A Hundred Miles Through the Desert by StarSpray  

Valinor
The Darkening

The light outside the windows shifted—slowly at first, then more swiftly. It grew sickly, gold turning to yellow and silver to green—before it suddenly dimmed. Finwë went to a window just in time to see the Light go out, and a great cloud of darkness billow up from the direction of Ezellohar, as though the darkness itself was something real, like a storm cloud. It covered the sky—the stars—and dread filled him at the sight: dread and sudden horrible grief, and fear such as he had not felt since before Oromë had first brought him to these shores alongside Ingwë and Elwë. 

The Trees were gone, their Light destroyed. The promise of safety and bounty and beauty, for whose sake Finwë had parted from his own nearest kin and led his people across all the world—just like that, it was gone. 

His thoughts went then to his grandsons, who he had sent out of Formenos to get fresh air and to escape the tension that remained there even in their father’s absence. He thought of his other grandchildren, at the festival of the Valar, and of his sons and daughters—of Indis, too, all of them so dear and beloved, all of them now plunged into darkness, and he not there to offer the reassurance and protection a father and grandfather should. 

Anger arose in him, as sudden as the darkness had fallen over Valinor, at the broken promises and the inability of the Valar to keep their brother in check, and he gripped the sill so tightly his fingers ached, clenching his jaw until it hurt as he tried to see what was happening, what had caused this, whether there was any movement in the darkness. He tried to see if his grandsons were near at hand—but a wave of even deeper darkness rolled suddenly up over Formenos, like a fog over the sea, and horror gripped his heart. 

Better for his grandsons if they remained lost, far away from Formenos, and the thing that had come to it. Finwë knew what it was—who it was—without even having to think. It was the Dark Rider, it was the monster that had filled everyone with fear when clouds hid the stars by the waters of Cuiviénen, when loved ones who ventured away from the waters and the fires to hunt, to look for food, or even just to explore—when they left and did not come back. And the Dark Rider was Melkor, who had never repented at all, who had just put on a fair face and form and smiled so brightly at them all, offering knowledge, friendship, though those like Finwë who remembered why they had left the lands across the Sea were unable to set aside old fears entirely. Finwë had tried—oh, how he had tried, tried to trust the wisdom of the Valar, to the promises they had made—and it was all for naught. 

He turned from the window and strode through the dark halls, finding his way by touch and by the way his footsteps echoed off the walls. As he went he summoned all the anger in him again, until his spirit burned with it, and he began to sing, chanting in an ancient tongue, words of strength, words of protection, of defiance against the dark, letting his voice sink into the stones of the walls and the wood and iron of the doors, words that his grandfather had taught him long ago before he too had vanished, combined with the arts he had learned of the Valar in the long years since his coming to Aman. Finwë had only narrowly escaped the clutches of the Dark Rider’s fell servants himself, when they came not to take but to hack and burn and destroy, filling the shadows with their gleeful malice, and he had wept tears uncounted for his grandfather—and his father, and his brothers, and all the others who had been lost. And now, he knew, as a power arose outside the doors to challenge his own, his own grandsons would do the same. 

But if they stayed away, if they kept away long enough, if he could withstand the horror of the dark for just a little while—surely someone else would come, someone stronger than he, and they would live to weep those tears. And someday, perhaps, he would return to them—unless Melkor had indeed arisen in all his might to slay not only the Trees but the Valar too, to plunge all the world into this foul and unnatural Unlight that blotted out even the stars. Finwë sang songs of light to chase away the darkness, and around him the crystal lamps that his son had made flared to life, and the Unlight was chased back, retreating back beneath doors and through the window panes. He lifted his voice again and again against the one that roared like thunder outside of the doors—its song of breaking and bending, of melting stone and splintered wood, of the stars falling from the sky and the Trees withering, of the Sea flowing with blood to stain the fair beaches of Eldamar black—until his throat burned and his head ached. Backwards and forwards the music swayed; Melkor had not expected resistance, and for a few astonishing minutes Finwë could feel him falter.

Then great shout shattered the doors and ended all the song, plunging Formenos into ringing silence. The force of it threw Finwë to the ground. He could not get up again, could hardly catch his breath as the figure that embodied all of his childhood fears stepped over the threshold. Laughter like boulders tumbling down the mountainside echoed around him, shuddering through his very bones. Heavy footsteps crunched over the flagstones and the pieces of wood and iron, until one came to rest on top of his chest. Finwë looked up, unblinking, into eyes that burned in a face made all of shadows.

“Finwë Noldóran, King of the Noldor—of fools and of thralls. Did you really think you could forever escape the dark?” 

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You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes…
- “Wild Geese” by Mary Oliver

- - 

Valinor

Fourth Age 175

Maglor woke to warm sunshine on his face and the smell of flowers all around him. When he opened his eyes it was to blue skies peering through the canopy of the towering beeches of Lórien, high overhead, and to red and white poppies bobbing in the breeze closer at hand, with queen’s lace swaying alongside them. He liked queen’s lace—in his youth it had been called Queen Míriel’s lace; in Beleriand it had been Queen Melian’s; in the Shire he had heard it named for Queen Fíriel. Perhaps somewhere, he thought idly, watching a butterfly alight on one delicate umbel, it was now named for Queen Undómiel. 

Arwen would have laughed at such a thought. Maglor sighed and let his eyes fall shut again. It was years and years now since she had passed beyond the Circles of the World, and he had come West, following Elladan and Elrohir and the promise he had made to Elrond. He did not know how long precisely—in the Gardens of Lórien it was impossible to count the seasons, let alone the years. It had been long enough for the weight of that grief to lift, though, at least a little. 

Long enough for many such weights to lift—or at least for Maglor to learn how to carry them. Many old wounds had been reopened upon his coming to Valinor, to find not only all of his brothers returned before him but his father too. He had seen Fëanor only once, and it had not gone well. He had met his brothers again not long afterward, all of them fleeing Tirion and its surrounding countryside as far as the shores of Ekkaia. That had gone better—not by very much, but at least well enough that Maglor had agreed to go back home with them all, to his mother’s house. 

So much about that summer had been so very hard, had been painful in ways both expected and not. He had not come to Valinor expecting to need to seek Estë’s help—nor had he wanted to. He had just wanted to see Elrond again, and to settle into his and Celebrían’s little realm of Imloth Ningloron as he had settled in Rivendell before. It hadn’t been enough, in the end, and so here he was, drowsing amid Irmo’s poppies and feeling more like himself than he had in centuries. He’d forgotten what it was to be himself, without the burden of all the years and all the shadows and all the blood weighing him down like chains; all of that was something he could carry now tucked into a corner of his heart where it would not trouble him. It would always be there, alongside the grief that accompanied it, but it would not be forever at the forefront of his mind. His voice no longer tried to turn every song he sang into a lament. 

Scuffling in the grass heralded the arrival of the hedgehogs. Maglor had brought one with him to Lórien, a companion found on the road to Ekkaia—one of two companions, really, for he had met Daeron even before Leicheg. Much about that summer had been hard, but falling back into friendship and then into love with Daeron had been so easy, as easy as playing the notes of the scale upon his harp, easy as breathing. Daeron had not come to Lórien, but had returned to Thingol’s realm and his own people. Leicheg had come, and had lived a very long life for a hedgehog, but of course even in Lórien hedgehogs did not live forever—although it seemed that cats might, for Maglor had brought Pídhres too, who had been a stubborn kitten when he brought her aboard the ship at Mithlond, and who had since grown into a sleek young cat, and then seemed to grow no older. Maglor had caught her once in the arms of Estë herself; Estë had laughed softly, winked at him, and kissed the top of Pídhres’ grey head before setting her down and dissolving into a burst of flower petals to flutter away on the breeze. But like the cats of Rivendell, Leicheg’s descendants had decided to keep him, and now three of them scurried out of the flowers to climb up onto his chest. Pídhres followed, licking her rough tongue across his cheeks and nose. “Good morning,” he murmured, reaching up to scratch her ears without opening his eyes again. 

“Are you awake, Cáno?” Maedhros appeared above him, his shadow blocking the sunshine for a moment.

“Mm. No.” He felt very comfortable, and like he could fall back asleep with ease—maybe he would. It had been a long time since his dreams had been troubled by darkness or cold, but he still marveled at it a little every time he woke up feeling refreshed rather than afraid. It still felt like a luxury to fall into sleep without fearing that the past would reach out to grasp at him.

“Then I suppose I’ll have to eat all the raspberries myself.”

“Raspberries!” Maglor opened his eyes. “Why didn’t you say so before?” He held out his hand and Maedhros, laughing, pulled him up. The hedgehogs went tumbling into the grass. 

As Maedhros hauled Maglor to his feet, a noise on the wind made them both pause. “Was that music?” Maedhros asked. 

“A flute, perhaps?” Maglor said. They both listened, but did not hear it again. Perhaps it did not matter. Maglor often heard voices somewhere out of sight, singing or laughing, though he’d never heard instruments before, except his own harp. Lórien was never empty, but it was rare to meet anyone else. He had even gone long stretches of time without being able to find Maedhros. 

“It isn’t only raspberries I found,” Maedhros said, leading Maglor over to a picnic basket, filled with bowls of fruit and flasks of a drink Maglor could not name, but which tasted clean and clear as spring water, while bringing new strength and warmth to one’s limbs. It was always to be found somewhere nearby after he woke from dark dreams. Those were rare, these days, and promised to grow even rarer in the future, though they would never go away entirely. Estë described them as scars; his spirit was healing, but it would always be marked by what had happened to him, what he had done, just as his body bore the scars of battles and torment—just as Maedhros, even returned from Mandos into a body made new, was still missing his right hand, and bore the memory of burns on his palm from the Silmaril. The important thing, though, was that even when the dreams did return, the lingering dark moods that used to follow would trouble him no longer. They would be like any other bad dream, easier now to forget about in the light of day. 

Maglor took a handful of raspberries from the bowl, savoring the sun-warmed sweetness of them. “What’s that over there?” he asked, seeing something else resting on the grass nearby.

“Saddle bags,” Maedhros said. “Ours.” 

“Oh.” Maglor lowered his hand. They had been speaking lately of leaving Lórien, both of them feeling as though they were ready to return to the outside world—to their brothers and friends and kin. It seemed that Estë agreed. “I suppose today is the day, then.” Maedhros smiled and nodded. He was still often somber and grave, but when they had first come to Lórien he had been almost incapable of laughter, hardly able to smile. He had been filled with dread at their father’s return to life and to Tirion, which lay so close to their mother’s house and their grandfather Mahtan’s estate, where Maehdros had lived since his own return from Mandos. “Where will we go, when we leave?” Maglor asked.

“Do you not want to return to Imloth Ningloron?” Maedhros asked. 

“Certainly. But do you want to go there?”

Maedhros picked up a strawberry, but didn’t take a bite. “Yes,” he said after a moment. “I cannot and do not want to continue as I have been. I owe Elrond, at least, another apology.”

“He might not agree.”

“Then thanks, at least. I would have come here regardless, because it was you that asked me, but—it was his words that made me understand what was wrong, and if I had come here without that…I don’t think it would have made any difference. He did not have to do me that kindness.”

There had never been much love between Maedhros and Elrond—and Elros, when he had lived—and it had grieved Maglor for a long time. It had been Maedhros that had held himself apart, sinking ever deeper into despair and desperation as the War of Wrath raged in the north, and the Oath grew heavier and heavier, and the dangers of Beleriand increased. Since his return from Mandos and Elrond’s coming West, the pattern had held. Elrond would not intrude where he felt he was not wanted, and Maedhros had withdrawn from nearly everyone, save their mother and Caranthir.

Until Fëanor had come. 

They had not spoken of their father in a long time, though of course they had spoken of everything else. So much lay between them, good and bad, and with the help of Nienna they’d had many difficult conversations—many arguments—and shed many tears over the course of their stay in Lórien. It was known as a place of rest, but such healing was not always restful—and even when it was, the dreams Irmo sent were not always soothing. They were both better for it, stronger, but Maglor did not feel very differently about Fëanor now than he had when he had left Imloth Ningloron on that fateful journey to Ekkaia—except that he did not think he was afraid anymore. Not of Fëanor, and not of losing his temper either. He had no desire to see his father, but he would not flinch, he thought, from any chance meeting. 

“Are you afraid, still?” he asked quietly. 

Maedhros did not have to ask what he meant. “Yes,” he said, equally quietly. “But…it is not the sort of fear that will keep me up at night, as it did before. I feel stronger now.”

“Good.”

“If I do meet him, though…I hope I will not be alone. I do not want to do that again.”

“Nor do I.”

They finished breakfast and gathered up their things, finding the saddle bags neatly packed with clean clothes and their cloaks. Maglor had his harp in its case, and a larger basket to replace the one that had once carried Leicheg. “All three of them are coming along, then?” Maedhros said, amused, as Maglor set the basket down to call the hedgehogs to it. They all came scurrying out of the grass and into the basket without any fuss. Pídhres jumped up onto Maglor’s shoulder as he straightened. 

“I think Aechen will be following you home,” Maglor replied, laughing. 

“I haven’t the first idea how to care for a hedgehog,” Maedhros protested, but not very strongly. 

“Neither did I, when Huan brought Leicheg to me. I’ve found they mostly take care of themselves.” 

As though summoned by the speaking of his name, they came upon Huan himself before long, splashing in one of the many streams that flowed through Lórien, as they began walking down the first path that they found. The nature of Lórien was such that any path would take them wherever they needed to go; Maglor had long ago gotten hopelessly lost, but he had also never worried about it. 

“Huan!” Maglor exclaimed, as the great hound bounded out of the water, barking a greeting. Pídhres made a disgruntled noise and shoved her nose into Maglor’s ear as Huan greeted them with enthusiastic kisses. Pídhres hissed at him and jumped from Maglor’s shoulder to Maedhros’. “What are you doing here?”

After he sniffed them thoroughly—including the hedgehogs—Huan turned and trotted away down the path, glancing back over his shoulder with that familiar expectant look. “Someone’s come to fetch us home,” Maedhros said. “Tyelko must be here somewhere.”

“Better not keep him waiting, then. Oh stop it, Pídhres,” Maglor added as Pídhres voiced her discontent. Maedhros picked her off his shoulder to hand her back to Maglor. Celegorm had sent Huan to keep an eye on Maglor upon his first coming to Valinor, and Pídhres had never been happy about it. She was not fond of sharing, except with the hedgehogs. “We’re coming, Huan!”

Huan led them through the winding pathways, past berry brambles and honeysuckle thickets, through flowering glades where bright golden sunbeams pierced through the canopy overhead, and alongside the many little streams and rivers and ponds that populated Lórien. None of it was particularly familiar to Maglor, but after a while he heard the flute music again, more than just a snatch on the breeze this time, and the sound of it made him come to a halt. “Cáno?” Maedhros glanced back at him. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” Maglor said. “It’s just—that sounds like—” Huan barked, and the flute cut off abruptly. 

“Come on.” Maedhros grabbed his hand and pulled him along down the path, both of them quickening their pace now, until the trees opened up into a wide meadow filled with flowers, bright yellow celandine and dandelions and sweet-scented pale chamomile mingling with cornflowers and irises. On the other side of it was a larger party than Maglor had ever seen in Lórien—five figures sitting in the grass. No, seven figures, he realized, for there was a pair of children with them. Huan barked again, and they all looked up. “It seems everyone has come to fetch us home,” Maedhros said, laughing, as all their brothers scrambled to their feet.

“Nelyo!” Celegorm was the fastest, and he lunged at Maedhros, nearly knocking both of them to the ground. “Did you just laugh?”

“Cáno!” Caranthir reached them on Celegorm’s heels to throw his arms around Maglor, who dropped the hedgehogs in their basket just in time. “Did you find what you needed?” Caranthir asked him, voice muffled by cloth and hair where he had his face pressed into Maglor’s shoulder. Maglor could feel something damp soaking into his shirt. 

“We did,” he said, tightening his own grip around Caranthir. “I promise, we did.”

The twins came to them next, and Curufin just behind them, and for several minutes everything was confusion, a tangle of limbs and hair and laughter and tears—a much merrier meeting than Maglor’s first reunion with them, far away on the shores of Ekkaia. There had been very little laughter then, and none at all from Maedhros. Now he laughed so much more freely, and Maglor could see the astonishment in all their brothers’ faces. They, too, were brighter than when Maglor and Maedhros had left them, more at home in themselves and with each other. The years, it seemed, had been kind to them all.

Then suddenly there were two new voices joining the chorus, a pair of young girls demanding to be picked up and introduced to their uncles. Curufin and Celegorm obliged, laughing. “Nelyo, Cáno, these are my daughters, your nieces,” Curufin said. “Calissë is the elder, and Náriel the younger.”

“Nieces!” Maglor exclaimed. He held out his hands to clasp their small ones, and as the girls giggled he kissed their cheeks. They looked like Curufin, with dark hair and grey eyes, but Náriel had her mother’s sharp features and Calissë the freckles that ran in Nerdanel’s family. “This is the best surprise! I am so glad to meet you.” Maedhros echoed him, and also kissed the top of Curufin’s head. Maglor hadn’t seen Curufin smile so freely since Celebrimbor had been small. 

“Uncle Nelyo, why have you only got one hand?” Náriel asked.

“Náriel,” Curufin began, alarmed. 

“I lost it,” Maedhros said.

“But how?”

“I was stuck in a very frightening and uncomfortable place,” Maedhros said, “and my cousin Findekáno had to come rescue me—and I lost my hand in the process. But it’s all right; I can do almost everything just as well with my other hand. There have been many songs made of it since, for Findekáno was very valiant, and I’m sure you’ll hear them when you’re older.”

“All of the best stories are ones we have to wait to hear until we’re older,” Calissë said, sticking her lip out in a pout that was so like Celebrimbor’s at that age that Maglor couldn’t help but laugh. “But could not Lady Estë help you get your hand back?”

“That’s enough, Calissë,” Curufin said. “We talked about this.”

“It’s all right,” Maedhros said. 

“It’s rude,” Curufin retorted. Maglor laughed again and covered his mouth when Curufin glared at him. “The two of you are supposed to be the good influences, to make up for Tyelko and Ambarussa!”

“I am an excellent influence,” Celegorm protested. “Aren’t I, girls?”

“The best!” Náriel agreed immediately. 

“Ammë says you’re terrible,” Calissë said, “and Atya says Ammë is always right.” Then she exclaimed, over everyone’s laughter and Celegorm’s mock-indignant sputtering, “Are those hedgehogs?” 

“Cáno, you have more?” laughed Amras as the three of hedgehogs came back out of the grass to sniff around their feet now that the chaos of their reunion had passed. The girls squirmed until they were let down to see them up close.

“Aechen, Annem, and Aegthil,” Maglor said.

“No Leicheg?” asked Caranthir. 

“Hedgehogs don’t live for fifty years, Moryo,” said Celegorm. 

“Neither do cats, and yet here is Pídhres,” Caranthir retorted, gesturing toward Maglor’s shoulder. Pídhres meowed. 

“Has it been that long?” Maglor asked, lifting a hand to pet her. “What else have we missed?”

“Not very much,” said Amrod. He took Maglor’s arm and Amras grabbed Maedhros’ as they made their way back across the meadow. Caranthir remained at Maglor’s other side. Amrod went on, “Except there’s been some talk of another Mereth Aderthad, or something like it. King Ingwë heard the idea and thinks it would be a fine excuse to bring all of the Eldalië together—the Noldor, the Vanyar, and the Teleri, and all the Avari who’ve made their way here too, if someone can convince them. It’s been rather long in the planning, though.”

“They’ve been waiting for Cáno,” said Curufin, “that’s why.”

“For me?” 

“They can’t have only two of the three greatest singers there to perform,” Caranthir said, “obviously.”

“But you don’t have to if you don’t want to,” Celegorm added quickly, with a worried glance at Maglor. 

“And if Ingwë doesn’t wish to take your no for an answer,” Amras added, “we can just ask Elrond for help. No one will argue if he says no.”

Maglor hadn’t even thought about performing since he’d come to Lórien. He’d once loved it, had thrived on it. That had all changed after he’d wandered too close to Mirkwood and fallen into the clutches of the Necromancer. 

Now, though… 

“Maybe,” he said. If he were to perform with Daeron and Elemmírë, it would not be so bad. He could feel a knot forming in his stomach at the thought of standing up before such an audience as all the kindreds of the Eldar gathered together, not to mention the Valar—but if he would not be alone, it would surely be different. “If—” 

There it was again, the sound of a flute, so lovely it made the breath catch in his throat. Maglor turned toward it without thinking. “Go on, then,” said Amrod, laughing as he and Caranthir pushed Maglor in that direction, Amrod snatching Pídhres off his shoulder in spite of her yowls of protest. “Just don’t get lost!”

“It’s very hard to get truly lost here,” Maedhros said as Maglor left them, following the sound of the flute. The song was unfamiliar but the playing wasn’t. He quickened his pace, passing out of the meadow and back under the cool shade of the trees. 

After only a few minutes he spotted a dark figure ahead, seated on one of the enormous roots raised up out of the ground at the base of one of the towering trees, with purple flowers in his hair and a flute in his hands, his long pale fingers dancing over it as he played an intricate melody that brought to mind birdsong in the early dawn and water flowing over smooth stones. For a moment Maglor just watched him play, listening to the music, as new and as familiar as springtime—for it was impossible not to; the forest had all fallen silent around him, as though the trees themselves were listening—and drinking in the sight of him. There would be time to both listen and to make music together soon enough, though, and the moment Maglor stepped forward, out of one of the deeper shadows, Daeron saw him and abandoned the song in an instant, throwing himself off the tree roots, hitting the ground already running. “Maglor!” They were of a height but Daeron was smaller, more slender, and Maglor caught him up in his arms, spinning with the momentum of it so they didn’t go tumbling into the leaves. Daeron wrapped his arms around Maglor and kissed him so deeply he thought he’d drown in it. When they parted they were both breathless, both with tears on their faces. Daeron kept his arms around Maglor’s neck. “I’ve missed you,” he said. 

“I missed you, too,” Maglor replied. They had exchanged a handful of short notes over his time in Lórien, whenever Maglor could find a bird willing to carry a bit of paper for him, but it wasn’t enough. He tightened his arms around Daeron, burying his face in his hair at the crook of his neck. “I missed you so much.”

“I found it much harder than I thought to be patient,” Daeron said. He pulled back just enough to take Maglor’s face in his hands to look into his eyes, searching for old shadows. His own eyes were dark as the midnight sky, lit with ancient starlight; Maglor thought he could drown in them, too. “Oh,” he breathed, “there you are, beloved.” Maglor smiled at him, and Daeron kissed him again. “The light in your eyes is back.”

“The shadows aren’t all gone,” Maglor said. “They never will be—but I can live with them now. The past doesn’t feel so heavy.”

“You’re ready to leave this place?” Daeron asked. “Your brothers all seem to think so. They sent Huan to fetch me in the middle of a banquet in Taur-en-Gellam—” 

Maglor laughed. “Oh no—”

“—but if you aren’t yet ready—”

“I am ready.” Maglor kissed him again; he never wanted to stop. “I don’t think Lórien would have let you all find us if we weren’t. Have you been often with my brothers since I left?”

“Oh yes. Your mother has practically adopted me. She and Caranthir built a new addition onto their house so everyone can stay there more comfortably, and the room meant for you has been called Daeron’s room, more often than not.” Daeron smiled when Maglor laughed again. “They really do all feel like my brothers too, now, and not only because we all missed you.”

“I’m glad. I’m so glad.”

“I met your father, though—he isn’t nearly as fond of me as your brothers, or your mother.”

“Oh no—what did he say?”

“It doesn’t much matter. I can tell you of it later—it was years ago now, anyway.” Daeron sighed and tightened his arms around Maglor, pressing his face into his hair. Maglor did the same, and they stood for several minutes like that, finally together again and not needing words to fill the silence. Daeron was warm, smelling of flowers, his hair softer than silk against Maglor’s face. “We should return to the others,” he said finally, voice slightly muffled, “before I lose all restraint—and then it will surely be one of your nieces who comes looking for us, and Curufin will never forgive me.” He did not move, though. 

Maglor laughed softly—it felt so good to laugh with Daeron again—and tightened his arms round him, but Daeron was proved right a few seconds later when both Calissë and Náriel came around the tree roots behind them. “Daeron!” Náriel exclaimed, darting forward to fling herself into his arms. Calissë was just behind her, and Maglor scooped her up, settling her on his hip; it was as easy and natural as it had been long ago when Celebrimbor had been small—and later, Elrond and Elros. “Atya said no one is supposed to wander off!”

“I think he was talking about you,” Daeron said, “and yet here you are!”

“We weren’t wandering!” Náriel protested. “We were looking for you!”

“We were just coming back.” Daeron shifted Náriel in his arms so he could reach for Maglor’s hand, sliding their fingers together. 

“Have you been crying? What’s the matter?” Náriel wiped at Daeron’s face with her small hands, making him laugh again. “I thought everyone was happy to see Uncles Cáno and Nelyo.”

“I am happy,” Daeron said. “That’s why I have been crying.”

“That doesn’t make any sense!” Calissë protested, as she wiped at Maglor’s own damp cheeks.

“Tears are not always sad,” Maglor said. He was done crying for the moment, but he could feel the tears still behind his eyes, waiting to escape. He would gladly take these joyful tears over the countless bitter ones he had shed over the centuries. “Sometimes one’s heart can feel so full that it overflows—and tears are the only way it can. Tears and laughter.”

“Or song,” Daeron said. 

“I do not think there is any song that could contain the joy I feel right now,” Maglor said.

Daeron squeezed his hand. “We’ll have to write one, then.”

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After spending so long in the quiet solitude of Lórien, coming upon all their brothers—and Daeron, and their nieces—all at once was almost overwhelming. Not in a bad way, though, Maedhros found as he was pulled down onto the picnic blanket in between Ambarussa. Pídhres tried to curl up on his lap, but was chased away by Náriel and Calissë, neither of whom were at all shy, and both very eager to see if all the things they had heard about their two absent uncles were true. They had all sorts of questions, and not just about his missing hand, and Maedhros could hardly answer one before they asked him three more. 

Neither, though, were they content to remain still for long. When they ran off in search of Maglor and Daeron, Celegorm said, “You two are really ready?”

“Yes,” Maedhros said. “We were looking for the way home when Huan found us.” Pídhres returned to curl up on his lap, and he ran his hand over her silky fur. “Is there really nothing else we’ve missed?” Fifty years both was and was not a long time, in Valinor. Anything might have happened, and nothing at all. And though he did not want to, he had to ask, “What of Atar?”

“He’s recently started tearing down our old house in Tirion, with the thought of rebuilding it,” said Curufin. “I think mostly for something to do, since he says himself he doesn’t really need a whole house for just him. I tried to help, but it was harder returning there than I had thought it would be.”

“We’ve seen him,” said Amras, gesturing between himself and Amrod, “and spoken a little, but it’s always been during larger gatherings, so none of us have said anything that means much.”

“I’ve seen him but not spoken to him,” said Caranthir. Celegorm just shrugged and looked away. “It’s easier to talk about him, now, but—well. Not much else has changed.”

“What of Ammë?” Maedhros asked, glancing toward where the girls had disappeared around a large tree.

“She sees him often in Tirion,” Curufin said, “but it’s…difficult for everyone, I think. For me, too. We fought before I left Tirion.”

“About what?” Celegorm asked, frowning. “You didn’t tell us that.”

“When was I gong to mention it, with Náriel and Calissë there?” Curufin replied. “It was about something stupid, just old frustrations bubbling over again. He’s trying to be better. That does not mean he always succeeds—or that I do.”

“You’re far more forgiving than I can be,” Celegorm murmured, plucking a bit of grass and some flowers to weave together.

Curufin shrugged. His look was troubled. “Calissë has started to wonder why all her uncles avoid her grandfather, though, and I do not know what to tell her.”

“I’m sorry, Curvo,” Maedhros said quietly.

“It’s not your fault. It’s his. He loves them, though, the girls, and they adore him. It’s almost like when Tyelpë was still very small, before all the whispers started.” Curufin shook his head. “I have no regrets. It’s just…hard, sometimes. Arimeldë and I will sit down with Calissë sometime after we get home.”

Maglor and Daeron returned then with the girls. Daeron pulled Maglor down to sit in front of him so he could wrap his arms around him from behind, resting their heads together, while Náriel and Calissë chased after the hedgehogs again. All talk of Fëanor was abandoned as Maglor cheerfully demanded to know what other small and unimportant bits of news and gossip they had to share. They talked mostly of Nerdanel’s efforts to expand her house so that all of them—including her grandchildren—could stay there comfortably without having to share rooms or retreat to Mahtan’s house on the other side of the plum orchard just to find a bed. Caranthir had many funny stories of the building efforts. There were tales too of Tirion and of the things Curufin and Celebrimbor were making, and of their cousins and old friends who lived there. 

They did not leave Lórien that day or the next, for there was too much to talk about and no one wanted to hurry. There was a sense of separation there in Lórien, as though the outside world was farther away than just a short walk through the trees, and could not touch them. It was perfect for taking the time to fall in with each other again, for Maedhros and Maglor to assure their brothers and Daeron that they really were well, and for them to see a little of the ways in which everyone else was different too. Celegorm was quieter and more thoughtful, but the anguish that Maedhros had seen in him before they’d last parted seemed to be gone. Caranthir had always been steady, but he could laugh about things now that he hadn’t before. Ambarussa were mostly unchanged, as cheerful and unconcerned as ever, and Curufin was of course a father again and so clearly thrilled to be so. In return Maedhros could tell how shocked and relieved they were to find him and Maglor able to laugh and smile so much more easily than they had before, to be able to speak of the past without pain—even to speak of Fëanor without faltering. 

Maedhros still feared encountering his father again, but it was not a fear that would cripple him. Not anymore. Whether anything would change going forward remained to be seen. He couldn’t even begin to guess one way or the other, not until he saw Fëanor again, whether those fears were still as founded as they had once been. 

When at last they left Lórien, they stepped out of the trees into bright summer sunlight that left both Maglor and Maedhros blinking for several minutes, so used were they to the gentler sunbeams and the shadows of the woods. The world seemed suddenly enormous, the wide fields and rolling hills stretching out before them, all green and gold and glowing under the bright blue sky. A river wound lazily through them, like a glittering ribbon. At Celegorm’s sharp whistle horses came trotting up, alongside a pony for Calissë. Náriel was yet too young to ride long distances on her own, and she perched before Curufin, who kept a practiced and steady arm around her, holding the reins with his other hand. Maglor hooked the hedgehog’s basket onto his saddle, and Pídhres jumped onto Maedhros’ shoulders before he swung himself up into his. 

“Really, though,” Caranthir said, glancing toward Pídhres. “How is that cat still alive?”

“Estë did something, I’m almost certain,” Maglor said. “I think she might be rather like Huan now.” Pídhres meowed. “She’s certainly able to make her opinions known the same way he does.” Maedhros reached up to scratch Pídhres, who purred into his ear. Maglor went on, “Even Leicheg lived longer than hedgehogs normally do, I think—it really is impossible to count the years in Lórien, though. You could tell me we had been gone ten years or ten hundred, and I would believe you either way.”

“Where are we going, then?” Maedhros asked as they started off, crossing a meadow filled with a rainbow of wildflowers to reach a road. The last time he had asked such a question they had been leaving on a very different journey, from a very different place—and they had had no destination at all. Now, though…

“Imloth Ningloron is closer than Tirion,” said Caranthir. “And we all assume that’s where you at least most want to go, Cáno.”

“It is. Does Elrond know we’re coming?” Maglor asked. 

“No one does,” said Curufin, “except Rundamírë, and Tyelko was pacing the length of the house the whole time I was telling her about it, trying to drive us both mad.”

“I certainly told no one, for I had no idea where I was going!” Daeron said, laughing. “One does not argue with Huan or ask many questions when he comes to drag one away from the banquet table. I’m surprised he let me change out of my robes and pack a bag.”

“You didn’t even tell Ammë?” Maedhros asked, surprise. “Or Tyelpë?”

“Oh, Tyelpë knows,” said Curufin. “He would have come too, but he is in the middle of a project he can’t just set aside.”

“Ammë is in Avallónë, teaching,” said Caranthir. “I left a note for Grandfather, but Tyelko was as impatient with me as he was with Curvo.” 

Maedhros glanced at Celegorm, who was unrepentant. “How did you even know it was time?” he asked. 

“I just did,” Celegorm said, flashing a grin. 

“Tyelko’s been very mysterious about it,” said Amrod. “But Galadriel is at Imloth Ningloron more often than not, and she always knows more than you’d think.” 

“She’s not there now,” Daeron said. “Or at least she was at the banquet in Taur-en-Gellam when Huan came to fetch me. Maybe she guessed what he was doing, but I was rather distracted at the time, trying to keep my sleeve from ripping while everyone laughed at me.”

“Huan wouldn’t have to rip up everyone’s clothes if you’d just follow when he comes to get you,” Celegorm said. 

“It was the middle of a banquet, have I mentioned? I was meant to perform before Thingol and Melian and Olwë that night!”

“Don’t worry about Elrond,” Amras said cheerfully, as Daeron and Celegorm continued to bicker over Huan’s timing and Daeron’s clothes. “He’ll be much too happy to see you to care about all of us descending upon his valley at once.” Maglor laughed. “We can write to Ammë from there—and Fingon, and whoever else you want to know you’re back.”

“I’m very eager to be back at home,” said Maglor, “but I wouldn’t mind it if we told no one but Ammë right away. I didn’t even see everyone before I went to Lórien, and I can only imagine it will be as overwhelming again as it was when I first came.” 

“I would like to see Fingon,” said Maedhros, “but I don’t think I’m ready for all of Tirion to descend on us at once, either.”

“Of course not,” said Amrod, wrinkling his nose. “That sounds awful.”

“Will Cousin Findekáno tell us how you lost your hand?” Calissë asked.

“Calissë Elenárë,” Curufin exclaimed, exasperated. 

“No, probably not,” Maedhros said, smiling at her. “Curvo, I really don’t mind. I didn’t even mind before. It’s just my hand.”

“It’s still rude.”

“Not if I say it’s fine.” To Calissë Maedhros added, because he was supposed to be the better influence, “You shouldn’t go around asking strangers about their scars, though. I don’t mind, but others might.”

“Can I ask Uncle Cáno why he’s got bits of white in his hair?” she asked. 

“No,” Curufin said sharply.

“He didn’t eat his vegetables,” said Amras at the same time. Daeron snorted and had to cover his mouth with a hand to stifle his laughter. 

“I don’t think that’s true,” Calissë said. “I think you’re making that up to tease me. Anyway I like vegetables.”

“I don’t,” Náriel said, and stuck out her tongue. Curufin raised his eyes skyward, clearly struggling to remain stern. 

“I had many adventures away across the Sea,” Maglor said, smiling at Calissë, “and I ran afoul of an enchantress. She tried to turn me into a statue of ice and snow, but I got very lucky and escaped, and all she managed to do was leave bits of her magic in my hair. Maybe if you’re both very good, and listen to your father, and eat all of your vegetables, I’ll tell you the full tale sometime.” 

“You can’t tell a tale that you only made up on the spot,” Maedhros murmured a few minutes later, as Celegorm distracted Calissë with a short race down the road. 

“I certainly can, though I will admit I am out of practice—why do you think I put it off until later?” Maglor replied equally quietly, both of them aware that Náriel might still be listening, though she appeared to have dozed off, slumped against Curufin’s chest, for they had made an early start. On Maglor’s other side Daeron was still laughing quietly. “Anyway, I’m almost certain I got the idea from a tale out of the Shire. I only have to change a few details to make it sound like an adventure of my own once we get home and I can find it in the library.”

“Did you have any such adventures?” Caranthir asked. 

“Of course not. My wanderings were all very boring, until they weren’t. No, it’s fine,” Maglor added when everyone but Maedhros looked at him with concern. “I’m fine. Why do you think I went to Lórien in the first place?”

The road followed the river, meandering lazily through the fields. The day was warm but the breeze was pleasant. It was wonderful, Maedhros found, to be on the road again with his brothers—and with Daeron, who began a traveling song after a little while, and was joined immediately by Maglor. When Maglor had first come to Valinor there had been a thread of deep grief and mourning wound through his music, even when the songs themselves were merry ones. An echo of it was still there, but Maedhros was sure he only heard it because he was listening for it. Maglor had made music in Lórien, but it had been quiet and often private, wordless songs played on his harp where he sat hidden among the roots of one of the towering trees, or beside one of the many small ponds or streams. He’d played the same way that Maedhros had filled his sketchbook—most of the drawings ugly, many of them frightening, all of them as cathartic as tears. He hadn’t left that book behind, but it was shoved into the bottom of one of his bags, and when he was somewhere private he would burn them. They were not for any eyes but his, the way that much of Maglor’s music there had not been meant for any other ears. Now, though, he and Daeron harmonized as joyfully and effortlessly as though they had spent no time apart at all. They remained the two greatest singers of their people, and it was a wonder and a delight to listen to them.

This journey was much merrier than the last one they’d all made together. No one was angry with anyone else, and the past and its shadows was not dogging any of their heels. Even Celegorm seemed more at ease, though he was quieter and more thoughtful. When they made camp a few days into the journey, Maedhros caught his eye, and they walked away together along the riverbank. Maedhros put his arm around Celegorm’s shoulders. “How are you?” he asked quietly. “When we left…”

“I’m better than I was,” Celegorm said. They stopped, and he leaned against Maedhros. “I missed you, Nelyo. You and Cáno.”

“We missed you, too. But you seem different.”

“I went back to Ekkaia, a few years after you left,” Celegorm said after a moment.

“To Ekkaia? Why?”

“Nienna dwells there.”

“Did it help?” Maedhros asked. Nienna spent much time in Lórien, too, and he had spent many hours in her company. It had helped him, but he would not have expected the sort of comfort that Nienna offered to be something Celegorm would seek out. “What made you go back there?”

“I needed…” Celegorm paused—not hesitating, but as though he was putting his thoughts in order. That was different too. “I was so angry,” he said finally. “It was like…he came back and it was suddenly like I had never even left Beleriand. I hated it. I hated him, and I didn’t know what to do about it. Ammë told me I had to let it go. Curvo told me to find something that brought me joy instead, but I didn’t…I still don’t know what that is. I’ve left Oromë’s folk behind; the Hunt isn’t for me anymore.”

That was such a change that Maedhros didn’t understand the words at first. “Tyelko…”

“I remembered what Daeron had said—remember, just after we met? He called his old anger and hatred a poison, and said he’d left it behind long ago. I went to him and asked how he had done it.”

“Daeron never went to Nienna,” Maedhros said.

“No, but he put many years and miles between himself and—well, between himself and Maglor, and all of the western lands. I’d had years, and they didn’t help, so I thought the miles would have to do. And Cáno told me that he’d spoken to Nienna there, and whatever she said to him seemed to have helped.”

“She came to me, too,” Maedhros said, “that first night we were there.” She had appeared out of the mist when he’d slipped away from his brothers to go down to the water’s edge. He had still been too lost to really pay her words much attention, let alone believe them. “Are you still angry?”

“Yes. I don’t know if I can rid myself of it entirely. But it’s—it’s not something that rules me anymore. I can visit Curvo in Tirion and I can—I’ve seen Atar at a distance, anyway. I don’t know what will happen if I ever have to speak with him. I think, though, I can learn to be Nerdanel’s son rather than Fëanáro’s.”

Maedhros rested his hand on the back of Celegorm’s head, on his sun-warmed hair. They watched a flock of geese alight on the water upstream, and then watched Huan charge past and into the shallows to send them into flight again in a grate cacophony of fluttering wings and indignant honking. Behind them a burst of laughter erupted at the campsite. “I’m glad, Tyelko,” Maedhros said. “Are you finding happiness?”

“I am now—now that you’re back, and all of us are together again. But I just—I can’t be like Ambarussa. I need something to do, and I don’t know what that is anymore.”

“You’ll find it,” Maedhros said. “It doesn’t have to be any one thing.”

“I know.” Celegorm wrapped his arms around Maedhros, holding on tightly. “I’m so, so glad you’re back, Nelyo. I missed you so much.” He did not only mean Maedhros’ absence in Lórien.

“I’m sorry it took so long,” Maedhros whispered. 

They returned to the camp to find Maglor and Daeron playing music for the girls to dance to. Celegorm sprang forward to scoop Náriel up and spin her around in time to the song, as Calissë tripped and fell into Curufin’s lap where he grabbed her and tickled her until she squirmed and shrieked with giggles. Maedhros sat down between Ambarussa, who threw their arms around him, laughing. Everyone was laughing; Maedhros couldn’t remember when last his heart had felt so full. 

As the afternoon wore on, Maglor set his harp aside, and then lunged suddenly toward Caranthir, who had started to pull out ingredients for dinner. “Caranthir! What’s this?” He grabbed at Caranthir’s hand, holding it up to show off a glint of silver on his finger, a slender band unadorned by jewels. “Is this what I think it is?”

“Moryo, why didn’t you say something?” Ambarussa exclaimed, abandoning Maedhros to tackle Caranthir from either side to get their own look at the ring. 

“Oh, get off!” Caranthir protested from underneath them, face bright red. “I can’t breathe, Ambarussa!”

“I thought we hadn’t missed anything else!” Maedhros said. “Was anyone going to tell us that Moryo had fallen in love?”

“We were waiting for Moryo to tell you,” Curufin said, amused in the way only a brother who had already suffered the same kind of attention could be. “When did you ask them, Moryo? Or did they ask you?”

“Who are they?” Maglor demanded. 

“I was going to tell you, just not in front of everyone,” Caranthir said as he shoved Amrod off of him. Amras was harder to dislodge. “Their name is Lisgalen, and they live in Tirion.”

“They’re a member of the Gwaith-i-Mírdain,” Curufin added. “But when did you exchange rings, Moryo?”

“Right before Tyelko came to kidnap me,” Caranthir said.

“It’s not kidnapping if you come willingly,” Celegorm said. 

“I hope you didn’t plan on marrying before we came back,” Maglor said. “I would never have forgiven you if you did.”

“Of course not! Amras, if you don’t get off me I’ll throw you into the river—”

“Please let’s not throw anyone into any rivers,” Maedhros said, to general laughter. 

Celegorm got up and hauled Amras off of Caranthir, who pushed his hair out of his still very red face and glared at the twins. “How badly did I ruin your plans, Moryo?”

“You didn’t. We weren’t going to make a big deal of it. I was going to write to Ammë about it and then just tell you and Curvo next time I saw you—Maglor!” Maglor pulled Caranthir into an even more crushing embrace than the twins had managed. He whispered something in Caranthir’s ear and kissed him before letting go. “Can I please make our dinner, now?”

“Oh, stop pretending it isn’t an enormous bit of news,” said Curufin, as Caranthir finally unpacked his pans. “Ammë is going to be thrilled.”

“We’re thrilled,” Maedhros said, as Celegorm sat back down, leaning back against Maedhros, who looped his arms around his chest. Huan flopped down just behind Maedhros, who leaned back in his turn, grateful for the soft warmth of him. Pídhres and the hedgehogs appeared out of the grass to cluster around Maglor and Daeron. The talk continued to center around Caranthir and his engagement, and around Lisgalen, who everyone liked and who, it was clear, Caranthir was very anxious for Maedhros and Maglor to like too even if he would never admit it aloud. 

The sun sank into the west in a blaze of brilliant red and orange clouds limned with gold. Maglor took up his harp again and played quieter songs as the stars came out. Náriel fell asleep on Daeron’s lap while Calissë tried valiantly to stay awake later than she should. Curufin indulged her, but it wasn’t long before she too was asleep, curled up in blankets beside him as he stroked her hair. Maedhros lay back and closed his eyes, letting the quiet conversation and the music wash over him alongside the sounds of the river and the crickets and frogs hidden in the reeds. Someone lay down beside him. “All right, Nelyo?” Amras whispered.

“Yes. More than all right.”

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There was no hurry to be anywhere, so they broke camp late and stopped early each afternoon. After they stopped the day after Maglor had discovered Caranthir’s silver engagement ring, he pulled Caranthir away from the camp to sit by the river, hidden from the others by a patch of tall reeds and cattails. “I didn’t ruin any surprises or secrets, did I?” he asked. “I didn’t mean to.”

“No, you didn’t.” Caranthir smiled at him, suddenly looking mischievous. “I was going to say something earlier, except no one noticed all the way to Lórien, so I thought I’d see how long it took, and then laugh at everyone for being so blind.” Maglor laughed. “But of course I wasn’t going to get married without you and Nelyo there.”

“I was only teasing. I know you wouldn’t.” Maglor hugged him. “I’ve missed you, Moryo.”

“It’ll be your turn next, you know,” Caranthir said as he leaned against Maglor.

“My turn for what?”

“I’ve been getting questions for years about when Lisgalen and I were going to wed. Next it will be you and Daeron.”

“Me and Daeron! That’s a little hasty, don’t you think?”

Caranthir rolled his eyes. “After several thousand years, of course you wouldn’t want to be hasty.”

“Most of those years were spend thousands of miles apart.” For most of those years, Daeron had hated him—and Maglor had deserved it. All that lay behind them now, but they had still been apart far longer than they had ever been together, even after coming to Valinor. Caranthir was only teasing, of course, but really Maglor and Daeron had only had a handful of years together, between the few weeks of the Mereth Aderthad and the few years after they’d come to Valinor and before Maglor had gone to Lórien. “There’s no hurry—not for us. Daeron says you’ve all halfway adopted him in my absence anyway.”

“He came to Tirion a few years after you left, and looked so lonely, like a lost kitten, that we had to do something.” Caranthir lifted his head off Maglor’s shoulder. “Well, that’s not wholly fair. He was a sad lost kitten with claws, and he did not hesitate to use them against Atar. Did he tell you about it?”

“He said they don’t get along, but nothing more—we’ll speak of it later. I don’t really care what Atar thinks, except that it might make things harder for Curvo.”

“I think Atar is trying very hard not to make it difficult for Curvo,” said Caranthir, “but the girls are old enough now to notice, and…that’s hard. They’re far too young to be told—well, anything. They only know our father as their doting grandfather—and he does dote on them, just like he did Tyelpë before everything went wrong.”

“Are you still angry?” Maglor asked quietly. 

“I don’t know. Mostly I try not to think about him, and mostly I succeed.” Caranthir looked away, out over the river. Dragonflies buzzed through the nearby reeds, and a handful of frogs were croaking at one another somewhere out of sight. “He has kept his promise, though. Not to seek us out if we don’t want him to. That’s…something, anyway. I know Nelyo was worried about it.”

Worried was an understatement, Maglor thought. Maedhros had been so very afraid, more afraid than even he himself had realized until they’d gotten to Lórien, far away from their father and any chance of him appearing unexpectedly. Fëanor had turned his rage on Maedhros after Losgar, and though Maedhros had not quailed outwardly then, it had left its mark—and surely the Enemy had used it, in Angband, the same way Sauron had used all of their faces in one way or another against Maglor in Dol Guldur. Some of that fear lingered even still, tangled up in hurt and the tattered remains of love that Maedhros still harbored for him, all of it barbed and thorny and painful. Estë and Nienna and Irmo—even they could not heal everything. There would always be scars, and some things had to be faced head on, at their source, before they could be entirely set aside. 

After some days more the lands began to look familiar again. They were nearing Imloth Ningloron, and it was hard not to charge ahead of everyone else, down into the wide stream-filled valley to find Elrond. Maglor missed him as much as he had missed his brothers and Daeron—and he missed the twins, too, and Celebrían, and the house itself and all the flowers and the orchards. Lórien was lovely and the journey had been wonderful, but he was ready to be at home. 

As they neared the fork in the road Maglor gave into his impatience and rode ahead. Daeron kept pace, and the others laughed. “Shall we ride into the valley singing, or would you like to surprise him?” Daeron asked. 

“I think I’d like to surprise him,” Maglor said with a grin, “if he really isn’t expecting me. I’d like to…” The road turning off into Imloth Ningloron came into view, and there was a party coming up from it, turning north toward Tirion. It was not a large party, but Maglor recognized his father’s banner, and a moment later Fëanor himself, turning to look at them. At the sight of his face the scars on Maglor’s right hand erupted, and he couldn’t stop himself hissing at the sudden, shocking pain of it, bringing his hand to his chest as he bit back a curse. He watched his father come to a stop, and behind him he heard Calissë exclaim in delight as the rest of their own party caught up and she saw her grandfather’s banner. She charged past Maglor and Daeron on her pony, and Fëanor dropped to the ground to scoop her up into his arms, laughing. 

The sound of his laughter made something ache somewhere in Maglor’s chest, and he looked away. Daeron reached out for his hand, turning it carefully to reveal the scars, usually pale, gone pink and inflamed. Maedhros rode up on Maglor’s other side, his jaw set in that way that suggested he was going to do what he had to, regardless of how he felt. There was a hint of the Lord of Himring in him, as hard and impenetrable as those high walls had been, that Maglor had not seen in a very long time. If his own hand hurt, for it held the memory of the same scar that Maglor bore, he gave no sign. 

Calissë, back on her pony, seemed to be insisting that Fëanor come back with her to greet everyone else, and of course there was no refusing her. Maglor turned his hand to grasp Daeron’s, needing that reassurance in spite of the tenderness in his palm, but he put on a smile for Calissë’s sake, and out of the corner of his eye watched Maedhros do the same. The rest of their brothers had caught up fully by then, Curufin trotting a little ahead with Náriel, who was also delighted to meet her grandfather so unexpectedly. “Does he often come to Imloth Ningloron?” Maedhros asked as Caranthir halted beside them, on Maedhros’ other side; Fëanor swung himself into his own saddle to trot down the road to them, following in Calissë’s wake. 

“No,” Caranthir said. “He does not leave Tirion much, except sometimes to visit Valmar or Avallónë.”

“Well met, my Lord Fëanor,” Daeron said as Fëanor reached them, bright and cheerful, in the way that some poisonous insects were bright and colorful. Maglor saw Fëanor look at their joined hands and then away, something going tight in his jaw for a moment. Maglor tightened his grip and Daeron squeezed back.

“You see?” Calissë was saying, all beaming smiles and excitement. “We went to Lórien to fetch back Uncles Nelyo and Cáno to surprise everyone!”

“It is indeed a surprise,” Fëanor said, with a smile for Calissë, though it didn’t reach his eyes as he looked and Maglor and at Maedhros, and their brothers around and behind them.

“Atar,” Maglor and Maedhros said, inclining their heads just slightly, only enough to be polite; the rest of their brothers echoed them. “What brings you to Imloth Ningloron?” Maglor asked. It was hard to keep his voice even, let alone cheerful, but he tried. 

“When one has a question of lore, one goes to the greatest loremaster of the age,” Fëanor said. He spoke lightly; he sounded almost like himself, the Fëanor of old that Maglor still loved and missed. He looked between Maglor and Maedhros, but his gaze lingered on Maglor, on the scars on his face and the strands of white in his hair—precisely the sort of staring that Maglor had once tried to hide from, and which he found he still intensely disliked. “Did you find what you sought in Estë’s gardens?”

“We did,” Maedhros said, his voice even. Maglor did not reach for his hand, because that would betray something neither of them wanted to show their father, but he wanted to. Maedhros’ horse shifted under him and shook her head a little. 

“I’m glad of it,” Fëanor said. “I will not keep you longer from—”

“Won’t you come back to Imloth Ningloron with us, Grandfather?” Calissë asked. 

“No, not today I’m afraid,” Fëanor said, smiling at her. “I am already late returning to Tirion. You’ll have to tell me all about your adventures when you return yourselves.” He kissed both Náriel and Calissë farewell, and murmured something to Curufin, resting a hand on his shoulder for a moment, before leaving at a canter, waving over his shoulder at the rest of them, his small party falling in behind him, riding away up the road toward Tirion. Only then did Maglor look at Maedhros, who shook his head minutely. 

Before Calissë or Náriel could ask any of the questions that Maglor could tell were swirling in their heads, he urged his own horse forward, calling out as brightly as he could, “Well, come on then! No reason to tarry when we’re practically on Elrond’s doorstep!” Fëanor was not quite out of sight, and Maglor caught a glimpse of him looking back over his shoulder before he turned away himself, down the long gentle road into Imloth Ningloron. It was a wide valley, as unlike Rivendell at first glance as it was possible to be, bowl-shaped and shallow. The Pelóri rose up behind it, with the forested foothills closer at hand, dark with thick and tall pine trees. Many streams and little rivers flowed out of those hills into the valley, watering the irises for which it had been named, and all the other flowers and trees that Celebrían had planted there. The house was large and open, with a scattering of workshops beyond it, and beyond them lay Celebrían’s orchards—peaches and apples, beside a wide field for strawberries, and another where blueberry bushes were all laden with fruit. It was peach season now, and Maglor could see figures moving about beneath the trees, singing harvest songs. The sight of it made it immediately easier to breathe; the pain in his hand ebbed away, almost as though it had never been.

It was much the same as when he had left it, except that there were the beginnings of a new orchard on the other side of the peaches. Maglor swiftly outpaced the others, cantering into the courtyard before the main entrance. The doors opened and Celebrían emerged, ready to greet the newcomers. She stopped short, though, upon seeing him. “Maglor!” she cried. 

“Celebrían!” he replied, laughing as he jumped out of the saddle as she hurried down the steps to embrace him. “I hope you don’t mind, but I’ve got all my brothers with me.”

“Of course I don’t mind! Oh, it’s so good to see you!” She kissed his cheeks, and took his face in her hands to look more closely at him, just as Daeron had—as many would. “Lórien was good to you, I see.” Her smile was knowing; she had spent many years there herself, long ago. “But I won’t keep you—Elrond is out in the apple orchard. Elladan and Elrohir are not here, though, but they’ll come back as soon as I write to tell them you’re home.”

“Thank you.” Maglor kissed her cheek. “I’m so very glad to be back.”

“Go on, go to Elrond! I’ll make sure your things get where they need to go.”

“I have three hedgehogs as well as my cat, this time!” Maglor called over his shoulder as he left the courtyard. Celebrían’s silver-bright laughter followed him, and once he was past the hedges he broke into a run, flying down the familiar paths, past the lilacs and the vegetable garden, past the workshops and forges, over little bridges and past the ponds, where ducks quacked at him and friends called out surprised and delighted greetings. Maglor waved but did not slow, not until he reached the apple orchard. It was quiet there and cool in the shade, the fruits all still small and round and green. He paused to catch his breath, inhaling deeply the scents of earth and leaf and grass, before passing farther under the trees. It was a good place to come to seek solitude and quiet—there were many such places in Imloth Ningloron, but the orchards gave the illusion of retreating to a small forest without having to cross the whole of the valley to the pine woods in the hills. 

He saw Elrond before Elrond saw him, walking slowly with his hands clasped behind his back, apparently deep in thought. He was clad in soft blue robes, and his hair was loose, held out of his face only by a few small braids joined together behind his head with silver clips. “Elrond!” Maglor called, and watched him halt and spin around, eyes wide. 

“Maglor?” Elrond gasped, and then they were both running. Maglor caught Elrond up in his arms. Tears stung his eyes. Now he was home. “When did you arrive?” Elrond asked. “We had no idea—”

“Only just now. My brothers and Daeron all came to fetch us from Lórien, but of course they did not bother telling anyone where they went.” Maglor drew back to let Elrond look at him properly. Whatever he saw brought tears to his own eyes. “Of course,” Maglor added, wishing for laughter and not tears, “that means you have all eight of us in addition to Curvo’s daughters now as house guests.” Elrond laughed, and threw his arms again around Maglor. “And three hedgehogs, a cat, and Huan,” Maglor added.

“You could bring an oliphaunt with you and I wouldn’t mind,” Elrond said, voice slightly muffled where his face was pressed into the crook of Maglor’s neck. “Oh, I missed you.”

“I missed you,” Maglor said softly, “so very, very much. I’m so glad to be home.”

They did not immediately leave the orchard. Instead they sat under one of the trees to talk a while. Elrond asked about Lórien, and Maglor told him some of it. Much that had happened he didn’t think he could speak of yet, if he ever could to someone other than Maedhros—and there were some things even Maedhros would never know. He and Elrond had once spoken of healing, in this very orchard, and while Elrond had spoken of festering wounds needing to be lanced before proper healing could begin, Maglor had talked of bones needing to be rebroken after having not been set correctly—or at all—the first time. His experience of Lórien had been much like that. It had hurt at first, and for a long time, but he felt that he had come out of it stronger as a result. Elrond did not ask more than he was willing to share, and he had plenty of small pieces of news of his own to share, bits of gossip and funny stories from the valley, and from Tirion. 

“Your brothers have all been frequent guests,” Elrond said. “I’ve been very glad to get to know them over these last few decades—and Lady Nerdanel, too.”

“I’m glad too,” Maglor said. “Maedhros wishes to speak with you sometime. I don’t know about what.”

“I very much want to speak with him, too,” Elrond said. “I’ve long wished that I had made more of an effort to reach out to him before.”

“I don’t think he would have appreciated it much, if you had,” Maglor said. “But Lórien helped him as much as it helped me. Maybe even more. We saw our father on the road, as we arrived.” He flexed his scarred hand without thinking, and saw Elrond frown at it.

“He came ostensibly to consult my library, but I think he really just wanted to know if I knew where all your brothers had gone. Since I didn’t know they had gone anywhere in the first place, he left rather disappointed.”

“Have you seen much of my father?”

“Not really. He writes sometimes—that’s usually how he asks questions of lore and such things—and I’ve seen him in Tirion a few times, but Celebrían and I have done very little traveling since you left. Elladan and Elrohir have done more—they’re getting to know Turgon, now, in Alastoron.”

“Has Elladan gotten to go sailing with Eärendil yet?”

Elrond smiled. “He has, and is already looking forward to doing it again. Elrohir thinks he’s mad.” Maglor laughed. “How did it go, though? Seeing your father?”

“Calissë and Náriel were there, so we all had to put on smiles,” said Maglor. “It’s…it was both harder and easier than I thought. He did not linger, or try to speak much to us—but I’m sure the girls could feel the tension, and I don’t know how Curvo is going to explain to them. They’re too young to know the full truth.”

“I’m not sure there is a good way to explain, even when they are older,” Elrond said. “In some ways that is a blessing—that they will never know that kind of grief—but in other ways it is a whole new sort of grief.”

“I wish that he didn’t have to explain at all.” Maglor looked away through the trees. He glimpsed Huan sniffing around a few rows over, and after a few minutes more Pídhres appeared, jumping onto Elrond’s lap to sniff at his hands and purr when he pet her. “I think Estë did something to Pídhres. I’m told it’s been fifty years or so since we went away, and that’s far longer than a cat should live.”

Elrond laughed quietly. “I know better than to question such things—of the Valar, or of cats.” He scratched Pídhres behind the ears. “Do you have an immortal hedgehog, too?”

“No. Leicheg also lived longer than a hedgehog should, I suspect, but I think hedgehogs take a different view of that sort of thing to cats. I do have three of her little ones, though. There’s a dozen others that wandered off into Lórien over the years, but Aechen, Annem, and Aegthil refused to be left behind. Aechen is particularly attached to Maedhros.”

“Speaking of your brother, we should not linger too long. I’m being a terrible host.” Elrond made no move to get up.

“Celebrían is making up for it, I’m sure. Anyway, you don’t have to stand on ceremony with any of my brothers.” Maglor held out his arms and Elrond leaned against him. “Have I mentioned how much I missed you?”

They lingered under the apple trees until Huan came to shove his nose into their faces. Elrond laughed as he got to his feet; Pídhres hissed at Huan and jumped into Maglor’s arms. “Very well, Huan, we’re coming.”

Back at the house, Maglor left Elrond and made his way to his own room, eager to be in a space of his own again, and to change into clean clothes and brush the dust of the road out of his hair. He found Daeron there, playing the harp that Maglor had left behind. He’d carved it, and the smaller one he took traveling, out of driftwood collected from the shores of Middle-earth. He loved working with wood, and driftwood most of all, twisted and smoothed and discolored as it was in so many interesting ways. The rest of the room was much as he had left it, if a little tidier, and with a few more personal touches of Daeron’s. The sight of them made him smile. “There you are,” Daeron said, smiling himself as he rose from the harp. “You found Elrond?”

“I did.” Maglor dropped Pídhres onto the bed, though she immediately jumped off and vanished, heading off to reacquaint herself with the house, and then sank down onto it himself, falling back with a sigh. “Oh, I’ve missed a proper bed.”

“No mattresses in Lórien, then?” Daeron asked, amused.

“There were bowers filled with blankets and pillows and things, if we wanted them, but none of them were my own bed. Come here.” Maglor held out his arms, and Daeron joined him. “You weren’t there, either.” 

“I’ve had the luxury of proper beds, but I have found them uncomfortably big and empty, since you left,” Daeron said. He smiled, but it was wistful. “I missed you terribly.”

“I’m sorry—”

“No! Don’t apologize.” Daeron kissed him. “You needed to go, and I’m glad you did. Seeing you again now—it is worth all the years of empty beds.” 

“Will you tell me what you said to my father? Caranthir said you had words, and I saw how he looked at you on the road.” Maglor brushed a few strands of dark hair out of Daeron’s face.

“He seemed rather insulted on your behalf by my own reputation, and then I think I confused him greatly by saying that I did not care about such things. He also told me that he had seen my face in Mandos upon that tapestry that showed our leaving Middle-earth.”

“I remember you wondered about that,” Maglor said. Fëanor had written to him of it; he hadn’t thought about that letter in years. It would still be tucked into a drawer at the bottom of his desk, just across the room, full of sentiments Maglor still didn’t know if he really believed or not. 

“That was our first meeting, at the start of that year’s Midwinter festivities—and it was among company, so we were both on our best behavior. Our second meeting was the day before I left Tirion again; we had no audience then, and he…” Daeron stopped, a frown passing over his face—the first bit of real anger that Maglor had ever seen in him. “He objected to my wearing the pendant you gave me. I suppose he could tell at a glance it was your work. He accused me of being a stranger to you and thus unworthy of such a token, simply because I had admitted our friendship in Middle-earth had been short-lived and then only lately renewed. That was far more offensive than anything he might have said about my talents or my music, and I spoke harsh words in return—pointing out that I was far less a stranger to you than he was, and it was by his own doing. I did not linger to hear what he might have said in reply.”

“It isn’t your fault if the truth sounds harsh,” Maglor said. 

“Well, I did certainly did not go out of my way to try to soften it. I suppose it was all coming from a place of care,” Daeron said. “And Curufin had told him nothing—he didn’t think you would wish for him to share such things with your father—which I am sure was frustrating.”

“I wouldn’t have, then. I don’t think I care so much now—I’ll have to tell Curvo that, so he doesn’t keep feeling caught in the middle. My father, though, lost the right to question to whom I give my heart long ago,” Maglor said softly. He did wonder whether it really was from a place of concern, or if it was only a matter of pride that made him object to Daeron, one who had the audacity to claim—as Fëanor would surely see it—to be mightier than any of his sons in anything, or for one of the Moriquendi to surpass a Noldo. He doubted whether his father’s pride had really been so dampened even by such a long stay in Mandos, whatever he had said and done immediately upon his release. “I’m sorry, though. You should not have had to face his scorn alone.”

“I am more than equal to it,” Daeron said, smiling at him. “I know my own power and my own skills, and I have my own pride. Your father doesn’t frighten me. We’ve met many times since, always in company, and it usually goes about as well as it did earlier today.”

“As long as you aren’t bothered, then, I won’t be either.”

“It only bothers me insofar as it might make things harder for you. You’ve seen him once, though,” Daeron said. “It can only be easier from here—and I am not going anywhere, beloved.” He kissed Maglor again, more deeply, and murmured against his lips, “And now let us put all such things out of our minds, since there’s no longer any fear of our privacy being invaded…” Maglor laughed and pulled him closer. 

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Elrond always found himself thankful that Fëanor’s visits to Imloth Ningloron were rare. He had been quiet and withdrawn through much of that first summer after his return from Mandos, but that could now be safely attributed to—well, to having just come from Mandos, to adjusting to life again on top of reconciling with his brother and facing some of the lasting consequences of his actions after the Darkening. He was well settled into life now, and Elrond found him a very impressive person—and also one very aware of his own talents, and so self assured that it bordered on arrogance. 

It probably had been arrogance, once, but Elrond did not think it was quite that bad now. Still, Fëanor remained unused to being seriously argued with, and Elrond often found himself arguing with him, which was often exhausting—especially if it was the sort of spirited debate that Fëanor seemed to think was fun, at least when he won, but which Elrond hated. However confident he was in himself, Fëanor still had much to catch up on and to learn, for the world had changed many times over during his time in Mandos. It seemed to frustrate him greatly whenever that lack of knowledge tripped him up. 

On this visit he’d wanted less to consult Elrond’s library than Elrond himself, concerning his sons; he was determined to leave them be, but that did not seem to extend to a willingness to remain ignorant of all their doings. Elrond had not even known they’d all gone off somewhere, and wasn’t sure why Fëanor had been so surprised. He had said himself it was sudden and apparently unplanned. They had all visited Imloth Ningloron a great deal since Maglor had left for Lórien, and Elrond was glad to have come to know them, but that certainly did not mean he was privy to all their plans or secrets.

After bidding Fëanor farewell, Elrond retreated to the apple orchard, wishing for solitude and quiet and also room to walk and to breathe. He hadn’t been there even ten minutes, though, before Maglor appeared, with such a smile on his face as Elrond had never seen before. It was never possible to guess how long someone might need to stay in Lórien, but Elrond had been prepared to wait far longer than only a few decades. The scars were still there, of course, but the shadows in Maglor’s eyes were gone, and they shone with Treelight brighter than Elrond had ever seen in him. Maglor even spoke of his father with ease, with a rueful smile rather than the tight, pained look that had always accompanied Fëanor’s name before. He did flex his scarred hand as though it pained him, and though Elrond knew it was foolish to expect every old wound to have been entirely healed, he still didn’t like to see it—but even that was easy to set aside in the face of Maglor’s easy laughter and bright smiles, and the way he held himself—so differently than he had in all the time that Elrond had known him from Beleriand onward; it was as though some great weight had been lifted off of him. 

Back at the house Maglor kissed Elrond’s temple before heading off to his room to change out of his traveling clothes—and probably not to emerge until supper time, if Daeron was waiting for him. Elrond went in search of Celebrían, and found her bringing a platter of pastries filled with peaches and drizzled with honey out onto the large veranda that overlooked the duckpond and the vegetable garden. “Maglor found you?” she asked.

“He did.” Elrond kissed her. “And he’s brought all his brothers back with him, he says.”

“Yes, they’re all gathering outside. Maedhros is here too, you know.”

“Yes, I know.”

“He’s very different than he was when we last met. No more wallowing in old miseries for him! It was a great relief to see.”

Maedhros was not outside when Elrond followed Celebrían onto the veranda. Curufin was, and the twins followed just behind Elrond and Celebrían. Calissë and Náriel were, of course, out by the pond. Caranthir was with them, crouched by Náriel as Calissë tossed treats out to the ducks and the fish. After greeting Elrond, Amras went to join Caranthir and the girls by the water, and Amrod sat cross-legged on the ground by Curufin’s feet. “So your sudden and mysterious journey was to Lórien?” Celebrían said as she set the platter down. “How did you know it was time?”

“You’ll have to ask Celegorm, for it was he that came to collect all of us,” said Amrod as he picked up a pastry. “Maybe Huan could tell. Neither Maglor nor Maedhros had sent any messages, though, if that’s what you mean. They were very surprised to see us!”

“As we were surprised to see all of you!” Celebrían laughed as she sat down. “I confess when we heard you’d left I was a little worried, recalling the last time you all set off together.”

“That was quite different,” Amrod said. “If something had happened, we wouldn’t have taken Curvo’s girls.”

“They insisted on coming on an adventure,” Curufin said with a smile, “and a trip to Lórien is as safe an adventure as I can think of. Arimeldë was very happy to have the house to herself for a few weeks, but she will come meet us here after I’ve written to tell her we’re back. Tyelpë may come too, if his work allows.”

“They are both more than welcome of course,” Elrond said. “The journey was good?”

“It was excellent,” said Amrod. 

Celegorm and Maedhros came to join them then. Elrond rose to greet them, hiding his sudden apprehension behind a smile. He’d seen and spoken to Maedhros only once since he had come to Valinor, just before Maglor had arrived, and it had not been a pleasant visit for either of them. Maedhros had been wrapped in misery and guilt and all sorts of other things, hardly changed from the person Elrond had known in Beleriand, and Elrond himself had been mourning both Arwen and Aragorn, worrying about his sons and about Maglor. That visit had ended with the news of Fëanor’s imminent return, and it had not been long afterward that they’d heard that Maedhros and all his brothers had left their mothers house for the western wilderness. 

Now, Maedhros seemed almost like a different person. He was still quiet, but he smiled when his brothers spoke to him, and the fire of his spirit had been banked. Even his voice seemed different, no longer weighed down by fear and grief and pain; he seemed younger, brighter, and much more like the Maedhros so many had spoken of, rather than the one that Elrond had known as a child. He held himself less tightly, his limbs looser and his shoulders relaxed. When Calissë and Náriel returned to join them, Náriel climbed onto his lap without hesitation, and Maedhros put his arm around her and kissed the top of her head, every inch a doting uncle. 

He still didn’t quite look Elrond in the eye, though. Much still lay between them, but it could be sorted out later; it was not the sort of conversation, or series of conversations, to be had in front of others, especially young children. Elrond did not say more to Maedhros beyond a greeting. “Where is Maglor?” someone asked after a little while. 

“With Daeron, I think,” Elrond said. 

“We won’t see them again until dinner, I’m sure,” Celebrían said. “How long do you intend to stay? I hope at least until Elladan and Elrohir return.”

“We’ll stay as long as you’ll have us,” said Amras, reaching for a pastry over Amrod’s shoulder, “and eat all of your peaches. I don’t think any of us have any pressing matters awaiting us.”

“Of course you don’t,” said Caranthir. “You just go off and sit in the woods.”

“We follow Vána’s teachings,” Amrod said.

“That’s what I said, isn’t it?”

Dinnertime came around, and as predicted that was when Maglor and Daeron reappeared. Maglor was still not in the habit of dressing in finery—many centuries of lonely wandering with no thought to his looks made returning to jewels and fine robes a struggle, sometimes—but he had ribbons in his braids that evening, and small silver and sapphire rings in his ears. His brothers teased him a little, but he laughed at them right back. Dinner was always a merry and busy meal in Imloth Ningloron, though it was quieter that evening than usual; many had gone traveling that summer, or were away on errands to Tirion or Alqualondë or Tol Eressëa. After dinner, as the stars came out, there was as always call for music—and especially for Maglor’s music. He had been missed by everyone in the valley, and he obliged with a brilliant smile, singing with Daeron and with Lindir, and others, and alone. Elrond’s own harp was also brought out, and the two of them sang together, songs that Maglor had taught Elrond as a child, and songs that Elrond had taught him in return upon his coming to Rivendell. 

It was a lovely evening—merry and joyful and starlit. After nearly everyone drifted away to their beds, or to other parts of the valley, Maglor lingered, sitting by Elrond and playing quiet and simple melodies on his harp. “I missed this,” he murmured. “Singing with everyone.”

“Does it still worry you, playing in front of others?”

“Certainly not here. I think it won’t be something I seek out again—performing before a larger audience, I mean—but it doesn’t frighten me as it did. I won’t refuse if I am asked.” Maglor smiled a little crookedly. “Which is just as well, since I hear that there is some great feast being planned, and that I’m sure to be called upon for it. Another Mereth Aderthad, one of my brothers called it, though I can’t imagine why Ingwë would take an interest in such a thing only now.”

“I don’t know either,” Elrond said. “I think plans are being laid for some sort of great celebration of something, but the particulars haven’t been shared with anyone here. For my part, I am very happy to let all the great kings and princes make their plans without me.” That made Maglor laugh. “I had quite enough of plans and schemes in Middle-earth.”

“Not such merry ones, though,” Maglor said.

“The merry ones are worse, for then everyone feels free to argue about every little detail.”

“Instead of just listening to you as they should,” Maglor teased. He tugged on one of Elrond’s braids as he spoke, the way he often did with Elladan or Elrohir. “Whatever they’re planning, I'm curious but quite content to only go where I’m instructed and sing whatever they wish of me.”

“You and Daeron and Elemmírë will be much in demand, I think,” Elrond said. “You know your father will also be in the middle of it.”

“Of course he will. I can face him without flinching, at least in company.”

“Your feelings haven’t changed, though?”

Maglor shrugged. “I don’t know. I don’t think about it much anymore—or at least I hadn’t until we left Lórien—but there are things even Estë and Nienna cannot mend, and I suppose whatever lies between my father and me is one of them.”

“And Maedhros?”

“The same. He…” Maglor lowered his voice, “The tales all speak of how he stood aside at Losgar, but they do not tell what our father said to him afterward. It was ugly—as ugly as anything he’d ever said to Fingolfin. Maedhros met him earlier today and remained steady enough, but I have not yet had the chance to speak with him about it.” Maglor glanced across the hall to where Maedhros sat, Caranthir on one side of him and Celegorm the other, all three of them laughing at something Lindir was saying. “Have you spoken to him?”

“Not yet. You’ve only all just arrived.” Elrond leaned against Maglor. “There’s no hurry.”

“No, of course not.” 

“I’d never seen you with all of your brothers until today. I’m very glad they’re all here with you. Especially Maedhros.”

“I am too,” Maglor said. “He has been apprehensive about seeing you again. You never did tell me what you quarreled about when he was last here.”

“I don’t know if quarrel is the right word. It was not a good time for either of us, and we both said some unkind things.” The past had been a heavy thing on both of their hearts then, though Elrond knew how to carry it a little better than Maedhros had—and he’d had Celebrían to help him. Maedhros, at that time, hadn’t had anyone. He allowed himself no one, until his brothers had all taken him away west. “I told Celebrimbor once that I wished I could have known the Maedhros he and others spoke of so fondly.”

“You can, now,” Maglor said softly. “He isn’t the same—that’s impossible—but he’s so much more like himself now than he was in all the time you knew him both here and in Beleriand.”

“I’m glad of it,” Elrond said. He knew it had both grieved and worried Maglor that Maedhros had held himself apart when Elrond and Elros had been young. They’d been afraid of him from the start, and unlike Maglor he had done very little to quell those fears. Only time, and seeing the closeness that he and Maglor still shared then in spite of everything, had eased those fears. It was impossible to like someone who made it difficult on purpose, but Elrond hoped now that they could leave all of that behind them where it belonged. 

He woke early the next morning, and ventured out into the gardens. Gentle mists hovered over the waters, tinged golden by the rising sun, glowing among the blooming water lilies. As he passed over one of the many bridges that spanned the various ponds, Elrond saw Maedhros was awake also, seated in one of the gazebos built in the middle of the water, with a book of some kind on his knee and a pencil in his hand. He lifted his head as Elrond approached, and straightened. “I don’t mean to disturb you,” Elrond said, pausing by the gazebo. 

“You aren’t,” Maedhros said. There was a pause, somewhat uncomfortable, in which Elrond tried to think of something to say. Finally Maedhros spoke again. “This valley is beautiful. I don’t think I said that to you before.”

“Celebrían built it, and planted the gardens,” Elrond said. “Your grandmother helped, I think.” He stepped into the gazebo. “I was glad to hear that you went to Lórien with Maglor. I wasn’t sure you would, having refused for so long.”

Maedhros looked away, out over the water. Birds were singing in the bushes and grass along the banks. “I never thought it would help,” he said, “though I couldn’t explain why. You understood, though, even when I didn’t.”

“I should have seen it sooner,” Elrond said, “but I did not look. I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be. I wouldn’t have listened. I still don’t understand how, though—we only spoke once, and I don’t think either of us were in the mood to understand the other, then.”

“I’m sorry for that, too,” Elrond said.

“Please don’t. It was wrong of me to come here as I did, at that time. I knew you were grieving.”

“So were you.” Elrond sat down on the bench, leaving a few feet of space between them. “As for how I knew—I realized what the root of the problem must be when Maglor came back here that autumn. We weren’t speaking of you, but of him—of his own fears. I knew the root of them, as did he, and once I made the connection to you it seemed so obvious.” Maglor had been the prisoner of the Necromancer, and Sauron had wielded fear like a blade, wounding with deadly precision and leaving lasting harm. Maedhros had, long ago, been a prisoner of Morgoth—and unlike the Necromancer, Morgoth had been at the height of his powers, though he had not wielded any of his weapons with the same precision. He hadn’t had to. “Of course you would be afraid of the Valar,” Elrond said. “Are they not cut from the same cloth?”

“Estë is as unlike the Enemy as it is possible to be,” Maedhros murmured. “I knew that.” They both knew, though, that fear did not often care about what one knew.

“Námo, perhaps, is not so different though.” Maedhros had held himself apart in Mandos, too, refusing any aid or comfort that was offered to him, until the Valar decided that those halls were not a place he could find healing. They had been right, though perhaps not in the timing of it. 

“In life we only see him as the Doomsman of the Valar. In the Halls I think he is very different, but I wasn’t interested in seeing that, or understanding any of it. I only wanted to be left alone. I didn’t realize then how afraid I still was; I’d thought I left it all behind me.” Maedhros dropped his gaze to the sketchbook on his lap, moving his pencil idly as he shaded in part of what he had been drawing. “Thank you,” he said quietly. “I would have gone with Maglor regardless, because it was he who asked, but I don’t think it would have helped if I still hadn’t understood what it was I feared.”

“I’m glad,” Elrond said. “Truly.” Maedhros smiled at him; it was a small smile, but real. “Maglor says you would only have withdrawn if I had sought you out earlier, but I’m sorry I didn’t. If I had known that you’d seen Maglor in the palantír, I would have told you much sooner that he’d been brought out of that place, that he was safe.”

“You couldn’t have known,” Maedhros said. “I spoke of it to no one but Finrod and my mother, and neither of them would betray a confidence. My brothers were furious with me for keeping it from them, but I still think it was the right thing.”

“It was a heavy burden to bear alone,” Elrond said. 

“No heavier than any other I’ve carried.” Maedhros shrugged. “I won’t ever apologize for trying to protect them. It drives them to distraction.”

“I’m sure it does,” Elrond said. He understood that desire, to protect everyone he loved from as much as he could, and he understood too how it felt sometimes to be on the receiving end. “When is it their turn to protect you?”

That made Maedhros laugh. Like his smile it was quiet, but it was no less startling for it. “They told Maglor and me that summer it was their turn to ‘be the oldest.’ Mostly I think it was an excuse to scold us—and maybe we needed the scolding. I did, anyway.” His smile faded away after a few moments, and they sat a little while in silence, listening to the water and to the birds. Someone began work in one of the forges, and to sing in time with the hammer falling upon the anvil. Finally, Maedhros said, “Elrond—at Sirion…”

“You needn’t apologize again. I’ve forgiven you all of it already.”

“I know. Afterward, though—I’m sorry. I know you were afraid of me, you and Elros. I didn’t know how to reassure you, then—and I thought it better if I didn’t, if I kept what distance I could. I was not…”

“I know. I understand, now, and looking back I can remember the ways in which you did care for us. Learning to wield a blade with both hands saved my life later, more than once. You insisted on that, didn’t you?”

“I did tell Maglor it would be best if you learned that way, as many skills as possible. He agreed—I didn’t need to insist.”

“Still. Thank you.” 

Small footsteps heralded Calissë’s arrival. Maedhros’ smile was much brighter as he closed his sketchbook and lifted her onto his lap without hesitation. “Uncle Nelyo, have you seen the fish?”

Elrond left them, Maedhros being appropriately impressed by Calissë’s favorite fish, and Calissë as happy and delighted with her uncle as it was possible for a child to be. Náriel sped past him over the wooden bridge, and he heard Maglor calling after her to slow down, to be careful. “The pond isn’t deep,” Elrond said as Maglor caught up to him.

“That isn’t as reassuring as you think it is,” Maglor said. “I remember pulling you out of plenty of waters we thought were shallow.”

“That was Elros’ fault,” Elrond said.

“What, every time?” Maglor laughed.

“Of course! But really, I know just how deep the water is here—and both Náriel and Calissë learned how to swim in this very pond.” Celebrimbor had taught them, alongside Elladan and Elrohir, while Rundamírë had dragged Curufin away to the workshops so he wouldn’t hover and make anyone else as nervous as he had been. “You don’t have to worry; they’re with Maedhros.”

Náriel and Calissë were both laughing, just out of sight in the gazebo. Maedhros’ deeper voice joined them after a moment. “I know,” Maglor said, glancing toward the sound. “Small children, though—it’s hard not to worry.” His look back at Elrond was soft and fond and a little sad. “Teaching you to swim was necessity, not play.”

“You still made it fun—and we knew a little already.” He’d spent the vast majority of his life dwelling far inland, at the feet of mountains, in river valleys, but Elrond remained a child of the seashore, of sands and foam and waves; one of his clearest childhood memories of his father was learning how to float in the calm waters of Balar, Eärendil’s hands big and steady under his back and his hair shining like gold in the summer sunshine. His most treasured possession from those years was a small box of seashells, somehow rescued in the chaos of Sirion’s burning—he could not remember how. The box was newer than the shells; Elros had made it, as Elrond had made the one he had carried away to Númenor with his half of the shell collection. Elrond didn’t know what had happened to that, whether it had been passed down through Elros’ family, its significance eventually forgotten, perhaps the box itself lost or destroyed. The thought made his heart ache a little, as so many things about Númenor did. “How are you?” he asked Maglor, wanting to think of something else.

“You don’t have to worry anymore either,” Maglor said. “I’m fine, truly. I slept wonderfully last night, and am still very happy to be home.” He embraced Elrond, holding tightly. “I spent too short a time here before I left for Lórien.”

“You went when you needed to,” Elrond said, “and now there can be nothing to call you away again—not for such a long time, anyway.”

“No, nothing,” Maglor agreed.

“You still intend to make your home here?” Elrond asked. It had been Maglor’s plan from the start, but that had been before he’d seen his brothers again, let alone reconciled with Maedhros.

“Yes, of course. In the future I suppose I’ll split much of my time between here and my mother’s house, but I would call this place home as long as you’ll let me.” He smiled to show he was teasing. “I’d apologize, for that means my brothers will all be forever coming and going, but they’ve been doing that in my absence anyway.”

“I’ve been glad of it,” Elrond said, “and I’m glad that Maedhros is here now too.”

“You spoke?”

“A little. It went well.” Elrond put his arm through Maglor’s, and they left the wooden bridge and followed a path that wound around the edge of the pond. “I think what you both really needed was each other, as much as what Lórien could offer.”

Maglor hummed agreement. “I have been thinking of Elros,” he said softly after a few minutes. “I wish he could have met Maedhros—this Maedhros, the one who laughs.”

“Were Elros here,” Elrond said, “he would push Maedhros into the deepest part of the pond. And then he would fish him out, soaking wet and covered in algae and duckweed, and laugh at him.”

“He would, wouldn’t he?” Maglor didn’t laugh, and his smile was small and wistful. “I remember thinking once that he would have pushed me into the Sea, only to drag me back out and yell at me afterward.”

“That was our plan,” Elrond said, and that did get a laugh, small and quiet though it was. The grief of Elros’ absence was familiar and well-worn by now, the edges of it dulled by time; it was easier to laugh about him, to play guessing-games about what he might do if he were to somehow return to them, but the heartache was still there, the shape of his absence one Elrond had had to grow around, like a tree growing around a wound. 

Maedhros’ absence was not a wound that Maglor had ever recovered from before coming west, no matter what he had claimed or even believed. Their reunion had not been a joyous one, both of them still reeling from Fëanor’s return and still aching from their own pasts—but the joy was there now, trust rebuilt and love renewed. There would be no great feast held for it, but Elrond thought that a greater cause for celebration than anything Ingwë might be planning.

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Once he parted from Elrond and satisfied himself that the girls were with Maedhros and not likely to fall into the pond—it was both surprising and not, how those old habits of worry had resurfaced, even knowing there was nothing in Valinor that could ever compare to the dangers of Beleriand during the War of Wrath—Maglor wandered away to the workshops, to reacquaint himself with wood and clay and to see what had changed there and what hadn’t. He greeted old friends and laughed at the renewed jokes about Pídhres and Huan, both of whom appeared at various times to check on him as he wandered through the valley. It was high summer and the gardens were flourishing, the orchards and fields overflowing with peaches and strawberries. The new orchard was for oranges, though the trees were too young yet to bear much fruit. Celebrían had planted a lemon tree near her herb garden, too, and was talking of mangoes. 

As he wandered the garden paths he hummed to himself, and when he returned to the fishpond he found Maedhros still there, alone now with his sketchbook. Maglor crossed the wooden bridge to join him. “You spoke to Elrond this morning,” he said, sitting and leaning against Maedhros’ shoulder to peer down at the page, which sported a few studies of the fish swimming about below, and one quick sketch of Náriel, still rough and lacking detail. 

“I’m sure he told you all about it.”

“No, we were distracted by Náriel and Calissë. I was worried about Náriel falling into the water, and Elrond was trying to tell me not to.”

“Náriel tells me she is an excellent swimmer,” Maedhros said.

“Well yes, she would. I think I said the same thing at her age, right before I fell into a lake and nearly drowned myself before Uncle Linquendil fished me out. But…?”

“It went well, as you must have guessed.” Maedhros leaned his head against Maglor’s. “It’s still surprising to me how kind he is.”

“He’s always been that way.” Elrond hated it when Maglor tried to downplay his own influence on Elrond’s life, but truly, Elrond and Elros both had been kindhearted and good from the start—kind as summer, had been Bilbo’s phrase for Elrond—and that had nothing to do with Maglor and everything to do with them. “He told me that he is glad you’re here.”

“That’s very kind of him, since it sounds like all our other brothers have been making nuisances of themselves ever since we left.”

Maglor laughed. “That makes me happy, too—to have everyone I love getting to know one another, to have you all like each other. What did you talk about with Elrond?”

“Fear, and regrets. He apologized to me, which would be ridiculous even if he had done something wrong.” Maedhros put his arm around Maglor and kissed the top of his head. “I think only you could’ve raised him the way you did and managed to shield him so well from anything that might turn him bitter.”

“I don’t know about that. He endured much after we parted.”

“But he met it all with the skills you taught him,” Maedhros said, as implacable as Elrond himself on the subject.

“I just loved them,” Maglor said quietly. He spared a moment to wish again that Elros could have had this chance, too—to meet Maedhros once more, to see him as he really was rather than what the Oath and years of torment and centuries of war had made him. He wished, too, that Arwen could have met Maedhros, as Elladan and Elrohir soon would. The closest she or any of her children had come was riding with Maglor up the coast north of Lindon, within sight of Himling Isle, where the towers of Himring still stood, mist-wreathed, only slowly succumbing to the ravages of time. Maybe someone had gone out to the island since, but Maglor never had. It would have hurt too much, to see that familiar place so changed, to walk the old halls that his brother had built loved and to see them crumbling and pitted, overgrown with moss and vines. 

“Did your hand hurt, when we saw Atar yesterday?” Maedhros asked after they sat for a little while in comfortable silence, listening to the water and the other sounds of the valley—laughter and singing, and the ringing of hammers, and the birds in the trees. Somewhere in the distance Huan barked. 

“Yes. Did yours?”

Maedhros sighed. “As though I were holding a Silmaril again. I thought it would be different, but it wasn’t.” Maglor reached for his hand, turning it over. The scar pattern there had faded again, almost invisible unless you knew what to look for. Maglor’s own scars had also lost the pain and last bit of lingering tenderness overnight. “I thought I’d be able to just…see him in company the way Ambarussa do. Be polite but nothing more. I don’t think I can.”

“Maybe it’ll be easier next time,” Maglor said, though he had his own doubts. They were the only two of their brothers to have touched the Silmarils, after everything. The only ones who followed the Oath to the very end—the end of it, the end of the world, long after they’d lost or tried to bury any love they might still have harbored for their father. Maglor had wept many bitter tears over it in Lórien, and Nienna had consoled him but had been unable to offer any real guidance. He knew that he should try to find a way to forgive his father. He’d once thought he’d never be able to forgive Maedhros for what had happened at the end—for having had to watch as he disappeared into the fire, and then to find his own way, somehow, through the breaking and drowning lands and then through the long years afterward. He had, though, and here they were, both of them so greatly changed, but learning all over again how to be brothers, how to find their way back to the closeness they’d once shared. 

Fëanor, though. That felt different. That hurt went even deeper—but at least it wasn’t one he had to bear alone. 

When they left the pond to walk back to the house the hedgehogs came scurrying out of the grass. Aechen went to Maedhros, who scooped him up and nestled him in the crook of his right arm. Leicheg had always liked to be carried like that, too. The other two followed along at Maglor’s heels, vanishing into the flowers and then reappearing a few minutes later as they went. They came to a wide open space in the garden near the house, and found Celebrían just arriving there as well—and not alone. “Galadriel!” Maglor exclaimed. He sprang forward to embrace her. “Did you just arrive?”

“I did,” Galadriel said, laughing. “Huan came so suddenly to drag Daeron away that I suspected it must be because you had returned, or were about to.”

“And you were right, as usual,” Maglor said. Galadriel smiled at him, catching and holding his gaze. Whatever she saw there made her smile even more. “It’s good to see you again,” he said.

“And you, Macalaurë. And you, Maitimo,” Galadriel added, turning to Maedhros, who inclined his head in greeting. “Is that a hedgehog?”

“Oh yes,” Maglor said. “There are three of them now. I don’t know where Annem and Aegthil have gotten to, but Aechen is particularly fond of Maedhros.”

“For reasons that remain mysterious,” Maedhros said, with a small smile. He did not quite meet Galadriel’s gaze, but Maglor hadn’t really expected him to. 

“Oh hello, Galadriel!” Daeron appeared then, coming up from another one of the many garden paths. “Good morning, Celebrían,” he added.

“Good morning!” Celebrían said. “Breakfast is inside for anyone who is hungry, though I’m afraid we haven’t anything on the table suitable for hedgehogs.” 

“I think Aechen has had his fill of breakfast already,” Maedhros said. He smiled at Daeron and followed Celebrían inside. 

“How much of a stir did Huan cause?” Daeron asked once they were alone with Galadriel. “I was rather distracted, trying to keep him from ripping my favorite robes.”

“Not much, really,” Galadriel said, laughing. “Everyone thinks you’ve just gone haring off into the wild again with Maglor’s brothers again. We all just shook our heads and laughed at you, and some bets were made on when you would be back.”

“Betting on me! I’ll have to write to Beleg to find out when it would be the funniest time for me to return.”

“But gone haring off again?” Maglor said. “Has that happened often since I’ve been away?”

“No, but they weren’t entirely wrong this time,” Daeron said, laughing. “Though when I leave to visit your brothers I don’t usually do so in the middle of a banquet—I may be somewhat lacking yet in manners, but I’m not that rude.”

“I’m not sure the road to Lórien really counts as the wild,” Maglor said. “What’s the latest gossip from Tirion, Galadriel? What is Finrod doing these days?”

“Finrod has been on Tol Eressëa these last few years,” Galadriel said. “Tirion is quiet, but Daeron has been making a name for himself among the loremasters, and causing something of a stir.”

“I was a loremaster in Doriath long before most of them were born,” Daeron said. 

“Of course,” Galadriel said with a smile, “but I was referring to your refusal to use the tengwar in any of your writings.”

“I think it’s good for the Noldor to have to translate another’s alphabet, and remember that they are not the pinnacle of all learning,” Daeron said airily, “and anyway I don’t only use my cirth. There are several Elvish alphabets and modes of writing that were developed in the east that predate even my own, and I have written several treatises on them in the last decade, since none of those who use them have come into the West.”

Maglor couldn’t help but smile. “And it is coincidence, of course, that you have done so much work in a field bound to interest my father, in a mode of writing that he had no part in creating.”

“I had no idea when I began that work that your father had any particular interest in it,” Daeron said. “Anyway, it doesn’t hurt anyone and I’ve heard no complaints, and it should not be surprising.” He slipped his arm around Maglor’s waist and leaned against him. “I use my letters because I made them and I like them best.”

“And if you can spite Fëanor, all the better?” Galadriel asked, amused. “I admit I am a little surprised, Daeron. I didn’t realize you had exchanged more than a handful of greetings.”

“It took very little more than that for Fëanor to take a rather decided dislike to me, and I am afraid the feeling is mutual. But what of your decided dislike of Fëanor, Galadriel? As I recall it was rather famous.”

“He continues to avoid me, for the most part,” Galadriel said. “For myself, I long outgrew such things. I won’t pursue a friendship, but I will not turn him away either, if he wishes to speak to me. But what of you, Maglor? What are your feelings, having now been to Lórien?”

“Much as they were before,” Maglor said, “though I think I spent all my anger the first time we spoke. I hear he does not often leave Tirion, and as I have no plans to be there much, I think I can survive the occasional meeting.”

“You’ve no wish for reconciliation?”

“Maybe when seeing him does not make my scars burn.” That made Galadriel frown, but it was as good an answer as Maglor had. Daeron slipped his hand into Maglor’s, his fingers rubbing over the scars there, as though to soothe any lingering ache. 

“Does it hurt Maedhros too?” Galadriel asked softly.

“Yes. Worse than me, I think.” As he spoke Maglor felt Daeron’s arm tighten a little around him. Galadriel sighed. “Mandos can work wonders, it seems, but it cannot entirely remake a person. My father is still himself, must still have a temper, and his pride.”

“He has it under control now, at least as far as I have seen or heard,” Galadriel said. 

“He and Curufin fight, at times,” Daeron murmured. “Curufin says sometimes it is ugly—but they have reconciled afterward, each time, and it seems to only bring them closer. Curufin remains hopeful.”

“Even so. It’s best…it’s best is our father continues to keep his distance, as he promised he would, and for us to keep ours.” 

It was something he still needed to speak to Curufin about. Maglor did not begrudge Curufin his own desires, or his love for their father. How could he? It grieved him, though, that they were all so divided. Ambarussa seemed entirely ambivalent; Celegorm was still resentful, even if he was somehow quieter and calmer about it. Caranthir was more difficult to read, but he could hold a grudge longer than any of them. 

He did not get a chance to speak to Curufin, for several more days. The girls made it hard to get him alone, and there were many demands on Maglor too as he found his way back into the rhythms of life in Imloth Ningloron, as one who lived there rather than as a guest. Finally, though, Maglor was able to catch him in a moment when Náriel and Calissë were entranced by a story Daeron was telling, and no one else wanted either of them for anything. “Curvo, can we speak?” he asked.

“Of course. Is something the matter?”

“I don’t know.” Maglor put an arm around Curufin’s shoulders as they walked outside. “Come this way, where it’s quiet.”

Celegorm and Maedhros came upon them just outside the memorial garden. “Is something wrong?” Celegorm asked, looking between them. 

“I just want to speak of Atar,” Maglor said. 

“Alone, or…?”

“No, just away from small ears.” Maglor opened the gate, but found his brothers hesitant to enter. “What’s the matter? Surely you’ve seen this place before.”

“But can we…?” Curufin asked. “Isn’t it meant for—”

“It’s quiet and private,” Maglor said. “Come on. It isn’t haunted.” He slipped inside, and shut the gate with a soft click behind them. “I came here once with Galadriel to talk about all of you. No one will care if we talk about our father here, least of all the hobbits.” The garden had been first made when Bilbo had died, laburnums and snapdragons planted over his grave, and a mallorn tree beside it. Frodo and Sam had followed in their own time, and a small memorial to Merry and Pippin had been erected between their graves, Frodo’s covered in soft blue forget-me-nots, and Sam’s shaded by a rose bush grown from a cutting he had brought all the way from Bag End, sweet-smelling and pink. 

“You spoke of us with Galadriel?” Celegorm said, startled, as Maglor went to the new memorial that had been made in his absence. It was a relief carving of two silhouettes in pale granite, easily recognizable even at a glance, with names carved neatly beneath them. Arwen and Estel—this place was not for kings and queens or princes or lords, but for dear friends and loved ones; there was no need for any title or regal epessë here.

“Yes,” Maglor murmured, as he ran his fingers lightly over the names. He turned to the statue of Gilraen beside it, brushing the fingers of her outstretched too in silent greeting. “As I said, it’s quiet. I was trying then to decide whether I wanted to go to see you.” He looked over his shoulder at the three of them, standing near the gate still. Maedhros was looking at Gilraen’s statue, an unreadable look on his face. “Then Atar arrived that afternoon and—well, that rather decided my course for me. Come sit.”

Curufin paused by Gilraen’s statue, peering into her face. “Who was she?” he asked. “She seems familiar.”

“Gilraen,” Maglor said as he sat on the bench under the mallorn tree, on the opposite side from the graves. Sam’s rosebush had grown, and Frodo’s soft blue forget-me-nots swayed in the gentle breeze between it and the laburnums that covered Bilbo’s grave. “She was Aragorn’s mother, and descended herself from the royal line of Arnor. You might see something of Elrond in her; she was Elros’ many times great-granddaughter.”

“Did you know her well?” Curufin came to join them on the bench; Maglor pulled him down between himself and Maedhros; Celegorm sat on the grass at their feet. 

“Yes. She was a dear friend. But I want to talk about you, Curvo.”

“Me and Atya, you mean? I’m fine.” Curufin looked surprised. “Really.”

“You said you fought before you left,” Maedhros said quietly. “Do you fight often?”

“No,” Curufin said.

“When you do fight, is it about us?” Maglor asked. “Daeron says at times it it ugly.”

Curufin shook his head. “Only sometimes. He’s—I think he did not expect everyone to stay away, really. I think he thought—he told me that you said, Cáno, the worst thing he’d done was die, and…well, he isn’t dead, now.”

“I did say that,” Maglor said. “And I meant it. That does not mean his mere presence in life again is enough to make up for all the rest.”

“I’ve told him that,” Curufin said. “But it’s—it’s so hard to make someone understand what it was like when they weren’t there. Tyelpë has had the same trouble in trying to speak to him of Middle-earth. It’s the same trouble we’ve all had with Ammë, except Atar believes he does understand because he did cross the Sea.”

“It’s hard, I think, when the person doing the telling has also come back from Mandos,” Celegorm said. He leaned his head against Curufin’s knee. “You don’t have the scars to show him. There’s nothing but your words, and so it only sounds like a story.”

“Elrond has also spoken to him, and he did not come here by way of Mandos,” Curufin said.

“Elrond doesn’t have visible scars, either,” Maglor said, “and I doubt he’s interested in sharing the ones he does have with our father. I have scars, but I don’t…”

“I wouldn’t ask it of you,” Curufin said. He reached for Maglor’s hand, turning it over to reveal the scars. “It hurt again, didn’t it?”

“Lórien healed much, for us,” Maedhros said, “but not everything.” Maglor reached for his hand with the one Curufin wasn’t holding, and Maedhros squeezed his fingers before letting go. “The Silmarils hold the Treelight and the blessings of Varda, but they are still the works of his hands, and…I think that’s what hurts now.”

“Speaking of things he has made, what of the palantíri?” Maglor asked, having a sudden thought. “You all looked for me in one of them, once—into my past. Let Atar look for all of us, let him see all that happened in Beleriand through the stones.” There were nine palantíri in a chest at Nerdanel’s house, the first ones Fëanor had made long ago—attuned to the seven of them and their parents, never showing anything else except with great effort of will. In their youth Fëanor had been endlessly frustrated with his sons’ continual forgetfulness to take at least one when they went traveling, so he and Nerdanel could speak with them at need. 

“I hadn't thought of that,” Curufin said, startled. “I don’t…that is asking a lot of him, and he did see much in Mandos—”

“And much of what he saw will have faded away by now,” Celegorm said, “the way it has for all of us. The palantír is a good idea. Let him see what we became, since it’s impossible to explain it to him in words.”

“He might see things we don’t want him to see, though,” Curufin said. “Private things—”

“If it means he understands, after,” Maedhros said softly, “let him see.”

“I’ll suggest it,” Curufin said, but he still sounded doubtful. “It will hurt him, to see it more clearly than in Vairë’s threads.”

“I’m sorry that you’re caught in the middle, Curvo,” Maglor said. He closed his fingers around Curufin’s. “You shouldn’t have to be.”

“He is different,” Curufin said quietly. “He’s—he does love us, all of us. But it’s…me telling you is, I know, the same as trying to tell him what Beleriand was like. He also hates Daeron, which really doesn’t help.”

“Is it because Daeron is the mightier singer?” Maglor asked. “He told me he thought Atar was offended by the distinction given to him over me.”

“I don’t know. I don’t think so, though maybe that’s part of it. Daeron doesn’t respect him, is I think the problem. Not as your father and not as…himself.”

“Respect is earned,” Celegorm said, “and I don’t think Atar has done anything to earn Daeron’s respect. Don’t worry though, Cáno,” he added, smiling up at Maglor. “Everyone else loves him.”

“That might be part of it too,” Curufin said. “He has to grit his teeth and be polite whenever Daeron comes to Tirion and they end up in company together, but Daeron is so unconcerned with what anyone thinks that he doesn’t have to try very hard to be pleasant. You can only tell that he dislikes Atya if you know him well.”

“Daeron also said that you don’t talk about me at all,” Maglor said. “Don’t feel that you have to keep doing that. I don’t care anymore what Atar does or doesn’t know—except maybe don’t tell him that our scars hurt.” It felt like a weakness that he did not dare let Fëanor know about. Curufin nodded, and squeezed Maglor’s hand briefly.

“What does Ammë say about all of this?” Maedhros asked.

“We don’t speak much of it,” Curufin said. “She sees and speaks to him, but she’s only a little quicker to forgive than any of you. You remember how they parted. It was very terrible, and she hasn’t forgotten. I don’t know what Atar will have to do to make up for it, if he ever can.” 

She might forgive more quickly if the rest of them could, Maglor thought. “I’m sorry, Curvo,” he said again.

“Please don’t be. It isn’t your fault.”

“I’m sorry too, but mostly because of the girls,” Celegorm said. “They should not be caught in the middle either.”

Celegorm and Curufin left the garden first. Maglor lingered, because he liked it there, and he suddenly missed Gilraen in particular a great deal. He had never really confided in her, but she had understood much without having to ask. They’d spoken a great deal over the years of grief and pain and other things, she offering him the wisdom of the Dúnedain and he sharing something of what little he had learned for himself. 

Maedhros stayed because Maglor did. He watched as Maglor rose to return to the memorial for Arwen and Aragorn. “When I came here before,” he said, “I was surprised to see nothing for Elros. Elrond only said that he has his monument on Tol Eressëa.”

“He does,” Maglor murmured. “I saw it when I was in Avallónë. I think Finrod carved it. Tar-Minyatar, though, looks quite different from our Elros.”

“Why nothing here, though?”

“I don’t think Elrond can bear it. Even this is very new.” Maglor traced the lines of Arwen’s hair with his fingertips. Part of it looked like Elrond’s own work, but it had been finished by other hands. Elladan and Elrohir’s, maybe. Celebrían did not work with stone. He knew that Elrond had made the statue of Gilraen, which was also relatively new. “They looked for us, you know.”

“I know. Elrond told me.”

“I had no idea until I came to Lothlórien and Galadriel told me of it.” Maglor sighed, and turned to go sit on the grass by Bilbo’s grave, between it and the bench where Maedhros still sat. “I had thought I’d come back here with a better idea of what I wanted.”

“I thought so too,” Maedhros said softly. “I hoped…” He looked away, farther into the garden. Other statues and little memorials were scattered throughout the flowers and small bushes, bearing names or symbols or the likenesses of dear friends whose memory was carried still in the hearts of those who lived in Imloth Ningloron. “I should’ve known better than to hope for anything, really. I knew what it felt like to have those kinds of hopes dashed.”

“It’s never wrong to hope,” Maglor said. He himself was still learning how—how to hold onto it again, to really believe that the future would be brighter than the past, that there would be good things that did not have to end, the way everything else had ended. It still felt like such a fragile thing, something he did not dare grasp too eagerly or too hard, lest it slide out of his hands like sand or seawater. He found that he still could not hope for anything at all when it came to Fëanor. 

Elladan and Elrohir arrived after another week passed, galloping down the road and leaping out of the saddle almost before their horses had come to a halt. Maglor had heard them coming and come to the courtyard to greet them. “Maglor!” Elladan reached him first, Elrohir only a step behind. “We almost didn’t believe Naneth’s letter!” Elladan said. He pulled back to look Maglor in the face. “Did it help?”

“Yes, of course.” Maglor kissed them both and held them tight for a moment. “I missed you, though, so very much.”

“I hope you’re here to stay, now,” said Elrohir.

“I hope so, too! And next time I get it into my head to wander off across Valinor I’ll be sure to take you both with me.”

“Is Maedhros with you?” Elladan asked. 

“All of my brothers are here,” Maglor laughed, “but I do want you to meet Maedhros at last.”

“Is that Pídhres?” Elrohir exclaimed as she came trotting out of the garden. “Hello, little one, I was not expecting you!” He picked her up, laughing. “Lórien was kind to you indeed!”

“Fingon asked us to tell you—to tell Maedhros, really—that he’ll be following as soon as he can get away,” Elladan said to Maglor as they walked into the house. “And I’m sure Finrod will be coming as soon as word reaches him in Avallónë.”

“It should have reached him already, since we’ve already written to our mother there,” Maglor said. “I think she is quite busy, though—and really, there’s no rush. No one is going anywhere.”

“And you’re really all right?” Elrohir asked as Pídhres climbed up onto his shoulders to shove her nose into his ear. “You found what you went looking for in Lórien?”

“Yes, I did, and I am. No matter how many times you ask, Elrohir, the answer won’t change.”

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Maedhros would have been perfectly happy to avoid Galadriel as he had in all the years since he’d returned from Mandos and she from Middle-earth, but she came looking for him. “Are you still afraid of me, Cousin?” she asked, smiling to soften the question and turn it into something teasing.

“Should I not be?” Maedhros replied in the same tone.

“Certainly not now,” Galadriel said.

They stood in the large dining hall, before one of the many tapestries that lined the walls. Maedhros had been looking again at it, at the depiction of Imladris as seen from the top of the path that led into it, down an almost-sheer cliff face. It was a beautiful tapestry, and a beautiful place. He had seen it in his own mind’s eye, brought to vivid life by Maglor’s songs, and could imagine the scent of pine and the sound of water flowing all around—in that respect much like Imloth Ningloron. Sometimes Maedhros wished he had gotten the chance to pass over the Ered Luin into Eriador and the lands even farther east, to see what lay beyond Beleriand. Sometimes he wondered what would have happened if they had thought to try for it, if he and Maglor had retreated over the mountains either with the twins or after they had parted, the two of them just vanishing from all the histories, wandering as Maglor had later wandered—but together, in freedom instead of despair. A useless thing to think of now, especially since the Oath would have never allowed it. He felt a pang of envy—very small, but still there—that Galadriel had gotten to do just that, even as he was glad of it for her sake.

He and Galadriel had never really been friends. He was the eldest of Finwë’s grandchildren and she the youngest, and by the time she had reached adulthood the discord in their house and among their people had been so deeply rooted that there had been no hope, as Maedhros had thought then, of ever being rid of it. Even he and Fingon had ended their long friendship in bitter anger, both of them too loyal to their fathers to keep trying for peace. It had hurt and Maedhros had regretted it deeply afterward, but then—well. It had taken a mountainside and a prayer answered beyond all expectation for that rift to begin to close. And by the time he had recovered enough to give much thought to anything else, Galadriel had vanished into Doriath, and he had seen her only once more in Beleriand, at the Mereth Aderthad, where they had not spoken beyond cool greetings. Maedhros had spent much more time with Finrod, both then and since his return to life.

After the War of Wrath Galadriel had remained in Middle-earth, and like Gil-galad, like Elrond, she had thrived, surpassing all their family and all their people in wisdom and in power. Only Elrond, with the blood of Melian in his veins, could rival her. Maedhros had heard the tales of how Galadriel had fought for so many years against Sauron, a never ending battle of wills and of minds. He could not imagine even attempting such a thing, let alone emerging victorious.

“Thank you—for what you did for Maglor,” Maedhros said quietly, after the silence had stretched between them. Elladan and Elrohir, so shockingly alike to their father and uncle in face that even forewarned Maedhros had not been able to stop himself from staring upon their first meeting, had brought Maglor out of the darkness of Dol Guldur, but it had been Galadriel who offered him shelter and safety and a chance to begin to heal. It was her golden realm of mallorn trees where he had rediscovered light and beauty, still within his grasp if he only reached for it.

“There is no need for thanks. He is my cousin—the only one I had left on those shores. If anything I should apologize for not acting sooner, but Maglor has already told me not to.” Galadriel’s smile was fond and a little rueful. “I’m glad to see that Lórien helped you as much as it helped him, Maedhros. Will you come now more often to Tirion and among our people again?”

“Maybe,” Maedhros said. He had not given it much thought, and did not find the idea very appealing. He had once been his father’s heir, the king’s eldest grandson, a shining prince able to smile and speak with anyone, even able to—for a while—do something to hold their people together alongside Finrod and Fingon. He was older now, and knew better the weight of power—and the relief that came from giving it up. Maedhros did not think he wanted to return to anything like he had once been. Since his return from Mandos, going to Tirion had been almost impossible, leaving him feeling like he couldn’t breathe until he escaped it again back to the quiet of his mother’s house and his grandmother’s gardens. He thought it would be different now, but he would never love it. He would never feel at home there again.

Certainly not while his father remained there.

“I would like for us to be friends,” Galadriel said quietly after a few moments. “I do not wish to be someone you fear.”

“I’m not afraid of you, Galadriel,” Maedhros said. He offered her a smile, as one of his brothers called from across the room. “I’m sorry friendship wasn’t possible before.”

“I am, too.” She reached for his hand, squeezing it briefly before going to speak to Celebrían.

Maedhros joined Caranthir and Ambarussa as they went outside. Aechen appeared to follow at Maedhros’ heels down the path until he stopped to scoop him up. “You’re going to be as bad as Maglor soon, just covered in small animals,” said Caranthir, watching Aechen settle into the crook of Maedhros’ arm.

“I hope not,” said Maedhros.

“Were you making friends with Galadriel this morning?” Amras asked.

“She was asking if I intend to go to Tirion more often, now.”

“Do you?”

“Probably. Sometimes—to visit Curvo and Fingon, at least. Are you gong to live there, Moryo, after you and Lisgalen marry?”

Caranthir shrugged. “We haven’t decided yet. We might split the difference between Ammë’s house and Tirion and build something in between, but we’re both comfortable where we are, so we might just go back and forth for a while before deciding. There’s no real reason to hurry.”

“Does Atya know about Lisgalen?” Amrod asked.

“I don’t know. Probably—I told Curvo he doesn’t need to keep any secrets for me, but Lisgalen hasn’t ever mentioned meeting him.”

“Maybe he learned his lesson after Daeron,” Amras said.

Caranthir made a skeptical face, wrinkling his nose a little. “Maybe.”

“What did Daeron do?” Maedhros asked. He was sure that Maglor and Daeron had spoken of it privately, but all anyone else had said was that Daeron and Fëanor did not get along. It wasn’t a surprise, exactly, but Maedhros couldn’t think of any real reason for it. Daeron was as impressive as Fëanor himself, and a loremaster—surely they had many interests that aligned, more reasons to get along than not.

“You’ll have to ask Daeron,” said Amras.

“I was in Tirion when he and Atar met, and he came to Curvo’s house after they had words,” Caranthir said, “but he didn’t tell us exactly what he said. I don’t think Atar really liked him even from the start, though. You saw how he looked at him and Cáno when we met on the road.”

Maedhros had noticed, he supposed, but he had been more concerned with trying not to show how badly his own hand hurt as their father had approached. “It’s because of Cáno that Atar dislikes Daeron?” All three of his brothers shrugged. It seemed Fëanor had not been any more forthcoming than Daeron had, or that Curufin had not shared in his own turn. Maedhros sighed.

“It’s not a problem for you to try to fix, you know,” Amrod said. “Daeron can obviously handle both himself and our father. Easily.”

“Atar could make things difficult for Daeron, if he wanted,” Maedhros said.

“Not unless he wants to destroy the Noldor’s relationship with the Sindar,” said Caranthir, “and whatever our own feelings, it must be acknowledged: he is going about things differently this time.”

“That’s true,” Amras said. “Daeron is a favorite of Elu Thingol, and I do think Atar really values Thingol’s friendship, because he was such great friends with Grandfather Finwë.”

“So was Olwë,” Maedhros said.

“Everyone is thinking clearly, now,” said Amrod. “Everyone wants to move forward in peace. Even Atar—I know we all still feel…I don’t know how to name my feelings, but we must be fair and realize that he is as committed as we are, as Caranthir said, to doing things differently, to being better. Maybe it makes no difference to us, but it makes a difference for the world, and for everyone else in it.”

“Our feelings are for our father as his sons, not as the Eldar for Finwë’s eldest son and brother of the King,” said Amras. “I don’t know how Fingolfin can manage to be friends with him now, but for everyone else it isn’t nearly so personal.”

“Fingolfin holds the power, now,” Caranthir said quietly. “He can approach our father from a place of strength—and, well, Finwë isn’t here. I think his absence is what’s really brought them together.”

Maedhros missed Finwë, suddenly and painfully. He hadn’t thought of his grandfather in a long time, that grief buried under so many others. It was one he had not spoken of with Nienna in Lórien. He hadn’t thought to, and now he regretted it. After so many other battles, so many other losses, so many dead—the finding of Finwë’s body remained the worst, because it had been the first—the moment when his entire world had come crashing down, shattered like the doors of Formenos. Aloud he said, “I suppose it doesn’t matter why—only that they are getting along, and not falling back into old feuds. As long as we are not asked to return to Tirion as princes ourselves, I don’t much care what goes on at Fingolfin’s court. I don’t even really care what Atar thinks of Daeron, except that it might make things harder for Maglor.”

“I don’t mind going back to court sometimes,” said Amrod. “But every time someone addresses me with a title it feels strange.”

“The less time I have to spend anywhere near the palace, the better,” Caranthir said.

“Even the gardens?” Amras asked.

“I have my own garden.”

Celebrían found them then, and called for help with the peaches. There was more fruit coming out of her orchards than she knew what to do with, and so she intended to send as many baskets as they could fill to Tirion and Alqualondë. Amras seized Maedhros’ hand to pull him away down the path to the orchard. He and Amrod kept doing that—grabbing Maedhros to drag him along as though they expected him to resist—because before he had gone to Lórien he would have.

Picking peaches in Imloth Ningloron reminded him of the plum harvests in the orchard by their grandparents’ house. When they were young Maedhros used to lift Ambarussa onto his shoulders so they could reach higher than anyone else. Now he found himself hoisting Calissë up instead, so she could pick the fruit from the highest branches to hand down to Caranthir. It was a bright day, with white clouds drifting lazily across the clear blue sky. Birds sang in the trees alongside the elves, who sang songs of bountiful harvests and sweet-tasting fruits, of strong roots and boughs. When Maedhros put his right wrist against the tree to steady himself he could feel the life humming within it, could catch a few of its slow and satisfied thoughts as it shed its ripe fruits into their hands, pleased with the songs and with the soil and sun and the breeze passing through its leaves.

It was a good day, a joyful day, but once summoned there Maedhros found that Finwë was never far from his thoughts. He thought of the plum orchard, but also of the cherry trees that Finwë had planted, and how Finwë had once lifted Maedhros onto his own shoulders to pick them by the handful, long long ago when Maedhros had been small enough to be lifted, and to feel utterly safe with his grandfather’s strong hands resting on his knees, the same way that he now held Calissë steady. When he heard laughter on the way back to the house with baskets full of fruit he thought for a moment it was Finwë, but it was only Elrohir. Elrond and his children all took after Elwing’s line, but in their laughter and sometimes in the way that Elrond spoke or gestured, Maedhros saw small glimpses of Finwë, or of Fingolfin.

He slipped away to his room after dinner. It was near Maglor’s, cozy and airy at once, lit with soft yellow lamps, and with wide windows and soft rugs scattered across the floor. The rugs and the hangings on the walls were all soft greens and browns. He had found two sketchbooks and a set of pencils waiting for him on the desk, and the bookshelf held a small collection of books that he might have chosen for himself off of Elrond’s library shelves. He still did not know how Elrond had known—or Celebrían—unless they had consulted with his brothers or with Fingon, and that felt equally strange, to imagine Elrond asking such questions about him with such an aim. Maedhros ran his fingers along the spines of the books, and picked one more or less at random before going to the window seat. Twilight had settled like a soft purple blanket over the valley, and the stars were coming out, glimmering on the water. Maedhros could hear singing somewhere out by the largest fishpond, where Elrond had found him the morning after their arrival.

Finwë would have loved Elrond and his family—would have loved this valley and the home they had made there. Maedhros blinked back the building heat behind his eyes and tried to turn his attention to the book on his lap, but rustling in the ivy that climbed up the wall outside heralded Celegorm’s arrival. “This,” Maedhros said, as Celegorm swung himself through the window to join him on the cushions, “is why Curufin thinks you’re a bad influence.”

“I can’t be a bad influence if they don’t see me,” Celegorm said. He fell back against Maedhros’ chest. “What’s troubling you? I thought Lórien would cure you of brooding.”

“I’m not brooding,” Maedhros said. He had a feeling he was going to be repeating that quite a lot in the future. Celegorm tilted his head back to frown at him. “I’m just—Moryo mentioned Finwë earlier, and I’ve been thinking about him. That’s all.”

“Oh.” Celegorm sighed. Maedhros set the book aside and settled his arms around Celegorm. “I miss him too,” Celegorm said quietly after a little while. “You know Curvo won’t eat cherries?”

“I don’t either,” Maedhros said. They tasted like plums did—like childhood and the warmth of Laurelin and the sort of joy they could never know again. There would be joy in the future—there was joy in the present—but it was of a different kind, something found again in spite of grief, rather than lived in ignorance of it. It felt now like something they had to hold onto as hard as they could lest it slip away again, where before they had been able just to be joyful, careless and fearless and free.

A knock at the door heralded Maglor, carrying his small harp. It was made of driftwood, and Maedhros thought Maglor brought it with him traveling for more reasons than just music—the wood had come from Middle-earth, picked up from far flung, desolate strands that no one else had ever visited except him. “Nelyo, is something the matter?” he asked as he shut the door behind him.

“We were just talking of Finwë,” Celegorm said.

Maglor’s worried frown softened, and he came to join them. “I was thinking of him today, too.”

“How bad was it really?” Celegorm asked. “When you found him.” He stretched out his legs over Maglor’s lap.

Maedhros looked at Maglor, who met his gaze only briefly before turning away. “Bad,” Maedhros said quietly. “He had fought, but…” Morgoth had not put forth his power yet into Angband or into the very earth as he had done later in Middle-earth. He had not yet been bound to only one form, not yet burned by the Silmarils. Fingolfin had only managed to wound him, later. Finwë had stood no chance—and yet he had not fled. The lamps had all been lit, though. Maedhros remembered that vividly, how all of Formenos, all the world, had lain in shadow but for the entryway where Finwë had made his last stand, speaking or singing words of light against the dark—and they had worked, had chased it back, at least a little. It had made it all the worse to find him, broken and unmoving, eyes still open and staring unseeing and empty toward the ceiling.

Maglor had been just behind Maedhros as they entered through the broken doorway, so Maedhros hadn’t been able to stop him seeing. They’d both, though, kept the sight from their brothers. It felt like the last thing Maedhros had really succeeded in protecting them from, even as he suddenly learned there were things from which they needed protection. They’d even managed to keep Fëanor from seeing the body later, though he’d been almost mad with grief and it had taken all three of them—Maedhros, Maglor, and Celegorm—to hold him back. Maedhros wasn’t sure Fëanor had ever forgiven them for it.

“Don’t ask us more, Tyelko,” Maglor said. “I know we all saw terrible things afterward, that on the face of it were so much worse, but—it was different.” Finwë had loomed so large in their lives, a bright and kind and warm presence—and to see him so utterly broken…Maedhros felt like it had broken something in them, too.

“We’ve talked about this,” Celegorm said. “You shouldn’t have to carry—”

“It isn’t that,” Maedhros said.

“We cannot speak of it,” Maglor said. “There aren’t any words, even if we wished to share it with you. There aren’t even…I was never even able to write a lament for him. Findis did, but I never could.”

“When did Findis write anything?” Celegorm asked, sounding startled.

“I don’t know. Finarfin took the song with him over the Sea, and shared it with Elrond. Elrond wrote it down for me.” Maglor kept his gaze on the window. “Maybe it’s time I tried again.”

The door opened again and Náriel darted in, and clambered up onto Celegorm’s lap, giggling. “Aren’t you supposed to be in bed?” Maedhros asked her.

“No!”

“Did your atya say you could stay up past your bedtime?” Maglor asked, smiling.

“Yes!”

“Well, that’s all right then,” said Maglor.

Celegorm laughed. “What happened to being a good influence?”

“What’s the point of being an uncle if I can’t indulge my beloved niece’s every whim?” Maglor asked. He picked up his harp. “Náriel, what song shall I sing for you?”

“The one about Uncle Nelyo losing his hand,” Náriel said after a few moments of thought.

“Náriel,” Celegorm protested, sounding so like Curufin that Maedhros couldn’t stop himself laughing, ducking his head so he could press his face into Celegorm’s braids to try to stifle it.

“I don’t think your atya would be very happy with me if I sang one of those,” Maglor said. He put his fingers to the harp strings and played a few chords. “I do have a song about Tyelko and Huan from when we were all very young—”

“Oh no, not that one!” Celegorm cried.

“It’s almost as exciting as Nelyo’s rescue by Findekáno,” said Maglor with a grin. “Would that do for you, Náriel?”

“Oh, yes!” Náriel said. Maedhros put his hand over Celegorm’s mouth to stifle any further protests as Maglor began to play a song he had written very long ago, long before they knew anything about trouble or discord or unrest, about an unfortunate incident involving a lake and a very large fish and an even larger rambunctious puppy. By the end of it they were all laughing, but Náriel was also fighting back yawns. Maglor adjusted his fingers just slightly and began to play another song, moving seamlessly from the silly story put to verse just to tease Celegorm to a lullaby, though not one Maedhros had heard before. His voice gentled and softened, and it did not take long before Náriel’s eyes grew too heavy to keep open, and she slumped against Celegorm’s chest. Maedhros felt himself yawning, too, before Maglor let the last notes fade away into the quiet room.

“I’ll take her to bed,” Celegorm said, getting up carefully. He leaned down to kiss Maedhros’ forehead. “No more brooding tonight, Maedhros.”

“I wasn’t brooding to begin with,” Maedhros said. “Goodnight, Tyelko.”

“Goodnight.”

Maglor lingered as the door shut behind Celegorm, and started to play again, quiet and wordless songs to fill the silence. As he played they both watched the night deepen outside. Clouds passed overhead, gathering slowly, promising rain in the early hours of the morning. Slowly, the whole house quieted, lights going out one by one, or dimming and softening. The sound of flowing water wove in between the notes of Maglor’s harp. Maedhros sighed, leaning back and closing his eyes. “Will you really try to write something for Finwë?” he asked after a while.

“Maybe. But maybe it’s been too long, and there will be no one now who wishes to hear it.”

“I want to hear it.”

“Then I’ll try.”

They stayed up most of the night, talking here and there, mostly just enjoying one another’s company. Eventually, Maglor asked, “You really aren’t bothered by Náriel’s curiosity about your hand?”

“No.” Maedhros shook his head, and laughed a little. “I wouldn’t have been bothered before, either—not by that.”

“The questions will change, you know, as they grow older and learn more,” Maglor said.

“Yes, I know. It still won’t trouble me. My hand is the one thing that has never troubled me as much as everyone thinks.”

“I know. Or I did know, before.” Maglor leaned back, letting the last notes he’d played fade away as he rested his hands atop the harp’s frame. “I just didn’t know if that had changed, since…”

“It hasn’t. It’s…I’m glad that I came back without it. It was never like any of the other scars I had, and…now that I don’t have them, it’s the one thing that really shows that I am not the same. No one can look at me and deceive themselves that they see who I was before.” Maedhros had spoken of scars once to Curufin, in the early days after Maglor’s return after his reunion with their mother’s family had not gone as well as anyone had hoped. The scars made it harder in many ways, but returning in a body devoid of them was a difficult thing of its own.

“I’ve often wished that I did not have such visible scars,” Maglor said without taking his gaze from the window, “and I still do not like the way people stare, when they realize what they mean.” The most visible scar he had was on his cheek, just above his cheekbone. Up close one could see the smaller scars around his mouth, marks left by a needle and thread—a tale of horror in themselves. There were others too—marks on his wrists, and even worse ones more easily hidden by his clothing. “But you’re right, it would be harder to meet those who knew me long ago and have them expect me to be unchanged, just because I might look the same.”

“I also wish you didn’t have the scars,” Maedhros said, “but that’s because I wish such things had never happened to you in the first place. You never did tell me what took you so close to danger to begin with.”

“I thought to follow the Anduin north—and I thought it would be safe enough if I kept away from the wood and close to the river. There was no particular reason. I did finish that journey later though, after Elrond left and the world was made safe.” Maglor smiled at him. “I went all the way to its headwaters in the Ered Mithrim.”

“You know that I don’t know where those are,” Maedhros said.

“Elrond has maps. I’ll show you sometime.” Maglor rose, and leaned down to kiss Maedhros in the same place on his forehead that Celegorm had. “I’m for bed. Goodnight, Nelyo.”

“Goodnight.” Once Maglor had gone, Maedhros made his own way to bed, falling into the pillows with a sigh. When he slept he dreamed of Finwë, but not of the end—instead he dreamed of the cherry trees behind the palace, almost glowing in the golden light of Laurelin, and of his grandfather’s deep laughter and strong arms lifting him up to pick the highest fruits. 

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Maglor’s dreams were quiet, but he woke in the early morning still thinking of Finwë. Daeron still slept, so Maglor slipped quietly out of bed and dressed. Aegthil trundled out of the cushioned basket at the foot of the bed where the hedgehogs slept in a pile, and followed him outside, all the way to the woodworking shop. It was a large building, with wide windows and skylights set into the roof, though the day was cloudy and a misty rain was falling, so the light was pale and cool. Maglor finger combed the raindrops out of his hair and braided it firmly back before he went to look through the wood for one that spoke to him. He didn’t know what he wanted to make, only that he wanted the smell of sawdust and the feeling of wood rather than clay taking shape under his fingers.

Finwë, he remembered, had made a cradle for every one of his children and grandchildren before they were born. He’d had to scramble to make a second, larger one after Ambarussa surprised them all, because they cried and cried if ever separated. He had made toys, too, and the first instruments that Maglor had learned to play, and many clever little figures of animals and people. They had been delightful, and Maglor had once had a shelf in his room filled with wooden horses that Finwë had made for him in all different sizes and poses. He had left them still there when they’d gone to Formenos, never imagining that he would never see them again, never receive another such gift to add to the collection. All of them now were probably broken, piled into a box somewhere, or else rotted away along with the rest of the house as time and nature took its course. 

His hands found a piece of cherry wood that felt right, and he went to pick the tools he would need. There was a set of woodworking tools—and one for clay—in his bedroom, tucked away in a drawer at the bottom of his desk. Fëanor had made them, after their ill-fated meeting and after Maglor had fled the valley with Huan and Pídhres. He’d found them awaiting him when he’d returned, alongside a letter. The letter had spoken of deep regrets, and of love. He didn’t disbelieve the letter, but he couldn’t fully believe it either, even if Fëanor did seem to be keeping his promises—to leave them all be, to let them choose whether to come to him, even as the years marched on and surely there were whispers about it in Tirion, speculation and rumor. Maglor didn’t care much about that, for he did not intend to be often in Tirion, but there was a part of him still that missed his father desperately. The other, larger part of him remembered only too well what it had felt like to pick up the Silmaril at the end of the world and feel the white-hot burn of it. They had been hallowed things, holy, precious, unstained and still as bright as they had been upon their first making, even after so many centuries held in the darkness of Angband. Of course they, the greatest works of Fëanor’s hands, had not suffered his touch, or Maedhros’. 

It wasn’t the holy power of the Trees that still burned in his memory and awoke in the scars on his palm whenever he came face to face with his father, though. He thought Maedhros had the right of it, that it was the heat of Fëanor himself, of his own power that he had used in their creation, the same heat that had burned his body into ashes upon his death so there was nothing even for his sons to bury except melted armor and a broken and twisted sword. He had been all fire and heat and rage by the end, and even after so many years in Lórien trying to untangle all the thorny vines of his memory and his fear and his past, Maglor’s mind still returned, again and again, to the flaming Eye of Sauron. They were so very different, and he knew it was unfair, but in his memory they were also so very alike. 

The last and least of the Sons of Fëanor, Sauron had called Maglor once, taunting him even as he tried to cajole him into entering his service. Maglor shuddered away from the memory, but he couldn’t stop hearing the words in his father’s voice—and he did not know whether it was something he imagined on his own or if it was something Sauron had put into his mind. In Fëanor’s letter he had praised Maglor’s strength, and Maglor could look back and see now that he was stronger than he had thought himself, could see the lies of his own self-doubt and self-recrimination for what they were. Fëanor had praised Maglor’s throwing away of the Silmaril, too, but if anything in his letter was a lie it was surely that. Fëanor had sworn vengeance for those jewels and had doomed them all in their pursuit. Maglor didn’t believe for a moment that his father had really forgiven him his casting away of it at the last. 

“I thought neither you nor Nelyo were supposed to be brooding anymore,” said Amras from the doorway. Maglor looked up from contemplating the piece of wood on the bench in front of him. Amras leaned on the doorway, Aegthil in his hands, his head tilted a little as he regarded Maglor. “What’s the matter?”

“I came out here to try to avoid brooding,” Maglor said, sighing. “Then I remembered Atar made me a set of woodworking tools, and…”

“Oh.” Amras set Aegthil down, and came to perch on a stool across the bench from Maglor. “Are they out here?”

“No, I have them locked away in my room.”

“He gave me a set of prisms,” Amras said. “Like the ones Curvo made when I was little.”

“I remember those.” Ambarussa’s room had been always full of rainbows, and Amras had begged Curvo to make ever more of them, even as he tried to move onto more challenging projects in gem craft—and he had always obliged. “What did you do with them?”

“Hung them in the window. But Cáno, I thought you found healing in Lórien.”

“I did. Just…some things can’t be healed that way, that’s all. Whatever is between me and Atar is one of those things.”

“Does your hand hurt?”

“No, not now.”

“Would you tell me if it did?”

Maglor sighed again. “Yes, Ambarussa, I would. I feel fine. I just…I’m missing Finwë, and it’s all tangled up in missing Atar, too.”

Amras leaned his elbows on the bench as Maglor picked up the tools at last and started to carve away bits of wood. “Maybe you should go speak to him again,” Amras said after a few minutes of watching. 

“There’s nothing left to say.”

“Maybe you could listen? I know he wrote all of us letters, but that was years ago now, and…maybe it would be worth trying.”

“Are you going to speak to him?”

“I’m thinking about it. But it’s…Amrod and I, it’s different. When you used to talk of Atar, back in Beleriand when it didn’t hurt quite so much, all the things you talked about, you and Maedhros and Celegorm and everyone, it was all things Amrod and I had done with you—you and Maedhros, mostly.”

Maglor set the wood down. “Amras…”

“I never realized until afterward that he hadn’t—as he was when we were growing up—that he hadn’t always been like that. I don’t know how to miss someone who wasn’t there the way he was for you.”

Daeron had spoken similarly of his own parents, though that was very different—they had disappeared, lost on the Great Journey when he had still been a baby. Fëanor had just withdrawn, all on his own. Maglor had noticed, of course, but he hadn’t realized it had been so bad. “You told me you weren’t unhappy, growing up,” he said.

“We weren’t.” Amras smiled at him, but it was a small and sad smile, not his usual sunny grin. “And it’s not as though he was wholly absent—he wasn’t, but…but it means…it means that Amrod and I don’t really have strong feelings now one way or the other about Atar. It feels strange and it feels wrong. We both love you, all of you, and we love Ammë, but Atar…he feels like a stranger. And he knows it—he wrote about it in his letters to us. I don’t know, maybe it could be a good thing. We can start all over again and maybe it will be better than before. Amrod spent a few years visiting Grandmother Míriel, and he thinks he wants to try to talk to Atar—really talk to him, not just exchange pleasantries about the weather whenever we happen to meet in company.”

“I know Curufin was worried about what we all thought, before he went to Atar,” Maglor said. He picked up the wood again, needing to be doing something with his hands. “I hope you don’t feel that way.”

“I don’t, and I don’t think Amrod does. We’ve even talked to Celegorm about it, and he didn’t get nearly as angry as he did at Curufin. Did he tell you he went to Nienna? He was gone almost as long as you were.”

“He didn’t,” Maglor said, “but I’m glad.”

“Me too.”

“I hope it goes well,” Maglor said after a few more minutes. “When you see Atar, I hope it goes as well as it did for Curvo.”

“Will you think about talking to him, too?”

“I think about it all the time,” Maglor said. “I just…”

“You didn’t think you could move forward with Nelyo either,” Amras pointed out. 

“I know. The difference is that I wanted to. I don’t…I don’t know what I want from Atar anymore.” Maglor focused his gaze on the wood in his hands, slowly carving into it and letting the curled up slivers fall to the bench top. “I know now that I can meet him without flinching, without losing my temper or running away, but I think that is all I can hope for.”

“Can I tell you what he said, after Amrod and I talk to him?”

“Of course, Amras.”

Amras got bored of watching Maglor work after a little while, and left to find something more interesting. Maglor kept going until his hands hurt and he’d formed the rough shape of a horse in mid-gallop. It had been a long time since he’d made anything that wasn’t useful, something that would just be pleasing to look at. Not since he had come out of Dol Guldur, at least, though he didn’t quite know why. 

He found Elladan nearby when he emerged from the workshop, which had slowly filled with other woodcarvers and teachers and students over the course of the morning. The rain had stopped, though it remained cloudy. “Good morning,” Maglor said as Elladan fell into step beside him. “Is anything interesting happening today?”

“Letters came from Tirion and Valmar and Eressëa—including some for you.”

“From Eressëa?”

“And Tirion, and Valmar.”

“Who’s writing to me from Valmar?” Maglor asked, surprised.

“Elemmírë?” Elladan guessed with a shrug. “I think we are expecting Rundamírë and Lisgalen later today as well, unless the rain delays them another day.”

“Oh, good.” Maglor liked Rundamírë—he’d always liked her, thought her a perfect match for Curufin, but he had met her again even before he’d seen his brothers after he’d come west, and she hadn’t looked twice at his face; he loved her all the more for it. “What’s Lisgalen like?”

“Much like Caranthir. Quiet, kind. They’re a silver- and gemsmith who once lived in Eregion, and escaped the destruction by chance, having gone to Lindon just before the war started. I think they came west just after the Last Alliance, but all the Gwaith-i-Mírdain were a bit scattered, Ada says, before Celebrimbor returned to Tirion. You’ll like them,” Elladan added. He draped an arm over Maglor’s shoulders. “How are you this morning?”

“Perfectly well, and if you keep asking me how I am in that tone, I’ll toss you into the fish pond,” Maglor said. “What do you think of Maedhros?”

“He is also quiet, and kind,” Elladan said. “Mostly I am glad that Elrohir and I did not shock him quite as badly as we shocked you upon our first meeting.”

“And what of Celegorm? You and he did not meet under the best of circumstances.”

“I think he’s been avoiding me, more or less,” Elladan said. “And Elrohir—I think he isn’t sure which one of us it was in the workshop with you that afternoon. If you can tell him that neither of us will bite if he says hello, I would be grateful.”

“I’ll make sure he knows.”

“You never did say what he was so upset about, or what you fought over.”

“We didn’t fight. He was upset over our father—what else?”

They found Elrond and Celebrían in one of the cozy parlors overlooking the rose garden. Elrond had a book and Celebrían sat beside him with her legs draped over his lap, assorted embroidery threads scattered about her. “Good morning!” she said, looking up at them with a smile. “Is it still damp outside?”

“A bit,” said Elladan. “Where is Elrohir?”

Before either Elrond or Celebrían could answer, Náriel raced by in the hallway behind Maglor and Elladan, and a crash and a bitten-off curse answered the question of Elrohir’s whereabouts. “Playing hide-and-seek,” Elrond said calmly. “Or at least that’s what they said they were doing ten minutes ago.”

“I don’t remember hide-and-seek involving any chasing,” Maglor said, moving into the room lest Elrohir crash into him next as he flew past after Náriel. 

“It doesn’t, usually, but it seems Náriel is making up new rules as she goes,” said Celebrían. 

“I don’t think that should really surprise anyone,” Elrond said. 

“I think I’ll stay out of all of that,” Elladan said, and went to sit on Celebrían’s other side. 

Maglor left them to it and retreated upstairs to change and look at the letters that had arrived for him. As he shrugged on a clean robe, Daeron came into the room. “There you are,” he said. “Where did you go this morning?”

“Just out to the workshops to do some woodcarving. I didn’t want to wake you.”

“I don’t mind being woken—I’d rather you woke me, in fact. What are these?” Daeron picked up the small bundle of letters. “Who’s writing to you from Valmar?”

“Elemmírë is Elladan’s guess—and he was right, this is her writing.” Maglor took the letter and broke the seal. It was not very long—the extra pages were two songs she had been writing, and on which she wanted his opinion. “She wants to come to Imloth Ningloron next year, perhaps in the spring,” Maglor said, “and she hopes that you will be here also. Have you not yet visited Valmar?”

“I haven’t had occasion to,” said Daeron. “I’ve been keeping myself busy with my songbirds and my writing.” He took one of the songs to look it over. “My student Pirineth would like this,” he said. “She is greatly skilled on the viol and loves a challenge.”

The other letters were from Fingon and Finrod—short notes to express their happiness at his return from Lórien and a promise to come to Imloth Ningloron soon—and from his mother. “Ammë cannot get away from her students in Avallónë just yet,” he read, “but she was meant to return home in the autumn anyway, and will come straight here instead.”

“Good.”

They went to sit by the window, Daeron leaning back against Maglor’s chest. It had begun to rain again, harder than the fine misty rain of that morning. Pídhres appeared to curl up on Daeron’s lap, and together they looked more closely at Elemmírë’s music, humming pieces aloud and talking of what they might do differently were it their own song. 

“I think I will like Elemmírë very much,” Daeron said after a while, as he folded the papers together. “I have liked all of her music that I have heard, and she must be a great teacher indeed, having taught you.”

“I think you will both like each other,” Maglor said. He looped his arms around Daeron, gazing out of the window, all the flowers and hedges made blurry and indistinct by the rain on the glass. “I am so very glad to have returned to find everyone I love coming to love one another too,” he murmured. “You and my brothers, and all of you and Elrond…”

“I’m glad too,” Daeron said. “I felt so very lonely for the first few years of your absence. It did not help that everyone in Taur-en-Gellam kept looking at me askance. It got much easier after I started writing to Caranthir regularly, and visiting Tirion more often.”

“Looking at you askance—because of me?”

“More because of your brothers. And I myself am different. I don’t have the same patience for the sorts of games and whispers people play at, even at a court as harmonious as Thingol and Melian’s is here. But speaking of those we love knowing and loving each other—my aunt and uncle are returned from Mandos. That was the real reason Mablung came to drag me back when you were preparing to leave for Lórien. I very much want you to meet them.”

“I would like to meet them, too.”

“They were rather startled to hear about you and me, and I think my aunt has some reservations still.” Daeron sat up and turned so they were facing one another, so he caught the look on Maglor’s face before he could say anything. “No, don’t apologize!”

“But if—”

“She is only thinking of how I reacted to the news of Alqualondë, but it was so long ago now—and I introduced her to your mother, and they like one another very much. There’s just so much only my own and Mablung’s reassurances can do. Aunt Lacheryn has always been protective.”

“Of course she has,” Maglor said. “She is your father’s sister, is she not?”

“Yes.” Daeron paused, a small frown passing over his face. “There are also others in Taur-en-Gellam who wish to meet with you. Galathil is one.”

“Galathil? Celeborn’s brother?”

“And Nimloth’s father. And…I suppose it would be a bit much to expect you to remember him, or even to have known who he was. He died in Menegroth.”

Maglor blinked at Daeron for a moment, uncomprehending—and then he realized. “Oh. Oh, I—” He started to draw back, but Daeron reached for his hands. “Daeron—”

“He wishes to see you, to speak to you. He isn’t angry, Maglor.”

“But I killed him—”

“And Celegorm killed Dior, and they have since met and made peace. That’s all Galathil wants. Nimloth has been less forgiving, but since Dior’s return even she has softened.”

“Of course I will speak to him if that’s what he wishes. I just—I don’t know what to say.”

“You don’t have to say anything,” Daeron said. “Just let him speak first.”

“Does Celeborn know?”

“He does. He’s known all along.”

Maglor closed his eyes, astonished all over again at the welcome and care shown to him in Lothlórien long ago, and the friendship afterward offered by Celeborn. All of it done in full knowledge of all that Maglor had done, and not just the generalities. “Whatever Galathil asks of me, I’ll do it of course, if it is in my power.”

“He will ask nothing of you, I think, except to look him in the eye. He just wants to speak with you so you can both put the past where it belongs. Maglor, beloved.” Daeron took his face in his hands, and Maglor opened his eyes. “Everyone seeks to put the past where it belongs. Do not pick up these burdens again after you’ve just learned how to shed them. I meant only to forewarn you that he might come here seeking you when he learns that you’ve returned from Lórien.”

“I haven’t shed them,” Maglor said. “I’ve just learned how to carry them. I did what I did, and there is nothing that can change it. I do not want to let it go entirely. Let me be reminded sometimes—let me feel the weight of it, now that I know how not to let it rule me.”

Daeron searched his face, expression grave. “Very well,” he said finally, very softly. “I still hate to see these shadows return.”

“They will pass.”

“I hope so. If they do not, I will have words for Estë.”

That was meant to make Maglor smile, he knew, but he couldn’t manage it just then. Instead he leaned forward to rest their foreheads together. “There is a reason,” he whispered, “that the greatest of my works will forever be the Noldolantë. It does no one any good to deny or to forget the past, even as we seek to leave it behind and look forward.”

“I do not believe that, that your greatest work must be the Noldolantë.” Daeron kissed him, very softly. “You will write many songs greater and more profound than that, of the joy that comes after sorrow and the hope that rises out of despair.”

“I don’t know about that—”

“I do. Surely the time is come now to leave lamentation behind.”

Maglor shook his head. “Almost,” he said. “I’ve one more lament to write, one I should have written long ago—I just never could find the words. For my grandfather.”

“Ah.” Daeron smoothed a strand of hair out of his face. “Of course you must write what your heart tells you to write. But your music cannot be forever only lamentations and grief, whatever the old tales say of you.”

“It isn’t. I don’t think I have written anything of grief since I came here. The song for Finwë is just…long overdue, and he has been on my mind of late. I don’t intend to write anything great, or anything I will even sing aloud except to my brothers, and maybe some of my cousins.”

“I think I met him once or twice, when I was a child,” Daeron said softly, “but I do not remember clearly. I’m sorry. I can see you loved him.”

“I did. I do.” 

A knock at the door was all the warning they got before it opened just enough for Calissë to slip inside. She shut it behind her and pressed herself back against it, giggling. “Is it your turn to hide?” Maglor asked her.

“Yes,” she said. “Can I, please?”

“Well, you’re here already, aren’t you? Go on then—we won’t tell.” Daeron settled back down against Maglor’s chest as Calissë ran to climb into the wardrobe. Maglor tangled his fingers in Daeron’s hair, and they fell silent, listening to the rain on the window and to Calissë shuffling around behind the clothing. “It’s a good thing we weren’t doing anything more than talking,” Daeron murmured. Maglor snorted. “I think we’re going to have to start locking the door.”

“And maybe start using different languages when little ears might overhear,” Maglor whispered back. “Do they know Westron?”

“Not yet,” Daeron said in that tongue. 

“Have you written to Mablung or your aunt and uncle yet?”

“I did, yes. They have not written back yet—but that is why I told you of Galathil. I do not know if he will seek to come here with them, but there is a chance of it. I told him you would speak with him when you returned from Lórien.”

“Try not to worry. It will be fine—I am forewarned, and won’t be caught by surprise.”

It took ten minutes for Náriel to come into the room seeking her sister. She did not knock, and was very thorough in her searching, even though Maglor and Daeron both professed complete ignorance to Calissë’s whereabouts. She even opened up the chests tucked into corners and beside the bookshelf. 

“Uncle Cáno, why do you have a bunch of wood?” she asked, frowning into the chest nearest the window seat. 

“I just like it,” Maglor said, smiling when she wrinkled her nose. 

“It looks all funny.”

“It’s driftwood, sweetheart, like what my harps are made of. I picked it up off the beach. Anyway, you can see that your sister isn’t in there.” 

Náriel closed the chest with a thump, and wandered off to another part of the room, dragging her little fingers along the strings of Maglor’s larger harp as she went. Daeron laughed quietly into his chest, and Maglor watched her get closer and closer to the wardrobe without ever quite deciding to look inside. He remembered games of hide-and-seek in his own childhood; he’d won, more often than not—except when Maedhros was the one looking. His cousins and younger brothers had hated it. 

In the end Náriel did not look into the wardrobe, but Maglor thought it was only because she wasn’t quite as tall as Calissë, and couldn’t reach the handle. When she left he heard giggling inside, and it wasn’t long before Calissë peered out. “Aren’t you supposed to stay put until Náriel gives up?” Daeron asked. 

Calissë giggled. “No! That’s no fun. You gotta keep finding new spots, and if you get found they gotta catch you!”

“Ah,” Maglor said, as Calissë jumped down from the wardrobe and went to peer into the corridor. “That explains some things.”

“I was shocked to learn this wasn’t how you all played the game yourselves,” Daeron said.

“Ours wasn’t a good house to run around like this in,” Maglor said. “It didn’t stop us running, of course, but we could never have made a game out of it.” He heard a shriek in the corridor outside, and then two sets of rapid footsteps charging past the door. 

Another knock a few minutes later heralded Amras. “Rundamírë and Lisgalen are here,” he said, poking his head into the room. “Is everything all right?”

“Yes, of course.” Daeron sat up. “We’ll be down in a few minutes.”

“Carnistir is very nervous about you and Nelyo meeting Lisgalen,” Amrod added, looking at Maglor. 

“He needn’t be,” Maglor said. “I have every intention of liking them as much as I like Rundamírë.”

“Were you nervous about your brothers liking me?” Daeron asked as Amrod left and they picked themselves up, reluctantly, off the window seat. 

“No. I was too busy being nervous about everything else.” Maglor pulled his morning’s braid free and ran his fingers through his hair, before gathering part of it back to secure with the hair clip Daeron had given him after their arrival on Tol Eressëa. It was silver, set with purple enamel asters, and it had become one of his most treasured possessions. “What do you think of Lisgalen?”

“I like them very much. Caranthir was also very nervous about me liking them, which I found very funny at the time. Whenever I am in Tirion, Rundamírë invites both me and Lisgalen over to sit in her rooftop garden and drink tea and talk about all of you behind your backs.” He smiled when Maglor laughed. “I hope you know that means I know all of the most embarrassing things you did when you were young. Rundamírë has made sure of it.”

“In that case, I’ll just have to ask Mablung about your embarrassing exploits when next I see him,” Maglor replied, grinning when Daeron grimaced dramatically. “Come on. We shouldn’t keep them waiting.”

As he had predicted he would, Maglor liked Lisgalen immediately. They were only a little shorter than Caranthir, but broader and with the well-defined muscles of a smith, with soft brown curls and brown eyes above an easy smile. Their nose had been broken at least once in the past and healed slightly crooked. If they were nervous to meet Caranthir’s eldest brothers, they did not show it. As Elladan had said, they were quiet and soft spoken, but they were not shy. When they greeted Maglor their grip was strong and firm.

Rundamírë greeted both Maglor and Maedhros with warm delight, kissing them both before turning to greet Calissë and Náriel, who barreled down the stairs into her arms. It was a merry meeting all around; Maglor kept his eye on Caranthir, and was glad to see him relax as it all went well. As they were called to dinner, Maglor caught him alone for a moment. “Ambarussa said you were worried. I hope you aren’t anymore.”

“No,” Caranthir said. He was smiling, and when he caught Lisgalen’s eye from across the room his whole demeanor seemed to soften. Maglor had never seen him so perfectly content. “But you really—”

“I like them very much, and so does Maedhros, I promise. We’re happy that you’re happy, Moryo.”

“I am.” Caranthir sounded almost surprised as he said it out loud. “I feel so very lucky.”

Maglor embraced him for a moment, and then pushed him ahead into the dining hall. “Go on, then.” He watched Lisgalen take Caranthir’s hand, and watched his other brothers laughing with each other, and Elrond taking his seat at the high table beside Celebrían, and Daeron lifting Náriel into her seat as Elladan and Elrohir teased Calissë. Before he had gone to Lórien, Maglor could have never imagined such a scene, a little chaotic, everyone smiling, everyone happy, with nothing to overshadow or complicate it. He hung back for a few seconds longer just to look, to commit the sight to his memory, before Celegorm turned to call out to ask what was keeping him. 

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Celegorm had spent far less time in Imloth Ningloron than his brothers had, in the years since Maglor had left it for Lórien. Mostly it was because he’d himself spent many years away, having returned to Ekkaia to seek Nienna’s halls. He’d gone out there many times in his youth, before the Darkening, and he’d never so much as glimpsed them—but when he’d gone looking, they had been terribly easy to find, white-walled and white-roofed, with quiet gardens filled with greenery but few flowers, except for white Evermind and pale roses climbing the walls. There had been very few other elves there, and if there were Maiar they went mostly unclad. Celegorm had been grateful for it; he hadn’t really known what to expect, or what he wanted, except for space and solitude. Even Huan had not gone all the way with him, leaving once they reached the heather-covered hills that glowed under the setting sun, just before Ekkaia itself came into view. 

He’d wandered through the gardens and up and down the shore, under clear skies and through the mist, listening to the quiet wash of the waves over the stones and missing his brothers and his mother, and missing even more all of the things he could never get back—all the things that had been lost alongside the Trees, all the things that could be gathered under one word which he had not thought of before Nienna had spoken it to him. 

Innocence. That was the thing he missed. Nienna had also pointed out the ways it had been fracturing even before the Darkening, as he’d clashed with his father amid the growing paranoia and unrest in Tirion, and how his friendships with his cousins had soured in the face of the rumors none of them believed fully but did not disbelieve, either. 

At the root of it lay Morgoth, of course, but Morgoth was no longer there, and Fëanor was. Morgoth had murdered Finwë after setting in motion all the things that had destroyed their world and their lives, but it was Fëanor that had sworn for the Silmarils, and not only for vengeance; Fëanor that had passed on the worst of himself to Celegorm, long before either of them knew it; Fëanor that had cared so little for them all that he’d laid their dark and bloody path before them and then left them to walk it alone, in his name. Others called it madness, but Celegorm knew exactly what that kind of rage felt like and he knew exactly how clear-headed his father had been. He’d known what he was doing—he just hadn’t cared, just like Celegorm had ceased to care later, to the point that even Huan’s departure hadn’t made him stop. 

“He cares again now,” Nienna had told him, sitting with him under a locust tree in her garden, “just as you do. Your father loves you, Tyelkormo. It was for that love that he pleaded at last to be released from Mandos, and it was also for the sake of that love that Námo relented.”

“I’m not sure that was ever really true,” Celegorm had replied without looking up from his hands, lying on his lap, clean and empty but still sometimes feeling, in that place, like they were covered in blood. He’d had a letter tucked into the bottom of his bag that said echoed Nienna’s words, but it was as hard for him to believe as it was hard to imagine his father weeping. 

“You know it is,” Nienna had said. 

Maybe she was right, but Celegorm hadn’t gone there to be convinced of his father’s love. He’d gone to find a way to heal his own heart—only it seemed that he couldn’t do it without making peace with his father, and he still couldn’t bring himself to meet him face to face. There was still a small child inside of him somewhere that remembered how it felt to watch his father turn his back because the sight of Míriel’s silver hair was too much to bear—and that child still expected it to happen again, and again, and again, even if the reasons now were different. He could, though, find ways to let go of the still-simmering anger, bit by bit. Nienna had helped him to learn how—how to look at it as something done for him and not for his father, for his own sake, for his own peace. It would be the work of many more years, and maybe he would never be able to let go entirely—but at least he could stop himself from sliding back into his worst memories and worst fears.

He’d then come back east to find Dior Eluchíl returned to life, as though to test that resolve. They’d met there in Imloth Ningloron almost by chance. Elrond had introduced them, and retreated a little ways—within sight, but out of hearing. Someone had told Celegorm once that he’d done the same for Fëanor and Fingolfin, offering privacy while remaining nearby to be sure no one got hurt. In this case it had not been necessary; Dior had been wary but kind. “Whatever anyone else says,” Dior had said, holding out his hand, “Daeron likes you, and I have found him to be wise in many other matters.”

“Daeron likes me for my brother’s sake,” Celegorm had replied, but he’d taken Dior’s hand, aware of the power of Lúthien’s line humming through his veins just under the skin, aware that both of them were remembering the last and only time they had met before, both of them raging like wounded animals, teeth bared and blades deadly sharp as smoke gathered in the great hall of Menegroth.

Beneath the bright sun of Valinor, Dior had smiled, under hair like shadows and eyes the soft blue-grey of a misty dawn. “No, he likes you for your own sake—else he would not defend you as vigorously as he does. I am glad we can meet again in peace, whatever anyone else might say. Maybe someday we too might even find ourselves friends.” 

“That would shock everyone,” Celegorm had said, and had been shocked himself when Dior had laughed.

Celegorm had also come back east to find two little nieces for him to spoil, and that had done more than anything else to lift his spirits. It was hard to be angry when he had two children climbing all over him and demanding to ride Huan like a pony. Huan was very good natured about it, just as he had been when Celebrimbor had done the same long ago. It made even visiting Tirion and risking an encounter with his father worth it—and the way that Curufin always smiled when Celegorm turned up on his doorstep, no matter how late it was or how unexpected.

Now he sat by one of the many streams, shaded by an oak and surrounded by niphredil and queen’s lace and buttercups. He leaned back against the tree and turned the brooch his father had made for him over in his fingers. It was made of silver and mother-of-pearl, a round and full moon with a silhouette of Huan racing in front of it. It was beautiful, as were all the things Fëanor made with his hands, but Celegorm had never worn it. He couldn’t bring himself to get rid of it, either. Caranthir had told him once that he’d burned Fëanor’s letter but kept his gift, too, tucked away in a chest where he didn’t have to look at it. Celegorm knew that Amras had hung the prisms that Fëanor had given him in a window where they would catch the most sunshine, but he wasn’t sure what anyone else had done with their gifts, or their letters. His own letter he had dropped into the forest on the way back from Nienna’s halls to molder away with the leaves. 

The rain had passed, and the sun shone bright in a cloudless sky overhead, sunbeams dancing across Celegorm and the brooch in his hands as the leaves swayed in the breeze. He heard laughter somewhere not far away—Caranthir and Lisgalen, and after a moment Rundamírë and Curufin too. Everyone had been in a bright and merry mood since they’d set out for Lórien, and it had only gotten better after they found Maedhros and Maglor. Celegorm didn’t know why he’d woken that morning thinking about his father, and with his mood dipping accordingly. 

“There you are, Tyelko.” Maglor and Daeron had come up the path, so quietly that Celegorm hadn’t noticed. “What’s that?” Celegorm held the brooch out rather than answer. Maglor sat on the grass beside him, and Daeron in front of both of them, crossing his legs and picking a few niphredil flowers to begin to weave together. “Is this what Atar sent you?” Maglor asked as he tilted the brooch so the mother-of-pearl moon caught the sunlight that filtered through the leaves overhead. 

“Yes.”

“I’m surprised you kept it.”

“I am, too.”

“It’s beautiful,” Daeron said, as Maglor handed it back to Celegorm. He slipped it into his pocket and leaned against Maglor when he put an arm around his shoulders. “I have not yet gotten a chance to ask you, Celegorm—did it help, going to Nienna?”

“Yes. Mostly.”

“I’m glad.” 

“I am too,” Maglor said.

“If we’re asking questions,” Celegorm said, “Daeron, I’ve heard that you’ve been going around defending me. Whatever for?”

“Who told you that?” Daeron asked, laughing. 

“Dior Eluchíl.”

“Ah, I should have guessed. Really, though, I have not been defending you so much as myself, because for a time it seemed that everyone I ever knew wanted to know why on earth I was friends with any of you. All I’ve really said is that you are not now who you were in Beleriand, and that I quite enjoy your company.” Daeron grinned when Celegorm frowned at him. “It’s true! Dior was the kindest about it, actually—kinder to me than he has any reason to be.”

“He was kind to me, too.” 

“I suppose all that time in Mandos affords one a great deal of time to think things over,” said Daeron. “Though we must also give Elrond credit for being a good influence on all members of all sides of his family. He does it without even trying.”

“He does,” Maglor agreed, voice full of fondness. He was smiling, but there was something sad in it. “He and Elros.”

It was strange—though not in a bad way—to see Maglor with Elrond, and with Elrond’s sons. There was as great a love between them and Maglor as there was between Curufin and his children, though Maglor was always so careful never claim the title even of foster-father. Maglor had always been like Maedhros—a warm and bright presence as an older brother, someone always able to be relied upon. Celegorm had thought before—a long time ago, before everything went wrong—that Maglor would have been a good father, but his fate had not turned that way. Except that it had, in a strange way filled with nearly as much grief as joy. 

“You seem steadier now,” Maglor said, turning the subject back on Celegorm. “But you say you haven’t even spoken to Atar?”

“I’m still angry,” Celegorm said. “I don’t know if I can ever let it go entirely.” Maglor made a quiet and sympathetic noise. “It’s…it goes deeper than just what happened at the end, I think.” 

“You fought often before the exile to Formenos,” Maglor said quietly. “Was it not just over Oromë, or your friendship with Irissë?”

“We never fought over Irissë,” Celegorm said. She and he had turned their backs even before Maedhros and Fingon’s friendship had soured. “I don’t think we were really fighting over Oromë, either. That was just…the thing I did he could get angry at.”

“What was it, then?”

Celegorm reached up to twist the end of one of his braids around his fingers, unsure how to answer. In the letter that Fëanor had sent with the brooch, Fëanor had spoken of his hair, the way it looked so like Míriel’s. He had apologized, had called it beautiful, had compared it to moonlight. Maybe it would be different if Celegorm could bear to speak to him in person, but the words on the page just read like the things Fëanor knew he should say, rather than what he really meant. Fëanor had never been one to admit fault, to admit mistakes. “Curvo was always his favorite,” Celegorm said, half-whispering. It would be horrible if Curufin came upon them in that moment and overheard. “I think that I was always his least favorite.” Curufin liked to say that he was most like Fëanor in all of the worst ways, but he also had all of Fëanor’s talents—his skill in the forge, his ear for language, his focus and his passion when he entered into a project that took up all his heart and all his thought. It was Celegorm that only had the ugly, burning anger, the rage that wouldn’t sleep, and the ruthlessness that made it deadly. Fëanor had looked at him and seen the mother he’d never really known and never stopped grieving; Celegorm had once thought that Fëanor had failed to see the ugliest parts of himself reflected in him, too, but now he wondered if he had seen it—maybe he hadn’t recognized their source, but surely he had seen and disdained what Celegorm had, even then, been on the road to becoming. 

“I am not a parent,” Daeron said after a few moments, “nor do I have siblings—but it seems to me very wrong that even if a parent has a favorite that they should show it so blatantly.”

“It did not seem so blatant when we were young,” Maglor said. “But I was neither the favorite nor the least favorite, and maybe I just didn’t see. I’m sorry, Tyelko.”

“Please don’t be. It’s not like there was anything you could’ve done about it.”

Daeron was frowning, though he kept his gaze on the wreath of niphredil and buttercup steadily taking shape under his hands. “I have wondered if perhaps I spoke too harshly to Fëanor,” he said, “but now I wonder if I did not speak harshly enough.”

“He probably wouldn’t listen either way,” Celegorm muttered. “He listens to Curvo sometimes, but I think that’s just because the novelty of Curvo fighting with him hasn’t worn off.” And, of course, Curufin would remain his favorite—especially since he was the only one willing to see or speak to him. 

“That might be unfair,” Maglor said quietly. “Elrond has said that he has made an effort to listen far more often than not, since his return—and I have not heard that he’s fallen out again with Fingolfin, or with his sisters.”

“No,” Celegorm agreed reluctantly, “but I still don’t trust it. Fifty years isn’t that long of a time.”

“It is and it isn’t,” Daeron murmured, glancing up at Maglor. Celegorm turned his gaze away; he didn’t need to see whatever private thoughts were passing between the two of them. “But you all saw him on the road, and no one came away from it either in tears or angry—angrier, at least. That must bode well for the future.”

“Only because Náriel and Calissë were there,” Celegorm said. He hadn’t looked Fëanor in the face at all, keeping to the back of the group behind Ambarussa with his head down. The last thing he had wanted was for Calissë to see his expression in those moments. Fëanor had looked at him, but Celegorm hadn’t met his gaze. He did not want to know what he would see there.

“Still,” Daeron said. “It’s more than you could have done before, is it not?”

“It is, but I at least already said all I have to say to him,” Maglor said. He had his left arm around Celegorm’s shoulders; his right lay in his lap, and Celegorm saw him flex his fingers a little. 

“Does it hurt, talking about him?” Celegorm asked, reaching for it. 

“No.” Maglor let Celegorm take his hand and run his fingers over the scars there. There was a place near the center of his palm that seemed different, like the scar was thicker there—like it had been opened again and again after the wounds began to heal. Celegorm thought of how Maglor had sometimes dug his thumbnail into his palm when he was upset or lost in thought, before he had gone to Lórien, and felt faintly sick. Unaware of his thoughts, Maglor went on, “I had hoped it wouldn’t wake up upon seeing him, but at least it didn’t last long. It really doesn’t hurt at all now.” Celegorm glanced at Daeron and saw him looking at Maglor’s hand too. Their gazes met, and Daeron’s lips quirked in a small, rueful expression. “Please don’t start worrying about me again.”

“Too late,” Celegorm said. “It’s only fair, if you’re going to worry about me.”

“Someday,” Daeron said softly, “none of you will have to worry about any of the others at all.”

The last time Celegorm had not worried about any of his brothers, he had been beyond worry about anything, too focused on the Oath and whatever it took to fulfill it, to wrapped up in his own anger to care. He knew that wasn’t what Daeron meant, but it still made him shiver to remember it. Fëanor had written to him to say that the Celegorm of Beleriand was someone unrecognizable to him, someone so unlike the Tyelkormo of Tirion of old—he had said also that he did not recognize himself in the records and histories that he had read and heard since his return. He still did not realize that it was an echo of him that Celegorm had turned into; he still tried to create distance between himself now and who he had become before his own end. Celegorm, looking back, could trace every single step that he had taken, and knew exactly how he had become what he had. In that, at least, he was not like his father at all. 

“Let us put Fëanor out of our thoughts, at least for now,” Maglor said. “I don’t know if it’s true that you were his least favorite, but whatever he thinks, or thought, does not have to rule us now.”

“It still hurts,” Celegorm whispered. It was an admission he would not have been able to make before going to Nienna. It felt too much like admitting weakness, to admit that he still cared even a little bit what his father thought, or had thought. Maybe that was no bad thing, though. If he did not want his brothers to pretend to be strong all the time, he could not turn around and demand it of himself. 

“I know.” Maglor kissed the top of his head. “I’m sorry, Tyelko.”

They had only a few minutes more of quiet before someone else came looking for them, but it was enough for Celegorm to be able to gather himself and to be able put on a smile by the time he had to. The brooch remained a heavy weight in his pocket, though—and he still did not know what to do with it. 

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In spite of Daeron’s words, Maglor couldn’t quite imagine a world in which he didn’t worry about any of his brothers, at least a little. In spite of his own words, he could not so easily put Fëanor out of his mind either. He watched Celegorm return to company with a bright smile on his face, hiding away the hurt that lingered in his heart—that had lingered, it seemed, for years and years—and wished that he knew how to take it away. He wished that he had known before, but thought maybe Celegorm himself hadn’t even known, or at least that he had not had the words. 

He thought of Amras talking so frankly about Fëanor’s increasing absence in his and Amrod’s childhood, trying to say that it didn’t matter because their brothers had filled that empty space, and he thought of Curufin balancing between them all and Fëanor still, trying to find his way to a space where he could be himself but also remain Fëanor’s son, and of Caranthir’s shrug whenever Fëanor’s name was brought up, the one that tried to be careless but didn’t quite succeed. He thought of his own scars burning at the mere sight of Fëanor in the distance, and of the stiff way that Maedhros had held himself during that brief encounter on the road. 

As he tried to sort out his thoughts, he wandered into the library, and found Maedhros there, looking at a shelf full of collected documents and records from Himring. “Why would they keep old inventories and harvest records?” he asked as Maglor stepped up beside him. 

“You’ll have to ask Elrond,” Maglor said. “I suppose such things answer questions the loremasters might have about what it was like to live there, in such cases where there is no one to ask.”

“But why would they care?” 

“The same reason we always asked our grandparents about the Great Journey, or Cuiviénen, I suppose,” Maglor said. “Elrond had these same records in Imladris—and all of that was taken to Annúminas before we left, so the loremasters of Arnor can now answer whatever questions they have about what you ate for breakfast.”

Maedhros reached up to take one volume down. It was a familiar one; Maglor had read through it many times in Rivendell. It was a collection of letters from all of them to Maedhros. The ones Maedhros had written in reply, of course, were lost—nothing had survived the burning of Maglor’s Gap, or Thargelion, or Himlad. Perhaps some things had made it out of Amon Ereb, but nothing from before the Dagor Bragollach. It was always strange to pick it up and see his own words in another’s hand. “If you want copies, Elrond would be glad to have them made for you,” he said, as Maedhros paged through the recreated letters.

“Maybe,” Maedhros murmured. He ran his fingers over a page that showed a letter from Caranthir, talking of harvests in Thargelion. “It just seems strange, seeing all this and knowing it’s…history. That it’s studied, learned from.” He sighed, and turned away from the shelves, looking at Maglor instead. “What’s the matter?”

“Nothing. I mean, nothing new. I just—I’ve been thinking of Atar.” It had been so much easier not to, in Lórien, when they were far away and there was no chance of coming upon him even if he did break his promise and come seeking them. Now they were back among their own people, they had seen him, and the knowledge that Fëanor was so close felt almost like the Oath had during the Long Peace, hovering in the back of his mind, never to be entirely forgotten or discarded, even if it could be set aside for a time. 

“If you’re worrying about me, don’t.”

“I worry about all of us. I just—I just don’t know how to sort out how I feel and what I want.” Maglor looked at the book in Maedhros’ hand. “Do you think he read those letters?”

“I think it’s likely.” Maedhros set the book back on the shelf. “Were you really serious about asking him to look into a palantír?”

“Yes. Do you think it’s a bad idea?”

“I think it could be. We don’t know how he’ll react to…any of it.”

“It will only be confirmation of what he’s been told already,” Maglor said.

“It’s different, though,” Maedhros said, “to hear of something and then to see it…the palantíri, they…you’ve never used them, really. I don’t know if you remember just how close they bring you.”

“That’s what I want,” Maglor said. “I want him to see. All the horrors and all the joys—if he cannot understand by reading old records or hearing what Curvo and Tyelpë have to tell him, what else is there? I don’t care if it hurts him.” 

“Be careful, Cáno,” Maedhros said softly. “That veers close to cruelty.”

“I don’t—” Maglor faltered. “Would it not be worse if he could watch what befell us without feeling anything? In his letter to me he tried to tell me that he loved me. How can I believe him if he will not even—” His voice broke, which was just as well because the library door opened a second later, and Erestor and Lindir came into the library, debating something about a metaphor. Maglor turned away from them, not wanting to get drawn into it, or to be asked what was the matter. 

“I don’t believe what he wrote to me, either,” Maedhros said, half-whispering now that they were no longer alone. “But I know that he saw me, and he heard what I said. Maybe the palantír will do more, but maybe that is all we can hope for. Maybe just being able to meet sometimes without tears is as close as we can come to…something like peace.” He glanced over Maglor’s shoulder, and then took his hand. “Let’s go somewhere quieter.”

“I know where we can go.” Maglor led the way, down the corridor and to a staircase half-hidden behind in an alcove behind a tapestry. The house was filled with such not-quite-secret doors and stairs and corridors; no room was without at least two exits. It had been built by many of the same hands that had made Imladris, and also Ost-in-Edhil and Gondolin and other cities now fallen and lost. There was no need for such measures here in Valinor, but they remained a comfort, and Celebrían had told Maglor once, laughing, how Bilbo had been wont to remind them all of the value of being able to escape unwanted visitors, especially since none of them had any magic rings that might turn them invisible. 

Maglor missed Bilbo; he would have had a great deal to say about Fëanor, little of it flattering and all of it funny.

This particular staircase led to a small balcony from which one could very easily climb onto the roof. It was not often used. “What’s the purpose of it?” Maedhros asked as he watched Maglor step onto the balcony railing and then hoist himself up onto the gently-sloping roof. 

“I’m told that Elrond often escaped to the roofs of Rivendell when it was first built when he needed a moment alone,” Maglor said as he leaned down to offer Maedhros a hand up. “I think Celebrían put this here as something of a joke. We won’t be disturbed up here, though. Hardly anyone remembers those stairs.”

The roof was not so steep that it was uncomfortable to sit on, and they moved away from the balcony into the shade of one of the chimneys. From there they could see the road stretching away out of the valley, and the fishpond closer at hand, and the gardens surrounding. Maglor looped his arms around his knees and watched Ambarussa kick a ball across a grassy lawn with Calissë. Maedhros leaned back on his elbows, sitting slightly lower on the roof so he could lean his shoulder against Maglor’s arm. “I don’t want to hate him,” Maglor said after a while. 

“Neither do I.”

“Did you know Ambarussa hardly feel anything at all for him? He was so absent when they were young—we were the ones…”

“I didn’t know. I suppose I can’t be surprised.” Maedhros leaned his head against Maglor’s arm. “It was the Silmarils, wasn’t it? He started that work when they were still small.”

“How do you come back from that?”

“You don’t. You try to build something new. Curvo thinks that’s what Ambarussa want to try to do.”

“Yes, Amras told me. I just—even then he was changing, and we didn’t see it.”

“How could we have? He had always gotten engrossed in projects like that. The Silmarils were different only in that they took longer. That they coincided with all the whispers.”

“He had never been so engrossed that he would ignore us, before,” Maglor said. But he wasn’t sure anymore if that was true. Maybe it was only his heart trying to turn his father into someone he had never been. Even so, all his memories of his own childhood in which he had gone looking for his father, no matter where he had been or what he had been doing, even if he had been meeting with someone important—Fëanor had always abandoned whatever it was, whether Maglor’s own wants or needs were really urgent or not. “And Tyelko…”

“Tyelko has been to Nienna. You can see that he’s steadier than he was.”

“Nienna can no more heal all hurts than Estë can,” Maglor said. Celegorm had sounded so very small when he had confessed his feeling that he was their father’s least-favorite son. Maglor hadn’t known what to say to comfort him; he wasn’t even sure now if he should tell Maedhros of it, or if Celegorm wished for it to be kept in confidence. “She told me in Lórien that some things must be settled between us Children.”

“I think she’s right,” Maedhros said quietly. “Have you spoken to Elrond about your hand hurting?”

“No. Have you?”

“I’ve barely spoken to him at all. There’s no hurry, you know. For me and Elrond, or for us and our father.”

“I know. I do. It’s just…still hard to think of time as something that won’t run out.”

“I know. I feel the same.” Maedhros looked up at Maglor and then sat up, putting his arm around Maglor’s shoulders. It was only then that Maglor realized he was weeping. He turned his face into Maedhros’ shoulder, and they sat in silence for a while, listening to Ambarussa and Calissë laugh below them. When the tears slowed, Maglor turned his head, and was just in time to see a small group of riders appear on the road. He sighed; there was a good chance those were cousins, or friends, come to see him and Maedhros. “That looks like Fingon,” Maedhros said almost as soon as the thought crossed Maglor’s mind. 

“Can you tell who is with him?”

“Finrod, I think. And someone with silver hair.”

Maglor sat up and raised a hand to shade his eyes. “Míriel,” he said. “That is Míriel—and Indis, too.” He looked at Maedhros. “Have you not met her, Míriel?” Maedhros just shook his head. “She came to meet me in Avallónë.”

“I avoided meeting nearly everyone for a long time,” Maedhros said. He spoke matter-of-factly about it, though Maglor knew it weighed on him, like a responsibility he had abandoned, even though no one had expected or asked anything of him. “I suppose she has come to remedy that.”

“Míriel isn’t someone we need fear,” Maglor said. “I suppose this means we should get down from here.

“Probably. Especially since Fingon has seen us.” Maedhros lifted his hand in a wave as Fingon’s voice reached them. Maglor looked and saw him waving back, the gold threads in his hair glinting in the bright summer sunshine. “You should wash your face.”

“I know.” Maglor wiped his sleeve over it, and then slid down the roof to the balcony, Maedhros following. 

They parted in front of Maglor’s room, and he retreated inside with a feeling of relief, able to close the door between himself and the new visitors for at least a little while longer. Pídhres was there, curled up on the rug with Aegthil and Annem and Aechen. Maglor splashed his face in the basin of water near the wardrobe, and sat down to spend a few minutes with them, letting the hedgehogs climb over his lap while he scratched Pídhres. She arched her back into his fingers and purred. Maglor heard the faint commotion of the visitors’ arrival downstairs, and sighed.

The door opened before he could get up, and Daeron came in. “Your grandmother is here,” he said. 

“I know.”

“What’s the matter?” Daeron knelt on the rug beside him.

“Maedhros and I were speaking of our father. It’s…I’ll be all right.”

“I thought Lórien was to help you put such things out of your mind,” Daeron said, tucking a strand of damp hair behind Maglor’s ear.

“Estë and Nienna cannot heal all things. Whatever this is between us and our father is something we must figure out on our own, I suppose. I found peace with myself in Lórien—that was what I needed most. And if it were only me I could put him out of my mind easily enough—I did it for centuries in Middle-earth—but it pains all of my younger brothers, and I don’t…I don’t know how to help them.”

“They know that you love them,” Daeron said, “and that you will never act as your father has. I think that is all you can do, and all that they need from you.” He pressed a kiss to Maglor’s cheek. “Do you want to hide away from the guests? Fingon is downstairs too—and Finrod.”

“No, I don’t want to hide. I’m done hiding.” Maglor kissed Daeron. “I just needed a few minutes. Is it so obvious I’ve been upset?”

“No, but let me fix your hair.” Daeron pulled the hair clip free and used his fingers to neaten the strands before putting it back. “There. Lady Indis is also downstairs.”

“I know. Maedhros and I were on the roof and saw them arrive.”

“Is it as overwhelming as it was when you first came?” Daeron asked as he rose, holding out his hands. Maglor took them and sent the hedgehogs tumbling over the rug, curling up into little indignant spiky balls. 

“Not yet, but I’m sure it will be. I hardly saw anyone really, before I went to Lórien. I saw Finrod, of course, but Fingon came the same day my father did, so I hardly spoke to him at all. I met my grandmother on Eressëa, but I have not seen Indis yet. Is anyone else with them?”

“A lady I did not recognize.”

“Dark or fair?”

“Dark.”

“Lalwen, maybe.” Maglor bent to pick up Pídhres, who was making herself a nuisance. “Of course you’re coming too, silly cat.” She climbed onto his shoulders and stuck her nose in his ear. 

“Come on, then. The sooner everyone has greeted everyone else, the sooner you’ll be at ease again.” Daeron opened the door to let the hedgehogs scurry out, all in a line. As they followed Maglor slipped his hand into Daeron’s. 

“Celebrían, are those hedgehogs?” Finrod’s voice floated up the stairs after a few minutes. 

“Oh, that just means Maglor is coming downstairs,” Celebrían laughed. “You see?” She gestured toward Maglor and Daeron as they appeared around the corner. Finrod and Fingon were there, alongside Míriel and Indis and the dark-haired lady that Daeron had not recognized—not Lalwen, but Gilheneth, Fingon’s wife.

“Maglor!” Finrod sprang forward to embrace him, just as Maedhros straightened with Aechen in his hands, to the great amusement of Fingon. Pídhres jumped from Maglor’s shoulder to Daeron’s arms with a yowl. “You took your time in Lórien, didn’t you?”

“I’m glad to see you, too,” Maglor said. “I hope you didn’t bring any wine,” he added, lowering his voice a little. “I’m not going to get drunk with you again this summer.”

Finrod grinned at him. “No, not this time!”

“Never again,” Maglor said, trying to sound stern.

“Mm, we’ll see about that. Hello, Daeron!”

As Finrod finally released Maglor to greet Daeron properly, Fingon and Gilheneth left Maedhros to come make their own greetings. “I hope you aren’t going to go running off again before we can actually speak,” Fingon said, embracing him tightly. “You’re looking much lighter; I’m glad.”

“I’m not going anywhere,” Maglor said. “Well met, Gilheneth.”

“It’s good to see you, Maglor.” Gilheneth rose onto her toes to kiss his cheek. “Lórien was kind to you, it seems.”

“It was.”

“Are you going to explain the hedgehogs?” Fingon asked. 

“Explain what? They’re just hedgehogs. Maedhros has Aechen, and the other two are Annem and Aegthil.”

“All right, fine,” Fingon laughed, “I’ll ask him. Russo! Explain the hedgehogs?”

Maedhros glanced up from speaking with Celebrían and Míriel. “They’re hedgehogs, Fingon. What is there to explain?”

“I hate you both.”

Maglor laughed at Fingon, and moved forward to greet Indis, and then Míriel, who kissed him and smiled warmly. “I’m glad to see you again, Macalaurë,” she said. “You are looking much lighter than when we last met.”

“I feel lighter. I’m glad to see you too, Grandmother.”

Elrond came to join Celebrían in welcoming the newcomers then, and Maglor and Maedhros’ brothers all followed—or almost all of them. Maglor caught a glimpse of silver hair as Celegorm turned and slipped away. He started to go after him, but Finrod called to him and by the time he could get away, there was no telling where Celegorm had gone. He did manage to catch Curufin alone, as they all walked outside to the wide veranda. “Curvo, has Tyelko ever met Míriel?”

“I don’t think so. He’s never been in Tirion when she comes. I don’t know where he is now.” Curufin glanced around, frowning. “He was with us earlier.”

“I know visiting Nienna did him good, but I’m still worried.”

“I’ll find him. I think Míriel wants to speak with you.” Curufin squeezed Maglor’s shoulder before slipping away, out into the garden. Maglor watched Huan trot down one path and join him, before he went to sit beside Míriel when she beckoned to him. 

“Have you written many songs since you came west?” she asked as he sat. Pídhres jumped up onto his lap.

“I’ve written bits and pieces of many, but have managed to finish only a few,” Maglor said, “and most of those are ones I’ve written with Daeron.” He glanced over at where Daeron sat with Finrod and Galadriel, all three of them laughing at something. It was a very merry party out on the veranda. Maedhros sat a little apart with Fingon and Gilheneth, not laughing but still looking happy as they spoke together. “Maedhros and I have only just come from Lórien, and I’ve written nothing new in the last few weeks.”

“I would speak with you more of your music while we are here,” Míriel said. 

“Of course,” Maglor said. He did not quite understand the expression on her face, thoughtful and concerned at once. “I did not know you had any great interest in it.”

“Oh, I’m no musician—but we can speak of it later,” she said. “I did get your letter before you left, and what you asked for is waiting at your mother’s house.”

Maglor had almost forgotten. “Thank you,” he said. 

“It was a pleasure to make such a gift for one of my grandsons,” Míriel said, smiling. Then Indis called to draw them into the conversation between her and Ambarussa and Celebrían, leaving Maglor to wonder what it was Míriel really wanted to speak to him about. He glanced more than once toward the garden paths, but neither Curufin nor Celegorm reappeared all afternoon. 

It was not until that evening after dinner that Míriel sought to speak to Maglor alone again—or not quite alone, for she brought Indis with her. They stepped outside into a small courtyard that smelled of bluebells and rosemary, and sat on either side of him on a bench near the doorway. “It is good to see you again, Macalaurë,” Indis said, taking his hands and kissing his cheek. “We were all very glad to hear you and Maitimo had returned from Lórien.”

“I’m sorry that I went there before seeing everyone as I should have,” Maglor said.

“Oh, there’s no need for that. You needed peace more than you needed an army of cousins and kinfolk descending upon you.”

“What is it you wished to speak to me about?” Maglor asked, looking between them. “Is there some song of mine…?”

“It is a song we would like you to write for us, unless you have written such a one already,” Míriel said. “Have you ever written anything for Finwë, Macalaurë?”

“Finwë?” Maglor repeated. “I…no. I have tried, but I could never find the words. What sort of song would you have me write?”

“A lament,” Indis said quietly. “There are none that have been written, except the most private of songs that are not meant to be performed aloud. You are the mightiest singer of the Noldor, Macalaurë—inheritor of Finwë’s own great power of song, alongside Findekáno, Findaráto, and Artanis. Now that you are returned to us, it seems only fitting that it is you we should turn to.”

“I can try,” Maglor said. “But I’ve…I’ve tried many times, and have not been able to find the words even for a song I would sing only to the wind and the waves. So it has been for all my fallen kin that I should have been able to remember in verse.”

“If you cannot, you cannot. The grief remains heavy for all of us,” said Indis. “All we would ask is that you try.”

“For whom would I perform this song?”

“When it is finished, come to us in Tirion,” Míriel said. “We will speak of performance then.”

Maglor frowned at that, but found himself already thinking of what shape the song would take—it would be something very different from what he had been envisioning before. It would not be only a grandson’s song for his grandfather, but the song of a whole family—a whole people—lamenting the loss of their patriarch and king, leader and father and husband. “May I speak to each of you alone, before you leave?” he asked. “Of Finwë, I mean?”

“Of course.” Indis squeezed his hand and rose. “We will answer whatever questions you have.”

“Thank you, Macalaurë,” Míriel said, also rising. She kissed his cheek, just over the scar on his cheekbone. “And in a happier vein, I look forward to hearing you sing again—merry songs, I mean.”

Daeron came to take Míriel’s place beside Maglor as Míriel and Indis departed. “What were you speaking of?” he asked. 

“They wish for me to write a lament for Finwë.”

“You were planning to do so regardless.”

“Yes…that was a different kind, though. What I had in mind would not have been a song I would sing before anyone except my brothers. Maybe my cousins. The song they want…it will be something more. Not just for my grandfather but for the King of the Noldor”

“You are equal to it,” Daeron said softly. 

“I hope so.”

“I will not offer my help; this is a song for you, Canafinwë of the Noldor, to write, and not for Daeron of Doriath to have any hand in. I will listen, though, when you need an ear.”

“Thank you.” Maglor offered him a smile. “I will have to go to Tirion, and maybe other places. I need to speak to my aunts and uncles, and all of my cousins. It is not only my own memories of Finwë that must be put into this song. And…perhaps I should write to Elu Thingol, too.”

“I will see that your letter reaches him, of course, and I will go with you wherever you must travel.”

“You don’t have to—”

“Oh, don’t start that again.” Daeron leaned his head on Maglor’s shoulder. “I am where I wish to be, which is at your side. We have been apart far longer than we have been together, even since coming west, and I would like to change that count of years. Don’t remind me of my duties to Thingol, either. He’s managed quite a long time without me, and I can write my studies and chronicles just as well here as I can in Taur-en-Gellam. Better, even, with Elrond’s library at my fingertips.”

“Should I remind you then of your students?”

“The younger ones are in good hands under Pirineth’s instruction, not to mention my other older students. Maybe I will bring some here so they can learn of you and of Lindir and the rest.”

“Lindir would certainly like that, but you’ll be sending them all back singing verses full of tra la la lallies and making up very silly rhymes to tease Thingol.”

“Good. Kings need teasing, sometimes.”

“Maglor, Daeron?” Elrond appeared in the doorway. “We will be playing music and telling tales soon. You’ll both be wanted.”

“We’re coming,” Maglor said, as he and Daeron rose. Daeron went ahead, and Elrond fell into step beside Maglor. “I think there will be more travel in my near future than I had thought.”

“Where are you going?”

“I don’t know yet. Nowhere until next summer at least—and then maybe only as far as Tirion. My grandmother and Indis have asked me to write a song for Finwë.”

Elrond looked at him. He knew already that Maglor had never been able to write such songs for those he loved. “You agreed?”

“How could I refuse? I’d been thinking of trying again anyway, and it seems that no one else has. If I find I cannot do it…then I cannot do it, and someone else will have to try. I’ll have to go to Tirion to speak to others, to know what they would wish to hear in such a song. I can’t only write it for myself, as I had been thinking, not if it’s to be something sung before others.”

“Well, at least this won’t take you all the way to Ekkaia,” Elrond said. “I have been hearing more talk of Finwë over the last few years than I have in all the time I’ve lived in these lands.”

“More and more of us are returning,” Maglor said. “Perhaps it is only that our thoughts now turn to those who still remain lost.”

“Perhaps,” Elrond murmured, frowning a little. His thoughts were surely with Gil-galad, who was among those that lingered still in Mandos—and, likely, with Elros and Arwen and those who had died and would never return. Maglor put an arm around his shoulders as they returned to the hall where the music was to be played and the stories were to be told. 

“Uncle Cáno!” Náriel ran over. As Maglor lifted her up onto his hip she said, “I ate all of my vegetables at dinner! So will you tell us the story of the enchantress and the bits of magic in your hair?”

“Of course!” Maglor said, as Elrond quickly turned a startled laugh into a cough. 

“What enchantress was this?” Elrond asked, a little hoarse and a little strangled. 

“The one that almost turned me into a statue made all of ice and snow, of course,” Maglor said, smiling brightly at him. “You remember.”

“Oh, of course, that enchantress.”

Náriel perked up. “Did you meet more than one?” she asked.

“Lots,” Maglor said, and Elrond had to leave them before he started laughing too hard and gave the game away. “Wizards, too! You have to watch out for wizards, even more than enchantresses. Have you heard the story about the wizard that sent the halfling Bilbo Baggins across the Misty Mountains and Wilderland to steal treasure from a dragon?”

“No!” Náriel said, eyes going wide. “Can you tell that story next?”

“Not tonight, I think,” Maglor said, “but sometime soon.” He went to sit by Daeron, settling Náriel on his lap, and Calissë came over to sit beside him, also demanding the story of the enchantress. Celebrían burst into giggles when Elrond whispered something in her ear, but Maglor ignored them and the incredulous look Finrod gave him as he began the tale. 

He had gone looking for the snow-enchantress story just after they had arrived in Imloth Ningloron, and found it in a book of Shire tales that Sam had brought with him, though it had been in the Shire itself that Maglor had first heard the story—from Pippin, telling tales of his ancestors’ adventures. Pippin’s version was about two Took siblings who had wandered off to have adventures in the far north, and escaped home again through cleverness and courage and sturdy hobbit-sense as well as help from kindly talking animals. It was a very good story, Maglor thought, as were so many that the hobbits told, and he looked forward to Calissë or Náriel finding it themselves someday. 

In the meantime he told his own version of it, starring himself being not so very clever at all, and escaping by means of luck—and also a few kindly talking animals—rather than bravery. He concluded with Elladan and Elrohir finding him half-frozen and taking him back home to their father in his beautiful and hidden mountain valley filled with flowers, who thawed him out and scolded him very soundly for being so foolish as to disturb such a powerful enchantress. 

By the time he was done it was time for the girls to go to bed, and after Rundamírë and Curufin took them upstairs Lisgalen asked, “Is any of that true?”

“No,” Elladan said, laughing. He and Elrohir had nearly spit out their drinks when Maglor had brought them into the story. 

“Well, the part about Elladan and Elrohir bringing me to Imladris is,” said Maglor, “though it was from the other direction and I wasn’t actually half-frozen.” It was also partly true that he’d gotten into trouble through his own foolishness—though perhaps careless was a better word—and the bone-deep cold that had clung to him for years was real enough too. He said none of that aloud, though, for it was too fine an evening for such memories. “I described Imladris precisely as I remember it upon first coming there, too.” Beside him Daeron took his hand, sliding their fingers together. Elrohir too glanced at him, less assured that the shadows really didn’t trouble him. When Maglor smiled at him, though, he relaxed a little more.

“So there really wasn’t any strange snow-wielding sorceresses living in the far north of the world?” Finrod asked with an arched eyebrow.

“There was according to Pippin Took,” Maglor said, “but I never went so far north.”

“I thought that sounded like a hobbit’s tale,” Elladan said. 

“So it is,” Maglor agreed, “but I did promise, and Náriel did eat all of her vegetables.”

“Yes, thank you for that,” said Curufin as he returned. “I hope you have more tales of your misadventures for the next time I need to bribe her into eating a few mouthfuls of asparagus.”

“I’m sure I’ll think of something,” Maglor said. Everyone laughed at him, and he leaned against Daeron, feeling warm and comfortable. The song for Finwë loomed before him, so different from a silly made-up story about enchantments and talking foxes, and a thing he would never have been able to contemplate before going to Lórien; however daunting the task, though, the more he thought of it the more he felt equal to it. It was the least he could do—for Míriel and Indis, and for Finwë.

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The morning after his arrival, Fingon came knocking on Maedhros’ door. “Come walk with me. Have you seen much of the valley?”

“Most of it, I think.” It was the sort of place, though, that would always offer something new to find, or something different in the gardens or even in the house. Maglor had told Maedhros that even the wide gallery of paintings and sculptures was always shifting and changing. It was never quiet, either. There was always singing or laughter somewhere nearby, and of course there was the sound of flowing water and wind through the grass and the flowers. “How are things in Tirion?” Maedhros asked as they walked along the pond, pausing as a family of ducks emerged from a cluster of blue and yellow daisies to hurry across the path to splash into the water. 

“Quiet,” Fingon said, “or as quiet as they ever get. Are you asking about Tirion or about your father?”

“Both, I suppose.”

“Fëanor is also as quiet as he ever gets. He’s rebuilding your old house when he isn’t experimenting in the forge or whatever it is he does there. Daeron keeps writing interesting things about the languages of the Avari in the far east of Middle-earth, which I would have thought would endear him greatly to your father—I know he’s been reading every one of them—but every time they have to speak your father comes away looking like he just ate something sour.”

Maedhros thought of the dangerously-bright way Daeron had greeted Fëanor when they met on the road. “I think the feeling might be mutual.”

“I know he puzzled Fëanor greatly when they first met,” Fingon said, “but I don’t know where the dislike has come from—on either side, really.”

“Cáno, I suppose.”

“One would think that would only make Fëanor try harder to like Daeron,” Fingon said, “but I suppose that’s a problem for Daeron and Maglor to manage. I can tell you that your father and mine are getting along shockingly well. I would call them friends, if I were able to believe my own eyes.”

“What of Arafinwë? Is he still in self-imposed exile?”

“No, he’s come back once or twice, but his meeting with Fëanor was decidedly cool, and he much prefers his seaside estate to Tirion. He says he’s had quite enough of ruling, and he hardly even wants to run his own household, let alone the Noldor.” Fingon grinned. “I sympathize. I’m very happy to be only a prince again—and a landless one at that, except for my own very small estate.”

“I’m happier still to be only nominally a prince,” said Maedhros. The less that was asked of him, he thought, the better. He sympathized too with Finarfin, and was glad he did not even have a household to worry about. His mother had left all such trappings behind long ago when she left Tirion, and Maedhros would be more than content to return to her quiet house. For such a long time it had held only three of them—Nerdanel, Maedhros, and Caranthir. Now all his brothers would be coming and going, noisy and chaotic—but still quieter than Tirion, and far more welcome. All Maedhros had wanted before was to be left alone; now he just wanted peace. 

“Will you come to Tirion yourself?” Fingon asked. “Not to stay, but at least to visit? Your father will be there, of course, but he’s not that hard to avoid, and I know he has promised not to bother you and your brothers.”

“We met him by chance on the road here,” Maedhros said. “It…did not go as badly as it could have. I’ll visit Tirion sometimes—I’ll visit you, and Curvo, but I don’t think I will want to go to the palace, and I hope your father won’t ask anything of me.”

“He and my mother will invite you to parties and things, as they always have,” Fingon said. “I hope you’ll accept, sometimes.”

The thought of dressing in courtly finery, weighed down by jewels and brocaded robes, still made Maedhros feel hot and itchy, even if he thought that he could probably survive an entire evening instead of only a few hours now. “Perhaps,” he said, just to make Fingon roll his eyes. That had been his answer always before when pressed to go to Tirion—or to go anywhere, to do anything—and it had always just been a polite way of saying no. “Really, though—I’ll try to come sometimes, but I don’t think I’ll enjoy myself any more than I did before.”

“I see Lórien did not fully cure your pessimism. That’s all right; Gilheneth and I will help with that. You’ll come visit us, of course, outside of the city?”

“Whenever you wish.”

A call from back up the path made them both turn, and Finrod came running to join them, bright and shining with jewels in his hair and at his throat. “Good morning, dearest cousins!” he said brightly, slipping his arms through both Maedhros’ and Fingon’s. “Am I interrupting?”

“No,” Fingon laughed, “not that you would care if you were. I’ve just gotten Russo to promise to come visit me.”

“Really! No perhaps-that-really-means-no? Does that mean I can invite you to my house on Tol Eressëa and expect you to actually come?”

“Perhaps,” Maedhros said, and laughed at the look on Finrod’s face. “By which I mean yes, of course.”

“Russandol, are you teasing me?” Finrod exclaimed, punching him lightly in the arm even as his face lit up with a sunny smile. “Lórien has done wonders for you, indeed!”

They wandered the paths, at times in silence and other times talking of inconsequential things like the hedgehogs or the journey back from Lórien. The last time the three of them had spoken together, Maedhros had asked both Finrod and Fingon to come to Nerdanel’s house so that he might warn them of Fëanor’s impending arrival. Now Fëanor still hovered behind their words, but he did not loom—there was no threat, not to either Fingolfin or Finarfin, or the peace among the Noldor, as they had all had reason to fear before. Now Maedhros was the only one who had any cause for concern, and even that was less than it had been. He had missed this, he thought as he followed Finrod across a fallen log that served as a bridge over one of the wider streams, passing out of the gardens and out into the wide meadowland beyond. He had missed spending time with his cousins with no purpose except to enjoy one another’s company. 

“You said earlier that you saw your father on the road,” Fingon said once he had also crossed the log bridge. Finrod turned around with a look of faint alarm on his face. “How did it go?”

“Náriel and Calissë were there,” said Maedhros, “and of course they were excited to see him. I don’t think he would have approached us if Calissë hadn’t insisted.”

“And?” Finrod asked. “What did he say? What did you say?”

Maedhros shrugged. It was almost silly how little had actually been said, when compared to the alarm he was greeted with whenever he told someone of it. “We exchanged greetings. He asked if Maglor and I found what we sought in Lórien. Calissë asked him to come back here with us, but he said he was expected back in Tirion, and so we parted. I can’t guess what he was thinking.” 

“What were you thinking?” Fingon asked.

“That my hand hurt and I couldn’t let him know it,” Maedhros said.

“Your hand?” Finrod reached for it, turning it over to run his fingertips over the ghosts of scars there. “Could Estë not cure this?”

“It isn’t…I don’t think it’s the sort of thing that will ever go away.” The touch of the Silmaril had marked him as deeply as had the rescue from Thangorodrim; Estë had not been able to give him back his right hand, either—she had apologized for it upon his return, even though she hadn’t needed to; he hadn’t wanted it back. He didn’t even really mind having the marks on his palm, most of the time. “It hasn’t hurt like that in a long time.” Dreams had once had him waking with his hand throbbing, but those dreams had mostly left him now, and when he did have a bad night he did not wake up in pain. “It was only seeing him.”

“That seems like something he should know,” Finrod said. 

“He might have guessed anyway,” Maedhros said. Maglor had been taken by surprise, and if Fëanor had not been distracted by Calissë he might have seen the way he had reacted, the way Daeron had reached for his hand the same way Finrod had just reached for Maedhros’ own. 

“You were afraid of seeing him again, I remember,” Fingon said quietly. “Has that changed?”

“I don’t know,” Maedhros admitted. “I had all of my brothers at my back, this time. If I were to meet him alone I think it would be worse. And if my hand is going to burn every time…”

“It is not the memory of the Silmaril that burns you,” Finrod said. He still held Maedhros’ hand in both of his, cupping it as though it were something fragile. The scars there were almost invisible, only noticeable to touch, and even then they were very faint. 

“It feels like the Silmaril,” Maedhros said. There was no pain like that heat. It was unforgettable, unmistakable. “But you are right, it isn’t…it isn’t the Silmarils themselves. My father put something of himself, of his own power, into them. His is a spirit of fire, and that is what burns still, I think.”

“Does Maglor feel it?” Finrod asked.

“Yes.”

“I hope Fëanor did notice,” Fingon said, his expression grim, his voice more akin to the commander of the Noldor in Beleriand than to his usual bright self in Valinor’s present. “I hope that he understands what his very presence does. Would that he could feel even a fraction of it.”

“I don’t want to punish him,” Maedhros said quietly. He thought of Maglor, who was still much angrier than he would admit even to himself, saying he did not care if looking into their pasts in a palantír caused their father pain. There was a part of Maedhros that agreed, but… “I want him to understand, but I don’t…”

“Some lessons hurt in the learning,” Finrod said. “None of us here are strangers to such things. Fëanor died before he could learn anything in Beleriand except a smattering of the language and what not to do when facing a host of balrogs.” Fingon snorted, and Finrod grimaced apologetically before going on, “If anyone should, here and now, feel an echo of this pain, it is not you, Russandol.”

“But I do, and…I don’t know what will change that. I don’t know what I need from my father, except—except that he keep his distance, I suppose. But neither of us can live our lives like that forever, never speaking, never seeing each other.”

“I don’t have any answers,” Finrod said. Fingon shook his head in agreement. They both loved their fathers, had never been so hurt by them. “I wonder if it would help you to speak to Fingolfin, or to my own father. One has reconciled with Fëanor, and one is almost as wary as the seven of you.”

“Your father did not bear the brunt of mine’s anger,” Maedhros said.

“Perhaps not, but he was left picking up the pieces afterward. His reunion with Fingolfin did not go so smoothly either—but neither of you heard that from me.”

A flock of birds erupted out of the flowers a little distance away, and the three of them turned to see Huan bounding through the grass and the irises, barking joyfully. Maedhros saw Celegorm following behind with Calissë on his shoulders. They saw Maedhros standing with Finrod and Fingon, and waved cheerfully.

Finrod sighed, and let go of Maedhros’ hand as Fingon waved back. “But if we are speaking of pain, I think Fëanor feels a great deal of it already—of heartache, at least. Whatever we may choose to believe, however little we may find ourselves able to trust him, I do believe he is sincere in his regrets.”

“I don’t think I can believe that,” Maedhros said.

“As I said before, that is no one’s fault but his,” Fingon said. “I am still surprised that Curufin gets along with him as well as he does.”

“It’s different for Curvo.”

“Because of Celebrimbor?” said Finrod. Maedhros nodded. “You know he gets along with Fëanor, too.”

“I know. It’s even more different for Tyelpë.” They’d all worked to keep Celebrimbor away from Fëanor at his worst, and of course Curufin had tried hardest. Even until they parted in Nargothrond, he had tried to shield his son from the worst of what they were all becoming. He’d come to Himring afterward furious and almost unrecognizable as the little brother Maedhros had watched grow up in Valinor—he and Celegorm both more like Fëanor in his wrath than any of the rest of them—but though he’d raged he had never raged against his son. It meant now that, though Celebrimbor was not ignorant of Fëanor’s final days, he did not have the same memories, the same fears. Maedhros was glad of it, and only wished he had been able to shield his brothers better, too. 

“Why were you afraid to begin with?” Finrod asked him.

“I don’t…” Maedhros took a breath. The fear had taken root before the exile to Formenos, but it had blossomed like a thorny, ugly weed the moment Fëanor ordered the ships burned. “I stood aside at Losgar, when I couldn’t convince him not to burn the ships.”

Finrod tilted his head, frowning a little. The sapphire beads in his braids clicked together softly. “Yes, we know.”

“Atar was furious afterward.”

“I would imagine…oh. Was it that bad?”

“It was.” Maedhros looked away again, back toward Huan. If not for the Oath, if not for the knowledge that his brothers would become targets next, Maedhros might have turned away from him then, and he would have been lying if he tried to say he hadn’t taken a certain bitter satisfaction in handing over the crown to Fingolfin later, knowing how his father would have hated it. Guilt still layered over it, because he was his father’s son and he had never known how to be anything else. Whatever Fëanor tried to say now, Maedhros knew there were conditions to be met in order to receive his love, as he had not known before Losgar. Maybe the conditions had changed, but they were still there. The burning in his hand felt like continued punishment—for giving up the crown, for standing aside, for destroying himself as soon as he got the Silmarils in the end, or maybe for only getting two out of the three. Maybe for all of it. 

“He did not mention Losgar in his letter to you,” Fingon said quietly.

“What letter?” Finrod asked.

“He wrote us all letters at the end of that first summer,” Maedhros said. “I think it was Celebrimbor’s idea. I don’t know if my father even remembers what he said at Losgar, or afterward. He was—he was terrible in his wrath, fell and fey, and…”

“You are still stronger than he,” Fingon said. “I told you so before, and it is only more true now.”

“I don’t want to have to be,” Maedhros said. 

“You shouldn’t have to be,” said Finrod, “but you have been, and you still are. Maybe it is only memory that burns your hand, and the more you see him the less it will hurt.”

“Maybe.”

“Or maybe it is a wound your father gave you that only he can heal,” Fingon said. 

Then it was a wound that would never heal, Maedhros thought but bit his tongue to keep from speaking aloud. He said instead, “I’ll just—I’ll handle it as it comes, whatever the cause or the solution. Nothing else hurts. I am better—I’m so much better than I was. If I am afraid of my father still, I am not afraid of anything else.” Whatever shadows still lingered, whatever his father might do or what he might want, Maedhros would live his life on his own terms going forward. He had the support of his brothers and his mother, and his cousins—what was Fëanor compared to all of them? He was not worth the tears that Maglor had shed the day before, or that Maedhros knew he would weep later that night when he was alone in the quiet dark of his bedroom. 

When they joined Calissë and Celegorm, Calissë insisted on trading Celegorm’s shoulders for Maedhros’, which were higher and afforded her a greater view. It was hard to remain gloomy in the face of her irrepressible cheerfulness, and even Celegorm was able to laugh and speak with Finrod more easily than he ever had before. Finrod, for his part, appeared determined to try to bridge the gap that still lay between them, and teased Celegorm mercilessly for his messy and crooked braids made by a child’s hands, and the broken flowers stems that were caught in them. Then after a few minutes, Finrod said, “Actually, Celegorm, I wish to speak with you. Come on!” Without waiting for an answer he seized Celegorm’s hand and pulled him away, out toward one of the smaller ponds covered in water lilies. Celegorm glanced over his shoulder at Maedhros with a look of alarm, but there was no arguing or gainsaying Finrod when he was determined. 

It was nearing lunchtime by the time they returned to the house. Maedhros set Calissë down as Rundamírë came to call her in to wash up before the meal, and as Elrond also came out. “Legolas and Gimli have just arrived,” he told them with a smile, as though they were supposed to recognize those names. 

Fingon seemed to, at least. “I have been looking forward to meeting them!” he said. “They are returned at last from Aulë’s halls, then?”

“They left Aulë some time ago, and have spent the last few years wandering the forests of Vána and Yavanna. Now they are come here to stay awhile, and we are very glad to have them. They are inside with Maglor and Elladan and Elrohir.” Elrond lingered as Fingon went ahead inside, and he looked at Maedhros, who had also hung back. “Are you not going to join them?”

“I’m not sure who either Legolas or Gimli are,” said Maedhros, “though Gimli sounds like a Dwarvish name.”

“It is. Did you not hear when they arrived? It was a year or so before Maglor and my sons came—they caused quite a stir when they appeared in Avallónë. No one had expected such a thing.”

“I had not heard, no. But why would a dwarf wish to come to these lands?”

“I forget that you kept yourself so separate for so long. Legolas and Gimli are two of the last three living members of the Fellowship of the Ring. Gimli came west for the sake of Legolas, after Aragorn’s death. Do you remember the song sung here of the Three Hunters?”

“No, I never did get to hear it in full.” Elrond had called Maedhros from the hall at the start of it, unable to hear it for one reason or another. Maedhros had wondered a little at the time, but he had had little curiosity for anything outside of his brothers in those days and had swiftly forgotten about it.

Elrond’s smile turned rueful. “I remember. You’ll hear it in full very soon, I am sure.”

“Was it because of Aragorn that you could not listen to it then?”

“The grief was still very near. I raised him as my own son. Estel, we named him in his youth, to keep him safe and hidden. Wingfoot, he was named later, after he raced many leagues across Rohan in pursuit of the orcs that captured Merry and Pippin.” Elrond looked away, out over the valley. A nightingale burst into song in a nearby juniper. “Hearing of his death was as hard as hearing of Arwen’s.”

“I’m sorry,” Maedhros said. 

“It is easier now to speak of him.” Elrond turned back to Maedhros, his gaze keen. “Are you well? You seemed troubled as you came in.”

“I was only speaking of my father with Finrod and Fingon,” said Maedhros. “It isn’t as though that trouble is anything new. I’ll be all right.”

“You and Maglor are both very fond of saying that.”

“At least now we can say it truthfully.”

“I hope you’ll forgive me if I remain skeptical for a while longer.”

How startling it was every time he realized that Elrond really cared. “I am all right,” Maedhros said. “Of course thinking of my father troubles me, but it’s—I don’t know how to fix it, or if it can be fixed at all.”

“You thought once there was no fixing what lay between you and Maglor,” Elrond pointed out. 

“I don’t know if I want the same thing now,” said Maedhros. “I just want to live my own life out from under his shadow.”

“You deserve no less,” Elrond said. “And I know of course I am one of the last people you would confide in, but if your hand continues to pain you, please tell me. Maybe there is nothing I can do, where even Estë could not bring full healing, but I would still like to try.”

“I will,” Maedhros said. He curled his fingers over his palm, feeling the faint markings there. Elrond smiled at him again, and led the way inside. 

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The arrival of Legolas and Gimli was as unexpected as it was delightful. Maglor saw Gimli bowing deeply to Maedhros, and speaking of the ancient friendship between Himring and Belegost that the dwarves of Middle-earth still remembered. Maedhros’ look of shock swiftly transformed into a smile as he returned the bow. 

Gimli was very old, even by the measure of the dwarves, with snow-white hair and golden beads and emeralds braided intricately into his thick beard, but he was hale and strong still, and further revived by his coming into the west. Legolas was as he had always been, cheerful and full of stories of the places they had visited and the things they had seen since coming west.

The afternoon passed brightly and cheerfully, and the evening was full of music. Many songs were sung of the Fellowship, and of Aglarond and the fair gardens of Ithilien. Gimli made quick friends also with both Curufin and Caranthir, who had had many friends among the dwarves of the Ered Luin long ago, and with Daeron, who had also known many dwarves, and who Gimli had greeted with as deep a bow as he had given to Elrond when Maglor had the pleasure of introducing them. Legolas fell in with Ambarussa just as quickly.

“I told you it would work,” Legolas said to Maglor, not a little smug, when they had a moment to speak after the flurry of introductions died down. “You were convinced we would wreck before we lost sight of the coast of Belfalas!”

“It was still a mad idea,” Maglor said, laughing, “but I am very glad you were successful. How are you finding it here?”

“It’s delightful to have a whole new world to explore—not to mention all the people to meet, and meet again! I have been trying to convince Gimli to go as far west as we can. Is it true what I have heard, that you went all the way to the westernmost shores yourself?”

“I did. It’s well worth the journey, but I don’t see why there is any hurry. Ekkaia isn’t going anywhere.”

“You went nearly as soon as you landed, or so I have heard—what was your hurry?”

Maglor smiled. “Have you heard of my family? So many cousins and brothers and uncles coming to see me at once—I needed to escape to Ekkaia just to breathe!” Legolas laughed, and turned his questions rather to the routes taken and what sort of country lay between Tirion and the westernmost shores. 

“It is very nice sometimes to be recognized for my runes before anything else,” Daeron remarked to Maglor as they retreated to their room late that night. “Gimli must be very remarkable, to have been granted leave to come to the Undying Lands.”

“He is,” Maglor said. “All of the Fellowship were remarkable.”

“Was that tale of the Three Hunters really true? My legs hurt just thinking about making a chase that far on foot—and in only a few days!”

“Yes, it’s true. There is very little that needs embellishing, when it comes to tales of the Fellowship.” They came to their room, finding Pídhres on the bed and the hedgehogs all curled up in their basket near the hearth. It was a warm night, and the breeze through the open window smelled of flowers, and carried the sound of flowing water. Maglor felt tired, but not unpleasantly so. His thoughts had been less weighty that day; he’d hardly thought of his father at all, or even of Finwë, though before Legolas and Gimli’s arrival he had intended to start jotting down notes for the song he was to write. 

Sleep came quickly and calmly, and he sank into dreams of the Sea, of the music of the waves and the wild beauty of the rocky shores of Middle-earth under wide and pale skies. Such dreams always felt a little like coming home, though that was a feeling he would never speak aloud in waking life. 

In the dark hours before dawn, though, he woke with a start. For a few seconds Maglor didn’t understand why, until he heard a soft sound beside him and turned to see Daeron caught up in a dream of his own, tangled up in the blankets and clutching at his chest, where there was an old scar from an arrow that had almost killed him once, long ago in Rhûn. “Daeron,” Maglor said, reaching for him. “Wake up, love. You're dreaming.” Daeron tried to pull away, muttering something in a language Maglor did not know. “Daeron, it’s me, it’s Maglor. Wake up.”

At last, Daeron’s eyes opened, though for a moment they remained unfocused, still caught up in the dream. Maglor smoothed his hair away from his face, and Daeron blinked, taking a sharp, shuddering breath. “It’s all right,” Maglor whispered. “It’s all right, Daeron, it was only a dream.”

“Maglor,” Daeron breathed.

“Yes, it’s me. I’m here. You’re safe.”

Daeron rolled over to bury his face in Maglor’s chest, shaking all over. Maglor wrapped one arm around him as he used his other hand to tug the blankets back into some semblance of order. Pídhres, disturbed by all the movement, jumped down from the bed and vanished out of the open window. Maglor settled back against the pillows, gently maneuvering Daeron so that he lay on top of him, resting against his chest, as he stroked Daeron’s hair and hummed a quiet and soothing song until the tremors stopped, though Daeron did not lift his head or ease his almost desperate grip on Maglor, hands fisted in his nightshirt. After a little while he said something, but his voice was muffled and the language was still that of Rhûn. Then he sighed, and turned his head a little. “I’m sorry,” he whispered.

“Don’t be.” Maglor kept stroking his hair. “What was the dream?”

“An ambush. In Rhûn. Going wrong in—in all the—” Daeron faltered, words failing him as they never had before. Something damp soaked into Maglor’s nightshirt. “Going wrong as it didn’t in—in life.”

“A memory with teeth,” Maglor murmured. “It’s all right; I’ll sing the dreams away.” Daeron exhaled shakily, pressing his face back into Maglor’s chest; his breath hitched, and he started to shiver again, just a little. Maglor started to sing very softly, songs of rest and and starlight and moonlight, of sunbeams through the trees and wildflowers blooming in spring. He kept singing as Daeron slowly relaxed and his breathing evened out and deepened as he fell asleep again. Outside it began to rain, and Pídhres returned, sitting on the rug to groom herself a while before jumping back up onto the bed to curl up by Daeron’s hand where it had slipped onto the blankets, purring as she rubbed her head against it. Daeron sighed in his sleep.

Morning came slowly, pale and grey. The rain did not stop, and Maglor suspected it would continue all day. When he ran out of songs he let himself doze, listening to the rain and to the sounds of the household slowly waking outside of their room. The hedgehogs stirred after a time, and Maglor very carefully extracted himself from the bed to open the door for them, so they could escape downstairs and outside for their foraging and whatever small adventures they might find in Celebrían’s flower gardens. He also asked someone he saw in the hallway for a tea tray to be sent up from the kitchen. 

Daeron stirred as Maglor slipped back under the blankets with him. “Maglor…?” He reached across the bed, already frowning even before he opened his eyes.

“I’m here.” Maglor caught his hand and kissed his fingers.

“Oh.” Daeron opened his eyes, and the relief in them was so clear that Maglor’s throat went tight for a moment. “Is it morning?” Daeron raised his head to look toward the window.

“It is. Come here.” Maglor pulled him back down onto the pillows. His own nightmares, when they had been very bad, had always left him cold afterward. It might not be so for Daeron, but Maglor pulled the blankets back up over them anyway. 

Daeron sighed as he relaxed against Maglor again. “I don’t think I’ve ever fallen asleep again after such a dream,” he whispered. “Thank you.” 

“You said once such dreams trouble you only rarely,” Maglor said. He pressed kisses to Daeron’s eyelids and to his cheeks. 

“Very rarely. Maybe they feel all the worse for it.” Daeron pressed his face into the crook of Maglor’s neck. “It helped. Your singing. But I’m afraid I won’t be good for anything today.”

“You don’t have to be. What do you need?”

“Just—just you.”

“You have me. Always.”

A knock on the door a little while later heralded the tea tray’s arrival. Maglor fetched it and coaxed Daeron out of bed and to the window seat, where they could sit and watch the rain as they sipped their tea. Daeron curled up against Maglor, quiet and weary. “What do you usually do after such nights?” Maglor asked after a while. 

“Wallow,” Daeron said, sounding just a little too tired to be truly wry. He sighed. “I should get up and seek out some sort of distraction, I suppose. It helped…not last time, but the time before.”

“Or,” Maglor said, “we can spend the entire day here, being extremely lazy and pretending nothing outside of this room exists.”

“That sounds nice.” Daeron sat up to set his empty cup aside, and then turned to kiss Maglor. “I would very much like to forget—” Someone knocked on the door, and they both sighed.

Maglor expected it to be one of his brothers, but instead it was Elladan. “A letter’s just come from Alqualondë for Daeron,” he said. “Is everything all right?”

“Yes, of course.” Maglor took the letter and offered Elladan a smile. “We’re just going to take advantage of the rain and spend the day being very lazy and indulgent.”

Elladan looked skeptical. “All right, then. You might want to lock your door unless you want your nieces barging in to demand stories or games.”

“I’ll make a note of it, thank you.”

“Do you need anything?” Elladan asked before Maglor could close the door. “Is there anything Ada should know?”

Maglor shook his head. “It was a difficult night, but not for me,” he said quietly. “Don’t worry too much. We might join you for dinner, and we might not.”

“I’ll let Ada know.”

“Thank you, Elladan.”

Back at the window seat, Daeron took the letter with a surprised frown, pushing tangled and disheveled strands of hair out of his face. “From Alqualondë, he said? Oh, but this is Mablung’s hand. What’s he doing there, I wonder?” 

“You don’t have to open it now, you know,” Maglor said as he sat down. 

“It’s as likely as anything else to cheer me,” Daeron said as he peeled up the seal, “and I am curious now.” He unfolded the letter, which was not long and looked hastily written. As he read his faint smile turned to a look of dismay. “Oh, you were right. I should have left this for tomorrow. Or perhaps never.” 

“What is it? Has something happened?”

“My aunt has managed to find my parents.” Daeron folded the letter again, very carefully, though he looked as though he would rather ball it up and throw it across the room. “Her meeting with my father did not go as well as hoped.”

“Your parents live in Alqualondë, then?”

“Yes—they have been there since the Years of the Trees. It seems they are very displeased that my aunt and uncle did not bring me across the Sea with Olwë, rather than staying to seek for Thingol. As though I wasn’t old enough by then to make my own choices.”

“In their memory you are still only an infant,” Maglor said. “Did Mablung write to ask you to go to Alqualondë?”

“He says I should know that we have found them—Escelírë and Aldalëo, their names are, in the language of this land. I knew their names would not be in the same tongue as mine by now, as our languages changed and diverged, but it sounds strange, feels strange on my tongue. Did you spend much time in Alqualondë in your youth?”

“Some,” Maglor said, “but I do not recognize those names. I do not think I ever met them. You might ask Galadriel or Finrod; they spent far more of their youth in Alqualondë than in Tirion.”

“Maybe I will.” Daeron looked back down at the letter, turning it over in his fingers. “I do not want to think of this today. Or at all. If they take it into their heads to come find me—”

“Well, we can always flee into the wilds again. It worked when my own father came here unexpectedly.” 

Daeron’s smile was a brief flicker, mirthless and unhappy. “I am in too poor a mood for this. Tomorrow, maybe, I can laugh at how foolish I am being now.”

“It isn’t foolish, Daeron. It’s easy to speak calmly of finding them when you don’t expect to, and don’t plan to start soon. It’s another thing entirely to have such news thrust on you unexpectedly.”

“Yet they are my parents. I shouldn’t—”

“Give me that.” Maglor took the letter before Daeron could damage it as his grip on the paper tightened and twisted. “You were right when you said you should not think more on it today.” He caught Daeron’s face in his hands and kissed him. “When you see them, I will be with you, as you were with me when I saw my brothers, and my own mother.”

“You have your own task to complete. The song for Finwë—”

“Don’t you start. I can take pen and paper with me to Alqualondë, you know—and I’ll probably have to go there anyway, since my uncle Finarfin comes so seldom anymore to Tirion. Whatever it is you decide to do, you do not have to do anything today. Just be here, with me, and set aside the shadows of the past and of the future.”

“You’re right. I know you are.” Daeron closed his eyes as their foreheads rested together, and sighed. “Play me something?”

“Anything you want.” 

Maglor moved to his harp and began to play, mostly songs that he had learned or written since coming west, songs of bright and peaceful things, of sunshine and wildflowers, of flowing water and wind in the treetops. Daeron curled up on the cushions of the window seat with another cup of tea and watched the rain outside, and absently stroked Pídhres when she curled up on his lap. When he fell asleep Maglor stopped playing only long enough to fetch a blanket to cover him, for the day had turned cool with the rain.

By the evening the shadows were gone from Daeron’s eyes, but he was still weary and worried, thanks to Mablung’s ill-timed letter. The next morning, though, he was himself again, waking Maglor with kisses and going down to breakfast as though the previous day hadn’t happened at all—except that after they finished eating he whispered to Maglor that he wished for solitude, and then slipped away. Maglor watched him go, and saw Pídhres trot off in the same direction. Worrying about Daeron was not a thing he was accustomed to, but it niggled at the back of his mind even though he knew it wasn’t necessary. Daeron knew himself well enough to judge his own moods, and to know how to handle his own past—and his future. He wouldn’t thank Maglor if he tried to hover, or to go after him when he wanted to be alone.

Celegorm sat down in the spot Daeron had just vacated. “Is he all right?”

“Yes.” Maglor rolled his eyes when Celegorm frowned at him. “No, I’m not going to tell you more; you can ask him when he comes back, if you’re really worried—which you need not be. I do want to talk to you, though—all of you. Where is everyone?”

“Maedhros is in the library, I think, and I don’t know where anyone else has gone.”

“Then let’s find them and meet back in the library.”

“Has something happened, Cáno?”

“I have a song to write, and I’ll need all your help—and in the interest of not repeating myself six times, that’s all I’ll say for now.”

Maglor found Curufin and Caranthir, and Celegorm rounded up Ambarussa, and they all got to the library at the same time, and found Maedhros at the far end of it, sitting at a table looking over some maps. He lifted his head and raised his eyebrows at the sight of them all. “What happened?” he asked. 

“Nothing,” said Maglor, sitting down across from him. He waited until the rest of their brothers had dragged over chairs or perched themselves on the nearby windowsill to go on, “Míriel and Indis have asked me to write a song for Finwë.”

“You meant to try your hand at it anyway,” Maedhros said.

“This is different. The one I would have written would have been just for me, and for the six of you and maybe a scant handful of others to hear. This one will be for a much wider audience, and if I am to do it properly I am going to have to speak to many people for it.” Maglor had known Finwë as well as a grandson could know his grandfather, he thought, but there were many things he did not know, and many thoughts and perspectives that would differ from his. To write a song fit for someone such as Finwë Noldóran he would need far more than just a single grandson’s grief and love. 

“What do you want from us, then?” Celegorm asked. “I don’t think we know anything of him that you don’t.”

“It isn’t that I think you might know something different, it’s…” Maglor paused, tracing his finger up the line of the Misty Mountains on the parchment before him. “You don’t have to tell me right now—please don’t, please take time to think on it—but there is really only one question I would ask you: what is it you would wish to hear put into a song about him?”

Silence fell between them, all their thoughts turning to Finwë. Outside the window a lark burst into bright song; the sun was out in a cloudless sky, and the scent of roses drifted into the library to mingle with the parchment and ink and old paper. Finally, Celegorm said, “What if what we wish we could hear isn’t something you can put into a song?”

“Let me worry about putting it all into verse. Just—tell me what you want others to remember, what you think is important enough to be sung. I do not yet know what shape this song will take, and whatever you have to tell me will help.”

“Will you be asking Findekáno, and Felagund, and others, too?” Maedhros asked.

“Yes, I expect I will be speaking with everyone in our family, and then some, at sometime or another. There’s no particular hurry; I’m not planning to leave Imloth Ningloron for at least a full year, anyway.” He saw several of his brothers exchange glances, though no one said anything. No one asked if everyone would include their father—though of course it must. Maglor could not write anything such as Míriel and Indis had asked of him without speaking to Fëanor.

Maglor thought again of Fëanor’s coming to Formenos after the Darkening, after Maglor and Maedhros had done their best to clean up at least some of the blood, to sweep away the fragments of stone and wood and iron from the shattered doors, of the way Fëanor had collapsed in their arms, weeping as though he might never stop, might just dissolve all into tears to be washed away by the rain called forth by the Valar, after a struggle that had taken Celegorm as well as Maglor and Maedhros to hold him back from the linen-wrapped body. 

Those were the last tears Maglor knew his father to have shed. After they dried up, well after they had all managed to drag him away from Formenos, back toward Tirion, it was like he’d hardened, calcified, like he had taken his grief as though it were raw iron and passed it through a forge so that it was transformed into rage instead. It would be a lie now to say that he was not hesitant to approach Fëanor, even to speak of Finwë. He did not know whether to expect the tears or the rage—but it would be a disservice to himself and to Finwë and even to Fëanor to shy away from it just because he was afraid. This was too important.

“Is there anything else serious we must talk about?” Amrod asked after a moment. “Or can we ask Maitimo why he’s looking at old maps?”

“I like maps,” Maedhros said mildly, “and Maglor promised to show me some of the places he has visited.”

“So I did,” Maglor said, and leaned forward. The map was quite different from others he had seen before, depicting nearly all of the western lands of Middle-earth, from Lindon in the west to Mordor and the Sea of Rhûn in the east, from the Ered Mithrim in the north down to the northernmost part of Harad. No maps in Rivendell or in Gondor had ever encompassed so much, and when he looked at a note jotted down in the corner he saw that this map was one drawn by Eärendil, and copied and labeled by Elrond. 

“Here is the River Anduin, that I followed all the way from its mouths to its headwaters.” He traced the line on the map all the way from the far south at the Bay of Belfalas to the farthest north, where the Grey Mountains met the Misty Mountains. “There is a lake there, deep and blue and cold, fed by rains and snow melt, that flows out into the little streams that are the start of the river.” That had been what he’d thought to seek when he had first struck north long ago—when he had been waylaid by orcs near the Gladden Fields instead. Being able to complete that journey at last had felt like a victory, though not one that he could put into words or make a song out of. “Afterward I visited Erebor and Dale, and then went back down south with a party of dwarves—after the portage roads were repaired and Amon Hen and Amon Lhaw reestablished, trade opened up between Wilderland and the south. The river was very busy in those days, as it had not been for years and years before.”

Celegorm leaned over Maglor’s shoulder, frowning at the map. “Is this where…?” He traced his own finger up the Anduin’s course, and then pointed at the small tower symbol in the southern part of Mirkwood. 

“Yes,” Maglor said. “And there, just across the river, is Lothlórien.”

“So close,” Celegorm said quietly.

Maglor did not want to think about Dol Guldur. “Here, on the other side of the Misty Mountains, here is Imladris.” He pointed to the little dot nestled just beside the mountains before moving his finger even farther west along the Road, past the Blue Mountains and the coasts of Lindon. “And here, Maedhros—here is Himring still.” 

“Did you ever go back there, Cáno?” Caranthir asked.

“No. I saw it from the shore, but I never went out to the island. It’s crumbling now, wearing away little by little—but still tall and sturdy. Many birds nest there.” Maglor looked up at Maedhros, but Maedhros kept his gaze lowered to the map. He looked back down at it himself, running his finger down over the coastline, past the Gulf of Lhûn and Mithlond, from which he had set sail at last, down along the shores that he knew so well that he did not even have to close his eyes to picture them, wild and remote. A faint pang of homesickness struck him. In spite of everything, he missed those shores, missed the waves and the Sea and the birds, and the cold winds. He would not go back now, even if given the chance, but a little bit of that longing remained. 

As they parted, scattering back to whatever everyone had been doing before gathering in the library, Celegorm fell into step with Maglor. He had a strand of his hair twisted around his finger, a habit Maglor had thought he’d left behind in childhood. “What’s the matter, Tyelko?” he asked. 

“Why did Míriel and Indis ask you to write a song for Finwë? I mean, I know why they’ve asked you, but why now?”

“I suppose they feel it’s long overdue,” Maglor said, “and they are not wrong. And I was not here to ask, before.”

“Will you write of his death?”

“I must.”

“Does that mean you will go back to Formenos?”

Maglor hadn’t thought of that. “I don’t know. Maybe.”

“Are you going to speak to Atar, too?”

“Yes.” Maglor glanced at him again. “Are you going to get angry about it?”

“No.” Celegorm kept his gaze on his feet. “Do you want to speak to him?”

“Not particularly, but I cannot write this song without him.”

“Can’t you just—just write to him instead?”

Maglor reached up and caught Celegorm’s hand before he started pulling his hair out. “I do not intend to write to anyone else,” he said. “This is…it’s such a heavy thing, this grief, and this song I am to try to write. I cannot treat it as anything less, whatever my own feelings about who I speak to. Whatever we might say about him as our father, he loved his own. I would not have been equal to it before I went to Lórien, but I am now.” Celegorm gave him a look full of doubt. “I’m not riding out to Tirion tomorrow, Tyelko.”

“Just—tell me when you do go? I want to go with you.”

“I don’t want to speak to him in front of an audience.”

“That doesn’t mean I can’t be nearby for when it goes wrong.”

How awful that Maglor couldn’t even argue—that it was when it went wrong, and not if. How awful that they still felt it necessary to protect one another from their own father. “You and Daeron can join forces then, and drive me mad with your worrying.” He tried to speak lightly, but Celegorm did not smile. “I’ll tell you. I promise.”

“Thank you.”

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The forge was empty but for Lisgalen when Caranthir went out there, and he took advantage of it to sit on top of one of the workbenches, idly swinging his legs while Lisgalen sorted through jars of pigments. “What did your brothers want?” they asked. 

“Maglor’s been asked to write a song for Finwë.”

“Aren’t there hundreds of songs for him already?”

“No. Or…maybe there are, but I’ve never heard any.” There hadn’t been much time for songwriting, or even grieving, between the Darkening and their departure. Surely songs were written in Valinor afterward, but it wasn’t as though Caranthir went to many places where he would hear them sung. “None have been written by Maglor, though. It sounds as though he’s going to be talking to everyone in our family and then some to put it all together.”

“That sounds like quite an undertaking,” Lisgalen remarked, glancing at Caranthir with a crooked smile. “Your family is…large.”

“At least everyone more or less gets along now,” said Caranthir, making a face so that Lisgalen would laugh. “What are you making?”

“I received a commission a couple weeks ago, only I didn’t get a chance to begin the work before Rundamírë came to fetch me out here, and since I don’t know when we’ll be going back I thought I might as well get something done here.” Lisgalen chose a few shades of red and began to spoon them into a crucible. Gem craft was something Caranthir had never been able to get the hang of, and he didn’t understand it now any better than he had when his father had finally given up trying to teach him, but watching Lisgalen at work was always both interesting and relaxing. “I like your brothers, by the way. I know you were worried about it.”

“I’m always worried about Nelyo and Cáno,” said Caranthir, “for one reason or another. I wasn’t really worried about you liking each other, though.” He’d been nervous, even though he knew there was no reason for it, but that was just—well, nerves. He remembered Curufin admitting once that he’d been horribly nervous about introducing them all to Rundamírë. All seven of them together could be rather a lot. Maedhros and Maglor were the oldest, and therefore the most likely to be intimidating, even if they didn’t mean to be—especially Maedhros, who could seem very grim at times, even now after so long in Lórien. 

“Well, this is one less thing. And really, they don’t seem to me like anyone you need to worry about.”

“You didn’t meet them before they went to Lórien.”

“Speaking of meetings,” Lisgalen said as they set the last jar down, “I met your father before leaving Tirion.”

That was something Caranthir had been worried about. Daeron’s introduction to Fëanor had not gone very well at all, and that knowledge had been hovering in the back of Caranthir’s mind ever since he’d first realized that whatever was growing between himself and Lisgalen was not mere friendship. “Oh no,” he said before he could stop himself. 

Lisgalen came over to stand in front of Caranthir, resting their hands on either side of him as they leaned in. Caranthir settled his hands on their waist. “It was an accident,” they said. “He arrived while I was visiting Celebrimbor.”

“What did he say?” Caranthir asked.

“Well he noticed my ring immediately,” Lisgalen said. Caranthir was meant to smile, he knew—he’d told Lisgalen about how none of his brothers had noticed it until after they’d left Lórien—but he couldn’t manage it. He could feel his cheeks getting hot. “He didn’t say anything about it, though, or about you, though I got the impression he was biting his tongue very hard to keep himself from doing so. He just asked about my work, and after we made pleasant and meaningless conversation for a few minutes I escaped and went home to pack my bags to come here. So it could have gone much worse, all things considered.” Lisgalen pressed a kiss to Caranthir’s cheek, and turned back to the workbench. “I still think we should elope.”

“My mother would never forgive me if we did,” Caranthir said. Nerdanel had strong opinions about doing certain things the proper way, and marriage was one of them. Curufin’s wedding to Rundamírë had been an enormous and lavish affair, but that had been during the Years of the Trees, and he the first of Fëanor’s sons to wed. Things were very different now, including Caranthir’s own standing among the Noldor—which he was very glad of—and the fact that Lisgalen had no living kin in Valinor. Their parents were Avari that had wandered westward toward the end of the First Age, and then followed Oropher back east, while Lisgalen had remained in Lindon with the Noldorin smiths, and then gone to new-built Ost-in-Edhil to join the Gwaith-i-Mírdain. They did not like to speak of that parting, and Caranthir hadn’t asked. He didn’t like to talk about his own estrangement with Fëanor, either—it was just less avoidable these days. Still—Nerdanel would insist at least on a formal ceremony and exchanging of rings before witnesses, including all of his brothers and his grandparents, and at least a handful of the Gwaith-i-Mírdain who would stand in for Lisgalen’s kin. Caranthir had no objections to any of that really, but he did not think the knot of anxiety that had just tied itself up in his stomach would go away until the wedding was over and his father had not done something, or made a surprise appearance, or…

“Your father is not going to ruin our wedding,” Lisgalen said, as they picked up some other substance to add to the crucible. 

“Well, he will now that you’ve said that out loud,” Caranthir said. Lisgalen rolled their eyes. “I just—it’s impossible to know what my father will do. And his initial meeting with Daeron went as well as yours too. Their second meeting, when no one else was there, went worse.”

“I’ll just be careful never to get caught alone with him,” said Lisgalen. “I do not have Daeron’s quick tongue—or his status. If your father takes issue with me, I would rather have someone to hide behind. Fortunately, Celebrimbor has very broad shoulders.”

“I can’t think of any reason he would dislike you,” Caranthir said, “except that you’ve taken up with me.” Lisgalen gave him a flat look. “Oh, don’t. I’m not—I don’t really care what he thinks. I just don’t want him to cause trouble.”

“Liar,” Lisgalen said, but not unkindly. Caranthir felt his face flush red again. “You care so much about everything—that’s one of the things I love most about you.”

“Fine, I don’t want to care, and I’m trying very hard not to.”

“It’s not shameful, you know, to want your father’s approval. Most people do.”

Most people never had cause to doubt their fathers. “Most people don’t have Fëanor for a father.”

“I suppose that’s fair. But you know Curufin and Celebrimbor get along with him just fine.”

“They had their own estrangement; they have a different view of it than the rest of us.”

Lisgalen set down the crucible and leaned against the workbench, looking at Caranthir. Their soft brown eyes were fond but a little sad. “I think this is the most you’ve spoken to me of your father since we met,” they said.

“Yes, well. You hadn’t met him before.”

“It really didn’t go terribly, Caranthir. He was perfectly polite and friendly—he’s just…well, I don’t have to tell you, I suppose. It isn’t even his reputation that makes him intimidating, it’s just his presence, if you know what I mean.”

“I do. I’m sorry.”

“It’s not your fault.”

It was, in a way. Fëanor had made his wishes clear: he wanted reconciliation, he was willing to do what it took to achieve it. So far Curufin was the only one who believed him. Caranthir did not begrudge his brother that, but he couldn’t let go of the past. It wasn’t even for his own sake. Every time he thought of Maedhros or Celegorm or Maglor—how troubled they all still were, how anguished they had been before they’d gone to Lórien or to Nienna—he got angry all over again. Caranthir had long ago accepted that of all his brothers he was the greatest disappointment in his father’s eyes, too unlike him, with no ambition or any particular talent, even when it came to the things he loved. He had more or less made peace with it. His brothers, though—whatever peace they had found in the last few decades, Caranthir feared that it was more fragile than it seemed. Even if it wasn’t, Fëanor was good at breaking that kind of thing. 

Still. If Caranthir were more forgiving, Lisgalen wouldn’t have to worry either—they would have been introduced long ago, and it would have been a happy thing, rather than worrisome. 

“You’re doing it again,” Lisgalen said. They had taken the crucible to the forge; its contents glowed. “Over thinking, I mean.”

“This is why I don’t like to talk about my father.”

“Then let’s not. What sort of help does Maglor want with his song for Finwë?”

“Different views, I suppose.”

“What will you tell him?”

“I don’t know yet.” Caranthir had loved Finwë—of course he had, they all had—but he had not been as close to him as Maglor, or Maedhros, or some of his cousins. He had most loved to listen to Finwë’s stories, to his tales of the Great Journey and the adventures their people had had along the way, or his more youthful adventures by Cuiviénen. Having been to Middle-earth, though, Caranthir wondered how much of those stories were true. He wondered what it was that Finwë had not told them, what sort of sorrows and fears he had been so careful to keep secret. Finwë had passed onto them some of the things his own grandfather had taught him—how to make spears out of stone and wood, for fishing or hunting, how to make arrows and bows—not nearly as good as what they could make in a proper forge or workshop, but useful in a hurry or an emergency. They’d all used those skills in Beleriand far more than Finwë had ever intended—in Valinor they were meant to be fun, to connect them to their people’s history, not real skills needed for survival. Caranthir realized, thinking about it now, that he did not even know Finwë’s grandfather’s name—or his parents’ names, or if he had ever had siblings of his own. 

“Caranthir?” Lisgalen had brought the crucible out to pour the melted contents into a mold, but they were looking at Caranthir out of the corner of their eye.

“Sorry. I’m—I don’t know yet what I’ll tell Maglor. I haven’t…I haven’t thought about Finwë in a long time.”

“His name is remembered still even among the Quendi in the east,” Lisgalen said. “He and Ingwë and Elwë—even those who did not wish to go west honor them for their courage.”

“I’ve never thought of him that way. He was just…he was just my grandfather.” But of course he had had enormous courage—he had faced down Morgoth at Formenos at the Darkening, when he might have fled. He had followed Oromë, a strange and terrifying being himself, across all the world and the Sundering Sea to see if there really was something there, for the smallest chance of finding a place where the Quendi could go and be safe, could live without fear, could thrive.

Once Lisgalen could set their gem making aside they left the workshop, abandoning serious subjects like Caranthir’s family, and talking of nothing more consequential than the flowers and the peaches that were so abundant that Celebrían was sending them away by the cart-full almost every single day, whether their recipients in Tirion or Alqualondë or Avallónë and other places wanted them or not. They came upon Gimli and Legolas near the memorial garden, but they looked too serious, speaking quietly together, to be approached. Nearer the house Caranthir heard shrieking, and both he and Lisgalen tensed before they passed by some bushes and saw Náriel and Calissë chasing one another around the lawn. As they approached, Maedhros emerged from the house, and the hedgehogs appeared out from under some nearby bushes to cluster around his feet.

Náriel came running at them, flinging herself into Caranthir’s arms. He hoisted her up onto his hip. In Elrond and Celebrían’s house, surrounded by laughter and sunshine, it was so easy to set aside thoughts of his father. As they sat down Maedhros asked Lisgalen what they had been working on, and somehow the conversation wound around to Celebrimbor and the Gwaith-i-Mírdain. Caranthir had heard most of the stories before, but he never minded listening to them again, and Lisgalen was a good storyteller. On his lap, Náriel listened too, entranced by the descriptions of the marvelous things the Gwaith-i-Mírdain had made; she was already showing interest in forge work, though it would be some years yet before Curufin allowed her to do more than watch from a safe distance. Calissë had darted away to follow Celebrían, Galadriel, and Rundamírë as they walked together into the rose garden. 

After a while Caranthir noticed the faint sound of flute music coming from somewhere across the valley, drifting along on the breeze. It was a strange and almost haunting sort of sound, the sort of music he’d once expected to hear from Daeron, though until now he never had. He transferred Náriel to Lisgalen’s lap, and set off to hunt down the music’s source. Daeron had seemed cheerful enough that morning, except that he had been very quiet, but Caranthir had seen neither him nor Maglor at all the day before. Elrond had not seemed worried, and Maglor had been his new-usual cheerful self that morning, but Caranthir was used to worrying about Maedhros when he didn’t leave his room for hours or days, and it was a hard habit to shake, especially when someone like Daeron suddenly withdrew. 

He found Daeron in a ferny glade some distance into the wooded hills at the far end of the valley. “I’d thought the music for the breaking of the heart was just poetry,” he remarked as Daeron finished his song and lowered his flute. Pídhres was sprawled across his lap, tail twitching as she dozed.

Daeron’s smile was crooked, but he didn’t seem either offended or upset at being disturbed. “Depends upon my mood,” he said, “and there was a time when I was often in such a mood.”

“Are you in such a mood today?”

“It seems so.”

Caranthir sat down amid the ferns by Daeron. “Where’s Maglor?”

“Somewhere back at the house. We don’t always have to be connected at the hip.”

“Could’ve fooled me,” said Caranthir. He meant to tease, but it was true enough; Daeron had sorely missed Maglor, and hardly ever left his side these days. Daeron smiled but didn’t laugh. “Did something happen? You didn’t fight, did you?”

“Oh no, nothing like that. I just had a difficult night. There’s never any rhyme or reason. Last night was better, and I am feeling more myself today. Maglor is fine—you don’t need to worry about him.”

“I’m not,” said Caranthir. “I’m worried about you. What sort of difficult night?” He and Daeron had exchanged many letters over the last decades, in between Daeron’s frequent visits, and Daeron had alluded once or twice to low moods or unpleasant dreams, but Caranthir had never seen the effects of them in person. He’d thought, when they had first started to exchange notes, that it would be the same sort of epistolary friendship he’d enjoyed with Bilbo Baggins, who had written to him with questions of the Elder Days, or his not-always-flattering and often-cheeky opinions on various high and mighty figures among the Eldar, or just chatter about flowers and his nephew Frodo. Writing to Daeron had started out that way, but it hadn’t taken very long for that to change. By now Daeron felt more like an extra brother than just a friend, even if there were things he kept to himself and did not talk about—such as the darkest parts of his adventures in the far east, surely the source of whatever bad night he’d had. Caranthir had seen some of the scars he bore, but of course he’d never asked about them.

Daeron shrugged carelessly. “I’ve spent much of my life close to danger, or on the edges of war. Such memories have barbs that can never quite be excised. Surely you know what I mean.” Caranthir nodded; he knew exactly what Daeron meant. “The past does not weigh as heavily on me as it did on Maglor—I so very rarely have such dreams. This time, at least, I did not wake to an empty bed or a strange room.” He turned his flute over in his hands. “I woke up this morning, as I said, feeling almost entirely myself again.”

“So why are you out here playing such melancholy songs by yourself?” Caranthir asked. “Do you want me to leave?”

“No, don’t go. I’ve had my sulk, and I should be returning anyway.” Daeron made no move to rise. “It isn’t the dreams that I have been dwelling upon. You and your brothers are not the only ones with somewhat fraught relationships with your parents.”

Caranthir raised his eyebrows. “Your parents?” he repeated. He’d never actually thought about whether Daeron had parents. He spoke often of his cousin and his aunt and uncle—and Lacheryn had come several times to visit Nerdanel—but of course he must have had parents too, if he had aunts and uncles. “What did they do? You have never spoken of them before.”

Daeron did not lift his gaze from his flute. “Vanished,” he said, “and then died, it seems—which, really, is better than the alternative. I have no memory of them; I was only a babe in arms then. Maglor knows the story, and I mentioned it once to Maedhros, on that journey back from Ekkaia. It’s no secret, there just isn't much point in speaking of those I have never known. Until yesterday I thought it likely I never would know them. Now, though, I have been told they dwell in Alqualondë, and are very unhappy with my aunt and uncle for never finishing the Journey.”

“I suppose that is rather fraught,” Caranthir said. “Are you going to Alqualondë, then?”

“I haven’t decided. I must decide soon and at least write to Mablung about it—I would rather meet them at a time of my own choosing, rather than have them come here unlooked for.”

“A good idea,” Caranthir said wryly. “I’ve had an estranged parent sneak up on me, and I do not recommend it.” That meeting had gone worse for Maedhros, because he’d sent Caranthir away almost immediately, and he hadn’t exchanged even a single word with his father. That was different, though. Fëanor felt like a stranger, after so long, after so many things had happened. Daeron’s parents were strangers. “But why didn’t they make themselves known before? You came west years ago.”

Daeron lifted one shoulder in another shrug, this one not so careless. “As our languages changed, so did our names. Daeron is not the name I was given at birth. When they heard of Daeron of Doriath they did not realize they heard of their own son, I suppose. I certainly did not recognize their names when I read Mablung’s letter. It was my aunt that tracked them down—my father’s sister. I don’t know how. Mablung only wanted to tell me that they had been found, and that I should make my way to Alqualondë, though I don’t think he really expects me to hurry, for he knows that Maglor is returned from Lórien.”

“Have you spoken to Finrod, or to Galadriel?” asked Caranthir. “They grew up in Alqualondë.”

“Not yet. I will. I must, I suppose.” Daeron sighed, and looked up at Caranthir, his expression now rueful. “I was too young when I lost them to either mourn or miss them, and I fear that they will expect both of me. And if they are angry at my aunt for not bringing me across the Sea, following Olwë, what will they say to my own decision to tarry in the east as long as I did after the way was made open again? I could have sailed then—I thought about it, though I do not regret my choices to stay, either for Thingol or for my own reasons later.”

“It doesn’t matter,” Caranthir said before he could think better of it. He winced. That was just what he told himself about Fëanor. “Sorry. Of course it matters.”

“It does and it doesn’t. They are my mother and my father, but they are also strangers, and I am unaccustomed to caring much what strangers think of me.”

“The timing of the letter doesn’t help, arriving on top of an already-bad day,” Caranthir said. “Maybe that’s what’s throwing you off balance so badly.”

“It certainly did not help my mood yesterday.”

“Give it another few days, then before you try to decide anything.” Caranthir got to his feet and held out his hand. Daeron grasped it and rose to his feet, scooping up Pídhres as he did so. She made a disgruntled noise, but settled quietly and comfortably into his arms. “And look on the bright side.”

“What’s that?”

“Whatever happens, at least they aren’t Fëanor.”

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Having spoken to his brothers, Maglor went in search of Míriel, and found her in the large workroom where the looms were, alongside baskets of wool and linen and other materials to be spun into yarns and threads, and sewing supplies and tables for cutting the fabric, and many comfortable places to sit and spin or sew. It was a large room with many windows that stretched from floor to ceiling, letting in the bright summer sunshine. Indis was there too; they both sat by one of the windows, Indis with a spindle and Míriel sewing some large panel of intricate embroidery, the threads all shimmering silk and silver against the dark fabric. “Good afternoon, Macalaurë!” Míriel said, smiling at him as he paused in the doorway. “Were you looking for us?”

“I was.” He’d thought to seek them out separately, but maybe it made more sense to speak to them together: Míriel and Indis, the two who knew and loved Finwë best, each in her own way.

“Come sit,” Indis said. Her smile was warm; it was strange to see them sitting there together. Maglor had heard it said many times that Indis was as unlike Míriel as could be, but he thought that could not possibly be true. They sat together as though they had been the dearest of friends all their lives—for all he knew, they had been. Maglor was realizing he did not know very much about any of his grandparents’ lives before they came to Valinor. He joined them by the window, sitting on the wide sill where he could cross his legs. “We missed you yesterday. Is everything all right?”

“Yes,” Maglor said. Most people would of course be assuming he had been the one suffering from dark dreams or just a low mood—it had happened often enough before, that he’d retreated to his room for a day or several—and he didn’t mind. “I have been thinking about the song that you asked me to write. Will you speak to me of Finwë?”

“Gladly,” said Míriel. She paused in her stitching to take his hand. “What would you ask us?”

“The same question I will ask everyone: what is it you wish to hear put into song about him?” 

He did not expect an immediate answer, and did not receive one. Indis pursed her lips thoughtfully as her spindle spun, her fingers pinching the wool with easy precision to form soft and fine thread. Míriel squeezed Maglor’s hand before picking up her needle again. “The Statute, we have always thought, was unfair,” Indis said at last. “Finwë was not the first of the Eldar to lose a spouse, or to find love again afterward, though he was the first to do so after we knew more of Mandos, and the nature of death for the Eldar. We would never have gone through with our marriage, though, if Míriel had given any hint of wishing to return to life, then or in the future.”

“I truly did not think I ever would,” Míriel said. “Nor did Finwë, when he came to the Halls and insisted that I be released in his stead.” Maglor couldn’t stop himself shuddering. “There are some even now who doubt that he loved both of us, Indis and me, in equal measure—but he did. Not in the same way, for we are not the same, but the love was no less strong. That is what I wish to hear sung of him—the way he loved with all of himself, whether we speak of his wives or his children or his people. It was love that spurred him to come here with Ingwë and Elwë, and love that burned so brightly in him when he came back to speak to us of these lands, of the safety to be found here, of all the fears we would leave behind in the dark.”

“We were estranged at the time of his death,” Indis said quietly. “The strife between your father and Nolofinwë—the strife between all of the Noldor as they broke into factions—it was too much for me to bear, knowing there were so many that blamed me. I still loved him, though. That has never changed, and I know that he loved me. Had things happened otherwise, we would have returned to one another in time. We thought that we would—that we had time, even to cool such a temper as Fëanáro’s.”

They’d all thought they had time, right up until time ran out. Maglor drew his knee up to his chest and looped his arms around it. “Why did he go with us to Formenos?” he asked. 

“You remember what Fëanáro was like then,” Indis said, sighing. “Finwë feared for him, feared what he might do in such isolation with nothing to counter whatever thoughts and fears were building in his mind even after the deceits of Melkor were revealed. For my part, I wanted Fëanáro far away from my children—but I did not want to see him destroy himself, either. Neither of us thought that exile was the right course. There was no good choice; Finwë would be seen as rejecting one of his sons no matter what he did, and I cannot deny that Nolofinwë was hurt by it, even though I spoke to him at length, and I think he did understand. Lalwen was far less understanding; Arafinwë and Findis—well, they kept their thoughts to themselves, and had always tried to stay out of all the strife. But if anyone could have gotten through to Fëanáro, we were sure that it was his father, given enough time. The Valar, of course, had other ideas, though any parent could have told them that such a forced meeting would come to naught.”

Maglor did not remember Finwë making much headway in all the time they were at Formenos—but whatever discussions or arguments he and Fëanor were having then, they had been private. Maglor had spent most of his time trying to keep his brothers’ spirits up, with less and less success as time went on.

“It was in large part for Fëanáro’s sake that Finwë wished to wed again,” Indis said after a few moments. Her spindle kept spinning, slowly filling. “Did he ever speak to you of his own youth, by Cuiviénen?”

“He taught us some things his grandfather had taught him,” Maglor said. “And he told stories that I don’t think that I really believe anymore.”

Indis and Míriel exchanged smiles, small ones. “I’m sure most of them were true, or mostly true,” Míriel said, “but there is much he would not have told you. To love so freely and so deeply is to open yourself to great grief, and Finwë carried that in abundance.” Indis nodded agreement. “Yet for Finwë, the nearer the grief the harder it was to speak of. He told me once that it was not a matter of wanting to share or not—the words stuck in his throat and just would not come. I think Fëanáro suffers the same affliction—and perhaps you do as well, to some extent, since you say you have struggled to write any songs for your grief.”

“I’ve written many songs of grief,” said Maglor, “but it is true that they have all been either for our people as a whole, or just…grief itself. I still don’t know if I will be able to find words for this song.”

“Thank you, though, for trying,” Indis said. “It means a great deal, even if you can never finish the song.”

“What happened at Cuiviénen?” he asked. “To Grandfather’s family?”

“His grandfather was taken by the Enemy, or by his servants,” Míriel said. “As were his father, and his brothers. So many were taken…I do not think there were any among the Tatyar who chose to follow Finwë who had not lost someone. I lost my aunt and my grandmother. Finwë’s mother took another husband after his father vanished, and he had sisters too that he loved dearly—but they all chose to remain. There were many such partings, full of bitter grief.”

“I didn't know any of that,” Maglor said. He wondered if his great-grandmother yet lived, if his great-aunts did—if Daeron might have met them in his own travels among the Avari of the far east. He wondered if he might have found them himself, if he had dared to make the journey. Finwë had greatly desired a large family—and he had gotten it, for a little while. Maglor had never thought to wonder why, before. 

“I left behind a brother and a sister,” Míriel said. “I think of them often, but it is difficult to speak of them. We all parted believing it would be forever, and that is hard indeed.”

Maglor did know that kind of grief—of partings with no hope of reunion. His thoughts went to Elros, and he turned his gaze from his grandmother to the window. The room where they sat was on an upper floor of the house, and the windows gave a wide view of the valley. He glimpsed a pair of figures coming back from the wooded hills through the flowering meadows, recognizable even at a distance as Caranthir and Daeron. Closer at hand, Maedhros sat in the grass with hedgehogs crawling over his legs as Náriel spun in circles as fast as she could before collapsing onto Lisgalen’s lap, giggling with the thrill of dizziness. That sight brought to mind Arwen and Aragorn’s children; once upon a time their daughter Gilraen had played that exact same game, the way all small children did, and it had been Maglor who caught her when she stumbled over the carpet afterward.

“Has this helped you?” Indis asked after a little while in which all three of them sat lost in their thoughts. 

With effort, Maglor turned his thoughts away from Minas Tirith far away. “Yes,” he said. “I think I know what the heart of the song will be, now.” He rose and smiled at them both. ‘Thank you.” 

He returned to his room to write down some of his thoughts before he forgot the precise shape of them. There was nothing yet of words or rhymes or even of melody, but he thought he had the first inklings of the thread that would bind all the parts of it together. As he finished the last bit of his notes, Daeron came in, looking thoughtful and neither happy nor unhappy. “Is everything all right?” Maglor asked. 

“I thought I would be able to think more clearly of my parents today, but I find my mind just going in circles.” Daeron set his flute down and then dropped onto Maglor’s lap. “Am I interrupting?”

“No.”

“Good.” Daeron kissed him and then pressed his face into Maglor’s shoulder. “Your cat followed me out into the woods, you know.”

“Yes, I know.”

“Did you ask her?”

“If I had she wouldn’t have done it.” Maglor wrapped his arms around Daeron’s waist and kissed his temple. “Is this your poor mood still lingering?”

“I don’t know,” Daeron sighed. “I’m too old for this. Maybe that’s the problem. I’m old and tired and in all probability and against all common sense my parents will be expecting a child, and—”

“I think this is your poor mood lingering,” Maglor said. “Put them out of your mind, Daeron. When you do meet at last, I’m sure it will go far better than you currently imagine. My meeting with my own mother did, you remember?”

“Not the one with your father.”

“You can’t compare your father to mine. If nothing else, you can be sure it will go better than that.”

“Caranthir said that, too.”

“Sometimes even little brothers can be wise. Come on.” Maglor got up, keeping a hold of Daeron, who yelped and clutched at his shoulders as he was lifted so abruptly. Maglor tossed him onto the bed and then sprawled across the blankets beside him. “I think,” he said, “you needed two lazy days instead of just one.”

“Is this wisdom you found in Lórien?” Daeron asked, smiling at him. “When in doubt, take a nap?”

“Oh yes.” Maglor kissed him, and Daeron sighed into his mouth, melting onto the bed as he relaxed. “Anything will seem better after a long enough sleep.”

“Mm.” Daeron slid his hands into Maglor’s hair, loosening the braids. “Or you could find other ways to distract me.”

“I could.” Maglor trailed kisses down Daeron’s jaw, but just as he reached down to grasp at the hem of Daeron’s tunic the door opened, and a pair of small footsteps darted inside, and after a moment they heard giggling from under the bed. Daeron sighed, and Maglor raised his head. “Or maybe not. We really need to start locking the door.”

“That’s my fault, I’m afraid,” Daeron murmured. 

Maglor sat up and leaned over to peer under the bed. “All right, what game is it this time?” he asked. 

“Trying to avoid learning to read,” said Rundamírë from the doorway. “I’m sorry, Macalaurë, Daeron. Náriel, Calissë, come on now.”

“Why in the world would you not want to learn to read?” Daeron asked, propping himself up on his elbows as Maglor reached under the bed, only to have the girls scoot back out of reach.

“It’s boring!” Calissë said. “And we aren’t at home, we’re on an adventure!”

“The adventure ended when you arrived in Imloth Ningloron,” said Rundamírë, sounding amused. 

“What if I promised to tell you the story about the wizard and the dragon later, if you go listen to your ammë?” Maglor asked them. 

“Is it a true story?” Calissë asked, narrowing her eyes at him. 

“Of course it is! And if you don’t believe me you can ask Gimli or Legolas.”

“You could ask Gandalf, too,” said Daeron, “whenever he next turns up, since he is the wizard in question.”

Exciting stories were apparently the best way to bribe both Náriel and Calissë into doing anything; they at last crawled out from under the bed. Maglor sat up, pushing his hair back out of his face. “Thank you!” said Rundamírë, smiling at him as she held out her hands for her daughters. “Don’t forget, Daeron, you promised me you would teach them your cirth after they mastered tengwar.”

“I haven’t forgotten,” said Daeron.

“There’s more?” Calissë exclaimed, horrified, as Rundamírë led her away. Maglor got up to shut the door—and lock it properly. 

“I think,” Daeron said as Maglor rejoined him on the bed, “that Calissë rather doubts your tale of the enchantress.”

“She’s very clever. As soon as she realizes that reading is not nearly as boring as it seems, she’ll discover that book of hobbit tales and figure out exactly what I was doing.” Maglor lay down and pulled Daeron with him. “And I’m sure she’ll come to scold me for it, and I will insist until the end of time that every word is true, and it will become a very silly and tired joke between us.” It would be one of many such jokes, he hoped, and he was a little surprised at how easy it was to imagine. It had not been so very long ago that thinking beyond the next week or even the next day was nearly impossible, let alone with enthusiasm. 

Daeron tucked himself against Maglor’s side with a soft sigh. “I think sleep does sound like a good idea,” he murmured, sounding halfway there already. “Sing something for me?”

“Of course, love.” Maglor tugged the ties out of Daeron’s braids and eased them loose off of his scalp as he hummed a quiet song. Daeron fell asleep quickly, and did not wake until Maglor roused him a few hours later to go down for dinner. “Do you feel better?” Maglor asked as he braided Daeron’s hair back out of his face again.

“I do. Much better.” 

“Good.”

The tale of Bilbo’s adventures was far too long for a single evening, but split into parts it made for excellent bedtime stories. Maglor thought Rundamírë might regret that decision after he sang the song about breaking all of Bilbo’s dishes for the girls just before they were meant to fall asleep, but that was his favorite part of being an uncle—indulging in silliness and causing minor problems for Curufin and Rundamírë. He said so when Curufin grumbled about it the next morning, and earned himself a tired and half-hearted glare. 

Having spoken to his brothers and to Míriel and Indis, Maglor went next in search of Finrod, and found him with Galadriel in the rose garden. “Will you walk with me?” he asked them.

“Both of us, or just your favorite?” Finrod asked. Galadriel rolled her eyes.

“Both of you,” Maglor said. “Since you are my second-favorite.”

“Oh well, in that case.”

“Is something the matter?” Galadriel asked as she slipped her arm through Maglor’s, and Finrod fell into step on his other side.

“No,” said Maglor. “Do you know that Míriel and Indis have asked me to write a song?”

“No,” said Finrod, sounding surprised. “What sort of song?”

“A song for Finwë.”

The three of them fell silent. The only sounds around them were the faint buzzing of bees, and a bluebird singing to itself just out of sight somewhere nearby. Finally, Galadriel said, “It is long overdue, such a song.”

“I tried to write one of my own once, long ago,” Finrod said, “but I gave up quickly. There were no words.”

“So did I,” Maglor said, “but I think maybe I can do it now. It cannot just be my own song, though. What would you wish to hear sung of him? You do not have to answer now.”

For a few minutes they walked in silence. The bluebird kept singing until it was interrupted by a cacophony of fluttering wings and cheeping as a group of finches burst out of a nearby bush to speed away over their heads. Finally, Galadriel said, “He was so very strong. That is what I remember most clearly.”

“Safe,” Finrod added. “When we were children I can remember no safer feeling than being held by him. When I heard what had happened to him…even more than the Darkening, that was what frightened me most, that even someone such as Finwë could fall thus.”

“I am not sure I can think of more to say,” Galadriel said. “He was safety and strength, and warmth and kindness—if he had a temper, I never saw it, but he was strong-willed and…so very brave. I spent so much of my childhood in Alqualondë, and saw him so much more seldom than the rest of you did. That is what grieves me the most deeply. It just—it did not seem to matter so much then. Oh, it is hard even in plain speech—even after all this time—to try to give voice to such a grief. ”

“Mm,” Maglor hummed agreement. “It may be the hardest song I ever write,” he said. 

“Will Daeron help you?” Finrod asked.

“No. He says he will offer an ear if I need one, but that this is not a song for him to take any part in. I might come to one of you if I find myself stuck.” Both Finrod and Galadriel were talented songwriters themselves; in their youth Finrod and Maglor had collaborated on many songs, though none of such importance or such a heavy subject. 

“Of course,” said Finrod. “Are you going to go around asking everyone what they want you to include?”

“Yes.”

“Even Fëanor?” Galadriel asked.

“Yes. It would be wrong not to, for many reasons. Don’t look at me like that,” Maglor said, glancing between the two of them and the identical frowns on their faces. “I’ll be fine.”

“Maedhros was not fine, when you saw him when coming here,” Finrod said, “and he said that you were not either.”

“I’m certainly better than I was the first time we met,” said Maglor. “You remember.” They had both been in Imloth Ningloron, and Galadriel had been with Maglor immediately after that first brief encounter, and leading up to what had turned into a confrontation. “I can speak to him of Finwë, and I’m already going to have Celegorm hovering nearby.”

“That,” Finrod said wryly, “is not reassuring.”

“Daeron will also be close,” Maglor said.

“Even less reassuring,” said Finrod. 

“Well, I can imagine Curufin will want to be there too,” said Maglor. “Honestly, Felagund, I’m not made of glass. I won’t shatter after one conversation with him, and I do not need an army awaiting me while I speak to him.”

“No, you aren’t,” said Galadriel, who knew what it looked like when Maglor already had shattered. “But it will hurt you.”

“All of these conversations hurt, in their own way,” Maglor said. “And—I don’t know. Maybe it will help to speak to my father of Finwë, instead of—anything else.” And maybe it would not. Maglor had thrown Finwë’s name in Fëanor’s face during that first meeting, and there wasn’t any taking it back, even if he wished to. “At least this meeting will be at a time and place of my own choosing, rather than something that catches me by surprise.”

Finwë would be so grieved to see them all, though, he thought as he parted from Galadriel and Finrod. All Finwë had ever wanted was for everyone to love one another—to be a real family. Maglor had once wondered at it, at Finwë’s stubborn belief that it could be possible for Fëanor to ever grow to love either Indis or his siblings; knowing now that Finwë himself had been a child of such a family, had loved his sisters and, presumably, his stepfather, he understood. Finwë would especially hate to see Fëanor so estranged from his own children, though Maglor thought—hoped—that he would at least understand. He wondered if it would be easier to find a way forward if Finwë were there. Then he wondered what Finwë would say of the Oath, and of what they had all done because of it, and he wanted to weep.

He made his way back out to the woodworking shop to continue carving the horse figure. He took it slowly, and thought of Finwë as he worked, of Finwë’s hands—warm, strong, safe—guiding his as he had first learned the shaping of wood. Finwë had been a very different teacher to Fëanor, patient and easygoing, caring little for anything like perfection. Those lessons had been precious time spent with his busy grandfather, when Finwë had shed the trappings of kingship to be only himself, to tell stories and to teach Maglor songs his own father and grandfather had taught him long ago, in the ancient tongues spoken on the shores of Cuiviénen. Maglor had asked once why Finwë’s family had not come with him to Valinor. Finwë’s smile had faltered, and Maglor had not recognized the look in his eyes then, before he mastered himself and answered—something brief and almost flippant about the Avari and differing desires—before swiftly and firmly changing the subject. Looking back, though—Maglor knew that look now. It was one he’d seen whenever he looked into a mirror for centuries, those shadows of grief mingled with old fears that were so hard to let go. Those shadows were why Finwë had led the Noldor across the whole world, so they could live in a place free from them, so none of them would ever have to know fear again, would ever have to know grief. 

Maglor did not want to think that hope foolish, because there was no way anyone could have foreseen the release of Morgoth and his treachery, any more than Míriel’s decline could have been foreseen. But they lived in Arda Marred, even there in Aman, and to live was to know sorrow. Were it otherwise, there would be no need of Nienna’s tears or comforts. He set his tools down for a moment, closing his eyes against the sting of his own tears. He had chosen a quiet and out of the way corner of the workshop, beside a window framed on the outside by ivy and partly shaded by a nearby yew tree, and half-hidden inside by a set of free-standing shelves. The other parts of the workshop were filled with chatter and the sounds of hammering and sawing and sanding, and he listened to the familiar voices, teasing and joking, and missed Finwë’s deep laughter. He missed what Finrod and Galadriel had spoken of, the strength of his embrace and the feeling of safety it promised, both when Maglor had been very small and when he had been grown. Even in Formenos, after Fëanor taught them all what fear was, Finwë had been there to offer comfort, in the form of quiet words, a warm hand on a shoulder, soft promises that this would pass, and they would return home to Tirion, and know peace again someday soon. 

He had not been able to keep those promises, in the end. It had not been his fault, though, and he had meant them—they were not like the promises that Fëanor had once made them and then overwrote with the Oath, breaking all bonds of love and care in one fell swoop. Maglor could remember standing up alongside his brothers to swear after him, hardly knowing what he did, swept up in the fire and fury of his father’s passion, desiring far more to avenge his grandfather than in any desire for the Silmarils. They were beautiful things, but he’d never cared about them for themselves. He had wanted to fight Morgoth, had wanted to rid the world of him as the Valar had not, had wanted to… 

Maglor sighed and picked up the horse again. They had all been foolish and foolhardy, too ignorant and too proud to listen to wisdom, and in the end they—he and his brothers—had only made themselves Morgoth’s own tools. It was in spite of them, not because of them, that there had been victory in the end. 

Fingon appeared at the window after a while, leaning on the sill, golden rings shining in his ears and on his fingers, though his hair was loose an unadorned. When he forewent the gold ribbons, Maglor thought, he looked very much like Finwë. “I hear you’re writing a lament for our grandfather,” Fingon said. 

“I am,” said Maglor. “Or I’m going to. I was going to tell you about it later.”

“To ask me what I want you to include, yes? That’s what Galadriel told me.”

“Yes.” Maglor set his horse down and looked up at Fingon. “Do you have an answer for me?”

“His laughter,” Fingon said immediately. “When I think of Finwë, that is what I choose to remember. Laughter and joy. Does that help?”

Maglor offered a smile. “It does. Thank you.”

Fingon leaned over his crossed arms on the sill, looking down at the carving in Maglor’s hands. “I just recently found some things he had carved for me, put away into a box by my mother after we left.”

“I don’t know what happened to mine,” Maglor said. “They must have gotten packed away too, but it’s been so long…”

“Worth going to look for though, maybe?”

“Maybe.” It would mean going back to the old house in Tirion—but apparently that was being torn down and rebuilt, and who knew what Fëanor had done with everything left inside. Maybe Curufin would know.

“I look forward to hearing this song, whenever you finish it,” Fingon said. “I’m glad you are the one to write it, Maglor.”

“I only hope I can do him justice,” Maglor said.

“You will,” Fingon said, all easy confidence and faith. “Let me know when you intend to go to Tirion, and I’ll tell Turgon to be there. You probably don’t want to go all the way to Alastoron.”

“Thank you.” Maglor paused, and then asked hesitantly, “Who among our family has not yet returned? I know Gil-galad has not, but…”

“Aegnor has not,” said Fingon, his smile fading, “and Irissë has not either—nor Maeglin. They are the only ones, aside from Gil-galad…and of course Finwë himself.”

“It is said Aegnor will never return,” said Maglor.

“The same was said of Fëanor, too,” replied Fingon. “I’ll keep hoping, anyway.” He propped his chin on one hand as he watched Maglor begin to carve the details of the horse’s mane. “Have I told you yet how glad I am you and Maedhros went together to Lórien? I told you that you needed each other.”

“We both knew that already,” Maglor said without lifting his gaze. “I was angry and hurt and…I know that I hurt him, but it’s so…it feels impossible to reach for something when it seems that it will just fade away as soon as you try.” That was what all his nightmares had done, for years upon years. “We’re past it now, but it was hard.”

“Most things worth doing are hard,” Fingon said quietly. Maglor nodded. “What of your father? Maedhros told me of your meeting with him on the road.”

“I don’t know what I want from him,” Maglor said. “I know why Maedhros did what he did, at the end. I know what despair is like. I don’t think my father ever despaired—I don’t understand him at all, and I don’t think he understands me. Not anymore.”

“Worth trying, though, isn’t it? Even only so your hand does not always hurt at the mere sight of him.”

“Maybe.” 

Fingon leaned suddenly in through the window, grabbing Maglor’s head to plant a kiss on his cheek. “I’m glad you’re back, Macalaurë. I hope you know we all missed you, all the time you were lost in Middle-earth. There was always someone waiting at the docks in Avallónë to ask for news of you. No one will be unhappy to see you when you appear to ask your questions about Finwë.”

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The summer wound on, lazy and warm. Maedhros spent most of his time with his brothers or with his grandmother, though he remained unsure how to really speak to her, but on one drizzly afternoon he slipped away to explore parts of the house that he had not yet seen. Aechen followed until Maedhros stopped to pick him up; once nestled in the crook of his right arm, Aechen purred happily. The light through the many windows was pale and grey, but lamps were scattered throughout the corridors and rooms, all in warm shades of yellow and gold. 

He came to a large room, with skylights as well as windows to let in as much natural light as possible while leaving plenty of space on the walls for paintings. There were dozens of them, in all sizes and of all kinds, and there were statues and sculptures scattered around the room as well. Maedhros spotted one of his mother’s works, a delicate stone sculpture that seemed to change its form as one passed it by. He remembered when she had first begun to experiment with such effects—it had been just before she’d left Tirion. It seemed that since then she’d fully mastered it, and he walked around the sculpture several times to see it from all angles. No matter how closely he looked, he could not quite tell how she had done it, how it was that from one side it looked like a horse rearing up, and from the other it was a dancer with her hands lifted above her head. 

Maybe when he returned home he would ask her to show him, even though he’d never be able to do it himself. 

Many of the paintings were by hands he did not recognize, and showed scenes and faces of Middle-earth rather than of Valinor. Maedhros paused before a painting of a courtyard where a traveling party had gathered. At first he had thought four of the members were children, but he realized quickly that was not so—they were halflings, and so the party must be the Fellowship. Gandalf was unmistakable, and having met them Maedhros could easily recognize Gimli and Legolas, though Gimli was much younger, with no hint of white in his hair. 

Maedhros had known that halflings were small, but it was strange to see. He looked into their faces, able to see at a glance which was Frodo Baggins by the way he held himself, by the protective hand that Gandalf had resting on his shoulder. Not only did he seem small, he seemed so young, though Maedhros knew that he wasn’t, not really—not by the measure of his own people. It was only the Ring that made him seem so. 

He walked slowly along the wall, looking at the other portraits and paintings, trying to guess who the people were, and probably failing. He stopped before one, a formal portrait of a family that could only be Arwen and Aragorn’s. Arwen looked so like Elrond—even more than her brothers—that it was startling. Maedhros knew the names of their children from stories Maglor had told, but with such a painting it was hard to see past the finery and the serious expressions to the people underneath. Aragorn looked grave, almost grim—so at odds with the picture Maedhros had had of him in his mind thanks to Maglor, of a laughing child with muddy feet and scraped up knees. His childhood had been a joyful one in the safety of Imladris; adulthood had taken him down dark roads, into deep shadows—and then out of it again, into a New Age. 

His feet brought him back around the large room to the painting of the Fellowship before their departure from Imladris. Maedhros looked not at the faces this time but at the backdrop, at the winter-brown trees and bushes, the pathways branching off of the courtyard into the gardens beyond. A statue of Nienna was visible just behind Aragorn’s shoulder. 

Footsteps behind him heralded Elrond’s arrival. “Arwen painted that,” he said.

“It’s beautiful,” said Maedhros, turning from the painting. He hadn’t given much thought yet to the painter, but now that he knew he could see the care with which every portion of the painting had been rendered, from the flagstones of the courtyard to the lines on Aragorn’s face. He glanced at few other paintings along the same wall, many of them done in watercolor, soft and dreamlike. “Those are her work too?”

“Yes. This painting she insisted I bring with me.” Elrond reached out to brush his fingertips lightly over the frame of the Fellowship’s scene. “The others came with Elladan and Elrohir. There were letters, too, and journals and sketchbooks.”

“She seems to have been very happy,” Maedhros said. 

“Yes, she was.”

“Was Elros?” It felt almost like a dangerous question to ask, almost as though he had no right to ask it. 

“Yes,” Elrond said, his answer quick and steady. “He had the same idea—letters and journals. A large chest full of them was awaiting me in Finrod’s keeping when I came west.” He looked at Maedhros then, a small and rueful smile on his face. “I still have not read through them all. But he was happy. They all were, in Númenor, in those early days. The sorrow and the shadow did not come until later. And it has been said and sung that the line of Lúthien will never end, which is also to say the line of Elros will never end. That brings me comfort—to know that his children will continue to live and laugh under the sun, even if I cannot see them again.”

“Your line, too,” Maedhros said quietly.

“Yes, I suppose so. Arwen’s line. She would have liked you, I think.” He looked up to see Maedhros blinking at him in shock, and laughed—quietly, softly. “Is that so surprising?”

“Yes,” Maedhros said.

“Would it surprise you to learn then that I like you?” Elrond asked him. “For yourself, not just because you are Maglor’s brother?”

“You know it would,” Maedhros said, “but now I feel as though I cannot admit to it without Maglor rolling his eyes at me later. Yes, just like that,” he said, as Elrond rolled his own eyes. He was still smiling, though. “Can I ask you something, Elrond?”

“Of course.”

“Fingon told me once that my father spoke to you about me.”

“He did. You wonder what I told him?”

“I had not made myself particularly likable then,” Maedhros said, aiming for wry but landing on regretful instead. 

“I told him that—that I couldn’t speak of you as one who loved you or who knew you very well. I told him he would be better off asking questions of Finrod or of Fingon, but he wanted to know of you after Sirion, and did not think they could give him those answers. I think they refused to tell him very much, anyway.”

Maedhros felt his stomach start to tie itself in knots as he imagined what Fëanor would have said in response to whatever Elrond told him of those years. It shouldn’t, he knew. He knew what his father’s disapproval looked like, what it felt like. He had it already—there was no point in dreading the piling on of more. “I’m sure he was not pleased with what you told him.”

“He was grieved,” Elrond said. “But I told him that I did believe you cared for us, in your own way. I told him of learning to wield a sword with both hands, and how it saved my life later.”

“Nothing else?”

“Not really. There was nothing else to tell him.” Elrond peered up at him, his soft grey eyes seeing, Maedhros thought, as much as Galadriel’s did. “He is not as he was, you know,” he said. “He only wanted—still wants—to understand.”

“I don’t think he can,” Maedhros said. 

“Maybe, maybe not. But does it not speak well of him that he is trying?”

“It does,” Maedhros said. “I know it does. I don’t hate my father, and I suppose no one ever really outgrows the desire for their parents to think well of them, but…” He already knew that Fëanor did not think well of him. Maedhros had done precious little to make anyone think well of him between the Nirnaeth Arnoediad and going to Lórien with Maglor. His own words to Fëanor on their first meeting surely ruined any chance they might have for reconciliation in the future. Whatever Fëanor said or wrote, Maedhros could not believe that he would be so forgiving. “At the end of his life he only wanted two things, and by the end of mine I had thrown them both away.”

“What he wanted at the end of his life is not what he wants now,” Elrond said. Then he asked, “Does your hand pain you?”

“What?” Maedhros glanced down at it, and saw that the scars were pinker than usual. When he closed his fingers his palm felt tender. “It’s fine.”

The look Elrond gave him was deeply skeptical. “Fine would be no pain at all,” he said. “Come.” He took Maedhros by the arm, avoiding touching his hand, and gently but firmly pulled him out of the gallery and to a room only slightly smaller, with lower ceilings but an equal amount of windows. It smelled of herbs, both dried and fresh, and Elrond sat Maedhros down by one of the worktables before going to put a kettle over a nearby brazier. Maedhros leaned down to release Aechen to sniff around as he would, though as usual he did not wander far. 

“They aren’t real scars,” Maedhros said when Elrond returned to take his hand, turning the palm toward the light so he could see it better. “They’re just—they’re just memory. I think even you cannot rid me of that, Elrond.” He meant it to be teasing, and thought he succeeded. At least Elrond smiled. 

“I know something of wounds to the spirit, too,” Elrond said. 

“I don’t think you can heal this one.”

“Will you let me at least try to help?” Elrond met his gaze, and Maedhros was reminded suddenly of a cold and rainy day long ago in Beleriand, after they had all only narrowly escaped a marauding party of orcs. Maedhros had been wounded, and Elrond, no longer a child but not yet full-grown, had insisted on cleaning and stitching it. Even then he had been as skilled a healer as was possible, lacking only proper teaching. Maedhros had let him, keeping his face turned away, knowing he was still someone Elrond feared, and not knowing any other way to ease those fears even a little. Elrond now was so much older, still as skilled a healer as was possible, with all the advantages of proper teaching and long years of study and application—and he neither feared nor hated Maedhros anymore. For a moment it was as though Maedhros was in both places and times at once, and the feeling was strange and dizzying. 

“Maedhros?”

Maedhros blinked, and the past faded back away. “Of course,” he said, when he could remember the question Elrond had asked. 

Elrond’s fingers brushed over the scars, and he frowned thoughtfully as he looked at them. “May I see your other arm?” he asked, and Maedhros held it up. Elrond examined his wrist, which was devoid of scar tissue. “I thought it very strange when I heard you had returned one-handed,” he said. 

“Estë said it just would not form,” Maedhros said.

“You do not sound troubled by it.”

“I ceased to be troubled by it long before I died. I’m glad I came back without it.” Maedhros looked up from his wrist to Elrond’s face and saw the surprise there. “It is irrefutable proof that it all happened. That I am not who I was before, whatever my face looks like.” That had been hard, in its own way—seeing the looks on all the faces of his loved ones after he had returned, all except Fingon, who had understood without ever having to ask. 

“It does not hurt?” Elrond asked now. “No phantom pains?”

“No, not at all.”

“Good.” Elrond released his wrist and looked at his hand again. “I’ve never seen scars like these,” he said. “The memory of them. I do not like what it says about such a wound as this—that such a punishment would follow you even through Mandos.”

“I don’t think it did,” Maedhros said quietly. “If they still wished to punish me, would they not have just kept me in Mandos?”

“One might argue that releasing you was punishment,” Elrond said. 

“I thought so, once. I don’t anymore.”

“No, neither do I. I think they were right in the releasing, if not quite in the timing. And if it was meant to be a continuing punishment, Maglor’s hand would not have healed at all. So the scars themselves are like to your missing hand, evidence of a thing that marked you and changed you; the pain, at least now, is linked to your father, not to the hallowing of the Silmarils.”

“Is that so surprising?”

“Maybe not.” Elrond released his hand and went to fetch the boiling water. He took a few leaves from a potted athelas plant growing by one of the windows. He poured the water into a basin that he set on the table beside Maedhros, and after bruising and blowing on the leaves, he dropped them in. The scent they gave off was clear and clean, like the wind off of the hills that swept around the battlements of Himring. For a few minutes they sat in silence, watching Aechen sniff along the far wall. Maedhros breathed deeply, feeling the refreshing effects of the athelas even as he felt the faint pang of homesickness that thoughts of Himring brought with them. Finally, Elrond said, “Avoiding your father will not heal this wound, you know.”

Neither would speaking to him. “It does not trouble me enough for there to be any urgency,” Maedhros said. “Even before I went to Lórien, it hurt sometimes after dark dreams, but—”

“And how often did that happen?”

“Often enough, I suppose. But they do not happen anymore, and speaking of him doesn’t make it hurt—even now it’s only a little tender, not painful, and this is the first time that’s happened. Only seeing him made it burn.” Maedhros looked down at his hand, flexing his fingers a little. It did not hurt at all now, and the scars were fading away, no longer pink. “What would you advise?”

“I don’t know,” Elrond said, and he sounded troubled by it. “There is much of Fëanor I do not understand; he keeps a great deal of himself hidden. It is clear to me that he loves you, all of you, but I do not think he knows anymore how best to show it. I do not know how one can come back from such a rift—but the rift between you and Maglor seemed equally wide, and here you are.”

“That was different,” Maedhros said without looking up. “That was…we never stopped loving one another, Maglor and I. Everything else was broken, but we still had that.”

“You don’t believe your father loves you?” Elrond asked softly. 

Maedhros thought of a letter locked away in his desk drawer at home, of its last line just three words repeating. I love you, I love you, I love you. “I don’t believe he loved anything at all when he died,” he said, “and I had ceased to trust anything he said well before that.” Maglor had not trusted Maedhros, either, when they had met again. It had taken a long time and many tears and many harsh and often bitter words for that trust to really start to be rebuilt—fighting and parting and coming back together over the years in Lórien, in between trying to find peace within themselves. They’d done it because it was the most important thing in the world for both of them—they both needed it like their lungs needed air. 

Maedhros did not feel that same need for his father, and he wondered sometimes what that said about him. Aloud he said, “The two things my father wanted then were the crown and his Silmarils. I gave the one away and I destroyed the other alongside myself, and I regret neither. Maybe when he tells me that he loves me he believes it now, but I don’t believe he has forgotten either one of those things.” He sighed. “You know him better than I do now, though, I think.”

“I suppose I do, but your brother knows him best.”

“Curvo would never try to tell any of us what to do regarding our father.”

“I think you need to speak to him,” Elrond said after a few moments of thought, “really speak to him—both of you need to hear what the other has to say. That is true for all of you, whatever the outcome may be. You and Maglor have spoken to him already of course, and I think both of you needed to say whatever it was you said, to get it out and let him begin to understand what his actions have wrought. But there is more work to be done before any of you can truly move forward. It is the same work Curufin is doing already.”

“I know you’re right,” Maedhros said. “I just…don’t know if I can.”

“And I know that it is far easier for me to give such advice than it is for you to take it.” Elrond reached out to take Maedhros’ hand again, this time grasping it firmly. “Know this, Maedhros: whatever happens, you and your brothers have my support. Imloth Ningloron was not made to be the same kind of refuge that Imladris was, but if ever you have need of it, we are here.”

After he retrieved Aechen and left Elrond, Maedhros retreated to his room. His brothers would be wondering where he was, but he needed a little time alone where no one would scold him for brooding. He set Aechen down and sat on the rug to watch him wander around. Maedhros set his hand on his lap and looked down at it, and thought of the Silmarils—of the first time he had seen them, when his father had pulled him into his darkened workshop and opened the chest into which he had placed them. It had been a finely-wrought chest, then, not the clumsy and quick box cobbled together after the War of Wrath. They had lain on fine velvet, and when Fëanor had opened the chest Maedhros had been dazzled and astonished. He remembered how happy his father had been at his reaction, how he had picked one of them up to place it in Maedhros’ hands. It had been warm to the touch but not hot—not yet hallowed, his own hands not yet stained—and as he had turned it in his fingers it had flared and sparkled, as though the stone itself was happy to be seen and admired. Now he wondered if that Silmaril, the one he had been the first after his father to hold, the first after his father to see, was the one he’d taken with him into the fire so many years later. 

A few tears splashed onto his palm, and Maedhros closed his eyes, drawing his legs up to rest his face in his arms. After a little while he heard a soft knock, and then the door open, but he didn’t lift his head. “I’m not brooding,” he said into his arms. 

“Could’ve fooled me,” said Caranthir as he sat down beside him. “Did something happen?”

“No.” Maedhros turned his head, catching a glimpse of Caranthir’s frown through the curtain of his hair. “Just—thinking of Atar. Curvo’s going to be going back home soon.” He and Rundamírë both had work to return to, and the girls missed their brother. 

“I know. Lisgalen and I are going with them. What are you thinking of Atar for?”

“I’m trying to convince myself that speaking to him will help. Elrond thinks it will.”

“He’s probably right. He is about most things.”

“Yes, I know. I just—”

“I know. Curvo told me of the plan to give him a palantír. Maybe wait until after he’s had a chance to look into it.”

Maedhros stood by what he had said, that he wanted his father to understand, and it didn’t really matter to him what Fëanor saw. But it would hurt him to see, especially if he really was as everyone said—if he really had learned how to care again. The time for such pain and heartache should be past, no matter who felt it. “Do you think it will help? The palantír?”

Caranthir shrugged. “It’s the closest he can ever come to being there.”

“You don’t think it will just…hurt?”

“Of course it will hurt—it should hurt, if he really cares. It hurt all of us to watch him die, didn’t it?” Caranthir moved to sit behind Maedhros, tugging gently on his hair until he sat up straight so Caranthir could finger comb the tangles out and braid it properly. “Are you going to live here now, or do you plan to return to Ammë’s house?”

“I suppose I’ll be going back and forth, but when I think of home I think of Ammë’s house. Where does Tyelko stay these days?”

“Ammë’s house. It’s been nice, especially when she’s away. The house is bigger now and it feels emptier when I’m there alone. Huan sheds all over the place, though. I forgot how annoying that was.”

“Are all the rooms changed around?” Caranthir had spoken a little of the changes made to Nerdanel’s house—additions added for extra bedrooms, extending the gardens to make up for what was built over—but not in much detail.

“Not all. Yours and mine haven't been touched, and the workshops are still the same, except Ammë decided to get rid of the forge. She never uses it, and I always go over to Grandfather’s anyway. I’m going to plant some kind of fruit trees where it was, but I haven’t decided what kind yet.”

“I think I’ll be glad to be home,” Maedhros murmured. Imloth Ningloron was lovely, and he could see himself thinking of it as a kind of second home, given time, but his mother’s house had been a refuge and a place of comfort since his coming from Mandos, and he looked forward to returning to the simpler, quieter rhythms of it. He missed the river and the willow trees, and his own small bedroom. 

Caranthir tied off the braid and moved back around to sit facing Maedhros. “Whatever happens in the future, I don’t think I can forget how Atar’s first coming back hurt you,” he said quietly. “I don’t think I can forgive him that.”

“Even though that’s what made us all leave?” Maedhros asked. That had set it all into motion—trying to fix what lay between all of them, finding Maglor, and eventually Maedhros and Maglor’s own journey to Lórien. None of that would have happened if Fëanor hadn’t come back.

“I would like to think we would’ve figured something out eventually,” Caranthir sighed. “We all still stand by what we said then, though. Even Curvo. Our loyalty is to you first. Not him.”

“And I stand by what I said: I’m not your lord, Moryo. I’m just your brother.”

“That’s more important. For myself—I don’t really care if I never speak to our father again, but I know it’s not the same for me as for you or Cáno or even Tyelko.”

“What do you mean?” Maedhros knew it was different for Ambarussa, who had been born on the cusp of the discord, who had grown up wild and carefree but also somewhat neglected, but Caranthir was older. As far as Maedhros had known, his childhood and youth were were not so different from Maedhros’ own. 

“I realized a long time ago I was never going to be the sort of son Atar wanted,” Caranthir said, not looking at Maedhros but instead at Aechen as he nosed around the foot of the bed. Realizing he was being watched, Aechen scampered over to sniff at Caranthir’s fingers. “Even before it all went wrong he wanted us to follow in his footsteps, to be—we couldn’t ever be as great as he was but he still wanted us to try.”

Maedhros remembered that pressure. Until it had all started to go wrong he hadn’t felt it as such a burden, though. He was his father’s eldest son and heir and so of course much was expected of him. Back then he had felt equal to the challenge, even if he’d never managed to find anything that caught his attention and his passion the way that the forge called to Curufin or music to Maglor. He could still uphold the duties of his station, to play the role of Nelyafinwë, Prince of the Noldor. But Caranthir… “I never thought you cared,” he said quietly. 

“I tried not to. I think I am finally succeeding.” Caranthir stroked his fingers lightly over Aachen’s spines. “I’m neither talented nor ambitious enough to be a son Fëanor really wants to claim as his own, whatever he says now. I’m not kind enough to want to give him a chance, either.”

“You’re worse than Cáno when it comes to passing judgment on yourself, if you think you aren’t kind,” Maedhros said. Caranthir’s lips quirked in a mirthless half-smile. “Moryo, I’m sorry. I didn’t know—”

“Of course you didn’t know, Nelyo. I didn’t want you to. It wasn’t…I wasn’t unhappy. I never really doubted that Atar loved me, at least then, but I did know that what I wanted—or really, what I didn’t want—would have been a disappointment to him. I suppose even then I could tell that his love had limits, even if I didn’t understand what that meant and I didn’t have the words for it.”

“That was true by the end,” Maedhros said quietly, “but I don’t think it was always so.” And therein lay the hurt, knowing that Fëanor had once loved them all, fiercely and warmly and unconditionally—until he hadn’t.

“Maybe. I was never brave enough to test it, like Tyelko did when he left to follow Oromë. I am now—or at least I want to think I am.”

“You are,” Maedhros said. “And you have all the rest of us at your back.” 

“I know. So do you.”

“I know.”

“Doesn't make it easier, does it?”

Maedhros shook his head. “Not really.”

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Autumn came slowly, lazily, creeping in with cooler weather and rainy days. Maglor spent those days with his brothers and with Míriel, who had come to Imloth Ningloron determined to get to know all seven of her grandsons at last. Celegorm had avoided her in the beginning, as seemed to be his new habit when anything made him upset or uncomfortable, but she was even more stubborn than he was, and Maglor saw them several times talking quietly together, and afterward Celegorm seemed a little more at ease, and Míriel pleased. 

Nerdanel arrived as the apple harvest began in earnest. Maglor was not aware of her coming, having retreated to the pottery studio to begin fixing a jug that had been broken. He’d learned how to repair such things in Imladris, long ago now, and he found the process soothing. Maedhros had joined him, curious about how it was done. As Maglor sanded down the sharpest edges of the broken pieces they chatted about nothing in particular—just Pídhres and the hedgehogs, the weather, and the apples. It was quiet, peaceful. Maglor had spent the morning working on the first very rough draft of a few verses of his song for Finwë, and was glad for a reprieve.

The sound of their mother’s voice just outside reached them suddenly. Maglor abandoned his work and Maedhros rose so quickly he nearly knocked over his stool, both of them racing out of the workshop and nearly getting caught together in the doorway. Nerdanel, crouched on the path outside petting Pídhres, looked up and laughed as Maglor got out by way of elbowing Maedhros in the ribs. “There you are!” she cried. She was still dressed for travel, with her hair bound up in braids.

“Ammë!” Maglor threw his arms around her as she rose to her feet.

“Macalaurë! Maitimo!” Nerdanel held on very tightly for a moment before releasing him and pulling Maedhros into her arms, and then holding them both at arm’s length so she could look into their faces. “Oh, you look so much better—both of you! The light in your eyes is back!”

“We are better,” Maedhros said. 

“We promise, Ammë, we are,” Maglor added. 

Nerdanel wrapped an arm around each of them, pulling them back in close. Maedhros said something, but Maglor did not catch it. He pressed his face into Nerdanel’s shoulder, swallowing past the tightness in his throat. “I’m so, so glad you’re back,” she said, and kissed their temples. 

At last Nerdanel released them, as their other brothers came up the path. Pídhres jumped into Maglor’s arms as all of them crowded around. When last they had all seven been gathered with Nerdanel it had been just before Maglor and Maedhros had departed for Lórien. There had been smiles and laughter then, too—but Maglor had still been fragile, and Maedhros struggling. Everything was different now; they were all better, stronger, happier. He could see that Nerdanel saw it, and could see how she relaxed the longer they spoke and laughed, as though the last shreds of her worries had been blown away like autumn leaves.

Maglor did not find himself alone again with Nerdanel until later that night. He sat with his harp, playing idle melodies as the household slowly dispersed for bed or other nighttime pursuits. Nerdanel had been sitting with Míriel and Indis all evening, but got up after a while to sit beside him. “I’ve just heard about the new song you are undertaking,” she said.

“It is long overdue,” Maglor said. 

“It is, though I wish you were not turning your thoughts again to laments and sorrow.”

“This will be the last lament I write, I think—but it’s too important not to.” Maglor set his harp aside and leaned his head on her shoulder. “I missed you.”

Nerdanel wrapped her arm around him and kissed the top of his head. “I hope you’ll visit often, now,” she said. “We’ve built onto the house so everyone can have their own room now.”

“Except I will have to share Daeron’s room,” Maglor said, just so she would laugh. “I’m glad he’s there often enough for it to be his.”

“As am I. We have all missed you—both of you. I think also that Daeron has found it lonely among his own people.”

“He came back among them changed, too,” Maglor said. Daeron carried the same weight of time upon his shoulders that Maglor did—that so many did who had sailed to Valinor. It was harder to tell just by looking at him, for he bore it more easily than most, but it was there, all the same, showing in his handful of scars and in the way he sometimes glanced eastward with a look of wistful longing. Maglor missed Middle-earth—he’d loved those lands, in spite of all the pain and the fear and everything else—but Daeron had been born there and that was a different kind of grief.

Later, Maglor asked him, “Do you ever regret taking ship?”

Daeron looked up from turning down the bedsheets, a look of surprise on his face. “No, of course not! Why do you ask?”

“I don’t know.”

“I miss it—Middle-earth—but my time there had come to an end. I could hear it in the Music long before I ever knew that you too were going West. Come here.” Daeron pulled Maglor down onto the bed and kissed him.

Maglor wrapped his arms around Daeron and buried his face in his hair. “My mother thinks you’ve been lonely in Taur-en-Gellam.”

“Only sometimes. The first few years were the hardest, but they’re all used to me again now—and I’ve had my work, and my songbirds, and your brothers that I count now almost as my own. All the last traces of my loneliness have fled now, with you here again.”

“I’m glad.”

“Are you having regrets?”

“No. I was just thinking of how different we both are from what we used to be.” Maglor turned his head and sighed, closing his eyes. “There were times before I went to Lórien that I wished I could go back east,” he said, “or that I had never left the shores at all. I missed them so terribly that I ached with it. I don’t wish that now.”

“I think if I had come to Mithlond and learned you were still lost,” Daeron murmured, “I would have gone looking for you.”

“Many others looked, and I never even knew.”

“They were not me.”

Maglor smiled into his shoulder, and then lifted his head. “That’s true.” He would have heard Daeron’s voice on the wind and been drawn to it like a moth to flame—or, rather, like a flower turning toward the sun. Of that he was certain. “I suppose I am also thinking of my kin that I haven’t yet reunited with. My cousins, and my aunts and my uncle Finarfin. I don’t know if it will be as hard now as it was before—but they will still stare, and still wonder, and…I am not afraid of it, but I think it will still be hard.”

“I think you will find it easier than you believe,” Daeron said as he smoothed Maglor’s hair back from his face. “You are at peace now with your past, are you not?”

“As much as I can ever be,” Maglor said.

“Then do not borrow trouble—and remember that I’ll be with you, as I was before. Don’t try to tell me I don’t have to be!”

“I won’t.” Maglor kissed him. “You are where you want to be, I know.”

“All I have wanted since we met again on the road to Ekkaia has been to be by your side,” Daeron said. “Are you thinking of going to see these cousins soon?”

“Not so soon. My mother plans to stay until at least the spring, but Curufin and Caranthir are returning to Tirion for the winter. You and I must be here come springtime to meet Elemmírë. Maybe after her visit I will think of going to Tirion, or to Alqualondë. There is no real hurry to finish this song, or at least my grandmother has given me no deadline, but it feels like something I should not put off for too long.”

“Are you finding it easier to write than you feared?”

“I don’t know if I can call it easy, but some words are coming to me, and I can feel it beginning to take shape. That is farther than I have ever gotten before.”

“Good. You spoke once of going to Taur-en-Gellam, or at least requesting an audience with Thingol. Should I write to him on your behalf come springtime, or merely ensure that your letter reaches him?”

“You know what to say to him better than I do, if you don’t mind.” Finwë and Thingol had been great friends once—it had been on the way to visit Finwë that Elu Thingol had been lost in Nan Elmoth. Growing up, Maglor had heard occasional stories of his grandfather’s dear friend Elwë, but looking back now he thought those stories had been as rare as the ones of Finwë’s own kin, the grief stilling his tongue and turning once-fond memories painful. It would be wrong to try to write this song without the cooperation of all Finwë’s family—and equally wrong to do so without speaking to his dearest friends too. He should likely try to speak to Ingwë as well, but that was even more daunting a thought than going to Thingol.

“We’ll have to choose the timing carefully. I am conspiring with Beleg to split the winnings on some bets he has been making about my return.”

“Surely no one will take any bet that Beleg makes, knowing he is your friend.”

“He is, in his turn, conspiring with Pirineth and my other students—all of whom will be very eager to meet you when we go to Taur-en-Gellam, by the way. I have no idea what kind of bets are being made, or what exactly is being wagered, but I imagine it will be very entertaining upon our arrival.”

Maglor smiled at the mischievous glint in Daeron’s eyes. “What of your parents?” he asked then. “Have you heard more from Mablung?”

“When I wrote back I told him I was with you, and had no intention of leaving your side, which can come as no surprise to him. He is back in Taur-en-Gellam now, but I do not know what my aunt and uncle or my parents might be planning to do. I did say that you intend to travel to Alqualondë in the next year anyway, which Mablung has taken as something of a promise from me to seek them out then.”

“Are you still uncertain about it?”

“Yes,” Daeron admitted. “But I feel more equal to the meeting, whatever it brings, than I did when I received the letter. Such moods always make everything seem so much bigger and more frightening than they really are.”

“I’ll be with you,” Maglor said softly, “as you’ll be with me.” Daeron smiled at him, and tangled their fingers together. “Surely there will be joy in this meeting, longed for but never really expected?”

“I hope so.” 

As the days grew shorter and the nights cooler, Curufin and Caranthir prepared to return to Tirion. Curufin’s girls were torn, wishing to remain in Imloth Ningloron but also missing their brother. When they were ready to depart at last, Maglor scooped up both girls, one in each arm, to pepper kisses all over their faces. “Don’t look so sad!” he said. “All adventures must come to an end sometime.” He had, over the course of many evenings, told them the rest of the story of Bilbo’s adventure and the defeat of Smaug and the restoration of Dale and the Lonely Mountain. Legolas and Gimli had cheerfully confirmed it all to be true, to the girls’ unending delight, and Gimli had sung for them the songs of the Dwarves and Legolas the songs of the Woodelves. “Think of all you can tell Tyelpë that he’s missed, staying home as he did.”

“Tyelpë doesn’t like adventures,” Náriel said. “He says they’re uncomfortable.”

“They do make you late for dinner,” Maglor agreed, quoting Bilbo to make them giggle.

Maedhros plucked Calissë from Maglor’s arms to kiss her farewell, before taking up Náriel too. “I, at least, will come visit you in the spring,” he said. 

“Will you really?” Curufin asked as Maedhros set the girls down.

“Yes. I’ll be going home with Ammë then, and Tirion is right there. If you don’t come to me, I’ll come to you.”

“And you, Cáno?”

“I’ll come to Tirion sometime next year,” said Maglor. “I don’t know when. Perhaps I’ll turn up unlooked for on your doorstep one evening to whisk your children away on another adventure!”

“Oh please don’t say that,” Curufin said, pained, as Calissë and Náriel cheered. 

“Only if they eat their vegetables and do their lessons,” Maglor added. The girls groaned, and Rundamírë had to turn away and cover her mouth to hide her smile. Lisgalen hurriedly turned their laughter into a cough. 

“You’re supposed to be the good influences,” Curufin complained as Maglor embraced him. 

“That’s no fun,” Maglor said. “Safe travels, Curvo. I’ll miss you.”

“Write to me, then,” Curufin said. “And—when you come to Tirion, we can talk of Finwë? I still need to think on what you asked of us.”

“Of course.”

Maglor turned to Caranthir then, as Maedhros embraced Curufin. “I’ll talk to you of Finwë when you visit too,” Caranthir said. He held on very tightly. “I’m so, so glad you’re back, Cáno.”

“I am, too.”

Curufin pulled Maedhros closer so the four of them could speak in low voices without being overheard. “I am going to take one of the palantíri from Ammë’s house to Atar,” Curufin said, looking between the three of them, “unless you’ve changed your mind about it. I asked Tyelko and Ambarussa and they haven’t.”

“I haven’t either,” said Maglor as Maedhros shook his head. 

“It’s a good idea,” said Caranthir. 

“Write if you need us to come to Tirion,” Maedhros added, resting his hand on Curufin’s shoulder. 

“Or if you need to leave it,” Maglor added.

“All the palantír will show him is us, you know,” said Curufin. “Not—not anything else.” 

“There is the great palantír of Avallónë,” said Caranthir, “and probably others in some other storage room somewhere.” There had never been an abundance of palantíri, and most had been taken long ago to the Faithful of Andúnië, and then either drowned with Númenor or, in the case of the last seven, escaped to Middle-earth, to Gondor and Arnor. Now only two remained there that Maglor knew of, one of which had been rendered nearly useless. Still, who knew what lay forgotten in various cellars or storage rooms in Tirion—even underneath their old house?

“I suggested the palantír because it’s us that we want him to understand,” Maglor said, “but Moryo is right too.”

“What if he doesn’t want to look?”

“Then he doesn’t,” Maedhros said. “All you’re doing is offering him the chance. I think he will, though.”

“He’s always hated not knowing things,” Caranthir said.

“I suppose that’s true.” Curufin glanced over his shoulder when Rundamírë called to him from where she stood with Ambarussa and Celegorm. “I’ll write after…after I know if he’s looked into it or not.” 

After Curufin went to help Calissë with something, Caranthir turned back to Maglor and Maedhros. “Do you really think it will make a difference?”

“I think I want him to see the truth,” said Maglor, “all of the things left out of the tellings, whether we mean to or not—the beauty and the joy, but the grief and the ugliness of it too. Whether it makes a difference is up to him.” 

“I think it will,” Maedhros said when Caranthir glanced at him, “but what that difference will be, I cannot guess.”

Others came out to say goodbye, filling the courtyard with laughter everyone talked over everyone else. Elladan and Elrohir teased Náriel and Calissë the way they’d once teased Estel as a child, and then later their own nieces and nephew. It was a cheerful parting with many promises of letters and visits to come. 

Later, Maglor went back to the pottery workshop to keep working on the broken jug, which he had nearly forgotten about over the last few weeks. Míriel found him there, accompanied by Nerdanel. “You never did show me how this is done,” Nerdanel said, smiling as they sat at the table with him. 

“I’m only just starting,” Maglor said. “Most of the process is really just waiting for the glue to try.”

“I have seen the end results,” Míriel said, “and they are lovely.”

Maglor remembered suddenly the letter his father had written to him, the description he had included of a tapestry he’d seen in Mandos. “Have you woven them, too?” he asked. 

Míriel smiled at him. “Yes.”

It was strange to think of himself woven with golden thread, somewhere in the walls of Mandos. Maglor lowered his gaze back to his work. His mother and grandmother chatted with him and with each other, laughing about Náriel and Calissë, talking of the harvest and of the coming winter. Finally Nerdanel asked him, “What were you and your brothers whispering about before Carnistir and Atarinkë left?”

“Curvo is going to give one of the old palantíri to Atar,” Maglor said after a moment, as he carefully picked up the last piece that needed its edges filed. 

“One of the ones from my house? Why?”

“He saw much in the Halls,” Míriel said quietly, “but the memories of death fade when one returns to life—and there is only so much that can be understood from a still image upon the wall, however skilled the weaver.”

Nerdanel pursed her lips. Maglor finished his filing and turned away to bring out the ingredients for the lacquer. As he rummaged through a cabinet Nerdanel said, “Would it not be easier just to speak to him?”

“Not for me,” Maglor said without turning around. “And Curvo has been speaking to him. It’s just—if you weren’t there, you can’t understand, not really. The palantír is the closest anyone can come now.”

“I know just how close the palantír brings you,” Nerdanel said. “You told me once, Macalaurë, that you wished I had not looked.”

“You know that’s different, Ammë,” Maglor said softly. 

“It will break his heart to see you thus,” Nerdanel said. 

“Maybe he needs his heart broken.”

“Macalaurë.”

“It can be mended afterward. Ours all have.” Maglor had said more than once that he wanted nothing more from Fëanor; Elrond, though, had known better even when Maglor himself didn’t. He had tried to help Fëanor to understand, just as Curufin was still trying to do, and they had both been right. Maglor did want his father to understand—to understand something, at least, of all of it, both the wonders and the horrors. If Fëanor’s heart broke just to see it—well, it would be easier to mend, maybe, there in Valinor far away and long past all the real harm that had been done, and he would not be alone for it. 

Nerdanel reached for him as he turned from the cupboard, cupping his face so he had no choice but to look at her. “Does this mean you want to be able to speak to him?” she asked. 

“I will have to, for the song I am to write,” Maglor said. “Beyond that—I don’t know what I want, Ammë. Whatever happens, though, I need it to be on my terms. I was not able to choose when to see him before, or when I saw my brothers.”

“Did it not turn out for the best, though, meeting them as you did?”

“That doesn’t mean it would not have been better if it happened differently.” It had all worked out in the end only because they had all so desperately wanted it to. Maglor had not been ready—he had barely been able to hold the pieces of himself together, feeling as though he’d been coming apart at the seams ever since he had set foot upon Tol Eressëa and learned that everyone he had been so sure he would never see again had returned, and were waiting for him. 

“Fëanáro will not try to force another meeting, Macalaurë,” Míriel said.

“I know. Does he know you’ve asked me to write this song for Finwë?”

“No. It was an idea Indis and I had just before we learned you had returned from Lórien.” Míriel smiled at him again. “So the timing worked out nicely, though it means we did not consult with anyone before approaching you.”

“Is it meant to be secret?”

“No, of course not, but…” She paused for a moment, as though hesitant to go on. “There is a purpose to it beyond merely honoring Finwë—though that is also important to us, and to all our people.”

“What is the purpose?” Maglor asked. “Why did you not tell me before?”

“Would it affect the writing of it?”

“It might,” Maglor said. 

Míriel met his gaze. Maglor had inherited her eyes, soft grey-green, and it was still startling sometimes to see them in another’s face. “You have been reluctant to sing before any great audience since you came West,” she said. “I did not wish to speak of it and discourage you from the writing.”

“What audience is this song meant for?”

“The Valar.”

Maglor sat back, hitting the wall with a jolt. “I am not Lúthien, Grandmother,” he said. “I cannot move the implacable Lord of Mandos with my song—”

“No one is asking you to be Lúthien,” Míriel said.

“But you want me to achieve the same feat—”

“We want you to write and sing this song on behalf of all our kin and all our people,” Míriel said, “for who better to express our deepest grief and our deepest love than our greatest singer? I have heard the Noldolantë, Macalaurë. I know you are capable of it. Manwë will not listen unmoved to your words.”

“But if you do not want to, Macalaurë…” Nerdanel began, frowning at Míriel. 

“No, I will do it,” Maglor said, the words escaping almost before he could think better of them. “I’ll write this song and I will sing it before the Valar upon Taniquetil or in Máhanaxar or wherever they will come to listen—but I do not think mine is the voice that will sway them.”

“Yours will be the voice that sings on behalf of all who love Finwë Noldóran. I know it is much to ask. We have pleaded and argued and spoken to the Valar for years, Indis and I, and Ingwë and Olwë and even Elwë and Melian both. What have we left to do but to show them how much he is missed, how wrong it is to condemn us all to such a separation, merely because he dared to find love again in his loneliness and heartache? But of this, Macalaurë, I would ask you not to speak openly.”

She did not need to worry about that. If it was widely known what he aimed to do, he would never be able to write another word. Maglor could not, though, keep it secret from either Maedhros or Daeron. He found the two of them together some time later, with Pídhres and the hedgehogs, and both of their smiles turned to frowns when they saw him. “What’s wrong?” Daeron asked. He had been lounging on the grass, but he sat up, sending Annem tumbling off his chest onto his lap. Pídhres darted to Maglor to claw her way up his legs until he grabbed her. 

“I’ve just learned something,” Maglor said. He sat when Maedhros pulled him down between them. “What were you laughing at just now?”

“Maedhros is worried that your father might be making me uncomfortable in Tirion,” Daeron said, “and I have been assuring him that I can handle myself.”

“I don’t doubt it,” Maedhros said, though he sounded doubtful.

“There are very few with the power to discomfit me these days,” Daeron said, “and however impressive he may be, Fëanor is not one of them. I’ve been visiting for years without any issue, and I don’t see why that should change now. But Maglor, what troubles you?”

“This song. The one for Finwë. It’s…Míriel and Indis intend to ask me to perform it before the Valar.”

Maedhros looked at him blankly for a moment, until full understanding came to him, and his eyes opened wide, but Daeron only nodded. “I wondered if that was it,” he said. “All this talk lately of those who are returning from Mandos, and of those who remain there…”

“I told her that I am not Lúthien,” Maglor said. “I cannot be. I don’t…”

“Was it Lúthien’s power that swayed Námo, or her heart?” Maedhros asked unexpectedly. “Was it who she was, or was it the mere fact that she dared to try? Did the eagle come because it was Fingon who asked, or because he asked?”

“Was it the words of Eärendil who swayed the Valar, or was it the love he bore for everyone left behind, for whose sake he had risked everything?” Daeron added.

“Others have asked, who love Finwë better than anyone,” Maglor said. “Míriel and Indis, and even Ingwë and Elu Thingol. Why should the Valar listen to me, when I go before them to ask them to reverse their own ruling?”

“Because you will not be speaking only your own words,” Maedhros said, echoing Míriel. He moved closer to Maglor, to put his arm around his shoulders and press a kiss to his temple. “Even before you knew this was the purpose, you determined that this song would not be yours alone. You will sing for all of us who love him.”

“Who better than you to put words to such grief, Maglor?” Daeron asked softly. “Who better than you to teach the Valar what it means, this heartbreak, this long separation that should not be?”

“When you sing—both of you—I can hear it, the Great Music echoing in your voices as it does in the Sea,” Maedhros said. “The Valar will hear it, too.”

“And when I fail?” Maglor whispered. Pídhres butted her head into his chin, demanding scratches. He obliged, ducking his head to let his hair fall forward, indulging an old habit that he’d tried to leave behind in Lórien. 

Daeron tilted his head slightly, as though listening to something only he could hear. Whatever it was he heard, he chose not to share it. “Do not think of failure,” he said finally, reaching out to brush Maglor’s hair aside. “Do not think of this performance. Think only of the song and of what it means, not of the Valar. That is what you were doing before. You need not worry about singing it before there is even a song to be sung.”

“If your voice cannot move the Valar to pity, Canafinwë,” Maedhros said quietly, “I do not think anyone’s can.”

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“What is it you’re worried about?” Caranthir asked Curufin as they stood in the cellar of Nerdanel’s house, in the corner where the chest bearing the palantíri had been tucked away. They weren’t used much anymore; Curufin though the last time the chest had been opened had been when they’d all gone out into the western wilds fifty years before. “Do you think he won’t do it?”

“No.” Curufin knelt and opened the chest. Nine dark orbs sat in a row on the soft blue fabric tucked inside. He picked one up at random. They were the first palantíri Fëanor had ever made, and they were not perfectly smooth; there were soft time-worn ridges from the molds he had used, and in a few places he could feel dings and chips where the stone had been dropped or maybe thrown. He imagined neither Maedhros nor Nerdanel had been particularly gentle after they had used them, and seen Maglor in darkness and torment so many years ago. “I think he will.” He rose and slipped the stone into the bag that Caranthir held out. Caranthir handed it back to him and shut the chest with a soft thump. “I don’t know. I’m just…worried.”

“Can I help?”

“I don’t think so. We’ll just have to see how it goes afterward. It’s probably a good thing no one else has one of these.” They were all attuned to the nine of them—Fëanor, Nerdanel, and all their sons—and also to each other, and it was too easy to accidentally start communing with one another if more than one stone was in use at the same time. Fëanor had fixed that along with other flaws in later stones, but it was one reason none of them had been very eager to take one when they went traveling or wandering, long ago. 

They left Nerdanel’s house and caught up to Lisgalen and Rundamírë and the girls. Calissë and Náriel were unaware of the nature of Curufin’s errand there, though Rundamírë and Lisgalen knew of it. Rundamírë caught his eye and he summoned a smile for her that he knew she saw right through. 

Curufin had been reluctant to leave Imloth Ningloron with all the rest of his brothers still there as well as Nerdanel, but it was a relief to pass through the gates of Tirion into the familiar streets, and even more of a relief to return to their own neighborhood, colorful and bustling with activity and the sounds and sights and smells of making. Lisgalen lived only a few doors down—that was how they and Caranthir had first met. They and Caranthir agreed to return to Curufin and Rundamírë’s house for dinner that evening, and so they all parted. 

There was the usual chaos of homecoming as bags were taken away and the housekeeper came to greet them and to share what tidbits of news they’d missed, which was little enough. “Is Tyelpë at home?” Curufin asked as Calissë and Náriel raced away toward the kitchen upon hearing the cook was making one of their favorite sweets. 

“Yes, he is out in the workshop,” said Maluwendë. “Your lord father is there too, I think—or at least he was this morning.”

“I’ll see what is keeping them,” Curufin told Rundamírë.

“Take the stone with you,” she said. “Better not to leave it where the girls might find it.”

The workshop was separated from the house by a narrow alley; it was a large and open building that Curufin and Celebrimbor had spent many weeks putting together and organizing so they might both work there comfortably and without getting in each other’s way. Curufin kept his forge separate and out of the way behind the main workshop; it was closed up and cold now, for since his return from Mandos Celebrimbor did no work there, though sometimes he would come to watch Curufin as he worked. As he reached for the door to the main workshop Curufin heard voices laughing, but he pushed it open just in time to hear Celebrimbor curse in Dwarvish a second before glass shattered. 

“Tyelpë?” Curufin stepped into the workshop to find Celebrimbor and Fëanor both reaching for rags to press to Celebrimbor’s palm. “What happened?”

“My fault,” Celebrimbor said through gritted teeth. “Just—stupid—I wasn’t watching—and it was broken already anyway—”

Curufin left the palantír on his own workbench and went to look at the cut. It was not too bad, though it was deep enough to need a few stitches. Celebrimbor looked away, his face grey and expression pinched. “Sit down, Tyelpë,” Curufin said, gently pushing him onto the nearest stool. “Atya, there are bandages in that cupboard.”

“That will need more than bandages,” Fëanor said as he moved to fetch them. He grabbed the broom too, to sweep away the pieces of glass scattered across the floor.

“Tyelpë.” Curufin waited until Celebrimbor looked at him. “Are you going to faint?” Celebrimbor shook his head, but Curufin wasn’t sure he believed him. Ever since his return, Celebrimbor had been abundantly cautious in the workshop, avoiding anything that might be considered particularly dangerous, and taking extra care in what he did do, and this was one reason why. This lapse in attention was very unlike him, though at least his distraction had not been the result of any sort of argument or poor mood. “Do you want me to stitch it, or Tindehtë?” Tindehtë was their cook now, but she had been their most skilled healer in Himlad until the Dagor Bragollach. 

“You, please,” Celebrimbor said. 

Curufin wrapped a bandage tightly around Celebrimbor’s hand to stem the bleeding until he could get what he needed. “Wait here, then. Keep it elevated—”

“I know, Atya.”

Rundamírë was nowhere to be seen when Curufin returned to the house, to his relief; he did not really want to explain why he had blood all over his hands not ten minutes after returning home. Tindehtë kept a kit near the kitchen for such emergencies, and he was able to grab it and leave again without either Calissë or Náriel noticing, and when he returned to the workshop he found Fëanor steadying Celebrimbor on the stool. “On the floor, Tyelpë. You don’t need to crack your head open as well as your hand.” 

“This is stupid,” Celebrimbor muttered as he obeyed, leaning back against a shelf and turning his head away as Curufin sat beside him.

“Not stupid,” Curufin said. “Here, sip this.” There was a small bottle of miruvórë in the kit, and Celebrimbor took it obediently. 

“Should we not seek a more skilled healer, if it’s so bad?” Fëanor asked as he knelt on Celebrimbor’s other side.

“It’s not that bad,” said Curufin as he unwrapped the bloodied bandages. The bleeding had already slowed. “Nelyo was hurt far worse than this on our journey west, and I stitched him up fine.”

“He was what?” Fëanor looked up sharply, and Curufin only then remembered he hadn’t actually told his father about what he and his brothers called the River Incident. 

“I just don’t like the sight of blood,” Celebrimbor said. His color was better, but he stared resolutely at the far wall as Curufin got out a needle and thread.

Fëanor frowned at him. “I don’t remember you having such trouble before,” he said. 

“Yes, well. Things change.”

“Tyelpë—”

“Atya,” Curufin warned, a little more sharply than he’d intended. He threaded the needle. At least this was a small cut, compared to the claw- and teeth-marks Maedhros had suffered in the hill country near Ekkaia, when a particularly stupid hill cat had attacked, and there was no reason to scold Celebrimbor for it the way they’d all scolded Maedhros. Accidents happened. Curufin worked quickly, aware that his father was watching with one of those unreadable expressions he wore sometimes now, just with a slightly pinched look around his eyes that spoke of concern. He said nothing, though, just guided Celebrimbor’s head to rest on his shoulder, keeping his hand on Celebrimbor’s hair. Celebrimbor closed his eyes and took a deep breath, letting it out slowly. It did not take long, and Curufin bound Celebrimbor’s hand up in clean bandages afterward. “All done,” he said, clearing away the bloodied cloths and bandages. Celebrimbor let his hand drop onto his lap. “Drink more of the miruvórë, Tyelpë. Your sisters are going to want to climb all over you when you return to the house.”

“Everyone’s home, then?” Celebrimbor asked without opening his eyes. He took another deep breath. “All right, I’m all right.” He sat up and took another sip of the miruvórë before getting to his feet with Fëanor’s help. His color was better, and once he was standing he seemed steady enough. He grimaced ruefully when he glanced down at his shirt. “Can you distract them while I change my clothes?”

“Of course,” said Fëanor, already moving to the door. Curufin would likely be answering some hard questions later, but that was all right. They would be no harder than anything else they would be speaking of.

Once alone he embraced Celebrimbor, who dropped his head onto Curufin’s shoulder with a shaky sigh. “I’m all right, Atya,” he said. “I wasn’t looking and knocked a piece of glass off the table and went to grab it, and…”

“I know you are. Such things happen, especially when you work with glass. I missed you.”

“I missed all of you. How are Maglor and Maedhros?”

“Very well—so much better than they were. They missed you, too.”

“I’ll go see them soon.”

“They would like that, but they’re both coming back to Tirion in the spring and summer, so there’s no rush.” 

Fëanor had Calissë and Náriel suitably distracted when they returned to the house, and Celebrimbor slipped upstairs to his room to change into clean clothes. Curufin returned the kit to its place and washed his hands in the kitchen, earning a narrow-eyed look from Tindehtë. “An accident in the workshop. No real harm done,” he said.

“Tyelpë?” she asked.

“Yes, but he’s fine.”

“Mm. I’ll take a look later.”

“I did the stitching—exactly how you taught me. Will you put on tea, please—and bring honey with it?”

When Curufin returned to the parlor he found Celebrimbor there, embracing his sisters, as Fëanor and Rundamírë greeted one another with—well, not warmth precisely, but not the same frigid politeness that Rundamírë had shown when Fëanor had first returned either. Curufin went to embrace Fëanor, since he hadn’t had the chance before. “How was the journey back?” Fëanor asked as he wrapped his arm around Curufin’s shoulders, his grip warm and tight. 

“Very pleasant,” Rundamírë said, “as was our stay in Imloth Ningloron.”

“Did you know that Uncle Cáno met an enchantress that tried to turn him into a statue of ice?” Náriel interrupted. She and Calissë had claimed Celebrimbor’s lap, sitting on the sofa. He rested his arm over the back of it, keeping his bandaged hand out of reach. 

“An enchantress?” Fëanor repeated, his tone suggesting that he didn’t know whether he was meant to laugh or not.

“He escaped because he got very lucky, and a talking beaver helped him and then he met a talking fox that didn’t really help him but was very funny, and then Elladan and Elrohir found him and took him home with them! And that’s why he’s got bits of white in his hair, where the enchantments got caught.”

Celebrimbor laughed. “I hadn’t heard that story before,” he said. “It sounds very exciting.”

“It was very silly,” said Calissë. “But no one will tell us how Uncle Nelyo lost his hand, even though he just laughs—”

“Calissë,” Curufin said, as Fëanor’s grip on his shoulder tightened for a moment. “That’s enough. Tyelpë isn’t going to tell you either.”

“It’s not nearly as interesting as talking beavers and enchantresses,” said Celebrimbor, as unbothered by the subject as Maedhros himself. “Uncle Cáno has all the fun, it seems. Anyway,” he went on, tickling Náriel until she squirmed, “I want to hear about your adventures.”

Tindehtë brought the tea, with plenty of honey and with a dozen of Celebrimbor’s favorite strawberry-jam filled pastries, and once Curufin saw Celebrimbor eat one, laughing at Calissë’s description of Maglor’s hedgehogs, and was satisfied that he really was all right, he caught Fëanor’s eye. 

Back in the workshop it was quiet. Outside the clouds had moved in, turning the light through the windows and skylights pale. At a gesture and murmured word the lamps around the walls sprang to life, soft golden yellow. “Why does Tyelpë grow ill at the sight of blood now?” Fëanor asked after a moment. He leaned on Curufin’s workbench, tracing his finger over a knot in the wood. 

“You know how he died, Atya,” said Curufin. Fëanor’s gaze flickered up to his face, his own unreadable. “He can’t bear it for the same reasons he cannot make himself take up gemcraft again.” He paused, for a moment uncertain, but deciding that it was worth whatever reaction he’d get. “It’s something you should understand at least a little—”

Fëanor made a noise that was equal parts bitter and frustrated. He turned away to start pacing around the room, all restless energy, braid swinging with each step. “You are always telling me, Curvo, that I can’t understand.”

“It’s not exactly the same, obviously, but—you never took up any sort of fiber craft, and you wouldn’t let us do it either, and there were the times you couldn’t even look at Tyelko—” Curufin watched Fëanor stop his pacing abruptly, going very still. He did that sometimes now, and it was always strange to see. The Fëanor of his memories was always moving, even if it was just his hands. 

“It was not Tyelko—”

“I know that. But we all have things like that now, things we can’t bear to see or to do, or to hear. For Tyelpë, blood makes him feel ill, and he can’t bear the thought of gemcraft, or putting any kind of power or even small enchantments into his work. It’s only lately that he’ll enter a forge at all. It isn’t something he can just push through—it isn’t cowardice, or—”

“I never said it was,” Fëanor said.

“You would have thought so, once,” Curufin said. He watched Fëanor bite back a sharp retort, because they both knew that it was true, however much they both wished otherwise. “The past is heavy, and some scars can’t be erased even in Mandos.” He thought of Celegorm again, how he’d avoided Míriel for reasons he hadn’t been able to put into words even for Curufin, and that old habit of twisting his hair around his fingers until it hurt.

“I know that, Curvo.”

“You know your own scars, and you can know Tyelpë’s a bit because they look a little like your oldest ones. You don’t really know ours. A single battle is not a war. Alqualondë—it was not Doriath or Sirion. Even the Darkening cannot compare to the Dagor Bragollach or the Nirnaeth Arnoediad.” Curufin reached for the bag that held the palantír, tugging the drawstring open so it fell around the stone, which sat dark and still and silent on the workbench, absorbing light rather than reflecting it. “My words aren’t enough, I know—I’m no storyteller like Maglor—and seeing what Vairë wove isn’t, either. This, though—this can bring you closer than anyone’s songs or tales.”

Fëanor looked at the palantír, and then at Curufin. “Your brothers will not thank you for this,” he said.

“It was Maglor’s idea,” Curufin said. “I would not offer something like this without having spoken to all of them. They—we all love you, Atya. But they’re afraid. Caranthir and Celegorm and Maglor are still angry.”

“What can I do, Curvo?” Fëanor asked. He leaned against the workbench again, almost like he needed to so he could remain standing, and looked at Curufin. “What can I do to show them…?”

“Look into the palantír,” Curufin said. “So much of it will be ugly and grievous and terrible—but there is beauty there too, and joy. You used to know us all better than anyone else in the world, but you don’t anymore. Sometimes now you look at me as though I am a stranger, someone you don’t know at all. This is the only way we can think of to start to fix it.” He paused, thinking of Maglor’s request that he not share how his hand and Maedhros’ still burned at the sight of their father. It felt like something Fëanor should know, but Curufin didn’t really know what telling him would accomplish except to pile onto the guilt he already felt—and would feel, after he looked into the palantír. “I don’t know what else you can do, except to keep going as you have been, and let them come to you when they’re ready. Keeping that promise means more than you realize.”

Fëanor closed his eyes for a moment and breathed a sigh. “I do not want to be someone you fear,” he said, very softly. 

“I know,” Curufin said. 

“How did we get here, Curvo?” Fëanor sounded almost lost, and it made Curufin want to take him back to the house and wrap him up in blankets and feed him pastries, like he would Tyelpë or his daughters when they were in distress and need of comfort. That wasn’t the sort of comfort that Fëanor needed, though—if he wanted comfort at all. The best Curufin could offer instead was honesty.

“You taught me to make swords, and then insisted I set aside everything else in pursuit of that mastery,” Curufin said after a moment. He dropped his own gaze to the tabletop, where his hands rested, still with traces of blood under his fingernails. “The way that you spoke of it, of how we would need them—that frightened me for the first time. By the time we went to Formenos—no, even before then, even before you drew your sword at the palace, we were all afraid. Even Maedhros. We followed you because we loved you, but we also feared what you would do if we didn’t.” And they had been right to fear. Maedhros had done no more than stand aside at Losgar, and Fëanor had turned on him with words as ugly as anything he had ever said to his brother. “I know you won’t go down that same road again, I do, but—but I would be lying if I said I did not sometimes fear it, all the same.”

For a little while they stood in silence. The past felt like a physical weight on Curufin’s shoulders, making it hard to breathe. He’d never spoken of those years before the Darkening with his father before. They had both avoided it, had avoided even the Darkening itself. Maybe that had been a mistake. He just hadn’t known how to speak of it without risking a fight, because even now Fëanor had his pride and he did not always react well to being told that he was wrong—though maybe that was another fear that was needless, because even when they did argue and when it got ugly, it wasn’t real anger that Fëanor ever showed. It was just frustration boiling over into something that looked like anger. Curufin knew the difference—knew it in Fëanor and in himself. If Fëanor was ever truly angry these days, it wasn’t with any of his sons.

Now he had spoken of it, and indeed that fear had proved false: there was no anger in Fëanor now. Instead he bowed his head, shoulders slumping. It was a posture of defeat, more than anything else. Finally, Fëanor straightened and came around the workbench to put his arms around Curufin, holding on very tightly. He kissed the top of Curufin’s head. “I’m sorry, Curufinwë,” he said. “I’m so sorry.”

“We aren’t blameless either in this—this estrangement. It’s just—” 

“No, I am your father, and it was my actions that led you all down this path. It must fall to me to fix this, if it is possible. I’ll look into the palantír—I will do anything you ask of me.”

“It will hurt, Atya,” Curufin said as Fëanor drew away. “It will break your heart.”

“Oh, Curvo. It’s already broken.” Fëanor cupped his face for a moment, as he reached with his other hand for the palantír, drawing it back into its bag to pick it up. “I’m proud of you, you know,” he said, “and I love you—more than anything in the world, I love you, all of you.”

“I know,” Curufin said. “I love you, too.”

Fëanor left, and Curufin sank onto a stool to rest his head in his arms. After a little while he heard the door open again. “I take it you gave him the palantír?” Caranthir asked.

“I did,” Curufin said without lifting his head.

“How did it go?”

“I wish there was another way, that we could just—” 

“I know.” Caranthir rested his hands on Curufin’s shoulders and kissed the back of his head. “I’m sorry, Curvo.”

Curufin raised his head. “Will you at least tell me why you’re still angry?”

Caranthir didn’t answer immediately, not until Curufin turned to look at him. Then he said, “Thinking about speaking to him makes me feel sick to my stomach. I don’t think I’m really angry, but I’m not not angry—but not for me. It’s for Nelyo, and Cáno, and Tyelko—they’re still—it’s—I don’t know how fragile their peace is, still, and I know how good Atar is at breaking that kind of thing, even if he might not mean to.”

“I think Tyelko doesn’t hate Atya so much as he hates himself,” Curufin said. “I don’t know how to help him either, how to get him to let it go.” Curufin was not the only one who had inherited all of their father’s ugliest traits, but Celegorm believed that was all he had inherited, and sometimes Curufin thought that they were all he reduced himself to. He didn’t know how to make him stop, to make him see that he was so much more than all of the anger and the guilt that even after spending so many years with Nienna seemed at times to be eating him alive. Even in that, he was like Fëanor—and both of them were too often too good at hiding how they really thought of themselves. Curufin had had a glimpse, that afternoon, of some of what his father usually hid so well. It made something under his ribs hurt, like a knife had been shoved between his lungs and his heart. 

“I think it will help,” Caranthir said after a moment, “knowing that he’s seen…whatever it is he’ll see. That he’s seen us, as we were, the good and the bad. I hope it will help, anyway. Cáno’s going to have to talk to him sometime about that song he’s writing. Maybe this will make it go easier—and maybe if Cáno can speak to him and have it go well, it’ll be easier for Tyelko.”

“I’d forgotten about that,” Curufin said. “He said he’s going to come to Tirion next year…”

“I think that’s why. Not just Atar—he’ll be talking to everyone.”

“I don’t remember him ever needing to consult with so many others for any other song.”

“He’s never written a song like this before. It feels like it might be one of the most important songs he’s ever written. I don’t know why.” Caranthir slung his arm over Curufin’s shoulders, resting his forehead against Curufin’s temple. “I don’t see a way forward for me right now, Curvo,” he said, “but neither did Nelyo or Cáno before they went to Lórien. That means something. I’m sorry you’re caught in the middle of it.”

“I don’t mind being in the middle,” Curufin said. He had at first, when Celegorm had been furious with him and it had been harder to believe the assurances of his other brothers that they weren’t, but that time was long past. Someone had to be the bridge between Fëanor and the rest of them, and Curufin was glad to play the part—if only he could a way to close the gap altogether. All he wanted was for all of them to be able to let the past go once and for all, to move forward—and to be able to do it together. 

“Ambarussa are planning to seek him out, you know,” Caranthir said after a moment. “They were thinking of it even before we decided to give him the palantír.”

“I did know that,” Curufin said. Ambarussa seemed to be the least angry of everyone. They seemed to carry the quiet and peace of the deep forests with them wherever they went. Of everyone, their meeting with Fëanor was most likely to go well. If they could find a way to share that peace with Fëanor, maybe… 

“Come on. Everyone’s going to wonder where we are.” 

The rest of the afternoon and evening passed much more cheerfully. Celebrimbor had recovered his composure quickly, and laughed off his injury, and much of the conversation centered around either Imloth Ningloron or plans for the coming winter. Curufin never felt happier than when his little family was all gathered together, especially if at least one of his brothers was there too, and for a little while he could put his father and the palantír out of his mind and just enjoy being at home again. 

Rundamírë had been talking recently of having another child, to make the number an even four, and when she mentioned it at dinner Caranthir laughed. “I think that’s what our mother said—make it an even six—only for us all to be surprised by Ambarussa.”

“Well, between your mother and Celebrían, at least I will have no shortage of advice when it comes to twins, if such a thing should happen,” Rundamírë said. “What do you think, Náriel, would you like to be a big sister and not the baby anymore?”

Náriel wrinkled her nose. “I’m not a baby, Ammë!”

“I like being a big sister,” Calissë said, and so of course Náriel immediately decided that she would very much like to be one as well. 

“Well, I suppose that’s decided,” Celebrimbor said. “And you didn’t ask, but I do very much like being an elder brother.” 

“Maybe,” Curufin said. “But we have a wedding to get through first.”

“I still think we should elope,” Lisgalen said. 

“You can’t elope, not with all the Mírdain already planning the biggest party we’ve held since the end of the War of the Ring,” Celebrimbor protested. 

“Well, maybe we don’t want a party,” Lisgalen said. “And if someone wants to talk about traditions we can just say we’re following some obscure Avarin way of doing things, and who’s going to question it? My own parents did it, so it’s at least my family tradition.”

“You can try to tell my mother that,” Caranthir said, “while I hide away somewhere.”

“Just warn the rest of us before you run off,” Curufin said, “so we know when to plan the party upon your return.” Caranthir made a face at him, and Lisgalen laughed. “Some traditions can’t be entirely evaded, Moryo! Only delayed. Letting all your friends and relations drink good wine and dance all night in your honor is one of them.”

“Maybe I’ll ask Mithrandir to make some fireworks for the occasion,” Celebrimbor said.

“Yes, fireworks!” Calissë exclaimed. “Just like at Midwinter last year!”

“It’s our wedding!” Caranthir protested, though he was also laughing. “Do we get a say in whether or not there are fireworks?”

“No!” Celebrimbor said. “Not if you refuse to plan a party at all.”

“Just don’t put Ambarussa in charge of the wine,” said Caranthir.

“No, I’ll ask Finrod instead—”

“Or Finrod! He’s even worse—”

Later that night, as they prepared for bed, Rundamírë asked, “You gave the stone to your father?” 

“I did. He’ll probably be up all night with it, so I’ll go find him tomorrow.” Curufin sighed as he sank back onto the pillows. It was wonderful to be back in his own bed, but he did not foresee sleep coming easily. Rundamírë finished her own nighttime preparations and slid into bed beside him, dousing the lamp and plunging the room into darkness. The city’s nighttime sounds drifted through the open window alongside with the slightly-chilly breeze, familiar and comforting. Curufin lay and stared at the ceiling for a long time, listening to that and to Rundamírë’s soft breathing beside him. 

In the morning he left the house, going first to the palace. “Did something happen yesterday?” Lalwen asked him when she found him coming out of Fëanor’s rooms, which had been empty but for the palantír on the floor near the bed; Curufin had picked it up and put it into a cupboard, out of sight and out of the way. “He seemed upset this morning. Did you quarrel?”

“Do you know where he’s gone?”

“The cherry grove, or else your old house. But what happened, Curufinwë?”

“We didn’t quarrel, Aunt Lalwen.”

He found Fëanor beyond the cherry grove, sitting behind Finwë’s old workshop, which had stood closed and shuttered since the Darkening. He wore yesterday’s clothes, and his hair was bound up in a tangled and unraveling braid. Curufin slid down the wall beside Fëanor, and leaned against his shoulder. “What did you look for?” he asked.

“The end, for all of you,” Fëanor said, voice hoarse. It shouldn’t have been surprising, really, that he would seek for the worst things first. His eyes were red, though whatever tears he had shed were long dry. “And Cáno, left behind—” His voice broke, and he closed his eyes, covering his face with a hand. “I don’t know how it came to that. I don’t—I never wanted—”

“I know. Atya—” 

“Do not comfort me, Curufinwë. Let me sit with this, all that I wrought.”

“No.” Curufin sat up, turning so he sat facing his father, rather than side by side, and laid a hand on his arm. “The point isn’t to punish you, Atya. The time for all that is long over, for all of us. We have all come to terms with what we did, as much as we ever can; we’ve done what we could to atone, though little enough has ever been asked of us. The past is still heavy, but it no longer drags us backward when we look to the future. We do not want that for you—we do not want you to lose yourself in the darkness.”

“I am long overdue for—”

“No, you aren’t. That’s not what this is for. I told you yesterday that it is your understanding that we need—we need you to see us, to know us as you once did, for all that we are and not just the things that are said of us or that we wish to or can share with words. The palantír shows you nothing but the truth unvarnished, good or bad, without anything embellished or left out. Look for us during the Long Peace next. That time shaped us as much as all that came after, and in much better ways. We were happy, for such a long time—and the battle that you led, though it ended with your death, made that possible.”

“Yet it all ended in fire.”

“Yes, it did. The Oath slept, and our Doom waited, but neither could be escaped forever. Remember, though, Atya: it was all so long ago. Morgoth is locked away beyond the Doors of Night, and Sauron is no more, and we have all passed through Mandos and come out again. We are all here.”

Fëanor did not lower his hand. “But not whole.”

“Whole enough. Have you seen those pieces of ceramic—bowls and cups and things—that were broken but repaired afterward with gold?”

“Your mother has some.”

“Think of us like that.” Curufin imagined Gandalf chuckling to himself somewhere, remembering how he had used that same metaphor to try to get them to see themselves and one another more clearly, to see that it was possible to move forward—to come back together in a way that could never be exactly the same, but could still be beautiful. “We’re all like that, all of us who lived and fought in Middle-earth. And—if you saw the cups at Ammë’s house, then know that it was Cáno who made those repairs. He learned how in Imladris.” He let go of Fëanor’s arm, sighing. “When you do want comfort, you know where to find me.”

Fëanor caught his hand before he could rise to his feet. “I love you, Curufinwë,” he said quietly. “It feels as though I cannot say it enough.”

“I know you do, Atya. I love you too, so much.” Curufin leaned down to kiss the top of his head. “Please be kind to yourself.”

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Autumn passed and gave way to winter’s chill. Imloth Ningloron got no more than the occasional frost—Celebrían disliked the bitter cold, and had chosen her home well—but the air took on a bite. Maglor also disliked the cold, but he enjoyed wintertime—the cozy fires and the long nights of mulled wine and music. The weeks slipped past both quickly and not, punctuated by the occasional letter from Curufin or Caranthir in Tirion. Curufin had given Fëanor the palantír, but he was reticent concerning what Fëanor had seen or what they had spoken of afterward. Whether that was his own choice or because Fëanor himself wouldn’t speak of it, Maglor couldn’t tell.

Indis returned to Tirion before Midwinter, but Míriel lingered until after the holiday, when she bid them farewell and departed to make her way back to Vairë’s halls. “I will see you in Tirion next year, perhaps,” she said to Maglor, taking both his hands and rising onto her toes to kiss his forehead. “Thank you for writing this song, Macalaurë. It is so important—even if it does not move the Valar as we hope.”

Some days later, Maglor sat in his room, feet up on his desk, chewing on the end of his pencil as he regarded the blank pieces of paper in front of him. The song would do nothing at all if he could not write it, and yet no words would come to him. Rain drummed on the window, and Pídhres curled up on the seat in front of it, tail twitching as she dreamed. A fire burned cheerfully on the hearth, less for the heat than for the sound of it, though Maglor had woken that morning feeling faintly chilled, as he rarely did these days; combined with his struggle to think of a single line it made for a more sour mood than he’d suffered since leaving Lórien. It was the sort of mood that made him want to throw all that he had written into the fire, and to prevent himself from doing so in a fit of pique he’d locked it all away in a drawer, leaving out only the blank sheets to taunt him.

A knock at the door heralded Elrond. “Daeron said you were writing this morning,” he said, setting a tea tray down near the fire. “Care for a break?”

“I haven’t written a single word,” Maglor sighed, lowering his feet to the floor.

“The song for Finwë?” Elrond asked as Maglor joined him by the hearth. 

“Yes.” 

“I thought it was going well.”

“Yes, well…that was before I was told its real purpose.” Maglor accepted a cup of tea, steaming and dark, fragrant with spices. It was his favorite, and had been since his youth. Coming to Valinor and finding it still popular and still tasting just as he remembered had been an unexpected delight. “Míriel and Indis wish for me to sing it before the Valar.”

Elrond looked at him in surprise. “Why?” he asked. Then, “Oh—oh, I understand.”

“I told them it won’t work,” Maglor said. He sat down and crossed his legs in his seat, glad of the heat from the tea and from the fire. “I’m no Lúthien—I’m no one the Valar will listen to, in song or otherwise.”

“I presume this is to be kept secret?”

“More or less—not least because I’ll never finish the song if I know everyone is expecting the impossible of me. Bad enough Míriel and Indis are, but at least I know you won’t. I’ve told Daeron and Maedhros too.”

“What did they say?”

“They tried to be encouraging.” Maglor leaned back in his seat and stared at the fire. “It is by the Valar’s own judgment that Finwë remains in Mandos. Of all people, how can I be the one to change their minds?”

“It is a new Age,” Elrond said. “Anything is possible, as Celebrimbor likes to say. The Valar have relented before.”

“I am no Eärendil, either. Maybe you should sing it. It’s your family that’s done all the impossible things.”

Elrond smiled, but didn’t rise to the joke. “You will be a grandson singing for his grandfather. There is much I think the Valar still do not understand about us Children, but they understand love and sorrow. Nienna will hear you, at least.”

They sat in silence for a while, sipping their tea and listening to the rain and to the crackle of the flames. Maglor found himself thinking of another rainy afternoon, far away and long ago in Rivendell, when he was always cold, before he had gotten his voice back, and long before he had been able to even think of writing songs, let alone singing before such an audience as all the Valar together. Elrond had spoken to him then of Rings and of dangers and uncertainties, seeking to reassure but really just adding to the pile of fears Maglor had been trapped under, feeling like he was slowly suffocating. Those fears had not come to pass, in the end, but it was still a relief to look at Elrond’s hand now and see that Vilya was not there. He was deeply grateful for the Elven Rings, and proud of Celebrimbor for having made them, but they had been as much a burden as a blessing, as well as an ever-growing danger. 

“You never met Finwë,” Maglor said after a while, after he dragged his thoughts back to the present. “But it feels wrong not to ask you, too: what would you hear, in this song for him?”

Elrond did not answer right away. By the window Pídhres stretched out all her limbs before curling back up into a small grey ball, face disappearing behind her tail. Finally, Elrond said, “His legacy. There is Fëanor of course, and the Silmarils, and Celebrimbor and his Rings and the glories of Eregion, and of course you and all your brothers—don’t make that face, you know what I mean. And had he not wed Indis—still Morgoth would have been released, still he would have sought to sow discord among the Eldar, and who knows what form it might have taken? Still, I think, he would have destroyed the Trees, and brought war to Middle-earth. Yet without the children of Finwë and Indis, how would it have gone? Eärendil would have never been. I would have never been, or Celebrían. So too is he the forefather of the race of Númenor, of Elros and all of his children after him. His strength flows in the veins of the Kings and Queens of Gondor and Arnor even now.” He had lowered his gaze to his cup as he spoke; now he looked up again at Maglor. “I have been inundated with kinsmen and -women since my coming here—I have met by now nearly all of the House of Finwë who walk again under the sun, save Finwë himself, and that is a great grief to me, though it cannot compare to the grief I know you feel.”

“He would love you,” Maglor said. “He would adore you and Celebrían and the twins—and this valley and all that you’ve built here.”

Elrond’s smile was sad, the same smile he wore at times when he spoke of Elros. “I like to think so,” he said, “but I can never know it for certain. Not while the statute holds. It is not the purpose of your song, but if you can sing a little of Númenor, of Lothlórien and Imladris, and of Lindon—those of us who followed his example to the best of our abilities, to not cower or flee before the horror of the dark…”

“I will,” Maglor said. It would grieve Finwë, he knew, to know that such strength had been necessary. He had sought to protect all his people and his children and their children from such a fate by bringing them to Valinor. But he would also, surely, be proud of those who had stood firm, who had fought the long wars and the many battles to emerge victorious, unbowed. Maglor was not one of them, but Elrond was, and Galadriel. Gil-galad had been, and Elendil and Isildur—and Aragorn, later, alongside all the Dúnedain of Gondor and Arnor. He could honor all of them as he honored Finwë. It was true, what Elrond had said: the world would be a much darker place had the children of Indis never been born. The thought of a world without Elrond, without Elros having been, made something in Maglor’s chest hurt sharply, constricting his lungs. “It is the purpose of this song, to tell of our grief—and yours is no less important than mine, to grieve the absence of one you should know but cannot.”

“It is a familiar grief, at least,” Elrond murmured. Maglor set his tea aside and moved to sit beside Elrond rather than across from him, so he could embrace him. “Oh, you don’t have to—I’m all right.”

“I know.”

“I’m so glad you’re here,” Elrond sighed, leaning his head on Maglor’s shoulder. “When you go traveling again, do you intend to go alone?”

“No. Daeron at the very least will be with me, but this won’t be at all like the last time I went away. Do you want to come to Tirion and Alqualondë with us?”

“I think so.” Elrond lifted his head. “I do not visit Tirion often enough. I traveled little after taking up Vilya because it was too much of a risk, and then it became habit.”

“I would love it if you came with us.”

Tea and conversation with Elrond lifted Maglor’s spirits, but he abandoned his attempts at writing, instead going to find his brothers and Daeron. Ambarussa were nowhere to be found, but Celegorm and Maedhros were with Daeron in one of the cozier parlors. Daeron sprawled across a sofa with his legs draped over Celegorm’s lap as he laughed at something in a letter. Maedhros had a book in a chair by the hearth, and Celegorm also had a few letters he was reading. “How goes the songwriting?” Maedhros asked as Maglor came into the room. Maglor made a face. “That well?”

“So well that I need a distraction. What news from your songbirds, Daeron?” Maglor sat on the floor by the hearth and by Maedhros’ chair, so he could lean against his knee. Maedhros’ hand dropped briefly on top of Maglor’s head. 

“Plenty of gossip that will mean absolutely nothing to anyone here,” Daeron said cheerfully. “I also have a letter from Dior who asks me to give his greetings to Celegorm.”

Celegorm looked up from his letters. “No he didn’t,” he said.

“He certainly did! Look!” Daeron handed over the paper, and Celegorm frowned down at it. “I’m sure the only reason he has not included Maglor or Maedhros is because he has not yet met them.”

“If you say so,” said Celegorm as he handed the letter back. “I don’t understand him at all.”

“I think,” Daeron said, “he would not be opposed to friendship.”

“He said that when we spoke, but I thought he was joking,” Celegorm said. “He can’t mean it. I killed him, remember?”

“And he killed you,” Daeron said. Maglor couldn’t stop himself flinching, the sudden memory of blood spilling over the dais of Menegroth’s throne room coming into his mind, and Celegorm’s white face, the sound of him gasping his last breaths— 

He blinked, and Maedhros’ hand was on his shoulder. Celegorm was too busy glaring at Daeron to have noticed. “Both of those truths should make friendship impossible,” he was saying. 

“Since when have impossibilities stopped you, Tyelko?” Maedhros asked, his tone far lighter than the grip he kept on Maglor’s shoulder. “Many impossible things have happened in recent years, haven’t they?”

“It feels that way,” Maglor murmured. “There you are, silly cat.” Pídhres had wandered in. She trotted over to climb onto his lap, accepting the scratches and pets that were her due. 

“There’s impossible and then there’s impossible,” Celegorm said. 

“That,” Daeron said, “makes no sense.”

“Of course it makes sense—”

“Have they been doing that all day?” Maglor asked Maedhros as Celegorm and Daeron began debating various definitions of the word impossible. 

“Yes,” Maedhros said. “You have no room to complain—you used to do exactly the same thing and were much more annoying about it.”

“Well, I’m not going to join in today. Words have failed me utterly and I have forgotten all their meanings.” Maglor leaned against his legs again. “What are you reading?”

“An account of the wars with Angmar.”

“Whatever for?”

“Was I supposed to spend all winter listening to tales of the War of the Ring and the Witch-king’s defeat and not be curious?”

“Why not just ask Cáno?” Celegorm said.

Maglor rolled his eyes. “About Angmar? I never even heard that name until I came to Rivendell. I think I must have been very far south when all that was going on—in Harad, maybe.” He couldn’t really be sure. Maglor had ceased counting years very early on in his wandering—but he did think he would have at least heard rumors of trouble in the north if he had been in Eriador at the time. The birds that flew south down the rivers had always had snatches of news, and the rivers themselves sometimes carried hints of what was going on elsewhere in their courses, though none of it ever gave a complete picture. “In fact, I am the worst person to ask about anything that happened between the War of Wrath and the War of the Ring. All the news and rumors I ever heard were years out of date and terribly jumbled.”

He spoke lightly, and meant it lightly, but Celegorm frowned at him. “That sounds horribly lonely, Cáno,” he said.

“It was. But it wasn’t all misery. For most of that time I wasn’t really unhappy.” He hadn’t been happy either, but there had been a certain contentment, a certain freedom in the isolation. “Stop looking at me like I just kicked Huan, Celegorm. I’m fine now.”

Celegorm shoved Daeron’s legs off his lap and got up, sitting down on Maglor’s lap instead and dislodging Pídhres, who jumped up onto Maedhros’ lap with an annoyed yowl. He was bigger than Maglor, so it was like Huan had come to sit on him. “Oof—Tyelkormo—”

“Why are we all sitting on Maglor?” Amrod asked as he and Amras came into the room. 

“Please don’t,” Maglor said, as Celegorm hooked an arm around him and leaned his head on his shoulder. “Honestly, Tyelko, wouldn’t it have been worse if I knew first-hand all that went on in Angmar and such places?”

“Depends on how you knew,” said Celegorm. “If you’d gone to Elrond—”

“Well I didn’t, so—”

“And that was stupid of you, wasn’t it?”

“Behave, children,” Maedhros said. He leaned over to yank on one of Celegorm’s braids. “It was a long time ago now, Tyelko.”

“And I’m fine,” Maglor repeated. “Or I would be if I didn’t have a great big—oh for—Ambarussa!” Both twins joined Celegorm in piling on top of him. “Nelyo, make them get off!”

“Nelyo’s always saying he doesn’t want to order us around anymore,” Amras said smugly. Then, “Are you upset today, Cáno?”

“He’s just grumpy,” Daeron said unhelpfully from where he’d taken over the entire sofa after Celegorm’s departure. “I daresay he’s cold, too.”

“Someone will be cold later tonight,” Maglor said, “and it won’t be me.” Daeron laughed as Huan wandered into the room. He saw the pile around Maglor and Maedhros and, of course, joined it. “All of you except Pídhres are terrible and I hate you.” 

“Oh, Cáno,” said Amrod after they were done laughing at him, “that reminds me—Amras and I have been thinking about your song for Finwë.”

“Yes?”

“He was warm,” said Amras. “Not like Atya was hot, but not not like that. Do you know what we mean?”

“Yes,” said Celegorm and Maglor together. 

“I don’t know how you can put that into a song, though,” said Amrod. 

“You let me worry about that,” said Maglor. “You’re not all going to get your own verse or something, but everything you tell me helps to…give it all shape. It tells me something of him, and the more I know and understand, the better I can put it all into words.” Assuming he could find the words at all. It had been days since he’d put anything down on paper, and even then he’d scratched most of it out almost immediately. He was looking forward to the coming of spring, which would bring Elemmírë from Valmar. Even just talking of music in general with her had always helped him before when he’d gotten stuck, better than anything else.

“Will you tell me more of Finwë?” Daeron asked. He rolled over onto his stomach, resting his head on his arms as he looked at them.

“Didn’t you ever meet him?” Celegorm asked.

“A few times, but I was very young and never took much interest in the visitors from the Tatyar that came among us. I remember someone with a kind smile and ready laughter—actually, you sound rather like him when you laugh, Celegorm—but very little else.”

“He’s right,” Maedhros said. “You do sound like him, Tyelko.”

Maglor stayed quiet as his brothers spoke more of Finwë, telling stories of their youth—the funny stories, the ones that didn’t hurt to remember. Their father inevitably came up in those same stories, but it was easier to talk and hear about him, too, when he was not the focus. Ambarussa shifted around, slowly, so that they were not sitting on top of Maglor anymore, though Amrod still leaned against him, while Amras sprawled out on the rug with Huan. 

Eventually someone called Daeron away, and Maglor’s brothers fell silent. Maedhros returned to his book, and Celegorm leaned his head on Maglor’s shoulder again. Maglor reached up to tug on his braids. “Stop worrying,” he said. 

“I’m not.”

“Then stop thinking about whatever it is that’s upsetting you.”

“Don’t you think about it—about all that time you spent…?”

Maglor sighed. “Not the way you do. I meant it when I said I wasn’t unhappy. For most of that time I wasn’t, even if I was lonely.”

“Isn’t being lonely unhappy in itself?” Amrod asked. 

“I got used to it, after a while,” said Maglor. “And—and I miss it, sometimes.” It wasn’t something he’d really intended to admit out loud, not to his brothers, but the words escaped almost of their own accord. “I miss those shores. The seabirds, and the dunes, and the stones. The Sea.” They were wild and empty of Men or Elves, and if they were desolate they were also so beautiful. He’d made many songs for them, though he’d written none down and had never sung them except to himself and to the waves and the stars. Maybe he should sing them sometime, he thought, looking between his brothers’ faces. “Please don’t look like that. I’m trying to reassure you.”

“You’re doing a terrible job of it,” said Amrod. “We all saw you when you came here, remember?”

“That wasn’t—that was—if Dol Guldur had never happened, I would have been very different. I’m speaking of the years before it.” If Dol Guldur had never happened, though, he might never have come west. He would never have sought out Galadriel or even Elrond on his own. Maybe Daeron would have found him before taking ship himself, but maybe not. It was easy to imagine a world in which he never returned among his own people, in which he remained in Middle-earth forever, watching it all change around him. That was not a world he wished for now, but it was one in which he could imagine himself having been content, maybe even really happy given enough time. But of course that wasn’t something he could ever say aloud, not to anyone. 

“Whatever happened, or didn’t happen,” Maedhros said, dropping his hand to rest on top of Maglor’s head again, “Cáno is here now.”

“And I’m very happy, except for how I can’t feel my legs anymore.”

“You were unhappy earlier,” Celegorm said.

“Not all my bad moods are a sign of something dire, Tyelko. Lórien didn’t turn me into someone of constant and irrepressible cheerfulness, and thank goodness for that because I’d want to strangle myself if it was so. I wasn’t thinking of the past at all until Maedhros spoke of Angmar. And I really can’t feel my legs, so can you please get off me?”

He did get off, but only so he could lie down with his head in Maglor’s lap instead. Maglor stretched out his legs with a dramatic sigh of relief, to make Ambarussa laugh. Amrod asked, “Why are you in a bad mood today, Cáno?”

“Writing is impossible.”

“Oh, it’s that kind of bad mood,” said Amras. “It can’t be so impossible, if you’re only mildly grumpy about it. You used to treat it like the worst disaster in the world. The only thing worse that ever happened to you was when Curvo spilled that glue all over your hair.”

“That was one of the worst things to ever happen to me,” said Maglor. “It also ruined my favorite shirt—”

“And then you refused to go out in public for weeks,” said Amrod, “because you had to cut your hair short. You know it’s very strange now, how little you care for what you look like.”

“You spend centuries wandering around the wilds where no one can see you, and then see how much you care for ribbons,” said Maglor.

“We did!” Amras laughed. “You’ll have to get back into the habit, though, if you’re going to visit Tirion and Alqualondë and all those places.”

“Ugh,” said Maglor, just so they would laugh again. He didn’t mind, it just felt strange. Jewelry was heavier than he remembered, and doing more than just pinning his hair back or braiding it into a simple plait was usually more than he cared to take the time for—half the time he didn’t even bother with that.

Eventually, Ambarussa dragged Celegorm away outside, as the rain started to ease, and Maglor left Maedhros to his history books. He found Galadriel in the weaving room. It was not empty, but there were only a few others there, across the room, so he joined Galadriel at her loom to watch her work. “How goes your songwriting?” she asked, and laughed when he made a face again. “You’ll get there, Macalaurë.”

“I hope so.”

“Is there anything I can do to help?”

“No, not yet—I haven’t written enough to be worth showing to anyone.”

“Daeron tells me you intend to go to Taur-en-Gellam this summer. To speak to Thingol?”

“Yes. He and Finwë were close in friendship, and it seems wrong not to speak to him.”

“I agree,” Galadriel said. “Daeron also says you must be careful about the timing of your visit. I thought he was joking before, when he said he intended to time his return to be the most amusing.”

“And profitable,” Maglor said. Galadriel laughed. “Whenever we go, it will be after Elemmírë’s visit here. She’s eager to meet Daeron.”

“Eager also, I think, to consult with you both about this festival that Ingwë is planning.”

“Do you know anything about that? All I’ve heard are the vaguest rumors.”

“I think it is something that has been on his mind since you returned,” Galadriel said. “Or perhaps I should say since Círdan came. There are many who have not yet come to these shores, either through Mandos or by ship, but so many have, and it is an opportunity now to gather together more of the Eldar than has been possible since the start of the Great Journey.”

“Oh,” said Maglor. “That is something to celebrate, I suppose.” It also felt, alarmingly, like a deadline. If he could finish his song and if it could sway the Valar before this festival… 

Better not to think of it, not if he wanted to ever write another word again. 

“It has been spoken of off and on for years,” Galadriel said as she passed her shuttle through the threads of her loom, swiftly and steadily, “and it is only lately that anything like real planning has started to take place. Your return from Lórien, I think, will speed things along even further. No one wished to hold such an event without all three of you—Elemmírë, Macalaurë, and Daeron.”

“That’s what my brothers said,” Maglor said. “I hope I won’t be a disappointment.”

Galadriel glanced at him. “Your view of yourself remains crooked, I see,” she said. 

“I am different,” Maglor said. “No one can deny that.”

“Different does not mean lesser.”

“No, but it might mean disappointment to those who expect what I was before.”

Galadriel sighed and rolled her eyes just in time for Finrod to see as he wandered into the room. “Oh dear,” he said, grinning. “What have you done now, Maglor?”

“Perhaps you can say that his voice being different is no disappointment, as he fears, and be believed,” Galadriel said.

“Why would it be? It’s not that different, anyway.” Finrod joined Maglor on the windowsill, bumping their shoulders together. “When I first heard you sing, after you arrived in Avallónë, I was delighted—or, no, not quite delighted. I was relieved. You were so melancholy I feared you would not have the heart for music at all.”

Maglor shook his head. “That hasn’t been true in a long time,” he said.

Finrod frowned. “It was once true, though?”

“Macalaurë was entirely silent, upon his coming from Dol Guldur,” Galadriel murmured. 

“I hadn’t heard that,” said Finrod. “What happened?”

“It took less than a year for Elrond to lift that last curse,” said Maglor. “But there was…there was a time when I almost did not want him to. It seemed safer—the silence. It seemed safer to keep my music beyond my reach, even though I missed it desperately.” He thought now that it would have meant his fading, to refuse to find his voice again, or if he had not been able to make his way back to music afterward; it was too much a part of him to go without for so long, however much he had feared it.

“Why?” Finrod asked. “How could that have kept you safe?”

“It was what he wanted of me. If I couldn’t do it I couldn’t give it to him. I don’t think I could have explained it like that at the time, it just…it was just all a tangle of fear and hurt. But I did get my voice back, and I did start to make music again—even if it is different now than it once was.” 

“Not so different,” Finrod said again. 

“Maybe it just feels different for me, then. I’m not afraid anymore, though.”

“Good,” said Finrod. “You were horribly afraid when you first came here, though I couldn’t tell of what.”

“Lots of things,” said Maglor, managing a small smile. “And almost all of them were pointless in the end. But it’s still true that my music is not what it once was, and just because you were happy to hear me again doesn’t mean others won’t be disappointed.”

“Anyone who is, isn’t worth worrying about,” said Finrod. 

“I know. I’m not afraid anymore, but that doesn’t mean I’m not nervous. If I perform at this festival of Ingwë’s, it will be my largest audience since…” He tried to think. “It might be the largest audience I have ever sung for.” It would be the easiest thing in the world, though, compared to singing before all the Valar. Maglor tried to quash that thought. It still wasn’t helpful. He did not want to tell Finrod or Galadriel the purpose of his song for Finwë—not yet, at least. Maybe when he had it written they could help him turn it into something the Valar might listen to. 

“What is troubling you, Macalaurë?” Galadriel asked. “You do not have to perform at this festival if you do not wish to. No one will insist on it.”

“No, it’s not that. I’m just—thinking too much, I suppose.”

Finrod poked him in the temple. “Well, stop it. Whatever you choose to do, you know, we’re all very glad to have you back. All of you, in fact. Before you returned hardly anyone ever saw Celegorm or the twins, and Caranthir never came to Tirion, and Maedhros only came when Fingon dragged him. Curufin was a little better, but only because of Celebrimbor.”

“It wasn’t really me that brought them all back together,” Maglor said. 

“Yes, I know. It was your father. But he only came back out of Mandos because of you, you know.” Maglor looked away. “Maedhros said your hand hurt too, when you saw him again.”

“It did, but not for long.”

“Any time at all is too long,” said Finrod. He took Maglor’s hand in his, turning it over to reveal the scars. “Maedhros only has the memory of these,” he said. “Do yours ever hurt otherwise? In the usual way of old injuries, I mean?”

“It used to get stiff in the cold,” said Maglor, “but I met Nienna by Ekkaia, and it hasn’t ached like that since.” Her tears had fallen on it, chasing away the stiffness and the chill. He almost had not noticed afterward how it had never come back. 

“I am glad she found you there,” Galadriel said. “I think you sorely needed her, then.”

“I suppose I did, though at the time I came away feeling rather…flayed open.”

“She has that effect, I’m afraid,” Finrod said. “Did she help you sort out whatever it was that lay between you and Maedhros? I still don’t quite understand what that was.”

“She seemed so certain there was a way forward. I suppose that did help—it was something I kept coming back to. But Maedhros…it was hard, seeing him then, because he seemed so unchanged, as though Mandos had done nothing for him. To look at him was to see Beleriand breaking apart again, at…at the very end, when he was lost to me.” 

“Seeing your father hurt him deeply,” said Finrod. “Before that he was…he was far from happy, but he had roused himself enough to come here to speak to Elrond.”

“I know. And it doesn’t matter now—we both went to Lórien, and we both found what we needed. Except whatever it is that will resolve what lies between us and our father still.” He looked down at his scars, his hand still resting in Finrod’s. Galadriel continued her weaving, the rhythm of the loom steady and unceasing. Thinking of his father made him think again of his song. “I had heard that your father does not like visitors. Would one of you write to him for me?”

“Oh, he’s much more lax about it now,” said Finrod, “but I’ll go to speak with him for you, unless you intend to go to Alqualondë before Midsummer.”

“I don’t know what my plans are. I may go to Taur-en-Gellam first, or I may go to Tirion—and from Tirion I might as well go to Alqualondë. I very much doubt, though, that I will leave here before Midsummer.”

“Well, just let me know what your plans are when you know them. Either way, my father will be glad to see you.” Finrod paused, and then said, “I told Maedhros he might benefit from speaking to my father. Perhaps you will, too. Not only of Finwë, but also of Fëanor.”

“I think Fëanáro was quite surprised to find his youngest brother so stubborn or slow to forgive,” Galadriel murmured. “He kept himself apart from the feuding, long ago, but after so many long years carrying the burden of the crown he no longer fears to speak his mind.”

“I think Fëanáro has been surprised by almost all of us,” said Finrod. “Even Findis.”

“I think Findis rather surprised everyone,” said Maglor. Both Galadriel and Finrod laughed. “At least no one ended up in the fishpond this summer.”

“Oh, no one was complaining when your father ended up in it,” Finrod laughed. “My only regret is that I did not witness it myself.”

“It was an important lesson for Fëanáro, I think,” Galadriel said serenely, “in what it means to have siblings. Sometimes you end up with a well-deserved black eye, and algae in your hair. I think it speaks very well of him that he was able to laugh about it afterward.”

“I suppose,” said Maglor. He could not picture his father laughing. Not outside hazy long-ago memories. It was impossible to picture him at any stage of life soaking wet with pond weeds sticking to him and mud up to his knees.

He and Finrod left Galadriel to her weaving. Finrod threw his arm around Maglor’s shoulders. “How did you manage to return to your music?” he asked. 

It had been a rainy winter night, Maglor remembered. He had woken from a terrible nightmare and opened his window in spite of the horrible cold, just to feel the rain on his skin. Afterward it had ended and the clouds had parted, and the silver moonlight had shone through the window onto the harp his brothers had made, that had survived the downfall of Beleriand and all the long centuries afterward. “I think it was the rain,” he said. “I could hear the Music in it, one night in the dead of winter in Imladris, in the rain and in the river. I’d lost that in the dark, and it…it felt as though I had been struck deaf as well as mute. I suppose that is what gave me the courage to put my fingers to the harp strings again, though it was still years before I could do it outside of my own room with the door firmly locked.”

“I’m sorry,” Finrod said quietly, all smiles gone. “I wish that had not happened to you, Maglor. You did not deserve it.”

“I wish it hadn’t happened either. But it’s what brought me to Lothlórien, in the end, and then to Imladris. I don’t know that I would have ever sought out Elrond or Galadriel on my own.”

Finrod smiled, though it was tinged with melancholy. “So it ever goes in the Third Theme,” he said. “Out of great sorrow and suffering comes hope and victory at the last.”

“Yes,” Maglor said. “I have thought of that often ever since.”

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Spring came with bright sunshine and an explosion of flowers throughout the valley. The gardens were carpeted with crocuses and daffodils, and the house was soon filled with the latter by the vase-full, bright yellow and sweet-smelling. It also brought talk from Nerdanel of returning home, and Maedhros found himself increasingly eager to be back there too. Even with the expansions built onto it since he had left for Lórien, it was much smaller than the sprawling house of Elrond and Celebrían, and as comfortable as Imloth Ningloron was, Maedhros found himself missing his own small cozy bedroom, and the kitchen that was always halfway to chaos in spite of Caranthir’s efforts, and the plum orchard that would be blooming soon, and the little river beyond where he’d found quiet solitude under the willow trees—for such a long time the only place he’d felt anything close to peace. 

Ambarussa announced their intention to go home with Maedhros and Nerdanel, and thence to Tirion to “bother Curvo and Moryo.” So they said in front of Nerdanel, but later Amrod confessed to Maedhros that they intended to go to Fëanor. “You can tell Ammë,” Maedhros said. 

“We don’t want to get her hopes up, in case it goes horribly,” said Amrod. “Have you heard anything from Curvo lately?”

“Not about Atar. Do you really think it will go badly?”

They sat together in the gazebo out on the water; it was late, and the moon was up, turning the water to liquid silver. The night was cool but not cold. A few bats flitted about, dark shapes against the starry sky. Amrod shifted in his seat, and crossed his legs. “I don’t know,” he said. “I don’t think so—we have spoken to him before, even if it was just polite greetings and empty chatter because we were surrounded by other people. It’s always awkward but I don’t feel badly about it afterward or anything. I don’t know what to feel about him still. It’s just—well, I don’t know. I just…I want to have a father again. It feels as though we—Ambarussa and I—that we haven’t really had one since we were so very small. I miss him.”

Maedhros held out his arms, and Amrod all but fell into them. Maedhros rested his hand on the back of his head. “You never seemed unhappy when you were young.”

“We weren’t. It’s only looking back now that we can see what we did not have. And he did apologize for it, in those letters he wrote us. He told Amras that if he could go back he would forget about the Silmarils if it meant he could spend that time with us instead. It’s impossible, of course, but it’s…nice that he would want to.”

“It is,” Maedhros said.

“You don’t believe it, though.”

“I don’t know what I believe anymore, Ambarussa. I want to believe there’s something to salvage. Maybe there is for you, even if not for me.”

“We never really thought about our father-names before we got those letters,” Amrod said. He rested his head on Maedhros’ chest and sighed. “Small and Last—that’s me and Amras.”

“Did he tell you why?”

“No, but it isn’t that hard to figure out, is it? I don’t know. It never bothered me before, and I don’t know if it does now. He was the only one that ever called us Pityafinwë and Telufinwë, anyway. It’s just, you know. Another little thing on top of all the other things.”

He did know. It seemed like such a small thing in the face of all the bigger things that had happened later, but names were important. They meant something—and Ambarussa had been born before the work on the Silmarils began, before the whispers had started, before Fëanor began to withdraw, distracted and increasingly agitated and angry. “Will you ask him, do you think?”

“No. I don’t really want to know what he’ll say. I would rather look forward than back. I think it bothers Amras more than me, though—maybe we’ll ask Ammë about it instead.”

“It may be that you can’t move forward without looking back,” Maedhros said. He had done a lot of looking back, though until he had gone to Lórien it hadn’t done him any good. Getting caught in circling thoughts of bitter regrets and what-ifs wasn’t healing, but looking at what had happened and why, and acknowledging which parts of it were your fault and which were out of your control—it had been a long and painful process, but he’d come out of it able to see everything more clearly. 

Well, almost everything.

Amrod hummed softly. “Maybe.”

“Whatever happens, will you come tell me about it?”

Amrod sat up to look at Maedhros. “You really want to hear about Atar?” he asked.

“I want to hear about you,” he said, “and to know that you’re all right—however it goes.”

“You don’t have to wor—”

“I’m still your elder brother, and you’re still my youngest baby brothers.” Maedhros tugged on one of Amrod’s braids. “I’m always going to worry about you. The least you can do is indulge me in this.”

“All right, of course we’ll come see you afterward. But we aren’t babies.”

“Tell that to someone whose hair you didn’t spit up in.”

A few days later, as Maedhros finished packing his things, Maglor came into his room, dropping onto his back from behind to wrap his arms around him. “I’ll miss you, Nelyo,” he said into Maedhros’ hair.

“I’ll see you in a few months, at most,” said Maedhros, “won’t I?”

“What’s that got to do with anything?”

Maedhros ducked forward and flipped Maglor over his shoulders. He went with a yelp, landing with a thump on the rug. Maedhros leaned down to kiss his forehead. “I’ll miss you too, Cáno. I really am looking forward to being at home, though.”

“Oh, I know.” Maglor smiled up at him, looking for a moment as young and bright as he had been long ago when the Trees still shone. “You know Tyelko’s worried you’ll slip back into old habits.”

“I am thoroughly sick of the word brooding,” Maedhros said. “I haven’t brooded since Lórien.”

Maglor laughed. “I know that. You might want to reacquaint Tyelko with the definition of the word.”

“I’ll do it while I dunk him in the river.”

Maglor sat up, and Maedhros returned to making sure he had everything in his saddle bags. “I thought you were going to burn that sketchbook,” he said, seeing it poking out of one of the bags.

“I am. I want to do it at home.” He could have destroyed it at any time over the winter, he supposed, but he wasn’t the one who cleaned the grates here and he didn’t want anyone to stumble upon anything that didn’t quite burn up. At home no one touched his small bedroom hearth except himself. 

“Just be sure Ammë doesn’t see it.”

“Be sure Ammë doesn’t see what?” Nerdanel asked, appearing in the open doorway. 

“Just old drawings,” Maedhros said as Maglor made an apologetic face at him. “They’re awful; you don’t want to see them.”

“Awful in what way, Maitimo?”

“Awful in the way you’re probably imagining.” He shoved the book down to the bottom of the bag and pulled the drawstring shut. He got to his feet and went to embrace Nerdanel. “I have plenty of other drawings I want to show you.”

“All right,” she said, sounding doubtful. “Should I be worried?”

“No, Ammë. I drew them in Lórien—it did help. The drawings helped all along.” It had been at Nerdanel’s insistence that he’d even picked up a pencil to begin with, that he had something to do that wasn’t—well, that wasn’t brooding. “I needed to get the terrible things out of my head and onto the paper, and destroying them will be part of it—but now it’s mostly because I don’t want to keep them.” 

“It’s like lancing an infected wound,” said Maglor behind him. “Though maybe that’s not a good comparison if you’ve never seen such a wound.” 

“I haven’t and have no wish to, but I do understand making something just to destroy it,” said Nerdanel, her frown fading away. “As long as it really helped, Maitimo.”

“It did.”

“And, Macalaurë, do you still plan to come to Tirion this summer?”

“Sometime this summer, maybe the fall,” said Maglor. “Depends on how long Elemmírë stays here, and then whether Daeron and I go to Taur-en-Gellam first. Definitely after Midsummer—we’re staying here for that.”

“You are vague with your plans, aren’t you?” Nerdanel asked, amusement taking over the concern. “I hope you weren’t like this in Beleriand.”

“He was worse,” Maedhros said, just so Maglor would look affronted. He wasn’t disappointed.

“I beg your pardon, my Lord of Himring!”

“Oh come off it,” said Maedhros. “More than half the time I never knew when I might expect to see you next.”

“During the Long Peace, maybe. I was busy. But I always came when you were expecting me,” Maglor said. He got to his feet. “Anyway, it’s not as though any great plans will fall apart if I don’t come to Tirion before autumn. I haven’t been given any imminent deadline for this song, and it’s too important to rush through it.”

“I thought Daeron just wanted to time his return to Taur-en-Gellam so someone could win a bet,” Maedhros said.

“Well, there’s that too.” Maglor joined them in the doorway to kiss Nerdanel. “I’ll write before I come to Tirion, Ammë, don’t worry.”

“Good. Your grandparents will want to see you—and your cousins.”

“I want to see them, too. It will be a much merrier meeting this time, I promise.” Maglor smiled and left them. 

Maedhros went back to his packing, and Nerdanel wandered through the room, pausing by the sketchbook he’d left open on the desk. “These are lovely,” she said. “You have a gift for portraiture, Maitimo.”

“I must get it from you,” he said as he finished securing everything.

“Will you return to painting at home?”

“Yes. I’m looking forward to it.” Maedhros looked up and smiled when she glanced back at him. “Really, Ammë.”

“I believe you. You do still seem terribly grim at times, Maitimo, when you think no one’s looking.”

“I can’t help what my face looks like when I’m not paying attention,” he said. “I can’t ever be what I was before—”

“I know that.”

“—but I’m not unhappy. I feel—I feel much like I did during the Long Peace, I think. I wasn’t unhappy then, either. I was very happy for much of it.” He had been dreaming lately of Himring, of its building and of just—seeing it, living there. He missed it, the way that Maglor missed the seashores, and the way that Caranthir would probably never admit that he missed Thargelion. He couldn’t decide if knowing that its walls still stood was a comfort or if it just made missing it worse. He could not think of a place where he had ever felt safer, even in Aman. It was also the one thing he couldn’t get right in any of his drawings, no matter what he did.

“Are you happy now?” Nerdanel asked, because there was a difference between not being unhappy and actually being happy, and of course she would know it.

“I am. I’ve been happier since leaving Lórien than I have since—since I can’t remember when.” The difference between now and the Long Peace, of course, was that there was no Shadow looming over them, no Enemy to watch, no reason to carry weapons wherever they went just in case—nothing to fear.

They left Imloth Ningloron the next day with Ambarussa—and with Aechen, who made the journey in a little basket that Celebrían had found for him to hang off of Maedhros’ saddle. Celegorm remained behind with Maglor, but promised that he would come back to Nerdanel’s house soon—either with Maglor, or whenever Maglor left for Taur-en-Gellam. Both he and Maglor held on very tightly when they embraced Maedhros. Fingon cheerfully promised to come drag Maedhros to Tirion for Midsummer, whether he wanted to go or not. Elrond said farewell with a warm smile. The journey was sunny and warm and not long. It felt odd not to be traveling with Maglor, but though Maedhros missed him immediately it wasn’t painful. They would never go long without seeing one another again, and there would be letters and messages flying back and forth in between.

Nerdanel’s house was the same as it had been when Maedhros had left it, except of course that there was a new wing attached, stretching back through where the garden had been before, finished long enough ago that it no longer looked quite new. The garden had moved accordingly, and expanded and changed. Roses climbed the walls alongside ivy, and the plum orchard that lay between and behind Nerdanel and her parents’ house was all in bloom, pale pink and sweet-smelling. “Is it just new bedrooms?” he asked as they approached.

“Yes, mostly. There is a workroom downstairs for Carnistir.”

“I spin the threads,” Amrod said with a smile, “and he dyes them, and then…I’m not sure what happens to them after that. He must take them to Tirion or something, because he’s not doing any weaving or anything here.”

“Some,” Nerdanel said. “The rest goes to Imloth Ningloron.”

They left their horses in Mahtan’s stable; Mahtan and Ennalótë were away, and so the four of them returned alone to Nerdanel’s house. Maedhros set Aechen down in the garden and watched him disappear around the hawthorn tree and into a patch of fennel, and then followed Ambarussa inside. His room was, as Caranthir had promised, untouched. It was much smaller than his room in Imloth Ningloron, with white-washed walls and a plain wooden floor laid over with a couple of braided rugs. The bed was tucked against the wall by the window that looked out past the orchard toward the river, which glittered in the sunshine, the banks full of reeds and bulrushes, the fields on either side full of dandelions. Come summer there would be daisies and buttercups and queen’s lace all in bloom too. Across from the bed was a wardrobe and a desk, and a small bookshelf that was mostly empty. Maedhros went to drop his bags onto the bed, but found two rolled up bundles there already. He took them for rugs first, before realizing they must be tapestries. 

“Where did these come from?” he asked Amras when he caught sight of him passing by the door.

“Where did what come from?” Amras peered into the room. “I don’t know. What are they?”

“I have no idea. Help me unroll them?” They untied the first and shook it out, Maedhros holding one corner and Amras the other. Maedhros’ breath caught at the scene woven into it, all green-gold and blue, cut through with dark grey—it was Himring, as seen from a distance riding east across Ard Galen under a wide summer sky. It was a scene he had been trying to render in pencil for years, wishing to have something to look at outside of his own memories. 

“This is Grandmother Míriel’s work,” said Amras as they laid it gently over the bed. “It almost looks as though you could step into it, doesn’t it?”

“It does,” Maedhros said faintly. He ran his fingers over the grey threads of Himring’s walls. It was exactly what he had wanted, but this tapestry must have been woven well before she ever came to Imloth Ningloron, before they had met. Even then, he had not spoken to her of Himring. She could not have known.

They unrolled the second tapestry, laying it on the bed overlapping the first. It was Himring again, but as it was now: an island rising out of the blue-grey sea, birds flying about the ramparts, rounded and worn with the passage of time and the wind and rain and waves. Beyond could be glimpsed the shores of Middle-earth, pale and distant. Trees grew around Himring’s walls, dark and hardy firs bent and twisted by the sea winds. The sky behind was streaked with pale clouds, rather than the clear blue of the first scene. Maedhros pressed his hand over his mouth, tears stinging his eyes. 

“Nelyo?” Amras put a hand on his arm. “You don’t have to keep them, you know, you can—”

“No,” Maedhros said, lowering his hand. “No, I—I do want to keep them. Both of them. They’re—I’ve wished I could see Himring again. I never thought I would.” He could have gone to Avallónë, he supposed, where there was the largest palantír ever made, put there for anyone to use who missed the eastern lands. But it would not be the same—not something he could look at whenever he wanted, whenever he felt homesick. 

“You really miss it so much?” Amras asked. 

“Don’t you? Miss Ossiriand, I mean, or any of it?”

“No. Not really. Most of our friends from then are here now, and the woods of Valinor are—well, of course they’re different, but woods are woods even still.” He stepped forward and Maedhros wrapped an arm around him, kissing the top of his head. “I’m sorry, Nelyo. I didn’t know you felt thus.”

“How could you? I never speak of it.”

“I wonder how Míriel knew.”

“Míriel weaves for Vairë. I suppose she knows a great deal without being told.” Maedhros glanced around the room. There was just enough space on the walls, if he moved the wardrobe a few inches to the left. “Help me hang them?”

Amrod and Nerdanel came to investigate when they heard the shuffling and the groan of the wardrobe as Maedhros and Amras shoved it aside. “What in the world are you doing?” Nerdanel asked. 

“Grandmother Míriel sent a gift to Nelyo, so we’re going to hang them,” Amras said. “It’s long overdue, Nelyo. This room is terribly plain.”

“Don’t you dare start sneaking more things in,” Maedhros said, seeing that glint in Amras’ eye. “I mean it, Ambarussa.”

“Well if you just painted the walls,” Amrod began. 

“If you paint my walls I’ll—”

“Boys,” Nerdanel said, though her attempt at sternness failed as she struggled not to laugh. “You have your own room to decorate as you please. You need hooks, Maitimo; I have some downstairs.”

“Really, though,” Amrod said when Nerdanel left, “you could paint the walls something more interesting. Blue, maybe—or green.” He gestured toward the tapestries. 

“I’ll think about it,” Maedhros said. 

“Or maybe murals or something,” said Amras.

“I just got back. And I’m still terrible with paints.” He’d only picked up a brush almost right before leaving for Lórien—and painting was a skill he had not needed in Beleriand, and so had never learned to do with his left hand. It would be a long time before he painted anything he wanted to hang up somewhere, let alone paint directly onto his walls.

“Well, I’m glad you want to hang these instead of putting them away somewhere,” said Amrod, going to the bed to look over the tapestries. “They’re beautiful.”

Nerdanel returned with the tools needed to hang the tapestries, and between the four of them it only took a few minutes. Ambarussa left, but Nerdanel lingered, looking at the scene of Himring as an island. “It seems a lonely place,” she said. 

“It is now, I suppose,” Maedhros said, “but it wasn’t always. And Elrond has all kinds of papers and records that were recovered from it after the War of Wrath.”

“I know, I’ve seen them.” Nerdanel took his hand and squeezed it. “Little enough is written in your own words, but I could still tell how you loved that place.”

“I did,” Maedhros said. As much as Maglor had loved his Gap, and Caranthir had loved Thargelion. Their other brothers had not been quite so attached to their own lands, Maedhros thought. But they had all loved Beleriand—Middle-earth—the mountains, the plains, the forests and the rivers. It was sometimes hard to remember, but there had been so much joy there, before doom caught up to them. 

“You could build something for yourself here, you know.”

“I know, but I like where I am. Unless you want me to—”

“You know perfectly well I like having you here. I just want to be sure it’s what you want.”

“It is.” 

Ambarussa stayed two weeks before departing for Tirion. Just after they left, Mahtan and Ennalótë arrived home. They had Maedhros’ uncle Linquendil with them, as well as his son Elessúrë. Elessúrë had been a small child when they had all departed for the east after the Darkening; Maedhros had spoken to him very little since his own return from Mandos. Maglor had been Elessúrë’s favorite cousin, but Maglor had told Maedhros that their reunion had not been a very joyful one, speaking of it early in Lórien with downcast eyes and slumped shoulders.

Elessúrë greeted Maedhros now with a little less warmth than their grandparents did, but still with a smile—and that was to be expected from a cousin who did not know him well. He had let his hair grow; it brushed his shoulders, a lighter shade of red than Maedhros’ own. He had more tattoos wound round his arms, too, intricate geometric patterns in dark ink. “You look brighter,” he said. “I’m glad. Where is Macalaurë?”

“He remains at Imloth Ningloron,” Maedhros said.

“Did Lórien help him, too?”

“It did. He’ll be glad to see you when he comes to Tirion to visit.”

“When will that be, do you think?”

“Sometime later this year.”

Elessúrë nodded. “I was not very kind to him before,” he said. “I didn’t—I didn’t know just how badly he was hurting.”

Maedhros shook his head. “He did not want you to know,” he said. “He wasn’t upset—or he was, but he didn’t blame you. That was the sort of welcome he expected to receive from everyone.” At this Elessúrë looked both horrified and abashed. “I’m sorry, Elessúrë.” He had been Maedhros’ baby cousin, too, terrified and so very small, and none of them had been able to do anything to offer comfort in the darkness—and then they had left. 

“I am too,” Elessúrë said. “I hope I can know you better now, Cousin.”

“I think I’m someone worth knowing, now,” Maedhros said. “I wasn’t before. Not really.”

Elessúrë frowned at him. “That’s a cruel thing to say about yourself.”

“It’s only true,” said Maedhros. “I was…I was caught up still in the past and everything I had done wrong, and all the fear and the horror of it. I’m not, anymore.”

“I’m glad of it,” said Elessúrë, “but should you not have left all that behind in Mandos?”

“Yes,” said Maedhros, “but I couldn’t. I don’t want to tell you any more than that, Elessúrë. You don’t need to know about it. Whatever tales you’ve heard are more than enough.”

“I’m not a child, Russandol.”

“What’s that got to do with it? I was not a child when I went to Middle-earth, and I wish that there had been someone to protect me from it. I heard once that you wanted to go with Arafinwë’s host to the War of Wrath. I’m so glad you didn’t.”

“Macalaurë said that, too. I only wanted to go to search for you.”

“In that case,” Maedhros said, “I’m even gladder that you didn’t go.”

After things settled down again, Maedhros was at last able to retreat to the little painting studio that his brothers had asked Nerdanel to make for him. It had been a storage shed, tucked into a corner of the garden behind Nerdanel’s much larger workshop. Now it was a small but bright space, with shelves along one wall filled with jars of paints and pigments, and sets of brushes, and all manner of other things he might need. There were canvases too, leaning against the wall beside the shelves, and several easels to choose from as well as a table by the window. Maedhros didn’t have any particular plans, except maybe to try to turn one of his sketches into a painting, something simple to practice colors and shading and just holding the brush correctly. Before, when he had looked at the shelves full of color, he had felt daunted. Now he felt excited as he reached for a jar of bright green pigment.

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A few weeks after Maedhros and Ambarussa left with Nerdanel, Maglor was in the library putting his notes for Finwë’s song in some kind of order, while Celegorm sat nearby flipping through a book. It wasn’t unusual for him to join Maglor in the library like this, but it was clear that he wasn’t actually seeing the words on the page. He seemed to be working his way toward speaking of something, and Maglor was content to wait until he was ready. He frowned down his own papers, and picked up his pen to scratch a few musical notations in a corner as a snatch of melody flitted through his mind. It might be nothing, but it might also be the start of something. 

“Are you working on your song?” Celegorm asked finally. 

“Yes.” Maglor looked up. “Do you want to speak of Finwë?”

“Not really.” Celegorm looked back down at his book, frowning. “It’s…it’s hard, Cáno.”

“I know. You don’t have to give me any answer if you can’t, or if you don’t want to.”

“I do want to, I just…” Celegorm blew a strand of hair out of his eyes. It settled back where it had been. “He never looked at me differently.”

“Differently?”

“Because I look—I look like Míriel. Sometimes it was like Atar couldn’t bear to look at me at all, but Grandfather never turned away or treated me any differently than he did the rest of you. I think now that it must have bothered him just as much as it bothered Atar, but he never let it show. That’s all I can think of for your song, but don’t want you to put that into it.”

“I won’t,” said Maglor. “Is that why you think you’re Atya’s least favorite, Tyelko?”

“No. Or—maybe part of it. Mostly I think I’m just—I’m too like him. I’m too angry—”

“You’re more than your anger, Tyelko,” Maglor said. “You’re more than—”

“—than all the awful things, I know. I do. I’m…I’m almost at peace with it, I think.” Celegorm looked up. “I miss him,” he said. “I miss both of them.”

“So do I.” Maglor set his papers aside and went to sit on Celegorm’s lap. It wasn’t quite fair turnabout since he was lighter, but he wrapped his arms around him, and Celegorm dropped his book to do the same, burying his face in Maglor’s shoulder. “Do you still hate him?”

“No. No, that at least I think I’ve let go.” Celegorm did not lift his head. Maglor rested a hand on the back of it. “Do you?”

“I don’t think so. I don’t want to. But I haven’t quite forgiven him, either.” But then, he’d forgiven Maedhros long before he’d realized it, so maybe that didn’t mean anything. All he knew for sure was that he felt a horrible knot of anxiety knotting tie itself up in his stomach whenever he thought of speaking to his father. That wasn’t anger. That was just fear.

“Neither have I.” Celegorm sighed. “I just—it still feels as though we’re all scattered, and…”

“Maybe the trouble is that you have not yet put down roots, like the rest of us are doing,” said Maglor as he stroked Celegorm’s hair. “Have you not returned to Oromë at all since Nelyo and I went to Lórien?”

“No. I shouldn’t have gone back to begin with, I think. I just…didn’t know what else to do. I still don’t.”

“It doesn’t have to be any one thing, Tyelko.”

“I know.”

“Have you tried making things?”

The library door opened before Celegorm could answer, and Elrohir came in. “There you are, Maglor,” he said. “Come downstairs; Elemmírë is coming down the road—she and Findis.”

“Findis?” Maglor repeated, startled, as Celegorm lifted his head.

“Yes, I saw her banner.”

Maglor got up, and Celegorm followed. He had stopped avoiding Elladan and Elrohir, though they were not yet quite friendly. “What’s Aunt Findis doing here?” he asked as he and Maglor followed Elrohir downstairs. 

“I haven’t yet seen her since I came west,” said Maglor.

“Oh. I keep forgetting you’ve hardly seen anyone.”

Findis was tall and golden-haired, looking far more like her mother than like Finwë. She sprang up the steps as Maglor stepped outside and embraced him. “Macalaurë! It’s so good to see you at last. And Tyelkormo! I didn’t know you were here.”

“Hello, Aunt Findis,” Celegorm said as Findis threw her arms around him next. Maglor stepped away and went down the steps to greet Elemmírë.

Elemmírë was short in stature, but that was easy to forget because her presence was so bright. Her hair was a deeper shade of gold than Findis’, and her eyes were the color of aquamarine and radiant. “You look much happier than when last we met!” she said, embracing Maglor tightly. She had come to Imloth Ningloron for the Midsummer celebrations the year that Maglor had come west. He had been cheerful enough then, but that had also been before he’d met with his brothers or his father, and the past had still been a very heavy thing. “I’m glad that Lórien could help you.”

“I’m glad, too—and gladder still to see you again. I don’t know where Daeron is at the moment, but he is also looking forward to meeting you.”

“And I him! I was delighted to hear that both of you were here together.”

Elrond and Celebrían emerged to greet Elemmírë and Findis, and after the usual bustle of new arrivals settled a little, Maglor went to look for Daeron. He had a vague idea that he was somewhere among the workshops. As he walked past the fishpond Aegthil and Annem appeared out of the grass to scurry along at his feet. 

He found Daeron just outside the woodworking shop, brushing sawdust off his clothes. “What are you working on?” he asked. 

“Oh, nothing particularly interesting,” said Daeron. He looped his arms around Maglor’s neck and kissed him soundly. “Were you looking for me?”

“I was. Elemmírë has just arrived, along with my aunt Findis. Have you met her?”

“Yes, several times. It’s Lalwen I somehow have never been introduced to. She’s always either away or busy or something whenever I am in Tirion.”

Elemmírë was outside on the veranda when they returned to the house. She rose to meet them, smiling as Maglor made the introductions and Daeron bowed over her hand. “I am so glad to meet you at last!” she said. “Come, let us sit a while.”

“I am very glad also, Lady Elemmírë, but I have been carving all morning—I will join you as soon as I’ve washed the sawdust away and changed into clean clothes.”

“Does he make his own instruments, as you do?” Elemmírë asked as she and Maglor sat down and Daeron vanished inside. Pídhres appeared to jump up onto Maglor’s lap, curling up to purr as he pet her. Annem and Aegthil had disappeared again, but he could hear scuffling in the grass nearby. 

“Yes he does. And we both looked at those songs you sent me; Daeron thinks one of his students would like them.”

“I have heard of the songbirds of Taur-en-Gellam,” Elemmírë said with a smile. “I’ve been so busy with students of my own, though—including your cousin, Vindimórë. He was a young child still when you arrived on these shores, and I’m not sure if you were able to meet him?”

“Elessúrë’s son?” Macalaurë asked. Elemmírë nodded. “I met him once, but very briefly. When Elessúrë was very young he wanted to learn to play the harp, but I was unable to teach him, and he told me that he had never learned after I left.”

“It isn't too late,” Elemmírë said, “though he might have no interest in it now.”

“Perhaps. How is Vindimórë?”

“Very talented, especially in singing. His sister Isilmiel was also my student for a little while, but though she is equally talented she has not quite the same passion; I think she just wanted to copy her older brother, but she’s old enough now to look to her own pursuits. Have you ever taken students, Macalaurë?”

“Some,” Maglor said as Daeron emerged from the house to join them. “None here—I taught Elrond and Elros, long ago, but that was all very haphazard. Later I was able to teach Arwen and Aragorn’s children and grandchildren better.”

“Elrond is very skilled,” said Elemmírë. “That speaks well of your teaching.”

“I’m sure he found better teachers—and time to practice—after the War of Wrath,” said Maglor. “I’m afraid most of what I taught him was what he and his brother needed just for survival. There was only rarely time for music just for its own sake in those days.”

“It was much the same during my time in Rhûn,” said Daeron, “but I took full advantage of whatever time I did find.”

“Will you take students now, Macalaurë?” Elemmírë asked.

Maglor blinked. “I…I hadn’t thought about it,” he said. “I would like to finish this song my grandmother and Indis have asked me to write first, though, before I give any thought to teaching.”

“What song is that?” Elemmírë asked.

“A song for Finwë. It is long overdue, and they think I am the best one to write it.”

“It is overdue,” she agreed. “Are you having much success?”

“Some. I haven’t written enough to share with anyone yet.”

The talk turned to songwriting in general for a while, and could have gone on all afternoon and all evening if they were not interrupted by dinner and then the inevitable calls for music afterward. It was still cool enough in the evenings that everyone gathered in the hall rather than outside. Elemmírë obliged cheerfully, bringing out her violin to accompany Maglor’s harp and Daeron’s flute. They traded instruments throughout the evening, though Maglor was sorely out of practice in playing any instrument with a bow and gave up quickly, laughing along as Lindir teased him for it. They sang together, too, and it was as wonderful as he had imagined it would be. Elemmírë’s voice was rich and high, a sound that Maglor always associated with the color gold—and not only because she was a Vanya—but it blended together with Maglor’s deeper voice well, and Daeron, whose range was astonishingly broad, brought perfect balance when the three of them sang together.

It was very late before Maglor and Daeron made it to bed. “That was wonderful,” Daeron said as he fell back onto the pillows.

“You should have made your way to Valmar years ago,” Maglor said, laughing as he unraveled his braids. 

“Maybe, but you would not have been there, and I’m very glad that our first singing together was the three of us. I could hear immediately that she had taught you.”

“She was—is—a very good teacher.” Maglor sat on the bed and watched Annem and Aegthil sniff around the hearth before going to their basket. “Before I went to Lórien I was thinking of going to Valmar as her student again. I feel as though I forgot a great deal.”

“There’s always more to learn,” Daeron said. “And you do have much to teach in your own turn, you know.”

Maglor wasn’t so sure about that. He’d done his best with Elrond and Elros, and later with Arwen’s children and grandchildren, but he’d been making it all up as he went along and he still wasn’t sure that they’d been successful because of or in spite of him. “I could maybe someday take on one student, or two,” he said, “but I don’t know what I would do with a group as large as your flock of songbirds.”

“You don’t need to,” said Daeron. He reached for Maglor, pulling him down onto the pillows. “Though if it is known that you only take a very small number of students at a time I’m sure you will be all the more sought after for it.” Maglor shivered before he could catch himself. “Does that disturb you?” Daeron smoothed Maglor’s hair back out of his face. “I thought you’d left such fears behind.”

“So did I. I don’t know—I’m still so unused to…any of this, really. I don’t feel afraid, exactly, but neither do I like the thought of being sought after for any reason.”

“When we go to Taur-en-Gellam you’ll find my students full of questions for you,” said Daeron. “You can start just by answering those. And, really, you don’t have to take any students if you do not wish to.”

“I wouldn’t say no, I think, if someone asked me,” Maglor said, “but I won’t go around looking for students either.”

“I didn't go looking for students,” Daeron said, laughing a little. “Pirineth came to me. I’m very glad she did, though. I needed something to fill my otherwise empty days. It’s hard to know what to do with myself sometimes, after so many years moving around, always with something to worry about or plan for. It was particularly hard when I found myself suddenly unable to turn around and kiss you whenever I wanted.” He leaned in and kissed Maglor, deeply but gently. 

“It feels dangerous,” Maglor whispered a little while later. Daeron lay half on top of him, head resting on his chest as Maglor played with his hair. Starlight shone through the window. “To make plans, I mean. For the future.” He’d spoken to Celegorm of putting down roots, but finding things to do and a place to belong wasn’t quite the same as looking to the future beyond the next few months. He could imagine things like watching his nieces grow, or traveling back and forth to Tirion and Eressëa, but making something of himself that was more than what he was…?

“You’ve been making plans all winter,” Daeron said.

“Those feel different. I don’t know how to plan for—the rest of my life? Or even just—just years into the future, or anything beyond a few months. It feels like…”

“Ah. Yes, I understand.” Daeron lifted his head. “Don’t make such plans, then. Let life come as it will, and before you know it you’ll find yourself established and comfortable and happy.”

“I’m already comfortable and happy.”

“But you are not established. You are starting to put down roots, but they haven’t taken hold yet.” Daeron kissed him. “Give it time. See this year through, all the travels and all the writing, and then take the next as it comes. Finish your song and start the next one.”

“You are very wise.”

“Of course I am. I certainly should be—I feel I’ve earned it through a great deal of heartache and foolishness.”

The next morning after breakfast, Maglor and Daeron ventured outside, and Maglor caught the sound of raised voices somewhere in the garden. “That sounds like your brother,” Daeron said. “Not a good sign.”

“No,” Maglor sighed. “Better go find out what’s wrong.” 

They found Celegorm facing off with, of all people, Findis. “Understanding must go both ways, Tyelkormo,” she was saying. She had her arms crossed, chin raised, looking quite ready to meet whatever Celegorm might throw at her in his wrath. 

Celegorm, on the other hand, stood stiffly, rigid in that way that Maglor could recognize now not as anger but as a desire to be anywhere else when he couldn’t see a way to escape and did not want to actually become angry. 

Findis went on, “If you wish for your father to understand you, you must try to understand him in turn.”

“I do understand him,” Celegorm did not snarl, but it seemed a close thing. “I understand him too well. That’s the problem.” 

“Celegorm,” Maglor said, adopting a sharp tone from Beleriand that had usually managed to cut through whatever arguments were happening between his brothers, or his captains, or whoever he needed to quiet in the moment. Both Findis and Celegorm turned, startled. Maglor tilted his head toward a path that led away through the gardens, out toward the hills. Celegorm nodded jerkily and fled. Out of Findis’ sight but just within Maglor’s, he broke into a run. Daeron glanced at Maglor questioningly, but Maglor shook his head. 

“What was that, Macalaurë?” Findis asked. She had never heard him use that tone, and did not look as though she appreciated hearing it now.

He sighed, and said in his normal voice, “You cannot scold us into speaking to our father, Aunt Findis.”

“Something must give,” Findis said. “This is unsustainable, this avoidance, especially with your brother caught in the middle.”

“We all love Curvo, and we know this is hard for him. The palantír—I assume that’s what you were talking to Tyelko about—it was meant to be a step forward. And,” Maglor added, “it was my idea, and something we all agreed on.”

“Do you have any idea how all of this hurts your father?” Findis demanded. “Do you care, Macalaurë? I cannot—I will not—believe that you do not care.”

“Of course I care,” Maglor said, feeling suddenly so very tired. Something in his chest hurt. “But I cannot say I’m sorry for it.” Daeron took his hand, grip firm and anchoring.

“Your father loves you,” Findis said. “Anyone with eyes can see that he loves you—all of you—desperately.”

“I can’t see it,” Maglor said. His father had been uncharacteristically cautious on the road, smiling for Curufin’s daughters but with guarded eyes, his thoughts impossible to guess. Maglor did not disbelieve Curufin or Findis, when they spoke of Fëanor’s feelings, but he could not quite believe them either. “I don’t know what you want me to say. None of us want this estrangement.”

“The past should be left where it belongs, Macalaurë.”

“We can’t look to the future without understanding the past, or else what is there to stop us making the same mistakes?”

“The root of our ruin was Melkor,” Findis said, “and he is gone. Nothing will happen to cause—”

“Yes, he is gone. But we did not live under his roof, did not watch him transform from a loving father into a fey and fell stranger full of nothing but fire and fury. In all the years I have lived, I can say there is only one other I’ve feared more than I feared Fëanor in his last days. It is so hard to let go of that fear, Aunt Findis, but we are trying. This isn’t something any of us can solve just by knocking him into a pond and being done with it.”

Findis frowned as though she did not quite believe him. “We are none of us strangers to fear,” she said. “Am I really to believe your reluctance, at least, has nothing to do with Daeron?”

“Fëanor knows from what source my dislike of him springs,” Daeron said. 

“I know what you said to him,” Findis said, turning her hard glare on him. Daeron met her gaze calmly. “It was neither true nor warranted, whatever it was that he said to you.”

“Perhaps I spoke more harshly than strictly necessary,” said Daeron, unapologetic, “but he also presumed much.”

“My reluctance to speak to my father has everything to do with him, and nothing at all to do with Daeron,” Maglor said firmly. 

“Because you are still afraid?” Findis asked. Maglor didn’t answer. He didn’t know how—there wasn’t any good way to explain that kind of fear, the kind that sank into your bones. Even decades in Lórien was not enough to banish it entirely—not this fear of his own father, however much he had hoped otherwise upon leaving. It had crept back up on him, unnoticed until it had already lodged itself back in his heart. He didn’t know if it was a remnant of Dol Guldur still, or if he would have felt this way even if he had never come there. The chill of the place had left him, for the most part, but not sound of Sauron’s mocking words in Fëanor’s disdainful voice. Not the roar of flame that he associated with both the Necromancer and with his father. 

Findis looked at him, her gaze lingering on his face as it had not before. Maglor watched her look at his scars, at the lines around his eyes that should not have been there, at the strands of white threaded through his hair that he could laugh about in front of his nieces, but not in front of his aunt. He hated it, this looking, hated that he knew she would not understand the small scars around his lips and that someone would have to explain them to her; hated that that someone would most likely have to be him. “What happened to you, Macalaurë?” she asked finally. “What is this despair even Nienna could not cure?”

Maybe she did know something more of fear than he’d thought. Maglor released Daeron’s hand to hold his out, scars up. “I threw the last shreds of my hope into the Sea with the Silmaril. Later—well, someone else can better tell you of the Black Breath. I no longer despair, but hope for many things remains out of my reach, and fear is never far away. As for my father…” He let his hand drop back to his side, where Daeron grasped it again, holding on tightly. “I do not intend to avoid him forever. I will speak to him before this year is out—I was planning to even before you came to scold us about it—though I won’t promise either of us will come away happy.” 

“That isn’t nothing,” Findis said. “There is no anger in him anymore. All seven of you are so like him—you all feel so deeply. I understand that makes it difficult to overcome the hurt, but you must know that he loves you. Hasn’t Curufinwë told you?”

“That’s the thing about fear, Aunt Findis. It doesn’t care what other people say.”

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“Did you tell me you were coming to Tirion this soon?” Curufin asked as Amrod and Amras stepped through the door. He looked like he’d just come from his forge, with soot smeared over the bridge of his nose and his clothes all rumpled, smelling of coals and metal.

“No,” Amras said cheerfully as he threw an arm around Curufin’s shoulders. “It’s more fun to surprise you! How are things?”

“The same as they ever are. How is everyone else?”

“All very well. Nelyo’s back home with Ammë,” said Amrod, “and Tyelko and Cáno are still in Imloth Ningloron. They’ll still be coming to Tirion sometime later this year, but Cáno’s refusing to be any more definite than that.”

“Well, he’s better than the two of you,” Curufin said, but he smiled as he spoke. That changed, though, when he asked, “Are you here to see—?” 

Calissë and Náriel came barreling down the hallway then, interrupting any serious conversation. There was no chance to speak further until later that night, after the girls and Rundamírë had gone to bed, and Curufin led the way up to the rooftop garden. The nights were still cool, so Celebrimbor lit the brazier, and the four of them settled onto the soft cushions and chairs set around it. Overhead the stars shone, and the moon was riding high in the sky, pale and half-full. Amrod watched it for a while, until Curufin said, “Did you come to visit us, or to see Atya?”

“Can’t it be both?” Amras asked. “But yes, we do want to talk to Atya. What’s he been looking for in the palantír, Curvo?”

“All the terrible things, I think,” Curufin said. Amrod looked over at him, finding his face troubled. Shadows danced over Rundamírë’s plants behind him, still slender with new growth. Somewhere on the street below someone burst into bright laughter; elsewhere Amrod could hear the faint sounds of a hammer on the anvil. Tirion was so very different from the mountains where he and Amras made their home, so much louder. “I think he has also looked for all of you more recently, just to reassure himself that it really is all over.”

“Have you told him about Cáno’s song?” Amras asked.

“What song?” Celebrimbor asked.

“No,” Curufin said. To Celebrimbor he added, “Míriel and Indis have asked Maglor to write a song for Finwë. It’s long overdue, they said, and he’s the best one to do it. He’s going to be talking to everyone about it—he said it can’t just be his own song.”

“It is overdue,” Celebrimbor said. “That’s why he’s planning to come to Tirion this year?”

“Yes,” said Amrod. “He’s going to Thingol, too, and I think he hasn’t decided yet whether to go there or come here first.”

“Why haven’t you told Atya about it?” Amras asked Curufin. 

“I should,” Curufin said, “I just…he carries that grief so near, still, and with everything he’s been seeing in the palantír I haven’t wanted to add anything to it. I will tell him before Maglor comes. He deserves at least to be forewarned.” Celebrimbor had tossed a pillow to the rooftop to sit beside Curufin’s chair rather than in one of his own, and he leaned his head against Curufin’s knee. Curufin rested a hand on his hair. “Ambarussa, when you speak to him, please try not to get angry. I don’t think he could withstand another confrontation like the one he had with Maglor.”

“We aren’t angry, Curvo,” said Amrod. It wasn’t that they never got angry, but he honestly couldn’t remember the last time he’d actually lost his temper. There wasn’t anything left worth getting so angry over. “We’re more worried about him getting angry.”

“He won’t,” Curufin said. “He’s just…he reminds me lately sometimes of Maedhros before he went to Lórien. Not quite as bad, but—that awful grief and guilt that’s eating him up inside.”

“It’s been there all along,” Celebrimbor said. “It’s just gotten worse since he started looking into the palantír. He was unhappy like this when he first came from Mandos, too. Quiet. Then I think he was worried about all of you being off away in the wild—and he wasn’t wrong, all things considered—and then after he came back to Tirion he got better, especially after you came back too, Atya.”

“I hope it wasn’t a mistake, the palantír.”

“I don’t think understanding can ever be a mistake,” said Amrod. “It’s the same grief we all felt, isn’t it? Just all at once, and fresh, while we’ve had years and years to get used to it.”

“It’s different when you can only watch,” Curufin said, “when you aren’t there to do anything about it.” Celebrimbor reached up to take his hand. 

“Yes,” Amrod said, “but he also can’t do anything because it’s already over—and we’re all here now.”

The next morning, Curufin told them that they’d most likely find their father at the old house. “He took a break for the winter, but he’s back to clearing out all the old storerooms and ripping up the garden. Which reminds me, I have some boxes of your old things here if you want to look through them later.”

“Do you have the prisms you made us?” Amras asked.

“I might. And if not, I can make you new ones.”

The house where they had grown up was not far from the palace, though it was a bit of a walk from where Curufin now lived. They had debated for a long time whether they wanted to go together or one at a time, before deciding it would be better together. If it didn’t go well, better not to face it alone. Amrod wasn’t really worried that it wouldn’t go well—they had exchanged greetings and brief pleasantries a few times over the last few decades, and if it was awkward it wasn’t painful—but better safe than sorry. As they approached the house, partly hidden behind still-solid and sturdy walls, Amras reached out to take Amrod’s hand.

They paused at the gate, which was really just an opening in the wall, for the gate was long gone, either taken away for the wrought-iron to be purposed, or just rusted away into dust with the passage of time; it was impossible to say, now. Amrod peered through it, and found the courtyard not quite as overgrown as he had expected, though that was surely due to Fëanor’s efforts; he saw patches of churned up earth and remnants of stems and roots where plants and weeds had been dug up. “He’s done quite a lot, hasn’t he?” Amras remarked in a low voice. 

“Digging up all the gardens would be the easy part, wouldn’t it?” Amrod replied. “Curvo said he’s sorting through all the storerooms inside now.” And then, presumably, he would start tearing the building down. Amrod looked up at it, slowly crumbling, moss-covered and with climbing ivy and roses slowly overtaking the roof. This was where they had grown up, he and Amras, and all their brothers. When they had left it for Formenos, none of them had ever expected not to come back—not to return to find it precisely as they had left it, if a little dusty. He wondered why their father wanted to tear it all down. “I suppose we should go look inside?”

They stepped through the gate, and passed through the courtyard. If he half closed his eyes Amrod could picture it as it had once been, picture everyone coming and going, their brothers and cousins all young and bright and their parents laughing. “Come on.” Amras pulled him forward, and they stepped up to the entrance. Unlike the gate, the doors were intact, even the panes of stained glass set into them, though they were faded and uneven now, the walls on the other side appearing strange and warped, and someone had used fist-sized stones to prop them open. The tiles of the entryway were tracked with dirt, their once-bright colors also almost entirely faded away into dusty browns. 

As they stood for a moment, looking around at the familiar walls that also looked so different, breaking and cracking and devoid of the art and paint that had once adorned them, they heard a thump from somewhere below, and a string of very creative curses. “Oh that’s definitely him,” said Amras. A few seconds later they heard his footsteps on the stairs, and then he appeared, smeared with dust and shaking out one of his hands, his hair bound back in a braid that was already starting to unravel, strands of hair sticking to his temples. Then he looked up and saw them—and immediately tripped on the last step. They darted forward to catch him, each grabbing an arm before he could pitch forward onto his face. “Good morning, Atya,” said Amras. 

“Ambarussa? What—what are you doing here?” Fëanor regained his footing and straightened. They were of a height, Amrod realized suddenly. Somehow he hadn’t ever noticed that before. Fëanor loomed so large in his memory, almost taller than Maedhros. 

“Looking for you,” Amrod said. “Curvo said you’re cleaning out all the storerooms. Would you like some help?” It was easier, maybe, to start by doing something, rather than standing and staring at each other while they tried to think of what to say first. 

“I…” Fëanor looked at them, eyes wide, and then he seemed to come to the same conclusion. “Yes. There are several chests I can’t bring up by myself.”

“A good thing we’re here, then!” said Amras brightly, and led the way back down the stairs. Fëanor had brought many lamps to illuminate the cellars, which were filled with haphazard piles of boxes and crates, chests and rolled up rugs, bits of furniture, pieces of artwork long forgotten. “What are you doing with it all?” Amras asked. 

“Throwing or giving it away, mostly,” Fëanor said as he followed them. “Your brother has most of the things he thinks you will want to keep.”

“Yes, he told us,” said Amrod. “Are you not keeping any of it?”

“I suspect I will be given much of it back later,” Fëanor said, sounding a little rueful, “but I have nowhere really to keep it now.”

“I’m sure our uncle can spare you a storeroom or two in the palace,” said Amrod. Fëanor only shrugged. He no longer stared at them, but now he would not meet their gazes at all—the same way Maedhros hadn’t for years after they’d returned, and the same way Maglor hadn’t, at times, on their journey back from Ekkaia. Amrod was not accustomed to seeing guilt written across his father’s face, and he found he didn’t like it, even as it reassured him that there was again more to Fëanor than just empty burning fury. Fëanor bent to pick up one end of a large chest, and Amrod took the other. Amras picked up a few much smaller boxes, and followed them back up the stairs to the entryway, where they left the boxes to go back downstairs—and this they repeated until the largest crates and chests closest to the stairs had been brought up. All the while Amrod and Amras filled the silence, talking of the past summer, and Maglor’s hedgehogs, and other cheerful things.

“Thank you,” Fëanor said at last, when he and Amras set down the last heavy chest. 

It was nearing lunchtime by then. Amrod glanced at Amras, who nodded and slipped away. They’d agreed before coming to Tirion that they each wanted to speak alone to Fëanor, if things went well, and one of them going to the nearest market for lunch was as good an excuse as any. Amrod stretched his arms over his head, easing the slight ache in his shoulders, which weren’t accustomed to lifting such heavy things. “Thank you for the letters,” he said, deciding there was no more point in avoiding what was in all their minds. “I know that’s overdue.”

Fëanor shook his head. “It isn’t—”

“What I really mean is, thank you for writing two letters.”

This earned him a blank look. “I only wrote one,” he said.

Amrod wanted, absurdly, to laugh. “No, I mean—a letter for me and a letter for Amras, instead of just one to Ambarussa.”

For a moment Fëanor didn’t answer. He frowned, and looked away, casting his gaze over the cluster of boxes and chests strewn through the entryway. “Do others write to you thus?”

“Well, yes—but to be fair, it’s never letters like the one you wrote, usually just short notes to tell us a bit of news or to extend an invitation; it’s not like either of us keep any sort of running correspondence with anyone. It would be silly to waste paper for those things. Just—we didn’t expect it.” Amrod watched Fëanor’s face as he spoke, but whatever his father was thinking, he kept it hidden. Somehow that was discouraging, and Amrod ran out of words. “So…thank you.”

“You shouldn’t—” Fëanor faltered, which was also horribly unlike him. “You shouldn’t have to thank me just for that. I wasn’t—I know I was not—I know I have failed you in so many ways, Pit—Amrod, but surely I was not so terrible a father that it surprises you that I can tell you apart.”

“There was quite a long stretch of time where we tried to make it hard for everyone to tell us apart, when we were younger. We thought it was funny. Ammë was the only one who was never fooled. And you can call me Pityo if you like,” said Amrod.

“But you do not prefer it.”

Amrod shrugged. “Not usually, but…well, it’s what you’ve always called me.” He had been ambivalent about his father-name for a long time, and Amras had been troubled for a little while after they got Fëanor’s letters upon their return from Ekkaia—Small and Last, they were called, and on paper it looked very much like names just jotted down just to round out a list. They had finally asked Nerdanel about it just before they came to Tirion, and she’d told them that they had been born early, and were alarmingly small, and that was all their father could think of through his fears for them. Last Finwë, she had added, with a small smile, had been meant as something a promise to her. No more children—for theirs had been her most difficult pregnancy, and Fëanor had been even more frightened by that. Then she had kissed them both and laughed about how quickly they had grown, and how wild they had been once they could crawl and walk, and how only Telufinwë had turned out to be at all accurate, but it was too late by then to change either name.

Fëanor was silent for a few moments, looking at Amrod like he was some kind of unsolvable puzzle. “Why are you here?” he asked finally, and it was almost like he was bracing himself for the answer, like he couldn’t actually believe any of them would want to come just to see him, just to help him with this strange project of his, clearing out their old home. And that was fair, Amrod supposed. He and Amras had been thinking and talking of coming to see him for years, now, but it wasn’t as though Fëanor could have known that. 

“I miss you, Atya,” Amrod said, and felt his throat tighten with the words.

Something in his father’s expression crumpled, and Amrod closed the distance between them. Fëanor held onto him as though he was afraid Amrod would disappear if he let go. Maglor hugged like that too, even still. Fëanor made a noise somewhere between laughter and a sob. “When did you grow so tall?” 

“That’s how you can best tell us apart,” Amrod told him. “I’m taller than Amras.”

“You are not!” Amras protested as he reappeared in the doorway with a basket in his hand. “He’s a dirty liar, Atya. I’m the taller one.” He set the basket down as Amrod stepped back so he could embrace Fëanor. “Don’t cry! We’re actually both shorter now than we were in Beleriand. Estë didn’t give us back bodies that had had any Ent draughts.”

“Any Ent—what?”

“Come sit down, and we’ll tell you all about it,” said Amras. “I found pies! They’re just like the ones they make at Imloth Ningloron, which I’m almost certain use recipe one of the halflings brought—I hope you like potatoes!”

They sat on the floor among the boxes and chests, and took turns talking about the Ents they had known and how shocked their brothers had been when they turned up at Himring afterward several inches taller than they’d been before. Caranthir and Celegorm had made many jokes about how Curufin should seek out the Ents and stay among them until he was at least as tall as Maglor. That had been during the Long Peace, when everything was still happy and hopeful. Afterward Fëanor asked them, a little tentatively, about what they had been doing since their return from Mandos, and so they told him about their little cottage in the mountains, about the lake where they swam in summer and skated in the winter. 

“We hung the prisms you made in the window,” Amras told him as they finished their lunch. 

“You could come visit us, if you wanted,” Amrod said. They’d talked about that, too, before coming to find Fëanor. “But I don’t know if you’d be very happy there. It’s very quiet, and we don’t…do much.”

“I don’t do very much either, these days,” Fëanor said. “Hence…” He gestured around them. 

“It is very quiet there,” said Amras. “But we go among the Laiquendi fairly often, and they’re very merry. Maybe you should come to visit us. From what Curvo has said, you could use some merriment.”

“But maybe not too soon,” Amrod said, glancing at Amras. “Cáno’s coming to Tirion later this year.”

Fëanor looked up. “What brings him here?” he asked.

“Curvo said he would tell you, but we might as well,” said Amras. “Míriel and Indis have asked Cáno to write a song for Finwë. A proper one to honor his memory. No one else has been able to do it, and it’s long overdue. So he’s going to be speaking to everyone he can find, because he says it can’t just be his words alone. That means he’s going to want to talk to you too.”

“Especially you,” Amrod said. 

Fëanor’s expression had shuttered, and it looked for a moment terribly forbidding, like he’d looked immediately after he’d come back to Formenos, after Maedhros and Maglor and Celegorm had dragged him back away, refusing to let him see Finwë’s body. Amrod glanced at Amras again, who had leaned back a little bit. Then Fëanor looked away, and the moment passed, and he only looked sad. “What sort of song is it to be?” he asked. 

“A lament of some kind, but what form it will take, we don’t know,” said Amras. “He’s going to ask what you would like to hear in a song for him—it can be anything, really. He says everything new he learns helps him shape the song, even if he doesn’t end up including it all in so many words. He’s spoken to Míriel and Indis, of course, and also to all of us, though I don’t think Curvo or Moryo have given him an answer yet.” 

“He also says he might not even be able to finish it,” Amrod said. 

“Why would he not finish it?” Fëanor asked. He looked back at them, having mastered himself. “I’ve never…I never knew him to leave a song unfinished before.”

“He said once he was never able to find words for any of us no matter how hard he tried,” said Amras. “But I think he will finish this one. He isn’t as weighed down by everything anymore, and it isn’t only his own words he’s got. In spite of what he says, he seems very determined to finish.” He gathered up the wrappings of their pies and went to dispose of them. 

After a moment, Amrod said, “Cáno isn’t angry anymore either, you know.” Fëanor didn’t answer, or look up at him. “I think he’s afraid.”

“I know that,” Fëanor said quietly. “You’re all afraid, aren’t you?”

“We have been,” said Amrod. “But Cáno is different…he was afraid of everything for a long time, and even after going to Lórien I think some of it lingers. He was afraid of us, before we met again, and even for a while afterward. He thought we would be angry with him.”

“For what?”

“He wasn’t able to save us. And he threw the Silmaril away.” Fëanor flinched as Amrod spoke. “We weren’t angry, of course—we never were, not with him, about any of it. I think he’s afraid you will be though.”

“I’m not,” Fëanor said. “I told him that I was glad he’d thrown it away.”

“Do you understand, though, why he might not believe that?” Even hearing it now, and seeing Fëanor’s face as he spoke, seeing that he spoke the truth, Amrod found it difficult to believe. The Silmarils had been everything to Fëanor, once. Worth storming back into Middle-earth and burning everything in their wake. Worth dying for. Worth killing for.

“I do.”

This quiet and withdrawn Fëanor was so strange, Amrod thought as Amras returned to them. He became a little more animated as they started to sort through the contents of the chests, mostly just by opening them to see what was inside, and then deciding which boxes could be thrown out and which should be kept. Some were filled with old clothes, long gone out of fashion and moth-eaten. Others were a jumble of knickknacks and toys, mostly already broken. Much of it brought back memories of much happier days, and after some coaxing Fëanor shared many stories—nothing important, mostly from the childhoods of their older brothers, before Amrod and Amras had been born, all of them silly, something all three of them could laugh at.

One smaller box was filled with wooden horses, all carved with such detail that Amrod would not have been surprised to see them move. “Your grandfather made those,” said Fëanor, his smile fading away as he knelt beside Amras, looking into the box. “He made them for Canafinwë.”

“You should definitely keep them, then,” said Amrod. Fëanor just nodded. 

They spent the rest of the afternoon further emptying the storage room, and then carting away all the contents to the palace, where Fëanor would throw out what wasn’t worth keeping, and send some to Curufin’s house, and give away most of the rest. Before they parted he embraced them both, holding on tightly. “I love you,” he said into their ears. “I love you both so much, Pityafinwë and Telufinwë.”

“We love you too, Atya—but don’t act as though we’re leaving forever! We didn’t come to Tirion just to spend one day with you and then disappear. We’ll see you tomorrow.”

They left Fëanor looking rather stunned at that, and made their way back to Curufin’s house. It was empty, but they found Curufin and Caranthir out in Curufin’s forge, bickering amicably over their differences in technique. They abandoned that as soon as Amrod and Amras came through the door. “How did it go?” Curufin asked.

“We helped him clear out most of one of the cellars, and learned all kinds of embarrassing things you all did when you were children,” Amras said. 

“It went much better than we expected, really,” Amrod added, “and we didn’t actually expect it to go badly.”

Curufin breathed a sigh, shoulders sagging a little. “Good.” 

“We also told him about the song Maglor’s writing, so you don’t have to worry about it,” Amras said.

Caranthir set down his hammer. “How did he take that?”

“I don’t really know. It’s very hard to tell what he’s thinking most of the time,” said Amrod. “He’s very quiet.”

“He’s not usually,” Curufin said. “He’s been very much his old self when he’s at court or when he visits here, until I came back last autumn and gave him the palantír.”

“How much of that has been an act all along, do you think?” Amrod asked. Curufin grimaced and did not answer. 

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Findis left them, shaking her head, and Maglor exhaled. “I’m not like my father,” he whispered.

“No, not in the ways you fear,” Daeron said. “I know we have been speaking of going to Thingol first, but I wonder if it wouldn’t be better just to go to Tirion and get it over with. The knowledge of this future meeting with your father looming over you does no one any good.”

“Maybe.” Maglor closed his eyes and took a breath. “What of your wagers in Taur-en-Gellam?”

“That’s just a silly game. And anyway, the general opinion seems to be that I’ll be away three years at least, so any time we arrive before then will be shocking for them and amusing for me.” Daeron took Maglor’s other hand. “I do think your aunt is right, though. Your father’s spirit burns bright, but not with fury.”

“Did he not get angry with you…?”

“I’m not sure I can call it anger. He was certainly not pleased, and I got angry, and have cordially disliked him ever since, but there was never any great display of temper on his part.”

Maglor sighed, and rested his forehead against Daeron’s. “I hate this,” he said. “I hate…I hate feeling like this. I miss my father. I should not be so hesitant…”

“Your aunt means well, but it is not her place to interfere.”

“I am glad he has someone willing to defend him,” Maglor admitted. “It’s…it means something.” Daeron was right—going to Tirion sooner rather than later would be for the best, for the sake of his songwriting and to see if there really was something there to salvage with his father. Maglor had left Lórien thinking his feelings hadn’t changed, believing he still wanted nothing at all from Fëanor—but either his feelings had changed very quickly or he had just been deceiving himself before. He was inclined to believe the latter. He’d thought, also, that he was no longer afraid.

So few of his fears had come to pass since he had come to Valinor, but that clearly did not mean much, no matter how much he missed his father. He hadn’t forgotten what he’d said when they’d first met—he’d meant every word, but he had also been aiming to wound. He’d thrown Finwë’s name in Fëanor’s face knowing it would hurt more than anything else. He was not blameless in the rift that stood between them. However much Fëanor might love him, or claim to love him, he was not known for being quick to forgive.

He’d thought the rift between himself and Maedhros unbridgeable too, once. Nienna had spoken otherwise. Maglor did not need to seek her out to know that she would say the same of Fëanor. 

“I should find Celegorm,” he said.

“He won’t go far, and I’m sure Huan will have followed by now,” said Daeron. “Give him a little time. Elemmírë wanted to speak to us of something this morning. Shall we go find her and think of happier things for a while?”

Maglor breathed a sigh. “All right…” 

They found Elemmírë in the gazebo out on the water, strumming a lute and singing to herself. She smiled brightly at them when they joined her, and they fell immediately and easily into conversation about nothing particularly important—instruments and music and the water—until Elemmírë set her lute aside and said, “You’ve heard of this great gathering the High King wishes to hold?”

“We have,” said Daeron. “I’ve been hearing little bits of gossip about it for a few years now.”

“Galadriel tells me the idea got started when Círdan came west,” said Maglor.

“Your own return was also a part of it,” Elemmírë said, smiling at him. Maglor looked away, out over the water. The sun sparkled on it, and the water lilies floated white and pink, rippling a little with the water’s movement. He wasn’t sure he liked the idea of Ingwë paying him any attention at all, any more than he liked the idea of the Valar sparing him a thought. Elemmírë went on, “But plans are moving forward now, and I have been asked to plan out a series of performances. That is what I wanted to speak to you both about.”

“To span the whole feast?” Daeron asked. 

“I don’t think anyone knows how long this feasting will last once it gets started,” Elemmírë laughed. “But over the course of a number of evenings I would like to have the whole history of the Quendi sung. It will take a great deal of collaboration and consultation among the kindreds, of course—and so I have come to ask for your help. Daeron, you know the Sindar, but you have also have traveled among the Avari, yes?”

“Not here,” said Daeron, “but I know where to find them.”

“That is a very long history,” Maglor remarked. 

“We will have many long evenings,” Elemmírë replied. “And of course not everything can be sung—I’m sure there are so many things that have never been put to verse. But the great song cycles will be included—the Leithian, the Noldolantë…yes, even the Noldolantë, Macalaurë. It is history, and we must acknowledge the ugly alongside the great.”

“Of course,” said Maglor. “I will sing it if you wish me to.”

“It will not be the only sorrowful song. I will sing of the Darkening.”

“I’ve not heard that yet,” said Maglor, “the Aldudénië.”

“I sing it very seldom, as I’m sure you only rarely sing the Noldolantë. But it is not only the great songs I wish to be heard. Are there other songs either of you would wish sung? You need not think of everything now of course, there is plenty of time, and of course we will all three of us consult others.”

“Maybe…” Maglor hesitated. “Maybe my song for Finwë, if I can finish it in time.” Daeron squeezed his hand. “When is this great feast to take place?”

“Not for another two years, at least,” said Elemmírë. “I know nothing of any other plans being made, but it is an enormous undertaking. Will that be enough time?”

“I think so.” Again Maglor thought—if he could finish the song and sing it before the Valar before this feast, if through some miracle their hearts were moved, perhaps there would be one more reason to celebrate, and no reason for him to perform it again at all. He tried to push such thoughts away, but the desire for it stuck in the back of his mind, immovable. 

“We cannot forget Men,” said Daeron. “The history of the Eldar cannot be sung without singing of the Edain. You have mentioned the Lay of Leithian, but there is also the tale of Húrin and his children that was written by Dírhavel long ago, and there are tales of Health’s people, and of Tuor, and of the Peredhil and of Númenor afterward—of Gondor and Arnor, and Rohan and Dale, and Rhûn and other eastern lands as well.”

“Hobbits too,” said Maglor. “The Lay of Frodo of the Nine Fingers and the Ring of Doom should certainly be sung. Neither Círdan nor Elrond nor Galadriel could have come West were it not for Frodo and Sam.”

“Nor you, nor I,” Daeron murmured. 

“Of course,” said Elemmírë. “I do not know these songs, and will leave them to you to be ordered, and to decide who sings them. As I said, there is no great hurry. I’m sure we’ll meet many times over the next few years to put it all in order and write it down. I have not forgotten the Dwarves, either! Perhaps Gimli son of Glóin would be so gracious as to sing to us of his own people.”

“I will ask him,” Maglor said. 

When he and Daeron left Elemmírë they parted, and Maglor went in search of Gimli, finding him in the forges chatting with Dringil about gold smithing. “Can I borrow you for a little while, Gimli?”

“Of course!” Gimli immediately joined Maglor in the sunshine.

“How are you liking Imloth Ningloron?” Maglor asked him as they walked down to the nearby stream to sit on a bench there. 

“I did not expect to find any place so like Rivendell here,” Gimli said as he sat on the bench with a sigh, “though at first glance it is so different. Of course I should have expected nothing else—no house of Elrond’s could be anything less than homely.”

“Lady Celebrían worked very hard to make it so, in anticipation of Elrond’s coming. Have you heard, perhaps, of a great gathering being planned by High King Ingwë?” When Gimli shook his head Maglor told him what little he knew of it, and of Elemmírë’s plans to celebrate the whole history of their people through song. “…and of course we cannot complete the tale without Dwarves or Men—or Hobbits,” Maglor finished. “You will of course be welcome at this feast as an honored guest regardless, but if you would also sing for us a song of Durin, perhaps, or of the Lonely Mountain—or of Aglarond!—I think there are many who would be very glad, and many more who would learn something of Dwarves for the first time, beyond the histories we have recorded ourselves.”

“Put like that, how can I refuse? Only tell me where to go and when, Maglor, and I will sing as many songs as you will allow. I know many of the hobbits’ songs, too. It will not be as merry a feast as it should be without some of Bilbo or Pippin’s drinking songs!”

“Certainly not,” Maglor laughed. “I will remember that. It’s too bad Bilbo isn’t still with us. We would have to drag him out onto the stage, but then he would be so very pleased to recite every poem he ever wrote, and more.” Gimli laughed, and their talk turned to the hobbits for a while, to Bilbo and Frodo and Sam, and others, until Gimli returned to the forge and Maglor went to tell Elemmírë that they could certainly count on him in their planning. 

Celegorm did not reappear that day, or that evening. Nor did Huan, and it seemed that no one else had seen either of them since breakfast. “Did something happen?” Finrod asked when Maglor found him and Fingon the next morning to ask if they’d seen anything of Celegorm. Finrod had lately been making a very great effort to reestablish the friendship he and Celegorm had once shared, though Maglor wasn’t sure how well it was really going. Celegorm these days tended to run away from things that made him uncomfortable—and Finrod at his most determined could be quite intimidating regardless of his aims. 

“He had words with Findis,” Maglor said. 

“Did she knock him into the fishpond?” Finrod asked, arching an eyebrow.

“No. She scolded me, too—apparently she’s run out of patience with us and came all the way out here just to demand to know why we still aren’t speaking to our father.”

“I wonder if Fëanor knows that,” Fingon remarked. “No, we haven’t seen Celegorm, Maglor. If I do run into him I’ll be sure to tell him you’re looking.”

Maglor sighed. “Thank you.”

“Do you want help looking?” Finrod asked. 

“No, I think I might have an idea—” Maglor turned and nearly ran into Gilheneth, who came racing up as though something were giving chase. “Gilheneth, what’s the matter?”

“Excuse me, Maglor,” she said, out of breath and looking almost frantic, but for the light in her eyes. “Fingon! We need to leave—right now.”

“What happened?” Fingon asked, sitting up in alarm.

“I’ve just received a message from Lórien! Come on, get up! Meet me at the stables in ten minutes! Never mind packing!”

“Lórien?” Fingon repeated, but Gilheneth had already darted away. “What could we possibly—” He broke off abruptly, eyes going wide. “Oh. Oh.”

“Oh?” Finrod echoed, looking at him with concern, and then reaching out to grasp his shoulder. “Do you need to go to Lórien, Fingon? You look like you’re going to faint.”

“I think someone else is ready to leave it,” Maglor said.

“But who—oh!” Finrod leaped up and pulled Fingon to his feet. “What are you waiting for then? What’s wrong?”

“I don’t—” Fingon looked as though Gilheneth had hit him over the head rather than given him a piece of news long desired. “I don’t know if I’m happy or—I haven’t—I haven’t seen him since—”

“Breathe, Fingon,” said Maglor. He stepped forward to embrace him. “This is joyous news!”

“I don’t know if he will even remember me,” Fingon whispered. “It’s been so long, and he was only a child. I’m not—maybe I shouldn’t even go—”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” said Finrod. “Gilheneth says you should go, and would she not know best?”

“Yes, but—oh, you’re right. I’m being an idiot.”

“I don’t think you are,” said Maglor. “I came here thinking no one would be happy to see me. After such a long separation it’s natural to be nervous—even if you know you needn’t be.”

Fingon laughed a little as he stepped back, wiping his eyes. “You didn’t—did you really?”

“Well, I was reasonably sure Elrond would be pleased to see me, but everyone else? All of you?” Maglor shook his head. 

“You are an idiot,” Fingon said, but he spoke fondly. 

“And Maglor has been wrong every single time,” Finrod added. “Of course Gil-galad will be happy to see you, but if you don’t hurry Gilheneth will leave without you and then neither of them will be happy.”

“I don’t know when we’ll be back,” Fingon said. “Or if we’ll come back here at all, though I can’t imagine Gil-galad won’t want to see Elrond—”

“I know Elrond will be very eager to see him,” Maglor said, “but don’t try to make plans now. Go!”

“Yes, right.” Fingon laughed suddenly and threw himself at them, wrapping his arms around both Maglor and Finrod. There were tears on his cheeks, but he was beaming. “My son is back! Can you believe it? My son!”

Finrod bumped his shoulder against Maglor’s as Fingon ran away down the hall. “Nearly everyone is back now,” he said, voice wistful. 

“Only Aegnor and Aredhel linger,” Maglor said. “And Maeglin.” 

“I feel terrible for Maeglin,” Finrod said. “To hear how all the stories tell it, he never stood a chance.”

“Do you think Aredhel lingers for his sake?”

“I don’t know. I hope her lingering isn’t to do with Eöl.”

“Has he come from Mandos?”

“Not that I have heard—and I would have, for Turgon has been keeping a very keen eye and ear open for such news. If I were Eöl, though, I would seek to avoid any word of my return from ever reaching Tirion.”

“Mm.” Maglor had never met Eöl, of course, but Curufin had. Maglor could not remember when he had learned what befell Aredhel in the end, or her son; he had no idea if any of his brothers had learned of it before their deaths. Curufin and Celegorm had both been very close in friendship with Aredhel before the discord had driven them apart, and it was not only Turgon that Eöl would have cause to fear, should he ever return among the Eldar. 

“I have feared for a long time that my brother would never return,” Finrod said after a moment. “He was determined not to, when I spoke to him in the Halls—I remember very little of that time now, except for that. But it was said also that Fëanor would never return, was it not? That gives me hope.”

“Fingon said the same,” Maglor said. “And Míriel once said she would never wish to return to life. Her mind changed in time, as her spirit recovered.”

“So she did. It is also so terribly lonely in the Halls, even when you are surrounded by all the other spirits there. I hate to think of my brother still there, mourning and unable to be comforted except by the Maiar, who cannot really understand. Nienna does, perhaps, but she cannot be in all places at once.” Finrod sighed, and nudged Maglor with his elbow. “Speaking of brothers—you should go back to looking for yours. How worried should I be?”

“I don’t know.”

“Let me know if you’d like me to do…well, anything.”

“I will.” 

Maglor went outside, hoping he’d catch a glimpse of Huan, and that Huan would then lead him to wherever Celegorm had disappeared to. Maglor did not believe he would go far—he’d left all his things behind, though his bed had not been slept in the night before. He walked again through the gardens, and found no sign, and so he then left them entirely and headed for the wooded hills beyond. The breeze swept across the valley from the orchards, carrying the sweet scent of apple blossoms. As he walked Maglor picked a handful of flowers, irises of course but also sweet chamomile and pale yellow primroses. There was no particular reason, except that they were lovely, and he wanted something bright in his hands. 

Huan appeared as Maglor stepped into the cool shade of the pine trees. “There you are,” Maglor said. “Where’s Tyelko?” Huan turned and trotted off. Maglor followed, passing through the glade where Finrod had taken him and Celebrimbor once to get unwisely drunk and to cry about the past. Some distance beyond it, Maglor found Celegorm seated cross-legged on the thick carpet of pine needles that covered the ground, with a bird in his hands. He was murmuring to it quietly, his speech interspersed with whistles and chirping sounds. 

“All right, Tyelko?” Maglor asked, pausing a few paces away.

Celegorm looked up. His eyes were red, but he did not look upset. “I’m fine,” he said. His voice sounded hoarse, like he’d been shouting. “This little one’s got a broken wing; I’ve been trying to convince him to let me help.”

Maglor sat down beside him. The little one in question was a mockingbird, who eyed him with a sharp black eye. “Do you want me to sing something calming?” he asked. 

“No, I think I’ve got him now.” Celegorm loosened his grip, and the mockingbird did not attempt to get away. “I hope your cat won’t try to eat him.”

“I’m sure she’ll learn very quickly to leave him alone.” Maglor looked from the bird back to Celegorm. “What else was Findis saying to you yesterday?”

“Probably whatever she said to you—demanding to know why we still won’t come to Tirion and all that.”

“You know she means well.”

“She should mind her own business.”

“You are the last person who should say that about someone’s sibling interfering.” Maglor put his arm around Celegorm’s shoulders and kissed his temple. “You don’t have to speak to her, but please come back to the house.”

“I don’t really want to see anyone. Except you. And maybe Daeron.”

“You don’t have to. I’ll make sure no one bothers you—or your mockingbird. Come on.” Maglor got to his feet, and Celegorm followed suit, still holding the mockingbird in careful hands. When they’d been young Celegorm had always been resourcing animals, birds with broken wings and squirrels with crooked tails, or stray puppies or kittens from the streets of Tirion. Most of those birds and squirrels had not wanted to leave him afterward, to the delight of Ambarussa as small children, and the annoyance of the rest of them who kept finding stray feathers and hoarded nuts in their beds and closets. As much as Maglor got teased now about his hedgehogs and his cat, Celegorm had always been the one to whom small animals flocked. Even Pídhres liked him, in spite of her continuing aversion to Huan. 

“Have you told Findis yet that you’re planning to talk to Atar anyway?” Celegorm asked as they left the trees, blinking in the sudden bright sunshine. 

“Yes. I haven’t yet told her why—I’ll do that later today, I suppose.”

“Do you think Atar knows why she came here?”

“I doubt it. I can’t imagine him wanting anyone else to fight his battles, can you?”

“I suppose not. Do you think that will make it worse when you do speak to him?”

“Findis certainly doesn’t seem to think so.” Maglor put his arm around Celegorm again. “So what are you going to name your bird?”

“I’m not. When his wing is healed he’ll go off on his own.”

Maglor laughed. “If you say so.”

At the house Celegorm left him to go find whatever it was he needed to splint a mockingbird’s broken wing, and Maglor went to find Finrod, to tell him that he’d found Celegorm, and then to Elrond, to make sure he knew where Fingon and Gilheneth had gone. “Yes, I heard,” Elrond said, smiling when Maglor asked. He was in a workroom just off of the library, copying a manuscript. Pídhres was curled up on the windowsill in front of his desk, basking in the sunshine. “But I don’t expect them to return here. Gilheneth has long planned to take Gil-galad home first—to their home north of Tirion. It’s quiet there, and she had it built after the manner of such houses in Lindon, so it will at least seem more familiar than other places.”

“A good plan,” Maglor said. “Will you visit him there?”

“I don’t know. I have very little experience with those so new-returned from Mandos, you know. The least I can do is wait for an invitation. It is enough, for now, to know that he lives again.” 

Maglor sat down in the chair beside the desk, and reached over to pet Pídhres. He had not known Gil-galad well, even when he was very young. Maedhros had visited Hithlum far more often than he had. He remembered a bright-eyed child with dark hair, whose greatest joy was being carried around on Fingolfin’s shoulders. He’d heard many tales since of Gil-galad the king, of his wisdom and his power and his courage. He’d ruled far longer than any of his predecessors, and more successfully. He’d been renowned and revered even when he’d been young, in the years before the War of Wrath, and Maglor had never regretted sending Elrond and Elros to him. If anyone could protect them and teach them all that he couldn’t, it was Gil-galad. 

“Fingon was both terrified and overjoyed,” Maglor remarked. 

“He need not fear,” Elrond said. “Gil-galad spoke of him often—he missed him terribly, even to the end of his own life. The day before he died, we spoke of Fingon.” He sighed. “Like Fëanor, there was nothing of him to bury afterward. His spirit burned bright, but it was the heat of Sauron that burned his body away. Elendil burned, too.”

“Did he not have a tomb, though—I feel certain that I saw it in Rath Dínen?”

“He did; Gil-galad bore the greatest brunt of Sauron’s fury in that last fight. There was enough of Elendil’s body to take and bury, though it was nearly unrecognizable.” Elrond sighed again. “It was a terrible end, though we won the day…”

“I’m sorry. I did not mean to bring back the memory.”

“You didn’t. I have been thinking of it lately anyway—and it is such an old grief that it does not feel either sharp or heavy anymore, even without the news of Gil-galad’s return. We are a very long way from Mordor.”

“Yes, we are,” Maglor agreed. 

Celegorm did not reappear that afternoon or evening. Dinner was as cheerful and bustling as it ever was. Word had gotten out that Gil-galad was returned, and everyone who had once dwelt in Middle-earth under his rule was aglow with delight. Maglor found himself seated by Findis, who seemed bemused by it all. “I don’t remember any such excitement when my brother Nolofinwë returned,” she remarked to him, “or even Findekáno.”

“Gil-galad was greatly loved—and he ruled far longer than either Nolofinwë or Findekáno,” said Maglor. “There was great love between him and Elrond; is it any wonder that Elrond’s household loves him too?”

“I suppose. Did you know him well?”

“No. I met him a few times as a child, but he was sent south after the Bragollach, and I never came after that to the Falas.”

“But after…?”

Maglor smiled at her. “Surely you have heard the tales, Aunt Findis? I was he who harped upon far forgotten beaches and dark shores, wandering ever in pain and regret beside the waves.”

“Oh, Macalaurë. I had thought that only poetry.”

“Perhaps it was exaggerated, but it was also said I came never back among Elven kind, and until near the end of the Third Age that was true enough. I haven’t sung of pain or regret in a very long time. It means, though, that I can tell you nothing of Gil-galad or his realm but what the songs say.” Maglor dropped his gaze to his plate. Down the table Elemmírë and Daeron were talking with Gimli of the differences between Dwarvish and Elvish music. Maglor would have liked to join them, but it was more important, he thought, to speak to Findis. “Aunt Findis—”

“I’m sorry for upsetting you yesterday,” she said before he could go on. “You and Tyelkormo, only I have not been able to find him to apologize.”

“Tyelko has gotten into the habit of withdrawing when he is upset,” Maglor said, “but he’ll reappear eventually.” 

Dinner soon wound down, and as the household began to disperse for the evening’s enjoyments—doubtless many songs would be sung that night of Gil-galad and of Middle-earth—Maglor turned again to Findis. “The stars are bright this evening. Will you walk outside with me?”

She looked surprised at the request, but readily agreed. They left the sounds of laughter and talk behind them, and walked out toward the open and grassy paths that bordered the largest pond. The gazebo stood empty in the middle of it. “Is there something you wish to say to me, Macalaurë?” Findis asked after a little while. 

Maglor did not answer immediately. He had been thinking of what to say all evening, but found he still needed a moment to find the words. “When I came to these shores,” he said finally, keeping his gaze on the path before them and his arms folded over his chest, “I did not expect much of a welcome, except from Elrond. More than that, it was a terrible shock to learn that my brothers were all returned from Mandos. The last thing, too, I expected to hear was that my father had also come back. I was not nearly so pleased then as everyone here is now to learn of Gil-galad’s return.”

“I have heard that, that you did not take it as good news,” Findis said, “and that greatly surprised me—that you would wish to avoid even Maitimo.”

“It surprised nearly everyone but Maitimo himself,” Maglor said. He stopped walking and looked out at the starlight on the water. A fish surfaced briefly, sending ripples spreading out over the pond’s surface, making the water lilies bob. The air smelled sweet and fresh with their fragrance. “I love my brothers,” he said finally, without looking back at Findis. “And I love my parents. I thought for a time that I did hate my father, that I could never forgive him what he did to us, the choices he made after the Darkening. I thought for a long time that I couldn't forgive Maedhros either, but at least I knew why he did what he did at the end. I never truly doubted that my brother loved me.”

“Your father loves you,” said Findis. 

“I don’t think he did at the end. Not after he swore the Oath. Certainly not after Alqualondë or Losgar. I told you before that I fear my father. We all do, even though we all love him. You cannot scold fear away, Aunt Findis.”

She sighed. “I know. But Tyelkormo did not seem afraid.”

“Of course not. Do you think he would allow you to see it?”

“But why the palantír?”

Maglor paused again, trying to find the right words and sharply aware of the irony. “To speak of something,” he said at last, “is to reduce it, to…to leave things out. Such is the nature of language—even between languages, there are words for a thing in one that cannot be directly translated in another. Something is always lost. Usually that doesn’t matter—words can capture enough. Usually. We can all speak to him until we run out of words and out of breath, but there are also our own memories to consider, the things we saw and did not see, the things we missed at the time or maybe are still missing, even about ourselves. He once knew us better than anyone in the world. Without seeing what we became, what we did, what was done to and around us—our father cannot know us like that again, not as we are now. 

“I suppose it’s also…there is some reassurance, at least for me, in knowing that he is willing to look, to learn, to try, even if it hurts. I do not hope for reconciliation, because I find it very hard still to hope for anything, especially the things I want the most.”

“But you do intend to speak with him? What about, if not this?”

“About Finwë.” Maglor took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “Indis and Míriel have asked me to write a song for him. I can’t do it without asking what others who love him wish to hear sung, or learning what they can tell me. I would speak to you of him too, if you’re willing.” He did look at Findis then. “I read the song you wrote,” he said. “Arafinwë took it to Middle-earth, and shared it with Elrond.”

“I know, he told me. I’m not sure what I can tell you that I did not write in that song.”

“I did not seem to me a song meant to be widely shared.”

“It wasn’t.” Findis crossed her own arms, and it was her turn to look away over the pond. In the starlight her hair looked more silver than gold. “I miss my father desperately,” she said after a few moments, “but I do believe he will return to us someday. What was destroyed does not remain forever defiled. The walls of Formenos are crumbling now, but trees grow around them and moss and wild roses cover the broken stones. Flowers bloom upon Finwë’s grave, and the sunlight shines golden upon the mists that hover over the lake. Nolofinwë and Fëanáro have come together as real brothers, finding love where there was once bitter hatred. All of these things give me hope. I would hear a song for him that ends thus, and not only in grief and darkness.”

“I can’t hope for it,” Maglor said softly, “but I can sing of it.”

He remained by the water after Findis left to return to the house, thinking about grief and hope, and the way they seemed always so deeply connected. The beginnings of a melody stirred in his mind. He hummed a few notes, and then sang a few words, and felt something fall into place. He sang a few lines that he had written, very softly, and they felt right on his tongue, sounded right in his ears. Love and grief and hope, all intertwined—that was what lay at the heart of this song, and that was something he could build on. 

Something even the Valar might listen to.

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“A letter for you,” Nerdanel announced, coming around into the garden where Maedhros was sitting under the hawthorn tree with Elessúrë, who seemed determined to make up for earlier reticence on both their parts. It was nice, getting to know him as an adult, though Maedhros often still thought of the small child he’d once been, and regretted not being able to see him grow. “A shame to see that Macalaurë is no more regular with his correspondence than he ever was,” Nerdanel added as she handed Maedhros the folded up letter.

“He’s got other things to be writing,” Maedhros said, “and it hasn’t been that long. But is there nothing from Findekáno?” Fingon wrote much more often, though his letters were always short, and Maedhros had been expecting something from him for several days now.

“No, that’s the only letter for you.” Nerdanel left them to return to her workshop, where she had three projects in various stages of completion, all with recipients that she claimed were growing impatient. 

Elessúrë pushed a strand of hair out of his face. “Why the frown?” he asked. “Is no letter from your cousin cause for worry?”

“That’s just what my face does,” Maedhros said as he broke the seal on the letter. “I’m not worried—just a little surprised. Midsummer is approaching and I was meant to go to Tirion with Findekáno and his wife for it.”

“Lossenyellë and I are going to stay with Súriellë, if you would like to join us,” said Elessúrë. “I don’t think you’ve met her wife yet? We’ll probably spend the holiday with Curufinwë and his family; there’s always something fun happening in Tirion this time of year.”

“I would like that, if I don’t hear from Findekáno.”

Maglor’s letter was not very long, compared to others he had written in the past. He shared some bits of amusing news and asked after Aechen and Nerdanel and Maedhros’ paintings, and then wrote a little of Elemmírë’s visit, and of the part she had asked him and Daeron to play in the upcoming gathering that Ingwë was planning. And then he wrote:

Aunt Findis came with Elemmírë, and she’s spoken to both me and Tyelko about our father. It feels a little as though she came to scold us into going to Tirion to see him, like we’re petulant children, and neither Tyelko nor I reacted very well—though she has since apologized, and I think I was able to help her understand a little of why we feel the way we do. As I told Daeron, I am glad that he has someone willing to speak for him—and I do not believe that he asked her to come, or even that he knows why she did—but Tyelko took it worse than I did. He isn’t angry anymore, not anything like he used to be, but I think he’s very afraid that whatever conversation he might try to have with Atar will turn into a fight. You remember how it was before we went to Formenos? I’m keeping an eye on him and so is Huan, and he has a mockingbird with a broken wing to tend to, so don’t worry too much. I write this mostly to warn you that Findis might try to come scold you too on her way back to Tirion; she and Elemmírë are leaving in a day or two, for both are wanted in Tirion and Valmar for the holiday. 

And speaking of the holiday—I know Fingon and Gilheneth intended to drag you into Tirion for it, but those plans have been abandoned. Don’t be too annoyed with Fingon for not writing you himself, though! Word came from Lórien that they are wanted there, and they were gone within half an hour. Gil-galad is returned, and Elrond tells me Gilheneth’s plans have always been to take him to their home north of the city, I suppose because it’s quiet and private. I don’t know Gil-galad at all, so I can’t predict whether those plans will hold now that he is really here, but regardless you shouldn’t expect to hear from Fingon for some time.

For myself, I’ve had something of a breakthrough with the song, and have written many lines and the main melody over the last few days. I haven’t written so much so swiftly in a very long time, and it feels wonderful, in spite of the subject matter and the expectations laid on it. Daeron and I will be coming to Tirion after Midsummer, so look for us then! Elrond will be with us, since he goes so rarely to Tirion himself. I’m quite looking forward to the trip—it will be much shorter than either of the last journeys I made, and much more comfortable, at least.

I miss you, of course. Tyelko sends his love and says he hopes you aren’t spending too much time brooding. Give Ammë our greetings and our love please, and our grandparents and Ambarussa and whatever cousins might be about. Which reminds me—Elemmírë tells me that Elessúrë’s son is one of her students, and that he is very talented. If Elessúrë is willing to hear it, please tell him how proud I am of Vindimórë. 

“It seems I’ll be going to Tirion with you after all,” Maedhros said as he finished reading the letter. He also shared the last part of it with Elessúrë, who smiled. 

“Vindimórë is very excited about the coming gathering,” he said. “He says Elemmírë is planning something magnificent.”

“She’s asked Macalaurë and Daeron to help in the planning,” Maedhros said.

“Good. Vindimórë has been very disappointed to have missed out on getting to know Macalaurë—he would have been his first choice for teacher, even over Elemmírë, though I told him that Elemmírë was the one who taught Macalaurë in the first place.”

“There is much, I think, Macalaurë could teach that Elemmírë cannot,” Maedhros said. “As far as I know, he’s taken very few students over the years—only family, really. Elrond and Elros, and then Elrond’s grandchildren.” He didn’t know if Maglor would have been able to take on any students before going to Lórien, but he might be more willing now. “What does your daughter do these days?”

“Isilmiel followed Vindimórë to Valmar for a while, but she’s lately returned home and trying to decide between other apprenticeships. Aunt Nerdanel told me once that you never picked any one thing to focus on, and I think Isilmiel will be rather like that.”

“I enjoyed it, learning a little bit of everything that I could,” Maedhros said. “It all helped me greatly later.”

“But now you’re focused on painting? I suppose there are things you can’t do anymore…”

“I’m somewhat limited,” Maedhros agreed, “but we’ll see what happens. Maybe something else will catch my fancy, but painting is a challenge that I’m enjoying.”

“Why challenging? You learned long ago, did you not?”

“Not with my left hand.” When Elessúrë grimaced, Maedhros added, “It really doesn’t bother me.”

“It doesn’t—well, isn’t it just a horrible memory?”

“All that came before is, of course, but I lost my hand when Findekáno rescued me—that’s one of the best things that ever happened to me. Even at my worst I never regretted that, and I’ve never regretted returning to life without it. Some things change you, irrevocably, and thus the spirit is reflected in the body.” Maedhros grinned and added, “If I had come back with both hands I think I’d forget more than half the time anyway.” That got Elessúrë to laugh. “Don’t worry about bringing up the past, Elessúrë. There are things I don’t wish to speak of, but not because it pains me.”

“Yes, I know, it’s to protect me, even though I don’t need protecting.”

“I have six baby brothers, and you are my baby cousin—of course I wish to protect you.”

Elessúrë rolled his eyes, but he kept smiling. “I’m not a baby, Russandol. I’m married with grown children of my own.”

“And I still remember how you also used to chew on Macalaurë’s jewelry, and so you’ll always be my baby cousin, no matter how old you get.”

After Elessúrë left to return to Mahtan’s forges, Maedhros went to share bits of Maglor’s letter with Nerdanel. She was distracted by work, though, so he left her to it and took his sketchbook out to the willow trees by the river. It was quiet there, peaceful, and he settled in among the roots of his favorite willow, which greeted him with a soft rustling of its branches, leaves all quivering. Aechen followed him out, and flopped down in the grass by his feet as he flipped open his sketchbook. Maedhros drew Aechen, and then drew his view of the willow leaves hanging out over the water. Then he turned the page and started a sketch out of his memories. He did not do that often lately, but this was a happier memory—an image of Gil-galad as a child, hair in messy braids and with missing teeth and scraped up knees, so much like Fingon at that same age. Maedhros had not seen Gil-galad after the Dagor Bragollach, had never seen him as an adult. He was glad of it, glad that he had not been there in Sirion. What Gil-galad might have to say to him now, Maedhros did not know, but he was happy for Fingon and Gilheneth’s sake that he’d returned at last. As cheerful as they both were as a general rule, the shape of his absence followed both of them like a shadow. 

He spent a few hours like that, sketching and letting his mind go quiet. From the outside, he knew, he probably looked as though he were unhappy, but he felt as at peace as he had on such afternoons in Lórien when he’d been left entirely alone, to wander the pathways or to sit under a tree or beside a pond listening to the water and to the birds singing, or to sleep the golden hours away.

Aechen finally roused, and sniffed at Maedhros’ ankle before climbing up onto his legs. Maedhros scooped him up before he could lose his balance and go tumbling into the river. “Ready to go home?” he asked. “Come on, then.” 

As he stepped out from under the willow tree, a large shadow passed overhead. Maedhros looked up to see a large white bird glide out over the river and then wheel around. He stopped walking, and watched as it soared down to alight in the grass ahead of him, transforming in an instant to a woman, clad in silver-grey, her dark hair falling loose over her shoulders. 

Maedhros had gone to Elwing—to apologize, however little it was worth—after his return from Mandos. She had shut the door in his face. Later he had spoken very briefly to Eärendil, but he had been as little inclined to forgive as his wife, though he had been somber and grave rather than angry. He supposed it was ridiculous now to expect to continue to be able to avoid one another. He would be visiting Imloth Ningloron a great deal, and he knew that Elwing also went there frequently, since Elrond was little given to travel. 

But that did not explain why she had come there, not to Nerdanel’s house or workshop as he might have expected if she wished to see his mother, but out to the river to see him. Maedhros remained where he was. He had no idea what Elwing wanted, and it seemed wisest to allow her to approach him, however it was she wanted to do it. He watched her shake out her skirts, taking her time, and then walk down the little path through the buttercups and grass. He had to set Aechen down to free his hand to press over his chest as she came near, bowing his head. “Lady Elwing.”

“Lord Maedhros,” she said. Her voice was clear and bright; her face was very like Elrond’s, but with somewhat more delicate features that belied the will of iron he knew lay beneath. Her eyes seemed larger, soft grey but piercing, with a light in them that was not quite Treelight but not quite starlight. “It seems Lórien was kind to you.”

“It was,” Maedhros said. Silence fell between them again, wary and tense. Aechen sniffed around the grass at Maedhros’ feet before disappearing into it. Somewhere across the river a blackbird sang. Maedhros did not know what to say. He’d had words prepared when he had gone to her before, but he couldn’t remember them—and he did not think they would be suitable now, anyway. Too much time had passed, and he was too different. He wondered if Elwing had met his father yet. She now seemed to him as fearless as her son, holding herself with all the steel and grace of a queen—certainly not someone who would quail before Fëanor. 

“I have seen a great deal of all your brothers over the last few years,” Elwing said finally, “and I spoke to Maglor upon his coming to Eressëa. It seems wrong that I should continue to avoid you, going forward.”

“It is not my desire to impose on you, lady,” Maedhros said. “I have not forgotten Sirion.”

“Nor have I. But Sirion is gone, and two full Ages of the Sun have passed since. If my father can desire not only peace but friendship with your brother, after they slew one another in Menegroth, it seems the least I can do to make peace with you.” 

“I as good as slew you,” Maedhros said. 

“No,” Elwing said. “I chose it. As you cast yourself into the flames with a Silmaril, so I cast myself to the waves. It only so happened that my jewel was not destined for the Sea, but for the stars.”

“Then what we have in common is that I drove us both to such a choice,” Maedhros said. He had watched Elwing cast herself into the sea but he had not realized then that it was an act of defiant despair, rather than defiant hope. Such a feeling was one he would not wish upon his worst enemy. “I am so sorry, Lady Elwing.”

“I know.” Elwing stepped forward and held out her hand. Maedhros blinked at it for a moment before reaching back. Her hand was much smaller than his, but her grip was shockingly strong. “I forgive you for it,” she said. “And I thank you for the care you showed my children.”

Maedhros shook his head. “I didn’t—”

“Less than your brother, perhaps, but it was not nothing. I cannot imagine they would have survived the ravages of Beleriand without you, and so I thank you. I am neither my father nor my son, and so I cannot desire friendship—but I do desire peace, and the ability to come together in company without awkwardness.”

“As do I,” Maedhros said. He let his hand drop to his side when Elwing released it. “Thank you.”

“I speak also for Eärendil,” Elwing said, “for he is away. Else he would have come to see you himself.”

“I cannot blame him for staying away from Tirion,” Maedhros said before he could think better of it. 

Elwing smiled, more wry than amused. “You speak of your father? He does not frighten us.”

“I cannot imagine much frightens you at all, these days.”

That made her laugh—it was so sudden and bright that Maedhros blinked, “That is true! As Elrond put it once, it is very difficult to feel afraid when all the worst things you can imagine have already happened.” She stepped back. “Farewell, Maedhros, son of Fëanor. I am sure we will meet again soon.”

“Farewell,” Maedhros said, and watched her transform again into a great white bird to soar up and away, back toward the road and then north, toward the Calacirya and her home beyond. He exhaled, and rubbed his hand over his face. Celebrimbor liked to say that anything was possible in this new Age. Apparently he was more right than Maedhros had ever dared to imagine.

It took a little while to find Aechen in the tall grass, and when Maedhros returned home he found Nerdanel emerging from her workshop, covered in stone dust. “Did you come to speak to me earlier, Maitimo?” she asked. 

“I did, but you were busy.”

“Oh, I’m sorry. What did you need?”

“Nothing.” Maedhros bent down to kiss her cheek. “I just wanted to tell you about Macalaurë’s letter. He sends his love and Tyelko’s, and they’re coming to Tirion after Midsummer, before he goes to Taur-en-Gellam. We might also receive a visit from Findis when she comes back in the next few days.”

“Oh, well, Findis is always welcome,” said Nerdanel, who had always gotten along very well with Fëanor’s siblings, especially his sisters. “As long as she doesn’t arrive today—I’m not fit for visitors today. Let me get cleaned up, and we’ll walk over to your grandparents’ for supper.” With just the two of them at home, Ennalótë insisted that they come over for all their meals, particularly since neither Nerdanel nor Maedhros were much inclined to cooking. It was one thing Maedhros struggled to do one-handed, having not had to, for most of his time in Beleriand, and Nerdanel forgot about mealtimes more often than not.

In the past, Maedhros had not enjoyed visiting his grandparents’ house. It was too great a reminder of his childhood and youth, memories all tinged with gold and silver and full of a joy he’d felt forever beyond his reach. Having regained—not the same joy, but something very like it—Maedhros could greet his grandparents with a smile, and sit at their table without feeling horribly out of place and like he just wanted to flee back to his bedroom. Since they had all gotten over the initial rush and welcome of his homecoming, everything now seemed so very normal, and that more than anything made him feel at home in a way he hadn’t, quite, in Imloth Ningloron, even with all of his brothers there. 

A few days after Maedhros’ encounter with Elwing, Caranthir returned home. His gardens needed attention, he said, but Maedhros thought he was just glad to escape the city. “How is everyone in Tirion?” Nerdanel asked him. 

“Very happy. The twins intend to stay with Curvo until Midsummer, at least. Amras told me they’re returning home for the winter, though. He says they miss the mountains.”

“And the snowdrifts taller than they are,” Maedhros said. Caranthir made a face, and Nerdanel laughed.

There was other gossip to share, and plans for the city’s Midsummer festivities, and talk of who would be there and who would not; Nerdanel had been invited to spend the holiday in Valmar by Indis, but she intended to return home once Maglor and Celegorm came to Tirion. Maedhros thought that Nerdanel was aware that Curufin had taken one of the palantíri, but she said nothing of it, and neither did Caranthir. It was not until the next morning that Maedhros could get Caranthir alone, after Nerdanel had retreated to her workshop and Maedhros followed Caranthir out to the garden. 

“How is everyone really?” he asked, sitting on the grass with his legs crossed as Caranthir surveyed the flowerbed he’d chosen to focus on that morning. “Curvo and Ambarussa, I mean. And Tyelpë?”

“Tyelpë’s fine,” Caranthir said as he knelt to start pulling weeds. “Everyone’s fine, really. I haven’t seen Atar, so I don’t really know how he is. Curvo was worried about him most of the winter, but that seems to be passing. He spends most of his time at the old house, clearing out the cellars and storage rooms. Ambarussa have been helping him these last few weeks.”

“So their meeting went well?”

“Seems so.”

“You still don’t want to see him though, do you.”

“If it were just me, no. But I can’t put it off forever, I suppose. I just—the more I think of it, the more I realize it will feel wrong to marry Lisgalen without him there alongside the rest of you, but I still don’t know how not to be angry. Lisgalen keeps saying we should just elope, and I’m starting to agree, even though it will disappoint Ammë. We don’t need any witnesses for the oath-taking, except Eru and the stars. Atar knows about Maglor’s song, by the way. Ambarussa told him so he’d be forewarned before Maglor went to talk to him.”

“What did he say?”

“Nothing much, apparently. Curvo says he’s often very hard to read, and he hides a great deal, which is very different from before.” Caranthir paused and sat back on his heels. “Curvo says Atar reminds him of you, sometimes—before you went to Lórien.”

Maedhros looked away, over toward the empty patch of dirt where the forge used to be. “I don’t wish that on anyone,” he said. 

“I doubt it’s that bad, especially if he’s able to hide it. As far as I know no one else is worried about him.”

“I think Findis is.” Maedhros leaned back on his hand, tilting his head back to watch a small flock of geese fly over them, headed out toward the river. “Maglor wrote to tell me she went to Imloth Ningloron to scold him and Celegorm.”

“Did she shove them into the fishpond?”

“I would’ve gotten a lot more letters than just Maglor’s if she did. Do you know what Atar’s looked for in the palantír?”

“No, but I haven’t asked Curvo about it either. I don’t…I appreciate that he is looking, but nothing we spoke about before has changed. What do you plan to do?” Caranthir leaned forward again, picking up his trowel to dig at the roots of a particularly large and prickly weed. 

Maedhros watched him until he loosened it enough to be pulled out. Then he said, “I don’t know. It can’t be delayed forever, but I don’t…”

“It could be,” Caranthir said.

“If I knew what I wanted, maybe I’d be able to make up my mind.” Feeling suddenly that there wasn’t anything more to say of Fëanor, he changed the subject. “Have you decided what to plant where the forge was?”

“Not yet. Pears, maybe. Or apricots.”

“I like apricots better than pears.”

Caranthir glanced up with a sudden smile, looking more like himself. “Apricots it is, then.”

Maedhros fetched his sketchbook and settled back down near Caranthir, drawing him among his flowers as he worked. A little bit of tension had come back from Tirion with him, and Maedhros watched it fade away as Caranthir lost himself in tending to his plants—his roses and his lilies, the herbs growing nearest the house—rosemary, sage, chamomile, and others—alongside the plants he used in his dyes, and the wilder flowers that grew in a riot of color all around, clustering at the bases of the statues and sculptures Nerdanel had set out. Violets bloomed purple and blue, and white phlox, and asters and daisies and queen’s lace bobbing in the breeze. Aechen wandered in and out of sight before coming to nap beside Maedhros’ knee. 

After a while Caranthir was satisfied with that afternoon’s work, and came to sprawl out in the clover, sweaty and smudged with dirt. “What are you drawing?” he asked. 

“You.”

“Oh, don’t. I’m disgusting.”

“Would you rather I do some sort of formal portrait, have you sit for me all decked out in brocades and jewels?” They’d all had to do that at one time or another in their youth, and even those of them that liked dressing up in fine clothes and jewels—Maedhros himself had loved it, then—had found the process tedious and uncomfortable. 

“Ugh.”

“That’s what I thought.”

Findis arrived a few days later, as Elemmírë rode on to Tirion and then to Valmar. “Hullo, Aunt Findis,” said Caranthir from where he perched atop a ladder set against the house, shears in hand as he pruned some unruly roses that threatened to overtake one of Nerdanel’s bedroom windows. “We were forewarned of your coming, and no, you can’t scold either of us into going back to Tirion either.”

Maedhros rose from where he’d been playing with Aechen. “We are glad to see you, though,” he said.

“Yes, of course,” Caranthir said, waving a hand before attempting to cut a vine just out of reach and nearly sending himself toppling off the ladder. 

Findis had been frowning at Caranthir, but she turned to Maedhros and smiled up at him as she took his hand. “I’m glad to see you looking so bright, Russandol,” she said. “It was not my intention to scold you, whatever tales your brothers have been telling.”

“Good,” said Maedhros, “because neither Moryo nor I want to talk about it, really.”

Findis sighed, and looked down at their joined hands. She turned Maedhros’ palm up, revealing the faint scars there. “This is why, I suppose?”

“Part of it,” Maedhros said. “Whatever Maglor told you, I do not think I have anything to add.”

“Yet he tells me he will speak to your father, and soon.”

“I don’t think he would, if he did not have this song to write,” Maedhros said. “He and I have only just returned from Lórien, Aunt Findis—and Maglor was hardly settled in Valinor at all before we went. Please do not ask more of us than we can give.”

Findis did not stay long, and she did not try to speak to either Maedhros or Caranthir of their father again. She spent much of the visit with Nerdanel, the two of them catching up on gossip and often laughing together. Maedhros thought it likely they also spoke of Fëanor, but they did it out of his hearing, and with that he was more than content. After she left he went back to his paints. Most of what he painted wasn’t anything of substance—just practice in shading and blending and simply in holding the brush in a way that didn’t feel strange or make his fingers cramp. Sometimes Caranthir came to peer through the window and make comments, but mostly the three of them—Nerdanel, Maedhros, and Caranthir—fell into old routines, engaging in their own occupations and needing little in the way of chatter. The difference now was that no one was worried about anyone else. It was comfortable rather than merely quiet. Maedhros would have described it as entirely peaceful, if it weren’t for the constant awareness of who was awaiting him in Tirion.

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After Elemmírë and Findis departed, others began arriving in anticipation of the Midsummer celebrations. It was always a merry time in Elrond and Celebrían’s house. The summer Maglor had arrived in Valinor, Gandalf had come with fireworks, just as he had the first Midsummer Maglor had spent in Rivendell long ago. It was not very surprising, then, when Maglor stepped outside two days before the holiday to find him unloading his wares in the courtyard. “Hello, Gandalf!” he said. “Would you like some help?”

“Hello, Maglor! I’m nearly done, but I’m very glad to see you back from Lórien. Is your brother here too?”

“Celegorm is,” said Maglor, “but the rest are all in Tirion.”

“Ah, that’s a shame. I had hoped to see all seven of you in one place.”

“You should have come to visit last summer then!” Maglor laughed.

Midsummer Day dawned bright and clear, with a glorious sunrise to which many songs were sung. The day was full of singing and dancing and games; the tables both inside and out were laden with food, and the wine flowed freely. Celebrían's gardens were all in bloom, a beautiful and fragrant riot of color. Maglor wore the robes he’d been given on his first Midsummer there, a gift from Míriel, all grey and blue and silver, the colors of the Sea and the shore. Daeron clad himself in blues and purples, and wore amethysts in his hair and on his fingers, and then insisted on winding sapphires through Maglor’s braids. “If you’ll be spending time in Alqualondë and Tirion—and in Taur-en-Gellam, for that matter—you’ll need to get used to this sort of thing again,” he said as he secured the last braid. 

“I know,” Maglor said. “I don’t mind all the finery, really, especially today. I just don’t have the patience anymore to do it every day.”

That afternoon, Celebrían sat down beside Maglor, pink-cheeked and breathless from dancing with her sons. Maglor was taking a break from making music. “You still plan to go to Alqualondë after Tirion?” she asked.

“Yes, and maybe Tol Eressëa,” Maglor said. It all depended on where he was to find his various and scattered cousins.

“Good. I think Elladan and Elrohir and I will follow a little while after you, but go straight to Avallónë. It’s been some years since we spent any time there, and it’s much easier to visit with Elwing and Eärendil when we’re all just there on the bay.”

“Is Eärendil back on land?”

“Not at this time, I think, but there’s a good chance he’ll return sometime this summer.”

“I don’t really know how long he’s ever gone at a time,” Maglor said after a moment, “but I hope he isn’t keeping away because of my father.”

“Oh, he isn’t! Well, they’ve been keeping away from Tirion, both Eärendil and Elwing, but they rarely visited before anyway—and it’s not because of the Silmaril so much as the sheer awkwardness of it, and Elwing doesn’t have the patience for that sort of thing. By now everyone is well assured that Fëanor is on his best behavior and will continue to be so.”

“Have you seen much of him, my father?”

“Oh, sometimes. He’ll come here on occasion, and we go to Tirion once in a very great while. I think whenever he has come here it’s been a rather thinly veiled attempt to learn anything of you, so I suspect we’ll see him even less in the future.” Celebrían glanced at Maglor. “Unless certain things change. Elrond told me your plans for this trip.”

“I don’t know if anything will change,” Maglor said. 

“Do you want it to? I know you didn’t, once.”

“I think I do,” Maglor admitted, “but thinking about it for too long makes me feel rather like I did before I went to Lórien, and I don’t particularly like it.”

“Even Lórien cannot fully reverse the work of years past,” Celebrían said. “I’m afraid those of us with scars will always wake up some days with the memory of them lying heavily over us, even if those days do grow rarer and rarer with each passing year.” She rose to her feet and held out her hands. “Come dance with me! You’ve been making music for us all morning—take some time now to enjoy it yourself!”

As evening came on, Gandalf brought out his fireworks. Maglor wandered over as he prepared to launch the first ones. He had been waiting all day for this opportunity. As Gandalf leaned down to light the first fuse, Maglor snatched his hat off his head and stuck it on the end of the large rocket mere seconds before it shot up and away. It burst into bright blue sparks that flew across the sky like a flock of birds, as small bits of charred fabric floated gently down to land in the fishpond.

“That,” Maglor told Gandalf as he sputtered and cursed, “is for meddling. I didn’t have the chance to take my revenge before, but now I have, and I am content.” 

“You,” Gandalf said quite sternly, the way that he had once spoken to recalcitrant hobbit children, pointing a finger at Maglor’s nose, “are a menace, Maglor Fëanorion!”

“I am not the one sticking his nose into everyone’s business!” Maglor laughed. “Let this be a lesson to you, Mithrandir!”

When he rejoined Elrond and Celebrían and Daeron, Celebrían had fallen back onto the blanket, laughing herself breathless. “I know you said once you were going to set his hat on fire,” Daeron said, “but that was much funnier.”

“I thought so too,” Maglor said, allowing himself a bit of smugness. Elrond had already been laughing too, and now he joined Celebrían on the blanket. “Next time maybe he’ll think twice before giving me unsolicited advice.”

“I did all work out in the end,” Elrond pointed out as he wiped his eyes and caught his breath. He did not sit up. 

“It did, but that doesn’t mean he should be encouraged.”

“Certainly not,” said Celebrían, but it came out sounding rather strangled, and she dissolved into giggles again. “Oh, the look on his face!”

Maglor settled back against Daeron’s chest to watch the rest of the fireworks. He saw Celegorm playing some sort of complicated looking card game with Lindir and the twins nearby, all of them laughing. He was glad to see Celegorm at ease again. His mockingbird had flown off once its wing was healed, but not far—Maglor had heard it singing in the gardens. He turned away, back to watching the fireworks, lighting the valley with blues and greens, reds and golds, in all manner of shapes, some which lingered for a time in the air, and others that faded away more swiftly. Afterward there was only the stars to shine down on them, silvering the water. There was more singing, but it grew quieter as the evening drew on into night. Maglor did not sing any more that evening, preferring to listen instead to the paeans to the starlight and to older songs in ancient tongues chanted by the fires, with drums replacing the flutes and viols and harps. 

When it grew very late, Daeron pulled Maglor inside and up to their room to rid him of his finery with the same determined precision with which he’d dressed him. Maglor returned the favor much more quickly and haphazardly before catching Daeron up in a deep kiss as they fell onto the bed already tangled up in one another. 

Maglor woke late in the morning to warm sunshine on his face, Pídhres purring somewhere at the foot of the bed, and Daeron tracing patterns on his chest. Without opening his eyes he rolled over to wrap himself around Daeron, who huffed a quiet laugh and wrapped his own arms around Maglor’s shoulders. “Everything all right?”

“Perfect,” Maglor said, still not opening his eyes. “Just don’t make me get up.”

“Shall we be lazy and indulgent, then?”

“Mhmm.” 

They did get up eventually, sometime in the afternoon. Everyone in the valley was feeling lazy after all of the activity of the day before, and it was several days before the usual routines and rhythms got started again. Then there was packing to do, and other little preparations for the trip to Tirion. Maglor gathered all his notes and drafts together, organizing them as much as his notes could ever be organized. Daeron was always despairing of his slipshod and scattered scribblings, but it had worked for Maglor for thousands of years and he was not going to try to change now. 

“Are you taking Annem and Aegthil?” Elladan asked Maglor the day before they were set to depart. 

“No,” said Maglor. “They’ll be much happier here than in Tirion. Pídhres is coming, because every time I have tried to leave her behind it didn’t work.” That had been true from the time he’d left her litter mates in Annúminas, to his leaving Imloth Ningloron on the trip that ended up taking him to Ekkaia. Elladan laughed, very familiar with Pídhres’ antics. “If someone can just make sure my bedroom door is left ajar so the hedgehogs can find their basket at night, I would be grateful.”

“Oh yes, of course. Or, if they don’t mind a little disruption, I think there might be something of a scuffle over who gets to take the basket to their room instead.”

Maglor laughed. “I think Aegthil and Annem won’t mind, as long as someone makes sure to show them where to go. They like their basket; I don’t think they care much about the room.”

Maglor, Daeron, Celegorm, and Elrond departed the next morning, bright and early after bidding farewell to Celebrían, the twins, Finrod, and Galadriel. Finrod would be going to Eressëa with Celebrían, and Galadriel intended to rejoin Celeborn in Taur-en-Gellam. Pídhres curled up around Maglor’s shoulders, purring gently. It was a bright morning, cloudless and clear, and the sky was very blue. The mountains rose up on their right, and on their left stretched wide plains and meadow lands, green and gold and scattered with bursts of bright wildflowers. Elrond asked about the journeys Maglor and Celegorm had undertaken in their youth; the conversation was easy and pleasant, Celegorm having long since gotten over his uneasiness of Elrond. The journey was not long, and it passed quickly and pleasantly. 

“Are we not stopping to see your mother?” Elrond asked as they approached the road to Nerdanel’s house without slowing.

“No one is there,” Maglor said. “They’re all in Tirion except our mother, who went to Valmar, but she’ll be in Tirion in a day or two.”

“Even Maedhros?” Elrond asked, surprised.

“Yes, he’s staying with our cousin Súriellë since Fingon isn’t there.”

“I was surprised, too,” Celegorm said. “But they’ll have had even bigger parties than Imloth Ningloron. Curvo told me they did fireworks last year, even though Mithrandir wasn’t around.”

“He taught your father how to make them,” Elrond said, “but I doubt even Fëanor’s are as good as Gandalf’s.”

“Why in the world would he teach our father to make fireworks?” Celegorm asked, aghast. “That’s asking for trouble. I’m surprised your orchards emerged unscathed. D’you remember that time he nearly blew up our house, Cáno?”

“I do not remember that, actually. What was he doing? And where was I?”

“Oh, maybe it was when you were studying in Valmar. I don’t know what he was doing, but Ammë was furious and he had to sleep in his workshop for a week and a half.”

“Celebrían was very firm about them taking their endeavors far away from the house. It was a distraction of sorts, I think,” Elrond said. “Or else something to cheer him up, and nothing quite cheers your father like learning something new, I have found.”

“At least with fireworks when something explodes it’s because it’s meant to,” said Maglor. Daeron snorted. “I should visit our grandparents, but I can do that on the way home.”

Just past Nerdanel and Mahtan’s houses, Tirion came into view, its tall white towers gleaming in the sun. Tallest of all was the Mindon Eldaliéva, a spire of silver standing above the palace. Maglor had passed the city by on his way from Eressëa to Imloth Ningloron, years ago, but he had not yet entered into it. His brothers, and Daeron, and his mother had told him all about the ways Tirion was different, and the ways in which it hadn’t changed at all. The palace was the same as it had been, for the most part, and Finwë’s cherry trees remained—or the descendants of his trees, anyway. Many of the neighborhoods and districts were rearranged, though, and many parts of the city still stood empty. 

“If you take that road,” Celegorm said, pointing to a road that had not been there in Maglor’s youth, leading west, “you’ll reach Turgon’s city in a couple of weeks. I suppose you’ll be needing to speak to him, too. Angrod and Orodreth have a smaller realm somewhere in the northeast, closer to the Pelóri.”

“Finrod wrote to them and asked that they make their way to Tirion or Avallónë,” said Maglor, “so I don’t have to ride all over the place. I expect I’ll visit Alastoron eventually, and—what’s the other city called?”

“Ithilheledh,” Elrond said. “It’s not a very large city—town is closer to the mark—and is beside a large lake of the same name.”

“Northeast of Tirion, on a lake?” Maglor glanced at Celegorm. “It’s not the same lake as—”

“No!” Celegorm shook his head sharply. “No, it’s farther east, right up at the feet of the mountains. They didn’t rename the Wilwarinen.”

“Where is the Wilwarinen?” Elrond asked. 

“Beside Formenos.” Maglor had been thinking lately of Formenos, too. Celegorm had asked him at the start of his songwriting if he would return there, and he still wasn’t sure if he needed to. He did not think he wanted to, even though so many long years had passed. For all he knew the house was merely a crumbling pile of rubble. It and the small town of Fëanor’s followers that sprung up around it had been built fairly rapidly after they had gone into exile, but they’d all been familiar with the lake. They had gone there to camp out under the sky with Finwë when he felt the desire to escape Tirion for a while. That was where he had taught them many things his father and grandfather had taught him long, long ago by the shores of Cuiviénen, and told them stories, taught them songs. It was a beautiful place—or it had been then—though none of them had been in the mood to appreciate such things when they had followed Fëanor there.

They came to Tirion, finding it still bustling and full in the aftermath of Midsummer. Elrond and Celebrían did not keep a house in the city, as they did in Avallónë, but Finrod had insisted they stay in his, which was near to the palace and next door to Fingon’s, which stood empty. “That way poor Curufin isn’t overwhelmed by guests, and you’re quite close to everywhere you need to go!” he’d said. “I already wrote to my housekeeper about it too, so you can’t refuse without being terribly rude.”

Predictably, all of the rest of Maglor's brothers turned up for dinner, alongside Celebrimbor and the girls. Rundamírë and Lisgalen were not with them, because they had begun a collaboration that neither of them were willing to step away from. “You know how it is,” Caranthir said as he and Curufin both shrugged, twin expressions of fondness on their faces.

After dinner by unspoken agreement Elrond and Daeron took charge of Náriel and Calissë while the rest of them retreated to a more private space to talk of more serious things than the summer holidays and the girls’ complaints about their schoolwork. Celebrimbor claimed the seat beside Maglor once they were shut away in a small and cozy room filled with soft chairs and little tables, and with walls lined with overflowing bookshelves. Maglor was amused to see several chairs clearly made to fit a hobbit’s stature. “It’s good to see you, Tyelpë,” he said as the rest of his brothers got settled. “What happened here?” He reached for Celebrimbor’s hand, which sported a new scar across the palm. It looked fairly fresh.

“Oh, it’s nothing,” Celebrimbor said. “I grabbed a piece of broken glass—trying to stop it falling and shattering. It fell anyway, and Atya had to stitch me up not ten minutes after he got home from Imloth Ningloron.”

“My standard of how bad a cut is is probably somewhat skewed since the River Incident,” Curufin said as he sat down on Celebrimbor’s other side, “but it really wasn’t that bad, except for making a bit of a mess.”

“The River Incident was the result of several unlikely events all happening at once,” Maedhros said, “and really shouldn’t set any standard for anything.”

“Do you want to know exactly how many stitches I had to give you?” Curufin retorted. 

“Let’s not argue about that, please,” Maglor said. It wasn’t the same visceral reaction he’d had at the time, but his stomach still wanted to tie itself in knots at the thought of anyone being stitched up. “You all know why I’m in Tirion; who’s all here that I can talk to?”

“Fingolfin, of course,” said Curufin, “and Lalwen—and Findis, but you probably already spoke to her. Argon is here, and Turgon and Elenwë turned up for Midsummer and haven’t yet left, and Finrod’s brothers also came. They’re all living or staying at the palace. You’ll still have to go to Alqualondë to see Finarfin.”

“And, of course, Atya is here,” said Amras. He sat cross-legged on the floor in front of Caranthir, who was separating his hair for braiding. Amrod sprawled out on some pillows on the carpet, seemingly half-asleep. “We’ve been helping him clear out the gardens at the old house, once we finished getting everything out of the store rooms.”

“I have piles of boxes I would very much like all of you to look at,” Curufin added, “so I can have my workshop back.”

“You can send them home with me, you know,” Maedhros said. “There’s plenty of room there.”

“Not in my workshop there’s not,” Caranthir said. “And if they go in the cellar they’ll just stay there for another six thousand years.”

“We can pile them up in mine, then,” Maedhros said. “I don’t need that much room just to paint.”

“I’m going to take you up on that,” Curufin said. 

“But,” Amras said, “we were talking of Atya. We told him about your song, Cáno. I hope you didn’t want to keep it too terribly secret. I think everyone knows what you’re doing.”

“Of course it isn’t a secret,” said Maglor. “What did he say when you told him?”

“Nothing much,” said Amrod without opening his eyes. “He’s very quiet. It’s odd.”

“He seems like his old self when he’s at court, or in larger company,” said Celebrimbor, “but in private he is much quieter than he used to be. More thoughtful.”

“He’s not angry,” Curufin added, very quiet himself. “He really isn’t.” Maglor glanced at Maedhros, who kept his gaze on the window, outside of which was a small courtyard with a fountain, where a small flock of colorful birds were splashing about.

“I believe you,” Maglor said, looking back at Curufin. “And since it’s been looming over me for months now, I think I should speak to him as soon as possible. Where can I find him?”

“He walks most mornings through the cherry grove,” Curufin said. “That will be the most private place for you to speak to him.”

“What’s he been looking for in the palantír?” Celegorm asked. 

“Everything, I think,” Curufin said, “but I have to bully him into looking for anything good. It’s working, though. When you speak to him it won’t be as much like speaking to a stranger—at least on his side.”

“I think he is very unhappy,” Amras said, “but he’s cheered up since we’ve been in Tirion. Amrod and I are going to take him home with us come fall. A winter away from the city will probably do him good.”

“Does he know that?” Celebrimbor asked.

“Not yet,” said Amras cheerfully, “but there’s no chance of him refusing. Not if we ask him.”

"We mentioned it once, but only in passing," Amrod added.

“He’ll go mad trapped up a mountain in the snow,” Celegorm said. 

“No, he won’t,” said Amrod. Still without opening his eyes, he knocked a foot against Celegorm’s ankle. “You didn’t.”

“I like the woods.”

“And do you know why?” Amras asked, and he went on without waiting for an answer. “There’s nothing in the woods that cares who you are or who your father is, or what you did or didn’t do. The trees certainly don’t. You can go days without ever even thinking about your own name because it doesn’t matter.”

“Those things do matter, though,” Maedhros said. “We are Elves, Ambarussa, not trees or squirrels.”

“Well, yes, obviously,” said Amras, “and so we never forget them entirely, we always come back out of the woods to pick them up again. But they are things we can set aside for a little while, sometimes. We can go out into the quiet and find again who we are without them, to find again who we are, just ourselves, nameless and alone. When has Atya ever had the opportunity to do that?”

“Mandos,” said Caranthir. 

“You know that’s different.”

“I know what you mean, Amras,” Maglor said. “The Sea doesn’t care, either.” Amras nodded at him; Celegorm looked pained for a moment, but said nothing. Celebrimbor leaned his head on Maglor’s shoulder. 

The next morning Maglor rose early, and Daeron insisted on braiding his hair more elaborately than usual, fastened with beads and woven with silver threads not unlike the styles Fingon favored with gold. “You’ll be going to the palace, so you must look the part of the prince you are,” he said as he sat behind Maglor on the bed with the comb. 

“I know,” Maglor sighed. “As I’ve told you, the jewels I don’t mind—the titles I do. I left that all behind long ago.”

“And then you came back.” Daeron finished the last braid and wrapped his arms around Maglor from behind as he leaned forward to kiss his cheek. “There. Wear a ring or two as well. Maybe a necklace.”

“Yes, yes.” Maglor obliged, and then dressed. He did not choose robes or anything in the styles of Tirion or elsewhere in Valinor, instead donning sensible trousers and boots, and over them a shirt and a long black sleeveless tunic that fell almost to his knees, which was embroidered with silver stars and musical notes—a gift from Arwen, which he had worn many times to the court of Minas Tirith. The style was more than fifty years out of date there by now, and very little like what was worn anywhere in Valinor. Gondor had not yet entirely abandoned its wartime practicalities when Maglor had left it; heavy and more cumbersome clothes had still been rare. Maglor liked the freedom of movement, and liked even better that Arwen had made it. He had kept it packed away ever since he’d come to Valinor, having had no occasion yet to take it out, and still preferring much plainer clothes for everyday wear. 

“That’s nice,” said Daeron, who hadn’t yet seen these particular clothes. “You’ll certainly stand out, you know.”

“I would stand out anyway, I think.” Maglor fingered the hem of his tunic for a moment, running his thumb over a silver embroidered star. “I’d rather stand out because of my clothes than the other reasons. All right, I should go, lest I miss him in the cherry grove.”

“Celegorm and I will be nearby when you’re finished,” Daeron said. 

“I still don’t think it will be necessary.” Maglor leaned down to kiss him. “But thank you.”

Downstairs he found Elrond with a cup of tea in his hands. “I haven’t seen that tunic before,” he remarked.

“I don’t often have to wear courtly things,” said Maglor. 

“Is that courtly?”

“Well, it was some years ago in Minas Tirith.”

Elrond looked again, and his eyes went soft and sad as he recognized the embroidery. “It’s lovely,” he said.

“Yes, it is.” Maglor dropped a kiss to the top of his head. “I’m going to the palace; I don’t know when I’ll be back.”

“I’ll see you there later, more than likely. Once my grandfather finds out I’m in Tirion I’ll be dragged into all sorts of things.” 

“You wanted to come,” Maglor reminded him. 

“So I did,” Elrond said agreeably. 

Maglor walked the short distance to the palace, finding at least the streets still the same, even if the buildings weren’t always. He avoided the busier thoroughfares and ducked through alleys and narrower side-streets, following shortcuts he’d once known as well as he knew the strings of his harp. It was very strange to walk them now, so much older, with no laughing brothers or cousins with him, with a far more sober errand than making it back home in time for dinner, or before a parent realized they had snuck out when they weren’t supposed to. It was still very early; the sky was pale and the sun would not rise above the Pelóri for some hours. It shone through the Calacirya in the east, though, and caught and gleamed on the Mindon Eldaliéva. 

It was quiet at the palace too, at least out in the gardens and grounds. Maglor managed to make his way to the cherry grove behind the main building and past the most popular gardens without meeting anyone. Under the trees it was green and cool and damp with dew. Cherries were thick in the boughs, ripe for picking now, and Maglor found stacks of baskets waiting for those who would come to harvest them later. He paused to brush his fingers over a few of the ripened fruits, but did not pick any. No cherry he had ever eaten in Middle-earth had tasted like Finwë’s, just as no apples could compare to Celebrían’s. Like the plums that grew by his grandparents’ house, these cherries would taste of his childhood, of the bliss of Valinor’s Noontide, and he did not want to have been crying when he saw his father. 

No one else was out walking through the cherry trees, though. It was almost silent but for the songbirds and the breeze whispering through the leaves. Finally, Maglor came to the far end, and halted. There was his grandfather’s workshop, exactly as it stood in his memories. It was not very large, for it was only ever Finwë himself and one or two children or grandchildren, or perhaps a friend, who had worked there at one time. Maglor swallowed past the sudden lump in his throat, and went to the door. He hesitated before lifting the latch, wanting and yet not wanting to see what was inside. He didn’t know which would be worse: to find it untouched since Finwë’s death, or to find it empty and cleaned out. He steeled himself, pulled open the door, and stepped inside. 

It was empty, but for the cupboards and shelves attached to the walls. Gone were the neat stacks of wood, the tables, the chests of tools, the small completed or partly-completed projects that had cluttered the shelves. Maglor stepped into the center of the room, which smelled only of stale air, rather than sawdust and the fragrant finishing oils that his grandfather had favored. 

He had been thinking so much of Finwë lately, and the grief had felt heavy, but not painful. It was familiar in its shape, the edges of it worn soft by time, like jagged stones slowly rounding into pebbles by the winds and rains of many years. Standing in that room, though—shadowy and so terribly empty—it felt fresh and new again. He pressed a hand to his mouth as tears stung his eyes. He squeezed them shut, still not wanting to cry, but not sure he would be able to help it. 

Then he started, the scars on his palm suddenly burning, at the sound of a voice behind him, saying sharply, “Who is here? This is not a place to—” Maglor turned to find his father in the doorway, a scowl melting away into a look of surprise. “Cáno,” he said, in a very different tone. “I am sorry, I thought…”

“It’s all right,” Maglor said, when he caught his breath. He would have reacted the same way, probably, to finding the door ajar, assuming someone had entered this place out of mere curiosity. He clasped his hands behind his back, pressing his thumb into his scarred palm, letting the pain of it chase away the tears for Finwë, though it did nothing to stop the sudden racing of his heart. He and Fëanor regarded one another for what felt like a very long time. Fëanor was dressed very plainly, in sturdy and stained clothes, and his hair was bound back in a single tight braid. There were shadows under his eyes, as though he had not been sleeping well. His gaze swept over Maglor, taking in his much finer dress, until it settled on his face. Maglor had tried to rehearse what he would say, but he hadn’t anticipated having this conversation in Finwë’s workshop; he hadn’t expected fear to rear its head quite like this—hadn’t expected to be taken by surprise. Finally, he took a breath and said, in a voice that shook only slightly, “I was looking for you.”

Fëanor did not look surprised at that. “To speak of the song you are writing?” he asked. He was guarded, his stance that of one poised for flight, as though he expected a repeat of their last encounter. Maglor couldn’t really blame him. He pressed his thumb harder into his palm, wishing that it didn’t hurt, wishing that he could meet his father with the same kind of ease that Ambarussa could, or the warmth of Curufin and Celebrimbor. He missed his father so much that it hurt, like a blade lodged somewhere under his ribs, between his lungs. He’d felt the same way when they’d met before, but the feeling had then been drowned out by how angry he had still been. Now the anger was gone—but the fear wasn’t, so it just ached.

“Yes,” he said, hoping none of that showed on his face or in his voice. “If you will speak with me.”

“Of course I will.” Whether he meant that of course he would speak of Finwë, or of course he would speak with Maglor, was impossible to tell. “Let us come out into the sunlight.” 

Maglor readily agreed, and shut the door firmly behind him. He let his hand rest against the wood for a moment, before turning away and following Fëanor back toward the cherry trees. They stopped under the closest one, and the silence swiftly grew tense. Finally, Fëanor said, “I don’t know if I will be able to speak much of him. It is…very hard.”

“I understand,” Maglor said. “Grandmother Míriel said that he was the same way. Unable to speak of such close griefs.”

“He was,” Fëanor said. 

“The question I have been asking,” Maglor said after another few moments of silence, “is what others would wish to hear sung of him. Not all of it will be sung—I cannot give everyone a verse—but all of it helps me to shape the song, to find the words that will capture him best. It cannot be a complete portrait, because to put anything into words is to lose something…but it will be as near to it as I can make it.”

“Then it will be very near indeed,” Fëanor murmured. He leaned back against the tree, arms crossed, and looked away into the grove, rather than at Maglor. The praise made Maglor’s throat go tight again, and he ducked his head—except the braids kept his hair from falling forward as he wished it to. Finally, Fëanor said, “I have been thinking of how I might answer that question since Ambarussa told me of it, but I don’t know. Anyone can tell you how great he was—how strong, how brave, how loving. You know all of those things yourself.”

“There is much I do not know,” said Maglor. “And no one knew him like you did.”

Fëanor took a deep breath, and let it out slowly. “I don’t think I knew him as well as I once thought. Regardless, I would not have him turned into—into a myth, into some figure of legend, to be reduced to his greatest deeds. He was as flawed as any one of us. Do not mistake me—I miss my father, and every day without him is—there are no words for it. I love my father, but I am not blind to his faults. His inability to speak of those most closely held griefs was one. If he had been able to tell me—willing to try to speak of—of his own family left behind or lost, perhaps things might have gone differently. I might have understood better his desire for a large family, knowing that he had once had one.”

“I have been told that his mother remarried after his father was lost,” Maglor said, “and that he loved his younger sisters dearly, though they would not make the Journey.” Fëanor closed his eyes for a moment, as though pained. “It is not my intention to flatten him into a mere legend or story. With this song I am trying to do the opposite. That is why I wish to hear from everyone who loves him—and you most of all.”

“He had a temper,” Fëanor said after a moment. “It showed rarely. He was furious at Formenos, but far more careful than I was to keep it hidden from all of you. He was—stubborn. Strong-willed, if you want to turn it to praise instead. And yet often he was too lenient. I don’t know why he did not intervene sooner in the conflict between myself and Nolofinwë. Intervene publicly, I mean, or more forcefully than only speaking sometimes to us each alone.”

“Would it not have only made things worse?” Maglor asked.

“I don’t know. No one can know, for he never did.” Fëanor sighed, and let his head fall back against the trunk. “Findis is of the belief he will return to us one day. At least she hopes for it, but I cannot. Such estel is beyond me.”

“And me,” Maglor said softly, thinking again of Indis and Míriel’s real intentions for this song, of the incredible hope that they harbored for it, the faith they were putting on him and his skills. Fëanor had no idea of it, and Maglor was glad. He did not want to see Fëanor start to grasp at hope only to have it ripped away. Maglor knew what that felt like, and would wish it upon no one. 

“Has this helped?” Fëanor asked. 

“It all helps,” Maglor said. He took a deep breath and said, “Atya—” at the same time Fëanor began, “Cáno—” They both broke off.

Fëanor broke the ensuing silence first. “Was it really so bad—at Formenos—when you did not let me see—”

“It was,” Maglor said. “We did not let anyone see, Maedhros and I, and he tried to keep me back too when we approached the doors, only I wouldn’t listen.” He paused for a moment, unsure whether to go on. Then he thought that if he didn’t say something, Fëanor would look into the palantír again, and of all the things Maglor wanted him to see and understand, to know, this was not one of them. “Only Fingon suffered a worse fate, later,” he said, “at the Nirnaeth. Finwë was—you would not have known him. It would have destroyed you.”

“It destroyed me anyway,” Fëanor said, very quietly.

“You do not need that memory of him in your mind,” Maglor said. “We did not let you see because we loved you, and we knew that you would follow him to Mandos then and there.”

“Maybe that would have been better than what came afterward.”

“Such thoughts as that never lead anywhere good,” Maglor said. “The Oath was a mistake—the Oath was what led to our ruin. Going east? That wasn’t. Beleriand would have been overrun ere the moon ever rose, and the rest of the world would have followed so swiftly even the Valar, had they chosen to act, would not have been able to stop it. Not all our deeds were in vain, however doomed we were.” He looked down at his hands. Speaking of the oath had brought back the pain in his scars, a steady throbbing—like the burns had felt as they finally started to heal, rather than the fresher, sharper pain. A reminder of how, after finally getting the Silmarils back, he had turned and thrown his away. He pressed his thumb into his palm again. “When last we met I said some very cruel things,” he said without looking up. 

“Nothing that you said was untrue.”

“That does not mean I should have said it. I’m—”

Fëanor reached out, taking Maglor’s hand in his and stopping him from rubbing his thumb into the scars. Maglor flinched, but Fëanor’s touch neither lessened nor worsened the pain in his hand—and he was careful not to touch the scars themselves. “You were angry,” he said, very softly, “and afraid, and in pain, and I lay at the root of it all. Do not apologize to me, Canafinwë.” His hand was warm, strong and rough with callouses. There were traces of soot under his fingernails, and he wore no rings.

“But I am sorry.” Maglor couldn’t raise his head, though. He was no longer angry, but it still hurt, and he was still so afraid. Sauron’s words in his father’s voice still echoed in the back of his mind, the lingering certainty that he was yet a failure and a disappointment—last and least—in his father’s eyes still clinging like a poison, and he still did not know what would banish them for good.

“You need not be.” Fëanor rested his other hand on Maglor’s shoulder. “I am your father; you should always be able to lose your temper, to lash out, without fear of reprisal, especially when I am the one who has hurt you. I know that has not always been true, and I am so, so sorry—and for this most of all.” He tightened his grip just slightly on Maglor’s scarred hand. “You were not wrong. I put my works above all of those I loved most in the world, and you have suffered the most for it. I’m so sorry. I know it’s not enough, I just do not yet know what will be.” Fëanor pressed a kiss to Maglor’s forehead, and stepped back. “I love you, Cáno. I look forward to hearing this song when it is done.” He did not wait for Maglor to reply before he left, walking back through the cherry trees. Once upon a time, Maglor thought, he would have picked a handful of the fruit as he went, to eat on his way to his workshop or wherever he was going. He did not do that now; instead he put his hands into his pockets. 

A few minutes after Fëanor disappeared beyond the grove, Celegorm and Daeron came from a different direction. “How did it go?” Celegorm asked.

“Much better than I thought,” Maglor said. “Neither of us started crying or shouting, so…”

“Love, you’re crying now,” Daeron said softly.

“Am I?” Maglor put his hand to his face, and his fingers came away wet. Daeron brought out a handkerchief to wipe them away.

“What did he say?” Celegorm asked. “Does your hand hurt?”

“He didn’t do anything wrong. I’m not upset. We were speaking of Finwë—it was always going to be hard.” That wasn’t what the tears were for, but Maglor didn’t want to share what else had been said. Not yet.

“If you say so,” Celegorm said, but he sounded doubtful. He glanced up at the cherries hanging over their heads, and picked a few. Maglor took one when it was offered. It tasted exactly like he thought it would.

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Having decided between the two of them that morning that Amrod would go to get some of the supplies they needed for their return to the mountains, Amras went to their old house alone. They’d fallen very quickly into the routine of helping Fëanor clear out the property. There was no particular hurry, and Fëanor seemed intent on taking his time, doing things properly—maybe delaying the time when he had to start really thinking about tearing down the walls. Curufin had spoken of this project months before as something Fëanor was doing just to be doing something, but Amras thought it was more than that, even if he still couldn’t guess what. Fëanor had offered no explanation, and Amras found himself reluctant to ask. 

He walked through the empty house, or at least the ground floor of it, since the stairs looked rather precarious. There was the dining room and the receiving rooms and parlors; there was the bright music room with two walls entirely made of windows—all open, now, the glass long-since broken—where Maglor had kept a small orchestra’s worth of instruments, as well as his writing desk and his collection of quill pens. Amras remembered being delighted with them as a child because they were of all different colors and sizes, had loved being lifted up onto Maglor’s lap so he could play with them while his brother worked, as long as he was very careful. Maglor had liked elaborate and beautiful and sometimes gaudy things, back then—so different from his almost austere habits now. 

Amras passed through the kitchen and the room he remembered as a schoolroom but which might have been a workroom just rearranged for his and Amrod’s use, and paused there to run his fingers over some clumsy drawings on the walls, preserved by virtue of being tucked away in a sheltered corner away from windows or doors, having escaped everyone’s notice somehow. There were little stick-figure people lined up, seven in descending order of height—Caranthir was taller than Celegorm in reality, but older had meant taller to Amras when he’d been very young and small—and two even taller figures for their parents. He crouched down to find his own clumsy child’s handwriting underneath the figures, scribbled tengwar that was meant to spell out all their names. He’d only gotten through Nelyo and Cáno and Telk— before getting interrupted. Most likely someone had come by and nearly caught them drawing on the walls. 

“Ambarussa?” Fëanor called from the hallway. “Are you here?”

“In here, Atya,” Amras said over his shoulder. Fëanor soon appeared in the doorway. 

“What are you looking at?” Fëanor stepped over some broken plaster to kneel beside Amras. He laughed a little, quietly. “Did you do this?”

“Yes,” Amras said, grinning at him. 

“Did you not have enough paper for drawing?”

“Oh, but that wasn’t as much fun as doing something we knew we shouldn’t.” Amras got to his feet. Fëanor ran his fingers over the drawings before also rising. “Did you see Cáno this morning?”

“Yes.” Fëanor’s smile faded away. 

“How did it go?”

“Better than the last time,” Fëanor said. Amras thought he meant to sound wry, but it didn’t really work. “We spoke of your grandfather. It was…it was always going to be difficult.”

“Do you feel better for it?” Amras asked. 

“I feel better for having seen your brother, and spoken to him without either of us upsetting the other. Speaking of brothers, where is Amrod?”

“Shopping,” said Amras. “We’re going to go back home soon. Do you want to come?”

“Come—where, home with you? To your mother’s…?”

“No, to our house, up in the mountains. It’s south of Imloth Ningloron. You don’t have to stay long if you decide it’s too quiet for you. There’s plenty of time yet before the first snows cut off all the roads.”

Fëanor looked away, back down at the drawings on the wall. “Let me think on it,” he said finally. “When will you leave?”

“Oh, a few days, a week, two weeks. It doesn’t much matter, though it drives Curvo a bit mad that he can never guess when we come or go. It’s not as though we have anything particularly urgent awaiting us. Did you want to do any work here today?” Amras thought Fëanor did not seem in the mood for doing much of anything. Talking of Finwë—talking to Maglor—seemed to have drained him, and he looked tired, worn out as though he’d already done a full day’s work of digging up crabapple saplings and runaway ivy vines.

“I had planned…” Fëanor began, but in the time it took him to reply Amras had already made up his mind. 

“No you don’t,” he said, and grabbed Fëanor’s arm. “Come on. We’ll find Amrod and maybe steal Curvo’s girls and go riding outside the city.”

“Steal Curvo’s—?!” Fëanor began, incredulous, even as he allowed himself to be dragged out of the house. 

“They’ll love it, and maybe Curvo will come too! Then it won’t be stealing.”

As they turned onto Curufin’s street, Amras glimpsed Maedhros stepping out of Curufin’s workshop with Celebrimbor and Elessúrë. Maedhros glanced their way and immediately stepped back inside. Amras hadn’t known that he would be there, but that seemed like a very foolish mistake, suddenly. Of course his brothers would be around, with all of them in Tirion. Celegorm would be at the palace with Maglor, but the rest were as likely to be at Curufin’s house as Lisgalen’s, just a few doors down. Still, it was too late to turn back now, so he just put on a smile and pretended he hadn’t seen Maedhros at all. 

“Hullo, Tyelpë!” he said as he and Fëanor reached Celebrimbor and Elessúrë. “Good morning, Elessúrë!”

“Good morning, Cousin,” said Elessúrë, who Amras was almost certain did not quite know how to tell himself and Amrod apart. “Good morning, Uncle.”

“Hello, Grandfather,” said Celebrimbor. “What brings you two here?”

“We’re going riding outside the city,” Amras said. “Is Amrod back yet? And do you think your sisters would like to join us?”

“Náriel’s getting to spend the morning with Atya in the forge,” said Celebrimbor, “and there’s nothing in the world that could drag her away from that, but Calissë would love to go, I’m sure.” He disappeared into the house to look for Calissë, while Elessúrë remained outside to chat with them about the holiday, and about his own work in the quarries just north of the Calacirya. Fëanor’s mood lifted as they spoke, which Amras was gratified to see even though he had no knowledge of and even less interest in quarrying stone. 

Celebrimbor returned with Calissë, who hurled herself out of the door into Fëanor’s arms with a gleeful squeal. He lifted her up onto his hip, and some of the weight he seemed to have been carrying since his conversation with Maglor fell away as he kissed her hello. “Do you want to come too?” Amras asked Celebrimbor and Elessúrë.

“I have a commission to finish,” Celebrimbor said.

“And I’ve made plans with Russandol and Carnistir,” said Elessúrë. Amras wasn’t quite sure if he knew the extent of the tension in their family; if he did know, he did a very good job of pretending not to. “And there is Ambarussa,” he added, nodding down the street.

Amras turned and waved. “Amrod!” he called. “We’re going out riding, hurry up!”

“When did we decide that?” Amrod demanded as he joined them, arms full of packages. “Hullo, Atya.”

“Ten minutes ago,” said Amras.

“All right, just give me two minutes.”

“You two really are terrible at planning,” Celebrimbor said. 

“We are excellent at planning,” Amras said. “It’s not our fault none of the rest of you can keep up.” That got Fëanor to laugh, and Amras felt absurdly pleased with himself for it. 

It was a beautiful day, perfect for racing across the fields outside of Tirion. They taught Calissë a few new tricks in the saddle, and picnicked out among the wildflowers, and did not talk again of Finwë or of their other brothers. By the time they returned to Curufin’s house it was getting late, and Calissë was tired enough that Fëanor had her on his saddle, an arm around her waist as she slumped back against him. They parted at the stables, Fëanor to return to the palace and Amrod and Amras to take Calissë home. As he transferred Calissë into Amras’ arms, Fëanor said quietly, “Do you really want me to go away to the mountains with you?”

“Yes, Atya,” said Amrod. “We really do.”

“Then I’ll come.” He offered a small smile. “Only give me more than ten minutes’ warning. Half an hour, at least.”

“I think we can probably give you a full hour,” said Amras. “It won’t be for some days yet, though. Will we see you tomorrow?”

“If you like, though I don’t think I’ll go back to the house.”

Amrod and Amras dined with Curufin, and joined by Maedhros and Caranthir. Afterward Amras left for Finrod’s house. He found Daeron and Celegorm talking together in the library. “Where’s Cáno?” he asked.

“Upstairs, working his song,” Daeron said. “He won’t mind if you interrupt.”

“Thanks. Is he all right?”

“He says he is,” said Celegorm, “but you know how that goes.”

“I do, yes,” Amras said, raising an eyebrow at him, because Celegorm could be just as bad as Maglor in that regard and he knew it. Celegorm scowled, and Amras left Daeron to deal with it. 

He found Maglor in his bedroom, sitting cross-legged on the bed with papers spread around him, chewing on the end of a pencil. “Hullo, Ambarussa,” he said, glancing up. “Is everything all right?”

“You tell me.” Amras moved some of the papers so he could sit on the bed too. “You talked a lot about Finwë today.”

“I did.” Maglor sighed and gathered up the rest of the papers. “It’s…hard. Every time. It’s harder here in Tirion, which I suppose I should have expected. Foolish not to.”

“What about Atya?”

“That…went better than I feared.” Maglor set the papers on the nightstand and turned to put an arm around Amras. “I heard you dragged him out of the city afterward.”

“He needed cheering up, but he said he was glad to have spoken to you. And he agreed to go home with us.”

“Good.” Maglor rested his head on Amras’ shoulder. “I haven’t had enough time to think about it or decide how I really feel yet, besides exhausted, and Celegorm and Elrond spent all evening hovering…”

“Do you want me to leave?”

“No. Is Amrod here?”

“No, he’s at Curvo’s. Are you tired because of Atya or because of everything else?”

“Yes.” Maglor was silent for a while. Amras tugged him over so they were both lying down, and then just waited. He traced the patterns carved into the plaster of the ceiling—Dwarvish in design, unsurprisingly; he suspected Nargothrond had sported the same motifs—and listened to the quiet music of a fountain outside and below in the garden somewhere. Finally, Maglor sighed, breath ghosting over Amras’ arm. “My hand hurt when I first saw him, but he also took me by surprise, and it didn’t last very long—it wasn’t quite as bad as before, either.”

“That’s good,” Amras murmured. He took Maglor’s hand to look at the scars for himself. They were pale and smooth and, well, scars. They did not seem to bother him at any other time, except that once he’d said his hand got stiff in the cold. “So it was just memory that made it burn, not Atya himself.”

“Yes, I think so. Atya’s just the source of all the memories. It was the same with…some of my other scars. They would hurt when I was reminded of what happened.” Amras thought that Maglor meant the brand upon his chest, in the shape of a large, lidless eye, which they had all seen but never spoke of. He had many other scars, but none quite like that. Maglor went on, “I don’t feel angry anymore. I just…I feel rather like I did when I saw Maedhros by Ekkaia.”

“You got past that,” Amras said.

“It took a very long time,” Maglor said, very softly. 

“What’s this bit in the middle of your hand?” Amras asked, as he rubbed his thumb over it. The scar seemed different there. 

“Mm?” Maglor lifted his head a little to see. “Oh, it’s nothing—”

“Did you injure it after you got burned?”

“No. Don’t worry about it, Amras.” Maglor pulled his hand free, closing his fingers over the scars. He sighed. “I don’t think I have it in me to speak to Atya again any time soon,” he said after a moment. “I need time to finish this song. Once it’s written and I…” he trailed off. “Once it’s written,” he repeated. “Then I can think about Atya again.”

Amras raised himself up on his elbow to frown down at Maglor, whose gaze was distant. He wasn’t lost in musical notes or lyrics, though—Amras knew what that looked like. This was something else, something too much like the way he’d sometimes stared off at nothing before he went to Lórien. “What’s the matter?” Amras asked, poking in him in between his eyes. Maglor blinked as he flinched back. “What about this song has you so worried?”

“It’s just…” Maglor faltered. “It’s so important.”

“If you cannot finish it, you cannot finish it. You said so yourself. No one will be upset with you if you can’t.”

“I’ve promised to perform it at Ingwë’s—”

“If it isn’t done, just sing something else. I’m sure Elemmírë won’t mind. Why give yourself such a deadline when no one else has?”

Maglor didn’t answer. He just sat up and reached for his notes. “It’s important,” he said again after a minute. “I have to finish it, and I have to—I have to sing it.”

“You know Finwë won’t care,” Amras said. They’d had a similar conversation before, about burials. Maglor and Maedhros had both felt horribly guilty about not being able to properly bury any of their people after Sirion, including Ambarussa, but the dead didn’t care—they were gone already. Funerals were for the living. There was grief in not being able to dig a grave or build a cairn, or even to make a song or find proper words, but Amras did not think there should be guilt. “Cáno…”

“I care,” Maglor said, as he rearranged the papers in his hands. His hair fell lose around his shoulders, and when he bent his head forward it fell like a curtain between him and Amras, him and the rest of the world. That was also a habit he had seemed to leave behind in Lórien. Amras did not like seeing it return.

“Cáno,” Amras said again, reaching out to draw his hair back. “What’s wrong? You’re not acting like yourself. Or rather, you are acting like yourself, but not yourself since you came back from Lórien.”

Maglor didn’t look up, but his hands stilled in shuffling the papers. “We spoke of the Darkening,” he said. “Atya and me. And then I spoke to Turgon, and…my thoughts are dark tonight, Amras, but it will pass.”

“Are you sure?”

“If not tonight, then when I finish this song.” Maglor set the papers aside and turned to embrace Amras, holding on tightly. “If I ask you not to worry, will you listen?”

“No.”

“I didn’t think so. When you see Atya next, will you give him a message from me?”

“Yes, of course.”

“Tell him my continuing avoidance isn’t because of him—because of anything he said today, I mean. He didn’t do anything wrong. There is just too much yet between us that I do not have the heart to think about or speak of. Not yet.”

“All right. I’ll tell him.”

Amras left Maglor to his songwriting, and went back downstairs. By that time Elrond had joined Daeron and Celegorm. “What’s so important about this song?” he asked them. “Maglor’s acting like the world will end if he doesn’t finish it.”

“It’s the first major song he’s written in a very long time,” Elrond said after a moment in which he exchanged a glance with Daeron. “And there is the fact that both Indis and Míriel have asked it of him.”

“Yes, but he wasn’t acting like this in the beginning. Did something happen after we left?”

“No,” said Daeron, but Amras didn’t believe him.

“He’s starting to fall back into old habits,” Amras said. “Little ones, but not good ones.” 

Elrond frowned, and Daeron rose from his seat. “If he is troubled, it is only temporary,” he said firmly. “I won’t tell you not to worry, but only because more useless words have never been uttered among this family.” He gripped Amras’ shoulder for a moment before disappearing up the stairs. 

Amras crossed his arms and turned to Celegorm, but Celegorm shook his head. He had Pídhres on his lap; Huan had not come to Tirion with them, having apparently gone off on some errand or adventure of his own. “Don’t look at me, Ambarussa. Are you sure it’s not just his meeting with Atar?”

“I am.”

“Maglor has always had a tendency,” said Elrond, “of burying things down deep—things that hurt, dark memories or old griefs. That was part of the trouble he had upon coming to these shores: they were all unburied at once, and he could not push them away again.”

“Us, you mean,” said Celegorm.

“Yes, and all of the old things associated with how he lost you. He is stronger now, and has learned better habits, but it seems that Finwë’s death is not a thing he has yet addressed. Now this song is forcing it upon him—upon all of Finwë’s house, really, but Maglor is the one most immersed in it. He isn’t alone, however. I am not worried—not yet, at least. He isn’t alone, and he isn't trying to run away from it.”

“Would you tell us if you were worried?” Amras asked.

“Yes, of course,” said Elrond. That, at least, Amras believed. 

The next day he went to find Fëanor in his own workshop at the palace, engaged in the very delicate and time-consuming work of stringing together many tiny golden links into a necklace chain. It was part of an elaborate and intricate looking piece, a drawing of which was on the nearby drafting table. “That’s going to be very pretty when it’s done,” said Amras, peering at it. “Who is it for?”

“No one in particular,” said Fëanor, which Amras took to really mean Nerdanel, except that Fëanor would not actually give it to her; Curufin had told Amras once that Fëanor had a small chest of such pieces in his rooms, slowly filling with jewels and rings and other such ornaments. Neither he nor Nerdanel ever spoke of the other, and Amras didn’t know if they spoke to each other with any frequency either. Nerdanel had once said she would not have Fëanor in her house again while her children were so troubled—which had, of course, really meant while Maedhros was so troubled. As far as Amras knew, that had extended into the years when Maedhros had been gone, even when Caranthir started to spend more time in Tirion or Imloth Ningloron. Fëanor did not look up or stop what he was doing, but he hadn’t sounded annoyed at the interruption, so Amras dragged over a stool to sit across the workbench from him. There were a few bowls of glittering gemstones there, and he picked through them idly. “Is this my hour’s notice?” Fëanor asked.

Amras laughed. “No—I promise, we’ll give you more than an hour. Maglor asked me to pass on a message.”

At that Fëanor did stop his work, and looked up with a guarded expression. “Yes?”

“It’s not bad,” Amras said. “He said to tell you that he’s going to go back to avoiding you, more or less, but that it’s not because of you. You didn’t say or do anything wrong yesterday—he wanted me to make sure you knew that. He just can’t think about anything else while he’s got this song all in his head. He doesn’t feel as though he can have another heavy sort of conversation yet.”

“…Oh,” Fëanor said, so softly Amras almost didn’t hear. 

“He’s talking about it like it’s terribly important, this song,” Amras said, “and acting like it troubles him horribly.”

“What do you mean?”

“I’ve been told not to worry by both Daeron and Elrond, and aside from Nelyo they know Cáno best,” Amras said, aware that speaking Daeron’s name might be treading on unsteady ground, but Fëanor didn’t so much as blink at it. “But he was very unhappy last night. But again,” he added quickly, “he told me to tell you that it’s not because of you. When this song is all done with and he’s performed it either here in Tirion or at Ingwë’s party, or wherever it’s wanted, he’ll be able to turn his mind to other things.”

Fëanor’s smile was rueful. “I understand that, Telvo,” he said. “You don’t need to make excuses to me for a craftsman’s focus upon his work. It is important, this song, and he should be giving it all of his attention.”

“Oh. I suppose that is it, isn’t it?” Amras didn’t usually equate Maglor’s songwriting to craft, since he did it almost entirely in his head and very rarely got so consumed by it. Amras was no real craftsman himself—he liked making things, but it never absorbed all of his attention in such a way. “Usually such things aren’t so…” He tried to think of a good word—but he didn’t have the talent for those either, the way his father and some of his brothers did. “Unhappy,” he settled on. 

“The subject is not a happy one. I hope this will be the last song your brother writes of its kind,” Fëanor said. 

“He has said it will be. Would you like me to carry any message back to him for you?”

Fëanor smiled again and shook his head as he picked up his pliers. “You don’t need to be playing messenger between us. I will see Cáno again when he is ready. Just knowing that he wants to speak again is enough.”

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After Maglor managed to compose himself and to convince Daeron and Celegorm that he wasn’t going to fall to pieces as soon as he left their sight, he went in search of his cousins, finding Turgon and Argon together in the library. “There you are, Macalaurë!” Argon exclaimed, jumping to his feet to embrace Maglor. “You took your time, didn’t you?”

“I hope you aren’t just going to repeat all the things Findekáno said to me,” said Maglor, smiling up at him. Argon was nearly as tall as Turgon, who was nearly as tall as Maedhros, and Maglor was glad to find them both seated.

“Oh, he said it to complain—I’m not! I want to hear all about your travels and wanderings. Everyone else got to see so much more of Middle-earth than I ever did, and you the most of all.”

“Unless you are particularly interested in the habits of seagulls and crabs, I’m afraid my tales will be very boring for the most part,” said Maglor. “Hello, Turukáno.”

“Hello, Macalaurë.” Turgon’s gaze lingered for only a few seconds on Maglor’s face and the scars there. “You’re here to talk to us about Finwë?”

“I am, though you don’t have to speak with me if you won’t want to.”

“Of course we want to speak with you,” Argon said. “I don’t know what we can tell you, though.”

“You can tell me what you would like to hear sung,” Maglor said. He sat down at the table with them, resting his arms on top of it. “Anything at all. It doesn’t matter if it’s the same thing someone else told me.”

“What sort of song is this going to be?” Argon asked. “Do we all get our own verse? This is what Turukáno remembers best, and this is Aracáno’s favorite childhood memory?”

“No,” said Maglor, “but it will all help me…shape it. Discover what words I will use. I don’t know how to explain better than that. I’ve never done anything like this before for a song.”

“Why are you doing it now?” Turgon asked. He sat leaned back in his seat, at first glance as comfortable and casual as Argon, but there was a faint tension in the way he held himself, a deliberate air to his stillness, and he did not smile. He was not quite as stiff as he had been when Maglor had last seen him, sometime before the removal to Gondolin, but he was not at ease either.

“Both Míriel and Indis asked it of me,” Maglor said, “and this is—it’s Finwë. It cannot be my song alone.” This, at least, earned him a look that was something like approval. He hadn’t really expected any sort of warm reception from Turgon, but his reticence still stung a little. They had been friends once, often thrown together while their older brothers went off to spend time away from younger siblings. They hadn’t had much in common in their youth, but Maglor still remembered those days with fondness. “And you do not have to speak to me now.”

Argon leaned forward onto the table, crossing his arms and tilting his head a little as he thought. He seemed so young, Maglor thought—because of course he was. He had survived the Helcaraxë, and that had surely left its mark, but he had died so quickly and so soon after reaching Middle-earth. Maglor hadn’t wept for him at the time, because he had been acting as Maedhros’ regent and fearing that it would very soon become more than a regency, and in the wake of Fëanor’s death and Maedhros’ capture he had felt so terribly numb that every other piece of bad news seemed like something far away, something out of a story that had nothing to do with him. It was all he could do to keep his people in order and to avoid an all out fight with Fingolfin’s host when they arrived, furious and grieving for all those lost on the ice, and then reeling from the shock of finding him, rather than his father or even his elder brother, there to greet them. He tried not to think about those years—those terrible years when Maedhros had been lost, and his brothers had formed and discarded plan after plan of rescue in spite of Maedhros’ last order to them not to try. After Maedhros had come back, after it was certain he would recover, Maglor had locked himself away for several days just to cry and cry, all the tears that would not come before spilling out all at once, until he fell asleep for a full day and night and woke up with the worst hungover feeling of his life, but also able to breathe again. 

Now Argon sat across from him, alive and bright-eyed. “He used to take us fishing,” he said. “You remember, he taught us to make our own poles, and our own spears?”

“I remember,” Turgon said.

“Yes,” Maglor said.

“Those were my favorite times, especially when it was just him and us.”

“He always tried to do that,” Turgon added after a moment, “to make time for us each alone, even though there were so many of us. He would let me join him in his council meetings when I was old enough to take an interest. I learned a very great deal from that, though I never expected to need any of it, really.”

“I wish he had told us more stories of his own youth,” said Argon. “But whenever I asked about his parents, or his grandfather that he talked about a little, sometimes, he just shook his head and changed the subject.”

“Indis or Míriel could tell you more now, if you wanted,” Maglor said. “They spoke to me a little of his family at Cuiviénen.”

“Really?” Argon sat up, eyes lighting with curiosity. “I would like that very much. I have nothing to add, Macalaurë, unless you want to ask me more questions. If not, I’m going to find Grandmother.”

“I don’t,” Maglor said, and Argon got up, planted a kiss on top of Maglor’s head, and left the library. It was very quiet there; only a handful of others were about, reading or writing alone or in pairs, in silence or holding their own hushed conversations. Maglor glanced toward the ceiling and found it to be the same ceiling he remembered from his youth, that his father and many others had painted over the course of many weeks. Maglor had been quite small then, and not allowed anywhere near the library while the work was going on, but he remembered Fëanor carrying him in afterward to show him the scenes high above. 

“So it’s really true, then, that you were captured by the Enemy?” Turgon asked after a few moments of silence. 

“Yes.” Maglor dropped his gaze to Turgon’s face. “And yes, that is where the scars on my face are from.”

“Are those scars around your mouth?” Turgon leaned forward a little, frowning. “I hadn’t noticed before. What…?”

“They are,” Maglor said. He pressed his palms flat against the table to stop himself digging his thumb into his scarred palm. He’d thought he’d left that habit behind in Lórien, too. “They’re needle marks.”

“Needle—?”

“My last act of defiance failed to bring his tower down, and he ordered my lips sewn shut. It was very—unpleasant.”

Turgon sat back in his seat, now looking rather stunned. His own hair was as dark and thick as Maglor’s own, and fell in similar waves over his shoulders. Usually it was Maglor with the unruly hair, but Turgon’s was only held out of his face by a simple golden circlet, set with a few tiny sapphires that glittered when he moved his head. “Unpleasant,” he repeated, incredulous. “That’s all you have to say about it?”

“I would much rather say nothing at all,” Maglor said. “The tower of the Necromancer was a dark and terrible place.”

“I’m sorry.”

“It’s all right. I know I look very different.” Maglor paused for a moment, and then asked, “Is there anything else you would ask of me, or say to me, Turukáno?”

He shook his head. “No. I’m not—I’m not angry, Macalaurë. I have missed you, and my brother did tell me something of what happened. It’s just that hearing about it and seeing it are two very different things. You are so much older than the rest of us now.”

“I suppose I am.”

“Are you still not on speaking terms with your father?”

“That’s…complicated.”

“I understand,” Turgon said. “I’m not on particularly good terms with mine.”

“Really?”

Turgon shrugged, looking away. “I was the one that built his cairn in the mountains. I had to…I prepared his body. Alone. That was my own fault, really—I was the one who had taken my people and hidden us away. But he…seeing it—”

“I know,” Maglor said softly. 

“Do you? Fëanáro did not die by Morgoth’s hand.”

“No,” said Maglor, “but Finwë did.”

Turgon closed his eyes, and slumped forward, elbows on the table as he rubbed his hands over his face. “I forgot,” he sighed, “that all of you were there.”

“We found him after. Maedhros and I. We didn’t know what to do except to cover his body and to keep our brothers and our father away. Findis mentioned his grave to me, but I don’t have any idea who might have gone back afterward to make it.” They’d known what graves were, then—they’d known the stories of those slain long ago, as part of the explanations given for why the Elves had left Cuiviénen, but no one had ever told them how to make one, to dig a grave or build a cairn or why one might choose one rite over another. They’d learned later, far more than they had ever wanted, but Maglor still wished they could have done something more for Finwë, rather than just…leaving him there.

“Ingwë and Olwë did. My father says there is a cairn by the lake, covered now in flowers.”

“Oh. Good.” Maglor dropped his gaze to the table. “Can you forgive your father, do you think?”

“I have, it’s not that. I just…when I look at him sometimes I see only his body. What was left of him in the end. Do you know what I mean?”

“When I came back that’s all I could think of when I saw my brothers again,” Maglor said softly. “But did you not…I mean, in Mandos—?”

“I’m sure it would be worse if I hadn’t sought help for it in Mandos. But it’s still hard. It makes speaking to him at all difficult, and we end up arguing most times that we try, even though neither of us are actually angry with the other. I’m not really that long out of the Halls, you know. Only a year or so longer than Atya himself. And I had my own difficult reunions with Idril and Tuor, and Eärendil. They did not have to bury me, but—well. They could not bury me. We were none of us very good fathers in the end, I think. In some ways Finwë was not, either.”

“No, but he tried. You tried—you all tried.”

“I didn’t,” Turgon said. He rose from the table. “I knew what I should do and I did not do it—I told myself at the time I had many good reasons for it, but none of that mattered in the end. Maybe Finwë also had good reasons for acting as he did during the unrest, but none of that mattered in the end either.”

“With Morgoth in our midst there was no way it could end well, whatever happened between your father and mine,” Maglor said. He also rose. “What-ifs and should-haves are useless, especially now. I do not intend to flatten our grandfather into some greater-than-life figure, some legend out of ancient days. But neither will I reduce him to only his mistakes. That isn’t the point.”

“Good.” Turgon’s smile was small and crooked. He reached out to grasp Maglor’s hand. “I really am glad you’re back, Cousin. If even you and Fëanor have returned to us, it gives me hope yet for Aikanáro and Irissë.” 

After Turgon left Maglor sat back down for a few minutes, looking up at the paintings on the ceiling, at how the sunlight slanted through the windows differently than Laurelin had, and made the colors look different. Then he took a breath and went in search of his aunt Lalwen. He found her out by the stables, talking of horse breeding and her hopes for a filly that had just been born. “Macalaurë!” she cried, abandoning her conversation with the stable master immediately upon seeing him. She threw her arms around him, squeezing tightly for just a moment. “You’ve finally made your way to Tirion! I’m so glad to see you. What an interesting style you are wearing. Is this what they wear in Middle-earth these days?” She took a step back, holding onto his arms as she looked him up and down.

“It was,” Maglor said. “I haven’t the faintest idea what the current fashions in Gondor are.”

Lalwen laughed. “Well, it suits you. You look very handsome—I like the music notes. But you want to talk about more serious things than clothes, don’t you? Come on, let’s walk through the gardens. Anairë has been growing a hedge maze and it’s finally tall enough to walk through and get properly lost!”

The hedges were of neatly-trimmed boxwood, just tall enough that even Maedhros or Turgon wouldn’t be able to see over the top even when standing on their toes. Maglor knew his brothers, though, would immediately cheat by hoisting one another up on their shoulders if someone let them into the maze. “I’m told you want to know what I would like to hear sung of my father,” Lalwen said once they were away from the entrance and Maglor had gotten entirely turned around. 

“I do,” he said. 

“I’m very glad you’re writing this song,” Lalwen said after a moment, instead of giving an answer to the question. “My mother spoke to me of it—I know its real purpose.”

Maglor tripped over a bit of loose gravel. After he caught himself he said, “Please do not expect any—”

“Oh, I didn’t mean that, and I haven’t told anyone else. That part of it, I know, is to be kept secret—just in case it does not work out as my mother hopes.” Lalwen smiled at him, though the bright laughter had faded, and her blue-grey eyes were very serious. “I’m a much better secret-keeper than anyone guesses, you know, because I seem like I would be terrible at it. If you start to feel the weight of this task, Maglor, please feel free to come to me. You can complain all you like and I will never tell another soul.”

Maglor did know that Lalwen was a good secret keeper. As children they had all known that their Aunt Lalwen, in spite of her boisterousness and ready laughter and near-constant teasing while in company, had always a ready ear to listen to whatever woes or secrets they might bring her, and that those things would never reach the ears of another. “Thank you,” he said. “It isn’t that no one knows already. I’ve spoken of it to Maedhros and Elrond, and Daeron.”

Lalwen’s teasing smile returned suddenly. “I knew Daeron was smitten with you at the Mereth Aderthad,” she said, poking Maglor in the arm. “I knew it, but Nolofinwë wouldn’t believe me! I’m very happy for you.”

“Thank you. I’m very happy too.”

“But I can tease you about Daeron more later. We are meant to be speaking of Finwë.” Lalwen fell silent as they walked. A few birds sang, hidden from sight in the hedges, and somewhere else beyond the maze Maglor could hear laughter and bright conversation. “The last time I saw my father,” she said finally, “we fought. I did not want him to go, and he would not stay—he was very angry, angrier than I had ever seen him. It was directed at the Valar mostly, I think, and at Fëanáro, though I didn’t realize it at the time. I just thought he was taking Fëanáro’s side again, when it was not Fëanáro who had had his life threatened. I have always regretted that—that we parted in anger, that I did not tell him that I loved him, or hear that he loved me, as the last words we exchanged. That was my own fault—he was not angry at me but I was very angry at him. It’s just…well, it’s just that I thought there would be time.”

“We all thought that,” Maglor said. 

“I don’t know what I would like most to hear in a song. I trust that you will find words for all of us. He was my father, and I know that he loved all of us dearly. I only hope that he knew, in spite of our bitter parting, that I loved him too.” Lalwen took Maglor’s hand and squeezed it. “That probably isn't terribly helpful. I’m sorry.”

“Everyone has said that,” Maglor said, “but it all helps—just to hear him spoken of by all of you, whatever it is you say. It is very hard, but it will all help me to make this song what it should be. What it must be.”

Lalwen knew the hedge maze well enough that they only got turned around for ten minutes before she found the way back out. Maglor lingered for a few minutes by the maze’s entrance as she returned to the stables, listening to the birdsong, then went inside, soon learning that his uncle was in his private study. It was not Finwë’s old study—that, like his workshop, remained shut up and unused. Fingolfin’s was nearby, but smaller and cozier, with warm brown wood paneled walls lined with shelves that held books and small sculptures and other interesting things, some of which looked as though they had come from Middle-earth. His desk was covered in stacks of parchment and paper and books and things, but it was all organized very neatly, and he immediately set his pen aside when Maglor was shown in. “Maglor,” he said, “welcome back to Tirion! It’s good to see you again.”

“Hello, Uncle. I’m sorry our last meeting was cut so short—”

“Oh, it’s all right; I understand.” Fingolfin embraced him with the same warmth that he had at that last meeting, which had been just before Fëanor had arrived and Maglor had fled Imloth Ningloron. “Come sit down. You’re here about that song for Finwë, are you not?”

“I am, but if you’re busy…?”

“I am not.” Fingolfin led the way to the window, where a pair of comfortable chairs sat facing one another. A potted orchid sat on the windowsill, sporting soft purple blooms, beside a few small stone carvings of abstract but clever shapes. “What is it of Finwë you wish to ask me?”

“Just—what you want to hear me sing of. It’s the question I’m asking everyone. Not everyone has had an answer. Whatever you wish to say—it’s all helpful.”

“Have you spoken to your own father yet?” Fingolfin asked as he sat down.

“Yes. I spoke to him this morning.”

Fingolfin had been in Imloth Ningloron when Maglor had had his first confrontation with Fëanor. No one had been close enough to hear the words, but Maglor knew they’d heard him raise his voice. Now Fingolfin leaned back in his seat and regarded Maglor solemnly. He looked very like Fëanor, both of them so greatly resembling Finwë—in the shape of their faces, the dark fall of their hair. Fingolfin did not burn in the same way that Fëanor did, but Maglor knew it was mistake to ever forget that he could. “How did it go?”

Maglor shrugged, looking at the flowers rather than at his uncle’s face. “Better than I feared. It was hard because we spoke of Finwë, more than for any other reason.”

“He has missed you, you know,” Fingolfin said quietly. 

“I know.” Maglor did not look away from the flowers. “It isn’t that easy to stop being afraid.”

“Is that what it is? Fear, rather than anger?”

“It’s always been fear.” Maglor did look at Fingolfin then. “I’m not as afraid now—not of most things, anyway. Not like I was before. I hope someone else has told you about how much of a mess I was, because I don’t really want to speak of it.”

“I’ve spoken with Elrond,” said Fingolfin, “but he is reluctant to share very much.” He paused, and then said, “Your father has been deeply unhappy since he returned from Mandos. I do not think he expected a warm welcome, but he did harbor hope for it, however small.”

“I know.”

“He has blamed himself for Finwë’s death,” Fingolfin said after another pause. “Findis and I followed him to Formenos some years ago, when he left Tirion so abruptly that your brother thought we had quarreled and I had banished him.”

“Curvo has never mentioned that.”

“It was a few years after you left for Lórien—so long ago now that he likely doesn’t think it worth remembering, since we had not quarreled and I certainly did not send him away. Fëanor did not stay there long. He wanted to see Finwë’s grave.”

“Turgon said that Olwë and Ingwë buried him.”

“They did, following the traditions of Cuiviénen. Flowers grow over his grave; we were there in spring, and so it was all snowdrops and hyacinths, like what grows near the doors of Mandos. It was morning, and the mist over the lake glowed golden in the early sunlight. You have never seen the Wilwarinen under the sun, have you?”

“No. Do you think I should?”

“It is beautiful. Lonely, perhaps it might be called desolate—but there is a certain beauty even to the crumbling walls of Formenos, covered in wild roses and lichen. The town is gone, entirely overtaken by forest now. Melkor’s most evil deed in Aman was committed there—but still life and beauty has returned to it. I suppose that is what I would like to hear in your song. Findis believes that he will return to us someday, though for years now both my mother and Míriel have argued and pleaded before the Valar and not swayed them. I find I do not have my sister’s capacity for such hope, but it was easier to believe her when we stood there by the lake, the three of us, with the air full of the scent of flowers.”

“Does my father still blame himself?” Maglor asked.

“I think so. It isn’t the sort of thing anyone’s assurances can really erase. He spoke of his guilt concerning Míriel, too, and I know he feels the weight of responsibility for all that befell you and your brothers. He does love you, Maglor.”

“I know,” Maglor said quietly. “I’ve spoken to him. I know.”

They spoke a little more of Finwë—of happier memories—until someone came with an issue Fingolfin was needed to resolve. When he left, Maglor found he had no heart to seek out Orodreth or Angrod. He was exhausted, though it was barely lunchtime, and really just wanted to go back to Imloth Ningloron to curl up in the clover with his hedgehogs and Pídhres. Instead he found Daeron and Celegorm near the stables with Lalwen. When Daeron spotted Maglor he immediately left the conversation, and pulled Maglor into the shade of a pillar, away from curious eyes. “Are you all right?” he asked.

“I’m tired.”

“Between seeing your father and spending all morning talking of your grandfather, is it any wonder?”

“No,” Maglor said, “I know. I have yet to speak to Orodreth and Angrod, but I don’t know where they are and I don’t think I can do it.”

“There’s time. The deadline of the feast is a thing you’ve given yourself, you know.”

“I know.” Maglor let his head rest on Daeron’s shoulder for a few moments. “I’m going to be terrible company the rest of the day.”

“Do you want to be left alone?”

“For a while, when we return to the house.”

“All right. Let’s go, then. There’s a bakery on the way that Mablung showed me on my first visit. Surely pastries will help to cheer you up.”

“They certainly won’t hurt.” Maglor raised his head and kissed him. “Thank you.”

Celegorm appeared behind Maglor, throwing his arms around his neck and leaning most of his weight on him, so that Maglor staggered forward with a grunt. “What’s the matter, Cáno?”

“You’re heavy, is what’s the matter.” 

“We’re going to get pastries and then go back to Finrod’s house,” Daeron told Celegorm as he finally let Maglor go so he could straighten himself. “Are you coming, or will you stay here a little longer?”

“I’m definitely coming if there are going to be pastries.” 

They left the shelter of the pillar and bid Lalwen farewell before Daeron led the way back out into the city. They took a very different route back than the one Maglor had followed that morning, through busy streets and bustling markets. It reminded Maglor a little of the market he and Daeron had visited in Avallónë soon after their arrival, but also of the markets of his youth when he’d ventured out with his cousins in search of sweets or music or gifts for an upcoming birthday or holiday. It was very strange to walk through the familiar streets of Tirion and hear Sindarin being spoken as much as Quenya, and even a scattering of other tongues and dialects too. It was a bright day, warm and sunny and cloudless, and he felt his mood lifting with every step away from the palace. By the time they reached the bakery that Daeron had spoken of, Maglor was cheerful enough again that Celegorm had stopped giving him worried looks. 

The look returned when they reached Finrod’s house and Maglor prepared to retreat upstairs. “I’m just tired, Tyelko, and I have work to do. Stop hovering, or you really will find me in a bad mood.”

“Come on,” Daeron said to Celegorm, grabbing him by the hand. “Maglor isn’t the only one who’s been writing songs. You can listen to my new one and tell me what you think of it. I’m experimenting with puns.”

Alone in his room, Maglor loosened his hair and changed out of his fine clothes into something far more comfortable, and sat down to write. He compiled notes from that day, and then turned his attention to the song itself, but found his mind wandering, and soon gave up and went to lay down instead. Pídhres appeared and curled up beside him, purring as he stroked her fur. His thoughts kept returning, again and again, to the horrors of the Darkening—he already knew that his dreams would be bad that night—and then, after a while, to his father. 

He didn’t really know how he had expected that meeting to go, but he had not expected the reality. To find his father so quiet and thoughtful and…sad. Turgon had been right: it was one thing to hear others speak of what someone was like, but a different thing entirely to see it. Guilt gnawed at him a little. Speaking of Finwë was so clearly painful—and he was also so clearly trying to do things differently than Finwë himself had, in speaking of him at all. They needed to speak again, but there was so much that needed to be said and just thinking of it made Maglor’s head hurt. He couldn’t do it—not while his mind was so full of old grief and the growing weight of the song. The more it took shape, the closer he got to finishing, the closer he came to performing. It was enough to send panic flooding through his veins, making it hard to breathe or even to think at all.

Maglor joined Daeron, Elrond, and Celegorm for dinner, but retreated upstairs again soon afterward. Both Elrond and Celegorm kept watching him, though Elrond was a little more subtle about it; it made him feel breakable in a way that he hadn’t in a very long time, and he hated it. Amras appeared not long afterward to hover around in his own way, and after he left Daeron came up. “If you start,” Maglor told him even before the door fully closed, “I’m going to send you to sleep on one of Finrod’s couches.”

“I’m not going to worry at you.” Daeron plucked the papers from Maglor’s hands. “I’m only going to point out that your brothers are noticing old habits start to appear, and I think it’s rather understandable why that might concern them.”

“I’m not—”

“I know.” Daeron set the papers on the desk and then started to undress. “And now, having said that, I’m going to kiss you senseless, and then we’re both going to fall asleep in bed and no one’s going to banish anyone else to a sofa.”

“Do I have a choice in this?” Maglor asked as Daeron slid across the bed to straddle his lap. Maglor wrapped his arm around him, tilting his head up as Daeron took his face in his hands.

“Certainly not. Now stop thinking.”

Later, as the ability to think about anything but Daeron slowly returned and they lay tangled up under the blankets, Daeron playing idly with Maglor’s hair, Maglor sighed. “I love you,” he murmured.

“And I you. Go to sleep, beloved.”

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Celegorm came looking for Maedhros at Súriellë’s house the day after Maglor was to speak with their father, carrying a bird on his shoulder. Súriellë was a scribe at the palace, but her wife Míraen was a baker; they lived behind and above the bakery, and Maedhros had been recruited to help knead dough for the morning, since it could apparently be easily done one-handed, and Míraen’s usual assistant was still away visiting family for the holiday. Elessúrë had laughed at him before making his own escape to go shopping with his wife and daughter.

“Taking up baking, Nelyo?” Celegorm asked, leaning over the counter to grin at him. 

“Only for today,” Maedhros said. “Where did that mockingbird come from?”

“You keep that bird away from my wares, Celegorm,” Míraen warned, coming out from the ovens with a warning frown and a tray of scones in her hands. Her frowns were more fearsome than most, aided by a scar tracing from her hairline to her chin, passing over her left eye, the ruin of which was hidden underneath a patch. A memento of the War of the Last Alliance, she had told Maedhros with a toothy and fierce grin, where she had fought in Gil-galad’s vanguard. “If I find any feathers…”

“You won’t,” Celegorm said. 

“I better not. Here, try one of these. I have been experimenting.”

“Why does everyone want to test their experiments on me lately?” Celegorm asked, but he took a scone and bit into it. “Oh, I like that. Consider your experiment successful. Can I have my brother, please?”

After Maedhros washed the flour off of his hand and returned Míraen’s spare apron, Celegorm pulled him out of the bakery into the sunshine. “How are you?” he asked. “I mean, really.”

“I’m fine,” Maedhros said. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

“Cáno isn’t.”

“Did he see Atar?”

“Yes. He said I went well, but he’s doing that thing where he hides behind his hair again, and—” Celegorm stopped himself, visibly biting his tongue. “I’m trying to give him space,” he said finally, “because Daeron threatened to drown me in one of Finrod’s fountains if I didn’t.” The mockingbird on his shoulder nibbled at his ear, and he reached up to stroke a finger down its breast. 

“Daeron probably has the right of it,” said Maedhros. “If Maglor says that it went well, speaking to our father, then it went well. He wouldn’t try to lie about it.”

“I know, but—”

“He’s also doing something that until now he has found utterly impossible. Let him work through it and be in a bad mood if he wants. You don’t see the rest of us threatening to drag you off to Lórien when you get gloomy.” Maedhros met Celegorm’s glare with a raised eyebrow. “Are you going to explain the bird, or not?”

“I fixed his wing for him back in Imloth Ningloron,” Celegorm sighed, “and he flew off and I thought that was that, only he turned up at my window this morning. I don’t know why.”

“Just make sure Pídhres doesn’t get him,” said Maedhros. “Does he have a name?”

“If he stays longer than a week maybe I’ll think of something.”

They wandered through the streets, seeing what had changed and what was the same. They avoided going near the palace, but Argon and Turgon found them anyway, and the four of them fell in together. It wasn’t as easy as it had been long ago, when they’d roamed the streets of Tirion in their youth under the golden light of Laurelin, but it wasn’t terribly hard, either. Turgon was grave and Maedhros was quiet, but Argon had not changed so much, and Celegorm was willing to be drawn into conversation and laughter. The two of them wandered ahead, and Turgon fell into step beside Maedhros. 

“I’m surprised to see you back in Tirion,” Turgon said after a while. 

“I came for Midsummer with my cousins,” said Maedhros. “My other cousins, I mean.”

“Have I heard right that all seven of you are here?”

“For the moment, yes. Have you seen Maglor yet?”

“We spoke yesterday. He is…different.”

Maedhros glanced at Turgon, who was the closest one of their family to Maedhros’ own height, only a few inches shorter. “We’re all different,” he said. 

“Yes, but…” Turgon shook his head. “I know you’ve both spent some years in Lórien. If he is so somber and wearied now I cannot imagine what he was before you went there.”

“He is usually much more cheerful,” said Maedhros. “It is somber work though, what he’s doing.” And there was the performance before the Valar, when the song was done, that hung over him. If asked, Maglor could claim not to be afraid, only certain that it wouldn’t work, but Maedhros knew better. Turgon could know nothing of that, though, so Maedhros turned the conversation away from Maglor and to Idril, asking after her and Tuor. Turgon smiled much more easily when speaking of his daughter, though it still didn’t reach his eyes; Maglor was not the only one who felt the weight of the past. Maedhros asked after Fingon, too, but no one had heard anything since he and Gilheneth had hurried away to Lórien. 

“I don’t blame them,” said Turgon as they dodged around a knot of children clustered in front the window of a toyshop. “It will be even worse for Gil-galad than it was for Elrond, when he finally comes to Tirion. Everyone is going to want to see him and speak to him and all of that. Outside of Tirion, no one dares to risk Gilheneth’s wrath by appearing uninvited. I hid away with them too for a while after I came back.”

“Can I ask why you left Tirion afterward?” Maedhros said as they halted to avoid being run over by another large group of children, this time charging down the street shouting at each other, waving sticks and toy swords. 

“I liked ruling my own city,” Turgon said with a shrug. “I was good at it—all my mistakes aside. And it’s not as though there isn’t room here.”

“No need for hidden kingdoms, either.”

“No, but I do miss it. Tumladen, the encircling mountains. I dream of it sometimes even still.”

“I miss Himring too,” Maedhros said.

“You could build another one here if you wanted.”

“No, it wouldn’t be the same—the things I loved most about it are the things that aren’t needed here. I don’t miss the responsibilities, though. I don’t even want a household to manage—let alone a city.” 

“Really?” Turgon frowned at him. “I thought you were all avoiding such things now because you did not think it would be taken well. But you gave up the crown, not all your titles, or your authority. There are many who would flock to a city you or your brothers founded. You see how many have gathered in the quarter of Tirion where Curufin lives.”

“None of us want that,” Maedhros said. 

“I suppose I should not be so surprised; even Fëanor is apparently content to let go of his own claims,” said Turgon. “Though he remains a Prince of the Noldor, and is happy to remind anyone who forgets. He sits on my father’s council and is very welcome there. You could still do something, if you wanted to.”

Maedhros shrugged. “I’m not my father.”

“No,” Turgon agreed, but in a tone that warned that Maedhros would not like his next words, “but you are your father’s son. You always have been.”

Maedhros stopped walking. Turgon stopped after another few steps, turning to look back at him with a raised eyebrow. “I am trying very hard,” Maedhros said, keeping his voice even only with great effort, “not to be.”

“And even in that, you are like him,” Turgon said, “since he is trying very hard not to be who he once was, too. I’m not sure he is entirely succeeding, but he is trying. The two of you even wear the same expression when you think no one is looking.”

“Are you two coming?” Argon called from ahead of them.

“Yes, we’re coming,” Turgon called back, and did not wait for Maedhros again. Maedhros caught up and fell into step by Celegorm again, trying to ignore the way his hand suddenly hurt, trying to school his expression into something cheerful and knowing that his brother saw right through it. This earned Turgon a dark look from Celegorm, but he said nothing when Maedhros caught his eye and shook his head. 

Later, after they parted from their cousins, Celegorm turned his scowl on Maedhros. “What did he say to you?”

“Nothing,” Maedhros said.

“Nelyo—”

“He just remarked how like Atar I am. It’s nothing I didn’t already know—”

“You aren’t,” Celegorm snapped. They had left the crowded market streets but there were still plenty of other people around, and a few glanced their way. Maedhros sighed and took Celegorm’s arm to pull him into the relative isolation of a small park, where they could have at least the illusion of privacy behind a few trees. “You aren’t anything like—” Celegorm began again as soon as they were alone.

“All I ever was, was my father’s son,” Maedhros said, trying to keep his tone even and calm but just landing on flat. “That shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone, least of all you.”

“But you aren’t now,” Celegorm said. “Turgon doesn’t know what he’s talking about.”

Turgon probably knew better than either Maedhros or Celegorm, having spent far more time in their father’s company even as rarely as he came to Tirion from Alastoron. Maedhros just shook his head. The mockingbird on Celegorm’s shoulder flew away, vanishing into the trees. Whatever he did, Maedhros was never going to escape his father’s legacy—he’d always known that. The best he could do was to keep moving forward on his own terms, and if they happened to align more closely with Fëanor’s than he would wish…well, maybe that meant his father really was no longer the monster that still sometimes haunted his nightmares. It was better than Maedhros being more of a monster, still, than he thought he was. 

“He’s always going to be a part of us,” Maedhros said after a few moments. “It would be foolish to try to pretend otherwise. Now we just…know better what roads to avoid turning down. That’s all. Stop scowling at me, Tyelko. I’m fine.”

“You and Cáno both like to—”

“What sort of miracles were you expecting Lórien to work on us? I’m not going to fall apart every time someone talks about Fëanor, but I’m not going to be happy about it, either. If I promise to tell you if I really am struggling, will you stop assuming the worst at every frown?”

Celegorm looked away, strands of hair falling out of his braids across his face. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I just—”

“I know.” Maedhros tugged him into a hug, resting his chin atop Celegorm’s head. “If you’ve been worrying at Cáno like this I’m surprised he hasn’t tried to punch you yet.”

“I think Daeron might be talking him down from it,” Celegorm muttered into Maedhros’ chest, and Maedhros couldn’t quite tell if he was joking. “I’m sorry.”

“Should I be worried about you instead?” Maedhros asked. He already was worried, but he wondered now if he wasn’t worried enough. 

“No. I’m mostly just—Maglor’s been acting strange, writing this song, and I don’t like it. I don’t understand why it’s so important that he can’t stop or even just slow down if it’s making him so miserable.”

Maglor did not want the full truth of it known, but Maedhros wasn’t quite sure why he was keeping it from the rest of their brothers. He glanced around, but there was no one nearby. “Míriel wishes for him to sing it to the Valar, before anyone else,” he said, very quietly.

Celegorm didn’t immediately react. Then he drew back, eyes very wide. “You mean—?” Maedhros nodded. “No wonder he’s so—why did he agree?”

“I don’t know.” He really didn’t, because Maglor was so convinced it would never work. “He just feels that he must finish it. He wants to do it before this feast of Ingwë’s, though I don’t know why. But don’t try to talk to him about it. He says he’ll never get another word written if everyone knows.”

“Who does know?”

“Me, Daeron. Elrond. I don’t know who else Indis or Míriel may have spoken to about it, but it isn’t anything anyone wants widely known.”

“Better not to raise false hopes,” Celegorm said.

“Something like that, I suppose.”

“Do you think he can…?”

“I think,” Maedhros said slowly, “that he still underestimates himself. I’m only telling you about it so you’ll let him have some space, and not just because Daeron’s been threatening you.”

“All right, all right.” The mockingbird flew back to land on Celegorm’s outstretched hand. He whistled at it, and set it on his shoulder. “I’ll just start complaining about his cat trying to eat my bird, so he can be annoyed at me for that instead of anything important, and then I’ll stay with you when he and Daeron and Elrond leave for Alqualondë.”

“I’d like that,” said Maedhros.

They returned to Súriellë and Míraen’s house, and there found Ambarussa waiting for them. “Fingolfin asked Daeron and Maglor to perform tonight,” Amrod said. “Do you want to go see them?”

“At court?” Celegorm asked, wrinkling his nose. “No thanks.”

“I didn’t bring anything I can wear to the palace,” Maedhros said. And he would attract as much attention as Maglor, if he went. Not to mention Fëanor would be there, and if they avoided one another at such an event there would be talk—more than there already was—and Maedhros felt exhausted just thinking about having to deal with it. “I don’t think Maglor will mind.”

“He won’t, no,” said Amras. “But we thought it would be better to ask you anyway.”

“Thanks.”

“How is Maglor?” Celegorm asked as they walked around the back of the bakery to the stairwell that led to Súriellë and Míraen’s apartments. 

“He seemed fine,” said Amrod.

“More cheerful than yesterday,” added Amras. “He saw Orodreth and Angrod and it must have gone well.”

Ambarussa stayed the afternoon, leaving only when they had to go prepare for a more formal dinner than they were accustomed to. Celegorm stayed and dined with Maedhros, Súriellë, and Míraen; Elessúrë and his family did not join them, going to spend the evening with Lossenyellë’s sister instead. They talked mostly of art, which meant Celegorm spoke little. He was not unskilled, and had learned all the same crafts and arts that Maedhros and the rest of their brothers had, but none of it had ever called to him like the hunt did, or the wild woods. He’d left the hunt behind, but as far as Maedhros knew he hadn’t found anything to replace it—except worrying about his brothers. But he listened, and when he bid them goodnight he seemed in a better mood than he had been that morning. 

“It’s nice to have you all in Tirion,” Súriellë said to Maedhros. “I feel as though we can finally start to know you. How much longer are you staying?”

“When Maglor leaves for Alqualondë, I think I’ll go home with Celegorm,” said Maedhros. “I think Ambarussa intend to leave not long afterward, too.”

“Well at least you’ll be close by, and not wherever it is they go,” Súriellë said, waving a hand in a generally southward direction. “Where do they live, usually?”

“Somewhere in the mountains,” Maedhros said. “They’re very mysterious about it. Wherever it is, they spend quite a lot of time with the Laiquendi from Ossiriand and the Woodelves from Rhovanion.”

“Merry company indeed,” said Míraen, laughing quietly.

“What do you think of Tirion now, Russandol?” asked Súriellë. 

“It’s very different,” said Maedhros with a shrug. “Fine to visit, but not to live in—not for me, anyway. I like the quiet of the countryside better.”

“I’m a little surprised you haven’t gone to see Daeron and Macalaurë perform,” said Súriellë as she rose to put on more tea. 

“I’ve heard them sing together before, and I will again,” said Maedhros. “It’s wonderful every time—but I don’t need to dress up for it. Why haven’t you gone to see them?”

“What sort of hosts would we be if we left you by yourself?” Súriellë asked. “And I don’t want to put on any finery tonight, either. There will be other opportunities, I’m sure—unless Macalaurë intends to never return to Tirion after his errands this visit.”

“He will, but you’ll be more likely to find him at our mother’s house,” said Maedhros, “or Imloth Ningloron. They are always singing there.”

When he retreated to his room, Maedhros took out his sketchbook. He’d started a drawing of Súriellë and Míraen together after a glimpse of them laughing at something in the bakery, and wanted to finish it for them before he left Tirion. The window was open, letting in the sounds of the city, quieted with the evening but never quite silent. If he leaned out of it and looked toward the Mindon Eldaliéva, he could see the neighborhood where his childhood home still stood, slowly crumbling, waiting for Fëanor to finish tearing it down. As he added a few final bits of shading to Míraen’s hair, Maedhros thought of that house as it stood in his memory. He hadn’t gone near it this visit, not wishing to encounter his father—and reluctant to see what had become of it. It was hard to think of it crumbling, slowly succumbing to the passage of time even there in timeless Valinor, but something in him recoiled at the thought of tearing it down, of taking a hammer to the walls, of carting away the broken stones in carts to be returned to nature somewhere or to be reused for some other purpose. 

The next morning he woke still thinking about it, so he slipped out of the house before any of his brothers or cousins could catch him, and made his way to the old neighborhood. The sun had not quite risen, and the light was pale, the sky only slowly turning grey as the stars lingered over the western horizon. It was unlikely he would find Fëanor already there; from what Ambarussa said, he would not arrive until later in the morning, after the sun was fully risen. Maedhros kept his head down until he came to the gateway, empty now where once beautiful gates of gilded wrought-iron had hung, made by both of his parents working together, with half-abstract designs of stars and hammers. Now it was only an opening in the wall, to which lichen and wild-growing vines clung. 

He stepped into the courtyard. The overgrown gardens had been mostly dug up and cleared out. A few stubborn plants remained; a crabapple sapling here, a cluster of purple columbine there. Dandelions grew through the cracks in the flagstones, bright yellow and cheerful. Maedhros paced across the courtyard, following the footsteps of his long-ago self, and pushed open the door. The hinges creaked gently, and the door dragged a little across the warped tile inside. It was dark and shadowy, the air smelling of dirt and dust and faintly of mildew, and standing there Maedhros could almost see the ghosts of himself and his brothers pacing around, coming and going, arguing and laughing. He could almost see his parents dancing, the way they sometimes had when everything was still happy and they were still so deeply in love, just for the sake of moving together for a few minutes on days when they were both otherwise too busy.

Maedhros didn’t go any father than the entryway. The rooms would all be empty, choked with dust and cobwebs. Even the cellars and storage rooms were now empty, many of the boxes and chests that Curufin had taken charge of carted away already to Nerdanel’s house, where Maedhros knew he would have to organize them to be sorted through properly later, when he or his brothers had the heart for it. This house was not where he had been born—he and Maglor had both been born outside of Tirion—but Celegorm and all the rest of his brothers had begun their lives here. They had all grown to adulthood in these rooms and hallways, which had seen scraped knees and tears and laughter and Huan’s arrival as a floppy-eared puppy, that had heard the discordant notes of Maglor’s first attempts at making music, and later the beautiful melodies he had written and played first just for them. They’d seen Ambarussa scribbling on the walls where they thought no one would notice, and Curufin’s first time bringing Rundamírë home to meet them, and in between all their cousins and friends coming and going, loud and young and so very bright. 

They had seen, too, their descent into darkness—the first blades that Fëanor had forged, the helms and the shields, had heard how he had increasingly often raised his voice, had watched Nerdanel pack her things and leave without a backward glance. And then watched the rest of them depart—first for Formenos, and then for the east. His last memories in this house were dark and frightened and hurried, and now there was no way to replace them with anything brighter. The house needed to be torn down, Maedhros thought as he looked up to the landing above, at the stairs that were broken and tilted and too dangerous to climb. He was surprised more of it had not already collapsed on its own. But looking at it was like looking at the tapestry Míriel had made for him of Himling Isle. It made his heart ache, but he couldn’t bear the thought of it disappearing entirely.

He walked outside into what was left of the gardens. The peonies that Caranthir had adored as a very small child were long gone, of course, but he could still pick out the precise spot where they had grown. The forge and the workshops still stood, but in even worse states than the house. Maedhros stopped before his father’s forge, where the Silmarils had been made. Even then it had been a very simple and unassuming building, not the place anyone would expect such a work to have been done. Maedhros brushed his fingers over the door, but did not open it. 

By the time he walked around the house back toward the gate the sky was fully light, and he could hear the rest of the city waking beyond the walls, beyond the quiet neighborhood of large houses and sprawling gardens. Now was when he could expect to meet his father, Maedhros thought, and he still didn’t know what he wanted to say, or wanted to hear. Sure enough, Fëanor appeared in the gateway before Maedhros could step out of it, and they both stopped, Fëanor blinking in surprise. Maedhros waited for his hand to start burning, and it did, sharp and hot. “Nel—Maedhros,” Fëanor said finally. “What are you…?”

“I hadn’t seen it yet. Since I came back.” Maedhros didn’t look over his shoulder at the house, but it felt like the windows had turned to eyes and were watching them. “What are you going to do after you’ve torn it down?”

“Build something new,” Fëanor said. “I do not yet know what.” 

Elrond had said they needed to speak to one another, to listen to what the other had to say. Maedhros knew he was right, but he didn’t know what to say, and it seemed to him that his father didn’t, either. It was something that Maglor had been able to speak to him, but Maglor had his song to write—something to begin the conversation. Maedhros just…

“Do you remember what you said to me after the ships burned?” The words spilled out of their own accord. Maedhros hadn’t even been thinking of Losgar. 

Fëanor blinked again. “No,” he said after a moment. “I don’t—I remember very little, with clarity, after the Darkening.”

Maedhros couldn’t decide if that made it better or worse, that his father had little or no memory of Maedhros’ single act of defiance or his own reaction to it. “Have you looked for Losgar in the palantír?”

Something went tense in Fëanor’s stance that made Maedhros want to flinch back, but when he spoke his voice was quiet. “No.”

Well, then. “Maybe you should.” Maedhros slipped past him and didn’t wait for an answer. His father didn’t call after him, and he didn’t look back.

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Angrod and Orodreth came to Maglor in the morning, after breakfast and just as he was starting to consider what he should wear to the palace, and wishing he could just crawl back into bed. It was with relief that he met them at the door, and led them both outside into the garden instead. “Is Findaráto not coming to Tirion?” Angrod asked as they sat by a fountain, bubbling cheerfully. He and Orodreth were both dressed in finery, each in a different shade of blue, with strings of blue topaz and tourmaline wound through their pale yellow hair. Orodreth’s spilled loosely down his back; Angrod wore his in tighter braids, not unlike what he had worn in Middle-earth—sensible rather than fashionable, if you took away the gems.

“I think he intends to go straight to Eressëa with Celebrían and the twins,” said Maglor. Pídhres trotted out of a clump of cowslip to sniff at Orodreth’s fingers. “They might already be on their way. I suppose I don’t have to explain why I wanted to speak to you?”

“This song for Finwë,” said Orodreth, as he stroked Pídhres, who purred and arched her back into it. “I’m not sure I can answer you. We did not see him as often as the rest of you did, living mostly in Alqualondë.”

“Whenever we did see him,” Angrod added, “it was all the more joyous. But it also made it all the worse when he was slain. We had thought there would be time—or, no, that isn’t right is it? We didn’t think we’d have time, because it was never something we had to think about at all.”

“Not until it ran out,” Orodreth agreed. He fell silent for a few moments, and then said slowly, “I never wanted any crown. When my brother gave his to me I…hoped that it was temporary, a mere regency.”

“I know the feeling,” Maglor murmured.

Orodreth grimaced in sympathy. “At least yours was a regency in truth. Even at the beginning I knew such a hope was foolish. Findaráto knew he wasn’t coming back. I had no idea what I was doing—I didn’t want it, and I wasn’t suited for it, and everyone knew it, and…well. We all know what happened. But I managed to muddle along for a while, and it was mostly doing what I thought Finwë might do if he were there. I was wrong more than half the time, I know—I don’t think Finwë would have ruled any hidden kingdom to begin with. He was too bold. But day-to-day I think his example helped.”

Pídhres jumped onto Maglor’s lap and he buried his fingers in her fur. He wasn’t sure how to respond, and so said nothing. To speak of Nargothrond was to speak of his brothers’ part in all that happened there, and he did not think it his place. That lay between them and Orodreth, them and Finrod. 

“Why did you never write such a song as this before?” Angrod asked him. “There was time—in Beleriand, I mean. Before the flames.”

“I tried. It is only now that I find I am succeeding, and I think it is because I’m no longer relying on my words alone.”

“What will you do when it’s done?” asked Orodreth. 

“I hope to have it written by the time this festival of Ingwë’s comes around,” said Maglor, “and I will sing it then, as part of Elemmírë’s cycle of songs that span the whole of our history.”

“That is ambitious, even for Elemmírë,” said Angrod, but he sounded impressed. 

“This whole gathering is ambitious,” said Maglor.

“Would that Finwë could be there himself, and your song rendered meaningless,” Angrod said. “No offense, Cousin.”

“None taken. I would very happily abandon this song if it meant he would walk into Tirion this afternoon.”

“And not only Finwë,” Orodreth said quietly. “You will be missing at least two voices in your song, you know.”

“I know. I wish it were not so. Everyone keeps pointing out to me that many things have happened lately that were once thought impossible, though. Aikanáro may yet return.”

“That is true,” said Angrod. “Almost I wish Mandos would release him whether he would or no, as they did Russandol.”

“I think it was a question of whether Mandos was doing him more harm than good by then,” said Orodreth. “That is what Findaráto told me, anyway, though I don’t understand it myself.”

When they looked at him Maglor shrugged. “Don’t ask me. For good or ill, I’ve never been to Mandos, and Maedhros has never spoken to me of his time there.”

“I daresay you came close,” Angrod said. 

“Not that close.”

“What did happen?” Orodreth asked.

“I was careless, and I paid for it.” Maglor looked away from them to watch a few sparrows flutter from one tree to another nearby. “I didn’t want to see you to talk about me. I hear you have a new city of your own somewhere north of Tirion.”

“Not much of a city,” said Orodreth, “and it’s Angaráto’s, not mine. I just live there.”

“Nominally it’s mine,” said Angrod. “There’s a council that makes all the decisions, and I just sign the paperwork.”

“It was your idea,” Orodreth said.

“And that’s why I get the title and have to come to Tirion sometimes for politics,” Angrod said, making a face at the word politics like he’d just stepped in something unpleasant. Maglor snorted. “It’s very nice, though—to have built something we know will last, and not having to worry about what’s just beyond the mountains. I’m surprised none of your brothers have done the same.”

“None of us particularly want to be in charge of anything,” said Maglor. “I certainly don’t. I get all the benefits of living in Elrond and Celebrían’s household, and none of the responsibilities, and I am quite content.”

“Speaking of responsibilities,” said Angrod, “our uncle wished for us to ask if you would perform for the court tonight—you and Daeron. I think Imloth Ningloron is the only place that has had that honor since you have both been in the same place at the same time.”

It had been Angrod, Maglor remembered, who had introduced them at the Mereth Aderthad. “I am willing,” he said, “and I think I can speak for Daeron too.”

“So it’s true then, the reason Aunt Lalwen is so smug today?” asked Orodreth, raising an eyebrow. “You and Daeron?”

Maglor raised an eyebrow back at him. “I don’t know why Lalwen would be smug about it,” he said. “It’s not as though she played matchmaker.”

“No, that was me,” Angrod laughed, and the mood lifted as suddenly as the sun emerging from behind a cloud. “Though all I thought at the time was that you were likely to be friends—or I hoped so, at least.”

“You were right,” Maglor said, “though at the time the friendship was short-lived. But since we both came west it’s been—”

“You don’t have to explain,” Orodreth said, laughing, “we can see it written across your face.” He rose from his seat. “I’ll tell our uncle you’ll be attending dinner this evening. Everyone will be thrilled.”

“This happiness suits you better than the grief,” Angrod added as he also got to his feet. When Maglor stood, Angrod embraced him. “We’ll have to go out riding one of these days—it’s been too long since we raced through the fields outside Tirion.”

“I would like that,” Maglor said. “When I’m done traveling around to work on this song, maybe.”

“We should all come together sometime,” said Orodreth. “All of us cousins, even if Aikanáro and Irissë cannot yet join us—our own miniature Mereth Aderthad.”

“That,” Angrod said, “is an excellent idea. I’ll write to Findaráto about it.”

“Then it will certainly happen soon,” Maglor said, and both of them laughed. “I am very glad to see you both. I’m sorry it was to speak of sorrowful things.”

“There will be time for happier talks,” said Orodreth. “Just be sure to sing something cheerful tonight!”

After they left, Maglor told Daeron and Elrond of Fingolfin’s request. “I’m always ready to perform,” said Daeron. “What should we sing?”

“I thought perhaps the song we wrote of Ekkaia?”

“I’ve heard of that song,” said Elrond, “but never the song itself.”

“I don’t know why we haven’t sung it in full before,” Daeron said. “But tonight is as good a night as any—it is a good song to celebrate your return, Maglor.”

Daeron had some errand in the city that afternoon that he insisted upon making alone, while refusing to say what it was. Maglor brought his notes down to the library where he and Elrond spent the rest of the morning in quiet company, speaking little except when Maglor asked Elrond’s opinion on a couplet, or a snatch of melody, or when Elrond shared something amusing from the book he was reading. Celegorm had disappeared before breakfast, and had not reappeared by the time they started to get ready to dine at court. Maglor wore a similar style to the previous day, but choosing green instead of black, and fastening his braids with clips set with beryl and green opals. Daeron dressed in the courtly style of Taur-en-Gellam, in mallorn-flower yellow. When Elrond joined them he looked every inch the Lord of Imladris and of Imloth Ningloron, a circlet of chalcedony on his brow, and pearls glinting in his braids. Pídhres had to be left behind, and made her displeasure very clear. 

“Oh, you’ll be fine,” Maglor told her. “I know you’ve already charmed Finrod’s cook, so you’ll get all the treats you can eat and I’ll have to roll you back home to Imloth Ningloron.” She meowed, apparently affronted, and turned to trot off, tail held high—in the direction of the kitchen. 

Maglor had taken part in court functions in Arnor and Gondor, though not terribly often, so he did not feel quite as out of his depth as he might have. Still, it was a larger and much more formal gathering of people than he had yet attended there in Valinor. His uncle greeted him with a warm smile, and Anairë was there too to kiss him and welcome him back to Tirion. Curufin and Ambarussa were there with Celebrimbor and Rundamírë, but he did not see his father anywhere. 

“He’s not absent because of me, is he?” he whispered to Amras when he could catch him alone for a moment. “When I said I was going to keep avoiding him I didn’t mean—”

“No, he’s not. He got caught up in his own work this afternoon—you remember how he gets sometimes. He might miss part of dinner but he’ll be here to hear you sing.”

“That wasn’t what I—I just don’t want him to feel as though he has to stay away.”

“He understands that you’re caught up in your own work,” Amras said. “It didn’t upset him, and I know for a fact he very much wants to hear you tonight.”

Dinner was not unpleasant, though Maglor barely managed to eat anything in between all the people who came over to speak to him or to welcome him back. He was aware of everyone’s eyes on him, and he knew it was mostly because he had not been seen in Tirion in so long, and because everyone knew he was to sing for them that evening, but it was still horrible. That he was able to sit through the meal without betraying the anxiety growing in his chest was a sign of all that Lórien had done for him. He would have fled the room long before they sat down to the table if he had come there fifty years before. The anxiety was still there, though, and he disliked how fragile it made him feel.

Daeron sat beside him, and during a lull in the stream of conversation around them he put his hand over Maglor’s. “Are you nervous?” he asked in a low voice.

“Not about the singing,” Maglor said without looking up from his plate. He turned his hand to squeeze Daeron’s before letting go. “It’s—it’ll be easier after tonight, once everyone’s had their look at me.” 

Halfway through the meal Fëanor arrived, skin still pink from scrubbing. He took his place at the high table beside Fingolfin, just a few feet from where Maglor sat with Daeron and his brothers at the end of their table. He heard Fingolfin greet Fëanor, and Fëanor’s reply, and even knowing they were friendly hadn’t really prepared him for the sound of them conversing so cheerfully. He glanced up in time to see Fëanor sit down. Their eyes met briefly. Fëanor smiled at him, and turned away back to Fingolfin. 

“So it really did go well?” Amrod asked, leaning across the table toward Maglor.

“Why do any of you bother asking me things if you don’t believe my answers?” Maglor replied, trying to ignore how the knot of anxiety in his stomach had grown spikes. “Yes, like I told Amras—and Daeron, and Celegorm. It was fine.”

Amras frowned at him. “You weren’t yourself afterward, Cáno,” he said.

“A thing can go well and still be draining,” said Daeron, resting his hand on Maglor’s again. The scars weren’t painful, exactly, but they felt tender.

“Leave it, Ambarussa,” Curufin said from Daeron’s other side. “You’re as bad as Tyelko.”

Finally, the meal came to an end, and there was mingling and conversation, wine still flowing freely. Daeron and Maglor retreated to fetch their instruments. Daeron had left his flute and brought a harp, elegantly wrought of dark wood inlaid with swirling designs of blue and silver. Maglor, of course, had his harp made of driftwood, much plainer in style, but fitting comfortably in his hands. He rubbed his hand over the frame as he and Daeron stepped up onto the small stage meant for musicians, whether they were providing music to fill the gaps between conversations as the crowds mingled, or performing as Daeron and Maglor were. The pieces of his harp had been gathered on the course of far happier seaside wanderings at the beginning of this Age, and he had put them together and shaped them in Rivendell, listening to the familiar song of the river outside the window. It had crossed the Sea and gone with him all the way to the shores of Ekkaia, and then to Lórien and back, and now it had come back here to Tirion with him, to the very same hall where he had made his very first public performance, so long ago, before his grandfather’s court. Maglor looked out over the gathered crowd. It was so like and unlike the crowds before which he’d sung in his youth that he almost felt as though he were standing with one foot in the present and the other in the past. It was strange, almost dizzying. 

Daeron stepped forward, and both he and Maglor bowed to Fingolfin, and Daeron announced that they would sing the first song they had written together, which had not yet been performed before an audience. Maglor put his fingers to his harp strings and began to play. After a few beats Daeron joined him with the harmonies, and lifted his voice, singing the praises of Ekkaia, his words the joyous ones of a traveler discovering something new and wondrous—the sea at the farthest edge of the world, waters dark under the bright glow of the summer sun overhead. When his verse ended Maglor responded with his own, of his memories of Ekkaia as it was in the Years of the Trees when only starlight could reach it. 

Maglor’s brothers had heard the first handful of verses, which he and Daeron had sung immediately and with no planning upon reaching those shores, not yet knowing they were not alone there. The rest of the song remained centered upon the image of Ekkaia, but it was really about the joys of wandering, one of them familiar with the lands through which they passed and the other not, of sharing in new discoveries and old memories, of the changes that had come even to the Undying Lands with the rising of the Sun and Moon and the delights they brought—of glorious sunsets over Ekkaia’s smooth waters, and the Moon’s rising over the heather-clad hills behind.

When the song ended Maglor startled a little at the applause; he’d almost forgotten that they had an audience. He and Daeron bowed again, and stepped down from the dais. He took a deep breath, finding himself shaking a little as he let it out. Daeron smiled at him. “That went quite well, for a first performance,” he said.

“It did,” Maglor agreed, smiling back. 

Everyone wanted to talk to them, to ask about the song and about their journey to Ekkaia. Maglor let Daeron do most of the talking; he was better at answering such questions without saying too much. He looked around and saw Elrond, who smiled at him from where he stood with Celebrimbor and Rundamírë. 

Ambarussa appeared with Curufin at Maglor’s side. “You could have warned us you were going to sing that song,” Curufin muttered into his ear. 

“Whatever for?” Maglor looked at him, and noticed that his eyes were a little red. “Curvo, you weren’t crying?”

“You forget your own power,” Amras said, shoving lightly at his shoulder. “It took us right back to Ekkaia when we first heard it.”

“I’m sorry, I didn’t—”

“Don’t apologize,” said Curufin. “It’s a beautiful song. Just warn us next time. Lalwen kept giving us strange looks.”

Amras leaned in to whisper, “Atya was crying too.” Maglor glanced around, but only caught a glimpse of Fëanor through the crowd. He stood with Lalwen and Findis, the former gesturing widely as she spoke. Findis caught his eye, and tilted her head slightly toward Fëanor. “I think he missed hearing you sing even more than he realized.”

With a little help from his brothers, Maglor escaped the crowd and made his way over to Fëanor. His heart still pounded, and he would rather have stayed by Daeron or joined Elrond instead, but he did not want to deal with any sidelong looks or pointed questions about avoiding his father so publicly. “Macalaurë!” Lalwen turned to him, beaming. “That was marvelous! It was even better than when we first heard the two of you together at the Mereth Aderthad!”

“Thank you,” Maglor said. “We’re more practiced now at performing together.”

“That’s a fascinating looking harp, too,” Lalwen added. “What sort of wood is it?”

“Driftwood,” Maglor said. He held it out for her to take and look at. “I don’t know what any of the pieces were originally. I found them in different places on the coasts of Eriador.”

As Lalwen handed it back Findis pulled her away, saying someone was calling them but giving Maglor a meaningful look as she went. That left Maglor alone with Fëanor. He turned to his father, hoping he didn’t look as nervous as he felt. “It was a beautiful song, Cáno,” Fëanor said. “I’ve missed your music.”

“Thank you,” Maglor said.

“I’d heard, though, that you don’t like performing before large audiences anymore.”

“I don’t dislike it, exactly—but it’s not so daunting now as it was before I went to Lórien.”

Fëanor smiled at him, and stepped forward to rest a hand on his shoulder for a moment. He kissed Maglor’s temple. “I’m so proud of you, Canafinwë,” he whispered, and then stepped away, disappearing into the crowd, having no idea how much those words really meant, as Maglor realized only in that moment just how much he had needed to hear them.

Even though the evening went well, it was a relief to slip out of the palace with Daeron later—Elrond remained behind, being much in demand—to walk home under the stars. Daeron slipped his hand into Maglor’s. “We’ll be asked for the same in Taur-en-Gellam, you know.”

“I know.”

“Have you spoken to everyone here that you needed to?”

“Everyone I came to see, yes, but I should go sit myself somewhere in the palace tomorrow and talk to anyone else with something to say.” There had been several questions asked that evening about the song he was writing, and Maglor knew he shouldn’t forget that there were many others who had loved Finwë—Finwë the king, the leader, the friend. “I think…I want to visit Formenos, too, before we go on to Alqualondë.”

“Do you want company?” Daeron asked.

“I don’t know yet.”

“You should take someone. Perhaps not me. One of your brothers?”

Maglor squeezed his hand. “I don’t think any of them could bear it. I don’t know if I can.” Fingolfin had called it beautiful, that place, lonely as it now was. Maglor wanted to see it, wanted to pay his respects to his grandfather’s grave, but it would be foolish to imagine it wouldn’t be hard, wouldn’t conjure up all the memories he was trying to keep tucked away.

The next day he did as he’d said and went to the palace, choosing a place in the gardens that was easy to find, and he listened to everything anyone could tell him about Finwë—to the lords and ladies, to old friends, those who had learned from him or followed him all the way from Cuiviénen. Some had followed Fëanor or Fingolfin back to Middle-earth; others had remained behind or turned back with Finarfin. Maglor smiled at them all and took notes and ignored the lingering stares at the scars on his face and pretended not to hear some of the more pointed questions they asked. By the time he left he felt as though he’d walked all the way to Ekkaia and back since the morning. Celegorm frowned at him but said nothing when Maglor declined dinner and retreated upstairs. His mockingbird had returned, and had proved to be a distraction from his worrying—or at least now he seemed more worried about Pídhres trying to eat the bird than about whatever Maglor’s face was doing at any given moment. To avoid any of that trouble, Maglor scooped Pídhres up as he passed by, and she only squirmed a little until the mockingbird on Celegorm’s shoulder was out of sight. 

It was Elrond who followed him. “Did you already eat?” he asked as Maglor tossed Pídhres onto the bed.

“No,” Maglor said, “but I’m not very hungry.” 

“Have you eaten at all today?”

“I had lunch with both of my aunts. Missing one meal isn’t going to send me into a decline you know.”

“No, but I’m starting to see why all your brothers are so concerned.” Elrond crossed the room to take Maglor’s hand. He’d been absently rubbing his thumb into his palm. “What’s the matter? Is it being in Tirion, or seeing your father, or…?”

“I don’t know. All of it, maybe. Please don’t start hovering like Celegorm.”

“Have you been having any nightmares?”

“No.” He’d expected dark dreams, but if he had had any he’d woken without any memory of them. Daeron was good at chasing such things away; Maglor suspected songs of subtle power were being sung every night after he fell asleep.

“Should I ask Daeron instead?”

Maglor sighed. “When have I ever lied to you about such things, Elrond? I’m not having nightmares. I’m tired, and I miss my grandfather. That’s all.”

“Writing this song should not turn into some kind of punishment,” Elrond said quietly. “I thought we were past all of that.”

“I’m not—I would very much like for this to be easier.” Maglor pinched the bridge of his nose, feeling tears prick the back of his eyes. “I did not expect—I knew it was going to be difficult, I just underestimated how hard it would be to be so constantly thinking of him and of what happened and—and of what my grandmother wants me to accomplish with this song. If I stop now, if I put it away for more than a day, I don’t think I will be able to pick it up again, and I can’t leave it unfinished. I know what I said in the beginning, but I was wrong. I must finish this song, and I must do it before Ingwë’s feast—I cannot explain why. It almost feels like the Oath pulling on me, except I have made no such promises.”

“If you say it is important, I believe you,” Elrond said.

“It won’t work,” Maglor said, “so I don’t know why—”

“I’m not so sure of that,” Elrond said. “But you do not have to carry this burden alone. How can I help?”

Maglor started to shake his head, before remembering what Daeron had said of going to Formenos. He could not ask his brothers. “Will you go with me to Formenos? Not for long—I don’t think I want to stay the night there—but it’s away from everything and I…would like to see his grave.”

“Are you sure?” Elrond asked.

“Yes. I know it seems backwards, but I think it might help.” If nothing else he could sit and cry for a while beside the lake and the cairn. Elrond was one of the few he didn’t mind seeing him like that, who wouldn’t worry unnecessarily, and who always seemed to know what to say afterward.

“Of course I’ll go,” said Elrond. He embraced Maglor, both of them holding on very tightly. “I suppose the sooner you get this song written, the sooner the burden will be lifted. Just do not let it crush you before you can finish.”

“No fear of that, with you and Daeron watching so closely.”

They did not leave the next day; Maglor did not go anywhere, intending to tuck himself away in Finrod’s library to write, with Pídhres on his lap and Daeron across the table with his own work. Celegorm vanished in the morning after muttering something about not wanting to hear any more of Daeron’s wordplay, and Elrond went back to the palace, and so it was something of a surprise when the door opened, and a visitor was shown in. 

It was Elessúrë. “Hello, Cousin,” he said, looking faintly sheepish. “Am I interrupting?”

“No—no, of course not.” Maglor gathered his papers together, ignoring Daeron’s pained look at the haphazard pile, and went to the door. “I’m glad to see you. Shall we go out into the garden?”

Pídhres followed them, and disappeared into the flowers as they stepped out into Finrod’s elegant gardens. “How was Midsummer here?” Maglor asked, after casting around for something, anything, to talk about that wasn’t awkward or painful.

“Bustling, as usual. Russandol came with us, and we spent the day with my sister and her wife, and all your brothers. Well, almost all, since Tyelkormo was with you. How was it at Imloth Ningloron?”

“Lovely, as always. Gandalf brought fireworks.”

“There were some set off here, too, at the palace. I think your father made them.” 

Silence fell, and Maglor didn’t know how to break it. They sat by a fountain, and Pídhres emerged from the cowslip to jump up onto Maglor’s lap. “Is that the same cat from before?” Elessúrë asked.

“Yes. I think she received a blessing of some kind from Estë in Lórien. Her name is Pídhres, and she came with me all the way from Rivendell.”

“Do you still have hedgehogs? One’s always following Russandol around at home.”

Maglor smiled. “That’s Aechen. I have his siblings Annem and Aegthil at Imloth Ningloron.” Elessúrë laughed, shaking his head a little. “How is your family? I’ve heard of Vindimórë’s music. Elemmírë speaks very highly of him.”

“They’re all well. My daughter Isilmiel starts her apprenticeship with Aunt Nerdanel soon.”

“Elemmírë spoke highly of her talents, too, but said she does not have Vindimórë’s same passion.”

“She’s still looking for it,” Elessúrë said. “She wants to learn everything, is the problem—everything all at the same time.”

Maglor ventured to say, after a moment, “I would like to meet her. And Vindimórë—properly, I mean. And your wife.”

“I would like that too,” said Elessúrë, to his surprise. “I’m sorry, Macalaurë. I said some very unkind things when last we met.”

“You don’t have to apologize. I deserved far worse.”

He shook his head. “No, you didn’t. Especially not then. Can we start over, please? I’ve been getting to know all the rest of my cousins, but I never missed them like I missed you.”

“Of course, Elessúrë,” said Maglor. “I missed you too—I missed you terribly.”

Elessúrë stayed the rest of the day, and his wife joined them at dinner along with Caranthir and Lisgalen. It was a more cheerful day than Maglor had had in some time, and he hardly thought about his song or about Finwë at all, or even about his father. After Elessúrë and Lossenyellë left that evening, Daeron sprawled out on the sofa, resting against Maglor’s chest. Caranthir and Lisgalen lingered; the conversation meandered around their wedding—the debate over whether they should elope or not remained ongoing—and Celegorm’s mockingbird, who had flown up to roost for the night in the recess of one of the relief carvings near the ceiling. Then Caranthir asked, “Are you done talking to everyone here for your song, Maglor?”

“I think so.” 

“So you’ll be heading off to Alqualondë soon.”

“Yes, but I’m going to Formenos first.”

Both Caranthir and Celegorm frowned, and Maglor sighed. “I’ll be fine. Stop looking at me like that.”

“But why go at all?” Celegorm asked.

“I’m surprised it’s still standing,” Caranthir said. “I would’ve had it razed to the ground long ago, if I were Finarfin. Or Ingwë.” Lisgalen reached for his hand. 

“Fingolfin and Findis both spoke of it,” Maglor said, “and if I’m going to write of it, I should see for myself what it looks like now.”

“I’ll be there,” Elrond added mildly, when Celegorm glanced at him, clearly hoping for support that he wasn’t going to get. “It’s not very far, and we won’t stay long.” 

“Oh, good,” Daeron murmured. He seemed half asleep as Maglor played with his hair. Without opening his eyes he added, “Don’t worry, I’ll keep Celegorm busy while you’re gone.”

“I’m not going to sit around listening to you make puns all day again,” Celegorm said. Lisgalen nearly spit out their wine as they laughed. 

“No, you’re going to help me with another project. I will excuse you the day after tomorrow, however, because I’m to meet Rúmil then—in person, at last. I’m very excited, but you’d think it terribly boring.” Celegorm made a face at him and Daeron made a rude gesture back, still without opening his eyes. 

“I do hope to come back and find you both in one piece,” Maglor said, amused in spite of himself. 

“I’ll knock their heads together if they start fighting,” said Caranthir. Celegorm punched his arm, and he smacked him upside the head.

“Don’t make me knock your heads together,” said Lisgalen, reaching out to smack them both in turn. The growing tension broke, and Lisgalen caught Maglor’s eye and winked as the conversation turned away to other subjects, and no one tried to turn the talk back again to Formenos.

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It was a quiet and misty morning when Elrond and Maglor left Tirion, heading north. Pídhres had refused to be left behind, and curled up around Maglor’s shoulders. Neither of them spoke much, and Elrond was content to let silence reign for a while. Formenos was isolated, but the distance was less now than it had been during Fëanor’s exile—distances were often strange in Valinor, though Elrond had not personally found it so, keeping as he did to the well-traveled and populated lands in the east. It came of dwelling so close to the Valar themselves. They had wished for Fëanor to be far from Tirion, and so he had been, though before and afterward the journey was the matter of only a handful of days.

They left the road leading to Valmar, taking a branch that led northeast. Elrond had traveled it before, going to visit Celebrían’s uncles in Ithilheledh. Maglor kept glancing around, brow furrowed slightly. “This used to be all fields,” he said finally. “Farmland and pastures.” Instead now it was all forest, mostly firs towering overhead, thick-trunked and ancient. 

“Did you visit Formenos often, before the exile?” Elrond asked.

“There was no Formenos before the exile, but yes—we went fairly often to the lake, the Wilwarinen. Finwë would take us when he wished to leave the city for a while. Do you remember when I taught you to make spears from wood and stone?”

“Yes.”

“Finwë taught us that at the lake. He said his grandfather taught him, long ago by Cuiviénen. It was just for fun, then—and just in case we needed something to catch fish or small game when we were out traveling on our own.” 

It had been very different when Elrond had learned—it had been a matter of survival, as it had been for almost everything Maglor had taught them. But he’d had a knack for making even the most unpleasant lessons both memorable and almost enjoyable, by teaching them songs at the same time, or telling stories that were at least half made up—like the one he’d told his nieces, turning the marks of his suffering into something silly instead. Elrond wondered if that too was something he had learned from Finwë, who seemed to have been equally circumspect about the details he shared of his own past.

They came to a turning in the road that was easy to miss at first glance, the branching path covered in pine needles and obviously very rarely traveled. It was quiet in the woods, the birdsong distant, and the air still. There was little undergrowth, and the trees seemed to loom, though their thoughts were not at all dark or unfriendly, as they might have been in such an ancient forest far away in Middle-earth. They made camp underneath one of them, not bothering with a fire, for it was warm—there was little in the way of dead wood anyway. Maglor had brought his harp, but when he did not bring it out Elrond reached for it instead. As he played a quiet and simple melody to fill the silence he asked, “How did it really go—seeing your father?”

Maglor shrugged. He leaned back against the tree, Pídhres curled up on his lap, purring as he stroked her. “There is too much between us to be solved in one conversation. But I’m…hopeful, I think.”

“I’m glad,” Elrond said. It had always been a rare thing for Maglor to give voice to any kind of hope. “Did you speak of anything besides Finwë?”

“Only very briefly. And as I told Amras—I don’t think I have it in me to speak to him again of anything else, not until this song is done.”

“Is that why you’re pushing yourself?”

“Maybe in part.” Maglor sighed. “It’s all so terribly complicated.”

“It has ever been thus, for the House of Finwë.”

“It didn’t feel that way, once upon a time. Once, my father just loved us, and we loved him, and there were no—conditions, no obstacles, no shadows. My father never liked his brothers before, but he could tolerate them. They were not friends, and there was far less love than Finwë wished for, but there was peace, and he was fond of all our cousins. Everyone forgets that. Findis is right when she says the root of all our ruin was Morgoth. But he had to have something to sink his barbs into, and…”

Elrond thought of the day Fëanor had first come to Imloth Ningloron, and how easily Fingon’s sharp tongue had been provoked. “None of the House of Finwë is without a temper,” he said. 

“Except your father,” Maglor said.

“I feel certain that he must, though it is true that I’ve never seen him angry,” Elrond said. “My mother sends her greetings, by the way; she will be visiting us on Eressëa, but isn’t sure whether my father will return by the time we arrive.”

“I haven’t decided if I’m going to Eressëa,” said Maglor. “I might part with you in Alqualondë. I don’t think there’s anyone in Avallónë I need to speak to.”

“You really aren’t going to give yourself any break from this?”

“Well, it really depends on how things go when Daeron meets with his parents.”

As they continued on over the next couple of days Elrond steered the conversation to more cheerful subjects, until they glimpsed a break in the forest ahead one afternoon, and Maglor fell silent. The trees thinned and then ended, growing almost to the very walls of Formenos, a once-large and oddly-fortified building of dark grey stone, unlike almost all others Elrond had seen in Valinor. Fëanor had built it at the height of his paranoia, but to hear of it was, of course, different than seeing it. It was crumbling now, the roof long caved in or rotted away, the walls falling down, covered in wild roses and lichen. They dismounted before the doorway, and Maglor stood very still as he looked into it. His gaze was far away, his face very pale. 

“Maglor,” Elrond said softly, reaching for his hand. Maglor grasped his very tightly. 

“It was just in there that we found him,” he whispered. “You can…you can still see his footsteps. Morgoth’s.” Elrond followed his gaze and found he could pick out places in the stone floor under a scattering of leaves and pine needles where clusters of cracks and breaks did indeed resemble footsteps—enormous, heavy footsteps. The sight sent a chill down his spine. “Everything was so dark,” Maglor went on, “but all the lamps inside were lit. Finwë, he…he’d chased back the dark, and even Morgoth couldn’t fully…” His voice broke and he turned away, covering his face. After a moment he took a deep breath, and then another.

“Even Morgoth could not defile this place forever,” Elrond said. “See the flowers, the trees?” Near the steps leading up to the door he saw rue in bloom, soft yellow, amid stonecrop and thick green moss. The wild roses gave off a sweet scent, and bees buzzed lazily through the blooms alongside many gem-bright butterflies for which the lake had been named.

“I do see.” Maglor lowered his hand. “That’s what I came here for.” He took another breath. “And—this way, we should come to the lake…” He did not let go of Elrond’s hand as they left the horses to graze where they would, and walked around the walls until the land opened up to reveal the gently sloping hill down to the water. A large yew tree grew near the reedy shoreline. Birds flitted through the reeds, and swans glided across the water. There was no mist, it being the middle of the day, but Elrond could easily imagine what it looked like in the early morning, silver-gold hovering over the surface of the water. 

Some distance from the yew and the water was a mound, familiar to anyone who had seen or made such graves. The grass on and around it was very green, though it was nearly hidden under the carpet of flowers—soft pink sword lilies, and red poppies, mingling with snowy Evermind. 

Maglor squeezed Elrond’s hand and let go when they came to the mound. “Thank you for coming with me,” he said softly.

“Do you want to be alone for a while?” Elrond asked.

“Yes, I think so.”

“I won’t be far.”

Elrond retreated back to the building. He could not deny a great curiosity to see it, having never known Finwë, having never known Valinor before the Darkening. Though Finwë had been spoken of a great deal lately, and Elrond felt that he knew more about him now than he ever had before, he remained out of reach, a figure in a story the same way all the rest of Elrond’s kinsmen had been until he came west and met them in person at last. He could climb the steps to the doorway, and feel only another shiver of discomfort as he stepped across the threshold, knowing but not able to quite imagine how Morgoth himself had once done the same. He stood where Finwë had made his last stand, and thought of Gil-galad on the slopes of Mount Doom, Aeglos in hand as he and Elendil clashed with Sauron himself. 

Gil-galad had returned, though. He was not so far away really, safe in his parents’ home. “Surely it is time to allow Finwë to come home too?” Elrond murmured aloud as he left the entryway to walk through the other corridors, dodging fallen-in walls and unstable bits of floor. The trail to the treasury was horribly easy to follow. He passed it by and peered into other rooms, seeing remnants of long-ago life here. Plates, cups, bowls, inkwells, pieces of furniture—some surprisingly intact, others broken into shards or rotted away. Little else remained. Birds nested amid the broken rafters, and he found evidence of other animals having made their dens in nooks and crannies, too. Dirt had been tracked and blown in; leaves were scattered about, and twigs and other various bits of wild detritus. It was not so different from other ruinous places Elrond had explored in Middle-earth, really. 

Once upon a time this had not been a terrible place. It had been isolated, it had been a fortress in a land where such a thing should not have been, but it had been comfortable. The countryside had been and remained lovely. Elrond returned to the entryway, and pressed a hand to the stones near the door. He stood for a while listening to all they had to tell him, until he opened his eyes without having noticed that he shut them, and found his vision blurred with tears. 

Back by the cairn Maglor sat in the grass, head bowed. Elrond joined him and leaned on his shoulder. Maglor rested his head against Elrond’s. “The stones have much to tell of Finwë’s last stand,” Elrond murmured after a little while. 

Maglor breathed a sigh. “I’ll come listen.” He sounded as though he’d been weeping, but when Elrond looked at him he seemed, under tear tracks and reddened eyes, more at peace than he had been when they’d left Tirion. The tears had been those of relief and release, more than anything else. “Fingolfin was right,” he said. “This is a beautiful place.”

“It is very lonely,” Elrond said.

“I like lonely places.” Maglor put his arm around Elrond and kissed his temple. “To visit,” he added, “not to stay.”

Elrond had known what he meant, but he said nothing. He himself could appreciate the beauty of it, but he would not want to come to any such place alone. He remained by the cairn when Maglor got up to return to the building, looking at the flowers and imagining Ingwë and Olwë performing the ancient rites, building the cairn over Finwë’s ruined body in a land they had all come to hoping never to have to do such things again, and he thought of all the graves he himself had dug and all the rites he had performed or participated in, all the tears he had shed. He thought of all the deaths and other terrible things that had had to happen in order for him to even be born—the destruction of Doriath, the fall of Gondolin, the Nirnaeth Arnoediad. It wasn’t often that Elrond felt the weight of all of it, but here was the place where it had all started. Once a place of joy, it had turned into a place of exile, and then into a place of death, and now…memory lingered, but it wasn’t really the same as the graves they’d made for the hobbits at home. The grief was different. It felt wrong—it was a grief that should have an end, but didn’t.

Maglor had said that Finwë would love Elrond—and Celebrían, and their sons—if he were there to know them. Elrond could believe it. Everything he had heard of Finwë spoke of someone with an open heart, eager to love anyone who would accept it. In that way he sounded a great deal like Maglor himself. But of course Elrond would never know for sure what Finwë would think of him—or what he did think of him, if he’d been paying attention to whatever Vairë wove in Mandos—unless the Valar relented. Maglor did not think they would, but Elrond could feel something, whenever they spoke of this song, of the weight of it. Whatever happened, it was important, and Elrond knew better than to say so in plain words, but he did think that it would move the Valar—he did hope that it would work, and that he would someday—maybe soon, maybe not—get to meet his forefather face to face at last. It was the sort of feeling he knew better than to ignore—not quite foresight, but not quite mere hope or desire either.

After some time, Elrond got up to look for Maglor, and found him sitting with his back against the wall near the entryway, watching a few bees crawling around the wild roses growing up beside him. He had fresh tears on his face. “I knew it was terrible,” he said, voice hoarse, as Elrond sat beside him. “I didn’t…I didn’t realize he’d stood as long as he did.”

“It seems it is Finwë from whom your own great power of Song comes,” said Elrond.

“Míriel said that too.”

“You don’t believe it?”

“I do. I know what I’m capable of.” Maglor gazed out toward the lake. “I keep catching myself thinking that if I can just…complete this song, and sing it before them, before this great feast, then…” He shook his head. “I keep thinking of it as something that will work, even though I know better.”

“You keep catching yourself hoping,” Elrond said. “It’s never wrong to hope, Maglor.”

“It doesn’t feel like hope. It feels like foolishness.”

“You know what else was a fool’s hope,” Elrond said. Maglor just shook his head. “Has it helped, coming here, as you thought?”

“I think so. I can write this part of the song, anyway…to write what happened, and to describe what it is now. And I feel better, in spite of—everything.” He took a deep breath, and got to his feet. “I don’t want to linger, though. Do you mind turning back and camping in the woods again?”

“Of course not.” Elrond accepted Maglor’s hand up, and embraced him. There wasn’t much else he could do, nothing that would help. He and Maglor both paused to look back toward the flower-covered cairn before it passed out of sight behind the walls. A lonely, almost mournful bird’s call was carried up to them from the lake on the wind, which brought also the smell of poppies and grass, and the faintest hint of rain from the clouds hovering in the north. Maglor sighed, and turned away first. 

The journey back to Tirion was quieter than the one to Formenos. They spoke little, both lost in their thoughts and content just to be in each other’s company. Neither brought out the harp. As Tirion came into view Elrond was thinking that he would be glad to leave it again for Avallónë and his wife, but his thoughts were interrupted by a hail from a rider coming north from the city. “Elrond, is that you?” they called, spurring their horse on up the road toward Elrond and Maglor.

“Círdan!” Elrond trotted forward, smiling as they grasped hands. “What brings you out here?”

“A summons from Lady Gilheneth,” said Círdan. “I looked for you in Tirion, but was told you’d gone north somewhere. I hoped I would meet you on the road!”

“Oh!” Elrond’s heart leaped to his throat, and he turned to Maglor, who was just catching up, Pídhres perched on the saddle in front of him. 

Maglor smiled at him. “Go on, then—and give my greetings to Fingon and Gilheneth and Gil-galad. Hello, Círdan.”

“It is good to see you, Maglor,” said Círdan. “And you, Mistress Pídhres.” Pídhres meowed.

“Are you sure?” Elrond asked Maglor. “If you—”

“Oh, stop. You’re as bad as Tyelko.” Maglor grabbed him around the back of the head and kissed his cheek. “The city’s right there, I’m hardly going to get lost! Go!”

“Can you tell Celebrían—”

“Of course!”

They parted there, Maglor waving over his shoulder as he rode on toward Tirion. He did seem lighter, as though something had been left behind at Formenos, and Elrond was glad of it. Círdan asked, as they fell in beside one another, “Where were you coming from?”

“Formenos,” Elrond said. 

Círdan raised his eyebrows. “What did you go there for?”

“Maglor is writing a song for Finwë, and wanted to see what it looks like now. It isn’t nearly as terrible as you might imagine.”

“I hope not,” said Círdan. “But he seems none the worse for it. How are you?”

Elrond smiled at him. “It was a sad and lonely place, and full of memories, but I’m far enough removed from it all that it didn’t trouble me too much.”

Fingon and Gilheneth’s estate was not very large, but it was lovely, with woods full of beech and oak, and open spaces good for riding or walking; the road that led to it wound through the trees until they fell away to reveal the house, stately and elegant, made of pale grey stone in places covered with ivy, and adorned with columns and wide windows, surrounded by lawns and flowerbeds. It was not quite identical to Gilheneth’s beloved home in Lindon, but it was very close. All that was really missing was the faint smell of the sea on the breeze. 

As Círdan and Elrond dismounted the front door opened and Gil-galad himself came out, already laughing as he ran down the steps, to throw his arms around both of them at once. 

Usually Elrond could think of Gil-galad and remember him as himself, either smiling or serious but always burning with that bright fire of life that was so prominent in Finwë’s line; he had been able to do so just a few days before while wandering the empty halls of Formenos. It had not always been so. In the aftermath of the War of the Last Alliance the grief had been heavy and sharp, always there to slice into him whenever Elrond let his guard down. He had been worn down and so wearied after those long years of war that it had been all he could do to make it back home to Imladris, feeling fragile and lost, and to think of Gil-galad had been to remember that last stand against Sauron upon the slopes of Mount Doom, and the ruin of his body burned away to ash afterward. 

Seeing Gil-galad now should not have brought all of that back—he was hardly the first lost loved one that Elrond had reunited with since his coming west—yet Elrond found himself hardly able to speak past the tears that lodged in his throat and threatened to choke him, the memory of Gil-galad’s last moments laying itself over this new-made Gil-galad with bright eyes and a head free from the heavy burden of a crown. It was strange and wonderful—which he had expected—and at the same time it hurt terribly, which he had not. Maybe he should have—he’d burst into tears upon seeing Celebrían again, too, unable even to say her name until the storm of them past.

It wasn’t quite that bad now, and he thought that he did a fair job of hiding it through the exuberant greetings and then Fingon and Gilheneth’s meeting them in the entryway. But later, when he was able to retreat to the guest room he usually used when visiting, ostensibly to wash the road off and change out of his traveling clothes, Elrond didn’t have a chance to do more than take a deep, shaking breath before Gil-galad followed. “All right,” he said, offering a smile when Elrond turned to him, “go on—you did not want to yell at me in front of everyone else, but you can now.”

Elrond tried to laugh, but it broke into a very different sound, and he had to press a hand over his mouth to silence it. “I don’t want to yell at you, my lo—” He didn’t even know what to call Gil-galad anymore. They were not herald and general anymore, king or vassal. Gil-galad had immediately taken both Elrond and Elros under his wing when they’d arrived, bedraggled and exhausted, at his camp halfway up the River Sirion as the armies of the West made their way north toward Angband. He had been their king, yes, and that distance had never quite disappeared, but he had also been their teacher and their friend, their cousin—not a father-figure in the same way that Maglor had been, but more like an elder brother. Elrond had loved him from the start—had been proud and glad to pledge himself to Gil-galad’s service and to keep serving after the war was over and they could look forward to rebuilding the world without the Shadow hanging over them. 

Then the Shadow had returned—again, and again—and Gil-galad had died, and Elrond had kept going because it was what he had always done, and now here they were. It was as though the last three thousand years hadn't happened at all, as though Elrond had left the slopes of Mount Doom only yesterday with nothing left of his king and dear friend except the smell of blood and smoke in his nose and the taste of ashes on his tongue that he hadn’t thought then that he would ever be able to get rid of. He could taste it again, now, in that clean and bright bedroom in the house Gilheneth had built, in Valinor where Sauron had never come. 

“I married Celebrían,” he said when his tongue would work again. “And you were not there.”

“I know,” Gil-galad said, voice quiet.

“I have children, and you—you never met them. You never will meet Arwen, because she—” His voice broke again, because one grief brought with it the other, a knife-sharp reminder that while Gil-galad walked again under the sun, Arwen never would. Nor would Aragorn, nor Elros, nor Elendil nor—

“I know,” Gil-galad repeated. 

Elrond remembered what he had spoken at the Council, that fateful autumn day in Rivendell. Not wholly fruitless, he had called the Last Alliance, though in his heart it felt entirely so. Gil-galad had died, and Elendil and Anárion, and so soon afterward Isildur—and for what? Sauron had come back, just as he had every other time, because they had not known enough—not about the Ring or what it would do to anyone who picked it up—and because Elrond had not pushed Isildur when he should have, had not had the will or the understanding that seemed so horrifically obvious in hindsight to insist that he take the Ring and cast it into the fire before it could take hold of him, before it spelled ruin for them all. 

He had just come from Formenos, where a grave stood beside a beautiful and lonely lake, covering the bones of Finwë Noldóran. Ereinion Gil-galad, High King of the Noldor in Middle-earth, had had no cairn, no monument. The flames of Sauron had burned him entirely away and they were left with nothing but memory and song. Now Gil-galad was here, and Elrond had met all of their forefathers and kin—and seen the paintings and woven depictions of Finwë himself—and could see now the ways in which Gil-galad looked so like Finwë—more than anyone else, in face and stature and almost all of his most striking features. He was darker than they were, taking after Gilheneth, and his eyes were her soft brown instead of Fingon’s grey, but at first glance Elrond wondered how many in Tirion would mistake Gil-galad for Finwë returned.

“I’m sorry,” Elrond said. “We didn’t—I didn’t—you died and it was all for—”

Gil-galad stepped forward. He was just as strong as he had always been, his embrace almost crushing, and he was tall enough that Elrond’s face was pressed into his shoulder. In spite of his best efforts, tears began to escape. “Do not say it was in vain,” Gil-galad said. “I do not see it that way. I did what I had to do, and I do not regret it. But I am sorry that I was not there for your wedding, or the births of your children, or for anything that came afterward.”

“Círdan gave us the apple trees from you,” Elrond said into his shirt. “Celebrían brought—brought cuttings with her when she came west, and they have thrived—in Rivendell and here.”

“I’ve heard of Celebrían’s famous apples,” Gil-galad said. He did not sound like anyone else in the House of Finwë. His voice was deep and resonant and wholly his own, and laced with fondness that just made Elrond cry harder. “I’m sorry, Elrond.”

“I’m not—I’m not angry at you,” Elrond managed to choke out. “I’ve missed you.”

“I’m sorry,” Gil-galad repeated. “And don’t call me my lord. I’m not your king any longer—I’m only a lesser prince, and your cousin, and I think I like that much better.” He drew back, and used his thumbs to wipe the tears from Elrond’s face. “I think you might outrank me now.”

“You are the High King’s grandson,” said Elrond, startled into laughter through his tears by the sheer absurdity of outranking Gil-galad. “Fingon is his heir, and you are Fingon’s heir—”

“And what does that matter, in this land where no one will die again?” Gil-galad laughed a little, quiet and clearly also amused at how silly it all was. “You are also Fingolfin’s grandson—and Elu Thingol’s, remember—and a lord in your own right. But I don’t mind. I was so young—too young—when I had to take up the mantle of kingship in practice even if not in name. I don’t remember who I am without such a burden, and I am very much looking forward to finding out.”

Gil-galad left Elrond to scrub his face and change his clothes. When he went downstairs again he was told that Círdan and Gil-galad had walked out into the garden together, and likely would not return until dinnertime. “Are you all right, Elrond?” Fingon asked as Elrond sat down with him on the veranda overlooking the gardens behind the house. “Did I hear right that you’d been to Formenos before coming here?”

“Yes, Maglor wanted to see it. I’m all right.” 

Fingon gave him a doubtful look, and Elrond somehow only in that moment realized that expression was identical to Gil-galad’s. “You don’t seem all right,” Fingon said. “How terrible was Formenos?”

“It wasn’t,” Elrond said. “And Maglor’s all right too, before you start worrying about him. I just—I suppose sometimes you forget how much you’ve missed someone until you see them again. How are you?” he asked then, thankful to be on such terms with Fingon that he could turn the tables. 

Fingon’s smile was a little rueful. “My son is an adult and a stranger,” he said, “but I knew that he would be—and that Círdan has far more of a father’s claim on his heart than I do. I’m just happy to have the chance to get to know him now. But what did Maglor want to go to Formenos for?”

“I think Fingolfin spoke of it, and he wants to include a description in his song. I’m glad that I went. It’s…beautiful, really. In spite of everything.”

“I’ll take your word for it.”

“How is Gil-galad?” Elrond asked. Gil-galad seemed to him bright and happy, light and unburdened, as though he had come from Mandos wholly rested and eager to embrace life again, but Elrond had very little experience with anyone so new-come from the Halls and wasn’t sure what might be lurking beneath the surface.

“Gil-galad,” Fingon said, “is the last person you need to worry about. We’ve been hiding away here for a chance to get to know one another without all of Tirion gathering around to watch, not because he’s in any way fragile or unprepared to face the world. Save all your worries for my cousins. Have they spoken to Fëanor yet?”

“Maglor has, and Ambarussa intend to take him away to their home in the mountains.”

“Do they really?” Fingon laughed, shaking his head, as Gilheneth came outside to sit with them, followed soon afterward by a tray of tea and bowls of summer berries and cream. “I don’t know why I’m surprised. Either he’ll go mad or it will be very good for him, or both. What else is going on in Tirion, then?”

By the time Gil-galad and Círdan returned to join them, Elrond was steadier, and could meet Gil-galad’s gaze without either bursting into tears or being thrown back into dark memories. It was strange and marvelous instead, to sit with Gil-galad and Fingon and Gilheneth and Círdan, laughing about gossip from Tirion and describing all of the cousins and various relations that Gil-galad would soon be meeting or reuniting with. Gil-galad laughed so easily, and Elrond soon found himself laughing too—feeling lighter and more carefree as the conversation went on. The dark memories were only that—memory—and if they hurt when recalled, at least the pain was short-lived, especially in the face of such present joy, and the promise of a future that only promised to grow brighter and brighter with each passing year.

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When Maglor arrived back at Finrod’s house he found it empty but for the housekeeper, who told him that he would find Daeron and Celegorm at Curufin’s house. So, after changing out of his travel clothes, he picked up Pídhres and went there. He hadn’t yet visited Curufin at home, and found the neighborhood to be bustling and colorful, full of workshops tucked in between homes along the tree-shaded street, many of which were full of window boxes and sported rooftop gardens, like Rundamírë’s. 

The housekeeper let him in and directed him through the house to the workshop next door, where he found Daeron with Celegorm and Curufin and Maedhros. “You’re back!” Daeron flung himself at Maglor, who dropped Pídhres just in time to catch him. “How was it?”

“Quiet,” Maglor said. “Did I miss anything interesting?”

“Not really,” said Daeron. “Your mother arrived yesterday but I think she’s already gone home. She had that rather distracted air she gets when she’s itching to start some new project.”

“She left this morning,” Celegorm said. He and Curufin and Maedhros were all watching Maglor with identical expression of poorly-concealed concern. “How was it really?”

“Quiet,” Maglor repeated. He really did feel better for having gone, for having seen it—the beauty of the place, lonely and isolated as it was. It was like he’d left some of the weight behind by the lake when he’d left. “I’m fine. I’d send you to Elrond for confirmation, but he was waylaid by Círdan on our way back and is gone to see Gil-galad.”

“Convenient,” said Celegorm. Maedhros elbowed him. 

Daeron drew back to take Maglor’s face in his hands, searching his eyes for a moment. Then he kissed him. “Of course you’re fine,” he said.

“At least someone believes me,” Maglor muttered.

“We’d believe you if you acted like you’re really fine,” Curufin said. He grabbed Pídhres by the scruff of her neck when she tried to slink by him toward the door standing ajar at the back of the workshop. “Oh no you don’t, mistress. Cáno, if your cat gets into my forge I’m not responsible for what happens.”

“Of course,” Maglor said. He went to take Pídhres back. “I really do feel much better than I did when I left, but if you want me to prove it just point me in the direction of your daughters, Curvo. I’ll fill their heads with tales of adventures and spoil them with candy from the market.”

“I like that plan,” Maedhros said. “Curvo, we’re going to take your girls to the market.”

“Oh, fine,” Curufin said, rolling his eyes and failing to hide a smile. “Just bring them back in time for dinner—and you’re staying, too. I’m going to get Ambarussa to come over so we can all seven be in one place at the same time at least once more before you all leave Tirion.”

“Are Ambarussa leaving?” Maglor asked as he set Pídhres on his shoulder.

“Any day now, presumably, but you know how they are.”

Maglor stepped over to embrace Tyelko. “I’m fine, Tyelko, don’t worry,” he said. “I promise.”

“If you say so.”

“If he’s not fine now he will be by tomorrow morning,” Daeron said cheerfully. “I’ll make sure of it.” This got all three of Maglor’s brothers to make disgusted faces and only vaguely coherent sounds of protest.

“I’ll hold you to that,” Maglor said, laughing as Celegorm made a gagging noise. 

“I don’t know what you’re all making such a fuss about. I’m talking about making music,” Daeron said. 

“You’re terrible,” Curufin said. “Get out of my workshop.”

Maglor laughed again and embraced him next. “All right, we’re going—we’re off to ruin your children’s appetites for dinner and make sure they keep you up all night.”

“I can’t believe out of the three of you Tyelko is the one least likely to make trouble,” Curufin sighed, but he was smiling. 

“Don’t you remember when you told us we weren’t to act like the eldest brothers anymore?” Maedhros laughed. “You can’t have it both ways, Curvo!”

The girls were with Rundamírë, Lisgalen, and Caranthir in Rundamírë’s workshop, where she and Lisgalen were working on something and Caranthir seemed to be in charge of keeping Náriel and Calissë distracted and out of their mother’s hair. “Hello, Rundamírë!” Maglor said brightly. “We’ve come to steal your children away.”

Rundamírë looked up and laughed. “Of course you have,” she said, as Calissë and Náriel scrambled to their feet with crows of delight. “Just make sure they’re back before dinner.”

“Yes, of course—we’ve already promised Curvo. Moryo, want to come too?”

“Of course I do.” Caranthir leaned over to kiss Lisgalen, and then followed them downstairs. “Where are we going?”

“To spoil everyone with sweets and prove to certain of our brothers that I’m perfectly fine, thank you very much,” Maglor said.

They made it to the street before Náriel and Calissë got into an argument over who got to ride on Maedhros’ shoulders first. While Maedhros mediated, Caranthir nudged Maglor with his elbow. “How was Formenos?”

“Quiet,” Maglor said. “I’m glad I went—really. It felt a little like visiting Ekkaia, if you know what I mean.”

“I’m not sure I do, but that’s all right.” Caranthir, fortunately, was more willing to believe Maglor when he said he was all right, and so he just stepped forward to scoop Calissë up onto his own shoulders, leaving Náriel for Maedhros. Pídhres curled around Maglor’s shoulders, and Daeron reached for his hand. 

It was a bright and sunny afternoon, and they bought far too many sweets for Náriel and Calissë, and then somehow Maglor found himself telling half-made-up adventure stories from Middle-earth to what seemed like half the children in Tirion, gathered around a fountain in one of the larger squares. It was as unlike Formenos as it was possible to be. Maedhros sent all the children home afterward with pockets full of hard candies and sweets after they all had a turn petting Pídhres. “That’s one way to completely upend your reputation,” Caranthir remarked as the last handful of children darted away, giggling, to answer their parents’ calls. “Keep your children away from those Fëanorians, or they’ll come home full to bounce off your walls and refuse to go to bed on time, full of stories about talking rabbits and wizards.” Maedhros laughed. 

“Speaking of going home,” Maglor said, “we did promise not to be late for dinner.” He picked up Náriel, who yawned and snuggled into his arms. Calissë finally got her turn on Maedhros’ shoulders. Daeron took several minutes to catch Pídhres before rejoining them to make the walk back home. “And you two had better eat all your vegetables, or your parents won’t let us take you out like this again.”

“You’ll just have to come kidnap us, like Uncle Tyelko did last year,” said Calissë. 

“Absolutely not,” said Maglor, who could tease Curufin about doing such a thing but didn’t actually intend to encourage such excitement in Náriel or Calissë. 

“And risk your ammë’s wrath? I don’t think so,” said Maedhros. 

“What about Atya?” Calissë asked.

“We aren’t scared of him,” said Caranthir. “Rundamírë can be terrifying.”

“No, Atya’s not scary,” Náriel said through a yawn. “He’s the leastest scariest person in the whole world.” Caranthir snorted, covering his mouth to smother his laughter. 

“Who’s the scariest, do you think?” Maglor asked. 

“Umm…” Náriel didn’t open her eyes, and hummed for a few moments as she thought. “Calissë, what was that scary monster at the parade on Midsummer?”

“That doesn’t count, Náriel,” Calissë said, “it was just a costume. There’s no such things as balrogs anyway.”

“That’s not true!” Náriel protested, opening her eyes and straightening up now that there was a fight to be had. “Atya said he saw one, and it was really scary!”

“Atya was just telling stories,” Calissë said, “like Uncle Cáno and the enchantress.”

“I beg your pardon,” Maglor said, pretending to be affronted as Caranthir’s struggle not to laugh made him choke. “Are you accusing me of making up that story, Calissë? It’s as true as the one about Bilbo and the dragon! You can ask Elladan and Elrohir when next you see them. Or Elrond!”

“Balrogs were real,” Maedhros said, before Calissë could say anything more, “but they aren’t anymore.”

“Oh,” said Calissë. 

“Uncle Nelyo,” Náriel said, as though announcing something.

“Yes, sweetheart?”

“No, I mean—you’re the scariest person I can think of.”

Maedhros raised his eyebrows as Caranthir stopped trying to hide his laughter. “Am I really?”

“Only sometimes,” Calissë said. “Atya says you frowned too much when you were our age and your face got stuck like that, but that doesn’t make any sense because you’ve got a brand new face from Mandos.”

“He’s not wrong, exactly,” Maedhros said, a little ruefully. “I don’t mean to be fearsome.”

“That’s his brooding face,” Daeron said. “Whenever he’s making it, you must be sure to go interrupt whatever he’s thinking of.”

“Don’t make me knock you into the next fountain,” Maedhros said. 

“The best way,” Maglor added, “is to start tickling him. He’s most ticklish on his ribs—”

“You’re as bad as each other!” Maedhros exclaimed as the girls burst into giggles. “I am not ticklish—”

“Is just what someone who is very ticklish would say,” Caranthir said, and ducked under the swing Maedhros took at him.

Curufin met them at the door when they arrived, all still laughing. Maglor nearly dropped Náriel when she tried to throw herself out of his arms at Curufin, who caught her easily. “Did you have fun?” he asked. 

“Oh yes!”

Ambarussa had arrived in their absence, and were with Celegorm in the parlor. Curufin sent the girls to wash up for dinner before joining the rest of them there. “If you ask me how I am,” Maglor said when Amras looked at him and opened his mouth, “I’ll smother you with that pillow.”

“He’s fine,” Caranthir said, dropping onto the sofa, half on top of Amrod. “When are you two leaving for the woods?”

“Oh, I don’t know,” said Amrod as he shoved Caranthir off, knocking him into Celegorm, who only just managed to lift his wineglass out of the way in time. “When are you going to Alqualondë, Cáno?”

“I don’t know. In a few days, maybe. I’ve done all I needed to do here.”

“All my errands are completed,” Daeron said when Maglor glanced at him. “Whenever you want to go, I’m ready. Are we waiting for Elrond?”

“No. I have no idea how long he’ll stay with Gil-galad, but it certainly won’t be a short visit.”

Dinner was chaotic and cheerful, with all seven of them plus Daeron and Lisgalen and Rundamírë and all of Curufin’s children. There was bickering and teasing and so much laughter that even if Maglor had been in a poor mood upon returning to Tirion, this alone would have banished it. They all lingered at Curufin’s house long into the evening after Calissë and Náriel were finally convinced to go to bed, talking of everything and anything, just as they had when they were so much younger and more carefree.

As they made their way back to Finrod’s house the moon was high, and Celegorm slung an arm over Maglor’s shoulder. “Did I tell you I’m going home with Nelyo instead of to Alqualondë?”

“No,” said Maglor. 

“That just leaves you and Daeron.”

“Oh no,” Maglor said flatly, “whatever shall we do. We’ve never traveled together before, alone, just the two of us—”

“Oh shut up. I’m not worried about you this time. Moryo told me that Daeron’s parents are waiting for him.” Celegorm leaned forward to look at Daeron on Maglor’s other side. “Do you want someone besides Maglor with you?”

Daeron smiled at him. “No,” he said, “but I do appreciate that you’ve thought of it. I’ll be fine.”

“If it doesn’t go well, you can come rant at any of us about it,” Celegorm said. 

“I’m rather hoping it will go well, but thank you for that too. Whatever happens, I’ll be sure to come tell you all about it.”

When they were alone later, Maglor asked, “How are you really?”

Daeron shook his head. “Far more nervous than I was ever going to admit to Celegorm. I thought I had set this aside, but the closer I get the worse I feel.”

“Come here, then.” Maglor pulled Daeron into his arms. “Shall I kiss you senseless?”

“Oh, yes please.”

They lingered a few more days in Tirion, and then Maglor made one last visit to the palace to take leave of Fingolfin. Findis caught him as he was leaving. “Have you said goodbye to your father?” she asked.

“No. I can’t—” Maglor swallowed a sigh when she frowned at him—though it was a look of concern rather than disapproval, which was a little easier to bear. “I’ve spoken to him. Twice. I don’t hate him. What more do you want from me? I cannot—I must finish this song before I can turn my thoughts to anything else.”

“Are you still afraid?” she asked. 

“Yes,” Maglor said, because there wasn’t any point in denying it. “Please leave my brothers alone about it—please do us all the courtesy of allowing us to make our own choices. We are not children, and we are never going to be what we were before.”

“I am not naive, Macalaurë,” Findis said. “I know you are all different—”

“Then let us be different.” Maglor took a breath, and added, “I am glad that my father has you on his side, truly. I don’t want him to be unhappy. I just—I have nothing more to give right now.”

“I understand. I just know it is sometimes too easy to get caught up in your own pain, until you lose sight of the way out, especially for those who feel such things so strongly. I do not want that for you—for any of you.”

“Thank you—truly—but this isn’t the sort of problem anyone else can solve for us.”

Back at Finrod’s house he found his brothers waiting to say goodbye. “Tyelko and I are leaving tomorrow,” Maedhros said as he wrapped an arm around Maglor’s shoulders. “And Ambarussa the day after.”

“So they say,” Curufin muttered. 

“We’re taking Atya with us,” Amrod added. “I think he’s actually looking forward to it.”

“He’ll be almost the first person to actually see whee you live,” saids Caranthir. “Of course he’s looking forward to it.”

“You all act like we live in some strange and inaccessible mountain cave,” Amras said. “Honestly, it’s not that hard to find.”

“You made it hard to find for years,” said Celegorm.

“No, we didn’t. You just never looked.”

It was always a little startling to remember that all his brothers had been scattered and divided before his return. Maglor had met them all together, by Ekkaia, but it had been terribly new and fragile for all of them—not just him. There were still ways in which they clashed and didn’t fit together as they once had. He leaned against Maedhros as the twins and Celegorm bickered, and Caranthir and Curufin started a separate conversation about making their own plans to go to Nerdanel’s house, and whether they would go before or after Maglor and Daeron returned from Alqualondë, since Maglor owed their grandparents a proper visit before he went on to Taur-en-Gellam. Maedhros was quiet, thoughtful if not quite unhappy, but when Maglor caught his eye later, as they all prepared to leave, he just shook his head. Whatever was in his mind, they would speak of it later, away from Tirion.

Maglor and Daeron left the same day Ambarussa and Fëanor did, though by a different gate, and so they did not cross paths. The road through the Calacirya was familiar. The sight of Alqualondë glittering on the shores of Eldamar was too, though the city had grown, and new roads branched out northward, though from what Maglor could see they were not much used. He’d seen it before when he’d first sailed come west, but had been preoccupied with other things and hadn’t taken much notice. “What’s north, besides Lady Elwing’s tower?” he asked Daeron as they rode down toward the southern outskirts of Alqualondë, where Finarfin dwelled.

“Since the rising of the sun, it seems that Araman is no longer as desolate as it was,” Daeron said. “Not many live there, I think, and since the end of the War of Wrath they are mostly Sindar who chose to live near to Elwing. I’ve not been back to Alqualondë since we first sailed, though, so all I know comes second- or third-hand.”

Maglor glanced up from the city, past the bay, and out toward the Sea. Oh, he’d missed the sight of it—more than he had realized until that moment. The wind was in the east and it smelled fresh and clean and faintly salty, familiar and comforting. 

He looked away from the sea and turned his horse off the main road toward the one that Finrod had described to him, that did not lead directly toward Alqualondë, but to Finarfin and Eärwen’s home outside of it, tucked back toward the Pelóri. It was built in the familiar style of Alqualondë, open to the breezes off the bay, built of pale stones with many columns and graceful arches. Maglor recognized his mother’s work in how some of the columns had been carved into the figures of people or trees. 

Eärwen emerged to greet them as they dismounted in the courtyard. “Welcome, Macalaurë,” she said, smiling at him and holding out her hands. 

“Hello, Aunt Eärwen,” Maglor said, smiling back. He introduced Daeron, who bowed over Eärwen’s hand, and she led the way inside, where Finarfin rose from his seat in a large and airy room meant for entertaining. He remembered his uncle as smiling and kind, that it was easy to forget he stood as tall as his brothers because of the way he held himself, the way he withdrew from attention or strife. He did not hold himself small now, and there was something grave in his bearing that had not been there before. It did not surprise Maglor to see it, really, but he did feel relieved that Finarfin seemed genuinely happy to see him, and to meet Daeron.

“But where is Elrond?” Finarfin asked as they sat down again. “Findaráto said that he would also be with you.”

“He was called away before we left Tirion,” Maglor said, “to see Gil-galad.”

“We heard that Gil-galad had returned,” Eärwen said, but her smile didn’t reach her eyes. “Findekáno and Gilheneth must be overjoyed.”

“They are.”

Finarfin knew why Maglor had come to see him, but it was a few days before he invited Maglor to sit outside alone with him so they could speak privately. When Maglor stepped outside he found Finarfin just sitting down by one of the fountains, moving stiffly and rubbing at his knee once he was seated. He looked up and grimaced ruefully at Maglor. “An old injury from the War of Wrath,” he said. “Most days it doesn’t bother me, but at times it grows stiff.”

“I understand.” 

“I suppose you would. Come sit. What’s behind this sudden request of my mother’s for such a song?”

“It is long overdue, she says,” Maglor said as he sat on the lip of the fountain. The water spilled into the basin from a flower in bloom, a lily with long petals down which the water flowed in a never ending stream. 

“I don’t think either my mother or Míriel would ask for such a song just because,” Finarfin said. “There is some greater purpose behind it. No one needs a song to remember Finwë. Do they want you to try to sway the Valar with your music and your words, since nothing else has worked?” He said it clearly as a joke, but his eyes narrowed when Maglor didn’t laugh—it was an expression that made him look rather shockingly like Fëanor. “That is what you are going to try to do, isn’t it?”

“It is what they want me to do,” Maglor said. “I told Míriel I didn’t think it would work—the Valar will not listen to me, not when they haven’t listened to them or to Ingwë or Thingol or anyone else.”

“Then why are you doing it?” Finarfin asked. 

“I had already agreed to write the song before she told me the real purpose behind it, and it is wrong that there is no such song for him already.”

“You were not here to write it,” Finarfin said. 

“I am not the only singer or songwriter among the Noldor, or even in our family.”

“No, but you are the best.” Finarfin sighed. “It should be written, and you are right—someone could have and should have done it long ago, only none of us had the heart for it.”

“What would you wish for me to sing of?” Maglor asked. 

“Is that all you came to ask me?”

“It is what I’m asking everyone. You can tell me anything—it’s just that that seems the best place to start.”

Finarfin sighed again, and looked away, out toward the sea, just visible through the trees. There were no walls here, any more than there were in Alqualondë, or Tirion. Sometimes that still made Maglor faintly nervous. Finally, he said, “Findis and I fought over the throne when I returned. It was such an absurd parody of Nolofinwë and Fëanáro’s feud that I started laughing halfway through and then couldn’t stop—and then of course Findis won, and after they managed to calm me down and everyone was assured I hadn’t actually gone mad I was crowned and that was that. Did you know the ceremony dates back to Cuiviénen? It never needed updating, before.”

“I do know,” Maglor said. “We had to perform it for Maedhros, and there were plans being talked of for my own coronation before Fingon brought him back.” And then of course there had been Fingolfin’s coronation, and later Fingon’s…if Turgon or Gil-galad had bothered with any such ceremonies, Maglor had not been there to see. 

“I’m not sure what I can tell you for your song that you haven’t already heard, or do not already know. I was woefully unprepared to lead anyone, especially in the wake of his death and the Darkening, and everyone else’s departure. No one ever believes me, but I was terribly angry with you all for a very long time, but I was angriest of all with my father. Not for anything he did—but for dying. He was who we needed in the dark. Not me, or even Findis. It was Finwë that had led us out of it in the first place—he who should have been here to lead us through it again.”

“I believe you,” Maglor said. Finarfin looked at him skeptically. His eyes were not grey but blue, like Finrod’s, and he looked so very tired, even now years after he’d handed the crown over to Fingolfin. Maglor wondered if his stiff leg was really just stiff sometimes, or if he only made light of it. “I was angry too.”

“I heard you raised your voice at your father.”

“I did. It was years ago now, just after I arrived on these shores.”

“What did you say to him?”

Maglor shrugged, looking away himself. “Mostly I threw his own words back at him. You know the tales they tell of me, surely—haunting the mists on the shore, singing in pain and regret, and all of it.”

“I had thought they were merely stories.”

“They were true enough for a long time. Sometimes grief feels an awful lot like fear, sometimes it feels more like rage. Most of the time it’s just awful.”

“Are you still angry?”

“No. I shouted at him and then ran away to Ekkaia and cried a great deal, and that seems to have vented it all. Are you?”

“I don’t know.”

“I know how that feels, too,” Maglor said. They shared a small smile, and sat in silence for a while, listening to the water of the fountain. 

Finally, Finarfin brushed a strand of hair out of his face and said, “I hope it works, this song of yours, though I also hope you’ll forgive me if I say I cannot really believe that it will.”

“There’s nothing to forgive. I’m no Lúthien. I don’t believe it will work, either.”

“Why agree, then—you never did say—why agree to perform it before the Valar, and not just to write it as you first promised? I’ve heard that you do not perform for anyone anymore.”

“I performed in Tirion earlier this week,” said Maglor. “It wasn’t so bad. I don’t really want to explain why performance feels so daunting now. But…it just feels like something I must do. This song. This singing. I don’t think it will work, but I must still try. I can’t explain any better than that.”

Finarfin sighed, but another very small smile touched his lips. “I suppose if they will hear anyone, it will be you.”

Maedhros had said the same thing. As though everything Maglor actually was, everything he had done and failed to do, was nothing against the reputation of his voice. “Is there anything you can tell me of Finwë that I might not know?”

“I don’t know. He is my father, and I love him, and I wish that I could hope for his return. But I left Tirion for Alqualondë for many reasons after I wed, and the tension he seemed unable to quell was one of them.”

“Could he have done anything without seeming to take a side and causing even more trouble?” Maglor asked.

“Perhaps not—otherwise he would have. Whatever his faults, he was a leader—a king, and a good one. It is true that when he left for Formenos with you there was a great deal of disquiet in Tirion; no one was happy with his choice, and I think no one would have been happy had he chosen to stay, either. Whatever Nolofinwë wanted, it was not to take up such a regency in such a way. But having worn the crown myself, I am not foolish enough to believe I would have handled it any better. I don’t know what he should have done, or could have done. As his youngest son, however, that does not stop me from wishing he had done something.”

Maglor thought of what Findis had said, in Imloth Ningloron—of Melkor and the ultimate source of the Noldor’s ruin. “Do you think it would have gotten that bad if it were not for Morgoth?” he asked.

“No,” said Finarfin. “Before the rumors of usurpation and whatever else Nolofinwë was supposed to be up to, Fëanáro did not like us and did not try to hide it, but there was no real conflict. He was kind to our children—I think he was even fond of them—even if he was not always kind to us. There was tension and I was still glad to get away from it when I married, but without Melkor’s interference we might have all just…gone along in peace, if not perfect harmony.” He paused, thinking. The breeze picked up, coming from the east. Maglor could hear the sound of gulls on it, and a longing opened up in his heart to abandon everything and go wandering; he smothered it, but only with difficulty. Unaware of Maglor’s thoughts, Finarfin went on, “Melkor would not have been able to do such damage, though, if the seeds were not already there. It took very little for your father to start to believe the worst, and little more for Nolofinwë to start making plans of his own, should Fëanáro do something foolish—though even Nolofinwë never expected him to actually draw a blade on him, let alone before our father and the whole of Tirion. We need not fear such interference now, but it would be a mistake for any of us to forget what we are capable of.”

“I don’t think we need fear that,” Maglor said quietly. 

“Does your hand pain you?” Finarfin asked after a moment. Maglor looked down and realized he had been rubbing his thumb over the scars.

“No. Just an old habit.” He made himself stop. “Will you attend the great gathering that Ingwë is planning?”

“I suppose I must,” Finarfin said, smiling slightly. “If nothing else, I will go to hear you sing with Daeron and with Elemmírë. From what Findaráto has written, it is not a thing to miss.”

“I hope it will live up to expectations,” said Maglor. 

“Why should it not?”

“It has been a very long time since you have heard me sing, Uncle,” Maglor said. “I’m told that my voice is not as greatly changed as I feel it to be, but it is still different.”

“Different does not mean diminished.”

“No, but I have been—diminished, I mean.” No one liked it when he said such things, but it was still true. He was stronger now—getting stronger every day—but he would never be the same singer whose voice once echoed through Tirion, knowing nothing but fearless joy. “Thank you for speaking to me, Uncle. Do you think Olwë would meet with me too?”

“I’m sure he would,” Finarfin said, “but he is still visiting Elu Thingol, and Elulindo rules in his absence.”

“Oh. That will make it simple, then,” said Maglor, “since I intend to speak to Thingol too.”

“You are thorough,” Finarfin said. He got to his feet, and only the first step he took was limping before his knee loosened. When Maglor also rose, Finarfin turned to look at him. In his own way, his gaze was as piercing as Galadriel’s. Maglor met it and let Finarfin see whatever it was he was looking for. Finally, Finarfin sighed. “Whether it moves the Valar or not, thank you,” he said. “It means a great deal that you are willing to try.”

“I miss him too,” Maglor said. “And I have been wrong about so many things—enough people believe that my words will be enough to move the Valar that I don’t think I could live with myself if I didn’t try.”

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It was a relief to leave Tirion behind. The visit had been pleasant enough that Maedhros hadn’t even noticed the tension slowly coiling in him until it was released, almost as soon as they left the outskirts of the city behind and he could suddenly breathe more easily. “All right, Nelyo?” Celegorm asked. His mockingbird perched on his shoulder, looking around with its bright and curious eyes.

“Just glad to be going home,” Maedhros said. “Are you all right?”

“I’m fine. Glad to be out of the city.”

“Have you named your bird yet?”

Celegorm rolled his eyes, but smiled. “Nallámo,” he said. 

They reached home late in the afternoon, and found Nerdanel just emerging from her workshop. “There you are!” she said, embracing each of them. “I missed you somehow when I passed through Tirion, Maitimo. Where are all your brothers?”

“Still in Tirion, but Maglor’s going to Alqualondë tomorrow,” Celegorm said, “and the twins are going off to the woods and taking Atar with them.”

“Are they really?” Nerdanel’s eyebrows rose. “He failed to mention that plan to me when we spoke the other day.”

“He probably had no idea when they intended to leave,” said Maedhros. “You know how Ambarussa are.”

Huan appeared the day after Maedhros and Celegorm arrived. Maedhros nearly tripped over him when he stepped outside, and found Aechen tucked between Huan’s paws, both of them sound asleep. Nerdanel was just behind him, and laughed quietly as Maedhros caught his balance. “Join me in my workshop, Maitimo? I need a model—just for the pose.”

“Of course, Ammë.”

“How was Tirion?” Nerdanel asked once she had Maedhros in the position she wanted, and had taken up her pencil.

“Busy,” Maedhros said, “but not bad. It was nice to visit Súriellë and Míraen.”

“How is Macalaurë’s song coming along?”

“I think it’s going well. He hasn’t spoken much about it. You know he’s going to stop and visit here after he and Daeron return from Alqualondë, so you can ask him then.”

“I know. I also know he spoke to your father—do you know how it went?”

“He says it went well, but I don’t know more than that, and he’s been preoccupied with his songwriting.” Maedhros felt his nose start to itch as he held still. “Do you know…?”

“The real purpose for it? Yes, I was present when Míriel told him.” Nerdanel frowned at her paper as she sketched out the general shape of the Maedhros’ body. “It was not an easy conversation for your father, at least, but he would not say anything more. Not that he says much to me in general.” 

“That doesn’t sound like him,” Maedhros said after a moment. The itch in his nose was growing, and he risked a glare from Nerdanel to scratch it. 

She didn’t glare, but she did say, without raising her head, “Your hand a little to the left, love. There, thank you. Did you see him when you were in Tirion?”

Maedhros thought about lying, or dodging the question. He swallowed a sigh and said, “Once.”

“It sounds as though it did not go well.”

“I don’t think it went well or badly. It was too brief for either. What are you going to turn this pose into?”

“I haven’t decided yet—I just want to get it on paper in case I do have an idea later.” Nerdanel fell silent, then. Outside Maedhros heard Celegorm talking to Huan and laughing a little, and the mockingbird singing a merry song. Inside the workshop the only sound was the scratch of Nerdanel’s pencil over the paper. Finally, she straightened, looking over the drawing and then at Maedhros. “That’ll do. Thank you, my love.” She came over to kiss Maedhros’ cheek as he relaxed his limbs. “I also heard about your aunt’s attempts at interference, though to be fair to her she really did stop here just to see you, since your brother put her rather soundly in her place. You know I won’t try to scold you into anything, if you wanted to speak to me of your father?”

“I know.” Maedhros rested his head on her shoulder for a moment as she put her arms around him, taking a few seconds to let himself pretend the whole world could be as simple and uncomplicated as this moment with his mother. “I just don’t have anything to say, except that I wish things were different.” There were also things he couldn’t tell Nerdanel, that he did not want to tell her—things that would just grieve her, and wouldn’t help anyone to be spoken aloud anyway.

“So do I.” Nerdanel kissed his forehead. “Do not let anyone push you into acting before you feel ready.”

“No fear of that.” Maedhros lifted his head and smiled at her. “I’m all right, Ammë. Really.”

Released from modeling, Maedhros went to his own studio, thinking about finally trying to turn one of the portraits in his sketchbook into a proper painting. As he flipped through the pages from the past year, Celegorm came to lean through the window. “What made you start drawing?” he asked. “When you came back from Mandos, I mean.”

“Ammë shoved a pencil and paper at me and then stood over me until I started doing something with them,” Maedhros said without looking up. “And then I just never stopped. Why?”

“Cáno thinks I should try making things.”

“It can’t hurt,” Maedhros said. He glanced up then. “Grandfather’s workshops are always open, you know. Or you can have one of my sketchbooks and some pencils, if it’s drawing you want to do.”

“I don’t know what I want to do, is the problem,” Celegorm said. 

“So pick one thing, and if you don’t like it pick something else,” Maedhros said. “Or do one thing in the morning and another in the afternoon. Don’t turn it into something bigger than it has to be.”

“It’s just that—I had one thing that was who I was, and now I’m not that anymore, and it feels…wrong,” Celegorm said. “And don’t tell me I can just go back to the hunt, because I don’t want to.”

“I wasn’t going to. What you do doesn’t have to define who you are. Come and sit down in here instead of looming through my window.”

“What are you doing?” Celegorm asked once he’d come inside to sit across the table from Maedhros.

“I’m going to paint a very terrible portrait. Should it be of Curvo or Moryo?”

“Curvo,” Celegorm said immediately. “And send it to Rundamírë so she can frame it and put it somewhere everyone can see it.”

Maedhros snorted. “I’m definitely not going to do that. It’s practice. I’m just being nice by not ruining your face for the first try.” He got up to choose a canvas and pick out the base colors he would need, while Celegorm paged through the sketchbook. As he rummaged around the shelves, Maedhros discovered a pair of jars shoved into the very back corner, silver and gently shimmering. He stared at them for a moment; he’d almost forgotten about them—ithildin, or something very like it. Fëanor had sent it as a gift, years ago, along with a letter full of pretty words and apologies that Maedhros still didn’t know whether he really believed. Maedhros moved a few other things back in front of them, and turned away. 

“These are good, Nelyo,” Celegorm said, as he flipped through several pages. “Why do you think the painting will be bad?”

“Because I’m still not very good at painting in general, and I’ve never painted a portrait before,” said Maedhros. “Why don’t you want to go back to Oromë?”

Celegorm made a face, and didn’t answer immediately. Maedhros just waited, busying himself with his palette and brushes. The sound of something falling and breaking reached them from Nerdanel’s workshop, followed by a string of passionate and creative curses. Celegorm snorted, and he and Maedhros shared a grin. The door to Maedhros’ studio, left ajar, nudged farther open, and both Aechen and Huan wandered in. “Keep away from my paints, Huan,” Maedhros warned. “I don’t need to be picking dog hair off my canvas.” Huan woofed and flopped down under the table, crowding his head against Celegorm’s feet. Aechen settled in between his big paws, purring softly. 

Maedhros rescued his sketchbook long enough to tear out the page he wanted: a sketch of Curufin he’d done from memory, after spending an afternoon with him and Celebrimbor in their workshop. Maedhros had managed to capture just the look he’d wanted—Curufin smiling a faintly, half his attention on something Celebrimbor had been saying and half on his work. It was so different from what Maedhros usually pictured when he thought of Curufin in his forge or workshop—those memories all from Beleriand—that he’d wanted to get it down on paper. 

“You know how the sight of blood makes Tyelpë sick?” Celegorm said after a little while, as he watched Maedhros copy the sketch out onto the canvas. 

“No,” said Maedhros. “Did something happen when we were in Tirion?”

“No. But you asked why I don’t want to go back to the hunt. I…can’t handle blood as well as I used to, either.”

Maedhros glanced at him. “You seemed fine when I was hurt.” He’d been torn up by a hill cat and then caught in a flash flood alongside Maglor, and had been a bloody mess afterward, on the way home from Ekkaia, in the episode referred to among themselves as the River Incident. It had been Curufin that stitched him up, but Celegorm had been right there the whole time. “Wasn’t it Cáno that was nearly sick?” He had a vague memory of Maglor doubled over in the grass, but most of that afternoon and evening remained hazy. He most clearly remembered Maglor panicking on the riverbank and then getting lost in some dark memory, and Maedhros hadn’t known how to bring him out of it. 

“I don’t know. I was sick, though—afterward.” Celegorm didn’t look up from the sketchbook, which was open to a sketch of Curufin’s daughters, sprawled on the carpet playing some sort of game. “You were asleep, and I left the camp for it, so I don’t think anyone else noticed.”

“Curvo would’ve noticed,” Maedhros said. 

“He never said anything. I just—I can’t do it anymore. I mean, I can do it if I have to, but—”

“I understand.” Maedhros lowered his pencil and examined the sketch on the canvas, comparing it to the paper, deliberately not looking back at Celegorm. He didn’t ask why Celegorm had remained so long with Oromë after his return. None of them spoke much about what they were all doing in between coming back from Mandos and their journey to Ekkaia. They’d all been trying to find themselves again, and missing everyone else without quite having the courage to do anything about it. “So I shouldn’t suggest healing as an alternative to hunting?”

“Probably not.”

“Why not just go over to Grandfather’s and ask him to teach you whatever he’s doing at the moment?” Maedhros said as he turned back to his paints. “He’d been thrilled to do it, and you won’t have to pick whatever it is.”

“I was never any good at making anything,” Celegorm said. 

“Only because you never wanted to practice. You can’t be good at something without being bad at it first.” Maedhros gestured to one of his earlier attempts at painting a tree, where it leaned against the wall. It was lopsided and the colors and shading were all wrong, but he knew the next time he attempted that tree or another one, it would be better, even if it wasn’t by very much. 

“Or maybe I’m just better at destroying things than creating them.”

“Huan, do you think he’ll stop sulking if you bite him?”

“Oh stop.” Celegorm lifted his feet off the floor to sit cross-legged in the chair, even though Huan didn’t so much as twitch an ear. “Did you like drawing from the beginning, or did that come later?”

“I didn’t like much of anything for a long time,” Maedhros said. “But it was easier to ignore everything else when I was drawing. It was also something I could see myself getting better at as time went on, and there was a certain satisfaction in that—and all of that is still true, on top of just enjoying it for itself now. Why don’t you try knitting or something? Grandmother Ennalótë spends all winter knitting when she can’t work in her garden. She says it’s calming. If you mess it up you can just unravel it and start over without having wasted any of the yarn, and you can carry it around like I can carry a sketchbook.”

“Maybe.” Celegorm flipped a page. “…Actually, that does sound like something I could do. I saw all that yarn piled up in Moryo’s workshop; does he have needles there too?”

“I have no idea, but if you can’t find any you can just ask Grandmother. Do you know how to knit?”

“Yes. I think so. Someone taught me once, I’m sure. I’ll figure it out.”

“Maybe ask Grandmother to show you the basics, at least,” Maedhros said, “so we don’t have to listen to you curse the yarn into oblivion whenever you drop a stitch.”

“Do you know how to knit?”

“In theory, but trying to find a way to do it one-handed is far more trouble than I care for.”

Celegorm got up and wrapped his arms around Maedhros for a moment, resting his head on his shoulder. “Thanks, Nelyo,” he said softly.

Maedhros straightened and hugged his free arm around Celegorm, kissing the top of his head. “There can be joy in the searching, too, you know. Just do what makes you happy, Tyelko. Don’t chase perfection or mastery—not if that isn’t what you want.”

“I know.”

Celegorm left, but Huan remained behind, apparently sound asleep under the table. Maedhros turned his attention to his paints. In spite of his own words about not worrying about being good at something—and he had meant them—it felt different and daunting to take his brush to a proper portrait, even one he neither expected nor particularly wanted to turn out well. He shook his head at himself and picked up a brush.

A few hours later Nerdanel came to the window to call him to lunch. “Carnistir and Lisgalen are here,” she added. “Is that Atarinkë? It’s very nice, Maitimo.”

Maedhros wrinkled his nose at it. “No it isn’t.”

“You are your own worst critic, of course. If this is your first venture into painting portraiture, it’s very good indeed. Come on; leave it for now, and go wash the paint out of your hair.”

“I have paint in my…?” Maedhros glanced down and sighed. That’s what he got for not pulling it back, he supposed. “Wonderful.”

Nerdanel laughed. “I’ll wash it for you, love.” 

“Hello, Maedhros!” Lisgalen said brightly when he stepped into the kitchen. “Hello, Aechen!” They knelt to pick up Aechen as he trotted past Maedhros to their outstretched hands. “Yes, I’m very happy to see you, too!”

“Celegorm!” Caranthir yelled from upstairs.

“What?” Celegorm yelled back, also from upstairs.

“Come get your stupid bird out of my room!”

“He’s not stupid—”

“He will be when I hit him with a pillow!”

“I missed this noise,” Nerdanel murmured, as though speaking to herself, “I did.” Lisgalen laughed, and Maedhros shook his head, following Nerdanel to the bathing chamber, where she filled a basin with hot water and sat him down in front of it so she could wash the paint out of his hair. He’d dripped more into it than he’d realized. “There are a couple of letters for you from Tirion,” Nerdanel said as she rubbed soap into the paint. “I took them to your room.”

“I don’t know what anyone can be writing about; I only just left.”

“The writing on them looks like Calissë and Náriel’s. I think Rundamírë has finally found a way to get them to practice their handwriting.”

“I hope they like stories about hedgehogs,” Maedhros said. “I don’t have much else to write back about.”

“I think they’ll love stories about hedgehogs, especially with illustrations,” Nerdanel said. She finished rinsing his hair and picked up a comb. “You would make a very good father yourself, you know, Maitimo.”

Maedhros’ first thought was that that was grossly untrue—but that was just old shadows out of Beleriand talking. “I’d have to find someone to have children with for that, and you know my heart has never turned that way.”

“Yes, I know.” She kissed his temple as she braided his hair down his back. “There, paint-free.”

“Thank you. I like being an uncle better, anyway. I get to have all the fun and leave Curvo to deal with the aftermath.”

Nerdanel laughed. “There is that. We’d better go make sure nothing has happened to poor Nallámo.”

Nallámo was perfectly fine, perched atop a a cabinet in the kitchen. Huan had returned to the house, and Celegorm and Caranthir were laughing instead of arguing. 

After lunch Maedhros retreated to his room to read the letters from his nieces. They were written very carefully, talking about what they had had for breakfast and how much they missed all the excitement of the holiday. He wrote them back each a note with a different silly story about what Aechen was getting up to with Huan; he wasn’t as good a storyteller as Maglor or Celegorm, but hopefully the little illustrations he included would make up for it. Caranthir and Celegorm both came into the room as he was in the middle of the second one. “If you’re going to scold me about brooding, I’ll toss you out the window,” he said without looking up, aware that his expression probably looked far more unhappy than he really was. “I’m drawing hedgehogs and butterflies for Náriel—even Tyelko can’t turn that into something worrisome.”

“Told you,” Caranthir said to Celegorm. 

“Those tapestries are new,” Celegorm said ignoring them both. “Where did they come from?”

“Míriel, I think. They were waiting for me when I got home.”

“That’s what it looks like now?” Celegorm asked, looking at the image of Himling Isle. “More of it’s standing than I would’ve thought.” He sat on Maedhros’ bed, crossing his legs. “How come you got letters from the girls and I didn’t?”

“Because Nelyo was the only one Rundamírë could definitely promise would write back,” Caranthir said. Celegorm made a face; Caranthir stuck out his tongue. Then he asked, “What was that project Daeron roped you into helping with?”

“He wanted help choosing colors for a gift he’s making Cáno,” said Celegorm. 

“And he asked you?”

Celegorm threw a pillow at him. “I know colors.”

“What’s the gift?” Maedhros asked, looking up from his drawings. 

“Some sort of instrument. Not a harp—a violin, maybe, or the bigger one.”

“A cello?” Caranthir asked. “I used to like hearing Cáno play that even more than the harp. I can’t remember when he last played anything else, though.”

“Maybe,” Celegorm said. “One of the ones you play with a bow, anyway—or maybe he’s making both. Daeron said it’s almost finished, he just need to add some sort of decoration. It’s also supposed to be a surprise.”

“Cáno won’t hear about it from us,” said Maedhros. 

“Having him talk at me about making instruments was better than the puns, anyway,” Celegorm said. “He gets very fidgety when Maglor isn’t there.”

“No he doesn’t,” said Caranthir. 

“I mean when Maglor’s gone for more than a few hours,” Celegorm said. “Like when he went to Formenos.”

“Maybe he’s just worried about his parents in Alqualondë,” said Caranthir. “He missed Maglor when he was away in Lórien but he wasn’t fidgety or restless with it, he was just sad.”

“What’s this about his parents?” Maedhros asked.

“Didn’t he or Cáno tell you?”

“No. I thought his parents were lost long ago.” Daeron hadn’t told Maedhros the full story—had only said, with a faint and crooked smile, that he couldn’t love or miss someone he’d never known. They’d been talking of Fëanor then, on the way back from Ekkaia when Maedhros and Maglor had both been a mess in more ways than one. Daeron had wanted to understand, and for whatever reason Maedhros had been easier for him to ask than Maglor. I had no shortage of guardians, he’d said, offering up a truth of his own as though in exchange for the truths Maedhros told him, but no parents. It had not seemed to truly bother him, but Maedhros wasn’t sure he would’ve been able to tell either way. He still didn’t know Daeron as well as the rest of his brothers, just because there hadn’t been enough time yet.

“They were lost,” said Celegorm, “and now they’re back—or they’ve been back, living in Alqualondë since the Years of the Trees. I bet there are some loremasters in Tirion itching to study how names changed along with language and how that makes finding family members out of Mandos difficult. Apparently they didn’t know that the most famous singer out of Doriath was their son until someone tracked them down and told them.”

“Is Daeron all right?” Maedhros asked. 

“He says he is,” Caranthir said, “but you know how that goes. He’s just as much a performer as Maglor used to be. I know he was troubled by the news last summer. It’s probably a good thing he didn’t learn about it until after you two came back from Lórien.”

“…You say his parents have been in Alqualondë since the Years of the Trees?” Maedhros said after a moment.

“Yes,” said Caranthir. “And—yes, I had the same thought, but I wasn’t going to bring it up if Daeron wasn’t.”

“I’m sure they’ll be thrilled to know with whom he’s been spending all his time,” Celegorm drawled, flopping back onto Maedhros’ pillows. “And delighted to see Maglor with him when they finally meet.”

“Most of the Teleri have put it behind them,” Caranthir said, though his tone was full of doubt. 

“I know how long it took Daeron to put everything behind him,” said Celegorm without lifting his head. “He told me it was the hardest thing he’d ever done. Stands to reason his family would be similar, but with less reason to put in the effort.”

“His feelings were a little more personal, though,” said Caranthir. 

“How do you know about it?” Maedhros asked Celegorm. 

“I asked him.”

“And he just told you? Because the first time you tried to ask him something personal—”

“It was well after we were all back from Ekkaia,” Celegorm said. “You were gone to Lórien, and I went afterward to Nienna.”

“It was the same year Daeron first came to Tirion and met Atya,” said Caranthir. “But also the year the rest of us started getting to know him better—so a good year overall, even as desperately as he was missing Maglor. He hid it pretty well, except from us.”

“Why did he go to Tirion?” Maedhros asked.

“Thingol came to visit for Midwinter,” Caranthir said, “and Daeron hadn’t yet seen the city—and he wanted to see us, whoever was around. Curvo says that’s what disturbed Atya about him. That someone like him from Doriath would be so willing to be our friend.”

“As much as I hate to agree with Atya about anything, he has a point,” said Celegorm. “I imagine there are plenty of Sindar who looked at him askance too.”

“He didn’t know the whole story,” Maedhros said, “unless someone had told him about Daeron and Maglor.”

“No one did, but it’s not as though Mandos dulled Atya’s wits—he could see just enough to come to the wrong conclusions, I suppose. I don’t know what passed between them, exactly. Daeron only ever said that they had words, and he was more worried about Curvo and Tyelpë having to deal with Atya afterward.”

“Daeron can handle himself against just about anyone,” Celegorm said, “but it’s always trickier when it’s your own family. I mean, look at us.”

“He’s got Maglor with him,” said Maedhros.

“That doesn’t mean we don’t get to worry about him too,” said Caranthir. 

Maedhros set aside his letters to his nieces and went to sit on the bed by Celegorm. Caranthir joined them, sprawling across both their laps. Maedhros leaned against the wall by the window, and glanced out of it to watch the river in the distance, gleaming under the sun. The plum orchard was all green, the growing fruits invisible from a distance. It would be weeks yet before that harvest began, and in the meantime they had baskets of peaches from Imloth Ningloron in the kitchen, waiting to be turned into preserves or eaten or baked into things.

He thought about telling his brothers about his meeting with Fëanor, but he couldn’t bring himself to do it. He didn’t want to talk about Fëanor, and didn’t even want to think about Losgar; he kept flinching back from the memories of it, which were oddly clear and yet disjointed at the same time, more like his memories of Angband than of anything that had come before. In some ways they were worse, though, so that wasn’t so surprising. “Did you find any knitting needles, Tyelko?”

“Yes, Grandmother gave me some, and taught me how to do it.”

“Don’t take any undyed yarn from my workshop,” Caranthir said. “Or the nice yarn. You can use some of that ugly yellow stuff.”

“The stuff that looks like Huan threw up on it?”

“Yes, that. I still need to figure out what went wrong, and how I want to fix it. It’ll be perfect for you to tangle up in knots in the meantime, though.”

“Thanks for the vote of confidence,” Celegorm said. “How’s the painting of Curvo, Nelyo?”

“Well, it’s recognizable,” said Maedhros. “The shading’s all wrong, though.” 

Caranthir left after a while, and Celegorm went too but came back with his knitting needles and a ball of horrifically yellow yarn just as Maedhros was returning to his desk. “Caranthir wasn’t joking when it called it ugly,” Maedhros said. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen that shade of yellow before.”

“Hopefully you never will again,” said Celegorm as he sat back down on Maedhros’ bed. “At least whatever I do won’t make it look worse.”

They spent the rest of the afternoon in quiet company, Maedhros sketching and Celegorm figuring out the most basic steps of knitting. Maedhros managed to surreptitiously draw him at it, brow furrowed in concentration as he looped the yarn around the needles. He cut it out of his sketchbook and slipped it into the envelope with his letters to Náriel and Calissë, knowing Curufin would find it funny. When they were called down to dinner and Celegorm stabbed his needles into the skein, Maedhros asked, “Do you like it, knitting?”

“I don’t know yet. But it’s harder than I expected, and I do like a challenge.”

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While Maglor spoke with Finarfin, Daeron had gone to Alqualondë to find his own aunt and uncle, who had been there since the previous summer when they had at last found Daeron’s parents. He came back late in the evening, when Maglor was in their room with his notes, and crawled onto the bed and into Maglor’s lap. “All right?” Maglor asked, putting an arm around him as he gathered up his papers with his other hand.

“I have sisters,” Daeron said into his shoulder. “And a brother. And two brothers-in-law, as well. What am I supposed to do with that? They are all waiting to meet me.”

“Did they surprise you today?” Maglor asked. “I thought you were just going to meet your aunt and uncle.”

“No they didn’t, thank goodness. But Mablung could have written about them, and he didn’t. I’m going to do something awful to him when we get to Taur-en-Gellam. Snakes in his bed, or frogs in his wardrobe, or something. I’ll practice my loudest instruments outside his window every night for a month.”

“Maybe he didn’t want to scare you away,” Maglor murmured. He kissed Daeron’s temple, resting a hand on his hair. “Does this change your plans?”

“No. We’re to meet tomorrow on the beach for a lovely picnic, just a much bigger gathering than I was expecting, unless Aunt Lacheryn can convince them all that it would be better for only my parents to come. I’m sure it won’t work, but it will be fine. Was this how it felt to come back and be told all your brothers were alive?”

“Well,” Maglor said, “I did already know that I had brothers.”

“Right.” Daeron sighed and turned his face into the crook of Maglor’s neck. “So it was rather a different kind of shock.”

“Still a shock. I’m sorry.” Maglor leaned back against the pillows. Pídhres jumped up onto the bed, meowing for attention. As he reached over to scratch her ears he said, “Are you sure you still want me to go?”

“Of course. I don’t think I could make myself go if it was just me.”

“I just—all things considered, might not my presence just be another source of tension?”

“Maybe. But it will not be a surprise—I asked Uncle Belthond and he assured me that everyone knows to expect you there, and that you and your family are in the good graces of Olwë and Elu Thingol both—though really it’s Olwë that they care the most about.”

“But if any of them were there at the—”

“They weren’t. I asked about that, too.” Daeron raised his head. “I care far more about my aunt and uncle liking you than anyone else we’re here to see, you know. I know that sounds terrible, but it’s true.”

“It doesn’t sound terrible.”

“They expect to like you, and they like all that I’ve told them of you, if that makes you less nervous.”

“I suppose it does. At least I know with certainty that Mablung likes me.” Maglor tucked a stray bit of hair behind Daeron’s ear. “But my nerves aren’t that important. I just don’t want to be the cause of any…” He didn’t know how to phrase it. Whatever assurances Daeron had been given, there was likely to be tension at the very least. Maglor would be surprised if there wasn’t, considering his past and his deeds on both sides of the Sea. 

“It will only be awkward if they decide to make it so. Whatever happens, I’m very good at ignoring that sort of thing, and I’ll drag us all through this meeting with determined cheerfulness, whatever happens.”

“You know I’ll follow where you lead in this. I just—there should be no stain on this reunion. It should be a thing of joy, not of anxiety or…”

“I have not expected it to be wholly joyful from the moment I read of Aunt Lacheryn’s own reunion with my father. Whatever my parents hope for from me, they will be disappointed.”

“Disappointed in you, the mightiest singer of the Eldalië?”

“That might be the only thing that doesn’t disappoint them. I also never completed the Great Journey, and they were among the most enthusiastic of Thingol’s followers before they disappeared. They would not have stayed behind—they would have come with Olwë, and do not understand why I did not, and understand even less why I stayed as long as I did after it was possible to come west after the War of Wrath.”

“Do not put words in their mouths yet,” Maglor said. “You do not know what they will think when they meet you, when they come to know you.”

“I’m not—my aunt and uncle have already spoken with them of this. I’m only relating what they told me of it.” Daeron sighed. “I can’t wait to find out what they think of me going back east.”

“Don’t borrow trouble, love.”

“I’m trying, I just—” Daeron closed his eyes. “I wasn’t expecting brothers or sisters. Everything I’ve tried to plan—what to say, how to act—it feels as though it’s now all for naught.”

“Whatever happens, it will take time for them to know you, and for you to know them,” Maglor said. “But you have time, all the time in the world. All you need to do tomorrow is to see them and let them see you. It’s just the first step of many.”

“I know that. I do. It’s just—the first step sets the course for all the rest. I’m sure to get it wrong somehow, and I don’t know how to avoid it.”

They left late the next morning, making their way down to the beach between Finarfin and Eärwen’s house and Alqualondë just before noon. Daeron gripped Maglor’s hand tightly. He had his favorite amethysts and pearls woven through his hair, and wore the pendant that Maglor had made for him. They had not spoken much of their plans beyond that day, whether they would go to Avallónë or return more directly to Tirion. Finarfin and Eärwen were kind and welcoming, but Finarfin still clearly valued his solitude, and was out of practice as a host, and Maglor did not want to impose longer than he needed to. If it went well, he thought they could go stay with Celebrían and the twins in Avallónë for a while, where Daeron’s family could come visit with ease, and Daeron would be on firmer ground among more familiar faces. If it did not go well, Nerdanel’s house was only a little farther than Tirion itself, and would be even more familiar and grounding. 

“This is the place, I think,” said Daeron finally. “There is the tree Uncle Belthond described.” It was a tall pine standing by itself, near to the beach, just by the road. Daeron kicked off his shoes and Maglor followed suit so they could go down to the water’s edge, letting the waves wash up over their feet, cool and smooth. The sand glittered around them, white and streaked with rainbows of tiny gemstones. Maglor inhaled deeply the fresh clean smell of the wind off of the water. “Have you missed it?” Daeron asked.

“Yes.” He watched a pod of dolphins jump high into the air, and the ships going to and fro across the bay—ferries carrying folk to or from Eressëa, pleasure boats out for an afternoon on the water, fishing boats drifting back into Eldamar from the wider seas beyond. It was a beautiful scene, joyful—and so very different from the seashores that he missed. 

“I don’t think I asked how your talk with your uncle went,” Daeron said after a few minutes. “He seems weary.”

“He never wanted to be king. I think it took a bigger toll on him than he’ll ever admit to—and he was wounded in the War of Wrath, badly enough that it still troubles him sometimes.”

“No wonder he wishes for quiet,” Daeron said. “Does he not get along with his brothers? I have always been under the impression that he is far more mild-tempered than either Fingolfin or Fëanor.”

“That does not mean he has no temper,” Maglor said. “It is just slower to wake, I think—and it smolders longer.”

“Rather like you.”

“My temper doesn’t smolder. It might be slower than some of my brothers’ to ignite, but it burns hot and fast. But if anyone deserves to be angry with the lot of us, it’s Finarfin. I don’t blame him in the least.” Maglor glanced back toward Alqualondë. “Is that them?” Daeron turned. A pair of figures came walking down the road from the city—two men, both dark-haired, one carrying a basket and the other with a folded blanket in his arms. 

“The taller is my uncle,” said Daeron. “I don’t know the other.”

Pídhres had been curled around Maglor’s shoulders; now she roused herself and jumped into Daeron’s arms, startling them both before she climbed her way up to his shoulders instead, tail swishing as she rubbed her head against his chin and purred. Daeron sighed and leaned into it, as he reached again for Maglor’s hand. Maglor pressed a kiss to the corner of his mouth. “It will be fine,” he said. Daeron nodded.

The smile he turned on his uncle and the stranger, though, betrayed none of his anxiety. It was bright as the sunshine on the waves, and were it not for the way he still clung to Maglor’s hand it would be so easy to believe him entirely at ease. “Hello, Uncle!” he said. “Which of my ever-increasing relations is this, then?”

“This is your brother Simpalírë, Daeron,” Belthond said with a smile of his own. Maglor thought that he saw right through Daeron’s cheerfulness, but was willing to play along. “And this must be Maglor.”

Maglor had to let go of Daeron’s hand to take Belthond’s, summoning a smile of his own. “I’m very glad to meet you at last,” he said, as Simpalírë moved to Daeron to greet him properly. 

“So am I,” said Belthond. His smile was warm and his grip strong. “I’m very glad you’re here,” he added in a lower voice, and in Sindarin rather than the Quenya they had been using. “Daeron is far less at ease about this meeting than he would have everyone believe.”

“I know,” Maglor said. “Does he have good reason to worry?”

“He might,” Belthond admitted, glancing toward Daeron and Simpalírë, who was being introduced to Pídhres. They were both laughing, and Maglor thought that Daeron’s was genuine. Simpalírë seemed familiar, though at first Maglor attributed that to his resemblance to Daeron—there was no question that they were brothers, though Simpalírë had the shine of Treelight in his eyes, and was taller, and the shape of their faces was slightly different. 

But then Simpalírë turned to him and said, “It is good to see you again, Prince Macalaurë.”

“Again?” Maglor repeated, startled. “Have we met?”

“We were peers for a brief time, in Valmar—I left Elemmírë’s tutelage not very long after you entered it.”

“Oh—oh, of course. I beg your pardon.”

“Were you one of Elemmírë’s students?” Daeron asked his brother. “I met her only recently, but I liked her very much.”

“I was,” Simpalírë said. His smile was identical to Daeron’s. “But I do not claim to be nearly as good as either of you.”

“Oh, that doesn’t matter,” Daeron said. Simpalírë looked at him a little doubtfully, but a call from up the road heralded the arrival of Daeron’s aunt, parents, and sisters. Lacheryn was slender and dark, as Daeron was, and her brother Aldalëo. Aldalëo’s wife Escelírë was silver-haired and round-faced, with Daeron’s dark eyes and such a similar cheerful air that Maglor wondered if she, too, was putting on a performance to hide her nerves. Neither she nor Aldalëo hesitated in embracing Daeron, exclaiming over how he had grown and how they had missed him. 

That left Maglor to be introduced to Lacheryn and Daeron’s sisters by Belthond. Lacheryn met him with a warm smile, taking his hands. “I’m so glad to meet you at last,” she said. “Daeron speaks of you often—he missed you terribly while you were away in Lórien.”

“I missed him too,” Maglor said.

Pídhres, disturbed by everyone jostling around Daeron, abandoned him and jumped down into the sand. She trotted over to paw at Maglor until he picked her up. Lacheryn laughed. “Daeron told us about this little one too,” she said, “and a hedgehog.”

“Leicheg’s children were quite happy to remain behind in Imloth Ningloron,” Maglor said, “but Pídhres hates to miss out on any excitement.”

Pídhres smoothed the slight awkwardness of his introductions to Daeron’s sisters, Netyalossë and Vinyelírë. They were perfectly polite, but addressed him as Prince Macalaurë even when he asked them not to, and Maglor could tell that they wished to keep him at a distance, though whether it was just uncertainty or for other reasons, he couldn’t tell. It was nothing he hadn’t expected, but it was still uncomfortable, and he was very glad that Lacheryn and Belthond were much warmer. They asked after his mother, and about their travels, and listened to his answers with genuine interest. 

Aldalëo and Escelírë were just as polite and lacking in warmth as their daughters when they greeted Maglor. Daeron embraced Lacheryn and then returned to Maglor’s side to take his hand again. 

They picnicked on the beach, the conversation for the most part cheerful and pleasant. Maglor spoke little, keeping half an eye on Pídhres as she stalked through the grass just beyond the sand, near the road. Daeron spoke more, answering questions and asking his own. Doriath and Alqualondë were spoken of, mostly, with some reminisces from the Great Journey. Daeron either ignored or deliberately misunderstood anything that might lead to deeper or more serious conversation, and more than once deftly turned questions around so that his family spoke of themselves instead. He was showing his family Daeron the performer, the bright presence who had dazzled Thingol’s court for many years, who could command an audience of any size, and reveal nothing of himself except what he wished for them to see. This was the Daeron that Maglor had met first, at the Mereth Aderthad, and he hadn’t realized until that moment just how quickly Daeron had let that mask fall away when they were alone, how willing he had been to show his real self and share his real thoughts. Maybe it didn’t mean anything, and Maglor had not really been an exception to any rule, and Daeron had simply grown more guarded as the years passed—except that he had put on no such performance when they’d met again aboard the ship at Mithlond—but he worried, a little, that Daeron was preventing any real foundation being laid that could be built upon by anyone, even himself, as his family sought to know him. He was trying too hard to avoid any missteps, so that it seemed he wasn’t willing to take any step at all. 

They parted with promises to meet again in Avallónë in the next few days or the next week. Daeron watched his family head back down the road to Alqualondë, and once they were out of earshot he sighed, shoulders slumping. “Well, that’s over,” he said.

“I thought it went well,” Maglor said.

“It went better than I feared.”

“You’ll have to let them start to get to know you, though—the real you, not the one you show your audiences.”

“Yes, I know. I’m sure my aunt will have something to say about that later, too. It’s just—I don’t think I can, yet.” 

“I understand.” Maglor opened his arms, and Daeron stepped into them. Down the road someone glanced back, but Maglor ignored them. “Do you want to go to Avallónë today, or wait another day or two?”

“Will your aunt and uncle be offended if we leave today?”

“I think they’ll be happy to have their house to themselves again.”

“Then let’s go to Avallónë as soon as we can find a boat. Will we wait there for Elrond?”

“I have no idea how long Elrond will stay with Gil-galad,” said Maglor as they turned back toward Finarfin’s house. “But there’s no real hurry. I want to consult with Finrod about my song, anyway. We can stay as long a time or as short a time as you wish.” He wanted to finish speaking to everyone else, too, but he had plenty of notes to work with until they could make it to Taur-en-Gellam.

“Is it still going well?”

“Yes, I think so.”

They took their leave of Eärwen and Finarfin. Finarfin embraced Maglor warmly. “I am glad you’re back, Nephew,” he said into his ear. “Next time I hope we can meet for happier reasons.”

“I hope someday soon we can all come together and be happy for it,” Maglor said. “Farewell for now, Uncle.”

The ferry from Alqualondë was just preparing to leave when they reached the dock. Once safely on board Daeron sighed and leaned against Maglor. Pídhres curled up on Maglor’s lap, ears flat, unhappy about being put on a boat. “I did not expect to be so tired,” Daeron murmured.

“It will get easier,” Maglor said.

“I hope so. And…I think that I like them. I like my brother, at least—as strange as it feels to say such things. I certainly wasn’t expecting you to have met any of them.”

“Neither was I. But I’m not really surprised to know that at least one of your siblings shares your talents.”

“None of yours do.”

“That’s not really true—they all have good voices, and they could learn at least one instrument if they wanted. It’s just that I’m the only one that really loves it.”

Celebrían and Elrohir were at home when they arrived. The house was elegant and spacious, built of white stone as were most other homes in Avallónë. Ivy and roses twined around the pillars, and the gardens were lush and fragrant. A path led through them down to a small white beach where the waves were gentle and quiet. From the upper windows Alqualondë could be seen across the bay, glittering in the coming evening. The sunlight slanted deep gold through the Calacirya, slowly turning orange with the approach of sunset. “Welcome!” Celebrían said, embracing each of them in turn. “How was Tirion and Alqualondë? How are my grandparents?”

“Your grandparents are doing very well, and both send their love; and both Tirion and Alqualondë were lovely,” said Maglor, kissing her cheek. “Where is Elladan?”

“Gone down to the eastern docks to see what news there is from Middle-earth,” said Elrohir, as he took his turn embracing Maglor. “He should be back soon. Where is Ada?”

“Still with Gil-galad, I assume,” said Maglor. He’d written ahead to tell Celebrían of it, and he would have expected Elrond to write as well. “I’m sure that you’ll hear from him before I do.”

“Is there anyone here on Eressëa that you must meet with?” Celebrían asked.

“Idril maybe, if she’s here. I’m going to take some time to work on the song itself, I think, and put my notes in order.”

“Your notes are never in order,” Daeron said. “It’s appalling.” Elrohir laughed.

“I want to visit with Finrod too,” Maglor added, ignoring Daeron. “And Daeron’s family will be coming to look for him in the next few days.”

“They’re very welcome of course,” Celebrían said. She slipped her arm through Daeron’s as they passed through the house. “How did your meeting go, Daeron?”

“Well enough,” Daeron said. “It still feels very strange.”

“I’m sure it does,” Celebrían said. 

They had a few days of respite before Daeron’s parents came looking for him, accompanied by his aunt and uncle. Celebrían greeted them with her usual bright cheerfulness and warmth. They were all outside in the garden when the visitors arrived, and Maglor remained where he was, cross-legged on the grass beside the bench where Elladan and Elrohir were seated. He had his notes and his harp, experimenting with melodies and musical themes. Belthond joined them, as Lacheryn sat with Celebrían nearby and Daeron’s parents walked with him a little farther away, to sit under a large purple hydrangea. Maglor watched out of the corner of his eye as Daeron plucked a few soft purple asters as he passed them, twisting them together in his fingers as he spoke with his parents. There were no smiles or laughter this time, but Maglor could not tell if that boded ill or not. At least Daeron was not trying to hide himself behind smiles and wit.

“Oh, play that again,” Elrohir said after a little while. Maglor obliged, plucking an intricate series of notes over the harp strings. “I like that a lot. Will it work in your song?”

“I don’t know.” Maglor picked up his pencil to scribble the notes down anyway. “If not, I can use it for something else. Or you can use it if you like.”

“I’m no songwriter,” Elrohir laughed. “I just know what sounds nice.”

Down the garden voices rose suddenly, and Maglor looked up to see Daeron on his feet. “—should not have died, then!” he snapped, voice shivering through the air, before storming away down a path half-hidden from where Maglor sat by an arbor draped with sweet-smelling yellow roses. A few birds flew up from beyond the arbor, disturbed by Daeron’s abrupt passage. 

“Let me go,” Belthond said, rising to his feet as Maglor made to set aside his harp. Lacheryn was already on her feet, going to Daeron’s parents. Maglor settled back onto the grass as Belthond vanished after Daeron. 

“Well,” Elladan murmured after a few moments, “I suppose that was bound to happen eventually.”

“For the best that it happened so soon, I think,” Elrohir said.

“Maybe,” Maglor said. He glanced at Daeron’s parents, now in heated conversation with Lacheryn. They wanted their child back, but Daeron had not been that child for a very, very long time. It seemed almost absurd to think that the Great Journey and the many splittings and sunderings between families and peoples that had accompanied it could still be a source of tension and strife so long afterward—but then, Maglor thought, he of all people should know what it was to have old hurts rear their heads unexpectedly, thousands of years later. 

“When did Daeron’s parents die?” Elladan asked, keeping his voice low.

“He was too young to remember them,” Maglor said. “That is why he has been so anxious leading up to this meeting.”

“Oh, I didn’t know that,” said Elladan as he and Elrohir grimaced. “That is hard—they’re practically strangers.”

Aldalëo and Escelírë did not stay for dinner, though Lacheryn and Belthond did—or at least Lacheryn did. Neither Daeron nor Belthond appeared again, and Maglor itched to go looking for them. He slipped out of the house as evening drew on, and saw Belthond returning alone from the direction of the beach. He did not see Maglor, and once Belthond stepped inside Maglor retraced his steps, and soon heard the haunting, melancholy notes of a flute. 

Daeron sat on the white sand, legs crossed, eyes closed as he played. Maglor sat beside him without a word, and waited until the song was done. As he lowered his flute Daeron sighed, and did not open his eyes. “Do you want to be alone?” Maglor asked.

“No.”

“Do you want to talk about it?”

“Not really.” Daeron turned and leaned against Maglor. “I’m just—I’m not who they wish I was. Who they thought I would be.”

“Are they who you thought they would be?”

“I hadn't really thought of it at all. Of course, I didn’t think I was angry at them either, so I don’t know if that means much.”

Maglor wrapped his arms around Daeron and kissed the top of his head. “Do you want to come back and eat something?”

“No. But I’ll come back and go to bed.”

In their room, seated on the bed, Maglor asked as he combed out Daeron’s hair, “Were you angry with your aunt and uncle?”

“No. They were caught up in the Dagor Bragollach—it was war, it was…at least we knew what had happened, awful as it was. My parents—they just walked away and never came back. I know it wasn’t their fault, but it’s still—it just feels different. Especially when they seem so eager to just—just forget about it, to act as though it doesn’t matter at all, when only a year ago I had no way of knowing whether they had ever made it to Mandos in the first place.”

“They returned from death a very long time ago,” Maglor said as he wove Daeron’s hair into a simple braid for sleeping. “By now I suppose it is something they can forget about.”

“They look at my decision to go into the east as the worst thing I could have done,” Daeron said after a moment. “Yet I think of it as one of the best. I do not regret it, but they do not want to listen.”

“They will in time,” Maglor said.

“I don’t know if I’m patient enough for that.”

“You can find patience—and you still have your whole life outside of your parents. You have your songbirds and your friends, and your writing.”

“And you,” Daeron added.

“And me.” Maglor tied off the braid, and Daeron turned to face him. “You always have me.”

“I know.” Daeron smiled at him. “You’re the only thing keeping me from running away—all the way back home to Taur-en-Gellam.”

“We can leave whenever you want,” said Maglor, “but you were the one to encourage me to give my brothers a chance, remember?”

“I do.” 

They curled up together under the blankets. Through the window the sound of the sea came, steady and quiet; the breeze smelled of salt and roses. Daeron wrapped himself around Maglor. “I don’t think my parents like you very much,” he said after a while. 

“I didn’t really expect them to,” Maglor said. “And they have good cause. I’m sorry.”

“If they do not change their minds, there is no hope for any kind of relationship between us, whatever other understanding we might find.”

“Daeron, I do not want to be the cause of—”

Daeron raised himself onto his arm and cupped Maglor’s face with his other hand, his eyes glinting in the dark. “Listen to me,” he said. “I chose you, beloved—the moment you smiled to see me aboard that ship at Mithlond, I chose you. You are my family, as much as my aunt and uncle and my cousin. If it comes to it, I will always, always choose you, and I will never regret it.”

“That’s not fair to you,” Maglor said softly. 

“If it isn’t fair, it’s no doing of yours.”

“But—”

“It is my choice to whom I give my heart, and I have made it. Those who know me and love me best understand it and support it, and if my parents cannot find it in themselves to do the same, then we must part ways and continue on as we were before, and I will not regret it.”

“Do not turn your back entirely,” Maglor said. “It’s still so early.”

“I won’t—I will give it time, I promise.” Daeron sighed, and leaned in to kiss him. “But I need you to know—I love you, and nothing is going to change that.”

“I have been afraid of many things, love, but never that. I just don’t want you to have to choose.”

“I don’t either. But I will not hesitate.”

Daeron fell asleep after a while, frowning slightly in his dreams. Maglor lay awake, listening to the waves outside and wishing there was something more he could do. When he had had his own difficult reunions, Daeron’s mere presence at his side had been such a great comfort—but his whole family had been disposed to like Daeron from the start, and Daeron was not the one with terrible deeds lurking in his past. As a whole the Teleri had forgiven the Noldor, but that did not mean all of them shared Olwë’s views, or that any of them would be pleased with their child taking up with a kinslayer. Maglor couldn’t begrudge them that, really. He counted himself very lucky already that Mablung and his parents were so accepting.

It was always going to be complicated, this reunion—Maglor had just hoped it would be more joyful than it seemed that it was turning out to be.

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Celegorm didn’t even have time to get fed up with his clumsy and tangled attempts at knitting before his mother dragged him into her workshop and put a chisel in his hand. “You want to make things, I hear,” she said with a smile. “I thought long ago you had an aptitude for stone—only you disagreed, and rode off to lose yourself in the woods instead.” She set a block of soapstone in front of him. “What better time than now to try again? Go on, get a feel for it under your hands.”

Nearby his cousin Isilmiel sat with her own half-gone block of stone, carefully chipping away at it, her honey-colored hair pulled up in to a tightly braided bun. She smiled at him briefly before giving it her full attention. Celegorm sighed and pulled his own hair back out of his face. Might as well try, he thought as he picked up the hammer and chisel. He remembered how it was done, in a distant and hazy sort of way, gold-tinged like most of his memories of Nerdanel’s workshop long ago when he had been Calissë’s age, before he’d discovered the wild woods and the excitement of the hunt. As he started chipping away very carefully at his stone he watched his mother out of the corner of his eye. She spoke briefly to Isilmiel, offering advice or encouragement, and then went to climb up the ladder erected by a statue twice as tall as Maedhros, with some sort of strange and undulating shape slowly emerging from the otherwise smooth and strait block of pale green marble.

Somehow he’d forgotten what it was like to watch his mother at work. She moved quickly and decisively, never hesitating when she put her chisel to the stone, and hummed as she worked. Fëanor had once said that Maglor had inherited his own talents from Nerdanel; she’d laughed and denied it, but Celegorm remembered Maglor agreeing, and remembered sitting outside of her workshop with him when they were young, out of sight of the windows, just to listen to her through the windows, because she almost never sang if she knew other people might be listening.

Celegorm worked slowly, obediently doing nothing but letting himself get used to the feel of a chisel and hammer in his hand, and the different ways that the stone broke beneath it depending on how he held it or how much force he used. There was, he had to admit, something satisfying in watching the pieces fall away, to imagine that someday he might be able to do this and reveal something worth looking at underneath. It had been a long time since he’d felt any sort of thrill from learning something new—a long time since he’d learned anything worth bring thrilled about. He didn’t feel it then, but he thought he might—and it was worth trying just because Nerdanel thought he could do it, and certainly it was worth getting to spend time with her in her workshop, where nothing mattered except what was taking shape under their hands.

Just like that, Celegorm found his mornings taken up by stones and chisels and his mother’s patient tutelage. In the afternoons he took the ugly yarn he’d stolen out of Caranthir’s workshop, and the needles his grandmother had given him, and went to find Maedhros, who was often either in his own workshop or out by the river, with a sketchbook or an easel. Huan followed him, and Nallámo perched in the window or flew about over the water. Aechen was always near Maedhros. Sometimes Caranthir came to join them; most often he was busy with his own projects or with Lisgalen. It was quiet. It was nice.

“Have you heard from Maglor?” Celegorm asked one afternoon. They sat under a willow tree, Maedhros with a set of colored pencils and Celegorm with what he supposed would be a scarf, if he didn’t do something wrong again and have to unravel the whole thing.

“I had a letter yesterday,” said Maedhros without looking up. Maglor and Daeron had been in Avallónë for two weeks, now. “It sounds as though Daeron is clashing with his parents a bit.”

“Why? You’d think they’d be thrilled.”

“I’m sure they were in the beginning—he was less so, it sounds like. I don’t know Daeron nearly as well as the rest of you, so there’s not much I can read between the lines. Maglor also says he actually met Daeron’s younger brother, long ago. They were both students of Elemmírë, though their time in Valmar did not overlap for very long.”

“How do they get along now?”

“Well enough, but Maglor is keeping out of their way, he says.”

“How’s his songwriting?”

“He says its going well. Felagund is helping.”

Finrod baffled Celegorm almost as much as Dior. They’d been friends once, long ago, so his insistence on being friends again was a little more understandable—except for the part where he’d died horribly because of Celegorm’s treachery. There was setting the past aside in the name of peace, and then there was whatever Finrod was doing. Celegorm knew better than to argue when Finrod got that determined look in his eyes, and he was trying to stay in the habit of being honest with himself, so he really would like to return to something like friendship, but it was never going to look the same. Finrod was never not going to place himself closest to the nearest escape route whenever they were alone together, and Celegorm wasn’t sure he would ever be able to look him fully in the eye again.

Caranthir wandered out after a while to join them. “How’s the stone-carving going, Tyelko?” he asked as Aechen crawled onto his lap.

“I like it more than I thought I would,” Celegorm said.

“More than the knitting?”

“I don’t know how I feel about knitting.” The needles felt clumsier in his hands than the chisel did, and the yarn was a source of constant frustration as it tangled itself in knots or slipped off the needles at the worst times, and his stitches were forever too tight or too lose—but when he did manage to work a few rows without any mishap it felt a little like the stone carving did. Like he could eventually turn this tangle of yarn into something worth looking at, or using, and that was just enough to keep him from giving it up in disgust.

“It’s not that hard,” Caranthir said. “I don’t know why you’re being such a baby about it. You should see some of the lacework Grandmother Ennalótë does. That’s much more complicated than what you’re doing. You aren’t even purling.”

“That she knits?”

“Oh, yes. It’s not all just scarves and blankets, you know.”

“You’ll get there, Tyelko,” Maedhros said, sounding amused. He flipped the page in his sketchbook and picked up a new pencil. “Have Ambarussa sent any messages?”

“No,” said Caranthir, “but they almost never do. I have a letter from Daeron. He’s very annoyed at Mablung about not warning him he has siblings.”

“How many does he have?” Maedhros asked. “Maglor wrote and mentioned a brother.”

“Two sisters, both of whom are married, as well as the brother, who isn’t. He has a niece and a nephew as well, but I don’t think he’d met them yet when he wrote to me. I can’t imagine arriving here and learning I’ve got siblings I never met.”

“I can’t either,” Maedhros murmured.

“Imagine learning that your long-lost elder brother is Daeron,” said Celegorm. He dropped a stitch and cursed.

“You can pick it up without unraveling—here, let me show you.” Caranthir took the needles, and fixed the stitch far too quickly for Celegorm to follow. “See?”

“No, I didn’t see,” Celegorm said. “You did it too fast—”

“It’s not that hard—”

“Then do it slowly—”

“I did do it slowly, you stupid—”

“Children,” Maedhros said, just a hint of warning in his voice.

“Here.” Caranthir took the needles again and dropped a stitch on purpose. This time he went about picking it up much more slowly, and if Celegorm still didn’t fully understand what he did, at least he got the general idea. “How was that?”

“Better.”

After a little while Huan lifted his head, ears perking up. Celegorm expected whatever had caught his interest to pass by after a moment, but instead Huan lumbered to his feet, sending Aechen rolling away in a little spiky ball, and woofed. “What is it, Huan?” Celegorm asked. Huan nudged him with his nose, knocking him into Caranthir and making half his stitches slide off the needles. “Hey!” Huan grabbed him by the shirt and pulled him away next. “Huan, stop!”

“This is why Maglor calls him a menace,” Caranthir said, laughing as he picked Aechen up out of the way of the scuffle. “You’d better go with him, Tyelko.”

“I would if he’d let me up,” Celegorm growled. His shirt had ridden up and he was halfway to choking as the collar caught around his chin. “Huan!”

Finally, Huan released him, having dragged him out from under the willow tree, and Celegorm got to his feet. He was now covered in grass stains, which he didn’t mind much, but he also had a few scrapes over his palms and his stomach from the willow roots that he minded a little more. “What’s the matter with you?” he demanded as he followed Huan, yanking his shirt back down into some sort of order.

Huan barked, and as Celegorm followed his gaze he saw pair of travelers—on foot and clad in the plain and undyed robes of the Returned, following the river toward them. Both were dark-haired; one was slightly taller than the other. Celegorm blinked, not quite sure that he was seeing what he thought he was. Caranthir stepped up beside him. “Moryo, that isn’t…?”

Caranthir raised a hand to shield his eyes from the bright afternoon sun. “That looks like Irissë,” he said, startled. “But that’s—why would she come here? And who is with her? They both look new-come from Mandos!”

“That must be Maeglin,” said Maedhros from behind them.

“But why would either of them be coming here?” Caranthir asked again. “Someone should have been called to Lórien, shouldn’t they? As Fingon and Gilheneth were?”

“That depends on whether they want someone to come,” Celegorm said. “I remember I didn’t.”

“Neither did I,” said Maedhros. “But how welcome do you think Maeglin will be in Tirion? Turgon is still there, is he not?”

“No, he and Elenwë were preparing to leave for Alastoron when I left,” said Caranthir. “But I see your point. We don’t really have a leg to stand on turning him away, is that it?”

“Something like that,” Maedhros said.

Huan bounded forward, barking excitedly. Maeglin halted, eyes going wide, but Aredhel sprang forward to greet Huan with a burst of bright laughter. She threw her arms around his big neck and kissed him. Celegorm couldn’t quite catch what she said. He followed after Huan, leaving Caranthir and Maedhros to either wait or go back to tell Nerdanel they had a pair of unexpected guests. Huan licked Aredhel’s face in greeting and then went to sniff at Maeglin, who stood very still. He was tall and dark—dark-haired and dark-eyed—and Celegorm couldn’t tell at a distance whether he favored Aredhel’s family or not. Celegorm wasn’t sure what he would say to him, or even to Aredhel.

What came out of his mouth, voice shaking only a little, once he was within speaking distance was, “You took your time didn’t you, Irissë?”

“I’m surprised they let you out at all, Tyelkormo!” she replied as she embraced him, holding on very tightly. She felt far more solid than she looked at first glance, and Celegorm wrapped his arms around her equally tightly. “Oh, I’m so glad to see you! Is Curvo here?”

“No, he lives in Tirion. That’s Caranthir and Maedhros behind me. But Irissë, what are you doing here?”

“I missed you,” she said.

“Right, but your parents—your brothers—”

“I’ll see them soon enough,” she said, and turned to hold out her hand to Maeglin, who stepped forward to take it. “Tyelkormo, this is my son Lómion.”

Up close, Celegorm could see how much Maeglin resembled Fingolfin. The rueful and hesitant expression on his face, though, was like looking into a mirror. “Welcome, Lómion,” he said, holding out his hand. “I’m glad to meet you at last.”

“Thank you,” Maeglin said as he grasped it.

“Come on. I’m sure we have clothes somewhere that will fit both of you if you want to get out of those robes. Ammë will be very glad to see you again, Irissë.”

“We aren’t intruding, I hope,” Aredhel said as they turned to walk back to join Maedhros and Caranthir. “Where are your other brothers? I heard all seven of you are back.”

“As I said, Curufin’s in Tirion. Maglor is in Avallónë at the moment, and Ambarussa live up in the mountains south of here,” Celegorm said, gesturing in the general direction. “We won’t see them until next spring, but Maglor will turn up sometime soon, probably.”

“Probably? Why is he on Eressëa?”

“Visiting Finrod. Celebrían and her sons are there too—Elrond’s wife and children.” Celegorm paused. “Do you know who…?”

“I don’t recognize the names, no,” Aredhel said.

“Well, Elrond is Eärendil’s son, Idril’s grandson,” Celegorm said, and out of the corner of his eye watched Maeglin trip over something in the grass and catch himself before he fell. “And Celebrían is Galadriel’s daughter.”

“Artanis had a daughter!” Aredhel exclaimed. “Where is she then—Artanis?”

“Taur-en-Gellam—that’s Thingol’s realm here. Somewhere a little south and then west of here. You probably passed the road to it on your way here.”

“We didn’t take roads,” Aredhel said. Then she darted ahead to greet Maedhros and Caranthir. That left Celegorm behind with Maeglin—and Huan, who had taken pity on Maeglin and moved so that Celegorm was between them.

“You’re in good company here, you know,” Celegorm said after a moment. He offered a crooked sort of smile when Maeglin glanced at him warily. “One could argue we were far worse than you.”

“Did you make deals with the Enemy too, then?” Maeglin asked, sounding brittle but like he would rather go back to Mandos than let anyone see.

Celegorm hadn’t expected sarcasm, but thought it was probably a good sign. “If you try to tell me you made yours entirely of your own will, I’ll throw you into the river,” he said, keeping his tone mild, slipping his hands into his pockets. It was Maedhros’ favorite threat, so Maeglin would have to get used to hearing it. “We made no deals, but that’s what makes us worse. We did his work for him and and he never even had to ask.”

“So what did you do when you returned?” Maeglin asked after a moment.

“Went to bend the knee before everyone we wronged,” Celegorm said. “For the most part they were all happy to say ‘yes we forgive you, now please go away and don’t trouble us again,’ and it’s been long enough now that no one so much as blinks when we turn up in public.” Maeglin didn’t smile, not even the slightest twitch of his lips. Celegorm hadn't realized before just how used he’d gotten to everyone being cheerful most of the time—even Maglor, when he wasn’t moody or snappish over his songwriting. He stopped trying to be funny. “I don’t know what will be asked of you when it comes out you’ve returned, but you’ll probably find a lot more forgiveness than you expect. We certainly did.”

“What I did not expect,” Maeglin said after a moment, “was to find you sounding so much like Lady Nienna.”

Celegorm snorted. “Well, I spent a few decades in her halls recently. I’m glad something seems to have stuck. Come on. At least it’s only three of us here at the moment. You can get used to us a little at a time.”

Nerdanel was shocked but very pleased to see Aredhel, and to be introduced to Maeglin. She ushered the two of them to the guest rooms and sent Caranthir next door for clothes fit for Aredhel; Maeglin was close enough to Caranthir in size that he could borrow some of his for the time being. “So that’s Lómion,” Maedhros remarked when he and Celegorm were left alone in the kitchen.

“I haven’t see anyone so terrified to be here since Maglor,” Celegorm said.

“You think he’s afraid?”

“He’s very good at hiding it.” Celegorm couldn’t have explained exactly how he knew that Maeglin was so frightened; it was just a sense that he had, some instinct honed over his years as a hunter. Something about the way he held himself, even if he wasn’t visibly poised to run off. Something about the way he kept looking for Aredhel, as though he couldn’t stand the thought of letting her out of his sight.

Maedhros sighed. “Seems to run in the family,” he murmured. “What is it you think he fears?”

“Not hard to guess. Turgon. Idril. Not to mention Tuor, and everyone else who once lived in Gondolin.”

“Do you think he has good reason?”

Celegorm shrugged. “I don’t know. It’s not as though I’m the one Turgon confides in. You’d be better off asking Finrod, or maybe Fingon.”

“Maybe I will,” Maedhros said. “Better to know before he actually meets with anyone. I’ll see what Irissë thinks later.”

With nothing else to do as Maedhros went to put his sketchbook and pencils away, Celegorm put a kettle on, and dug through the cupboard for tea that he thought Aredhel might like. He couldn’t even begin to guess at Maeglin’s tastes. Most of the jars were full of Caranthir’s odd and experimental blends, some of which were more successful than others. Celegorm couldn’t remember what Aredhel liked, so in the end he just picked the newest experiment that he liked best.

Aredhel returned to the kitchen as he spooned the leaves into the teapot. “I’m not sure what I expected to find,” she said, leaning against the counter beside him, “but I don’t think it was anything quite so domestic.” He shrugged. “Thank you for welcoming Lómion,” she added after a moment.

“I should have done far more, long ago,” Celegorm said quietly. “I’m sorry, Irissë.”

“You did not wrong me just by being away from home when I came looking,” Aredhel said. “But Tyelko, what you did—”

“I know. I’m sorry for all of that, too—more sorry than I can say. I’m…we’re all trying to be better. I think Curvo’s doing the best out of all of us, honestly.”

“He’s back in Tirion, you said. Back with Rundamírë?”

“Yes. They have two little girls now, did Ammë tell you?”

Aredhel smiled, and then laughed. “No, she didn’t! Little girls—Tyelpë must be delighted.”

“He is. Do you want me to write to Curvo? I can just ask him to come visit—I don’t need to write in a letter why if you want to keep it secret.”

Aredhel did not answer immediately. The kettle sang, and Celegorm poured the water into the teapot. Finally, Aredhel said, “I do miss him. I miss everyone—but I was unable to protect my son, before, and I need to do better now. Until I know better how he will be received, I do not want to return to Tirion at all, or even for my family to know that I am returned.”

“You can always go to Fingon first,” Celegorm said. He turned to the cupboard to take down mugs. “He and Gilheneth are north of Tirion, and they’re not welcoming many visitors just now either—Gil-galad is back too. If you don’t want anyone noticing a letter from you, slip it inside one of Maedhros’.”

“Would he mind?” Aredhel asked.

“Not at all,” said Maedhros as he came into the kitchen. “I have a letter to him I was going to send tomorrow, if you want to write sooner than later, Irissë.”

“Thank you, Russo.” Aredhel smiled at him. “I’ll try to think of something tonight.”

Caranthir returned then with clothes for her, and Aredhel disappeared to change. “Who does that leave in Mandos, still?” Caranthir asked when she was gone.

“Aegnor,” said Maedhros.

“And Finwë,” Celegorm added.

“Well, Finwë goes without saying,” Caranthir said. Celegorm glanced at Maedhros, who shook his head minutely. Unaware, Caranthir went on, “I almost wonder if something has happened lately. Maedhros and Maglor came back from Lórien, and now all who remained are flooding back.”

“Three people is a flood?” Maedhros asked, amused.

“Feels like it, a bit. Coming in such quick succession after the two of you.”

Aredhel and Maeglin returned, changed out of their robes from Mandos and into proper clothes, and Celegorm poured the tea for everyone. There was still a little awkwardness, because none of them knew Maeglin and it had been so long since any of them had seen Aredhel. She, however, had never known what awkwardness was, and therefore had always been good at chasing it away. She wanted to know all the latest gossip and news from all sides of the family, and what their brothers and cousins were doing alongside her own. Maeglin sat quietly, speaking when spoken to but otherwise appearing more than content just to listen.

The next day Celegorm spent the morning with Isilmiel, chipping away at stone as he started his first rough sculpture. Afterward he introduced her to Aredhel, and when she left to return to Mahtan’s house Aredhel turned to Celegorm with a raised brow. “You’re a sculptor now, are you?”

“No,” Celegorm said, shaking his head. “But I’m…I can’t be a hunter anymore, the way that I used to be, so I’m looking for something else. It’s either that or just—drive myself mad worrying about all my brothers.”

“Do they need worrying about?” Aredhel asked. They sat under the hawthorn tree in the garden, and she leaned back against the trunk, twirling a strand of hair around her finger. “Russandol and Carnistir seem fine.”

“They are now,” said Celegorm. “But Nelyo only returned last year from decades in Lórien, because Mandos didn’t help him at all. Cáno, too—Cáno never died, you know.”

“I didn’t,” Aredhel said. “I paid very little attention to anything but myself and my son in Mandos. Well, I paid attention to the big things, but nothing really after the War of Wrath…what was Macalaurë doing all that time, then?”

“Wandering, mostly,” Celegorm said. He drew a knee up to rest his arm over it as he watched Aechen trundle by. “Then—some awful things happened to him, and he ended up with Galadriel and then with Elrond. He didn’t come west with them, but came with Elrond’s sons.”

“Has he been on Eressëa since? I mean, aside from Lórien?”

“No. Elrond and Celebrían have settled in a valley a little ways south of here—Imloth Ningloron, it’s called. It’s that wide sort of bowl-shaped valley filled with streams and irises. Cáno lives there with them. He’s been in Tirion and Alqualondë and now Avallónë because he’s got this song he’s writing and he wants to talk to just about everyone who ever knew Finwë for it. He’ll probably ask you too, if you’re willing.”

“To talk of Finwë?” Aredhel shrugged. “I suppose.”

“You don’t have to.”

“Well, I did just come from Mandos, where he still is. I can tell Macalaurë of that.”

“You might want to write down whatever you want to tell him,” Celegorm said. “You’ll start to forget soon enough. Everyone does.”

“Maybe.” Aredhel stretched her legs out in front of her, and tilted her head back to watch the leaves sway above their heads. “You’re very different, you know.”

“Good. I don’t want to be what I was.”

“That’s a shame,” Aredhel said. “I rather liked who you were—fire and temper and all. So you aren’t a hunter anymore—do you still have your bow?”

Celegorm did still have a bow, and they found another one better suited to Aredhel, and took a couple quivers of arrows out into the fields beyond the river. They shot at no game, just old fence posts or tree stumps. Aredhel’s shots went wild more often than not, but she just laughed—it was still all new to her, being alive again, and it would be some time before the thrill wore off. Celegorm hadn’t been quite so happy about returning to life—but he’d come back alone and even less certain than Maeglin of the kind of welcome he’d receive even from Nerdanel. But he did remember that particular feeling of exhilaration that came with regaining a body—that came with all the sensations of life, of touch and sound and smell, and hunger and weariness and even pain, in its own way—that feeling of rightness that came with his spirit settling back into a living body in the living world.

As they rested back by the river, Aredhel lay back on the grass with her arms behind her head. “Where’s your father?” she asked after a little while. “He’s back too, is he not?”

“He went off with Ambarussa, but mostly he lives in Tirion.”

“What’s the matter?”

“What? Nothing.”

“You never were a very good liar.”

“I was an excellent liar,” Celegorm said tightly, and immediately wished he hadn’t.

“Well, maybe to other people.” Aredhel knocked her foot against his ankle. “So what lies between you and your father?”

“Everything. Curvo gets along with him fine, and Ambarussa have mended things so far as to take him off to the mountains with them, but the rest of us—haven’t. Don’t mention it to Maedhros, though, please.”

“All right. How tense will it be when I finally return to Tirion?”

“Probably not very tense at all,” said Celegorm. “Your father and mine haven't just made peace, they’re apparently friends.”

“Really?”

“Most everyone is more or less at peace with my father being back and being…himself. He gave up his claim to the crown, so your father is still the king. It’s just us that don’t speak to him.”

“Why?”

“Why—you know what happened. We never would’ve done any of it without the Oath and he’s the one that made that, he’s the one that set us on that path and then died—”

“I doubt that he wanted to,” Aredhel said quietly. “I didn’t.”

“You,” Celegorm said, “didn’t have anything to do with what happened to Gondolin later.”

“Didn’t I? I opened the door for it.”

“It’s not the same thing.”

“It’s close enough.”

“It’s not close at all—”

“Also not worth arguing about,” Aredhel said. “I didn't come back just to fight. Or at least not about that—not with you. I’m sure I’ll get into a screaming match with Turgon sometime, and then we’ll both cry a bit, avoid each other for a few months, and then never talk about it again.” She sighed. “I suppose I just know what it’s like to be a parent and to fail my child. But mending it has to go both ways, so he must be doing something right if Curvo and Ambarussa have forgiven him.”

“I guess so. He wrote us all letters, back when he first returned. That was fifty years ago now.”

“What did he write in yours?”

“Apologized. Said he loved me. You know, all the sorts of things you’re supposed to write in that kind of letter.”

Aredhel sat up. “Your father never says anything that he doesn’t mean.”

That, Celegorm thought—remembering all the things they’d each shouted at one another when things had first started to get bad—was the whole problem. “I know,” he said aloud. “That doesn’t mean he won’t change his mind.”

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Maglor had not expected Daeron’s parents to be daunted by that first setback, and so they weren’t. They did not visit every day over the next month or so that Maglor and Daeron stayed with Celebrían and the twins, but someone did—if not Aldalëo or Escelírë, then at least one of Daeron’s siblings. For his part, Maglor continued to stay out of their way. He got to know Daeron’s aunt and uncle, who had come to stay in Avallónë with them, and found them to be kindhearted and wise, warm and easy to talk to. They were much like Mablung—and much like Daeron.

He also made a fair copy of what he’d written so far of his song and took it to Finrod, along with the music he’d made to go with it, and spent many very pleasant afternoons talking about melodies and harmonies and general musical theory with him.

Then a message came in the middle of one such visit, short and hastily scribbled. Finrod opened it with a frown, and then nearly knocked over his wine in his haste to get up. “What’s wrong?” Maglor asked, catching the glass before it spilled.

“Nothing! Nothing at all! Oh, this is why Fingon looked so ready to faint when he got the news—”

“Who’s back?” Maglor asked.

“Aegnor! My brothers are already halfway to Lórien by now. I have to go—”

“Of course you do!” Maglor rose and caught Finrod by the shoulders. “Just breathe, Finrod. Do your parents know?”

“I don’t know. I’m going to assume Angrod sent them another such note, but we’ll be dragging Aegnor back to Alqualondë whether he wants to come or not so they’ll know soon enough—oh, I hadn’t really dared hope—” Finrod laughed, sudden and bright, and embraced Maglor. “That’s nearly everyone now! Tell Celebrían for me—but no further. No one coming from Mandos likes a big fuss made—”

“Of course. Go on, then. I’ll see myself out.”

“Your song is wonderful, by the way!” Finrod said as he left the room. “I can’t wait to see it finished!”

Back at Celebrían’s house, she heard the news in astonishment. “All sorts of impossible things are happening,” she said, and laughed a little breathlessly. “First Fëanor came back unlooked for, and now Aegnor who no one ever dared hope to see again—and so soon after Gil-galad too! It’s dizzyingly wonderful.”

“It’s certainly dizzying,” Maglor said. “Where is Daeron?”

“Out in the garden with his sisters. No one’s done any shouting, so I think it’s going well. Come walk through the city with me.” Celebrían slipped her arm through Maglor’s. “It won’t hurt to take an afternoon’s break from your songwriting. Elrond wrote to me, you know, to keep an eye on you. He said you’ve been indulging in some old bad habits.”

“Elrond doesn’t need to be worrying about me when he’s with Gil-galad.”

“If it makes you feel better, it was a post-script, and he did not make any other mention of you in the entire letter.”

“It does, in fact,” Maglor said, and Celebrían laughed.

Maglor had not seen very much of Avallónë when he had last been there. He’d wandered through some of it with Daeron, but neither of them had really known where they were going or what they would see. Celebrían knew it much better, and was an excellent guide. Eventually they came to the square that, rather than a fountain, sported an enormous sculpture of all the greatest heroes of the Edain gathered together, with Elros at the forefront, crowned and kingly. Maglor had seen it before, but even prepared he found himself staring up at it again, trying to find a hint of the Elros that he had known in this depiction of Tar-Minyatar.

“Elrond isn’t very fond of that statue,” Celebrían said, also peering up at it. “My uncle carved it, though, and all who knew him swear that it is true to life.”

“I believe it,” Maglor said. “Does Elrond dislike that he is so stern and unsmiling?” All the statues were, stern or grave, chins raised proudly. That was just how such monuments were so often carved, however unlike the living person such an expression might be.

“Maybe,” Celebrían said. “I’ve never asked him. We speak of Elros sometimes, but I know it pains him.” She leaned against Maglor a little. “The same way he used to answer questions about you willingly enough, but wasn’t always able to hide how it hurt.” She turned her gaze toward the statue again. “There is some talk lately of making a sculpture of the Fellowship to join this one. I think Gimli may have been approached about it, though I do not know if his talents lie in stone craft.”

“It would be a worthy addition,” Maglor said.

“Yes, I think so too.” Celebrían turned them around, and nodded toward the tower that Maglor had taken notice of on his first visit to that square. It was very tall, but also very plain, and the door stood ajar, though now as then no one seemed to be coming or going. “Do you know what that is?”

“No.”

“That is where the palantír is kept—the biggest and most powerful one that your mother brought to Eressëa after the War of Wrath, when Avallónë was settled and filling with exiles and others homesick for the eastern lands.”

“Have you ever looked into it?” Maglor asked.

“Once or twice, long ago,” said Celebrían. “I don’t like the palantíri, though—they give me a headache. So did my mother’s mirror—and that was worse because I never saw anything useful in it anyway. And it was…bittersweet, to look into the palantír. I preferred the letters Elrond and my children sent me. But if you, perhaps, wished for a closer look at some of the things you are writing of…?”

Maglor hadn’t thought of that. He should have—it had been his idea to give Fëanor a palantír. “Maybe,” he said, looking up toward the top of the tower. “To look all the way back to Cuiviénen, or the Journey…”

“It would take some effort, I think—but then I am just not suited to using such instruments.”

“I don’t think I am, either. I always hated trying to use the palantíri when I was younger. But maybe I’ll try…just to see what I can see.”

On the way back home they came upon Idril and Tuor. Celebrían greeted them with delight, and then took Tuor’s arm to walk ahead, leaving Maglor to offer Idril his own arm. “It’s good to see you, Cousin,” he said. He hadn’t seen her since long before Turgon had taken all his people and vanished into Gondolin, but remembered most clearly the small golden-haired child she had been before the Darkening. Now she was of course a woman long-grown, as tall as Maglor was, still golden-haired and with the same sort of steadiness that Elrond had inherited.

“Are you here to ask me questions about what I remember of Finwë?” Idril asked, smiling at him. “Finrod told me all about it.”

“Only if you have anything to tell me,” Maglor said.

“I’m afraid I don’t. I remember him, of course, very fondly—but not in any detail that would be helpful to you. Just a child’s hazy recollections. I’m looking forward to hearing your song, actually, so that I can learn more about him myself.”

“Is there anything you want to ask me?” Maglor asked.

“Beyond the very broad, what was he like? No, not really.”

“He was warm,” Maglor said after a moment’s thought. “He was kind—he loved freely and fiercely. I think he also grieved deeply, though he was careful not to let any of us see.”

“You might be speaking of anyone in our family,” said Idril.

“He lives on in all of us,” Maglor agreed. It was a concept he had never thought of before encountering Men, who traced their lost loved ones in the same way he was tracing Finwë, keeping their memory alive in the pieces they could see in children’s faces and in the memories that were kept and shared and passed down. “In all our strengths and all our flaws.”

Idril laughed softly. “I’m glad to hear you say so. Few songs want to linger on anyone’s flaws.”

“I’m trying to render a portrait as close to life as I can, allowing for the limitations of language—and maybe a little poetic license here and there,” Maglor said, and Idril laughed again. “Have you spoken to your father lately?”

“No. He comes seldom to Eressëa, and we go even more seldom to the mainland. It’s…it’s a hard thing to not be listened to, especially when you know you’re right—when you have a Vala’s own words supporting you. My father, I think, has never really stopped seeing me as a child who nearly perished on the ice. I love my father—and my mother—but I will no longer bite my tongue when we disagree and I’m not sure he knows what to do with that.” Idril glanced at Maglor sidelong. “Are you going to tell me now that I should be doing more to reconcile with him?”

“Certainly not,” said Maglor. “I’ve already had my own aunt try to do that to me—whatever lies between you and your father is yours to fix or leave alone or make worse, whatever anyone else says. I only wondered, because I saw him recently too.”

Idril’s eyes widened a little in surprise, and then she smiled. “Thank you for that,” she said, “though I don’t want to make it worse. What is between you and your own father that Findis or Lalwen thinks needs interfering with?”

“Just—estrangement. Few of us have wanted to see or speak to him since he returned.”

“He came back at the same time you did, did he not? I did not manage to see you then, but I heard from Finrod how fragile you seemed. I have very few memories of Fëanor, but he is certainly not someone I would imagine going to for any sort of comfort.” Idril paused. “Maybe that’s unfair. I only remember him really after the Darkening. He cannot always have been as he was then.”

“He wasn’t—that’s what makes it so hard.”

“Well,” Idril said as Celebrían’s house came into view around the next turn in the road, “perhaps both of us will find a way to bridge the gap between us and our fathers—though I would rather my own start the construction himself.”

“There’s time,” Maglor said. “Whichever way it goes.”

“Yes,” Idril said, though she frowned. “There is time—hard as it seems to really believe even still, for those of us who are all too used to time eventually running out.”

They came to the house and found Daeron sitting out on the veranda with all three of his siblings. He had Maglor’s harp on his lap, his fingers gliding smoothly over the strings as he played. He wasn’t performing, just filling the silence under their conversation with soft music. He was smiling already, but when he looked up to see Maglor and Idril approaching it brightened. Maglor saw his siblings take notice, and only paused behind Daeron’s seat for a moment to kiss him hello before following Idril inside.

She went to find Celebrían and Tuor, and Maglor gathered his songwriting notes and sat down in the open and airy parlor that opened onto the veranda, where the quiet murmur of voices and the soft notes of the harp could just reach him, hovering in the background as he turned his thoughts to rhyme and meter and metaphor. Across the room a few other members of the household were seated with their own work, and the kitchen was close enough that he could smell baking bread and hear the cooks singing and laughing together.

After a little while someone approached Maglor’s table. “Care for company?” It was Eleryn, who had served as one of Galadriel’s handmaidens in Middle-earth, and who had cared for Maglor in the immediate aftermath of his rescue from Dol Guldur. She had a small basket on her hip with what looked like clothes that needed mending.

“Of course.” Maglor moved his papers around to give her room, and she settled herself across from him. “How are you, Eleryn?” They had spoken several times since he’d come to Eressëa, but never for long with both of them being occupied by other things and people.

“Very well, thank you. I’m very glad to see you doing so well—and making music again.”

“I’m glad to be making music,” Maglor said. When Eleryn had known him in Lothlórien he had been silenced in more ways than one, and unable to bring himself even to touch the harp that she’d found for him.

They chatted about Avallónë and Tirion, and the differences between Lothlórien far away and its namesake in Valinor. Eleryn brought out a small bowl from the bottom of her basket after a little while, filled with buttons. It was clumsily made, painted bright green with yellow flowers, and Maglor found himself staring at it in astonishment. He’d made that bowl in Lothlórien after some potters had waylaid him while he wandered the paths and avenues under the trees—it was the first thing he had made with his hands in years. “You kept it?” he said.

“This bowl? Of course.” Eleryn smiled at him as she set it on the table, and picked through the buttons for the one she wanted. “Why are you looking at it like you’re afraid it will bite you?”

“I just—it isn’t very good.”

“It holds buttons very well. As far as bowls go it’s perfectly serviceable, and I like that it’s a little uneven. It gives it character.”

Maglor shook his head, though he couldn’t help but smile. He had made the bowl, clumsily building it out of rolled coils of clay, because the potters of Lothlórien had insisted that making something with his hands would help. They had been right—more right than they could have guessed, really. He hadn’t painted or fired it afterward; it had just appeared again in his bedroom a few days later. He’d given it to Eleryn before leaving for Rivendell because she had been so kind and he hadn’t known how else to thank her, having neither the voice nor the words. It was lopsided and lumpy, more than just a little uneven—but he found himself glad to see it, this simple thing he’d made at his weakest and most hopeless that still, remarkably, brought someone else joy.

As he wrote and Eleryn sewed, Daeron’s voice floated through the window, mingling with his sisters’ and his brother’s. Maglor heard his name, but didn’t pay much attention until he heard it again, and heard Daeron’s voice take on a sharper tone. Eleryn noticed too, and glanced at Maglor with a frown. He shook his head. “I’m afraid Daeron’s family doesn’t quite approve of me,” he said softly.

“As far as I have seen, they barely know you.”

“It doesn’t bother me on my own account, but…well.” He tilted his head toward the window, where Daeron said something else before the harp music suddenly ceased. Daeron did not come inside, but Maglor remained where he was. Daeron would find him when he wished for his company. “I can’t blame them, but it’s not going to help them come to know Daeron any better.”

“Family is always complicated,” Eleryn said.

“Have you reunited with your own?” Eleryn’s parents had been among Curufin’s followers, who had then stayed in Nargothrond with Celebrimbor. Maglor couldn’t remember if Eleryn had ever told him what became of them afterward, but they had not followed her to Lothlórien when she entered Galadriel’s service.

“Oh yes. We’re all quite happy here on Eressëa, now.”

The door opened, and one of Daeron’s sisters came in, looking frustrated. She hid the look away when she saw Maglor. Eleryn immediately gathered up her things and excused herself, though she winked at Maglor and did not go far, just across the room and out of earshot. Daeron’s sister sat down, glancing after Eleryn. “Who is…?”

“An old friend from Middle-earth,” Maglor said. “What can I do for you…” He couldn’t remember which of Daeron’s sisters this was.

“Netyalossë,” she said, turning back to him. She wore her dark hair in neat braids twined around her head like a crown, woven with pale green ribbons, and had pearls at her throat and in her ears, giving her the appearance of being adorned in sea foam.

“Netyalossë, I beg your pardon.” Maglor set his pen down, and watched her glance over his papers.

“My brother is very fond of you,” she said after a moment.

“I’m very fond of him,” Maglor said, wondering if she was going to work up to asking him what his intentions toward Daeron were. It was a little late for that, and he was sure Daeron would not appreciate it any more than Maglor himself had appreciated Celegorm’s attempts years ago. At least Celegorm had had somewhat better timing—and knew Maglor, even then, far better than Netyalossë knew Daeron.

“You had a reputation once for breaking hearts,” Netyalossë remarked next.

Whatever he’d expected, it wasn’t that. Maglor stared at her. “…I’m sorry, I had a reputation for what?”

“We heard all about it from Simpalírë when he returned from Valmar, long ago—he and his friends. They laughed about it then, but it does not seem quite so funny now.”

“Then someone was making up stories,” Maglor said, “or you misunderstood whatever it was that Simpalírë told you.” He’d gone to Valmar to learn, and not much else. Whatever Simpalírë had heard, he’d taken no lovers, had only very rarely indulged in a bit of flirting at a party when he’d had a little too much wine—but nothing more than that. He’d been teased for it sometimes—for never wanting to have fun—though never in a mean-spirited away. Those he spent all his time with in Valmar had been primarily Elemmírë’s other students, all of them dedicated to their craft and their studies, even if no one else had that particular Fëanorian tendency to get completely absorbed in such things, and he’d counted nearly all of them as his friends in one way or another. He could not imagine any of them spreading such rumors.

Even later, when he had returned to Tirion, neither he nor anyone who had occasionally shared his bed had expected more than a bit of fun. He had enjoyed flirting and laughing and teasing, and had shared many more drunken kisses behind pillars or in shadowy alcoves than he’d ever had partners in bed, but Maglor had never gone looking for love, and he certainly had never tried to lead anyone on just to leave them jilted and brokenhearted, as Netyalossë seemed to be suggesting. If anyone—in Valmar or in Tirion—had harbored stronger feelings, they had chosen to remain silent, and he had never known.

“You have a reputation for other far worse things now too,” Netyalossë said. “Will you tell me all of that is made-up rumor?”

“No,” Maglor said, “of course not. But do you think Daeron is ignorant of it?”

“I do not know what to make of my brother,” Netyalossë said. “He makes light of everything and laughs at things that should be serious, and then he takes up his instruments to play the most beautiful music that is yet so filled with heartache that it almost hurts to listen—but only when he believes we are no longer close enough to hear.”

“He is your brother,” Maglor said after a moment, “but he is also a stranger to you, as you are to him. Why does it surprise you that he is slow to open his heart or share his thoughts?”

“Slow to open his heart to us, his family, but very quick to not only open it but hand it over entirely to a kinslayer, it seems.”

Maglor couldn’t help but laugh. He shook his head as he rearranged his papers, just to be moving his hands. “Quick? No—it was six thousand years and more between our first meeting beside the Pools of Ivrin and our reuniting at the Havens of Mithlond, and with a great deal of anger and grief in between. There was nothing quick about it. If you’ve come to warn me away from your brother, I’m afraid you’re several decades too late. If you want reassurances—well, I can make you all the promises you want, but it doesn’t seem to me that you will believe any of them. I love Daeron, and I wake up every morning to marvel at how he loves me. I don’t know what else I can say.” What other words he could think of were still too poor to really capture what was in his heart, but they were also for Daeron’s ears alone, to be whispered in moments of quiet far from other ears, rather than spoken aloud to anyone—especially an almost-stranger like Netyalossë.

“There is nothing else you need to say,” Daeron said. Maglor had not noticed him come in. He came to stand behind Maglor’s chair, hands on his shoulders as he frowned at Netyalossë. “You are putting yourself forward, aren’t you, little sister?” he asked, with the slightest emphasis on the word little.

“You speak often of the long years you spent far away from your own people,” Netyalossë said, entirely unapologetic.

“That does not make me ignorant,” said Daeron. “Even if I did come to these lands somehow unaware of all that had happened after I left Doriath, do you not think I would have learned it all by now? I did not step off the ship yesterday.”

“No, but I do not think the Sons of Fëanáro tell the same tales that the rest of the Eldar do.”

“No, they don’t,” Daeron agreed, voice tight, “but not in the way you suggest. I think Vinyelírë and Simpalírë are waiting for you outside.”

Maglor covered one of Daeron’s hands with his own as Netyalossë rose, recognizing a dismissal when she heard it. The look she gave Maglor was thoughtful and very carefully neutral. The glance she gave Daeron was more troubled.

Once she was gone Daeron sighed and leaned forward to wrap his arms around Maglor. “Siblings are exhausting,” he said into Maglor’s hair.

“I hope you aren’t just discovering this, after spending so many years with mine,” Maglor said.

“I think I like your brothers better than my sisters.”

“It’s early days yet, love. And Netyalossë held out longer than Celegorm did when it comes to asking pointed questions.”

“She’s also many years too late—and if anyone has the right to ask questions or make threats on my behalf, it’s Mablung.”

“He did give me a few warning looks at the Mereth Aderthad, now that I think of it,” Maglor said. “Come here.” He pushed his seat back and tugged Daeron around to sit on his lap instead of leaning over him. “Aside from that, how is it all going?”

“Well enough, I suppose. At least I can talk about music with Simpalírë.” Daeron leaned his head on Maglor’s shoulder. “How goes your songwriting?”

“Very well. I just need to speak to Thingol, and probably Olwë and Ingwë too—before I can finish the verses of my grandfather’s youth.”

“Are you ready to go to Taur-en-Gellam, then?”

“You’re the one that keeps telling me not to rush,” Maglor said.

“Yes, but I would not object to an excuse to leave. They can come visit me if they like, and at least the advantage of familiar surroundings will be mine, there.”

“All right.” Maglor kissed his temple. “We can leave tomorrow or the next day, perhaps, and stop for a while at my mother’s house before going on to Taur-en-Gellam. Most of my brothers will be there, and you can complain about your siblings to mine while I pay my grandparents a long-overdue visit.”

Daeron hummed as he thought about it. “That sounds wonderful, actually. Better make it the day after tomorrow. Much as I would like to slip away without a word, I should say proper farewells to my family, and extend an invitation to them to come visit me in Taur-en-Gellam.” He lifted his head and kissed Maglor. “I’ll tell my aunt and uncle.”

“I’ll write a note to my mother, and tell Celebrían.”

“Out of curiosity, where do you think those rumors of you breaking hearts came from?” Daeron asked.

“I have no idea, truly—at least the ones from Valmar. All I can think of is that someone was being sarcastic and someone else misunderstood. From later in Tirion I can understand it better; I liked to flirt and have fun and I wasn't shy about it.”

“So you’ve left no trail of lovers scorned behind you, from Valmar to Tirion?” Daeron asked, sounding amused at the thought.

“I certainly hope not,” said Maglor. “I’ve had my share of lovers, but fewer than it seems rumor would have it, and I never sought to fall in love or to make anyone fall in love with me. I suppose I always assumed it would just happen on its own, when it was meant to.”

“And so it did,” Daeron said.

The next day brought Daeron’s entire family to Avallónë, to spend the whole day visiting before they said farewell. Maglor spent the morning making pleasant conversation with Lacheryn and ignoring the assessing glances thrown his way by Daeron’s sisters; Daeron’s parents had apparently decided to ignore him for the time being, and Maglor couldn’t really say that he minded. After lunch, he slipped away and went back to the tower that held the palantír. It was worth at least one look, he thought as he stepped through the door. It was dimly lit inside, though lamps flared to life along the wall as he began the climb up the winding staircase. At the top of the tower waited the palantír, as tall as Maglor’s chest, covered in an enormous silken sheet. Maglor tugged it off and walked around the orb as the cloth settled on the floor. He had a vague idea of how to use it, though he’d never attempted to look into one as powerful or far-seeing as this one—the pinnacle of Fëanor’s experimentation with the seeing stones. If he had ever found a way to increase their power and scope without proportionately increasing their size, Maglor had never heard.

He sighed, and stepped around the stone again so that he faced east. This top room of the tower was open to the breezes and the sunshine. He could see it glittering off of Belegaer beyond the Bay, where the waters were not quite as blue and had a wilder look, choppy with foam-tipped waves. Few ships ventured out there, and none very far. Maglor dropped his gaze from the distant waters and reached out to brush his fingers over the surface of the stone, smooth and cool and dark. It did not warm under his touch, and as he looked at it small bursts of color bloomed under his fingertips before fading away. The longer he looked the less he saw around him, the farther his gaze was pulled into the stone, into shadows and swirling bits of colored light like Gandalf’s fireworks bursting all around him.

Then the lights gathered together, combining into proper colors and shapes, swiftly clarifying even before he could put his thoughts in order, before he could think of what it was he wanted to see. Maglor could not quite remember if the other smaller stones were so strong, but it felt almost as though he stood in the midst of what this one showed him, except that all his senses but sight were muted. When it all stopped shifting Maglor found himself standing on a beach, sand and stones mixing together. Grassy dunes stood behind him and the Sea stretched out before him, wild and gray under a pale overcast sky. As he stood and stared a flock of birds passed by overhead. In the far distance a whale surfaced, visible only for a moment by the plume of spray it exhaled before sinking back under the waves.

He knew this place—this exact place. If he were truly there he could walk northwest and after some days see the southern end of the Ered Luin in the distance. To go south and east would bring him to the mouths of the Brandywine. This was his favorite strand of shore, a place he’d always come back to no matter how far away his feet carried him. It was desolate and lonely, empty of every living thing but for him and the birds. Most of the driftwood he’d gathered to make into his harps or just to pack away into a trunk to take to Valinor with him had come from this place.

Maglor closed his eyes and withdrew. When he opened them again he found himself back in the tower in Avallónë, the sun shining in a cloudless sky outside, gulls crying to one another in the harbor just below. He took a deep breath and wiped his face, feeling faintly ridiculous. How foolish to be brought to tears merely by the sight of an empty beach—even if it was one he still yearned for sometimes, the closest thing to something his heart could call home for such a long time.

After a moment he reached out again, prepared this time. He turned his thoughts to the long ago and faraway past, to Cuiviénen under the stars and to his grandfather. The star bursts spun around him and took longer this time to coalesce. When they did it was dark but for the bright spill of stars overhead, and the flickering firelight of an enormous bonfire around which many Elves were gathered, laughing and talking soundlessly, sharing food. Some played drums or pipes made of reeds. Maglor searched the faces, looking for Finwë, but did not see him. Instead he spotted someone who looked familiar, and yet was entirely a stranger. He was tall as Maedhros, with the same sturdy build that Celegorm and Fingon shared. His features were like Finwë’s, but the shape of his jaw brought to mind Angrod instead. There was a light in his eyes, the fire of his spirit burning brighter even than the bonfire—just like Fëanor’s. As Maglor watched him he turned and smiled—a bright, blinding smile that none of Maglor’s generation had inherited, but which Celebrimbor had—and knelt to hold out his arms. A child ran into them, and when Maglor glimpsed that child’s face he knew—somehow, perhaps it was the stone that gave him the certainty—that that child was his grandfather Finwë. Finwë laughed as he was tossed into the air, and then caught by the tall figure—either his father or his grandfather, surely. An older child joined them, and Maglor thought he must be one of Finwë’s brothers. They were all smiling and so happy. Maglor turned away, looking at all the other faces, and saw no trace of fear or sorrow. This was before all of that, when the Elves had been young and wild, free and fearless under the stars. Maglor looked up; the stars were not the stars he knew, or had seen anywhere in his long wanderings. He traced the unfamiliar constellations, committing the sight to memory, and then looked around again, seeing Finwë now being chased by his brother—brothers, for now there were three older boys—through the crowd as part of some sort of game.

Maglor withdrew, blinking in the bright sunlight once he returned to himself. His head ached, and he thought that he would not be doing that again any time soon. He did not regret it, and maybe before his song was done he would return here, to look for other things, to perhaps fill in some gaps between the stories others told him. For now, though, it was a relief to draw the silk sheet over the stone.

He found Elladan and Elrohir waiting for him at the bottom of the stairs. “Headache?” Elladan asked.

“Ugh, yes. I’m reminded why I hate using those things.” Maglor accepted the flask that Elrohir handed him. It held miruvor, and he sipped it gratefully. “Do either of you use it at all?”

“Sometimes,” Elladan said, “when we want to see how it goes in Gondor or Arnor. It’s hard, though—enough years have passed that there are new faces, new children, and there is no way to learn their names or anything about them.”

“I hope there is at least one little Elrond running around,” Maglor said. The twins both laughed. Maglor had mentioned the possibility once to Elrond himself, who had seemed faintly alarmed at the idea.

“There might be a little Maglor or Macalaurë, too,” Elrohir said.

Maglor understood, suddenly, Elrond’s feelings. He was aware of several stewards and kings with names like Turgon or Eärendil, but the idea of a little Prince Macalaurë roaming about the White Tower in Gondor seemed absurd to the point of impossibility. He did not feel at all like someone worthy of being a namesake.

Elladan laughed at whatever Maglor’s face was doing. “I always go ask for news when a new ship comes in, if I am here,” he said. “I’ll be sure to let you know how many of our great-nephews are named for you or our father if someone coming west happens to know.”

“Please do,” Maglor laughed as they left the tower. “And don’t forget to tell me how many are named for the two of you.”

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For reasons he could not begin to imagine, Maedhros woke suddenly in the early hours out of dark dreams to pain—not the burning of his left hand, but the memory of a very different kind of pain. His entire right shoulder and arm ached horribly, in fact, and he lay in bed with his eyes closed for a long time, breathing through it and trying to remind himself that he was at home, in Valinor, in a body that had never actually known the torments of Angband or the agonies of the cliff side. That did not stop his muscles from cramping, or his bones from aching at the site of ancient breaks, or his skin from feeling tender and fragile at the memory of rough stones and sharp iron chains and shackles.

As his room brightened with the morning, the rest of the house began to stir. Maedhros was not usually a late sleeper, but he couldn’t make himself get up. He wanted to go back to sleep, or at least to pull the blankets up over his head to shut out the rest of the world for a little while. If he didn’t get up for breakfast, someone would come looking for him, though, and in spite of his promise to Celegorm to tell him if something was really amiss, he didn’t think he could make himself explain. Not this.

Maglor had spoken a few times in Lórien of other people’s concern making him feel as breakable as they seemed to think him. Maedhros had sympathized, then, but hadn’t experienced exactly the same feeling himself—he’d been too caught up inside his own head to notice, for a very long time, just how much that troubled those around him. He could easily imagine now, though, how much worse he would feel when Celegorm came in to frown at him, or the way Caranthir and Nerdanel would sneak sidelong looks over the breakfast table. Or the way Aredhel would not understand—or worst of all, the way Maeglin probably would.

He muttered a curse and rolled over to bury his face in his pillow. The phantom pains were gone, but he found himself moving stiffly and carefully, like one wrong move would send his muscles seizing up again. To try to break out of that, he rolled his right shoulder and flung his arm out across the bed with more force than he would have otherwise, just to prove to himself that it really didn’t hurt. He turned his head to stare at the wall, trying to remember all the things Estë had taught him about coming back into his own body after such a night, grounding himself in the present time so his mind did not slip back into the past against his will.

After a little while Aechen woke up; Maedhros could hear him scuffling around near the door. He sighed and heaved himself out of bed. “Sorry, Aechen,” he murmured as he opened the door. He shut it again, knowing Aechen could navigate the stairs perfectly well on his own, and retreated back to bed. Just as he pulled the blankets up over his head, though, someone knocked on the door. He didn’t answer, wondering if he could get away with pretending to be asleep.

Caranthir didn’t wait, anyway. “Nelyo?” Maedhros felt the mattress dip, and Caranthir’s hand come to rest on his back. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” Maedhros said into his pillow.

“Liar. Bad night?”

“Mm.”

“Does your hand hurt?”

Maedhros sighed, and turned his head. “No. It wasn’t that kind of bad.” He couldn’t quite see Caranthir’s face, but the weight of his hand on Maedhros’ back remained unmoving. “I’m just tired.”

He need not have worried about Caranthir; he had never been one to want to speak of his own troubles, and so rarely pushed for Maedhros to do so. Instead he just asked, “Do you want breakfast?”

“No.”

“All right. Go back to sleep, Nelyo. I’ll make sure no one bothers you.” Caranthir kissed the back of Maedhros’ head and rose.

“Thanks,” Maedhros whispered.

Once he was alone again Maedhros rolled onto his back to stare out of the window. A few white puffy clouds drifted across the sky. He could hear the distant ringing of a hammer in one of his grandfather’s forges—and that made him think of fire and heat and metal, and that made his heart start to race, so he sat up to close the window and shut out the noise. Then he curled up under the blankets and closed his eyes, trying to think of nothing at all. It mostly worked, and he dozed, half-hearing the bustle and commotion of breakfast downstairs, muffled voices and the clatter of dishes. The memory of aching muscles and the pull of his own weight slowly retreated in the warm dark under his blankets, but sleep would not quite return. He kept flinching awake.

Getting up, he knew, would help. Moving his body and doing something that required his mind’s focus would do more to bring him back into the present than just lying in bed, but he’d gotten up once and now he couldn’t make himself do it again.

He didn’t know how much time passed before he heard footsteps outside his bedroom, and then a soft knock just before the door opened. “Maedhros?”

“Maglor…?” Maedhros pushed the blanket down as Maglor came into the room. As he shut the door Pídhres jumped up onto the bed to butt her head into Maedhros’ face. “Didn’t expect you today,” he said as he scratched her behind the ears until she moved to curl up against his chest, purring softly.

“We left Eressëa with the early tide.” Maglor came to kneel beside the bed, so his face was level with Maedhros’. “Caranthir said you had a bad night.”

“Haven’t dreamed of the cliff in a long time,” Maedhros whispered.

“Ah.” Maglor brushed the hair out of Maedhros’ face. “I can sing the dreams away if you want.”

It wasn’t anything he hadn’t done countless times before, but somehow it made Maedhros, absurdly, want to cry. “Please?”

“Of course. Just close your eyes.” Maglor kissed Maedhros forehead, and kept stroking his hair as he began to sing, a very quiet song with a soft melody that wrapped around Maedhros like another blanket. It was a familiar song, and Maedhros let his eyes fall shut, this time confident that nothing but rest awaited him.

The next thing he knew he was waking to moonlight on his face, and the only stiffness in his body the kind that came from sleeping deeply for many hours without moving. With a yawn he stretched his limbs—all phantom pains long gone—and sat up. Aechen was in his basket, curled up beside Pídhres. Maedhros dressed and slipped out of his room and downstairs, leaving his door ajar so the animals could find their way out come morning. The house was quiet, everyone else in bed, and he found the kitchen empty and dark. He lit a lamp and stirred up the hearth to heat water, feeling more thirsty than hungry. As he rummaged through the tea cupboard he heard someone on the stairs, and glanced over to find Daeron, yawning and in the midst of twisting his hair into a braid over his shoulder.

“I didn’t wake you, did I?” Maedhros asked.

Daeron blinked, apparently startled to find someone else awake. “No,” he said, and smiled a little crookedly. “That would require me to have been asleep. Are you feeling any better?”

“Much. Tea?”

“Thank you.” Daeron went to fetch the cups as Maedhros finally found the peppermint, blended with half a dozen other things, that was his favorite of Caranthir’s experiments, which had been shoved into the very back of the cupboard for some reason.

As he waited for the water to boil, Maedhros leaned against the counter, arms crossed. “How was Alqualondë?” he asked finally, after failing to think of anything else to talk about.

“Exhausting. No one bothered to warn me that I have three younger siblings—two sisters and a brother. I have the dubious distinction now of being the eldest and the newest addition to the family, and that means they all want to forget the first part and treat me like the baby.”

Maedhros wrinkled his nose. “That sounds awful.”

Daeron laughed—the sort of laugh that came out when it was either that or succumb to frustration. “It is. And I can’t even ask anyone for advice about it because I don’t know anyone else in this particular position.”

“I do have plenty of advice for dealing with younger brothers,” Maedhros agreed, “but it does all rely on having known them all their lives. What of your parents?”

“They’re just as bad—they last saw me as a baby, and that is how I have lived in their minds and hearts all these years. I can’t blame them for it, of course, but it’s…hard. Especially when I have no real memory of them at all.” Daeron ran his finger around the rim of one of the mugs—the one Maedhros had broken, after they’d returned from Ekkaia, and that Maglor had mended. The copper painted over the cracks glinted in the firelight. “None of them are fond of your family, either.”

“Were they—” Maedhros couldn’t make his tongue work to finish the sentence.

“No. No, none of my family were present at the quays then. My sister is married to a sailor, but none of the rest of my family have anything to do with ships or shipbuilding, except that my father is one of those who tend the forests from which the Teleri harvest their timber.”

“Good,” Maedhros murmured, breathing a sigh. At least there was that.

“Don’t go apologizing for it. I don’t need it.”

“Have it anyway,” Maedhros said. “I am sorry—for all of it, and also for lying and keeping secrets.”

Daeron smiled at him. “Thank you. You know that I forgave it all long ago.”

The kettle sang, and Maedhros poured the water over the tea while Daeron brought out a jar of honey, and they moved to sit at the table. While it steeped, Daeron leaned his elbows on the table, regarding Maedhros with dark, thoughtful eyes. “Last time we spoke of my parents,” he said, “I had asked about yours.”

“I remember.”

“Has anything changed since?”

Maedhros shook his head. “I don’t know. I think I was wrong before—when I said he had been restored to what he once was. That isn’t what Mandos does. I was just…unable to see clearly then.”

“Have you spoken since?”

“Briefly.”

They sat in silence for a little while. It wasn’t uncomfortable; Maedhros still didn’t feel that he knew Daeron well, but he liked him and he trusted him, and Daeron would not worry at him the way his brothers would. When the tea was ready Daeron picked up the pot to pour it. “You were worried before that your father might make things difficult for me in Tirion,” Daeron remarked as he accepted the spoon to stir honey into his mug.

“Did he do something when you were there?” Maedhros hadn’t heard of anything, but that didn’t necessarily mean nothing had happened. Whatever lay between Daeron and Fëanor was not public knowledge; Maedhros wasn’t sure even his uncle knew of it.

“No. I did.”

“How worried should I be?” Maedhros asked, pausing with his mug halfway to his lips.

Daeron laughed quietly. “Not worried at all. I’m sorry—I’ll stop teasing. I just went to speak to him. Neither of us were at our best, really, when we had our confrontation years ago. I apologized, and he apologized, and we’ve made peace. I just haven’t found the right time to tell Maglor about it yet, since I’ve been so preoccupied with my own family, and he with his song.”

Maedhros set his mug down. “And just like that…?”

“Probably not,” Daeron said. “That depends on how things go with all of you moving forward, because if it comes down to it I will of course take your side. But Maglor wants it to go well, even if he isn’t yet ready to take the next step, and it will be easier for him at least if he knows that Fëanor and I are no longer at odds.”

“And he…apologized. To you.”

“Yes. He was very quick to do it, actually—to admit that he had been wrong. I thought that you should know that.”

“And you…” Maedhros dropped his gaze and took a sip of his tea before he went on. It was hot and sweet and soothing. “You believe him?”

“I do. Fëanor has a reputation for many things, not all of them good, but it seems to me his faults lie rather in being too truthful than the other way around. He does not say a thing if he does not mean it.” Maedhros flinched, and spilled tea over his hand. He cursed and set the mug down. Daeron rose to fetch a cloth to mop it up. “I’m sorry,” he said. “What did I say?”

“Nothing—it’s not you, it’s—nothing.”

But of course Daeron didn’t believe him, and of course he was too clever not to understand why his words had struck a chord. “I’m sorry,” he repeated, resting his free hand on Maedhros’ shoulder. “Whatever he said to you in the past—if he meant it at the time, I do not think he believes it now. One can be wrong without being a liar.”

“I know that he was wrong,” Maedhros said. “That isn’t—it’s that he did believe it when he said it. Please don’t apologize again. You didn’t—it’s not your fault. Any of it.”

“No, but I’m reopening wounds when I am trying to help you close them—and on the heels of a difficult day.”

Maedhros shook his head. “There’s no reopening a wound that never closed in the first place. I’m glad you spoke to my father, and that Maglor did. I just can’t—”

—worse than Nolofinwë—useless—treacherous—no son of mine—I should have left you to—

“I just can’t do it. Not yet.”

“Now I wonder if I went and apologized too soon,” Daeron said.

Maedhros thought it was supposed to be a joke, but he couldn’t find it in himself to laugh. “Please don’t pick another fight with him.”

“I won’t. Believe it or not, I never intended to pick the first one. I just wanted to meet him once, to see if all I had heard matched the reality, and would have been very happy to leave Tirion again without speaking a second time.”

“What was it he said that angered you?”

Daeron sat back down and picked up his tea. “He had concerns about someone from Doriath taking up with his son. All things considered, he wasn’t entirely wrong to worry, and I seem to have done such a good job at hiding how unhappy I was at the time that he saw me only as some sort of cheerful fool who took nothing seriously, either my craft of my friendships or even the worst things that had befallen my home and my people. Part of it too, I think, is that he was still very new-come from Mandos, and time seems to pass strangely there.”

“It does,” Maedhros murmured. “Many centuries had passed for you, but it would not have felt thus for him.”

“In his eyes I was little better than a stranger, and not someone who should be going around wearing any sort of token Maglor had given to me.” Daeron’s hand rose to the pendant he always wore, the pale wooden one inlaid with purple enamel in the shape of a many-petaled flower, that matched Maglor’s favorite hair clip. “In my eyes he was just—well, he was the subject of many of Maglor’s nightmares, and the architect of the Oath, and all that it wrought. I did not realize how deeply unhappy he was, too. We misunderstood one another in precisely the right ways for it all to go wrong, and so it did. And now I find myself in the very odd position of getting along better with Fëanor than my own closest kin. It would be funny if it weren’t also frustrating.”

“Is there anything we can do to help?” Maedhros asked.

“You just have, by letting me talk at you about it in the middle of the night even though I shouldn’t be burdening you—”

“I’d rather think about someone else’s problems than my own,” Maedhros said. “At least yours have a relatively simple solution.”

“Time, you mean? Maglor keeps saying so too.”

“You were there to support all of us when we were trying to come back together, and you didn’t have to be,” Maedhros said. “I hope you’ll let all of us return the favor, and not just Maglor.”

“I was mostly there to support Maglor, but thank you. It does help to have someone to talk to who is at least somewhat removed from it.”

“Yes, it does.”

Once the tea was gone Daeron retreated upstairs again, hopefully to find sleep. Maedhros had rested almost too well and was still wide awake, so he went out to his painting studio, lighting one of the crystal lamps with a touch, so he had enough soft light to see by. The moon was very bright too, casting silver squares over the drawing table and the floor through the window. He turned his attention to the portrait of Curufin, which he had finally finished and which…wasn’t as terrible as he’d thought it would be. He set it aside and sat down with his sketchbook to decide which of his brothers he would practice on next, focusing all of his attention on that, on the paper under his fingers and the smells of paint and paper and flowers that surrounded him, and the quiet nighttime sounds outside, grounding himself in the present and not permitting his thoughts to wander, because if he did they would just take him back to where he didn’t want to be.

It worked until the moon set and he glanced out of the window to see Gil-Estel hovering near the western horizon, bright and beautiful in the way only a Silmaril could be. He looked back down at his palm where the scars were almost invisible, and sighed.

As the sky brightened with the dawn and the birds began their morning’s song, the rest of the house started to wake up. Maedhros remained where he was, taking up his pencil to draw the Queen’s Lace that grew up outside his window, just peeking over the sill in all its pale and delicate beauty. He heard the door open and close a few times, and the door to his mother’s workshop. He heard her voice, and his cousin Isilmiel’s. When he glanced up he saw Huan trot out into the garden, nose down to sniff at some interesting scent, and he saw Aechen following until he disappeared into the tall grass and clover. Celegorm and Aredhel came outside; Celegorm glanced toward Maedhros and lifted a hand in a brief wave before they passed away out of the garden.

Maglor appeared next, and came to lean through the window. “Feeling better?” he asked.

“I am. Thank you.”

“Have you eaten breakfast yet?”

“No, not yet.”

“Come eat with me, then. Daeron is still asleep, and I think Caranthir and Lisgalen are too.”

Maedhros wasn’t going to deny Maglor anything, even if he still did not feel very hungry. He left his sketchbook and followed Maglor back to the house. Maedhros still wasn’t any good at cooking, and Maglor didn’t seem inclined to it that morning, so they found sweet rolls stuffed with currants that someone had made the day before, and a small basket of blueberries, and took them out to the river to sit by the water as they ate. “Do you want to talk about it?” Maglor asked after a while.

“Not really.” There wasn’t much to talk about—nothing had happened, the memories just decided to rear their heads, as they had not for a long time, and Maedhros was hopeful that it would be even longer before such a thing happened again. “I’d rather hear about you. How was speaking to Finarfin?”

“He’s very different. From all I’ve heard he was a good king, but I don’t think it suited him.”

“No, it was not a burden he ever wanted to pick up.”

“He told me that he and Findis fought over it, actually. And he was wounded during the War of Wrath and it still troubles him sometimes. It was…it went well. I am glad I spoke to him, and not just for the song. I’m glad to have seen and spoken to everyone, really. It’s only Aegnor that I haven’t, yet.”

“You spoke to Irissë of it?”

“Not yet about the song, no—but I’m very glad that she’s here. I haven’t yet seen Maeglin, though. Celegorm said he’s been hiding out in Grandfather’s forges.”

“Not hiding, exactly. I think he’s just…nervous about anyone showing up unexpectedly.” Maedhros brushed the crumbs from his roll off of his leg. “How did it really go in Tirion—speaking to Atar?”

“It was hard,” Maglor said after a few minutes. He turned the last bit of his own roll over in his fingers. “Speaking of Finwë was hard. He wanted to speak of his faults, which I did not expect. He isn’t the only one—Finarfin spoke a little of that too, and Turgon—but it felt like it was coming from somewhere different, in Atar.”

“Did you only speak of Finwë?” Maedhros asked.

“No. I tried to apologize for what I had said to him before, and he wouldn’t let me. He apologized instead.” Maglor leaned his head on Maedhros’ shoulder. “I think I was very wrong about what I thought happened in Mandos,” he said after a little while. “I had thought that he was returned to how he had been before it all went wrong. I thought all of you had been, too, and that’s why I didn’t want to see you at first. But of course that’s not how it works.”

“No, it’s not. But he is restored in part.”

“Healed, maybe. Restored isn’t the right word. Like we found healing in Lórien—maybe it’s not complete, and won’t ever be, because you can’t break a bowl and put it back together and expect the cracks to disappear again.”

“You just paint them gold instead,” Maedhros murmured.

“I don’t think Atar’s are ready for that. I think the glue is still trying to dry.” Maglor gazed out over the water. His expression was hard to read, his gaze far away—not unlike how he’d looked often when he’d first come back, after they’d met again by Ekkaia. It had been particularly bad in the days following the River Incident, but Maedhros was almost certain nothing nearly that frightening had happened lately—not unless he’d been doing a very good job of lying and pretending that his meeting with Fëanor had gone better than it really had. Maedhros didn’t think so, though. Maglor had once been very, very good at that sort of performance, but he had either lost that skill or abandoned it on purpose in the long years since Beleriand’s sinking. Finally, he said, “My hand hurt again when I saw him, but I don’t think it’s him anymore. The scars just hurt because—because the memories hurt, and Atar’s the ultimate source of them. He didn’t say anything wrong, or terrible…he said everything I had wished I could hear him say. I just…”

“Just what?” Maedhros asked softly. “What are you still afraid of, if it went so well?”

“I don’t think there’s anything that can rid me of—the darkest shadows that still cling to me are not ones that have their roots in Atar, even if they’ve taken on the shape of him. That’s not his fault.”

“It is in part,” Maedhros said. “He made himself into someone who could fit into whatever shadows still haunt you. But Maglor, I thought you left all that behind in Lórien.” Not everything had been left there, but Maedhros had thought that Maglor could at least put Dol Guldur behind him. Of course, he’d thought the same of himself and Thangorodrim, and that was clearly not true.

“I don’t think it can ever be fully left behind. I’m always going to have the scars. There are things I cannot yet let go of, even though I know they are lies. I don’t know how. That’s not his fault. I’m not even sure it’s mine.”

“It’s not your fault,” Maedhros said. He put his arm around Maglor, who drew his knees up so he could curl against Maedhros’ side.

“Did you see him in Tirion?” Maglor asked after a while.

“Briefly. I went to our old house, and saw him as I was leaving. I asked him what he was going to do after he tore it down.”

“What did he say?”

“That he is going to build something new. He doesn’t yet know what.”

“That’s what we’re all trying to do,” Maglor murmured. “Is that all?”

“He doesn’t remember Losgar. He said he doesn’t remember much of anything very clearly after the Darkening.”

“That doesn’t surprise me,” Maglor said, and that did surprise Maedhros. “He lost the most important person in his world. I don’t know how much time I lost after you died.”

“Cáno, I’m—”

“No, don’t. I just mean…it could have been weeks or months. Maybe it was years. I just don’t know. It just makes sense to me that Atar would have suffered something similar.”

“I don’t know if that makes me feel any better about Atar,” Maedhros said after a few moments. It made him feel much worse about Maglor, but they’d already talked about that so many times, though Maglor hadn’t spoken of losing time like that before. There wasn’t anything left to say, even if Maglor would let him apologize again.

“I know.”

“I suppose I know where to start when I do try to really speak to him, though. I know that I have to, I just…don’t know what I want out of it.”

“We all just want our father back,” Maglor said softly. “We’re never going to get the one we miss, but that might not be a bad thing. I can’t speak to him again until after I’ve finished my song and sung it before the Valar, but he knows that and…Amras said he understands.”

“Does he know you’re to sing before the Valar?”

“No. I hope he never finds out. Something broke in him when Finwë died, I think, and…I don’t want to see what happens if he starts to hope for his return only for the Valar to refuse again.”

Movement downstream caught Maedhros’ eye, and he turned his head to see Nerdanel walking toward them through the grass. Maglor lifted his head as she reached them. “Good morning, Ammë,” he said.

“Good morning, my loves.” Nerdanel nudged them apart and sat down between them, and both of them leaned against her shoulders when she put her arms around them. “Or is it a good morning? You seemed very serious just now.”

“We were talking about Atya,” Maglor said after a moment, his voice sounding very small and strangely young. “And the past.”

“Do you want to tell me about it?” Nerdanel asked, in that same gentle voice that had offered solace throughout their childhood and youth and which Maedhros hadn’t even known how much he had missed after they all left until he had come back to hear it again.

They did not tell her everything—not about the past and not about the things that still haunted each of them—but it was a relief to sit by the river and answer her gentle questions and to talk through some of the things that worried them both, and to hear the things she had to say in reply. There was much Nerdanel did not know and could not understand, but she knew them, better than anyone, and she listened, and passed no judgments and gave no advice unless they asked her for it.

After a while Maglor kissed Nerdanel and got to his feet. “I owe Grandmother and Grandfather a real visit,” he said. “I’ll see you all at dinner—tell Daeron where I am please, if you see him before I do.”

“Of course,” Nerdanel said. Maedhros had not lifted his own head from her shoulder, and she stroked his hair as they watched Maglor walk back toward the house. He still carried himself lighter than he had before he’d gone to Formenos, however unhappy the things they’d been speaking of that morning were. Maedhros would not have expected it to help, going back, but though Maglor hadn’t really said anything about what he’d seen or done there, it was as though he’d left behind some heavy burden.

“I missed you yesterday,” Nerdanel said after a little while. “Carnistir said you had a difficult night.”

“Just bad dreams,” Maedhros said. “I don’t remember them now. I wasn’t—I was just tired.”

“You sound tired now.”

“I suppose I am, a little.”

“What do you intend to do when your father comes back to Tirion?”

“I don’t know. How do you do it—speak to him, I mean, without…”

“Without it dissolving into a fight?” Nerdanel kissed the top of his head. “I believe he is genuine in his sorrow and his remorse, but that doesn’t erase what happened, because I know he means what he says now, and I also know he meant what he said then. We speak rarely, and not often in private, which makes it easier but also means we have not spoken of anything truly important in many years—which is, I think, the answer to your question. It cannot go on like this forever, but I am not yet ready for what comes next.”

There was something reassuring in that—in knowing that even Nerdanel could not quite let go of the past. “We should have gone with you when you left Tirion,” he said after a moment. “I’m sorry that we didn’t.”

“Oh, Maitimo. Thank you, but you don’t have to be. I understand why you didn’t. We were all caught up in lies and growing paranoia, and I think it might have gotten much worse much more quickly if any of you had left with me.”

“You still deserved our loyalty more than he did.”

“Not at that time. I think we both deserved your loyalty—but both of us together, and our parting put all of you in an impossible position, and for that I owe you an apology.” She sighed, and put both her arms around Maedhros, resting her cheek on his hair. “Findis likes to put all of the blame for the unrest on Melkor, but he did not steal our wills. None of us made good choices.”

“I’m not sure there were any good choices,” Maedhros said.

“I’m sure there were better ones than we made. But we can talk about what we should have done until the world ends, and it won’t change anything. All we can do is move forward and remember our mistakes so that we do not make them again. This, at least, your father understands.”

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Maglor found his grandmother harvesting tomatoes in her garden. “Macalaurë! I was starting to think you’d forgotten about us.” She shifted her basket on her hip to accept his kiss. “I’m so glad to see you—and not only because you can help me harvest all of these!”

“I didn’t forget. I’ve just been busier than I expected to be.” Maglor picked up another basket and started picking small tomatoes from the plant beside Ennalótë’s. He asked about the rest of her garden and about his aunts and his uncle, and she cheerfully filled him in on all the family news and gossip that he’d missed over the last few decades. Some of it he had heard already, most of it he had not. It was nice to put one side of his family out of his mind and to think about the other for a few hours. Once the tomatoes were all picked and delivered to his Aunt Vanilómë in the kitchen they moved on to pruning roses and picking flowers to refill the vases scattered throughout the house. As they did that he told Ennalótë about the song his grandmother had asked him to write. Mahtan and Ennalótë had been staunch supporters and followers of Finwë since the time of the Great Journey, and she had much to tell Maglor about that time.

They ended up sitting in the grass near Mahtan’s largest forge, inside of which Maglor could hear voices and the ringing of several hammers. “Does Grandfather have students?” he asked.

“Not officially,” Ennalótë said, “but he’s managed to befriend your young cousin Maeglin. I haven’t seen anyone so skittish since Tyelkormo came back from the Halls, though he hides it well.”

“I suppose it’s me he’s hiding from?” Maglor asked, still skeptical of Maedhros’ claim that Maeglin wasn’t hiding. He and Daeron had arrived earlier than initially planned; finding Aredhel there had been an enormous shock, though afterward he’d been less surprised to learn that her son had come back from Mandos with her—or rather, that she had lingered there until he was ready to leave. It did not surprise him either that Maeglin was not prepared for his return to be widely known, but he hadn’t even caught a glimpse of him yet.

“I think today you’ve just missed one another by coincidence,” Ennalótë said. “It’s his uncles that he wishes to avoid, rather than your side of the family. We’re also all quite different from what he was used to either in Gondolin or—was it called Nan Elmoth?”

“Yes.”

“Thank you, I keep getting all the different names there confused. Anyway, I think he finds the familiarity of forge work rather comforting—and your grandfather is a very undemanding teacher; Maeglin is not the first to have come here to relearn skills that his spirit remembers but his body no longer knows.”

That was everyone returned, now, Maglor thought, leaning back on his hands and tilting his head to watch the clouds drift by overhead. It would not be very long before word got out that Aegnor too had returned—beyond almost all hope. Of their family that left only Finwë himself lingering in the Halls. Again.

Sometime in the afternoon Aredhel came wandering through the shrubbery, idly twirling her hair around a finger as she glanced around. “There you are,” she said when she saw Maglor.

“Were you looking for me, Irissë?” he asked.

“I was. Can I borrow him for a little while?” Aredhel asked Ennalótë.

“For a while,” Ennalótë agreed, laughing. “I want you both back before dinnertime! And will you bring your harp tonight, Macalaurë?”

“Yes, of course.” Maglor kissed her cheek before getting to his feet. “I’ll play whatever you want.”

Aredhel slipped her arm through his and pulled him away through the garden to the orchard. “Tyelko told me about your song,” she said, “and that you’d probably want to talk to me about Grandfather.”

“Only if you want to,” said Maglor. “I know you must have other things to be thinking about.”

“No, I want to help—it wouldn’t be very fair if I didn’t, since you’ve talked to everyone else.” Aredhel flashed a grin. “You know I hate being left out of all the fun.”

Maglor smiled back, but said, “I wouldn’t really call this fun. But I’ll gladly listen to whatever you have to say.”

“All right, but some of it is a secret, at least for now.”

“Well, now you have me terribly curious.”

“I can tell you of Finwë in Mandos,” Aredhel said after a moment, growing more serious. “I’m told these memories will begin to fade before too long, so I must tell you now while they remain fresh in my mind. He has told every one of us, when we leave, to give his love to all the rest of you.”

Maglor bit the inside of his cheek hard, blinking back sudden tears. It was difficult to keep his voice steady. “That’s—thank you for that.”

“I don’t think you’ve seen anyone else fresh enough out of Mandos to hear that, have you?”

“No, I haven’t.”

“I’m glad I could be the one to tell you, then. He is…I remember when I first came to Mandos he was one of the first to find me. I was so furious, then—so terribly angry at having died and at having died the way I did, without even a weapon of my own in my hand. It was Grandfather who calmed me down and comforted me when the rest of it finally sank in, though he was still in such pain himself.”

“Is he still hurting?” Maglor asked. “Is he still…?”

“I think he is as healed now as is possible in Mandos. It’s hard to explain if you haven’t been there yourself.”

“I think I know what you mean,” Maglor said.

“He always tried to be there for us if we needed comforting, even if he had to step away from something important for it, do you remember?” Aredhel said with a quiet sigh. “That has not changed. He gave that same love and comfort to Lómion, too—even when all the other spirits there shunned and avoided him. Not that they were not right to, I mean—”

“I understand,” Maglor said.

“I miss my brothers,” Aredhel said quietly, leaning her head on Maglor’s arm as they continued to stroll through the trees, “but I dread seeing Turukáno again. He spoke to no one in the Halls, except perhaps Elenwë—and Finwë, of course. I did not go near him; I did not know what to say, or to do.”

“It was not your fault, what happened to Gondolin,” Maglor said.

“No, it was my son’s.”

“I think Turgon would argue that he also bears much of the blame,” Maglor said, remembering the look on Turgon’s face as he spoke of his own failures. “And…Finrod would welcome Maeglin. We spoke of him a little earlier this summer after Gil-galad returned from the Halls. You might be surprised by who is willing to forgive and to move forward—to start over, and build something new.”

“Maybe,” Aredhel said. “At least I’m not surprised to hear of Findaráto, though he must still be close in friendship with Turukáno. You and your brothers are not among them, though—those willing to start over. Tyelko’s told me all about what’s between you and your father.”

“It’s complicated,” Maglor said. “I did not mean to suggest it wouldn’t be for Maeglin, either. Complicated, though, doesn’t mean impossible.”

“True. For what it’s worth, I remember Fëanáro in the Halls too, and how he watched all of you. It’s hard to describe what it’s like…spirits don’t have eyes, so we did not see one another exactly, but it’s also impossible to hide what you’re feeling or sometimes even what you’re thinking of. I did not speak to him, but I could see that he was terribly grieved. Sometimes when I glimpsed him it was as though the fire of his spirit seemed on the verge of guttering out like a candle in the wind. I pitied him—and I never thought I would say that about your father, of all people.”

The image of his father’s spirit guttering like a dying candle made something hurt under Maglor’s ribs. “I’m not angry with him anymore,” Maglor said. “It’s just…hard. Until I am finished with this song our grandmothers want me to write, I don’t think I can speak to him again. I can’t speak for Tyelko or anyone else.”

“I never thought I would be in the position of defending Fëanáro,” Aredhel said wryly, “but—well. Death makes a lot of things horribly clear. Do you want to know anything else about Mandos?”

“No,” Maglor said, “but thank you. And if Lómion is at all worried, please tell him he has nothing to fear from either me or Daeron.”

“I have told him,” Aredhel said. “You won’t find him shy, only…cautious.”

“I understand. But what’s the secret you were going to share with me?”

“Of course—I nearly forgot! All along, Finwë has been urging us back toward life, when he could tell that we were ready, or nearing it. I was ready myself some time ago but I did not want Lómion to come back alone. But Finwë has been working on Aikanáro for a very long time, and though we did not see him when we lingered in Lórien, I know he came from the Halls not long after we did.”

“Oh,” Maglor said, and laughed a little. “I already knew that—or at least I knew that Aikanáro is back, not that it was Finwë who convinced him to come.”

“What!” Aredhel cried. “How? Who told you?”

“Finrod did. I was with him in Avallónë when he got the news from one of his other brothers. He nearly spilled wine all over my notes—but he also asked me to keep it a secret for now, so I haven’t told anyone else except Celebrían.”

“Oh, that’s not fair! I thought I was going to shock you! But I’m not sure you can use any of this in your song anyway—I don’t even know what the song’s about, except that it’s for Finwë.”

“It’s a song for and about him—a proper lament, as has not been written before. Your grandmother and mine asked me to write it. I might not use the details of what you’ve told me, but it still helps.” Maglor reached up to muss Aredhel’s hair, making her squawk indignantly. “Thank you, Irissë. You and Aikanáro were the last ones, you know. All of us have returned now, even Gil-galad.”

“Almost all,” Aredhel said. “That stupid statute, though—ugh, it’s so terribly unfair. When will you have this song of yours finished? Tyelko said you’ve been working on it since last fall.”

“I don’t know,” said Maglor. “There’s to be a great gathering of all the Eldar in Aman in a few years’ time—Tyelko probably told you about that too. I hope to have it completed by then. I’ve spoken to nearly everyone that I want to speak to, and then I just have to—well, write it. I have bits and pieces, but it’s only a beginning and will take many drafts, I think, to get right.”

“Well, I look forward to hearing it, whenever you do complete it,” said Aredhel. “We will all be missing Finwë when it comes to this gathering. He will be the only Elvenking absent.”

They returned to Nerdanel’s house to find Calissë sitting in the garden with Maedhros and Daeron, playing with Aechen, while Caranthir and Celegorm dug several large holes where the old forge had once stood. “What are you digging for?” Maglor asked them.

“Moryo’s going to plant apricots,” Celegorm said.

“Oh, I haven’t had an apricot in—I don’t know how long,” Aredhel said. “That’s the best part so far of returning to life. All the fruit! I could eat my weight in apricots.”

“You’ll have to wait until next year,” Caranthir said, “or the year after. One of Lisgalen’s friends is bringing a few saplings and I don’t know exactly how big they are already.”

“We’ll be drowning in plums soon enough,” said Celegorm. “And then apples, once that harvest starts. I didn’t know a tree could hold as many apples as Celebrían’s all do.”

“I have not yet met Celebrían, but she’s already my new favorite cousin,” laughed Aredhel.

Maglor went to sit by Maedhros and greet Calissë. “Where did you come from, sweetheart?” he asked as she climbed onto his lap to hug him.

“I came with Tyelpë! He’s inside with Cousin Lómion.”

“And we’ve been kicked out of our room,” Daeron added. “I’m not sure yet how annoyed I am about it.”

“Kicked out of our room? What’s Tyelpë doing in there?”

“It’s a surprise!” Calissë said.

“Oh no,” Maglor said before he could stop himself. Maedhros snorted.

“It’s a good surprise,” Calissë said.

“What is it, then?” Maglor asked.

Calissë poked him in between the eyes. “I can’t tell you, silly, because it’s a surprise!”

“All right, all right. Where’s your sister?”

“She stayed home.”

“Curvo’s starting to teach her some things in the forge,” Maedhros said. “Apparently not even Aechen was enough to tempt her away.”

Caranthir called over to them suddenly. “Hey, Calissë! Will you run over to Grandmother Ennalótë’s house and ask for a lemon?”

Calissë jumped up and ran off around the lilac bushes. “Do I want to know why you want a lemon?” Maedhros asked Caranthir.

“Irissë wants to eat one.”

“A whole lemon?” Daeron asked, eyebrows shooting up as he leaned against Maglor, slipping an arm around his waist.

“I’ll eat any fruit you put in front of me,” Aredhel said. “Whether it be a lemon or a peach or an entire bushel of cherries—”

“I feel like I should discourage this,” Maedhros said to Daeron and Maglor, “but I’m not going to. I think most everyone who comes back from Mandos makes one or two stupid decisions in the excitement of having a body again. Tyelko broke his arm within three months because he forgot he didn’t have the same strength he’d had before, and he fell out of one of the plum trees.”

“Of course he did,” said Maglor as Daeron laughed. “But I think this particular stupid decision of Irissë’s is just a refusal to back down from a dare, and that’s nothing new.”

Aredhel did not back down even when Calissë returned with what Caranthir called the biggest lemon he’d ever seen. She peeled it and picked out a wedge and popped it into her mouth without hesitation. Immediately her whole face puckered, making Calissë burst into giggles. “It’s delicious,” she declared once she’d swallowed it, and ate the second one.

Jokes about lemons followed them all the rest of the afternoon. They returned to Mahtan and Ennalótë’s house for dinner, which was a loud and merry affair, as it always was. The last time Maglor had dined at his grandparents’ had also been the first time, since his return to Valinor, and it had been overwhelming in all the worst ways. This time he did not feel any desire to run away back to Nerdanel’s house, and when Ennalótë asked him to play something for them after the meal, he was both willing and happy to oblige.

Mahtan embraced him as they all prepared to part for the evening. “It’s good to have you back, Macalaurë,” he said into his ear, before kissing his forehead.

“I’m glad to be back,” Maglor said.

Later, he and Daeron retreated to Curufin’s room, since Celebrimbor still wouldn’t let them into their own and the two extra guest rooms were taken by Aredhel and Maeglin. “You slept late today,” Maglor said as Daeron pulled the blankets up to envelope the two of them in quiet and warm darkness. “Are you all right?”

“I couldn’t sleep last night. I spoke to Maedhros sometime in the wee hours of the morning, and that seems to have helped.” Daeron tucked himself up against Maglor, face in the crook of Maglor’s neck. “You still could’ve woken me up this morning.”

“I’m not going to wake you when you clearly need sleep.” Maglor wrapped his arms around Daeron, who sighed as he relaxed against him.

“Being tired is better than waking in an empty bed,” Daeron said very softly after a few minutes.

“I’m sorry. I’ll wake you if you really want me to.”

“It’s all right. It’s not your fault. I’m just being ridiculous—”

“No you’re not.” Maglor kissed his temple. “You just had a rather trying month.”

“It doesn’t feel as though it should have been so trying,” Daeron said, and sighed again. “It feels a little as though I’m just being difficult, except—”

“Except?”

Daeron shook his head a little. “I don’t—not yet.”

“All right.” Maglor kissed him again. “You don’t have to tell me anything if you don’t want to, you know.”

“I don’t want to keep secrets. I just need to stew in it a little longer. Which reminds me—there is something else I have been meaning to tell you, only you’ve been so weighed down by your songwriting, and then I was caught up in my own complicated…whatever you can call what’s between me and my family.”

“Is something wrong?”

“No.” Daeron pulled back so they could look at one another. “The opposite, in fact. I spoke to your father in Tirion.”

“My father?” Maglor couldn’t hide his surprise. “I thought the two of you avoided each other when at all possible.”

“We did, but I sought him out after you spoke to him.” Daeron reached up to run his fingers through Maglor’s hair. “Your aunt was worried that I was the thing holding you back. I know I am not, but I don’t want to become such a thing—so I went to apologize.”

“Did you have something to apologize for?” Maglor asked.

“Yes. I’m not entirely sorry that I said all of the things I did, because I’m not sure he really understood how deep your pain went even after he saw you, but if I had not lost my temper I might have said them more gently. And…I misunderstood him, going to Tirion expecting not to find anything to like in the first place, and also finding him very different than I expected, and he misunderstood me, because I was making a concerted effort to hide how unhappy I was at the time. You know what it looks like when I put on a smile for an audience. Our mutual misunderstandings clashed in just such a way that he spoke foolishly and I replied very harshly. I think we’ve remedied that, now. He was very quick to apologize himself, which I did not expect.”

“I’m glad,” Maglor whispered. “You didn’t have to do that, but—thank you.”

“I did have to.” Daeron offered a small smile. “I don’t actually enjoy being at such odds with someone, however entertaining it was in the beginning to throw someone like Fëanor off balance.”

“Were you really so unhappy then?”

“It was only a few years after you had left for Lórien, and I was in Tirion. I had a nice time and I certainly don’t regret going—that was when I started really becoming friends with your brothers—but I missed you terribly.” Daeron tucked his face back into the crook of Maglor’s neck. “You haven’t yet told me what it was you spoke to him about, besides Finwë.”

“He apologized to me,” Maglor said, “but would not let me apologize to him.”

“What do you have to apologize for?”

“When we first met here I said some cruel things. None if it was untrue, but I only said it to hurt him, because I was in pain and it didn’t seem fair that he wasn’t—of course that wasn’t true, and I just couldn’t see clearly. But it was—it was a step forward, when we spoke this summer. I don’t know what Celegorm or Caranthir intend to do, and Maedhros is still so uncertain, but I’m…more hopeful than I was. More hopeful than I ever thought I would be.”

“Good,” Daeron murmured. “He asked me some questions about you, when we spoke, and I answered them. I didn’t think you would mind.”

“I don’t mind at all.”

Daeron fell asleep eventually, still holding onto Maglor like he was afraid to wake up and find him gone again. Maglor sang a few quiet songs of rest and peaceful dreams until the frown on Daeron’s face smoothed away. Sleep did not come so quickly for him that night, and he lay awake for a while listening to the quiet settling of the house around them, and the muffled sounds of his family downstairs or in their own rooms. Outside the open window Nallámo was singing.

When Maglor fell asleep at last he dreamed of Formenos. He stood by the flower-covered cairn watching the water. It was raining, but the clouds were beginning to break, and a rainbow arced across the sky over the lake. Still, Maglor felt a chill, and he knew in that strange way of dreaming that if he were to turn around he would see Formenos not as it now was, or as it had been when new-built, but as it had stood immediately after the Darkening, shrouded in shadows, the doors broken in and the lamps burning in the entryway, and his grandfather—

He did not turn around. Instead he walked down to the water, finding a space where the reeds fell away and he could kneel at the water’s edge on the grass. It lapped gently against the shore, and the Music in it was not that of the Wilwarinen in waking life. In the dream it sounded like Ekkaia instead, like lamentation wound through with the thinnest thread of hope shining like starlight piercing through the cloud-wrack. Maglor reached out to touch the water, but as he did the dream dissolved.

Maglor woke to Pídhres kneading her paws onto his arm, and Daeron still curled up around him, deeply asleep but looking far more at peace than he had been the night before. Maglor freed his arm to grab Pídhres and move her to the pillow above his head, where she curled up with a soft purr, and then closed his eyes again with a sigh. It was warm, and the bed was soft. He dozed, letting his thoughts drift until Daeron woke up. When he did it was with a soft sigh, and then a reluctant loosening of his grip on Maglor. “Good morning,” Maglor murmured, smoothing a few strands of Daeron’s hair away from his eyes.

“Did I oversleep again?” Daeron asked without quite opening his eyes.

“No.” Maglor kissed him softly. “I’d suggest we lock the door and stay in bed all day, except I’d rather do that in our bed and not my brother’s.”

A small smile touched Daeron’s lips. “Me too. We’ll have to bother your nephew about it today.”

Once they dressed and made their way downstairs, Pídhres riding on Daeron’s shoulder, they found Lisgalen making lemonade and Maedhros sitting at the kitchen table while Caranthir braided his hair. “…can do it myself,” Maedhros was saying.

“And have it turn out lopsided and likely to unravel halfway through the morning, and then you’ll just get paint in it again” Caranthir replied. “Morning Cáno, Daeron.”

“Good morning. I know I’m not supposed to ask what he’s doing, but do we know how long it will take Celebrimbor to do whatever-it-is in our room?”

“He said he hopes to be done by this afternoon,” said Lisgalen.

“Oh, good.”

“He was supposed to come install it three weeks ago,” Lisgalen added, “but got caught up in another project in Tirion. You know how it goes.”

“Do you know what it is?” Daeron asked.

“Yes, of course. But it’s supposed to be a surprise.”

“A surprise for Maglor, not for me,” Daeron said. “What if you just told me what it is? You know I can keep a secret.”

Lisgalen laughed at him as they set the pitcher on the table. “Nice try.”

Maglor took his notes and papers outside into the garden after breakfast. Daeron joined him, bringing out Maglor’s harp rather than his own flute, and they sat under the hawthorn tree. Aechen came over to sniff at their fingers before scurrying away, chased by Pídhres; Maglor’s brothers all dispersed. Calissë vanished into Nerdanel’s workshop with her and Celegorm, who was apparently learning stone carving in the mornings and practicing knitting, of all things, in the afternoons.

Daeron played some of the music Maglor was writing as he wrote it out. “This sounds familiar,” he said. “Where have I heard it before?”

“Ekkaia,” Maglor said.

“You didn’t play anything like this there.”

“No—it’s as near as I can render the part of the Song I could hear in the waves there.”

“You think you’ll use it in this song for your grandfather?”

“Maybe. I have the main melody here, but…I’m not sure. I want to fit it in somehow.”

“Hm.” Daeron peered at the main melody, and played through a part of it, and then played through again, adding just hints of Ekkaia’s theme as he did so. “Something like that?”

“Yes—yes, just like that. Hold on, play it through again—” Maglor grabbed his pencil as Daeron obliged, so he could note down the changes. “And what if you played them both, one with each hand…?”

“Like this?”

“Yes, that’s perfect—”

“Stars above, Cáno,” Caranthir said, coming around the tree. He was pink-cheeked and rubbing at his eyes. “What are you trying to do, move Manwë himself to tears with this song?”

“Sorry,” Maglor said, trying not to wince at Caranthir’s choice of words as Daeron stilled the harp strings.

“It’s beautiful, but I’m not sure anyone will be able to listen to the whole thing if it sounds like that.”

“Noted,” Maglor said.

“It was a mistake to let you two make music together, if you’re just going to work together to find the prettiest way to break every heart in Aman.” Caranthir shook his head as he went away.

“I’ll have to play some of old Bombadil’s most ridiculous songs later to make up for that,” Daeron said. “Do you want me to keep going now?”

“No, I’ve got what I needed down. Thank you.”

Daeron shifted to playing something much more cheerful, though not quite as bright as anything Tom Bombadil sang as he bounded over the downs and through the Old Forest. Huan came around the tree to flop down beside Maglor, sending all his papers flying. “Menace,” Maglor muttered as he grabbed at them.

“You are going to drive me mad someday, the way you never keep your notes organized,” said Daeron as Maglor shuffled everything back together.

“I do keep it organized,” Maglor protested.

“I’m not sure you really know what that word means.”

Calissë wandered out of Nerdanel’s workshop after a while, and came to crawl onto Maglor’s lap. “What are you writing?” she asked, peering curiously at the papers.

“A song about my grandfather, Finwë,” Maglor said. “Your great-grandfather.”

“I’ve never met him,” Calissë said after a moment, frowning as she counted her great-grandparents on her fingers.

“No,” Maglor agreed. “He is in Mandos.”

“What happened to him?”

“You know how we all went away across the Sea a long time ago?”

“Yes. To fight the Enemy, Atya said.”

“Yes, and because Finwë had died—because of the Enemy.”

“Oh.” Calissë seemed to be counting on her fingers again, and then said, “You’re the only one that didn’t, Uncle Cáno.”

“Our cousin Galadriel didn’t, either,” Maglor said.

“Was it very scary, across the Sea?” Calissë asked after a little while, sounding uncharacteristically hesitant. “Sometimes Uncle Tyelko tells scary stories but I don’t know if he’s just making it up to get us to scream.”

“It was scary,” Maglor said, though whatever scary stories Celegorm had told were made-up, he was sure. “But it is also very beautiful.” He kissed the top of her head. “Finwë was born across the Sea, and he led our people across the whole world here to Valinor. It was supposed to be safe, but the Enemy crept in and fooled even the Valar—but he was defeated a very long time ago and cast out of the world, so there’s nothing to fear anymore.”

“What about in Middle-earth?” Calissë asked.

“There are always dangers in the wider world, but the last great Enemy there has been defeated too,” said Daeron.

“So why can’t Grandfather Finwë come back?”

Maglor looked at Daeron helplessly. Daeron said, “That is a question, I think, for the Valar.”

“Oh.” Calissë snuggled against Maglor’s chest. “D’you miss him?”

“Yes. Very much.” Maglor had a sudden thought. “He taught me woodcarving. Would you like to learn a little, Calissë?”

“Oh, yes please!”

“You have fun,” Daeron said when Maglor glanced him. He leaned over to kiss him. “I’m going to bother Caranthir to make up for the music earlier.”

Maglor hoisted Calissë onto his back to carry her off through the orchard to Mahtan’s workshops. Mahtan happened to be in his woodworking shop himself, and was more than happy to allow Maglor and Calissë room and tools for a lesson. “Finwë would be very happy to see you right now,” he whispered to Maglor as he handed him a few pieces of scrap wood, “and very proud.”

That morning Maglor and Calissë worked together to carve a small and very simple duck shape out of a piece of pale wood. Calissë was truly her parents’ daughter: when really interested in something, all of her attention and focus was caught up in it. She was also, like her father, a very quick learner, and as soon as they were done sanding the duck she wanted to go show it off to everyone, but particularly Celebrimbor.

By then it was past lunchtime, and when they returned to Nerdanel’s house they found Celebrimbor in the kitchen looking faintly alarmed, though he relaxed as soon as he spotted Calissë in Maglor’s arms. “There you are!” he exclaimed. “Where have you been?”

“Just next door,” Maglor said. “Calissë wanted to learn woodcarving.”

“Look, Tyelpë!” Calissë held up the duck. “Look what we made!”

“I love it,” Celebrimbor said as he lifted her into his own arms. To Maglor he added, “Next time just tell someone when you take my sister away somewhere, won’t you?”

“I told Daeron,” said Maglor. “When I steal away your sisters I’m always mostly responsible about it.” That made Calissë giggle. “Are you done with our bedroom now? Daeron and I would very much like to sleep in our own bed tonight.”

“Yes, I’m done. Calissë, why don’t you go show Grandmother?” Celebrimbor set her down and she darted out of the room. “You can tell me if you don’t like it, and I’ll take it out,” he said to Maglor once she’s gone. “I wasn’t sure about it, but he thought—Grandfather, I mean—he seemed confident that you would.”

“My father made me something?”

“I helped, a little. But it was mostly him.”

“Things have changed a bit since the last time my father made me a gift. I’m sure I’ll like whatever it is.” Maglor offered Celebrimbor a smile, and kissed his temple as he passed by on the way to the stairs. “Thank you, Tyelpë.”

The bedrooms were all on the north side of the house, with windows facing the orchard or the road or the river. Daeron and Maglor’s was near the front of the house, and had two windows looking out toward the orchard and Ennalótë’s gardens beyond. One of those windows, Maglor found when he stepped into the room now, had been replaced with stained glass, all blues and greys and smoky-whites. Maglor stepped up to it, recognizing the scene as one of the seashore, but not quite sure at first what to make of it.

Standing directly in front of the window revealed the subtle and lovely enchantments that had been laid over the glass, so that it was both like looking at a work of stained glass art, but also very like looking through the window at the scene it depicted. It was that stretch of shore again, the one Maglor dreamed of most often, the one the palantír in Avallónë had shown him. It was not quite the same, being a work of art and not a memory of his own or the reality of it that the palantír had revealed. It was beautiful—it was a glimpse of the way Fëanor had seen those same shores, the things he thought most striking about them or the most worth preserving or depicting.

He didn’t know how long he stood staring at it before he heard the door behind him. “Cáno?” He turned to see Maedhros. “Is that what Tyelpë was doing in here?”

“Atya made it,” Maglor said.

Maedhros came to stand with him. “I’ve seen that place before,” he said, reaching out to brush his fingers over the glass. “I dreamed it once, I think. Dreaming of you.”

“I spent a lot of time on that particular stretch of beach,” said Maglor. “Atya must have seen it in the palantír.”

“It’s so empty, though,” Maedhros said softly. He let his hand drop to his side. “Míriel made me tapestries, you know. Of Himring.”

“I know,” Maglor said, earning himself a look of surprise. “I asked her to. You’d been trying to draw it before we left for Lórien and didn’t seem satisfied with anything you did, so I wrote to her. Do you like them?”

“Of course I do. You never said—”

“I wanted it to be a surprise.” Maglor hesitated for a moment. Then he asked, “When Atar comes back from Ambarussa’s mountain, will you speak to him?”

“I don’t know.” Maedhros looked away, back to the window. “I know I need to, but I don’t want to do it alone.”

“I’ll go with you.”

“You’ve got your song to write.”

“Yes, but—”

“After it’s done. Then maybe I’ll speak to him, if you’re there too. But don’t push yourself for my sake, Maglor.”

“I won’t.” He was going to push himself anyway, because the sooner he got the song written the sooner it would stop hanging over him like a storm cloud threatening to burst. But if Maedhros wanted a reason to put this meeting off, Maglor could give it to him. He just hated to see the painful uncertainty on Maedhros’ face whenever Fëanor so much as hovered at the edges of a conversation. “Just—just one conversation, Maedhros, just so it stops being something to dread. If nothing else, you’ll be able to see more clearly what you want afterward.”

Maedhros sighed. “I know.” He reached out to touch the glass again. “Why this place? Why did you spend so much time there?”

It had been empty and desolate, and he’d spent enough time there to watch as the jagged edges of the broken coast softened into stand and wind-rounded stones, to watch the generations of birds come to nest in the nearby cliffs every year, raising their chicks and diving into the waters for fish. He’d seen ships in the distance and had probably been the source of many strange stories the sailors told, if the wind was right and they happened to hear his voice singing. “It was peaceful,” he said finally, unable to think of anything else to say that wouldn’t just upset Maedhros. “It was quiet. Safe.”

“Lonely,” Maedhros said softly.

“Yes, but…that doesn’t always have to be a bad thing. I was not always unhappy in Middle-earth.”

“So you’ve said.”

“You just never believe me when I do.”

Maedhros kissed the top of his head, resting his hand on Maglor’s hair. “I believe you. I just also know the difference between not unhappy and happy.”

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Something about the look on Maglor’s face when Caranthir asked him if he intended to move Manwë himself to tears with his music—which had been an attempt at a joke—stuck in the back of Caranthir’s mind afterward. It was like an itch he couldn’t scratch, a growing suspicion that made him nervous in the same way that thinking about talking to his father made him nervous, and he didn’t know how to ask about it. It would explain a lot about the way Maglor’s mood was shifting, at times as bright as when they’d found him in Lórien and at others as though he was carrying a weight as heavy as the Oath.

Caranthir was almost certain that Maglor wouldn’t have sworn anything related to this song, but almost was not entirely.

The next day Celegorm dragged him out of his workroom and out to the river. “Out with it,” he said as they sat on the grassy bank, bare feet in the water. Huan splashed across the river to go chasing after rabbits in the field beyond. Behind them the plum harvest had begun; Caranthir could hear the songs for it. Celegorm nudged him with his elbow. “What’s wrong?”

“How come you aren’t so worried about Maglor anymore?” Caranthir asked. “You were driving yourself mad with it in Tirion.”

“I didn’t understand what the problem was in Tirion,” said Celegorm. “Now I do. And—well, he’s also been a lot lighter since he got back from Formenos, which is the opposite of what I would’ve expected, honestly, but I’m not going to risk him falling back into gloom by asking.”

“What was the problem?” Caranthir asked. Celegorm didn’t answer, so Caranthir shoved at his shoulder. “You can’t just say that and then not explain!”

“Sorry, just—I’m not really supposed to know it either.”

Caranthir rolled his eyes and flopped back onto the grass. “You are the worst,” he said.

“Sorry,” Celegorm repeated.

In spite of their closeness in age and birth order, Caranthir and Celegorm had always clashed a little. Celegorm was wild and loud, preferring the wilderness to the gardens that Caranthir favored. They were both abrasive in different ways that didn’t always fit well. But since Celegorm had abandoned the life of a hunter and come back to spend most of his time at Nerdanel’s house they’d had to figure out how to make it work. And—well, maybe Mandos had smoothed away some of the sharp edges both of them had carried before. Celegorm wasn’t as loud, and Caranthir had learned how to think, most of the time, before he spoke.

Caranthir wasn’t stupid, though, even if he wasn’t quite as clever or as quick as some of his brothers. He could figure things out if given enough clues and enough time. “He’s going to use this song like Lúthien, isn’t he?” he asked after a while.

“How in the world did you figure that out?” Celegorm demanded, turning to frown at him.

“What else would turn it from something he was going to try to do, for our grandmother, into something he feels like he has to finish? What else would scare him so much that it made him start hiding and digging his nails into his scars again?” Why else would he have looked so startled, eyes going wide and the rest of him going very still for a few seconds, when Caranthir spoke of Manwë the day before? “Do you know why?”

“It’s the whole reason Míriel and Indis asked him to write it in the first place,” said Celegorm. “But don’t tell anyone else. I only know because Maedhros told me, and he only told me so I’d leave Maglor alone about it.”

“Huh.” Caranthir rose onto his elbows. “Why the secrecy?”

“The more people who know the worse Maglor feels about it, I guess,” Celegorm said.

“Do you think it’ll work?” Caranthir didn't want to let himself hope that it would—their family was not one the Valar had any reason to listen to, especially if they hadn’t heeded either Míriel or Indis—but he could feel the stirrings of it anyway. Just the idea of Finwë being permitted to come back—it felt almost as though, if that happened, everything else would somehow magically fix itself. He knew that was childish, but it was how he’d always seen his grandfather, as someone who fixed things—he also knew it wasn’t true, that no one could fix everything just by existing, but it felt true, the same way it had felt as though the whole world was ending when they’d come back to Formenos and then Maedhros and Maglor had come stumbling out again, ashen-faced and refusing to let any of the rest of them see what lay inside the doors.

“Maedhros said Maglor doesn’t think it will,” Celegorm said, “but—I don’t know. It feels dangerous to believe that it might.”

It did. It was just setting themselves up for heartbreak when it didn’t. But if it did work…

“No one thought the Valar would ever let Atar out either,” Caranthir said after a few minutes. He lay back down in the grass. Celegorm fell back beside him with a sigh. “Are you still angry?”

“If I think about it too long,” Celegorm said. “But—mostly, I just don’t want Maedhros to be the only one, if he ends up not being able to…” He raised a hand to gesture vaguely. “Whatever it is we’re supposed to be doing.”

“Me too,” Caranthir said. In this, he and Celegorm had been entirely united ever since they’d learned of Fëanor’s return. Their loyalty was to Maedhros, not their father. Maedhros hated it when they talked that way, so they mostly didn’t, but it was still true. It wasn’t the same kind of loyalty that Maedhros had commanded in Beleriand. He wasn’t their lord or their king or their general, he was just their big brother whose heart was hurting, and it felt like it was their turn to protect him—or, if that wasn’t possible, at least to stand beside him.

“I don’t really think he wants to talk to me anyway,” Celegorm said after a little while. Caranthir turned his head to look at him, but Celegorm kept his gaze on the sky. In profile he looked a lot like Nerdanel, and not just because he had a smudge of dust on his forehead in almost the same place she always did. He had also been spending a lot of time out in the sun with Aredhel, so his nose was pink with sunburn and starting to peel a little.

“What makes you think that?” Caranthir asked.

“He wrote that—” Celegorm stopped. Caranthir watched his jaw work for a moment as he wrestled with whatever it was Fëanor had written. Caranthir had burned his own letter after reading it, but he hadn’t forgotten what it said. He could think about it now without wanting to punch something, at least, and he could sometimes take out the gift his father had sent along with it, and not want to throw it against the wall. That didn’t change the fact that it felt like his letter had been written to the son his father had wanted him to be, instead of the person he really was.

Finally, Celegorm tried again. “He wrote that he’d been reading all the stories about us in Middle-earth, and he didn’t recognize who I turned into. I feel like I turned into someone an awful lot like him.”

“We all did,” Caranthir said.

“Not like I did. And I was never his—” Celegorm sat up abruptly. “Doesn’t matter. I’ll talk to him eventually, and it’ll just turn into another shouting match and then we’ll never speak to each other again, and it’ll be—it’ll be fine.”

Caranthir sat up more slowly, and leaned his head on Celegorm’s shoulder. He wasn’t good at this—comforting other people. Not with words. It was easier to care by bullying everyone else into taking care of themselves, or into letting themselves be taken care of—into getting Maedhros to let him braid his hair for him, or needling Celegorm into stealing more yarn by pretending that he didn't want him to. That wasn’t what Celegorm needed right now, though. Caranthir wasn’t sure what he needed, except maybe for their father to look him in the eye and say the right words, whatever those were, and mean them. A shouting match and permanent estrangement wouldn’t be fine, that much was obvious.

All Caranthir could think to offer was a truth of his own. “At least he’ll care enough to yell at you.”

“What does that mean?”

“If you’re too much like him, I’m not enough. It is what it is; I’ve known I was the disappointment for a long time.”

“How can you possibly be more of a disappointment than me? You weren’t at Nargothrond.”

“I didn’t do anything,” Caranthir said, “except pick the wrong allies. I’ve never been particularly ambitious, or cared about being the best at anything. It was a relief to find out that I didn’t have to take up any titles again when I came back if I didn’t want to. But I’ve always known I wasn’t what Atya wanted me to be, long before the troubles started in Tirion.”

“Ulfang and Uldor weren’t your fault,” Celegorm said quietly.

“I know that.”

“Do you?”

“I wouldn’t have been let out of Mandos if I didn’t.” He still had his doubts, but they didn’t keep him up at night anymore. “But that’s not the point.”

“No, I know. I just wanted to make sure.” Celegorm wrapped his arm around Caranthir’s shoulders. “Also that’s not all you did—you also shredded our diplomatic relationships with Angrod and Aegnor, and insulted Thingol in the same breath. That’s almost as impressive as anything our father ever said in anger.”

Caranthir grimaced. “Right, I couldn’t keep my mouth shut either.” He’d since learned—centuries in Mandos had helped—but of course that didn’t undo the damage, and it hadn't made his apologies to Angrod any easier. Angrod, who had never liked Caranthir any more than Caranthir had liked him, had accepted the apology and sent him away, and Caranthir was quite happy to continue avoiding him where possible, and to continue biting his tongue bloody on those rare occasions when they were thrown together and Angrod made sly remarks that Caranthir knew he deserved and still wished he could retaliate against, however unhelpful it would be.

“There’s also the time you helped Haleth,” Celegorm said after a moment. “Not everything you did was terrible or forgettable, Moryo.”

“No, just the most important things.”

“Fine, be that way. None of it holds a candle to what Curvo and I did in Nargothrond. So why are you still angry?”

“Because Maedhros is so unhappy about it—and you. Maglor too. I’m not sure I believe it really went as well as he says it did.”

“I think that might just be everything else piled on top of it,” Celegorm said. “You don’t have to worry about me, though.”

“Someone’s got to,” said Caranthir. “Didn’t it help at all, going to Nienna?”

“Yes, of course. I can think through it all now without getting so upset that I can’t think at all, and I am learning to let it go. It’s just—hard. Like that time—you remember when Huan had a run-in with a porcupine when he was a puppy?”

“Ugh, yes. That was awful.”

“It’s like picking those quills out, one at a time. And—it is as awful as it sounds. Nienna never promised it would be easy.”

“Nothing’s ever easy in our family.”

“Some things are.” Celegorm kissed the top of Caranthir's head and got to his feet.

Caranthir accepted his hand up, and then found himself yanked forward, spun around, and shoved into the river. “Tyel—!” He hit the water with an enormous splash, and by the time he flailed his way out of it Huan had returned to jump around him, splashing even more, and Celegorm was halfway back to the house. “I hate him,” Caranthir told Huan when he caught his breath. Huan woofed and licked up his face. “Ugh, I hate you too!”

By the time he got back to the house, still trying to wring out his hair, Celegorm was nowhere to be seen. Lisgalen was coming out of Nerdanel’s workshop, and stopped short on seeing him. “What in the world happened to you?” they asked.

“My brother happened.”

“Which one?”

“The one whose hair I’m going to dye green, given half a chance.”

“Oh, so we’re only annoyed, not angry. That’s good.” Lisgalen came over and kissed him, and then bent over to hoist him over their shoulder. Caranthir yelped, and then heard Maglor and Daeron laughing from over by the hawthorn tree.

“Shut up, Cáno,” he tried to growl, but the thing about being carried like a sack of potatoes, his hair falling in dripping tangles around his face, was that it was the least dignified position one could possibly be in, and no one was going to believe any threats he tried to make.

“Or what, you’ll dye my hair too? It’s too dark for that.”

“Maybe I’ll just dunk Pídhres in a dye vat—”

“I’d like to see you try!”

Lisgalen carried Caranthir up to their room, where they dropped him unceremoniously onto the bed. “Look on the bright side,” they said as they started peeling off his soaked pants.

“What’s that?”

“It’s the perfect excuse to take all your clothes off in the middle of the day.”

“Oh, well, when you put it like that.” Caranthir sat up and managed to get his shirt over his head before Lisgalen grabbed it and tossed it to the floor in a wet heap that Caranthir knew he would probably regret later, though he couldn’t really bring himself to care in the moment. “Did you lock the door?”

“Of course I did.”

Later, as they were drowsing together, still tangled up in the blankets, someone knocked on the door. “Go away,” Caranthir called.

“We’re going to Grandmother and Grandfather’s for dinner in an hour, if you care to join us,” said Maedhros, and left without waiting for an answer. Lisgalen grumbled something, more than half-asleep, and Caranthir pulled the blankets up over them both. Dinner could wait.

Neither he nor Lisgalen discovered any desire to get out of bed until later in the evening, before anyone else had returned from Mahtan and Ennalótë’s house, but well after they’d gone. As they ventured into the kitchen to find their own meal, Lisgalen asked, “So what made Celegorm toss you into the river, anyway?”

“Who knows,” Caranthir said as he opened a cupboard. “How hungry are you?”

“Not very. Let’s just toast some cheese on bread. You didn’t fight?”

“No. The opposite, actually.” Caranthir got out the bread and handed it to Lisgalen to slice before going in search of cheese to melt on it. “Brothers are just the worst.”

“Are you really going to try to dye his hair green?”

“Depends on if Maglor warns him about it.”

Lisgalen hummed thoughtfully as they sliced the bread. Then they asked, “Need any help with it?”

Caranthir snorted. He found the cheese and set it on the table before leaning over to kiss Lisgalen. “I’ll let you know when to distract him.”

They toasted the bread and cheese and took it back to Caranthir’s room, sitting on the floor in a patch of silver moonlight. Lisgalen told stories of pranks played between members of the Gwaith-i-Mírdain in Eregion until they were both laughing hard enough that they almost didn’t notice the commotion of everyone else returning to the house.

After they went back to bed, though, Caranthir found himself lying awake, staring at the ceiling. Lisgalen sprawled out beside him, always able to fall asleep quickly. He’d been distracted by falling into the river and then the rest of the afternoon with Lisgalen, but now his thoughts turned back to Maglor, and his song, and its real purpose. He understood why Maglor wanted to keep it a secret, even if he was a little hurt that he hadn’t been told. Of course Maedhros knew, and Maglor wouldn’t keep any secrets from Daeron either. Maybe it was just because they hadn’t yet spoken of it, just the two of them. They’d both been busy, and Caranthir still didn’t know what to tell Maglor that he wanted to hear in the song. All he could think of was the cherry trees, and of course Maglor was going to include those.

The next morning he found Maglor under the hawthorn tree again, alone this time. “Where’s Daeron?” he asked.

“Off with Celegorm,” Maglor said. “He promised to tell him about how it went with his family.”

“How did it go?” Caranthir asked as he sat down beside Maglor.

“Not as well as hoped, and I’m fairly certain it’s half my fault. But as I keep telling Daeron, there’s time.”

Caranthir picked a few blades of grass to braid together. “I haven’t answered your question yet, about your song.”

Maglor had been leaning back against the trunk, watching the branches overhead as he twirled his pencil in his fingers. Now he turned to look at Caranthir. “It’s all right if you don’t have an answer,” he said.

“I don’t think I do. I just miss him, and you don’t need me to tell you that.”

“I miss him too.” Maglor tugged Caranthir over to tuck him against his side, arm around his shoulders. “What’s wrong, Moryo?”

“I know you’re all right now, but you weren’t before.”

Maglor sighed, and rested his head on top of Caranthir’s. “It’s hard to be thinking of what happened so constantly,” he said after a little while. “I went to his old workshop when I was in Tirion, and it had been cleared out. I don’t know why it hit me so hard then—it would have been worse, probably, if it had been left untouched. And then there’s…”

“There’s what?”

“Grandmother Míriel wants me to sing before the Valar.”

Caranthir raised his head to look at Maglor’s face. “You’re going to do it?”

“I said I would. Keep it to yourself, though, please.”

“Why is it such a secret?”

“I just—Míriel doesn’t want it widely known, and neither do I. I don’t think any of you will tell anyone, at least outside our family, but the more people who know the more nervous I feel.” Maglor couldn’t quite meet his gaze. “The more people who will be disappointed when it doesn’t work.”

“I’ll be disappointed if it doesn’t,” Caranthir said, “but not with you. If the Valar aren’t moved, then…that’s them. It’s got nothing to do with you or your songwriting or your singing. Even Míriel has to know the chances aren’t good.”

“A fool’s hope,” Maglor murmured.

“I don’t think it’s foolish.”

“It feels foolish.”

“So did lots of things that ended up saving the world.”

“Have you been talking to Elrond?” Maglor smiled a little, and pulled Caranthir’s head back down to his shoulder. “I don’t like keeping secrets; I’m sorry I didn’t tell you before.”

“It’s not like we’ve had a lot of time to talk about it.”

“I still need to talk to Curvo about the song.” Maglor sighed. “And then just—three more kings. Olwë, Ingwë, Thingol. At least Olwë and Thingol will be in the same place, and I won’t have to go back to Alqualondë.”

“And then you have to finish writing it.”

“Yes.”

“Where are you going to go for that?”

“I don’t know how long we’ll stay in Taur-en-Gellam—Daeron has responsibilities there, even if he likes to pretend otherwise. But eventually I’ll end up back home at Imloth Ningloron. Do you want to see what I’ve written so far? You can tell me if there’s something I’ve gotten terribly wrong or forgotten.”

“All right, but I don’t know anything about songwriting.”

Maglor laughed softly as he handed the papers over to Caranthir. They were scribbled all over, with arrows drawn between lines and things crossed out or written over. Caranthir had read Maglor’s drafts before, though, and knew how to decipher it all. The words were still very rough, in some places just paraphrasing what Maglor wanted to say, so he could find better words for it later. The section he’d handed Caranthir was about Finwë the grandfather, rather than Finwë the king or the leader or the singer. Even without the real poetry and the music that would accompany it, Caranthir finished reading it with tears building behind his eyes. “I miss him,” he whispered as he lowered the pages to his lap.

“Me too,” Maglor said softly. He kissed the top of Caranthir’s head.

“I think it would be easier to talk about—or talk to—Atya if Finwë were here,” Caranthir said after a little while.

“I’ve been wondering about that,” said Maglor. “Both Atya and Finarfin spoke of how Finwë had not been able to find a way to mend things between his own children. I’m not sure there’s anything he could do to fix what’s between us and Atya.”

“That’s different. Atya never liked his brothers, and then Morgoth was working against us all. But I just meant—he was easy to talk to, and I think it would be easier to talk to him about what happened in Middle-earth, and maybe he’d…I don’t now. He would understand. At least he would listen, and he wouldn’t lose his temper. Just because he loved us all doesn’t mean he was blind. He didn’t go to Formenos because he agreed with Atya.”

“That’s true. He isn’t here, though, and…unless the Valar are more soft-hearted than I believe them to be, he won’t be returning any time soon. We just have to find our way forward on our own. You still don’t want to speak to Atya?”

“I want Maedhros to stop looking haunted whenever his name comes up,” Caranthir said. “He tries to pretend it’s fine but he’s not very good at it, even if he’s got himself fooled.”

“I’ve spoken to him, but you’re right—he talks around it. I think it’s the one thing he would not speak of to Nienna or Estë when we were in Lórien. But when I’m finished writing this song, he’s agreed to speak to Atya, as long as I’m there with him.”

“Good.”

“You should probably be nearby too, in case it doesn’t go as well as it’s gone for me and Ambarussa and Curvo.”

Caranthir sat up. Maglor’s expression was somber and sad. “You think it will go badly?” Caranthir asked.

“I hope it won’t, but of course I can’t know for sure. I think it’s more likely to go badly for Maedhros than for anyone else except maybe Celegorm. I do think our father loves us, and I think he wants to make things right, except that there isn’t really anything he can do, not in the way he’s used to solving problems. I think he’s deeply unhappy about it, but it—it means something that he’s not trying to charge forward anyway, that he’s letting us take the time that we need. Doesn’t it?”

“I guess so.” Caranthir thought about the blown glass flower in the trunk in his room under a pile of old clothes. It was lovely and imperfect, an early attempt at a craft Fëanor had not worked with much in his previous life as he had been starting to relearn all of his old skills. The letter had proven that he still didn’t understand Caranthir, not really; but if he was honest with himself, Caranthir could admit that he’d never tried to make himself understood, either. It had felt less important than avoiding his father’s disapproval or displeasure. “I don’t know what I want from him, Cáno.”

“You don’t have to.” Maglor leaned forward to embrace him properly, a hand on the back of Caranthir’s head. He’d always understood Caranthir best—had never pushed him when he didn’t want to talk about something, had always made space or time. It was his voice, singing an old lullaby from Caranthir’s earliest childhood, that had kept Caranthir tethered to the living world as he’d recovered after the Nirnaeth Arnoediad. “I know exactly how hard it is to believe what other people say about him. None of this means you have to speak to him, or ever see him again, if that isn’t what you really want. Just—you need to decide what to do for you, Caranthir. Not for anyone else, even Maedhros.”

“I care about Maedhros far more than I care about Atya.”

“I don’t think that’s true,” Maglor said softly. “I think you care about everyone. I just want you to care about you just as much.”

Caranthir left Maglor to his songwriting and retreated to his garden. There was always weeding to be done and digging his fingers into the dirt offered a kind of certainty that most other things in his life seemed to be lacking. Well, no, that wasn’t fair. He was on firm ground these days—with his brothers, with Lisgalen, and his mother, even with most of his cousins. He liked his dye experiments and he even liked splitting his time between Nerdanel’s house and Tirion. It was just that Fëanor loomed so much bigger than anything else. He always had, and always would in one way or another.

When Lisgalen came out to sit on the grass nearby with some small project to fiddle with Caranthir asked them, “Do you think I should talk to my father? Don’t just say I should do what I want to do.”

Lisgalen lowered their tools to their lap, frowning at him. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing. I just don’t know what to do.”

“I don’t think it will help much to just do what someone else tells you. Especially me. I’m too far removed.”

“That’s why I’m asking you.” And, really, they weren’t that far removed. Aside from Maedhros and Maglor, it was Lisgalen that knew Caranthir best, had heard all his secrets and fears and old heartbreaks, and shared their own in return. They were the only one who knew about the nightmares he occasionally still had about his time in Middle-earth, and the way he woke up sometimes weeping after much calmer dreams of Thargelion before the fires.

“All right,” they said after a few minutes of thought. Caranthir yanked on a weed that wouldn’t come loose as they said, “In that case yes, I think you should. That way you’ll know, one way or the other, and it will stop being something looming over your future, and maybe you’ll stop having nightmares about it. But obviously you can’t do it now, unless you want to go track down wherever it is Amrod and Amras live.”

“I don’t have nightmares about it.” The weed broke loose suddenly, sending Caranthir falling backward.

“Not ones you remember,” Lisgalen said quietly. “You talk in your sleep sometimes, though.”

Caranthir sat up, weed in one hand, and wiped at the dirt on his face. No wonder he woke up occasionally feeling as tired as when he’d gone to sleep. He’d been worrying about Fëanor but he hadn’t thought it was that bad. “Do I wake you up?”

“Sometimes. Don’t apologize, it’s not like you can help it.” Lisgalen leaned over to kiss him. “Once you put this behind you, however it goes, we can go back to debating wedding dates.”

“I was thinking about that,” said Caranthir. “What if we just eloped, like you keep saying, but did it right before the big feast—so there’s a party when we come back anyway, and we don’t have to be the focus of it?” Nerdanel would be annoyed, but they’d already passed the traditional one-year engagement time, so what was another handful of traditions broken?

Lisgalen laughed. “I like that,” they said. “All right—that’s what we’ll do. Let’s not tell anyone, either, and see how long it takes your brothers to notice that our rings aren’t silver anymore.”

“We should tell my mother, but otherwise that sounds perfect.”

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As nice as it was to sit under a tree and listen to the birds while he worked, one clumsy step of Huan’s was all it took to get a great big muddy paw print all over two pages of notes, and for Maglor to decide tables were nicer than tree-shade. “Mind if I join you?” he asked Maedhros, peering through the open window of his small studio.

“Did Huan eat your draft?” Maedhros asked, glancing over his shoulder. Maglor had not been quiet about his displeasure.

“No, just walked all over it. So, can I?”

“Of course you can. You don’t even need to ask.”

Maglor didn’t really write much over the course of his stay at Nerdanel’s house, in spite of his efforts. He ended up watching Maedhros work instead, and talking to him about the painting and about other everyday things. They made some vague plans to go through the piles of boxes taking up the empty portion of his studio, all brought from their old house in Tirion, but Maglor didn’t have the heart for it and suspected Maedhros didn’t either. He spent a lot of time with Calissë in Mahtan’s woodworking shop, and with Mahtan and Ennalótë, catching up as he hadn’t gotten the chance to do in between his arrival in Valinor and his going to Lórien. He got to know Isilmiel a little too, though she was absorbed in her own work—whatever passion Elessúrë was worried about her finding, it seemed she’d stumbled upon it. Celegorm wasn’t quite so enthused about either stone carving or knitting, but he seemed to like doing something. Maglor was glad to see it; it grounded him in a way that he’d been missing before.

Celebrimbor also lingered. He was in between projects of his own, and seemed determined to befriend Maeglin, who in his turn seemed bemused by the very idea, though not opposed. Maglor wasn’t quite sure what to make of Maeglin, though he recognized the weight that he seemed to be carrying on his shoulders. It was a very familiar one. Aredhel had been corresponding with Fingon and Gilheneth, and when she announced that she and Maeglin would be leaving to visit them, she included Celebrimbor in the plan.

“I’m surprised you stayed as long as you have,” Daeron remarked.

“Are you?” Aredhel laughed. “This is a much more relaxing place to get used to life again than Tirion would be.”

Daeron snorted. “I cannot imagine what you expect to find in Tirion if you find this company relaxing.”

“No one’s making you stay,” Celegorm said.

“Just because I don’t find you relaxing doesn’t mean I don’t find you amusing.”

“It’s more relaxing than I would have expected, true,” Aredhel said. “But Findekáno and Gilheneth’s home is promised to be much quieter.”

“It’s lovely,” Nerdanel said. “I’m told it’s built in the style of Lindon.”

“It is,” Celebrimbor said. “Gilheneth designed it herself.”

And of course Elrond would be there. Maglor had had a letter from him the day before; Celebrían and the twins would soon be making their way also to that estate in order to see Gil-galad. Still, it would certainly be more relaxing than Nerdanel’s house, with more than half of her sons shouting at each other up and down the stairs all day and Pídhres hissing at Huan, and Nallámo fluttering through the windows at all hours.

A little while later Maglor saw Maeglin sitting outside, apparently absorbed in a book—except that he had not turned the page in some time. Maglor went over to sit beside him. “I keep meaning to ask you which name you prefer,” he said when Maeglin looked up in surprise. “Maeglin or Lómion—or some other name entirely?”

Maeglin shrugged. “I don’t mind either one,” he said. “Though it sounds a little strange to hear Lómion from anyone besides my mother. What name do you prefer? I think I heard your brothers call you three different ones in the same sentence yesterday.”

“I’ve been called Maglor longer than any other name,” Maglor said, “and no one uses my father-name besides my brothers, but I like Macalaurë just as well. I also wanted to tell you,” he added, “that you’ll probably find a warmer welcome than you think you will, and more friends than you expect.”

Maeglin’s look turned wary. “What makes you say that?”

“Experience. Everyone wishes to move forward in peace and in friendship, if possible. Maybe not everyone can, but we are all trying. The fact that you are here at all will soften many hearts, and ease many fears. But if you find it too much, you are always welcome here, or in Imloth Ninglor—”

“Not there, surely,” Maeglin said, aghast.

“You’ll see, when you meet Elrond. Anyway, most people are fine with all of us running around.”

“That’s different.”

“Well, yes. I would argue that we were worse. But that’s not the point. If you need to speak to someone who understands what it is to do terrible things, you can come to any of us.”

“You sound like Celegorm. And he sounds like Nienna.”

“I hope you listened to her, when she spoke to you,” Maglor said. Maeglin looked away, but he nodded. “We’re all more than the worst things we’ve done, and we’re not bound to who we used to be.”

“I know,” Maeglin said. “But I can’t be someone new before I—face my uncle. And my cousins.”

“You don’t have to go alone.”

“That’s why Celebrimbor insists on going with us. What’s he like now—Turgon? I was told you’d spoken to him lately.”

“I did. He was…grave, but I don’t know if he’s like that all the time. It was not a happy conversation.”

“Why? Why seek him out at all, then?”

“He greeted me far more kindly than he could have,” Maglor said. “It was unhappy because we spoke of unhappy things—of our grandfather, mostly, for this song I’m writing. Also of our fathers, which came naturally after speaking of our grandfather. He spoke a little of Gondolin and his own regrets, but did not mention you. I saw Idril too on Eressëa, but we did not speak of you then either. I don’t know what you might expect from either meeting. I just know that when I came here, I expected the worst from everyone except Elrond, and I was wrong every single time.”

Maeglin did not answer for some time. He looked across the garden to where Celegorm was wrestling with Huan, while Maedhros sat nearby with Aechen on his lap, laughing with Caranthir. They did not look, Maglor thought, like the figures Maeglin would have heard stories of, would have seen in Mandos’ tapestries. “My mother used to tell me stories of all her brothers and her cousins,” he said softly, after a little while. “I could hardly imagine it. They were all such happy stories; I used to hate that I was born so late. After so many awful things happened, after you were all scattered and separated. I didn’t know then that the worst things were yet to come, and that I would play such a part in bringing about the worst of all.”

“It’s a new Age, now,” Maglor said. “We’re all back, and there is hope that we can all come together—old faces and new—to make new memories worth telling stories about. It won’t be the same, because none of us are the same, but it will still be good.” Maeglin looked at him briefly, doubtfully, but nodded. “You’ll see.”

Calissë stayed behind when Celebrimbor left with Aredhel and Maeglin. The plum harvest left them inundated with fruit, and soon the nights began to grow a little chillier, and Maglor and Daeron began to speak more seriously of going on to Taur-en-Gellam while the weather was still fine enough for travel. “You travel around an awful lot,” Calissë said, draping herself over Maglor’s shoulders from behind as he sat by the river with Daeron and Maedhros, talking of their plans.

“I’ll settle down after this,” Maglor said. “I’m actually quite looking forward to being back in Imloth Ningloron to stay. I miss my hedgehogs.”

“I asked Ammë if we could have a hedgehog but she said they wouldn’t like the city.”

“She’s right,” Maedhros said, as Aechen climbed over his legs to go sniff around the water’s edge, “but you can come play with Aechen whenever you want.”

“Can I come stay with you at Imloth Ningloron and do more woodcarving?” Calissë asked.

“Of course!” Maglor turned his head to kiss her cheek. “I would love that, sweetheart.”

A shout went up from behind them at the house, followed by other raised voices. “Oh dear,” Daeron said, looking back towards it over Maglor’s shoulder. “That’s a rather unfortunate shade of green.”

Maedhros craned his neck to see what was going on, and then rolled his eyes as he fell onto his back, throwing an arm over his face. “I didn’t see anything,” he said. “I don’t have to do anything if I didn’t see it.”

“You don’t have to do anything regardless,” Maglor said. “Worse comes to worst Tyelko has to cut his hair, and if I can survive it so can he.”

“When did you have to cut your hair?” Calissë asked.

“When your father spilled glue all over it, a very long time ago,” said Maglor.

“Atya never spills anything.”

“Because he learned his lesson after he ruined my hair and my favorite shirt. That was an accident, however—whatever is going on now is very much on purpose.”

“Fortunately,” Daeron said, “hair grows back. Unfortunately, Caranthir might end up with some bruises.”

“Bruises fade,” Maedhros said. “What did Celegorm do to deserve green hair, anyway?”

“Threw Caranthir into the river, I think,” Maglor said. “I don’t think they’re fighting, but I also don’t know what else you can call it. You might want to rethink your own threats about tossing us into the water.”

“Moryo knows better than to try something like this on me.”

As Calissë ran off to see whatever horrors Caranthir had committed against Celegorm’s hair up close, Maedhros asked Daeron, “Still prefer our siblings to yours?”

“Honestly, coming here was a breath of fresh air after Alqualondë,” Daeron said. “If I never have to speak about the Great Journey again it will be too soon. And you all get along well enough to do things like—well, like throwing ugly dye over each other’s heads, and teasing each other. It makes me miss Mablung, but not my own sisters or my brother.”

“We’ll be singing about the Great Journey, if Elemmírë has her way,” Maglor said.

“Ugh.” Daeron fell back onto the grass much more dramatically than Maedhros had. “And I told her I’d go recruiting singers from the Avari. That will be a task for next spring, I suppose.”

“I didn’t expect to look forward to whatever this is that Ingwë is planning,” Maedhros said, raising himself up onto his elbows, “but I think I’m starting to. If nothing else, this song cycle of Elemmírë’s will be wonderful.”

“It is ambitious,” Maglor said, “and rehearsing will doubtless be a nightmare.”

“I hadn’t even thought about that part,” Daeron groaned. “I’m exhausted already.” Maedhros laughed, and Daeron kicked at his ankle. “I’m going to sleep for a hundred years after that performance, and if anyone dares to disturb me I’ll sing them into an enchanted sleep to last even longer.”

Later, after they had returned to the house to find Celegorm attempting to wash Caranthir’s fabric dye out of his hair—more for the smell than for the color, which hadn’t had enough time to truly stick—Maedhros followed Maglor upstairs. “Are you nervous about performing?” he asked, leaning against the doorway as Maglor brought his pack out of the wardrobe.

“At the feast? No. I was at first, but I sang before Fingolfin’s court in Tirion and it went well enough.” Maglor set his pack on the bed and sighed. “Besides, what is all the Eldar gathered together compared to the Valar?”

“You’ve performed before them before,” Maedhros said.

“A very long time ago.”

Maedhros crossed the room to kiss Maglor’s forehead, wrapping an arm around his shoulders. “It won’t be as bad as you fear. Hasn’t that been the case for everything else?”

Hadn’t he just said that very thing to Maeglin? “It has.” Maglor sighed and let himself lean against Maedhros for a moment. “I’ll just be glad when it’s over, whatever happens afterward.”

“I told Celegorm what the song is for,” Maedhros said, “when we were in Tirion.”

“Is that why he suddenly stopped hovering?”

“Yes. I know you don’t want it widely known, but none of us will spread it around. We just want to help.”

“No, I know. I told Caranthir about it too, and I suppose I’ll tell Curufin and Ambarussa when next I see them. I just don’t—it’ll get their hopes up even if they try to say it won’t.”

“Doesn’t Elrond always say it’s never wrong to hope?”

“Yes, and I know he’s not wrong, I just—I can’t do it. Not for this.”

Calissë darted into the room then, and climbed onto the bed. “Uncle Cáno, can I go with you to Taur-en-Gellam?”

Maglor blinked at her, startled. “Well, I certainly wouldn’t mind,” he said, “but that’s a question for Daeron—and more importantly, your parents.”

“It would be an adventure!”

“It certainly would,” Maglor agreed as Maedhros laughed, “but I’m not going to steal you away for one without permission. Your mother would come drag me back to Tirion by my ears, and that would not be fun for anyone. Besides, we’ll be there all through the winter at least, and that’s a very long time for you to be away from home.”

“I’m big enough!” Calissë protested. “And I asked Daeron already and he thinks it’s a good idea!”

“Someone can come get her if she decides she wants to come home early, or gets homesick,” Maedhros said.

“I won’t get homesick!”

“I’m not the one that needs convincing,” Maglor said. “And Daeron will certainly agree with me that we need to ask Curvo and Rundamírë first.”

Downstairs they found Daeron with Celegorm in the kitchen, the latter scowling with green-tinged hands and his hair still a pale shade of it, damp and tangled from rough scrubbing. Daeron had a comb in his hands, carefully tugging it through the snarls. “Look on the bright side,” he was saying as Maglor followed Maedhros and Calissë into the room.

“I’m not sure I want to know what your idea of a bright side is,” Celegorm muttered. He glared at Maglor. “Not a word, Cáno.”

“I wasn’t going to say anything!”

“The bright side,” Daeron said, “is that Caranthir was kind enough to wait until Aredhel left.”

“It’s also almost washed out already,” Maedhros said. “Whatever you two are fighting about, please don’t try to escalate it.”

“We aren’t fighting!” Celegorm protested.

“Whatever you want to call it, then,” Maedhros said. “I don’t want to be caught in the crossfire.”

Voices from outside drifted in through the window, and Celegorm groaned, leaning forward to bury his face in his arms. In the process he yanked the comb out of Daeron’s hands. “That’s Atya!” Calissë exclaimed, and ran out into the garden. “Atya, come see Uncle Tyelko’s hair!”

“Could be worse,” Maglor said as he sat down at the table by Celegorm, who grunted. “It’ll wash out, and you don’t have to cut any of it.”

Calissë returned with Curufin in tow. “What’s this about Tyelko’s—stars above, what happened?”

“Moryo happened,” Celegorm said into his arms. “And Lisgalen.”

Curufin covered his mouth with a hand, eyes crinkling as he struggled not to laugh. “What did you do to deserve it?”

“Nothing!”

“Come on, sit up,” Daeron said. “I can’t do anything with you slumped over like that.” Celegorm obeyed, and Daeron set about parting his hair for braiding. “It could be much worse, you know. This shade of green is rather pretty.”

Rundamírë came inside then, Náriel on her hip, and burst into laughter at seeing Celegorm. Náriel also thought green hair the funniest thing in the world, and in the face of the children’s laughter Maglor could see Celegorm’s annoyance start to ebb away, even though his face remained flushed and blotchy.

A little while later, Maglor was able to get Curufin alone. “Is this about your song?” Curufin asked as they walked out into the orchard, where it was quiet with the harvest being nearly done.

“Partly,” Maglor said. He spotted two plums that had been missed, and reached up to pick them. He handed one to Curufin. “You don’t have to talk to me about Finwë if you don’t want to.”

Curufin turned the plum over in his hands as they walked. “I remember when we went to Formenos, how worried I was,” he said after a moment. “I was terrified, actually—I saw what Atya was becoming and I’d already followed him in so many other ways. I don’t know if it was just my imagination or if the rest of you could see it too—”

“I was worried about you because I could see how worried you were,” Maglor said. “I just didn’t know what to do about it.”

“There wasn’t really anything anyone could do, was there? But Grandfather just…treated me as he always had. Like I was my own person and not just a copy of Atya, like…like he didn’t have any worries about what I would do at all. He was wrong, but…it meant a lot at the time.” He didn’t look up from the plum in his hands. “I wish I’d gone to learn woodworking from him. I just—wood didn’t interest me as much as gemcraft, and I didn’t think…”

“None of us did.” Maglor rubbed his thumb over the smooth skin of his own plum. “Calissë’s interested in wood, by the way. She’ll want to show you all the things we’ve made together over the last few weeks.”

Curufin laughed, though he also had to reach up to wipe his eyes. “I’m glad.”

“She also wants to go with Daeron and me to Taur-en-Gellam. Neither of us have any objections, but I told her it would be up to you and Rundamírë.”

“I’m not really surprised. She’s been itching for more adventures ever since we got back from Lórien. I remember being her age and wanting very desperately to be allowed to go off with you and Nelyo whenever you went wandering.”

“I know I joke about stealing your children away for adventures,” Maglor said, “but I really wouldn’t do such a thing, and I wouldn’t ever take them anywhere at all dangerous.”

“Oh, I know that. I don’t mind the jokes—I’m just glad you’re able to tease me about things again. As for Taur-en-Gellam…how long do you intend to stay there?”

“Through the winter at least. Daeron has errands to run come springtime, and if Calissë is with us I’ll go back with her to Imloth Ningloron. Of course I can change those plans if Calissë decides she wants to return home sooner.”

“I’ll speak to Arimeldë about it. If we do decide she can go, we’ll impress on her that she can’t just decide to come back in the middle of winter. It would be a miserable journey for her even if it isn’t so terribly far, and it isn’t fair to disrupt plans you’ve already made.”

“It’s up to you,” Maglor said. “I just wanted to tell you first, away from Náriel’s ears.”

“Thank you. Náriel isn’t quite so keen on adventures, though. She’ll be disappointed at being left out, but that’s easy enough to distract her from. And you really don’t mind if Calissë comes with you?”

“Of course not. If I didn’t like the idea I would have led with that, and if Daeron didn’t he would have already come up with an excuse to discourage Calissë. But it won’t break our hearts either if you say no. She is still young.”

“I think Arimeldë will be more willing to let her go than me, honestly,” Curufin said after a few minutes. They came to the river where it flowed past the very edge of the orchard. “But that’s just because I worry more than I should. There’s nothing dangerous between here and Taur-en-Gellam, and even if there was, I know you’d protect her—no one better. When are you going to leave?”

“Sometime soon, while the weather is still fine and warm.”

They sat under one of the plum trees at the water’s edge and ate their fruit in companionable silence, listening to the water and to the birds in the trees behind them and the fields in front of them. Distantly, Maglor heard someone laughing—one of their brothers—and then a child’s shriek. Beside him Curufin winced. Maglor wrapped an arm around his shoulders. “You’re a good father, Curvo. You always have been.”

“I tried,” Curufin said softly, “but it—it wasn’t possible to be a good father and to follow the Oath. Or to be a good father and to be what I thought was a good son.”

“You kept Tyelpë from the worst of it.”

“The worst of us, maybe. But he’s still—I can tell that he wants to do the kind of work he used to, that he used to love. He just can’t, anymore, and it’s—I don’t know how to help.”

“You’re here,” Maglor said. “You love him. You don’t have to do anything more than that unless he asks for it.”

“It feels like there should be something more that I could be doing.”

“I know. Elrond kept asking me the same question when I first went to Rivendell—what else he could do.”

“Was there?”

“No.”

Curufin lifted his head to look at Maglor with narrowed eyes. “Would you have said so even if there was?” he asked.

Maglor laughed a little. “Not in the beginning, no. But there really wasn’t. Rivendell was safe—the safest place in Middle-earth, maybe—and I knew from the moment I arrived that I was cared for and wanted there. That was enough. That and Elrond’s frankly astonishing capacity for hope.”

“I don’t think I can give Tyelpë that.”

“I don’t think Tyelpë needs that from you. He just needs you, and he’s got you.”

Curufin sat up fully, frowning again. “Do you think that’s what our father needs—his father, I mean?”

“I don’t know. Maybe. I know it was very hard for him to speak to me of Finwë—but he said that he misses him, badly. And I remember what it was like right after Finwë died.” Maglor paused, and then said, “That’s what this song is for.”

“What?”

“The real reason Míriel and Indis asked me to write of Finwë. They want me to perform it first before the Valar, when it’s done.”

Curufin stared at him uncomprehendingly. “But—why? What would—”

“They think it might do more to move them than their own arguments have.”

“They think—” Curufin’s jaw went slack in astonishment. “And you agreed?”

“What else was I supposed to do?”

“But—but Cáno, they aren’t going to listen. Not after all this time, not after so many others have begged and pleaded. Even Ingwë went before them, and they gave no answer!”

“I know.” Maglor looked out over the water, watching a few leaves drift by on the current. “But Míriel thinks they will listen to this, and so does Elrond. This part of it isn’t meant to be known though, Curvo. I’m only telling you because Moryo and Tyelko know now, and it feels wrong to keep secrets from all of you. Whatever happens, though, please don’t tell Atya.”

“Why not?”

“I don’t want him to start to hope only for nothing to change. It would break his heart.”

“It’s already broken,” Curufin said quietly, “but I know what you mean. He won’t hear of it from me.” He leaned back on his hands, frowning at the water. “Is this why you’re avoiding him until you’re done?”

“In part. It’s also just that—there’s so much else we need to speak of, and I can’t do it yet. Not while this is hanging over me. Amras says he told Atya that, and that he understands.”

“He does—if anyone understands getting so caught up in your work that you can’t spare a thought for anything else, it’s Atya.”

“It’s not quite that bad for me, but close enough.”

When they returned to the house Curufin went to speak to Rundamírë about Calissë’s desire for adventure, and at dinner, Curufin and Rundamírë told Calissë that yes, she would be allowed to go with Daeron and Maglor to Taur-en-Gellam. This was followed by a series of instructions from Rundamírë that Maglor wasn’t certain Calissë heard in the throes of her joy. Náriel demanded to know why she couldn’t also go, but was very quickly mollified by promises from Curufin for more time spent with him in his workshop and forge. “Are you sure you can handle her alone, Macalaurë?” Nerdanel asked. Maglor was seated next to her near the head of the table. “Calissë can be rather spirited.”

“Daeron will be there too. And anyway, I handled Elrond and Elros. Calissë can’t be that bad—at the very least, she’s unlikely to bite me.”

Across the table Maedhros nearly choked on a piece of bread. “I forgot about that,” he said when he recovered enough to catch his breath. “I think I learned three new curses that day.”

“Did you just say Elrond bit you?” Celegorm asked from Maedhros’ other side.

“No, it was Elros.”

“Who grew up to be a great king of Men,” Daeron added, “so you must have done something right.”

“Either way, Calissë can’t be that wild,” Maglor said, smiling at Nerdanel.

“No, not quite,” Nerdanel said, laughing. “But she is her father’s daughter, and he was prone to wandering off at that age—following butterflies or rabbits. We couldn’t take him anywhere without at least one frantic search through the grass or the bushes—”

“I wasn’t that bad,” Curufin protested.

“No, you were worse,” said Caranthir. Curufin opened his mouth to argue, but Celegorm chimed in to agree, and started telling stories about all the times Curufin had wandered away when he was a child, to the great amusement of Rundamírë and the fascination of both Calissë and Náriel. In the end Rundamírë extracted a promise from Calissë to not wander off, whatever interesting things she saw on the journey, and to stay close to Maglor and Daeron at all times.

They left a week later. “I’ll write as soon as we arrive,” Maglor promised Curufin as he embraced him. “And I’ll see you next spring in Imloth Ningloron.”

Maedhros hugged Maglor a little more tightly than Maglor had expected. “Good luck,” he said. “See you in the spring.”

“Take care of yourself, Maedhros.”

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Maedhros was never surprised when someone came looking for him out by the willows, but he was surprised to look up and see Curufin rather than Celegorm or Caranthir. Curufin seemed to have his hands too full these days to worry too much about Maedhros—which was how Maedhros liked it—but he looked worried about something, now. “What’s wrong?” Maedhros asked, flipping his sketchbook shut. He had been sketching his hand with its pattern of scars, having started to draw without really thinking about it, and was fairly certain that would count as brooding, whichever brother saw it.

“Maglor told me what Míriel wants him to do with this song.” Curufin sat down next to Maedhros and leaned against him. “Why would she ask such a thing of him? It seems cruel.”

“Desperation, maybe. It seems they’ve tried everything else. I don’t think either Míriel or Indis meant to be cruel.”

“But he doesn’t—I don’t believe that Lórien cured him of all his fears, not the way he wants everyone to think. He was shaking after he sang before the court in Tirion.”

“But he did sing,” Maedhros said.

“After hardly eating anything beforehand, and snapping at Amrod over dinner.”

Maedhros sighed, and wrapped his arm around Curufin, resting his cheek against his hair. “Don’t try to talk him out of it, Curvo. It won’t work and you’ll just make him feel worse than he does.”

“No, I won’t. But he doesn’t even believe it will work.”

“He doesn’t, but I think Elrond does. I think Daeron does.” There had been something about the way Daeron had paused after Maglor had first told the two of them of Míriel’s request, something about the way he had seemed to be listening for something, or in the light that had glinted in his eyes for a moment. It was as though he could hear the Music itself—and not just hear it, but understand what it meant. It had been the first time Maedhros had looked at Daeron and seen someone truly powerful, in the same way Galadriel was, or perhaps one of the Vanyar who lived close to the Valar upon Taniquetil. He’d known it already, but had never had any occasion to see it, and it had been as unsettling as it was reassuring.

“Does that mean you do too?” Curufin asked.

“I don’t know, but I know better than to ignore someone like Elrond. And Maglor would not be so set on completing this song if he didn’t also feel it was important, whatever happens. He could have said no, when Míriel asked him. He could still change his mind, but I don’t think he will.”

Curufin was silent for a little while. Down the river Huan barked, and Maedhros heard splashing. Across the river in the wide fields a flock of birds erupted out of the grass in a cacophony of cries and fluttering wings. Nearer at hand a blackbird sang somewhere in another nearby willow tree. Finally, Curufin said, “He doesn’t want Atar to know—but it won’t be possible to keep it a secret after he actually performs before the Valar.”

“Why doesn’t he want Atar to know?”

“He’s afraid of what will happen if Atar gets his hopes up, only for the Valar to refuse again.”

Maedhros’ mind went immediately to the way Fëanor had fallen apart at the doors of Formenos, to the way Maedhros had been so afraid that he would die of grief then and there—only he hadn’t. He had just hardened, and that had been so much worse. “What does he think will happen?”

“Nothing like what you’re thinking. Just—more heartbreak.”

“If you don’t want to keep it secret—”

“No, I agree with him. It’s the fact that it cannot stay secret forever that worries me.”

“I’m sorry you’re still caught in the middle, Curvo,” Maedhros said quietly.

“I don’t mind. It was only really hard when Tyelko was angry with me over it. I’m worried for him, too—I just wish he’d tell me why he’s still so upset.”

“I think it runs deeper than just what happened at the end,” Maedhros said after a moment, remembering how Celegorm had avoided Míriel the year before when she’d first come to Imloth Ningloron, and the way he just looked hurt whenever Fëanor’s name was mentioned, instead of angry like he used to. Maedhros hadn’t tried to ask him about it, but now he thought maybe he should.

“Is it something like that holding you back too?” Curufin asked.

“No. It’s just—some things can’t be taken back after they’re spoken aloud, and I don’t know how to let it go.”

“You mean what he said at Losgar? He asked me about it before he left Tirion.”

“Yes.” Curufin hadn’t been there when Fëanor had spewed his rage at Maedhros after the ships were set aflame. Maglor had been nearby, but no one else knew just what was said, and Maedhros did not want to share. Their guesses would be close enough, though perhaps not on the mark; they all knew how angry Fëanor had been then, as though he’d forgotten it was possible to be anything else.

“I think he regrets that more than anything,” Curufin said after a few moments. “Burning the ships.”

“He told me he doesn’t even remember it clearly.”

“That’s not the same as not remembering it at all. He’ll have looked for it in the palantír too. I think if we hadn’t given it to him he would’ve had the idea himself eventually—he wants to know everything that happened, I think especially the parts he was there for but can’t really remember. We haven’t spoken much of what he’s seen, yet. I’m hoping he’ll open up more to Ambarussa.” Curufin paused, and then said, “You and Atya are still a lot alike, you know.” Maedhros flinched. “Sorry. I just mean that he’s unhappy in the same way you were unhappy for so long. He’s just better at hiding it in front of other people. I’m not sure even Fingolfin knows how unhappy he is.”

“Are they so close that Atar would let him see?”

“I think you would be surprised.” Curufin sat up, crossing his legs and facing Maedhros. He was frowning; there was something pinched and worried in the expression, tense around his eyes. “I just—I don’t know what to do.”

“I don’t think there’s anything more you have to do,” said Maedhros. “There’s nothing broken that’s your responsibility to fix.”

“I’m good at fixing things, though—or I used to be.”

Maedhros sighed. This was all so much more complicated than the broken clasp of a necklace or a gem that needed a new setting. “That doesn’t make it your responsibility to fix everything. Are you just worried about Calissë, that everything else suddenly seems bigger than it is?”

“Of course I’m worried about Calissë. I’m always worried about all my children, and she’s never been so far from us before, let alone for so long a time. But if she’s not safe with Cáno, she isn’t safe with anyone. I’m more worried about you, and that’s not new. It feels like there should be something I can—”

“Curvo.” Maedhros leaned forward to put his hand on the back of Curufin’s head, and to press their foreheads together. “I’m fine,” he said. “I don’t need you to do anything more than what you’re already doing. Just be my brother, and let me be yours. If I need something more, I promise I’ll tell you.”

Curufin reached for Maedhros’ sketchbook and flipped it open to the most recent drawing. “You’re fine, really?”

“If I wasn’t, it wouldn’t be my hand that I was drawing.” Maedhros took the book back. “If you start hovering over me like Celegorm was hovering over Maglor in Tirion, I’ll throw you into the river.”

“No you won’t.” Curufin pushed himself back and got to his feet. “You’d have to catch me first.”

It was a clear dare, and Maedhros sighed again, putting on a show of rolling his eyes. Then he lunged to his feet, only narrowly missing Curufin as he slipped out from under the willow, already laughing. Curufin was quick, but Maedhros had longer legs, and he caught Curufin up around the waist just as they came within sight of Nerdanel’s house. “Wait, wait, no I take it back—!” Curufin yelped as Maedhros swung around and sent him tumbling into the water. It was shallow, the current lazy, and Curufin sat up, spluttering, with water streaming out of his hair. Huan came charging out of the fields on the other side of the river to splash around Curufin and then to bound out of the water to drench Maedhros when he shook himself off.

“Feel better?” Maedhros asked as he waded into the water to give Curufin a hand up. If it had been Celegorm he wouldn’t have tried—Celegorm would have pulled him down into the water with him; Curufin wasn’t heavy enough to get that kind of leverage.

“I feel wet,” Curufin said. Maedhros hauled him up onto his feet. “Do you feel better?”

“I told you before, I’m fine.”

The wind picked up as they wrung out their clothes, and Curufin shivered. “You’ll have to come up with another threat; it’s too cold to be throwing everyone into the river.”

“The cold makes it even better.”

Nerdanel shook her head at them when they turned up still dripping. “Again? Aren’t you all too old for this sort of thing?” she asked.

“He started it,” Maedhros and Curufin chorused, each pointing at the other.

“Oh, just go get changed, and stop dripping all over my kitchen—and I’d better not see either of you tomorrow with different colored hair!”

“We aren’t fighting!” Curufin said as he headed upstairs.

“No one ever believes me when I say I’ll throw them in the river,” Maedhros added, stopping to kiss Nerdanel’s cheek. “So I have to sometimes follow through.”

“If you say so,” Nerdanel said, lips twitching as she tried very hard to pretend to be stern. “Go on, then. And Tyelkormo tells me that hedgehogs hibernate over the winter, so he’s in your room preparing a little den for Aechen.”

Celegorm glanced up from the hedgehog den he was constructing in the corner of Maedhros’ room, near the hearth, and raised an eyebrow. “Isn’t it a little cold for wading around in the river?”

“No,” Maedhros said as he stripped off his shirt. “Too cold will be when there’s ice.”

“That body has never lived at Himring.”

“Neither had my other one when I first went there. Where’s Aechen?”

“Outside somewhere with Náriel, I think. What were you doing in the river?”

“Fishing Curvo out after I threw him in.”

“What did he do?”

“Same thing I’m always threatening to throw the rest of you in the river for.” Once he had changed into dry clothes Maedhros sat on his bed to watch as Celegorm finished constructing Aachen’s little den. “Thanks for that.”

“He could make himself a cozy little place somewhere, but this way we’ll all know where he is and that he’s warm enough.” Celegorm sat back on his heels. “Was Curvo worrying at you?”

“Not too badly. He’s more worried about Cáno, I think. It’s just that Cáno isn’t here and I am.”

Autumn wound on. Maedhros spent many afternoons watching the yellow willow leaves drop down into the river to be carried away, and then he started a painting of it. Painting water was very hard, but he didn’t hate the result. Náriel decided that she wanted to learn to paint, so Curufin made her a small easel to set up beside Maedhros’, and Maedhros supplied her with brushes and paints. She had a wonderful time smearing color all over her canvas, bright and clashing streaks of it. Rundamírë also came out to Maedhros’ studio to investigate his shelves, making a note of the colors he used most. Her particular talent lay in paints and inks and pigments, and she’d been the one to supply almost all of his paints when the studio had first been set up. “I didn’t make this, though,” she remarked, pulling one of the jars of ithildin out from where Maedhros had pushed it into a back corner. “Did Telperinquar give you this? It looks like his work.”

“Yes.” Maedhros glanced at it. “He and my father made it.”

“Ah.” Rundamírë set it back on the shelf, understanding without having to ask any other questions.

“It’s pretty!” Náriel said, darting over to stand on her toes to peer at it. “Why don’t you use it, Uncle Nelyo?”

Maedhros had to bite back the first few replies that came to his mind. “I just haven’t painted anything yet that needs to shine like that,” he said finally. “Maybe someday I will.”

“You could paint stars on your ceiling,” Náriel said. “Tyelpë did that in our bedrooms! It’s so pretty at night, and he taught us all the constellations and the stories—”

“Maybe,” Maedhros said, smiling at her. It was a nice idea, but Maedhros wasn’t sure he would ever be able to fall asleep with something his father had made hovering over his head like that, even if the painted designs were his own. Sometimes it was hard even to glance toward the horizon in the evening or at dawn, when Gil-Estel shone so brightly.

“If you want more of it, Tyelpë would be glad to make you some,” Rundamírë said.

“I know. Thank you—but I really don’t know yet what I’d use it for.”

Rundamírë ushered Náriel out of the studio, telling her to go find Curufin for help washing the paint off of her hands and arms and face. Then she turned back to Maedhros. “Did Curufinwë ever tell you what Fëanáro’s gift to him was?” she asked.

“No.” None of them had really spoken of their gifts. Maedhros knew that Caranthir had a glass ornament with a flower inside it, but not what anyone else had received. He didn’t even know what Maglor had.

“A box of gems that he’d made,” Rundamírë said, “but all the flawed ones—the mistakes he was making as he began to re-learn how to do it.”

Maedhros didn’t know what to do with that. His father did not make mistakes—not in his craft, certainly not in gemcraft, and if he did he did not share them. “Why are you telling me this?” he asked.

“He did not know how to make Tyelpë’s ithildin, either. So he asked to be taught. I don’t know about you, but hearing those things made me wonder if it was really Fëanáro that had returned from Mandos.”

“I know that he’s different now,” Maedhros said. He’d known too that Celebrimbor and Fëanor had made the ithildin together, and that it had made Celebrimbor incredibly happy—to be his grandfather’s peer, to be a teacher too instead of only a student.

“It goes deeper than just that the fire of his rage has guttered out,” Rundamírë said. “I would be lying if I tried to tell you I did not still distrust it, but his pride has softened, and that makes me almost ready to believe absolutely anything is possible.”

Rundamírë left, and Maedhros looked back at his own painting—another try at water, flowing around the willow roots. He suddenly had no heart for it, and went to clean up his paints and brushes. Náriel’s painting he set aside, with the others she had made; he would ask his grandfather to make frames for them and then send them to Tirion sometime, to surprise her. After a moment he moved one aside a little, so he would remember that he wanted to keep it—he had plenty of room on the walls of his studio, and it was a bright splash of color, pink and yellow and blue, that wasn’t trying to be anything except a child having fun, and he liked it far better than anything he’d yet tried to make.

The problem of his father niggled at the back of his mind as he washed his brushes, watching the water turn blue then green then muddy brown. Everyone thought—not entirely incorrectly—that he was just afraid. But it wasn’t that, or it wasn’t that he really thought that Fëanor would revert suddenly to who he had been at the end. It wasn’t even that Maedhros did not believe his remorse and regret were genuine. It was just—

Fëanor never said anything he did not mean. His faults lay not in falsehood but in too much truth. Everyone said so, and Maedhros had long known it. He might not think or believe the things he had said after Losgar now, but there was a time that he had, and that meant there might come a time in the future when he would think similarly. Maedhros felt stronger now than he had in many years; he did not fear coming face to face with his father anymore—or at least, he was trying to tell himself that he didn’t, and most of the time he believed it. But he was not strong enough to risk learning what it would take to earn anything like that kind of ire again.

Fingers dug suddenly into his ribs and Maedhros yelped, dropping his brushes into the basin with a small splash. “You were wearing your brooding face,” Caranthir said as he took a step back and to the side, out of reach of any swing Maedhros might take at him. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing.” This, of course, earned him a deeply skeptical look. Maedhros sighed. “Nothing I want to talk about.”

Caranthir, fortunately, was not Celegorm, and didn’t push once he had as much truth as Maedhros was willing to share. “All right,” he said. “I like that,” he added, nodding to the partly-finished painting on the easel. “Is it getting easier?”

“I think so.” Maedhros glanced at Caranthir, who had himself been quiet and withdrawn lately. “Are you all right?” he asked.

“Fine. Why wouldn’t I be?”

“Moryo.”

“It’s nothing I want to talk about.”

“All right.” Maedhros dried off his hand and hugged Caranthir close for a moment. “Tell me if there’s anything I can do.”

“I will.”

When they returned to the house they found Rundamírë with a letter. Maglor had sent a starling with a quick note to say they had arrived safely in Taur-en-Gellam, and now a longer letter had arrived with more detail. “Calissë has decided she wants to learn to play the harp,” Rundamírë was saying to Curufin and Lisgalen as Maedhros and Caranthir stepped into the kitchen. “I think Maglor is even happier about it than she is. She also did very well when introduced to Thingol and Melian.” She paused. “And Olwë and his wife, and Ingwë and his wife—goodness, I’m surprised your aunt and uncle aren’t also there, if they’re gathering all the kings and queens together.”

“Did she really do well, or is Maglor just being reassuring?” Curufin asked, reaching for the letter.

“I can only report what he actually wrote, Curufinwë,” Rundamírë laughed. “I have no trouble believing that Calissë is behaving perfectly, unless you and your brothers have been teaching her otherwise when I’m not there.”

“Cáno would’ve turned it into a funny story if anything had gone sideways,” said Caranthir, “and I don’t think we need to worry about Thingol or Olwë or Ingwë being offended by Calissë. Especially not with Maglor and Daeron there.”

It wasn’t long after that that Curufin, Rundamírë, and Náriel returned to Tirion. At the same time a letter came for Maedhros—not from Maglor, or Fingon, or even Finrod, but from Elrond. He wrote of meeting with Maeglin—awkward but less fraught than might have been expected—and of Gil-galad, and of his and Celebrían’s plans to spend the winter quietly in Avallónë. The letter ended with an invitation to visit them there, or else to come to Imloth Ningloron sometime after they had all returned home.

Maedhros had not intended to travel anywhere for some time; he was quite happy at home, settled back into his own routines and his own rooms. But at the same time he didn’t feel as though he could really turn down such an invitation. Not from Elrond, who had been so firmly kind and so determined that the two of them should come to know one another properly, now that they could both leave the past where it belonged. He found, too, that he didn’t even want to. So when he wrote his reply he said, at the end, I have not visited Eressëa since I returned from Mandos; I would be very glad to join you there for at least part of the winter.

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The weather was fine for travel, the nights cool but not yet too cold and the days warm and bright. Daeron and Maglor spent those days teaching Calissë all the travelings songs they each had learned in Middle-earth, and answering her many questions about where exactly they had learned them, and about the flowers and birds and beasts that she spotted on their own journey. She wanted to know everything, and every answer they gave her only produced more questions. The journey to Taur-en-Gellam was not long anyway, and it passed quickly and cheerfully.

They came to the forest late in the evening, having not wanted to stop and camp in the woods when only another hour or so would bring them to proper beds. Calissë was tired enough that Maglor had lifted her off of her pony into the saddle with him, and tucked his cloak around her so she could drift off against his chest. He hummed quiet songs as they rode, one hand on the reins and the other securely around Calissë. “Ah, too bad it’s dark,” Daeron murmured as the road led them through a grove of trees towering above them, pale silver and seeming to shimmer faintly in the growing darkness. Maglor tilted his head back to look up into the shadowy canopy, knowing the leaves were silver too, seen from beneath, and maybe just starting to turn golden at the edges. Mellyrn. He hadn’t seen such a grove since he’d left Lothlórien.

The folk of Taur-en-Gellam lived in a combination of houses high in the branches, such as the Galadhrim in Lothlórien, and in more traditional homes built upon the ground, often against or around trees that grew into a part of the structure itself. Mablung’s was one such house, sprawling and climbing around the trunk of an enormous beech. Daeron had said before that Beleg also lived there, when he wasn’t away wandering the forests, in addition to Mablung’s parents and himself. It was empty when they arrived. “They’ll all be at some dinner or event or something,” Daeron said. “There’s feasting and dancing and music somewhere most nights.”

Maglor set Calissë down. She yawned, but looked around curiously. “Will they be back late?” Maglor asked.

“Almost certainly—unless Melian mentions our arrival to them. We certainly did not come entirely unnoticed. Come on. The kitchen is this way, and then I’ll go find out which room my aunt has chosen for Calissë.”

After they ate a meal that wasn’t traveling rations, Daeron drew a bath for Calissë, and then he and Maglor took their bags upstairs to the bedrooms. Pídhres vanished to explore the house and make herself at home. Calissë’s room was just across the hall from Daeron’s. Daeron’s room was only slightly smaller than the room they shared at Imloth Ningloron, and cluttered with instruments and books, though it was all neatly arranged, down to the piles of paper and parchment on his desk. There was a balcony too, full of pots and boxes with flowering plants and green twining vines, though they were all starting to go to seed with the autumn.

“Tomorrow will be busy,” Daeron said as he dropped his bags at the foot of the bed. He hesitated a moment before adding, “I think it is likely that Galathil will come seeking you even before we are called before Thingol.”

“I hadn’t forgotten,” Maglor said. “I just don’t want Calissë present for that meeting.”

“Of course—Aunt Lacheryn will keep her busy. Do you want me there?”

“I would like it if you were at least nearby,” Maglor said. He set his own bags down. “But whatever Galathil has to say to me, he has the right to say it—you do not need to interfere.”

“I don’t think he wants to berate you,” said Daeron.

“Still.”

A little while later, as Maglor helped Calissë get ready for bed after her bath she asked, hesitantly, “Uncle Cáno, if I wake up scared can I come find you?”

“Of course, sweetheart.” Maglor kissed the top of her head as he finished braiding her hair. “We’re right across the hall. You can always come find me if you’re scared, or even if you just don’t want to be alone. Do you want a story before you go to sleep?”

“Yes, please!”

Maglor did not see any of Daeron’s family until the next morning; they had not returned home until well after he and Daeron had gone to bed themselves. At breakfast Mablung and his parents greeted all three of them cheerfully, though Daeron immediately dragged Mablung away to berate him in private. “If Daeron lets poor Mablung get a word in edgewise,” Lacheryn laughed as she poured tea for Maglor and Calissë, “he’ll learn that Mablung did write to him of his siblings—only the letter never got sent because he thought Beleg had taken it and Beleg thought Mablung had, and it wasn’t found until last week under a sofa. And we didn’t bother to write ourselves because we thought Daeron was here in Taur-en-Gellam until Mablung wrote to us to say he’d already passed on the news—and I hate writing, anyway, which drives Daeron to distraction.”

“Why not mention them in his first letter?” Maglor asked.

“Oh, he didn’t know. He left too soon after we found Aldalëo—called back here by Thingol for something, I cannot remember what—and I’m afraid that first meeting was taken up by arguments over what was or was not done and what we all thought should have been done—the Great Journey was a source of strife from its first proposal, so it isn’t so surprising, even if it is rather late.”

“Did you not wish to come west?” Maglor asked.

“I did not wish to be parted from my brother,” Lacheryn said with a rueful smile. “And then it seemed—well, there were signs that pointed to a worse fate than what seems to have truly befallen both Aldalëo and Escelírë, and I am very glad that we were wrong, but there seemed no point in coming here to await those who would likely never join us, especially not with Thingol lost, and Elmo so certain that he would be found. Still, it wasn’t as easy a choice as it might seem from the outside. Oh, but speaking of brothers—” Lacheryn broke off and shook her head when Daeron’s voice rose in surprise in the other room. “Simpalírë is here with us,” she finished.

“Are Daeron’s parents or sisters going to visit this winter?”

“Perhaps. Escelírë almost certainly will, but I doubt Netyalossë or Vinyelírë will come; they’re busy with families of their own—and Vinyelírë is expecting again.”

“Honestly, is it so hard to just tell me things?” Daeron said as he returned to the kitchen, Simpalírë and Mablung in tow. “Am I going to find an extra third-cousin-twice-removed under my bed later this evening, Aunt Lacheryn?”

“Not unless Mablung has been keeping some very big secrets,” said Lacheryn, as Calissë giggled. “Good morning, Simpalírë. Don’t mind your brother; he’s always particularly dramatic before breakfast.”

“Just like Netyalossë,” Simpalírë said, and Daeron made a face. “Good morning, Macalaurë.”

“Good morning,” Maglor said, and introduced Calissë. Simpalírë looked quite startled to discover that Maglor had a niece, but he recovered quickly, and Calissë was fascinated to learn that Daeron had a brother and sisters of his own—and a niece, too, with a name very similar to her own: Calindë was Netyalossë’s daughter, and only a handful of years older than Calissë herself. Breakfast was a calmer affair than it was at Nerdanel’s house, and quieter than a place like Imloth Ningloron, though still full of chatter and laughter and exchanging of news and gossip. Afterward, Maglor had nothing to do but await Thingol’s pleasure—and Olwë’s, and Ingwë’s, he learned from a stray comment of Mablung’s.

“When did Ingwë arrive?” Daeron asked, also startled.

“The day before yesterday,” said Belthond, “so you cannot get annoyed with us for not warning you.”

“I wouldn’t be annoyed with you, Uncle!” Daeron protested. “Only Mablung!” Mablung reached over to yank on his braid, making Daeron yelp and Calissë giggle.

After breakfast Lacheryn took Calissë upstairs to find something to wear that would be suitable for meeting three Elvenkings. Maglor went to change into the clothes he’d worn when he had first gone to the palace in Tirion—the black tunic that Arwen had made and embroidered, and the shirt and pants that matched it best. Daeron followed after a little while to change his own clothes. “Does it change anything that Ingwë is here too?” he asked.

“Well, it means I don’t have to make the trip to Valmar,” said Maglor. “I’m not terribly nervous about meeting him—he isn't a stranger.”

“No, only the High King of all the Eldar.”

“At least before the Darkening that was more of a courtesy than anything,” Maglor said. “I suppose he had the authority, but he never tried to wield it, or to overrule Finwë or Olwë. Mostly he was just my grandfather’s dear friend, and Indis’ brother. How little can I get away with here in the way of jewelry?”

Daeron laughed. “You got away with far less than the Noldor usually wear in Tirion,” he said. “Here, let me.” He swiftly wove a handful of slender braids back from Maglor’s temples, and then wove them together into a single braid secured with a silver clasp; then he went to pull out the jewelry box that Maglor had tossed into his bag without much thought when packing to leave Imloth Ningloron. “Have you any circlets in here? Ah, this one is nice.” He drew out a silver one that he carefully secured amongst the braids. “Very handsome.” Maglor made a face so that Daeron would laugh. “You can get away with an awful lot in the way of personal style, though, if you’re known to be a bit eccentric. That’s what I do. No one will pay much mind if you eschew gems and circlets outside of formal occasions after today.”

“There’s eccentric and then there’s whatever my reputation is. There’s a necklace in there that goes well with this tunic—silver and white gold. Yes, that one.”

“No bracelets or arm bands?” Daeron asked as he looked through the jewelry box.

“I’m not very fond of them, and there’s no point when I always wear long sleeves.”

“Very few rings, either.”

“I can really only wear them on my left hand.” The scar tissue on the fingers of his right hand wasn’t thick enough to hinder him, but it sometimes made wearing rings uncomfortable—and Maglor had never liked to wear many rings anyway, especially when he played music, so it was no real loss. “Will someone come to fetch us to Thingol, or…?”

“He’ll be holding court this afternoon, so unless he wishes to meet you beforehand, we’ll go and be announced, and everyone will stare and be utterly charmed by Calissë, and then the king will get on with the rest of the day’s business, and that will be that. We’ll have to dine with the court tonight, and you’ll be given a seat at the high table as a guest of honor, especially with Ingwë and Olwë here—you being a member of the Noldorin royal family.”

Maglor made another face. “What about you?”

“Me, seated with all the kings and princes?” Daeron laughed. “I’m high in Thingol’s favor but not that high! Don’t worry—I’ll be close by. Here, this ring is nice—wear this. You need to look suitably Noldorin at least for today.”

They returned downstairs after Daeron dressed, and found Mablung in the large and bright parlor with another guest—one Maglor at first mistook for Celeborn. Of course it was not Celeborn, who was off with Galadriel and her family welcoming Aegnor back—it was Galathil. He was also dressed for court, resplendent with his silver hair wound through with pearls, in fine robes of soft purple and blue. Mablung exchanged a glance with Daeron and then excused himself.

Maglor had not even tried to rehearse what he might say to Galathil when they met. “My lord,” he said now, and stepped forward to kneel before Galathil.

“Prince Maglor,” Galathil said, and stepped forward in his turn to take Maglor’s hands and raise him to his feet. “There is no need for this. I have not come here to make any demands of you.”

“You would be well within your rights,” Maglor said. He met Galathil’s gaze, finding pale green eyes not unlike Celebrían’s. He did not remember how or when they had come face to face in the caves of Menegroth—it had been all chaos and smoke, and nearly everyone had worn a helm or something else that obscured their features.

“But it would serve no purpose,” said Galathil. He had not released Maglor’s right hand, and turned it palm up to reveal the scars. “You were punished enough, I think—more than enough, when I remember all that my brother has told me.”

“I am sorry,” Maglor said quietly. It wasn’t enough, but it was all he had to offer, especially if Galathil refused to ask anything else of him.

“And I forgive you.” Galathil smiled, looking even more like Celebrían, speaking as though it really could be just that simple. “Neither of us wanted to be there, when last we came face to face. Now we can put it all behind us where it belongs, and move forward—I would like to do so in friendship, not least for my brother’s sake, and my grandchildren’s.”

Whatever Maglor had expected, it wasn’t this—not anything like friendship. He understood very well, suddenly, why Celegorm always looked so startled when Dior’s name was spoken, and he wondered if this was where Dior had gotten his own ideas. “I would like that,” he said, but the words came out sounding uncertain. Galathil’s smile grew a little, and he laughed.

Calissë came running into the room then, having escaped Lacheryn and Mablung, to show Maglor her dress and the amber beads that Lacheryn had braided into her hair. Daeron stepped forward to introduce her to Galathil, who laughed. “Did your brothers all come with you as well?” he asked Maglor.

“No, only my niece,” Maglor said. “She had a taste of travel last year and wished for more, and who am I to say no?”

“I hope her parents also said yes,” Galathil said.

Daeron laughed. “Of course they did! Neither I nor Maglor are foolish enough to risk Rundamírë’s wrath.”

“Uncle Cáno doesn’t want to get dragged back to Tirion by his ears,” added Calissë.

Galathil walked with them to the palace, a sprawling building built partially in the trees and partially on the ground. The large hall where Thingol was holding court was bright and colorful, with tapestries and hangings along the walls, and filled with lords and ladies in butterfly-bright robes and gowns and glittering with gems and jewelry. Daeron’s return was greeted with surprise and delight. Maglor and Calissë’s welcome was warm as they bowed before Thingol and Melian—and it was also just one event among many other matters that were to be dealt with that day. Maglor was aware of eyes on him as he stepped back into the crowd beside Daeron, and he knew it also did not go unnoticed that he had arrived in Galathil’s company, or that Galathil engaged him in conversation afterward. Both Olwë and Ingwë also stepped over to greet him, and to be introduced to Calissë. Ingwë bowed over her hand, rendering her unusually shy, and as he straightened she clutched at Maglor’s leg.

Though he was not a new arrival, however, Simpalírë was of much greater interest to Thingol’s court even than Maglor. He was Daeron’s brother—and even better, Daeron himself had returned, and all the gossipers could now see them together and make comparisons and speculations. So Daeron muttered in Maglor’s ear. “Oh no,” Maglor said, laughing a little, “you’ll have to get along with your brother in public. How awful for you.”

“Oh, stop it. Simpalírë and I get along fine. I don’t like being whispered about and watched, that’s all.”

“You should stop whispering to me, then,” Maglor said, though he made no move to move away himself. “I can see five different people watching us.”

“I would hope they got all their gossiping about us over with years ago,” Daeron said.

“They haven’t seen us together before.” Maglor would have expected to feel anxious about it himself, but his time in Tirion seemed to have helped more than he had expected. So many eyes on him made him itch under his skin, but it wasn’t so bad that he couldn’t ignore it. When Calissë got restless he picked her up so she could whisper questions to both him and Daeron, which Daeron answered in such a way as to keep her giggling. Simpalírë soon joined them, and he was far less practiced at keeping a straight face in such company, which Daeron took full advantage of while keeping his own expression entirely serious, describing all the various lords and ladies with increasing ridiculousness until Simpalírë’s face had gone pink with the effort of trying not to laugh.

Daeron was called forth after a while to help solve some dispute, and Simpalírë stepped a little closer to Maglor. “I feel rather as though I’ve met five different people in one person, in my brother,” he said, watching Daeron step forward to bow to Thingol and listen to the question posed to him. “And here he is stepping into yet another role. I cannot tell which ones are real and which are false.”

Maglor shifted Calissë’s weight on his hip. “We all play roles, depending on where we are and who we are with,” he said, aware that she was listening. “They’re all real enough—just different facets of the same jewel.”

“Mm. Perhaps.”

“Why didn’t you know Daeron before?” Calissë asked Simpalírë, “if you’re brothers?”

“Daeron did not cross the Sea when our parents did,” Simpalírë said after glancing at Maglor, “and I was born on these shores.”

“Daeron lingered in Middle-earth as long as I did,” said Maglor. “There were many families sundered in such a way during the Great Journey.”

“Oh.” Calissë considered this, nose wrinkling as she frowned. “That’s sad,” she said finally. “I would hate to grow up not knowing Náriel or Tyelpë.”

“I’ve wished all my life that I knew my older brother,” said Simpalírë. His smile was still identical to Daeron’s—rueful this time, and little crooked. It was the smile Daeron wore sometimes when speaking of the past. “I’m very glad now to finally have the chance.”

Mablung came by then to ask if Calissë would like to see some other parts of the palace, since mingling among all the adults must be terribly boring. Calissë was thrilled, and Maglor was glad to escape small ears for a little while. Once Mablung and Calissë had gone he turned to Simpalírë and said, “Please give Daeron time. He did not expect to find any of you when or how he did—I think he never expected to reunite with your parents at all.”

“My uncle said the same,” said Simpalírë. “I think Daeron clashes with Netyalossë just because she’s used to bossing us around, Vinyelírë and me, and she can’t do that to him.”

“He feels as though there are expectations laid upon him that he cannot meet,” Maglor said, keeping his voice quiet.

“None of us mean to make him feel that way,” said Simpalírë, “but it is true that my parents are not happy that he wasn’t brought west when there was a chance for it. Both of them lost almost their entire families to the Dark Rider, long ago—Atya only had Aunt Lacheryn, and I think they argued a great deal before she relented and agreed to leave Cuiviénen at all. They only feel that they were right all along, having heard all the stories of what happened in the east. It isn’t that they had any particular expectation of Daeron, it’s that they cannot understand the wish to remain there—and that colors everything else.”

“Have you told Daeron this?”

“Not yet. We haven’t had a chance to speak much alone—but that’s why I’m here. We at least have something in common, Daeron and I. I think we can learn to get along better than he and our sisters, anyway.”

“He does want that,” Maglor said.

“And I know Netyalossë was making a nuisance of herself to you too. I’m sorry—for her and for our parents. I don’t know why they are so surprised that he’s as stubborn as he is. As though our mother isn’t equally hard-headed, or Netyalossë.”

“I understand why they feel the way they do about me,” Maglor said, “and I never expected anything else. I just don’t know what to do about it, aside from go away—which I won’t do.”

“Of course not,” said Simpalírë. “And for what it’s worth, I don’t know where Netyalossë got her ideas about how you were in Valmar. Everyone knew you had about as much interest in romance as a rock.” Maglor laughed. “She must have overheard something and misunderstood; many of my friends in Alqualondë had questions about everyone I met in Valmar, especially Prince Fëanáro’s son, and I’m sure I made many jokes at your expense.”

“Oh, I don’t mind you telling tales or making jokes,” said Maglor. “But who I was then is not who I am now.”

“No,” Simpalírë agreed, “and I did point that out. They’ll come around eventually. What happened—well, it was a long time ago, and everyone directly involved has agreed to move on, so the rest of us should do so too. I would rather be friends than hold onto old grudges.”

Daeron rejoined them then. “I think we can make our escape now,” he said, slipping his hand into Maglor’s. “Where is Calissë?”

“Off exploring with Mablung.”

“Oh, good. Come on then—we can do some exploring of our own, and I can show you both all the best parts of the city.” Daeron grabbed Simpalírë’s hand next, and led them both out of the hall. “The library is that way,” he said, nodding toward a corridor just outside the large gathering hall. “It isn't as impressive as the on in Tirion yet—or, I’m sure, the ones in Alqualondë or Valmar—but we’re working on it.”

“Alqualondë has no great library,” Simpalírë said. “Few of us write much down, except for lists and inventories and things when needed. There are plenty who have never bothered to learn to read or write at all.”

“Doriath was much the same,” said Daeron, “and we learned to our sorrow what a mistake that was. Not that any such tragedies are likely to happen again, of course, but—and perhaps I am biased as well—it is still a great comfort to have things written down.”

“I don’t remember any large libraries in Valmar, either,” said Maglor, “but that was long ago.”

“There are a few smaller ones, but nothing like the collections in Tirion,” said Simpalírë. “It’s the Noldor that have always wanted to write everything down.”

“Even the Noldor can be right about some things,” Daeron said, flashing a grin at Maglor, who laughed. “But we can look at the library later. I want to introduce you both to my students first of all.”

They found many of Daeron’s students gathered in one of the meadows, where lingering wildflowers bloomed as the wood began its slow fading from summer into autumn. There were a dozen children among the older figures, and they saw Daeron first and came racing over to cluster around him, all talking excitedly over each other to welcome him back. Daeron laughed as he waded among them, greeting everyone by name, and listening to all they had to tell him about what he had missed, and what they had been doing and learning in his absence. When his older students came to join in Daeron disappeared entirely.

He reappeared after a few minutes and called Simpalírë and Maglor over. “You’ve all heard of Maglor, of course,” he said, “and here is my brother Simpalírë, come to visit from Alqualondë.” Maglor found himself greeted with wide-eyed stares from the children, and warm words of welcome from Daeron’s older students. Simpalírë was received with equal warmth, but more curiosity, for he was someone entirely unforeseen. And then Daeron told them of meeting Elemmírë, and the chance to perform before all the Eldar in Aman at the great gathering being planned, and Maglor and Simpalírë were entirely forgotten in that excitement.

“What is Elemmírë planning?” Simpalírë asked Maglor as they sat down in the grass at a slight remove from the throng of Daeron’s students.

“She wants to sing the whole of our history, from Cuiviénen to the present,” said Maglor. “It’s very ambitious. Daeron has promised to seek out the Avari living here in Valinor, to ask them to join in as well.”

“Why Daeron?” Simpalírë asked.

“He spent many years in the east among the Avari of Middle-earth,” Maglor said, keeping his tone light but aware that he was treading on potentially fragile ground. “He made many friends among them and knows their tongues. It might be that some he knew in Middle-earth have also made their way here, though I think he does not expect it.”

“I doubt he is the only one to have friends among them. They keep to the west mostly, or so I’ve heard, but they do keep themselves entirely separate.”

“No, of course not,” said Maglor, “but Elemmírë has asked both Daeron and me to help her organize this performance, and that is why she asked him. I’m sure others have already gone to tell them about the feast itself. I haven’t gone recruiting yet among the Noldor, but I have little doubt of finding plenty of volunteers, and I’ve spoken to Gimli about it too.”

“Who?”

“Gimli—the dwarf who was part of the Fellowship of the Ring. He is staying now in Imloth Ningloron with Legolas.”

“Oh! I’d heard of their coming.” Simpalírë shook his head, smiling. “They caused a great stir when they arrived.”

“I can imagine.”

“How do you know them?”

“I lived in Rivendell until I came west,” Maglor said, “and was there when the Fellowship formed. Afterward I traveled often to Gondor—and Rohan, where Gimli dwelled in the Glittering Caves, and a few times to Mirkwood. Well, the Greenwood again now, since all the shadows and fell creatures have been driven out. I knew all of the Fellowship. I only took ship after Aragorn’s death—King Elessar, I mean.”

“I’ve heard the tales,” Simpalírë said. “I do not remember hearing your name in them.”

“No, I dropped out of all such tales after the First Age. I played no part in the events of the War of the Ring, except as witness at the beginning and the end.”

Simpalírë looked at him. It was very strange, how alike he was to Daeron and yet so very different. Daeron had starlight shining in his eyes; Simpalírë’s held Treelight instead. “You really are very different from what I remember,” he said.

“Yes, I am.”

Daeron called to Maglor then with a question about one of Bilbo’s songs. They passed the rest of the afternoon with Daeron’s students; Mablung brought Calissë after a while, and she was welcomed among the younger ones with delight on both sides at making new friends.

As evening drew on they had to leave Daeron’s students to prepare to dine that night with Thingol's court. Maglor pulled on some robes and let Daeron weave emeralds through his hair. Daeron himself wore again his amethysts and pearls. “I noticed you speaking to my brother today,” he said as he ran the comb through Maglor’s hair. “He didn’t say anything foolish, did he?”

“No. I think you’ll find it much easier to speak to him—alone, away from your sisters and parents. And not just about music.” Maglor turned to look at Daeron. “He has no expectations of you.”

Daeron offered a small, rueful smile before tugging on Maglor’s hair so he turned around again. “Maybe,” he said, “and I have not made myself very likable either—I know that. I’m as much at fault for how it’s all going as they are.”

“It’s unfamiliar ground for all you to be treading,” Maglor said.

“Except I have been refusing to tread it at all. It’s awful, really, to know what you’re doing wrong and not quite be able to stop yourself.”

“What are you afraid of?”

“I don’t know.”

After Daeron finished with his hair, Maglor turned and found him with overly bright eyes and his lips pressed together in a tight line. “Come here.” Maglor opened his arms and Daeron all but fell into them. “Are you sure we cannot skip this feast tonight?”

“No, we can’t,” Daeron said into his chest. “I’ll be fine.”

“Will you?”

“I’ve smiled my way through worse. We’ll go and eat and drink and be quite merry, and afterward I’ll sing some songs, and then we can slip away.”

“Are you sure?” Maglor asked.

“Yes.” Daeron straightened, dry-eyed and able to put on a smile that Maglor thought most people would really believe was genuine. He could tell, though, that the falseness of it was a brittle thing. “You don’t need to worry about me, Maglor.”

“I think I do,” Maglor said softly.

“No.” Daeron shook his head, and then leaned forward to kiss Maglor. “Not tonight. I’m fine. I’m just—I’m being ridiculous.”

“Daeron—”

“Come on. We’ll be late if we don’t get going.” Daeron grabbed Maglor’s hand and pulled him out of the room and downstairs to join Mablung and Simpalírë.

As Daeron had predicted, Maglor was led to a seat at the high table in the great dining hall, and seated in between Thingol and Ingwë. It was not as nerve wracking as it might have been if Thingol’s court had not already had a chance to look at him earlier that afternoon. Both kings greeted him kindly and asked after his travels and his family. Maglor could see Daeron seated at a nearby table, though he was far enough away that they could do no more than exchange the occasional glance—and even those were further limited as the kings on either side of him continuously engaged Maglor in conversation.

“My sister has told me of this song she and Míriel have asked you to write,” Ingwë remarked sometime during the second course. “From what she has told me, you have been hard at work on it for the last year. Is it going well?”

“I think so,” said Maglor. “I would like to speak to you of your journey—the one the three of you took here, before the Great Journey.”

“Yes, of course.” Ingwë smiled at him. “We can tell you a little more of his youth too, by Cuiviénen. I can speak very little of his doings on the Great Journey itself, since my people traveled more quickly than did the Noldor.”

“I can tell you a little more of that,” said Thingol on Maglor’s other side. “But there is no great hurry, is there? You will be here through the winter.”

“There isn’t,” Maglor said. “I hope to have this song finished before your great feast, Lord Ingwë, but that is a deadline of my own creation.”

“I hope you do finish by then,” said Ingwë, “so that we may all hear it. I’ve heard some of Elemmírë’s plans—she is quite ambitious.”

“The whole thing is ambitious,” said Maglor, forgetting for a moment who he spoke to. He bit his tongue, but Ingwë only laughed and agreed. “May I ask why now?”

“Many reasons,” said Ingwë, “though mostly it is that the timing seems right—of all who I wish most to have there, only Finwë is missing, and that cannot be helped. Elwë is returned to us, and Nowë too has finally come west. Not to mention Daeron and yourself. We have all split ourselves into so many different groups that I fear it has become all to easy to forget that we are all Quendi—we were once one people, and we could be so again, however sundered our tongues and customs might have become, whatever feuds and disputes and sorrows lay in our past. Elemmírë’s plan to sing through the whole of our history is just the sort of thing to remind us all of that. If your father, Macalaurë, can return from Mandos and make peace with his brothers, than I have great hope that all the Eldar in Aman, even those counted as Avari who came here by way of Mandos only because they had no other choice, can come together in peace and friendship again as well.”

It was a beautiful vision. Maglor had been thinking of the coming feast as only a deadline for his song, and as the gathering of a larger audience than he had ever dreamed of performing for, but of course it was so much bigger than that. He glanced toward Daeron and found him laughing at something Simpalírë said. Thingol followed his gaze, but did not remark on it.

After the meal was done Daeron was called forth to perform for them, many voices calling out that it had been far too long. He obliged with a bright smile, and Maglor couldn’t tell from a distance whether he was still feigning his cheer. However he was feeling, his music was beautiful, breathtaking and enchanting. Maglor closed his eyes, basking in it. He sang many songs that seemed to be favorites among the Sindar, of starlight and woodland flowers, of Doriath and of wider Beleriand, of rivers and mountains and the Sea. When he had finished others came forward to sing and make music, many of them Daeron’s students. Theirs was music meant for dancing, and a space cleared swiftly in the middle of the hall for it.

“Are you ready to go?” Daeron asked, slipping up behind Maglor to wrap his arms around his waist, resting his chin on Maglor’s shoulder.

“Whenever you are,” Maglor said. “That was wonderful.”

Daeron smiled at him. “Thank you. Let’s just take leave of Thingol and Melian.”

At home they found Calissë already asleep in bed, curled up with Pídhres. In Daeron’s room they shed their finery and slipped under the blankets, cocooned in warm darkness. Maglor raised up onto an elbow, smoothing Daeron’s hair from his face with his other hand. “How are you really?” he asked softly.

Daeron shrugged, no longer putting on a smile. “Tired. Dinner was—it was fine. I can get along with anybody in public, when we don’t have to talk about anything serious.”

“You can’t run away from it forever.”

“I bet I could.”

“Daeron.”

“No, I know.” Daeron rolled forward to tuck himself against Maglor’s chest. “I don’t know what’s the matter with me. I’m sorry.”

“Don’t apologize to me. I know what it’s like to be scared. It’s—it’s like what we spoke of before, on our way to Ekkaia, isn’t it? You can’t stop mourning the family you never knew just because the real thing is in front of you now.”

Daeron was silent for some time. Then he said, “I hadn’t thought of it like that. I hadn’t thought I was mourning them.”

“You can mourn what you never had, what was stolen from you,” said Maglor as he stroked his hair, “even if you can’t really mourn the people you never knew. It’s such a part of you that maybe you just stopped noticing—it has been all your life, and it probably always will be.”

“Then the reverse must be true,” Daeron said, “that they will never stop mourning who I might have been.”

“Yes,” said Maglor, “but isn’t it also true that our grief does not have to rule us?”

“It is. And…anything is easier when you know what the problem really is. I look at them all and see what I might have been a part of if things had been different, and…” Daeron lifted his head and pressed a kiss to Maglor’s cheek. “Thank you,” he whispered.

“I love you,” Maglor said softly. “I want to see you happy.”

“I am happy—outside of this one thing—”

“It’s a very big thing, Daeron.” Maglor kissed him. “You don’t have to pretend for me.”

“I know,” Daeron whispered. “I’m not trying to. I am happy, and I’m excited for the future, I truly am—for this upcoming feast, for the songs we’ll write together, and watching my students grow and do incredible things, and—all of that should outweigh this ridiculous—”

“Stop calling it ridiculous.”

“It feels ridiculous. They’re still practically strangers,” Daeron said, “and I am—I’m unused to caring what strangers think of me. I hate it, and I hate that the Great Journey is still such a point of contention. I should not have to justify myself to anyone, not now.”

“I agree,” Maglor said. “They should not be asking you to justify yourself. I don’t think that’s what Simpalírë is here to do. I think he just wants to know his brother. And…speaking as a younger brother, I think it would hurt him very deeply if you turned your back before giving him a chance, on his own and away from meddlesome parents or sisters.”

“I don’t want to do that,” Daeron whispered.

“I know. And I do think you and he have a chance to really be brothers, if you’ll just let yourself. It will take time, but it will be worth it.”

“I’ll speak to him tomorrow. Seriously, with no false cheer. I promise.”

The door opened then, and Calissë, sounding sleepy and faintly upset, said, “Uncle Cáno?”

“We’re here, sweetheart.” Maglor rolled over to grab a nightshirt before anyone could turn on a light to reveal the scars he didn’t want his niece to see. “Did you have a bad dream?”

“No, I just woke up and it’s—the shadows are all scary.”

“Come here, then, and we’ll protect you from all the frightening shadows,” said Daeron. He turned on a lamp once Maglor’s chest was hidden, and Calissë darted forward to climb onto the bed and burrow into the blankets between them. Pídhres followed, curling up on the pillows above Calissë’s head. Once she was tucked in Daeron turned out the light, and Maglor sang a lullaby, one he’d written long ago when Curufin had been born. He put just enough power into his voice to catch both Calissë and Daeron in it; Daeron gave him a knowing look even as his eyelids drooped, and it wasn’t long before they both fell deeply and peacefully asleep. Maglor scratched Pídhres behind the ears, and settled down himself. He let his thoughts circle as he listened to Pídhres purr, passing between his songwriting and Daeron and the events of the day until sleep finally caught up, bringing dreams of empty seashores and distant voices on the wind. 

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The news that Aredhel had returned came as a shock. “She was here for weeks, and you didn’t tell me?” was all that he could think to say when Celegorm finally shared it with him, after the commotion over his green hair died down and after Maglor and Daeron left with Calissë for Taur-en-Gellam.

“She didn’t want anyone knowing,” said Celegorm, “and none of us wanted to overwhelm Maeglin.”

“But—is she—”

“She’s not angry with you, if that’s what you’re worried about.”

It was. Of course it was. Aredhel had been his friend too, in their youth—the three of them had roamed Valinor together for years, and it had been Aredhel who had introduced Curufin to Rundamírë. And then everything had gone wrong, and then she had vanished into Gondolin and then again when she’d left it, with no explanation either time—and then when he’d had a chance to do something right, he’d just—

Celegorm flicked his forehead, just between his eyes. “Stop that. I told you she isn’t upset.”

“But she didn’t—”

“She’ll turn up when she’s ready, when she’s satisfied that no one’s going to run Maeglin out of Tirion or something.”

“What if that does happen?”

“Odds are he’ll end up in Imloth Ningloron,” said Celegorm with a shrug. “I don’t think that will happen though. But she really does not want it widely known that she’s back yet.”

Curufin rolled his eyes and shoved at Celegorm’s shoulder. “I heard you the first time. I can keep secrets.” It came out more accusing than he meant, but Celegorm didn’t rise to it.

“Just for a little while.” Celegorm paused for a moment, and then said, “She said that Grandfather sends his love to everyone.”

Curufin remembered little from Mandos; those memories faded quickly after one came back, leaving behind only hazy and dreamlike impressions. But he remembered Finwë’s spirit whispering the same thing to him—give them all my love, Curvo—and he remembered only deciding to return without Celebrimbor because he knew that Finwë would be there with him, that same warm and comforting presence that had helped Curufin himself in the immediate aftermath of his own death. Now, he just nodded. It was so hard to think of Finwë and not think of what Maglor was going to try to do. Curufin didn’t believe it would work, but he was afraid that, in spite of his words, Maglor was starting to believe it might—and Curufin was far more worried about Maglor’s heart being crushed by failure than he was about Fëanor hearing of it.

It was a relief to return home to Tirion, even though Curufin couldn’t fully banish his anxiety for Calissë being so far from them. Before they left his mother’s house he took another one of the palantíri; he missed his father too, and even if Fëanor wasn’t using his own palantír—which Curufin honestly hoped he wasn’t, hoped he was spending his time with the twins instead—Curufin could at least look for him. And he could look for Maglor and see how Calissë was doing, if the stone cooperated. Maglor was infamously hard to find, and Curufin doubted that would have changed since his return from Lórien.

Rundamírë saw him unpack the stone later, and frowned. “Just keep that thing out of Náriel’s reach,” she said.

“Of course.”

“You aren’t going to start looking back at all the terrible things, are you?”

“No.” Curufin caught her hand and kissed it. “My interests lie solely in the present, I promise.”

“Good. And what about the future? You wanted to wait until after Carnistir was married, but he seems quite content to languish in betrothal for the next few decades.”

“I don’t think it’s that bad,” Curufin protested, but it was true that Caranthir and Lisgalen had stopped talking of potential wedding plans or dates. Curufin took that to mean that they would just vanish sometime and reappear with golden wedding bands instead of the silver engagement ones, eschewing any and all traditions except for the ones that actually married them, which needed no witness but Ilúvatar. “But you’re right, we shouldn’t put anything on hold until whenever they decide to do—whatever it is they’re going to do. Honestly, they might never get married just to be contrary.”

“That sounds like something Carnistir would suggest,” Rundamírë said, laughing. “In which case we should disregard them entirely when making our own plans. Just one more child, and then I’ll be content—I have no desire to attempt to surpass your parents in sheer numbers.”

“We’ve already surpassed them in daughters,” Curufin said, just so Rundamírë would laugh again. “But remember what Carnistir said! If you keep talking about just one more, we’ll certainly end up with twins.”

“You’re both being ridiculous.”

“It’s happened before!”

“Would you mind?” Rundamírë asked, growing serious. “Twins, I mean.”

“No, of course not.” Curufin leaned in to kiss her. “One more child or two—I would love them just the same. But I also cannot help but remember the toll it took on my mother, and how worried everyone was when Ambarussa were born.”

“Both Nerdanel and Ambarussa turned out perfectly fine,” Rundamírë pointed out.

“It was still frightening.” Curufin had been a child at the time, but old enough to understand something of what was happening, and certainly old enough to notice how afraid his father had been in the weeks just after Amrod and Amras had been born—both for them and for Nerdanel.

Rundamírë was unmoved. Her three pregnancies had been as easy as such things could be, and there was nothing that could dampen her confidence. “I’ll be fine, whatever happens.”

That night was Curufin’s turn to tuck Náriel into bed. He entertained her with a retelling of part of the story about the dwarves and the halfling and the wizard; Náriel liked best the part where they escaped the Elvenking’s halls in barrels. Then she asked, as he made sure her favorite stuffed rabbit was nestled under the blankets with her, “Are you and Ammë really going to have another baby?”

“Yes,” said Curufin. “Would you like that, having a baby brother or sister?”

“Oh yes! ‘Specially if Calissë’s going to go off on adventure without me.”

“Just a few more years, my love, and you’ll be old enough to join her.” It was something Curufin had been trying not to think about—he wasn’t ready to have both girls going off into the world without him, even accompanied by their uncles or their brother. Going to Nerdanel’s house for a visit was one thing—that was right outside Tirion, less than a day’s travel away. Calissë would no doubt be wanting to go all the way to Ekkaia next, or to explore the unknown lands of Avathar in the south, or other equally far-flung places, and Curufin was dreading the time when she could just get up and go without even needing to tell anyone where she was off to.

“I don’t mind,” Náriel said through a yawn. “I like staying home. I just miss her.”

“I miss her too, but it’s only until springtime. And you and I—we’ll make all kinds of things together this winter, won’t we?” Curufin leaned down to kiss Náriel’s forehead. “And that means you need to go sleep.”

“Goodnight Atya,” Náriel yawned again. “Love you.”

“I love you too.”

The next morning, Náriel accompanied Curufin to his workshop. He lifted her onto his drafting table so she could watch as he paged through some old designs he’d drawn up but had not yet had occasion to make. “What are you making?” she asked.

“I want to make a gift to welcome my cousin back,” he said. “You remember the stories about Irissë?” He pulled out a drawing of a hair piece, something elegant but not too elaborate. He had not been thinking of Aredhel when he’d drawn it, but now he thought that it would suit her. “What do you think of this one, Náriel?”

Náriel looked at the drawing, lips pursed as she considered the question. She was already much more serious and thoughtful than her sister. Celebrimbor teased her for it sometimes, tickling her until she stopped frowning and started giggling. “It’s pretty,” she pronounced finally. “It looks like a flower. Like one of Grandmother Ennalótë’s roses.”

Curufin looked back down at the drawing. “So it does,” he said. “I had been thinking of white gold, and aquamarines for the gems, to stand out against Irissë’s dark hair, but maybe rubies would be better.”

“I like pink roses,” said Náriel.

“Rose quartz, then?”

“Oh yes! That’s my favorite.”

Curufin laughed. Náriel’s favorite gemstone changed by the week. “Rose quartz it is. And that means we need to pay Elessúrë a visit, because I don’t think I have any.”

It was nice to have a new project—and to have someone in mind to gift it to afterward. Gathering supplies took him all over Tirion, with Náriel in tow. She wanted to know about everything, and everyone they spoke to was more than happy to answer all of her questions. “Like father like daughter,” Curufin heard more than once, always accompanied by a smile.

People had said such things about him when he’d been small and always following Fëanor about. It made him smile to have those words now directed at him, but there was also worry niggling at the back of his mind. His likeness to Fëanor had made him a favorite—and it had not taken him long to realize what that meant, as he started to grow up and notice the ways that his relationship with his father was different from his brothers’. Mostly it had not seemed to matter much—they all had their own interests, and if Fëanor had favored Curufin in many ways he had been equally free in his affection with all of his sons—or so it had seemed to Curufin, at least. That had changed as things got more tense in Tirion, as his feelings toward the Valar had changed—he had clashed most obviously with Celegorm, the two of them so often shouting or snarling at one another. Celegorm had turned away from the Valar himself, eventually, but not fully until the Darkening, but there had been distance and tension between Fëanor and Caranthir, too, and the twins. Curufin remembered wondering how Fëanor’s feelings could change so drastically toward any of them—and then, much later, he’d wondered if they had, or if Fëanor had just been more careful to hide his favor or disdain in happier days.

He didn’t wonder about that anymore—it had been a change, and it was a change Fëanor deeply regretted now, though Curufin wasn’t sure he fully realized how much damage it had done.

Curufin had worried about falling into the same trap, but so far he did not think he was in any danger of that. He could not fathom loving Náriel more than Calissë just because she was more interested in forge work, or loving either of them more or less than Celebrimbor, or neglecting one or more of them in favor of another for any reason. All he wanted was for all three of them to be safe and to be happy.

When he and Náriel returned home after picking up a large case of rose quartz from Elessúrë two weeks after they’d all come back to Tirion, Rundamírë met them with two rolled up letters in hand. “For you, Curufinwë,” she said, holding them out. “I had a pair of blue jays come pecking at my window an hour ago.”

“From Ambarussa?” Curufin asked as he shed his cloak.

“I assume so,” said Rundamírë. “They’re the only ones who would need to use birds—I imagine there is already snow in the mountains blocking the paths back down.”

“Are they stuck all winter?” Náriel exclaimed, aghast.

“They like it that way,” said Curufin as he took the letters.

“But why?”

“You’ll have to ask them,” Rundamírë laughed. She hoisted Náriel onto her hip and kissed her cheeks, pink with the chill that was settling over Tirion. They would receive no snow for some time yet, but it was certainly the time of year for curling up by the hearth side with blankets and hot drinks. “Your uncles are all very strange, Náriel, but Ambarussa are strangest of all.”

“That is certainly true,” Curufin said. “I’ll just take this to the workshop and then I’ll be in.”

“We have guests for dinner,” Rundamírë said. “Your cousins and a few of the Gwaith-i-Mírdain—and Telperinquar is home. He’s out in the workshop.”

“Tyelpë!” Náriel exclaimed, and after squirming to be let down she darted away down the hall toward the workshop.

Curufin paused to kiss Rundamírë before he followed her. “Did he come alone?” he asked.

“Yes. Irissë and her son are still with Findekáno and Gilheneth, but I think Elrond and his family have gone to Eressëa for the winter.”

“Have you written to Irissë?” Curufin asked.

“Not yet, but I’m putting together some things for her and for Lómion for Midwinter. Let me know when your gift is done, so we can send them all at once.”

“Of course.”

In the workshop, Curufin found Celebrimbor laughing as Náriel told him all about what he’d been missing in Tirion in his absence. After managing to get a few words in to greet Celebrimbor himself, Curufin put his gems away and turned his attention to the notes from Ambarussa. One was from Amras, who had more legible writing than Amrod; the other was from Fëanor. Amras had only written a few lines to assure Curufin that they were all fine, and that the paths down the mountain were blocked, and so no one should expect to hear from them until spring. Unless you take up another one of the palantíri of course, Amras added at the end. I think we all tend to forget that part of their purpose is to speak over distances and not just to see things and spy on people, so I thought I’d remind you.

Fëanor’s note was longer, small letters crammed onto the bit of paper the bird had been willing to carry. Curufin skimmed it, looking for anything notable either good or bad, but there was nothing that stood out. There was time yet for Fëanor to go a little mad, trapped up the mountain in the snow, but so far he was enjoying both the quiet and the distance from Tirion.

By the time Curufin put the letters away, Náriel had finished telling Celebrimbor all of the important news. “So where is Calissë, then?” Celebrimbor asked, since Náriel had informed him that Calissë was away on an adventure, but not where or with whom. “I swear that I left her quite safe at Grandmother’s house.”

Curufin laughed. “She’s off in Taur-en-Gellam with Maglor and Daeron,” he said. “In Maglor’s last letter he said she’s charmed half of Thingol’s court and made friends with all of Daeron’s youngest students.”

“That is an adventure,” said Celebrimbor as Náriel giggled. “I’m surprised you allowed her to go.” Curufin shrugged. “Better, I suppose, than going off with Amrod and Amras to the mountains.”

“That, I would have refused,” Curufin said. “At least in Taur-en-Gellam I know she’s sleeping in proper bed and not on a tree branch somewhere like a squirrel.”

“Squirrels make nests,” Náriel said. “Uncle Tyelko showed me one once. They’re cozy!”

“And still not suitable for little elven girls,” said Curufin. “We’ll leave the squirrel nests to your uncles.”

As autumn faded from its bright colors to the softer browns and grey skies that heralded winter to come, Curufin finished the rose-shaped hair piece and tucked it into the package of other Midwinter gifts that Rundamírë put together for Fingon’s household. He made other gifts for his brothers and various relations, and attended parties with Rundamírë and Celebrimbor. Maedhros made his own way to Eressëa to visit Elrond, but continued writing to Náriel, who was more willing to practice her penmanship when it meant she got silly stories about hedgehogs and Huan, including drawings, in return. Celegorm sent Curufin a badly-knit scarf made out of hideous yellow yarn, and Curufin sent back a set of bright green hair ribbons. Things were busy but settling into a routine, and it was nice.

He didn’t get a chance to take out the palantír again until an evening when Rundamírë was visiting her sisters and Celebrimbor and Náriel were busy building a fortress in her room out of blankets and pillows. Curufin retreated to his own bedroom, and settled onto the bed with the stone on his lap. He looked for Maglor first, and found him with surprising ease, seated on the floor of a comfortable looking parlor with Calissë on his lap, each of them with identical, intent expressions as they listened to someone—Curufin recognized the look on Calissë’s face as the one she wore when entirely absorbed in a story. It was startling and funny to see it mirrored in his brother. He noticed also that Maglor was dressed very warmly, even sitting so close to the fire—he still hated to be cold.

Curufin withdrew from the stone and sat for a little while, fighting the temptation to look for Maglor’s past. He had spoken of it only haltingly, never in much detail—only just enough to get the rest of them to stop asking questions. Curufin had told Rundamírë that he wouldn’t look for the dark past, and he had meant it, but now he had it in his head; and he was still his father’s son and sometimes that meant he couldn’t quite make himself leave well enough alone.

He leaned back over the stone, and this time the vision coalesced into a large and shadowy room, lit by red braziers along the walls, where dark figures hovered. The doors opened and Maglor stumbled in, dirty and bruised and with his clothes in tatters and his hair in tangles, shoved from behind by the orcs that then pulled him forward. Curufin watched his eyes dart around, taking in the room and its occupants. This was not Maglor bowed or broken; he remained defiant even when forced to his knees, his arms bound behind him, shoulders thrown back and chin raised up. But Curufin knew his brother and he could see the fear in his eyes when he realized who it was that sat on the dais before him. But he still didn’t shrink back, even when the gag in his mouth unraveled and the Necromancer clearly commanded him to sing—drawing him into a trap, into a battle like the one that had felled Finrod long ago. Maglor clenched his jaw, baring his teeth, looking for a moment as wild and fearsome as Celegorm, and for a few minutes Curufin thought he would refuse entirely. Then he relaxed his muscles all at once, and opened his mouth. The palantír was soundless, but Curufin did not think Maglor’s song was a loud one. It was the sort of posture he adopted when singing very softly, when singing lullabies or something equally gentle. Curufin watched as he kept singing even when the Necromancer rose to counter him; he could almost see their songs flowing back and forth, making the air shiver, Maglor somehow resisting far longer than Curufin would have thought possible, even for him.

Then something happened and Maglor crumpled like a puppet with its strings cut, and Curufin shoved the stone away, breathing hard. He’d intended to look for his father next, but he didn’t think he could bring himself to look for anything in the palantír again that evening. Instead he shoved it back into its bag and then dropped it into the chest by his side of the bed before retreating downstairs to his workshop. He didn’t have anything in particular to lose himself in, so he emptied the shelves that held his various boxes and jars of gemstones and set about reorganizing them and making a note of what gems he needed to make or find more of. Anything to stop thinking about the image of Maglor falling.

He didn’t pay much attention to the passage of time until Celebrimbor came looking for him. “It’s very late to be doing that, isn’t it?” he asked, crouching beside Curufin where he was seated on the floor in front of the shelves.

“Is it?” Curufin looked up. “What’s the time?”

“Nearing midnight. Ammë just came home. Did something happen?”

“No.” Curufin started putting everything back onto the shelves. “I’ve been meaning to reorganize, and figured I might as well get started while I was thinking about it tonight.” It wasn’t untrue, he told himself. Celebrimbor didn’t need anything new to worry about, and it was just his own foolishness that had upset him. Maglor was long out of Dol Guldur, and as recovered as it was possible to be.

“I got a letter from Ingwion today,” Celebrimbor said. He sat down on the floor, crossing his legs as he watched Curufin. “About that feast of Ingwë’s—all kinds of things will need to be made and constructed for it. Stages, tents, pavilions, decorations.”

“The whole of the Gwaith-i-Mírdain will be wanted, then, as well as all the rest of Tirion’s crafters,” said Curufin. “You must all be excited.”

“We are—it’s nice to have a large project to look forward to. Your work will be wanted too, you know.”

“Whatever Ingwë wants, I suppose,” said Curufin. “It’ll be another year, year and a half?”

“Give or take. He wants it to run through Midsummer. Maglor’s going to be busy if he really wants to finish this song of his beforehand on top of whatever it is Elemmírë’s planning.”

“Yes, he will. Has he spoken to you of it?”

“No, but I don’t think I have anything to add. I remember Finwë fondly but not terribly well.”

Curufin grimaced. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s not your fault.”

“I know. Hand me that jar please?”

Celebrimbor obliged, and said, “Are you worried about Calissë?”

“I’m always at least a little worried about all of you,” Curufin said, “but no, I’m not particularly worried about her tonight.”

“You don’t have to worry about me, Atya,” Celebrimbor said quietly.

“That isn’t how fatherhood works, Tyelpë.” Curufin reached out to muss Celebrimbor’s hair. “It’s no great burden; I’m not lying awake at night thinking of all the terrible things that might befall you. I’m just—too aware that there are things that I cannot protect you from, or your sisters. At least now they are mundane, everyday sorts of things.”

Celebrimbor shoved his disheveled hair out of his face. “But you are worried about something. Is it Maedhros?”

Curufin sighed. He picked up an almost-empty jar of sapphires and made a note to start making more the next day. “In part.” In large part. Maedhros wasn’t as haunted as he had been before he’d gone to Lórien, but something about the very idea of speaking to their father seemed to be driving him at times back to that old state of mind, however much he tried to protest otherwise. He was unhappy in much the same way that Fëanor often was—and was it any wonder? Curufin had been Fëanor’s favorite for a long time, but Maedhros was the eldest, the heir, and had been even closer to their father for even longer; it had been Maedhros who was the first to see the Silmarils after they were completed, before even Finwë or Nerdanel. There had been deep love and trust between them, even after the Darkening, but it had shattered when Maedhros had refused to take part in burning the ships. Curufin hadn’t been present when Fëanor had raged at him—he had been with Celebrimbor, struggling to explain what had just happened and why—and he did not know what words had passed between them, but Maedhros had not been the same afterward.

They’d all forgotten about that, in the wake of the horrors of Angband and the rescue from Thangorodrim. Maybe Maedhros had made sure they all forgot. However much they’d fought over his decision to abdicate the crown he was still their oldest brother and their leader, and if he was not going to speak of Losgar again, then the rest of them wouldn’t either. It was a habit they’d made of a lot of things, not speaking, and even now it was hard to break out of it. Curufin had only recalled that rift opening at Losgar recently because Fëanor had come to talk to him about it before he had left Tirion. There was a lot that Fëanor did not remember with much clarity, between the Darkening and his own death, which wasn’t really surprising, but Curufin hadn’t been able to answer the tentative questions that he’d asked about it, and Fëanor had not said what had brought Losgar back to his mind all of a sudden—it wasn’t hard, though, to guess.

“Atya?”

“Why were you so willing to speak to me again, when you returned?” It was a question Curufin had never dared to ask before. It hadn’t really mattered, because Celebrimbor had been willing to speak to him—he’d been happy to see him. The why of it had been a thing Curufin hadn't wanted to bring up, lest Celebrimbor remember all of the reasons he should not be so happy. Enough time had passed now, though, that even if they did end up arguing about it nothing would be ruined. It would be awful, but it wouldn’t be the end.

Celebrimbor did not answer immediately. When Curufin looked at him he saw the faint frown on his face as he stared at the ground, putting his thoughts in order. Finally, he said, without looking up, “It wasn’t the same thing.”

“Wasn’t it?”

“No, it was—I’d had a lot of time to think about what happened, to come to terms with the things you did and the things you didn’t do. Grandfather dragged all of you down with him when he swore his oath—though I really don’t believe he expected anything to go as it did. I think he really believed the Teleri would be willing to either join us or at least lend their ships. But he still expected all of you to follow him without question or hesitation.”

“I expected the same of you,” Curufin said quietly.

“Not exactly the same. You never had me swear the oath, and you could have. I would’ve done it willingly right up until Beren came to Nargothrond. When we parted, I couldn’t follow you and I couldn’t bear to watch you fall the way you were, but I never actually doubted whether or not you loved me. It was just that you were becoming someone who could not show it as you should anymore, and I was afraid that if I did follow, and if I did keep defying you or trying to argue, that you would stop. At least when we parted I could believe there was something left to salvage later.”

Maybe there had been—until abruptly there wasn’t. “Is that really all it was? Time?”

“Time and regret.”

“Maglor had that too,” Curufin said after a moment.

“That’s different again,” said Celebrimbor. “He’s more like Maedhros than like me—and I was never left alone as he was. I had people I could talk to, to confide in and to help me make sense of it. Maglor never had anything like that until he came here. But now, I’m not sure there’s anything more that you can do to fix what’s between them and Grandfather.”

“I know. It just feels like there should be.”

“What you can do is come with me tomorrow to meet with everyone to organize who is going to do what for this upcoming feast, and getting materials, and all of it. You’re much better at all of that than I ever was.”

As distractions went, this was an obvious one, but Curufin had used the same tactic on his own father and couldn’t really be upset about it. “All right,” he said. It would be good to have a big project to occupy his mind anyway—and to work with others in both the planning and execution of it. If it was complicated enough there would be no room for worry. Curufin put the last jars back onto the shelf and rose to his feet. “Can I see Ingwion’s letter?”

The meeting the next day was crowded and chaotic; there were meeting halls scattered throughout the city for just such a purpose, and the one in their neighborhood was more than half full by lunchtime, with members of the Gwaith-i-Mírdain of Eregion in addition to their friends and family and anyone else who had happened to catch wind of something going on. Word would spread even farther in the coming days. Celebrimbor liked to deny that he was any good at organization or any sort of leadership, but of course that was a lie. He hated the paperwork and the minute details of the logistics, but that didn’t mean he was bad at them—and he was very good at people. Curufin sat and watched him call everyone to order, listened to him speak and make sure others had a chance to say their piece or put forth their ideas, of which there were plenty. Curufin, along with half a dozen others, took notes and jotted down questions they would need to send back to Ingwion, starting with the most obvious: where was this great feast to be held? Everyone had their own ideas of where would be the best place, but ultimately it would be Ingwë’s choice, probably in conjunction with Fingolfin and Olwë and Elu Thingol—and with Turgon and Angrod and others who were the princes and lords of their own smaller realms who may or may not want to be anywhere near this grand undertaking.

Curufin thought it should be held somewhere away from any cities or realms, somewhere perhaps on the open plains out west that stretched for miles and miles, all rolling hills and wildflowers and grass. There would be plenty of room to set up pavilions and tents—to create a small temporary city for the duration of the feasting. There were rivers and lakes aplenty, and there would be game for hunting, and room for racing and other games. That was what he would do, but it was just as likely that Ingwë would choose to hold it instead outside of Valmar, near the Ezellohar where most grand festivals were traditionally held. They could make it work, but if it was to be as big as Ingwë wanted, as Ingwion had hinted at in his letter to Celebrimbor, then Curufin wasn’t sure there would be room, not between the forests and the farmland and the cities of Tirion and Valmar, not to mention the Pelóri right there.

Regardless, it wasn’t his decision, and Curufin was quite happy to take what directions he was given and to follow them, wherever the feast ended up taking place. Make something lovely was what it would boil down to, and that was always his favorite kind of challenge. He also enjoyed all of the work in the background—the logistics, the details, the coordination, all the things that frustrated Celebrimbor. He had learned most of those skills in Beleriand and found that he was good at them; it was one reason he and Celegorm had worked so well together in Himlad, because Celegorm was not good at those things, but was good at all the same things Celebrimbor was.

As the meeting dissolved, and everyone either departed or broke off into smaller groups to talk further or about something entirely different, Celebrimbor sat by Curufin. “Well, that was productive,” he said, looking over the pile of paper in front of them. “This should be fun.”

“Is that what it was like in Ost-in-Edhil?” Curufin asked.

Celebrimbor smiled. “Whenever we had some big project, yes—though we never had anyone else to ask for clarifications before.”

“Not even Gil-galad?”

“No, he never asked for anything so big. He was happy to let me have my fun in Eregion while he enjoyed the peace and quiet of Lindon. He was a good king,” Celebrimbor added after a moment, “a very good king. We were never close in friendship before, but that might change now if he has his way. He seems thrilled to come back to no responsibilities at all; I’ve never seen him so light or heard him laugh so often. Even Elrond doesn’t quite know what to do with it.”

Someone came over to ask for Celebrimbor’s opinion on something. Curufin waited until the conversation was over to say quietly, “Have I told you lately how proud I am of you, Tyelpë?”

“I don’t think I’ve done anything lately to warrant it.”

Curufin could list two dozen things from the last week alone—the stained-glass lampshades he was making for Eärwen that glowed like the finest jewels, the gentle way he teased Náriel into laughter every day, the way he had organized this large and very disorganized group of artisans in less than half a day, the way he had taken his cousin Maeglin under his wing determined to ease his way into Noldorin society, or at least to find a place for him where he could find his footing and figure out what he wanted to make of himself. Curufin wasn’t going to say all that out loud and embarrass Celebrimbor in front of everyone, so he just shook his head, smiling, and said, “You don’t have to do anything. You’re just yourself.”

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It was some days before Maglor was called to a private meeting with Thingol, Olwë, and Ingwë. In the meantime he amused Daeron’s students by demonstrating just how out of practice he was with most musical instruments, and entertained the rest of the Sindar with better music, both by himself and with Daeron. They sang the song of Ekkaia again, and Mablung told them the next day that some were already making plans for their own journeys into the west, to see it for themselves.

“It’s well worth the journey,” said Daeron. “I’m very glad to have gone.”

“I want to see it!” Calissë said, scrambling up onto Maglor’s lap.

“Maybe when you’re a little older,” Maglor said, laughing a little. “Your parents would never let me take you so far now.”

“Then can Náriel come too?”

“If she wants to,” Maglor said.

“And Tyelpë!”

“Goodness,” laughed Daeron, “don’t go making plans just yet, Calissë. Maglor just said you’ll have to wait a few years.”

“But it isn’t fair to leave them out of all the fun adventures,” Calissë protested, as Mablung laughed.

“You can take it up with your mother and father when you get home to Tirion next spring,” said Maglor. He had no intention of heading back out to Ekkaia any time soon, himself. It was beautiful and he was as glad as Daeron to have gone, but it was not a journey to make often—and Curufin would certainly never consent to either of his girls making it, young as they were, especially remembering all of the mishaps and difficulties of their own journey.

For her part, Calissë was having fun making friends among Daeron’s younger students and their friends and siblings, as well as learning to play the harp herself. Maglor found himself giving lessons to several of Daeron’s young songbirds as well, all of them clustered in the parlor of Mablung’s family home on chilly afternoons. Some of Daeron’s older students sat in on the lessons as well, with questions of their own for him afterward, of more complicated music and of songwriting, and a little of instrument-making.

It was busy, but it was nice. Maglor still had his own song to write, and he carved out a few hours in the mornings to work on it, retreating to the large library in the palace where there were plenty of desks placed in nooks and alcoves where he could sit unnoticed and unbothered as he worked. It was quiet there but for the quiet murmur of conversation and the rustling of paper, and every time he left he felt like he had accomplished something, even if it was just rearranging a few lines over and over.

Daeron and Simpalírë often went walking together, or retreated to a quiet corner of the house, speaking quietly and seriously—though there were times when Maglor caught them smiling or laughing together. Every time he got Daeron to smile—a real smile, one that made his eyes crinkle, rather than one of the falsely sunny ones he put on for audiences or strangers—Simpalírë seemed to be equal parts delighted and surprised.

Finally, Maglor was called back to the palace to speak to the kings. He dressed with the same care he’d taken when he’d gone to the palace in Tirion, wearing one of the tunics Arwen had made him, and letting Calissë choose the ribbons to weave into his braids. Daeron walked with him to the palace; the days were quite cold now, a sharper and heavier cold than ever settled over Imloth Ningloron. They had woken that morning to frost patterns on the windows. “I don’t think the king intends for this to be a particularly formal meeting,” Daeron remarked as he led the way to the wing of the palace where more private rooms were located, rather than the public chambers and receiving rooms.

“I hope not,” said Maglor, though he could not quite imagine what an informal conversation with Elu Thingol would look like—let alone Ingwë or Olwë. Let alone all three of them at once. They were all three kings, and all three among the mightiest of the Eldar, born by Cuiviénen, leaders of the Great Journey. Finwë had been their equal, but it was easier to forget that when Maglor thought of him first as his grandfather, away from the demands of leadership when he could be freer with his laughter, kind and gentle and almost never stern.

“To reach the library from here, take that hallway,” Daeron said as they came to the room Thingol had specified for this meeting, pointing down a nearby corridor, “and turn left when you come to the tapestry of the Trees, and then after a little while you should be back among more familiar surroundings. If you get lost, someone will set you right—and probably tease you a little bit, since this palace is neither as large nor as labyrinthine as Menegroth once was. I’ll be waiting for you in the library, probably on the upper level.”

“And if this meeting runs long?”

“Come to the library anyway—or someone else can be sent to fetch me, if Thingol wishes for us to dine with the court tonight. And if no one comes to find me I’ll just meet you in the dining hall anyway.” Daeron kissed him, and they parted. Maglor watched Daeron disappear down the hallway he had pointed out before, and then turned to knock on the door.

Upon being admitted he stepped inside to find a very cozy sitting room, with comfortable furniture arranged around the hearth where a fire blazed, very welcome after the chill outside. Thingol was there, dressed in warm robes of a deep red color, with silver embroidery on the sleeves, but he was alone, and his head was bare of even a simple circlet. Maglor bowed his greeting, and Thingol waved him forward to sit. “Will you tell me more of this song you are writing, while we await Ingwë and Olwë?”

“Indis and Míriel asked me to write it,” Maglor said, sitting carefully across from Thingol. He did not feel exactly nervous, but he couldn’t quite feel at ease either. “No one has written anything for him before—not like this, something meant to be performed before any kind of large audience, I mean. I know my aunt has written at least one private song for him.”

“Why did you not do it before?” Thingol asked.

“I tried,” Maglor said. “Many times. I just couldn’t make it work. It’s easier now I think because I am not relying only on my own words and my own memories.” He paused, and then added, “It’s still very difficult, and not only because there is much that I did not—still do not—know about my grandfather. About his family, and his life at Cuiviénen. He told stories, but rarely and…never ones of real substance.”

“Finwë always kept his own counsel,” Thingol agreed, “especially about his own past. I know that he spoke to Námo when we first came here, and whatever he learned troubled him deeply; he did not speak again of the family he’d lost, after that.”

“Does that mean they did not come to Mandos?”

“Only Finwë can answer that, but I fear so. I think Finwë harbored some hopes that were dashed, then—and then his mother and sisters refused to come, which I do not think he took well. There were many ugly partings then. But I might be wrong, and they may not have fought like I suspect they did. Míriel would know better.”

“She didn’t say whether they had fought,” Maglor said, “only that there were many such partings, full of bitter grief—and my grandfather was never able to speak of his the way maybe he should have.” There had been a culture of silence among the elder Noldor in Tirion, Maglor had come to realize. Perhaps they were all only following Finwë’s example, or perhaps there had been some agreement, unspoken or otherwise, to try to forget who and what they had left behind, to refuse to linger on painful memories. Maglor knew all about ignoring and pushing down the things that hurt, and in his experience it had only made things worse later—but it was also a very hard habit to break out of.

“It’s easier, often, not to speak of it,” said Thingol, “though in my experience it is almost always better to do so. I would rather hear my daughter’s name spoken with sadness than never hear it again. It is a comfort to be reminded that we are not alone in our grief—especially those of us who have known and cared for those of the Secondborn.”

“It’s different, with them,” Maglor said after a moment. “At least…it feels different to me. I don’t know if I can explain it right.”

“It is certainly different than grieving Finwë,” said Thingol. “Even Lúthien—she chose her fate, and she did so with her eyes wide open, and when she passed through the Halls and beyond them she shone bright as the sun, unburdened by either regret or sadness. It is a comfort to me also to know that Túrin and his family have passed out of the world into some place—I hope—neither pain nor sorrow can reach. But Finwë is one of the Eldar, and we were never meant to languish for ever in the Halls. Even Míriel desired to return to life eventually.”

Aredhel had said that Finwë was as healed as was possible in Mandos. Maglor realized that he did not quite know what that would look like in his grandfather. He had been slain by Morgoth himself, his body nearly unrecognizable, and Maglor had been trying very hard not to think about the damage likely done to his spirit. There were almost certainly some, he thought, who had suffered so greatly that they would never be able to return to life even if their spirits had made it to Mandos, not until the world was remade and the Music re-sung. It may be that Finwë’s kin were among them—the great-grandfather and uncles and great-great-grandfather that Maglor had never known and would never meet.

It occurred to him then to wonder whether Míriel and Indis had not been heeded not because the Valar refused to reverse their judgment, but because Finwë was too far gone to find full healing either in death or in life, even if he was able to in some way help those of his children and grandchildren who came into the Halls, to encourage them to leave even when he couldn’t.

Better not to dwell on such ideas—that would be far worse than mere refusal to listen on the part of the Valar.

“Will you tell me of that first journey here, that you and Ingwë made with my grandfather?” Maglor asked.

“Of course,” said Thingol, as the door opened. “There you are, Ingwë—just in time. Do you remember your first sight of these shores when we came with Oromë?”

Ingwë smiled. “I do,” he said. “With the Mingling Light streaming through the Calacirya to shine upon the waters of Eldamar—I will never forget it.”

Maglor learned a great deal that afternoon—about the Eldar, about their customs at Cuiviénen and what had been kept in Valinor and what had been left behind. He had known something of what kind of leader Finwë was—but he had known Finwë as an established king, with his royal seat in Tirion, and not Finwë the wild youth who claimed leadership of the Tatyar through sheer force of personality and a capacity for hope that seemed in Ingwë and Thingol’s telling to rival even Elrond’s.

“And he was a mighty singer,” Olwë said after a time, “descended from other mighty singers.”

“He was,” Ingwë agreed. “Orcs and fell creatures of all kinds fled before the sound of his voice—though even he was not as mighty as you, Macalaurë. But you get it from both sides of your family; Ennalótë’s family was also comprised of great singers.”

“Finwë sang against the Enemy at Formenos,” said Olwë quietly. “He held out for a long time; I could see the signs of it when we went there.”

“I know,” Maglor said. “I went there this summer; the stones remember.” His voice failed him then; he did not know how to thank Olwë and Ingwë for Finwë’s grave, or even if thanks were necessary—he did not know either how to apologize for not knowing what to do himself, then, or—

Ingwë was seated beside him, and now he reached out to rest his hand on Maglor’s arm. “I am very sorry, Macalaurë, that you had to find your grandfather thus,” he said. “It is not a thing any of you should have ever had to face—it was precisely what we came here to escape.”

They spoke for a long time; all three kings had many stories to tell of Finwë both before and after coming to Valinor. There seemed to be some release for them in the telling of those stories, in sharing the memories and laughing together at youthful misadventures and old jokes. Even more than speaking to Míriel or Indis, or his uncles or even his father, it felt like Maglor was being given a great gift in this picture drawn of his grandfather by those who had once known him best in the world, and who loved and missed him still. All three, Maglor knew, had already gone before the Valar to beg for Finwë’s release. He could not quite tell if they were resigned to that failure or if any of them harbored any bitterness. It was clear, though, that neither Míriel nor Indis had spoken even to Ingwë of the real purpose for this song. Maglor was grateful, but it also made the secret feel even heavier.

In the end Maglor did not go to the library to meet Daeron; instead he accompanied Thingol and Olwë and Ingwë to the dining hall, where Daeron was already waiting, his fingers ink stained, surrounded by his older songbirds and accompanied by Simpalírë. “Will you sing for us after the meal?” Thingol asked Maglor. “Perhaps some songs you once sang before your grandfather’s court?”

“Yes of course, my lord. I would be happy to.”

When Maglor joined him Daeron asked, “How did it go?”

“Very well. I learned a lot.”

“Enough to finish your song?”

“Yes, I think so.”

“Good.”

Daeron’s students had questions for Maglor about his songwriting as they sat down to dinner, but Daeron headed them off with laughter. “Oh, don’t ask him for advice! You should see his drafts—they’re almost unreadable! I don’t mean the ideas are bad, but he scribbles out or writes over everything, and his handwriting is atrocious. I have no idea how anything worthwhile comes out of such a mess.”

“It’s a good thing no one but me has to decipher them, then,” Maglor said. “You’re right, of course—I know they’re awful to look at, and I wouldn’t advise anyone to do it like me.”

“Something about them must work,” laughed Pirineth, golden curls bouncing when she turned her head, “since all the singers and songwriters of Valinor have been studying Maglor’s songs for years uncounted!”

“There are dozens of essays and treatises written about most of them,” added Lathrandir.

“Are there really?” Maglor asked, startled. “About my songs?”

“About some of Daeron’s too,” said Lathrandir’s sister Albethiel as she reached across her brother for the basket of rolls.

“Everyone is, of course, free to make their own interpretations,” said Daeron, “but some so-called scholars are quite bold in their speculations.” Albethiel and Pirineth laughed. “I’m still trying to determine where the idea that I am Thingol and Melian’s son originated.”

Maglor had to hurriedly set down his wine glass before he inhaled some of it. “Who thinks that?”

“No one anymore, thankfully.”

“Some of your older songs do seem to view Thingol as at least a father-figure, if not really your father,” said Pirineth.

“Well,” Daeron said after a moment of thought, “that is not wholly wrong, but it is not wholly right, either. The reality is always more complex than songs or poems would have us believe—such are the limitations of the medium, and why we do not only record our histories and tales in verse. The best phrase I can think of to describe what Thingol was to me in my youth is almost-uncle, but even that might require some explanation—which I am not going to provide today, so you need not go to the trouble of asking.”

Pirineth and her fellow students laughed, and turned the conversation back to Maglor’s music and how he was going about writing his song for Finwë. Maglor was happy to answer, but he noticed the thoughtful look on Simpalírë’s face, and the way that Daeron had not looked at him even once during the talk of Thingol and Daeron’s heretofore mysterious parentage.

That evening Maglor was called upon to perform, and as promised he sang many songs that he’d written or learned in his youth that Finwë had often asked him for. Some were songs that Finwë himself had taught him, whose origins Maglor had not thought, at the time, to wonder about. He still wasn’t quite sure if they had come all the way from Cuiviénen or if they had been first sung on the Great Journey, but he had enough knowledge and experience himself now to tell that they were very old indeed. By now he suffered almost no nerves at all in performing before an audience—though it was not quite so easy to do so alone, and it was always a relief to step aside and be swallowed up by the crowds again, to retreat to Daeron’s side where he could stand or sit and not be expected to do or say anything for a while.

The next few days took a sharp turn towards the bitter cold, and so Maglor spent them at home, not leaving the house in favor of curling up with his work by the fire while Calissë played with Pídhres or practiced on either Maglor’s harp or the smaller one that Pirineth had given her, and Daeron and his family provided cheerful and comfortable noise in the background.

Maglor was startled out of absent daydreams one afternoon by Daeron abruptly getting up from where he’d been sitting playing chess with Simpalírë across the room, pale and with his lips pressed together in a thin line. He caught Maglor’s eye and shook his head before leaving, and a moment later Maglor heard the front door open and then shut. He glanced at Simpalírë, who rubbed a hand over his face with a sigh before getting up and also leaving the room.

Calissë had been playing her harp on the floor, but now she got up to curl up beside Maglor on the sofa. As he tucked the blanket around them both again she asked in a half-whisper, “Who was Lúthien?”

“Oh,” Maglor said, and sighed. That explained it. He poked Calissë’s nose and summoned a smile. “You know who Lúthien Tinúviel was, sweetheart. You’ve heard the Leithian.”

“But why is Daeron so upset?”

“I don’t know if he’s upset, exactly,” Maglor said after a moment. Daeron was upset, but he wasn’t sure it was in the way that Calissë meant. There had been something hard behind his eyes that made Maglor uneasy. “But he knew Lúthien well—she was Thingol and Melian’s daughter, you know—and I’m sure he misses her still.”

Calissë frowned, and Maglor let her sort out her thoughts. He saw Mablung pass by, and then heard him leave the house too, and hoped that he was going after Daeron. Lúthien was nearly as fraught a subject as the Great Journey, and Maglor wished he knew what it was Simpalírë had said. He wished, too, that he and Daeron had spoken of her before. Daeron only sometimes mentioned her name, like the story he’d told once of her falling out of a tree to land on top of him and break his nose, but they’d never talked about her quest, or his part in it, or what had happened afterward. Maglor had never asked because he did not want to pry into anything Daeron did not wish to speak of, and especially lately it felt as though Daeron had enough to worry about without dredging up even more old pain.

Finally, Calissë said, “What’s it mean that she—what is it the songs say? That happened to her?”

“She died,” Maglor said softly, tucking a strand of hair behind Calissë’s ear. She was still so young, too young to know what death really meant even for the Elves. She just knew that sometimes someone was badly hurt enough that they went to Mandos, someday to return in a brand new body. She was too young to understand the grief of it, the pain and the sorrow of long parting—and Maglor was glad of it, and hoped she never would fully understand. “She died and passed beyond the Circles of the World, following Beren.”

“So that means she can’t come back, like everyone else?”

“That’s right. She is the only one of the Eldar ever to be permitted such a thing. And it’s…it’s very hard, to lose someone and know you will never see them again.”

“But why?” Calissë asked. “Why can’t Men ever come back?”

Maglor sighed. “Because that is their fate. They are not bound to the world like we are. I don’t know why—no one does. It’s just the way of things. Exceptions have been made—Lúthien was one, Tuor is another, and for all I know Gimli might be too—but I can’t tell you why that is either. As for Lúthien and Beren—long ago they passed away, in the forest singing sorrowless. Those who knew them and loved them will always miss them, but it is a comfort to know at least when someone you love has left the world in peace, unafraid to face whatever comes next for them.”

“Did you know her?” Calissë asked.

“No. I never met Lúthien, or Beren, though I traveled to Ladros at times and met some of Beren’s kin. But Elrond is their great-grandson, and I have known and loved his brother Elros, and his daughter Arwen and her husband Aragorn, and their children and grandchildren, all of them either born to or chose the Fate of Men. I will love and miss them forever.”

“That’s awful, though,” Calissë protested.

“It feels awful, sometimes,” Maglor agreed, “but it’s…just a part of having lived in the world. It’s just the price that I have to pay for having had the chance to know and to be a part of their lives and for them to have been a part of mine—and I would not give that up, not for anything. It’s different for those who loved Lúthien, though, because she chose that fate when no one thought such a thing was possible. She was not born to it, and that makes the grief harder to carry, even now, even with the comfort of knowing she chose it and went to it fearless and sorrowless. I would not be surprised if Daeron is unhappy the rest of the day.”

“Simpalírë shouldn’t have reminded him,” Calissë said after a few moments.

Maglor wrapped his arm around her and kissed the top of her head. “Simpalírë does not know the whole story. He didn’t know his questions would upset Daeron—they’re still trying to get to know one another. I don’t think either of them have done anything wrong today.”

“Do you know how to make Daeron feel better?”

“I’ll talk to him later,” said Maglor, “when he’s ready.”

Daeron did not reappear for dinner, however, or by the time Maglor tucked Calissë into bed. Neither had Mablung, and when Maglor ventured to ask, Lacheryn assured him that Mablung would not let Daeron wander too far in the cold. “They’ll be in the library most likely—that is where Daeron most often retreats when he needs to be distracted.”

“Should I go looking for them?” Maglor asked.

“No.” Lacheryn squeezed his hand. “No, it’s enough that you’ll be waiting when Daeron returns. And don’t worry about Simpalírë, either. He is with Belthond, and I will speak to him too in a little while.”

Daeron, though, did not return that night. Maglor stayed up with a book that he couldn’t focus on, until he fell asleep in spite of himself, and woke again to an empty bed. It did not trouble him the same way it troubled Daeron—except that waking alone did trouble Daeron, and there was no good reason he would have avoided coming home to bed. He rose and dressed, and did not find Daeron downstairs either at the breakfast table or anywhere else. “I left him in the library yesterday,” Mablung said when Maglor asked him where Daeron was. “Did he not come home last night?”

“No.” Maglor hesitated, then asked, “Should I go look for him, or would that just make it worse?”

Mablung shook his head. “You couldn’t make anything worse, Maglor.”

“But if he’s upset about—”

“I don’t know what he’s upset about; he wouldn’t tell me. But I can’t imagine it has anything to do with you. If he isn’t in the library, try the mallorn grove. He used to go there often when he was unhappy in the early days after his coming west. Don’t worry about Calissë. Beleg returned last night and we’ve already promised to take her exploring in the woods today.”

“Thank you.”

It was another very cold day; Maglor wrapped his cloak around himself tightly as he walked down the road toward the mallorn grove after not finding Daeron in the library, watching his breath fog in the air before his face. It was a little easier to bear these days, because the cold of winter was so different from the cold that had sunk into him beneath Dol Guldur and refused to leave for so long. This cold was sharper, cleaner. He liked many things about winter—the fresh smell in the air, the crunch of snow or ice under his feet—but there was still a part of him that feared that even when he retreated to the warmth of the fireside or his bed, the chill would cling. So far it hadn’t happened, but Maglor had long ago accepted that some fears, like some scars, just wouldn’t ever fade completely.

When he reached the mallorn trees he paused to look up at them, silver trunks crowned with gold. The yellow leaves were a beautiful and bright splash of warm color in the otherwise bare and stark winter wood. Daeron, though, was not there. Maglor walked several times through and around the trees, but the grove was empty. He gave up, and decided to go ask Lacheryn if she had any other ideas—but then on his way back he spotted Daeron walking slowly, head bowed and arms crossed, along the partly-frozen Helethir, under a stand of aspens, slender and pale, branches empty and swaying slightly in the breeze that had picked up. Maglor left the path to approach him. “Daeron?”

Daeron didn’t lift his head. “What are you doing out here? It’s freezing.”

“Looking for you. I missed you last night.” Maglor stopped an arms length away, unsure of what to do. Daeron held himself rigidly, and when he had spoken he hadn’t sounded like himself, but Maglor didn’t know what it was he did sound like. “What do you need?”

Daeron’s jaw worked for a moment before he lifted his head. His eyes were red rimmed but dry, his gaze faraway. Beside them the Helethir flowed along, its music muted by the ice along the edges of the banks. Daeron seemed to be listening to it, but Maglor thought he was instead remembering the music of the Esgalduin. Finally, he said, voice hard, “It would be nice if—if someone would just—”

“Just what?”

“Just—speak plainly for once what I know they’re all thinking, what we all know is the truth, instead of asking careful questions or talking around it as though—we all know it’s because of me that Lúthien—that she never would have—”

“Daeron—”

“—without trying to soften it or make it someone else’s fault when we all know that if I hadn’t—”

“I’m not going to do that,” Maglor said. There was something else he should say, but he didn’t know what it was. He wished now that he had tried to ask Simpalírë what he had said, so that he might understand why the mere mention of Lúthien’s name had not just upset Daeron but angered him. Maglor had never known Daeron in this kind of mood, and he knew even before he opened his mouth that he was bound to say the wrong thing. “I wasn’t there, and—”

“No, you weren’t,” Daeron said, voice like broken ice, because Mablung had been wrong and it seemed Maglor could make everything worse, “because you drew your sword in Alqualondë and ruined everything before it even began and even now it’s—”

This was bound to happen sooner or later, Maglor thought. Daeron had been on edge for weeks now, ancient grief brought to the surface by new frustrations, and of course it had dredged up other things, opening old scars. This was just the blood welling up out of them, pain with no other direction to go, Daeron looking for a fight not because he wanted to hurt Maglor but because he wanted to be hurt himself. His words weren’t even untrue. Maglor had ruined any chance of happiness for the two of them in Beleriand long before they had ever even heard of one another, first by drawing his sword and then by keeping secret what had happened; it was the Doom of the Noldor that had ensnared Doriath in the end, though Thingol’s choices had been entirely his own, and if it was not directly Maglor’s fault he could not be held blameless in it either. Neither he nor Daeron wanted that to overshadow what they were building together in the present, but the knowledge of it was always there.

It still hurt, to hear it said aloud, to hear that awful bitter anger even if he knew it wasn’t really meant for him—and coming from someone who knew all of his weaknesses and all of the best places to strike if he wanted to do real damage. Maglor found himself bracing for it, like he’d once curled up with his arms raised to protect his head from the worst blows of the orcs in Dol Guldur. He couldn’t have this fight out here in the cold; he wished they weren’t having it in Taur-en-Gellam, where there was nowhere for him to go afterward. He was among strangers, and as kind as they were, Daeron’s family were Daeron’s family, and he could not just pick up and go back home to Nerdanel’s house or Imloth Ningloron either, because Calissë was there with them and such a journey in the middle of winter would be miserable for her and he would just end up with Curufin and Rundamírë angry with him too.

He didn’t want to run away, but knowing he couldn’t made Maglor feel trapped, like walls were closing in around him, and that made the cold feel somehow worse, like it had developed teeth. It felt like chains wound around his limbs.

In a voice that he was relieved did not shake, he said, “I’m not going to fight with you.”

“No,” Daeron said bitterly, “you’re just going to run away and hide like—”

“No,” Maglor said, taking a few steps back. He did not want to hear what would come out of Daeron’s mouth next. “We’re not going to do this. I’m not going to hide—not from you—but I’m not going to stay and listen to this either.”

He left Daeron by the river and returned to the city, and after debating with himself he went back to the palace and the library, where it was warm and quiet and he could at least pretend to be working. Some of Daeron’s students were there and they greeted him cheerfully; somehow he managed to put on a smile, though he declined their invitation to join them. He wanted to be left alone. He retreated to a secluded corner, far away from the parts of the library he knew Daeron favored, and sat down with several sheets of blank paper and without a single real thought in his head except a vague idea that Daeron was going to realize that everything would be easier—better—without Maglor, and then Maglor would have to retreat and figure out how to put himself back together on his own. Again. The more reasonable part of him knew better than to listen to that thought, knew that by the evening or the next day Daeron would apologize, remembered all the promises they had both made that meant so much more than careless words spoken in anger, but it came from the same place as all his other darkest thoughts that most of the time he could bury down deep and ignore, but which even decades in Lórien hadn’t been enough to fully uproot. Some of them had been planted by Sauron, but most were just truths borne out of the worst years of Beleriand, and once wakened they were all very hard to drown out again, even with all the things he had learned from Estë and Nienna about doing exactly that.

He stared at the paper and tried to think of his grandfather, but all he kept coming back to was his grandmother’s desire that he go before the Valar, and…

He’d ruined everything before it even began—and then he’d made it worse and worse with every decision he made from Alqualondë onward. Maybe everyone else could forgive and forget, but for Thingol it was because of Finwë’s memory, and for Ingwë and Olwë and others it was just for the sake of keeping the peace of Valinor. The Valar had no reason to do either and certainly no reason to listen to him, however good this song turned out to be. Maglor pressed his hands to his face and leaned his elbows on the desk, and wondered if Finwë even really wanted to come back. Aredhel had said he urged all the rest of them back toward life, but that did not mean he ever wanted to return—not to a family with so much blood on its hands and so much pain and grief still clinging to it. Everything he had worked for ans sacrificed had been to prevent exactly what they’d all gone and done anyway. In that moment Maglor could only bring to his mind the image of Finwë turning away—from him, from his father, from all of them—and it felt like he’d been punched in the chest, all the air driven out of his lungs.

Still. He’d made promises; so many people were depending on this song being finished, most of whom didn’t know anything at all about the plan to bring it before the Valar. It didn’t matter that nothing he wrote would be enough, that the Valar would never listen to it. Others would, because they needed something to remember Finwë by that was more than a lonely grave beside crumbling walls. Maglor swallowed past the lump in his throat, and picked up his pen. 

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The journey to Avallónë was quick and uneventful. Maedhros had left Nerdanel’s house before dawn, and reached the docks of Alqualondë just in time to miss one of the late afternoon ferries that went back and forth from the island. He kept his hood up, glad of the chill in the air that let him hide his distinctive hair and his face; maybe no one would be unkind, but they would certainly stare, and he didn’t want to deal with that, not traveling alone.

When he finally made it to Eressëa he found the weather already much warmer, and Elrond and one of his sons waiting in the harbor. It was still hard to tell Elladan and Elrohir apart at a glance, though up close it was made easier by a small scar through Elrohir’s eyebrow. In this case, it was Elladan who awaited him, and who cheerfully informed Maedhros that he had lost him one of his favorite armbands. As Maedhros tried to figure out how to respond Elrond rolled his eyes. “My sons like to place bets on you and your brother,” he said. “Elladan did not think you would accept my invitation.”

“What do they bet on about Maglor?” Maedhros asked.

“We haven’t made any bets about Maglor since we sailed west!” Elladan protested. “Not since we left the ship, anyway. And that one was whether he’d ever notice the way Daeron kept looking at him when he thought no one else was watching. I won that one,” he added, as they turned down a quiet street.

“Does Maglor know you were…?”

“Oh yes. We told him when he and Daeron returned from Ekkaia. He was horrified, and Daeron thought it was very funny.”

“And what did you win?” Maedhros asked.

Elladan grinned at him. “The armband that I have to give back now.”

Elrond and Celebrían’s house in Avallónë was very unlike the large and rambling house in Imloth Inglorion. It was stately, made of pale stone, and with more contained gardens surrounding it. Roses twined around the pillars at the front. Celebrían greeted Maedhros with a kiss on both his cheeks, and apologized for her sons’ antics. Elrohir was nowhere to be seen, but Maedhros could imagine he and Elladan laughing over the armband that had probably been passed back and forth between them for years and years by now.

Upstairs, Elrond nodded to the room just across the hall from the one prepared for Maedhros. “That’s Maglor’s room,” he said, “though of course right now it’s empty. How was he, when you last saw him?”

“Very cheerful,” said Maedhros. “He and Daeron took Calissë with them to Taur-en-Gellam. I was surprised by how much happier he seemed after coming back from Formenos.”

“Would you ever go back there yourself?” Elrond asked. They stepped into Maedhros room; it was similar in style to the rooms of Imloth Ningloron, open and airy, with windows looking out toward Avallónë, one partly blocked by one of the tall trees in the garden. The rugs on the floor were all in shades of green; there was no hearth, but none would be needed. Even in winter, the power of Uinen kept Alqualondë and Eressëa warm. The only chill came from the breezes through the Calacirya.

“I don’t know. I don’t think so.” Maedhros dropped his bags onto the floor by the bed. “What did you think of it?”

“Fingolfin has called it lonely, and I think that’s accurate,” said Elrond. “It’s beautiful—the lake, I mean, and Finwë’s grave all covered in flowers. I had thought perhaps it might be like other graves I have made or visited, but it wasn’t.”

“Because it should not exist,” Maedhros said. “Not here.”

“Yes. It is a grief that should have an end, and yet it doesn’t.”

“Do you really think this song will work?” Maedhros asked, looking from one of the watercolor paintings on the wall to Elrond, who stood with a thoughtful expression near the door. “Do you think the Valar will listen?”

“I cannot see what is to come,” said Elrond after a moment. “But Maglor feels strongly that he must write it and that he must sing it, and I believe that whatever comes of it, it’s an important thing to have been done—if that makes sense.”

“I’m not sure that I understand,” said Maedhros.

“When the Fellowship was broken, above Rauros,” Elrond said, “Aragorn made the decision not to go after Frodo, but to instead pursue the Uruk-hai that had taken Merry and Pippin. He and Legolas and Gimli made their chase across the Emyn Muil and the plains of Rohan—and they did not find their friends. But in the attempt they were brought to exactly the place that they needed to be in order to reunite with Gandalf, and to meet Éomer. It was the right choice, not to abandon their friends, even though they failed. The stakes now are not so high—Finwë is not suffering in Mandos, I don’t think, and if Maglor’s song fails to move the Valar it only means that nothing changes. But the choice to try is never wrong. Sometimes it is more important than success or failure. To try to destroy the Ring was worth it, and would have been worth trying even if it had failed, because to do nothing was to guarantee defeat.”

“What will the point be now, though, if it doesn’t change anything?” Maedhros asked. “All that will come of it is heartache, especially for Maglor.”

“But not to try guarantees failure, that Finwë will never be released,” Elrond said. “As I said, I cannot see what will happen. My feelings are not quite as strong as foresight, but they do not feel like only my own desire for Maglor’s success. All I can say is that it is important. It’s never wrong to care, and it’s never wrong to hope. Gandalf once said that despair is for those who see the end beyond all doubt—and we do not. We could not then, and we cannot now.”

He was right, but Maedhros wasn’t sure he could make himself hope for anything—especially not something like this.

Maedhros did not find himself alone with Elrond again for some days. In the meantime he was shown around Avallónë by the twins—including the square that held the monument to all the Edain, all the great heroes and figures, from Barahir to Hador to Elros. Maedhros would not have recognized Elros at all, were it not for his statue’s prominent position amongst the others, and the way that Elladan pointed him out. Once, Elrond and Elros had been as alike in face and stature as Elladan and Elrohir were. Kingship seemed to have changed Elros, and Maedhros hoped that he had not always been so stern. He wished, too, that he’d had a chance to make things right with Elros the way he was now able to with Elrond. But Elros had lived his life and died long, long before Maedhros had returned from Mandos, and he would probably not have welcomed Maedhros into his kingdom anyway.

When they returned to the house they found Idril and Tuor there. Maedhros had not seen Idril since before Turgon had vanished with his people to Gondolin—he thought perhaps the last time had been at the Mereth Aderthad, actually. Tuor he had never met at all. Both Idril and Tuor were wary of Maedhros in the beginning, which was only to be expected, but when Elrond casually reminded Tuor that Maedhros had known both Húrin and Huor, particularly in the lead-up to the Nirnaeth Arnoediad, his distrust evaporated in the face of a chance to learn more about the family he had never known.

After Idril and Tuor left in the evening, Maedhros opened his sketchbook. “What are you drawing?” Celebrían asked, sitting beside him to offer a glass of mulled wine.

“Huor,” Maedhros said as he took the glass. “And perhaps Húrin.”

“Ah. For Tuor?” Celebrían smiled at him. “That’s kind of you.”

Maedhros managed a smile, and didn’t reply. It was the least he could do, really—nothing could make up for all the harm he’d done, but at least he could do this. He had not known Huor well, but he remembered him clearly, and especially the way he had told anyone and everyone he spoke to that his beautiful Rían was expecting, and that he was going to be a father. Maedhros could draw that particular brilliant smile that he had worn whenever he spoke of his child, and he could draw Húrin too, with a similar look whenever he spoke of Túrin. Not Rían, who he had never met, nor Morwen who he had seen only once at a distance, but at least he could give Tuor something. Huor had loved him so fiercely before he was ever born—and Huor had died, because the plans Maedhros had been foremost in making had failed, because he had failed to come to the field in time, because the House of Hador had been drawn into the Doom of the Noldor. Fingon had died too, alongside so many others, but Fingon had come back, and neither Húrin nor Huor ever would.

Tuor and Idril came back a few days later for lunch, and after Celebrían and Elrond walked off with Idril to show her something in the garden, Maedhros brought out his sketches, carefully cut out of his sketchbook and tucked into a folder, and handed them to Tuor. “I thought you might like these.”

“What are they?” Tuor took the folder curiously, brushing a strand of hair out of his eyes as he did so. He had streaks of grey in his hair and laugh lines around his eyes, though it seemed that he had stopped aging sometime not long after he had come to Valinor. Maedhros wasn’t sure if the Gift of Men had been taken from him entirely, or if he was given the same grace that the Men of Númenor had once had, and had just never yet decided it was time. Maedhros certainly wasn’t going to ask. He leaned back in his seat as Tuor opened the folder, and averted his gaze when Tuor inhaled sharply. They sat in silence for some time as Tuor looked through the pages—at Huor and Húrin and at the other patriarchs and members of the House of Hador that Maedhros had known or remembered well enough to sketch.

Finally, Tuor said, quietly and hoarsely, “Thank you.”

“I never met your mother,” Maedhros said, keeping his gaze on a seagull pecking around a path just off the veranda where they sat, “though I knew others of the House of Bëor—Ladros was not so far from Himring.”

“Did you ever meet Beren?”

“A few times, in his youth—all before the Dagor Bragollach.” Maedhros glanced over at Tuor then. “Huor was thrilled to become a father. He spoke of you often and with great joy. In those days we all hoped that the battle would go our way—many were certain that it would, that our plans were sure to succeed. I don’t know if Huor was one of them, but he certainly had hope.”

Tuor traced the edges of Huor’s smile on the page, laid out on the small table between their seats. “I know many stories of him from his youth, from the year he spent in Gondolin,” he said after a little while, “but all Turgon could tell me of him as an adult was their last meeting near the Fens of Serech—of my father’s last words, that a star would rise from his house and Turgon’s. I always knew that meant Eärendil, though I did not realize it would be quite so literal.” He shifted the pages until Húrin’s portrait lay on top. “Did you know that he sought Gondolin again—before he died, he tried to find it. I never knew until much later that the eagles brought word of it to Turgon, and Turgon—” Tuor covered his mouth with a hand, blinking a few times. “He refused to let him in.”

“Did he ever say why?”

“I have never asked him. I learned of it only after Gondolin’s fall—I can’t remember now who told me, and maybe it isn’t even true; there were all kinds of stories and rumors being spread, then. There was an insinuation that Morgoth was watching and that it was Húrin, still under his curse, that first drew Morgoth’s eye to those mountains. I don’t know if that’s true either. I do know that if Turgon had just listened to me, we would all have been away from there, all have been safe by Sirion or at some other stronghold, perhaps more easily found, and my uncle could have…” Tuor shook his head. “Gondolin was wonderful. It was beautiful, it was safe…and we had a chance to leave it that way, before disaster struck.”

Maedhros thought of Maeglin with his haunted eyes and the way he’d pulled the hood of his cloak up to hide his face when leaving Nerdanel’s house. He wondered if Idril and Tuor knew yet that Maeglin had returned from Mandos, but it wasn’t his place to ask, or to share that news if they hadn’t yet heard. “Turgon has many regrets,” he said instead.

“I know. I can forgive most of them—but I don’t know if I want to hear his reasoning for his rejection of my uncle, after everything…after the Fens of Serech. Even if that story isn’t true, I don’t know how to ask.” Tuor traced his fingers lightly over the waves of Húrin’s hair. “I saw my cousin once,” he murmured after a few minutes. “Near the Pools of Ivrin—defiled by then, after Glaurung. Voronwë and I were passing them and…he came up from the south, alone, calling for Finduilas. He stopped by the pools and we heard him cry out in despair—for Beleg, and Gwindor, and Finduilas again. I didn’t know any of those names. I had no idea who he was, but later I heard the tales and…and I realized that that had been my cousin, Túrin Turambar. It was the closest I ever came to any of my family, and I had no idea. He never saw me at all.”

“I’m sorry,” Maedhros said softly.

“I’ve never been able to listen to the whole of the Narn i Chîn Húrin.”

“There are many tales I can’t bear to listen to either,” Maedhros said. “I’m not sure I’ll be able to listen to the whole of the song my brother is currently writing.”

“The one about King Finwë?”

“Yes.”

“Idril can’t wait to hear it sung. When do you think he will have it finished?”

“He hopes to perform it at the great feast of Ingwë’s,” Maedhros said. “Will you go?”

“Everyone is going,” Tuor said. He slid the drawings back into their folder, as Celebrían’s laughter reached them from down the garden, joined with Idril’s. “Would you…would you tell me something of my kin of the House of Bëor, if I came back to ask?”

“Of course,” Maedhros said, “though my cousins would be better.”

“I’ve heard all that Finrod can tell me, and Angrod,” said Tuor. “Maybe you won’t have anything precisely new, but it’s a different perspective.”

“I’ll be here all winter,” Maedhros said. “You can come ask me anything you want—about Ladros or Dorthonion, or about anything else.”

Tuor met his gaze, his own eyes holding something like a challenge. “Anything?” he repeated.

“Anything.”

Idril and Celebrían returned then, and Elrond reappeared a minute later. Tuor tucked the drawings away, and the rest of the visit was spent speculating about Ingwë’s feast.

The next day Maedhros received a letter from Maglor, describing Taur-en-Gellam and Daeron’s students, and Calissë’s little adventures as she made new friends and charmed all the lords and ladies at Thingol’s court. He spoke of the cold, and of a grove of mallorn trees that grew near the forest city, and how lovely they were in wintertime. I find myself missing the one at home in Imloth Ningloron, though, Maglor wrote, and missing Imloth Ningloron in general. This place is lovely and Elu Thingol has been more than welcoming—and I learned many stories of Finwë that I can’t wait to share with you—but I’ll be glad when spring comes. Calissë might not be; she’s made so many friends, it’s truly wonderful to see. It hasn’t yet snowed but when it does I am imagining them all building snow-fortresses and having snowball fights, and ambushing unsuspecting passers-by, the same way Estel used to. Maybe I’ve been missing Rivendell lately, too. I definitely miss you. I should be working right now, but I can’t concentrate on the song so I’m writing this letter instead. I was very glad to hear that you’re spending the winter with Elrond on Eressëa; I’m sure it will be much more peaceful than whatever is going on at Ammë’s house or in Tirion.

Usually Maglor’s letters included a message from Daeron, either in his own hand or paraphrased by Maglor, but this one did not mention Daeron’s name at all. When Maglor spoke of his students he only called them the songbirds, rather than Daeron’s songbirds. There was something about the way he wrote of being homesick and looking forward to spring that made Maedhros uneasy. He knew his brother, and he knew what it looked like these days when Maglor wanted to appear happier than he really was—the way he wasn’t very good at it anymore. This letter read more like the one he’d sent Nerdanel upon first arriving in Avallónë, years ago now, than his more recent letters.

He wrote back with a few probing questions, hoping that by the time Maglor received his letter whatever was wrong would have resolved itself. He included a sketch of Elladan and Elrohir and Elrond sitting together on the beach, Elladan and Elrond laughing at some story Elrohir was telling, his arms flung out as he gestured. After a little bit of thought, he wrote a quick letter to Daeron as well. Then he sent both letters and tried not to worry too much. Anyone with eyes could see how deep the love between Maglor and Daeron ran, but Maedhros caught himself thinking more than once of how deep the love between his parents had run, and how that had turned out in the end.

It wasn’t the same thing. He knew that—Maglor and Daeron were not Fëanor and Nerdanel, and they were both aware of those same pitfalls and potential disastrous mistakes. Still. Neither of them were at their best, both of them carrying the weight of expectations neither had asked for. The last thing either of them needed was a fight, especially with each other. Maedhros found himself wondering if perhaps he and Maglor had come too soon from Lórien, or whether they had thrown themselves too quickly back into everything else.

“Maglor has, maybe, with the way he’s been going around to see everyone all at once,” Elrond said when Maedhros ventured to mention it to him. “But you seem to have been taking things slowly enough—a few weeks in Tirion isn’t so very long, and your mother’s house is…” He paused. “Well, I was going to call it quiet, but I’m not sure that suits.”

“It’s mostly quiet,” said Maedhros. “And the noise doesn’t bother me when it’s only my brothers.” It was relaxing in its own way—the noise was more often laughter than anything else, and even when Celegorm and Caranthir did clash it wasn’t over anything serious. Life with as many brothers as Maedhros had was never going to be quiet—except for those last years in Beleriand, when it had been quiet, with no laughter and no bickering, and only tense arguments about what their next move should be.

“But then Aredhel and Maeglin came,” Elrond said. “Even if Aredhel is not a stranger, it has still been a very long time. I hope you don’t feel obligated to do anything here. I invited you because I thought you would appreciate the peace.”

“I feel as though I’ve slept better here than I have in weeks,” Maedhros admitted. “I think the wearying thing has been how they’re all worried about me. I feel fine, but I spent so long saying so when it wasn’t true that no one else believes me now. That’s my own fault, but I can only threaten to throw my brothers in the river so often.”

“Has your hand pained you at all?”

“No.”

“You know you will have days when you aren’t fine,” Elrond said after a moment. “Healing doesn’t work the way we all wish it would—even Lórien cannot rid you of all your scars.”

“I know. Such days don’t last, though, and I know how to deal with them.” Sometimes that meant hiding under his blankets all day instead of getting up and making himself exist in the present, but Elrond didn’t need to know that. Those days were few and far between, and Maedhros wasn’t worried about Angband creeping up on him while he was there on Eressëa. He hadn’t even been feeling anxious about his father.

It was nice, to not have anything at all to worry about, except for whatever was going on with Maglor—and even that, Maedhros was almost entirely confident it would be resolved by the next time Maglor wrote to him.

Elrond said, “Good. I have athelas here too, if you want any. It soothes and calms the mind even when you might not realize you need it; Celebrían often throws a few leaves into the bath.”

“I’ll keep it in mind.” When he went to bed, though, Maedhros found that the salt- and rose-scented breeze through the window, and the sound of the waves, was more than enough to relax him and lull him to sleep—and his dreams were quiet, all starlight on clear waters, and music more beautiful than any he had ever heard in waking life, though when he woke it slipped from his mind like sand through his fingers, yet left him feeling rested and more at peace than he had been since leaving the Gardens of Lórien. 

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In the time it took for Maglor’s letter to reach Maedhros in Avallónë, and for Maedhros’ reply to come back to Taur-en-Gellam—accompanied by a sketch of Elrond and his sons, which should have done more to cheer Maglor up than it did; instead he just missed them so much it hurt—Maglor did not see Daeron. If Daeron returned home at all in that time, it was when Maglor wasn’t there or late enough that Maglor was asleep—or at least in bed. He didn’t sleep much, just curled up with Pídhres and watched snow flurries whirl by outside of the window and worried.

No one asked if he and Daeron had fought—that much was obvious—but at least Lacheryn and Belthond continued to be kind, and no one seemed to think Maglor was at fault. Beleg had made fast friends with Calissë, and took charge of her most of those days, going out to meet with her other new friends and to explore the winter woods. She came back in the evenings happy but exhausted, only wanting to curl up on Maglor’s lap by the fire while Belthond or Mablung or Beleg told stories. Maglor spent his days keeping out of everyone’s way, trying to work but not really managing to get much done. The words just seemed to stare at him from the pages, incoherent and mocking, and all he really accomplished was giving himself a headache.

One morning, the day after Maedhros’ letter had arrived with a few pointed questions that revealed just how badly Maglor had failed to project an air of cheerfulness in his own writing, he woke to hear raised voices, and came downstairs just in time to hear the front door close and to see Simpalírë retreating to his own room, red-faced and scowling. In the kitchen Lacheryn sighed, and poured a cup of tea. “Daeron just needs a little more time, I think,” she said as she held it out to Maglor. “Usually when he’s angry or upset he’ll go write songs until his fingers cramp around his pen; I think that’s what he’s been doing this time too—though I don’t think I have ever seen him quite this upset.”

“I don’t think he has been sleeping,” Maglor said after a moment.

“Likely not,” Lacheryn agreed. “And that will make it all worse.”

“Should I go somewhere else, so if he wants his own bed—”

“Absolutely not!” Lacheryn said firmly. “You stay right where you are. He’s not angry with you, not really, and none of this is your fault.”

“I know, but—”

“Do you?” Lacheryn looked at him, her dark eyes kind but very keen. “I can’t say that Daeron has never lashed out at others when he’s gotten angry or afraid, but it is a very rare thing these days, and perhaps that means there is more weight behind it now. Thank you for not rising to it, but I am sorry you’re now in such an uncomfortable spot. Do you want to go somewhere else for a little while? There are plenty of rooms in the palace if you want your own space.”

“No,” Maglor admitted after a moment, without raising his eyes from his tea, watching the steam curl gently up from it. “I don’t want to worry Calissë.”

“She’s noticed that something is amiss, of course,” said Lacheryn. Of course she had. She was Curufin’s daughter, with his keen eyes and keener mind, however distracted Mablung and Beleg were keeping her—and of course she would be missing Daeron too. “I don’t think you need to worry about her. She’s having too much fun with my son and her new friends to spare too much thought for the woes of the adults around her. Are you all right, Maglor? Daeron has a sharp tongue, and if he has let his self-control slip—”

“No, nothing like that happened.” Maglor had also learned very early just what kind of damage his voice or his words could do if he wasn’t careful; however upset Daeron had been, there had been no power behind his words, and no damage had been done besides hurt feelings. It was his absence that bothered Maglor, far more than anything he’d actually said. “I’m just worried.”

“Would you like a little bit of advice?”

“Please,” he said, and hated how small his voice sounded.

“Don’t hide yourself away today,” Lacheryn said. “Don’t go to the library or back upstairs to your room. Daeron will come back eventually, and I think it would be good for both of you if he saw you waiting for him.”

It was the opposite of what Maglor was inclined to do—which was to keep out of the way until Daeron came looking on purpose, not hiding but not trying to force a meeting that might turn into another confrontation—but Lacheryn knew far better than he how Daeron’s mind worked when he was this upset. So Maglor fetched his harp and a book and curled up by the hearth in the parlor, within sight of the front door. He hadn’t been able to get properly warm in days; that day was no different, and he couldn’t focus on either his book or any music he attempted to play. Calissë then appeared and demanded a harp lesson midway through the morning, which did help him to think about something other than all the worries and fears swirling in his head. He heard the door open as he guided Calissë’s fingers over the strings, but didn’t allow himself to look up or get distracted.

He taught Calissë a relatively simple melody that day, but one that was used for many different songs. “The hobbits say it’s as old as the hills in the Shire,” he told her, “and they make up new words for it all the time.”

“Can I make up words too?”

“Of course you can, but how about first I teach you some of Bilbo’s?”

Calissë looked up then, and her face brightened. “Daeron, listen to the song I just learned!”

“I heard it,” Daeron said, offering her a small smile. He leaned against the doorway with his arms crossed over his chest, with ink-stained fingers and bloodshot eyes; it looked like he had been there for a while, watching them. “When you’re done, Maglor…” He hesitated, then tilted his head toward the stairs.

“All right,” Maglor said quietly. “Are you—”

“It can wait.” Daeron left, heading upstairs.

“You can teach me Bilbo’s songs later, Uncle Cáno,” said Calissë. “I’ll just practice right now, and then Mistress Lacheryn and I are going to finish my new gown for Midwinter.”

Maglor kissed her temple. “That sounds lovely. Do me one favor before you go to bed tonight, though.”

“What’s that?”

“Write to your parents.”

“Oh, but writing is boring!”

“But they miss you and want to hear from you. Don’t you want to tell them all about the music you’re learning, and your friends, and about your new gown?”

Calissë grumbled, but agreed, and Maglor kissed her again before getting up. As he did Pídhres jumped onto the sofa beside her to curl up into a small and soft grey ball.

Upstairs, Daeron’s room was dark; no lamps had been lit, and at first glance Maglor thought he had misunderstood and Daeron wasn’t there. Then he looked to the corner where Daeron had set a deep and cozy chair, perfect for reading or playing music, and found him curled up in it, looking out of the window, apparently lost in thought as he turned something over in his fingers. “Daeron?” Maglor said quietly, shutting the door behind him and leaning back against it.

“I received a letter from Maedhros yesterday,” Daeron said after a moment. His voice was rough around the edges, like he hadn’t slept in some time. “He sounded rather worried.”

“I wrote to him,” Maglor said, “but I didn’t mean to—”

“No, I know.” Daeron dropped his gaze to whatever it was he held in his hands. “I’m sorry. I haven’t—I’ve been awful, and I know it. There’s no excuse, and you don’t deserve it. I’m sorry.”

Maglor didn’t move. The door was solid against his back, and he let it hold a little more of his weight as he said, “You know I love you, Daeron. If you need time, or space—whatever you need, I’ll give it to you. What I won’t do, is be the weapon you use to hurt yourself.” He saw Daeron wince, curling into himself a little tighter. “Do you want me to leave? I can stay somewhere in the—”

“No!” Daeron looked up then, but his hair fell forward and it was hard to see his face in the shadows of the room. Whatever anger he had been feeling before had run its course, though, and now he just seemed—well, exhausted, with a tremor in his voice and shaking hands. “No, please don’t leave. I didn’t—I don’t want—”

“All right, I won’t.” Maglor crossed the room to kneel before the chair. Up close he could see that the object Daeron was clutching in his hand was the pendant Maglor had made for him. Maglor covered Daeron’s hands with his own.

“I’m sorry,” Daeron whispered. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me.”

“What do you need?” Maglor asked.

“I don’t—I’m getting it all wrong, just like I got it wrong when Beren came to Neldoreth, and I don’t know how not to, and now I’ve ruined our—”

“You haven’t ruined anything,” Maglor said. “I’m right here. What do you need, love?”

“I don’t—I don’t know. To be someone different, maybe, someone who doesn’t—”

“Daeron.”

“I’m sorry. I don’t know. You. I need you.”

“You have me,” Maglor said, “always.” Daeron’s hands were cool under his own, as though he hadn’t warmed up yet after coming in from outside. “When was the last time you slept?”

Daeron made a small noise that was somewhere in between a laugh and a sob. “I don’t know. I think I fell asleep in the library yesterday.”

“When did you last eat something?”

“This morning. I breakfasted with Melian and then she—not scolded—admonished? Very gently, more gently than I deserved really, and…”

“You deserve gentleness, Daeron,” Maglor said. “What did Melian say to you?”

“She told me to come home to you and that things would look far brighter after I had slept,” Daeron said after a moment. “And that my parents will arrive sometime today or maybe tomorrow. Just in time for Midwinter.”

“Surely if you need to skip Midwinter, no one will object,” Maglor said.

“No, but…there will be talk, and I don’t…” Daeron looked away, out of the window. The sky was heavy with clouds, promising snow to come. In the grey light Daeron seemed very pale, almost washed out and ghostly; he had dark circles under his eyes, like bruises. “I can get through Midwinter,” he said after a moment.

“Not if you don’t sleep,” Maglor said. He pulled at Daeron’s limbs until he uncurled them, and then rose up onto his knees to kiss Daeron, who responded by sliding his fingers into Maglor’s hair to try to pull him in even closer.

Then he broke away as his fingers found the hair clip Maglor was wearing, and he tugged it free to look at it. “You’re wearing—”

“Of course I am.” It was the one Daeron had given him, silver set with purple enamel asters. Maglor took the clip and kissed Daeron again.

“But I don’t—”

“Don’t you dare try to tell me what you do or don’t deserve.”

“But—wait, Maglor, wait—” Daeron caught Maglor’s face in his hands. “I love you, and what happened—in Doriath, long ago—what happened then had nothing to do with you. I don’t blame you for any of it. I wasn’t thinking of you at all at the time. What I said to you the other day was cruel and uncalled for and untrue and I am so, so sorry.”

“You’re already forgiven,” Maglor said. “I forgave you before I walked away.”

“Maglor—”

“I love you.” Maglor kissed him, and said it again against his mouth: “I love you. You haven’t ruined anything, I promise. Come to bed.” In reply Daeron slid out of the chair into Maglor’s arms, already pulling at their clothes as he deepened the kiss.

Some time later, as snow began to fall outside, and both of them were spent and tired and finally warm, Maglor ran his fingers through Daeron’s hair. It was still dark in the room, but even in the gloom he thought that Daeron looked better, less fragile, all his limbs gone loose and soft. “Will you tell me what started all this in the first place?” he asked.

“It’s stupid,” Daeron sighed, eyes half-closed. He had his hand on Maglor’s arm, rubbing his thumb over one of the scars there.

“Tell me anyway?”

Daeron didn’t answer right away, not until Maglor started to think he wouldn’t answer at all. But finally he said softly, “From the moment I saw Lúthien with Beren in the woods, all my choices were the wrong ones. I knew even at the time, but I just—I was so afraid. When I saw them it was…has it ever happened to you, that you almost hear a change in the Great Music?”

“No,” Maglor said, “but I don’t think I have witnessed anything like that, or if I have I was not paying attention.”

“If I listen…sometimes I can hear something of what is to come, or gain some understanding of what is happening,” Daeron said, “but I didn’t stop to try, then. I just knew that something was happening, something big and something terrifying. I went straight to Thingol, when I should have gone to Lúthien instead. And later…I felt it again, when she told me of her plans to leave—and clearly I had not learned from my first mistake. I couldn’t think of anything except her making it all the way to Angband and then never being able to get out.”

“Of course you were afraid,” Maglor said softly. He knew that fear. He knew what it was to have it come true. “Surely you did not expect Thingol to set a Silmaril as Lúthien’s bride price.”

“No, of course not. And—he only did it so Beren would never come back. I don’t think he ever expected him to succeed. It was still foolish—it was yet another thing that happened that I could feel change something in Doriath, though I can’t really describe what it was that changed or how I knew. It was like hearing a discordant note in a song, maybe. But that’s not what—it was still me that set it all in motion, and from that moment nothing I did was right, not until the Girdle spit me out east of Region and I decided not to try to return.”

“That isn’t what’s happening now,” Maglor said.

“Isn’t it?” Daeron opened his eyes. “You said yourself after that first meeting in Alqualondë—”

“There is a space in between opening yourself entirely to strangers and in holding yourself so much apart that you make it impossible for yourself to be known. I thought you had found that space with Simpalírë, at least.”

“I thought so too,” Daeron said, “but then he asked—and it’s not his fault. I just…”

“Could you tell him what you just told me?”

“No,” Daeron said. “Or—I could, maybe, but I don’t want to share it with anyone else, and I cannot ask him to keep secrets for me, and—I can’t bear the thought of Netyalossë hearing about it. And I know that I’m being unfair, especially to her—that it’s no small thing for her to find herself suddenly having an older brother, any more than it is for me to suddenly be one. I should offer them all more grace than I am.”

Maglor raised himself up onto an elbow, resting his hand on Daeron’s face, tracing his cheekbone with his thumb. “It’s not really anyone’s fault that Mablung’s letter went astray, and you went to Alqualondë unwarned,” he said, “but that doesn’t mean it did no harm. Even so, you were never going to be as prepared as your brother and your sisters, who have known all their lives that you were out there somewhere. I’m not sure they are being particularly gracious if they expect you to take all of this in stride.”

“Maybe both sides are at fault, then,” Daeron said. “Except Simpalírë; he hasn’t asked anything of me except to know me. And maybe Vinyelírë—I think I would like her just as well, except she never came to see me without either our parents or Netyalossë, and I don’t know if Netyalossë is just overbearing or if Vinyelírë is just shy and reserved.” He sighed. “And there I go again…”

“I’m not sure I like Netyalossë much either, if that makes you feel any better.”

“It doesn’t, really.”

“Is there anything that would?”

A small smile touched Daeron’s lips as he reached up to brush his knuckles over Maglor’s cheek. “I already feel better than I did this morning. I should have just talked to you in the first place, instead of trying to pick a fight.” He let his hand fall away, and then raised his head, glancing toward the window. “How long have we been up here? Isn't Calissë waiting—”

“She’s with Lacheryn. I’ll check on her before bedtime to make sure she wrote to Curvo and Rundamírë like I asked, but she’ll be fine otherwise.” Maglor gently pushed Daeron back down onto the pillows. “You need to sleep, as Melian said.”

“I need to talk to Simpalírë.”

“You tried this morning, didn’t you?”

“Well, no. He tried, but I—”

“Try again when you aren’t so exhausted, and maybe it will go better.”

“Maybe.”

“Can I ask you something?”

“I’m not going to like it, am I?”

“Probably not.”

“I probably deserve it,” Daeron sighed. “Ask.”

“We’ve spoken of grief, but…have you let yourself grieve? For any of it?”

“Yes,” Daeron said softly. “I grieved for Lúthien—I mourn her still, but I did…I wept and I screamed at the sky and I sang songs and then I moved on, just like I did for you, and for my aunt and uncle, and Mablung, and everyone else. Long ago. I traveled and learned things and met other people and…the weight never lessened, but I got stronger and it got easier to bear. I don’t know why it all feels so sharp and new again now.”

“But you never did that for your family.”

“I never thought I had to. It never felt…all my life, their absence was just a fact, like how water is wet and fire is hot.”

“You need to let yourself feel it, Daeron,” Maglor said. “If you just ignore it as you have been doing, it will just keep coming back to trip you up. I know because that’s what I did with everything, I pushed it all down so I didn’t have to think about it, until I came here and couldn’t ignore it any longer, and—well, you saw the results. Please don’t do that to yourself.”

“Do you think I need to go to Lórien?” Daeron whispered.

“Not if you don’t want to.”

“I don’t.”

“But Nienna will come to you if you really need her, or if you call for her.” Maglor’s own meeting with Nienna by Ekkaia had left him feeling raw and bruised, but those tears had also taken something out of him with them, like poison had been drawn out of a wound, and after that he had been able to—slowly, clumsily— find his way toward real healing. “At the very least, right now, I think you need to cry yourself to sleep, and then sleep. It won’t fix everything, but it will be a start.”

“It sounds miserable,” Daeron said, “but I suppose it can’t be worse than what I’ve been doing.”

Maglor kissed his forehead and then rolled out of bed, ignoring Daeron’s noise of protest. He fetched one of Daeron’s pipes and returned, settling back against the headboard as Daeron curled up against him. He started to play, as best he could render it, the Music that could be heard in Ekkaia’s Waters, the sorrows and the consolations of the Third Theme of the Great Music. He played very quietly, not wanting the sound of it to escape that room. After a little while he felt Daeron begin to tremble beside him, and then to shake as the tears he had been holding back for weeks finally escaped. After a while Maglor switched to a different song, one he had learned long ago in Valmar—a hymn to Nienna, meant for comfort in the face of heartache.

Eventually, Daeron did cry himself to sleep. Maglor gradually stopped playing, and gently wiped some of the tears from Daeron’s face before slipping out of bed. He dressed and left the room to check on Calissë and to let Lacheryn know that Daeron had returned home and was resting. Instead he nearly ran into Mablung at the top of the stairs.

“Is Daeron here?” Mablung asked.

“Yes. He’s sleeping.”

“Oh good.” A great deal of tension left Mablung’s shoulders as he sighed. Not all of it, though. “Escelírë and Aldalëo have just arrived.”

“I don’t think Daeron is in any state to meet them—not today,” Maglor said.

“At least he has been aware of their coming,” Mablung said, a little wryly and ruefully. “There won’t be any hiding that he quarreled with Simpalírë, but—” Voices floated up from downstairs, and he glanced over his shoulder. Maglor thought they sounded cheerful enough. Then Mablung asked him, “What did you quarrel about? I still don’t even know what upset him in the first place—he wouldn’t tell me, and neither would Simpalírë.”

“It’s hard to call it quarreling when he just wanted to pick a fight and I wouldn’t let him,” Maglor said.

“For no reason? That doesn’t sound like him.”

“Simpalírë had mentioned Lúthien,” Maglor said, and Mablung grimaced. “And if Daeron knew then that his parents were on their way, he might have been on edge already. I don’t think Simpalírë meant anything by it, but—”

“I know. I’ll speak to Simpalírë—I’m sure my parents have already, but they were not there—and I’ll make excuses for Daeron’s absence to Aldalëo and Escelírë.”

“I’ll keep myself scarce too,” said Maglor. “I don’t really want to leave him alone. But where is Calissë?”

“Downstairs, charming my aunt and uncle,” Mablung said with a smile. “I hope you don’t want your harp back today. Don’t worry about her.”

“Just remind her she has to write to her parents tonight, if you would,” Maglor said. “She’ll never do it if she isn’t hounded.”

“I’ll promise her an extra slice of cake if she writes her letter before dinner.”

“Thank you.”

“Maglor,” Mablung said as Maglor started to turn away. When he glanced back Mablung asked, “Are you all right?”

Maglor thought about deflecting, but couldn’t come up with anything Mablung would believe. “I’m tired,” he said, “and I’m still worried about him, but I’ll be all right—we both will.”

“I’m glad he has you,” Mablung said, and retreated back down the stairs.

In their room, Maglor crawled back into bed and curled himself around Daeron, pressing his face into his hair with a sigh. He didn’t quite fall asleep, but he drifted, thoughts circling lazily, just overwhelmingly glad that Daeron was back and that nothing had been broken that couldn’t be repaired.

It was late when Daeron woke, well after Maglor had slipped out again to kiss Calissë goodnight. She was full of excitement about her new dress and the songs that Lacheryn had taught her on the harp that evening—very old songs from the time of the Great Journey, many of which would be sung and danced to at the Midwinter celebrations there in Taur-en-Gellam. “And I did write about it all to Ammë and Atya,” she added as Maglor tucked the blankets around her. “And I wrote to Náriel and Tyelpë too, and I only smudged the ink a little bit.”

“Good,” Maglor said, and kissed her forehead. “I’m sorry I was absent all day, sweetheart. You’ll have to play me those songs tomorrow.”

“And Daeron?”

“Yes, and Daeron too.”

“Are you still mad at each other?”

“No, we aren’t.”

“Good. You shouldn’t go so long without apologizing, Uncle Cáno. Ammë says so—she won’t even let me and Náriel go one whole day without making up when we fight.”

“We weren’t really fighting,” said Maglor. “Daeron just needed to be alone for a while—but your mother is right, of course. The sooner you can make up after a fight, the better.”

“What’s the matter with Daeron?”

“Like I told you, he has been missing Lúthien,” said Maglor. “And, well, sometimes family is complicated.”

“That’s what Atya said when I asked him why you don’t talk to Grandfather.”

“I have spoken to your grandfather,” Maglor said. “I went to see him in Tirion this summer.”

“But you weren’t very happy when we met him after we brought you back from Lórien, and Atya wouldn’t tell me why. Neither would Ammë. They just said it’s complicated, but that’s not a reason.”

Maglor wasn’t sure Curufin would be pleased with him for having this conversation with Calissë, but it wasn’t something that could be put off forever. At least she hadn’t ended up going to Celegorm or Caranthir for an explanation instead; Maglor loved his brothers, but neither of them would be any good at explaining the tangled up threads of their family in a way Calissë would understand—not without telling her either not enough or far too much, and probably in a way that would just upset everyone. “After the Darkening…everyone was very angry, because Finwë was gone, and the Trees were gone, and none of us felt safe anymore. It was your grandfather that urged us all to return to Middle-earth. He wasn’t wrong—I really don’t think we were wrong to go back. But he did lead us into some other things that were very wrong, and things that hurt us—hurt me, and your father, and the rest of our brothers, and many other people. And then we lost him, too, before there was any chance of setting any of it right.”

“But Grandfather wouldn’t hurt anybody,” Calissë protested, but she sounded uncertain. Pídhres jumped up onto her lap, and Calissë hugged her close.

“No, of course not—not now. The Darkening was a very frightening time for all of us, and we all made terrible mistakes. Nothing like that will ever happen again. It’s just that sometimes it’s hard to forgive someone even when they’re truly sorry and doing their best to make it right. I love my father, and I know he loves all of us very much, but I was angry with him for a very long time. Some of your uncles feel the same way, but we’re trying. It’s still true that you should apologize as soon as you can after you do something to hurt someone, or if you fight with them, but we never had a chance for that, and that just makes it all hurt even worse.”

“But what did he do that was so bad?”

“That’s another story for when you’re older, I’m afraid,” Maglor said. Calissë groaned. “I’m sorry, I know it’s frustrating. The important thing, though, is that we all do love one another, even when we’re angry or sad or hurt.”

“Did Daeron’s family also do something bad?”

“No, Daeron’s family is quite different. It was only that he was parted from them when he was very small—much younger than you or Náriel—and now he doesn’t know them and they don’t know him, and none of them know how to talk to one another. That’s not anyone’s fault. It will just take time, and perhaps a lot of arguments, before they figure it out. And now it’s getting late,” Maglor added, and leaned down to kiss her forehead again. “You should be going to sleep. I’ll see you in the morning.”

“Good night,” Calissë yawned. Pídhres curled up by her, purring gently. “Will you make snow-people with me tomorrow, if it snows a lot like Mablung said it will?”

“Yes, of course.”

Some time later, when the house was very quiet and outside the snow continued to fall, thicker and heavier by the minute, Daeron finally stirred. He sighed and rolled over onto his back. “How long did I sleep?” he murmured.

“All day.”

“Did you sleep?”

“A little.” Maglor waited until Daeron blinked his eyes open. They were still a little swollen, and his face still bore traces of his earlier tears. “How do you feel?”

“Awful. Hollowed out. Hungover.”

“You’ll feel better if you eat something.”

Daeron huffed a quiet laugh as he reached for Maglor. “More wisdom you learned in Lórien?”

“The Shire, actually. Well?”

“Yes, all right.”

The kitchen was quiet and dark, with the rest of the household in bed. Daeron lit a lamp and put water on, and Maglor found the teapot and some mugs. As he leaned against the counter Daeron came over to lean against him, resting his head on Maglor’s shoulder. “Midwinter is only a few days away,” Daeron said after a few minutes. “I still need to wrangle everyone else into rehearsal. Not tomorrow, but the next day. At least I know what you need and what you’ll be performing.”

“I just need my harp and for you to tell me where to stand. Can you wrangle…?”

“Yes. I feel—I don’t know if I feel better, but I feel calmer. At least I won’t snap at any of them when they get irritating.”

“Do you expect anyone to get irritating?”

“Everyone is irritating in rehearsals.” Daeron sighed. “Do you know if my parents arrived?”

“They did, not long after you fell asleep.”

“Oh, good—before the snow got very bad?”

“I think so.”

Daeron leaned more heavily against Maglor. “I can’t believe I’m still so tired.”

“That happens when you go without real sleep for days on end,” Maglor said. He wrapped his arms around Daeron and kissed his temple. “Did you at least get any songs out of it?”

“I don’t know. I wrote a lot, but whether any of it is worth keeping remains to be seen.”

The kettle sang. Daeron spooned the tea leaves into the pot, and Maglor poured the water. “I’ve been thinking about what I’m to sing at Midwinter,” he said as he set the kettle aside and got a loaf of bread out, and a jar of honey.

“I thought you had already decided,” Daeron said.

“I had, but then I remembered that song about the sea monster—”

Daeron was startled into a burst of bright laughter before he clapped a hand over his mouth, just as Maglor had intended. “You wouldn’t,” he said.

“I always meant to perform it before Elu Thingol and all his court,” Maglor said, “remember? So they can all hear how you—”

“Oh stop!” Daeron, still laughing, kissed him. “I’d forgotten all about that stupid song. Don’t tell me you actually finished it.”

“No, but I have enough that I could sing—”

“Absolutely not. I forbid it.”

“Or maybe I could finish it in time for Ingwë’s east and then all of the Eldalië can hear—”

“Maglor!”

“You can’t forbid me from singing it then,” Maglor said, “because Elemmírë is the one in charge, not you, and I’m sure she’ll be very happy—”

“Elemmírë would not—”

“So if I write out a copy and send it to her—” Maglor might have gone on as long as he could keep Daeron laughing, but movement in the doorway caught both his and Daeron’s attention, and they turned to find Escelírë there.

“Amil,” Daeron said, “I’m sorry, did we wake you?” He had an arm flung around Maglor’s neck, and it tightened just a little as he pressed himself closer.

“No,” she said. “I wasn’t asleep, and thought I heard your voice.” She seemed to hesitate before asking in precisely the same tone Nerdanel would have used, “Are you well, Daeron?”

Daeron opened his mouth, but then closed it, visibly stopping himself from giving a cheerful and flippant answer. “I’m very—I’m tired,” he said after a moment. “I’m sorry I was not here to greet you and Atar earlier.”

“That’s all right,” Escelírë said. “We heard you had been busy, and spent the morning with Queen Melian.”

“Part of it, yes.”

Escelírë’s gaze flicked to Maglor, but he couldn’t quite read her expression. “We can speak more tomorrow?” she said to Daeron.

“Yes, of course.”

She left then, returning upstairs. Daeron took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. “I suppose that could’ve gone worse.”

“First steps,” Maglor said, and kissed his cheek. “It’s a start.”

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It was very strange having Fëanor in their little cottage up in the mountains, but not in a bad way. He had ideas for fixing various things that neither Amrod nor Amras had thought of, and was also, Amrod learned early on, made very uncomfortable by heights. The way he visibly restrained himself from protesting when Amrod climbed a particularly tall tree or jumped from one branch to another, following the squirrels, was almost funny. It was also a far cry from the Fëanor of their youth, who had not even noticed when they’d climbed onto rooftops or scaled the garden walls to sneak out and venture into the city. They had not always succeeded in sneaking out, because their mother had been more observant—and if she hadn’t caught them, Caranthir had, though he usually just told them to be quieter about it before turning his back—but that hadn’t ever stopped them from trying.

Autumn in the mountains was glorious—the trees were afire with color, reds and golds and oranges, with patches of dark green pine, and soft warm browns. Amrod loved the autumn, loved spending his days in the treetops, watching the birds and the squirrels and other beasts go about their winter preparations. He hunted, and brought back game to dress and preserve for the winter; the Laiquendi who lived not very far away came to trade, bringing preserves and mead in exchange for some of the things Amrod and Amras had brought back from Tirion—and in exchange for Fëanor’s talents, often bringing small things to be fixed or asking for his opinion on how best to go about crafting one thing or another. They knew perfectly well who Fëanor was, but they had come up into the mountains to stay and so rarely went back among the rest of the Eldar that they did not care. Ingwë himself could come visit and he would be treated with the same cheerful irreverence. Amrod had realized only when they had their first visit that he and Amras had forgotten to warn their father, but the worry proved needless—Fëanor just laughed with everyone else. He seemed lighter, out here away from everything, less burdened than he had been in Tirion. He seemed more like himself, more like the father of Amrod’s earliest memories.

Fëanor had once traveled widely—they all had, but they’d all gotten that wanderlust from their parents. Amrod was still hesitant to ask too many questions, lest it seem like he was questioning Fëanor and not just trying to learn things, but he ventured to ask, a week or so after they arrived in the mountains, “Why do you not leave Tirion anymore?”

They had come down to the lake where, in the winter, Amrod and Amras joined the Laiquendi to ice skate. With time yet before the waters froze, Amras was fishing, and Amrod had wandered with Fëanor up the shore a little ways, to a spot where there were many flat and round stones perfect for skipping over the water’s surface. Fëanor picked one up and turned it over in his fingers, and did not answer until he had flicked his wrist to send it skimming over the water. “There’s nowhere else I have particularly wanted to go,” he said, “and no one to go there with. I did return to Formenos once, but did not stay long.”

“Why?” Amrod asked. “I mean, why go there at all?”

Fëanor flung another stone out over the water; this one only skipped three times before sinking under the surface. Overhead a flock of geese passed by, pointing like an arrowhead toward the south, dark against the clear blue sky. “I wanted to see my father’s grave,” Fëanor said finally, without looking at Amrod. “I wanted to see what had become of everything. That lake used to be a place of happy memories. Now it’s just…lonely.”

“Maglor likes to say that lonely doesn’t have to mean unhappy,” Amrod said. He knelt to pick up a handful of stones. “But I’m not sure if he really believes it or if he’s just trying to make the rest of us feel better about having left him alone so long.”

“I have seen some of the places he lingered most often,” Fëanor said after a moment. “He isn’t wrong—there is great beauty in the most remote and desolate places…and your brother always liked seeking out those places, even when he was young.”

“Like Ekkaia,” Amrod said. He flung a stone out over the water and counted a dozen skips before it plunked into the water. The ripples spread out over the water’s surface before slowly fading away.

“Why did you all go out there?” Fëanor asked. “I know why you left—but what took all of you all the way to Ekkaia?”

“Oh, that.” Amrod shook his head, laughing. “It was Mithrandir—we met him on the road right before Midsummer, which seemed like chance at the time, though looking back it definitely wasn’t. He went on for a while about broken pottery and then told us that Ekkaia was nice that time of year. Someone had already joked about going all the way out there, and so we thought—why not? Amras and I hadn’t ever been there, and neither had Curvo. And then it turned out Mithrandir played the same trick on Maglor, putting the idea of Ekkaia into his head when he left Imloth Ningloron. It could have been worse, though,” Amrod added, glancing over at Fëanor with a grin. “Historically when Mithrandir meddles in someone’s life they end up getting sent on some terribly dangerous but important quest. At least we didn’t have to face any dragons!”

Fëanor’s smile was brief and forced. “Your journey was still dangerous, was it not? Curvo let slip that he had to stitch Nel—Maedhros up at some point.”

“That was on the way back.”

“What was on the way back?” Amras asked as he came to join them, holding up several fish. “I have lunch! Ambarussa, I thought you were going to start a fire.”

“It’ll just take a minute,” said Amrod. “Tell Atya about the River Incident while I do.”

By the time Amrod had a fire going and Amras and Fëanor had the fish boned and cleaned, Amras had described the rain and the hill country they’d gotten themselves stuck in on the way back from Ekkaia, and the rain-swollen river they kept coming up against trying to leave it. “And so Maglor finally decided he could sing the current down,” Amras said. “Apparently he knew a song for making a river flood, and just had to reverse it or something to do the opposite. I don’t know anything about songs of power, so I have no idea what exactly it was that he did, but it worked.”

“Did Daeron help?” Fëanor asked.

“He played music and lent some of his own strength to it,” said Amrod, “but the words were all Maglor’s. But that all went exactly as it was meant to.”

“Only then there was a hill cat—a particularly stupid and starving hill cat,” Amras said. “It tried to jump Maglor after he came up onto the bank after the rest of us, but Maedhros got in the way and it knocked itself and him into the river. We and Celegorm shot at it, but the current was already picking up anyway.”

“Maglor tried to drag Maedhros out of the water, but then all the water his song had held back came roaring down, and took them both,” Amrod said. Fëanor dropped the knife he had been cleaning. “It’s all right! You’ve seen them since—you know they’re fine.”

“Huan found them some hours later, downriver,” said Amras. “Maglor had managed to get Maedhros’ wounds bound up, but he’d strained his voice with the song and then lost it entirely while yelling at him. We all took turns yelling at Maedhros ourselves, but—well, it wasn’t really his fault. Any one of us would’ve done the same thing if we’d been closer.” Maglor had also been almost unable to move with fear, for reasons Amrod hadn’t understood at the time and still wasn’t entirely sure that he did. That had been more disturbing to him than anything else, in spite of all the blood. “Anyway, that’s when the rest of us decided that Maedhros and Maglor weren't allowed to be the oldest brothers anymore.”

This startled Fëanor into laughter. “What does that mean?”

“Mostly that they don’t get to complain when we go and poke them out of whatever bad mood they’ve worked themselves into,” said Amras, “and we get to protect them instead of the other way around. That hasn’t stopped Maedhros from threatening to toss us all into the river behind Ammë’s house for worrying at him, but I don’t think he’s actually done it yet.”

“Does he need worrying at?” Fëanor asked. “I thought all that time in Lórien…”

“Oh, he’s much happier now than he was before they went to Lórien—they both are,” said Amrod. “The fire’s ready for the fish, Amras. I think the rest of us are just too used to worrying, especially about Maedhros. Even when none of us were really talking to each other, we still worried.”

“Why didn’t you? Talk to one another, I mean,” Fëanor asked. When Amrod and Amras glanced at each other and hesitated, he sighed. “I’m not—I won’t be upset with you. I just want to understand.”

“We know,” said Amrod. “I’m just not sure how to explain.”

“It’s not that we hated each other, or were angry, or something,” said Amras, “except that I think Curvo was angry at Tyelko for a long time.”

“That’s because Tyelko wouldn’t talk to him, because he’s an idiot,” said Amrod.

“And you could be forgiven for thinking that Carnistir was angry with everyone,” Amras went on, “but that’s just because he’s prickly. Well, less so now. A little bit.”

“We all changed in Beleriand,” Amrod said. “And we didn't fit together like we once had. Like we still wanted to.”

“In Beleriand, by the time we went to Doriath, the Oath was the only thing holding us together,” Amras said. “For some of us it was the only thing keeping us alive, I think.”

“And then we all came back and didn’t have that anymore, and didn’t know how to talk to each other or even really what we wanted to do,” said Amrod. “Carnistir had the easiest time, I think, settling back into life. I think Grandfather Mahtan and Grandmother Ennalótë helped him a lot. Especially Grandmother.”

“Maedhros had the hardest time, because Mandos didn’t work for him and the Valar weren’t very careful about when they released him to find what he needed in life,” Amras said. “And of course the first thing he did was go and take up one of the palantíri, and the one time Maglor was easy to find…”

“He was in Dol Guldur?” Fëanor asked softly.

“Yes,” said Amrod, “and none of us knew anything about that until he came here and Tyelpë met him in Avallónë and then told the rest of us. Tyelko was furious with Maedhros for keeping that secret.” He hadn’t been very happy either, but it hadn’t come as a surprise—it had been a shock to learn that Maedhros had known, but not that he had kept it from the rest of them. Of course he had. And anyway, when had any of them except maybe Caranthir ever talked to him long enough to even bring up Maglor’s name?

“How did you find out that he knew?”

“He’d told Elrond, who told Maglor, and maybe told Tyelpë? I’m not quite sure of the order,” said Amrod. “And obviously Maglor couldn’t keep hidden that something had happened. Maedhros never has apologized for keeping it secret. Ammë knew, too, but obviously she would want to keep it from the rest of us.” They had all also been in tacit agreement not to be angry with Nerdanel about anything; they had done enough to upset her already, and she did not deserve any more hurt, not from them. “For us, it was—we’d gotten used to the quiet of the woods, when we lived in Ossiriand. We didn’t want to go back to Tirion, and it was awful in Ammë’s house with Carnistir so grumpy and Maedhros hardly able even to look at us. So very early on we came out here and found some old friends and then made our own home. We didn’t leave very often, until Huan came to find us when Ammë called us all home, so she could tell us you were coming back. So maybe we had about as easy a time getting used to life again as Carnistir, except we did it out here away from everyone.”

“It’s not that we ever hated each other, although Curvo thought Tyelko hated him for a long while,” said Amras.

“We just didn’t know how to talk to each other anymore,” said Amrod again. “We didn’t know how to love each other, after all that happened and all we did. We joke about being annoyed at Mithrandir’s meddling, but really that was the best thing that could’ve happened to us.”

“Hill cats and flash floods notwithstanding.” Amras moved the fish off of the flames, and set the other one into the pan with a sizzle. “You can probably find it in the palantír, but that would just be alarming yourself for no reason, Atya. Everyone turned out fine.”

It had set Maglor and Maedhros back, though, Amrod remembered. Maglor hadn’t looked at Maedhros in the face even once between the river and their arrival at Nerdanel’s house. Amrod hadn’t forgotten either the panic in Maglor’s voice when he’d called for Maedhros as he hit the water, or the fear that had clung to him afterward. He wasn’t going to mention any of that to Fëanor, though. Maglor and Maedhros now were closer than ever, and all the rest of them—even if they still clashed sometimes, and still needed space to pursue their own lives away from everyone else—it no longer felt like any little spat would grow into something unfixable. It was just normal brother things, instead of what their first lives had made of them.

As the days passed, the three of them often parted, each to his own pursuits. Amrod and Amras went hunting and foraging; Amrod took to the trees, and Amras ventured into the deep thickets. Fëanor wandered somewhere in between, looking a little more at peace every time he came back. There was very little for him to make, out there—they had no forge and no materials anyway—but he had a sketchbook that would doubtless be filled with ideas before the winter was out, and it seemed like Fëanor didn’t mind the forced idleness, at least for the time being. Amrod did catch him once or twice looking at the prisms that he’d made for Amras, and which they’d hung in the kitchen window that got the most sun, with a look on his face like he was making notes of all the mistakes he’d made and how he would make better ones next time.

When he was alone one morning, Amrod climbed one of the tallest trees, which gave him a view down the mountainside and out over the plains beyond. He could see a rainstorm in the far distance, dark clouds and hazy rainfall beneath them. Where he sat the skies were clear, slowly brightening with the dawn. Amrod drew one knee up to his chest, and idly kicked his other foot against the tree trunk. It was very cold; soon they would be waking up to frost, and then not long after that the snows would come. He wondered what all his brothers were doing, and how they would be spending their winters. Hopefully it would be quiet.

After a while he started to sing softly, a simple song of the year’s waning, saying farewell to summer and to harvest time, and welcoming the frost and the coming chill. It was a song he’d learned in Imloth Ningloron, that had its origins in the Shire far away—or maybe even farther east, if what Elrond had said about versions of it coming into Eriador with the first halflings was true. Amrod didn’t usually miss Middle-earth, but sometimes he wished that he’d gotten to see more of it, that he had been able to wander over the Ered Luin or the Misty Mountains, to see the Falls of Rauros and follow the Anduin down to the Sea. He gazed out over the wide plains and wondered what else there was to discover out there. He and his brothers had wandered far and wide when they were young, but the lands of Valinor, though called Undying, were not unchanging. He could never see the Lonely Mountain or wade in the streams of Ithilien, but there were other things to discover here. Meres and streams never yet seen by Elves, flowers yet unnamed or creatures never before seen. Hills never climbed, valleys never explored.

Maybe if things went well—maybe they could take other journeys like the one to Ekkaia, when Calissë and Náriel were older. Perhaps Elrond or his sons might come with them. Perhaps, if things went very well, even Nerdanel and Fëanor…?

Elrond said often that it was never wrong to hope. Amrod knew his brothers’ wounds ran deep, some deeper and older even than all that had gone wrong after the Darkening. But Fëanor had left them all alone when they had asked, even though he clearly didn’t want to. He listened more than he spoke, now, and the very first things he’d made after his return from Mandos had been gifts for all of them. That meant something—that meant quite a lot. Amrod didn’t know what lay between his parents, but if Maglor and Maedhros could go to Lórien and come out of it again smiling and laughing, then surely there was hope that their whole family could find a way to fix itself.

The cracks would always be there. But they could be glued back together like the broken bowls that Maglor liked to fix, and the missing pieces could be filled in with gold. “Huh,” Amrod said out loud, as a blue jay perched on the branch just beside his head. “I guess Mithrandir wasn’t talking nonsense after all.” He looked at the jay. “Not that you’d know anything about it.” The jay ignored him and preened its feathers. “Or maybe you would. You like shiny things.” Amrod took one of the small gold clips out of his hair and held it out. The jay peered at it with its bright beady eyes, tilting its head back and forth for a few moments. Then it croaked its thanks, snatched it up, and flew away, vanishing in a bright flash of blue into the dark pine woods.

He swung down to the ground, still thinking about broken pottery and how fixing it could make even the sharpest and most jagged of edges into something lovely, and nearly landed on Fëanor. “Good morning, Atya!” he said as he staggered a little, having swung to the side at the last moment, and as Fëanor took a few quick steps back. “Sorry—I wasn’t looking where I was going.”

Fëanor glanced up. “How far up were you?” he asked.

“As far up as the branches would hold me, so nearly to the top. I had a nice chat with a blue jay.”

“What do blue jays talk about?”

“Well, I chatted. It may or may not have been listening.” These days Amrod always felt like he’d achieved something when he got Fëanor to laugh. “What are you doing out here?”

Fëanor’s laughter faded. “Just walking. It’s very quiet.”

“Lots of birds have gone,” Amrod agreed. “It will be even quieter when it snows.” There was nothing quite like the silence of fresh snowfall, especially out in the forest. “Is it too quiet?”

Fëanor shook his head. “No.”

“You won’t hurt our feelings if it is,” Amrod said. “I know it’s not for everyone, trapping yourself up a mountain for the winter on purpose, and you’ve still got a little time before that happens.”

That got Fëanor to smile again. “It’s also something I’ve never done before,” he said, “and I’ll try almost anything once. I don’t mind the quiet—I would have once, I think, but not now.”

“Can I ask what you were thinking about, that brought you out here?”

Fëanor’s face did something complicated. “Just—trying to figure out where it all went so wrong.”

“If you think about that too long you’ll just wind up at the very beginning of everything, when Melkor introduced the first notes of discord into the Great Music,” said Amrod.

“I’m trying to figure out where I went wrong,” Fëanor said.

“You aren’t going to go wrong again, Atya,” Amrod said.

“Did you acquire some form of foresight as well as a few extra inches of height with the Ent draughts in Ossiriand?” Fëanor was clearly trying to make a joke, but whatever his thoughts had been circling around before he met Amrod was too heavy and dark for it, and he just sounded bleak instead.

“No,” said Amrod. “That would have been awful. Foresight can be useful, I suppose, but I don’t think I’ve ever seen it make anyone happy. I like the here and now just fine—I don’t need hints or visions of what the future holds. But there’s nothing left to go wrong, Atya. Morgoth is shut away beyond the Doors of Night, and Sauron is utterly destroyed. All the rest of their servants are gone too, and none were ever as strong as either of them. The only harm that can find us just comes from ourselves—”

“That’s rather the problem,” Fëanor said. “If I—”

Amrod took a step forward and wrapped his arms around Fëanor, burying his face for a few moments in his shoulder. Fëanor’s arms came up to wrap around him in return, holding on very tightly. Fëanor hugged like Maglor did, like he was afraid to let go lest they vanish into smoke, or like ghosts. “You don’t have to wonder where it all went wrong,” Amrod said. “I know exactly where it went wrong—where it reached the point of no return. It was when Grandfather Finwë died, and that wasn’t your fault, and nothing like that is ever going to happen again. You frightened us before that, because you were so angry, but it wasn’t anything like afterward. And I’m not frightened of your temper now.”

“I am,” Fëanor whispered, almost soundless.

It wasn’t an unreasonable fear exactly, but it was needless, and Amrod wasn’t sure what to say. He didn’t know how to reassure his father—in the past it had been the other way around, and Fëanor had never needed reassuring. He had always been so assured, so confident. That had turned to arrogance and pride and had been his downfall, but Amrod did not like to see him now going in the opposite direction. There had to be a balance, or else nothing was sustainable, but Amrod didn’t know where that balance lay or how his father might find it. Most likely it was something he had to do on his own.

Amrod had never had to do anything hard on his own. Amras was always there, knowing him almost better than he knew himself. In many ways Fëanor had always been alone, set apart in so many different ways—by his brilliance, his status, by the fact of Míriel’s death, by his own choices. It didn’t have to stay that way, though. Only Fëanor could figure out how to live with what he was capable of, maybe, but surely that didn’t mean there wasn’t any way to help.

“You know what it looks like now, when it gets very bad,” he said finally, “so you can stop before it gets there.”

“And if I cannot?”

Amrod drew back to look Fëanor in the eye. “We’ll tell you,” he said. “Amras and me, or Curvo, or Fingolfin or Findis or someone. We know what it looks like, and we aren’t afraid to speak up anymore. You just have to trust us enough to listen.”

“I do trust you, Pityo,” Fëanor said. “It is myself that I no longer trust.”

Later, Amrod told Amras about that conversation. They had gone down to the lake again, while Fëanor wandered higher up in the mountains. Amrod wasn’t worried about him getting lost; they would be able to find him easily enough if he did, but Fëanor had a canny sense of direction of his own and it had yet to steer him wrong. “It’s remarkable how alike he and Nelyo are, isn’t it?” Amras said when Amrod was done. “Everyone always says it’s Curvo that’s most like him, but that’s only on the surface. Underneath it’s Nelyo that’s got his fire.”

“Tyelko’s got it too,” said Amrod, “and now all three of them are just…I don’t know if Nelyo’s afraid of himself, but I think Tyelko is, and Atya definitely is.” All of them used to burn so bright, but Maedhros’ fire had nearly guttered out in Mandos, only to flare back to life when he’d come out of it, except turned inward so that it just slowly ate away at him over the years. Lórien had banked the flames and now it burned low and steady, much like it had when they had been young—but the scorch marks on his spirit remained. Tyelko’s fire burned low too these days, but Amrod wasn’t sure if he could call it steady. The fire of Fëanor’s spirit, the thing for which he was best remembered, could be a deceptive thing. It flared to life sometimes; in Tirion hardly anyone would look at him and think anything was wrong. But sometimes when there were no eyes on him it was like the light in his eyes flickered out, like he’d shuttered a lantern. Not always—but often enough that Amrod had noticed, and he didn’t like it.

“I think Nelyo’s afraid of Atya,” said Amras. “He asked me the other day about Losgar, you know.”

“What about it?”

“If I’d been nearby when he’d spoken to Nelyo afterward. I wasn’t—we were trying to do something useful with the horses, I think.”

Maedhros had never spoken of Losgar afterward. None of them had, but Amrod did remember how Fëanor had stopped looking to Maedhros for his opinion when they and the leaders among their people were gathered to council—Fëanor rarely took advice but at least before he had let Maedhros speak; he had stopped speaking to him at all, save for giving orders—and those short, sharp things. Maedhros had obeyed every one of them without question, and without expression. And then after Angband and Thangorodrim there had been far too many other matters to think about. And, well, Fëanor hadn’t been there, so it had ceased to matter. Now Fëanor was back, and whatever had triggered that change after Losgar suddenly mattered again quite a lot.

“Did he say why he wanted to know?” Amrod asked.

“No. I’ve half a mind to look into the palantír for it, though.”

“Oh, don’t do that, Ambarussa.”

“You don’t think it would help? If Losgar is at the root of what’s between Atya and Nelyo—”

“I think neither of them would thank us if we tried to meddle,” Amrod said.

Amras sighed. He stooped and started cutting sprigs of wild thyme to add to his basket. “Whatever Atya said, it must have been awful if Nelyo’s still holding onto it this long.”

“Of course it was awful,” said Amrod. “Almost all the things he said then were awful.”

“Right,” said Amras, “and we all knew that, and Nelyo knew he would be furious when he defied him. So what could he have said that was so bad that Nelyo still can’t let it go, even after he’s come to terms with everything else?”

Amrod knelt to harvest some mushrooms near the wild thyme patch. The problem with being the youngest was that they’d missed so many years, so much that held weight for all their brothers, that shaped what they did and how they thought about Fëanor now. It wasn’t anyone’s fault, it was just the way time worked, but it was horribly frustrating all the same. Even if Maedhros were willing to confide in either of them—which he wouldn’t be, because he was the oldest and they were the youngest and he still thought they needed protecting, whatever any of them said about reversing their roles—there was a good chance that they wouldn’t really understand the root of his pain anyway.

As autumn faded toward winter, Amrod put Losgar out of his mind. Fëanor also seemed to do the same—or at least to try; he laughed more, and started to tease Amrod and Amras back, and to tell stories of his own misadventures and wanderings when he had been young, before Maedhros had been born. The nights grew longer and colder, and after the first snowfall Amras recruited a pair of blue jays to carry notes to Curufin in Tirion for them.

Then a mockingbird appeared with a note tied to his leg. “Oh hello, Nallámo!” said Amrod as he opened the window to let him in. The note, of course, was from Celegorm, admonishing them to take care in the heavy snows and letting them know where everyone had scattered for the winter. As Amras wrote back to assure Celegorm—really, to assure Nerdanel—that they were perfectly fine and knew exactly how to handle winter in the mountains, Amrod found some seeds for Nallámo to eat before flying back down the mountains.

“Is Tyelko back to collecting strays?” Fëanor asked as Amras carefully tied his note to Nallámo’s leg.

“Seems so,” said Amras. “I think he found this one in Imloth Ningloron. But lately it’s Cáno that’s going around with small animals in his wake. It’s very funny.”

“The hedgehogs you mean?”

“He went to Lórien with one and came out with three! And his cat, of course.”

“Elrond says the cats of Imladris adopted him back when he first arrived, and that he wasn’t surprised at all that at least one insisted on coming west with him,” said Amrod. Nallámo flew away, and Amras shut the window. “Pídhres hates Huan, too—it’s even funnier than the hedgehogs.” He turned his attention back to Celegorm’s note. “Tyelko and Carnistir are with Ammë still, and Curvo’s back in Tirion; Maedhros has gone to Eressëa to spend the winter with Elrond—good, I’m sure it’s much quieter there than in Tirion—and Cáno and Daeron have gone off to Thingol’s realm with Calissë.”

“Curvo let her go with them?” Fëanor asked, surprised. “How far is Taur-en-Gellam from Tirion?”

“I’m not sure,” said Amrod. “I’ve never been. Amras?”

“If you’ve never been, I’ve never been,” Amras said, “but it’s farther than Imloth Ningloron—north of there but farther west.” He sat on the floor to lean his head on Fëanor’s lap. “Calissë will be fine, though—she’s with Maglor, and she’s also known Daeron and his family all her life. Ammë is good friends with Lacheryn.”

“Yes, I know. I’m not at all worried about Calissë.”

“Is it Curvo?” Amrod asked. “He’ll be fine too. Rundamírë won’t let him worry too much.”

“And that won’t stop him from worrying at all,” Fëanor said with a wry smile, “just like you can’t stop me from worrying about him.”

“You can always spy on him in the palantír,” said Amras. “Or maybe talk to him—I bet he’s got one so he can spy on Cáno and Calissë.”

“Assuming he can find them,” said Amrod.

“Your brother is quite easy to find these days,” Fëanor murmured as he ran his fingers through Amras’ hair. “He does not seem to want to hide himself away any longer.”

“Do you look for him often?” Amrod asked.

“Every once in a while—just as I look for all the rest of you. In the Halls I was always able to find you in the tapestries, to see what you were doing and that you were safe; it’s reassuring to be able to find you now in the palantír.”

“Did you see Cáno in the tapestries?”

“Until he disappeared into—into Mirkwood. If those things were ever woven, they were not shown to me.”

“That’s probably for the best,” said Amrod after a moment.

“We’ve seen his scars,” Amras added softly. “They’re very bad.”

“You haven’t looked for that in the palantír have you?”

Fëanor looked toward the window as a gust of wind blew snow against the glass. “No,” he said. “Not yet.”

“Don’t, please,” said Amras. “You don’t need to see it.”

“I thought the point was that I should see everything.”

“I think what we all meant was everything until the end of the War of Wrath,” said Amrod. “Although—I don’t care what Maedhros thinks about it, you don’t need to see what happened to him in Angband either. Or on the mountain. Unless it’s his rescue, that’s probably fine. But have you looked for Himring? Maedhros loved Himring, and it withstood everything the Enemy could ever throw at it.”

“I’ve seen it,” Fëanor said. “I like hearing about it all from you better, now that I can more easily see it all in my mind. Tell me more about the journey to Ekkaia?”

“That calls for drinks. Do we have any chocolate, Amras?” Amrod asked as he got up.

“No, but we’ve got more tea than we can ever drink,” said Amras. “Find one of the tins we haven’t opened yet—one of Carnistir’s experiments.” He got up to put the kettle over the fire, and tossed another log onto it as the wind picked up, howling around the corners of the cottage. There would be monstrous drifts to clear away from the doors come the next morning, but for now it was cozy and warm inside and there was nothing to worry about or to do, except for Amrod and Amras to compete to see who could make Fëanor laugh more. It was still a little strange to look over and see him there sitting by their hearth, so far away from everything else—but not in a bad way. It was nice.

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It snowed heavily all through the night, and they woke to a world outside gone soft and white, with snowdrifts taller than Calissë gleaming in the sunshine. Her excitement was endless, and she was barely able to sit still at the table long enough to eat her breakfast—and she only did so because Maglor flatly refused to go outside until he finished his, and then, to keep her attention and to tease her, he ate as slowly as possible.

Meanwhile, Daeron had disappeared with Simpalírë. The rest of the family were at breakfast, laughing at Calissë’s excitement and talking of the snow and of the upcoming Midwinter celebrations. “Will you sing for us alongside Daeron, Maglor?” Lacheryn asked.

“Yes, of course,” Maglor said, looking up to offer a smile. “Daeron and I were talking of it last—Pídhres!” He spotted her jumping up onto a shelf and rose to grab her before she knocked something over. “You’re far too old for this sort of nonsense!”

“She looks barely out of kitten-hood,” said Aldalëo.

“She has the favor of Estë, for reasons that must remain mysterious,” Maglor said as he tossed Pídhres out of the dining room and watched her dart away down the hall. “I took her with me to Lórien decades ago and she hasn’t aged a day ever since.”

“Daeron once said she came all the way from Middle-earth with you,” said Mablung.

“Yes, all the way from Rivendell, and then all the way to Ekkaia and back. She must be the most well-traveled cat in Arda by now, as well as the longest-lived.”

“But why?” Escelírë asked, looking rather baffled by the idea. “She cannot have done very well on the ship.”

“You make it sound as though I had a choice!” Maglor said. Mablung snorted into his tea. “I did try to leave her behind in Annúminas with Halbarad alongside all her litter mates, but she was having none of it. Anyway, she hid in the hold the entire voyage.” Maglor sat back down and reached for his tea. “And that meant that I had to go hunting for her when we docked, so I was the last one off the ship.”

Daeron and Simpalírë came in a minute later, neither of them smiling but both looking a little more at ease with the other. Pídhres had draped herself over Daeron’s shoulders, rubbing her head into his chin. As he sat beside Maglor, Daeron scratched her absently behind the ears. When Calissë learned that Maglor wasn’t going to go outside with her until Daeron finished his breakfast, she blew an exasperated raspberry and gave up, running off to get herself dressed. “Better eat quickly, Daeron,” Mablung laughed. “And watch out when you get outside. Calissë will make you both pay for this delay.”

“Oh, I’m sure,” Maglor said. As the talk moved on, he leaned over to whisper to Daeron, slipping into Westron that no one else at the table spoke, “Everything all right?”

“It will be, I think,” Daeron said softly in the same tongue. Simpalírë had taken a seat at the other end of the table, beside Aldalëo, and hadn’t looked over at Daeron since. “It’s hard to tell. I know how fights with Mablung go, and how to patch things up afterward, but not my brother.”

“You’ll figure it out,” Maglor said. “It won’t be the last time you fight, and next time it will probably be over something very stupid.”

“I hope so,” Daeron murmured. “Something silly and simple and easy to fix.” He kept his gaze lowered, eyes on his plate, and didn’t engage with the wider conversation around them. Pídhres didn’t move from his shoulders, not even to sniff at his food, and under the table Maglor kept a hand on Daeron’s knee. “Are you still tired?” Maglor asked him after a little while. “You don’t have to come outside with me and Calissë. You can go back to bed.”

“No, I don’t want to go back to sleep. I need a distraction—and I warn you, it won’t be only Calissë waiting to ambush us.”

“I don’t doubt it,” said Maglor.

Daeron ate little, but insisted he was fine and very soon all but dragged Maglor away so they could find their coats and cloaks and gloves. Maglor liked the snow—it was beautiful, the source of many lovely images for wintertime songs—but he knew he would be thoroughly chilled long before they came inside, and was not looking forward to that. “Will you be all right?” Daeron asked as Maglor tugged on his gloves.

“I’ll last as long as Calissë does,” Maglor said. “She doesn’t need to know that I don’t like being cold.”

“She’s too clever not to notice,” Daeron said. “You can always blame it on that enchantress—but then all the other children will demand to hear the story.”

“Which will be a good excuse to retreat inside for hot chocolate and the fireside,” Maglor said. “I don’t mind telling the story again.”

“It will be shared far and wide, you know,” Daeron said. “I bet even Melian will tease you about it.”

Melian had thus far been very gracious and very kind, but Maglor had tried to avoid speaking to her for very long at any one time. She was more like Gandalf than the other Maiar that he had met or seen, but she could see even more clearly into a person than Galadriel could, and while Maglor didn’t mind Galadriel looking at him like that, it was far more uncomfortable coming from Melian herself. “Does Melian tease people?” he said, because he didn’t want to try to put any of the rest of his thoughts into words lest he say something accidentally insulting.

“Sometimes, if she’s very fond of you,” Daeron said. “Does she frighten you?”

“She…makes me nervous,” said Maglor. “I know she shouldn’t, but—”

“It’s all right.” Daeron slid his arms around Maglor’s waist and kissed him. “She makes many people nervous, outside of Taur-en-Gellam, but you really have nothing to fear—from her, or from anyone. Come on—the longer we wait the more time the children have to gather their snowballs.”

They stepped outside into, as expected, a hail of snowballs, which hit their cloaks and exploded into sparkling white powder. Daeron laughed out loud, and ducked behind a snowdrift to gather a handful of his own to fling back, making Calissë and her friends erupt in gleeful laughter and redouble their own efforts.

The children won the fight, of course, having the advantage of a snow fortress built while waiting for the adults, and a ready stockpile of snowballs already made—and they outnumbered Maglor and Daeron. Daeron tried to call for reinforcements but Mablung only opened the door briefly to laugh at them, and then closed it again just before three snowballs hit, thudding into the wood in quick succession.

Once Maglor and Daeron surrendered, they found out who exactly had joined Calissë in the assault: four of Daeron’s students, all around Calissë’s age and all breathless with giggles, pink-cheeked and red-nosed with the cold. Maglor scooped Calissë up and tossed her into a snowdrift as she shrieked, and then Pirineth and Glossvir came to find them all, dragging sleds behind them. “There’s a hill that slopes down to the Helethir,” Pirineth said, “and is perfect for sledding!”

“Don’t worry,” Glossvir added to Maglor, “the river is well frozen and there’s no danger of falling through—just of sliding very far and very fast!”

All five children raced ahead, passing light footed over the snow, laughing and calling to one another as they went. Maglor and Daeron followed more slowly, falling into step with Pirineth and Glossvir, who took the opportunity to ask Daeron’s opinion on a song they intended to perform before Thingol’s court at Midwinter. Daeron seemed refreshed by the cold and the activity, much more like his usual self as he laughed and offered guidance and encouragement. When they reached the sledding hill, however—which had already attracted two dozen other children and various adults who Maglor wasn’t entirely sure were there solely to supervise—they hung back and did not follow the children or Pirineth and Glossvir up the hill.

“Are you going to sled down?” Daeron asked Maglor.

“No thank you,” Maglor said, watching the first sled go zooming down the steep hill and then go sliding down the frozen river. “How exactly are they going to stop?”

“There’s a net,” Lathrandir said, coming up to join them. He had snow caught in his dark hair and all down his cloak, as though he’d been rolling around in it. “Don’t worry, it works every year!”

“I hope so,” Maglor said, “or else Curvo is never going to let me take Calissë out of his sight again.”

“She’ll be fine,” Daeron said, looping his arm through Maglor’s as Lathrandir ran up the hill to join the line. Maglor saw Calissë getting onto a sled with Cýroniel, both of them giggling. Calissë spotted him and waved.

“I know,” he said as he waved back. “I’m still glad that I had her write home yesterday.” Daeron laughed, and leaned his head on Maglor’s shoulder. “Are you really all right?” Maglor asked softly.

“I am. I can’t say I’m looking forward to speaking with my parents later, since I'm sure they’ll have heard all about my recent behavior, but…it is what it is.”

“Siblings fight; I don’t think it will be as bad as you fear,” Maglor said. Glossvir pushed the sled and Cýroniel and Calissë went hurtling down the hill, screaming, and vanished down the river, the sled’s runners scraping over the ice. Maglor grimaced. “Oh, that is so fast.”

“Oh please, you would have been the first one up that hill at that age. I bet you and your brothers would’ve found a way to make the hill even higher.”

“I don’t see you eager for it either.”

“The way things have been going for me lately, I’d probably break through the net at the end and then break something else crashing into a tree—sweet Elbereth have mercy, is that Ingwë?”

“Valmar is in very hilly country,” Maglor said as they watched the High King of the Eldar go zipping away down the hill, laughing as his long golden braids flew out behind him. “I bet the Vanyar know a thing or two about sledding.”

A bonfire was built near the hill for those either waiting to go sledding or just there to watch, and flasks of hot tea or mulled wine were passed around. Maglor was grateful for the fire, but by the time Calissë and her friends were ready to retreat somewhere properly warm he felt frozen to his bones.

“Are you cold, Uncle Cáno?” Calissë asked as she slipped her hand into his for the walk back.

“Not as cold as when the enchantress nearly got me,” Maglor said, and as predicted he received a chorus of what enchantress? from Cýroniel, Faranel, and Celugil. Ríthon had run ahead, but came darting back at the hint of a story. As Daeron laughed Maglor told them, “I’ll tell you all about it when we’re inside somewhere cozy.”

It was a great relief to step inside and inhale warm air instead of air so cold it burned his nose. Maglor changed into his warmest and most comfortable robes, and followed Daeron back downstairs where Lacheryn and Escelírë were passing out mugs of steaming hot chocolate. His story of the enchantress and the talking animals was as well received there as it had been in Imloth Ningloron; Maglor even saw Daeron’s parents laughing at it.

After he finished, Faranel looked at him with narrowed eyes. “Is that true?” she asked.

“Of course it’s true!” Maglor said, putting on an affronted air at the very idea of telling such an outrageous lie.

“It is,” Daeron said. He sat behind Maglor on a chair, while Maglor sat cross-legged on the rug in front of the hearth. “He told the same story in Imloth Ningloron, and Master Elrond agreed that every word was perfectly true. You wouldn’t doubt Master Elrond, would you?”

“No,” chorused all the children, but Ríthon added, “We might doubt you, Master Daeron. You’re always telling silly stories that aren’t really true.”

“For shame!” Daeron exclaimed as the children giggled. “Name one story that I’ve told that isn’t true—”

“The one about the horses with wings that live near the Sea of Rhûn,” said Cýroniel immediately.

“You mean the ones that I saw with my very own eyes—”

“And the one about the lands where the Sun comes to rest on the sands in the far south so Arien can dance with the people there, the ones you called Sun-dwellers,” added Celugil.

“That one I had from Eärendil himself,” Daeron said.

“Then there was the one about the giant spiders—”

“Oh those are definitely real,” Maglor said. “Mirkwood was full of them.”

Celugil still seemed skeptical. “Even the ones that tied up a bunch of dwarves that then got rescued by the halfling with a magic ring?”

“That one is true!” Calissë said. “I asked Master Gimli, and he said his father was one of the dwarves, and Master Legolas said so too.”

Maglor added, “Legolas knows all about the dark things that lurked in Mirkwood; his father still reigns there—though of course it’s the Greenwood again now. There are no more spiders left. But his rescue of the dwarves was one of Bilbo’s favorite stories to tell.”

“Told you,” said Daeron, and stuck out his tongue at Celugil.

“But what about—”

“All right, that’s enough,” said Lacheryn. “Come bring your mugs to the kitchen; there’s more hot chocolate—and honey cakes just out of the oven for you!”

As the children scrambled away Maglor leaned back against Daeron, who slid his fingers through Maglor’s hair and kissed the top of his head. “Horses with wings?” Maglor asked.

“It’s a legend in those lands, old as the Sea of Rhûn itself; there are dozens and dozens of stories, only some of which I’ve gotten a chance to share here,” said Daeron, laughing. “And I am certain that I saw one once—flying over the water, wings shining white in the moonlight. It was beautiful.”

“And the one about Arien coming down…?”

“I didn’t really hear it from Eärendil, but I read it in a book of tales out of Númenor about his early voyages, and there was a note in the beginning promising that they were all records of tales Eärendil had told himself in Sirion, so that’s close enough. There was another story that says he slew Ungoliant, but I’m not going to tell that one to children. The spiders of Mirkwood are quite scary enough.”

“So is the enchantress story made up, or is part of it true?” Escelírë asked.

Maglor looked over at her and summoned a smile. “The part about Elladan and Elrohir bringing me back to Rivendell is true,” he said, “though we came from the opposite direction; I’m certainly not going to tell the real story to my nieces. I knew a halfling who swore up and down that his own ancestors met such an enchantress in the north, however, and who was I to question the Thain of the Shire?”

The expected response to that was to ask for the real story, but perhaps something in Daeron’s face discouraged them, because neither Aldalëo nor Escelírë asked anything more. Instead Daeron asked them about the journey to Taur-en-Gellam from Alqualondë, and about his sisters and their families. Maglor leaned his head back against Daeron’s legs, happy to just listen, and that both Daeron and his parents seemed more at ease around one another, able to laugh at and talk of simple everyday things without the past creeping in at the edges. Pídhres trotted into the room to curl up on his lap, purring contentedly as he pet her.

Having consumed as much cake as they could stand, the children came crowding back into the parlor to demand more stories. Daeron took over with some old favorites of the Sindarin children that Calissë hadn't yet heard. Then Daeron decided to make a lesson out of it and asked his students to sing one of their favorite lays, as practice for their upcoming performances.

The children all scattered before dinnertime, heading home through the growing twilight and glimmering snowdrifts. Maglor felt increasingly tired, though he hadn’t really done much that day except stand around in the cold, and by the time Calissë was falling asleep on his lap after dinner he was ready to retreat to bed too. “Are you all right?” Daeron murmured in his ear before he got up.

“Fine.” Maglor pressed a quick kiss to his cheek. “Just tired.” He could tell that Daeron was weary too, both of them still feeling the effects of all those recent sleepless nights, but he thought that Daeron was hoping to get some difficult conversations out of the way before he retreated to bed, and Maglor wasn’t going to stand in the way of that.

“Are you still feeling cold?”

“No. Don’t worry about me.” Maglor kissed him again and then bid everyone else goodnight before carrying Calissë up to her own bed.

He fell asleep almost before he had fully settled onto the pillows. His dreams, though, were all of dark cold places, a strange blending of Formenos after the Darkening and the halls of Dol Guldur. He kept trying to find his grandfather, or his father, but whenever he caught a glimpse of them they vanished around a corner—and behind him lurked the Necromancer, and he kept going in circles until he didn’t know where he was at all or even whether he was chasing real people or just phantoms and—

Hands on his face brought Maglor awake with a start. “It’s all right,” Daeron whispered. It was morning, still early, the light pale and dim coming through the window. Maglor was shivering, and couldn’t seem to stop. “It’s all right, beloved—it was only a dream.” Daeron’s brow was creased with worry as he stroked Maglor’s hair. “Do you know me? Do you know where you are?”

“Daeron,” Maglor whispered. “I’m sorry. I—”

“Shh. Come here.” Daeron rearranged the two of them so that Maglor lay half on top of him, his ear pressed against Daeron’s chest over his heart. Daeron tangled his fingers in Maglor’s hair. “What was the dream?”

The details were slipping away quickly now, though Maglor still felt horribly cold. “Just—dark. I think I was looking for someone.” He closed his eyes as Daeron pulled the blankets up, enveloping them both in soft warmth.

“Have you had other dark dreams lately?” Daeron asked, clearly thinking of the nights they had spent apart with no small measure of guilt.

“No.” Maglor lifted his head. “I’ll be all right. They don’t linger anymore, the dreams.”

“You’re still shivering,” Daeron said softly.

“You could warm me up.”

That, at least, got a smile. “I could.” Daeron kissed him, but only softly and briefly. “But we do need to get up soon—tomorrow is Midwinter Day, followed by Midwinter Night, and we’ll be at the palace until the following dawn, and today I need to make sure everyone who is to perform before the court is ready.”

“Do you need me for any of it?”

“No…” Daeron pressed their foreheads together. “But I want you.”

Maglor didn’t want to get up. The cold had ebbed away and the bed was warm, and Daeron was there, and in spite of the dreams he felt rested. He would have to write to Maedhros after the holiday, though he wasn’t sure what to say—Maedhros would want more detail than what reassurances Maglor was willing to put into a letter. Staying up all night for Midwinter itself was also less exciting in that moment than it should have been. Maglor liked holidays, but nearly all of Taur-en-Gellam would be gathered together for the feasting and the dancing, and he still did not like to have so many eyes on him, no matter how easy performing on normal evenings had gotten.

And then his mind turned to Finwë, as it did so often these days, and a chill like a draft through the cells of Dol Guldur swept over him, making him shudder.

“Maglor?” Daeron’s hands were very warm as they rubbed up and down his back, over his spine—over the scars that still criss-crossed his skin. “What’s the matter?”

“My grandfather always liked winter holidays,” Maglor said. “They were different then because the Trees meant the days were always the same length, and the seasons weren’t always like they are now, but there were still parties, and—he would have raced Calissë to the top of the hill to go sledding yesterday, and I just…”

“I’m sorry,” Daeron whispered.

“I don’t—the more I write the more I’m coming to realize that I don’t know what I’ll do if the Valar don’t listen. If I fail at this—”

“It will not be failure, Maglor. If the Valar are not moved it will not be because you are lacking.”

“What if he doesn’t want to come back?” Maglor whispered. “Or what if—what if he can’t, not because of the statute but because Morgoth hurt him so badly—”

“Don’t think of such things,” Daeron said, placing his fingers over Maglor’s lips. “Míriel spends her days in in Vairë’s company, does she not? She knows more of what goes on in Mandos than any other living Elf, I think, and surely if Finwë were so badly hurt she would not be attempting to gain his release. If he did not want to come back, surely she and Indis would honor that wish?”

“I don’t know,” Maglor whispered. “I don’t know what they know or don’t know, or—I just—I’m not enough. I’m not Lúthien, or Eärendil. I’m just—”

“You are a grandson who loves and misses his grandfather,” Daeron said. “You are a son who loves his father, and a singer who loves his people. I’ve heard the music you are writing, I have seen the words, and more than any argument or plea anyone else has made, this song will be all of that love, yours and all the Noldor’s, made manifest. No one who hears it will be unmoved, even Námo Mandos. I am sure of it.”

“And when I fail and my father learns of it, and he…”

“Do not borrow trouble. Surely your father will understand that it is out of your hands once the song is sung. Where are all these thoughts coming from?”

“I don’t know. I just miss him more and more, the more than I learn and the more that I write, and…I don’t know what to do.”

“Just finish the song. One line at a time.” Daeron traced his fingers over Maglor’s face, over his eyebrows and cheekbones. “That’s all you can do, my love. Should I delay my errand for Elemmírë? I don’t have to go this spring—”

“No, don’t delay. The sooner you go the sooner you can come back to me, and the sooner the Avarin singers can start their own preparations.”

“If they wish to participate.”

“Why wouldn’t they?”

Daeron shrugged a shoulder. “I don’t know. They don’t keep themselves entirely separate from the rest of the Elves here, but there are still those who look askance at them, who remember that they were the ones who refused to come west in the first place. It’s nonsense, of course, but…”

“Have you spoken yet with Ingwë?” Maglor asked. “He wants to bring us all together so that we remember that we are all still one people, regardless of the ways we have divided ourselves. Perhaps a message from him will help you if they are reluctant.”

“Perhaps. I should probably get better acquainted with Ingwë anyway.” Daeron leaned in to kiss Maglor. “We really do need to get up, though. Try to put your song out of your mind until after the holiday. It is meant to be a joyous time—the days will grow longer again, the light coming back to chase away the shadows and sorrows of winter’s depths. Grief lies heavy on both of us for now, maybe, but there is hope yet for its easing.”

They went down to breakfast and then made their way to the palace, where Daeron stepped into his role as minstrel and teacher, directing and cajoling and teasing the other musicians, many of whom were or had been his students, and others who were his peers. Maglor sat to the side, offering opinions when asked, but mostly just content to watch. Others drifted in and out of the large hall, watching if there was singing or just to say hello. Daeron’s parents and brother came in and sat near Maglor, accompanied by Lacheryn and Calissë, who ran over to climb onto Maglor’s lap.

“Are you cold, Uncle Cáno?” she asked, when Maglor shifted to tug one of his sleeves back down over his hand.

“Only a little,” he said, aware that Aldalëo was sitting close enough to overhear them, and to catch a glimpse of any scars that might reveal themselves when Maglor’s sleeves rode up.

“Are you sad?” Calissë asked after a moment, peering up at him.

“Why do you ask that, sweetheart?”

“You look a little sad.”

“I think my face just does that sometimes.” Maglor looked down at her. “Are you feeling sad?”

“I miss Ammë and Atya,” Calissë said. “And all my grandparents, and Náriel, and Tyelpë.”

Maglor kissed the top of her head. “I miss them too,” he said softly. “Spring will come before you know it, though, and as soon as the weather warms up enough we’ll be on our way back to Imloth Ningloron.” A bright burst of laughter from across the hall echoed off the high walls and vaulted ceiling. Maglor added, “And tomorrow night you can stay up as long as you want.”

“Really?” Calissë brightened. “Ammë never lets us stay up late, even on holidays!”

“Well, your ammë isn’t here is she?” Maglor said. Calissë would soon be old enough to stay up late on such nights as a matter of course, but for the moment Maglor was glad he could cheer both of them up by spoiling her a little. He wrapped his arms around her and rested his chin atop her head as they watched Daeron sit himself onto the floor so his youngest students could gather around to read over his shoulder as he explained some detail of their performance.

“I thought you were also a part of the performances tomorrow, Prince Macalaurë?” Aldalëo asked after a little while.

“I am,” said Maglor. “I’ll sing with Daeron early in the evening, and closer to midnight I’ll perform a few songs alone. Daeron knows what those songs are, and all I have to do is go where and when he tells me, and all I need is my harp; I don’t need to get involved in all of that.” He gestured at the vaguely chaotic scene before them.

“Calissë!” Cýroniel called as Daeron dismissed his younger students so he could speak to the older musicians. “Come on, now we can teach you our dances!” Calissë jumped down from Maglor’s lap and ran to join her friends, grasping Cýroniel’s hand to join the ring of dancers they were making.

Maglor leaned back against the wall, and then laughed when Pídhres appeared to take Calissë’s place. “Hello, little one. Where have you been?” Pídhres rose onto her hind legs to nuzzle his face before curling up on his lap, purring as he pet her. A few courtiers stopped by to greet him and be introduced to Pídhres. Maglor put on a smile for them, just as he had put on a smile for the Noldorin lords and ladies over the summer, but he still felt tired, and Daeron’s parents sitting so close by made him itch under his skin.

Finally, Daeron came to sit down beside him, sighing dramatically as he leaned his head onto Maglor’s shoulder. “Is it always this chaotic?” Maglor asked him.

“No! Usually we barely have to rehearse at all, but for some reason everyone wants to try new things this year—new songs and new dances as well as putting everything in a different order. I can’t complain, really, because we were due for a few changes and Pirineth has written some beautiful music for this winter, but it does mean that I’m longing for bed already and it isn’t even noon.”

“Noon was an hour ago, love,” Maglor said.

“It was not.” Daeron sat up. “Atar, what’s the time?”

“An hour after noon,” Aldalëo said, lips twitching into a smile. On his other side Simpalírë laughed. “Can you step away for lunch?”

“That explains why I’m starving. Yes, let’s go get lunch—I’ll fetch Calissë.” Daeron went to scoop Calissë up into his arms and dismiss the rest of the children, who darted off in various directions to return home or to wherever they were going to get their own lunch. Calissë wrapped her arms around Daeron’s neck and whispered something in his ear that made his face go very serious as he paused on his way back to the rest of them.

“Your niece seems very fond of Daeron,” Escelírë remarked to Maglor as they all got to their feet.

“Well, he’s been as good as an uncle to her all her life,” Maglor said, “even in my absence.”

“Absence?”

“I only returned from Lórien a year and a half ago—I didn’t even know I had two new nieces until then.” Maglor didn’t look away from Daeron, where he conversed quietly with Calissë just out of earshot; he didn’t want to see whatever might be on Escelírë or Aldalëo’s face—or Simpalírë’s. He just added, trying to keep his voice light, “My encounter with the enchantress left me with more than just a few bits of white in my hair.”

Daeron and Calissë joined them before anyone could say anything more. “Ready?” Daeron asked, smile firmly back on his face. “This way to the kitchens.”

The rest of the day passed busily. The whole of Taur-en-Gellam was engaged with last-minute preparations for the feasting and dancing of Midwinter night. Maglor did as Daeron suggested and put his own song away, and tried to put Finwë entirely out of his mind. It didn’t really work—especially on Midwinter Day when he found himself in conversation with Ingwë or Thingol, for they inevitably mentioned how much Finwë would like these celebrations, or remembered fondly past celebrations in Tirion before the unrest and strife.

His own performances went well, and Calissë enjoyed the dancing and the games, and managed to stay awake far later than Maglor had actually expected her to. He carried her home through the snowdrifts that glimmered in the starlight, and helped her out of her lovely gown embroidered with tiny seed pearls on the sleeves. She was asleep even before her head hit the pillow. Maglor tucked her in snugly and left Pídhres to curl up with her, and returned to the palace just in time for his own midnight performance. After that there was dancing until sunrise, when the whole city emerged to greet the dawn with songs, many of which had been first written in praise of the very first sunrise over Beleriand long ago.

“Which ones were yours?” Simpalírë asked Daeron as they made their way home afterward. The snowdrifts were all rosy pink now with the dawn; the air was frigid, and Maglor was exhausted.

“The first one we sang,” said Daeron. “I wrote others but that’s the only one worth remembering now. Two of the others were Maglor’s.”

“Really?”

“I was surprised to hear them too,” said Maglor. “I didn’t write them in Beleriand, though—I wrote them in Rivendell.”

“I think Dior brought them back here from Imloth Ningloron,” said Daeron. “I’m surprised he and Nimloth did not return here for the winter.”

“They’ve been staying with Elwing,” said Beleg on Daeron’s other side. “You might pass them on the road come springtime when you go home.”

“Well, the rest of you might,” Daeron laughed, “but I have errands in the west. I’m sure I’ll see Dior and Nimloth before I leave here. That reminds me, Beleg, I wanted to consult with you.”

“Where is Daeron going?” Aldalëo asked Maglor once they were back at the house, and Daeron went off with Beleg. All of a sudden, since coming to Taur-en-Gellam, Daeron’s parents seemed quite happy to engage Maglor in conversation—though it was mostly just questions about Daeron—and he thought that was probably a good sign. At least they weren’t avoiding him entirely.

“Ingwë’s feast is coming up, and Elemmírë wants singers from all the Elves to participate in her grand performance, in keeping with Ingwë’s desire to bring us all together as one people again,” said Maglor. “Daeron volunteered to go look for singers and musicians among the Avari who keep more to themselves.”

“Why?” Escelírë asked, frowning. “They may not welcome outsiders.”

“Daeron is less of an outsider than you might be imagining,” Maglor said, and watched them both frown. “It’s one thing to disagree about choices made before and during the Great Journey, but none of that had anything to do with his decision to travel back into the east. It was probably safer there, east of the Ered Luin, when he left Beleriand.”

“He would have been safest, though, if he had not stayed behind at all,” said Escelírë. “We don’t expect you to understand—you Noldor who went back yourselves; it was madness.”

“Well, Valinor did not prove as safe as hoped in the end either, did it?” Maglor said quietly. “We were wrong about many things, but I don’t believe going back was the wrong choice.”

“You really believe that?” Escelírë asked. “After all that happened—all that happened to you? You have no regrets?”

“Of course I have regrets,” said Maglor. “But going back to Middle-earth is not one of them—that’s not the same as how we went back, which was terrible, and I regret it deeply. But were it not for promises I made to Elrond, I never would have returned here.”

He made his escape after that, to collapse into bed and sleep the rest of the morning away. He woke to Pídhres shoving her face into his and meowing loudly, with Daeron wrapped around him from behind and grumbling into his hair. It was so normal that it was almost like the fight had never happened, like nothing was wrong, nothing was hanging over them at all. He scratched Pídhres’ ears and laughed at Daeron before rolling over to kiss him fully awake. 

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Eressëa was quiet. Maedhros had not spent so much time away from any of his brothers since Caranthir had returned from Mandos, and it was strange—but though he missed them, it wasn’t bad. Caranthir’s letters were rambling and Celegorm’s were short, and Curufin’s somewhere in the middle, mostly talking of Náriel and Celebrimbor.

He didn’t hear from Maglor again until sometime after Midwinter which Maedhros spent quietly with Elrond and his household, with no large parties or great feasts, though they all went down to the beach to watch the fireworks set off over the bay. They were marvelous, sparkling over the water and falling like a shower of stars, but Elladan and Elrohir both proclaimed that Gandalf’s were better. Maglor’s letter did not answer any of the questions Maedhros had sent, only thanked him for the sketch and wrote about Daeron and the holidays in Taur-en-Gellam as though nothing had happened at all. Daeron’s only reply to Maedhros was a quick greeting jotted at the end of Maglor’s letter, as cheerful as Maglor’s but even less informative.

In the days following the holiday, Maedhros spent more time near the water, often with his sketchbook, and also often in Elrond’s company. Most often they spoke of nothing particularly consequential—Elrond’s projects in copying and transcribing and in gathering lore, Maedhros’ attempts at painting, their various relations, and speculations about Gil-galad’s reception in Tirion when he came there sometime in the spring.

“I’ve seen so many depictions of Finwë since I came here, but somehow I never realized before seeing Gil-galad again just how much they look alike,” Elrond remarked one afternoon. They sat on the white sand, warmed by the sun even though the breeze from the west carried a bite, and through the Calacirya the sky was wintry grey.

“I’m not surprised,” said Maedhros. “Fingon also looks a great deal like Finwë.” He leaned back on his elbows and watched a few dolphins jumping about in the water, to the delight of some Telerin youths out on their sailboat.

“Not so much that they might be mistaken for twins,” Elrond said.

“I always thought Gil-galad took after Gilheneth,” said Maedhros, “but he was still a young child when I saw him last. Is he very tall now?”

“Oh yes, taller than me but not as tall as you or Turgon. Will you visit before you go back to your mother’s house?”

“I doubt it. There’s no real rush, is there? And Fingon and Gilheneth sound as though they have their hands full juggling everyone who wants to see Gil-galad now, while keeping them away from Maeglin…how did they get along when they met?”

“Maeglin is terribly skittish,” said Elrond, “even if he hides it well, and Gil-galad is—well, he’s pleased with everything, and especially to meet and know his cousin and his aunt. Gil-galad was very happy to see Celebrimbor again, at least, and Celebrimbor seems to have taken Maeglin under his wing.”

“Yes, he decided they should be friends within about two minutes of their meeting, and Maeglin didn’t really get a choice in the matter.”

“I think it is a good thing,” said Elrond, “but I have not yet told my grandparents of his return—or my parents, though I don’t know when I’ll next see my father.” His other grandparents, Dior and Nimloth, had spent Midwinter at Elwing’s tower, and had visited Eressëa a few times over the course of the last few weeks—but Maedhros had made himself scarce when they came after the initial introduction to Dior. “My father rather famously does not hold grudges,” Elrond went on, “but I think Maeglin might be an exception.”

Maeglin was to Eärendil, Maedhros thought, what he himself had once been to Elrond. Worse, even—if the tales of the battle that Maedhros had heard were true. “What will you do if he is upset by Maeglin’s return?”

“Nothing,” Elrond said. “That is between them. I can be present if they ever decide they should meet face to face—Elbereth knows I’ve had practice—but I won’t do anything more.”

“Practice?” Maedhros repeated, glancing over at Elrond.

Elrond smiled, but it was a tired sort of expression. “Your father and my grandfather,” he said. “They wanted a witness to at least the beginning of their first real conversation after Fëanor returned from Mandos, and picked me. Fingon and Finrod thought it was very funny.”

“I don’t,” Maedhros said.

“Anything can be funny if you’re trying very hard to ignore the tension in the room, and I did encourage it a little. Better to be laughed at than to have to stop everyone from arguing. It went well, though, that meeting. I think mostly Fëanor wanted me there so I could vouch for him later in case anyone was skeptical of his affirming your abdication and giving up his right to the crown. Everyone else probably hoped I would prevent violence from breaking out, but they didn’t have to worry. Fëanor offered to let Fingolfin punch him, and Fingolfin declined.”

Maedhros had heard about that from Fingon, and hadn’t known whether he really believed it. But Elrond had been there, and Elrond wouldn’t make up stories like that for a joke. “Findis took him up on it instead,” he said.

“I don’t think Findis waited for him to offer. She’s now one of his staunchest allies.”

“Siblings are strange,” Maedhros said.

“They are,” Elrond agreed.

“I’m not sure you can say that,” Maedhros said. “You and Elros never fought.”

“Yes we did—maybe not much as children, but when we were older. The worst was the time I accidentally broke his nose.”

“You—you broke his nose?” If anything, Maedhros would have expected it to be the other way around, though he couldn’t have explained why.

“It was an accident,” Elrond repeated, smiling faintly, “and it was—it was some time after you had died, and not very long after his coronation.” He paused, and then said, “It also wasn’t very long after we had each made our choices. If we were going to really fight about anything it was that, but we’d both determined not to, so we argued over other, stupider things.”

“I’m sorry,” Maedhros said.

“I was very angry with him for a while, but…it was his choice, and it was the right one for him, just as mine was right for me. He feared the uncertainty of being halfelven, of not knowing what would happen to us if or when we died. Just knowing which path he would take was a great relief, and not knowing what lay beyond it—that was a different kind of uncertainty, one that beckoned rather than frightened. My only regret is that our lives diverged when they did, and I could not be with him at the end, as I could not be with Arwen.”

“Can I ask why?” Maedhros asked after a moment. “Why you couldn’t stay for Arwen, I mean?”

“I was so tired,” Elrond sighed. “I am thankful for Vilya and all that it allowed me to do, but it took its toll, just as all the rings did. I couldn’t stay. I would have just—faded away, long before Arwen, whether I wanted to or not, and that would have broken her heart worse than our parting broke mine. But my sons were able to stay, and so was Maglor. The end was neither as lonely nor as bitter for her as I had feared.”

“Maglor speaks often of her,” Maedhros said, “and her children. The first time I saw him smile after we met again was when someone asked him about Aragorn.”

“I hate what happened to him,” said Elrond, “but I will be forever grateful that it brought him home to Rivendell in the end.” He sat up and looped his arms around his knees, watching a crab scuttle through the surf at their feet. “What of your father?”

“I don’t want to punch him,” said Maedhros, “but Celegorm might.” Elrond snorted. “I haven’t forgotten what you said before. I just…don’t know what I want to come out of it. He doesn’t even remember clearly the worst things he did.”

“How do you know that?”

“He told me. We met briefly in Tirion.”

“What is it in particular you wanted him to remember?”

Maedhros did not look at Elrond, instead watching the crab until it was washed away into the water. The dolphins were still jumping around the sailboat. Their chittering and chirping was audible even where he and Elrond sat on Eressëa. “Losgar,” he said finally, and half-wished they were somewhere far away from the water, or the ships of the Teleri.

“The ship burning?”

“I think he remembers that well enough—and I suppose he’s made peace with both Fingolfin and Olwë over it, and what happened in Alqualondë. It’s—that was the only time I ever defied him, out loud and to his face. I spoke against it, and then I would take no part. He was—angry. Very angry.”

Fëanor’s face flashed through his mind, half in shadow as the ships still smoldered behind him, but his eyes burning brighter than anything. It would have been better had you—

“Ah,” Elrond said very softly, as though this admission had allowed him to make sense of a few things. “Are you worried he’ll repeat whatever he said to you?”

“No. No, it’s—I believe you and Maglor and everyone else when you say his regret is genuine. It’s just—even if he regretted them seconds after the words were said, he meant them as he spoke them. And it’s…it’s the future that I’m uncertain of. If there comes a time when I have to speak against him again—I’ll do it, but I don’t…” He didn’t know how to explain. Even if he never spoke to Fëanor again and something still happened to put them on opposite sides of whatever-it-might-be, facing his father’s wrath again, however unlikely it was, would break something in him and Maedhros wasn’t sure it was something that Nienna or Estë or even Námo could fix. He was stronger than he had been since before the Nirnaeth Arnoediad, now, but sometimes he feared that that strength was a of a brittle kind, that it would shatter if hit in just the right way.

“You do not have to speak to him, or even ever see him again,” Elrond said. “I know what I said before, but you need not take my advice just because I am the one that gave it.”

“You were right though,” said Maedhros. “And I would—” He swallowed, and watched the dolphins all suddenly vanish, diving under the water and not resurfacing. One of the sailors dove in after them, a bright flash of silver hair disappearing into the clear blue waves. “I would like to be wrong,” he said finally. “And I am going to speak to him, once I decide what I need to say. After Maglor’s finished with his song.”

“You might be waiting for some time, if you are waiting for that,” said Elrond.

“Yes, I know.” That was rather the point.

“Come to Imloth Ningloron when you’re ready for it,” Elrond said after a little while. “It may be easier there than in Tirion. It was for both your father and Fingolfin.”

“I don’t think I will need you there to make sure no one gets hurt,” Maedhros said, trying to speak lightly. “I’m not going to punch him.”

“That isn’t what I’m worried about.”

“I don’t think he’ll do anything to me, either.”

“I don’t think either of you will try to hurt the other,” said Elrond, “but both of you are already hurt, and even if it goes as well as it possibly can it will still be painful. I would like to be nearby, whatever happens, and at least in Imloth Ningloron you will not be burdened by the memories of Tirion, good or ill.”

Maedhros looked up at the sky. An eagle soared out from the mountains over the water, lazily riding the thermals. “All right,” he said. “But this shouldn’t be your—”

“You are all my family,” said Elrond, “so I’m going to meddle as much as I like. I’m also not above leveraging the fact that none of you can get angry at me for it because I’m one of the babies of the House of Finwë.” Maedhros nearly choked on surprised laughter. “So, really, you have to indulge me—and if not me, then Celebrían, who will say the same thing if you ask her. At least you can be assured my meddling won’t send you all off across the entire continent.”

“In Mithrandir’s defense,” Maedhros said when he caught his breath, “it worked, and I’m not sure anything else would have.”

“Don’t say that to him,” Elrond said, “or I’ll never hear the end of it.” He smiled when Maedhros laughed again. “And I think you could’ve done without being attacked by a wild hunting cat.”

“I could have, yes,” said Maedhros, “but I don’t think we can blame Mithrandir for that.”

“Do those wounds ever trouble you?”

“No. Curvo stitched me up afterward, and Daeron sang many healing songs. You can look at the scars if you want, but they never hurt—they were healed long before I even went to Lórien.”

“I believe you.”

“They aren’t the kind of scars that will ache,” Maedhros said after a few minutes of silence. “The whole incident at the river—it’s never kept me up at night, and I don’t think it ever will, not like other things have. It was awful at the time, of course, but not that kind of awful. They were all furious with me, but even that was reassuring in its own way.”

“They were angry because they were frightened for you.”

“Mostly they were angry because I wasn’t more upset myself.” It was the sort of thing that would have broken them all apart and sent them scattering before they’d gone to Ekkaia, before they had all decided not to let something like that happen again. “But I wasn’t dead or going to die, and I’d survived worse before.” He shrugged. “Mandos wasn’t going to let me in a second time, I don’t think.”

“I’m sure I should object to that line of thinking,” Elrond said, “but I don’t know enough about Mandos to do so.”

“I didn’t want to go back, by then,” Maedhros said. “But they had kicked me out once, and I don’t think Námo would have been very pleased to see me again. It doesn’t matter, because I didn’t die, no matter how often Curufin wants to remind me exactly how bad it was. I lost more blood, but it was Maglor who had a worse time at the river.”

“He told me about it when he came back to Imloth Ningloron. Did you know what was happening, after his voice gave out?”

“Yes, though not why. I tried to break him out of it, but nothing was working—and I think the fact that it was me only made it worse.” Maedhros did not look at Elrond. The dolphins had returned, and all the sailors had jumped off their boat to swim with them. “It almost makes me disappointed that Sauron is gone—that I can’t go find him myself.”

“He got what was coming to him,” Elrond said quietly. “Do you now why now, though? I’m never quite sure what Maglor has told—well, any of you, really. I know he’s told Curufin.”

“Curvo told the rest of us, which is what Maglor had intended. I’ve never asked him anything, myself. About any of it.”

“Why not?”

“I don’t have to. I’ve seen the scars; I know what they mean. There are some things you just—they’re impossible to explain to someone who doesn’t already understand, and if someone already understands you don’t need to try anyway. I don’t need to ask Maglor about Dol Guldur just like he now doesn’t have to ask me about Angband. It’s—it’s very hard to walk that line, between not wanting anyone to know what happened because it would horrify them, but needing them to understand that it did happen and that you aren’t the same, and you can’t ever be the same. Anyone who’s lived in Middle-earth understands enough to be getting on with, for the most part. Curvo didn’t need to ask for more of an explanation than he got. But those who never left here—they can’t.”

“I understand.”

“You lived in Middle-earth,” Maedhros said, offering what he hoped was a wry smile.

“Is that why you gave your father one of your mother’s palantíri? Why you’re so afraid to speak to him—because you believe he expects to see someone you aren’t any longer?”

“I’m not afraid.”

“You didn’t think you were afraid of Lórien, either.”

The sailors were climbing back onto their boat now, dripping and laughing and falling onto the deck. One of the dolphins leaped clear over the prow to land with a splash on the other side. Finally, Maedhros said, “I’m not afraid, exactly—I don’t fear my father now. But I became someone my father hated, though I was not the one who had yet changed then. I don’t know what he will think of who I am now when he starts to know or understand me. At least through the palantír he’ll have some idea of why I am who I am.”

“I don’t think he will hate you,” Elrond said softly.

Elrond had not been at Losgar. “I haven’t disagreed with him yet.”

“I am not Fëanor, but I am a father,” Elrond said after a little while, as the sailboat’s sails were raised and it began to drift away back toward Alqualondë. “My children have often made choices that I disagreed with, or spoke out in disagreement with me. I could never hate any of them, though I spent several decades unable to speak to my sons without it dissolving into a terrible fight that had them storming out of the room and then out of Rivendell—precisely the opposite of what I wanted them to do. I also never wanted Arwen to make the choice that she did—because I knew it would be a bitter and painful end for her, and because I, more selfishly, did not want to lose her. In the end she did make that choice, and our final farewell was bitter, but I never hated her for it, not for a moment. Neither she nor her brothers ever doubted that I love them more than life itself.”

“You said so yourself,” Maedhros said, “you are not Fëanor. My father never liked to be gainsaid, even before things went wrong. And it is still true that the things I regret least are the things he would have been even angrier over than he was over the ships. But what did Elladan and Elrohir ever do that put you at such odds?”

“In the wake of Celebrían’s departure they threw themselves into hunting orcs, into combing the Misty Mountains for them, into—into anything that I deemed too dangerous and often foolish. They took part in the Battle of the Fields of Celebrant the year after Celebrían left, and I had no knowledge of it until they came back, both wounded and both of them having been careless with those wounds. I was furious—angrier than I had ever been with them, before or since.”

“You were angry because you feared for them,” Maedhros said, “not merely because they disobeyed you.”

“Of course I was afraid. I thought they were going to get themselves killed, and they hadn’t—they had not yet made their choice, and I did not know what that would mean. I have a better idea now, having since met my grandfather Dior who died before such a thing was ever offered, but I couldn’t know, then. And they were angry, I think, in the same way that your father was. Their grief for their mother’s suffering had hardened into something else once she was gone, and there were times when I found myself wondering if they really realized what they were doing—how they sometimes frightened myself and their sister. I know Celebrían’s departure is not the same as her death would have been, but for those of us who had lived all our lives in Middle-earth, and with the future still so uncertain and growing ever darker, it did not feel very different.”

“Even your future?” Maedhros asked. If Elrond had been slain, he would have come to Mandos and then again to life in Valinor—as he had chosen.

“Especially mine,” Elrond said, but did not explain further. Instead he went on, “They calmed eventually, with time—Elladan and Elrohir. They never stopped riding out, but they started to listen to me again, and more and more often I was the one sending them out as the world grew darker and more dangerous. And you have seen them now. There is nothing of that rage left.”

Maedhros heard what Elrond was telling him, but found it as hard to imagine either Elladan or Elrohir burning with that kind of anger—not now, when they were making silly bets with one another and singing even sillier songs just to make Celebrían laugh—as it was to imagine Fëanor having burned his anger entirely out. It was equally hard to imagine Fëanor laughing as he once had, or doing or saying anything that might be considered silly or playful.

He didn’t want to think of his father any longer. “Have you heard from Maglor?”

“Yes, and whatever was going on between him and Daeron, they seem to have sorted it out.”

“You noticed too, then.”

“Yes, of course. I’m not going to question him about it though, not when I can’t see him in person to know whether it would help or just make things worse. I think they are both feeling a great deal of strain right now, between the songwriting and Daeron’s family and Ingwë’s upcoming feast. If they fight with one another it’s because they both know that that’s safe in the end—I don’t think either would ever say or do anything the other could not forgive.”

“Have you met Daeron’s family yet?”

“Yes. Celebrían has decided we should all be friends, not least because she believes it will make things easier for Daeron; but I doubt you’ll see any of them while you’re here. Netyalossë and Vinyelírë are unlikely to come to Eressëa if Daeron is not here, and Simpalírë and their parents have gone to Taur-en-Gellam.”

Wonderful, Maedhros thought. An additional source of stress neither Daeron nor Maglor needed. Hopefully they had reconciled before Daeron’s parents arrived—hopefully Daeron’s parents weren’t the root of the argument. “What do you think of them?”

“They aren’t bad people,” Elrond said. “It’s only that family is always complicated, and so is the history of the Eldar, and we are seeing that playing out in miniature between Daeron and Aldalëo and Escelírë. So often we find ourselves with an idea of someone in our minds, only to meet them and find they are not at all the way we thought they would be. I’ve had that experience nearly every time I met someone new after coming here—and I came into those meetings usually with much more knowledge than either Daeron or his family had of each other. People change, and sometimes people just don’t get along for reasons that aren’t really anyone’s fault. I think that might be the case for Daeron and his sister, with the added complication of Netyalossë disliking the fact that she is no longer the eldest sibling in practice and not just in name.”

“Daeron mentioned that to me,” said Maedhros. “I know all about being the eldest—but obviously it’s different, since I’ve known my brothers all their lives.”

“As I said,” Elrond said a little wryly, “family is complicated.”

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After the holiday, things settled back into a routine. Daeron had his duties, and Maglor found himself in increasing demand as a teacher—and found that he enjoyed it more and more. He still took time in the mornings to work on his song—after he and Daeron fixed things, the words started to come more easily again. The anxiety didn’t fade, but at least it was no longer holding him back.

Daeron spent a great deal of time with his parents, each alone, and with Simpalírë, and with all three of them together. Maglor rarely joined them. Nothing went nearly as badly as it had before Midwinter, but he still often came away tired and unhappy and not always able to explain why. When they were together Daeron always wanted to stick close to Maglor’s side, always touching him in one way or another, even more than in the days right after they’d reunited in Lórien.

“I think we’re starting to understand each other,” he said to Maglor as they walked through the woods, talking of family. Spring was coming, with snow melt turning the ground to mud and crocuses starting to peek through the lingering drifts, bright splashes of purple against the brown and white. It was still cold, but it was losing its bite. “But…”

“But?” Maglor prompted after Daeron fell silent for several minutes.

“Pirineth did very well singing the Leithian last night,” Daeron said.

“Yes, she did.”

“I think Simpalírë must have warned both Amil and Atar not to speak to me of Lúthien, but I can tell they want to. And it’s…I think I could answer calmly enough, except—I can’t start that conversation myself. And I don’t actually want them to ask me anything.”

“What is it you’re afraid of?” Maglor asked.

“I don’t know. Netyalossë said some things in Avallónë about me having missed my chance for a better something or other—I wasn’t really listening because she was just being snide about you and I didn’t want to hear it. I don’t actually know if she was talking about Lúthien or not, but…”

“Netyalossë isn’t here.” Maglor hesitated a moment, and then asked, “Would you have? Married Lúthien, I mean?”

“Yes,” Daeron said simply. He stepped over a patch of particularly slick mud, not letting go of Maglor’s hand. “There was a time when I would very happily have married her, and she knew it. She did not feel the same, however, and—well, it hurt of course, but it would have been worse to lose my dearest friend than to not marry her.” He paused for a moment, and then said, “It was worse to lose my dearest friend.”

“I’m sorry,” Maglor said. “You don’t have to tell—”

“No, it’s—I got over it. I never stopped loving her, but the love changed. We had it all settled between us years and years before I ever met you. She teased me as mercilessly as Mablung after the feast, and then when Angrod spilled the truth, she never mentioned your name again.”

“I’m sorry,” Maglor said again.

“You would have liked one another. I’ve often thought that you would have been friends if you had ever gotten to meet. I just…I don’t know. I can talk about her with Mablung or with Thingol or Celeborn, because they all knew her, and I can talk about her with you because you know me, but I don’t know how to explain any of it to anyone else.”

“Her fate was not your fault you know,” Maglor said after they walked a little farther in silence. “I know you don’t want to hear the blame passed on, but—”

“No, that was—I do know better. Whatever happened, she may very well have decided to follow Beren into death and beyond even if they were able to live a long and peaceful life together in Doriath, without any quests or Silmarils or any of it. The part I played was still not nothing, and I should have let Lúthien bring Beren to her father’s attention in her own way and on her own time, but…no one could make or stop Lúthien from doing anything when she set her mind to it. I did make peace with all of that long ago. I still don’t know why it reared up again the way it did.”

“Sometimes the past just…tangles itself up, so one thing drags up another,” Maglor said. “At least in my experience—but you’ve been better than me about not just pushing it all down and ignoring it.”

“I try, anyway,” Daeron said. “I do miss her. I’ll always miss her, especially because I never got to see her again after she left, never got a chance to properly apologize. Dior told me once that she spoke of me fondly, so I suppose that means she forgave me. And she did tell me, right before she left—she told me that I’d understand someday why she did all that she did, because I would find the same joy that she had found.” His grip on Maglor’s hand tightened. “She was right. We should have spoken of this long ago. I’m sorry.”

“I didn’t want to ask because I didn’t want to bring up unhappy memories,” said Maglor. “But you know I’ll always listen, whatever it is you want to tell me.”

“I know. I don’t know why I haven’t. Just…wanting to live in the present and not dwell in the past, I suppose. And for what it’s worth,” Daeron added, smiling a little mischievously, “You can tell me all about your previous loves too, if you want. I promise I won’t get too jealous.”

“I’ve already told you I was never in love with anyone else,” Maglor said. “There’s nothing really to say about the rest of it. I just liked to have fun whenever I was in Tirion—though still less than gossip would have it.”

As they turned back toward the city, Daeron sighed. “You’ll be leaving soon.”

“So will you. Are you going alone?”

“No, Beleg and Mablung are coming. Beleg was another almost-uncle to both Mablung and me in our childhood and youth. It will be nice to travel with them both again—we once roamed all over Beleriand together, from Ossiriand to the Bay of Balar. I asked Simpalírë if he wished to go, but he hasn’t decided yet.”

“I hope he does,” said Maglor.

“I do too,” said Daeron, sounding a little surprised to hear himself say it. “But I’ll miss you horribly.”

“I’ll miss you too, but it’s only a few months. A year at most,” said Maglor. “And then we’ll make our way to Tirion or Valmar or wherever Elemmírë wants to rehearse.”

“Ugh, that’s going to be awful.”

“I think it will be fun. I just need to finish my own song first.”

“You’ve been working hard all winter. Have you made progress?”

“I have a draft nearly complete—complete enough that I can show it to others to ask for their opinions once I write out a fair copy. Finrod and Galadriel already promised they would look it over, though they might still be busy with Aegnor.”

“You haven’t yet spoken to him,” Daeron said.

“No, but—this song is important, but it’s not so important that I need to intrude when he’s trying to readjust to life; from what Galadriel wrote in her last letter to me, I think he’s finding it a little harder than Gil-galad or Aredhel. The last thing he needs right now, probably, is inquisitive cousins.”

Finally, the weather grew warm enough that travel would not be more than mildly uncomfortable, and Maglor made preparations for his and Calissë’s return to Imloth Ningloron. He took leave of Thingol and Olwë, and of Ingwë, and bade farewell to Daeron’s students and to his family. Calissë was sad to leave her friends, but she had gained a new appreciation for letter-writing after Cýroniel and Ríthon both promised to send letters as often as they could.

Daeron lifted Calissë up and peppered kisses all over her face when it was time to leave. “Give your parents my love please,” he said, “and give Náriel a kiss for me, won’t you?”

“I will,” Calissë said. “I’ll miss you though!”

“I’ll miss you too, but I promise I’ll come back with a dozen new stories to tell you.” Daeron set Calissë onto her pony and turned to Maglor, pulling him into a tight embrace and deep kiss. Calissë made a disgusted noise, which made Simpalírë laugh somewhere nearby. “I won’t be anywhere I can send letters,” Daeron said as he pulled back, “but I’ll be thinking of you.”

“I love you,” Maglor murmured in his ear. “Be safe—don’t rush anything on my account.”

“I won’t. Take care of yourself, beloved.”

“I will if you will.”

As they left Taur-en-Gellam, Maglor and Calissë passed through the mallorn grove, and both of them stopped to look up and around, at the tall silver trunks crowned with golden flowers, and the ground underneath carpeted with golden leaves. It made Maglor think of Lothlórien in springtime, far away. He wondered if the mallorn trees there still thrived, or if they were fading away with the passing of the Elves and of Galadriel’s power. The mallorn tree in the Shire, he was certain, would be in bloom, tall and stately and providing beauty and shade to generations of hobbits for their parties and picnics. He told Calissë the story of Bilbo’s one hundred and eleventh birthday party as they rode, describing all the fireworks in as much detail as Bilbo himself ever had, including the way all of the other hobbits had been frightened out of their wits by the dragon.

“Could we ask Mithrandir to make one of those?” Calissë asked. “A dragon firework? I want to see it!”

“I’m sure he would be delighted,” said Maglor. “You should certainly ask him when next you see him—it will give everyone a terrible fright, just like at Bilbo’s party!”

“How did Bilbo disappear like that?” Calissë asked a little later, after Maglor had finished that part of the story.

“His magic ring,” said Maglor.

“That’s the same ring that had to get destroyed, though?”

“Yes, that’s right. But Bilbo didn’t know that at the time—no one did. For him it was just a very useful little thing to help him get out of danger and avoid his unpleasant cousins the Sackville-Bagginses, and also to play one last silly trick on all of his neighbors. Once his nephew Frodo learned what it really was, he was much more careful.”

“Frodo’s story is much scarier than Bilbo’s,” Calissë said.

“Bilbo’s was scary too,” said Maglor, “but he told it differently than Frodo told his own—it is true, though, that going into Mordor was even more dangerous than creeping down into a dragon’s lair.”

“They were very brave,” said Calissë.

“Yes, they were,” said Maglor.

“Like you.”

“Me?” Maglor glanced at her, ready to laugh, but found her quite serious. “I’m not that brave, sweetheart, I just got lucky.”

“No,” she said, “Atya says you’re braver than anyone else in the family. He said you spent a really long time alone, and that it was really scary and dangerous and you’re the only person in the whole world that could do it.”

“When did he say that?” Maglor asked.

“When we were going to Lórien, and he and everyone else were telling stories about you and Uncle Nelyo.” Calissë paused, and then said a little sheepishly, “And then he said not to tell you that he said that, and Uncle Moryo laughed at him, but I forgot until just now.”

“That’s all right,” said Maglor, smiling. “He won’t be upset that you forgot, he just doesn’t want me to know he said anything so nice.”

“Is everyone going to be waiting for us at Imloth Ningloron?”

“Maybe. Or maybe we’ll beat them there—or maybe we’ll meet them on the road! It will be a surprise, whatever happens.”

They did meet someone on the road, just as they joined the main north-south road coming from the one that led west to Taur-en-Gellam, though it wasn’t Curufin. It was Elladan and Elrohir instead, coming south in the company of Dior Eluchíl and Nimloth just as Beleg had predicted. Calissë recognized the twins at once and rushed forward to greet them. Elrohir, laughing, dropped out of the saddle to scoop her up. Elladan trotted forward to clasp Maglor’s hand. “This is a happy chance! But where’s Daeron?”

“Still in Taur-en-Gellam; he has duties to perform and errands of his own,” said Maglor, “and it will be some time before he can come back to Imloth Ningloron. Are you headed home?”

“Yes, we were just about to part with our grandparents. Come! You haven’t yet met, have you?”

Dior could not be mistaken, being as alike to Elladan and Elrohir as Elrond was, though there was a different sort of light in his eyes. He smiled warmly at Maglor as he held out his hand. “I’m glad to meet you at last,” he said. “Elrond and Daeron have both spoken so highly of you.” Nimloth also smiled, but did not extend a hand in greeting, though she softened a great deal when Elrohir introduced Calissë. “I’m sorry to have missed Midwinter at home,” Dior said once introductions were done, “if both you and Daeron were there. It must have been marvelous.”

“It was!” Calissë said.

“It was,” Maglor agreed, “though I played a very small part in it.”

“What will truly be marvelous is the upcoming great feast,” said Elrohir, “and all of the music that Elemmírë is planning.”

“All of Valinor is buzzing with talk of it,” Dior said, “and I’ve never seen Tirion so busy.”

Everyone was eager to be at home, however, so they soon parted, Dior and Nimloth for Taur-en-Gellam and the rest of them for Imloth Ningloron to the south. “Are your parents at home yet?” Maglor asked.

“No, they’re visiting Finarfin and meeting Aegnor,” said Elladan. “We stopped for a few days, but then came ahead with Grandmother Nimloth and Grandfather Dior, and hoping to get home in time to welcome you. We’ve missed you,” he added, glancing over at Maglor. “Maedhros will be following in a few days as well; he did not want to impose on our grandparents.”

“Has he met…?”

“Oh, yes, but he still feels a little awkward. I could tell you did too.”

Maglor shrugged. “No more awkward than some other meetings I have had. Tell me about all I’ve been missing?”

It was always fun, traveling with Elladan and Elrohir. It was familiar and comfortable, and only after a few hours in their company did Maglor realize just how much he had missed that—the long-ingrained habits and the easy banter, and the silences that did not need to be filled. And when they reached Imloth Ningloron, arriving in the middle of the day to laughter and smiles, there were no strangers waiting and no one Maglor had to worry about impressing or not offending. His hedgehogs had woken up from their winter’s hibernation, and came scurrying out of the daffodils to meet him, purring and sniffing at his fingers. It was a disappointment not to have Elrond and Celebrían there, but they would come home soon enough, and his brothers would follow.

“You seem tired,” Elrohir said a few days after they had arrived. Maglor had brought a mug of tea outside to sit in the sunshine. The air was still cool, but his clothes were thick and warm, and the tea was hot and sweet. The earliest spring birds were singing in the trees, and the air smelled faintly of daffodils and niphredil. Somewhere out in the garden, Legolas was singing to the flowers. “Did it all go well in Taur-en-Gellam?”

“For the most part,” Maglor said. “I am tired, but that’s just because it’s wearying to be traveling around and then a guest for such a long stretch of time.”

“You were not a guest in Avallónë,” said Elrohir.

“No, I meant Taur-en-Gellam—but as nice as it was to spend time on Eressëa, it had its own tensions.”

“Is that any better? I know that Daeron’s brother and his parents followed you to Taur-en-Gellam.”

“I think it’s better,” said Maglor. “It might improve even more now that I’m not there.” Elrohir made a face. “I know. It is what it is. But I have spoken to everyone I need to, and now all I have to do is write, so I’m not going anywhere, which means I can sleep in my own bed and get some real rest.”

“Good,” Elrohir said. “You know my father is worried about you. Your letters this winter were not all very cheerful, and then your later ones were not quite as reassuring as I think you meant them to be.”

“I’m sorry,” Maglor said.

“But did you and Daeron—I know you said he has errands of his own, but is that really why…?”

“Yes, that’s the only thing keeping him away. There was—he argued with Simpalírë and snapped at me, and it was tense and unpleasant for a little while, but that was before Midwinter. We’re fine, so don’t start in on Daeron when he does get here.”

“If you’re sure,” Elrohir said doubtfully.

“Believe it or not, Daeron and I are perfectly capable of working through our own problems by ourselves. I’m only—how many thousands of years older than you? And he is even older!”

That was meant to make Elrohir laugh, but he remained serious. “I know,” he said, “I’m sorry. It’s just—a hard habit to break. Worrying.”

“I know, and I’m sorry for it.” Maglor reached out to tug on one of his braids. “What’s troubling you?”

“Nothing, just—sometimes I think about…” Elrohir glanced toward the door, as though worried Calissë might be nearby. Then he asked softly, “Do you remember when we found you?”

“Not really,” said Maglor. “I mean, I remember hearing your voices and seeing your faces and thinking I’d finally gone utterly mad. I remember being very afraid, and how everything hurt, and the light being too bright, but not much else—not until I woke up later to sunshine on the leaves in Lothlórien.”

“I was the one that noticed the door—the one with its lock rusted shut. I almost ignored it, thinking that no one could possibly be inside if it hadn’t been opened in that long. I almost—”

“Oh, Elrohir.” Maglor set his tea aside and pulled Elrohir into his arms. “Don’t dwell on such things. You didn’t ignore it, and that’s why I’m here with you now.” He kissed Elrohir’s forehead. “And I’m so grateful for it—beyond any words. You know that, don’t you?”

“I do.” Elrohir rested his head on Maglor’s shoulder. “I don’t usually dwell on it, but I kept dreaming last night of—oh, just old and dark things. It happens sometimes, and I’m all right. Just—so many things came down to mere chance, and sometimes if I think about it too long I realize all over again just how frightening that is.”

“I understand,” Maglor said. “I think, though, that it was a little more than mere chance that led you to open that door.”

A loud bark echoed through the valley then, and a second later Maglor heard Calissë’s voice calling out to her parents and her siblings. He kissed Elrohir once more before releasing him so they could walk around to the stable yard, where Curufin had Calissë in his arms and Elladan was already there, greeting Celegorm and Rundamírë and Maedhros and Celebrimbor, while Huan sniffed at everyone, tail wagging hard enough to nearly knock Celegorm over. “Uncle Cáno!” Náriel hurled herself at Maglor, who knelt to catch her and pepper kisses all over her cheeks. He had to shift her to his hip as he rose, because Curufin stepped forward to embrace him with surprising force.

“Everything all right, Curvo?” he asked.

“Yes, of course,” said Curufin without lifting his head from Maglor’s shoulder. “I just missed you.”

“Atya, can I tell Uncle Cáno the surprise?” Náriel asked.

“What surprise?” Maglor asked as Curufin lifted his head. “Don’t keep me in suspense!”

“Don’t keep any of us in suspense!” said Celegorm as he stepped up to take Curufin’s place. “I don’t know what this surprise is either—hullo, Cáno. You look tired.”

“And your hair is still green,” Maglor said, cuffing him lightly upside the head.

“It is not—” Celegorm grabbed the end of his braid to look even as he protested.

“Ammë and Atya are having a baby!” Náriel interrupted, wiggling in Maglor’s arms and kicking her legs as she ran out of patience.

“A baby!” Maglor and Celegorm exclaimed at the same time, as Maedhros and Celebrimbor laughed.

“Next winter,” Rundamírë confirmed as Calissë squealed in her arms. “So none of you are allowed to go off traveling anywhere before then!”

“Of course not!” said Maglor as he stepped around Celegorm to kiss her cheek. “That’s wonderful news, Rundamírë!” He turned to embrace Curufin again too.

“Where is Daeron?” Náriel asked, craning her neck as though expecting him to appear at any moment.

“He stayed in Taur-en-Gellam,” said Maglor, catching her before she fell out of his arms, “and then he has errands of his own, so I don’t know when he’ll be coming back here. A few months at least—maybe not before autumn.”

“He’s gotta come before the baby does!”

“He will, don’t worry,” said Maglor.

“What sort of errands are keeping Daeron away?” Celegorm asked once Maglor and Rundamírë had set the girls down and they raced off after the hedgehogs; Maedhros had brought Aechen, and all three vanished into the grass, followed by Calissë, hand in hand with Náriel.

“He’s going to recruit singers for Elemmírë,” said Maglor. “That was always the plan. Why are you looking at me like that?”

“Calissë wrote all about how you and Daeron weren’t speaking,” Rundamírë said, arching an eyebrow.

He really should have looked at that letter before it got sent. “She wrote that letter while we were making things right,” he said now. “Everything is fine.”

Celegorm looked ready to argue, but before he could say anything Maedhros said, “I think Rundamírë is more concerned about how you bribed Calissë with cake to write that letter.”

“I didn’t,” Maglor protested as Rundamírë laughed. “That was Mablung! And you’ll find Calissë much more willing to sit down to read and write now, even without cake, since she has several friends in Taur-en-Gellam who will be expecting regular letters.”

That successfully turned the conversation away from Daeron, at least for the moment, but Maglor knew better than to expect any of his brothers to leave it alone, since the letters he had written after Midwinter seemed not to have reassured them at all. And sure enough, after the girls went to bed that night Maglor found himself ambushed in his room by Maedhros, Celegorm, and Curufin. “I told you everything is fine,” he said before they could get started.

“We believe you,” Celegorm said. He sprawled across Maglor’s bed. “But it wasn’t fine at Midwinter.”

“Which was months ago,” said Maglor. “Do you all insist that Curvo share every detail of his arguments with Rundamírë?”

“Arimeldë and I have been married for years and years, even without counting all that time we were apart,” said Curufin. “That’s different. But also yes, you all did demand every detail of every argument when we were first courting.”

“Fine. What about Moryo?”

“I did bother him about it that one time he and Lisgalen stopped speaking for half a year,” said Celegorm. “But he never wants to talk about anything, and I stopped when he threatened to smother me in my sleep.”

“Well, I don’t want to talk about this,” Maglor said, “and I’m not above shoving a pillow in your face either.”

“We’re not mad at him,” said Maedhros. “We’re worried about him—not because he lost his temper, that happens, but because he avoided you for so long afterward. I’ve been worried about you, too, because you really didn’t sound like yourself when you wrote to me and didn’t mention his name in the letter even once.”

“I didn’t mean to make you worry,” Maglor said. He sat down on the rug in front of the hearth so the hedgehogs could crawl over his lap. Curufin sat down next to him. “I just couldn’t focus on anything else and writing to you about more cheerful things seemed to help. I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry,” Maedhros said. “Is Daeron really all right?”

“Yes. Or at least he’s better than he was over the winter.” Daeron had also confessed once, when they were out walking alone through the woods, that he’d been just as worried about having ruined his friendships with all of Maglor’s brothers as he had been of everything else. Maglor wasn’t sure if his brothers all knew how important they were to Daeron, how few truly close friends he had these days. He had plenty of old friends in Taur-en-Gellam, but he still held himself apart, as Maglor suspected he had not done in Doriath of old; he thought it must be a result of his long travels, where he had been mostly alone or among strangers. It wasn't so pronounced with his students, but that was a different kind of relationship, a different kind of closeness. Maglor wasn’t going to tell his brothers any of that, because that was Daeron’s to confess or not, but it was a relief to know they were more worried than angry. “It’s just the past coming back to trip him up, on top of trying to find a way forward with his family. He snapped at me because I was there, not because he was actually angry at me.”

“What was he angry at?” Celegorm asked.

“Himself.” Maglor saw Celegorm wince. Daeron’s attempt at a fight had been not unlike Celegorm’s own, when he’d come to Imloth Ningloron after Curufin had first returned to Tirion with the intention of seeking out their father. That was years and years ago now, and felt even longer, but Celegorm had been trying to do the same thing—to pick a fight he wouldn’t win. Maglor hadn’t fully recognized that at the time, though he wished now that he had.

“And he couldn’t delay his errand for Elemmírë, even a few months?” Curufin asked.

“Not if we want everything ready in time for Ingwë’s feast. I told him not to rush, and he won’t be anywhere letters can easily reach for some time. Meanwhile, I’ve got my song to finish. Do any of you want to read what I’ve got?”

“I don’t think we can read what you’ve got,” said Curufin, making a face.

“I’ve made a fair copy,” Maglor said. “Two, actually. I’m going to send one to Finrod and Galadriel in Alqualondë.”

“Have you heard from Aegnor?” Maedhros asked.

“No. Did you see him?”

“No, I didn't want to intrude. But it seems wrong to leave him out when you’ve spoken to everyone else.”

“It does, and I’ll mention it to Galadriel when I write to her,” said Maglor, “but I’ve told everyone that they don’t have to talk to me if they don’t want to.”

“Has anyone not wanted to?” Celegorm asked.

“No, everyone has been surprisingly willing, even if they don’t really know what to say at first.”

“Even if this song doesn’t do what Míriel wants it to,” Curufin said after a moment, leaning his head on Maglor’s shoulder, “it will be worth it for all of us having gotten to speak of him, and to have this song—even if you never perform it again, it will still be there for others to look at or sing themselves.”

“I’ll perform it twice,” Maglor said after a moment. “I’ll sing before the Valar, and I’ll sing at Ingwë’s feast, and then I will leave it to others to take up as they will.”

The hedgehogs retreated to their basket by the hearth, and Maedhros came to offer his hand and his arm to both Curufin and Maglor. He hauled them both up and kissed the tops of their heads. “Don’t push yourself, Maglor,” he said. “It doesn’t matter if you don’t finish before the feast.”

“It does matter,” Maglor said. “I can’t explain why, but it does.”

“You have another year or so, then,” said Curufin. “But please don’t push yourself into the same state you were in in Tirion last summer.”

“I won’t,” Maglor said. “Going to Formenos really did help. I can’t really explain that either, but it was…it was something, to see the vines climbing over the walls and the moss growing through the cracks in the stone. That life came back even to that place. It was almost like—”

“Like what?” Celegorm asked.

“I went back to Dol Guldur some years after the War of the Ring,” Maglor said after a moment, and was not surprised when all three of his brothers frowned. “Not alone—I was with Celeborn and Elladan and Elrohir, and Thranduil came, and Radagast, and many others. Galadriel had sung the walls down, opening all the pits and the dungeons to the sky, and we sang other songs to encourage green things to grow there again. Even before we came, little bits of life had come back there. Green shoots, and moss, and that sort of thing. It didn’t…I didn’t come away from there any less burdened, obviously, but—I don’t know. I think it might have been worse if I hadn’t gone. If I hadn’t seen the start of its renewal. I left something behind me there, and I think I left something else at Formenos.”

“Do you still get cold, Cáno?” Curufin asked.

“Sometimes,” said Maglor, “but it doesn’t last. I was cold all winter, but that’s because it was a very cold winter. Why?”

“I saw you in the palantír,” Curufin said. “I wanted to check on Calissë—you were bundled up even by a fire, every time I saw you.”

“Like I said, it was a cold winter. There were snowdrifts almost as tall as Maedhros. Calissë will tell you all about it.”

“I’m sure she will.” Curufin smiled, though it didn’t quite reach his eyes. “She had a wonderful time, and I’m glad that you took her with you.”

“So when I tell you that I let her stay up far past her bedtime on Midwinter night, and let her go sledding down a very steep hill—”

That got Curufin to laugh, as Maglor had hoped. “Yes, it’s fine. Or Midwinter was fine; I’m not sure I want to know more about the sledding.”

“Probably not,” said Maglor. “But it wasn’t anything worse than what we all got up to as children.”

“All right, you know that’s not reassuring,” said Curufin as Celegorm laughed. “She came home in one piece, and I’m very happy to remain ignorant of the rest.”

Celegorm and Curufin left, but Maedhros lingered. “Are you really all right?” he asked once they were alone.

“Yes. I’m tired, and I’ll be glad when this song is done and Daeron is back, but I’ll be fine. I’ll be happier too when everyone’s done asking if I really am all right.”

“Noted.” Maedhros kissed the top of his head again, and Maglor leaned against him, realizing all over again just how much he’d missed Maedhros while away in Taur-en-Gellam, even after working things out with Daeron. “If you really want other eyes on it,” Maedhros said, “I’ll look at your song tomorrow.”

“I do, thank you.”

“Elladan and Elrohir laugh like he did. Have you noticed?”

“I have.”

“He would love them.”

“Yes, he would.”

“Whether this moves the Valar or not, I think he would be very proud of you,” Maedhros said softly.

Maglor wasn’t so sure about that. The doubts that had arisen in his mind in Taur-en-Gellam had not abated, even after Daeron’s reassurances, but he had voiced them once and didn’t think he could do it again, even to Maedhros. Hearing the words, though—it was almost the same as hearing his father say that he was proud of him, something he hadn’t realized he needed to hear until the moment he heard it. “Thank you,” he said, because it was also Maedhros’ way of saying that he was proud, and that was no small thing either.

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Amrod and Amras had agreed to take pity on Fëanor, as they hadn’t done on Celegorm when he’d come to stay with them. They obtained a pair of skates and took Fëanor down to the lake as soon as it froze over so he could practice without all their friends there to laugh at him. Fëanor strapped them on cheerfully, clearly not expecting to find any difficulty, and then immediately slipped and fell hard onto his backside once he actually stepped onto the ice.

“Careful!” Amrod called as he glided out over the ice.

“At least your feet didn’t go in opposite directions like Tyelko’s did,” Amras said as he helped Fëanor up. “He pulled a muscle and then was grouchy about it for the next week. Come on, it isn’t hard once you get the hang of it!”

“Nothing’s hard once you get the hang of it,” said Fëanor, watching Amrod and then carefully starting to move his feet in the same way. “Who came up with this?”

“No idea! We learned in Beleriand, but I suppose it’s possible some Vanyar have been skating in the lakes high in the Pelóri for years beyond count and would laugh at all of us for thinking it’s something new. One of these years we’re going to get someone to sing the ponds in Imloth Ningloron to ice thick enough for it so we can teach Calissë and Náriel. Curvo’s going to hate it.”

As in everything else, Fëanor was a quick learner, and by the end of the afternoon was racing both of them across the lake, all of them windblown and red-cheeked from the cold. Amras didn’t care much about winning races, not like Amrod did, but he loved to go as fast as he could and then to just let himself glide, with the wind in his hair and his arms flung out—it felt like flying, and it was even more marvelous when they came back on moonless nights, and all their friends among the Laiquendi were there, with flasks of warm drinks and bonfires on the shore.

It must have been like this at Cuiviénen, he thought as he sat beside Fëanor by one of the fires, listening to someone tell a story while they rested for a while from skating. Bonfires and starlight and no other sounds but their own voices. Fëanor’s arm around his shoulders was warm and solid, and Amras leaned against him, feeling the laughter rumbling through his chest as much as he heard it. Inviting Fëanor to come out into the mountains with them had been almost a whim, a decision made on the spur of the moment, but he was so glad they had asked, and that he had said yes.

The next day it snowed hard enough that even Amrod didn’t want to venture out of the house. They built up the fire and took turns telling stories, and then brought out the palantír to spy on Nerdanel and all their brothers. Curufin was busy with Celebrimbor and many others, with lots of paper spread out over a table full of notes and lists, all of them bright-eyed and excited about whatever they were doing. Amras found Maglor with surprising ease, building a snowman with Calissë and Daeron in a place Amras did not recognize but which must have been Taur-en-Gellam. Maedhros was on Tol Eressëa with his sketchbook and a peaceful expression. Celegorm and Caranthir were at home with Nerdanel, Celegorm covered in stone dust and Caranthir shooing Nallámo out of his bedroom while Nerdanel sketched out something wild and abstract.

“I’m very surprised Curvo let Cáno take Calissë with him,” said Amrod once they set the palantír aside.

“Maybe she hid in one of his saddlebags like Pídhres,” said Amras.

“She would,” Amrod laughed.

“She’s at the same age he was when he started demanding to go traveling with your brothers,” Fëanor said, “but he had a tendency to wander off at the smallest distraction, so we almost never let him. You two were even worse.”

“Because there are two of us,” Amrod said cheerfully. “I bet Calissë’s having a marvelous time, though. Daeron has lots of students her age, I think. And Curvo didn’t look very worried.”

“Of course not,” said Amras. “She’s with Maglor.”

“Have you been looking at the past, Atya?” Amrod asked.

“Some,” Fëanor said, slipping the palantír back into its bag for the moment. “I found myself watching Maglor with Elrond as a child—and his brother. Elros? I have no idea which one is which, in these memories in the stone; it’s odd.”

“Maglor doesn’t talk about Elros much,” Amras said after a few moments, “though he talks fairly often about Arwen and her children, and her husband Elessar—except he calls him Estel.”

“I’ve never really understood how they could do it, Elrond and his brother,” Amrod said softly. “To choose such different fates like that, to choose to be separated.”

“They are halfelven,” Fëanor said after a moment. “Whatever fate they choose, they are set apart, even from one another. I have not met Elwing or Eärendil—or Dior—but I must imagine they are the same.”

“Dior is certainly one of a kind,” said Amras. “He keeps trying to be friends with Tyelko, and Tyelko doesn’t know what to do about it.”

Fëanor frowned. “Friends—but didn’t they—”

“Yes, that’s why Tyelko’s so confused. Nimloth has more reasonable feelings about the whole thing, which sometimes makes visiting Imloth Ningloron a little awkward, but that’s never stopped Elrond from seating Dior and Tyelko beside one another at the dinner table. Or maybe it’s Celebrían.”

“Probably both,” said Amrod. “Have you looked for Maglor at all in Rivendell, Atya?”

“Some,” Fëanor said. “I’ve looked for him more than any of the rest of you.” He glanced away as he said it, even though it was entirely reasonable.

“Well, there’s more of him to look for,” said Amras. “What about—other places?” They’d asked him not to, but that was like asking Pídhres not to climb the nearest tree.

“I’ve looked for that, too.” Now Fëanor’s face had an unhappy set to it, in the downward curve of his mouth and a tight look around his eyes. Amras regretted asking, except that the whole point of Fëanor looking for them all was so they could talk about it all without talking past one another, so they could speak and know they were all talking about the same things. “Though I have a feeling that that isn’t what he wanted me to see, when I was given the palantír.”

“He doesn’t want any of us knowing much about it, same as Maedhros has never wanted to speak of Angband,” said Amrod. Fëanor winced. “You looked for that, too? Atya—”

“If I’m going to learn something, I’m not going to do it halfway.”

“There’s learning and there’s just punishing yourself for no reason,” said Amrod. “And for what it’s worth, I don’t think Angband or even Thangorodrim haunt Maedhros the way Dol Guldur has haunted Maglor.”

“No, it was other things that drove Maedhros to—” Fëanor covered his mouth with a hand, closing his eyes for a moment. “I never thought—I don’t know what I thought, when I swore—but I never wanted—”

“We know, Atya.” Amras moved to sit beside him, leaning against his side. Fëanor wrapped his arm around Amras and kissed the top of his head. “It’s important to us that you understand what happened, but it’s also important that you know that we understand that it was never what you intended.”

“That doesn’t matter,” Fëanor said. “What I intended doesn’t matter in the face of what happened, and what I did, I know that—”

“It matters to us,” said Amrod quietly. “And it matters to Maedhros.”

Because that was what troubled Fëanor most now, Amras thought. He thought that Fëanor could handle Celegorm and Caranthir’s anger and even Maglor’s hesitancy, but Maedhros was still so hurt, and by now Amras was sure that Fëanor had looked into the palantír to refresh his hazy memories of Losgar.

“I’m not sure there’s any fixing things with Maedhros,” Fëanor said after a little while.

“That’s what he and Maglor once thought,” said Amras. “And then they decided that it was too important not to fix, so they found a way.”

“We all found a way,” said Amrod. “That’s why we left for Ekkaia. Honestly, it involved a lot less shouting than I expected it to, even from Celegorm.”

“Celegorm doesn’t yell very much these days,” said Amras. “I mean, not really. He and Caranthir yell at each other a lot but that doesn’t mean anything.”

“What do they yell about that doesn’t mean anything?” Fëanor asked, voice still rough with held-back emotion.

“Same stuff we all used to yell about, living in the same house,” said Amrod. “It’s just bickering, and I think sometimes they exaggerate it just to be annoying to everyone else.”

“It’s hard for Maedhros to brood when he’s rolling his eyes at them,” Amras agreed. “Or threatening to toss them into the fishpond or the river.”

Fëanor rested his cheek against the top of Amras’ head. “Tell me something ridiculous,” he said after a moment. “From here, from Beleriand—just—”

Amrod launched into a story about the time they all found out that Caranthir was actually courting Lisgalen, which they had not bothered to share with anyone any more than they had bothered to share the news that they were engaged. The story turned into a farce in Amrod’s telling, playing up how he and Celegorm had stumbled upon Lisgalen and Caranthir in the orchard beside Nerdanel’s house, and how Huan had charged forward to knock them both to the ground with doggy kisses of his own, and then their collective outrage when they all learned that Curufin and Celebrimbor had known about it the whole time and kept quiet, even though Caranthir hadn’t asked them to.

“Honestly, we’ll be lucky if they have a proper wedding,” Amras said when Amrod was done.

“Bet you anything they won’t,” said Amrod. “Ammë says she wants to follow the proper ceremonies, but I don’t think she really expects it, not from Carnistir.”

“He’s always liked to go his own way,” Fëanor murmured.

“Have you met Lisgalen?” Amras asked. “They’re friends with Tyelpë—that’s how they and Carnistir met.”

“Once,” said Fëanor, “just after you all came back from Lórien, and before they and Rundamírë left to meet you. One brief meeting isn’t much on which to form a judgment, but I liked them, and Tyelpë spoke highly of them afterward. They seemed clever—though perhaps a bit shy.”

“They’re not usually shy,” said Amras. “They keep up with all of us just fine; they’re just a bit quiet. They suit Carnistir very well—I haven’t seen him so happy since before the Dagor Bragollach.”

“In Thargelion, you mean?”

“Yes, he loved it there.”

“It was beautiful,” Fëanor said. “All of it was beautiful, just as all of what you are building and making here, now, is beautiful.”

The winter dragged on. Fëanor took up the palantír a few more times, and spoke to Curufin once or twice, since he’d taken Amras’ suggestion even before Amras had made it and taken one of the other stones home with him so he could check on Calissë every once in a while. There was little enough to do in the winter in the mountains, besides the occasional hunt, and wandering through the woods and the snow. Amras kept expecting to wake up to find his father ready to climb the walls in frustration at the forced idleness, but he never did. Fëanor filled his sketchbook with drawings of the trees and the snowdrifts and ideas for things he would do or make when he returned to Tirion, but if he felt impatient for spring he didn’t ever show it.

He reminded Amras of Maedhros, who also liked things quiet and slow these days—and who was also almost always with his sketchbook, drawing idly during conversations or sketching more seriously when alone. They had several drawings that Maedhros had given them—portraits, mostly, of themselves and all their brothers, of Nerdanel, of Calissë and Náriel and Celebrimbor—as well as flowers and trees, and the hedgehogs curled up in between Huan’s paws as they all slept. Amras went to pull them out of the chest where he and Amrod kept them, and sat down next to Fëanor, where he sat near the window. Spring was slowly encroaching on the mountains, and the world outside was full of the sound of running water everywhere as snow and ice melted and trickled away in tiny rivulets to find the proper streams and rivers, swelling the lakes and ponds and tumbling down the mountainside in great rushes to water the plains and perhaps someday find its way to the Sea. “Have you seen Maedhros’ work?” Amras asked when Fëanor blinked himself out of whatever daydream he’d been lost in as he watched the icicles outside drip steadily into the mud below.

“I had heard he wished to take up painting, but that was before he went to Lórien.”

“He has taken it up, though I don’t have any paintings. I meant his drawings.” Amras handed the stack of them over. Fëanor set his pencil aside and paged through them in silence. “He’s very good, especially at people.”

“Yes, he is,” Fëanor said. “And flowers. When did he take up drawing?”

“I think almost as soon as he came from Mandos,” said Amras, “but only because Ammë made him, so that he had something to be doing, to keep him busy. None of us ever saw his drawings until we went out to Ekkaia. I think he burned them all.”

“Why?”

“Until our trip I don’t think he was drawing what was in front of him. I think it was all nightmares—but that’s just a guess, since I never saw any of them. I don’t think he even showed Findekáno.” Amras fell silent, watching Fëanor look at the pictures. Outside a bluebird flitted past, a bright flash of color against the still-barren wood, all dark browns and dingy whites. “Atya,” he ventured after a little while, knowing Amrod didn’t think it would do any good but not really able to make himself leave it alone.

“Yes?”

“What was it that happened at Losgar—that was troubling you last fall, I mean?”

Fëanor didn’t lift his gaze from the sketch he had just drawn out to set on top of the pile. It was of Aechen under some flowers—delicate Queen’s Lace and thickly-growing bluebells. Amras wasn’t sure if Maedhros had drawn it in Imloth Ningloron or in Caranthir’s garden at home. After a long silence in which Amras started to think about how to apologize, Fëanor said, very quietly, “Maedhros and I met briefly in Tirion, by chance. He asked if I remembered Losgar.”

“Did you?”

“Not well. I remember many things a little clearer now that I have gone back to look for them—truly, I think I should have picked up a palantír years ago—but before then much of it was…hazy. Mostly I just remember the heat, building and building until at the end I just—” He shook his head, and passed a hand over his eyes. “He was right—Maedhros was right about the ships, and about Nolofinwë and Findekáno. I didn’t listen, and then—he did not deserve the things that I said to him afterward. I don’t know what it is in particular that still troubles him so, but maybe it doesn’t matter. I should not have said any of it. I wish I could take it all back.”

“Do you know what you’ll say to him when next you meet?”

Fëanor sighed. “Probably what I just said to you. I just don’t know if that’s what he wants to hear. Or needs to hear. I don’t know any of you anymore, not as I should, and Maedhros—” His voice came dangerously close to breaking, and he shook his head again, sharply; strands of hair fell loose of his braid to brush over his temples.

“You’ve just spent all winter getting to know us,” said Amras, “and you know Curvo just fine.”

“Not the rest of your brothers. You’re all so changed, and—and I’m not sure I ever knew Tyelkormo or Carnistir as well as I thought I did. Looking back…I don’t know what I should have done differently, but there must have been something.”

“You can’t change anything in the past,” Amras said, “but you can do things differently in the present. You are doing things differently.”

“I’m not sure it’s enough.”

“Maybe it isn’t, but you can’t know until you actually speak to them. And…I’m sorry that Amrod and I waited so long. We were never really as angry as the others. I’m not sure I can explain why we kept putting it off.”

“You don’t owe me any explanations. Or apologies.”

“That’s not how this works,” Amras said. “I am sorry that we delayed, even after we decided that we did want to try to make things right. I’m sorry that it’s turned into something that looks like we’ve been punishing you, because that’s not what any of us intended—but you said yourself intentions don’t matter as much as what actually happens. It’s not fair—not to any of us, really—and I’m sorry for it.”

“The world isn’t fair,” Fëanor said. “It never has been.”

“Celegorm said that too once, sitting almost where we are now,” said Amras. “And I told him that that’s why we have to be fair, to ourselves and to one another, if the world won’t be. Maybe if everyone tried harder the world wouldn’t be as unfair as it is. We haven’t been trying as hard as we should have, and I’m sorry for it.”

Fëanor reached out to gently tug on one of his braids, his expression soft and fond in a way Amras didn’t remember ever seeing before. “When did you get to be so wise, Telvo?” he asked softly.

“I don’t know if that’s wisdom,” Amras said. “That’s just the least we can all do, to try to make the world better after all the ways we made it worse.”

“It sounds like something Elrond might say,” said Fëanor, “which I think means it is very wise. I still don’t think you should apologize to me. I knew when I came back from Mandos it was likely none of you would ever wish to see or speak to me again. I was and am willing to endure it.”

“Why come back at all, then?”

“I hoped that I was wrong. And…” Fëanor looked away, back down at the drawings. The next one he drew out was of Míriel, sitting beside Maglor as he played his harp and sang. “I know what it is to be parted forever from a parent,” Fëanor said, tracing his fingers lightly over the folds of Míriel’s skirts. “First my mother, now my father. I cannot ever speak to him again, however much I want to. At least now all of you have a choice in the matter. You can avoid me or you can seek me out as you wish—I am here. I don’t know how to make any of the rest of it right, but I can at least give you back that choice.”

Amras suddenly felt terrible for the way they had all been thinking of Fëanor when he’d first returned—for the apprehension and the fear, all of it needless. That was probably something he really shouldn’t apologize for, because without knowing anything of what their father had really been thinking he wasn’t sure what else they were supposed to feel, but it was still awful, to know that all their father had wanted was to see them.

“Honestly,” Fëanor said after a moment, “I didn’t expect to be released. I asked, and was as surprised as everyone else when the answer was yes.”

“And…you don’t regret it?”

“No. No, not even for a moment. The worst part is missing my own father, but I knew it would be, and he did not want me to linger just for his sake.”

“Did it make that worse, talking to Maglor?”

“No, though I’m not sure it was very helpful to him.”

“He says everything helps,” Amras said. “That’s the whole reason he’s in Taur-en-Gellam now—to talk to Thingol.”

“He’s working very quickly,” Fëanor said, frowning a little as though it had just occurred to him. “I spoke of it to Indis briefly, before we left Tirion—she said there is no particular occasion for which she and my mother want the song. No reason for him to work so hard so fast.”

“I think he wants to sing it at Ingwë’s feast, whenever that will be,” said Amras. “In the next year or two maybe.”

“It isn't as though it is necessary, though. No one will object if he does not have it done by then. In the past he used to work for years on songs much smaller in scope than this one.”

Amras shrugged. “I don’t know. He seems to feel that it’s very important, this song—I mean, obviously it’s important, but he won’t give any particular reason. Daeron or Elrond probably know more, but they aren’t sharing either. Maybe it’s just one of those things where he can’t put it down because if he does it will be too hard to pick up again.”

“Maybe.”

“Neither Daeron nor Elrond will let him push himself too hard, you know.” Amras didn’t want to tell Fëanor about the small but troubling habits Maglor had been falling back into in Tirion. He’d mostly stopped after visiting Formenos, but it was true that this songwriting weighed on him more than it should. Fëanor, though, was already worried enough. “Maybe it’s just that this is the first song someone has asked him to write in a very long time. And it was Grandmother Míriel who asked, as well as Indis.”

“Maybe,” Fëanor said again, still frowning. He looked as though he were trying to work out a puzzle with some pieces that wouldn’t quite fit together and others that were missing. The only way to solve it, though, would be to ask Maglor, and that wouldn’t be possible until they all made their way back to either Tirion or Imloth Ningloron.

Amras rose; there would be time later to worry about Maglor, and about Maedhros, later when they were all more or less in the same place. “We’re running low on firewood. Want to come with me to gather more?”

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The day after his brothers’ arrival, Maglor spent the morning in the library. It was cozier in many ways than the library in Taur-en-Gellam, with fewer secluded nooks and corners—though there were some, for those who liked to tuck themselves away to read—and with many more windows, all looking out over gardens and meadows and streams. It was familiar and comforting, very like the library in Rivendell. He wrote to Galadriel (with greetings to his second-favorite cousin Finrod), and enclosed a copy of his song.

Afterward, he took the other clean copy he had made and went to find Maedhros, who was outside on the veranda with Calissë and Náriel and the hedgehogs. “Uncle Cáno!” Náriel threw herself onto Maglor’s lap as he sat down beside Maedhros. “Are you really going to take Calissë all the way to Ekkaia next? I want to come too!”

“Calissë is telling tales,” Maglor said.

“You said,” Calissë began hotly.

“I said you would have to wait a few years, and that you have to wait for your parents’ permission,” Maglor said. “Besides, I’ve had enough of travel for the time being, and I won’t be budging from this valley until you’re both of age at least. Maybe not even for a hundred years.”

“Oh that’s not fair!” Calissë protested. “You’ve got to come to Tirion sometimes!”

“Why should I, when you can all come visit me instead?”

“But you’ve got to come see the new baby!” Náriel said.

“All right,” Maglor allowed, “maybe I’ll make an exception for the new baby.”

“And the feast next year,” Maedhros said.

“Ugh, fine, and the feast. But that’s it!”

Maedhros went on, “And there’s—”

“No!” Maglor interrupted, as the girls giggled. “More than two exceptions and they stop being exceptions!”

Rundamírë came to call the girls in to wash up for lunch, and once they were alone Maglor handed Maedhros the song. “Here. You can scribble in the margins all you like; I’ll be marking it up myself later.”

“All right. You’re not really going to refuse to leave here are you?”

“No, I was teasing. But I am going to be very happy not to have to go anywhere for a while. Daeron wants to sleep for a hundred years after the feast, and that sounds like a very good idea to me.”

Maedhros glanced at him, smile fading. “I thought you said you were all right,” he said.

“I am. I’m not unhappy or haunted or anything else you’re worried about. I’m just tired.”

“I don’t think they should have asked this song of you so soon after we came back from Lórien,” Maedhros said after a moment. “You’ve been doing too much too fast. Ever since you came west, really—going all the way to Ekkaia, and then…”

“We spent decades in Lórien, remember?”

“And at least two thirds of that was not restful at all,” Maedhros said. He hooked his arm around Maglor’s shoulders and pulled him over. “Please take care, Cáno.”

“I’ve done all the hardest parts, aside from actually singing the song,” said Maglor. He rested his head on Maedhros’ shoulder, and watched the hedgehogs dart by through the grass all in a line. “I’m going to set the song aside until you and Galadriel and Finrod have had a chance to look at this draft. Then I’ll start rewriting it. It’s the words that will give me trouble—the music itself is exactly what I want it to be.”

Erestor came out then. “Maglor, I just remembered—a chest came for you from Tirion last summer when you were away. I put it aside at the time; do you want it taken to your room?”

“A chest from Tirion?” Maglor repeated. “From who?”

“I think it came from your father,” Erestor said. “That’s why I did not put it in your room straight away.”

“Oh. No, it’s all right, it can go to my room. Thank you, Erestor.”

“What’s Atar sending you?” Maedhros asked.

“I don’t know. Something from the old house, maybe?”

“All of that went to Curvo and then to me.”

Maglor shrugged. “Just a guess. I have no idea what else it could be.”

After lunch, Maglor went upstairs. Maedhros followed, and so did Calissë and Náriel when they heard Maglor utter the words “mystery chest.” Erestor had placed it near the foot of the bed. It was plain and sturdy, clearly old, with small signs for preservation and protection carved all around it. “What’s in it?” Calissë asked, climbing onto the bed to peer down at it. Náriel scrambled up after her.

“I don’t know,” Maglor said. “That’s why it’s a mystery.” There was a bit of paper sticking out of the lid, and he tugged it free to find a folded up note. It was in Fëanor’s writing.

Cáno, Ambarussa and I found this not long after you and I spoke; usually I give such boxes to Curvo for you all to sort through in your own time, but I think there is no doubt that you will want to keep these. And—this is not for your song, but just for you: my father told me many times that he treasured the time spent with you in his workshop, teaching you and working alongside you. He loved you so much, I hope you remember that.

He folded the note back up and slipped it into his pocket before opening the chest. The contents were shocking but not wholly surprising. Maglor pressed a hand over his mouth at the sight of them, dozens of wooden horses, carefully and cleverly carved, of sizes ranging from no larger than his thumb to almost as large as Pídhres, in all different shades of brown, from cherry to white oak to mahogany to ebony. Once they had sat on a long shelf in his bedroom, all in a row. He reached for one of them with his other hand, and turned it over to see on its belly the very simple and stylized etching of the Two Trees, branches entwined, that had been Finwë’s personal mark.

“Did you make these, Uncle Cáno?” Náriel asked. “They look like the one you made last summer!” She pointed to the horse Maglor had carved the summer before where it sat on his desk, one leg lifted as though it might start prancing across the scattering of papers there.

“I didn’t,” Maglor said when he could make his tongue work. His voice sounded odd even to his own ears. “My grandfather made them.”

“Grandfather Mahtan?”

“No. Finwë.” Maglor set the horse back down carefully, and glanced at Maedhros, who also stared at the horses in astonishment, his eyes bright with sudden unshed tears. Maglor carefully closed the chest as Calissë slid off of the bed to come wrap her arms around his neck, clearly remembering what he had told her of Finwë. Maglor kissed the top of her head, and then she went to hug Maedhros, who scooped her up and kissed her all over her face until they were both laughing instead.

“Who’s Finwë?” Náriel asked.

“Grandfather Fëanáro’s father,” said Calissë. “Uncle Cáno told me all about him, but you weren’t there.”

“That’s not fair! I wanna hear about Grandfather Finwë!”

“I can tell you all about him right now,” said Maglor as he rose and picked her up off the bed, swallowing down the lump in his throat. “I have lots of stories no one has heard yet, that I learned in Taur-en-Gellam.”

He left the chest of horses where it was, and led the way back downstairs. Fëanor had been right—Maglor was very happy to have those horses back, and he would decide what exactly he wanted to do with them later, after he could sit and cry over them for a while. He had been full of thoughts of Finwë, and memories, and fragile hopes, but having again things that Finwë had made with his own hands felt so very different somehow.

Downstairs they found that Caranthir had just arrived. “I’m glad you’re back,” he said to Maglor, embracing him tightly. “I needed an excuse to get out of Tirion.”

“What’s happening in Tirion?”

“It’s just very busy with preparations for the upcoming feast,” said Curufin as he lifted Náriel onto his hip. “I’m surprised they all let Tyelpë escape.”

“That’s because I didn’t tell anyone I was leaving,” Celebrimbor laughed. “I just left a note. The rest of you are lucky—you don’t have to do anything except attend the feast.”