Maegnas by HannaGoldworthy

Maegnas

Read Maegnas

Sweat poured down Maeglin’s brow, and nervous tension wracked his limbs.  He used both of these things to his advantage, as his father had taught him; his sweat he used to cool himself in the unrelenting, glorious heat of Gondolin’s weapons forge, and the nerves he used to goad himself forward in his labor.  Today was the final test of his skill as a blacksmith, and King Turgon and Princess Idril watched keenly.  On this day, out of all days, his product had to be perfect.

 

The commission itself was simple: the princess had requested a weapon for her own self-defense.  Her father had inquired, only half serious, just who she intended to defend against when she was not a warrior by trade and never showed any inclination to leave her secret city.  Fair Celebrindal shrugged elegantly in her soft grey walking dress; she had adopted the late Aredhel’s trousseau in an understated show of mourning, which touched the cold heart of her cousin more than he could say.  “There is no sense in leaving anything to chance,” she said lightly, a smile on those sumptuous lips that Maeglin could never quite ignore.  “I prefer my adornments to be functional, anyhow.  You know this better than any, Atar.”

 

Turgon smiled.  “Very well.  You heard her, nephew.  A weapon, both strong and beautiful.  Your skill should be enough to manage it.”

 

It would have to be more than simply enough; already, Maeglin lived for the dancing light in Celebrindal’s eyes, as he had once lived for that in the eyes of his mother.  Nothing less than perfect could suffice; he had to bring her joy, or else it would all be for naught.

 

So, in a moment when their attention was occupied elsewhere, Maeglin slipped his most closely-guarded secret out of the pocket of his apron.  His hapless father – curse the man’s name – most likely had missed the chip of mithril (bought at great price from Belegost) and the slightest sliver of fallen star (left over from the forging of Anglachel and Anguirel) long before he had even noticed the disappearance of his so-called family.  Maeglin had no doubt in his mind that, had Eöl had his way, these two treasures would have been hoarded and left to rust, much as he had hoarded his bright and beautiful wife and his sharp and shadowy son.  These trinkets were a truer reminder of Maeglin’s freedom than the white walls of this city; he had claimed them for himself, as he had claimed his kinship with Gondolin.  And he would give them freely to Gondolin, as he freely gave them his service.

 

Of the mithril, he had the greater supply, and so he used it to temper the steel of the blade; as he did, he whispered a spell he had learned in the dwarf mines, one he was sure that the blade-makers of Gondolin had not seen.  He had noticed that warrior’s swords glowed with white flame, a valuable asset against an enemy that feared light.  Celebrindal, however, was a stateswoman before she was a warrior; should the unthinkable happen, her value would require her to run before she fought, and she would need a measure of stealth when she chose to do so.  So Maeglin caused the blade to react to the near presence of orcs by emitting a soft blue, which could be easily hidden by a sheath if needed; he explained the process to the onlookers as he did (leaving out the fact that he possessed the mithril), and smirked as King Turgon failed entirely to hide his keen interest.

 

The star-metal was stronger, and kept its shape longer, and so it tempered the steel of the hilt.  This part of the design, as Maeglin viewed it in his head, required more delicacy than the blade, and so he did little talking.  Instead, he let the curves of the vines and leaves speak for themselves as they appeared, and indulged in the flush of pride that ran to his face as Idril herself murmured a compliment on its loveliness.  The hilt would keep its artful shape even in the hand of a life-long fighter; when it was cool, Maeglin held it himself, and smiled at how easily it conformed to his palm. 

 

His friends amongst the dwarrow would consider the blade little better than a fancy letter-opener, but then, they themselves had done much damage to each other with letter openers in the past.  It was ornamental, but it would more than serve the Lady’s purposes.  Perfect.

 

He made one last inspection for presentation’s sake; though he was confident he had done more than well enough to earn his place in Gondolin, it was unseemly to seem brash in present company.  As he turned the blade perfunctorily in his hands, however, his ears prickled with the sound of a voice he had never heard before.  It was a high, light voice, cold despite its gentility, and strong despite its smallness, and it spoke the tongue of his mother’s forefathers with an accent unsettlingly strange.

 

Aiya Eärendil Elenion Ancalima!

 

“Nephew?  Are you well?”

 

Maeglin blinked, coming abruptly out of a reverie which he had hardly expected.  He covered his brief misstep with as bright a smile as he could manage, and bowed low before his king.

 

“With respect, my lord,” and here he crossed the room, drawing as near to sparkling Celebrindal as he dared in his sodden work-clothes before dropping to one knee, “I have made this for my lady alone.”

 

He took not the risk in meeting her gaze, proffering his gift with both hands and downcast eyes; but a well-formed hand draped in the sleeve of his mother’s dress grasped the hilt, and he read the awe and respect in its motion with an exquisite twinge of satisfaction.  Celebrindal twirled her dagger with practiced ease, and the hilt, as he intended, was made to fit in her little hand.  She sheathed it at her waist, in his mother’s belt, and Maeglin could not fight back the half-grin that reached his lips.  This was the greatest vengeance he could have for his father’s abuse: that a thing made of Aredhel’s light and Eöl’s shadow had fought itself free, and would forever grace the side of Gondolin herself.

 

***

 

The little dagger did not speak again, not to him, but Maeglin was not one to forget even the littlest of things.  Whenever he found time alone in the library, he scoured the sky-charts, searching for the slightest notation of a star named Eärendil. Surely, a star described as the brightest in the night sky had to have received a name by now.

 

But there was nothing.  No official names, no unofficial names, no alternative names, no transliterations from far-off Valinor, and no strangely nameless stars amongst the brightest in the sky.  Nothing.

 

For a century and more, he convinced himself that he had dreamt the high, reedy voice.  It had to have been a mixture of dehydration and mental exhaustion that had convinced him the blade he made with his own hands could speak.  The rumors that Anglachel could speak were just that, rumors; Anguirel remained silent in her sheath, and Maeglin sniffed at any who believed such old wives’ tales, including his own young, deluded self.

 

And then…there he was.  Gondolin’s brightest son, born to her greatest daughter and a low-born mortal who did not deserve her or him.  Eärendil, hope of man and elf.  Foretold by the work of his elder cousin’s hands, though none knew or would ever know what had happened in that forge so long ago.

 

Maeglin tried to hate him, but found that the only thing he could manage to hate about Celebrindal’s son was that he was not his.  He was beaten, and soundly; the only graceful thing to do in the situation was to retreat into his work, and remain silent.  Tuor was mortal, after all, and Idril herself was a product of the precedent of remarriage among their kind; Maeglin could afford to wait.

 

***

 

This was the greatest vengeance he could have for his suffering at the hands of Morgoth and his minions: everything he had ever wanted, freely given him by his enemies.  So what if the city upon Amon Gwareth burned?  Celebrindal was Gondolin, and he was destined to forever be at her side.  If only she could see that, then all would be right.

 

“Let me go!” screamed the child in his arms, and Maeglin’s only response was to readjust his grip.  The child would see as well, once he was grown; Eru knew he seemed to do even that faster than any elven child.  Celebrindal, strong and beautiful, stared regally at him from a safe distance away on the ramparts; even with her son in apparent mortal peril, her head remained cool.  Maeglin had never loved her more entirely, or been so frustrated with her obstinacy.

 

“You’re scaring her!  Let me go!”

 

“Shut up, child.  I’m trying to see you both safely out!”

 

He placed a palm over the boy’s mouth, but Eärendil bit down with sharp teeth.  Maeglin cursed, dropping the boy in his pain, but reaching for him quickly once he realized his misstep.

 

Too late. 

 

Gilthoniel A Elbereth!

 

A bright flash lit up the darkness of the courtyard, and Maeglin clutched his twice-wounded hand against the all-too-familiar sting of cold steel against his flesh.  Once again he heard a high, clear voice singing brightly in an odd accent.

 

A Elbereth Gilthoniel!

o menel palan-diriel,

le nallon sí di’nguruthos!

A tiro nin, Fanuilos!

 

Maeglin stared at his long-lost masterwork, held menacingly in the tiny hands of the son of his greatest rival.  The blade fit perfectly in the boy’s terrified, but steady grip, as if it had been made for him and only him.

 

Despite himself, Maeglin glanced up from the tear-stained boy before him at his mother, who advanced behind Eärendil on silent feet.  Some words, he knew not what, boiled up within him, threatened to give voice to his feeling of deep betrayal, but they died at the sight of her in Aredhel’s deep grey hunting dress.  She did not move to harm Maeglin, only to stay Eärendil by his shoulder, her eyes welling with sorrow.

 

He both desired her love and deserved her hate more now than he had ever done, and still she could give him nothing but pity and he could not make himself accept that.

 

He snarled, returning his attention to the boy.  “You’ll pay for that, you brat.”

 

Eärendil scowled back, but made no answer.

 

“Now come, you filth!” cried the nameless dagger in the boy’s hand, and if Idril or Eärendil heard it, they reacted to it not.  “You’ve hurt my master, you brute, and you’ll pay for it.  We’re going on; but we’ll settle with you first.”

 

Maeglin staggered back against the ramparts.  He was mad, he had to be.  Anguirel had never spoken in all his years of wielding her.  Only one had ever heard a child of Eöl’s star-metal speak, and that one had died in a fit of sheer insanity years ago.

 

“No…go away!  Keep it away from me!”

 

“Come on, and taste it again!”

 

In his desperation, Maeglin drew away, too far and too fast.  He only realized he had overbalanced when it was too late to stop his descent.

 

As he fell headlong into the same chasm that had claimed his accursed father’s miserable life, Maeglin held the gaze of Idril Celebrindal, Gondolin Herself, as she wordlessly and fruitlessly stretched out her hands in Aredhel’s raiment in one last attempt to save their hapless and pitiless relation.

 

He had never loved either of them more.

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Chapter End Notes

So, I know Sting was named, but not until years after the Silmarillion; that's not cheating, right?