A/N:

Everyone in Middle Earth: *Sees Elrond* Oh wise Master of Rivendell, last of the great Elven princes of the Noldor!

Everyone in Aman: *Sees Elrond* A BABY

Music for this chapter: There Beneath, The Oh Hellos

Chapter 7: A Child Of Many Houses

There is new music in the timeless void.

This is unusual.

Ainur and Maiar murmur in song to themselves, singing of wonder and curiosity for this new theme. They had not descended into Eä, the World that Is, Ages ago when Eru wrought it from Song. The songs that have sounded through the depths of the void since the beginning of thought are of endless themes of joy in the presence of Illúvatar.

But this new music is changed.

It is music of Being, of beauty in sorrow, and hope in grief. It is music of the painful brilliance of the sunrise on the shore to those who have never seen the sun; who have heard whispers of waves but have not beheld them.

There are eight voices, neither Maiar or Ainur. Among them there is one voice raised to such brilliance that the hearts of those listening blaze with wonder– this cannot be a child of Eru, created as fëa embodied?

Beautiful and unwavering the voice sings on, as, further on beyond it, the discordant thunder of limping steps threatens to overwhelm it.

That will not do, those who are listening decide. It is not done to sow discord in beauty such as this.

Gathering together, they raise their voices as Eru taught them, and give their power into the weave of this new song.

(:~:)

Elrond is aware of little, at first.

Fair voices above, a cool hand on his burning brow; sweet water slipping between his lips as someone tenderly cradles his head; a familiar hand in his, small and strong and impossible – Celebrían had sailed five hundred years ago, and despite his children, Elrond has been alone since.

The echo of his childhood sickbed, Peredhel illnesses that were foreign to the Noldor; of Maglor holding Elrond in his fever, singing songs of healing and of comfort. It had been the same when Elros and he were both ill, and Maglor had curled around them both and sung simple melodies of brighter times under the light of the Trees, Maedhros sitting unspeaking beside them and brushing the twins' fever-slick hair from their foreheads.

For all the discomfort of being ill, Elrond had always looked forward to the few days of recovery afterwards, when his fathers would ever be at his bedside and his waking hours full of song.

He latches on to the memory for as long as he is able, and when it fades turns his face into the sweat-damp cloth of his pillow to hide the tear that slips down his temple.

A cool hand at his cheek.

"Elrond. Elrond, darling."

He opens his eyes, and looks up into his wife's careworn features. Beyond, the walls of the chamber are of fair white marble and filigree settings – elegant and tasteful, and very Noldor.

Celebrían, Elrond mouths, throat too parched to speak. His entire body aches with each movement.

To his horror, her face crumples; her eyes squeeze shut and her curtain of silver hair swings over him as she turns away, her hand leaving his cheek to stifle a sob.

And then her shoulders straighten, an echo of her mother's steel-lined resolve. She pours a cup of water from the ewer at his bedside, and sits on the edge of the bed to help him drink.

She still does not meet his eyes, though Elrond seeks her gaze with his own.

Celebrían places the empty cup aside, and turns from him to rise.

Elrond's limbs are impossibly heavy, but the fingers of his sword-hand twitch at her long white sleeve on the coverlet beside his and latch on.

"Celebrían," Elrond whispers.

She does not look at him, carefully easing her sleeve out of his hand, and the terror that grips Elrond in that moment is too great to voice.

Three thousand years and more of marriage, and she has never–

His fëa flutters within him, a terrified wrenching of his soul that leaves him gasping silently from the whiplash, and Celebrían's hand is suddenly in his again as she stares at him in horror.

Elrond shakes his head to dispel a sudden wave of dizziness. He is not fading, he reminds himself, and Celebrían is not leaving him.

Although most others already have.

Elrond grounds himself to the warm hearth of Celebrían's fëa, and raises his free hand, trembling, to brush away the angry tears that slip down her white-lipped face.

"I am sorry," he says. "I should have sent word, when the Valar did not listen to my plea."

"You should have," Celebrían says, without accusation; it is a statement of Elrond's faults as they are, and he accepts it without question.

He looks up into the aching hurt in her gaze, and thumbs away a fresh tear that escapes down her cheekbone.

"You should have sent word," Celebrían says, voice trembling as she leans into the touch. Her fëa blazes under his palm. "And when it became clear the Valar would not admit you again, you should have stopped."

"I know," Elrond whispers, thumb moving in achingly slow circles over the back of her hand. "I am sorry for that, as well. I caused you pain, and thought only of myself. I am a horrible husband."

Celebrían makes a choked, pained sound, and curls over him to bury her head under his chin. He feels her shake her head even as the aching fury in her fëa scorches his.

Elrond breathes through the pain, as he had all those seven days before the silent gates of the Ring of Doom, and brings up shaking arms to hold her close.

They remain like so, his guilt and her fury simmering with their tears, until all is cool and quiet, and they can speak again.

(:~:)

There is broth and more water and a changing of his sheets, and Elrond sleeps again, with Celebrían's hand in his.

The second time Elrond awakes, there is an unfamiliar Elf at his bedside.

"Oh good, you're awake!" the Elf says, throwing down his book and helping Elrond sit up against the cushions. "I'm afraid Idril has spirited away your wife to rest, and I am her rather poor substitute."

Elrond examines at his companion's face in the golden afternoon light. The stranger is tall – almost as tall as Maedhros had been, but there is something of youth in his face still – and there, in the cool grey eyes and midnight hair, the angle of the jaw and chin, is an echo of Fingon.

The stranger sticks out a hand. "Arakáno Nolofinwion. Or Argon, I suppose the histories would say. The shift in language and names was past my time."

Elrond lifts an arm to grasp Argon by the forearm in a warrior's greeting, gratified to see that his hand does not shake, and Argon's smile widens.

"Which should I call you?" Elrond enquires.

Argon shrugs. "Either. I am technically your great-grand-uncle, but I've done some calculating and I've actually spent far fewer yení alive than you have."

Now if that isn't a disturbing thought.

"Indeed," Elrond says carefully.

"Disadvantage of dying too early, I suppose," Argon says. He seems far too happy discussing the facts around his demise, and Elrond finds himself blinking a little at the shock of it. "Anyhow, I was told to ask if you were up to visitors?"

"I believe I am," Elrond says.

"Good," Argon says. Halfway to the door, however, he pauses and winces. "It'll be fine," he says reassuringly. "They don't stay angry for long. Usually."

Elrond has no time to ask whom they refers to before Argon is out the door.

A few moments later, two Elves enter, and Elrond feels suddenly as though he is an elfling again, and impossibly, utterly small.

His great-great-grandfather and the High King of the Noldor each pull up a chair and sit at either side of his bed.

Fingolfin's hair is braided simply, and he wears no gems, but he is instantly recognisable. Finarfin's waterfall of golden hair is bound by no crown, save a simple circlet. A family affair, then, which Elrond supposes he should be grateful for.

Elrond inclines his head respectfully and waits, fighting the urge to swallow, as Fingolfin and Finarfin stare at him with near-identical, inscrutable gazes. Fingolfin leans forward to study him more closely, one elbow resting languidly on his knee. In contrast, Finarfin lounges carelessly in his chair, eyes sharp.

"You told me he was young when you met him," Fingolfin says to Finarfin, dispassionately. "You didn't tell me he was stupid, as well."

Finarfin tilts his head and smiles a sly smile, looking terrifyingly like his daughter. "Oh, I wouldn't know about stupid," he says. "Stubborn, yes. Like our dear brother, certainly."

"That thrice-damned Fëanorian stubbornness," they say together, sharing the ghost of a smile.

Elrond considers speaking, then decides against it. He fights the urge to shift uncomfortably.

"Elrond," Fingolfin says abruptly.

"Yes," Elrond says, forcing his shoulders to remain relaxed. He is six thousand years old, for pity's sake, not some chastised elfling–

Fingolfin takes a breath. "I will tell you a tale. It brings me little pleasure, and no little pain, but it is important you listen carefully."

Something about Fingolfin's gaze speaks of icy steel, and Elrond nods once.

"A long time ago, there was a young Elf with two younger brothers who adored him." Fingolfin speaks without pause, without inflection. "There existed, however, a misunderstanding on both sides that caused the elder to believe the younger two hated him, and vice versa."

Finarfin is listening wordlessly, but he too holds Elrond's gaze with cool composure. There is something of old pain in the line of his mouth.

"The time came when the eldest of the three had to leave home for a quest to avenge their father," Fingolfin continues. "His younger brothers wished to go with him. The second of the three even killed for him." Old bitterness and guilt in enters Fingolfin's ice-lined gaze. "But the eldest brother burned hot with anger for their father's death. He would not wait for his brothers. He sundered himself from them."

"Then," Finarfin breaks in, quietly: "Then, the eldest brother surged ahead, wildfire unstoppable, and threw himself alone into a mire of flame that all three brothers should have faced as one. The eldest's flame burned and burned, until he himself was consumed."

Elrond closes his eyes briefly against the echoing grief in Finarfin's words. Elrond knows the histories – every Elf in Middle-Earth does – but it is different, hearing it calm and quiet from the lips of one who died for it, and one who remained behind.

"The second pressed on," Fingolfin says, eyes blazing with the terrible chill of remembered ice. "The third turned back to attempt to bridge the abyss his elder brothers left behind."

Finarfin looks away. Elrond sees him swallow once, painfully.

Fingolfin continues, relentless. "And when the second brother finally reached the far-off land to be rejoined with his kin, the eldest brother was long dead, and his eldest son captured by the enemy."

Maedhros.

"I often wonder what would have happened if the eldest brother had waited," Fingolfin says, an old ache in his voice. "If all three brothers had faced their father's killer together."

Seven blows, Elrond reads, drifting there at the forefront of Fingolfin's thoughts. Seven blows, and I stood alone.

"Elrond," Fingolfin says, leaning forward in his chair to gently clasp Elrond's hand, "There are always noble causes. But nothing is to be gained by leaping into battle alone, to burn away as a single, lonely candle against a greater wind. I know it. There are those of my children who know it, as well."

Fingon's people, leaping like white flame down towards the taunting enemy before their allies arrived in the east, only to be drowned and consumed; Turgon, who heeded not Tuor's warning from Ulmo, and fell as the last spring flowers did at the Gate of Summer; Argon, who hewed his way through a sea of orcs like an ice-fed blade, only to be surrounded, and overwhelmed.

Elrond blinks back tears. It is not often he is reminded that many of the griefs of the War of Jewels could have been avoided. But what has happened has happened, and the Noldor must live on.

"Your fathers raised you well," Finarfin says, and Elrond turns to him in astonishment. "They did," Finarfin continues. He smiles earnestly, reaching out to take Elrond's other hand. "But you might have inherited a little too much of their independent, stubborn temperament."

Elrond opens his mouth to object, because he will not suffer his foster-fathers to be insulted, but both Finarfin and Fingolfin smile knowingly at him, and he closes his mouth again.

Elbereth, it has been five thousand years and more since he was last chastised thus.

Both Finarfin and Fingolfin's hands are sword-calloused against Elrond's fingers, despite the long millennia since the War of Jewels. It would seem neither of them have forgotten the lessons of the First Age.

"I understand," Elrond says quietly, "But I will not abandon the House of Fëanor to the eternal darkness. Perhaps… there is another way. But I will not rest until your brother and nephews are returned to us."

He smiles as Fingolfin and Finarfin's hands tighten in his. "I am of both your houses," he says to them. "And of your brother's, also. Therefore, I am of Finwë's house, first and foremost. I would like to see it whole once more, or as whole as may be possible. But I will heed your wisdom and seek to simmer, not to burn."

Finarfin suddenly smiles; a brilliant thing that blazes brighter than his crown of golden hair.

"I told you he was wise," Finarfin tells his brother.

"He's my great-great grandson," Fingolfin says, with a hint of pride.

"He's my grandson-in-law," Finarfin counters, with a glint of challenge in his eye.

"I am Fëanor's grandson," Elrond interjects, before the conversation can deteriorate further. "As terrifying as that sounds."

"Ah," Finarfin says, releasing Elrond's hand to dig in one richly embroidered sleeve. "That reminds me. Here." He throws a sheaf of documents onto Elrond's lap.

Fingolfin does not let go of Elrond's other hand, although Finarfin has. Elrond suspects this to be yet another form of brotherly competition, but he ignores this in favour of leafing through the documents with his free hand.

He stares down at the lines of formal Quenya.

"You're not," he says to Finarfin, aghast. All formality has fled him in the horror of the moment.

"I am," Finarfin says, with a beatific smile. "You have no idea what pleasure this gives me. What ease it will bring between my nephews and I, as well – Turukáno's people are forever quarrelling on this matter, and Findekáno is forever sympathetic to the opposing faction. Arakáno bounces between the two of them with no predilection."

"He does," Fingolfin supplies.

"But the Fëanorian district," Elrond says, feeling the breath catch in his chest. Perhaps he has sat up for a little too long. Or perhaps this is the same feeling of horrified inheritance he had felt the day after the last battle at Dagorlad when Círdan had tried to hand him Gil-Galad's crown.

Fingolfin's hand tightens on his, lending a little strength from the cool hearth that is Fingolfin's fëa, and Elrond is too grateful to be embarrassed for it.

"The Fëanorian district," Finarfin confirms with relish.

"I can't!" Elrond exclaims.

"Oh, you most definitely can," Fingolfin interjects on his other side. "I hear great things about Imladris."

"Imladris is a homely house!" Elrond protests. "It almost governs itself, and I had Fingon's chief supply-master with me – I'm not sure if you remember Erestor? The point is, I've never been king of anything–"

"Oh, you wouldn't be king," Finarfin says mildly. "I'm the only one kinging here. I'm simply…delegating. Like I delegate the Gondolindrim to Turukáno."

Elrond looks at him.

Finarfin's expression changes, softening, and he reaches forward the same time Fingolfin does – helping Elrond ease back down onto the pillows, tactfully ignoring the tremble in Elrond's hands and the paleness of his face.

"We have exhausted you," Finarfin murmurs. "I apologise."

"As do I," Fingolfin says. "You must rest, and you can think about my brother's offer later. Loath as I am to admit it, it is one of his wiser decisions."

"You are welcome in my house for as long as you like," Finarfin says, smoothing the coverlet and placing the papers aside. "It is your house, also."

"My thanks," Elrond whispers, already feeling weariness sweep over him in an unstoppable wave.

To his surprise, Fingolfin and Finarfin take it in turn to press a kiss to his brow, somewhat formally, before taking their leave.

In the quiet after, Elrond blinks away the sudden moisture in his vision.

It has been a long time since anyone has acted so fatherly to him.

He closes his eyes, and rests.

(:~:)

"Did you hear the new songs?" Finrod says, reaching over to crack a walnut on Angrod's head.

Angrod snarls and attempts to mash a handful of walnuts into Finrod's hair.

"No," Elrond replies, attempting to hide his fascination as Finrod catches his brother's wrist and offers his own golden head, gesturing for one walnut only.

Crack goes the walnut, as Angrod grins. Finrod winces and rubs his scalp.

The gardens of the king are warm in the sunlight, overlooking the southern slope of Túna below. Elrond leans quite comfortably on a cushioned recliner under a trellis laden with honeysuckle and purple-throated orchids. The grass about him is crowded.

The few days since Elrond entered the King's house have been quiet and idyllic, but also full of new introductions. He has since met his grandparents Idril and Tuor (an experience so strange he finds it easier to think of them by their names and not their relation to him) and Eärwen, Anairë, and a plethora of other people that he had formerly only heard of in history.

Elrond is grateful that his current company is unassuming.

He had started out the afternoon alone, Celebrían having gone into the city with Idril; but he had found himself gathering more and more grandsons of Finwë around him as the afternoon progressed, entirely unintentionally.

"I have heard the songs," Turgon says, already deep into his third cup of wine for the afternoon, and showing no effect at all for it. He reminds Elrond of Thranduil in that way, and acts nothing like the great-grandfather Elrond had imagined. "Ecthelion sang what he heard for me. Rather…exaggerated, aren't they?"

"All Vanyar music is, a little," Argon says, shuffling over on his stomach to steal one of Fingon's walnuts.

"Am I missing something?" Fingon says, leaning back on one elbow in the grass to hand Elrond a shelled walnut.

"Some of the Vanyarin bards have gone and composed songs of Elrond's ordeal," Finrod supplies.

Elrond nearly chokes on the walnut. Finrod gamely smacks him on the back until he recovers.

"Hm," Turgon says dispassionately. "Do they have any idea what he was kneeling for?"

"Not in the slightest!" Finrod says delightedly. "But I'm told it all seemed terribly melodramatic and heartrending from a distance. There was an entire verse about how your hair fell over your face when you collapsed, Elrond–"

Fingon gets up abruptly, scattering walnut shells into the grass.

Elrond looks up at him. There is something old and terrible in Fingon's gaze that Elrond almost could name–

"I'm getting more wine," Fingon says. "Turgon?"

"Much appreciated," Turgon says, saluting his brother with his goblet, though he wears the same expression of concern that all the others do at seeing Fingon stalk off towards the kitchens.

Elrond sighs, and moves to rise.

"Are you sure that's wise?" Angrod says with some alarm.

"I'm fine," Elrond says, clutching at the throw around his shoulders and waiting for the world to stop spinning. "I can walk."

He can feel Finrod, Argon, Angrod, and Turgon's stares boring into him, but he holds his head high and makes his way slowly and carefully between the ordered flowerbeds towards the kitchen door.

Elrond finds Fingon crouching by the wine barrels in a shadowed chamber, running a finger over the letters on the oak as a severe frown creases his forehead.

"Cousin," Elrond begins.

Fingon's head comes up. "Elrond," he says, frown melting into an expression of concern. "What are you doing? Sit."

Elrond suffers to be led to lean against the nearest cask of wine.

"What do you think?" Fingon says, nudging a barrel with his foot. "Doriathrim wine or Telerin? I don't know if you know the difference–"

"Cousin," Elrond says firmly, "I am sorry."

Fingon pauses.

"You don't have to apologise to me," he says.

"I do," Elrond says, leaning more of his weight against the wine cask. "You rode out for a day's easy hunting with your cousin, and ended up standing guard beside me for a week. Rain, wind, and storm."

"You didn't ask me to," Fingon says, crouching to fill an ewer from a cask. "I didn't even offer. I just decided to do so."

Elrond watches Fingon straighten, the silver ewer glinting in the half-light of the door.

"It was difficult for you," Elrond says.

Fingon's fingers visibly tighten. The wine sloshes, dark and thick.

"It was difficult for everyone involved," Fingon says lightly, making to move past Elrond towards the door.

"You called me Maitimo," Elrond says. "Twice."

Fingon's smooth steps pause. He sets down the ewer, and turns.

"What of it?" He says, voice low and tightly controlled.

Elrond takes a steadying breath, and rises to move towards Fingon.

"I brought back memories of a painful time," Elrond says, reaching out to place a hand on Fingon's shoulder. "I never intended you pain. I am sorry."

Fingon exhales harshly.

"You looked so much like him," he says quietly. "That same stubborn fire. If I had not found him, Maitimo would have endured to his death on thangorodrim, spurning the release of fading."

Elrond's hand tightens on Fingon's shoulder. They each take a slow breath against the echoing lash of the memory across Fingon's mind.

Fingon scrubs a hand over his face. "He was so- he was so quiet, on the flight back to Mithrim," he says hoarsely. "What time I did not spend keeping pressure on his wrist, I spent speaking to him, for fear that he was dead. He swooned away as we descended to the camp at Mithrim. I screamed then, because I thought he was dead; dead a mere few moments before he might be reunited with his kin."

Elrond flinches.

Maitimo! Fingon had screamed when Elrond had felt his consciousness slipping, as they landed in the courtyard of the King.

Fingon makes a choked noise, and pulls Elrond into a tight embrace. "You are the last memory we have of your foster-fathers," he murmurs, arms clasped tight around Elrond's too-thin form. "Do not squander that."

Elrond nods into Fingon's shoulder.

They are both weeping a little, and neither of them are truly holding the person they wish for, but there is comfort and forgiveness here nonetheless.

"Right," Fingon says, lifting his head and smiling determinedly. He supports Elrond with one hand and reaches back for the ewer of wine with the other. "We'd better get your great-grandfather some more wine."

Elrond makes a face. "Please don't remind me about Turgon. I can't even think of Idril and Tuor by anything other than their names."

Fingon barks a laugh.

They make their slow way out of the cellar, and Elrond is quietly grateful for his cousin's steadying arm. He has been standing for far too long, and the world is tilting gently at the edges like a ship at sea.

They step carefully out into the sunlit garden, and nearly collide with Elwing and Eärendil.

The world shudders.

It is as though Elrond blinks, and when he opens his eyes again the ewer is gushing wine into the grass like blood and Fingon has one arm around Elrond's back and the other holding his hand in a white-knuckled grip.

"Elrond," Elwing exclaims, hands half-extended towards him.

Elrond looks at her, at the concern in her face and voice.

The last time he saw her he and Elros had been curled weeping in a corner as she stared at them, clasped her hand around the Silmaril at her throat and jumped-

She is smaller than he remembers. Eärendil, beside her, has a face that Elrond recalls only vaguely, like the threads of a half-remembered childhood dream.

"Elrond," Fingon says, alarmed.

"I am well," Elrond manages, sweat beading his brow. "I need to- I need to sit."

Eärendil and Elwing hover anxiously as Fingon leads Elrond to the nearest bench.

"Do you want me to stay?" Fingon says, ignoring the sharp glance Elwing directs at him.

Leaning gratefully against the cushions, Elrond shakes his head and tightens his grasp on Fingon's hand in thanks before letting go.

Fingon bids the three of them farewell with perfect manners before turning in place, scooping up the empty ewer, and moving towards his brothers and cousins.

Too far away to listen in, Turgon, Argon, Finrod and Angrod are vainly attempting to hide the fact they are sneaking glimpses instead; Fingon reaches them, throws his arms around his brothers' shoulders, and makes a pointed jerk of his chin in Finrod's direction. Finrod duly grapples Angrod and follows.

Elrond watches as the troop of Finwë's grandsons disappear back into the house.

His parents sit on either side of him – Elwing almost anxiously, Eärendil heavily.

"My son," Elwing says, clasping his right hand with both of hers. "Are you well?"

He looks down at her beside him, and at her hands clasping his. He should remember what her hands feel like.

He doesn't.

"I am recovering," Elrond manages. "Thank you." A part of him is aware he sounds distant, but the rest of him is occupied with keeping the ache of the memories at bay.

Elwing squeezes his hand, and Elrond fights against his discomfort.

"Elrond," Eärendil says quietly on his left. "Do you remember me?"

Elrond turns to him.

Eärendil's eyes are very blue, and his hair bright and golden in the waning light of the afternoon. The Silmaril is nowhere to be seen.

"…I do," Elrond says, and his own words surprise him. "I fell off the docks as a child," he remembers. Sea-foam, water– "You caught me up out of the waves."

New moisture in Eärendil's gaze. "Yes," he says, a choked note to his voice. "I did, and carried you home, where your mother gave me an earful for not watching you two properly."

"We saw you at that last battle on Anfauglith," Elrond says. "We looked up at your ship, at the Silmaril shining on your brow. We raised our swords and tried to call to you, Elros and I, though our voices were choked with dragon-smoke."

A hurt noise from Elrond's right. He steels himself against turning back to Elwing, and holds his birth-father's gaze instead.

"I would have come down if I was permitted," Eärendil says. "I looked for both of you, you know. I went to the prow and gazed down into the smoldering fires and tried to look for you in all the blood and the mire, even though I knew there was little chance of success."

"You wouldn't have recognised us," Elrond says. "We were wearing Gil-Galad's colours, but both of us had the Star of Fëanor on our cloaks and helms."

Elwing makes a stifled gasp. Her grasp on Elrond's hand turns painful.

Elrond lifts his aching head and turns to look upon her.

"You knew this," he says, trying to be gentle. "It should not surprise you."

"I did," Elwing says, hurt and anger warring on her fair face. "It does not lessen the blow any less."

"It is the star of my foster-fathers' house," Elrond says. "And so it is of mine."

"They took you away from us," Elwing says – not harshly, but with a chiding note, as though Elrond is still a child.

Elrond inhales sharply. He must not lose his temper. He has spent millennia striving to be kind, and forgiving, and wise.

He cannot allow this millennia-long ache to show.

Eärendil shifts beside him, and Elrond senses faint understanding in Eärendil's mind.

Elwing appears to take Elrond's reaction as that of pain. "They took you away from me," she says. "Oh, my children–"

"They didn't," Elrond says, closing his eyes against the sharp headache that starts up behind his temples.

"What?" Elwing says. Her thumb moves over his knuckles, and Elrond cannot stand it any longer; he draws back his hand. She inhales in shock.

"They didn't take us from you," Elrond says, and he brings his hands up to press to his throbbing temples, blinking away the pain. "You left us."

Elwing tries to reach up to take his hand again. He shifts away, and pushes away the spike of guilt as he sees how much this hurts her.

Elrond lowers his hands to clutch at the folds of his sleeves. He takes a breath. "Are you sure you want him here for this?" he says quietly, indicating Eärendil, who is watching with a closed, grieved expression.

"What?" Elwing says, looking between Elrond and her husband. "Of course I do! He's my husband!"

The bitterness and pain is too much. It bleeds through the cracks of Elrond's mental walls, searing its edges like fire.

"Did you tell him?" Elrond says, and hears the bleak ache in his own voice. "Did you tell him how you looked at us as we cried out for you, and still you clasped the jewel tighter about your neck and jumped?"

Elwing looks up at him with tears in her eyes. "Maglor Fëanorion had a sword," she says, defending herself bitterly.

"A sword which he had lowered," Elrond says, the words tearing out of him like flame from his lips. His fëa blazes unbidden from within, flaring like a burning forge. "He held out his hand and asked for the Silmaril. They had sent a letter, before."

Elwing's eyes are wide. "Elrond–"

Elrond flings the grey throw around his shoulders to the grass and stands, though the world tilts dangerously and his flames grow thin. "They always sent a letter, and although it does not excuse their kinslaying, you chose the Silmaril. You chose the Silmaril over Sirion, and when the time came, you chose the Silmaril over your sons!"

The scream of birds taking flight, as many of the birds that had returned to roost with the oncoming dusk take to the air again.

Tears run unhindered down Elwing's cheeks. The garden is still and silent around them. Any garden attendants have long disappeared.

Elrond becomes aware his speech has slipped into words of power; that his fëa is aflame like Maglor and Maedhros's must have been in battle.

He is being unfair, and he knows it.

Before him, Elwing continues to weep silently. Eärendil's face is a granite mask, though his eyes glimmer wetly in the oncoming dusk.

"Please say something," Elrond whispers, voice hoarse.

Elwing shakes her head. She is sobbing now, full six thousand years and more of sorrow slowly unfurling.

Elrond abruptly finds it very difficult to remain standing. His fëa stutters, flames spluttering, and he sees rather than feels Eärendil leap up and catch him as he sways.

"You shouldn't strain yourself," Eärendil says, voice rough with unshed tears. "You need to rest."

Elrond closes his eyes briefly, shaking his head.

He does not need rest. He needs…he needs Elros.

"Father," Elrond says, and feels joy at the word unfurl in Eärendil's mind, their fëar pressed close as they are. "Could you help me to my chamber?"

"Of course," Eärendil says, words laden with emotion. "Show me the way."

The sun is setting. The birds are slowly returning to nest, their song filling the cooling garden.

Two steps towards the house, Elrond pauses, Eärendil with him.

"Elwing," Elrond says, and sees her flinch at the name. "I would…I would like you speak to you again."

He does not apologise. To do so would take too much.

Elwing straightens then, and looks every inch like a princess of Doriath. "I would like that as well," she says formally, though her eyes well with fresh tears. "I shall await you in Alqualondë."

Elrond manages a nod, but the world is now greying at the edges, so he leans on his birth-father's arm and makes his slow, stumbling way back to his sickbed.

(:~:)

Maglor isn't quite sure why he is singing any more.

He has sung of the stars, of the light of the Trees; of the sea, and of battle and glory and death.

Morgoth's limping steps are growing closer; close enough that the creeping miasma of true darkness around him begins to bleed into all their exposed fëa forms. It is cold and cunning and chokingly foul, and it makes it very, very difficult to sing.

Caranthir stops singing first, then Celegorm, then the twins, and Curufin, and Fëanor, and last of all Maedhros, who stumbles with Maglor in his hold.

Maglor opens his lips against the taste of blood (blood? He shouldn't be bleeding, not in this body of sea-foam and water) and weaves a new melody into the wavering song.

He calls on the stars, though they are not here.

He calls on the last of the Silmarils, which was wrought with his father's soul, and the light of the Trees.

"Aiya Eärendil Elenion Ancalima!"

Morgoth laughs, a ripple of crooked notes echoing behind them.

Then, from all directions – formless, empty space – there is song.

New voices join Maglor's, bolstering it and raising its melody to new heights.

Morgoth's roar of fury is lost in a torrent of sound.

Voices, hundreds of them, singing words in a language so ancient it sings of fëa and music, before time and existence, when all words were simply thought.

Maglor could weep from the beauty of it.

Fair-voiced singer! The voices cry. Fair-voiced singer from Eä created! We have come to sing with you!

The song builds into a crescendo, themes and lyrics and brilliant crystalline notes scattering about them like priceless jewels – brighter than any Silmaril, purer than the even the Trees themselves.

Maglor breathes in the song and sings–

And suddenly, he is elsewhere.

They all are – Fëanor and his sons tumble over the image of something that might be light, or stardust, or a marble floor.

Maedhros reaches for him, and pulls him protectively close.

Maglor looks up, fëa form trembling, and realises that he can no longer hear Morgoth's footsteps. Around them, there are the faint silvery outlines of what might be a high-vaulted chamber, with many fair halls leading away from it.

Hello, something says, directly into his mind.

Maglor flinches, as does everyone else.

Fëanor flares his flames and stands, as though in challenge.

There is no need to be alarmed, the voice says. We very much enjoyed your singing, O you with the fair voice. The one that was following you is one well known to us. He was sowing discord in your music, which is not to be tolerated.

"You know him?" Fëanor calls into the emptiness. "The oath-breaker and foul murderer?"

Something about the voice suggests shock. We know not the meaning of those words, it says. But the one that was following you has become the worst of all things under Eru's thought. He has forgotten how to sing.

Maglor barks a laugh, and runs a sea-water hand over his face.

Will you sing for us? the voice says eagerly, as many other voices join, asking the same words. Will you sing for us, O you with the fair voice? Sing of Eä! Sing of things that Are!

Maglor looks at his brothers, huddled together in the midst of this strange, shifting hall, and his father, who stands above them all as though his very presence will protect them.

"I will," Maglor whispers.

It takes him two tries to stand. In the end he stands buttressed on one side by Maedhros, and on the other by his father.

What to sing?

Eä, the voices had asked. To sing of Eä, the World that Is.

Maglor closes his eyes, and begins at Cuiviénen.

Next up: Elrond and Celebrían still have some things to work out, there is the matter of Elrond's unanswered petition, and Maglor's singing changes his fate.

A/N: Okay real talk though my twin (and beta-reader) and I realised halfway through this that Elrond's relationship with Elwing very much mirrors our relationship with our mother

Virtual hugged each other across thousands of kilometres by whatsapp because we were both triggered

Very Eluréd and Elurín of us isn't it

I'm terribly behind on answering the last two chapters' comments, but I promise I'll get to it soon. I have returned to work after a week of holiday last week, and I'm using every spare moment to write.