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"Deceptive ... an interesting word choice," Atalya smiled. "I have to admit, though, that I can't take the credit for the design of the place. Luthien was the one who finally decided what plants would go where, how the path would run, and where the brook should go. It's actually sad, really, that it took so long before it was even finished. I think Daeron was kidnapped only a day or two after it was finished, and he was three years of age at the time."

At the back of the courtyard was a small marble walk. An easel was set up there, with a large canvas on it. Sitting in front of the canvas was Luthien. Her long raven hair was tied back in the same manner as her daughter's that day, and she was dressed in the same white gown that was specially designed to keep out the desert heat. Her skin was slightly darker than her daughter's, however, due to the hours she spent out here, painting. Indeed, at the moment she had her paints out on her lap and was working on a painting of the forests that she remembered from her childhood, before the war and the succession of the desert.




Sir Valdemar smiled and paused, still looking at Lin. "Which creation?" he asked her. "Of the world or the elves?"

Lore grabbed it taking in the surrounding area with a soft smile before focusing in on Atalya's words. He noticed that there always seemed to be something happening, something big from the sounds of it.

"Hmm... interesting."

"The creation of the world it is," Sir Valdemar nodded. He ran his finger down the spine of the book, then opened the front cover. As had happened the last time, the pages began to flip rapidly, and sounds escaped from the book, each of them cut off as the pages turned and they closed once again. This time, however, the pages flipped open to the back, then started flipping back to the front: and once they reached the second page of the book, they stopped immediately.

The room grew black, a blackness so dark that nothing was visible at all. It was far darker than the blackness of night: it was the blackness of absolute lack of light. There was no sun, no moon, no stars.

Nothing.

Suddenly, slowly, a faint sound could be heard. As it grew in volume, it became clearer until it was recognizable as music: the song of many voices, blended so melodiously it was far more beautiful than any music anyone might even hope to create with any instrument imaginable.

"Something pleasant?" Lore inquired softly.

He was happy for it though, she rarely had one of those when she thought of something in the past. It must be finding Daeron he thought, or maybe even Elrohir since he didn't know how Elrohir had been like way back when.

Atalya laughed softly. "Was that what happened? It's not surprising, I suppose, considering how he used to be." She smiled with amusement. "All of a sudden I don't wonder why you were afraid of him."

As she painted, Luthien's ears picked up the sound of voices. That in itself wasn't terribly unusual, she sometimes had visitors out here - but what was unusual was the fact that she didn't recognize the voices. She looked up curiously, searching for some faces to match with the voices, but there was a tree in the way and she couldn't see anyone at all.




The voices (which were indeed nothing more than voice, no words at all) grew louder and softer, drifted between unison and harmony. Slowly, so slowly that it might take someone a while to even notice it, tiny specks of light began to appear - the stars. At the same time, a shadow appeared below them - the shadow of the earth.

Lore chuckled at that, "Poor Triton, I'm surprised a fight didn't break out."

He had met Triton a few times, he seemed like someone who could look after himself. Still, he was also quite aware that having a sword pointed at you was not pleasant.

Slowly, the earth lost it's perfectly round shape as mountains, barely visible, even just as silhouettes, rose up from the ground, and oceans and rivers formed. In the light of the stars, the earth slowly turned a dark shade of green as plants appeared and bloomed on nearly every non-water surface. Then, at the very top of the world, and at the very bottom, two trees grew, one white in color, the other silver, leafless, but having instead what appeared to be stars growing on their branches. The light from these smaller stars supplied light for the entire world, bathing it in a silver glow that was slightly brighter than the brightest moonlit night.




The voices were clearer now, and Luthien set her paints aside to see who might be coming. She had no idea who it was, which was strange - she even knew Haradhel's voice by now.

She walked up the path a bit and stopped in her tracks as she rounded a corner and the small group came into view. She recognized the queen, of course ... and it looked like ...

"Elnara?"

Lore looked at the sound of the voice seeing an elf he did not recongize. Though to be fair he knew there would be a lot of elves he would first meet that he would not recongize at all.