Atandil by Eilinel's Ghost  

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11. Many A Dreadful Path

“You ask only such? To place the road to torment within thy palms and send thee forth, dear son of dear sons, unto a death of agony, alone and friendless? Only such!” Nóm’s eyes blazed out in the vehemence of his words. “I cannot, Beren. I will not."

Beren arrives in Nargothrond and both he and Finrod navigate a swath of memories as they determine the path forward.

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465th YEAR OF THE SUN, AUTUMN
Nargothrond

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Beren remembered his father telling him of the Bëorian apartments in Nargothrond. He would describe them with a laugh: very pleasant, very Atani—had you lived a century or so past. “You cannot be aught but upright there, Beren lad,” he would say with a grin, “not when it feels as though you’ve all the line since Bëor hanging about the corners, looking on to ensure you behave. An exceedingly comfortable mausoleum.”

“It’s a shrine,” Emeldir had corrected as she walked past, drawing her hand along Barahir’s shoulders. “And don’t be cruel.”

He found he agreed with both assessments as he sat now in the midst of the bed, looking about through the dim light that trickled in from the courtyard. The garden was an uncanny sight in the midst of the city, formed within the perimeter of a sinkhole that had long ago fallen through the shoulders of the hill and opened a sunlit bowl within the caverns. It was around this that the royal quarter was constructed and onto this that the Bëorian apartments looked out.

They were three rooms, set amid the king’s lodgings—a large chamber holding both sitting area and bed, a small study branching off from one corner, and a last room, smaller than the library, which sat two steps down along the far side. Within this stood a bath, carved from the trunk of a tree and twice the size of any Beren recalled among his own folk. It had been relief beyond measure to slip into its depths the previous night, both dirt and chill shearing off into the water’s warmth; and after it he slept all the night through, untroubled for the first time since Doriath by dreams or waking fears.

Though to think back on it now, all the night before seemed a dream in itself, sleeping or no. It had been a week of traveling with his guides through the dark until at last the Doors of Felagund reared up, gigantic and eerie in the gloom beneath the hillside. His senses reeled as they materialized from the trees with the precarious corporality of sleep. He had seen them before. No, there were three here, the lintels straight and not curved, and these doors were hewn of stone. He passed a hand over his bleary eyes and looked again at the apparition before him. No, he did not stand before Menegroth and Lúthien’s hand did not lie cool within his own to guide him on through the darkness. He shivered.

His passage from thence to the halls of the king remained a blur in his memory. The darkness of the gates, the echoing footsteps, a wash of golden light as the inner doors opened and the wide entrance chamber spread before him, tall beyond reckoning, bright as the evening sun, teeming with plants and trees. Many of these latter had been wrought cleverly from the living stone, with leaves of emerald and jade set within their branches. But other plants there were that grew indeed, and in surprising abundance—nocturnal ivy weaving its way along the flowstone, binding about stalagmites and pillars. There was one flower that sprouted throughout the halls; akin to the morning glory blossoms Beren knew from the meadows of Ladros, only the petals of this shone with a rich silver and it blossomed rather as the light faded than with the dawn’s waking.

They led him on through the winding passages, dim after the golden light of the first hall, until he could no longer tell one from the other in the long maze of stone and star-hued lamplight. Beren walked in a daze and his steps faltered as they passed ever deeper into the labyrinth, but a hand was always at his elbow to catch and hold him steady. He remembered little of how they arrived at last, only the shape of the door before him, carved in a vivid likeness of two swans looking back over their wings, their ebony gaze fixed on any who approached. And above them at the crest of the arch wound the same serpents he had known these past five years, twined in their supple dance about his own finger.

He was no longer accompanied by the sentinels who shepherded him from the Guarded Plain. A new warder stood at his side, tall, unmistakably Elven, his shroud of hair hovering in sable waves about his shoulders, his raiment intricate and bearing the mark of the king’s household. He had paused before the threshold, awaiting some signal beyond Beren’s perception, then he pressed his hand to the stile and the great beams swung soundlessly inward. 

The room opened out before him and Beren caught his breath at the sight. In many ways it was akin to the halls he passed in Menegroth, but the winding stone forests were merged here with the fashion of the Dwarves—co-authors and not solely executors of another’s design—and wrought throughout with the high craftsmanship of the Ñoldor. Beren could not discern where the natural formations ended and the carvings began, each woven seamlessly into the movement of the other; trees, vines, a rolling sea of hewn waves across the far wall with lithe water birds rising in flight about the circumference of the room. A great hearth cast light across the chamber, but the walls were lined too with a further collection of the lamps Beren saw throughout the caverns, only these threw their dancing light in tones of gold rather than the starlight of the passageways, and this fell full upon the table amid the chamber. 

Had Beren not known him already by sight, the image before him would have left no question. The lamplight illuminated all seated at the table, but it gathered and danced about the central figure. It swam within his hair and the golden strands cast it back again in a prism of light, filling the room with hues of his own presence, and Beren felt peace ease through his limbs as he entered and found himself wrapped too within the lamplight’s embrace. Here, then, was the lord of Nargothrond.

“I beg you will pardon the interruption, aran nin.” The Elf at Beren’s side bent in a quick, formal bow. “I judged you would wish him brought straightaway.”

The king froze. The grey eyes had already darted up to meet Beren’s before the first of the other’s words left his mouth, and they held upon him, bright and unsettling as he recalled from his youth among the Ñoldor of Dorthonion. Then a sudden querying wave broke upon his thought, a shock of recognition that cried out in hope, then was pulled back at once with the same immediacy. Beren saw the spasm that crossed the king’s face, the slip of his hand as it returned a goblet to the table, narrowly holding it back from toppling. Then he was on his feet, rushing toward him with his arms outstretched.

“Beren!”

He should kneel. He willed his legs to bend, though knew in the same instant that once he reached the ground he would be unable to rise again. The weariness trembled through every muscle and his descent quickly turned to collapse rather than salutation. But then the king was before him, dropping to his own knees as he reached him, and clasping him in a tight embrace.

“You live.”

At once Beren was a child again, lifted from the heath beside Aeluin where he had fallen, his ankle broken by the rabbit warren that gave way beneath him as he played. He had dragged himself on hands and knees until his strength gave out and the pain overwhelmed him, then lay helpless amid the gorse till night fell, unable to keep from crying as he shivered and tried not to think of the wolves roaming the highlands, the bears that lumbered through the wooded slopes. And then Nóm found him. He, with Emeldir and Barahir and all the folk of Ladros had spread across the heath until Nóm’s eyes at last sighted the boy where he lay. He was at Beren’s side in an instant, lifting him gently into his arms where the child found himself surrounded by warmth and wrapped in the scent of heather blossoms. “Beren! You live.”

Again the clear music of Nóm’s voice, again these same words exclaimed through his hair, again the scent of heather and meadowsweet washing through his senses. A sob escaped Beren’s throat and he clung to the king despite decorum. 

“There, my child, you are safe. You are welcomed here, Balanion.”

Beren had not heard his own tongue since his father’s jesting farewell, there too in the gorse beside Tarn Aeluin. To hear it now, an Elven voice with the words and accent of his own people, to be sheltered and not hunted, greeted and not condemned...All the anguish he had held at bay tore loose and the tears came without recourse as he leaned his face in upon the king’s shoulder and wept against him in silent grief. 

“Gawarthi, albe vët.” Finrod’s voice drifted down over him, repeating the words of comfort until the tumult stilled. “Gawarthi, sunus eil.”

Gradually Beren’s pride had reasserted itself and he raised his face from the king’s shoulder, subduing the torrent beneath several steady breaths. There were two dark splotches marring the draped silk, the imprint of his own face, and for a long moment Beren could not take his eyes from the sight: his grief made tangible, his pain embraced. Then he dipped his head in deference. “Forgive me, lord,” he managed in a hoarse voice, “I knew not where else to turn.”

“Forgive thee? Beren, my heart is lifted up to see thee safe.” Finrod stood and raised him to his feet. “Indeed, it is beyond hope that I greet thee—“ his voice broke off as Beren met his eyes and he saw there the yawning dark, deadened and hopeless, and his grip tightened about the other’s elbow. 

He nearly told the king all in that moment, but he had become increasingly aware of the others’ eyes resting upon them. There were eleven of them yet seated about the table, seemingly forgotten by the king when he rushed forward, and Beren felt the curiosity and evaluation growing in their gaze. He had held his silence and listened as Nóm gave directions for his lodging and care—the Bëorian apartments, a fresh supply of clothing, food and drink brought to his rooms so he need not bear the strain of conversation, no disturbances until at least mid-morning, rest.

Mid-morning had come and gone, to judge by the tone of light, and Beren shifted the bedclothes aside and rose. The thick rugs muted the chill of the stone floor and his feet sank into their depths as he crossed the room. It was bliss after the weeks of travel. A set of clothes had been laid out on the low table beside the window and he retrieved the breeches from this and pulled them on under the linen nightshirt. They were of Mannish cut and Beren chuckled as he remembered his father’s jesting, very pleasant, very Atani—had you lived a century or so past. The assessment was apt. These were clearly from years gone and were fashioned still after the manner of Bëor’s generation, long and loose, binding in about the ankles and waist. He wrapped the long ties about his hips to secure them, then washed his face in the waiting basin and turned to look about the room.

A mausoleum Barahir had called it, and Beren had thus imagined it would be cold and dim, damp as the caverns he knew from the hills about Ladros. But in truth the apartments were lined with comfort, unexpectedly airy, filled with a surprising rush of daylight. Various plates of polished metal had been worked into the stone arches or along the shelves that lined the walls and these caught and reflected the light from within the sinkhole garden, leaving the room nearly as bright as though it sat above the ground. A hearth had been delved in the meeting point of the three rooms, opening out onto each, and a low fire crackled still within its bowl. Beren wondered in passing whether Elven fires carried on longer without tending or whether he had slept in such oblivion that a servant could have entered without his notice and built it up once more after the night. However it came about, he was glad of the flames that danced through the stonework and tempered the caverns’ chill. 

He meandered about the room, looking now with curiosity at the shelves which had received only his passing glance in the haze of midnight. They held the expected assortment of scrolls and books—a sampling compared to the collection in the adjoining room—but Beren’s eyes were drawn to the other items laid out in careful arrangement. A shrine, just as his mother had said.

He drew his fingers down the edge of this nearest as he walked along its length. There was an old Atani spearhead, of the sort they used in the long migration, an ox horn, a hrögemetheilit crock—empty, Beren noted with a chuckle as he tipped it and lifted the cork, but marked with the sign of his house traced into the clay. A small portion of wood lay beside it, carved into the likeness of Iuthap, the sun goddess, arms wrapped about her and hair splayed out in rays behind her head. Beside this lay a book, carefully bound and set out in its own place of honor. With a pang, Beren recognized it as the twin of one Emeldir had kept similarly displayed in the hall at Ladros, an heirloom of Belen’s line. She would hold him upon her lap as a boy and read pages from it when the winter’s rain and snow kept them sheltering inside. “It is a fool who heeds not his past, Beren,” she would say at each reading. “Know the path your forefathers set so that in such grounding you may see where your own should diverge.” Beren reached out to touch the binding and longing overwhelmed his heart for the child he had been, the home that was ash, the mother whose fate he never knew. 

His eyes drifted to the box beside it. It was the size of his hands placed side by side, and all about its surface were cut rough etchings depicting scenes from his people’s history and legends. His hand moved to the latch, then hesitated as he felt the abrupt conviction of a trespasser setting eyes where none were invited. But the ache in his heart reached out nonetheless, eased by the solace of these familiar designs, this long lacking sense of home. He slid the latch free and opened the lid.

He was intruding. It was apparent at once that this was a personal collection, a little stash of odds and ends that meant nothing to any save their keeper. There was a sprig of dried holly leaves, an Elven glass vial filled with sand, a pebble with early Atani runes scratched about the edges, several other stones of varying sizes, a carved otter toy, a palm-sized piece of a broken mirror, a gold wristband of Elven make, the necklace of an Atani woman.

Beren closed the lid. Then he caught his breath as he looked at the shelf above and saw the instrument sitting before him. The harp was smaller than he thought it would be, intended to rest in the crook of one arm, and constructed from two bent branches lashed each to the other and fastened to a hollow base covered with taut hide. The catgut strings were still wound tight about the pegs, but a wide crack had split through the base and left the instrument unusable. He ran the tips of his fingers along the arms, the wood coarse and rough-hewn. It was Bëor’s harp, he knew at once, carried over the mountains from their wandering and laid aside in the woods of Ossiriand, lifted in Nóm’s hands to summon Beren’s ancestors out from their slumbering. 

The floor seemed to buck beneath him and he swayed, reaching out to steady himself against the stone shelves. Know the path of your forefathers, Emeldir’s voice recited again—for he too had awakened in the greenwood, called back from death unto life by an Elven song drifting through the branches. The tendrils of despair coiled and dragged once more at his chest, and he fought against them, forcing breath back into his lungs. But what hope now, when that which brought him back from the deadened haze was sundered beyond that very wall of darkness? Beren stood frozen in memory, one hand gripping the shelf’s edge, the other resting still upon the bowed arms of the ancient harp. 

So he stood yet when the king found him, his footsteps moving soundlessly over the threshold from the sunken garden. 

Finrod’s own breath faltered to see him outlined against the familiar backdrop. The ache shuddered across the jagged edge of his soul, even as it had mere hours before when he looked up from his cup to see Balan’s phantom hovering in the doorway before him.  After the initial shock of recognition, he found he could trace the dissimilarities as well, Boron’s ears, not Bëor’s; Emeldir’s nose, which of course had first been Belen’s; the three lines playing between his brows which were Andreth’s—oh Manwë there was no comfort there, only a second wound to prod. But the set of the shoulders, the unruly waves in his hair, the line of the jaw and the curve of his lips, those hands resting upon the same stone shelves, upon the harp his own hands had not touched in more than a century.

How many mornings had he watched Balan linger even there beside the arch of the doorway, the light brushing across his wrists as it did upon Beren’s now and calling out the deep amber of his skin. Sixteen thousand, three-hundred and forty one, Finrod’s mind supplied in agile distraction. Nay, that was the tally of days between the midnight at Thalos’ springs and that second midnight he forced ever from his mind. The number of mornings in this room, then, must be—

“My lord,” Beren’s voice brought him back from the reverie. “Forgive me, I did not hear you enter.”

“My own fault.” Finrod smiled as Beren crossed toward him and the faraway look clouded his eyes once more. “I lost myself to memory, seeing you there. There is so very much of your forefathers wrought together in you.”

A spasm crossed Beren’s face at this and his fingers dug into the opposite wrist, ballast against the threatening flood. “It is a balm, lord,” he managed at last, “to be in the company of one who remembers them with love.”

“Orro, meldonya,” Finrod said softly, laying a hand upon the other’s shoulder, and Beren felt near to weeping once more at the kindliness of the touch. “Come and tell me all, if thou wilt. Much already can I guess from thy demeanor; but come, sit beside me and let it be a burden shared.”

Beren nodded and allowed himself to be led to the long bench before the hearth. Like the bath in the adjoining room, this too had been carved whole from the trunk of a tree, the seat and backrest following along the bending grain of the wood. Cushions were piled along its length in a motley assortment, some of fine Elven silk, others adorned with the vibrant embroidery of his own people. He sat upon the far side and lifted one of these latter into his lap, absentmindedly wrapping his arms about it for comfort. The king took a place near him and though he did not gather up a pillow of his own, his fingers traced over a line of needleworked bears in the same pursuit of solace. Beren saw the grey eyes rest upon his father’s ring for a long moment before they moved up to meet his own, grief resonant in their depths.

“He is gone, then?”

Beren nodded as he searched for his voice. “Five years past.” His voice was little more than a whisper, and he watched the lines etch deeper in the other’s face. It was strange, he thought, to see grief mark the Elven features like age.

“This is loss beyond words,” the king said in a hollow tone, then matched conduct to speech and let silence rest between them, his hand shifting from the embroidered bears to press absently against his side. The quiet drifted through Beren’s heart and he felt the ice-hold on his spirit ease to share in lament with one who too had known and loved what was gone. For unlike Lúthien who mourned indeed at his side, Nóm shared the grief through his own loss, a personal lament too and not solely on behalf of Beren’s own. 

He knew not how long they sat thus, two mourners in a long belated rite, but the fire burned low before the king spoke again. And when he did, he seemed to know by instinct what would comfort the man before him, and set his words gently in the tongue Bëor’s folk brought over the mountains. “Little news and late came to us from Dorthonion. I never knew what became of him after our ways parted and he left in search of you. Truly, I believed you all dead till I heard tell of your own deeds—and those only by conflicting rumor.” Shame rippled over Finrod’s face. He had left him abandoned in the charred highlands, this son of his savior, alone in the anguish and solitude. It was little wonder he had not recognized Beren the night before. The face before him was lined with care, the temples and beard touched with grey, a far greater change from the child he knew than time’s passage would account. “I thought often in the intervening years to send a company that might seek you out, but ever I held back lest it draw the eye of the Dark more keenly upon the highlands and bring yet greater adversity than what assailed you already. And then too I knew not whether you lived in truth or if the rumors themselves were but phantoms set to draw us thither. Bitterly now do I regret my inaction.”

“Little would have been gained by open battle,” Beren replied, “for naught but corpses and shadows remained. Yet do not reproach yourself, lord! Even had you sent your soldiers to retrieve me, I would not have been coaxed thence by any promise of shelter. For as my father was, so too am I—it is beyond us to set aside any task once given its charge.” A smile crossed his lips at this, but there was no mirth in it and almost at once he let his face fall back to impassivity. “Death only I wished. And for death I prayed in the bitter nights, looking up at cold Menelmacar in his march over the heath, pleading that he might in mercy set his sword through my breast.” His fingers caught at the twined serpents, twisting them round and back, round and back again, and Finrod saw the callous standing out against his finger, numbering the hours of this restless practice. “Years were gone before I could weep. Four winters before my body would let me mourn. It was Gorlim who gave up our camp at last. Thû laid a trap amid the old village and lured his heart with phantoms—not wrong were you, lord, to suspect such trickery. He saw his wife, he thought, and so was taken, and so put to torment, and so broken at last to treachery. I returned too late. I found only their corpses.”

“Oh, my friend…” 

“Death is our lot, my father would jest at each sally against our land’s marauders—wry ever his humor—let us see if he hunts.” Beren crushed the cushion within his arms, staring deep into the hearth’s embers. “Prey were we all—father, comrades, mother, sister…I alone am left of my people.”

“Nay, Beren, knew you not?” Finrod’s face lit with the thought of bringing some hope to the man before him. “They live! Emeldir led them out—through what trials I cannot imagine—but they reached Brethil, and there they dwell yet with the people of Haleth.”

“They live…” The cushion fell to the ground and Beren gripped the king’s arm impulsively. “Nóm, you know this in certainty?”

“I do.” Finrod set a hand on Beren’s arm in return, the ghost of a smile tugging his lips at the affectionate name. How like was his to his father’s voice, how like to Baran’s, to Balan’s…he pulled his mind back. “I sent word urging them to shelter here, but your mother would not tread a league further than need demanded. Yet be assured, as late as the height of Iavas I had word from Elu’s emissaries that she and your sister dwelt yet in safety, and—Beren, is aught amiss?”

Beren’s face had undergone a rapid series of expressions and he held the king’s eye now with a look of thunder. “Thingol knew they lived? And in Brethil—upon his very borders?”

“Aye,” Finrod replied, though he hesitated now and cast his mind back to the exchange. “Or rather the messengers who greeted me had word of it for Beleg Cúthalion is held in friendship with the Haladin. But there is naught gleaned by Thingol’s marchwardens that does not soon pass to his knowledge as well. I have little doubt that he knew. Why? Beren, art thou ill? What is it I’ve said?”

Beren had risen and was pacing before the hearth, his hands clenching open and shut, then dragging through his hair, gripping behind his neck. “If all that passed besides had not been bitterness enough…here, here is his final cruelty. All the while he knew them living and yet he named me spy, creeping snake, broodless pup…” He came up abruptly before the mantel and slammed his palms against the stone wall to emphasize this last, his arms shaking with fury as he held himself in place.

Finrod watched at first in bewilderment, then rose and crossed to rest his hand between the other’s shoulders. “Beren,” he said gently, and felt him flinch at the touch, then the set shoulders crumpled beneath his palm and heaved as he wept in ragged sobs against the stonework. Finrod did not turn him from this, but passed an arm about him for support, all the while fighting to hold his own perceptions firmly in the moment. 

Memory had folded in upon itself at the sight of Beren’s face the night before, aged beyond his years into a mirror’s replica of six generations gone, and Nóm struggled to hold the strands of time apart. Beren weeping here against the wall, Balan in his arms beside this same hearth, Beren’s voice crying out his fury, Balan’s thrown back against him as they argued near to breaking, Beren’s hand pressed against the stone—they were the same hands, the shape of the knuckles, the vein patterns across the sinews, the fingers strong and compact—Balan’s hand pressed down against his chest, the weight of Beren supported by his arm, the weight of Balan as he lifted him in his age…ai Valar, hold the thread, find the stillness.

“Beren,” he said again, naming his thought into the present, “Beren. Mellon nín, I know not by what evil paths thy way led thee to such insult, nor indeed how twas possible that thine and my kinsman’s road overlaid—truly that is a great curiosity to me—but it was cruelly said and badly done. From my share in kinship to the house of Elwë, please take these apologies of—”

“Nay, lord, let me tell you first the cause ere your regrets are offered. For I confess, even now I tremble lest you too should perceive it an offense and turn me away.”

“Speak, then, and lay that fear aside. Long years have I known thy people, Beren, and goodly ever have been their ways. So too the integrity of thine own heart is not hidden from me. Naught would induce me to scorn thee, offense or no. But speak it, I entreat thee, for I feel a weight rising about my limbs that I cannot discern, and I dread that specter in the dark. Give it name that I might see it and know its hold. What was it brought thee foul of Thingol’s wrath?”

Beren turned at last from the wall and met the king’s eye, his features drawn with resolve, with sorrow, and these lit within by a bitter joy. In shock, Finrod felt the rough touch of the other’s thought collide with his own, ungainly in its fierce solidity, achingly familiar, and yet approaching with more nimbleness than ever Bëor had achieved. Balan, Balan, canst thou reach out still? Find me, I am here! How had this boy learned so seamlessly? He felt the gasp catch in his throat as Beren’s memory held out an image of summer meadows, of Neldoreth—how well he knew those glades from wandering lighthearted with Artanis ere the winter of sorrow—and he watched as snowdrops spread in waves throughout the grasses. His fingers tightened upon Beren’s arm and the tears tickled as ran down beneath his chin.

“I held out in hope these limbs of death toward that which lives undying,” Beren spoke at last and his voice was clear, resonant, and yet passing barely the distance from lips to ear. “Thingol’s daughter did I meet beneath the glimmering stars in Neldoreth, in summer’s joy, and in the solace of her song my heart was healed—hers the star that called me again to life, and hope found me amid the long darkness.”

The room was reeling. 

A rage of jealousy burned through him to hear Balan’s voice speak those words of another. Beren’s voice, he corrected again in growing frustration and fought back the envy. Hold the thread, number the years, bind reason to the present. 

“There beneath the starlight she set my hand in hers, she led me out from anguish, broke me free from the long death of isolation…Nóm, I never knew life till in her song, nor myself till her eyes called me forth.” Beren’s voice broke and the light about him faltered. “Lord, who am I now without? And what? What am I to do?”

They stood in the mingled light of hearth and sun, each grasping the other’s arms, each frozen in memory, mirrored rivers upon their cheeks. The long minutes passed.

“Elu knows of this?” Finrod’s voice trickled out at last, a hoarse whisper through the stillness.

“The minstrel told him.” Beren shook his head apologetically. “Forgive me, I mean no offense, I do not know his name.”

“Daeron, I would suppose. Long has his heart turned toward her in fruitless devotion.”

“Daeron. He watched our meetings. We were careless; I from weariness and awe, she from the certain conviction of our love: that it was of the Light and thus unquestioned Good. The king swore to her he would not harm me,” Beren smiled bitterly, “and truly not a single wound did he mete upon my body. But here the dread doom lies, my lord, and here I deem is where I name the specter’s weight. The purchase of life and love is this—a trifling thing, a little thing, a paltry price…” A cheerless laugh escaped his lips at this, unnatural and too swift. “The worth of his daughter, a Silmaril.”

It came upon Finrod in an instant, the sudden crystal stillness when the air falls deadened before the onrushing gale. He had sat here upon that selfsame carved oak, years past when these rooms were yet intended as a dwelling for his sister, and she reclined against the far cushions where Beren sat now, a sharp smile on her lips that warned him the strike was coming. He had readied the apartments in anticipation of her arrival, believing it her homecoming and not a passing sojourn, and his weeks were filled with glad yearning for her laughter to be again the sound of home, her quick understanding once more the balm at his side.

Nerwen’s laughter arrived indeed, but it was at Ingoldo’s assumption that she would trade one cavern for another, when Menegroth held every longing—Melian, the idol of his sister’s ambition and of whose teaching she had not yet drunk her fill; and moreover Celeborn who had, to the great astonishment of all, caught the golden princess of the Ñoldor within a net of stolid affection. Stung by the loss, her brother had shifted paternal and they bickered. His pride lectured rather than pleaded and he pressed that swiftness should end only in heartbreak: certainty was the work of time. Remove for awhile and govern Nargothrond alongside him, discern here whether the attraction yet held or whether it was a mere fascination of novelty, there away from her own. Should she not know with surety ere bonds were tied that could not be undone? And thus it came as he countermanded her autonomy, the flash of her eyes, the sharp smile, the strike. “Then why, Ingoldo, sits there no queen at thy side?” 

He had opened his mouth for the retort, but even as it did now, the void opened like a crevasse on the Ice, gaping at his feet, and it held his voice. He saw the darkness rise before him, the specter rumbled behind his sight. An oath I too shall swear… Where had Nerwen stood when Beren was summoned before Singolo’s throne? Had she watched this unfold upon that eerie stage? Did she seen their father’s ring upon that hand and know, as he did now, where their kinsman’s knife would find its mark?

“So he thinks to strike thee down, without ever laying hand to thee,” Finrod whispered to gain a moment’s time, his eyes tracing again over those lost features, living yet in Beren’s face. He steeled himself with their presence, girded his courage with their memory.

“And fain will I take that ending, Nóm. Sooner should I be spent seeking the price of hope than spend all my days a stranger unknown even unto myself. What life remains for me if I am to be sundered from her presence? Nay, let me rather fall to Thingol’s doom than face that living death. I will not be swayed from the attempt.”

“Yet such doom goes beyond his purpose and Elwë prods to life that greater which dogs us all. More oaths are there at work, son of Barahir, than that which I owe to thee.” He was silent for a time, then turned to pace the length of the room, his agitation palpable. “Fool! Vain, stubborn fool! Does he not know that even naming such price is to call it down upon all our heads? Or is that his aim, a vengeance long deferred and set upon us by our own hands? Then he shall find himself caught within his own retribution, for the sons of Fëanor would lay all kingdoms in ruin—yea his own as well as ours—ere they suffered any but their line to win its purchase. This is madness.” He held back his steps as he saw the growing anxiety in Beren’s own features and strove to measure his voice. “Celegorm and Curufin dwell even now within my hall, they were among our company when Edrahil brought thee before me in the night, and with them came a great multitude of their people to shelter. But any friendship between us would be set at naught if thy quest were known to them. Indeed I would change from asylum to adversary in that very moment, unless I handed thee over as fodder to that doom which drives them. Yet my own oath holds, and my love moreover; and thus we are all ensnared.”

Remorse worked its way through Beren’s features. He watched the king drift across the room and linger before the shelves, the grey eyes wandering over the little collection. In his despair and haste Beren had not reckoned with ramifications of his arrival, with what the mere knowledge of his charge would entail for the king. "I should not have come,” he murmured. “It is not yet too late, lord. Turn me from the gates ere they put that choice before you. I have set more in jeopardy than I knew.”

“Nay, it was right of thee to come.” Finrod glanced back at him and shifted again to Taliska. He smiled, but Beren saw the weary resignation within its lines. “To whom could you have turned else? You may not understand it, Beren, but long have I loved your fathers and mothers—long have I loved you—as those children of my heart that I have not of blood. I am glad you turned to me in your need, dire as is any choice now before us.” Finrod reached out to rest his hand upon the box with its mural of etchings. His expression was unreadable and when he spoke again, his voice drifted toward Beren as though an echo of itself. “What is it you would have of me, oath-bearer?”

“I know not, lord.” Beren had given little thought to what lay beyond his flight to Nargothrond. Nóm would have an answer. If he could once reach the hidden doors, then wisdom would guide him. Nóm would set his path aright. Yet now he stood before the king and found himself utterly at a loss, queried by that gentle voice and instead of directed, and he cast about in confusion. “Provisions…or perhaps if there are maps I might study? Or guidance in any way…” Beren’s voice faltered. What aid could there be for such a journey? He felt the absurdity of his words and his voice trailed to a murmur. “If the tales are told aright, my lord, then do you not know at least the ways by which I might find the gates?”

Finrod’s fingers tightened upon the wooden box. Madness, madness all of it. Willful, futile madness. The old anger rose again as he saw it stretch before him, the tenuous thread that remained of the siege snapping in an instant, the bonds of blood drowned, the slumbering Doom summoned out with dripping maw opened wide—and for what? So that Thingol might hoard his daughter with the same jealous frenzy that drove Fëanor to rebellion and exile. So that he might keep from her that fleeting joy, frail and precious, bitter and beautiful and, he could admit at last, worthy of any price it required. Do you not know at least the ways by which I might find the gates? Ever they saw it with more clarity than he, these hearts of the Atani. Beren had set off stumbling toward the reek, pressing on with eager hope toward a death of anguish from the sure conviction of his love’s goodness, knowing not even the path to find the gates. Beren, dear heart, standing here before him and looking up in appeal with Balan’s own eyes, this child he had once carried through the heather and rain.

“Yes,” he said at last, “I know that road. But long years lie between where we sit now and when I beat my fist upon the doors of hell—all the years of thy people, Beren—and much will have changed in the slag and fire. Nevertheless, what knowledge I have is yours. But if I may offer counsel…” Finrod’s voice caught and he saw Aikanáro’s face hovering hopefully in the firelight at Tol Sirion. No, he had lost any right to counsel. “Forgive me, if I may offer a question instead. Would there not be life for thee yet in the woods of Brethil? Could not the comfort thy company would afford to mother and sister revive peace within thy breast?”

“It is kindly said, lord, and my heart warms to know you think so well of me as this. But what comfort would it be to return to them a hollow shell, a son and brother wandering yet from them as a ghost beneath the trees? Brethil! There upon the very eaves of Neldoreth…Nay let them have the comfort of memory and know me only as I was—unless beyond hope I should return with my joy in hand. Only further grief should I bring them were I to return as I am.”

“Faint thou dost count their love to deem it so easily conquered, but I perceive the intent of thine heart in this—and I confess mine would lie similarly if found in such a straight.” Finrod turned from the shelf at last and met Beren’s eye. “Thou art determined in this?”

“I am.”

“Then aid I shall grant thee.”

“Lord—“

“Only give me first thy word to remain here till the start of Firith ere pressing onward and allow me time to write to my kinsman to see whether he might not yet be turned from this decree. If thou wilt permit it, I will stand as lord and father in Barahir’s absence and offer any price he names, short only of my kingdom itself.”

“Lord, I would permit it gladly, and with a depth of gratitude I can never hope to express for love shown this friendless wretch upon your hearth. But knowing the lord of Doriath as you must, can you truly believe he would be induced to alter his course once set?”

“It is unlikely, I grant thee. But allow me at least the trial of it.”

“To what end? That your own allegiance might lie jeopardized by offering needlessly that which he will never accept? While I linger behind the futile words, dear hours spent on this false hope of my own conjured phantoms. Should I not rather lay my path at once toward that which is my only surety—a prayer to win thus in secret passage what the raging armies may not glimpse? Death is my lot, let me see if he hunts. The shelter and care you have granted already I count in appeasement of your oath: knowledge only do I beg of you in further fulfillment—knowledge and food, supplies.”

“You ask only such? To place the road to torment within thy palms and send thee forth, dear son of dear sons, unto a death of agony, alone and friendless? Only such!” Nóm’s eyes blazed out in the vehemence of his words. “I cannot, Beren. I will not. For love of those who went before thee, if thou wilt not accept it on thine own behalf, let me try to loose thee from this price.”

Beren faltered at the pain cracking through the clear, Elven voice. So too had Lúthien’s rung in his ears as she caught hold of him before the court of Menegroth, his retort to her father ringing yet through the carven chamber. “Stubborn fool, I would have fled with thee to whatever end, and thou hast bound us now to his vengeance, condemned my heart to send thee forth to death. Would I not have followed thee through wood and dale? Our bower set amid the willows, wed with trees our witnesses and the wild berries and herbs our wedding feast?” Ai Lúthien, Lúthien… 

Then another presence, faint and looming, ancient and familiar, rising up through his own veins to mumble another chorus. Let pride sit awhile. Let him try the course. Let your heart be steadfast as the oak, patient as the owl.

Beren shivered. What was it his father had quipped…all the line since Bëor hanging about the corners. And did Barahir now linger with them in the shadows of these walls? Or had his blood spoken in a yet more distant voice?

“You have my permission, vatta,” he said at last, yielding to the steady beat, and named the other in token of his resignation. “And may your worth find favor where mine has failed.”

---

Chapter End Notes

TRANSLATIONS
Q = Quenya, S = Sindarin T = Telerin
aran nin: [S] my king
Balanion: [Q] & [S] son of Balan
orro: [Q] alas
Meldonya: [Q] my friend

TALISKA INVENTIONS
For the most part, all faux-Taliska is loosely inspired by or modeled on Germanic-Gothic
- Gawarthi albe vët: peace, little one
- Gawarthi sunus eil: peace, my son

MISC NOTES
- For an explanation of hrögemetheilit, see Here in Our Frailty.
- Iavas: the Sindarin name for the season of early autumn (Aug 10 - Oct 3)
- Firith: the Sindarin name for the season of mid-Autumn (Oct 7 - Nov 30)
- Thû: the name Men called Sauron