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Interlude
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After his trip Elrond remained at the havens for a good long while, now feeling content to settle into his studies and recording of histories and maps and family trees. Every so often he would go to stay for a while with Galadriel by Lake Evendim, and learn whatever she and Celeborn would teach him on magic and defenses and healing. Once in a while Celebrimbor would come and visit with his friends by the gulf, bringing many gifts of gems and jewelry, and advising the king's crafters on improvements to their work in making tools and weapons and armor.
Elrond would make his touring journey of the west lands of Middle-earth again, but only every couple hundred of years. On his second trip he decided to venture up the other rivers into the vast forests of the midlands and the surrounding region of southern Eriador, curious to see if anyone aside from the isolated and scattered fisherfolk might live further inland. To his surprise he found that he did not have to go far upstream before he found settlements of mortals living along the rivers, who held themselves kin to his ancestors and the people of Hador and Bëor who had once lived between the Lake and Bree. They were indeed more like the Bëornings east of the mountains and northmen near the Lonely Mountain than the shy wildmen along the coasts. He was delighted to meet them, and gave to them many gifts of tools for carving and building and fishing. But soon enough he moved on, continuing along to the old stops from the first tour. But with each trip, having not come through their lands since the days of their great-grandfathers, the mortals he encountered would of course have no memory and little legend of him. But he would gather news as he could, which for many years gave no cause for worry.
Sometime after his second tour he was living for a while with Círdan by the shipyard, when one spring he noticed a curious raven began visiting him in the mornings. Then he began having strange dreams when he slept, in which he saw memories of his brother, and images of a warm and beautiful island, with a single mountain peak towering high above a grand city whose chief palace was roofed in silver and adorned with gold, and there were tall and fair elf-like people who lived there. Then one day a large dove appeared at his balcony, dropping at his feet the branch of a tree in flower, with broad bright leaves and clusters of little yellow blooms. Such a tree was found nowhere in Middle-earth, as far as he knew. The poor creature itself collapsed in exhaustion and shortly died, and after that the raven did not return. With sadness Elrond knew in his heart that after over four hundred years since departing from Middle-earth, his brother at last had died of weariness as mortals eventually do, and gone to wherever the One sends their spirits when they leave.
It was not until the third trip that he began to bring back worrisome news. Queen Ereloth of Edhellond near the mouth of the Anduin River had been arming and training the sailors and shoremen down at the harbor, and reported that pirates out of the further south had started to harry the peoples of the coastlands and along the river with growing frequency. In Lorinand the elves said they had recently heard the howling of the wargs and wolves growing closer, and the Bëornings likewise reported wolf packs growing bolder in troubling the woodmen who lived in the forest. The elf kingdom in the Greenwood Forest told Elrond that the colonies of giant spiders were beginning to encroach northward closer toward their realm from where they had long clustered far to the south. And on the other side of the forest the mortals of the Long Lake reported that the nomads who roamed the plains south of them were coming under harassment by raiders and marauders out of the distant east.
This news was troubling enough that on his way home Elrond went first to the lake to report to Galadriel, where he decided to remain for the winter. It was always a lovely respite there, and they walked together through the woodlands of the surrounding hills, where the trees were now bare of leaves and a flurry of snow fell from overcast skies to dust the cold dormant ground, asleep for the season under its blanket of dried leaves. But Galadriel's cheer cooled as Elrond reported on his travels, and she turned grave. "One such report by itself would be little cause for alarm," she said. "But so many such events so close together may forebode a greater will at work. What did you advise them?"
"I stayed a while at the port to help train the mariners and their families, along with the queen and woodland elves there. I also persuaded the Bëornings to help me erect tall fences of sharpened poles around the homes of their friends in the forest. The kingdoms in the north seem well prepared to guard themselves," he answered. "Do you think they are all driven by just one source?"
"I think it unlikely that any other explanation would suffice," she answered.
"Do you think there is some stronghold in the east we should have a mind to seek out?"
Galadriel thought about this for a moment. "I am not certain. These seem but stirrings of Shadow and not yet overly bold attacks. But something is having an influence on the minds of mortals and beasts of the distant lands east and south that were long under the sway of Morgoth. We should begin to take heed for stronger defenses at least."
After this she gave orders to her lieutenants to reinforce the watches along the ridge line around the lake. And when spring came Elrond returned to the havens to give his report to Gil-galad, who followed suit, tasking Elrond with both establishing a robust defensive posture for the realm and training the king's army for deployment abroad.