We Cry The Same Tears by just_jenni

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Chapter 1

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1) Curufin

A messenger brought news of Aredhel's death which had occurred in Gondolin at her husband's hands.

I'm afraid I frightened the manservant who brought the dire news to me. I screamed, charged about the room like a madman on fire and threw things. I tossed him out the door before I would hit him, so lost was I in my rage.

It was three days ago yet I have not been able to calm myself. I cannot eat or sleep. My own guilt is welling in my throat like well-deserved bile and my anger will not diminish. I liken my grief to the untrained, wild black stallion that rears up in my stable, trying to smash everything in range. It is wilful, stubborn, enraged and on the verge of going mad.

I realize that recriminations will be of no use but the guilt I feel is worse than a sword thrust through my already pained gut. For I blame myself - I should have killed him when I had the chance - should have ended Eol's black, accursed life. I never should have let him go. Telling him to go home and not pursue Aredhel and Maeglin was the worst thing I could have done. Of course he did not heed my warning.

It is my fault she is dead.

The next night my brother came. No doubt he was in a similar mood to me but I could not yet abide to share my grief with anyone. I wanted to turn him away.

"Who is there?" I had asked the manservant when I heard sounds of his arrival.

"My lord, your brother Celegorm has come to see you." The servant's voice trembled no doubt with the fear I had instilled in him. For that I felt immensely guilty.

Turko was here. He loved her too, but not in the way that I did. No one knew how much I loved her. It was not proper for cousins to love each other that way in Noldorin society but we both held such disregard for the rules of society that we loved each other secretly and passionately when we were young, years and years ago.

I knew I should share my grief with Celegorm, my closest brother. My first inclination was to dismiss him and continue to grieve alone but deep within my spirit I knew that we needed to share our loss together, for he had been her good friend through difficult times and had loved her too.

"Let him in," I said.

2) Maeglin

Mother is dead.

She died from Father's poisoned spear that was meant for me.

He tried to kill me.

When he told everyone that he loved me more than she did I new it was a lie. He used me. He took me to the Naugrim to teach me metalcraft and forced me to make things for him.

Little did he know how much I enjoyed crafting and I now intend to use my gift to profit myself, here in Gondolin where I have wanted to come since Mother first told me about it.

Mother loved me more than he did, for I am Noldorin like her. My proper name is Lomion, not Maeglin as he called me.

What an ugly name.

But when I look in the mirror I see someone magnificent, like Uncle Turgon. I quite resemble him, not my ugly father. For that I am proud.

And Turgon's daughter Idril is something else. I have never seen anyone more beautiful, not even Mother. I shall have Idril for my own someday.

Turgon says that Eol will soon be put to death. For that I am happy. It is the right thing to do.

3) Turgon

I sit here in her bedroom watching her corpse as it lies in repose. I told her not to go. I tried to warn her but she was headstrong and would not listen. I tried then to make things easier for her, sending her with escorts, not knowing that they would become lost in the web of forest that lay in those accursed lands like a dark malevolence waiting to ensnare such a beautiful thing.

Oh, Aredhel.

And I have welcomed your son who is one of us now. I know not how you could have married such a dreadful man as Eol, but thank Eru his son is nothing like him.

Aredhel, my beloved sister, if only you had stayed with me in Gondolin and found yourself a nice lord from one of the many houses here - that would have made me so blissfully happy. To see you tamed and satisfied.

But more importantly you would have been safe and not lying here upon your death bed. I shall cry many more tears over your beautiful figure, clad as always in your favourite white and silver, as beautiful in death as you were in life, before they come to take you away.

Farewell, my dear sister whose life has ended too soon.

In this moment I remember also my Elenwe, who fell during the crossing of the Helcaraxe and drowned. The pain of her loss was so acutely felt that I remember it now as painfully as if it had happened anew.

You are so still and quiet, Aredhel, your restlessness finally settled into a quiet I never knew from you in life. I have never seen you look so peaceful.

I have many regrets about the loved ones in my life. Elenwe and Aredhel, wife and sister, but I also regret that I never again saw my beloved cousin Finrod after I left him for the Vale of Tumladen.

I must tarry here no longer. My grieving has not yet stopped, but I must go and make your husband pay for what he has done with his own life. It is the right thing to do.

I kiss Aredhel's fine white brow and with one last touch of my hand to hers I will take leave to go to avenge her untimely death.