Welcome to Gaia! ::

The deck, with everyone up there, was a little bit crowded, and Earendil waited at the door to below decks for Lin. The moment she appeared, he reached for her hand and pulled her close.

"Come on," he murmured. "We should see what's going on."

He nodded to where most of the crew was looking over the edge of the ship. "I think something is going on over there."

He made sure Miyuki was close and then started towards the starboard rail to see what was going on.

But down was not the direction to look: ahead of them, in a wide half-circle and very clearly and very intentionally blocking their way, were a dozen small ships - caravels, like the light and fast ships that Roydon and Arwen used to take the cargo from Namonuito to the Zephyr down the river.

"Can we go around them?" Earendil asked aloud, more wondering than anything.

One of the crew nearby shook his head. "We're too big," he told him. "We could get around them, sure, but they're small and fast, they could just get ahead of us again without any trouble."

Earendil looked at the sailor. "So what are our options?"

"Right now?" The sailor looked back out at the ships. "Stop. Or at least, slow down and find out what they want."

"I'd like to know where they came from," Earendil murmured, looking around as the ship slowed down. "I can't see any land anywhere ... on any of our trips, I've not seen any other land."

"Well, they came from somewhere," the sailor quipped before heading off to help with stopping the ship.

It took them a while, but the ship slowed and stopped just before reaching the half-circle of smaller ships. Roydon made his way to the bow so that he could speak with them.

"Come on," Earendil murmured, tugging Lin and Miyuki along as well.

Earendil and Lin and Miyuki joined Roydon at the bow, and Earendil peered over the rail at the ships so far below them. He was trying to see what kind of people they were - clearly they were from somewhere that he didn't know about yet.

Of all the ships that were down there, only one had a person visible: a tall black-haired fellow with pointed ears and dusky skin.

Earendil blinked. "Dark Elves?"

"What is this all about?" Roydon called down to the man below them. "Why have you stopped us?"

The elf held out his hands, palm up, in a gesture of peace. "We mean you no harm," he shouted back. "But we must ask you to come with us."

"Go with you where?" Earendil muttered to himself.

"Not that I can see," Earendil repeated, totally confused now. But there had to be, somewhere - and obviously, these people had been able to see the ship from somewhere far away, if they could be here to cut them off.

Roydon was suspicious. "Where would you have us go?" he shouted back. "We have a destination to reach! There are people waiting for us!"

"I'm sorry, but we must ask you to come with us!" the man called back. "We cannot let you go further!"

Roydon sighed and passed his hand over his face. He really had no choice - if they refused, and the caravels didn't move, they would be stuck there. If they pushed forward, they would risk damaging the ship - as well as making some possibly dangerous enemies. They knew nothing about them ...

"Roydon, you're not honestly considering it, are you?" Arwen asked softly, stepping up beside him.

Roydon looked at her wearily. "What choice do I have?" he replied softly. He turned back to the other man. "Very well," he shouted. "We will follow you. But we have stores for only one week of travel, so unless you have more then I hope we are at least that close to land!"

The elf nodded. "Half a day's journey," he shouted back. "Even in that ship."

Roydon turned back from the rail and began shouting orders for them to get underway again.

"Sir, what coordinates?" asked one of the sailors.

Roydon looked at him grimly. "Wherever they take us," he replied softly. He raised his eyes to the sky. "And pray the Valar are watching over us."

"No, we shouldn't have," Earendil replied solemnly. "Especially as this is our third time passing this way. Though," he amended, "if he's talking about half a day's sailing for those ships, that would be like ... a full day for the Zephyr."

He paused. "I wonder if Roydon will change the wind to speed us up," he mused.

He put one hand on Miyuki's shoulder and gave it a light squeeze.

"I guess we'll find out," Earendil shrugged as they started going.

Within half an hour, though, the island came into view - at least for the elves. But another half hour later, and it was visible to the non-elves as well. It was a rather large piece of land, much bigger than either Amon Darthir or Nauros, and a range of mountains rose into the clouds. They almost seemed to sparkle, which confused Earendil. And when they came even closer, a city came into view: a large city, easily three or four times the size of the city on Amon Darthir, bigger even than Tor Karad, built out of marble and silver. Even the docks, when they approached, were made of marble.

Earendil was amazed. The marble was trimmed with silver, all of it, and it gave the city an almost celestial feel to it.

"How could we have missed this?" he breathed as the ship slowed and stopped a short distance from the shore. It was too shallow for them to go any closer, and Roydon was readying one of the long boats.

Suddenly Arwen appeared behind them. "Earendil," she said softly.

Earendil turned to face her. "Yes?"

She looked at him, then glanced at Lin and Miyuki and back at him again. "I have a feeling that it may be to our benefit to have people of rank go ashore ... I really hate to ask this of you, but would you go? Roydon and I are also going, and Leyenda and Kelirahc and Celeb and Haldia."

Earendil looked down at Lin and Miyuki. He didn't want to leave them behind, but he didn't know if it would be safe to take them to the island, either.