And They Looked Up and Saw a Star by grey_gazania

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Chapter 7

Within a week or so the boys were well again, though not before Maglor had learned how truly miserable being sick could be. The low point of the week was definitely the day that Elrond had vomited spectacularly right into Maglor’s lap, which had caused Elros to throw himself protectively across his brother’s body with a cry of, “Don’t hurt him! He didn’t mean to!”

 

“I’m not going to hurt either of you,” Maglor had reassured them, all the while trying not to breathe in the smell of vomit. “Even if Elrond had done it on purpose – which I know he did not – I wouldn’t hurt him. You are safe here. I have sworn it, and I never go back on my word.”

 

That was the problem, really, he couldn’t help thinking. He’d sworn a different oath long ago, sworn it for his father and grandfather’s sakes, and he would pursue it unto the ending of the world, no matter how heartsick it made him, because he never went back on his word. More than that, Maedhros never went back on his word, and Maglor would follow Maedhros to the ends of the earth.

 

He had failed his older brother once. He would not fail him again. 

 

Melloth, with her experience treating Mannish illnesses, was invaluable throughout the ordeal, and Maglor wished he had some way to reward her beyond simple verbal praise. But the remaining Sons of Fëanor had no treasures left to bestow. While they were rich in the loyalty of their people – apart, of course, from those traitors who had turned on them at Sirion – they were poor in resources; a single keep, with their people numbering less than two hundred now. They hunted, and fished, and farmed enough grain and herded enough sheep to keep themselves fed and clothed, but they had no gems, no jewels, no precious metals. Praise was the best he could offer.

 

“Do you get sick often?” Maglor asked the boys once they were on the mend, with more than a little trepidation. He hoped the answer would be no.

 

Elros shrugged. “Don’t know,” he said. “I don’t know how often is often. We get sick sometimes. Nana says – Nana said,” he corrected himself, his mouth twisting into a frown at the use of the past tense, “that it’s part of being half-elven.”

 

Full elves, Elros knew, did not get sick.

 

The upshot of the incident was that the boys had begun to soften slightly towards Maglor, who had barely left their sides while they were ill, and they had softened even more towards Melloth, whose gentle care and soothing demeanor had comforted them enormously. Maglor decided to count it as a small victory, a step in the right direction. Already he had grown fond of his tiny charges, thinking of them as his wards rather than his captives, and he was optimistic that they would eventually settle in and come to trust him.

 

It wasn’t as though they had any other options. Besides, they were still quite young, and young children were more easily molded. Someday, they would understand why they were here.

 

*************

 

“I’m going to start you on a new subject today,” Maglor said, once Elrond and Elros had recovered enough to return to their schooling.

 

“Quenya?” Elrond asked. He was still annoyed about the fact that Maglor wouldn’t teach them the High-Elven tongue, which the Sons of Fëanor and their people used so frequently. He had come to realize, however, that it wasn’t merely a case of talking over his and Elros’ heads. Many times, Maglor and the others didn’t even seem to realize that they had switched languages, and Ólloth had even apologized on occasion for leaving the twins out of her conversations with Nelmir and Arthoron.

 

“Not Quenya,” Maglor said. “But it is a new language. I’m going to teach you our sign language. It’s important that you be able to understand it, and it’s been highly useful for us. I think you’ll be staying with us for some time, so it’s best you start learning now.”

 

I think you’ll be staying with us for some time. That was one way to put it, Elrond thought sourly. There had been no messengers from the people of Sirion, from Círdan or Gil-galad, from Eärendil his father – assuming Eärendil was even back from the sea. No one had come to rescue them, or to parley, or even to give themselves up as a hostage in the twins’ place. It was a lonely feeling, knowing that your own people weren’t even trying to get you back.

 

That’s not fair, Elrond, Elros had said when Elrond confessed his feelings. Maedhros and Maglor would probably have any messenger or rescuer killed. They won’t give us up without their stupid Silmaril. That’s not Ada’s fault, nor Círdan or Gil-galad’s. If the jewel is lost in the ocean, there’s nothing any of them can do.

 

Elrond, though, couldn’t help the way he felt, and he felt abandoned and bereft.

 

“Are you paying attention, Elrond?” Maglor said, snapping Elrond’s attention back to the present.

 

“Yes,” Elrond lied.

 

Maglor gave him a look that was heavy with skepticism, but didn’t press the point. “I’m going to start by teaching you the finger alphabet,” he said, with the air of one who was repeating himself. “It’s simple, and it will let you spell words that you don’t know the signs for.”

 

Elros raised his hand and, when Maglor acknowledged him, asked, “Is it just the tengwar with our fingers?”

 

Maglor shook his head. “It doesn’t map exactly to the tengwar alphabet, no. Vowels and diphthongs each have their own signs.”

 

The language – Fëanorian Sign Language, as it was properly called – had been developed centuries ago by a linguist who had followed Amrod and Amras to Ossiriand. And, though Maglor had no intention of telling the boys this – at least, not yet – it had been developed specifically to give Galwen a way to communicate, for the injuries she’d sustained in the orc attack that had killed her family had left her mute, and she struggled greatly with trying to read or write. Its utility in other areas – especially hunting and war – meant that it had spread beyond Ossiriand and into the lands of Maglor and his other brothers.

 

Maglor thought his father would have been proud of Amrod and Amras, arranging for a problem to be solved with the clever and sustained application of linguistic principles.

 

Would he be proud of his eldest sons now, with their younger brothers slain and the Silmarils still out of their grasp? Maglor didn’t know, but the question haunted him and Maedhros both.

Chapter End Notes

For more about Fëanorian Sign Language, see my Chosen Exile series.

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