Just One Victory by Feta

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The Time

Thank you to belevechange, anolinde, and darkshine for reading through this, and all your helpful comments.

Here is what Maitimo recalls.

He has divided the time into phases, for simplicity. When Amil first told him of the rising of the moon, he thought she was making it up. Next, she told him of how it waxed and waned, and he decided that he himself was just like this mysterious orb.

He began new, blank, under different possession, determined and proud and resolute. This phase involved ample amounts of gritting his teeth so as not to make a sound, then at last shouting, whimpering –

– until he realized that this did no good. After that, he was a full moon, at the height of his glory, his fire burning brightly, until the pain and sorrow and determination that was sapped away so rapidly was his fëa itself, burning less and less, so that he felt more like a thing of slime than of fire.

That was when they decided he was ready; their reasoning most likely related to conduct that was sporadic at best. To be honest, there were no parameters or logic to Maitimo’s behavior at all. He found himself overcome by someone who was not him, someone who chose to struggle and thrash on some days and remain still on others.

This someone had not sense or reason to him. He raged with hopelessness or was calm in acceptance. He was Fëanáro and he was Makalaurë and he was Findekáno.

This suited Maitimo just fine. If he could not be with the ones for whom he cared the most, to himself be them was the next best option. And his wildly irresolute moods aggravated Moringotto no end.

When finally he proved that he was not, in fact, ready, he was returned like a shoe that does not fit, and the process spiraled back to the beginning once more. Moon phases.

Maitimo let go of the control of his body, and found himself floating.

He knew that the last word from his brothers came after five months, because that is what Moringotto said, sitting on his dark throne and leering at his so-called thrall, jewels glittering from an iron crown.

There is not much to say about that period, aside from the fact that it was a great deal like what he is going through now.

In that time, he learned of the yellows, greens and purples that bruised skin can turn. He learned that for the elves who were slain when he was captured, at least it was a swift and decisive death. For the various ruined elves who were brought before him and killed in ways he does not like to think about, while he was chained to the wall and could do nothing to save them, it was oftentimes slow. And here, there was no ocean into which blood could drain. It clung to the stone floors and smudged across his feet when he stepped in it.

He never thought he would miss those days; but with no concept of the unspeakable, he never thought that things could get worse, either.

The main difference between then and now was faith: surprisingly innocent for one damned. The childlike trust that there is no doom worse than death. The conviction that as long as he can recall the names of a father or a brother, a lover or a friend, he will find some reason to endure. The confidence that survival will always be a priority, and not a curse.

On the day when the last of that confidence made itself scarce, he was brought before the one he called Black Enemy.

Moringotto spoke of other things that have not a lot of significance now: your brothers send word that they do not want you back, you are my property, I shall have to find a use for you, and so on. What it came down to was: you are never going to leave here, you are dead to the world, and no one will save you.

Maitimo recollects struggling to stand, spitting at his captor’s feet, though all that came up was blood. Acts of defiance after this were to be few and far between.

He thought he was going to die soon. Strange, how he could have such little faith in immortality. He has none of those qualms now.

Where Amil took him was to a passageway with tiny cells all along it, small windows carved into their doors, from which came moans that made Maitimo shiver. Something was not right. Such a statement feels illogical now. There is no longer such a thing as right or wrong; or, if there is, he does not think he can sense it anymore.

Amil brought him, naked, into one of the rooms, and how she knew which one was to be his remains a mystery. Inside were nothing but iron fetters and he remembers shivering and thinking that whatever happened he was not going to cry out as he so often had previously, which is the type of naïve absurdity that could only come from the same idiot who thought his father would send back the ships.

 

 

 

Actually, though, he stuck to his word for quite a while. Amil has told him that it was many centuries of the sun. He has decided to believe her, mainly because if days are now counted by the passing of a flying piece of fruit, anything is possible.

She explained the situation to him with the abrupt minimalism of her kind. He was the entertainment, he was the plaything, and anyone or anything who merited a reward might be sent to him. She would be by every now and then. Good luck.

The first time was not particularly difficult. He lay there like a dead thing and let it do what it wished. Luckily, all it wanted was to touch him, to run perverse fingers along his pale skin and exhale thick, heavy breaths that made him feel polluted.

It kept one hand pinning his shoulder to the ground, while with the other it roamed down his stomach, lower and lower, so that the relief when it pulled its fingers back sent him almost into shock.

Next, it kicked him, just to see how he would react. In reality, he had been struck by so many hands and feet by that time that one more did not make much of a difference. He let it think that it was very clever. This was not so bad. Maitimo had never really minded being the center of attention, and he had gained quite a tolerance.

And then it was over.

When the second orc came, Maitimo started thinking that maybe he should fight back. He did not put this idea into action, but it was something to contemplate while the orc in question tried to decide what to do with him. With a knife it traced a thin line across the elf’s cheek; he could feel a bead of blood trickle down like a teardrop.

Next it snatched up one of his hands above his chained wrists and this time drew a thinner blade from a sheath at its leg. Maitimo bit down on his lip, which was already shredded and mangled from years of such conduct, and kept his gaze fixed on the stone ceiling as with the blade the nail of his index finger was pried off, and fell to the floor.

His breathing grew fearful and labored, but he made no sound as this action was repeated three times more. Finally, it gave up, and left.

He kicked the third orc rather forcefully in the crotch, mainly because it seemed to want a bit more than the first one and he got the feeling that Manwë and Mandos might have more pity on him if he upheld the laws and customs of his people.

Amil was sent to punish him for that one. He forgives her wholeheartedly. As far as he is concerned, she did the right thing. If nothing else, she bought him some time, and elucidated Manwë’s concern for him more clearly.

It wasn’t until the wounds she had left were almost gone that she returned. She asked if he was going to be good from then on. He said yes.

 

 

Time went on, measured by such trivial things as the regrowing of missing fingernails and the lengthening of hair that had been sheared upon his arrival at the fortress. There were good years and bad years. Sometimes he was left alone for so long that even the company of an orc seemed a relief. Sometimes he savored his every moment of peace.

He learned quickly that the laws that he had thought would bind him so forcefully to his first love were not as strong as previously thought. After he discovered that one, hope became irrelevant. Days when whatever soldier or miner he was confronted with wanted nothing more than to see him bleed were at first a welcome alternative from other options.

He is unsure of when that logic flipped. It happened so casually that he hardly noticed: at some point he found himself thinking that blood is difficult to clean up.

He longed, thorough the years, to be treated once more as himself: a dangerous adversary; an elf to be taken seriously; a son of the spirit of fire, with his own hidden white flames that could at any moment ignite.

This came to pass naturally, as it was only a matter of time. To this day, he is unsure of what role he prefers to play, but there is no going back.

Occasionally the Master of Lies himself came by to examine his captive. His hulking form took up any remaining space in the cell; the first time, Maitimo struggled to his feet only to be pushed back down again by a burned and blackened hand. The elf looked upon the charred fingers with sympathy as much as hatred; he thought – that must have hurt – and even though the true story was still clear in his mind, he could not shake this feeling.

Moringotto ran a rough finger along his prisoner’s scarred cheek and said what a shame it was that his followers have not been taking better care of Maitimo; but then, his function in the world did not call for much better. The jewels in the enemy’s crown gleamed with hope unattainable.

Maitimo kept quiet and did not reply. That is one thing he had learned to do in a hurry. Moringotto left, but assured his hostage that he would be back. Life went on, punctuated by various happenings. Time was calculated through Amil’s visits, the only times in which his wrists were unchained and he was unrestrained, allowed to move about on his own. Deep red welts always remained where the shackles had been. He was never permitted to leave the cell.

Quite soon after he made his promise to be good, two orcs came at a time, grumbling about a lost battle; Maitimo was fettered as usual. He watched impassively as they withdrew knives; he was roughly overturned so that his wrists bent back at awkward angles and his forehead collided sharply with the stone floor.

“Let him fight,” one of them protested. “More fun that way.” At the time, he was still just becoming proficient in their language.

Coarse laughter. Something that felt very much like a booted foot came down hard on his wrist, followed by another snigger as he felt bone shatter.

“Too weak,” a voice said, “fragile. Not worth fighting.”

They set to work with their blades instead. Maitimo was unsure of whether or not he was relieved. He closed his eyes, and did not react as…

As the feeling in his injured wrist faded from sharp pain to a dull pounding as line after line was sliced into already-scarred skin.

As he was slimy with blood and shivering but not so unaware as to not recognize the telltale sounds of one of the creatures undressing.

As a body forced its cold, clammy flesh against his own, wrapping itself around him and pressing its hardness against him before entering him swiftly and callously.

There was a round ruthless cackling from the second orc as Maitimo hovered on the border of unconsciousness, coming and going in waves.

These two particular orcs returned many times during the ensuing years; he recognized them and learned their names, sometimes even calling out to them when the moment seemed right. They appeared to like this. Often they would take turns, one standing by the door and looking down with distain and delight.

Sometimes, they did not take turns.

Other instances merged together in his mind, an endless time-after-time generic occurrence that followed a relatively standard format.

An orc would enter the room. It would nudge Maitimo with the toe of its boot. This seemed a universal gesture, as though they were for some reason afraid that their master would give them a dead elf. Even Maitimo has more faith in Moringotto than that.

The orc then would crouch or stoop over him; if it was wearing any kind of helm it would remove that and toss it in the corner, none too gently, and the rattling, clanking sound was Maitimo’s signal to remain still and try not to breathe. Remaining somehow, inexplicably alive, however, made breath necessary; but the stench, after a while, became routine and did not make him gag.

It could go in a couple directions from there. The most common involved the grabbing of his shoulders, pulling him up onto his knees, which was all the movement that the chains permitted. It might touch his face or hair with warped fingers before it removed the remainder of its armor; and, naturally, it was all downward from there.

The first times were the worst. Laughter was common; it broke against his ears and went straight to his fëa. Once or twice he felt something warm and damp against his cheeks, which he recognized belatedly as tears, but it made no difference, because then the orc would say something like:

“New, are you?”

To which he would not answer but become more determined to give it what it wanted and get it over with. There was no pretending this was Findekáno, as it pulled him toward it and it was slippery and slick against his lips until finally his mouth was full and probably for a while after that.

After some time, there was no mention of him being new.

He felt like something had crawled inside him and died there, and he could not get rid of it, he could not forget it, except in the instance that he was lashed with metal or leather until all else became extraneous and he reached blindly for Nerdanel and grasped Amil’s hand instead.

Once, he thought he saw Mandos standing over him, tall and shadowy, but Mandos would not have lain down atop him, heavy so that he felt crushed against the floor and tried in vain to get out from underneath this bulky creature who thrust against him until when it at last rolled off of him he was sick all over it.

They punished him for that one, too, but he did not even notice.

As time stretched on, sanity ran thin. He looked up one time and it was Makalaurë who pinned him to the floor. A moment later, it was an orc again.

Another time, his blood was black, but something was wrong; it flickered crimson every now and then; his eyes could not decide how to color it. This phenomenon came and went.

The door was opened by a tall and solid figure, clutching a thick weapon, and beyond him were the Trees.

Not dead and broken, but gleaming like never before, silver meeting gold and mingling, light so bright it nearly blinded him. The door was shut, but the light remained; it shattered and formed into glowing shapes of yellow-grey mice and spiders that crawled up the walls and exploded into tiny stars, each time that the sharp weapon collided with his flesh, indiscernible in the otherwise dim cell.

Amil questioned him about all of this. He told her everything. There was no reason to lie.

She arranged for him to have a day off. She sat by him so that he would not have to be alone, careful not to touch him, and said that she used to have the same problem. It would go away, she told him.

It did.

However long it was, Maitimo remembers clearly the last time, how his every move was routine, how he knew when to stay still or to shut his eyes or to spread his legs or to open his mouth. Why something changed that time, of all times, was an uncanny fluke, a simple mishap that shattered his uneasy reality. For the time being, at any rate.

What happened was, Amil came in, and not just for an ordinary check to make sure he was still breathing. She said that today was special. Sitting his wilted body up against the wall, she painted his lips red and put something sticky on his eyelids and waited for it to dry. As she worked she told him how very lucky he was. He didn’t speak much. Conversing was an old habit he had grown out of.

She turned him around and started on his hair. Her hands were gentler than he was used to, but he hardly noticed. He had retreated inside himself long ago, and all that remained was a shell, a wraith who nodded when she said he was beautiful and asked if he wanted to see a mirror.

It was not his reflection that started the bonfire, not precisely. Thin and wan, scarred and gaunt. It was no surprise to see what he had become. What transpired was: he caught a flash of gold and tilted his head. Ribbon. In his hair. Amil must have put it there. He had not paid much attention. Just hours ago he had recited the names – Makalaurë, Fëanáro, etc – but now one came back.

It stuck in his head, complete with a flash of a wavering image. Findekáno. Dark hair with gold ribbon, grey eyes and perfect lips that said – “Russandol” – and then the evidence was gone. A few embers sparked.

He lay down with his arms above his head and wondered what Amil had meant by – special – and kept his eyes shut while she chained his wrists so that she could not catch a glimpse of the light that had crept back into his eyes. The name echoed thorough his mind, the friction of it warming him and making him quiver with pent-up emotion.

As it happens, the day was special in a number of ways. Once Amil had stroked his cheek fondly and departed, he counted the seconds until the door creaked open once more: one hundred, no more, no less. Expecting at least something new or different, when another orc entered the cell he was not exactly excited. “Findekáno, Findekáno,” his mind chanted.

Well, it didn’t take much to know that this grotesque creature, twisted and misshapen, was not his Findekáno. He kept his eyes shut and remembered his father teaching him to fight blindfolded. He remembered the pure light in Fëanáro’s eyes when he removed the blindfold five minutes later and congratulated his son on his apparent talent. That is what he tried to channel; that brightness, that radiance…

The radiance of tow fëar in a garden lit by tree-light, as Findekáno rolled off of his older cousin onto the grass, while Maitimo lay there licking his lips to gather the last of the dark-haired one’s taste and wondering how something could be both so wrong and so right.

…His veins were on fire. Aman was in his eyes. The memories had slept long enough.

This particular orc was heavy and when it climbed on top of his thin form he lay tense and prepared like a cat waiting to strike. Stiff and still and alert. Eyelids hid fiery eyes. Hands above manacled wrists were clenched in fists.

He found his opportunity after the creature had removed its armor, after it grabbed his shoulders and tried to get a good grip. After it had spread its legs just enough, and slipped itself inside his waiting mouth.

It didn’t take much to know how to deal with that one. He bit down vehemently.

The creature retreated hastily with a hiss of anger; Maitimo rolled over and spit out a great deal of thick, sour blood. It did not seem pleased with the situation. Maybe he had chosen the wrong orc to mess with. He seemed to remember a time when any orc would have been an enemy, instead of a natural part of his occupation. The thought of such a time…

A time when he drew a sword that had been baptized at the swan haven and ran it though such a creature while fire-demons flamed in the background and the ashes of white ships lay not far off. His father called war-cries and Maitimo first truly understood the heat of battle and the pure joy of fighting for a cause that was his.

…is what made him coil and then strike.

Amazing, the power of memory. It comes and goes as it pleases. The ghost of Findekáno fought beside him as he kicked and clawed at the creature, its anger drawing it closer and closer until it was in biting range once more. This time: its cheeks, wrists, neck. Maitimo shrieked as he fought; screamed of hope and honor that just for a moment he possessed, while its blood sullied his scar-crossed skin and stuck like tree-sap. They came running, but by the time the door was opened he was pushing the dead weight of its corpse off of his chest, the motion difficult without the use of his hands.

Memory is a funny thing. An hour or two later, as he bled like nothing else, Findekáno was once more only a name.

Findekáno was a name that had nothing to do with his disfigured, struggling hroa, his hands clenching into fists and then unclenching again as he focused on enduring.

And therefore, Findekáno was irrelevant.

 

Later they told him it had been a captain that he had killed, a favorite of Moringotto’s, one that had been with him almost from the beginning. Amil said that she used to love this precious captain, long ago, but admitted that she no longer knew what this meant; she did not seem as upset or disappointed in Maitimo as she should have.

He was taken away from that room in which he felt as though he had spent the majority of his life; he was given clothing to wear, and led through a maze of corridors. From that time on, he was never to be left in the same place for more than a few hours. This was both a relief and revelation, that the fortress itself was far too big for him and he no longer had much desire to do aught but curl himself in a ball and avoid penalty.

It was the beginning of something new. What was this new joy that he acts out even to this day? That is not complicated. Right now everything done to him is performed methodically, a long and tedious ritual designed perhaps by the Enemy himself, systematically destroying his each and every hope or reason for rebellion until the thing that is left is not a Fëanarian at all. Certainly those who perform each torment seem to find a hefty amount of enjoyment in the process, but the difference lies in purpose. He is a task and not a toy. He prefers this role infinitely, or he sometimes supposes that he does. He finds himself hoping wistfully that it will go on forever, and hardly notices how drastically his standards have been lowered.

But no matter. By now he has sunk back down again. It is difficult enough to remember that the name – Maitimo – belongs to him, if still it does. He has a few other names in his head and the hazy knowledge that two of them may or may not belong to living, breathing beings in a world where light comes from the sky. All he knows that his ability to count himself among them is a thing soon to be gone. He lifts his gaze to where he supposes Amil’s shrouded ones are. The question comes unbidden to his lips:

“What is it like?”

“What is it like?”

 

“What?”

Maitimo persists: “Do you still have to feel? Hatred? Longing?” The words tumble from mouth, unwarranted and altogether inappropriate; he has to borrow near-forgotten syllables of his old language because orcish to which he has grown accustomed cannot express such things properly.

It would be treasonous and self-destructive for Amil to answer; the enemy hears all. Supporting his theory that she is far more than any lowly orcco, she responds: “Yes. But…”

“But?”

“But it is a dull ache. An old wound, healed over. He has made me that which I am. Who am I to ask for more?”

“I would be lucky to be you.”

“You would.”

“But if that is my fate…”

If he is doomed to be: a creature who staggers down stone corridors on misshapen feet to face each new torture it is presented with as though it is a gift, a being whose face is its only feature that remains nearly unblemished, a thing that treats torment like a routine. If that is his fate.

He continues: “You’d think he would have gotten this over with first. Spared some trouble. Made sure I was ready. He’s never seemed like the type to take chances.”

But then again, Moringotto did take chances. He took the chance that Fëanáro would follow him to Beleriand, so that rather than sitting alone in an iron fortress with no move to make toward power or dominion, he had a war to wage. He took the chance that Fëanáro’s eldest would take his bait.

He took the chance that his prisoner might be strong enough in fëa not to make a sound in the face of agony. In truth, the Dark One need not have worried. In a small room with no chance of a change in his fate, Maitimo kept quiet for some time; but it had not been so previously. It would stand to reason that in a darkly glorious chamber with a Moringotto who had climbed down from his great throne, the niceties of this court were a bit different than elsewhere in the prison.

Speech was required when spoken to. Screams were required when applicable.

It was a trap. To disobey and remain silent was disobedience. With disobedience came more punishment. With punishment came the desire to call out. Such cries were only incentive for a tormentor to continue. And so it spiraled.

And thus as the charred hand of Moringotto himself held burning metal to his flesh, there was no need to keep quiet. He writhed and whimpered the first time, and did so the latest time just the same. By then, they were running out of unblemished skin, and though his screams were just as childlike, desperate, agonized, it was for altogether different reasoning.

He was tired of both his fëa and hroa. He wanted an end.

He wanted to break.

As Amil prepares to answer Maitimo’s query, she grows cold. “Our lord does what he deems best. I do not question him.”

He envies her this attitude like he can remember envying nothing before.

Out of nowhere comes shouting and the stomping of heavy feet. Another orc peeks his head into the room.

“You are needed,” the newcomer informs Amil. He tosses her a sheathed sword, a clunky thing that fits awkwardly in her gloved hand.

“What about my child?” she questions, gesturing to Maitimo.

‘Does he know how to fight?”

“He would likely betray us. We haven’t finished with him yet.”

The orcco nods. “Get yourself to the gate,” he commands. “You can deal with your child later.”

And then he is gone.

Amil chooses her words very carefully. She says:

“Our lord told me that there would be a battle soon. This is a day we have been expecting for a very long time. I don’t know what will become of us.”

She turns on her heel and walks out, her gait discomfited, her veil fluttering.

Maitimo watches her go; watches the door left wide open; glances down to see the sword she has left on the grimy stone floor. He is not completely sure of what he is doing. He unsheathes the weapon. It is heavy so that he can hardly lift it; he could not accurately be called strong, not anymore.

Sitting up already takes up so much effort that it does not cross his mind to attempt to stand once more. He drags his body out into the hallway laboriously, arms supporting his weight, scraped by the rough floor.

Not completely sure what he is doing? That is more than an understatement. Several feet down the corridor he feels a bit of power trickle into his system, the energy of exhilaration as for the first time in a long time he is his own master. He may lack an inner compass, but it does not take a mastermind to know that the thundering of thousands of orcish feet is going in the same direction he is.

Footsteps approach from nearby, and he drops to the ground at an uncomfortable angle, lying there like a dead thing. When whoever or whatever nudges him with his foot, he does not breathe. The passerby continues on. His auburn hair covers his face; some of it is in his mouth. Before he can think of slumping his way back up again, more individuals approach, grunting to one another; he catches a few strands of conversation:

“Damn it… “

“Where the…”

They find him. One kicks his chest, making recent wounds sting; he shudders involuntarily.

“Alive, is it?” the creature cackles. “I’ll bet his family is missing him. Get him up.”

They do their best to haul him into a standing position but he crumples the moment his weight is placed on his bruised and bleeding feet; he collides with one of them, grabbing at its armor to hold himself up. It pushes him to the ground, then lifts him and slings him over its shoulder. The sword that he tries to cling to, they pry from his hand, sniggering and sneering all the while.

His world becomes the rhythm of his captor’s footsteps and a hazy view of the filthy ground above which he dangles. This sudden break in his inexhaustible routine is confusing; it leaves him nearly in shock. He shivers slightly and waits to see what will happen next.

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