A/N: This story is compliant to events of The Ransom of The House of Fëanor, but can be read entirely separately.
The Shadow of a Friend
Eirian Erisdar
Chapter 1: Old Wounds
The news comes to Tirion one fair spring morning a yen after the fall of Barad-dûr: the tattered spirit of what had once been Sauron, the greatest servant of Morgoth, has been captured at last.
Tirion is fairly aflame with the news mere moments after the messenger from Valimar clatters over the cobblestones of the courtyard of the King.
Fëanor (who had finally acquiesced to accept the crown from his youngest brother fifty years ago) rightly sends a messenger to inform his elder grandson before anything else.
Celebrimbor Telperinquar Curufinwion receives the news with a slow nod of acknowledgement, and promptly returns to his forge and his latest project without pausing for thought.
After all, he has spent long millennia in Námo's Halls trying not to think too much about Morgoth's most faithful lieutenant; it is easier to continue the practice now, rebodied and unmarked, with the familiar air of Tirion about him and the warmth of the forge by his side.
His current project is as demanding of patience as it is of his skill as a smith; Celebrimbor uses this excuse to escape his father's offer of noon meal, and sends one of his apprentices to express his apologies to Finrod's house when Finrod extends a written invitation to visit that same afternoon.
Fëanor's rather more unsubtle invitation to supper comes in the form of Celebrimbor's eldest uncle, who hides his concern very poorly.
"I'm fine," Celebrimbor finds himself saying bluntly as he pushes Maedhros out of the workshop. "I cannot come to supper because am going to see Ecthelion's concert this evening. That is all. Give Grandfather my regards, and tell Grandmother I am sorry to miss her pastries."
"Tyelpë–" Maedhros protests, but whatever else he had been about to say vanishes behind the thick workshop door as Celebrimbor slams it shut. Good, solid woodwork, that door; Celebrimbor had ordered it made exactly to his specifications when he returned from the Halls a little over a century ago.
Celebrimbor runs a soot-stained hand over his face, glances at the window to judge the angle of the setting sun in the sky, and goes to find an appropriate tunic.
(:~:)
Celebrimbor ventures not two steps into the crowded atrium before he realises his mistake.
The vaulted ceiling of the great opera house of the Finwëan district glitters overhead. The murmur of quiet speech surrounds Celebrimbor as he threads through the crowd in search of wine, and without fail, each and every conversation is of Námo's newest prisoner.
"I hear the filth did not come quietly," Celebrimbor hears someone say, as he passes a group of Gil-Galad's people. "I am told he was laughing even as Eönwë led him before Manwë in chains."
A hiss of disgust. "Well, he is Námo's prisoner now. I hope he rots there in the shadow of the Halls while the Valar debate his fate."
Celebrimbor grits his teeth and quickens his pace. Wine, then the matter of finding his seat; surely there will be no more speech of this matter once Ecthelion begins the concert proper–
"Did you hear he was still wearing an image of the Firstborn?" the whisper comes behind him. "That awful glamour he wore when he wormed his way into the favour of Ost-in-Edhil–"
Celebrimbor's fingers slip as he reaches for a goblet from a passing attendant. He steadies his grasp immediately, and the swell of crimson liquid settles in the goblet like congealing blood.
Celebrimbor had not made a sound; but the attendant does, a soft gasp that causes heads to turn in their direction.
A terrible silence descends in an immediate circle about him. Celebrimbor raises his head, and meets the horrified gazes of those who had been speaking a moment before.
Celebrimbor holds their gazes steadily, despite the thunder of his pulse in every finger clenched about the goblet in his hand.
He smiles sharply, raises his the goblet in a salute, and downs the wine in one long draw.
Then he returns the empty goblet to the white-faced attendant with a polite word of thanks, and goes to find his seat.
The lanterns dim. Ecthelion of the Fountain ascends the stage, bows to enthusiastic applause, and begins to play.
Celebrimbor sits still and silent throughout it all, and hears not a single note.
An idea occurs to him, takes hold, and refuses to fade.
(:~:)
He ruminates over the matter a further three days. On the third, a letter comes from Avallónë, from the house of Fëanor's younger grandson; Elrond makes no particular demand or expression of worry, unlike Fëanor and Curufin, but offers Celebrimbor the sanctuary of Elrond's quiet cliff-top home by the sea, and listening ear should Celebrimbor wish it.
Celebrimbor locks the letter in a drawer in his study, and goes to seek his father.
He finds Curufin working a long length of bright alloy that sparks and hisses in the light of the setting sun cascading through the westward window of the forge.
Celebrimbor halts at the door of the workshop. As a smith himself, he knows well the importance of not interrupting the working of freshly heated metal.
But Curufin only smiles when he catches sight of Celebrimbor, and sets aside his hammer without further ado, leaving the length of metal to fade from cherry red to dim yellow.
"Tyelpë," Curufin says, pulling off his work gloves and leather apron to gather Celebrimbor into a light embrace. "I am glad to see you. Have you come for supper? Your mother will be pleased."
"I haven't decided," Celebrimbor says, returning his father's embrace gratefully. He eyes the abandoned anvil. "Is that quite all right to leave to cool? Don't stop your work on my account."
Curufin bats an easy hand. "Nothing I can't start over. I have been experimenting with a new alloy. Your grandfather is quite eager to see the results himself."
"I see," Celebrimbor says. "Father…I wonder if we might speak a while?"
Concern instantly enters Curufin's gaze. He looks Celebrimbor up and down, quickly, as thought gauging for injury.
"Are you well?" Curufin says, urgently. His hand closes vice-like about Celebrimbor's fingers.
Celebrimbor stifles a sigh.
There had been a time in Hithlum and later Nargothrond where Curufin had turned from his family to ever more to seek the Silmarils, and power for himself and Celegorm; it had driven Celebrimbor's mother to stay behind in Hithlum, and had caused Celebrimbor to choose to remain with Orodreth when their cousin cast out Curufin and Celegorm from Nargothrond.
Curufin had not been the best father from whom to seek advice, in Nargothrond. Celebrimbor had often gone to Finrod instead, before Finrod had left with Beren. And then there had been the fall of Nargothrond, then Sirion and Celebrimbor's horror at facing remaining uncles with a sword in his hand – and then he had found himself suddenly lord over the remnant of Fëanor's people in Eregion, a lord to whom people turned for advice.
To Curufin's credit, he has been attempting to make amends since his return, but he often does so to the extent that Celebrimbor finds…exasperating.
"I am well," Celebrimbor says. "Only – well. There is the matter of Þauron."
"I see," Curufin says reassuringly, even though he plainly does not. "You need not be ashamed if you are afraid, my son. Nor do you need to fear. The betrayer is chained with Aulë's own work, I am told, and locked under guard before Námo's Halls. You will never have to see him again."
Celebrimbor opens his mouth, and shuts it again.
His father is leading him quite determinedly in the direction of the kitchens, where the scent of his mother's cooking brings him back to the tranquil peace of his childhood under the Light of the Trees.
"Father–" Celebrimbor manages, but then his mother has appeared and he suffers to be embraced with sugar-dusted hands and to be kissed on both cheeks as though he is an elfling, and not millennia-old and Lord of Eregion for centuries before Annatar came.
His mother is glad to see him – his mother, who spent long years captive in Angband after Hithlum fell, and does not deserve to be reminded of her worst jailer.
Celebrimbor stays for supper, and speaks not a further word of why he came.
(:~:)
"Tyelpë!" Finrod says delightedly. "How good to see you."
A measure of relief enters Celebrimbor's mind as Finrod smiles at him. Finrod had always been easier to speak to than his own father on matters not related to the forge.
"I didn't expect to find you here," Celebrimbor says, eyeing the freshly raked hay of the stall and the spotlessness of the stables. "Don't you have grooms for this?"
Finrod laughs as he sets aside the rake and plants his grime-streaked hands on his hips. "The wonderful thing about my father no longer being king is that I have far more time to myself. I think it's worthwhile to muck out my own stables once in a while. Reminds me what it was like in Hithlum when the rest of us first arrived in Beleriand."
It is at times like these that Celebrimbor understands his uncles' frustration at the sheer perfection of Finarfin's children – Finrod most of all, beloved even by he Valar themselves.
Celebrimbor turns to his cousin again and finds Finrod looking keenly at him.
"Drink?" Finrod says, nonchalantly.
"Yes," Celebrimbor replies.
In short order Celebrimbor is settled into one of the unfairly comfortable chairs of Finrod's study, a glass of horrendously expensive Vanyarin wine in his hand, and Finrod cleaned up opposite, already starting on his second glass.
"So," Finrod says, leaning languidly back into his seat. His golden hair fans out behind him as it dries in the late afternoon sun. "Is this a casual visit? Or is this about the other thing that we have in common? Apart from being cousins, that is."
It does not escape Celebrimbor's notice that for all his cousin's casual ease, Finrod takes a rather large sip of wine after that statement.
"The other thing," Celebrimbor says, lowering his glass. The Vanyarin wine is excellent. It still somehow tastes of blood.
Finrod does not immediately reply. It is a trait of his that Celebrimbor has always appreciated; Curufin would have immediately started speaking, Fëanor would have looked like a lance of flame into his very fëa, but Finrod allows him time to think. He is similar to Elrond in that way.
"Would you–" Celebrimbor grapples with the words. It is one thing to think it, among the silent audience in the dark opera house with Ecthelion's flute-song all about him, but to say it is another matter. His knuckles whiten on the graceful stem of his glass.
"If you had the choice," he says, pushing the words out past his stiffened lips, "If you had the choice, would you go to face him again?"
Finrod is silent for a long while. Celebrimbor forces himself to look at his cousin, and finds Finrod carefully examining the beam of sunlight that refracts through the mellow gold of his wine glass.
"I don't think I would," Finrod says, quietly. "In a way I'd already defeated him once, when he sent his wolves. I have no more things to say to him; Beren lived. I foresaw it and it came about exactly as I had seen, blood and song and all. That Elrond exists is reward enough for my victory."
Celebrimbor blinks.
That is…not the answer he had expected. Not from one who had fought Sauron with song and word and then bare fists and teeth.
But Námo does not deign to release those under his care unless they are healed; Finrod had been in the Halls mere weeks before he was rebodied, but perhaps…perhaps even then he had already been healed.
Closure, the dwarves of Khazad-dûm had called it. A mortal term. There is no exact translation in Valinorean Quenya. Closure.
"Tyelpë?"
Celebrimbor raises his head. Finrod has lowered his glass and is looking at Celebrimbor with some alarm.
Celebrimbor takes a breath, tosses back his head, and drains the rest of his wine. When the crystalline goblet is empty, he reaches for the flagon between them and refills the glass to the brim.
"This wine is excellent," Celebrimbor says. "I hope you do not mind."
"Not at all," Finrod says.
Celebrimbor lowers the flagon, and Finrod's hand settles over his on the flagon handle, feather-light.
"It would not be wise to go," Finrod says, holding Celebrimbor's gaze with calm certainty. "You know better than I why it would be so."
The memory of Annatar's hand, still calloused with forge-work – forge-work that Celebrimbor had taught him – tracing the newly blossoming bruise on Celebrimbor's shoulder before the iron poker had lanced white-hot from the glowing coals to plunge into Celebrimbor's skin–
Finrod's fingers are white-knuckled over Celebrimbor's, now; Celebrimbor notes with a shuttered breath that he had let the memory come to the surface of his mind, where Finrod had not doubt seen all.
"It would not be wise," Celebrimbor agrees, quietly. A part of him is still conflicted; he does not understand why.
He had come to ask for advice, and advice he has been given.
"Stay for supper," Finrod says abruptly.
Celebrimbor looks at him. "I couldn't impose–"
"Don't be daft," Finrod says, and raises his glass in the light of the setting sun. "I have three more bottles of this particular vintage. I'm not going to finish them alone. Amarië won't object. Findekáno comes often enough."
Celebrimbor raises an eyebrow. "Dear me. I do wonder how you managed to look presentable when your father was king and you presided over morning council."
"Practice," Finrod says, and tosses back the remainder of his glass in one.
(:~:)
"Do you think bravery can also be stupidity," Celebrimbor says as he settles by the campfire to skin the rabbits they had caught for supper.
"Yes," Maedhros replies, sharpening his hunting knife.
Celebrimbor fights a wince. Down by the river, Amrod and Amras have caught Maglor in a headlock and are pushing him steadily towards the water. Curufin watches, smirking, entirely unaware that Celegorm is sneaking up behind him.
When Celebrimbor glances up, he finds Maedhros looking at him, hunting knife abandoned.
"Why do you ask?" Maedhros says. He is wearing an expression Celebrimbor finds entirely too familiar until he realises it is the same expression Fëanor wears when he is concerned for his sons.
"Nothing in particular," Celebrimbor says. "Forget I said anything."
In the river, Maglor is standing waist-high in the current, shouting at his youngest brothers as the twins laugh on the bank; Curufin smiles dangerously as he surfaces, reaches for Celegorm's helping hand, and pulls Celegorm in, drenching Caranthir as he does so.
Fresh shouting and splashing erupts into the afternoon air.
Maedhros's brows furrow with concern. "Do you need your father?" He turns towards the river, lips forming the first syllable of Curvo–
Celebrimbor clamps a hand over Maedhros's wrist. His right wrist, which now continues down into an unmarked hand where for so long it had stopped short.
Rabbit blood drips from Celebrimbor's fingers to line his uncle's in crimson.
Maedhros falls silent.
Maedhros had never spoken of who his torturers had been in Angband before they hung him on the precipice at Thangorodrim. Celebrimbor is willing to wager the name of one of them.
"It is nothing," Celebrimbor says, and holds his eldest uncle's gaze until Maedhros's eyes soften.
"Are you thinking of doing anything brave that could also be construed as stupid?" Maedhros says steadily, though his free hand rises to clasp Celebrimbor's shoulder.
The chatter of laughter and good-natured shoves filter across to them as Celebrimbor's father and uncles draw near, all of them drenched.
"No," Celebrimbor says. "At least, not at the moment."
Maedhros nods, and it is a testament to his respect for Celebrimbor's own claim to lordship that he does not press the matter.
Then Amrod and Amras dart over to Maedhros and fling sopping sleeves about him, and there is too much yelling to speak further.
(:~:)
A week passes, in which Celebrimbor begins no less than seven new projects and completes precisely none of them.
On the seventh day he pulls open a drawer at his desk, removes the folded letter within, and rereads the perfect lines of Tengwar with eyes gritty from lack of sleep.
He packs enough for two weeks' journey, far more than needed for the day's journey to Avallónë from Tirion, and rides out with the early morning mists east through the pass of Calacirya.
(:~:)
Celebrimbor storms into Elrond's solarium and voices his question before he even sheds his travelling cloak.
"What constitutes self-destructive behaviour?"
Silence.
Elrond looks up calmly from his medicinal herbs, and lays aside his pruning shears.
"Well," Elrond says, his face a picture of composure. "What do you think constitutes self-destructive behaviour? It is good to see you, by the way. I'm glad you accepted my invitation."
Celebrimbor bats away the attendant who reaches for his cloak. "No, that's quite all right, I'll handle it myself, thank you– Elrond," he says exasperatedly. "You're the healer. I came to ask you that question."
"Thank you," Elrond directs at the attendant. "If I could trouble you for some tea for my cousin and I."
The attendant's soft footsteps fade away down the corridor, and Celebrimbor is suddenly aware of the windswept state of his clothes and the dust still caught in his travelling cloak.
"Come sit," Elrond says, directing Celebrimbor to a chair. He smiles. "I've never had to invite you to sit before. We have an hour or so before supper; if the matter is not resolved by then I will inform Celebrían of our regrets and have our cook send up a tray."
"…Thank you," Celebrimbor says, and unclasps his cloak. Elrond takes it in lieu of the attendant, and places it aside.
"Now," Elrond says, settling opposite, "What is troubling you?"
"What is–" Celebrimbor blinks. None of the others he sought to speak with had thought to ask him that question. They had all assumed they already knew.
There was once a time where Elrond would often make the ride eastwards from Mithlond to Ost-In-Edhil, and Celebrimbor could speak freely with his youngest surviving cousin where all others in Eregion would only look to Celebrimbor for advice.
Annatar had done away with that.
The attendant returns with tea, and leaves as quietly as she came; Elrond waits patiently.
Celebrimbor takes a breath. "I find myself wishing to visit Þauron in his captivity."
He waits.
But Elrond does not exclaim, or look horrified, or immediately counsel him otherwise.
"I see," Elrond says, tilting his head in a manner that reminds Celebrimbor infuriatingly of Makalaurë. "And you think this is – how did you put it – self-destructive behaviour?"
"Yes," Celebrimbor replies, a trifle snappishly. "No. I mean– I don't know."
"Well," Elrond says. "That would depend on why you wish to see your former captor."
Celebrimbor pauses. "He was my friend," he says.
Elrond chokes a little on his tea, despite his evident efforts to maintain a healer's calm expression.
"I see," he says, with forced lightness.
Celebrimbor nearly upends his cup. "No, I didn't mean– not like that – I don't think of him as a friend any longer, naturally. I only meant–"
"Ah. I quite understand," Elrond says, looking somewhat steadier. "Continue."
The tea tastes of summer flowers, and the light of the sun.
There is no trace of iron-tinged blood, or the stench of suffering and filth that suffuses the deepest stone dungeons of the citadel of Ost-in-Edhil.
"He," Celebrimbor begins. He halts, and finds himself having to take another sip of tea to ground himself before he speaks again.
Elrond sits quite still, holding his gaze, listening.
"He never removed his glamour," Celebrimbor hears himself saying, hollow and foreign. "The image of Annatar, my friend. At first I didn't understand whatI was seeing, when I saw him there with the blood of my people on his hands, wearing that same brilliant half-smile he used to wear when we worked at the forge together."
Celebrimbor takes another sip of tea, because there is nothing else to do, and it is better than screaming. "He was still wearing that smile when he dragged me in my broken armour down to the deepest depths of the citadel."
"Ah," Elrond says. "And I take it that he did not deem it necessary to change his face throughout your captivity." Elrond's gaze is sorrowful, but holds no pity. Celebrimbor is grateful for it.
Celebrimbor nods once, and wraps his fingers tighter around the ceramic of his teacup. "He didn't change his face, or his voice, or his hands. And all along while he tormented me he made sure I understood he was still Annatar, the one whom I had thought was my friend."
"I see," Elrond says. He looks contemplative. "And why do you wish to see him again?"
"I simply–" Celebrimbor runs his hand over his face. "I want to bury my friend, Elrond."
Silence.
Celebrimbor lowers his hand, and finds Elrond looking at him with a closed expression – the kind Elrond wears when he is hiding something that pains him for the sake of others.
"Cousin," Elrond says quietly. "Námo does not allow those who are not yet healed to return from his Halls."
"Yes," Celebrimbor says. He does not like where this is heading.
"Did I–" Elrond says, quiet and steady, each word like a healer's careful stitch, "Did I force Námo's hand in releasing you too early when I ransomed Fëanor's House? Námo assured me you were healed."
Celebrimbor stares.
"I was healed. I am not ill, Elrond," he says, hearing the disbelieving anger in his own voice.
"I am not saying you are," Elrond says placatingly, though he looks relieved all the same. "Why do you feel the need to bury him?"
"I don't know," Celebrimbor says, struggling to maintain his anger; it is easier to be angry than to consider the seething maelstrom of his own thoughts.
"Do you wish him dead, utterly and completely?"
Yes, Celebrimbor thinks, and knows it is a lie before he even speaks it. "No," he says instead. "I suspect…I suspect I need to say goodbye. To the man I thought was my friend, who had laughed with me once and laughed as he tormented me. I need to say goodbye on my own terms. Not…not gasping out my last breath in a pool of my own blood."
Elrond looks at him steadily, and nods once, decisively.
"That seems sensible enough," he says. "Would you like some company?"
"Excuse me?" Celebrimbor blinks.
"Understand, I am only asking as your cousin," Elrond says calmly. "As a healer I would insist you do not go alone."
Celebrimbor stares.
Something warm and light and steady suffuses him.
"I would be grateful if you accompanied me, Cousin," he murmurs, and hears the rasp of exhausted relief in his own voice.
"Good," Elrond says, and stands briskly. "We must to supper, and let us agree not to mention this to your father or my fathers."
Celebrimbor thinks of Curufin, and Maedhros and Maglor, and smiles ruefully. "Agreed."
Next Chapter: Elrond and Celebrimbor travel to Sauron's prison in the shadow of Námo's halls, and Celebrimbor comes face-to-face with the one whom he once called his closest friend.
Thanks for reading so far, everyone. For anyone wondering where the last chapter of A Song In Stone is, I posted a life update with reasons as to the delay on my tumblr (handle is eirianerisdar).
I'm on a much-needed one week holiday, so I'll have the next chapter out soon. this will be a two-or-three-parter. I thrive on comments and feedback, so leave a comment if you like!