Painting is “The Gate” by Christophe Vacher

“LOVE CANNOT BEAR”

© Robert Fripp

Love cannot bear that any soul is barred

from finding its place in Paradise.

The variety of natures seeking entry,

even those who deny the possibility of Paradise,

requires a variety of Gates.

Grace provides a Gate suited to each and every soul

that approaches with sincerity and determination.

Some Gates comprise challenges which provide necessary

conditions for souls whose natures are not perfected,

and which act by using the imperfection as a means of

transformation. The greater the seeming imperfections,

the greater the possible transformation.

It is said that some Gates have signs over them,

marked “Humility”, “Sacrifice, “Service”, “Suffering”,

and that the queues outside such Gates are very short.

Perhaps Paradise is not what we expect it to be,

and may itself be a Gate.

(Picture is “Woman In Rain” by Luthien Tari)

This is a story about what happens when faith overcomes doubt. It may be a true story or it may be fiction. You get to decide.

“RAIN DANCE”

Arafin © 2010

The first drop fell as all drops of rain do, unnoticed. This was followed a few seconds later by it’s brothers and sisters who made their presence increasingly known by tickling noses, dampening hair, and pattering upon patiently waiting leaves. Hands would stretch out to affirm that this was indeed happening and a lot of hurrying and scurrying ensued. The sound of millions of raindrops landing quickly on hard dry pavement and soft green grass echoed through the charged air like the first wave of an autumn tempest falling against the upper reaches of a shore untouched by water during a long summer of low tides. This powerful whisper turned gradually into a mad roar as the water bounced momentarily back skywards in wriggling splashes too frantic for any pedestrian to understand, too overwhelming for any onlooker to ignore. And the exuberance of storm wind rushed in, adding it’s voice to the symphony, a continuously building crescendo of all pervasive excitement. Birds sang out with thrilling immediacy while children shrieked in high tones of holy glee. It was underneath this glad cacophony of heavenly watery radiance that a tiny woman with the improbable name of Analune hopped off her bicycle and let it fly almost on it’s own into the empty rack in front of the red brick flat and made a frolicking dash up the steps and through the front door.

Cool drops fell from Analune’s hair like diamonds from the branches of a fragile willow, making little damp dots on the unvarnished wooden floor. Such a good reason to smile, this gift from the sky, and she was just happy for the sake of happiness as her dainty feet leapt up the stairs two at a time, round and round, higher and higher, till breathing heavily and almost laughing she stumbled forward against the door to her room, fumbled for the key, and burst in full of unstoppable mirth, calling out to her parrot that she was home. “Analune, Analune, anytime very soon!” came the bird’s raucous reply. Fetching a small seed treat from the cupboard she held it between her outstretched lips and leaned close to the perch. Jimbo, who had done this a thousand times, lurched for the treat and flapped his colorful wings in a manner which always made Analune laugh, and of course, after carefully pecking and swallowing the seeds, the parrot laughed, too. A soft knock at the door interrupted the bliss of this moment.

Opening the door revealed the landlady, Mrs. Fadish, who had probably come about the late rent. Analune picked up the blue and white porcelain vase on the shelf nearby and stuck her hand inside for what she knew was not there. Withdrawing only half the required amount she held it out to the old woman with the most tentative hint of wistfulness and the most endearing expression of peace, and Mrs. Fadish, with all the charm and cunning of a loan shark, grabbed the crumpled paper notes like so much rubbish she detested and shot out harsh threats and insults at the poor young woman. Explanations would be useless, she knew, and so Analune offered none. Promises of forthcoming funds would be met with disbelief and scorn, and so she kept her red lips together and just smiled a little. She felt like winking impishly, but decided that would be too much. Her job at the library was what it was, something she loved doing despite rather low wages, and the prospect of getting a second job which would leave her no time for herself was just not acceptable. Mrs. Fadish blurted out a final threat of eviction if the rent was not paid in full by the end of the week, and doing an almost military about face, stomped off like a drill sergeant, no doubt to inflict her utter lack of patience upon the other tenants. Times were hard for everyone and she would likely find no happiness that day.

Going back inside, leaving all worry about the rent out in the hall, Analune busied herself with fixing her dinner. She had managed to scrape together enough money to buy a few fresh vegetables and a loaf of bread to accompany the large bag of brown rice she was more than half way through. It would last another month at best, but then what? Such questions were far from her mind as she sang softly to herself, chopping a carrot and slicing some ginger while the rain outside her window washed away whatever grime had built up during the hot spell that had lasted months. Jimbo fluttered around the room like a young bird, which he was not, and called out silly challenges to her as she cooked. A bit of olive oil dribbled into the wok as she answered with childish riddles of her own. It was a game they played every night at this time and she wouldn’t trade it for any other entertainment, not grandest opera nor most magnificent ballet. A wonderful orange light from a precocious sinking sun sneaking beneath the line of dark grey clouds filled both indoors and out with magic. Analune and her parrot stopped to admire this miracle when the phone rang. At first she took no notice, so lovely was the orange light, but then, with a slight sigh, she picked up the device and tended to yet another bill that could not be paid on time. Dinner, simple in it’s contents yet delicious in the enjoyment it brought, was eaten in hushed reverie while the rain outside finally lessened and then abated, leaving the air empty and clean and fresh.

That evening this petite imp of a woman did what she often did and listened to soft music through headphones as she read from a thick hard bound book of great weight and even greater age. The music she heard was soft acoustic country. The words she read were in an older version of English no longer spoken save in plays. Jimbo rested quietly next to her sofa on a wooden perch at just the right height so that she could stretch out her hand from time to time and stroke his rainbow plumage. She had had him since she was seven years old, a rescue bird a friend’s father who worked at the shelter had said was a hopeless case. The poor bird had been abused by it’s original owners, a gang of drug dealers who taught it to swear and taunted it with squirt guns and lighters till the creature went mad and pulled out all of it’s feathers. When the gang had been arrested the bird would surely have flown away if it could, but by happy chance was captured and taken to an animal shelter where everything possible was done to cure it of it’s broken heart. The young Analune begged to adopt it, saying she was certain that she could nurse it back to full health, and the decision was made to give her six months. In four the bird had feathers, a very pleasant disposition, and a new name.

When bedtime came she washed and climbed into her tiny bed, actually a child’s bed, for she needed no more and the space saved in the small room was useful in other ways. Pulling the antique satin quilt up around her neck she called out good night to Jimbo. Came the reply, “Analune, Analune, sleeping softly like the moon”. Dreams came easily, as they usually did, first with sudden starts and shudders of things which frightened her, but gradually mellowed into curious adventures where she would gain more and more lucidity until finally she would be in full control. It was this state that she lived for, a wonderful haven of peace and safety far from the troubles of a rigid grey world seemingly headed for destruction. At first she walked through long gardens of white and pale blue flowers and dangling dark green vines, and then, coming to a large clearing with a small pond in the center, she ran jubilantly towards the water.

Just before reaching the water’s edge she leapt as high as she could and turned her thoughts to the broad night sky, and as she had learned to do so many years ago, she flew. It was easy to recognize that this was a dream and just as easy to keep dreaming and not emerge back into wakefulness. Flying this way was an exhilarating joy like no other. It was accompanied by such poignant emotions of ecstasy that it almost skirted the line between sexual pleasure and holy epiphany. She often felt like singing when she flew in her dreams and did so now, a strong aching tune of timeless love for the beauty of the world, not a lament, not a mournful dirge, but a soft slow hymn of deepest reverent joy so intense that any who heard would surely have been unable to resist crying. On and on she flew in her dream, singing one beautiful tune after the next, higher and slowly higher, till at last she came to a great mountain range, it’s lofty peaks tipped with blue white snow in the pale glow of the brilliant moon. It was necessary now to ascend even higher in order to cross these summits and so she turned her thoughts steeply upwards and pushed herself faster and faster till she cleared the tallest peak and could see down the other side.

Before her stretched a wide valley which cradled a meandering river, it’s water like silver in the lunar light, winding quietly away into the distance through deep forests full of mysteries forever unexplained. Gliding downwards towards this new adventure the little dream woman was happy and full of awe at the magnificence of this hallowed land. She had stopped singing now as all her concentration had become focused upon the great river below. It seemed to call her to come closer, which she willingly did. It was not a siren pull, nor a strong command, but a simple yet very inviting friendly invitation she felt inside her heart. The river welcomed Analune as if she were a long lost orphan coming home at last to her true parents. Descending and slowing, she hovered for a brief second over the water as time stood still, and then she simply let herself drop the last few feet into the moon dappled liquid. It was so warm! It felt softer than real water, too, almost like thin syrup, and it smelled of lilies.

It was so warm, so comforting, and so utterly enchanting, this quietly gurgling river under strong moonlight. Here and there she could feel the bottom with her toes as the lazy current moved her slowly downstream. She took this as an invitation to dance, and in slow motion leaps and pirouettes lovingly mirrored the river’s every move. Only the sound of water lapping at the banks, the whisper of her own breath, and the beat of her glad heart could be heard by whatever creatures watched as she drifted on and on, a growing sense of calm building within her. When a thought would stray back to her waking life and the troubles awaiting there, the dream river seemed to wash such cares away with a steady feeling of confidence, a flowering trust, that everything back there would be alright. Analune could not tell how long she floated in this manner, nor did she care, and by the time the rain clouds began to surround the benevolent moon she had passed many small tributaries. These offshoots made her curious as to what magic might lay upstream, but not curious enough to swim into them. Now the current brought her near to a stream larger than all the rest, and she noticed something different about the water that issued forth into the ever widening river. The flow of this side stream was not as dark as the inky warm liquid that had carried her thus far. It was a slightly silvery aquamarine, still dark as night, but quite easily distinguishable from the main channel. It just felt right that she should swim up there. It was not a compulsion nor an order, just a inwardly happy feeling like a little laugh one might make when someone says something charming and funny. She moved towards the tributary with graceful dream determination and a growing smile upon her pretty face.

The silvery blue water of the tributary was a bit cooler than that of the river, but it could hardly be called cold and was not the least bit uncomfortable. In fact, it felt refreshing and almost tingled against her skin as she glided up stream against the gentle current. The further she swam away from the river the greater grew two very different and very strange sensations within her mind. One, it felt sad to be leaving the great river, though not sad in any sense of final parting, but rather sad as in leaving good friends at a fun party too soon. The second sensation she noticed building was an almost erotic excitement, the type of thing one feels when connecting with someone special for the first time and just knowing that deeper feelings lay ahead. These two feelings did not conflict with each other and that was what was so strange. The river, it seemed, would always be there and to it she could always return, and the building excitement of what lay up this little stream could be revisited as well. She just knew this. It appeared odd to her that both emotions seemed to be permeated with, and even perhaps come from, a peaceful realization that this particular dream she was experiencing was going to somehow change her life. She swam on and on as this realization grew, and with it grew a sense that in the forest on either side of the little stream were many sleeping beasts both great and small, and that as she passed them they were having very wonderful dreams of their own. The current was a little swifter than that of the river, yet the channel was the same depth, and every once in a while Analune’s wriggling toes would patter across a few feet of clay or sand. This made her smile and sometimes laugh, but only softly, for she somehow knew it was best not to waken the sleepers beyond the banks. And then the bird flew out and landed right on top of her head.

At first this gave her a bit of a start, but as it was a small and friendly bird she quickly welcomed it. The creature was a crow of some kind, it’s feathers jet black, and it cawed and gurgled softly for a bit as it settled down upon it’s new perch. Analune continued swimming, now taking care not to more her head too much lest it upset her new passenger. “Thank you, thank you, Analune”, it suddenly spoke, and had it been any other bird voice but Jimbo’s she would surely have screamed in surprise. As it was she merely gasped and swallowed a little water which made her gasp some more. She had often fantasized about sharing a dream with her parrot, but until now it had never happened. “Analune, Analune, always coming sometime soon”, sang her special companion. And she reached up and stroked his new black form with loving tenderness, soon feeling his beak preening her wet hair in warm reply. It felt so good, so comforting, to have Jimbo here with her. He now surprised her again by speaking not in parrot rhymes, but as would any human. “Analune, my dear, ahead the stream widens a bit and there is a flat rock to climb out on. Something wonderful awaits you there.” She almost shouted with glee to hear him speak this way although she knew it was a dream, but did let escape a loud gasp, only the last part of which was muffled by her hand. On the bank a large sleeping beast stirred but did not wake. “Careful”, said the bird. “They would not hurt you if they awoke, but they would make a terribly disturbing noise that might upset the waters.” She thought she understood as she spied the wider spot in the stream before them.

Just as Jimbo had promised there was a large flat rock which she promptly climbed out on. Although completely soaked she was not cold. The crow stood beside her now as she looked out over the little wide spot in the stream. Beyond, it again narrowed and plunged forth into yet more welcoming blackness. Rain began to fall delicate and soft, then swelled slowly into a downpour. Yet, for all the thickness of the rain clouds above, the brilliance of he moon shone through from an opening in front of them which always seemed to be outside the path of the storm. As the rain fell her dream deepened, each drop striking her having the effect like a small spell of sleep, yet still she stood erect, taller now than in real life and more powerful. The crow nudged her with his beak and she bent to pick him up, setting him atop her head once more. He felt like a beacon somehow who would guide her. Very softly at first so that she hardly noticed, Jimbo began shifting his weight from foot to foot, and then, as she really could tell that he was moving, he began to lift each foot just a little, then higher and higher. This movement was rhythmical and was easily recognized as a dance, and as soon as she spotted this she was overcome by an uncontrollable urge to dance herself, keeping time with her feet on the rock, matching the footfalls of the bird atop her black hair.

It poured down in sheets upon them as they began to dance, in the beginning a bit tentatively as if unsure just how much they could really let go. The crow bobbed up and down on top of her head and shifted from side to side. Analune swayed and rocked as the rain ran off her long black hair and cascaded down her slender frame. After a few minutes these midnight dances grew bolder and put more feeling into their motion, enjoying the glad sensations of their own rhythm synchronizing with that of the driving torrent. When Jimbo leapt atop her shoulder she was overjoyed and let out a hearty laugh, and then, liking the sound of her voice against the roar of the rain, she laughed again. Her laughter turned into a song in an unknown language of the moment, a singing in tongues of woman and bird and holy all encompassing rain. The sleeping beasts around them in the darkness were not awakened by any of this, but only driven deeper into their own dreams.

An unmistakeable feeling of well being swept over the two dancers, a great peaceful conviction that they were being blessed somehow by this magical experience, this water ritual of cleansing and creating anew. The rain could have lasted for many minutes or it could have lasted for many hours, it really didn’t matter to either of them. On and on the rain fell and on and on the woman and the bird danced, she upon the flat rock and he upon her shoulder, a symbiotic duo of two old friends lost in the depths of mysterious renewal which drove their common dream. The tributary which surrounded the rock grew swifter and more full as the downpour continued until, with happy gamboling toes, Analune felt the water of the stream lap against her. Looking down without stopping either dance or song, she laughed to herself that she was so blessed to have so much wonderful water in her life. At the same time she realized, of course, that the stream would soon overflow the rock and they would have to depart. This was not an urgency so much as one of those lazy dreamlike realizations which one understands but is not overly concerned about.

Jimbo had felt the same thing and now sent this thoughts to her to fly upwards, and she, as if pulled by a marionette string from above, lifted slowly and gracefully off the large flat rock which had been their dance floor and began to rise upwards into the rainy night sky. The bird now lifted from her shoulder and rose beside her, not with flapping wings as do birds in the waking world, but simply floating and gliding as do birds and ladies within their dreams. Higher and steadily higher they ascended, and as they did so the rain continued to fall onto and all around them, almost calling them onwards towards the uppermost reaches of heaven. Eventually the rain drops became smaller, though hardly less frequent, and later on smaller still, till at last they were no bigger than droplets of heavy fog. Analune thought she could see this mist reflecting illumination from above.

Suddenly they burst gently forth above the clouds. Where below they had been bathed in rain they were now bathed in brilliant moonlight, so strong and bright that Analune almost had to squint. Still she knew this was a dream and that she could direct her progress where she wished, and she wished now to fly back over the mountains they had crossed earlier that evening. Back over the mountains and back to her world of waking reality. And this they now did, she gliding faster and higher and he keeping pace right beside her all the way, calling softly to her now and again in her mind, “Analune, Analune, always coming sometime soon.” It made her smile outwardly as she flew, and inwardly, ….. well, there was just no feeling quite so glad as to know that Jimbo was still with her. On and on, higher and higher over the mountains, and higher still as if trying almost to touch the great silver moon itself. Higher and brighter and now more and more awake, closer and closer to the surface of the mind waves which roll forever across the surface of the ocean of dreams that stretch endlessly into perpetual starry expanses too numerous and to wondrous to describe.

And then they were awake, back in the tiny flat several stories above Mrs. Fadish’s head, and this sleepy waking realization gave Analune reason for mirth. And so, as she so often did, this lithe and impish woman who always looked at life as something positive and beautiful to love swimming in, woke up laughing. And, as he so often did, Jimbo upon his perch by her bed, answered with laughter of his own, although to his peels this mooring he now also added a riddle. “Analune, Analune, where will, who will, you see soon?” Odd, she mused, for she had never taught him to speak these words.

******************************************************

With little time to spare she showered and prepared her brown bag lunch and checked Jimbo’s needs. The day was fresh and clean from the rain during the night and she felt fresh and clean herself, full of even more hope than usual, anxious to mount her old bicycle and peddle away to the library, there to navigate the ocean of books and people and mundane tasks that was more than just a job to her. It was also a joy, for she loved both people and books, and truthfully, often thought of them as much the same, believing that a unique story existed within each, there for the reading and understanding if one but made the effort and took the time. Oh, what worthy secrets were there for the finding, what precious treasure of mystery and importance, both great and small and in between! Scampering to the door as she called goodbye to her faithful pet, she bounced down the stairs and along the short hallway towards the front door. Mrs. Fadish was outside sweeping the steps and acknowledged Analune’s cheerful “Good Morning” with only a wry smile. Still, it was better than her customary scowl, thought Analune as she hopped aboard her bicycle and peddled off buoyantly down the street, long antique skirt billowing in the wind like some colorful banner from an ancient and curious land lost ages ago to the depths of time.

The first order of her job was usually to tally and put away the books which had been put through the drop slot in the front door, but on this morning she would have to deal straightaway with a rather angry man who wished to protest what he claimed were excessive late fees levied against him for a book he had had in his possession for over a year. The information on the computer was certainly correct and Analune wished she had available to her another choice than telling him he must pay before he could check out any more books. To this he complained even more loudly and vigorously. She was glad that no one else was in the library yet or surely this tumult would bring consequences. There did not seem to be any compromise solution in sight for either of them when she suddenly felt like touching this irate man on the forearm, which she did with grace, tenderness, and a feeling that she was transmitting new hope to him somehow.

In less time than it took him to draw another breath, the man who had been so angry instantly became calm. In fact, a smile began to spread across his wide and wrinkled face and his eyes began to twinkle with the first signs of joy. Gone was his rage at the late fees and in it’s place glad acceptance. He took out his wallet and withdrew several large bills and one small one and placed them upon the counter in front of Analune, who was more than a bit surprised. She had realized that it was somehow her touch which had effected this miraculous change, but that did nothing to assuage her somewhat speculative astonishment. To be perfectly accurate, she was thunderstruck. The man now apologized for his absent mindedness and promised to never keep a book overdue again. He then wished a very amused Analune good morning and walked cheerfully off and out the door, no doubt to infect others with his new found good will and happiness.

The rest of the morning passed with only the usual events and she was able to relish being surrounded by her precious books. At lunch time Analune took her bag of meager sustenance and walked half a block to the little park where she often went. It was too close to cycle and she enjoyed walking past the fancy shops, though the contents would be, she felt, forever out of her reach. As she sat munching gently upon a quite ordinary sandwich a quite unordinary boy ran directly in front of her and tripped, falling flat on his face and skinning his forearms. His unusual appearance was chiefly the result of a high stegosaurus hair do of impossible shades and sheen. The baggy pants and black T-shirt were less noticeable, being the standard uniform for so many of the youth that perused the city streets looking for amusement, and forever trying to act as if they had found none. This young fellow was obviously scared and, as he picked himself up to renew his mad dash, Analune saw from the corner of her eye a policeman who was obviously searching for this person. For an instant the boy looked into her eyes and in that same instant she instinctively stretched out her fingers and touched him on the back of the hand which was holding a woman’s purse. This was the ill gotten prize which he sought to escape with.

In what seemed to the boy like a long slow moment of dream, he let go of the purse without even realizing it and took no notice as it fell to the concrete pavement at Analune’s feet. His facial expression changed from fear and anger to one of peace. She could also see an understanding forming behind his grey eyes that he had somehow escaped capture and been given a second chance. From that instant on he would never steal again. Analune was glad for him, smiled broadly, and he smiled back, a big friendly grin revealing a missing tooth, … or was it a wad of  licorice? The dream moment ended as quickly as it had begun, she withdrew her hand and nodded to the lad to walk calmly off, which he did. The approaching policeman seemed unable to see the departing boy but spotted the purse on the ground easily enough. For a second he looked at Analune with just a flicker of professional curiosity, but she, more nimble of mind than he and more graceful of heart, winked and said, “Is this what you were looking for? It was dropped here, I think.” He picked up the purse, thanked her with just a hint of suspicious hesitation, and walked off to return the item to it’s rightful owner, the boy now totally absent from his thoughts as if had been somehow struck by amnesia.

The afternoon went much as the morning had, a happy journey through never ending aisles of tomes punctuated by odd chores here and there of answering questions and giving suggestions. On the way home she stopped at a little Italian grocery store which often had a bin or two of produce discounted due to it’s age. Here she purchased some bruised apples and a bunch of slightly browning celery. A few flicks of the paring knife and a few strokes of the vegetable peeler would render these items completely edible. Taking her choice to the front she was immediately saddened to see the woman working the till sobbing, her eyes red and her nose dripping.

“What’s wrong?”, asked Analune with true caring in her heart but also a familiarity that would have seemed out of place between two people who were not family.

“It’s my husband”, cried the woman, not seeming to care that the young customer in front of her was nearly a total stranger. She recognized her, of course, as she came in at least once a week, but they had never spoken other than to conclude the brief business of buying produce with the customary pleasantries attached like meaningless decoration. She took in a deep gulp of air and suddenly spewed forth her feelings as if to a cherished friend or trusted aunt. “He was so angry with me this afternoon when he stopped by. I have no idea what I’ve done wrong and when I asked him he wouldn’t say.” And with this she burst forth in a torrent of sobs and tears which touched Analune so deeply that she again instinctively reached out and made soft contact with a total stranger, this time upon the poor woman’s shoulder.

In the blink of an eye the woman sucked in a new deep breath of air and let out a tremendous sigh of relief. All sorrow flowed out of her on the sigh as a bit of driftwood might flow out upon a receding tide. She looked up at Analune’s smiling face and spoke almost with reverence, as if to someone she might suspect of being an angel in disguise. “Now I see. He was angry because he had forgotten our anniversary. He’s terrible with dates, he is. He wasn’t angry with me, he was angry with himself. Oh! I want to go right home and tell him that everything is alright!” In a way which no scientist could have explained, Analune’s touch on the shoulder had effected a total change in how the woman felt. It was not a miracle of spectacular proportion worthy of film, but it was indeed a miracle of the quiet and often unnoticed kind, the kind that one remembers when one is very old and near death and thinks back fondly of the things that one treasures most.

Riding homeward now she could see what looked like fresh storm clouds on the horizon. Would it rain two nights in a row? She hoped so. The rain in her dream was present in her wish.

Mrs. Fadish was cooking cabbage and sending wave after wave of the pungent vapors up through every floor of the building in the process. The delicious smell struck Analune like a thunderbolt and she realized how hungry she was, deciding in that twinkle of time that she would walk right into Mrs. Fadish’s kitchen and just be friendly for the sake of being friendly, despite the old woman’s obviously temperamental muttering. Without thinking, she also reached into her pocketbook and withdrew her change purse, taking out all the funds she had, holding it out to the old lady cooking cabbage as if it might have been a handful of jewels instead, or a day old newspaper, or a dandelion. A treasure or a trinket, it could have been either in her lilting and carefree mind, and Mrs. Fadish, for some reason no one will ever know, reached out with her fat warm hand and pushed the money back. “You can pay me the rent when you have it, my dear. No need to put yourself off balance by giving your last cent. I can wait.” Her tone was warm and gentle, not cold and harsh as it usually was. And Analune had not even touched her. She had touched Analune. And, the change had actually begun before the touch. Very curious indeed.

“Do you like boiled cabbage?”, queried the old lady with a mischievous grin that would have been well suited to a scheming child. You look hungry.

The young woman heard the distant peel of thunder as she nodded eagerly in the affirmative, not quite sure if she was in the real world or some other. “I’ll just pop upstairs and check on Jimbo, my parrot, and be back in ten minutes.”

“Oh, please, Analune, can you bring Jimbo with you? I’m sure he’d like to explore my place and I have some crackers for him.”

All this was almost more that Analune could absorb, but she dashed upstairs and grabbed her pet, saying, “Guess what? Tonight we’re eating out!”

“I know”, he said with unexcited matter-of-factness.

“You do?”, she said, astounded.

“Of course I know. I have always known you two would become friends and that this would be the night.” He was not speaking in rhyme or the simple phrases she had taught him. He was speaking to her like the crow in her dream

“Yes, that’s right”, he continued. “I am the crow in your dream, and you are the lady in mine.”

Time seemed to slow down to a crawl then as the gathering storm clouds began to flicker with lightening and a fresh cool breeze heralded it’s approach. Grabbing something to take as a peace offering, Analune and Jimbo on her shoulder, glided out of the room like two wisps of smoke blown by some ancient spell, drifted down the flights of worn wooden stairs like two falling feathers, and sailed into Mrs. Fadish’s steamy kitchen like two ships long away in heavy seas and finally coming home to safe harbour. In her hand Analune held a small book of French poetry she now offered to the old lady as a gift.

“Oh my!”, shouted Mrs. Fadish with a burst of girlish exuberance. “This was one of my favorite books when I lived in Brussels as a young girl! I used to have a copy but sold it after the war when I needed food more than beautiful words. How ever did you know I loved this so?”

“I didn’t”, came the honest reply. “I just grabbed it as I was walking out the door. I’m so glad you like it.”

“Like it?”, the old lady gasped in astonishment. “I love it more than you could possibly know! In fact, please consider it payment for your rent for the rest of the year. It may even be worth more than that by now.”

Analune was stunned, and Jimbo, quiet until now, seized the opportunity to show off. “Analune, Analune, giving presents like the moon.” She had not taught him to say that exact sentence, but then again, this was proving to be a most unusual evening. Mrs. Fadish laughed heartily at whatever Jimbo said, fed him tiny crackers from her wrinkled fingers, and served up a delicious feast of boiled cabbage, little new potatoes, and thick slabs of corned beef. The storm rolled in as they ate and at one point Mrs. Fadish remembered her laundry hanging on the line in the back yard. Analune offered to fetch it for her, but the old woman just laughed and laughed and laughed, saying it could probably use all the washing it could get. They sipped port wine after dinner and Jimbo happily perched next to a large painting of someone who looked like old European royalty. The two made a perfect pair and both women said so, smiling at each other with wet eyes of new found friendship.

By the time Analune and Jimbo ascended the stairs to bed, a long and welcome weekend ahead of them, the rain was coming down in buckets. They would sleep and dream together, visiting new and even more mysterious lands, and in the morning, bright and clean and wonderful in it’s freshness, Jimbo would astonish his companion once again by requesting that they go for a long walk together out of doors. It would be the very first time he had ever been outside since she brought him home all those years ago. What wonders would they meet upon that and all their journeys? What souls would they touch and transform? She mused on these things as the sun rose and lifted soft mist from the wet ground. And the parrot, ever attentive to what was going on around him, especially inside Analune’s mind, gave yet another startling answer.

“You will meet the love of your life today. He’s been searching for you for so very long. Analune, Analune, always coming sometime soon.”

THE END

(Picture is from Corps Circuits)

Just looking at you, or is she?

(Picture is from Corps Circuits)

“SHIMMER”

Arafin © 2009

She glided into the bedroom like a leaf floating on the dark surface of a deep meandering woodland stream, and finding the satin quilt upon the bed pleasing to the touch, sank down with slow motion wistfulness, becoming more cat than woman. The swirling beads of her dress drank in what pale light there was in the antique room, and mixing with the heat of her creamy flesh, shone and shimmered like the notes of a deliciously dizzy waltz. Half stretching lion sinews coiled and ready to pounce, yet half drifting with intoxicating sleep, this lady of light and shadow pulsed waves of aching perfume into the breathless lungs of all who dared drink in her presence and wove tantalizing patterns of bewilderment into the helpless minds of all who braved the vision of her pose. When she was ready she would feed, and when she had fed she would dream, and carried with her in those shivering sparkling dreams would ride the trembling happy thoughts of all souls she had consumed, candle hearts lit in devoted offering to a blazing hunger too powerful to resist.

(Picture is from Corps Circuits)

Turning away and teasing, pulling the eyes along as surely the strongest horse can draw the lightest cart, she dangled fuel before the fire as if challenging all restraint to gallop headlong into the inferno. There was no time to think, and in the instant that he glimpsed his fate she sank her fangs of lust in a little deeper and heard his heart begin to pound. In a few seconds she would have him on the bed, there to rip and tear at aching wanton nerves with passion and hope and desperation, leaving him on the brink of oblivion till she was done, then finally drowning him deep in the infinite vastness of heaven’s freedom that was hers to bestow and hers alone.

(Picture is from Corps Circuits)

Chameleon desire, shifting shape and changing color so that at times it is scarcely recognizable until it is too late. Sneaking up slowly like a panther stalking a sleeping deer, or charging full on like an elephant intending to trample all in its path, we are more helpless to its terrible charms than to any other riches. And once fulfilled, slaked, and run its course, the chameleon slinks back into the tangled undergrowth of other feelings, but still is always waiting, breathing, sensing, …… when to strike with velvet glove again and with such precision that victim after victim will fall, ….. and hope always to fall more deeply than the last.

Ristorante

Arafin © 2009

I love Italian food, especially in the summer.

I had taken the advice of my most trusted friend and booked off work for an entire month. A vacation in Italy was just what I needed and my friend had assured me that the medieval hill town I was about to visit would hold a promise of romance and adventure beyond my wildest imaginings.

As I disembarked the taxi and stepped out into the crisp evening air of San Gimignano the first things that struck my senses were not the beautiful Tuscan towers overlooking the town but the delicious aromas of the little restaurants. Such spices! Such breads! Forgetting my hotel reservation completely I gave in to my newly awoken hunger and selected a quaint eatery at the entrance to a small side street which shot off the main square like the tentacle some grey stone octopus. I sat at a table for two outside, separated from the busy street by a low iron railing.

The waitress approached wearing one of those intricate 13th century peasant costumes ablaze with rainbow colors and complex beading, her ample bosoms cresting magnificently behind the low neckline of a bunched white blouse. “Quello che osso ottenere?”, came her velvet and happy words, asking me what she could get me. “Lo chef della targa speciale”, I replied in a ridiculous accent, not having had time to browse the menu and using one of the stock lines I had learned to obtain that which every restaurant had,  the chef’s special plate. Her playful eyes gleamed at my nervousness, seeing instantly that I was less than certain I had communicated my intentions correctly. “So you want the chef’s behind on a platter, do you?”, she queried with mock amazement.

Instantly I froze, neither understanding her tease or remembering that I had spoken that same line with much success many times before in countless other eating establishments. She leaned closer so that I could see the dark promise of her wholesome cleavage. “Would you like your dessert now?”, she cooed with a dulcet breath. I had not even begun my meal, of course, but she had me. First the shock of her joke had blown past my critical faculty and then the confusing suggestion buried within her question and reinforced by her visual charms. I was under before I knew it, realizing only faintly what had happened as she drew closer still and gently took my hand in hers, her skin so impossibly warm. At that first touch I no longer cared that I was being covertly hypnotized and willingly let drop my last guard, receding into a luscious sweetness of calm.

She lifted me by the hand from my table as one might lift a wisp of dandelion puff, so easy was I to control. Leading me back into the darkness of a little room behind the kitchen she stood before a tiny ancient door, brittle wood blackened by the ages and held together by cast iron strapping, crude blacksmith’s hinges rusting slightly around the edges. “Stoop low, my dear”, she sang as the door opened and she guided me through. The light of the setting summer sun was blinding salmon pink and the birds made a mad symphony as we strode forth into the miraculous landscape. “I have  waited for you so long, my love”, she purred. “Now at last we are home!”

[To be continued ...]

Generally speaking, which do you find more sexy, a covered attractive body or a nude one? If your answer is the latter, then why? Does the addition of fabric tease, enhance, or mystify?

(Picture is “GATeWAY to Dreamworld” / Artist Unknown)

“WAVE GOODBYE”

Arafinte © 2009

Just a note, I wrote this as a double sided exercise. One, to try my hand at some Tolkien fan fiction and two, to explore some memories that popped up during a past life regression hypnosis session. The memories were of the unclear and very dreamy nature, so I decided from the outset to just let this story unfold as it wanted to, like watching a dream, and not try to control it in any way. When editing I did consult Tolkien maps and language texts, but other than that the whole thing just sort of “fell” out.

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Contents:

Prologue: “Is the Glass Completely Empty or is the Glass Completely Full?”

Chapter One: “Waving Hello”

Chapter Two: “Moving East”

Chapter Three: “Change of Plans”

Chapter Four: “Moving Apart”

Chapter Five: “Secrets Hidden and Secrets Revealed”

Chapter Six: “The Gateway”

Chapter Seven: “Lost Chances”

Epilogue: “Many Shores”

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Prologue:

“Is the Glass Completely Empty or is the Glass Completely Full?”

Do you believe that everything is true? Everything? Say, for the instance of this writing, that everything Tolkien wrote is true just as he described it, that it is in fact, not fiction at all, but gospel truth. Do you believe this? Or, ……. do you believe that this very world we live in is fiction to the point of being completely untrue? Do you believe that this world does not exist? There is proof for the realizing that both cases are so. Do you believe that the universe is infinite? Imagine, just for the sake of this writing, that you are immortal. Also imagine if you will that you have a space ship that is very, very fast. Now imagine that you travel in your ship in a straight line away from Earth at very high speed, … say one million times the speed of light, and due to your immortality, you can do so forever. I will ask that for the time being you forget Einstein’s Special Theory of Relativity so that the friends and loved ones you leave behind on Earth do not age much more rapidly than you do. Traveling in a straight line at one million times the speed of light, you eventually come to a star. There are no planets orbiting around this star and you travel on.

Eventually you do come to a star around which orbit some planets, … but none of them resemble Earth in any way. On you go. Remember, you are immortal and your ship is very fast. You go faster now, eventually coming to a star around which orbits a planet about the size of Earth but which has no atmosphere or water. Time to travel onwards again.

Because the Universe is infinite, eventually you come to a planet which has an atmosphere and water, and eventually to a planet which has air, water, and life. The life is just some algae, … not very interesting, … so you speed up your flight in a straight line. Now you come to a planet with air, water, and life SOMETHING like what you were used to back on Earth, although it is more different than similar. So, becoming very determined you put your foot to the floor in your spaceship and after many, many years of travel you finally come to a planet with life quite similar to Earth. It has taken a long time to get here, and you have traveled a very great distance, but you have found it. Congratulations! They will name something in your honor back home.

Travel on now, faster still, encountering not one, but many planets, some of which have life, and a few of which have life similar to Earth. Because the Universe is infinite, you must encounter these planets if you travel in a straight line. After what seems like an eternity, you come to a planet EXACTLY like Earth, with a me writing to a you, … an exact copy in every way. Because the Universe is infinite, there is not only this one exact copy of Earth, but an infinite number of them. Because the Universe is infinite, there are also an infinite number of variations of Earth, …….. and an infinite number or each of these variations. All this in a straight line.

Now think about it, ……. if there is all this infinity in a straight line, then there MUST be a world out here somewhere in this straight line EXACTLY as Tolkien described in his writings about Middle Earth. Of course, there are an infinite number of these Middle Earths, an infinite number of variations of Middle Earth, and an infinite number of each of these variations. All in a straight line. Because the Universe is infinite, not only do infinite numbers of infinite variations exist in a straight line, they exist EVERYWHERE, and because they exist everywhere, all infinity is full of them. If all infinity is full of an infinite number of infinite variations, then Middle Earth exists everywhere, ……. including right back on the Earth you left so long ago in your very fast spaceship. All this everywhere. It seems that you didn’t need to leave after all. So, if everything exists everywhere then it not only exists in the infinite but in the infinitesimal as well. Everything in every infinitesimal point.

Because everything exists in the infinite as well as in the infinitesimal, and because all possibilities are thus true, then there also exists everywhere the case that none of it exists at all. Emptiness in all the infinite Universe and in all the infinitesimal Universe. Not only are there no Middle Earths, there are no home Earths either, including the one you came from. Are you dreaming? WHO is dreaming? Oh, by the way, ……. because every possibility exists, (and doesn’t), then all possibilities exist, (or don’t), into the infinite past as well as into the infinite future. Everything everywhere all the time. Nothing anywhere ever. So, ……. due to the infinity of possibilities and the emptiness of those possibilities, everything and nothing exist in the

infinitesimally present point of NOW. Sorry, but it looks as if you won’t be getting something named in your honor after all.

Or will you?

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Chapter One:

“Waving Hello”

I had been keeping up with an old tradition that I have observed for many years of reading “The Lord Of The Rings” at Christmas time. I understand that many other folk observe this practice as well. I was within four chapters of finishing the last book when the power went out. Winter storms often accomplish that on the little island where I live. The rogue wave, however, was quite unusual.

As the water swept over and demolished my house I was surprised to find that my last thoughts were of Middle Earth, specifically, of wishing I could be there and help, of all people, Gollum. Poor creature! If only I could ………….

My thoughts overcome by a gigantic wave of light, ……. and then ………..

Blackness.

It was cold and windy when I awoke, desolate brown grassland to the North and a vast dark green forest to the South. A small river flowed from the former into the latter. Next to this I had for some reason made my bed and in doing so exhibited poor choice because an intense biting dampness from the river hovered next to the ground, utterly soaking my short green robes.

Short green robes?

When the wave hit I had been wearing blue fleece pajamas.

Oh, yes, the wave.

Was I dead?

I did not feel dead. I just felt very cold and damp, ……. and hungry, …….. and ……….. different. I felt like looking into a mirror. Standing and walking to a calm spot in the river I was mildly dismayed to find any smooth reflective surface obscured by mist. It was thicker here immediately above the water, the product of a temperature differential between cold air above warmer liquid. Then I chanced to glance down my chest towards my feet, still half awake, you understand. Still sleepy and groggy and not yet fully conscious.

Breasts! I had breasts! This would not have been at all unusual for someone who had expected to wake up as a woman, but I had been a man when the wave hit.

The wave …….

Was I dead?

No. I had already established that I felt otherwise. But now I was a woman. Let me here assure any male readers who have fantasized about what it might be like to exist as a member of the opposite sex that no amount of such fantasizing can adequately prepare one for the shock and absolute oddness of the first realization that one is suddenly female. Any proximity to consciousness that I had been previously approaching was now shattered by the overwhelming dizziness of shock. I fainted.

And for the second time in what seemed like only moments I was covered with water, and it was freezing. Jerked awake by the icy river I had just fallen into I dragged myself with all haste back onto the shore where I instantly set about dripping and shivering. The mind is so strange. Even in that state of being dangerously close to severe hypothermia the oddest thoughts can arise. I cautiously slid my right hand beneath my robe and felt my ………………..

Oh, yes. One more item of note. As I raised my hand to scratch my ear I discovered that it was pointed.

I was a female and I was an elf.

My eyes were grey, my hair was jet black, and I was about five feet nine inches tall.

Not wanting to faint again, if for no other reason than falling into freezing water two times in five minutes was indicative of simple mindedness, I withdrew my hand and forced myself to think rationally. Well, sort of rationally. What my mind really did was quiver back and forth between possible plans of action to keep from freezing to death and the very impossible to neglect fact that I had somehow switched genders. As the immediacy of my physical peril began to win out over concerns related to my identity, I found myself walking briskly towards the shelter of the trees. I must get out of this wind. I was starting to shiver uncontrollably and pushed myself to run so as to generate more body heat. Very peculiar to run in this new body. Increased ratio of power below the waist making it easier to balance yet lowered ratio of strength above the waist making it more difficult to ………….. run like a man.

The forest was fortunately fairly dry and I soon had the bright idea to make a fire. Searching my garments for a pocket in which would be a happy lighter or book of matches I was dismayed yet not surprised to find that I had neither devices with which to make fire or pockets. Good thing I had been a Boy Scout in my youth. I soon found a springy young branch of yew and then a splintered piece of some kind of cedar, dry as a bone. Some of the oaks I next encountered were adorned with beards of a moss that I recognized as good tinder. I quickly found a sharp stone with which I set to chiseling a small pocket in the piece of cedar. Next I removed the belt from my waist and tied it between the ends of the yew branch, bending it into a bow. Setting this aside I searched for a straight piece of dry conifer wood and soon found a suitable piece of pine. Lastly I notched a small chunk of green oak to act as a handle for the pine drill. I was shivering violently by now and knew that I must hurry.

I had to see if these materials would work. If they did, then I could easily gather more tinder, twigs, and then serious firewood. I twisted the belt of the bow around the pine drill and set it into the notch in the cedar below and the notch of the green oak above. I then placed a bunch of the dried moss next to the bottom of the bow and began vigorously spinning the drill by working the bow back and forth. In ten seconds the cedar began to smoke and in thirty seconds the moss burst into flame. It worked! Dashing back and forth from one tree to another I gathered firewood and rekindled my fire, this time building it high and hot.

As I sat naked next to the roaring flames, my clothes drying on branches above, I marveled at my new body. I appeared to be in my twenties, slender yet muscular, and rather beautiful. Before you wonder, I was indeed having a bit of trouble not becoming aroused by the sight of my own body. This was so weird! Only the dire necessity of avoiding succumbing to the bitter cold had deterred me from indulging in sexual fantasy of a most real nature. Now that I was dry and warm I let my mind explore what my body did not yet dare do, yet still, this was exciting. It was also strangely calming in a way I can only describe as dreamlike. I was not dreaming, however, and was acutely aware of this when the elf walked into my campsite.

At first I had tried to hide, but it quickly seemed ridiculous to do so. He had seen me and seen me up close. And he was smiling in a manner which made me feel less than comfortable. Damn! This just would not do! Donning my nearly dry garments I faced him and spoke, breaking the awkward silence I felt he had established by his unannounced presence. Better to keep him on the defensive, I thought.

“Who are you and what do you want?” I queried, instantly regretting the second part of my question.

He stared dumbfoundedly and replied in a language I could not quite make out. It sounded a bit like Welsh. Again he spoke. He was asking me a question and seemed to be doing so in a polite and respectful manner. Again I attempted to communicate with him and again was not understood. Then it hit me.

He was speaking Sindarin!

Knowing but a few words and phrases from the books written by Tolkien I recited hopefully, “Quel amrun”, (Good morning).

“Quel amrun!” he immediately replied, a broad smile gracing his angular face. “Saesa omentien lle”, (Pleasure meeting you) . Glad that I recognized his return greeting I somehow thought I realized in that brief instant what had happened. I was in Middle Earth. I was alive in Middle Earth and had somehow skipped past any memories of growing up here but instead retained all memories of my life in Canada. I had always believed in reincarnation but the manner in which this chain of events had unfolded was not exactly in keeping with those beliefs. Still, the obvious could not be denied.

Over the course of the next half hour it became abundantly clear that my Elvish and his English were about as likely to succeed in meaningful transfer of knowledge as a chimpanzee is likely to succeed in writing a novel. I then wasted a few seconds wondering if there were chimpanzees in this world. We did establish that his name was Nuryan and he was cousin or brother or something to Legolas. Yes, that Legolas. Nuryan’s uncle was Thranduil and I had awoken on the Northern border of Mirkwood. I had no idea what my name was so made one up on the spot. I would be called “Ithriel”, (meaning “Moon Garland”). Look, I had to make the best of this, right?

I followed Nuryan deep into the forest for a day, after which we eventually came to Thranduil’s halls beneath the Earth. Thranduil was able to read my mind but I could not read his. He explained to the throng which had gathered out of curiosity to see me that I was newly arrived in Middle Earth and had forgotten how to speak. Somehow I understood that it would have been imprudent to explain that I had really come from a place called North America and that just a day ago I had existed in a man’s body.

During my first night in the hospitality of the King of the Wood Elves I was given a small phial of glowing liquid to drink by a golden haired elf woman named Alpheth who was visiting from far away Lothlorien. If I understood correctly, Alpheth was a student of Galadriel, or apprentice, or some such thing. Within seconds of drinking the contents of the little phial I began to feel a pleasant dreamy warmth spreading throughout my mind and body. It felt like the soft ringing of a bell mixed with sunlight mixed with gurgling water flowing within my veins and thoughts. The elves who had gathered around smiled knowingly as Alpheth began to speak slowly and methodically, almost in a drone.

At first I could recognize only a smattering of her Sindarin and understood next to nothing of her meanings. This continued for what could have been five minutes or five hours, but eventually her speech seemed to be making a bit of sense. Thranduil stood off to one side, scratching his chin and smiling. He seemed to be waiting for something. Then it happened so suddenly that I could have screamed in surprise.

I understood every word Alpheth was speaking! She was reciting the entire Sindarin dictionary, if such a thing existed. But it was also more than that, for with each word spoken by that lovely golden haired lady there was a telepathic imprint of all it’s meanings and possible uses transmitted to my mind. I was learning their language! I was learning it all at incredible speed.

By the time the last of the sun’s rays had faded I was fluent enough in Elvish to be comfortable conversing with the many folk that had gathered to see the strange visitor from afar. I still made the occasional mistake, but I put that down more to my inherent confusion than to any fault of the miraculous teaching method. They had so many questions and I answered as best I could, telling them of my world and my previous life. When I mentioned the wave they would grow strangely silent and get a far off look in their eyes. When I would make a slight grammatical mistake or use the wrong word they would erupt with the most delightful laughter. For many days we thus conversed and then Thranduil spoke to me aside in a manner which was far less jovial than the party-like atmosphere that had sprung up around me.

Alpheth was to depart tomorrow for Lorien and I was to accompany her. It seemed that Galadriel had questions for me which she wished to ask directly. I suspected that Galadriel already knew much about me for I had observed Alpheth on several occasions staring into the distance as if in trance and soon after query me about something new. Each such question was prefaced by a brief explanation that “Lady Galadriel wishes me to ask of you …….”. Telepathy. I had read the accounts of mental exchange between Galadriel and members of the Company Of The Ring, and so should perhaps not have been surprised, but this more personal encounter with the phenomenon was slightly disconcerting. When dawn broke we left the Halls of the Woodland Elves, thanking King Thranduil for his gracious hospitality and each promising to return someday.

We would travel North around Mirkwood and then cross the Anduin near the Carrock. From there we would hasten South along the Western bank of the Great River and hopefully reach Lothlorien in less than a week. We carried with us few provisions for Alpheth promised that we would find much of what we needed along our path.

I had now grown mostly accustomed to existing in the body of a female. More cause for thoughts which distracted me away from tasks at hand was existence as an elf. If not fatally injured or broken by impossible grief this body would endure as long as the world lasted. Still having immediate memories of life as a man, but now being in a woman’s form, would under different circumstances likely have been cause for much self exploration of both an emotional and sexual nature, but the reality of practical immortality easily overwhelmed all such inward thoughts. I found myself constantly focusing outwards towards the world around me in a way I had never imagined. Every leaf, every twig, every bird song now had new vitality and import. The world appeared far more vivid and intense, far more vibrant. As we walked out of the forest into the cold barren lands to the North and turned West towards the Anduin, I thought I began to fathom how and why the Elves had been so inraptured with Middle Earth to have been able to teach trees to speak and create fantastic dwellings such as Caras Galadhon.

Alpheth continued to teach me as we strode, not language this time, but an assessment of current events. It soon became apparent to me that my knowledge gained from reading Tolkien in my last life would not allow me to foretell the future here. I had, in fact, surmised this to some degree when I had asked Thranduil about Legolas and was told that he had been living in Rivendell for nearly a year. This Middle Earth was not an exact image of that which I had read about. Was it one of an infinite number of variations? I settled it into my mind that it was and did not seek to pass on too much of what I had read from Tolkien to Alpheth. This she seemed to understand and no longer questioned me about my former existence.

We walked quickly and sometimes jogged. Day and night we travelled thus and in less than a two and a half days we reached the ford and crossed the Great River. Beorn was nowhere to be seen and I imagined him out foraging in the moonlight as any good bear might do. As yet another dawn approached we were well down the Western shore from the Ford of Carrock when we saw the orcs.

It was a small band of no more than twenty and they were traveling in the same direction as we were, but due to our greater speed we had overtaken them. Alpheth recommended that we outflank them to the West which would only cost us half a day at most. I put forth the idea of passing them by stealth when the moon sank below the horizon just before dawn, but she said it was too risky. Neither of us were armed for battle, only possessing knives for utility rather than fighting. I quickly consented to Alpheth’s wishes and we veered right towards the shoulder of the Misty Mountains, giving the orc party a wide berth. I only hoped we would not encounter more of them. We did not.

Our rate of travel here was not to be as fast as in the open lands to the North of Mirkwood but we still made good time. Three days later we finally reached the outer borders of Lothlorien and were there quickly greeted by elves of the Galadrim. Alpheth had been expected and had much to talk about with our escort as we progressed deeper into the enchanted wood. Not less than an hour from Caras Galadhon three elves of obvious nobility met us and bade us change course for the river to our left. At first Alpheth objected but then agreed when one of the noble elves whispered something in her ear that must have been both surprising and worrying. We turned East and ran for all we were worth, reaching the water in less than half an hour. There stood Celeborn next to a small boat and attended by two other elves dressed in very dark blue. They were male and appeared to be twins.

I was hastily introduced to Lord Celeborn and the two blue elves who proved to be none other than Elrohir and Eladin, brothers of Arwen Evenstar. They all had troubled looks upon their brows. Alpheth spoke privately with Celeborn for a moment and then bid me come forward. Celeborn then explained that Lorien was under assault by orcs from the South and that Galadriel was leading the defense. Although it was not a full out action by the forces of darkness, merely a probing attempt, it was deemed important enough to warrant direct involvement by the Queen of the Golden Wood herself. I would later learn from Alpheth that Galadriel was able to not only repulse the attack but by way of her magic keep the entire event cloaked from the Great Eye of Sauron. Better he did not know what lay within the forest.

Galadriel sent apologies that she would be unable to meet with me at this time but bade me undertake a mission or great importance, if, of course, I was willing. Once Celeborn told what was being asked of me I both froze with fear and warmed with the opportunity to fulfill the wishes of the Lady of Lorien. I accepted and gave my solemn word to succeed or die trying. What was I to do? I was to take one of the boats with Alpheth and make for the Falls of Rauros, cross to the Eastern shore of the lake, and catch up to Frodo and Samwise. Galadriel had foreseen Boromir’s internal conflict and subsequent demise yet had also foreseen something else which was not in the books I had read. Me.

Alpheth and I were to aid Frodo and Sam on their journey into Mordor and I in particular was to tend to Gollum. Galadriel had been expressly clear that he was to be treated with as much kindness as possible and once the Ring was destroyed that he be brought to Lorien, there to spend his final days under her healing hands. It had been learned, though I had no idea how, that Gollum possessed within his tortured mind a secret of great importance that would affect the recovery of all Middle Earth should the mission to destroy the Ring be successful.

Alpheth and I now quickly boarded the little boat, accompanied by one of the original elves who had escorted us into the forest. Pushing away from shore we waved a hasty farewell to Celeborn and the sons of Elrond. I hoped very much to meet them all again.

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Chapter Two:

“Moving East”

We did not drift but paddled for all we were worth. I found myself wishing that this boat were a canoe. It would have been faster and more suited to three paddlers. This boat was too wide and too slow and I worried that we would not reach the Eastern shore of the lake in time to intercept the two hobbits. Alpheth shared my concern and dug at the water even harder. All three of us had arms of lead by the time we finally beached the little boat and unloaded our meager gear. We had been given elven cloaks, rope, and several leafy packages of lembas along with a number of water skins. These skins were now empty as we would be able to fill them one last time before we departed the broken hills of Emyn Muil.

The elf who had accompanied us thus far now took leave and paddled the little boat back North against the current. It would be hard work for him to make Lorien in one day, which was his goal. Again I found myself wishing that boat had been a canoe.

Alpheth and I had missed Frodo and Sam but were not far behind for we soon found a few footprints still soft in a muddy patch of wooded trail. No mistaking hobbit feet for those of any other. A little further on we stared aghast at a third set of footprints joining in behind the Ringbearer and his companion. These prints were similar to hobbit feet yet narrower and with longer nail marks. It was certainly Gollum. I no longer depended on events unfolding exactly as they had in the books and felt the greatest sense of urgency in intercepting the hobbits before Gollum did. Alpheth concurred and we redoubled our efforts, quickening our pace to a full run. Just as we crested a stoney rise which gave us a brief view of the more desolate land ahead, I spotted Gollum loping along, half running, half cringing much as might an ape move when fearful and in a hurry. Ahead by perhaps no more than two hundred meters were two very tired looking hobbits. They were not moving fast at all. Gollum would be on them in minutes!

Running with all the strength that we could muster, Alpheth and I somehow managed to reach and tackle Gollum only seconds before he was about to pounce upon Frodo. Sam had fallen behind to pick a few herbs and this had appeared as Gollum’s opportunity. Frodo was surprised to see me tackle Gollum as Alpheth slipped a small net over his flaying arms. “Don’t worry, Frodo”, Alpheth cried out. “Galadriel has sent us to you.” Frodo heard and understood through Gollum’s pitiful screams as Samwise Gamgee ran up from behind, sword drawn, and demanding of everyone except Frodo himself who we were and what was our business here. Despite the severity of the situation, I could not help but laugh a little.

The net used to ensnare Gollum was specially made for the task and contained no fibers woven by elves. Rather it was a bit of altered fishing net that had probably been used by some menfolk up river. Alpheth cooed and whispered to Gollum in languages I did not understand and soon the poor creature began to abate his howling and thrashing and eventually fell nearly quiet, merely sobbing a little from time to time as he looked pitifully up at first one of us then the other. His sunken and bulging eyes were filled with fear and imploring, so desperate was he for release and avoidance of pain.

I explained our mission to Frodo and Sam who were most glad to have our company and assistance, though Sam did not lessen his suspicion of Gollum by so much as a hair. His distrust for this creature was pronounced and unhidden. Alpheth suggested that we make camp there for the night as  it was close to the last fresh water we would find for a long while. As Sam and I fell to preparing supper, Alpheth and Frodo confronted Gollum.

Just as in the books, Gollum swore upon “The Precious” to not harm Frodo and help us get into Mordor. Unlike the books he also swore to obey Alpheth in every way, and should Alpheth not be around, to obey me in her stead. For our part we all agreed to call him Smeagol from now on and treat him kindly. Even Sam agreed to this after I told him of Galadriel’s instructions in complete detail. After Smeagol swore his oaths the net was removed and discarded. After supper, while Frodo and Sam slept, Alpheth and I stayed up talking over our plans. We would take up the journey once again in the morning and make for the ground between the Dead Marshes and Wetwang. Although Smeagol insisted that he knew a way through the Dead Marshes, Alpheth spoke of firmer ground slightly to the South. We would miss the Battle Plain of Dagorlad and head straight for Henneth Annûn, “The Window on the West”, there hoping to find a bit of respite before tackling the Mountains of Shadow and entrance into Mordor. I did not yet know of Alpheths’s plan for passing over those mountains, but I did know her need for haste. Celeborn had told her at our parting that Sauron was amassing his forces for an assault on Minas Tirith far more quickly than had first been imagined.

We set out before sunrise and picked our way through the sharp puzzle of rocks with help from both Smeagol’s nose and Alpheth’s memory. It seemed that she had come this way before a long time ago, though she did remark that the land was now much changed. In less than a day we were out of the razor-like maze and making our way through the mushy ground between the two great marshes, the Dead Marshes to our immediate North and the more expansive yet less cursed Wetwang to our South. The water was not fit to drink here and few birds stirred as we walked all day and part of the following night. When Alpheth finally allowed the hobbits to rest we had come nearly thirty miles into this bog where no orc or man would seek to hinder us. This was no place for anything that went upon two legs or even four. Great centipedes wound in and out of the mire and the odd small dark green snake slithered between tussocks of swamp grass on their way from one pool of festering water to another. We all felt extremely fortunate that no insects were around at this time of year. Even Smeagol seemed to hate places like this when mosquitoes abounded.

As the hobbits slept Alpheth sang softly some ancient and gentle song of this land before the coming of the sun and the moon. Elves once wandered here before it was a bog and sang to the stars of heaven. Her voice was incredibly beautiful and I was mesmerized into transcendent reverie as more time passed than I could measure. Dawn startled me back to reality as Smeagol tugged at my arm. “What’s it she sings about, Mistress Ithriel? What’s it she says?” As the song had been largely in Quenya, of which I understood very little, I let Alpheth explain. Smeagol had not slept but remained awake the whole night through, listening to her song and becoming as transfixed as I was. “When was it, …. the things you sings of?” asked Smeagol. Alpheth replied, “It was many thousands of years before you lived by the Great River and fished for your supper. The elves walked here and marveled at the beauty of this land as it was then.” A single tear rolled down his forlorn face and I imagined he might be remembering the brother he slew in order to possess the One Ring.

Sam prepared a meager yet nourishing breakfast without benefit of a fire and all of us save Smeagol partook. For him there was a small catfish he had gleaned from one of the rivulets that ran meandering through this tangle of pools and swamp land. He made slurping and grunting noises as he ate and I could see that this greatly distressed Sam who moved further away in disgust which he made little effort to hide. Smeagol laughed when he saw this. “Silly hobbits cook fish!” Then looking up at me with a rather sarcastic grin, “Do elveses cook fish, too?”

“Well”, I began, “one of my favorite dishes is made with raw fish. If I could find the correct ingredients I’d make it for you sometime.”

Alpheth shot me a look so startled that I at first suspected a great troll was bearing down on me from behind.

“You eat WHAT?!”, she asked with utter disbelief.

“It’s made up of a bit of raw fish rolled up in cooked rice and a particular type of seaweed. It’s called Sushi. It’s truly delicious.”

“You are a strange person indeed to like raw fish let alone admit to it”, she laughed.

Smeagol now had a completely childlike expression on his face. He stared at me in wonder for perhaps thirty seconds as not one of our party spoke and I felt that I had maybe made a mistake mentioning sushi. “Is is juicy?”, he asked in almost a whisper.

“Yes”, I replied, “it can be. I think you’d like it.”

And from there Sam, Frodo, Alpheth, and Smeagol began picking away at me for more details about sushi, to which I answered as best I could.

By mid morning we had covered another ten miles through the bog lands and then caught a glimpse through the scrubby trees of the mountains to our East. Mordor, land of darkness. Beyond the peaks a dark red glow under-lit the gathering storm clouds. We were really going in there. It startled and sickened me to accept this, yet this was our task, and mine was in particular to bring Smeagol back alive to Lorien. Stopping only briefly for a bite to eat we soon pressed on and made as good progress as could be expected over such difficult terrain. As we neared the Eastern reaches of this vast fen the rivulets were becoming broader and harder to cross. Wading was hindered by tangled roots and weeds which clawed at our feet and made it particularly difficult for Frodo and Sam. Alpheth and I, being much taller, had a less difficult time of it, but only Smeagol found such traverses easy. He actually seemed to enjoy half loping and half swimming forward through this labyrinth of water and undergrowth.

It was nearly nightfall when we at last saw dryer land ahead of us. We would spend a last night within the cover of Wetwang before dashing towards Henneth Annûn in the morning. It was doubtful we could cover that much ground in one day but we had to try. The land before us was more open and would offer little cover from prying eyes. We would also come closer to the River Anduin as it bent Eastwards towards Ithilien. Orcs and other forces of Sauron might be moving openly there by this time. If we did not make our goal by sunset we would be wise to press on through the night till we did.

That night Sam and Frodo fell quickly asleep. It had been a hard day of traveling for their short legs. Alpheth and I talked strategy for a while and then she fell into that state of trance that serves as the closest thing elves know to sleep. I was too anxious to do even that and stayed fully awake, listening to what few night birds dared call out in this troublesome murkiness. Smeagol approached and curled up close to my feet as I sat upon a small bump of tussock. He had just eaten a fish he had caught and seemed more peaceful than usual. Up until now he had never really stopped focusing on what dangled from Frodo’s neck. We all knew what that pull was. Even I felt it. I can only describe it as a sickening combination of loathing and longing suffused with horrible fear. Never had I been so repulsed by something and at the same time never had I so wanted to grasp at something so disgusting. It was morbid curiosity at it’s worst on the surface and darkest nightmare at the deepest. I was glad Smeagol was for a short while distracted by something long enough to enjoy a bit of peace. I soon learned what that something was.

My earlier descriptions of sushi had been on his mind all day, though he had said nothing. Now he spoke without looking directly at me. He talked as if to anyone who would listen in a manner that suggested play acting as much as serious conversation, yet his words were obviously meant for my ears alone. “Is there sushi where we are going, kind Mistress? Can we haves sushi when we gets to the mountains?”

I had to disappoint him by replying in the negative. “No, Smeagol. I will probably have to go to the sea to find the type of seaweed I need. Rice I can probably find in many places in Gondor. The other ingredients will be easy. I have already seen ginger since I have been here and fish is easy to find, isn’t it?” This last remark was intended to invoke mirth in the wretched creature and it did that in spades for Smeagol rolled over and beamed up at me with childlike enthusiasm and whispered loudly with great joy, “YES! Fish is easy for Smeagol to find! Smeagol can finds fishes everyyyyywhere!” I smiled back as he rolled over again and drifted into a fitful sleep. I soon moved off into trance and let the night do what it would with my thoughts.

In my mind I saw before us the jagged mountains we must cross and vast armies of orcs and men from the South in our way. I saw fear on the faces of my companions and horror upon the face of Alpheth. Lastly I saw fire bursting forth from Mount Doom as Frodo ran in terror from a fissure in it’s side, the Ring destroyed at last, but lava now pouring forth all around him. As the dim light of a cloudy morning shifted me from my deep I had a gut wrenching feeling that this day would not end well. We packed quickly and moved off. In minutes were at the final rivulet of Wetwang and soon across. Alpheth shot me a worried glance as we began to jog out over the dry ground ahead. Had she also seen something in her dream state which spelled misfortune?

All day we jogged and walked with great speed towards the Northern most border of Ithilien, now turning slightly South and skirting the edge of the desolate Battle Plain of Dagorlad. We were frequently in the open and during these times knew full well the danger of being spotted by servants of the Enemy. We had all joined in discussion of crossing this wasteland under cover of darkness, yet both Alpheth and Smeagol had refuted such an idea with tales of nameless things which might too easily spot us, and so we hurried now from sparse cover of bush to sparser cover of dusty boulder. Mostly we were exposed. Mostly we felt as if we were living on borrowed time. By nightfall we had put over forty miles behind us yet still had at least five to go. On we sped, the hobbits exhausted yet resolute. What marvelously tough little folk they were! It was still before midnight when we crossed the stream that led from Henneth Annûn and turned back to the Northeast and soon were close enough to the mountains of Ephel Dúath to reach out and touch them. Only Alpheth knew the way here. Not even Smeagol in his unhappy travels had come in this direction before. Just as my hope at finding the sanctuary we sought began to fade we heard the singing.

Men of the West greeted us first with drawn bows and then with friendly welcome as we were ushered into their secret lair. Smeagol was permitted to enter only if he consented to a blindfold, to which he initially objected with mad fury, but soon agreed to only with the gentlest and most skillful ministrations by Alpheth. As Smeagol’s blindfold was removed a tall man with long hair waved hello to Alpheth. She was known to this man and several of his brethren. His name was Faramir and he was a captain of the forces of Gondor to the South. All the men eyed Smeagol with suspicion but then he did the strangest thing. He waved back at Faramir as might one old friend wave hello to another in casual passing. He was mimicking that which he had just seen, of course, and these men found it funny enough to laugh out loud, but Smeagol had also meant some degree of sincerity with his gesture and to this Faramir acknowledged with a slight nod of his head. We were safe for the moment and could all relax. How wonderful it would be if we could relax more thoroughly when the task before us was complete.

*********************************************************************

Chapter Three:

“Change of Plans”

“Sauron has amassed two separate armies, one with an expeditionary force which he sent from Minas Morgul not five days ago to attack Minas Tirith, and the second a force ten times that size to completely overthrow and occupy all of Gondor. The first attack against Minas Tirith failed, but not by much. It was only by the last minute arrival of the Army of the Dead from Dunharrow that the Enemy was defeated. The soldiers of Gondor who remain, and those of Rohan who accompany them, are largely broken and weary. Sauron will soon unleash his next attack and Gondor cannot possibly stand against it.” Thus spoke Faramir to us and to his men, having just received news of these events from a lone courier sent North from Osgiliath to summon the last forces available to return to the White City.

Things were very much different in this world than in the books, I thought, as I shook my head in disbelief. Frodo was still the last best hope, but how to enter Mordor via the road by Cirith Ungol now? A dark army of tens of thousands would soon pass that way. Even the tunnels that ran through Shelob’s lair would not provide unnoticed passage for us at this point. Then Samwise Gamgee, simple gardener from the Shire, saw the solution before any of the rest of us did.

“Why can’t we go over the mountains right here above us and make straight for Mount Doom. Sauron’s forces are moving South and away, are they not?”

“Sam, you’re a genius!”, called out Frodo from accross the room where he stood next to Alpheth. Smeagol appeared to be slightly disappointed and I put this down to dashed plans of leading Frodo into Shelob’s web. Or perhaps it was the wall of jagged rock that Frodo had just suggested we climb up.

Faramir looked astonished at what Sam had just said and then he hushed the rapidly growing chatter among the men and addressed Frodo as if proclaiming doom. “The mountains behind us are nearly vertical in places and in others so jagged and sharp that to climb them would be impossible for any man, any elf, or any hobbit. This chain of mountains further South is still formidable, yet less so than here. I implore you to cross closer to Minas Morgul. You can climb there if you wish. At least you will have a chance.”

Frodo shook his head and pointed to the map of the Plain of Gorgoroth that lay upon a large wooden table in front of Faramir. Sam, Alpheth, and I joined him and looked at the map as Frodo spoke. “The Plain of Gorgoroth is emptying to the Southwest and the eye of Sauron is being drawn there. I can feel it. We can cross the mountains here. Sam and I brought with us elven rope from Lorien and Alpheth and Ithriel brought even more. Smeagol can climb absolutely anything. I have seen it. He can string the ropes ahead of us and we can climb up.”

“Yes, that’s it”, said Sam. “That’s what I was getting to. We can climb straight up and over in the last place Sauron would ever expect.”

The room was silent. Only the sound of rushing water nearby was audible.

Then, determined to contribute in the best way that I could, I raised my voice and offered yet more support for Sam’s plan. “I come from a place where it is not at all uncommon to scale rock faces as sheer as the one behind us. I know for a fact this can be done. I cannot climb as well as Smeagol, but I’ll wager I can climb better than any other person here.” I was shaking a bit with my boldness and could feel my face flushing. I was not bragging idly and really could climb rock very well, having spent many years enjoying the hobby back home in Canada. What a fantasy fulfilled if only I could somehow lay my hands on chocks, cams, and ascenders.

Alpheth looked at me with a smile. “There are surprises about you yet, Ithriel.”

I found myself suddenly conscious of the fact that I was now a woman. Under the urgency of our ordeal since leaving Mirkwood I had not been able to reflect on this much, strange as that may sound. It was almost like a dream now to realize that I was no longer who I used to be. There was no panic, no rejection of this form, and also no great self introspection either mental or physical. I was who I was and that was that. Then I looked at Alpheth again in gratitude for her support and felt a tinge of attraction I had not felt for a long time, ……. and it was oddly different now.

Thunder could not have shaken me more than this brief spark of emotion, for I instantly realized that I had feelings for Alpheth and that these feelings were not those of my former male self for a woman, but feelings of my new female self. So this is what it was to be a woman and feel attraction for another woman. No imaginings as a man could have prepared me for this moment, no fantasies, no dreams. Even the many past life regressions I had partaken in under hypnosis, some of them remembering lives as various women, was not sufficient to parallel what I was experiencing now. It was not a powerful feeling at all, but simple and soft and quiet. It was like breathing warm air on a spring day. It was like sighing at the sight of two birds circling each other in courtship.

I shook myself awake from this flash of emotion and returned my attention to the task at hand. How strange to think of something like that at a time like this. I glanced at Alpheth to see if she had noticed my distraction. She appeared not to have caught on. Good.

Everyone in the room once again fell to chattering about the plans that we had just made. Faramir would depart at first light and move as quickly as possible towards Osgiliath and there cross the Great River and make for Minas Tirith. A last defense against hopeless odds. Yet, with Frodo’s ascent this far North perhaps the Great Eye would not notice such audacity and not see that the Ring was so close to him, right under his nose in fact. It was Faramir once again who called order and addressed an issue that everyone else seemed to have overlooked, that of Smeagol’s cooperation. “Smeagol, will you guide these people over the mountains behind us? Will you remain loyal to your master?”

Smeagol was hunkered in a corner of the room eating a fish he had just plucked from the stream that ran close by. “Yes, yes. Smeagol guides hobbitses and nice elveses over the mountains. Smeagol can climb better than anyone!” His manner reflected both genuine pride at being so honored  and the ever present sarcasm that was a basic part of his wretched personality. “Smeagol always helps. Smeagol always helps.” Faramir scowled at him and made an oath under his breath.

“If you truly wish to trust your fate to this creature, then so be it. If it were not for the integrity and wisdom of Lady Alpheth that I have so many times learned to rely on, I would regard this plan as sheer folly!” Faramir looked straight at Alpheth as he said this and she looked straight back at him. They obviously knew each other well. A molecule of jealousy arose like a bubble in my mind and vanished just as quickly. No time for such things. Think of what lies ahead.

The rest of the evening most of us slept. Only Alpheth and I and two Gondorian guards remained awake. Even Smeagol slept, his belly now being quite full of freshly caught fish. He still had scales on his face.

Before dawn we all rose and prepared for our various departures. Faramir gifted us with additional water skins which we knew we would need and also gave us some hard cheese and dried meats to sustain us on our climb. I managed to find several pieces of wood which I hoped would serve as climbing aids and folded these into my pack. Sam made the hard decisions to leave behind various cooking utensils that we knew would no longer be needed where we would soon be going. For him it was like leaving behind part of his past. One of Faramir’s men who had once been a cook took pity upon the hobbit and promised that if ever this horrible war was won, he would return here to Henneth Annûn, retrieve Sam’s cooking utensils and pots, and somehow send them to him. It was a promise of great kindness that served it’s purpose for it brought a smile of gratitude to Sam’s face, yet both Sam and the soldier tried unsuccessfully to look away from the unlikelihood that this promise would ever be fulfilled.

Soon it was time. Faramir summoned his men to form a long line and took the lead. With a wave back towards us he turned and began to run. At once all his men followed. As they rounded the first bend in the road and passed out of sight, we heard a loud “Fare thee well!” shouted in unison from the brave throats of those who now ran to what would probably be their last battle. Smeagol waved a frantic goodbye as the last man passed out of view. He was mocking, of course, but the rest of us paid it little notice. All except, Sam, that is. Sam eyed Smeagol as might a hawk eye another hawk.

We began our ascent by following Faramir’s advice and taking a short staircase carved into the rock that lead upwards to a lookout. From there we followed a stoney path to the actual face of the mountain and there stood for a moment looking upwards at what task lay ahead. The rock was almost black. Probably basalt, I thought, regular and strong enough, yet often smooth and difficult to gain a purchase on. This analysis soon proved correct as we at last began to climb, and within less that fifteen minutes we broke out the ropes. I instructed everyone how to tie themselves together and then took the lead, followed by Smeagol, then Frodo, Sam, and Alpheth last. It was not so difficult yet that Smeagol needed to go first and I wanted to teach the others some basics of climbing before we got into serious trouble. Always keeping three points of contact on the rock, never overreaching past the point of no return, and not looking down if it bothered you. Using leg muscles whenever possible to propel one’s weight upwards and relaxing as often as opportunity allowed, not wishing for muscles to remain tense any longer than was necessary.

I struck a fairly straight line upwards, veering to one side or the other only when holds were too sparse for the hobbits’ shorter reach. I would climb for perhaps twenty or thirty feet, set a piece of wood into a crack so that it could not fall loose, and then send the rope behind it. I would then call for the others to follow, each removing the blocks of wood and replacing them as they passed, with Alpheth removing them permanently as she brought up the rear. There were places, of course, where none of the several blocks fit, and here I was forced to ascend without placing safety stops for as much as seventy feet at a time. If one of us fell on such a leg we would likely all peel off and plunge to our doom. I did not mention this to anyone although I knew that Alpheth would understand the inherent danger in what we were doing. The hobbits seemed to just accept that the whole thing was dangerous yet they both took to it surprisingly well and I was most impressed at their attention to detail and focus on the tips I gave them. We climbed thusly for nearly two hours before reaching a narrow ledge upon which we rested and gazed out across the expanse to the West. Dark storm clouds roiled above us and I fretted that we would be caught on the rock face by a sudden deluge or wind and rain.

The next leg was at first no more easy nor was it any more difficult. The black basalt yielded sufficient holds to allow us another two hours of ascent before the rock became so smooth in places that I needed to constantly retrace my tracks for five or ten minutes while the others waited and I sought a different approach. At last we attained a broader ledge and rested for lunch. Despite the long journey ahead of us I insisted that everyone eat a hearty meal. Climbing burned a lot of calories and we would need all the strength our bodies could produce before this day was done. The rock above us now was far more difficult than that which we had just traversed. I looked out towards the Anduin, partially obscured by mist, and wondered if I would end my short life in this world on this high precipice or perhaps under the lash of some evil orc guard if our mission failed. Smeagol crawled up to me and whispered so as not to let the others hear.

“Will Smeagol go first now? Smeagol can climb anyyyyyything!”

“Yes”, my friend, “you shall go first after we have rested. You are indeed the best climber I have ever seen, and I have seen some great ones. You would be marveled at in my world.”

He beamed up at me with all the wonder of a child on Christmas morning catching the first glimpse of his stocking. I pitied him so and would do my level best to follow the instructions given me by Galadriel.

“Can Smeagol find fish? Smeagol cannot eats hobbitses food or elveses food.”

I had not the heart to tell him that there would be no fish up here and only cautioned him not to search far. We would leave again in half an hour. When it came down to it, I knew he would eat some of the dried meat we carried with us. I would not let him starve.

Twenty minutes later Smeagol was again at my side and in his mouth a tiny fish, still wriggling. In his left had were several more. These were perhaps only four inches long and no bigger around than my thumb. I stared in wonder as he held one of his catch out to me. “Ithriel likes nice fish?”

“Uh, … no. No thank you, Smeagol, that is very kind of you, but I have eaten. You eat them.”

“Can Ithriel makes sooooshi?”

“No, Smeagol, I would need too many other things that we don’t have here.” I laughed a little at his innocence but was still more impressed that he had found fish up here on this mountainside. The hobbits appeared not to have noticed and Alpheth was busy inspecting the coils of rope. “Smeagol, can you show me where you found your fish?”

His smile was infectious despite his pitiful appearance. “Yes, yes, Smeagol will show the nice elf lady where he finds fishes. Come, follow me. Follow me.”

I quickly explained to the others that I would be right back and followed Smeagol along the ledge and around a corner. There the ledge narrowed to less than a foot and turned another corner where it broadened once more and then darted behind a tiny waterfall. Water! A last chance to fill our skins to the brim. I had not expected to see fresh water again for a long time. This then must be the source of the stream which flows into and through “The Window on the West”. Smeagol vanished behind the waterfall and I pursued. Dashing after Smeagol, I climbed a narrow stairway tunnel carved into the black rock which ended suddenly, to my utter astonishment, in a large room through which ran the sparkling stream as it leapt over the edge, producing the waterfall outside. This had been made not by orcs, not by men, but by elves. The architecture of the carving was unmistakeable. In the center of the room was a small pool perhaps ten feet across, the source of Smeagol’s fish. This pool was fed by a stream issuing forth from the far wall where the water sped out of a hole no bigger than a fist could fit through. A tiny fish swam back up against the current and vanished into the wall and so escaped the grasp of Smeagol who was now in the middle of the pool hungrily hunting for more food. Urging Smeagol to wait, I returned to the others and bade them bring all the gear and follow.

No sooner had we all arrived at the room in the rock than a sudden cloudburst sent forth hail and heavy rain. There would be no climbing in this deluge and we were all extremely grateful to have found such shelter. One and all we thanked Smeagol who puffed himself up so with grandeur that we all howled with laughter. He seemed to understand that we were making fun of him but also knew that we were truly grateful and meant him no harm. Could such a creature as this ever be able to relax and know true happiness again after being poisoned by the Ring for so long? I intended to find out. As the storm outside raged Alpheth set about exploring our new confines.

The room was actually three rooms, each joined by a small passageway of less height and width than a conventional doorway for an elf yet adequate enough to not necessitate bending as one passed. These passages were no more than thirty feet in length. Each of the three rooms, of which the one we were now in with the pool was the first, had one small window carved out onto the cliff face and set with squares and diamonds of glass in leaded cane. In the third room was a door around which were carvings in Quenya. Alpheth read these aloud to us in the dim light. “Here lies the last home of Corulin, the Eyes of the Queen, who looks upon Darkenss, who prays for Hope.”

“Who was she?” asked Frodo.

“I am not sure”, replied Alpheth, “She appears to have been stationed here a very long time ago to act as an observer for someone.”

“For Galadriel?” asked Frodo.

“No, I don’t think so. This language is very old and Galadriel never spoke of such a person living here. I think Corulin may have lived here during the First Age of even before, before Sauron became Morgoth’s lieutenant and established the realm of Mordor. There were once other darknesses here long before Sauron arrived.” Alpheth fell silent and looked to be a little drained from recalling that which she just spoke of.

“Can we go in there?”, asked Sam. “Is it a way through the mountains?”

Alpheth tried every spell and incantation she could think of in all of the many languages she spoke, but the door would not yield. Frodo and I looked for signs of a lock or handle but there was none. I even tried the riddle approach that I had read about in which Gandalf spoke “friend” and entered into Moria. After many minutes Alpheth stopped. “I don’t think this is a passage through the mountains, Sam. I think it’s Corulin’s tomb.” Alpheth spoke this almost as a whisper.

“Smeagol, NO!”, cried Frodo.

We all spun to look as Smeagol pushed at the center of the door with his dripping hand. It was not the push that worked the magic that now unfolded, it was the water on his hand from the pool. Without knowing it he had solved a puzzle it would have taken the rest of us ages to figure out. And, did we want this door to open at all?

Too late to stop Smeagol, we stared aghast as he entered. “Come hobbitses and elveses. It’s just another room, sillies. Come see the pretty glass things!”

Cautiously Alpheth entered, followed by myself. I bade the others wait.

This room was tiny, less than ten feet from side to side and not more than fifteen feet long. There were no other exits save the one we had just come through and no window. Only a little light from the other room made it’s way in here. The room contained at it’s center a circular structure which looked like a crypt with an ornately decorated lid. All around the edge of the crypt were tiny glass phials, seemingly empty. On the far wall hung a piece of cloth, perhaps a banner of some kind, it’s colors long ago faded and now impossible to see. Nothing else adorned this enclosure. The air was heavy and dry. This room had been sealed for a very long time, perhaps over seven thousand years if Alpheth’s theory was correct.

Sam poked his head through the door and remarked, “What are all those little bottles for?”

“I don’t know, Sam”, I replied. Alpheth concurred and we all exited the room and returned to the first room with the pool. Smeagol fell to hunting for fish again but they had all vanished into the hole in the rock from whence the stream issued. We had been unable to completely close the door to Corulin’s tomb, only succeeding in pulling it so that it was now ajar. It did not seem right to us to leave it open. Outside the storm raged with renewed ferocity and it soon became apparent that we would be forced to stay here at least until tomorrow. This did not sit well with any of us save Smeagol, who seemed more relaxed than at any time I had seen him. For over a day now he had not once showed interest in what hung from Frodo’s neck. In fact, Frodo himself appeared to have almost forgotten his burden, not clenching it at all as he sat there in the growing gloom.

As we sat in silence I tried to console myself with the fact that this rest would do us all good because the climb ahead of us would be truly difficult, especially on Frodo and Sam. We must get the Ring to Mount Doom before Sauron’s main army attacks Minas Tirith! We must press on in the morning no matter what the weather. I began to doubt the wisdom, let alone the possibility, of this plan, and I attempted to distract myself from these negative thoughts by imagining what Corulin had been like and what kind of life she knew in this lonely place. Had she been exposed to some terrible malice like the One Ring we now sought to destroy? Had living here under the nose of evil been a burden that scarred her soul the way the Ring scarred Smeagol? During these musings my mind eventually fell to the little glass phials surrounding her crypt.

And then an idea hit me!

I jumped up and ran back through the other two rooms and into the crypt. There I picked up one of the little phials which was less in line than the others, sticking out as it were and appearing to not have had room to join it’s brothers and sisters at their posts. I ran back out and through the next room. Behind me I heard a huge thud, turned around and ran back. Alpheth soon joined me as we stared in shock at the door to the tomb as it now lay tightly closed again. I had not pulled it shut in my haste. It must have closed on it’s own or by some spell.

“Why do you clutch that phial and why did you take it?” she asked.

“I’ll show you”, I answered, and made my back to the first room.

“Sam”, I asked as I roused him from the beginnings of sleep, “can you make us a little fire? You can use one of the pieces of wood I have been using to aid out climbing.”

“Uh, … sure. I can make a little fire with one of those. I guess in here no one from outside could ever see. What do we need a fire for, least of all such a small one?”

“I’ll explain as we go along, Sam. If I’m right I may be able to help Frodo make his burden a bit lighter.” And with that I set to prying the glass stopper carefully from the phial as Sam got started with tinder and flint to kindle a fire big enough to boil a cup of tea yet little else. “Do you still have any of your pots left?” I asked Sam.

“Just one small one. All the others are down there at the bottom in that hidden place of the men.”

“Good”, I said. “One small pot is all I need.”

“What are you up to?”, queried Alpheth as she stood next to me. The heat of her body was delicious and for an instant I wished that I could embrace her. I relaxed my galloping mind and let such thoughts vanish back into the ether from whence they came. Again she had appeared not to notice.

As Sam’s fire leapt to life I began to explain my idea. The Ring not only made the wearer invisible, it also poisoned and corrupted the heart. In addition to that it prolonged life in a most unnatural way. I offered the examples of Bilbo and Smeagol as proof.

Into Sam’s small post I put some water from the pool and brought it to a boil. I then slowly lowered the now open glass phial into the cool water of the pool, being careful not to totally submerge it, thus keeping the inside quite dry.

“Frodo, if you would be so kind as to oblige me in a little experiment. Please take the Ring and dangle it from it’s chain right here”, and indicated a place between the little fire and the pool. Frodo complied, though somewhat reluctantly. Smeagol’s eyes were drawn to the Ring like a moth to the flame and both Alpheth and Sam moved themselves between him and his object of focus, still allowing him to see but blocking him from moving closer.

I now withdrew the cool phial from the pool and into it drizzled a few drops of boiling water from Sam’s tiny pot. Instantly the hot liquid emitted vapor as it struck the cool glass and thus the little bottle filled with mist. I now held it close to the Ring hanging from the chain in Frodo’s shaking hand.

There through the mist could be clearly seen tiny trails moving from the direction of the Ring. Little paths in the fog. All eyes stared in amazement.

“Now, Frodo, if you will hold the Ring between you thumb and forefinger. Don’t put it on! Just hold it. Do you understand?”

Frodo nodded and did as I asked. Immediately the tiny trails through the mist in the phial increased tenfold in number, then twentyfold, then thirty. “Alright, Frodo. You can put it away now. I know what I need to.”

I then briefly explained how certain poison metals from my world could be detected this way by holding them next to a glass container full of fog. The nature of these poison metals was called “radioactivity”. Particles flew off these metals and would leave tiny visible wakes through fog. The particles were too small themselves to be seen but the wakes through the fog were visible with the naked eye.

“So what good does this do us, knowing that the Ring can make little trails of fog in a bottle?” Sam’s question was a legitimate one and probably upon the minds of everyone in that room save me. Even Smeagol was intensely curious to know why I had done what I had just done.

I walked over to the window and smashed my fist through it. This drew gasps and confusion from all and a freighted shriek from Smeagol. I quickly apologized for startling them as I withdrew the lead cane from the opening, shaking out the last bits of glass. I poured out the water from Sam’s pot and put in the bits of lead. “They had held that window together for untold ages and now they will hopefully make a shield of sorts”, I explained as I stoked the fire and blew upon it to increase the heat. It wasn’t working. I could not get the fire hot enough with just wood as a fuel. Alpheth understood what I needed to do and bid me step away.

The golden haired elf raised her hands high above her head, spoke three long words in a tongue I did not even slightly recognize, and then brought her hands down like crashing hammers to within inches of the pot. There was a flash of blueish light and the lead inside the pot became molten. I stepped forward and fetched the pot from the flames, it’s sides now glowing red, and poured the hot metal within onto a flat rock next to the pool. I then set about beating it with a smooth stone and soon had formed a piece of crude lead foil about an eighth of an inch thick. When it cooled I trimmed it with my knife into a square about three inches on each side.

I now repeated the same experiment as before with the phial and the Ring. This time, as the trails through the fog became visible, I slipped the piece of lead between the Ring and the phial. Instantly the fog trails stopped. When Frodo held the Ring and the trails were frantic and many, a few particles slipped through the lead and made their presence known in the mist, but far fewer even than with the Ring not being held and no lead in the way.

Finally, I asked Frodo to wrap the Ring in the lead foil and once again hang it from his neck. The result was all I had hoped for.

“I can feel the added weight from the lead, ……… but the Ring itself feels less heavy. It’s hard to explain. It’s as if it is a bit further away now.” Frodo smiled nervously at me and then at Alpheth. I smiled back but Alpheth seemed quite agitated.

“Alpheth, what’s wrong?” I asked.

“Come with me!” she said and grabbed me by the arm. The contact did nothing to warm me and everything to chill me. We went outside into the howling rain so as not to be heard by the others. There she bent close to my ear and spoke words which will haunt me to the end of my days.

“If we do not destroy this ring before Sauron reaches Minas Tirith, then there will be many more …………. “ Her words trailed off in abject horror. “I now know what else Sauron seeks and must race with all my being to find it first and hide it till it can be safely destroyed. Please help me, Ithriel! Please help me do this if you can!”

I was bound to serve the quest set before me by Lady Galadriel and return Smeagol to Lothlorien after the Ring was destroyed. “How can I accompany you? How can I abandon Frodo, Sam, and …….. Smeagol?”

The color returned to Alpheth’s cheeks and she managed a smile. Sakes alive, she was beautiful! “You need not accompany me to help me”, she said. “To help me as only you can, … you need to ….” A flash of lightening and a crack of thunder drowned out her last words, but I understood. In the sudden brilliance I gazed deep into her eyes and she deep into mine. She had known. She had known along along how I felt about her, probably long before I knew myself. How I prayed in that instant that we could be together in safety and comfort and not thrust into some terrible task such as the one we were now on! She read my thoughts and kissed me, not on the lips for I surely would have fainted, but on the cheek, and in that instant I knew the fork in the path that lay before us. She would leave now for Minas Tirith and I would continue into Mordor. Had Corulin done this once before?

*********************************************************************

Chapter Four:

“Moving Apart”

The storm broke as dawn tried to make it’s presence known through the gathering gloom that crept over the mountains above us from the East. The hobbits and Smeagol were actually anxious to continue the climb and this surprised me a bit. Alpheth was nowhere to be seen and for a moment I feared she had slipped away without saying goodbye. Then, for some reason I cannot clearly explain, I felt that I should check the crypt room again. Sure enough, there she was. She had opened the door with a few drops of water from the pool and now stood inspecting the circular crypt again, this time with the aid of a small phial of light that I recognized as the gift Galadriel had given to Frodo when he departed Lothlorien. Alpheth took no notice of me at first but then invited me to come closer and look at the lid of the crypt and the writing upon it.

The lettering was in Quenya, just like the writing on the outside of the entryway into this tiny room. These letters, however, had not been visible until now when the light from the Phial of Galadriel shone upon them. The writing glowed mysteriously almost as if lit from within. “What does it say? Can you decipher it?” I asked these questions in a whisper, feeling it would be wrong to speak out loud in the tomb of this ancient guardian.

“I can easily translate what the words say, but to translate their true meaning is at this point beyond me. It may be a riddle or it may refer to something that is no longer part of this world. I just don’t know. Early this morning I had a vision of this room and the lettering on the lid of the crypt. I had no idea how to make the writing visible and simply asked to borrow Frodo’s phial because it is a convenient source of light. Clearly this writing was intended to be seen only in the light of the Star of Elendil, which the phial contains. If my theory is correct regarding the age of this place then Elendil would not have yet been set in the heavens with the Silmaril bound to his brow. The Silmarils would not even have been created by Feanor when this crypt was made. There is a mystery here. This writing is clearly intended to be visible only under that specific light, yet that specific light did not exist when this room was constructed.” Alpheth brushed her hair back as she said this, revealing a tiny silver ear ring I had not noticed before. It was a silver star with seven points inside a circle.

“The words written here are as follows”, said Alpheth, and as she now spoke them aloud she seemed to enter a state of distant reverie and I listened as if in a dream. “REST HERE AND PASS FROM THIS WORLD. DREAM HERE AND REMAIN FOREVER IN IT. AWAKEN HERE IN STARLIGHT AND THE GREAT JOURNEY WILL BEGIN AGAIN.”

There was no time to contemplate the meaning of these words further, at least not in this place. We had to be on our respective ways and each knew that time was of the essence. Alpheth had been able to discern one thing with certainty and that was how to close the door. She had tested this a few moments before I had arrived. One simply had to take one of the small glass phials from the room and the door would close a moment later. I was invited to try for myself and picked up one of the tiny bottles as we exited. Sure enough the door moved silently closed and so remained until the next person should approach and sprinkle water from the pool upon it.

We joined the others in the first room and made our final preparations to depart. I ached so at the thought of being separated from Alpheth but we each knew what we had to do and there was no stopping it. It suddenly occurred to me that she would have great difficulty descending the cliffs that we had climbed the day before. We could not spare enough rope if we wished to continue our ascent and she could not spare the rope if she wished to descend. I stood close to her so that the others might not hear and made these concerns known. It was then that I witnessed something both terrible and wonderful which will shake me in my memories whenever I recall it. She bent close to my ear and whispered, “I am about to trust in a magic that I have never tested. Galadriel gave me a special gift long ago and told me that one day I would know when to use it. Today is that day.” Her warm breath against my ear was almost more than I could stand and I was afraid that the others would notice how much I wanted to kiss her. Before I could correct my posture so as to appear less interested in this beautiful golden haired lady, and before any of us could speak in protest, she held forth in her hands a tiny blue feather. It glowed even in the light of day. Stepping to the edge of the cliff and holding the feather before her she stepped into the ether.

“Alpheth!”, I screamed, and rushed to catch her, but it was too late. Frodo and Sam had been standing further away but they too now bolted to the edge of the precipice, staring down in shock and amazement at Alpheth’s plummeting body. Smeagol shrank against the wall of the cliff and tried to look away, an expression of terrified despair upon his face. My heart rose to my throat and I felt that I could not breathe. Why? Why had she done this? And in that instant of frozen in fear I began to think about who this person really was. I’m sure you have heard it said, or perhaps felt it yourself, that one’s life flashes before one as one is about to die. Well now her life was flashing before me and I realized that she would not have done something to bring about her own destruction, but instead must have a plan. These thoughts were too quick in succession to comfort me, but what I saw next as I continued to stare down the face of the cliff relieved me in a way that I can only describe as glorious.

Alpheth was still falling, yet far more slowly than before. It actually appeared as if she was falling in slow motion, ….. and then, ….. in a manner that I must call truly miraculous, she began to move outwards from the cliff. More and more slowly she fell and further and further outward from the rock she moved. She was flying!

I cannot say how long this entire process took but I will guess here that it was no more than a minute from the time she stepped off the ledge to the time she came gently to rest upon the road far below. To say that we were dumbfounded as we looked down upon her would have been the greatest of understatements. Seeing our astonishment and noticing our lack of anguish, Smeagol crept to the edge and looked down. It was only then that Alpheth turned her gaze upward. Though the distance was great I somehow knew that she was smiling and I unconsciously smiled back. In the next instant she turned away and began to run like the wind, South along the road which would lead her to Minas Tirith. She appeared to glide as much as she appeared to run and in a few seconds she had disappeared around the corner. A small bend in the road was visible further on and to this I now devoted my attention. Sure enough, several seconds later she appeared there and then vanished beyond the next turn. She was gone, and my joy at realizing she was alive was greatly tempered by my sadness at realizing she was moving further away.

It’s funny how the mind can mix together thoughts so different from each other in times of great emotion. Although my heart ached like it had never ached before I was also fully aware of what now must be done and so turned my attention again to the seemingly impossible climb ahead of us. I gave the order to rope ourselves together and the others quickly complied. Smeagol took the lead and began moving straight up the rock face above us with his very unnatural gate, for which I was extremely thankful. I would have covered the same span of rock in about twenty minutes but he had just done it in less than one. He set a safety block and moved on, soon set a second, and then a third. Once he had secured himself in a good position to hold he signaled for us to follow. Frodo went next, followed by Sam, and I now took up the rear. It was doubtful that I could successfully catch one of the hobbits if they fell but my position at the end of the rope gave them a sense of security and moral support. In a situation such as this, when all hope seems so very far away, such securities, unrealistic as they may be, would seem to be as valuable as any solid stairway.

And thus we proceeded, seventy to one hundred feet at a time, until at midday we had reached the bottom of the last stretch of sheer cliff. Above that the rock began to slope slowly inwards, creating a positive angle of perhaps fifteen degrees. It would be much easier going from that point onwards, or so we hoped. We had ascended a vertical distance a perhaps three thousand feet above the valley floor. We stopped on a narrow ledge and rested while we ate from our provisions. In less than half an hour we were on our way again, up the last stretch of cliff face. The rock here was almost as smooth as glass and we marveled that Smeagol was able to scale it. His hands and feet seemed almost to stick to the featureless basalt as if coated with a glue. At one point Sam remarked under his breath that  because Smeagol was so filthy his hands were sticky and that was how he was able to accomplish this. Sam immediately took back his comment and freely admitted that we would never have gotten this far but for the aid of this unhappy creature. We overcame this last obstacle of sheer cliff in a little over an hour and were soon sitting on the broadest ledge of our ascent so far, some thirty feet wide in places. Here we took a proper rest and consumed a bit more food than might have been prudent under our present system of rationing, yet I felt it was more important to reward our efforts to this point than to adhere to any kind of strictness.

We have been lucky so far in that and no strong winds had buffeted us as we ascended except for last night when we sheltered in the room with the pool. Above us now I could hear the screams of the air tearing through the jagged rocks and I knew that although the angle we would have to negotiate would be far easier, the weather we would have to contend with would be far worse. Advising the hobbits to put on warmer clothing with their elven cloaks on top, we moved upwards once more. This time I took the lead, and even though we were still roped together we could now walk more than climb as the slope continued to diminish, until at last it was no more than forty five degrees. The cold wind howled around us and bit into our faces with tiny pieces of grit which stung like fire. We squinted our lids to protect our eyes and eventually I called us to a halt so that I could address this growing problem of visibility. It was not exactly a sandstorm, but the blowing volcanic ash was making it increasingly difficult to see. From my pack I withdrew four pieces of wide silk ribbon, selected from among Faramir’s stores for just this purpose. With my knife I cut two narrow slits into each piece of cloth and showed the hobbits how to tie it over their eyes so that they could peer through the cracks and still be able to see where they were going. Smeagol steadfastly refused to don his piece of cloth until Frodo commanded him to do so, and once he determined that the cloth had not been made by elves he grew more calm cooperative. In front of us now lay perhaps a mile of jagged windswept chaos. Into this maelstrom of blowing ash we now walked.

The sky had become so dark that it was difficult to determine the time of day but I guessed it to be mid afternoon when we reached the divide, the crest of this mountain chain which marked Ithilien on the West and Mordor on the East. Hear the wind screeched around us with near hurricane force and I feared that if we had not been roped together the hobbits would have been blown right off the face of the mountain. I immediately ordered our descent, having to use sign language, as all verbal communication was now quite impossible in the presence of his roaring tempest. We were all quite relieved to find the slope on the Mordor side to be no more difficult than that which we had just traversed. The only difference here was that the rocks had been blasted smooth by the wind and were less jagged. I knew from accounts given me by both Faramir and Alpheth that further South these high winds were less common, but our need to cross the mountains here had outweighed any such considerations of inclement weather. Within two hours we had descended far enough so that the wind was now mostly above us. In another hour we were low enough so that the raging storm only troubled us with the occasional gust, and these were thankfully free of ash. The slope became increasingly steeper from this point on but never again turned into sheer cliff as I had feared it might. We remained roped together for safety’s sake but no longer found it necessary for one person to lower another. When true nightfall came we were all feeling exhausted yet we had come an even greater distance than I had hoped for and were now less than two miles from the level ground of the Plain of Gorgoroth.

Through the haze and the darkness we could all see that which we most feared, the great fiery eye of Sauron atop the Barad-dur and the red surges from the peak of Mount Doom. Tomorrow we would push forth across the inner fence of Mordor, the Morgai valley. Compared to the terrain we had just negotiated this would be easy. Beyond that lay mostly open ground punctuated mainly with pits and boulders and heaps of smoking slag. It was perhaps fifty miles from our present position to the slopes of the volcano and this distance I hoped to cover in less than two days. The air here was stinking with fumes of sulfur and rot and we all felt it difficult to breathe. This destroyed what little appetite we had yet I insisted that everyone eat something and drink water. As I have previously suspected, Smeagol ate a bit of the dried meat we had been given by the Men of the West. What I had not suspected was that he did not complain about this food in the least. His attention seemed more focused more upon our geographical goal than our present location and I would gladly take this distraction. Far better that our attention be spent on what lay ahead of us than on what hung from Frodo’s neck. I had feared that as we grew closer and closer to the mountain of fire the effect of the Ring would increase its influence over both Frodo and Smeagol. While this was true in some respects it was still less than I had expected. Frodo was agitated and fitful in his sleep, yet sleep he actually did. Smeagol also slept, though he frequently called out for “Precious”, pawing the air in front of him as if he was trying to catch hold of it. Sam seemed to sleep like a rock.

No light of morning came, only the sensation that a certain amount of time had passed and it was now no longer night. We all drank from our water skins but found it too difficult to eat anything, so putrid was the atmosphere around us. A greasy film had formed on our clothing and exposed skin, residue from the pollution all around us. It itched and burned. It was all we could do to keep from retching. We set off down the last slopes of the mountains and were soon picking our way through the narrow valley of gray ash and boulders. This we crossed quickly and without incident. Ahead of us now lay a vast expanse of choking dust, torn rocks, and festering pits of bubbling filth. Our eyes burned and our throats ached. We all experienced dizziness and shortness of breath. There seemed to be less oxygen here and I felt certain that much of what we were taking into our lungs was quite poisonous. Still, my main concern was not the air or the land we were passing through but who else might be here. By the end of the day we came to a great road which ran roughly North-South, linking the Black Gate to our left with the majority of Mordor to our right. We had traveled well and covered at least thirty miles. I now consulted the others and asked them if they wished to continue on or rest awhile before we crossed the road. We were currently in a good place to stop as we enjoyed cover from a group of large boulders which we now hid in the middle of. It would be difficult for anyone to spot us here from the ground or from above.

While Sam and Smeagol were in favor of resting a while, Frodo felt it was more important to press on. He was the Ringbearer and the decision was his and I was happy to see that the others accepted his judgment. I wish I could have been as glad, for I noticed in Frodo now the beginnings of madness. It was nothing very obvious, more small signs that his mind was moving away from that which we call sanity and approaching that which is far from it. He was twitching slightly and muttering softly to himself. I could see that Sam was very concerned for he kept offering Frodo some water or a bit of food and asking if there was anything he could do to help. To these offers Frodo would politely thank Sam but accept nothing, saying he was fine. I felt that Frodo was doing this more to ease Sam’s worries than to give a true account of his condition. Not wanting to discourage the momentum towards our goal, I gave the word for us to continue. The road was empty in both directions, yet there was obvious sign that many feet had passed this way not long ago. I went first by myself to the other side and then waited for a few minutes to determine if I had been spotted. I had not. Signaling the others to join me, we once more resumed our march towards the mountain of dread that lay before us. It was then that I noticed what I had feared most in Smeagol.

“Precious, we mustn’t let them do it. We must stop them, Precious.” He was wringing his hands and convulsing his chest as he said this over and over again. In between his words were interspersed that guttural sound which had resulted in his nickname, “Gollum”. I walked up beside him and tried to put my hand upon his shoulder to comfort him but he batted it away and growled at me like a rabid dog. “We must save the Precious! We must take the Precious away and keep it safe! We mustn’t let Him have it! They want to give it to HIM!” And with this last exclamation he turned and lunged towards Frodo. In the blink of an eye the point of Sam’s sword was at Smeagol’s throat as Frodo struggled to remove the fingers that clutched at his neck. Of all the places for this to happen this was the worst. We were out in the open and completely exposed. I feared that this commotion would draw the attention that we most wished to avoid. Stealthily approaching from behind I thrust my arms underneath the armpits of Smeagol and brought my hands up behind his neck and interlocked my fingers. Stepping backwards I pulled him away from Frodo and Sam and tried my best to comfort him back into calmness. The power of the Ring was at last too much for Smeagol to bear and his mind snapped. Try as I might I could not quiet him.

“Frodo, Sam, you must continue now as fast as you can and throw it into the fire. I cannot hold him and accompany you at the same time. I will do my best to restrain him and follow you as I can, but you must go on ahead or all will surely be lost.” I looked straight into their eyes as I said this and could see that they each understood, though they were most reluctant to do as I had instructed. With many miles ahead of them there was no time to lose. Through the haze and smoke of this foul land could be seen the red beam of light striking outward from the top of the Barad-dur, the fortress of  Sauron. His attention was focused to the Southwest and away from us, and for a moment I tried to visualize his massive army moving over the pass at Cirith Ungol, down through the Morgul Vale, and across the river towards Minas Tirith. I said a prayer that Alpheth would be successful in reaching the White City before the army of darkness.

Frodo and Sam turned and ran in the direction of Mount Doom and I held onto the writhing Smeagol with every ounce of determination I had. His madness for the Ring head given him great strength and it was all I could do to keep him from slipping out of my grasp. With his heels he was kicking hard at my legs and knees and I knew that I could not long endure this assault. I had to find a way to restrain him and I had to find it quickly. Turning so that I was between him and the two departing hobbits, I let him go. Just as I had hoped, he spun around and tried to chase them, and in that instant I hit him square on the jaw with my right elbow. He slumped to the ground in unconsciousness and I quickly acted to bind him. Knowing that elven rope would burn him terribly I instead used the silk goggles that had protected us from the blowing ash. First I bound his hands behind his back and then his ankles. Lastly I tied his bound hands to his bound ankles and with the final piece of silk I gagged him. He began to stir.

“Smeagol, I am so sorry to have tied you up. I promise that I will untie you soon. I will not hurt you. I’m trying to help you. Please don’t struggle. Please let me help you.”

Through the silken gag he shrieked in terror as loudly as he could, over and over again, his eyes frantic with unnamable horror. His fear was overwhelming and his madness complete. No amount of soothing words from me were going to do any good. I picked him up like a sack of potatoes and slung him across my shoulder and began to walk after Frodo and Sam, who had by now moved out of sight. As they ran, I walked, and in so doing the distance between us increased. This was my intention. I had to trust now that in this world the outcome for the One Ring would be the same as in the world described by the books I had read. As I walked I prayed that Frodo would be successful and not give in to the madness himself. I prayed that Sam would be right there to help them in his hour of greatest need. As I had hoped, the direction of my travel seemed to somewhat decrease the struggles of the sad creature on my shoulder. If I had moved away from the Ring he would likely have struggled more viciously. I was now extremely grateful that no one had seen us and that the land in front of us appeared to be empty of any living souls. For hours and hours I walked in this manner and during this entire time Smeagol did not once cease his attempts to writhe loose and escape, but the silk was strong and I had tied the knots well. My arms and shoulders ached from carrying the wild thing.

Every once in a while I would catch far sight of Frodo and Sam as they crossed a bit of open ground. They were making good speed and I estimated that they would reach the mountain in less than four hours. If I continued at my pace I would catch up with them in perhaps seven. By then, of course, I was counting on the Ring being destroyed and there no longer being any danger of it falling into the hands of the Dark Lord. As my shoulders burned and the minutes melted away into hours and the hours passed with the agonizing slowness of centuries, I found myself thinking now and again of Alpheth. It did my heart good to allow her into my thoughts in this time of greatest struggle. How I wish she was here to either help carry Smeagol or help guide Frodo and Sam. But wishing for what was not was a waste of time and I knew this. Better to except what is and make the best of it. It was now probably night in parts of the world not overshadowed by this disgusting gloom. I prayed as I walked for this quest to succeed and all the lands of free peoples to enjoy peace once more. I thought of Galadriel in Lothlorien and of Thranduil in the Great Forest. I thought of the men of Gondor. My arms and legs burned like fire. My throat was parched and the pain in my eyes from the increasing fumes was screaming agony. I drove myself now with sheer will alone, for any strength of my body had now surely evaporated. One foot fell in front of the other like dumb clumps of mud. I could not feel them and for a moment found it funny that because of this I might trip and fall flat on my face with the struggling Smeagol on top of me. How strange some of the thoughts that arise under stress. Stranger still are some of the thoughts that arise when one is at that the very limit of holding on to final hope, that the last spark of all that is good that seems about to be snuffed out forever by infinite blackness.

And I did trip and fall forward flat on my face with the struggling Smeagol on top of me, but I did not fall because I had misplaced my feet. I fell because the ground shook so hard that I could no longer keep my balance. Struggling to rise and regain control of the poor creature who lay screaming through his gag, I turned my gaze for a moment towards the mountain. The foul gloom was lit with a blinding flash of crimson flame that shot forth from the summit straight towards the heavens, a hand from hell reaching desperately for the peace of the stars. The ascent of the flame slowed and began to fall back just as another flame erupted. The ground shook again and I fell to my knees. He had done it! Frodo had cast of the Ring into the fire and the explosions of the mountain where the death throes of the great evil passing into emptiness.

Smeagol grew suddenly quiet and then began to weep as might a child who has skinned its knee. “If I untie you will you not struggle anymore?”

He turned his eyes to look at me and in his hopeless gaze I saw that all the fight had left him. I quickly untied the knots that bound him and he still laid there as if chained and weighted. Lastly I removed the gag so that he might whimper freely. This he did in such a pitiful manner that I was moved to tears myself and I sat beside him and petted his clammy head as I hummed gently to soothe him. Eventually he fell into a far-off stare and his breathing became slow and very shallow. I was keenly aware at this point of what Galadriel had told me to do and I dared not tarry here any longer, feeling that he might wither completely and die before I could reach Lorien. The ground continued to shake as the mountain continued to belch forth fire and ash and I was glad that the prevailing winds were blowing away from us. As gently as I could I picked up Smeagol and began walking once more towards the mountain. My concern now was to find Frodo and Sam and then hopefully we could together exit this tortured land. I knew again that events here were in no way destined to unfold as they had in the book and so held little hope that the Eagles would suddenly appear and fly us to safety. Just as I thought this I looked up ahead of me to see for huge sets of wings approaching. There in the gentle clutches of one set of talons was Frodo Baggins and in another set of talons was Samwise Gamgee. They both appeared to be fine and were shouting joyously to me as I wept in glad thanks.

As the two eagles which carried Frodo and Sam circled above, the other two descended and landed in front of us. I understood that they would bear us westward over the mountains and slightly North and thence into Lorien. This was somehow communicated to me telepathically, I suppose, for no words had been spoken, yet I had understood perfectly. I knew that I must comply though I longed now to travel with Frodo and Sam to Minas Tirith to find Alpheth. Again the unmistakable feeling that I was being told to go to Lorien. And with that one eagle picked me up and the other clutched Smeagol, and we rose into the air and circled once with the Eagles who were carrying Frodo and Sam. They seemed to understand that we must part. Higher and higher we rose, all of us, the swiftness of our flight astonishing me. Eventually we broke through the boiling clouds of darkness which were slowly beginning to dissipate, increasing beams of brilliant sunlight shining through and making it at last to the scorched earth beneath. Frodo and Sam then moved off to the Southwest and Smeagol and I to the Northwest. Below I could see the route we had taken on foot, and as we eventually passed over Wetwang my heart leapt to see the Southern reaches of the Great Forest. I knew that not far beyond that lay the Great River, … and on the far shore, … blessed Lothlorien.

Below in the Southern tip of Mirkwood there was a column of black smoke rising from what I assumed to be Dol Guldur. Yet another difference between the unfolding of events in this world and those in the book, for I had assumed that Galadriel would not tear down those walls for several days yet. Throughout our entire journey in the air Smeagol had remained as  limp as a wet rag. Now that we began to glide down towards Lorien he started to become agitated once again. I knew that he feared elves and hoped that his transition would soon become easy. As the two eagles set us down by the banks of the Celebrant and bade us farewell, I once again picked up the poor creature, who had once been so much like a hobbit, and carried him towards the band of elves who stood waiting for us with open arms. Smeagol was too weak to protest and only whimpered piteously as I whispered in his ear, “We are home now, my friend. At very long last you can be healed from the horrible wounds which have been inflicted upon you. Peace and happiness await you.”

He struggled to get down from my shoulder and I let him. Softly I took his hand in mine and walked forward towards the elves. His gait was now stiff and crippled as if every movement hurt. He tugged at my arm so as to pull me closer that he might speak in my ear. “Friend? You are my friend? It’s been so long since I have heard that word. What means friend?”

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Chapter Five:

“Secrets Hidden and Secrets Revealed”

Galadriel returned from the destruction of Dol Guldar the next day. Most of those who traveled with her were in the mood for rejoicing because of the destruction of the One Ring, but Galadriel herself was more reserved. Something was troubling her and she was keeping to herself for the time being. Finding me down by the river with a very weary Smeagol, she immediately set about doing her best to heal him in both body and heart.

The life energy was draining from him quickly and hour by hour one could see the long years catching up with him. What few long strands of hair had remained on his head a few days ago had now fallen out and the sallow skin which was stretched over his thin frame appeared more loose, as if his insides were shrinking. He no longer stood upright when he moved but crawled on his hands and knees in the most pitiful fashion one could imagine. With tenderness and love in her heart the Lady of the Golden Wood recited soft chants and songs in forgotten tongues while we both bathed him with waters from a tiny spring that burst forth from the damp earth there by the Great River’s edge. I later learned that this spring was fed from a holy place high in the Misty Mountains behind us and that this very water had been used to cure Gandalf from his wounds after he had battled the Balrog.

Within a few days a bit of strength seemed to return to Smeagol although his physical appearance continued to decline. He would stand upright on occasion but move very slowly as would an old, old man who was afraid of losing his balance. One of the elves made a short cane for him and for a little while he used it, but then it became lost in the underbrush. When I found it and returned it to him he denied that it had ever been his and refused to take it in his hand again. His short-term memory deteriorated more and more rapidly from that point on although his long-term memory actually seemed to improve. He spoke very little, but when he did speak it was usually of days long gone by, before he had found the Ring, and had still lived happily along the upper shores of the Anduin. One of the most heartbreaking stories I ever heard was when he recounted with eery detail how his brother Deagol had found the Ring and then he, Smeagol, had murdered him for it. This story ended in a flurry of tears and choking sounds and several of us who witnessed this felt that at that moment he was close to death, although Galadriel could see that he still had some time yet to be in this world.

One sunny afternoon while sitting next to him on a log looking out across the water I remembered my promise to him to make sushi. “Smeagol, my friend, would you still like to try sushi?” He had given up catching fish for himself and now relied on others to bring him his favorite food. He was eating less and less.

“Soooooshi?”, he whispered with a pale grin. “Yes, I would love to try soooooshi.” I did not catch it at first but Galadriel did. For the first time in more than five centuries Smeagol referred to himself in the first person singular rather than in third person plural. He said, “I”.

I quickly walked aside with Galadriel and explained my promise to him and my predicament that I needed ingredients which did not exist here in Lorien. She laughed aloud and put her hand upon my shoulder to comfort me. “I know exactly the seaweed you speak of and we have some of that here, although it is not yet in the form you require. This will be a small matter to correct. As for rice, we have many different kinds. Ginger also we have which can be quickly prepared in the way that is needed.” She laughed again and looked into my eyes and I quickly realized that she had known my thoughts on this matter for some time. How absolutely delightful this was and how continuously upsetting whenever it happened. I would gladly be upset in this way every day of my life should she wish it.

One of the elves caught a huge salmon in the river and another somehow transformed the seaweed into sheets of nori. Ginger was appropriately pickled and some long slices of cucumber prepared. A type of seasoned vinegar was brought forth that tasted remarkably like that which I had known back in my previous life. When all the ingredients were thus before me I set about making sushi there beneath the golden mallorn trees of Lothlorien. Somewhere along the way Smeagol had crept up beside me and was now watching with rapt attention as I worked. I asked him if he would like to help and he eagerly volunteered. Although he was now frail and weak, his fingers maintained a marvelous dexterity that most people would never know. He watched me create several rolls and then mimicked me with perfection, the only difference being that he did in a matter of seconds what had taken me nearly a minute. The elves looked on and laughed with joy. It was so good to see this poor victim of Sauron’s evil enjoying these happy moments in a place of safety and good will. We soon produced enough sushi so that everyone in attendance could enjoy several pieces. The pickled ginger was sent out in some small wooden bowls along with some small bottles of a salty brown liquid that tasted suspiciously like soy sauce. Just before my thoughts strayed to the one ingredient I had overlooked, Galadriel stepped forward with two small green leaves upon which were dollops of a bright green paste. How in this miraculous world had she known about wasabi? Seeing my amazement, she laughed again and all the elves laughed with her. Smeagol succumbed to the infectious mirth and laughed himself and grinned from ear to ear with not a trace of his previous sarcasm.

I offered the food first to Galadriel and Celeborn but they both insisted that Smeagol be served first. This meal was in his honor and when he realized this he began to cry with joy. As the sushi was placed in front of him he reverently reached for it with two shaking hands and took one piece to place upon the leaf that served as a plate. Galadriel softly suggested that he could take many more pieces, and with an innocently mischievous grin he complied, whispering all the time the word “sooooshi”. I was somewhat concerned that he would not like the wasabi but he took a small portion and put it on his plate just as I now did. Everyone else followed suit and then Smeagol took his first bite. He chewed cautiously and very, very slowly while we all observed as unobtrusively as we could. I held my breath. After what seems like ages he tipped his head back towards the sky and swallowed. Then, with a voice that was no longer husky and horse but now clear and sweet as a bell, he let forth a joyful ringing cry, “Sooooooooshi! It is so good! I love this so much! Thank you, thank you, thank you!” Talk about success. This was success beyond measure.

In what seemed like an hour, but what was more likely a matter of only a few minutes, all the sushi was consumed. Without a word of encouragement or instruction, more salmon was then caught and more ingredients prepared and this time Smeagol and I and all of the elves present made enough sushi to feed the entire host of the Galadrim. We loaded the uncut rolls onto large trays and carried them through the forest to Caras Galadhon, and there we sat until it was all consumed. Smeagol ate until I feared he might burst and I pondered for a brief moment how he would have handled hot saki. As the gentle dimness of the evening closed in around us and the various peoples returned to their places of dwelling, Galadriel invited Smeagol to ascend the winding staircase up the giant mallorn tree which was her home. Since arriving in the Golden Wood he had stayed close to the river and had refused previous invitations to come here. Now he accepted her hospitality peacefully and exhibited the greatest respect, bowing as best he could with his tattered body. She took his hand in hers and I his other hand, and thus we stayed him as we ascended the winding stair. When we reached the flet near the top, Galadriel set a soft cushion upon the floor and invited Smeagol to sit. Here was the greatest Queen in all of Middle Earth inviting the most lowly of creatures to sit in her presence where all others dared only stand. Somehow realizing the great honor being afforded him here, he at first politely declined, but then seeing her smile, he melted onto the cushion and looked up at her with pleading eyes.

“I hurt so much now. I know I am dying. Thank you for helping me. Thank you.” As he choked to get these words out, I glanced over at Galadriel and saw a single tear roll down her cheek. She glided over to a small chest at the edge of the flet and withdrew from it a tiny blue glass phial no bigger than her little finger. Walking back over to Smeagol she handed it to him and bade him drink. “What is it?”, he asked with pure curiosity and not one shred of fear.

“It is water from a blessed spring in the Undying Lands and it will help to heal you of all the pain in your heart. I regret that I cannot heal the pain in your body. Your physical form is coming to an end but your spirit will live on, and I will do my best now to guide you so that your next existence will be a happy one.” As she spoke these words I had every confidence that she would succeed in doing what she had just said and that Smeagol would at last know true peace of mind.

She now prepared seven small candles and was about to begin a long chant when Smeagol interrupted her. “You are helping me so I will help you. I want to repay your kindness with kindness. All I have to offer is a secret and I hope that you will find it useful.” Even this great Queen could be surprised, for her eyes opened wide and she gazed upon the tiny person before her with absolute astonishment. She knelt on the floor beside him and motioned for all the rest of us to follow. As we sank down in silence, Smeagol began to recount what he had seen on the Great River one year before he collided with the Ring. There had been a mighty deluge up river and the level of the water where his people dwelt had risen quickly, too quickly for many of them to withdraw their possessions from the shore, and many things were swept away. In a few days the water subsided back to its normal level and his folk returned to inspect the changes that the torrent had made. While others busied themselves near the main part of their settlement, Smeagol and his brother Deagol had wandered North to a bend in the river where they had often played as children. The water had eroded a large part of the bank and several trees had toppled into the river and been swept away. There in the freshly exposed earth, but a few feet above the water line, was a shiny metal cylinder the size of his arm and sealed on both ends. He and his brother had wrested it from the mud and laid it upon the grass above. There they pried one of the ends off and tipped the cylinder upright so as to spill its contents upon the ground. It was a scroll of silvery metal-like parchment and upon it was written a language in beautiful flowing letters that sparkled with rainbow colors in the sunlight.

Carefully, so as not to disturb him from his state of mind, Galadriel asked if he could remember any of what he had seen written there. Alas, he could not. “Do you mind if I try something with you, Smeagol? I think I can help you to remember.” It was plain to see that he trusted her completely and he nodded his head respectfully in the affirmative. She now asked everyone to leave except me and Smeagol, and as soon as the night air around us had once again grown quiet she began to speak to him in the common tongue, yet in a very special way which I soon recognized. “Just listen to the sound of my voice, Smeagol, and let my words become your thoughts. As you listen to the sound of my voice you may notice that my words feel good to you and that you enjoy hearing them. Just let yourself relax now, down into a peaceful sleep. With each word you hear me speak you can feel yourself sinking further and further down into deep relaxing peace. The further you fall the better you feel. The better you feel the further you fall. That’s right, just let yourself go, drifting down like a feather into deep sleep.” She was hypnotizing him, and in a few minutes he was deep in trance, breathing slowly and deeply, still sitting upright but nodding forward. She placed her hand upon the back of his neck and spoke again, urging him to lay upon his side and sink even further down. As he leaned over to one side she guided his head softly to rest upon the cushion and laid a small blanket of shimmering green cloth over him to protect him from the slight growing chill. I marveled that cloth woven by the elves no longer burned him.

Continuing to talk to him with her soothing voice and magical manner, she began to explain to him that he could now clearly see what was on the silvery metal scroll that he had found so long ago. Watching his facial expressions carefully, she waited for the exact moment when his eyelids began to flutter, and in that instant she knew that he could clearly see the ancient writing in his mind. With the fingertips of both hands she gently caressed his temples while continuing to talk to him and bidding him to hold his gaze upon the parchment. After several minutes she withdrew her fingertips from his face and spoke to him more energetically, counting him up slowly from his trance until at last he was wide awake once more. “Did you like the way that felt?” With a wide grin he signaled that he did. Then Galadriel asked me to take my leave. She would stay with Smeagol throughout the night, chanting for him and preparing him for his final journey. I sensed that I would see him again in the morning and so did not wave goodbye, but as I descended the winding stairs I heard him call out to me yet another thank you for making him “soooooshi”.

Morning came bright and clear with happy bird song and sparkling dew upon the leaves and blades of grass. As I made my way back to the giant mallorn there were Galadriel and Celeborn holding each of Smeagol’s hands and guiding him gently in the direction of the river. I followed as did several of the other elves who had grown close to this hobbit of old. When we reached the water Celeborn picked up the frail creature and set him to rest upon a newly prepared bed of silky moss. Smeagol could barely move on his own now and I noticed that his breathing had become labored and shallow. I knelt close to him and looked into his tired eyes which were beginning to film over. “Smeagol, my friend it has been a pleasure knowing you and I hope that we meet again someday under happier circumstances. I’ll make you sushi, as much as you can eat.” I didn’t know what else to say and was close to tears as I spoke these words.

“Ithriel, thank you for saving me. Thank you for being my friend.” He was struggling with emotion even more than I was. With a voice that was almost a gasp, he pushed out a final phrase as Galadriel and I bent close. “I love you”, he said, and he did not breathe in again. Galadriel closed his eyes and Celeborn laid the little blanket from the evening before over him. I wept openly now and brushed the top of his head with my hand. “Go to your peace at last, my friend. No one deserved the burden that was placed upon you. You have earned your rest so enjoy it well. May we meet again.”

And so Smeagol the hobbit passed from this world into the next.

Galadriel, Celeborn, and I laid garlands of simbelmynë upon him where I am told it continues to bloom to this day.

As we walked away from the river Galadriel sensed my question before I spoke it. “The words on that ancient scroll that Smeagol and his brother saw were in a language of Valinor used only in sacred rituals. What was written was no ritual, however, but a warning.” Although shining with her usual golden radiance this Queen of the elves in Middle Earth was obviously troubled, and I wondered what warning she had seen in Smeagol’s mind. I would soon find out. I’d almost rather I had not.

I was to ride with all haste to Minas Tirith and there hand a written message to Alpheth, Gandalf, Aragorn, and Arwen. The message, of course, was Galadriel’s transcription of that ancient warning on the silvery parchment found so long ago upon the banks of the Great River. Curious how the water would hide things and then make them visible when the time was right. What force was at work here that could make things so?

I was given the swiftest horse in all Lothlorien and provisions for two days. My destination was nearly four hundred miles as the crow flies but nearly five hundred by the road that I must take. Even if I rode all through the night I would be lucky to make it in the time allotted. I have been told that time was of the utmost importance and that if three days came to pass it would be too late and great tragedy might result. Galadriel had foreseen something. No more was told to me and I accepted the task with the same trust that I had accepted the previous one. I rode due South across the fields and streams of that fair land, and by nightfall had nearly come upon the western section of Emyn Muil. I did not stop for more than a moment here and there as necessity dictated, and so rode on through the darkness, now veering slightly to the west to avoid the marshy lands that made up the Mouths of the Entwash. The full light of morning shone upon me as I finally reached that river which flowed from the dark depths of Fangorn Forest and swam across beside my horse. This was an amazing animal to be sure and was definitely blessed with powers far exceeding that of any earthly horse. He had run most of the previous day and throughout the night and appeared as fresh as when he had started. By noon I had reached the road that led into the White City and here urged my steed to let fly with everything he had. I was not disappointed, and in another two hours could see the high towers of Minas Tirith looming in front of me.

War had wrecked havoc upon this beautiful city and great portions of it lay broken and destroyed. As I slowed my pace and began to ascend the winding road to the upper portions of the city, I observed workers clearing rubble and salvaging what possessions they could from the ruin. As I at last rode out onto the top level of this once magnificent jewel of Gondor I saw standing by the White Tree several figures I recognized instantly as Aragorn and Arwen. Not far behind them stood Gandalf and Alpheth.  I was so glad to see her but I almost dared not look into her eyes. As soon as I had dismounted and paid proper respects to the King and his bride to be I inquired about Frodo and Sam. Aragorn spoke with a measured pace, “They are fine and you can see them soon, ……. but first we have business of great importance.” Gandalf now stepped forward and held out his hand in greeting. It was so good to see him and he was just as I had imagined, tall, long white hair, and eyes that twinkled with a magic and a mirth that was quite indescribable. I withdrew the document handed me by Galadriel and offered it to the wizard.

“No”, he said, “what is written there must be read by the King.”

Aragorn took the parchment from me and unrolled it, staring for a long time at what was written thereon. Arwen looked over his shoulder and her eyes widened as she also read. Finally Gandalf was asked to read it as well and he shook his head in disgust as he did so, offering words of admonishment for fools who had long since ceased to exist. “Why is it that with all the beauty and the wonder available to us in this life that some of us seek nothing but destruction and despair?” Alpheth now came and stood by my side and took my hand secretly in hers. Though this was not a moment for romance, I felt so happy to be next to her once again that I am certain my joy was obvious to all the others there.

“Come”, said Aragorn. “We have little time if we wish success. We are fortunate that the moon will afford us a little while yet. With what is written here, I at last know where to find what Alpheth came here to seek.” He spun on his heels and led the way into the Great Hall and we followed, I with some trepidation, and Gandalf still muttering. Straight through the high stone passageways to the very back of the great structure. There was a doorway blocked by two guards who stood at attention, their hands upon the hilts of their swords and their shields at the ready. Aragorn bade them let us pass and was asked to provide the correct password which he immediately did. As the guards stepped aside we hurried onwards through a narrow hallway and eventually came to a round room with walls of faceted mirrors. Alpheth consulted the scroll from Galadriel once more and walked forward, slightly to the right, and placed her hand upon the glittering surface. “It is here”, she said. Arwen now produced an elaborate key which she slipped into a tiny lock in the wall and turned. We all had to push the heavy panel of wall open and so entered onto a winding staircase that led downwards into the mountainside. There had been torches set in brackets in the walls in the corridors we had just passed through, but here there was no light whatsoever and Gandalf illuminated the top of his staff that we might see. Down and down we walked for what seemed like many minutes until at last we came to a level floor and proceeded forward through a rough hewn tunnel carved long ago through the solid rock. After several hundred yards the tunnel came to an abrupt end where it’s construction seemed to have been terminated before completion.

Gandalf now withdrew from his robes a tiny stalk of wheat and brushed it against the stone in front of us, back and forth as if painting with it. As he did this he dimmed the light from his staff so that we might see the rock face began to change. At first the transformation was nearly imperceptible, but after a few moments I could clearly see the rock begin to morph and shimmer as if it were a mirage. All the while that Gandalf brushed the rock with the stalk of wheat he recited a slow chant in an ancient language that had not been spoken here for untold ages. Within a few more minutes the stone face in front of us had dissolved into a quivering grayness, like mist,  and through this we passed, feeling an odd coldness that seeped into our bones. Aragorn could see my curiosity and whispered to me as we walked forward, “This tunnel is far older than Gondor or even Numenor. It was built during the First Age and few people ever knew of its existence. Even I did not know of it until Alpheth arrived several days ago, and none of us knew how to find it until we read what Galadriel had translated from Smeagol’s mind. It guards a secret so terrible the world must never know.” Arwen squeezed his hand as he said this and Gandalf continued to mutter as if becoming increasingly irritated with what we were about to do and why we would have to do it. In another five minutes we came to yet another dead-end and Gandalf once again produced a stalk of wheat, this one fresh and green, and began to brush the stone. Upon the previous barrier he had brushed back and forth horizontally and now he brushed up and down vertically, and the chant that he spoke was different. This chant seemed happy and almost a song of joy and I realized how hard that must have been for him, knowing how he felt about this task, because it was anything but happy. Once again the rock dissolved into a shimmering mist and we walked through into a large chamber with an arched roof.

To my horror, I saw the skeletons of several people scattered about the floor along with various debris that I imagined to be the equipment of wizards. Something awful had happened in this place and these people had died in agony and been unable to get out. I could feel my heart racing as we passed across this room to the far wall and stood before a door very similar to one I had seen not long ago. Around this door was writing in Quenya which Arwen quickly translated aloud. “PASS HERE ONLY THOSE WHO CAN DESTROY FOREVER WHAT LIES INSIDE. TO OPEN THIS DOOR AND FAIL IS TO FAIL LIFE ITSELF.” Gandalf now commented that by “life itself” this warning meant all life in Middle Earth. What could possibly be so terrible that every living thing in this world could be at risk from what lay beyond the door? I was curious to find out and I dreaded to find out, and as Gandalf began to try various incantations and methods of entry, including brushing the door with stalks of wheat, I almost regretted that I knew how to proceed. Alpheth remained silent and let me explain.

“Does anyone have any water with them?” I asked this in such a way that no one suspected I was interested in quenching my thirst. From beneath her robes Arwen withdrew a small flask of water and handed it to me, whereupon I uncorked at and poured a bit of water onto my hand. I then sprinkled it upon the door and it began to swing open. Gandalf looked at me with a wry grin and I knew that he would require an explanation before long. We now entered into a small room very similar to Corulin’s crypt chamber high above Henneth Annûn. There was no crypt in this chamber, however, merely a short stone table upon which there lay an iron chest approximately two feet long and one foot high and wide. I could feel the hair on the back of my neck begin to stand up and I had a feeling in my gut that was almost sickening.

“Do not touch this foul thing!”, cried Gandalf. He then bent close to the chest and increased the light from his staff so that he might read what was written upon the lock. He did not share with us what he read but we could all see from the countenance of his face that it was something truly horrible. I then spoke and explained as quickly as I could what I had seen in that tiny chamber above the Window on the West, what little I had learned about Corulin, and the description of her crypt. Lastly I recited aloud the words that had been written outside the door of that chamber and had been translated by Alpheth. “REST HERE AND PASS FROM THIS WORLD. DREAM HERE AND REMAIN FOREVER IN IT. AWAKEN HERE IN STARLIGHT AND THE GREAT JOURNEY WILL BEGIN AGAIN.” Then Alpheth spoke the same words aloud in their original tongue. Only Gandalf raised an eyebrow at this while both Aragorn and Arwen displayed on their faces that this language was unfamiliar to them.

“So”, said Gandalf, “you found that which the Five Wizards with all their knowledge could not. I am not sure what good this will do us now. Eventually we may indeed discover a connection between Corulin and what lies here upon this table, but now we must find a way to hide it.” He paused as if afraid to go on.

“What does lie here?”, I asked. “And, … is it not hidden well enough already?”

“A piece of metal”, answered Gandalf. “A piece of metal from another world that has within it the power to destroy all life. It was hidden here long ago before this city was built.” The wizard then recounted in detail the story behind this iron chest.

“Long ago, before the first elves were summoned on the Great Journey to Valinor, some of them turned Eastward and wandered until they reached the furthest sea. It is said that there they built a great civilization which remained completely cut off from the rest of the elves of the world. They discovered great magic and thought it prudent to cloak their realm from prying eyes, and so avoided the gaze of the Valar and the summoning to attend the Undying Lands. Before the First Age began, before Feanor created the Silmarils, these elves of the East discovered how to travel between one world and another, and from that other world brought back an elemental metal which afforded them great power. At first they used this power for good and their kingdom flourished in its solitude, but then, as does all power, it slowly began to corrupt the minds of those who were too hungry for it. Some of these people wanted to return all of the metal to the world from whence it had come, and in fact much of it was returned, but one piece remained, and this brought about the ruin of that entire civilization. In a giant cataclysm of their own creation their entire land sank beneath the waves, and it is said that only a few escaped in ships and wandered in the only direction they could, Eastward, into the endless sea. That final piece of metal itself, so poisonous and so potentially evil, did not sink beneath the waves, however, nor did it escape upon the ships. It had been taken by the king of that land and placed atop the highest mountain in the region, and when the rest of that realm sank below the waves the mountaintop remained dry.” Gandalf paused again and looked each of us in the eyes before continuing. He was about to tell us something terrible indeed.

“By this time there were other elves who had been summoned to Valinor and had turned away from the journey and wandered throughout the far reaches of Middle Earth. One of these elves, whose name has long since been forgotten, found the piece of metal upon the mountain top, now a small island, and carried it with him Westward until he crossed the Misty Mountains and came to the realm known as Eregion. There he grew fatally ill and died as the full moon rose, not realizing that it was what he carried that had killed him. The great Ringsmith Celebrimbor found the piece of metal and began to discover its secrets. This was at the same time that he forged the Three Rings of the Elves. When Sauron came upon the scene Celebrimbor did not tell him about the special metal, and this was a very good thing indeed, or else it might have been used to forge the One Ring, ……. and the world as we now know it would not exist, but rather a continuous dark nightmare from which there would be no awakening.  Sauron suspected that something was being hidden from him, however, and it was for this reason that he began to share what knowledge he had with Celebrimbor in hopes that he could discover the secret. Of course, this never happened, and Celebrimbor came to see Sauron for what he was. After Sauron departed Eregion for Mordor, Celebrimbor was able to discern the true threat that the metal from another world posed. He did not dare use this metal himself and he did not dare hide it in the area where he was. He also did not dare tell another living soul, and so set out to hide this thing himself. He would’ve destroyed it if he could, but he recognized that it could not be destroyed in this world, only in the world where it was created.”

“Before he could hide the metal the full moon rose again and he died. Celebrimbor’s assistant was a mortal man of great skill, a sorcerer in his own right, and it was now to him that the task fell to hide this deadly secret. He was friends with the king of this city and had heard rumor that a secret chamber existed beneath it, carved long ago by some forgotten race, long before this city was built. The king had no knowledge of this chamber and so let the sorcerer make use of whatever he could find. It was all done very secretly and the king had no idea what came with the sorcerer when he arrived. The sorcerer was not a bad person, but was careless in his handling of the metal. Not only that, but he had summoned to his side a number of apprentices who were equally careless. Curiosity got the better of them and their task of hiding this material strayed to the point where they began to experiment with it. While they tried to figure out what potential this metal held, the full moon once again rose high and they suddenly grew deathly ill and died in the chamber outside this room. The very safeguards that they had put in place to hide their laboratory would no longer allow them to escape, and they were trapped in here with the terrible poison. We must somehow find a way to destroy this evil substance lest it fall into the hands of darkness, and we must do it before the moon is full.”

Aragorn now raised his voice in question. “But Sauron has been utterly defeated. What evil force is there now in this world that could turn this metal into a weapon?”

Again Gandalf spoke. “There are my two former compatriots, the Blue Wizards who passed into the East, Alatar and Pallando. I fear they have learned of this substance and are making their way here as we speak. Galadriel has foreseen this and spoken to me in a dream. Long ago they were corrupted by Sauron and are now quite likely become very powerful indeed. Though they do not command great armies, they are skillful in black arts too evil to speak of. Worst of all, they are proficient in the smithing of rings of power. Should they obtain this material they would surely forge rings, one for each of them, far more destructive than the One Ring which Sauron created. Rings of power made of this metal could blacken all life in Middle Earth to a tortured cinder, yet still alive and writhing in unimaginable pain and screaming hopelessly for relief that would never come. We must find a new hiding place for this …… abomination ………. and it must be done immediately!” He paused again and shook with something I would never have imagined in him, … uncontrollable fear. “The thing is, I have no idea how to hide it from Alatar and Pallando. They can look deep into all places in Middle Earth, such is their power.” The danger was now apparent to all of us and suddenly I realized that chance had been afforded this world by my entrance into it.

“I believe I know how to shield people from the effects of this metal and I believe I know how to destroy it.” Once again Gandalf looked at me with a raised eyebrow and I knew he would later pick my brain for answers. I then explained how I had discovered that the One Ring had been radioactive and how I had fashioned a lead shield for it which aided Frodo in carrying it to its destruction. Lastly I spoke of my world and the horrible weapons that my people had created. I was certain now that the metal in this chest was a radioactive element or isotope that had been brought into this world from my world and somehow mixed with great magic from the ancient elves of the far East. Similarities between the tales of Atlantis and the tale of the downfall of the Eastern elves bubbled up in my mind as I spoke these words.

“We have plenty of lead in this city”, said Aragorn. “We can easily build a container to shield this poison.”

“Yes”, said Gandalf, “but only shield it when the moon is not full. This metal has been changed by ancient magic so that once a month it’s powers flourish and expand. No amount of lead will shield it then. But, ….. we might just be able to get it out of the city and back into Ithriel’s world before the Blue Wizards find it and before the moon rises. No one can be near this thing when the moon is full, of that I am sure.”

I then had to explain that in all honesty I had no idea how to return to my previous existence. For all I knew I had died in Canada and been reborn here in Middle Earth.

“There is a way”, said Alpheth, “but we must hurry.” I looked at her with begging curiosity. She seemed to know a great deal about me that I had never told her. I had always put this down to the same sort of High Elven telepathy that Galadriel frequently demonstrated. Was there something more at work here?

Aragorn and Arwen now hastened back to the city and began to oversee the rapid construction of a leaden cask which would house the radioactive material. When the casket was complete it would be brought here and the entire chest containing the deadly material put into it. Then where? Then what?  Gandalf was certain that the Blue Wizards were less than a week away. It was Alpheth who now explained our last best hope. We listened and were astonished, everyone of us.

She told us who she really was and where she had really come from. She was many thousands of years old, perhaps almost as old as Galadriel herself. When the far Eastern realm of the great elves who had originally brought the radioactive metal from my world perished, a few had survived. Much of the skill they had learned had been taught to them by one of the Maia who had discovered them quite by accident. When they had destroyed themselves this Maia had shown the survivors in ships to a place of safety, a small island several weeks away to the Northeast. There these few people survived and flourished under the benevolent guidance of this powerful spirit, and it was on this island that Alpheth was born. Those that dwelt there realized the terrible mistake of trying to harness the power of the metal and had never sought to find it, although some suspected that the king had hidden it in safety. All would have been well for this tiny island community, but one day a great wave came and washed over the island, utterly destroying it and all its inhabitants except one, Alpheth, who had been out in a boat and so ridden above the destruction. She eventually made her way to the mainland and there traveled Westward for many years, until at last she wandered broken and battered into Lothlorien. Galadriel had taken her in and made her her closest friend and confidant.

Alpheth had always hoped and prayed that she would one day find the Maia again who had guided her people to safety, but she never did. Galadriel had told her that when the time was right the Maia would appear and until then Alpheth would surely benefit from the blessings of that great spirit. Such spirits never abandoned those whom they cared about but would sometimes change the method by which they worked.

Now Alpheth spoke of what she had just now realized. The Maia who had saved her people had been known then by the name “Diniel”, although now she realized that later the name “Corulin” had been hers. Corulin had somehow foreseen that one day that this metal would again be found and those who craved power would be corrupted by it. She had flown Westward when the tiny island nation had been destroyed by the great wave and settled in the cliffs high above Henneth Annûn, a name, by the way, that she had originated and had only been copied, first by the elves, and later by the men of Gondor. From time to time Corulin had taken in wandering elves with no home and cared for them. In return they had built her abode and created the room which contained the “crypt”. It was not a crypt at all, however, as Alpheth now realized when she recited again the words written in the stone above the door.  “REST HERE AND PASS FROM THIS WORLD. DREAM HERE AND REMAIN FOREVER IN IT. AWAKEN HERE IN STARLIGHT AND THE GREAT JOURNEY WILL BEGIN AGAIN.” The round structure in the little room was not a tomb at all. It was a gateway.

Corulin had not died, she had passed out of Middle Earth into the world where the radioactive metal had originated. What had been her purpose in doing this we had yet to figure out, but Alpheth was now certain that she knew how to move the metal from this world back to mine. I was certain that once the metal was back in my world it could be destroyed utterly and forever. So, the task that now lay before us was to encase the poisonous metal in a lead shield so it would not kill us as we transported it to Corulin’s gateway nearly one hundred miles to the Northeast. Gandalf agreed that this was the best plan of action and felt that we actually had a chance to pull it off.

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Chapter Six:

“The Gateway”

In less than a day the lead casket was completed and carried back to the chamber deep in the mountainside. Gandalf and Aragorn lifted the heavy chest into the casket. The casket rested upon a four wheeled cart which made it much easier to move around. The entire affair including the cart must have weighed at least seven hundred pounds. It was easy to push this cart along the level hallways, but to muscle it up the stairs required the aid of many soldiers who were sworn to secrecy by Aragorn. Once out of the mountainside and into the light of day the entire cart was hoisted into a sturdy wagon drawn by twelve the strongest and fastest horses that could be found. These animals had been hand selected by Eomer himself and he guaranteed their attributes with his life. He would ride with us along with forty Rohirrim as an escort all the way to Henneth Annûn. Although the great enemy had now been defeated there were still many dark forces roaming here and there in disarray and it would not do to have this cargo fall into the wrong hands. Gandalf had also made arrangements for Gwahir and the Eagles to fly overhead.

With us we would carry great lengths of rope and pulleys. The Eagles could carry the rope aloft along with several of us who were familiar with Corulin’s dwelling. With the help of the Eagles we would rig a series of lines with which to pull aloft the heavy lead casket. The Rohirrim on their horses could supply the power below to make this happen. Even with all the help that we now had arranged I found myself wishing that Smeagol would be with us to assist. No one could climb the way he could.

Our entire entourage included fifty four men and elves. I was allowed to briefly visit with Frodo, Sam, Merry, and Pippin. They would all be remaining here in the city. Aragorn, Gandalf, Legolas, Gimli, Alpheth, and several other elves from Lorien would come with the cargo. We set out early in the morning and rode hard to Osgiliath. All the bridges had been destroyed in the war but a makeshift barge was ready to carry us across in stages. Once upon the Eastern shore we drove Northward for several more hours and by early afternoon had reached our destination. The Eagles had kept a constant watch overhead and several of the elves and Rohirrim had ridden ahead as scouts. We were all relieved that no sign of enemy forces had been seen, either remnants of Sauron’s armies or the Blue Wizards.

For the rest of the afternoon we all labored with the rigging and by nightfall it was nearly complete. It would be too dangerous to lift the heavy weight in the darkness so we had no choice but to wait for daylight. There were two of Captain Faramir’s original company with us and they invited our entire throng into their secret chamber to rest and break bread. One of the Gondorians was the same who had inherited Sam’s cookware not long ago. He now packed it for the return journey to Minas Tirith. Sam would be absolutely delighted. We posted guards in every possible location though few of us slept. At one point in the middle of the night I went to Alpheth and asked her to walk with me outside under the starlight.

“I know that I must take this terrible material back into my world and destroy it, and I know this will be dangerous and fraught with peril. I would never wish to endanger your life yet I find myself so anguished at the thought of being parted from you again that I am both desperate and ashamed to be asking you now to come with me.” I was holding back tears as I said this, and when I looked at Alpheth I could see that she had failed as well in her attempt to keep from crying.

From behind watery eyes she spoke. “From the moment that this plan was decided upon it was in my heart to come with you. Just as you found this world strange and I helped instruct you in our ways, I’m sure you will help me to learn your ways once I’m in your world. I know you do not have any magic which can teach me your language as quickly as you learned mine, but I’m sure I’ll manage in time.” We stopped walking at this point and she turned to face me, placed her arms around my waist, and drew me close. There under the starlight that shone down upon Middle Earth, we kissed, and for a moment time stood still. Of all the bits and pieces of lives that I had recalled to this point, nothing equaled the poignancy of this experience. I no longer thought of myself as a woman who had recently been male and I no longer thought of myself as specifically an elf. I was a person. I was an entity in love. I had found someone to be happy with and she had found me and what more was there in this life or any other that could exceed the beauty of that? In the distance a nightingale burst into song, seemingly in harmony with our feelings. Would that this moment could have lasted longer, but duty called once again.

Gandalf had come looking for us. “We have to begin the ascent now. I have been receiving information from my colleague Radagast and have just now learned that the Blue Wizards are closer than we thought, perhaps less than a day from us. They are riding swift horses that have been enhanced by magic and do not tire. As we rested they have been riding through the night. If it was just one of them that we now faced I would not be so fearful, for alone they would be no match for me, but the two of them working in consort are extremely dangerous.”

Within minutes our entire party was awake and set to work once again. Gandalf made the tip of his staff glow so brightly that the entire mountainside was illuminated in it’s whiteness. The Eagles carried the final rope and tackle aloft along with Alpheth, Legolas, Gimli, two other elves, Aragorn, and myself. Gandalf would remain on the ground until the casket had been hauled all the way to Corulin’s chamber. With more than four hours of darkness remaining it was hard work even with Gandalf’s illumination to set the ropes and pulleys. As dawn finally broke we were ready. The casket was securely fastened in a sturdy sling and Eomer gave the command for the horses to begin pulling, gently at first, and then more quickly when we could see that the load was ascending smoothly. Within an hour the casket was to the first ledge and within another hour it was to the second. There were places along the way where we had to slow down and even stop in order to nudge the heavy object by hand around jagged outcroppings. Most of this work was performed by elves who hung from ropes alongside the main line. At last, by noon, we had succeeded in raising the casket to the wide ledge behind which was Corulin’s ancient abode. The  four wheeled cart had been left behind. It was too wide for the narrow hallways here, let alone parts of the ledge, so we rolled the casket on dowels until we at last had it in front of the door to the gateway chamber. Back outside a small bird was behaving frantically at the entrance to the first room, and as Gandalf arrived on the ledge he learned from this messenger sent by Radagast that two Blue Wizards war less an hour away and seemed to be heading straight for us.

On the ground Eomer was now in charge and he immediately ordered all the ropes pulled down so as not to aid any enemy in climbing up. He then set his cavalry to form two lines of defense to our North. The wizards may come but they would not pass unchallenged or un-fought. Elves hid in the rocks and prepared their bows. Above, the Eagles circled in preparation for swooping attacks, their talons bristling.

Alpheth this time drew water from the pool in the outer room and sprinkled it upon the inner door, causing it to open. The casket was pushed inside and we prepared for the final stage of our mission. The lid to the gateway was easy to remove. There below was what appeared to be a well full nearly to the brim with sparkling water. There was an odd ringing sound coming from this liquid and we could all detect the faint smell of lilies. Gandalf took the bottom tip of his staff and very slowly touched the surface of the water. This produced nothing but the expected ripples, but when he withdrew his staff he stared in amazement at it, for the section of it that had been immersed in the water was now missing, as if cut clean away by a knife of impossible sharpness. If I was going to pass through this, if Alpheth was going to pass through this, our survival seemed now like a matter of faith, and I could have spoken for both of us in that moment by saying that our faith was somewhat challenged by doubt.

Gandalf now spoke solemnly and we all became quiet and listened intently. “I recommend that Ithriel pass through first, followed by the casket, and followed at last by Alpheth. Once you are through I will seal this gateway with a spell. If Alatar and Pallando make it into this room it will take them a great deal of time to break the spell and pass-through into your world. He looked straight at me as he said this. I cannot guarantee how much time you will have, but I feel it is safe to say at least three days. The task to find a way to destroy this deadly material within three days is your goal. May the blessings of the Star of Elendil be upon you.”

“What will happen to all of you?”, I asked. “What do you think will happen when the Blue Wizards arrive?”

“They are concerned only with the contents of this casket”, said Gandalf. “Once it is gone from this world they will try to pursue and will have little interest in us. In truth, I think we will be able to do little more than annoy them. As I have said before, when they work in consort with each other they are tremendously powerful.” This did not exactly give me confidence that my friends would survive, but I knew that they were capable of achieving great things in the face of seemingly impossible adversity.

Aragorn now spoke. “I will defend this gateway with my life and the Sword That Has Been Remade shall sing again if any enemy should come near. This room, this entire structure, is easily defensible, and no one, Wizard or man alike, will have an easy time making their way in here.” Legolas was at his side with his bow in hand. His eyes gleamed with pure ferocity at the thought of the battle to come. I pitied anyone who stood in the way of his arrows. Gimli braced his muscles and raised his gleaming axe. “Let them come, the fools! I will feed them a feast of steel they will not soon forget!”

Now it was time. Alpheth and I said our final farewells to our friends as the casket was shifted so that it was directly beside the round structure in the middle of the room. Heaving with all their might, and with the aid of a quick spell, Gandalf and Aragorn lifted it so that it rested upon the edge of the gateway, ….. and then I stepped up onto the edge myself. I closed my eyes for a moment and said a brief prayer for our success, …. then stepped forward over the glimmering liquid, and fell.

At first my thoughts were overcome by a gigantic wave of light ….. and then ……

Blackness.

It was like waking from a long dream and being a bit confused. There I was, sprawled on my back in the middle of a large field. Beside me was the lead casket. Once again I will remark at how strange the mind is and what odd thoughts will arise when one least expects them. I inspected my own body. I was still wearing the clothing of the elves given me in Lothlorien and I was still female. I touched my ears. I was still an elf. Interacting with people back here was going to be very interesting to say the least. I sat up and looked around. In the distance I could see a small town, and from the topography of the land and the architecture of the buildings, I discerned that I was somewhere in Saskatchewan or western Manitoba. I stood, …… and then it hit me like a thunderbolt. Where was Alpheth?

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Chapter Seven:

“Lost Chances”

I wept for what seemed like hours. Try as I might, I could not find any sign of Alpheth.

I waited for a long time, hoping against the feeling in the pit of my stomach. Darkness crept across the prairie like a black sheet being drawn over a cool bed of sorrow as swallows chased the final insects of the day and then disappeared to their nests. I knew what I must do but had little idea how to do it, and I had far less ambition now that Alpheth was gone. What had happened to her? Had she been unable to enter the gateway or had she entered and gone elsewhere? Would I ever know?

The casket was far too heavy for me to move by myself. I figured that it was safe enough for the moment where it was as no one was likely to come out into the middle of this field so late at night. Checking my bearings against the stars overhead, I headed for the town, it’s lights glowing coldly in the way only electricity can accomplish. How I missed candles and torches and the soft light of the Feanorian lamps of Lothlorien. As I walked I formulated a plan, daft as it seemed.

Near the edge of the town was an old gas station that appeared to be long out of business. Beside it was an old pickup truck with one flat tire, a hand operated boom and winch attached to the bed. This could probably lift the casket, I guessed, but I had to fix that tire. No grass grew up around it and I figured that it had been in working order recently. The window was open so I entered, trying to be as quiet as possible, but being unable to keep the rusty door from creaking treacherously. Frantically I searched for the keys. None! I exited and probed the old gas station for tools with which to change the tire. The spare in the bed had looked worthy enough. No luck. Then, just as I was about to abandon this old truck and search for a vehicle elsewhere, I saw one of those pressurized cans of tire sealer and inflator laying half buried under some rags. I picked it up and shook it. It was full!

Returning to the truck, I opened the hood. Thankfully this did not creak the way the door had. All appeared well and a quick brush across the battery terminals with a piece of thin wire revealed that it still had charge. Now I checked the gas tank by rocking the truck with my shoulder. What luck! It appeared to be nearly at the top! I unscrewed the valve cap of the flat tire and shook the can of sealant vigorously for a minute. The tire was not completely flat and I hoped that the contents of the can would suffice to inflate it to working condition. As the pressurized chemical sped into the tire and the tire lifted, and the corner of the truck rose higher and higher, so too did my hopes begin to rise. I was about to hot wire and steal a truck but I actually felt optimistic about the whole thing. Not optimistic the way one would feel about being delivered from some terrible danger, but optimistic the way one would feel when about to dodge one more blow from the Sword of Damocles that loomed overhead.

Creaking the old door open once again, I bent underneath the dash board and ripped out the ends of the ignition wires. Splicing together the circuit that would allow the vehicle to remain running, I next brushed the starter wire across the ground and winced in agony as the noisy old beast coughed and roared to life. Not one hundred meters away was what looked like an inhabited house, although no lights were on. I climbed in and eased the gear shift into first. When I let the clutch out I could have screamed for joy as the truck lurched forward, and I could have screamed in anguish as it immediately stalled. Quickly I restarted it, and being more careful this time to not stall it, I drove as quietly as I could away from the lights of the town and out into the field to where the casket lay.

It took me nearly twenty minutes, but eventually I managed to pry the casket high enough with a crowbar to sling the cable from the hand winch around it. Cranking the winch with every ounce of strength I had, I watched apprehensively as it raised from the ground, higher and higher, until at last I was able to swing the boom so that it could be lowered into the bed of the truck. I had done it, although the strain was surely going to leave my back sore in the morning. As I drove West to where I had seen the moving lights that announced a road, I boldly congratulated myself on having come this far. Then I thought of Alpheth, and the sorrow was nearly overwhelming. Driving straight through the barbed wire fence at the edge of the highway I turned left and headed away from the town. No one had seen or heard me. It was a miracle.

In an hour I came upon a scraggly looking teenage boy with his thumb out, only when I stopped to let him in it proved to be a scraggly looking girl dressed as a boy. I found myself wondering if she would notice my odd clothes. I was wearing pale blue leggings tucked into soft deerskin boots with pointed toes and from the waist up was covered by a dark green tunic with wooden toggles. An intricate pattern of leaves and vines graced this tunic, and though the whole outfit would not have looked too far out of place for someone auditioning for a Shakespearean play, it was not exactly the sort of thing one wore while driving a 1959 Dodge Powerwagon down a Manitoba highway.

“Thanks, ma’am”, said the girl. “Didn’t think anyone would stop.” A long pause followed as I waited for her to get out the words I knew were hanging. “How far are you going?”

“All the way to the coast. You?” I inched out my reply past the fear that she would notice my clothes.

“Awww, that’s great! Can I ride with you all the way? I can help with the driving if you like. I have money for gas, too.” She had suddenly become animated, eager, and the solution to a definite problem, … I had no money.

I introduced myself as “Sally” and explained that I had to take this old chest to a friend and had been in a play the night I left and had not had time to change my clothes, leaving even my wallet behind in haste. She immediately offered to buy me some clothes at the next truck stop. She was not rich, but seemingly well able to afford such generosity, and I gratefully accepted her kindness.

As I granted her permission to accompany me to British Columbia and thanked her heartily for offering to help with the gas, I learned that her name was “Grace”. How appropriate, I thought, as we plowed on through the night. The old Dodge was a thing of beauty and never complained as we crossed into Saskatchewan. We stopped occasionally for fuel and a bite to eat, all of it courtesy of Grace’s wallet, and I came to know her a bit. She was nineteen and sick to death of university. She had always wanted to travel and figured that a semester on the road would be more to her advantage, and so she had donned her grubbiest street clothes and headed West. Not once did she question me about my past. Was this respect or some sort of apprehension generated by my original attire? It felt oddly comfortable, and uncomfortable at the same time, to once again be wearing jeans and a sweatshirt, runners and a ball cap. The clothes of the elves had been so much more to my liking.

We drove in three or four hour shifts and soon crossed into Alberta as dawn broke behind us in a crescendo of brilliant red and orange. The old truck made easy work of the rolling hills and I felt that the mountains ahead would be of little challenge to this venerable chariot I had so stealthily liberated from it’s rightful owner. I dared not think what would happen if it was reported to the police and I was pulled over for anything. Best to dream of success and stay positive. At one rest stop Grace finally asked me where I originally hailed from, and not feeling it was in the least a lie, stated with confidence that I had been born in BC. She stared at me as if my head were on fire and I wondered why. What had I said that was unusual?

“Were you in stage make-up for that play?”, she asked, her stare persisting. “Those ears look awfully real.”

In shock I realized that I had brushed my hair back as we sat there chewing on sandwiches and drinking tea. I had been so careful up until now to keep my ears covered by my tresses, and before I could spit out another lie she reached up and touched my right ear with her index finger.

“It’s warm!”, she whispered frantically. “Your ears ………….. your ears ……… what ……………… what ……………….” Her voice trailed off as I envisioned the sudden end to free gas and a sudden beginning to a lot of unwanted attention.

“Can we talk back in the truck?”, I pleaded, looking her straight in the eyes and praying with all my will that she would say yes. She did, and I could have kissed her out of gratitude at this chance to explain, though I had no idea how I was going to pull off a believable explanation. We finished our meal in silence and walked slowly back to the truck as if both afraid to resume our journey. It was my turn to drive but I did not start the engine. We sat quietly for a few minutes and then I spoke.

“Grace, what I am going to tell you will seem like a joke or perhaps like madness, but I assure you it is neither. I regret that I have lied to you and for that I apologize. I was once from BC, just as I said, but more recently, …………. recently as in this life, ……….. I am from a place very far from here.” I stumbled now and did not know how to proceed. Fortunately, Grace made the next move.

“Are you an elf?” Her question could have easily been exchanged with “are you European?” for all the concern she placed behind it.

“Yes”, I replied. “And, ……. my name is not Sally, … it’s Ithriel.”

“Did you steal this truck?” She shot the question at me like an arrow.

“Yes”, I said, “but I had no wish to. I was desperate. If at all possible I shall return it and somehow repay the owner for the trouble.” I was sweating and I’m sure she noticed.

I poured out a lot then, the wave that swept over my island, about being reborn as an elf North of Mirkwood, of meeting Alpheth, of being separated at the gateway, of needing to take this chest to the coast. I did not, however, divulge what was in the chest or that I had once been male. Grace listened as might a student at a lecture on ancient history. She questioned me here and there about the similarities and differences between the Middle Earth Tolkien had described and that which I professed to be from. She knew a great deal about the stories and I could not tell if she was playing along with what she thought was a game or if she really believed my theory about alternate universes. Then she said something which turned me inside out.

“Sally, … I mean Ithriel, ….. I have had dreams my whole life of living in the world you describe, long before I read the books, and I have always wished there was a way I could really go there. Now I think it’s real and that I can. Will you take me with you? Please?” This last word trailed off in a mournful wail that nearly broke my heart. I felt the same yearning myself to return.

I asked her to promise that she would never tell a soul what I was about to explain to her, and upon receiving her word, I told her about all the rest of it, being a man not too long ago, about the two Blue Wizards and the radioactive metal which I must destroy, and about all that I had left behind. I told her that if I could, I would take her with me, but did not know how to get back myself. Finally, I told her of my plan and asked for her help, telling her in all honesty now of the possible dangers involved. If Gandalf’s predictions were correct, I could expect to have the Blue Wizards breathing down my neck in less than two days. Not only that, the next full moon was less than a week away. I dreaded what would happen if I failed.

Grace astonished me with her solemn vow to help me no matter what the cost to her wallet or to her well being. It seemed that I had met the one person in all the world who not only believed the fantastic story I had told, but was eager to become a part of it. I started the truck and moved back onto the highway. If we drove all day and all night we could see the Pacific before noon tomorrow. If only I could find the Admiral when I got there.

Many years ago I had become friends with a US Navy Admiral who had a summer home on the island where I lived. He had once been the captain of a US aircraft carrier before being promoted to a desk, a vessel he would easily have preferred to avoid. We had spent many evenings talking about various world events and he had once divulged something to me that at the time I felt might have been privileged and not meant for my ears. He had been tasked to help with the destruction of outdated nuclear weapons by taking fissile material to a secret location where it could be rendered inert. This was my goal, to approach this Admiral, now nearing retirement, and ask him if he would be so kind as to destroy a hundred or so pounds of a radioactive material so controversial that it’s existence in this world would be denied by all but a handful. I smiled wryly as I realized the audacity and sheer madness of this whole idea, but what else did I have to try? Was this all a dream? Would I soon awake to one of my cats licking my face and mewling to be let out?

The road ahead was bathed in bright sunlight, the kind that dispels all doubts regarding it’s reality. Grace sat next to me in the passenger seat and looked ahead with me, and in that moment I did not care what was real and what was not. I only cared about what I felt. I felt that I must complete this task. I felt desperate to find Alpheth. And I felt protective of this young girl who I had somehow roped into assisting me in this very dangerous work that would probably get us arrested, killed, or both. I pushed the old Power Wagon hard as the Rockies loomed ahead and then vanished into the background. Grace thrust us on through the Kootneys and I took over again as we headed down the long Fraser Valley towards the Pacific and …….. home ………. or what had been home so long ago. It seemed long ago at any rate. In actual time it had been less than a month.

In Hope we stopped at a department store and I bought a cell phone and long distance card. My old name and information still worked. Back on the road I text messaged the Admiral and told him simply that I would be in Vancouver in a few hours and would like to meet. I knew he would be there at this time, going back to the States for another stint in Washington, his next to last as I remember him telling me when we had dinner together not five weeks ago. Grace had wanted to stop to change the oil in the truck because it had smoked a bit when crossing the last mountain pass, but I would not hear of it. Time was of the essence. Perhaps Gandalf and company could hold off the assault by the Blue Wizards on the gateway for three full days and perhaps a little more, but to assume longer was foolish. To count on the three days was all I could do. What choice did I have? Driving as fast as we could get away with and not get stopped for speeding, I was thankful that the weather was good. Heavy rain or fog at this point would have slowed us to a crawl.

We met at the little restaurant near the airport, Grace going ahead and telling the Admiral that she had been hitch-hiking and I had picked her up and wanted to give him a little surprise when I walked in. Surprise? A heart attack was more like it once I convinced him it was really me in this new body. This man possessed one of the keenest minds I had ever met and we had frequently engaged in delightful conversations about alternate universes, so I knew that I at least stood a chance. Just get him to accept what I had to say about myself and then give him a few minutes to catch his breath before hitting him with the news about what was in the back of the truck. In a few moments Grace came out and told me to come in. The Admiral was happily curious, she said.

I walked right up to the table and sat down across from him. “Hello, Jake. How you been keeping? Ever get that email I sent you about the Stephen Hawking special on television last month?” I knew this would get his attention, and it did.

“I’m sorry, ma’am, but I don’t believe we’ve ever met. I can guess who put you up to this. Very funny. Now where is he?” A wry grin spread across his weather beaten face and his eyes twinkled with delight. Grace sat down next to me.

“It’s me, Jake.” And with that I began, very methodically, very slowly, to explain that which was necessary to convince him that I was indeed me. It took a while. It would have taken less time, but Grace kept laughing at the most inappropriate moments. Eventually he did believe me and I let him have those few minutes to adjust to the shock before I gave him have a glimpse of my ears. When the color returned to his face I invited him to come outside to the parking lot to see what was in the back of the pickup.

After closing the chest and lead casket again, I let him have five minutes this time. Then I told him what I needed to do.

“Are you NUTS ?” he screamed so loudly that several people nearby took notice. He immediately lowered his voice and repeated the question in a whisper, though just as emphatically. From the look in my eyes he could see that I was either quite sane or quite seriously mad, I was not sure which myself. “Is that what I think it is?” he gasped.

“Yes”, I said. “It is. Stolen from the Hanford Nuclear Reservation years ago. What’s left of the only material of it’s kind ever created. You can understand why it must be destroyed. It makes uranium 235 look like skim milk by comparison.” I covered the casket with an old tarp and we went back inside. “It only emits gamma radiation in cycles and that cycle coincides with that of the moon. I know it sounds fantastic, but right now it is new moon and the material is safe. On a full moon it will kill anything near it in a matter of minutes. I was not always this way. It was altered far from here by someone who hoped to increase it’s potential as a peaceful power source, but unfortunately it also made the material lethal. The worst thing is that under certain circumstances, and when manipulated in a specific way, it can become a weapon more deadly than anything this world can imagine. Two people who know how to do this are on their way here to attempt that very thing and that is why this unholy thing has to be destroyed.” I was shaking as I said this. Grace was not laughing any more.

“You are asking me to smuggle dangerous radioactive material across an international border, material that went missing and is under investigation by every governmental agency on the planet, and somehow sneak it into Hanford and have it rendered inert? Is that all? No choir of angels or marching bands or anything?” His sarcasm was understandable. I had just asked him to do something which could land him in a federal penitentiary for the rest of his life, if he wasn’t shot first.

”The choir of angels would be a nice touch”, I wisecracked. He did not smile right away, but a few seconds later let go a brief chuckle.

“I need to make some calls”, he said. “Give me a few days.”

“We don’t have a few days. We need to do it now.” I looked him gravely in the eyes and could see that he understood.

“Any ideas?”, he quipped, as if expecting me to come up with a crazy plan for getting across the border.

“Sure”, I said, suddenly feeling inspired to be very crazy indeed. “We all three of us drive back East a ways and take the smallest border crossing we can find. We make it look as if we’re on a fishing trip. I’ll need a passport though.

“I’ll need one, too”, said Grace.

Jake started laughing and Grace joined in immediately, followed by myself a few seconds later. He retrieved his bags from the restaurant and we piled into Power Wagon, the most unlikely band of companions one could imagine; a girl, and elf, and a US Navy Admiral. Heading into the city we soon found someone Jake knew who did not wish to be identified, and who, for most of the money in his wallet and all that was left in Grace’s, produced two very realistic looking passports in less than half an hour. We were assured that they would clear US Customs and Immigration but we all had our doubts. Next we went into a sporting goods store and bought some cheap fishing poles and other angling gear, using Jake’s credit card this time. Heading East on the highway for an hour we crossed the border at Sumas without incident and rolled into the United States. Was I dreaming? We had only been asked the standard questions about where we lived and where we were going. Fortune was smiling on us, or so it seemed. As we made our way on back roads across Washington State towards the Columbia Valley, I began to have an uneasy feeling that something terrible was about to happen.

I felt it best to avoid the Interstate and so we crossed the Cascades on Route 20 and then dropped down towards Hanford on the smallest paved roads I could find. Jake assured us that once there he could get in, but not us and not the truck. He would do his best to convince the site superintendent to bring the chest inside the perimeter and then call on an old friend to take it to the “Dampener”, as the device was called which could supposedly render the fissile material inert. An hour away from our goal disaster struck.

They came out of the afternoon sky in two helicopters and attempted to land in the road right in front of us. Through the canopy of each aircraft I could see their faces, twisted and wrinkled and glaring with an inhuman ferocity that surely was driven by the sort of fear and hatred that only their dealings with Sauron could have instilled. They were Alatar and Pallando, the two Blue Wizards, and they were terrible to behold. I winced to think what they might have done to my friends back in Middle Earth and feared that some magic beyond anything this world could combat protected them now. I swerved the truck off the road and into the dry scrub brush. Pulling behind a clump of willows, I shouted at Jake and Grace to jump out and spin in the manual locking hubs to the four-wheel-drive on the front axle. Jumping back in, we headed on, trying our best to out maneuver the two choppers which kept lowering themselves in front of us. They weren’t shooting at us. Why?

Jake reached into his flight bag and produced a 45 which he aimed at the tail rotor of one of the helicopters and fired. The first round missed but the second found it’s mark, and wild vibrations soon forced the craft to land. Out jumped one of the Wizards who ran to the other chopper as it settled briefly to pick him up, and then ascended again to harry us as we sped on through the dust. Although Jake tried to bring down the second chopper as he had the first, he could not get a shot, and I knew I could not keep up this losing game of wolf and hare much longer. Sooner or later they would block our route in a manner which I could not circumvent. Why weren’t they shooting at us? If these two could commandeer two helicopters then why could they not also obtain guns? It was Grace who then made a very critical observation about the Wizards and Jake who made a very critical observation about our cargo.

Grace asked, “Why can’t they use some sort of powerful spell against us the way they could have in Middle Earth?”

Jake said, “If they hit the chest then the material might be compromised in a most unpleasant way.”

Both Grace and Jake were right, of course. The Wizards should be able to work terrible magic against us as Gandalf said they could, so why weren’t they? And, the reason we were not being shot at was because our cargo was too unstable to risk the sudden impact of a bullet. It would not explode if hit, but it would briefly heat in the small spot in which the bullet impacted and emit dangerous particles which apparently the Wizards were afraid of.

I jammed the transfer case into low range and shot the Dodge up a steep hillside. If I could crest the top I might be able to kick up enough dust on the way down to give them some trouble. Up and up the hillside the old truck climbed, clawing at the dry desert soil like a boat clawing the face of a great wave about to engulf it. As I neared the top all momentum began to drop away and I knew I was losing traction. Frantically I began to cut the wheels back and forth to the right and then the left in a last ditch effort to negate the effects of gravity and clear the crest. It was working. Just a few more feet. We were going to make it.

Suddenly the chopper landed square in our path and it’s skids collided with the front bumper of the truck. Our forward momentum was so slight at this point that we stopped instantly. Jake jumped out the door just as the two Wizards jumped out of the helicopter. Jake raised his 45 to shoot but the Wizards were faster, throwing long thin spears of silver metal at him, one piercing his right arm just above the elbow and the other pinning his left leg to the side of the truck. He belched a loud curse but could not free himself. I instinctively reached for my knife though I knew I would be no match for these two. They had forced their way past Gandalf, a hail of arrows, and a thicket of swords. What chance did I have? I was worried about Grace and wished in that instant before my doom that I had never picked her up. But it was Grace who acted next, and for her actions I will ever be supremely thankful.

Picking up a small stone from the ground beneath her feet, the young girl let fly straight at the face of the nearest Wizard. The stone struck him dead on the nose, and although it did not knock him down, it both stunned him and unleashed a torrent of blood. Instantly the other Wizard grabbed his nose as if he too had been struck. Grace saw it first and shouted, “They’re linked together! What hurts one hurts the other! And they can’t work magic here in this world!” Of course! Why had I not figured it out? I bent to pick a rock from the ground as Grace again did the same. Somehow we each instinctively knew which one to aim for. She took the one on the left and I took the one on the right.

The two stones hit the two foreheads of the two Wizards simultaneously and they crumpled to the ground like so much wet cloth. I ran to jump on top of the nearest and choke him to death while Grace grabbed the tire iron from the truck and raced towards the other. Suddenly Jake cried out, “Get my pistol!”

I lifted it from the dust at his feet and aimed at the nearest Wizard but I was too late. He was upon me before I could fire.

So strong his fingers around my throat. Like icy cable tightening with no mercy. I found the cold strange as I struggled not to lose consciousness and for a split second wondered how Grace was faring. Try as I might I could not break the grasp around my neck and from the sounds not far away I deduced that Grace was not having any better luck. Jake was swearing blue murder. It was almost over. I was fading. My vision was tunneling to blackness. I had failed. I had let everyone down. And then I heard that voice so smooth and soft and comforting that I put it down to my dying thoughts as the last life slipped from my body. It was Alpheth telling me to let go.

I had been holding on to the robes of the Wizard in an attempt to gain leverage against him and throw him to the ground. I guess that they had not heard of Judo because it didn’t work worth a damn. But somehow, in that briefest of moments before I lost consciousness, I heard Alpheth’s voice telling me to let go and felt that she did not mean to let go of life, but rather to let go of the Wizard’s robe. I complied and found myself falling slowly backwards as the loud report of a rifle broke the air. I landed on my back and heard the rifle fire again. “Get up!”, she said. “We don’t have much time till they recover!”

I stared up in amazement at Alpheth standing over me, rifle in hand, smiling down at me as only she could, but her face imparting in it’s countenance the utmost need for urgency.

I jumped up and hugged her for all I was worth as Grace ran up beside me. “Don’t tell me, let me guess ….. Alpheth?”

“Yes. At your service. Now we need to move!” And she actually pushed me away from my embrace. The blood from what should have been fatal head wounds to the two Wizards was no longer seeping out. It was seeping back in. Their wounds were somehow reversing. As I pulled the spears from a still screaming Jake, Alpheth sensed my curiosity and answered my unspoken question aloud. “Not all their magic left them when traveled to this world. If I was to shoot them again they would recover even more quickly. We must hasten now for all we are worth!”

Before I could ask how she had found us and gotten here I saw the dirt bike. Alpheth jumped on and kicked it to life while I helped Jake into the truck. The spears had been very small in diameter and his bleeding was not bad. Just for good measure I threw the two spears in the back as Grace got in beside Jake. Alpheth raised her rifle and quickly put several rounds into the tail of the chopper but then said to me, “They can find other means to follow us, be sure of that. As long as the metal in that chest exists, they will have great power in this or any world. They have somehow become linked to it and are now drawing from it’s energy. Once it is destroyed they will become purely mortal in this world and soon begin to age rapidly. They will not live long and will be of no danger to anyone ever again.”

I backed the truck down the hill and soon found the road again. Alpheth went ahead, somehow knowing the way. After about two miles she turned off the road and we once again picked our way through the scrub brush. A rabbit dashed for cover in front of us and I suddenly thought of Smeagol and how he had once told me of catching rabbits to eat. So odd the way the mind works. In half an hour the short cut became apparent as we returned to the road, having bypassed a long bend that would have cost us a great deal of time. Finally we could see it as we cleared a rise. There by the river  before us lay the Hanford Nuclear Reservation. How on Earth was a bleeding Jake going to get himself in there through all that security, let alone get the casket inside? As usual, Alpheth had the answers.

She drove her bike right up to the outer guard booth and said something to the officer on duty while pointing back at us. I marveled at her beauty even now. Her dark blue elven leggings and darker blue cloak spoke of royalty and her every move told of elegance that more common folk would never know. Why did the guard not notice her clothes? What was going on? I pulled up to a stop and the guard came up to my window. “You need to drive in now. I’m going to let you in now.” His words were rather monotone and he seemed a bit dazed. I glanced at Alpheth and she only smiled for a second before motioning for me to continue. No identification check, no questions, and the same thing happened at the next two checkpoints. Alpheth spoke and the guards seemed to ….. become transfixed and a bit confused. I was going to have to talk to her about this.

Jake directed us to the building that housed the Dampener and again Alpheth worked her magic of voice so that we passed inside, this time wheeling the casket behind us on a large rolling dolly that Grace found in a side hallway. Into the very bowels of the huge facility we strode, a girl, a bleeding US Navy Admiral, and two elves, one clad in the raiments of Lothlorien and the other in blue jeans. If only Galadriel could see us now. (And then I wondered if perhaps she could.)

Alpheth spoke to the crew that ran the Dampener and they walked dreamily over to Jake who gave them instructions. The procedure was more simple than I had thought it would be. We just wheeled the casket, dolly and all, onto an elevator platform which then lowered it into the Dampener below. There was no warning siren and there were no blinking lights. A technician pushed a button and there was a momentary humming noise below us as I thought I could detect a bit of vibration coming up through the floor. “It’ll take about fifteen minutes”, said another technician. Just then I heard the screaming of the two Blue Wizards outside the doors which had thankfully been locked behind us.

“Let me handle this”, said Jake in a very matter-of-fact tone. And with that he strode over to the control panel next to the door that the Wizards were trying to pound their way through. The door was heavy steel plate but was being dented from the other side by something very forceful. Jake studied the control panel for a moment then selected a few buttons. Now the klaxon I had expected began to blare out it’s warning and a large red light above the door began to flash. Outside there were screams of agony as high pressure steam blasted into the two people who had an hour before speared the Admiral.

“It won’t stop them for long”, cried Alpheth. “They will find another way in.”

“What seems to be the problem?”, came a voice very much like Alpheth’s, with that accent that set her so slightly apart from all the other elves I had met. “Do those nasty little mongrels really think they can get in here?” The words came from a strikingly beautiful and very petite woman wearing a white lab coat. She walked up to the door behind through which we could still hear screaming, and spoke in a voice now like thunder. “HOT STEAM BECOME ICE! ICE FREEZE AND BIND YOU! MOVE NO MORE ALATAR. MOVE NO MORE PALLANDO.” The air quivered as she spoke and the walls shook. I thought I could see sparkles and flashes around the door. None of the technicians seemed to notice any of this. Below, the floor continued to vibrate softly as the minutes ticked by and no more screaming came from beyond the door. Finally, the technician who had initiated the Dampener told us it was over. The tiny dark haired woman in the white lab coat unlocked and flung open the door to reveal the two Blue Wizards frozen in a wispy coating of ice, yet rapidly decomposing, their skin folding up with wrinkles like the surface of milk that has reached a boil. They were collapsing in upon themselves as if they were deflating balloons. In less than a minute they were but husks of skin, appearing to have no substance inside whatsoever.

The little woman turned now to Alpheth and smiled. “I am so glad that you finally made it, Alpheth. I am Corulin, at your service. I have been waiting here for a very long time for you to arrive with this horrid poison. Now that it has been rendered forever harmless by this device of my design, this world and many others need never fear the evil that sought to use it to rule in cruelty and terror.” And then her voice dropped to a whisper. “Though there will no doubt be others who will choose the path of darkness.” She was almost too beautiful to look at. Even Alpheth seemed to be transfixed by her sparkling eyes and Grace was flushing as she stood stock still, staring at Corulin unabashedly. This was no ordinary woman and this was no elf. This was a very powerful Maia, despite what I would later learn about magic from Middle Earth being very different here. From inside her lithesome frame a radiance beamed forth, seeming to illuminate her skin, her words, her every movement.

And so it was done. My task was complete, although it had been largely accomplished by the hands of Alpheth and Corulin. We exited the facility the way we had come in, by hypnotizing the guards. Alpheth gave the dirt bike to the first guard at the gate. A present for his teenage son. We all piled into the 1959 Dodge Power Wagon, Jake and Grace in the back, and rolled peacefully down the Columbia Valley towards Portland. We had much to talk about and stopped frequently along the way to eat and rest. Corulin and Alpheth healed Jake as he slept and when he awoke he remembered nothing of any of what had transpired over the last day. We dropped him off at the Portland airport where he caught the first flight to Los Angeles and from there to Washington. I would probably never see him again. He would hear about the wave that hit my home and assume that I had been killed. He would not know me again as Ithriel.

*********************************************************************

Epilogue:

“Many Shores”

I learned from Alpheth that Gandalf, Aragorn, and all the others were alive and well. They had been overcome eventually by some sort of weapon that paralyzed them in place while the Blue Wizards passed through the gateway. Alpheth had tried at first to follow me but for reasons unknown could not. The gateway had closed just after I passed through and they could not open it again. Alpheth had anguished just as I had at out parting. Then, just as the Wizards managed to open and pass through the gateway, the spell that had bound everyone in place faded. Alpheth had been nearest to the gateway and jumped in before it shut. Corulin explained that the Wizards arrived far to the North and had far to travel in order to catch up with me, and had in fact followed only two days behind, not the three that Gandalf had hoped for. Alpheth had arrived on a small island far to the South and had hastened here by various means, not all of which had been entirely legal.

Speaking of legal, we determined who the owner of the Dodge Power Wagon was and sent him ten thousand dollars and a hearty apology. It turned out that he was an old miner who never knew it had gone missing. He had just gotten drunk one night and driven into that abandoned gas station by mistake. He stayed drunk for days, and by the time he figured out his truck was not where he was, he had received the ten thousand dollars by courier. He returned a letter to Grace, (who had done the honors of sending the letter to him), by telling her she was welcome to keep the truck. It always carried him into mischief he said. It had taken us into the mouth of doom and brought us out the other side. We kept it, completely refinished it, and have it still. We named it “The Swan” after the swan boats of the elves. Folks would hear us refer to our truck this way and scratch their heads, which never failed to bring soft smiles to our faces and chuckles to our conversations.

“What happened to us? We four; Alpheth, Corulin, Grace, and I all live together now on a marvelous little island not far from the one I used to live on, though at a much higher altitude that is safe from any rogue waves. My cats somehow survived the wave and have come back to me, and yes, they recognized me well enough, even though I am no longer the man I once was. Alpheth and I are still elves, yet we are aging now as does everyone else in this world. Except ……. Corulin, who appears to be immune to aging. Grace knows everything about us and shares our home and our lives as if she was a sister. At night, when the moon is full, all of us commune with Galadriel in our dreams.

Try as we might, we are unable to discover a way to return to Middle Earth, and Corulin, for all her vast wisdom, cannot explain how the material that we destroyed ever made it’s way out of this world in the first place. The ancient elves of her island home so long ago had perished with their secret. Just as well, she thought. Just as well. What is meant to be in a realm is meant to be, and all this mixing of one world into another was rather disturbing.

And then one evening Grace asked Corulin a question that raised smiles, eyebrows, and wonderment. “If Ithriel moved from this world to Middle Earth, and she and Alpheth and you moved from that world to this, then could there not be some force of nature at work in all worlds that binds them together so that passage is always possible?” She had pleased the three of us immensely with her prowess, had our Grace, our adopted daughter. And she continued, “Maybe ………. the ancient elves of the Eastern island did not create a means of travel at all, but merely discovered a means of travel that already existed naturally.”

Corulin winked at me. “Yes, dear, that is quite true. When I built the gateway above Henneth Annûn all I really did was tap into that which was already present. In one sense I built only decoration around it. Still, I cannot work much magic here and so cannot create what I did on that mountainside. But do not despair. There is always hope and one day the means to return to Middle Earth may become apparent. We know that deep in our hearts. I can feel it in each of you. The one key ingredient which is essential when traveling through any gateway is …. faith.”

“Belief that it is possible?”, said Grace.

“Not belief”, said Alpheth. “Faith. There is a difference.”

I reached for the keyboard on the laptop nearby and Googled one of my favorite authors. “Here it is”, I said. “From Aldous Huxley:”

“Give us this day out daily faith, but deliver us, dear God, from belief.”

Grace pondered this as Alpheth and Corulin now looked at the screen.

“Belief is so limited”, I said. “It is limited by the very things it defines. Faith, on the other hand, by definition includes critical analysis, and thus faith is bounded only by the imagination, and that is limitless. I do not simply believe in infinite worlds, I have faith in them. Do you?”

Grace, now twenty one, affirmed that she did. How very much I would love to take her to the place of her dreams, Middle Earth, to meet Galadriel and Celeborn, Thranduil, Gandalf, Aragorn and Arwen. Alpheth and Corulin closed the laptop and joined Grace and me by the fireplace. The dry fir crackled and popped as the orange flames licked upwards, beaming out the comfort and special heat that only a wood fire can. It was the place of my dreams, too. I ached to return and I knew that my feelings were shared by all in that room. Still, we were so happy where we were. Life was good if you lived it to it’s fullest and were lucky enough to find a place such as this. We called out little island “Tol Estel”, (Island of Hope), though the others who dwelt in this area called it by another name. Our friendship made us richer than all the royalty in all the world and we knew we were blessed. We had faith in ourselves and in each other.

And Alpheth and I had love. What prize greater? What treasure more precious? We were together at last, and Corulin, still able to see far, said that we would be so for ages to come.

In the morning Grace went down to the mailbox as she always did. It was a lazy ten minute walk down the hill and a slow fifteen minute walk back up. But today Grace did not walk back up the hill. She ran as fast as she could, waving excitedly. In her hand was a postcard. The picture on the front was of a bright star on a field of midnight blue. The back was light green and all around the edge was a delicate pattern of tiny silver leaves, and on the stamp was the image of a golden Mallorn Tree. The words written in flowing and elegant hand you can probably guess.

“REST HERE AND PASS FROM THIS WORLD. DREAM HERE AND REMAIN FOREVER IN IT. AWAKEN HERE IN STARLIGHT AND THE GREAT JOURNEY WILL BEGIN AGAIN.”

*** THE END ***

IN A BARREL

Arafin © 2009

Many years ago, when beatniks were transforming into hippies, my parents went on vacation to Provincetown at the very tip of Cape Cod in Massachusetts. This town, once a posh resort location, had become a smaller east coast version of San Francisco. The hippies fascinated me and I expressed my desire to be one myself, but my father, not at all amused by their long hair and strange attire, explained that he would never allow his son to degenerate to such a forlorn level. Of course, this denial of permission to go native only reinforced my determination. Sorry Dad, but you should have used reverse psychology.

As we departed this outpost of flower power a particularly large hippy with a spectacular Karl Marx hairdo walked nonchalantly accross the road in front of us, causing my father to slow his vehicle lest he strike the poor fellow, (something that I imagine appeared as the more sensible choice and one that would improve humanity as a whole). This gentleman of the hairy tribe, out for his evening stroll, was wearing naught but a wooden barrel hung from his shoulders by two leather straps. “Hey Dad! Look at that one! That’s what I want to be! Can I wear a barrel? Can I? Can I?”

Quite possibly deciding that he did not want splinters in his radiator, my father did not run over the barrel clad giant who had never had a haircut in his life,. We swerved around my new idol and headed home, both my parents remarking several times along the way how dreadful that man with the wooden overcoat looked. It has thus been my lifelong ambition to assert my independence by one day wearing a barrel, and because I had difficulty pursuing this goal when constantly interrupted by visions of splinters in my nether regions, I chose stainless steel as a safer, (and more durable), clothing material.

A few years ago it was time for a new set of tea cups so I headed for a local dinnerware emporium. While attempting to negotiate the narrow aisles the sides of my barrel came into unwanted contact with the fragile items on several shelves, gravity then became involved, and a most unfortunate amount of breakage occurred. I was directed to leave this establishment without delay and so walked into a similar store nearby, but there, too, much delicate product met with the same fate and I was asked to leave. And so it went with every shop in town until, thanks to the ingenuity of a store owner who was either kind, or broke and needed the business, ….. or insane, I fitted my barrel with blinking blue LED lights and a surplus WWII air raid siren. These additions worked marvelously as a warning to shop owners within a large radius, giving them ample time to protect their stock from my arrival. Whew! Talk about bull in a china shop.

And that, dear friends, is how I came to wear my current attire.

(Painting is by Philip Straub)

“The Storm Angel”

Arafin  © 2009

Milton had wandered far into the great forest behind his house before. Here, on the edge of the vast tropical wilderness, a place he had chosen so carefully to live, he straddled the boundary between civilization and wilderness like a tight rope artist. He cherished the solitude of the vastness behind him as much as he cherished the companionship of the people in the town in front. It was the perfect balance, the best of both worlds, and never a day went by that he did not give thanks for his good fortune to be able to live this way. Today had been much like any other. He had spent the morning writing, lunch time and the early afternoon socializing with friends at the pub in town, preparing a light early evening meal for himself, feeding his two cats, and then setting off along the well-worn trail for a few hours of blessed reflective piece. As his well-worn Italian hiking boots thumped gently along the narrow trail he thought for a brief instant that he heard thunder in the distance. He had planned to walk for two hours towards the great plateau and they rest at its base for perhaps another hour before returning home in plenty of time before nightfall. If there was a storm growing, however, he knew it would be unwise to venture that far. A more definite clap of thunder in the distance erased all such doubt, and without losing a step, he altered his plans to proceed only as far as the river.  He would sit in the middle of the little suspension bridge, feet dangling down towards the rushing water hundreds of feet below, and marvel at the power therein.

The storm seemed many miles away and he figured it would be moving slowly. More importantly, it would be moving across the great plateau from east to west. This tempest would not wander far enough north to affect him as long as he did not approach within five miles of the cliffs. These late autumn afternoon storms always followed a very predictable pattern,  arising from the warm sea and following the great valley to the plateau where they would then dislodge their heavy cargo of rain, and becoming lighter, ascend slowly as they passed away towards the high mountains in the far west. The much larger storms that came in the night would blanket the entire area with a deluge much greater. This was definitely not one of those storms.

It was hot, steamy tropical rain forest here below, but on top of the great escarpment the forest became more temperate with completely different foliage and wildlife. To negotiate the high cliffs along treacherous paths would take half a day in itself, so excursions up there were reserved for long weekend outings with friends. It would simply be foolish to try to go there alone.

Milton liked the hot sticky feeling of the rainforest, the incessant call of the birds, the frantic chatter of the monkeys, and the dripping of water from the tangled trees. After living and working for most of his adult life in the bone numbing damp and cold of Yorkshire he had always dreamed of retiring to someplace where he would never feel chilled again. This country had been perfect. The government was relaxed about foreigners with money living here and doing as they pleased, (as long as they did not attempt to become involved in politics). Although he was quite fluent in the native language there were also plenty of English-speaking friends in town with whom he could converse happily whenever he wished. On the odd occasion when he felt the urge to partake of big-city life, a one hour plane trip east would fulfill that desire, but he did not do this often. More and more he relished the solitude of the jungle interspersed with the friendliness of the small town. After seven years here he was happier than he had ever imagined he could possibly be, except, of course, for one thing. His wife of thirty seven years had died of cancer two years before their planned retirement. He had worked those two years in gradually decreasing agony until at last he felt he had overcome the anguish of losing her, while at the same time building up the courage to leave the country of their birth. They had talked about moving here only in jest, but by the time he had worked his last day that jest had somehow transformed into reality.

He just didn’t feel as if he needed to be in love again, or even to have a casual relationship. He still became attracted to pretty women when he saw them, but he felt complete as he was and no longer experienced the driving determination to rail against loneliness. This was perhaps because he did not feel alone. He felt fulfilled, whole, and more than that, part of something larger. While nature was to him what religion is to many people, and as he and his wife had shared this love of the earth, the bond between them seemed to live on somehow with every step that he took along this damp and winding trail. He was not remembering her at every moment, but perhaps subconsciously he was sensing her in the ground and the trees and the echoing noises of rich wildlife. There were many trails that he would take in this vastness, but this was his favorite, the one that led to the little suspension bridge and then eventually reached the towering cliffs below the great plateau. Sometimes he would encounter local hunters as he walked and they would exchange the normal pleasantries. He did not really know them, he knew of them. They, however, knew him more than he understood. Having lived in this jungle for untold thousands of years they could see things in these people from the “wild lands” to the far north. Funny how two completely different cultures can have two completely different meanings for the term “wild”.

An enormous blue and purple butterfly floated lazily in front of him as he rounded the last bend before the river. He had been able to hear the roaring of the rapids for over ten minutes now and he longed to sit on the little bridge and enjoy the rush of the torrent as it passed beneath. The sound of the cascading water was muffling the thunder in the distance and it was thus that Milton was unaware that this storm, unlike its cousins, was moving uncharacteristically much further to the north. As he walked out onto the swaying contraption and sat gently in the middle, eating a piece of fruit he had brought with him and relishing the rumble of the sound and the spray, he was a happy man. The fact that the water one hundred feet below him was moving very quickly in no way interrupted the mental process by which his thoughts began to slow. After five minutes he was lost in deep reverie, after ten he was nodding slightly, and after twenty minutes he was sound asleep. Dreams of ancient cities and lost lands populated by a strange and gentle people who spoke a language he did not understand. Winds of mysterious music too delicate to scrutinize floated in and out of his swirling mind, calling him and tempting him to slip further and further down, deep into that wonderful bliss that is both free from all worry yet full of wonder and fascination. Some small part of him recognized that he was dreaming, but that’s small part let the process go on, knowing instinctively that it was both safe and necessary. Deeper and deeper into this magical fantasy world he fell, not falling quickly as would a stone, but slowly as would a feather. It was the slowness of the descent which was so delicious, so inviting. It was also the slowness, this peaceful manner in which he was slipping down, which made him feel secure. It was almost as if someone infinitely wise and kind was watching over him and would not allow any harm.

The storm had approached slowly and deliberately and would have given fair warning to anyone who had been paying attention, but to the sleeping man sitting above the river it was totally unexpected when a great bolt of lightning struck the Earth not fifty feet away. The report of thunder had been instantaneous, of course, and had also served to scare him half out of his wits. He stood quickly, clutching the guide ropes to his left and right with either hand, and was suddenly frightened by something else. The sky had now grown almost completely dark, not from the storm which was surely heavy and thick with rain, but dark because the sun had already set, its last echoing glow fading to the west above the escarpment. He had no flashlight with him, but as he fought to resist panic he gradually began to feel confident that he could walk the path back in the direction from which he had come. He should arrive home before midnight. Although he knew how to survive here and could have easily done so for the night, he would much rather be at home in a warm bed than out here in the midst of the downpour which now fell like buckets from above. Just as he started to walk back towards the beginning of the bridge there came another flash of lightning which turned the entire jungle briefly a blinding white, and this light revealed a large black panther sitting calmly in the middle of the path. These creatures could kill a man instantly but usually preferred smaller game, and there were no tales of anyone being mauled in this area in recent history. Still, Milton had absolutely no desire to move even one inch closer to this powerful cat. It just sat there, looking at him calmly, perhaps thinking of dinner, or perhaps contemplating how it was going to cross the bridge.

Milton decided the wisest course of action would be to retreat to the far end of the bridge and move off upstream for about two hundred yards. The flashes of lightning were growing more frequent now and these brief spurts of illumination would allow him to see what the panther did and where it went. He was hoping, of course, that the panther would move away, either on its side of the river, or cross the bridge and go about its business, allowing him to return home. The cat just watched him as he walked carefully to the opposite side. The terrain on this bank of the river was flat and open for a short ways and he knew it was as safe to walk here as on the path. Long ago someone had cleared this area, for what purpose he would never know. He walked by the light of the flashes until he was perhaps two hundred or two hundred and fifty feet from the bridge and at the edge of the little clearing. “Come on,kitty. Make your move”, he muttered under his breath, but the cat just sat there and looked at him, not moving a single one of it’s velvety clad sinews. This was an impossible situation. What did the panther want?

As if to answer his question the great cat raised itself up upon its hind feet and stretched its great paws high into the air above. Then, with a bloodcurdling roar that would have waked the dead, it brought its front feet crashing down onto the ground. At the very instant the cat’s feet touched the ground a great bolt of lightning struck the center of the bridge, blowing it to bits.

Milton stared in disbelief and horror. If it was daylight he could walk downstream for five hours to the logging road and cross the river at the steel bridge there, but now it was pitch black and he knew that while it would have been slightly foolish to attempt the path home in the dark it would be completely ridiculous to attempts to make it to the logging road in this gloom. The path along this far bank of the river was not very well worn anyway. Another flash of lightning and he could see the tattered remains of the bridge hanging down into the raging current below, the strands of rope being pulled and whipped in a chaotic dance that seemed to spite him. The same flash of lightning revealed the great panther at last turning and walking slowly away into the inky depths of the forest. It seemed ridiculous but he couldn’t help feeling that the panther had somehow caused the lightning to destroy the bridge. The locals would have believed it. Their folklore was full of such legends, powerful spirits residing in the form of animals, some sent to harm us and some to watch over us. So here he was, trapped on the far side of a raging cataract in the dead of night and being rained upon mercilessly from a storm that had for some reason blown off course.

He had two sensible choices at this point and he weighed them both in his mind before deciding. One, he could stay right where he was and wait till daylight and then start the long trek south towards the logging road.  Although no one would be working in the forest tomorrow because it was Sunday, and it would be unlikely that he could hitch a ride, he could still walk all the way back to town in another five hours. A very long way around but a very safe one. His second option was to walk west on the path until he came to an enormous tree in the roots of which he could take shelter from the rain. This would add an extra hour to his journey in the morning, but at least he might be able to sleep a little if he could get out of this rain. He knew that the path in front of him was as reliable as the path behind and he felt that he could traverse it without injury. He finally decided upon the second option and set off carefully, walking more slowly than he would in the light of day, and thankful for the constant flashes of lightning which gave him many snapshots of where he had to go. He was pleased with himself that he had calculated the distance with decent accuracy as he reached the giant tree in just over an hour. Scrunching up within the walls of the giant roots he was no longer frightened, although he did feel a bit embarrassed and just a trifle upset for having gotten into this situation in the first place. Back in the village his friends would certainly have a good laugh at him when he showed up for a prearranged dinner tomorrow night.

The rain continued to fall and actually seemed to do so with increasing ferocity, the large drops hitting the ground and splashing back upwards for a few inches, tiny wet bombs exploding on the jungle floor. In the canopy above the sound of this deluge was almost as loud as the roar of the river had been. Milton figured that sleep would be impossible if the lightning and thunder kept on, but gradually they subsided and he drifted into fitful repose. He woke several times at the insistence of a cramp here or a bony piece of root there. It was perhaps just past midnight when he at last gained a level of sleep which actually did his body some good, the forward motion of his mind gently arcing down into depths of dreamless slumber. As the rain continued to fall it eventually did so with less intensity, so that by the time it did stop it would have been almost indistinguishable from a slow drip off the leaves.

It was as Milton’s mind began at last to spiral gently upwards out of beautiful numbness that the air became warm and the stars appeared. Higher and higher his mind rose, at times noticing the aches and pains in his body from sleeping in such an uncomfortable position, at times noticing the wondrous fragrances wafting forth from the freshly soaked forest. As his eyelids fluttered open and he was held for a moment in that transition phase between wakefulness and dream he thought for an instant that he saw a figure, tall and graceful and clothed all in white. Full wakefulness revealed nothing but the huge tree next to him and the path before him. Rising slowly and stretching, he gazed upwards at the sparkling heaven that seemed to welcome him back from his ordeal. A definite feeling of safety flowed over him and he smiled. “You’ve been lucky, old chap. You have been very lucky indeed.” And as he was about to nestle down amongst the roots of the great tree once more he happened to glance at the path again. In that moment, that instant, that brief fraction of a second within which his heart scarcely had time to beat once, … he saw her.

When he had seen the panther he was startled and his body shook with a burst of muscular contraction. Now, when he had suddenly seen this beautiful figure in front of him the opposite thing occurred, and he felt instantaneously relaxed, as if all the weight of the world had been upon him and was suddenly switched off. He rubbed his eyes in disbelief and craned his neck forward in an attempt to see her again, but of course, she was gone. Was he going mad? Was he still asleep and dreaming? Was she, ……….  real? He sat down upon a large knob of root and marveled at how much warmer to air had become. His clothes were completely soaked yet he was not cold. The air was, in fact, as warm as if the noonday sun were shining freely down. This was very unusual because the nights were generally quite cool, especially after a heavy downpour. He should be shivering. There was no longer any sign of the storm, not lightning or thunder or wind. Had he had a candle the flame would have burned straight up without movement, so still was the atmosphere. He glanced up and outwards towards the sky once more and it seemed as if the warmth he was feeling was coming from the stars themselves. Warmth from the stars? He must be dreaming.

Everyone has within them a “little voice” which speaks to them from time to time. Sometimes this little voice issues warnings and sometimes temptations. It was now that Milton’s little voice spoke to him an answer to a question he had not asked aloud. The voice in his mind “touched” him with the answer more than spoke it. “You have always been dreaming”, it said. And he laughed in relief as would someone who is glad to finally hear that a problem long scrutinized was finally solved. And then, without really knowing why, he rose to his feet and walked to the path, turned west towards the escarpment and began to march slowly and deliberately, almost as if he was part of some official procession. He knew he was walking away from his home and he knew he was very tired, but this did not seem to bother him. He felt comfortable with what was happening and upon self introspection was convinced that it was by his choice that he drove his feet in this direction. He began to feel less and less tired as he walked and the aches and pains from having slept curled up in the roots of the giant tree started to vanish. The air was so delightfully warm, or was that the light from the stars that accomplished this miraculous feat? Onward he walked as his strength seemed to increase, till at one point he actually felt like jumping in the air and clicking his heels together. He felt more energy within him than he had in years. He must be dreaming.

“You have always been dreaming”, came the little voice in his head again.

Was it his voice, his own consciousness speaking to him, or was it someone else? Was it her? And then he caught another glimpse of her ahead on the path, standing and waiting for him, but vanishing into thin air again as he strode closer. If he was awake he would have felt like running forward to catch her and ask who and what she was. But he did not feel the need to rush, and so once again reasoned that he must be dreaming. He felt patience within him, an acceptance of how things were, a sublime peace built upon the understanding that there was enough time. Enough time to walk forward, enough time to eventually come face-to-face with her.

“You have always dreamt about me”, came the faint voice again, and again he caught a glimpse of her on the path ahead, although this time her back was to him and she was walking casually away.

His legs and feet functioned without physical sensations of weariness just as they might in a dream. It was so easy to keep going, so effortless, and it felt so good to walk on and on and on. Every once in a while he would see her in front of him walking forward, knowing that he would follow. He had to follow. He needed to follow. Walking this path behind this lady in white, her gossamer robes flowing behind her like mist trailing behind a swan as it glides across the still waters of an enchanted midnight lake. And now he longed to see her face. Where before he had remained contented to just walk in her footsteps and see brief images of her almost out of sight, he now really wanted to come before this living angel and address her with respect and awe.

“I’ll be waiting for you up there.” Her words coincided perfectly with his haphazard gaze upwards towards the top of the cliffs. He had arrived at last at the base of the greatest escarpment, the high plateau above. There were soft flashes of light coming from up there. Perhaps another thunderstorm too far away to hear the thunder from it. Ahead of him lay the winding stair carved into the rock by forces of wind and water, or had been created by skillful hands so long ago that the countless ages hence had rendered it looking natural? Milton began to climb, and as he did, would occasionally pause to look out across the canopy of the tropical forest below. He could see so well in the soft starlight, better than he ever remembered being able to see in darkness, even with a full moon. The sparkling light that came down from the stars was now more than adequate to illuminate all he wanted to see.

He must be dreaming. In a real life situation not even the fittest athlete could move up this nearly vertical incline without feeling tired, yet here he was, a man several years past retirement age bounding up the rocky steps like a mountain goat. For nearly an hour he climbed, and at one point almost marveled that the air, which should be much cooler here at this higher altitude, was still tantalizingly warm. At another turn he stopped to wonder at how his clothes had become completely dry.

At last he reached the top and stood awestruck as he gazed out at the beautiful panorama in front of him. The large stately forest was not nearly grown so close together as the jungle below, and there were wide spaces between many of the trees. Many people could walk abreast here, perhaps twenty or thirty or more. The birds that inhabited this forest sang very differently from the birds in the jungle below. While the birds below sang in a chaotic and wildly emotional manner, the birds here sang in an almost rhythmically peaceful fashion, their voices more beautiful than that of any nightingale, their gentle calls echoing softly through the happy starlit glade.

And there she stood, just a little ways off, perhaps no more than one hundred feet. She had turned to face him and her arms were outstretched wide as if to invite, to welcome, …………  to welcome home. As he approached with a little timidness and a lot of respect, he found it wondrous and at the same time satisfying that her face contained within it something familiar. She seemed to almost shimmer between the gorgeous face of his young wife when they had first met, and someone he had seen in his dreams forever. “But you did meet me, long ago, here in this very place.” Her words so vibrant and real in his mind. How could this possibly be a dream? “It is a dream because you sleep”, she said, her lips moving, dancing, calling him closer. “Just let me know when you want to awaken.” And she laughed like bubbles breaking against the wings of skylarks.

It was an invitation and a question and a tease. It was serious and mischievous, heavy and light hearted all in one. It was playful and knowing, telling and mystifying. Her voice, like the starlight shining down upon them, flashed and shimmered and danced to a tune of pure joy. And as Milton walked tenderly forward into her wide embrace, and as her angelic arms enfolded him in a feeling of infinite safety and love, she flashed from within as brightly as any lightning bolt. This immediate brilliance shone right through him, into him and filled him, saturating him through and through. And then he realized it, the radiance of the lightning and the radiance of the stars were one in the same.

She led him far away across the great expanse of the temperate rain forest, ever westward, ever gradually higher. In that time he learned to let go of all his fears and expectations, but not his hope. That was increased and expanded and nourished. She taught him how to recover his youthful dreams and believe once again that anything was possible. He learned to see the limitless wonder of the future instead of just the self restricted security most accepted as fate. They explored stately groves of towering trees too old for man to have known them as saplings. They visited deep blue lakes and winding streams and grottos of fantastic golden rock formations quite beyond that which normal imagination could conceive. By day they rested and partook of the many delicious fruits which grew in abundance and by night they strode onward in grace, two companions drifting onwards through an ever more beautiful paradise, like two ships gliding happily together upon a secret sea of perpetual adventure. Stars lit their way and warmed them, and when the dawn came at last, strong and bold and full of crimson glory, the starlight shone on within their hearts and minds, having taken hold like living seeds of limitless holy grandeur which kept growing and expanding with every precious moment.

By the time they reached the mountains he was a different person altogether, or perhaps it would be more accurate to say that he had ceased to be the person grown apart from what he had always dreamed of. The storms from the sea seldom made it this far, but when they did it was usually to drop peaceful depths of silent snow on the slopes above, and it was eventually to these heights that they climbed. The cold clear air of perpetual winter did not phase them in the least, both of them permeated by the warmth of the stars, engulfed by the brilliance of heaven. As Milton and the Lady crested the highest peaks and began to descend towards the great blue ocean before them, he had all but forgotten his life behind.

Friends would assume he became lost, searching in vain but figuring he had died happy, doing what he loved best. His cats and his home would be tended to with compassion and responsibility. Every Saturday afternoon a toast would be raised in his memory and a few jokes told, remembering Milton as he would have wanted to be remembered. And the great panther that broke the bridge with lightning? It would continue to prowl the jungle in the depths of darkest night, especially during wayward storms, always on the lookout for those who had strayed from their dreams, or whose dreams had strayed from them. Was there a difference?

“The water is so much calmer here than the eastern ocean”, said Milton, his hand in hers as they strode blissfully along a white sand beach under a wide violet moon.

“All water is the same, all the same family”, she replied. “People only think of it as this sea or that sea because they are mesmerized by the shore.”

It made perfect sense to him and she smiled as she saw this. “We shall walk in peace here till you are new, and then we shall sail over the great water to even greater wonders and even greater joy.”

It didn’t seem possible for anything to surpass this place or what he was feeling, but he had faith in her. Many years ago he had had the great good fortune to have met and married this magical guide of beings, and now, when at last he was ready, she would show him the far way to undying peace.

*(*)*

Photo is from www.Yeeeeee.com)

“HELD DOWN”

Arafin © 2009

He had worked well past dinner time and on into the night, feeling the pressure from his boss to complete the market report by 10:00 AM the next morning “or else”. Both tragic and funny that his future should hang in the balance like this after so much careful planning and investing. He had made all the right moves, never taken foolish risks, but still here he was, on the verge of loosing his home and job if he didn’t pull off this project to the satisfaction of someone who had only been in the company for two weeks. Two weeks! And he had been here eight years. The word “unfair” didn’t even begin to describe it.

It was around midnight that his stomach began to growl relentlessly and when he could no longer retain the ability to concentrate over the gnawing in his guts, he wandered down to the cafeteria. It would be closed at this hour, of course, but the vending machines would still be accessible. He rummaged in his pockets for some change but could only produce a few pennies, a nickel, and a parking stub. Just as he was about to choose between going outside to search for an all night eatery or returning to his office to slog on through the wee hours like a determined soldier ready to die for his cause, he heard a faint rustle of papers behind him. Turning to look, he noticed that a door long locked was now open. It had always looked as if it led out onto a patio overlooking the street far below, and many an employee had tried the knob with that hope in mind, but none had ever gained entry. Now the door was open and hunger was replaced by curiosity, the need to finish his market study usurped by the need to explore a little. He craved a bit of distraction from his task. It was so boring! Besides, who ever had rustled those papers might have some change for the vending machines.

Passing through the doorway he noticed that the floor tiles changed from dark green to a more pastel shade and that they appeared imperfect and somehow a bit odd in appearance. He couldn’t quite place it. They almost looked ancient, but that didn’t make sense. The building had been constructed in the previous decade.

And then he saw her.

She was long and thin and oh, so beautiful, with strawberry blonde hair just grazing the tips of her perfect shoulders, her elegant arms like those of an elf waving delicate fingers in a gentle dance of circular motion, round and round her lap, a beckoning sort of movement. Her eyes were deep and green and laughing. Her mouth was curved into just the hint of a mischievous smile. One leg was folded neatly on top of the other while the foot remaining on the floor tapped rhythmically upon the ancient looking tile. More than anything he could not help focusing on her circling hands, drawing him towards her lap. The exhaustion of working long hours with little food hit him with full force now, and this exhaustion was joined by a new sensation, a happy tingly sleepy feeling like one might get just as they were about to fall into the arms of a long separated lover. How desperately he wanted to fall into her embrace, to rest his head in her lap and sink into delicious sleep.

“Come”, she whispered, her breath echoing from the walls of the small sun room as if it were a hundred times bigger, a deep and mysterious hallway in a palace lost for centuries to the knowledge of men. “You need to rest. You are so tired. Come and lay your sweet heavy head in my lap, ….. for just a little while. You know you want to. You know you NEED to.”

The words, “… you NEED to …” felt as if they jumped right into him, startling his heart and mind and body in a way which he could not control. He was at once thrilled by her invitation, soothed by her beauty, and terrified by this power she had over him. Before he realized it his feet were shuffling forward like a sleepwalker and he lay gently down upon the dark green velvet couch next to her and let her guide his head to rest in her lap. So warm and soft and achingly sweet! All his exhaustion now seemed to combine with all the tiredness of all the world and he let himself just fall ………….

“There you go, darling, falling so deeply for me, falling so deeply down into my lap. Bottomless it is. Never-ending, the folds of my dress and the warmth of my thighs, and you thirst for this so much, don’t you? You cannot help but crave now to just let go of everything and fall. That’s it, just let go of your body. Just let go of your mind. I’ve got you.” And then she let out a playful little laugh as might a schoolgirl who had just tricked a boy into doing her a favor. “I’ve really got you now.”

And he dropped off the edge of the Earth and sank into her graceful green enchantment, sank so deep and so fast that the plunge would have been too dizzying to withstand had her palm not been steadying his head, holding it down against her lap as he sighed out a breath of relief heavier than all the weight of eternity.

The last thing he remembered before he lost consciousness was the smell of jasmine from her thigh. It reverberated within him like the cool distant thunder from a retreating storm which had left the air clean and fresh from much needed rain after a long drought. Jasmine swirling round and round in his mind as he fell. Jasmine oozing into him and engulfing his mind forever. There was nothing left but jasmine.

*****************************************

“Where’s the hell’s my report! Where the hell is that no good fool who was supposed to have it on my desk half an hour ago?” The company boss’ face was flushed bright red with anger, and his secretary, an older woman of some experience with such outbursts and much skill at taming them, offered up a glass of mineral water and a soothing suggestion to sit down for a bit.

He would accept neither water nor chair.

“Here it is, sir. It’s right on your desk.”

Why hadn’t he seen it before? There it was, all in good order. He stood as he read. Perfect. Better than perfect. He paced delightedly back and forth while repeatedly telling his secretary to fetch the young genius who had performed this miracle of marketing analysis. But, search the building as his employees would, they could not locate the young man, and the boss kept pacing.

He eventually did sit down, but by that time the door to the sun room downstairs next to the cafeteria was locked again, and inside the sun was brightly beaming in through the old glass skylights, falling like warm waves of infinite bliss onto the head of the young executive as he lay sleeping upon the lap of the exquisite woman in green. Years from now when he woke, his world would be changed, and he would walk with her along distant beaches of white sand under the swaying branches of giant willow trees. He had found paradise in a simple nap.

Or had it found him?

Nothing is as sexy as a smile. It can turn an otherwise ordinary face into a shining star. Far more than just the angle of the mouth, a nice smile brings into play the entire face, especially the eyes. There are coy smiles, wanton smiles, daring smiles, friendly smiles, and mysterious smiles. Every woman has within her repertoire that which Mona Lisa made famous. What a bleak world this would be without the warmth of the simple smile.

Generally speaking, which do you find more sexy, a covered attractive body or a nude one? If your answer is the latter, then why? Does the addition of fabric tease, enhance, or mystify?

(Photo by Corrine Day)

SEA STARE

Arafin © 2009

The water was so warm, almost like a bath. Swimming was to be a lazy thing here, not at all strenuous, and I just lay floating much of the time, marveling at the soft pastel muted azure of the sky, relishing the deeper blue of the sea. I had saved up hours and days and weeks for this vacation and nothing was going to get in the way of my complete and utter relaxation. Nothing.

Without noticing it I somehow drifted further from shore than I had anticipated and before I knew it was nearly past the break in the coral reef and out into the open ocean. The waves were so gentle today that I had not been warned by the usual crashing of high surf. The air felt so conducive to sleep, especially when in the water. I was having a wonderful waking dream. I was not worried that I was now over half a kilometer from shore. I was a good swimmer and could easily cross that distance when the time came. I wanted to continue to drift. The breeze and soft current would carry me North along the outer beach until I could simply walk onto the jetty at the end of this side of the island. Many people had done this before and in rougher water than this. Most used inflatable rafts or inner tubes, but today was so absolutely delightful that I would need naught by my own buoyancy. The sounds of laughter and singing on the inner beach had now long faded and I was engulfed in only the sound of the delicate wind and tender laughing waves. I closed my eyes again and just gave in to the sea.

I had intended to open my eyes and check my bearings again in about ten minutes, but over an hour must have passed. When I looked about I could just barely see the jetty to the South. It must be at least a mile away. I had drifted right past it and was now caught in a stronger current which was taking me away from the island altogether. I did not panic, but I was concerned. I gathered my strength and prepared myself for the long swim back. I would head slightly East and then South, out of the current and into the lee side of the island. It should take me about forty five minutes to an hour and the workout would do me good. Remembering countless swimming competitions from my youth, I congratulated myself for the shape I was in then, trying to fool myself into thinking that things were still that way now. After fifteen minutes of hard swimming I was out of breath and slowed to a side stroke. I was getting closer to shore but this current was more than I had expected. It actually seemed to be increasing in speed the further towards the island I got. After swimming gently for five minutes and catching my breath, I attacked the water again in a deliberate crawl for about ten minutes and then stopped to take stock of my location.

I was no closer to shore and I was being carried North and West again! I now recognized fully that I was in trouble and tried to make sense of what would happen and how I could deal with the situation. That this shouldn’t be happening. That no such currents were mentioned in any of the resort brochures or local chatter was irrelevant now. This was real and I was too far away to call for help. No one on the beach would be looking for someone in this direction and certainly not this far out. What was worse, no boats or planes came this way, all such traffic instead plying avenues to and from the other end of the island. To the North and West was nothing but open ocean for many hundreds of miles. I tried swimming South and West for a bit, thinking that it might get me out of this damned current, but it only clutched at me all the harder. The low profile of the island was growing more and more distant and I was becoming more and more tired. I finally decided to continue side stroking due East, figuring that the current would eventually be broken by the shadow of the island. I would be many miles away by the time I was in still water, but at least I would have a fighting chance to swim back. I would be wiped out and sore for a week, but I would be alive. I really had no other choice.

The minutes dissolved into hours and the hours dissolved into the late afternoon sunset. I was going to be out here after dark! The island was just barely visible now, the first lights of evening celebrations twinkling tantalizingly over the vast distance that had only grown and grown and grown. I began to think about my death, about loved ones who would be hurt by my sudden passing, about my cats back home who would never see me again. I had to survive! I had to get out of this! Oh, how foolish I had been! Damn my arrogance and stupidity! I screamed in anger and my voice felt smaller than a squeak in the lonely emptiness of the great ocean.

Suddenly she appeared before me, angel of the sea, so close and so beautiful that I at first believed myself to be dead and dreaming. Her long blonde hair flowed back from her exquisite face like gold rays from a living sun. Her devastating bluer than blue eyes shot through me with a stare so intense that I thought I would scream again, … but I did not. Her lips were so perfect and so sweet that I lost all thoughts of survival in that instant and longed only for a single perfect kiss. I was thunderstruck and paralyzed and weaker than a jellyfish in a tempest. I tried to speak but could not. I tried to smile but could not move my face. I tried even to blink but could only stare back, back into those terribly enchanting eyes, hungering for her gaze to beam into me forever, desperate for her to see right through me and into me. I wanted her eyes to obliterate me, to demolish me, to rend me down into nothing but salt water which would wash away forever into the void. Why was I feeling this? Who was she? What was she? Oh, how I wished I could scream in joy, scream in longing, scream my lungs out in the anguish of all unimaginable frantic hopeless love that had ever been felt by anyone anywhere ever! I went straight past insanity all the way to absolute blankness in those few awful seconds, and then … she pulled me back. Not all the way back to normal functionality, but just back to the delicious madness of completely foolhardy love.

She smiled. “Do you want to go back to the island?” Her voice was so eerily sweet, like soft bells and choir angels and nightingales all rolled into one. She saw my answer in my eyes. I did NOT want to go back. I wanted to stay with her, even if I perished one minute from now and drowned.

“Do you really want to leave your life behind?”, she whispered to my aching mind. “That’s not very wise, you know.”

I knew. I knew. My eyes betrayed my shame as she smiled again.

“Let me take you back. You’ll never be able to swim that far alone.”

And my eyes pleaded “yes” to her offer and at the same time “no, I want to stay”, and she saw it and glided towards me like a summer cloud glides towards the horizon. I felt like a horizon, lost and beyond the range of all things known. My fear was not for my life any more but that I would never see her again.

She knew. She knew just what my fears were. “You will see me again. Don’t worry. Don’t be afraid. When you are ready, you will see me.”

And with that she took me in her arms and flew more than swam through the water. Darkness surrounded us as we sped towards the lights of the island and I wished we were moving more slowly, that this moment of rescuing embrace would last longer. I felt her laugh as she read my thoughts and the quiver of her mirth vibrated her silken skin next to mine and I thought I would explode. It was too heavenly to withstand, this dear proximity, this goddess embrace. How could mortals possibly entwine with such beings?

“You’ll see someday”, she whispered directly to my heart, her mouth perhaps not moving at all. It was hard to tell in this darkness.

We reached the outer beach and she flew between the break and thus quickly into the inner lagoon. Within twenty feet of the white sand, and about fifty feet from a young couple cuddling on a blanket, she stopped and kissed me on the cheek. “Go back to your world now, … for a little while. Finish your life there and take your time. Be good to others and be good to yourself. When the time is right I will come to you again. I promise.” And she kissed me on the lips, just the briefest peck, but in that lightening second I knew that I would indeed see her again one day. The rush of pleasure she had driven into me, the memory she created then, would never fade. In fact, it would only grow, and through it’s magic, her tantalizing spell, I would live a long and prosperous life full of joy. I would know great happiness and great love, and when this body had worn to a husk, I would return to the sea and fall helplessly, bewilderingly, ….. perfectly ….. into the arms of the sea angel.

And before I knew it she was gone.

My feet touched the sand and I walked stealthily onto dry land once again. It seemed to move underneath me, reverberations of so many hours at the mercy of the waves. I took care not to disturb the young couple on the blanket and made my way eventually back to my hotel. Despite my physical exhaustion, my mind was full of energy and wonder and sleep did not come at all that night. When the sun rose I was still staring out the window towards the sea. When room service brought my breakfast I gave the young native girl a one hundred dollar tip and smiled from ear to ear. It felt so good to be alive. And, it felt even better to know that being alive could be so good.

WASHED AWAY

Arafin © 2009

She picked her way nimbly through the bustle of pedestrians and cars, buses and cabs, bicycles and scooters. A flexible cat dancing among the pigeons, only they never knew it. Danger in disguise. They all wore grays and browns and blacks. Business attire with hard uncomfortable shoes. No fun at all. She, on the other hand, was a bright flashing gem shining happily in this graveyard of mediocrity. Her deep green skirt and matching short blouse, tied at the middle in a knot, shot like an emerald laser through the somber minions of King Profit. Dark red lips snickered at executives too obsessed with figures to notice hers, and oh what a figure she had. Legs as long as a gazelle’s driving musically swaying hips. A tiny waist and proud breasts, swan’s neck and chiseled face, eyes as green as her clothes, shiny with moist enthusiasm. Ariadne was her name and she would soon have need of sustenance. Being of good upbringing and priding herself on proper manners, she preferred to only eat the impolite and disrespectful of society.

The way she saw it it was like cleansing the herd, making it healthier and more vigorous. They were buffalo and she the predator. She would not kill the strong, only the sick and weak, and to her the sick and weak were those who were unable, or unwilling, to be civil to one another. Oh, and to be uncivil to her was to invite more than simple consumption. Rumors were that she kept such boors alive for weeks before finishing them off, finally granting them peace, finally granting herself peace from their whimpering and sniveling. Ariadne continued West for a few minutes and suddenly stopped in front of the museum. On the steps were several protesters with signs decrying the display of ivory art inside. For some reason this intrigued her and she entered, bounding up the steps like a lioness about to disrupt a quiet watering hole in the Serengeti.

The ivory art exhibition featured carvings from all over the world. Elephant tusk ceremonial objects from Africa, ancestral worship implements from Thailand, scrimshaw from bygone sailors, and Inuit items of both practical and decorative purpose. All were cordoned off with extra layers of velvet rope and guarded by more than the usual lone security officer. Today there was a guard on every display, perhaps some fifteen in all. Several eyed her suspiciously. Signs warned that anyone who attempted to breach the ropes and touch the ivory would be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. She did not approve of killing for ivory, and she did not approve of vandalism. She looked at several displays before the chief curator, doubtlessly drawn by her unusual attire and stunning looks, approached her and inquired as to her interest in the art on display.

“I was just curious”, she hummed, her voice neatly skimming along in an almost musical lilt, inferring a carefree attitude on the surface but with an underlying current of power and knowledge below.

“Do you come here often?”, asked the curator, a nervous little man with reddish brown hair and a suit which had been tailored for him too many large meals ago. It’s tightness across his stomach was ever so slightly irritating to her.

“Once, years ago”, she replied, “to an exhibition of ancient Minoan art.”

“Oh yes”, he oozed, “that was one of our most popular presentations. I designed it myself, of course. Such beautiful objects deserve the best attention, I always say. Are you from around here or just passing through. You look as if you were from out of town.” His pass was creepy but not rude. He simply had no idea what would catch the interest of a woman like this.

“I am from far away, a place you have probably never heard of”, she said. “And I am living here for the time being. The wildlife interests me.” This last statement was oddly teasing but by no means an invitation to pursue romantic overtures.

“Say, ….. I get to leave whenever I want because I’m in charge here. I could show you around the city if you like. People say I’m a wonderful guide.”

Ariadne was bothered by his forwardness yet not angered. He was being a bit pathetic but forgiveable. “No thank you”, she said. “I am quite familiar with this city, having visited it numerous times in the past. Thank you for your offer, however. That was very nice of you. Now, I really must run.” And with that she smiled politely and spun on her heels like a soldier and vanished into the crowd.

Out on the street the protesters were being asked to move along by the police. All was peaceful and no one was hinting at violence. The protesters slowly gathered their backpacks and signs and began to amble off, probably intending to return tomorrow and every day as long as the ivory exhibition was on display. One very pretty young girl dressed in a denim skirt and white billowing blouse came up to Ariadne and spoke. “Did you see the display inside? Did you see the ivory?”

“Yes”, said Ariadne, “I saw some of it.”

The girl grew slightly anxious and shifted back and forth on her feet. “Would you be willing to make a contribution to our fund to prevent the slaughter of animals for their ivory?”

Ariadne looked at this girl and saw immediately that she meant no one any harm but was simply trying to do some good in the world. She reached into her purse and withdrew five crisp one hundred dollar bills and these she placed gently into the trembling hands of the bewildered young college student.

“Wow! Ma’am, that was incredibly generous of you! Thank you so much! Thank you!” And with humble gratitude the girl removed a necklace of blue beads from around her neck and offered them with deepest sincerity to Ariadne. The beads were fake lapis, not worth more than ten dollars altogether, but the motivation behind this gesture touched the heart of the lady in green and she accepted in the spirit in which the necklace was given. The girl beamed.

Just then the curator swept up and shouted at the girl, “Get away from here with your foolish trinkets! No one wants to buy that trash!”

“But I wasn’t selling it”, said the girl. “I was giving it as a gift.”

“Who wants a gift from you?”, snipped the curator. “You have nothing a woman like this would want!”

The girl burst into tears and fled. Ariadne followed, first making a mental note of the curators scent. She would later use this memory to find him again in the city of millions.

Catching up to the girl, Ariadne comforted her and offered to take her to tea, an offer which was gladly accepted. A few of the girl’s friends came along, too, a fact which seemed to amuse the emerald woman with the flashing eyes. These kids were so passionate about saving innocent animals. She was touched by their sincerity and bright optimism that they could make a difference in such a dark world. They spent all afternoon snacking and chatting in various indoor and outdoor eating establishments, all at the expense of Ariadne. She insisted so sweetly that they could not refuse. They had little money, she correctly surmised, and she had more than she knew what to do with, the fruits of countless wise investments dating back a very, very long time. In the end, it was just Ariadne and the girl again, sitting on a park bench and taking in the sunset.

“I need to get home and study”, said the girl. “Thank you so much for a wonderful day and for being so nice to us. You more than wiped away what that nasty little man at the museum did.”

Ariadne smiled warmly at the girl. Over her green silk blouse she was wearing the cheap glass beads as if they were sapphires given by King Solomon himself. They were precious not for their material but for their meaning. “Go now and study. Learn how to make the world a better place. You have much success in your future. I can see it, you know.”

They rose and hugged and the girl walked off, turning once to wave goodbye again just before she rounded a corner and passed out of sight. Ariadne would watch over her from time to time, even depositing money anonymously into her bank account when times were tough and she would otherwise have to forgo groceries in favor of books for school.

Now the emerald lady moved off in the opposite direction and began sniffing the air softly with her delicate nose. There was a slight breeze and this was good. It was much more difficult to track prey when the air was completely still. In less than an hour she had located the general area where the curator lived and in another twenty minutes his building. For all his bluster he lived not in a high end apartment in the posh area of town, but in a modest walk-up near the market area. This was where low level white collar and high level blue collar met, the transition ground between lower and upper class, not that it mattered to her more than a passing amusement. She deftly picked the lock and disabled the meager security alarm. Moving upstairs as quietly as a leopard upon velvet, she found his door and knocked boldly.

“Who the hell is it?”, came the angry reply.

After what must have been his peek through the fisheye lens in the door it quickly opened to reveal the curator in a dingy brown bathrobe, a bottle of half consumed beer in his hand. “Well, well, well, what do we have here? You’d like me to show you the sights after all, would you?” The alcohol had combined with his ego to overshadow the obvious fact that she had known exactly where he lived, but then slowly it dawned on him, and the fear that should have been immediate began slowly to well up inside him. It was also her eyes. They were not friendly now as they had been in the museum. “How did you find me?”, he stammered, his hands sweating so badly that the bottle of beer slipped to the floor and broke in a puddle of foam.

“Oh, I don’t know. Just lucky I guess. May I come in?” She was smiling now, but not the sort of smile anyone with any sense would want to see. It was the smile of death but it was also mixed with a seductive power absolutely impossible to resist.

Transfixed and struck dumb he backed up slowly and with both hands gestured for her to enter. Her heels crunched over the broken glass as might a battle tank crunch over the bones of a defeated enemy. She closed the door behind her and threw the bolt. Turning to face him again she began to laugh, a deep, throaty laugh full of hunger and malice and unstoppable ultimate justice. The pudgy little curator began to cry as she came within arm’s length and he fell backwards into a waiting armchair, every muscle in his body shaking with uncontrollable terror. “Please, please, what do you want? Take anything you like! I’ll do whatever you want! What are you going to do to me?” But he already knew what she was going to do just as surely as he knew that he had absolutely nothing to offer her that she would ever be interested in.

For the first day she left his throat intact enough so that he could whimper but not scream. On the second day she took even that ability of expression away from him and rendered him mute. On the third day she grew tired of his pathetic attempts to escape and removed both his feet and hands. She was very careful to prevent him from bleeding too much, and skillfully cauterized any wounds immediately after inflicting them. It was only on the fourth day when he had ceased to tremble and slipped for the final time into unconsciousness that she consumed his entire body, piece by rude little piece. Ariadne left the apartment exactly as she had found it save for the absence of its former resident. All traces of her visit were as washed away as he was. At the museum very few people missed him and a few were even glad that they did not have to put up with his arrogance anymore.

She would not need to feed again for at least a month, but in this maze of wickedness and greed she would have little trouble finding her dinner.

(Painting by Philip Straub)

I have been away from my own blog for nearly a month due to relentless obligations elsewhere. The nature of these obligations, although requiring all my creative strength, it seems, was still something I chose to undertake by my own free will, knowing full well it would be worth it. And it was.

Now I have more time to devote to writing again and hope to post here with more regularity. To begin with I will quite simply express my frustration at not feeling like writing when I was so busy, (and then ask if any of you have ever felt this sort of thing when you were overworked, the need to create but lack of energy or time to do so). I really feel that I must write as part of my very existence, and when I don’t I begin to grow sad, even a bit ashamed. I go from attempting to convince myself that I could write if I really wanted to, to feeling that I’ll find time tomorrow and then feeling guilty that I put it off again and again, to giving up altogether. Logically I knew that I did not have the time or the motivation to write this past month, but I just can’t escape the feeling that I could have done better. (Please pass the kleenex. I’m feeling sorry for myself here. ……. Ugggh! This is disgusting!)

Any professional writer will tell you that it is more important to write something every day than to write something good. I know this. Next time I am stretched thin I hope I’ll remember it more clearly, keep it in the forefront of my thoughts when I have even half an hour of free time, and let my fingers move as they wish. I know that something will come out if I do that. It always does.

(Picture is of Canadian actress Molly Parker)

 

 

“MAGNETS”

 

Arafin © 2009

 

 

She prowls the city streets for a while just before sunset, looking but not really looking, resting her irresistible eyes more than using them. The warm afternoon glow brings a smile to her perfect dark red lips and she eases legs too delicate to conjure off the concrete sidewalk and into a dark little cafe, narrow and moody and sleepy. Later, poets will gather here and trade their latest creations to a peculiar mixture of jubilation and cucumber cool, but for now it shelters old men passing time before their wives expect them home for all too familiar suppers. Sitting on a stool in front of the polished mahogany counter, she orders an espresso and a biscotti, sipping and munching pensively as she surveys her domain. The world is her domain, yet few realize it at any one time. Two old men gaze at her from behind, their hungry minds doing what their bodies no longer can. Noticing this offering of desire, she cocks her head and winks to them, a flower of gratitude, a little jewel of acknowledgement. What abandon flashes there within them as they reel without moving!

 

Finishing her snack she tips generously and prances stoically away like some ancient guardian of secret romances too precious for all but royalty. Setting sunlight casts long amber shadows upon hot stone walls which will radiate many hours yet on this teaming enclave of bustle and woe that passes for civilization. There is a task within her mind, a mission, a need. She thirsts for fresh affection pulsing in the veins of some yet to be discovered stranger, his unsuspecting mind hovering over an abyss he cannot see. Heels clicking tiny echoes of brazen defiance against the artificial canyons, her path is clear, lit from without by growing neon and headlights, lit from within by a brilliance of panther lust. There is no destination of place to be found, merely a destination of who. And then she spies him with catlike eyes so adept at detecting the slightest scurrying movement of libido. Her concrete jungle hunting ground quivers as she coils her charms in preparation for attack.

 

He is young, perhaps still in his twenties, a junior executive of some sort, well enough off to afford silk suits but not yet rich enough to afford custom tailoring. Still, she can easily make out his sleek muscular form as it glides forward to within range of her grasp.

 

“Excuse me”, she whispers, but can you tell me how to get to Market Street?” No deception is visible in her feigned confusion and her mouth twitches ever so slightly in mock nervousness as she gages the response of her victim before he even speaks it.

 

“Uh, yes. Sure. I’m headed that way myself. Just follow me.” His voice is nervous but not embarrassingly so. He has been taken off guard by her sudden rush of beauty, yet he confidently maintains a composure fit for a man much his senior, or so he thinks. The first whiff of her perfume is so faint he cannot be sure he smelled it at all, but the rise in his heartbeat and increase in his testosterone are all too obvious to her. She just flexes her dimples politely at him and offers simple thanks, but inwardly her mind is racing with desire. He will do just fine. He will give her what she needs and then some.

 

After a few small forays at small talk from him and a few clever replies from her they are within sight of the street she requested, and within a few feet from one of her many abodes. “Nests” she calls them to herself. Without seeming to mean to, she brushes his arm with her fingertips, sending a frenzied shock of excitement up his spine. She swiftly follows this with nine little words spoken so expertly that no one could really resist them. “Now come let yourself follow me, … if you dare!” And she laughs so softly that it is more a breath than a true laugh, but to him it might as well be thunder, for he quickly finds himself being led off the street and through a somewhat constricting doorway, then up darkly lit wooden stairs, flight after flight, spiraling round and round till at last they break open into an expansive foyer with high ceiling and a wide light marble tiled floor. At this point he offers the first hint of protest, but no words are allowed to escape his lips, for she puts her index finger to his mouth in a gesture of quiet, and without thinking, he obeys. Leading him like a lamb, she proceeds to the end of the hallway and opens a tall arched door, bidding him enter. Again he tries to speak but cannot, this time needing no hushing finger to silence him, but only the sight of what greets his eyes.

 

Every manner of leather and iron restraint dangles from walls and protrudes from tall thick oaken chairs. A veritable arsenal of whips and cuffs hangs from display racks. Artificial symbols of manhood too numerous of design to mention, and too absurd of imagination to make sense of, lay scattered here and there like so many soldiers strewn helter skelter by some magnificent battle too decadent to believe. He begins to panic and she laughs freely now.

 

“Sit down!” she commands. And his legs respond without any input whatsoever from his brain. His body falls to rest in one of the tall oak chairs, thick leather restraints bristling from the arms, and with these she quickly and effortlessly binds him. He all the while watches as if in a dream. He can scarcely believe it. He is letting her trap him!

 

And then a terrible realization cascades down into his waning consciousness from above as she smiles so sweetly his heart aches to melt completely for her. She can hear his every thought as easily as she can control it!

 

“Of course I can!” she laughs. Her voice is so much stronger now than the girlish whisper on the street that first ensnared him. “I can hear you as clearly as I can hear that drip of water from the fountain over there.”

 

And his eyes dart suddenly to his left and the fountain she alluded to, it’s dripping sound becoming like canon fire in his ears. The fountain is in the shape of a man much like himself, bound in a chair much like the one he is bound in, only it is all of white stone, water leaking gently from the eyes. Tears of ecstasy to match the expression of insane joy upon this statue’s upturned face.

 

And he realizes in that instant that this was never a statue carved from a piece of rock, but was once a living breathing man. A single tear rolls out of each of his eyes as he sees this in his shaking mind, his body now quite and utterly paralyzed.

 

She brushes her fingers against his cheek and bends to kiss him on the lips, but just before her mouth devours his, she lets him hear these words, a token of appreciation or an offering of recompense, take your pick. “Yes, dear one, I drank the life right out of him and then turned him into that handsome fountain. I have many more just like him, both men and women, scattered about this place and many others. In time, when it amuses me, I breath a little life back into them and play for a while. Then, if they have served me well, I release them from these marble bonds and let them return to their meager world, all the while remembering in their dreams what miraculous joy they experienced with me. You will thus gain your freedom someday if you serve me well.”

 

And her perfect lips touch his, and it seems for a second as if all of  heaven is flowing into his heart. Or was it a minute? Or an hour? Or a day? 

 

***********************************

 

The sound of dripping water echoes softly now as he just watches. Watches as others come into the room and are drained. That is all he can do, really, watch. That and cry a bit. Cry for joy, for he knows that his time will come again to please this perfect Mistress of the Magnetic Eyes.

Just when you thought you had read and heard so much information about orgasms that you were about to burst, along comes yet more knowledge, much of it seemingly designed to bring about climax by laughter.