Morgoth's Ring (22 page)

And when your folk welcomed us and gave us aid, otherwise then ye spoke: in the land of Aman we were to dwell for ever, as brothers whose houses stand side by side. But as for our white ships: those ye gave us not. That craft we learned not from the Noldor, but from the Lords of the Sea; and the white timbers we wrought with our own hands and the white sails were woven by our fair wives and maidens. Therefore we will neither give them nor sell them for any league or friendship. For I say to thee, Feanor, these are to us as are the gems of the Noldor: the work of our hearts, whose like we shall not make again.'

$149 Thereupon Feanor left him, and sat beyond the walls brooding darkly, until his host was assembled. When he deemed that his strength was enough he v ent to the Haven of the Swans and began to man the ships that were anchored there and to take them away by force. But the Teleri withstood him stoutly, and they cast many of the Noldor into the sea. Then swords were drawn, and a bitter fight was fought upon the ships, and about the lamplit quays and piers of the Haven, and even upon the great arch of its gate. Thrice the folk of Feanor were driven back, and many were slain upon either side; but the vanguard of the Noldor were succoured by Fingon with the foremost people of Fingolfin. These coming up found a battle joined and their own kin falling, and they rushed in ere they knew rightly the cause of the quarrel: some deemed indeed that the Teleri had sought to waylay the march of the Noldor, at the bidding of the Valar.

$150 Thus at last the Teleri were overcome, and a great part of their mariners that dwelt in Alqualonde were wickedly slain. For the Noldor were become fierce and desperate, and the Teleri had less strength, and were armed mostly with light bows only. Then the Noldor drew away their white ships, and manned their oars as best they might, and rowed them north along the coast. And Olwe called upon Osse, but he came not; for he had been summoned to Valmar to the vigil and council of the gods; and it was no'. permitted by the Valar that the Flight of the Noldor should be hindered by force. But Uinen wept for the mariners of the Teleri; and the sea rose in wrath against the slayers, so that many of the ships were wrecked and those in them drowned. Of the Kin-slaying at Alqualonde more is told in that lament which is named Noldolante,(16) The Fall of the Noldor, which Maglor made ere he was lost.

1496

$151 Nonetheless the greater part of the Noldor escaped, and when the storm was over they held on their course, some by ship, some by land; but the way was long and ever more evil as they went forward. After they had marched for a great while in the unmeasured night they came at length to the north of the Guarded Realm upon the borders of the empty waste of Araman, which were mountainous and cold. There they beheld suddenly a dark figure standing upon a high rock that looked down upon the shore. Some say that it was Mandos himself and no lesser herald of Manwe. And they heard a loud voice, solemn and terrible, that bade them stand and give ear.(17) $152 All halted and stood still, and from end to end of the hosts of the Noldor the voice was heard speaking the Prophecy of the North and the Doom of the Noldor. 'Turn back! Turn back! Seek the pardon of the Valar lest their curse fall upon you!' So the voice began, and many woes it foretold in dark words, which the Noldor understood not until the woes indeed after befell them. 'Tears unnumbered ye shall shed; but if ye go further, be assured that the Valar will fence Valinor against you, and shut you out, so that not even the echo of your lamentation shall pass over the mountains.

$153 'Lo! on the House of Feanor the wrath of the gods lieth from the West into the uttermost East, and upon all that will follow them it shall be laid also. Their Oath shall drive them, and yet betray them, and ever snatch away the very treasures that they have sworn to pursue. To evil end shall all things turn that they begin well; and by the treason of kin unto kin, and the fear of treason, shall this come to pass. The Dispossessed shall they be for ever.

$154 'Behold! Ye have spilled the blood of your kindred unrighteously and have stained the land of Aman. For blood ye shall render blood, and beyond Aman ye shall dwell in Death's shadow. For know now that though Eru appointed unto you to die not in Ea, and no sickness may assail you, yet slain may ye be, and slain ye shall be: by weapon and by torment and by grief; and your houseless spirits shall come then to Mandos.

There long shall ye abide and yearn for your bodies and find little pity though all whom ye have slain should entreat for you.

And those that endure in Middle-earth and come not to Mandos, they shall grow weary of the world as with a great burden, and shall wane, and become as shadows of regret before the younger race that cometh after. The Valar have spoken.'

$155 Then many quailed. But Feanor hardened his heart and said: 'We have sworn, and not lightly. This Oath we will keep. And lo! we are threatened with many evils, and treason not least; but one thing is not said: that we shall suffer from cravens; from cowardice or the fear of cowardice among us.

Therefore I say we will go on, and this doom I add: the deeds that we do shall be the matter of song until the last days of Arda.' And the doom of Feanor was true-spoken also.

$156 But in that hour Finrod forsook the march, and turned hack, being filled with grief, and with hitterness against the house of Feanor, because of his kinship with Olwe of Alqualonde; and many of his people went with him, retracing their steps in sorrow, until they beheld once more the far beam of the Mindon upon Tuna still shining in the night, and so came at last to Valinor. There they received the pardon of the Valar, and Finrod was set to rule the remnant of the Noldor in the Blessed Realm. But his sons were not with him, for they would not forsake the sons of Fingolfin; and all Fingolfin's folk went forward still, feeling the constraint of their kinship and the will of Feanor, and fearing to face the doom of the gods, since not all of them had been guiltless of the kinslaying at Alqualonde.

Moreover Fingon and Turgon were bold and fiery of heart and loath to abandon any task to which they had put their hands until the bitter end, if bitter it must he. So the main host held on, and swiftly the evil that was forespoken began its work.

1497

$157 The Noldor came at last far into the North of Arda, and they saw the first teeth of the ice that floated in the sea, and knew that they were drawing nigh to the Helkaraxe. For between the West-land of Aman that in the north curved eastward and the east-shores of Endar (which is Middle-earth) that bore westward there was a narrow strait, through which the chill waters of the Encircling Sea and the waves of the Great Sea flowed together, and there were vast fogs and mists of deathly cold, and the sea-streams were filled with clashing hills of ice and the grinding of ice deep-sunken. Such was the Helkaraxe, and there none yet had dared to tread save the Valar only and Ungoliante.

$158 Therefore Feanor halted and the Noldor debated what course they should now take. But soon they began to suffer anguish from the cold, and the clinging mists through which no gleam of star could pierce; and many of them repented of the road and began to murmur, especially those that followed Fingolfin, cursing Feanor, and naming him as the cause of all the woes of the Eldar. But Feanor, knowing all that was said, took counsel with his sons. Two courses only they saw to escape from Araman and come unto Endar: by the straits or by ship.

But the Helkaraxe they deemed impassable, whereas the ships were too few. Many had been lost upon their long journey and there remained now not enough to bear across all the great host together; yet none were willing to abide upon the west-coast while others were ferried first: already the fear of treachery was awake among the Noldor.

$159 Therefore it came into the hearts of Feanor and his sons to seize all the ships and depart suddenly; for they had retained the mastery of the fleet since the battle of the Haven, and it was manned only by those who had fought there and were bound unto Feanor. And lo! as though it came at his call there sprang up a wind from the north-west, and Feanor slipped away (18) secretly with all whom he deemed true to him, and went aboard, and put out to sea, and left Fingolfin in Araman. And since the sea was there narrow, steering east and somewhat south he passed over without loss, and first of all the Noldor set foot once more upon the shores of Middle-earth. And the landing of Feanor was at the mouth of that firth which was called Drengist, and ran into Dor-lomin.(19)

$160 But when they were landed, Maidros the eldest of his sons (and on a time a friend of Fingon ere Morgoth's lies came between) spoke to Feanor, saying: 'Now what ships and men wilt thou spare to return, and whom shall they bear hither first?

Fingon the valiant?'

$161 Then Feanor laughed as one fey, and his wrath was unleashed: 'None and none!' he cried. 'What I have left behind I count now no loss: needless baggage on the road it has proved.

Let those that cursed my name, curse me still! And whine their way back to the cages of the Valar, if they can find no other! Let the ships burn!'

$162 Then Maidros alone stood aside, but Feanor and his sons set fire in the white ships of the Teleri. So in that place which was called Losgar at the outlet of the Firth of Drengist (20) ended in a great burning bright and terrible the fairest vessels that ever sailed the sea. ' And Fingolfin and his people saw the light afar off red beneath the clouds. This was the first-fruits of the Kinslaying and the Doom of the Noldor.

$163 Then Fingolfin knew that he was betrayed, and left to perish in misery or go back in shame. And his heart was bitter, but desired now as never before to come by some way into Middle-earth, and meet Feanor again. And he and his host wandered long and wretchedly; but their valour and endurance grew greater with hardship; for they were yet a mighty folk, the elder children undying of Eru Iluvatar, but new-come from the Blessed Realm, and not yet weary with the weariness of Earth; and the fire of their hearts was young. Therefore led by Fingolfin and his sons, and by Inglor and Galadriel the valiant and fair, they dared to pass into the untrodden North, and finding no other way they endured at last the terror of the Helkaraxe and the cruel hills of ice. Few of the deeds of the Noldor thereafter surpassed that desperate crossing in hardihood or in woe. Many there perished, and it was with a lessened host that Fingolfin set foot at last upon the Northlands of Endar. Little love for Feanor or his sons had those that then marched behind him, and blew their trumpets in Middle-earth at the first rising of the Moon.

Here the Noldor passed out of Aman and

the Annals of Aman tell of them no more.

NOTES.

1. 'Aule the Maker' replaced 'Ulmo'.

2. Struck out here, probably at once: '(the Dark Enemy)'.

3. Struck out here (later): 'not a second time would the Black Foe of Arda be dismissed with proud words of scorn.'

4. This passage is a replacement of the original text: but Yavanna was dismayed, for now the Light of the Trees had passed utterly into a great Darkness, which though the Valar did rot yet understand they perceived that it must come from some aid that Morgoth had called from Without, and they feared that it was lost beyond the End. Therefore all was one, whether Feanor said...

5. This passage was emended from the original text, which read thus:

There countless became the hosts of his beasts and his demons; and he brought now into being the fell race of the Orkor, and they grew and multiplied in the bowels of the earth like a plague. These creatures Morgoth made in envy and mockery of the Eldar. Therefore in form...

6. 'bred' is an emendation of 'made'.

7. 'children' is an emendation of 'a spawn'.

8. This passage, from 'But indeed a darker tale...' and including the footnote, was struck out at a later time than the changes given in notes 5 - 7 and perhaps in revision of the text before the making of the typescript, in which it does not appear. The whole addition by AElfwine is enclosed within brackets as originally written.

9. The original text was 'Aran Endor, King of Middle-earth.' Aran Endor was then corrected to Tarumbar; finally the reading 'King of the World' was substituted.

10. The text as originally written read here: 'and never but once only did he come forth from the deeps that he had dug, while his realm lasted.' When my father corrected this to the text printed he added all that follows to the end of the paragraph.

11. In this paragraph the passage from 'ere it was too late' as far as

'many of the Eldar heard then for the first time of the Aftercomers', and the final sentence 'No other race shall oust us', were later additions.

12. The associations of the Noldorin princes were different as this passage was first written: 'Fingolfin and his sons Fingon and Turgon spoke against Feanor', and 'of [Finrod's] own sons Inglor alone spoke in like manner, for Angrod and Egnor were with Fingon, and Orodreth stood aside; whereas Galadriel...' But the changes that give the text printed appear to have been made immediately, since the passage at the end of the paragraph belongs to the original writing of the text.