Chapter Text
“Elrond?” Elros says with a nervous laugh. “I’m at least half certain you were knocked out cold last night… But if that’s really the case, why do you look like you haven’t gotten a wink of sleep?”
Does he truly look as terrible as he feels? Elrond absentmindedly traces the bags under his eyes and peers at them through the mirror in the communal bath. They ring his skin like faint little bruises, the worst dark circles he’s ever gotten. That’s saying a lot too, given how often he used to pull all-nighters pouring over Maglor’s old Quenya texts the year before.
“I didn’t even bruise that badly when I got hit with the butt of an axe during that one orc raid! Did Maedhros deck you in the face yesterday or something?”
“It’s nothing. I’m just tired, that’s all,” he says.
That’s also what he tries to tell himself as he gets dressed, brushes his hair and trails to breakfast with the rest of Amon Ereb. He cannot help himself from scanning the hall, looking for either Maglor or Maedhros with his heart beating wildly in his chest. Of course, neither of them are there, though he knows not whether this is a comfort to him or something that only prolongs the torment bubbling to the surface.
It doesn’t help that he is somewhat of the center of attention for today. Some of Maedhros’ men come up to him and slap him on the shoulder, thanking him for saving their beloved lord’s life; others holler their appreciation at him from across the hall. Mostly he is just stared at, like some sort of freak attraction for people to gawk at. The cruel irony of it is that it only makes Morgoth’s cruel words resonate in his head all the more
…all who gaze upon his broken form and see through him the spoils of an existence in my kingdom....
....only to then quiver before him in a mixture of awe and repulsion....
…people like you propagate his torment…
...you are horrified by his scars… To you, he is an outlier... an abhorrent mockery of Iluvatar’s ideals...
…he struggles even today, plagued by nightmares and traumas and shame.... Yet you form thoughts of your own...
...You have pried so much from him already, after all…
“Be quiet!” Elrond shouts— and then he realises the entire hall has fallen silent.
The elf maiden who’d been asking him for help decoding a particularly challenging book of runes freezes, looking fearful that she has somehow done something to offend him with her innocent request. With bile rising to his throat, he stutters out a pathetic apology. Before anyone can attempt to stop him, however, he pushes his bowl of barely-touched oatmeal aside and flees from the hall.
Blindly he runs and he runs and he runs, but no matter where he goes he cannot escape from those gnawing termites of guilt that devour the butterflies in his stomach with ravenous savagery. Then suddenly he feels like he’s going to spew those termites from his mouth so he locks himself in the outhouse and waits for the vomit to come rising but it never comes and he ends up contemplating sticking his fingers down his throat to pull them out one-by-one as if that would be a less painful solution to drown out all the sudden feelings of anxiety and resentment that are peck-peck-pecking away at him like some sort of relentless goblin—
The next time he comes to, he is curled up under the shade of a weeping willow. He presses himself against a large hole in the bark, shivering. Although his body is now too big to fit inside, being as close as he can to the little hidey-hole he used to retreat into as a child brings him a sense of comfort he thinks is closest to a mother’s embrace.
A mother’s embrace? How peculiar he’d liken it to that. He’s already forgotten what it felt like the last time Elwing held him in her arms. Now he worries that he’s going to forget her face entirely, too.
Elrond thinks he is shaking because of the cold. He thinks that if he just buries his head into his knees and wraps his arms around himself tighter, the chill will disappear along with this dread he cannot understand. He doesn’t think that he is crying- but when someone gently taps him on the shoulder and he lifts his head, he realises that his cheeks are frigid in places shaped suspiciously like tear tracks.
“Oh, my little moon,” comes a soft voice. “What are you doing weeping out here in the cold? You’ve grown far too big to try and fit in the tree, you know.”
“Ada,” he croaks.
“Come, little one.” He feels an arm wrap around him, gently hoisting him to his feet. Instinctively he curls into Maglor’s warmth and buries his face in his quilted robes, taking comfort in his familiar smell of lavenders. Ever the doting father, Maglor indulges his childish bid for comfort and pulls him into an embrace. “Let’s get you inside, alright? My goodness, you must be freezing, you poor thing. Come on now.”
Maglor leads Elrond to his room, where he lights the fireplace and bustles about getting a pot of tea ready once he has thoroughly bundled the boy in a mountain of quilts and furs. He fusses and coos like Elrond is six years old again, spooning a generous amount of honey into a steaming cup of tea and handing it to him with a kiss on the forehead. It embarasses the boy, to be treated like a little child again, but somehow he doesn’t quite mind the extra attention.
“How did you know I’d be outside?” he mumbles.
“Half the breakfast hall saw you suddenly take off like a worried little bird,” Maglor answers with a sympathetic smile, “Though, it was Elros who nearly knocked me over when he ran to my study screaming that something was wrong with you.”
Elrond manages a half-smile at the thought of his brother running through the halls of the citadel, screeching at the top of his lungs. Perhaps if he’d been paying more attention to the world around him, he’d have heard him. In hindsight it was a rather amusing thought, although the thoughts weighing in heavily on his heart keep him from enjoying it fully.
Maglor sees this. He hums softly an amicable tune as he pours Elrond another cup of tea.
“It is unlike you to crumble to such hysterics,” he comments, though not unkindly. “Would you like to talk about it?”
“I couldn’t,” Elrond mutters, but the knowing look in Maglor’s time-wearied eyes sparks a flame of hope in his chest. For a second he contemplates this-- but then Morgoth laughs once more, and his resolution crumbles immediately.
“Oh, I know,” Maglor says softly, “You haven’t been yourself since yesterday. This concerns Maedhros, doesn’t it?”
Sweet Maglor, whose kindness knows no bounds. Gentle Maglor, who has always been able to read him like an open book. Loving Maglor, who would never pry into anything without his express permission, nor judge him in his moments of weakness…
“Will you hate me if it is?” Elrond asks, and he hates how he sounds like a guilty child terrified of punishment.
“What reason would I possibly have to hate you?”
“Because of what I did yesterday!” he blurts out. “When I was working on him he was in so much pain but I couldn’t find any painkiller so-- so I used some of the malasië you made, only it drugged him! He wasn’t in his right state of mind, Ada, and there was nothing I could do... He talked more than he would have normally, and… and…”
Maglor’s almond-shaped eyes narrow as the implications of this admission piece themselves together in his head. He contemplates for a moment, as if choosing his words carefully. He stirs his tea and watches stray tea leaves dance in the flurry of the tornado his spoon creates. Elrond takes a sip- then another, and another, in an attempt to drown out the nervous butterflies making havoc in his stomach.
“Did he tell you much?” Maglor finally asks.
“About...” he hesitates. “About his, um…”
“His captivity,” the minstrel finishes gently.
The boy’s face crumples. “Not so much that I am acutely familiar with everything… But enough that I now understand the reasons for the way he carried himself around us when we were children.”
“I see,” Maglor murmurs. The look in his eyes is faraway yet sorrowful all the same. “So he finally spoke of it.”
“Has he not spoken of it before?” he asks in surprise. “I do recall him saying so, but… Surely, bottling such pains up for so long without telling a soul… that should be impossible…”
“Aye, but that is the truth. You, little one, are to my knowledge the very first person that Maedhros has confided to. That is an… honour… not even I nor our late brothers can call our own, for all the centuries we spent by his side.”
“That is not right then! I cannot be the only one who knows!” Elrond exclaims, looking crestfallen. “I am an outsider in this matter- I have acted out of line. Would it not be better if you, his brother, were to—”
“Do not finish that sentence,” Maglor interrupts shakily. “You need not repeat a thing to me. What Maedhros has told you, he has told you in secrecy. I do not intend to pry this from you.”
Elrond groans, despairing. “That’s the problem! When I administered the malasië, I drugged him— I did not know it would drug him, but it did nonetheless. It was only under its influence that he spoke to me of… his….”
“But he spoke to you nonetheless, did he not?”
“Not of his own volition, surely! And because of that… I feel as if I have crossed a boundary that I very much had no right to venture across.” The boy pinches the bridge of his nose before his head sinks down, gripped between his hands. “I feel like I have destroyed what existing trust he may have in me.”
Maglor scoffs, making a low and incredulous sound very much unlike his usual graceful mannerisms. “Goodness, child, are you drugged? A troll could repeat your words and I would laugh at it less.”
Elrond winces like the words have slapped him and the minstrel softens, seeing the genuine guilt that appears to be eating the Peredhel up from the inside.
“Forgive me… I only jest. It’s just that when I hear your words, I’m simply reminded of my younger self.” He sighs, “It was a long, long time ago, but Eru has a peculiar sense of humour. Back then, I found myself in a situation somewhat similar to the predicament you say you are trapped within.”
“What do you mean?”
“I saw a glimpse into his torture, even though I had no right to pry. And what I witnessed that day, I have not forgotten since...”
(Himring, FA 147)
He had not intended to find himself tiptoeing into Maedhros’ chambers under the cover of twilight. All Maglor wished to do that night, after he’d awoken with a throbbing soreness on his shoulder where he’d suffered an old arrow wound, was get some painkiller from the medical wing. Given he was only staying in Himring as a guest on visit, he’d gotten miserably lost. Confused and growing increasingly bashful, he’d passed by Maedhros’ room when he heard the sound of soft whimpering from beyond those heavy oak doors.
As inaudible as they are to him, standing uneasily in the middle of the dark hallway, they seem to grow louder the more he focuses on them. Before he can realise what he’s doing, he finds himself kneeling by the door to Maedhros’ room with his ear pressed against its cold wooden surface, straining desperately to see if his brother is truly in pain or if he’s finally going insane.
The whimpers continue. Maglor needs no visuals to understand the raw terror that suffocates each one like a terrible poison, leaving his brother gasping for air and choking back tears. Unable to simply shrug this off and return to bed pretending like nothing has happened, the minstrel opens the door as quietly as he can and creeps into the chamber.
The closer he draws to Maedhros’ sleeping figure, the more defined those cries become. Under the soft streaks of starlight that illuminate the chamber in thin lines, Maglor sees the outline of his body, curled into a shaking ball under his blankets. Only the top of his head and his crimson hair are visible. Maglor kneels by his bedside, gently teasing the blankets away so he can have a clearer view of his brother’s face.
Perhaps it’s the odd lighting, or perhaps it’s simply Maglor’s own emotions warping his perception of reality, but the Maedhros before him now seems nothing like the one that swept through the halls of his stronghold in the daytime giving courage to his people. His sleeping face is one creased by vulnerability: his eyebrows crumpled together, the corners of his eyes stained, his chin shielded by a few slender fingers that curl over it.
Maglor swells with shame when he catches his fear in his throat. Loath as he is to admit it, it honestly frightens him to see his older brother in such a state. He had again grown accustomed to seeing him the way he carried himself in the face of battle and leadership, despite him having returned from hell itself little over a century ago.
To the world, Maedhros Fëanorion was a living, breathing example of a miracle: arguably the most unfortunate of Bauglir’s victims, yet the one who’d made the strongest comeback. Many praised him for the calm head he carried on his shoulders— for his stoicism and the unbelievable emotional strength he surely must have, given how quickly he was able to rebound from his captivity. To lead his people as lord once more without so much as allowing himself to be caught faltering.
Yet it is by the nature of any sentient being that past traumas cannot just be forgotten in an instant, even if the one who carries them wills them to. Despite the unshakeable front Maedhros had put up, the memories of his torment surely must still have haunted him. Memories he’d locked away; memories drowned out by the new distractions he had to lean on as a leader, a general— as living, breathing proof that one could survive Morgoth’s cruelty and come back stronger than ever. Memories that only resurfaced when he was alone… for better, or for worse.
Maglor had forgotten that.
The world had forgotten that.
Perhaps Maedhros would have liked to forget that, too.
Another low moan shakes the sleeping elf. Sweat trickles down his face and he rocks violently, almost as if accosted by an invisible force, but almost immediately he falls back into tormented stasis. Maglor strokes his brother’s face and tucks unruly strands of red hair behind his ears. He yearns to sing, but his throat is dry— and he knows if he attempts to make a sound now, his voice will only break and bring with it the onslaught of tears that threaten to spill from his eyes.
Oh, hányo, what cruelty Irmo scorns you with, he thinks bitterly to himself, That even in slumber he refuses to grant you a moment’s peace free from the torment of your mind.
Maglor sighs, but clasps his hands together and briefly contemplates if a prayer might move Lorien and his wife to pity. He does not know if it will work, but he decides to try anyway. He spends the next few moments with his eyes squeezed shut, mind flowing with words he desperately attempts to channel to the realm of the Valar he once knew as mentors. Yet in the midst of his endeavour, as he enters the deepest pit of his concentration, he stumbles across something else entirely—
No… no more… Please, I beg of you…
He jolts backwards in surprise but regains his composure last minute so as to not sever what strange connection he has formed to the voice that echoes in his mind. It belongs to Maedhros, yet a quick glance to his dormant figure will prove that he is still deep asleep, trapped within the confines of his ongoing nightmare. The words continue to creep into existence all the same.
No more… no more, not again…
A cruel laugh reverberates into Maglor’s mind, causing him to gasp and clutch the side of his head. Maedhros groans, burying his face into his blankets. The distress permeating his body language is now undeniable; Maglor inevitably pieces two and two together, and the ramifications of his epiphany leave him realising that perhaps he has launched himself into something far more convoluted than he initially braced himself for.
He yearns to comfort his brother- it is something he has strived to do since the day Fingon returned with him. When Maglor helped nurse him back to health and witnessed the slow but powerful return of vigour to Maedhros’ countenance, he held onto that desire to make up for lost time and walk him through his recovery.
But Maedhros had built walls around his heart. With each attempt Maglor made to forge doors that could lead past those blockades, his elder brother only retreated further behind his defenses and erected new ones far taller and impenetrable than the first few.
Maglor does not know if he acts out of a desire to genuinely comfort him, or if it is his guilt that pilots his desperation. But Nelyo’s voice… the Moringotto’s terrible laugh- they resonate endlessly within his spinning head, goading him on the same uselessness he flaunted during his thirty-three years as the High King Regent of the Noldor. Here now before him is a rare opportunity to reach out to Maedhros— to share his pain, to understand him better so he may be able to offer him assistance! And even if this practise is something he personally frowned upon, is it not something he necessarily deems wholly unusable...
So Maglor steadies himself, closes his eyes and places a gentle finger on Maedhros’ left temple. He had been skilled at ösanwë - nearly the best of his family, save for perhaps Artanis or Findekáno - and the delicacy of growing up as one of the older children meant that he and Maedhros had often resorted to communicating via this when they deemed the topic of their conversations unsuitable for younger ears.
Never once, however, had he attempted ösanwë with a recipient unaware of it.
Traversing through the annals of space that reside within the darkness of Maedhros’ mind, Maglor sees before him now an archway that is sealed away only by a short rope. Upon closer inspection, he realises it is the mental link between him and his older brother- delicate, worn thin by time, yet dimly golden in its unbreakable resplendence nonetheless. The passageway beyond is so frigid that even standing before it leaves him submerged in an icy feeling of dread.
He unhooks the rope and plunges himself into the frozen abyss.
All at once, the new feeling of about a thousand different sensations knocks the wind out of his lungs. Maglor winces at the heat that nibbles at his fingertips and the pungent miasma that seems to scald his lungs with every breath he takes. When he opens his eyes he is startled by just how dark it is— yet unlike the cooling feeling of nothingness from earlier, this darkness is oppressive. It is almost as if he has wandered into the maw of a ravenous beast.
There is a shift in the air somewhere to his left: the sound of rattling chains, a deep gulping inhale. Maglor startles when he realises that the low gasps rebounding across the musky cell are coming from his lips, although the voice leaving it does not belong to him. Then he jolts forth violently as the hröa he inhabits moves beyond his volition. When his arms - mottled and weakened by the fresh trophies of torture - cave beneath him, his foreign body crashes to the ground.
Laying there weakly, he shivers and chokes and sniffles all the same as he is accosted by a million different sensations. Despite the heat, an unnatural cold bites at his barren form; the dust he’s inhaled clogs his airways; his skin is slick with sweat that his dehydrated system cannot afford to lose. Wheezing with a throat that cannot make any noise, he sees the red hair that hangs over his face, limp and sorrowful.
A veil of blood. A veil of fire.
Nelyo, he thinks with a mounting feeling of dread. So I am in Nelyo’s nightmare right now.
Is this a nightmare, however, or a memory…?
Ringing out across the chamber comes a strident voice that affirms his thoughts.
“Maitimo, my dear Maitimo,” it purrs, and Maglor feels Maedhros curl up into himself and begin to tremble. His fingernails - or what is left of those that haven’t been ripped out - dig painfully into the skin of his stomach as he tries to suppress his fear. “Have you the unsightly gall to deny me your acknowledgement today as well?”
Heavy grating slices the silence like sharpened talons of a great beast. The door to the cell is heaved aside to let the speaker in. Light from the outside world can only permeate the interior for a fleeting second before He steps into frame and blocks it out entirely.
Maedhros’ world goes completely black, almost like the presence of the Moringotto amounts to that of a great vacuum sucking the life out of everything within his vicinity. Cruelly enough, amidst the suffocating darkness he ushers in, the three sacrosanct lights that sit triumphantly atop his mangled iron crown are almost blinding in their mockery.
He smiles down at the elf. His face is illuminated by the brilliance of their father’s dearest creations, and in their resplendence his tormentor almost seems… Fair. Ethereal. Holy. Yet through the weathered experience of Maedhros’ eyes, Maglor knows that His visage is one marred by unspeakable cruelty, of debaucheries known only by those who’d languished in the bowels of Angamando long enough to survive them.
The Moringotto is here. Makalaurë had only before seen Him from a distance and even then His presence had been one that sent their troops into a frenzied disarray. He is the one who drove their father to madness, and subsequently to his death. The one who threatens to put Maedhros to that same fate and yet by refusing him that, has ultimately subjected him to one perhaps infinitely worse.
He is so close now that Maglor can feel his hot breath upon the nape of his neck. Shaking violently, Maedhros draws back as far as his chains will let him; the line between his scripted reaction and Maglor’s own instinct blurs. Gripped by a fear unlike anything he has experienced before, Maglor cries out. He wants to pull away. He wants to flee. In a moment of madness he nearly wills his own fëa to depart the confines of his hröa if that will take him far away from His vicinity. But he is only a spectator inhabiting Maedhros’ memories, and to his horror his brother does... absolutely none of that.
He cannot, Maglor realises. He has read Maedhros well enough to know that he certainly had the courage to release himself to Mandos’ Halls, if that would mean escaping the clutches of the Dark Foe and his unspeakable tortures. Surely their father would have wanted that; Maedhros would not have been shamed if that was path he chose. Perhaps he had tried, only to be foiled by whatever cruel sorcery Angamando hosted. Perhaps he once burned with a desire to retaliate.
What does that matter now? There is nothing he can do…
“I have done some studying of my own,” the Moringotto says, his depthless orbs twinkling, “A good artisan always engages in his research before endeavouring into a new project, and you, dear Maitimo, are a very precious project to me.”
Maedhros says nothing in response, but his defiant seething eyes betray the idea of what some might misinterpret as subservience. The fallen Vala laughs. A grating sound. A painful sound. Maglor’s eardrums burn and crackle.
“I am not good with ‘Tengwar’, or whatever silly little script your precious father created. It is pretentious chicken scratch, is it not? I have no need for such a thing,” he traces the ground just next to Maedhros’ head. “But I have been practising my penmanship lately, you see… I would not wish to provoke your irk. Ah, my lovely Mai-ti-mo...”
The Moringotto stretches each syllable out like a child pulling toffee apart. Its consonants slip through his teeth, sloshing around his mouth and mixing with his voice’s mocking tenor. Much like how even the loveliest of candies can quickly turn sticky and uneatable when a child plays with them for too long, the result is almost the same. With those three abused syllables the precious name Nerdanel lovingly bestowed her firstborn is reduced to nothing more than sticky sweetness, mixed with the foulest dregs of Angamando’s Black Speech that leaves an jarring, bitter aftertaste in the tongues of all those who utter it.
Maglor’s breath hitches in his throat. The reason for his brother’s repulsion to being called ‘the well-formed one’ all those years ago suddenly dawns upon him.
With a lazy flick of the wrist, the nails on the fingers of the Moringotto’s right hand morph into knives that glint and snicker under the glare of Fëanor’s Silmarils. Maedhros’ breathing accelerates as panic sets in. His stomach heaves - up, down, up down - while he struggles faintly to spit out the bile rising up his throat. Yet he does not even have the strength to flounder for long; the Moringotto coos when he sees the fatigue wrap its arms around his pathetic form.
“Do not worry, my dear Maitimo, for I will not be long. Endure, and you will emerge stronger than ever.” But he sneers, leering down at him with a lustful delight. “Is that not what you told yourself as you cut down your innocent kinsfolk that day in Aqualondë, at your precious father’s orders? Endure. Endure! Endure, and keep your eyes averted, and all the horrors shall be hence forgotten...”
“....no…” Maglor finds himself whispering with Maedhros’ voice. Warmth trickles down his cheek in the form of a lone tear. “...I did not… want…”
“Endure, you worthless piece of Noldo filth!” roars the Moringotto. For a moment it is almost like the entire cavern grows eerily still until he moves again.
He holds one knife-like finger over Maedhros’ heaving stomach just below his navel and begins to trace over it; not hard enough to create grievous cuts, yet sufficient enough to form light scratches. Maglor strains his eyes and sees the telltale curls and dots of his father’s Tengwar script. In the darkness he cannot make out what exactly the Moringotto has written, but he has seen the scars on Maedhros’ stomach enough times to know by heart what torture this memory entails—
“Stop!” he screams to an entity who does not know of his existence. Maedhros too seems to share that sentiment, as evidenced by the panicked gasps that now wrack his chest like coughing spasms. “Don’t you dare touch him!”
The Moringotto raises a finger. He smiles and tucks a few strands of red hair behind Maedhros’ ear. He bends forth, lips grazing past cheeks stained by grime and blood and dried tears, and his whisper departs like smoke curling from the wreckage of a swan ship swallowed up by greedy orange flames.
“You filthy, filthy kinslayer.”
The knife makes its first contact with the skin of his stomach, pressing down hard and slowly dragging through flesh previously unmarred. Blood bursts forth from where the skin splits apart like cloth cut by wanton scissors, but heat exuding from the Moringotto cauterises the flesh almost instantly in a manner so cruelly inhumane. Maedhros’ wail is wrenched from his lips and paraded through the air, to the delight of Angamando and its unholy coven. Maglor screams with him as he shares the pain in equal parts. Luckily - or perhaps unluckily - his scream and his pain and his desperation to escape carry back into his actual reality. The Moringotto pulls a sizzling knife-finger from within Maedhros’ stomach and raises it over the second letter, so close to making another fresh engraving until—
Maglor staggers to his knees, sobbing.
Maedhros jolts awake with a start.
A low growl is torn from his throat as he instinctively reaches out to defend himself against what he believes is another of his old tormentors. He grabs Maglor’s collar; once his good hand finds its target, he lunges forth like a cornered animal. The minstrel has little time to react as he is seized and pinned by the throat against the bed frame. He gasps as strong fingers clasp against his neck and begin to cut the supply of air leaving his lungs.
He struggles; panic settles in as his head grows lighter, fingers clawing desperately at the exposed surface of Maedhros’ left arm. However as they brush over his skin, they scratch past rocky bumps and uneven depressions that come in an assortment of shapes and lengths. Maglor’s stomach tightens when he realises it is old scars that he is clawing against and instantly tears his hands away. Despite this, Maedhros continues to keep him in a chokehold which leaves his instincts wrestling with the urge to either fight back or refrain from hurting him more than he already is.
Tears prick his eyes as his vision begins to haze over.
“Nel… yo…” he chokes out, “Stop… please…”
Maedhros’ breathing is heavy and laboured. Once he comes to his senses and realises the figure held within his iron grasp is not an uruk but his younger brother, he recoils with a panicked look of horror. Maglor drops to his knees and wheezes great raspy breaths, all while Maedhros attempts to recollect himself and remember just where he actually is.
When his mind pieces together what his brother’s presence in his bedchamber after such a vivid nightmare means, anger seizes his scarred face like a turbulent tempest.
“What are you—” he hisses, although his words do not come out with as much force as he wills. “Why are you— what— how—”
“Angamando…” Maglor pants. “You were there… The Moringotto... I saw, yet I could do nothing...”
For a moment, a look of stricken mortification takes over Maedhros’ countenance. When he first attempts to speak, it is only a garbled mess of words that flops pathetically into the air. The eldest Fëanorian scrambles, like a beggar on his hands and knees, to regain his composure.
“How did you,” he splutters, but when realisation settles in once more he grows pale and sickened, his shoulders sinking. “…no, surely not… Kana, please tell me you did not…!”
“Forgive me, hányo,” Maglor whispers.
He winces, bracing himself for the flurry of retaliation that he thinks may come. But Maedhros is silent and that stillness scares him more than any furious outburst or onslaught of rage. Gingerly, the minstrel watches him like how one might spectate a sleeping dragon, yet when his silence grows too concerning Maglor swallows his anticipation and gently tries to rouse the redhead’s attention.
A single seething glare is enough to freeze the blood coursing through his veins.
“Do not,” Maedhros growls, yet his voice is low and choked and it breaks, so scarily fragile, frightened almost, as each word passes his lips, “Do not— disregard— me like this, that’s all I ask— how dare you pry into my mind especially when I am unaware—”
“Forgive me,” Maglor weakly repeats, “I did not mean to intrude. I only wished to see what was wrong—”
“Nothing is wrong,” he hisses, pulling his blanket over his body tighter to shield himself from what he instantly concludes are Maglor’s judgemental eyes, “Do not ever try to… to do whatever sorcery you attempted again. I will never forgive you if you do.”
“You were crying, hányo. I could not overlook that!” Maglor pleads, reaching out a hand. When his older brother panics and recoils as if slapped, he raises it in the air assuring him he means no harm. “It has been well over a century, yet you are still suffering from… those memories.”
“Foolish you are to believe that you could help me by infringing on what I’ve told you is my greatest shame,” Maedhros snaps, his voice rich with contempt. “I— I confided in you, Kanafinwë. Apparently that was foolish of me. Yet even more foolish would be the belief that my ‘ordeal’ is something I could possibly ever forget, as if it never happened.”
Maglor pales, clenching his fist to stop it from trembling as the weight of tonight’s many follies claws his heart deeper into the pit of his stomach.
“Oh, no… oh god, Nelyo, I did not mean it in that way! I am so sorry…”
“I know,” Maedhros mutters, and for a moment his eyes flash over with remorse at his harsh outburst. “You would not hurt me on purpose… That much I know.”
Yet still he reels with the fright of nearly having his deepest nightmares exposed to the discretion of someone other than himself. Nelyafinwë Maitimo has no choice but to obey the humiliated chidings of his heart - the only counsel he can bring himself to turn to, even if it may not always work in his best interests - so he constructs his defensive walls once more, this time building them taller than they ever have previously stood in the past.
“Leave me be and return to your chamber,” he finally says. “Get out, Makalaurë.”
“But—”
“Get out before I cast you from here myself, goddammit!” Maedhros snarls. Maglor’s knees buckle the moment he drags himself from the room and collapses into the cold stone hallway, shaken by what he has both been given and denied.
“The next morning he did not speak of the incident, nor did he ever acknowledge it had happened at all,” Maglor concludes his recollection. “But his warning stayed with me, and I have never dared attempt to tap into his memories since.”
Elrond is quiet for a moment, as if hesitating. Maglor sees this, and recognises this, and he gives the boy a silent go-ahead to speak his mind.
“That was unethical…” Elrond mumbles quietly, but he is stricken by guilt immediately after and quickly adds: “But I am no different! With the whole malasië mess, so… I am in no place to say such things.”
To his surprise Maglor laughs, although it seems more woeful than mirthful.
“But it is true, is it not? What I did was selfish and wholly unethical. It hurt Nelyo more than any ill rumour of his allegiance to Morgoth spread by biased gossip. For years unnumbered I believed he never forgave me for my trespass, but… I was the fool all along, for he never once hated me for it. Isn’t that unbelievable? That even after such a misgiving, he never held it against me.”
“You acted out of genuine concern for him,” the boy offers. “Perhaps that’s the reason why?”
“Genuine concern,” Maglor sighs, “Or selfish desire? Tell me truthfully which I harbour, child, and then I will come to terms with it. Until then, I will bear the weight of my insolence.”
Elrond falls into silence, not knowing what to say, but Maglor continues on. The look in his eyes is distant, as if he’s still four hundred years back in the past.
“Yet still… long and hard have I thought about it, and recently I believe I have come to understand Nelyo’s attitude to this whole ordeal better.”
“And what is that?”
“For the longest time I believed he’d been angry with me because I had intruded into his private memories. However, over time I realised he was angry not for that reason, but because he was scared.”
“Scared?” Elrond echoes.
“He was scared that by delving into his dreams, I would be taken back into Angband with him. He was frightened that I would relive the horrors he went through there too. He wanted to… to shield me against knowing the true extent of Morgoth’s cruelty, and so that’s why he forbade me from ever attempting such a stunt again.”
Maglor sighs. It is a long and drawn-out sound that echoes with it the pains and griefs of issues far beyond those of regular emotion
“And he succeeded, that he did. Aside from those brief glimpses, I know next to nothing of his captivity. He will not tell me, and I cannot bring myself to pry those details from him. And now—” Maglor takes Elrond’s hands into his own. “—Even now, I do not intend to pry them from you, not unless he grants me permission.”
“I do not deserve to know them,” Elrond says quietly, although tears curve down his cheeks in soft silver lines. “If there was a draught I could take to wipe my memories clean entirely, I would do so in a heartbeat.”
“I know,” Maglor murmurs with a sad smile. “I know it must be frightening, my little moon. But as it stands now, you are the only one in the world who knows the true extent to my brother’s torment.”
“I should have kept my big fat nose to myself,” he bitterly mumbles.
His father laughs and dabs at his tears with his long sleeve, smoothing his hair back with his gentle touch like he often did in the past to calm the weepy child that Elrond had been.
“I cannot tell you how to feel about this. That would not be fair of me. But still, perhaps I am biased in my old age,” he says softly, reassuringly. “My little moon, I do not want you to demonise yourself for ending up in this situation. What’s done has already been done. We cannot change that. Wallowing in undeserved guilt will do nothing to alter the fact that Maedhros has already told you.”
Elrond bites his lip. Taking his silence for acceptance, Maglor continues on.
“Do not blame yourself. Perhaps this is a blessing in disguise, for both us and him. I spoke to Maedhros upon his awakening earlier this morning and he does not blame you either.”
“He is awake?” Elrond asks, perking up instantly. “How does he fare?”
“He is recovering well. Contrary to your own belief, you did a miraculous job yesterday. Plus, the malasië has worn off,” Maglor stifles a chuckle. “I should really work on that again, no? I suppose another fruit of your efforts has been motivating me to refine what could potentially be a field-changing medicine. When it breaks through the market, shall we split the profits?”
Elrond groans. “Don’t tease me, Maglor. You know I’m still mortified by what it brought about.”
“I know, I know, I’m just an old fool pulling your leg. On that note, however… Maedhros wishes to see you in his chamber later.”
Almost immediately, the Peredhel’s blood runs cold and his palms grow clammy. Maglor must see the instant horror that washes over his pale face and quickly rushes to quell his fears.
“He is not upset! Not in the slightest!” he insists, “He simply wishes to speak to you about your efforts yesterday. It is nothing more than that.”
Elrond states at him, unconvinced, but he sighs in defeat after a moment’s contemplation. “There’s no way I can refuse his summons, is there?”
“You always could,” Maglor offers with a knowing twinkle in his eye, “But knowing you, I have full confidence knowing you won’t, even if it is the last thing you want to do right now...”