Gloredhel was roused a little before dawn by a soft knocking on her door. So recently reborn, her first instinct was still to grab for her knife which she had left within arm's reach. Then her thoughts slowly coalesced, as she wondered where she was, and finally she remembered: you are on Tol Eressëa in Galdor's house. Throwing back the covers, she rose from bed. She was still dressed in her traveling clothes so she went straight to the door.

It was Galdor in the hallway, holding a lantern that illuminated the hallways, casting jagged shadows across his face and the wood floor. Only the dimmest shafts of light were beginning to creep through the curtains in the hallway and in Gloredhel's room. Dawn was not quite yet upon them.

"We can watch the sunrise and talk," was all Galdor said.

Gloredhel starred at him for a moment, blinging slowly, not quite awake and momentarily confused, still caught at the barest edges of a dream. It had been a long time since she has risen habitually this early. Before I died. Rog, whose eyes had been very sensitive to bright sunlight after his captivity, had always risen early to work for awhile before midday. During the brightest hours, he would stay sheltered in the dark depths of the Hammer of Wrath's house and then return to work later in the afternoon. Gloredhel had risen early when in her brother's house but had gotten used to rising even earlier with Rog, but that … had been a very long time ago. In Tirion, in her uncle's house, there was no need for her to rise before dawn. "Alright," she agreed, "Give me a moment to get my boots."

It's a good thing I trust Galdor.

That was one of Gloredhel's main thoughts not very many minutes later. When the two emerged from the house, Galdor led the way on an oblique angle into the woods, picking a meandering path through the trees for what seemed to Gloredhel no rhyme or reason. There was no path, just trees, trees, and more trees, and soon the house disappeared behind them into a screen of foliage, and there were only trees, a maze of nearly identical trees that were so tall Gloredhel had no hope of even using the sun to guide her without climbing a tree first.

I'm not sure I could find my way back if you gave me a map.

To Gloredhel who was most certainly not a Wood Elf, trees mainly looked like trees, and without some sense, some view of the sky, she felt totally lost.

Finally, the land began to slope upwards, and it became clear Galdor actually had a fixed destination in mind at which to watch the sunrise. That destination was a medium-sized hill, mostly clear of trees, high enough that one had a decent view of the horizon and a good view of the sky that would be shortly turning an array of colors that Gloredhel wished she could actually reproduce in paints one day. However many paint shades she mixed, she had never been able to the a Valinor sunrise or sunset justice in paint.

There was silence for a while once the two were seated on the grass, and uneasy, Gloredhel resisted the childish urge to fidget, but her eyes bounced restlessly around the glade, her better eyesight noticing a variety of things that her mind wanted to a catalog.

Finally, Galdor spoke, "I am honestly surprised that you have not already heard this story from your followers, since you said those of the Fountain and Golden Flower who sailed have sought you out, but perhaps they were trying to spare you the grief when you have so newly returned. I would spare you, also, but you have asked, and I have given my word to tell you all I know."

Her unease and the knot in her stomach grew worse at those words. I am assuredly not going to like what I hear. Her cousin was dead, but in Beleriand, there was death, and then was death, and then there were those things worse than death. Just because Maeglin had died, that did not mean he had died quickly or easily.

The memory flashed through Gloredhel's mind of the day Findo had returned from rescuing Neylo from Thangorodrim after he had suffered thirty years of torment hanging on the mountain peak by one arm. His mother had named him Maitimo ("Well-Formed One"), but the Nelyo Findo had brought back had been more rags, wounds, sores, dirt, and stick-thin limbs than a comely elf-lord. He had suffered torments beyond imagining there, and though he regained much of his strength, he was never the same mentally or physically.

Gloredhel was silent for many minutes, starring off into the distance, her gaze so fixed that she thought she could have numbered the very leaves on one great fir so long was her gaze on it. "Just tell me," she whispered, "For good or for ill, just tell me, so that I may know how Maeglin died."

For I loved him like he was my own son.

Maeglin had still been a child by Elvish reckoning when his mother died and he had been subsequently orphaned by Turgon's punishment of Eol, being only eighty at the time, twenty years from his majority. He had been terribly young even when he died.

Taking a deep breath, Galdor finally began. He starred off toward the slowly lightening sky as he spoke, as if he could not even bare to look at Gloredhel as he told of Maeglin's fate. "I did not see Maeglin fall, since I was with you and the column trying to escape through the princess' passageway, so I can only tell you what I heard and what has been recorded, though I am greatly skeptical of both."

Greatly skeptical of both?! Those words Galdor spoke sent a chill running through Gloredhel's blood, and he had not even truly begun yet.

"As to his manner of death, Maeglin fell from the heights like his father before him, and his body was shattered upon the slopes of the Amon Gwareth," Galdor spoke those words with an effort, "He fell, or rather I should say, he was thrown."

Thrown?

Even as tears pricked at her eyes and grief stabbed at her heart, Gloredhel frowned puzzled, her mind dissecting Galdor's words. Eol's prophecy came true then. Even those who were not normally gifted or cursed with foresight sometimes had visions as death approached, and such had been the case with Eol. "You may yet die the same death as I," he had said of his son, speaking so quietly before being thrown from Caragdûr that only Rog and Galdor had heard his words.

To be about to die so cruelly, and to be plagued with such a vision … sometimes the fates were merciless. Maeglin had been kept from having to watch his only remaining parent die through the combined intervention of Gloredhel, Glorfindel, Rog, and several other lords. Rog had told her of Eol's prophecy that night, but for good or ill, they had chosen to never tell Maeglin of his father's last words for mercy's sake.

But why had Galdor corrected himself? Why the emphasis on Maeglin having died because of being thrown from the walls? A strong-enough orc could lift an elf and throw them to their doom, of course, but …

That cannot be what he means. He wouldn't have corrected himself if it was.

"Thrown?" Gloredhel forced the question from her unwilling throat.

Now Galdor turned to look at her, and pity mingled with grief and anger in his eyes. "Thrown," he confirmed, "He battled with Tuor upon the wall and was thrown down."

"Tuor?" Gloredhel starred at her companion in disbelief. "Tuor? You are certain?"

Tuor?! Why would Tuor have done such a thing?

Galdor's statement made absolutely no sense to Gloredhel, though it made her feel sick hearing it all the same. (It was a good thing they had not stopped to grab breakfast before leaving the house.) Why would Idril's husband have attacked his wife's cousin? It made no sense. What would have provoked such a confrontation while Gondolin was being sacked of all times? It made no sense.

Why? Why?

Galdor nodded.

"What madness … was this?" Gloredhel cried in a voice full of horror, feeling anger rise to again harshen her words, "Was there already not enough Kinslaying in Gondolin? Was the Sack not enough, our losses to Morgoth's foul servants not enough that we must slay our own people?"

"If you read the histories of the fall, listen to Idril's account, there was no madness, at least not on Tuor's account," Galdor replied, "It is said …" he stopped and swallowed hard, his face twisting, "It is said," he began again, visibly stealing himself, "that Maeglin willingly betrayed us to Morgoth out of a hatred for Tuor, a wish for power, and a twisted love for Idril. It is said that Maeglin sought to kill Earendil and claim Idril as his own but was only stopped by the intervention of Tuor and the House of the Wing."

Galdor's words sounded more like a paraphrase from a history of the fall of Gondolin than anything else. What he was saying was almost incomprehensible. What? What is he saying? None of this made any sense. Maeglin betray us? Because of that? It makes no sense. It felt like her world had been twisted upside down, like she had suddenly lost her grasp of Sindarin because none of this made any sense.

"Willingly. Betrayed. Us. To Morgoth?" Gloredhel repeated flatly in disbelief. "That is madness."

Galdor snorted, "I never knew your cousin well, for our work was far different and we interacted rarely, but I am suspicious. Do not ever read what of his history of Gondolin and its fall Pengolodh has sent across the sea, especially what he said of Maeglin, I beg you." His voice was deadly serious. "You might test whether it is possible to die of wrath … or desire to start a Kinslaying on your own."

"Pengolodh?" Gloredhel shrieked. Her hold on her temper snapped, and she sprung to her feet in a flash of rage, eyes flashing and cheeks as red as Moryo's when in a temper. "Pengolodh is the one writing this madness?"

Born in Nevrast before the migration to Gondolin, Pengolodh was known as the "Sage of the Noldor," and was thought to be the greatest Noldorin Loremaster since the likes of Fëanor and Rúmil more than an age before. Gloredhel had little against him as a person and found him to be generally pleasant as long as you kept him on uncontroversial topics, though conversations with him tended toward the tedious. However, Gloredhel had little love for him as a scholar and a historian. Turgon's court both at Nevrast and Gondolin had been heavily influenced by Turgon's almost rabid anti-Feanorion suspicions and prejudice and the more general Noldorin prejudice against the Sindar and returned thralls, and Pengolodh who had court historian carried the worst of Noldorin prejudices with him, which influenced every aspect of his writing.

Due to her position at court and relationship with Turgon, Gloredhel had once had the opportunity to look at some early drafts of the early portions of what Pengolodh called the Annals of Beleriand, which he hoped to be a successor to Rumil's Annals of Valinor. She had not been at all pleased with what she read, not with the way he dealt with facts and the reasons for certain events, not with the way his prejudices colored his writing and influenced his narrative.

I did not even get half way before I threw it down with disgust.

If one read Pengolodh's works, one would think that the Sons of Feanor were brutal, scheming monsters with barely a redeeming quality between the six of them—and then there's the contortions Pengolodh went through to deal with the couple of good things he actually thinks they did—and that the Noldor were the be all and end all with their Sindar relatives as 'lesser' and 'not as refined' cousins.

To name but two problems.

And that's not even getting to the Avari.

"Sit down, Gloredhel," Galdor said gently but firmly, "I like Pengolodh's tale little, but he has not, I think, spun it out of whole cloth, as the saying goes. Whatever happened with Maeglin upon the wall, whatever the reasons that drove those events to their ends, it is nonetheless clear that something went and Tuor had none of the madness of Turgon. They would not have turned Kinslayer without reason."

With a growl of anger, Gloredhel sank back down upon the grass, folding her hands in her lap and gripping them together so tightly that her knuckles went white. She hissed out a breath between her teeth and then said in a voice almost trembling with rage and grief, "I know that Maeglin was a polarizing figure. By and large, you held him dear, or you hated him, and too many only saw the shadow of Eol about him, saw naught but his half-Sindar heritage, but what it said," she shook her head, "That is madness! After all he suffered, Maeglin held little love for Gondolin or his uncle, but to betray us all to Morgoth? For what? Hatred of Tuor, some twisted love for his cousin, and desire for power?" She nearly shrieked the last word before she forced herself calm again, "Do they know nothing of Maeglin's character? He only left the city for mining expeditions in the valley! When could he have even met with Morgoth?"

"It was no secret that Maeglin and Tuor never got along," Galdor added as an aside.

Never got along, true?

But did anyone stop to think about WHY, for pity's sake, or just jump to the worst conclusion?

"True, but anyone who knew anything of Maeglin could guess why," Gloredhel's voice was scathing, though her angst was directed at the dead, not her companion, "And it had nothing personal to do with Tuor himself and nothing to do with competition over Idril. All Maeglin could see when he looked at Tuor was his father Huor. Turgon was arbitrarily selective with whom he allowed to leave Gondolin, even though the rules legally applied to us all. Eol wished to leave, and he died. Maeglin would have liked nothing more than to leave, and he was not allowed. But Hurin and Huor were allowed to leave? What good is an oath of secrecy against the magics of the enemy?"

"I'm not disputing your point or even agreeing with what is said of him," added Galdor, "I'm just noting how it appears."

Those who wish to draw the worst conclusion choose the facts they want and fail to consider the reasons!

The fire in Gloredhel's eyes grew brighter, and she shot a sharp look at her companion, "Turgon and I had arguments that were almost fit to bring down the palace roof on our heads so harsh were our tongues, and at times I think my cousin barely trusted me by the end. Do you think I will be painted as a villainess in the histories?"

Me the golden-haired half-Vanyar?

Beloved niece of Fingolfin?

Friend of Thorondor, bless him?

Galdor made a face and did not bother to answer. It would have been a resounding "No!" anyway. The double-standard was horrifyingly clear.

"If there was some secret love in Maeglin's heart for his cousin, I cannot say," Gloredhel added, a little calmer for a moment, "but if it were true, I doubt you could call it 'twisted,' for he had a good heart, and Eol and Elenwë were not even the remotest of kin, so it would not have been against our laws for them to marry, though I admit it would have been commonly done." Now her eyes began to flash yet again, "But as to Maeglin betraying us for some wish for power, I count that as one of the most foolish and ignorant things I have heard in many a long-year."

Gloredhel paused, sucked in a deep breath through her nose, and then finally continued in a calmer voice, "Even if Maeglin thought he could have done a better job at ruling Gondolin than Turgon, he had no wish for power, no love for ruling. He barely had any idea how to rule his own house when Turgon dumped the lordship of a new House in his lap. He cared for the Mole, tried to do well by his people, but his Steward did more of the managing than he did. Helping Eol and Aredhel manage the small household at Nan Elmoth gave him no preparation at all for managing a Great House even as small as that of the Mole. Maeglin would have been much happier if you let him stay in his forge all day!"

Oh, that boy! Gloredhel's anger left her in a rush, and all she felt was deep sadness, thinking of how she frequently had been forced to go by the forges to pull Maeglin away from his work when he got so hyper-focused and absorbed in his work that he forgot to eat or rest or even drink, sometimes, for half-a-day, a day, sometimes more.

Being of the Firstborn does not mean we are tireless or can work in a burning hot forge without sustenance without risking collapse.

He didn't even realize usually that so much time had passed. He was like my uncle in that.

"As to your earlier question, I think I might have an answer to when it would have even been possible for them to meet," Galdor said finally after a silence of many minutes, "I've had several long-years to think on this."

Gloredhel's head snapped up, "Go on."

"Do you remember the year before the Fall," her companion asked, "when Maeglin had that mining expedition that lasted more than twice as long as any of the others? The one where he returned with barely a handful of the men he left with?"

How could I forget?

Turgon was almost ready to send our search parties.

Maeglin had always been very meticulous in his planning, and he almost always returned on the day he planned. A day or two's delay was little concern—weather, an injured horse, or practiced problems could account for that—but as the days had ticked on, concern in Gondolin had only grown.

"How could I forget?" Gloredhel replied, "There was a mining accident, he said. Most of his men were killed, and all their supplies were lost along with their weeks of labor. He was terribly shaken by the loss of his men. Cave-ins … crush injuries, suffocation, it would have been terrible in its own way, though he had seen battle at the Nirnaeth. Many forget that he was still so young, not even two-hundred when he died." She paused, shook her head, "After that mining accident, I don't think Maeglin was ever quite the same."

"No," Galdor agreed, "He wasn't."

What are you saying?

"What are you saying?" Gloredhel asked cautiously.

Galdor huffed out a breath, "I've had over five-hundred years to think on this, and … now, I doubt there was actually a cave-in, or if there were, I doubt it was natural. Maeglin, I think, and his people were captured and made thralls. I know that you hated the suspicion with which Rog and his people were viewed even after they had been so long followers of Turgon, but trust me, that wariness of Morgoth's returned thralls is not unfounded." He paused, added sadly, "The cynical part of me has been surprised more than once that someone somewhere has not tried to lay the blame of Gondolin's fall on the Hammer of Wrath."

Let them try! I will deal with them as they deserve for such foolishness!

"I know," Gloredhel replied, "I've heard the stories. Some escape in truth, body and soul, while some only escape in body, for some are sent out for his ends, covered by the shadow of the terror of him, their wills …" Her voice died in her throat, and she went as pale as death, as her own words registered with her. "… chained to his. Oh …" One hand came up to cover her mouth. Her shoulders bowed under the weight of that realization, and she felt almost sick.

Oh, Maeglin.

"I have no proof," Galdor said quietly, "I was not there. I did not see Maeglin's final confrontation with the princess and Tuor. I know only what I was told, but unless he become much more loquacious at the end than he ever was during his time in Gondolin, I am quite skeptical of what Pengolodh says about Maeglin's actions and motivations. I have had five-hundred years to think on this, and this seems the much more likely. His will was strong, but even the strongest can finally break."

Oh, child!

Looking back on those events, Galdor's explanation made much more sense than the cave-in story. Maeglin's being made a thrall would explain many oddities that last year, the pieces of which she had never put together because she had been missing the key, including …

Stars above!

"That explains why Maeglin argued to hold the city," said Gloredhel in horrified realization, "No vengeance for Morgoth if all his forces find is an empty, deserted city."

Galdor nodded, "And a few other oddities from that last year. You truly knew nothing of this, not even in the Halls?"

"News in the Halls is only as reliable as the tapestries you see and the fea you speak with," Gloredhel said with a scoff, "And I spent most of my time with my kin. The news I received was scattered and incomplete. If my uncle knows of Maeglin's fate, he has been deliberately avoiding the topic. He has told me of my other kin, and I was surprised he never mentioned Maeglin, but considering my uncle … Fingolfin … never even knew of his grandson's birth before his death and that Fingon knew nothing either until the Nirnaeth," she paused with a grimace, "given Turgon's obsessive protection of the city included to not sending news, I thought it was possible my uncle just didn't know."

I wonder if Tyelko …

"It's possible," Galdor's reply cut off that thought, "I never spoke of Maeglin's fate to the High King, only yours and your brothers and your husband, but the princess likely told him. She and Tuor have a house in the north. Have you seen them?"

No, and now I think I'm glad I haven't.

This wasn't news she would have wanted to hear from Idril … or Tuor.

Gloredhel shook her head, "No. After all that happened the last long-year before the city fell, we weren't on the best of terms. If she wants to see me, she can come to Tirion. I'm not going north."

Not considering what is being spouted about Maeglin …

Now she wondered if some of Idril's hostility that last year had been …

Her secret passageway

The timing …

His final trip …

Random memories and puzzling moments of that final year aided by Galdor's theory about Maeglin's fate—Gloredhel's heart broke as she thought about her cousin's suffering … How could I not have known—were slowly coalescing into a whole that horrible sense as the conversation with Galdor continued.

"Oh, stars and powers!" She exclaimed when those final pieces slotted into place, and she understood the horrifying whole. Her face went deathly pale.

"Maeglin's return from the mining trip …" Gloredhel said slowly, "It was only after that point when Idril started building her way of escape. She had no gift of foresight, but something made her suspicious enough to start building, but I saw nothing. How by all the Powers did I not notice? How did Rog not see? How did any of us not see?"

He ate with us about as frequently as he ate with his house.

I went over daily to make sure he wasn't overextending himself in the forge.

We sent so much time together. I loved him like he was my son.

He was almost raised in my household from his arrival in Gondolin until the Mole was dumped in his lap.

How did I not see?

"Morgoth is a cunning foe and a deceiver. His power as your cousin knew was beyond imagining," Galdor said quietly, "Unlike with most returned thralls, we had no reason to suspect that anything worse than the cave-in had befallen Maeglin and his people."

By cousin, Galdor meant Neylo … by all rights, Maedhros should have died on that mountain peak. Not even one of the Firstborn who has seen the Trees could survive exposure and the lack of sustenance for years without the interference of one of the Powers.

"I still should have known," Gloredhel snapped abruptly, and then just as suddenly, she began to weep, burying her face in her hands. Galdor shifted closer on the grass and rubbed her back until her tears began to slow.

There was still one last cruel fact yet to be revealed.

"When they said that Maeglin attempt to throw Earendil from the walls," Galdor added after some minutes had passed, "I knew there had to be more to the tale than was told."

The sun had long since risen, but even with its warming rays shining down on her, Gloredhel only felt cold, chilled to her bones. "Now I know for sure that Maeglin was not acting of his own accord!" She cried aghast, eyes full of horror, "However caustic his tongue was at times at court, he was never less than kind to the children. Only madness or the leading of another's will would have led him to attempt such a foul deed."

"And this poison was a subtle thing," Galdor noted, "And whatever his secret feelings about Tuor and Idril might have been, I think … Maeglin would have been one of the last to hold any sins of the parents against a child."

Considering how he was more often seen foremost as Eol's son.

Though whatever Eol's true faults were, he was not as the stories about him said, at least not that I could judge from my briefest of meetings with him before he died.

Gloredhel could only nod agreement, "Have you spoken of this … to anyone?"

"My people speak of it at times. They have … concerns about these tales as I do," Galdor was being tactful in his choice of words, "We raise a glass to Maeglin as to the other fallen lords when we remember the Fall, but to others outside my house, no. I was not there, and it would be my word against the princess', against Tuor's." He paused, "What will you do?"

That is a good question.

"I think … I will speak to my uncle when I return to Tirion. I will tell him all I know of Maeglin, of what we have spoken of here, and all that … happened with Turgon. My uncle's counsel has always been wise, and I will not stand to hear my cousin's memory maligned when I have the chance to see the record straight."

Maeglin was always judged the more harshly because of his heritage.

Some might prefer to forget that Hurin and Huor knew the city's location. Given Hurin was captured by Morgoth and then released, who is to say he might not have exposed the city's location?

Gloredhel rose to her feet and gave Galdor a smile that was positively Feanorion in its quality—wolfish and reminiscent of Tyelko in a very bad mood, "And one of these evenings I might propose a toast to my cousin."

That the dinner she was alluding to would not be a family one was quite clear from the look on her face.

And accept the consequences.