Work Text:
forte (noun)
1. a thing at which one excels
2. a passage performed or marked to be performed loudly
i.
Maglor knew the exact moment when the meaning of words themselves shifted. He felt the change in his very soul, the weight of them heavy in his lungs. It hadn’t affected his brothers or father the same way, but, for all their eloquence, none of them had the same devotion to words that he had maintained from an early age.
The Oath had cut into him somehow. The words bound him, strangely living in a way that few of his own songs or poems had ever achieved. Speaking it had changed everything. Before, his words had been used to soothe crying children, to flirt across palace halls, to impress his father, to tease his brothers. Now they were a weapon, against others and himself. At Alqualondë, he had sung notes and phrases that made the Teleri turn and run in fear, and afterwards he hadn’t stopped. He was a military commander now, and his voice inspired his troops, and held them to his cause. It cast fear and doubt and disorder among his enemies. It was a complicated game, and one that he excelled at. But some days it left his throat bleeding.
He had to wonder if it was really worth it.
ii.
When he was a child, first learning to sing, he used to push his voice to the brink of what was possible. He had always been loud, but he wanted to be louder, to be able to project as far as he could, without ever losing his perfect notes, his perfect diction. Maglor prided himself on his voice, he’d been named for his voice, it had to be perfect.
It was Nerdanel who changed the way he viewed that name. Strong-voiced Finwë had at first been a comment on the extraordinary power of his lungs when he was a baby. Fëanor had believed that he could be a singer, had quietly hoped for it as much as he quietly hoped for a smith or a weaver, but strong, despite all connotations, had never been intended to mean the loudest. It was the hope that Maglor would take pride in it, would believe firmly in everything he said, would be gentle and funny and commanding in turn. He didn’t have to push himself so far, she told him, he only needed to sing the songs he enjoyed the most.
Maglor often forgot that lesson, but he tried. When Maedhros suffered nightmares, or when Amrod and Amras longed for home, or when Curufin mourned Atar, or when Caranthir felt isolated from all of them, Maglor lifted his voice with the gentle strength, the elegance that his mother encouraged him to find, and did his best. It wasn’t always easy to remember the sweet songs, amongst all the death and grief, but he tried.
iii.
It was rare that Maglor sang anything other than the Nolodantë. The song had become a part of him, had helped him fill some of the gaping void that all that grief had left behind.
Elrond had only had to raise a disapproving eyebrow at him before he had changed tune to something less sad. His visits were rare, and Maglor didn’t wish to waste a moment of this. He would never complain of the rarity, for Elrond lived a whole life beyond him, with a wife and three children for him to return to. Instead, they were precious moments that Maglor treasured. He played a different song, one from childhood, for the ghosts that sat among them, and for the son that he did not deserve but had anyway.
If he cried as he played, neither of them mentioned it.