Prompts: Maglor in Fourth Age, Seaside Market, "He believed that he must now say farewell to both love and light."

The Singer by the Market Square

He hadn't seen much people since he chose his life of loneliness and regret. But lately he had found himself each day drawing closer to civilisation. And he argued with himself of that had he decided to forsake everything, both light and love. That he would never even sail to Valinor, no matter what. Thus he should back away from the little fishermen's' village located near his whereabouts. And yet he now sitting on a bench of stone, on the edge of the market square, his harp by his side, looking out over the people busy with their clamouring and shopping.

It was an exceptionally busy day in the square. The fish had been plentiful and salesmen were competing of the villagers' attention. Cod, salmon, herring and eel, the whole square stank of fish.

Maglor decided that he would watch the people from far. They were busy and they were of humankind; they would hardly notice a lonely Elf standing in the corner of a market square, not once as battered as he was, rugged pale clothes, windswept hair, hollow face with gaunt features... an Elf almost faded away already. The people seemed all to look past him or even through him, occupied by chores and gossip. Maglor was almost sure that he had already faded away from his body without knowing it himself, until a small voice from somewhere little next to him piped up and gave him the first comment in millennia.

"Your harp is pretty," a little girl said. Maglor looked down at her surprised. The girl was, supposing that she was of a race with a common mortal lifespan, maybe five years old, dark haired with dark complexion, and she was holding a small paper bag in her hand from which she was currently popping small pieces of dried fish into her mouth which apparently lacked one front tooth. Maglor nodded in reply, having in his confusion momentarily forgot how to answer properly as he hadn't spoken to people for a long, long time.

"Can you play it?" the girl asked, sitting down on the stone bench, she as well. "Like now, for me to hear?"

Maglor thought for a moment. Could he? He hadn't even meant to get into conversation with the locals, and had not this child come up to talk with him, he would still have been standing silent and alone. He shook his head.

"But you know how to play it, don't you?" The girl looked at him intently, stuffing some more fish into her mouth. Seeing Maglor stare at the fish, she misinterpreted the look and offered him the paper bag. "Do you want some? It's okay, my mother bought it for me." Maglor shook his head again; he wasn't really hungry. "Can you talk?" the girl asked. "Or are you like my grand-uncle who can't talk because they cut his tongue when he deserted the army? Do you have a tongue?" Maglor sighed. The girl was talkative. Too young to understand when she should be quiet. "You are mute, aren't you? That's why you are alone." The girl looked a bit sad at the thought.

Rather the other way around, Maglor thought. He had been alone for so long talking to people didn't come naturally any more. Singing did, occasionally. But who was there to sing for but himself and the Sea if no one was around? And he needed no voice to sing to the Sea; it would understand him either way. But as the girl swung her legs as she sat on the bench, Maglor gave up. He opened his mouth a few times, drawing air into his lungs, tightening his jaws, concentrating on forming a sounds with his lips.

"No, it's not."

The girl looked up in surprise. "You can talk after all!" she said happily.

Maglor had croaked an answer and was almost surprised at how he had sounded. "Yes," he went on, his voice now steadier. "I just have seldom need for it. I don't talk to people."

"Why? Don't you like people."

"It's not that. You wouldn't understand, but I have chosen to forsake it."

"Forsake what? Why?"

Maglor sighed again. He had known the girl wouldn't understand. "It is a long and tragic tale and I couldn't tell it to you. But after all that I had been through I chose to isolate myself."

"Since you can talk, won't you sing something? Play with that harp. And I am sure you can sing as well."

"What would you like me to sing?" the Elf asked. He had already come this far, he could as well sing to the girl since she begged him so.

"Your favourite song," the girl said. Maglor nodded, taking his harp. He tuned it quickly as only a professional would, pulled a few chords and sighed. "Come on, I won't laugh at you if you can't sing that well after all," the child laughed. "I can't sing well either."

Maglor said nothing, he merely tried out a couple of other chords. Then he began to play, and soon started singing. Although Maglor hadn't used his voice for a while, it was still as beautiful as ever. The more he sang, the wider the girl's eyes grew until her jaw dropped, and the paper bag with the fish hung comply in her hands, and the Elf soon got lost into the song as well. The dreamlike soft sounds of the harp carried his singing, his voice struck every note with no room for false tones. His voice was the sound of the darkness of the winter, the birds in spring, the sunlit meadows if summer and the autumn wind. His voice could rise up to the stars and lift then down to the earth for people to behold; his voice could sink down deep into the ocean, only to spring up like a silver fountain; his voice could forge gold.

"That was one of my own compositions," Maglor said quietly as he ended his song, leaving a breathless quiet where the melody had filled the air. He fell silent as if shy and modest and not sure of what to do next, and brushed his his nose with his sleeve, closing his eyes.

"What did it tell about?" the girl whispered, still stunned by the music. "It sounded so very beautiful."

"It's a song in Quenya," Maglor replied. "I composed it for my wife."

He looked down at his hands. His fingers shook a little as he still clutched the harp. The girl said nothing: there was nothing to say. The song had been beyond anything she had expected. But she was not the only one who had become quiet. The whole crowd that had been going in with their business on the market square had gradually fallen silent as the people one by one had hearkened to the music. At last the silence was broken: an old fisherman, still standing behind his counter two fishes half-forgotten on the scales, clapped his hands together in applause. As if awakened from a trance, one after another of the spectators joined the cheer. Nobody had previously even taken notice of the stranger with the harp, but his music had been beyond anything that had ever been heard in the village. Maglor smiled meekly - he had not been the object of such attention for a very long time, but an artist is always pleased when his work is appreciated. He put his harp aside as if to signal the ending of the performance, and cast his hood over his head.

"Who are you who sings that well?" The girl still sat beside him.

"I have cast away my past and wish to forget it," Maglor replied, leaning his slender fingers together. "What is a man without a past?"

The girl, frowned and thought of his words in silence. She was interrupted by a woman carrying her newly bought goods in her arms. On her back she had a wrapped cloth that formed a bag in which a small baby was tucked in safely. The woman greeted Maglor by lifting her hand to her heart and bowing slightly. Maglor suspected this was the young girl's mother because of the likeness they bore. His guess was confirmed soon.

"You have met my daughter, I see and I hope she hasn't been intruding or a nuisance, my apologies," the woman said, glancing at the girl who was still seated beside Maglor.

"I have not been," the girl pouted, and looked at Maglor for confirmation.

"No nuisance," Maglor assured politely, "it has been a pleasure to talk with her." In his thoughts he marvelled at how he after ages of loneliness was suddenly talking to as many as two people at the same time.

"My my, that is good to hear," the girl's mother looked relieved. "She can be quite the talker when she gets in the mood, and strangers won't scare her away."

Maglor smiled. That was certainly something he had noticed.

"Mother, this man must be some minstrel of kings," the girl piped up. "Did you hear him sing?" She gave Maglor a broad smile. "Mother, you should ask father to invite him to come for a supper. You could use that fish we bought..."

The mother looked thoughtful at the suggestion, but Maglor stood up. "No, I should go," he said. His new-found young acquaintance looked at him with a somewhat disappointed expression. "It is true," Maglor said gently. "I had never meant to stay here for long, indeed I hadn't even planned to come to this village."

"But you are here nonetheless," the girl replied. "You have already altered your plan."

"No, dear," her mother said, taking her hand. "He has business elsewhere, and we better not take up any more of his time."

"No, mother you don't understand," the girl went on. "He has no business, he-"

"Now shush you!" her mother snapped. "Don't you talk like that. We will let him go." She held onto the girl's hand a little tighter. The girl looked from Maglor to his mother and back to Maglor. Then she nodded.

"It was nice to meet you," Maglor said, bowing. He put his harp over his shoulder and turned away. As he went the villagers continued to watch him with a mixed curiosity and respect. No one would approach him though, and indeed they seemed to make way for him whereas elsewhere on the streets even a horse would hardly have made it through the congestion. Maglor was content. Back to his loneliness – he had never meant to been taken notice of. Had not the girl come to him and asked him to sing, nobody would even have noticed him.

Almost already out of the village, on his way through the gates, Maglor stopped intuitively. The soft running footsteps behind him, caught up with him and as he turned around without a word, the girl stood behind him, slightly out of breath.

"I just wanted," she panted, reaching out her hand, "to meet you."

"Here again?" Maglor snickered, lowering himself onto his knee to the same level as the girl. "You wouldn't have had to. I thought your mother told you not to follow"

"No, but I wanted to say goodbye," the girl blushed. "And... I... I don't even know your name, but you said you had a wife." she said shyly. "And yet you said you have no love and no past."

Maglor sighed. "You don't understand how it is possible, do you?" he said.

"No, but I saw you took happiness in singing," the girl said and looked up at Maglor. "You should sing more often, and with other people, too. Instead of being alone." She looked at Maglor's harp. "I don't understand how someone like you would want to be alone. Because you seem so talented, so kind and so... I hope you'll come back some day."

"Maybe," Maglor sighed, and rose up. "Maybe I will." He doubted it, though.

"Here," the girl reached out to him again. "It's a pretty stone I found in the Sea." On her palm lay a pebble with a smooth dark glittering surface, probably containing fool's gold, but pretty nonetheless. "It reminds me of your song, so I want you to have it."

After all the lonely years of sorrow and regret, now there stood before him a girl who offered him a small pebble. A pebble worth nothing for a merchant, and nowhere near comparable to the stone Maglor had cast into the sea himself. And yet Maglor was moved. He accepted the gift and turned it in his hand. "I will treasure it," he smiled. "You may say it reminds you of my song, but I will say that it reminds me of you."

The girl looked back at him. "Will we meet again, then?"

"I cannot promise that," Maglor replied. "But if we ever meet, I will give this stone back to you. For that will be the day I sail into the West."

With those words he turned away and walked away. The girl was left behind as she stood puzzled in the middle of the street. "Are you an Elf, then?" she cried after him. "Sir? Is that why you sang so..." She left her question hanging in the air, unable to find a word good enough to describe the music the stranger had showed her. But Maglor merely lift his hand in a farewell, his back still turned away as he left through the gates, the stone in the pocket of his tunic.

As the man opened the front door of the cottage, a fresh breath of air swept into the room. The man had keen ears and thought he had heard a knock or something, but looking out, there was nothing. Then his eye caught something on the steps. He picked it up and turned it in his hand. "Seems it was just a pebble that came a-knocking, he laughed and showed it to his wife. The woman glanced at it, turning away from her grand-son she had been trying to feed porridge to. Seemingly uninterested at first, she turned back to the boy that kept struggling away from the spoon, but then something flickered in her eyes, and she spun back towards her husband.

"Let me see it again with my own eyes, will you," she said frowning. As she took the stone, her eyes widened. "It is the same shape I think. No, in fact I am quite sure of it," she muttered. "It is that same pebble I found in the Sea when I was little." She looked up at her husband. "The one I gave to the stranger."

"What stranger?" the man asked confused.

She smiled, holding the glittering stone in her palm. "The Elf who has sailed to West."