The Beginning of the End by Urloth

Part One.

Read Part One.

 

The rain was making a lovely drumming sound against the tent roof. Dragging a quilt over his shoulders, Liltafinwë toed on his slippers and crept from his bedding, past the partition screen, to hover at the foot of his father’s bed.

At thirty five he knew he was too old to go sneaking into his father’s bed but the rain, despite its soothing drone, had left him feeling startled and uneasy with his surroundings. The pre-dawn darkness (was it even an hour called morning?) did not help.  Everything felt wrong but he could not place his finger on the degree. All he knew was that the wrongness and unease rolled around inside him to such a degree that he was starting to feel sick.

He shivered, watching his breath rise before his face like a mist.

“Lilta,” his father sighed softly, mellifluous voice husky with sleep, “stop hovering and come into bed. Don’t catch a chill.”

Permission acquired, he wasted no time in crawling under the pile of quilts and blankets. He did not stop until he was resting against his Father’s side, one arm thrown over Turkafinwë’s chest.

He could feel the padding of the bandages there, just beneath the night shirt, and hummed softly in worry. His father sighed and turned into his side to face him. In the darkness, Tyelkormo’s cuiviénen eyes swallowed up all the sclera and left nothing but eye shaped pools of black to peer into.  

As a child it had been Lilta’s greatest joy that he had inherited his father’s eyes, but as he had grown older he had noticed his eyes did not expand as far in the darkness, and the black was in fact a intense and dark shade of blue. His disappointment had been bitter indeed.

His father had been practical about it though. “It takes two to make a child,” he had reminded Liltafinwë who had been dealt the double blow of realising there were fine strands of gold mixed with the silver in the cream colour of his hair; rending his hair also no longer that of his father’s. (It was not noticeable unless under bright sunlight, something he avoided for this reason.)

“Nerves?” his father asked.

“I’ve never gone to war before,” he mumbled. He knew better than to glorify it when Tyelkormo’s Lord Lavarisse walked with a limp, Curufinwë’s Lord Sárómë’s beautiful face was covered in slashing scars, and Lilta’s former nursemaid Hlusserë no longer had a sister, though she kept reaching for the missing woman.

And these three women were only a minor representation of the daily on going effects of their lifestyle he saw.

When Liltafinwë finally saw war would he lose an eye like Linquemaril? An arm like Belellen? (though apparently she had lost her arm before the wars.) A hand like Uncle Matimo?

His smile like Uncle Ambarussa?

“I wish you did not have to experience this,” his father mumbled, pressing kisses to his hair, “my little dancer, you were not made for this. I wish I could wrap you up in in Valmarin silk, and twine black pearls, sapphires and diamonds all through your hair, and put you atop of Mindon Eldaliéva away from everything bad in this world but I know that is no way to raise a child.”

The rain chose to pick up, and for a moment they saw the tent-poles of their tent backlit as lightening chose to strike.

“And you would hate me,” his father added as an afterthought. Thunder roared overhead.

“I would be very irritated at you,” Liltafinwë shivered and his father tucked further quilts around him, “but I could never hate you.”

Liltafinwë hooked his fingers in the chain always around his father’s neck, gold with medallions of golden flowers along it, and drew out the flat rectangle pendant of warm white stone. He ran his fingers over the familiar engravings.

He wasn’t sure about the story of the pendant. He knew it had something to do with him. He had vague, incredibly vague, memories of his father gently pressing this pendant to his forehead as a infant and mumbling blessings. And Uncle Curvo had a sketch of Liltafinwë as a newborn, wrapped in swaddling with this necklace over the top.

His father sighed, caught Lilta’s hands and held the pendant with him for a moment before tucking it back into his shirt.

“I’m not a child anymore,” he reminded his father, his fidgeting hands immediately starting to play with the end of Tyelkormo’s long silver and cream shaded braid.

“No,” his father smiled sadly, “but you are not an adult yet either. Stuck between the two, poor you.” He chuckled at Liltafinwë’s pout.

“We really need to get back to sleep,” his father brushed a hand against Gildor’s cheek, the feel of it rough with the bite scars from the many hounds that had attacked his father after Huan’s betrayal.

“I try, I can’t, my heart is beating too fast,” Liltafinwë mumbled.

“MMnnn,” his father sighed.

“Counted sheep?”

“Yes.”

“Counted hedgehogs?”

“Yes.”

“Counted backwards from one hundred?”

“Yes.”

“A thousand?”

“Yes,” Liltafinwë’s voice clicked with annoyance.

“How about this: think of all the enjoyable things you have learned from your uncles and me over the years. If anything it’s revision.”

His father yawned.

Lilta pursed his lips and thought about it. He thought about the fiery mathematics lessons with Uncle Moryo; the intensive lapidary and metallurgy sessions with Uncle Curvo.

Uncle Kana’s hands gently readjusting his grip on a flute, harp or bodhran, and those same hands adjusting his posture so that the air flowed properly as he took a breath to sing.

He yawned.

Uncle Ambarussa teaching him how to shoot a bow and arrow; followed quickly by how to retrieve an arrow from someone’s tent and patch up the hole without anybody noticing.

Uncle Matimo teaching him serati, because that was how his father and uncles had learned their reading and writing; focusing on the history before the function.

It had forced them, as it had forced Liltafinwë, to teach themselves tengwar if they wanted to read Fëanáro’s script. Then Uncle Matimo had taught him a chaser of Doriathrin Cirth, because you never knew when the Þindar of Doriath would try and sneak messages past you written in Daeron’s script.

His eyes grew heavy.

His father teaching him the speech of animals. How to track, hunt and survive in the wilderness.

C…calligraphy.

His body relaxed into the crook of Tyelkormo’s arm.

Uncle Moryo’s history lessons that nearly always dissolved into equally educational arguments with the nearest brother over various historical inaccuracies.

Of the Þerindë, and why he should not listen to the mantra of other Noldor that women were somehow lesser beings by virtue of what resided in their braes.

Not when all of his father's men had abandoned him at Nargothrond,but not his father's women, making the army all the stronger for it.

Philosophy…which had always resulted in as many arguments as his history lessons.

Secretly being taught broidery by Uncle Moryo who always seemed so embarrassed…

Star gazing with Uncle Kana.

Constellations.

Bright stars blazing in unique formations.

He barely felt the warm kisses pressed to his forehead as he fell back asleep.

 

Part Two.

Warning: Character death and violence

Read Part Two.

 

“Wake up dreamer,” his father called him from the depths of sleep. He was warm but the steady heartbeat beneath his ear was gone. He sat up sharply, looking around and saw his father at the foot of the bedding, the partition screen pushed back and Lilta’s bedding already packed away in a neatly folded pile.

It was the dim light of pre-dawn, but a Noldorin lamp-stone glowed softly and illuminated the tent perfectly.

His father’s armour was out, shining silver and glorious on its stand. Liltafinwë stared into the empty eye-sockets of the helm, with its brow ridges engraved with the leaves of Teleperion, and felt dread come over him.

“Don’t go,” he said before he could stop his mouth.

“I am right here little dancer,” his father chuckled, testing his gauntlets. “Ah I cannot wear my ring with these.”

His father shook off the gauntlet and went to his jewel casket, opening it and rummaging until he pulled out a chain.

His father wore many rings, he liked them, but the one that never left his hands was a brilliant signet ring where triangular pieces of ruby, diamond and yellow and blue sapphires made up a mosaic of a sixteen pointed star. It had been King Finwë’s, passed to Tyelkormo when he had come of age, as all his grandsons had been passed a ring that had been in the King’s possession and bore his device.

“You do not wear gauntlets, you shall wear this for me and keep it safe from any looters,” his father declared, and let the ring thump onto Liltafinwë’s chest, the chain dragging against Lilta’s neck with the weight.

Lilta picked up the ring with shaking fingers, turning the priceless piece over with his fingers and watching the mosaic flash as though the star within it were made of fire.

The tent's privacy curtain rustled as Hlusseré made her way from the outside world, pushing into the warm bubble of light inside the tent.

Hurriedly Liltafinwë tucked the ring into his night shirt and wriggled from the bedding.

“I knew food would get you out of bed,” his father laughed and joined him at the small table, taking the covers off the two bowls of porridge, and taking the other necessaries from Hlusserë so she could whisk back out of the tent and back to her duties.

Liltafinwë poured the thin milk over his bowl and then poked at it with his spoon. His stomach was aching, a low grind like there was a weight inside it pressing it into the other organs.

“What’s wrong?” His father paused in the middle of pouring honey over his bowl.

“Feel sick,” he muttered.

Tyelkormo watched him, eyes thoughtful then tugged over the small bowl of dried fruit brought in with their breakfast. “You have all the berries then,” he sprinkled them over Liltafinwë’s porridge.

Liltafinwë swallowed, unease back. His father’s temper was famous, but Liltafinwë had never experienced it directly. He viewed it usually at a distance, and Uncle Moryo had once commented that watching Tyelkormo not lose his temper around Liltafinwë was like watching a cat traverse over white hot metal.

But if there was one thing they did argue over, it was who got the most of the blueberries when they were in season. Or dried blueberries when they were not.

His father was eyeballing him, wondering what was wrong now.

“I don’t think having all the berries is going to help,” he managed gamely.

“You have to eat,” his father said firmly, “you can’t go into battle on an empty stomach.”

Liltafinwë sighed and dug in. After a few spoonfulls the tightness in his gut eased and he ate with greater speed and pleasure.

“I think the oats might be slightly off,” he said, halfway through his bowl, “they taste slightly bitter.”

His father wrinkled his nose and ate his next spoonful of porridge slower.

“It might be the type of oat,” Tyelkormo suggested after a moment, “we finished the last of the bags from Hithlum last week. I don’t know where these oats come from.”

“Maybe that,” Liltafinwë chased a berry across his bowl with his spoon, ran the poor thing down and devoured his victim. He finished his breakfast and stretched, yawning. He felt full and warm, the anxiety gone.

Hlusserë had reappeared, as was her efficient way, and was laying out his clothing. He washed his face and shoulders, let her help him comb and braid his hair back then dressed himself. The clothing was warm, winter ware that was good for long travel.

He hummed confusion, wondering where his padded jerkin was, then yawned again. He felt like crawling back into bed for another couple of hours. Just a couple.

“Still sleepy?” His father’s arms swooped around him and picked him up as though he was a babe again.

“Mmnf,” he managed and yawned.

His father sat down, Liltafinwë in his lap, and pressed his face against the crown of his head.

“I’m sorry,” his father said softly, “Liltafinwë one day I am sure you will be able to forgive me for this. But for now know I am so sorry of what I have done. I should not have let my temper and obsession for revenge get away on me. We could have waited fifteen years, twenty years, even thirty years. They could have kept the damn gemstone for that long. Forgive me for sundering us.”

“Father what do you mean?” he asked in confusion but it came out slurred. His tongue felt heavy and too big for his mouth.

His body had become an inconvenient weight, limbs dangling, and his breathing struggling to escape a slow, languid pattern.

His father pressed kisses over his forehead, his cheeks and just lightly against his mouth. There must be a hole in the tent, Liltafinwë thought, because there were raindrops hitting his face. Strange rain though.

It was warm.

“Take care of him,” his father said from a distance.

“He is the treasure of the House of Fëanor. We will guard him with our lives,” someone replied.

“I love you,” his father murmured against his ear, “Liltafinwë I love you. Don’t forget that,” and then Liltafinwë knew no more.

-

He managed to struggle awake, assisted by the great noise of people assembling.

He was held in someone’s arms, not his father’s, no. Hlusserë’s brother Hunaiwë was holding him as carefully as if he was made of glass.

He could see his father, if blurry, standing by his horse and speaking to someone. Tyelkormo's army was arrayed before him, a pathway through their ranks so he could move through to his position at the head.

Hlusserë’s anxious face swam into view as he made a faint noise of protest. His father was dressed in his armour, a fearsome and awe-inspiring sight indeed. The last drops of the morning downpour clung to silver hair, and dripped down his father’s face. It glinted brightly on the protective metal plating before dripping off the edges onto the ground.

Lilta wanted to sleep but fought it, grunting at the effort.

“Shhh Gildor,” it felt so strange to hear his Þindarin epessë when he had only recently heard his real name from his father. It felt jarring…and there was a finality to the name. His father always claimed there was a latent sense of foresight in the family that manifested as a bad feeling in the stomach. Liltafinwë got that feeling as Hlusserë called him Gildor.

His father mounted his horse. Liltafinwë struggled to dry out to him; to tell him to stop, but managed only a miserable bleat of noise.

That was enough though, his father turned and Liltafinwë saw the way his legs tensed, muscles bunching to turn the horse around and ride back to them. But then with a roaring in his ears, Liltafinwë’s eyes slid shut against his will, that bitter taste from the porridge thick upon his tongue.

Next he opened his father was riding down the line of waiting soldiers, back held straight and proud. He did not look back.

The drugs finally won and that was the last time Lilta saw his father.

-

There was a pattern to his non-life: Waking, being fed and tasting more of that bitterness. Being too weak to resist swallowing the bitterness. Sleeping.

“How long has it been? When will we hear news?” someone asked over him.

But he fell asleep before he could hear the answer to either of those questions.

-

A sword slammed through his chest.

Tyelkormo gasped, breath driven out of him.

Oh Dior was clever, leading him here into this water garden with its mirrored mosaics. The light saturating the air had blinded Turkafinwë’s light sensitive eyes, giving Dior the chance, as Celegorm stumbled blindly, to rip the armour from his chest with magic.

“My mother taught me well,” Dior laughed into his face.

“Too well,” Tyelkormo coughed blood into Dior’s triumphant face and tasted the ultimate victory in the sweet, futile resistance of wind-pipe and spine against Fëanárion steel.

Dior’s head tipped from his body into Tyelkormo’s waiting hand and the body against his slumped away.

Such a lovely face, Tyelkormo thought dizzily, just like the mother’s.

Why had he not recognised him earlier? If Tyelkormo had known the identity of the anonymous youth he’d trysted with on the banks of an unnamed river, he would have slit Dior’s throat right then and there.

Thoughts of Luthien, her dark hair and darker smile drifted forwards. Her laughter in the woods when she had confessed to him, still thinking they were scouts, that the idea of dooming the Fëanorions to the void was titillating, enough to sooth her anger at her father for setting Beren this task.

Tyelkormo wondered if Beren had ever figured out Elu had set him such an impossible task to try and save him.

History would be written by the victors. They’d talk of Tyelkormo’s consuming fear of Luthien as a consuming passion. They’d not talk of how he spent many hours wondering if he should take up his dagger, or draw a mithril chain around her pretty neck and rid Arda of her.

Had no one considered the side effects of mixing maiar blood with eldar? Perhaps that was why Elu and Melian had only had the one child.

The black haired wraith witch, who had come drifting through the forest, and whom Curufin had fucking invited into Nargothrond.

This room was beautiful, Tyelkormo thought with his last gasping breaths, even light sensitive him could see that. He would have loved to have brought Liltafinwë here; would have loved to have seen the gold glow bright amongst the silver in his son’s cream coloured hair.

Lilta was starting to look so much like his father…

I don’t want to die, thought Turkafinwë Tyelkormo Fëanárion.

-

Liltafinwë woke up screaming.

 

Part Three.

Read Part Three.

The rain which had been a prelude the morning of his father’s departure, came back with extra as they crossed the border and made their way towards the house of Galadriel.

They moved amongst the early, broken refuges of Doriath. Liltafinwë, whose heart had disappeared from his chest overnight, found not an ounce of sympathy for them within himself.

Not when the world conspired to take his father from him.

Physically.

Mentally.

And now legally.

“Inglorion,” he repeated dully to Hlusserë. “She knows who my father is. Why must I call myself Inglorion?”

“The prince didn’t tell him,” someone whispered hoarsely at the back of their little caravan, and Hlusserë’s face twisted in horror.

Of course, he might have guessed, in time, at the truth. There were little clues; little nuggets of information scattered through his memories which he had discarded.

The smell of his mother’s grief had always been fir tree and white rose; the scent rising from a foreign white silk tunic with yellow sapphires around the neck which she said had come from Nargothrond.

But that had been when he had been young. And the smell of her own damask rose had pleased his nose more, and he had never thought much about the tunic. In time she did not take it out so often. In time she stopped weeping quietly when they were alone and she did not have to be strong for everyone.

In time…

In time his mother had …

She had disappeared. And his father had replaced her. Gildor had not minded, nor ever mourned this. Nothing had changed for him despite the switch over. His uncles continued to cherish him with an endless well of deep love, and his father's love had been a warm blanket to wrap around himself as he snuggled into Tyelkormo's arms during the bitterly cold nights in Himring.

He did not react outwardly to the news. He remained stiff and unmoving on his horse. Then he turned away from them all and would not speak for the rest of the day.

The day they reached his aunt’s house was especially heinous. As the lightening flashed and thunder roared, he pulled the seal furs he wore tighter around his body. The rain was beating against him like fists.

He remembered how his father had taken him away when the hunters had gone sealing, not liking their methods. But ever practical he had still taken the offerings of fur, and the marvellous smoked silver of the furs had been complimented by the silk lining with bands of blue embroidered waves inside.

Quietly his father and uncle had wondered if it was cruelty to sew the ocean upon the skins of gentle creatures who would never return to it. Then shrugging Uncle Moryo had said that he had simply sewn what inspired him.

Anybody who thought princes could not, and should not sew, were clearly not friends of Uncle Moryo, not that he seemed to have many friends.

He said he had inherited the skill from his grandmother, and that he was not ashamed of what he could do with silk thread and cloth. Liltafinwë had never stopped to ask why people thought Caranthir should be ashamed.

His ears ached slightly from the weight of the earrings through them. Hlusserë had taken out the plain gold rings marching up the side of his ears, all six, and the ones through his lobes, and replaced them with heavier and more expensive jewellery.

A lot of it looked like it had come from Uncle Moryo’s cache of dwarrow tax pieces.

His observation was correct.

And that was how he had discovered that the news had come down the line that his uncle was dead.

Who else was gone?

Did it matter?

No one mattered after his father. They were drops into an overflowing bucket.

Or so he had thought, steeling himself for any more bad news, but the news of Caranthir’s dead hurt like a punch to his throat, and left him wheezing and breathless.

But why the jewellery?

“We have to make sure she knows you are wealthy in your own right,” gentle Moicalócë explained, weaving mithril chains with hanging opal drops through his hair so they hung down like a diadem upon his forehead. She was his father’s accountant and she had always had a way of understanding Finwean minds that made her the go-to for translating the latest Fëanorion upset.

“She needs to know that if she turns you away, you do not care. She needs to know you are doing this as a favour to her. Not her to you.”

“I don’t understand.”

“The house of Arafinwë,” Moicalócë explained, “has exactly one member living in Middle Earth right now. Well two, you as well, but your Father denied her custody of you when she asked about you. She is alone, save for you.”

Father had kept him.

Father had wanted him as a son. Not as a replacement for a brother lost.

That was what Liltafinwë read into her words.

She wrapped a great necklace around his neck, loops and loops of diamonds upon segmented platinum.

Whispers started up when the caravan saw his tunic pulled back so his neck was well displayed in its garish glory. “Felagund adorned himself so.”

It was hard not to rip the necklace off.

“Did he?” he asked.

“Yes,” Moicalócë confirmed, “he preferred tunics that framed his neck, and he would adorn his throat with necklaces of great beauty and detail. It was a unique preference of his.”

Liltafinwë pulled a face then realised why she had adorned him so. He had to look like this faceless sire for his …aunt. Moicalócë was not as sure of their welcome as she had made herself sound.

They left most of the group to find accommodation and hostelry at a nearby inn, and Liltafinwë walked the distance to his aunt’s house with only three people, wise Moicalócë, loyal Hlusserë, and kind Hunaiwë.

Moicalócë knocked upon the door. There were words. Shouting. Someone ran for someone else and then he saw her for the first time.

She was… beautiful, tall and of course, she was proud.  She held herself almost in the same way as his father and uncles, but he could not feel anything about that. He did not know what to feel about her at all.

The lightening flashed about them, and the rain continued to fall. He glared in consternation, confused by her.

“Findaráto,” she breathed suddenly.

His throat caught and his back stiffened in outrage. Too late she realised her mistake but the damage was already done, and their relationship took a great deal of time to ever leave the awkward, frigid beginning of it.

-

News of the final death came five days later.

It was brought by one of the infamous female Lords who had found power beneath the star of Fëanor.

Sárómë rode into the town with no care for the Fëanorion stars blazing on her armour. Her beautiful face was further slashed, black lines of stitching crisscrossing the older scars. She cradled a sodden lump of silk in her arms.

Galadriel’s husband had words about the housing of one of the lords that had just attacked his home. Who had murdered his people. Hearing his grief, Liltafinwë felt a flicker of unease, for a first time, about Doriath.

“It is for Gildor,” he heard his aunt whisper, crouching behind her solar door to eavesdrop.

“Why is it for Gildor?”

“Because it is for Gildor she came!” snapped his aunt, “she shan’t be here long!”

Sárómë slept for three days, awoke on the fourth and presented him with three standards.

The first was her own, a black pine tree against a green background. The second was the standard of Prince Morafinwë, four black eight pointed stars on a scarlet background. The final one was of her own Prince Curufinwë, a white eight pointed star within another white eight pointed star upon a black background.

“What of my father?” he asked her.

“The gardens he went into after Dior were set alight,” she shook her head, “nothing has been recovered.”

She took his hand and kissed the ring finger. “I will return,” she promised, “when you are of age. And you will have my allegiance.”

Then she stood. Out of the door she walked that day, still as beautiful as a child’s doll beneath her scars; shining black hair, blue eyes and pink lips. He did not see her again, as promised, until he was of age.

Sárómë had fought in Alqualondë when her father tried to turn her back, and she had crossed the sea and watched swan ships blaze. She had lost her father, her two brothers, three male cousins and a nephew before finally Curufinwë had placed the standard of her family in her arms and pronounced her his Lord.

She was not the only lord to have such a history.

She and Hunaiwë of all his uncles followers had been brave and not stayed, unlike those cowards until their deaths, those traitorous people who deserved their fate. in Nargothrond.

Laureyávë arrived next. These female Lords of the Feanorions moved with impunity. They were fierce, feminine and fatal to those who underestimated them. This had been the downfall of many an enemy. Doriath had been no different.

But as always, people forgot of them in the aftermath. If they did not wear their armour they were not questioned by the border guards; people paid them no mind at all.

Sárómë had taken advantage of the confusion to ride in her armour, but Laureyávë was forced to adopt a dress for her travels.

She licked blood from her cracked lips, and watched his aunt from the corner of her eye. Laureyávë’s hair shone a lurid gold; brightly and cheerfully Vanyar gold. Her father had, had the honour of being the husband of Ingwë’s favourite niece, and her mother the dishonour of not being Ingwë’s favourite niece.

Shame-born Laureyávë had fought for a title at Fëanáro’s coming of age ceremonies and she had been triumphant. Never had she looked back at the spineless man who had abandoned her mother and her. Never had she bowed her head again to a Vanyar, or any with Vanyarin colouring.

She and his aunt sneered at each other, and moved around one another like predators.

She presented him with a missive from his uncles. Then she left, blowing a kiss at Celeborn who went almost puce in response.

The missive was nothing important. An official declaration of what he had already found out.

We love you, said the final line.

We love you. Be good for Cousin Artanis.

I will be good for you, he promised.

Linquemaril arrived a month after the war. Her patch was set at a jaunty angle across her face and her hair like Laureyávë’s, brilliant in the thin sunlight; it was Vanyarin gold thanks to a Vanyar grandmother

She would not enter the house, not that Liltafinwë though his aunt would let her in. Linquemaril's father had been Arafinwë’s lord, but he had NOT turned back, and so had sworn himself to Fëanáro. She had been her father’s only child to follow.

Upon her breast blazed the diamond and sapphire token of Arafinwë’s vassal lord. His aunt had pressed her hand against the doorframe when she saw it, whilst inside the house all the crockery began to vibrate.

Linquemaril brought Lavarrísë, his father's female lord, with her, tied to her waist in fact so she would not fall off. Scary and mighty Lavarrisë, who had been laid low by two arrows to the backs of her knees, and then a cutting blow to a tendon in her back. She had laid in the mud, barely alive, people running over her until Linquemaril had realised she lived.

There was no glory in war.

Liltafinwë found it very hard to not hate Moicalócë in the aftermath of this. Why did Moicalócë get her wife back? Why not Liltafinwë’s father? And Lavarrísë was one of his father’s lords. She was meant to fall before him!

“I failed,” said Lavarrísë to him, unable to look at him for shame. Her hair was limp against the pillows of the cot she lay in and seemed to have lost its oak-wood glow, almost like the mud she had nearly drowned in had come with her and merged with her mane.

She gave him his father’s gauntlet which she had recovered. An arrow strike had deformed the metal.

What sort of arrows had the damn Þindar been firing?!

It had lost its flexibility, the metal plating forced down where it had cut the top of the hand. Not deeply but enough to stain the metal.

The gripping leather across the palm had been completely ripped off as well. His father must have simply discarded it, finding he had a better grip with bare skin and more flexibility.

“He could have worn his ring after all,” Liltafinwë choked and fled.

The ring's weight pulled the chain tight against the back of his neck, and it leapt against his tunic with every step; a reminder for all he had lost.

Lavarrísë’s appearance, before she and Moicalócë disappeared together, broke the shock he lived in; smashing the cotton-wool wrapped world, he had been half drifting in, to pieces.

Nightmares pursued him. They were horrible things that would have him dry heaving by the end of the night, his sweat sodden, clammy skin burning under the touch of whoever came to assist him.

Then to make matters worse, Morohen, his father's other lord, arrived, with his Cuiviénen eyes like Tyelkormo’s. He came with a banner of silk that was completely untouched. It unfurled to reveal a compass rose.

“Commissioned by your father before he left. I picked it up from the merchant before I arrived. He wished for you to travel beneath something more than a star, for stars can burn out,” Morohen murmured, gaze far away. His cheek had been bisected and then sewn up. Half of his thick, black curls had been burnt away.

He brought Liltafinwë a final gift, a twisted, melted piece of metal that ended in a barely preserved tip, engravings of Teleperion’s leaf just visible, which identified it as his father’s word.

Without a word Morohen disappeared and a spate of unfortunate deaths occurred amongst the refugee population. They were all Lords and people of former high status who had encouraged Dior to deny the Fëanorions.

He saw Morohen once more during that reign of terror; the Lord came sliding like a shadow into Liltafinwë’s bedroom and pressed a bloody dagger into his hand. Then fey, fickle Morohen who had been born in Cuiviénen, died there, and had then been reborn in Valinor decided it was time for him to return to his birthplace.

“East,” said Hlusserë asked when Lilta, panicked, thought the Lord’s abstract words meant he had taken his life, “as far east as you can imagine, and then furthermore so, apparently. That is where he said he was going.”

“Why did he tell you that, and give me a scare?” Liltafinwë grumbled.

“He used to deliberately talk to your father that way to rile him up, he likely forgot you were not him,” Hlusserë stuck him with a pin. He had grown. They were letting his hems out.

The end of spring found him wrapped up in a blanket from his bed in the conservatory on the far side of the house, watching the late spring rain come down on the glass.

Ultimate victory…

Oh no. He thought. His stomach heaved.

Sweet resistance of windpipe and spine...

He bolted for the nearest pot plant and threw up.

Sweet resistance…

He heaved more.

…Fëanárion steel

Heaved again.

Footsteps at the doorway and then someone came towards him.

He gagged, spat and threw up some more because of the taste coating his mouth.

“Oh dear, get water,” Celeborn ordered someone else. His hands came and steadied Lilta’s shuddering body. Lilta sobbed, humiliated.

“Shh Gildor,” Celeborn’s hands massaged the tensing muscles of his back, “spit out what you can and take deep breaths.”

“You’re not telling me to try and fight it?” he croaked. That was what he heard all the time. He couldn’t! They did not realise he could not just see it but he felt it and he smelt it.

The blood on the dagger Morohen had given him was tacky, and hard to wash off his hands.

He gagged some more.

“I’m not stupid,” Celeborn continued to rub his back.

A maid came with water and Celeborn thanked her then dismissed her. Liltafinwë felt pathetically happy. He did not want anyone else to see this.

He drank the water.

A sword slammed through his chest…

He threw up water and bile.

“Aiyah,” Celeborn went back to bracing his body and rubbing his back. “This is why we do not have children during wartime. The mental bond between parents and their children is a profound one that we do not know much about.”

“You’re not denying my father then?” Liltafinwë spat out more bile.

“I can’t exactly deny it. He took you and raised you from birth. He managed to replace the bond between you and my brother-in-law. I am aware that with…current events, people do not want to think about bright martyred Finrod Felagund’s son loving the Fëanorions. But I can’t deny what is happening in my own household.”

He sounded utterly bitter about it. Lilta felt a pang of shame for he had caused a great deal of upset to their lives. They hadn’t had to take him in. Honestly if he had been them he’d likely have tossed his arse out by now.

Lilta hiccupped and managed to drink a glass of water without it returning.

Celeborn held him against his chest until the final shudders left him. His heart beat was a steady thud but did not sound like Tyelkormo’s at all. But maybe that was for the best.

“Gildor I know you have not been happy since you have arrived here, as is natural with your grief,” Celeborn said quietly, “and with … well I know you have not met the most inclusive people. I am sorry that you have had to put up with the slurs that you have.”

Bastard. Liltafinwë had never been called the word until he had arrived here. His father had jokingly called him his love-child once or twice, and he had known his parents were not married. He had not realised there was a stigma though. He had been protected, wrapped up in silk like his father had wanted, raised in an almost fantasy world where your birth status did not matter.

“Your aunt and I are thinking of leaving the town for a while, there is a lake a few days travel from here, we sometimes camp there. Would you like to come with us and escape awhile?”

“Aren’t you needed here to help with the refugees?” Liltafinwë asked.

“Someone else will be taking over while we get away, this is for my health as much as yours. Alatariel’s orders.”

“I am sorry,” Liltafinwë said though he wasn’t sure what he was sorry for.

“I am sorry as well,” Celeborn moved, very hesitantly, and pressed a dry kiss to his forehead. “Gildor will you allow Alatariel to look into your mind tonight and quiet the nightmares?”

“…alright,” Liltafinwë murmured.

“Good lad,” Celeborn squeezed his shoulders and gently released him. Liltafinwë rose to his feet, unsteady. The ring on its chain knocked against his muscles in a steady thump. He had not worn it outside of his clothing since his aunt had seen it. She had ordered him to turn it over so she could lock it away for safety, and he had refused, sensing he would not see it again if he did. Their argument had been... loud.

“I am sorry I am a burden to you both,” he said suddenly, “I’ve brought nothing but trouble. And I cause nothing but trouble.”

“You cannot help being what you are,” Celeborn said, “and you are not trouble before you misinterpret me,” he added swiftly, seeing the storm close in on Gildor’s face.

“But you are a Finwean by blood and a Fëanorion by your raising,” he shrugged an eloquent shoulder. “What do people expect from you? Not a single line of Finwë has ever been a roll over.”

Liltafinwë bit down all mentions of Arafinwë with such thoroughness he deserved a commendation for it.

Above them the rain was picking up and it made a completely different noise on glass than on canvas.

Celeborn’s hair was the wrong silver, too strong and undiluted. There was not a strand of cream colour to break up the metallic gleam of it.

“Come along lad,” Celeborn held out his hand. He did not smile hopefully. But he looked him in the eyes and saw beyond Liltafinwë’s anger at the world and his grief. Liltafinwë hesitated.

“Gildor?” Celeborn coaxed.

No more Lilta, Liltafinwë thought, no more ‘little dancer’, no more ‘my star’, no more ‘darling son’ when I am in trouble.

He took Celeborn’s hand and let him lead him out of the conservatory, the sound of rain growing muffled by the thick roof of his aunt’s house.