Quenta Narquelion by bunn

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The Battle of the Twilight Pools

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Though the northern sky over Thargelion and East Beleriand was dark with the mirk of Angband, today, in what passed for spring in Ossiriand, dim light was filtering through the cloud.

Maedhros’s people riding down from Belegost had been helping their dwarven allies clear orcs from the slopes of Mount Dolmed yet again. Or at least, they had assisted against those that were above the ground, coming down on them on horseback like thunder, driving them shrieking into their holes. The dwarves needed no Elvish help with orcs underground, so the Noldor left them to finish those that had begun making tunnels in the mountainside, and rode south.

Maedhros had brought half his full strength, all that he could mount and arm. They still did not have enough trained and proven horses for the entire company, but in a few more years they would do. The stables of Belegost were full now, with far more tall warhorses than they had been designed to hold, and extra stables had been built.

The company reclaimed the dwarf-bridge that led over the river south into Ossiriand from a group of mountain-trolls that had set up camp near the river Ascar.  It was the third time they had cleared trolls from that same bridge. Then they crossed the Ascar, and later the Thalos and went on south, to the swift river Legolin.

It was rare, now, that the patrols south and west into Ossiriand encountered anyone but orcs and trolls: most of the Elves who had lived there in happier days were dead, enslaved, or had already fled east of the mountains. But Ossiriand, being far south, away from Angband, was not yet as dark as Thargelion. The Shepherds of the Trees who once had come to Beren’s aid against the Dwarves of Nogrod had fled the darkness, moving east across the mountains into the wide unknown lands beyond, but there were still a few Elves left, clinging on among the darkened woods, in the foothills of the Ered Luin where the sun peered over the mountains and in the far south where once Lúthien had lived, where still orcs were reluctant to walk.

The Green-elves did not speak to the Noldor, if they could avoid it; not since the attack on Doriath. But there were signs, sometimes, of where they had dug for roots, or cut the bark of trees to drink the sap. The Green-elves of Ossiriand did not eat the meat of birds or animals, and in happier days they had not needed to: the forests had provided honey, nuts and fruit in plenty.

“We’ll make a fire,” Maedhros said, raising his voice a little so the order would be heard. “It will attract eyes, and very likely worse things too, but we are here to make a point. We might as well make it brightly. Water the horses first, then make a fire on the hilltop. If we have to retreat into the woods, we will. But for now, we pitch our banners and put them where the fire will shine on them.”

“I take it we aren’t planning to sleep tonight then,” Elrond said. He was hunched a little on the horse’s back, and looked tired. It had been a long day already.

“Sleep if you need to,” Maglor said, dismounting and leading his horse down the riverbank to drink. “We’ll wake you when the attack comes.”

“If you can manage it, so can I,” Elrond said crossly. He slid down from his horse’s back.

Maglor opened his mouth and then closed it again, plainly thinking better of whatever he had had been going to say.

Elrond paused and looked apologetic. “Sorry. It’s just...Elros isn’t here. It feels strange. As if there is a space where he should be saying things and he’s not...” he gestured vaguely. “I’ll get used to it.”

“How are things on Balar?” Maglor asked, looking warily out over the darkened water with one hand on his sword hilt as his horse drank noisily. They had not seen any of the giant water-beasts in the rivers that came down from the Ered Luin, yet.

“Busy. Last time we spoke he was called away to deal with some problem about fish. The time before that, it was some argument over plumbing. I don’t think Elros knows any more about plumbing than I do.”

“Water engineering is another field where you should both have had at least a basic introduction,” Maglor said, looking guilty. “My father would be appalled.”   

Fëanor thought this a little unjust.  Water engineering was an important field, and Elrond and his brother had been very able children, but one could not learn every important field at once. When Maglor had been Elrond’s age, he would have been well able to design a fountain or mend a drainage system, but he had been nowhere near to Elrond’s match with a sword.

For that matter, Amrod and Amras had never built a fountain. Something of an oversight, but it was far too late to worry about it now. Eventually their grandparents had given up asking about it anyway. Possibly Maglor had not noticed: he had been away journeying with Maedhros around that time.  

But Maglor had never been a father, and as usual with Maglor, once a problem could not be ignored completely, it bothered him excessively.  Nerdanel had always said he got that from Fëanor, and probably it was true.

Now he was fretting about what Turgon might say.  Fëanor was inclined to think that if Turgon in the Halls of Mandos was thinking of his great-grandchildren at all, he was probably simply glad that they were still alive and not thralls of the Enemy.

“I’ve missed out so many things. I should have made a list!” Maglor said, which might have made sense, if he had thought of it ten years previously. “I‘ll ask Saeldir to take you through the basics when we are next in Belegost.”

“Thank you,” Elrond said, his eyes bright with laughter. “I’d hate to feel my education lacked something compared with a century or so of the finest teaching in Tirion, despite war, orcs and the Black Enemy of All the World.”  

Elrond had a good deal of common sense for one so young.  Perhaps it was part of the Mannish heritage that had seen him and his brother grow so swiftly in both mind and body.  

Men had turned out to be quite startlingly unlike what Fëanor had expected from them. He had expected power-hungry usurpers.  He had not expected them to look so much like his own people. Nor to look on Elves with such a disconcerting wistful longing, nor to have such a hunger to learn the languages of the Elves.  Nor to grow so swiftly weary of the world in body and mind and pass beyond it, as the House of Hador had, as the Men of Bór did.  

As perhaps Fëanor’s own mother wished to do... It was probably best not to let himself fall into thoughts about that again.  Look to the future, Nerdanel had said, long ago, and though the future now did not seem bright, it was still wiser to look forward than vainly back.  He wondered if Elrond would weary of the world and go elsewhere, and if he would be able to if he wished it. He did not seem weary yet, but he was still young, even by the measure of the brief years of Men.

Maglor grinned ruefully at Elrond. “I tried, at least!” he said. “Surely there must be people from Gondolin and Nargothrond left on Balar who can help Elros fill in the gaps?”

“I think that may have been the problem. Gondolin, Nargothrond, Doriath and Hithlum, all with different views on what approach is best.”

“Ah, I see! I’m sure he will tackle the dispute bravely and get them working together, with time. I see why Gil-galad wanted help. I imagine that a plumber from Doriath might not be eager to listen to the High King of the Noldor.”

“At least it’s not quite so crowded there, now that they have started moving people east to the Baranduin. And he seems to be enjoying it, but...” Elrond hesitated. “He wondered if you might come with me to the people of Bór, next time he comes there?”

Maglor’s face closed. “I know. He asked Maedhros too. Maedhros thinks it a bad idea.” He began to lead his horse up the hill. Elrond scrambled after him.

“Elros didn’t know when he agreed to leave that you were going to vanish into Ossiriand! Would it help if we told you that you must be there, instead of asking if you would?”

“It was no help to Fingon,” Maglor said flatly.

“But Fingon was at Alqualondë,” Elrond argued, encouraging his tired reluctant horse up the slope. “Anyway, you can’t blame the doom of the Noldor for everything. Give Morgoth some credit as an adversary, he was one of the Valar, after all.”

“If Maedhros agrees to it then I will follow him, of course,” Maglor said, tethering his horse to a stake. “ I’m allowed to. But consider Elros’s position, even setting aside the doom of the Noldor. Elros is among friends on Balar. He will come to the Baranduin on a ship crewed by Círdan’s people.  Nobody will think well of him if he is seen to visit the sons of Fëanor.”

“But do you think it’s fair on him, when he wants to see you?” Elrond checked his horse’s feet carefully.

“I think you are the most argumentative of all hostages, and I would send you off at once to join Elros on Balar, if I thought there was any chance you would actually go!” Maglor said, half annoyed and half amused.

“You could tie me up and leave me by the Baranduin to be collected,” Elrond suggested cheerfully, beginning to rub the horse down.

Maglor had to laugh at that. “Do you think I could? I am not so confident,” he said, looking Elrond up and down. “You have become rather tall and strong. I might get hurt.”

“You’ll just have to put up with me, then,” Elrond said grinning.

* * * * *

 

They built a fire on the hilltop, where it would be visible right across the River Gelion, and set up the banners around it, wide-spaced to suggest greater numbers than they had. The silver stars of Fëanor glinted gold in the firelight, but they set the the banner that showed the niphredil flowers of Lúthien, for Elrond, in the centre.

Elros, on Balar, had begun to use the red spearheads of the House of Hador as his sign, but here in Ossiriand, the sign of Lúthien was more likely to be recognised, both by any Elves still lingering in the fading woods, and by the orcs of Morgoth. They were careful not to show the symbol publicly in Belegost, where the dwarves of Nogrod that Beren had slain had so many relatives, but here in the woods far from Nogrod and Belegost, it was a useful thing to carry.

The fire lit, they sat and waited for what would come, swords bare and shields close to hand, the horses tethered where they would be least at risk. But nothing happened.

“This is far too quiet,” Maglor said, fidgeting with his sword hilt. It had a loose wire on it he kept trying to tuck back into place. “There’s something wrong.”

“There’s always something wrong, this side of the mountains,” Maedhros said reasonably.

“Well, yes, of course. But to be precise; now and here, there’s something wrong. We’ve been up here for hours with a bright fire and banners you could see a league away even under all this murk. We’re showing the banner of Lúthien’s heirs, no less. We could not be more provocative, yet we’ve not drawn in so much as a goblin. I can’t believe they think we look too strong to tackle. Something is going on. What is it?”

Maedhros stepped a little away from the fire and looked out west over the valley of the Gelion, towards Beleriand. Nobody could see all the way across the wide miles of East Beleriand to the river Sirion, where Morgoth’s armies held Finarfin’s host from crossing, but usually, when they raided in this direction, flames and movement could be seen far away on the darkened plain. But not tonight. Beleriand might have lain at peace under a night of natural cloud, rather than the roils of smoke from Thangorodrim. Even Fëanor’s senses could detect little more than darkness.

“I hope it’s not...” Maedhros said, and stopped.

“What?” Maglor asked.

“I hope he’s not coming out to deal with Finarfin in person,” Maedhros said.

“Morgoth? Morgoth’s not brave enough to tackle a host that size. Is he?”

“I would have said not. Not unless he was forced to it. But you know, there have been rumours. And you are right. It is quiet.”

Elrond put his hand to his belt-pouch, and brought out the seeing stone that Maedhros had given him. Elros had taken the other to Balar with him, of course. “Shall we look?”

Maedhros looked down the dark hillside again, and at his sword, which showed only the faintest flicker of light along the edges. He looked at Fëanor’s spirit, out beyond the banners, as he had begun to do from time to time, though he did not speak.

Fëanor did not speak either. The living must not speak with the dead.  

Fëanor had known it since his father had explained it to him as a child. He had had to explain it in turn to each of his sons, as they grew old enough to learn about their grandmother.  

There had been seven children in Aman for whom death was not a distant and temporary theory, but a reality chosen and endured: a thing that was close and personal and permanent.  In all the long years of Fëanor’s life, his mother had never sent him any message.

He should not have spoken with Curufin, even in his dreams. It had done no good.

It still seemed hard, here on the other side of death.

Fëanor shook his head: he could do that, at least since Maedhros could not help but see him. He could not see any danger approaching either.

Maedhros shrugged and sheathed his sword. “Well, we are not doing anything useful standing here.” He sat down near the fire, pulled out the one seeing stone that was still his, and set it on the ground. Elrond set his stone next to it, and Fëanor drifted a little closer to look as Maedhros called the stones to life.  

The Vanyar host were camped on what had once been the Guarded Plain, north of Nargothrond. The seeing stones showed the camp, with its white banners under dark skies. The ground to the north of it was scarred with great burns, rent with deep ditches and pits, with the vast white bones of dragons strewn across it here and there. There was a sullen redness to the dark and heavy sky over Brethil, and warg-riders were attacking the guards on the northern border.

“Nothing unusual there,” Maedhros said. “Let us see if the stones will show us the host of the Noldor.”

The camp of the Noldor host spread both sides of the Andram Wall, north and south. Their first sight was of the southern camp, and that was as quiet as the camp of the Vanyar. But on the north side of the great hill-wall of the Andram, a desperate struggle was raging.

The northern flank of the camp bordered the place where the River Sirion spread out into wide swamps and fenlands, miles of them, filled with wide pools and low banks covered in tall reeds and groves of bog-willow.

It had been beautiful, once, filled with birds; the Twilight Pools of Sirion that shone in the starlight. It was not beautiful anymore.

The long ragged muddy edge where the broad waters came up to the drier land where the Noldor were encamped was filled with long low boats, beached everywhere across the mud, each with a savage dragon-head mounted at the bow. Around the boats, down into the mud and up through the Noldor camp, a savage and desperate battle was raging. Blood and mud were everywhere, and it was hard to tell who it was that was fighting lower on the shore, in the slime of the fens: all were covered in it.

“There’s Ulfang’s banner again,” Maglor said, frowning.

“Easterlings,” Maedhros said to Elrond. “That wolfshead sign, there on the biggest of the ships. That belongs to Lorgan’s people, the usurpers of Hithlum. They must have taken the boats down the Sirion to get past the Vanyar host. They have come up onto Finarfin’s northern flank to catch him by surprise.”

He moved a hand over the stones to direct them to look more towards the river, and now they could see the wide land-bridge across the river Sirion, and the towers that the sons of Fëanor had built there long ago, that now were held by Morgoth.

Out of the east, across the wide river, vast swarms of bats were whirling out of the darkened sky. The gates had opened, and out of them came a sortie of huge mountain-trolls, armed with monstrous stone clubs, and they were striding into the ranks of the Noldor, smashing them out of the way. Behind them, a great mass of heavily-armoured orcs armed with jagged swords came racing out to take advantage of the confusion they had caused.

“No Balrogs,” Maedhros said, considering. “That’s good news. And no sign of Morgoth himself, or his lieutenant Sauron, I am relieved to see.”

“Good news?” Elrond said, staring wide-eyed at the distant ghosts of desperate men and elves locked in combat.

“Finarfin will kill them all, eventually” Maedhros said, grimly confident. “See, they are closing the gates again, behind the orcs. They will not be going home. Their job is to do as much damage as possible to Finarfin’s host before they fall. The same goes for the Easterlings of Hithlum... although I suspect that the Easterlings don’t know it.”

“No, probably not, ” Maglor said. He saw Elrond’s questioning look and explained. “They have nowhere to retreat to. They are on the wrong side of the river and Finarfin’s host is between them and the Andram. I doubt they could take those boats back upstream against the current, even if they could get them launched again, and downstream, the river dives beneath the Andram Wall. They are all going to die.”

Maedhros nodded. “You can see they don’t have the numbers or the training to overcome a force that size. Look, they are already being pushed back into the water, on their west flank.”

“That’s horrific,” Elrond said, looking pale. “There are thousands of them. They aren’t orcs...”

“That’s war. They betrayed us, and enslaved your grandfather Tuor and his people,” Maedhros pointed out.

“Those men didn’t,” Elrond said. “Their grandfathers, their great-grandfathers... The Nirnaeth Arnoediad was almost eighty years ago. If they have come down from Hithlum, they were born there.”

“True. But I do not suppose Finarfin is concerned with that just at the moment.”

Maglor leaned forward, peering closely at the image. “Is that not Anairë, there by the tents?” he asked his brother. “I think it is, she is wearing Fingolfin’s colours...  They must have been taken by surprise, she has no helmet.  I had not realised she had come with Finarfin.  That is Galadriel with her, or I have never seen her fight.” Maedhros indicated the elf at Anairë’s side in the golden colours of Finarfin’s house, who was using a sword and shield with both expertise and enthusiasm.  “She had time to find a helmet.”

“ She would. She’s been at this far longer than poor aunt Anairë... You know, I never would have taken Anairë for a fighter.”

“Those who were eager to fight came with us to begin with,” Maedhros pointed out. “I was puzzled how Finarfin had raised so many.  He must have brought almost everyone who was left in Tirion and all the country round about.”

“Anairë is battling valiantly,” Maglor observed. “But the Men are savage fighters! See, they have run through a whole company there on the left, and are trying to break through to join with the trolls. Will they make it?”

“I say not. They are fighting uphill and the footing is bad,” Maedhros said. “They are strong though, and tall, that will help them on that ground. Taller than Ulfang and his people were, from the look of it... I suppose they have mingled with those of the Edain that could not escape from Hithlum. Some of them are yellow-haired.”

Elrond said unhappily, “Finarfin will not give them the chance to surrender?”

“I would not,” Maedhros said. “Prisoners are a complication that can prove costly, and apparent surrender can be used to mount a counter-attack. Finarfin might. He won’t have dealt with many escaped thralls with minds broken by Morgoth. When you have dealt with those who can do nothing but follow his will, like a needle following a magnet in the dark, accepting a surrender begins to seem like too much risk.”

Elrond looked at him. “Your brothers took you back,” he observed.

“Well,” Maglor began, taking a deep breath but Maedhros leant over and nudged him, almost smiling.

“My brothers are well known to have been extremely foolish,” he said. “And one person is a different affair to thousands of unknown Easterlings.  I am not sure many would choose to surrender. Morgoth tells his servants that we cannot be trusted, and are expert in torment, and since he is both himself, they not unreasonably suppose us to be similar.”

He leant forward over the small clear vision above the stones. “They are being driven back down onto the mud now. And... Oh!  I did not know Anairë knew how to call light like that!  She has been taking lessons from the Vanyar.  She is working with Galadriel, I think, there’s something about the style....  A small revenge taken for Fingolfin, and we can see better what is happening. That is the third of the trolls down, but the orcs have got out into the barracks-lines... I am not sure Finarfin will get the chance to take many prisoners, even if he wished it. This is not a formal battle-line drawn up in order, it’s a surprise attack in darkness. A few of them might get away, if they can swim.”

“It seems unfair,” Elrond said. “They can’t help who their fathers are.”

“Their grandmothers in Hithlum could not help it either,” Maglor said. “I wonder if they hope this attack will succeed or fail? It must have been a hard life, for the women and children who were left behind to the Easterlings, with no help to call on.”

Maglor never spoke now of the Sindarin girl he had met at the Feast of Reuniting, who had been lost in battle. A minor entanglement, Fëanor had thought it, at the time, swiftly over and forgotten. Their marriage had been brief, and there had been no children.

But now her face shone in Maglor’s mind so clearly that Maedhros, at least, could see it. Even Elrond must have caught a glimpse of her, reflected in the surface of Maglor’s mind, for he reached out and touched Maglor’s shoulder tentatively.

Maglor had never found her body.

“At least we know why the east is so quiet tonight,” Elrond said, at last, after a long pause, when they watched the Easterlings fight and die under the blades of Finarfin’s people in silence.

“Morgoth is trying to reduce his enemy’s numbers,” Maedhros said. “Just as he did with ours. Now I wish again that Finarfin was more bold. But at least Finarfin can call for reinforcements, if it comes to it. I hope he does not! Our chance to take the Silmarils will be small enough if Morgoth is confronting Finarfin and Ingwion and their hosts. If he comes out to battle Tulkas, Champion of the Valar, there will be no hope for us.”

“It seems unlikely to come up,” Elrond said. “Finarfin’s people and my great-great-grandmother are doing well on their own.” He was trying very hard to sound unreservedly cheerful about it.

“They are. And they are giving us a night off in the process, which makes a welcome change.” Maedhros’s attempt at sounding cheerful was more convincing than Elrond’s. “They have been sitting there for years looking mournfully at the Andram Gate as if staring at it will eventually wear holes in it, after all. It will do them good to get some practice in.”

“We have never tried making holes in a gate by staring at it.” Maglor said and laughed, a little harshly. “It might work. Why did we never think of it? We should have tried it on the gates of Angband.”

 

* * * * *

As Maedhros had predicted, Finarfin had the victory, and it was a decisive one, with fewer losses than their Enemy might have hoped. Some few of the Easterlings had thrown down their weapons, once the orcs were all dead, and were taken prisoner after all.  That made Elrond smile in hope, and Maedhros too seemed cheered by it.

They sang as they rode back through the woods to Belegost, some of of Maglor’s songs from the long-ago victory of the Dagor Aglareb. A little group of Elves on horseback — laughably few compared with the forces that had followed Maedhros then, to the relief of Dorthonion, and to meet with Fingolfin’s armies out of Hithlum, when they had left their enemies slain upon the green fields of Ard-galen, under the very shadow of Thangorodrim.  

Fëanor would have sung with them, if he could have: Finarfin’s victory felt almost as if it were their own. When they came to the road that ran down towards Sarn Athrad, and saw an orc-troop marching south, on the other side of the river, Elrond caught Maedhros’s eye.

“Don’t you think they look as if they might cross the river?” Elrond suggested. In truth, the orcs had seen them and seemed disinclined to do anything of the kind. But they were within easy reach of the ford.

“It seems extremely likely,” Maedhros said, and there was a gleam in his eye. “Are you requesting aid on behalf of Ossiriand?”

“I think I am,” Elrond said, and laughed. “Or are you going to tell me it’s too dangerous for the Noldor to cross a river?” Maglor exclaimed in outrage, laughing back.

“I am not,” Maedhros said. “Where did you get the idea that I resemble my uncle Finarfin?” He pulled on his helmet, drew his sword, and urged his horse down the hill at a gallop, with the the others riding wild behind him.

They came to the ford and crashed across it, water flying from their horses’ feet, white in the gloom. If there was anything hiding in the waters of the Gelion this time, they crossed too swiftly for it to be aware of them. They fell upon the orcs in fury. The enemy had begun to run, but they were afoot, and could not hope to outrun the mounted, armoured elves.

Even so, it was not an unfair fight. The orcs were armoured too, and there were more of them, but as orcs will, they did not fight together as one, and would risk nothing to help each other. The Eldar killed fifteen before the rest got away, and Maedhros whistled the riders back before they could get too far from the ford.

* * * * *

 

“What will you do, if we win this war?” Elrond asked Maglor cheerfully, over the noon meal, back in Belegost.  “Would you stay in Middle-earth? It would be good to go over the mountains, perhaps, and explore all the way into the uttermost east.”

“I’ll think about it if it happens,” Maglor said, rather shortly. He pushed away his plate. “I think I shall go to bed. My leg hurts.” One of the orcs had nicked him on the thigh as it went down.

“Can I help?”

“Maedhros will help me if I need it, thank you. Don’t you have water engineering systems to look at with Saeldir?”

Elrond gave him a dubious look. “Water engineering systems? Really? You meant that?”

“Drainage and clean water are important, Elrond, ” Maglor said, tired.

“Well, I suppose so, but nobody builds cities any more.”

“You might, one day. I won’t get the chance, but you might. Please.” Elrond had spoken lightly, but Maglor sounded almost as if he was going to cry.

“All right! I’m going, I’m going... Have a good rest.” Elrond gave Maglor a worried look as he pushed back his chair and went off to find Saeldir.

 

* * * * *

 

Carnil was making a new pack, working the canvas with a curved needle and thin practiced fingers by the fire in the great hall when Elrond came and dropped a pile of papers onto a table and folded himself into a chair next to her.

“Is there something wrong with Maglor?” he asked her.  She was one of Maglor’s few remaining followers, owing her first allegiance to him, and only indirectly to Maedhros.  Not that that meant very much any more, but no doubt that was why Elrond had gone to her.

“Nothing more than the usual,” she said, and shrugged. “He was asleep when I looked in to see if he wanted anything, just now. He’ll be fine in the morning, I expect.”

“I didn’t mean to upset him. I thought, perhaps, thinking about something in the future other than Silmarils might help.” Elrond said, frowning. He shuffled the plans in front of him so that a rough diagram of Tirion’s aqueducts annotated in Saeldir’s confident hand-writing was on the top, and looked at it blankly.

“Too late for that, I fear.” Carnil wrapped the thread around neatly with practiced fingers, and cut it with a small knife.

“I can’t believe that,” Elrond said. He put down the pen and bit at his thumb instead. “How can it be too late? They are both alive still. The Valar have sent their hosts to help at last. It must be possible for them to heal. Or at least not get worse. There are enough orcs already.”

“They’ll never be what they were in Aman. Not after Doriath, and the Havens, above all.”

Elrond laughed without humour. “You can’t imagine I’ve forgotten that. I met all of you as murderers first, remember?”

“So you did.” Carnil said. “So why stay here? You should go to Balar with your brother. It’s where you belong. You need not trouble yourself about them and their Oath, there.”

“They are part of our family,” Elrond said sharply. “Elros’s and mine, no matter what. We can’t give up on them. We agreed that he would go to Balar, for Gil-galad and the Edain, and I would stay and try to keep them from their oath and the doom of the Noldor.”

“Whew,” Carnil said with surprised respect. “You got the short straw, there.”

“It was the long one, actually” Elrond told her. “Elros had to leave almost everyone he knew behind... I can’t abandon them to Morgoth and their oath. They’ll never not be murderers, but there is good left in them. It doesn’t have to be that everything worthwhile is in the past and lost beyond the Sea, no matter what the Eldar think.”

“And that’s the wisdom of Men, is it?” Carnil said looking doubtful.

“How would I know?” Elrond said. “I know nothing about the wisdom of Men.” He laughed suddenly, gesturing at the pile of plans. “And it seems I am not Noldor enough that I can understand a city drainage system either... But it seems to me that you can’t get out of a mess like this by lamenting the past, or trying to recreate it. I must press on, trying and hoping for some new way to open.”

“I never thought I’d think any of the sons of Fëanor lucky. Not since the Nirnaeth Arnoediad,” Carnil said a little wistfully. “But they are lucky in you.”

“I’m sorry, “ Elrond said, answering the thought and not the words. “You still have had no word, then?” Carnil’s wife in Valinor had been of the people of Finarfin, and had turned back with them to Tirion.

“I can feel she is there,” Carnil said unhappily. “It’s not so far to the Noldor host on the shores of Sirion. But nothing more than that she is there, and is alive. She doesn’t want a kinslaying wife, I expect. Who would? And I can’t decide if I want to beg for her forgiveness or hit her. She doesn’t understand. But then, how should she? I’ve been at war for so long... If I were new-come from Aman, and my lord had always made the wise and cautious choice, I too would not understand.”

“I don’t really understand either,” Elrond admitted. “But all I hear of Morgoth says that despair delights him, and he twists it to his own ends. Elros always says that neither Beren nor Lúthien would ever give up hope. I think he’s right.” He looked at Carnil, thoughtfully. “You knew the sons of Fëanor in Aman, didn’t you? What were they like?”

“I knew Maglor,” Carnil corrected him. “I only met the others later. I was a potter, not a lord.”

“I didn’t know that. I thought you were a soldier?”

“Not then. We did not have many soldiers, in Aman. No need for them, you see?”

“That seems so strange. But you knew Maglor?”

“A little, yes. I learned my trade in a village outside Tirion. I was apprenticed to my uncle. But I thought my pots were as good as anyone’s, and so I wrote to the lord Fëanor...”

“That sounds brave.”

“It was, a little — but it was the usual thing to do, to write to one of the House of Finwë. I was proud as Fëanor himself, and confident, and I wanted to set up a workshop in Tirion, and to do that, I needed a license from the King, and preferably, a patron. I wanted my patron to be the best. So I wrote, and he sent Maglor to see if the work was right.. I’m sorry, this is very dull.”  To Fëanor, it was less dull than amusing. It was true, he had been proud indeed, but he had not realised he had almost become a proverb for it.  

“It isn’t dull,” Elrond said, “It’s like hearing of a different world. Go on. Why did he send Maglor, in particular?”

“I don’t know. I think they all took a turn at it. They did all sorts of things. Water engineering too, I expect. The Tirion water systems were mostly designed by the King, their grandfather. There was a little plaque about it in the Square of the Fountains, I remember.”

“Were they? Oh, I see!” Elrond said, looking as if light had suddenly shone into darkness. “So what happened when Maglor came to see your work?”

“He liked it. He took a jug away to show his father. And so I got my license and my patron, as I’d hoped. But you wanted to know what he was like. Everyone in my village knew exactly who he was, both as prince and as a singer, of course. He was was very charming about that, and said all the right things to everyone. Very clever, very impressive, he was. They all were, or so the word went, brilliant, persuasive, proud... Maglor was all I’d expected. But then, when I had the workshop in Tirion and was getting ready to open, he came there quietly on his own, to make sure I had the things I needed.”

She folded the canvas over neatly and began stitching from the other side. “I was unloading boxes, and he helped us carry them up the steps. I was so embarrassed. It was nice of him, and not as if there was anyone else there to be impressed. He came by a couple of times after that. He’d have a cup of tea with us and talk about music, or art, or how making pots for practical use is like and unlike sculpture... And then he came to my shop, for the opening. I suppose that might have been his duty, but I didn’t know many people in Tirion, then, and I was grateful. He brought his friends, introduced me to them all, and bought a teapot. I sold so many teapots on the strength of that... But then all the House of Fëanor went off to Formenos. The next time I saw them after that was when the Darkness had fallen. And after that, not so much need for pottery, and far more need for soldiers. I don’t suppose that tells you much about why he took the Oath, though. Or what he did afterwards.”

“It tells me he was kind,” Elrond said thoughtfully. “That hasn’t changed.”

“He’s a good friend, and a lord that people will follow and die for too. Maedhros, as well,” Carnil said, matter-of-fact. “If they weren’t, they’d be dead already. There’s a reason that it’s those two and Celebrimbor that are left, and it certainly isn’t caution.”

“No,” Elrond agreed. He thought about it. “Did Maglor carry a harp with him everywhere, then?”

Carnil raised an eyebrow, surprised. “No. Not in those days. He only started that after Doriath. But he would have had many harps in Aman, of course, and the big concert harps are far too large to carry about easily.”

“Of course,” Elrond said. He had probably never seen a harp that was not small enough to carry at a run. He shuffled the plans again, sighed and started to make notes. Carnil went on stitching canvas with practiced skill, every movement economical and expert, leaving Fëanor, lingering unseen and thinking of Tirion.  They had marched away without even looking back.