Island of Sorrow RPG

[piosenniel]

Endamir left Malris to the care of Tasa. Unbuckling the belt that held his blade, he wrapped it round the sheath and laid them down atop his pack. His thoughts were discomfited at the scene that had just played out; he felt his words would hold no credence with Malris, who seemed almost possessed with the singing they had heard.

He cocked his head listening closely for any further refrain, but there was none. And even now he wondered if the music and the singing were some trick of the night breezes through the old ruins. Malris was so keen on coming to this long dead place that perhaps his need had infected all their minds. Taking in a deep breath, he breathed it out slowly. There were enough ghosts of his own to consider and appease, he thought grimly to himself, without taking on those of another.

Lindir nodded as Endamir returned to the fire. He held out a crisp fish to Endamir, who took it gratefully. The hot fat dripped down his fingers, but it was scarcely noted, the enticing smell of food overcoming the discomfort. He smiled at Lindir and sat down cross-legged near the fire, his eyes asking the other Elf to take a seat near him since his fish-filled mouth could not. Nimble fingers picked the meat neatly from the stick, leaving only a bit of uncrisped skin as an offering to the fire.

Endamir licked his fingers, in a graceful motion, like a cat enjoying the last remembrances of a successful hunt and kill. Wiping them at last on his breeches, he picked up a stray stick and poked at the fire, sending up showers of little sparks into the dark sky. Across the fire, he could see Lómwë, lost in his own thoughts it seemed. From their previous conversation, Endamir wondered what he would think of Malris’ most recent actions. Had Lómwë heard the singing? What did he think of it?

His musings were interrupted as someone started to sit down next to him. A hand rested familiarly on his shoulder as the figure used it for support.

[Anguirel]

Malris had looked back at Tasa with an emotion between gratitude and pity in his eyes, as she bound his wound, and implored him to forget the fateful voice.

"Most named Daeron a greater musician and singer than Maglor," he said at last. It seemed a peculiar comment, and the long pause he left after it would not set his friend's mind at rest. Eventually he spoke again.

"I was not among them, of course. Partly because Maglor was my friend, my protector, and I his...but his voice always had a power to move me that the Dark Elf's did not. Mind you, I only heard Daeron once, when I came with Maglor and Maedhros to the Council of Peacemaking...which ended in ashes and ruin, like everything else. Everything else but those two bards...and this place."

His thoughts were rambling, circuituitous. He shook his head, suddenly, as if to clear it.

"What I am trying to say...is that I felt that power in my heart just now. And Maglor was always named the mightier singer, though many preferred the Wood Elf's subtleties. I believe Maglor has taken up his brother's fortress again. He is within Himring, but his voice reaches us, though he has no idea of it."

He took Tasa's hand gently. "Do not think me mad. A great hope has possessed me. I spent years looking for him...and only found what was left of Lord Maedhros. If Maglor is here, then...then nothing else matters. But I will wait."

He smiled again, taking one of the fish off the fire. "It looks well done. The others are ready too, I think. Let us eat and then sleep at last."

[Envinyatar]

‘My leg is stiff,’ grumbled Orëmir. ‘Where the Orc club struck me in the hip . . . it’s the cold of this place, I think, that brings the aching back.’ He eased himself down beside his brother, tucking his cloak beneath his left hip to give it some padding. He’d brought his own pack as well as his brother’s over to the fire. Fishing about in the inner section of his own, he found some hard waybread bought at the western edge of The Tower Hills. The oiled parchment the old woman had wrapped it in had kept it safe for the most part from the rain and the sea. ‘Not as tasty as lembas,’ he acknowledged, levering a piece of it between his teeth to snap off a bite. ‘But it should fill in the crevices not taken up with fish.’ He passed the bread to his brother, indicating he should pass it on.

‘I brought our packs and weapons near,’ he said to his brother. ‘Whatever the source of that singing we heard, we should be prepared.’ He snorted, laying his hand on his own sword. ‘Though what protection these will be against ghosts will not be much if any. Rest and a clear mind will be of more aid, I think, than these metal blades.’ He looked to where Malris now sat, eating at his meal. ‘I worry about him . . . and in turn, all this group, since he has stepped up as acting leader on this expedition. I had hoped, at first, that this would be only a last look about of some old piece of our history, a tidying away of some rough details. Or perhaps tidying is too neat a word.’ He shook his head. ‘But I am tired and cannot think of a better. At any rate, I say we should keep alert for any more unreasoned outbursts from Malris. After all, fond though we may be of him and though for a time when we were young we did place our safety in his decisions and commands, we are no longer under his authority.’

He turned his gaze on his brother’s face. Endamir’s face was in profile, the light from the fire throwing shadows along the plane of his cheek, darkening the hollow of his eye. ‘I mean to keep you safe, brother. Be it for the voyage West or a return east with me. Death will not rob me of what few days and hours are left to us.’ The fingers of his right hand traced the fading vines that intertwined on the scabbard at his side; his left hand lay lightly on his brother’s knee.

[Firefoot]

As he sat down near the fire, Lómwë was privately glad that their short expedition had not gotten much past the beach. He did not know who… what… the voice had been, and he doubted that night was the time to find out. Maybe it was just a trick of the wind or rumours of the earth, or ghosts. He found Malris’ near-obsession with this dead place, with that voice, disturbing. Leave it be, leave it be, the voice in his head seemed to chant. Maglor was gone, long gone, and whatever the source of the song, it could not be Maglor, unless it was Maglor’s ghost, of which Lómwë was skeptical of, and hoped was not.

Lómwë was, however, becoming increasingly convinced that ghosts, whether tangible or not, did inhabit the isle. For the voice, whether Maglor’s or not, had been a ghost of sorts, and the long-forgotten memories that kept flashing in his mind, these were ghosts as well. Glancing up in the direction of the fortress, he recalled, as if it were yesterday…

It was a breezy summer day in the latter years of the Long Peace; Lómwë was standing on the tall battlements of the fortress at Himring, his son Aradol, seven years old at the time, was standing by him. Lómwë was pointing out the landmarks they could see as Aradol followed his gaze avidly.

“See, there are the River Aros and the Little Gelion,” he said, pointing each out.

Aradol looked out at the rivers for a few moments, then twisted around to look up at his father. “Where is our house at?” Lómwë knelt down and took Aradol’s arm and pointed to the east in the direction of their home which stood on one of the further hills. “You can’t see it from here, but it’s right about there, behind one of those hills.”

Aradol pondered this for a moment, then pointed out towards Ossiriand. “And nana used to live there, right?”

Lómwë smiled and nodded. “Yes, she did.” While the day was not chilly, he noticed that the breeze seemed to be getting to Aradol, who wore only a light tunic. “Shall we head down?”

Aradol looked out one more time longingly at the surrounding country. “I guess so…” He ran on ahead, Lómwë following behind. As they began to descend from the high wall, Lómwë noticed that his wife and Aradol’s mother Ellothiel was watching them from the ground below with a smile on her face and love in her eyes. Lómwë smiled back…

And just as abruptly as it had begun, the memory ended and Lómwë was brought back to the present. A shadow passed over his features; those had been the happiest years of his life, but they were long gone, now, merely memories, as were most of the noble and beautiful things that had once filled this place.

He was further shaken from his reverie when he was passed a piece of waybread. He tore off a bit and passed it on before biting into it. He was not very hungry, and the bread was not particularly good, but it took his mind off things. He tuned in to the conversations around him and caught some of Malris’ words: “…A great hope has possessed me. I spent years looking for him...and only found what was left of Lord Maedhros. If Maglor is here, then...then nothing else matters. But I will wait.” But other things do matter, Malris, he thought. But is that why you brought us here? To dig up ghosts and painful memories of the past? But why? Maybe we should not have come. Maybe ghosts should be left in peace.

[Feanor of the Peredhil]

"Do not think me mad. A great hope has possessed me. I spent years looking for him...and only found what was left of Lord Maedhros. If Maglor is here, then...then nothing else matters. But I will wait."

Tasa looked with wonder upon her old friend. Tenacity she remembered, but this was beyond. She fixed him with an uncharacteristically hard stare.

"Nothing else matters? Would you now forsake your own life and those of your friends for the truth behind a voice on the wind? Would you forsake your happier memories of this place, of your wife, to replace them with hard-earned and hard-forgotten memories of battles and ghosted shadows? If love and friendship could so easily be forgotten; if..." she paused, trying with her gaze to make her friend see reason. "If nothing else matters," she spoke slowly and pointedly, driving her words deep, "then I do not believe I wish to continue this journey."

Her outburst had drawn the attention of the others. Even in her younger years, full of spirit and energy, she rarely spoke out thus, and never with the sole intent of making the listener writhe with guilt. Her mouth was fixed in a firm line, ungiving.

"Malris," she continued more softly. "It was a voice on the wind, and nothing more. If you insist, we may check it more thoroughly after the sun has risen and warmed the coldness of this place some. I think, my friend, that it is time for you to inform us why we are truly here... because I rode far to put hard memories to rest. I travelled long and silent to cast away my demons. Not to battle a whisper in the dark of night."

[piosenniel]

Endamir bit back the curt words that were forming just behind his tight pressed lips. They had been bickering back and forth for nearly a year now, each unwilling to accept the other’s decision. All the arguments had played and replayed; all the fine points they had mustered would not serve to sway their decisions. Nor would an injured tone, or worse yet a bitter one.

There had been a subtle change in Orëmir’s phrasings just now, he thought. His brother had left the possibility open that he and Endamir would take separate roads when this last task was done. And he’d voiced it in a gently offered way. Endamir softened at his twin’s words, and taking Oremir’s hand in his own, he cradled it against his cheek. ‘I will tell our mother and father that you kept your vow and were my defense against any who might keep me from returning home.’ He leaned forward, bringing his forehead in to rest against his brother’s. ‘And if at the last you still remain firm in your decision to stay here, in Middle-earth, when my ship leaves, then know I will keep watch for you and rejoice in the day when the white ship brings you home at last to me.’

They stayed locked in their communion for a space of time; the hard-edged barriers they had built between themselves, dissolving. Then, the voice of Tasa, raised in challenge, recalled them from their rediscovered affinity.

Of the two, Endamir was the first to turn his gaze to her. She had voiced her concerns and now demanded an explanation. Well said, Tasa! he thought, lending her his support. ‘What will he say, I wonder, in his defense,’ he said quietly to his brother, speaking loud enough though, that Lindir and Lómwë might pick up his words.

[Envinyatar]

‘If not mad, then surely he is what the goodwives in The Angle call “moonstruck”. He was never this foolish, or foolish at all, really, when he led us.’ Orëmir looked to where Lindir sat, remembering the words of warning he’d spoken before they’d sailed. ‘Perhaps this was an ill-fated little venture on our part. And this island . . . perhaps it strives against us, recalling the old wounds our battles with the Dark One caused it. I’ve heard it said that earth and its outcroppings and deep places hold long their memories. Perhaps this last remnant of a once mighty peak holds some grudge against those who caused its downfall.’ He looked at his brother and shrugged his shoulders at the thought. ‘Who knows?’

Orëmir picked up one of the sticks the fish had been spitted on. He poked at the little fire, pushing the glowing embers closer together before he piled on additional wood. ‘Here, use my blankets for now,’ he said, untying his bedroll and spreading it near the crackling flames. ‘It’s been a long day. Why don’t you get some rest? I’ll take the first watch, as I said.’ He grinned at his brother. ‘Once you’ve got the blankets nice and toasty, I’ll wake you for the second watch. Fair enough?’

He glanced over to where Tasa still looked to Malris for an answer. ‘It really won’t matter what he says. It’s unlikely we’ll bear him bound and protesting from this place to the ship and back to the Grey Havens. He’ll lead; we’ll follow cautiously. Protect ourselves; protect him as we can.’ He glanced upward to the top of the isle where the ruins lay. ‘Besides . . . I’ve decided I want to stand on whatever remains of the northern wall. My last look from there was on the darkness in the north that crept toward us and pushed against what small leaguer we tried to hold against it.’ He shook his head at those long ago memories. ‘He was an Ainu. An Ainu! And one of the mightiest. How wonderfully foolish we were then in our younger years to think we might defeat him.’

Standing, he picked up the belt with his sheathed blade on it and wrapped it round his hips. ‘Let us hope that whatever might infest this old place is something we stand a better chance against.’ His long strides carried him from out the brighter circle of his companions and to a small rocky outcropping nearby where he might keep watch for a while.