“Catch!”
Erestor nearly did not look up in time, and let out an “ooof!” as he caught the heavy sphere. It was smooth and dark, a blackish-blue color. Amarië looked up from the beadwork she was doing and wrinkled her nose, while Mahtan snorted and grinned along with Fëanor. “What is it? A paperweight?” asked Erestor, rolling it back across the ground to the youngest of the group.
“Careful, there!” Fëanor dodged around Mahtan and crouched down to catch the object. “What, you think they grow on trees you can just toss them about?”
“What of your throwing it at me?” countered the eldest, nearest to his majority of the lot. “What is it, anyway?”
“Mine is what it is.” A wide grin spread over Fëanor’s face again. “Want to see what it does?”
“Looks like the stone in the tower of Avallónë, only smaller,” remarked Amarië.
Fëanor wiped the ball with his sleeve and sat down beside Erestor. Amarië leaned closer, while Mahtan plopped himself down as well. “Better than that. Travel sized. Watch.” Fëanor placed his hands on either side of the sphere, and closed his eyes, concentrating. Within, colors swirled and a mist cleared, showing a distorted view of the inside of Finwë’s house. “I made a bigger one for home, and one to take with me.” Fëanor opened his eyes, smiling to see his father and his step-mother, Indis. “The best thing about it is, unless I want them to see me, they cannot.”
“How did you do that?” wondered Amarië.
Shrugging, Fëanor simply said, “You would not understand, being a girl. Now, watch this.”
Jaws dropped when the scene changed, and the display was of the throne room of Manwë. Practically unable to speak, Erestor barely managed to say, “You put one in Ilmarin?!”
“Two.” Now, they saw the room from a different angle, and instead of Manwë and Varda, viewed a few of the other Valar, mingling and drinking nectar while the Maiar sang to them sweet music. “And that is not all.” Again and again, the image changed, showing different places – on a pier in Alqualondë, beside a stable in Valimar. A house on the river, and a shop on Tol Eressëa.
“Someone will find them!” warned Erestor after Fëanor showed them all of the places he could spy upon now.
“I made many of them smaller so they will not be found,” Fëanor explained. “Some can be used to communicate with others, like this one, and others are only portals.”
“If you keep making palantiri, eventually there will not be enough of the one in Tol Eressëa for them to work,” warned Erestor, though he knew not whether or not this was true.
The light faded from the sphere and it went dark. “I do not plan to make palantiri all my life. I have bigger plans. Have you seen the jewels that the ladies weave into their hair? The ones everyone wears draped around their necks? They are so dull,” Fëanor told them. “I have an idea; something better. I want to trap fire in crystal.”
“You cannot do that,” laughed Erestor. “That would be impossible.”
Fëanor held up the palantir. “Everyone said this was impossible. No one knows how to make them smaller. No one knows how to make them do anything. But I can,” he said with determination, standing up. Letting go of the palantir, Fëanor smirked as Erestor reached out and caught it before it could smash to the ground.
Fëanor walked a few steps away from their little hidden glade, then turned around. “You should come with me; I am sure Aule would not mind.”
Unsure, Erestor began to stand, but only until Fëanor laughed. “Not you. You could not trap a bullfrog in a sack, let alone fire in a jewel. Mahtan, are you coming?”
Eagerly, Mahtan got up and followed his friend. Amarië was gathering her beads. “Wait for me! I want to see these jewels!” she called, and decided to leave her work behind to catch up with them.
Erestor glared in the direction of the trio until they were out of sight, then looked curiously at the dark sphere. Closing his eyes, he tried to concentrate on one of the places he had seen earlier, but each time he opened his eyes, all he saw was darkness.
“Stupid rock,” he said, and he rolled it away. It went a few feet, slowed, and mysteriously rolled back to him. Erestor thought perhaps he had rolled it up an angle, so he picked another direction. Again, it went only a little ways, stopped, and came back to him, resting against his knee.
Standing up abruptly, Erestor walked a few steps away, and turned to find he was being followed. “Go away!” he shouted, pointing in some other direction.
The palantir rolled up against his foot.
Leaping away, Erestor spied Mahtan’s discarded cloak, and he picked it up, tossing it over the palantir. He thought he heard it growl at him, and thus wasted no time in hastily running away before it could follow him once more.
