Not the Stuff of Legend
The first human he had met, he had found unremarkable. His brother had escorted him to their encampment after multiple letters marvelling at the Second Born's appearance in Middle-earth. Finrod, ever curious, had stumbled upon them after a failed hunting trip and it seemed he had been inseparable from them since.
Aegnor, however, could at first only see them as a strange concoction of Dwarves and Eldar – elvish in shape but the men with beards. How strange.
These were the Aftercomers who Fëanor had claimed were poised to take over Middle-earth? Obviously, he took little notice of the ravings of his half-uncle, but still, he had expected more than these primitive beings living in mud huts, scurrying away from Morgoth's growing shadow.
He found their language difficult, again unlike his brother, who learnt it in a matter of weeks, as was his way. The sounds fell stilted from his mouth, which was still unused to the foreign Sindarin tongue, let alone a new human one.
But the humans were gracious – smiling and warm. They welcomed him, never once making him feel inferior and allowing him to learn. He had, it seemed, been wrong. The Edain did not possess the distrustfulness of the Dwarves or the harsh corrections of the Eldar when he mis-conjugated a Sindarin verb. They were new children to the world – forgiving and devoid of hardship.
They could not stay that way for long.
Some Edain tribes became ruthless, caught in a battle for survival. Others joined the ranks of the elven armies that marched upon Angband, their soft flesh to be skewered on black swords, mortal blood sucked down by the earth from their broken bodies.
Andreth was a walking contradiction. She was a forest fire, beautiful but deadly when enraged. Yet when he held her in his arms she was small and gentle. She wanted to learn to heal in a world full to the brim of festering wounds.
By the Valar, he loved her.
He loved the way her mind approached healing as both an art and a science; the concentrated way in which her brow furrowed as she performed her craft over and over, a light in such dark times.
Her hands were so small and delicate within his own, and yet strong, calloused from a life of hardship.
She held him closer when he spoke of the Ice, the bodies of friends lying motionless with their blood frozen black in their veins. Bird-like fingers would caress away tears he didn't know were falling.
They traded stories. Whispered words were shared under starlight – some from her human dialect, others from his forbidden tongue, exchanged like secrets or kisses.
By the Valar, he would always love her.
He had to leave.
The Siege was still ongoing. (Would it ever end? Sometimes he thought it would crawl on forever.) He was needed on the battlefield to fight alongside his family and his people.
The Eldar do not marry during war, he had told her. She said she understood. Understanding was not the same as agreement.
Even he did not agree. He felt his insides tear as Finrod clasped his arm and told him it was for to best. A marriage between the Eldar and Edain could never work, he reassured. Mortals, well, they were just that. They were a blink in the life of one who had all of time at their disposal.
What Aegnor didn't tell Finrod was that shooting stars were not loved less for their fleeting nature. They lit the sky with hope and, for however brief a time, it was enough. Andreth would always be enough, young or stooped with age as was the nature of the Edain.
For a while, Finrod would tell him about her. She misses you, he would say. Eventually he stopped, sensing the pain it caused.
It was many years later but so very soon that he learnt she had passed. An old woman in her sleep, they said. A part of him died with her. The Dagor Bragollach dawned with war cries and fire. It was almost a relief when the sword slid through his ribs. There were worse ways to go, he knew.
Swiftly, his fëa moved to the Halls, fighting against evanescence at the thought that she would not be there to welcome him. No one knew the fate of the souls of the Edain, not even the Valar. In this, Ilúvatar was cruel.
In whispers, other stories would reach him, breaching his solitude in the Halls. Beren and Lúthien, a mortal man and an elf maid had deified Morgoth and escaped the Halls. Tuor and Idril, a mortal and an elf whose love had survived the destruction of their walled city and had been enough the cross oceans for. Later there were others - Arwen Undómiel was the half elven woman who gave up her immortality for her mortal love Aragorn. All the stories were epic in a way his and Andreth's would neverA/N be.
While their love had not been the stuff of legend or the type to defy dark lords or forsake immortality for, they had still loved. It would always be enough for him.
One day, they would meet again and her sweet voice would fill his heart.
Author's note: I know that technically Andreth dies after Aegnor but I'm taking some poetic licence
Also posted on AO3