It had been a few weeks since I had returned to Rivendell after my long absence and I had my nose buried in a book as I sat outside in one of the gardens. It was a very lovely day indeed and just was not the type of day to stay cooped up in the library studying when I could do the same thing in the out of doors. Arwen came to sit with me and hummed softly. It was a bit before I noticed her presence. She shook her head at me.
"There you go again; you come home, rest a while, and stick your nose in a book. At least Ada is glad you are doing so outside." I sighed and closed the book I was carefully looking at and frowned at her.
"Have a lot of people been to the library in my absence?" I asked her.
"No, hardly any. Other than the archivist, I would wager. Why do you ask?"
"Because the two books about the Dunedain on Strider are not where they should be standing. I looked all over the library, even in the vaults, and they are just simply not there. Like someone took them but either forgot to return them or does not want me to know more about him." I said still frowning. Books did not just disappear from Rivendell. Arwen frowned suspiciously herself then, stood up, whirled around toward me pointing her finger and said:
"I bet it was Melchel!"
"Who?" I was confused for a moment as the name did not register.
"Fanuiel from the house of Nobility? Or Melchel as her nickname proceeds her?" Arwen waited until the names finally registered something in my eyes.
I had to shake my head to even remember her. Melchel was the thorn in the side of every royal of Rivendell. She was an only child of noble elves living in Rivendell but she had not a drop of royal blood in her veins. That had not however stopped her from trying to attain the unattainable to her. She wanted to be a princess of Rivendell. Arwen and I became aware of her when we were younger. She made her presence known in the most nasty of ways; she pointed out that I had no lineage as I had no mother nor father and that uncle Elrond should appoint her as princess based on her wishes alone and the fact that she was of noble standing.
All of this happened in the dining hall. At first my uncle ignored her with a dismissive hand. But she was persistent; even shouting at him that she demanded his attention to her matter at once. To which practically everyone froze in place including her mortified parents; you do not shout a command at Lord Elrond of Rivendell unless there is a battle field involved and you were the enemy. Arwen and I exchanged glances as did Arwen's brothers. Uncle Elrond had narrowed his eyes at her and told her to mind herself and who she was.
Tears came to my eyes as he defended me roaring at her that though I was parentless, the royal blood of two lands flowed through my veins and she was no more than an elven maiden in this land. That if she ever dared approach him in such a manner again--no matter how much he admired her parents--she would be banished from the land for all eternity. After which he left her standing there without a word as her parents all but forcefully dragged her home. Dinner for the evening was forgotten though I later, with Arwen's help, brought food to my uncle in his private chamber and we shared his meal with him. He told me then that I would always be like a daughter to him and no one or nothing would change that.
That was the day her nickname "Melchel" or greedy was born and no one has called her by her real name since; not even her own parents. But her peskiness, over privileged, and downright nasty behavior started way before that. I should describe to you what she looked like for starters; she was a little on the heavier side which mattered naught for us elves and her dirty blonde hair she always wore in braid around her head. She always felt that for reasons still unknown to me, I was her biggest competition. She would always walk past me when we were growing up with her nose stuck so high up in the air that I thought she would inhale the branches from our lowest trees.
In her mind, whatever she wanted should come true because she wanted it. That there should not be any work put into it. Just like magic, POOF, and tis done. There were times when I would be in the library studying up on something and she would come in and I was always cordial with her regardless of how she looked down upon me. She would sometimes ask what I would be reading and I would give the title of the book. The following day that book and maybe one other would inconspicuously disappear from the library and I would not be able to find it or them until the archivist would track it down to her house. She was never reading them, you see. But she wanted to make sure she would sabotage my studying process. I knew she did not read them because when I would ask her about them, she would never be able to tell me a single thing about their contents.
After a while, when on the off chance she would even enter the library and ask what I was reading, I would just off handedly say 'nothing of use' to her and go back to reading. The book disappearances stopped. So it would be only natural for Arwen to think that the Dunedain books absence had something to do with Ms. Sticky Fingers herself being back to her old tricks. But this time I was not so sure.
"Arwen, I do not think tis her. I looked for those books the third day of my arrival home and no one knew save you that I was even going to look for them. Plus I mentioned it to you in Lorien not here. I was not even sure the Rivendell library carried them." I said thoughtfully.
"You are right. What do you think became of them then?" She said clearly stumped again.
"Tis a mystery. But it is alright I am sure they will turn up sooner or later. I have a bigger deal to research. And it has to do with the Dark Lord Sauron." Arwen shuddered.
"Now that, I really do not want to know about right now." With that she kissed me on the forehead and left me to continue reading as I smiled after her.
I read for a little longer and shut my book, and started walking down the hill toward my wing. Dinner was in a couple of hours and it had gotten a little chilly outside as the sun started to fade in the west. As I walked silently, lost in thought, I heard heavy breathing coming from around the right corner and slowed to investigate. There I saw Melchel for the first time in what must have been a few centuries. She was holding a sword that was duller then bark of a wet tree that she must have gotten at the smithy somehow. She was practicing lunging with it or at least that is what I discerned as lunging but she kept tripping over her own gown because she was not placing her feet properly. She stopped when she saw me observing her.
"What are you looking at?" She snapped nastily at me. I ignored her tone and asked.
"Would you like me to show you how to properly do that?" I offered though I certainly did not owe her anything. I always believed everyone deserved kindness because perhaps they had not found it and that is why they were nasty.
"I know what I am doing, leave me be. Go read your stupid book!" She all but spat at me as I looked at her with raised eyebrows. I knew she was trying to goad me into an argument but I was not buying into it. I have seen enough of the likes of her, so I just shrugged and said:
"Suit yourself."
And I walked away. I felt her staring after me but I did not bother turning around. Instead I continued to walk toward my wing. But our exchange reawakened more memories of my past that I had long forgotten. When I was about 5 years old, uncle Elrond found me near the smithy looking over and holding a dagger. Now to a little 5 year old girl, a dagger seemed like a sword in itself. He was far away from me but rushed forward in concern that I would cut myself with it. He stopped shortly before reaching me because he saw an intense look enter my eyes as I dropped the doll I was holding. I ran my fingers over the dagger, concentrating on every inch of it. I then instinctively took the handle of the dagger and just brushed it back and forth as it made a whooshing sound.
I liked the sound a lot. It made me smile. I looked around and then looked up. My uncle could not tell what I was staring at until I chucked the dagger up into the tree and brought down a green apple. He was mesmerized as I carefully removed the dagger from the apple so not to cut myself and setting the dagger near my doll, started eating the apple. It was then that my uncle realized that I was different from the other elves. By the age of 10, I had steadfastly refused any training with the bow and arrow but when given a sword or daggers, broke through the guards' lines with speed and agility previously unseen. My uncle and aunt consulted then and realized though I had no prior training, the sword I would hold would become an extension of me and instinct would take over and that is how I was able to defeat my 'pretend' enemy.
It was at 13 that my aunt traveled from Lorien herself along with Haldir whom I had met the year before and presented me with the sword that would become my renowned weapon all over Middle Earth; Altherial. It was beautiful. It had my familial symbols of the sun and moon carved into it just below the handle and other Elvish runes in the language of the Eldar going up and down it; it was a sacred sword forged especially for me. I had never seen a sword that beautiful in my life. I was then taken to train with Haldir and the rest was history.
I smiled to myself as I remembered it all; I put the book down once I reached my wing. I looked down on top of the chest that the sword was laying on and using an alternative strap, attached her to my dress and covered myself with a cloak. My long trusted instincts, told me I would need her tonight. I decided to head toward the dining hall early, in case I would run into some elves to chat with. I felt a bit bad since as my cousin mentioned all I did was stay buried in books; I would need a little reprieve so what better way, than to catch up with family and old friends.
But just as I was to cross a cement path, out of the shadows, Melchel stopped me. She was carrying her sword. Her nose was up in the air again. I sighed, crossed my arms, and asked her:
"What is it that you want, Melchel?"
"In order to be the best, you have to fight the best and win, right? And you are it from what I hear supposedly."
She said this with a very dramatic eye roll. I looked at her very matter-of-factly. Though her nose was up above her head, I still had an edge because unlike her, I was quite tall. Just shorter then my betrothed Legolas but taller then Arwen in fact and she was not. She stopped growing. Her body type suggested getting married and having lots of happy babies but she was not the type. Happiness was not in her heart nor her soul so that was out of the question. I answered her at that point:
"Do not believe everything you hear." My face revealed nothing.
"Yes believe it." I heard as I looked over her head and she turned to see uncle Elrond descend the stairs and smile at me as I sighed at him.
"Uncle please do not flatter me. I am no better than any elven warrior in any land." And though I did not say it, I also implied Mirkwood. Uncle Elrond shook his head then.
"I only see what is right in front of me and I am not the only one singing your praises; I have seen what you are capable of since you were 5. Let us not forget a certain king in Mirkwood and that battle where you fought side by side with him." He said then and I turned my eyes away and smiled. He continued:
"When it comes to the sword and hand to hand battle, you my dear child, are the best there is in Middle Earth. Period. You spent your whole young life making sure of it. Be proud of your accomplishments now as they will serve you mightily in the future."
Melchel, who never liked not being in the conversation, let alone not the center of it, cleared her throat so I glanced at her again. I saw it in her eyes; that challenge to prove herself. I accepted it. I nodded at her as my uncle stepped aside. She lunged toward me with her dull sword and I disarmed her and tossed the sword aside with one hand and pushed her gently with the other.
"I can fight damn you!" She screamed at me as she scrambled to get her sword and others started to come out to see what the commotion was. I was about to answer her when I heard a different commotion come from the other side and concentrated on it. Elrohir came running toward us with some of the guard. He stopped before my uncle and me sidestepping Melchel neatly.
"Goblins! Right outside the main gate!" He said urgently as my eyes narrowed and a slow smile spread across my face.
"How many?" I asked quietly with an expression my uncle knew too well. He waved at me then and said:
"You are supposed to be on a break."
"I need some exercise you said it yourself; I cannot keep sitting there with my nose in a book. Your words uncle." I said pointing at him with my head halfcocked and a sly smile on my lips. He sighed and shook his head then as he turned away he mumbled in Elvish:
"Remind me next time to eat my words." I knew I got him fair and square. I turned to Elrohir then and asked again:
"How many?"
"20 right now but with possible reinforcements on the way." He looked at me expectantly as I nodded at him.
"There are always reinforcements. But since the reinforcements have not arrived yet, we are going to do a little lesson. Bring about 15 men Elrohir." He nodded and started to walk away as I said:
"Melchel?" And beckoned toward her as he came back his mouth aghast.
"You have to be joking. Her?"
"Yes exactly her. Come Melchel, now!"
My voice was firm with no room for argument as she followed me. I saw my uncle lift his eyebrow but he smiled seeing ahead as usual. He knew what I was doing. As we walked past the stables, I told Melchel to follow Elrohir; she gulped and nodded as the latter rolled his eyes. Meanwhile I whispered to Sunset's caretaker to just set him free; he would not budge unless I needed him and I was sure I would, just not immediately. I got a wink in confirmation. I then proceeded to walk outside and saw that the guards had surrounded the goblins with Melchel watching wide eyed and trembling.
"What is the matter, Melchel? You wanted to fight. This is our enemy, these are goblins. A lot uglier then what you saw in those pictures huh? Guess what? Their weapons are a lot sharper too and some stand taller then you! Go! Fight! Kill one!" I pushed her towards them as they writhed towards her. She fell back white as a sheet with fright.
"I do not understand, Melchel. You have been on my case since we were young about how you deserved everything. You were this that, a golden bug up my uncle's butt! And yet here when you should fight, you do not! So how does it go? Melchel the wannabe princess is nothing but Melchel the coward! Even Arwen would take them on! What are you waiting for? Get your sword dirty; let their black blood squirt on your face! Because that is what real royalty does; you will not find tea and biscuits here, you stupid fool! We protect our own; give up our lives for our lands and our people!" I yelled at her then. I saw one goblin squirming toward her and me.
"What do you want, filth?" I addressed it. I let it get really close to Melchel before it spoke.
"We are here to speak with the warrior princess of Rivendell." I smiled at him and then with Melchel's dull sword took his and three of his kind's heads off making sure that their blood splattered all over her.
"Well you are speaking to her....or were rather." At that point the rest of the guard finished off the remaining goblins as one of the guards yelled:
"Wargs!!!" The goblins reinforcements had arrived. With that I pushed Melchel toward Elrohir and tossed her sword at her. I then whistled.
"Get her and the rest of your men inside the gate!"
"What are you going to do?" He yelled back with concern as Sunset appeared and I mounted him in a fraction of a second. With a smile at Elrohir, I reached underneath my cloak and unsheathed Altherial just as Melchel gasped.
"I am going to go get some exercise. Here endeth the lesson." I said with a smile before galloping off on Sunset toward the wargs and their masters. I rode him into the thick of it and all one heard for the next 10 or 15 minutes was systematic slicing and dicing. When I was done I rode back to the gate.
"Get some of your men including Melchel to help build fire pits." I rode Sunset back into the gate and toward the stables. I did not have a drop of goblin blood on me but Sunset had some and he was not pleased in the least so his caretaker and I exchanged a knowing glance and a smile; someone was going to be getting a nice wash down.
I walked back toward where my uncle stood with his back to me gazing at the stars. Arwen was standing next to him and I joined him on the other side. The rest of the elves just kept staring at me in awe which I could not understand. All I did was kill some goblins, big deal. My uncle read my gaze and turned toward me.
"Was your exercise a success, my dear?" He asked gently. I had not re-sheathed Altherial as she had a bit of black blood on her blade.
"Yes indeed it was uncle." I said with a smile and he nodded as the rest of the guards some more covered with goblin blood then others came trudging through and I smiled at them kindly as they saluted me. Melchel came behind them; her emotions were somewhere between spastic fear and rage.
Elrohir had taken out a wool-like kerchief and wiped the blood from his blade. He saw me looking at it and with a smile he tossed it to me so I could do the same with mine. As I stroked the length of the blade from handle to tip, the black blood just dripped to the ground and into the cracks within the earth. It did not stain the blade unlike Melchel's sword which was pretty much useless even though she kept trying to scrub the goblin blood off of it. I threw the kerchief back to Elrohir with a nod of thanks. A look passed between him and I that only relations could understand and was quickly picked up by both my uncle and Arwen. Melchel was annoyed to top off what she was already feeling.
"So you had your sword on you this whole time?" She asked indignantly.
"You mean even when I disarmed you using my own hands? Yes. There was no need for her to come out. You were not of danger to me where I needed my sword." I replied barely looking at her.
With a fierce and wild cry she launched herself at me holding her sword with both hands over her head; had I not blocked her sword at that moment with Altherial and had Arwen not jumped out of the way; she could have been injured as Elrohir gasped. Melchel's sudden vicious attack had very nearly seriously injured my cousin. My uncle caught his daughter as she jumped out of the way. Goblins no problem, trolls small deal, orcs annoyance but a demented elf coming after mine family while trying to get to me? Huge no-no. For the first time in a very long time my eyes bore fire. Not since the Battle of The Five Armies did I feel that fire rip through me.
Without any effort at all, using Altherial, I sliced Melchel's sword in half and sent the two shards of blackened metal at top speed into a tree where they would remain imbedded for all eternity. The force of that action knocked Melchel on her back across the courtyard as I stood over her with Altherial's sharpest point at her throat. Everyone knew all I had to do was swipe just slightly and her head would be off of her shoulders. For the first time ever, all of the arrogance was gone from her eyes replaced by total fear.
"You disgusting sack of bile! You are worse than those goblins out there. I should just separate your miserable head from your useless body! Get up!"
I seethed through clenched teeth as she scrambled to her feet with my sword still at her throat. At this point my uncle spoke as he stepped forward and placed his hand on my shoulder. I slowly lowered the sword but never tore my eyes away from the disgrace in front of me.
"In deference, to my unwavering respect towards your parents who had the displeasure to raise such a repulsive and loathsome child, I will spare your life. However, this will not go unpunished. You charged at my niece and nearly very severely hurt my daughter. You are hereby banished from the lands of Rivendell and Lorien. I warned you many years ago; my memory serves me well. You refused to heed my warnings. You are never allowed to return to these lands again. The guards will deposit you off to the east somewhere, where no kind heart will ever show you mercy again."
With that three guards with shackles came and chained her up as she begged them not to. She was too stunned by everything to apologize. Her parents were weeping but they looked away from their only child; they could not handle her anymore. I kept my eyes firmly planted on the ground in front of me, still holding my sword if she dared try anything else. I would skin her alive if I had to; she would never harm my family. She was carted off in a cage. Just before they left I stopped one of the guards and whispered something in his ear as he looked at me, swallowed, and nodded. That was the last anyone ever heard from Melchel.
Sadly, it was not the last we had heard of her, as we learned immediately after she was taken away that that same day her parents found out that she had been secretly poisoning her mother through food. She considered her mother pitiful and weak and therefore not a candidate for her delusional royal family. It was also quite obvious that Melchel had wanted Altherial for herself hence her gasping when I rode off to fight the goblins after I unsheathed her. Her attack on me had been her attempt to disarm me and take my sword. A royal sword for her royal insanity.
Having suffered as much as her parents had, my uncle sent them to the Grey Havens to take one of the boats across the seas to Valinor so that they may live out their eternity in peace. When I found out about the poisoning, I secretly wished I had killed her. She had something I had always dreamt of; a loving mother. I knew mine would have been if she had not passed away giving birth to me but to have that and throw it away was unforgivable.
As I re-sheathed Altherial, my uncle asked me where I had told the guards--whose entire round trip journey took 4.5 days to complete--to take Melchel and leave her, I said simply:
"Dol Guldur".
And continued to my wing without another word to my uncle or anyone after I had checked on Arwen to make sure she was alright; though she had small scratches, she was sleeping peacefully. I kissed her on the forehead. As I walked into the sitting room and the moon shown over the water, I saw something lying on my table. As I walked toward it and looked at it, I knew my uncle knew there would be only one thing that would help the wrath and sadness disperse and bring a smile to my face and he was right as always.
It was my first letter from Legolas; who as promised would write when he found the Dunedain and Strider. I held it in my hands as I ever so slowly smiled.
***Picture of Hedraliel as she faced off against Melchel. Drawing by Ekaterina Khokhryakova.***