The Day Transcending Night by StarSpray  

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Five

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No, no nononono— 

Celegorm couldn’t breathe. The smoke in the air took him back to the Dagor Bragollach, to Himlad burning around him, to that frantic flight south—he’d been thinking of it all the time they’d been making their way north, since there had been precious little conversation, all three of them preoccupied with fear of discovery and fear of what they’d find, and no room for anything else that needed to be said. He knew he was now holding on too tight to Daeron, but couldn’t make himself loosen his grip. It was impossible to tell what was happening in the city, where Eluréd or Elurín were. Where Celebrimbor might be. Please be safe, please be safe, please get out. If there had been a way to escape before the city was overrun, surely Celebrimbor would have taken it. He’d escaped Himlad, long ago. He’d escaped Nargothrond. He’d survived the War of Wrath and the breaking of Beleriand. Surely he could survive this too. He had to. They all had to. If he lost Eluréd and Elurín and Celebrimbor before he could even try to speak to them again—

“Look!” Maglor exclaimed, grasping Celegorm’s shoulder and pointing at the road. Two horses—familiar horses, with familiar riders—raced down it, heading south toward the hill where they stood. 

For a moment Celegorm thought he was going to faint. Then he sucked in a breath and grabbed Daeron’s shoulders. “Daeron, look!” He turned him, and Daeron cried out, falling to his knees, half-sobbing in relief as he covered his face with his hands. “But what’s that—”

Elurín spotted them and called out as he and Eluréd veered off the road and came around the hill, halting as Celegorm and Daeron half-slid, half-ran down the slope to meet them, Maglor following a few steps behind. “What are you doing here?” Elurín demanded.

“What are you doing?” Celegorm retorted. “You just charged into—”

“We had to find Celebrimbor,” said Elurín, and then Celegorm looked—really looked—at the figure slumped in the saddle in front of him. Behind him Maglor made a soft sound like he’d been punched in the chest. 

Daeron had gone to Eluréd, who looked like he was ready to faint himself, swaying in the saddle, though he was aware enough to reach for him. Celegorm went to Elurín, resting a hand on his knee as he looked at Celebrimbor. He was a mess, covered in blood beneath hastily applied bandages that were already soaked through, and shivering under the cloak that Elurín had wrapped around him. “Are you all right, birdie?” Celegorm asked quietly, looking up into Elurín’s face. It was hard to read. He did not seem pleased to see any of them. 

Yet he had Celebrimbor in the saddle in front of him.

“I’m fine,” said Elurín. “I had the easy task. But we can’t linger—he’ll find out what we’ve done soon enough.”

“Go home,” Daeron said. He’d recovered himself, and now spoke calmly and firmly, though his voice still shook a little, and there were still traces of tears on his face, his braid half-unraveled around his shoulders. “You need to get home. When you’ve recovered a little, sing more power into the Girdle. It will keep you hidden, even from him.”

“What do you mean you? What will you be doing?” Elurín asked. 

“Distracting the Enemy. He’ll recognize my voice—he’ll take my bait, as he took Eluréd’s. I’ll lead him north, maybe, or west, and—”

“No!” Elurín cried. “This is why we didn’t tell you! You can’t just leave—”

“—and when I’ve managed to lose him, I’ll make my own way home,” Daeron said, still remarkably calm, as though he hadn’t been uncontrollably frantic atop the hill just a few minutes before. “Just as I once promised you.”

“It will be more effective with two of us,” Maglor said suddenly.

Celegorm spun around. “Maglor, you can’t!”

“You go with them. I’ll stay with Daeron. Between the two of us we can take on Sauron. He was only Morgoth’s lieutenant—”

“He’s stronger now,” Eluréd said. He pushed himself up in the saddle with effort from where he’d been almost lying on Mithrenvos’ neck, face grey with exhaustion. “There’s something different about him. You can’t—you can’t fight him. Even both of you at once.”

“We won’t,” said Daeron, squeezing Eluréd’s hand. “We’ll do just what you did, birdie. But we can’t stay and argue about it. You need to go. Stay together.” Daeron looked at Celegorm as he spoke.

“No!” Celegorm said. “No, we all stay together, and—”

“And we’ll all be followed, then,” Maglor said. He came to Celegorm’s side, and reached for Celebrimbor, who hadn’t stirred through any of this. 

“They’re cold—” Elurín began when Maglor reached for the manacles still on Celebrimbor’s wrists. But Maglor just murmured a word and they snapped open, falling into his hands with a heavy clink. Celebrimbor’s wrists beneath them were red and bloody, the skin rubbed raw. If the metal was as cold as Elurín warned, Maglor didn’t seem to feel it.

At that moment an enormous boom! echoed over the hills around them. The ground shuddered; the horses whinnied, and Daeron had to lunge forward to grab Lhimmir and Limral's reins to keep them from fleeing. Eluréd and Elurín retained control, but only with effort. This was what woke Celebrimbor, at least a little. He mumbled something, turning his face into Elurín’s shoulder. 

“He’s found what we’ve done,” Elurín said. “We need to go.”

Celegorm looked at Maglor, who wrapped an arm around him and kissed his temple. “I’ll be fine,” he said softly. “We’ll all be fine, but not if we don’t move now. Stay with Tyelpë. I love you, and I’ll come back to you—nothing in the world could keep me away now.”

“You’d better.” Celegorm released him only reluctantly. He stepped back as Daeron moved to say a quick farewell to Elurín; when he finished Celegorm caught his arm. “You keep that promise, Daeron,” he said in a low voice. “Don’t you dare not come back to them.”

“You’re hurting me,” Daeron said quietly, holding himself very still.

“Good.” But he released him immediately. “Just—just come back.” He couldn’t stop being angry if Daeron went and got himself killed. He couldn’t even start to try to make sense of everything that had happened until they were all back together somewhere safe. 

“Lossë,” Daeron said as Celegorm turned away. He’d answered to that name for so long that turning around was automatic, and as he did Daeron threw his arms around him, holding on more tightly than he ever had before. Celegorm’s arms came up to hold him in return before he could think to stop himself; without thinking he lowered his head, hiding his face in Daeron’s hair. If this was the last time— “I promise I’ll come back to you,” Daeron whispered. “I’m so sorry.” He held on for only a few seconds, and then he let go, leaving Celegorm feeling horribly empty and bereft. 

“Maglor, take Lhimmir,” he said, hearing his voice shake a little and not knowing what to do about it. “You both need to move fast.” Maglor nodded. “Eluréd, I’ll ride with you.” He swung himself into the saddle behind him, and wrapped an arm around Eluréd’s waist. It wasn’t just that Maglor needed a mount of his own—Eluréd looked like he might fall without someone to hold onto him. “I’ve got you, birdie,” Celegorm murmured.

“I know, Atya,” Eluréd sighed, leaning back against him. 

“Be safe,” Daeron said to them, and then he and Maglor were gone, charging away back up the road, north and west. After a minute Daeron’s voice rose, louder and stronger than Celegorm had ever heard it, almost shocking in its defiance against the shadow that hung over Ost-in-Edhil. Listening to him then, one might never guess that he had been rendered speechless and almost silent with terror on top of the hill. Having now chosen his course of action and committed to it, he seemed to have forgotten his fear.

“Come on,” said Elurín, and urged Rhawhul forward, moving away from the road, more east than south. Celegorm followed, continually looking back over his shoulder. They pushed the horses as hard and as far as they could, and made their camp long after sunset. It was cold, but they did not dare risk a fire. Celegorm helped Eluréd down and tended to the horses, and then went to kneel by Elurín, who was taking a closer look at Celebrimbor’s wounds. “It’s very bad,” he said quietly, without looking up, “but I think he will live. If we can get him home.”

“Elurín, will you help me sing protections?” Eluréd asked. 

“I’ll do it. You rest.” Elurín finished tying off the last bandage and went to pace around the camp. In the distance they could hear the howling of wolves. Sauron was no fool. They just had to hope that he had spared only a few to send south, and that most would follow after Daeron. And that Daeron and Maglor together would be able to evade them.

Celegorm remained where he was, and rested his hand on Celebrimbor’s forehead. He couldn’t tell if he hadn’t woken because Elurín had ensured it, or if he just couldn’t. “Oh, Tyelpë,” he sighed. “I’m so sorry.” Celebrimbor still didn’t wake, but he turned his head slightly, into Celegorm’s touch.

Eluréd slept, but neither Celegorm nor Elurín did. They remained watchful and tense, listening to the sounds of pursuit in the distance, which veered off toward the west sometime late in the night. “They’ll think we’ve gone west—even without Daeron and Maglor’s distractions,” Elurín murmured after a while. “West toward Lindon.”

“Hope so,” Celegorm murmured. The tension between the two of them, he and Elurín, was so thick he felt like they would both suffocate under it. Eluréd had not really looked him in the face either before he had fallen asleep, but that might have been because of the same feelings, or just because he had been too tired. He’d also still called him atya, but Celegorm thought that was just old habit. “Elurín—”

“Not here.” Elurín still didn’t look at him. “Not yet.”

“Can I at least ask why you went to Ost-in-Edhil in the first place?”

“Someone had to get him out, and we were the only ones who could.”

“But without telling Daeron—”

“He would have tried to stop us.”

“With good reason.”

“I know. That’s why we did not tell him, and why we did not wait for you. Eluréd followed after you, you know—we knew you’d found your brother, that you were all right. We waited until you returned for your things, and left when we heard you and Maglor make your plans to return home. We wouldn’t have just left otherwise—but we knew you’d try to stop us, or insist on coming with us, and it wouldn’t have worked if you had.”

He hadn’t known that Eluréd had followed him. He should have noticed—but most of that day felt like a blur, now, and after he’d looked up to find Maglor standing on the beach in front of him he hadn’t had room to think about anything else, and even afterward he hadn’t been as watchful as he should have been—obviously, since he hadn’t seen the signs of them still being nearby, and then had missed seeing where Eluréd and Elurín had turned away from Daeron’s path. The agony of remembering was still fresh inside him, but he could look back now and see that without it he never would have turned south—he would have continued on north toward Lindon and Maglor would have stayed where he was, and neither of them would have ever known just how close they’d come to one another. Again.

And without that remembering, Eluréd and Elurín would not have gone off on their own. Celebrimbor would still be in Sauron’s hands, suffering—dying.

Maybe this was what Ossë had meant—though Celegorm wasn’t really prepared to give him that kind of credit. Not when the memory of his lungs filling up with water was still so fresh.

They didn’t speak again that night. In the morning Elurín managed to get Celebrimbor to drink a little water, and then they went on—this time Celegorm rode with Celebrimbor, and Eluréd and Elurín shared Rhawhul’s saddle. Wolves howled behind them, but Elurín led them through the woods in a winding course, swiftly heading south, staying close to the mountains, using all the tricks both Daeron and Celegorm had taught both Eluréd and Elurín to throw off pursuit and to hide their passing. It was a longer route than the one they’d all taken north, but they had no choice—to take the road was to be seen, whatever they did to hide themselves. They just had to hope that Celebrimbor would make it.

As the days passed, blurring together into a haze of exhaustion and fear, Celebrimbor woke a few times, but never for very long; he was in too much pain to do anything, even to make much noise. Celegorm hated to see him like this, hated that they had such a long way to go, and it was with enormous relief that he recognized at last, after far too many days of travel, the break in the southern arm of the White Mountains, and the path that led to their little house in the hills, and an even greater relief to finally feel the Girdle Daeron had sung up close in around them like Daeron’s own arms, warm and familiar and safe. They all breathed a sigh as soon as they felt it. 

At home, Celegorm dismounted, and carefully slipped Celebrimbor out of the saddle. Eluréd came to take Mithrenvos’ reins, and Elurín held open the door. “Your bed?” he asked. 

“Yes,” Celegorm said, and in just a few minutes they had Celebrimbor in the bedroom, a fire going, and water fetched to heat. Elurín and Eluréd were both skilled in healing, far more skilled than Celegorm, so he just did what they told him and then tried not to get in the way. There were wounds to stitch and songs to sing, and after a while Celebrimbor stirred, crying out hoarsely, struggling to open his eyes until Elurín managed to calm him and sing him back to sleep. 

This was all far too reminiscent, in some ways, of Celegorm’s own rescue from Doriath. He didn’t remember it, but he knew that an Ent had carried him from Menegroth to Ossiriand, crossing the Gelion, all in winter—and he still didn't know how he’d survived that trek. It had left him with a multitude of scars and some injuries that had never fully healed, even besides Dior’s curse. And that had just been battle wounds and a cave falling in. This was different. This was worse. 

He caught himself thinking then that if this was like his own rescue it was even more like Maedhros’, and had to escape the house and flee into the woods to be sick, all that awful grief welling up again—not just for what Maedhros had suffered in Angband, but how his life had ended. And they had been so close—Celegorm had seen him across a battlefield, and had turned away on purpose. From his brother. He had been right there in the camp when the last two Silmarils had been taken—he just hadn’t understood what it was that made him want to get up and go, and so he’d let Daeron keep him away. And Maedhros had died, and Maglor had been lost.

And now his nephew had nearly died and might never fully heal from this ordeal the same way Maedhros had never fully healed from his, and Celegorm hadn’t been there. Again. He hadn’t even wanted to be there because he hadn’t known. 

“Lossë?” Elurín had come out to find him. Celegorm straightened, spit the lingering taste of bile out of his mouth into the leaves, and tried to catch his breath. “Are you all right?” Elurín asked from behind him. 

“No. How’s Tyelpë?”

“Sleeping. Real sleep, this time. I don’t know when he’ll wake—but he will wake.” Elurín waited until Celegorm turned to face him, and then said, “I don’t think I can ever call you—Celegorm.”

“That’s…that’s fine. And if you don’t want to call me anything, if you want me to leave—”

“I didn’t say that. I don’t know what I want. It’s—I can’t—you can’t be the same person. I can’t make it work in my head, and I don’t…”

“I’m sorry,” Celegorm said. “Elurín, I’m so sorry.”

“Is it true, though? I know what all the histories say, what the tales and songs say, but did you—my father…”

“Yes. Or—he triggered the cave-in, I think, but I had already delivered a killing blow.”

“And he’s the one that cursed you to forget.”

“He—yes. I don’t remember Doriath very clearly, but I remember that.” Elurín nodded once. He was pale and exhausted and Celegorm could see how much all of this was hurting him. “I’m sorry,” he said again, wishing there was something else he could say, wishing his apologies didn’t sound so meaningless. 

“If you hadn’t forgotten…what would you have done? In Ossiriand?”

“I wouldn’t have hurt you, Elurín.”

“Because you would not have been able to, or because you would not have wanted to? You told me once that you thought you had been so angry that it crowded out everything else, and—”

“That was true. But I—even at my worst I would not have hurt a child.”

“I don’t know if I believe you.”

“That’s…I deserve that.” If he were to be completely honest, he didn’t know if he believed himself either. He didn’t know what he would have done if he had woken up alone and in pain and still knowing who he was and what he thought he wanted, with a stranger and two children bearing Dior’s face trapped in the flet with him. But he wanted it to be true. He wanted to have always been who he was as Lossenol, or to have stayed the way he had been as Tyelkormo in his youth far away in Treelit Valinor, to have never been what Celegorm the Cruel became.

“I don’t know what to do.” Elurín dragged his sleeve over his eyes. “Just—come back to the house please. Please don’t leave when Daeron comes back.”

“I won’t.”

“Promise you won’t.”

“I promise, birdie. I’ll stay until you send me away.”

When he stepped inside, Eluréd rose from his seat by the fire and came to wrap his arms around him, hiding his face in Celegorm’s shoulder. Elurín disappeared back into the bedroom. “Please don’t run away again,” Eluréd whispered.

“I won’t, Eluréd. I wasn’t now, and I’m sorry that I did before on the beach.” Celegorm kissed his temple. “You should get some sleep.” They were all tired, but Eluréd had had the harder part of the rescue, had had to again endure Sauron’s full attention, and was still recovering.

“Can’t. I keep dreaming, and Daeron isn’t here to sing them away.”

He fell asleep anyway, there by the fire with his head on Celegorm’s lap. Celegorm sat and stared at the flames and listened to the occasional rustle from the bedroom where Elurín sat vigil over Celebrimbor, and to the wind whistling around the corners of the house. He thought of Daeron and Maglor, and hoped they were all right. He thought of Celebrimbor’s broken body and prayed for the first time in centuries. Please let him be all right. He doesn’t deserve this. Not Tyelpë. He’s always been the best of us. Please let him live. Please, please… 

And then he thought of his other brothers, all of them dead, out of reach in Mandos. He wondered if Vairë had woven his fate into her tapestries, if they knew what he had been doing, where he had been, if they’d even bothered to look. He wondered if Curufin was watching even then—if he knew what had been done to his son, if he knew that neither Celegorm nor Maglor had been there to protect him when he needed it most. He remembered when they had received word of Nargothrond’s fall—of the battle that killed Orodreth, and of the city taken over by Glaurung. They hadn’t known then that Celebrimbor had made it out alive, and Curufin had gone still and silent for days, and then he’d locked himself in his forge to work until he couldn’t lift his arms anymore; they’d all thought he would fade away, until word came at last that a remnant had made it to the Mouths of Sirion and Gil-galad on Balar, and that Celebrimbor was with them. And now…

It wasn’t a good idea to dwell on those thoughts, he knew. He would suffocate under the weight of all his failures if he did, and he couldn’t afford to. He didn’t want to die—and not only because he did not want to come to Mandos and have to face all of his brothers there. Or his father. Or—others. Maglor had been glad to see him, but Maglor had also been alone for centuries. Whatever else he was, Celegorm wasn’t stupid—there would be a reckoning eventually, when the shock of it all finally wore off, or when they were finally all somewhere safe. It would be ugly on all sides. He just needed to keep it together until then—until Sauron was driven back to his dark lair somewhere in the southeast and he could be certain that Celebrimbor would be safe. Then he’d face whatever was coming for him, and he’d take it, and—well. He couldn’t guess what would happen after that. Probably nothing good.

He breathed a sigh and stroked Eluréd’s hair when he murmured something in his sleep. “I’m here,” he said, and Eluréd sighed, relaxing again. 

Was Dior somewhere in Mandos, watching, or had he passed beyond the Circles of the World upon his death? Could he see what was happening, who had raised his sons in his absence? Could Nimloth? Did Elwing know who her brothers had stayed in Middle-earth for?

Elurín emerged from the bedroom late in the evening, and Celegorm went in to take his place. In the soft candlelight Celebrimbor looked even worse, his bruises livid and the skin underneath them ashen. “I’m so sorry, Tyelpë,” Celegorm whispered. He rested his hand over Celebrimbor’s, over the bandages encircling his wrists. Celebrimbor, of course, didn’t answer. He didn’t even move except for the shallow rise and fall of his chest. 

It occurred to Celegorm only then to wonder what it was Sauron had wanted. And to wonder where Gil-galad was, why no help had come to Ost-in-Edhil, what had started the war in the first place. Well, that last question was easy enough to answer—Sauron sought to take his old master’s place. But why now?

The night passed slowly. Celegorm paced and tried once or twice to nap, but he was restless, and so tired that he couldn’t sleep even if someone didn't need to be awake for Celebrimbor. Then, as dawn started to break and pale light came through the window, Celebrimbor stirred. Celegorm went to his side, reaching for his hand—and then hesitated, remembering suddenly the look of horror on Maglor’s face when they’d first seen each other on the beach. It should not be him there when Celebrimbor woke. Even if he was in his right mind—it would be too much of a shock.

He didn’t open his eyes, though. He just made a soft, pained sound, head lolling on the pillow. Celegorm leaned down to kiss his forehead, and then retreated. “He’s waking, I think,” he said to the twins, who both looked like they had just rolled out of their own beds, and were half-heartedly making breakfast. “I should not be the one there when he does.”

“He’ll panic no matter who’s there, probably,” Elurín pointed out.

“Yes, but—he thinks that I’m dead.” Not to mention the last time they’d seen one another. Celegorm remembered in a strange, distant sort of way how angry he’d been, though he didn’t think he had been surprised, exactly, when Celebrimbor had disavowed them and refused to leave Nargothrond. It all felt now like it had happened to someone else. There was no anger left—like the fire inside of him that had ignited with the Bragollach had been doused, somewhere between Menegroth and Ost-in-Edhil, leaving him cold and empty. But he had no idea what Celebrimbor would think now. “He’ll mistake one of you for Elrond, at worst. But if he wakes up to me…”

“I’ll sit with him.” Elurín slipped past Celegorm without looking at him, disappearing into the bedroom.

“You should sleep,” said Eluréd after a moment. “Take my bed for now. Later we need to speak of our winter stores.”

“I’ll go hunting later, after I’ve slept. Maybe someone can make the trip to Edhellond in the next few weeks, if it’s safe.” It wasn’t too far, and the journey would be a quick and easy one if the weather held. Sauron seemed to be concentrating all of his attention on the north; hopefully he had left the southern havens alone.

“Atya,” Eluréd said as Celegorm turned away. He froze; that was deliberate, not the name just slipping out through a haze of exhaustion. “I’m not going to stop calling you that. It’s still true.”

“I don’t think your real father would approve, Eluchilion,” Celegorm said. 

“I love my father, and I miss my father, and sometimes I hate my father,” Eluréd said, quiet but blunt. Celegorm turned to stare at him in astonishment. “If I wanted to, I could name ways in which every single adult in our lives hurt us or failed us when we were young, except perhaps Daeron. There is nothing simple about what happened then or who we are now, and many things can be true at the same time. I can resent what my parents chose to do even as I understand there were forces moving in the world far bigger than any of us, and I can hate what you did and love you for all that you’ve done since. I can wish things had been different and understand why they could not have been. I am a contradiction, just in the fact that I was born—it is not so hard for me to hold more of them in my heart. But I don’t care whether Dior Eluchíl would approve of my choices now. Nor Nimloth, nor Thingol, nor anyone else. They have not lived my life. They do not know me. I chose to love you when I was six years old and Elurín and I gave you the name Lossenol, and I chose to call you my father when I was ten, and I choose to keep doing so now, and if no one else can see that that is not a rejection of Dior or Nimloth, then that is their affair. I don’t care.”

“Eluréd…” Celegorm heard his voice break. He didn’t want to start crying again; he felt as though he should have run out of tears by now. “I love you. Both of you. That I remember who I am, now—that doesn’t change the fact that I love you more than anything.”

“I know, Atya Lossë.”

“But it changes everything else.”

“Not everything. And not for the worse—not if we don’t let it.”