Note: excerpt from “The Lay of Leithian”, The Lays of Beleriand, The History of Middle-Earth Volume 3, J.R.R. Tolkien, edited by Christopher Tolkien. Dialogue on blades, moon-letters and Durin’s Day from “A Short Rest”, The Hobbit, J.R.R. Tolkien

Chapter XVIII: Unknown Lineage

‘For the love of all that’s good and noble, child, be still!’ Gilraen exclaimed in exasperation as the length of hair she had been trying to plait slipped from her fingers for the fourth time.

‘I am sorry, Mother, but I’m most excited!’ Estel said gleefully, twisting in the chair to look up at her. ‘I did not look to be allowed downstairs at all tonight!’

‘It is only for an hour or two,’ she reminded him. ‘When Master Erestor comes to fetch you, you will have to go quickly and quietly and without protest. Had the choice been mine you would not...’ She caught herself on the cusp of criticising Elrond’s decision. The midsummer revels marked one of the high holidays of the year, and it would have been a grievous blow to her son had he been forbidden from participating. She reminded herself sternly that preserving Estel’s secret and with it his life was as important to the Elf-lord as it was to her... or nearly. ‘You are very fortunate to be permitted to do this, but if you do not hold still then you shall not be fit to go out at all.’

Subdued somewhat by her warning, Estel sat as motionless as he could, though his body was fairly thrumming with exhilaration. ‘Do you think they shall sing the Lay of Beren and Lúthien tonight, Mother?’ he asked eagerly. ‘It is by far my favourite.’ Then he launched into the sweet, plaintive melody:

All these he had and loved them less
than a maiden once in Elvenesse;
for fairer than are born to men
a daughter had he, Lúthien.

Such lissom limbs no more shall run
on the green earth beneath the sun;
so fair a maid no more shall be
from dawn to dusk, from Sun to sea.
Her robe was blue as summer skies,
but grey as evening were her eyes;
‘twas sewn with golden lilies fair,
But dark as shadow was her hair.
Her feet were light as bird on wing,
her laughter lighter than the spring;
the slender willow, the—

‘Hold right there, my son, or you shall sing it all for them,’ Gilraen said fondly, smiling in private pleasure. Estel had a very fine voice, much better than her own. She only hoped that he would keep his perfect pitch after it broke in adolescence.

‘I do not know it all,’ said Estel candidly. ‘Only the first four cantos, and the death of Finrod Felagund. Friend and comrade, Beren bold, my heart is burst; my limbs are cold...’

‘Stop!’ cried Gilraen, a shiver running up her spine as she thought of her beautiful child grown grim with long labour, languishing like his forebearer in some dungeon of the Enemy far from any aid. She shook off the fearful supposition and tried to laugh. ‘There will be singing aplenty tonight.’

‘Yes, Mother,’ Estel chanted obediently. ‘You are not dressed for revels. Will you not be coming out with me?’ he asked.

‘I will not,’ Gilraen answered quietly. ‘For the folk of the Valley this is a night of joy and celebration, but for me it is a time of solemnity and remembrance.’

Estel turned his head and again she lost her hold on his hair, but this time she did not scold him. His brows were knit with puzzlement. ‘You have always gone down to the river before,’ he said.

‘You were too young to understand; I did not wish to detract from your merriment,’ Gilraen said; ‘but I was wedded upon this night twelve years ago, and for me it is a reminder of he whom I have lost.’

‘My sire,’ Estel said softly, and for a moment he seemed lost in thought. Then his face grew grave and he regarded her steadily. ‘Then it shall be a night of solemnity and remembrance for me as well, though still one of merriment, for had you not wed him, I should never have been born.’

Gilraen reached out to touch his cheek. ‘Your grandmother once said something similar,’ she told him. ‘Now turn around and let me finish, or they shall be up to fetch you before you are ready to go.’

Estel obeyed her contentedly, somewhat more sedate. Gilraen hoped that she had not spoken too soon of her pain. He seemed older now, since he had been ill, but he was still young, and the burdens of her broken heart were not his to bear.

lar

Estel sat in the grass as the glorious sunset flamed above him. The revels were just beginning, and much of the household was still inside, tidying up after the evening meal. His father was in counsel with the guests, which was why he had been allowed to come out. When the time came for the dwarves to join the celebrants Erestor would come to spirit Estel away, but for now he was content to sit and smell the sweetness of the summer evening, and to enjoy the songs.

They were singing of Gil-galad and the founding of Mithlond at the dawn of the Second Age. Though the deeds of which they sang were deeds of healing and creation rather than war, the song was coloured by a profound sadness. For the folk of Imladris had been the High King’s people, and there were many who remembered the grim day when he had ridden with his armies and the soldiers of Elendil to wage war against the Shadow. There were many who remembered how he had fallen to the fires of Orodruin, and many who had seen his glory fade into wistful memory.

Sometimes Estel wondered what it must be like to look back upon a life as long as the hills themselves, and see friends who had passed into darkness, comrades who were now the stuff of legends, brides and children and compatriots lost in the eddies of time. He thought of Atar, whose parents had vanished into the West nevermore to walk the forests of Middle-earth, whose brother had taken the doom of Men and perished in a long-ago Age, and whose wife had ridden the Road all the way down to the Sea and never returned to the Last Homely House. And though she was not of the Elven kindred he thought of his mother, and how her bitter loss coloured her every thought and deed. Was that what it meant to grow up, he wondered; to learn the sorrow of loss and the bitter-sweet savour of remembrance?

‘Such a grave face on such a merry night,’ a mellifluous voice observed as the speaker lowered himself onto the greensward next to the boy. It was Elrohir, clad in blue and gold with bright gems bound on his brow. He rested one arm upon a raised knee and leaned to look at Estel. ‘What troubles you?’

‘You have lived long in Arda,’ Estel said.

‘An astute observation,’ said the warrior, smiling a little. ‘Is it my turn? You have lived ten years, and look to live many more.’

‘My mother says that you have had many mortal friends,’ Estel ventured, emboldened by the amused indulgence in the adult’s voice.

‘I have. And I hope that I may come to count you among them, if you will have me. I have found Men faithful in fair weather and in strife alike, and doughty in battle, and resourceful in a tight spot, and they are surpassing witty when they have a mind to be. The Second-born make glad company.’ Elrohir halted, tilting his head to listen to the song that floated amid the trees and seemed to echo off the water.

‘When they die, do you remember them?’ asked Estel.

‘I remember them all,’ Elrohir said. ‘But why do you speak of death upon such a night as this?’

Estel shifted uncomfortably. As friendly as the Sons of Elrond had been these last few days, he was not certain he could freely unburden his soul to one of them. ‘I was thinking of Gil-galad,’ he said.

‘Ah. That is some matter different,’ said Elrohir. ‘Gil-galad was of the Firstborn. When he was slain his fëa was severed from his body and passed into the Halls of Mandos...’

‘Where in time it might be healed of its hurts, and take corporeal form again, and Gil-galad might walk freely in Valimar, and be once more reunited with his family and his friends,’ Estel concluded. He was well-versed in metaphysics, and what he did not wholly understand he could at least recite accurately. ‘But when a Man dies his spirit is freed from the bounds of the world, and what then becomes of it no one can say, not even Atarinya.’

‘That is true,’ said Elrohir solemnly; ‘yet that is both the doom and the gift of Men, for they are not fettered to the fate of Arda, and they need not linger to watch the things they love age and crumble and pass away into memory. When you have at last grown old, and you are weary of the world, you may depart from it in peace, and find freedom that the Eldar cannot.’

There was a shadow in his grey eyes, and he seemed to be walking in distant memory or in some vision of a future hidden beyond Estel’s ken. The boy watched sombrely as the Elven warrior returned to the present and smiled. ‘But here we sit debating the fate of the Children of Eru while the night is fair and our friends are dancing. Shall we not join the revels?’

‘Tell me of my father,’ Estel said abruptly, the words tripping out before he could censor them. ‘Tell me of my mother’s husband.’

‘There is little that I may tell you that you do not already know,’ said Elrohir. ‘He was a formidable warrior and he was my dear friend. Upon this night one dozen years past I danced at his marriage-feast, when your mother’s laughter fell like silver rain upon the glade and the stars of Elbereth sang out their blessings upon their union. What more I can say, I do not know, for we do not speak of him any longer.’

‘Why not?’ Estel asked. ‘If he lived and died with honour, why must his life be secret? Yet if he lived or died in shame, should I not be told of it so that I may avoid the same pitfalls?’

Elrohir’s eyes flashed with something akin to fury. ‘Your sire never knew shame!’ he said fiercely. Then his expression softened and he continued with more decorum. ‘He was to the last an honourable man, and it may be that someday tales shall be told of his deeds, but that day has not yet come. For the time being he must be to us all as a nameless stranger, remembered in secret even by those who loved him best. A time will come when you will understand.’

‘I do not wish to wait: why can I not be made to understand tonight?’ asked Estel.

‘Because it cannot be,’ said Elrohir with a sad smile. ‘And because you must learn patience. If you live the long life that has been foretold for you, this will be the least of the things for which you must wait. Consider it a test; a preparation for your manhood.’ For a moment he paused, studying the child’s face. Then he sighed. ‘Yet it is a bitter thing to know nothing of the man who gave you life. Therefore ask me one question, and I shall answer it fully and with absolute truth. Let whatever comes of it, good or ill, come as it will.’

Estel’s eyes widened and the multitude of questions he had pondered over the years flooded to his mind. What was his sire’s name? Of what race or people was he born? Had he any history or lineage at all? How had his father died? And where? And why? It seemed an impossible task to choose just one question from among these and a dozen more.

Then he halted his racing thoughts and drew in a deep breath. This was a chance, he realized, for him to choose between gratification and wisdom. Never had his guardian equivocated or denied him the answer to any question – save only those pertaining to his birth and his genealogy. If Elrond Peredhil, master of lore and lord of Imladris, kept this knowledge from him, then surely there was some reason, grave and important. Though he did not understand the cause for secrecy, he trusted his father enough to know with absolute certainty that it was of desperate consequence.

Yet he could not cast away a chance to resolve at least some part of his doubt about his parentage. When the solution to his problem occurred to him, Estel smiled soberly.

‘Very well,’ he said. ‘I have chosen my question.’

Elrohir watched in apprehension, and Estel realized that he, too, had been thinking along those same lines and regretting his hasty pledge.

‘What colour was his hair?’ the boy finished.

A barking laugh escaped the Elf-lord’s lips, and his eyes grew wide in astonishment. Then he smiled appreciatively. ‘You are wise beyond your years, child of Gilraen,’ he said with quiet wonder. ‘His hair was dark as the shadows at twilight, even as your own.’

‘Thank you,’ Estel said neatly. ‘I do not think I could have troubled Atarinya with such a foolish question, and I would never dare to ask Mother. I am pleased to know the answer at last.’

‘You are welcome to it,’ Elrohir assured him. ‘And when the time comes I promise there shall be a day of reckoning, when my brother and I may answer all of your questions. For now, however,’ he said, getting to his feet and holding out his hands to draw Estel up after him; ‘the night is merry and the stars shall soon be coming out to join our singing. Let us go and be part of the revels. Unless you are too old and dignified to dance on the green?’

‘Never!’ said Estel, and he felt his spirits lifting. His step was light as he followed the Half-elven warrior towards the whirling colours of the brightly-clad dancers, and for once his curiosity was quelled without being satisfied.

That too, he supposed, was part of growing up.

lar

Reluctantly Elrond held the bare blade out, and Gandalf took it. The ancient runes vanished as the sword was returned to its sheath. ‘Keep them well!’ he said, forcing bravado and pride into a voice that longed to be tremulous with painful reverance.

‘Whence did the trolls get them, I wonder?’ said Thorin. In his hands Orcrist gleamed, and it seemed as if the delicate finger-marks of its original bearer still glimmered on the hilt. It was more wieldy than its mate, less in length and in weight than Glamdring. Upon its hilt was laid in sapphire and beryl the device of an ornate flower: six petals and six sepals that spoke more clearly than any volume of lore as to who had carried this blade. At least now, thought Elrond, the dwarf had some appreciation of what it was that he bore, though he would doubtless be displeased to hear the whole tale.

‘I could not say, but one may guess that your trolls had plundered other plunderers, or come on the remnants of old robberies in some hold in the mountains.’ Abandoned, doubtless, upon the heights of Turgon’s city when Maeglin was cast down by Tuor – left, perhaps, in favour of a burden more precious; a half-Elven child of seven years? Mayhap it was captured there by some great worm who bore it north, away from Angband and into the wastes that were not swallowed by the Sea when Morgoth was overthrown and Beleriand was broken? Or taken by a craven Orc and passed from one thief to another through the long millenia, until it appeared still matched with its mate in the house of the grandchild of its owner.

‘I have heard,’ Elrond went on, his lore-master’s tongue outstripping his frantically flying thoughts; ‘that there are still forgotten treasures of old to be found in the deserted caverns of the mines of Moria, since the dwarf and goblin war.’

As he had hoped these words caused Thorin to swell a little with pride. ‘I will keep this sword in honour,’ he pledged. ‘May it soon cleave goblins once again!’

Then, thankfully, he sheathed the blade and its spell was broken. ‘A wish that is likely to be granted soon enough in the mountains!’ Elrond said, a little ruefully. ‘But show me now your map.’

They produced it and he studied it with care. Here was a welcome distraction from hurts that were older than the halls of the ancient dwarf-lords of Khazad-dûm, and gratefully Elrond traced the fine lines of the pen that had laid out the mountain and the lost town of Dale. All the dwarves were watching him intently, and the hobbit seemed enthralled. Gandalf was leaning against a bookshelf,an impassive observer. By the door, Erestor was waiting for the sign to go out and whisk Estel away into the house. Elladan, who had insisted upon being present out of respect to the guests he had attended for a fortnight, seemed to have little interest in the map, for his eyes kept darting to and from between the swords. Elrond wished his son would desist: it was an unpleasant foreshadowing of a conversation that he did not feel equal to having tonight. He focused more intently upon the parchment in his hands.

It seemed that his eyes caught sight of a shimmer upon the page where it curled between his fingers. Puzzled, he lifted the map and held it to the moonlight that poured in through the window. ‘What is this?’ he said, a queer smile touching his lips. ‘There are moon-letters here, beside the plain runes which say “five feet high the door and three may walk abreast.”’

‘What are moon-letters?’ Bilbo exclaimed eagerly, bouncing on the balls of his feet.

There followed a brief lesson in dwarvish subterfuge, which Elrond delivered without his usual commentary on the unnecessary complexity of such methods of concealing important information. It would be rude to point out the folly of an artifice that left so much to chance, or the danger of such messages being lost forever, unless someone – like himself – chanced to lift a paper to the light of the proper moon because he was trying to distract himself from the ghosts of the past. Both Gandalf and Thorin seemed rather annoyed that they had not made this discovery themselves, which was gratifying both in its absurdity and because it was always rather amusing to see Gandalf vexed.

‘“Stand by the grey stone when the thrush knocks,”’ Elrond read; ‘and the setting sun with the last light of Durin’s Day will shine upon the key-hole.”’

‘Durin, Durin!’ Thorin exclaimed, finding an opportunity to launch into a blustering boast. ‘He was the father of the fathers of the eldest race of Dwarves, the Longbeards, and my first ancestor: I am his heir!’

Elrond had yet to meet a dwarf who did not claim some degree of kinship to Durin, and he certainly did not need lessons in dwarven history. Yet such a holiday was unknown to him. ‘Then what is Durin’s Day?’ he asked, glancing back at the map.

‘The first day of the dwarves’ New Year is as all should know the first day of the last moon of autumn on the threshold of winter,’ said Thorin, with a hint of disdain in his voice. ‘We call it Durin’s Day when the last moon of autumn and the sun are in the sky together. But this will not help us much, I fear, for it passes our skill in these days to guess when such a time will come again.’

Elrond was about to offer the services of his astronomers, whose talents were more than equal to such a task, but Gandalf spoke before he could open his mouth. ‘That remains to be seen,’ said the wizard firmly, shooting the Elf-lord a look that demanded silence. ‘Is there any more writing?’

‘None to be seen by this moon,’ Elrond said. Behind him he heard Erestor open the door and slip out. It would take a few minutes more for him to reach the riverbank, and the same amount of time again to get Estel safely into the house. He rolled the map with care and handed it to Thorin, who secreted it about his person with the air of one entrusted with the destiny of his race.

‘Now,’ said Elrond, crossing to one of the desks and producing from it paper, pen and ink; ‘my folk are making ready provisions for you, and if there is any other article of gear that you require I shall be happy to furnish that also. Gandalf, you have said you will require one of my ponies...’

Fifteen minutes were effectively wasted while the dwarves deliberated amongst themselves, and items such as rope, and liniment, and a few drams of brandy (‘Strictly medicinal!’ said Ori) were added to the list. At length, Erestor reappeared at the door and invited the guests to follow him down to the water to join in the revels. They departed gladly enough, Bilbo Baggins fairly flying in his excitement. None seemed to notice that their host did not follow, and Elrond was soon left alone with his son, who was watching him appraisingly.

‘Now tell me, Atarinya, what you concealed about those swords,’ Elladan said, getting to his feet and coming forward to perch on the desk at which his sire sat.

‘What I told them was the truth,’ said Elrond. ‘Glamdring was the blade of the King of Gondolin – your great-great-grandsire. Orcrist was its mate.’

‘A strange mate,’ Elladan commented. ‘Though the craftsmanship is identical and the style is similar, they are rather different in size.’

‘Convenient for the finders, no doubt,’ remarked Elrond. ‘I do not think that the strength even of the mightiest dwarf-lord would serve to wield Glamdring with ample agility for battle.’

‘You were troubled by the sight of them: I saw the signs, and Erestor and Gandalf could not have missed them, either.’

‘I was astounded,’ Elrond said. ‘For seven thousand years those blades have been accounted lost, and they appear now, but a handful of stony miles from my doorstep. How? Why?’

‘You sound like Estel: one impossible question on the heels of another,’ Elladan said, laughing a little. ‘Does it matter? Is it not enough that they are found?’

‘It is a wondrous happening,’ Elrond said, his voice betraying something of his haunted thoughts.

‘Then what troubles you? Do you covet them, as treasures of your forefather? I had not thought you could be so... human.’

‘I do not covet the swords. They shall soon, as Thorin said, slay Orcs once more and avenge some small part of their lord’s demise, and I could not wish for a better fate for them.’ Elrond sighed and drew a hand across his brow. ‘Elladan, I am a master of lore. I know the history of our people from their very inception, as none now remember it, and yet all that I know of my father’s kin I learned third-hand and fourth from the servants of my liege-lord in the Second Age. There are no details in my mind not elsewhere recorded, no personal tales or undisclosed secrets. Ëarendil and his folk are as strange to me as the distant Vanyar, studied by me in book and legend as Estel learns the history of Númenor.’

Elladan put a consoling hand on his sire’s shoulder. ‘And this troubles you,’ he said softly, but it was plain that he did not understand.

‘When I was young, the pain of that ignorance was great,’ Elrond confessed. Seldom had he spoken to his children about his own childhood, and even now, speaking to a hale warrior who had known hardship and sorrow and torment enough, he kept his words intentionally oblique. ‘There were those who reviled my lack of knowledge, and derided me because of it, and I came to think that unless I knew those from whom I had come I could not rightly know myself. My Noldorin heritage was foreign to me, and even after I came under the tutelage of Gil-galad and began to learn something of the folk of Gondolin it was plain I would never understand that birthright as I did the legacy of Elwing and Lúthien her foremother.’

‘That is only natural,’ Elladan said. ‘You learned of that folk from your mother’s own lips. Yet if it is Gondolin of which you wish to learn, you might always ask Glorfindel. He remembers much of which he does not speak.’

‘And he has told me much that he has not shared with you. Yet still that is the testimony of an observer,’ said Elrond. ‘Tonight, for the first time, I learned something of that branch of my family without the aid of some veteran with no blood claim to my line – our line. Tonight I have discovered the answer to a question I had never thought to ask. It seems that Orcrist, long known to be the mate of Glamdring wrought by the Noldor of Gondolin for Turgon their king, was not wrought – as most have thought – for Ecthelion or another of the great lords of the city. It was wrought for Idril Celebrindal, Turgon’s daughter and my father’s mother. Her device is inlaid upon the hilt. That is why the sword is not so heavy as its partner.’

Elladan laughed. ‘That is a fascinating revelation,’ he said. ‘And as you say, it is nowhere recorded. Why did you not mention it to Gandalf?’

‘Do you think that Thorin Oakenshield, the indomitable dwarven adventurer, would be glad to learn that his blade was forged for a maiden?’ Elrond asked wryly.

‘Perhaps not,’ Elladan allowed. ‘But this discovery has provided you at last with a secret of your family to hoard in your vast stores of memory. Does that not please you?’

Elrond smiled sadly as he rose to his feet and made for the door. ‘I would rather be able to say that I had known my father,’ he murmured; ‘than learn the answers to all the mysteries of Ëa.’

Before Elladan could say more, Elrond slipped into the corridor, unable to endure any longer the sorrow and the bewilderment and the loving pity in his eldest child’s eyes.

With memories of his shattered childhood bearing down upon him with a sundering force that he had not thought possible after so many centuries, Elrond could not suffer himself to go out to laugh and dance with his folk. He made for the back stairs instead. He would go up and see Estel safely to bed. A foster-father was a poor substitute for a true one, but he would do his best. Moreover, he knew the boy’s presence would comfort him and ease his heart. Then, maybe, he would be in more of a mind to go out and celebrate the apex of the year.