Oh Brother, Mine
"Hello, brother."
The words ripple over him, soft and deep, and with eyes that water from the pain Melkor looks up, beyond the blackness and the bars of dark matter, towards the radiance lingering on the other side.
He has not seen Manwë in many eons, and he has not heard the word brother in longer since. They are all brothers and sisters under the fold of their ever-absent father, but the others do not think of him as such, anymore. Defiler, they named him, and he had smiled. World Breaker, they screeched, and he had laughed. But Manwë has always been a little daft in that area, he thinks. A little more forgiving. Always, the saintliness has irritated him.
"Brother." Melkor says in return. In the void, his voice echoes endlessly, rebounding and cavernous as a thousand pipe organs droning in the deep.
"Are you well?" Manwë asks. There is a soft, glassy clink as he taps his staff against the non-existent ground to step closer; the rustle of his pale robes and the fall of his silver hair as he tilts his head to observe him. It is an old joke between them, Melkor believes. Manwë always asks of his health, even when he's shoving a sword through his gut or chaining him up in the darkness. As if it were not his hands that were doing the deed.
Brother, Manwë says, in the past and the present and every future afterwards. Brother, I missed you. The song is incomplete.
"Well as I can be." Melkor quips, and it is the second half of their joke; his stock answer to Manwë's supposed benevolence. Whenever Varda is around, she watches their dance with a heavy gaze, then rolls her eyes and walks away. The Mother of Stars has no time for mummers.
Across from him, his little brother nods his head, tall and radiant as he gazes with cobalt eyes into the void. Melkor does not like Manwë's current form. He's never liked it, as it looks a bit too much like the Eldar for comfort; twice as tall, of course, and utterly luminous, but those damn robes. That silver hair. His pointed ears. His little brother is utterly besotted with the tiny children their father created, and always has been.
My children, Manwë says in his head, and he is crying. My children. Please, don't hurt them. Their songs are sad.
"I have missed you." Manwë says, and his voice cracks. Melkor shifts in his chains and tries not to sigh, because this weakness of his little brother is contagious. Always, Manwë clings to things that have long outgrown him, grasping with burning fingers in an attempt to draw them back into the fold. He does it with everything, really. Him, the Maiar. Even his wife. Those cursed Eldar. Especially them.
Gnats, they are. Flies with pretty faces to squish beneath his heel.
"I wish…" Manwë begins, then pauses, his expression guileless and blue eyes bright. "I wish things were as they had been. When we made the music. Your songs were beautiful."
"You called them discordant." Melkor spits, but Manwë is so saintly his idiotic expression never wavers. Ever the perfect son, he is.
"You went against the wishes of our father." Manwë says. "That does not mean I do not miss it. The harmony was best with your voice." Then time shifts and folds around them, like a piece of cloth, looping back to the present and around to the future. There is nothing fixed in the void.
"Where is your wife?" Melkor demands, and feels the bile of a thousand suns rising within him. He remembers the stars that Varda created, but he also recalls those other stars, before the ether. He sees the stars of his father, deep in dark space. Across from him, his little brother's robes are white, but in the past and the present and every future afterwards, they are red and black and blue. Every creature has a different shade of blood, Melkor has learned. And Manwë is not benevolent.
Son of mine, Illúvatar booms, but he is not there anymore, either. Defiler, they had called him, and Melkor had laughed. I love you, brother. Manwë says, and Melkor hates him. Hates this primordial titan that stands before him, wearing skin and hair and clothes like a mask. He is not one of the Eldar, but he tries to be. They're both mummers in this game.
Finish the dance, Varda hisses, but she's not there, too.
"Our sister-wife is making stars." Manwë demurs, his slender hand clenching around his staff as his head lowers. Suddenly there is a coldness there, and Melkor is in the future. His little brother is screaming, wings sprouting from his back and a sword in his hand, and how dare you hurt the children. How dare you. I will end this.
"Where is Mairon?" Manwë asks. Melkor laughs and grins wide, because his little brother's threats are toothless. There is nothing worse than the void. The two of them were born in dark space, and his lieutenant was made from fire.
"Couldn't find him, could you?" He drawls, and Melkor thinks he chose well. Crafty, Mairon is. Resourceful, and so very cruel. It things had been different, he would have made a wonderful Vala, but he was born after The Beginning. Such is the arbitrary nature of Illúvatar, as it were. Their father rips and rends and takes without ever explaining why.
Manwë's expression is sad.
"I will not hurt him." His brother promises, and his voice rings like a bell in the void. Melkor shifts in the darkness and looks down at the chains that bind him: the spikes that go through him every which way, leaking energy. He has a high threshold for pain, he knows, but Manwë is more skilled at inflicting it than he realizes.
World Breaker, Manwë sobs. You broke it. You broke the song. But that hasn't happened yet. Time is folding again.
"Even if I knew where he was." Melkor begins, and he gives his brother a knowing look. "I would not tell you."
Manwë's expression softens into a pout, and it looks very odd on a Vala. He has an elvish face in this form, except the features are off: the cheekbones too high, his mouth too wide, his cobalt eyes huge and pupil-less. Manwë tries so very hard to mimic the tiny children their father created, but he can never quite seem to get it right.
"He must come back." Manwë insists, and his voice is firm. "I will not hurt him, I swear it."
"No. Leave me in peace."
"Does my word mean nothing to you?" Manwë demands, his voice rising in desperation. "Is there no bond between us?" And Melkor closes his eyes and thinks ah, this is what he came for.
"You called my song discordant." He repeats. He will never let his little brother forget it. The act of closing his eyes is odd to him, though. He does not wish for a body anymore, as they are cumbersome, clunky things, but Manwë likes to mutilate.
"He is hurting the children." His brother says with a trembling voice, his lips pressed into a thin, pale line. "Please Melkor. Make him stop."
"But they aren't your children." Melkor says, and an ugly smile crosses his features when Manwë's shoulders droop, just a bit. "After all, they fled like rats. Left you all alone on your mountain." Only, that hasn't happened yet. Time has no meaning in the Void, and the universe is an ever-shifting series of layers.
Manwë's hand tightens around his staff as he speaks, and Melkor can feel it: the neediness that clings to him, the energy of stars.
"That was your fault." Manwë says, and it's the angriest he's ever heard his little brother sound. "You told them lies. You sung discordant."
"THE MUSIC IS OVER!" Melkor roars, and suddenly he wants to strangle Manwë more than anything; wants to rip out the wings that have not yet sprouted and drag him back to the beginning of time, to show him where everything fell apart.
He remembers the song as if it were yesterday; remembers being born in darkness and seeing the light of their father. He recalls being given free will to make his own music, then a rumbling voice inside his head telling him his notes were hollow. But you couldn't make hollow notes when there was already nothing, and oh, how it burns Melkor to think of bowing his head to Illúvatar. He's a celestial being, too.
"Tell me where Mairon is." Manwë insists, and Melkor snarls in the darkness and says "no." He will not give him up, this single sour note that he created. But then, Marion has always been his own creature, too. They are all mummers, and the play is not yet over.
Author's Note
Stream-of-consciousness, non-linear time, and probably canon-divergent. All in all, a confusing oneshot. For those of you still waiting for The Hematic to update, my sincerest apologies. It will be up soon. Happy Holidays, folks!