Music for this chapter: Come Back To Us, Thomas Newman
Chapter 11: Quiet Resolve
The sun has just properly risen when the small ship comes hasting into the little harbour of Avallónë.
Those familiar with seamanship note that the captain appears to be in some urgency; the ship makes its final turn a full half-league out to sea and comes flying into the quay with the waves frothing at her prow, wind full in her sails.
The ship has barely come alongside the dock and the ropes just secured before the gangplank slams onto the deck and eight hooded riders come thundering off the boat and up the dock like fire is at their heels. A gust of wind catches the hood of the rider in the lead, throwing it back for the merest instant, and every elf on the quay sees the unmistakable circlet and golden hair of the High King of the Noldor unfurl in the sea wind before he pulls up his hood again with a muttered curse.
The murmurs begin and rise in volume as the riders gallop straight through Avallónë and north on the path that leads up the cliff towards the house of Elrond Peredhel.
(:~:)
Elrond scrubs a hand over his aching eyes and considers the sheaf of parchment in his lap.
It is calm and quiet on the cliff-top here; the grass green and lush in the early morning sunlight. Elrond sits among the grass, facing Arien rising in the East, with a half-empty bottle of ink at his knee and a stack of blank parchment to his left, held down with a pebble. Scattered around him is the detritus of a day and a half of toil; crumpled sheets with scrawled-out lines and smeared ink, and several smaller piles of carefully inked sheets before him.
Elrond blinks glassy eyes at the too-bright horizon, rubs away the cramp in his hand, and bends his head to continue writing.
The drum of many hooves sound from the cliffside path to his right. Elrond closes his eyes briefly, opens them again, and continues to write as though he has heard nothing.
Muffled voices behind him. They seem to be arguing about something. Elrond presses a hand to his throbbing temple.
Footsteps, the rustle of cloth as someone crouches beside him, and then a hand on his shoulder.
"Elrond," a voice says, and Elrond jolts so badly he nearly upends the bottle of ink.
He turns his gaze to the unblemished hand on his right shoulder, and follows the hand up the red sleeve embroidered with Fëanorian stars into the concerned face of Celebrimbor Telperinquar Curufinwion.
Last Elrond saw him, Celebrimbor had been a bloated corpse thrown into the no-man's-land before Sauron's front lines in Eregion. Celebrimbor's body had been rent with so many marks of agony and torture then that he had been unrecognizable, save for the Star of Fëanor cruelly carved into the flayed skin of his chest.
Elrond had wept when he saw it, silent, furious tears streaming down his face, as Sauron's forces had marched over the thing that had once been the greatest remaining Elven smith east of the Sea, stamping Celebrimbor's body into the mud.
The hand tightens on Elrond's shoulder.
Elrond blinks. "Cousin," he says. "You've returned."
"Cousin," Celebrimbor returns, sharp grey gaze looking Elrond up and down. His eyes narrow, and his lips thin in fury.
The ink bottle goes flying as Celebrimbor's hands close around Elrond's collar and shakes him once, harshly; Elrond blinks the stars out of his vision as his cousin pulls him upright again.
"What in Illúvatar's name do you think you are doing?" Celebrimbor hisses in his face.
Elrond reflects that it really is quite refreshing to be confronted thus, after the rest of the extended family have spent the last few years treating him like glass.
Behind them, there is shouting, and Elrond waves a numb hand to indicate he is well.
"Writing letters," Elrond says, looking over at the little group a few paces away.
Finarfin and Fingolfin are quite predictably staring. Finarfin's eyes are suspiciously wet, and Fingolfin's expression is both furious and grieved. Nerdanel looks like the fire that always blazes within her has been quenched, and Fingon and Finrod both look like they have been struck. Beside them, Eärendil is quiet and sorrowful, and silent tears slip down Elwing's cheeks.
Elrond smiles wanly. "I suppose this saves me the trouble of composing a few letters I had planned."
"I didn't ask about your damned letters," Celebrimbor growls, shaking him again. "I am asking what gives you the Valar-forsaken right to take the doom of my house upon your head."
Elrond blinks at his cousin.
"It is my house, as well," he says, "My fathers, my uncles, and my grandfather."
Elwing stifles a cry and turns into Eärendil's shoulder.
Elrond's jaw tightens, sliding his gaze purposefully away from his mother.
Something breaks in Celebrimbor's gaze. "I can't allow you to do this," he whispers. He looks to his grand-uncles. "You can't allow him to do this."
Finarfin and Fingolfin come forward to kneel by Elrond's side.
"Elrond," Fingolfin says. "There is no victory to be gained by sacrificing yourself like so."
"It is the only way to bring them back," Elrond says, sitting back a little so Celebrimbor's slack hands slide off his collar.
Fingolfin's eyes flash. "Then there is no way at all," he says. "If this is the only path by which our brother and nephews may be freed from the Eternal Darkness, then perhaps they should not be freed at all."
Elrond sees how much the words hurt Fingolfin as he says them, and so stays silent.
A long moment of quiet here on the cliff-top, as the breeze ruffles the papers before Elrond's knees. Celebrimbor puts his face in his hands.
Finarfin takes Elrond's hand. "Pityo," he says as he looks Elrond up and down. "Have you slept? You are still in your festival clothes."
Elrond looks at grandfather-in law. "Yes," he says. He had slept, a few hours here and there, collapsed on the soft grass with his precious letters clutched to his chest; but he spares them the details.
Finarfin swallows, his eyes glimmering with unshed tears. "And Celebrían?"
Elrond's fëa twists sickeningly in his chest, and he feels eight minds leap into his at once in concern; he flinches back like a moth from flame, and feels Fingolfin's strong hand on his shoulder feeding the embers of his soul with Fingolfin's own.
"She has gone to her mother in Avallónë," Elrond manages, and the steadiness of his own voice surprises him. "You must have seen Galadriel as you were riding up. She left not too long before you came."
"Yes," Finarfin says. "She did not stop to greet us. She appeared…"
"She struck me," Elrond says, and shakes his head at the shocked gasps about him. "No, no. I quite deserved it," he continues plainly, raising his head a little so the bruise is more visible at his left cheekbone, close to his ear. "She struck me because her daughter was too kind to do so."
A pause, where Elrond's breath hitches with the agony in his chest, despite his best efforts.
"I think Celebrían has left me," he says, trying to sound unaffected and instead hearing the words come out in one long gasp. "As she should, after what I've done. I've sent Bilbo, Frodo, and our attendants after her. Actually, it's good you're all here; there are a few letters that I need sent east after I–"
Finarfin makes a horrible noise. Elrond looks up at his grandfather-in-law, and follows Finarfin's line of sight down to the sealed letters by his knees.
Arwen, the first one reads. Estel follows, then Elladan, then Elrohir. The first line of the parchment in in Elrond's lap begins with My dearest Celebrían.
Finarfin rises wordlessly, face like stone, and begins to move away. He halts a dozen steps along the edge of the cliff and puts his face into his hands. His shoulders begin to shake.
Fingolfin breathes in and out once, slowly, and stands.
Elrond watches as Fingolfin goes to his younger brother and curls a hand around the back of Finarfin's neck, pulling Finarfin's head down to his shoulder, circlet and all. Looking at Fingolfin murmur into Finarfin's temple, there on the edge of the windblown cliff, Elrond is reminded that the High King is after all the youngest of his brothers, and has been left behind one too many times.
"Cousins," Elrond says, looking at Finrod, Fingon, and Celebrimbor. He turns to Nerdanel. "Grandmother. I will speak to each of you in turn, but I must first speak to my parents. If you would give us a moment."
"Of course," Nerdanel says with a determined glint in her eye, which Elrond acknowledges with a tired smile.
Celebrimbor gives Elrond a hard look as he rises, but Fingon and Finrod pull him away, and then it is just Elrond and his birth parents here at the cliff edge with piles of parchment scattered about in the grass.
Eärendil comes and sits beside Elrond as he had so many times over the years as Elrond knelt before Máhanaxar, and there is something comforting about the familiarity. Elwing, however, circles around Elrond and stands facing him a pace away. Her shadow falls over him.
"I need to know why you're doing this," she says. Her tears have stopped for now, but her eyes remain red-rimmed.
Elrond moves his completed letters by his knee so she will not accidentally step on them if she moves closer, and looks up into her shadowed face to reply.
"I wish to have my foster-fathers returned," he says.
"And you must give yourself up for them?" Elwing says, anger and grief twisting her voice. "They have taken you from me once, but now they must claim your fëa as well?"
"They have not taken anything that I have not given willingly," Elrond says calmly, because he has no more strength left for fury or grief. He only has strength enough for each breath.
Elwing's eyes flash with venom. "They have taken your childhood," she hisses. "Your name, and your house. Must they take your fëa as well? Will they then finally be satisfied?"
"I am coming back to you," Elrond murmurs. "I will come back to you."
"But even if you do, you will be changed!" Elwing exclaims, and her hands form fists at her sides as she looms over him. "Those kinslayers took my half-Sindar children and returned to me someone grown and Noldor and Fëanorian." She chokes on the last word, tears starting up in her eyes. "Even should your fëa survive a yen in the Void, you will become someone else. I don't– I don't want to lose even more of you, Elrond."
Elrond looks up at his mother then, the six-millennia-long ache of abandonment and betrayal and bitterness welling up within him, mixing with the decade-long pain of her disapproval, and finds he has no more tears left in him.
It really is the same feeling as when he was six and he watched her leap from the balcony in Sirion; the same knife that she plunges into his heart even now.
Eärendil's hand finds his, and the jarring contrast between the parent that looms over him with clenched fists and tears and the one that quietly grasps his hand in support overwhelms him.
"Mother," he says, and seeks Elwing blink in surprise at the title. He has never called her thus since he came west, not until now. "Mother, I will not ask for your forgiveness, because I do not think this is forgivable. But I ask two favours of you, if you are willing."
Elwing opens her mouth to speak, but Elrond shakes his head.
"Firstly, when my foster-fathers return, they will apologise to you for Doriath, Sirion, and for Elros and I. You do not have to accept their apology, but I humbly ask you to at least listen. Perhaps it will finally convince you that they did indeed love me."
Elwing looks like she very much doubts the latter, but gives a steely nod nonetheless.
Elrond gathers his courage, and stamps down on the bleeding of his heart. "Secondly, should I– when I return, I hope you will find me at last worthy enough to love."
A moment, where Elwing looks at him oddly, as though she has been struck.
"You don't – you don't think I love you?" she says, horror growing in her voice.
Elrond furrows his brow at her silhouette in the morning sun.
"No," he says, because to him, it is the truth.
Her face crumples, and she stifles a sob in her hands.
"I think," Elrond says, feeling a little detached and not at all present, "I think you love an idea of me. An idea you had when Elros and I were children, and you had lost so much in Doriath. But the Oath came, then the War of Wrath, then Sauron in Eregion and the Dagorlad, then Angmar, and the War of the Ring. I am no longer the child you knew, and I will never be him again."
Still weeping, Elwing stoops to press a kiss to Elrond's brow, and then walks southwards, towards the flower-fields between the house and the woods. She halts there, one hand pressed to her mouth and the other hugging her waist, and bows her head.
Elrond watches her go. There is nothing in him left now but exhaustion.
"My son," Eärendil says hoarsely.
"Yes," Elrond says, turning to his father.
"Is there anything I could do to stop this plan of yours?" Eärendil asks quietly, blue eyes full of sorrow.
Elrond shakes his head, mustering a small smile.
"What if I offered to take your place?" Eärendil murmurs. "I have sailed the Void before."
"No," Elrond breathes, and feels his father clasp his hand tighter. "The agreement is between Manwë, Námo, and I. You could only volunteer if I offered, and I will not. This doom shall be mine and mine alone."
Eärendil brings up his free hand to Elrond's cheek, and brushes one calloused thumb over the bruise at his cheekbone.
"Then so be it," Eärendil says. "Oh, I am angry, and grieved, and heartsick beyond words. But you are my son, and I will love you no matter the doom you have chosen."
Elrond's breath hitches as his father pulls him into an embrace; warm and steady. He buries his face in Eärendil's shoulder, in the scent of the sea.
"I will petition the Valar so that I might accompany you as far as the Door of Night," Eärendil murmurs in Elrond's hair. "We will take Vingilot."
Elrond shakes his head into his father's shoulder, and Eärendil shushes him.
"Allow me this, Elrond," Eärendil says. "I may not have done much for you as a father, but this within my power."
A moment.
"Thank you," Elrond breathes, "Ada."
Tears leak into Elrond's hair where Eärendil's face is pressed, but for the first time in long, long days, Elrond is comforted.
(:~:)
"Eat," Nerdanel says crossly.
Elrond looks up from tucking in the corner of a completed letter and meets his grandmother's glare where she stands silhouetted in the noonday sun, her hair a coronet of fire about her head.
"I've raided your larder," Nerdanel says, slamming a tray down before him. "If you insist on writing outside, you might as well have a full stomach for it. I've corralled the others into eating in separate rooms and groups so your mother doesn't try to shove a fork down Tyelpe's throat, and Fingon and Finrod don't end up accidentally insulting her."
"I see," Elrond says, placing the letter on the neat pile of completed correspondence by his knee. "You have my thanks. Would you like to dine with me?"
"Don't be daft. Of course I'm dining with you," Nerdanel says, plopping down opposite him and starting to violently stir honey into a cup of tea. "I still haven't given up on convincing you not to go, you know." She thrusts the cup into his hands.
"It's your husband and sons we're speaking of," Elrond says cautiously as he sips at the tea. It is made exactly how he likes it, and this utterly confuses him until he realises that this is how Maglor used to make it – because he must have learnt from his mother.
"You're my youngest grandson," Nerdanel retorts, knocking back an entire cup of scalding tea in one go and reaching for the teapot. Elrond winces.
"I'm afraid I'm quite decided," Elrond says, and Nerdanel huffs in frustration and stuffs a sandwich into his hands.
"Quite decided, are you," Nerdanel says. "I've had quite enough of Fëanorian men being decided about things. Fëanáro decided to challenge the Valar and ended up going to Formenos without me, and all my sons decided to follow him. He decided to take a terribly worded oath and sail off east without saying goodbye, taking all our sons. He decided to burn the ships at Losgar, and he decided to go into battle against twenty balrogs without any plan except 'Let's stab them until they go out'. Then two of my stupid sons decided about Luthien, and all of them decided about Doriath, and the remaining four decided about Sirion."
"Well," Elrond says, blinking a little as the ache in his stomach resolves with the swallowed sandwich, "I suppose your eldest two sons also decided to adopt my brother and I, and that was one of the better decisions they made."
Nerdanel takes a savage bite of an egg and cress sandwich. "One of the only good decisions they made over there. Goodness knows they were due one."
"Have you told Celebrimbor about his mother?" Elrond says, hoping vainly that changing the subject might bring the topic away from his impending exile.
Nerdanel skewers him with a look. "Yes," she says. "She's still in Estë's gardens, as is Makalaurë's wife. I'm told they're recovered, but they wish to help others remaining there who also were also thralls of Angband."
It is strange to think of Maglor married, but then Elrond has never met her. He would hardly know what to say to her.
"Don't think you can change the subject," Nerdanel says, stuffing a bowl of thick soup into his hands and slamming a chunk of bread into it. "I'm not stopping until you agree to stay."
"I won't," Elrond says, spooning up a bite of soup.
"You will."
"I won't," Elrond says more forcefully.
Nerdanel looks at him, and says no more until he has drained his bowl, and the tray is full of empty dishes.
"Fine," Nerdanel says suddenly, and Elrond is surprised until she reaches over and pokes a finger in his chest.
"I know a decided Fëanorian when I see one," she says fiercely. "But you come back, you hear me? You come back for that poor girl down in Avallónë. I don't care what you have to do. You come back to her."
Elrond meets her steely gaze, sees the glimmer of unshed tears there, the echo of old pain.
"I will," he says, and Nerdanel nods once, snatches up the tray, and moves back to the house.
(:~:)
"You have to come back," Finrod says, as the shadows grow long where the sun is setting in the west.
Elrond sighs as he seals another letter. Just one more to write.
"Nerdanel already told me," he says.
A hand fists in his collar, and Finrod shakes him once, hard, his face so devoid of the gentleness that he usually possesses that Elrond is stunned.
"I am speaking as two people," Finrod says. "I am speaking as the uncle to your wife, and I am speaking as the brother to an elf who gave his heart to a mortal woman, who was perhaps the best woman I ever knew save for my wife. Aikanáro will dwell forever in the Halls until Arda is remade, waiting for Saelind. You will not resign Celebrían to the same fate. Am I understood?"
Elrond nods, and Finrod releases his collar.
"Now will you put down that damn piece of parchment and come in to dinner," Finrod growls.
"Save me a tray," Elrond says. "I have one last letter to complete."
"I will send Findekáno out with a tray," Finrod says, straightening. The setting sun sets his golden hair afire. "He has less patience than I do, and I wish him every success."
"Try me," Elrond says as he reaches for a new inkpot, and Finrod narrows his eyes at Elrond as he stalks away.
(:~:)
Fingon comes out with a tray and an oil lamp, sighs, sets both down before Elrond, and sits carefully opposite.
"I take it I'm the last," Fingon says.
"Yes," Elrond says, scratching out the beginning of the letter. He blinks away the exhaustion in his eyes.
"I wonder if we should just lock you up," Fingon says contemplatively, as Elrond reaches for a sandwich one-handed.
"I'll sing my way out," Elrond says around a mouthful of ham.
Fingon's eyes flash. "Then we'll chain you, as well."
"I can sing my way out of those, as well," Elrond says, swallowing. "Maglor taught us, first thing, when Elros and I asked if we would be chained as hostages. He quite perfected singing chains apart after Maedhros returned from–"
Elrond cuts himself off, the bread turning to lead in his stomach.
Fingon's eyes are glinting in the lamplight.
"I'm sorry," Elrond says.
"Don't be," Fingon says unaffectedly, though his eyes are hard. "It makes perfect sense. Maglor was always a practical one. Maedhros was, as well, but he had a streak of idealism in him."
"You'll have him back in two days," Elrond says, reaching for a cup of tea. His other hand does not stop inking Tengwar in perfect letters across the parchment on his knee.
Fingon lashes out at Elrond's cup and knocks it out of his hand. Elrond snatches his letter to safety with a yelp, and Fingon's hand clasps with bruising strength around his wrist, crinkling the paper in a starburst from Elrond's fingers.
"I don't fucking want him back if you're going to die for it," Fingon says, with such low, burning fury that Elrond is stunned to silence. "He may be my closest friend and the brother of my soul but you are the youngest of our family. The most treasured of all Tirion, Aman, even. My house. Arafinwë's, The Gondolindrim, the Fënorian district, the Doriathrim, the Sindar in Avallonë, the Vanyar by Indis, even the Teleri in Alqualondë by virtue of your mother's heritage. You are loved and we will not let you throw yourself away."
The circle of lamplight lights their faces from beneath, turns the golden ribbons of Fingon's braids to yellow snakes, Elrond's circlet to chains. The light pools over Fingon's hand where it is white-knuckled at Elrond's wrist, the letter fragile in Elrond's fingers.
"I know," Elrond says. "I thank you, cousin."
"Do you?" Fingon says. "Celebrimbor says your fëa could fade away to nothing in the Void. Do you know what that means?"
Elrond nods, and winces as Fingon tightens his grip further.
"You forget my nephew is Maeglin," Fingon whispers. "Or Lómion, perhaps I should call him, out of deference to my sister. When Tuor threw him from the walls of Gondolin, his fëa shattered. My sister never accepted it. When I left the Halls I begged her to come with me, but she would not leave until she found him."
Elrond closes his eyes and feels the letter slip from his hand as his fingers slacken; it falls to the grass between them.
Fingon snatches it up with his free hand. His eyes widen as he reads he first line. He looks at Elrond, his grip slackening.
"Yes, it's addressed to Atar and Atarinya," Elrond says, pulling his hand back and rubbing at the five finger-shaped bruises beginning to form on his wrist – his writing hand, too. He would have to take care with his handwriting, so as not to make Maedhros and Maglor worry.
Fingon looks at the darkening bruises on Elrond's wrist. "You know what Makalaurë would do if your fëa disappeared from the void."
Elrond bows his head.
"He would voluntarily return to the Halls to look for me," he admits.
"Yes," Fingon says. "And you would not be there. You might not even be where Men go, when they die."
"So I'll come back," Elrond says.
"You can't promise that," Fingon says sharply. "You can't promise anything."
"Well," Elrond says, fumbling for his inkbottle with fingers that do not quite work properly with the stinging of his wrist. "Then I'll do my best."
Fingon reaches out for Elrond's wrist again, and Elrond nearly flinches back, but Fingon only places the half-finished letter to the side and takes Elrond's bruised wrist in his hands.
"I'm going to sing this well again," Fingon says shortly. "Partly because I'm sorry I did it, and partly because Aunt Nerdanel would kill me if she found out. Don't tell."
"Of course," Elrond says, as Fingon begins to sing, and the ache in his wrist turns gradually to a pleasant coolness.
"I simply–" Fingon's voice catches, once Elrond's wrist is healed. He is still holding Elrond's hand. "I simply thought, for one moment, that there would be one descendant of Fëanor, honorary or not, who wouldn't have to be re-bodied."
Elrond has nothing to say to that.
Fingon clasps Elrond's wrist in a warrior's hold, and clutches his shoulder with his other hand.
"Come back alive," Fingon whispers, and Elrond nods.
There is one more embrace, and then Elrond is left alone to finish his last letter.
(:~:)
Arafinwë holds council in Elrond's dining room late into the watches of the night.
Elrond had staggered in late in the evening, set a pile of letters neatly on his desk, declared he was going to bed, and had done precisely that.
The other current inhabitants of the house eschew sleep in favour of discussing methods of contravening Elrond's agreement with Námo and Manwë.
The sun is just creeping over the eastern horizon when Arafinwë stops rubbing at his temples – the headache does not go away no matter what he does – and stands.
The squabbling quiets.
"There is no point to any of this," he says, and he hears the rough grain of exhaustion in his own voice. "Short of holding Elrond against his will, there is no convincing him to remain."
"I quite agree," a voice says in the corridor, and the occupants of the room all turn towards the newcomer.
"Olórin," Finarfin says, with some relief. "Perhaps–"
"No," Olórin – or Gandalf as the little folk of Middle-Earth call him – says. He is wearing his usual form of an elderly man, but walks straight-backed and veiled with power. "As much as it pains me, I have been in discussion with the Lady Nienna. There is naught we can do to stop Elrond Peredhel, or Kanafinwion as we should perhaps call him. I should know. I saw enough of his stubbornness in Middle-Earth."
Fingolfin sits forward. "But perhaps you or one of the Maiar could go with him– "
"We cannot," Olórin says as he sits heavily by the door. "We are bound to Eä, we the Ainur and Maiar who descended into the World that Is; I cannot go with Elrond, no matter how very much I wish to."
"And the sentiment is appreciated," a tired voice says from the hall.
Elrond enters and greets Gandalf warmly. "It is good to see you, old friend."
Arafinwë studies his grandson-in-law. He notes Elrond seems to have cleaned up since they last saw him, and is wearing a plain but clean set of robes and a simple circlet.
"Fool of a Peredhel," Olórin says affectionately. "I miss one Harvest Festival and everything goes to pieces."
Elrond smiles – his fëa is still terribly thin to Arafinwë's eyes – and inclines his head. "Please look after Bilbo and Frodo for me," he says quietly.
Olórin's eyes glimmer with something other than the sunlight. "Of course," he says.
Elrond nods. "I am going to see my wife," he says to the chamber, and raises a hand to forestall any exclamations. "I do not need any commentary on the state of my marriage; I am well aware of it. Good day."
And with that, Elrond turns and steps away. The front door clicks shut a moment later.
Eärendil speaks first. "Olórin," he says. "There is a matter regarding Vingilot I would like to discuss with you."
(:~:)
The morning air is cool and still, but the light of the sunrise warm as Elrond makes his careful, unhurried way down the cliffside path towards Avallónë.
Tol Eressëa is beautiful in the dawn light, and Avallónë bright and sun-drenched before him. He has never quite had the opportunity to examine the place in the early morning before – he had always been well on his way west towards Máhanaxar by the time the sun rose into morning.
It occurs to Elrond as he breathes in the fresh sea wind that he only has two more such mornings in Eä; two more, like a last, desperate gasp of air, before he is submerged in long, long darkness.
He stops for a moment at the edge of town to catch his breath; then he steels himself and continues on.
People stop and stare as Elrond passes by; at first he is discomfited, but then he catches a whispered conversation behind him and understands.
Word of Elrond's agreement with the Valar had spread like incandescent flame down from Tirion, through the Calacirya, and into Alqualondë. The ferrymen had brought the news with them the previous morning, and now all Avallónë knows that Elrond Peredhel has taken the doom of the House of Fëanor upon himself.
"Lord Elrond!"
A familiar voice, tight with desperation.
Elrond turns his head. "Lindir!" he says, smiling despite himself. "I didn't know you had sailed!"
A moment, where Lindir clasps Elrond's arm and stares up at him beseechingly, and Elrond notes the travelling bag over Lindir's shoulder and the distinctly windblown appearance of his braids.
"Have you just arrived?" Elrond says. "Did anyone else come with you?"
"Glorfindel," Lindir says, and Elrond feels a lead weight settle in his stomach. "But never mind that – the harbour-master said something very strange. He said you– you took the doom of the House of Fëanor upon your head. That in two days' time, you will be exiled into the Eternal Darkness in exchange for the release of Fëanor and his sons–"
Lindir's young face is pale with denial, and he is speaking far too rapidly, as though to convince himself the words are untrue.
Passersby in the street are stopping to stare at them now.
Elrond closes his eyes briefly. "Is Glorfindel still down at the quay?"
"Yes," Lindir says. "But Lord Elrond, the rumours–"
"They are not rumours," Elrond says gently. "They are the truth."
Lindir's hand slides off Elrond's arm. He looks suddenly much older than the young glad-faced bard he once was in the Hall of Fire.
Elrond smiles gently as the first tear slips down Lindir's cheek. "Find Glorfindel. Ask for directions to Lady Galadriel's house; I am on my way there. I am sure she will be happy to house you two while you locate your families. I would offer, but my house will stand empty in two days' time."
Lindir shakes his head and opens his mouth to reply, but Elrond purposefully turns away and continues up the street.
Once he is out of sight, Elrond brings up a hand to rub at the hollow ache in his chest. He must find Celebrían quickly; it is unlikely he will be able to withstand a tirade from Glorfindel and still have enough breath to say all he must to Celebrían.
He comes to a fair house dotted with saplings of silver bark. Galadriel had brought seedlings from Lothlórien with her on her journey west.
Elrond knocks politely. The attendant that lets him in is perfectly polite, but he is not welcomed in as he should have been, like family; he is told instead to wait, and is led to a marble bench in the wide, white marbled entranceway like a distant guest.
A hiss escapes him as he lowers his weight onto the bench; the walk had been taxing, despite his full stomach and a few hours' sleep. He leans his head back against the cool marble, hoping to stave off the headache that starts up between his temples.
The soft thud of bare feet against the floor.
"Why, Master Elrond!"
Elrond startles to full awareness, and finds himself the object of scrutiny between two hobbits, one of whom is carrying two mugs of tea.
"Frodo," Elrond says, smiling faintly. "Bilbo. I trust I find you well this morning?"
"Well!" Bilbo says, leaning his stick against the wall and accepting Elrond's hand in climbing up to the tall stone bench. "As well as can be, given the current state of things. You've really put your foot in it now, haven't you?"
That brings a chuckle up out of Elrond, despite everything.
"Bilbo and I have mostly been left to our own devices," Frodo says, placing the mugs on the bench and clambering nimbly up on the bench to sit at Elrond's other side. "We did go for a walk yesterday, but everyone seemed so frantic about the news. It didn't make for a very nice walk."
Elrond passes Bilbo a mug, blinking away a headache as he does.
Frodo looks keenly up at Elrond. "You don't look very well," he says, as he lifts his mug of tea. "Would you like mine? I haven't touched it."
"Far be it from me to come between a hobbit and his tea at breakfast," Elrond says mildly.
Frodo pushes his mug into Elrond's hand anyhow, and Elrond looks down at it, touched beyond words.
The tea warms him from within, feeds a little fire into his spirit – enough to keep him going for a little while longer.
The three of them sit there for a few moments in contemplative silence, the hobbits' furred feet swinging.
"I'll miss you both terribly," Elrond says, and is proud of how his voice does not catch. "I apologise for having to leave so suddenly."
"Well," Bilbo says. "I can't say I'm not rather torn up about it. But you have to do what you have to for your family, I suppose. I can't blame you for that."
"I understand," Frodo says quietly. "I didn't particularly know I was going to offer to take the Ring to Mordor until I said it. And then I was awfully afraid, but I knew I had to do it. You probably felt the same when you spoke to Námo."
"…Yes," Elrond says in surprise, dipping his chin to look at Frodo beside him. "Yes. That was precisely how I felt."
"Everyone keeps telling me I was very brave to offer in the first place," Frodo says earnestly. "So I honestly think you're being very brave as well, Master Elrond."
"Frodo Baggins," Elrond says, feeling a proper smile tug at his cheeks. "You have grown wise."
"He's already wiser than I am," Bilbo says. "I wager he'll grow wiser still."
Movement in the corridor; Galadriel appears, her gown white as blinding ice, her blue eyes piercing.
With a word of farewell to Elrond, Frodo and Bilbo hop off the bench and step into the next room.
Elrond stands and makes a deep bow. Galadriel does not return it.
"Elrond Kanafinwion," Galadriel says, each word like silk polishing steel. "You were not invited."
"I was not," Elrond acknowledges. "But I would like to speak with my wife, if she is willing."
"And if she is not?" Galadriel says, the challenge plain in her voice.
"Then I will take my leave," Elrond says. "And wait for her in our home, until she seeks me, or I must depart."
A pause, in which the snap of Galadriel's gaze lancing into his turns Elrond's headache into a throbbing hammer in his skull. Then Galadriel's mind withdraws from his, and she closes her eyes a moment. Elrond can sense her mind reaching out to another.
"Very well," Galadriel says, meeting his gaze again. "She has agreed. You may see her. But if I see that you have harmed her any more than you already have, I do not care if you will be only fëa in two days' time; I will personally see that you know my wrath."
Elrond bows. "I would expect nothing less."
She turns, and he follows.
(:~:)
Elrond finds Celebrían sitting alone in a small garden, facing a view of the shore and the whispering waves below. She is working with a needle and a square of cloth in the lap of her white gown; silver and gold threads already line out the beginning of a pattern.
"I am making a blanket," Celebrían says without looking up as Elrond approaches. "I had a letter from Arwen yesterday. She is expecting; the child will be born in the summer."
Elrond feels as though he has been struck.
Their first grandchild, who will be full-grown and in the latter part of their life before Elrond returns; and Arwen and Estel would be long gone.
Celebrían continues to embroider stitch after neat stitch in the cloth, as though she has not stabbed Elrond through the heart with a blade as keen as the needle in her fingers.
It is what Elrond deserves. He knows it.
"Celebrían," Elrond pleads, sinking to his knees beside her chair. "I am sorry."
"Your apology means little," Celebrían says calmly. She still is not looking at him. "There is but one statement from you that could induce my forgiveness. You know what it is. Any other words from you are worth little."
Elrond reaches for Celebrían's hand, the hand that clutches at the square of cloth with white-knuckled fingers, and she pulls her hand away.
"I cannot leave my fathers there in the Eternal Darkness," Elrond says, desperately.
"And yet you are leaving me here, alone, for what might be eternity," Celebrían says. "Beyond even Arda remade."
She had wept, when he first told her three days ago; wept and wept and railed against him like white flame.
The flame is gone. She is stone, now.
"I will come back," Elrond says bleakly, searching her face.
"You don't know that," Celebrían says with a terrible emptiness in her voice, bowing her head so her curtain of silver hair hides her face.
"I do," Elrond says, and he knows now that this must be his purpose; he must return to her, no matter what.
Celebrían stifles a sob. Her other hand folds the needle under her palm, clutching the folds of her dress.
There, kneeling beside his wife, Elrond reaches for her hand, the one still grasping the needle; he clasps her hand in both of his, and cares not that the needle pierces him.
"Elrond," Celebrían says, so startled that she meets his gaze, and Elrond shakes his head and holds her hand tighter, despite the gathering wetness of blood in his palm.
"Hear me, Celebrían daughter of Celeborn," Elrond says, each word slow and earnest as he looks into her eyes. "Hear me, Illúvatar, from whom all Eä is wrought; hear me, Manwë, Lord of the winds."
Celebrían's eyes widen. She attempts to press her free hand over his lips, but Elrond lifts his uninjured hand and clasps that one, as well.
"I swear I will return to you, Celebrían, daughter of Celeborn," Elrond says, and feels the words of power bind his fëa to hers. "I swear I will return to you, and Illúvatar and Manwë be my witness. This shall be my oath, and mine only."
Elrond finishes speaking, and lifts Celebrían's hands to press a tender kiss the back of each hand, closing his eyes as he does so.
"No," Celebrían whispers, tears streaking down her cheeks. "What have you done, Elrond? What have you done?"
"It may mean little, if I am already in the Eternal Darkness," Elrond says. "But I will come back to you. I swear it."
Celebrían looks down at their clasped hands, and at the blood welling between their palms.
"Get out," she whispers, eyes wide and welling with fresh tears. "Get out."
Elrond makes a sharp, pained noise deep in the back of his throat, and presses his forehead to her fingers.
Then he releases her hands, and folds his injured palm into his opposite sleeve. He stands, wavering a little, and bows deeply.
"I will wait for you in our home should you wish to find me," he says. "I will wait until the last possible moment."
Celebrían does not reply. She is looking at the bloodstained needle in her hand, and Elrond's blood in her palm, seeping into the white of her dress.
Elrond turns and moves to the garden door; but at the threshold he turns, driven by a wish to fix one last image of Celebrían in his mind, if this is to be the last time he sees her.
Hair like spun silver in the sunlight, her white dress resplendent, curling one fist stained with his blood to her heart while the other presses to her mouth as her shoulders shake with sobs.
Elrond forces himself to turn away.
He makes his way through the corridors like a wraith, and none disturb him when they see his face.
He reaches the entrance hall, and Glorfindel leaps up and stalks towards him, fists swinging at his side, but halts when he meets Elrond's gaze.
"Come to take your turn, my friend?" Elrond says, smiling faintly.
Glorfindel looks him up and down, horror growing on his features.
"It's only been ten years," Glorfindel says. "What happened to you?"
Elrond shakes his head. "If you could accompany me back to my house," he murmurs. "I will be glad for the company, even if you wish to strike me."
Glorfindel takes one sharp step forward and pulls Elrond into an embrace.
"Come," Glorfindel says, fiercely. "I'll walk you home, and you can tell me everything."
Elrond nods, and Glorfindel, with one arm still slung protectively around him, leads him out into the street.
(:~:)
Gandalf finds Elrond the next day, his last, singing Celebrían's flowers into bloom. Elrond has said his farewells to all the others except Eärendil, who has gone to see to Vingilot, and the house is once more silent and empty.
"I wanted Celebrían's garden to grow as well as can be managed until she returns," Elrond says as he pauses between verses to reach out and cup a camellia in his bandaged hand. "She might not return for some time."
Gandalf sits in the grass beside Elrond, and pulls out his pipe.
"There is no soul I know braver than you," Gandalf says, packing pipeweed into the bowl with one broad thumb. "Well, perhaps Frodo or Sam. But all the same, you must be quite terrified."
Elrond releases the blossom.
"Yes," he murmurs. "Quite terrified."
Gandalf lights his pipe. Elrond takes up his song again.
Night slowly begins to fall.
(:~:)
Elrond lays there awake in the late watches of the night, the bed empty and cold beside him. He cannot sleep. The dread and the fear thunders in his chest, and he is ashamed for it.
The bedchamber door opens.
Elrond sees the single candle and the graceful hand that follows, and then the sweep of silver hair over blue travelling cloak, and is too grateful and relieved to weep.
Celebrían.
She does not speak. She places the candle on the bedside table, lifts the covers, and slides in beside him, travelling cloak and all. He reaches out to her and pulls her close, burying his face in her hair as she tucks her face in his collar. He can feel the thready beat of her heart, and she his.
They remain like so, curled about each other, still and quiet and fragile, until the sun rises on their last dawn.
(:~:)
"Come back to me," Celebrían says, hands stilling on the cloak-pin at his collar.
"I will," Elrond says, drawing her close.
One last kiss, his thumb brushing over her cheekbone and her fingers at his cheek, and they part, Elrond stepping through the door to the sound of her stifled sob.
He closes the door behind him, and looks out onto the cliff-top.
Vingilot is waiting in the dawn light, moored to the edge of the cliff. By its wide gangplank stands Eärendil, the Silmaril shining on his brow. Beside him stands Gandalf, and Eönwë, resplendent in mail.
Elrond takes a breath, and begins to move toward the ship.
Next Up: Fëanor and his sons battle Morgoth, a reunion, and then...
No Fëanorians against Morgoth until the next chapter, unfortunately - I had to cut this somewhere. A monster chapter coming up next, length and plot-wise.
I haven't had time yet to reply to everyone's comments, but I want to mention that what Elrond is doing is actually a quite selfish - it's strange that his most selfish act is to sacrifice himself, but he has a wife and children and responsibilities as well. It's an awful thing on both sides - both points of view are understandable, but absolutely awful for both Elrond and everyone around him.
A reminder this story is also on AO3!