Maglor in the Middle by Dilly

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The powerful voice

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I

 

The baby elf stood up in his romper and took a deep breath, behind the bars of his bed. He frowned ; his voice rose, deep and powerful, which he modulated with his tiny hand, as if he were addressing an invisible audience.

"O torment of hunger

That is always harassing me...

Why ? Why ?

All my calls

Do they soar up in vain ?

For all I desire

Is my pretty bottle

Oh, my lovely bottle..."

Passing by, a redheaded teenager stuck a nursing bottle in his mouth to shut him up.

 

*

 

But an hour later, the baby's song resounded again in the Valinorian villa.

"Cruel ! is the will of the gods...

Up there in the sky,

They sent me this storm,

Terrible, which left me all wet.

O Brother ! Have mercy on me

In this shipwreck... that overwhelms me !"

The redheaded teenager returned ; he set about undoing the bottom of the romper and inspecting the nappies.

"Indeed, what a shipwreck !" he observed.

 

 

 

II

 

"I am lucky with my children," said Fëanor, who already had three, while Nerdanel was pregnant with a fourth. "They are all exceptionally precocious and endowed by nature like their father. Nelyafinwë is a prodigy of beauty, grace and eloquence. Kanafinwë has an exceptional voice, and could hardly hold his bottle when he was already singing operas. Turcafinwë is unusually strong, I have seen him lift anvils higher than he is."

"If you consider it a good thing..." replied Fingolfin, trying to keep calm.

"It's true that it's exhausting to deal with all these high potential children. Sometimes I envy you, not having this problem with yours."

Finwë's second son put his glass on the pedestal table, looking for a mental trick so as not to kill his half-brother on the spot.

"What a pretty little girl," said Fëanor, as if to drive the nail in.

The "little girl" in question, who had just entered, was wearing an embroidered dress, and her dark hair was styled in two thick braids, closed with yellow ribbons, on either side of her face with big blue eyes.

"It's not a little girl," Fingolfin corrected coldly. "It's my son."

"Are you sure ?"

" I know what I'm saying," replied Fingon's father, as Fingon began to climb a curtain behind him.

"At least it gives him something original..." concluded Fëanor. "Being ordinary is so boring."

"He's talking about me now ?" Fingolfin wondered inwardly.