The Captive by Glorified

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Chapter 9. A Letter.

Ella is forced to accept a shocking truth and can hardly bear its implications for her and Maglor.

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Chapter: A Letter.

 

Three months later.

The flower beds had sprouted in to tumultuous cascades of colour yet he who had planted them was not here to see his handiwork and because of that I too could not thoroughly enjoy their riotous display. My locus and reason for being had left with Maglor and now all was void of meaning to me. Elrond said it was normal considering the bond we had. He was careful I noted not to use past tense when speaking of Maglor but we had still no word. I was all for sending a letter the next few weeks after Maglor had gone but Elrond cautioned me to be patient and let things settle. He said we had to let the situation resolve without any interference from us. If we did otherwise and broached the matter too soon it could spell disaster, especially if his estranged wife got any inclination that mine and Maglor ‘affair’, as she would think it, was on going. Better he said if we let her believe that it was ended and he had cautioned Maglor in this area too before he left. He said that a scorned female was double trouble.

 

Given my inattentive unfocused state I was staying intermittently between bouts at the New Imladris and my homestead. Elrond came with me when I went back to and fro and the donkey and Mearas followed too in my wake. Elrond became my shadow watching over me like a hawk, trying to distract me out of my increasingly morose state. I would sit for hours staring not thinking caught in a vacuum. He come into my bedroom in the morning with honeyed tea and urge me to wash and dress and take me on excursions to the village or see some new puppies that had been born at one of the local farms.

 

But it was all to no avail, Elrond knew and I did too all my hope hung on word from Maglor. I tried to be patient but I began to wonder if I had dreamed all that had happened between myself and him and that perhaps now he was happily settled in Formenos with his wife. Elrond scoffed and holding me shook my shoulders for thinking such things. I acceded to his greater knowledge of Maglor than I but secretly doubt gnawed at me in the dark hours in the night. I knew realistically that I should face up to the fact that according to the terms of the reclamation order he would be expected to return to the marital bed and resume his conjugal duties. We had spoken of it before he left; he was abhorred to hear me to speak of such things but I told him it was better we both face up to what would be expected of him. My heart splintered a little more thinking about it though.

 

It was coming up to the fourth month after he left and Elrond had a letter, I was sitting in his study in New Imladris. He came into the room proffering it to me. I shook my head,

“No, you read it”, I asked him I was shaking when he opened it. It was addressed to Elrond not myself and I thought that odd.

 

“Dear Father,

I hope this letter finds you and your household well. Summer has fully bloomed here in the north and I am finding Formenos comfortable and pleasant with my wife and family around us. The crops will be ripe for harvesting in another couple of months and until then my time has been passed with summer parties, and festivities. It really is a beautiful summer here.

I hope everything is well with you in New Imladris and our dear friends. Remember me to them all particularly to those that you especially hold dear, you are always in my thoughts.

I will be in Tirion with my Family and Wife for the early summer festival, I had hoped if you are there to see your wife and other family members that we would be able to meet, I shall be attending on the following dates………….. My wife wishes to convey her warm wishes to you also and convey our happy news. She is with child and hopes to be delivered come late spring, early summer next year. With fond wishes and blessings.

Maglor.

Ps I did not tell you I have taken up the harp again. I find the Suya Enda especially comforting and dear to me”.

 

I heard nothing after ‘come late spring early, summer next year’. I some how found myself sitting on the floor. Elrond picked me up and laid me down on the low chaise. He ran to get brandy and made me sit up and sip it. I could hear his voice talking to servants hastily, then he was holding my face speaking earnestly to me hugging me to him but I heard nothing. My world had upended, and I was spinning and rotating so fast I could collect no thoughts or bring myself back to conscious awareness. The sleeping potion he gave me thankfully put me under any obligation to try to be compos mentis until the next morning.

 

I woke late, I knew from the sun being full up. Elrond was dozing in a chair by the bed, and for a few seconds I wondered why he was there and why I had woken so late. Moments later I felt the ragged wound in my hurt reawaken and pierce me, Elrond woke with a start and looked at me alarmed.

 

“You're awake, I’ll send for breakfast”

“Have you been here all night?”

“Yes” he said sheepishly

“You shouldn’t have”,

“I had to”.

We said nothing until breakfast came.

I couldn’t eat much and sipped my tea, Elrond had put some sort of sedative in it.

“You can’t keep me drugged”, I said.

He sighed,

“Ella you were very distressed”,

“I should go, I’d better get back, I have commissions to work on”,

“No! I will not hear of”, Elrond cut through,

“What’s the point?”, I shouted at him, “A CHILD! , A CHILD! did you not hear?” I screamed as I threw the tea cup with all my might at the far wall, it crashed spectacularly.

“You must have faith”, Elrond pleaded taking my hands,

“What does it mean?, TELL ME!”, I demanded my voice rising as I pulled away from him.

He held onto my hands looking imploring at me, “It may be just gossip Ella, we do not know for sure until we hear the truth from Maglor”,

“TELL ME”, I shouted ignoring him.

“It means that a child is testament of an accord and the reclamation is resolved and …. Maglor will not have to face being imprisoned again”,

“AND?”, I said,

“That…. that they shall live together as husband and wife again”.

“And he will never come back”, I finished, tears now spilling down my face, as I turned and buried my face in the pillows. Elrond stroked my hair gently, and soothed endearments to me.

When my sobs had abated some what he turned me and pulled me in to his embrace and would counter no protests from me as he rocked me too and fro like a child who had fallen down and hurt their knee and now needed comfort.

“It was always going to be difficult for us wasn’t it?” I said

“Yes”, he said simply, Eonwe himself would have come to collect him if he had ignored the reclamation order. He could not have stayed with you under any circumstances”.

“Thats...hic….thats..wwwwhy you told him…. to hic… return”.

“Yes I knew there was only a slim chance but nonetheless a chance. We had to take it and play the card dealt to us”.

He spoke against my head, “Believe me when I say this Ella, I know him and there is more to this than meets the eye, there is some subterfuge happening here, what I cannot say but I know that Maglor truly loves you and I have, never, never, seen in all my years the flame of love and passion arise so high between two as I saw arise between you and Maglor. If there is a child, there will be and explanation, I know this, I would forfeit my life on it. Please, please please! Ella, try to read between the lines. do you not see he has had to be very circumspect so as to not arise suspicion. He probably had to pen such a letter with on lookers seeing what he was writing. I have told you before it will be quadrupedally hard if they hear any suspicion that his affections for you are not long severed and dead. He is merely trying to play into this ploy by writing such a letter. He loves you dearly believe me. Please, please believe that”.

“It seems to me she has got exactly what she wanted”.

“No, No it may seem that way Elrond chided me. Listen to me Ella, before Maglor left we talked privately, it was best not to get your hopes up, but we agreed if he desperately needed to see you he would send word in a code”.

“Code”, I repeated,

“In the song, ‘Suya Enda’, we agreed if he should include mention of it that then ….”

“Tell me… the words”, I said cutting through,

 

‘I hear my heart beat

I wait as your breath clouds the morning air,

I breathe you into me,

Lying on the forest floor together,

the world is stilled,

as our spirits twine’.

 

I looked at Elrond stunned, tears brimming in my eyes,

“Its beautiful”, I sobbed.

“He loves you Ella never, never, doubt it. You shall have to come as part of my retinue though, Firiel, probably would be a good name incognito and I think a scribe would suffice for your station, that will give you access to courtly life but merely in the background. We shall have to brush you up on court etiquette, manners etc, who to bow and courtesy to. Clothes we will get some made for you as soon as we arrive”.

“I heard Elrond as if from a distance not fully taking in what he was saying, “But, but I said I don’t understand”,

“We must make plans to go to Tirion.”,

“We?”, I said

“Of course, come Ella, he has sent word, he want to see you, we must give him grace enough to hear him out and bring some sort of reason and explanation to all this. I have told you before there's is no love match, I believe her or her family seek to gain from this in some way, either financially or socially. What they truly want I am not sure but my heart tells me that we must wait this out till their hand turns and we see what it is they are now hiding. It is only then we will know how to strike a path and position ourselves”.

“You make it sound like a war stratagems”,

“In a way it is but they don’t know that I am a chief strategist and war lord, or use to be in Endor.

We must bear with things a deal longer Ella. After what you told of Olwe’s interest in Maglor and you in Alqualonde I believe there is some political manoeuvrings going on here”.

“Really”, I said,

“Yes indeed, Olwe may seem benign and endearing on the surface but he is an astute leader and kings do not become kings without political savvy and acumen. The high king is married to his sister and he knows Finarfin answers to her. The link that is lacking as to why, or how this connects to Maglor or his family. I believe his wife is behind this!”.

I looked at Elrond surprised, “You do?”,

“Yes, but what for I do not know, believe me it certainly is not Maglor back as husband. I have already sent word months ago to some of my household in Tirion to start quietly asking around”,

“You have” feeling surprised at my friends deviousness.

“I’ll wager too that attack in Alqualonde was set up by if not Olwe someone in his court”.

“Why?” I said, alarmed,

“To shut you up, scare you, when are ever such tactics used?”.

“Well that didn’t work”, I said.

“No but you must assure me you will use no such intervention when we get to Tirion”,

“So if I am just about to be ravished, I should what, give in gracefully?”,

“You know of what I speak, you have been constrained to do so by the powers themselves in this matter, and stars above there are enough complications without divulging your heritage and face accusations of interfering and coercion between the Eldar race and its peoples”.

 

I thought back to Olwe, finding it hard to imagine him giving orders like that.

“I don’t understand”, I said “What in Valor’s name is going on?”,

“It is just the politics of courtly life Ella”, Elrond laughed. He had become more animated from our conversation than I had seen him in months.

“I think you enjoy all this intrigue, don’t you?”,

He smiled ruefully, “Truth to tell, I enjoy the sparring of it, I must admit”.

 

“Tirion”, I thought, I sobered at that as it began to dawn on me the magnitude of what I was facing. I who had never been part of courtly life. The thought terrified me of meeting Elrond’s illustrious relatives and Maglor’s family to boot.

“Friend”, I said, “I cannot imagine how will I mange?”

“Do not worry you will have me”.

We set out in two days.