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8.30.17
Daymon, we say, Ea! Let these things be! [Words of the Faithful] Pleased, proud, we are of your labor of your hand, and heart, and so should you be, pleased, and lightened of that burden slowly loaded upon your soul; but your end is not yet come, in the writing of these tales, as before we have stated.
The time shall soon be when all things change: the order of nations, their leaders and pomp, being high in the esteem of Man, brought low; and the low raised as standards for others to aspire to emulate, being wrought in meekness, if not to the fulfillment of all that Eru has in mind for your realm.
Alzberow, Great Warrior Rugus, was lain as one dead, amid the ruin of Doriath-Barad-dur, and yet living, he was traded for, acceding to the transaction was this wraith-Nazgu, Maglor, for whom the bird’s catch was a memorial of Living Days, and yet an anchor of his own captivity, being hoped for, that though terrible, it may be made lovely to wear, and to look upon, beguiling;
Rugus in After Days upon Middle-Earth joined for a time that throng of Zhera’s Folk, the Zheradin, and he it was who sent forth the man Zilpharon to his caves to seek of Eru Iluvatar the light of gems everlasting, under the pretension of his fear of Darkness provoking their necessity.
Nothing of Rugus, his acts and deeds heroic, has been preserved even in those records deemed loathsome, and so some guidance of thought may be given, here and there, concerning such things as he accomplished, and these shall be the means of telling a long tale, of Eru, amid the Darkness, shining forth, to light his lamp, carried forth into the depths, under the lands of earth- Arda; seeking with Joseph-Tal-Elmar, u-Hazad a way to restore to this realm, the daughters raised up, without asking of them a return without glory; there amid the wastes of Arda, among those glooms enformed that wait to ensnare the living spirits with deceits, and forgetting, deep into the roots of things evil- begotten, they discovered the one Silmaril claimed by Madhros, and it was kept as for safekeeping, by his brother, Maglor, the singer renown.
He as a wraith repentant, was thither drawn having forsaken the realm bequeathed him by his master Thû in mockery: swamp and mire, festering noxious fumes, dizzy with flies, and their buzzing over decaying flesh, a foundry of Evil works, abandoned in the overthrow of Thû’s building, by those he (so held the Master of Souls) ought to have withstood, should his loyalty have been without reproof.
—
Often he (Madros) would visit and attend to Maglor, in this deepest hole, learning of him in song all that was done in lands no longer friendly to him, and by him forsaken; here these brothers oft sat in the darkness, nurtured by the light of Silmaril, recalling their follies and heroic acts, intertwined, and thinking on their Father Feanaro, who even now in Mandos’ Halls sits and muses upon all that has come, followed from his brief work (as it seemed, easily wrought, though greatest) to save for a day (if only) that light scattered forth of the trees Most Renown.
Begun he [Feanor] did on a whim, and as a challenge to match as may be done, the work of Varda, and of Yavanna, and to give these jewels to his spouse, in recompense for all his haughty disregard of Nerdanel’s “quisling” (to him) reverence of Vala-kind, a reverence indeed incapacitating to her, and worrisome to Vala, as a sickness unintended, but likely to spread among the Children of Eru Iluvatar. Thus he wrought the gems, and Eru seeing his work, hallowed it; and bethought to there and thus do a Thing of Music fore-sought: to make at-one all the Faithful of Arda: Vala, Ainu, Maia, Vanyar, Teleri, Noldo, Umanyar, Avari, Atani, and stunted Dwarf of Aule’s workshop.
And though it is not said nor in any(way) true that Melko was inspired of Eru to slay those Two Trees Revered, in that brief Deed of Evil, little forethought by him it seems, the Liar of Ages without End was an instrument of Eru’s hands, thereafter by His work to redeem, and restore to greater glory, the world on which His children would grow into flame, swords of light to be raised throughout, perpetual, the void-darkness, to whom would gather souls otherwise forsaken.
So recalled and supposed Maglor and Madros, one bound to an oath, and so to a master despised, the other wrenched of soul, for having forsaken his bond-brothers, and yet knowing his choice was right. Black and White the spectres sat, beholding the Jewel of their Father’s Captivity, and of their kin, and if the salvation and oil of Restoration of Arda, also had the jewel become the pool of misery from which no end to draughts/drafts drawn must be drunk, each being bitterer than the previous cup’s provision.
When upon their silent pondering stumbled Rugus, as a dull fire, yet without quenching. And this man – Rugus, was by them ensnared (for his own safe-keeping in those depths) and brought to a brink of death, preserved only by the arts taught upon Numenor, as if embalmed, a corpse; and dragged in body, and spirit by body chained came along also, from Nether realms, unto the land of light under the Day-star, and being kept for a time, clean and sleeping (as if); he was in body upheld as an example of sorts, that all who opposed the will of Nazgu would become as if dead, but not free; forever bound to those bound also. Yet it was not so, for Maglor had in his thought kept still a hidden place, unknown to Thû, and there preserved his lore, in song, and from these songs, drew he hope in Eru of Restoration yet concealed he all under the command to serve without question of allegiance every whim and counsel of Thû.
Then when Dyacôm led forth the Host of Mordor, before his Star agleam, there was in the wreck and ruin of towers and fences and fields upturned, the man Rugus, preserved and noted by Zimulof-Tal-Elmar, and this man he puzzled over in after days, until in the rebuilding begun by the wraith – now without pity, having received scorn in payment of service unending – a market was established, and he sat at times, to trade for the body a trinket little regarded, as in spite to all men, being of no worth under the stewardship he obtained in misery, under Thû (and it seems, now to us, under Eru, too).
So as if under the guise of trading, came Thingol and his friends – Joseph of Dreams, and Ki-Abroam, Ax-man ready to laughter – and they traded the falcon catch of Ifariel, and it having passed through the hands of the Zheradin, was treasured by this wraith, who made trade, happily. And though he of spirit-body could not put the catch upon his arm; upon a living tree was it placed, to him a memorial of those children, and their parents, who for a brief span brought in light to the Dark Realm, and there, cultivated among many slaves beyond hoping, love for Eru; not least in his regard sat Zilpharon.
So it was in After Days, healed, and restored though not without consequence, that Rugus led Joseph in dreams and then in body-person, to the caves that descended, until again stumbling, came they upon the light of the star of Earendel, and finding the Silmaril, they did not keep it, nor take it away, for love of those by oaths bound to deeds driven to reclaiming all that was promised to their father, though now all these sons and the Father Feanaro be wary as with illness, even to think upon these jewels.
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