Three Graces

The company was making final preparations to depart from Bree as the sun rose. Mounts and pack animals were being assembled in the courtyard before the Prancing Pony as Barliman glared from the stairs, Nob hiding behind his leg as if he wished to confirm that the band were actually leaving. The Innkeeper had made clear to Xanderian and Xandilif the night before that if any more damage or upset were caused by the travelers, he would have to put a large surcharge on their already considerable tab.

Running softly, Asmalinde made her way through the Old Forest and over the escarpment that led into the bowl of Tyrn Gorthad, The Barrow Downs. The barrows were the ancient cemeteries of the Northern Kingdom of Cardolan. The surface was barren and covered with knee to chest high grasses. Timeless cenotaphs jutted from the earth like staggered teeth. Starlight pierced the low lying fog and cast intricate shadows upon the boulders and old gravestones.

Asmalinde came fully awake. She had been drifting half in half out between the elven world and the earthly one. Nothing was clear to her. Flashes of a deep stairway, fire and stars blotted out by shadows. She shook her head and broke from her all but non-existent camp. She had left her horse behind in one of the small farms dotting the landscape on the edge of the Old Forest and the east road to Bree-town.

Xandilif strode into the main hall of the House of Three Graces, following a trail of crumbs as it meandered over the stone floors. At the end of the trail, as she expected, she found Finchley, just finishing off a fresh caraway roll. Hearing the champion’s heavy steps Finchley turned, and her face seemed to crumple.

Shimmering waves of heat rose above the grasses of the Firion Wood. Mosquitos droned around her ears as Asmalinde pressed her body deeper into the crevasse in the Ered Nimrais, the White Mountains separating Rohan and Gondor. She was forty days out of Imladris: through Misty Mountains cold and the swamps of the Anduin wetlands. Asmalinde’s journey had been uneventful, at least until today.

I have risen early, slipped into a robe and wandering up to the gleaming Dwarrow Mirror high above Tol Lochul to greet the dawn. Stars are still gleaming in the velvet blue sky as I reach my perch, arrange my implements, and begin to draft this account. 

Asmalinde sat in a chair in front of the great fireplace in the Hall of Fire in Imladris. She slouched backwards, legs stretched out as she enjoyed the warmth of the fire and the ethereal, timeless joy of the hall. Her journey from Mithlond had been swift. She had parted from the southern bank of the Gulf of Lhun twenty days before. Asmalinde journeyed through the wilderness. Tall trees and hilly crags blocked the old path travelers had abandoned.

The gentle strains of harp music flowed over the Hall of Fire like soothing water. The light from the setting sun was further softened as it filtered through the high boughs of the trees of Imladris, finally casting lengthening shadows from high windows in the Last Homely House. Another day, in a near eternal string of days, was coming to a soft spoken, genteel end.

Lightning peeled open the sky and thunder boomed across the hellish landscape. Flames from the desperate push of armies lit the night sky as smoke billowed in green and red hues. The warrior, sword and shield raised, blocked the attacks of a dozen or more iron blades that reigned down upon her. The flash of a flaming blue blade eliminated half of the orcish arms that wielded them. Side to side the elves fought as one.

“What…what by the horde of Ancalagon goes on here!!!” shouted Gareth Steelheart, Captain of the Hounds of Anarion as he stood surveying the wreckage of the upstairs chamber of the Thirsty Seer.

Over Gareth’s shoulder, the barkeep Emery surveyed the room with dismay. “You maniacs...do you know how much this flooring COST ME!!!????'