The Peoples of Middle-earth (75 page)

'So be it,' said Buldar. 'But it is not to be thought that I should let thee go free. For thou art precious in my sight. And consider well: vain is it to seek to escape from me. Long is the way to the remnant of thy folk, if any still live; and thou wouldst not go far from the Hills of Agar ere thou met death, or a life far worse than shall be thine in my house. Base and unlovely thou namest us. Truly, maybe. Yet true is it also that thy folk are cruel, and lawless, and the friends of demons. Thieves are they. For our lands are ours from of old, which they would wrest from us with their bitter blades. White skins and bright eyes are no warrant for such deeds.'

'Are they not?' said she. 'Then neither are thick legs and wide shoulders. Or by what means did ye gain these lands that ye boast of? Are there not, as I hear men say, wild folk in the caves of the mountains, who once roamed here free, ere ye swart folk came hither and hunted them like wolves? But I spoke not of rights, but of sorrow and love. If here I must dwell, then dwell I must, as one whose body is in this place at thy will, but my thought far elsewhere. And this vengeance I will have, that while my body is kept here in exile, the lot of all this folk shall worsen, and thine most; but when my body goes to the alien earth, and my thought is free of it, then in thy kin one shall arise who is mine alone. And with his arising shall come the end of thy people and the downfall of your king.'

Thereafter Elmar said no more on this matter; and she was indeed a woman of few words while her life lasted, save only to her children. To them she spoke much when none were by, and she sang to them many songs in a strange fair tongue; but they heeded her not, or soon forgot. Save only Hazad, the youngest; and though he was, as were all her children, unlike her in body, he was nearer to her in heart. The songs and the strange tongue he too forgot, when he grew up, but his mother he never forgot; and he took a wife late, for no woman of his own folk seemed desirable to him that knew what beauty in a woman might be.(5) Not that many were his for the wooing, for, even as Elmar had spoken, the people of Agar had waned with the years, what with ill weathers and with pests, and most of all were Buldar and his sons afflicted; and they had become poor, and other kindreds had taken their power from them. But Hazad knew naught of the foreboding of his mother, and in her memory loved Tal-elmar, and had so named him at birth.

And it chanced on a morning of spring that when his other sons went out to labour Hazad kept Tal-elmar at his side, and they walked forth together and sat upon the green hill-top above the town of their people; and they looked out south and west to where they could see far away the great bight of the Sea that drove in on the land, and it was shimmering like grey glass.

And the eyes of Hazad were growing dim with age, but Tal-elmar's were keen, and he saw as he thought three strange birds upon the water, white in the sun, and they were drifting with the west wind towards the land; and he wondered that they sat upon the sea and did not fly.

'I see three strange birds upon the water, father,' he said.

'They are unlike any that I have seen before.'

'Keen may be thine eyes in youth, my son,' said Hazad, 'but birds on the water thou canst not see. Three leagues away are the nearest shores of the Sea from where we sit. The sun dazzles thee, or some dream is on thee.'

'Nay, the sun is behind me,' said Tal-elmar. 'I see what I see.

And if they be not birds, what are they? Very great must they be, greater than the Swans of Gorbelgod,(6) of which legends tell.

And lo! I see now another that comes behind, but less clearly, for its wings are black.'

Then Hazad was troubled. 'A dream is on thee, as I said, my son,' he answered; 'but an ill dream. Is not life here hard enough, that when spring is come and winter is over at last thou must bring a vision out of the black past?'

'Thou forgettest, father,' said Tal-elmar, 'that I am thy youngest son, and whereas thou has taught much lore to the dull ears of my brethren, to me thou hast given less of thy store.

I know nothing of what is in thy mind.'

'Dost thou not?' said Hazad, striking his brow as he stared out towards the Sea. 'Yes, mayhap it is a long while since I spoke of it; it is but the shadow of a dream in the back of my thought.

Three folk we hold as enemies. The wild men of the mountains and the woods; but these only those who stray alone need fear.

The Fell Folk of the East; but they are yet far away, and they are my mother's people, though, I doubt not, they would not honour the kinship, if they came here with their swords. And the High Men of the Sea. These indeed we may dread as Death.

For Death they worship and slay men cruelly in honour of the Dark. Out of the Sea they came, and if they ever had any land of their own, ere they came to the west-shores, we know not where it may be. Black tales come to us out of the coast-lands, north and south, where they have now long time established their dark fortresses and their tombs. But hither they have not come since my father's days, and then only to raid and catch men and depart. Now this was the manner of their coming.

They came in boats, but not such as some of our folk use that dwell nigh the great rivers or the lakes, for ferrying or fishing.

Greater than great houses are the ships of the Go-hilleg, and they bear store of men and goods, and yet are wafted by the winds; for the Sea-men spread great cloths like wings to catch the airs, and bind them to tall poles like trees of the forest. Thus they will come to the shore, where there is shelter, or as nigh as they may; and then they will send forth smaller boats laden with goods, and strange things both beautiful and useful such as our folk covet. These they will sell to us for small price, or give as gifts, feigning friendship, and pity for our need; and they will dwell a while, and spy out the land and the numbers of the folk, and then go. And if they do not return, men should be thankful.

For if they come again it is in other guise. In greater numbers they come then: two ships or more together, stuffed with men and not goods, and ever one of the accursed ships hath black wings. For that is the Ship of the Dark, and in it they bear away evil booty, captives packed like beasts, the fairest women and children, or young men unblemished, and that is their end.

Some say that they are eaten for meat; and others that they are slain with torment on the black stones in the worship of the Dark. Both maybe are true. The foul wings of the Sea-men have not been seen in these waters for many a year; but remembering the shadow of fear in the past I cried out, and cry again: is not our life hard enough without the vision of a black wing upon the shining sea?'

'Hard enough, indeed,' said Tal-elmar, 'yet not so hard that I would leave it yet. Come! If what you tell is good sooth we should run to the town and warn men, and make ready for flight or for defence.'

'I come,' said Hazad. 'But be not astonished, if men laugh at me for a dotard. They believe little that has not happened in their own days. And have a care, dear son! I am in little danger, save to starve in a town empty of all but the crazed and the aged.

But thee the Dark Ship would take among the first. Put thyself not forward in any rash counsel of battle.'

'We will see,' answered Tal-elmar. 'But thou art my chief care in this town, where I have and give little love. I will not willingly part from thy side. Yet this is the town of my folk, and our home, and those who can are bound to defend it, I deem.'

So Hazad and his son went down the hill-side, and it was noon; and in the town were few people, but crones and children, for all the able-bodied were abroad in the fields, busy with the hard toil of spring. There was no watch, for the Hills of Agar were far from hostile borders where the power of the Fourth King (7) ended. The town-master sat by the door of his house in the sun, dozing or idly watching the small birds that gathered scraps of food from the dry beaten mud of the open place in the midst of the houses.

'Hail! Master of Agar!' said Hazad, and bowed low, but the master, a fat man with eyes like a lizard, blinked at him, and did not return his greeting.

'Sit hail, Master! And long may you sit so!' said Tal-elmar, and there was a glint in his eye. 'We should not disturb your thought, or your sleep, but there are tidings that, maybe, you should heed. There is no watch kept, but we chanced to be on the hill-top, and we saw the sea far off, and there - birds of ill omen on the water.'

'Ships of the Go-hilleg,' said Hazad, 'with great wind-cloths.

Three white - and one black.'

The master yawned. 'As for thee, blear-eyed carl,' he said,

'thou couldst not tell the sea itself from a cloud. And as for this idle lad, what knows he of boats or wind-cloths, or all the rest, save from thy crazed teaching? Go to the travelling knappers (8) with thy crone-tales of Go-hilleg, and trouble me not with such folly. I have other matters of more weight to ponder.'

Hazad swallowed his wrath, for the Master was powerful and loved him not; but Tal-elmar's anger was cold. 'The thoughts of one so great must needs be weighty,' said he softly,

'yet I know not what thought of more weight could break his repose than the care of his own carcase. He will be a master without people, or a bag of bones on the hillside, if he scorns the wisdom of Hazad son of Buldar. Blear eyes may see more than those lidded with sleep.'

The fat face of Mogru the Master grew dark, and his eyes were blood-shot with rage. He hated Tal-elmar, yet never before had the youth given him cause, save that he showed no fear in his presence. Now he should pay for that and his new-found insolence. Mogru clapped his hands, but even as he did so he remembered that there were none within call that would dare to grapple with the youth, nay, not three together; and at the same time he caught the glint of Tal-elmar's eye. He blanched, and the words that he had been about to speak, 'Slave's son and your brat', died on his lips. 'Hazad uBuldar, Tal-elmar uHazad, of this town, speak not so with the master of your folk,' he said.

'A watch is set, though ye who have not the ruling of the town in hand may know it not. I would wait till I have word from the watchers, whom I trust, that anything ill-boding has been seen.

But if ye be anxious, then go summon the men from the fields.'

Tal-elmar observed him closely as he spoke and he read his thought clearly. 'Now I must hope that my father errs not,' he said in his heart, 'for less peril will battle bring me than the hate of Mogru from this day forth. A watch! Yea, but only to spy on the goings and comings of the townsfolk. And the moment I go forth to the field, a runner will go to fetch his servants and club-bearers. An ill turn have I done to my father in this hour. Well!

He who begins with the hoe should wield it to the row's end.'

He spoke therefore still in wrath and scorn. 'Go you to the knappers yourself,' he said, 'for you are wont to use these sly folk, and heed their tales when they suit you. But my father you shall not mock while I stand by. It may well be that we are in peril. Therefore you shall come now with us to the hill-top, and look with your own eyes. And if you see there aught to warrant it, you shall summon the men to the Moot-hill. I will be your messenger.'

And Mogru also through the slits of his eyelids watched the face of Tal-elmar as he spoke, and guessed that he was in no danger of violence if he gave way for this time. But his heart was filled with venom; and it irked him also not a little to toil up the hill. Slowly he rose.

'I will come,' he said. 'But if my time and toil be wasted, I shall not forgive it. Aid my steps, young man; for my servants are in the fields.' And he took the arm of Tal-elmar and leaned heavily upon him.

'My father is the elder,' said Tal-elmar; 'and the way is but short. Let the Master lead, and we will follow. Here is your staff!' And he released himself from the grasp of Mogru, and gave him his staff which stood by the door of his house; and taking the arm of his father he waited until the Master set out.

Sidelong and black was the glance of the lizard-eye, but the gleam of the eye of Tal-elmar that it caught stung like a goad. It was long since the fat legs of Mogru had made such speed from house to gate; and longer since they had heaved his belly up the slippery hill-sward beyond the dike. He was blown, and pant-ing like an old dog, when they came to the top.

Then again Tal-elmar looked out; but the high and distant sea was now empty, and he stood silent. Mogru wiped the sweat from his eyes and followed his gaze.

'For what reason, I ask, have ye forced the Master of the town from his house, and brought him hither?' he snarled. 'The sea lies where it lay, and empty. What mean ye?'

'Have patience and look closer,' said Tal-elmar. Away to the west highlands blocked the view of all but the distant sea; but rising to the broad cap of the Golden Hill they fell suddenly away, and in a deep cleft a glimpse could be seen of the great inlet and the waters near its north shore. 'Time has passed since we were here before, and the wind is strong,' said Tal-elmar.