Banks of Stone - (March 3010) - [Open]
Feb 15, 2018 13:31:53 GMT -5
Post by Farin on Feb 15, 2018 13:31:53 GMT -5
The babbling brook laughed and tumbled over the rocks of the riverbank, the trees high and vaulting above the cloaked head as the small figure made their way forward. Southward she tread, through limb and leaf, over hill and by the stream, bright green eyes eyeing the pebbles that were strewn upon the bank. The Mering Stream was small here, though it had not been too long ago that she had seen it flowing strong as it joined with the Entwash.
Bird and beast called this wood their home, though Farin knew there were yet men about. High in the trees there were platforms. It was not enough to call the stands a treetop city, though she had been told by some travellers she had met upon the way that the Beacon Knights of Gondor were the ones who raised and kept those flying floors. Farin had, at first sight of one, been curious enough to peer up to the boughs and see if she could spy glimpse of one such servant to the Steward, though she had found it to be empty. Perhaps there were many platforms, but only a handful of knights, she had reasoned. And soon, the dwarf had set off once more.
Her voice, a low and rich alto that hummed with with richness of the soil about the forest around her. The song, which had been flowing for a fair few verses once more lifted, as the dwarf stooped and plucked from the ground a purpleish pebble, and examined it at her fingertips.
A king he was on carven throne
In many-pillared halls of stone
With golden roof and silver floor,
And runes of power upon the door.
The light of sun and star and moon
In shining lamps of crystal hewn
Undimmed by cloud or shade of night
There shone for ever fair and bright.
Farin was, to her knowledge, the only dwarf that stood beneath the might oaks of the Firien; it was, perhaps, the only reason she sang with such abandon. Clad in her brother’s armor, she looked the part she played; Farin, son of Gimlain. Farìs, the name she held secret, was a daughter long lost. Farin had adapted to much of the lie; she knew how to step, how to speak to sound like her elder brother. It helped that many of the big folk saw her bearded chin and thought her to be male straight away, and that running into those of the Mountain was rarer, and more difficult to come by.
They were more likely to notice the slight femininity to her features, the way her voice, though low and pleasant, was yet higher than the others of her stone-blood.
Still, even the men of the great Dale, or of Esgaroth, as she had explored there for a time, would have known her secret by sound of her song. She did not sound like rumbling stone, or dark places. Farin’s alto was winding, low and pristine like a river itself, and surely belonged to one who was a rare gem amongst her people.
Quietly, she slipped the pebble into the pouch at her waist, adding it to the ever growing collection of bits of earth she kept as reminders of the places she had tread.
There hammer on the anvil smote,
There chisel clove, and graver wrote;
There forged was blade, and bound was hilt;
The delver mined, the mason built.
There beryl, pearl, and opal pale,
And metal wrought like fishes' mail,
Buckler and corslet, axe and sword,
And shining spears were laid in hoard.
She had heard that Minas Tirith was a land of a great stone city of itself, and Farin could not fight the curiosity that came with her imaginings of what a city of man would look like in dwarf-make. And so she moved toward the mountains at the foot of the Mering, where she would turn west to find the Steward’s lands.
Perhaps men were not so different, she found herself pondering. She, too, served someone in Erebor that was not her king. Not truly.
Unwearied then were Durin's folk;
Beneath the mountains music woke:
The harpers harped, the minstrels sang,
And at the gates the trumpets rang.
Perhaps it was unwise to sing so boldly; the beacon knights were surely about somewhere in the wood. And yet, her heart could not be stopped, and Farin continued to follow the Mering at a slow, and steady pace, voice lifting the Song of Durin into land that likely had never heard such a tune before.
Bird and beast called this wood their home, though Farin knew there were yet men about. High in the trees there were platforms. It was not enough to call the stands a treetop city, though she had been told by some travellers she had met upon the way that the Beacon Knights of Gondor were the ones who raised and kept those flying floors. Farin had, at first sight of one, been curious enough to peer up to the boughs and see if she could spy glimpse of one such servant to the Steward, though she had found it to be empty. Perhaps there were many platforms, but only a handful of knights, she had reasoned. And soon, the dwarf had set off once more.
Her voice, a low and rich alto that hummed with with richness of the soil about the forest around her. The song, which had been flowing for a fair few verses once more lifted, as the dwarf stooped and plucked from the ground a purpleish pebble, and examined it at her fingertips.
A king he was on carven throne
In many-pillared halls of stone
With golden roof and silver floor,
And runes of power upon the door.
The light of sun and star and moon
In shining lamps of crystal hewn
Undimmed by cloud or shade of night
There shone for ever fair and bright.
Farin was, to her knowledge, the only dwarf that stood beneath the might oaks of the Firien; it was, perhaps, the only reason she sang with such abandon. Clad in her brother’s armor, she looked the part she played; Farin, son of Gimlain. Farìs, the name she held secret, was a daughter long lost. Farin had adapted to much of the lie; she knew how to step, how to speak to sound like her elder brother. It helped that many of the big folk saw her bearded chin and thought her to be male straight away, and that running into those of the Mountain was rarer, and more difficult to come by.
They were more likely to notice the slight femininity to her features, the way her voice, though low and pleasant, was yet higher than the others of her stone-blood.
Still, even the men of the great Dale, or of Esgaroth, as she had explored there for a time, would have known her secret by sound of her song. She did not sound like rumbling stone, or dark places. Farin’s alto was winding, low and pristine like a river itself, and surely belonged to one who was a rare gem amongst her people.
Quietly, she slipped the pebble into the pouch at her waist, adding it to the ever growing collection of bits of earth she kept as reminders of the places she had tread.
There hammer on the anvil smote,
There chisel clove, and graver wrote;
There forged was blade, and bound was hilt;
The delver mined, the mason built.
There beryl, pearl, and opal pale,
And metal wrought like fishes' mail,
Buckler and corslet, axe and sword,
And shining spears were laid in hoard.
She had heard that Minas Tirith was a land of a great stone city of itself, and Farin could not fight the curiosity that came with her imaginings of what a city of man would look like in dwarf-make. And so she moved toward the mountains at the foot of the Mering, where she would turn west to find the Steward’s lands.
Perhaps men were not so different, she found herself pondering. She, too, served someone in Erebor that was not her king. Not truly.
Unwearied then were Durin's folk;
Beneath the mountains music woke:
The harpers harped, the minstrels sang,
And at the gates the trumpets rang.
Perhaps it was unwise to sing so boldly; the beacon knights were surely about somewhere in the wood. And yet, her heart could not be stopped, and Farin continued to follow the Mering at a slow, and steady pace, voice lifting the Song of Durin into land that likely had never heard such a tune before.
