A/N Hello to my new guest commenter Ann! It's been lovely to read your thoughts this week. And Raven, I'm doing a victory dance with you on the brace troubles being over! I don't have a specific length in mind for this, but I do have several different story arcs planned out so it's likely to be a long one! Hope your sister enjoys this if she does read it, I know I have readers who know the Silm but not FB, so it will be interesting to see if it works the other way around.

IMPORTANT CONTENT NOTE: This is a very heavy chapter. It includes a PTSD-type flashback episode involving self-harm and graphic descriptions of blood. Please look after yourselves if this is likely to be distressing for you. If you do not want to read about these things, stop reading at the end of Dumbledore's letter to Newt. If you're enjoying this story but these things are triggers for you, they will always be signposted and avoidable in future chapters if it helps to know that.

Chapter Thirteen: Out, Damned Spot

Dear Professor Dumbledore,

Apologies for not having written for a while, I have been very remiss with my correspondence lately. You're of course aware that the Werewolf Task Force has been causing lots of upset in recent months. Better late than never, though, so please allow me to thank you for all your stalwart support during that awful Registry fiasco. I'm aware that my stance is an unpopular one, and since you're being tipped for Minister, it means all the more that you risked votes by backing me. I'm only sorry that I let you and the lycanthrope community down and didn't get that position. At least it's been proven now that whilst I can offer my professional opinion to the Ministry, and deal with anything involving dragons, I shouldn't be let anywhere near the writing of legislation. My boggart changed during the war, as many people's did, but I'd wager that if I met one again now, after that experience, it would be the same awful desk I faced when I was fifteen. I feared it then because I thought it would be my prison; I fear it now because it reminds me how I created one.

Anyway, enough of my moping, how are you getting along with Fawkes? He is a majestic creature indeed, is he not? I hope my belief that you would get on well has proven true. And how is young Kettleburn getting along in his new professorship? He seemed a very enthusiastic fellow when I met him, and with a real passion for the subject, if perhaps a little too eager to rush into things without thinking first. (Pots and kettles, I know!) He seems to me just the type of person to enthuse the next generation of magizoologists.

I was hoping to ask a teensy favour of you, if you don't mind? Katarina is getting along nicely, her wing has healed up and she'll be flying again very soon. She has settled into the suitcase well and formed strong bonds with some of my other rescues. I was wondering if I might keep her a little longer before returning her to the Hogwarts herd? It seems a shame to uproot her so quickly when she has formed a mutually beneficial friendship with another of my current residents.

On an entirely unrelated note, have you come across any references to an extinct magical people known as the Eldar in your research? They were mentioned to me by an acquaintance the other day, but he wasn't particularly forthcoming once he'd dropped the name, and I've been unable to find any other writing on who they were. If you know of any sources of information on that people and their fate, I would be grateful if you could direct me to them. Simply for curiosity's sake, you know.

Yours faithfully,

Newt Scamander

Newt, my dear boy,

One of your most laudable qualities is that deceit does not come naturally to you in the slightest, even on paper, and hence I found your last letter most intriguing. Perhaps you have forgotten that I had the pleasure of teaching you over several years, and whilst I agree that your curiosity is a powerful force, it tends to be directed towards creatures and people who currently exist and could benefit from your knowledge, however rare or misunderstood. I pride myself on my imagination, but Newt Scamander suddenly developing an interest in a completely dead people? That stretches even my capabilities. Your general disinterest in History of Magic was no secret, you know. Therefore, I am inclined to believe that perhaps these 'Eldar' are not quite as extinct as you claim they are? My own curiosity is piqued by the identity of your new acquaintance. He sounds like a most fascinating being.

Do not be alarmed, my dear boy. I appreciate that perhaps the situation is complex, but rest assured that you can count on my discretion. If you believe that your current realm of study is best kept concealed from the public eye, and particularly the Ministry, I am willing to trust your judgement in this matter. Regrettably, I do not recall having read of the Eldar in any of my studies, which is not necessarily to say that I have not. I shall trawl the Hogwarts libraries and see what I can find to assist you. You need not worry about my activities raising questions; it is rather useful to have an entire school so accustomed to one's eccentricities that, in general, they deem it better not to ask.

By all means, keep Katarina for a while longer. Might I guess that her new friend is of the Eldar persuasion? Just a thought, correct me if I am mistaken. I shall inform Professor Kettleburn of her continued absence, although it would be useful to have her returned to the herd before the Easter break, if possible. Professor Kettleburn, by the by, is doing splendidly, and makes full use of his already impressive collection of scars to intimidate and inspire his students in equal measure. Class sizes for Care of Magical Creatures are increasing year on year, helped by his tutelage and a fascinating textbook. You should be proud, my boy.

On that note, you should also be proud of the fact that werewolf attacks have dropped by thirty percent in the last two years and the entirety of Grindelwald's loyalist attack squad have been apprehended. Werewolf-on-werewolf violence and its associated collateral has also significantly decreased, due in large part to that legislation you are so determined to be ashamed of. I agree that the Ministry has taken its usual short-sighted, blundering approach to its continued application, and I am aware that that is not what you wanted. However, you stepped up in a difficult situation and did what had to be done, without hatred or prejudice, only a desire to protect. It is an unfortunate fact that sometimes there are no easy choices, and in order to do the most good we must commit to the course we believe in our hearts to be right. You are one of the most forgiving people I know, Newt. Extend some of that to yourself.

Fawkes is a true blessing and has already become a close companion. He regenerated himself into a much larger form after his last combustion, so if I understand correctly he is now into the adolescent phase of his development. Might I expect teenage temper tantrums in the near future? It would be useful to have some warning if so. On the whole, however, he has proven himself an extraordinarily sensitive bird, singing to soothe students who come to me upset, and giving me the odd nip when he quite correctly judges that I am being uncommonly grouchy: even for an aging professor who is entitled to be so. I am extremely grateful to you for entrusting him into my care.

In the hope to see you very soon, and dare I ask, perhaps also your new acquaintance?

Yours cheerfully,

Albus Dumbledore

However does he do it? Newt wondered, shaking his head as he put the letter down on his desk. Bad enough that those kindly eyes could stare right through you as you squirmed – did he insist on taking apart your innermost thoughts remotely as well? Apparently so, and maybe it was for the best. Dumbledore's wisdom could prove helpful moving forwards; he was probably the only person around who might have an idea about the nature of Maglor's curse damage and how to treat it. That course of action would depend on the Elda's consent, though, which he'd refused at every juncture so far. Leaving this for future consideration, Newt started penning a reply. He didn't get very far before he was distracted by a thumping from inside the case, strategically placed under his desk.

It spoke volumes about the attention Newt paid to his creatures that he could interpret almost any sound they made, even if it wasn't a vocalisation as such – a stamping hoof, burrowing claws, or the rhythmic thud of a demiguise fist. For instance, he could distinguish Dougal's I'm feeling cooped up and I want some attention rattle of the suitcase trapdoor, from his exasperated Helga's stolen all the lids to your potion jars again tapping.

The noise being made now was his someone is hurt or ill and we really need you warning knock. Abandoning his unfinished letter in a heartbeat, Newt darted down into his case.

As Maglor felt himself sinking into the mire of the memory, a distant, detached part of his mind observed that it had been a comparatively long time since this had last happened; living in Newt's suitcase wasn't particularly conducive to dwelling on the horrors of the past. But he had attempted to get back into the rhythm of his repentance, at least in part, and today for the first time since he'd met Newt, his reflections on Alqualondë were becoming so intense that his mind was slipping into that space where the present faded out and the memory overwhelmed him.

Elves usually had a greater level of mental control than humans, able to direct their reveries rather than leaving their thoughts at the mercy of whatever dreams may come to them. Maglor didn't always avail himself of this control, though. Sometimes, when the memories, preserved in all their terrible elvish perfection, were at their most intense, he would let them take over his whole consciousness, lose himself in the horror again to make sure that he would never neglect a single detail of what he had done. It was terrifying, and he was always shaken when his focus returned, but he had survived every event he remembered. He owed his most complete penance to those who didn't.

Newt wouldn't like you doing this, that same detached part of his mind warned.

Newt wasn't there. Newt doesn't know what you did, a louder, darker voice overruled it. He bowed his head and let go of the peaceful tranquillity of his mountainous space, letting the birds be drowned out by the distant clashing of new-forged swords, the groans of the dying and the wailing of the bereaved…

He spun around in a graceful arc, sword extended. No enemies came to challenge him. Nelyafinwë was helping the Ambarussa clear the way to the final ship, but apart from that, the battle was over.

They'd won. They'd won the ships, their mission was before them, this was the first step towards reclaiming the Silmarils and victory against Morgoth.

But Makalaurë felt like he'd lost everything.

Fourteen elves had died by his sword. Elves who had danced to his music, once, elves whom he would have greeted courteously had they crossed each other in a banquet hall.

But they had not crossed each other in a banquet hall. They had clashed in the heat of the first pitched battle to mar Valinorean soil, and he had massacred them.

In the battle itself, he hadn't stopped. He had been furious, fuelled with determined loyalty to his father and the raw energy of the newly sworn Oath. The slices and parries had flowed from his sword with all the finesse of Fëanor's training, dancing through the breaking bones and spraying blood with a lethal grace. He'd become something different, someone he didn't recognise, and that frightened him.

Now, with devastating abruptness, everything that had been obscured by the red haze of battle resolved into crystal clarity.

The faces twisting in agony as his sword sliced through them; the expressions of hurt and betrayal as elves he recognised begged him to stop; the hopelessness and grim determination of the last to fall, fighting to the end in honour of the cause their kin died for, though the despair in their eyes showed that they knew the inevitable outcome.

One of the Teleri musicians running up behind him, shouting, "Makalaurë, please! This isn't you!" Makalaurë had swung around and swiftly silenced him.

An apprentice throwing herself in front of her shipbuilding master with only a piece of broken bow as a weapon. He had knocked it aside like a toy before killing them both when they refused to yield their ships.

"What have I done?" he breathed, the sounds he'd filtered out becoming all of a sudden too loud, too much, too awful. "What have I done?"

He stared down at his hands, covered in the blood of fourteen murdered elves. Fourteen elves who were simply defending what they created. Why was the Fëanorion right to do that greater than theirs? And why was it only now he had committed something so irrevocable that he began to doubt his unquestioning adherence to his father's ideals?

The stench of blood sickened him and his stomach roiled. It was beginning to crust on his skin and suddenly nothing was more important than the need to get it off, get it clean, make it stop. He staggered across the docks and plunged his hands into the sea. A red cloud billowed up around them and he dragged them through the water, trying to pull them away from it, but the crimson trail clung to them, unshakeable. He brought them out of the water and inspected them. Blood had invaded every tiny crevice and curve of his hands. It was all over them, under his nails, stuck in the creases of his knuckles and the lines of his palm. All around him, the waters of Alqualondë were turning red. He scrubbed at his hands furiously, desperately, abrading the skin so that his own blood mingled with his victims', but the stains wouldn't leave, no matter how hard he tried to shift them.

It was then that he realised the enormity of what he'd done.

This blood was going to stain his hands until the end of time.

An entire ocean could pour over them, and still it would not be enough.

Someone was shaking his shoulder.

"Kanafinwë, what is this? We need you!" his father, stressed and irritable, pulling him to his feet, guiding him back to the carnage. His voice softened a little as he saw his son's distress; well, as much as his father's voice ever did. "Come. There is much to be done."

But no. It wasn't his father, and this wasn't that memory. It was a different voice.

"Maglor! What are you doing to yourself? STOP!"

Newt hastily pulled him back from the pool outside his hut, where he'd been kneeling, his body lost with his mind in the memory, scrubbing his wounded hands hard enough to tear open the blistered and inflamed skin.

"What happened?" Newt sounded aghast as he inspected Maglor's hands, the Elda for once too shaken to protest. He didn't answer. He thought if he opened his mouth he might throw up. Intellectually, he knew where and when he was, but he could still smell the nightmarish combination of sea salt, blood, and gore that marked the First Kinslaying, and the howls of pain echoed in his ears. Normally in one of these episodes, he would be yanked back to the present by the anchoring pull of his self-inflicted injuries, but it hadn't gone as far as usual this time and he was disorientated, not yet completely released from the memory's claws. Numb, he allowed himself to be shepherded into Newt's cabin and seated, focusing on breathing through his nose so the stench, which he knew didn't exist, wouldn't catch on the back of his throat.

"Why did you do that?" Newt asked as he carefully dabbed a sweet-smelling solution over Maglor's hands.

He owed Newt an explanation. He tried to focus.

"They are dirty. I want to wash them."

"Why so harshly?" He paused when Maglor tilted his head slightly at the unfamiliar word. Newt paused to illustrate the contrast between 'gently' and 'harshly' with some hand movements. "Why did you hurt yourself?"

Maglor sighed. Alone, this had made so much twisted sense, but now all the explanations he composed in his head sounded ridiculous.

"Before, they were dirty. Now, I know is different, but I see before. I wash, but they are not clean."

He noticed a red stain blooming on one of Newt's discarded cloths.

"What is that?"

"Blood. That's called blood."

"I look my hands, I see blood from before, much blood. Have to wash."

Saying it made it horrifyingly, instantaneously real again, and the wounds on his hands disappeared under a thick, viscous layer of blood that wasn't his own and the desperate desire to get it off get it off get it off had him clawing at his skin again, but his fingers just slipped through the sticky coating on his hands and it kept flowing and it would never go away…

"No, absolutely not. Maglor, stop that right now!"

The sheer surprise of hearing so much authority in that usually mild voice made him cease his frantic scrabbling motions, which allowed Newt to get a hand around each of his wrists and pull them apart. He could have freed himself instantly if he wished to, but something about Newt's sudden commanding demeanour made it feel as though that wasn't even an option. His frown deepened as he watched blood drip from his mangled fingers, staining Newt's floorboards.

"No, none of that now. Leave your hands alone and look at me."

He did, surprised that for once, Newt was actually trying to look him directly in the eye. His voice got gentler.

"What you see isn't real. You're having a flashback."

"Flash…back?"

"Yes, a flashback. Errr, a bad thing happened in the past, before. You see it again now, but it's not real. Not now."

A flashback. There wasn't even a word in Quenya to describe that experience, they were rarely spoken of among his people, and Maglor realised now how much that had added to his unease about them; it was a terrible thing for a wordsmith to be confronted with a nameless terror. Simply naming it shattered its paralysing grip and Maglor murmured the word, feeling a thrill of empowerment.

"Yes, that's right. You're not there anymore. So we're going to think about now to help you stop seeing it. Where are we now? Talk to me."

"Your cabin. The suitcase. London."

"Yes, absolutely. What can you see?"

They'd spent an evening in Norway just naming everything in Newt's cabin. He could do this.

"Shelves. Herbs. Quills. Workbench. Parchment." He eyed the disorganised pile of field notes awaiting their write-up on Newt's desk and remembered a word he'd learnt from Hilpy's ramblings. "Mess."

Newt chuckled. "Very true. I need to sort that. What else can you see?"

He cast his eyes around a little more.

"Windows. Ladder. Crates." A silvery shape materialised on one of the rungs and a warm pair of amber demiguise eyes blinked worriedly at him. His lips curled into a tiny smile despite himself. "Dougal."

"Yes, he's been here all along, he came to get me. He was worried about you."

"Sorry," he winced. And still, you disturb the peace wherever you go, can't stop causing pain…

"Don't be, it's not your fault. He cares about you, that's all."

That sounded…strange, it wasn't how he was used to thinking. He caught sight of his bloodied hand, dripping heavy globules of blood to pool on the wooden flooring, and shivered.

"There is blood on the floor."

"Is there? What, that tiny spot?…oh, you're still…alright, let's not look at that. Ummm…" Newt's nerves were showing a little now, but he was clearly doing his best to keep it together. "What about the herbs? Did I tell you their names?"

Newt hadn't, but Maglor recognised some of them. He canted his head towards a bunch with small white flowers.

"For when too hot?" he suggested.

"Yes, that's right, by 'too hot' you mean a fever, that's feverfew. Next to that with the small leaves is dittany…"

Newt had evidently got the measure of him now, since he'd correctly guessed that a list of tempting new words was exactly the thing to pull him out of his downward mental spiral. He kept his eyes fixed on the hanging bunches of herbs above the workstation, grounding himself with Newt's monologue on the different types of herbs and their uses, resolutely not looking down at his hands and ignoring the phantom sensation of Teleri blood trickling over them. By the time that Newt had named all of the herbs and potion ingredients above his workbench, Maglor had forgotten why they were there in the first place.

"Tell them back to me," Newt instructed.

"Ashwinder eggs, for burns," he began to recite, going to look down when he felt Newt slowly moving one of his hands but snapping his gaze back up when he was interrupted.

"Hey, Maglor, don't look at that. Eyes up, alright? I'll clean your hands for you, so you don't have to. Just focus on naming the ingredients. What are they?"

He pointed to a jar of wrinkled stones, and gaze lifted once again, Maglor picked up where he'd left off.

"Bezoars, for poisoning. Lacewings, for Polyjuice, the face-changer…"

He continued in this vein, aware of Newt working on his hands but avoiding looking down at them; Newt had quite correctly surmised that the sight of the blood from his recently opened wounds might trigger his flashback again. The slight stinging sensation from the potion Newt was using helped to anchor him in the present time: this time, the blood on his hands was his and only his, it was his pain and not another's, and that thought brought him a warped sort of relief. Having the new vocabulary to concentrate on helped the most, though, and as he concluded he realised his hands had been released and set down gently in his lap; he hadn't even noticed when that happened.

"Word-perfect, as always," Newt praised. "Are you ready to look at them?"

He glanced down at where his hands rested in his lap. There were some recently closed scratches zigzagging over the older damage, but all traces of fresh blood had been carefully removed. Beneath them, the floorboards were almost mockingly spotless. A sigh of relief escaped him as it sunk in that it was over and his mind – what was left of it – was his own again.

"Are you with me now?" Newt asked.

"I was here. I did not go." Maglor frowned, confused.

"No, I mean in your mind," he explained, tapping the side of his head. "You know it's now? You know you're not there anymore?"

"Yes, sorry," he replied, acutely aware of how broken he had to be if he couldn't even keep his wayward mind in the right age.

"You have no reason to be. Never be sorry for having a flashback, it's not your fault." Newt chewed his lip, considering. "Has that…happened before?"

Maglor nodded.

Newt's voice got quieter, gentler still. "Have you hurt yourself before?"

He nodded again, ducking his head and averting his eyes. He couldn't work out why he was feeling so ashamed about this. During his years of solitude, it had felt cathartic, as though he were giving his entire self to the work of memory and remorse, and his suffering was somehow restoring the balance of justice in the world. But in the soft mid-morning light of Newt's case, away from the perpetual crashing of the waves, his perspective was changing, and the actions that had made so much sense before seemed warped and twisted now.

"Maglor," Newt breathed, and that single word was filled with so much emotion, love and worry and concern and a desire to just make things right. Maedhros used to say his name like that, trying to coax him out of his rooms when he'd been holed up with his harp for days after something had shaken him.

"Can I hug you?" Newt asked, wringing his hands nervously and tears gathering in his eyes. Maglor couldn't say no to that look, and he didn't want to, so he nodded, not trusting his voice. Newt embraced him fiercely, holding him close with steady arms, and it was only when those soothing touches stilled him that Maglor realised he'd been trembling. He felt a warm weight land on his back and realised that Dougal had joined the hug, enclosing him from the other side. There was something so reassuring about the feel of demiguise fur tickling the back of his neck.

"Will you do something for me?" Newt asked, voice strained. "If you feel a flashback coming, if you want to hurt yourself, I want you to call me, alright? I'll sort you out a bell, magic so I can always hear it. Will you let me help you, Maglor? Please?"

Maglor nodded against Newt's shoulder, resolving to do as he asked. It was going to be tough, diverting his thought patterns from the familiar labyrinths they'd been stuck in for millennia, but this interaction had made one thing crystal clear: when Maglor hurt himself, he hurt Newt too. And that was simply unconscionable. Perhaps the reason isolation had hit him so hard was that he was so used to living for his brothers, he didn't know where to direct his energies without them, and so he'd channelled all he had into his self-loathing and guilt.

But in some of the most important ways, he had a brother to live for now. And he was determined not to let him down.