Chapter Text
This is from Western Khand. It may be of interest to note that there are few blacksmiths among this people, as they live primarily in mobile settlement and in wagons drawn by horses, and they are obliged to trade for most of their metal gear, both farther east where they have cities, and to the south and west. Whether this story comes by way of one of those cities, it is impossible to say.
Once there lived a skillful blacksmith, who made all manner of weapons as well as beautiful treasures and precious things. And so he worked beside his roaring fire, and he was well contented, until one day he looked up from his forge and he saw a beautiful princess.
Well, it appears that one of us is a princess
this time. It’s probably you, if I’m the
wonder-worker. - A
She was very tall, her hair like spun gold and her robes as white as the clouds in a summer sky. She rode upon a magnificent horse called Hallas, with a golden bridle and gold braided into his mane, and on her saddle jewels were set, and other treasures past compare.
There it is; I think the princess is you. -C
Not necessarily; yellow hair is a mark of status,
it’s not like they know what either of us
looked like. - A
“Smith,” the princess said to him, “my horse has cast a shoe; will you make a new one for me?”
“A shoe only?” said the blacksmith. “Will you not ask more of me? Let me show you my quality; I will make you a belt of silver leaves as light as the grass-blades; I will make you a necklace of gold so cunningly knotted that it may not be untied.”
But the princess laughed. “I have seen finer things in my own country,” she said, “than any you have to offer. A shoe for my horse, smith, and I will be gone.”
So the blacksmith made a shoe for the horse, but he could not stop thinking about the princess. So he went to his forge, and he made a silver belt. It was the finest work he had ever done, and the finest he had ever seen, and he sent it to the princess. But she sent it back to him. “I have seen finer things in my own country,” she said.
Then he went to his forge again, and began a long work, and made a necklace of gold that flowed like water through the hands, but was so cunningly knotted that it seemed to have no end and no beginning, and the fame of the smith was great in the land because the necklace, and he sent it to the princess. But she sent it back to him. “I have seen finer things in my own country,” she said.
Then the smith was cast into despair, for he had done the greatest work he knew how to do. But as he sat in despair as his dark forge, there came a knocking at his door.
There stood a tall man with very bright eyes and a hood over his head. “What are you crying for?” he asked, and his voice was as cold as winter, and as sharp as the wind, and yet he smiled and seemed kind enough. So the smith told him. “Is that all!” said the guest. “That is easily solved. I will teach you how to make something that will certainly win you the princess’s heart, if you will learn from me.”
And the smith trembled a little in his heart, for he knew that his guest was an Elf, and their gifts do not come without cost, but he thought of the princess, and he could not refuse.
Or perhaps this time you’re the Uninvited Guest!
You are a sinister figure, it’s true. - A
This might be you.
Appears offering dangerous knowledge,
gifts that come with a price... -C
I thought I was the beautiful princess. - A
“Only,” he said, “when will you come to collect your fee?”
“Never mind about that,” said the stranger.
So he taught him, and the smith learned all the secrets of the elves. He taught him the secret of making a ring to bind and loose, and a ring to multiply gold in store, and a ring to turn the heart of the wearer. So the next week the smith forged three rings, each finer than the last, and sent them all to the princess. And her heart was won, and they lived together very happily.
But one night, the stranger came knocking at the forge door again, with his hood up over his head and his eyes like sparks. “Have you been enjoying my gifts?” he said.
“I think I have learned a little,” said the smith cautiously.
“I hope you have indeed,” said the elf, “for now your payment is due, and you will live under the earth with me and serve me as my bellows-man. You shall fetch the water and blow the fire and sweep the cinders from my forges, and the forges of the elves are very great.”
I think they may be getting elves
confused with the dwarves? - A
I think they’re talking about Angband.
The dwarves notoriously do not employ
strangers, but I can think of some underground
forges that recruited their labor force
from the ranks of the unwilling. -C
Then the smith trembled greatly in his heart, for he had heard the rumor of the great forges of the elves, and the pale servants who labored there under the earth. “Come in,” he said, “and see some of the work that I have been doing. For I want to be sure I am skillful enough to work in your forges.”
“It is not skill you will be needing there,” said the elf, but came in anyway, for the weapons were sharp upon the wall, and the gold shone brightly, and he wished to see what it was the smith had learned from him.
“Here is a ring,” said the smith, “newly wrought. It is yours, if you will have it.”
“Do not think that you will buy your life so cheaply!” said the elf, but he took the ring, and put it on, and admired how fine it looked upon his hand.
Then the smith laughed aloud. “You taught me well,” he said, “for that is a ring to bind and loose, and you are bound, bound to serve me. You shall fetch the water and blow the fire and sweep the cinders from my forges.”
Then the elf began to stamp and curse, and to bite at the ring, for they are creatures of air and darkness that hate above all things a cage. “If now I set you free,” said the smith, “you will never trouble me more.”
The elf swore, and the smith lifted the charm upon the ring, and he fled into the night and was never seen again. And to the rest of his days, the smith lived in peace with the princess, but he made no more magic rings.
TRANSCRIBER’S NOTE:
This appears to be for the most part a much older and unrelated story - that of the Smith’s Bargain, which appears, in some variety, in every mortal culture involving metalworking. Metalcraft, as something broadly taught from the outside rather than developed within a group, retains the suspicious of foreignness - and of course the shadow of Angband, which was forging steel while the ancestors of the wainriders of Khand were trading copper ores west from River Running. In the main I agree with its inclusion here - the Eregion legends have exerted a clear influence on the course of the story, primarily in the introduction of magic rings. The Menacing Stranger and the Beautiful Guest have been split into two figures (we see this duplication in some of the other accounts in this notebook) but the idea that the rings are made at someone else’s behest and with someone else’s knowledge is a recurring motif.
CONCLUDING NOTES:
I am not, on reflection, entirely certain that this story is influenced by the Eregion legends. This is very close to being the farthest geographically we have travelled from Eregion (Harad may have been farther, some astronomical calculations will be necessary) and it is certainly the farthest in terms of cultural remove. Though the peoples of Khand were recruited or pressed into the wars of Mordor, the stories of those wars blend together and are principally concerned with what sort of loot was returned. The figure of the Great King is mentioned, but not his disastrous foray into the North, and there is no particular explanation as to why he drops out of the historical record.
I include this story in the compendium of Eregion legends, however, because of the struggle over (and resolved by) magic rings. In the stories I have collected, there is a fairly limited range of options for this resolution: trickery, power, sacrifice, or all three. The resolution selected appears to say more about the people who are telling the story, and their reasons for telling it, than it does about the story itself - but I cannot say that is a bad thing, or even a disservice to the truth. A strange service it may be, but when a story is let loose into the world, it is for others to take and shape as they will and they need.
On Tol Eressea beyond the Sea, the returned dead contend in the Strife of Truth with Art, where they set their memory of their story against the legends that have sprung up around them, and the onlookers must judge between them. I cannot say which has won this long competition, waged over centuries and over half Middle-Earth, save Annatar and I, who have been served by the truth as well, and better, than the legends serve the storytellers.