I own none of the characters in this story. They are all from Tolkien's imagination, though their actions (most of them) are only hinted at by him.

CHAPTER ONE

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Ashes.

He stood alone on a rocky plain, Staring at the ground, where mere moments before, his father's dying body had been.

Father…

The wind whispered to him, whipping his hair about, caressing his skin, and he tried to ignore it.

But he couldn't. Of a sudden, his knees went weak, and he fell to them; the hard ground scraped at them, and there was a dull ache against his shins, but he did not care. His head tilted to the side and he shut his eyes, and without warning his face wrinkled as if in great pain, and a terrible wail of grief filled the valley. His long-fingered hands dug their way into the ashes that were his father's remains, and he wept and wept, for he knew not what else to do.

Then suddenly the landscape shifted. He was somewhere darker, far darker, and all around him was death. The bodies of at least fifty of his people lay strewn about him, yet no enemy touched him. He stayed there upon his knees – the ashes were now gone – watching in dismay as suddenly, the chaos stopped. All his company were now dead, and the enemy closed on him. His hand went to his sword, but  he was not given the chance or time to strike before a sharp blow landed to the back of his head.

As most do, the dream ended. He opened his starlit eyes, slowly and regretfully.

He would have preferred to mourn his father in the plains of the dreamworld than be here.

He would rather watch the slaughter of his people a thousand times than be here.

"Tell me your name, Elf." For being the incarnation of all evil in Middle Earth, he voice was almost pleasant.

"You know it already."

"Mayhap I forgot. Remind me." At this, the elf's hair was grabbed and pulled backwards quickly by his greatest and most hated (and feared) enemy.

"Maedhros."

There was a deep, foul laughter then, and the hand pulled harder. "Maedhros who? Who was your father?"

"Fëanor." With this all said, Maedhros' head was released, after being thrown to the floor.

And then the dream began again, swallowing him whole, and once again his father's ashes upon the rocky plain, his eyes wet with tears.

A/N – First of all, if you actually read the entire thing, and are interested in reading this also, then this mustn't be TOO BAD of a start.

Next, this is my first Silmarillion/First Age based fic. I've never gone into this territory before, and am doing my best to remain as canon as possible. I've only read the Sil once, so this is work looking it all up. LOL, I even took notes! This is a Maedhros story, obviously, because I love him, and you should too. ;o) Tolkien gave me lots of room to get angsty by using the words "torment" and "Maedhros" in the same sentence, so this is not entirely my fault. I am a mean mean lady (to my characters), so be prepared. I'd venture to call this the big bad NC word, but for once I have left rape and extreme violence out of a story. Those who know my work will gasp and be afraid at this, but hey. Being in the clutches of Morgoth and hanging by one wrist are good enough for me.

Anyway, I'm trying to avoid writing the Same Old Maedhros Being Tormented Story™, and as I've only read (and this is my personal experience here) one fic that really elaborates on the torment part (not just the rescue and ensuing slash with Fingon), and I'm doing it differently from that, so we'll see what happens.

As any author would say at this point, please review. I'll write this regardless, but I just like to know whether people are interested or not. Otherwise I'll take it down and keep it on my website alone (it's less work, what can I say? I'm lazy).