Lilleduil

My dearest Norlië:

I hope you can read my cramped writing on this tiny parchment, and that Lille's eagle finds you in relative safety.

Oh, Diary! How long have I been unwilling to touch your pages, to record what has really happened?

The clasp was small.
A center wooden piece, and two crossing swords.
The clasp turned to ash in his hands.
Thendryt blinked, but thought nothing of it. He looked up, and gazed upon the wooden structures of Imladris. The Vale was quiet, solemn.
Something caught his eye. A cloak, gently flowing through the air. He caught it with both hands, and held it.
Flames suddenly covered the cloth. Thendryt released the cloak, his eyes opening wide. He took a step back, as the cloak became confused by the fire.
“Thendryt? Something wrong?”

Thendryt was sitting on a stool in Rivendell’s stables, tool in hand. The evening air was chilly, but refreshing.
Bovad complained as Thendryt grabbed his hoof.
“Stop complaining.”
Bovad let out a final grumpy snort before giving in, and Thendryt started cleaning it.
“Thendryt.”
Lowering the tool, Thendryt looked up to find Nelnardis standing next to him, bottle in hand.
“Nel, long time.”
“Yes, it has been.”
Thendryt turned his attention back to the hoof.

Diary, I have long neglected you. The seasons turn -- without Themodir. The apples fall -- without Themodir. We might have gone picking nuts together.

And I deem Norliriel suffers nearly as much as I do, and that is bottomless agony. Again I come to the problem of having some skill fixing the hröa but not the fëa, not over some ocean of grief this deep, while I too am shipwrecked in it.

Adanmiel rode leisurely back into the Vale as the sun began to set along the horizon.

"Llamreth, thank you for accompanying me, friend," she whispered as she dismounted.  Her steed trotted off to a grassy clearing nearby and began to graze.  Her strength had begun to improve after returning from the long journey they had taken together to Edhellond.  Adanmiel was glad, the journey had been hard on Llamreth.  She removed Llamreth's bridle and headed home.

Nelnardis took a long mouthful from the bottle of wine. She was sitting on the grass behind her house in Imladris. Not bothering to replace the cork, she set down the green bottle, focusing her attention on the journal on her lap.

Traitors! Defilers!

A storm raged in his mind. He felt his blood boiling, he heard the voices from the past, their chattering, their screaming and shouting rising again, until they reached the gates of his Fëa. And all the time, he saw him in front of the eyes of his mind:

Dolthafaer had – foolishly, he now realized – believed that his troubles with Thendryt had come to an end.  Months ago, the Man had departed from the Valley and taken up his post in the Coldfells, where his madness had been allowed to run unchecked so long as it was against the servants of the enemy.  Out of sight.  Out of mind.  The thought that he might even find his end in those cold pines had been a comforting one.