A Hundred Miles Through the Desert - Chapter Fifty Three

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Fandom: Tolkien
Rating: T
Characters: Sons of Feanor, Elrond, Feanor, Daeron, various others
Warnings: n/a
Summary: After years in Lórien, Maglor and Maedhros are ready to return to their family and to make something new with their lives--but to move forward, all of Fëanor's sons must decide how, or if, they can ever reconcile with their father.
Note: This fic is a direct sequel to High in the Clean Blue Air.

Prologue / Previous Chapter / Next Chapter

 

Maglor retreated again to the library the day after Maedhros left, hoping to make some actual progress, but found himself just staring the pages as his thoughts drifted between Finwë and his father and his brothers. And his mother. He wasn’t sure what she would think of all of this, beyond being horrified and probably angry all over again at Fëanor. It was Maedhros’ choice when and how to tell her about it—but she would surely grow suspicious that something was wrong, when she went long enough without hearing from any of them. He hadn’t yet seen Celegorm again either, but Maglor still didn’t want to do more than send a message through Nallámo. That was probably childish, but he couldn’t really bring himself to care, especially when he moved wrong and the lump on the back of his head made itself known all over again.

Then he remembered Aegnor’s letter, and dug through his ever-growing pile of papers and notes to find it. By the time he pulled it out he thought that Daeron might have a point about organization, and then forgot about that as he broke the seal and unfolded the paper. It was a much longer letter than he would have expected. 

 

Greetings Cousin,

Findaráto has told me all about this song you are writing for Grandfather Finwë, and how you have been going around to ask for everyone’s help with it, and has shared also what you wrote to him—that you will not intrude while I am still so new-come from Mandos if I do not wish for visitors. That is kind of you. I would like to see you, but it is true that I feel rather overwhelmed. Not in a bad way, though, if that makes sense. Just—to have spent so long as a spirit unbodied, and now to be doing things like holding a pen, and eating food, drinking water—even just breathing—I’m not sure how to explain the strange suddenness of the change. I think it is something that can only be understood, really, by those who have experienced it, and even then it isn’t the same for everyone, judging from the way my brothers speak of their own experiences. So in a way I suppose I’m rather glad that you can’t understand—you or my sister.

I’ve also heard all about what you did, and what happened to you—your long wanderings and your capture. Galadriel assures me you won’t mind, and that you would rather the story be spread around by others so that you don’t have to tell it yourself. I’m so glad you made it home in the end, Macalaurë, and I promise to try not to stare when we meet again, though I’m afraid I’ve been staring too long at everyone just because it’s all so strange to see real faces again. I’m glad too that you and Daeron found one another. I always liked him, and I hope you know that Angaráto is still very smug about having been the one to introduce you two. I imagine he was insufferable about it when you met in Tirion.

But though I would like to remain here at home with my parents, with visitors few and far between for the time being—with the exception of Celebrían and Elrond and their sons, who were all so kind and understanding when they came—I would still like to write to you of Grandfather. Findaráto tells me you have been asking only what we would all wish to hear in a song, and I’m not sure I can answer that, but I can tell you a little of Mandos. Perhaps it is only a repetition of what Irissë has told you? She is recently come from Mandos too, as you must know by now since I cannot imagine her being anything but ready to charge back into life and to grasp at all parts of it with both hands. Or maybe what I have to say will be entirely different. I cannot begin to guess what she might find most important; we did not speak when we were there.

I never paid much attention to the tapestries there, but I know that Grandfather watches for all of them. There are many that appear in out-of-the-way places, smaller ones that offer us glimpses of loved ones or of things that are not important enough to be revealed in the main halls. I don’t know if that makes sense. Mandos is strange to try to describe now that I am back among the living, both wide and open halls and narrower corridors and secluded places, labyrinthine but easy to navigate. It is open to the stars, did you know? But they are not the same stars that can be seen in the living world. I spent ages watching them. But the smaller tapestries are the ones Grandfather seeks most often. He is always wanting to see everyone, to know what you’re all doing and that you are safe and that you are happy. He asked before I left that I give everyone his love, but in particular, he asked me to make sure that you and Galadriel hear it, that the two of you know that you are no less in his thoughts or in his heart than the rest of us—more so, because you are the only two he has not gotten to see again. That is bittersweet, for he misses you terribly but is also glad—so glad—that you have survived.

I’m glad you are writing this song for him, and I’m sorry that we cannot yet speak of it in person—or of anything else, now that I think of it. I think that besides Findaráto, you might understand better than anyone else my reasons for lingering in Mandos so long. I never thought to return to life, and I’m unsure now what I want to do or where to go, and the thought of even going into Alqualondë is overwhelming. It was overwhelming just to make the journey here from Lórien. It was Grandfather who urged me—over and over again, he spoke of all who awaited me, and assured me that it would not be as bad as I feared, nor as lonely. I know of course that I am not the only one to have loved one of the Secondborn, and I will not deny that I found it a very bitter thing to see all that Lúthien did and then to watch her pass through Mandos and out of it again, following Beren as I could never follow Andreth, and then to learn that Turukáno’s daughter and her husband were blessed in the opposite direction. I do not know what Andreth would have thought of either tale. I wish I had been half as brave as either Lúthien or Idril.

And I know that though your love was of a different kind it ran no less deep, for all the Men that you knew, and for the Halfelven children of Lúthien and Beren and Idril and Tuor—and you have endured. More than endured. So between those thoughts and Grandfather’s urging, here I am. I cannot deny it is a relief to have returned to my parents, and especially to find them leading such quiet and peaceful lives now, though it’s terrible to see my father so worn down and limping sometimes when old wounds pain him.

Here’s a thing no one warned me about, returning to life: the spirits of the dead cannot weep, and so all the tears just build and build without you realizing it, and then they escape in fits and bursts when you finally enter a body again. It’s awful. I keep bursting into tears every time my father enters the room, because he should have never had to sit on a throne he didn’t want, never should have had to lead an army or face the horrors of war—not my gentle and kindhearted father. I weep sometimes for Grandfather too, because though the Halls are not empty, I was the last of our family to depart, and that leaves him alone, with only the tapestries of Vairë to keep him company. I hate that it is so. I wish—no matter. I should close before I start to weep again and have to rewrite this when the ink smudges. I doubt that either of us will be leaving home before this grand feast next year, so I suppose I will see you then. I hope you are well.

Aikanáro 

 

Maglor read the lines concerning Finwë’s message to him—to him, particularly—from the Halls several times, and had to blink back the sudden prickling behind his eyes. Then he set the letter aside and picked up his pen to finally start scratching lines out and scribbling changes over them, adjusting his descriptions of Mandos to better align with what Aegnor had written, and to start fixing other smaller things—rhymes and rhythms and imagery.

Some time later, someone else entered the library. He didn’t pay much attention—people were always coming and going—until Pídhres jumped onto his lap and Celegorm said behind him, “You know you’re going to have to prepare for the kittens soon, right?”

“What?” Maglor blinked as he straightened. He lifted Pídhres up, revealing her rounder-than-usual belly that he’d been too distracted to notice before. “Oh. Well, there must be a very smug tomcat somewhere in Taur-en-Gellam.” She meowed, sounding very smug herself. Maglor kissed the top of her head and set her onto the table, and she went to sprawl out in the sunshine coming through the window.

Celegorm sat across the table from Maglor, slouching in his seat and crossing his arms over his chest. He looked like he hadn’t been sleeping; his hair was loose and a little tangled, and his eyes were bloodshot. “I’m sorry,” he said after a moment, not quite meeting Maglor’s gaze. “I didn’t—I should’ve—I didn’t think I pushed you that hard. How bad did I hurt you?”

“Just bruises,” Maglor said. “How bad did I hurt you?”

“The same.”

“If I ask Elrond, is that what he’ll tell me?”

Celegorm shrugged, which was as good as saying outright that he hadn’t let Elrond see the bruises in question. “I’m fine.”

“If you’re going to lie, at least try to be convincing.”

At this Celegorm attempted to scowl, but the effect was ruined by the way his eyes were a little too bright, and how he kept blinking as though holding back tears. “I just—I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have—I should’ve trusted you.”

“Yes,” Maglor said quietly, “you should have.” Celegorm looked away. “I understand your anger, Tyelko. I understand why you were angry with me, for not explaining what was happening right away, but if there are sides to be taken you must know that I will always stand beside Nelyo.”

“I do know. I just—if Atya really said—”

“But he didn’t. That was a product of fear and despair taken and twisted into something that felt like a memory. What Atya did say was awful, and of course it hurt Maedhros deeply, but a wish that he had left Maedhros behind in Araman is very different from a wish for his death. When he says he never and would never so much as think such a thing, I do believe him.” Maglor picked up his pen, though he didn’t do more than sketch a small swirling pattern on the corner of a piece of paper. “What is it you’re still upset about?”

Celegorm did not answer for a long time. At the end of the table Pídhres stretched and yawned, tail swishing. Otherwise it was very quiet. Finally, Celegorm said, “I didn’t think I could get angry like that anymore.”

“What, you thought Nienna cried away your temper? You’re still you, Tyelko. Your temper isn’t all you are, but it’s still a part of you.”

“Well, maybe I don’t want—ow, hey!” Celegorm flinched as a balled up piece of paper hit him in the forehead. “What was that for?”

“You’re being ridiculous. The anger isn’t the problem. We were all angry. You just need to learn, one of these days, how not to let it rule you—make it work for you instead, if you can’t contain it.” It was something Celegorm had known, once upon a time, to the sorrow of Nargothrond. But in his quest to leave all the worst parts of him behind, he seemed to have forgotten.

“Is that what you do?” Celegorm asked. He ducked under the table to pick up the paper.

“I try very hard not to get that angry in the first place,” Maglor said, “because for me it’s—when you get angry you might just punch someone. When I get angry my voice can do far worse damage than your fists, and more easily. I learned that very early, and have had to work to maintain control of myself ever since.” He was lucky in that his temper was naturally slower to wake than some of his brothers’, but the line between annoyance or frustration and true anger was sometimes difficult to see before it was crossed. He had come close in the moments when he’d slammed Celegorm to the ground, and it was honestly for the better that he’d used his hands first, instead of his voice. “But—yes, to answer your question, when I get that angry I do try to, and usually succeed, in controlling it rather than letting it control me.” It was also easier, these days, to not get angry at all. The embers of the flash fire temper he had inherited from Fëanor had been all but drowned in his centuries of seaside grieving, and then nearly frozen by the icy despair of Dol Guldur. Sometimes they flared back to life, but never for long. When things upset him these days, mostly it just hurt.

Celegorm sat up with the crumpled paper in his hands, and carefully smoothed it out on the table. Without looking up he asked quietly, “How do you do it?”

“I don’t know if I can explain how. It’s just something I do, like singing. What I do to remain clear-headed and in control is probably not something that would work for you, anyway. You know your own heart and mind better than I do. But again, Tyelko, it’s not your anger that upset me. It’s that you immediately assumed the worst of me—that I would choose a moment like that to turn my back on Maedhros—that I would turn my back on him at all.”

“I know,” Celegorm said. “I’m sorry. I just—I heard what Maedhros said and I couldn’t think past it, and—I’m sorry.”

“And I forgive you, because you’re my brother and I love you. But I’m not going to apologize for knocking you down. You deserved it.”

“I did,” Celegorm agreed.

“You also look terrible,” said Maglor. “Have you eaten or slept since…?”

“Um. I might have eaten something.”

Maglor made a show of rolling his eyes, and started gathering up his papers. “Come on, then.” He would get something from the kitchen for the both of them to eat in the privacy of his room, and then sing lullabies until Celegorm had no choice but to fall asleep. Pídhres meowed until Maglor picked her up, and she purred and rubbed her head against his cheek. Celegorm followed without protest.

The plan went off without a hitch. Celegorm fell asleep almost as soon as Maglor started to hum the first song, before he even realized what was happening, slumping down over Maglor’s pillows with a soft sigh. Pídhres curled up on another pillow with a contented yawn. Maglor pulled the blankets up over Celegorm, and went to play his harp, experimenting a little with variations on the melodies he would use in his song for Finwë. Unlike the words, it needed no more work, and now it was just a matter of practicing until he did not have to think about it at all when he put his fingers to the strings.

After a while the door opened and Náriel came darting in, with Curufin following a moment later. “Uncle Cáno!” Náriel clambered onto his lap as he turned away from the harp.

“Shh,” Maglor said as he lifted her up. “Tyelko’s asleep.”

Curufin glanced toward the bed. “How did you manage that?”

“How did I manage to sing someone to sleep?” Maglor replied. “Don’t ask silly questions, Curvo. Did you need me for something?”

“We made you a gift!” Náriel said, holding out the small wooden box in her hands. “I helped and everything!”

“A gift for me? Why, thank you!” Maglor kissed the top of her head as he took the box. Inside was a necklace: interlocking mallorn leaves with mallorn flowers set in between, made of amber and yellow topaz, so delicately carved that they almost looked like the real thing in miniature. As he lifted it out of the velvet-lined box it caught the sunshine through the window and gleamed. “Oh,” he said softly. “Curvo—”

“It was Náriel’s idea,” said Curufin, “because of the brooch you wear on your cloak. We made it over the winter, but haven’t had a chance until now to give it to you.”

“It’s beautiful.” Maglor kissed Náriel again, and then got to his feet so he could embrace Curufin. “Thank you—thank you both. I love it.”

Náriel was not content to remain still for long when there were hedgehogs to chase through the flowers with her sister, but Curufin remained behind after she ran out of the room. “I know you don’t like to wear much jewelry these days,” he said as Maglor tucked the necklace back into the box, “but you can’t perform unadorned before all of the Eldar at the feast next year.”

“I won’t,” said Maglor, laughing quietly. He went to put the necklace with his other jewelry, and opened the jewelry box that Gimli had made for him not long after the War of the Ring to show Curufin its contents. “I do own jewelry, even if I don’t often wear it—but of course hardly any of it was made by you. Of course I’ll wear the necklace next year.”

“Why don’t you wear jewelry anymore?” Curufin asked as he picked up a ring from the box. The rubies set into the golden band glinted gently as he turned it in his fingers. “There was a time when you never left the house unless you were dripping with jewels.”

“That was along time ago, Curvo. I stopped caring much about any of it after the Bragollach, and by the time it was all over I didn’t have anything left even if I did want it. Who was I going to try to impress, anyway—the seagulls? By now it’s just…a hard habit to pick back up again—caring what I look like, I mean. I know I probably should.”

Curufin shrugged. “Just as long as it’s what you want and not—I don’t know. Something else.”

Maglor shook his head. “No, nothing like that. Mostly I just never think about it except on holidays or special occasions.”

Curufin looked back over at the bed, where Celegorm had shifted slightly in his sleep. “You two are all right?”

“Yes, we’re fine. Everyone just has the terrible habit of not sleeping when something goes wrong, and that always makes things feel worse than they are. I made him eat lunch, too. He’ll be better when he wakes.”

“And you?”

“I’ll be better when I hear from Maedhros.”

He heard nothing, though, as the days passed. Fëanor lingered in Imloth Ningloron, but Maglor kept to the library or to his room, only going downstairs at mealtimes, unable to really muster any enthusiasm for jokes or even singing most of the time. He received the copy of his song back that he had sent to Finrod and Galadriel, marked up with notes. They had shared the song with Finarfin as well, and he wrote a short note that Maglor found tucked in among the pages. I can already tell this is going to be marvelous, Macalaurë. Well done. Galadriel also wrote to tell him that Finrod had gone to join Maedhros and Fingon, though she wrote as though she was unaware that there might be something to worry about. Maglor wrote back to thank her for the notes on the song, keeping the letter short and cheerful. He also wrote to thank Aegnor for his letter, and to share a little of how overwhelmed he had been upon returning to Valinor himself. It was not quite the same thing, but he hoped it would make Aegnor feel a little better about his own reluctance to rejoin the world.

Celegorm spent most of his time in Maglor’s room too, quietly reading or muttering curses as he tried to teach himself to use a drop spindle. Their other brothers and Elladan and Elrohir came by often, sometimes spending a whole morning there, sometimes only for a few minutes. Calissë and Náriel came charging in one afternoon to announce that their parents had said they could take a kitten home, if it was all right with Maglor. “Of course you can,” he told them, to squeals of excitement. “You can’t let a kitten wander away in Tirion, though, not like I let Pídhres—it’s a very big city and your kitten will be very small, and probably very silly.”

Náriel ran off to tell Curufin and Rundamírë the good news, but Calissë remained behind. “Uncle Cáno, did you fight with Uncle Nelyo?”

“No,” said Maglor, because what had happened could not be properly called a fight.

“Did he fight with Grandfather?”

“No.” Maglor lifted her up onto his lap. “Not exactly. Remember how I told you everything is a bit complicated?”

“Yes, but…”

“He just needs space, like Daeron needed space last winter. He’s gone to visit our cousin Findekáno.”

“But if you didn’t fight, why are you acting like you did when Daeron was mad at you?”

Celegorm snorted from his seat on the floor near the window. “You can’t hide anything from Calissë, Cáno. She’s too much like her atya.”

“I’m trying to finish writing this song before next year’s feast, that’s all,” said Maglor, even though he hadn’t actually touched it in three days. He’d been writing other songs instead, trying to lift his own spirits with rhymes about kittens and spring flowers.

“But you were writing it all winter!” Calissë exclaimed, apparently aghast that he still wasn’t done.

“It’s a very long song,” Maglor said, as Celegorm snorted again, “and it’s very important that I get it just right. Stop snickering, Tyelko.”

“He’s spent years working on a single verse before,” Celegorm told Calissë. “He’s hardly taken any time at all on this song, all things considered.”

“Yes, well, I don’t have years to work on it,” said Maglor. “I hope to have it done by this fall—before Daeron returns, and then I don’t have to worry about it again until it’s time to perform.”

After Calissë left, at least partly reassured, Celegorm said, “Don’t push yourself, Cáno.”

“Pushing myself is how I will get it done. It’s easier now than it was in the beginning, especially since I’ve gotten a complete draft written. It’s just the rewriting and little fiddly bits that are going to give me trouble now, and that has far less to do with the subject matter than with the language itself.”

“If you say so,” said Celegorm doubtfully. “How are you going to go about getting an audience with the Valar when it’s done?”

“I don’t know. The first thing I must do is go to Tirion to give it to Indis, and to Míriel if she’s there. I’ll ask them how to go about it.”

“Are you going alone?”

“I don’t know that, either.” Maglor shifted the papers around on his desk, tucking away the song about kittens and pulling out the song about Finwë. Galadriel and Finrod had had many good suggestions for improvement. “But—probably.”

“I don’t think you should,” Celegorm said.

“You didn’t think I should speak to Atya alone either, and that went fine.”

“It wasn’t fine for Maedhros.”

“That’s different, and you know exactly why. I don’t know what I’m going to do yet, Tyelko, but if I do decide to go alone, I want you to promise not to follow after me anyway.”

“But—”

“Promise me.”

Celegorm scowled at him, and then turned back to his spindle. “Fine,” he said. “I promise I won’t follow you if you don’t want me to.”

“Thank you.”