Scion of Kings by janeways

Chapter 2

Thank you all for your kind comments and for encouraging me to keep writing this!

To Maedhros, from Gil-galad.

‘Well, that’s something!’ Gil-galad thought. ‘Four whole words. Now I just need…several hundred more.’ Quill in hand, tip poised and at the ready, Gil stared hopefully at the parchment, as if by sheer force of will and a determined gaze, the paper might produce the right words out of ether. The page, having failed to be adequately intimidated, remained blank.

After a few moments, having failed to adequately intimidate the paper through sheer force of will into producing the right words out of ether, Gil-galad let out a deep-seated sigh. Slumping his shoulders back against his chair, he took his face in his hands and rubbed gently, considering his options. He was a king, for Eru’s sake, and by all reports not too shabby of one; he had negotiated countless treaties and council meetings. He had fought battles against enemies far more intimidating than an empty sheet of parchment.

“But the parchment isn’t really the enemy here, is it?” he asked himself.

The shadows had grown long as night fell over Lindon. Nightingales chirped in the low-hanging branches outside his window, the leaves softening the glow of the Fëanorian lamps that had slowly begun to light the dusk.  Rising to light a candle, Gil-galad resolved to return to the task at hand and begin writing this time, really, because he could not afford to pull another all-nighter this month, not at his age, and anyways, surely the pleasantries couldn’t be so difficult. Yes, start with those, have a sort of warm-up before the difficult content.

My lord,

It pleases me greatly to hear of your recent reembodiment from your foster-son, Elrond. As you doubtless know, he is my herald, chief among my privy council—and more than that, he is my closest friend. He has often recounted to me pleasant memories of his youth and the childhood he and Elros spent in your and your brother’s care. I was gratified to learn—

‘What?’ he thought. ‘That you hadn’t really kidnapped them and kept them as hostages? That the lie I told myself, the lie I needed to understand what you’d done, what you’d become, why you kept them and not me—

That at least one of us got to spend a happy childhood with you?’

—that you and Prince Maglor were such dutiful and attentive foster-fathers, and to learn of the great love the twins bore you both.

Restless tapping, a quill nib on paper.

“Well, Eru Almighty, I can’t just say, ‘What the hell was so special about them that you didn’t see in me?’ can I?” Gil-galad muttered in frustration. Logistically, he understood it; as a king, he understood it; but as a child who wanted the love of his mother and father, at the strongest, most intimate and primordial level of his being, beyond all the abstract and intellectual rationalizations, he did not understand how Maedhros could have abandoned him, how he could have sacked Doriath and burned Sirion. And perhaps Gil never would, despite the long and difficult conversations with Maglor and the forgiveness Gil had eventually found in his heart. Perhaps Maedhros wasn’t even his father—

It was a fool’s hope, really, but it was all he had. Once, he could have lived a perfectly happy and productive life without ever having an answer, and in all honestly, he more than likely still could. But now the not-knowing had grown uncomfortable, a weight rather than a buoy, and since the opportunity had at last presented itself…Then again, maybe the direct route wasn’t such a bad idea—perhaps not that exact choice of words—but by Elrond’s account, Maedhros had been a no-nonsense sort of person, even in his more diplomatic moments. He might, Gil reasoned, appreciate a similar approach.

My lord, I confess I write to you with more than felicitations and warm wishes. You know that my parentage is, shall we say, murky. I have long endeavored to determine the identities of my parents—but not, as you might suspect, to solidify any claim to the throne. On the contrary, I have always believed in my heart it is the abilities and characteristics of a person that qualify them to rule, rather than whom their parents happened to have been. The people have placed their trust me, and gladly do I accept it.

But as one might imagine, the question of my parents has long troubled me. As a king, I feel it makes no difference as regards my ability to govern, but as a person like any other, I desire to know—to love and honor—my mother and father. Yet their names remain a mystery, even to many whose memories are long.

You may have now guessed my intention in writing to you. I am called Ereinion, Scion of Kings, sent to the house of Círdan—some say by you yourself—marked by nothing but a note and the silver of my hair. They say your grandmother, Miriel, had silver hair, too.

There are not so many kings of the Noldor of whom I might be scion who might have granted me that rarity. And I have often wondered if—if I am to be honest, my lord, I have often wished that—it was you.

I hope you are not shocked by what must seem to you my great impertinence, and I am well aware that, to many, this would seem not a little strange, considering our history.

‘Considering Sirion,’ he thought. ‘Considering the War of Wrath. Considering so many things.’

—Nonetheless I write to you with the desire of determining if you are my father. The desire, if I may be so bold, that you should be my father. I am told by Elrond that you valued forthrightness, and endeavored always to instill that value in him.  I hope, at least, that I do not disappoint you in that matter.

Please respond at your earliest convenience. And please know that, no matter your response, I wish you every happiness. I truly do.

It seems wrong, somehow, to sign this officially, as “High King of the Noldor,” for you yourself bore that title. And so I will leave you, just

Gil-galad

As Berlin points out, one reason the story has likely remained so popular today is the high level of identification Diaspora readers feel with Esther and the Jews of Persia: “American Jews read this diaspora story as diaspora Jews…they see themselves in it…” (“Commentary” 9).  This has in some part to do with Jewish understandings of time and memory.  Richardson explains that the rabbis understood both the Biblical past and the (Messianic) future as bracketed from, but deeply and intimately entwined with, “the vast present that is the real objective of rabbinic practice” (53).  The Book of Esther resonates with Jews today and throughout history because it links us—not only to the Biblical past, but one generation to another.