The sight of the fresh flowers in her room reminded Katie of her dilemma when she awoke the next morning. She pulled on some clothes and brushed out her hair, then rapped softly on her grandmother's door.

"Come in," Vivian called. "Good morning!" she said when Katie walked in.

"Morning," Katie answered and took a chair.

Vivian looked closely at her. "What's wrong? You've got something on your mind."

"You're psychic," she said, smiling.

"Doesn't take a psychic to read your face, just your mind," her grandmother answered. "Come on, spill the beans."

"Well…" she tried to think of how to say it. "I kinda suspect a certain person of putting up those notes," she finally said.

Vivian took a seat, not looking at all surprised. "Do you have proof?" she asked.

"Well, no. Not really," Katie answered truthfully. "It's all circumstantial. Do you think I should tell Elrond about it? I mean, if I end up being wrong, I'm gonna feel really bad for accusing this person."

"That's hard to say," Vivian answered. "All I can tell you is, if you get to the point where you examine all the evidence and decide it's more likely than not that the person is guilty, then tell, and let Lord Elrond deal with it."

"Okay," Katie said, nodding slowly. "I'll think about it some more, then." She paused. "You see, I was thinking… Maybe the reason the two of us are here is so we can catch the person who's doing this. You know, maybe that's why Ilúvatar kept me here and sent you, as well."

Vivian shrugged and smiled, then quoted her accustomed phrase. "Who knows? God works in a mysterious way."

In the end, Katie decided not to talk to Elrond about it. Everything she had seen could have had another cause. It might not even have been Sadron that she saw talking to Lossefalme. If it was, they could've been talking about anything. The looks she thought she saw them exchange could just have meant that Lossefalme was a little frightened by the situation, and Sadrom maybe suspected that she had heard someone at the door. It might've just meant nothing. Anyway, she was not even half sure of her conclusions, so she was going to keep her mouth shut.

000

Despite her dismissal of it earlier, Katie was still fascinated by the idea that humans used to be different than they now were, and she resolved to ask Erestor more about it. Elladan was busy with Elrond one day, and so the usual four met on the east terrace. Erestor had brought the Athrabeth with him, since it seemed to come up so often in conversation.

"So Erestor," Katie began, "if Men aren't now as they once were, what were we like? I mean, what with the whole 'I'm leaving Arda, and I'm taking my body with me!' thing."

The other three laughed. "Well, as we've seen, the people of Andreth and Adanel her teacher believed that men were once made to live completely immortal lives, with no death whatsoever. In fact, Andreth said that many of the Wise held that in their true nature, no living things would die.

"Be that as it may, Men in their original form did not die. And you would have had greater control over your bodies, as Elves do. Furthermore, Finrod held that human spirits were always meant to eventually leave the circles of the world, but that originally they must have taken their bodies with them. In the Ainulindalë it says, Death is the fate of Men, the gift of Ilúvatar, which as Time wears even the Valar shall envy. But Morgoth has cast his shadow upon it, and confounded it with darkness, and brought forth evil out of good, and fear out of hope. So originally it was a great and wonderful thing for the spirit to leave the circles of the world, for it took the body with it. But now Men's spirits only leave when they have been forcefully severed from their bodies. That is what death has become."

"But how could we have changed like that? What happened that made us like we are now?" Katie wanted to know.

"Andreth would not say," Elrohir told her. "She told Finrod only that it was through the malice of the Lord of Darkness—that is, Morgoth."

Erestor paged through the book. "Finrod did not believe it could have been quite as she said: that Morgoth had not the power to rob an entire race of their inheritance of immortality, in spite of Ilúvatar. 'To doom the deathless to death, from father unto son, and yet to leave to them the memory of an inheritance taken away, and the desire for what is lost: could the Morgoth do this? No, I say. None could have done this save Ilúvatar. Therefore I say to you, Andreth, what did ye do, ye Men, long ago in the dark? How did ye anger Eru?'

When he stopped reading, Vivian leaned forward. "What did she tell him?"

"She told him nothing," Erestor answered. "She said that the accounts were confused and had become more legend than pure fact—because Men had tried to forget. Furthermore, she said that Men would not speak of it to people of the other races."

Vivian nodded in understanding, and Erestor regarded her with curiosity. "Do you know, Saelon?"

"I know a story of the Fall of Man, yes. But as Andreth said, it has become patchy and symbolic. If you want to know, here are the basic facts. Ilúvatar told humans there was one thing they were not to do. And Morgoth tempted the humans to do it, and they gave in to temptation and disobeyed Ilúvatar. They tried to blame it on one another, and they tried to blame it on Morgoth, who had after all tempted them, but in the end the decision had been their own. And so Ilúvatar took away their immortality because humans had become corrupt and had fallen into the Shadow. And," she indicated herself and Katie, "now you see what we have become, compared to an unfallen race." She indicated Erestor and Elrohir. "We have fallen, indeed."

They were all silent for a time, contemplating this. Then they were interrupted by the call to a meal, and had to leave the rest of the conversation for another time.

000

One morning, there was a rap on Katie's door. It was Elrohir.

"My brother and I are going to have luncheon privately in our sitting room, and we wondered if you and Vivian would care to join us?" he asked courteously.

"Sure," Katie said immediately. "Thank you!"

Vivian agreed as well, and so noontime found all four of them sitting around a table set with delicious-looking viands.

Katie always enjoyed watching the twins interact. They were so close to one another, that watching them gave her warm fuzzies—as she liked to say. The two of them also had a great affection and respect for her grandmother. She liked to tease them, and they would respond in kind, but always there was the feeling that they held her in very high regard.

And of course, Katie herself simply adored the twins—her gwedyr, as she now frequently called them. They were the big brothers she never had, and fantastic friends, to boot.

She realized that in a strange way, Rivendell was beginning to feel more like home than home was. She loved her family and friends at home, of course, but there was something wonderful about Rivendell, beyond its beauty, that almost made her wish she would never have to leave it. The Last Homely House was a very good title for it, indeed.

"How are you enjoying your stay in Rivendell?" Elladan asked Vivian.

"Very much," she answered emphatically. "It's gorgeous. Ever since Katie told me about it, I wanted to see it. I'm just glad I got a chance. And now I'm sitting here eating with the Boanerges!"

"Boanerges?" Elrohir asked, bemused.

"The Sons of Thunder!" Vivian declared dramatically.

"No, no, Grandma. His name is Elrond. Sons of Elrond," Katie explained slowly. They all laughed.

"But Sons of Thunder is more dramatic!" Vivian complained.

"Here, one of the servants must have brought this in when I was out of the room," Elladan said, fetching a bottle of wine from nearby. "Would any of you like some?"

Neither Katie nor her grandmother were terribly fond of alcohol, and Elrohir declined, so Elladan poured himself a glass.

"Are you planning to help with the harvest this year, as well?" Elrohir asked him as Elladan tried a sip.

"Probably," he answered.

Vivian grinned. "I'm imagining you swinging a scythe," she said. "I bet the fields are gorgeous when they turn gold."

"They are indeed," Elladan agreed. "Elrohir and I used to help on the farms quite a bit when we were young."

"You still look young to me," Vivian said in a teasing grumble.

Elladan put down his glass with a funny look on his face. He put a hand to his side.

"Elladan?" Elrohir said in concern. "Are you unwell?"

Elladan swallowed hard and nodded. "I think… there was something in the wine," he said. In a moment, he doubled over with a groan.

The others jumped up in alarm as he slid off his chair onto the floor. His face had gone white as parchment and he writhed in pain, biting back a cry.

"Katie! Go get our father!" Elrohir commanded as he dropped to his knees next to his brother.

Katie's mind whirred as she watched her grandmother kneel on the elf's other side while Elrohir felt his pulse. Maybe it was Sadron after all, and she was supposed to tell Elrond and she didn't, and now maybe Elladan was going to die…

Vivian looked up and saw Katie frozen in place. "Katie!" she said loudly. Katie looked at her with wide eyes.

"Go get Lord Elrond!" Vivian repeated urgently and emphatically. Katie turned and ran for the elf lord's study.

TBC

AN: I know, cliffie. I hate to do this to you, but I'm going to camp on the eighth, and I won't be back until either the eleventh or the fifteenth, depending. So you'll have to wait a bit for the next part. Sorry to keep you in suspense!

Princess Siara: Faded elves do not desire bodies, and if they appear to people, they appear in what looks like a bodily form. Only the Houseless desire bodies. And they're pretty nasty, anyway.

Fk306: Yes, I copied off the Athrabeth and took a highlighter and a pen to it. Yeah, if Katie did accuse Sadron and he turned out to be innocent, that would be bad. But then, if he's guilty and she doesn't voice her suspicions, that could be very bad as well. Bit of a dilemma for the poor girl.

IwishChan: Well, it isn't prophetic or anything. It's just that she's feeling rather anxious and clueless about the whole situation, and that's how her subconscious rendered those in her dreams, mixed in with the images of her day.

EresseElrondiel: Of course! You can always get a hug from either of the twins—or Legolas or Estel, for that matter.

Ravens Destiny: Sorry, bad joke. You should hear me in real life… Yes, no dead mangled elves is definitely a good thing.

theycallmemary: Sometimes when I say I'm not confirming anything, it does indeed mean you're right. And sometimes it just means what it says, that I'm not telling you anything. So you really can't interpret that response as an automatic yes. I'm horrible, aren't I? lol As for the Ilúvatar thing, Tolkein was a Christian—Catholic, specifically. His mythology of Arda is based on a mixture of his beliefs and the mythologies he liked so much. You'll find a lot of parallels between Tolkein stuff and Norse mythology, for instance. So Ilúvatar (the All-Father, which was also a title for Odin) or Eru (The One) is what Tolkein called God in his work. So Ilúvatar is worshiped by Jews, Christians, and Muslims. More on that later. As for Círdan, the Encyclopedia of Arda says that it's unknown how old he is, but that it's possible he was one of the Elves awaked in Cuiviénen—that is, he was one of the very first Elves ever created. So he's old. Like, really old. I doubt very much that Elves shrink, and since Círdan is the only elf we know of old enough to have a beard, we can't really guess what they look like when they're older than him. Galadriel, on the other hand, was born in Valinor before the rising of the sun, so she's pretty darned old. And interesting point to consider also, is that Gandalf is a Maia, so his spirit existed before the creation of the world. But he only took on a body in the third age, so in one sense, he's about 2500 years younger than Elrond. Weird, huh? Katie doesn't ask Lossefalme because she doesn't want to butt in if it's something else entirely. And I don't think she has the knowledge or the supplies to dust for fingerprints. Thanks for pointing out the bit with Orain-Sadron; I'll fix that. Wow, that was a long response…

werewolflemming: Good advice; she already has. :)

Thanks, everybody! Please review and I'll get to work so I can post as soon as I get back from camp!