Days had turned to weeks and into months, and on the Undying Lands a brooding restless descended again. Whispers were passed from mouth to ear; glances crossed and spoke of a shared distrust. The Teleri's long abandoned boats rocked and clashed upon the dead Sea, and the sound carried ominously in the Sun's rusty light. Black birds flocked to the house of Manwë, where Morgoth has made his lair, their cawing strange and wistful. And although the Dark One didn't seem yet to be doing anything evil in particular, still the minds of the folk forebode of a plague and a pestilence looming on the horizon. Nukumnon knew that hint of rising mutiny and felt it in his heart, and where once it would have pleased him mightily, now it only served to shatter his nerves further on. This charged atmosphere spoke of an oncoming storm, and that he could no longer withstand.

-.-

The next time Nukumnon saw Melkor was when the Maia ran a message to Mandos and a gigantic black shadow suddenly swooped down and lifted him up in its talons. It landed after a short and dizzy flight in a dell somewhere in the Pelóri, tossing Nukumnon down with a soft thud. As soon as it touched ground, the winged creature re-shaped into Lord Melkor's regular form in one graceful motion. The Vala towered above the crouching Nukumnon, his arms crossed upon his chest. He cast a shadow now, deeper and fuller than any of the Valar's nowadays. To the Maia's horror, he seemed furious. He tried to scramble away on his knees.

"Please, Master. I have an errand to run. Lord Manwë would be mad at me if he knew…"

"A slip of the tongue again, Mairon?" gone was the velvet. His voice was iron.

Nukumnon's heart skipped a beat. "You… know my name?"

"Aye, Mairon, my most loyal and trustworthy servant… or so I thought. For you didn't deign to tell me the one fact I sought most. You kept me in the dark like some fool, fawning over those miserable wretches who despise me." his lip curled in contempt. "Did you think I wouldn't notice that something was amiss? Do you think I'm blind to all the glances I get, to the way the Children avert their eyes when I pass and mutter prayers to our Lord? Perhaps you do deserve the awful name you are now called."

Nukumnon's spirit crumbled even further. "How did you find out?"

"My brother told me," he said. "He couldn't keep his tongue tied for long. Claimed that it was our Father that made him tell me, but he was always a prattling idiot. He matters not. It's you I'm angry with."

"I did it for you…" Nukumnon whispered. "They told me I must keep silent for your own sake, that if I told you who you were you would be taken away forever back into the Void, and I couldn't bear it. I couldn't bear being ripped away from you again, and know that it is my fault that you suffer. I'm sorry. I'm not as strong as I used to be."

"Do you think me so feeble as to require a Maia's protection? I can take care of myself, in case you forgotten" the Vala said. His gaze strained upon the Maia's crouched form. "You should have told me. You should have warned me. That's what I would expect from the one I loved so much. Or have you forgotten that, too?"

The Maia's eyes shot up, unbelieving, but there was no trace of lie in Melkor's face. "I was your Lieutenant."

"That's not what I meant. Didn't you know?"

"No," whispered the Maia, unable to speak up. Some things were not meant to be said out loud, their pronunciation a shard of glass cutting into soft flesh, a paradox that might swallow the world whole. The contrast was too high.

"I never told you?"

"You were not… sentimental."

"Well, I still do, even after all these years."

It couldn't be, that was the only way the world might still make sense. Melkor could not love. Nukumnon was too tired to conceal the bitterness in his voice. "Why? I'm broken, weak, ugly. You are… perfect, as you always been. Why would I believe you?"

There was a long silence at that. Nukumnon lowered his head and closed his eyes. And then he felt large hands settling on his shoulders, and he lifted his head.

Melkor was kneeling in front of him, his face a breadth of hair away. His hair tickled Nukumnon's face.

"You are not broken," he said. "And you are not ugly. You are a being of fire, and it shines through the cracks from afar. You called on me, and even without remembering who you are, I came to you."

The Maia didn't know how to answer that, but then the Vala's lips pressed upon his and no reply seemed relevant anymore.

-.-

Melkor was sitting on the rocky ground beside him, drawing sigils with his fingers on the earth. The rolling clouds overhead cast flitting shadows on his face, and even here in the mountains, the air was thick and stuffy.

"So I was Disowned? All the time I thought I sat at our Father's feet, I was Disowned by Him?"

"Yes, my Lord."

Melkor sighed, a heavy, shaking sigh. It was painful to hear him like that. He picked up a stone, crushed it to dust in his palm and looked at it with wonder. "It's so strange. I do not feel like this spirit of destruction, at least not anymore. How could it be, if this is the role I played in His Music?"

"Perhaps things change. Perhaps you are to assume a different role now that you're back."

He shook his head. "This answer does not satisfy. It cannot be so simple; nothing is ever simple with Him. He is playing subtle, convoluted games, and I never liked being a pawn. Mairon," he said, lifting his gaze into the Maia's eyes. "I think it's time I took you back."

"Do you want me to swear fealty to you?"

"You are already sworn." he said and spread his arms. "Come here and open up."

-.-

The spirit, as the body, follows the same laws set in Eru's thought. As large masses of Matter attract smaller rocks and clouds, so do the smaller Maiarin souls gravitate towards the vast spirits of the Valar, and both orbit the infinity which is the One. And like a body long left in solitude and untouched, a soul will hurt when taken by a bigger mind, however gentle its touch. Mairon moaned as the ashes of his soul awoke and quickened to life, as his whole mind was cleared of dust and became whole once more. Memories, thoughts, and emotions rushed between the Vala and his Maia, almost inseparable now in their embrace. And when the dance of flames shrieked into a roaring climax and lightning filled the darkening sky, Melkor tossed back his head and roared with laughter.

His laugh echoed in the air and shook the foundations of the earth, until the entire world seemed to thrum in pain. Mountains erupted in the distance at the sound of his laughter, and in the city the Children screamed.

"Now I know what my purpose is," he thundered amid his laughter, black hair whipping around him in the rising gale. "I am here to end it all, am I not? All of this beauty and light which I always loved so much, and was forced to destroy again and again! Do you hear me, Father? I figured it out! I know what it is you want of me!" blackness reeking of ash and blood wrapped around him like a cloak and he brandished a sword fashioned out of thin air, its blade sharp enough to butcher Arda herself. "I am no longer purposeless, Mairon. This is me, this is my destiny. Will you follow me?"

And Mairon gave out a great cry when his fire burst out again as it did of old, engulfing his entire being with its deadly heat. His sorry flesh was gone, replaced by limbs made of living flame. He fixed his burnished gold eyes on the Vala and hissed, his voice an inferno of flames.

"To the Void and back, Master."

-.-

In Manwë's halls upon Taniquetil Tulkas and Eönwë heard the distant storm beginning and turned to look at each other. And in the Mortal Lands, long deformed and forgotten, a black haired youth was startled from a nightmare of fire and fury.