Prologue: Journal

11 May 93 (Fourth Age), Emyn Arnen

I am named for the father of a legend. In his time this father claimed a measure of renown, but that was three long Ages of Middle-earth ago, and to history he has been lost ... save in a name of nearly forgotten heritage, and as inscribed upon faded pages in dusty books of lore. His son — perhaps the greatest in our people’s history — lives on in name and memory, though even one once judged so mighty crumbles beneath the relentless accumulation of history. Many could say what he did, and why, but few would remember how he did it. Not with any accuracy. Tale has long replaced truth.

That is as it should be. What we do in our own day, however great it seems, must inevitably submit to the editing of time. Fact becomes history, history becomes legend ... and what is legend but the evolution of fact into mythos? This is the natural order of things, and to attempt to arrest this process is to overvalue that which has passed. A sin to which we Men are all too susceptible.

My grandfather was born to a throne, in a sense, and while a great man in his own right and time he never achieved it, and will most likely fade into history as a name in a rarely opened book. He played a crucial role in one of the Great Stories, yet that story was not his own, and even now he has already been mythologized beyond fact. His name may live on, for a time, but his memory will not be him.

So be it. He must be content that mythology remembers him well. He deserves that honor.

Yet even though the memory of modern-day legends already grows dim, all agree that my grandmother was one. She achieved something that, according to prophecy, neither Man, nor Elf, nor Dwarf, nor Wizard, nor any man of her age (or any other) could. It will be long, I deem, before her greatest deed is forgotten. Though she also played a part in my grandfather’s tale, and he in hers, it is on her own that she is remembered, and with a clarity he can no longer claim. Even as I write these words, decades later, her historical fact and her legendary fact remain largely the same.

Thus it was that I thought I knew her, as all our people do. Of course, as her grandson I believed I held special, personal insights. That I knew her better than almost anyone.

Then I found her secret journals.

I no longer believe in legend. Or history. Or fact. I don’t know what to believe, anymore.

Once, sneaking about my grandparents’ home — as misbehaving youth are wont to do — I found a sturdy box behind a hidden panel in my grandmother’s closet. At first I thought it a mere (albeit heavy) block of decorative wood, and was about to toss it aside in favor of some more interesting yet equally ill-gotten trinket when I felt something move within. I turned it over and around, but I couldn’t discern what it might contain.

The only recognizable mark on its surface was a galloping white horse crossed with sword and spear, the points of which were rather absurdly entwined with long braids. I knew this symbol. When my grandmother wished for something to carry a sigil, but felt that the object merited neither the heraldry of Gondor, nor Rohan, nor Emyn Arnen, she applied this device. It was private and somewhat bitter joke regarding the division between warrior and woman, or so she’d told me when I’d asked, and over the years she’d shown me many an amusing item carrying the symbol. Most seemed specifically chosen to challenge a society in which the roles of men and women were understood to be entirely separate and distinguishable, and as I grew older I came to understand her subversive purpose in using it when and where she did.

In my furtive and curious youth, however, I was entirely uninterested in symbolism. I was far more distressed that I couldn’t open the box.

For years, given any brief chance, I secretly returned to their quarters and puzzled over this mystery. The box often changed position, so it was clear that someone else — likely my grandmother — was handling it, but its secrets remained opaque. It was entirely without clasp or visible seam, and though I searched long and hard for a key of some sort, I had no idea what I might be looking for, and thus my quest proved utterly fruitless. I occasionally considered forcing it open, but that damage was likely to be irreparable. Worse, my grandmother would almost certainly suspect the cause of such destruction, and I trembled at that consequence; she was a patient, kind, and loving woman despite all her well-known physical gifts, but her rare moments of fury were truly fearsome to behold. So I waited and wondered, hoping that the wisdom of age would eventually bring insight. Instead, as I grew towards adulthood and its many distractions I gradually forgot about this puzzle of my misspent youth.

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