A Song Amidst His Torment by Elrond's Library  

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23

Maitimo sews, and everything goes to shit.

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“And he and his host wandered long in misery, but their valour and endurance grew with hardship, for they were a mighty people … The fire fo their hearts was young, and let by Fingolfin and his sons, and by Finrod and Galadriel, they dared to pass into the bitterest North; and finding no other way they endured at last the terror of the Helcaraxë and the cruel hills of ice. Few of the deeds of the Noldor thereafter surpassed that desperate crossing in hardihood or woe ...it was with a lessened host that Fingolfin set foot at last upon the Outer Lands.” (Of the Flight of the Noldor).

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Something in the air shifted, an imperceptible click into a newness that shivered into raw potential.

The twins were wrestling in their wolf forms on the plush carpets, teeth bared and biting gently, rolling to get a pin on the other. Happy yips and playful growls came from the pair, so Maitimo wasn’t worried. Draugluin threw Carcharoth into one of the legs of the small table, and the white king of the well-worn arantyalmë set toppled over and rolled off the side.

They were nearing their seventh Begetting day, and with their swift growth came the manifestation of their gifts – Muinalumbel’s diet had changed around the same time. The twins spent an almost equal amount of time in each shape, wolf and elf, and try as they might, Mairon didn’t think they would be able to assume any form other than those two, as a pure Maia might.

He watched them play at fighting over the top of the embroidery hoop in his hand. A pattern of interlocking keys in purple thread grew over the black fabric. He needed only to fill two rectangles the size of his hands with this pattern – they would become the cuffs to one of Muinalumbel’s gowns. As the years passed, her growth continuing to hurdle into adulthood. Seventeen years since she had been Begotten, nearly a woman grown, limited only in lack of experience outside of Mairon’s apartments.

And she was vain, vainer even than Maitimo had been in the Tree-lit days of his youth, and Maitimo indulged his daughter as much as he could. So he decorated with her her clothes with vibrant embroidery, and what jewels and gems her Ada could give her. Mairon might roll his eyes and rue her inherited Noldorin appreciation for sparkle, but he gave nonetheless.

Maitimo blinked, seeing something shift in his perception. He was unable to pin it down, put words to what had changed, but something had. He turned to the great, south-facing window with a frown.

The darkness was different.

More than twenty years he had spent staring listlessly out of this great window, and never in all that time had the hue of the darkness changed. The stars were constant, wheeling in great arcs overhead, but never fading.

But the darkness was changing. He watched, embroidery abandoned in his lap, awe a lump in his throat as the eastern mountains revealed the source of the changing dark.

A great silver disk rose. Telperion reborn.

He stood at the window, just watching the disk painstakingly crawl across the sky. Maitimo barely noticed the tears falling onto his cheeks. The wasteland outside of Angband was stark, flat and lifeless, in the light that was both new and heartbreakingly familiar.

The Trees were dead. He had seen their carcasses with his own eyes. He had seen Nienna Núri weep for them, kneeling with Yavanna Kementári as she wailed in grief and something even stronger than grief.

The Trees had given them all a final gift.

“Atar?” Carcharoth tugged on one of Maitimo’s fingers, his hand still so small and delicate. His brother pushed his snout into Maitimo’s thigh as if to reinforce his brother’s bid for attention. “What’s that?”

Maitimo fixed a small smile on his face, wiping the tears from his face. “I’m not entirely sure, little one. It looks like one of the great lights from where I came from.”

Carcharoth leaned against Maitimo’s leg, staring at the disk in the sky. “Pretty.”

Maitimo nodded, smoothing down the boy’s hair. “Very pretty.”

With the attention span characteristic of small children, the twins grew bored of watching the silver disk as it trudged across the sky. Maitimo eventually sat, curled into the corner of a couch where he could continue to work on Muinalumbel’s cuffs and keep the disk and the boys in his periphery. Something settled in his chest, relieving an ache that he didn’t know he’d been carrying.

And then, a sudden grief that was not his own flared, and was quickly blocked out. The corner of his mind where he had stuffed his marriage bond to Findekáno felt suddenly raw and tender, aching. Maitimo breathed through the dread and panic. What was he doing on this side of the sea? He was supposed to be safe in Valinor, and how—

He pushed questions and his worry away with ease. He could not afford to let his mind slip, even now. Maitimo had to keep him safe. He shepherded the twins through their bedtime routine quickly, selfishly not wanting to let the light disappear while he wasn’t watching. And, he couldn’t help himself. He gently poked at the ache, the connection flaring but still so tenuous, so thin. At this distance, only the strongest of emotions might be able to pass, certainly not words. Findekáno might not even notice. But he was alive and on this side of the sea … 

Muinalumbel stole into the main room not long after, stopping at the door and staring. The disk had made it to the western mountains, beyond which his brother’s camp lay, probably. “Atya, what is that?”

Maitimo huffed a small laugh, chest aching. “Your brothers asked the same. I’m not entirely sure what’s going on. I do have a theory.”

She joined him on the couch, hugging her knees up to her chest. “What’s your theory?”

“I’ve told you about the Two Trees.”

“Laurelin and Telperion. Ungoliant-sister destroyed them, I thought.”

Some minute part of Maitimo still flinched at the honorific of ‘sister’ his daughter gave to the killer of the Light. Maitimo nodded. “This … disk. The light is silver, nearly the same as Telperion at his height. It’s possible, perhaps, that the Valar were able to take some remnant of Telperion and do something to it, transform it, and put it in the sky.”

Lumbelincë hummed, her bright red eyes staring at him thoughtfully. “Why?”

Maitimo shrugged, turned the question back on her. “Why do you think?” She stuck out her tongue, which made him chuckle.

“It’ll be safe there,” she finally said, thumb tapping against her fingers as she ordered her thoughts. “In the sky, Ungoliant-sister can’t get to it again, can’t eat the light. The Valar … can keep it out of the hands of … Melkor-father.” A pause, as the disk in question dipped below the western horizon. “Am I right?”

Maitimo sighed. “I can’t know for certain.” Muinalumbel pulled a face. “But I concur. It seems likely.”

“You could have just told me that.”

“Thinking is good for you, Shadow.”

She rolled her eyes. “I guess,” she drawled, in that sarcastic way the young sass their elders with. “Can you braid my hair, Atya?”

He nodded, finishing a stitch and storing the needle in the loose excess that hung down from the hoop. She grabbed a pillow and sat on the floor in front of him.

“Do you think it’ll come back?” she asked, as he tied off a braid and sectioned her hair for the next.

“I hope so,” he replied. I would beg Varda Elentári, if I knew she could hear me. I would pray again to have it back.

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The silver disk did come back. It disappeared. Came back again. Disappeared again.

And then everything fell apart.

Thuringwethil sat at his feet, his hands in her hair as he braided her hair again. The twins were asleep.

Faint shouting echoed in the hallway outside. Thuringwethil’s ear twitched, her hearing far more sensitive than even Maitimo’s own. “I think that’s Ada. And …” Another twitch. “That has to be Melkor-father. Ada sounds distressed.”

Cold dread froze Maitimo’s fingers mid-braid. Melkor never ascended this far up the peaks. Mairon always went to him. Why was Melkor here? Why now?

“Ada’s … pleading.” Thuringwethil twisted, looking up at Maitimo. Looking to someone she loved for answers, and the trust in her eyes broke Maitimo’s shell of fear and base survival.

The children.

“Shadow, go to your brothers. Bar the door. Do not leave, no matter what you hear. Do not speak. Keep your brothers quiet. Mairon will find you.”

Thuringwethil nodded, probably picking up on his fear. As she stood, she asked, “What about you?”

Maitimo shook his head, gave her a smile with a bravery he didn’t truly feel. “Don’t worry about me, Shadow,” he whispered. She pursed her lips like she wanted to argue. “Go. Now.”

She threw her arms around his waist, squeezed tightly, and ran.

The shouting was getting louder.

One breath.

Two.

Three.

He stepped around the low table.

Knelt in the middle of the room, sitting on his heels. Hands limp in his lap. Made himself small.

Thud, thud, thud.

“Please, my Lord,” Mairon’s voice was muffled through the door. “Beloved, please, just listen!”

Maitimo’s hands were steady.

The door slammed open, lock shattering easily. The door which he had only passed through thrice, which had kept him contained for these twenty years, which he had dared only once to escape. He had come to the stark realization that even as horrific the actions that had played out within the apartments were, it could always be worse outside, and despite everything, staying here had been safe. And so the steady calculus of tolerance and fear had kept him bound to Mairon’s purpose, opaque as it may be.

He was about to lose that safety, he knew.

The torchlight limned the shape of familiar Mairon, in his black surcoat and all his round edges, and the shape of his Lord-husband.

Melkor stared at Maitimo, lip curling in disgust and rage. He still wore the crown that Mairon had made, the Silmarilli bound in angry black iron on his brow.

Maitimo bent swiftly at the waist, pressing his forehead into the carpet in obeisance.

In the quiet moment between wrath and action, the Silmarilli reached, singing in the space between Maitimo’s mind and their bright spirits. We are here, Maitimo, Little Nelyo, best beloved, first child, white fire, third Finwë, Not Least, Survivor.

The Oath he swore with his brothers flared back to life, choking him. Maitimo’s heart ached in time with the beating of the Oath to hear them again.

“You really hid the Ñoldóran from me, Mairon-precious,” Melkor sounded amused. Disappointed.

“You gave him into my keeping, to use as I saw fit,” Mairon’s voice was tight.

“So you kept him as your pet.” Melkor paused, and Maitimo fought the urge to flinch. “As your wife.” Maitimo did flinch then.

“No. I’ll always be yours.”

Melkor laughed. “Sit up, Nelyafinwë. Let me see how you’ve fared under Mairon-beloved’s tender care.”

Maitimo unfolded, weight shifting back against his heels. His braids barely fell over his shoulders, thick and heavy and healthy again after his second pregnancy. He kept his eyes down even as his spine straightened.

Melkor crouched, a pantomime of their first meeting before Melkor’s throne, far below. His hands, gloves hiding the damage inflicted from grasping the Silmarilli, caressed Maitimo’s cheek, traced down his neck, cupped the flesh of his chest. Maitimo shuddered; Melkor’s hands were so cold, cruel. Maitimo tried to stay still, tried to keep his fear in check, to keep from flicking his eyes to Mairon in a desperate plea for help. His ears twitched, flattening against his skull.

“Oh, little Ñoldóran,” Melkor crooned. “You could be back in Tirion with how well fed Mairon-precious has been keeping you, if not for the scars.”

“My Lord has been … good to me,” Maitimo whispered, only barely lying.

Melkor hummed. “I’ve been looking for you for a while, did you know?”

Maitimo shook his head slightly, raising his eyes briefly to meet Melkor’s before lowering them just as fast. “I did not,” he whispered. Stay small, stay quiet. Survive.

“Scouting bands of your people in the east some years back. They ran into a group of my hunters.” Maitimo felt himself pale, his hands tightened into fists. “Only two survivors made it home, little Ñoldóran. And so I thought to myself, wasn’t there a clause, in that treaty Mairon-precious made with your brothers, that kept the irritating Noldor in check? Perhaps I might make an example of their Ñoldóran. If only I could find him!”

“On behalf of my brothers, I apologize for the loss of your hunting party,” Maitimo said.

Melkor raised an eyebrow. “If only that were the worst of our losses.”

Maitimo saw Mairon grimace out of the corner of his eye, holding out his hands as if to beg for Maitimo’s forgiveness.

Melkor continued, not paying his husband any attention, his hand resting now on Maitimo’s thigh with a possessive intent that made Maitimo’s skin crawl. “You saw it, I’m sure. The silver of Telperion’s last flower, set in a disk in the sky.” Maitimo nodded shallowly, tense. “Varda-sister’s way of mocking me, surely. Well, with it came a whole host! More fucking Noldor! And would you believe, warmongers all you Eldar are, they engaged our host guarding the western borders.”

Maitimo frowned, pulling away slightly from Melkor’s cold hand. “Who? Whose banners were they flying?” Makalaurë would not. He had not, in all these years, he would not. Makalaurë had gotten a letter just recently, his brother had to know he was still—

“Blue and orange. Prince Nolofinwë, is it not?”

Maitimo’s mind spun. How could they all have gotten here? Findekáno alone he understood, his husband was reckless enough to make the attempt, but an entire host? Olwë’s ships were gone, Doomed and damned they could not have asked for the Valar’s aid, and if they were here, they did not turn back to Tirion, so … the Helcaraxë? Only a desperate fool … but Fëanáro had made them desperate. Losgar would have forced that march. And had he not felt his marriage bond flare, even for the briefest moments?

Fuck.

Maitimo forced himself to nod, smooth his shaking hands over his thigh.

“Do I remember correctly that Nolofinwë was the leader of a different faction?” Mairon interrupted, relieving Maitimo from Melkor’s oil-slick stare. “I negotiated with the Fëanárion prince, not this Nolofinwë.”

Melkor stood and considered the pair for a long moment. Mairon frowned, gesturing at Maitimo without sound. Ósanwë, then. Would it truly hurt to have this conversation out in the open?

Maitimo waited, watching Mairon through his lashes. Mairon had always been expressive where Melkor was impassive, and he thought he had a decent picture of the argument that was building between the two Ainur.

It was looking worse and worse for Maitimo by the second.

“So glad we understand each other,” Melkor snarled suddenly. Maitimo could barely brace himself before Melkor snatched the back of Maitimo’s overrobe, tangling with his braids in a grip as unwavering as diamond. He was pulled to his feet, dragged across the room and towards the hall.

Maitimo, foolishly, reached for Mairon as they passed. Mairon let Maitimo grope and grasp at him desperately, saying nothing. His face betrayed nothing, no anger nor pity nor sorrow.

He stumbled as Melkor released him, thrusting him into walking before him. As he looked up he cringed, Melkor’s expression was eager and wrathful in equal measure. And then, glancing behind Melkor to the door, he saw Mairon holding his Silmaril-burned hands over Thuringwethil’s mouth to keep her from crying out, struggling to keep her from running.

“Lumbelincë,” he whispered into their bond, even as he turned away. “My Shadow. Don’t watch. Don’t follow. Do not.”

And then he threw up every wall he had, silver shields and grey stone and diamond-hard intent, fortifying and reinforcing the space between every bond his mind had ever held, isolating himself within his own mind.

Whatever Melkor did to him, he would not have Maitimo’s mind.

And so he straightened his spine, grew tall and defiant, every muscle tense and ready, and walked willingly once more into darkness.