Golden light streamed through the high windows of Fëanor's dining hall, bathing three of his sons in a shimmering, ephemeral glow. Maedhros and Maglor sat together, their backs to the windows as Curufin stood proudly at the far end of the table, gesticulating enthusiastically as he talked. Maglor listened to him with an air of strained patience, fiddling with the end of his braided hair in irritation as Curufin's brash words echoed through the room. He squinted to his right at Maedhros, hoping for some sort of moral support as Curufin continued to rant, but Maedhros was sullenly sprawled backwards in his chair, gazing absently at the eight-rayed star emblazoned in crimson and glittering golden thread hung across the wall, a magnificent banner that centuries ago their mother had woven for her princely fiancé. Maglor eyed with some concern his brother's hollow look; the strange yellowing bruise on his cheek, disturbingly vivid against the pallid, sickly tone to Maedhros' skin that had become all-too pronounced of late. A slight frown crossed his brows, and reluctantly he turned back to Curufin, once more listening to the hateful words spilling from his lips.

"Father should have slain him then and there!" Curufin exclaimed, miming a sword thrust as he spoke, his dark eyes glittering. "He could have done, nobody would have stopped him. Indeed I would have helped!"

He smiled in satisfaction, an arrogant smirk twisted across his face as he flicked his sable hair behind his shoulders, looking coldly across the table at his brothers. Maedhros remained silent, seemingly unhearing of Curufin's words as he continued to stare at the banner. His fingers drummed an erratic, faltering rhythm against the table as he wandered in thought, recent events turning over and over in his mind, and he paid little heed to the strident words of his sibling. Maglor however was not content to bear Curufin's haughtiness unchecked, and he leant forward, a sternness gleaming in his deep blue eyes.

"Do not speak that way!" he began, a brittleness ringing his usually lilting voice. "It was horrific that our family should come to violence over something so trivial. Have words lost their power? Can we no longer settle our differences with reason, with intelligence? Or must we simply thrust our swords in each others faces, to threaten, to coerce; like beasts snarling over a kill?"

"You are too soft for such matters, Maglor," Curufin sneered. "Go back to your songs, your fantasies, your harps and lutes and silly viols. Battles are fought with weapons, not words. It is the bright sword that slices through armour, the arrow that pierces bone…"

Abruptly Curufin reached behind his back, snatching up the dagger that lay sheathed against the base of his spine. He spun it around before slamming it down onto the table, its whetted blade glinting hungrily. Curufin leant forward, the hilt clutched within his pale fingers, his knuckles showing white beneath his skin as he gripped it, near grinding the crossbar into the wood.

"This is what wins fights, brother, not your useless words!"

Maglor sighed, shaking his head in exasperation, and pushed back in his chair, regarding Curufin with a disapproving stare from across the table. But at his stinging words Maedhros unexpectedly shifted, a messy swirl of hair tumbling across his shoulders as he tilted his head, propping his chin up on his hand as he edged his elbows onto the table. His lips quirked thinly as he bit down the scathing remark he so desperately wished to make, but instead he opted for a milder course, hoping still to make his brother see sense.

"You speak of things that you do not understand, Curufin," he said, his voice carefully kept level despite the stirrings of anger that plucked at his heart. "Weapons are dull, mute affairs. Yes, they are useful, but they are deadly. You cannot ask advice of a corpse. You cannot apologize to it. Words give meaning to actions; they are the sparks, the catalyst. But how we proceed from there is up to us – the pen or the sword. The choice lies before you."

Curufin snorted derisively as he straightened, his nose wrinkling in disgust.

"That is the coward's way out, Maedhros, and you know it. You heard what our uncle was saying! Slinking around behind Father's back, undermining his standing with the king. He plots to overthrow us, can't you see that? He tries to steal from you your birthright. You are the eldest, Maedhros, surely you of all people would care? The throne in time may be yours, and you would have it stolen from you?"

Steely silence followed Curufin's outburst, as Maedhros and Maglor stared coolly at him, unmoved. With a sigh of frustration Curufin sensed the mood turning against him, and turned to Maglor, glaring at him pointedly.

"And what of you, Maglor? Have you nothing to say? Your family's honour is slighted, we are threatened to be dispossessed of our rights, and you would just sit here, and do nothing?"

"I have no wish to quarrel with my uncle," Maglor replied gravely, a frown knitting his brows. "I do not believe that his intentions were aimed in malice. I think he truly wished the king to take a firmer hand on matters of court, and to seek the source of these rumours of insurrection. Do you not think it strange? For since when has our uncle ever shown the slightest sign of jealousy? When have our cousins ever grudged us anything?"

"Always!" Curufin growled, a vicious light flaring in his eyes, shining in obsidian fury. "They have hidden it well, but it is there, lurking beneath the façade of friendship. Beneath their smiles they envy us, they always have. Like insidious little maggots they have wormed their way amongst us, inside of us…"

With his last remark Curufin looked snidely at Maedhros, his insinuation plain. Maglor winced, internally praying that Maedhros wouldn't react, that he would not rise to the bait dangled so foolishly in front of him. But Maedhros sat like he was carved of marble, unfeeling, unseeing; unreacting as Curufin's barbed vitriol washed over him, and inwardly Maglor breathed a sigh of relief, before focusing wearily once more on Curufin.

"…and we have welcomed them with open arms! They have bided their time well, but now we feel their poison."

"Curufin, this is madness!" Maglor cried; every tendon in his hands locked rigid as he fought down the urge to clench them into fists. "What proof have you of this, what evidence?"

Curufin bridled a little, his jaw working, and Maglor seeing the weakness in his argument pressed forward: "You echo Father without thought, without care. But this cannot come from you alone. What say Caranthir, and the twins? And Celegorm?"

Maglor cocked his head oddly, a persistently nagging thought suddenly coalesced into clarity within him.

"Where is Celegorm?" he asked, "I have not seen him at all recently."

"The fool fell off his horse while hunting," Curufin replied brusquely, rolling his eyes. "It is not serious, but I believe that Caranthir and the twins are keeping him company while Mother stitches him back up."

Maglor nodded, a wry smile sneaking across his lips, which sharply disappeared as Curufin snapped: "But that is beside the point. You both have heard as well as I, it has been whispered in my ears by many: 'Beware the sons of Fingolfin, for they wish to usurp the elder line of princes.' Do you think I will stand idly by as rumour becomes fact?"

"Who started these rumours then?" Maedhros abruptly interjected, glancing at Curufin from beneath a wave of auburn hair. "Where is their source? I credit our cousins with enough discretion to keep their secrets if they so choose, so if not from them, where have these whispers come from? Answer me that, before you throw such wild accusations around."

"It doesn't matter where they came from!" Curufin insisted, his voice thin, a vein puling visibly at the side of his neck. "The point is that they are there! We need to take action before they can strike, to help Father rid our people of such parasites."

Maedhros looked away in wordless disgust, and Maglor sighed exasperatedly, crossing his arms over his chest as he strove desperately for a civil response, but he could not banish the glimmers of loathing from his voice as stiffly he said:

"You sound just like father; a little shadow spouting his rhetoric. Will you not stop to think? Why would you wish harm upon your own kin? Why do you seek out discord between us? Our cousins have always been close friends, from where comes this outpouring of hate?"

Curufin snorted, tossing his head in annoyance before he leaned menacingly over the table, the well-defined muscles of his forearms tensed as he hissed:

"Our cousins! Turgon is an insufferable bore even on his better days, Aredhel will scarcely stop from her hunts and her dances to give me the time of day, and Argon is always hiding behind his mother's skirts, the little worm."

His brothers looked on in appalled silence, as Curufin leaned further forward, the veins slowly rising beneath his skin from the pressure of his forearms against the table, his fingertips digging into the wood.

"And Fingon," he spat, glaring maliciously at his brothers, "Fingon is always too busy with his lips around Maedhros' cock to offer much in the way of conversation."

"Curufin!"

Maglor's voice jumped unnaturally loud through the brittle air, slicing through the sly susurrus of Curufin's taunt left ringing through the room. Beside him, Maglor could feel Maedhros tense; every muscle in his body contracting like a wolf drawing itself up to pounce, the air seeming to stick in his throat as a cavalcade of blistering emotions boiled up inside of him. And so hard he fought to bite them back down, but with an unstoppable wrench they burst forth, and after one suffocating moment Maedhros leapt to his feet, growling:

"Enough! Throw your childish insults somewhere else, Curufin! I have little patience for them."

Maedhros slammed his chair backwards, sending it squealing across the stone floors as he stalked around the table, and lightning flashed in his hazel eyes as they bored into Curufin's own; dark pools of ink wetly shining. And suddenly Curufin seemed to waver, what arrogance he had worn fading a little as Maedhros strode towards him, something feral in his stance, something slightly unhinged in the furious scowl that twisted across his face. As his brother advanced, Curufin paled, stepping back a little in dismay as Maedhros spoke like one fey, the words hissing over his lips, searing through the air with their vehemence.

"Until I am given indisputable proof that our uncle and our cousins mean us harm, I will not believe these rumours, these lies, nor will I take up arms against them. And I would advise you, brother, not to antagonize me further, lest our next encounter become…regrettable."

Maedhros stepped up to Curufin, his height lending him an air of perilous menace that even Curufin's insufferable pride quailed under, and he shrank backwards a little in apprehension, seeing the throbbing vein split down Maedhros' forehead, the unearthly light flared in his eyes. With a resounding clunk Curufin backed into the table, its edge jamming into the backs of his thighs as Maedhros stood over him. An awful, ruined smile curved over Maedhros' face, all skinned lips and pointed incisors as he whispered, spitting the words into Curufin's face:

"Take your petty hatreds, and get out of my sight. Now."

And Curufin went without another word, looking nervously up at the fell expression on his brother's face. He snatched his knife back from the table, jamming it into its sheath as he slipped around Maedhros, suddenly reticent to spite him further. Despite his pride Curufin had cunning enough to know true rage when he saw it, and recognized the need for organized retreat, glancing warily once more at the murderous look on Maedhros' face. Quietly he slunk from the room, and yet was not cowed completely, as he looked down on Maglor disdainfully as he passed, his dark eyes flashing.

As Curufin slipped around the doorframe, Maedhros sunk into the nearest chair with a sigh, his head pounding, all of the anger that had burned inside of him now imploded into a vague emptiness, a faint sense of nausea that curled unpleasantly in his stomach. Maglor appraised him concernedly from the opposite end of the table, but held his silence, content to wait until Maedhros mastered himself fully and wished to talk. Maglor knew his brother better than most, and cared not to press matters better left undisturbed.

Slowly, Maedhros reached up, raking his hand through a sweep of hair, tucking the errant strands behind his ears. His fingers caught suddenly on a knot, but he yanked them through with a pained grimace, coppery strands of hair wound like metal filigree into his fingers as he lowered them onto the table. And even at the distance Maglor could see that his hands were shaking, could see the flex of his tendons beneath the pale skin, the tremble of his fingertips, the strands of hair wrapped about them quivering in the golden light.

"The son is but a shadow of the father," Maedhros said abruptly, gazing down at the table, his eyes unfocused. "That is what someone said to me once. I thought that they meant Curufin, or even Caranthir but…"

He trailed off, his hands slowly curling into fists. And he looked at them in despair, in hatred even, willing them to stop shaking, willing the awful aching numbness spreading in his chest to just go away.

"I wanted to kill him, Maglor," he said, his voice hollow, as if spoken from terribly far away, a lonely soul amid the ruins of a battlefield. "Just hearing Fingon's name on his lips…It hurt. It hurt so much, and I wanted to slap him, shake him, make him stop saying these things, these lies…"

He looked up suddenly, his eyes rimmed in redness, his irises cast like splinters of burning emerald as he stared at Maglor beseechingly.

"But what if they're not…"

And Maglor shook his head in denial even as the words fell out of his brother's mouth, and firmly he began:

"Maedhros, no…"

"What if they're not, Maglor?" Maedhros cut in, scarcely registering that Maglor had spoken. "What if Curufin is right? About our uncle, our cousins. About Fingon…"

Maedhros' hand absently wandered to his cheek, his fingers probing the yellowish bruise that blossomed across his cheekbone. As he touched it his eyes seemed to shiver, all of the light in them dying. "Could he have lied to me all this time? All of this time we have spent together, all those nights…What if he hated me all along?"

Maglor fought down a scream of frustration, instead affixing Maedhros with a piercing stare, his gentle eyes like shards of bitter steel as he commanded:

"Maedhros, stop this! Now. You are being ridiculous. You are tormenting yourself with spectres; half-formed wisps of lies and deceits that you coil around yourself, and twist to suit your own imagination. Fingon would never do that. Never. Do you understand me, Maedhros?"

And perhaps it was the urgency, the strength in his brother's lyrical voice that pierced through his misery, but Maedhros sighed at last, a broken, wistful smile wavering over his lips as he acknowledged his brother's words, and he weighed them, and instinctively he knew they were true. He looked plaintively up at Maglor, peeping from beneath his hair like a shy child, and forlornly he said:

"I just miss him so much. Just him being there, being near me. It's…it's just…hard, you know," he finished lamely, his eyes skittering towards the windows, gazing out over the pale roofs of their house.

"Come," Maglor said firmly, rising, and walking over to him. He extended his hand, and after a brief hesitation Maedhros took it, smiling falteringly as Maglor tugged him to his feet. "Let us go for a ride, together. A gallop through the fields ought to clear the mind of cobwebs. Elvëa has not been out of the stables in days, and neither has Morímírë, so I'd hold tight if I were you. Come, I'll race you to Lórien, brother. Let us see who proves the swifter!"

"As you please," Maedhros replied softly, his voice pallid against Maglor's enthusiasm. "Some time out of the city may help, I suppose…"

At that Maglor scoffed, and decisively he decreed:

"This melancholy air does not suit you at all, Maedhros! Now stop feeling sorry for yourself and put this on."

Maedhros looked up in confusion, only to flinch as a riding jacket was flung at him, a button nearly gouging out his eye. He blinked at the jacket in surprise, puzzling over where Maglor had gotten it from, but even as he did Maglor strode towards the door, yelling over his shoulder: "Hurry up! Put it on while I fetch my harp."

If nothing else, his brother could play him as well as any instrument: the threat of Maglor's endless singing hovering over him like a gathering thunderstorm. Tendrils of half-hearted mortification ran through him, and he groaned,

"Oh no, no harps on this trip, I forbid it!"

But Maglor simply winked at him, slipping out of the door with a mischievous smile. For an instant Maedhros considered simply resigning himself to a day of being grudgingly serenaded, but something inside of him shuddered at the gruesome thought. And in that moment he decided, the last shreds of self-pity driven from him in the face of this new, far more pressing horror, and he sprinted towards the door, his hair streaming out behind him as he shouted pleadingly after his brother:

"Maglor! Maglor, no! Please, I beg of you, spare me just this once…"