Redemption by Music

Silmarillion / Lord of the Rings, shard two.

Author's notes:

This is what happens when you read too much Silmarillion fanfiction, all the while listening to WAY too much of Lacrimosa, Opeth and, most importantly, Deep Purple's Concerto for a Group and Orchestra.

The basic premise is unashamedly riffing (pardon the pun) on the idea of a fanfic I found on the Silmarillion Writers' Guild website, called Rise Again From Ashes by Independence1776, detailing the return of Maglor – the only surviving son of Feanor, and likely the only major character of Silmarillion to be unaccounted for in all the time that had elapsed in the world of Tolkien's writings since the First Age.

While this was intended at first to be a humorous / crack fic, as I was writing it – starting on Jan. 20th, and the whole premise had coalesced in my mind the day before – all the parody elements started to evaporate rapidly, subsumed by the serious matters.

I also believe it's the first ever story I wrote in first person, and this is an extra kind of responsibility.

När jag vandrar på den steniga vägen genom livet
När det känns som jag bar på en sorg
Då gömmer sig solen sakta i moln
Och ordet är adjö
Snart faller snö i mina drömmar

Jag måste resa igen och leta efter tröst
Jag måste leta igen efter ömhetens röst
Jag måste resa igen till nästa höst
Den ständiga resan till nästa höst

Opeth – Den ständiga resan (original song by Marie Fredriksson)

A moment of silence
Just before you hit the stage
This is your day of reckoning
To pay back all the dues and turn the page.

You hit rock bottom and you stood the count to ten
Came back to harvest glory, now your star will shine again.

Hammerfall – The Fire Burns Forever

1. Aeons Elapse

Immortality is a double-edged blade.

On one hand, it's undoubtedly a good thing that you never have to worry about your body being worn down by age and the inevitable chronic diseases, down to the point where you might be welcoming death as deliverance from the suffering. Or, worse still, fall inexorably into a barely conscious state, failing to realize anymore who you are at all, before even that feeble flicker of life is extinguished. Add to this the fact that even though the Ainur and the Elves may speak about "the gift of Ilúvatar" to mankind, and - worse still - argue its benefits, there is nothing good or appealing to the idea of becoming old, infirm, and ultimately suffer the passage from this life into something nobody has ever proved to exist. To those remaining, it looks like the cessation of existence. It may very well be.

To the Edain, the extolling of their fate by the higher beings had always sounded like fallacy; as benevolent delusion at best – to the ones who were once noblest and most favourably inclined towards the Eldar – and as mocking hypocrisy at worst. The latter viewpoint has been prevalent except for a very short time around the period of the first contact. It has also led to countless disasters, ones I do not need to remind anyone with even a basic grasp of history.

I should know that. After all, I've spent more time among the humans than any other sentient being alive, certainly more than any other I have ever known of.

I, Macalaurë Kanafinwë, once known in the language of our long departed Sindar kin as Maglor Fëanorion.

I am the last of my kind in this old, greyed world.

Note: the chapter name is from a song by Ahab (from The Giant album, 2012)