More Quest of the Silmaril...

The last time we looked at the Lay of Leithian, we saw how the maiden Lúthien put Morgoth, the mightiest of all the dwellers in Eä, to shame, even in his own hall. The Lay goes on...

Beneath the vast and empty throne

the adders lay like twisted stone,

the wolves like corpses foul were strewn;

and there lay Beren deep in swoon:

no thought, no dream nor shadow blind

moved in the darkness of his mind.

''Come forth, come forth! The hour hath knelled,

and Angband's mighty lord is felled!

Awake, awake! For we two meet

alone before the aweful seat.''

This voice came down into the deep

where he lay drowned in wells of sleep;

a hand flower-soft and flower-cool

passed o'er his face, and the still pool

of slumber quivered. Up then leaped

his mind to waking; forth he crept.

The wolvish fell he flung aside

and sprang unto his feet, and wide

staring amid the soundless gloom

he gasped as one living shut in tomb.

There to his side he felt her shrink,

felt Lúthien now shivering sink,

her strength and magic dimmed and spent,

and swift his arms about her went.

Before his feet he saw amazed

the gems of Fëanor, that blazed

with white fire glistening in the crown

of Morgoth's might now fallen down.

To move that helm of iron vast

no strength he found, and thence aghast

he strove with fingers mad to wrest

the guerdon of their hopeless quest,

till in his heart there fell the thought

of that cold morn whereon he fought

with Curufin; then from his belt

the sheathless knife he drew, and knelt,

and tried its hard edge, bitter-cold,

o'er which in Nogrod songs had rolled

of dwarvish armourers singing slow

to hammer-music long ago.

Iron as tender-wood it clove

and mail as woof of loom it rove.

The claws of iron that held the gem,

it bit them through and sundered them;

a Silmaril he clasped and held,

and the pure radiance slowly welled

red glowing through the clenching flesh.

Again he stooped and strove afresh

one more of the holy jewels three

that Fëanor wrought of yore to free.

But round those fires was woven fate:

not yet should they leave the halls of hate.

The dwarvish steel of cunning blade

by treacherous smiths of Nogrod made

snapped; then ringing sharp and clear

in twain it sprang, and like a spear

or errant shaft the brow it grazed

of Morgoth's sleeping head, and dazed

their hearts with fear. For Morgoth groaned

with voice entombed, like wind that moaned

in hollow caverns penned and bound.

There came a breath; a gasping sound

moved through the halls, as Orcs and beast

turned in their dreams of hideous feast;

in sleep uneasy Balrogs stirred,

and far above was faintly heard

an echo that in tunnels rolled,

a wolvish howling long and cold.