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December 12, 2013

Remembrance

Alatar looks about him, with a deadened haunted look. "Avenged," he repeats, his voice hollow, thin.  He looks down at the wisps of smoke snaking about his body.  The forest seems cold, dead, no sounds of birds, no rustling of leaves.  "What flavor is 'avenged' in the Halls of Mandos, you think?"  His hair hangs slack about his face, and the paleness of his skin shows the dark circle under the eyes as he slowly lifts his gaze.  There is no trace of the Orcs now: only the violence they visited upon these graceful Children of Eru remains.

Pallando looks around the charred settlement and replies. "I am referring to the Children, but... those that have been corrupted by the dark powers, we know not their fate." He then remembers their mission. "If there is danger in the woods, they may be patrolling the coast. Olwe may already be in danger." Pallando says to his friend. "It seems that Eonwe is correct in urging us. But the bodies of the Children, what should we do?"

Alatar looks up at his friend and stumbles to his feet, reaching out to Pallando for support as he lurches unsteadily.  Raising a hand up to his face he rubs his brow. "I," he swallows and reaches for reserves of energy. He is hungry and thirsty, and his skins feel stretched taut across his bones. He looks about him and takes in a shallow breath. "The very air tastes of their ashes, " he says, and manages enough moisture in his mouth to turn his head and spit.  "We..." he pauses and looks back at Pallando. "Do you feel their presence, the Orcs? Do you sense more anywhere close?"

Pallando helps his friend to his feet, then bows his head and closes his eyes, linking his mind with the life force of the world. "No, no one close. Everyone around us... dead," he says. He had left his traveling gear at the forest edge in their frenzy at discovering the fires. "I can retrieve our gear if you want."

Alatar grips his friend's arm as he rocks a little, growing more steady by the moment. "I...I left little Orome on the road. In my cloak. I like that cloak," he says. "And I haven't finished the little jacket for him. He gets cold at night, you know." He pauses.  "They need a proper resting place, these beloved Firstborn of Eru. We can't leave their bodies..out..not this way."  He slowly lets go of his friend, more alert, more calm. He looks down at his hands, and murmurs under his breath.  "With your help, we can cover this whole settlement, make a cairn, like some of the Children of Men do.  Remember..when we were in the arid places? They erected caves of stone. We can create a hill, of rock and stone, and then you...you can urge the flowers and grass, the trees and other green things to claim the rock and dirt. Turn it into a beautiful place once more. Not....not ..." He pauses and looks about him..."Not this."

Pallando agrees to his friend. Together they erect stone and rock over the bodies of the elves and set it as a cairn. In their physical forms this task was laborious, but it is the most consoling to the ways of the elves. Urging his friend to rest, Pallando then sets a young sapling in the center of the cairn. Calling upon the powers of Yavanna, he urges the sapling to grow into a mighty oak that will stand the test of time as remembrance to the atrocity that happened here. The task completed, Pallando then returns to his friend. "Let us go to little Orome and our camp, and plan out how best we should interact with Olwe and his companion."