Silver by ingoldamn

Chapter 1

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Everyone suffers cruelty in their lives. It is one of the many unspoken truths of the world. Sometimes people are born in tragedy, like Maeglin of Gondolin, and sometimes people manage to avoid it for most of their lives, like Lúthien of Doriath, but no matter what, cruelty always catches up with you. Maeglin was thrown from the walls of the city he betrayed and Lúthien lost the Man she loved.

Cruelty cannot be avoided, whether deserved or not.

Tyelperinquar knows this better than most people. Has often been the victim of cruelty, of malice, or seen others suffer in like manner.

He did, after all, grow up with his father and his grand-father and his uncles; all of them cold and cruel, brimming, it seemed, with the need to hurt others. Sometimes when they got tired of hurting each other, they would turn on him with their sharp tongues and their cold, silver eyes.

(The family eyes, his grandmother used to call them with a fond smile).

For years, even long after their deaths, he cannot look at himself in the mirror - he looks too much like his father, like his grandfather, with dark hair and eyes like liquid silver.

(Silver. Always silver. Silver haunts his nightmares. He just about screamed when Narví first showed him mithril).

He speaks naught of it to anyone, thinking it too personal, too fleeting, to figurative, too inexplainable, until he sits as lord of his own realm, his family long gone, and a beautiful stranger comes to him.

The stranger is tall and fair, his hair a golden halo around his beautiful face, and Tyelperinquar is instantly taken with him.

Annatar, the stranger calls himself, the Lord of Gifts.

And gifts he brings, in the form of knowledge and teachings - it seems he knows everything. It makes Tyelperinquar wonder what made Ereinion and Elrond turn him away from Lindon, but he secretly he is glad of it.

Annatar is gentle, and Annatar is wise, and Annatar is so wholly unlike anyone who has every claimed to care for Tyelperinquar (save perhaps his mother), that he can hardly be blamed for so freely giving away his heart and soul.

(Annatar's hair is like spun gold, his skin is tanned from the sun. Annatar wears only red and green and gold. For the first time since crossing the Sea, Tyelperinquar does not dream of silver every night).

With Annatar he feels safe, he feels loved and cherished, and he is suddenly free to remember, without fear of judgement.

He remembers how Maitimo had a talent for diplomacy, that none of his brothers had. Remembers how Maitimo would smile and say something kind, when it was in front of others, and then turn around immediately, once they were alone, and lash out. Unpredictable, Tyelperinquar says, he was unpredictable. And after Thangorodrim, he grew bitter as well. His fair countenance was ruined and he would not let anyone call him by his mother-name. 

(Annatar lets out a sigh that might have been a gentle laugh, when Tyelperinquar mentions Thangorodrim. He wonders, but forgets it, when Annatar pushes him back on the pillows and distracts him with hands and tongue and teeth).

Maitimo wanted to be loved, Tyelperinquar says. He wanted to be loved and adored, but the fear, the mistrust, the hatred he was met with, turned him against people, until he fought less for love of them and more for love of a long-dead father and an Oath that could not be foresworn.

(Even thinking of Maitimo, of his scarred face, is enough to make Tyelperinquar shiver, remembering the silver coronet on his red hair, and the silver necklace around his neck).

Tyelperinquar remembers Makalaurë, whose cruelty lay in subtlety, as everything about him was. Makalaurë's cruelty was in whispered rumours that spread from the servant's quarters to the kitchens to the market places and the people in the street, until someone's entire livelihood had been ruined, often over small or even imagined slights. No one ever suspected Makalurë, of course, for he was but a gentle poet with a gentle poet's hands and heart. But though he never spoke of the rumours or the mean-spirited songs being sung in the streets, Tyelperinquar knew it was Makalaurë who originated them. The truth was there in the little pleased smile on his pretty lips, whenever he heard of the result.

(Thinking of Makalaurë makes Tyelperinquar think of dark things; dark blue robes, dark brown hair, but also silver. Makalaurë wore his wedding band on his left hand, made for him by his wife. Silver, she said, to match his eyes).

Tyelperinquar remembers little of the Ambarussa. They had been pranksters, he recalls, from the fogs of his childhood. Barely older than himself. They had not been sophisticated, but then again, neither was their mother. After Losgar, of course, after Pityafinwë's death in the inferno, Telufinwë stopped speaking and he stopped laughing.

(None of the son of Fëanáro ever mentioned that night and Tyelperinquar learned to live with a sorrowfull silence that almost semed to shine like silver).

(Silver. Always, always silver).

He remembers Carnistir, who was the least cruel of the seven, whose death he mourns still. Carnistir was not cruel, really. He was cold, yes, and very pragmatic, but he was fair and could be kind, when he wanted to be. He was, Tyelperinquar adds, the most considerate of them all, the one most like Nerdanel.

(For once he thinks only fleetingly of silver. Carnistir wore blue and red and copper. Rarely silver).

Tyelperinquar whispers of his father's favourite brother, his own least-beloved uncle, crass and uncaring Tyelkormo. Tyelkormo's cruelty was wanting. He always wanted, wanted more food, more wine. Wanted to do as he wished without considering the consequences, and often did so. It was what led him to try and force Lúthien of Doriath to wed him against her will and what led him to follow his father across the Sea - he wanted new lands where he could gain new glory for himself. Tyelkormo wanted and wanted and wanted, to the point of self-destruction. Only Tyeplerinquar's father could calm him down and make him think.

(Uncle Tyelko's hair was golden, and his skin was tan, and his eyes were blue like the summersky, but his armour was silver and so was his sword).

Tyelperinquar saves his father for last.

(His father. His beautiful, frozen father).

He talks, slowly, hesitatingly, haltingly of his father. Curufinwë, he says, had always seemed to relish in his cruelty; relish in being self-serving and sly. His heart, Tyelperinquar says, was made of ice and shadow and freezing silver. 

(Tyelperinquar confesses that he hates working with silver because it reminds him of the cruel gleam in his father's eyes. Annatar does not laugh at this and Tyelperinquar is grateful).

Curufinwë was a great smith, of course, though not so great as his father nor so great as his son; his true talent was with words. Sometimes soft, sometimes harsh, but always always measured and with a hidden purpose; he always knew how to twist the truth to fit his every whim; he could convince anyone of anything, given enough time. He delighted in manipulation, in twisting people's minds to suit his own purpose, in ruining friendships and turning love to hate. He spun golden lies that made people follow him into the jaws of death and he would take pleasure in watching them die for him and his cause. It was no wonder, Tyelperinquar muses, that his mother had left him.

(Only Ingoldo could ever stand against him, with his gentle smile and his all-seeing eyes and never-ending patience - only from him did Curufinwë tolerate sweetness and truths and soft touches).

(Not a single day goes by where Tyelperinquar does not fear the capacity for cruelty that he has inherited from his father).

(Annatar listens quietly, stroking Tyelperinquar's hair, no judgement on his face. No silver gleam in his eyes).

('I think they broke me', Tyelperinquar whispers as they lie naked and spent together, and then repeats with more certainty, they broke me.

'You are not broken', murmurs Annatar against his skin, 'you are beautiful, strong.' He looks up and for a moment his eyes flash silver. It is gone so fast that Tyelperinquar is certain he dreamt it. 'Mine.'

'Yours', Tyelperinquar agrees).