Pieces of the Stars by Nibeneth

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Chapter 1

It would take Elrond many years to piece together the significance of the events directly following the sack of Sirion. At the time he only understood two things: playing the same mancala game with Elros and Osgardir the healer for hours on end, and the sound of Amras crying for his mother in the next room.

The clatter of glass mancala beads against the wooden game board made a steady rhythm over the shifting voices and footsteps outside. Strong aromas of mastic and poppy could not mask the odors of metal, sweat, and blood that clung to the invaders’ makeshift infirmary. Osgardir was relentlessly pleasant and engaging, reminding the boys whose turn it was and exclaiming at well-played moves. His attempts at distraction only added to the confusion of noise and smells, but in the endless round of game after game Elrond found stability in counting and dropping the beads— four, three, two, one, scoop, three, two, one, store —and anticipating his next move when Elros, like clockwork, took his turn at dropping and scooping the beads. No matter how a new game began, the rhythm stayed the same, and Elrond depended on it.

It was well past noon according to the sun, but everything since his confused, predawn awakening blurred together in his head.

It began with flurries of frantic activity, shouting and the creak of bowstrings. They are here! came the cries. They have come for the Jewel! My lady! There is no more time!

Mother was shaking and her hands were cold as she held Elrond and Elros close for as long as she could. She kissed their foreheads, leaving them wet with tears, and then hurried them into the arms of her handmaiden. “Run as far and as fast as you can, just keep them safe, please—”

They ran. But instead of taking them beyond the palisade, she stowed them in a linen closet off a little-used corridor. “Stay quiet! I will return when I can,” she whispered, and left them in the dark. She did not return.

The names of the sons of Fëanor had been curses in Mother’s mouth for as long as the twins could remember, and their minds offered up shadowy answers for the questions they had not had time to ask. Shapes passed across the crack of light under the door and they stayed as silent as fawns in the grass. It was a long time before the sounds of running and shouting began to subside, and longer still before they heard anyone approach their sanctuary. They tensed. Elrond felt Elros’ fingers wrap tightly around his own. Sharp, unfamiliar footsteps paused in front of the closet door.

“You’re a healer, how do you not have enough bandages?” A man, a stranger, aggravated.

A second, higher voice answered him. “He bled through my entire stock already!”

The knob turned, and Elrond and Elros winced in the blinding light that washed over them. Tense, they waited to be stolen away. But long seconds stretched out before them, and the figure in the doorway only stood still. Black-haired and wild-eyed, he towered over the boys in a crimson surcoat stained even deeper with fresh blood. The shadow of Mother’s past had become flesh. Maglor froze with one hand slightly extended toward the linens, but his wide, dark eyes were fixed upon Elrond and Elros.

“The sons of Elwing,” he whispered.

Elrond’s heart hammered in his chest. Elros squeezed his hand so tightly that he couldn’t feel his fingers. Maglor just stared, his momentum extinguished by the unexpected discovery.

“Linens, Maglor!” barked the short elf at his side. Maglor blinked, reached past Elrond and Elros, and gathered an armful of folded sheets.

“Come with me, young masters,” Maglor said in a carefully level voice. “I will not harm you. We’ll get this sorted out.”

What could they do but obey him? Silently and still holding tightly to the other’s hand, Elrond and Elros followed Maglor out of the closet, his follower bringing up the rear with another load of linens. They quickly lost track of time and distance in the disorder of the main hall—strange warriors in crimson and jingling mail, loud debate in Quenya-heavy jargon, the odor of dust and horses. They stood and waited and then were jostled along for a bit, only to stand and wait some more. Elrond did not dare let go of Elros’ hand for fear of sinking into a bottomless sea of crimson and steel and harsh voices. Eventually Maglor, accumulating a small crowd around him as he went, collected the boys and headed outside.

The smells of blood and smoke stained the sea air. Horses snorted and pawed at the ground. Weapons rattled. Maglor walked quickly, his eyes not on the path in front of him but on the pale gray sky. A pair of his followers hurried ahead of him with a heavily-bandaged man on a stretcher. When Maglor marched into the old barracks, he immediately parked Elrond and Elros on a bench just inside the door.

“Wait here. Don’t go anywhere.”

“What’s going on?” Elros asked, the first words either of them had spoken since the closet door clicked shut on them.

“There is too much! Just wait!” Maglor and his retinue were already halfway down the hall, leaving Elrond and Elros alone once again.

Elrond picked his nose. Elros chewed on the ends of his braids. Terse conversations filtered through the walls while they waited, counting bricks and swinging their feet. Only a few snatches made sense.

— sign of Ulmo’s favor! She must have—

— should have left already—

— cannot believe—

— damn fools, all of us—

— hate this. Everything—

— only option after Doriath—

— the Jewel—

Someone was crying elsewhere in the building. The awful, desperate sound made Elrond’s scalp crawl, and he bit the inside of his cheek and squeezed his eyes shut and tried to listen to the sound of his own heartbeat in his ears.

— damn bloody lunatics—

— fought like a bear. A wild animal. I don’t know if—

— be here soon—

— two little boys? They had no part in this, I hope—

— might as well face up to it—

“That is all I can do for now. He should sleep,” came the healer’s voice from very close. “If not right away, then after a few doses. Let me see to your other brother for a moment and then I’ll keep them occupied while you sort this out.”

Elrond and Elros kept waiting. The bench was hard and their feet dangled above the ground, and they fidgeted. The panels of golden light on the floor lengthened. The agonized weeping relented a little. When it faded into heavy, labored breathing, the healer emerged in search of the boys.

His name was Osgardir. He had a gentle voice and a small game board, and after everything that had happened, that was more than enough to make Elrond and Elros like him immediately even though he too wore the eight-pointed star. He led them into his infirmary and boosted them up at the end of the table where his medicines and tools were laid out. The game board had nine men’s morris on one side and mancala on the other. They chose mancala, and they played over and over, barely pausing between games. A commotion was building outside the infirmary—Maglor was arguing one position, and other voices contradicted him, but Elrond couldn’t make out what they were saying.

Another man lay passed-out on a cot behind a folding screen. He was so tall that his feet dangled off the cot, and he wore many bandages. His tangled red hair brushed the floor at the far end.

“That is Maglor’s elder brother, Lord Maedhros,” Osgardir said when he noticed the boys stealing furtive glances at him. “You need not fear him. I gave him medicine to make him sleep, otherwise he might run off and get more banged-up than he already is.”

Maglor and Maedhros—that was two, but Mother had said three of the sons of Fëanor remained, all of them pursuing the Jewel with a single-minded obsession. “Who is the third brother?” Elrond asked, and Osgardir looked surprised at the question.

“That is Amras,” he said. “The youngest. He is badly hurt, so I put him to bed next door where he’ll be more comfortable. But you need not worry about him either. Shall we start another game?”

They kept playing. Elrond had long since lost count of how many games they had played or what the tally was. He was counting and dropping glass beads almost by rote, and he didn’t care whether Elros bested him. More games started and finished, and after a time he began to hear Amras start to groan in pain once more.

Maglor came into the infirmary only infrequently and usually without purpose. He would stand in the doorway, stare at Maedhros or the boys for a moment, and then leave again without saying anything. The arguments outside continued until the sounds of Amras’ suffering climbed to a constant scrape that set every hair on end, and Maglor returned to the infirmary, this time with purpose.

“Your drugs are doing nothing for him!” he nearly shouted at Osgardir.

The healer frowned. “How much have you given him?”

“All of it!”

Osgardir stood with a rattle of his mail coat and pulled Maglor behind the folding screen. “How long since the last dose?”

“About an hour!”

“He should be asleep! I can do nothing but make it easier before—” a sharp brown eye peered out of the gap between the screen panels. “Little pitchers have big ears,” he muttered, and then their voices dropped to a register that Elrond couldn’t make out, no matter how hard he strained.

After a short discussion, the two men emerged. Wordlessly, Osgardir went to his medicine case and began mixing several different things together in a mug while Maglor stood by, tapping his fingers in a constant rhythm on his crossed arms. He waited and stared at the boys, then the healer, then his brother, and then Elrond and Elros for a moment longer.

“Thank you,” he said when Osgardir handed him the mug.

Osgardir did not look at him. “The faster he drinks it, the quicker it will be.”

Maglor hesitated, nodded once, and then departed.

Amras stopped crying a short time later.

Osgardir showed Elrond and Elros how to play nine men’s morris when their tolerance for mancala grew thin and the outside conversation once again had Elros chewing on his braids. Osgardir’s hand paused over the board, ready to place a red mancala bead to capture one of the blue ones, but even he could not block out what had almost devolved into a shouting match. Maglor had set up his headquarters in the abandoned barracks because the westernmost windows had an unobstructed view of the sea and sky, but so far he had only spent a lot of time staring at the horizon, finding nothing. His advisers had tolerated his inaction at first, but now they were losing patience.

“My lord, we cannot wait any longer, they will be upon us by dawn—”

“She has to come back! She’s up there, she knows where we are!”

“If she does not come back before nightfall, we will all be lost! We need to leave now!”

More voices joined in, and their words became indistinct as they moved down the hall. At the other end of the room, Maedhros stirred upon his cot, and Elrond went still.

“He’s no danger to little lambs,” Osgardir said gently. “Come along, Elrond, it’s your turn.”

They kept playing. The argument upstairs continued, and occasionally Maedhros moved a little. The light slanted downward through the windows, painting the room in gold and illuminating the red mancala beads like drops of fresh blood on the worn tabletop. It was a dream, not a nightmare exactly, but still Elrond hoped it would all go away, and that this red-and-gold unreality would dissipate like fog on the sea and he would wake up in his own bed, only a little disoriented. It remained, even when he bit the inside of his cheek in one last half-hearted attempt to wake himself up.

The infirmary door opened with a bang. Elrond, Elros, Osgardir, and even Maedhros all jumped. Maglor, grim-faced, stood in the doorway.

“We’re leaving, Osgardir,” he said. “Can my brother ride?”

“Does it look like it?” The healer stood and approached Maedhros’ bedside. “Between the blood loss and the drugs, he’s down. We can rig a sling if necessary.”

“That will have to do. Boys, come with me.”

Elros looked skeptical. “Where?”

“Somewhere safe.”

There was a heavy thump. Maedhros had rolled off his cot. He pushed himself up on his left hand, trembling and shaking his head like he was trying to clear something out of his ears. Osgardir moved immediately to help him back to bed.

“You said he was drugged!” said Maglor.

“My lord, hold still, you don’t want to have me stitch you up again.” Osgardir gripped his upper arm, and held firm even when he tried to pull away. “Let’s get back on the cot now and sleep it off.”

“No.”

“Stop. Fighting will only make it worse.”

“No!” He jerked free and lifted his shaggy head, facing Maglor with a surprisingly sharp look in his bleary eyes. “You will not take them anywhere!”

“I promise you, no harm will come to them,” Maglor said in a deliberately patient tone. “The High King’s host is nearly upon us. Since their mother has thus far not returned, the king will take them into his charge. We, however, need to leave now if we do not want to become ornaments on the king’s battlements.”

Maedhros let out a cracked laugh. “That is exactly what I want.”

“And the rest of our people? Even Osgardir?”

“Leave me out of whatever this is,” Osgardir said.

“You will not take them anywhere,” Maedhros repeated. He was shaking more violently now as he lurched to his feet and nearly fell, but he steadied himself on the table at his bedside. “I will not let you.”

“I don’t need your permission to leave them in the care of a suitable guardian!”

“Such altruism! Such generosity!” Faster than any of them could have predicted, he had crossed the room and seized a fistful of Maglor’s surcoat. Even wounded and medicated, he towered over his brother, and Osgardir clearly knew better than to try and get between them. “Disgusting! Abandoning them to whichever army finds them first, now that the Jewel is out of your reach!”

“The king is half a day ahead at his current pace—”

“I will not let you make that wager! You took them, now take responsibility for them!”

A wrinkle of skepticism appeared in Maglor’s forehead. “What would you have me do? Raise them as my own? For Eru’s sake, they don’t deserve that.”

“Figure something out,” Maedhros snapped. “I am your lord.”

Maglor said nothing.

Against the advice of Osgardir, Maglor, and his own squire Alagostor, Maedhros tied himself to his saddle and rode, hunched and gray-faced, at the head of the column that thundered forth from the ruined gates. The golden afternoon faded into a moist gray evening as they left the abandoned city behind, and Elrond looked back one final time from beneath Captain Hestedis’ cloak. Smoke still rose from the fire-smudged timbers and sooty stones jutted where shops and houses used to stand before all the walls had burned away. It was a place that Elrond knew but did not recognize.

He turned back around. Elros was looking at him from under Maglor’s cloak, pale and round-eyed.

“We must take the southern way!” Hestedis called to Maglor. “The western road will be impassable before we have time to clear it!”

“That adds too many days to the journey!” he called back. “And we must leave a route to send an envoy to the king!”

“You left it too late! We have no choice!”

Maglor stifled a curse. He raised one gloved fist and the host began a long, slow turn south as the light continued to fade and thick, heavy clouds obscured the rising moon. A fat raindrop hit Elrond in the eye and he retreated under Hestedis’ cloak once again. Before long, he was lost in the rhythm of hooves and jingling mail and his own heartbeat pounding in his ears.

Sandy marshland gave way to grass, and clumps of trees grew thicker and thicker until forest enveloped the road on either side. The rode for hours, making only one brief stop to shed their crimson surcoats and replace them with hoods and draped tunics that melted into the colors and textures of the woods.

They camped for the night but lit no fires. The moon was full but quickly retreated behind thick clouds, and it was so dark that Elrond had to walk with his hands outstretched in front of him.

“Get some sleep,” came Maglor’s voice. “Here. There’s a blanket on this soft grass. No, this way. There you are. There’s no telling how much longer we’ll need to travel before we can get you home, and you need to be well-rested.”

Elros started to sniffle, and then cry.

“What is it?”

“I need to pee!”

Maglor let out an exasperated huff. “No crying! Go behind this tree!”

Elros went behind the tree and his tears subsided to a soft hiccup. Elrond went after him, and then they both settled onto the blanket. Maglor tossed them another blanket. “Sleep. You’ll need it tomorrow.”

Elrond and Elros nestled under the blanket, but they did not sleep. The elven host moved through the trees with only the slightest whisper of their boots on the grass, and soon Elrond could make out their dark silhouettes against the pale birch bark behind them.

“I need a volunteer,” Maglor said quietly to the assembly. “Doubtless the High King will be searching for us and the princes. You will carry the message to him that the princes are safe in my custody, and that I will gladly deliver them to a location of his choosing. I ask no ransom.”

“Surely their return is worth clemency for our host!” someone said.

“Or the Jewel, if that remains you objective and not common banditry!” someone else said more bitterly, which elicited a murmur of controversy.

“I’ve given her ample time to make that trade, and the opportunity has passed,” Maglor snapped. “I will return them to their kin, and that will be the end of it!”

“I should have turned coat with Eliadis,” muttered the second speaker. Foliage rustled as they excused themselves from the circle.

“Just one volunteer,” Maglor reiterated. “I want the children’s safe return and nothing more. Who will carry this message?”

“I will.”

“Good. Leave by moonlight if the clouds clear up, otherwise by dawn.”

“Understood.”

Elrond and Elros lay still but awake through the night. Crickets sang, and when the moon shone through a break in the clouds, hoofbeats drummed on the loam as Maglor’s envoy departed. Maglor himself sat near the boys, motionless and watchful. The whites of his eyes were pale against the night, and Elrond looked away.

He could feel Elros’ heartbeat against his arm and feel the faint brush of his shallow breath. His eyes scanned the deep black sky as if searching for something they both suspected they would never see again.

Morning brought mist and the sound of distant, muffled thunder.

Elrond was to ride with Hestedis again. He didn’t like her. He wanted to ride with Osgardir instead, and suddenly it all bubbled up deep in his belly and came out in the form of a tantrum. He seemed to be watching from somewhere just above his body as he threw himself down, wailing and beating his fists against the ground and kicking and biting and screaming when anyone tried to touch him. A choking black cloud expanded behind his eyes and filled his head, and he did not know how long it was before he could take in a breath and not have it escape him in sobs. He lay, wheezing, and when he opened his eyes, it was to the sight of a pair of muddy black boots.

Maglor scooped him up under the armpits and lifted him to eye level in a single fluid movement. He was very tall: Elrond fell absolutely silent with his feet dangling in empty air.

“Enough,” Maglor said in a voice that was soft but stern. “Scream all you want under Gil-galad’s wing—you deserve it. But not here .” He gave Elrond a gentle shake. “Do you understand me? Do you ?”

Mute, Elrond nodded.

Maglor set him back on his feet. As planned, Elrond soon found himself back on the front of Hestedis’ saddle, and once more the column of riders set off into the wild.

Elrond would later learn that Osgardir had been occupied with Maedhros: replacing burst stitches, changing bandages that he’d bled through, arguing about the pace he was setting, forcing him to take food and water, and confiscating his hip flask every time he managed to steal it back. Despite the healer’s tenacity, Maedhros only continued to lead the host onward through rainfall and deepening shadows. They finally stopped along a riverbank to water the horses. The rain came down in sheets so heavy that it obscured the tops of the trees in gray. Maglor tried to herd the boys under some thick foliage, but it was too late: like the rest of the company, they were already soaked to the skin.

Maedhros was clearly unwell, no matter how much he tried to act otherwise. He hung grimly onto his pommel to stay upright, and when Maglor noticed, he called an extended halt. Sentries disappeared into the mist at his command.

They waited. The rain did not let up. Elrond, with water in his eyes, curled up into a motionless ball on the damp ground.

“Is there any word?” Maglor asked Hestedis.

“No sign of Hadlath yet. He should have made contact with the king by now.”

“There is no way to be sure.”

“No, unfortunately not.”

Maglor paused. He shifted his weight to the other foot. “Is there any talk of a great white bird…”

“Not since it happened.”

“Hmm.”

Elros wasn’t looking at them, but he had one ear turned toward their conversation as he sat with his knees drawn up to his chin. His normally chatty mouth was set in a grim line, and tendrils of wet hair clung to his face. Elros had always been Elrond’s mirror, but in this moment he looked much braver than Elrond felt.

Night fell again. The messenger still had not returned.

The rain let up, however, and Maglor located an acceptably dry patch of ground for the boys and their blankets. Everything was clammy.

“I’m cold,” Elrond said.

“We can’t light a fire here,” Maglor said simply, tossing his cloak over a branch to make a tent for Elrond and Elros. “Stay wrapped in those blankets. Wool will keep you warm even if your clothes are wet.”

Elrond wanted to throw off the blanket and continue to be cold out of some deep-seated petulance, but a seeping weariness soon overtook the urge. What would it accomplish? Would it send him back home? Would it erase what had already happened? Would it summon a white ship rolling in with the fog, accompanied by the light of his mother’s Jewel?

The chill and loneliness and darkness, however, were real and extremely present, so much that Elrond had trouble holding the fantasy in his mind. His world was shadows and doubt, wet blankets and a sore backside from endless hours on a horse.

Elros’ nose was running. He kept sniffing and wiping mucus on his sleeve. It was annoying, but at least he was there, the sole comfort and familiarity in this nightmare.

Nearby, what he had mistaken for a shaggy bush moved its head and revealed itself instead to be Maedhros’ hunched figure. Maglor crouched next to him.

“Tell me,” Maedhros muttered.

“It was quick,” Maglor said. “He took the cup from me, and slept, and then…”

“Only we remain.”

“Yes.”

Maedhros did not respond. Maglor, also silent, remained with him.

Elrond didn’t realize he had fallen asleep until he felt Maglor shaking him awake.

“We need to keep moving. Hustle up, now.”

It was still dark, and a light drizzle had started up again. Groggy, Elrond didn’t protest when he was boosted onto Hestedis’ saddle again, and he bobbed like a toy boat on top of the horse’s canter.

Something had gone terribly wrong, but neither Elrond nor Elros had words for their fears. Through the rain, the host continued deeper into the forest without waiting for the messenger any longer.

“I’m not hungry,” Elrond said, picking crumbs off the edge of the flatbread he’d been given.

“Irrelevant. I won’t have you wasting away before I deliver you to the king. Eat. You didn’t eat yesterday either.”

Elrond took an unenthusiastic bite under Maglor’s supervision. It tasted like sawdust. Elros hand dutifully eaten his portion already and had moved on to listlessly picking at blades of grass. With some difficulty, Elrond chewed and swallowed the bite, and at Maglor’s urging, he took another.

His body seemed to have stopped delivering normal sensations. The rain continued, but he felt neither wet nor cold. Voices were meaningless. The bread was nothing more than ash. All around him the forest was a painting in shades of gray. This overwhelming detachment somehow seemed safe, as if he were a toy placed on its shelf until after his lessons were over.

“Eat,” came Maglor’s voice, a shard in the thick softness that enveloped Elrond’s head.

“He’s picky,” Elros said.

“I don’t have anything else. Get some food in your belly or you’ll be grumpy later.”

“He’s already grumpy,” Elros pointed out.

Maglor sighed and rubbed his forehead. A burst of birdsong rang out through the treetops, and a tense silence fell over the company.

“Scatter!” Maglor hissed.

In the blink of an eye, his followers and their horses vanished into the trees. Maglor scooped up Elrond and Elros and whisked them along into the dense wood beyond the road. He stepped on rocks and fallen branches instead of soil where he could, darting between shadows until they came to the river. The water flowed swift and rough and the near bank was a steep drop. Maglor paused. He adjusted his grip on the boys and followed a path of chunky pebbles down to the edge of the river. Elrond instinctively grabbed Maglor’s shoulder when his right foot splashed at the shore, but Maglor simply ducked into a small, dry hollow that the springtime swells had carved out of the riverbank. He sat, furled his earth-colored cloak around the three of them, and clamped his arms tightly around Elrond and Elros on either side.

Elros’ brow crinkled. “Why are we—”

“Hush!”

Elros fell silent. He looked over at Elrond with renewed fear in his wide eyes.

They waited silently, but Elrond couldn’t guess what they waited for. It was the breath before a leap. Possibilities raced through his mind, but none seemed likely to make Maglor son of Fëanor afraid. And he was afraid. Elrond could feel it in the almost-painful grip on his shoulder.

The woods remained still. Raindrops pocked the surface of the river, which rushed on as always. A frog hopped near Elrond’s foot. Still nothing happened, but the quiet was like a fine glass that would drop at the slightest whisper.

It seemed to last a lifetime. The rain picked up, and Elrond could feel rivulets of water and soil rolling down his back from his sodden hair—his whole body tensed to keep from shivering. He glanced around, hoping to catch a glimpse of whatever they were hiding from, but he saw nothing. No, not quite nothing: he blinked and stared closer at a patch of greenery across the river. An elf crouched there, shrouded in a cloak and hood. His eyes followed a tall tree up to a sturdy branch where Hestedis roosted like a hawk. She had her bow in hand with an arrow already set to the string.

The forest shivered with approaching footsteps, numerous and heavy on the ground. Harsh words in rough voices cut through the mist. They became louder, closer, and soon a ripe stew of odors prickled Elrond’s nose: wet fur, unwashed bodies, matted hair, foul breath.

Orcs. All of Maglor’s haste and secrecy had not been enough.

An axe sank into a tree trunk with a spiteful thud. “Gah! These woods are thick with elf-stink!”

“Stragglers from Sirion.”

“Near enough for hunting,” a third orc said with relish, prompting hungry smacks from the other two, punctuated with weapon hafts thumping against the damp earth.

Elrond didn’t realize he was whimpering until Maglor’s hand clamped firmly over his mouth. He glanced at Elros. Maglor was covering his mouth as well, and the whites of his eyes shone all the way around in the gloom.

“No hunting!” bellowed a deep voice. “Not until the elf-king calls off his dogs!”

“Spoil-sports,” muttered the first orc.

“They want ‘em all to themselves, more like. Elf-scum hunt their own kind now.”

Bad-spirited laughter crackled among the trees and the rain. “And they think they’re better than us! That’s perfect!”

He didn’t know how many there were, only that the band of orcs was hungry for a fight, and that Maglor was afraid.

The creatures started hacking at trees and branches for firewood, and when they had enough they lit fires that smelled of burning grease. They were making themselves at home. One of them exclaimed loudly—there was a thunk of a weapon sinking into the ground, a squeal of a small animal, and then something that sounded like wet, open-mouthed chewing. Elrond gagged, swallowed, and then squeezed his eyes shut. If he strained hard enough, he could hear only the sound of his teeth grinding together in the back of his mouth. More branches fell to the orcish axes. It seemed like they were doing it for fun.

Their speech fluctuated between the common jargon and their own barking tongue. They spoke of being expelled from Sirion and what they planned to loot when they went back, and what they planned on doing to any elf that got in their way. Images of rusty knives at his throat and Elros struggling against gnarled, clawed hands forced their way back into Elrond’s mind.

“The elf-king thinks he can keep us out forever,” one of them chuckled.

“We’ll take what’s ours!”

“All of it!”

A great howling, shrieking whoop rose from the orcs. Bones and weapons and armor plates rattled and Maglor’s hand over his mouth was all that kept Elrond from screaming. His head felt about to burst from the packed-in terror and helplessness, so much that he shook with the effort of containing it.

Go away go away go away go away go away go away…

He could not help but keep up the desperate mantra in his mind. If he only listened to the river and rain, he could block out the animalistic growling coming from the slope above them, and he could almost pretend that he was safe at home and that none of this had ever happened, but the shouts cut through the water and flooded his ears and he had to push them out or he would scream and they would catch him and rend him and eat his flesh—

Go away go away go away go away go away go away go away go away go away go away go away go away—

“Elrond!”

He flinched and lashed out with both hands. Strong fingers tightened around his wrist.

Someone batted briskly at his cheek. “Elrond!”

He opened his eyes. Nothing made sense for one wild moment until he saw Elros’ face a few inches from his own and began to get his bearings again.

They were still in the hollow by the river, but it had stopped raining. Maglor was still holding his wrist. Elros had planted himself between Maglor and Elrond, and when Elrond didn’t speak he gave him another pat that was almost a slap. “Elrond! It’s all right! They’re gone!”

Elrond blinked. “What?”

“The orcs are gone!” Elros repeated, wide-eyed. “They packed up and left!”

A vague uneasiness settled into Elrond’s belly and he tugged his wrist free of Maglor’s hand. “How… long ago?”

“Long enough,” Maglor said. He stood and indicated the way back up the riverbank. “We need to get moving. These woods are still not safe.”

Elrond and Elros climbed up the rocky slope. The orcs’ camp was still there, complete with hacked wood and oily fires that still glowed with coals. They had left deep, misshapen footsteps in the mud and churned the grass into mulch. The uneasiness remained in Elrond like a missed stair as he looked around at the mess and how close they had been to it—how had they not been found?

Elros hovered almost protectively at his side with a look of stout determination on his face, and Maglor kept glancing back at him. Elrond turned to his brother. “What… happened?” he asked.

“You were shaking. You looked really ill,” Elros said. “You wouldn’t answer when I said your name.”

Elrond said nothing. He felt fine, if a little disoriented. One by one, elves in earth-colored cloaks appeared out of the bushes and dropped out of trees while others led horses out of the deep woods, whispering to them and stroking their noses. All of them walked quietly as if one wrong step would bring the orcs down on them once more.

Hestedis strode up to Maglor with her bow still in hand. “I said you left it too long. That was much too close.”

“Either way, it is done,” Maglor said.

“We need to leave.” Hestedis beckoned sharply at Elrond. “Come with me, boy.”

“His name is Elrond ,” Elros said, rolling his eyes. Hestedis frowned and opened her mouth to snap at him, but Maglor raised his hand.

“One moment, Hestedis. I’ll have a word with the princes while you round everyone up.”

Hestedis closed her mouth and gave him a grudging nod. She departed, and Maglor looked back at Elrond and Elros. He dropped to one knee to speak to them on their level.

“Listen to me,” he said. “With whatever free will I have left, I will get you home safely. The king will take you into his care and this wretched episode will be behind us at last. I am sorry that this is the best I can give you.” Without waiting for a response, he stood. His squire had come up with his horse, and he took the reins with a nod. “Now, we must go. There is still a long ride ahead.”

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