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On the day the boy is to be executed, there is news of an orc-patrol, and Maglor rides in pursuit of it; lesser matters must give way to greater. He could command another to deal with the matter, of course, but despite his sixteenth birthday the traitor still appears as a boy, and they might flinch from it and let him run away. After five months living in the middle of the camp and sleeping in the commander’s tent, the consequences of either his capture or his willing allegiance to Angband could be disastrous.

Why has he kept the traitor so near him? It seems like folly, in retrospect; they ought to have made a prison and left him there on bread and water until he was of age.

When he returns, he sees the boy has relaxed, hoping this might mean some reprieve, and finds he does not have the stomach for it.

Caranthir finds him when the delay has stretched to a week.

“It is past the time appointed, and the traitor still lives.”

“I know.”

“Do you not want him dead? He and his family are the reason we are here, scraping out a life and hiding from orcs, rather than victorious and masters of Beleriand.”

Yes. One child. Would have turned the tide of the battle, that would have.

The words You’re the one who thought we should recruit them have not been said since the battle, will never be. Neither will the words You’re the one who thought saying “They breed like rabbits, and we need reinforcements” in the hearing of their commanders was a good idea. In all probability, it didn’t matter. In all probability, they were already on Morgoth’s side before they crossed the mountains.

“He tried to kill you.”

“He tried to make me kill him, that was patently obvious. He wanted a quick death rather than a slow one. He hasn’t laid a foot out of line since he realized I wasn’t going to torture him.”

“You’re being sentimental. You have been this whole time. Or else just squeamish. If you’re not going to kill him, what else would you do with him?”

****

What else would he do with him? It’s not as if the boy’s been any use thus far.

But he wanted to be.

He wanted not to die, that was all, and he thought he was more likely to avoid it if he was useful.

What if he could be?

****

Maglor spends two months arguing with himself before he comes to a conclusion.

They hadn’t required their Easterling allies to reveal their minds to them. Nor had the other Noldor demanded it of the leaders of the Three Houses. Osanwë was an intimacy, not an interrogation; it could not be demanded of every new ally as a condition of trust. Nay, they’d have lacked allies if they demanded it; no elf, past, present or future, had been or ever would be permitted such encroachment on a dwarf.

It was a mistake.

The traitor can make a choice. Death is his due; life demands proof.

He holds the sword at the traitor’s throat. “Look at me.”

The traitor looks up. There is a fear in his eyes, and a faint glimmer of hope in his eyes; he knows perfectly well that a sword at the neck is not how you disembowel someone.

“Do you want to live?”

The voice is a whisper. “Yes.”

“Is there any way I can trust you?”

He seeks for words, and finds none.

“Did you know that the Eldar can read minds?”

His voice shakes. “I did not, westlord.”

“I can read yours, if you permit me. If I find anything I do not like, I will kill you. If I find you are willing to be loyal, I will give you a chance. Do you prefer this to execution?”

“Yes, westlord.”

Maglor pages through his mind. There is no deceit there, nor hostility; if anything, he’s rather surprised that he hasn’t been treated worse. He has no desire to serve Angband or to seek out the rest of his clan.

More surety is needed, for a child of traitors.

“Swear to me.” Maglor’s look becomes hard and sharp as steel as he lays out the words.

“Repeat. I swear to serve you, to aid and defend your people, to fight against your enemies, to do your will and follow your commands in all things, to die rather than be taken captive by the enemy, I swear so by the Valar, and by the thrones of the Valar, and by Eru Ilúvatar, and may the Darkness Everlasting take me if I fail in any part of this oath.”

The boy has never heard of the Valar and has only a distant idea of what is meant by Eru Ilúvatar, but he repeats it and as he speaks, he feels a bond tightening around him, snapping into place, a certainty and a sword over his head far deadlier than Maglor’s own.

****

“You did what?” said Amras.

“It will hold,” insists Maglor.

“Who cares if it holds? He’s one human traitor, it’s not as if he’s worth anything to us. Why go to such lengths to keep him alive? Are you just squeamish? Or have you gotten attached? Planning to take him on as a page?”

“I’m not planning to take him on as anything. He’s an adult now, and he can work like anyone else. There’s no need to throw away an extra pair of hands needlessly.”

“One human servant is insignificant, even if he were trustworthy, which he isn’t. I knew there was something wrong when you insisted on keeping him around you for months. If you were of a mind to take a foster-child, you might at least choose an elf!”

“It’s idiocy,” Celegorm agrees. “What other place is so mad as to adopt the children of traitors?”

“Nargothrond, apparently,” snaps Maglor, nettled, and has to jump back from the table as Curufin dives at him with a sword. Maedhros slaps the blade away with the vambrance worn over his handless right arm and glares at both of them. “Enough. It’s a piece of folly, but it’s done, and the boy will have difficulty doing any harm alone in a camp with a hundred eyes on him. If makes any trouble or does anything suspicious, we’ll kill him.”

“Maglor won’t.”

“I would,” Maglor protests.

“I will,” returns Maedhros, with a skeptical glance at him. “Now let it drop, everyone. He’s not worth more trouble.”

The room empties quickly. When only the two of them are left and Maglor is passing through the door, Maedhros grabs his arm. “So you’re aware,” he says in an undertone, “I still think it would have been much kinder to kill him. Than to bind him so.”

“I told you already,” Maglor says. “I didn’t do it to be kind.”

****

For the first years after his oath, Spring Rain is not trusted to bear weapons. He is given menial tasks, tasks that he would say are for children, though elf-children do not seem to be assigned any work: carding wool from the sheep that can be raised in clearings of the forest, gathering nuts and berries and roots (always under the supervision of at least two others). And other sorts of work no one else wants to do, like mucking out the stables for the horses. He does it all uncomplainingly. He even enjoys the latter task: it lets him spend time around horses, the joy and passion of his people. Some of the horses are ordinary beasts, though fine ones, each of them fit for a chieftain of his clan; but some are more magnificent by far than any he has seen before. He knows without being told that he is not to touch them. 

He begins to try to care for the ordinary horses, brushing their coats and checking their hooves, but there is never any need; the horses are perfectly kept, and no rider will leave the stables without first ensuring that their horse has all it needs. It is this, more than anything else, that helps him begin to trust these strange elves.

One day a scouting party returns having met with orc-raiders, with several riders and horses wounded. Spring Rain takes charge of a horse whose rider is carried to the healer’s tent. The mare is shaking and soaked with sweat and has several cuts on her legs; he cleans and talks gently to her and cleans her wounds. When the stablemaster comes he checks her over carefully and looks at Spring Rain with new respect.

“You know horses.”

“They’re our lives. I was riding almost as soon as I could walk.”

They talk at greater length, about his people’s practices and about elvish practices with horses. The stablemaster gives him more responsibilities after that, and he spends more time with the horses and less time gathering food in the forest. On occasion he is allowed to ride, and learns to ride as the elves do, without saddle or reins. Many of the elves are cold towards him, some are hostile, but none can find any fault with his care of the horses. In time this begins to win him a measure of trust from some and even, with a few, friendship.

He learns that the strange and wondrous horses come from the far west, across the sea, and are the horses of the gods. They are not part of his responsibilities and he does not dare touch them, but in his free hours he often sits near them and speaks to them; they seem content with and even pleased by his presence, and he almost believes they understand his words.

One day the stablemaster introduces him to a new elf who questions him on his knowledge of weapons. Spring Rain answers nervously and is taken to the archery field and given a choice of bows. He chooses a short, recurved bow. He’s out of practice, but he’s still not bad, and within a month of being permitted to practice, he’s regained his old skill. He’s fast, accurate, and shoots well in any direction from horseback, including above and behind himself, though he’s not as skilled as the elves at great range; they seem to have eyes like hawks. 

By the time he’s nineteen they let him ride sometimes with scouting parties, made up of elves who are willing both to tolerate him and to watch him closely.

By the time he’s twenty they let him ride armed. This is a great joy - the open plains are his home, and it’s a great relief to be out of the forest and riding at speed with the wind in his face. For the first few years, his scouting groups meet with nothing worse than small orc-bands, and return uninjured. 

Then one day, another patrol encounters a large orc-band and is taken captive. His group is among those who ride after it in pursuit. They are too late. By the time they arrive, all the captives are dead.

The orcs killed them soon after capture, but not quickly. Fingernails ripped from hands lie scattered across the orc-camp between the mutilated corpses. And fingers. Noses. Ears. Tongues, lips. Spring Rain is sick. The elves are wrathful, but grim-faced; it’s clear they’ve seen this many times before.

No one speaks to him as they ride back to camp after burying the dead. He doesn’t want them to.

He had not thought deeply on the war before this time. Skirmishes, raids, battles and even wars between tribes are not uncommon in his people’s history - they have many songs of them, not infrequently honoring great warriors on either side. Foes are slain; captives are taken, and often, like himself, permitted to build a new home and new life among their captors. But this wanton cruelty, torture for pleasure, is unthinkable. What manner of monsters have his people allied with?

Cautiously, he speaks of the war and the enemy with his small number of friends, and learns more and worse. Far worse. 

No wonder he is hated and despised by many in the camp. No wonder his people are hated. It is not the treason alone; they have allied themselves with a dark and terrible evil.

And it is devouring them. As a youth he had dimly felt that a shadow was growing within his family - words were sharper, blows more frequent, outsiders spoken of with more contempt. Through grey-elves of Hithlum who have fled to Ossiriand, he learns that the shadow has deepened. Among all the news of cruelty and oppression, one piece snags in his brain. They whip their horses now. 

He grieves for them, but a sense grows within him of his capture as an escape rather than a misfortune. Without it, who would he now be?

****

He’s cautious about what he says about his former people, even among his friends, but his knowledge of the shadow over them grieves him, and works its way even into the memories of his childhood. When he sits near the mearas, if no one else is around, he speaks to them of his boyhood, of good and ill, of aunts and uncles and friends, of warning signs and childhood joys, and tries to understand what has happened to those he once knew. One of them, a mare with a silver coat and a dark silver-grey mane, seems to be a particularly good listener and often grazes near him while he sits on the ground and talks.

One day she walks a few steps closer and nudges his hand with her nose. He scrambles backward and to his feet. She steps towards him again.

He darts a look around, sees no one, and gingerly reaches out to pat her mane.

“What’s your name?” he whispers, half-expecting an answer.

One of her dark eyes meets his, and he has the sudden sensation of galloping through long grass on a moonless night full of brilliant stars, a cool breeze in his face filled with unfamiliar scents. “Night Wind,” he breathes, knowing it is an inadequate rendering - but anything would be, and she looks pleased by it. He repeats the name in his own tongue, which he hasn’t spoken aloud since his capture.

She pokes at him with her nose, giving the distinct impression she wants him to ride. He begins to walk back to the stables instead. She walks beside him. “You’re going to get me in trouble,” he says softly. He has no idea whom she belongs to, but it must be someone important. “Could you wait here?” He needs to talk to the stablemaster, find out what to do.

She follows him back to the stables, to his great dismay; he finds the stablemaster just outside and stumbles through an explanation and the question of who owns this horse and is probably going to kill him.

The stablemaster takes a long, evaluative look at him. “What’s this one’s name?” he asks, as if he didn’t know. Spring Rain isn’t sure why he’s being toyed with. “Night Wind,” he says. 

“She told you that?”

Spring Rain stops with his mouth open. He hadn’t told the stablemaster that; it would seem like the wildest of falsehoods. The elf smiles. “Yes?” “Yes,” Spring Rain whispers. 

“In that case, I’d say she’s decided she’s yours. The mearas choose their own riders; they’re not given or traded. Her last rider died in the Bragollach.” He looks contemplative. “An untrained child couldn’t fall off a meara that was willing to carry them, and the best rider in the world couldn’t stay on the back of one that wasn’t. They know people; they’re rarely wrong, and they almost never reject a rider they’ve chosen. It’s a good sign. It means I wasn’t wrong to trust you.” He suddenly looks around, as if afraid he’s spoken too freely. “But don’t throw it in people’s faces. Ride her outside the camp, and let your commanding officer know when you’ll be out, where you’re going, and when you’ll be back. Can’t have anyone thinking you’re deserting.” His voice drops lower. “And give Lord Celegorm and his forces a wide berth.”

Spring Rain does as he’s instructed. And when, not long after, the stablemaster ends up with a broken arm after walking through Lord Celegorm’s section of the camp, Spring Rain realizes that his new people are not without shadows of their own.

He speaks with their neighbours and allies the green-elves, and learns songs that are not sung within the camp, and the shadows take clearer form.

****

In later years, the camp of the westlords breaks apart into many smaller ones. It’s easier for smaller, more mobile camps to remain hidden from what orc-patrols venture into the woods; and they don’t run through food and grazing pasture nearly as quickly when they’re small and mobile, and this is essential for remaining on good terms with the green-elves.

Spring Rain stays with Lord Maglor’s forces, and life takes on an even rhythm. He rides with patrols; they bring back news of the enemy’s movements, fight orc-raiders, and rescue thralls and captives when they can. He is injured several times, but only once seriously, and the healing skill of the elves surpasses anything he has seen before; the old wound pains him only occasionally.

For the most part he is content, and even happy. He has work that he enjoys, and that shifts as he ages and learns; he has his small circle of friends; and he has Night Wind. He will never marry or have children, being the only human within the camp, but he has accepted that. 

For many years since the Great Battle, the state of the war remains largely unchanged. They make no gains, but have no further great losses. 

Then, when Spring Rain is a little shy of his fortieth year, something cracks, like a dam breaking. A small band of refugees came from the West, bringing news that Glaurung had come to Nargothrond and the city was fallen, its armies destroyed, its people killed or captive. To Spring Rain it is ill news but distant, a name out of legend and song; but it is otherwise with the west-elves, and many from all the camps come to question the refugees desperately for tidings of those they have known. They learn little; all was in too great confusion for clear news of who is alive and who is dead, who is captive and who has escaped.

Not all those who come from the other camps are welcoming to the refugees, nor are the refugees glad to see all of them. The word “traitor” is bruited about camp more than it has been in decades, though there is no agreement on whom it refers to. Watching your words and knowing your company well before speaking becomes even more important than it was before, though no quarrels go beyond fistfights. Wearing weapons in the drinking-tents is banned. 

One evening, when the atmosphere in the camp is tenser even than usual, and the dark looks and derisive comments he attracts more frequent, Spring Rain goes for a walk outside the camp to clear his head and avoid trouble. After some minutes’ brisk walking, he begins to catch the faint strains of music and moves towards it.

Suddenly, the power of it strikes him to the ground. He does not know where he is or who he is, only a terrible, raking, sorrow and an overwhelming sense of loss. He is sobbing helplessly, and he does not know why.

The power at last releases him, a power he has not felt since his first day in the camp, and the music has faded. His face is wet and his eyes pained with long weeping. Prudence would direct him back to the camp; instead, he walks toward a clearing where the music seemed to come from, knowing already who he will find there. The elf-lord sits beside his harp, eyes closed; despite the power of the music, there are no tears on his face.

“Lord Maglor. You are grieved.” The words are laughably insufficient, as if he had put his hand in fire and said it was a bit warm. The elf does not look at him, or even open his eyes, but replies.

“What would you say the definition of treason is?”

The elf-lord has rarely spoken to him since the day Spring Rain swore loyalty. Spring Rain is, irrationally, disappointed to find no change in his attitudes towards him since them; the statement is a rebuke of his presumption and a reminder of what he will, in the elf’s eyes, always be.

“To turn on your allies or friends, and fight against them.”

“Yes.” There is sadness rather than anger in the elf’s voice. “Go back to camp.”

If Spring Rain were braver, he might have stayed, might have sat down by the elf-lord, might have placed a hand on his shoulder. He isn’t. He turns around and goes back to camp.

**** 

Doriath falls, not even at the hands of Angband, but in some quarrel with the dwarves over the same gemstones the westlords seek. Some in the camp grieve, that the war goes so ill; others say that this realm, like Nargothrond, sowed their own doom when they refused to fight in the great battle, and had only themselves to blame.

The camp mustered for war, but by the time they came upon the dwarf-army they were already slain. Then there was much debate among the westlords, and the camp was abuzz with rumours. Where was the Silmaril? Had some of the dwarves escaped with it? Or was it with Thingol’s sorceress daughter who lived far in the south of Ossiriand?

Spring Rain was among many who quietly hoped it wouldn’t come to a fight. He didn’t want to fight a sorceress who could walk into Angband and defeat Morgoth single-handed, as the songs sung by the green-elves told.

Apparently the westlords don’t want to either, because the orders to march never come. But from that time, the tenor in the camp changes. The undercurrent of bitterness against Doriath, that has existed for all the time Spring Rain had lived there, rises to the surface; soldiers grumble against thieves and cowards that had thought their sorceress-queen kept them safe, and that they could laugh at the troubles of the outside world. We missed our chance, they grouse; the dwarves had no desire to live in forest-kingdom, but a swift attack after Thingol’s death could have brought the Fëanorean forces not only a jewel, but a palace and realm. If we ever get another chance, we’ll not miss it.

Spring Rain, for his part, lets the grumbles and muttered invective pass him by, and stays away from places where soldiers are in their cups; if they are centred on resentments of their defeat in the great battle, it is best that his presence not remind them who else they have to blame. The pattern of daily life, of work and tending his horses and occasional forays against orcs on the plains, has not greatly changed; and if more insults are directed his way, in undertones or otherwise, he has learned to ignore them or turn their edges, and to avoid those who are most hostile. He has his small circle of friends, who trust and respect him, and is content with that. He tells himself it is only words, only grumbling. But unease grows within him. 

And a few years after the fall of Doriath, the Fëanoreans’ second chance comes. Doriath begins to regrow from its ruins, with the Silmaril at its heart. Demands sent to its child-king return unanswered. The hot coals of anger in the Fëanorean camps are quickly fanned into flames. Resentments are more open, sharper, more pointed, and do not need the influence of drink to be voiced. Fights break out against those that question, though for the moment only bare-handed and with no serious injuries. Spring Rain’s unease deepens. Too many words, too many resentments and self-justifications - we’ll take what is ours and they’ll pay for their arrogance and we owe nothing to those who care nothing for us - recall the way his old camp, his old people, felt in the days before the battle.

And the Fëanorean forces gather together and move across Gelion and into Taur-im-Duinath, where there are no green-elves to overhear.

That is the moment when Spring Rain can no longer deny what is happening. 

The next morning the mearas are gone. There is shouting, and some claims of betrayal, but everyone knows the truth. The mearas are not ordinary horses, to be set loose or scared away; they have departed by their own choice. Spring Rain misses Night Wind, but is not sorry that she is gone; only that he could not go with her.

The next day the order to prepare for the attack is given. It feels like a strange nightmare, like he has been transported back to his youth, forced to hear and watch the same descent, forced to feel the same patterns over again, forced to do the same things.

But Spring Rain is no longer a child. In the years of his people he is nearing a half-century, almost an old man; his back aches in ill weather. If he has spoken little, he has seen and learned and pondered much; he has grieved one people, and learned to live as part of another. And his second people are now falling into the darkness that consumed the first.

Yet he is bound to them, in light or darkness. He has not thought of his oath for long years, having had neither cause nor inclination to disobey any of the orders he has been given; but he feels it now, heavy on his shoulders. He sold his choice to buy his life; he cannot now take it back.

But neither can he, as a man, allow himself to be swept along by the same currents that carried him as a boy. The shadow he dimly felt as a boy is now clear and sharp-edged and terrible; he will not serve it, will not permit himself to again be made a foe of any who resist the dark power in the north.

If he can neither defy his orders nor obey them, he must change them.

****

He stands in the commander’s tent, for the first time since he was a youth.

“My lord,” he says, “in my time with you, have I ever questioned my order, or shirked duties because they were dangerous or unpleasant? Have you any complaint to make of my service?”

Maglor is looking down at a notebook, writing, with an air of giving only partial attention to the conversation. “Your service has been acceptable,” he says dismissive.t. “As shown by your continued life.” He does not ask the reason for the question, depriving Spring Rain of the opening he was looking for. Spring Rain forges ahead stubbornly.

“My lord, I do not understand the reasons for this attack. In what way does it harm Angband, or how does it protect our people?”

Maglor glances up in irritation. “You know enough, which is that it is your duty and you are sworn to us. And as for Angband, would you have us sit by and wait for our enemy to reclaim the jewel, as he undoubtedly will if we wait, now that the fool has made himself an open target?”

“Then you would have us destroy Angband’s enemies for them?”

Maglor’s voice turns sharper, and he no longer feigns divided attention. “I would have us regain my father’s work from thieves, and I would have you refrain from insolent questions. You have no understanding of this matter, nor need you any.”

“I understand that I have once fought against the enemies of the Dark Power, wrongly, and I would not do so again. And,” - knowing that he is crossing a perilous line - “I heard you. I heard your song. I do not think you want to do this either. I do not think you want to spend the rest of this war in adding more verses to it. I have regrets. You have regrets. Why should we add to them?”

Maglor’s eyes are steel, harsh as a blade, as he stands. “You have no right - ” He stops himself. “I should never have expected that you could understand loyalty.”

“You admit I have shirked nothing in defence of our people. What is yours loyalty to, if not the war against the enemy?”

“To my family!” Maglor snaps, and seems to instantly recognize that he has slipped, revealed too much, as Spring Rain returns with: 

“As mine was?”

In less time than it takes to draw breath, there is a sword at Spring Rain’s throat, and Maglor’s teeth are bared in rage. His voice is cold as ice and hard as stone. “You have no choice. You have sworn, and you have bound your self and your soul, as surely as we have. And you will go, and you will fight, in the front rank. I will make sure of it, and if you turn traitor I will kill you as I did Uldor. Now get out.”

In that moment, something crystallizes inside Spring Rain. Maglor’s face is a mirror; his uncles’ and grandsires’ faces, twisted in their last days into masks of hate and resentment and greed, are mirrors.

Let it cost him his soul if it may, he will not become them. 

He feels something within him snap, his will slicing through it as a blade through bonds.

“You are right in one thing, my lord,” he says, a grief and a farewell in his voice. “You have exactly as much choice in this as I do.”

The sword at his throat quivers and a bead of blood appears.

“Get out.”

****

The next day, Spring Rain notices that some people are missing from the camp. A few leaves in a forest - dozens, at most - but they are gone. Most are ones who had spoken little of Doriath, either for or against. They were the wise ones: able to slip away without drawing attention; able to return to Ossiriand, perhaps, and disappear among the green-elves. People with enough sense to act rather than speaking, rather than confronting the commanding officer in his tent like an utter fool.

Spring Rain cannot get away from the camp now. He is watched; he can feel eyes on him wherever he goes. It is strange to force him to ride with the army, knowing he is against the attack; it seems to invite betrayal; but he understands it. Maglor wants the chance to either kill him with a clear conscience, in battle as a proven traitor, or force him to fight in the assault; permitted to live now, or even to die for his defiance, he would be a rebuke that cannot be borne. One way or another, he will not be allowed to die with clean hands.

****

Spring Rain is assigned to a brown mare without any name he knows, and put in the vanguard of the forces. The soldiers surrounding him keep their hands on their weapons. They ride north.

He watches for chances of escape, but he scarcely knows what he would do if he did. Now that he is on the battlefield, to flee and leave either his friends or their victims to die seems like cowardice. Could he try to bring warning or intelligence to the Doriathrim? That would be a betrayal indeed, one that he does not know if he can bring himself to.

****

Arrows fly, horses and riders fall, and swords clash, as the battle begins sooner than anticipated, nearly as soon as they enter the forest. Spring Rain, in an instant, directs his horse to the left and into the trees, away from the path. In minutes, he can no longer hear the fighting.

Then a branch swings down from a tree above and knocks him from the saddle into the deep snow.

****

He wakes with an aching head and back and fingers numb from the cold. His horse, fortunately, is waiting patiently for him; she has scraped aside the snow to reveal a patch of old grass and is chewing at it contentedly. Spring Rain runs his memory back over the fall and cannot comprehend it: he has been riding in the woods since he was a youth, and it has been decades since he has had a fall; he knows well enough how to dodge tree-branches! 

He drags himself up to a sitting position, and feels utterly useless. So much for his conflict over whether to warn the Doriathrim; they clearly had suspicions of the attack already, and now, since that first skirmish, have been aware of it for hours at least. He is neither traitor nor soldier now, simply a deserter who can’t even desert successfully, and equally useless to either side.

He has nowhere to go. 

And as he tries at least to pick his way out of the forest, that ‘nowhere’ becomes ever more literal; he, who knew the woods of Ossiriand better than his own reflection, keeps finding himself turned around, finding himself going in wholly different directions from the ones he intends, and once recrossing his own horse’s footsteps. By nightfall he is exhausted and bewildered, and stops to make camp, lashing fallen wood and branches together to make a platform in the trees as the green-elves taught him: warmer, in winter, than sleeping on the snowy ground.

In the morning he sets out south, determined to continue only in that direction; but the woods are dense, paths deceptive, and by noon he finds himself headed north-west - towards the battle, and the very last direction he wants to go.

He has heard rumours that the very trees of Doriath are hostile to intruders, and he is ready to believe it. He gives up and lets them lead him where they will for the afternoon; it is not as though he has any clear purpose of his own.

He hears no sounds of the battle, which may by now be over. But near evenfall, he hears crying. He dismounts his horse and moves quietly in its direction.

There are two young boys, huddled against the bole of a tree, holding onto each other for warmth. Their hair is a fine silver; their fingers are blue with cold. How did they come here? Perhaps they heard the noise of the battle and fled in fear, and have gotten lost. He crouches down so as not to alarm them, and moves where they can see him, hands held up. “I’m a friend,” he says gently in Sindarin. “Are you lost? How were you separated from your parents?” At this, they start crying harder; one of them glares at him over the other’s shoulder. He moves slowly towards them, still crouched with his hands up. Thinking of something, he gestures his horse forwards; she walks slowly up to the boys and lays down in front of them, a calm and warming presence. One of the boys reaches out gingerly to pat her mane.

He sits down, the horse between him and the boys.

“Who are you?” the one patting the horse says. “You don’t look like an elf. Are you Adan, like grandpa?”

Oh. These are the children of the new king of Doriath.

“Yes. I’ve heard the stories about your grandpa. They say he was very brave.” He smiles gently at them. “Can you tell me a story too? Can you tell me what happened to you?” 

The glaring one wraps both arms around his brother, one hand clenched in a tiny fist. “They killed daddy and mama! They showed us them dead, and said ‘Tell us where it is, little rats, or we’ll do the same to you.’ But we didn’t know. And they searched us, and they didn’t find anything, and then there was a lot of yelling, and they kept saying ‘It’s with the children, we questioned the prisoners and they said, it’s with the children! It has to be here! They have to know!’ And then some of them grabbed us and rode off with us last night. They said we could go home if we told them where the jewel was, but we didn’t know, so they left us here. We tried to go home but we couldn’t find the way, and home’s full of them , and mama and daddy are dead so it wouldn’t be any good to go back anyway.” He drops his head to his brother’s shoulder and begins sobbing again.

Surely they could not possibly, thinks Spring Rain, but the pieces are starting to come together. The Fëanoreans had been victorious. They had taken prisoners and interrogated them under some kind of threat, and believed the children had the jewel or knowledge of its whereabouts. And when the children did not, they had abandoned them in a rage. Utter folly, on top of the evil - whoever does have the jewel would doubtless exchange it for the boys. But men - or elves - do not behave rationally when the battle-madness takes hold.

We don’t kill children echoes bitterly in his head. So even that fragment of bitter mercy, the life of a boy with a death sentence hanging over his head, has been discarded; and for children younger far than he was, and entirely innocent. 

It does not matter what prompted the act; it does not matter whether or not anyone might have reconsidered; he will not take the boys back to be hostages.

Where else can he go? He knows the eastlands well enough, but there is no harbour there. It was very clear when the army rode out to war on Doriath that the green-elves would never let them return to Ossiriand; would shoot them on sight, rather. The westlands he knows not at all, and there is no reason for anyone not to shoot him on site; they know his people only as enemies. And the boys’ parents are dead, all their people dead or captives.

The thought that came to him when he first heard of the plans for the attack returns again. I want to go home. What part does he have in these wars of elves with elves? What purpose or good can he do here? What is left in this land but death and madness and greed?

He does not remember the lands of his people; he may have been born there, but he spent his boyhood on the long journey west. He has the tales from his mother and father, uncles and aunts, elders of the tribe; memories of near past and long past. There are many there, wiser than himself and his family who did not leave, who did not chase a light in the West that turned out only to be a deeper darkness.

He will return to them. He will take these children away from this land of war and cruelty and bondage, and give them a home where they can live free.

****

The journey is not an easy one.

He has blankets and warm clothing for himself, as befits a winter campaign, and he wraps the boys in as many layers as possible. He seats them in front of him on the horse, and between the warmth of the horse, of himself, and the extra clothing, their fingers and faces soon begin to regain some natural colour. Food will be a problem; he shares some of his rations with them, but has less than a week’s supply for one person.

Three riders is a burden for any ordinary horse, and he rides at a gentle pace. The forest seems to have accepted him; rather than the winding and disappearing trails of the previous day, a path opens before him to the east - and, so far as he can tell from backward glances, seems to close behind him.

They’re fortunate enough to happen across an injured deer at evening on the first day of travel; a swift shot fells it, and he spends the night cooking as much of the meat and he can over a fire. He packs it in ice, wraps it in the hide, and ties it to the other bags. The cold should hopefully keep it good, though the weight will slow them further.

His planned path, after leaving the forest, is across the plains to the ford of Sarn Athrad, and then northeast to the mountains; he must skirt both Ossiriand and the dwarf-kingdoms. How he will find a passage through the mountains in winter, he has not yet any idea.

When he reaches the edge of the edge of the forest, he stops in wonder. Night Wind stands before him, for all the world as if she had been waiting for him. He dismounts, runs to her, and kisses her between the ears. “My lady, I believe you’re smarter than most humans, and all elves!” She whinnies in agreement. He’d never expected to see her again.

This makes the onward journey a good deal simpler. He moves all the baggage onto the other horse; himself and two small children are no difficulty for Night Wind. She can see better than him in the dark, as well, and riding at night will enable them to more easily evade Angband’s raiders.

The plains pass by with no more incident than an attack by a small wolf-pack - ordinary wolves hunting for food, not those of Angband, and felled easily enough by arrows in the light of a full moon. When three are dead, the rest flee for easier prey. The dead wolves supply additional meat, though the children wrinkle up their faces at the taste.

Night Wind takes her own direction to the mountains, and he lets her choose her path. She takes them by a low pass between peaks where the snow is not too deep and some grass still remains underneath it. She’s clearly taken this route before; it must be how the rest of the mearas left Beleriand. After one windy, chilly, and unpleasant night, they are descending the far side of the Ered Luin, into lands he has not seen since he was a young child, and a vast forest greater even than Ossiriand or Doriath lies spread out beneath them.

****

The journey east takes months. He stops in villages and homesteads on the way, for food and supplies, and sometimes stays for weeks at a time. The orcs and wolves are far less in number east of the mountains, but they are here, and a warrior who can fell a small wolf-pack or orc-band alone is valued. Southward, in the plains, there are wild horses he can tame, to the great satisfaction of the villagers, and he sees herds of the departed mearas running free; Night Wind seems happy to meet her old friends again. Men and elves alike are delighted with the children, and offer much care and advice, to Spring Rain’s great relief; he has known nothing of child-rearing, and learns much.

In time they move east again, to the plains of Rhûn, drawn by two needs: to bring the children as far as possible from Beleriand, in case their heirs of Doriath might be pursued by enemies, and to learn if there is anything left of Night Wind’s people and life he dimly remembers. The loss of his second home and people has brought back his homesickness for the first in full force.

By the time they depart, he has taught the children to ride, on ponies and gentle horses and a very patient Night Wind.

He has started calling Night Wind by a name in his own tongue that captures more of the vision she showed him.

He has told the children his name in his own tongue.

The first moment he hears that tongue on another person’s lips, approaching a camp on the shores of Rhûn, he realizes he has almost forgotten it; he speaks it clumsily and accented, like a stranger. As they settle into the life of the camp, it slowly returns to him. The boys, disconcertingly, learn it even faster than he does. He is welcome, here as elsewhere, for his skill with horses and with arms when needed.

Eluréd and Elurín grow swiftly; time seems to pass quicker, now that he is among Men again, than they did in a warriors’ camp where adults were ageless and children were few. He tries to teach them both his ways and their own. He speaks their own tongue - his tongue for most of the years of his life, but no longer - with them when they wish, and a handful of words from it are woven into the clan’s speech. He teaches them the songs of his people, and the songs he learned from the green-elves, songs of his ancestors and songs of their grand-parents. 

He teaches them, above all else, to never let the claims or demands or persuasion of another person override their own souls’ knowledge of right and wrong.

Years pass. The boys grow to adulthood; they marry; and by his fading years, Spring Rain has the joy of seeing his grandchildren.

Spring Rain dies, but his lessons do not.

Centuries later, a great lord with strange powers comes seeking the allegiance of the peoples of Rhûn, offering great gifts and prizes to the loyal, death and destruction to the disloyal. He offers power; he offers escape from death; he offers rings. Some chieftains, desiring power or fearing their neighbours, accept. Their people fracture into those who will follow, those who will submit, those who will resist.

Among those who resist are some with silver hair.