She, sorry they, will be back

Ginny's POV

I'm very thankful when an early night is suggested as I've hardly been able to even look in Adindel's direction since we re-joined the others.

In fact, everyone seems to be rather nervous; no one speaks very much and we all jump to our feet when Turgon announces his intention to turn in.

It seems all the Valar are impatient to the core for, over breakfast, Ellie describes how she awoke very early and entered the sitting room, soon finding herself face-to-face with none other than Ulmö.

I think this unnerves all our victims slightly as the appearance of one their deities must really bring home to them the fact that we are most definitely only here to 'fetch' them back to where they belong.

Apparently, we've been summoned to Mont Saint Michel, where we shall all meet Ulmö – on the sands.

Why, I hear you ask. Well, don't look at me – Ellie just skimmed over that part. I don't think Ulmö really gave her a satisfactory answer.

However, we can't leave Josselin for a few days yet as various members of our group have actually been paid to attend the fair.

The Duke attends everyday and is still determinedly flirting with me, even though he was also witness to Adindel's 'pillaging of my mouth' as Ellie called it (yes, using her usual political skill with tact and delicacy)!

The fair passes much the same as it had at the start, although I get some pretty interesting looks from various quarters, especially if I'm in a group that includes Adindel – I'm always glad to leave at the end of the day.

When the fair finally finishes, we bid farewell to the Duke. This is done with many kisses all around; the Valinorians are slightly put out at being required to kiss the Duke on both cheeks, but as Ellie and I have been told many times before: etiquette is etiquette!

I don't think the Elves were all too happy with our smug expressions and many comments that included some sort of reference to 'payback'!

We all pile into a mass of helicopters and fly in a northerly direction to Mont Saint Michel.

We have booked into a lovely hotel owned by none other than the Tayconters – something tells me that that might not be a coincidence! We also happen to take over the entirety of one of its buildings.

We're left to our own devices on our first day, but are invited into a private sitting room in the evening where we finally get to meet our hosts.

There are three in the family: Fabrice, Suzanne, and their absolutely adorable little girl Isabelle.

One of the things that immediately strikes all of us when we sit down in front of the little group is how much Fabrice and his daughter resemble our old friends from Gondor, not to mention their great to God only knows (literally) how much uncles, i.e. Elladan and Elrohir.

This is probably why they in particular take such a shine to little Isabelle and take charge of her for the majority of our visit.

As the Tayconters already know Celeborn, Thanduil, and Adindel, they treat this a bit like a catch-up session. Many minutes are passed while they ask after each other's current activities, etc.

Suzanne then looks over at the rest of us with a meaningful expression that implies proper introductions are in order.

Thanduil begins,

"Over here is my wife, Myrwen; our children, Llordan and Miriel; and their spouses, Alex and Ellie; and those four are our grandchildren, Valya, Vala, Aini, and Mána." The last four he points at like a teenager and wearing a manic grin.

I comment,

"He's a little daddy proud!"

All us Elves then take great pleasure in their freaked out expressions.

Thanduil, with his arm now firmly placed around Myrwen's waist, begins another of their rather frequent and steamy reunions. Therefore, Adindel takes over,

"Next to Ellie is Ginny..."

At this, Ellie somehow requires a hacking cough which is none too dissimilar from laughter. I move to elbow her in the side, whereupon she scuttles over to her husband and collapses in fits of giggles against his chest.

Legolas holds on to her whilst he wears an expression which suggests that his laughter is held off by the thought: 'The things I do for love'!

Everyone else is doing variations of the sky-floor inspection squad and wearing nutty grins, all save for Gil-galad who's looking like he wants to throttle Adindel very slowly and very painfully. I myself probably bear an uncanny resemblance to the lobster I had in the restaurant earlier.

Suzanne, bless her, obviously notices the teeniest bit of tension in the air and immediately moves the conversation somewhere else.

Later on, just as we're about to leave, Suzanne leads me out to one of the many balconies and asks concernedly,

"What happened earlier?"

"Well... it all relates to the saga that is me and Alistair." She looks at me with a perfectly raised eyebrow and I elaborate, "The first time he saw me I was asleep and topless, he then proceeded to act like a complete pillock and pretend that he hated me, whilst actually fancying the pants off me. We did not see each other for quite a long time and the next time we did see each other, he just walked up to me and began snogging me like there was no tomorrow."

Suzanne utters a diplomatic 'ah' before tilting her head to one side and, wearing an inquisitory expression, asks,

"Did you notice that Gerard didn't seem to find it quite as amusing as the others?"

"Yes I ..."

Oh.

I then utter the Sindarin equivalent of the F word.

The next morning, Ellie informs us of a new development: we now have a time and a place for our metaphorical 'phoning in'.

We leave our human friends and all troop down to the marshy sands that are only visible at low-tide.

It's a rather novel experience to finally be able to walk over tidal sands and not begin to sink into the stuff.

After a few minutes of waiting, the water-logged sand begins to rise up into an elegant spiral, forming a solid wall, before slowly sinking again. When it stops moving, we are confronted by a robed Ulmö; he's wearing a very superior and self-satisfied smile.

Good God (no pun intended), grow up.

Ulmö then makes an overly florid bow and looks at us expectantly; Valya completely deflates the situation by saying, in a very derogatory manner,

"Yes, dear."

No guesses as to where she got that from.

Ulmö's eyes flicker slightly before his face smoothes back into its usual passive expression.

We then begin walking and talking; we basically begin filling Ulmö in on what has happened since we arrived. We obviously leave out one or two more intimate details, but I can't help noticing that all our victims have become rather quiet all of a sudden.

Can't blame them really, I mean they're obviously only just realising how their refusal to come to Valinor for so long has really pissed off the Valar and Ulmö doesn't have the most light hearted of reputations.

At some point during the conversation, I voice a question which has been bugging me ever since this morning,

"Ellie said you communicated to her via a dream, but she never dreams, so how did you work that one out."

Ulmö raises his eyebrows – OK, maybe the question was slightly stupid given the fact that I'm face-to-face with an all-powerful deity, but what would you say?

After a slight pause, Ulmö answers in a very off-hand manner (with a gesticulation to match),

"Oh, Irmo gave me a hand."

Short as it is, this answer does make sense: I do remember something about Irmo being the god of dreams or something along those lines.

It's about this time that I notice that we're missing a member of our group: having got bored whilst we were talking about time scales and stuff (yes, I wasn't that enthralled either), Valya had drifted off on her own and began examining the sand.

Watching out of the corner of my eye, I notice her bend over. She has her back to us so I can't really see what she's doing.

I don't have to wait for long to find out.

Straightening up and turning round, hands behind her back, Valya calls,

"Ulmö!"

Ulmö turns only to get a face full of gooey and glutinous sand.

Eleanor's POV

Very early the next morning I got up, unable to sleep.

I wrapped myself in a satin dressing gown and wandered down the corridor to the sitting room.

As I curl up on a sofa I seem to hear the sound of waves then, to my total amazement, I see Ulmö standing there, in image if not in body.

"Have you found them all yet?" he asks, not bothering with formalities.

"Yes, now it is a matter of convincing them to come back."

We talk a little over what has been going on and Ulmö shows that Manwë' sense of humour is not unique among the Valar; he just keeps his hidden better.

If you were wondering, he took great pleasure in the descriptions of the whole set of expressions on missing elves' faces when we turned up. He also thought greeting the Sindars in Quenya was highly amusing too.

The only thing I found really peculiar about the conversation, bar the fact I was talking to the image of a god, was the fact that Ulmö seemed to take a certain interest in my daughter's well being.

Is this the anti-social Vala we all know and love?

He also gives us instructions that when we get to the Mont Saint Michel we are to go out on the sands and he would meet with us all there.

"With tides like that and the quicksand?" Is my contribution.

"The quicksand has no effect on Elves, it is like snow, a human will sink through it, but an Elf can walk over the top with no trouble. You will know when it is safe to come; I will make sure of that."

Okay, do what the ultra powerful deity says.

The fair lasts for a few more days and, on accounts of some of us having been paid to be there, we go.

Almost as soon as we can, we take helicopters to the northern part of the Brittany/Normandy border to the place known as the Mont Saint Michel.

That is another thing: the Tayconters own one of the many little hotels on the island.

No prizes for guessing where we stay when we are there.

On the first day we go and be tourists, exploring the attractions available before eating in a nice restaurant with a balcony from which we watch the tide.

You might think this sound like watching paint dry, but if you think that you have never come across the tides of the Mont Saint Michel.

The tide there goes in at 30mph and forms a wall of water when coming in.

It is highly impressive.

When we go back to the hotel, we are invited into a private sitting room where we finally get to meet the ultimate descendants of Aragorn and Arwen.

Like with Michael, the elfin blood seemed to have bred true.

Fabrice, the head of the family, was a guy in his mid-thirties with the same look that prevailed both in Breton colouring and in the Peredhil family – pale skin and dark hair.

His wife, a lady named Suzanne, also followed that colouring and they had this lovely little daughter called Isabelle. She was about nine and spoke with the cutest French accent.

We all fell in love with her immediately.

During the night, the meeting times were delivered in the dreams I rarely remembered.

As far as I can work out, the Valar made it so I don't dream unless that dream contains important information. That is kind of useful to know.

Either way, we go out, making sure to leave all humans behind, and through what I suspect is mystical power, we find the spot Ulmö wants to meet us at.

It happens to be very near the water, cannot think why that might be.

Shortly after we get there, Ulmö arrives.

In a way that suggests he also suffers from a flare for the dramatics.

Males are the same, no matter what the species or power level.

The upstanding elf-lords we have collected while here look at the first of their gods that they have ever seen in a certain amount of wonder.

That sense of awe wares off after a while.

We talk boring stuff, like practicalities and time scales with him while noticing that Ulmö seems more interested in what my daughter is doing.

Now you come to mention it, I am wondering what she is doing.

She has this bored expression on that reminds me of children the world over listening to their parents talk adult stuff.

She wanders round, occasionally crouching down and poking the sand.

It is a bit more like sandy mud really and there is grass growing on it.

I get a bit of a sense of foreboding when I see the flicker of a mischievous grin on her face before she turns her back on me.

Shortly after that, she calls to Ulmö and, as he turns round, he gets a face full of muddy sand.

I will give my daughter this – it takes guts to lob wet mud at a deity, even if that deity happens to be one of the slightly insane Valar.

To all of our total amazement, Ulmö crouches down and picks up his own handful of mud.

He then stalks over to my hastily retreating daughter, who trips over a suspiciously placed piece of grass (now would Ulmö cheat?), and smothers the mud all down her front before wiping the mud off his face and spreading that over her face as well.

While the rest of us are biting our lips, trying not to laugh at the sheer juvenileness of this, she takes her suddenly prone position as an opportunity to lob more mud at Ulmö and running off while he is trying to clear his eyes.

The moment he can, he chases after her and soon the pair are rolling in the sand.

It is a good job we have magic to clean her up with, it would be hard to explain why there was a mud covered female walking around.

Eventually, we remind the wrestling pair that, though they are having fun, some of us have to worry about the tide coming in.

They both quickly engage in the use of magic to return to the looks of normal people rather than mud monsters and we start the walk back to the city.

Ulmö remains standing on the muddy sand as we go and as we think that he is gone we hear a call.

"Valyaceulë!"

She turns round and gets a face full of mud.

Trust a god to get the last word.