the light that you keep burning there by EchoBleu

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the light that you keep burning there

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The flames licking the decks of the docked ships carry an uncomfortable echo to that fated night in Losgar, and for a moment, Maedhros falters. But there is no time for memories. The orcs and their torches have already ran off elsewhere, their deed done, the fighting shifted over to the second harbour where the defence has yet to be breached. The sails of the evacuating ships can’t be seen through the smoke, but Maedhros’s quarry is here, a tiny, overlooked boat just starting to drift away.

“Princess Elwing!” he calls out, already jogging towards her in the fumes of the ruined docks.

The last of the pontoons collapses, unmoored boats drifting away before colliding with each other, spreading the flames. The planks give out under Maedhros’s feet, and he leaps, landing dangerously close to the prow of Elwing’s small boat. He tilts his body forward to avoid capsizing it entirely and rolls, ending up in a crouch at the bottom of the boat.

Elwing hisses. “What are you—”

“We’re losing,” Maedhros says, out of breath. He stands back up and plants his feet to settle the sway of the boat, grimacing when he realizes that his acrobatics have subluxated his bad shoulder. “We’re not going to make it. The King and Círdan will hold Balar as long as they can, but I don’t give it more than a few months.”

“I know all that,” Elwing cries, eyes wide.

“We need help. We need the Valar.” It tears at Maedhros’s throat to even say it, though it’s far from the first time. It feels like a betrayal of all his father stood for, to go begging for the Valar’s help, but they’re out of options.

“All the expeditions have been lost,” Elwing points. “What hope is there?”

Maedhros reaches into the folds of his gambeson, between the armoured plates. He holds out his hand to her. “Take this to your husband. It might tip the scale.”

Elwing stares at the Silmaril glowing in his hand. “You—”

“They are good for nothing if we’re all dead. The Valar wanted them once. Maybe if we’re willing to negotiate…”

Maedhros stops. The last tendril of the old Oath pulls at his vocal cords, powerless but nonetheless present, as if screaming for his betrayal.

“Take it to Eärendil,” he repeats. “Sail to Valinor. Do what we could not.”

“What about my sons?” Elwing asks, though her hand already twitches toward the Silmaril. Maedhros has to restrain himself from snatching it away.

Maedhros closes his eyes. “I had them evacuated to Balar with Maglor. They’ll have your brothers. We’ll do everything we can to protect them until you come back.”

“This is really the only hope we have, isn’t it?” Elwing whispers, and she looks every bit as young as she really is, a terrified child who has known nothing but a losing war.

“Be as swift as the wind,” Maedhros breathes, as kindly as he can, studiously immobile as she takes the Silmaril from his hand. “May the stars shine upon you and Varda look after you.”

“I pray that this is not the last time we meet, Maedhros Fëanorion,” Elwing says. “Take care of my sons for me.”

Maedhros nods and tears his gaze away from the Silmaril. Turning his back on Elwing, he yanks his shoulder back into its socket with a wince and dives into the water.

His armour is light enough to allow for swimming, but his one-armed strokes are less than efficient, and there is hardly a spot left of the harbour that isn’t on fire. It’s an exhausting half-hour before he managed to hoist himself onto solid ground and find a path back into the fray.

They are losing ground, fast. The retreat is disorganized and chaotic, and for many, fatal. They’ve already lost too many ships, and the ones left are already crammed with wounded soldiers, men and elves alike. The city, mostly built by refugees on the swampy grounds of the Sirion delta, is made of wood and cob on stilts, and the fire eats through it like a starved wolf its prey.

Maedhros blazes his way through a line of snarling orcs, felling each of them with precise throws of his sword. Morgoth didn’t bother to send Balrogs to this battle, or dragons beside the small flying one who started the fire. He didn’t need to. The Havens are a city of refugees, not warriors, and Maedhros’ small force makes up the only fighters. Without any more ships, they are backed against the water, facing a legion of orcs twenty times their number. Maedhros makes for the tower, the only stone building that they still have a chance of defending.

He can just see his youngest brothers standing on the parapet with bows in their hands, trying to keep the dragon at bay. The dragon’s hide is riddled with shallowly embedded arrows, but they don’t seem to hinder it as it flies round to strike at the tower again. Ambarussa run for cover, along with the two other archers with them – the Iathrin twins, Elwing’s brothers. Maedhros spares a glance toward the water again, spotting a lonely white sail disappearing in the distance.

Elwing made it. She’ll find her husband, sail for Valinor, and maybe give them a fighting chance.

But unless a miracle happens, Maedhros will not see that chance realized.

Orcs are surrounding the tower, going at the door with a battering ram. The light guard Maedhros left there was long overrun, and he doesn’t have enough people left to dislodge them. His soldiers are being herded to the water, and some of them are jumping in rather than let themselves be taken, choosing to take their chances with Ulmo.

Balar is too far to swim to in armour, especially after a day of fighting and orc arrows raining on the waters. Perhaps some of them will manage to catch up with the last of the fleeing ships. Maedhros tightens his grip on his sword and goes after the archers, determined to cover their flight with his life if need be.

A shout of victory rings out from the top of the tower, and the dragon rears and screeches, a thick Iathrin arrow protruding from its eye. It flies erratically for a moment, one huge uncoordinated wing sweeping a dozen orcs off the ground, and then it crashes straight into the tower.

Maedhros doesn’t even realize he’s crying out, doesn’t hear his own words. He slashes through a sea of orcs as the tower crumbles, sharp-edged granite stone raining down on the fighters below. A piece glances his cheek, but he barely feels the blood pouring from the wound and into his neck guard.

The dragon finally tumbles down and lands down at his feet with a resounding crack, its huge black body covered in stone dust, wings still twitching. Maedhros pays it little attention beyond stepping out of the way, his gaze focused upward.

The parapet and the top floor of the tower are gone. The doors have opened wide under the combined weight of the shaking and the battering ram, and Maedhros launches himself through them, unheeding of the orcs trying to impede his way. They don’t come after him when he runs up the stairs, their interest in the tower gone.

The fifth floor landing opens to the smoke-filled sky (there used to be seven floors). Maedhros finds Pityo first in the rubble, backed up against a carved out wall. His face is turned to the veiled sun, and his eyes are open and unseeing. A few feet away, Eluréd is sprawled on his side, his head bashed in, the blood-stained block of stone that hit him still lying next to his crushed body. Even had he not looked identical to his twin, only the crest on his breastplate could have identified him now.

“Telvo!” Maedhros shouts, frantically looking for the brother he can’t see – but that hope is soon crushed as well. He finds a hand first, pale and still, a dark red braid whitened with dust. His youngest brother lies on his back, mouth still opened in a silent scream. Maedhros nearly retches at the sight of his body past the shoulders – there is little left.

A cough attracts his attention away to the remains of the opposite wall. Elurín is slumped against a slab of stone, his great bow still inches from his listless hand – likely the one that took down the dragon. His breastplate has a great dent in it, and his breathing is shallow and erratic. (He’s already past saving. Maedhros can tell at a glance.)

Maedhros falls to one knee beside him. He seems conscious, but barely. His usually tanned face is paler than a shroud. Helpless to help him, Maedhros starts to hum an old healing song, hoping to at least ease the pain of his passing. He’s done this for too many of his people.

He was too late to do it for his brothers.

“Eluréd…” Elurín whispers between laboured breaths. “He’s gone.”

“I’m sorry,” Maedhros says without interrupting his song. He reaches out to take Elurín’s hand, but the half-elf doesn’t squeeze back, as if his body has already given out. His eyes are clouded but intent on Maedhros’s face, still searching, still clinging to life.

“Ambarussa—”

Maedhros swallows and shakes his head. He can’t feel anything – not yet.

Elurín coughs again. Blood trickles down from the corner of his mouth. “It was… an honour to—to fight beside them.”

Maedhros stops humming, opens his mouth to offer a prayer of safe travels to Mandos, but it occurs to him, suddenly, that he doesn’t know if the half-elves count as mortal. Will they join his brothers in the Halls of Mandos, or pass beyond the world?

He will not grieve them like he will undoubtedly grieve for his brothers, once the numbness fades, but he can’t help wondering. They are so young, barely of age even by mannish standards. Even if they’re mortal, they should have had decades to live.

“You slayed a dragon,” he says instead. “Your bravery will be remembered.”

Elurín smiles, with blood staining his teeth and pooling out of his mouth. “Good. Elwing?”

“She’s safe, she sailed out. She’s going to her husband.”

“The children…”

“We’ll take care of them,” Maedhros promises. “We’ll keep them safe.”

“There were sails…” Elurín chokes out, barely a murmur. “Your king is… coming.”

He breathes out, and doesn’t breathe in again. Maedhros swallows back a dry sob and reaches up to close his eyelids, brushing back a loose strand of hair from his face.

Painfully, he stumbles back to his feet and over to the outer wall, where he leans over the remains of a windowsill. The fire is still spreading through the city, the cries and clangs of battle still ongoing below him, but all he can see is the wide spread of the sea.

And there in the distance, fast approaching under full sail, Círdan’s ships, flying the king’s blue and silver banner.

Fingon is coming to save them.

He will be too late for Eluréd and Elurín. He will be too late for Telvo and Pityo. Two more brothers that Maedhros held in his arms moments after their births and swore to protect, two more brothers that he has failed.

He feels something trickle down his chin and reaches up, surprised that he can’t feel himself crying, but his hand only comes back stained with blood from his cheek wound. His eyes are dry.

Hours later, Fingon will find him keeled over in front of the tower, amid a sea of dead orcs, his sword still dripping with blood. He will frantically search Maedhros over for injuries and guide him onboard a ship, strip him of his armour and wash away the grime. And when Maedhros finally weeps, it will be in Fingon’s arms, but only after he has seen to the care of Elwing’s sons and broken the news to each of his remaining brothers.

(There is nothing else left to do.)

*

Maglor stills his fingers and puts his lap harp side way across his knees. The twins have finally both fallen asleep, after no less than three stories and five songs. Putting to bed ten-year-old peredhil who have decided that they hate bedtime is much harder than Maglor ever thought it could be, even after helping his parents and Maedhros with Curufin and Ambarussa.

It’s been four years now since he became the closest thing to a parent the twins have – four years, also, since the loss of his youngest brothers. Elros and Elrond are growing at an alarming rate, their Mannish side clearly coming on top when it comes to maturity. It seems like every day, Maglor finds something new to fret about, be it clothing sizes or Elrond’s recent propensity toward foresight.

(Everyone who could tell them what’s normal for peredhil is either dead or gone beyond where anyone can follow.)

As quietly as possible, Maglor pushes his wheelchair backwards out of the twins’ tiny bedroom and closes the door behind him. Their accommodations on Balar are sparse, far from what should befit the heirs to half of the elven kingdoms in Beleriand, but the little wooden house is better than the tents and makeshift buildings that too many of the refugees are still sleeping in. They have real beds and a fireplace, and space enough for the children to play.

The late summer night is clear. A cool breeze from the sea hits Maglor’s face as he wheels himself past the open front door and over to where Maedhros is standing, watching the starry sky. Maedhros doesn’t react to his presence, but his handless arm twitches minutely.

“That’s a Silmaril,” he says, his eyes directed toward the shining star in the west, set just above the last tendrils of sunset orange reflected in the sea.

“It rose four days ago,” Maglor answers.

“You didn’t tell me.”

Maglor shrugs. “It’s been a bad week.”

You haven’t been outside in days goes unsaid. Where Maglor, when the world stops making sense, seeks the comfort of the stars and the sea, as far from the cavernous throne room of Angband as he can get, Maedhros tends to retreat inward and inside. He doesn’t like watching the stars. It reminds him too much of the years chained to Thangorodrim, Maglor thinks. Of all the years after the Darkening, maybe – many of those who passed over the Helcaraxë don’t like them either.

The new star, when the last light of the sun hits it just so and dampens the brightness of the Silmaril, looks suspiciously like Eärendil’s great ship Vingilot. Maglor isn’t sure yet how to feel about this. He eyes Maedhros, half fearing his wrath – his mood swings of late have been spectacular, though never where the children can hear – and half hoping for counsel.

“Eärendil and Elwing made it,” Maedhros says, his voice even. “They took our plea for help to the Valar.”

“But why this? Why a star?”

Maedhros shifts, without looking away from the Silmaril. “A sign.”

Maglor nods. That’s the best conclusion he can come up with, too. A message from the Valar. It’s what he’s heard in town, too. Círdan was doubtful, but Círdan, for all his devotion, has never set foot on Aman.

“The people have started to call it Gil-Estel.”

“Atar would be furious,” Maedhros says.

He sounds… amused, almost. Maglor widens his eyes in surprise – he’d expected anger on their father’s behalf, a reminder of their Oath, maybe – but then Maedhros gave Elwing the Silmaril. Maglor didn’t really understand that, either. He feels like he understands very little, these days, beside his music and the little boys he’s trying to care for. Leave the politics to Maedhros and Fingon – he’s had enough of them.

“Wouldn’t it have been easier to just send Vingilot back?” he asks. “By the sea, I mean. Elwing must be anxious to reunite with her sons. Eärendil, too.”

Maedhros doesn’t answer. His profile, pulled out of the night in sharp contrast by the light of the moon from Maglor’s low point of view, is once more stony and emotionless.

“They’re not coming back, are they?” Maglor sighs. “What do we tell the boys?”

“The truth.”

The truth. That the twins are functionally orphans – left behind to fight a war that has already taken everything from them. That the Valar, immaterial gods so far removed from the world of Middle-Earth-born peredhil, would keep parents away from their children for the sake of a symbolic hope.

The surge of anger comes almost as a shock to Maglor, he who almost never rages except in music. It feels cold and gripping, nothing like Maedhros’s fiery outbursts. He hates the Valar – the Vala who sits on his stone throne in the fortress of Angband, who made him sing and sing until his throat bled and mangled his legs beyond repair, and the ones who looked down on them from their mountain in Valinor and doomed them to fail and die alone in the dark. And now the twins, by virtue of – what? being born Noldor? being loved by Fëanorians? – are enmeshed in their doom as well.

Maglor thought he had left behind any concept of fair, of recompense and just desserts. But tomorrow, he will have to look at his charges and tell them that their parents aren’t coming back, and Elrond will cling to him with tears in his eyes, and Elros will yell, “It’s not fair,” and Maglor’s heart will break for them a little more.

Abruptly, he pushes himself forward. The motion is too harsh and sends him wheeling down the path until he grips his wheels and locks them, scratching his palms, and the jolt of fear washes the rages away.

“Káno?” Maedhros asks in concern, coming after him.

Maglor puts on the brakes and brings up his hands to check on the damage. The scratches are stinging, but no blood was drawn – he’s fine. His right leg throbs from the involuntary contraction.

“I’m tired,” he whispers.

Tired and sore. He’s been handling things on his own, with Maedhros too ill to help and Fingon and Finrod in Ossiriand to speak with one of the last Kindi tribes. The twins are energetic and didn’t do well with being cooped up inside because of the rain – and with missing their sword training lessons with Maedhros.

Maedhros’s hand hovers over his shoulder and, at Maglor’s minute nod, squeezes it tightly. With the barest wince, he lowers himself to a crouch beside Maglor’s wheelchair. He’s so tall that they are almost of a height like this, with him sitting on his heels.

“Help will come. This,” Maedhros gestures toward the star, “is what it tells us. I hate all of this as much as you do, but we must endure.”

Endure. It has been so long – less than a century, really, since Morgoth rose again from the ashes of Angband, but it feels like an age. To evil end shall all things turn that they begin well. They had hoped the Doom nullified by their initial victory, by the long peace that they bought in blood and tears, but they saw it all fall. They lost battle after battle, strongholds (homes) after strongholds, friends, cousins, brothers. And still it will not end. Here on the tiny island of Balar, the last bastion of the free people of Beleriand, they must endure.

And wait for the help of those that forsook them.

“I will talk to the boys,” Maedhros says.

Maglor leans forward until their foreheads touch. It isn’t a warm embrace. Maglor’s legs burn with cramps and Maedhros’s hand is too tight on his shoulder, trembling ever so slightly. There is little left of the vivacious, charismatic brothers they were once in Aman.

“We’ll do it together.”

Elrond and Elros deserve a better future. For that, for them, Maglor will endure.

*

The sails were spotted almost three days ago, and the white ships have been anchored in the distance for almost a day. There has been exchanges of messengers, of heralds. Fingon sent Gil-galad rather than Finrod, unsure who to expect on the other side. He came back with a letter written in a hand that made Finrod gasp and leave the room.

The ships are Teleri-made. Maedhros full-body flinched at the sight, when Círdan first showed them. They’re all on edge, the relief at the end of a long wait offset by the stress of the situation. Fingon can feel it in the slight tremor in Maedhros’s stump, in Finrod’s clenched jaw, in his own tense shoulders under his armour.

The harbour square, the cramped space that lies between the King’s house and the docks, is kept empty by Fingon’s own guards, posted at each street corner. Beyond that perimeter, the people of Balar have crammed themselves in every inch of space, hundreds of faces watching over the guards’ shoulders and pressed against the upper floor windows of the houses overlooking the square. Space, on Balar, is a prized commodity, especially since they were joined by what was left of the Havens’ people.

Fingon stands waiting, in full armour, in the middle of the square, Maedhros at his right and Finrod at his left. Beside Finrod is Círdan, a few steps away, in formal robes, with a smattering of his advisors. All of them gravely face the harbour, where, on the closest pontoon, a small swan-shaped boat is docking under Gil-galad’s watch.

Fingon allows himself a discreet look around the square, taking care not to meet anyone’s eyes. Maedhros looks so tense as to be ill, his skin pasty, though none of it shows in his expression. Fingon wants to take his hand, even knowing that he can’t, that Maedhros would not thank him for breaking protocol. The situation is delicate enough as it is.

Behind him, almost against the wall, Maglor is sitting in his wheelchair flanked on each side by one of the twins, who are whispering to each other. Círdan and Fingon both asked for their presence, as the heirs apparent to the thrones of fallen Doriath and Gondolin both, the one tangible link of the fragile alliance between Noldor and Sindar. Maedhros and Maglor would have rather have them far away from here – as they themselves, Fingon thinks, would rather be anywhere else. Elros and Elrond were given the choice, and they mostly came because they still hope that their mother might be on one of the ships.

Unlike Princess Elwing, though, the people who step onto the harbour are all shockingly blond and shiny, silver armour so polished that it reflects the light of the sun in all directions. Guards and standard-bearers smoothly fan out into formation, allowing Fingon to concentrate his gaze on the three in the middle.

Gil-galad bows low and guides them over.

“Arafinwë Finwion, High King of the Noldor in Aman, Ingwion, Crown Prince of the Vanyar, and Ëonwë, Herald of Manwë, High King of Arda.”

Gil-galad smoothly repeats everything into Sindarin for Círdan – and it’s only here, in front of these faces from the distant past, that Fingon notices that Gil-galad’s Sindarin is much more fluent than his Quenya. Maedhros doesn’t wince when he translates Arafinwë’s name as Finarfin, but Fingon almost winces for him. They both remember a row of epic proportions between their fathers on the matter of Fingolfin calling himself Finwë Nolofinwë right before the Fëanorians left on the ships.

Finrod, on the other hand, does wince a little. He’s never been good at schooling his face. He hasn’t seen his father in six centuries, and they parted in anger – he’s been fretting even more than Maedhros. Fingon, again, resists the urge to reach out.

Finarfin is laden with more jewellery than Fingon has seen on anyone since the Exile, his hair braided with pearls and gems, his silver circlet heavier than a crown. His armour is not ceremonial, but still obviously untested, and his left hand hovers at his side rather than resting comfortably on the hilt of his sword. Fingon meets his eyes, and he simultaneously wants to hug his uncle and fall to his knees at his feet, and raise his chin and walk away.

He does neither, bowing exactly as deep as he should to a king of equal rank. There’s a flicker of – something – in Finarfin’s gaze as he returns the gesture. Fingon repeats it with Ingwion, who he barely knew in Aman, and offers a slightly shallower bow to Ëonwë. The Herald stays impassible and does not bow back.

(Well, that sets the tone.)

“My lords,” Gil-Galad is still announcing, this time turned to their guests. “Findekáno Ñolofinwion, High King of the Noldor in Beleriand, and Ciryatan, Lord of Balar, Lord of the Falathrim and Regent of the Iathrim.”

The introduction is short. As king, Fingon’s father had a list of titles longer than the arm, and everyone here was king or lord of something not so long ago. There’s nothing left of that now – even Fingon’s kingdom is now landless, courtesy only in the city of another lord. But the guests know little, or nothing, of all that.

“Welcome to Beleriand,” Fingon says, pitching his voice so it will carry. “Or what is left of it.”

It is only much later, in the relative privacy of his bedroom, that Fingon leans into Maedhros’s arms and lets himself feel.

The leaders of the Host went back to their ship, turning their nose at the poor accommodations that Balar could offer. No, that isn’t fair, Fingon supposes. They have advisors of their own, plans to make, and no doubt far more luxurious fare awaiting them in their gilded cabins. Just as well – feeding them even what passes for a kingly meal here on Balar would have meant half the island went hungry.

Ëonwë was cold and unyielding. Ingwion seemed to snub everything he landed his eyes on, but that might just be his general personality. Finarfin wore his heart on his sleeve while somehow acting like they are all good friends.

Finrod and his father had a private row and a private teary hug, and Fingon knows that nothing between them is resolved. There will be a reckoning, later. How could there not be? How could anything ever go back to what it was before the Darkening?

Somewhere on one of the ships, they have been told, is Fingon’s mother – and for how much he misses her, the thought of seeing her again fills him with dread and rage and guilt in equal measures. How can he face her, after the deaths of his father and his brothers? How can he welcome her here, six hundred years after she turned her back on them? (How can he want her here, in the wasteland of Morgoth’s wrath, in the blood and the grime and the death?)

“What are you thinking about?” Maedhros asks softly, his voice rough and low like it has been ever since Angband.

His arms are a welcome restraint around Fingon’s own. His hand idly plays with then hanging end of Fingon’s silk belt – they’ve both exchanged their armours for dressing gowns. Fingon, in turn, gently traces the scars on Maedhros’s stump, made by his own blade.

“Home,” he answers.

Maedhros sighs, nuzzling his braided hair. There’s a crash and a curse in the adjoining room, and Fingon wonders vaguely what Finrod just threw at the wall – hopefully not one of the good crystal glasses, they don’t have enough of these left. He can’t muster the same anger in himself, only tiredness. He leans into Maedhros’s embrace until their cheeks touch.

“When we go home,” Finarfin had said, encompassing them all as if this was a foregone conclusion – but home is no longer Aman. Fingon used to dream, even long after the Doom was set upon them, of coming back to Tirion triumphant and, fundamentally, unchanged. It was but a pipe dream – that ship sailed (with Maedhros on it) the moment they drew their blades in Alqualondë.

For many years, it was the guilt that clawed at him, that made the thought of a return impossible. He is a kinslayer. It’s an inescapable truth, a taint he will never be clean of (a taint he should never be clean of). But today, hearing Finarfin talk of home, that is not where his thoughts lead him.

Fingon has made a home here – not here on Balar, but in Maedhros’s arms, in the company of Finrod and Maglor and the others, in mentoring Gil-galad, in the raising of the peredhil boys. A home in war-torn Beleriand that the proud, condescending Host of the Valar will never understand.

“When we go home,” Finarfin had said, “we can work on building a lasting peace together.”

Two High Kings of the Noldor, whose experience of war and peace could not be more different. No, Aman is no longer home, and Fingon isn’t persuaded that they will even be allowed back at all, but that is a problem for later.

For now, they have a war to fight. And for the first time in a long time, they have a real, tangible hope of winning.

---

Chapter End Notes

The initial divergence of this AU is that Maglor tried to rescue Maedhros from Angband, and ended up captured in turn, which led a number of his brothers and cousins (plus Lúthien) to plan a heist and prison break. It's all just hinted at here, but I'm planning to write more of the early years. So, if you want to read more, you can watch/subscribe to this series.

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