Our Most Beloved Star by Uvatha the Horseman

The Ransom Note

The hatch swung open, revealing a dazzling square of white. Elrond put his hands over his eyes, momentarily blinded.

"Let's go to the house and get you cleaned up, and then we'll have some breakfast." Maglor helped him climb out into the morning sunlight. The air was cold, and fog had settled low around the trunks of the ancient forest trees.

Inside the house, a long wooden table held fresh-baked bread and pots of jam. While they ate, his captors talked in hushed voices.

"If we don't lock them up they'll run off, and we'll have nothing to bargain with," Maedhros hissed.

"They can't run off. There's not a village or even an isolated farm anywhere nearby. And they won't hide in the forest, it's too dangerous."

"They don't know that. They might be stupid enough to try."

Maedhros fell silent for a long time.

"This is what I've decided. You're going to stay in the house until you're ransomed. You can't run away because there's nowhere to run to. And don't even think of trying to escape into the forest. It isn't safe. You'll get lost, and in desperation, you might eat poisonous berries or mushrooms, or you'll drink tainted water and get a case of the flux that could kill you."

"Maedhros is right. The forest is dangerous. If you got separated from each other and one of you twisted an ankle, you could die right there within a couple of days. No one would ever know what happened to you."

Elrond felt a knot in the pit of his stomach. The b0ys who would have been their uncles were abandoned in the forest when they were six. In spite of the family legend about being raised by woodland animals, they'd almost certainly perished. He didn't think he and Elros would do any better.

"How long do we have to stay here?"

Maglor patted his shoulder. "Just a little while. We'll send a ransom note to your parents, choose a place to do the trade, and then you can go home."

"Maglor, I need you to be my scribe." Maedhros pushed paper and ink across the table.

"These are our terms. If you want to see the boys again, we'll trade them for the Silmaril." Maedhros suggested a bridge in a neutral location and a date, two weeks in the future.

Maglor lowered his pen. "We have to allow time for our messenger to reach them, and to come back with a reply. And they might need some time to think about it."

"What's to think about? We're giving them the chance to buy back their children. I don't think it will take them long to agree," said Maedhros.

Except for one thing. When the house was attacked, Mother made a split-second decision between her boys and the Jewel. She chose the Jewel.