Hard it was!
The war-scars long stitched my bone-locker with pain that renewed itself, each day ever fresher.
Tolkien had scribbled a note here: “The blunt energy of these lines, the gold of men of old, enmeshed in woven spell, is the bard’s gift to us today.”
Waiting for the enemy that came only by rumour As creeping fog and distant sounds that give no battle But unsettle as no din of war could ever muster!
Here Tolkien had underlined portions of the text:
One day in my great hall, proud of my mastery,
I admitted, in courtesy, an errand from another kingdom.
Sweet words, echoing my own boasting estimate, did he speak,
Visions, of power greater, did he lay before me.
And the Source that would its certainty insure
An ancient Ring of Spells.
A token of an alliance of equals, did he offer,
The rites of ring-giving were registered,
The Vow of Protection duly scribed
Like the unthinking swipe of a broadsword to bloody some last innocent at battle’s end, I spoke hastily,
“’Tis done!” said I,
And no king would take back words so spoken.
Now of fell work to full grasp filled were my hands.
To other kingdoms did I travel
And extolled the virtues of the Ring-Giver.
And others sought to repeat my grand alliance
So that, in time, less than a double-handful of us, esteemed kings of lineage and grace, did compare and carefully assay the wondrous craft of these tokens.
The Professor’s own words followed: “Much is lost here. However, in the same hand on separate parchment and perhaps much later in time, the poem continues. My translation is as follows,” and he continued the verse:
Generations of the lives of men have passed.
I wear the tattered robes and horror-geild
As once I did strut with finest fur and emblazoned shield bright with honor,
The banners of my kingdom have long rotted in the seeping drench of storms and roofs unmade by fire and ruin.
My bone-locker gone, replaced by this mist of a body—
A bitter turn for one so proud of his limbs, sword-stewards that could unleash such havoc in battle!
Of my own folly was I ensnared and unmanned by this Ring!
Mark This! The Vow of Protection lies unspent and
unfulfilled — The leather writing in which it resides, moldy and ragged, now forever lost.
She finished and held the pages. A final note of Tolkien’s translation was at the bottom:
This poem found by I, Thygol, leader of the Cerian Band of the Free, in a pouch on the stinking carcass of a winged beast on the plains where we fought the Black Army.
Cadence searched the rest of the box. At the bottom was a separate manila envelope. She opened it. It contained two items. First was a small, rough piece of hide inscribed with runes as obscure as they were magnificent. On a second, larger piece of leather, as thin and supple as doe-skin, was an elaborate diagram, an intricate wheel with scores of spokes interwoven with Elvish characters. This had to be the translation key — except for one problem: it looked more indecipherable than even the Elvish. Finally, at the very bottom of the box, lay a disintegrating napkin from — she paused and smiled ruefully—Ye Olde West End Bar. On it was scrawled a sort of map:
Take 1 train / 137th stop
137th ===130th (Old Stop) ===
door (padlock/key hidden) == the pool
This last was perhaps nothing or, if she believed just a little, finally a real bricks and steel rails clue. She pocketed all the documents, put the empty box back, and, looking behind as she went, set out to find the only exit.
Hours later, she found Osley in the familiar corner booth at the West End. She sat down across from him and eased her newfound documents under his nose, just as he was pondering the apparently curious remnants of his blue-plate special.
He began reading, carefully studying the Professor’s notes and the poems. He sat bolt upright when he opened the manila envelope with the wheel figure.
“Where did you find this?” He sounded excited, almost angry.
She told him. He reflected for a moment before taking her hand and looking her straight in the eye.
“Cadence, you must be careful! Don’t go off on your own like this.” He held the translation key up in his hand. I haven’t told you some things because … because I want to protect you. This all has to be sorted out carefully. One day at a time…”
“I don’t have a lot of days.”
“Stop! Please. This is becoming very dangerous.” Then he added, “and I’m sure we will find your grandfather. I will help you.”
She was astounded at his tenor, the light of a real person breaking through. He was like a man imprisoned in his past, struggling to get a message out, even if he could never escape.
He patted her hand. Then he took it back and shook his head. The prison warden in his mind was back. “Now, for what you have found in your foolish venture. You indeed discovered some leavings of good Master Tolkien. And you have with you fragments of a lost poem, a tale by one of the Wraiths. Do not come here and wheedle that you have nothing you can put your hands on, that you lack still your ‘proofs.’”
“But what have I got?”
“Quiet! Be still! Proof enough you have of something more important than these documents. Your own heart and courage! Descending to that dank hole in the library was no idle holiday stroll. Now that you have proved it, you need not do so again.”
He stirred in his seat, presumably looking about for spies. Then his eyes stopped at the bar and she followed his gaze. The one-eyed bartender was nowhere to be seen. That seemed to make him more uneasy, as if his back wasn’t covered. He leaned across the table and continued. “Let me tell you something— whether you believe it or not — of the errand they have sent you on. But before the ‘they’ and the ‘errand,’ you must understand what you are really dealing with here. And let’s get something straight about your grandfather. Never seek too hard for someone that intentionally disappears. No pics, no prints, no DNA, no records. That says a lot. If you need more proof, look at me. If they couldn’t find me, a Top Ten Fugitive — yea, I’m sure you’ve figured that out— how could they find your two-bit, itinerant, derelict, legend-in-his-own-mind relative? The borderland of fable and reality is hard country to track a man.”
He waited, letting it sink in, and then continued. “Now, that being said, the day your grandfather departed with the documents, Mr. Tolkien sat where you sit and told me of his deepest thoughts, which I have long remembered but never repeated to anyone. He said—”