"Would you like to come?" Elrond asked, kneeling down to Morwinyon's eye level. She would be tall one day, by her coltish legs and arms - maybe as tall as her mother. Today she was still a child.

She cocked her head at him, which was more a mannerism of her father. Elrond found himself relieved that she was not a copy of her mother in behavior as well as looks.

"To Imladris," Morwinyon said, tone flatter than he might have hoped.

"That is where I live, yes," he said.

Morwinyon looked at him for a long moment, and then glanced over her shoulder. Elrond followed the look to a red-haired woman near Legolas. She kept a close eye on Morwinyon, and took a step forward when she saw Morwinyon look for her.

"What would I do in Rivendell?" Morwinyon asked, and he heard an echo of her mother, who had asked something similar in Lindon.

He might have said that she could learn healing or poetry, or that she could sleep without darkness tapping at the windows, or that her cousins would love her too, or that she would not wait for her father to wake from grief. His mind went blank before he said any of it, and he was not sure any of it would have convinced her anyway. He said nothing.

Morwinyon nodded as if he had, and turned on her heel, and walked back to the redheaded elf, who immediately began smoothing hair that had no need to be smoothed. Morwinyon smiled up at her, which was another expression he had rarely seen on Laeriel.

"We are not taking Morwinyon?" Arwen asked as Elrond rejoined his party.

"She did not want to come," he said, and Arwen frowned at him and then behind them. Elrond looked too.

Morwinyon's friend had an arm around her, and Morwinyon leaned into her comfortably. Legolas spoke quietly to them both, and Thranduil stood apart. He watched with a face Elrond could not read, as his daughter buried her face against the redheaded woman and ignored him entirely.

"We should take her with us," Arwen said.

Elrohir snorted. "Make Laeriel Glingaerien's daughter do something she does not want to do? I wish you luck."

Elladan shook his head.

Elrond rode back to Imladris with his children, and tried to tell himself he was not abandoning another.


"You killed him," Laeriel said finally.

Erien's lips pressed together, nearly disappearing entirely, but she nodded and sat back from Goldor's body. She did not protest, as she could have, that it had been an accident. Laeriel should not have appreciated that, but she did.

When Laeriel said nothing else, Erien got up and went to the door.

"We have had an incident," Erien said. "Find me something to clean myself up. We will go to Caranthir after."

She closed the door.

Laeriel collected herself and stood. "He was wrong."

Erien did not answer as the door opened. A Noldo woman handed in a bowl of water and a length of cloth and stepped back out when Erien flicked a hand at her.

Laeriel waited as Erien went to Goldor and reclaimed her sword, wiping it down on a corner of the cloth and sheathing it before she set the water on the desk and cleaned her own hands and face. Laeriel walked past her and straightened Goldor's limbs, closing his eyes and making sure his hair was brushed away from his face.

"Come wash your hands, Lairë," Erien ordered. Laeriel obeyed without considering otherwise, stepping up beside her at the desk.

There was a mirror on the wall, polished and placed so that even when Erien sat with her back to the door she could see any who entered. Laeriel stared blankly into it now, and Erien stared back.

The only differences Laeriel could see was the scar under Erien's eye where Laeriel had none: their jawlines were identical, their lips, their eyebrows. Their noses had the same gentle slope, and of course there were their eyes.

"He was wrong," Laeriel said.

Erien went back to washing her hands.

"Grandmother?"

"Goldor was wrong about many things," Erien replied, and hesitated before saying quietly, "I wish I had not killed him. I know you would have preferred otherwise. Wash your hands. I will see to his care."

She went to the door again.

"But it was not you that let them in," Laeriel said. She was glad her voice sounded confident.

Erien sighed. "You know better than that, my darling," she said, and left the room.


The dead were everywhere. Laeriel did not look closely, too afraid she would know them, but she saw pale hair and dark alike and some colors she could not discern under the blood. Most arrows were gull-fletched, as if few of the defenders had managed to lay hands to bows.

"This does not look like stopping excess," Laeriel told everyone at large. She spoke Quenya so no one around her could claim to misunderstand.

"You were not at Alqualondë," Erien said grimly. None of the other Noldor herding Laeriel along said anything.

When one reached out to catch Laeriel's elbow and help her over a pile of fallen masonry she shook him off, curling her lip at him. Oddly, he looked pleased, and so did the others.

Erien they did not offer to help. She led the way over and down the other side. The rocks did not dare shift under her.

Eventually they came upon a cavern guarded by Noldor, features other than black hair lost in the flickering shadows of torchlight and helmets, and they stepped aside for Erien before she issued orders.

Laeriel followed her inside. The other Noldor did not.

"Erien," an elf drawled from a desk across the room.

The room itself had been set up as a command center: there were maps of Menegroth laid carefully over tables and empty desks for missives. Officers stood without helmets, their spears leaned against walls and swords sheathed at their sides, bows set aside for the moment.

The officers that had been sitting stood: all bowed to Erien. Only two of the elves did not, including the one who called her name.

"Get out," the other unmoving elf said, and the officers picked up their weapons and helms and slipped out past Erien and Laeriel. The last one closed the door behind them.

"You have brought us the girl," the sitting elf observed. "Does that make up for taking the other one?"

"Maedhros wished to meet her," Erien said. "Where is he?"

"Out trying to stop everyone killing each other," the elf replied, waving a hand as if it was of no matter.

"And you stay here?" Erien asked. "Once you were brave, Curufin."

Her great-uncle laughed and leaned farther back in his chair, propping an elbow on the desk. "Once you were loyal, Tirionë."

"I have never been anything but loyal to the house of Feanor."

Laeriel's hands formed fists without her entire consent: her nails dug into her palms. Her grandmother had always been loyal to the house of Feanor, and look what it had lead to. She could not listen to Erien take offense to the wrong things any longer.

"By what right do you attack our city?" Laeriel demanded in Quenya.

"Our?" the other elf asked, speaking for the first time.

"I am a citizen of Doriath, and a guard of Menegroth," Laeriel said. "I speak for us here. Who else will?"

"No one," Curufin said, sounding amused. "Come into the light, girl. Let your uncle and grandfather get a look at you."

Erien stepped aside, beckoning. Laeriel grit her teeth, nails still digging into her palms, and obeyed.

Curufin stood and approached. Caranthir moved to stand near his wife.

"When will Maedhros return?" Erien asked.

"Always you ask for Maedhros," Curufin said blandly, circling. "Only Maedhros. One might think you cared nothing for your husband."

Caranthir stepped quietly up beside her, and Erien did not glance his direction. Curufin stopped behind Laeriel, running a hand down her hair until he could slip a hand under her chin and tip her face this way and that. Laeriel endured his proprietary examination, but she glared.

"Not so," Erien replied. "Often I asked for your father."

Curufin's face tightened. So did his grip on Laeriel's chin. Suddenly he spun her so they both faced Erien and Caranthir, Laeriel held close against him. His hand had slid so he held her throat.

This is who you wished me to meet, Laeriel thought, meeting Erien's eyes and holding them. It is to him you gifted my city.

Was it worth it, Grandmother?

"A bit lanky," Curufin commented, exerting pressure so Laeriel rose to her toes. "Was it you who failed to breed true, Caranthir, or was it the father?"

"Lerinië was well until her mother took her from me," Caranthir said, impervious to his brother's taunts. His held Erien from behind by the arms, trapping her swords. Curufin huffed when Laeriel flinched at Laindes' Quenya name.

"Lerinië was no true child of Feanor, and she was not well." Erien met Laeriel's eyes without flinching and continued, "She was not well in Thargelion."

"Erien, of course, always knows best," Curufin murmured into Laeriel's ear. Louder he said, "You say your daughter was no true child of our father. It is reassuring for my brother most of all."

"And it is your brother whose grandchild I bring," Erien countered. "My Lairë is all we could hope and more."

"I hear she fainted at the sight of blood," Curufin said. His tone was all false sympathy.

"If you truly did, then you heard incorrectly," Erien replied. "As Feanor's blood runs in you, recognize it in her."

"Lairë Feanoriel," Curufin mused after a moment. "It has a ring to it."

Laeriel had not known Glingaerdir well, and she did not have enough to know he had loved her: he had, after all, turned his face to the wall and died when she was a child. At the very least he had loved her mother more, enough to follow Laindes instead of staying with his daughter, and Laeriel knew she had not been the easiest child to love so she had never blamed him.

But he had given her a name, and it was the name she used, and how dared Curufin call her anything else?

"My name is Laeriel Glingaerien, daughter of Laindes," she said steadily, and saw Erien register that she stopped before finishing, as she never had before. I am Laeriel Glingaerien, daughter of Laindes, daughter of Erien. Laeriel wished she was not sorry for the hurt she saw in Erien's expression.

Caranthir grimaced. "Tirionë, you left her here too long. She cannot be a cuckoo in the nest if she does not know who she is."

Curufin pressed up just enough that Laeriel strained. He was taller than she was, and Laeriel did not like it: there were not many even as tall as she in Menegroth. His hands were calloused from the forge too, and they were rough on her throat. She shifted to check his grip and the arm around her waist tightened.

Laeriel hated him. She hated Caranthir too: she hoped her eyes conveyed it when she met his gaze. "I have told you who I am."

"What matter her name?" Erien demanded, ignoring that she had refused to call Laeriel her full and correct name for over a century.

Curufin snorted and Caranthir leaned out to the side so Erien could see his unamused expression. Something about it made Laeriel think the motion practiced, and she realized with fury that she knew the feeling: she had never had to work to receive Erien's attention, but when her father had lived she would put herself in his way so he could not ignore her. Caranthir had the same air of desperate uncaring that she recognized in herself.

"It is her blood that matters," Erien continued, ignoring Caranthir, whose blood she referenced. "She has it, and it runs true."

"As true as her eyes," Curufin said so reasonably that Laeriel knew he mocked her.

Erien, whose dark, near-black eyes Laeriel had inherited rather than her father or grandfather or apparently great-grandfather's grey, tossed her head. Her hair fell across Caranthir's face, and he closed his eyes a moment, turning into the fall of it, before collecting himself. "That she has my blood can only be an asset. Your father often said so."

"My father said many things," Curufin said. "Sometimes he was wrong."

Erien jerked, as if of all he had said that was the least expected and most heinous. Caranthir's fingers tightened on Erien's arms - his knuckles and her arms turned stark white.

"Bring us to Maedhros," Erien ordered. There was no sign in her voice that she was in pain, though she must be.

"You do not give orders here, Tirionë," Caranthir said. "Maglor may have left you to wait, but he always was intimidated by you. I am not."

"No?" Erien asked. "Let me loose then."

Curufin snickered when his brother did no such thing. Erien's eyes narrowed.

"No power here, Erien, with your least favorite of Feanor's sons," Curufin told her. The pressure on Laeriel's throat grew: she began to feel the effects. "With your Lairë in my hands."

"You would not dare," Erien snapped. "She is a true scion of-"

"I have a son," Curufin said. "A truer scion of Feanor there is not. What need have we for another?"

Laeriel had heard enough. She went limp and Curufin caught her weight in surprise. Almost at the same time, Erien slammed her booted heel into Caranthir's foot and ground down.

Curufin dropped Laeriel to assist his brother, hand going to his sword, but Laeriel had gotten there first, letting her grip and weight pull the weapon from its sheath as she fell. Curufin grabbed for the hilt and missed, slicing his hand open on the blade: Laeriel braced herself against the floor as the rest of the blade came free and shoved up.

The sword went into him like a warm knife through butter and out the other side. Laeriel knew it should not have been so easy. She also did not care. She yanked the sword from him and thrust it back in as she stood, higher, at a better angle, under his ribs and up into his heart. He hit the ground with a wet thump when she turned to help her grandmother, sword dripping blood.

Erien did not need her help. Caranthir stood disarmed, hands to his side and one of Erien's swords to his throat.

"Kinslayer," he said.

Laeriel flicked the sword as Erien had taught her, sending most of the blood flying. "I did not begin it," she replied.

His mouth twisted - ruefully, almost. "Even we were sorry."

Laeriel thought of all those dead now and all who would be by the end of the day, and how he had done it before and come to do it again.

"I do not think you were," she told him.

He lunged as if he expected Erien to move her sword and let him. He lunged as if he did not think she really would kill him.

He lunged, and Erien did not move even a little, and he died, and Erien said nothing as he looked up at her.