The Waning Moon
In Cavern's Shade: 37th Chapter
"I don't want so much misery.
I don't want to go on as a root and a tomb,
alone under the ground, a warehouse with corpses,
half frozen, dying of grief."
- Joseph Conrad, Heart of Darkness
Author's note: Please be advised that you are reading an M rated story.
Sooooo sorry this took so long. I was really having a lot of trouble with Celeborn. He completely shut down emotionally and it was really hard to get anything out of him. Character profile is at the end for reasons that will soon become clear. Also, if you follow me on AO3 I will no longer be updating this story there. It simply takes me way too long to do the formatting for both sites, especially with how long these chapters are. Once I finish the story I will upload the remainder of the chapters to my AO3 account as well but until then I will only be updating on fanfiction.
Luna: Thank you! So glad you liked it. There will be more Galathil in the next chapter!
This-is-Menegroth: Thank you so much! Galathil was so hard to write but I am really glad you think he came together well. Ohhhh gosh! Things are about to get even more tragic. Honestly I just want to write fluff already! I'm tired of the sadness!
Guest: Thanks so much :)
The branches of the two trees draped like great vines of wisteria throughout Tirion, spreading here and there, pushing through holes in walls, climbing lattices like ivy on the sides of houses, leaves and branches dripping with lush light that pooled in puddles of flowers. The silver of Telperion had gone dull, light latent and pulsing slowly within, but the gold of Laurelin shone with vibrant radiance, casting its glow about the whole city, and Artanis was lying now on her back across a stone bench in the great square beneath the Mindon, reading by the light of Laurelin's branches, fanning herself idly in the late afternoon heat.
The ladies, she thought to herself, were like delicate pastries, their fine clothes and makeup melting away like frosting on a cake in the humid heat of this season of growth. But she had little care for such things as proper dress and decorum, her long golden hair tied back in a thick braid that she had bound up on her head, stray hairs floating about lazily here and there in the breeze. Gowns were not for her, she had decided long ago. Breeches and shirts were much more her fashion, just like the ones she wore now. The people laughed, and sniggered, and called her Nerwen and Finarfin's tomboy but what care had she for such pettiness when there were so many more interesting things to occupy her mind?
She had taken to pilfering books from her grandfather's study, which was why she was here now, in the square outside his house, a little leather-bound treasure held carefully in her hands, eager fingertips turning the pages as quickly as her voracious eyes could drink in the words and drawings inscribed there. "Elwë…" she whispered, her fingers brushing over the drawing of her grandfather Olwë's brother as if in feeling the lines she might be able to communicate with this strange elf in his strange land, feel the angles of his face just as surely as she could feel the raised lines of ink beneath the tips of her fingers.
She turned the page, her eyes alighting on a map of Middle Earth and she felt the spirit of adventure swell in her heart like a river at flood. What wonders might be there, what hidden glades and glens, what secret meadows filled with golden grass, what crystal waterfalls plunging from shining cliffs of white stone to tumble to great roaring rivers below? She gasped softly, rolling onto her stomach and kicking her legs before crossing them at the ankles, biting her lip as a broad grin spread across her face. She could almost picture those places in her mind from the fragments of the stories that Olwë and Finwë had told her, picture the dark elves that lived there, people of the twilight.
"Now how are you going to find a husband with your nose stuck in a book all day?" A familiar voice asked and she sighed, rolling her eyes, looking up.
"Cousin," she said with a laugh, well her half cousin really, but who had the time for such long and cumbersome titles, especially amongst such close kin? "That is hardly my concern," she giggled. "Fie! Let them come to me. Why should I have to go about searching for them? I have more important matters to occupy my time." And yet, her heart was not as carefree as her countenance would have had him believe.
She wondered if that was why…why he was here…if Celebrimbor had told him what had happened. It had all been in good fun at first, when he had kissed her down by the lake, a quick peck that had caused her to laugh and slap him.
"What are you doing?" She had exclaimed.
"Kissing you," Celebrimbor had laughed, a merry twinkle in his eyes.
"No you're not!" She had laughed with incredulity that he had quickly silenced, taking her hand and drawing her close, kissing her again. And she had let him; she had kissed him back, knowing that she shouldn't, but something about him made her reckless. They had both been inexperienced, unsure, broken apart after a few moments, laughing nervously, sweaty fingers closed about each other.
The next time had been a bit more daring, hiding behind the stables by his father's house. The kisses were not so innocent…their hands were even less so. For her it had been an exploration, the same way that she dreamed of Middle Earth, this too was a foray into the unknown, an adventure of sorts. For him it had been something more; she had seen it in his eyes…and that was when she had understood that whatever she had felt for him paled in comparison to what he felt for her.
But she had not rightly known her own feelings; how could she have? She had been young and inexperienced in many things, love not the least of them, and so her response had been to avoid Celebrimbor, and his had been to seek her out all the more, puzzled by her sudden frigidity, which she had guarded within, far from his sparking flame.
Was that what frightened her about him? Perhaps it hadn't been at all that she felt nothing for him, no, even as she thought it she knew that to say she had never loved Celebrimbor would be a lie. Perhaps it had been the ephemerality of it, the emotions that came in breaking waves to crash upon the shore before they were quickly withdrawn, that moved like the ocean at tide, in and then out again, that passed like the seasons, dying to be reborn and then fading just as quickly. When she was with Celebrimbor it was as though she had become possessed by some madness: as if colors were more vibrant, as if smells were more fragrant, fire hotter, cold more bitter.
Curufin seated himself at her side as she sat up, closing the book in her lap, and she glanced toward him, wondering what he meant to say, if he knew what she and his son had been doing, if he had come to chastise her for it. "You can't wait for everything to come to you, Nerwen," Curufin said with a chuckle. "Some things you must go out and claim for yourself, suitors included."
"You sound like Uncle Fëanor with all your talk of conquering," she said with a wry grin, smoothing her hand over the leather-bound book in her lap. Uncle Fëanor who had not so long ago waylaid her on her way home from her grandfather's house after a party, who had, by the light of Telperion arrested her with a hand on her arm, who had pulled her into the shadows where she had felt that peculiar heat of his, as if he himself were made of flame, burning against her back.
She remembered it so distinctly because it was the first time she had felt true fear, had understood it, as Fëanor's arm had circled her waist, pulling her close, his face buried in her hair, and she realized that he was stronger than her, that she would not be able to break free. It was with shock - cold, and silent, and deadly like ice dripping down her back - that she grasped hold of the terrifying truth that the name Nerwen was but a pretense, that she was not as strong as a man, that if he wanted he could imprison her mind in the frail shell of her body that he could bend to his will all too easily.
"You are so beautiful," he had murmured into her ear from behind, the scent of alcohol reaching her nose as the hand around her waist moved lower, still gripping her just as firmly, lower, cupping her where she knew he shouldn't, his middle finger pressing against her, sliding upwards. She froze, hating her traitorous body for its refusal to move, her mind gone blank, unable to comprehend, unable to accept what was happening; it was unthinkable. "I could immortalize you in materials far more enduring than the weakness of flesh," he whispered in her ear, his hands gripping her more tightly. Her chest felt tight at the thought, her mind screaming in horror, no longer horror that her body was within his grasp, but now the stark rattling fear that he could beguile her thoughts as well. For he had just now shown her the weakness of her body, even as he offered her escape from that selfsame weakness.
She could feel her heart pounding in her chest like a hammer, her breath coming in quick, pinched, painful gasps, her stomach turning with revulsion. "Let me go. This is unnatural," she managed to choke out, but Fëanor either hadn't heard her or had no care to heed her words. Or…perhaps it was because he sensed her hesitation…because he knew that his words had taken root, burrowing deep into the crevices of her mind, making their home there and scattering their seeds: weakness would never satisfy her; it was power that she wanted.
"I would place your hair in indelible crystal," he whispered in her ear, "and not just any crystal either, but one of my own making, crafted of my own being, my own fëa, and you and I would burn together." It had been that, that mention of her and him that had tipped the scale against him, that had caused her disgust to rally, but shame now flooded into her heart, pulsing hot and heavy with the wetness of tears yet unshed: shame that she was as he had said, that she was weak, that she had even considered the thought.
"Stop it! Stop it!" Artanis had shrieked, pushing him away with all of her strength, trembling, tears in her eyes as she turned to fix him with a glare. She wished she felt strong but she didn't; she felt as though she was about to cry like a child. "You're drunk!" She cried, balling her hands into quivering fists. Fëanor grinned, his copper eyes sparking like coals in the dark. "What…what need have I for such a thing?" She stammered. "Am I not immortal already…am I…am I…" She could not think of what else to say and a grin twisted its way across Fëanor's face in the wake of her words.
"Flesh is weak," he said with quiet confidence as if he had perceived her thoughts so clearly. "It may be cleaved and torn, desecrated, destroyed…touched without consent."
"Not here, not in Aman," she had replied, her voice trembling, unsure of whether she believed her own words or not. Fëanor cocked his head quizzically.
"Your mother's people have a saying do they not?" Feanor said, his disdain for the Teleri dripping from his words. "Don't count your cygnets before they're hatched." He paused, taking a step forward and she moved back. She wasn't sure if he had done it because he wanted to draw closer or because he wanted to prove that he could force her to step away. "Don't depend on things being as they always have been. Things are changing, Artanis," he said. "The noontide of the Noldor draws near and yet we are forced to live alongside and share our lands and our crafts with the Vanyar, with the Nelyar."
"Is that what angers you?" She spat defensively, her anger a safeguard, "or is it that you are forced to share your father's affection, and your power, and your glory with the children of Indis?"
"You insolent girl," Fëanor growled, reaching for her again, but she twisted away, staring straight into his eyes as if daring him to touch her again, though her heart trembled at the thought.
"I'll tell my mother," she spat. "I'll tell her what you did to me, of the dark things you were speaking of."
"Will you?" Fëanor asked, turning away, and she hated him for it, hated him for knowing that she would not, that she would never have been able to bear the look on her mother's face, the horror she would suffer if she knew…that she might guess…
"Perhaps you ought to stop reading these books," Curufin mused with a small laugh, drawing her out of her memories as he took the book from her hand, turning it over, examining it. "They seem to make you even more inattentive than usual."
"I don't think so," she mumbled, feeling suddenly uncomfortable, as if the memory of Fëanor had been more of a warning than a memory. But it was just then that her need to wonder which it was came to an end, for the scene that began to unfold before them, that caused both her and Curufin to leap to their feet, left no doubt as to Fëanor's intentions.
A great shout had arisen from within Finwë's house and, presently, Fingolfin exited his father's residence looking as though he were in a rather unusual rush and, at his heels came Fëanor, his hand on his sword, the sound of it being drawn - steel on steel - echoing about the courtyard. Fingolfin paused, turning back to his half-brother, unasked questions filling his eyes, but Fëanor took advantage of the moment to level the tip of his sword with his brother's breast and Fingolfin stilled, silent.
"Artanis, go home," she heard her cousin's voice at her ear and turned to see the lines of Curufin's face clearly etched with worry. "Go home! Do you hear me? Go, now! Tell your family to stay inside!" His copper eyes so like his father's were filled with concern. She nodded numbly as Fëanor's words rang through the now crowded courtyard.
"See, half-brother! This is sharper than your tongue. Try once more to usurp my place and the love of my father, and maybe it will rid the Noldor of one who seeks to be the master of thralls." She glanced once more towards the door of the house, where Fingolfin stood still as stone, Fëanor's blade at his chest, and then frantically turned back to her cousin.
"Curufin don't do anything rash!" She cried over the dinning of the crowd. "Don't do anything stupid!"
"Go! It isn't safe for you here!" Curufin cried frantically, pushing her away, and she fled through the streets, breathing hard, until she collided with someone solid and looked up to see her mother standing there, her eyes, blue as ice, flashing with anger and something else, something unfamiliar.
"Your father had a seeing. I've been looking for you," Eärwen said, her voice deep and musical as the sea yet tinged with the tension of a hurricane. Her strong hand, calloused and used to taming the thick rough ropes of Telerin sailing ships, grasped her daughter's and then together they were fleeing back to Finarfin's house, feet pounding over cobblestones as slurs chased behind them, shouts of "third born," "silver siren," "half breed." It wasn't until the heavy door was firmly closed and barred behind them, until the guards had been set at their posts, that Artanis noticed the knife clutched in her mother's trembling hand.
"It was nothing," she murmured, shaking her head, eyes on the floor, but she felt her mother's fingers strong beneath her chin, forcing her to look into her eyes. Eärwen's eyes were unnerving, clear as glass and yet blue beneath, like sea ice.
"Something happened," the Telerin princess said, her voice low but taut with hidden rage, and Artanis knew what she meant, knew she could see the latent shame.
"Nothing happened," Artanis replied, tearing away from her mother's grasp, angry footsteps echoing across the marble floor. She should have known she couldn't get away, not from her mother, and she felt her grasp on her wrist: strong, hard, painful, pulling her back around to face her. Eärwen's colorless face was flushed red.
"He did something to you. I knew it!" She said, her nostrils flaring wide with anger.
"It's nothing," Artanis ground out from between clenched teeth, her own anger rivaling her mother's. She tore free again and this time Eärwen did not follow, but when the night came and Telperion's silver light blossomed on the vines and branches that reached even here to her window, she found herself more sad than angry. Heaving a sigh she leaned back against the window frame, watching as the gentle breeze tossed the white curtains like sea foam in the night air that filtered in through the open window.
That was precisely the moment that a small pebble had come hurtling past her eyes and through the window, causing her to start, gasping, and she grasped at the windowsill to steady herself, turning to look down from whence the pebble had come. The sight of a familiar face, a handsome face, smiling up at her provided some relief from her dark thoughts and she felt her lips quirk up into a small smile. "Celebrimbor…" the name left her lips like a breath and he motioned for her to come down. Without a second thought she grasped hold of Telperion's branches, climbing down the vines perhaps a bit too swiftly, her hands raw at the rough bark of the tree by the time she reached the bottom, where Celebrimbor caught her in his arms.
She had thought she was finished with him, that whatever had been between them was done, but tonight something in her needed him, perhaps so that she could forget what had happened today, what had happened those years ago, perhaps to prove to herself that someone normal wanted her, that she was normal herself, that her body was her own to do with as she pleased. She didn't know the reason, but she kissed him, long and hard, and he kissed her back, laying her down there in the soft grass of the gardens beneath the cover of Telperion's boughs.
His lips were hot on hers, scalding like fire, and then like a trail of flame along the curve of her neck as she felt his fingers, tentative, pulling at the hem of her skirt. She nodded, moaning against his shoulder, and then felt his fingers brush softly against her and gasped. He looked up, his gray eyes unsure, meeting hers, the question present in them and she nodded. "Yes," she whispered, inhaling long and deep as she felt his fingers gently push in, then his kisses, and at last the trembling shuddering pleasure that claimed her senses, set her nerves on fire, caused her to cry out silently, her mind going blank, all thought slipping away for a brief moment.
Then it faded and Celebrimbor lay down by her side, panting, and she reached out, touching him. "You don't have to," he murmured, his eyes catching hers, watching her, mesmerized.
"I want to," she whispered, pressing her lips against his, drawing back just enough then so that she could watch the way that his eyes changed, the emotion that welled in them, the way that he gave himself over at last to the same pleasure that had consumed her only a little bit ago. And it was as he threw his head back, as he cried out silently in wordless abandoned that she realized at last why she was doing this: because in a world where it seemed everything was about to be taken from her, she needed to know that something was hers, that there was something, someone who could take her away from this mess.
"What's wrong with you?" Celeborn's frantic voice tore through the cloud of memories that assaulted her and, gradually, the world swam back into view. Celeborn…he lost his calm in anger but never in fear, yet it was unmistakably fear that filled his voice now and she looked up into his green eyes - dark - Moriquendi eyes. Surprised at her own thoughts she shook her head as if to clear them away, her heart reaching out, grasping for him like a drowning man at the hull of a ship.
"What's wrong with you?" He asked again, his hands on her shoulders, shaking her. She knew what he meant. She knew it was worry, that he feared something was the matter. And something was the matter, something was deeply the matter with her.
"Everything," she whispered at last, "everything is wrong with me." He looked at her quizzically for a moment, as if he did not comprehend what she had said and perhaps he did not, but she felt as though she was understanding it for the first time.
"The Silmaril," he said, hands firm on her shoulders, eyes boring into her own.
"The treasury," she stammered. "It's in the treasury." He turned away but, desperate, she reached out, grasping at his arm. "You can't go!" She pleaded, her heart thundering in her chest. "You can't! You've no…no weapon…You can hardly walk!"
He stepped forward, taking her arms in his hands, his grip tight, too tight, painful, his eyes a churning amalgamation of anger, pain, ferocity. "Those are my people out there dying," he said. "I may have forgotten many things, but I still remember who I am." Having so said, he turned on his heel, striding forward, fists clenched at his sides, and her heart trembled as he stumbled near the door, catching onto the frame before, with a movement that took him more effort than should have been necessary, he pulled the door open, screams echoing loudly in the moment before the door closed behind him, muffling them.
"Celeborn," Galadriel whispered to the silence, hands empty at her sides, trembling, her heart quenched in fear. She stepped to the door her hands resting softly against the wood for a moment before she pushed it open. What met her was chaos and she half stumbled, half was pulled out into the corridor and was immediately met by a stream of panicked elves flooding through the halls in abject darkness, shouting and screaming, some of them with blood smeared on their clothes. The torches had been extinguished and, the stars above having taken their leave with Melian, the entire city had been plunged into blackness, making escape near impossible as elves stumbled over one another in the dark, confused, unable to tell friend from foe.
Galadriel needed not a moment more to think or to act but threw the doors to the houses of healing open, a shaft of light penetrating the darkened corridors. "INSIDE!" she shouted, grabbing some of the other elves by their arms, physically forcing them into the houses of healing, and soon they began to understand, to follow, pushing their way in while she attempted to force her way out through the teeming press of elves, taking with her a lone candle in a tin and glass lantern that she held aloft, searching.
"Celeborn!" She shouted, turning here and there, buffeted about like a leaf in a tumbling river by the bustle of frantic elves trying to make their escape. "Celeborn!" She cried again but it was no use. Her voice was drowned by the shouts and screams, just one meaningless sound among many.
She pushed through them, struggling against the current, heading for the treasury, and it was when she at last managed to break free of the crowd, making her way through the smaller corridors and at last into one of the main thoroughfares that she beheld in the dim light of the lantern the harbinger of what horror was to come. The floor was slick with smeared blood beneath her feet, crimson as autumn leaves, and the brooks that traced their way through the earthen floor were awash with thick, black, congealed blood and gore that bobbed along the surface. Galadriel put a hand to her mouth, retching at the stench, stepping over the brooks where the colorful ornamental fish bobbed, belly-up, dead.
She had to step over bodies as she made her way through the wide passageway, corpses of elves full grown and children alike, cut open as though they were nothing more than carelessly discarded carcasses of wild animals. And she frantically cast the light of the lantern about, eyes searching for any sign of life, trembling fingers searching for pulses that she could not find. The flowers that had bloomed so lushly had been broken, trodden, trampled beneath fleeing feet and all was silent here, all unmoving, all dead. She reached the end of that corridor at last and turned to find, to her immense relief, that the light of the lantern had revealed Celeborn, standing as if paralyzed, staring into blankness, his clothes covered in blood.
"Celeborn!" She gasped, running to his side, and he turned to look vacantly at her. "This…this blood."
"Not my own," he said softly, staring down at his hands as if in disbelief and she knew by the look in his eyes that he had done the same as she, checked each body for signs of life and found none. He looked back up again, staring ahead. "I…I do not remember…where is the treasury?" He murmured turning, disoriented, as if he were in some horrific dream in which time had grown slow.
"This way," Galadriel murmured, her hand soft upon his, pulling him the opposite direction of where he had begun to head, "it's this way." Her ears were still echoing with the distant screams that reverberated throughout the caves, shouting in Sindarin, words she could not make out, and the emptiness of these halls only increased her unease. "Did you find a weapon?" She asked as they began to run.
"No," he said bitterly. "They were all unarmed." They ducked into a dark corridor and Celeborn suddenly came to a halt, reaching out to take her hand, arresting her movement. Panting, she stopped by his side, looking to him as he gazed into the darkness.
"What do you see?" She asked quietly, for he had grown to adulthood in darkness and was thus more accustomed to seeing where she could not. But, he said nothing and then slowly bent, pressing his ear to the ground.
"They put out the lights to use the darkness to their advantage," he murmured, eyes unfocused as if his mind was far away and she knew that he was listening to the earth. "They had this planned…they're hunting them down. This is no robbery -it is a massacre."
Celeborn knelt, placing two fingers to the earth beneath them, his eyes suddenly going vacant as the winter sky, the lines of his body drawing tense as a viper before it strikes, coiled muscle holding within it the potentiality of motion that was stilled as if in precursor to an attack. The ground seemed to shiver then all of a sudden, a deep tremor ran beneath Galadriel's feet, making the entire city tremble. "What are you doing?" She asked then, confused, frightened, for she had seen him use Sindarin magic long ago to show her something beautiful but now she had the sense that what she was about to see was far from lovely.
"Diverting their path, confusing them," he murmured, "leading them towards us instead." His eyes went clear as glass for a moment, the green disappearing to be replaced with white, his entire body seeming to curl briefly around that one spot where the tips of his fingers dug into the earth's flesh, and the caves seemed to swell and contract violently in the matter of an instant, the caverns themselves at his command. Then another tremor ran through the earth, long and deep, before a rumbling surrounded them as of rocks falling to the depths of the earth or deadly thunder in the distance, and a sudden gust of wind swept towards them, whipping at their hair and faces.
Celeborn pulled his fingers across the earth in a slow line, as if he were stroking some great beast that rose to his will and the earth responded. It seemed to Galadriel as if the world itself shifted, layers of rock that had lain still in perpetuity suddenly coming to wake, the soft dormancy of trees falling away like leaves to reveal some strange and primeval brutality. He was hunting, and this time with no bird of prey, but with all of this earth at his command, obedient to his behest.
"Pagans, the lot of them, who worship false and foreign gods rather than the Valar. Heathens, barbarians, their power is simplistic, brutal, unrefined, nothing like our gifts that have been honed by the Valar," Feanor's words echoed in her mind as her breath caught in her throat. It was not often that she saw Sindarin magic, and even less frequently that Celeborn performed it, and she remembered now why it frightened her, why Celeborn sometimes frightened her, why she loved him, why she could have him until the end of time and still never have enough: like it, he was wild, untamed, like the earth she would never be able to bend him to her will, to bind him to it; he was beyond her and yet buried in her more deeply than her own heart.
He rose, his entire body seeming to quiver with some energy, some slow beating dark light. He turned to her for a moment, watching her with eyes that seemed as distant as the far reaches of the universe, as close as the blood within her own veins. In awe she reached out, fitting her hand in his, feeling whatever it was flow through him and into her like a current, pulling irresistibly at her like a riptide tearing her out to sea. She nodded; she was ready.
"I'm yours," she said, opening herself entirely to him, feeling that power flow into her not as though she were his conduit nor he hers, but as if the sky had come down to kiss the earth and the earth risen to embrace the sky, stretching between them the brightness of lightening. She felt a great tremor course through her body, shaking her bones, blinding her for a moment in which it seemed that they were no longer two separate beings but one, bound by a blistering fusion of power that welled from two sources become united, splitting the heavens like a searing bolt of lightening that branched out above in veins and arteries of blinding light that illuminated the thousand caves, making them bright as day. The sky above Menegroth blossomed again, swelling as the entire universe was expanding, an array of stars spinning above in some mystical cataclysm.
It was in that sudden light that she saw the dwarves and the first had not even the span of a moment to raise his axe before Celeborn was upon him, swift, silent, deadly, his hands catching the sides of the dwarf's helm, twisting quickly, smoothly, the motion followed by the crack of the dwarf's neck. His movements were simple, economical, as he pivoted, tearing the helm from another dwarf's head before he lifted him bodily and caved his skull in against the wall.
Galadriel stood silent, still, breathing slowly. She had known it would come to this from the second she had set foot outside the houses of healing, had known that this was what they would have to do, that if they did not kill these dwarves they would themselves be killed and yet she could not help but remember in her heart that these were the children of Aulë.
By that time the dwarves had taken stock of their situation, their voices rising in alarmed shouts as they brought their axes up in defense, but Celeborn was quicker, far quicker, and he easily wrested an axe from a startled dwarf's hands, quickly decapitating its owner before, swinging it with blinding speed and a brutal elegance that cut down the dwarves like wheat in autumn before the thresher's scythe. They fell one after the other, no match for the Sindarin prince, and he did not stop until he had cut his way to the other end of the hall. Like a thundercloud he was, on the verge of a storm.
Trembling, Galadriel stepped forward over bodies, determined not to look down at the gristly work he had wrought, reaching the end of the hall at last, where Celeborn had fallen to his knees, his breath coming in short, quick, pained gasps, the axe standing upright before him, his arms crossed over the top of it, his forehead resting there at the juncture. Galadriel fell to her knees at his side, her hands still shaking, wishing that she could have protected him from this pain, feeling so completely useless, as if she should have foreseen this, as though she had failed him. His fingers were slick with blood that fell in slow droplets to the floor, his eyes closed, his face contorted in pain, his breath hissing between clenched teeth.
"I…I'm sorry," she murmured at last, her throat tight, her voice thick with the onset of tears.
"No," he whispered, reaching out, clasping her hand in his bloody one and it trembled with some strange energy. "No," he said. "Better that it was I who have never before turned blade against those uncorrupted by Bauglir. I would not have your fëa endure another such trial." He gasped as though speaking had been a test almost beyond enduring and Galadriel reached out for him, taking his hands in hers as the axe clattered to the floor.
"You remember," she said quietly and he raised his eyes to hers, dark eyes, haunted eyes, tormented eyes.
"I remember everything," he told her. "The moment you set your hand in mine I remembered, but I wish I had not." Galadriel felt her heart sink in her chest like a stone as those words.
"You're hurt," she said, seeking to break the silence, but Celeborn shook his head.
"I can go on," he said. "It is the old wounds that have opened, that pain me still with exertion, not new ones."
"Still…" Galadriel began.
"Help me," he interrupted her. "To the treasury, help me. These dwarves were only a small part of what company must have come. It may well be that there are yet others we shall encounter." He turned, his gaze piercing hers yet again, his eyes burning with fierce resolution. "If they reach the Silmaril before us," he gasped, stopping to draw ragged breaths before continuing, "it will plague Arda for all time, for they will never destroy it of their own volition. We must get to it first, Galadriel. We must destroy it."
She nodded, knowing he was right, and helped him to stand, her arm beneath his shoulders, supporting him as he leaned heavily on her. "We are very close now," she told him, and yet she felt some sense of nausea twisting in the pit of her stomach, for the way ahead was silent and empty and she had very much begun to doubt that they had arrived in time.
And yet, as they drew closer she saw that the place was not entirely abandoned, for there was still one who remained, fallen before the golden gates of the treasury, a figure crawling, pulling himself slowly and wearily across the floor, leaving a trail of blood in his wake. "Mablung," Celeborn gasped quietly, leaning heavily upon Galadriel as they staggered forward, confirming the dread that had already begun to creep at the edges of her mind.
"Celeborn…" Mablung gasped, his world swallowed by a fit of coughing and retching as he spit up crimson bile onto the floor, blood running from the corner of his mouth, over his chin. The warden extended his hand, trying once more to pull himself forward, his armor grating across the stone floor, the horrible squelching sound of blood and distended organs accompanying that grating noise. He stopped, breathing hard, facedown.
"Mablung," Celeborn gasped, collapsing at last at his friend's side, turning the warden over, cradling his head in his lap, and Mablung began to cough violently, blood pouring forth from his mouth, his long dark hair so carefully tended now matted with his own blood.
"Celeborn," Mablung reached up, desperately tangling his hands in the prince's silver hair, tears washing down his handsome, ruddy face as he pressed his forehead to Celeborn's, sobbing uncontrollably. "Forgive me…I beg you," he choked out. "I do not deserve it. It was my entire life, protecting the royal family of Doriath. I have failed, but forgive me nonetheless, I beg of you. Before I die I would have your forgiveness."
"There is no forgiveness to be given," Celeborn said, his own face awash in tears as he held Mablung in his arms, "where no wrong has been committed. My friend, you have ever served loyally and honorably. You are without wrong, without guilt, without shame."
"I have failed you," Mablung gasped, his voice weak and trembling now.
"Nay it was I who failed you," Celeborn replied. "Never should that cursed jewel have been allowed to enter this kingdom." Mablung drew a deep breath, laboring under the pain of it.
"There was nothing you could have done," he murmured, "nothing any of us could have…caught in this web that was never of our own design…" he closed his eyes, breathing deep, shuddering, and then his eyes shifted to Galadriel. "Why…" he gasped, "why did the Valar forsake us? Why…"
But Galadriel could do nothing more than shake her head, lips pulled tight in an effort to keep at bay the sobs that threatened to pour from her throat, for Mablung was indeed dying. That was obvious now, seeing him turned on his back. He had been disemboweled and his guts lay strewn along the path that he had crawled to them. Celeborn clasped Mablung's hand tightly, meeting Galadriel's eyes, and she knew; knew that this was a horrific, slow death meant to inflict pain, meant to torment the victim. One could live for many hours in such a way, but death was certain. "I do not know," she said in reply to Mablung and he closed his eyes for a moment.
"My wife…" he said, pausing as if to collect his strength, "tell her I love her. I will wait on the far shore…" Galadriel nodded vigorously, wrapping her arms around herself as if that would be some meager protection, but she had no idea of whom he was speaking, had no idea that he had married, and yet that seemed a poor thing to tell a dying man.
"I will," she promised instead. "I will." Mablung let out a deep breath, seeming satisfied, and then returned his gaze to Celeborn.
"That day…you almost bested me that day, the first day that Galadriel watched the fights. Do you remember?" He asked, his voice shallow, and Celeborn nodded. "That was the closest you ever got." The warden laughed, hissing in pain.
"I know," Celeborn replied, nodding, a faint smile on his lips, "I know. I have never fought so hard…but I…I wanted her to see."
"Ah…" Mablung said, a small smile of reminiscence blooming on his face, his voice a soft whisper. "I ought to have let you win just that once."
"No," Celeborn shook his head with a soft laugh. "I wouldn't want what I didn't deserve, even if it would have impressed her."
Mablung laughed. "But we rarely get what we deserve, do we?" He said. Something unspoken seemed to pass between them then and they both nodded.
"My knife," Mablung said, ending the silence, "… at my right side." And Celeborn reached down, pulling it from its sheath. It was near identical to his own with the long, wicked, curved blade, save that Mablung's was inscribed in Tengwar, something he had done in a fit of whimsy, fascinated by the foreignness of it, when Finrod and Galadriel had first arrived in Doriath. Foe of darkness: the characters gleamed in the light that fell from above.
With trembling, bloody hand, Mablung reached for Celeborn's hand, clasping it tight, his eyes full of tears. "Strike true," he gasped and Celeborn nodded. He paused for a moment, taking a deep breath, and then drove the blade home, straight through the leather chest plate, down deep into Mablung's heart, and the warden's copper eyes flashed for a moment, a spark of evanescent light, before some nearly imperceptible darkness stilled them and, with one last long sigh, the life fled him. His hand remained clasping Celeborn's for a moment longer and then slowly fell away.
Galadriel stood silent, frozen, unable to move, or think, or hardly even breathe, her mind torsed by what had just happened before her eyes, by the hypocritical disgust that wore at her heart like water against sand. Celeborn was bent over Mablung now, face pressed against his friend's still chest, weeping silently, and Galadriel stared, at a loss for words. She had been through enough that she ought to have known differently and yet, despite the charity of what Celeborn had just done, she felt as though all right, all justice had fled from the world and for the first time, perhaps, she at last understood, fully understood what it was that he had felt upon learning of the kinslaying.
He stood then, eyes dry now but face stained with the salt of tears and with blood, and turned to her, cradling her cheek in his right hand as his eyes met hers, staring into the deep of her, watching the movements of her soul. His lips parted for a moment, as if he meant to speak, but he closed them again and was silent before at last he found the words. "Do not look to me for your salvation," he whispered at last, "for I cannot give it." He let his hand fall to his side, looked at her for a moment longer and then, still clutching the knife in his hand, turned and slowly walked away.
"Issue the order for her arrest. Bring her to me. Bring her here," Celeborn gasped, wheezing with pain as the wardens helped him to a chair. He shook off their friendly hands, his shoulders hunched and quivering with anger. "I can manage on my own," he spat, collapsing at last to the seat, still breathing hard. He could feel Galadriel's familiar presence at his side and turned slightly to see her take her place behind him. He wanted to send her away if only because he did not wish for her to see this.
"She is already here, Your Majesty," one of the guards murmured and they turned to see that Venessiel stood in the doorway. She looked as though she had not slept in weeks, her normally lush hair matted, tangled, thick with grease, her face pale with dark circles beneath her eyes. The skin of her hands was raw and red, as if she has scrubbed them over and over countless times in an effort to remove some unseen yet indelible stain.
She approached slowly, eyes on the floor, and bowed low at Celeborn's feet. It was a while before she rose and, when she did, she did so slowly, as if a great weariness sat within her bones. Celeborn, on the other hand, felt possessed by a near manic energy that even Galadriel's touch as she lay her hand upon his shoulder could not ease. He could feel wrath beating through him like a pulse as if it wished to tear free of his body, a force of its own.
Venessiel laid a hand on her pregnant stomach, seeming afraid to begin, her mouth opening and then closing again like a fish. "There is something I must tell…" she started at last, her voice weak and faded, still finding herself unable to raise her eyes from the floor.
"Do you think I have not already surmised for myself what you have done?" Celeborn seethed, his voice thick with anger and, beneath that, hatred. The wardens shifted nervously and Venessiel glanced about furtively. It would have been impossible for Celeborn to seek to find any mercy within his heart in this moment and so he did not search for it. "Tell us now the full tale," he said, "and I pray you be quick about it, for there is none whose presence is now more loathsome to me than yours."
It still took her a moment to begin but at, last, swallowing hard, she said, "Thingol had wanted the dwarves to come here. He wanted to see their wares, was considering purchasing them, re-outfitting the army after the Battle of Beleriand, but they would not come without some guarantee that we would indeed buy what they made. They wanted 10,000 in silver promised to be paid upon the completion of the armor that I had told them we would order. We had the money. I drew up the contract. I showed it to them. They came. I withdrew the funds," she said.
"All I had left to do was to get the King's signature. That was when he began to have doubts…or perhaps he had never been as serious about it as I had thought. He said that first we should observe the quality of their craft before making any contract. I did not tell him I had already drawn it up. I did not tell him that I had shown it to them. After all, he hadn't signed it. It was not yet valid. I…I meant to put it away in case he changed his mind." She paused as if she were almost unable to continue.
"I went to return the money to the treasury. But…looking at all of it there…I…I couldn't. It was so much money, 10,000 silver. I thought of what I could do with that much silver…I…I knew that if I invested it properly the return would be monumental. I thought that I could pay you back for what I had done to you, that I could return all of it. And so I…I invested it in Nargothrond. I thought that Felagund was my lucky break. But I needed to cover my tracks and so I forged Thingol's signature on the contract with the dwarves. His signature crossed my desk a thousand times a day, I was familiar enough with it to be able to do it. No one would question why that money had been withdrawn."
"Then I drew up the investment papers for Nargothrond. I forged those as well. I thought that all the money would come back and more, double, triple. There would be enough to pay the dwarves if Thingol did decide to purchase from them. There would be enough to pay you back with interest and you would love me again. I was sure of it."
"I was nearly found out once," she said, "when you began to push the king to make good on the contract with the dwarves before Nargothrond was yet built. Of course, he did not know that the contract had ever existed but, if he had agreed to buy their wares then he would have discovered that the money was gone. He would have known what I had done, he would have found all of the forged papers. The forgeries were good enough to trick you but he would have known that he had never signed them. But you saved me, though you did not know it. You pushed him too hard, so hard that his mind was completely turned against the idea of buying anything from them and their protests fell his deaf ears. He did not know there had ever been a contract and he dismissed their insistence as typical dwarven greed, as I had thought he would. I was saved. Everything after that was going according to my plan." She paused, hands trembling as she clutched them tightly together, her voice having grown weak.
"But Galadriel ruined everything," she started again. "You fell in love with her and you were never supposed to fall in love with her. Oh, I knew she was beautiful, and clever, and charming…but I never thought you, you of all people, would fall for a Noldo. After they first returned to Middle Earth, before she and her brothers came to Menegroth, you and Beleg used to laugh at them, to make fun of the ludicrous stories you would hear about the Noldor. I at least thought that she would never fall in love with you, for she was so prideful and I thought she would deem it below herself to consort with a Sinda. But she did and it was for love of you that she told Thingol of the kinslaying."
"And that…that ruined me and all my plans along with me, for our ties with Nargothrond were severed completely and the money was gone, lost, I would never get it back. But then it seemed as if the hand of fate had saved me yet again, for the dwarves left and I knew that what I had done would go unnoticed, that I could hide it away and no one would ever be the wiser for it. Yes, I had lost you, and yes, I had lost the money, but at least no one would ever know."
"So I fixed the books and I forgot about things for a while. I forgot about you. I was happy, even. I found that I could love again and I fell in love with Oropher, married him. But then she came back. Oh and I knew why you loved her, even though she was a kinslayer, even though she could be maddening, there was something about her that was so good, so right, so unblemished. She had that determination, that resilience, that strength. Sometimes I thought she was more yourself than you were. I almost loved her myself. How could anyone resist her?"
"And she intended to renew our alliance with Nargothrond. I saw my salvation in her. It didn't matter that I had lost you. I didn't want you anymore. I was happy and in love with Oropher. But I still thought that I could undo the wrong that I had done, that if she could do it, if she could succeed in setting things right between Finrod and Thingol that my investment would be returned from Nargothrond and that I could put the money back in the treasury, I could return what I had stolen from you. No one would ever know."
"So I became determined to help her in whatever way I could. But it seemed that she hardly needed my aid, for she rose from the ashes of her own accord. I was near sick with worry when she refused my help and so I took her friend into my service so that I could gather information on her, manipulate her even, if things came to that. But it was not necessary. She managed things on her own and our friendship with Nargothrond was renewed. The money came back, all of it and more and was deposited into my account. Finrod was none the wiser. To him the accounts were just mere numbers and he had no idea which ones belonged to me and which belonged to the king. Felagund had become a wealthy man and I became a wealthy woman in return."
"I returned to Doriath what was Doriath's. I returned the money I had taken from you to your account slowly, over the course of years so that you would not notice. The only thing I could not do was give to the dwarves the money that I had told them Thingol promised. They would have questioned Thingol and I would have been found out. But I did not think it mattered. I did not expect that we would ever deal with them again. Of course, I was worried when Galadriel returned, bringing the coins with her, for I was more certain than anyone then that the dwarves of Nogrod had colluded with Morgoth and sought to take their revenge upon Doriath. But, we had Melian to protect us and I knew they could never breach the girdle. And, I knew that the public was of the opinion that it was a mere coincidence. After all, dwarves are killed all the time by orcs and have their money stolen. It was nothing unusual; there was no reason for anyone to suspect that it had anything to do with what I'd done…except for Galadriel's visions…but no one believed them anyway, even her own brothers did not take them seriously."
"The dwarves could not touch us. Thingol had been so furious with them that I was certain he would never invite them to Menegroth again. Everything was right with the world. I had escaped unscathed and, more than that, I had won my bet and won big. Still, I vowed that I would never do such a thing again. I had a husband to think of and I wanted to have a child."
"But then there was the matter of that contract. I had had to keep it around you see, to excuse myself of any liability if you asked about it again. It would have been suspicious if I had lost it. For you had asked me once already and, in a moment of confusion, of surprise, I had showed it to you when I ought not to have done so. And so I had kept it, though I would rather have destroyed it, for I knew that if you asked me for it and I was unable to produce it you would check the accounts and then you would know what I had done. Once I had paid all of the money back I knew that I could safely destroy it, that even if you asked to see it and I could not produce it, you would never be able to prove anything."
"But Bainwen, whom I had taken into my service in an effort to gather information about Galadriel, betrayed me. The contract was missing, though I was certain where I had hidden it. I began to suspect that she might have taken it, that perhaps she had seen me with it when I thought I was unobserved. I questioned her harshly and at last she confessed to stealing it and told me that she had already hidden it in your chambers to find."
"It was you," Celeborn heard Galadriel's voice, cold and hard, at his side and Venessiel nodded.
"I broke in in an attempt to retrieve it," she said. "It was I who sent the note to Celeborn so that he would be far from your rooms, but I did not expect you to return so soon. I was sick with worry, thinking that I had not found it but that the guards would discover it when they searched your chambers that night. Yet they did not…and I began to suspect that Bainwen had lied to me, that she had never hidden it in your rooms as she had said."
"My attempts to coax the truth from her proved fruitless and I only knew I was correct when she was caught burglarizing your rooms. I knew she had gone to hide the contract there and I was furious with her. With the heavy guard that had been set upon your rooms after I had first broken in, I knew it was beyond my reach, that I could never hope to retrieve it. Fortunately for Bainwen, but unfortunately for me, she had the presence of mind to disguise the entire thing as a robbery, meaning that she would not be returned to my custody, where I would be able to control what she said and to whom, but that she would instead be jailed and taken for trial before the king. I certainly could not interrogate her in prison but I knew with certainty that if she were brought before Thingol she would tell him what she had discovered and so I forged just one thing more: an order transferring her to a prison colony on the Isle of Balar."
"Is that where she is?" Galadriel asked, her voice thick with worry and burgeoning anger.
"It was where she was supposed to have gone," Venessiel replied quietly, "though as they were attacked en route I cannot say."
"If she is dead then may her death be upon your head, and those of all who have died as a result of your greed," Galadriel spat, but Celeborn's hand on her own quieted her. Venessiel reached up to wipe away tears that sat heavy in her eyes and had begun to make their way down her face.
"Continue," Celeborn ordered, his voice as cold as sharpened steel and, presently, she did.
"But Thingol's wrath, which had heretofore played in my favor, suddenly turned against me, for because of it he set Beren in pursuit of the Silmaril. Still, I thought I was safe. I never thought he would actually succeed. But he did. It was then that I knew that doom was upon me. Our craftsmen had not the skill to set that jewel, I knew it, and what was more, Thingol wanted it set in the Nauglamir. He called the dwarves of Nogrod back to Menegroth. I knew that they had not forgotten. I thought at worst they would reveal my lies. But I never imagined that they had planned Thingol's murder." She fell into silence and at last Celeborn spoke.
"Do you have anything to say in your defense?" He asked.
"No," Venessiel said, raising her eyes to his and he could well see the horror and pain written in them, but in the face of it he felt nothing resembling compassion for her. He could not even muster the anger that Galadriel had, but only a strange and hollow emptiness sat heavy in his heart like a stone. "I never intended for any of this to happen," Venessiel said, her voice shaking. "Certainly I never wanted it. But what I have done is inexcusable and…and…" harsh sobs wracked her body. "I ask that you punish me as you see fit, for I assure you that there is no one alive who despises me more than I already despise myself."
Celeborn was silent for a while, feeling the bite of Galadriel's fingers digging into his shoulder, hardly knowing what to think, unable to think. "Did Oropher know of this?" He asked at last and Venessiel shook her head violently.
"He is entirely innocent," she said. "I swear it. He knew nothing!"
"Then I will not force him to endure your fate," Celeborn said, his heart like a leaden weight in his chest as he pronounced his judgment. "It is only for the sake of the child you bear that I will not exile you from this kingdom today," he told her. "But once your child is born you shall be stripped of your possessions, your head shall be shorn, and you shall cast out to wandering. Your children shall be given into the custody of their father for they are of the royal family of Doriath. Whether or not Oropher wishes to follow you into exile shall be his own choice to make, but I would not expect mercy from him if I were you, given what you have done. A ban shall be set upon you so that you may never return to this kingdom, nor shall you find welcome with Círdan and his people. You had best pray that the green elves find some mercy in their hearts for you. Death is too kind a fate for one such as yourself but maybe it will find you in time and long may you dwell in Mandos's halls."
At his words Venessiel sank to her knees, uttering a terrible cry as tears streamed down her face, but the guards took her by the arms at Celeborn's behest and raised her to her feet. "See that she is comfortable until the child is born," he said. "After that, cast her out. I wish neither to see nor speak of her again." With that he stood, pushing Galadriel's hand from where it lay on his arm, and strode from the chamber.
His footsteps were quick at first, carrying him through winding, labyrinthine corridors that all ended in darkness. He had no purpose other than that he wished to be away from here, from this, from everything, and he did not know where his feet were leading him. It was all too much and the only thing he wanted now was to forget that any of this had happened, to go back to how things had been when he had remembered nothing, when it had all seemed so simple. But no…he wanted to go back further than that.
His feet had carried him to Thingol's great hall and, looking up, he found himself at the foot of the throne. That place, which had once been so marvelous, so full of laughter and life, was now silent, deserted, more like a tomb than anything. His eyes tracking a path across the ceiling that had by now gone completely dark once more and he knew that never again would he see the stars shine there, moving in perfect congruence as if guided by some silent music that bound the world in spheres of harmony.
It was as if all had returned to how it has been long ago beneath a darkening sky, before the appearance of the sun and the moon, before Menegroth, when they had lived every day of their lives in nameless dread of foul and unseen things that would spirit them away to their deaths or worse. Doriath had been a bastion of strength, of safety, a lone outpost against the darkness, sole fortress against the night of Morgoth's maleficence. And now…now it was no more.
He stepped forward, over the great incarnadine stains of blood that marked the places where his people had fallen, that scarred the earth like open wounds. In the horrifying aftermath of the slaughter, for that is what it had been, a slaughter, not a battle, most of the bodies had been cleared away by grief stricken friends and relatives, but the blood remained, running through the creeks and streams that flowed throughout the city. It was strange, he thought, that a place so lived in could have in the matter of a few hours been turned into something more akin to an antique ruin, a crypt.
The leaves of emerald and green glass, veined with silver and gold, had been torn from the trees, an unnatural harvest, and lay scattered now upon the ground. His feet crunched over them as he stepped forward and heavily seated himself upon the throne. Autumn had come to Doriath but already the scent of winter was in the air, bitter and cold. He wanted to go back, back to the way that things had been, to feel safe, and loved, and warm again, but those days, he knew, were long gone, vestiges of an ancient memory that would no longer bear life, gone just as surely as the life had fled this hall.
Never would he forget the way that the streams had once bubbled here with crystalline waters and brightly-colored ornamental fish, nor the vibrance of the trees with the verdant canopies that had towered higher than even he could climb, or the soft spotted fawns and doe-eyed rabbits that had wandered here and there in peace and happiness. All that was left now was the hollow corpse of a city in which the song of nightingales had been extinguished like the flame of a solitary candle.
But, more than this, he would never be able to erase from his mind the cries of his people as they had fallen in their own home, the sight of their bodies grown cold and still, their eyes staring up accusatorily at him as if to say 'you were supposed to protect us,' and most of all, he was haunted by the hollow look in Galathil's eyes as he held Inwen's still and pallid corpse. She had died as she had lived, seeking to diminish the pain of others, to aid them in their hour of need, to heal even as the world around her was choked in violence. Never had he felt more powerless than in that moment when he realized that there was nothing he could say or do that would even in the smallest way relieve his brother of the immense burden of pain that had been so unexpectedly thrust upon him.
Nor was there anything or anyone who could have healed him of his own pain, of the insurmountable weight that he felt settle about his heart, coil about it, constricting the life out of it. He wished that he could find his anger, for that would have provided a refuge, albeit one that would pass all too quickly. Instead he felt enveloped in some strange feeling, something for which he had no name - but that consumed his entire body in a deep aching the likes of which he had never known before, consumed him until he felt empty. And even knowing this, he knew that he must go on, that for him there could be no respite, not peace, no time for grieving, but it seemed an impossible challenge and his mind refused to turn to it, preferring instead to cower in the shadows.
Lowering his head into his hands he wept, not only for this city, and this kingdom, and those who had been killed, but for the dreams that could not now be and were forever lost, for the advent of a world in which any semblance of safety was a thing of the past, a time in which children would be thrust into adulthood before they were prepared for it, just as he had been.
The sound of quiet, slow footsteps interrupted him and he reached up, quickly wiping away the tears, ashamed that he had been seen in such a state. Kings, he knew, could not afford such luxuries. If a kingdom was a body then her king was the heart and if the heart does not keep pumping then the body will perish. He raised his eyes slowly to find Galadriel standing at he base of the dais, a faintly flickering lantern held in her hand.
She had come to reprimand him, to rebuke him for the things he had said before about wanting to forget, about how he could not give her the salvation that he had presumed she expected of him, but now she saw that what he had said was not a condemnation of her, but of himself. Quietly, she stooped and set the lantern on the ground where its light cast eerie shadows about the darkened hall.
Celeborn glanced towards her and then looked away before voicing his deepest fear to the silence. "I failed them." The words hung heavy in the dark hall and Galadriel felt her heart aching as she knew that nothing she could do or say would ever soothe the pain in his soul nor persuade him otherwise.
She stepped slowly forward, sinking to sit at his feet, pulling her knees up to her chest as if she were a child, wrapping her arms around them as she leaned her head against his knee. "What do we do now?" She asked simply, action the one thing she was certain could draw Celeborn's mind from his sorrow, even if his heart could not yet follow.
"Evacuate the city," he said softly. "Our numbers are too few now, our forces too diminished. We could certainly never withstand another assault of that magnitude, but even an attack by a weaker force than the dwarves brought could easily decimate us. There is only one way in or out of the city, a method of protection while the girdle was in place, but without it, it proves a death trap.
"Where will we go?" She asked.
"South first," he said, "to regroup with Círdan's people and to gather to us those of our people who live in the forests and towns of Doriath rather than here in the capital, for they shall be in grave danger as well. Were we to go straight to the mountains it might prove too dangerous, for the dwarves dwell in that region and we would be vulnerable to Bauglir's foul beasts. With greater numbers our chances of surviving the journey will increase."
"But will Círdan join us?" Galadriel asked and he nodded.
"The settlements on the Isle of Balar and at the mouths of the Sirion are only temporary. He knows that he cannot stay there forever. He is only trying to give his people a chance to rest and recover before they too must certainly move eastward. Perhaps he will be able to accomplish this sooner if we join him." His words were quick, decisive, his fierce analytical mind at work and that provided Galadriel some small measure of relief, for so long as he felt he had a purpose, she did not believe he would let his despair consume him.
"Then let it be as you have said," she told him, "and let us lose not a moment in delay, for my heart tells me that the sooner we are away the better. This place is as a home to us no longer but if we tarry I fear it shall become our tomb."
With the sun and moon extinguished from the vaulted ceilings above, Celeborn knew not whether it was night or day when he awoke. Since his memories had returned, it still felt strange to him in a way to sleep at Galadriel's side, nearly as though he lay beside a stranger whom he knew better than anyone else. It had not been so easy for him to try to return to how things had been and the reestablishment of intimacy was proving to require a great deal of time. It rather felt as though he had not seen her in a very long while and, though he remembered her well, and loved her more dearly than his own fëa, it was taking them time to become reacquainted with one another.
He rolled over in the dark, draping an arm over her warm, soft body, taking comfort in the gentle, slow, rise and fall of her breathing, burying his head in her lush golden hair filled with the light of Aman. He closed his eyes, the light from her hair a warm glow against his eyelids, and wondered what it must have been like to know a time without this suffering. As long as he had been alive, even from his first memories as a child, the threat of violence and death had been ever-present. In a way he envied her, envied her compassion, the way that she could bring herself to trust so fully, to give her heart so freely, so entirely to others, to forgive completely.
And I… he thought, there is always part of myself hidden in reserve, kept secret, always part of me that is vigilant, untrusting…even of those I love best. His own words had haunted him for weeks after, haunted him still, do not look to me for your salvation. He had seen the confusion flit across her eyes in that moment, had wondered at himself that when he ought to have comforted her he had only admonished her coldly, warned her that he would never be able to give her everything she deserved. And she, in her ever constant compassion, had not rebuked him, had understood, had comforted him even.
Every one of the Sindar knew that a wolf, no matter how tame it became, would always be a wolf, would always be a wild animal at heart and he wondered if they weren't the same, if it might be the case that no matter how much he loved her, there was always the chance that he would tear her heart out and devour it. Perhaps, after all, that was what the Noldor had meant when they called them 'dark elves,' that they could never completely be trusted because they could never completely trust. Perhaps this earth had marred them after all, perhaps it had taken from them something that they could never get back.
She deserves better, he thought, a thought he would never dare voice to her. She had made her choice, as he knew, as she had said herself, and he would not challenge her judgment nor her free will. If it was him that she wanted then he would give her himself as best he was able; he only wished he could give her more. He drew a deep shuddering breath, his hands trembling as he held her close within the circle of his arms, his tears falling silently, ensnared in her hair like drops of dew had once upon a time been caught upon the golden glory of Laurelin's light.
Thanks for reading! :) You guys are the best!
Character profile: Oropher and Venessiel
I originally did not write Oropher into this story since he isn't in the Silmarillion at all and he seemed really superfluous to me since he is such a minor character even in Unfinished Tales, but after the Hobbit movies started to come out I figured I would get slaughtered if I didn't put him in the story and, as it turns out, I am really glad that I put him in.
He has turned out to be a really nice foil for Celeborn. They're very different elves with very different opinions and agendas. They're both good people at heart, just very different, and I wanted to kind of show that dichotomy in the story: just because you don't get along with someone doesn't mean that they're a bad person. We'll be seeing a lot more of Oropher in the sequel that will enhance this relationship even more.
Essentially, Celeborn tends to have a much more moderate political agenda than Oropher has and their motivations are very different. Celeborn does things typically because he wants them done right or he thinks they should be done a certain way but Oropher tends to have a little bit more of a self-serving agenda, which isn't always a bad thing. Oropher is in this story, and in canon as well, extremely politically conservative and very isolationistic. The fact that he wants nothing at all to do with the Noldor while Celeborn marries a Noldo obviously creates friction between them in Tolkien's books and in this story. But, I think Oropher's point is worth considering: perhaps if Doriath had never gotten involved with the Noldor things might have gone better.
As for Oropher personally, I've cast him as the kind of person who wants to be well-liked. The approval of others is very important to him and he places a lot of emphasis on the importance of status. As the youngest, and therefore the most junior of the princes, he really struggles with this personally because he is very ambitious but he doesn't have the sort of position in the court that he wants. Instead of taking his own stand, however, he tends to attach himself to influential people like Saeros in a bid to rise to the top.
Although he loves Venessiel very much and they do have a very loving marriage, like any marriage they have issues. One of those issues is that Venessiel is the kind of wife Oropher thinks he should have: pretty, smart, powerful, wealthy. She's kind of a puzzle piece that he thinks he needs in his bid to rise through the ranks of Thingol's court. This is why he gets frustrated with her whenever he perceives that she isn't following his plan. In his mind, they're in this together and he can't understand why she sometimes does things that, in his eyes, thwart his plan. He'll really grow and evolve on all these issues in the sequel.
Venessiel, for all of her intelligence and her math smarts, is chiefly governed by her heart and she even takes this to hedonistic extremes at times, as with her gambling problem. She has very poor impulse control and very poor control over her emotions, which is one reason that her break up with Celeborn was so difficult for her and why she never really got completely over it. She also has a very strong need to 'make things right,' which is why, even though Celeborn didn't care whether she paid him back or not, for her this was necessary. Whether she is aware of it or not, her paying Celeborn back is more about making herself feel ok and fixing what she did, than actually making things right between her and Celeborn. Celeborn is probably much more aware of that than she is. No matter how daft he might be about his own emotions, he is often keenly perceptive of those of other people.
Venessiel definitely still has feelings for him and, even though she loves Oropher and is happy that she is married to him, I think sometimes in life you have feelings for someone that never really go away so that is what she is going through. And, again, I think her love for Celeborn actually has more to do with her own feelings of unworthiness than with him. It's more about her obsessing over what she sees as a mistake in her past that she can't fix.
And, speaking of her past, I think a big reason that she fell into gambling is because she was brought up in a lower class family, as is alluded to in the story, and eventually rises to a really high position at court. She has a lot of ambition, which is what I think really ties her and Oropher together, but she also has this fear of losing everything that she has gained, which makes her do really irrational things sometimes since she will always act in the interest of self-preservation, even at the expense of the people she loves.