'[H]e landed on the elven-strands
of silver sand and yellow gold
beneath the Hill of Ilmarin,
where glimmer in a valley sheer
the lights of towering Tirion,
the city on the Shadowmere.'
JRR Tolkien, 'The Treason of isengard'
Year of the Trees 1140
She was the beautiful child with the golden curls, leaning over the marble parapet of the Mindon Eldaliéva to get a better view, just as if she had inherited that unashamed and almost sensual enjoyment of life which so annoyed her in her mother, Ingië, sister of Ingwë. Standing on the summit of the Mindon was like being on top of the world, until you turned and saw Taniquetil pointing skywards to the north. But Indis did not look that way. Instead she peered down into the Square of the King, spread out at her feet like a map. There all the people were crowded together to see the ceremony; but none of them had such a view as Indis!
Beyond the Square, the city of Tirion fell away, sparkling with newness, to the outer wall. Observers on the Mindon-top could actually see right over this and even glimpse part of the Shadowmere, the long and foam-fringed inlet of the sea that crept right up to the golden feet of Tuna, surrounded by dark woodland.
"Pretty, isn't it?"
"Mother! Pretty! It's more than pretty!"
"If you say so, darling! What a little fusspot you are! Isn't she a little fusspot, Rilmo?"
"Yes, dear."
Ingwë, who was not only the king of the Vanyar but also Indis' favourite person in the world, called his beloved only sister a character. Indis took this to mean that Ingië had a low sense of humour and a loud voice, which she was fond of imposing upon other people. She was an agonising embarrassment to her daughter.
Rilmo was Indis' father, tall, lean, flaxen-haired and in total thrall to his wife. His seeming subservience was only the outward expression of a consuming love; but Indis who was too youthfully self-absorbed to understand this sometimes came close to hating him for his meekness.
In fact, it was to Rilmo and his official title of 'Keeper of the Lamp' that Indis owed her privileged position at the summit of the great tower, opposite the enormous palace of Tirion that her uncle had designed as his royal residence when he had still imagined that his home would lie in the new city. Rumoured to contain 144 rooms, it had taken eight Years in the building, during which time its creator had of course decided to take up residence in Valinor. This architectural masterpiece would now pass, along with his new responsibility, to Ingwë's successor as ruler of Tirion.
And now the crowd on the palace side of the square was parting before a dark-haired Elda dressed in blue, as Ingwë and Malwë, his queen, came forth from under the Mindon to meet him; their heads shone gold in the light of Laurelin. Malwë cradled Ingwion, her infant son, but Ingwë held a plain staff of pinewood. The latter seemed to have the greater effect upon the spectators.
A hush fell in the square as Ingwë held it out to the dark-haired other. The ceremony was no less solemn for being newly invented, the product of a young people making up a culture as they went along and in love with their own creation. There were no time-honoured traditions; there was only Finwë, King of the Noldor, taking on the rule of Eldamar with a plain piece of wood that was nonetheless wonderful, because it had been cut in the forests of a magical land.
It was Indis' first feast; she can still remember the exhilaration of the beauty of the clothes and the music and the fine food. Sometimes it seems to blur into all the other official celebrations that came after, time foreshortened in retrospect, so that her life in those Years seems nothing more than a succession of elegant occasions. It is hard to believe in herself and the other players in this pageant as truly independent agents with wills of their own. When she considers those festivities, she sees them rather as innocent painted dolls, falling down the Years, encumbered with no real idea of the seriousness of the world.
The feast was held in the great palace atrium, with its mosaic floor and graceful furniture. Indis could tip back her head and study the beauty of the vaulted ceiling until she felt rather dizzy. Even the stones of it seemed to glory in their own newness. She could feel their voices in her blood.
She was brought back to earth by the sound of two voices. One was that of Malwë, more cultured than Ingië's, wishing the new king luck.
The other was one of the most beautifully modulated that Indis had ever heard: that of Finwë Noldóran. Now Indis had an interest in Finwë. She hoped that it would not be too rude to stare at him on this celebration of his accession, because, having once rested her eyes on his face, she found it hard to tear them away. He was easily the most handsome nér in the atrium.
"To tell you the truth," he was saying, "I really feel guilty. All this glory should belong to your husband!"
"Nonsense!" Malwë retorted. "Our new arrangement is the most harmonious that could be devised. It would not be ideal to have two leaders in one city, surely?"
"Perhaps you are right," Finwë sighed. "But how we will miss you, who are left behind!"
Indis nodded to herself; even before his departure, she was already missing Ingwë. Yet she could not honestly say that she would have liked to be going with him to Valinor. Tirion was to her a place of the highest excitement and adventure. Over the last eight Years, it had swept her up into its budding life to such an extent that she found it hard to believe in her own existence before coming to Aman. She was young and easily adaptable and had left Cuiviénen before she was five Years old; and even the hardships of the Great March seemed a very long way away.
