New Challenge: Title Track
Tolkien's titles range from epic to lyrical to metaphorical. This month's challenge selected 125 of them as prompts for fanworks.

When Maedhros returns from Mandos, re-connecting does not prove easy. Nerdanel is determined to care for her son and finds that she must confront grief along the way.
In my dreams my sons wander at length, lost in pathless woods, ancient, sunless and foreboding. In the waking world, Maedhros breathes and moves before me, but is rarely truly there. I see the dream-wraith Maedhros superimposed over my living son, and am sure he never found a path out of that desolate place. The whispers in my dreams insist he never will.
Written for Scribbles and Drabbles 2025 Prompt #53: Night Watch by Zhie, to whom credit belongs for the artwork below (which can also found here).
Many thanks to Elronds_Library and timelessutterances for beta reading, and Double_Sharp for the conversations on equatorial climate.

“What if,” said Manwë, regarding Maedhros with star-bright eyes, blue as sapphires and piercing as blades, “you were sent from these Halls for a purpose, son of Fëanáro?”
“I suppose, my lord,” Maedhros said slowly, “that would depend upon the purpose.”
Maedhros is sent back to Middle-earth, in the company of the Maia Olórin.

Nerdanel ran her fingers along one, and turned her thoughts to her son, hoping for a glimpse of more than a misty shore, or of the ragged hem of his cloak. She wished to see his face, wished to see that he was somewhere safe and warm and perhaps not still alone after so long. But even a glimpse of him lonely but whole upon the shore would be a relief, and enough to banish the dreams that had troubled her, knowing them for just dreams and nothing more.
Troubled by dark dreams, Nerdanel picks up a palantír to seek for Maglor. She finds him.
After, Maedhros has returned to life and also seeks for his brother--and also finds him.