A Hundred Miles Through the Desert by StarSpray  

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Thirty Three

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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.”