Chapter Text
Turgon still believes in God.
He wishes he did not, when his hands shake with the memory of holding his wife, his daughter, his mother. It would grant him greater numbness, if not ease: facing the world with an empty soul. To become what one looks upon is a sort of defiance. Such defiance—for good or ill—survives long.
So does anger.
He should have known that he would be angry at Fingon, when Fingon died. Now that he has seen one brother’s corpse, rolling and thrashing in Fingon’s frantic hands, Turgon can well imagine Fingon’s body in his hands.
He would shake those square shoulders, curse that square face (Fingon’s face is never ruined by death, in this vision), and he would say,
You fool, you fool, you fool.
But because he saw Argon die, because he saw Mama die, because he felt his touch leave Idril’s delicate warm body—
He never guessed that he would not know the manner of his older brother’s death.
The cramped quarters of their encampment are cloying to him. They do not appear to have such an effect on everyone else. The stubborn tatters of Fingolfin’s household, the watchful wanderers under Haleth’s lead, and the rescued thralls mill and bond like frightened children. This is a place of safety, Turgon knows, because his father is here.
Where Fingolfin abides, so does security. The winter did not kill them all, and though the savage cold had no respect for the greatness of a single man, Turgon will forever credit his father’s level head for leading them a little farther, a little farther, until those that remained were saved.
Fingon threw that protection away with the same pure-hearted stupidity he has lived by since—since birth, Turgon expects. Fingon has been a fool always.
Of course, Turgon did not know Fingon when he was born, and now, because Fingon fled under the cover of night, Turgon shall not know him when he dies.
Night is coming on again. The second night without his brother, though maybe only the first (or not even the first) since his brother has perished. There is a chance that Fingon yet lives.
There is no chance—no hope—that he is anything but lost.
All in pursuit of Maedhros! Turgon has never trusted Curufin, lynx-eyed and cruel even when he was barely in breeches. He has hated Celegorm, who has ignored and humiliated him by turns. And Maglor is—Maglor is broken, that can be seen at a glance, but Turgon will not pity him.
Instead, he wants to rage,
You could have been safe! You could have been with my father!
But what Feanorian will ever care for that?
The last time Turgon saw Maedhros was in passing. He was in Fingolfin’s house, but only waiting at the door for Fingon to exchange coats or ugly hats or somesuch. They had been at a meeting elsewhere with their fathers. Turgon was not invited; it was still in question, in his mind, whether Uncle Feanor even knew that he existed.
Maedhros stood on the step, in beautiful riding boots that had not ridden, and a coat tailored so close that it made him look almost as slim as a woman. He was striking his gloves lightly against one palm. But he had ears like a cat—all that family did—and he heard Turgon hesitate in the hall.
“Hullo, cousin,” he said softly, nodding his bright head. “How goes it?”
Turgon was on his way to meet Elenwe, and wanted no part in something he could not attain. He hated that his tongue was tied by another’s greeting.
He nodded, once, twice, and said “Maitimo.”
And then he colored, embarrassed, raging at Fingon for putting the silly nickname in his head.
But Maedhros smiled, quick and cunning and then not so cunning at all, and he said, “Even your brother doesn’t call me that so much anymore, you know.”
Beneath his heel, Turgon grinds the ashes of a fire he should have kept alive. That cousin, that cunning, is three thousand miles and a lifetime gone.
Curufin and Celegorm and Maglor, in all their inner ugliness, were right.
Maedhros is dead, and it is no time to unbury him.
(Fingon had come running down the stairs, his hat mashed under his arm, and he had not even looked at Turgon as he passed into the outside world.)
“Have you even had any supper?” Aredhel asks. He considers snapping at her, but decides not to. She isn’t accusing him, not really.
He shakes his head.
“You should eat. Wachiwi made stew.”
Wachiwi is sweet on Fingon. She has borne up rather well, though, under the truth of his death. “I haven’t any appetite. And I won’t starve.”
“I know,” Aredhel says. “We’ll never starve again, in a land that doesn’t bring much winter.” She sits down beside him, elbows on her knees, and he considers snapping for another reason, for he has just remembered—
“You were with Celegorm.”
“What?”
“I saw you two come out of the woods together. The other night.”
Aredhel flushes—the arrow has hit its mark—but she doesn’t break his gaze. “And what of it? He came sneaking, I tracked him down.”
“And you didn’t kill him?”
“Oh, come off it. His father’s dead,” Aredhel said. “And you and I aren’t sorry for that, but—”
But Maedhros. Maedhros at least, and maybe more—there was only one twin at the meeting in Mithrim—
“What had he to say for himself?”
“He’s Celegorm. Same as always.” But her voice shifts strangely, as if she is grieving, in the middle of speaking, that Celegorm is not the same.
Night falls like that, hanging over them. Turgon concentrates on the anger settled behind his eyes. He is glad for his sister’s company—the only sibling he has left—though he fears she will draw Galadriel to join them.
He wants to speak to his father, but he doesn’t want to see the useless love for Fingon that will be written on his father’s face.
Turgon and Aredhel are on the side of the camp that is farthest from Mithrim, and as such, they hear the wild shouts almost at first.
Ho there! Ho there! Anyone, anyone!
Hoarse, desperate.
A trap, in the form of a twisted plea?
Turgon has a gun and a knife. Aredhel has a number of hidden blades. They run together, and Turgon’s heart pounds death, death.
But it isn’t death.
It is Fingon.
(Aredhel even says his name.)
How strange it is to see his brother living—living and so changed. Fingon is on his knees, bloodied in the torchlight that has already thronged around him. He is gasping wildly, brought low by his burden.
Turgon—Turgon understands in a pain-shocked instant, what that burden is. Who it is.
It is the cruelest thing he could do, perhaps, to recognize his cousin Maedhros in that thing.
“Father!” Turgon cries, because Father is the only one who can lead them away from here. “Father!”
My heart cannot break again, he tells himself, beneath all the rest. Beneath darkness, light, voices, cries. Not now. We have no time for me!
(If he touches Fingon, he fears that Fingon shall die right then and there.)
Fingolfin comes. There are others here—Finrod, even Haleth, and many more faces that Turgon has not the wits to make out. Yet Fingolfin looks like a king, in Turgon’s blurring eyes, though in truth he knows that his father has barely slept and barely eaten. The grey hair at his temples seemed to fade faster in the last week than it ever did in the years at home.
Turgon’s father has taken not just blows, but carvings, to his heart. He lost his wife; his youngest son. He lost all his children, insofar as they were once children at all—kept somewhat innocent by a mother’s care. Still, there is enough left in him for Fingon to core it out like this: Fingon, kneeling in one of his reckless prayers, saying, take this cup away from me—but it is Fingon, so he makes all that about Maedhros, and does so with a child’s simplicity.
Yes, Fingon is the only child left of them, and his words reflect it.
“Papa,” he begs. “Help him.”
Turgon watches his brother fall. Watches the arrowhead of torchbearers and alarm-callers, himself among them, rush forward to offer aid.
There is weary Gwindor with Maedhros in his arms, and there is Fingon in his father’s. Turgon’s eyes are fixed longest on his brother’s hands, which are still clenched as if they remain clinging and strong.
“My boy,” Father says (he is just Father again), “My boy—not you, not you! Never you, I pray God—I pray—”
“He lives!” Gwindor’s gruff voice rises again. “Fingon will live—”
And the crowd murmurs its approval, its relief. Turgon does not even know who is here, but somehow they have all become one gathered people.
Fingolfin’s people, grateful for the life of Fingolfin’s son.
He loves you more than he loves the rest of us, you fool, Turgon thinks, staring at Fingon’s still, square face. Oh, his face is very white beneath the blood. Let him—let him save you! What care we for—
But he cannot lift his eyes to where Gwindor crouches. Cannot know Maedhros again.
Father rouses himself, lifting his head. “Turgon—Finrod—where is Turgon—”
“I am here,” Turgon hears himself answer. Finrod is there, too, standing as Father cannot, as Fingon cannot. Finrod is standing guard, and so is Aredhel, and so must Turgon be also.
Prepare the way…make straight his paths…
“Turgon,” Father says, rising. As he does so, he lifts Fingon in his arms as if he weighs nothing. As if Father has eaten, has slept, and is not worn and thin. “Take your brother and see to him. Aredhel, go with him.”
The crowd has fallen silent. Turgon blinks, trying to understand. His father is straight, and at full height—but his arms are shaking. Turgon throws his own out, and Aredhel joins in, and they take Fingon so that one of his arms is around Turgon’s shoulder and the other around Aredhel’s.
“We can drag him,” Aredhel mutters. She still sounds like herself. “Father, don’t be afraid. We’ll look after him.”
Of course, Turgon thinks. Maedhros is dead, and the dead are always Father’s charge.
Fingon is—Fingon lives.
Three steps, four. They are away from the torches, picking their way in the dark. The heat stays in Turgon’s skin, somehow. In his eyes and throat.
“Lord, he smells foul.”
“Aredhel…”
“Turgon, you’re slipping. I can’t carry all his weight.”
Turgon shuts his mouth. His brother’s matted hair, overlong and braided as if he never knew New York styles and civility at all, brushes against his cheek. “We should take him to the tent—the tent where that woman is.”
“Estrela? No. They’ll need that for—” Aredhel chokes. She sways, and lurches, and they nearly tumble down together.
For the first time, Turgon considers the possibility that his brother succeeded in his mad quest.
Help him.
“This way, then,” he says curtly. “Aredhel, it’s your turn to do your part. Bear up.”
Turgon’s faith is far from being like Fingon’s. Turgon believes in God’s justice; Fingon in His mercy. Turgon wonders if, at present, they both measured wrong.
(There is a ring on his left hand, and a rosebud babe who will no longer be so small nor so sleepy as when he saw her last, if indeed he ever sees her again. There is a wife.)
(He left them.)
“Turgon! Aredhel!” Wachiwi arrives in a flash. Turgon knows her, even in the dark, by the sound of her voice and the faint scent of sage that attends her. They have traveled together for nearly a year. All those days were spent together. Wachiwi is a friend.
Wachiwi is more than a friend to Fingon.
The three of them are able to carry him to shelter in short order. Stretched on a tattered quilt that belongs to Wister, Fingon breathes deeply and evenly. Aredhel unbuttons his coat.
Wachiwi lights a lantern. “That’s exhaustion,” she says, stooping over him. “His spirit is very low. But he has no fever, and his face does not look like he is in pain.”
Turgon cannot see that much, in a sleeping face. He knots his fists and tries to thank her. The words don’t come.
“I’ll…are you needed elsewhere?” Wachiwi asks. “I’ll stay with him, if you like.”
“Oh, we can’t leave him,” Aredhel says. “We can’t, can we Turgon?”
Turgon nods, shakes his head, does not know how to convey that she is right. He sinks down on his haunches, to be closer to his brother, and that is answer enough for Aredhel.
Wachiwi rises, and dusts her hands against her breeches. “Then I shall leave you three,” she says. “Perhaps it would do to bathe his face and hands, though—shall I bring water?”
Aredhel assents to this. Turgon is still silent. He takes one of Fingon’s dirty hands, and folds it in both of his. He does not care if this is a childish thing to do.
It is cold outside, and they have no fire. This information arrives in his thoughts in shattered pieces, mingled with pieces of the past. He hates the curse of memory, as much as he hates this barren place—but now that he has had his brother returned to him, he must be more willing to pay that price anew.
Yes, Turgon must see himself shaking Fingon out of icy slumber, must feel both his brothers’ arms around him, at the ash-heaped bridge.
How grief seemed to have taken hold of them then, in those long-ago hours! Once because death seemed near; once because their family seemed so far.
Fingon was angry then, and Fingon was hurt. Turgon was, at the bridge, little more than an uncertain boy. In the despairing cold, he was something else—rage, yes; fear, certainly. But it was all so very different from their old life that his grief could be divided into floes kept apart by churning waters of need and hunger.
Now, having survived beyond that, he has to face a world where their family—all their family—feeds itself to Death slowly, bit by bit.
Love by love.
It always comes down to bitter, innocent love.
They should have known two nights past: Fingon would never have accepted a word; a promise. Not for Maedhros. Not ever again.
Turgon does not realize that he has begun to weep until Aredhel snuffles into her own sleeve and rasps,
“One of us should try and stop bawling. Wachiwi will bring the water soon.”
“I hate him,” Turgon gasps. “I hate him—and he’s brought him back.”
His whole body curves like a jackknife, at that. He does not let go of Fingon’s hand, even as he sobs over it. In the morning, the world will be different and new. His brother will regain his strength and spirit, and leave this tent in search of Maedhros.
Only this time, he will do it all in front of Turgon’s very eyes.
“You cannot let them do this,” Aredhel hisses. “Turgon, you cannot allow it.”
“What?” It is more of a gulp than proper speech. “Who?”
She pounds her fist against the packed earth. “Our cousins. They are all of them weak, in their own ways. And we are not! We are strong…but for one thing. Our love of them. Fingon and Father and I—we’re all tangled up in a family that doesn’t deserve us. Do you think I don’t know that? Do you think I wanted to see Celegorm again, after all he’d done? I did, that’s the truth of it. I hate myself for it, but I missed him so painfully. I missed him when we were dying of cold. Feanor couldn’t take that from us. He never succeeded in making Father hate him. He never separated Maedhros from Fingon. You know he must have tried. We always follow where they run, so resolutely, with such dreadful love. All of us except—you. You love us, not them. Be the strongest, Turgon. Help Father, and Fingon, so that they can prevail. If we don’t, it’s just more madness and grief, and I can’t bear that—not if it’s needless.”
Turgon does as she did; he wipes his tears on his sleeve.
His sister can be rather wise, sometimes.
They stare at each other, breathless, in the lantern glow.
“Do you have a handkerchief?” he asks, finally. His sleeve is dubious.
“Turgon.” The light isn’t particularly strong, but he can perceive every contour of her judgment. “I’ve never had handkerchiefs. Not even in New York.”
He laughs. In a way, it tears itself out—but he does laugh.
Wachiwi comes with the water, then. She is quiet and sober, as she rarely is. Aredhel tells her to stay, which isn’t quite fair, but which is likewise not the same as betrayal. Together, the women wash Fingon’s face and his hands.
When the mud and blood are cleared away, he looks like himself again. There is a furrow between his dark straight eyebrows that tells Turgon an old story:
Fingon is puzzling something out in his dreams.
I wonder what you saw, Turgon says in silence, to the brother he can admit (here) that he adores. I wonder what it was like, to find him and free him, however you did.
There are hours until dawn. Sleep rears its head, a little, because Turgon has cried himself out and is comfortably tired. He stretches out on the quilt beside his brother, as they used to lie for warmth sometimes, during the horrid winter nights.
Aredhel sits up, sentinel-sharp, with her chin in her hands. At least—she holds the shape of watchfulness, but her softened breath reveals her. After a while, her head droops.
These last hours, pressed against each other, are neither blessing nor curse.
Turgon, before he drifts into the deep quiet, knows that the same must be true of the morning.