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3.17.17
“Of the fruit of every tree thou mayest freely eat,” Sauron of old told all the people of the lands about his dominion, “But of this one tree thou shalt not of its fruit partake.” He forbad the eating of the fruit of Nimloth to the king and his house, deceiving them that it was the source and cause of the wrath of the Valar, to continue and persist in the eating of what ought to be by all enjoyed for fragrance and vision; yet to the kingsmen alone he explained, as revealing something hidden, that the eating of the fruit was a matter that long ago divided the Dark Eru from the False Powers in the West, who likewise ate of this freely, and for which derision of his law the Dark One destroyed the light of the trees, and punished the Powers:
Yet again those false to His Majestic Darkness have eaten of the fruit of this scion surreptitiously carried forth of that realm accursed, and by these Powers unrighteously upheld, as their land alone of all the mighty upon the world of Ea, and great is his anger upon this house. He stood upon the dais before the altar, his back to the kingsmen and their own victims, brought to be burned and offered in propitiation of the sins of their own house.
By one known to you as Izilba was the fruit of this tree grasped wrongfully, and consumed, and yet to her it brought painful wrenching of death, and now her spirit abides in misery forsaken by the Dark One, left to linger about his halls outside forever. This day we offer to the Dark One who upon Darkness sits and before whom the light dares not light, for it comprehends not his mystery, and soon shall all lights be extinguished, and the Ancient of Day return mankind his chosen, to the Primordial Night before the usurpation of the False Powers that sit in mockery upon mountains in the west, in leisure curing not the ills they have brought to the righteous, nor caring a whit of the least troubles of those most faithful to their rebellion.
And at this, Thû thrust a curved dagger of ancient cursing into the neck of Amandil, severing his head, to bleed upon the smolder of Nimloth, that yet refused to cease its reek amid the temple; though much diminished from its original covering of the whole land in a cloud white, and full of grief, and remorse for the gifts given to Man still too crooked to let such hang in growth from their limbs, without also consuming their own fruit as food.
The vision of these deeds was given to Silmariel, who told of the fate of Amandil to Izilba, even as his mournful spirit was taken by ship into the realm of her administration, an heir to the promises of her seed, espoused of Elros the Pure, a man unlike any before or since.
It [was] told among the friends of Elendil at this time, that troubled by dreams of his father’s incarceration by powers brought to anger in his folly of Ban-breaking, having not upheld their single command to men of Numenor; so Elendil brought in secret some of his own house back – despite all misgiving and counsel of friends – upon the shores of that forsaken-unblessed island, being unwilling utterly to search about the lands of the seas west, foreknowing the end that men would make there, and yet his own father’s body was burned, even as he set at port, and to the kingsmen was this pointed out, that his own son would not offer to trade for so great a king’s rebel, and thus were their hearts at last turned to stone. And Sauron- Thû meditated the spirit-wanderings of Silmariel, and her voice’s movement across the sea to one who spoke the noblest tongue (dialect of royals alone taught in the courts of Pharazôn even at that day, if only to assuage their thirst for elvish lore, and to persuade them of its vanity, being revised under his hand). And he doubted his own testimony to the king and his bootlicks, but could not now send any other than his own lieutenant to hunt down that voice addressed as daughter, by most ancient queen of Numenoreans, by Thû most hated.
Thus out of the north, having sacked Foramenos and driven refugees into the icelands northward, and by his command men awaited these sad folk southward, to slaughter as if invaders under the guise of seeking quarter and sanctuary; out of the north they flew high above the lands, seeking for one whose voice carried in it the treacherous work of the House of Zimulof Kloshtuz, to whom alone Elvenhome was called, by long tradition passed mother to daughter, Ezshtaru. So all the crystals and gems under their dominion had been alerted, to listen and watch for the traitor to the Mighty Six who alone of men sickly upon earth had overcome the death that comes upon all.
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