Beleriand is gone and Tol Himling remains. No one lives there, few dare to venture close. Even years later, the fortress feels like bitter grief and pained endurance.
The remaining Noldor– and there aren't many of them by the Second Age– start sailing there. It's not far from the shore; an easy enough journey, even for someone with little seafaring experience.
One day, someone– no one is sure who– takes one of the broken pieces of Himling's walls, carves Maedhros's name into it, and sets it as a tombstone. After that, more graves appear, slowly at first, then more quickly. Old battle-songs and tributes to the dead are carved and painted into the walls. Soon, the meadow around the old fortress is full of memorials, some made from the ruins, others lovingly crafted and brought from the mainland. For all the Noldor fought amongst themselves in the First Age, now their headstoens stand together. In the cemetery, the House of Finwe is united in death as it never was in life. Graves for Feanor and Fingolfin sit side-by-side in a sorrowful peace neither lived to see.
Himring stood on an icy mountaintop where the snow never melted, but Tol Himling does not. One spring the barren meadow blooms, red poppies and blue forget-me-nots. It flowers every year after, new hues and blossoms appearing annurally until the graves are surrounded by a colorful sea of flowers.
Not many Noldor choose to sail west– most that go back to Valinor go in death– but those that do leave tokens on Himling before they leave, broken weapons and battered armor. Maybe they do it to leave something with the dead who may never return from Mandos. Maybe they do it because like the dead, their fight in Middle-Earth has ended.
Men who sail by the island– always by, never to– are very sure that there are ghosts there. To them, the place seems strange and misted, and every figure there looks like a shade. They speak of a golden-haired warrior who spends hours talking to some of the graves, a king who dutifully cares for the tombstones, wiping away dust and moss, the strange dark-haired figure who comes every year to sow wildflower seeds. But those aren't the spirits of the Noldor dead. Only those who would remember them.
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