Author's Note: Okay, so. Bit of explaining to do here. This was meant to be the first part of the long-awaited update, detailing Inzilbeth's voyages that were taken as voted for in the last round of voting. However, it turned into...this. A very long and nice piece of writing that I've ultimately had to cut from the final update for length. Seeing as how I still think this is an important bit of the quest, and an absolute blast to write, I've decided that all future voyages/trips voted for will be described in-between turns in interludes.
I took the opportunity to turn this specific inaugural interlude into a refresher for the quest as a whole. Hopefully, by reading this you should be able to get a rundown of the quest and everything that's happened in it so far.
Happy New Year!
But the King's Men sailed far away to the south; and though the lordships and strongholds that they made have left many rumours in the legends of Men, the Eldar know naught of them. Only Pelargir they remember, for there was the haven of the Elf-friends above the mouths of Anduin the Great.
Great was the joy of the crew of the
Pillar of Heaven* as she set forth from the harbor, but greater yet and more childlike still was their joy when the last speck of land had dwindled over the horizon. They sang and they drank and some even wept openly into the ocean spray. They had been too long from the Great Sea. Inzilbeth carried herself sternly and with grandeur, as a captain must, but in her heart she smiled and cried all the same to feel the salt on her skin. Southward the great ship sailed, and the foam danced white upon her brow. South she sped, around jagged coasts and wide shores; south, over purple-blue seas and under burning orange skies; south, ever south, upon the whale-road. Finally, after many days of sailing, they came to a place where the sea and the land met, where the mountains pierced the stars like horns, and where the great river Anduin rolled at long last from over a thousand leagues to meet the sea with open arms.
There, upon the mouth of the river, stood a city. It seemed to grow out of the very water, like a dwelling of the sea-spirits of Ulmo who first forked the waves when the world was young. Great bridges arched like bent bows between titan pillars and soaring domes, and seagulls winged wildly through toppling spires of marble and adamant that caught the sun like glass. A large harbor spread out from the city like a mother with arms outstretched, and within her bosom were nestled a thousand thousand ships, their masts bristling in the wind as a forest upon the waves. Above and through it all ran the salt-wind out of the west, heavy with the sea-song, brushing the sails and kissing the domes and lifting the gulls into the sky.
This was Pelargir, the City of the Ships, the haven of the Elf-friends. In beauty and grandeur and love in the hearts of mariners, it stood unmatched by any port of the Men of the West save one other -- Romenna on the Blessed Isle. There was a legend which held that the mariners who built the city, Romennans all, so loved the sea that they could not bear to step one foot more upon land than the very spot where the sea-waves broke into foam, and so built Pelargir there, at the mouth of the Anduin, gazing forever west over the Belegaer to Númenor and Romenna the beloved.
It had been a great many years since Inzilbeth had seen this city, but she loved it still -- and the city loved her. Inzilbeth was received in the harbor with cheers and whistles and song, and a great crowd sprang up to meet her. The Pillar of Heaven was well-known in that harbor, and it's people rejoiced to see the ship and it's captain returned. All of this praise came in the lilting, reedlike syllables of Sindarin, the elf-tongue fairer than song and older than the stars. Here, the speech of the Men of the West was a rare thing -- only the houseless and the disposssed spoke the King's tongue in everyday speech. Pelargir was a haven of the Faithful, and elves, long absent from the streets of Númenor, strode the walkways and bridges of the City of Ships in great numbers. Tall and lithe and fair like the city itself, their presence added something wordless and nameless to the air.
But she had not come here for the elves, or to trade old sailing tales with other mariners. With difficulty, Inzilbeth disentangled herself from the web of admirers and slid through the city streets until she came to the mighty many-towered domed building which stood at the center of Pelargir. This was the Telaear, the Dome of the Sea, and from it's highest point it was said that one might stand and see the shores of the Blessed Isle upon the horizon. It was the palace of the Sea-Lord of Pelargir, and Inzilbeth had been here before, a great many times -- so she was ushered in quickly.
Through buttressed halls and soaring chambers she walked, until she came to the Ruling Chamber at the heart of the Dome, where sat the lord of Pelargir in all his splendor, throned above a teeming crowd of nobles and courtiers.
Annûthor was his name, Heledir's son and Sîriel's heir. Most powerful of the Sea-Lords was he, and his hand and will was felt even upon the Blessed Isle, for he was a lord of the Faithful, and many counted him the greatest and the noblest of the Elf-Friends of his age, chief in power among those who held to the old ways. Some (who valued, perhaps, freedom of tongue more than possession of tongue) said aloud that in influence among the Men of the West he rivaled only one man -- Tar-Calmacil the King.
"The last time I saw you, you came perhaps to my knee," Inzilbeth quipped as she entered the chamber. Many in the audience gasped, but the Sea-Lord himself merely smiled and rose from his chair.
"And now I am taller, I think, than you yourself. You have not aged a day, 'Zil."
"You flatter an old woman too much, Sea-Lord.", she chided, but smiled as she spoke.
The Lord of Pelargir descended the steps of his throne and met her in a hug. "It seems only yesterday that you danced me on your knee and told me tall tales from over the eastern sea."
"The stories I told you were many things, my lord, but they were about as tall as you yourself were in those days."
The Sea-Lord beamed and bowed to her.
"Welcome, daughter of the West, to my hall.
Êl síla erin lû e-govaned vîn." The hall broke again into whispers as he spoke.
A star shines on the hour of our meeting.
Inzilbeth scoffed, though her eyes glistened. "You would greet me as an equal? You?"
"Always, my lady.
Aglâr Nâkhadâ."
She bowed. "You honor me. Hail, son of the Star. I come as a sister and a friend.
Êl síla erin lû e-govaned vîn.
Aglâr Nâkhadâ."
She rose, and appraised the Lord of Pelargir. Annûthor was a slim man, with tanned skin and curly hair that fell in ringlets about his ears. He had his mother's eyes, proud sea-green marbles, and though he was young -- barely 53 -- his face shone with the maturity of one a century his elder. He was indeed a far cry from the boy she had watched run in these halls scant decades ago: a lord of men, crowned in glory. He reminded her perhaps of Imrazor -- young, both of them, but wise beyond their years.
"What brings you to my city and my hall, lady Inzilbeth? Last we had heard, the
Pillar sailed in foreign seas."
"I come now not of my own accord, but on behalf of another. I am an emissary of one who holds himself your peer -- the Sea-Lord of Târ Nîlon at the Angren's mouth."
Annûthor raised a dark eyebrow. "A new colony in the north? The Venturers have grown daring indeed."
"This colony was not sent by the Guild of Venturers, but by the Shapers."
That set the hall into another frenzy of whispers. One old noble in bright blue robes scoffed loudly, and there were more than a few laughs.
Even Annûthor had to stop a smile from creeping to his face. "The Shapers? What do the
Zimrailai know of ships, or of the sea?"
"Less than you might expect, and more than you would think. Two of them -- a Lady Shaper and one who might have expected such an honor in his lifetime -- have left the Blessed Isle to found upon the shores of the sea a new city. This Shaper, Imrazor, seeks friendship with the cities of the Faithful."
Annûthor listened quietly, then waited a moment before he replied. "I do not see why such a thing needs be refused. Long years have passed since Men of the West dwelt northward in any great number. An Elf-Friend with the backing of one of the Guilds...well, this might change matters for the better."
Inzilbeth broke in. "This lord, Imrazor, is no enemy of the elves, but I must caution that he is not of the Faithful, though he may be counted among the Wise, and holds the old ways dear, as we do."
"The tale grows stranger and stranger, until it resembles one I heard on your knee in my youth. Not an Elf-Friend, but one of the Wise? Not of the Faithful, but he dwells willingly and freely in the north? A Lord Shaper in the making, and he has abandoned it to dwell in houseless lands and rule untamed fields?"
"He is a curious man, but far-sighted and shrewd. We will all have need of such men in the years to come, I believe."
"Ever and anon it was said that the Sea-Strider returned from the wide ocean only when she had found something to baffle and amaze even the hardiest of men. The old tale proves true again, I wonder." Annûthor thumbed his lip in thought for a moment, then nodded. "Very well. Return to your Sea-Lord in his wild land and tell him Pelargir opens her arms in friendship. The north is rich in iron, and I fear we will have much need of such things soon. Orcs afoot in great numbers in the Emyn Arnen, and the Sea-Lords of Lebennin fear that our Enemy is at work again. He has assaulted us twice in recent years, and the second of those assaults was helmed by a Black Rider. This last raid very nearly reached the Anduin herself, and only all the colonies working together threw his power back. What is worse, there are some who fear that even this was merely a test -- a prelude to some greater assault that may be launched on the whole of that middle earth between Minhiriath and Umbar."
"And aid from the Gift...?" Inzilbeth ventured.
"Is less than forthcoming. The King and his Men pour their wealth into Umbar and the glory of conquest -- they care little for the Faithful who suffer the cruelties of Mordor."
Inzilbeth smiled grimly. "Then we children of the shore shall have to see to our own defenses, no? How does the old saying go?
Êphal îdôn Yôzâyan..."
The Lord of Pelargir finished. "...
Êphalak îdôn ka-Bâr. 'Númenor is distant, and the king is far away'. Truer words by the day."
"We build upon the Isen a great city of foundries and steel, a redoubt of the Shapers that might in time serve as an armory for all the Númenóreans of the North. A place of strength. We could use friendly hands, and loyal hearts. Are there any among your people who would join us?"
"A fair dream, Sea-Strider. I would be a poor lord indeed if I said there were citizens in my lands eager to depart for new colonies -- but there may be some. I will see what can be done. A friend in the north is well enough -- but tell your lord in plain words that any friend of Pelargir must be a friend to the Elves, sooner rather than later."
"Mine own journey shall take me to Lindon ere it ends, with the same message I bore to you, my lord."
"You will find my hall a pale shade of Gil-Galad's own, I should not wonder. Farewell, daughter of the Gift. My city is open to you and all your crew while you remain here. May the stars shine always upon you."
"And upon you, son of the Star."
And all the Elves that missed their way
and never found the western bay,
the gleaming walls of their long home
by the grey seas and the white foam,
who never trod the golden land
where the towers of the Valar stand,
all these were gathered in their realm
beneath the beech and oak and elm.
North the ship sped, across the Bay of Belfalas and around the horn of Gondor. The mountains grew larger and closer together, and behind them high Pelargir and fair Anduin shrank away. The Belegaer was calm and the bay was still, so barely a day and a half had passed before the watchmen sighted a slim white tower of adamant rising above the mountain-tops. That slim tower, all mariners knew, was Tirith Aear, the Tower of the Sea -- raised by the hands of the elves, yet used as a guiding-sign by any mortals sailing the storm-tossed seas of the Bay.
Within but a few more hours of sailing, they had rounded the cape and drew close to the shore -- and to the city-port which sat nestled in the mountains' neck: Edhellond, the refuge of the Elves. Here, long centuries ago, the Elves of Eregion and Lorien had fled the coming of the Dark Lord, and even after his passing had remained by the shores of the sea, gazing into the west that was lost. It looked like a picture stamped out of Elder Days -- buildings of lily-white, fair and arched like the necks of swans, arching gracefully over tree-lined streets and wide boulevards.
Above it all rose toppling the tower, like a needle of diamond thrust into the sky. Though simple stone, it glinted on every surface as it caught the sun. At night, it was said that it blazed in the moon like a pillar of light, and could be seen through even the darkest storm. The King's Men held it to be an evil omen, and when it blazed such in the night they called it the Witch-Lamp, and avoided it even to their peril. Inzilbeth and many other mariners, who had been raised in the old ways of the elf-friends, knew it by another name: the Lamp of the Lord and Lady. No lighthouse of mortal men had ever blazed so bright, or cut so sharp through the mist.
The
Pillar slid into the dock to polite cheers and clapping. At the docks, elves slid from the crowd one after the other to clasp her hands or grasp her in an embrace. Some of them were old friends, who had known her when she first traveled here as a little girl, and had known her father before her as a young man. They laughed to see her again, and the laughter of the elves was as music on the wind.
Inzilbeth's heart lept to see them all again, and to see the city. No port in all the world was quite like Edhellond, she had found. Something fey and wild danced in the salt wind. Time seemed to hang still here -- the very air was fresher and cleaner, and the march of the Ages did not seem to dull the cobblestones nor wear the bright tower.
Nothing dark could come here, she felt, lest all the world had fallen first to the Shadow. Only then might it dwindle and go out -- last of all, as a candle in a bitter wind.
She was led by smiling friends through the thronging streets, greeted by familiar faces every few steps. It was only after several hours that she was able to make her way through the throng to approach the double-gates to the great tower at the city's heart. No guard stood at those gates, merely a harper strumming her instrument, who smiled and strummed as she passed.
Up the tower she went, rising and rising and rising. There were many floors, each dedicated to a different activity -- on some, elves sat and wrote in great gardens, and in others strode among books and scrolls and read poems aloud. In others still, they bathed in pools of clear water, or danced to the piping of many flutes. At the very top, she knew, there was a great room where sat a mighty and slow bell of wrought brass that had been fashioned in Eregion long ago, and when rung on a clear day could be heard over the mountains and across the Bay.
But it was not to the bell-room she climbed.
She came at last to a high-roofed hall ringed with windows. The walls were covered in leaves of silver, and the floor shone like mirrored gold. Many elves were here -- some singing, some chanting poetry aloud, and others still gathered here and there talking. A few leaned out of the windows, gazing out over the mountains at the world below.
In the middle of the room, on twin thrones of carven elder wood, sat the Lord and Lady. Very tall they were, of equal stature and beauty. The Lord, Celeborn, had silver hair and a stony face, and he rose to meet Inzilbeth as she came, and bowed with all the nobility and grandeur of his race.
The Lady rose too, but it was as the ocean rises, and when she stood, it was as a mountain stands. Her eyes were very old, and deep like the wells of stars, and her face proud and stern. But her hair -- her hair was as gold, finer than thread, and it caught the light dancing as it moved. It fell about her waist in waves, shifting and glimmering as it did, so that she seemed crowned with starlight -- yet her locks seemed to Inzilbeth fairer and more terrible than any crown or metal of men.
Galadriel did not speak, but she smiled, and in the smile was many words.
She bowed. "
Mae Govannen, my Lady, my Lord."
Celeborn spoke in Adunaic, bending into the ancient greeting-bow of Westernesse. "Welcome to our hall, Daughter of Men.
Gimlun bêl nakhat-ze 'nNê."
Inzilbeth could not speak for a long moment. When she found her voice again, it was a rasp. "You do me honor, Lord."
"The honor is ours, Inzilbeth of Númenor. Too long has it been since a daughter of your isle has graced this tower. We have ill missed the speech of men within these walls."
Inzilbeth frowned. "Pelargir stands across the Bay, my Lord, and Dor-en-Ernil even closer. There are many hearts there yet glad of friendship with the elves."
Galadriel spoke. Her voice was like a note of music, but strong and clear. "Long is the reach of the King in the Sea, and many are his ears and eyes, even in the Belfalas. It is not an easy thing, to pay us a visit in these days."
"Would that it were not so, my lady."
"Would that many things that have come to pass were not so. But speak high, and clear, and name the errand that has brought you hence. I sense it is not friendship alone which has brought you hither over the Great Sea, nor drawn you back from seas and shores beyond the knowledge of the Eldar."
"But it is friendship alone," Inzilbeth cried, "for I come on behalf of another: Imrazôr, latest of the Sea-Lords. A city has been raised on the shores of the Isen, a hold in the wildness of Minhiriath. He stands now master over the lands where once dwelt the Gwaith-i-Merdain, and all the wild from the Misty Mountains to the White is his."
Celeborn furrowed his brow. "A new colony in the north? So close to Gil-Galad, and so far from the war? It does not seem the temper of your King to countenance such a thing. Must he now extend his hand over every part of Middle-Earth, even those which he has long set in such low favor?"
"No temper of his, Lord, but a doing of the
Zimrailai, the Shapers' Guild."
Galadriel smiled, but it was grave. "The Men of Jewels reach their hand far, and greedily. I have some imagining of what they must hope to find in Eregion, where the Rings were made, but the hope is vain -- I say to you now, whatever treasure they imagine lies in those lands, it shall not be worth the pains by which they will win it."
Celeborn nodded in agreement. "There are things in Ost-en-Edhil which have been forgotten for many lives of men, and for good cause. Eregion has been dead a thousand years. Leave it so."
Inzilbeth inclined her head in acknowledgement. "Be that as it may, the choice is not mine, nor my lord's. With all respect, a thousand years have passed since the Lord and Lady dwelt upon the Gwathlo. There is a power in Tharbad now, of Númenorean descent, which exerts it's hand harshly over the Middle-Men, pressing them into bondage and tribute."
"It is an ill thing," Celeborn started darkly, "but as we have heard it told, there are many
ill things done now by the tall men of Elenna-nore between the mountains and the sea. Where has gone the great Eryn Vorn, or the men who dwelt there in ages past? Where now are the kindly Wood-Woses, or the old Ents of the North?"
"Hold," said Galadriel. "Those deeds, however black, were not the work of this daughter of Men -- and I sense there is more yet at hand."
Inzilbeth bowed. "Thank you, my lady. You are correct. There is an evil in those lands not of any mortal make. There stirs an evil power whose name we know not. Orcs are afoot beyond the Gwathlo for the first time since the Wizard failed at Tharbad. They bear a stamp in their vile tongue: the sign of the black mountain, Gundabad."
All in the room stirred. There was a silence. "That is evil news," Celeborn said finally. "Evil, and unsettling. The Mountain of the Dwarves has slept in shadow for millennia. Has the guard of Khazad-Dum strayed at last?"
"Their gaze may have slipped -- there is war in the Dwarrowdelf. Dwarves who walk in the sun bear arms to the Doors of Durin. They say they are the Folk of Var, come to Middle-Earth out of the utmost east, who seek to redress some ancient wrong against Durin's Folk."
Galadriel's voice was low and somber when she spoke again, yet it rang high in the hall. "War among the dwarves and new evil in Gundabad. Tharbad, old and forgotten, strays into wickedness. Sauron turns from his wars in the south to cast his strength against Pelargir, and the eyes of your King swing north to follow him. And in far Númenor, the Shapers dream of cities."
She fixed Inzilbeth with a clear eye. "I have seen some of these things -- many, but not all. Know this: this Second Age of the Sun now balances on the point of a knife, and the darkness which has swallowed all the world now threatens to rush over Middle-Earth. It may come to pass that this new city on the Isen stands at the center of great and terrible events which may shape the doom of all."
"Tar Nilon," Inzilbeth interjected. "The name of it is Tar Nilon."
Galadriel smiled softly. "A fitting name. It will need the light of the stars to guide it in the days and years to come. We will be glad of friends in old Eregion, should the Enemy stray north again."
Inzilbeth hesitated. "My master, Imrazor...he does not count himself among the elf-friends. Yet, he is of the Wise, and knows the old tongues and ways."
Celeborn scowled. "Wise, then, he cannot full call himself, if he is blinded from friendship so needed by pride alone. Has the folly of Númenor soured even the most learned of the tall men?"
"Men are wise in many ways," Galadriel said, "and foolish in others. Friend or no, a firm hand in the north may be necessary sooner than we anticipate. But Celeborn is right in this -- if your master holds himself in wisdom, he will understand that lines are being drawn even now in the Blessed Isle which may not be so easily straddled in the coming years. He may stand in the middle for a time -- a century, maybe two. But the darkness which grows now upon the Land of the Gift is like nothing I have yet seen in the hearts of men. The fear of death is set heavy and fast in their hearts. No words will sway them now from their path."
Inzilbeth found that her breath had almost left her. Galadriel's voice had grown darker and deeper as she spoke, and she sounded now almost as a thunderclap. "Where does the path lead?"
"Where all paths of Men lead," Galadriel replied. Her voice was dark still, but the tone was sad. "to an ending. But it will be a bitter one, and there will be tears unnumbered at it's coming."
"Is it certain? This...downfall?"
"Nothing is certain, nor is any doom set in stone. But the road grows narrower by the day -- for you, Sea-Strider, and your wise lord too."
Inzilbeth stirred. The room had grown quiet, and all the elves in the room were watching their Lady in silence. She loomed above Inzilbeth, and struck the Sea-Strider for a moment how tall she was. How tall, and how terrible, and how old. On her neck -- how had Inzilbeth not noticed it before? -- there sat a white ring on a silver necklace, and it seemed bright as a star upon her breast.
The silence stretched a long moment, and then Inzilbeth shook herself to movement. She bowed a final time. "My Lord. My Lady. It has been an honor, as ever."
Celeborn did not speak, but bowed and sat down. His eyes were storm clouds.
Galadriel remained standing, but spoke one final time:
"May the stars shine ever upon you, daughter of the Gift, and may your seas be ever clear.
Aglâr Nâkhadâ."
The fellings had at first been along both banks of the Gwathló, and timber had been floated down to the haven; but now the Númenóreans drove great tracks and roads into the forests northwards and southwards from the Gwathló, and the native folk that survived fled from Minhiriath into the dark woods of the great Cape of Eryn Vorn. The devastation wrought by the Númenóreans was incalculable. For long years these lands were their chief source of timber, not only for their ship-yards at Lond Daer and elsewhere, but also for Númenor itself.
Shiploads innumerable passed west over the sea.
The sun hung low in the sky. Inzilbeth stood at the prow of her ship, looking out at the coast growing rapidly before her. The waters which tossed the
Pillar now were the waves of the Cape of Eryn Vorn -- named by the first explorers to leave the Blessed Isle. Long millennia ago, the first Númenóreans to ever return to Middle-Earth had landed on these shores and walked under the eaves of the great dark forest they had found there. Blackwood, they had called it then, the
Eryn Vorn in the Elvish tongues.
But nothing now remained of that ancient wood. Great dark plains stretched out in every direction from the shore. Countless stumps stood row in row, stretching away as far as the eye could see, and between them wound the faint scars of roads that had been carved long ago through woods long gone by woodsmen long dead. The earth itself was black, coated thick with dust and ash. Nothing grew. No birds chirped. Nothing moved. The waves broke on a silent shore. Through it all wound the river Gwathlo, sullen and silent, as if it remembered a time when it had flowed in the shadow of mighty oaks.
Out of all this desolation sprouted something incogruous -- a city.
Wide and white walls loomed over thick domed buildings and narrow streets. A harbor, smaller than Pelargir's but still impressive in construction and size, opened yawning into the Cape, and besides them, mighty shipyards hung open to the sea. But the white walls were not manned, the streets were empty, and only a few stray ships sat in the great harbor -- and none at all in the shipyards, which had not seen fresh timber for many lives of men.
This was Lond Daer -- the Great Haven, which once had been the greatest and most stately of the ports of Numenor, heart of a beating industry that had sent fleets of timber across the sea in the time of Inzilbeth's father's father. Elven ships had sailed from Lindon to call upon the Elf-Friends of the haven, and wealth and riches had flowed down the Gwathlo to Tharbad and the lands beyond.
No more.
The trees had gone, and with them the elves, and the traders, and the wealth. The Venturers abandoned their first haven for the richer and younger cities of Pelargir and Umbar, and the shipwrights had gone with them, leaving the shipyards unusable. Abandoned by the Blessed Isle, the old city had slid first into desrepair and now nearly to ruin. Mighty lords had ruled here once, and grown great on the trade which flowed from her harbors, but now the lordship of Lond Daer was a position of exile, where the Kings sent disgraced advisors and overmighty sons to wait out their final decades ruling over a wasteland. Silence wrapped the city on the black shore, and no cheers were heard when the Pillar set anchor. Only hard faces and sharp eyes met Inzilbeth and her crew as they entered the port. Those who dwelt here still were an inauspicious and ramshackle lot -- men and women who preferred life out of the eyes of the king, for purposes ranging from the shameful to the illicit.
A request to one of the port guards to meet with the city's master was met with a scowl. A pouch of coin recieved a slightly kinder response, and earned her and her crew an escort through the darkened streets to the wide-arched, many-domed building that perched like a gull on the shore, looming out over the Cape: the Sea-Palace of Aldarion.
Here, the sixth king of Westernesse had built his summer home, which in an age gone by had been reckoned among the greatest structures in all Middle-Earth. Yet now, like everything else in the city, it looked only a hair above a ruin. TIme had rotted her timbers and weathered the noble faces carved into her walls. The sea had long worn away at her foundations, and now she slumped darkly and ominously to the side, as if only an errant push from toppling into the crashing waves.
Guided by a stony-faced guard, Inzilbeth and her men walked through the darkened halls of the old king. Men loitered in dark corners, and many pairs of eyes watched them from the rafters. At last, they came to the old throne-room of the king, which was as decayed and rubbled as any other part of the great building. Great pillars loomed on every side, painted in paint which had once been the blue of crashing waves but was now chipped and dark. A massive tiled mural stretched around the entire curved wall of the room, so that one could start on the right, follow it all the way around, and return to the end where they had entered.
The mural depicted the first landing of the Numenoreans on the shores of Middle-Earth: on the right, tall men stepped from golden ships into a dark wood. As the mural curved, they explored the wood, forded the rivers, and, finally, founded the city of Lond Daer -- Vinyalonde, then -- a recreation of which occupied the majority of the mural until it wrapped around into dark forests.
The mural, too, had fallen to time, and many parts of it lay chipped and faded, but one thing remained almost pristine. At the center of the mural, across from the entrance, so that none could enter and not gaze upon him, was the Sea-King himself, Tar-Aldarion. Unlike everyone else in the mural, he did not touch the 'shore' -- he leaned instead from the prow of a ship, one arm clinging to the rigging, the other raised to his forehead as he peered out over the land. A seven-rayed-sun rose behind his head, crowning him.
Beneath the image of the long-dead king, on a raised dias at the end of the hall, sat the Lord of the Great Haven.
He sat slanted on the chair of Aldarion, an arm cocked and a foot tossed over the armrest. He was clearly older, as the Númenóreans reckoned such things, but held himself as one decades younger. He had a great angled nose, like a bird, and curious eyes that seemed to smile always at some secret joke. He had a slim beard, clipped short and close in the southern style. He wore robes of dark crimson slashed with gold and silver over a heavy breastplate of black iron. Rings crowned with rubies fat as cherries sat on each of his fingers, and his ears glittered with golden hoops. A wine-goblet dangled loosely between his fingers.
At the side of his throne stood a black-haired woman with pale skin, dressed sumptuously in robes of silk and silver that would not have looked out of place at a banquet on the Blessed Isle, but which seemed almost eerie in the crumbling atmosphere of the palace. She looked for all the world a ghost from the days of Tar-Aldarion, stepped out of the mural and striding now through the dim halls which she had ruled in older times. Her eyes flickered to Inzilbeth as she entered, but she did not say a word.
At the foot of the throne, surrounding the dias, stood a line of dark-skinned men in burnished armor of black and gold, holding slim spears of wrought silver. Their armor was littered with trophies and artefacts from what was clearly many lifetimes of war. One man bore several long necklaces made from dark, pointed teeth, while another's armor was notched with countless carven tally marks. A third was tattooed from head to toe with swirling patterns that danced across his skin. Many of them had strange vertical cuts on their cheeks, forming odd symbols.
On all of their armors -- some under their chests, some on the shoulder, some right on the helmet -- they bore the sigil of a red star.
Inzilbeth strode down to the center of the hall, stopping directly before the dias, some feet from the first of the soldiers. There she stood a moment in long silence. The slim lord did not speak, but only watched her with those bright, curious eyes.
After some time, she cleared her throat.
"Hail, son of the star. I come as a sister and a friend."
At this, the lord of the Haven smiled, but there was something too wide about it.
"Welcome, daughter of the gift, to mine hall. May a star shine on the hour of our meeting."
"I am Inzilbeth," she replied with a bow. "Círhael's heir and Abrazân's daughter."
At this, the man's eyebrow jumped.
"Ahh-hhh-hhh," he laughed. "So the honor is mine then. Abrazân's daughter visits my city. But it was not always
my city, was it? From one Sea-Lord of the Great Haven to the daughter of another: may glory be ever with you."
"And with you, lord. My father's lordship was long ago, but I am certain he would smile to see your...skilled stewardship."
"Perhaps he would, at that. But Abrazân Elf-Friend is dead, and a new lord rules Lond Daer."
Inzilbeth eyed him shortly, as one might a snake. She did not like his voice. It slipped and curled and darted from syllable to syllable. "Aye, there is a new master in this city -- and he need not speak his name, for I know it from the sight of him: Galpazath of the Harad. Far from home, are you not?"
Galpazath's thin smile grew somehow wider at being named. "So you
have heard of me. My curiosity gains the better of me -- how have you come know of me, Elf-Friend's daughter? Maybe you are not the only legend in this room, eh?"
"Not all legends are auspicious my lord, or should be repeated in high company. Take my word that I know you well."
"Please, we are not elves here. We are men, and not all our stories need be coated in gold and glamor. Now tell me, what songs are told of Galpazath and his men in the halls of the Elf-Friends?"
"No
songs, my lord."
There was the smile again, sharp and thin and cold like razors in the night. "I should imagine not."
"I question again, my lord, what has brought the sons of Aurenion to this end of Middle-Earth. Last I heard, the master of this city was Talantur the --"
"Dead. And with his dying, the King has called me here from the sunlit lands. Ar-Belzagar has greater concerns than this city, but make no mistake, he has tired of his subjects cavorting with the elves under his nose. So he has given this city to the
Nardū̆, his swords of the south."
Inzilbeth blinked incredulously. "He has put the city under hired blades?"
The lord's eyes flashed, and the thin smile vanished.
"What a rude term, my lady. How should you feel if I called you a boat-master, or an elf's..."
He trailed off into a dark scowl.
"My emotions escape me. You are right. Ar-Belzagar our King - may he live forever - has seen fit to contract the
Gimilkarasai and their captain to serve as his agents in the city of Lond Daer for a period of no less than twenty-five years."
"A quarter century to keep watch over tree stumps and wild men? Has the power of the Wizard so dwindled that such strength may be spared? Or, perhaps, our King in his mercy is sparing the Enemy your terrible wrath?"
Galpazath waved a hand dismissively. "The designs of the King of Men are beyond you, I fear."
"Men
of the West." Inzilbeth replied sharply.
Galpazath frowned. "Hm?"
"
Tar-Calmacil the Great is King of the
Men of the West and of
Númenor. He is not the king of men, nor the king of this world.
"
Galpazath regarded in her in silence for a long moment.
His lip bent, then curled yet again into that wry, wolflike smile. She was beginning to hate that smile.
"Indeed." There was something high and mocking in his tone.
The woman at his side bent and whispered something into his ear. He nodded, then fixed his gaze squarely on Inzilbeth.
"Why have you come, Abrazân's daughter? To needle my ear? Should you not be sailing north to present yourself to some fetching Elvish lord?"
Inizilbeth's voice could have cracked cold steel. "I come as an emissary, my lord, from the city of Tar Nilon on the Angren's mouth."
"Ohh-hh. Yes. Yes. The 'City of the Shapers'." There came a barking laugh from the high throne. "We shall see how long that lasts. I wish you the utmost luck."
"You have heard of the colony?"
"I am a servant of the king and a Sea-Lord of Westernesse. I would be remiss in my duties if I did not keep myself informed on the doings of my neighbors."
"And yet they have heard no word of you in Tharbad, and we have seen no sails from Lond Daer. Indeed, we did not know a new lord ruled in the Haven."
The curious eyes flickered again, too-bright and too-knowing.
"Why should I sail down the river to pass words with halfbreeds? The tower is held. That is the king's only concern, and so it is my only concern. And it seems there is enough of Númenor left in them for that, at least, to not require my attention. And as for you and yours, well..." Galpazath paused to take a long swig of the wine-cup in his hand, then lowered it, licking his thin lips. "...you are here, are you not?"
Inzilbeth looked around her at the crumbling edifices and the ruined mural.
"Indeed," she replied sharply. "I am here. Know this, then: Imrazôr Belrubên's son is master upon the Isen. He seeks friends and hands to work for common cause against the evil that grows now in the north. "
Galpazath cocked his head towards her. "Evil? What evil? I would not think you speak of the elves so."
"We have seen orcs abroad, beyond the Gwathlo. They bear the stamp of the Black Mountain. Gundabad stirs, for the first time in a century."
Galpazath snorted. "Orcs. Gundabad is an old hill filled with rutting goblins, aimless and masterless.
Zigûrun has no interests here." The tall lord smirked. "But, of course, I understand. You who have grown soft in the lap of the Blessed Isle would doubtless quiver to see hair or hide of orc-work, that the blood and toil of stronger men have kept from your sight these long years. Have no fear, Abrazân's daughter -- the
Gimilkarasai are come now into these lands, and the orcs of these lands shall die as well upon our spears as die the orcs of Mordor."
The lord thrust a single gloved fist into the air. "
Kalabag-hai!"
At that, the row of men standing before the throne let out a single roar, deep in their throats, that rang through the throne-room: "
KALABAG-HAI!"
Inzilbeth spat in disgust and fought to keep herself from shuddering visibly. "You name yourselves in the tongue of Mordor?"
Galpazath smiled -- a real smile, dark with pride. "
Kalabag-hai." The words of the Black Speech rolled like pearls from his lips. "I have heard it translated both as 'the Conquering Folk' and as 'the People of the Conqueror'. It is the name for the armies of the King in the tongue of the Orcs. They howl it as we fall upon them, and we howl it back and see them weep. Have you ever heard an orc's fear, I wonder? There is nothing finer."
He stood, rising to his full height. The sun-and-tree shone on his breast. Behind him, Tar-Aldarion glowered into the dark.
"Tell your wise man this. Ar-Belzagar the King has sent his finest. The
Kalabag-hai are come into the north. If the Wizard's servants stir here, as you say, then let them come. We have no fear -- not of orcs, nor of anything which lives. We are the Conqueror's own, who have broken the Upper and Lower Harad, who have driven the armies of the Wizard before us, who know no equal and no rival, who have never shrank from battle."
Inzilbeth stood undaunted before the proud figure. "No, my lord, not from
anything have you shrank -- not for coin."
"Indeed," boomed the thin figure. "Not from anything. Let all the north remember that, should they find it in their hearts to question the will of Ar-Belzagar the King of Men."
*Properly, the ship is named Meneltarma, after the Great Mountain in the heart of the Land of the Gift, but out of reverence for that holy place the Elvish name is not used. Minul-târik she is properly called in the language of the Men of the West, but her captain forbids her to be named in that tongue, else the speaker lose his own.
