A tragic tale of dwarvish origin. It was shared by Hrondís at the Haunted Inn in Mirkwood, where the weaver Lomeanis had once again invited different folk to satisfy the stirring spirits with poems and stories.
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Long ago, in a lonely hold among the very peaks of the Misty Mountains, there lived an old dwarf with his daughter. A renowned craftsman was he, a maker of instruments; harps of gold he built with wizened hands whose skill knew no equal. But his daughter was the one who played them, and it was said that her hands on the strings could make mountains weep. But because they dwelt alone among the icy heights, few ever heard her play.
Outside the doors of their dwelling, the old dwarf had hewn a ledge into the mountainside. His daughter would often stand upon it wielding one of her father's harps, and her music would float up into the clouds and roll down the mountain's flanks like clear water.
But one day while she was playing, she heard something new among the echoes of her song: a voice that was not her own, yet spoke to her alone.
O mountain-maid! So sweet thy song
Thou'st dwelt upon the heights so long.
So many wait for thee below
To whom thy harp could pleasure show.
The maid of the mountains looked around but could see no-one near, so she went back inside and told her father of the voice. She wished to follow its advice, she said - to descend from their hidden hold and bring their shared works to the people, to play for them in valleys and mountain-homes and gladden their hearts.
But the old dwarf did not share her desire, and at hearing it he grew wroth instead.
"So this is how you thank me?" he said. "You know my legs will no longer carry me down the mountain, yet you would abandon me to heed a whisper on the wind. No, my daughter, we shall not be parted by some treacherous voice."
And with these words, he shut the doors of his hold and locked them both inside.
Yet this is not the end of our story, even though he tried to make it so. Winter fell upon the mountains, and icy winds blew among the crags. The old dwarf slept fitfully, for each night he heard them whistle and sigh. At last he awoke on a cruelly cold morning to hear a voice upon the air.
O dwarf, thy treasure's not thy own
What thou hast made is but a loan.
For in thy heart thou know'st the truth
That age must ever yield to youth.
And while those words rang in his ears and chilled his heart, he became aware of another sound: one of his own harps was ringing out within the hold in mournful song. Although trapped among the stones, his daughter’s music was still impossibly fair. But hearing it only drove him further into despair - for if the wind could speak to him through the walls, so too would her playing seep through the cracks and be heard outside.
“Your hands shall hold no harp of mine again!" he cried. "Your song belongs to me, and me alone!"
In his madness, he stormed into the workshop where his daughter sat plucking the harp, and wrenched it from her hands, and shattered it upon the floor. Then he took an axe and brought it down upon another instrument, and another, until all that he had ever wrought was utterly destroyed.
And still there is one more sad turn to this tale.For as the old dwarf stood among the ruins of his life's work, his daughter's deft hands snatched a ring of keys from his belt. While he ranted and raved, she unlocked the doors to their hold, stepped out upon the ledge and began to sing.
Her voice pierced the morning air, strong and clear as ice; it glanced off the sheer cliffs and grew so loud that the snow slid off the nearby mountaintops in a thundering cascade. It was heard from deep within the earth to high within the heavens, and in valleys many leagues away people lifted their heads.
But now her father came through the doorway senseless with rage and cruelty, and he brandished a knife to contain her music once and for all. At this his daughter laughed bitterly, and then she sang:
O father, greed hath ruined thee!
But if there is no life for me
Upon the winds my song shall soar
'Twixt stone and sky forevermore!
And as her last note rang out, she leapt from the ledge into the mists below.
Thus we have finally arrived at the end. Many who had heard the singing followed it up the mountain, and they learned the whole tale from the old dwarf ere he succumbed to starvation. But of his daughter, the Maid of the Mountains, no trace has ever been found.
And yet, on especially cold days in the Misty Mountains, many say they can hear upon the wind the clear ringing of a golden harp, and a woman's voice crying out in song.
