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.
Thanks for reading and reviewing!
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
'None of the Eldalië ever hated Melkor more than Fëanor son of Finwë, who first named him Morgoth...'
-J.R.R. Tolkien, 'The Silmarillion'
Lúthien, Fëanor, and Maedhros looked at each other.
"Welcome to sunny Mordor," said Lúthien at last. She sat down on a grimy window ledge and hugged her arms to herself. She felt cold and sick. She missed Beren. Having adventures with Fëanor and his son just wasn't the same.
Maedhros tried to sit down on the same window ledge, and found that he could not come within a meter of Lúthien. He frowned in puzzlement.
Fëanor sat down on the floor. His legs were not tired, but sitting made a change of perspective.
"What should we do?" asked Lúthien.
"We should–" began Maedhros and Fëanor in unison, and they both paused to scowl at each other.
"I am your father," said Fëanor. "I should be in charge."
"I have had more experience with this sort of thing," said Maedhros. "I should be in charge."
Lúthien sighed.
Fëanor and Maedhros bickered for a few minutes. Then Maedhros asked Lúthien, "Can you still make your hair grow really long? With sleeping spells mixed in?"
"I cannot fool Morgoth in the same way twice," said Lúthien. "I was lucky enough the first time."
"I know!" said Fëanor. "Maedhros can sneak up on Morgoth and stab him to death, while Lúthien and I are distracting him!"
"Distracting him?" Lúthien asked, arching her eyebrows.
"Yes. Ghosts and beautiful women are very distracting," said Fëanor. "I can walk through walls, you know."
"Why don't you haunt Morgoth for a while, Fëanor?" asked Lúthien.
"Haunt him?"
Lúthien nodded. "Make him uneasy. Keep him awake at night. Then, when he is greatly fatigued, Maedhros can sneak up on him and stab him to death."
"Or you could distract him all by yourself, Lúthien," said Fëanor, "while Maedhros sneaks up and stabs him to death."
"Wait. Why am I always the one who has to stab him to death?" asked Maedhros.
"You don't want to kill him? I thought you would enjoy it," said Lúthien.
"Well, I would, of course, but why must I be the stabber?"
"Two reasons," said Lúthien. "Firstly, Fëanor cannot pick up a knife, let alone stab someone with it. Secondly, I cannot stab him, because I will not be able to come within an arm's length of him."
"You could throw a spear at him," suggested Maedhros.
"I couldn't, actually."
They sat in silence for a few minutes, pondering their problem.
"Perhaps Sauron could stab him to death?"
Maedhros and Fëanor gave Lúthien a questioning look. "I thought we had decided to leave Sauron out of this," said Maedhros.
"Why should we leave him out of this, if we can't do this without him?" asked Lúthien in a reasonable tone.
Fëanor shook his head. "I don't doubt that Sauron wants to get rid of Morgoth, but that doesn't mean that the world would be a better place with him in charge instead."
"True," said Lúthien.
"We could finish off Sauron after we had stabbed Morgoth," said Maedhros.
"How do we know that stabbing Morgoth will destroy him?" asked Fëanor. "He might stay alive."
"If Maedhros dies in his stabbing attempt, I could come in for the kill with my spear," joked Lúthien. She saw Maedhros's expression and cringed apologetically.
"But if we defeat Morgoth, then Sauron will just take over," said Maedhros. "We need to defeat them both at the same time."
"Then we can ask Sauron to stab Morgoth to death. He will fail, and Morgoth will kill him instead," said Fëanor. "Then Maedhros can sneak up and stab Morgoth to death while he's choking Sauron, or whatever he likes to do to people who try to stab him. Sauron will be half-throttled, and unable to defend himself properly, so Maedhros can kill him next."
"You know, if it were really this simple to kill Morgoth, I'm sure the world would not have been under his sway for thousands of years," remarked Maedhros.
"I am sure no one ever thought of a plan so startling in its simplicity," said Lúthien.
Fëanor waved a ghostly hand modestly. "You need say no more."
"I think I should say one thing more," said Lúthien, " just to remind you. Not only can Sauron make illusions, change shape, and sound wise and reliable when he's lying his head off, but he can also sing."
"Sing?"
"That's how he defeated Finrod and my dear husband."
"Is there anything he cannot do?" asked Maedhros.
"There is one thing he cannot do," said Lúthien, "and that is stab Morgoth to death. Because if he could, I am sure Morgoth would be destroyed by now. The Valar are the only ones who can defeat Morgoth. We cannot."
"We can try," said Fëanor.
Manwë and Varda sat on the steps outside their home, listening to Vairë as she gabbled out her bad news. Eventually she had to pause so that she could breathe, and Manwë interjected the question, "So you think Morgoth is back?"
"Yes," said Vairë in a strangled tone.
Manwë thought for a moment. Clichéd phrases came to mind, such as 'this is not good'.
"I can check," Varda volunteered. "I can go to the Void again, and see if he is missing."
"But he is missing!" cried Vairë, still sounding strangled. Taniquetil was a high mountain; there wasn't a lot of oxygen readily available for inhalation. "I tell you, he just appeared in Middle-earth! He's taking over it!"
"But some of him might still be in the Void," said Varda. "I have a theory that he is capable of putting pieces of himself in several places at once."
Vairë blinked. "Oh," she said.
"That is a good idea," Manwë said to his wife. "Do you mind looking for him?"
"No," said Varda. She stood up and hurried away, looking very businesslike.
Manwë asked, "Did you say that you could not undo your weaving, Vairë?"
"Yes," said Vairë.
Manwë pondered this some more. Distinctly unpleasant possibilities crowded his thoughts. He said, "I'm sorry, Vairë. I think I have failed you."
"Failed me?" echoed Vairë, worried.
Manwë stood up and set off down the mountain at a brisk jog. Vairë rushed after him. "Failed me?" she asked again.
"I hope I'm right about this," muttered Manwë. "I really hope I'm right."
They ran some more. They ran all the way to Aulë's forge, where Manwë asked Aulë if he could borrow his largest hammer. Vairë grew more worried.
Manwë lugged the hammer to Vairë's hall of weaving, walked purposefully across the room, lifted the hammer above his head with an effort, and then brought it crashing down on top of the loom.It creaked and shuddered.
"What are you doing?" screamed Vairë.
Manwë bashed the loom again. One of its legs popped off and skittered across the floor. Vairë kept on screaming. Manwë was terrified that he might have leaped to the wrong conclusion, but he had a feeling that he was right. He hoped he was right. If he wasn't, Vairë would probably try to kill him.
He slammed the hammer down again and again. He bashed the loom until it lay on the floor in a mangled, twisted heap, with pieces of thread tangled around its shattered remains. Vairë finally stopped screaming. She looked rather shattered as well.
"What have you done?" she whispered.
Manwë was beginning to think he had been wrong when he saw a very small, very sneaky shadow trying to creep around the framework of the decimated loom. He reached down and grabbed it.
"Um, what is happening?" asked Vairë.
"I thought that Morgoth was in your mind," said Manwë, "but he wasn't. He was in your loom. He's been controlling things from there; probably messing up historical events when you weren't looking."
"My loom...?"
"Now that I've smashed it, history in Middle-earth will come to a halt. Morgoth will be weakened now that I have a piece of him. He will be easily destroyed," said Manwë encouragingly.
"That's... good," said Vairë. She looked at her loom and sniffled.
"I'll have Aulë make you a new one as soon as possible," said Manwë. "I'm so sorry it had to be decimated."
"That's... all right," said Vairë, and burst into tears.
Manwë held on tightly to the wriggling shadowy form. "I'll just go put this bit of Morgoth back in the Void," he said awkwardly, and hurried away, wishing his line of work didn't force him to be so destructive.
When Varda encountered Eärendil again, he had regressed to whistling the Anthem of Gondolin backwards, having mastered the Anthem of Sirion. At first Varda did not recognize the cacophony that issued from his lips, but eventually he stopped trying to whistle and told her what he was doing. Varda nodded wisely and said nothing, except that she would like him to take her to the Door of Night again, please.
"Certainly, Lady Elbereth," said Eärendil obligingly.
It did not take long before they had reached the Door. Varda unlocked it, slipped through the Walls of the World, and found herself standing in the blackness of the Void. She produced a star from her pocket, and waved it around, searching for signs of Melkor.
"Morgoth!" she yelled. "Are you here?"
There was nothing but silence. The Void was very... empty, actually living up to its name for once.
Overcome with annoyance, Varda murmured a mild, Valarly swearword. "I suppose all of him must be in Middle-earth then," she said. She flung her star forcefully into the emptiness, and watched, with slight satisfaction, as it exploded into a million pieces.
Morgoth rather resembles the genus of weed known as the dandelion. He is hard to eradicate. He sprouts up where he is least expected. Unlike dandelions, he is not yellow and cheerful. Unlike dandelions, he does not make the world a better place. But in other ways, he is very like them.
Despite Manwë's optimism, history in Middle-earth continued. Of course.
Sitting at her computer, Luthy wished that she had not studied the languages of Middle-earth quite so intensively. At that moment, Morgoth was using a lot of the less savory words to express his anger and frustration, and she wished she couldn't understand them.
"Um, what's happening?" asked Luthy eventually.
Nothing replied Morgoth.
Unconvinced, Luthy tapped her fingers on her desk. "Anything else you want me to write," she asked, "or can I get up now?"
You aren't having fun? asked Morgoth. She thought he seemed genuinely surprised. You aren't enjoying killing all who oppose me? You aren't enjoying taking my upstart Maia down a peg or two? Don't you enjoy being POWERFUL?
Luthy thought. "Actually..." she said at last, "Actually, I do rather enjoy this..."
XD replied Morgoth.
TBC...