The Women of Troy by heget

The Women of Troy

Fingon strips Dor-lómin of men for his grand assault on Angband, his grand alliance. He empties all of Barad Eithel. All his soldiers and knights from all across Hithlum swell his van for that oh-so-clever two-pronged attack on the catastrophic morning of the Fifth Battle. What is left to defend his fortress castle of Barad Eithel is not worth mentioning. No soldiers. No valiant men patrol the breadth of either Dor-lómin or Hithlum, for they are confident that their valiant king shall lead them to victory. His queen, the true sovereign heir of these lands, the daughter of Mithrim’s lord, the Lady Meril, stays behind in Barad Eithel. Her grandfather had settled and then ruled all of the northern territories of Beleriand. During the First Battle she had been sent away to Lord Círdan for safety. The lord of Northern Beleriand stayed with his sons and grandson and soldiers to fight. Meril weathered a siege behind the walls of Eglarest while her family died far inland. But Meril had returned to her birthplace, and as the sole survivor she negotiated with the Noldor on behalf of her people who survived. She sits on their councils to give not only the Sindar a voice but those of the Tatyar Avari that flocked to her for refuge. No other lords remained, so Meril was their hope. When Meril had returned that first time, unable to grieve against the burdens piled high against her, she had been able to not only reunite with her people but unify the Avari to her and secure them the alliance with these new Noldor overlords. Her father and brother died defending this land and their people, so Meril will fight for them with her words and an alliance. When Fingon leaves, this time Meril stays in Hithlum. It is only in her imagination that she smells the sea as she waits inside the fortress walls.

Her husband dies, cloven in twain by a balrog. His valiant knights and soldiers die around him. Morgoth commands the bodies piled into a great mound, the Hill of the Slain, the Hill of Tears. Meril can only bar the gates of the fortress, send her servants and washerwomen and cooks to the barricades and wait to be overrun. She has no fighters to send to defend her people. She can only spare a messenger to warn her vassals that Morgoth’s armies, despite losses, are victorious and have thoroughly routed all the allied forces of her husband. There is no rescue and no defense- and precious little time for anyone to flee. Meril, certainly, cannot. She dies in the fortress that her father-in-law built on the border of her homeland, facing the north where her husband died. She does not weep over him. She cries over her long-dead brother, her mother and father, her grandfather. She is thankful that her son has been sent away. Lady Meril of Mithrim dies, along with all her women and all her servants.

There are no survivors in Barad Eithel.

Lalwen, Princess of the Noldor, also dies. She too was one of the few women trained to fight and ride, and even though she dies on the road, one of her guards survives long enough to reach Dor-lómin and warn Morwen, wife of the Chieftain of the Hadorim, that all their men have died in the battle.

Morwen cannot save her people. She does not have enough time to hide them away or lead them down out of the mountains to safety. Morwen’s aunt and uncle, Chieftain of Bëorians, had enough time to save the survivors of Dorthonion when Morwen was a girl, but history does not repeat itself so neatly.

Lorgan and his men do not slaughter the women and defenseless servants of Dor-lómin as had fallen onto the elves of Hithlum. He is merciful to the people of Húrin. There are survivors. Lorgan can use servants, washerwoman and cooks.

Morwen’s cousin, Rían, is missing.

Back during the First Battle of Beleriand, as Meril’s brother and father died trying to defend their land from being overrun that first time by Morgoth’s army, a herdsman of the Mithrim was cautious and quick-witted and saved as many of his neighbors as he could. His name is Annael, and he repeats that feat. He, his husband, and their neighbors flee to the caves that once held the Tatyar before they emerged to join under Meril’s protection. There are a few Avari among Annael's survivors. The herdsman tried to save all that he could. The number is far fewer than that first time, for all that Annael has more neighbors now. When the accounts come of how badly the Fifth Battle has gone, how there are no soldiers left to retake or save their homeland, Annael tells his husband to take their surviving children and the women who cannot fight and flee south via the secret ways to join with Meril’s child. Annael will send whom he can to Círdan. Few stay behind, for few are strong or skilled enough to fight back.

Rían is with them, just long enough to give Annael her newborn son, but soon she leaves to look for her husband, Huor, amidst the mountain of corpses that Lorgan raised after Fingon and Húrin’s army was wiped out. She dies on the Hill of the Slain.

Annael’s brother-in-law is a soldier in Fingon’s army, but he too had been Sindar, not a fellow Noldorin knight shouting that the dawn would rise again in a language emphatically not his. Nowhere near the spot where Fingon was killed, nor where Huor died defending King Turgon’s retreat back to the safety of Gondolin, or where Húrin was captured under the weight of the many trolls that he slew.

His name was Albethor, and his body is dragged to the Hill of the Slain and tossed in with all the other dead. Beside him is the corpse of the Tatyar Avari leader. They, at least, had died together. They will not know what befalls their people.

The adopted son of Albethor survives, but he parts ways halfway through the journey to the safety of Círdan, kissing his uncle goodbye. He wants to fight still. But he will not return to Hithlum or Dor-lómin.

Morwen sends her son, fleeing secretly, out of Dor-lómin to safety. Túrin is younger than she was when she had to flee Dorthonion after the Fourth Battle - but old enough to survive the journey. She and her soon-to-be-born daughter and her people remain in Dor-lomin, captives.

Annael raises Rían’s son as his own, and Tuor wants to fight, and Annael cannot stop him, or stop him from being captured by Lorgan. When Tuor finally escapes and returns, the caves are empty. Eventually Tuor leaves all of Hithlum behind, as his cousin once did, but unlike his cousin never returns. Tuor ends up in Gondolin, where he marries and has a son, and much later, the sea, where he is reunited with Annael and his husband.

Morwen is also reunited with husband, very far from the mountains around Dor-lomin.

Many years later, the nephew of Annael finally meets the son of Meril, escorting to safety with him the grandsons of Tuor. There are very few soldiers left on the Isle of Balar. Mostly women and children, servants and washerwomen and cooks.

Chapter End Notes

Annael's nephew is Seregeithon from In Need of a Cold Shower. The Tatyar Avari had settled around Lake Mithrim well after the Sindar were already established and at first avoided others, but ironically were the first elves than the newly arrived Noldor encountered (and the Avari were decidedly not impressed with the Noldor, which makes sense since these were Fëanor and his followers, so I don't blame them.)

Fingon has major Takeda Katsuyori vibes, and I'm delighted to write more of my long-held Meril headcanons.

Her grandfather is the same Eredhon from my other stories.