A Gift and a Curse: Disenchantment

By Irmo-(Valar)
Januari  17, 2003
Stories > Authors > Irmo's stories > Disenchantment

   Dedicated to the fond memories of the Irmo That Was Irmo Before Me, and of the One We Knew As Gwindor, two great visionaries who have left our Guild:  They will be remembered with honor!
 
    Gandalf walks to the Halls of Taniquetil. Varda is there to greet him at the gates.
    "Hail my dear friend, sit here for a while and rest."
    "Thank you Milady, that I will do."
    "Tea?"
    "Would be lovely, Varda."
    "Manwë is still transporting the Eldar to Chi Equui. The spectral energy on that world is of course much less than it was on this world, but it will be enough to sustain them - and us. You are required to go with the next shipping, if you are able."
    Gandalf noddles and quietly enjoys his tea, before he resumes the conversation:
    "We have won Milady, but at what price?""
    "Oh Olorin, we knew there would always be a price, Sauron made sure of that."
    Turning his ring in his fingers, Gandalf says: "It has turned dead now, not a spark, nothing."
    "Yes my friend, I fear all Spectral Energy has now gone from this world altogether."
    "Was there no way to avoid this Milady?"
    "None, believe me. The path was clear and you have kept true to it, Olorin. From the moment Sauron succeeded in grasping this world’s incredible Spectral Energy within his Power Circle, there were but two choices left. Either destroy Sauron's Circle, and thereby the energy of Arda, or in the end Eru would have had to obliterate this world. Look how far the Black Numenoreans came, when Sauron did not even have his device! No restricted solution like with Numenor would have sufficed now. There would have been no alternative for Eru but complete destruction. For would Sauron have been allowed to fully master his Circle the enemy would have swarmed the Galaxy with his foul creatures. Our calculations show that he could even have been able to threaten the Flame Imperishable, thus tearing at the very fabrics of Eä."
    "Aye Milady, and by directly interfering with Sauron ourselves and trying to get control of his Circle we would have certainly destroyed this world and yet solved nothing, I know. Now at least we have saved the peoples that live here. But the thing they know as magic will now forever be gone from their existence on this planet. How will they cope?"
    "They will cope Olorin! Let your soul be at ease about this. Look at it this way: they will have no Gandalfs and Elronds to guide them, but neither will there be Saurons and Sarumans to endanger them.
    "Irmo told me recently about some visions he had. Always - even eras from now - the people of this world will have a collective memory of this thing that was once known to them as magic. Yes, even in the far future people will be weary of science and technology and they will have fantasies about schools where one can learn how to change into a cat, become invisible, how to defend oneself from Dark Arts, about using mandragora root and meeting unicorns. The people will rejoice in these memories of magic as it could and should have been, but at the same time they will be sad their world is utterly devoid of it. Thus we leave them with a gift and a curse, really."

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