Title: The Tale of Marian
Chapter: 13
Rating: G.
Pairing: OFC/Haldir
Genre: Adventure/Romance/perhaps a little Angst
Timeline: AU, modern times.
Feedback: Welcomed, begged for, appreciated.
Warnings: None.
Author's Note: See Chapter 1 for disclaimer.
* * * * * THE TALE OF MARIAN
CHAPTER 13 - MANY PATHS TO THE TOP OF THE MOUNTAIN*
12 September
If it wasn't for my journals I would soon lose all sense of time. Is
it because of the serenity and timelessness of the elves, or the
ethereal world of the caverns themselves?
Lindir tells me that the elves feel the need to emerge from the
caverns from time to time, to greet the moon and the stars, and to
feel the tree-scented wind on their faces. They do this discreetly,
in small groups or alone so as to avoid discovery from the outside. I
hadn't noticed.
I don't yet feel a need to go outside. I find the ever-present murmur
of water and the gentle waxing and waning of the lanterns in the
vaults above to be soothing. And there is change in cavern's
atmosphere as well. Often the heights of the tree-pillars are
shrouded in mist or wispy, thin clouds that play among the upper
branches. Other times the domed halls are clear and I can see far up
the waterfalls or down the river until the view disappears past the
lanterns into the quiet darkness beyond.
The waterfalls call me. Twice I have stolen away with Bruno, in my
precious little free time. I walk and climb upstream, lantern in
hand, in hopes of finding the river's source.
I thought it would be easy, but twice I have been defeated. The river
does not seem to spring from a single source. One branch joins the
Linluin from around the side of the Great Hall - that stream that
flows beside the terrace of Lord Haldir's study. The larger flow
continues up several more steps of the falls onto a wide rock shelf.
To this point the river path and the lanterns extend. Two sentries
are posted there as well, silent and invisible. I would not have
noticed them except for a change of guard. They ignore me. And at
this point, to my dismay, no less than five equally strong branches
converge to form the river. Some fall from far above, some emerge
from dark passages or rock clefts beyond. The rock shelf is a
powerful, beautiful place, and for me a frustrating one. I'm sure the
elves have a perfect name for it, strong and lovely.
Two branches Bruno and I have explored with the lantern, only to come
to dead-ends where the water emerges from an opening in the cave walls
that is too small to enter alongside the water's flow. I am not
foolish or brave enough, nor do I have the desire to go into any
small, spelunking holes underground.
Yet these streams must converge again at some point in the Linluin
outside, for Lord Haldir said "it" was their water supply, and he is
not only eloquent, but most specific in his speech.
Today or tomorrow I will try to follow a third branch. If I can find
the source; if Lord Haldir sees that I know where the entrance by the
Linluin is and I don't use it or betray them with it, then perhaps he
will see at last that I can be trusted.
* * * * *
I have settled into a daily pattern with the elves. Though my lessons
are rigorous and often draining, I find my point of view, my values
about life itself shifting. There is a fulfillment and rightness in
my heart that I have not known before. I am beginning to think that
the world of Men outside, my world, can change, if only others can
experience this place, too.
Each day I rise early to swim, and my strength is improving. Lord
Haldir's consistent presence is, although quite demanding and more
impersonal since our disagreement at the lake, still one that makes it
worth rising early.
My mornings are pleasantly spent with Allinde in the library, then
with Gladrel in the gardens or greenhouses.
Allinde and I have found no more references to the Palantiri, but I am
learning to read elvish, a little.
Allinde also took me to Vanimë to request two simple day-gowns. I was
not surprised to see that this was indeed the elleth who had dumped
Lord Haldir's soiled robes in my arms my first day in Methentaurond.
She is the least friendly elf I have met here, though there is nothing
specific that I can complain about. When I asked her why I had not
received her message about Lord Haldir meeting me early at the lake,
she innocently said that she had left a small note on my door: in
elvish, of course; in the morning. How, I asked her, was I supposed
to wake up in time to read a note that told me to get up early, in
elvish. She replied in a slightly standoffish voice that she had left
it very early in the morning and hadn't wanted to awaken me; she
hadn't expected me to sleep so long. And, she had not thought about
the language; no one here had ever NOT spoken elvish.
Uh-huh. Apparently coming to an understanding with this elf was going
to be a challenge.
My plant notebook grows thick with botanical sketches of the plants
that Gladrel points out to me as growing in Methentaurond and nowhere
else. They have been propagated and treasured for thousands of years
like precious jewels. Some have medicinal value to the elves and have
been kept for the healers. Others have been nurtured purely for
pleasure or nostalgia of places dear to the elves that have long
disappeared. Some look to be no more than weeds. But the elves have
also preserved these plants out of their fear and love for the balance
of nature in Arda: Man has so reduced the number of plant varieties
through our agriculture or careless destruction of habitat that it has
alarmed them.
Gladrel has begun to show me the vast treasury of seeds that she and
others have established here - there are at least 40 different
varieties of tomatos alone - and how to replenish and maintain it for
our future.
My afternoons are first spent with Lindir, then with Lord Haldir.
Lindir continues to wax philosophical. I have found that he quite
enjoys arguing with me, and I with him. When he is not telling me
stories he is introducing me to every facet of life in Methentaurond
and practically every person: The cooks, the builders, the weavers
and seamstresses, of whom Vanimë is the most skillful, the archers and
wardens, the healers. He is quick to make sure I notice that every
person's function is dependent and cyclical with each of the others'.
I have progressed, thank God, from just Bruno-training to the
fascinating experience of observing Lord Haldir lead his people. As I
watch him I have the privilege of growing to know him better, and in
spite of my warnings to myself he grows in my heart each day. A more
excellent leader I have never seen, nor any person more tirelessly
dedicated to the welfare of his people or more sure of his duty and of
himself. He demands perfection of himself, and expects and receives
no less than total commitment from all who are under his care. If
only I could learn to possess such confidence, inspire such
dedication. But that, I think, would be a miracle.
I believe that Lord Haldir thinks it would be a miracle as well.
Though patient, I am sure that he tires of me constantly dissecting
his decisions: Why did he speak harshly to someone? How did he
change that person's attitude? It goes against his nature, I think,
which is to expect and receive instant and unconditional obedience to
his every command. Yet how else am I to understand?
Certainly I know that I fall far short of his standards. Though I am
proud of my progress, no matter how hard I try I am never strong
enough, quick enough, sure enough or good enough for him; my
conclusions are never quite acceptable. So I try all the harder.
I want so much for him to approve of me, even if it is only in some
small thing. Sometimes the frustration is enough to make me want to
cry, but I have not done so, at least not in front of him.
Yesterday we were sitting in the Council Chambers off of the Great
Hall, listening to two elves: One elf had mistakenly wronged the
other but his pride was keeping him from admitting so and making
amends. Lord Haldir startled us all by ordering me to decide what the
elf should do to repair the wrong. Both Lord Haldir and the elves
looked expectantly at me, the former calmly, and the latter both
bewildered at this strange turn of events. I clasped my hands behind
my back to keep from fidgeting and looked at a tapestry on the wall to
give myself time to think. Uncomfortably, I rendered what I thought
would be an appropriate remedy, along with the reasons why. The elves
both looked incredulously at Lord Haldir, who promptly told them that
indeed they were both to do as I said.
As soon as they left the room, I asked him, why did you put me on the
spot like that? I have no right to tell your people what to do! You
wouldn't have done that, would you?
Upon which without hesitation he said no, and rose to walk across the
room and contemplate the battle scene I had been staring at.
Why, was it not appropriate? I pried, following him and trying to
divert his attention from the tapestry.
Reaching out to stroke the ancient fabric, he responded without
turning his head that it was. . . unusual, yet it might be
effective.
What would you have done, I appealed to him.
"Why must you explain and question yourself every time you render a
decision, when no one asks you to?" he turned on me and demanded with
a snap of his eyes. I knew by then that any slight facial expression
of this elf's, if revealed at all through the shield that he holds
over his private thoughts, is only revealed for a purpose and harbors
a much deeper feeling within. This look was one, I thought, of
exasperation and extreme disappointment.
I had finally come to a point where I was as equally frustrated with
him as I expected he was with me.
Because, I said sarcastically, I don't think "because I said so" is a
legitimate reason to make someone do something!
"You will not gain respect or authority if you open yourself to
argument at every turn," he said as well as he apparently could with
his teeth clenched together.
I want to build a team, I blurted out, waving my arm at the tapestry,
not command an army! There it was, I thought, now I had offended him
for sure.
But he only relaxed his jaw muscles and said with controlled patience,
"You will only make your goals harder to achieve than they should be.
You must learn when it is advantageous to explain your reasoning, and
when it is not."
I am not you, Haldir, I struggled to explain in a more reasonable
voice. I don't command instant and absolute respect the way you do.
I have to find what works for me. I am a woman. I will not get
automatic obedience from anyone. I will be expected to fail. I will
be constantly questioned, constantly challenged.
"Yet you hold a position of authority as an architect, do you not?
You have overcome these obstacles before."
Yes, I recalled to him with pride, I had, with a lot of hard work and
a lot of relationship building. But this was different.
"All the more reason NOT to offer explanations when you do not need
to," he said. "You cannot lose yourself in the desire to placate
those you lead. Find your strength. Become the example for others to
follow, and they will. But, you will on occasion have the need to
impose discipline."
My eyes widened; I had not thought of that. Discipline at work was
something that Ed did, one of the reasons that I hadn't started my own
office. I hated confrontation. I hadn't needed to discipline my
project teams - everyone had worked hard because I worked hard, and
they wanted our projects to succeed. The part of my work that I
disliked the most had been the most like discipline: construction
administration - making sure the builders did their job. But then I
had a contract to hold over their heads like a big stick. What would
I have here?
I confessed to Lord Haldir that discipline would be the hardest thing
for me to deal with.
"Nay, Marian," he corrected me. "The most difficult thing will be to
lead so well that discipline is rarely needed."
You mean, I asked in confusion, that you see that elf's need for
discipline to be a failure on YOUR part?
"Aye, so it is, and I must ensure that he does not need it again."
My head reeled with the weight of ownership that this noble elf
imposed on himself. Was it not a measure of arrogance, that he could
and would control so much of other people's lives? Yet they did not
chafe under his rule, they thrived, even in secrecy. No, it was not
control; they were here with him because they wanted to be.
"Marian, to discipline is either to impose something that is not
desired, or to remove something that is desired, is it not?"
A carrot or a stick, I repeated.
But what did he have that was a carrot? Methentaurond itself, of
course. Methentaurond was safety, comfort, opportunity, community.
It was the only such place, he had said, left on this earth for the
elves.
This carrot would soon be mine. Perhaps all I needed to do was choose
the people who would value it as much as I did.
But then there was him - fierce, strong, demanding yet fair,
dauntless, inspiring. He was a magnet, a force of nature within
himself. I could never hope to be like him.
Disappointed again with the doubt in my eyes, he said firmly, "You
must find what you need within yourself, and soon. I cannot find it
for you."
* * * * *
In the evenings I dine at Lord Haldir's table and most often in the
company of Orodren and Lindir as well.
Lord Haldir was uncommunicative at dinner the evening after the crush.
I had worn Allinde's green gown and received several compliments, but
he merely gave me one of his brief yet thoroughly assessing glances,
and looked away. Any gaity, any warmth that he may have shown to me
earlier in the day was gone, his eyes cold and emotionless once more.
The question of the Linluin's entrance to Methentaurond, it seems,
stands between us like a wall.
I turned from him then, discouraged, and spent the meal conversing
with Orodren, who was leaving the next day for two weeks of warden
duty in the forest. I imagined I felt Lord Haldir's eyes boring into
me from the side, and I couldn't lift a glass or pass a plate with a
completely steady hand. Yet whenever I glanced his way his attention
was elsewhere. After a short time he took his leave, and striding
swiftly across the Hall, retired through the same passage he always
took after dinner. I started to rise, intending to pursue him and
speak to him alone. But I made myself sit back down when he was
followed instead by his page Vanimë, who with an inhospitable look in
my direction, disappeared through the archway behind him.
Vanimë was everything I was not: graceful and elegant, a cool,
slender, pale beauty. She was someone that any male would be
attracted to, and any powerful male would want to display as his own.
I glanced back at Lindir in embarrassment. I was silently grateful to
him that he had tactfully started a conversation with the elf on his
other side.
I looked without interest at my plate with its tasteful salads and
perfectly prepared vegetables. I was making myself miserable, but I
couldn't help it. I wanted chocolate.
* * * * *
After dinner, Lindir and I, sometimes accompanied by Lord Haldir,
continue to visit Callo in his talan.
Callo is getting worse. He has become weaker and more distant, his
breathing shallower. His eyes are unfocused much of the time, as
though he is seeing another place beyond our ability to follow; a
place inside himself or beyond our perception. Watching this
dignified, gracious elf fade day by day is heartbreaking. I am
distressed too, for Lindir. I know he yearns to help his friend
recover, but can do nothing other than stand at his side.
Callo was a jeweler, Lindir said, and a sculptor in glass and metal.
A crystal paperweight within which a darker crystal is suspended lies
to Callo's left pinning sketches of a broach to the surface of the
side table. This paperweight also Callo made. It looks as heavy upon
the parchment as whatever weighs on Callo's heart, pinning him to his
bed. No matter how we try to lift it, it will not let him go.
As Gladrel wished, I gave the infusion to Callo under the watchful eye
of Lomion, the healer who I found with him on that morning after the
crush.
(I must bring a doctor, too. But what doctor will I find who would
give up a lucrative career to follow me here?)
The infusion seems to ease Callo a little, so Lomion has consented to
me bringing it fresh to him nightly. I wish fervently that there was
more we could do.
We return to the Hall in the late evening, where between the sweet,
melancholy songs of the elves, Lindir puts down his flute and
continues the story of the Silmarils. I am copying what I remember
each night before I go to sleep. It is a long tale of faith and
family, duty and rebellion, of an oath taken in pride and fear and
kept in blood and sorrow; a story of doom and strife, hope and glory.
Lindir has told tonight of the Kinslaying and the journey across the
ice fields of those who Feanor abandoned on the shores of the Undying
Lands when he stole the ships of the murdered Teleri elves and sailed
for Middle Earth. Even though the Valar doomed them also never to
return if they continued, these elves chose this dangerous, frozen
path, hoping for wild lands and realms of their own to rule instead of
turning back and being forgiven. I was surprised to hear the name of
Galadriel among them. Lord Haldir had said that she took a ship to
Valinor, so something must have changed - either her heart, or the
hearts of the Valar. I will have to ask him if he knows.
I was shocked to learn that before the Kinslaying there had never been
a murder, or even a threat of harm among the elves except one; the
slaying of one of Feanor's sons by Morgoth to rob the Silmarils. How
different from our world theirs was, and I wept with many of the other
elves as Lindir told what a terrible deed the Kinslaying was, on the
very shores of Paradise.
Lindir's voice carried me ages and worlds away, and I felt that this
tale was not one of three jewels with the light of the Trees alone.
It was a telling of the heart and soul of the elves, deeper and
fiercer than I had ever imagined. I believe I sometimes glimpse such
fierceness, deep in Lord Haldir's eyes.
I was most dismayed to hear Lindir tell that one of the reasons for
Feanor's terrible oath and the oath of his sons to wrest the Silmarils
from anyone who possessed them was because they feared the coming of
Men to Middle Earth. We were to follow and inherit the Arda from
them, surpass them even as they faded. Feanor thought if he held these
jewels, the Elves would remain lords of Light and Earth, not Men.
How had we surpassed them - by mistreating the very earth that
sustained us? It was no wonder the elves did not understand us; we
didn't understand ourselves. Even the rumor of our coming, ages ago,
lent cause to the strife among them. How could we make things right,
against so much that had gone wrong before?
* * * * *
If I look up from the balcony of my talan I can see, across several
bridges and along a rising path, the terrace of Lord Haldir's study.
Returning from the Hall tonight I saw him appear alone at the railing,
gazing out over the tranquil stream below the terrace. It seems to be
his habit late at night to appear there, perhaps treasuring a moment
of solitude and reflection.
I try not to watch him. No matter that the twilight aurora of the
lanterns caresses his still and valiant profile, turning the outline
of his hair and garments into a softly glowing mantle about him. His
demeanor at such moments, when he is away from others, seems faintly
troubled. Perhaps this was a time that he usually shared with his
brother, who had still not returned. Would he welcome companionship
or comfort from me at such a time, were I to offer it? I doubt that
he would ever reveal enough of his inner self to allow it, though to
be such a confidant to him is something I desire.
Not wanting to intrude on his reverie by interrupting him, still more
often than not I catch myself halfway across my balcony toward the
path before I stop myself and go inside to bed, where I can still see
him, if I look, through my open window.
Not long after he retires from the terrace, when the last gentle
echoes of music and song in the Hall fade away and I drift off toward
sleep, I sometimes think I hear the faint strains of a harp drifting
down from above me, bittersweet on the still air.
*"There are many paths to the top of the mountain, but only one view."
-Harry Millner
* * * * * THE TALE OF MARIAN
CHAPTER 13 - MANY PATHS TO THE TOP OF THE MOUNTAIN*
12 September
If it wasn't for my journals I would soon lose all sense of time. Is
it because of the serenity and timelessness of the elves, or the
ethereal world of the caverns themselves?
Lindir tells me that the elves feel the need to emerge from the
caverns from time to time, to greet the moon and the stars, and to
feel the tree-scented wind on their faces. They do this discreetly,
in small groups or alone so as to avoid discovery from the outside. I
hadn't noticed.
I don't yet feel a need to go outside. I find the ever-present murmur
of water and the gentle waxing and waning of the lanterns in the
vaults above to be soothing. And there is change in cavern's
atmosphere as well. Often the heights of the tree-pillars are
shrouded in mist or wispy, thin clouds that play among the upper
branches. Other times the domed halls are clear and I can see far up
the waterfalls or down the river until the view disappears past the
lanterns into the quiet darkness beyond.
The waterfalls call me. Twice I have stolen away with Bruno, in my
precious little free time. I walk and climb upstream, lantern in
hand, in hopes of finding the river's source.
I thought it would be easy, but twice I have been defeated. The river
does not seem to spring from a single source. One branch joins the
Linluin from around the side of the Great Hall - that stream that
flows beside the terrace of Lord Haldir's study. The larger flow
continues up several more steps of the falls onto a wide rock shelf.
To this point the river path and the lanterns extend. Two sentries
are posted there as well, silent and invisible. I would not have
noticed them except for a change of guard. They ignore me. And at
this point, to my dismay, no less than five equally strong branches
converge to form the river. Some fall from far above, some emerge
from dark passages or rock clefts beyond. The rock shelf is a
powerful, beautiful place, and for me a frustrating one. I'm sure the
elves have a perfect name for it, strong and lovely.
Two branches Bruno and I have explored with the lantern, only to come
to dead-ends where the water emerges from an opening in the cave walls
that is too small to enter alongside the water's flow. I am not
foolish or brave enough, nor do I have the desire to go into any
small, spelunking holes underground.
Yet these streams must converge again at some point in the Linluin
outside, for Lord Haldir said "it" was their water supply, and he is
not only eloquent, but most specific in his speech.
Today or tomorrow I will try to follow a third branch. If I can find
the source; if Lord Haldir sees that I know where the entrance by the
Linluin is and I don't use it or betray them with it, then perhaps he
will see at last that I can be trusted.
* * * * *
I have settled into a daily pattern with the elves. Though my lessons
are rigorous and often draining, I find my point of view, my values
about life itself shifting. There is a fulfillment and rightness in
my heart that I have not known before. I am beginning to think that
the world of Men outside, my world, can change, if only others can
experience this place, too.
Each day I rise early to swim, and my strength is improving. Lord
Haldir's consistent presence is, although quite demanding and more
impersonal since our disagreement at the lake, still one that makes it
worth rising early.
My mornings are pleasantly spent with Allinde in the library, then
with Gladrel in the gardens or greenhouses.
Allinde and I have found no more references to the Palantiri, but I am
learning to read elvish, a little.
Allinde also took me to Vanimë to request two simple day-gowns. I was
not surprised to see that this was indeed the elleth who had dumped
Lord Haldir's soiled robes in my arms my first day in Methentaurond.
She is the least friendly elf I have met here, though there is nothing
specific that I can complain about. When I asked her why I had not
received her message about Lord Haldir meeting me early at the lake,
she innocently said that she had left a small note on my door: in
elvish, of course; in the morning. How, I asked her, was I supposed
to wake up in time to read a note that told me to get up early, in
elvish. She replied in a slightly standoffish voice that she had left
it very early in the morning and hadn't wanted to awaken me; she
hadn't expected me to sleep so long. And, she had not thought about
the language; no one here had ever NOT spoken elvish.
Uh-huh. Apparently coming to an understanding with this elf was going
to be a challenge.
My plant notebook grows thick with botanical sketches of the plants
that Gladrel points out to me as growing in Methentaurond and nowhere
else. They have been propagated and treasured for thousands of years
like precious jewels. Some have medicinal value to the elves and have
been kept for the healers. Others have been nurtured purely for
pleasure or nostalgia of places dear to the elves that have long
disappeared. Some look to be no more than weeds. But the elves have
also preserved these plants out of their fear and love for the balance
of nature in Arda: Man has so reduced the number of plant varieties
through our agriculture or careless destruction of habitat that it has
alarmed them.
Gladrel has begun to show me the vast treasury of seeds that she and
others have established here - there are at least 40 different
varieties of tomatos alone - and how to replenish and maintain it for
our future.
My afternoons are first spent with Lindir, then with Lord Haldir.
Lindir continues to wax philosophical. I have found that he quite
enjoys arguing with me, and I with him. When he is not telling me
stories he is introducing me to every facet of life in Methentaurond
and practically every person: The cooks, the builders, the weavers
and seamstresses, of whom Vanimë is the most skillful, the archers and
wardens, the healers. He is quick to make sure I notice that every
person's function is dependent and cyclical with each of the others'.
I have progressed, thank God, from just Bruno-training to the
fascinating experience of observing Lord Haldir lead his people. As I
watch him I have the privilege of growing to know him better, and in
spite of my warnings to myself he grows in my heart each day. A more
excellent leader I have never seen, nor any person more tirelessly
dedicated to the welfare of his people or more sure of his duty and of
himself. He demands perfection of himself, and expects and receives
no less than total commitment from all who are under his care. If
only I could learn to possess such confidence, inspire such
dedication. But that, I think, would be a miracle.
I believe that Lord Haldir thinks it would be a miracle as well.
Though patient, I am sure that he tires of me constantly dissecting
his decisions: Why did he speak harshly to someone? How did he
change that person's attitude? It goes against his nature, I think,
which is to expect and receive instant and unconditional obedience to
his every command. Yet how else am I to understand?
Certainly I know that I fall far short of his standards. Though I am
proud of my progress, no matter how hard I try I am never strong
enough, quick enough, sure enough or good enough for him; my
conclusions are never quite acceptable. So I try all the harder.
I want so much for him to approve of me, even if it is only in some
small thing. Sometimes the frustration is enough to make me want to
cry, but I have not done so, at least not in front of him.
Yesterday we were sitting in the Council Chambers off of the Great
Hall, listening to two elves: One elf had mistakenly wronged the
other but his pride was keeping him from admitting so and making
amends. Lord Haldir startled us all by ordering me to decide what the
elf should do to repair the wrong. Both Lord Haldir and the elves
looked expectantly at me, the former calmly, and the latter both
bewildered at this strange turn of events. I clasped my hands behind
my back to keep from fidgeting and looked at a tapestry on the wall to
give myself time to think. Uncomfortably, I rendered what I thought
would be an appropriate remedy, along with the reasons why. The elves
both looked incredulously at Lord Haldir, who promptly told them that
indeed they were both to do as I said.
As soon as they left the room, I asked him, why did you put me on the
spot like that? I have no right to tell your people what to do! You
wouldn't have done that, would you?
Upon which without hesitation he said no, and rose to walk across the
room and contemplate the battle scene I had been staring at.
Why, was it not appropriate? I pried, following him and trying to
divert his attention from the tapestry.
Reaching out to stroke the ancient fabric, he responded without
turning his head that it was. . . unusual, yet it might be
effective.
What would you have done, I appealed to him.
"Why must you explain and question yourself every time you render a
decision, when no one asks you to?" he turned on me and demanded with
a snap of his eyes. I knew by then that any slight facial expression
of this elf's, if revealed at all through the shield that he holds
over his private thoughts, is only revealed for a purpose and harbors
a much deeper feeling within. This look was one, I thought, of
exasperation and extreme disappointment.
I had finally come to a point where I was as equally frustrated with
him as I expected he was with me.
Because, I said sarcastically, I don't think "because I said so" is a
legitimate reason to make someone do something!
"You will not gain respect or authority if you open yourself to
argument at every turn," he said as well as he apparently could with
his teeth clenched together.
I want to build a team, I blurted out, waving my arm at the tapestry,
not command an army! There it was, I thought, now I had offended him
for sure.
But he only relaxed his jaw muscles and said with controlled patience,
"You will only make your goals harder to achieve than they should be.
You must learn when it is advantageous to explain your reasoning, and
when it is not."
I am not you, Haldir, I struggled to explain in a more reasonable
voice. I don't command instant and absolute respect the way you do.
I have to find what works for me. I am a woman. I will not get
automatic obedience from anyone. I will be expected to fail. I will
be constantly questioned, constantly challenged.
"Yet you hold a position of authority as an architect, do you not?
You have overcome these obstacles before."
Yes, I recalled to him with pride, I had, with a lot of hard work and
a lot of relationship building. But this was different.
"All the more reason NOT to offer explanations when you do not need
to," he said. "You cannot lose yourself in the desire to placate
those you lead. Find your strength. Become the example for others to
follow, and they will. But, you will on occasion have the need to
impose discipline."
My eyes widened; I had not thought of that. Discipline at work was
something that Ed did, one of the reasons that I hadn't started my own
office. I hated confrontation. I hadn't needed to discipline my
project teams - everyone had worked hard because I worked hard, and
they wanted our projects to succeed. The part of my work that I
disliked the most had been the most like discipline: construction
administration - making sure the builders did their job. But then I
had a contract to hold over their heads like a big stick. What would
I have here?
I confessed to Lord Haldir that discipline would be the hardest thing
for me to deal with.
"Nay, Marian," he corrected me. "The most difficult thing will be to
lead so well that discipline is rarely needed."
You mean, I asked in confusion, that you see that elf's need for
discipline to be a failure on YOUR part?
"Aye, so it is, and I must ensure that he does not need it again."
My head reeled with the weight of ownership that this noble elf
imposed on himself. Was it not a measure of arrogance, that he could
and would control so much of other people's lives? Yet they did not
chafe under his rule, they thrived, even in secrecy. No, it was not
control; they were here with him because they wanted to be.
"Marian, to discipline is either to impose something that is not
desired, or to remove something that is desired, is it not?"
A carrot or a stick, I repeated.
But what did he have that was a carrot? Methentaurond itself, of
course. Methentaurond was safety, comfort, opportunity, community.
It was the only such place, he had said, left on this earth for the
elves.
This carrot would soon be mine. Perhaps all I needed to do was choose
the people who would value it as much as I did.
But then there was him - fierce, strong, demanding yet fair,
dauntless, inspiring. He was a magnet, a force of nature within
himself. I could never hope to be like him.
Disappointed again with the doubt in my eyes, he said firmly, "You
must find what you need within yourself, and soon. I cannot find it
for you."
* * * * *
In the evenings I dine at Lord Haldir's table and most often in the
company of Orodren and Lindir as well.
Lord Haldir was uncommunicative at dinner the evening after the crush.
I had worn Allinde's green gown and received several compliments, but
he merely gave me one of his brief yet thoroughly assessing glances,
and looked away. Any gaity, any warmth that he may have shown to me
earlier in the day was gone, his eyes cold and emotionless once more.
The question of the Linluin's entrance to Methentaurond, it seems,
stands between us like a wall.
I turned from him then, discouraged, and spent the meal conversing
with Orodren, who was leaving the next day for two weeks of warden
duty in the forest. I imagined I felt Lord Haldir's eyes boring into
me from the side, and I couldn't lift a glass or pass a plate with a
completely steady hand. Yet whenever I glanced his way his attention
was elsewhere. After a short time he took his leave, and striding
swiftly across the Hall, retired through the same passage he always
took after dinner. I started to rise, intending to pursue him and
speak to him alone. But I made myself sit back down when he was
followed instead by his page Vanimë, who with an inhospitable look in
my direction, disappeared through the archway behind him.
Vanimë was everything I was not: graceful and elegant, a cool,
slender, pale beauty. She was someone that any male would be
attracted to, and any powerful male would want to display as his own.
I glanced back at Lindir in embarrassment. I was silently grateful to
him that he had tactfully started a conversation with the elf on his
other side.
I looked without interest at my plate with its tasteful salads and
perfectly prepared vegetables. I was making myself miserable, but I
couldn't help it. I wanted chocolate.
* * * * *
After dinner, Lindir and I, sometimes accompanied by Lord Haldir,
continue to visit Callo in his talan.
Callo is getting worse. He has become weaker and more distant, his
breathing shallower. His eyes are unfocused much of the time, as
though he is seeing another place beyond our ability to follow; a
place inside himself or beyond our perception. Watching this
dignified, gracious elf fade day by day is heartbreaking. I am
distressed too, for Lindir. I know he yearns to help his friend
recover, but can do nothing other than stand at his side.
Callo was a jeweler, Lindir said, and a sculptor in glass and metal.
A crystal paperweight within which a darker crystal is suspended lies
to Callo's left pinning sketches of a broach to the surface of the
side table. This paperweight also Callo made. It looks as heavy upon
the parchment as whatever weighs on Callo's heart, pinning him to his
bed. No matter how we try to lift it, it will not let him go.
As Gladrel wished, I gave the infusion to Callo under the watchful eye
of Lomion, the healer who I found with him on that morning after the
crush.
(I must bring a doctor, too. But what doctor will I find who would
give up a lucrative career to follow me here?)
The infusion seems to ease Callo a little, so Lomion has consented to
me bringing it fresh to him nightly. I wish fervently that there was
more we could do.
We return to the Hall in the late evening, where between the sweet,
melancholy songs of the elves, Lindir puts down his flute and
continues the story of the Silmarils. I am copying what I remember
each night before I go to sleep. It is a long tale of faith and
family, duty and rebellion, of an oath taken in pride and fear and
kept in blood and sorrow; a story of doom and strife, hope and glory.
Lindir has told tonight of the Kinslaying and the journey across the
ice fields of those who Feanor abandoned on the shores of the Undying
Lands when he stole the ships of the murdered Teleri elves and sailed
for Middle Earth. Even though the Valar doomed them also never to
return if they continued, these elves chose this dangerous, frozen
path, hoping for wild lands and realms of their own to rule instead of
turning back and being forgiven. I was surprised to hear the name of
Galadriel among them. Lord Haldir had said that she took a ship to
Valinor, so something must have changed - either her heart, or the
hearts of the Valar. I will have to ask him if he knows.
I was shocked to learn that before the Kinslaying there had never been
a murder, or even a threat of harm among the elves except one; the
slaying of one of Feanor's sons by Morgoth to rob the Silmarils. How
different from our world theirs was, and I wept with many of the other
elves as Lindir told what a terrible deed the Kinslaying was, on the
very shores of Paradise.
Lindir's voice carried me ages and worlds away, and I felt that this
tale was not one of three jewels with the light of the Trees alone.
It was a telling of the heart and soul of the elves, deeper and
fiercer than I had ever imagined. I believe I sometimes glimpse such
fierceness, deep in Lord Haldir's eyes.
I was most dismayed to hear Lindir tell that one of the reasons for
Feanor's terrible oath and the oath of his sons to wrest the Silmarils
from anyone who possessed them was because they feared the coming of
Men to Middle Earth. We were to follow and inherit the Arda from
them, surpass them even as they faded. Feanor thought if he held these
jewels, the Elves would remain lords of Light and Earth, not Men.
How had we surpassed them - by mistreating the very earth that
sustained us? It was no wonder the elves did not understand us; we
didn't understand ourselves. Even the rumor of our coming, ages ago,
lent cause to the strife among them. How could we make things right,
against so much that had gone wrong before?
* * * * *
If I look up from the balcony of my talan I can see, across several
bridges and along a rising path, the terrace of Lord Haldir's study.
Returning from the Hall tonight I saw him appear alone at the railing,
gazing out over the tranquil stream below the terrace. It seems to be
his habit late at night to appear there, perhaps treasuring a moment
of solitude and reflection.
I try not to watch him. No matter that the twilight aurora of the
lanterns caresses his still and valiant profile, turning the outline
of his hair and garments into a softly glowing mantle about him. His
demeanor at such moments, when he is away from others, seems faintly
troubled. Perhaps this was a time that he usually shared with his
brother, who had still not returned. Would he welcome companionship
or comfort from me at such a time, were I to offer it? I doubt that
he would ever reveal enough of his inner self to allow it, though to
be such a confidant to him is something I desire.
Not wanting to intrude on his reverie by interrupting him, still more
often than not I catch myself halfway across my balcony toward the
path before I stop myself and go inside to bed, where I can still see
him, if I look, through my open window.
Not long after he retires from the terrace, when the last gentle
echoes of music and song in the Hall fade away and I drift off toward
sleep, I sometimes think I hear the faint strains of a harp drifting
down from above me, bittersweet on the still air.
*"There are many paths to the top of the mountain, but only one view."
-Harry Millner