#gondolinweek2023

Turgon tries not to think too often about him. Often if he does, things begin to slip again, like he is losing his grip on reality. It's happening less, these days, not how it was shortly after the Nirnaeth, when days after days had passed without him really taking notice. But it still happens, sometimes, that a dangerously straying thought pulls the rug out from under his feet and leaves him trapped with his people’s glorious defeat.

It had been only one time when he had dared to risk everything, but they had lost in such a way that it wouldn’t have mattered if he had just kept abandoning his brother. And now they must endure. And yet it feels like they are waiting for something, like something is stewing just out of their reach.

Like Fingon is still throwing a shadow over him every time he puts on the crown and feels like a fraud.

Don’t go there, he reminds himself. Don’t think about him now.

Idril worries, too.

He grasps for the thought of her like it’s a lifeline, and tries to consciously breathe in the fresh morning air to remind himself where he is.

It’s not a much nicer thought because she worries to the point where she is looking weary and stressed and he hates seeing her like this.

He would like to help, would like to know what ails her so. It’s not about him, not only, that’s as much as he knows, but it’s also nothing she would tell him about. Maybe she would have told him a decade or two ago. Or four. Maybe not. But nowadays, she doesn’t.

The knowledge hurts Turgon more than he would admit, although he is glad that, in her husband, she has someone beside her old father to open up to now. Someone to brace her when Turgon won’t be able to do it anymore.

That’s also not a good thought.

Maeglin is quiet as well, but he is remarkably obliging, too. The latter worries Turgon more than the former because it means that something is wrong.

But he won't talk to Turgon either, he rarely does and less so if he's pushed, so Turgon leaves it be.

Irisse would not have left it be. She would have tried to coax the truth out of her son and niece, she would have tried to get to the bottom of what was being kept from her.

She would have argued with him, too. Would have tried to coax him out of his shell, only to frustrate him to no end in the process. They probably would have fought, and reconciled shortly after. He doesn’t want to think about her.

Atar would have- No, he is not going there.

Fingon- Not there either.

His thoughts have run the first full lap and he tries to force them onward, to break the circle. He can’t think about Fingon without thinking about how they lost. How he lost him, how hope was lost with him.

And yet- And yet...

They are approaching the Tarnin Austa, the Gates of Summer, the most important festival that belongs solely to their young, motley gondolidhren culture. Fingon has never heard about it, but he would have liked it, Turgon is sure of it.

Maybe this is the right moment to think about Fingon, if ever. Maybe it’s time to think about how, bathed in the first sunrise of this coming summer, the echo of his brother’s last futile triumph will ring out the loudest.

The day has come.

The day has come, and gone. But it was not the last day, not for everyone. Day shall come again, as it rings in Turgon’s head as the accompaniment of his bitter defeat. Maybe there’s a truth in those words, though.

Day might come again. Summer will come again. The light will be bright, and the sun will be warm. They will wait in silence for this new hope, every year anew, and it has always come.

This year will be no different, and maybe, this time, hope will last after all.

Idril, FA 510, May 31

The last day of spring in Gondolin is simultaneously the most stressful and the most solemn day of the year.

Idril enjoys it, enjoys the buzzing of the last hectic preparations.There are those for the grand feast that is being held out in the city streets and all over the brilliantly decorated King’s Square and the Great Market, last minute setups, preparation of food and drinks, arranging of instruments for those who will brighten up the coming of day with music, and the construction of dancefloors and podiums all over outstanding sites of the city.

Idril, who as usually has been on the planning committee that started their work months ago – the members are so enthusiastic about the feast every year that her job mostly consists of talking people out of ideas that are just too crazy to actually accomplish and making sure to safely enable others – feels a sense of pride and gratitude to see everything come together like this. It is surprising, every year, how exuberantly everyone throws themselves into preparations, how high the anticipation rises every year anew, even in times like these, when Idril often feels like collapsing under the dark, evil grasp that seems to tighten around their little oasis of fragile peace.

But maybe that is the point; they need this. She needs this. Even though it sometimes felt like treacherous thing to worry about the right appetisers or the colour of garlands in the face of rising chaos outside their valley; they need something to keep believing in.

Sometimes she looks at her father and the way his gaze still often closes off as he drifts back to horrors she would gladly clear from his memory. Tthe way he clenches his jaw in denial whenever someone even brazes the mention of opening the gates, and how if betrays his fear, if only to her. And seeing this makes it easier for her to swallow her own worries, if just for a day. To not think about her dreams for once. Not even those that seem to mess with the borders of time and reality, those that show her futures she hopes aren’t written in stone yet.

But they are prepared. They deserve a day of song and laughter in between all this mess.

She shakes her head as if to clear it out, and then she finishes helping with the last of the preparations outside and heads to her own house to see what her most beloved boys have brought about in the meantime.

After the grand feast outside, it is custom to split up into smaller groups of friends and family and continue celebrating the day inside the own four walls or gardens. Idril loves this part almost more than the official celebrations, just because she knows that there barely are set traditions and every family does it differently. She loves this, loves hearing some of her neighbours sing until deep into the next night while another couple often sits on their balcony that is barely visible from her and Tuor’s place and just talks and talks and talks. She loves that Tuor and her have started the tradition of hiding little affectionate notes for each other around the house – some of which they often find only days later – and that Eärendil excitedly joins in with his own messages, written in the scrawly hand of a young child.

When she comes home, she finds the decorations mostly done, the food ready and out of reach of the therefore rather sorrowful dogs, and her two boys passed out together in Idril and Tuor’s bed.

She smiles and gently closes the door, letting them collect a bit of sleep for the long night that awaits them. She will wake them up in time for dinner, traditionally only a small, modest meal held shortly before the beginning of dusk.

With the onset of evening the Gondolindrim will slowly begin to gather on the big squares, or in their case high up on the front balcony of the palace, talking quietly among themselves and getting in the right mood for the long, silent night that awaits them from midnight till the first ray of sunlight.

Idril absentmindedly sets straight some ornaments that have gone askew and then settles down on her armchair, where she strokes one of the dogs’ ears and tries not to glance over her shoulder to the row of shelves that hides a yearlong project that will hopefully never be put to use.

It will all be alright, she thinks. We deserve this. We will greet summer with laughter and song in our hearts, and it will all be well, in the end.

Eärendil, FA 510, June 1

The night of the last day of May is the only one when Eärendil is allowed to stay up way past his bedtime. Actually, he is allowed to not sleep at all, which, obviously, is terribly exciting.

The whole day he has watched his parents and the people of the city prepare everything for the feast and he has tried to help where he can as well. He has set a whole table by himself and took extra care to place all the cutlery very neatly and to make sure that all the carefully folded serviettes (not carefully folded by him, although the kind woman who had done it had tried to show him how to) are shown to advantage.

He has also helped to prepare some of the food in one of the palace’s biggest kitchens, but he has been thrown out by the main chef because he apparently was getting in the feet of everyone. He hasn’t, he was very careful to not run into anybody while they were handling the food, but they might have been annoyed that he brought one of his parents’ dogs. Dogs don’t belong into kitchens, and apparently, neither do small boys.

After all that hustle with the last preparations, Eärendil has been very excited for the feast to finally begin. He can remember last year’s, which has been great fun, and the one before as well. The one three years ago, he isn’t so sure about. His Atto says that he has an excellent memory, and he can even recall glimpses of many things about the years when he has been very, very little, but he is no elf, so he can’t always remember everything.

But before the celebrations could begin, they must get through the night of silence. Which Eärendil has not yet managed to do without sleeping in, but he will really try this year. It’s not his fault that he is a child and needs more sleep than all the adults. He even needs more sleep than elven children do, at his age, because he is half-mortal. His Atto has more problems than all the elves to not sleep at all for one whole night, so he usually takes a very long nap together with Eärendil at noon the day before the Feast. They have done this today as well, but Eärendil has been far too excited to sleep and he didn’t want to lay around and do nothing for hours. This has been when he has tried to help in the kitchen, actually, before someone has ushered him home where he reluctantly has crawled in with his Atto into bed again.

But still, a while after midnight, when everything and everyone is eerily silent and the city looks still and static like a painting, Eärendil does begin to get very tired again. It’s hard, to not talk for so long, and be expected to be as still as he can and do nothing that makes much of a racket. He has focussed on looking up at the stars at first, like most elves around him do to. But it’s not much fun if he can’t even tell the others what constellations he can make out in the endless dark sky, so now he is cradled into his Atto’s arms, resting his head against his wide shoulders that always remind him of a bear or a lion that can walk on two legs because he is so strong and broad (and a little furry, in the face) and has trouble keeping his eyes open.

He knows that it won’t be a problem if he falls asleep. He does not have to stay awake, and actually, if he doesn’t, he will be way more awake and fit for the celebrations in the morning. And Amil has promised to wake him up before dawn. He wants to be awake a little before the first sunrise in any case because he wants to be the first one to see the light. He has decided to sit on his grandfather’s shoulders this year, because he is the tallest elf he knows and like this he really has an advantage on seeing the light first. Maybe it’s really better to fall asleep now, so his eyes will be keener and more alert in the morning. He really does not want to miss the first light.

…

When he wakes up, he sees his Amil smile at him and put a finger over his lips. He is confused at first, and also confused why they are outside in the dark, why he is lying on a bench at the back of the palace’s huge balcony, with a pillow under his head and a blanket wrapped tightly around him.

Then he remembers and suddenly is very awake. He repeats his Amil’s gesture and tries to sign that he wants to sit on grandfather’s shoulders now. He is very hurried because he is afraid that it might be already dawn any minute, but as he finally rests on his grandfather’s shoulders – slimmer than his Atto’s, but almost as steady – he can see that while the sky begins to grey at the egdes, dawn is surely still a short while away.

“Ammë, when can we eat?”

Eärendil tugged at his mother’s skirts, pouting already in anticipation of her answer. He had first strung words together only a few short months ago, and now he was babbling and toddling around, getting sticky hands all over the place. A tiring time, she had found, but it was a distraction on her melancholy hours and a joy on her good days.

Clever and quick-growing – Tuor said it was the way of Men’s children – as he was, he had not yet grasped time, or patience. An hour’s wait or a minute’s – to her son, it was all the same.

Idril crouched and smiled at him.

“I know you are hungry, and excited.” Though he had had his breakfast but two hours ago, and made a mess of it too. She had spent more time cleaning up than she had making the meal. “But we must wait for the feast to be prepared. The cooks are working hard, we do not wish to rush them. A little hunger will not hurt you, my little star.”

She knew that well herself. Idril still remembered the hunger on the Ice. She had been not been any bigger than Eärendil’s was now – much smaller, when they had started out, even accounting for the differences in elves and men. Food had become scarce so quickly, and after her mother had died, she had had to be weaned, for there was no wet-nurse to comfort her. Idril did not remember very much of that time, but she remembered the gnawing in her stomach, she remembered how the cold had made the hunger worse. She remembered the pale and thin faces, the deep, hungry gazes of those around her. She remembered her relatives’ attempts to soothe her, distract her.

But it had been bearable; she had never gone more than a day or two without someone giving her something to eat, and she had grown strong all the same. A few hours would not harm Eärendil. But still… she did not like the thought of him ever going hungry. Her would live in comfort and peace, and if he wanted to eat, she would make him something.

“But I think a little snack won’t hurt.” Eärendil’s cheer warmed her, as he dashed ahead of her on unsteady, toddler legs. Down the grand staircase, the bannisters ringed with ribbons and flowers, blatantly ignoring her call to watch where he was going, or he would trip someone up. Again. Her son bounced on his heels at the bottom of the stairs as he waited for her to catch up.

“I will race you, Ammë!” His soft shoes pattered across the stone floor. Idril dashed after him, calling out again – Eärendil always acted swiftly, without the hesitance that had been in her since her youth. She knew her father was there before she rounded the corner; she heard his laugh, deep and rich, and Eärendil’s squeal as he was lifted high in the air.

“Haru!”

“Little prince,” Turukáno spun her son high in the air – Idril felt a spark of terror, buried deep within her chest. She always feared he would drop him, when he lifted her son like that, even as Eärendil giggled. Idril had not been a joyful child, her father (and indeed everyone else who had known her then) had told her. She had not ever found joy in being thrown about, but Eärendil loved playing and wrestling, loved for his father to toss him onto the couch pillows like a bag of flour. “Where are you racing off to today?”

“Ammë and me are getting snacks!”

“Ammë and I, Eärendil.” Idril corrected gently, and her own father laughed again, shaking his head as if he had not been so precise in correcting her a child. It was good to hear him laugh. He laughed more now Eärendil was here. Idril did not think she had ever heard her father laugh so often.

“Snacks? Before the feast?” Her father tickled Eärendil cheek, “A little warrior like you needs to keep his strength up. Run along, and I will make you something to eat.”

There was a strange, distant look in her father’s eyes as he sat Eärendil down again, and her son charged off once more. Idril reached to catch her father’s arm before he could follow.

“He eats so much. It must be his father in him.”

Her father’s deep gaze met hers, and in it she saw sorrow. Deep, unavoidable sorrow. Perplexing; was Eärendil’s joy not infectious?

“All elflings eat so,” he chided her in his familiar, gentle tone. Her father always spoke so smoothly – so rarely she heard him raise his voice. “I suppose you do not remember. I know you do not remember much of… that time.”

Something passed between them then. Was it his memory, or her own, long buried?

Herself, bundled in cloth and cloaks so heavy she could hardly move, being carried to her grandfather’s tent. It was dark, always dark, and her stomach growled. There were hushed voices – her aunt, her uncle, someone else whose name she did not recall. Someone was saying there was nothing to eat; not enough to go around – people would have to go without.

Her father was pressing a bowl of soup, lukewarm and tasteless, thin. But it had been something, and she had not, then, remembered what food was supposed to taste like. Her father’s face, grey and thin, had gazed down at her and kissed her hair.  Eat, child, and be strong.

“I do not remember, Atya. You kept me from being too hungry.” Her hand tightened on his arm. She had not known it then, but she knew it now, looking into his eyes – or perhaps, in the back of her mind she had always known. Her father had given up his share for her in that moment – and how many other times?

“Haru! Atya!”

Eärendil’s bright voice came calling again. Idril smiled. Her father smiled back.

‘Now, listen again,’ said Solosimpe.

She walked over to the wall where there was an arrangement of gongs and bells. Starting with a gentle touch, she produced an entirely different sound. It swelled out gradually, unhurriedly from under her fingers, but continued to unfold, a slow solemn sequence of sounds that calmed and seemed to open up spaces in Salgant’s head, settling him back in his skin and clearing his eyes. He noticed the way the light was falling into the room.

‘Wonderful,’ he said reverently. ‘I thought your instrument was the flute!’

‘Thank you,’ said Solosimpe. ‘I was not trying to impress you, though! There are others here that can play these better than I. I was trying to demonstrate the difference between the moods, how music can match itself to what the occasion offers and enhance it. You knew that already, of course, and you can do both on any instrument, including the flute, including your harp. But it is easier to hear the difference on the drum and the bells.’

Gently, thinks Salgant, playing his harp on the morning of Tarnin Austa, letting his harp notes ring out softly. It is time for the bells now.