Havens of the East #2

[Andorinha]

Appartently one may not modify a given posting more than once before the system breaks down and simply erases the message altogether. Consequently, after losing three such postings, and somehow blocking access to the original "Havens of the East" topic, I am reposting my material here. Let's see if this works. It may be that the "pro-board" format does work fully and consistently with my ancient Apple?

[Andorinha]

Havens of the East

1. The Scribe at Work:
In the near-ruins of Annuminas, November 4, 1937, Third Age


I sit and watch the rains run down the large square panes of the ancient glass, and try to see just how the flowing stuff will shape its courses to accommodate the ripples and the bullseyes.

It is a mesmeric play-- glass coloured fluids sheeting down the "frozen" panes -- a play that can absorb one's full attentions for many quiet hours. I am tiring early on these long winter nights, and though it is not yet cold enough for snow, my shoulders and my elbows ache, and I've abandoned the pen that I was clutching because it makes my sharp-angled fingers sore to write in this deep damp. There is a fire close by, a small affair of cinders, ash, and weakly glowing coals. I suppose I should rouse both myself and it, should stand up and walk slowly across the room to poke and stir the thing into a more inflammatory greed by adding a log or two to that center of combustion.

But the water play across the window still holds me rapt, and the chill and the darkness of my room grow equally apace as the fire starts to die.

I was working up another translation from the Elvish, the faded texts of the original requiring a long and tiresome effort with the convex lense just to tease the shape of the characters from the stains, creases, burns and smears that all the many years had left. But it had held the focus of my mind as tight as a single beam of the Sun, until the rainfall started. Now, I look occasionally at the erudite passages of this Second Age historian, and merely blink before turning back to watch the racing patterns of the rain.

Eriandol was a minor figure in the vast Library of Armenelos, the City of the Kings in drowned Numenor. He wrote in the high scholarly tongue affected by the savants of his time, and his floruit was largely coterminous with the reign of Tar-Ciryatan, 1743-2037 SA. Eriandol chronicled, in the fair tongue of the Elves, the many voyages of discovery that his regal Sea Lord had commissioned. For our modern purposes, Eriandol is vaulted into his present prominence by the fact that his manuscript seems now the single surviving record of the foundation of a Numenorean haven (indeed a city, if his account be accurate) upon the eastern margins of our Middle-earth.

********

There was established upon the far coasts of the Eastern Sea,
in the 27th regnal year of our Majestic King, Tar-ciryatan,
12th Lord of the High House of Elros, a post of observation
and a haven against the vicissitudes of travel. Here trade wares from
Numenor can be exchanged to our advantage against the gold-sands
washed from the rivers of the Orocarni Mountains by the tribes of
the inland hills, and plateaus. These folk groups most demand the
soothing balms and healing unguents that we find in such ready
abundance upon the slopes of our own island. More especially the
exotic herbs from the Undying Lands that aid difficult birthings,
or restore sight to ancient eyes find a constant and an eager
reception, for the people there are much afflicted with all the sores
that Morgoth devised in the despite of the Valar so very long ago.

Let the merchants, under Royal seal, bring thither also great bolts
of the brightly coloured Sarrasind webs, deep amber, crimsons,
and light sky blues seem to meet with the high favour of these
rustic folk. Forget not the implements of digging, the hoes and
rakes of the field, and all such edged lengths of our alloyed metals
as may be worked into tools and weapons that do not rust nor
diminish of their sharpness through time or use or wear.

********

There is much more work to follow, as I've just begun with the initial pages of the codex-bound texts of Eriandol, but not even the hope of discovering the lost name of that dawn-most Numenorean establishment can yet draw me from the finer spectacle of these cooling rains.

[Andorinha]

Havens of the East

2.The Scribe at Work:
In the near-ruins of Annuminas - November 6, 1937 Third Age

Simply Getting out of bed should not be the crowning achievement of one's day. But, gripped by age and the dead chills of this morning, my tranfer from the horizontal to a tottering sort of verticality demands a perseverance, strength, and courage that must equal the best exertions of a young man entering the bloody contests of a heated battle.

At last, I am "risen."

In a first cleansing act, I pour into my mouth a few inches of last night's diluted wine, and chase the stuff across my teeth with fast movements of my tongue. Somewhat fortified, and measurably more aware, I begin to regard my surroundings as suspiciously brighter than usual, and taking a sharper notice of this brilliance, I trace it to its source. My small window regularly allows but a feeble light to enter, so why all this bright commotion? Wishing to see just what sort of face this new day wears, I thrust my hand against the frame to remove the concealments and distortions of its thickened panes.

The hinged valve is reluctant to shift upon its pins, and its groaning complaints match in timing and in tone the moaning sobs of my own efforts. It is stuck fast. A more vicious rap bangs it suddenly open, and rips from my throat a great exclamation -- taken, no doubt, from some Orkish dialect. I place the fleshy part of my palm into my mouth, and suck at it unconsciously for the gleaming sight that fills my eyes has quite driven the pain of this fresh tear from my startled mind.

There is a hoar-frost spread over the spectacle below, re-doubling the winter Sun's effulgences. It is almost as efficient a reflector as snow itself, and somehow more entrancing because of its delicacy, and its apparent ephemeral nature -- transitory stuff, this frost will be melted away in just an hour's time and then only the memory of its glory will remain.

The waters of Lake Nenuial belie the dulling cold of its shores, for the azure waves are not ice-touched at all, they still break fluidly and scatter drifts of white-white foam upon the freshing breezes. But all the lawns and the mounding shoulders of the hills are transparently coated with tiny sparks of crystal that re-iterate the fiery joys of the Sun. Even the winter-twisted shocks of the autumn-coloured grasses are given a luminous silvering along the edges of their blades; and the dusky evergreens are diamond dusted! I would break into song, cast the visions of this morning into high poetries, but I am a mere historian, and one whose voice works only crow-wise, and whose verses never seem to rhyme. Well, I shall be content then, with simply chronicling the charms I see displayed.

Our mountains rise above the fields and the woodlands, their hard faces are bare and dark in pointed contrast to the glitter-fields that run below the summits. There is something perdurative, dour, and perhaps a little sad about these harsh crags. Should one chance to lift an eye toward those reaching pinnacles. somewhat later in the year, they will be softened into a matching splendour, when the real snows come and blend the highlands imperceptibly into the downs. All things will be uniformly white then.

Did I just call the Emyn Uial "mountains?" Let me rush to correct any mistaken impression I may have conveyed. I call the Hills of Evendim "mountains" only by exaggerative courtesy. I have been, many times, reminded by those who make a professional study of the shapes and forms peculiar to this world, that: "The Emyn Uial are not true mountains. They are but largish hills. One must travel several weeks to our immediate west, should one wish to view real mountains. Cast your eyes upon the northern ranges of the Ered Luin before you call our 'hills' by that lofty term, 'mountains.' Or, if you wish the genuine article, drop your scrolls and pens, go roaming out there, east aways, and be humbled by the bulking masses of the Misty Mountains!"

I am not likely, at my advanced age, to down my books and grab a stick for some dubious trek into The Wild just to put a finer, more geologically appropriate meaning to a word already made obvious from my dictionaries: "Mountain, a large pile of rocks." There are several adequate maps in the collections here, and a few admirably inked drawings that depict -- sufficient for my purposes -- the high tors and the stretching monoliths of the greater peaks. Besides, in these degenerating days, the Writ of the King is no longer law, out there in The Blue. Nor do his rangers have enough free time to mount rescues for blithering scholars who have wandered off the paths of reason.

_____________

The rays of the Sun are falling at a steeper angle now, and the long, blue shadows seem to retract as noon approaches. Yet still the frosts linger. A pulsing wind turns the heavy branches and tosses the long grasses on the hills, and each fresh shift sends new rivers of light dancing over the fairy-etched meadows. I am content to simply stand and wonder.

Content to wonder -- until the sudden clang of the refectory bell replaces my bemused amazement with the enormous realization of my hunger. We do not often, in these declining days, serve up a feast, but to honour the visitor who has come down from the King's Table at Fornost, our High Scholiast has seen fit to slaughter one of our aging kine. The noble beast that has for many seasons dragged our plough through endless miles of furrowing, will find my gratitudes expanded toward the infinite, once his final sacrifice becomes the comfort of my belly.

In olden days the Concourse of the Scholars in Annuminas ate well indeed, partaking generously of the Kings' bounty. No doubt they would expend in daily consumption the monthly tale of our own bills of fare. "Meat at every meal, and four meals a day!" Or so our cook likes to tell it, though doubtless he exaggerates. But our subsidies have fallen off of late, especially since the court fled to the greater security of Fornost, leaving Annuminas to slide largely into ruin. Even the youngest acolyte among us can bring to mind "better days" when we all had meat, three times a week, and four candles were issued to each scholar's cell.

We once had paper in abundant lots, though I must not be seen to be pejoratively complaining here, for even now we still have adequate materials to hand for all the requisite recordings we must make. We use slates and chalks for our initial compositions, and wait until after the corrections have been made, before we transfer our precious notations to the hoarded sheets that yet remain. Our stable man has taken up the task of making parchments, though he cannot find sheep skins enough for this fine art. Rather, he pares carefully the smaller hides of rabbits, feral pigs, and even squirrels to make up the uneven fabrics of this medium. Still, closely writ, even a rabbit's skin will accept the inky charges of several pages worth of any scholar's wisdom.

We do still produce great works of the mind, and though our circumstances are reduced, the vast expansions of human understanding cannot be checked. Just recently Inzil's "Formulae Concerning Some Re-duplicative Numbers in Sequential Plotting" has revolutionized the art of chronology and makes possible the closer prediction of both solar and lunar eclipses. Let the ancients try to better that!

My own work, while less general in its applications, and not so noble in its calculations, still pushes back, in one small way, the former frontiers of our ignorance. No one, since the Fall of Numenor, has glimpsed so well the true extent of that grim empire, as I have now. A great city in the uttermost east! A citadel of learning and a seat of power where the treasures of a vast commerce were stored, where magics now forgotten might lie hidden in the pages of arcane volumes unread for several thousand years! What bright marvels might not await a re-discovery in that place of ultimate journey?

Well, my apologies, I do become a trifle excited by "mere schloastic possibilities," and in a moment of more sober judgment, I must admit that there is much work left to do. Why, just to puzzle out the name of that distant entrepot will take me many hours, days, maybe months of painstaking transcription and translation; and then will follow a similar effort, requiring the assistance of our geographer, to determine the city's precise location -- all this before we can consider the utility of an expedition. Even then, like as not, we'll find the place dead, buried under ash flows, or washed away by some convulsion of the Ocean. But -- a thin "but," I admit -- what if its heaps and piles can yet be found? What if the vaults still hold the treasured books we seek? The wild tribes of the east despised the lore of Numenor, and while all the artifacts of silver and of gold, all the ancient weaponries and armours, all the utensils of daily life must surely long since have been despoiled, who, save a Man of Numenor, or one of his descendants, would bother to loot the books?

Ah! That is the last bell, my slice of ox is waiting!
 

[Andorinha]

Havens of the East

3. The Scribe at Work:
In the near-ruins of Annuminas -- November 7, 1937, Third Age

I have been slow at my work in teasing the pages of Eriandol's text, one from the other. Immense pressures must once have lain upon this volume, for many of its pages have been greatly compacted. At times the sheets separate cleanly with a modest application of a tentative prying force. But, occasionally, an uncareful hand that turns a leaf too quickly will rip away entirely the inked surface of a sheet and leave it "glued" to its facing page. I have only made this mistake once. Our Conservator has suggested several solutions in which the volume may be immersed to soften the bonds between the pages, though she cautions me that some of the inks may be incompatible with such bathing fluids, and there is a danger that portions of the text will simply dissolve. So, for now, I steam the edges just a bit (making the leaves more pliable) and slide a thin spatula into the promising gaps to wedge the pages, carefully, apart.

Now this is a curious matter, upon separating two sheets this morning I have come upon an obvious interpolation. Eriandol is quoting from another source! This is a magnificent discovery and it effectively doubles the value of his text. Not one lost source, but two! Even more curious, the style of the characters shows a definite alteration of scribal hands. If we assume the large, bold-writ Tengwar to be Eriandol's own script, then this later, more miniscule and less slanted form can only belong to a second writer who has become a contributor to this volume. But Eriandol gives us no introduction, and presents no reason for this alteration. Will further reading reveal the name of this co-author? He/She exhibits a deeper, closer knowledge of those far lands that lie upon the verges of the Eastern Sea -- perhaps representing the voice of one who has actually travelled there and collected from the natives their own tales of the city's ancient origin?

********

Far out upon the eastern limb of the world, yet still upon the same great mass of land that bears up Eriador, Rohvanion, and the Southlands of the Sun, there dwelt many strange peoples, whose histories had anciently diverged from the "Tales of the West," and in their own traditions the Valar, the Eldar, and the Atani of the Three Houses were but vague rumours and matters of confusing myth. Upon the shores that opened eastward, where rolled the great Yellow Sea, a broad thumb of land projected north and formed the exterior margin of a deep, still bay. Many tributary rivers and one great flood poured down fertile silts into the colder waters of this bay. Up-welling currents swept there the nutrients of the Ocean floor, and in these sheltered, enriched waters many kinds of fish were multiplied, and the great beasts of the main came often there to feed and shoot their watery breaths into the air. Here too, at last, came Men, ragged bands that fled the tumults of the north and west, and sought to avoid the terrors made by the ever-warring gods. They stopped here, looking out upon the Ocean, and heard, perhaps, some gentling song of Ulmo, and were content with the isolated peace, and the clean beauty of the place. A small and quiet people, they grew slowly, and soon became adept at taking their living from the bounties of the sea. Small boats they built, cunningly constructed to handle both the shallows -- where fast currents and breaking waves made all maneuvers tricky -- and the greater deeps off shore, and sometimes they travelled even further.

Many lives of their kind were passed in the quiet, daily construction of their own, sundered histories. And, on occasion outsiders came to visit, and sometimes just to stay. So they were recruited, and a few towns developed along the shores. Farmsteads were taken from the grasslands and the forest, and the items of a rudimentary trade went back and forth along a growing net of paths.Counselors were chosen to guide and smooth the way that was leading all this folk into the development of a realm.

There came a time of restless anxiety, when the very air one breathed seemed uncertain, and all normal joys were muted as in those who wait for a dooming stroke, and turn from side to side in puzzled worry, and cannot tell from which quarter it approaches. Then shocks and thunders ran through the earth, and the bay was set to boiling, and hills slid into the sea, and the land was re-made and many of its features altered. When all grew quietly still again, the folk came out from the ruins of their homes, and turned to stare with horror into the glowing skies of the night. Far away in the westward lands fires must be burning, flames as tall as mountains, kindled by the dying strife of the gods. Many of the folk felt then that the world was coming to its end, and their voices rose like the thin mewing plaints of sea birds into that nightmare sky. Those who knew the art, wrote vivid passages into the books of the folk, though few were sure that any eye would ever chance again to read them. But the days of thunder moving through the ground came to an end, and the waters became flat. The folk stood dazed and stared upon the twisted forms of a new, yet still recognizable scape, and then they turned their hands and minds to the long, hard chores of rebuilding all they could of what they once had known.

********

It is clear that in this portion of the text, we are dealing with "autocthonees" of this territory, and "B" as I shall henceforth designate the writer of this second script, is referring to matters that occurred in the Elder Age itself. Surely "the thunders that move through the ground" can only be the earthquakes that accompanied the fall of Morgoth's Thangorodrim!

While B's account seems only a redaction of those first sources (or it is perhaps taken from surviving oral traditions alone) it is still wonderful to find a clear memory of those most ancient times preserved, to be recorded in the Second Age, some two thousand years later. And now, almost a further two thousand years have passed, in the count of Men and Elves, and here I am, on a fine though chilly afternoon, reading with my tired eyes these deeply ancient narratives! What a wonder is this gift of writing.

Several new clews are here presented that should make the task of locating this eastern haven more secure. "A north projecting thumb of land," a number of contributory flows, and one great river, all confluently entering a significantly-sized bay of the Eastern Sea. The colour ascribed to this sea, "yellow," might also allow a more narrow focusing of our search, for most of the texts I have read concerning that far off arm of our great Ocean, refer to its blue-black waves. Apparently the rivers that mingle their flows in this bay, push yearly enough sediment to greatly alter its normative hues many miles outward. Raniel, our prized geographer, shall be winkled out of his anchoritic retreat, and set to pulling forth the charts that cover those distant shores.

Alas, we in Arnor have had few occasions demanding such extented travels ourselves, and the maps we possess showing those regions in the greatest detail, are ancient documents themselves -- inhereited from the ruin of Numenor. Their intelligences may not reflect the present nature of those ever-changing coasts. But I grow sanguinely optimistic that, from B's assisting narrative, we shall soon find a likely corner on some chart where we may tentatively place our haven.

[Andorinha]

Havens of the East

4. With Raniel - Geographer:
In the near-ruins of Annuminas, November 8, 1937, Third Age.

Through Raniel, some peculiar news has reached me this morning. Apparently our Visitor (from the King's Court) spoke at considerable length upon the topic of "our security." I suppose my attentions should have been directed more towards the comprehension of his speech, than toward the savory slab of ox they placed before me -- but while my hearing is no longer as good as it should be, my taste buds are still capable of doing a very full justice to any haunch of meat. Consequently, I can excuse myself for concentrating upon the Victuals and not the Visitor. Raniel -- a bit of a fuss-pot, if you take my meaning -- is almost scandalized that I paid so little heed to our esteemed, imposing, and (so I am led to believe) eloquently spoken, though ultimately perilous guest.

"What do you mean, you do not remember him saying anything important!" Raniel barks at me, his voice shifting easily into the remonstrating tones of a schoolmaster finding fault in the careless work of a distracted, if not simple-minded student. "We are to have soldiers here! Great, hulking brutes, all cased in jangling mail and clanking plates; sword-play in the rose gardens; rough oaths and coarse jokes, professors mocked and probably tumbled daily into the fountains! Soldiers, man! Do you understand that now?"

I fully appreciate his concern, bordering quite obviously upon a positive anxiety, but I really want to leave this trivial matter for some more appropriate moment of "carping leisure," and I need (almost desperately) to bring him back to the wide table where the unrolled charts that delineate the eastern territories of Middle-earth are now haphazardly scattered.

"Yes, yes, my dear fellow, 'soldiers,' nasty things I'm sure, but less nasty than the Orcs and brigands of Angmar. Calm yourself, calm yourself, Raniel. My own brother is a ranger, and he has some authority in these matters. He reports himself directly to the King. If any of these 'soldiers' dare affront your dignities, I shall contact my brother at once, and he'll set them to the 'right-abouts'!" Though Raniel still glowers -- and I swear I can see the smokes and fumes of his anger rising from his white brow -- he is somewhat mollified, at least sufficiently to allow his angry eyes to return to the piled charts.

"Well then, that's alright, I guess..." he mumbles, tugging a map from the near bottom of the heap. He snaps it forth with all the precision of a sheet-tossing laundress laying out her fabrics for a session with the iron. The great square of the thing settles slowly, somehow reminding me of a large bird alighting upon our lake, and then, Raniel (authoratatively) stabs his stiffened forefinger upon the spot.

"There! That's got to be the location, though this map is blank upon the current question, as it gives us not even a vague marking to indicate a ruin, let alone the circled-dot symbol that signifies a great city. But here is, surely, the deep bay you seek, and the jutting 'thumb' of land that reaches almost directly north."

Tracing a heavily blackened and sinuous line, he further exclaims: "And here, I'll wager my next meal of beef, is your 'Great Flood.' Anyway, it is a major river, plain enough. Though there's no trace of all those 'contributory' streams that B rattles on about. Could be the scale here left the chartist no real scope to show the finer features, could be he worked from notes not quite as specific as the record you've got now?"

Well, we might be right, we might be wrong. Still, having a definite "place" in mind, an actual spot upon a map where I can point my finger and say simply "here," gives me a fine and shivering sense of wonder! Now, if only I can bring this city closer to life by finding a name to put upon it! Ah, there is indeed magic in the mere act of uttering a name! It draws the numinous and the legendary out of the phantasms of the imagination, and makes any object more real, solid, concrete. The defining essence of anything (so some of our Philosophes have told me) is always bound up with its name. I can well believe it now, for in my obsessions I am elevating the"name" to so primary an importance, that were the actual city placed before me, still nameless, I would howl my disappointments to the shuddering stars! "What's in a name," indeed? Everything, I would answer at this moment.

In returning to my cell I approach my work tables, my benches, my books in a near-drifting sort of contemplation. My vision seems curiously double, as if I am using but one fragment of my consciousness to navigate the torturous paths through my scholastic clutter, while I employ the foremost elements of my cogitation to view again the coloured lines of Raniel's bright chart. It takes me some time to settle, some time to peel back the next leaf of Eriandol's compendium. I am not discretely aware of having risen to light my lamp, when (finally) the fragile book falls cleanly open. Two fresh faces await the linguistic skills of my translation.

The finer script of B continues:

********

A long while after the Nightmare Time, and the Re-making of the World, great ships and bold mariners came sailing down the north winds of the Ocean. At first they stopped in the bay just to trade, to find new timber for repairs, and left little more behind them than startling tales of places unimaginably far, and deeds of great astonishment. Tall were these new folk, dark-haired for the most part, and with eyes of grey or golden-brown that carried hints and subtle traces of some deeper Elvish sort of sight. They were a gentle people, and traded fair, and taught freely of their skills and brought healing herbs, and nurturing fruits of exotic hues, tastes, and forms. The feasting halls were thrown open whenever the high-towered ships of the Numeni came to visit. And best of all were the songs they chanted, the lays they spun-out in music and in words -- musics that brought dreaming images into the minds of all who stopped to listen. So deep these enchantments became that the hours were soon fled, and many tasks were left undone whenerver a minstrel-mariner chanced to lay skilled fingers on a harp.

The years wore away, and the Numeni made homes among the Folk, though they stood yet apart and did not often mingle kin with kin, but rather did they marry most among their own kind, for the great ships were owned and crewed by familes in those days. With the consent and friendly connivance of the Folk, the mariners were soon established chiefly on the rolling table-lands of that thick peninsula which masked the bay from the roil of the Ocean. Plantations of strangely beautiful trees were set down as orchards, and new grains (and richer) ripened tall in the declining suns of autumn. They built with marvelous craft, upon an isolated crag, a great tower from whose surpassing heights both the Ocean and the bay might be scanned for many, many leagues. It was tall and fair, and shone with the ever-changing hues of the opal in the young light of the rising Sun. The "Tower of the Dawn," they named this spire, and at its feet in later years there rose a city of bright aspect, Romen-Dur. Its circuit they walled with cliff-like heights of carven stone that gleamed softly white by day and were silvered by the Moon at night.

From this towered place of guarded beauty the gifts of Westernesse enriched the country round, and the population grew apace. At first the numbers of the Folk (and those of the mariners) rose from simple domestic increase. But, when the fame of Romen-Dur became a storied matter in those peaceful years that followed the War of Wrath, and when travel had become less difficult, many who still lived precariously within the eastern wastes of Middle-earth came flocking to the bayside. For long, this constant growth was a well-modulated thing, and room was found to absorb in certain comfort all and sundry. As the tended fields radiated further outward, and the paths became stone-paved roads, deliberate measures were enjoined to preserve favoured groves and long stretches of the wilderness where the roebuck and boar still found a deep quiet for their ease. Many fowl could congregate in the marshy hollows and send their hoarse and haunting calls across the shallow waters. A pleasant land of mixed cultivation and thicking parks of green resulted, and all whose health required long walks beneath the unbroken ceiling of the leaves, could set out in the morning and find themselves, within the hour, deep lost in the refreshment of some hushing forest.

********

I have my name.

[Andorinha]

Havens of the East

5. Yorlaith and the Yellow Dog:
In the near-ruins of Annuminas - November 12, 1937, Third Age

Yorlaith was on her way to the shores of Nenuial. Her hair was at times a nuisance as the wind was loose in the hills today, running where it wished, pulling at the long black stuff she knew she should have braided. But, a carefree spirit had taken her this dawn, and she dared the crossing breezes to make her "matted" manes any more of a tangle than the usual. She had been almost "willful" upon arising; enthused by a bold mood that seemed in full flow from the very moment that her yellow dog had roused her (with a shower of cold airs) as he tumbled the last quilt from her bed. Now, the sun was barely over the eastern arch of the far lands, and the two of them, dog and lady, were already rushing down the grass grown lanes to the semi-lunar notch that formed their cove.

A red and yellow fall of spinning leaves stopped them momentarily, as a passing gust of windy exuberance tossed the jumbled colours high enough to make an impenetrable screen from all those whirling motions. She was delighted, the dog was annoyed. He would brook no delay, no checking influence upon the purposed progress of his paws, and he sprang (snarling) into the thick of that leafy cyclone. A yellow dog among the yellow leaves -- she laughed with loud spontaneity at the mixing sight as the dog sought to grip this airy thing and bring it to submission. He succeeded (after a billowing while) and the path, new-carpeted with dull gold and soft red, was finally clear again.

They came out from under the bending groves, and stood still for a moment, looking over the piling waters and the tatters of the foam that flew from the crests of the endlessly repeated waves. There was a rush and a roar in their ears that reduced all other sounds, including the dog's bright barking. He was simply happy to be there in that small moment of carefully balanced anticipation -- the barest instant before the leap. And she was fully enthralled by the vast beauties of that re-bounding surface. Across the complex play of air and wave, above the distant line of the green-grey smudges of the wintry forest, she viewed the ragged slopes and the rocky heights of Evendim. There was a trace of snow up there, just a subtle wisp of the stuff laid out in the distant shadows of the peaking tors. Tomorrow there would be more, the binding ices of the north were coming. She pulled her great shawl further up along her shoulders, and shivered just a bit. Full winter would be soon upon them, and dog would have to amuse himself with sliding games instead of swimming.

She turned to watch the dog go gladly down the steeping bank and plunge into the open waters of the cove. She saw his furry form become sleek and clinging with the weight of all that silvered liquid. His fine, long head was held above the sprays, and the curving waves that parted from his underjaw, formed the lengthy ripples of his wake. There was always an earnest determination to the set of his swimming features, and even to the rapid rhythms of his pounding stroke. The swimming dog radiated a sort of concentration that enthused his watchers with the momentary certainty that, whatever he was up to, this was a serious business requiring all their rapt attentions. Of course he rarely did anything beyond his usual quick circuit of patrol: out ten yards, over ten yards, and ten yards back to the shore. A spectacular tumult of "drying" shakes and twists that expelled a million gemlike sparks, would raise about his tossing form a nimbused halo of sheer glory -- always worth the watching. But otherwise, all that grim endeavour in the lake built up to no real, matching climax. Still, it must have been a very important doggish ritual, as he repeated it so often.

Seven AM was fast in its approach, and the partial Moon above was losing all His night-time gold, becoming white as a bone china plate in the growing wash of the Sun's full shine. The dog had finished with the lake, and they turned back for home. Damp dog, and cooling woman, together they walked a hesitating path near the flicking branches of the wind-stripped willows, and saw a few last flowers, small, pale, and blue as her chilled flesh. The dog surged ahead for a brief reconnaissance, then sat upright, looking further along the path, waiting to release his next bounding charge as soon as she could catch him up. She chased him in this staccato fashion for a longish way, and they both let the heats of their exertions gradually displace their clinging chills.

The initial warning that they were no longer alone came from the dog, whose next spurting run was suddenly curtailed. He sat back upon his haunches and brought himself to a sliding halt just where the path turned. Into her mind, unbidden, leapt the swift image of an Orc, or some marauder from the east with scimitar drawn, its edge already bloody. But the dog's tail thumped steadily, reassuringly, and his bark was nothing more than a greeting, so the momentary rise of her concern was soon allayed. It must at least be someone the dog considered innocuous, and the absurdly intruding fear that maybe it was an Orc, dissipated completely.

The Visitor had warned them, just a few days since, that Fornost was uneasy about the frontiers, and a file of troopers would be assigned them, "just in case." The soldiers had not yet arrived. She shook her head, realizing only now, just how seriously her subconscious mind must have taken the Visitor's vague warning. She left the safety of her closure with no thought of peril whatsoever, until this brief reaction on the homeward path. The fleeting thrill of danger had shaken her, more than she wished to admit (even to herself). "Next time, I'll bring a dagger..." she promised under her breath, though what good a slender blade in her weak hand would be -- against a vicious Orc -- she was not too certain.

"Well, Dog, good morning to you, sir! Now, where is your mistress?" The deep inflections of the old historian were quite recognizable, even at some distance. She increased the length of her stride to come a bit sooner round that corner to confront her "erstwhile" Orc with a broad smile and a reaching palm.

With a slight touch of saucey flirtation to colour her banter, she addressed him at once: "Well, I see even you are up and about. A chance meeting, or have you some compelling errand that leads you to the lake -- hoping to find a fish or two still hungry, and ready to steal even your worms?" She laughed generously, partly to conceal her own emotions, and gave him a firm answering hug. She placed a polite, "fake-kiss" upon his face, letting it carelessly land somewhere near his stubble-clouded cheek.

"Humph!" My trawling skills are legendary, Ma'am, and next time I take a great perch, you'd best be ready with an apology, or I'll give your share to the dog. But, no, I'm actually here after you. Come see!" Arm in arm they worked their way back to the postern, and left the lawns and groves behind them. She noted that he was careful to shut the complaining gate, and that he even took the extra bother of drawing out his pass-key to turn the lock behind them. They dismissed the dog -- or rather, he left them and went off to beg scraps from the kitchen -- and they kicked their way through the heaped leaves that lay about the side entrance to the library. Raniel was there before them, his maps upon the center table, while off to one side were several sheets of paper that bore the careful impress of the historian's practiced script -- the translation of Eriandol.

[Andorinha]

Havens of the East

6. Yorlaith, the Historian, and The Geographer:
In the near ruins of Annuminas - November 12, 1937, Third Age.

"We have a 'highly likely' position on the map now, and a nicely confirmed site-name to show you!" The geographer pointed to a bit of land near the eastern shores of the world, while the historian pointed, with an identical flourish of his index finger, at a certain line in his manuscript. She divided her attentions equally through the simple mechanism of twisting her head several times, back and forth, first looking at the map and then the name. As Archivist, Yorlaith had an encyclopedic understanding of all the collections housed here, and both these senior scholars had come to trust in her deep and detailed memory.

"So," Raniel injected, before the historian could squeeze out his own query, "you ever hear of this place before? 'Tower of the Dawn,' or 'Romen-Dur'?"

She picked up the manuscript, peered very closely at the ranks of the letters there, then asked for the original codex. Satisfying herself that the historian had done his usual painstakingly careful work, she compared the ancient Tengwar with his translated results. "I concur, no other possible reading. Now, let me think a minute." She screwed up her face in visible concentration, and sent one of the retrieving demons of her mind scurrying through the heaped names that were resident in her head, and shortly she exploded. "'Ramani-Dour'! Yes, that's it, but it's not in the Numenorean files at all. It's in one of the Easterling Texts, and unless either of you can spell your way through Kennish, and puzzle out that curious script made up of wedges jammed together, you're not very likely to have ever heard of the place. Be right back!"

She caught the tag end of the historian's bright smile, and the affirming nod of the geographer's head as she scooted around the table and set off down the tall, stacked rows of the library's massed entries. She soon recovered that peculiar Easterling volume which some zealous collector had curated for Annuminas so many centuries before. She lay the huge thing down on a nearby table, and slowly paged her way into its crackling depths. Raniel and the historian flanked her now, and like some three-headed troll, their near joined forms leaned hungrily over the book while she pointed out the exact passage where, concealed by the cuneiformic characters, the name Ramani-Dour could first be found.

"I can work up a full transcription/ translation for you later, but I'll bet you both would prefer, right now, to get at least the gist of the thing?" Their heads bobbed in exaggerated agreement, and she began:

********

High were the walls and well-defended, our engines could make no headway against those massive bulwarks. 'Ramani-Dour' we could not take by storm, and from our spies we knew well that there were ample stores within. There had they also many wells of fresh, clean water. Even orchards and fields they had inside the reaching ambit of those walls, sufficient for their long sustenance should we try by the siegecrafts of investment to bring about their submission through thirst and dire starvation. The rich plunders we had from the outlying townships had only whetted our appetites for the greater wealths treasured in their citadel, and we were full loath to turn from the Shining Tower. But, already the year was old, and the biting winds had found a colder set of fangs, and we were ill-prepared to sit in the burnt ruins of their outworks and abide the fall of winter.

The Seer-Lord, Kraelthun, had seen it within the captured Stone, and he warned our Taxiarchs that a Numano fleet must be expected for the city's relief when the new warmths of the Spring were come. We were, upon no chance, to stay so far into the new year. Finding the walls would not permit our access, and the garrison was not to be suborned to treachery -- we made in council our decision to hazard neither our army, nor those plunders already gathered. We would not mount our leaguer any longer, though the Answering Stone that yet remained within their tower had not been taken. This Stone it was that the Lord Kraelthun coveted above all things. He promised to us, the greatest part of all the other precious plunders (not excluding the bright Moon metal of the Numano) if only we could bring him that puissant object of great sorcery. But in this course we failed, and so must be contented with a smaller tithing of the booty we already bore.

********

"I cannot yet tell you the date of this Easterling account," Yorlaith pre-empted the historian's obvious question, "but, I think, if I recall this source aright, there was an index prepared some while ago by another Orientalist, maybe Rastarnil? I'll look for it."

"Oh, this is already exceeding my day dreams!" the historian nearly shouted. Then he bit a corner of his lip beneath the cover of his beard, and asked in some consternation: "But, you are certain that this uncouth Easterling term, 'Ramani-Dour', is fully cognate with our Adunaic-Sindarin 'Romen-Dur'?"

She laughed, reassuringly. "Very certain! Do you not remember that my special field of interest was the Easterling tongue of Kennish, and all its three scripts? The alterations from the vowels of Numenor to those of Kennish would produce just exactly these shifts in their written forms. The two terms are the same."

The historian smiled, and then Raniel injected: "Two more Stones! Palantiri, I'll be bound. I think this matter has taken on a new significance, we should inform the High Scholiast."

The historian and Yorlaith dropped their mirthful manners and reflected just a moment before he answered, with some solemn deliberation: "Yes, Raniel, this 'matter' has become an issue of political importance. It is no longer just a scholastic exercise. Though we still have no more than our tentative conclusions to report, we must now pass what we know through the sieves of His finer discernment."

"Political..." Yorlaith echoed, letting that single word lengthen into a portentous declamation. "Well, lead the way," she gestured to the historian, "it's your project, or rather, it was."

[Andorinha]

Havens of the East

7. Matters of State, Matters of Convenience:
In the near-ruins of Annuminas, November 14, 1937, Third Age.

The Historian:

I must admit that I am somewhat reluctant to lay this material before the learned High Scholiast, Rastarnil. Bringing it to his attention elevates this peculiar aspect of my study to the uncomfortable plane that all "matters of state" assume. It does, as Raniel and Yorlaith have told me, politicize my work, and insure that it is no longer really mine. Committees will be appointed to consider the ramifications of our discoveries, other authorities will rule upon its significance, and the entire, weighty apparatus of the state will (undoubtedly) become involved. The cloak of silence that wraps all "state secrets" in a deadening pall, may be invoked. All my work may be buried, and further translations forbidden. It is a sad thing when the advancement of human knowledge must be impeded so that our security may be maintained. But, we are living on the edge here, and what would happen should our immediate enemy, Angmar, learn of the existence of two more Seeing Stones? Would not that Dark Sorcerer scour the far eastern lands for such a prize? And how detrimentally impacted would be our cause should that dread king possess a palantir? What little communication we yet have with Gondor would be imperiled, or even made impossible if a Stone were lost to that foul master; all our joint plans would be exposed to his ever-spying eyes.

Up until this moment, the translation of the Eriandol manuscript has been nothing but a pleasant task of purely academic interest. At best, I suppose, I toyed with the idea that something important might be found in that scribe's close-writ pages, something warranting a minor expedition out that way, eastward -- but, I never really thought it would eventuate in quite so inconvenient a manner. Palantiri. I guess the presence of two Stones, previously unknown, would be considered "significant" in anybody's judgment. Now, as a result of my investigation, lives will be put at hazard. Someone must go east, must establish just what happened to those Stones, recover them (if possible), or at least assure us that they are indeed well lost, and truly un-recoverable.

Raniel, The Geographer:

I do hope our historian fully comprehends the situation of deep danger our studies have revealed. Two Palantiri, tossing about loosely in the foreign wilds, one apparently held by some Easterling lord an Age ago, and not, so far as we know, properly neutralized; and another, whose last certain placement was in some fabled tower whose fate is, as yet, undetermined. These are troubling intelligences and it is our duty, however inconvenient, to make the full import of this matter known to the Crown.

But, what will be the likely cost of this "patriotism?" Revealing what we know will provoke a certain amount of censorship -- of that I am sure. Possibly, it will entail surrendering the manuscripts involved. A pity. Things sent up to Fornost have a way of "disappearing" forever. Perhaps we can rush our studies here, produce copies of Eriandol and the Easterling text before we lose control of them? But will it stop with just these two confiscations? Fornost is insecure, and in such times, when the dynasty may be at stake, they are all too likely to overreact. Certainly Fornost will want to send even more soldiers here, and they'll probably want a thorough search of all the stacks, looking ever for more documents of such a sensitive nature; and, just to be on the "safe side," they'll confiscate any manuscript that is as yet untranslated. This will gut our library, and the Syndicate of Free Scholars will quite effectively be ended. So, pinned between two loyalties, between the seemingly contradictory virtues of pure scholarship and national security, what will we do? I think it all too likely we'll do nothing, just sit on our hands until some other power moves preemptively to end all possibility of independent action. So, it comes down to this, which virtue do I serve?

He finally decided to prepare for all eventualities, and began to copy the translations of Eriandol that were at hand, and then each additional sheet -- so soon as the Historian had worked his way through another passage. To this text he added his own notes, and his expertly drawn miniatures of the maps that were relevant to their study. He was also able to append a fairly accurate précis of the Easterling texts that Yorlaith had provided, though when he searched for that volume in the archives, he found it was missing, still charged to her account.

Yorlaith, Archivist:

Her mentor was Rastarnil. He was the Chief Scholar of their syndicate, and, moreover, he was her friend. She would be reporting to him, soon. But precisely when? She was almost certain that he must be aware of the Easterling text, must know of its straight forward references concerning the two Stones. Could Rastarnil, past master of the Easterling tongue, have missed this particular document? It was possible, she concluded. There were, after all, many such short bits laid up in the library, and she herself had only known that it contained a reference to "Ramani-Dour" because some ancient scholar had tagged it thus in the great index. Had not the historian found the Numenorean name of Romén-Dur, she would never have connected the two, and (probably) would never have bothered to even look at the unprepossessing scrap. If Rastarnil had actually read the thing, could he have ignored the import of its discovery? Ignored the potential existence of two more palantiri? Doubtful! It would be more likely that he had access to other sources, texts that made explicit the full history of these Stones. Perhaps Rastarnil knew they had already been destroyed, or were demonstrably buried deep in something more concrete and impenetrable than just the mists of time? So she swung, pivoting upon twin uncertainties: either Rastarnil had never read the Easterling text. or, having read it, he knew it was not as important as its contents might lead one to suppose. Either way, she would have to speak with him, soon...

The King's Eye:

"There has been a considerable amount of secretive bustle of late; senior scholars dashing about the halls, heads close held, voices tight and low as they pass their hushed communications. Doors that were usually left open, are more frequently closed now, sometimes locked, and the cabals convened behind them occur at odd times of the day, or even deep within the night. Such things stimulate one's curiosity. Something is afoot!"

He redoubled his efforts to puzzle out the answers, remaining quite cautious, gliding almost unseen and shadow-wrapped through the corridors -- and he always had a plausible excuse at hand should any note that he was dogging the steps of those he knew to be "conspiring."