The Silmarillon

In the time that followed Turin spoke much with Mim, and sitting with him alone he listened to his lore and the tale of his life. For Mim came of Dwarves that were banished in ancient days from the great Dwarf-cities of the east, and long before the return of Morgoth they wandered westward into Beleriand; but they became diminished in stature and in smith-craft, and they took to lives of stealth, walking with bowed shoulders and furtive steps. Before the Dwarves of Nogrod and Belegost came west over the mountains the Elves of Beleriand knew not what these others were, and they hunted them, and slew them; but afterwards they let them alone, and they were called Noegyth Nibin, the Petty-Dwarves, in the Sindarin tongue. They loved none but themselves, and if they feared and hated the Orcs, they hated the Eldar no less, and the Exiles most of all; for the Noldor, they said, had stolen their lands and their homes.

Long ere King Finrod Felagund came over the Sea, the caves of Nargothrond were discovered by them, and by them its delving was begun; and beneath the crown of Amon Rudh, the Bald Hill, the slow hands of the Petty-Dwarves had bored and deepened the caves through the long years that they dwelt there, untroubled by the Grey-elves of the woods.

But now at last they had dwindled and died out of Middle-earth, all save Mim and his two sons; and Mim was old even in the reckoning of Dwarves, old and forgotten. And in his halls the smithies were idle, and the axes rusted, and their name was remembered only in ancient tales of Doriath and Nargothrond.

But when the year drew on to midwinter, snow came down from the north heavier than they had known it in the river-vales, and Amon Rudh was covered deep; and they said that the winters worsened in Beleriand as the power of Angband grew. Then only the hardiest dared stir abroad; and some fell sick, and all were pinched with hunger. But in the dim dusk of a winter's day there appeared suddenly among them a man, as it seemed, of great bulk and girth, cloaked and hooded in white; and he walked up to the fire without a word. And when men sprang up in fear, he laughed, and threw back his hood, and beneath his wide cloak he bore a great pack; and in the light of the fire Turin looked again on the face of Beleg Cuthalion.

Thus Beleg returned once more to Turin, and their meeting was glad; and with him he brought out of Dimbar the Dragon-helm of Dor-lomin, thinking that it might lift Turin's thought again above his life in the wilderness as the leader of a petty company. But still Turin would not return to Doriath; and Beleg yielding to his love against his wisdom remained with him, and did not depart, and in that time he laboured much for the good of Turin's company. Those that were hurt or sick he tended, and gave to them the lembas of Melian; and they were quickly healed, for though the Greyelves were less in skill and knowledge than the Exiles from Valinor, in the ways of the life of Middle-earth they had a wisdom beyond the reach of Men. And because Beleg was strong and enduring, farsighted in mind as in eye, he came to be held in honour among the outlaws; but the hatred of Mim for the Elf that had come into Bar-en-Danwedh grew ever greater, and he sat with Ibun his son in the deepest shadows of his house, speaking to none. But Turin paid now little heed to the Dwarf; and when winter passed, and spring came, they had sterner work to do.

Who knows now the counsels of Morgoth? Who can measure the reach of his thought, who had been Melkor, mighty among the Ainur of the Great Song, and sat now, a dark lord upon a dark throne in the North, weighing in his malice all the tidings that came to him, and perceiving more of the deeds and purposes of his enemies than even the wisest of them feared, save only Melian the Queen? To her often the thought of Morgoth reached out, and there was foiled.