Extracts from papers found in the effects of the late Rosemary Took
28th August
S.R. 1512
Tol Himling
The weather held fair for the crossing, though the sky was black and the wind in the bay smelled like thunder. (I wonder that Azalea agreed to come with me - though I suppose she would not have wanted to stay behind on the shore.) It may, on reflection, have been more prudent to postpone, but I had a notion that we'd get over safely, and so here we are.
We have pitched our tent in a cosy nook above an east-facing cove. Our little Red Minnow is moored safely above the tide-line, and Azalea has gone to look for firewood. We have not yet gone up to the ruins; by the time we had made camp and appeased our grumbling stomachs, the light was softening into gold, and I did not think we would get there and back before it fell dark. (Not that I mind a late evening stroll, but we do not know this place, and it is easy to turn an ankle or to trip and bruise a knee in the gloom.) We saw them, though, as we approached in the Minnow - great jagged towers and reaching walls, and archways of broken grey stone. I was not prepared for their size; the drawings in the library at Great Smials do them no justice. It is a pity that neither Azalea nor I can sketch. There is such sadness about them, and a kind of watchfulness too, as though they wait for those who once dwelt within their walls.
29th August
S.R. 1512
I can well believe that Elves lived here once. The stonework, grown over though it is with trees and weeds and wildflowers, is so finely carved; the engravings around the fireplace in what must have been the great hall seem to dance with life. When I pressed my cheek to one of the pillars, it was warm, though the sun's light could not yet have reached it. It was almost as if the old place was welcoming us.
It is strange that in such a damp place there is so little moss - and it is quieter than I thought it might be. There are puffins and gulls aplenty nesting in the cliffs, but few birds in the ruins themselves. Strange, too, that the ruins are so...I suppose the word is tidy. Vines grow through the old archways, and trees sprout from the chimneys, but I had expected to find more rocks and stones in the ground; the roof has long since caved in, and yet there are few of its fragments scattered around. Still, we are not even the only Hobbits to make this trip, let alone the only creatures to set foot on this island since the Elves went away. Perhaps earlier visitors took the stones back with them.
Azalea, I am pleased to record, is enchanted. We discovered a flight of stairs spiralling upwards into a tower, and I was sure we should find the top of them crumbled away - but no. They led to a shadowy little room with only a shaft of sunlight streaking in through a slender, arched window, and on its sill rested a silver hand-mirror, which Azalea was very taken with. It is an elegant thing, round-framed with a thin handle, delicate filigree around the glass, and an inscription on the back that I cannot read here; I will have to translate it when I am back in the library at home, or else give the thing to one of the Gardner children when we see them next. (I confess I was a little surprised to find something so fine still here. I expect that earlier visitors did not trust the steps up to that little room.)
30th August
S.R. 1512
A beautiful morning - the sea is as flat as Bywater Pond, and the air is rich with the scent of salt and summer earth.
I had thought us alone on the island, but last night as I was falling asleep I heard a sweet voice humming a tune unlike anything I've heard in the Shire or Bree. Like the ruins, it was watchful, and sad, and though the voice was young the music seemed so very old. Azalea says she heard nothing.
2nd September
S.R. 1512
The weather continues fine, though I fancy the air may be cooling.
We have found little else of note - a few fragments of pottery and broken glass, nothing more. I suppose earlier visitors have picked the carcass clean. Still, Azalea is delighted with the place; she says it is just as she imagined it from the stories, and that it was more than worth the sea-crossing to get here.
I have not yet summoned the courage to ask what I brought her here to ask.
3rd September
S.R. 1512
Last night the singing came again, and once again Azalea says she heard nothing. Perhaps it was a dream, though it was strangely vivid, and I cannot say that I felt rested when I woke.
4th September
S.R. 1512
The rain has begun, thin and mizzling and grey. We took our lunch - potted fish, oatcakes, and the last of the radishes - to eat inside one of the watchtowers. Azalea insisted on getting out all our findings again to examine them, and her delight and enthusiasm were enough to chase away the last tendrils of my shadowy sleep. (Strange dreams again - I thought I heard something moving around outside our tent. It sounded...not quite like an animal; it was more akin to a Hobbit or a Man creeping about on all fours. It can only have been my imagination; there were no marks or trails in the grass when we awoke.)
The mirror is our most interesting find by far. Azalea seems to like it very much; I may give it to her, once I have translated the inscription. It is remarkably untarnished for such an ancient thing (though I know that items of Elvish or Númenorean make often last many lifetimes longer than those made by Hobbits or Men) - and its glass is utterly clean and clear. We both examined our faces in it after lunch, though there is no-one here to see us but each other, and it gives a perfect reflection.
I say there is nobody here...when I looked into the mirror it was facing a window, and for half a moment I thought I saw a stooped figure in a cloak, away down the hill. When I turned, though, there was nothing. Azalea says that I am being foolish, pointing out - quite correctly - that we have been all over this island in the last few days. If it was inhabited, we would know it by now.
5th September
S.R. 1512
I confess that I am growing uneasy. Last night I dreamed of a black-haired woman in a grey, hooded cloak. She walked through the ruins of Himling as though they still stood fair and proud, ascending staircases long since fallen, opening doors that are no longer there. She is the singer of the song, sweet-voiced and sad, and I followed her through rooms and hallways that I could not see, except if I tried not to look. Sometimes she would pause and wait for me, and once she held out a hand, slender and as white as a rose - but for all her seeming loveliness, I was afraid to take it. She kept her face turned carefully away.
I was woken by a scratching at the side of the tent, as though something sought a way in. I looked out, intending to chase away whatever it was - a fox, perhaps, for I do not know what else would be so bold - but once again I saw nothing.
It was still dark, so I returned to the tent - quietly, so as not to wake Azalea. On the edge of sleep I felt soft hands brushing hair from my face. My mother used to do that to soothe me as a girl, but my mother's hands were not cold, and she would not have held me in place if I tried to turn away. I found I had no voice to cry out with - such is the power of dreams - and I woke in the grey light of dawn with my breath coming fast and a prickling on my lips like the memory of a kiss.
I think we will leave today. I hope Azalea will not be too disappointed.
7th September
S.R. 1512
We did not return yesterday - though we are back on the mainland now, and I am more grateful for it than I can express. Azalea is making up the fire, and the Red Minnow is safely moored. Tomorrow we begin the journey home.
I will not say much. I do not think there is much that I can say, or perhaps even should. Azalea agreed to leave on the morning of the 5th, as I had hoped she would, and she seemed happy enough with my excuse that we should be back before the autumn mists settled and made camping uncomfortable. The sky was threatening and grey, but even so she went for one last look over the ruins while I got ready to dismantle the tent. First, though, I went through each of our findings, wrapping each one in soft cloth so that they would not be damaged from being packed away.
I could not resist a last glance at the mirror, though the thought of it now makes me cold and faint. I held it up so that I could see myself with the sea behind me - and once again, nearer this time, I saw the cloaked figure. She knelt facing away from me, perhaps fifty yards distant, on the lip of the nook. When I turned she could not be seen, but she was there in the mirror all the same.
Azalea was not within shouting distance, and I am not sure I could have called for her if I'd wished it. My throat was tight and chilled, and my knees felt as though I'd spent a day at sea. I laid the mirror face down on the grass and continued to work - mad, perhaps, but what else was there to do? - until I felt long, cool fingers lifting my hair clear of my face.
I do not think I cried out. I cannot say what possessed me, but I had to see, to know. I lifted the mirror to my shoulder - and yes, she was there, as I had been certain she would be. Her face was turned to the left, covered by her hair and her hood, but as I gazed on her she lifted her head and the hood fell away. Poor, pitiful creature, I thought - for her hair hung from her scalp in patches, as though it had been ripped out by the handful, and her face was death-pale and broken and scarred - but when her eyes met mine there was such hunger there, and malice, and a cold kind of lust that I have seen only in the face of a shrike surveying its prey.
Azalea found me in a swoon when she returned from the ruins, and took me back to the tent. I have told her nothing - I am not sure that she would believe me - except that a kind of fainting illness runs in my family, and that I am from time to time afflicted with it. She insisted that we stay another night, until she was satisfied that I could sail back without incident. I had no wish to spend more time on the island, but what reason could I give for hurrying our departure?
In the evening, while she was checking the Minnow, I crept to the edge of our little dell and left the mirror lying face down on a rock. If I could, I would have taken it back to the tower-room where we found it, but there was no time - and my dreams were undisturbed, so perhaps it was enough. If Azalea ever asks about the mirror, I shall tell her I forgot it. I don't like myself for lying to her, but even if she believed the truth, I think it is better that she does not know.
I still have not asked her. I think perhaps I will do it when we are almost home, on the edge of Tuckborough, in the warm light of an autumn afternoon.
Letter from Azalea Noakes to her niece Opal Twofoot at Bree
24th October
S. R. 1559
My dearest Opal,
I hope this finds you in good health. I offer my deepest congratulations on your engagement to young Saradoc - a most respectable gentlehobbit, as Rosemary would say. She sends her regards, and regrets that we are unable to attend your wedding, but she has been rather unwell of late and I will not leave her. She has not had an unbroken night's sleep these two weeks together. First she insisted that a woman was walking around outside the house each night at dusk, singing - nonsense, of course, which I proved by opening the door and inviting the mysterious singer inside. No-one appeared - but Rosemary shook and sobbed and begged me to close the door again.
Next she began to wake in the night, insisting that something was creeping around the room. To be truthful I too heard something rustling about, and once or twice felt a soft brush against my cheek, but perhaps we have rats. I shall have to speak to the Ropers about taking in one of their kittens.
After a few days of this she refused to sleep in our room any longer, and made up a bed in the drawing room. All seemed well - but last night, as we were sipping fortified wine in front of the fire, she glanced at the window, let out an awful scream and turned as pale as wall-paste. When she could speak again, she would only say, "she's here, she's here." I cannot fathom what she meant, and she will tell me nothing. I would suspect a fever, but if anything, she is rather too cool.
I hope you will forgive our absence, my dear. With this letter I enclose a gift for you - a dainty silver mirror that I believe to be of Elvish make. We found it on our long-ago trip to the island marked on maps as Himling, though the Gardners give me to understand that its true name is actually Himring, with an 'r'. (As a matter of fact, Rosemary tells me that she intended to ask for my hand on that visit, but she had one of her turns and we had to sail back before there was time. She was so unwell that she almost forgot the mirror!) It feels right to me that you should have it now; I take it out and look at it from time to time, but Rosemary so dislikes being reminded of that trip that I keep the thing hidden from her, and so I gain little pleasure from it, though it is really very pretty. I hope it reaches you in time; I had looked it out for you, but almost immediately afterwards Rosemary was taken ill, and that drove the mirror quite out of my mind.
All my good wishes for your wedding day; I hope to see you again in the spring.
Your loving aunt,
Azalea
A Note on the Supplementary Materials Included with the Fourth Copy of the Thain's Book, sent to Gondor following the death of Harding of the Hill
Scholars have written elsewhere of those Elven fëar that refuse the call of Mandos and choose instead to remain in Middle-earth, with many suggesting that such a choice is a sign of taint or corruption in those who make it.
Contemporary sources indicate that Maedhros son of Fëanor made Himring a place of refuge for escaped or released thralls during the First Age. The treatment of such thralls is well documented, though the mistrust felt for them by their kin was not unfounded - there are several reliable and tragic accounts of former thralls attacking family and friends without warning or provocation. Even so, it is perhaps unsurprising that of all the lords of Beleriand, Maedhros should have attempted to give these damaged souls a measure of comfort and peace - though the idea of the figure in the mirror being such a one is speculation on my part. There are no writings or records extant to suggest who might have owned the silver mirror, or who occupied the shadowed tower-room.
Rosemary Took passed away in the winter of Fo.A. 138 (S.R. 1559). Azalea Noakes died the following spring.
The fate of Opal Twofoot is not known.
- Findegil, the King's Writer
Fo.A. 186
Minas Tirith