From That Rubble by StarSpray  

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Seventeen

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Begin again
Dynamite the dam on the flow
Your body feels the tock tock tock of time as it hammers
Lord, we are all cinders
From a fire burning long ago
But here it is the knock knock knock of your own heart that matters

If you are afraid, come forth
If you are alone, come forth now
Everybody here has loved and lost
So level up, and love again
- “Level Up” - Vienna Teng 

 

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Before dinner, Curufin came into Fëanor’s room without knocking. “You went up onto the roof?”

“Good evening to you too, Curvo.”

“You hate heights!”

He’d known this was coming, but it would have been nice if it had come the next day sometime—he was still tired, and unsure if he even wanted to go downstairs for the evening meal. “I don’t like heights,” he agreed, “but I love your brother—and that’s where he was.” He finally finished picking bits of grass out of his hair—Huan had been very enthusiastic at play that afternoon—and picked up his comb. “Is he all right?”

“Not really, but not because you said anything wrong. But why seek him out?”

Fëanor winced as his comb hit a snarl he hadn’t known was there. As he teased out the knots he said, “It just—it feels like the time for staying away is past, and keeping my distance is where I went wrong in the first place. At least with Tyelko. At least he didn’t try to throw any punches this time.”

“You didn’t offer to let him, did you? I wish you’d stop doing that.”

“If it makes you feel better, I’m glad he declined.”

“Atya.” Curufin crossed his arms and leaned back against the door, the very picture of exasperation.

Fëanor had been as sure as he was about anything these days that going to speak to Celegorm—trying to meet him where he was—had been the right choice. The look on Curufin’s face made him doubt. “Should I not have spoken to him?” he asked. 

“He was surprised by it, but you’ve given him some things to think about. I don’t mean to suggest you shouldn’t have gone up there. We were all just surprised, that’s all.”

“You all?”

“Well, Caranthir and me—and probably Maglor as well, since that’s where Celegorm went first.” Curufin hesitated, and then said, “Don’t try to seek out Caranthir, Atya. He told us earlier that he doesn’t want you to.”

“I won’t, Curvo. It just seemed to me that it would be better to try to talk to Tyelko after what happened. If I thought I’d be able to find him anywhere else, I wouldn’t have climbed up onto the roof.” But he was glad he had—it hadn’t been as bad as he’d first thought, and Celegorm was more important than his own small and irrational fears. “I haven’t seen Moryo—I can’t guess at what he needs from me, and so all I can do is wait.”

“That is what he needs. He needs to be the one to come to you, I think—but I’m half-guessing too, because he still doesn’t like to talk about anything to anyone except maybe to Lisgalen.” Curufin paused. “That’s another thing he’s worried about. Because you and Daeron…”

“I am not going to make the same mistake twice—and Lisgalen is very different from Daeron. I met them once, and I liked them—and Tyelpë speaks very highly of them.”

“I know that, and I think he does too—but, well. Worry isn’t always rational.”

“No, it isn’t.” Fëanor set the comb aside and braided his hair back out of his face before getting up. “So if there’s anything more I can do to assuage those worries, please tell me.”

“I will. And—you’re all right?”

“Yes, Curvo. I’m fine.” Fëanor kissed his forehead, and followed him downstairs to dinner.

Fëanor spent most of the next day in his room again, not wanting to venture out and run into Celegorm or Caranthir by chance when neither of them were ready for it—and wanting to avoid Gandalf, who was always ready to meddle in other people’s affairs. Fingolfin had written again, a little alarmed by Fingon’s sudden departure from Tirion after receiving a note from Elrond, and suspicious of Fëanor’s own silence on the subject of his sons. Fëanor spent most of the afternoon trying to think of something to say that would not alarm Fingolfin further or betray something Maedhros was not ready to share with someone beyond his cousins. 

In the end he gave up, and when the rest of the household gathered after dinner for music, Fëanor retreated to the library. He wanted quiet. A book of amusing tales out of the Shire caught his eye, and he took it to a far corner by a window, out of which he could see the cloudless night sky, glittering with stars. They reflected on the pond, shifting and glittering as the water moved and rippled. When he pushed the window open a little the breeze flowed in, cool and carrying the scent of flowers and the sound of music. Elrond was singing, and after a verse Maglor joined him. Fëanor had never heard them make music together before, and he sat for a while with the book closed on his lap, just listening. 

Others took up songs afterward, and Fëanor turned his attention to the book. Flipping through he found one or two familiar stories—Bilbo Baggins’ encounter with a trio of trolls was one—and many that he had never heard of. They were fantastical and often ridiculous: stories for laughter, to tell to children or to share among friends by the fireside. There was one tale of two siblings who had had an adventure very similar to the one Maglor claimed to have had, encountering a strange enchantress in the far north and escaping with the help of a few clever animals. The hobbits were more sensible than Maglor had portrayed himself—his rescue was down to luck, while theirs was, as the writer said, down to “good hobbit sense.” Fëanor wondered whether that meant something—that Maglor had changed the story in such a way—or if he had only been looking to make his nieces laugh. 

His thoughts drifted back to his other sons. When he looked out of the window again he saw a figure moving along a path by the pond; it looked like Caranthir. As Fëanor watched, the twins caught up with him, one throwing an arm over his shoulders, and they walked on together; after a moment the breeze carried their voices, laughing, up to the window. 

Paws on his leg startled him, and Fëanor looked down to see Maglor’s little grey cat peering back. She meowed. A moment later Maglor appeared, scooping her up and sitting in her place to rest his head on Fëanor’s lap. “Cáno?” Fëanor rested his hand on Maglor’s hair without thinking. “Is something wrong?”

“No,” Maglor sighed. His face was turned away, but he sounded tired. “I just miss you.” And before Fëanor could swallow past the sudden lump in his throat to reply he asked, “What are you reading?”

Fëanor turned the pages back to read out the title. “A collection of tales from the Shire, as recorded by Thain Peregrin Took.”

“Have you gotten to the one about the enchantress yet?”

“Yes, I have. Is that where your tale came from, or is it the other way around?”

Maglor laughed a little. “Oh, that story was generations old before I ever met Pippin. It was just the first one I thought of when the girls asked why my hair looks different, since they didn’t believe Amras when he said I didn’t eat my vegetables.” Of course Amras would say something like that. Maglor turned so he was sitting with his back against the bench, still leaning his head on Fëanor’s leg but now able to look into his face. He looked tired, too, as though he hadn’t slept well. The unnaturally white streaks in his hair—the result of terrible pain and distress, rather than anything so simple as not eating his vegetables or almost getting turned into ice—stood out starkly against the darker strands in the soft lamplight. His cat nestled in his arms, purring contentedly as he scratched her behind the ears. The marks on his body were all old now, and his eyes were clear of shadows, the soft grey-green that he shared with Míriel shining gently with ancient Treelight. “I’m almost done with the second full draft of the song,” he said, with a touch of nervousness in his voice. “Do you want to read it?”

It had been so long since Fëanor had gotten a look at one of Maglor’s songs in progress—not since those long-ago golden afternoons when Maglor had been new to the art and not yet a master of language and rhythm. This would not be like that at all, but it felt like an even more precious gift. “I’d love to,” Fëanor said, and was rewarded with a smile—a real one, not one of the hesitant and polite ones that Maglor had been giving him. Fëanor wanted to keep seeing that smile, so he said, “I’ve heard a great deal about the Ringbearers, but very little of Peregrin Took. Did you know him well?”

The smile stayed, and Maglor laughed. “I did know Pippin—not as well as I knew Bilbo, but better than I was able to know Frodo. He never went by Peregrin, except when he wanted to remind everyone he was Thain.” He went on then to explain what Thain meant, and more about the Shire than Fëanor had yet learned.

Pippin was, of course, long dead—he and Merry as well as Frodo and Sam and Bilbo—but Maglor spoke of them all with that same soft smile, and though the grief was there it was as gentle a thing as the memory garden under the mallorn tree. It wasn’t anything like the pain showing itself through anger that Fëanor had seen in him when they’d first met again after both returning to Valinor; it wasn’t like the fearful sorrow that Fëanor had seen in Tirion, when Maglor had just confronted the emptiness of Finwë’s wood shop, and was still trying to find a way to carry the burden of this songwriting. Maglor had known the hobbits and he had opened his heart, even knowing the loss that was coming, and as far as Fëanor could see, as Maglor described the day Pippin’s son had met his namesake, Faramir of Gondor, he did not regret a moment of it.

They stayed up talking of Middle-earth as Maglor had known it after the War of the Ring, and when they finally parted to go to bed Maglor said, “It will be a few days before I can make a clean copy for you.”

“Take your time, Cáno. I’m not going anywhere.” Fëanor hesitated, and then said, “I thought your intention was to keep avoiding me until it was done.”

Maglor shrugged. “It was, but—I have all my thoughts out onto paper now, even if they don’t have the right shape yet. And—well. I miss you. I’ve always missed you, even when I was angry.” He ducked his head, hair falling forward. Pídhres was asleep in his arms. “I tried to write songs for you, after you died. I tried for all of you—I just never could. Not for you or my brothers or Fingon, or—anyone. This song I’m writing now feels like it’s not just for Grandfather, but for everyone. I think that’s why it was so hard in the beginning, and why it feels like such a relief now, even if it’s not finished yet.”

“Sometimes there just isn’t a way to express a feeling,” Fëanor said, “whatever you do or whichever medium you try.”

“I think it was because I was trying to find the words by myself,” said Maglor, “when—well, in the end my grief was my own, alone, to bear or not, but it isn’t anymore. It isn’t only my own words that I have now—I’m building with the materials I’ve been given by everyone, and that has made a great difference. Maybe you’ll see when you read it, I don’t know.”

“Take your time,” Fëanor said again. “I want to read it, but I can wait.”

“I do want to know your thoughts—your honest ones,” said Maglor. “So—please scribble all over the margins if you want.”

“I will.”

Maglor looked up again, his smile small but genuine. “Thank you, Atya. Good night.”

“Good night, Cáno.”

The next morning, Fëanor went back out to the wood shop to finish carving the box for Náriel. He spotted a few sketches on the workbench Maglor had used to make his shelves; they looked like plans for a cradle, and he recognized both Maglor and Curufin’s writing on them. Curiosity got the better of him, and he leaned over to look more closely just as Curufin himself came into the workshop. “Did something happen to the cradle you already have, Curvo?” He hoped not—Finwë had made it long ago when Celebrimbor had been born, as he had made cradles for all of his children and grandchildren. 

“No.” Curufin grinned at him, looking like he had a secret ready to be shared. “It’s just that it isn’t big enough.”

Fëanor blinked at him. “How big are you expecting this new baby to be?”

“Quite small, actually.” Curufin laughed at whatever Fëanor’s face was doing. “We’ve only told Cáno so far—and Elrond and Celebrían—but we aren’t just expecting one baby.”

“Twins?” Fëanor exclaimed. 

“Not two, either—three.”

“Three—three babies? At once? Is that even—” Of course it was possible—Curufin wouldn’t be telling him about it if it wasn’t—but it was very nearly unbelievable. 

“It’s not unheard of among Men—or hobbits,” Curufin said, a little ruefully. “But I’ve never heard of it happening among the Elves. But that’s why we wanted to speak to Elrond and Celebrían first, before telling anyone else. We told Cáno first afterward because we wanted him to make the new cradle.”

Fëanor pulled Curufin into his arms and kissed the top of his head. “That’s amazing, Curvo. And Rundamírë is alright?”

“Oh yes. She’s excited—we’re both excited—and she’s eager to be at home again to tell her own family, only we’ve promised to stay until the kittens are born.”

“Calissë is very excited about the kittens,” said Fëanor.

“She and Náriel are already fighting over names.” Curufin drew back. “We’re going to tell them about the triplets this afternoon, though, so they might forget all about cats for a while.”

“Do you need anything from me?”

“Not at the moment—and you’re going to be much in demand when we return to Tirion, you know.”

“Whatever sparkling baubles Ingwë wants for this feast of his are not nearly as important as the sparkling baubles you’ll need for the nursery,” Fëanor said. Curufin laughed. 

Once Curufin left, Fëanor got to work on the box, and finished carving out the design on the lid that morning. He packed it away to finish back in Tirion, where he could more easily find the velvet he wanted to use for the inner lining. 

The next day Maglor gave him a thick stack of paper after breakfast, and did not wait even for Fëanor’s thanks before all-but fleeing. “Why is he so nervous?” Fëanor asked Celebrían, who happened to be nearby. 

She arched an eyebrow, looking very like her grandmother Eärwen for a moment—she even had pearls wound through her hair, though she’d chosen freshwater pearls instead, which were never worn in Alqualondë. “You mean, why is he nervous about what you might think of this song that he has been working on for months, that is perhaps the closest song to his heart that he has ever written, about one of the most important people in either of your lives?”

“Well, when you put it like that,” Fëanor said, and Celebrían smiled at him. “But there’s more to it than that, isn’t there? He’s been working so fast—”

“He wants to have it done before the feast next summer, and he wants to have a bit of breathing room in between the finishing and the singing. But do take your time in reading it. He took a break from writing while all his brothers read the first draft, and I think it did him a great deal of good.”

“Until I arrived and undid it all, you mean.”

“That was not your fault,” Celebrían said. “No, don’t look at me like that! You think I don’t know what I’m talking about, just because I did not live through the First Age? Maybe I do not know Morgoth, but I know Sauron’s work very well, and that’s just a different verse of the same song. I grew up in Eregion, you know, and I passed through it afterward, every time I went from Rivendell to Lórien and back. If he could not have used what you said at Losgar to plant something terrible in Maedhros’ mind, he would have used something else.”

“Maybe,” said Fëanor. 

“Certainly,” Celebrían said firmly. “Now go read the song—and be kind, whatever you think of it. I really did mean it when I said this is very near to Maglor’s heart—hearts are such fragile things, and his is already bruised.”

“I know,” Fëanor said. “Has anyone heard from Maedhros lately?”

“A few letters came today. None to me or Elrond, and Maglor has not yet shared what he received, which I take as a good sign. If he were truly worried he would have spoken to Elrond.”

Fëanor took the song up to his room, but did not pick it up again until that night. As he settled in with the pages, he heard his door open and small footsteps patter quietly across the rugs. A moment later Náriel climbed onto the bed. “What’s wrong, my love?” Fëanor asked.

“Can’t sleep, and Ammë and Atya are downstairs still.”

Fëanor lifted the blankets, and Náriel tucked herself against him with a soft and sleepy sigh. “Why can’t you sleep?” he asked.

“Dunno. What are you reading?”

“The song your Uncle Cáno is writing.”

“Is he finished?”

“No, this is only a draft—but it’s already very, very good.”

“Atya said once that he’s the very very best—and then Daeron threw a dinner roll at him.”

Fëanor laughed quietly. “Well, I think Cáno is the best, but Daeron is also very good. Also, you shouldn’t throw food at the dinner table.”

“I know that! It was Daeron that threw it!”

Náriel settled down after that, asking a few more increasingly sleepy questions. Fëanor answered them, and after she fell asleep he read a few more pages of the song before carefully setting it aside and picking her up to take back to her own bed, lest Curufin or Rundamírë discover her missing in the morning and panic unnecessarily. 

He took his time reading the song—he couldn’t read it all at once: it was simultaneously wonderful and painful and those feelings combined very quickly into something overwhelming—and then went through it again to make the notes that Maglor wanted. Though it had been a long time, it did not seem as though Maglor’s process had changed much, and at least when it came to language and the way it sounded, Fëanor felt on firm ground.

A few days after Maglor had given him the draft, Fëanor went walking through the gardens, and as he passed by the stable on the way back to the house he saw Celegorm and Maglor beside a horse, with Huan waiting nearby. 

“…not supposed to worry when you won’t tell me—” Maglor was saying, but he broke off when Celegorm’s gaze slid past him to land on Fëanor. Their eyes met as Maglor turned also, but Celegorm looked away first, and Fëanor couldn’t guess at what he was thinking. He said something to Maglor, and then sprang into the saddle, taking off at a canter without looking back. Huan licked up the side of Maglor’s face before bounding away after him. 

Fëanor joined Maglor as he rubbed his face on his sleeve. “I don’t suppose you know where he’s going,” Maglor said, sounding as though he didn’t really expect an answer and just wanted to voice his annoyance. 

“No,” Fëanor said. “But he seemed in high spirits.” He was certainly in a better mood than Maedhros had been when he had left. On its face the scene had not been so different from other times, long ago, that Celegorm had ridden away—to hunt or to roam, just for the joy of it. The difference now was that Maglor’s gaze lingered on the road, because whatever explanation Celegorm had given him was not satisfactory. 

“I suppose,” he sighed, and then turned to Fëanor. “Pídhres just had her kittens. Want to see them?”

Fëanor had only seen Maglor’s bedroom in Imloth Ningloron once, years before. It was much the same now, though more lived-in—and now obviously not Maglor’s alone, but Daeron’s as well. The paneled walls and the floor were pale wood, not mallorn but similar enough that the new-made shelves above the desk, full of the wooden horses that Finwë had carved long ago, matched them well. Rugs and hangings adorned the space in various shades of blue, and the bookcase was full of both books and small knickknacks. The large harp made of driftwood sat by the window, and near the hearth was a basket where Pídhres curled up with a pair of tiny kittens in a nest of soft blankets. Fëanor watched Maglor crouch beside the basket, smiling down at his cat and then at Calissë and Náriel as they debated which kitten they wished to take home with them. Even when it threatened to turn into an argument, Maglor seemed entirely relaxed and far more cheerful than he had been in Fëanor’s presence since—well. Since they’d both come back to Valinor. 

When it became clear that no decision was to be made just then, they took the girls downstairs to tell Curufin and Rundamírë the news about the kittens. As they all sat down Maglor asked, deceptively casual, “By the way, do you know where Tyelko’s gone?”

“No idea,” Curufin said, just a hair too quickly to be truthful. “Don’t worry about it. He’ll be back soon, I’m sure.”

“Yes, he said that, but—”

There was no getting anything out of Curufin or Rundamírë when they decided to join forces, and Fëanor watched Maglor realize it and concede defeat. Later, Fëanor caught Curufin alone and asked him, “Is Tyelko all right?”

“Yes,” Curufin said. “He didn’t leave because of you—he’s got an errand he wants to complete before summer is over, that’s all.”

“And you’re sure my presence here had nothing to do with it?”

Curufin shrugged. “Well, maybe a little—but Tyelko just needs time and space to put his thoughts in order. The errand itself is something separate, and I think when he returns to Tirion you’ll find him willing to speak to you again.”

“Did he say that?”

“No, and he would probably deny it—but I’m still the one who knows him best, and I think I’m right about this. He’s fine, and he’ll continue to be fine. It’s Cáno and Nelyo we’re all worrying about.”

“Cáno seems fine,” Fëanor said, frowning.

“He’s been having nightmares,” Curufin said, “since Nelyo left. Don’t say anything to him about it, though. He’s already annoyed with the rest of us for worrying at him.”

“I won’t.”

“Did he really give you the latest draft of the song to read?”

“He did.”

“Good. I’m glad. What do you think?”

“I think it’s incredible—but of course it’s incredible. He has long been the best songwriter among the Noldor.”

Curufin’s smile was a little rueful. “I hope you’ll tell him so,” he said. “I think he needs to hear it from someone who isn’t one of us or Elrond—he knows he’s good, but I don’t think he always believes it, these days.”

They stayed in Imloth Ningloron only a week longer. Rundamírë wanted to be at home—she was eager to share the news of the triplets with her own family, and Fëanor knew Curufin was equally eager to tell Nerdanel of it. Fëanor went through the song once more, and then took it to Maglor the evening before they left, finding him in the library. If he had taken a break from his work while his brothers read the earlier draft, he had apparently not taken one this time.

“What did you think?” he asked as he accepted the papers. His fingers were ink stained, and he had a smudge of it on his forehead where he’d pushed his hair back out of his eyes. It reminded Fëanor of Nerdanel, always getting clay or dust everywhere. 

“It’s wonderful, Cáno. I knew it would be.” Fëanor kissed the top of his head, as Maglor dropped his gaze. “You know that you’re good at this,” he added. “Why are you so worried?”

For a moment Maglor didn’t answer. Fëanor was half afraid he wouldn’t, that he shouldn’t have asked—that it was too prying. Whatever they were rebuilding between them felt fragile, still, like the early days after he had reunited with Curufin in Tirion. Fëanor thought he had already made the worst missteps, but he was so tired of this uncertainty, of never quite knowing whether what he said or did would cause harm or not. 

Finally, Maglor said, without looking up, “It’s important. And it isn’t writing the song, really. It’s just—singing it, after it’s done. I don’t—I can’t—” He raised a hand to his mouth, like he wanted to keep the rest of the words in. 

Like he did not want to risk admitting weakness in front of his father.

Fëanor sat down. This was important—as important as speaking to Celegorm on the rooftop. “Does it frighten you?” he asked. “Elrond told me it did—years ago—but you’ve been performing for everyone here for weeks.” Just the night before he had engaged in an absurd contest of tongue-twisters with Lindir, and had won only because Lindir had been laughing too hard to continue by the end of it. Nearly everyone in the household had been present; Fëanor couldn’t remember when he’d last heard so much laughter in one place.

“It’s different here,” Maglor said. He lowered his hand but did not lift his gaze. “I know everyone, and they know me. It doesn’t feel like I’m performing, not like when I get up on a stage. No one is watching me.”

He does not like to be seen, Elrond had said, all those years ago. Fëanor had not known of the Eye, then. Now he did, and he thought he understood in part. He placed his hand over Maglor’s on the table. “Will you tell me why? I’ve heard of it from Elrond, and I have looked into the palantír, but I would also hear it from you if you are willing to tell me.”

Maglor didn’t answer right away. He kept his gaze on their hands, his expression very unhappy—a little like he had looked in the cherry grove when he’d tried to apologize for his words at their first meeting. Very unlike how he had been when speaking to Fëanor over the last week. Finally he said, very quietly, very distressed, “When I said I wanted you to look into the palantír, I didn’t mean that.”

“You had to know that I would.” 

“I thought Curvo would tell you not to.”

“He did. So did Ambarussa. I looked anyway.” The whole point was so he could come to know what had shaped his sons, how and why they were who they were now—to not look for the darkest parts of their history might have spared their feelings and his, but he did not think it would have helped. The point was to make conversations like this one possible. “I could not save you from the road I doomed you to walk, and so the least that I can do now is bear witness.” Maglor winced, very slightly. “You wanted my understanding. Please, help me understand.”

Again, Maglor did not answer immediately. It was very quiet in the library, which was empty but for the two of them. The only light came from the softly glowing lamp that Maglor had set on the table. After a few moments he turned his hand to grip Fëanor’s. It was his right hand, and for the first time Fëanor could feel the raised tissue of the scars there. If they pained him at all, Maglor gave no sign. When he spoke it was in a tremulous whisper. “It was my voice in his service that—that the Necromancer wanted. He would not let his servants injure my hands or my tongue.”

Fëanor had seen that—had wondered at it, a little—but had not been able to guess the reason. Hearing it now sent a chill down his spine. 

“I wasn’t going to—for a long time I told myself I wouldn’t let him break me, but I wasn’t strong enough, and…” Maglor hesitated, lips twisting unhappily before he admitted, “without even meaning to, I forgot everything I knew about music, in the dark after he—” He gestured with his free hand at his mouth, at the small scars there that were easy to forget about unless one looked closely. “And then—then the White Council came, but—he just slipped away, and it was only a handful of years before he declared himself openly again in Mordor. I used to dream of the Eye. He wasn’t always looking for me, but I knew that he wanted to find me again. That he would, when he came to his full power.”

He never had come to his full power—he had been utterly destroyed in the end—but Fëanor heard the hopelessness in Maglor’s voice even now. “You did not think the West would have the victory?” he asked softly.

Maglor shook his head. “No,” he said simply, “I didn’t. I was too afraid, and I’ve never been able to hold onto the kind of hope that Elrond can. I don’t…I don’t know how to explain what it feels like, to be under the Eye. All I wanted to do was hide, for such a long time. I don’t much, anymore. I’m not always afraid—I performed for Thingol’s court all winter, both alone and with others, and it got easier every time—but I can’t enjoy it like I once did. And…at the feast next year, all of the Eldar in Aman will be there. It will be the largest audience I’ve ever sung before. I can do it, and I know that I won’t regret it afterward, but I also know it will be hard.” 

Once, Maglor had thrived on the stage. Fëanor remembered those early days when he had been nervous, especially the first time he had gotten up to sing before the court in Tirion—but that nervousness had melted away very quickly, and he had blossomed in front of his audience like a flower under the light of Laurelin. That joy had been stolen from him, maybe forever—another scar to add to all the others, and maybe one of the worst. Fëanor tried to imagine Maglor unable to make music at all, and couldn’t. It was like trying to imagine him without half of himself. It was horrible—and that imagining was nothing compared to what it must have felt like for him, voiceless and unable to even play the harp, in those weeks and months following his rescue.

“How did you come to that place to begin with?” Fëanor asked, thinking of Maglor making his way up the Anduin. “Or rather—I know how, but what made you strike north?”

“Oh, that.” Maglor looked up then, finally meeting Fëanor’s gaze—and smiled. “I wanted to see if I could find the source of the Anduin—there was no real reason except curiosity, and it’s not like I had anything else to do. I’d heard of the Necromancer, but only vague rumors, and I didn’t think his reach would extend all the way to the river. And I did go back and finish that journey later. I followed it all the way from its mouth in Gondor to its headwaters in the Grey Mountains—to a lake filled with snow melt. It was beautiful. I saw many beautiful things and places—it wasn’t all misery, whatever the stories say.”

He said that often, if his brothers were to be believed—because to speak of his life in Middle-earth was often to speak of the years spent alone, and no one ever believed him when he said he was not always unhappy. 

“But it was lonely,” Fëanor said, because not unhappy was not the same as happy, even if the delight Maglor had found in that mountain lake was bright and clear now. That had come after the lonely years.

“Yes, it was. But for most of that time I didn’t really mind it. Lonely places are often the most beautiful. Like—like that window that you made for me. I haven’t thanked you yet…”

Fëanor hadn’t forgotten the window—but he hadn’t known how to ask about it, in case Maglor had not liked it and wanted to spare his feelings. Now he could ask, “Do you like it?”

Maglor’s smile grew a little. “I love it,” he said. “That stretch of shore was, for a very long time, where I felt the most at home, and I still miss it. Everyone hates it when I say things like that, but it’s true.”

No, they hated to think of him being so utterly alone—with nothing but the wind and waves to hear him singing, with no one but the crabs and seagulls to talk to. They hated that he had felt for so long that he had to remain so—that he did not dare seek out even Elrond. “What everyone hates, I think,” Fëanor said aloud, “is the reminder that you had no real home to return to during those wanderings. Not like you had here, when you were young and prone to striking off alone.” 

“I’m home now,” Maglor said softly. “And—aside from everything that’s happened lately, I’m very happy.”

Everything that’s happened lately encompassed quite a lot. Maglor had just said that he missed the shores of Middle-earth—and Daeron had said so too. Daeron had also said with great confidence that Maglor did not regret taking ship, but Fëanor still asked, “Are you really? You don’t regret coming west?”

Maglor’s answer came swiftly and firmly. “No. I might not have come if I hadn’t promised Elrond—but now that I’m here, I don’t regret it at all. I’ll always miss Middle-earth, but I don’t want to stop missing it either. It’s still a part of who I am, and I don’t regret going there or staying as long as I did. I was happy—I hope you looked for that, too. In Rivendell, and in Minas Tirith, and in Annúminas when it was rebuilt—I was happy.”

“Yes, I saw that.” And he believed it. Maglor had been very happy—it had just been a more fragile thing than anyone had realized then. Now, Fëanor hoped, the foundation for it was firmer, and there were no more surprises waiting to try to break it. He kissed Maglor’s forehead. “Your song and your performance are going to be amazing, Canafinwë.”

“Thank you, Atya,” Maglor said softly. Fëanor left him in the library, and went to bed. 

The next morning Maglor, Caranthir, and the twins came out to see them off, though Caranthir kept his distance, and Fëanor knew better than to even look too long in his direction. Instead he embraced Amrod and Amras. “We’ll come to Tirion with Maglor later this year, when he’s finished his song,” Amras told him. “And we might write in the meantime, but you’ll be so busy you probably won’t have time to read any letters!”

“I’ll never be that busy,” said Fëanor. 

The twins turned to kiss Náriel and Calissë goodbye, and Maglor turned to Fëanor—and embraced him, holding on as tightly as the twins ever did. “Take care, Cáno,” Fëanor said.

“I will. I love you, Atya.”

Fëanor tightened his grip and ducked his head to hide the sudden wave of emotion that swept over him. So much had gone wrong that spring, but somehow—somehow it was all turning out even better than he had ever dared to hope. “I love you too,” he whispered.