Jeric put down his trowel and dug in the rocky earth with his small fingers, pulling up what he hoped would be a wild carrot.  He tugged the root free after a brief struggle, and was rewarded with a distinct carroty smell.  He tucked it into his pouch with the one burdock root that had been worth collecting.  His hands were numb from the winter cold, and the clouds overhead promised snow.  He did not want to disappoint his mother with such scanty pickings, but he would sooner go hungry at home than die alone in a storm.

Tired and frustrated, he climbed to his feet and trudged on through the wooded foothills.  The Mountain loomed ahead of him, cold and implacable against the sky.  He was tempted to despair, but even now there was an indomitable spark of hope in his heart that over the next rise he might find a lovely bush full of rosehips, or an unplundered walnut tree.  His grandmother had always said he had a bright spirit, the sort that kindly powers may notice.

Jeric’s grandmother had been able to keep him, his mother, and his siblings fed for the first difficult years after his father had disappeared in the east.  She had earned a modest living as a healer and lore-master, although there were many who had considered her a witch.  She claimed to have learned her craft from Elves, and even that she had lived among them for many years in her youth, and that had made her strange in Dale.  It was she who had taught Jeric to forage in the wood, the only one among his siblings to show an interest.  She had taught him all about stones and herbs and the elemental spirits of the world.  Since her death last year, the family’s plight had been worse than ever.

Jeric’s mother and two older sisters took whatever work they could find as seamstresses or washer women, but the labor was hard and the rewards too small to keep six people adequately fed.  Jeric was too young and slight to win any apprenticeship in town, so it fell to him to do what he did best and forage for extra food in the wild places of the valley.  His younger brothers especially depended upon his efforts.  The summer and autumn had been fruitful enough to see them through, but the winter was already proving harsher than expected.

Guide me, Grandmother, Jeric prayed desperately as he scrabbled up the slope.  I have not time to search this whole wood tonight.  Show me where to look.

His ragged breath hitched in his throat as he pulled himself over the ridge.  A magnificent stag looked up at him from a lush bed of watercress in a mountain stream.  They regarded one another for a few timeless moments, the silence broken only by the rushing water.  Eventually, the stag chose to take his leave, but he did not bound away in reckless flight.  Rather, he stepped out of the stream and stalked cautiously into the wood, pausing once to look back at the shabby little boy who had disturbed him.  

Jeric at last dared to breathe again.  He was not unduly frightened of deer, but he knew better than to provoke them.  Moreover, his grandmother had always insisted that the great stags often served as portents in that country, omens of good fortune more often than bad.  New excitement coursed through his veins as he ran toward the unexpected bounty in the water.

He was less pleased when he discovered the majority of the watercress to be cropped or trampled by the great beast.  He added a few soggy sprigs to his pouch, but they would never make a very fine supper.  Reluctant to dismiss the omen so soon, he grit his teeth and plunged his arms into the frigid water, feeling about on the stoney stream bed in hope of encountering some mussels.

There were no mussels, but his eye caught a flash of white beneath the ripples.  He closed his stiff fingers around it and drew it out of the water.  He sat back on his heels to examine his find, hardly daring to believe his luck.

It was an uncut moonstone, ghostly white and as large as a plover’s egg, polished by uncounted years in the stream bed.  Its purity was mesmerizing, unmarred but for a few small scars and inclusions.  Jeric’s weary heart now beat wildly against his ribs.  He was certain his grandmother had led him to this stone; she had always worn a small moonstone necklace, and they were rumored to bring their bearers good fortune.  Surely this would see them through the winter!

Jeric thrust the stone into his pouch and rushed headlong down the hill and back into the valley.  It would be a long way to run, but he was determined to go directly to the market before the bad weather broke.  He would not go home with only two roots and some wilted watercress, not with this new wealth in his pocket!

The cold air was burning his lungs as he neared the city.  Jeric slowed to catch his breath for a moment, wrapping his moth-eaten coat closer about him against the chill.  He hoped to duck through the bustling people without being questioned, but he was accosted by two older boys who were apparently also returning from the hills, a pair of fat rabbits hung on a stick between them.  

“Where are you going in such a hurry?” the eldest of them asked.  His name was Elof, and his brother was Olin.  At one time, Jeric would have been happy to have been their friend, but he had eventually concluded that their sour companionship was not worth the effort.  

“I am going to the market,” Jeric boasted stiffly.

“The market?”  Elof was incredulous.  “Today?  You’ll be trampled to death in that crowd before you have a chance to beg any supper from anyone.”

“I do not have to beg!” Jeric insisted.  “I have this.”  He revealed his precious moonstone for a moment before tucking it back into his pouch.  He had no wish to be robbed by these two oafs.

Elof just laughed.  “No one is going to give you so much as an old apple for your bit of stone,” he said, “not when there is gold and silver to be had.”

“What would you know of it?” Jeric snapped, but they only continued to laugh.  They were wasting his time.  He turned and began running again, putting their guffaws far behind him.

His throat was raw and his knees weak when Jeric finally reached the outskirts of Dale’s famous market district.  It was bustling even at this late hour with hoards of peddlers and patrons of all classes and races, illuminated by yellow lamplight in the early dusk.  The smell of fresh bread and roast meat almost drove him mad with hunger.  He squared his small shoulders with fresh determination and darted into the crowd.

His giddy anticipation quickly turned to disappointment.  It seemed Elof and Olin had been right after all; no one seemed to value his beautiful stone as he thought it deserved.  He was brusquely turned away from every stall he approached, always with some combination of pity, impatience, or disdain.  He was pushed aside by tall men, buffeted by bulging sacks and satchels, and almost run over by a pony cart.  All the while the night grew darker and colder.  

Jeric knew his mother would be home by now, wondering at his absence.  Without his contribution there would never be enough on their table to adequately feed the whole family.  He imagined them all sitting and starving in their cold and poorly lit home, and he resolved to try his luck once more.  The moonstone glowed softly in his hand, reflecting the lamplight like clouded glass.  It could not possibly be worthless.

“Pardon me, sir,” he called to a baker as loudly as he could.  “What will you give me for this?”

“What have you?” the baker asked from behind his fortress of fresh loaves and buns.  “A stone?  Have you no money, lad?”

“No,” Jeric said.  “But surely this stone is very fine.”

“A pretty thing to put on your mantelpiece, perhaps,” the baker allowed, “but I do not deal in stones.  Be off home now, before you are caught in the snow.”

He would not even look at the stone properly.  Jeric did not move, a dark anger and frustration building in his heart.  The baker had already forgotten him, engaged as he was in an animated negotiation with a man who apparently had more interesting currency.  Desperately hungry, and by now feeling rather spiteful, Jeric snatched a seed bun and dashed away.

He could hear the baker shouting at him as he ran, creating more of a scene than a single seed bun seemed to warrant.  People grabbed at him as he passed, but Jeric plunged headlong through the crush with one last frantic burst of strength.  He might have made good his escape, but before he could retreat into the dark alleyways someone caught him by the arm and wheeled him around.

“Hold there, young sir!”

Startled and disoriented, Jeric looked up through the thin flurries of snow and found himself in the midst of a company of Elves, the largest of whom held him firmly by the wrist.  For the moment he could do little more than blink at them stupidly; he had seen Elves at a distance on a few rare occasions, but had never spoken to one.

The crowd parted to allow the breathless baker to approach his quarry.  “You’ll have the whip for this, you guttersnipe!” he huffed.  “Thank you, my lord, for catching hold of him.”

Jeric cringed as man moved to grab him, but the tall Elf boldly planted a hand on the baker’s broad chest, preventing his advance.  There was an audible intake of breath from the spectators.

“Of what does this boy stand accused?” the Elf asked.

Now the baker was the one blinking stupidly, as if the facts of the matter should have been obvious.  “He is a thief!” he insisted.  “Look, the bun is still there in his hand!”

The Elf turned to Jeric with a severe expression.  “Is this true?”

Jeric could not have lied to him even had he time to fabricate a more favorable story.  “I did steal it,” he admitted pitifully, “but only because I am so very hungry!  My whole family is hungry, waiting at home for me to bring something for my brothers to eat because my mother and sisters cannot work enough to feed us all since my father was lost and my grandmother died, but no one will hire me, and no one will trade with me, and now I think the winter will surely ruin us all.”

Jeric’s frantic explanation finally digressed into tears.  He had not intended to let their whole story of woe tumble out, but he was exhausted.  When he finally dared look up again, he saw that the Elf’s stern air had relented a bit.

“Theft may not be excused even by want, young man,” he said gravely, though his voice was softer now.  “Such desperation, however, makes it easier to forgive the offense.”  He turned and spoke tersely to his companions in their own tongue, one of whom produced a small silver coin and gave it to the baker.  

“Be compensated and be gone, sir.”

The baker sputtered.  “But . . . but, my lord . . . the punishment for theft is . . .”

The Elf leveled an icy glare upon the man which struck him dumb immediately.  “Perhaps you would prefer that I withdraw my patronage,” he threatened.

Released at last, Jeric sank his teeth into the soft bun, which proved more glorious than anything he could remember tasting before.  He tried to finally skulk into the shadows, but the Elves closed ranks around him yet again.

“That bit of bread will not hold you for an hour, let alone the whole winter,” the first among them said, turning back to Jeric now that the querulous baker had gone.  “And what of your family at home?  Surely you have not forgotten them.”

Jeric was rendered temporarily mute by a large wad of bread in his mouth, though he would have been at an acute loss for words even without the obstruction.  It was of no matter, because the Elf did not seem to expect a reply.  He gave some quick instructions to the others, then turned on his heel and led them on.

Jeric found himself quite powerless to resist his unexpected inclusion in their party, and for the next incredible half hour he was shepherded through the market in what seemed a very military fashion.  He saw more silver change hands than he had ever seen at once in his life.  Cured meat, bread, nuts, cheese, dried fruit, honey, a cask of wine, woolens, bundles of tinder and firewood.  When at last they had finished, and each of the Elves was burdened with something wonderful, their leader stepped aside and indicated that Jeric should move ahead.

“Lead the way, young master,” he said, dropping a fine woolen cloak over Jeric’s boney shoulders.  “It is high time you returned home.”

It had grown very dark, and the snow was falling thick and soft.  Jeric had no trouble; he could have found his way in any weather, and his new cloak did a much better job of staying the chill than did his old coat.  Additionally, the elements did much to obscure their progress through the city, or such a party would have caused much comment.  They were neither stopped nor questioned.

Jeric burst through the front door and into their dimly lit home, wild with excitement.  “Mother!  Mother!  We needn’t starve anymore!”

Far from sharing his enthusiasm, his mother was initially dumbstruck, unable to do more than stand agape with her other children as twelve Elves filed inside and lay the unexpected bounty on the table.  “Whence comes all this?” she finally gasped.  “We are not beggars!”

“Indeed, not,” the greatest Elf agreed solemnly.  His presence seemed to fill the room with a perilous but strangely comforting air.  “It is I who beg you to allow me this indulgence.  Your son betrayed your circumstances only under duress.”

She opened her mouth to refuse, but an impatient glance from the Elven lord silenced her.  “I know what it is to be at the mercy of winter,” he said severely, lowering his voice.  “I remember the ache of cold and hopeless hunger.  Do not allow your pride to condemn your children.”

Two Elves had already kindled a fire in the hearth, flooding the room with new light and warmth.  Jeric’s two younger brothers, not so proud as their mother, fell joyfully upon a wheel of cheese.

Jeric’s mother seemed chastened, but her face was flushed and she was close to tears.  “We have no means to repay you!” she lamented.

“I have!” Jeric shouted.  He had quite forgotten his stone in all the excitement.  He drew it out of his pocket now.  It seemed small and cold beside the mountain of delights crowding their table, but it was still beautiful.  “I found it in the river,” he explained apologetically.  “I know it is not very valuable, but surely it must have some virtue.”

“It is a moonstone,” the Elven lord said, the first in all of Dale to give the stone the courtesy of his undivided attention, “and, in fact, a very fine one.”

“But,” Jeric stuttered, puzzled, “it is raw and unshaped.  The smiths of Erebor have many finer . . . “

“Dwarf stones from Erebor are as common as dross in this corner of the world,” the Elf explained.  “When I want them, I need not look far.  What you have is a stone shaped by the mountain itself, finished by water and the interminable march of time.  Perhaps you have heard the tale of Nimphelos, the great pearl crafted by the sea and untouched by any smith, given by Elvenking Thingol in ages past to the Dwarf lord of Belegost, who prized it above even a dragon’s hoard.  This is the Nimphelos of Erebor, and it has seen fit to come to you.  If you will part with it, I will accept it for your mother’s sake, and hope that you will consider yourself adequately rewarded.”

Jeric had never heard of the pearl Nimphelos, but his heart swelled all the same.  He had no intention of withholding the stone, but the tale made him reluctant to part with it without at least holding it a moment more.  He was more certain than ever of his grandmother’s involvement, and that warmed him more than even the fire could.

“I will part with it, sir,” he said, as grandly as a child of his age could manage, holding the gleaming stone in his outstretched palm, “with many thanks.”

Jeric never forgot that remarkable winter night, and was ever after fascinated by their Elvish neighbors to the west.  Among the many gifts, they had surreptitiously left a purse of gold coins which had been enough to see the family through the leanest times and even to secure Jeric an apprenticeship with a local tradesman.  

After several years there was to be a grand festival in Dale to commemorate the city’s founding, and Jeric was pleased to hear that a great contingent of Elves was to attend by special invitation.  He hoped to see again that one who had brightened the bleakest winter of his childhood and gone without confiding his name.  Jeric had always looked for him, but to no avail.

He was attending his stall in the festival market when a small army of Wood-elves paraded into the city, chanting and singing amid the general gaiety.  Jeric spared a curious glance for the royal guard as they approached on their magnificent horses.  

The breath went out of him at the sight of the Elvenking, for Jeric recognized him at once.  Thranduil did not see him, nor would he have recognized him if he did, for the boy was a grown man now.  But tears stung Jeric’s eyes as he realized the Elvenking had certainly not forgotten him.

Thranduil’s crimson cloak was held fast to his shoulder by a silver brooch fashioned as a boar’s head, and in its mouth was set a large uncut moonstone.