The Veil Lifted

[Feanor of the Peredhil]

Tish laughed.

Alone in her dark, candle lit house, with only a cat and chopsticks for company, she laughed and tried to flick her hair out of her eyes, forgetting, as always, that she had short black hair now, not long blond hair. It made her stop laughing.

With cold eyes and no candy, she took her cloak, her beloved full-length, black, embroidered, purchased-for-way-too-much-off-EBay, cloak, and slipped out the back door toward the cemetery for her annual stroll.

If she ever could have guessed what horrors awaited her, surely Tish would have dressed as a fairy princess and stayed home with Twix and Skittles. If she could have known - and known that they'd reached a time of human existence wherein epics and death chants and songs of heroic deeds pretty much stopped existing - she never would have stepped onto the dark road.

[Forest Elf]

Jacinta looked down, the girl was right; it was better than nothing…“Thank you!” Jacinta called down. She closed her eyes and gulped, she wasn’t used to being stuck in tree’s, much less, in this rather odd position. She opened her eyes again and stared down. “Do you think that I should fall? Or jump, kind of…”

She stared down at the mattress, her head starting to spin. She closed her eyes again, and started to hope that this wasn’t really happening, but the sharp bark against her arm proved that is really is happening…and soon, if she didn’t do something, or someone else, she wouldn’t be able to feel her foot.

[Bêthberry]

The library was not greatly lit after hours. There was a subdued lighting around the main librarians' desks, the computer terminals, the old card catalogue which no one ever searched these days but which maintained a pride of place. Not everything had been transferred over to the electronic system and some day some scholar was going to discover just what significant tomes were encoded on the small cards. That discovery would lead her or him to the quiet spot on the shelves where waited the expectant book, savouring the prospect of discovery in the patient knowledge of the long wait of years.

The main hallways were lit, of course, as well as the central study areas where tables now were bare of any books, laptops, photocopies, day planners. Yet off to the sides, at the very edges of the building, there lay the study carrells, like applicable (not allegorical) reminders of the ancient monks' carrells oh these long years ago. A mumble was heard in the corner where the blue carrells ran up against the yellow carrells. There, the last remnant of comfort remained, signifying a scholarly desmense from years back. Yes, there in the corner were the last upholstered chairs of the library, where someone could seek comfort and ease and curl up with a great book, out of sight of the timeclock which imposed the mintues and hours of every assignment due.

And what to wondering eyes did appear but two figures, heads close, almost closeted in intimate discussion. Around them were piles of books, stacked irregularly. Some books were laid open, their spines split, while others more modestly merely held spots with bookmarks. Yet these tow figures oft referred to the books, pulling open a page and reciting chapter and verse--well, not quite, as these books more tellingly were of letters. It was date and number which were pulled forth for proof and refutation. For that was the business of these two figures, pale in the pale light.

"No one appreciates the letters any more," complained one. Surprisingly, he wore a mohawk hair style. "I tried to nail one discussion the other day by reference to a letter to Rayner Unwin but no one else had read it."

"Ke ke ke ke ke" retorted the other figure.

"Really, it's worse than fangirls gushing without having read the books, let alone the Letters."

"Ignorance."

"Worse than that. Then you've got some who tear the letters to shreds, insisting that Tolkien didn't really mean what he said, that it was all fabricated for the person he was writing to."

"Well, don't ride me. I never suffered fools gladly. And look where it got me."

"Yeah, yeah, I know. But it's sad, really. People think the height of the Downs is this Yorkshire new age bloke. They don't arfing realise how scholarly things were once when we really clued in on the historical aspects, the consistency of Middle earth."

The second figure remained silent at this, merely shaking his head.

The two of them sat there, resigned, wondering if anyone would show up this night at the library, or merely fixate on the easy pop culture charicatures of the movies. Surely some night someone would come by to read the books that started it all. They sat there patiently--a characteristic each had learned with some effort--these two, burrahobbit and obloquy--wondering if ever again would the really interesting discussions come to the forefront of Books again. They sat there, so pale that their figures could easily be missed, except that they had chosen this night to present themselves. But wondering too if anyone would ever find them, mired as they were in the lost reaches of the bookshelves, where no scanned online version ever trod and where no one could with a click of a finger copy text.

[Firefoot]

Raven had glared at Sidagorn as he spoke loudly to the witch lady, spilling the contents of her whispered message - and then the way he treated them! "Sorry about these kids," indeed. His following call of "Caaaannnnndeeeeee!" had gotten her and Tucker moving, having reminded her of her woefully empty bag of candy.

"That looks like a good house," he commented as they neared the next one on the block, and it was delightfully spooky with "cobwebs" strung up on their porch and tombstones strewn about the lawn. Nevertheless, Raven felt resentful at the comment; she and Tucker were old enough to be out on their own, after all! He wasn't in charge of them.

"We can go by ourselves," Raven informed him, and as she and Tucker hurried up the walk, she muttered to her brother, "We don't need this Sidagorn tagging along with us. We can go trick'r'treating on our own. We're going to ditch him - we'll slip down an alley somewhere or something."

Tucker didn't seem to care whether Sid went with them or not, but the idea of trying to escape him definitely appealed.

They collected their candy at that house and trudged back towards Sidagorn standing on the sidewalk. It's not going to be any treats for you, Mister Sidagorn. Only tricks.

[Esgallhugwen]

She looked to the girl still in the tree. "I would suggest jumping. That way you can prepare for the inevitability that you may get hurt whereas falling would leave you prone to become hooked by the tree again and then possibly hurt".

She shrugged her shoulders, "I really can't give you much advice, I've never been in this predicament before". The tall girl knew that either way the younger one stuck the tree would get hurt whether a few scrapes from the weaker branches or some bruises and bumps on top of that.

"I know this is easier to suggest than to do, but can you reach up and pull your foot free of the branches?, if so maybe you could try to drop down without being hit". Another whisper of the others made her tense but she pressed her dark red lips into a hopeful smile, trying to expect the best outcome.

She almost looks like the Hanged Man from my tarot card deck. Emphasis on almost of course, considering she didn't choose to be in this state. Yet still something to be accounted for. A choice for either her or myself must be made tonight. I'm sure of it.

[piosenniel]

The monitor screens threw little pools of soft light here and there in the reading room.

~*~ New Ford Public Library ~*~

scrolled silently across their pale grey surfaces. And there in the lower left corner of each screen was a little blinking light. A bright little jewel, a star... beckoning.

Gilli looked sideways at one of the screens as she passed. She stifled a gasp, and bit back a giggle as a quick little face peered out at her from atop the flashing light. A wee sprite’s face, it seemed. And just as quickly it disappeared when she turned her gaze full on it.

‘Well, I’ll be! There’s pixies in the wires. Just as my old granddad told me.’ Her eyes slid furtively to the right and she was sure another little face gave her an impish look and stuck out its tongue at her. Again, it was gone as soon as she tried to pin it with her eyes.

‘Have it your way, then, good folk!’ she said, turning away from the screens. Gilli put her fiddle case on one of the reading tables and drew her instrument from it. She held it under her chin and plucked at each of the strings, turning the tuning pegs until her ears were satisfied with the sounds.

Above her arched the rounded dome of ceiling; while above the room itself a wide balcony made its way about the area with carrels stashed here and there among the second floor library stacks. Most of what lay just beyond the balustrade fronting the balcony lay in shadow and Gilli wondered, as she looked upward, if her eyes did really see soft shadows moving among the darker ones.

Best not to think about them too much, she whispered to herself. Acknowledge them; leave little gifts as you can, is what her granddad cautioned. Just don’t call to much attention to yourself...lest the wee people take too much note of you and do some mischief.

She drew her bow softly across the strings and tapped her foot in time. ‘Well, now, here’s something for you. The Faerie Reel, it’s a lively one. Go on then, dance if you will...

[Child of the 7th Age]

Aiwendil turned in appreciation and smiled at Gilli who was playing a sprightly fiddle tune. The old man would have liked to stop and dance, but there was no time for that. A more serious business called. Eerie noises still drifted from the carrels above, as glimmers of light flashed and beckoned from inside the pages of books. These tiny sparks glowed for an instant and, if no one picked up on them, quietly faded into darkness. There seemed to be quite a bit of fading going on in the dusty recesses of the stacks.

Aiwendil’s eyes traveled warily from one end of the wall to the other and then inched upward towards the domed ceiling. He could sense no real animosity or evil here, only hearts filled with mischief or resignation. Whatever live bodies or spirits inhabited these particular halls, they were unlikely to be the ones he had come to find. And yet Aiwendil could not throw off the feeling that the dangers Hedwig had described were somewhere close by, close enough that the creatures in question could actually see the things he was doing.

The old man sat down uneasily in front of the terminal screen and pulled out a long sheet of rumpled paper from his back pocket. It was a simple scribbled list that anyone except Aiwendil would have a hard time deciphering. The original listing had been even longer than this, but a number of the other sites had gone out of business after the uproar over the films died down. Even so, it would take him some time if he was going to try and visit every site appearing on the sheet.

http://www.lotrplaza-we'rethebiggest!com
http://www.councilofelrondandarwen.com
http://www.planet-tolkienandlewis.com
http://www.minastirithrising up.com
www.writersofrohanandtheshire.com
http://www.theonering.net/rumourmill. html
http://www.khazaddumonlyforthefoolhardy.com
http://www.glyphweb/wikicombined.com
http://ardalmabion for the brave
www.mythsocforthestuffy.org
www.tolkiensociety-we're the best!.org
www.forum.barrowdowns.com

In his haste to get something down on paper, Aiwendil was sure that he had overlooked a number of important sites. But the old man did not have the time or patience to do any more research, and he was hopeful that at least one of the names on the list would yield something interesting. Hedwig had sworn he had overheard whispered conversations between several of the nighttime beasts about strange and potentially perilous goings on. One fruit bat had even hinted that on the eve of Samhain some of the more powerful shadow creatures would claw a terrible rent in the fabric of the veil and threaten to overwhelm the world of man.

Aiwendil sincerely hoped that he would find Hedwig had been wrong about these rumors. In the old, old days he had left such headaches to Gandalf as he had no special love for untangling other people’s problems. But alas, after Gandalf sailed west, he sometimes had to exert himself, since no one more appropriate was left to deal with these matters. Once in a hundred years the istar might receive a reassuring dream from Manwe or his own beloved Yavanna to let him know he had not been totally forgotten. But he could not remember the last time he had received such a message of hope.

Aiwendil sat down at the terminal crossing his fingers that the electronic beast would behave and allow him to get on these various sites. The old man had a limited understanding of computers and, if anything went wrong, he was never sure how to fix them. In that one respect, luck was with him. He quickly logged on and began pulling up the various sites. His actual search results, however, were far from encouraging. He had hoped to find some mention of the goings on that Hedwig referred to. Fans of the professor were quite good at digging up rumors and passing them on, even if they misunderstood many key elements of the legendarium to an even greater degree than Master Tolkien had done.

In the first place, one or two of the sites were filled with off-topic conversations that were totally useless for Aiwendil’s purposes. The quality of the posting was definitely going down. Many of the other sites contained endless gibberish about a few, fixed questions: Balrog wings, speculation on where the Lady Ents had gone, and lively debates on who Tom Bombadil actually was. Aiwendil could have settled each of these problems for the mortal posters. Someday, he would take the time to do a post and tell them what the real answers were, but tonight he did not have that luxury. He pushed on to some of the more serious sites, the ones that dealt with languages and books and provided short reference articles. Surely, these learned people would have picked up on any serious threat to the health and happiness of 7th Age Arda. Again, he met with disappointment. The old fellow was getting desperate since he was down to the last name on the list: http://www.barrowdowns.com. It was a rather smallish website with an odd color scheme of black, green and orange. Aiwendil ruefully concluded that this must be the Barrow-wight’s idea of a bad joke. Despite the dreadful color scheme, the site did seem like an appropriate place for creatures of the night to gather.

This time at least, there was a large Books forum. Aiwendil carefully read over all the recent posts but could not find anything beyond the usual references to Balrog wings. He clicked on another link and was taken to a spot where people were playing games about werewolves. For one moment, the istar considered the possibility that the threat to the peace of Arda might actually be an invasion by werewolves. But this did not seem probable, and he could get no sense that any real peril motivated the light hearted if gruesome words of these particular posters. About to give up and wander back to his cottage in the woods, the istar impulsively clicked on a link that took him to a series of role playing games. He was shocked and dismayed to skim over one story that totally misrepresented his own character and actions. If he ever got hold of that “Child”, he would give her a scolding in no uncertain terms! Still he could see nothing that reminded him of what Hedwig had spoken.

In desperation, Aiwendil went further down the screen to “Elvenhome”, apparently the cemetery for games that had died. Surely, if the dark creatures had posted a notice of their intent this would be the appropriate place. He clicked through a list of games, most of them finished but a few half done, and then worked his way back to the very oldest ones. It was on the last page that he saw it. With excitement glowing in his eye, the old man called over to Jack, “Come here! Take a look at this. Do you think this means anything?” Aiwendil pointed to the first post in a half done story. It was apparently from the very old days of the RPG forums before the moderator Piosenniel and her sidekick Child managed to bring order to the chaos. It was a time when magical weapons and chat discussions abounded; the games could and did center on some very strange topics…...