The Soldier

Fingon stood over the remains. The body was badly decomposed but it was quite evident that the elf had met a brutal end at the hands of the enemy. Pulling his hair back, Fingon carefully crouched over the remains, looking to see what remained that might help him return this nameless elf home whatever road that might be.

A tattered piece of clothing.

Gently, Fingon poured some water from his waterskin on the dried and muddy fragment, revealing a green- a familiar green. Laiqendi, one of the Green Elves, but which group did this elf belong to?  Fingon gingerly picked the leaves away from what remained of  the body. At least now he knew that the remains needed to be returned back to whomever the bones belonged to. It would be a great tragedy that this soul not be returned as the Laiqendi believed the body must be prayed over before the soul could choose to remain or go to the Halls.

“I’ll get you home,” Fingon whispered, remembering his people lost to the ice, their bodies sinking to a dark, watery grave.

Behind him, leaves crunched indicating someone’s approach. A soldier. Fingon paused a moment before turning to face the unknown soldier that stood behind him, though Fingon knew with certainty it was one of his people. He could smell the hint of horse on the man’s clothes though normally Fingon could tell who it was by the manner of their gait. After a moments pause, Fingon motioned to the soldier to approach. The soldier came to stand quietly beside his commander. For some time the two looked upon the remains, each quietly praying in their own way.

The soldier broke the silence between them. “Sir, there might be a way we might yet know who these bones belong to.”

“How so?” Fingon asked, looking up to the soldier, a Sindarin fellow from a village that had pledged itself to Nolofinwë. The soldier was new to Fingon’s cavalry unit. He had come highly recommended by one of Fingon’s captains.

Scratching his face, the Soldier spoke, his words short and to the point as was the way when soldiers are out on patrol: “The Green elves are a fey folk.”

Fingon raised an eyebrow. He knew how the Laiqendi were viewed, had heard stories, though most knew to keep their prejudiced views to themselves. The Sindarin soldier, however, had proved himself to have no problem voicing his mind, a quality Fingon found useful. Noldorin decorum was of no use on the battlefield.  

The Soldier continued, “It is said that if one them Green folk die and are not laid to rest by their people that they haunt the place of their death causing mischief and other more ominous type of work.” Mortal ghosts caused no such grief for elves, but the ghosts’ of elves were another thing entirely.

Fingon shook his head in understanding. From the corner of his eye he could see the Soldier looked spooked, his own words reminding him of some story or some event the Soldier witnessed in his youth spent in the grey forests of Middle Earth.

“Surely the Dark Lord wields greater fear than the lost soul of one of the Laiqendi?” Fingon responded, unsure of whether his own words could still the discomfort stirring in his own heart.

The Soldier tipped his head in the direction of his Commander. “Aye, but I can't help feel the chill in the air though it is a warm day. Do you feel it Sir?” The Soldier asked, using Fingon’s military title.

Fingon shifted his weight back onto his heels. There was a strange weight and coolness in the air. Though Fingon at first thought it normal because they were under a dense canopy of trees, it now felt like it was more than mist.

The Soldier’s eyes scanned the clearing amongst the trees. “I do not know the way nor am I gifted in the ways and lore of the dead, but I have heard say that your folk have an uncanny ability to commune with such spirits.” By your folk, the Soldier meant the line of Finwë, for Finwë’s grandchildren all inherited a sort of second sight. Whether it was foresight, the ability to see beyond the realm of the living, or a strange and utterly queer sight that conjured the abstract into being, the line of Finwë was so blessed or cursed. While the Soldier himself possessed no such gift, there were many among his people who did. In fact, it was said that the Green elves, to a person, could wield this strange current of power. Maybe this is why they were fey in death.

Fingon stood up, his eyes also circling the small open space amongst the trees. A mist haunted the borders beyond the clearing. Resigned, Fingon nodded his head, passing his hand over his mouth. His company owed the life that once claimed the bones the right to be mourned by his or her people. Their patrols were not sufficient to turn the tide against the dark creatures of Morgoth that stalked the lands and inflicted such devastation. “Very well,” Fingon sighed, “Stand by in case…” Fingon’s voice dropped off. In case of what, he mused. Only Mandos could know such things and even then the Lord of the Dead Halls did not truly rule over the souls of the Laiqendi.

Without a word the Soldier quietly retraced his steps to the borders of the forest where the horses wandered freely, eating and drinking as needed.

Sitting next to the remains, Fingon whispered old incantations, words passed on to him by his mother, words first spoken by the shores of Cuiviénen. Such words travelled with the Eldar to the Blessed Realm and had been stored away in memory for death was not a companion familiar to the Noldor during the time of the Trees. They were simply ceremonial words, shared to remember the dead that were left behind, commemorating the Second Clan’s journey. But now the words were sung, reborn from ashes of memory to fill the need of the living as they once more encountered the dead. Though this was the first time Fingon was singing them for a soul long dead. This was new to him.

At first a whisper tickled Fingon’s consciousness: the whisper like a thought one is trying hard to remember but evades coming to be. Repeating the words, a haunting lament, Fingon once more tried to capture that whisper and give it texture, give it color. Slowly the whisper became its own sad song, the death lamentation of the Laiqendi that did not yet realize it was being called forth. Fingon’s voice sang the lamentation, hearkening the departed soul to him. It was not often done for elves that were long dead and souls not departed could be capricious and ensnare the living in the haunting mists that were the only physical manifestation of the soul that remained.

Fingon had first heard the lamentation when his grandfather, Finwe, was killed. Those lamentations were the most agonizing, painful sounds he had heard in his life. He would never forget those moments. Those dark days in Aman were the first time he felt horror and great sorrow in the pit of his stomach, but not the last. Fingon would thereafter sing for the dead, for Elenwë, for Arakáno, for far too many. In this regard, Finwë’s line was duty bound to sing for the Dead, to sing them to the Halls of Mandos. It was a strange fate that the Doom of the Noldor awoke the old rites taken by those elves chosen to be leaders in the early days of the calaquendi. And now Fingon, a scion of Finwë, sang for an elf long dead and the dead elf responded, took shape within the contours of Fingon’s song.

The elf responded, its song like a hiss. The sound filled Fingon’s mind with force, throwing him onto his backside. The dead elf’s lamentation lashed out at Fingon, thin tendrils that wrapped around the notes of Fingon’s song. The song grew, a low grating sound, as if the dead elf was trying to sing through the rotted flesh that was left of him. Fingon clung to his lamentation, allowing sorrow and regret to strengthen the notes of his song. Indeed, Fingon possessed great depths of intense grief to draw from. Never before had Fingon had to weave such power in a lament for the dead, but then again, never before had Fingon sung for one of the Green folk, and one long dead.

The Green Elf’s song quieted, overcome by curiosity. It listened to Fingon and found a semblance of understanding in the images offered to it. He remembered his own sorrow, the family left behind, the bitter end he suffered. And he desired once more: desired to be reunited with his kin; desired to be guided to the paths his Dead walked amongst the trees and grasses of the meadow he was born in, beneath the glory of the stars.  He whispered the name of the meadow. It was the only word that took shape in his lamentation.

Lygnand. Fingon began to hear this word whispered. He quieted his voice, allowing the Green Elf to speak. Lygnand. Lygnand… Silence. The whispers of the Green elf ceased. Fingon opened his eyes to take in his surroundings. The mists that haunted the clearing dissipated, the sun filtered in. It was a place name. Fingon had no doubt as he at least knew nand to be the word for valley in Nandorin for many of the place names the Noldor now called home retained their Nandorin origins. It would be easy enough to discover the direction of the valley and travel in its direction. What would happen, however, once Fingon crossed into Green Elf territory was entirely unknown.

Lygnand. Pale Valley. It was a beautiful place, yet secluded. Fingon was allowed passage by the Laiqendi, though he was surprised by this allowance on their part. The Laiqendi were notoriously secretive. Fingon expected that once he crossed the borders into their lands, he would be quickly relieved of the contents he carried with him. This was not the case. Upon crossing into Laiqendi lands, Fingon revealed the bones to the first scout he encountered and told his story, revealing the name whispered to him by the dead soldier. The scout whistled a signal to what were more than likely other green elves that Fingon could not see.

The same scout escorted Fingon on their journey to Lygnand where Fingon was received well and the remains taken from him. A great silence descended upon the valley in that moment. There was no bird song, no chirping of crickets. It was an eerie and strange type of sorrow that embraced the beautiful pale valley…almost as if the place exhaled leaving Fingon to stand in that absence.

Fingon dared ask for the name of the elf he carried. An elf, clearly one of the unbegotten, smiled at Fingon, answering simply: A soldier. A soldier. Fingon ruminated. A name, a station, he too occupied. Once he had been innocent. They had all been innocent. They all fought the same enemy. The soldier had fought. An innocent soldier for the Green elves did not take on that mantle willingly.  A son, a father, perhaps, maybe a brother. Fingon would not know. It was not his place to know. Yet there was an intimacy shared with this Soldier for that was a word, an identity, that Fingon shared.

And with that Fingon was given leave to return. The same scout who escorted him to the pale valley, once more escorted Fingon back out to the borders of the green elf territory. Nearing the border of the Laiqendi, a great wind stirred, whipping up leaves, and for a brief moment blinding the elves. A great breath had been released. Birds slowly took up song, insects once more called their mating sounds. Fingon felt a release he did not know he carried.

The soldier had found home.

Fingon faced his escort and bowed his head. The scout paused, raising her hand to her heart, a sign of greeting and departure. Fingon turned and made his way to more familiar trails, headed back to his life: a son, a brother, a friend, and a soldier.

“When then we’ll hear St. Peter tell us loudly with a yell,

Take a front seat you soldier men

For you've done your hitch in Hell!”

--Frank B. Camp (1917)

The End