United, Divided: The War of Telerin Aggression by eris_of_imladris

The Vacant Chair

We shall meet but we shall miss him.
There will be one vacant chair.
We shall linger to caress him
While we breathe our ev'ning prayer.

Findekáno remembered his first steps off the ice since Alqualondë, his first foray onto dry land in what felt like an eternity. After all the years of torment and hardship when he feared he’d never feel warmth of his body or soul again were finally over.

So few made it, and those who did were focused on one thing only: fighting the enemy. But after the ships burned, no one could quite agree who that was. It was clear from the enduring darkness that Morgoth still loomed large, that Fëanáro had not succeeded in his mission. And yet, Findekáno wondered if his people would join that fight or continue the one that had been started against them.

His father had led their people across the ice, stubborn and hard-headed as Fëanáro had been when he chased them away. So many of the Noldor had died, and the ones who lived were unrecognizable. The bliss of Aman was so faded in their minds that sometimes, even to Findekáno, it felt like a tale he’d heard rather than a place he’d seen in the light, smelled in the morning, lived in.

This world past the ice was entirely new, but most of his curiosity was gone. It faded into gnawing hunger, biting cold, the ever-present worry that his feet would slide and he would fall to his death as so many others had. Death was no longer a mystery but a given in such conditions, but the little part of hope that remained inside of him wondered if things would be different now. Surely, enough time had passed that Fëanáro’s temper would have cooled - or, at least, he would need more men for his army, and he would know how to use the land for its resources.

The campsite was identifiable by a flag with the symbol of the house of Fëanáro, and although many people muttered under their breaths, Findekáno felt a surge of hope at the thought that, beyond the blankets and food and water, there might be friends there. His cousins, who provoked memories of kindness and the home he had once known, even though the conflict between their families had seemed insurmountable when they left for these shores.

Makalaurë stood to greet them, a single person facing a horde of starving, furious elves. He stood straight, looking Nolofinwë in the eye, making no move except clasping his empty hands together.

He was unarmed. This boded well for them.

“Where is he?” Nolofinwë asked, as surprised as Findekáno was to see Makalaurë - not the diplomat, not even the heir - greeting them. Was this already an insult? “Where is my brother?”

“The High King is dead,” he said solemnly. “You will have to treat with me.”

When one year ago we gathered,
Joy was in his mild blue eye.
Now the golden cord is severed,
And our hopes in ruin lie.

The news that Fëanáro - his ever-burning uncle, fierce and passionate, angry and vindictive but still somehow family even after all he’d done - was dead burned through their camp. Shouts followed whispers, some exulting in Fëanáro’s death for the suffering of the Helcaraxë, others bemoaning that they’d followed Nolofinwë rather than staying in Tirion, since the war was surely lost.

Findekáno followed Makalaurë and his father to one of the grander tents set up, where a few of his other cousins milled about. He could barely look them in the eye, but he found himself desperately looking at their hair. Silver, black, black, finally a redhead but not the right one, it was one of the twins polishing a small knife with a vacant look in his eyes - and inside, there was a great empty chair, perhaps the best that could be crafted under these conditions. The king’s chair, certainly. Maitimo’s chair.

Until Makalaurë sat in it.

Maitimo was lost, he said. Taken by Morgoth in the early days of the war. Findekáno felt his heart thudding in his chest like a bird bashing itself against a cage. Fëanáro’s fate, he was beginning to understand. But Maitimo? Kind, sweet Maitimo who always had a kind word for him, clever Maitimo who could get out of any situation his father got him into? How could he be gone?

It was little comfort, and perhaps even worse, that he might still live. Morgoth was cruel; that was certain, even if many of the Noldor had more of a problem with Fëanáro. There was no way he was treated as anything other than the lowest dirt, tortured for the sins of his father.

Even the people who wanted Fëanáro dead blanched at this, even if only a little. Some pretended not to care, even as they set up their camp on the other end of the lake and began their new lives, but the thought couldn’t leave Findekáno’s mind. What point was there in living as enemies when a bridge could be built, when both Maitimo and Fëanáro could be avenged by uniting together?

Maitimo had always been the voice of reason, the one who had convinced everyone by his kindness to follow him. He was the missing link, the only one who might bring this mess back to a point where it could be solvable.

He stayed long enough to forget the cold biting at his bones, to occasionally feel full from a meal, to create the weapons he would need in case he was discovered. He told no one of his plans, knowing that both sides would stop him for their own reasons. Nolofinwë needed his heir safe, and Fëanáro’s people needed to not owe them a debt. But none of that mattered to Findekáno. If their places were switched, Maitimo wouldn’t have cared either.

He set out late one night on the swiftest horse he could find, slipping away before anyone would notice he was gone. And when they noticed, would they care? Would Fëanáro’s sons cheer that there was one less heir to the house of Nolofinwë? Would his own house disavow him as a fool or worse, a traitor, for defying Morgoth for the sake of his own kin? If he didn’t come back, that would surely happen, so he would need to be sure to return.

It was time to remind both sides of their true enemy.

True, they tell us wreaths of glory
Evermore will deck his brow,
But this soothes the anguish only,
Sweeping o'er our heartstrings now.