[It didn't fall away into the sea in a night. It wasn't thunder in the earth that shook them suddenly and took them to the bottom of the sea to meet Ulmo in a violent moment, beyond their control and ken.
Instead, it was a slow sinking. The ground gave beneath them here and there, the sea rushing in only a few feet and then suddenly it was miles inland. Pools sprung up where they had never been seen before, rivers cracked into a thousand creeks where the water rushed in from the sea not out to it.
Fear was so thick on the air that it could be tasted. The animals fled, eastward, ever eastward in great droves. No elf could stop them even if they wanted to, predator and prey alike ran together with no fear for anything but the sudden unsettled hollowness of the ground beneath them that had been moving and shifting since the Host of the Valar had come and gotten their quarry and left again, leaving the Sindar once again to pick up the pieces of what remained.
It was a nightmare.
Mithiel had stuck to Doriath as long as she could. She sank into the trees she loved, helped people pack, and urged all the creatures that could move on their own. There was nothing to be done about her family home. She packed what she could but she had only herself and one horse so it was two, three bags at the most and one of those was supplies.
By the time she left the water was already ankle deep, her horse fussing at the far eastern side of the forest that she bid goodbye for the last time whose western end was already a good six feet under dirty, brackish water.
Somewhere under all of it the graves of her parents were lost to time, the grave of her king, the unknown resting place of her long-loved Princess. An entire two ages of the elves and their love and laughter and their tears dragged into the sea as if they had never even existed.
It was a ride of nearly two hundred miles to escape the now quickly rising water and cracking land. Sometimes she had to walk her horse, not trusting the ground to not give beneath them. By the time she had gone east enough that she was on solid ground again she was so far east she had never come this far in anything except her imagination. Not in over a thousand years of life.
The eastern mountains were now a stone's throw away, the trees were different, the air was still abuzz with terror and despite the trails of elves making their way down the coast or further east that she could easily join, Mithiel found herself a spot under a tree, unburdened her horse and just sat there on the shoreline using her elf-eyes to watch as Doriath slowly drowned and fighting the urge to go and drown with it.
Day and night passed, and she was unmoving, waiting for death or the sea to come and steal what little remained to her.
The second age didn't begin with victory, nor even a whimper. It began with weeping as Mithiel was. Silent and alone with salt burning in her lungs and the corners of her eyes.]
oh, my love, don't forget me (when i let the water take me)
Instead, it was a slow sinking. The ground gave beneath them here and there, the sea rushing in only a few feet and then suddenly it was miles inland. Pools sprung up where they had never been seen before, rivers cracked into a thousand creeks where the water rushed in from the sea not out to it.
Fear was so thick on the air that it could be tasted. The animals fled, eastward, ever eastward in great droves. No elf could stop them even if they wanted to, predator and prey alike ran together with no fear for anything but the sudden unsettled hollowness of the ground beneath them that had been moving and shifting since the Host of the Valar had come and gotten their quarry and left again, leaving the Sindar once again to pick up the pieces of what remained.
It was a nightmare.
Mithiel had stuck to Doriath as long as she could. She sank into the trees she loved, helped people pack, and urged all the creatures that could move on their own. There was nothing to be done about her family home. She packed what she could but she had only herself and one horse so it was two, three bags at the most and one of those was supplies.
By the time she left the water was already ankle deep, her horse fussing at the far eastern side of the forest that she bid goodbye for the last time whose western end was already a good six feet under dirty, brackish water.
Somewhere under all of it the graves of her parents were lost to time, the grave of her king, the unknown resting place of her long-loved Princess. An entire two ages of the elves and their love and laughter and their tears dragged into the sea as if they had never even existed.
It was a ride of nearly two hundred miles to escape the now quickly rising water and cracking land. Sometimes she had to walk her horse, not trusting the ground to not give beneath them. By the time she had gone east enough that she was on solid ground again she was so far east she had never come this far in anything except her imagination. Not in over a thousand years of life.
The eastern mountains were now a stone's throw away, the trees were different, the air was still abuzz with terror and despite the trails of elves making their way down the coast or further east that she could easily join, Mithiel found herself a spot under a tree, unburdened her horse and just sat there on the shoreline using her elf-eyes to watch as Doriath slowly drowned and fighting the urge to go and drown with it.
Day and night passed, and she was unmoving, waiting for death or the sea to come and steal what little remained to her.
The second age didn't begin with victory, nor even a whimper. It began with weeping as Mithiel was. Silent and alone with salt burning in her lungs and the corners of her eyes.]