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I’ve lived here since I was born. My parents lived here, in these rooms, with the window that looks out and up towards the Redhorn Gate. I was given my name in these rooms.
(What’s that noise?)
My name is written in stone beside the door, like my parents’ names, and my grandparents. My great grandparents worked to shape these rooms.
(Where is that sound coming from?)
This will be the last day I live here. The last day I ever look from the window, or walk down into the hollow City.
This has been our City since the First Days, since long before the Rising of the Sun. The City was our home, our joy.
(It sounds like drums)
It’s not our city any more.
We thought, when the news of the first deaths came, that it was some sneaking goblins, a force of orcs, perhaps some fell spirit from the Deeps that could be banished with the sound of bells, the right spells and lights.
We’ve dealt with such troubles before.
(the mines are empty now, but they are not silent)
Durin is dead. He was the last Durin, I heard people saying in the City last year. That already felt like sacrilege.
(the walls of my rooms have an echo. I’ve never heard that here before)
But now Náin Durinsson the King is dead. The might of the City is fallen with him.
It took him. We could do nothing, nothing but weep into our beards.
The Dark Flame is come among us, and we are helpless as children: we, Durin’s folk, hardy in war.
(What is that sound in the corridor? The neighbours, moving out? Or....)
I’d best finish packing. Only, I don’t know what to take.
I don’t know how to live anywhere but Khazad-dûm.