And I'll Bloody Up My Hands (As Long As You Don't Have To) by electroniccollectiondonut

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Chapter 3

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The ride to Hithlum is dusty and long, but overall uneventful. They make their way around the west side of Doriath, shimmering faintly green and gold where Melian’s power rings it off from the outside world. They can see Doriath’s border guards watching them, day and night, from the other side. Celegorm thinks he recognizes one of them from Menegroth’s twisting corridors in a battle that hasn’t happened yet.

He digs deeper into the memory on the second night, shaking the dirt out of bedrolls as Curufin minds the pigeon cooking over their fire.

She fought like a demon, the tiny princess under her arm holding the Nauglamir in white knuckled fingers and screaming fit to bring the heavens down. He killed her, took her head off with one swipe of his sword, but Dior had already gutted him, and he was dying even as he chased the princess a few more steps before his legs would no longer hold his weight.

One of his people arrived, an old friend from Orome’s Hunt, and pressed cold hands, shaking as adrenaline faded, to the wound in Celegorm’s abdomen. Celegorm shook his head and pointed after the girl. He tried to speak, but blood burbled up from his lips and he choked instead. Still, his friend nodded, eyes sad, and followed her.

Somehow, seeing a face that he last saw on a victim of decapitation alive and glaring at them brings everything into painfully acute focus, from the feel of the sword’s hilt in his palm to the howl of the wind whipping snow through the nonsensically looping corridors and streets of Menegroth. It hits him like a punch to the gut, and it hurts , in the same way it did when all his blood was spilling out onto his lap from an attack he was stupid enough not to dodge.

He didn’t remember dying before. He didn’t remember anything after engaging Dior. He had assumed that he’d died quickly by Dior’s blade, or maybe went to Curufin so that his favorite baby brother would have someone with him in his last moments. But he didn’t. He died alone.

The realization shakes him, and he sits down in the dirt before he can fall. Curufin turns to him upon hearing the thump, one eyebrow raised in idle question. Then he actually looks, and he swears, stirring up dust as he stands, crosses the short distance to Celegorm, and drops to his knees in front of him. “I knew it was too soon to travel,” he mutters under his breath, fingers going to the pulse point on Celegorm’s wrist. Celegorm lets him, passive under Curufin’s attentions.

He died alone. That means Curufin must have as well. He let Curufin die alone because he was chasing after the Silmaril.

That won’t happen again.

The amount of conviction in that thought scares him a little, but it shocks him out of his stillness enough to answer his brother’s next question.

“What’s wrong?” Curufin asks. He looks scared, under the concern and confusion.

“I let you die alone,” Celegorm says, and the utter horror in his voice pierces through the fog of memory enough that he notices when Curufin frowns and shakes his head, the expression of confusion a strange thing to see in place of Curufin’s usual scowl.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about. We’re both alive and as safe as we can get. No orc or spider or anything else is going to come this near Doriath. You didn’t-”

He cuts off with a squeak as Celegorm comes out of his listless indifference and hugs him. Tight. After a few moments, Curufin relaxes into the embrace and even, a little hesitantly, returns it.

“I’m going to protect you,” Celegorm says against his brother’s shoulder. Then he pulls back and moves to the fire to make sure that their supper doesn’t burn. Curufin follows, still frowning in genuine bafflement.

“From what?”

“The Oath. I’m going to protect all of you from the Oath somehow.”

Curufin stills beside him and sucks in a breath over his teeth. “Father wouldn’t like to hear you say that,” he says after a while.

“I never listened to Father in the first place. And it’s making us make bad choices.” Celegorm chews over the wording of that last sentence for a long time, and it still doesn’t sound entirely right, but he’s a man of action, not words.

“You always make bad choices,” Curufin tries to joke. It sounds forced, but Celegorm makes himself laugh anyway. If he’d wanted to have a heart to heart, he’d have asked Maglor to come to Hithlum with him.

You didn’t let Maglor die alone, his mind tells him, traitorously. He ignores it and begins mentally reciting old maths lessons that only Caranthir ever liked. If he’s thinking about maths, he can’t think about how he failed.

They eat supper and then lie down to rest. Curufin pulls his bedroll closer to Celegorm’s than he usually would and tucks his head under Celegorm’s chin, and Celegorm lies awake for a long time, watching the stars and trying not to think of anything too important.

When he finally falls asleep, he dreams of an empty palace made of blood, with stars winking menacingly in the red of the walls and floor and ceiling in a gruesome approximation of Varda’s work. His own voice is clinically reciting maths formulas, growing ever louder as time passes, and he can’t escape it no matter where he runs, nor can he escape the liquid red sky that has come down all around him to form his prison. Come morning, he wakes feeling as though he hasn’t rested at all.

They make good time the next few days despite Celegorm’s persistent nightmares, crossing the mountains into Hithlum and finding the road to Barad Eithel. The brush to either side of the dirt track is burnt to ash, and a ways off to the east, toward Angband, charred, leafless trees claw at the grey sky, the ground covered in a layer of black stone born from fire. It’s a chilling reminder of the forest that was there two months ago, dead and ashes since Morgoth broke the Long Peace.

They’re five days hard ride out of Nargothrond when the walls of Barad Eithel become visible in the distance, and by noon of their sixth day, they’re close enough to see the decorations being put up on the city’s spires for the New Year’s Festival, celebratory despite the recent tragedy.

The guards at the gate recognize them, that much is clear, but they still insist on waiting for someone with authority to confirm that Celegorm and Curufin are actually allowed to be here. Celegorm huffs in impatience and swings down off of Huan’s back as one of them runs off into the city. Curufin follows his older brother’s lead, handing the reins of his horse off to the guard, giving a scathing little, “No?” when he protests that he’s not a stable boy. The other guard comes back ten minutes later with Fingon on his heels.

“Thank Orome,” Celegorm groans, because it’s been awkward for the past nine minutes. He doesn’t particularly like Fingon, but the two of them can at least carry on a conversation, which seems far beyond the realm of the guard’s capabilities.

Fingon looks tired, and his perpetual smile drops a little as he looks them over. “Please don’t tell me there’s more bad news.”

“Why would you think that? Can’t we just come for a visit?” Celegorm asks innocently.

Fingon just looks at him, then shakes his head and waves them through the gate. “Well?” He asks after a minute. His timing is impeccable: there are no civilians in hearing distance to be panicked is there really is bad news.

“Your father is planning to do something stupid after the New Year’s Festival,” Celegorm says, quietly so that only Fingon and Curufin can hear. Both look at him in surprise, though Curufin rallies more quickly than their cousin. Fingon is silent for a while, and Celegorm wonders if he’s said too much.

“How would you know?” Fingon says at last, and the scorn is a strange contrast to his usual demeanor.

“I was there when Maedhros got the letter. He mumbles when he reads.” It’s a lie, completely and utterly, and Fingon knows full well that Maedhros doesn’t ever mumble, but he takes it at face value and mulls it over for a minute.

“‘Something stupid’ covers a lot of situations,” he says, because apparently he’s decided not to press for more information about how Celegorm knows this.

“It does, doesn’t it?” Celegorm says. Fingon flinches at the levity in his tone, and he decides not to drag things out too much. His tone becomes serious once more. “Your father is going to try to get himself killed. I want that about as much as you do, albeit for different reasons, so I’m going to stop him.”

“Why?” Fingon demands, nodding to a pair of guards as they enter the palace proper. “You don’t even like us.”

“I always said you were a fool,” Curufin mutters, and the glare Fingon casts him is more exhausted than intimidating.

Fingon stops walking and turns to face Curufin, arms crossed. “Go on, then, tell me what I’ve missed this time.” His tone is full of the false airiness he often adopts when he’s angry, the kind of sharp edged politeness he never did learn to wield properly that only lends credence to Curufin’s accusation.

“You make Maedhros happy. If your father dies, you become king. We saw what being king did to Maglor, and you’re nicer than Maglor. You just don’t understand ruthlessness. The crown would chew you up and spit you out and Maedhros would hate it.”

It isn’t what Celegorm would have said, though he’s glad Curufin is backing him up. Fingon actually handled the kingship fairly well the first time around, for all that Maedhros was the one doing most of the grittier politicking. But Curufin says it all in that haughty, better-than-thou tone that he’s been perfecting since he could talk, and Fingon’s shoulders sag.

“And you do protect each other,” he murmurs, eyes on the floor. “Alright,” he says after a moment, “I’ll trust you. Just this once. But I’m not taking the fall if you cause an incident. And I’m not getting you out of any trouble you get yourself into either.”

“Fine,” Celegorm says.

They shake hands on it, sharing a nod, then Fingon turns back around and continues walking. “Now, I’m sure you already know where your usual guest rooms are, but we’ve changed a few things recently and most of the usual rooms are storage right now. Is there anything in particular you’d like to be close to?”

Celegorm recognises it for what it is: a little bit of assistance, layered in the royal propriety that their previous conversation lacked. “Perhaps the stables,” he says, wondering if Fingon will get the hint.

He does, because he’s not actually as much of a fool as Curufin likes to say. “Do you plan to join Adar on his morning rides, then? He likes to go out to get a moment away from all his responsibilities before breakfast.”

Breakfast, Celegorm knows, is very strictly at the same time each morning, as this is a Noldorin city. “I think I may.”

Fingon nods and pulls a key from his pocket, of the very generic kind that could probably open any number of guest room doors within the palace, and hands it to Celegorm, gesturing at a pair of doors. “Good luck,” he says quietly as he walks away.

Celegorm doesn’t have the heart to tell him how much they’re going to need it, and he wonders when he started being nice to any of their cousins except for Aredhel. He opens one of the doors and tosses the key to Curufin, but his brother follows him inside and twists the door’s latch to locked.

When he speaks, it’s a snappish demand: “What in Eru’s name was that?”