Bracken

AN: I was going to make this slash but then I got high...also, this is probably the most plotless fic I have ever written. Just a warning.

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Naked trees line the salty shore with the illusion of perpetual winter. Yet winter is not an illusion with the Eldar - many have sailed beyond the Sea to the Blessed Land, and many now seek solace in Mandos. Maglor wanders across the expanse of sand; his powerful voice rings in melodious anguish against the rock, but none answer save for the throaty, echoing roar of the waves.

"If," he murmurs to himself, "if one day I move the rocks to tears...then it shall be the day when I am free to reutrn to my abode, or forsake this wretched existence, and it wil be the day when the oath of my father shall be made void..."

He is alone; pain has blunted the aim of his wanderings - before the first pink streak appeared in the sky, with a throat rawed by countless years of the haunting tune of Noldolante he would rise to utter its terrible tale yet again; on the tip of his toungue his tears were indistiguishable from the taste of sea spray... after the evenings' first star his retreat was in the forest of age-old trees.

The day draws to a close as the first of Varda's lights shine in an array of pin-sized colours, Maglor looks to the ground as if to forget that Elentari has forgotten him and heads through the veil of dead trees into the archaic woods.

In that darkness, the only glow emanates from his white skin - Maglor wishes that he was as dark as the living things surrounding him, so as not to feel so alone in his possession of light. Reaching a familiar glade he pauses, almost to sit down - but tonight feels different, and he remains standing, waiting.

Then, dimly but steadily it comes - the startling chantings of another, unheard for...an eternity? It is fair beyond belief; in its voice Maglor hears his own, and yet it seems as though it contains something else, something that makes Maglor shiver at its sheer beauty.

Afraid that the source of the voice belonged to one of the Divine who had come to condemn him, Maglor shuts his eyes to black out all, but sound is not sight, and the ghostly lullaby grows louder and fills the dusty air around him until he senses the breath of another presence, then altogether the ballad falters.

"Who are you?" Maglor starts at the abrupt question, warily he opens his eyes. The figue standing before his is undoubtedly an elf, while slightly shorter than Maglor, his skin is just as pale, his silvery hair extends past his waist, and his deep yellow eyes are stained with melancholy. Yet he is a Sinda, and so his race sundered far from the proud, rebellious Noldor...

"Who are you?" the question is repeated, its inquirer stepping closer. Maglor lets his gaze take one sweep down the other elf's ragged garments before answering, "I am called Maglor, son of -" he stops in mid sentence, but it is too late.

"Son of?" the other sounds impatient.

"Son of Feanor. And now I must ask of your name."

An expression of awe, and perhaps of anger crosses the other elf's face. He ignores Maglor's querie. "I have heard of that name," he speaks in a low, smooth wont. "I have heard of it once in my Lord's halls. Once, and not again. He did not gain my his favour, and so questions my opinion of you."

"Opinions matter much less than they had, Wood-elf," Maglor's own voice now grates painfully against his ears in contrast to the Sinda's. "And your Lord has perished in his halls. So will you not tell me your name? I have exchanged it with my own."

"I am Daeron the wanderer," the other says at length. "You say my Lord has perished? What of his daughter?"

"Of that I do not know," sighs Maglor. "But it surprises me more that you do not know of your land's demise."

A single rivulet runs from Daeron's eyes, and he turns away. "Then she is lost," he shakes his head with defeated grace. "And all my songs, all my wanderings, all my sorrow has been in vain."

These last words cause something inside Maglor to flicker, a sputter of anger roused by Daeron's thoughtlessness. For how dare this - this Moriquenda forsake all, deeming his sufferings too great to bear for a mere woman? Maglor has forsaken his beloved wife, his life and his soul in swearing an Oath he was not prepared to be bound by. He has seen blood, smelt blood...and shed blood out of anothers' will. Blood of his own kin.

"Then you will never comprehend mine," he hisses.

"Yours?" scoffs Daeron. "I have heard the words to your song, Maglor of the Golodhrim. It is a great song concerned with great matters. But there exists no emotion, no love, no beauty. It is nothing compared with what matters to the heart."

"Emotion? Love? Beauty?" says Maglor incredulously. "If it had, I would not be here. The Noldolante is a telling of what has been, not of what I have felt. To do so would be selfish."

"Then will you not hear my tale?" Daeron's voice dips to a whisper. "There are things that you may yet learn from it, as is it apparent that you have lost yourself. And perhaps then you will know better before judging others so quickly."

Maglor looks at Daeron, and again what was spoken elicits a response deep inside of him, and all of a sudden he can feel the age-old emptiness throb along ancient scars - in his eyes shone a silent Yes. Tell me of emotion. Tell me of love, and of beauty...

The words to his song trickle like water down the streams of time as Daeron sings of his younger days, each low, soft note resonating in Maglor's very soul. No, he had not heard of this talent, this Valarin voice embodied in the flesh of a lowly wood-elf, and for a while he struggles to catch his breath. Breezeless is the air as the Sinda utters regret, betrayal - all petty; trivial, even - but all of what a sheltered life has known, and within the confines of that existence such pains bore deeper. The melodies are slight, yet the words are clear; every movement of Daeron's lips seeks to be heard and registered, silent secrets lost in a soul, desperate for someone - anyone - to share their sadness...

Then suddenly, perhaps for the last time, the key shifts and the verses weave and interlock to tell of Luthien before she succumbed to her doom with an inferior mortal: her tresses dark as twilight as she danced in the glades at dusk, the new beams of moon illuminating her translucent skin as a pale flame would the finest pearls. And everything seemed alive as her glowing limbs moved in time to her songs; a sparkle of fresh yet ancient magic settled on the ferns and aspen and the leaves swayed in delight... Daeron's enchating voice darkens in desire as he sings of how he had longed to claim her, to place his hands on her breasts and feel the beating heart of the most beautiful of all the Children of Illuvatar as he savoured the taste of her lips on his -

Maglor interjects, a little too vehemently, for the tale of Daeron ceases.

Maglor looks at the forest floor. "True love should be unsullied, wood-elf," he sighs at length. Daeron's pale golden eyes narrow as he wipes the corners of his dry mouth with a tattered blue sleeve.

"And what love has yet to be marred by lust? I did not seek those of my own gender, nor have I claimed the body of any perforce, and that is more than I can say for many. Indeed it seems," he faded pink mouth curls into a smile of private amusement at the irony, "as though the Eldar who perceived light sought more than ever for darkness."

"In that regard you may be wrong." Those words lie, and Maglor knows it, being one of them of whom Daeron has spoken.

The wood-elf's smile has faded and he looks into his trembling hands, and Maglor starts to doubt whether he has heard heard his answer.

"But she was beautiful...you would not understand even by the finest of my songs...you Golodhrim, only concerned with the art of war, with things of consequence, with the shattering of peace, you would not understand," Daeron whispers half to himself, "Words, images locked in time cannot do her beauty justice...aye, I have failed you, my stolen one..." Daeron's tone quivers as shining drops of tears run from his eyes, and he buries his face in his hands, delicate frame swaying in grief. Moments pass, and Maglor is torn between pitying him and reminding him of his foolishness, but says nothing; silver tears drip through Daeron's fingers and glisten on the ground like liquid crystal.

Slowly, Daeron sinks to his knees as if his shuddering body were a sapling bent by a strong draught, and in the blink of an eye he is gone - like a breath of wind, his spirit unravels its wispy threads from his body and departs forever.

For a moment the Maglor is motionless, lips parted in surprise as he gazes at the remnants of the wood-elf's hroa; Daeron's slender form is pale beneath the cool rays of the white moon. And even as Maglor looks upon him who had dwelt in the magical, forgotten realm of Doriath, the elf's long fingers blend to dust, his still features chalk like ash, and it seems as though the shadows of his long silver hair are tangled between the birch twigs above.

But the Curse of Mandos still stands, and now Maglor knows that he is truly alone.

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Feedback, criticism, comments all welcome.

I read somewhere that elven hroa deteriorate very quickly after death. Urgh.

Just to let you know, I think Daeron is a bit of a spoilt brat and I don't feel more sorry for him than for Maglor.