The first meeting between Dragonborn and Gandalf was not what one might call pleasant.
He had been commanded by the Master of the Grey Havens to present himself at the council hall at an hour that should have been devoted to breakfast, all to greet a stranger he had never met.
Dragonborn, in whose veins ran the blood of an unrepentant trencherman, was deeply aggrieved.
“I recall Fena in the kitchen saying yesterday that there would be bear among today’s dishes.
Utterly maddening.
I, too, wished to learn what bear meat tastes like…” He grumbled under his breath, his gaze fixed on the long, shapely legs of the Elf-woman walking ahead of him.
Forgive him his sullen mood.
In his former life, he had been a model citizen of a peaceable realm, and had never dared taste bear flesh.
So when the summons from the Lord arrived, all his designs upon the legendary bear meat in the kitchens collapsed at once, leaving him thoroughly disgruntled.
Let it be said that many believe Elves eat no meat, subsisting only on greens and vegetables.
That is false.
The Elves indeed love and draw near to nature, but as part of the living cycle of the world, while they hold nature in reverence, they also possess every appetite of the living.
Their desires are simply quieter.
The Elvish board includes bread, honey, sausages, cheese, meats of many kinds, and wine.
Thus Elves do take life and eat the game they hunt, but their hunts usually harvest only what is needful, and they release the surplus.
Such hunts are rare, undertaken only when beasts grow wild and aggressive for some reason, so that the Elves must cull them to keep the lands about their dwellings safe.
More often, the Elves trade with Men or the Hobbits of the Shire, exchanging their peerless gems and fair craftworks for food and wine and other goods.
Even now, the works of Elvish hands rank among the costliest luxuries in Middle-earth.
The high lords of the kingdoms of Men are enamoured of all Elvish craft, be it from woodlands or the sea, be it arms, armour, or adornments, holding that only the noble-born are worthy to own and enjoy them.
Thus, when Dragonborn learned that a hunting party had brought down a great grey bear that had been terrorising the road between the Grey Havens and the Blue Mountains, his spirits kindled at once.
He had entreated Fena of the kitchens, a Falathrim Elf who prepared meals for the Lord of the Havens and his councillors, to set aside a portion for him when she dressed the beast, for he longed to know the taste of bear.
She had agreed to save him a share the following morning.
And then, just as his hopes were about to be fulfilled, the Elf-maid Ilwen had forcibly marched him to the council hall upon the high ground in the southern reaches of the Havens, causing him to miss his breakfast entirely.
“Cease your muttering!” The Noldorin Elf ahead of him had grown so vexed that she wheeled about, half in exasperation.
“If I have truly made you miss your morning meal, then I shall hunt a bear for you myself next time.
Utter another word, and my ears shall grow calloused!” Dragonborn shut his mouth at that.
He blinked at her, lifted his chin, squared his shoulders, and strode into the council hall.
“Good day.” Dragonborn bowed courteously to the Master of the Grey Havens, and in his steadily improving Sindarin said, “Lord Círdan.” At the same time, his gaze stole sideways, probing the tall, aged figure who could only be the stranger he had been summoned to meet.
And at once, his eyes were snared by the old man’s gaze, which gleamed like starlight beneath a cloud of white hair and a grey cloak.
He scarcely heard what the Lord of the Havens said.
Dragonborn felt as though the old man’s eyes (he did not yet know that this elder was a wizard) held some enchantment.
Helplessly drawn into those shining eyes, he stood staring, motionless.
Círdan’s expression flickered.
He knew what the wizard was about, and he rose at once, crying out, “Stay your hand, Mithrandir!” But both the wizard and Círdan had misjudged the Dragonborn.
Just as the wizard sought to probe the deepest hidden secrets of this mysterious sky-fallen stranger with the eyes of a dragon, the defense buried deep within the Dragonborn’s soul awakened in the next heartbeat.
Dragonborn threw back his head and let out a world-shaking roar.
The sound was so vast, so thunderous, that it was as if a great dragon had bellowed in fury.
The council hall, built of white stone, trembled to its foundations; the whole Grey Havens seemed to quiver.
The white-bearded Grey Wizard’s face paled.
He shaped a swift gesture, and a dazzling white light enwrapped both him and the Lord of the Havens.
“Your eyes roused memories I would rather leave undisturbed, and so…” The Grey Wizard called out his apology to the Dragonborn in a great Sindarin voice, struggling to maintain the warding spell.
“Forgive me, I beg you!
I was merely over-curious…” Yes, that was ever the failing of wizards.
Their prodigious curiosity too often drove them headlong into acts that, in hindsight, seemed wholly unnecessary.
Whether it was the wizard’s sincerity that reached him, or simply the shock of his own colossal voice, Dragonborn fell silent, his face full of wary wonder.
He shut his mouth and cast a guarded look at the spell-wielding wizard, then at the equally startled Círdan.
He seemed on the verge of speaking, then held back.
Satisfied that Dragonborn had regained his composure, Gandalf let the magic fade with a rueful smile.
He nodded apologetically toward the Dragonborn, then turned to Círdan.
“I am deeply sorry, honoured Lord Círdan.
I know my heedlessness has alarmed all within the Havens.
Pray forgive this reckless act of mine.
I shall tender my most heartfelt regret to amend this discourtesy.” Círdan shook his head and said nothing, instead signalling the guards who had rushed in at the upheaval to stand down.
The loyal sentinels stared in bewilderment at the two figures before them; that great sound had been all too like a dragon’s roar.
And among those present, Dragonborn was plainly the most suspicious.
Elves are not blind, and Dragonborn’s eyes, however one looked at them, were the eyes of a dragon.
So every uncertain gaze came to rest upon Dragonborn.
Among those gazes was the Elf-maid’s.
“Lord?” Ilwen called tentatively to Círdan, her bright blade still half-raised, unsure whether to sheathe it.
Círdan waved a hand, bidding them all withdraw.
The guards let out their breath, sheathed their weapons, and departed.
As she left, Ilwen cast one long, searching look back at Dragonborn.
Once the loyal guards had been dismissed, the Lord of the Havens was at last free to speak to Dragonborn.
“Ochriamm, this is Gandalf the Grey.
Though at times he proves rather…
unreliable, in the main, he is not an ill-meaning man.
I ask you to forgive his discourtesy.” They had been speaking swiftly and urgently, and Dragonborn, piecing it together by guess and by half-understood words, needed a long moment to grasp their meaning.
After thinking it over, he accepted the Lord’s explanation and acknowledged the wizard’s apology.
In part, no doubt, because he had heard a name he recognised.
Gandalf the Grey.
Ah, was he not that ageless meddler…
that eternal bachelor of Middle-earth?
If during the preceding fortnight the familiar yet strange names, Grey Havens, Elves, Lindon, the Blue Mountains, the Lord of the Waters, had given Dragonborn a fair notion of what world he had fallen into, then the name “Gandalf the Grey” now confirmed every suspicion beyond doubt.
“A wizard?” He feigned ignorance, turning to the white-bearded Grey Wizard, who with his sweeping silver beard and kindly, wrinkled eyes looked for all the world like a festive Yule-father masquerading in a traveler’s grey cloak.
In his broken, half-mastered Sindarin, Dragonborn added, “The sort that performs conjuring tricks?” Gandalf stiffened, then offered a sheepish grin.
“Why, of course, I can manage a trick or two.” And the mighty wizard, renowned throughout Middle-earth, swept his hand grandly, made a strange, mirthful face, and conjured half a dozen bright, fluttering butterflies into the air around them.
“Oh?” Dragonborn stared in genuine wonder, watching the butterflies dance as though they were living things.
After a long moment, he smiled.
He regarded the Grey Wizard with a look of teasing amusement in his slitted golden eyes, as if to say: You may drop the performance; I see through it.
“Ahem…” Gandalf felt a prickle of unease under that cold, deep, golden gaze.
This little trick was one he used to beguile mortal lords and kings; simple as it seemed, the magic woven into it was real enough to deceive nearly any eye.
“Very well.” The Grey Wizard waved his hand, and the half-real butterflies vanished into nothingness.
“I could not fool you after all.” He looked deeply into Dragonborn’s dragon-like eyes, then at Círdan, whose face had settled once more into calm, and a genuine smile spread across his age-lined features.
“May the light of Elbereth, Queen of the Stars, shine upon you forever, O herald of the dawn in the dark times, O saviour…” At last, the Grey Wizard had perceived the glimmer of the divine within Dragonborn, and he understood that this stranger’s origin was no simple matter.
With wholehearted sincerity, he said, “I was indeed most discourteous.
Pray forgive me.
Should ever you have need of me, you have but to command.” Dragonborn blinked.
He looked at the ageless meddler…
the eternal bachelor.
He looked at Círdan.
His expression was one of utter bewilderment.
Círdan knew he could not catch the flow of high blessings and oaths the wizard had just uttered, so he simply smiled and said, “It is nothing.
Go and have your breakfast.
Even from afar, I heard you lamenting that you missed the morning meal.
As it happens, the kitchen fires should not yet be cold; Fena will have kept that promised portion of bear for you.
So…” He smiled.
“Off with you, off with you.
I have matters to discuss with Gandalf.” The simplest words about food Dragonborn could understand well enough.
He glanced at the well-meaning Grey Wizard, then at the smiling Master of the Havens.
After a moment’s thought, he bowed and took his leave.