Set in Stone - Haldir's Story -

Chapter 1 - The Brothers

A full moon had risen over Lórien, its soft glow coating everything in pale silver. The fair hair of the Silvan Elves shone white, almost as white as their gowns. Only here and there an elf was clad in a grey cloak covering the white and so being almost invisible between the bluish shadows of the mellorn trees. It was wintertime in Lórien and although it never snowed in the elvish wood, the trees were devoid of their golden leaves and the shadows were scarce.

"Blood will be spilled tonight." The sentence was calmly spoken, so quietly it seemed to fade away into the dark almost immediately. The tone was low for a female voice, so grave and monotone as if the Lady who had spoken didn't mind whether anyone would hear her at all. But someone did, she knew he was still at the other end of the flet, although she hadn't turned around these last few hours and was well aware he could disappear without making a sound, if he wished to. – "The humans never cease killing each other and I fear they never will," Lord Celeborn finally answered, crossing the flet and coming to a halt next to his lady.  – "They might." – "Do you wish to help them?" – Lady Galadriel turned to face him. "It is too late now. The time when we are helping humans again shall come. But it is not now." She turned her head to look out at the forest again. "We will have to deal with a different issue in a few weeks' time. Thranduil has sent his nephews. "

Celeborn nodded slowly. He was curious as to what his wife would decide when the three elven boys had brought forth their message. He had promised himself not to interfere – Thranduil's younger sister had been one of Galadriel's closest friends in the times of old. Unfortunately, she had never done anything of consequence, so no one remembered her name nowadays. Another reason for the perhaps a little too quick fading of her memory was that she had never been married, yet given birth to three sons. It was told their father had been of a higher elven-kind than Woodelves, but not even her brother knew who he was.  When she died 220 years ago, the secret had died with her. Even though Galadriel had talked to no one about it, Celeborn felt her grief as if it were his own. The youngest boy had never known his mother, since she had died giving birth to him. She might have been saved, if elven medicine had been at hand – yet she hadn't talked to anyone about her pregnancy and just withdrawn to a solitary corner of Mirkwood, leaving her other two boys in the care of her older brother. They had only been 16 and 12 at the time – it hardly ever occurred that elf babies were born in such a close succession.

"Thranduil won't have told them that I knew their mother," she stated, still looking outside but actually seeing nothing, as Celeborn was well aware. – "No. It is unlikely he talked to them about their mother much. The youngest was not even named by her." – "Indeed, he is called Orophin, after his Grandfather. Diniel would not have chosen that name." – Celeborn felt the suppressed expectation in the air. His wife's opinion of Thranduil was still undecided, despite her wisdom. It was probably depending on how he had brought up his nephews – if he had taught them to despise their mother, Galadriel's good opinion would be lost forever. She could watch them now in her mirror, yet she didn't dare. To humans and dwarves it often seemed as if the dignity of the elves was just covering a void which was preventing them from feeling anything, especially love and fear and anger.  Yet this just proved that they didn't understand: Elves felt all of that, even the wisest. Even his wife.

The nights weren't as beautiful in Mirkwood as they were in Lórien. The shadows were darker and its creatures were dangerous. Sauron's poison had transformed the Great Wood into a realm of dark magic the Woodelves were struggling to fight off. Rumil had been searching the whole labyrinth of caves for quite a long time without being able to locate any of his two brothers. Most of the other elves in Mirkwood thought they had a special mind-connection, since they had been born with just a few years parting them, yet Rumil had never experienced anything like it. Normally, he didn't approve of the other Elves believing it, for it led them to think of the three brothers as one, some not even bothering to distinguish between them and just calling one of them by the first name of the three they could think of. The question "Which one of them shall I bide to see you?" was more often than not answered with "Any". Now was the only time Rumil wished there actually were a connection between them, so he wouldn't have to search the whole castle over and over again.