Strange Alliances
by Erestor
Disclaimer: I own nothing pertaining to The Lord of the Rings, The Silmarillion, or the Harry Potter series. This story was written for entertainment purposes only.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
'For Maglor took pity upon Elros and Elrond, and he cherished them...'
-J.R.R. Tolkien, 'The Silmarillion'
Fëanor was wandering through Rivendell, whistling. He had the smug, contented feeling that comes over one after one has just scared someone else half-witless. In fact, he had the smug, contented, important feeling that comes over one just after one has scared the Invincible Legolashalf-witless. He wanted to savor that feeling.
The feeling was short-lived. Fëanor entered a room and nearly banged into a serious little Elf that was shuffling papers one-handed whilst balancing several books on his arm and looking very preoccupied. All Third Age Elves were small and serious when compared with Fëanor, but none of the other Third Age Elves had reacted to Fëanor's presence quite in the way this one did.
"Eep!" said the serious little Elf, flinging himself backwards and throwing all his books and papers into the air. These gestures seemed entirely innocent and involuntary, but Fëanor was clunked over the head with a book nonetheless, much to his annoyance.
"What's the matter?" Fëanor demanded.
The Elf was lying in a serious little heap on the floor. Papers drifted downwards like leaves in the autumn.
Fëanor prodded the Elf, and the Elf groaned.
At that moment, and it was a very bad moment indeed, another Elf stepped into the room, saw a tall, dangerous Elf prodding his lord, and panicked. "Help! Murder! Murder!" he squealed, dashing out of the room. (In the end, nothing came of this plot development. No one ever paid attention to Lindir.)
Fëanor frowned. He shut the door and locked it. Then he bundled the Elf into a chair, stood back and stared at him for a few minutes, trying to remember if he'd seen him before.
The Elf woke up eventually. He stared up at Fëanor, looking like a small frightened mammal (perhaps a rabbit) whose life is flashing before its eyes. At last he said, "You must be Fëanor."
Fëanor was delighted at being recognized. He was also flattered that the sudden realization of his identity had actually made another Elf pass out in so spectacular a fashion. "Yes, I'm Fëanor," he said, sitting down in a seat across from the Elf. "How did you know?"
"Maglor looks a lot like you," said the Elf.
"Oh," said Fëanor. "You must be Elrond."
The Elf nodded. "Did he tell you about me?" he asked hopefully.
"Well, he tried to," said Fëanor. He remembered Maglor showing up in the Halls cooing about two wonderful Elflings and how they'd brought joy to his otherwise mundane existence, but he hadn't really been in the mood to hear about the 'little darlings'. Thousands of years in Mandos had not made him very sympathetic to sentimental driveling.
"Umm... what are you doing here?" asked Elrond, having run into a dead end with his last comment.
"Just visiting," said Fëanor. "With a few friends." He hated calling Mandos a friend. Hated it, hated it, hated it. He was going to have to make Mandos's life extra-miserable for this.
"That's... er... great," said Elrond. Trying to converse with the uncommunicative Fëanor was in the process of becoming the most terrifying experience of his life so far. "Oh, I seem to have dropped all my books," he added desperately.
"So you have," said Fëanor. "One hit me on the head."
"I'm so sorry!" cried Elrond. He leaped out of his chair and began picking up books as quickly as he could, apologizing under his breath.
"Did Maglor tell you much about me?" asked Fëanor.
"Er... oh yes... he did. Quite a bit," said Elrond frantically, scrabbling after the papers.
"May I ask what sort of things he told you?" asked Fëanor, having finally found a topic he wanted to stick with. "I mean, were the tales of my exploits happy bedtime stories, or were they more along the lines of 'get into bed this instant or I'll call for Dad and he'll chop you into pieces'?"
"Well..." said Elrond, striving to be diplomatic, because by being diplomatic he might live a little longer. "You lived a very... exciting... life."
Fëanor nodded. He had an expression of polite interest on his face, which is the most unnerving expression in the world. "They weren't happy bedtime stories," he said.
Elrond made a thankful noise in the affirmative.
"Well, Maglor always was ungrateful," said Fëanor. "I'll have to give him a bit of a talking to when I see him next. Doesn't appreciate the sort of things I went through for him. Nasty little brat."
Elrond was clinging to his books and papers as though they were his lifeline to reality. The fact was beginning to sink into his mind that Fëanor, the most dangerous, clever, and powerful Elf ever, was sitting in his study, ranting about his ungrateful son.
"I'm afraid," said Fëanor, "that I shall have to set a few things on fire. I hope you don't mind."
Elrond mumbled something about how he didn't mind.
"Good!" said Fëanor brightly. "Please excuse me, then."
As he exited the room, he pulled the cigarette lighter out of his pocket and gave it a little flick.
Mandos was on a rampage. When he caught Glorfindel, he was going to shred Glorfindel into small pieces and feed him to the crows. There was very little about Mandos that suggested how furious he was, since he was simply striding calmly after the fleeing Glorfindel, but he was furious indeed, and Nienna realized this.
"Námo!" she yelled down the hall after her brother. "I was talking to him!"
Mandos halted. He did not want to shred Glorfindel unfairly. Mandos had never rampaged before, and he didn't want to make stupid mistakes during his first attempt. He ran his fingers through his hair (trees of Valinor, now he was picking up nervous habits) and turned back to face his sister. "Well, I suppose that's all right then," he said, lamely.
Nienna was not sure how to respond to that, so she smiled nervously and went after Glorfindel, to calm him down.
Mandos did not know why he felt so strongly about Glorfindel and Nienna. (He wondered if he had become over-protective due to being in an entirely new environment. He was not used to being in a hröa for this long, and, worst of all, he was beginning to get used to it, which bothered him.) Nienna had never showed any interest in Ulmo, despite various matchmaking attempts of varying desperation on the part of the other Valar, and she had ignored the Maiar completely, despite various matchmaking attempts of varying hopefulness on the part of the Maiar. Mandos was afraid that she would become fond of Glorfindel, because they'd have to leave eventually and go back to Valinor. Anyway, Glorfindel would be an extremely obnoxious brother-in-law.
"I suppose you could always speak to him again sometime," said Erestor glumly, standing the entrance to the library. "Your message might get through his thick skull after a while."
"Perhaps," said Mandos. He felt as glum as the Elf.
"I wouldn't count on it though," said Erestor, glummer still. He trudged back into the library, and Mandos followed after him.
If there was an equivalent to the Halls of Mandos on Middle-earth, it was the library of Rivendell. Under Erestor's careful patronage and hard work, it had become a dark, quiet, organized place, frequented by few and actively avoided by many. Erestor had some candles in a box to be used as reading-lights. He lent them only to the deserving, and grudgingly at that, hence the darkness. There were some beautiful and atmospheric cobwebs in the corners and there was so much dust floating in the air that eventually Erestor's hair had turned a kind of grey-black color, which people assumed was its natural shade.
Erestor looked slantwise at Mandos, and then asked, "Would you prefer to shelve books, or to write lists?"
Mandos said that he would prefer to write lists. He liked writing things. Soon he was sitting at a desk, copying out book-titles.
A shadow fell across the desk, and he looked up, irritated. Mandos did not like interruptions to his work.
Glorfindel was standing there, brazenly, bold as you like, grinning down at Mandos as if Mandos had never come close to strewing his limbs all over Imladris. "So, he put you to work, did he?" he asked. "He manages to get everyone to work themselves to the bone for him. Don't know how he does it."
"He does not manage it with everyone," said Mandos meaningfully.
"Sorry about your sister. I'll stop teasing you," said Glorfindel.
"That was an unexpectedly wise decision for you to make."
Glorfindel's eyes danced. "Would you like to watch Fëanor make Legolas's life miserable? He's at it right now."
While other pitiable shades spent their time trying desperately to avoid Tulkas, seven fëar hid half-under one of Vairë's tapestries, and discussed the shocking (but not unprecedented) disappearance of their father.
"I wonder where he went," murmured Amras for the fifth time, thoughtfully yanking at translucent pinkish strands of his hair. (To their horror, the ghostly aspect of fëa-ness had done nothing for the hair color of Maedhros, Amrod and himself.)
"I think in this situation," said Maedhros, "we should be pondering whether Father escaped or just disappeared."
"If he had found some way to escape, would he not have taken us with him?" asked Maglor mildly. He had died only recently, when he had been eaten by Jaws in a freak accident off the coast of Lindon, and he had not yet become properly jaded about the Halls of Mandos. He acted as though he did not mind being dead.
Curufin snorted at Maglor's question. "Don't be so naïve, stupid," he said ungraciously. "I'm sure that our presence in the Halls was great incentive for Father to escape."
"Yes, Maglor," said Caranthir, "if you noticed, when we arrived here, Darling Dad didn't rush over to chat about the good old days."
"We have been rather obnoxious," said Amrod.
"Not that there's anything wrong with that," said Amras.
"Just be quiet," growled Curufin. "Let the ones of us with brains do a little thinking."
"Do you think we actually have brains?" asked Maglor. "I mean, we're not exactly flesh and blood any more."
"Ugh... I never thought about that," said Celegorm disgustedly.
"Can we get back on topic?" asked Maedhros, but in vain.
"I think Finrod is looking at me funny," muttered Caranthir.
"Don't be so paranoid," snapped Celegorm. "He's not even facing you."
"Here comes your son, Curufin," said Maglor.
"Why is he coming over here? He hates me!" cried Curufin, desperately trying to wiggle more underneath the tapestry.
"Hello, uncles," said Celebrimbor jovially.
"Hello, Celebrimbor," chorused six of the seven sons of Fëanor, not quite so jovially.
"Why is Father lying on the ground half-under that tapestry?" asked Celebrimbor.
"He fell down," said Celegorm.
"Ah." Celebrimbor stroked his chin reflectively. Then he said, "Look what I have!" and waved a scrap of paper under Maedhros's nose, Maedhros being the Elf closest to him.
Maedhros took the proffered paper, and read it, his face blank with surprise. Then he said, urgently, "How did you get this?"
Celebrimbor smirked. "Never you mind that, uncle dear. I just want you to know that it's possible." He snatched the paper back and skipped off.
"What's possible?"
"What was that?"
"What's Celebrimbor up to now?"
"He has a certificate," said Maedhros, "a certificate that will allow him to get out of the Halls of Mandos with a new body."
"What!"
His brothers all stared at Maedhros in shock.
"How did he do that?" demanded Amrod.
"I have no idea."
"And he came over to taunt us!" Amras wailed. "The villainy!"
"He always was good at getting what he wanted," said Curufin reflectively. "But then" –he smiled– "he took after his father."
"I remember when you were little, Curufin," said Maedhros, "you were always getting things by looking cute and sad. It's no wonder you were known as 'the Crafty'."
"I always thought I was called that because I was good at crafts," said Curufin in surprise.
"Cute and sad," said Celegorm. "Can you still manage that?"
Curufin looked up at Celegorm with huge, misty eyes. His lower lip wobbled.
"Let's visit Nessa," said Maedhros.
TBC...