Chapter Text
Makalaurë is not certain what he had expected when returning after so many weeks. Beasts gnawing on bones? Mangled corpses? Nothing at all? What he finds is, without a doubt, far worse than anything he could have imagined.
The twin elflings sleep curled together so peacefully. Such tiny things they are, nowhere near their majority, that they fit perfectly in a tight divet between rocks that serves as a makeshift shelter from the elements. If not for a small pile of mushrooms and lichen clearly gathered for food, Makalaurë would not have believed the pair had moved from the spot he’d tucked them into when he’d first abandoned them here.
They are so dirty. Moss clings to the tangles of their dark hair. The same robes they had been wearing when they were yanked from their beds are very near to rags. Small cuts and bruises pepper their arms and legs from all the hazards to be found in this cave.
Had they truly lingered here all this time? Hadn’t there been anyone to come looking for two lost children?
Of all his wrongdoings, this he feels is the worst of them. It will have been a greater mercy to end them swiftly rather than to leave them to die here, neglected and forgotten. It still can be, he thinks with a hand on the hilt of his sword. They are asleep. They will not feel a thing. They will not be safe anywhere else.
Makalaurë begins to weep as he realizes the little ones are shivering with the changing of the seasons. He does not know how terribly half-elves feel the cold bite of winter but it matters not. With a gentleness he has not had an excuse to wield since the birth of the Ambarussar, Makalaurë carefully cradles one child in one arm and then the second child in his other arm. They are incredibly light yet still weigh heavily on him for as small as they are. As young. As innocent.
How can he permit himself this mercy when so many others have suffered by his hands? What makes these children any less deserving of his ruthlessness than anyone else?
His soft touch is for naught as the boy in his left arm shifts. Tiny arms wrap around Makalaurë's neck and that little head tucks beneath his chin. Whether the child is merely seeking warmth or perhaps dreaming of being carried away on his mother’s wings to join his father in the stars, it does not matter; Makalaurë weeps. With a finality to his decision, the second son of Fëanor hikes them both a little higher in his hold as he carries them out of the cave.
Nelyo will not be pleased with this choice and it is the one Makalaurë is making.
Though this does not absolve him of his misdeeds nor quell his ever-growing guilt, he knows in his heart and in his Song that it is the right one.