Aiër- Prologue
T.A. 3003
The night was cool and clear in the valley of Imladris. The deep indigo of the evening sky was scattered with summer stars and the familiar sound of the River Bruinen was melodic and refreshing as it danced on the breeze over the Last Homely House. Lord Elrond stood at one of the high, open windows of his study, gazing out over the docile waters where they lapped at the western bank. He had spent many peaceful nights sitting at his great oak desk, listening to the river water gurgle lazily far below; the sound was usually soothing to his ears and mind and such balmy summer evenings normally brought to him a sense of relaxation and contentment.
Elrond's mind, however, was not at ease on this night. He had risen from his chair and abandoned his reading some hours ago, for a sense of foreboding had come upon him unexpectedly. He surveyed the valley, the great fords of the river, knowing that the stillness of the night would not last long. He felt something approaching quickly through the darkness.
Even deep in thought as he was, he heard the hurried footsteps in the hall several moments before a sharp knock sounded upon the closed door behind him.
"Enter," he called, his eyes still on the night. He heard the door open.
"My Lord Elrond, you are needed immediately in the infirmary."
Elrond turned, hearing the urgency in Erestor's voice. The elf's eyes shown with worry in the soft light of the fireplace. The elf-lord hastened towards the door, for seldom did Erestor's face wear an expression of such disquiet.
"What has happened?" Elrond asked calmly as the two hurried from his study. Moonlight flickered eerily across their faces as they passed swiftly through long, colonnaded corridors and down winding steps. Erestor did not answer for a moment, and Elrond turned his sharp gaze back to look at him, startled and worried by his hesitation.
"The patrol has returned, my lord," Erestor answered finally. Elrond could tell that he was speaking carefully.
"My sons?" he asked immediately, though he knew that his advisor and friend would be much more frantic had something happened to Elladan or Elrohir.
"They are well," Erestor reassured him as they crossed a courtyard and approached the infirmary. Their feet were silent on the smooth cobble stones. "But they bring with them one who is not."
Elrond's eyebrows drew together at this. He stepped over the great stone threshold and into the Healing Halls of Imladris, instantly aware of many shadowed figures along the wall near the door. He registered distantly that these were all the soldiers of the first patrol crowded into the room, but he had no time to consider this before his eyes found his sons. Elrohir sat on the edge of one of the hall's many narrow beds, his back to the door and his brother standing before him. Strange gasping sounds echoed under the vaulted ceiling as Elrond strode forward. Both twins raised their faces to meet their father's gaze as he hurried over to them, Elrohir turning his head to look over his shoulder. Their expressions were grim and strangely tender.
"They found the child on the outskirts of the forest, not far from the Last Bridge," Erestor murmured anxiously from behind him as Elrond rounded the end of the cot. He stopped dead in his tracks as he took in the sight before him.
Huddled in Elrohir's lap, wrapped in several cloaks, was a weeping child. Her gaunt face was pale except for where her eyes were red from crying; tears stained her little cheeks. She was utterly filthy. What little of her that Elrond could see was covered in dirt and dust—skin and clothing alike. Her eyes were tightly closed and her sobs seemed to shake from fear and pain. Tiny, pointed ears peaked out from under her tangled hair, illuminated by the moonlight and the candles that elves were beginning to light around the room.
"We have tried both Sindarin and Westron, Adar, but she will not speak and we are unsure if she understands us," Elladan explained in his soft, sturdy voice, but he shifted his weight uneasily as Elrond stared at the little girl.
Finally, he knelt down next to the bed. His son held the child close to his chest, seeming simultaneously unsure of what to make of the crying creature in his arms and reluctant to release her.
"She is hurt?" he asked pointedly, reaching to gently pry the cloaks away from her little body. At the sound of his voice, she finally looked up, her blue eyes wide with distrust and wonder. She shrunk away from him as he peered at her emaciated limbs and ragged clothes.
"Yes. We think she has been beaten."
"Beaten?" Elrond asked sharply, fixing his son's face under a piercing gaze. Elrohir did not answer, but fury flashed in his eyes and Elrond gently coaxed the hysterical child off of his lap and onto the bed. He ordered a draught to be made to calm the elfling as he and his sons murmured soothing words in elvish. The child shivered in the warm summer air and cried out as he peeled off the rags she wore, though she had not the strength to fight against him as he had expected.
Elrond pulled her threadbare dress over her head and clenched his jaw in anger and revulsion. Behind him, someone swore loudly—Glorfindel, he thought, but he had not heard him come in. Dark bruises covered the child's arms and torso, so terrible that they were still purple despite being several days old. Long, thin burn marks ran across the front and back of her thighs, and the flesh of her back was marred by crisscrossing lashes, some scabbing over and others still raw and open, but all were infected. The child recoiled from him as he examined her.
"I need athelas, sage, pilinehtar, and a bowl and pestle," Elrond ordered darkly as he probed the child's sides for broken ribs. "Now." He worked in near silence, speaking only to give orders and reassure the little elleth. His hands were steady but his heart pounded with rage. Finally, after balms, ice, and bandages had been applied to her wounds, the grime sponged from her skin, and a soothing tea coaxed down her throat, the child lay asleep on the cot. Even in her exhausted state, distress remained on her young face. Elrond stood at the foot of the bed, his left arm crossed over his chest, the thumb and forefinger of his right hand pressed against his eyes. He had ordered the soldiers out earlier in an effort to calm the girl-child. Those who remained in the room stood in silence for a moment, but now that the child had been cared for and their anxiety somewhat abated, Elrond could feel their anger thick in the air. Elven children had become rare and precious, and he was sick with rage as he thought of the torture that the little girl had been subjected to.
A soft wind blew in through the open windows, the curtains billowing a bit as a result.
"Who would do this to a child?" Glorfindel finally exploded, breaking the silence. He clenched his fists and paced before the fireplace. "Who would whip a little girl?" Such anger was a great contrast to his usual composure, for he had seen and done much in the world.
"She has clearly been amongst men," Elrond answered scathingly as he stood regarding the child's sleeping form. He had covered her with a soft blanket and brushed her hair away from her face. The pleading in her eyes when she had looked at him had almost been his undoing.
"And how did she get there? What of her parents?"
"She is half human." Elrond's replied bitterly. "It is not such a mystery."
Glorfindel stopped pacing, turning around to look at Elrond in surprise. Erestor sighed deeply, as if in resignation, and the twins rose from their perch on the windowsill. Elrond realized that they had never taken off their leather armor or unburdened themselves of their weapons.
"The child is Peredhil, Adar?" Elrohir asked in astonishment, looking from his father to the child and back. His face was startled, but Elrond saw recognition in his eyes.
"She is," Elrond affirmed. They all stood around the sleeping child, no one willing to speak. Glorfindel was a silhouette before the fire, his usually good-humored face thunderous and half in shadow. Erestor was beside him, his hands resting on the top of a high-backed chair; there was sorrow in his eyes. Elladan and Elrohir stepped up on either side of their father, their identical faces for once adorned with identical expressions; Elrond saw the same tumultuous emotions that he felt in his own heart reflected back at him as he looked first at one of his sons and then at the other, and he knew what he would do.
Elrond was there when the child woke the next day. It was still very early; the sun's rays had only just peaked over the mountains to the east and birds sung in nearby trees. Elladan and Elrohir were there as well, for they felt that it would be good for the child to wake to their familiar faces. Elrond was standing at the window, watching the dawn without really seeing it, when he heard the child stir next to him. Sleepily she rubbed her eyes, but Elrond saw the beginnings of panic as she looked around and did not remember where she was. He stepped forward and she looked up apprehensively into his face.
"Good morning, pen tithen," he said, pulling over a chair and lowering himself onto it. He watched her wide eyes flicker around the room, to Elladan and Elrohir, who smiled fondly at her, before returning to him. "My name is Lord Elrond," he told her in the common tongue, "and you are in my house, where you are safe." The child said nothing, only continued to stare. "Do you understand me?" he asked, searching her small face. Finally, she nodded. Elrond smiled.
"Very good," he said kindly. "Can you tell me your name?"
The little girl looked back at the twins for a moment, then up at the ceiling. Elrond leaned forward a bit in his chair as she rubbed her hands against her eyes and looked at him once more. He smiled at her encouragingly.
"Shëanon," she whispered tremulously, her azure eyes large and round.
"Shëanon?" Elrond repeated, and the child nodded again. "That is a very pretty name."
Elrond's smile grew wider as he watched the child's cheeks turn pink, happy with the compliment despite her wariness. "How old are you, Shëanon?"
"Five," she answered shyly, still looking at Elrond in nervous awe. Elrond's eyebrows rose in surprise.
"Five?" He asked, sharing a quick glance with his sons. Shëanon nodded and held up five little fingers in confirmation. Elrond was disconcerted but said nothing. If the child was only five years old, then it was clear that she was growing at human speed; a five-year-old elfling would be hardly more than an infant. "Well then, you are a big girl," he said indulgently. She flushed again and smiled hesitantly, but the smile faded and was soon replaced by her wide-eyed stare.
"Are you frightened, pen tithen?" Elrond asked after a moment, concerned.
"You're bright!" the child said very nervously, and then seemed to instantly regret it, biting her lip and looking worried, as though she thought it unwise to tell him that she was aware of his brightness. Elrond laughed outright, completely endeared.
"I am bright because I am an elf," he explained, watching her little jaw drop. The nervousness left her small face, and her expression became one of pure wonder.
"An elf?" she asked, her voice hushed with awe. Elrond nodded, and Shëanon looked quickly at Elladan and Elrohir. They smiled at her conspiratorially. "Are they elves, too?" she asked him in a hopeful little voice.
"Yes they are," Elrond replied, pleased by her astuteness. He chuckled as she glanced back at his sons and then quickly averted her gaze, embarrassed to have been caught staring. "You are in an elven city," Elrond explained to her. "Everyone here is an elf."
At these words, the little girl looked around the room, trying to see all that had been built by elven hands. Elrond looked at the child pensively. He considered her for a moment.
"You are an elf, too, Shëanon," he told her seriously, looking at her to gauge her reaction. Her face dropped immediately.
"No I'm not," she said sadly.
"No?" Elrond asked, raising a brow. "Then what are you, pen tithen?"
The child hesitated and did not answer, but looked at Elrond with doubt and naked longing in her fawn-like eyes. Elrond smiled once more.
"Shall I tell you something about elves?" he asked her, his tone akin to that which he would us if he were offering to share some great secret. The little girl finally sat up, nodding eagerly, her pain forgotten in her excitement and in the wake of the previous night's treatment. The soft green blanket was still a cocoon around her small shoulders. Elrond turned his head slightly and pulled his hair away from his right ear. Shëanon stared at him in shock.
"That's just like my ears!" she squeaked.
"Indeed," Elrond agreed. "That is because you have elven ears, penneth."
The three grown elves laughed at the look on the child's face.
Shëanon remained in Rivendell as Elrond tended to her. He noted in amusement that the child was particularly drawn to his sons; she had taken to following them around the valley, staring silently at her surroundings as her small hand clutched at the back of their robes. This had become such a common occurrence that Elladan and Elrohir had started calling her 'tithen lum.' In those first few weeks, Shëanon spoke very little, but every ellon or elleth who looked upon her adored her immediately and soon elves were flocking to his door with tiny dresses and ornate dolls to present to her. The elfling seemed a bit overwhelmed by all of the attention, and indeed unsure of what to make of it, but Elrond could see that she was pleased.
Try as he might, Elrond had been unable to learn anything about Shëanon's parents. It was obvious that one had been Eldar and the other of the race of Men, but beyond that he knew nothing. He wracked his brain in an attempt to think of an elf who had fallen in love with a human, or might have fallen in love with one, or who had recently gone missing or passed across the sea to Valinor or Mandos, but he could think of no one who could possibly be the child's mother or father. The affair had obviously been kept a secret.
He did, however, obtain some other insight through questioning the child. This had proven difficult as, at best, Shëanon seemed wary of Elrond, and he found that she was very reluctant to speak with him. He finally coaxed her one day into explaining how she had happened into the forest where his sons had found her. She claimed she had been running away from her "master."
"Your master?" Elrond asked sharply. "Do you mean your father?"
Shëanon shook her head slowly, backing away from him as her little face grew pale and her eyes became wide and uncertain.
"Was it your master that hurt you?" he asked more gently, searching her face with his probing gaze. He watched her distrust evolve into panic as she retreated back another step, finding herself now against the wall. She started to cry. This strange behavior recurred each time that Elrond tried to learn more about the child. "Come now, pen tithen," he would murmur woefully as he took a step towards her, "no one here will hurt you." Such reassurances however seemed to do little to calm the girl once her tears had started, and only Elladan and Elrohir were able to put an end to her hysterics. This bothered Elrond greatly, though he did not speak of it to anyone and he would watch somberly as the tiny child was lifted into one of the twin's arms. She did not cry on any other occasions and little by little she seemed to grow accustomed to her new home.
Exactly three weeks since she had been brought to Imladris, Elrond sat with Shëanon on an upholstered bench in the library, where he had persuaded the child to let him read her a story. He smiled to himself as the little girl had slowly inched closer to him, peering at the pictures of the Valar on the book's aged pages as she became engrossed in the tale. The story was written in Sindarin, in the tengwar alphabet, but Elrond translated it to Westron as he read aloud. He would teach her the tongues of her people soon enough.
"That is Yavanna," Elrond told the girl as she looked intently at an illustrated page. There was depicted a beautiful female figure with flowing blonde hair and billowing green robes; behind her were two luminous trees, one bathed in silver and the other shining gold. "And the trees Telperion and Laurelin, do you see?"
"Master Elrond," called a voice, and Elrond looked up from his reading to see an elf stride toward him. "A message from Estel," the elf said, bowing and handing him a small scroll of parchment. Elrond nodded his thanks and accepted the note, tucking it into his robes. He turned back to the story just as the child scrambled out of her seat. The look on her face was conflicted, but Elrond could sense the anxiety she felt.
"Shëanon?" he asked patiently. Her chin began to tremble.
"I knew it," she said in despair and started to cry. "I knew it, I knew." Alarmed, Elrond set the book down beside him and stared at her, waiting.
"What did you know?" he asked hesitantly; the child had been happy only moments before.
"I knew you're my new master," the elfling wept. Her little shoulders shook with the force of her tears. Elrond was so surprised that for a moment he was at a loss and could not speak. "I knew, I knew," she cried over and over.
"Shëanon," he said firmly when he had recovered from his shock. He leaned forward on his elbows to bring his face closer to hers. "I am not your master."
The little girl shook her head furiously, her copper curls whipped about by the motion. "He said so! He said you were the master! He said!" she cried, and her sobs now rose all the way from her chest.
"I am not your master," Elrond promised, looking intensely at her face. "You have no master here."
Shëanon looked as though her worst fears had been realized. "You're not my master?" she asked in distress. Elrond shook his head and, sensing that the child was about to flee, he rose to grab her. He was dumbstruck when, rather than back away from him, she lunged forward, attaching herself to his leg with such desperation that he did not think he could have pried her away even if he had tried.
"Please," she begged, "please don't send me back! Please don't make me go back to my master! I promise I'll be good! I promise I'll obey you!"
Elrond looked down at her in astonishment. Her tears dampened his clothes where she pressed her face against him. She took gasping little breaths. Slowly he knelt before her and she looked up nervously, unmoving, as though she half-expected him to strike her. Crystalline tears clung like dew drops to the thick lashes around her eyes. Elrond's heart was swollen with emotion has he pulled her up into his arms. He sat back down on the bench with the child on his lap; her hands latched onto the front of his robes, her small fingers curled into fists.
"No one is going to send you away," he said slowly, his voice low with compassion, one hand one her little head. "You are staying here, in Imladris, where we will take care of you."
"C-care?" the child whimpered, and Elrond held her closer.
"Yes," he confirmed. "You are staying here, and I will take care of you."
"But you're not my master?" Shëanon choked, and he could tell that she was desperately trying to understand. She sobbed again, the sound so small and innocent to Elrond's ears that he began to rock her gently back and forth.
"No, I am not your master, child," Elrond said softly. "I am your adar, your father. Do you understand?" he asked, looking down at where her small face rested against his chest. Her features were pinched with concentration.
"You are Elladan and Elrohir's adar," she whispered after a moment, and Elrond smiled tenderly at her perceptiveness.
"Yes, I am," he confirmed. "And I am your adar now, too." Even as he said the words, Elrond knew in his heart that it was true.
Translations: Adar- father
Pen tithen- little one
Penneth- little one, young one
Tithen lum- little shadow