<<Previous Page | Next Page>>
1.31.18
Red are these chapters coursing over the pages of the book of your history, House Broken; Red in fire, stained by blood the red iron sulphur yellow soil, red exacting scorching earth by magma, as Earth bleeds pouring lava; Red that star of war arising in might as omen to smite Orion’s haughty spin over the star charts kept by gazers and wisemen; Turin’s Bane, red and gold glaurungus, trod into mire was the worm, by time diffusing before the washing rinse of Beleriand’s Seas over its filth, yet arising too in Sauron-Thû, this red one, and again, in the Eye of Mordor (having not the suit demanded of Zilpharon- Celebrimbor); Red the blood of men spilled by men, brothers slicing, drinking of one another’s life, taking and giving, in the monthly issue of blood; All this anticipates thy House’s restoration, brought to pass in the shedding of His blood, and now in your present time, by the redemption of, red-emption (hah!) given Thingol-su, Elwë in a mountain fastness kept, unyielding that stone-star by his hand clasped, red flesh of his hand both astonishment to his captors (those sons, and the wolf Carcaroth), and trigger to their desire, to hold again that flesh run red in lust of flesh, eaten, pleasured, bled in being cut and of spirit severed; Three Sons remain, wraiths to a spectre King Imaginary, Thû resident on Arda no longer, who once was feared by all, here;
In those First Days upon Arda, little can be stated surely, by Elf, and neither may we rely on words of Valar-speech in retelling; for no keepers of Those Days put into writ the record or account of their doings, First upon Arda; and no time either to tell, or keep events tracking, for their words stood apart of time, being wholly here, of Arda fashioned, and not of her surrounding; yet some little of the Initial Battles can be surmised, particularly from the boastful songs of Tulkas, even now ringing out in festive, fevered halls raised to his name;
Being a history short in space of Israel, Broken Finwë House, and all his children; being spirits first in form here, before taking up hroa of Manwe devised, or by Eru stitched of his own holy make, thy House seldom offered more than reconnaissance, and little other aid in battle afforded, powers raising earth and sea to crash down, or spurting volcanic heat-in-rock, violent in the material spewings, crashings; and though telling much of the enemies’ plans, movements, and retreats, whereto, and how garrisoned, above and below Arda’s soils, safely kept from destruction was your people kept, by Vala-decree; and observant of Melko, and his servants, thou and thine house learned evil- deeds’ doing, and was warned of their consequence; seeing in spirit the darkness growth, and the spirits come to wasting thereby, until chained to Melko, having no will to do otherwise, and evil all their days, done and inward suffered;
Thus, though schooled in all evil’s craftiness, cunning wiles, and the purposes of Melko’s Battles, and ruses of war, and false capitulations, retreats upon land, or away into the Far Beyond; Thy House divine also partook, and being free – alone of all souls here First Resident – thy spirits did choose, pursuing evil to make or unmake good works; or good-doing, ringing out in Arda’s matter that chime harmonious sung in Eru’s Halls, aforetime; one to bind, and thereby consume the will; the other to unbind, if necessary, and to make here a song-sheet for later choirs before Eru; those Initial Battles build Arda as it is, and not as They would have her made it, a rolling memory of Eru- place, beauty and joyous to be instructed upon, in all her unfolding of thriving life, free to grow, and without detriment to any other resident; Not so, Arda became, but a repository of scars, too; as though also memorialized were ancient forays, one soul before another making, to subdue, or raise up, free or bond by those magic skill[s] no longer actual, for matter has changed; Indeed, it is said were Eru free to read all Arda’s scars, flowers, hills, salt plains, and the rings of every tree, every rock fissure, all that was, has happened, wished for, bethought, lied about, and considered ill or wise, here may he recite, of Arda’s frame and substance;
For though the Powers staunch one power’s rising, or subdue their own in respect to another, this activity occurs not in a manner of men, or Elf-kind; no sword slays Vala, no stone crushes; so what of their battles? The stuff fought with? In the Story’s Telling, the words chosen, to become and taken of Arda, and how thus she prepare for orc or elf or man, hobbit, dwarf and so on; though time has no part in their telling (and trying to our understanding!), being of Arda wrought, those words unfold time, drawing as it were from surrounding her, into Arda’s Nature herself; and so also are tracks and trails, hillworks and forests, lakes, streams, and all else, wrought by their word- thought, and in this, considerable (!) care they take, to knit a realm not only suitable for other kindred, but also joyous to encounter, and instruction itself, of the means by which they shape (if keeping hidden the powers themselves, for making).
So at times – Time being unrolled variously, across Arda’s realms – Vala-kind may enter into the matter of created stuff, as though (re)turning to their own conceptions, and this they undertake to comprehend what has become of their creations, being given free-domain, whereso set to unroll; so Melko in seeking Final Understanding of all Arda’s materials, condescended; and was himself, entrapped thereby; no longer to escape out to Varda’s pastures, to stain where she makes clean; ever seeking obtuse, recondite lore, Finwë and his companion faithful Feanor-Lucifer, knew most of all his doings, and they two set within Arda, that scepter – in image of memory, so a likeness in actual form was grown here – long ago by Eru laid down in challenge of Melko, and his astonishing hubris, also to take leave of, and laugh at (not without pity!).
And seeing that Power melt his being to thus undertake total upheaval of his set foundations, solely to recover a phantom of that cast aside rod of power still housed upon Finwë’s home in Eru-place – still they wondered at his falling down before illusion, and recompensed considered themselves at mocking his condescension, even as he sputtered out, bubbling, babbling, incoherent, of Eru-fearing, his realm to supplant, again; no fear afterward did either these two, going forth in flesh-hroa as father and son blessed most, and most distraught, bear from spirit house into hroa, of Melko, mocked as “that dainty, ditzy enemy, pitied”;
But this enemy, Valar power remained, nonetheless; and by his deeds, first took his aim at that House of Finwë, and Feanor especial; and seeing in that House’s Breaking, a never reconciled disunity, Vala, Maia, and else from Eru, forever; thus he plotted that house’s downfall.
Chief agent of this plan-strategem to ruin all Vala-hopes here, and to bring them into subjection of his will, unrelenting, was Sauron-Thû; and this one went forth, Red aglow, to meet Feanor, as to instruct him as a fellow traveler, by further afield in expertise; and showing him that grade may be had of earth’s inclinations, and cuts thereby to bring into her arrangement (of some Vala spoken out thus arrayed), so mines delved, and their fruits, gems too maybe cut, and graded, to refinement; in this instruction Thû to Feanor (as a spirit, yet unborn-first to Finwë) hoped to tempt the latter to devise what beyond his skill he desired, and so tempted to pursue nature “above” his fashioning, to break in the attempt, and thus cut into all Arda, a puzzle of the Seeming; How can one thing by Vala-power be easily thrown as thought upon a potter’s wheel, and yet to another, scarcely even thought in fancy, and never to fulfill the thought in attempting, but to bring only failure, self-loathing doubt, and in time – taking time to an evil coursing – teaching of effort, bitterness; and not of Arda’s secrets.
Feanor would not succumb to Thû’s tempting wiles, however; and so Thû returned, himself creating what he purposed to set down on another, and there to bind, unfreely; Neither would Finwë, either upon Arda without Valinor, in After Days early in his living as enfleshed; or upon Valmar’s blocks, succumb to whispered misdirection.
But Feanor made for himself of Miriel’s womb, a hroa-body too light for any mother to bear without suffering; and in consuming fear, worry for her babe’s flesh, to burn off and upward raise, away, she succumbed to Thû’s Seeming, that what may be, by one’s mind’s eagerness to dissuade or prevent, would indeed become; and yet crookedly, too, as she herself was broken in that consuming energy, while her son thrived, ever more light-full; and first of all hroa-bodies, hers was reft of fea-spirit, and would not take up it again, in all Arda’s unfolding; Victim of a war she entered not into, by a stroke their enemy contrived, deep in his malice to rend all Valinor of faith to Manwe-Varda; And in this, as tales report, he has in small part, success.
<<Previous Page | Next Page>>