A/N: English is not my native language, my stories are beta'd by friends of mine who aren't native speakers either, so forgive me for any mistakes that slipped past us.
Broken
The large hall was filled with laughter.
It was filled with people, dancing to the music of Ecthelion's silver flute, talking about anything and everything, drinking, elflings playing, their merry voices, the clicking sound of the elliths' high heels on the stone tiles and the tinkling of goblets moving around on the servants' silver trays bouncing off the intricately carved, marble walls. Shining, crystal chandeliers were hanging from the curved ceiling, casting a warm, orange glow over the hall.
Sitting on his throne he looked around. He could easily make out all the Lords of the Houses among the guests. Glorfindel, with his gleaming, golden hair, standing in the centre of the hall, ellith fawning over him like they always did. Galdor, off to the side, talking to Duilin, both well on their way to becoming uproariously drunk. Penlod, sitting on one of the tables, feet dangling off the edge, throwing olives high up in the air and catching them between his teeth, with a dozen elflings cheering him on. Rog, laughing at Penlod's antics. Egalmoth dancing with an elleth, dressed in the colours of the House of the Golden Flower. Salgant, perched on the armrest of a sofa, next to Ecthelion, laughing merrily as he plucked at the strings of his harp in an energetic pattern that had even the Lord of the Fountain struggling to keep up. Maeglin, in the back, standing close to the large double doors, as if he didn't know whether to leave, or to stay and watch a little while longer. So different was he from his mother.
Aredhel had never been good at standing still. At feasts like this one, she would dance and sing, talk to all the guests, make sure everyone was enjoying themselves, give the servants a helping hand if she could. Every once in a while, she would come to sit next to Turgon, shooing away the presumptuous nobles, trying to sweet-talk themselves into the King's good graces. That role had now fallen on Idril. How like her aunt she was, from the way she walked to the way she talked, her bell-like voice ringing in his ears. He looked at her, and so did Maeglin, he had noticed, as she walked, nay, danced through the hall, from guest to guest, smiling and talking. How like her aunt. How like her mother.
Elenwë had been like the sun, brightening the world with every step she took. She had been his sun. Lauremelda, his Golden Love, he'd called her. He had kept calling her that, in the smothering darkness and the biting cold of the Helcaraxë, until the very end. In the everlasting night, when even the sight of the stars had no longer been enough to lift the Noldor's spirits, when their cold light had turned into a twisted mockery of what could have been, he had pulled her close to him as they clung to the last bit of hope they still had. Their daughter.
He looked at her, from across the hall, and saw Maeglin doing the same, as she danced with Egalmoth, having taken the place of the elleth whom the Lord of the House of the Heavenly Arch had been dancing with only minutes earlier. He would've chuckled and shaken his head at that, he would've been worried by the jealousy and anger in his nephew's eyes, but he couldn't. When he looked at his daughter in that moment, he didn't see Itarildë, he saw Elenwë.
He saw the young elleth he had met on a visit to Vanyamar with his parents. He had first seen her sitting on the stairs by the palace's entrance. He himself had been young then, he had just had a growth spurt and was, by then, taller than his father, but he had not yet had the muscle to accompany his height. She had caught him staring and made a rude comment about it and he had known at that moment that he wanted to marry her.
He saw the elleth he had first asked to dance in the garden on a late summer's evening, after a feast in his grandfather's palace in Tirion, when most of the guests, the musicians included, had already gone to bed. She had sung the most beautiful song while they danced. A song that she had sung many times afterwards, but of which he couldn't remember the words.
He saw the elleth he had asked to marry him on impulse one autumn morning, fully expecting to be rejected. Her eyes had filled up with tears and he had been so worried that he had said something wrong, until she had thrown her arms around him and kissed his lips, promising to stay with him for the rest of eternity.
When things started to go sour, between his father and his uncle, an eternity with Elenwë had been the only surety in his life. Whatever happened, if his family broke apart, it didn't matter, because Elenwë would always be there for him. He had been even surer when Idril was born. The world had been falling apart around him, but it hadn't been his world. Elenwë and Itarildë were, and they would never leave him.
Then the Trees died, and his grandfather was killed, and the Silmarils were gone. His uncle and cousins swore their Oath, the Noldor were leaving Valinor, his father and siblings were going too.
He was going, but it didn't matter, because Elenwë and Itarildë were with him.
He was standing on the beach, red water lapping at his boots, his sword in hand, dripping blood. The faces and the voices of the Teleri as they fought and died defending their ships seared into his brain. He was a kinslayer, but it didn't matter, because Elenwë and Itarildë were with him.
He was looking at his father, whose face was set in grim determination, but whose eyes sparked with murderous intent as he stared out over the ocean, at the lights of fire basking the horizon in an orange glow. They had been betrayed, but it didn't matter, because Elenwë and Itarildë were with him.
The Helcaraxë had changed everything.
At first, it hadn't been so bad. They had had enough firewood, enough food and water. At first, the ice had been thicker and there had been no danger of sinking through it. Then, people started dying. From crippling hunger or from the biting cold, innocent people died all around them. Elflings, ellith, death spared no one.
On the Helcaraxë, eternity got a different meaning. As they stumbled along in perpetual darkness, all thought of valour forgotten, living day by day, but not being able to tell one from the next, the Noldor started losing hope of ever finding a way out of that frozen hell.
Every night he hugged his wife and daughter close to him, murmuring soft words of comfort to Idril and desperately telling Elenwë how beautiful she was as he had always done before they went to bed.
But she was no longer beautiful. Her golden hair had lost its shine and her sparkling green eyes had gone dull. Her skin was pale, her cheeks were hollow, cheekbones standing out so sharply that he was afraid they might actually cut through her skin.
She was dying, and there was nothing he could do about it.
They were walking. Ploughing through the thick layer of snow as a blizzard made talking nearly impossible.
"Turno!" His eldest brother called out, his voice barely audible, "hurry up, we're falling behind!"
He pulled desperately on his wife's hand. Elenwë had been struggling for days now. He had offered to carry her, but she had insisted she could walk. He had offered to carry Idril and she had hugged her close and kissed her forehead before handing her to him, as if she knew that that was the last time she would hold her daughter.
"Finno, we have to slow down, Elenwë can't keep up!" he shouted at his brother, but he already knew the answer he would get.
"We can't, Turno!"
He gripped Elenwë's hand a little more forcefully and picked up his pace, but it was of no use.
She stumbled.
She fell.
The sound of the ice breaking was deafening.
Her panicked scream rang through the air. He put Idril to the ground and started forward, the ice creaking dangerously under his feet. He locked eyes with her and saw the utter terror on her face and then she was gone.
He heard himself screaming her name as she disappeared into the water. He threw off his cloak, ready to jump in after her, to save her, when a pair of strong arms wrapped themselves around him. He fought the person holding him, he screamed her name again, but he couldn't break free.
"She's gone, Turno," Fingon whispered in his ear, and his panicked screams turned to broken wails.
The look on his wife's face as she fell to her death was etched into his memory, never to go away. In the night, he could hear her screams as clearly as if he were there again.
He had always believed that as long as Elenwë was there, everything would be okay, that she would be with him forever, but when the King of Gondolin awoke from his nightmares in the dark, screaming in terror, there was no warm presence who would wrap her arms around him and hold him until his fears subsided and he stopped shaking. When the King of Gondolin awoke from his nightmares of the Grinding Ice, there was no one there to comfort him, to tell him that everything would be alright. When the King of Gondolin awoke from his nightmares of the Helcaraxë in the dark, he awoke to find that he had landed in a different nightmare, one from which there was no waking up.
The King of Gondolin looked out over the large hall, expecting to see his people making merry, unaware of their King's pain. Instead, he found that the hall was empty, except for his daughter, his nephew, still standing by the open doors, and the other Lords of Gondolin, concern written plainly on their faces. He looked up at Idril, who was leaning over him.
"Adar?" she asked, gently shaking his shoulder, a concerned expression marring her fair features.
He looked past her and locked eyes with Maeglin. There was a strange glint in his nephew's eyes. The Lord of the House of the Mole inclined his head and gave him a sombre smile before turning and disappearing into the dark hallways behind him. No one knew about his nightmares, not even the most trusted of the Lords who were standing around him right now, but Maeglin knew. Maeglin knew what it was like to be frozen, knew what it was like to be broken. Maeglin understood.
"I'm fine," he said, "don't worry."
But he wasn't fine, he never would be.
A/N: Thank you for reading, reviews are appreciated :)