The Seven Gates by Laerthel

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Fire and Blood

The self-inflicted exile of Maedhros ends with a nightmare, a confession from Gwindor of Nargothrond, a deadly fight, and the hanging of a foreign banner on the walls of Barad Eithel.

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FA 469, Midsummer, before dawn

He was alone if he did not count the dead.

The promise of rain hung heavily over the wastelands as they lay deserted, the tension palpable in the unmoving air. It was hard to override the instinct to cover his ears, bracing himself for the hit of the thunderclap; but he was much more reluctant to let go of the pommel of his sword.

It was a sword Maedhros had never seen before, the blade glimmering faintly in the eternal gloom of his dreams. He was holding a double-edged longsword, the like of which he so often wielded on the battlefield. It felt lighter in his hand than it should have, almost weightless; and he could not shake the feeling that the blade had been made specifically for someone who lost a hand, but could never lose their preference for longswords, heavy as they were to lift without additional support.

In other words, himself.

In sorrow it has started and in sorrow it must end; behold the banners as they gleam in the light of the rising sun! The night is passing but another night shall come, blacker than ink, black as the Void beyond the Circles of the World. Many years could one wander and many years could he hope, yet he shan’t succeed; the mountains are high and the peaks icy cold, and all flowers shall wither.

Maedhros knew those words by now the way he knew his brothers’ names, the recurring items of seasonal provision counts, or the song that Findekáno had sung in the throes of the Iron Prison before he rescued him; and that familiarity ran so deep in his bones that it took him a full minute to notice that they had not been spoken.

The Voice had always been there, from the first occurrence to the last, whispering the same ominous words, again and again, over and over.

All flowers shall wither.

Where did the Voice go? Why would it suddenly desert him, leaving him so completely alone in the calm before a storm that never comes?

With an effort, Maedhros turned his attention back to his surroundings. It had been three or four seasons since he saw the last of his curious dreams – maybe less, maybe more, he did not care to remember. All that mattered was to exploit this dream, the here and now, as much as he could, with or without the Voice. He had to remember every detail. To analyse. To interpret.

Around him, the dead lay in piles as they so often would; but there seemed to be more of them than ever before. Orcs in abundance, Morgoth’s slave men, thralls and prisoners, even a few Trolls and lesser Balrogs, lying flameless and quiet, black pools of blood gathered around their contorted, hideous bodies. He saw Dwarves and Men as well, both from Hithlum and the East. Elves from Barad Eithel, from Nargothrond, from Ossiriand; and Elves with sigils he did not recognize.

And there lay, of course, his kinsmen.

Their faces were veiled in the precarious haze of dreaming, but he wished he could weep for them all the same. That message, at least, was clear: more would die in battles to come. Hardly a surprise – many lives had been lost already while he gathered his army and stormed the ashen desert of the Anfauglith, driving the remaining Orcs from their hides under the earth and chasing them until they collapsed, ruthless and terrible in his wrath. He did not know how many he had slain, nor did he care. The watchtowers of Dorthonion were rebuilt and remanned, the borders redrawn the way they had been before the Flames. The roads were once again safe, the mountain passes opened, the night raids in Hithlum put to end, the fell wolves of the North still being chased out of Beleriand. The rule of the High King was strong, his army growing larger by the day – though well concealed, leaving the Enemy under the impression that he was almost powerless –, and he, Maedhros, son of Fëanor was now called the Lord of the Marches, the Warden of Beleriand and the Enemy of the Enemy.

Many Elves, Dwarves and Men died to make this possible, and more would be slain when they would finally march North to pursue their cause; and Maedhros knew this. He thought of it every single day since the Flames, and he doubted that he would ever, in his waking life, be able to stop. Even now the sinking feeling of I should have saved more settled deep in his stomach as he continued his usual route under low-hanging clouds.

A dark, greedy sort of curiosity gripped him as proximity revealed more and more of the fallen. Most of the dead had been mounted into a great pile, looming like a grotesque hill at the edge of his vision. His boots were becoming soaked with something sickly and wet, emitting a pervading, metallic smell. A smell he knew all too well.

He felt the horror before he saw the face.

Cold dread spread in his chest, making him understand before he could comprehend what he saw. All he could discern were pieces of the whole: a still twitching finger, a lock of hair, the large carrion crow sitting above the uncovered flesh, tearing at it, shiny, coal-black eyes laughing at him with quiet malice.

The face was unrecognizable.

He recognised it.

The High King of the Noldor was dead; and he was treading in the mire of his blood.

“FINDEKÁNO –”

He jerked awake, a gnarled root lodging painfully between his ribs as he rolled onto his stomach, seeking shelter from invisible enemies. Cold sweat ran down his spine, his heart rattling treacherously in his chest. Even the guards must have heard it, he thought as one of them lowered his torch to approach him.

It was only then that Maedhros recalled where he truly was, and why would he sleep among such unforgiving roots. Indeed. He had rather resumed his wolf-hunt, delving deeper and deeper into the mountainlands of Mithrim than go back to either Himring or Barad Eithel, and face his own victory.

Since the Flames, his men saw him as a hero, a saviour, a higher power – and now, inadvertently so, he had managed to expand the same impression to all the Free Peoples of Beleriand. Wherever he went, Elves, Dwarves and Men bowed deep in front of him, gave him uncomfortably ceremonious gifts, praised his name and sang of his deeds when they should have been singing of the High King. Maedhros knew it was only a matter of time before the whispers would once again be roused within his own ranks: whispers that he should have kept the crown, or at least claim it back when Nolofinwë died – and he could not explain to them why it would be unthinkable, and impossible, and utterly foolish. Instead, he did what he perceived to be good at: leaving the intricacies of court to Makalaurë, he kept hunting for Orcs, protecting the borders, and undertaking quests to find alleged werewolves that had allegedly attacked an alleged group of Edain children, and – allegedly so – no one had ever heard of them again.

The aftermath of his nightmare left him breathless and nauseous; and it was hard to wave off the guard with a half-believable explanation of how he had accidentally stabbed his toe. He might have shouted Findekáno’s name out loud or might have only screamed it within the wordless confines of his fëa – he deigned not to ask. The guard would go and tell Gwindor anyway.

Ever since they got acquainted, Lord Gwindor of Nargothrond followed him like a bloodhound. At first, Maedhros thought that he was terrible at hiding it; then, it occurred to him that he might not be trying to hide it at all. He pretended not to notice Gwindor’s newfound interest in his person, but the next time he scouted the dark forests of Hithlum to follow wolf-trails, scoured the dried plains of Anfauglith to instill terror in Orcs, or rode along the guard-posts atop the hills to make sure that they were sufficiently secured, he went to Gwindor himself, and asked for his company; yet his motives remained unknown to him still. To his surprise, he grew to like the Captain of Orodreth, who at first sight appeared stern and serious, but cleverer than most, and with a quite scathing sense of humour, much like his own. He was also a good fighter, a fast thinker, quick to react, to assess, to hatch new plans if something went awry. He would have reminded Maedhros of Tyelcano, if not for the stifled wrath that seemed to linger in each strike of his sword; each arrow he sent flying through the plains; each thrust of the two long daggers that hung night and day on his belt as if he saw life as a perpetual hunt.

There were more than enough wolflike creatures in Hithlum to hunt for, that much was certain. Most of these were no more than wolves indeed: nature-bred beasts, emboldened by cold and hunger; but some of them were evil spirits in wolf’s clothing. Such abominations were the work of Sauron, Maedhros knew – but where was he? Did Moringotto punish him for failing to kill Beren, that mortal Man? Was he merely biding his time? Was he preparing for war? Or was he – as his brothers were inclined to think – cowed, afraid of another defeat, devising some new terror in a dark fortress? Surely, his alliance could not escape the lieutenant of the Enemy if they were to challenge him openly? Surely, they must face the Deceiver first…?

Or was Sauron trying to lure him deep into the woodlands, away from his men, to catch him unawares? Because in that,Maedhros observed as Gwindor’s tall figure appeared among the lengthened shadows of dawnbreak, and lowered himself to sit beside him, he succeeded.

“I shall ride out some more,” Maedhros said sternly, ignoring the stubborn ache in his head. His heart was still pounding in his chest with treacherous force, and it took every modicum of his self-control to keep his legs from shaking. “Go find some rest. I need to think.”

“You have not slept for a week, Lord Warden,” said Gwindor softly.

“I need it not,” Maedhros lied, with little conviction. Even as he straightened his back and lowered his shoulders to correct his posture, he felt the immaterial veil of exhaustion drape over his limbs, the way it rarely happened with the Eldar. “I have much to do, and that keeps me awake. There is a stream nearby. I long for a fresh drink, and to clear my head.”

“You did sleep, but something chased you back to awareness,” said Gwindor softly. “Your dreams, maybe.”

His face was calm and fair in the gloom before dawn as Maedhros stared at him; and he held his gaze, with a lot more understanding than he would have liked.

“How many battles have you seen, Gwindor of Nargothrond?”

“Much more than I would have liked,” said the captain. “All the Great Battles, I should say; or at least, some of each.”

“Then be thankful that you have nothing more to dream of,” said Maedhros, with as much dignity as he could muster.

He tightened his cloak around his shoulders as he set out to the valley below. The battered, disfigured corpse of Findekáno was not an image he could easily banish from his thoughts, a simple nightmare as it might had been. Waving the guards away, he turned his long strides downhill, gaining momentum with each step, trying to glimpse the beauty in the morning mist as it rose above the woods of Mithrim. His body still ached in ways he was no longer used to; his muscles flexed uneasily, his hair stuck damply to his forehead, and his maimed arm hurt as if it still had wrist, palm and fingers attached to it; with a feverish, down-to-the-marrow, haunting pain.

That pain, at least, was familiar.

“I have offended you, Lord Warden,” said Gwindor, falling easily to step beside him. “For that, I apologise.”

“And how long will you continue offending me with your presence when I clearly wish to be alone?” said Maedhros, his tone coming out sharper than intended.

The Gwindor he had come to know for the past year would have now lowered his eyes, and bowed, and went on his way; but yet one more time he withstood the full intensity of his glare.

“My behaviour is most untoward, I know,” he said, “and it may as well be that my words shall rouse little sympathy in your heart; for you stand tall, and proud, and powerful, and fearless as one who returns from the dead. And yet… there is something I have been longing to ask for quite some time; and I fear that if I fail to do so now, then I never shall.”

“Is this about Tyelkormo and Curufinwë?” said Maedhros coldly. “I know what they did; and you know that they have been punished for it.”

But Gwindor shook his head, his eyes suddenly veiled by a shadow of anguish.

“No, Lord Warden, it is – it is about my brother.”

Maedhros raised his brows. “I have never known anyone else from your family.”

“No – I do not think you have. But my brother, he – he was…”

Understanding dawned on Maedhros with sudden clarity, tendrils of dread creeping across his chest.

“He was taken, was he not? To the Iron Prison.”

The forest was silent around them; wisps of mist floated around the trunks of the trees like low-hanging clouds, moisture oozing under his chainmail, ice-cold and intruding. The thought of washing his face with clear water suddenly did not seem as alluring as before.

“You hoped he would return, alive or dead, but he never did,” Maedhros went on, unable to blunt the edge of his voice. “Time passed, and peace eluded you; and now that your City has been sealed, you defied your king, gathered the swords you call your own, and came to observe the prime example. Is he truly alive, or do the servants of the Star dress one of his brothers each morn to impersonate him? Has he taken leave of his wits? Can he indeed eat with one hand, and fight, and mount a horse, and dress by himself, and be anything else than a cripple in shining armour?”

“Lord Warden-” Gwindor cut in, his face suddenly white.

“So what do you see, then?” Maedhros snapped at him. “Have I satisfied your curiosity, Lord of Cave-Dwellers?”

The stream chattered happily at the bottom of the valley, and moss grew green on its rocky shores.

If he could have silenced the ever-moving water, he would have.

“It was never my intention to offend,” said Gwindor, his voice level and emotionless, “and if you think it was, then I, too, am wounded. For I was told that the Warden of the East was the only one that could face the Black Foe; and he gave hope and courage to all who sought him. And that is all I was looking for – fathomable hope that my brother could still be alive, and that he could still be saved…”

And be like you, Maedhros heard the end of the sentence, even if it was left unsaid.

He took a deep breath and observed his shameful wrath as it subsided, the last of its flames snuffed out by sudden sorrow.

“…I – I think I wished to ask you if he would still recognize me and rejoice in the sound of the wind and the rain. If he could still sing. If he could still hold a sword and face our enemies. If he could remember anything other than darkness and fear… I meant to ask all these as if you could know. No one knows, of course. That was deeply unwise of me to presume.”

“But you wanted to know if there was a chance,” said Maedhros.

“I know there is,” said Gwindor. “Here you stand before me; and you are everything you are said to be, and more; for so have I witnessed.”

“I did not save myself,” said Maedhros. “I did not close my own wounds. I did not teach myself how to walk again. I did not teach myself how to hold a sword in the other hand, either. I was saved, and taught, and trained, and nourished, and cared for; and bothered into insanity if I ever thought of giving up. By my cousin,” he added, his voice fainter and fainter with each word. “And my brothers. And my counsellor. Sometimes, I wish they kept bothering me still – and yet in a way, they do indeed.”

The captain stood beside him atop a dull-edged rock, and they both watched as the spray painted tiny rainbows on the mossy rocks over the stream in the red glow of sunrise.

“So there is a chance,” Gwindor said slowly, “but how big a chance, I wonder? What if… what if he shall remember nothing of his life before? What if he became an – what if I have to kill him?”

“Then you will have to kill him.”

“Have you –”

“Sometimes.”

Anor was rising above rocks and water, painting the forest orange and rose gold. The wind turned and brought the faint smell of smoke – the guards must have continued to feed the campfire rather vigorously.

Maedhros jumped over the stream, settling atop a flattened rock on the other side. He pulled his leather glove off with his teeth, let it fall, and cupped some water in his palm to drink. After a few heartbeats of frozen silence, Gwindor followed; he washed his hands and his face, running wet fingers through his hair. His shoulders trembled in the morning chill; and Maedhros glanced at him with sudden scrutiny.

“If it is my sympathy you are looking for, Gwindor son of Guilin, you shall not have it. Not yet. Not while there still is a chance, however small. If you had hope enough to seek me out and wedge yourself into my battles and scourings, then this is truly not the moment to lose such inspiration for impertinence.” He gave the captain a long look. “When the gates of the Iron Prison are thrown open and its monstrosities brought to light, we shall look for your brother together, you and I; and together we shall retrieve whatever is left of him. For that, I give you my word – and you know that I keep it.”

“You most certainly do,” said Gwindor, a little faintly; and Maedhros did not restrain his hand as it crept tentatively up his shoulder and squeezed it. “I thank you for your friendship, Lord Warden – it is not something that I looked for, but something I shall always remember.”

“Thank me when we have found your brother,” said Maedhros. “How shall I call him?”

“Gelmir,” said Gwindor, his voice barely above whisper.

“Keep that name in your mind, always,” said Maedhros. “Do not restrain yourself from calling it; you might have to teach it to him again. You might be the only one who can. Now come; let us go back to the camp, I wish to…”

He swallowed the end of the sentence, suddenly alert.

Something sour-smelling and hot drifted before his face, hitting a mossy rock. The next moment, a red flash swept across the chattering stream, landing above the bushes at the edge of the treeline; then a thin band of smoke rose above the water, spark turning to flame with a low hiss.

The smell was not coming from an overtopped campfire, Maedhros realised with a pang of fear; and the beautiful orange halo was not that of Anor.

It was the glow of a forest fire.

But why would such a fire break out now? The months of Lótessë and Nárië had been cold for the season, and full of storms. The woodlands were green, the meadows dappled with wildflowers, the air smelled sweet and rivers flooded the lowlands in the south.

This fire had to be fed.

Gwindor emptied his flask over the flames, trampling the dead embers deep into the ground with the heel of his boot.

“Orcs,” he said between his teeth. “This is typically the damage they do. Alas! The green forests of Mithrim are among the most beautiful in Beleriand; it is a terrible sin to destroy them so. And I thought that our hunt for them was over!”

Maedhros kept his silence. He knew the paths of these woods the way he knew his own palm; and so he knew the land's ever-singing streams, the bald hilltops, the wide meadows and the graceful swans as they glided in pairs above the lake. It was here that he had learned to walk again, then run, then write his letters with the off hand. It was here that Findekáno and Tyelcano had trained him for days, weeks and months, tireless and stubborn and full of love, until he bested them both with a sword. It was here that the weight of the crown had finally been lifted from his brows, no longer reminding him of his failings and regrets. His second life had started here; and each fallen tree, each leaping flame wound his heart like a personal offense.

“Lord Warden,” called a guard’s voice from over the stream. “There is –”

“A fire, I know. Not by our fault, I presume?”

“It seems to be coming up from the southern slopes of Ered Wethrin – not natural, I should say. It reminds me of the Fell Year, when the Flames came.”

“Ai,” said Maedhros, “I’m afraid I’ve had quite enough of that.”

“So have we all,” said Gwindor warily. Maedhros could feel his eyes on his back as he turned his strides back to the south-east, towards the fire.

The guard took a deep breath. “Lord Warden – do you not think that we should…”

“The Dwarves taught me a song about myself the other day,” said Maedhros lightly, “in which I kept spitting on the Enemy’s fires to put them out. Try if that works, shall we?”

*

It was nothing like the Flames, truly.

Maedhros remembered the hour they struck as if it had happened yesterday – and according to the long memory of his kin, it should indeed have felt like yesterday. A mere seventh of a yén, or not even that: he would have called it a glimpse of an eye in his youth. Suffering, however, had the unbecoming nature to slow down the passing of the years in the same way that joy and contentment seemed to speed it up.

The Siege of Angamando last some four hundred coranári. A little less than three yéni. That felt like a glimpse of an eye; and the first hours of the Flames had imprinted themselves into his mind as millenia. So they had lumbered by, minute after minute, desperate escape after desperate escape, liquid fire, death, ruins, and havoc.

And it was nothing like this – nothing like a hunt for foes in a forest still green, under skies still clear, the smell of smoke more nuisance than threat. Nothing compared to the dry-hot inferno of the Flames when he had first felt them, and the fine ash crept down his throat and through his lungs and into his hair and under his skin; and Tyelcano had fallen to his knees beside him, fighting for each rattling breath, terror in his eyes.

The assault that was later called the Dagor Bragollach reached them far out in the Marches under open skies. They were returning home together; and even though they had travelled all the way from Barad Eithel and visited the whole length of the Siege with its outposts, Maedhros was restless still. Leaving his escort in the last watchtower, he wished to ride through that winter night and watch the sunrise from the low-running hills below his fortress. His counsellor was weary and of an ill mood, with an evident lack of desire to partake in such adventures; but he did not want him to go entirely alone, and Maedhros would take none other with him.

And thus had they both saved the other’s life; for the last watchtower was taken hours later, and all that dwelt there had been slaughtered; and neither lord nor counsellor would have ever reached home without the other. In times of peace, the journey would have taken the whole night, and the morning after; with rivers of liquid fire burning through the Marches and an army of Orcs on the loose, it took them a fortnight.

Compared to those dark days, this fire was laughable; still, Maedhros could not blame the guard for the surge of memories. He felt a light reluctance as well when the heat of torches caressed his skin in castle halls as he came close to them; or when Curufinwë left the door of the smithy open; or when the campfire crackled and a spark landed on his cloak. Fear was hard to unlearn.

This fire, it seemed, had come down from the mountains of Mithrim: a strange occurrence in itself, but the fact that it did not die out immediately was even stranger. The earth was brown and moist, the forests grew green, and the nights were colder than usual – even for this distant, northern land where he had to truly brace himself to swim in the lakes. He had never seen a forest fire around here; and he knew only from hearsay that the fires of the Bragollach had never reached the Ered Wethrin, either.

Yet such was the nature of flames fed by the evil of Morgoth: they sprang high even in the dead of winter, unstoppable, deadly and swifter than arrows. Hotter than melted steel, designed for destruction, made to wreak havoc. From the depths of the Iron Prison they had burst: from the furious, ancient core of Arda itself where no Quend had ever walked...

From the hilltop, Maedhros looked down on the hazy silver mirror of Lake Mithrim as it spread on the horizon. Before it, trails of fire and smoke had spread over the woods like an irregular spider web: sometimes deviating from itself, sometimes running back to its own patterns. He could now see that the fire could not truly spread, but each time the trail turned back to an area, it did more damage.

“What in Manwë’s holy name…” Gwindor whispered as he stopped beside him.

“Valarauko,”* said Maedhros grimly. “Or something akin with that.”

The captain and the guards looked at him, their faces blanched.

“Is that truly – ”

“Not all of them are twelve feet tall winged beasts with flaming whips,” said Maedhros. “Some of them look like Gothmog the Terrible. Some look like oversized trolls.” He raised his brows. “Some may look like wolves, for that matter; and like so, the giant werewolf sightings in Hithlum could be explained. Fear not! The lesser ones are mere nuisance. As long as they have their bodies, they are fearsome, terrible, and capable of immense destruction; but as soon as their bodies are destroyed, they flee back to their master, harmless.” He turned back to the guards, smiling fiercely. “An arrow through the eye. A knife in the throat. That is all it takes, and the reign of their terror is over – so give me an hour. And fetch my horse, will you.”

*

An hour later, Maedhros was patting his stallion’s neck, frowning at the pervading smell of smoke at the bottom of the wide valley the fire had first run down to. Ashes and dust whirled around Silmatal’s hooves as he kept pawing the ground, huffing dejectedly at his master’s latest whim.

“I know, my friend,” said Maedhros. “But wolf-hunting in a flaming forest is not for you.”

“By the sight of him, he thinks that it is not for you, either, Lord Warden,” Gwindor remarked. “I thought you would ride him into the fire, the way it is told in tales of the Marches.”

“I asked for him because I know that he would not leave me on his own volition,” said Maedhros. "It was in these lands that I had learned to ride again, and Silmatal has been with me ever since. Fought in many battles with me. Survived the Flames with me... and soon he shall carry me once more to war and peril. He knows it; and the wait is getting too long for his bearing." He ran his hand through the stallion's silvery mane, then softly, he held the side of his long face. "Go race the wind, and find my cousin," he said lightly. "He shall never forgive me if I chase a fiery demon through his lands, and leave him out of it."

If his horse could talk, he would have scolded him now, Maedhros knew; but all he did was press his large nose into his palm for a moment, and turn away with a displeased snort.

Silmatal would have faced the wolf if he asked him to, and stood firm at his command, even if it came to a deadly fight among the flames. It would have probably been wiser not to go on foot, but the woodlands were known to him, his body itched for a fight, and cold fury dissolved his exhaustion as if he had never felt it.

"I shall go with you," said Gwindor.

"So shall we all, Lord Warden," said the guard. "We beg you not to command us to leave you behind, that is. Messengers have been sent to Barad Eithel, so that the fire would be known of."

"Come, if you so wish," said Maedhros, turning his long strides back towards the woods. No one dared restrain him - because what could they have done? Defied an order from the Warden of the East? Questioned his judgement? Of his servants, only Tyelcano had ever dared to do it; Tyelcano, who was now far away, held by Turukáno's ridiculous laws.

There was no power on Arda that could stop him from unleashing his wrath on the first possible target.

The trees along the trail were ashen skeletons as they towered above him, their leaves a scattered dark blanket where the flames could not destroy them completely. An eerie silence settled over the forest, and Maedhros felt the same instinctive pull as in his dreams before: to run on and attack, to ease the tension of waiting. The memory of his last vision came back to him, vivid and frightening, as real as the soft sounds of his companions' steps and the wind playing with barren branches above.

Did he see things to come, or things to avoid? Part of his dreams had already come to pass, after all. He had seen battlefields, eerie and abandoned after the fight; he had seen dead mounted in piles; he had seen unforgiving wastelands and carrion crows. He knew that he was waging war, weighing the lives of his kinsmen against the hope for freedom and the desire to overthrow the Enemy and reclaim the Silmarils. Still – he was succeeding. He had made Beleriand safe again: as safe as it had been in the years of the Long Peace. Surely, there was no harm in that? Surely, that was his duty since no one else seemed capable or willing to do it?

And the High King of the Noldor would not die like this: alone and surrounded and beaten into the ground to the point of disfiguration. Not if they stuck to their plans. Moringotto had no way of knowing that he had an army nearly as powerful as Maedhros himself: that not all of his people had died in the Flames, that they have prevailed even after Nolofinwë had ridden into his doom. That was the reason for it all: for Maedhros to parade around with his army of Noldor and Casari and Easterlings, to demonstrate his power throughout Beleriand, to paint himself as the true hero of the Flames in the eyes of the Free People. It had started off as mere coincidence, but became a conscious choice: a request of Findekáno’s that he had promised to fulfill.

The secret was safe. No one knew how much the other army had grown – not Azaghâl, not Uldor, not Gwindor, not even his brothers. Soon they would learn, and rejoice, and follow his lead to war and peril, and maybe death.

Until then, he and his companions had a wolf to kill.

Curiously enough, the burned paths kept meandering towards the still-distant Lake Mithrim, as if the wolf - if it was indeed a wolf - sought to dim its own inner fire. The terrified Edain of the northern woodlands had described it as a giant beast with fur like coal, eyes like rubins and teeth like diamonds; and the leader of an entire pack...

Maedhros was not surprised when after some two hours of scouting, he heard the first howl; nor when he saw grey flashes among trees still green. Naturally, the pack would follow the leader, guided by its menace. He paid little heed as the first arrows whizzed above his head, some hitting target, some lodging into tree-trunks. He only had eyes for the burned trail of his prey, his senses tingling with the wild anticipation of a fight.

"There could be as many as forty," came Gwindor's voice from the back. "That is the largest pack I have ever heard of. Perhaps all wolves serve this creature of the Enemy now; that would explain why they are not afraid of the fire."

"They probably are afraid," said Maedhros, "as most servants of Evil are. But their fear of their master is greater than any pain the fire could cause them. Keep an eye on the pack while I cut the strings that move them. Kill, if you must."

With these words, he drew his sword; and so he descended to the nearest wide strath that led to the great lake in the west. The walk was long, and lonely, and eerily quiet, but after a time, he could hear the song of water: the chattering of forest streams turning into the low hum of the river below, that no fire could touch.

Inadvertently, he thought that this was one of the worst places in Beleriand to start a forest fire.

What if the fire was a distraction?

As soon as that thought formed itself in his mind, he glimpsed the source as it emerged from the treeline.

The Edain had spoken the truth: the wolf was large. Larger than a horse, its hide black as the Void, its eyes red flames of menace, its claws longer than Maedhros's fingers. Yet it was not the sight of the wolf itself that made him recoil; but what it held between its jaws.

It was an arm.

Maedhros could not turn his eyes away from the details: the vambrace with adornments unknown to him, the hand turning to greyish blue, the long fingers still holding the torch that, by the malice of some hidden power, was burning far too high, and would not burn itself out. It was terrible, and impossible, and unnatural, and it made his stomach churn; yet all he could do for a few heartbeats was stand glued to the wet soil, and try to keep his maimed arm from trembling. The shadow of his ancient pain came back to haunt him with sudden intensity, taunting his imagination - what would it feel like to have the entire arm ripped off? How off-balance would he be if he were to fight, and ride, and lead his army, and lock blades with his enemies, yet never be able to strap on a shield again?

Would he even survive, or would he bleed out within minutes?

The wolf leapt ahead, snarling, and in his frozen terror, Maedhros reacted a fraction of a second too late - but then, Tyelcano's sequacious training kicked in, and he took on a position of defense, his blade a sharpened shield between him and the beast.

And the arm. The terrible, dripping, oozing arm with the torch and the flames and the smell of death.

Maedhros let himself fall and rolled to the side as the wolf charged at him with maddened fury; the claws passed a mere inch away from his shoulder, but he was faster, and more agile, and more seasoned, and a lot braver than this. He had spit on the feet of Moringotto, withstood the taunting of Sauron, never broke under torment, never betrayed his kinsmen, never let the Orcs take his fortress, never shied away from a battle and never ran from a challenge - it was not a Valar-forsaken arm that was going to be his undoing!

Think, he commanded himself as he jumped on his feet and raised his blade for another backstroke. How do you win this fight?

He did not know how strong the spirit inside the wolf was - definitely not as strong as the Valaraukar he had fought in the year of the Flames, but probably just as malevolent. It seemed to know how to unsettle him at the very least.

So this was the source of the fire. How utterly impossible. If he told it to the Edain that served in Barad Eithel, none would believe him. They would think that the Warden of the East had finally gone mad. That he lost his courage...

Yéni of training saved him once more as the wolf charged for the second time; driven by instinct, he slid behind a large pine tree, let the bark and resin ward off the attack.

Hiding. The Warden of the East was hiding like a coward.

Not far in the forest, a group of riders was chasing the rest of the pack - probably Findekáno with his archers. Of course he would abandon council meetings and feast preparations if there was a fight nearby; and so he would find his cousin, cowed and driven into a corner, bested by the enemy he had set out to kill...

The wolf had circled him by now, chest heaving with each growl and snarl, teeth still locked around its hideous prize.

It's just an arm, Maedhros thought as instinct moved the sword in his hand. At least you don't have to heed the teeth.

It took every bit of his willpower to tear his eyes away from the severed arm, but once he did, he never looked back. When the wolf lunged at him again, he sidestepped at the last moment, aiming at its stomach with a backhanded downward stroke, swift as lightning, but with great momentum behind it. It was a daring attack, executed with ruthless precision; the blade sank deep under the hide, and Maedhros turned the blade inside to sever muscles and cut through to the heart -

Not deep enough.

The wolf's jaws opened, and the severed arm landed close to Maedhros's feet. The torch it still held hissed angrily, trails of fire running through the undergrowth. He paid no heed to it; he clutched the sword-hilt instead, trying to deepen the cut. If he let go, he would lose his weapon, he knew.

But the wolf could still move. Whining and snarling in pain, it jerked to the side, and Maedhros's blade slid out of the wound. He had a second to choose his position before the wolf pounced at him again, ready to kill.

Maedhros gripped the hilt and charged with the tip, tumbling backwards as the wolf, blinded by rage, impaled itself upon the full length of his longsword. The cut was neat and deep; it drove clean through hide, skin, muscle and flesh, yet again it missed the heart. He tried in vain to pull the sword out; with a sickening sound, it lodged into something in the body, and the blade would not even turn anymore.

Blood gushed out of the wound, and the wolf still pushed him with its full strength. Maedhros felt his legs give way, trying in vain to remove his sword. Still howling in pain, the wolf sought to jerk itself free as well, pulling away from him, bending the blade so hard it almost slid out of his hand.

A blade was not supposed to bend this far.

It was about to -

Maedhros's eyes widened as his longsword, broken some ten inches above the hilt, slid out of the wound; and for the first time, true, visceral fear shot through his body.

There was no time to draw his dagger; and the wolf charged for the last time.

Maedhros threw the broken sword into the open mouth, and let his instincts drive him.

The flashing white teeth stalled less than an inch away from his face. One of them lodged painfully into his  heel, as the force of exertion pushed it deeper and deeper into the sole of his boot. His hand hurt as if it had been struck by lightning, but he did not let go of the upper jaw, keeping the mouth open with dwindling strength, pushing the broken blade deeper down the still gurgling throat with his other foot.

If he had only kept his other Valar-forsaken hand...

An arrow whizzed through the clearing and lodged into the wolf's eye, driving seamlessly into brain and skull.

Maedhros knew it by the feather.

A gust of wind shook the burning trees around him, the low feeling of menace springing high as the spirit left the wolf-hide. Its presence then faded, and the wolf's jaws went limp. The fire died out with a last menacing hiss, and Maedhros released a breath he was quite ashamed of holding.

"Well met, cousin," he said as brightly as he could manage. "I truly appreciate the timing."

But Fingon's laughter was nowhere to be heard, and his steps were heavy as he crossed the meadow, and knelt above him.

"What will you do," he said, "if I miss my shot one day?"

"If today is any indication, I will probably die a terribly painful and incontestably stupid death," said Maedhros. "But you never do."

Fingon looked at him long and hard. "Why would you leave your escort behind, and chase an evil spirit by yourself? You may call me a pretender for saying so – Valar know I have never been the paragon of sanity and sound judgement – but what happened today could have killed us both. You, because you barged head first into danger, and me, because I gathered my kinsmen and followed without a second thought. For so I shall always follow."

Maedhros looked back at him. The High King of the Noldor was wearing a hastily donned chainmail over simple garments and a pair of old riding boots. Not even a cloak; and in his quiver remained a mere three arrows. He could have woken from his sleep, or skipped his meal, or abandoned a council meeting to come after him; and so have his archers.

"...you thought I was in grave peril."

"You were in grave peril!" Fingon snapped. "And... and I dreamed of you," he added in a lower voice. "I saw you die."

"In a dream?" Slowly, painstakingly Maedhros pushed himself into a sitting position. "How so?"

"Fire. So much fire... I have seen the Flames too, but it was nothing like it."

"Fire," Maedhros repeated.

"And then I saw black smoke spread over my woods." Fingon's eyes were cold and distant. "And Silmatal stormed back into my courtyard, saddle empty, the way Rochallor had when my father -"

His voice trailed off.

"I just wanted you to ride him back, and hunt with me," said Maedhros softly.

"I did."

"I am sorry."

"Say that to young Antalossë, who donned his chainmail above his nightrobe so he would not miss his idiot King's departure." Fingon grabbed him by the shoulder and waist, and pulled him to his feet. "And Captain Gildor, when we get back. For thus the days of your self-inflicted exile have ended. You must come home with me, and sit in council, and let people celebrate you."

"I suppose I must, if my King so commands."

"He does," said Fingon. "Although I will admit, this hunt was decidedly less menacing than negotiating tax regulations. Something your Counsellor would probably accomplish in less than a day, which makes it all the more infuriating."

"Not with the Dwarves," Maedhros sighed. "But you could ask Carnistir next time."

"Maybe I shall."

Fingon's wrath seemed to have subsided as fast as it came, the way it so often would; and Maedhros allowed himself a rueful smile. Ignoring the pain in his heel, he crouched over the carcass of the wolf, running his fingers through the hide. The fire did not seem to have touched it at all, although the smell of smoke lingered around it still.

"It would be a shame to leave it unskinned, would it not," his cousin voiced his thought.

"Well, this monster did cost me a sword," Maedhros nodded. "It seems only fair that we should take something in return."

They crouched back, and worked in silence for a while. They needed their joint strength to turn the carcass on its back to make the first cut; and Maedhros thought the blood would never drain.

Still, he grind his teeth and kept pulling the hide with his aching, single hand; and Fingon kept skinning the wolf.

"You died in my dream, too," said Maedhros, almost against his will. "On the same battlefield we always see."

Fingon put down the knife.

"How?"

"...blood," said Maedhros. "So much blood. Then I woke up, terrified. I kept telling myself it was not real."

"It was not," said his cousin softly.

They spoke no more until the hide was off the wolf, and straped into a roll with Maedhros's sword belt, now empty and useless. Anor was rising above the woods, the black wisps of smoke dissolving slowly in the summer air; and their escort found them among the lower hills, looking at the thin, high tower of Barad Eithel.

"...but why was the wolf on fire?" Gwindor kept asking. "The power of the spirit?"

"Maybe the Edain tried to scare it off with torches," said Maedhros, trying to erase the image of the severed arm from his mind, "but they could not hurt it so, and the spirit turned their weapon against them. It could not turn the fire into such a deadly woe as the Flames of Morgoth, but it could still damage these forests, and probably kill many Men."

"And it even broke your sword, Lord Warden!" Young Antalossë glanced at him apprehensively. "Nothing broke your sword since the Valarauko, or so they sing in the Marches."

"In fact," said Maedhros, "that beast of a dragon snatched one, too. And one fell into a liquid stream of fire in front of my gates. It was truly touching how Moringotto made sure I would not freeze to death."

"Any blade should tremble when given to the Warden of the East," said Fingon teasingly. "Alas, its days are numbered."

The day was getting warm, and flowers blossomed in the fields as they rode off to Barad Eithel at the feet of the Ered Wethrin. Maedhros rode ahead of his scouts and the archers, and Fingon raced him back to the fortress; and his mood brightened, and the memory of the dream, the wolf and the Flames lifted from his heart.

Here he was, his enemies once again defeated, his best friend in the world by his side, going home to a fortress filled with allies. It truly was an uplifting sight: the banner of the House of Fingolfin flew high and free above the walls as the wind played with it; and below were hung all the other flags of their alliance. The Star of Fëanor, the flag of Belegost and the royal banner of Azaghâl, as well as the blazons of the Easterling clans and the Haladin, the Edain from Dor-Lómin and Hithlum, the Falathrim, and even that of Orodreth for the sake of Gwindor and his company.

And even as Maedhros admired the banners, another one was hung from the walls: that of a winged moon in a field of black, surrounded by stars.

The High King of the Noldor and the Warden of the East stopped their horses before the open gates, and glanced at each other, speechless. Then they glanced back at the new banner, and again they looked back at each other, as if in a dream.

Captain Gildor was waiting for them in the courtyard, fingers drumming on his crossed arms.

"Majesty, Lord Warden," he said, "I am glad that you have both returned from your hunt; for there is grave need of your presence in the parlour."

"So it would seem," said Fingon slowly. "Tell me - is that truly..."

"A joint embassy has indeed arrived from Himring and Menegroth not even an hour ago," said Gildor, his voice remarkably impassive.

Maedhros stared at him.

"A what?"

"Apparently, Lord Morifinwë is here to seek audience with the High King of the Noldor and the Warden of the East, to discuss the terms of the surrender of the Silmaril, as worded upon agreement of Tyelkormo and Curufinwë, sons of Fëanáro with King Elu Thingol of Doriath."

Maedhros kept staring at him.

"My brothers did what?!"

* * *

---

Chapter End Notes

A yén is a “long year” according to Elven reckoning (144 coranári, “solar years”). Both words Quenya.

*On the Balrogs/Valaraukar: I aimed to reconcile earlier texts (in which there are a lot of creatures named "Balrogs" and they are, in general, lesser in power) with Tolkien’s later edits in which he claims that there could be, at most, seven of them because they are too powerful. So my take is that there are approximately three to seven Balrogs (in The Lord of the Rings-sense), which are actually corrupted ainur (like Gothmog). The others are much smaller, weaker spirits of various manifestations who are themselves incapable of taking a physical form, but were given one by Morgoth or Sauron. I picture many of these "lesser Balrogs" as "failed experiments", their bodies and spirits not strong enouth to become powerful like Gothmog, or the Balrog of Moria.<br />
In my fic-verse, Maedhros is aware of this difference, but he calls Valaraukar (~ “demons of power”) both the “real” Balrogs and Sauron’s evil-spirited minions, regardless of their physical form. He hunts them for sport in the Bragollach and even manages to kill a significantly more powerful creature of this sort (if 'The Warden of the East' ever gets uploaded, you’ll get the full scene), but he would never fight a creature like Gothmog, unless he had no choice.<br />
This particular evil spirit here was given a wolf-body by Sauron.<br />
Anyway, this take might not be entirely canon-proof, but I think it offers a fun explanation, and some semantic background to the word "valarauko":)

On Silmatal's age: Silmatal was brought to Beleriand from Valinor as a foal, and gifted to Maedhros from Fingolfin as a "get well" present of sorts after his rescue from Angband (I imagine that he is related to Rochallor somehow). There is – as I have recently learned – no clear indication of how long exactly can these horses live, but it is plausible that their lifespan is measured in yéni instead of coranári, which is more suited to the lifespan of Elves. So I went with that.

Of Maedhros and his swords: I have this silly headcanon that he never names his blades (with one exception, more on that later), and he breaks, loses, melts or otherwise destroys a LOT of them during those "deeds of surpassing valour" against various enemies. So much so that it ends up being a running joke in his family that he just can't keep a sword:D not even one made by Feanor, or Curufin, or Telchar, or anyone else.