High in the Clean Blue Air - Chapter Forty Seven

[starspray]

Fandom: Tolkien
Rating: T
Characters: Maglor, Elrond, Maedhros, various others
Warnings: References to torture and trauma
Summary: Maglor keeps a promise, and comes to Valinor, only to find the ghosts he thought he'd left behind are alive and waiting for him.
Note: This fic is a sequel to Clear Pebbles of the Rain, which is itself a sequel to Unhappy Into Woe.

Prologue / Previous Chapter / Next Chapter

 

Returning to his grandparents’ house was strange in many painful, uncomfortable ways. It was not exactly the same as he remembered it, of course, but it was similar enough. Furniture had been replaced and walls repainted, new artworks displayed in place of the ones he remembered from his childhood, the roof recently re-tiled, and the floor of the entryway redone long enough ago that it would soon need it again, but still a strange and new pattern to Maglor’s eyes. But it still felt like stepping back in time, especially when Ennalótë burst out of the door to throw her arms around him, crowing in delight before she noticed how different he looked up close. She recovered quickly, and he guessed that his grandfather or uncle had warned her, but her smile still slipped, and she let go of him as though afraid of being too rough, as though he needed to be treated as gently as though he had just come out of Dol Guldur that morning.

Maglor hated it. He didn’t want to be wrapped in cotton wool and coddled. It made him feel as breakable as they all thought he was. 

It was a little better greeting his aunts, his mother’s sister Vanilómë and Linquendil’s wife Mornilótë, and being introduced to the cousins he had never met, Elessúrë’s sisters. Calarustë was a craftswoman, often working closely with Mahtan. Súriellë lived in Tirion, serving as a scribe in Fingolfin’s court. They were both visiting Mahtan and Ennalótë then only by chance, and were delighted to have all of their cousins in one place—a very rare event, even before Maglor had come, Súriellë told him cheerfully as she sat beside him at the dinner table. He liked her immediately; she did not look twice at his face, and treated him exactly as she treated all of his brothers, friendly and warm. 

Elessúrë was not there; he had left directly after speaking to Maglor that afternoon, claiming that his wife was expecting both him and Vindimórë before dinner that evening. 

It was a lively, merry gathering, dampened only by Maglor’s own silence. Everyone seemed to expect Maedhros not to speak much, but Maglor saw both his grandmother and Vanilómë look at him often, clearly expecting him to add a joke or tell an amusing story to follow along whatever the line of conversation was at that moment.

It wasn’t that he couldn’t, in general—it had taken a little time, but before he’d left Imloth Ningloron he’d felt perfectly at ease at Elrond and Celebrían’s table, teasing the twins and Elrond and joking with Glorfindel and Lindir, laughing with Finrod and Galadriel. None of them had stared at him, though. None of them looked into his face and searched for a person who no longer existed. They expected him to be who he was, not who he had been so long ago that the memories felt more like dreams. He had once been joyful and carefree at his grandparents’ table, but he found that the words all stuck in his throat now, let alone the laughter. 

He slipped away as soon as he could after the meal was done, in a moment when no one was looking at him as the table was being cleared and the party was moving to one of the large and cheerful parlors. It was too much to be back in that house where he’d spent so much of his childhood and youth, surrounded by so many unchanged faces—and new ones—and he knew someone would call for music, and no one would understand when he had to refuse. 

Daeron followed soon after. Maglor had retreated to their bedroom, preferring the cozy quiet and the soft golden light of the lamp by the bed even to the starlight outside. “Do you wish to speak of it?” Daeron asked. 

“No. I don’t know.” Maglor leaned his arm against the window where he’d been brooding over his reflection, trying not to imagine what they were all saying about him in his absence, and failing. “I shouldn’t be so unhappy. I did want to see them.” Daeron stepped up behind him, and Maglor turned to face him. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”

“No one like being stared at,” Daeron said. “Was it so bad meeting your cousins?”

“No, but they weren’t even born when I left, except Elessúrë. All they know of me are the stories they have heard, and it’s hard not to exceed those expectations.”

“You mean the stories from Beleriand. I think they have heard more tales than those.” Daeron took his hands. “I’m sorry. I wish there was a way to make it easier for you.”

“You’re here,” Maglor whispered. It was more than he would ever have dared to ask for, and he didn’t have the words for how much it meant. He kissed him, trying to say it that way instead. The house was empty but for them, and they stumbled back onto the bed without worrying about having to be quiet, fumbling at laces and ties and falling into helpless laughter when they tried and failed to undress without having to stop kissing or touching each other. 

By the time Maglor heard the doors downstairs open and close, the the voices of his brothers drifting up the stairs, he was more than half asleep, tangled up under the blankets with Daeron; the moon was not yet up, but the stars were out and bright. Daeron murmured something into his hair and tightened his arms around him. He was warm and the bed was soft; the linens smelled of lavender. Maglor kept his eyes closed; his last thought before sleep claimed him fully was to hope his dreams would be equally peaceful. 

He was not that lucky. He woke in the early hours of the morning, in the dark before dawn, from some nightmare or other; the details vanished upon waking, but he had also forgotten where he was, and in his panic he flailed, the blankets feeling like ropes binding him, and managed to kick Daeron in the shins before he fell out of bed onto the floor, startling Pídhres into a yowl and Leicheg into fleeing under the bed. 

“Maglor?” Daeron pulled the blankets off of him; by that time Maglor had woken fully, and the fear had started to ebb into embarrassment. “It’s all right,” Daeron was saying, as he helped him up off the floor. 

“I hit you,” Maglor said. “I’m sorry—”

“I’m fine, don’t worry. Come back to bed.”

A knock on the door made Maglor start. “Maglor?” It was Celegorm. “What happened?”

Maglor didn’t want to yell through the door, so he got up, wrapping a blanket around himself, and went to open it just enough for Celegorm to see his face. “I’m sorry if I woke—”

“I was awake already. Are you all right?”

“I’m fine.”

“You yelled something.”

Had he? Maglor winced. “I’m sorry.”

Celegorm was frowning at him. His hair was disheveled and he was only half-dressed, and he did not look as though he had been up already—he looked like he had stumbled out of bed at the first sign of trouble, still tense and poised as though ready for danger, for a fight, a look of fear lingering even as he tried to hide it away. “Cáno, what’s wrong?”

“It was just a nightmare. I’m all right, really. I’m sorry.” But as he spoke other doors were opening, and he heard his other brothers starting to ask questions, sounding sleepy and alarmed at once. He heard Nerdanel’s voice, too, from down the hallway. 

Celegorm’s face softened. “Go back to bed,” he said, and added over his shoulder, “It was just Maglor’s cat causing trouble.” He winked at Maglor, and pulled the door shut.

On the bed, Pídhres meowed. Maglor slipped back under the blankets into Daeron’s arms. “What was the dream?” Daeron asked.

“I don’t remember it.” Maglor closed his eyes. “What did I shout?”

“I think I heard the word please,” Daeron said, very softly. 

“No one is going to believe it was my cat.”

“No, but they’ll be kind enough to pretend. I don’t think any of your brothers are strangers to such nightmares.”

He’d had those kinds of dreams before—the ones that woke him screaming. In Rivendell it had not been quite so mortifying; he was not the only one troubled by such things, and the walls were thick enough that even his voice only rarely disturbed anyone else. The walls here, though, not not been built for the same purpose—not that the walls in Imladris had been built with sound in mind, rather than keeping the warmth in during winter and the heat out during summer—and they were much thinner. Maglor should have thought of it before, but it had been such a long time since he’d woken up screaming like that. 

“I’m sorry,” he whispered again. “How hard did I hit you?” If he couldn’t even share a bed with Daeron without—

“Sometime it will be my turn to wake you up like that,” Daeron told him. “Don’t apologize. I might find a bruise on my shin later, but that’s nothing, and you must know by now that I am very good at singing those away.”

“You have such dreams?”

“Sometimes.” Daeron stroked his hair, and pressed kisses over his forehead and his cheeks. “I know well how some memories have teeth and claws. They sink in and never really let go. Time is the only cure, I have found.”

“Your songs help,” Maglor whispered.

“Then I can count on yours, when I have my own restless nights.” Daeron kissed him once more. “Go back to sleep.”

Maglor tried, but he didn’t do more than doze, and when the sun finally rose he gave up on sleep entirely. Daeron had fallen back asleep, so Maglor slipped out of bed carefully and dressed silently. Pídhres and Leicheg followed him out of the room, and he caught Leicheg before she could jump down the first step and go tumbling. 

The kitchen was empty, the house quiet. After he let his animals outside, Maglor tended to the banked fire on the hearth and put a kettle on for tea. The kitchen was unfamiliar and it took him several minutes to locate the cupboard with the jars full of tea leaves, in more than a dozen blends most of which were unfamiliar to him, but at least the ritual of boiling water and spooning out the tea leaves into the pot remained the same, no matter what side of the sea he was on. Maglor sat at the table and let himself slump forward, head in his arms. 

He heard footsteps on the stairs, and so wasn’t startled by the hands that came to rest on his shoulders a moment later. “Want to talk about it?” Caranthir asked. 

“No,” Maglor said into his arms. 

“Want to help make breakfast then? There’s oats and fresh berries and cream. You still like raspberries, don’t you?”

Maglor squeezed his eyes shut. Elrond had asked him that very same question once, the morning after he’d first arrived in Rivendell. Then, he hadn’t been able to recall the taste of them, and when he’d tried the jam it had made him cry. He’d felt ridiculous then, when every little thing seemed to bring him to tears, and still felt ridiculous remembering it. “Yes,” he said, lifting his head. At least he knew what they tasted like, now. “They’re still my favorite.”

They worked quietly, not really speaking except for Maglor to ask where things were kept, and for Caranthir to answer, Caranthir offering Maglor the same sort of wordless companionship Maglor had given him long ago, when Caranthir had come to him when troubled. They finished cooking before anyone else was awake, and took their bowls outside. Huan wandered into the garden from the direction of the river, soaking wet and looking pleased with himself. “You stay back, Huan,” Caranthir said sharply, pointing with his spoon. “It’s too early to smell like wet dog.” Huan woofed, but obliged, vanishing to the other side of the workshop. Maglor heard him shake himself off—and heard someone protest. It seemed he hadn’t been the first one out of bed after all.

“What’s back there?” he asked Caranthir as they sat under the hawthorn tree. Leicheg came over to climb onto Maglor’s lap and sniff at his bowl.

“It’s been a storage shed, but Tyelko and Curvo asked Ammë to turn it into a painting studio,” Caranthir said.

“For who?”

“Nelyo.”

“He paints?” Maglor had learned painting the same time Maedhros had, long ago—it was just one of many things they were taught, in days full of lessons and tutors, from painting to language to mathematics to dance. He didn’t remember Maedhros taking any particular interest in it, and no one had spoken of it lately. Maedhros had never taken particular interest in any one craft, preferring to learn a little bit of everything, flitting from lessons to short-lived apprenticeships like a butterfly between flowers, taking equal joy in all of it. He’d had a small library in the corner of his bedroom in Tirion with such an eclectic selection of books and manuscripts that not even their father had understood his methods of keeping it all organized. Maglor had never been convinced that he had kept it organized. 

“No,” said Caranthir. “He draws—you’ve seen him with his sketchbook? It started as a way of keeping himself busy. Ammë’s idea. He used to burn all his drawings, but I don’t think he’s burned anything from this summer.” He paused for a moment, stirring his oatmeal around the bowl a few times. “The drawings he burned—they were frightening,” he said in a low voice. “He doesn’t know I’ve seen them. Some must have been nightmares, or memories of Angband. I think it helped him though—to put it on paper and then to destroy it.” 

Maglor didn’t ask for details of what the drawings had been. He could guess all too easily. “So why paint now?”

“He said something about it to Curvo at Midsummer, I guess in between convincing him and Tyelko to actually talk to each other like adults instead of either snarling at each other or not speaking at all.”

That sounded like something Maedhros would have done long ago, before Doriath, before Sirion, before he’d been worn down to almost nothing. Herding feuding brothers back together was not something he would have been capable of after all that. Maglor himself had barely managed to keep Elrond and Elros in line when they had their own spats—though those had, thankfully, been very few and far between. Normal sibling fights had been a luxury they could not afford, not when the world was breaking apart around them. Even so, Maglor doubted that Elrond and Elros would have fought often even if they had grown up in peace; he couldn’t imagine them going more than an afternoon without speaking to one another.

Maedhros came around the larger workshop, damp and scowling, with his sketchbook under his arm. He slowed when he saw the two of them. “Breakfast is inside,” Caranthir said. “Try not to drip wet dog water into the oatmeal.” Maedhros made a face and a rude gesture before continuing on inside. “That,” said Caranthir after a moment, “was the most like himself he’s seemed since I returned. Maybe we should get Huan to bother him more often.”

Maglor finished his breakfast and took his bowl inside. Maedhros was not in the kitchen, but he’d left his book on the table, open to let the damp pages dry. Maglor couldn’t help but glance at the open page, and found himself staring into his own face, at a drawing of himself walking away down a sandy, shell-strewn beach, glancing over his shoulder as he went, expression solemn and sad. Maedhros had drawn no scars, but otherwise it was almost the same face Maglor saw whenever he looked into a mirror. He turned the page back and found his other brothers looking back at him, or drawn caught in the middle of laughter; there was one surprisingly detailed rendering of one of the twins shoving Celegorm into a river, a fresh-caught fish still clutched in his hand. When the turned the page forward he found the sketch of Nienna, only half-finished, and a few other vague and just-begun drawings of landscapes or flowers. Maedhros had done very little drawing on the journey back. 

When he looked up again he found Maedhros in the doorway, dressed in clean clothes and using his teeth to tie off the end of his braid. “These are good,” Maglor said, feeling like he’d been caught sneaking somewhere he shouldn’t have. 

Maedhros lifted one shoulder in a shrug. “I’m not supposed to be brooding,” he said. “That…helps.”

An awkward silence fell, and Maglor wished he knew better how to fill it. They hadn’t spoken alone together since that morning in the tent, just after they’d both almost drowned. That was weeks ago, now. “Sitting at the pottery wheel helps me,” he said finally. He missed it, suddenly—the feeling of wet clay on his skin, the rhythm of the wheel, the satisfaction of watching the clay shift and change, rising and falling according to whatever he wished in that moment. It was easy to let dark thoughts and fears fall away in the face of making something, of watching it form under his hands.

Ambarussa came clattering down the stairs then, and Nerdanel followed, breaking the tension but also ending whatever further conversation they might have attempted. Maglor turned away to pour himself another cup of tea. The twins disappeared into the dining room with their breakfast, dragging Maedhros along with them. Nerdanel lingered in the kitchen. “You were missed last evening,” she said finally.

“I’m sorry.” Maglor stirred a small spoonful of honey into the tea slowly, not looking up.

“And—Macalaurë, this morning, you—”

“I’m sorry,” he repeated, “I didn’t mean to wake everyone. It won’t happen again.”

“That’s not—I am not trying to scold you, Macalaurë.”

He sighed. “I know.” 

“It was certainly not your cat that caused the trouble,” Nerdanel said after a moment. So much for everyone being kind enough to pretend. “What was it instead?”

“A bad dream. I don’t remember it now, and I don’t—there was nothing that happened to cause it.”

“You’re going to tell me not to worry, aren’t you?”

“It would be nice,” Maglor said, lifting his teacup to his lips, “if people actually did stop when I asked.”

Nerdanel poured herself a cup of tea. “Come out to my workshop then,” she said, “and tell me how you repaired that cup you sent me. I’ve never seen anything like it.”

“All right.”

Daeron came down then. Maglor was aware of his mother’s gaze on them as they exchanged a quick good-morning kiss, as Daeron peered into Maglor’s face in search of lingering shadows, and then pulled his hair back out of his face for him, securing it with the purple and silver hair clip—a wordless encouragement to try not to hide. When Maglor followed her out to the workshop, she was frowning again. “Is that wise, Macalaurë?” she asked once the door was closed behind them. “Is he not from Doriath?”

Maglor set his teacup down before he dropped it. “I have no secrets from him, if that’s what you mean. He knows what I did.”

“Does he, really?”

“Do you think I would keep it from him?” Maglor asked her. “Do you think I would lie?”

“I don’t know,” she said, meeting his gaze. “There are many things I once thought you would never do.”

It was only the truth; he didn’t know why it hurt so badly to hear. “Daeron knows them all,” he said, with a sinking feeling. They were not going to talk about the cup, or pottery, or any of the other things he’d learned in Rivendell that he thought he’d like to tell her. Instead they were going to argue. 

Of course they were going to argue. This family had once argued as much as it laughed, tempers flaring and bursting before subsiding, like Gandalf’s fireworks, even his, even his mother’s. Everything else was different now, though, and this fight wasn’t going to be only the matter of an afternoon, a meaningless dispute that would be fixed with a hug and a joke after they took an hour to calm themselves. Maglor did not want to argue—not with anyone, and not about Daeron. He’d thought that Nerdanel would be happy for him, at least in this. That at least she could see that his life was not all dark dreams and fell memories—but it seemed that just when he had started to let go of his fears, this one came true: that she saw only the scars, only the hurt, only the shadows, only the broken pieces of him and not how he had put himself back together.

“I just—I don’t want to see you get hurt, Macalaurë. After all that’s happened, I don’t want to watch you get your heart broken too.”

“Daeron is not going to break my heart, Ammë.”

“But is it wise to give it to anyone now? You are still—”

“Still what? Broken? Disfigured? Diminished?”

“No! Do not put words in my mouth; that is not what I—”

“Daeron has seen all of my scars, and he is the only one in these lands who has not recoiled from them. Not even once.” He had stared, but only for a few moments; he had been horrified, but it had not driven him away. He hadn’t had to retreat to make sense of it, like Maglor’s brothers. He was not rendered incapable of treating Maglor as he always had before, of laughing at and teasing him or of taking him seriously as either himself or as a musician or as a friend—or as a lover. “I’m never going to be again who I was before I left these shores, Ammë. But I am not—I am not a child, or unable to make my own choices for my own happiness—”

“Yet you have been alone for two full Ages of the world, Macalaurë. Your exile has only just ended—”

“My exile ended two hundred years ago. I haven’t been alone since I was brought out of Dol Guldur.” Maglor watched his mother’s face go pale when he spoke the name, but he refused to feel sorry for it. If he could not say it aloud, he could not let go of the fear, and he was so tired of being afraid. “I found joy again, Ammë. In Middle-earth, long before I ever set foot on that ship. I found healing. You must know that—Galadriel told me that she spoke to you. I wrote to you. The scars I bear just—I know they’re ugly and I know they distress you, but they mean that I survived. 

“Besides,” he said, turning to leave, “I already know what heartbreak feels like, six times over. You can ask your other children about it. Nothing Daeron could ever do or say can be worse than that.”

He left the workshop and left the garden, making his way out past the orchard to the river. His feet carried him there of their own accord, following the path of his childhood when he wished to be alone with his thoughts, and following an even more deeply ingrained habit of seeking the nearest source of water so he could lose himself in its music. He walked upstream for a while, until he came to the willows that grew on either side. He splashed across the river, which was shallow, no more than shin deep—a far cry from the rain-swollen river in the hill country far away in the west—and climbed into the fork of the willow tree on the far bank. He buried his face in his arms and turned his thoughts deliberately to the water. 

He didn’t know how long he’d been out there when he became aware of someone else walking up the riverbank. When he lifted his head he found his grandmother stepping through the willow fronds. “There you are, Macalaurë,” she said. “We missed you last night.”

“I know. I’m sorry.”

“I’m sorry,” she said, coming to lean against the willow tree, which was low enough that where he sat put him at her eye level. She was not a tall woman, but she was sturdy, forever with dirt under her fingernails and the smells of her garden lingering about her, of herbs and rich earth and roses. “We should have known better than to drag you to a big family dinner as soon as you arrived.” She reached out to tuck a strand of hair behind his ear. “Your cousin scolded us most soundly for it last night, after your mother and brothers left.”

“Which cousin?”

“Súriellë. She has been often among those returned from Middle-earth, like you, who still bear the scars from it; her wife is a surviver of the Last Alliance.”

“I was glad to see you,” Maglor said quietly. “And to meet Súriellë and Calarustë.”

“I know.” Ennalótë smiled at him, but her eyes were sad. “It grieves us to see you like this, but that should not be your burden too.”

“I understand. I know I don’t look—”

“You look like yourself, sweetheart.” Ennalótë leaned forward to kiss his forehead. “You do not look like the Macalaurë of our memories, but why should you? I hope that will not stop you from visiting us again in the future.”

“Of course not,” Maglor said. He had known it would be hard in the beginning—and that it would get easier afterward. “I’ve missed you.”

“We’ve all missed you too. Come find me whenever you want to, and I’ll put you to work in my gardens. That is still the best cure for cares and heartaches that I have ever found.”

“I’d like that.”

“Your friend Daeron is also welcome,” Ennalótë added, with a smile. “I like him very much, especially since from what your brothers have said he seems to make you so happy.”

“He does,” Maglor said. “He makes me very happy. But Ammë doesn’t think—”

“Nerdanel has spent so long worrying about you, I think she is finding it difficult to stop.”

Maglor looked away, toward the water flowing along cheerfully through the shallow riverbed. In the shade under the willow he saw tiny silver fish darting around, just as they had long ago when he’d come out here as a child. “I know what that’s like,” he said finally. “Not worry, exactly, but…”

Ennalótë kept stroking his hair. “Time is the only cure for it,” she said.

“That is what Nienna told me.”

“Have you seen her? I’m glad. It’s what she told me, too, long ago. The trick is to let time do its work, and to remember to be kind to one another in the meantime. Someone said last night you do not intend to make your home here, as they all did when they first came back.”

“My home is with Elrond,” Maglor said. 

“I have not met Master Elrond,” said Ennalótë. “But your mother and your cousins did work for Lady Celebrían when she was building her house.”

Maglor hadn’t known that. “It’s a beautiful house.”

“I helped her with the gardens,” Ennalótë added, smiling, though it faded a little as she went on, “but I haven’t had occasion to visit since her husband came west—I have been busy, and Master Elrond has been much in demand. Perhaps after you have had time to settle in properly I will return there, to see how the roses fare, and perhaps to hear you sing? I have missed your music.”

“I would like that,” said Maglor. 

“Would you like to help me in my garden today? I could use another pair of hands.”

Maglor unfolded himself from the willow tree. He rested his hand briefly on the trunk in silent thanks for its quiet company before following Ennalótë away down the river again. She looped her arm through his and talked of flowers and pests and of butterflies and bees, and a family of rabbits that had made its home under one of her maple trees. She seemed to have entirely gotten over the shock of his appearance, and it was such a relief to have her treat him—not as she had of old, exactly, but as himself as he was now, to put her arm around him and squeeze, and not to act like he was something breakable. She asked about Middle-earth, but not about what had befallen him or about the wars or great deeds done there. She wanted instead to know of the gardens in Rivendell, and in Gondor, of the trees and flowers that grew in each place. By the time they reached her garden and she handed him a pair of shears to help with some pruning, he could almost forget what had driven him out of his mother’s house in the first place.