Thranduil’s not-so-common New Year’s Eve. Another spin-off from “Many fruitless victories.”

Warning: It is somehow laden with annoying footnotes, yet those are perfectly avoidable, I believe…. You don’t need to have read “Many fruitless victories” to follow this, but you’ll surely want to know that this is an “elves-in-modern-day” series…

Deep in the Forest.

Last Day of December 2006. Somewhere in the Huaorani Reserve, Yasuni National Park, Amazonia, South America.

The old man moved across the forest with the stealth and gracefulness of the jaguar, his mate spirit.  He looked up to check the position of the first rays of sun filtering through the dense canopy high above his head and decided that he had enough time left for one last task before the heat of the day became unbearable. He took out the stone knife from its sheath and began to scrap the bark of a young tree with deft, precise movements. He carefully placed the shavings in a small container made of palm fiber that hung from the cord that circled his waist. He rearranged a handful of thick vines over his shoulder, secured a bag that contained the leaves he would use to prepare the Mi’i - the ritual draught he would need that night- and began the slow return home.

The forest noises were dimming as most creatures went in search of shelter. The boisterous spider monkeys, though, had already begun their morning foraging routine. By their excited cries the old man could tell that a new feeding place, most probably an area with ripened fruit, had been found. He smiled softly. Well-fed monkeys meant more food for his people. He was sure that the hunting party had been successful last night, although he had left their hamlet too early to know for sure. The season was good for gathering turtle eggs, too, as the charapas had just finished their laying in the white beaches in the rivers’ junction. Food was not lacking, the old shaman observed grimly, yet his people did not thrive as it would have been expected.

They were a dwindling community, he thought vaguely as he paused to accommodate the vines and take a look around to check his way in the apparently impenetrable rainforest. He still remembered how life had been before the missionaries and the oil companies first arrived and began cornering them. He and Taga, their beloved and mourned leader, had already been friends back then, the son of the tribe leader and the newly minted shaman. It had been after heated debates –and following the path revealed by the shaman’s spiritual guide, the jaguar- that Taga decided to break up with the rest of their Huaorani kin, those who called themselves the people, and retreat even deeper into the jungle, followed by his shaman friend and a host of relatives.

To no avail, the shaman admitted wryly, for it had not served to free them from the traditional blood-debts and revenges that were common among the Huaorani tribes, nor from the suffocating pressure of illegal timbering, poaching or drilling.

In fact, that decision had in the end claimed Taga’s life and had kindled another bloodied conflict between the people that now called themselves the Tagaeri and the rest of the world.

They fought with brutality, armed with blowguns and piercing spears of chonta palm, to preserve their isolation and independence, killing with unexpected ferocity any stranger that dared trespass their self-declared limits and keeping themselves from the outside world, as they had decided long ago. They only wanted to live as they had always done, as hunters and gatherers, taking what they needed from the forest and enjoying each day as it came, waiting for nothing and desiring nothing.

Yet they were dwindling, the shaman sighed, seeing in his mind eye how many of them -youngsters, women, warriors- had died in the past rain seasons, killed by fire guns or spears, or by spiritual diseases his powers were unable to prevent or heal.

If it was the will of the creator that they, the people, ceased to exist, it surely meant that the world was about to reach its end, the shaman concluded resignedly, feeling an acute sense of compassion for the forest creatures that would be doomed to perish with it. 

He was brought out of his thoughts by a particular trail in his path, so he stooped to have a closer look. It had been long since he had seen the tracks of an adult jaguar in their territory, and the proximity of the creature that embodied his spiritual self made him think of the only stranger who had been admitted within their borders and in their company, and who was counted as one of them, despite his fair skin and yellow hair. Tengomai, the jaguar shaman of the Tagaeri, wasn’t sure, after all those years, who or what the stranger they knew as Malléhuenga, the son of the jaguar, was.

The cry of a harpy eagle made him lift his head. A slow smile crept into his ageless face. The eagle was heralding a welcome arrival and the jaguar was around. Those were indeed good news.

 ****

It took Thranduil –Dr. Greenwood, the renowned ethnobotanist, as he was known there- almost two weeks to reach the seasonal settlement of the Tagaeri after he left the Yasuni Scientific Research Station making it loudly known that he was heading east, towards Tiputini River. Once he was sure that he was out of sight, he retraced his steps and turned southwest, entering the Huaorani Ethnic Reserve as secretly as he could. The Tagaeri had chosen to remain out of touch and he knew that if the rumor of his long friendship with those mysterious people was confirmed it would mean a death sentence for the encroached and failing tribe.

Not that they would escape their doom anyway, he sighed, studying his surroundings and following a faint trail that led towards the river, but they deserved to disappear in the way they chose, rather than dwindling and fading in a sad loss of their spirit and ways of living, slowly abandoning their culture and habits and dying from alcoholism, drug addition and starvation.

He shook his head and felt an ancient surge of anger threatening to overcome him. It was always the same in these days and all around the world; yet for some reason he had felt particularly attached to those bellicose, fiercely independent and proud warriors long before they were “discovered” in the middle of the twentieth century. He had hunted with them, had learnt their ways and their speech and had returned to them each generation, to feel the pure joy of living day to day without doubts or worries, just hunting and gathering what the forest had to offer and enjoying the harmony and peace that came from living in such way.

As a warrior, he had never marched with one clan against another, keeping his distance and being thus considered as one of the elders, the son of the jaguar or Malléhuenga. Yet, he had stood by their side when the illegal foresters and poachers began using fire weapons against the Huaorani, and had wielded their chonta spears with deadly accuracy in defense of their lives and their forests, with a wild abandon that had frightened himself and had earned him a place in the legends of those warlike tribes.

That had been before Taga decided to separate his clan from the rest of the Huaroani and had led them even deeper into the forest, turning his back on his enemies in what he thought was the only way to keep his people safe.

Thranduil still mourned the bold, fearless leader. He had been massacred –together with his wives and children- by another branch of Huaorani relatives seeking revenge for a crime committed by Taga’s father long ago. The rest of the story had unfolded in a well-known tale of retaliation.

Now, half a century after that, less than forty individuals of the Tagaeri group remained, and that year Thranduil had felt the sudden urge to visit his friends before it was too late.

Equipped by the half-Occidentalized Huaorani who lived near the Scientific Research Station with three chonta spears, a barbed harpoon, a long blowgun and a quiver of feathered arrows, a bark box of curare and a hammock of threaded chambira, Thranduil felt ready to face the challenges of a forest that made him feel more alive and at home than any other place in the world, despite the peculiarity of its flora and the dark, untamed hearts of many of its trees.

War was incessantly waged in the rainforest, yet it was a primal struggle, one for light, for nutrients and for reproduction. The wild beating of life there reminded the Wood Elf of the voices of the once endless and equally alive forests of the lands of his youth.  

He walked along the river for five days until he reached the last Huaorani settlement, where he traded six monkeys for a dugout canoe and some reluctant and vague indications of where their secretive, isolated enemies had last been spotted.

The heat was humid and almost tangible, and the sun slipped along the luxuriant leaves and reached even the darkest spots of the forest as the Elf paddled calmly upstream, enjoying the colours, the smells and the sounds of the jungle. That was the most diverse forest in the world, he thought wistfully as he led his canoe along the wide river, and a Wood Elf never tired of seeing new trees and learning their voices.

He traveled slowly for days, studying the forested shores in search of traces of human occupation. It was time for turtle eggs, he knew, so the Tagaeri would not be far from the river.

On the ninth day of his journey, as he lay comfortably in his hammock perched between two strong palm trees and protected from insects’ bites by the juice of the palm’s nuts, he heard dim voices brought downstream by a lazy breeze.  He picked up his weapons and walked silently to the place whence the voices came, suspecting a Huaorani foray. Half the way there, though, the hated sound of a sawing machine made his blood roar in his ears. 

He took to the sheltering branches then, and he advanced silently and quickly until he reached a clearing where three men were cutting down mahogany trees with a lack of respect that enraged the former King of Lasgalen. Images of his ravaged forest, of forests loved and lost around the world assaulted him, and he gripped his spears tightly, fighting the urge to pin those men to the same trunks they were defiling and watch as the curare slowly paralyzed their muscles and killed them by suffocation.  He closed his eyes for a moment. That would not solve the problem, and would create more for the already besieged tribes. He willed himself to loosen his clutch and calm his ragged breathing, forcing himself into a cool appraisal of the situation. After some thought, he decided to retreat silently. He searched for –and soon found- the men’s camp, which happened to be not far from the clearing and close to what had been a Tagaeri’s seasonal settlement. Fortunately, the settlement had been abandoned some time ago, Thranduil could tell by the ruinous state of the roof of the long hut, which had been almost completely devoured by voracious termites.

He methodically destroyed the men’s tents and equipment, scattered their provisions and ammunition and emptied their containers of fresh water. After a short hesitation, he drove one of his spears into the ground in the middle of the ruined camp, as a warning sign. The tales surrounding the mysterious and ferocious tribe of the Tagaeri, and the fact that his spear was of Huaorani manufacture would confuse and frighten the men, Thranduil hoped. That would be enough to convince them to abandon that part of the jungle, forbidden to them by law and ancient custom.

He had no other encounters on his way, nor other company than that of the excited shrills of the monkeys, the menacing clicks of the harpy eagles, the curious faces of the tapirs as they peered from behind the shrubs and the carefree calls of the brightly coloured macaws and indifferent toucans, busy in their daily search for food. Even silence was colourful and resonant in the rainforest, Thranduil thought with the same amazement that threatened to overwhelm him every time he found himself deep in those untainted woods.

When he spotted a couple of pink dolphins swimming under his boat he knew he was getting closer to a junction, a likely place for the Tagaeri to have settled down in that season. Trusting his instinct, he set ashore and spent the rest of that day, and part of the night, hunting monkeys and fishing, as no guest should arrive without a present for his hosts.

Early next morning he returned to the river and found that the pink dolphins seemed to be waiting to lead him upstream. The sun was beginning to rise above the tallest trees when he reached a wide bending on the river.  With a playful pirouette, the dolphins swam under his canoe and splashed him with their tails in goodbye as they surfaced, before disappearing downstream. The sharp cry of a harpy eagle surprised him and the Tagaeri woman who was gathering turtle eggs in the large strand formed by the junction of the two rivers that met in the broad bend.

She looked up straight to meet his gaze and smiled openly in recognition. Then, she picked up her shirga, the threaded bag in which she was carefully placing the eggs and ran into the jungle.

“Malléhuenga! Malléhuenga”! She cried as she disappeared under the dense canopy. Thranduil shook his head as he carefully paddled to the nearest shore.

“Apparently, I am expected,” he told himself amusedly, slinging his burden of meat over his broad shoulder and picking up the harpoon. He refused to wonder how they had known: the dolphins, the eagle, and the people. Those were wood people, much as his own had been, and he smiled softly remembering how little went unnoticed in his own forest so many ennin ago.

 ****

When Tengomai, the jaguar-shaman of the Tagaeri, returned to their settlement that morning the merry voices only confirmed what he had already known. He smiled at the picture that received him. The tall, wild son of the jaguar was sprawled on a low hammock, half buried under the only five children of the tribe, and their laughter mixed with that of the adults as Malléhuenga recounted how he had killed the monkeys that were piled beside the fire. He mimicked the movements to show them how he had blown his blowgun, and his long, pale hand imitated the arrow as it flew to its target. The children laughed and shrilled excitedly and the warriors, returned from the hunt, nodded in appreciation and laughed, too, at the explanations of the “spotless jaguar”, as they also knew him.

“I am glad to hear that you have not lost your ability with the blowgun, Malléhuenga,” the shaman offered as he stepped into the friendly reunion.

Thranduil smiled at his friend and stood up nimbly, two of the children still clutching at his powerful arms. His chest already showed the red and black patterns of the Tagaeri hunters as a sign of respect.

“The Huaorani taught me before they became the Tagaeri, Mallé-shaman,” he answered courteously, nodding before the shaman. “The forest still blesses me with his gifts…” he added seriously.

“The forest will always bless its children, Malléhuenga,” the shaman returned with another bow. Once the ritual greeting was performed, and the visitor was officially welcome in camp, the activity became frantic, like in a harassed anthill. The hunters turned to prepare the monkeys for consumption and preservation while some of the women returned to the river to gather more turtle eggs and the children followed their visitor around.

It was a very busy day, in which Thranduil confirmed for himself the extent of decay in the once fearless and proud tribe. It had been thirty years since he had last visited him, yet he missed the faces of many warriors who had been but youngsters or mere children then.

“We have lost many warriors to the poachers and their fire guns,” his shaman friend recognized sadly as they shared a bowl of yuca chicha. “And to an unexplained ailment,” he added in a lower voice. Thranduil had seen the effects of malnutrition and the malformations that proclaimed the exhaustion of the gene pool and could only nod in sympathy. Never before had the shaman acknowledged his impotence, but Thranduil was more than a welcome friend. They believed him to be a herald of the sun-creator, a god that walked among The people when he tired of other occupations.

“We are fading, my friend,” the shaman added with an equanimity that froze the Elf in place, as long-buried memories of a distant past and other people now vanished returned abruptly to him. “We know that the world is about to end…and it is only fair that The people shall disappear first…we shall follow the sun where he leads us…yet I feel for these trees, for these waters, for the brother jaguar and the spirits of the forest…. What shall become of them when The people are gone?”

Thranduil felt a lump growing in his throat as his shaman friend –a man who had never left the forest- began to list the warning signs that heralded the end of their world. He could not hold back a bitter smile, noticing how the symptoms were repeated along the world, in modern as well as in primitive societies. Yet these forty people had managed to hold decay at bay for a long time, like true Stewards of ailing Arda, preserving a wide forest with their nomadic habits and their deep knowledge of all the biodiversity that it held. Their disappearance would not only mean a great loss of ancient, traditional wisdom, but of another patch of protected, untainted, untouched natural world and the umpteenth defeat of a different way of living.

“I have no apprentice,” the shaman observed softly, standing up with some difficulty and walking to the entrance of one of the long huts that sheltered them, bending to check a great bowl that had been left there. Thranduil followed him and observed the dark, thick, pastry substance in the bottom. “They know enough to prepare a good, fast curare, almost as good as this,” the shaman kept on as he put a stick in the mixture and tested its consistency. “Yet they won’t survive long without spiritual guidance and protection. They don’t know how to invoke the protection of the jaguar, or the blessing of the forest; they don’t know where to find the right herbs for some ailments or to counteract the spells of our enemies. They are warriors, and they shall die as such, but shall they find the way to the creator, without a shaman to prepare their path? Will the creator ever forgive us if we fail to protect His forest?” 

Thranduil sighed heavily. One of the children ran to them in that moment, wielding his toy spear and challenging the “spotless jaguar,” saving him from answering a question he did not want to answer. Soon, the other children joined in the fray and their happy shrills attracted the approving looks of parents and elders. In no time, the mock fight involved the warriors, and it ended up in a half-serious spear-throwing contest between Thranduil and Tihti, Taga’s younger brother and his successor. The Elf’s arm hid the strength of millennia, yet the tribe leader was a worth contender, and it took all of Thranduil’s skill to finally beat him by driving his spear right into the center of the appointed target and dislodging Tihti’s, breaking its point in the process, a feat that was received with awe by all. There was no shame in being defeated by a god, anyway, and the tribe leader palmed Thranduil’s back repeatedly, laughing loudly and wielding the two pieces of his spear with pride.

Later that night, as the children lay in their mothers’ laps beside the fire, listening to the soft chants and rhythmic music of the rattles, while the warriors took turns at recounting tales of valour and great peril, Tihti waved to Thranduil to join him apart from the rest.

“How far were those foresters?” he asked bluntly. Thranduil thought he was disappointed that he had not killed them there.

“Four days down the river...”

“You did good not to attack them, Malléhuenga; we cannot draw more attention to us...”

Thranduil watched him in doubt. The Huaorani, all of them, were warriors above all. To see their lands invaded thusly was the most grievous offence that could be inflicted to them. That apparent discretion simply did not fit with what Thranduil knew about his bellicose friends, and Tihti’s next words confirmed his suspicions.

“We’ll march against Babé’s settlement after the rains,” he kept on with a ferocious glimpse in his dark eyes. Babé was his half–uncle, now an old man of eighty and the responsible for Taga’s death. “They have set the foresters on us, and they shall pay for it. They are defiling the forest as well as our ancestors’ spirits. My brother’s soul claims for revenge,” he added eagerly. “Will you fight with us, Malléhuenga?”

Thranduil felt an immense tiredness overcome him. Here they were, those ancient people marching to their utter demise with the same confidence with which the ents had marched to their destruction.

“Don’t do that, Tihti, they are many more and better armed than you; they have fire weapons and they shall use them against you…” He knew the uselessness of his efforts even before speaking. The tribe leader’s face was set.

"We are warriors, we don’t fear the enemy! We shall drink their blood and rip their hearts from their bodies, and the creator will be glad!”

“And what of your women, and your children? What, if you fall in battle and do not return to them?”

“The Tagaeri are warriors, Malléhuenga, they do not hide from their enemies. Our women know what we are. They would not respect us if we did not make them pay. Will you fight by our side?” he insisted.

“You know that I will not. And I wished that you reconsidered. You are a wise leader and you would not like to see your people vanish and fade because of a rash decision….” Thranduil was almost pleading now, despite the futility of it all. The tribe leader fixed him with a thoughtful, somewhat outraged glare, and for a moment the Elf feared that he had offended him. Then, his sudden, open, loud roar of laughter made Thranduil shook his head and smile in spite of himself.

“You are tempting me, Malléhuenga! You wanted to know if the heart of the Tagaeri is still firm and strong enough!” He laughed heartily, palming Thranduil’s back and shaking his head in joy. “I passed the test, didn’t I? Aren’t we worth of the creator’s blessing?” he demanded proudly. 

“Of course you are,” Thranduil agreed softly, watching as the man returned to the fire and greeted his warriors. The Elf shook his head in desolation as he heard their roars and the warlike songs with which they received their leader’s speech.

“The jaguar does not recoil before any prey…why should his people?” Thranduil turned to see the old shaman standing beside him, looking at the men around the fire with a strange expression in his slightly unfocused eyes. “You want to join me?” he added, placing a bowl of a fuming drink before the Elf. It was the Mi’i, the ayahuasca, the ritual beverage that gave the shamans their power over the spiritual world through visions and foresight, enhancing their awareness and inducing a state of trance. 

Thranduil shook his head. He had once tried the ayahuasca, and the effects had frightened him deeply, for it had made his memories become unbearably close and clear. He had since then learnt that the shamans could perceive his own faer when they were in that state of trance, and he had been able to impart some counsel and visions to them. Wondering if he would be able to dissuade Tihti through the shaman, he suddenly remembered why Tengomai had been drinking the Mi’i.

“How is she?” Even as he asked he perceived the answer in the shaman’s tired mind. Tihti’s wife, who had been very ill, had finally passed away, despite the shaman’s best efforts. She had given the tribe leader three sons, though none had lived enough to beget children on their own, and she had been by his side for most of her more that fifty years.

Thranduil sighed and sat on the ground, resting his back against the firm trunk of a palm tree. The men were still singing by the fire. They would mourn Tihti’s wife briefly in the morning. They were a dour, stern people, who saw death as the logical balance to life. He knew them well enough to know that Tihti’s plans for revenge had nothing to do with the loss of his wife, but with their ancient culture and the only way of life that made sense to them.

Yet he felt suddenly tired, as if all the battles of his long life were weighing upon his shoulders. He closed his eyes, trying to banish all thoughts from his weary, worried mind, and then he felt it, the shaman’s mind in his faer, in the form of an agile, swift jaguar that ran through a dense forest. He stilled then, trying not to disturb him as the shaman’s spirit revisited the most significant moments of his life and showed them to the Elf.

Thranduil watched in amazement as the jaguar showed him the life of that man that was his friend: his apprenticeship as a shaman, his first healing and how he had ran into his first jaguar. His marriage, Taga’s death, and the death of his children…he watched until the jaguar stopped at the top of a small hill and looked down to a devastated land. The whole forest –and the wide lands beyond- were on fire, and the sky was black as the pits of Dol Guldur.

“Is that what awaits us, Malléhuenga?” he heard the amazed gasp in his mind and met the sparkling amber eyes of the jaguar in his vision. “That’s what the creator shall do with our forest when The people are here no more?”  Thranduil shook his head in disbelief, as the jaguar turned back on that sight and got lost in the forest. “Thank you for letting me see that, my friend,” the shaman sighed in his head. “Now I know which course is ours…we shall die as warriors… and the world shall perish after our passing.”

Thranduil opened his eyes with great effort and focused his attention on his friend, who was sitting before him with his eyes closed and humming softly to himself, deeper now in his trance. The Elf shivered and stood up, uncertain of what had just happened. He turned his gaze to the fire, and much to his surprise he noticed that it was almost out. Only the younger men remained there, still trading tales and warming up, Thranduil suspected, for the battle their leader had just announced.  

The Elf who had once been the mighty King of Eryn Lasgalen, who had fought in Dagorlad and had held the Dark Lord at bay for a whole age bowed silently before those brave, reckless and valiant people who were about to confront their final defeat with the same grace and dignity with which they had faced their lives. He felt suddenly drained, grieving for their doom even if they seemed to accept it gladly.

He picked up a spear as a precaution and walked into the near forest, searching for a tree tall enough for his purpose. He needed to find rest under Elbereth’s stars, and he felt as if the dense canopy of the rainforest threatened to suffocate him. He found a great ceiba not far from the hamlet and began to scale slowly, relishing the touch of that soft, light bark that seemed happy to receive his caress. When he reached the first branches, he was more than one hundred feet from the forest floor and he commanded a wide view. The presently leafless tree had also sheltered a harpy eagle’s family, as he could tell from the abandoned nest in the nearest junction. He chose a strong branch and sat there, pressing his body against the trunk, watching the moonless night and finding comfort in the dim heartbeat of the tree and the pale stars that shone shyly through the night’s mists.

He was confused and disoriented by the shaman’s vision, which had also haunted his dreams for a long time now. He wasn’t sure, in truth, if he had actually followed the shaman’s spirit, or rather it had been his friend reading in his own mind, or maybe it had been the forest’s own vision of the future, or of what had once came to pass. Anyway, it had only served to strengthen those people’s convictions about the end of their world, and it pained Thranduil to admit that there was little he could do to prevent it from happening.

Too baffled to keep dwelling on that sad defeat, Thranduil closed his eyes and snuggled against the comforting trunk, allowing his memories to carry him to a time long past, when he had been truly young. They had lived up in the treetops then, and he could still hear his mother’s soft silvan accent, and his father’s strong, determined voice.

Oropher.

It had been ennin since he had last thought of his father, and a soft smile curved his lips as he admitted that those stubborn, valiant warriors reminded him of the brave King who had led his people to fight the Dark Lord armed with spears and bows.

“What am I doing here, Adar?” he sighed tiredly. His family was in the West, or in Mandos Halls, and he had refused to sail in what he had thought was an appointed mission to preserve his failing forest and which had, somehow, turned into a desperate, meaningless fight to save the forests of Arda from an unavoidable decline.

A soft gush of wind tore away the dense clouds that heralded the approaching rains, allowing bright Eärendil to cast his light over the confounded, lonesome Elf.  

“Ai, Eärendil, what do you see from up there? Is yours a vain, hopeless mission too?” he wondered. He had always thought that the Valar had been too cruel to impose such a ban upon the half-elf, yet in that moment he was glad the he still sailed the skies of Arda, for his presence offered a most welcome comfort to him.

“I should have heeded Celeborn, we should have reunited, the four of us,” he acknowledged reluctantly. Out there, the world was celebrating the coming of another year in an arbitrary display of chronology. Thranduil had always refused to join in that calendar, arguing that it seemed a thing born out of the Shadow, to celebrate the New Year in mid winter, when the trees were under the winter spell and the shadows were stronger.

Yet he could not help missing his friends and wondering how they were faring those days. They had not met since last July, in Rome, and despite their differences they were his only kin, the only other elves left in that world, fighting to save the Secondborn again from the shadow they had carelessly brought about themselves.

“I’ll invite them to join me in April,” he decided, blinking back the unwanted tears that were welling in his eyes. He would spend the rain season with the Tagaeri and would try to dissuade them from their planned war. Then, he would call his friends home for the Elven New Year and would show them how to keep their customs and traditions in that tainted world.

Reassured by his New Year’s resolution and comforted by the presence of the friendly light of Eärendil, he accepted the embrace of the tree and tried to find some sleep.  

“I would never hear the end of it, if Maglor ever got to know that I have missed them…” he thought grimly before taking the elven path of dreams.  

*****

Footnotes and boring stuff:

Huaorani: A dwindling ethnic group in the Ecuadorian Amazonia. There are less than 1500 people left. They speak a language that has defied classification until now. Little is known of their origins or that of their language. Huaorani, as they name themselves mean “the people.” They were first contacted by occidental people in the fifties. Until then they had led a nomadic life in the rainforest. Unfortunately, the lands they had lived upon for centuries happened to be full of oil. You don’t want to hear the rest of the story.

Tagaeri: A clan of the Huaorani who refused to become Occidentalized and retreated into the forest to preserve their independence. Family feuds with other Huaorani tribes and their fierce defence of their lands have led them to fight unbalanced wars with oil companies, Huaorani kin armed with weapon, illegal foresters and so. About 45 people of his clan are supposed to remain now. 

Mi’i one of the many names that receive the ayahuasca or yagé, the “vine of the souls” an Amazonian brew prepared form a concoction from segments of a species of a particular vine (Banisteriopsis) mixed with leaves from other plants and resulting in a potent hallucinogenic tea with effects similar to those of peyote. It is used by shamans to reach a state of enhanced conscience that allows them to identify the ailments in their patients, or in ritual celebrations.

Charapa: species of fresh- water turtle

Malléhuenga: son of the jaguar. Huaorani term. The jaguar is their most sacred animal, one of the creatures that embody their creator whenever he decides to assume bodily form.

Chonta: a type of palm tree. Its wood is used for making weapons, mainly spears, harpoons and blowguns.

Curare: a deadly venom, generic term for many types of preparations containing scrapings from the bark of some vines and other substances. It kills by suffocation, as it relaxes the muscles until breathing is impossible. It is used for hunting as well as for battle. Arrows are wetted into the sticky mix and shot with deadly accuracy with long blowguns. Death can take up to twenty minutes for large mammals.

Chambira: Another palm tree. Its threaded fibers are used mainly for hammocks and bags, called shirgas.  

Pink dolphins: Species of fresh-water dolphins.

Chicha: Fermented drink of smashed grain or roots.

Ceiba: Gigantic tropical trees, with umbrella-shaped crown. They host many different types of species, vegetal and animal, upon their branches. They easily reach 160-180 feet. Their wood is mainly used for building great dugout canoes. 

It is Redheredh's birthday, as agreed by Bodkin and I. Have a wonderful year, my friend, and may the muses never leave you! I dare not step into your universe, but I hope you enjoy this.

Chapter 2.  Out in the desert.

Last day of December, 2006. Somewhere in Al Talila Reserve, Al Badia Desert, Palmyra, Syria, Middle East.

 “…And gazelles have multiplied now from ten to three-hundred. Oryx are taking longer, as it was expected, but all in all it cannot be said that we’ve been unsuccessful, what do you think, Dr. Feldman?” the young biologist almost shouted from the back seat of the old jeep that bumped across the rocky desert trail, not far from the Al Talila reserve boundaries.

The driver tried to mask his snort as a cough, and he avoided Dr. Feldman’s reproachful glance. The scientist sitting beside him looked tired, drained, and how would he not after such an exhausting trip, Asim thought, fixing his gaze on the battered track ahead.

“It is a good job indeed, congratulations. How’s the hunters’ association progressing?” Dr. Feldman barely turned back to answer.

“Oh! I don’t know.” The driver needed not look at the rearview mirror to know that the blond, young researcher was wearing a puzzled expression on his suntanned face. “We do not meddle in politics,” the young man added, and the tone in his voice conveyed what he did not say; “least of all in these god-forsaken lands and among these ignorant people.”

“Three-hundred gazelles are far more than the Reserve can handle… How are you controlling them?”

“Stop harassing Dr. Koster, Cyrus, he’s a biologist, not one of you, -program officers,” the fourth passenger, a tall, dark-haired man in his fifties, grunted in annoyance from his seat behind Dr. Feldman.  “Despite your good intentions all those smart Bedouins and their sedentary friends are turning things for their convenience, while you bureaucrats preach from your comfortable desks in Washington and Geneva…”

Asim tightened his grip on the wheel at that. Cyrus Feldman was not only a renowned scientist, but a good man as well, and the one who had fought for years to see the Reserve of Al Talila established before immoderate foraging caused the total loss of the grazing lands, the seasonal lakes and the traditional ways of living in the famed Hamad, the semi-arid rangelands of Al-Badia in Syria. Only when the Reserve turned out to be a success did researchers from all over the world, as well as a handful of agencies and Non Governmental Organizations, take notice of the endangered area and begin flocking there with resources and projects –and interests- that did not always match the needs of the local inhabitants. Things had changed drastically in the last twenty-five years, Asim thought grimly, but one thing was still sure: Cyrus Feldman remained the person who had done more for the inhabitants of the area –human, animal and vegetal. Far more than that newly minted German researcher and far more than Dr. Martin Green, Asim told himself, scowling mentally at the stern, impatient chief researcher who had just scolded Cyrus.

“It was not my intention to bother you, Dr. Koster, please accept my apologies; I fear my tiredness must be clouding my ability to express myself, as Dr. Green has kindly reminded me…” Dr. Feldman addressed the young biologist mildly.

“It’s ok, Dr. Feldman, no need to apologize…” the younger biologist was now blushing furiously –Asim had the pleasure to see as he cast a brief glance at the car mirror.

“Thank you. I just wanted to know how you are keeping track of their numbers if many of them are undoubtedly wandering off limits, and, most assuredly, being hunted down. I could inquire about the hunters’ association and give you a hand with that, if you find it useful,” he added calmly.

“Sure!” The other seemed excited with the prospect. “It is not only the gazelles, you know, but falcons, eagles, and houbaras as well. A hunters’ association seems the only way for them to coordinate and actually stop decimating the wildlife without control, though I cannot see how it could be achieved….”

“Cyrus has been trying to do that for ten years now, Erik,” Dr. Green put in with undisguised sarcasm, “and all he has managed is to be consistently tricked by these roguish people who only care for the money to buy more trucks and more sheep…”

This time, Cyrus could not help exchanging a quick, exasperated look with the driver.

“Ten years is but a short span for these people, Martin. Besides, it is dangerous to oversimplify.” Dr. Feldman’s voice had a steely tone now, as he addressed his colleague. “You know as well as I do that there are many other reasons, apart from some people’s dishonesty. Bedouins…”

“The Bedu are not the romantic, idealized people you keep defending. They are businessmen, Cyrus; shrewd, heartless and corrupt ones, selling away their lands and their natural resources for quick money…”

“Much as farmers and breeders and foresters are doing around the rest of the world.” It was seldom that Cyrus Feldman lost his composure, and Martin Green was an old friend and colleague. “Yet we try to help them do it in a more harmless way, don’t we?”

“Only to be consistently hindered by chemical and biochemical and pesticide and genetic labs, and do not forget food processing industry, trying to impose…” As former Chief Officer at UN Food Safety Unit and one who knew exactly what he was talking about, Dr. Green did nothing to mask the bitterness in his words.

“Exactly.” Cyrus Feldman’s voice held no hint of mockery or triumph. “The same old tale. And it happens everywhere, Martin, not only with the Bedu…”

A tense silence followed as the old vehicle cruised the parched, desolated area towards the Reserve research station. The sun was already as high as it would get in that season, and the freezing cold of the night seemed now almost impossible to believe, Cyrus thought, watching the light playing tricks with the irregular, angular boulders and the cracked rocks scattered around them. He let escape a deep sigh as he tried fruitlessly to wipe away the tiredness from his face. He had flown in Damascus late last night, but he was already up and waiting at five am, when Asim picked him up at the hotel for the three hour drive to the ancient city of Palmyra, where he had met with local authorities and received their shows of sympathy and their condolences. Later, they had joined Martin Green -and his assistant, Dr. Koster- for a cursory surveillance of the grazing areas around the Reserve, which lay some forty miles from the renowned city and archeological site.

“How are the Bald Ibises progressing?” Cyrus finally broke the silence, trying to find a safe topic.

“Oh…Well, they are fine!” the younger scientist sounded a bit uncertain. “We have set up an international team to watch over them,” he added in a lowered, confidential tone of voice. He moved forth, towards Cyrus, and kept speaking in a whisper. “We watch them constantly, day and night, from breeding to migrating season…And do not talk much about them. Local hunters might be interested in them, you know,” he added confidentially. “They are most valuable, the last individuals in a species long-thought extinct…”

It was obvious that young Dr. Koster simply ignored the well-known fact that Dr. Feldman was the former Director of the Reserve, and as such he had conducted the two-year wildlife inventory project that had led, among other less known results, to the discovery of that now famed and overprotected colony. Asim expressed his displeasure with that state of affairs driving the jeep into several holes, pretending not to take notice of Dr. Feldman’s warning glares and the younger biologist’s grunts as his head hit the car’s ceiling.

“Asim was in the team that found them,” Cyrus said then with a wicked smile. The driver could not hold back a dismayed groan.

“Oh, was he? Why Asim, you never talked about that!” Dr. Koster’s voice held a new tone of respect as he sat back, still rubbing his head. “It must have been a thrilling experience! How I wish I had been here then,” he mused wistfully. “Did people actually know that they were there?”

Asim blushed and murmured something unintelligible mostly directed at his moustache, obviously uncomfortable with this unwanted celebrity, while Dr. Koster continued pestering him with questions.

Cyrus closed his eyes for a while. He remembered those times only too well. Asim and his fellow local researchers had been patiently visiting distant hamlets and interviewing nomadic shepherds during the wildlife inventory process. Scattered in legends and old sayings, in time-withered stone carvings and traditional knowledge whispered from father to son, the hints and clues had slowly but definitely pointed to an almost unbelievable discovery. After a long, detailed search, a dwindling colony of Bald Ibises -the Al-nuq, the secretive hermit birds with their bald, wrinkled heads and necks and the glistening, iridescent sheen on their wings- was discovered in a remote mountain range, nesting in a sheer cliff. 

“Did the Bedu know they were there? I mean, it is strange that they survived for so long if the hunters knew of them…” Dr. Koster continued questioning Asim with more friendliness than he had shown to the driver since they had met earlier that morning.

The whole process had been a strange matter, Cyrus recalled with a wry smile, and a subject for many conjectures, as if someone had been guiding their steps carefully, while at the same time studying them and evaluating their goals. Rumour had it that someone had eventually allowed word of the precise location of the Al-nuq colony reach a team of local research assistants, and Asim had been one of them. Bound by their long-time honoured friendship, Cyrus had accepted Asim’s explanations and had not inquired beyond what was offered to him. And so the questions of who, how and why remained unanswered.

“Not even the Bedouin hunters would disturb the Al-nuq, Erik,” Martin Green explained wearily from his seat. “They are sacred to them, symbols of wisdom, splendour and glory, and revered ushers of transmigrating souls…”

“But surely their decline…”

“Their decline is not due to hunting, but just a biological indicator of the general, inexorable decline in the area… The files are kept in the Station’s archive, Erik; you’d do well in reading them. I believe they are there, Asim,” Dr. Green tapped the driver’s shoulder, pointing at a dismal patch of greenery barely visible under the trampling hooves of a great flock of sheep.

“Hold on,” the driver warned this time, getting out of the track and bumping the old vehicle expertly all the way to the small oasis, while his passengers did their best to avoid hitting their heads.

“What’s that trickster doing here…” 

Guessing that his colleague did not speak of any of the three young researchers clad in their stylish outdoors khaki outfit and bending over some expensive-looking pieces of equipment, Cyrus searched for the cause of Dr. Green’s contempt among the group of scruffy, dust covered Bedouins that stood by a battered truck arguing animatedly between them and with the young scientists, while the sheep grazed freely around them.

“I drove him to the rangelands a week ago. He is staying at the station for the season; all his permits are okay...”

“I know that, Asim. I am the chief researcher, after all,” Dr. Green snapped. “I mean, what is he doing here? There is always conflict around that man…”

That man, Cyrus decided, was the tall stranger leaning quite casually against the trembling flank of an extraordinarily well proportioned bay mare with the markings of pure Hadban breed, and who seemed to watch the quarrelling crowd with faint amusement.

Even before the vehicle came to a full stop, Dr. Green stepped out and strode towards the arguing group, shouting in his hoarse, heavily accented Arabic, Dr. Koster in tow.

“They are doing nothing wrong,” the driver grunted. After a short hesitation and a brief prayer he switched off the coughing engine. All of a sudden, the bleating of the sheep transported them to another age.

“I bet Dr. Green is ear bashing his assistants, Asim. He knows what he’s doing…” Cyrus said merrily, opening the door and breathing deeply the exhilarating and healthy desert air, glad to be able to stretch his long legs for a while. “I know Martin Green has not the sweetest of tempers,” he continued, chuckling at the driver’s scowl. “But he is an honest man; and one of the best professionals I have ever worked with…”

“...And I do not care that the satellite is not transmitting! You are supposed to know the boundaries and regulations by heart!” Irascible Dr. Green was certainly delivering a top grade scolding to his team, it seemed, but Cyrus’ attention was soon caught by the strange man, who now walked towards them, his mount following docilely.  Cyrus had a brief sight of an ironic smile on a pale, serious face and a black, intense and disturbingly deep gaze. The man covered his head with the checked kaffia, holding it in place with the agal, the double camel-hair cord, which was set at a jaunty angle. One corner of the head cloth was thrown back after the manner of the desert Bedouins. He nodded courteously as he walked past them.

“Welcome back, Dr. Feldman. Asim,” he greeted them in a powerful, eerily beautiful voice that stirred a faint memory in Cyrus. He blinked briefly and the man had already jumped gracefully on the tall mare and was riding away.

“Who is he?” Cyrus asked, his puzzlement increased by seeing deep respect in the way Asim had returned the stranger’s greeting.

“Al-nuq,” the driver answered briefly, naming the stranger with the same word the Bedu used for their respected Bald Ibis. A harsh call from Dr. Green prevented Cyrus from making more questions.

“Asim, help them carry their equipment to the jeep. Cyrus, I hope you don’t mind if we give them a lift, although they do not deserve it,” he groaned exasperatedly. The three young researchers -a thin, minute girl and two strong, muscular looking fellows- looked properly downcast and embarrassed, but Cyrus did nothing to reassure them. A lesson in humility was never redundant, so he turned his attention to the shepherds, who looked around nervously. He recognized one of them and soon was engaged in an animated conversation.

“Cyrus, we’re ready!” Picking up the impatient ring in his colleague’s voice, Dr. Feldman exchanged vigorous hand shakes with the men and took his seat beside Asim, while the driver tried repeatedly to get the engine started, encouraging it with soft curses.

“I hope Selim was not very enraged by this incident,” Dr. Green commented. “See, Cyrus, Dr. Surayud, Dr. Matheson and Dr. Howard,” Dr. Green introduced him to the three new passengers that were crammed in the rear compartment among the pieces of equipment. “They are our visiting researchers, so deeply committed with the vast sea of knowledge that surrounds them… For over a month there has been this big notice on the general board at the station announcing that this big Zuara would be taking place… Of course, any announcement that does not reach them via e-mail is not worth their attention….” Dr. Green kept ranting. “Can you tell me then why you thought you had the right to hold these people up and threaten them with sanctions and god knows what else?”

“We thought… we thought they were going to enter the Reserve with their sheep and they did not have the permits,” a voice answered uncertainly from behind.

 “And what did they have to say?”

 “They claimed they had rights and that they were heading to a well outside the reserve anyway, but you know how these people are, Dr. Green, they are always making things up…” The coughing sound of the engine masked Asim’s amused chuckle as hell broke loose over the unsuspecting scientists.

“If you are so sure that they are going to lie to you, then you must have more information than they possess, so you can double check their claims on spot, dear team,” Martin Green said very coldly. “During some special gatherings all Bedu and their cattle are allowed to enter the Reserve, Dr. Howard. And the upcoming Zuara is the greatest of these gatherings, taking place only once every seven years, as the wandering clans meet with their leader, the sheikh Labid,” he pronounced slowly and loudly, as if talking to children. “If you see a notice on the general board and do not know its meaning or importance you are supposed to ask. The management plan clearly records the exceptions on every type of local celebrations, and it is your responsibility to know those regulations,” he added sternly, barely controlling his anger. “You had no right to act as you did, and it was very irresponsible of you three…”

“Dr. Drung told us so,” the girl admitted after another, rather embarrassed pause.

“Dr. Drung?” Cyrus turned to ask, his curiosity piqued.

“Or Daerung or… whatever it is his name,” she informed him with a beautiful smile. “The man with the horse.”

“Al-Nuq,” Asim added helpfully. Dr. Green reacted as if he had been bitten by a viper.

“Stop calling him that, Asim! I do not want to hear him called like that! It only drives unnecessary attention to the birds,” he added, at Cyrus’ questioning glance. “And besides, why does he call himself Bald ibis? He’s an anthropologist, and he even wasn’t around when the birds were found out… Was he, Cyrus?”

“Perhaps he is bald as well?” Cyrus suggested playfully, amused by his colleague’s unexpected outburst.  “No, I had never met him before, although there is something familiar in him,” he continued more seriously. “And somehow I feel that it was not he who chose the name,” he said. Asim’s serious face only confirmed his suspicion.

It was strange, Cyrus thought, that he who had worked tirelessly there for several years and had earned, he knew, the trust and respect of the Bedouins had never met –not even heard of- that tall stranger who was apparently well known to the Bedu –and deeply respected by them to the point of naming him after their sacred bird.

“Look there! White camels!” Dr Koster, who was surely considering a career as a firefighter after that tense morning, pointed to a not too distant cloud of dust that, after careful observation, dissolved into the strangely attractive silhouettes of a herd of camels, the pure whites standing out among their darker haired kin. It was a wondrous sight, and one that heralded good luck and strange portents, the desert people believed. They all watched in awed silence as the herd walked away in their slow, swaying cadence, like an illusion out of a distant time.

“That is the sheikh’s herd, Erik,” Dr. Green’s harsh voice broke the spell. “He is here to preside over the Zuara. You might as well find out that your hunters’ association is quickly established at a click of his fingers, as Dr. Feldman probably expected,” he told his assistant harshly. Cyrus shook his head and chose not to take offence.

“Can any of you tell me the direction the camels are taking?” he asked instead calmly to the three downcast researchers crammed in the rear compartment.

“Southwest?” The answer came after some hesitation and much neck craning.

“Right. And we could see that the sheep were heading the same way. Now, the Reserve lies in the opposite direction, doesn’t it? “

“Well, yes, but without the satellite….”

“Instruments are useful, but will be more so if you learn to look around with your own eyes as well. The sheep were not heading towards the Reserve limits but opposite, and in that direction lies a famed well, which is also an important meeting place, something you could have learned from the big map hanging in every office back at the research station. Didn’t you notice the flocks of white-throated robins all along the way as well?” he asked, pointing at a cloud of white dots that jumped happily on a dwarf shrub, shamelessly unafraid of the coughing and bumping vehicle.

“Why should we?” There was an expectant, interested silence brewing in the rear compartment.

“Because they usually gather around camel stool,” Cyrus explained patiently in his best professorial mode. “While it is still fresh,” he added with a soft chuckle. “And so you would have known that a herd of camel had passed in the same direction not long ago…Now, two herds heading for the same point…What would that mean, in the desert?

“Water.”

“An oasis.”

“Food.”

“Exactly. So, you see, you needed not the Gps to have a good idea that the shepherds were indeed heading to a well, and not into the Reserve. They weren’t within boundaries, in the first place,” he reminded them gently. “The instruments are not your eyes. You should rather use them to improve your sight.” He waited for the acknowledging grunts and continued with a smile. “You must remember that this is their land, and all we are doing here is helping them care for it as they have chosen to do,” he ended firmly, but in a kind way.

They were now reaching the entrance to the Reserve, and Cyrus stopped paying attention to the animated chatter that had followed his practical lesson. He studied the familiar adobe building of the scientific station and the new, ochre-coloured lower structure that flanked it, the new Environmental Education Centre, with its arboretum, its original Bedouin tent and its welcoming flags, with mixed feelings. It had been a long, hopeful fight for such a small place, and he had thought to see it finished under happier circumstances. But despite his personal grief, the Centre held the hopes of the desert population, and it was in itself a beautiful tribute to those who had contributed to it but would never see it, he reminded himself firmly. Cyrus let escape a deep, sad sigh and then shrugged apologetically at the worried look in Asim’s face.

“Will you join us for the New Year’s Eve celebration, Dr. Feldman?” one of the young researchers invited him as they unloaded the equipment and Cyrus’ pack from the jeep. He suddenly felt all the weariness of the past months crushing him.

“I will, if I am in a better shape in a few hours, thank you,” he managed with a tired smile.

“Oh, it will all begin before seven,” the girl warned him, and then, with a friendly wink, “Bangkok time, you know!”

“And then Central and Eastern European time and then West Coast time,” Dr. Koster informed merrily, pointing at his colleagues. “You cannot fail to attend at least one celebration!” he joked, as they entered the station laughing excitedly.

“You knew the sheikh Labid would be here this year, didn’t you?”

Cyrus had just shaken Asim’s hand in goodbye and was picking up his backpack. He looked up to see Martin Green standing before him, his hands on his hips, his face set and his voice tense.

“What do you mean, Martin?”

“That you planned to come here in coincidence with the Zuara so you could talk your friend the sheikh into promoting your cursed hunters’ association, and earning all the recognition for it!” he spat.

It was so strange for Martin Green to be that mean that, had he been in the mental frame to consider it, Cyrus would have not taken his words into account, blaming them on the unbearable pressure of the almost insurmountable task he was facing. But he had his own wounds as well, and the dam was ready to break.

“I planned to come here in coincidence with the Zuara because I had promised my son that he would ride a white camel and would get to see the Bedu in their greatest day, and that he would meet their highest chief,” he said coldly, in a voice that did not tremble. “And because I wanted him to see a place he, too, helped create,” he added more hoarsely. With that, he turned his back on his friend and stomped up the stairs inside the station and towards the spartan room he knew was prepared for him upstairs.

***

Silence was born in the desert- Cyrus groaned as he rolled in his bed, straining in vain to discern the slightest noise that would lull him back to sleep. With an exasperated sigh he admitted that he would not find more rest that day -or night- and so he sat up tiredly, groping in the dark until he found the lamp.

The room was as he remembered it, showing the healthy simplicity of the nomadic desert people, who treasured most the things that could be carried away in their souls. The guests’ chamber contained a big bed, a small window, a chair, a wooden table and washstand and a brightly coloured rug by the bedside. A niche in the adobe walls served as cupboard; another, as a nightstand. A pack of candles and a half consumed stub meant that power remained as reliable as it used to be, Cyrus thought idly. He stood up and stretched his sore muscles, and decided to take a shower, hoping that the hot water would wash away the last threads of his tortured dreams.

But the sad memories were still there as he put on clean trousers and a shirt and sweater and combed his short, silver streaked hair. In his troubled sleep he had traveled back, unwillingly, to the last days he had spent with his wife and son in Rome past summer. He kept reliving their last goodbye at Fiumicino airport where they had last parted, he, heading for Edinburgh, where he was awaited at the World Summit, while Susan and little George were to return to their current home in Kenya in the following day.

He had experienced again in his dreams the unexplained anguish, the desperate, silent cry that had rent him from within and had forced him to abandon a press conference; the sudden emptiness and despair and the searing certainty that had overwhelmed him -even before he heard of a plane crash in East Africa- that they were no more with him.

That was his nightmare, the one he relived again and again, the feeling of standing alone at the edge of a tall cliff looking down on a bottomless abyss, and the certainty that he would be there for the rest of his life. Everything else was a dream. A bad one, admittedly, but he had gone stoically through all the procedures and had received condolences with the same professional distance he dispensed to critiques. And then he had resumed working, back at Headquarters, postponing his return to their empty house until he felt he was strong enough to confront that merciless silence.

He picked up his parka and walked downstairs in search of some food. They had planned that New Year’s Eve up to the slightest detail together. George and his ten year old schoolmates in their small Kenyan hamlet had contributed with their drawings of African wildlife to the exhibition about biodiversity in the recently opened Environmental Education Center at the Reserve. That Center was the last link in the delicately crafted job of arousing environmental awareness in the nomadic shepherds that Cyrus had conducted there for more than ten years, and the child had been eager to see the result of his father’s efforts and his own contribution. It hurt deeply to remember it now that he was actually there, alone, on the appointed day. Cyrus half-choked on a strangled sob as he walked along deserted corridors in the silent and empty station he knew so well.

He crossed the large mess hall and, out of habit, turned out the light that someone had carelessly left on. The remains of the celebration of the New Year, Bangkok time, were still visible on a corner of one of the smaller tables that had apparently replaced the huge wooden plank that used to occupy most of the room when he was Director there. Staff, service people, drivers, scientists and park rangers out of duty joined around it to share meals and conversation in an informal, relaxed atmosphere back then. He went into the ample kitchen and after some searching he helped himself to a serving of already cold Gai Yang.

“Of course, everybody went home for the new year,” he told himself, finally understanding the reason for that deep quietness. “And the rest will be celebrating with the Bedu.” With a tired sigh he put his plate on the pile in the sink and stepped out the back door and into the overwhelming splendor of the desert night.

Fighting the urge to sit there under the blazing stars and drown in a pain that struggled to make itself heard, Cyrus decided to join in the revelry that, he knew, was taking place several miles south at the Sheikh’s camp, where he would be surely entertaining most of the station scientists, as well as his own council of elders. He found the keys of one of the battered trucks in its usual hiding place and drove south, to the distant reflection of the open fires in the Bedu camp. 

The magic struck him as soon as he turned off the engine and descended. The long, flat, hand-woven camel hair tents of the elders stood in a wide circle, and the open fires still blazed happily, although the traditional mensaf surely had been eaten up long ago.

A crowd was gathered around one of the tents, clapping hands and singing animatedly. As the throng parted briefly Cyrus got a glimpse of a man tenderly embracing the wooden, light frame of a rababa and plucking it in a frenzy that was punctuated by the steady beat of the mihbaj, the Bedouin coffee grinder. As the gap became wider to allow a young one a hurried retreat, Cyrus caught sight of the rababa player, who was no other than the stranger Asim had named Al-nuq. Before him, sitting on a coloured rug, the minute Thai scientist knocked and stirred the large, wooden, stand-up coffee grinder, hitting it with the stick and keeping the rhythm with great concentration, encouraged by her two colleagues. The Bedu around them took times at improvising the rhymes, fantastic tales of wine, camels, desert wisdom, battles and women, and the strange man would end up each round with the ancient refrain from a well-known ode: “So I stood and questioned the desert; yet how should we question rocks, whose speech is nothing ever heard by Man?”  

“Dr. Feldman, you are here!” A hand on his arm shook him from the spell of the music.

“Erik,” Cyrus nodded to Dr. Green’s assistant, turning his attention again to the show. Two old men were now competing with increasingly intricate verses about the glories of their respective herds and horses, under the indulgent, satisfied smile of the player.

“The sheikh awaits you….”

Cyrus followed the assistant to the longest of the tents, where the sheikh and his council of elders drank coffee, entertained guests and resolved the lingering feuds that could dampen the upcoming celebrations, when thousands of nomadic Bedu would gather around the Ephka, the third sacred spring in an ancient system around the city of Palmyra, to search for wisdom and honour a force that was even older than their god.

“Welcome, Cyrus, friend of the Bedu, we are brothers in joy and sorrow.”

“Well met, sheikh Labid. I ask for the Bedu’s hospitality for the night,” he returned, bowing to the group of old men sitting around on the coloured rugs and greeting each of them by name. Martin Green was there as well, and they nodded to each other warily.

“Ease your mind, my friend,” the old sheikh urged him, stretching to reach the pot and pouring a shot of the cardamom scented coffee on a small china cup. Cyrus complied gladly with the ritual welcome and accepted three cupfuls:  one for the soul, one for the sword and one because you are a guest and a brother in this tribe.

“May the wisdom of the Ephka pour down on you and your people,” he wished, jiggling the empty cup briefly to indicate that he was done with coffee, and that, given that they were sitting outside the tent, he was ready to get to business talk as well.

“We have good news for you, Cyrus,” one of the elders began, avoiding the traditional questioning about health and family. “The clans have agreed to regulate the hunt of the houbaras. The sheikh has spoken to each and every hunter in the desert for ten years, but your colleague says that is not enough…”

Not paying attention to Martin Green’s tense expression, Cyrus let escape a resigned sigh and embarked again in another round of never-ending negotiations, checking all the issues that had been discussed endless times with these and other leaders of the Bedu.

A teapot had made its appearance, and several cups later he discovered with surprise that all their demands had been met by the cunning, shrewd Bedu, who simply wanted to see if they forgot any of their requirements on that last round.

“A two-kilometre security perimeter around the Reserve for gazelles and Oryx, a ban on houbaras, falcons and eagles, and a hunters’ association to regulate the catches, is that all, Dr. Green?” the old sheikh summed up quite nonchalantly, as it had not taken them almost ten years to reach that agreement. The stern chief researcher nodded nervously, reluctant to express either agreement or otherwise, lest he would somehow offend the sheikh.

“We Bedu understand the need to care for the wilderness,” the sheikh added slowly. “The people of sheikh Labid are true Bedu” he claimed, hitting his chest. “We deal not with sheep or goat and we follow the rains with our camels. But we are not the leaders of all Bedu,” he continued with a wry smile. “We have no power over those who raise sheep and live in houses and drive trucks, and lead their herds into the Reserve and eat out the grass and dry out the springs… We are not sedentary, greedy businessmen. We do respect the rangelands, yet the government would force us to settle down in the cities and pay taxes, we will not allow that!”

Before his colleague pointed out in his curt manner all the damages caused by sheikh’s Labid nomadic people in the past ten years, Cyrus chimed in.

“The sheikh Labid is wise like the desert. We cannot tell the government to leave the Bedu alone, but they will see that the Bedu are good for the rangelands and the reserve.”

“But there is still the problem with the water,” another of the elders pointed out.

Martin Green sighed. “That is the government’s problem,” he lashed out impatiently. “It is not only your sedentary kin who are exhausting the wells and springs…I can see that the sheikh owns a quite comfortable truck as well…”

“Trucks made all men equals, Martin Green,” the sheikh said harshly after a tense silence. “So now the wisdom and cunning of a Bedu, and his ability to survive in the desert mean nothing when a truck can drive sheep faster and farther than camels can walk…”

Dr. Green was about to retort, but the sheikh raised a hand and bid them all listen. Cyrus whistled in appreciation. He knew that great skill was needed to coax such a bewitching sound out of a wood and horse hide instrument with no frets or sound hole and with just one horse-hair string. And yet it was not the enthralling, thick, rich sound of the ancient rababa what sent shivers down his spine, but the haunting, husky, otherworldly voice that now accompanied the old instrument, making the well-known words of the song, the praise of a swift camel, sound fresh and new as they must have sounded when Tarafa, the murdered poet boy, first sang them in a fit of youthful delight during a long, boring desert journey more than a thousand years ago.

It seemed that all the joy of Bedu life, the freedom of the desert, the light of the stars, the strength of camels and the speed of pure breed horses, but also the melancholy of a time long past, were there in the singer's voice. 

Cyrus felt a lump in his throat, a pain in his chest, an ache in his heart, a longing for a beauty that he had not known but that called to mind the forlorn hopes of a life that had come to an untimely end. As the voice faded away, like the echoes of the marching hoofs of the camel, Cyrus could see that he was not the only one moved almost to tears by the eerily powerful voice. Even the sleek, slender saluki dogs stirred in their dreams, surely following falcons and camels in a never ending hunt.

“Who is he?” Cyrus managed in a voice that trembled slightly.

“Al- nuq,” one of the elders pronounced with deep reverence.

“That’s nonsense,” Martin Green burst out angrily. “He is just a ...”

“He sang back the Al-nuq to us,” the wise old man insisted firmly, looking Dr. Green in the eye, challenging him. The scientist lowered his gaze and the old one turned then to Cyrus. “The birds were gone, he only knows where, and when he saw that the true Bedu were ready to welcome them, he sang them back, so the souls of our dead may find their way…”

“But he…”

“He is the Hammad,” the sheikh added in a voice that admitted no opposition. “The transmitter. He has given us the words back, renewed; the songs of our past, which had been lost in trivial, meaningless repetition. To possess the word is to own your fate and he gave us that…” he added thoughtfully.

“Given the state of your people, it cannot be said that he has given you much, though,” Dr. Green answered scathingly, and for once in that long day, Cyrus felt that he had to agree with his short-tempered colleague.

“You judge for what you see, Dr. Green,” the sheikh retorted with a soft, understanding smile. “These are hard times for the world, and something new is fighting its way out, while many things are lost. Well-being is not wealth and comfort. It is knowing who you are and what you are here for. For long the Bedu forgot who they were and where they belonged to. Death is not to be feared, but failure. He gave us our pride back, our own selves, and for that we are grateful.”

“The ways of the Bedu are their own to follow,” Dr. Green said finally, after a moment in which he looked as if willing to contradict the sheikh. “And I am glad that we have reached an agreement.” He proffered his hand and shook the sheikh’s. “The agreement is sealed and the Bedu will profit from it. Substantially, if I may say so. May the poles of your tent keep increasing their numbers until they match the stars in the sky,” he said courteously, taking his leave from his host, and then he stood up swiftly and looked at Cyrus. “You brought the old jeep, didn’t you?” he asked, stretching his hand. “Asim will drive you back when you are finished here.”  Cyrus gave him the keys and accepted another cup of tea, wishing that the strange man would sing them all into oblivion before that long, tiring day was over.

“A good man, Martin Green,” the sheikh said at last, some time after Dr. Green had left. “He truly cares for the lands, but for all his knowledge, he is wholly ignorant of the cycle of things…” he added, and they all laughed knowingly.

“I cannot help but agree with him, Labid,” Cyrus argued tiredly. “You are not much better than the High Sheikh in Damascus…many of your youths are already taking to sedentary life and shepherding more sheep than the rangelands can sustain…because they have no other options left. We are trying to stop the tide with our bare hands,” he said, and then had to laugh at the irrelevant metaphor he had just used. “We are trying to block the sun with our finger,” he corrected himself.

“We are, indeed,” the sheikh assented calmly. And then, at Cyrus’ perplexed look, “come, my friend, you are tired and grieving, but you cannot fail to see that it is a time of change…and much that we now love will be lost before you and I follow the Al-nuq. Water is the friend of the Bedu, but it is also the desert’s enemy. We fight to preserve what we love most, only to see it slip through our fingers in its due time. Only words will be left, and singing beautifully is what we must do, so things are not forgotten and something is preserved, even if only as a dim memory that may one day sprout again into being…”

The stars shone brightly on their path in the cold desert night, making up for a new moon that was shrouded, sharing Cyrus’ mourning, as Asim drove them back to the station.

“So, was that the man who led you to the Al nuq?” Cyrus asked quite abruptly. The driver just nodded. “And where did he come from? Who is he? Why did he know where the birds were? Did they sing him to life or what?” he ranted quite pointlessly

“Some say he’s a Djinni,” Asim shrugged with his provoking half smile. Cyrus sighed and passed a hand over his brow and let escape a short laugh.

“I can well believe that. I think I’m too tired to think,” he added apologetically. “It was a pleasure to see you again, Asim.”

“It was my pleasure, Dr. Feldman,” the driver answered. “I’ll pick you up at noon, to drive you to the Zuara,” he added, trying to show his affection without breaking his usual impassive façade. Cyrus knew him well and just nodded, descending tiredly and patting the car’s roof in goodbye. 

“You are welcome to spend the countdown for the New Year –European time- out here, Dr. Feldman,” a deep voice informed him as soon as Asim had disappeared towards the staff barracks. He turned on his heels to see the musician sitting on the stairs that led to the kitchen’s door. There was light coming from the windows on the side and the front, and Cyrus suspected that the celebrations would go on for some time, making it impossible to slip silently upstairs and find some rest. He nodded silently and walked slowly towards the stranger, eyeing him with curiosity.

“And who would you be?” he asked brusquely, sitting on the steps beside the stranger. “A Djinni, the Hammad, Dr. Something… not the Al-nuq, that is evident,” he added ironically, glancing at the man’s long, glistening black mane that he wore in a loose braid.

“The name is Daeron,” the man smiled amiably, proffering a pale hand with long, calloused fingers and letting escape a laugh that rang deeply, musically in the silent night. “But my friends call me just the Bard. Or the Poet,” he added with a mischievous grin.

“Dr. Feldman. Cyrus Feldman. But you already know me, I’ve heard. It was long since I last heard someone play the rababa with such mastery,” Cyrus complimented him in a friendlier manner. “No wonder the sheikh thinks you the new Hammad…”

A sudden burst of laughter and cheers wafted through an open window and cut the musician’s answer.

“They are having a great time,” Cyrus observed.

“Dr. Green was very happy about the agreement. Congratulations…” Daeron observed merrily. Cyrus cast a wary look at him.

“Perhaps we have to thank you for that as well?” he asked pointedly. The man laughed again and shook his head.

“Me? I am the Bedu’s minstrel, not their sheikh, or environmental advisor,” he retorted lightly. Cyrus smiled despite himself and took the point. 

“That’s good. I do not think Dr. Green would be glad to hear you had anything to do with his great success…”

“Says the man who fought for ten years to convince the Bedu to stop decimating the houbaras at their pleasure. Are you truly relinquishing all merits and honours on this?” The softly mocking tone in the elegantly modulated voice irritated Cyrus Feldman.

“What do you know and why would you care, anyway?” he demanded, quite petulantly.

“I am the man who sang back the Al nuq, do not forget that,” Daeron retorted cheerfully. “I am supposed to know everything that goes around here. Try this,” he added pleasingly, producing a silver flask from a tightly woven bag by his side, “let us celebrate.”

Cyrus drank briefly and studied the intricate carvings on the flask.  “Interesting work. I cannot identify the craftsmanship. Nor the liquor, by the way,” he added, handing it back to its owner with a grateful nod.

“I didn’t expect you to,” Daeron said with a pleasant, enigmatic smile, offering no more information. Cyrus sighed as the other drank.

“I…I tire of useless fights,” he sputtered, breaking a companionable silence. “I fought for ten years to see that hunters’ association established, but whom do I want to fool?” he wondered aloud. “Martin thinks it’s a success because he can tick off another item from his management plan, but he cannot see that this is temporary…  The sheikh was right. Much shall be lost -and soon. Much has been already lost, and even if we manage to save something here, now, it will not survive other things we have no control over…it is a mighty loss of time,” he concluded, grabbing the silver flask and gulping down another long swig of the somehow comforting drink.

“I’d say that you are weighed down by your recent loss,” Daeron observed neutrally, “and not by your fights. For, tell me, what is life in the end but a lost battle? We lose parts of ourselves every day, until there is nothing else to lose…”

“But it hurts more when you lose chunks,” Cyrus retorted, amused despite himself.

“You are right there…”

“I have had enough,” Cyrus sighed. “Enough wandering, enough fighting, enough fooling myself. This is a lost battle and I’ve reached my limit. I have nothing else to lose…nor the will to keep trying.”

“Then why are you here?”

“I had promised my son that we would spend the New Year with the Bedu. He wanted to ride a white camel…”

“I once swore that I would not ever again walk in a forest land,” the other sighed. The wistful tone of his voice piqued Cyrus’ curiosity.

“Why?”

“Because it was long ago in a mighty forest that I met her, and loved her, and lost her,” the musician whispered in a voice that stirred Cyrus’ soul beyond compassion.

“I am sorry…”

“And yet here I am,” the strange man said with a wicked smile, his eyes glinting strangely as he turned to look at Cyrus.

“Not many trees around…”

“You are wrong, my friend,” Daeron smiled, and let escape another of those laughs that seemed to come from unmeasured depths. “Look,” he added, grabbing a handful of soil and placing his open hand before Cyrus. “Limestone. Flint. Sedimentary rock. This once was a marine bed, this stone once was alive, breathed and swam and ate and loved..and died to rest on the sea floor.  And then a powerful force broke and submerged the forestlands, and pressed the trees and leaves and fishes and mollusks together. Then it elevated the marine depths again, so now the stones resonate with the voices of those creatures that roamed the lands and swam the seas that once were, as they now slowly dissolve into dust. There is no way of escaping loss, Cyrus, for it is all around us…it is the matter of life.”

“Why fight it, then,” Cyrus argued obstinately, charmed by the point yet reluctant to give in, as a child who sought reassurance when faced with an impossible task.

“Because in fighting and losing we learn to understand…and understanding is the first step to loving what we are bound to protect. We are Stewards, much as Dr. Green and the Bedu... The world began without Men in it, Cyrus; all things already had their own voices before the Men came and silenced them…but they are still there, fighting to be heard and heeded… ”

“I am yet to hear the music of the atoms,” Cyrus said with mild irony. “And I doubt it would make any difference, if I ever got to hear it, “ he added quickly. He seemed to have regained his footing, stepping solidly on his pown, private quagmire of frustration and pain. “But you are an anthropologist, then…”

“Entropologist, I prefer to call myself,” the other laughed, completely undisturbed by Cyrus’ apparent sarcasm. “But above all I am a song-chaser,” he continued flippantly, “because music is the true fabric of the world, the language in which all was written and brought to life and death…Can’t you hear?” he urged then them both to silence.

The desert night was cold and silent. Those celebrating inside had closed windows and doors, so no sound came from the otherwise quite sober celebration.

And still…

“You heard it?”

Cyrus cursed. “Martin was right, you are a jester…”

“No, you heard it, you know what I mean…”

Dim, soft but ominous, from time to time they could hear the faint sound of a boulder or rock cracking under the pressure of frozen drops of the day’s moisture trapped on its pores and breaking it to crumbles.

“Water is the desert’s enemy” Cyrus reminded the sheikh’s words and shook his head. “But this…”

“This is the desert’s death song. The geological clock, if you want. The voice of the stones. The endless, unstoppable cycle. What once was a forest, then became an ocean, then rose to the surface and hosted camels and caravans for a while, until water again turns it into sand and after that… who knows?”

“Water, irrigation, soil regeneration…” Cyrus muttered thoughtfully. “What are you trying to tell me?” he confronted the mysterious man with a frown.

“That you are still needed, Dr. Feldman, more than ever, and that you are the only one who is ready to hear the song of the earth in all its grieving voices…and find some comfort for its ailments…”

“I am a scientist…”

“And you can learn to be a more integral one, an Earth scientist, one that sees and hears what others are too busy or blind or deaf to perceive…”

“This is magic, superstition. New-ageish blather you are spreading around…”

The man smiled knowingly and closed his eyes briefly, then began humming to himself. His voice rose softly, like smoke, like mist over a frozen lake, sweet like a cherry tree in blossom but also strong, and powerful like a high sea storm. Or was it a winter gale across a naked forest? And then Cyrus gaped. He blinked twice but it was still there, all around him, a densely canopied forest and a starlit glade, and a wind that swirled around fallen leaves and children that ran and played and laughed merrily, while Daeron’s voice brought to life a strong forest scent, and a warm feeling, and a deep joy.

“What... what the hell was that!”

Daeron blinked and shrugged. “New-ageish blather,” he joked softly with a kind smile, as the last threads of the fvision vanished in the thin air.

“But I… saw the forest…I smelled it!” Cyrus looked at the other man through narrowed eyes. “What did you do?”

“I sang,” the man said simply, mildly. “And you saw.”

“I did not understand the words… I could not recognize the language!”

“I did not expect you to,” Daeron repeated with a wink, offering him the silvery flask again. Cyrus smelled it distrustfully and then shrugged and drank down.

“Now you will make me believe that you are actually the Al nuq, ushering the souls of the dead towards reincarnation…Am I dead or what?-,” he joked with nervous uncertainty.

“I don’t think so,” Daeron answered with a shrug. “And if I were indeed the Al nuq I would have certainly followed her long ago, wherever she dwells now,” he added in an immensely sad voice, and all of a sudden all magic disappeared. That was a lonesome, bereft man like himself, Cyrus thought, deeply sympathizing with the Daeron’s pain. He returned the flask with a knowing glance.

“Was she beautiful?”

“The most beautiful girl that ever sang upon the face of the lands of Hither,” Daeron assented, in a whisper that seemed to come from a long distance. “The flowers blossomed as she walked, and the birds learnt their songs from her lips…” Cyrus nodded in understanding.

“What happened?”

“She met another. Then she died.”

“I am sorry. Did you have any children?”

The man lifted a troubled, extraordinarily beautiful face to the stars and sighed.

“She did. Not mine.”

Four simple words that conveyed the weight of a heartbreaking tale, Cyrus knew. The evening star shone briefly in the man’s bottomless eyes as he looked up in hope and pain, as if expecting that mercy and forgiveness could come from above. 

“But that was long ago,” he added then in a voice that was again free of anguish. “Since then, I walk in dead forests, listening to faint echoes of joys long past...Grieve in peace, Dr. Feldman, but then stand up again and keep walking,” he said, standing up and shaking Cyrus’ hand. “There is much still to do.”

And with that he walked into the night, leaving Cyrus there, blinking in amazement and staring at the pieces of rock and sand on his hand, the parting gift of that talented trickster.

He slept deeply that night, and no dreams troubled his rest. Right before waking, he thought he heard a bird sing, and a soft rush of wind brought him the scent a northern forest. He blinked in surprise and opened his eyes carefully; half-hoping that he would wake up in the same glade he had glimpsed the night before. The sober white walls met his gaze and he shook his head amusedly, chiding himself. 

And yet he could still feel the fresh fragrance of beech and oak leaves around him, and a sense of hope and renewal that he had thought forever lost filled his heart as he got up and made ready for the day. 

A/N

Disclaimer: Daeron belongs to Tolkien. The rest are fictional characters in almost fictional places and events...

Houbara: A bird of the family of bustards, much appreciated -and brought to the brink of extinction- by Arabic hunters.

Rababa: in short, the father of all fiddles.

Bedouin Literature: Around the eight century (BC), a talented scholar with a prodigious memory compiled the works of many bedouin poets in what are known as the Golden odes. This man, known as "The Hammad" or transmitter, was the first to fix some of the traditional and ancient verses of these nomadic people. Tarafa, the murdered boy was one of those poets. Most of the Bedu compositions are on free verse, revolving around the subjects of the desert, camels, wine, women, horses, the hunt, the passing of life, and so on.

Djinni: spirits of the earth, in pre islamic desert mythologies.

By the Ocean.

Somewhere near the estuary of the River Casamance. Low-Casamance region; Senegal, West Africa. Last day of December, 2006.

Tired of tossing and turning and drenched in sweat, the old man laboriously sat up on the bed and fought wildly to get rid of the flimsy mosquito net that stuck to his humid fingers. Then he had to rest for a while, busy recovering his breath, ashamed that just setting his feet on the ground took so much trouble and caused him such level of exhaustion.

Life must slow down at eighty-two, he reminded himself, trying to calm down the accelerated pace of his heart. He took in several deep breaths, gathering the strength to haul himself up and out of bed. He managed it with great effort, grasping one of the posts that supported the mosquito net and pulling himself up with a sudden heave.

He reached the makeshift washstand at an excruciatingly slow pace, dragging his swollen, puffy feet over the dry floor of packed earth. A number of differently coloured small flasks lined up on top of the old chest of drawers beside the washstand. He studied them with a critical eye, still breathing heavily.

His kidneys did not work properly, whence the swollen limbs, telltale signs of liquid retention, which also affected his lungs and forced an already weakened heart to work doubly. Choosing what medicines to take was a problem, though, for what worked well for one ailment was not so good for the others, and so it all ended up being a game in which he watched and all the machinery inside him raced against whatever time he was left.

“These are the latest, they will make you feel good, I had them sent straight from France, through Doctors Without Borders,” the young practitioner at the field hospital in Oussouye would tell him eagerly, bringing a new promise of hope every time he came to visit.

Age is not an ailment, he wanted to argue, but he never did, pitying the young doctor who was so eager to help, so hopeful that his science and his medicines would work. So father Antonino Rizzone, father Nino, or the Italian Priest as he was widely known in the country, simply nodded and obediently followed the physician’s instructions and then informed him on the effects, no matter how tempted he was to get rid of those pills, sit calmly and wait for his hour to come.

Hope was unnecessary when confronted with more reassuring certainties, but hope, he reminded himself, was also the truth of youth; and youth was the only disease that was actually cured by time.

Therefore he obeyed patiently and took his remedies, and felt better because the young doctor looked so hopeful and relieved. With an effort he opened up the first of the flasks and dropped two pills on a sweaty palm that trembled slightly as he lifted it to his mouth. Fumbling around, he found the pitcher and poured himself a mouthful of tepid water on a deteriorated cup and drank down slowly, easing his dry throat.

Bow to the lord and do as is your wont.

His grandfather’s saying came to his mind suddenly. It meant actually “say ’yes’ to the landowner and then go and do as it is your custom or preference,” a cry of freedom, a piece of rustic wisdom against the haughtiness of the powerful, but also against innovation and change.

But father Nino would not feel well cheating the young doctor.

Obedience, the old priest had learnt long ago, comforted those who commanded it and freed those who exercised it, since it was a chain and a gift that worked both ways and tied together differing wills upon a basis of reciprocal responsibility.

So he freely chose to obey the doctor and that was the end of it.

But his grandfather had been free as well, he had always thought, a poor peasant who had raised his five children to adulthood with tireless, backbreaking work, cultivating the lands of others - bowing to landowners while doing his wont- and who had died alone, in the open, bent on the patch of vegetables in his small orchard, which he still tended personally disregarding doctors’ advice and protective, fretting daughters-in-law.

Father Nino -a child of ten back then- had found him collapsed over the freshly removed soil –stiff already, his eyes closed and his face turned to the flighty autumn sun. He could still remember the quietness, the dream-like quality of the scene. The hound had been restless at home, pulling at his lash and baying mournfully, but up there in the windswept patch the birds had been singing happily, the trees rustling contentedly and the mountain stream ringing endlessly against the stony riverbed, undisturbed by the old man who lay now in peace, one with the landscape, belonging there.

He had been dreaming of that day often in the past weeks.

“Age plays strange games with memory,” he thought, pouring water on the basin and refreshing his sweat-drenched face. He had not been afraid, or shocked, he remembered. Death was a natural, even a fascinating event for a boy of ten who was growing up in the countryside. But the calmness of that moment had stricken him, seeped into him, sat within, deep in his soul, and had become part of his most inner self. And he now longed for that peace.

“You are an old man, Nino,” he scolded himself, “loosing yourself in childhood recollection while unable to remember what day it is today…”

“Va’ffan…” The curse, which he had not uttered for almost sixty years, came naturally to his lips as one of the smaller pills from the third flask slipped through his fingers into the ground. He shook his head and looked up and into the cracked mirror. There was a tired, sallow, deeply-wrinkled face there, but a ten-year old who had grown up free and wild in the Alpine grazing lands of Val d’Aosta in northern Italy gazed at him serenely from the depths of sunken, tired eyes, waving invitingly.

“A dirty mouth at your age?” he chided his reflection, his mind wandering eagerly to the green pastures, the coolness of eternal snows and the lightness of a child’s limbs. It was a recurring dream in those hot, suffocating days since the always scarcer rains had ended, but it felt almost real at times.

He picked another pill from the flask and swallowed it with difficulty, then scrapped the remnants of last night’s yuca porridge from the bottom of a battered bowl and ventured outside.

A wave of hot, humid air hit him on his chest. The sun had not yet climbed over the dense canopy but soon the relentless heat would make it impossible to stay outdoors.

For now the hamlet was calm.

Fishermen would be back from the ocean soon, and the rest of the villagers were surely at work in their rice fields, father Nino pondered as he shambled under the cover of the scarce shade provided by the steeply pitched, thatched roofs of the wattle sheds that made up the poor settlement.

Following an undefined impulse, father Nino stopped and looked back to the jungle edge and the river bank. The silence was dense. He strained to catch the familiar voices of the monkeys foraging for food, the chatter of birds, the growl of hypos coming for their mud baths, but he could only hear the roar of his own blood thundering in his ears, and the pressure of an expectant, tense silence; the stillness that heralded a predator’s attack. He waited for a while, until the voices of the birds were heard again: egrets, herons, marabous,calling as if nothing had happened, keeping the secret of the jungle’s affairs.

His breathing had become a hoarse rattling when he reached the entrance of the communal building that also housed his small chapel. It was a big, round hut with a wide opening on the top of the thatched roof that allowed water to fall into a central basin during the rain season, and with several big rooms that were used for different purposes after the fashion of the Jola people’s ancient building techniques.

He nodded respectfully to the stone figurine that guarded the threshold, a long-limbed god of wild mane and bright eyes, crowned with powerful buffalo horns. The seated watcher held a round salver toppled with different amulets, mostly roughly carved wooden dolls that were commonly used as messengers to the deceased ancestors when someone died. Some had fallen to the ground and lay scattered at the god’s feet. Obviously his neighbours had the feeling that someone was about to die, father Nino thought absent-mindedly, for they had been leaving message dolls for their dead loved ones at the appointed place for several days now.

The rise and fall of children’s voices as they recited their lessons in the largest chamber distracted him and made him smile proudly. He leaned on one of the wooden pillars for a while, listening, his breathing a bit eased in the relative coolness of the building.

“Bon jour, père Nino!” a voice chirped merrily behind him, and a little girl rushed past him, waving his hand to him and hurrying towards the opposite side of the central, circular court.

He waved back contentedly, watching as the child ran happily towards the classroom.

Ten years ago father Nino had been forced into retirement, after a long, laborious and productive life of service to the Church. Instead of retiring to one of the several century-old monasteries that his order maintained for such purposes in the wide plains of northern Italy, father Nino had decided to settle down there, in Senegal, to live among those who had less, as he had done for the greater part of his life and in different parts of the world.

Now he was one of them.

A small part of his retirement pension he used to attend to his own needs. The rest he invested in community projects like that construction which housed the small school, a communal granary and a showroom for the handcrafts made by women in the surroundings, which were sold to tourists that passed the distant hamlet on their way to Cape Skirring’s famed beaches or the Isle of Birds natural reserve.

He had also helped finance a piping system and a well for fresh water, and had helped buy some necessary equipment for the small dispensary. He regularly lent money to those who needed it badly, and now they were embarked in several other projects regarding the preservation of the jungle and their territory…

The girl had reached now the classroom door and turned to wave again.

“Kassoumay, Bakin!” she greeted in their dialect, looking beyond the priest, and then entered the class.

Father Nino turned around as fast as his old bones allowed, but there was no one behind him, at least no one in sight, although he had the nagging feeling of a passing presence.

Had he looked through the wide open door to the jungle edge, he would have caught a glimpse of a strange golden glimmer among the trees close to the embankment –thicker than the swirls of silvery mist that rose from the many channels and waterways that laced that upstream part of the estuary of the River Casamance.

                                           ~*~    ~*~    ~*~

Insa was close to the river when the Bakin, the spirit of the forest, arrived unnoticed that morning.

He had got up before the sun and had hurried to carry his fetish doll to the altar of the stone guardian before father Nino got up. Insa’s father had died only a rain season ago, and the young man needed his counsel desperately. Father Nino -Insa knew- would not fail to find Insa’s father when he reached the other side, and would hand Insa’s questions to him. After all, Insa’s father had been the priest’s host and protector when he arrived; he would not refuse to do this for his host’s son.

He had then walked to the rice fields of his family, among the best in the whole area, to check on the dikes and do the maintenance work that was the privilege -and duty- of the head of the family.

It was earlier than usual and the rest of the village rice fields –further upstream- were surely still empty. Insa worked quickly while pondering his worries. At thirty-one, and being the eldest surviving male of his line, he had been appointed keeper of the family’s lands even before his initiation.

He had to be proud of his role –he reminded himself as he worked the mud with his hoe and checked the ancient works for cracks and weak spots in their structure.

It had been a dramatic change in his life, though. He had been sent away from his home when he was barely ten, first to study in the mission in Oussouye, and then to Dakar, in the hopes that he would make a better life away from the jungle. He could read and speak French and he had attended nocturnal law school for four years now, working hard to become a lawyer rather than a driver for international lawyers. His visits home had become rarer as the years passed by.

But the jungle was in his blood.

Or perhaps the fetish master had secretly picked up a handful of hair from his head and had buried it under the same tree to which his first soul had been tied at his birth, thus binding him to the village forever.

Then, less than a year ago, he had come home to visit before the rain season and there had been great feasting and rejoicing. There would be a Bukut that year, his father had told him, the initiation ceremony that lasted two months during which the candidates had to survive alone in the jungle and receive the full approval of the spirits. The Bukut granted full rights to lands and citizenship to the youngsters –as well as the right to marry. The last Bukut had taken place twenty years ago, and there was no way of telling when –if ever- there would be another one.

Insa had argued with his father. The Bukut meant another knot in the rope that enslaved him to the jungle. He had an elder brother who had already been initiated, and his brother’s wife could still bear him an heir. They could manage without him. Besides, he could not lose so much time away from his job. And he was in his last semester at law school and soon would obtain his degree.

But he had promised that he would think about it.

A couple of days after that conversation, both his father and his brother had been killed by a vicious, blood-thirsty panther during a hunting party.

And so Insa had been forced to remain, lest the lands that had belonged to his line for centuries were lost for lack of an heir. He would not bring that shame and misery –and bad luck- upon the whole village, he had decided then, surrendering to the demands of kin and lineage and following the path that the trees had long ago ruled for him.

He had almost died during the Bukut.

After fifteen years in Dakar he was a stranger to the jungle, and the demons there fought him fiercely. He lacked the knowledge, the resilience, the ability to survive there –and perhaps even the will. 

One day, when barely three weeks of Bukut had passed, he lay dying in a grove of mango trees. Tired of his inability to catch his own prey, he had fought an old hyena over the rotting despoils of a gazelle’s carcase. Then, after three days of being sick, he had found himself delirious and dehydrated, and lacking even the strength to drag himself under the shade of the trees. It was not unheard of that some of the candidates died during the Bukut, but it seemed a cruel joke to Insa as he lay there wondering –with the detachment that only approaching death grants- which of the spirits that waited patiently for the unravelling of his souls would get to him first.

He shivered in the hot, humid morning, remembering how the tall, black-haired Bakin had approached him that day, shrouded in a golden light, claiming his dying body against the houseless spirits of the forest who had been stalking him, taunting him as he slowly passed away… The Bakin had taken care of Insa in his hut until he was strong enough to stand, and had looked after him from a distance while the Bukut lasted, providing him with food and water when he was unable to find it for himself.

Insa shook himself from those haunting memories and looked up suddenly, alerted by the uncanny silence that had blanketed the jungle’s morning chattering. He stopped digging on the mud and listened intently, feeling the tension brewing up.  

Suddenly, the jungle exploded in noise again, as if a shadow had passed, or a threat had been dispelled, and Insa concentrated again on his job, freeing the dikes of vegetation and stones and piling fresh mud on the weaker walls so the relentless sun would reinforce them. He worked efficiently, with the sure hand and caring dedication that had been passed from father to son, bending over the ancient structures with his ankles submerged in muddy water. When he stretched up again to take a brief rest he noticed a thin veil of mist hovering over the river, golden simmering tendrils threaded on the bushes and around a dugout canoe that bobbed lazily on the riverside, not a hundred paces from Insa’s dike.

With an apprehensive look around, Insa held his hoe tightly in his left hand and walked cautiously towards the apparently abandoned canoe which had not been there but a few moments ago. The golden mist was lifting slowly, or rather dissolving in the ordinary silver shroud of evaporation, as he approached the boat. He stood in silence for a moment, suspicious, trying to feel the presence around him. Satisfied that he was alone, he inched his way to the riverbank and bent forward to peek inside the canoe. The carved paddle lay in the bottom, as well as a long-handled shovel, but he could not hold back a soft gasp at the sight of an ejumba, the full face, cylindrical, buffalo horned mask that every initiated received after the Bukut. Made of  tightly woven vegetal fibre and topped with antelope or buffalo horns, the ejumba was worn by every initiated as proof of virility and full rights in the wild festival that followed the end of each Bukut and during which most of the new initiates found their wives and mated for life.

Almost unconsciously he extended reverent, hesitant fingers to touch the mask that had been denied to him after his ordeal. He had feared that he would not be granted all his full rights as an initiate because he had received help during the Bukut, but when he came out of the forest, last of the candidates and still unsteady upon his feet, the village fetish master had bowed before him as before one chosen, and had named him Wise-man-to-be, a higher status than that of a simple initiate, yet one which allowed him not marriage for some more years.

“Here! Help me with this!”

The low, beautiful voice caught Insa by surprise. He lost his balance, toppled over and fell in a heap inside the canoe. He looked up from his undignified position to see the tall Bakin standing over him with a faint air of amusement despite his blazing eyes, the wild dark mane and the strange glimmer that always surrounded him.

“Go to the sacred grove and set these on the fetish tree.”

Insa could hardly nod his assent as the tall spirit dropped an armful of fetish dolls quite carelessly into the canoe.

“When you are done return the canoe here. Do not touch the mask,” the Bakin warned, pushing the canoe from the river bank with a powerful kick.

Insa looked from the imposing forest spirit to the canoe, now loaded with the messenger dolls the villagers had left upon the guardian’s tray, and could only nod silently and obey, too stunned by the unexpected apparition to even think of whistling a call to his neighbours, who would surely be upstream working in their fields.

Grabbing the paddle with the clumsiness of a blind monkey, he finally managed to steer the canoe against the current and towards the sacred grove where the Kanolen, the festival to honour the dead, was held. 

                                              ~*~     ~*~

Father Nino entered his small chapel half-expecting to find the Bakin waiting there.

Although the Jola and Baïnouk people, the predominant ethnic groups in that part of the country, were mostly catholic, animism was still very strong there, in the deepest heart of the jungle. He had made it clear since his arrival that he was not there to force any of them into conversion, and apart from some misgivings from the fetish masters and recurring political struggles among village chiefs, who took him as an excuse, he had been ignored first -an unmarried old man who could not tend his own rice field- and only slowly accepted later as a useful member of the community.

He had decided to build the chapel to appease the bishop –who back in the capital worried for this old priest lost in the middle of the jungle without spiritual comfort- but also with the intent of creating a meeting place that served his neighbours’ needs.

He sketched a tired bow before the plain wooden cross and began his prayer.

The settlers had been enthusiastic at the idea of building up a great communal place, he remembered fondly, and the works had proceeded amidst general joy and much singing. Women had threaded the palm leaves gathered by children on the posts set up by the men, after the elders approved the layout following the indications of the fetish master, who first consulted the spirits of the forest.

Once the wattle structure stood up, the men had kneaded loam soil with water into a mass of malleable consistency, daubing the gaps of the wattle structure with it until it formed a solid wall.

The enthusiasm rose as the decorations began, after a new, thicker coating was spread over the first wall.

Father Nino had first seen the stranger they called the Bakin then; a tall, slender, pale figure of long black hair and extraordinarily bright eyes, who one day materialized gracefully out of the mists of the jungle, shrouded in an indescribable golden glimmer, reducing the whole settlement to an awed silence and sending the women hurrying in accorded motion to offer him the bunuk, the palm wine, together with other delicacies reserved to the mightiest spirits of the forest.

The strange man had joined them in the decorations, father Nino remembered fondly, casting an appreciative glance at the skilled high-relief carvings that adorned the walls inside as well as outside. First he had carved a mighty trunk, with a strong vine threaded around it, from which powerful branches spread to embrace the whole building. Once the mighty tree was brought to life under his talented hands, the tall man had helped the children carve animals, birds and plants, as well as guardian spirits of the jungle to take care of those under their protection.

As word spread, tourists had began flocking there, taking part as well in the decorations so now there was not an inch free of carvings, up to the thatched roof. Besides, it had become a word-to-mouth attraction, so now wealthy tourists would stop there for a while and leave money for the preservation of that work of art, money that was always welcome and always needed in the community.

The strange man had remained with them for several months at that time, living in a half abandoned hut away from the close knitted village and at the very edge of the jungle, as it suited his apparent nature as mediator between the village and the forest.

To the children and women he was a Bakin of the jungle, one of the friendlier, playful guardian spirits that dwelt in the groves and protected villages, at times playing tricks on villagers who did not pay due respect to them. They had tales about his visiting, once or twice in every generation, and they felt blessed by his presence.

The adult men respected and feared him, believing him to be one of the A Halawa, houseless spirits who occasionally took possession of innocent villagers, doomed to wander the forests until they redressed a terrible wrong committed during their previous existence.

The fetish masters had whisper red on occasion that he was an incarnation of Emitay, their almighty god, who came to the forest every other generation to see how his children behaved.

The Baïnouk, the most ancient ethnic group in the area, believed him to be the reincarnation of their mythical king, who had once cursed his people and doomed them to never ending wandering in exile and poverty because they had refused to follow him into war.

But all greeted him openly, offered him due respect and gifts and treated him as he preferred, as if he were one of them; and so they just pretended that they ignored his otherworldly nature as he shared his skill and grace with them for as long as it pleased him.

Father Nino, on his part, knew him to be a mystery; a troubled, doomed stranger who hid from guilt and remorse and buried himself away from civilization in a vain attempt at leaving behind the ghosts that haunted him. 

Yet he had seen enough in his long life to know that this man was no usual lost soul, no common criminal or cast away serving self imposed penance for actual or perceived failures. The blaze in his dark, deep eyes, or the glimmer that surrounded him he had never seen before, nor the wild, bottomless despair that at times seized the stranger and sent him howling in the night, the beautiful voice that was capable of charming the jungle into awed silence rising harsh and broken like the wail of a wounded animal.

Strange things happened around the Bakin, or rather around Malcolm Lauren, as he was known in the offices of Ministries and land-development companies in Dakar and Oussouye where Father Nino had found him as well, stern and self-assured, commanding hushed respect from secretaries and Ministers in his relentless defense of the land tenure system of the Jola. That was as well father Nino’s goal, to prevent another bloody conflict as the government insisted on destroying the network of traditional rights of the Jola people to their lands, the fight for the Jola’s property over their sources of fresh water underlying the conflict. So they had become allies and as close to friends as it could be said of such two lost people as they were.

Father Nino prayed not for the first time in deep gratefulness for such a powerful ally, be demon or angel, who appeared out of nothing when he was most needed, blessing the village with his sole presence and father Nino’s solitude with his intelligent conversation and, on occasion, with his light mood.

A sudden, sharp pain speared him through in the middle of his prayer, and he swayed and had to support himself holding convulsively the back of the closest bench. He gasped for air and clutched a hand against his chest, where his heart beat wildly, irregularly, painfully. Hunched there, in his own chapel, battling a shroud of darkness that lurked at the corner of his vision, father Nino panicked that he would die there, alone, without the chance of setting his papers right and telling Insa all he had to know of the ongoing processes that affected the village, as well as what was expected of him.

Hold on, not now, not yet, he encouraged himself, closing his eyes as he struggled to calm down the beatings of his heart, consciously pushing the pain to the back of his mind.

He could not tell how long it was before he was able to straighten up, drenched in cold sweat, trembling uncontrollably and with his vision blurred, but with enough energy, he deemed, to haul himself back to his hut and set things right before leaving.

Asking for help in the adjacent class was not an option, he knew, for as soon as they gathered that he was about to be called back to his creator, his  neighbours would insist on keeping him company and drink him, sing him and dance him into the other life. He still had many things to do before that, so with painful care he took one step, then another, and he slowly dragged himself outside, where he stood for a while against the heavy stone idol, fighting the rising tide of panic and the hurried rush of blood that thundered in his ears.

As his knees finally failed him and he slipped slowly to the ground, he noticed that all the fetish dolls had disappeared and the salver was empty. “They took the fetishes to the sacred groove,” he told himself, suddenly aware that it was his death what his neighbours had foreseen and had been getting ready for. As he lay on the ground, breathing laboriously and flickering in and out of consciousness, he had the faint impression that the stone idol had come to life and was bending over him, eyes that blazed wildly and a knowing, compassionate look on his beautiful face. Take me away, I am ready, father Nino desperately fought to say to that otherworldly presence, but suddenly his tongue seemed too big for his mouth and a moment after he knew no more.

                                              ~*~     ~*~

The priest was light as a feather, barely a bag of bones and hide, as Maglor lifted him from the ground and carried him back to his hut. In his long years he had seen many Edain depart beyond the circles of the world, so he recognized easily the song of a human fëa singing goodbye to Middle-earth…and the distress and longing that it always aroused in him, a Firstborn who had been for such long ages stranded in the shores of hither.

Seldom did he get attached to the Secondborn nowadays, but there were always a few of them in each generation that rekindled in him the feeling of kinship and softened his increasingly harsh feelings towards thoughtless, selfish humankind. Mostly those were uprooted souls who drifted across Middle-earth fighting lost battles and giving voice to those too weak to make themselves heard, without losing their hope in the process. Maglor flew to them, like a moth to a night fire, hoping to drink in their strength and find the source of their courage, their invulnerability against despair that he so badly needed. 

Father Nino had been one of those kin souls, he sighed as he laid the weakened body carefully on the mattress. He was a strong, resilient fighter who was never subdued by defeat and who was always up and back on the fight, searching for ways to improve his own contribution to those who were around him while never losing his optimism and his sense of humour.

Maglor checked the priest’s irregular heartbeat and pulse and silently wished the old man’s fëa to hold on for a while. “There are still a few things that we must settle down, my friend,” he whispered softly. After forcing some drops of fresh water through his throat and reassured that he was not dying immediately, Maglor left him to regain a bit of strength and looked around to make himself comfortable while he waited.

Rummaging inside an old cabinet he found one of what father Nino called “his miracles” –not as in performed by himself but rather the proof, in the priest’s eyes, of his creator’s grace poured down on him.

Every three or four months, father Nino loved to recount to willing ears, his best childhood friend used to send him a box of his best Barolo, no matter which part of the world father Nino was lost in at the moment. The red, strong, dense wine from the hills around Torino had unfailingly reached the Italian priest around the world, warming his soul with a piece of his homeland and a memory of others who loved him and remembered him. When his friend died, his eldest son, who had long ago taken charge of the family business, kept sending the precious wine to the old exile.

The other miracle was the money. Meager as the priest’s barely a thousand euros pension was, it represented a fortune in those forsaken, hunger, draught, war and Aids-wrecked lands of Africa. A fortune that traveled undisturbed from a bank in Rome to a bank in Dakar every month and then miraculously reached Oussouye’s communal bank intact, where it served to help attend the many needs of the several communities scattered in the area.

Evil engendered evil, of that Maglor was certain; but he had also seen in his long life that at times good also engendered good, and father Nino’s miracles stood encouraging testimony to it.

Unclothing the carefully kept crystal cup, Maglor sat at the priest’s battered desk, uncorked one of the remaining bottles, poured the crimson, dense liquid that smelled of oak and dark, cool stone cellars in long lost summers, raised his goblet and drank silently to his own ghosts.  

The sun was already hidden behind the tall canopy when the old man began to regain consciousness. He had been drifting in an out during the afternoon, and Maglor had tended him with dedication, forcing some more water inside him, keeping him as cool and comfortable as he could in his situation, and watching his dwindling constants.

“Welcome back, my friend,” he smiled warmly, sitting by his side and placing a comforting hand on the man’s shoulder. The man’s gaze was clear and alert, and Maglor knew that they did not have much time left.

“I thought I was already there…” the priest joked weakly and then coughed, breathless with the effort.

“Without taking your leave and saying your goodbyes?” Maglor smiled. “That would have been a terrible discourtesy,” he added, steadying the old man and helping him drink. “And there are a few things that I must consult with you.” He stood, walked to the table and came back with a handful of papers and the goblet. The priest smiled softly at the sight.

“There are…a few bottles left… for you…”

“You know that I appreciate the gesture in all its worth. Now listen, Nino, there are a few things that I want you to know.” Slowly and briefly, Maglor updated the dying priest about the difficult legal situation of his neighbours, and listened to what the old man had to tell him in turn. The government was intent on displacing all of them to the cities, to ensure free access to the fresh water that sustained the Jola and their thriving rice producing lands, the country’s granary. More than thirty years ago, the first assault on their rights upon fresh water had ended in bloodshed and bitterness, and Maglor knew that father Nino had spent his last ten years trying to prevent a second, even bloodier confrontation that seemed more unavoidable each passing year, as many external interests fought and pressed to gain access to the resource that ensured the life of the Jola.

"I have a team of lawyers working at national and regional level, and we are creating worldwide awareness. It will not happen again, you have my word,” Maglor said with deep sentiment, and was moved by the gratitude that showed in the old man’s face and surprised by how deeply it mattered to him.

“I…I must ask…something of you...” the old man managed in a voice that was a bit stronger, now that his immediate worries were apparently quieted. “Keep my place…” Maglor paused for a moment, uncertain. “They need you…they need someone… Only...a few weeks…Someone will come…”

“Did you send word?” The priest cast him a strange, curious look.

“Did I send word to you that I was dying?” he asked with a kind, frighteningly knowing smile. Maglor sighed and looked away, suddenly afraid that, with the clear-sightedness of death, the priest would uncover his secret, the truth oh his otherworldly nature. “Someone will come and take my place soon… but… please…keep the place…”

“I will,” Maglor finally gave in with a warm smile.

“And give Insa a hand,” father Nino continued between laborious intakes. “They need... one of them… to guide them… I have… Bring me… that folder…”

Silently, Maglor reached the leather folder gathering dust on a shelf, and the old man opened it and searched frantically.

“Here.” He extended pale, swollen fingers in a trembling hand to Maglor, who studied the document with curiosity. It was a bank account in a Dakar bank under Insa’s name. “Make sure he gets his…degree…They need him a lawyer…not a rice cultivator…”

“I intended to take care of that as well,” he smiled, amused and moved by the old man’s foresight, and his devotion to those lost people who had become his by choice. “Now let go of everything, let me look after you, friend Nino. Is there anything that you… wished to… keep with you?” he asked, suddenly hesitant. The old man gave him a bright, peaceful smile, and searched under his sweated shirt to show him a wooden cross that had been around his neck for fifty years now.

“This is all that I need. I am ready.”

Impressed and somewhat reassured by the strength of the old man’s faith, Maglor nodded.

“Let us go, then,” he said in his deep, otherworldly voice, and bending down he picked him up again and carried him effortlessly outside. He caught sight of furtive glances stolen through quickly closed window curtains and doors in the neighbouring huts as he walked in his steady, easy pace towards the river. Surely Insa had sent word across the jungle, so they would not be disturbed.

Placing the dying man as comfortably as he could in the bottom of the dugout canoe that Insa had obediently left at the same place, Maglor picked up the paddle and with a few, powerful strokes he pushed themselves in the middle of the river and allowed the current lead them closer to the ocean.

When they finally reached their destination the old man’s breathing was laborious and irregular, but he smiled gratefully as Maglor laid him to rest against the trunk of a powerful, solitary baobab that topped a hill which overlooked the mangrove-lined beach and the ocean –a favourite haunting of the priest’s.

“Thank you,” the old priest sighed.

“I know that you like looking west,” Maglor whispered in a tight voice. Watching Arien go down beyond the western edge of the world hurt him more each passing ennin, and he hid from the soughing song of the ocean as much as he could.

“And I know that it pains you,” the priest whispered gratefully after a long pause, searching with a trembling hand that Maglor met and clasped tightly. Too troubled for words, he raised his powerful voice in a song that he expected would comfort his dying friend. Only when he turned to look at him he realized that he had sung in Quenya; a sad, hopeless lament that he had composed long ago, when he was still an Exile among exiles. The priest’s face was serene and peaceful, as if all pain had been lifted from him and only his strong faith –which was certainty - sustained him.

“You are forgiven, Malcolm,” he said in a voice that sounded unexpectedly strong.

“What?” Caught by surprise, Maglor pierced his mortal friend with the blazing gaze of a firstborn who had seen the Light before the light.

“I do not know who, or what kind of creature you are, or what your true name is…or what evil deed you once committed, but this I can tell you: you are a good being…and your creator has already forgiven you…” Maglor could not hold back a sarcastic, bitter laugh.

“How would you know, priest?” he asked harshly. “You are but a man, comforted by your faith and too short-lived to even fathom things that are beyond your mortal measure…”

“I know of pain, and hate, and sin and evil...and living hells.” Where the dying man had found his strength Maglor could never guess, surprised as father Nino met his blazing gaze steadily and admonished him. “And I know of guilt, and shame, and forgiveness and redemption…and the deep mysteries of creation. A creator capable of bringing to life a being of light like yourself...cannot fail to take your grief…and shame…and remorse…and turn them into blessing and forgiveness…no matter your deeds,” he stopped to catch his breath, but Maglor was too stunned to interrupt him. “Never doubt that you are forgiven and beloved, child, for your soul shines brightly,” he sighed now faintly. “I will pray that you finally find your way home…and that we meet again…”

Tightening his clasp on the weakened hand, and too moved for words, Maglor sang again, the mightiest of singers that were ever heard in these mortal shores, and he sang beautifully of the making of the stars and the coming of lords that brought love and light and wisdom to the lands, and the hope that lay in the growing things, in the music of the waters and the blowing of the winds. As he sang, the birds remained still and the beasts stopped in their tracks, and even Arien faltered in her trail, all caught under the spell of that otherworldly voice that rose in desperate plea.

“Lie me down,” the old priest pleaded weakly, after the last ray of Arien sent a soft caress to his wan face before disappearing beyond the brim of the ocean, leaving behind her green trail. Maglor complied in silence, easing him to his side, his head pointing south and his face looking east, the home of the Sun, after the manner of the Jola people.

“God bless you, my friend,” father Nino murmured, and then slowly, peacefully, he passed away; his last heartbeat given to the land that had fed him in the last years, his hand held by a friend’s and his last breath blowing in blessing towards the hamlet that had sheltered him.

Maglor did not stop singing as he dug under the huge, sacred baobab he had chosen as father Nino’s guardian. Hot tears streamed down his face as he carefully laid the shrunken, light body to rest under the old tree. When he straightened up and looked to the darkening sky for comfort, he caught a glimpse of his father’s Silmaril sailing closer than ever and brighter than Maglor had seen it for a long time. With a sad smile he raised his burnt hand in greeting, comforted by the priest’s hope and taking Eärendil’s presence for a confirmation of his friend’s last words. Perhaps his long fight would one day reach a blessed end.

The hollow trunks that served as drums began to echo steadily in the jungle. The Kanolen had begun; father Nino’s friends and neighbours were celebrating his passing with the honors and cheerful carousing reserved to important villagers, Maglor realized with satisfaction as he readied himself to join them. It could not be otherwise –he reasoned as he reached his canoe and pushed the mighty ejumba over his head. It was not every day that a Bakin of the forest came to lead a villager to the other world.

A Bakin of the forest danced in the sacred grove of the Jola that whole night in the Kanolen held to honour father Nino. Jumping and circling, singing and howling and pouring blessings over that people, he led the revelry with a wild abandon that was enthralling and contagious. The elders, together with the initiates, howled and sang and danced as well until the racket was so mighty that they were sure that the spirits of the other world would not fail to hear them and greet father Nino as he deserved. They also drank the sacred bunuk until they lost consciousness and fell happily in the realm of dreams, sure that, with the Bakin among them, the fetish dolls dancing on the trees in that sacred grove would carry their message to their loved ones even faster than with the help of father Nino’s soul, and they would get answers to their questions that very same night.

Only Insa was awake when the sun rose. Unable to get himself duly inebriated, he kept watch for the whole night in more alertness than he had wished for. Now he sat beside the dying fire while his neighbours slept peacefully, unawares of the day or the morning chores. With a sigh he stood up and took the path that led uphill, following the tracks of the Bakin, who had left them not long ago.

The first rays of the new day were warming his back as he reached the top of the hill. The glowing seemed to pool around the old baobab, and Insa inched his way closer. The Bakin lay there, bathed in that golden glimmer that at times seeped from him, his head resting on a long mound of freshly removed soil toppled with a rough, makeshift wooden cross. That was father Nino’s resting place, Insa knew, bending to get a closer sight of the sleeping, tear streaked face of the Bakin. Malcolm, he told himself, remembering that the Bakin was a man as well, and one who had lost a dear friend.

The ejumba lay beside him, and Insa took it and sat at the other side of the grave, toying distractedly with its mighty horns while his thoughts strayed beyond the clear, sapphire horizon, wondering about his uncertain future, hoping that his father’s answer would reach him soon from the other world.

“You can keep it, it is for you.”

The beautiful, if somewhat harsh voice startled him again. He looked around to see that the Bakin was awake, craning his neck to look at him with that indefinable, distant but fond expression of his. “And you will get your degree, so you can defend the village legally. We will make the necessary arrangements because it was his last will, so I will remain here until I make sure that everything is settled,” he added warningly, patting the mound on which his head was resting. With the agility of a wild cat he then stood up. “Goodbye, my friend, keep good care of the land. This will become the new sacred grove of the village, and I will come here to find my peace,” he whispered then to the mound. “Come, Insa, there are many things that we must discuss; I am terribly hungry…and with a mighty headache,” he groaned, shaking his head carefully and narrowing his bright eyes in displeasure. “That bunuk is a killer…”

Insa shook his head in disbelief as the tall, lean Bakin disappeared down the hill. He looked at the ejumba on his hands and then at the rather small mound that marked father Nino’s tomb. He looked up to see the mighty, imposing silhouette of the tall baobab towering over him. A white egret sat on a branch not far from him, and as he looked at it in wonder, for egrets seldom strayed away from the waters, it released a deep, urging screech before extending its wings and flying downhill to the beach.

After a short gaping Insa broke in a fit of relieved, accepting laughter; finally understanding that his life had changed indeed but that its course was still in his hands. He was a Wise-to-be, and he had the friendship of the Bakin. All he had to do was finally assuming his responsibilities and acting accordingly. The fate of the hamlet depended heavily on him, and he could not cower back in fear of tradition. With a grateful chuckle he patted the priest’s tomb and started after the Bakin, the treasured mask in his hand, curious to hear what the tall spirit’s plans were.

The white egret returned later and began to build its nest on a branch that stretched over the grave.

To the uncle who taught me to love the land. 

A/N

Va’ffan... Italian for What the…

“Bon jour, pére Nino.” Good morning, father Nino. French is official language in Senegal together with local dialects.

Kassoumay: dialect greeting of the Jola of Low Casamance.

Bakin: a spirit, in Jola animism.

Maglor –Makalaure- naming himself “Malcolm Lauren” first happens in “A chance-meeting” 

Celeborn goes home for the New Year’s Eve. With footnotes. In two parts, to celebrate Redheredh’s 2007 and 2008 unbirthday.

Oaks are dying across the world.

Under the Stars, Part 1.

Last day of December, 2005. Somewhere inside the Strictly Protected Area (SPA); Bialowieska Forest, eastern Poland.

A cold breeze sleeked the lynx’s greyish fur. With slow and deliberate movements it sat back, turned its well-formed head and started to lick the snowflakes coating its shoulder with deceptive concentration. Its pointed, sensitive ears twisted briefly at the almost inaudible sound of newly fallen snow crunched by cautious feet. The lynx stopped its grooming and pierced the vanishing darkness with amber, glinting eyes.

There it was, coming up the hill in its calm stride, the grey-haired creature it had glimpsed earlier that night down in the peat bog; a creature that walked on its hind legs but behaved not like the other two-legs that haunted the forest.

The lynx watched it intently. It climbed the steep slope easily, leaving no marks, unlike the rest of its kin. Its mane floated freely in the cold air and its eyes glittered even from that distance. Unsettled by the proximity of this unfamiliar being, the lynx pummeled the spongy snow with a large, blood-stained paw and looked around nervously, its powerful muscles tense, ready to leap and flee at need.

The creature stopped by the two tall holly trees that stood guard over the sleeping herds of birches, alders, lime trees and old oaks that populated that deepest glade in the forest. It stood there for a while and looked around, resting a hand that was clawless on the trunk of the tallest tree, which thrummed in contented welcome. Satisfied that the trees knew the newcomer and greeted it, the lynx let escape a bored yawn that conveyed more curiosity than wariness and turned its attention back to its claws, picking at the small pieces of bloodied fat and meat stuck between the sharp nails. Tough it would not look straight into the stranger’s grey eyes, from time to time the lynx cast sidelong glances, studying the furless face that was so similar to those of the humans that stalked the forest –and yet so different.

A half-breed, the lynx decided, reminded of other strange, aberrant creatures that it had seen at times, born in the wrong season, or with the wrong number of limbs, or after a wrong mating. Mostly harmless, it considered, since it did not sound like human, nor moved or smell like one nor, more importantly, generally “felt” like those ungainly yet powerful two-limbs that ruled the forest and its creatures. This one moved silently and carried a grief and a yearning that reminded the lynx of a solitary male during the mating season.

Perhaps it was the snow, which had started to fall down again copiously; perhaps the drowsiness caused by eating almost a whole roe buck on his own after surviving several days on small rodents; perhaps the fact that its attention was caught by the strange creature, who had climbed the tallest holly tree with more grace than could be expected from his race, but the lynx missed the muffled sound of an engine and the hushed voices of the two-legs that swarmed out of their vehicle and had almost reached the top of the snow covered hill at its back.

Alerted by an extemporaneous imprecation of the approaching hunters, the lynx tensed to attention and prepared to flee. Instinctively, it let escape a warning cry followed by a growl addressed to the strange creature, who stood on the branches of the holly tree still unawares of the danger that scrambled towards them.

That merciful gesture cost the lynx what little advantage it had. The leading two-leg heard it as well and cried to the others, pointing at the -until then- invisible feline. With unbelievable speed and agility, the ungainly creatures fanned out and encircled the beast in a living ring. Panicking, the lynx ran uphill, vaguely aware that the dense pine-covered slopes were too far out of reach.

****

Jolted by the warning call of the lynx, Celeborn looked back in time to see a cloud of coloured parkas chasing after the fleeing beast, a flash of silver on the white snow. A wave of rage took over him as he jumped from the tree and ran after them. He could feel the lynx’s fear and hear the trees’ sympathetic whining while the group of men cornered the frightened beast. Running as fast as he could over fresh snow, Celeborn did not stop to consider what he could do against half a dozen armed men. He only knew that he would not allow such a beautiful creature to be killed there, right in the middle of the most protected glade of that ancient forest in which he had once, long ago, ruled.

Bitter bile surged up his throat as he saw one of the men lift an automatic gun to his face and aim at the defenseless cat, which pressed its lean body against the lowest branch of a naked oak in a desperate attempt at becoming invisible.

“No!”

The dry sound of the shot muffled his cry. The lynx jerked and for a moment remained in place. Then it fell heavily and the waiting men closed in around it and hid it from Celeborn’s sight.

“What do you think you are doing?” His voice came out hoarse with anger and sorrow as he hurried towards them, overwhelmed by guilt. “Leave it alone!” he cried then, seeing that the hunters seemed busy over the fallen creature and fearing that they would dare skin it where it lay.

One of the hunters turned his head brusquely at the sound of his voice and spotted him. He stood up nimbly and lifted a hand. Celeborn feared that it might be raising a weapon and braced for the confrontation, but he did not stop. Instead of shooting, the hand pulled back a heavy hood and a pair of protective sunglasses, revealing a long, blond, shining mane and blue-grey eyes in a beautiful face alight in a wonderful smile of recognition.

“Silvertree! When did you arrive?” she cried in a deep, husky voice that sent shivers down his spine.

****

“…So you thought we were poachers and pretended to confront us with your bare hands?”

Celeborn did not mind the softly mocking tone in her voice. After introducing him to the group of researchers and park rangers that accompanied her in that mission, Maria Grodinski, the chief scientist in Bialowieska National Park, had left her companions to fix the tracking tool on the deeply asleep lynx and had driven Celeborn to her office. They were now enjoying a mug of warm tea while they checked the last figures in biodiversity conservation in the forest.

“What would you have done, had we truly been a gang of Belorrusian fur traders?”

“I might have tried to disarm you with my charming smile…” She reminded him so much of his wife that flirting came out naturally to him, even when it had been years -two, this time- since they had last seen each other.

“It might have worked…with some of us,” she acknowledged with a short laugh. “But it was reckless,” she added more gravely, placing a loose strand of golden silk behind an ear Celeborn wouldn’t have been surprised to discover elegantly pointed. “We are so close to the border, and the number of incursions has increased in the past months…”

“And here I thought that natural furs were old fashioned,” he sighed. “How are your oaks?” he asked then while she put away the reports that they had been studying. She turned around with a file in her hand and cast him a sharp, almost reproving look.

“Have you seen Thomas?”

“Not yet…I arrived yesterday and…”

“Then he will surely tell you this evening. You will have dinner with us, of course… wait a moment,” she begged, as she hurried to answer a phone that rang persistently in another office.

Celeborn listened to her deep voice speaking in her sweet, hurried Polish for a moment and then cast a curious look around. The large desk was covered in documents, files, reports and data sheets. The familiar logo in a leaflet that stuck out from under a pile of scientific publications caught his attention. He fished it out carefully and read it with interest; then let escape a deep sigh and returned it to its hiding place.

“I am sorry, I intended to have lunch with you, but the guys in the Committee need the precise figures for next year’s budget today and they…” she cast him an apologetic look from the door. Celeborn waved his long hand in dismissal.

“Do not worry. I will find a way to entertain myself. Do you happen to have a detailed map of the Strictly Protected Area? I was looking for a particular pond but I got lost…”

“I’ll give you something better!” She turned and called to someone behind her shoulder. “Jerzy, look, I found you a playmate!” Celeborn heard a chair dragged heavily and steady, firm steps. A moment later a blond head peered inside Maria’s office. A young ranger cast him a quizzical look then scowled at her. She shook her head.

“Seriously! I bet my friend Silvertree here will be thrilled to see all your satellite pics and maps, he is looking for a particular pond in the SPA…” she winked at Celeborn with a mischievous smile. “Jerzy knows how many leaves our trees lose every autumn… and how many beetles live on each tree. The guys say that he even names them…”

“Come on, Maria!” the young forester sounded aggravated but she flashed him one of her beautiful smiles.

“Be good to my friend, Jerzy, will you?” she pleaded. “You can order lunch from the cafeteria until half past noon. I’ll be back at two at the latest…”

“Fine, fine, I will take care, now go!” the young man finally gave in with faked annoyance.

“Do not go anywhere,” she warned Celeborn, picking her parka from the cloth rack. “You will help me cook dinner and then you can tell me where you have been all this time… behave, Jerzy!” she added, patting him fondly as she left. Celeborn had to chuckle inwardly at the smitten expression on the young forester’s face as he continued to look at the main door after it closed behind her. Maria’s ability for charming her co-workers, allies, subordinates and even enemies into doing what suited her also reminded him of his wife.

“So what are you looking for, Mr. Silvertree?”

Three hours later the two of them leant over the spacious table in the meeting room, littered with satellite pics of the area, historical series of vegetation maps, and the remains of venison sandwiches. The young park ranger turned out to be a shrewd, intelligent post graduate in forestry. He kept good track of the most subtle changes in the forest mass in the whole park, and his discoveries left little room for hope. Celeborn straightened back on the chair and looked out of the window, holding the mug of hot tea between his hands.

“These percentages are truly worrying… I wonder why I do not see them in the annual reports…” he said.

“They would ruin the general effect,” the young scientist shrugged with humorous bitterness. “I am not saying that Maria is lying to the committee…she’s doing a fantastic job here,” he hurried to explain, perhaps remembering that the calm, intelligent man who had listened with deep interest to his theories for long hours was, after all, a good friend of his boss. Celeborn smiled gently and urged him with a soft nod, lifting his mug to his lips to disguise his amusement while the young scientist squirmed on his chair.

“But?”

“She is doing a great job,” the young man insisted. “She has managed to get us supplementary funding, and even fuel for our vehicles… and we have a small group of armed guys patrolling the border…We are doing what we are being asked to do,” he admitted tiredly, at last meeting Celeborn’s steady gaze. “But the fact is that the density of the forest canopy continues to thin out by the year, the numbers in each and every species are decaying and the forest is slowly but steadily receding… and we still don’t know why…”

“Why do I have the feeling that you have a reasonable guess?”

The young scientist shrugged. After a brief hesitation he shuffled the pile of maps and aerial pictures and then brought out one. “Look at this,” he suggested.

Celeborn held it in his hand and could not hold back a sigh. From the air, the shape of his forest came out painfully clear. He could see the area between the two rivers, the Naith, and the hill upon which, he knew, ages ago Caras Galadhon had stood.

“…taken this spring. Now look at this one, only two springs ago.” The youngster was handing him another picture and he compared the two.

And then frowned.

“And this one was taken five years ago, when I first came here. I was working with Dr. Grodinski then…”

Celeborn met the glum, if somehow triumphant gaze of the young scientist. The aerial pictures showed a strange discoloration spreading steadily, year after year, across the top of the oak woods.

“What is that?”

“In my humble opinion, and I do not have yet enough data to sustain my claim, so that is why she will not hear of it officially, it is a mix of factors, but mostly contamination…”

“Water?” Suddenly, Celeborn was deeply worried. If the only place in that strange world that he still somehow could call home was in danger, it meant that everything else was in danger and perhaps there was no hope for him… for them…

“The atmosphere. I suspect that the increased amount of ultra violet radiation, together with air pollution, is causing deeper changes than those we normally see...and measure, so our data cannot be consolidated to prove my… our theory as accurately as would be needed. We suspect that there is a deep change going on in the chemical balance at top canopy level that is affecting mainly the oaks…for now, but that could be extending to other species as the oaks succumb to it and the decrease in their numbers affects the whole ecology of the forest floor…We have already seen that certain species that grow on the border of the forest line are succumbing due to excessive radiation as well. This thinning out also increases the amount of radiation reaching other trees used to being more protected and is causing a chain effect of unpredictable consequences…”

Celeborn interrupted him. “You are working with  Dr. Thomas Grodinski!” Suddenly, it all made sense. The young ranger looked away.

“I used to, but then he…she…” His gesture was clear enough, and Celeborn nodded. He was familiar enough with his friends’ differing approaches to the same field of research to guess what had happened.

“And what are you doing now?”

“I am leading the tracking-tool program for felines,” the young scientist admitted a bit reluctantly. "The park hired me on a full-time contract and offered me a grant for my research, but I still help Thomas in my spare time,” he added eagerly. “I expect to complete my thesis in one more year… and then I would like to devote more time to those canopies. No one has ever thought of studying the ecology of the high canopy of oaken woods and I…”

“Except for Thomas Grodinski,” Celeborn thought sadly, thinking of his friend, and the strange expression he had glimpsed in Maria’s face when he had asked about their oaks, and the leaflet that he had found half-hidden under her papers…

“So what were you exactly looking for, Mr Silvertree?” The young rangers’ mildly chagrined voice brought Celeborn from his thoughts. “We have spent four hours with my speculations and Maria said that you were looking for something…”

“I could manage with this map, if you could lend it to me...I will return it to Maria after the New Year. I am looking for a particular pond at the bottom of a particular ravine…”

“Sure, keep it.” The ranger handed him the aerial picture that had so stricken him and a detailed map of the central part of the SPA, The Glade, the heart of Bialowieska Forest where the oldest trees grew. “I do not know about ponds,” he added thoughtfully. “There are bogs and swamps, and then the lake…but perhaps in this area…”

They were again bent over the maps when the front door opened.

“So you’re still here! I told you would have a great time, didn’t I?” Maria quipped, collapsing on the chair closest to the door. Despite her apparent good humour, Celeborn knew that she was trying to hide her disappointment. 

“It was very instructive,” he admitted. “Thank you very much for all the information, Jerzy,” he added, helping the young scientist put away his maps and charts. “I will return the maps to Maria…”

“Oh, you can keep them. I have more copies….”

“Good boy,” she interjected, nodding to her young colleague with a sad expression on her beautiful grey eyes. “Perhaps you can talk him into financing your hot-air balloon thing as well… Dr. Silvertree is one of the greatest donors to Bialowieska Foundation, I forgot to mention...” she added with a mischievous grin, while the boy gaped as a fish that leapt out of the water.

“I... no, you… but, Dr. Silvertree, I…”

“Go home, or to your New Year’s Eve party, Jerzy. Dr. Silvertree will be here next year… and if he is not, I will tell you how to find him!”

“I will be thrilled to hear about your hot-air balloon device,” Celeborn promised seriously, though he could not stop a small smile from tugging at the corners of his lips at the expectant look in the young scientist’s eyes.

“I will send the designs to you! And do not mind the budget, it can be made for much less, but we thought…”

“Happy New Year, Jerzy!” she laughed, and cast him a pointed look. With a nervous shake of hands Jerzy finally took his leave and walked away, banging the front door behind him in his excitement.

“A hot-air balloon?”

She shrugged and met not his amused glance. “Surely he told you about that high canopy research project he had with Thomas… and he will be needing the money, since the tracking tool program will receive no more funding…” she confessed in a low, bitter voice. Celeborn extended a long hand and pressed hers comfortingly. He could feel that something had happened at that meeting, something that had dampened her light and her hope. He waited in silence. It always worked.

“They have reached an agreement with the Belorrusian authorities, and now they say that the problem is over,” she continued in a scornful, outraged manner a moment after. “They say the Belorrusians will control their side of the forest and in sign of good faith we must pull out our armed patrols… and since there are going to be no more poachers –they say- there is no pressing need for tracking the felines, since they are not going anywhere…Oh, Silvertree, I am so angry!” 

He nodded in sympathy. Politics and the short-term pressing needs of management always caused that even intelligent top ranking officers were quick to believe that saying was the same as happening. Against that, even his all-powerful foundation was almosthelpless.

“I am so looking forward to leaving this all behind!” she snapped, hitting the desk and growling in impotence.

“Leave?” 

She nodded briefly and sighed, again not meeting his concerned eyes. Instead, she stood and began putting out the lights and turning off computers. “Come, let’s go! We can talk while I cook!”

It was the most domestic afternoon that Celeborn could recall in quite a long time. He sat at the large table in the spacious kitchen in his friends’ wooden cabin and watched while Maria prepared the pierogi, the tasty dumplings filled with a mix of farmer’s cheese, fried onion and mushrooms that they would eat as first course, after the soup. They joked, and exchanged small talk, and then Celeborn prepared the venison and placed it in the oven while she opened a bottle of white wine and put a couple of crystal goblets and a plate of pickles on the table and smiled softly at him.

“To the Old Year,” she toasted, clinking her goblet with his. “Because it brought you back to us when most welcome!”

“I am but a phone call away from my friends when they need me,” Celeborn scolded her mildly.

“I know, but at times one does not know what she is needing…until it pops out of thin air before herself… you looked like a leszi today in The Glade… Like one of those elf lords in the old tales, the lord of the forest protecting his creatures…”

Celeborn chuckled and raised again his glass to hide his emotion. “So what is that story about leaving?” he asked, while she toyed with her drink.

“I have been offered a research grant at Forest Research, in Scotland,” she admitted with a shy, proud smile. “They want me to manage a new program in the Upland Forest preservation strategy….”

“Congratulations! Actually, I saw their brochure on your desk this morning… and you featured there as resident researcher….Something to do with oaks, I suspect?”

She looked away and sighed. “Yes. And among other things I will be part of a team led by Cyrus Feldman, the geoscientist…” Celeborn nodded quietly to indicate that he was familiar with the name. “He is leading a worldwide research on the Sudden Oak Death…”

“I thought it was agreed that it was directly caused by a fungus, the Phytophthora…”

“Ramorum… yes, but there is a research being conducted to learn more of its behaviour under natural conditions, and how it adapted so efficiently to such a varied range of conditions…”

“And what does Thomas say to this?” Celeborn’s tone was cautious, but not enough.

“He says nothing.” Suddenly her eyes flashed and her voice froze to a coldness that made him shiver. “But I suspect that he will be glad to talk to you, since you seem to be of his opinion,” she snapped, releasing an exasperated sigh. “You too think that I should remain here and help protect this forest, rather than researching a wider occurrence and caring for other forests around the world, don’t you?” she accused, challenging him with glaring eyes that reflected deep grief and stern determination.

Taken aback by a sudden pain that flared with the freshness of a newly inflicted wound, Celeborn sat back and shook his head in bewilderment, fighting to control a sudden burst of feelings and memories that bubbled out to the surface as a mountain creek after a quick and unexpected thaw.

“That is unfair, Maria, you…”

“It is,” she acknowledged sadly. “But it is how things go.” She wiped her eyes quickly and shrugged. “I wished that he would accuse me of stealing his research, but he says nothing. I managed to obtain a position as assistant professor for him…but he wouldn’t even answer them,” she whispered. It broke Celeborn’s heart to see the fear underlying her determination and hear her silent cry for support. It also reminded him, painfully, of another parting that had happened ages ago.

He shook himself from the contemplation of a guilt that at times took also the form of bitter regret and untamed resentment. These are Maria and Thomas! he berated himself. Their problems are not your own, they are not facing a separation beyond time and space, or fighting the soul-splitting clash of duties and loyalties that you bore for all your life, that made you remain here while your wife sailed away! “I do not see Thomas as an assistant professor at Saint Andrews…” he half-joked, trying to enliven the mood.

“And I do not see us apart,” she sighed softly. “I believe the venison is ready, what do you think?”

Thomas arrived while they were laying the table. He strode into the kitchen still shaking newly fallen snowflakes from his wild mane and he was delighted to find Celeborn there. All in all it was a happy meeting of good old friends. On unspoken accord, none of them brought up the subject of oaks and they allowed themselves to enjoy a merry celebration.

By midnight they had laughed at shared memories, and had toasted several times to the Old Year and the New one, and to lasting friendships and healthy forests, and had downed two bottles of strong, red wine. At that point, Thomas decided that it was time for singing.

“May love last longer than oak woods,” he declaimed darkly and then embarked in a sad, glum song of a man who waited beyond death for his beloved to return. Even without the ever present violin, it had the tragic, melancholy Polish mood. Thomas’ tenor rang full of sentiment as he unfolded the sad story of faith betrayed and hopeless wait until the man became a wraith that haunted the oak woods.

“Very appropriate, my husband,” Maria observed coldly, a deep frown obscuring her beautiful face. “Couldn’t you hold back your resentment before our guest?”

“He is not a guest, he is a brother!” Thomas retorted in a voice that was too loud. “A man needs not hide his bleeding heart, does he, Silvertree?” he asked, lifting his glass and drinking again. “Wine,” he spat in contempt, putting away the goblet. “That is for poets and softies! For the pain that is soul-consuming you need vodka, my brother!” he decided, dragging his chair back and stumbling towards the kitchen. “I’ll show you what I have been keeping…”

“I am sorry,” Maria whispered. “Let him drink until he falls asleep. You know where the guest room is. We can talk in the morning,” she added, leaning forth to place a soft kiss on Celeborn’s cheek and walking away briskly towards their room upstairs.

“Here it is! Where is Maria?” Thomas had returned with three glasses in one hand and a bottle in the other.

“She said she was tired, she went to sleep…”

Thomas cast a regretful look towards the stairs and shook his head. “Well, then it is the two of us, my friend. Come, let us sit by the fire…”

Celeborn sat on one of the comfortable armchairs and extended his hands towards the heartwarming flames while his friend dragged a low table and placed bottle and glasses before them.

“Pure Bison Grass Vodka,” he said, handing Celeborn a small glass filled to the brim with the pale, slightly golden liquid. “Not that Zubrovka commercial stuff. Home made in a century old distillery and flavoured with grass pulled out under the noses of Bialowieska park rangers in dark moonless nights,” he chuckled raising his glass. “To us.”

“To us.” Celeborn drank down in one long swig and closed his eyes to better appreciate the deep tang of the forest. Bison Grass Vodka was a century old tradition that hailed back to the Middle Ages. A commercial brand had usurped the name and only part of the ancient recipe, but Thomas always managed to obtain the authentic stuff, home distilled and mixed by the few remnants of the old foresters who had patrolled Bialowieska in the name of the old king even under the Communist rule. With a satisfied sigh, Celeborn placed the glass on the table and looked at his friend. Thomas was studying his glass with a lost, distant look on his eyes.

“You know that British writer who said that drinking Zubrovka was as delightful as listening to music in the moonlight?” he spat. “Shit. Delightful. Ha! True Bison vodka is like drinking the forest, the cruel spirits of the bogs and the wild heart of the bison, and the twisted souls of the oldest trees deep in the glade…you have seen them Silvertree…Delightful! What did he know, eh?” He lifted the bottle and poured another round. “To the trees,” he said, raising his glass towards Celeborn. “May their hearts live longer than the love of a woman…”

“To the trees.” Celeborn downed the second glass and placed it upside down on the table before him. Thomas eyed it skeptically and then shrugged.

“You are out of shape,” he commented, pouring another shot for himself and then sitting back and closing his eyes. For a while, they listened to the clacking of the flames in the hearth.

“She is leaving, Silvertree, she is giving up and abandoning me...”

Celeborn squirmed in his armchair remembering the leaflet on Maria’s desk and the well-known logo on it. He could not tell Thomas that it was one of his foundations hiring his wife, luring her outside the forest that was her life, and that of her husband, the forest that had taught them all they knew and had nurtured their love. It was one of his foundations that had capitalized on her hunger for knowledge and her yearning for the wide world, opening the doors for her while Thomas remained behind, an old oak that was firmly rooted to the land, an old oak who gathered news from birds and winds and raindrops and beetles, and who felt the changes in its roots.

“Maria was never a tree…” he said softly, almost unwillingly. He was surprised to see his friend nod sadly, without opening his eyes.

“She is a bird, I know, but until now she had been contented in this forest…”

“She will return, Thomas, it will be a matter of time…” The tall man opened an eye and shook his head dejectedly.

“Once she leaves Bialowieska, she will not return. There will always be another forest to know, new trees to meet…new things to learn… she will never return, I know that. If only she had learnt to hear their voices….”

“Their voices?”

“The oaks are dying, Silvertree. I know they are dying across the world, but it is not because of a fungus, mark my words! You can only learn the true extent of what is going on if you sit still and listen to them for enough time…”

Alert, Celeborn tensed on his armchair. “What do you mean,” he inquired softly. The big man cast him an amused glance.

“You taught me how to listen to the trees and the forest, and how to let let them guide me to the root of their ailments,” he insisted. “A decade ago the tanners reported a change in the quality of oak bark. No one takes tanners seriously, disgusting trade of theirs, but I listened to them and began studying oak bark and its ecology…and that led me to the canopy. Did you know that up there at twenty something meters over the ground there is a whole new ecosystem that no one cares to research because it is so difficult to reach up there?” He snorted derisively and extended his long legs. “I had to design a device lifted by a hot-air balloon for my first canopy research and almost got myself killed!” He chuckled bitterly and stretched to place another log on the fire. The flames played games on his animated features, lending a reddish tinge to his long, unkempt mane. He looked more like an old, crazy tramp than a respected scientist with two doctorate degrees, but Celeborn knew him well and just nodded and waited.

“Up there is where the delicate chemical balance of the trees takes place, that basic, unimportant service that they perform for us unmarked, just purifying our air,” Thomas continued with an ironic sneer. “Air pollution, climate warming and increased ultra violet radiation are changing the nature and characteristics of high canopy populations, and this is affecting the delicate balance of chemical processes… and weakening the trees and the entire system that they support, from bacteria to insects to birds…That affects the quality and amount of chemical exchanges and secretions, and also the quality of the soil, the ties that keep the land packed together, the quality of the river beds and the waters, and the vegetal cover and the very soil that sustains life…not to mention rain patterns. And then someone finds that damned Phytophthora eating up weakened oak woods and everybody goes crazy about a fungus that just happened to be there, and suddenly everybody goes spending millions in studying a poor soldier while the armies march along unimpeded…”

This time Celeborn did not refuse another shot of the strong spirit. He knew the bleak prospects only too well, but he still found it hard to accept that decay was affecting his forest as well. Thomas continued with his aggravated speech. “And my wife will go to a shiny old university and pretend that she will achieve something so very important… banning imports of Rhododendrons! And when they find out that forests continue to fade, wounded by hundred different ailments… what will she do then, eh?he almost sobbed, raising his glass towards Celeborn.

“And what would you do, Thomas?” Celeborn demanded softly after they drank in glum silence. “It has happened before, with drownings and ice ages and climate changes, it is not the first time and…” he stopped short, mindful that he could not say for sure this wouldn’t be the last time.

“Well, I don’t want it to happen in my lifetime,” the big man sighed sadly. “I just want to protect this forest, and they will not let me,” he complained bitterly. “They would not give me the funds, arguing that my research was not well founded…” he chuckled angrily. “Even my wife, can you believe that? She said that I had no data to sustain my claims -how could I when they would not give me a single euro?- and thus she denied me the funds…she said that all I did was wandering the forests listening to old men and coming up with crazy theories and making “politics”…she has become a bureaucrat, Silvertree, can you believe that?”

Celeborn sighed. He remembered Thomas as a young graduate, a brilliant botanist and chemist who loved the forest passionately and paid attention to details that other scientists even refuse to acknowledge. He was a true child of the forest, and very often as they patrolled together The Glade in the harsh days of the perestroika Celeborn had wondered whether the tall, red haired scientist had Wood elven blood in his veins. Thomas learnt greedily from Celeborn and had then increased his knowledge through long familiarity with the forest, slowly but steadily forsaking the more speculative, scientific pursues for another, different manner of gaining knowledge; and that had earned him as well the scorn of his colleagues.

On the other hand, Maria was a bright mind and an obstinate, strong woman, one who had managed to climb the academic ladder through sheer talent and had then jumped into the managerial highway with the same grace with which her husband crossed the most secret trails of The Glade. Celeborn shook his head sadly. Time and different interests had slowly but unavoidably driven his two friends apart and they now stood at a point where they were about to lose sight of each other and knew not how they had reached there. He knew how it hurt.

“I don’t want to live without her, Silvertree.” The pained admission came in a low, subdued voice. “But I am fifty-two. I do not want to leave this forest either… Even if I know that it is a lost cause I want to defend The Glade until the last tree dies out…what am I going to do?”

There was no answer and Celeborn did not try to offer one. With a heavy sigh the big man dragged himself upwards and patted Celeborn’s shoulder. “It is good to have you here, my friend; you have always been a light in dark times…”

Celeborn nodded silently and listened as the man climbed the stairs slowly and finally entered the room at the end of the corridor, no doubt in search of comfort in his wife’s arms. He sighed deeply and watched the changing flames. He felt tired. Suddenly the burden of endless ennin of hopeless struggle felt too much to bear. Thomas’ fight was no less futile than Maria’s, and he knew everything about fruitless wars, but that night, above all, he missed his wife badly. Not for the first time in his long ages alone he wondered what on Arda had possessed him to remain even after the last ship had departed, fighting the long defeat.

Surrendering to a heaviness of the soul that he could not fight, he closed his eyes for a brief while, or so he thought, and fell abruptly in the path of elven dreams. He was walking in The Glade as it was ages ago, and strange stars shone above him. He followed someone along a path that was almost invisible amidst the tall, strong trees that sang healthily at their passing. Hard as he tried, he did not manage to get a glimpse of his guide, for every time a branch or a bush would impede his vision, leaving him to follow a shimmering trail and soft footsteps that did not leave any mark. Suddenly, the path became familiar and he could identify where he was, close to where once his mighty city of tall mellyrn had stood. He trembled in his dreams as he followed his invisible guide into an enclosed garden and down a stair into a deep green hollow, through which ran murmuring a silver stream. And there, as he recalled it, upon a low pedestal carved like a branching tree stood a basin of silver, and a tall thin elven woman crowned with a garland of radiance greeted him. “Come, my lord, it is not all lost,” she said, extending her hand to him with a soft, tender smile that he knew so well. Just when he was about to hold her, he awoke with a start and let escape a soft whimper as he found himself sitting before the hearth.

“Oh, Galadriel!” he sighed, passing a long hand across his tired eyes. “What does this mean?” A log clacked in the fire, and for a brief while he thought he had glimpsed her inside the hearth, waving at him, urging him to follow her. Unsettled, he stood up and paced the living room. The dream had been clear as if he had been there, and he seemed to recognize the area. Muttering to himself he picked up his parka, opened the door and walked out. It had stopped snowing and a dense, eerie silence blanketed the night. The moon shone full in the winter sky and Eärendil twinkled steadily right above him.

“What do you want from me?” he whispered to the unyielding star.

Filled with a sudden decision, he picked Maria’s truck and drove inside the Forest. When the snow was too packed even for the truck, he descended, cast a brief look around and walked into the forest filled with certainty, choosing his path with sure foot. He walked in Eärendil’s light and he felt not alone, as the Silmaril cast its warming light over the sleepy trees. Trembling in anticipation, Celeborn soon recognized the trail and knew that he was bordering what had once been the southern slope of Caras Galadhon. He found the remains of the hedge, the traces of a stair and the ravine with the singing stream. No basin, as he already knew, but a small pond where the stream had been dammed by logs and fallen stones. He cast a quick look around, half expecting her to appear before his eyes and then laughed bitterly at himself.

“What am I doing here?” he wondered. And then a soft glimmer that came from the pond caught his attention, and he bent over the polished surface and first saw his own face and Eärendil above him and then the pool that had remained undisturbed for ages blazed in a sudden burst and Celeborn gasped and watched in enraptured delight as the face that he knew so well appeared before him.

****

An Interlude in Valinor.

Taniquetil.

“It was not a mistake. I do not make mistakes.”

A laden silence crossed the garden on the topmost peak of Taniquetil, where the Valar were gathered at Manwë’s request. Finally, a soft voice broke it cautiously.

“Then how do you explain his obsession? Perhaps he was not ready to be released when…”

The Lord of Mandos frowned.

“As I said before, I do not make mistakes, Varda Tintallë. There must be some other reason…”

“And what would that reason be, Oh Voice of Doom?” the Lord of Waters asked with undisguised glee. Unlike the rest of his siblings, he seemed to be terribly amused by the whole situation and was not impressed by Namo’s deepening frown.

“It is not that easy,” the Judge of the Valar retorted. “This is a completely new event, it cannot be treated as…”

“Not so new, Námo, not so new,” Ulmo chuckled. “Why, it is what, the third time that he attempts the same trick?”

“The fourth,” Aulë corrected dryly, and this time not even Manwë could hold back a quiet laugh at the memory.

“Indeed! I had forgotten that time when he tried to dig out his way under your very nose…” Aüle’s brows met each other over the Valar’s glaring eyes while the rest of the Powers laughed helplessly. “So let us see…he hid in the bilge of Eärendil’s ship,” Ulmo began, extending one long, scaly finger. “Then he bribed Thorondor, then he dug that tunnel under Aulë’s house and now he has stolen one of the Shipwright’s ships and almost convinced Elwing and her seabirds to sail him back….” He waved four wet fingers and looked around pointedly. “I would say that we have a problem here, Manwë, what do you intend to do?”

“Why don’t we send him to Irmo’s gardens?” Námo hit back viciously.

“It would not work,” the Lord of Lórien hurried to warn his siblings, waving his hands in nervous rejection. “Remember when we last tried that? We had a lot of complains then because of the tales that he would tell about the lands beyond the waters…Dreams were not what they used to be for some time after his sojourn in my gardens…”

“He could spend some time in the deepest forests…either with my Maiar or with Oromë, but I doubt that would appease his longing for the lands beyond the waters,” Yavanna offered haltingly. “I suspect...”

“…That you already have an idea, Manwë,” Aulë ended his wife’s thoughts curtly, then winced at her annoyed frown. “So I do not know why you bother us…” All the Valar turned expectant glares on the King of Arda.

“I agree that this particular Firstborn is giving us an inordinate amount of trouble, although I would not say that he pins for the lands beyond the waters, but rather that he worries for those who remain there, as he always did,” the King of Arda observed. “But there are other things as well to take into consideration. I summoned you all up here because I wanted to show you something, if you would follow me…”

Intrigued by the King’s unusually mysterious manner the Powers trailed obediently after their brother, who led them outside his windswept garden and along a narrow path that led towards the very top of the Hallowed Mountain. Up there on a flat ledge was a high seat carved in stone, in which Manwë used to seat and look East and pierce the mists of time and space to learn what happened across Arda. The seat was placed beside a huge, irregular boulder, an outcrop the Valar had named Gonlath –and seldom dared they come there because the simple sight of the stone troubled them deeply.

Manwë stopped beside his seat and nodded towards the boulder. The stone shone with a strange, pale glimmer, as if lit up by combined shafts of sun and moon that seemed to lace the rock, or rather to be tied to it. Overcoming their reluctance, the Valar finally studied the strange occurrence and exchanged meaningful nods.

“Ah!”

“Interesting.”

“It is becoming visible…do you think it has a meaning?”

“I never heard of this happening before…”

“How long will it last, do you think?

Manwë shook his head silently as his siblings studied the rock and its bonds, which had remained invisible since the Lord of Time had first fastened the fates of Arda to the very foundation of Valinor. Three strong cords glistened occasionally, silver and gold, around the mighty rock and up to the sky, a shimmering thread that stretched beyond sight. The Powers of Arda looked at each other and then turned to their king, looking as if hit by a sudden bolt of lightning.

“But then it is…It is a matter of time!”

“It has always been, Námo,” the King chuckled softly. A chorus of nervous chuckles echoed his words. They were unsettled and he could not blame them. After all, he had had ages to come to terms with the idea. A powerful beating caught their attention and broke the spell.

“Ah, here you are!” Manwë said with undisguised relief, welcoming the mighty eagle that descended elegantly on the narrow platform and lowered its powerful body to allow a grey-cloaked figure descend from its back. “I will now explain what I intend to do with the help of our friend here…”

“He? Is he your solution?” Aulë interrupted in a voice that did not betray emotion but that echoed deep in the roots of the mountains. At Manwë’s grave nod he shook his head. “Now you have all my attention, brother,” he sighed, looking more troubled than he had in a long time.

TBC in Part 2

Notes and stuff

Bialowieska Forest in Eastern Poland is one of the most ancient forests in northern Europe, and one that to my eye really looks like Lórien of old…except for the mellyrn, of course. Supposing some minor geographical shifts along the ages, it is not so difficult to place Lórien where now Bialowieska Forest lies, for the purposes of this tale.

Sudden Oak Death –SOD- syndrome is affecting oak woods around the northern hemisphere, from northern Europe to the North American Pacific coast, at alarming rates. Scientists are now trying a systemic approach to explain global decay of oakwoods beyond a fungus. Curiously enough, the ecology of the high canopy in oak woods is a rare and little researched field. Forest oaks grow to greater heights than their isolated cousins, and it is very difficult to carry a research up there. But still some changes taking place up there, where bacteria and specialized types of insects interact with the leaves and the photosynthesis processes are affecting for instance the attributes of bark, sap, the quality of wood, the presence or absence of particular beetles and larvae and the birds that feed on them thus impacting in a chained manner the whole balance of the oak forest.

Bison Grass Vodka is an old beverage produced originally in Bialowieska forest in Poland. It is a very strong yet well balanced vodka flavored with grass from the forest, in which the European bison still grazes. Home made is a tad harsher and drier than the commercial produce branded by Zubrovka. You can still find a few locals that make it at home and pick the grass right from the Glade, for they maintain that the grass from the Strictly Protected Area was the favoured by the strongest bison. Thomas’s quote refers to W. Somerset Maugham, apparently a devoted consumer of Bison Grass Vodka.

Gonlath. In the Book of Lost Tales, Chapter IX the Darkening of Valinor, there is a beautiful tale about how Time entered Arda. After the flight of the Noldor and the creation of the Sun and the Moon, and as the Valar wondered how to control the courses of the new lights, three old men presented themselves before Manwë and offered him their craft to solve this problem. They closeted themselves in a chamber and after some time they presented the king of Arda with three heavy, invisible ropes that they tied to the vessels of the sun and moon and then fixed to a rock on top of Taniquetil that after that was called Gonlath, which means something like “strap stone”. The three old men then introduced themselves as Day and Month and Year, the children of Aluin, Time, the eldest of all the Ainur, who remained with Eru. In this manner time entered even the blessed lands of Valinor so every thing from then on was subjected to decay and fading, no matter how slow.

For Redheredh’s 2008 un-birthday. The good thing about un-birthdays is that you can have one whenever it suits.

Under the Stars, part 2.

An interlude in Valinor. Olwë’s palace in Alqualondë.

“Do you need anything, my lord?”

“Solitude.” 

The maid bowed briefly and walked away in a soft whisper of grey linen, leaving the High King of the Noldor under the cloud of gloomy thoughts that had darkened his wise brow since his arrival, and had soured his usually gentle disposition.

A soft breeze carried a peal of laughter across the terrace. The troubled king frowned more deeply and looked around for a better hiding place. When he had left them, the females of the family were recalling in all detail the events that had forced them in all haste from Tirion to Olwë’s halls in Alqualondë, where his eldest son had been confined by Manwë’s request after his last adventure. Apparently, they found the whole episode deeply amusing.

How can they laugh about it? Finarfin thought bitterly. This is worrying, disturbing, even alarming!

Eärwen had watched him with a fond, almost patronizing smile as he tried to make them understand what Manwë might had to do this time –what he, in the place of the King of Arda, would be forced to do with such a recalcitrant subject. Amarië had patted his hand comfortingly and Galadriel and Celebrían had failed to hide their amusement behind falsely grave faces. Irked beyond measure by their lack of respect towards the burdens and responsibilities of kingship, and by the lightness with which they dismissed his son’s stubborn defiance of the Powers, he had stomped away from the airy hall in search of a place where he could work out his annoyance and fret in solitude.

But his troubled steps had taken him before the Sea, and he was not in the mood for an argument with Ossë; and an argument there would be if he ever laid his hands on the slimy Maia…

“I win again!”

“It is unfair, grandfather; you distracted me with your tales…”

“We never said this was going to be fair play, Finrod…”

The players were in a terrace right below him. Finarfin scowled and retreated from the mother-of-pearl railing, not wanting to make his presence known to them. He was vaguely jealous of the easy companionship that existed between Olwë and Finrod, and ashamed of that feeling. Never again since the kinslaying had he been able to open his heart completely to his wife’s father, restrained by shame and guilt, and he begrudged Finrod the abandon with which he confided in his grandfather. Despite the long ages, Finarfin could not yet stop the shadow of their bitter parting in Araman from tingeing his own exchanges with his eldest son. They loved each other profoundly, but Finarfin was still scarred by the deep sense of failure and bereavement that had devastated him after seeing all his children turning his back on him.

He sighed. At times like these he missed his father and elder brothers sorely. Just when he was about to succumb to a load of sad memories that carefully glided over his lost kin’s frequent quarrels and flaming tempers, a cheerful voice and a heavy hand on his shoulder fished him out of his wallowing.

“Oh, here you are, cousin! Do not blame the maids, I just bribed them…”

“Ingil, well-met,” Finarfin sighed, accepting the presence of his wise cousin as Mandos’ answer to his bout of self-pity. “What are you doing here? Are you...” he fretted, suddenly worried that Ingil was there to deliver the Valar’s judgment on his eldest son’s most recent transgression.

“No, no!” Ingil shook his hands in a soothing manner. “I only escorted the messenger here. I guessed that you would be upset…”

“I am fine. The messenger? Manwë’s messenger?” Finarfin struggled to maintain his studied composure. “Who did he send?”

“Just me, my lord Finarfin.” The High King started and then turned around quickly to meet the newcomer.

“Ah, Olórin! I mean, no, Mithrandir… Mithrandir?” Panic clutched again at the High King’s throat, turning his clear, gentle voice into a croak. The Maia, clad in the grey cloak and pointy hat that he had taken to wearing during his long sojourn in Middle-earth, bowed respectfully.

“I was instructed to deliver Manwë’s message first to you, my lord, and then to your son and the rest of the family. But I fear I will not be able to comply,” he warned the worried king with a conspiratorial smile. “I have been waylaid by your lady wife, her lady mother, your daughter…”

“…and all the females in the palace and other relatives, as well as old friends,” Ingil chuckled. “Cheer up, cousin; this is not the end of Arda!”

“You have always been so perceptive, my lord Ingil,” Mithrandir nodded, studying the Vanyarin prince with interest. “I must warn you that all of them are quite close behind me, my lord king, so perhaps we should retire to a more secluded place?”

“Oh, here you are, husband, I wondered where you were hiding…” the threatening harmonics in Eärwen’s apparently soft voice rang warningly in Finarfin’s trained ear. “They are here!” she called back to the flock of billowing skirts that hurried after her. The king nodded weakly and sketched a thin smile.

“We will wait for everyone, so you are saved the trouble of retelling your message several times,” Finarfin informed Mithrandir with all the grace that he could muster under such circumstances. “I am glad that you are here, my ladies,” he added, bowing courteously to his wife and her escort. “Lord Mithrandir brings a message from the King of Arda…Oh, and look, here they are! Finrod, Olwë, right in time,” he greeted with strained glee as the two players joined them, no doubt attracted by the merry din. “Since it seems that we are all here…” he sighed, as clouds of friends and relatives popped out from everywhere.

Olwë’s entire household had apparently convened around that terrace, Finarfin noticed grudgingly, briefly meeting his eldest son’s calm gaze. Resigned to the public display of Finrod’s chastisement, he waved his hand and urged the Maia to proceed.

“My lord Finarfin, it has been brought to Manwë’s attention the fact that Lord Finrod has attempted not just once, but four times now, to find a way to get back…”

“I believe that all here are familiar with Lord Finrod’s deeds, Mithrandir,” Finarfin interrupted in a tense voice. “And since he is noted for his aversion to all kinds of praise, I’d suggest that you went straight to inform us of the King’s verdict…”

A chorus of ill-concealed chuckles ran across the assembled elves while Finrod smiled modestly and Mithrandir bowed his head briefly in acceptance.

“I now understand how your father felt when Irmo banished you from his gardens,” Finarfin muttered to Ingil. “Mithrandir?” he whimpered aloud, wincing as Glorfindel started retelling the tale of how Ossë had caught the rebellious High Prince when he was about to sail past Eressëa, in case there was still someone there who had not heard it at least twice.

Olórin took pity of the mortified High King and smiled softly. “No verdict as such, my lord. The King of Arda is worried by Lord Finrod’s… restlessness. He has entrusted me with a delicate mission, to accomplish which I am to request your son’s assistance, if you would grant it, in the hopes that this task will somehow help ease the prince’s worries…”

Relief deprived Finarfin of articulate speech momentarily. He opened and closed his mouth and then looked around in surprise while the rest of his family and friends laughed and commented, and Celebrían’s sons made their approval known quite loudly.

“A mission with Mithrandir!”

“Finrod, you are a fortunate Elf…”

“…Or not, if our experience is to be taken into account…”

“One thing is sure, uncle, you will not be bored, mark our words…”

“How can I be of help, Mithrandir?” Finrod asked evenly while Finarfin still struggled to overcome his surprise. Mithrandir shrugged and cast an apologetic glance at the king.

“I fear I cannot reveal any details, Finrod. Only that you are to meet me tomorrow at dawn by the King’s ship,” he explained, nodding his gratitude towards Olwë, who acknowledged him curtly.

“Atar?”

Finarfin sighed deeply and nodded quietly, finally regaining his composure. “Of course, you have my leave. Is that all, Mithrandir?”

“All that I am allowed to disclose my lord…Except that there is no punishment involved.”

“I am not completely sure that is good news,” the king retorted dryly. “Lord Finrod,” he added gravely, “it is our wish that you join Lord Mithrandir in his mission and assist him as he might need.”

“I am yours to command,” Finrod answered mildly, bowing respectfully before his father not before exchanging a quick, worried glance with his sister.

                                             ~~***~~

Rags of mist clung to the snow-white sails that rippled lazily on the proud masts. A grey-cloaked figure stood on the quay by the King’s tall Tauralph, his back to the sea, watching with interest as a golden-haired rider left Olwë’s palace and hurried north along the same path another golden-haired rider had taken less than an hour ago.

Sketching a satisfied, knowing smile, Mithrandir boarded a small craft that nodded eagerly in the deep waters of the bay of Alqualondë, dwarfed by the King’s ship. He had just finished checking the triangular canvas sail when he heard light footsteps on the dock.

“Right in time,” he greeted the cloaked figure that stood before him. The first rays of Arien gave a reddish tinge to a golden lock that escaped the hood. “If you would come on board, we are ready to depart.”

The elf obliged gracefully, releasing the rope from the bollard and tossing it inside the boat, then jumping in without a word. Mithrandir nodded briefly while raising the sail. “Your grandfather provided us with supplies enough for crossing the Belegaer twice, not that we are going to need them,” he chuckled. He raised his arms and lifted his head and muttered a few words. A gust of wind rose out of the sea and filled the sail. With a shiver of joy, the swan-like craft glided away from the quay and steered itself eastwards out of the haven and into the open sea, dancing merrily over the surf like an overgrown seabird.

“The wind knows where it is leading us, you will not need that,” Mithrandir told his companion, who had taken seat by the tiller. He cast a satisfied look around, rummaged in his tunic until he found his pipe and sat down with a sigh. A moment later he was puffing out blue mists that insisted on wafting towards the silent elf.

“Perhaps if you sat beside me you would not be disturbed by the smoke,” he suggested, barely concealing his mirth. The cloaked figure only shrugged.

On they sailed in companionable silence, greeted by seabirds and curious fishes. They skirted Eressëa on its northern flank and still they sailed east under the wings of Manwë’s winds, while Arien speared them with all her might.

“It is exceedingly warm,” Mithrandir observed. “You would be more comfortable if you got rid of that cloak…my lady?” The covered head shot up quickly and a pair of bright burning eyes pierced Mithrandir from the shadows beneath the cowl. Slowly, a couple of long hands rose to the heavy hood and pushed it backwards, revealing the golden-silver head of Finarfin’s daughter, and her beautiful face wrinkled in an annoyed frown.

“How…How did you know?”

“You were expected, my lady. I saw your father ride away at dawn, following the tracks of another rider who had ridden north earlier….Did he know who he was meeting?” Mithrandir asked with a conniving smile, totally unimpressed by her frown.

“He thought he would be meeting me,” she admitted grudgingly. “But how could you know?”

“It will do them good; there are still so many things unsaid between the two of them, even after all these yéni…It will do them good, that is, once and if Finarfin manages to overcome his panic at this new show of disobedience from his firstborn,” the Maia laughed quietly just picturing the scene. “One would expect that his sojourn in Mandos would have somehow sobered up your headstrong brother, though…”

“Mithrandir…”

“My lady?”

“Why did you say that I was expected? Did Finrod tell you?” she insisted, now genuinely interested. And then, with a half-frown, “are you laughing at me?”

“Manwë forbid it, my lady. But it is a joy to see you curious and intrigued as an elfling…”

“That is true,” she admitted, somewhat mollified. “The One knows how long it has been since I have last been surprised. Now, do not press your advantage, Mithrandir, I am no longer used to riddles and I have never been noted for my patience…How did you know?”

“It was easy, my lady,” the Maia explained, puffing shamelessly at his pipe. “Your brother worries for those who remained behind but, above all, he feels guilty for the happiness that he enjoys while…”

“He deserves it, as I deserve my lot,” she cut him sharply. “My lord chose to remain and I chose to sail without him, same as Finrod once chose himself...”

“But you still miss your lord husband dearly. So your brother feels that there must be something that he might do…” Her guarded smile told him that he had been right in his assumption. None among the Powers, save perhaps Ulmo, knew the hearts of the Eldar better than Olórin. “Knowing Finrod,” he continued softly, “it was easy to guess that were he to be presented with the chance to set his unrest at ease, he would surely defer to his little sister…”

“You are an old scheming wizard, why this comedy, then?” she complained, too outraged to take in the implications.

“I would not rob Lord Finrod of the choice,” Mithrandir answered, waiting for realization to shine on her face. It was as if a frozen wave had hit her in her chest. She got pale and opened her mouth, gasped, then closed it, her eyes open wide and fixed in the Maia.

“You… you mean that we are going…?” she whispered, her voice a thin thread of expectation and dread.

“No one can sail back there, child,” Mithrandir said softly. “But I hope that our expedition will grant you some comfort and renewed hope, both to you and to your lord. Everything in its appointed time, my lady,” he added, raising a hand to forestall the storm of questions that he read in her eyes. “It is all about time, after all,” he mused, remembering the silver and golden pulse that each day became more visible around the Gonlath. “Look, it is there where we are going,” he added, pointing at a dense wall of grey fog that rose before them.

“There? What’s that?” Her voice sounded awed. “The Isles of Twilight?”

Mithrandir nodded as their boat sailed determinedly towards that imposing dark fence. “Where even the Powers dread to sail,” he murmured thoughtfully as they crossed the unsubstantial barrier and the world changed abruptly around them.

“Are…are we still in Arda?” Her voice carried a mix of uncertainty and wonder that echoed somehow childish in that noiseless void, but Mithrandir could not fault her. He found it hard to find an answer. All of a sudden they were sailing an indistinct landscape in which seas and skies and winds and clouds weaved and mixed together in a deep void deprived of stars, and yet alight in a strange pale glimmer, as if dawn were always about to happen there.

“I could not say,” Mithrandir admitted. This looks familiar, he thought with a shiver; even that silence echoed familiar in his trained ear, as if a harmony too vast and deep for incarnate matter to hear was about to be played, or perhaps it was being played in another dimension, and he was unconsciously thrumming to that well-known chord… “Time,” he mused aloud, “this is time before time, the endless void as it used to be before…”

“Not exactly, but not far from the mark,” a deep voice boomed. A stretch of white sand floating amidst the void appeared suddenly before their eyes, and a tall dark figure clad in mists, standing on that ghostly beach. As if following a silent command, their craft turned diligently ashore toward the waiting silhouette.

“Who is that?” Galadriel sounded more surprised than awed.

Sudden as dawn, realization hit Mithrandir. “Lord Aluin,” he whispered, descending from the boat and bending to his knee on the seaside.

“Brother,” the tall figure rumbled as he stepped gracefully towards them, spreading his arms in welcome.

“Who?” At her almost annoyed tone, the tall lord turned his attention to her.

”I am Lord Aluin, my lady, the Lord of Time…”

“The Eldest of the Ainur, and the most powerful,” Mithrandir explained softly. “My lord, this is…”

“I know who she is. Rise,” Lord Aluin insisted, grabbing the still kneeling Maia and pulling him to his feet. At the Ainu’s touch, Mithrandir felt as if he had been suddenly despoiled of his incarnate form and for a brief moment the whole Music played within his freed substance, reminding him of what it meant to be again part of Eru’s mind, and one with his creation. “Brother, not lord,” Aluin whispered in his soul, and his powerful voice swept away the veil that shrouded Mithrandir’s true nature, and he smiled in relief as he remembered with sudden clarity the ultimate meaning of all their toils.

“Lord of Time? Why I never heard of you, my lord?” Unawares of the unspoken communication that passed between the other two, Galadriel still pressed for explanations even as she splashed in the shallow waters of that strangest of shores.

“Perhaps because I came to Arda short after you departed the Blessed Realm, so you just felt my presence but never knew my name, child,” Aluin explained in a soft, amused manner, extending a hand to help her into dry sand. “Since the very beginning I sat behind Eru,” he elaborated in a more sober manner, inviting them to follow him along that apparently endless beach with a courteous gesture. “I watched as his mind unfolded the visions of what was to be. I saw my siblings coming to life out of his will, and his own creatures, you Children, whose ultimate purpose is still unfathomable to me, as it is for my brethren…And I saw many of the visions kept in the Music come to life even before I was sent to kindle Time within them.”

“I thought it was Yavanna who brought the Trees to life…”

“So she did, but she weaved not time with them, that is my privilege,” Aluin agreed as Mithrandir recalled in his mind the lights that had shone even before Telperion and Laurelin were born, and the great commotion in which they had perished, together with the many wonders that had awoken to a first spring back then. He remembered how they had mourned then, and feared that all their efforts had been for nothing…

“I watched as my siblings came here, and laboured tirelessly and for long. I worried with them that Melko would destroy their partial view of the music even before it came into being. Yet I trusted our lord in a way my kin never learnt to, or maybe in a way they forgot since they left his presence,” the Lord of Time continued softly. Mithrandir felt his own thoughts beating as one with those of his brother, as truths that had been hidden for long returned in their full strength and filled him with joy.

“Shall beauty not before conceived be brought into Eä, and evil yet be good to have been” he mused aloud, or thought he had mused, for in his ear the words echoed rather as a chord that he had once heard played in all its glory amidst the Music.

“And endless seemed the vigil to those who waited, but the moment for beauty has come at last,” Aluin agreed. “For long I sat behind Eru, second in power and understanding only to him, and watched as Ëa evolved before my eyes. And still I was restless, or perhaps jealous. When Melko killed the trees and your people defied the King and took the way East I was sent to join my siblings in Arda...And remained in this place of my creation, the beginning and the end,” he explained, pointing at the ever changing void around them. “With my arrival, Time entered Ëa…”

“I never imagined that the Valar would have been punished by our desertion,” Galadriel said thoughtfully. At that, Aluin stopped and turned to face them. A gust of wind blew back his hood, revealing a face of unbearable beauty and eyes that gleamed with a light that was even brighter than that of the Two Trees.

“Punished?” he whispered sternly. “Time is Eru’s gift, child, and a boon that even the Powers of Arda envy as the ages unfold endlessly. For, who among the incarnate would suffer loss and waning eternally? Time is the One’s promise and reward, the beauty beyond all evil, the last chord that encompasses all his Music and lasts forever in one single moment…has Manwë forgotten, that he had to send you to plead with me?” he challenged the Maia then.

Mithrandir had an answer ready by then. When Manwë had first told him of this mission he had worried that the King was being too enigmatic on purpose. He had resented being sent -once again– clueless and blind to fulfil another task of the utmost importance, with the only certainty that the invisible ropes that tied the vessels of the Sun and the Moon were becoming more visible each passing day, and the reasonably accurate suspicion that this could not be good news in any case. But as Aluin spoke, the signs and hints that the King had laid before his eyes while he explained the mission began to shine as clear as those ropes–or so he thought.

“The hawsers that you once gave Manwë to keep the Ships of Time in check have begun to dissolve, and we know not how long it will take before the Sun and the Moon are lost,” Mithrandir explained slowly. “The Powers forget not what was promised, but the King worries for some of the Children who are still stranded in the shores of Middle-earth…”

“I barred the way West ages ago for those who did not sail on their appointed time, on Manwë’s behest,” Aluin retorted dryly, and his rebuke echoed deeper than Aulë’s hammer in the roots of Valinor. “Would the King gainsay his own decree now?”

“No!” Galadriel’s anguished gasp pierced what was left of Mithrandir’s soul, the part that had once been mortal and had known hunger and cold and worry and pain across the endless leagues of Middle-earth… But also trust and hope and friendship, and love for the things that grew and for the brief lives of Men, which shone so brightly and gave away their fragile flames gladly for a good cause, or a hopeless one. And all of a sudden he saw a truth, or perhaps heard a chord, that had escaped Aluin’s attention.

“Those left behind are fulfilling a purpose, and it is the will of the King of Arda that their sacrifice is not disregarded, whichever doom the One has set for the Firstborn after the End,” he pronounced sternly, knowing that pleading would not avail him his wish. Pity was a stranger to Time, and Time was but just another instrument through which the Music reached its fulfilment. And yet the Music was a harmony, he remembered briefly, so none of its parts alone could ensure its full completion. The knowledge emboldened him. “They should be given warning, so they can choose what to do with what time is left to them…”

“They chose to remain. It is not for us, not even for the King of Arda, to twist the Music to suit his whims...”

“And it is not for us, not even for the Lord of Time, to presume that one single player can lead the Music to its completion…No theme may be played that hath not its uttermost source in me, nor can any alter the music in my despite. For he that attempteth this shall prove but mine instrument in the devising of things more wonderful, which he himself hath not imagined, or have you forgotten that, Aluin? Manwë is the Steward of Eru in Arda, do not stand between him and his will!”

That gave the powerful Ainu pause. “There is no way to sail back, Olórin, you well know that…” he said carefully, studying the Maia intently.

“Leave that in the hands of the King. Do you forget that he himself set up a new star in the sky long ago? Or did you think that it was for the sole purpose of dragon-slaying? Come, brother, show us what Time was and will be, so those lingering in mortal shores can ready themselves…and play whatever part the Music has in store for them.” The command sprout out of his mouth unexpected even to him, yet he somehow knew the words to be true, and felt strangely reassured.

For a brief while Time stood still, the full weight of its attention fixed on the bold Maia, while Galadriel watched in trepidation.

“So be it,” Aluin agreed finally, a strange expression on his fair face. “But you will not get a straight answer, nor a vision of the Last Battle,” he warned almost mockingly. Following a lazy wave of his arm, the void dissolved all around them into a swirling vision of darkness deeper than Melko’s heart. Yet deep in that darkest of nights a reddish heart pulsed steadily, and Mithrandir knew that he was recalling the moment when Eru had said “Ëa” and the music had taken form before the awed eyes of his creatures.

“My lord!”

The longing that echoed in the awed whisper drew Mithrandir from the contemplation of the familiar tale of the building and rebuilding of Arda, as storms, earthquakes, floods and eruptions followed extended periods of peace and blossoming, during the long ages even before Arda entered history. He followed Galadriel’s gaze and had to smile as he saw a well-known, tall, grey-haired elf bending over a small, leaf-clogged pool and locking eyes, across time and space, with his lady.

His smile widened as he watched Tilion and Eärendil eavesdropping behind the elf-lord’s shoulders, shining brightly over tall, naked, sleeping trees in a world whose beauty he had not forgotten. He nodded to himself as he finally grasped the wisdom of Manwë’s strategy, and the risks that he was taking.

~~ *** ~~

In Bialowieska Strictly Protected Area.

Dawn was creeping in, forcing shadows into their hiding places and tingeing pink that silent, colourless New Year’s morning and the elf kneeling on the leaf-moulded, twig-spattered, frozen ground of the most hidden ravine in The Glade. A soft scrape shook him from his contemplation, and he cast a sharp look around.

“Ah, it is you. Are you feeling better?” Celeborn relaxed as he met the lynx’s amber gaze. He sat back and wiped his hands on his trousers, still too awed to make any sense of what had just happened. Galadriel’s beautiful face still filled his mind eye, and he could almost feel her love and longing flowing across the mists of time and space and reaching him, but the comfort offered by the memory of her soothing presence could not dim the horror of the vision that they had been granted. “Did you see that?” he whispered pleadingly, as if somehow the lynx could confirm that he had been dreaming. “What am I going to do?”

The lynx would not answer. He licked its shoulder and yawned quite disinterestedly while a couple of grouses hurried from their hidden nest on their morning foraging. The soft crunch of elk’s hooves on frozen ground reached the clearing, almost muffling the careful tiptoeing of a fox in its winter coat stalking a white hare. A disrespectful croak made Celeborn lift his head, and he discovered a bold crow looking down on him with an amused expression. He heard the soft song of the wind and the merry voice of a nearby creek, free from choking ice. He listened to the morning calls of fowl down in the pond and the flap of wings as they took flight in search for food. He looked around and saw the flaming red of holly berries and the hazy purple of naked alder branches, laced with rags of mist turned pink by Arien’s first rays. Looking up again, he spotted a ball of mistletoe perched high on a top branch of an ancient oak.

That gave him pause.  

Mankind, much like mistletoe, could be considered a pest that wasted the earth, upon which it was a parasite. But, much like mistletoe, the Secondborn also helped create conditions for other species to grow and progress, and for biodiversity to thrive, and for the land to improve…. It all lay in the balance, and balance was the very nature of Arda’s existence within the Music, in which all things had their place…. Arda unmarred could not be born out of total destruction of what had once been, he thought in despair as he closed his eyes and tried to drown in the sounds and smells of that living glade, hoping that they would wash away visions of Arda crumpling down in fire and floods. 

“Shall beauty not before conceived be brought into Eä, and evil yet be good to have been.” The words came back to him unbidden, as he had heard them pounding over those terrifying images. But those had not been Galadriel’s words. She grieved with him at what was foretold; he had felt her sadness across their bond, so miraculously restored if only for that night. But there had been someone else there, a powerful being who had callously unfolded those visions before them while the two of them rejoiced in the unexpected gift of each other’s presence and basked in the warmth of their love.

“What do you know of beauty, you proud lords beyond the waters?” he cried out in defiance, hitting the ground with a clenched fist, anger and pain coursing through him. “This is beauty enough for those who live in Arda and beat to the pulse of life and death, instead of hiding safely in a stale, ageless realm, afraid of change!” he spat bitterly, as hot tears rolled down his face. It could not end that way. They had not fought and lost so much only to be forced to depart at last in sad defeat, leaving all of Arda to perish under flame and water. He thought of his friends, and their own demons. He thought of all the Secondborn who had worked with them –who still worked with them- to make Arda a better place, true Stewards who loved the land with almost elven passion, though without their hopeless sorrow. He thought of all the battles they had fought along the long ages and the many trees that they had seen die, only to be replaced by new shootings in which the memories –and the voices- of the old ones still lived…

Overwhelmed by grief, he did not hear the approaching hooves nor noticed the powerful presence that had come into the ravine, until a soft huff made him lift his head. Not ten paces before him stood a huge, white bison, Bialowieska’s elusive, almost mythical lord. It was very old, judging by his horns, yet its fur shone spotless with blinding whiteness. It held Celeborn’s awed gaze for a long while and then let escape another, impatient snort, while crushing a pile of half-frozen dry leaves nervously with one hoof.

“I will not let it come to pass,” Celeborn vowed there, in that glade that had been the heart of elvendom, before the Spirit of the Forest, reasserting the promise that he had made to his wife after the vision dissolved before them in flames. “Something must remain, so the Secondborn will not forget,” he added, his decision strengthened by the memory of her serious, understanding nod while he apparently sealed their separation even beyond the circles of the world by committing himself to defying the Music. He had seen it happen before, floods and eruptions and great convulsions of the land, and new lights appearing on the skies, and darkness inescapable covering the forests and choking out life….but as the vision unfolded he had had for a moment wondered whether that was a beginning or an end… or both things at the same time, endlessly succeeding one another…and that had given him an idea. The bison puffed again, stopping the flow his rambling thoughts. It nodded twice and then turned around and vanished gracefully amidst the trees, leaving behind the soft blur of the uncanny rippling where it had stood. Taking that presence as a comforting sign, and with a clear goal in mind, Celeborn stood up, placed his fist over his heart, bowed to the lynx and walked away without looking back.

The sun shone brightly over the snow covered landscape by the time he reached Maria’s truck, and to his eye it seemed that all things glistened and glimmered as if kindled with a new light, allowing their innermost beauty, a beauty that not even him had perceived before to shine through. That world was too beautiful to perish, Celeborn thought, and he was not about to consent it.

After a quick search he finally found his cell phone in one of his pockets. He switched it on and wrote a text message, then selected three names on his list and pressed the send button. As the words coursed the world –Let’s meet for the New Year at Thranduil’s- he drove back to his friends’ house, his head boiling with new projects and lines of research. That Arda was dying was not a surprise for him, nor would be for his friends, but they were better prepared than the Valar, he suddenly understood, to manage what time was left and to arrange an escape route for Arda’s living things, if it came to that.

The dull thud of iron on wood greeted him as he descended from the truck. He rounded the house to the back yard, following the sound, and stopped there, unnoticed. Thomas was hacking wood for the fireplace and Maria sat on a huge log, a steaming mug on her hand, watching him. There was an air of contentment around them, as if all differences had dissolved and faded away with the old year, leaving behind only the melancholy certainty of a love that was stronger than their own wills.

“Is it us what I am seeing in them?” he thought, wondering that he was feeling the echo of his own bond with his wife, unexpectedly restored for one brief night. It had pulsed stronger than ever as it sang of a deep joy and unquenchable hope, and it had filled him with her strength and decision, and her loving support. Taking a closer look, he confirmed that it was his friends’ bond what he was seeing for the first time, a thin but bright thread that ran between them and surrounded them in its glitter and strengthened them, even if they could not see it.

It did not matter that they were short-lived, Celeborn suddenly understood with blinding clarity. His friends were heirs to a long line of people who had devoted their lives to caring for Arda and tending to its forests and its creatures of all kinds. When they passed away, there would be others still picking up their voices, as the acorn held the memories of the oaks that had been before them, so the line of the Stewards would never be broken, and he would see to it, no matter what it cost him.

Suddenly, he was reminded of Elrond’s patient, faithful watch over the line of Elendil and felt reassured that his was but another link in that long chain of duty that the Elves of Middle-earth had secretly forged in the service of Arda and its creatures. Perhaps Arda itself was beyond his power to save from the Doom, he told himself firmly, but at least he would do his best to help the Secondborn, and the rest of living creatures, have a new beginning somewhere. They did not deserve less.

“Happy New Year, my friends,” he greeted as he stepped into the yard. “Can I give you a hand?”

They both looked up at the same time and smiled at him. Maria stood as he came closer and stretched to put a soft kiss on his cheek. “Happy New Year to you, too. I’ll go and fix breakfast,” she said. “We were waiting for you…”

“I am almost done, but you can keep me company,” Thomas said, pointing at the log where Maria had been sitting. “Where did you go?

“To The Glade.” Thomas nodded and continued chopping wood in silence. Celeborn sat on the log, extended his long legs and enjoyed the warmth of the pale rays of sun. The rhythmic beat of the axe hitting wood was the only sound that was heard in a morning that looked fresh as it had been brought straight from the dawn of Time.

“I saw a white bison,” he started aloud after some time. Thomas stopped for a brief while to wipe sweat from his brow but made no comment. “I have been thinking about your research and I want to fund it, even if the Park does not. I want to fight with you, Thomas,” he added in a voice that cracked with emotion. “I want to save this forest….” 

“There are many other forests in the world…”

“But I want to save this one, and I have the money for it. We can also allocate some extra funds, so you could conduct a parallel research in Scotland while Maria is there.” Thomas cast him a curious look, swinging the axe distractedly in his strong arm.

“That would be a good thing,” he admitted softly. “Maria and I both want the same things,” he started hurriedly, before his courage dissolved away. “Only in a different manner. I could no more force her to remain than she could convince me to leave, and that is why we grieve and hurt each other…But why would you do that?”

Because this is the last place that I have called home in several ages, the place my daughter left to become a wife, the place where my lady and I ruled happily for what then seemed and endless spring, and our grandchildren loved to visit. The place where my granddaughter came to die, he wanted to say. Because your plight so much reminds me of my own, only no one could bridge the gap for us…or so I thought until last night… “Because you are my friends,” he said simply, “and because this forest means so much to both of you.”

“And to you as well, I know that….But you are a strange being, Silvertree,” Thomas chuckled to hide his emotion, as he put the axe away and picked up an armful of logs. “If someone were to ask me, I would declare that you are Bialowieska’s leszi indeed!

“After a bottle of Bison Grass Vodka, no doubt…”

“From the mouth of drunkards…”

“Will you accept my proposal or not?”

“I will be honoured to be your steward in Bialowieska while my strength lasts me, my lord,” Thomas joked, but the strange glint in his eyes belied his light tone, and Celeborn just nodded quietly, sealing the agreement between them without words.

It never ceased to marvel him how generously the Secondborn devoted their lives and loyalties to what touched their souls. “Would they, if they knew how hopeless everything we do is, how close the end is?” he wondered. He suspected that it would not make a difference. For Thomas and Maria, and for many others like them, it was more a question of how they spent their short lives, and to what cause they devoted them, than worrying about the great cycles of birth and destruction that were at the root of everything…and beyond their power to alter.

Since he had promised not to give up on Arda, not until the bitter end, he could as well start defying the Music by not giving up on his forest…and his friends, whatever the outcome. He picked up another armful of logs and jerked his head towards the back door. “Then let us go and tell Maria. It pained me to see your grief yesterday…”

                                                ~~***~~

Back in Valinor.

“How did the Firstborn take it?”

“Quite calmly. One would say that they were expecting it…”

“And Aluin?”

“He was shocked…almost outraged.”

Manwë allowed himself a fleeting smug grin. “I am sure that he would be,” he chuckled. “Our brother of Time has spent too long alone, to the point that he has forgotten that we are all instruments, Olórin, and that only in harmony we can achieve our ultimate purpose…”

It was the first time that Olórin met the King alone since his return from his mission and his report to the Powers. No one had spoken for a long time after he had finished his account, and after that no one had challenged his actions, or even commented his decisions. The Firstborn, too, had taken Galadriel’s story with surprising serenity, more a welcome piece of news about their stranded kin and food for speculation than a disturbing sign of impending, terrifying doom. At times Mithrandir feared that he was the only one bubbling with unspoken questions and not a few concerns.

Not the only one, he reflected. “Námo did not look very pleased when we met on the path…” The Lord of Mandos had bowed distractedly to Mithrandir and had walked away briskly, muttering angrily to himself. And Eonwë…

“So what happens now, what will Celeborn do?” he finally dared ask.

“I have no idea….”

That shocked Mithrandir. “But...” he stumbled. “I thought… I mean, you sent me there to interfere, to induce Celeborn to resist doom, to change…” he stopped there, out of words, and sighed in impotence, his pride still tender. He had defied the mightiest of the Ainur and had forced his hand, allowing Celeborn –and Galadriel- a deeper insight of the Music than any of the Firstborn had ever been granted, and even now he was not sure whether he had done it after his own will or rather induced by the King’s.

Worst, he suspected, he had helped introduce an unexpected change in the Music, one of unpredictable consequences… or was it not so unexpected? His head began to spin when the steady, understanding voice of his king came to his rescue.

“We are simply well-tuned instruments, Olórin, and we play best when we allow the Music to use us…”

“But you sent me to confront the Lord of Time!” he accused, then groaned at how childish he had sounded. Manwë shook his head thoughtfully.

“It was love what drove Finrod to disobedience. Love for his sister, and for those left behind, but also for Middle-earth and its creatures…and it was the same love that tied Celeborn there, and what keeps the Secondborn going on despite their many mistakes,” Manwë mused aloud, unimpressed by Mithrandir’s outrage. “I know not what the One has in store for us, but I do know that while we are here, and Arda lasts as we made it, we are its stewards and protectors, and it is our duty to help his children as best as we can, even when we are bound to Arda’s fate and they are not…. You lived and died there, Olórin. I thought you were the best choice, the one who could better understand what all this would mean for them…and act accordingly,” he added softly, pointing at the glistening ropes around the Gonlath. That gave Mithrandir pause, and for a long time none of them spoke.

“So now it is all in Celeborn and his friend’s hands?” he ventured, and felt like blushing at Manwë’s fond smile and mild rebuke.

“No. It is all in the Music, my friend, it has always been. Is that so difficult to understand?”

“You took a great risk, my lord, sending this dumb Maia in that mission,” Mithrandir sighed, obliquely acknowledging defeat. “I could have blundered so easily…”

“I knew that you would listen to the Music when the moment came…”

“And here I thought I had been following your instructions….”

“That is a common mistake, even among the Powers. At times we forget that we do our best when we simply allow the Music to flow through us…”

“You seem to be very good at that, now I know why you are the King,” Mithrandir chuckled, and smiled at the knowing nod in Manwë’s kind, wise face.

“Well… that part about Eärendil…”

“Yes?”

“It had never occurred to me that he might be the one who could bring them back in the end. You are getting very good at it as well.”

Mithrandir nodded quietly, grateful for the compliment. They both stood by the Gonlath in companionable silence, their gazes fixed up into the sky along the gleaming ropes, as if they feared they would dissolve at any moment now.

“It is getting brighter by the moment, isn’t it?” Mithrandir wondered after some time of thoughtful contemplation.

Manwë shrugged with studied carelessness, but he tilted his head to better study the ropes, Mithrandir noticed with a wicked smile. “Did Aluin let anything slip about how long? Even approximately?”

“I fear he was quite adamant about that, my lord, not a word.” For a Valar who claimed that he just allowed himself to be led by the Music and flowed with it, Manwë’s sigh sounded a bit too much disappointed to Mithrandir’s ear.

“I suppose that we just have to wait, then, as we have always done.”

“As always?” Mithrandir almost snorted. “I saw Eonwë inspecting his mail and wielding his broadsword as I came here, my lord…” That made Manwë chuckle.

“I did not have the heart to tell him that prophecies should never be taken literally,” the king acknowledged. “He never actually wound down since the War of Wrath, so I would not rob him of the hope of a Final Battle… for now. You are right,” he added, sitting on his stone chair and resting his chin on his palm. “Never before did we have this feeling of upending doom so close at hand… and it is quite unsettling.”

“Well, this is how the Secondborn feel all throughout their short lives, so it should not be difficult for us to get used to it,” he could not stop himself from pointing out; then cringed at the long, considering stare that Manwë cast on him. But the king just let go a soft, approving chortle.

“Only we do not have much time left, do we, Olórin?” he observed, pointing again at the glistening chords. “But you do have a point there, it may be that only in the end we are allowed to get a glimpse of what the Children experience, and how they relate to Arda, so that we can understand our folly when we presumed to order them around,” he mused thoughtfully. “I told you that you were getting better at following the Music…”

The King was right; Mithrandir had to admit as he took the steep path down Taniquetil on another of Manwë’s errands. There was not much time left before the Doom of Arda was fulfilled… or changed by a handful of Eru’s creatures, and no-one knew what that might bring. “Well,” he told himself resignedly. “If I can help change the tides of Time I can as well make Námo change his mind about tearing his walls down and releasing all those faer under his care. It is not as if he had asked me to stop Eonwë from marching to war…”

With the nagging feeling that that might be his next task, he took the long way towards the imposing Halls of Mandos while Time beat ominously over the Blessed Realm and all creatures shone under a new light, as if newly aware of the beauty and fragility of the present moment, which would never, ever again last forever as it had once seemed to them.

A/N:

I’ve stolen a couple of quotes from the Silmarillion.

Aluin as the eldest and most powerful of the Ainu, and Lord of Time, comes from the Book of Lost Tales, Chapter IX the Darkening of Valinor, as does the Gonlath, the rock upon Taniquetil to which Aluin’s children tied the vessels of the Sun and the Moon and thus gave Manwë control over them…but also introduced Time into the Blessed Real, causing all things there to be subjected to decay and fading, though slow.

A leszi is a mythological character, a lord of a northern forest.

Warning: Originally intended as an Epilogue, this chapter turned out outrageously long, with footnotes and all!

Chapter 6. The Last Debate.

Somewhere near the estuary of the River Casamance. Low-Casamance region; Senegal, West Africa. March, 2006.

Maglor watched the newcomer from under a beaded curtain of black hair that blurred his vision. Since the rains had finally settled in, the lands of the Jola were regularly blessed with torrential downpours that sheeted every morning and every afternoon, until the rice fields were duly flooded.

He loved to sit cross-legged before his hut at those times; hunched, enduring, like the birds on the trees and the beasts upon the ground. It had a magical feeling to sit there under the rain, becoming one with the blinding curtain that poured down joyfully until he could no longer see, could no longer feel the pounding drops on his skin and became one with the rain, opening up to it as the soil did, accepting the gift humbly. At times, if he concentrated enough, he could even hear the echo of Ulmo’s horns coming down with the rain; waters that had once coursed the veins of Arda and that had risen high in the sky upon the wings of Manwë’s winds…only to come down again in the form of a blessing upon an earth that each day was drier and farther from grace.

But not today.

He had been restless since the night before, with a nagging feeling of upcoming events. Or perhaps it was his own nervousness at seeing how the appointed date –the Elven New Year- got closer and still there was no trace of a replacement, though Father Nino had been so sure that someone was on his way…Half-despairing that the miracle would ever happen, Maglor had nonetheless kept his promise to his old friend and was taking care of Insa’s family’s rice fields, while the young man returned to Dakar to get his degree.

Eager as he was to meet with his friends –it was four no, five years since they had all been together for the New Year- Maglor would not betray his word to the old priest. And just when he had lost all hope of savouring Thranduil’s more than passable reds for yet another year, the man had jumped off the old truck that brought supplies from Oussouye monthly and had started asking patiently in every hut. Maglor studied him quietly from the other end of the hamlet, as the villagers answered the stranger’s questions and pointed him towards the bakin.

He liked what he saw. The man was neither old nor young; a thickset, short fellow who carried a medium-sized backpack carefully enveloped in a waterproof cover. He wore plain cotton trousers with less than five pockets and a t-shirt, and seemed not bothered by the pouring rain. Even better, he did not even try to get under cover, as one who actually knew the futility of such efforts under equatorial rains.

“Good afternoon, Jürgen Purchert. They said you could tell me about Father Nino…”

Maglor took some time to study the well-worn trekking shoes before raising his head and meeting the newcomer’s eyes, which turned out to be deep blue slits on a plain, honest face wrinkled by experience and framed by greying hair. He stood up gracefully, pushing back strands of black, soaking hair that sent more rivers trickling down his spine, and shook the proffered hand with his scarred one. “Malcolm Lauren,” he said. “You can leave your pack here. It is not far.” He picked his machete from its peg and watched as the man unslung his backpack without a word and placed it as safe from the rain as he dared without invading the privacy of Maglor’s cabin.

The newcomer kept his silence while following Maglor to the river. He boarded the dugout with sure step, knowing exactly where to take seat and picking up a paddle without being told. He had strong arms, and after a few sure strokes they were amidst the river, which was swollen with the heavy rains. By the time they took the steep, tangled trail up the hill at the other side Maglor was already persuaded that the man was up to the position. With well-aimed blows of his machete he cleared the last stretch towards the hill top, where the old baobab stood watch over the priest’s resting place. The rain had stopped by then, and Arien was piercing her way amidst pewter clouds, colouring the dripping trees with myriads of tiny, glistening rainbows.

“There,” he said, pointing at the plain driftwood cross that marked the place. The man nodded and walked up the short distance to the tomb, then dropped down clumsily and looked at the simple carvings for a long time. Maglor just stood there, watching the old tree and the empty nest on its sturdy branch.  

“A beautiful place,” the man said finally in a deep voice. “I am sorry that I could not come before…I suppose that Insa is back in Dakar?” The question shook Maglor from his contemplation and he cast a questioning glance at the man. “I met Father Nino some thirty years ago, in the Brazilian Amazonia, in an irrigation project,” the other explained. “I was a young engineer then, fresh from college, and we were in the opposite sides of the barricade… but we ended up as friends,” he chuckled, smiling at some fond memory. “We’ve been in touch since then. I told him that I would be glad to help the Jola as soon as I finished my last commission…but it was too late, I fear. I came here a couple of times in the last years…And I was curious to meet you, Mr. Lauren,” he added, looking up and searching Maglor’s face quickly. “Father Nino spoke highly of you…”

“We were friends,” Maglor acknowledged softly, wondering whether the engineer had heard about the lawyer or rather the bakin. “So you are come to settle down,” he added, feeling a surge of relief and gratitude towards the old priest, who had taken time to tie up all the threads carefully before leaving. “And I suppose that you are ready to remain here until Insa comes back, taking care of the rice fields for him?”

“And also of the legal conflicts, although it would comfort me to know that we still count with your support…”

“My office in Dakar is keeping track of everything; you will find their number among Father Nino’s papers. I have other duties elsewhere, so I cannot tell when I will be back…Come,” he said, standing up and casting a last glance at the solitary mound. “Take your pack to his place, and let’s drink to his health with his wine…” And without looking back he took the path down the hill.

Word had spread across the hamlet, though, and when they came back they found that their neighbours were ready to receive their new resident with due ritual, since he had already been acknowledged by the bakin. First they showed the engineer into Father Nino’s cabin, which they had supplied with fruit, yucca, fresh water and a new hammock, and then they shared the powerful bunuk with the newcomer and swore him into the old gods. They feasted the whole night, and Maglor sang for them and played drums with absolute abandon, deeply grateful for the peace and forgetfulness that he had always been granted among the Jola. Before dawn, while everyone slept in the blissful fog of the bunuk, he slipped quietly into his own hut, gathered his scarce belongings and walked away.

                                                                                                                        ~~ * ~~ 

Somewhere near Carnac. Bretagne, France. Five days later.

It took Maglor two days on foot to reach Oussouye, one day to get air transportation to Dakar in an old Cessna that jumped and burped like a drunken bird and two more to find a ticket with Air France to Paris. Trying to make it in time for a domestic connection between Charles De Gaulle and Orly airports was only too daunting a challenge, even for one who had fought Morgoth’s armies in the First Age, so he rented a car instead and drove down the busy highway and towards the sea.

Half-way between Paris and Rennes he stopped at a small, quaint village of stone houses and silent squares and managed to found a decently prized guesthouse where the innkeeper seemed glad enough –after his French manner- to take a guest in that late in the evening.  Bread, cheese, a bowl of vegetable soup and a glass of new cider from the barrel tasted like some old forgotten home to Maglor, and he climbed the creaking wooden stairs to a penthouse bedroom in a rather melancholy mood.

He slept for a few hours and was back on the road well before dawn. He made good time and bet Arien to Carnac, so her first rays found the Elf walking among evergreen oaks and tall pine trees, along the rows of stone alignments that Men called Kermario, the House of the Dead.

Maglor loved that land like few others in Middle-earth. The lines of standing stones there were old; he suspected that the mounds and barrows and stone landmarks had been there since Bereg of the house of Bëor led a great host of Edain back south from Estolad and across the Ered Luin. They still stood there, the stones, and their presence at the very rim of drowned Beleriand somehow comforted him, as a reminder of the world of old. But they also filled him with a yearning that each passing yén became more unbearable.

He sat there for some time, his back against one of the old standing stones, hoping to regain some measure of serenity after so long in the fast-paced jungle. He closed his eyes and reached for his fëa, urging its song to join the slow, ancient voices of the stones and the always welcome chatter of oaks that were mere saplings when compared with the mossy boulders. And yet he could not find the usual peace in that familiar place. He had been shaken by the priest’s death and by his parting words. Father Nino’s well-intentioned talk of forgiveness and redemption had stirred unfathomable depths of guilt and shame, and now Maglor felt again the weight of his banishment. Releasing a deep, anguished sigh he forced on his customary cold, cynical front and went in search of the guard.

“The dogs were restless, but this one did not bark, so I thought it might be you…” Man and dog greeted him at the other side of the fence they had been forced to erect years ago to protect the site from too much admiring by careless tourists.  Now only sheep, visiting researchers and the site guardians and their dogs were granted the privilege of strolling among those ancient stone trees. “It’s been how long, Dr. Lauren? Five, six years? It’s good to see you!”

“Five, I would say, and not enough for that grass to grow back, I see,” he pointed out as he climbed the fence with the casualness of one who felt at home. “I hope your wife is well?”

“She is, thanks,” the guard laughed, shaking Maglor’s hand in welcome and casting furtive glances around to make sure that no early tourist had witnessed that blatant violation, while the dog cavorted and wiggled its tail madly and licked Maglor’s hand in recognition. “And she will gladly trade a cup or two of her coffee for your tales!”

“Not now, my friend, send her my regards. I have an appointment, and I just dropped by to tell you that I am here…”

“Are you staying at your friend’s? Bring him down for lunch on Sunday, then,” the guard insisted, walking Maglor back to where he had parked his car. “The children will be here, and they will be glad to see you…”

He promised, clasped the guard’s arm and patted the dog, his mood notably improved by their warm reception. He had spent some time there many years ago, but they still received him as a long missed family member and were glad to exchange gossip and tales with him, no matter how long it had been since his last visit. It made Maglor feel like home; and he was grateful for it.

He was humming an old tune as he drove inland, towards the place where Thranduil had settled down many years ago. A well-paved road wound up a hill that had once, he was sure, housed a large barrow. A few houses cluttered its wide, bare crown, commanding an impressive view of the westernmost seas. He shivered as he parked the car and walked the last meters, trying not to think about the Straight Road that was closed to him forever. It had always stricken him as passing strange that the former king of Lasgalen, and a Wood elf at root, branch and leaf, would choose such a place for his preferred dwelling, looking west and into the sea.

Perhaps he, too, feels the call, he told himself. He would not know. They never talked about such things among themselves, or at least he did not. He kept his distance from his Sindarin fellow exiles as much as he could, always mindful of the impenetrable wall that his lineage and his crimes set up between them. He preferred to hide behind a façade of aloofness and arrogance that at times did not manage to wholly conceal his shame and his grief.

Thranduil’s great house stood alone on the farthest end of the hilltop and facing the ocean, its slate roof shaded by a mighty evergreen oak whose old age was the wonder of the neighbourhood, and its granite walls guarded by a couple of tall, straight holly trees that stood to permanent attention in the yard. Behind the house, hurrying downthe soft slope of the hill and reaching towards the bend of the river, stretched a large beech forest. Beyond there rolled Thranduil’s vineyards in ordered rows not much different in the distance from the almost endless lines of standing stones. Depending on where you stood, you could well believe that you were truly alone in that awesome landscape that so acutely called to mind ages long gone: Granite, trees and silence broken only by the voice of Manwë’s winds and the everlasting song of Ulmo’s horns. Moved by the beauty of the land, Maglor stood still for a moment on the old flagstones that lined the way to the main door and breathed in deeply, savouring the tang of the western waters blown in by winds which, he liked to think, at times came straight from lost Valinor.

“At last! Where were you? We have been trying to get to you for a couple of days!” Daeron’s accusing welcome broke the peaceful spell and brought Maglor’s annoyance back with a vengeance. He shrugged and walked past his friend, pushing his backpack into his hands.

“I cast my cell phone into the ocean,” he grunted menacingly as he shoved through the heavy wooden door. “Where is the urgency, anyway? I am sure that you would not miss my company, and Thranduil should be cooking. It is his turn, if I am not mistaken...” he complained loudly as he entered the spacious living room. “Where is that king? I cannot smell anything on that royal oven of his…”

Celeborn looked up from his laptop and cast him a grave glance. “He is missing. For two weeks, now.”

                                                                                                                      ~~ * ~~ * ~~

Flying South. Elven New Year, 2006

With a wave of his charred hand Maglor refused the meal and reclined on the seat, turning once again in his mind what little information they had while the plane sped across the Atlantic Ocean.

Celeborn had looked quite worried, and after listening to the messages in Thranduil’s voice mailbox Maglor considered that he should have been fretting instead.

“Hello, this is Inti Sacha, from Greenwood Great’s office in Quito, Ecuador. Dr. Greenwood has gone missing for two weeks now…that I know of. He had a ticket to Paris for March 15^th, but he didn’t show up. I have been making enquiries, and he was last seen in Tiputini Research Station last December. He called me the second week of February, though, and asked me to buy the ticket for him… He also asked me to check on him in his home in France every two days after the day of his scheduled arrival…just to make sure that he had indeed arrived, or until someone answered the phone. I told this to the Police and the Army, but they did not pay much attention. Yesterday I was told that they intended to leave the search…if they ever started one...”  Not much for a start but, after contacted, the woman had refused to give more information on the phone, Celeborn had told him, for fear that she was being spied on.

And so they had bought their tickets and were now spending Yestarë flying down to South America in search of their adventurous friend in a very strained mood. “There is nothing that we can do until we get there,” Maglor told himself, trying to relax on his seat and catch some sleep. And then Celeborn’s words last night returned to his mind.

“I had summoned you all here because I have some very important news to share,” the Sindarin lord had informed them quietly.

Maglor had interrupted him in his most flippant manner. “Let me guess, the end of the world,” he had blurted. Much to his chagrin, Celeborn had maintained his legendary composure. Anyone in his place would have snapped at that stupid comment, but the Sindarin lord had only shrugged and sighed, “It can wait until we are reunited. Good night.” But there had been that quick glance, that imperceptible smile and nod that only now registered in Maglor’s mind as he recalled the scene.

“Oh, well,” he groaned, struggling to fit his long legs under the front seat and pulling the blanket up until it covered his head. “Thranduil goes missing, there might be an apocalypse coming and soon I bet we will be hearing about the sun and the moon losing their orbits. I should have remained with the Jola,” he berated himself right before he fell asleep.

Thranduil’s assistant was waiting for them at the airport, smiling merrily in her gaily embroidered blouse and the elegant long woollen skirts that all women of her race wore. As all of them did, too, she looked like a child to Maglor’s eyes, although she was surely a grown woman, or at least a married one, he noticed, judging by the long, dark braid tightly held in the patterned hairband that declared her status. “Welcome to Quito, Dr. Silvertree,” she offered in a singing voice, shaking Celeborn’s hand and nodding to Maglor and Daeron.

“Nice to meet you, Inti Sacha, how did you know it was us?” Daeron asked teasingly, bending to kiss her cheek after the local manner.

The woman chuckled. “I have been working with Dr. Greenwood for some time now… and you all have that same...air of…not really being here,” she pointed out with a shy smile and a shrug. 

“A grown woman and a wise one,” Maglor decided, casting a swift glance around to see if someone was taking unduly interest in them, even if they looked no different from other groups of foreign tourists being greeted by their guides. And yet he knew that they didlook different. After so long in Middle-earth they were all beginning to fade, as the fire of their fëar slowly but steadily consumed their hroar. If the woman had noticed it so could others, Maglor told himself warily, still looking around.

“Behind you, the man in the ill-fitting grey suit,” the woman whispered softly. Maglor fought the urge to look back and nodded at her. “They are following me; there is little that can be done. What do you want to do?” she asked then in a louder voice. “I can drive you to a hotel for the night, or you can fly right now to Coca…I thought you would,” she chuckled as the three jumped on the last choice. “Come, follow me, there is a small airplane waiting for you, and the basic equipment that you might need. I can brief you on our way...”

Barely an hour later they were flying over snow-capped volcanoes that blazed ridiculously pink in the sunset. Maglor looked outside the window while Celeborn and Daeron discussed the latest news in soft, hurried Sindarin.

“Bridges?” Daeron sounded more amused than outraged.

“He has been doing that for years, it is part of his projects here,” Celeborn explained. “They collect metallic structures and pieces of wood that are being dumped and cart them to remote places where he enlists the help of villagers to build bridges. They love him, down there in the jungle. A bridge most often than not means a short cut of several days for those people to get to the nearest village.”

“So what do you think that happened to him? A villager that did not want his isolation disrupted?” Maglor could not help wondering aloud in his mocking tone.

“Perhaps, although I am more inclined to think that this has to do with all the restlessness around the border,” Celeborn answered calmly. “I did some research these past days. Apparently, a couple of Huaorani settlements were massacred in the past months, and some say that this was the work of the Tagaeri, although the tales are confusing and some of the proofs seem made up… but all in all it has more to do with illegal timbering and the Colombian guerrilla, I suspect…”

“And our rash king had to meddle in there, of course.”

“Or was caught in the middle of it. Do not fret, Maglor, Inti Sacha seemed quite sure that he was being kept alive for ransom…”

Maglor shrugged noncommittally, his gaze fixed on the landscape below, which changed dramatically from the bare, wind-swept highlands into the emerald green of the rainforest. It always unnerved him how well Celeborn read through his provoking, insulting manners.

"Inti Sacha also said that he had been last seen leaving Tiputini Research Station,” Daeron mused aloud. “Why do you think that he might be this north, now?”

“Since February the Tagaeri have been sighted here and here,” Celeborn said. Maglor heard the rustling of a map being carefully unfolded but did not turn to look. He was almost sure that their bold friend had run into a band of poachers or arms smugglers and had been carried away by his warrior instincts. If he was actually alive, all they had to do was showing wads of dollars around and wait patiently until someone spat some useful names.

“That is quite far from where the Huaorani camps were massacred,” Daeron whistled worriedly. “And very far away from their usual roaming areas… Poachers, then?”

“I’d rather suspect guerrilla groups or their allies clearing an emergency escape route for their new meeting point,” Celeborn retorted grimly. That caught Maglor’s interest.

“This is the place where that guerrilla camp was shelled the other day inside Ecuadorian territory,” Celeborn showed them. “See? These Huao settlements were in the middle of their natural emergency escape route… so I suppose that they cleaned up the Huao settlements just to be sure that no one would stand on their way in case they needed an escape…not that it served them in the end,” he added darkly.

“And they left behind spears of Tagaeri making, so that the blame would go to Thranduil’s friends,” Daeron ended sadly.

Maglor shook his head unconvinced. “Everybody knows that the Tagaeri would never leave their spears behind!”

Daeron agreed. “Indeed. But since the Tagaeri are the only obstacle between the oil companies and the new concessions in the strictly preserved area, everybody was ready to proclaim that the Tagaeri had gone berserk and that they had to be hunted down, brought to court and deprived of their lands…”

Maglor slumped back on the uncomfortable seat and shook his head. He was tired of useless wars. The Tagaeri were as good as extinct, and there was no way that Thranduil –or anyone else- could save them from their doomed fate. Caught in turmoil of corrupt politics, misery, land occupation, ruthless wood cutting, guerrilla camps, weapons smuggling, oil reserves and concessions and coca trade routes, the legal mandates that supposedly aimed at protecting the Tagaeri and their lands amidst that hell had in the end turned out to accelerate their extinction. Their status as a people in voluntary isolation singled them out as the only obstacle for the many converging interests bent on milking the promising well of riches that was Yasuni forest, and they were an easy prey. To Maglor, it seemed a cruelty worth of Morgoth’s twisted mind, binding a helpless people in a net of invisible, impossible laws nobody complied with, and then leaving them, hands tied, to the wolves.

They landed as the sun set, in a thin strip sliced across a dense stretch of rainforest not far from town, and were greeted by the suffocating heat that oozed from the jungle after a heavy rain. A battered wagon drove them to the city, which looked rather like a camp, and left them before the best hotel in town, a dirty concrete building with a shiny neon sign on its roof.  They checked in and were given sparsely furnished rooms with creaking beds, ragged, flimsy mosquito nets and noisy fans.

“I am going to the police station to gather any news. What are you going to do?” Celeborn asked his two friends when they met in the lobby.

“I’ll make some enquiries along the river,” Daeron informed promptly. “Someone may have seen him…or heard of him, at least.”

“And you, Maglor?”

“I’ll go with you, if you don’t mind,” he decided after a pause, casting a questioning glance to Celeborn, who nodded quietly.

“Good. Do not let him set anything to flames with that terrible gaze of his, Celeborn, it would be difficult to explain” joked Daeron, patting Maglor’s arm with reckless casualness and handing him a pair of dark sunglasses. “I’ll see you at ‘the blue monkey’ later,” he reminded them as they took opposite directions.

“Is something wrong, Maglor?” Celeborn asked cautiously. Maglor sighed and cast a look around as they walked down the darkening street.

“I hate this city,” he finally admitted, meeting the other’s searching glance. “It stinks of decay…” He could feel anger welling up inside, too. Coca was the paradigm of a living hell, a city built upon the largest oil reserves in the country and yet swarming in corruption, poverty, theft and sewage. They walked past a line of clubs where sad, wan looking women winked and waved at them languidly from the doors. Children played on dirty pools and around mounds of garbage on the unpaved street, mindless of the shouts and threats that at times drifted out of the clubs. Groups of workers from the oil companies were seen around, shouting at each other or at the women, brawling, celebrating their release after their three-week shift or mourning that their leave was over and they were bound again to the unyielding rainforest. Whatever their motive, they just indulged with desperate conviction in what pleasures their money could buy, and were only too willing to try new ones that shrewd businessmen were always eager to bring into the city. After all, Coca had a thriving, innovative economy thanks to the exploitation of the oil fields.  

“Here we are. Would you mind if I lead the conversation?” Celeborn’s soft voice brought him from his dark thoughts. He looked away from a bundle that he had spotted lying on the mud. It was a Huaorani, by his looks, whether dead drunk or just dead he did not know –nor really wanted to find out.

“As you say,” he shrugged, following his friend into the dimly lit building that housed jail and police station. Blank faces looked up from cards and magazines and watched them with open boredom and latent annoyance.

Celeborn’s questions were met by a wall of suspicion and indifference, but the Sindarin lord kept on patiently, until they were finally dragged to see some boss by a suddenly agreeable officer who had been conveniently encouraged by Celeborn’s generosity. Surely expecting an encouragement according to his rank, the commander began by harassing them and demanding that they showed him their passports and declared their true purpose. After patient coaxing, the man finally made a show of looking up in his files and shook his head.

“Nobody has seen or heard of him. I do not know why they charged us with this case but, if you want my opinion, he went too far and those damned Tagaeri killed him…”

“Did you search for him?” Maglor intervened then in a sharp voice that somehow froze the suffocating atmosphere. The commander cast him a blank look.

“Search? Why would I? We just questioned this and that, made sure that nobody had seen him in the surroundings and sent word to Quito. You should ask in Tena, he was last seen in Tiputini, after all…why should I spend my time looking for a mad gringo that goes around building bridges and meddling with…”

Celeborn managed to grab him as he bent threateningly over the table and raised a curled fist towards the commander. “Why don’t you go for a walk?” his friend suggested pointedly. Nodding curtly, Maglor turned around and strode away, not really seeing a couple that was entering the office until he bumped into them and then shoved them aside to gain the door and step outside that stifling building, almost choking on his rage.

He walked around aimlessly along dark streets until his feet led him to the river side, where a soft breeze brought some relief from the hot humid atmosphere. Maglor sat there for a while, watching the long fingers of the trees reach up to the waxing moon, allowing their sweet song to seep into him and cool down his wrath and despair. Not for the first time he wondered what had made his friends remain in that sinful, corrupt world, when they were not subjected to a lifetime banishment. As the ages passed by and men became bolder in their destruction of Arda, Maglor felt the weight of his isolation more deeply, and his contempt towards the Secondborn more difficult to bear. But deep down his anger and his melancholy mood lay an unbearable longing for forgiveness that would never be fulfilled, he feared, a longing turned into despair that estranged him from his friends even more than his crimes.

When he felt that he was in command of his temper he went to meet Daeron at ‘the blue monkey’, the riverside bar that was one of their refuges in the city. The deep, beautiful voice of his friend welcomed him as he walked down the unsteady wooden steps that brought him down to the riverbank, where a makeshift wooden kiosk stood precariously on an abandoned floating quay.

“Look, Tapuy, a very cold beer for my friend, he is in a foul mood today!”

The few locals scattered on chairs, trunks or wooden boxes were being treated to a session of Daeron’s talent unplugged, and waved distractedly at Maglor as he came down into the unstable bar. The Sinda was coaxing enticing sounds from an old guitar and singing old melancholy Spanish tunes that were eagerly echoed by the regulars. Maglor accepted the beer and drank down from the bottle, watching as Daeron embarked on a different song and his audience sang along willingly. He finished with a flourish and came to sit beside Maglor on a stool by the counter.

“Any news?”

“I left Celeborn at it, since you made it clear that burning the commander alive was not an option,” Maglor grunted, feeling a sudden urge to wipe Daeron’s smug smile from his face. “And you?”

“Not bad,” the other answered. “Tapuy had some interesting tips… Come Tapuy, tell my friend!”

The bar owner came closer and nodded at Maglor. He was a short man, an ethnic quichua with all of his race’s ability for commerce and negotiation. Master of many trades, his secreted night bar was the meeting point for hidden informants, transactions and agreements that were best conducted in privacy and other, darker sides of politics and business that always needed that kind of twilight area in which to take place.

“Greenwood was here on the second week of February,” the man began in his halted Spanish. “He was looking for someone to take him down the river, beyond the last settlement…”

“What for?”

“He would not say…but I helped him find a guide and a dugout. He seemed quite angry, and he told me something about the Huao that I did not understand. I do not like the Huao, and I told him that he should keep himself from them, they are warriors, aucas,” he explained, frowning at Maglor’s mirthless chuckle.  “The guide came back alone a couple of weeks ago. I got him to confess that he had abandoned Greenwood in a very dangerous area… guerrilla camps and all that. When word that Greenwood was missing spread, he went into hiding…”

Maglor frowned. “I want to find this guide,” he said.

“We don’t need him,” Daeron chimed in. “Tapuy got him to confess where he had abandoned Thran… our friend, and guess what! It was not far from the Huao settlements that had been attacked. We know where to start looking…”

“Perhaps, but I want to reward him conveniently for his services,” Maglor shot back threateningly. The bartender shook his head.

“Someone else did. They found him in the river two days ago. He had gone to talk to the governor… and never came back. Wait a moment.”

Maglor exchanged a dark look with Daeron while Tapuy brought more drinks for his customers. “What has he got himself into this time?” he raged. “How far is that settlement?”

“Four days down the river. Tapuy has got us a dugout; and supplies for the trip. He says that we should start tonight, before anyone suspects. This is a dark affair, Maglor,” Daeron said, lowering his voice. “The military are involved in something very big that apparently went wrong…and the bombing of that militia camp north from here made things worse. Everybody is very nervous around here...”

“And your friend is right in the middle,” the bartender ended up for him. “Do you want to try the chicha? It is the first of the season…”  

Daeron was singing again when Celeborn came down the stairs and into the bar, carrying their packs. He dropped them on the floor beside Maglor and accepted a cold beer. “He cannot help it, can he?” he chuckled softly, as the customers threw money at Daeron after his last song. Maglor shrugged, amused despite himself. “Can you get us something for dinner, Tapuy?” the Sindarin lord asked the bartender, and then signalled for Maglor and Daeron to follow him to a more secluded area where a couple of tables and several mismatched chairs witnessed most of the meetings that were not held in that place.

“I think I got it,” Celeborn said as Daeron returned the guitar to its peg on one of the posts and dragged a chair.

“The commander told you?” Maglor asked incredulously. “I doubt…”

“Not the commander but the couple that you pushed aside so unceremoniously in your rushed way out…They were abducted a week ago and carried to a settlement around here,” Celeborn explained, pointing at a place on his map, very close to an area that was already marked several times. “They are working for a multilateral organization, so their captors thought it wiser to release them unharmed after relieving them from their belongings…They left them to walk or swim…or die in the jungle, if they were not strong enough,” he added with a strange, steely glitter on his eyes. Maglor saw them in his mind then, dishevelled and caked with mud, the man supporting the limping woman and piercing him with a wrathful, accusing glare. He grimaced in remorse. “Of course the commander did not pay much attention to their plight,” Celeborn continued, “but I waited for them and listened to their story...and got the man to draw me a rough map. They said they heard the women in that camp talk about another prisoner, a valuable one, and by their words the woman suspected that he might be the famous bridge-builder,” he finished with a triumphant glance at his friends.

“Guerrilla, then?” asked Daeron.

“Jungle businessmen,” the bartender chimed in, placing more cold beers and three plates of food on the table. “A guerrilla group would have kept them. There are many displaced people settling in that large area… making a living out of selling anything to anyone who would pay for it,” he added, pointing at the place that was already heavily marked in Celeborn’s map.

“So we must assume that Greenwood is in the hands of these Jungle Businessmen, then?” Maglor spat disdainfully, picking a thick chontacuro from the plate. “Isn’t it early in the season for these?” he asked then, savouring the roasted worm and pointing at the plate.

“It is. And we fear that the crop will not be plentiful at all, there is some sickness affecting the chonta palms,” the bartender complained. “Too much rain out of season…The dugout is waiting for you. You better row for the night, until you get well away from town. They will know that you are gone, but at least you will have a good start…from the military,” he explained at Daeron’s quizzical glance. “They will radio your description and your purpose… They already knew about this two people that Silvertree met, they were expecting them today or tomorrow…and I am sure it was the military who suggested that they were set free. But Greenwood the bridge-builder is a different matter… he represents no danger but good money…to be split up between the parties.”

“So they think,” Maglor grunted darkly, not meeting Celeborn’s quick, worried glance.

“Be careful. An armed incident down there could fire a war, and we do not need that. I must go, good luck,” the bartender warned, nodding to them and returning to his clients, who were trying to make up for Daeron’s absence with dissimilar results.

“I will go and check the dugout and get everything ready,” Daeron said, after exchanging a pointed glance with Celeborn. Washing down one last mouthful of charred fish with a long swig he picked up their packs and walked into the bar.

Maglor heard him exchange jokes with the customers and listened to his soft hurried conversation with the bartender as he paid their bill and then took the path down the abandoned quay. He studiously refused to meet Celeborn’s eyes and concentrated on the bony, tasteless fish, the remaining worms and the slices of cooked yucca. When he was finished, he gulped down what was left of his second beer and shrugged. “Shall we go?”

“Are you sure that you want to go?”

“Why would I not?”

“You tell me… You are not yourself; I can see there is something troubling you, Maglor, a kind of…”

“Do not speak about what you know not, sinda,” he cut harshly. “It is that annoying friend of yours and those stupid stunts that he insists on pulling what troubles me… If he is so tired of Middle-earth he should start swimming west and rid us of his useless fights once and for all!”   

“I only say that it would be foolish from your part to come, risking yourself and us, when you are clearly not in command of yourself. You could wait here…”

Maglor cast him a contemptuous smile. “Nonsense!” he spat, a dangerous glare crossing his unnaturally bright eyes, the eyes of an Exile who had seen the light of the Two Trees…and had looked upon the faces of the Powers. “I want to kick his royal ass when we find him…unless he dies waiting, while Celeborn the Wise insists on fencing with words with a son of Fëanor,” he added venomously, turning his back on the Sindarin lord to ignore the look of pity that crossed Celeborn’s features and walking away purposefully down the floating quay to their canoe. He walked past Daeron without looking at him and stepped with dangerous abandon up to the prow of the long dugout, plopping down carelessly and causing the shallow craft to dance and sway madly.

“He is raging, Celeborn. We shall have to keep an eye on him…or else let him loose upon Thranduil’s captors,” Daeron chuckled as Celeborn stepped in more carefully. Maglor ignored them, with his back stubbornly turned on his two friends, and he started paddling as soon as he felt that the dugout had been pushed into the undisturbed stream.

They followed the wide, deep current of the Napo River for two days and then took a small tributary that came from the south. They would start the engine when they felt it was safe, and paddle when not. All that time Maglor kept his silent, sullen mood, as they led their canoe across an indistinct swamp scattered with bushes that emerged from the waters here and there. It felt strange to Maglor to think that those shrubs were actually the tops of trees twenty or more metres tall, barely surfacing from the seasonally flooded plains.  

The water descended on the third day and, following Celeborn’s indications, they took another small waterway in that dense network, which led them to the unflooded uplands close to a row of hills of red clay. The vegetation changed abruptly there, and a dense understorey of bushes and lianas covered the banks, while the canopy trees rose up to thirty metres in their merciless struggle for light.

“We should leave the dugout here and continue on foot,” Celeborn said as they stopped for the third night in a small beach. Daeron had caught a handful of bony fishes and now they sat around a small fire eating them carefully.

“How do you know?” Maglor asked. It was the first time that he spoke since they had left Coca. Celeborn shrugged and cast him a cautious glance.

“The man at the police station in Coca finally gave me a few GPS coordinates of several unofficial camps, one of which might -or might not- be the one we are looking for.”

“I sincerely hope that bribes are deductible,” Maglor grunted dryly. “Since you seem to have everything in hand, I will excuse myself,” he added, standing up abruptly and walking back to the dugout. He preferred to lie there, cradled by the warm wood and soothed by the steady voice of the water lapping at the pebbled river beach. Out of habit he looked up, hoping that at least a few stars might have pierced the dense canopy, but he was disappointed.

He was the first to get up next morning, and had already packed by the time his two friends got up, so restless and anxious he was to be on the road. Inti Sacha had provided them with everything needed for a trek in the jungle, and the bartender had supplied the dried food, water skins, three sharp machetes and long chonta spears, but no fire arms that Maglor could see.

“We must be careful not to use undue force…” Daeron explained mildly. “You heard Tapuy. Any armed conflict in this area at this point could start a war.”

“And with these spears we could start a genocide,” he grumbled. “They are of Huao making…”

“We will make sure that we are not mistaken for Huaos,” Celeborn chimed in grimly, picking up one and checking its balance expertly. For the first time in a few days Maglor smiled, though not prettily, openly pleased by his friends’ warlike attitude. 

They walked at a brisk pace, following some half hidden trail surely opened by tapirs, and it seemed to Maglor that either Celeborn knew exactly where they were headed, or else the jungle made way willingly before the former lord of Lothlórien, clearly easing their march. Unhindered by any other obstacles than the forest itself, which here was crowded by lower trees and knots of woody vines that at times reached out and tried to tangle them, they made good time and arrived at the remains of the first settlement well before midday.

“This was abandoned long ago,” Daeron declared, coming out of the only hut that stood up. “And I can see no traces of recent occupation….”

“Well, this leaves us two options,” Celeborn said, consulting his map and his GPS device. “One to the north and one to the south. Which one should we check first?”

“Did those people that you met at the police station say something about the river?” Daeron mused, studying the map uncertainly. Celeborn narrowed his eyes and then unfolded the rough sketch the grateful man had drawn after Celeborn led him and the tired woman to the hotel and paid for their rooms.

“This is not of much help…” he muttered, studying the jagged scratches.

“Wait, what is this? It seems to me that the huts are between streams…” Maglor pointed out, unfolding the official map anxiously and comparing the two. “See? There is this small current here… north from where we are now…It matches that man’s sketch… and roughly with your coordinates and it looks to me a better place for a settlement than the one south… Let’s try this!” he urged them.

They started north.

The trees grew taller and the jungle darker as they progressed towards the row of low hills. Tall ceiba of thick, green trunks loomed over them, and the rainforest watched in expectant silence as they trudged along. A soft rain pattered the tallest leaves and evaporated almost before reaching the forest floor, marking with steady rhythm their tireless march. Only a loud, harsh screech would be heard from time to time, always ahead of them, apparently advancing on their same direction.

After a few hours, Celeborn called to a stop. “We are close now, about half an hour from the settlement...”

“We should take to the trees, I can see no obstacles ahead,” Daeron suggested, casting an appraising glance at the endless lines of tall ceiba that spread beyond their sight. Maglor could not hold back a dismayed groan when he saw the slow smile spreading across Celeborn features. “You could follow us on the ground, Maglor,” Daeron continued, ignoring, as it was his wont, the Noldo’s murderous mood. “I will make sure I have dinner ready by the time you catch up with us…”

Without answering, Maglor strapped his long spear to his back and started climbing the closest ceiba. As he felt the rugged bark for handholds he could not help thinking of another, thick ceiba tree that watched over his friend’s tomb an ocean away. “Shall I go alone?” he piqued his friends when he reached the first branch.

Soon they were running across sturdy branches in the silent, graceful manner of their kin. Bands of monkeys that sheltered on the densely foliaged trees to hide form the heat of the day watched them pass with disinterest, keeping their presence secret. The loud, rasping screech sounded closer now, and Maglor was the first to descry the harpy eagle that flew in circles at some distance.

“There,” he grunted, filled with sudden certainty.

“You may be right,” Celeborn nodded, pointing to their right. A stretch of forest had been roughly cleared not far from there to make room for a chacra, an orchard where the jungle people cultivated their staples –mainly yucca and other seasonal crops.

“We are not far,” Daeron whispered. “How shall we proceed?”

“First we should study the surroundings and try to guess where they keep Thranduil…”

“If they indeed keep him,” Maglor interrupted impatiently. “Let’s find the settlement!” Without waiting for answer or acknowledgement he started running again, a cold rage filling him. Deaf to his friends’ soft calls he got as close to the settlement as he dared, and alighted silently high amidst loaded boughs that hid him from sight. He unshouldered his pack and laid it securely in the wide fork formed by branch and trunk. Then he turned his attention to the settlement below. It was made up of several buildings, one of them an abandoned long hut of Huaorani making that still looked more homely and solid than the crude, makeshift huts scattered around the clearing.

By the time Celeborn and Daeron reached him, Maglor had already carried out a careful search of the camp. He noticed that his friends had fanned out, one to his left and one to his right, and nodded approvingly. There were a few naked children playing by an open fire, while a woman busied herself skinning some prey. Another one was coming with a load of sticks in her arms, and she chided the children good- naturedly. Two men sat lazily before one of the huts, passing a bowl of drink between them, and another lay on a hammock, apparently fast asleep, right under Maglor. A fourth one emerged, a gun in hand, from a more solid looking hut behind which he thought he could distinguish a satellite dish.

Silently, Maglor slid down the trunk to the lowest branch, pointing the sitting men to his friends and paying no attention to their frantic gestures that he should return to the safety of the canopy. He could feel the blood roaring in his ears, the battle mode taking over his senses as resentment pumped up his heartbeats.  

“You bags of scum! I told you to kill that beast!” the man barked, lifting the gun to his face and taking aim at the harpy eagle that screeched accusingly above them. That was more than what Maglor could take. Throwing caution to the wind, he ran lightly along the branch, hoping to jump down gracefully and closest to the armed man. The first shot caught him by surprise, though, and made him lose his footing. Unbalanced, he finally fell down and right upon the man that was still asleep on his hammock.

Chaos ensued. “Damn!” he thought he heard Daeron shout. He jumped on his feet quickly, unsheathing his machete in one fluid movement and knocking the man out cold even before he could untangle himself from the hammock or understand what had happened. He heard the women cry in distress, and sensed the two men who had been lounging by the other hut charging at him. He whirled around swiftly to meet them and raised his blade in a protective arch that managed to deflect gracefully the first cut, and bought him time to land two of his own. They bore down on him at the same time, with more force than skill, but still one of them managed to graze Maglor’s arm while he was busy kicking the other’s machete away from his reach.

“Stop it!”

Maglor wondered briefly where his friends were as he turned to face the third man, who had the gun pointed at his chest. Then relaxed.

“You better drop your gun,” Daeron suggested softly, surging behind the man and resting his machete against the man’s throat. “Now,” he urged pleasantly, nicking the soft skin to drive his point home. “That’s better… surely your friends won’t need their machetes now?”

Maglor smiled nastily and returned his attention to his two attackers. One was lying on the ground, nursing his cuts, but the other still stood with his blade in his hand. Almost lazily, Maglor raised his hand and hit him on the head with the hilt of his machete, sending him sprawling to the ground by his friend. Quick as lightning he unshouldered his spear and advanced on the lying men, wielding his weapons threateningly. The women cried again and the other man struggled fiercely in Daeron’s grip.

“Now you tell us where you keep…”

“Enough, Maglor!” Celeborn advanced calmly from the other side of the clearing surrounded by an air of confidence and control that enraged Maglor.

“Stay back,” he growled, his rage fuelled by the fear that seeped from the men. “I know what I am doing…”

“There is no need,” Celeborn insisted, walking up to him. “Look,” he said in a commanding tone. Maglor followed his indications and sighed in relief at seeing the harpy eagle alive and apparently unscathed. It was perched on the roof of the abandoned long hut and seemed to watch them intently. “Go,” Celeborn suggested then softly, placing his hands over the Noldo’s. “We’ll take care here…”

Grudgingly, Maglor nodded and released his grip on his weapons, surrendering them to Celeborn. Without looking at the frightened women he strode towards the hut, urged by the eagle’s now encouraging screeches.

The hut was a strange, absurd warehouse. Maglor raised his brows at the sight of an armchair and a washing machine, two large barrows –one of which missed a wheel- a DVD player, a set of frying pans and casseroles and scattered pieces of furniture. Jungle businessmen? The bartender’s words came back to his mind but he discarded them. Most assuredly those were refugees, forced in all haste from their houses, and too befuddled to separate what was important from what was necessary on their hurried flight.

Where are you, Thranduil? he called in his mind. It seemed to him that he could barely hear the song of an elven fëa but could not point whence it came. He cast another anxious look around and something caught his attention. Frantically, he pushed aside a large carpet of vegetal fibre that lay incongruously clean on the farthest corner of the hut and released a relieved sigh when he found out it hid a wooden trap door. It opened to a narrow tunnel from which a strange glitter emerged. Without hesitation Maglor lowered himself to the narrow passage and advanced on all fours, noticing that the unstable walls were crudely affirmed with fragile-looking, roughly shaped wooden pillars. He crawled for twenty meters, perhaps, to the source of that glimmer and soon found himself in a wider chamber.

He felt a number of metallic boxes around him but lost no time in checking them for amidst them lay his friend, tied up like a bundle of hay and shinning brightly as a midsummer fire, or rather as if his fëa was about to depart his hroa and finally answer the call of Mandos.

“Do not dare, you hear me?” he groaned, shaking the unconscious elf unceremoniously. “I’m going to drag you outside, and then I’ll tell you what I think of these adventures of yours!” Maglor gasped, grabbing the ropes and pulling Thranduil after him. Panting and grunting he somehow managed to reach the trap door and haul the unresponsive elf up into the relatively cool air of the long hut, where he was finally able to check his state.

Under all the mud and dirt that caked him, Thranduil looked worryingly pale, almost translucent. A deep, pulsing light pooled right under his skin, almost as if his fëa were about to burst out and flee. All of a sudden Maglor felt panic clutching at him.

“I have found him! I need my pack! And a blanket!” he cried out in Sindarin, wondering what his friends were doing out there as he nervously tried to unbound his friend and checked him for injuries. He was unconscious and his wrists and ankles were raw from the ropes, but otherwise he seemed unscathed and yet...

“Here. How is he?” Daeron could not hold back a worried whistle as he squatted beside them with Maglor’s backpack in his hands. Maglor cast him an anguished glance.

“He is fading, Daeron… he is almost gone...”

“I do not think so,” Daeron retorted confidently, placing a long hand upon the former king’s heart. “But he has had a hard time, it seems…There is a path that leads to the second river behind this hut, it is not far from here,” he added softly, seeing that Maglor was almost out of himself with worry. “Why don’t you take him there? Celeborn and I will join you shortly...”

Maglor did not stop to wonder what might keep his friends there, except perhaps killing those orcish Secondborn. He wrapped Thranduil on a blanket that he had packed that morning, and then rose up carefully with his friend firmly caught in his arms.  

“Stay with us, will you?” he murmured as he searched for the trail Daeron had mentioned, mindless of what was happening at his back. Thranduil was lighter than a bag of feathers and his heartbeat was erratic and weak. Suddenly, Maglor was reminded of the old priest, and he worried that his friend might fade right there before his eyes. Not knowing what to do, he began to sing softly, old songs that he had once knew, or heard in his youth. Singing, he made it to the smaller current and found a clearing suitable to make camp, far enough from the settlement. He sang as he rid his friend of his filthy rags and washed him carefully in the clear creek, and while he untangled the long tresses and combed them back from his wan face, and cleaned and bandaged the lacerations in his wrists and ankles and wrapped him in clean clothes and a warm blanket and finally laid him among the powerful roots of a mighty ceiba after trying to force some water into him.   

It seemed to Maglor, as he sat back and studied the still form, that his glowing had diminished and that his breathing was steadier, but he could not be sure. He was still there, watching anxiously over Thranduil when Celeborn and Daeron found them. Celeborn patted his shoulder comfortingly and knelt by the unconscious elf. Maglor watched him place a hand on Thranduil’s heart and then on his brow, and whisper something he could not hear, for Daeron’s voice brought him from his contemplation.

“Take seat and some rest, Maglor, and have a look at that cut in your arm. I told you that I would cook dinner today, didn’t I?” the Sindarin bard told him fondly while he set himself to start a fire. Only then Maglor noticed that they had carried firewood with them. “How is our kingly friend, Celeborn?”

“Weak, but he will feel better son, I am sure…”

“Watch the fire while I go to the supermarket, then,” Daeron chuckled, and disappeared into the jungle with the agility of a monkey, leaving Maglor there, feeling like a useless piece of wood.

“Relax, Maglor, he is going to be fine,” Celeborn insisted, casting him a worried look.

As relief settled in, Maglor felt his precarious control of his short temper slipping from him. “I’ll go and take a bath, then,” he snapped. He followed the creek away from their makeshift camp until he was sure that he was out of earshot and then allowed himself to let escape a strangled cried, muffled against the welcoming trunk of a palm tree. Fear coursed freely out of him as pictures of what might have happened danced madly in his mind’s eye. The simple thought of losing one of his friends terrified him, he who had for ages believed himself the last of the Quendi on Middle-earth and had accepted his banishment with grim resignation. At times he could not help but cursing his regained vulnerability. Exhausted by emotions, he walked into the current and dropped down gracelessly and remained there for hours, allowing the waters to sing away his pain.

By the time he returned to camp it was deep night, and he welcomed the light of the fire and the smell of three huantas that roasted on it. Daeron was a talented hunter, he reminded himself gratefully, and almost unmatchable with a spear. He stepped silently into the circle of light and nodded to his friends, who continued with their conversation after greeting him. Maglor accepted a haunch and sat by the fire.

“You will never believe this, Maglor,” Daeron told him conversationally. “A group of Huaos built their long hut right over a guerrilla’s secret cache of weapons. When the mercenaries came to retrieve them the Huao attacked them… and were massacred. Then the mercenaries carried the bodies to an abandoned settlement in the south and dropped a handful of spears around… and when they came back they found this group of refugees settling down… so they threatened them and forced them to work for them…We found boxes of automatic weapons in that tunnel, the settlers say they belong to the guerrilla and they will come for them…”

“And what was the bridge-builder doing here?” Maglor asked in a low voice, nodding towards their adventurous friend. He had noticed that Thranduil was now awake, half-seated against the trunk, watching them wearily. At the changing light of the flames he looked ghastly pale, though dimmer than before. A painful memory hit Maglor as he watched his friend’s still features framed by his golden mane. He had found Celegorm lying thus against a beech after the battle for Menegroth, a peaceful look finally settling over his troubled features in death. So long ago and it still hurt like a fresh wound…

“He was investigating other deaths in a different settlement…and caught the mercenaries carrying in the bodies and setting up the stage so that the blame would be on the Huaos... or the Tagaeri, despite the bullet holes in the bodies,” Celeborn explained flatly on behalf of their bedraggled and tired-looking friend. “Of course they knew he was a valuable hostage…and when they found the refugees in this settlement they delivered him into their custody…until they thought it safe to ransom him. They buried him with the weapons when they brought in the couple that I met the other day…and kept him underground for fear that someone might come for him…”

Maglor shook his head and concentrated on his meal for a while. He could understand Thranduil’s rage and impotence, but the risk had been too high.

“And where were you going to build your bridge here, your kingship? Between trees?” he finally challenged their friend good-naturedly. Thranduil answered with a slow, tired smile, but that was enough for Maglor. “You owe me a kingly dinner and free access to you cellars, you crazy Sinda. I had to fly in a hurry from Dakar to be in time for Yestarë…”   

“And how was your friend the priest?” Celeborn chimed in. That brought Maglor suddenly back to reality.

“I buried him on New Year’s Eve,” he sighed. For a while the clacking of the fire was the only sound that joined the jungle’s voices. Then Daeron sighed.

“He was a good man, and a true steward. May he find peace beyond the circles of the world.” He reached out to place more wood in their fire and then added in a low voice, “I met Cyrus Feldman for the New Year, in Al-Talila… he is almost broken, but I think he will recover…”

“He has to,” Celeborn stated resolutely. “We need him more than ever!” At this Maglor looked up and pierced Celeborn with a deep, flaming gaze. The Sindarin lord’s mysterious words back in Thranduil’s house returned to him abruptly.

“Explain yourself,” he demanded, half-knowing what they were about to hear.

And Celeborn told them.

All the sounds died down in the jungle, as in the presence of a mighty predator, while Celeborn the Wise unveiled before his friends the doom of Arda…and its hope. Yet no sound was heard, as visions and thoughts were exchanged in mind speech, eyes alight in starlit glitter as images went to and fro.

Maglor broke the silence abruptly, reeling not from the images but from the firm decision that seeped from Celeborn’s fëa.

“Are you crazy, too?” he confronted the sindarin lord harshly. “You mean to defy the Powers?”  He cast wild looks around and shook his head blankly at seeing the same calm, set expressions in Daeron and Thranduil’s faces.  “It is written in the Music, you ignorant Moriquendi! Not even Manwë can change it! ” he explained in exasperation. “Arda remade, purified of Morgoth’s taint, and a place of completion and fulfilment…. And you pretend to prevent that? You will condemn yourselves to Everlasting Darkness!”

“And that is what bothers you,” Daeron chuckled. “That you would be burdened with our company forever…”

“This is not a matter for jokes,” Maglor growled warningly. He stood up and paced restlessly around the fire, waving his arms expressively. “You cannot understand! I am doomed, but you…”

“Oh yes, we know, we know. Exile, Oath-taker, ship-burner and thrice kinslayer…your crimes are a bit stale at this point, Maglor, don’t you think? What else am I forgetting?”

“Kin rescuer, too,” Thranduil put in helpfully, in a voice harsh with disuse. “And not just this once…”

“You cannot oppose the will of the One, nor undo his Music!”

“We cannot, and we will try not,” Celeborn agreed placidly, fixing Maglor in a deep, understanding glance that pierced the Noldo’s bleeding soul and bared it to the bone. “But since we are here, we can try and do what we feel is right, and hope that it all adds to the final chord…”

“But you have your family, your friends, and your people waiting for you!” Maglor sighed brokenly, looking at his three friends, almost overwhelmed by the extent of what he had lost and what they could still could hold on to...and were risking in that foolish decision.

“And we will still have them when we are done here, Maglor, same as you…”

“But surely that… That vision of yours was a message! You cannot go and refuse the call; surely they mean to bring you back before all happens……You are giving up on hope!”

“And how do you think that they were going to spirit us away, Maglor?” Daeron chimed in jokingly. “Eärendil?”

“We are giving up on nothing…or no one, Maglor,” Celeborn replied softly. “And we will never leave you behind…”

Maglor shook his head in despair. The end of the world -the end of his banishment- was close at hand, and suddenly those crazy elves decided that they were going to prevent it. Worst, they pretended that was what they had remained behind for.

“Not everything will be lost, at least we should ensure that,” Celeborn whispered sadly. “Arda remade should not be born out of nothingness…as if nothing had existed before, as if all of those deaths had been for nothing…We cannot leave the Secondborn to their doom.”

“You do not know what you are refusing,” Maglor sighed dejectedly, fighting images of the blessed peace that he had known in Valinor in his youth. He turned to meet his friends’ compassionate gazes, opened his arms and shook his head in impotence. “You do not know…”

“Then show us,” Thranduil commanded in a surprisingly firm voice. “You sang to me earlier, I heard you in my dreams… Show us what it is that awaits us…”

And Maglor sang. He slid along the trunk to sit beside Thranduil and sang words almost forgotten in a language that only he now spoke on the shores of Hither, of a land he alone had seen in his youth. Music poured out of his throat as tears coursed down his cheeks, and bright visions of a land lit in silver and gold filled the clearing and enveloped the four elves in peace and hope.

“You Noldor were even greater fools than what the singers would make you, to forsake such blessed lands for war, and darkness…and bright jewels,” Thranduil whispered after a long silence. But as he spoke he extended a hand tentatively and clasped Maglor’s tightly. “Sing,” he ordered drowsily. “Your voice comforts me and gives me strength.”

And Maglor sang the moon and the stars out of the night sky while Thranduil dozed restlessly and Celeborn and Daeron listened intently, drinking in every word. As dawn came in Daeron stretched.

“Quenya is a beautiful language,” he sentenced with a soft smile. “So how are we going to do this…rearrangement of the Music, Celeborn? Any idea?”

“Oh, several! Actually I have been working in a plan that will help us redirect all our activities towards this goal but first…”

“First I will follow Thranduil’s example,” Daeron chuckled, patting Celeborn’s shoulder. “I only wanted to be sure that you already had a plan…You will let us know in due time!” With a conniving wink cast towards Maglor, Daeron wrapped himself up in his blanket and slipped gracefully into the peaceful path of elven dreams.

Untangling himself carefully from Thranduil’s now slack grip, Maglor stood up and walked towards Celeborn.

“This is foolish, a useless fight, and you know that…”

“What else have we been doing for our entire stay in Middle-earth, Maglor, but fighting the long defeat?” Celeborn sighed patiently. “My grandchildren stood before Sauron’s gates with an army that was ten times lesser than that of the Dark Lord…and yet they only hoped that their sacrifice would not be in vain, that something might survive so that hope might be rekindled some time…”

“You were fighting Morgoth’s power incarnate, Celeborn, but we are talking of human greed, and blindness and stupidity here…and while I will give you that those must have been bred by Sauron himself, they are now so widely embedded in human’s nature that they are impossible to fight…”

“And yet we are Stewards, Maglor, we must do something...”

“Are you? Congratulations, I had been given to understand that the last of Manwë’s Stewards had returned after the End of the Third Age…”

“We remained here for some reason…”

“I have nowhere else to go...”

“We are all here for a greater purpose, even you…”

“And don’t you think that, had Manwë intended for us to lead another rebellion against Eru’s will he would have sent a very different message?” Hope and fear clashed violently inside Maglor and the struggle was plain to see. “I am not a Steward but a doomed Exile, banished forever…”

Aware of his friend’s plight, Celeborn stood up and placed a comforting hand on Maglor’s shoulder. “We are all stranded here, Maglor, for one reason or another, and I for one would not sit back and watch as this world comes to its utter destruction. I have lost too many friends and kin in Arda to allow it to be destroyed without a fight…You are one of us, and your help and skills would be more than welcome, but it is the same if you choose to stay away from this fight. When the end comes we will all meet it together, kinsman, at least you have my word on that…”

Maglor winced openly at Celeborn’s last words. Kinsman? he wondered. He met the Sindarin’s grey gaze briefly but had to look away; overwhelmed by the depths of compassion and understanding that showed there. He shrugged with pretended casualness. “I cannot condemn myself more than what I already am, so I can as well give you a hand in this useless fight of yours… How do you mean to do it, then?”

But he did not pull back when Celeborn clasped his arms tightly in a ferocious grip, nor looked the other way when a tiny spark of hope began to burn deep in his mind as he listened to the Sinda’s enthusiastic plans. Perhaps it was not all lost, he found himself thinking. Perhaps not even for himself.

The End.

A/N: This whole series if elves in modern day was inspired by a re reading of Arthur C. Clarke’s “The End of Childhood” back in May 2005. The proper, chronological order of the stories is as follows:  “A chance-meeting”, “Stewards of Arda” and “Fruitless Victories.”

Bakin: A forest spirit of the Jola people in Western Africa.

Bunuk: palm wine.

Carnac: in French’s Brittany, the area hosts the largest concentrations of stone alignments known in the world (or so they claim).

Chicha: a fermented drink made out of different things: corn, yucca or chonta among others. Deep in the jungle they offer you a variety called “chewed chicha” which is made exactly like that.

Chontacuro: a thick worm that lives on the leaves of chonta palm tree… and a north Amazonian delicacy.

Huaorani: A dwindling ethnic group in the Ecuadorian Amazonia. There are less than 1500 people left. They speak a language that has defied classification until now. Little is known of their origins or that of their language. Huaorani, as they name themselves, means “the people.” They were first contacted by western people in the fifties. Until then they had led a nomadic life in the rainforest. Unfortunately, the lands they had lived upon for centuries happened to be full of oil.

Tagaeri: aclan of the Huaorani who refused contact. They are a people in “voluntary isolation,” nominally protected by international and national laws. A wide stretch of land, “the intangible reserve” has been technically “granted” to all Huaorani clans, but its borders were never officially drawn and no one respects or makes respect that delimitation. Family feuds with the other Huaorani clans and their fierce defence of their lands have led the Tagaeri to fight unbalanced wars with oil companies, Huaorani kin at times armed with fire arms by third parties, illegal wood cutters and so on. About 45 people of this clan are supposed to remain now. 

Huanta: a large rodent, very much appreciated for its meat.