The Day Transcending Night by StarSpray  

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Eleven

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“How did my uncle forget who he was?” Celebrimbor asked Daeron after Maglor went outside to find Celegorm, who had been gone rather longer than it should have taken just to wash his hands. Celegorm had mentioned a curse, but nothing more, and Celebrimbor hoped that Daeron might be more forthcoming.

“Dior did something,” Daeron said. He had gotten up to throw more wood on the fire. “I don’t know what—and I don’t know what Ossë did, either, that lifted it, except that it was very painful.”

So much for being more forthcoming—but at least it seemed to be out of ignorance rather than a deliberate attempt to keep secrets.

“Ossë also almost drowned him,” Eluréd said from across the room.

It was very hard to figure out what lay between the four of them, and whether it was normal or if everything that had happened lately was the source of all the tension. He couldn’t imagine it was normal, not if they’d spent so many years together already. Celebrimbor glanced between Eluréd and Daeron, and wished he’d tried to get to know Eluréd and Elurín better in the beginning when they’d met just after the War of Wrath—or at least that he had asked Elrond about them later. Then he realized: “Did—Elrond has met him, hasn’t he? He’s known—”

“He does not know him well, and only knows him by the name Lossenol,” said Daeron. “He’s kept no secrets from you, I promise. I was the one keeping secrets.”

“But why? After—after Maglor and Maedhros took the Silmarils, wasn’t the Oath…”

“I should have spoken then,” Daeron said. He returned to his chair as Eluréd brought a pot to set over the flames, smelling of herbs and meat. “I know that. I’m sorry that I didn’t.”

“I do not think the discovery of a third son of Fëanor in the midst of that encampment would have been received well,” said Eluréd, sounding skeptical. “You should not have kept the secret this long, maybe, but I do not think speaking up then would have done anyone any good. Celeborn was already suspicious.”

“Celeborn knew—?”

“He met Lossenol, briefly,” said Daeron, “and if he was suspicious and disapproving of my taking up with a Noldo—and he did believe him to be a kinslayer even then—I do not think he ever suspected that he was Celegorm, who everyone believed to be dead. It was Galadriel I feared most, and I did manage to keep them from ever meeting. I will have much to answer for, though, when we meet again and all of this is over.”

“Not if Elurín and I have anything to say about it,” said Eluréd. “Did Nellas ever know?”

“No. She only knew as much as you did.” Daeron glanced at Celebrimbor. His eyes were dark with regret. “I’m sorry. Truly. For keeping secrets and for how many explanations you’ll need to sort through now to understand where your uncle has been all this time. Nellas was a friend of mine from Doriath, and she knew Eluréd and Elurín when they were children there. We reunited in Eriador, and she took ship into the west after the War of Wrath. You may have heard her name also in connection to Túrin Turambar.”

“I don’t mind,” said Celebrimbor. It wasn’t entirely true, but he couldn’t admit aloud how envious he was of the simple and happy life it sounded like they’d made for themselves. Or not the simplicity—he would not have been content with that—but the happiness. He’d been happy himself, for a long time—but he’d had to fight for it, and there had always been the shadow of grief lurking in the background, even at the height of his own power in his own realm when he’d made the most beautiful things with Narvi and his other friends and comrades among the Dwarves and the Gwaith-i-Mírdain. Who were now all dead, probably. Because of him. Because it was never going to last, no matter what they had told themselves in their hope and their pride and their folly. At least Narvi had not lived to see Annatar’s arrival. And it was worth admitting: “I think Eluréd is right. I’m not sure I would have been so happy to see my uncle if all of this had been revealed so soon after the War of Wrath, and I know no one else would have been. It would have just caused all kinds of trouble on top of everything else we were trying to deal with.”

His uncles returned, both of them quiet. Celegorm sat down on the floor so he could bracket Celebrimbor with his legs and loop his arms around his chest from behind. Celebrimbor leaned back against him gratefully, even though he was cold. The fire was warm, and Maglor and Daeron returned to their discussion about some ancient song. Elurín came in, and he and Eluréd joined the debate. Celebrimbor closed his eyes and wished he could pretend that this would last. Wished he could believe them all when they said that everything was going to be fine. 

That night he dreamed of Ost-in-Edhil, of the fires and the screams and Sauron coming with Annatar’s face, but twisted with malice that had never been there before—that couldn’t have been there before, that he should have seen, if it had really been there all along. He woke with a scream lodged in his throat, and two sets of hands on his shoulders, on his face, two voices murmuring his name. “Tyelpë, it’s all right,” said Maglor. The scars on his right palm were strange and smooth against Celebrimbor’s cheek. “It’s all right, we’re here. You’re safe.”

“It was just a dream, bear-cub,” Celegorm added. “He’s not here.”

“He’s found them,” Celebrimbor heard himself say. “He has them. The Nine and the Seven, and he—”

“Shh, Tyelpë.” Maglor smoothed his hair back out of his face. “You’re still dreaming—”

“No! He has them and—” He’d given them up, hadn’t he? He couldn’t remember. He’d thought about it, of giving him those lesser rings if it bought him time—bought Elrond time, and Celeborn, to get away. Bought Galadriel and Gil-galad time to hide the Three properly. Anything to keep the them out of his hands, because of Sauron got them he would take and twist them, warp them, and that would be worse than anything the other Rings could do. He’d taken what knowledge he had of the Three and he’d locked it in the deepest part of his mind and Sauron had not breached it—but now he couldn’t remember what he had given up instead. 

Maybe it didn’t matter. The Seven and the Nine had still been in Ost-in-Edhil—hidden, but not anywhere that wouldn’t be uncovered given enough time, which Sauron had in abundance now. He should have sent them away too. Should have destroyed them. Why hadn’t he destroyed them?

“What does he have, Celebrimbor?” Celegorm asked. “What is he trying to do?”

“The—the—we made—” The words got stuck in the back of his throat and he couldn’t say them. He felt as though Sauron’s hand was around his neck again, squeezing the life out of him, the One burning into his skin like a brand. He raised his own hand and found the mark there, a small raised burn scar—just one more way in which he was forever marked by the Enemy he had willingly let into his city and his home and— “I’m sorry,” he whispered. 

“You have nothing to apologize for,” Maglor said. 

“Don’t apologize,” Celegorm said at the same time. 

“But I—”

“Are there others who know?” Maglor asked, his voice so horribly gentle. “Are there others who know what he is after?”

“Y-yes. Gil-galad. Galadriel. El-Elrond. But—”

“Then rest assured that they are not idle,” Maglor said. “It is likely they think you are dead, and until we can reach them we have to trust that they will do what they must.”

He was supposed to be stronger than this, Celebrimbor thought as his uncles pulled the blankets back up, and Maglor started to hum a quiet, soothing song. He had survived the Darkening of Valinor, all the battles of the First Age, the fall of Nargothrond, the War of Wrath. He had built a city of his own and it had flourished. He had healed—he thought—the rifts between his house and those others who remained of the House of Finwë. He had made beautiful things, had reclaimed the Star of the House of Fëanor for his own. He’d thought that they could heal the whole world, and he had opened his doors and his arms to anyone who wanted to do the same no matter what they’d done before. He had listened to Gil-galad’s warnings and had recognized Galadriel’s suspicions, when Annatar had come—and then he had ignored every small twinge of uneasiness because he had wanted so badly to believe that all the smiles and all the generosity, all that brilliance, had been real. Of course he’d known that Annatar was someone who had seen Angband, who had perhaps served Morgoth—there was no true hiding of those shadows—but if the rest of them, those who had followed Celebrimbor’s grandfather and uncles, those of the House of the Mole, others who had escaped Angband, who carried the weight of their own dark pasts—if all of them could turn away from it and find something new, surely even someone like Annatar could too. 

Until he had felt the presence of the One, until he had heard those terrible words echo through his mind before he ripped Narya off his own finger—he had truly believed Annatar had been genuine. Even now he wondered whether it had really all been lies or if Sauron had hesitated, even for just a moment, before he forged that Ring of his own. He would never know, and that not knowing would forever haunt him.

In spite of Maglor’s songs he did not find sleep again. He just drifted, feeling cold in spite of both of his uncles with him, and then feeling the ache of his too-slowly-healing body. It got worse by the morning, so he couldn’t move without everything hurting almost as though his wounds were fresh again, and when he looked he was shocked to see scars, pink and fresh and tender, and not open and bloody wounds. Instead of trying to get up he pretended to still be asleep. Neither of his uncles tried to wake him, but after a few minutes he heard someone else come in, and then Celegorm speaking quietly, something about nightmares.

“He is badly wounded in spirit, Lossë,” Daeron said after a moment. Celebrimbor felt his hand on his hair. “It is going to take time.”

“Do we have time?” Celegorm asked.

“I don’t know. I think Eluréd and Elurín’s idea of going north to Lórinand is the best idea. Galadriel might help him better than we can. I will do all I can for him, but I think she has more experience in this than I do.”

“She can’t be more powerful than the songbirds—”

“She is not descended from Melian, as they are.”

“What does Melian—oh.”

“Yes.”

“…I’m going to find Sauron and I’m going to tear him limb from—”

“Lossë,” Daeron said as Celebrimbor couldn’t bite back the strangled sound that tore itself out of his throat. He opened his eyes to find Celegorm just turning away, back rigid. It was far too like when he’d turned his back at the last in Nargothrond, even though Celebrimbor knew—he did—that he wasn’t the object of his anger now.

As Celegorm left the room Daeron sighed and sat down on the edge of the bed. “He didn’t mean it,” he said. “I’m sorry.”

“He meant it,” Celebrimbor whispered.

“He loves you,” Daeron said. “Can you sit up for me? I want to look at your injuries. My songs might help a little more than the birdies’.”

“Why do you call them that?” Celebrimbor asked, desperate for something else to talk about as he struggled to sit up. Everything still hurt, but once he was upright and holding still again it was a little better. Daeron helped him, hands very gentle. 

“Lossë—Celegorm—started calling them songbirds when they were children, when they were very quick to learn the bird calls he taught them.” Daeron’s smile was a little sad; it hadn't just been for fun, those lessons—not like the same ones from Celebrimbor’s own childhood, so long ago now that it seemed like someone else’s dream. “Then he named them Pínfileg and Pínamrent, our little sparrow and little lark. It was too dangerous for them to be Eluréd and Elurín. It might be again, but it’s a little late now to take that secret back.”

“Was this before or after they named him Lossenol?”

“After—months after. They gave him that name only days after he woke in Ossiriand with no memory of who he was. We needed to call him something, and they very swiftly grew very fond of him.”

“Why didn’t you take him back to my other uncles?”

Daeron didn’t answer immediately. He helped Celebrimbor out of his nightshirt, and ran light and gentle fingers over the healing scars across his chest and his arms, pausing over the rings of tender skin around his wrists where the manacles had rubbed them raw. The metal had been so cold that it had burned. Finally he said, “I would have, if we had not had the twins with us. I couldn’t risk taking Dior’s sons to Amon Ereb—I was very afraid of what they might have done, then.”

“Rightfully,” Celebrimbor murmured.

“Maybe. But he also did not want to return. I did not keep everything entirely secret—he knew from the start that he had been in Doriath, and what that meant, though he assumed he had just followed the Sons of Fëanor, not that he was one of them. It horrified him—and even as wary and distrustful as I was at that time, I knew it was not feigned.”

“I find it very hard to imagine,” Celebrimbor admitted. He shouldn’t, really—he could see how it haunted Celegorm now. But it was hard to imagine him not knowing it—not knowing himself, not wanting to return to his brothers. Whatever else could have been said of any of them in those days, they had been unflinchingly loyal to one another. It was why both Celegorm and Curufin had not understood why Celebrimbor had refused to leave Nargothrond with them—why they had both been so angry.

“Dior’s curse was meant to harm,” Daeron said. He picked up a jar of ointment, fresh-smelling and herbal, and rubbed it over Celebrimbor’s wrists. “And it has done harm, more than I think he intended, for I cannot imagine he expected his own children to get caught up in it, but it also saved all four of us. We would not have made it over the Ered Luin if your uncle had not been with us. Eluréd and Elurín would have died and I would have been caught and taken to Angband—I very nearly was.”

“Is that how you got that scar?” Celebrimbor asked, and then bit his tongue. “Sorry—”

“This one?” Daeron gestured at his throat. Celebrimbor nodded. “You needn’t apologize, but no—I got this much later, during the War of Wrath.” He set the jar of ointment aside and picked up a roll of bandages. “These wounds healing slowly—it does not truly surprise me—”

“I might never recover,” Celebrimbor said, because it wouldn’t do anyone any good to avoid that truth.

“In body, I believe you will,” Daeron said. “I’ve never been a particularly skilled healer, but I do know what I’m doing—certainly I know better now than when I first met Lossenol, and Eluréd and Elurín know even more than me. But the wounds to the spirit are worse, as I think you heard me say before. Eluréd and Elurín should be better able to help you than I am, except that the nature of the wounding and the nature of their healing is too similar. You will recover, because you are stronger than you feel yourself to be right now. But it will take time.” He finished wrapping Celebrimbor’s wrists, and turned his attention to the long scar that sliced down the middle of his chest. “I know how tempting despair can be,” he said. “You must not give into it.”

“You might not say that if you knew—”

“Unless you are going to tell me that you willingly and knowingly aided the Enemy, it doesn’t matter what you did.”

It was an almost eerie echo of Elurín’s words, and did even less to make him feel better. “I did willingly aid him,” Celebrimbor said. “And I should have known, I just—”

“It is always very easy to see what we should have done, when we look back. But if you were deceived, the fault lies in the deceiver.”

“Elurín said that too. I just…”

“I know. I do.” Daeron reached up to cup Celebrimbor’s face in one hand. “It will be a very long time before you can hear us say that and believe it—and that is why we will keep saying it, over and over, as long as it takes. All you need to do right now is rest and let yourself recover. You are allowed, too, to find happiness in being reunited with your uncles, and in being alive. If that happiness is fleeting and hard to grasp right now, that just makes it all the more precious.”

“And when he—when he covers all the world in darkness and succeeds where his master didn’t, because I—”

“Whatever it is you did, or think you did, he would have found a way regardless. He is clever and cruel, and it was a mistake for any of us to believe that he would simply fade away just because Morgoth was cast through the Doors of Night. He used your brilliance and your kindness. That does not make either of those things a weakness.” Daeron’s eyes were very dark, shining gently not with Treelight, but with starlight, and whatever he saw in Celebrimbor’s own gaze did not make him pull away. 

“My house,” Celebrimbor whispered, “is not known for its kindness.”

“That is no fault of yours—and for what it is worth I have found both Lossenol and Maglor to be very kind, when they are free to choose it. We are all of us so much more than our worst mistakes.” Daeron thumbed away a tear and then turned away, reaching for the jar of ointment again, as well as more bandages. “Today I think you should rest—sleep more if you can. I have songs that will chase away the dreams, if you wish. Or I can send Maglor in.”

“Can you do it?”

“Of course.”

When he finished with the ointment, which had some kind of numbing effect that brought incredible relief, and the bandages, Daeron helped Celebrimbor lay back down and drew up the blankets. His songs were different than the ones Maglor sang, and did not hold any memories either bitter or sweet. His voice too was very different—but it was lovely, and the lullabies were like another blanket that wrapped around Celebrimbor, soft and warm, and when real sleep finally took him, his dreams held nothing but the soft glimmer of distant stars. 

It was the middle of the afternoon when he woke, feeling a little more like himself and in much less pain. He still didn’t get up, just lay curled up under the blankets, listening to the voices through the door and to the quiet crackle of the fire on the small bedroom hearth. When the door opened he expected one of his uncles, but it was either Eluréd or Elurín instead. It was still difficult to tell them apart—except they wore almost-matching pendants carved of wood, one a maple leaf and the other oak. That helped a little, except he couldn’t ever remember which was which. “You should eat,” said this twin—Elurín, Celebrimbor was almost certain. When he ventured to ask he got a smile. “Yes, I’m Elurín. Do you want to join the rest of us or just go back to sleep?”

“I…don’t know.” He didn’t really want to be alone, but he did not want to have five pairs of eyes on him, all worried and everyone poised to leap up to help the moment he so much as blinked. “Could you stay?”

“Yes, of course. Do you wish for silence, or for me to fill it?”

Silence seemed suddenly unbearable. “Someone—I think someone said you had gone traveling in the east. Will you me about it?” 

Elurín's smile grew. “Gladly.”