We are a fine and careful race, the Quendi. We can set foot on top of snow without sinking in. I have done it myself. It is not so hard if you know the trick.
Accordingly I eased through some bushes and pressed my back against the rock-face without being heard, not even by the keen ears of two of my fellow Ñoldor. With my cloak wrapped around me, it was easy to take on the appearance partly of leaf, partly of rock, partly of shadow. For this was an utterly consequential meeting that I spied upon. Two figures that well I knew, lit by the forge -- had not our kind suffered enough from this sort of thing? And clearly, neither Elf-lord wished me to know. This... this was a conspiracy!
One was Branalph. I stared at him as he held his thumb and forefinger apart just a space. Unbidden then to me there came the memory of holding his hand -- his bare hand in my likewise naked hand -- for the first time without either of us wearing glove or gauntlet. It had seemed a delicious, forbidden thrill at the time, and well too did I remember his curious stare. He had examined my hand minutely as if he might have been seeing the hand of a nis for the first time. Was it all a plot to lead us -- himself and me and his co-conspirator -- to this exact moment?
"Are you certain, friend?" The other voice was the deep, mellow one of Glorfingwë. "If it must lie flat, you must know precisely."
Ah, sneaking lord! Keeper of secrets! Again I bent my ear to listen. "Yes, it is no larger than this and no smaller than this. I could not forget it if I tried. And remember -- she must not know."
I kept my breathing slow and shallow, though my heart was like to leap out of my breast. "You have made your plan of attack, then?" Glorfingwë chuckled, and his hammer rang out, precise and yet with more force than any mortal Man could exert.
"Yes -- the Spire, I think. It seems fitting somehow." Branalph produced a curious item then: a length of cord, knotted at both ends. It was curiously short, as if it measured only the breadth of a finger. "And this will do for me. Both must lie very flat."
"A wise choice." Again the hammer rang out, and echoed off the surrounding rocks. "You mean them to fit underneath and be worn at all times, yet not catch or scrape."
Branalph nodded. "You see here the kind of hand-armour I am accustomed to wearing. There is no question of any stones. They must both be very plain."
Glorfingwë picked up some sort of sharp tool, and paused. "Suppose that I were to etch upon the smaller one seven lines across it? One for each of the gates of fair Gondolin?"
Now I knew that this devilry concerned me. I stayed in my cramped hiding-place, paused, all things in life seemingly paused. "That seems fitting," Branalph answered. "Since nothing can be raised, an etching seems the wisest way."
Both lowered their heads, the one lord watching the other. "And you are -- well, you are certain that you will return in triumph, and not desolation?"
"I would not have given you the metal to work, had I not been." I could hear something like pride in Branalph's voice, and I imagined him smiling at Glorfingwë. It seemed highly probable indeed, considering his relaxed posture, the hint even of slight braggadocio in Branalph's assured tones.
What were all these items? A tiny saw. Several files, and a wooden block, notched in several places. Tongs, of course, and a bowl of some sort of liquid. Glorfingwë, indeed, grasped a small object in the tongs and cautioned Branalph to stand back. With infinite care, with infinite subtlety, he lowered the metal thing -- which must be hot as a glede by now -- into the bowl of something that could not have been mere water.
Over the course of two hours, growing more and more cramped but unwilling to tear my eyes away -- indeed, unable -- I watched the older Ñoldo at his work. When, that is, I was not watching Branalph himself. Some things are just that tempting.
Finally, after passing two small metal pieces over little wheels that spun until something about them satisfied him, Glorfingwë dropped them into Branalph's glove, and by the light of the forge, I could finally see them. They were two silver rings, a larger and a smaller, just such as one might use in... well, in plighting troth.
"And when will you do this thing?" Glorfingwë arched an eyebrow, and Branalph, in response, named a date. I resolved to lurk in the very near vicinity of the Spire of Meeting on that day. At last all would be revealed.
"You seem very sure."
"I am." Branalph busied himself helping Glorfingwë pack his odd little tools and devices. "I cannot imagine any other course of action."
Nor can I, meleth nîn. I hope it is right -- because once this course is set -- well, whom do I think I am fooling? The course is set. I will not reveal what I have heard today.
Not until after. And then, by the customs of our people, we wait a full turn of the seasons. But I can see no other end to the matter than this, and I am full of feelings that twelve times twelve scribes could not contain in as many books.
Meleth. Meleth nîn.
