of the Mariner's tale that I have yet to hear?" Gil- galad inquired, gazing at his ever-love with admiration and intrigue plain in his turquoise eyes.
"It was a lesser quest much earlier in my long life," Sivi smiled ruefully. "It's unimportant."
"But—"
"As if on cue, the friends were thrown to the deck as the ship lurched horribly to port. Siobhan, closest to the railing, felt the smack of sea spray across her cheek and brow before the ship righted herself once again. 'You had Osse do that on purpose!' Andrea thought furiously to her friend.
'If you'd kept your mouth shut, I wouldn't have had to,' Sivi returned just as heatedly.
'Why? Are they not supposed to know?'
'No one is!' Sivi fairly snapped.
'Then why tell me?'
"Andrea, Tony, are you both alright?" asked Peggy, cutting into the testy mental debate.
"Yeah, that was fun! Let's do it again!" Tony cried, bouncing up and down in a fairly 'squeeish' maner.
"No, let's not'" Andrea told him hatefully.
"What's wrong, Andree?" Tony queried, using his pet name for his favorite (and only) sister.
"Nothing, sorry. I just have carpet burn—wood burn—whatever. My knees hurt."
"Aww. Have Legolas kiss it and make it better," Tony suggested innocently.
Andrea turned as red as Sarah's hair, and Orlando engaged in a sudden fit of heavy coughing.
"Hey, Tony, let's go see what Ulmo's doing," Peggy said with a mother's bright falsetto excitement.
Yes! Ulmo!" Tony exclaimed, and bounced happily down the stairs.
As Peggy passed Andrea, the girl whispered gratefully,
"Thanks, Mom."

"Bad business, Mr. Frodo," Sam pronounced darkly.
"I know, Sam; I know," Frodo murmured, gazing morosely at the open door of Bag End.
"Let me go in and have a look about," Sam offered, and was into the Hobbit hole in a trice on noiseless furry feet.
It was dark inside, riddled with the kind of shadow that comes when the power goes out during a storm at dusk; a thick grey that is not quite black.
"'When the power goes out'?" Sam wondered, catching his unconscious thought stream. "What does that mean? O, well, it came out of MY head, so it may well mean nothing at all. My gaffer'd prob'ly say so, anyhow."
A thick layer of dust lay heavy on everything, and the spiders had been busily plying their trade. Papers were blown about on the floor; paint was peeling; portraits had fallen and broken, so that Sam had to watch his step; and hinges and doorknobs were badly rusted.
"Hunh, would've thought Lobelia'd keep up with the place, even if she wasn't going to live in it — and why she isn't living here's a mystery to me, when she waited so long to have it from Mr. Frodo," Sam muttered.
At the sound, there was a dry, dead rustle in the shadows, but Sam, turning, could find nothing to have caused it. An irrational gut fear clutched at the little Hobbit, and he darted down the corridor and outside to his master... but Frodo wasn't there, and Sean awoke in a sweat.

Sivi knew she was going to have a sizable bruise on her hip, and she was resolved to positively bean Ossë when she saw him. She had said for him to ROCK the boat, not CAPSIZE it. She had managed to fall on her side so as not to injure her unborn son, but she was still shaking from the closeness of the thing.
Sivi was now rather far along, positively round, and absolutely hating it. She was thankful for her child, of course, but Ereinion treating her like glass, her increasingly large, spherical abdomen, and the boy waking up at the oddest hours wanting to kick and play were all about to drive the young Vala mad.
On a sudden weird inspiration, Sivi tucked her feet under on the bed and sat on her knees, arranging the blankets in around herself like a little cat's bed. She chalked it up as one of those crazy urges pregnant women often got and sat there pontificating. There was a timid knock on the door.
"Come in," Sivi called before she thought.
"Sivi?" Andrea murmured, poking her head around the door. "I, uh, just wanted to co — What are you doing?"
"Nesting," Sivi replied matter-of- factly. "Daddy's eagles do it all the time, so I thought I'd try it out."
"Oh... Er, is it... comfy? It looks... kinda like it hurts."
"It does hurt," Sivi commented, and promptly pulled her feet out again. "Our legs aren't built for that."
"Er, yeah, well, I just came to say I'm sorry about getting mad at you."
"I'm sorry, too. I didn't tell you not to say anything, and anyway, it wasn't life or death. Ossë wasn't supposed to pitch us quite that hard, and I almost landed on my stomach, so I was scared, and that made me angry. Still, that's no excuse."
"Sure it is," Andrea protested. "Are you okay?"
"I'm fine, and so is Cuiviesul," Sivi smiled.
"You know I'll never be able to say that. Maybe I can call him Sully."
"NO."
A fresh, brisk knock saved the situation. At Sivi's invitation, Gil- galad entered, followed, to Andrea's surprise and slight consternation, by Orlando. The latter smiled self-consciously at Andrea and took an unobtrusive seat on an Elven sea-chest by the beautifully crafted oval window. Gil-galad stood by his wife's shoulder.
"At the prow," he began solemnly, "we were... interrupted. It seem to me that if you can do anything to bring us safely through this passing then—"
"I cannot," Sivi answered almost curtly.
"May I inquire as to what the princess meant when she said—"
Gil-galad stopped short in the face of his lady's obvious agitation.
"Do you know the jeweled star set in Andrea's tiara?" Sivi said at length, a strange and terrible coldness entering into her voice.
"Indeed," her husband returned.
"Er—give me a minute," Orlando fumbled; "sometimes, if I push myself, I can remember—little things."
After a pause he continued cautiously, his high brow handsomely furrowed beneath a shower of jet curls,
"I remember, Andrea carried a gold chain with a star when she—left—"
He shook his head, and his dark eyes cleared.
"Not well, Lady."
"Enough," she answered him. Well enough, for this purpose. It was made by a Maia of Aules for... for my sister."
Have I met your sister?" Gil-galad inquired curiously, but Andrea's eyes were on the floor.
"You have not," Sivi said. "She is the only one of the Ainur of Ea to have re-entered the presence of Iluvatar."
"She left?" Orlando asked innocently.
"She died," Andrea corrected sepulchrally.
Both males stared at their wives, unbelieving. The Ainur could die?
"She loved the Maia Melian as a younger sister," Sivi explained, "so when Melian's daughter Luthien was confronted with Sauron's wolf manifestation, my sister stepped in. She was... never... strong. He sent her from the world, but so spent his spirit in the doing that Luthien was able to conquer him.
"None of this would have happened," she continued, "if not for the Silmarils. They are dangerous to the fates of Elves and mortals, and these can affect even the Ainur, as you see. That is why the firstborn of each Vala that had children, as there were at that time only three couples who did, was appointed as a keeper, one to each Silmaril, with the charge of returning them to the Valar. If once they succeeded, the light of the Silmarils could be used by Yavanna to remake the Trees, and then the Silmarils themselves would be spent, never to leave any of Iluvatar's children to ruin again. I and Sarah are Keepers, and it was in the capacity of a Keeper that I had the authority to bring Earendil and his Silmaril across the Sundering Seas. My labors are finished, and I bear that authority no longer."
There was a long and weighted silence. Orlando queried,
"What about Sarah and—well, whoever the other Keeper is?"
"The remaining two Silmarils are lost, one to the sea, and one to on abyss of fire. The Valar know that they will not remain thus forever; someday the Keepers will be needed again. For now, however, Sarah builds the strength of her fiery spirit. The final Keeper was but a babe when her charge was laid, and by the time she was old enough to realize it, the need was past."
"Where is she now? Gil-galad wanted to know.
"With her mother, she is presently studying Nienna's art," Sivi said guardedly.
"I suppose the more pressing question would be, how are we to cross the seas?"
"Ulmo is the Lord of Waters. He has the authority to bring us through mortals or no mortals. We'll be fine," Sivi answered calmly. "However, I must caution you to be absolutely silent about the things I have told you. The lure of the Silmarils is very great. Even the mention of them has been known to drive Men and Elves to lust and subsequent destruction."
The ship heaved hard to starboard and flung its prow to the sky. There was a sickening moment of weightlessness before the vessel struck the ocean with a jarring smack that made the timbers groan.
Gil-galad fell to his knees and caught Sivi as she was thrown from the bed, almost certainly saving their baby's life. Andrea tumbled into a heap on the floor, only to find herself nose to nose with Orlando, who gathered her unashamedly to himself, holding her hard.
"What's happening?" he shouted through a mouthful of flyaway copper hair.
"This is the Sundering Seas: this is what they do," Sivi cried, only half coherently.
"Where's Ulmo? He has to make this stop!" Andrea yelled as the ship pitched again, to port this time, sending a great salt wave smashing against the cabin window.
In a spray of glinting glass and briny water, the window collapsed inward over the heads of Andrea and Orlando.
"Are you okay?" Andrea panicked as she saw the long, thin line of crimson snaking down Orlando's jaw.
"Yes. Are you?" he demanded, but Andrea had heard only that "yes."
She tore herself from his arms and out of the cabin, calling over her shoulder,
"I have to find Ulmo! He has to fix this!"
"Squee, NO!" Orlando cried, rushing after her.
"It is ending, my guardianship of Andrea," Sivi said into the noise of the storm.
Gil-galad braced her as the vessel hurled itself about, choosing not to question or reply.
"All will come to a head very soon, and because of the choices I have made, it cannot be easy."
"What choices?" Gil-galad shouted as the ship nearly rolled over in the water.
"The choices of solitude and silence," Sivi said, and then the sea flooded in through the window, and she spoke no more.

"SQUEE!" Orlando cried, but he had lost her in the milling mass of Elven sailors and Regulars, the latter coping with the storm in a number of odd ways. After pushing through the crowd for a few moments and finding no trace of Andrea, he grabbed Jesse by the vest and shouted,
"Where's the princess?"
"Think she's gone below t'find Lord Ulmo," Jesse returned as loudly.
As Orlando turned to go below, he saw Andrea climb up out of the second stairwell, further down the deck.
"SQUEE!" he shouted again.
She turned but long enough to motion him to follow. He shoved past Adam and Misha, not taking the time to register that the two had lashed themselves to the foremast with what looked like cobwebs. He followed Andrea up the steps to the prow, where Ulmo and Peggy were having a chouted conversation. "Ulmo!" Andrea broke in. "You have to fix this! You have to make it stop!"
"I'm working on it," Ulmo yelled grouchily, "but there's not all that much I can do about it. There are mortals on these ships, and that's against the Law, and the Law isn't one bit happy about it!"
"But what's going to happen?" Peggy wanted to know.
"I don't know yet. I'm going below where there's less noise to talk to Osse and Mandos."
"Hurry!" Peggy cried out.
Andrea was no longer listening. The winds screamed and pummeled her, but she did not hear or feel them. The lightning split the dark, but it only served to illuminate her wistful fancy. She sang one melodic phrase in a far away voice:
"I will not say the day is done, nor bid the stars farewell." Then she removed her tiara from it's corded pouch and clutched it to her breast.
"For Sivi's sister," she whispered... and the seas were calm.

In the little cabin, Gil-galad gazed out the broken window at the brilliant sunbeams in wonder, but Sivi only lay herself quietly on the bed and told the ceiling,
"There it is: the beginning of another end."