Unfinished Tales - J. R. R. Tolkien [109]
Then the Queen was grieved; but Erendis said to her: ‘Tarinya, if you will cut the bough from the Elven-tree, I will bear it to the haven, by your leave; for the King has not forbidden it to me.’
The mariners thought it an ill thing that the Captain should depart thus; but when all was made ready and men prepared to weigh anchor Erendis came there, little though she loved the noise and bustle of the great harbour and the crying of the gulls. Aldarion greeted her with amazement and joy; and she said: ‘I have brought you the Bough of Return, lord: from the Queen.’ ‘From the Queen?’ said Aldarion, in a changed manner. ‘Yes, lord,’ said she; ‘but I asked for her leave to do so. Others beside your own kin will rejoice at your return, as soon as may be.’
At that time Aldarion first looked on Erendis with love; and he stood long in the stern looking back as the Palarran passed out to sea. It is said that he hastened his return, and was gone less time than he had designed; and coming back he brought gifts for the Queen and the ladies of her house, but the richest gift he brought for Erendis, and that was a diamond. Cold now were the greetings between the King and his son; and Meneldur rebuked him, saying that such a gift was unbecoming in the King’s Heir unless it were a betrothal gift, and he demanded that Aldarion declare his mind.
‘In gratitude I brought it,’ said he, ‘for a warm heart amid the coldness of others.’
‘Cold hearts may not kindle others to give them warmth at their goings and comings,’ said Meneldur; and again he urged Aldarion to take thought of marriage, though he did not speak of Erendis. But Aldarion would have none of it, for he was ever and in every course the more opposed as those about him urged it; and treating Erendis now with greater coolness he determined to leave Númenor and further his designs in Vinyalondë. Life on land was irksome to him, for aboard his ship he was subject to no other will, and the Venturers who accompanied him knew only love and admiration for the Great Captain. But now Meneldur forbade his going; and Aldarion, before the winter was fully gone, set sail with a fleet of seven ships and the greater part of the Venturers in defiance of the King. The Queen did not dare incur Meneldur’s wrath; but at night a cloaked woman came to the haven bearing a bough, and she gave it into the hands of Aldarion, saying: ‘This comes from the Lady of the West-lands’ (for so they called Erendis), and went away in the dark.
At the open rebellion of Aldarion the King rescinded his authority as Lord of the Ships and Havens of Númenor; and he caused the Guildhouse of the Venturers on Ea¨mbar to be shut, and the shipyards of Rómenna to be closed, and forbade the felling of all trees for shipbuilding. Five years passed; and Aldarion returned with nine ships, for two had been built in Vinyalondë, and they were laden with fine timber from the forests of the coasts of Middle-earth. The anger of Aldarion was great when he found what had been done; and to his father he said: ‘If I am to have no welcome in Númenor, and no work for my hands to do, and if my ships may not be repaired in its havens, then I will go again and soon; for the winds have been rough, 13 and I need refitment. Has not a King’s son aught to do but study women’s faces to find a wife? The work of forestry I took up, and I have been prudent in it; there will be more timber