Having some problems with posting a blog so here is the post... sure hope it shows up online.

The Abandoned Ones A series of notes upon the way of Sylvan Elves

Let it begin then, the telling of a tale long ago hidden. When Gondolin fell many Elven Folk were taken prisoner, but even in captivity they remained Elves. Many years passed and still they were kept away from the light and the starry nights in the forests. Held in the caves deep below the earth they began to change yet they were Elves still. After the passing of a thousand years they who remained alive were given their freedom. No answer why, nor any supplies given for their entry into the bright world. Dumped they were, after having been carried blindfolded and bound for several weeks without food. Though drink they had been given a bitter gal that which kept them weak of limb but alive.
When they awoke in the bright light and cold wind of the forest the noise of the wind was as a hurricane in their ears and the light that dimly filtered through the trees was as the sun at noon in the high desert. They thought to hide from it all, but they were naked to the light and try though they did they could find no cave to hide in. So they lay between the roots of the trees under the piles of old leaves and dead mosses of the forest floor. When the night came and the wind died down it was quiet to the ears of most Elves but not so these survivors of Gondolin long held in the caves. For them the night while easier to see in was full of loud furious actions and it took them many years for them to come to terms with the raccoons and squirrels chatter not to speak of the problems with the hawks’ shrill cries.
Even with the noise the night was better for these Elves, and within a few months they had found such barks and fibers to tease and spin into rough yarn for the making of tunics and pants... Harder was the learning to skin and tan hides of the squirrels that were so plentiful in the forest and the cooking over fire was a pain at best but a necessary one for raw squirrel meat is unclean by Elven Laws as all meat not of fish must be cooked to be eaten. Fish alone may be eaten smoked without being cooked. And many a trout was smoked long before these Elves mastered bright fire for the cooking of squirrel or river rat…

Long decades passed and an urge to follow the sun bright as it was caught and held fast the Fea of these night traveling Elves for Night Elves they had become, all white as ghosts and long of limb, swift as rushing water they flowed west over the very mountains that had held them captive for almost a full age. The seasons change, while it had been spring at their leaving of the forest of their freedom as they passed through the high mountains winter set in. Snow they had seen but softly it lay in the forests of their dreams not like this snow that fell in blinding white and choked the wind out of a body as they walked. Again they had to travel in the night though the cold was bitter even more so then the drink they remembered from the hated caves. Three moons did they walk over the high mountains and not a body lost though many a Fea came close to abandoning their bodies. A song they heard in the night from the stars it came and somehow it warmed them and kept their Fea from failing into Shadow. And the spring came the rushing of waters down the hills and a house in the distance that seemed to grow up from the trees that stood among the flowing waters.
Yet they did not trust those Elves they saw below them. It would be another 300 years of living in the timberline above Imladris before these Night Elves would seek discourse with Lord Elrond and even then it was the calling of the sea that made them come down and the singing of a song by a young Man, a song of Lindon and of the travelers led by on Legolas of Gondolin through the woods and plains of Belierland. It was a song that broke the walls around the tide of memories. Down they came like rushing waters asking to hear of the children of Gondolin... “Did Any Survive?” they asked, with long sad faces they begged silently for word. Only to hear that many had died in the passage though their children lived in Lindon and even some few fair ones at Imladris were the grandchildren of Gondolin’s Refugees.
Delirium; they though the Lord of Imladris mad until he showed them the wall paintings of the fall of Gondolin, then they knew that kin they had here though distant at best but kin even so… These Night Elves knew nothing of Feanor or his Oath for much had they forgotten or dismissed as madness of the tales they heard from wandering men. Kin slaying they could not fathom, but greedy Dwarves they had some memory of. This is not to say that these Night Elves were naive but they chose what was real of t ales told to them by Men over firelight…

Asked they did for rights to the woods above Imladris for they could not as yet live among strange Elves and even so they could not go far from Imladris as the trees summoned them back when the strayed off…
Lord Elrond gave them such rights to the woods as they might wish but required of them that all they took be easy on the hills and those that dwelled therein. Agreement there was then between them and the Night Elves seemed often as ghosts to the Men and Dwarves who stayed at Imladris; though to Elvenkind and to Hobbits they showed themselves to be merely tall and fair Elven Folk not ghosts but simply quiet for Sylvan Folks. Thus did the Abandoned Ones the last Elves to see Gondolin find shelter at Imladris, while the One ring lay hidden in a cave with Gollum as its keeper.

As to when they left their high woods none know the date, yet one day the were found among those who dwelt in Lindon. Quiet were they more so then their norm on the day that three gray ships sailed into Mithlond with a messenger who made the long walk to where they watched in the hills high above the city. Still to the point of seeming to be carved of ice as the listened to the words of Manwe, a summons west a place kept for them on the slopes of Taniquetal if it pleased them to sail west and return once again to dwell among the Caliquendi. Amazed and frightened they were, and yet it was Nagathe youngest of them all who in a voice barely above a whisper asked “What price for our return to Valinor?” “What duty must we undertake for this permission to return home?”… only this requested Manwe “That you be willing to gather with all the Quendi at the times of High Festival holding no grudge against any save Morgoth who enslaved you”. Nothing more was asked of these Night Elves for Manwe well knew how troubled of spirit they were and wished only to give them a safe place to finish healing from their trauma; having heard from both Irmo and Namo as to how troubled their waking and sleeping Fea were and how their darkest thoughts were of the torture they feared to receive from Manwe’s hand.
Shunned they expected to be yet when they arrived in Avalonne they were greeted by those of their close kin who had stayed behind. Wreaths of willow and of forget-me-not were placed upon their heads and to a feast that lasted several weeks they were led. Songs were sung in the hall but not the boisterous songs of warriors but the gentle songs of mothers seeking their children lost in the mists… songs that told of the finding of the lost ones and of their return to the homes of their parents. Often would a small group of Elves stray out into the gardens at night a mix of well-tanned Caliquendi and their paler Night Elven kin. Little was said during these walks along the moonlit garden paths but much holding of hands and tear drenched smiles were seen on faces both tanned and pale. Eventually groups left for Taniquetal; some large, some small, and again none could say exactly when which of them left when only that all the groups who left were a mix of pale and tanned Quendi and that none left before they wished to leave… for all had been welcomed home and none were there who wished to dwell alone though many still preferred to rise at sunset and sleep at dawn a tendency left from the dark days of their ancient past.