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thelordofgifs · 2 days ago

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Part 37! In which several people fuck up.

"You are not easy to find, Curvo," Amras says thoughtfully, dismounting. "But I had my suspicions I would find you skulking around the Girdle eventually."

"I'm here, too," Celebrimbor says pointedly. "Much to my regret."

No one pays any attention to this. "Well, this is a surprise, Pityo," Curufin says, looking his brother in the eye. "I did not see you come rushing to our aid when Morgoth's forces overwhelmed the Eastmarch, nor indeed when Himring fell. But I am glad to see you can be drawn out of your fortress eventually, with sufficient... inducement."

"I am impressed you dare speak of the fall of Himring," Amras says, his voice very light and casual. "But then you never did have any shame, I suppose."

Curufin laughs loudly. A bird in a nearby tree takes off in fright. "So you have come to scold me, I see!" he says. "Well, I am afraid yours will have been a wasted trip in that case, Pityo. Have you not heard that I am beyond any sort of redemption now?" He casts Celebrimbor a swift bitter look.

How quickly the mask slips, Celebrimbor reflects, trying not to care. Not five minutes ago was Curufin trying to convince him that he was yet a devoted father.

"You did not need to tell me that," Amras says. "In Nelyo's place I would have disavowed you long ago."

"Oh, so it is Nelyo who sent you," Curufin says; "well, you might tell him that I am of no mind to come flying back to his shoulder like some tame songbird, and he should give up searching for me."

"He is missing," Amras hisses, his eyes bright with sudden anger; "I suppose no-one would have informed you of it while you have been cringing in the forests like the coward you are – he has disappeared from Barad Eithel, they have heard nothing of him for weeks. And you have the nerve yet to speak his name, after what you did to him!"

"This is all very interesting and important," Celebrimbor interjects, "but might you mind having this conversation somewhere else? You could both leave. Without me, even."

"What have you come for, then, little brother?" Curufin says coldly, ignoring Celebrimbor again. "I should imagine you were happier thinking me lost. Yet you have gone to all this effort to seek me out. One might even believe you missed me."

Amras gives him a thin-lipped smile. "Not that, exactly," he says; and then he twitches aside his cloak to reveal the bright dagger gleaming at his hip. "I just think it might be about time I finished some things that had been left undone."

Curufin laughs again. "So little Pityo has decided to assert his claim to relevance!" he says. "Shall you kill me, then – and doom me to the Everlasting Darkness with my Oath yet unfulfilled?"

Amras shrugs. "Why not? If it was good enough for Tyelko, and for – for Telvo, I see no reason why you should yet linger here, when all your machinations but serve to keep the Silmarils in the grasp of others, and condemn all Beleriand to Morgoth's dominion meanwhile."

"Do not speak of him," says Curufin, white-lipped in an instant, "you do not know—"

"You can expect no pity from me, Curvo," Amras says coldly, "you who yet honour our father's name after Losgar." He glances past Curufin at Celebrimbor. "Even to the shame of your own son. Tyelko is dead – and I am glad of it, glad he died when he did rather than fall any further from grace – and it is more than time you followed him, I think."

"You have not the courage," says Curufin, his eyes very bright, "you will not do it."

"Will you try to fight me, then?" Amras asks softly. He nods at the burn on Curufin's hand. "I do not think you will get very far, with that."

Curufin is silent.

"Give me a reason," Amras says very slowly, gripping his dagger-hilt. "One reason only that I should spare you." He meets Celebrimbor's gaze again. "Have you too nothing to say in your father's defence, Tyelpë?"

"Have you not heard?" says Curufin, lifting his chin. "I am not his father any more, he claims."

"I am glad to hear one person in this family has sense, at least," Amras says. He comes to stand before Curufin, who watches him through slitted eyes, and does not move, even when Amras rests the tip of his dagger very lightly at the base of his throat.

"Not a word more to spare yourself, Curvo?" Amras says softly. "I thought your slippery tongue would have more to do in your favour."

Curufin manages, marvellously, to smile. "If only Telvo could have boasted one such tongue," he says, "or Nelyo, for that matter, when he quarrelled with our father about the ships – why, he might not have burned at all."

Not a very witty comeback, thinks Celebrimbor, who has faced the cutting edge of that selfsame tongue more than once. Indeed it seems to him almost as though Curufin is goading Amras deliberately – and even that clumsy jibe seems to have worked, for Amras' eyes are black with rage, and Curufin is still making no move to step away – and then he glances quickly at Celebrimbor and all at once Celebrimbor understands—

Oh, the cowardice of it all! Curufin wants Amras to kill him. He is counting on it, after Celebrimbor's new rejection – thinks it perhaps an honourable ending, as though to scrub out the stains of his ill deeds with his own red life-blood – how much easier, after all, to die simply and tragically than work to fix your own mistakes.

Celebrimbor has always understood his father far better than he wanted to.

He is so angry that he is tempted, for a moment, to say nothing – let Curufin meet his end here at his own brother's hands, it is no more than he deserves – but then he cannot bear either to think of Curufin getting what he wants one last time.

"Stop," he says clearly. "Uncle, stop."

Amras does not seem at first to hear him; he presses the dagger against Curufin's throat again, drawing a bright little bead of blood, and smiles icily.

Curufin's eyes are closed.

"Stop," Celebrimbor says again, and he comes forward to put his hand on Amras' arm, and draws it away from Curufin's throat.

It takes Amras a moment to register that his blade has been moved. He blinks dazedly at his hand, and then at Celebrimbor, and then says slowly, "So you are your father's son after all, I see? He will not love you better for it, you know."

"I care not whether he loves me," Celebrimbor says coldly. "Only that I will not stand by and watch a Kinslaying take place before my very eyes. You ought to want better for yourself, uncle."

Amras smiles again, a flash of teeth. "So you set yourself up as the best of us!" he says. "You forget, Tyelpë, that the House of Fëanor has never had much compunction in spilling its own blood."

Curufin has opened his eyes. He is gaping at Celebrimbor in unbridled awe, his eyes very bright.

Celebrimbor manages a laugh. "For all your disdain, uncle, it seems yet to matter a great deal to you that you belong to that selfsame House."

Amras lifts his chin proudly, stung.

"Tyelpë," Curufin breathes, his voice shaky. "Tyelpë – I knew you did care—"

Don't, Celebrimbor wants to say, disgusted, don't thank me, don't even look at me, I wish you had died after all— But he cannot quite manage the words.

As he is trying best to formulate some scathing remark – wrapping together contempt and anger and exasperation all at once – he hears a voice calling for him through the trees.

"Tyelpë? Tyelpë, is all well?"

"Who is that?" Curufin asks swiftly.

Celebrimbor cannot move.

"There you are, cousin," Finduilas says cheerfully, coming into the clearing, and then she stops short.

Meanwhile in Dor-lómin:

Lúthien is wandering listlessly through the fields.

Departing her father's realm was a relief, but still she cannot deny that this land – which she once looked to with such girlish enthusiasm – can never truly be a home for her.

Beren, at least, is happier here than he had been in Doriath. He speaks little and smiles less, but there is at least now no fine line of strain between his eyes.

Is this what I died for? Lúthien wonders. Is this all that I could ever have hoped for?

In the distance she sees a stooped figure making her way back up to the great house from the well.

Morwen has serving-women to carry her buckets for her, Lúthien knows. She imagines it is some stubborn impulse that has driven her today to fetch her water herself, even now that her belly is beginning to weigh her down, and resolves to do nothing.

Morwen has made it clear enough, time and again, that she does not want Lúthien's help.

Still that reasoning cannot sway her when she sees the other woman stop suddenly, swaying under her burden, and then crumple to her knees.

Lúthien cries out and is by Morwen's side in a moment. "Are you well? I can fetch one of your women – or Rían if you would prefer—"

But Morwen looks more winded than truly hurt. "No," she gasps out, struggling back to her feet. "And especially not Rían, do not trouble her." She stoops to pick up the bucket again.

"I doubt very much she would consider it any trouble," Lúthien says lowly, "to care for one whom she loves."

Morwen merely looks silently at her, and does not answer. She grasps the handle of the bucket and a tiny wince flashes across her face, so swiftly that no mortal vision could have caught it.

"At least allow me to help you with that," Lúthien says, unhappily conscious that she is overstepping; but to her relief Morwen says nothing, and inclines her head with what might be gratitude.

The bucket is weightier than Lúthien was expecting. Her limbs have been heavy these past few days, as though some of the treacly stillness of Doriath's air yet clings to her in the chilly north.

But she manages a smile and sets her course up to Morwen's house.

Morwen rarely feels any inclination to fill a silence. Lúthien had forgotten that in the weeks since she last spoke with the other woman; now her lips keep twitching, stirred by impulses alternately to comment inanely on the weather or to ask, Did I really make you hate me so much that even Beren your cousin is not welcome in your house?

"I do not hate you," Morwen says quietly, with one of those strange flashes of not-quite-mortal insight. "Think you I of all people have no pity in my heart for those exiles of Beleriand, without even a hearth to name their own? I wished you and Beren only good when first you came here. But there is no use in trying to make a barren land bear fruit."

"No land is truly barren," Lúthien breathes. "I cannot be made to believe so."

Morwen gives her a look she cannot quite decipher. "Perhaps not."

"Beren deserves a home, after all he has suffered," Lúthien says. "And I may not rest until I have found him one."

"It is not here," Morwen says bluntly. "You know that. So what are you going to do?"

Again that impossible heaviness deep within Lúthien, an ache blooming at the base of her spine. "I don't know," she says (although she does).

Morwen gives her a level, assessing look. "You will have to decide soon," she says, cryptic again.

They have reached her house. She takes the bucket back from Lúthien and says, all politeness, "I thank you for your kind assistance," and then goes in.

Back in Doriath:

Finduilas is pale, but she keeps her composure admirably, casting Celebrimbor naught but one nervous glance.

Celebrimbor brushes his mind against hers, a fumbling attempt at reassurance, but he knows not what to say. It's all right? Run?

"Who is that?" asks Amras, who does not often leave Amon Ereb, has no interest in feasts and gatherings, and likely last saw Finduilas as a babe in arms.

"Orodreth's daughter," Curufin says slowly. He glances at Celebrimbor. "So you have kept up a friendship with your cousin, I see, Tyelpë. What is she doing here?"

"As if I am likely to tell you that," Celebrimbor says sharply, his hand going to his sword-hilt. "If you have any sense at all you will leave without sparing her another glance – both of you."

Amras bristles. "Think you to tar me with the same brush as your father? I have no record of abducting maidens in the woods."

At the same moment Curufin says, "She comes from within the Girdle, does she not?"

Finduilas has been listening to the back-and-forth Quenya with an uncomprehending frown. Now she bursts out, "Kinsmen, some may consider it discourteous, to guard your thoughts in a tongue not all present can follow."

Amras looks puzzled. "A princess of the Noldor has no knowledge of the language of her own people?"

"It was never spoken in Felagund's halls," Curufin says in Quenya, with a shrug. "The girl ought to have applied herself to studying it if she wished to eavesdrop on the conversations of her elders."

"It is a tongue best-suited to treachery," Celebrimbor says in icy Sindarin, "and you will not hear another word of it out of my mouth."

Curufin's face goes very rapidly from white to red to even whiter, which is what Celebrimbor was hoping his words achieve. The satisfaction is hollow even so, tempered as it is by unease.

Curufin is so inconveniently clever sometimes.

Case in point: he turns to Finduilas with a smile that attempts at avuncularity, and says, "So you were visiting the halls of Thingol, little niece? I did not know that Nargothrond yet maintained relations with the Dark-elf."

Finduilas regards him with unalloyed suspicion, but, remembering her failure, she cannot quite school her expression in time. "It does not," she says, trying to be terse.

"Finduilas," Celebrimbor says quietly, but the rest of the warning freezes at his lips.

"And yet you leave Menegroth alone, not escorted by any armed Iathren force," Curufin observes. "Your uncle yet remembers your kinship, I'll wager."

"Bold indeed for you to speak to me of kinship," Finduilas retorts. "I have nothing to say to you."

"No, indeed," Curufin says softly, reverting to Quenya. "But there is something you could bring me even so."

Amras looks at him with narrowed eyes. "Speak plainly, if you will."

"Do not dare," Celebrimbor says in Sindarin, gritting his teeth.

But Curufin smiles and says, "Thingol of Doriath wrested our father's Silmaril from Káno's very hands as he slept. Perhaps our little niece here will help right that injustice."

Finduilas, catching the word Silmaril in amongst the blur of Quenya, purses her lips. "I have no part in your foolish Oath," she says, "and will offer you no help in it. Do not presume to ask it of me."

"I am not asking," Curufin breathes.

Amras, behind him, has shifted the banked hungry fire of his gaze to Finduilas, too.

Celebrimbor steps in front of her and draws his sword again. "By treason of kin unto kin shall you be hindered," he says quietly. "Mandos spoke truly: I will slay you if you touch her."

"You would not," Curufin says, "mere minutes after sparing me. In truth you do know from where your own blood springs, Tyelpë."

"Is it true?" Amras asks urgently. "Does Thingol yet allow those of the House of Arafinwë past the Girdle?"

The indignity of it, thinks Finduilas with a flash of fury, to be turned away in disgrace from Thingol's halls only for the sons of Fëanor now to see the value in the connection!

"I do not run and fetch on your command," she says, moving to stand by Celebrimbor's side again. "There is nothing that will compel me to steal from my uncle for the sake of a usurper and a murderer."

"Nothing?" asks Amras, wetting his lips a little. He casts a glance, almost imperceptibly swift, at his nephew.

Celebrimbor laughs. "Here, then, is all your righteous outrage!" he cries. "What difference, in the end, between a father who would slay his son and an uncle who would slay his nephew? How swiftly the mask falls, when a Silmaril comes into play once more. But I say to you now that you will never lay a hand on the one in Thingol's halls, either of you."

"Tyelpë," Curufin says, his voice low, "be reasonable—"

"Is it reason that moves you now?" Celebrimbor demands. "Scarce hours ago you were doing all that was in your power to convince me you had changed, and I ought to forgive you – forgive you, as though I am the one you wronged! But one breath of a mention of the damned Silmarils and your true nature comes through in an instant." He casts a disgusted look at Amras. "You are all the same, every one of you, for all your high-minded speeches about justice and shamelessness—"

"Do not speak of that you do not understand," Amras hisses. "I am nothing like your father."

"I have no father," Celebrimbor declares, his eyes bright. "And yet you bear more than a passing resemblance to this pitiful creature before me. Do you claim now that to abduct a maiden in the woods is so very far below you?" He glances at Finduilas, pointedly. "Or else to spill the blood of your own kin, after the threats you have made today? No, uncle, if you are true-hearted in your quest for vengeance you will turn your blade first of all upon yourself – and until then know that you carry on the House of Fëanor's fine tradition of hypocrisy perfectly well."

"Tyelpë," Curufin breathes.

"Come, cousin," Celebrimbor says firmly, taking Finduilas' hand in his. "With luck we will run into one of your father's search parties sooner or later, and then you will be home safe again."

"But will you?" Curufin asks.

Celebrimbor meets his eyes. "Better than I would anywhere else," he says. He pauses, and then adds, "I really might have given you a chance, you know."

Curufin looks after him, silenced, as he leads Finduilas away to where she left her mount.

[his own horse was um. well there were a lot of wolves ok. sadly it is no longer true that no horses were harmed in the making of this fic]

"We can still go after them," Amras says.

"He was right about you, you know," Curufin says wearily.

"He was right about you," Amras counters.

As a child Amras never really squabbled. He and Amrod were so perfectly wrapped up in each other that they had very little inclination for quarrelling with their elder brothers, even Curufin who was not quite out of adolescence when they were born.

Strange now to hear his bickering, and stranger still when it falls so dreadfully flat.

"What now, then?" Curufin asks.

He supposes Amras might still decide to kill him, without Celebrimbor to stay his hand.

Without, without, without – it is over, he is gone for good, another casualty on Curufin's endless blundering trail of destruction—

But his brother shrugs.

"You will see me again," Curufin says in a low voice. "Whatever you proclaim. All five of us living are bound by ties deeper than blood."

"Think you I do not regret that daily?" Amras asks. "Were it not for your foolish scheming the Oath would not be burning in my blood each dawn when I awake. Were it not for our father and his madness Telvo would have at the very least died free."

Despite himself Curufin bristles. "Do not."

"All right, Curvo," Amras says flatly. He manages a wan half-smile, very different from the sharp glinting grin he wore upon first coming across them. "See you then." And he saddles up his mare again and makes ready to leave.

"That's it?" Curufin asks dully. And then, because Amras' icy fury was the most alive he has felt in many months, "I knew you had not the courage to slay me."

"You could call it that," Amras says, without turning to look at him. "Farewell, Curvo."

He is gone before Curufin can think of a response.

For a long moment he stands frozen in the empty clearing, wanting to shout, wanting to beg, Do not turn your back on me now—

He is still there when the call comes.

Meanwhile in Dorthonion:

"I have been thinking, Maitimo," says Sauron, coming suddenly into the cave after days – weeks, perhaps – of darkness.

No games today, at least. There is that to be thankful for. He wears his usual guise, fair-haired and flame-eyed, robed all in white.

Maedhros blinks at him, and says nothing.

(He could not speak even if he wished to – his mouth is bone-dry, his throat parched and stinging.)

Sauron kneels before him, caresses his forehead with burning fingers. "My poor sweet one," he says, his voice tinged with regret. "I would not have to keep you bound were you only a little more – stable."

You made me so, Maedhros wants to cry out. It is good, in a way, that his thirst has gagged him so: he does not want to give Sauron the satisfaction of an answer.

It will not last for ever; soon enough Sauron will grow bored with this dull-eyed silence, he knows.

"But answer me this, Maitimo," Sauron says, his voice soft and thoughtful, "your conscience held you back when last you entered Menegroth, did it not? What makes you so very certain that you will have the mettle to take the Silmaril from Thingol this time?"

It is not that any of this will have occurred to him just now, Maedhros knows. Likely all these arguments and counter-arguments were clear to him in the moment they first struck their bargain; and now, while they wait for Morgoth's answer and the Silmaril from Angband, the Silmaril Maedhros will not be able to touch, Sauron seeks to amusing himself by toying with him.

Well, he will keep his silence.

Sauron shifts so that all his weight – and he can make himself impossibly heavy for all that his form is so slender, as though the mass of all the rocks in the cavern is concentrated in him – rests upon one of Maedhros' shattered legs. "I asked you a question, Maitimo."

His breath on Maedhros' lips is hot and dry, like a desert wind.

O for the gift of Míriel, for her endless, peaceful slumber!

But Maedhros spent long enough yearning for death on the mountain to know it cannot be that easy.

He takes his tongue between his teeth and bites down hard, hard enough that his mouth is filled with hot metallic blood and he can at last wet his lips a little.

"What answer will satisfy you?" he manages to rasp. "That I have faith in myself, or that I do not? Your decision is made either way."

"Still I wish to know," Sauron says silkily. He cups Maedhros' cheek with one hand, and Maedhros leans into the touch despite himself. "You ask me to depend upon you a great deal."

He should not play the game. He should hold his tongue and take whatever beating Sauron metes out in response; it will make no difference either way, the Silmaril is coming regardless.

But Maedhros does so like to be clever.

"Depend instead upon my Oath," he says, "for it compels me to deal death to him who witholds a Silmaril from me. Thingol has bound himself to his fate."

"And yet you walked away from Menegroth, leaving a Silmaril in his power," Sauron points out. "That is not the behaviour of one driven solely by his Oath to reclaim the jewels."

"It was in my brother's possession when I left Thingol's halls in search of the other," Maedhros says. This much at least is true – though he does not like to speak of Maglor in Sauron's presence, does not like to remember that they two both exist in the selfsame world. "I was foolish enough to trust that he would not surrender it. I will not make the same mistake twice." There, that is scorn enough in his voice to fool anyone.

"And yet you trust him now to hold the one in Barad Eithel," Sauron muses. "Do you not claim the jewel for your own, Fëanor's eldest son? You were unkind enough to shine it in my eyes on the battlefield."

"He will guard it with care," says Maedhros, "and it is his by right as much as mine – more, even, for he suffered for it during the fall of Himring, and besides—" He pauses.

Sauron leans in and presses his hot lips to Maedhros', licking clean the last droplets of blood clinging to his cracked skin.

"Besides?" he prompts.

Bile rises in Maedhros' throat. He shudders, but Sauron holds his jaw closed tight, forcing him to swallow it rather than retch.

"I'm waiting, Maitimo," Sauron says softly.

Maedhros spits blood in his face, which seems only to amuse him. "Besides he is better than you," he hisses, "and better than me, and it will never burn him as long as he lives—"

The pressure on his leg vanishes abruptly, leaving him oddly light-headed.

"So it will burn you, my sweet?" Sauron says softly.

His voice now comes from far above Maedhros' head. He tries to tilt his head back to see – long experience has taught him to keep his eyes on Sauron as much as possible – but the cold wall of the cave arrests his motion.

"You and I were always more alike than you wished to admit, my little liar," Sauron murmurs. He reaches down to tousle Maedhros' matted hair. "You will never be able to pass through the Girdle, will you, Silmaril or not? Well, then."

"Are you going to kill me, now?" Maedhros asks, the faint flicker of what may be relief in his chest. "I can be of no use to you after all."

"I keep my promises, Maitimo," Sauron says briskly, "even to those as faithless as you." And with a swish of his robes he is gone.

That is a bad thing – he is sure that is a bad thing – what was it Sauron promised?

But he is so, so tired, and he cannot remember, and now that Sauron is gone he is alone once more with his thoughts, and all he wants to do is sleep until the breaking of the world.

But he cannot – just yet. For Maglor's sake.

For the first time since he came here he opens up his mind, just the tiniest of cracks, and reaches out.

Are you there? I need help.

(to be continued)

the fairest stars: post vii

Yet more of the "Beren and Lúthien steal two Silmarils" AU! Masterpost with links to all previous parts on tumblr and AO3 here.

Part 35: on stories, and the ways they repeat themselves.

Finrod goes to Mandos' throne room, and kneels – such as it is – in supplication before the Vala.

"Son of Arafinwë," says Mandos. "Having turned down our boon, have you come to ask another?"

"Not for myself," says Finrod. "But for my cousin."

"Whatever vow you have made," says Mandos, "Turkafinwë Fëanárion is not ready to be released from my Halls, even were he willing."

"Not – not Celegorm," says Finrod, "but Amrod his brother. Has no judgement been passed on him? It is many centuries now since he burned to death at his father's hands."

"The judgement was passed," says Mandos, "when he swore his Oath, and bound himself to violence. No one compelled by such a force can be released into the peace of Aman."

"But he regretted it," Finrod argues. "He meant to turn back as my own father did, and beg pardon of the Valar. He would be free of it, if he could."

"But he is not," says Mandos, implacable.

Finrod is good, and pious, and faithful. Finrod is not going to lose his temper with a Vala.

"Is there no pity in these Halls?" he asks. "Is there no way to set him free of a bond he does not want?"

"Lúthien your cousin asked a similar thing when she came before me," Mandos says. "And I will tell you what I told her: it is beyond my power to undo an Oath sworn in the name of the All-father. The Valar are not gaolers, child. Telufinwë's chains were of his own making."

"It wasn't his fault," Finrod says tightly, "it was his father who bound him—"

"I cannot give you what you want," Mandos says, interrupting him.

"Then pass the boon you have given me onto him," Finrod says; "transfer it away from me, I do not want it. Grant him his release, he has lingered here long enough."

"That is not how it works," Mandos says. "You are free to leave these Halls whenever you desire. It is not my way to retract mercy once it has been offered."

Do you call this mercy? Finrod does not say. He takes his leave instead.

“You did not need to do that,” Amrod says, when he returns.

Finrod is in no mood for Fëanorian self-pity. “Do you want to rot here forever, then?” he asks sharply.

“So it was decreed,” Amrod says, “and I told you already that I never expected any mercy for myself.”

“Yet you would have me extend it to your brother,” Finrod says.

“That,” says Amrod, “is not precisely what I said.” He makes some spirit-approximation of a shrug. “You know Tyelko as he is now better than I do. Is he past saving? Perhaps. But it is for your own sake that you are trying anyway, I think.”

“But if even you are condemned to remain here forever—” Finrod says, unable to keep himself from bitterness.

“I’ve killed people, Ingoldo,” Amrod reminds him. “Three of them, in fact.” He shudders briefly. “Why me? Why Tyelko, for that matter? There are many worthier souls in these Halls to demand your attention. After the Dagor Bragollach the Exiles came pouring in here in their thousands, and every one of them lies under the Doom of Mandos – all except for you. You could be pleading for any one of them, instead of your Kinslaying cousins, who are anyway bound by a greater chain.”

“Because,” Finrod says, irritable, “chains can be broken. And I cannot bear to see you deny that, again and again – you as well as your brother! Forever need not always mean forever. There are brighter things in store for you, for all of us, than to mourn here for eternity in the dark. Valar help me, I did not fully realise it, until Lúthien showed me it was so – and yet—” He stops suddenly.

Amrod looks at him with sympathy. "It is not only us you are angry with," he says.

"I do not want to be angry at all," Finrod says wearily. "I want to find a way out, I want to believe that there is hope for all of us – for you and me and your brother and my Ten and those we lost on the Ice and all the doomed and damned and grieving Noldor – can it be so? Or is it always the same story over and over again, all of us trapped in our roles until the end of the time? The Ainulindalë had space in it for new themes, did it not? So why must we condemn ourselves over-hastily, name these chains unbreakable for ever?"

"Perhaps they are," says Amrod, "for the rest of us, if not for you."

"I do not believe that any more," says Finrod. "And I am going to speak to my brother."

Back in Middle-earth:

Finduilas and Celebrimbor have ridden swiftly, their journey uneventful. They are coming now to the borders of the Girdle of Melian.

Finduilas smiles at Celebrimbor, more bravely than she really feels. "This is where we part ways."

To her eyes the Girdle is clearly visible, a sharply demarcated shimmering in the air, whereas all Celebrimbor can make out is a blurred sort of wrongness, as though the world itself is bending around Doriath's border.

"It isn't too late to change your mind," Celebrimbor tells her. "We can go back to Nargothrond, we can tell your father we only got lost in the mists—"

"It has been too late for that for a long time," Finduilas says, decisive. She smiles again. "Don't fret, Tyelpë! The worst Thingol can do to me is speak harshly. I am not the one in danger."

"I will be fine," Celebrimbor tells her. "It is the northern stretch of the Girdle where danger lies thick." He thinks of the desperate flight from Himlad after the Dagor Bragollach, and shivers a little. "You had better not tell Thingol that I am here, not after what my – my father tried."

"You aren't your father, Tyelpë," Finduilas says softly. She leans over to kiss his cheek. "Take heart! With any luck my errand will not be a long one, and we will have an escort of Iathren marchwardens to take us home."

Celebrimbor thinks that is overly optimistic, but he only says, "I will be here when you return – and good luck, coz."

He watches as she rides away from him, through the Girdle and then into the darkness of whatever lies beyond it.

It is a perfectly nice clearing they have chosen for their meeting-place, and he spends some time the next day setting up camp; then he gets bored, and invents a better mechanism for collecting rainwater for drinking, and then makes himself a makeshift chemistry lab out of the weird plants growing near the Girdle; and then he carves every fallen stick in a mile's radius into a miniature wooden animal, and ends up with a host of Eagles and an army of bears and No Dogs At All; and then and then and then

He's really bored tbh.

In Barad Eithel:

One thing about Maglor is that he needs a Job or he will go a little mad.

He is like Maedhros in that, Fingon reflects, and tries not to indulge the stab of the thought.

Unfair, to blame unhappy Maglor for not being his brother, for not having Maedhros' smile and Maedhros' bright thoughtful eyes and Maedhros' commanding presence—

Anyway: usually this does not pose much of an issue, because Maglor has made Maedhros his Job and attends to him both capably and contentedly.

Now, on the other hand, he is restless, and when Maglor is restless he hovers.

Fingon does not mind this most of the time. He likes his cousin's company, despite everything, and also Maglor is a better and more sensible advisor than most would give him credit for.

But there is really not that much for him to do today, and he is maybe driving Fingon a little crazy.

"Makalaurë," he says, "you might go down to the armoury."

Maglor smiles drily at him. "Trying to get rid of me?"

"No," Fingon lies, "only it occurred to me that you are certainly the most skilled person here at testing the metal for minute flaws – the same way you use its resonance in swordplay. And it would be good to make sure everything is in good shape while Morgoth seems to be unwiling to attack again."

“You are trying to get rid of me,” says Maglor, not really offended.

An hour later finds him in the armoury, sorting swords that need mending from those whose metal sings cleanly; he is so absorbed in the work that he does not at first notice there is someone else in the room, until Maeglin comes to stand before him.

“I did not know you had any interest in metalwork,” Maeglin says, in lieu of any other greeting.

“Not particularly,” Maglor says mildly, “but my father was the greatest smith of the Noldor, even so.”

Maeglin’s expression seems to imply that he intends to change that.

Maglor decides he might as well try to be friendly. “We have spoken little since you came to Barad Eithel,” he says; “forgive me, I have been too absorbed in my own affairs to greet you with the courtesy due so close a kinsman. But I am glad to meet Írissë’s son at last.”

Maeglin says, “Were you close to my mother?”

“Not as much as my younger brothers,” Maglor admits, “but even so I thought her fearless, and kind, and never reluctant to speak her own mind.”

“She was different,” Maeglin says in a low voice, “when I knew her.”

Maybe it would be good to change the subject.

"How well do you like Barad Eithel?" Maglor asks. "You have made friends among the lords of the Noldor already, I am glad to see."

Maeglin is looking at him guardedly. "Everyone has been very kind," he says, his voice neutral. "Although my uncle has had less time for me than I hoped."

Maglor bites his lip. "He has much to trouble him at present, too," he says, as evenly as he can. "But you should know he speaks highly of you."

"I am glad to hear it," Maeglin says. He looks at Maglor in silence for a little while, and then says, "You are close in his counsel, I think."

Maglor is kind of regretting his decision to be friendly.

"We have been friends for a long time," is all he says.

"But not as close as he was to your brother," Maeglin says, watching Maglor very carefully as he speaks.

"You were on the field after the battle," Maglor says, trying to keep his patience. "I think you already know the answer to that."

"Forgive me," Maeglin says then, and flashes Maglor a quick rueful smile. "You are all names I have only ever heard in half-complete stories. There is a great deal I must learn. And nobody had ever told me that the High King was wed to his cousin."

"They are not wed," Maglor says automatically, Maedhros' customary rebuttal; then he wonders why he is still making Maedhros' arguments for him, still playing the lieutenant when the war is long since over, and the weight of his loss seizes him around the throat anew.

Belatedly he realises Maeglin is speaking. "Turgon my uncle was not happy to learn of it," he says. "But perhaps it does not matter so much now, since your brother is – well." He has the grace to look vaguely sympathetic, at least. "Some of the other lords are beginning to say that it would be wise for the King to take a wife, now that he is free of any other attachment. But that seems to me unkind."

"Unkind," Maglor asks, "or just contrary to your own hopes, which rather depend on his remaining unwed and heirless?" He raises an eyebrow.

Maeglin tenses. Maglor's eyes rest on him the way Idril's used to, as though seeing some ugly nub inside him, invisible to Maeglin himself.

Maeglin does not want to think about Idril.

"I have told them it would be cruel," he says, "to raise the matter to him while he has so many troubles."

"I see," Maglor says, and some of the pressure of his gaze relents. "Since they seem to listen to you, you might tell them that Fingon loves my brother, and is not so faithless as to waver in his affection now." He manages the flicker of a smile. "Or perhaps it would be wisest if you do not say that: they might like you less, then, after all."

"You are determined to mistrust me, I see," Maeglin says stiffly. "Strange, when half the court thinks you a spy for the Enemy, and your brother his puppet."

"Those accusations," Maglor says, "are older than you by many centuries, and have lost much of their sting. I am not a spy, and Fingon knows that. But you mistake me, Maeglin. I am not determined to mistrust you. I am only worried – for you, not just because of you." He looks directly at Maeglin again. "You are very lonely, I think."

Maeglin lifts his chin. "I am perfectly content," he says, his voice clipped, "and have very little need for your concern, thank you."

Maglor decides to take a risk. "You are not the only one," he says softly, "who knows what it is to drag the weight of a father's madness behind you. I too understand a little of that grief – it is a heavy thing, and solitary. But I am here if you wish to share some of the burden."

But Maeglin bristles. "What do you know of my burdens and my griefs?" he asks, scornful. "Spare me your pity, please. I do not need it – least of all from one cast so low as you. What now is the House of Fëanor but a set of traitors and invalids, clinging to glory they have long-since lost? In truth I think you envy me – envy that the High King trusts me, and gives me duties the likes of which you cannot imagine."

Maglor cannot stifle a laugh at this speech. "Yes," he says, "that must be it."

Maeglin glares at him and then storms out.

"At least you tried," Fingon says later, when Maglor relates the story.

(Some of it, at least. He does not think Fingon will take kindly to hearing about the speculation on his taking a wife; and Fingon is already rather too prone to lashing out at his lords at the moment.)

"You ought to spend more time with him," is all he says. "For your sake as much as his. He is rather too invested in who shall be named your heir, I think."

Fingon smiles drily. "Well, at least someone is looking to the matter of the succession," he says; and when Maglor gives him a Look, he throws his hands in the air and adds, "he's barely out of childhood, Makalaurë! Do you really think he's sneaking about plotting to poison me in my bed? My brother trusted him, clearly."

"Everyone trusted Curvo, too," Maglor mutters, "and look where that got us."

But when Fingon glances sharply at him he subsides. He does not have the appetite to argue with Fingon.

Fingon changes the subject. "I have not heard you speak so of your father before," he says quietly.

Maglor's ears twitch uncomfortably. "How unthinkingly we bound ourselves," he says, "gave up our freedom and our will and our innocence because he asked it of us – and how could we ever do otherwise? He was our father and we would have done anything for him." He draws a shaky breath.

Fingon has his own complicated feelings about his father, but he is simply Not Engaging With Them. "He has been dead a long time, Makalaurë," he says after a moment.

"I know!" Maglor says, bitterly. "I know: and we are still not free. I am tired of it."

Maedhros' name hovers in the air between them. Neither of them speaks it.

"You know my thoughts on your Oath," Fingon murmurs instead. "Chains can be broken, Makalaurë. Just because you have done evil before does not mean you are obliged to do it again." He gives Maglor a sympathetic look. "I am a Kinslayer too, you know."

"Did you tell Nelyo that?" Maglor asks, breaking their unspoken pact, and Fingon flinches.

[this is known as failing the Maedhros Bechdel Test]

After a moment, Maglor says, "I used to think – to hope, even – that maybe you were right, that Lúthien was right to tell me I need not lament forever. But here we are! Five hundred years have passed and the Oath still binds us tightly as ever it did, and he is gone, it has taken him from me once more – must it always be the same story over and over again? Shall I never be singing anything but the Noldolantë – must its themes echo through time for ever? I am tired, Finno."

"I know," says Fingon, "I know," and he puts his arms around Maglor, and Maglor leans shivering into the embrace, but it is not enough.

In Doriath:

Finduilas' entry into Menegroth has gone smoothly, and she is privately beginning to believe that Celebrimbor's fearmongering was just that.

Nobody has stopped her on recognising her (for she came here often, with her father, in the peaceful days of her youth before the Sudden Flame).

Nor does Thingol turn her away when she goes formally to her knees before him in his great throne room, and says, "I have come as an ambassador from Nargothrond, in the name of Orodreth my father."

"Little niece," says Thingol, with a flicker of humour at the corners of his mouth, "strange are the days when you whom I dandled on my knee not so many years ago now come to treat with me as a foreign king. But you will always be welcome in Menegroth, child."

Finduilas beams at him, and feels her confidence wax – until she hears footsteps behind her, which halt abruptly.

"What's this?" Lúthien asks sharply.

Finduilas spins around to face her.

Lúthien looks – good. Flourishing, even. Mortality suits her, adds some shimmering quality of transience to her loveliness, as if some light beyond the circles of this world is already shining through her skin.

A far cry from how she was when Finduilas last saw her, her face blotchy with tears, her nails ragged and torn – help me, cousin, please, let me out—

"Cousin," Finduilas says, summoning up a smile. "I am glad to see you again."

Lúthien ignores the greeting, looking past her to Thingol. "What is the meaning of this, Father?" she demands. "Why have you allowed her past the Girdle?"

Thingol looks troubled. He does not think he has ever seen Lúthien speak with such untempered anger. "The kin of Olwë my brother have always been welcome here, Lúthien," he says.

"Kin," Lúthien repeats. She looks at Finduilas now, her eyes hard. "That is one word for the way they treated me, certainly."

"I am sorry, cousin," Finduilas breathes. "I did not look to find you here, or else I would have come prepared with some gift of apology for you: but it is for that reason that I have come to plead Nargothrond's case with your father, because I am ashamed of how things happened, we are all ashamed – and my father has cast the sons of Fëanor out of the city—"

"I know that," says Lúthien, "they tried to kill me after he did so, you know."

Finduilas bites her lip. This is not going at all how she pictured it.

Lúthien makes a disgusted sound. "I can't do this," she says, and turns to her father again. "Either she leaves or I do," she says; "you know ultimatums are not my habit, Father, but I will not dwell under the same roof as she again."

She walks out.

Once she is gone Finduilas falls to her knees again. "Uncle," she says, "uncle, please. I have come for the sake of both our realms – please, give me another chance."

Thingol's eyes are colder now. "It is not my intention," he says, "to go against my daughter's wishes again."

"Let me make it right with her," Finduilas pleads, "she has every right to be angry, but I would see our old friendship renewed, if I can."

Thingol hesitates a moment, and Finduilas holds her breath. If he turns her away now, it will all have been in vain—

But at last he nods, and Finduilas is directed to Lúthien's favourite haunt, a clearing aboveground (for Lúthien above all other Elves cannot bear to be caged out of sight of the sky).

She stiffens when Finduilas comes across her. "Still here?"

"I know you are angry," Finduilas says, in a low voice, "and I have come to apologise. I should have protested harder when Celegorm sought to imprison you – I should have found some way to set you free – forgive me, cousin. It was not what I wanted: and I was not brave enough to speak against them."

Lúthien makes no indication that she accepts the apology. "Why have you come here, Finduilas?" she asks. "You were never the sort to pay much attention to politics."

Finduilas chews at her lip. "Nargothrond is weakened," she admits. "My father does his best, but after what the sons of Fëanor did – our unity is failing. Nor is he willing to ally with the High King in the north. I would not have us lose all the friends we once had."

"The friends you had," Lúthien says casually, "when Finrod was your King."

Finduilas does not want to agree, does not want to acknowledge that her father is not the king his brother was. But perhaps her silence is agreement enough.

"So you are here to win back Doriath's might," Lúthien muses, "afraid, perhaps, of the prospect of it mustered against you."

Finduilas feels hot with embarassment. "No – no, you mistake me, cousin," she says. "I want to make things right. Nargothrond grieves what was done to you."

"Nargothrond," Lúthien says, her voice now very sharp, "was complicit in it, every single one of you who were too afraid to do what you knew you be right, too cowed by the sons of Fëanor of all people – two cowards who were bested by Beren and a dog, a dog who had more courage in his heart than your whole rotten city put together—" She draws a furious breath.

Finduilas blinks back tears. "I am ashamed of it," she says unhappily.

"But you still do not think you are really to blame," Lúthien says. "Dear little Finduilas, o best-loved niece and least-noticed daughter, the last princess of the Noldor: who could ever fault you for anything? Why do you think my father allowed you to stay? He too holds you blameless in all Nargothrond's failings, naught but a pretty spectator." She looks coldly at Finduilas. "I do not. You should have done better. You should have helped me." She pauses, as if gathering her strength for the blow, and then adds, "Finrod would have lived, had you helped me."

Finduilas draws a breath.

"I was only hours too late for him," Lúthien says, very softly, her eyes distant. "Had I come sooner, he would have been saved." She shudders, and then looks at Finduilas again. "So do not speak to me now of Nargothrond's troubles. They are of their own making."

Finduilas' eyes are stinging again. "Tales are told of your friendship with the eldest sons of Fëanor," she says angrily, "and yet you will not spare so much as a sliver of pity for your own kin?"

Lúthien shrugs, undeterred by the barb. "Call it selfishness, perhaps," she says. "Darling little cousin, did you think to take me for your model, to come here and win my father's quarter with your smile, and carry home some great boon? Give it up. You are not me."

"Does it mean nothing that I am sorry?" Finduilas cries. "Perhaps I am not brave like you, or clever like you, or so well-favoured by the Valar: but I grieve what was done to you! Does that not count for anything?"

"Not really," says Lúthien; "not until you are willing to realise the part you played in it." She looks at Finduilas then and manages a smile, a real one. "You are part of this world too, coz, a strand of the Great Music just as much as all these great lords and princes. Own it: and once you have done so perhaps we might reach some sort of understanding. But for now there is little I can say to you."

Finduilas walks away at that, and Lúthien manages to exhale.

She was harsh, she knows. Unfair, to blame Finduilas for all Nargothrond's crimes, to think of the blood underneath Lúthien's own ragged fingernails as she clawed desperately at the door and pin it all on her little cousin as though she was Lúthien's sole gaoler.

It was Sauron, Lúthien reminds herself, who killed Finrod.

Still she cannot keep the hot tears of guilt from her eyes.

Back outside the Girdle:

Celebrimbor is still Bored.

He is also quite worried about how angry Orodreth is going to be with him for absconding to Doriath with Finduilas.

It would have been easier, he thinks sometimes, had he left Nargothrond with his father and uncle.

Not better. Not right. But easier, maybe.

If Finrod had lived, if he had been the king Celebrimbor had thrown his allegiance behind, it would have been better received, he is sure.

But he could not have gone with his father either, he reasons to himself. Look what became of Curufin! Nobody even knows where he is; but the stain of his deeds marks all Beleriand yet.

Perhaps Celebrimbor might have stopped him and Celegorm from attacking Beren and Lúthien, had he been there.

Perhaps Huan would have stayed – would have lived, if Celebrimbor had been there.

Easy to fantasise. But Celebrimbor did nothing when he had the chance, did not speak against his father and Celegorm until it was too late to mean anything, left Lúthien sobbing in her lonely gaol instead of working to free her.

Lost in these unhappy musings, he does not at first notice how quiet the forest has grown: but there are no birds singing, suddenly, and the rustle of small mammals through the undergrowth has stilled.

It might be the Girdle, and the strange effects of Melian's magic, Celebrimbor reasons to himself.

Then he hears the growl.

The problem is – for just one crucial moment – his traitorous heart stills – and he thinks, Huan is here, he is come back for me as he always did—

The wolf-pack is lining the clearing by the time he realises his mistake, cutting off his chance of running.

Ah.

Celebrimbor has seen true wolves before, as a child in Valinor.

Once his father took him on a hunting-trip in the wilds near Formenos, just the two of them, and bade him be very quiet when they came to the sparse northern plains; and then he whispered in Celebrimbor's ear, Look! and, looking, Celebrimbor caught sight of an animal nearly bigger than Huan and snow-white all over, with a fine thick tail and a proud snout.

Typical, he thinks now, that Sauron could have perverted even so noble a beast: for the werewolves surrounding him now are mangy and thin, their frames twisted in the same painful way orcs are built, their eyes like dull hungry flames flickering in their heads.

It is not fair, a childish part of him wants to cry out, Tol-in-Gaurhoth was cast down, there should be no wolves roaming these lands now—

But Celebrimbor is a Scientist. He knows better than to trust what he believes over what he sees.

He scales a tree.

The wolves close in around its base, snarling up at him.

No Carcharoths, these, only relics of Sauron's experiments: but that will not matter, when their teeth sink into him.

Everything about you is derivative, some ugly voice seems to whisper to Celebrimbor, its sibilance woven into the wolves' growls; Celegorm your uncle was slain by a greater beast than these poor prototypes, and Finrod Felagund whom you loved at least saved another before they killed him, but you are going to die here, alone and forgotten and unmourned—

Celebrimbor grits his teeth, and ignores it.

He is not going to jump out of the tree to some foolish death. He is going to live forever, and leave a greater mark on the world than that of his father the traitor – he will not end like this—

Besides, Finduilas is expecting him to wait for her.

He leans against the trunk of the tree and settles in for a long night.

By the morning things are rather more dire.

The wolves have not tired; Celebrimbor, on the other hand, is very thirsty, and also growing worried for a new reason.

Finduilas is expecting him to wait for her.

If she comes back to the clearing where she left him, and the wolves decide she is an easier target—

She could perhaps run back to the safety of the Girdle in time – but the wolves are fast, and hungry.

Celebrimbor briefly imagines riding alone back to Nargothrond to inform Orodreth that his daughter is dead.

No: he will have to find a way to drive the wolves away, and quickly, for he does not know how much longer his cousin will be.

He grips his sword-hilt and then hesitates.

There is a pressure on the back of his neck, an oddly disapproving one, as though to say, Don't even think about it, child.

"I am not a child," Celebrimbor says aloud, and the wolves look up at him, snarling as though in agreement.

Finduilas is in danger, Celebrimbor reminds himself, and then he draws his sword and jumps down from his branch.

The wolves are upon him almost instantly. There are many of them, but Celebrimbor is quick, and moreover learned to fight wrestling with Huan long before he was ever given a sword.

He ducks and weaves and rolls, slashing with his sword as best as he can; but then one wolf lands a lucky blow with his claws on his thigh, and another collides with him from behind, sending him sprawling onto the ground—

Celebrimbor closes his eyes, and does not bother to cry out, for nobody will hear him.

Then he has the brief muddled impression of a thud, and sudden pressure on his chest, and then before he can catch his breath or work out what is going on the weight on his legs is lifted, and someone is snapping at him, "Get up, Tyelpë!" and his sword is suddenly back in his hand—

Celebrimbor knows that voice. He scrambles to his feet.

Standing before him, currently locked in a struggle with one of the last few wolves, dishevelled and bloodied but very much alive, is his father.

(to be continued)

#silmarillion #my fic #bullet point fic #the fairest stars #celebrimbor #amras #curufin #luthien #morwen #finduilas #maedhros #sauron #this one was a struggle but let's GO

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