#Maglor | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

welcomingdisaster · 17 hours ago

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fly!

ao3

He sits in the tub, and Maglor washes his hair. The water stings slightly against the bruises and scrapes on his skin. The teeth of the comb run gently along his scalp. He sifts gently through each piece of tangled hair, cut short due to the damage, starts at the end and works upwards. Steam rises from the water. Maedhros blows at it lightly and watches it disperse, hiccup up, towards the wood ceiling. Remembers he can reach out and touch the water, running his fingers over the surface. His skin wrinkles, finger-tips pruning. Maglor hums. Maedhros wishes he would sing, but he does not.

“I am sorry,” he says, “I can see this bothers you. We will be done soon. You can go back to sleep.”

It does not bother Maedhros in the slightest. He likes to be in bed, but in truth does not wish to return there, not now. It does not enter his mind that he could voice the thought, that he has any power at all over what happens to him; all he feels is a bone-deep sense of loss, of longing. Wants to be kept, to feel his hands in his hair, to watch the steam rise, to feel the heat. He wants to break open his bones and pour the water inside them, so that he might carry the warmth everywhere with him.

Then he remembers that one of his bones is broken open, and he laughs. Imagines pulling off the bandages and submerging the stump, so that it he might be filled with rose-scented bathwater, and laughs more, high and trilling, his head bumping against Maglor’s hands.

“What is matter?” Maglor asks. “Oh—do you cry, no, are you laughing?”

Maedhros is.

“What are you laughing at?” Maglor asks, and that question is concrete enough for to break through the ice around Maedhros’ head, his mind.

“He cut it,” he says, “he cut through the bone. It’s hollow inside. If it weren’t cracked you could fill it with water and it’d hold. But now it’d just trickle out.”

“Oh,” Maglor says, “oh, no, no. Of course not, Russo, I wouldn’t let water get into the wound. I’m not going to hurt you.”

Maedhros catches steam in his mouth and pushes it deep into his lungs. Blows it out, watching it spin out. It’s like the twisted reptilian things down below, which Maglor doesn’t know about. They used to be halves of one soul, he and Maglor. Now there’s a chasm between them and it’s full of hollow bones and creatures of the darkness.

“We’re almost done,” Maglor says, “can you lift your foot?”

Maedhros can, but he doesn’t.

Then Maglor helps him out of the bath, catching him under the armpits to pull him up. That hurts. Everything hurts. He doesn’t mind. Doesn’t even mind the way it makes him feel like a rag doll, hanging in his brother’s hands. He could probably try harder to be elven, try harder to be alive. He doesn’t remember when he’d stopped trying.

He watches from somewhere outside of them, as Maglor swaddles him in the towel and dries his skin. They look ridiculous, Maglor pulling each part of him into position, all long limp limbs, like he’s a dead animal, a skinned thrall. It is taking all of Maedhros to remember Maglor isn’t planning to cut him open.

“Heart on a platter,” he says, “stuff it with— stuff it with anything. The little brown herbs they eat.”

“Wake up,” Maglor says, “wake up, you’re home, you’re well.”

He knows. It’s not that he doesn’t know. Words spill from him, as they have for years, and he has forgotten they sound like anything at all. “I know,” he says, “I wish you would sing instead.”

So Maglor does.

* * *

“Come back,” Father calls, “pick up the torch. Are you a boy, or a lord?”

* * *

He is in bed, the mattress smelling very slightly of straw, and the pillow of down. Fingon is asleep in front of him, curled up on his side, not touching him. He doesn’t track when Fingon comes and goes. He is like the birds, Fingon.

His hair is braided in many thin braids, tight against his scalp. Maedhros wonders how they had braided out on the ice, their fingers numb with cold. Finrod, his hair thin and light, might have done well enough. But Fingon’s hair is thick and curly and Maedhros can’t imagine him being able to plait in gloves. Maybe he cut it short.

He reaches out with his left hand and picks up the edge of one braid. A golden bead runs all the way down it, to Fingon’s scalp, propelled by gravity. Fingon doesn’t stir.

Maedhros pulls.

Fingon bats at his hand, turning away. “Ow,” he says, “ow, quit that.” But quickly enough he’s asleep again, elbow thrown over his face, and Maedhros is still holding his braid.

He yanks again.

Fingon wakes fully. His amber eyes glow slightly in the dark. “Do not pull my hair,” he says, catching Maedhros by the wrist. “What’s gotten into you?”

Maedhros doesn’t answer. Fingon sighs and turns away, wrapping the blanket over his head to protect himself. Maedhros pulls at the back of his tunic. Fingon sleeps through that, so Maedhros digs his nails into the bared skin underneath.

Fingon yelps. Sits up, blinking at Maedhros with barely-contained anger. “What is it?”

Maedhros says nothing.

“Do you wish for me to sleep here?” Fingon asks.

“Yes,” Maedhros says, “I wish it.” He cannot stand it, being left along in the room. It is worse than anything else they could do to him, he thinks.

“Very well,” Fingon says, “is there something you need of me?”

Maedhros is silent.

Fingon breathes deeply through his nose. “Yesterday,” he says, “has left me very weary. Tell me if you need something. Otherwise let me rest.”

Maedhros cannot remember what happened yesterday. He feels adrift in time entirely, a bead loose from the string.

“Kill me,” Maedhros breathes. He doesn’t truly feel it, at least not right now. He doesn’t know why he says it. “I need you to kill me.”

“No.” Fingon says.

“Then sleep with me,” Maedhros says. “Bed me.”

“No.” Fingon says again. “I might get you wine, or bread, or some salve for your cuts. I might get you the waste-pot. I might open the window. These are the things I might do.”

Maedhros thinks about it. “Wine,” he says.

Fingon stands, swaying slightly. He’s limping. Maedhros feels he ought to know why. But then he’s alone in the room, and time folds oddly, and then he’s sitting up, and drinking wine, cold on his tongue and a little over-sour. Fingon is sitting against headboard, his eyes half-shut. Maedhros watches him fall back asleep like that, sitting up, one hand still raised against the cup. Maedhros listens to his breathing and feels himself seep out of the edges of his skin, thinks he must be dying.

* * *

He is awake. Someone with long dark hair sits on the edge of his bed. Breathes.

“Maglor,” he says.

His father’s face turns to look at him, eyebrows knitted together, mouth set. There is a bruise, greenish, on his cheekbone.

“I hate you,” Maedhros says, “I am glad you died.”

“I will go and fetch him,” Curufin says mildly.

* * *

He is on the floor and it is dark. In his mind he is watching himself from the outside, not on the floor but before (or now, is it now? He has no way of telling what has passed and what has not) on the bed, and there are many of them in the room with him and he’s biting them, clawing at their skin, and he can taste blood in his mouth, not just his tongue, hair in his hands, feathers coming out of somewhere on the bed, fluttering in the draft from the window, calm yourself, calm yourself, calm yourself, do not— many faces, flashing white eyes, don’t know who, don’t know where, get off, get off, get off—stop, you hurt him, stop—hand over his wrist, crack of the bed below him, the leg of the bed, crack of the oak, get off—

Now he takes his hands to his mouth. Takes his hand to his mouth. Sucks out the bits of skin and blood caught under his fingernails. Doesn’t know when he’s going to eat again. If he is.

* * *

Fingon is holding his head, pressing his head against his own breast. Maedhros hears the beating of his heart, faster and more panicked than he’d admit to. His hair is loose and that is how Maedhros knows time has passed, because Fingon keeps his braids in for weeks. It falls like a cloud over and around Maedhros, so long now. Dark curls.

He’s holding Maedhros tight and he’s saying, “you’re alright, now, pretty babe, you’re well.” He’s saying, “I have you,” and “all is well,” and “no harm done, hush now,” and he’s running his fingers over Maedhros’ ears, and Maedhros weeps and presses against him.

Then Fingon is on top of him, holding his wrist in one hand and the back of his head with the other, kissing again and again the top of his head. Maedhros wraps his right arm around his waist and shakes and shakes.

“Is Maglor coming?” he asks, after the worst of it has passed.

“He cannot come right now,” Fingon says, “he is not here.”

Maedhros frowns. “Did I hurt him?”

“No,” Fingon says, smiling tightly, “not for a long time, beloved.”

* * *

“I cannot recall,” Maedhros says, watching Maglor stoke the fire, “I cannot recall if you are dead.”

“I am not,” Maglor says. “Father is.”

Father frowns. “I am not either,” he says, out of the fireplace, “I am made of flames and thus I cannot die.”

“Father is dead,” Maedhros echoes. That seems right. “Maglor.”

“Yes?” Maglor straightens up. He walks to the table. The table is small, wound, carved of wood. It doesn’t look like anything they had before. Maglor pours wine and waters it down, mixes in honey.

“You must tell me if you have died,” Maedhros says, “it is cruel if you do not tell me.”

“He is a poet,” Father says, “he must be cruel.”

“I have not died,” Maglor says, “come, put your hand on my life-vein and feel my heart beat.”

Maedhros stands up. He is surprised that he can; that he walks now, stumbles a few steps from the chair to little bench by the fire. That he takes Maglor’s hand. Pushes his fingers against his skin. Feels his heart. Boom. Boom. Boom.

“You must tell me everyone who is dead,” Maedhros says.

Maglor sighs. “Father,” he says, “Grandfather…”

But their father speaks over him. “Maglor,” he says, “Celegorm. My brother’s awful sons, they have fallen beneath the ice and drowned…”

* * *

“Where is Maglor?” Maedhros asks. “Maglor, Maglor—”

“Oh, stars above,” Amras groans. His face is covered in blood, the left half of it distorted and ugly and old, the right fair and young and clean. He is his own twin image. “Down, in the cellar, licking his wounds. That Sindar bitch near sliced open his ribcage.”

“Maglor,” Maedhros calls, “Maglor, Maglor, Maglor.”

“He is not here,” Father says, “he is dead. He fell beneath the grinding ice and drowned.”

“I was never on the grinding ice,” Maglor says, sitting next to him in bed. “That’s the host of Fingolfin, remember?” He is smiling and he is young. There is no blood nor dirt on him. “You are at Lake Mithrim, you are well. Eat some eggs.”

“You are in Doriath, and three of your brothers are dead.”

“Which three?” Maedhros asks.

“You can eat any eggs you want,” Maglor says.

* * *

He knows it is Maglor standing over his bed, and snaps his outstretched fingers anyways, out of habit. Crack. Maglor howls in pain and Maedhros is happy with himself, then sorrowful.

* * *

“Who was it that had his head broken open?” Maedhros asks. They’re sitting outside, on the grass. He keeps catching blades of it in his fingers and ripping it up. Satisfying burst of the stems, damp brown dirt bared underneath. Worms, scurrying insects. “On the stairs. Brain spilled out.”

Maglor shuts his eyes like the question pains him. Next to him Fingon calmly sips his wine. They’re outside eating. Beautiful morning.

“Grandfather,” Maglor says.

“Burst into flame,” Maedhros says. “Stabbed, bleeding underneath the chainmail, bubbled through underneath, blood on the lips. Then fire.”

“Father,” Maglor says.

“Hung out like a pelt to dry in the sun,” Maedhros says, “‘ere Fingon took pity and shot him through with his arrows.”

“That did not happen,” Maglor says, “he did not kill you.”

“I wish he had,” Maedhros says.

Fingon moves suddenly, yanks up his sleeve and sticks out his arm. “Bite me,” he says.

Maedhros hesitates, looking at him. Maglor gapes. “What?”

“Plainly he means to hurt you, by making you list such things,” Fingon says, “and he means to hurt me, it seems, through his return to the cliffs. It would be easier, Maedhros, if you just.”

Maedhros bites him. Draws blood. Fingon sits, blank-faced, and sips his wine. Maglor weeps.

* * *

“When will you die?” Maedhros asks. He’s in bed, his head on Fingon’s lap. Fingon is stroking his hair.

“I already did,” Fingon says, “don’t you remember? They caught me up in their whips and they burned me, and you couldn’t do anything. You failed me.”

“Oh,” Maedhros says. For some time they are silent. Fingon kisses his hair, lips cold as the winter wind. “I do not wish to be alive, if you are not.”

“Well, too bad,” Fingon says.

* * *

The mud is cool under his hands. Roots of trees. Wood caught under his fingernails, wood splinters. Warm air, cool mud. Sweat.

“Do not leave,” his father says, far below the dirt. But it is too late, he has gone.

“How might I help you?” a voice asks him. “What do you need?” He wishes to claw, to bite.

“Maglor,” he breathes, “Maglor, Maglor.”

“No,” the voice says.

His heart beats hard against his ears. He thinks. “Wine,” he says.

* * *

Fingon wraps his arms around Maedhros’ waist from behind and kisses the back of his neck. Maedhros reaches for him, feels for his warmth in the darkness. A loose feather on the mattress flutters with his exhale.

“Are you alive?” Maedhros asks.

“What do you think?”

Maedhros hesitates. “No?”

“Yes,” Fingon says. “I live.”

“Oh,” Maedhros says. His hand finds Fingon’s wrist. “Please do not die. It would be cruel of you to die.”

(“He is Fingolfin’s son,” his father says, from the corner of the room, “he must be cold and cruel.”)

Fingon draws him closer. Kisses his shoulder. “Do not fret for me, pretty babe,” he says, “I will live forever.”

* * *

“You’re home,” Maglor says, running his fingers through Maedhros’ hair, tucking it behind his ears, “you are well. We have the gems.”

“I know,” Maedhros says, “I know.”

* * *

“If you had killed me, that day,” Maedhros says, “we would have fallen against the forces of darkness. Your father would never be king; or perhaps he would be, after all my brothers were dead, but not for long. We would never have been wed.”

Out of the portrait Fingon looks down at him, his amber eyes angry. The artist had rendered the crown on his head oddly, like it is lit by a different light source.

“It is good,” Maedhros says, “I am glad you did not kill me.”

Fingon scoffs. “We have fallen against the darkness regardless,” he says. “There was never hope.”

* * *

He sits in the bathtub and Maglor trims his fingernails, one after the other, with a little paring knife. Maedhros likes the attention. Likes Maglor’s calm grey eyes on him, his focused attention. There is a perfect little circle bruise in the flesh of his forearm.

“Did I bite you?” Maedhros asks.

“Yes,” Maglor says, “it is alright. It was a while ago.”

“I do not remember,” Maedhros says, “I do not know why I do not remember.”

“Sometimes you cannot,” Maglor says, “all is well. Do you know where you are?”

The steam rises from the water. Maedhros blows on it, watches it hiccup at the sudden displacement of air. “Yes,” he says, “I know.”

“How does that feel?” Maglor asks, tracing his nails with the pads of his fingers, “is that good?”

Maedhros feels it. Dips it below the water. “Good,” he says, “short. I will not bite it to the blood.”

Maglor beams at him. The water shrivels his fingers.

“I never want to be anywhere else,” Maedhros says, “I do not want to go.”

* * *

“Who was it, that was skinned and withered in the sun?”

“No one. That was not anybody.”

“I am quite sure it was someone. I just need the name.”

“No one, Russo.”

“What about the elf that jumped into the flames?”

“That did not happen. You are coming up with dead elves again.”

* * *

They are drinking, the three of them. Outside it is winter, though it has not been some while below. Flakes of dry, crumbly snow stick to the window and melt. Icicles hang over the window, catching the moonlight. Maedhros likes to be in the warmth, likes the flickering yellowish light of the candles, the…

“Living souls,” he says, sipping spiced wine, mixed with brandy, “trapped in the flames. Father…”

“Shh,” Fingon says, “shh, you are speaking aloud.”

“Let him, if he wants to,” Maglor says.

Maedhros doesn’t know what he wants. He drinks. There is one harp in the room and two players; they get in each other’s way, Fingon starting a melody and Maglor wanting to play it differently. Maedhros likes to watch them together; it feels rare, these days. Here they are, each perching on one side of the harp-stool, meant for only one player, bumping elbows against each other, spilling wine and laughing. Maglor’s hair is down; Fingon catches a lock of it in his hand, wraps it around his fingers, yanks. Maglor shrieks with laugher and shoves him. Somehow someone pulls a harp-string, clear notes ringing out over the chaos.

It is like watching the birds, Maedhros thinks, it is like watching the birds squabbling and preening in the rock caverns below. He doesn’t know how drunk they are. Doesn’t know how drunk he is.

“You would be a starling,” he says, “you’d be a thrush.”

He holds out his arms and nudges Fingon with his mind, and then Fingon is on top of him, arms wrapping about his neck, kissing his cheeks. He smells of alcohol and pipe-smoke and herb oils. Maglor’s next to them, laughing, drinking, eating roasted nuts. Maedhros drifts off like that, Fingon solid and warm on top of him, Maglor’s weight on the mattress.

When he wakes it is dark, and Fingon is sitting by the vanity, painting his eyes. When he reaches for Maglor he is not there. His tongue is heavy in his mouth, thick, hairy. He can voices a room over, a woman’s and a man’s.

Mother and father, he thinks at first. But that is not so. Mother, certainly, and grandfather, Mahtan, his low voice rolling as the flames of the forge.

* * *

Steam rises from the surface of the water. His hair is so long now it falls deep into the bathwater, swirls about like seaweed. Maedhros catches the steam on his tongue, feels the comb bump against the scars on his scalp.

“Your hair is growing in nicely,” Maglor says. “Even where you tore out the roots. It will be thick and good in no time at all.”

Maedhros reaches to touch it. “I wish you’d sing instead, Maglor,” he says.

“I’m not Maglor,” Maglor says. “Look at me. Do you know where you are?”

Maedhros turns and looks at his brother’s face, his long dark hair, his stormy grey eyes, the freckles scattered over his nose. “Yes,” he says, “yes, I know.”

Maglor leans over him, and kisses his forehead. “I know it can be hard,” he says. “You’re doing well.”

“Are you dead?” Maedhros asks him.

“Maglor, you mean?”

“Yes,” Maedhros says, “is Maglor dead?”

“No one can say that,” Maglor says, “no one can say he’s dead.”

“Did it hurt?” Maedhros asks. “What happened?”

“At first,” Maglor says, “after that no one can say if it kept hurting. Can you give me your hand? I would cut your nails.”

Maedhros can, but does not.

* * *

“Come with me,” Father says, “fly. Are you a boy, to fear a little fire?”

* * *

Maglor comes to lay down next to him. Next to them, him and Fingon, still sleeping on the other side. His fingers are bandaged up, his eyebrows set with pain. He reaches for Maedhros, and draws him forward, to rest against his chest. Strokes his hair.

Maedhros lets him. He knows now he is holding a viper, a biting fox, an unloveable thing. Let him do as he wishes.

“You are in the worst of it now,” Maglor says, “you are weary, and horribly hurt. It will only grow better from here.”

“I wish you’d sing instead,” Maedhros says.

#my fic #maedhros #maglor #fingon #lena speaks

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