Written for Back to Middle Earth Month 2018. Prompt: Sea Creatures

Land Under Wave

The Sea roiled.

The gentle rolling of the Belegaer that lapped again the shores of south Beleriand and Eriador had changed. Schools of slivery fish spun around in massive funnels and the water was murky with disturbed kelp and plankton. The dolphins, whales and seals had fled to deeper waters by a commanded from Ulmo, leaving only the lesser creatures caught up in the massive sucking undertow. The waters had drawn far back from the shores and were now gathering into a great, towering wave, grey-green and crowned with foam, larger than any ever before seen in Arda.

Salmar savored the cool caress of the water as he swam in the heart of the great wave, graceful as a dolphin and swifter than a swordfish. His excitement spilled over into his fana and he could not keep from smiling. That was the most irritating thing about adopting a physical body, worse than even the muffling of ósanwe. They never had the same control as ëalar did in their natural state. Emotional states easily bled into bodily reactions unless one was very mindful. Salmar had never managed the impassive façade that others of his kind affected when embodied.

He caught a glimpse of Uinen as she passed before him, propelling herself with a tail like that of whales only coated in scintillating aquamarine scales. She had always preferred a fana thatappeared as some uncanny offspring of a Sea mammal and an Elda. Salmar himself was clothed in the fana he most favored when he was required to take on a corporeal form. The body was similar to that of the Eldar, as was custom with most Ainur. He had chosen his silver hair for its semblance to nacre; and his eyes, the lightest of blues, were like the ice of the Helcaraxë.

Salmar twirled, angling upward, flying through the turbulent waters until he broached the spume capped head of the wave. From the great height, the mountains of the Ered Luin seemed to be at an equal elevation and he could see for many leagues. The area around the southern Baranduin was mainly saltmarsh and coastal plains devoid of trees. South Ossiriand was covered in a dense forest of broad-leafed trees, and in the distance, a silver line that he knew to be the river Gelion, flowed into the Sea. Abruptly, Salmar felt the light touch of his lord upon his mind, calling all his servants to readiness. 

Then the Sea stilled. The intense currents ceased and, for one long moment, all was silent.

Then the world seemed to pitch forward as the tidal wave surged forward with a great roar that was echoed by the cries of the Maia within its depths. The wave smashed into the mountains. Each one trembled under its power and with a tumultuous rumble, crumbled and was crushed beneath the might of the Sea. The wave did not stop, powered as it was by the Lord of Waters, but continued northwards, faster than a marlin or even a falcon. It battered into the land, cracking the bedrock that even Salmar could feel was imbued with the shadowy, malignant threads of Melkor’s power.

From his vantage atop the swift moving mountain of water, Salmar could see ahead across the wide flat lands of copses and pasture just east of the Ered Luin. There the land was dotted with the thatched roofs of Edain villages that emitted wisps of smoke into the clear midmorning air. And in the northern most settlement, a desperate battle was waging. It was hard to work out exactly what was going on. Yet it seemed that a large company of Men under wolf’s-head banners were routing another, far smaller, force comprised of Men and Elves under a banner depicting an eight rayed silver star.

Overhead, black clouds that must have boiled forth from Thangorodrim cast a strange, dreary pall over the battle.

Salmar saw the moment when the Children realized what was soon to be bearing down upon them. The battle abruptly ceased, Melkor’s Men fleeing to the north, from whence they must have come. The Edain and their Elven allies scurried westward, seeking refuge in foothills of the Ered Luin where, Salmar had been informed, the women, children and elderly of their people had been told in dreams sent by lord Irmo to evacuate. Just before the wave was about to swallow those stragglers and injured that had not made it to the higher ground, Salmar dove beneath the water until he was hovering above the newly made Sea bed.

Salmar saw the water envelop a Man with a blood drenched leg as he covered his head with his arms in what must have been as instinctual gesture of protection. Swooping in, he grabbed the Man from behind and, wrapping his arms around the Mortal’s chest, hoisted him upwards. The Man thrashed, his hands clawing at the Maia’s arms. Salmar frowned and tightened his grip. It was taking most of his concentration to weave a song of Power through the surrounding water. Elsewise the Man’s fragile hröa would be battered by stones and other debris the wave had picked up on its northward journey. 

Salmar might have been annoyed by the Mortal’s continuing struggles, if his open mind had not been broadcasting intense terror.

After a long moment, their heads breeched the surface in a shower of droplets. The Man gasped raggedly, limply hanging in the Maia’s arms. Salmar was glad one of Estë’s servants had been responsible for preventing all the Children under the water from inhaling. He was not certain he would have been able to prevent even one Mortal from drawing breath without suffocating them, let alone dozens of them. Keeping the Man’s head above water, Salmar made his way west to where the surf lapped tempestuously against what had recently been a fair sized hill.

Gazing north, he could see the wave had dissipated into new shoreline yet not before it had devoured Melkor’s retreating company of Men. A trembling hand griped his arm. Salmar glanced down at the Mortal. His leather helm had fallen off, reviling dripping brown hair. His choppy, storm tossed thoughts made little sense to the Maia. He reached out, touching the Man’s mind and found distress, confusion and pain. Salmar slowed his pace, realizing his haste was hurting his charge’s injuries. Unexpectedly, the Mortal cried out, shutting his mind tightly.

The Man uttered a rough, quavering word. Salmar frowned. He did not know the Mortal’s tongue and could not perceive it’s meaning from his closed mind. They were only several body lengths from the shore. The upland was covered by an open forest of beech, spruce, silver birch, and rowan. The ground was carpeted with wood sedge and little herbaceous plants, the names of which Salmar did not know. His feet found the ground beneath them and he rearranged his hold on the Man, who protested weakly. Bending over, Salmar gently deposited the Mortal on dry land before retreating into the water.

And now the mountains that had comprised the southern half of the Ered Luin ended abruptly in the Sea, and what had been South Ossiriand was lost beneath deep and turbulent waters.

Glossary

Fana (Quenya): The “raiment” in which the Valar and Maiar self-incarnate. The word ‘fana’ is related to the word for ‘veil’ or ‘cloud’ as fana are not real in the same way the bodies of true incarnates (i.e. Men and Elves) are.

Ósanwe (Quenya): ‘interchange of thought’. Essentially telepathy. Tolkien said that all of the Children of Eru have the ability to perceive other minds to some degree. Ósanwe is the Valar and Maiar natural form of communication; when embodied, even their ability to "speak" mind-to-mind is diminished in force and precision.

Ëalar (Quenya): ‘beings’. The spirits of those not designed to dwell in a body, namely, the Ainur.

Hröa (Quenya): ‘body’. Refers to incarnates (i.e. Men, Elves, Dwarves etc.)