No one panicked when everything went according to plan.
It was only when we strayed off the predicted path and ventured into the unknown, that fear began to drown reason.
I had a simple plan.
Use the mess I made while securing Anchor Gate to draw Enemy attention to Amon Sul, which in this case was entirely disposable, while others took care of One Ring.
It seemed to be going well.
The Ringbearer, Frodo Baggins arrived in Imladris without my intervention. Well, without my intentional intervention. And with much less trouble than in the book. He was even escorted by a ranger.
Not Estel, for he was some reason in the vicinity of Gondor. And there was an extra hobbit. But, all in all, an acceptable outcome.
Archer warned that I wouldn't like what came next, and he was right.
Someone who could recognize the One Ring at sight had finally come to Imladris. Except it was someone who shouldn't be anywhere near the ring.
Curumo, or Saruman in Westron. Head of the White Council. Wizard most knowledgeable about the workings of the Enemy. And one corrupted by that knowledge.
Probably. Possibly.
I didn't know for sure.
Everything was different from the books.
And movies too.
And there was a parallel timeline that was very similar to one of the games.
Honestly, by this point, I wouldn't be surprised if I had run into an Elf cult who thought the original Dark Lord destroying Two Trees was a good thing because the Light of Trees made it harder to see stars.
So in conclusion White Wizard may or may not be corrupted, yet, or ever.
But still, the risk was too great for me to let him near the One Ring.
One good point was my distraction worked better than intended so he was probably looking in the wrong place for now.
I had made plan after plan on how to get out of this situation, each more impractical than the last.
By the evening I had managed to work myself into quite the state.
I would have done something reckless, like kidnapping Frodo and One Ring and running off, probably using an untested glider prototype if Archer had not sat on me.
And by that I mean he wrestled me to the ground and sat on me.
"Are you calm now," he asked, while his weight pressed me down. This was not the first time he needed to do this, but the number of times he had done it could be counted without removing his shoes.
Considering the trouble I regularly got into after summoning him, it was quite remarkable. Now I thought about it, could it be that he was bad luck? He was pretty enough for me to ignore it.
I took a deep breath, and rather than fight I relaxed. It was not so bad being under him. Even with clothes between, I could feel the pressure of his firm bottom on me.
"Thanks, I needed that, but I am calm now," I said, and it was mostly true, "I guess that I had gotten too attached. The memories of Rin the Elf seem like mine."
"It's not a bad thing, Rin, to feel something," he said, stood up, and offered me his hand to help me stand up. "To surrender all your bonds for the cause... In the end, you will be left with nothing."
I took his hand and said, "That is not my problem. I am not one for causes. Ideals may be admirable, but they are too… Either naive or simplistic? For me to get emotionally attached to them. But caring about people here will hurt more when we leave. Clarity would serve me better."
"So, are we still leaving this World?"
"Yes." It was obvious. "Even if we wanted to stay, the time of Elves nears the end. We would soon be presented with the choice to either go West or Linger."
"Soon? We are young for the Elves. It could be centuries."
"No," I firmly said. I did not know how, but I was certain that this was true. "I feel it in the wind. I feel it in the water. The choice to either leave Ea or be bound by the fate of Elves would come much sooner. But not before the One Ring is unmade."
In truth, I was not sure as there would be a choice. There was something calling to me. Something that needed to be done.
Not here, but elsewhere. Unfinished business.
And that was my main trouble with this Wizard. He wanted to use One Ring, and not destroy it.
And I felt that in some strange way, the very existence of One Ring bound me to Arda. Why or how was beyond me. It was just an intuition, but it was enough.
That was why I needed to get Frodo to Gandalf as soon as possible.
It was a bit odd referring to the Mithrandir by the name Man gave him—a dissonance between sets of my memories. Rin the Elf, naturally used the Elven name for the wizard, but other parts of me were more used to the books.
Luckily there was something that would help get the hobbit to Gondor fast. And I would be testing it soon.
"If you had let me fly it, we could have done this weeks ago," my older apprentice grumbled as we did the last checks on the prototype hand-glider.
Even without access to polyester and aluminum, we managed to create a high-quality item. I think that it was probably superior to modern hand gliders. It was certainly prettier to look at.
The material wing was crafted from a light and airy fabric, the same type of material used to craft the sails of elven ships, which weighed less and was better at catching wind than anything made by modern science. It was also more aesthetically pleasing with the star of Earendil embroidered in the middle. The cloth was blue, the color of a cloudless sky.
The tubes that made the metal frame were elegant in their simplicity. And both lighter and stronger than one would expect from the metal they were made from.
As I finished examining the last connection between the frame and the wing, I smiled and whispered back, "We would have missed having a large audience."
I was referring to the throng of people who had come to witness the launch. Although they were too far away from the launch platform, built on the side of the mountain, for us to see them, I knew they were gathered near the designated landing space. The crowd consisted of Elves, Dwarves, Men, and even a Wizard. Elrond was there, but he was more in the role of a medic, which indicated a lack of confidence in either my design or Ascarnil's piloting. Archer, with the help of my younger apprentice, was catering the event.
The question was whether they had gathered to witness this flight, or just to eat excellent food.
Last of the checks completed I raised my voice, speaking to the test pilot, and said, "Everything seems to be in order. Are you ready to launch?"
"Yes!" he shouted back, his voice brimming with confidence and excitement.
"Then fly!"
He began to run carrying the contraption. He didn't have any trouble with it. Like all Elves, he was stronger than he looked, and the hang glider was designed to light. Without hesitation, he jumped over the cliff and his trust in my work was rewarded.
"It seems to be working as designed," I commented.
"He's going in the wrong direction, master," the boy said, pointing towards the glider. The plan was for the glider to quickly glide to the designated landing site, but the glider was flying in the opposite direction. Was it the wind? It didn't seem so. It must be the pilot. The problem with overly bold test pilots was that they rarely kept to simple plans. "That wouldn't have happened if I was piloting."
"Is he doing loops?" Indeed, he was. The glider was more maneuverable than I expected, and the elven scout was learning to pilot much quicker than anyone could have predicted without instruction.
The glider plummeted toward the ground.
"He's going to crash it!" I exclaimed. But he didn't. He pulled out of the dive at the last moment, nearly brushing the tops of the trees, and found an updraft to regain altitude. The maneuver was impressive, given that Imladris was in a gorge, with surrounding mountains leaving little space to maneuver.
"No point and standing here. Let's go to the designated landing site. He has to come down sooner or later," I said and then added to console the boy, "Consider this. Now that we know that they work we can make more. Soon you may have your own glider."
Afterward, Elrond approached me, his gaze piercing and wise. "You have given wings to those who were born with none. It is a glorious feat, but is it wise? I cannot say for certain, as even my foresight cannot pierce the veil that surrounds your future."
I shrugged. Neither precognition nor postcognition worked as they should on me. It could be that it was something with my Origin, but the same thing prevented me from knowing that for certain.
"Perhaps reason should guide us then," I returned. "Nonetheless, this is but the first step on a long journey. Your father's light should have been a sign to guide us to him, not an unreachable star."
Actually, I just needed a faster way of traveling, but this sounded better, and it was not quite untrue.
Once the problem with Rings of Power was properly resolved I may spend some time doing that while trying to master my Sorcery. A void between stars would be a safe place for some riskier experiments. And I am sure there would be interesting sites to see. To boldly go where no Elf had gone before.
He gave me a somber look, his voice tinged with sadness and resignation. "Silmarils. It always comes back to them. How could such beauty give rise to such sorrow?"
Did he just assume that the only reason for developing the Elven space program was to get my hands on my most infamous ancestors' pet rock!? And mug his father once we escaped the bounds of Arda.
Well, not that I wouldn't like to examine that masterpiece of gem crafting, but it wasn't much of a priority. Truly I was more interested in their material composition, than ownership.
But still, it was insulting.
"Because beauty ensnares. It inspires greed. But if you think Feanor's masterpiece is the reason why I seek your father, then we have much left unsaid," I replied, raising a voice a little. "He is but another step towards a journey beyond the bounds of Arda. Ea is vast beyond reckoning. Why should we be content with just a small part of it?"
"Have you forgotten who lurks beyond Gates of Night?"
I have not. The original Dark Lord, the Black Enemy of the World, was banished beyond the bounds of Arda. It was possible that he had wandered away in ages that past, even bound by chains reforged from his iron crown, but unlikely.
He had invested too much of himself in Arda.
But that's no excuse, to become a shut-in.
"If you are unwilling to ever leave your fortress, then it has become your prison."
"Your words echo those of your most infamous ancestor. And not only his. That was a sentiment common among those who joined him. I am not surprised, just saddened. You are so young and yet you have been born at the twilight of our race. What is the West to you but something that steals your kin?"
"Once more you misunderstand me. Are you blinded by your preconceptions or am I just that bad at communication? I do not begrudge their choices, even if I don't agree with them. I do not believe that the Valar imprisoned elves. Well no more than they do themselves. But let's speak no more of this. There is little to be gained from it."
Elrond's eyes narrowed, concern etched on his face. "We will have more words later, for I fear you walk a perilous path. I can see into the hearts of many, but yours often remains closed, or I read it wrong. But there is another matter. There is to be a meeting in two days about current events. As much of it concerns Amon Sul, and you and Fano were last to visit the caves beneath it, your testimony will be needed. Both of you."
"We will be there," I said, and then we talked about more neutral topics like the lore of the wind, in which he proved to be more than knowledgeable.
I was worried about being close quarters with White Wizard, especially if he was to speak to me. The voice of Saruman was infamous. Well, not here. After all, such arts worked best on the unsuspecting. There was no reason to suspect that he would turn any particular attention to either me or my partner, but as they say, guilty run when none pursue them.
Fortunately, another project of mine was completed. It was not meant for this purpose. But it could be of some use. If nothing else it was additional muscle if we were to be discovered and needed to flee.
For that, I needed to talk to a very cooperative prisoner and ask him for a favor.
I decided to take the scenic route and opened the gate at the edge. It had been too long since I surveyed the domain I had claimed.
As I walked through the caves under the Amon Sul, I marveled at all of the changes. Where once were just bare stone, now there was a beginning of a thriving settlement.
There was perhaps some merit in having orcs as minions. Well, at least the undead ones. Not their looks, the orcs were short and scrawny, with warty skin and beady eyes. Living ones were also cruel, cowardly, and as ugly in character as in appearance. So filled with hatred, that their love of kin was that they hated their blood just slightly less than everything else. But they all had a love for gears and mechanisms, as any way to bring death to multitudes, like poisons or explosives.
That we did have In common.
But the dead ones were both obedient and industrious. The corpses I animated inherited all of the skills and knowledge of the original owners of the bodies. Under the guidance of Central Intelligence, they had been excavating, building taps, brewing poisons, constructing forges…
The problem was that after the last attack, the number of corpses gathered outgrew my capacity for animation. There were several reasons for that. One was that animating corpses was a part of necromancy that was more of a hobby than an area I seriously studied. I was more skilled with the spiritual part of it than moving flesh and bone.
Naturally, because of that the Mysteries I used in their creation were shallow, and thus very inefficient. Also easy to disrupt by another Magus, but it was not something I had to worry about now. counterspells used in Arda tended to tear through magecraft like a rock through glass windows.
The Otherworld supplied enough energy to run a modern city and it could be converted into mana. The problem was not in scarcity but in distribution.
The original setup was that by simulation of metabolic processes undead would absorb magical energy while in the prepared circle, and then use that energy to be animated. Once stored magical energy had depleted the process needed to be repeated.
The recharging was not instantaneous. It took quite a bit of time. So with adding new bodies, it came to be that the circle was constantly in use. And there were bodies left over in storage—lots of them.
One solution was to create secondary charging stations.
The simplest thing would be to create simplified circles, but that would just have the same logistic problems as previous ones.
The way to avoid it was to create a "fuel". In other words, rather than place undead in a high-density mana area, was to create material with high-level magical energy saturation and have undead consume it.
The optimal material for it would be body fluids. Well also gems, but that would be prohibitively expensive. Before I would say that of a Magus, but recent discoveries have shown that Orcs' bodies were excellent at both absorbing and retaining magical energy. The more I studied it, the more I grew impressed with Morgoth, no he would have been Melko still when he made them, work.
I still did think that dragons were better, and would like to get some samples of them too.
Thanks to my sister's dietary restrictions I already knew how to use bones, precisely bone marrow, and hearts to make a Mystic Code that could turn water into blood. It was an old necromancer trick for those who commonly dealt with blood-drinking species.
There were many ways to do it, but I based mine on the first plague that God sent upon Egypt, the turning of the Nile River into blood.
Then I had a bright idea to construct it in the Otherworld. There were benefits to that approach. It was much easier to integrate a supply of mana and water there, and the undead had access to it.
But there was also a downside.
To dwell in the Otherworld for any length of time was to slowly trade reason for madness. Drop by drop. Handful by handful. But there were truths that only a diseased mind would contemplate and artifacts that only a madman would create.
What that implied about Arche's habit of gardening there, and the fact that he used things he grew in that eldritch garden in our meals was something better left alone. The food he made was more than delicious, and as long as I didn't stumble on something suspicious like an earring or a human finger bone I was not going to question it.
But this was about me and not about him. And I knew what I had made. A beautiful horror.
Mystic Code I so painstakingly crafted in a realm beyond at first glance looked like a pool of black liquid, for the blood of the Orcs was black, from which rose tree made of the fused bones. Where on the normal tree would be knots, on this one were Orc eyes, forever glaring in undying hatred. From the branches hung beating dead hearts, carved to look like macabre flowers. Instead of dew, blood gathered on morbid decorations, and slowly dripped into the pool below.
It was a cycle, as long as both pure water and magical energy were supplied to it, it would create new blood. The first step would be removing some blood from the pool, it would immediately be replaced with water, somewhat diluting what was in the pool, but then through the roots tree would draw water, and as it passed through the truck it would slowly turn to blood that then flowed through the branches and finally dripped from undead hearts.
But there was more. I was not sure I could have done the next part outside the Otherworld. There was more than one tree, although only one was real. A whole forest of potential existences fighting to be true. As normal plants fought for their place in sunlight, this shadow tree fought to be one that was currently real. Because only the real tree would cast new shadows, each subtly different. And if the tree spent too much time being unreal it would fade into non-existence.
That made it disconcerting to look at because the tree constantly and subtly changed whatever part no one was looking at. In that way, by looking and turning one's gaze away one could guide that artificial evolution. There were also more direct and efficient ways of doing that, so I used those.
There also, since it was a part of the Otherworld, were other parts that were disturbing. Like that branches were all wrong angles, twisting in a wholly unnatural way. That black blood did not move quite like Newtonian liquid should. Or the trunk was both colors of the old bone and impossibly white at the same time.
That also led me to another discovery. It was not only the gates that could be extruded from the Otherworld. This Mystic Code could lasso be brought outside. However, when it did, there was an underwater, well under the blood, tunnel that connected to the Otherworld.
The worst thing about it was its name. Whether I did it under a thrall of inspiration or madness, or Central Intelligence did it without my input didn't matter. What mattered was the name. Ashturu that, in Black Speech, meant Bone Tree.
I should have destroyed it then if only it wasn't so useful. Also, I wanted to study it.
And so it stayed.
But the irony was that to make Ashturu I used most of the spare corpses. So in the end I didn't increase the number of troops by much. But on the other hand, I did significantly increase the potential number of undead, as long as I found more corpses.
I thought that my bats would indulge themself in the blood generated by the Bone Tree since they already showed some blood-drinking tendencies, but they avoided it. I wondered if that was because it was never living orc-blood, or was Eldrich nature inherited from the Otherworld that repulsed them?
Two bats remained in my service. One was lost in the Shire and I had not added others. But they were no longer so small. Changes were expected. Once a living animal, even though the death and rebirth process I used, was made into a familiar, that animal in time transformed into a magical beast.
Actually, the method I used both hastened the process and tended to produce more potent results. As a consequence, they were now the size of a small Orc. Their diet moved from insects to birds and fresh blood when they could get it.
Coming to the broken bridge turned my thoughts towards my last familiar. My efforts to educate him were futile. It wasn't that he couldn't understand, he just found no value in any of the subjects I tried to teach him. Its way of thinking was utterly alien to me.
In a way, it did remind me of a part from Hitchhiker Guide to the Galaxy. One about humans and dolphins. To paraphrase it: humans thought that they were smarter than dolphins because of all the things they invented, like wheels and war and cities, while dolphins spent that time having fun in the water, on the other hand, dolphins thought that they were smarter precisely for the same reasons.
As long as he was happy, and diligently patrolling the underground river I was satisfied.
We never repaired that bridge. There was no point. The only people who would benefit from it would be potential invaders. Those who were on my side had better ways of crossing that river. Bats had wings, the Kraken stayed in the river, and undead controlled by Central Intelligence could use the Otherworld as a shortcut. And for Archer and me? We had our own methods, besides going through the Otherworld.
I brought forth mercury and let it take the form of a thin silvery bridge. That was the glory of the miracle, the power bestowed by the grace of God. It was intuitive to use and so very versatile.
I walked on the quicksilver bridge. By any rational reason, the liquid bridge should not be able to bear my weight. But because I asked for it, it did. Even with such limited power, for the blessing that only concerned mercury, I could see why Mages lusted so for the spells from Age of Gods.
In truth, I should have perhaps spent more time researching it. It was a supernatural phenomenon, and magecraft at its core was a recreation of such.
But I already had too many commitments.
I noticed something strange when I entered the room where we had kept imprisoned Barrow Wights.
There were some black lines appearing on the surface of mercury that filled the iron coffins. It looked a bit like tarnished silver. Disturbing, since oxidized mercury was bright orange, not black.
Yet another mystery. Something to occupy my nonexistent free time. Well, there was no internet here, and even if the library in Imladris was one of the largest currently in Middle Earth, I had already mostly exhausted all recreational reading.
But first.
I am sorry to disturb you, have you thought more about abandoning that shell? I mentally addressed the first captured and most cooperative of imprisoned wights.
I am not yet ready to be judged, he replied in the same way, almost immensely.
And if you stay in that corpse, you may never be. But I was not talking about going West. I have a potential new home for your spirit. It is named Endelómeríe.
Then I took it out and showed it to him. I was not quite sure what he saw, for he lacked physical eyes. But to me at first glance, it looked like a relatively simple black circlet with large onyx at the front. The only decorations were miniature swords all over it. Touch revealed something of what hid under the surface. I could feel a pulse, an artificial heartbeat.
The reason for that was that the foundation of the crown was a replica of my cardiovascular system made of mercury. I used magecraft to perfectly visualize it. Then brought forth mercury in that image. The next step was then carefully twisting the silvery construct into a ring shape while preserving the integrity, quicksilver that represented blood vessels in lungs unfurling like a flower, forming a resting place for the gem.
Archer then, on my request, brought forth iron creating a shell. Swords were his contribution.
The last part was the gem. It was the pinnacle of what I could accomplish by combining Jewel Magecraft and Noldo lapidary lore, with a dash of what I learned from my studies of making Rings of Powers.
In a World where magecraft originated, ores and jewels that have been beneath the surface for an extended period of time generally carried powerful nature spirits. That was one of the Mysteries that Jewel Magcraft tried to recreate. But in the end, it was beyond human ability to create a nature spirit. The best was a counterfeit that could do one thing, one singular effect as the gem was destroyed.
The Elves on the other hand…
But Nature Spirits, even counterfeit ones, were too alien for me to be able to easily use them. Fortunately, there was already an established solution to that problem. The Guardian Spirits. They were created by the union of a Nature Spirit and human soul, giving human values to something that was not human. Since, from a certain point of view, that could be looked at as a type of supernatural marriage, I had relevant rituals recorded in my Crest.
Since human souls were hard to come by in this world, unless I wanted to use a living human, here I was acquiring a substitute. Elf fea would do as well, and maybe even better, in my informed opinion.
A Crown of Midnight. He paused for a moment, then continued. Such an interesting name. Strangely appropriate. I am ready. How are we to accomplish moving my spirit from one vessel to another?
You can't do that on your own?
No. I don't know how. Is that a problem?
Not really. As long as I have your consent, I can do it. I didn't really need his consent. I would be a very poor necromancer if I could tear a spirit out of a body, living or not. I was just being polite. Just one more warning. This is likely to result in loss of memories. At least for time. Do you still want to proceed?
That is more of a temptation than a drawback. There are many sorrows I would like to forget. Do it!
I did as he asked. But before that, I deliberately forgot one thing. Afterward, I sent the corpse to be re-animated. It should prove interesting.
The night before the meeting I had a pleasant midnight excursion with Archer. One of the no longer small bats had flown ahead before us, while Archer and I had ridden together on his bike to our destination.
"It has been a bit too long since we could go for a nice walk together. Why the long face? Fresh air. Nice scenery. What would you want?"
"Less grave robbing?"
I didn't see why he was complaining. Two of us were in a merely supervising position. Actual grave robbing was being done by the orc corpses under Central Intelligence's command. I had used the key on one mausoleum door, registering another gate, and opening a path to Amon Sul.
And besides, it was because of him I was doing this in the first place. He was the one who was always complaining that Central Intelligence was sounding too much like an Orc so I had decided to add new, human, perspectives to the network.
Also, I needed a control sample. Orc undead were showing some anomalies, especially after I started feeding them blood from the Bone Tree.
"Don't be so picky. Besides, graveyards under moonlight are romantic."
In my opinion, Bree's new cemetery was more attractive than the town itself. Once upon a time, Brees inhabitants performed burials in Barrow Downs, adding their own to the worthy dead. The Witch King's curse had put an end to that practice. For some odd reason, most people preferred dead bodies to stay put once they were placed underground.
"Well, it was my own fault for getting involved with a necromancer. But being dead limits one's dating pool."
"When you shouldn't have gotten yourself hanged. Although I heard that hanging is quite erotic."
"You make me sound like one of those fools that managed to hang themselves from the doorknob while jerking off. I was betrayed by the people I saved, made a scapegoat for everything that happened, and then publicly executed."
"You know, if you had wanted to get me interested in your body, there are easier ways. Like taking off your shirt."
The corner of his mouth curled up in a mischievous smirk. "Since it happened after I died, I don't really know what happened to my body. But if I have to guess you probably got it. The other you from that timeline I mean."
I raised an eyebrow.
"Well, you said something like this." And then he made a finger quote. "If you are going to be a suicidal moron, at least leave me your corpse, so it won't be a complete waste." Another finger quote. "Also the other you was nearby."
"Didn't that happen in some third-world country? What was other me doing there?"
"Looking for newly dug diamonds. That country was famous for diamond mines. At least that was what he told me when we met."
I wondered what the other me was doing with fresh uncut gems. A jewel that had been carried by many different people over a long time was stained with their thoughts, making it easier to be of use in Jewel Magecraft. Especially ones with a storied history. Ones just brought forth from nature were lacking in comparison.
"Were you close?" I was a bit curious. It was a topic he was rarely in the mood to talk about. Not that I was jealous or anything like that.
"He was my last remaining bond. But I can't really say that we were close."
Even for someone as antisocial as me, there was something profoundly sad in those words.
I didn't know what to say after that.
Arrow saved me from an awkward attempt at continuing the conversation. It struck my aerial scout. From the damage dealt to Material Barrier, I could deduce that it was a normal arrow. Echolocation confirmed it. Tall human, with a distinctive long cloak. A ranger.
"We are retreating," I commanded. If it was an agent of the Enemy I would fight but bore no malice towards rangers. Pity that would not be reciprocated. But then again that was the price of deception. In the end, I believe that it was worth it.
Besides we had gotten some useful corpses I was especially pleased with the mason and glassblower.
The next day, a few hours before the scheduled meeting, two hobbits visited me unannounced at home.