Heirlooms of My Kin [Tanfui 455 F.A.] [Mithiel]
Dec 20, 2018 10:21:33 GMT -5
Post by ERESTOR MAGLORION on Dec 20, 2018 10:21:33 GMT -5
Heirlooms of My Kin
Nargothrond on Tanfui, near Midnight
Year 455 of the First Age
The heraldic device of the Feanorians
A few months hence had the company of Finrod returned to the realm of Nargothrond with tidings of the Dagor Bragollach. The sudden flame which had waged the whole of the past winter, sending the great snows of the north to waterfalls of meltwater, blood, and char. Those which had survived the rivers of flame and poisonous fumes had traveled south. Dorthonion had been set to complete and utter ruin; Aegnor and Angrod slain. Fingolfin, the High King, had been crushed beneath the foot of Morgoth. Maglor’s Gap devastated; his father’s horsemen had been burned alive and the few remaining had made hasty retreat to Himring to assist the alliance of Maedhros. Erestor had word that his father had survived the onslaught, and the Himring, though taking heavy damages, had not fallen. Yet he at the time had been stationed at the Pass of Aglond with Celegorm and Curufin, and it was they and their remaining men who had taken refuge in Nargothrond.
Erestor sat himself at a desk in one of the libraries of the realm, thinking of all that was lost. Few things had come from with them from the old country. Few records, resources, scrolls, manuscripts, things written in the language of his kin, by his kin. But almost nothing had been saved from the northern realms, men fleeing with only that which was upon their bodies at the time when the dragons approached.
Pity the loss! He should have ridden with the company of his cousin from the start. Finrod had been hospitable and kind in the few months he had been taken into his knowledge as kin. Nargothrond was not a war mongering realm like those of his Feanorian cousins, but a place which reminded him after more than four hundred years away, of the prosperity of Aman. There were loremasters, art, music. There was, Erestor hoped, peace to find here, though his thoughts always returned to Himring. After the snows melted and made travel possible, Erestor would turn to the realm of Maedhros where his father dwelled.
Tanfui was upon them, with stories of elven yore, yet all Erestor could dwell on was a wonderment of who sat by Maglor’s side at the table of feasts and by the roaring fires in the stone walls of Himring? Who was it, if not him?
Attempting to distract himself, Erestor turned back to his work. The side of his hand was smeared black with the remnants of ink as midnight approached on the eve of winter. The elf had not turned aside all frivolities, of course. A bottle of Finrod’s fine wine sat empty in the corner of the desk, and a second aside as Erestor was copying into a book one of his own accounts of the halls of Aglon. His dark hair fell long and sleek down his back over robes of grey linen and black velvet, and a circlet of silver set upon his head which matched his eyes, the thin bands of the circlet met in the front and graven and melded into it the colorful gems of Feanor's heraldic device, the only color upon his whole body; the only sign that spoke of him as one of the Lords among the high elves.
A parchment sat aside him, sketched in detail the great gates of Aglon, which by request the one-eyed weaponsmith had drawn up for him when Erestor’s own memory brought forth not the details he desired. The scholar was passing the evening trying to replicate the art as a line drawing on the page of the book. Not quite satisfied with his own work; his talent was in words and script, not art. He sighed, doing his best; though his best was not enough and he would have to reconcile. It was not meant to be a piece of art to display upon the wall, but merely a record for the ages, while the heirlooms of his kin were lost, the least they could do was preserve their memory.
There was song and story in Nargothrond tonight, but this was how Erestor would honor the deeds of his kin. Records and manuscripts. Telling straightforward, without poetry which could impede the true nature of things. The dark haired elf looked up as he heard footsteps in the archives. Not to see who had entered, but to pour himself another glass of the wine, and the second bottle was emptied into his glass as he drank of it. His head was half swimming in mulled apple wine, and Erestor decided he had done enough of sketching for the evening, and his words would flow better the next day, as he put a cap upon his ink and set his quill into the copper stem upon the table.