Elenion Sunquele
(Private with Moriel)
Traitor. Oath-breaker. Kinslayer. Traitor…
The wind tugged heavily at the elf’s dilapidated cloak, whipping it violently about his legs as the entity once known as
Lantaelen, the
Fallen-Star gazed upon the ruins of his once glorious home and realm. A count of nearly two and a half million times had the Sun risen and sank since those faded memories had once been reality and indeed like a faded wrath, he clung to the places that he had once been so fond and protective of in the ancient days of glory. At times he felt as if it had never been real, perhaps a dream or induced nightmare because of his crimes, a taunting from the Powers that were, a punishment they inflicted upon those who believed they could control their own destiny. But then he would come upon a familiar ridge or hill and look out and feel all too readily the memory of ancient sunlight or the heat of dragon fire as it swept clean the lands of his people and kin. No, it had been all too real. And though it be millennia past, the heavy pain lingered in his body and spirit like a black rooted poison. Perhaps it could be made to withdraw by the thought of glorious battlements and banners in the breeze, but like a weed it would ever take root again and spread its foul growth. An endless cycle of misery and despair. But this was his fate and he readily accepted it.
Traitor. Oath-breaker. Kinslayer.
The wind carried these words, ever at his back, inescapable like the rays of the Sun or Moon. His cloak did not protect him. Perhaps it had once been a bright, glorious crimson, a symbol of his allegiance and token of the sacrifices he had made with his own blood and tears. Over time, through endless rain, hail, snow, and mud, it had faded and lost its colour, becoming a dull pink, then a rotten brown, and finally reduced to uneven, muddied black tatters with rips and holes. Yet he kept it, representative perhaps in a visual manner of the state of his spirit and mind. His clothing was no better, a tunic wrapped with half-measured attempts at mending and patching, with trousers that were more individual pieces of fabric wrapped about his legs, tucked into boots that had long lost their soles to his endless trekking. Going bare-footed among the grass and forests had once been an object of enjoyment. Now it only served to remind him of his blisters and pain, endless stabbing into his feet as if to say
begone, foul beast, you shall have no rest here. For he was indeed such; traitor, oath-breaker, kinslayer. He had failed his liege. He had failed his people. He had failed himself.
Traitor, for having turned against his people. Oath-breaker, for having spilled his own people’s blood, where his mandate should have been all their protection. Kinslayer, for he readily slayed elves much akin to himself, fair and immortal, though he was no longer so. His hair was ragged and disheveled. The light in his once brilliant indigo orbs now faded. His limbs were slender with starvation, as were his torso and ribs. No weapon did he bear, but a staff of rowan he carried, with cherry-vines wrapped about it, every so often bearing fruits in which to extend his torment, half caught between starvation and fullness, but never satisfied in any true definition of the word. But rather than seeking a cure to his despair, he stayed here.
In what had once been Thargelion, the last patch of his Lord’s realms and home. Across the water lay the barren peak of Himling, inaccessible to him, yet like a beacon ever drawing him near, keeping him close, teasing him with these memories of glory.
Faces he recalled. Names he had forgotten. He had them too, once upon a time. What were they? His mother called him one thing, his father another, his friends and the rest of elvenkind a third. What was it again?
Hecildo the wind seemed to whisper as it whipped at him.
You are outcast. Forgotten. No one wants you. He had done deeds fit only for the Dark Powers, yet neither among them or the Light he had once served had no need of him. This was his fate, to wander forever between the ruins of his home, until some fate finally befell him. It was just.
The loneliness bit the worst. Even though to an elf there was never truly any quiet, it did not serve to alleviate his despair. The leaves in the trees rustled, season after season. Even in winter the wind could sing such songs. But there was no joy in it. It had been long since he had seen any others, though they had not seen him. When he first came here, having awoken after a tremendous head injury, he found the land had changed greatly. Where once there had only been elves, now there were men and dwarves as well. They journeyed to and fro and he espied them afar, though never challenging their progress. Sometimes the rumour of evil carried with the wind and birds, though never lasting, and soon too he forgot the tongue of birds which he once knew so well. Then came the short period where the ships of men could be seen in abundance, always traversing off the coasts, no doubt not knowing that beneath the water was once the grounds where great armies gathered, marched, and gave battle. Once dragons crawled over these lands. Once orcs prowled in impossible numbers.
Once beings of radiant energy and light liberated it from such. But all forgotten, like him.
Then the deep silence came and very few now came to these lands. A thousand years or more,
Hecildo had lost count. A new Age came and went, twice, and yet he knew nothing of such passages of time. For him, he was frozen in place, a living statue from another time, forever trapped in the despair he felt after the tribulations at the Haven. There had been many of his ilk before then. When he had awoken, there had been none. He knew they were all gone from this world. It was just him. It was just…
Footsteps. Someone was near. Someone was coming! It sprang up in his mind, alerting him as if all the powers of evil were bearing down on him. Someone was here! Who would dare come to these grass covered stones? Dwarves seeking riches no doubt, surveying mountains. Or a party of elves on some pilgrimage of nostalgia. Did they know what lay beneath the grass? He knew. The butt of his staff discovered it more than not, from the soft thud of grass to the duller thump when it found stone truly lay beneath. They did not know! And so, they did not belong here. This was his lair of remorse and regret. They had no place here.
Go back to where it is sunny and happy and leave me be! And yet, some other fatalistic part of him decided against it. He did not truly care. Let them intrude on his consciousness. Misery after all loved the company of others.
But fear also ruled him. He had not spoken to another since the Havens. His own mouth felt dry and his own voice would seem a strange thing to him, as if another inhabited his mind and spoke for him. Alas, it was very much his old voice, which once commanded companies of determined elves that fought back the Night. Perhaps though, this stranger would pass, lost or merely traveling. He found he did not even have to conceal himself in this vast, wild place. Between the thick foliage and the lolling lowlands at the foot of the Blue Mountains, it was easy for two to come within a league or two of one another and still not make contact. They would pass and he would remain, as ever it had been. They were most likely lost. But he was not. His staff showed him the way. He thumped it, feeling the stone, and recalling that perhaps this had once been a villa, or a gatehouse, or the base of a battlement.
Once the great fortress and abode of Caranthir.
The sounds of footfalls did not fade however. Indeed it grew louder, until the forgotten elf feared that Orome himself had come upon him, to finally inflict his true punishment. Hah, did he think these long years of loneliness and bitterness was his true fate? The Valar were akin to the Dark, they must not have mercy as Morgoth did not. He cared not. He tapped the butt of his staff again to a seemingly indistinguishable patch of grass. The sound was the same but elven ears could differentiate. There was stone work under here, not the endless garden of dirt and rock that underlay everything. He was near to what had once been the market square of the settlement. Once there had been many voices here, elves, men, dwarves, all trading and bartering. He stood a moment and attempted to recall the colour of fruit or the hues of fabric or the sparkle of dwarven gems. None of it came to him.
But something else did.
He could smell it. And it left him with a snarl of disgust.
It was too…clean! Pure. There was another elf here. A she-elf, he judged, by the heaviness of her footfalls. Slowly, he turned, still possessing some military elegance as he spun on his heel and stopped his feet side by side, gazing with contempt upon the newcomer.
He had been found! Seen, for the first time in many long centuries. There was no shame in his own experience. This was who he was. But he felt disdain when he saw the other…
for they were no different. Traitor. Oath-breaker. Kinslayer.
Last time he saw her, a town had been on fire. And men and women who looked just like them lay dying or dead.
Some by his sword.
He recognized the face. Perhaps the name too, though he refused out of pride to mention or think of it. The same punishment he felt due unto himself he now readily assigned to this individual.
It was all a pathetic mask for shame and guilt. His eyes then espied the sword in hand and…a wolfish smirk grew on his lips, though they wavered, for the muscles had lost their endurance in conducting even such a simple gesture as smiling. He was so weak, of limb and body. That sword could easily finish him off. Perhaps…though it went against all his mother once taught him about the One above…perhaps he should seek out this finish.
He was not at all afraid of the armed individual. Last time he had seen her was indeed when a town was on fire…in the exact same posture.
On the other side. And yet he could admit that she too had a claim on this place. But that claim was forfeit when she made her choice at the Havens.
“Still afraid.” He suddenly cackled, voice pitching in uneven frequency but it took just a moment to regain full knowledge of this skill of speaking. He was not asking if she was. He was
stating it. Why else come with a naked blade?
“It should not surprise me that you should draw a sword in this place, where you once pretended to loiter as a friend. Come then, and silence me, as you did to the truth and your own oath. None shall ever know about it, except He who awaits in the Halls of the Dead. For that is why you have come, is it not?” He asked in a coy tone, his smirk falling as the muscles in his cheeks finally gave way.
Smiling was too arduous a task, even to mock. So what hope did he have in a fight? She looked healthy.
How dare she. To live so comfortably after her deeds? Truly wicked.
Elves lived in memory. That explained why he could not escape his past. It also showed why it seemed like he had just seen her yesterday or the day before, though in truth it be more than sixty-five hundred years ago.
“To finish what you failed to do, so long ago. If I had known you dared to come back, I would have prepared a welcoming party.” He stated, struggling to flash her that wolfish grin again. But it was a lie. His hand on his staff gripped tighter, turning white knuckle, and that took another great deal of energy from his already meagre reserves of strength. He had nothing to prove though.
The truth spoke for itself. And she had betrayed them all.
His grip on the staff failed after a brief heartbeat. Anger did not even fuel him as much.
”You have a lot of nerve for coming here. Explain yourself.” He demanded, feeling his bones ache as he strove to stand more rigid and tall, like the figure of authority he had once been.
Brannon uin Himring yes, that’s what he had been, and now he shall honor that title by dealing with this foe.