Chapter 4: Relics

In Lorien, deeply asleep and dreaming, she too felt it like a wrench in her gut. Something had gone from the world… Far away, a soul faded…No. Not faded. Extinguished. She felt the same shock ripple through Nenya, Narya, Vilya…As that small fëa went from the world, the Three felt it like the tides feel the Moon.

She sat up from her bed sharply, tears streaming down her face for the loss- oh, the loss! A bright soul extinguished. Surely nothing had happened like this since the First Age?

Celeborn awakening too, reached out to her, pulled her back to him and for a moment, she wanted nothing more than to turn into him, to bury herself in his strength, his warmth and smell, but the sense of dislocation, of a terrible shattering of the Song overwhelmed her.

Fighting the bitter words that were always so close to being spoken, she threw him off instead and went from their still shared bed.

'You felt it,' he said. He said nothing of her rejection of him; he never did. He swung his feet to the floor and leaned forwards. His face was pale. 'Something has happened in the Song but I know not what.'

'A fëa has gone.'

He looked at her uncomprehending.

'Gone! Vanished.' She said when he did not respond, irritation ringing in her voice. She was frightened, but would never admit to it. 'Extinguished.'

Celeborn stared at her for a moment. 'Is this Sauron's work? Surely he is not capable of it?' He fixed her with those penetrating, hazel eyes. 'I have not felt such a thing for many Ages past. If it is Sauron, why now?' He rose to his feet smoothly, and his long, long silver hair fell in a stream down his strong back. Her eyes lingered in spite of her fear, desire stirring in her loins as it always did. 'What has changed?'

Celeborn opened the door of the adjoining room and stepped through, threw open the armoire and pulled on suede breeches, a thin linen shirt over his head. He paused looking at her, the shirt still open to his waist and she thought how beautiful he was, that she still found him desirable after all the long years together and the terrible tragedy of loss. 'Elrond and Mithrandir will have felt it too?'

'Yes. They will have felt the disturbance in the universe. They will wonder at it…' Her fingers plucked at her gown restlessly; its white samite slipped easily through her fingers, fell in graceful folds around her, hugged against her breast and belly. She felt the pull of curvë, the mirror, and wanted to run to it, to seek answers.

His mouth thinned as if he read her thoughts. 'You will of course be running to your Mirror for answers,' he said bitterly. It was ever between them, his distrust of the curvë of the Noldor, of Celebrimbor in particular. Her Mirror, her Ring.

She did not respond but looked at him obliquely. 'Where are you going?' she asked instead.

'I am going to the Marches to see if our borders are safe,' he said as if this were obvious. 'I must know if this is any threat to us.'

'It is not,' she said dismissively and sensed his teeth clenching.

'I am going anyway.' He pulled on his boots and swept his long hair back, secured it with a thin band. 'I will send messages after our boys,' he said.

That made her pause and she was suddenly seized with fear.

'They are in danger…' she murmured, remembering what she had seen in the Mirror when she had brought him to her. 'Elrohir…his darkness lures them. They want him for their own…' She had seen it, but even as she spoke, it was Elladan for whom she suddenly feared.

Celeborn stared at her, anger kindled in his hazel eyes, the anger of a father who could do nothing to protect his only daughter. It made him unreasonable. She understood that even if she resented it. He strode to her and grasped her arm. 'What have you seen?' he demanded. 'Tell me! Tell me this time!' He shook her slightly and she gasped, staring at him. His fingers clenched around her arm and hurt.

'What do you mean? This time?' she demanded though she already knew.

For a moment they stood, locked, eyes burning into each other.

Deep, unspoken resentment and anger simmered in his eyes. He blamed her, in part at least. But she blamed him too. She tried to pull away but his grip dug harder and his eyes were ice.

'What have you seen?' he said again but there was no gainsaying him this time. He grasped her chin and forced her head up. He had never forced her to give up her secrets before, never made her tell. It was too easy to forget his power, so focused was she on her own, but he had dwelled far longer in Menegroth than she. He had awoken under the stars and was one of the oldest. She felt the flutter of her heart in her breast and his eyes ground into her, blasted her and forced her to open to him.

'I saw them before the Morannon,' she cried. 'There were the Nazgûl and they forced upon Elrohir an iron ring, an iron crown!' The images crowded upon her, filled her thoughts. 'He will never wear such base metal!' she cried oblivious to her husband's shock. Her voice dropped now to a murmur and she turned inwards, remembering the visions that had crowded together in her Mirror 'Mithril he will wear, a different crown for he is most like me…I would make them kings in their own lands. Gil-Galad would be as nothing compared with our dominion.'

'Our dominion?' he asked coldly.

She gazed up into green-gold-amber eyes, for suddenly hazel seemed too simple a word to describe the power of his gaze, lost in her own dreams of dominion, of pushing back the threads of time…of unlocking the door and changing the past. He read her like the words were written on a page.

'And how exactly will you do that? By taking the One Ring?' His voice was bitter but his eyes were full of sadness, loss. He turned away from her in disgust. 'You are no longer Artanis, the woman I loved. You are changed beyond recognition. Artanis would never have even considered that.'

Ah! How that hurt! She staggered back, clutching her breast. 'How dare you! How dare you criticize me for wanting Power, knowledge!' Her voice cracked, sobbed, and she felt the angry tears well up and cursed herself for womanly weakness. 'You cannot possibly understand…' The pain in her womb, in her breasts, in her heart, for her child. How could any man understand that! It was such a little thing, to take the Ring, to make it all right…to take the hurt and suffering and make it so it had never happened. She would be whole again…

'Tell me!' he stepped towards her, hands outstretched, a last appeal.

But she flung away from him, proud, proud, proud. She would not tell him what he should already know. 'How can you be so stupid! How can you not know?' It was as if he had forgotten Celebrian.

He turned away from her then. 'Do you think you have the knowledge and Power to hold the One? You forget that I was under Melian's* tutelage long before you set foot upon these shores. Do you think you can turn back time, you can part the threads and change the world?' He laughed bitterly. 'It is not only the Nine Rings that consume their bearers. You no longer simply bear Nenya. You ARE Nenya!'

He turned on his heel then and parted, leaving bitterness and frustrated fury in his wake.

o0o0o

Celeborn flung himself easily down the slender hithlain that took him speedily to the forest floor, cloaked in golden leaves, muffling and softening all sound. Sometimes he felt suffocated. A fall of leaves suddenly scattered around him like golden rain. He could not deny the anger that raged in his breast, even as he could not help blaming her in part at least, that she had not foreseen what would happen on that fateful journey from Lothlorien to Imladris, that she had not stopped their daughter from going so late in the year when the snow was deep on the Pass, and Goblins and Orcs roamed…

He strode to the mews where he kept his horses and birds. It was quiet, the birds all roosted sleepily on their perches. The silence and peace soothed him. A few hawks turned their hooded heads as he passed. He walked more softly now though his thoughts were restless, full of recrimination; Celebrian had been so keen to get home for Yule, to be with her children, her husband, and he had laughed indulgently, protested, but been persuaded to let her go. A knife in his heart twisted. He had let her go. He was not blameless in this, should have refused to let her go, should have gone with her, known when she was attacked, left earlier to search for her…

Did Galadriel think she was alone in wishing to part the threads of Time, to change the Past? Did she not know that he would empty his heart, his veins of blood, would suffer unimaginable torment to spare his sweet child one second of what had befallen her?

But he would not lose his boys. He had lost his daughter and he knew he was losing his wife.

Murmuring softly, he stepped into a stall and smoothed the feathers of the falcon within. It turned its head and shuffled along its perch so the jesses jangled slightly. He hummed the falcon's Song so it stepped onto his leather gauntleted wrist and he smoothed its feathers, quieting himself as he did, letting the dark and anger flow from him into the air, the wind, as Melian herself had taught him long, long ages ago. He opened his free hand and let the his lingering resentment and bitterness towards his wife drift away, leave him. But even cool and calmer as he now was, he could not ignore the estrangement that had been gradually happening between them. It had taken a long time, but their shared pain had simply driven a wedge between them instead of drawing them closer.

He sighed and bowed his head. There had been long years where they had shared a purpose, belief, happiness even. But that had been destroyed utterly and he could not see how they would ever recover now…After the Ring had been destroyed as Elrond and Mithrandir decreed, Galadriel would sail. He knew that though she did not yet admit it even to herself. But he would remain. And diminish if that is what Eru had decided for those who yet lingered on these shores…The falcon shifted restlessly and he looked down at the wild thing he had captured and tamed. A pain swelled in his chest for what he had lost.

Hoofs clattered on the stone floor of the stables and he looked up; one of the stable boys was leading out his horse, silver coated Idrilhen, who snorted and shook his long silver mane. Celeborn knew the boy well and smiled.

'Thank you Rosgalad.' With one hand he smoothed the horse's soft muzzle and handed the bird to the boy whilst he mounted.

'Will you be back soon, lord?' asked Rosgalad fearlessly, for Celeborn was well-loved by his folk.

Celeborn shook his head. 'I ride to the Marches. Do not wait up for me.' The boy handed him the falcon and Celeborn let Idrilhen ease into a long loping canter along the green sward and beyond the city wall. He carried his hawk smoothly, raising his wrist so the bird would not unsettle.

'You will go to my children,' he whispered to the bird as they rode. 'You will tell them of my unease. An elven fëa has slipped from the world…' He conjured images of his beloved boys, their faces clear and sharp. He showed the bird the way over the Hithaeglir, through the Redhorn Pass and beyond into the wilds that were now Eregion.

The Noldor have brought only evil, he thought to himself, and then berated himself for his treachery to his beloved wife. Yes, still beloved. And not only evil, he admitted. But much evil has come of it.

He had reached the edges of the Wood with ease as the Moon set over the high peaks of the Misty Mountains. Stars faded and Eärendil sailed down into the morning. He gave a small inclination of his head to the Mariner, whose blood was mixed in the veins of his beloved boys. I hope you watch over them too.

He kept his mind clear of any of the images he had seen in his wife's memory, and raised his wrist, conjuring the last sharp images of his children, their black horses coming down off the Mountains, for surely they were over the high ridges by now? The hawk looked about sharply, cocked its head on one side to regard him unwinking with its yellow eye and then flapped its wings. Go. Seek the riders who have my heart. Tell them my fear. Be vigilant. Make haste home with news for me.

The falcon climbed swiftly upwards on the air currents and when it was a mere speck, it sped like an arrow into the vast dawning winter sky.

As he turned, he let himself dwell on what he feared almost as much as the peril to his grandsons. Galadriel with the One Ring…They had had news that the One had been discovered, was to be taken to Mordor to be destroyed…It was planned that the company should pass through Lothlorien. Celeborn pursed his lips thinking that he would rather it went anywhere but Lothlorien. Could they not go through the Gap, and then Rohan, avoiding Lorien altogether? He hoped that might still be their path.

There was more though… what she would do should the Ring come to her. She would push back Time, unravel the threads and unpick the Past…change the future.

Ah, he could not blame her; he wished to do the same to save his little girl the torment she had suffered. But Galadriel would not stop at that. She would have every elven lord and king kneel before her and worship her as they would not the Valar.

And his boys, Elladan and Elrohir? Her plans made him cold.

I would change the world…she had said.

…I would make them kings in their own lands. Gil-Galad would be as nothing compared with our dominion.

His boys would never be kings as she envisaged, he thought. They would become wraiths and he would kill them himself before that happened. And though it would break his heart, he would kill her too if need be.

o0o0o0o

Far away in Phellanthir, Erestor had let his sword drop to the stones with a great clang. The Nazgûl had vanished, fled. And Rhawion's dimming, fluttering light was utterly extinguished.

Erestor covered his eyes with his hand. He bowed his head and so quietly so that Glorfindel would not hear, he prayed. 'Eru, hear me at last. Hear the prayer of those you have forsaken,' he murmured. 'Punish us no longer. Have pity.'

He felt Glorfindel's hand clasp his shoulder. 'Has it gone?' He shook Erestor ever so slightly. 'Enough. We have time for prayers later. For now we must make sure there are no others, and that the angu has gone indeed….And where it has gone.'

Glorfindel's blue eyes were still flaming and bright. He was wiping his sword on his cloak, breathing hard. But the strange atmosphere in the dim hall prevailed and Erestor heard Glorfindel's thoughts, his recriminations and guilt as clearly as his own.

Too slow, too slow! As I was for Celebrimbor…Even worse, Rhawion threw himself into the jaws of the Nazgûl to distract and deflect the blow that might well have killed me.

No doubt Glorfindel could hear Erestor' miserable prayer equally well, he thought. Neither of them offered the other solace or excuse and Erestor was glad of that. There was none. They had failed. Utterly. He closed himself off from the failure that curdled in Glorfindel's breast, not wanting to hear, to see what was in Glorfindel's mind- it felt too intrusive and regardless of the way he presented, Erestor was respectful of grief. He had had too much of it himself to wish to endure another's.

At last he spoke quietly. 'I feel nothing of the Nazgûl,' he said, looking around and peering into the darkness.

'Nor do I,' Glorfindel agreed. He paused, and then added, 'But I feel a presence, a Power. And it is close, very close…Like smoke after Mithrandir's fireworks.'

Erestor knew what he meant; the air was charged like a lightning bolt had struck. A metallic tang was on his tongue. He glanced up with sudden interest. 'This was Celebrimbor's Oromarde-Curvë,' he said slowly, searching his memory of this place. 'His greatest treasures were here, though surely they must now have been either destroyed, or worse, plundered and taken by Sauron. But perhaps there is some lingering Power.' He could hear his own voice as if from a great distance, as if he uttered some great portent.

'We must make sure there are no other Nazgûl.' Glorfindel sighed heavily and rubbed a hand across his eyes. 'It is too close to Imladris, and though we…' He paused, then said emphatically, 'No, I have failed Rhawion, I would not have them close to other elves.'

'Not you alone,' Erestor said quietly and held up a hand to still the other's protest. 'We both failed. I as much as you, whatever is in your heart.'

'I do not see what more you could have done, Erestor…'

'And I do not see what more you could have done, my friend. Rhawion did not know you at first, could not see you for the pain caused by the Nazgûl.' He shook his head slowly. 'Let us not argue over apportioning blame.' He reached out to Glorfindel and clasped his hand in conciliation. 'But you are right that there could be other wraiths and we still do not know why the Nazgûl guard this place. Surely there is nothing left of any worth?'

Wearily he leaned on his sword and pulled himself to his feet. He drew himself upright and looked about curiously. 'What advantage does it give them?' he mused aloud. 'The Angle is close, and Imladris, but both are well guarded and secure against the Nazgûl as we have seen. Even all Nine.' Glass crunched beneath his feet, old, ancient glass. He wondered absently why it had not been eroded by the thousands of years, ground into dust by the weight of Ages. Perhaps there was some lingering magic, and the stones themselves had not quite forgotten the Elves, he thought. But what he said was, 'They had enough time to take anything of worth and destroy anything that they could not use.' He took a step into the darkness. Shattered glass ground beneath his feet.

Glorfindel must have thought the same for he suddenly said, 'What do you think this glass is? Surely it should be dust?'

He looked down at his feet again. Stooping he picked up a shard of glass and cradled it in his hand. It felt smooth, and a little warm as if it had been in the sun rather than in a dark, abandoned hall. He caught a flicker of luminescence ahead of him and thought for a moment it was Glorfindel, but surely his companion was behind him?

'It is a mirror.' Glorfindel's voice came from behind but his glimmering shape appeared before Erestor, approaching from the wrong direction.

Erestor started, glanced behind to see Glorfindel behind him. He gasped and then laughed at himself. 'Of course. A mirror…'

The hall had been lined with many tall mirrors that reflected light from the shafts cut high in the vaulting roof as it was in the Great Hall through which they had entered the citadel. But here in this high hall, this inner temple, the light was filtered through prisms of glass. It had the strange effect on light so it split into vertical bars of colour.* Celebrimbor had talked about this endlessly; he said it was important why the light spilt into bars, why it did not simply split into the spectrum, how it could be understood. He had wanted to harness it somehow as Fëanor had done with the Palantri…A memory struck him with painful clarity, as sharp as if it happened yesterday…

…Celebrimbor's bronze hair gleamed in the torchlight for the sun had gone, and his grey mercurial eyes glittered. He looked so like Maedhros for a moment that Erestor was distracted and lost for a moment the thread of the discussion. Annatar had leaned forwards, his golden-amber eyes glowed uncannily, disturbingly, Erestor had thought for they did not yet know Sauron in his disguise. Here in the Guild of Smiths, Annatar was a great craftsman, a lore-master, a gift from the Valar, said Celebrimbor. A refugee from Angband, said others who did not trust him.

'You must watch to see why it is that the light splits this way. I have a machine that will help you to see what I see - a copper plate, a screen that I have treated and made myself…' He went into how he had made the screen and how it showed light. Erestor had been intrigued but sceptical…Celebrimbor excited. The next time Erestor had visited, there had been huge mirrors in the hall, a sheen of copper coated them so the hall was filled with an ethereal golden light and then the light spilt; it was like walking through some strange, distorted rainbow.…

'Yes,' he said slowly. 'There were endless mirrors here. So perhaps one survived.' He tossed the shard of glass and caught it again in his hand. 'As the light struck each mirror, it changed…there were pencil beams of light on the surface. It was a wonder but Celebrimbor used to say that this was not the wonder, this was only the merest suggestion of the Power that could be unlocked with such knowledge.' He turned his head to Glorfindel and smiled slightly. 'It amused Celebrimbor no end to see the faces of those fortunate enough to be invited to join him here…'

And Annatar…It had amused him too but Erestor did not say that. A shiver went down his spine to think he had sat in here and dined with Sauron himself, when all the while he was using Celebrimbor to help him uncover the secret of the Rings and then plotting to kill the man who helped him in the most coldblooded manner possible…

A flicker of thought touched him then, a memory that was not his. Glorfindel was thinking too, lost in memory. How strange it was that he kept seeing things that he had not seen with his own eyes but through the filter of his companion's memories, hearing things he had not heard…It was the lingering Power here in this ancient Oromarde-Curvë that caused this mingling of each other's thoughts and memories. And now he saw Glorfindel's memory as if it were his own; Glorfindel's charging attempt to rescue Ost-in-Edhel…

... they could smell the smoke and stench of burning flesh as they galloped along the banks of the Bruinen to Ost-in-Edhel's aid. The host of elven steeds and knights, helms gleaming in the sun…Too late, too late…his white steed's long mane streamed before him, hooves pounded the earth until he crested the ridge and lifted his visor to see better the burning city, the crumbling towers blasted and razed, saw it all with his piercing blue eyes that had seen more than any Elf living. Behind him was the snap of their own bright pennants streaming in the wind and the pound of horses' hooves...too late, too late…

…Far ahead, ranks of Orcs, thousands upon thousands trampling the same earth as Elves, trampling blood into that earth, shrieking their triumph. A bloody trophy was lifted high; at first he couldn't see what it was but then he turned aside and retched. A strand of long hair had lifted on the wind and a low, painful cry came from the still living Celebrimbor. Naked, bloody, he twitched and whimpered as he was hoisted into the air by jeering Orcs and then a forest of elven arrows whooshed over the heads of the standard bearers and the body went limp…

Erestor gasped in horror. He had not known. Not a single man who returned from that failed rescue had spoken of this, that Celebrimbor had been alive when they hoisted his poor tortured body high on the spear. He felt bile burn in his throat, and turned aside and retched.

He remained for a moment, leaning over, blinking, and wiped his eyes; he had not known for he had not witnessed the sack of Eregion.

"I am sorry… We kept that secret. War, you know how it is.' He felt Glorfindel's hand gently upon his shoulder and nodded. He did indeed know; secrets and lies were the aftermath of battle, of War, to spare the families, to polish the reputations if the victorious slain, to tarnish the name of the defeated. He felt the skin of the water bottle pushed into his hand and took it gratefully. Cold clear water soothed his throat and slowly he straightened.

'It is right that you did…Thank you.' He did not say what he was thanking Glorfindel for, whether it was for the water or for ordering the flight of arrows. It did not matter. He thanked him for both.

Glorfindel took a step into the darkness. His back was to Erestor but he could see the broad shoulders were a little bowed and knew he felt it still. In spite of his hostility to the House of Fëanor, he still grieved for Celebrimbor and his folk. It had been a devastation in Eregion. Not a soul left alive in any of the three great cities.

Glorfindel stooped and he too held a shard of glass in his hand. It was one of the prisms that had glazed the roof. 'It is strange that the glass has survived in spite of the ages that have passed,' he mused. 'And it seems one mirror was left intact. Does it serve some purpose, for surely Sauron did not overlook this place?' He stepped closer and peered into the last mirror. His own reflection swam eerily before him and then Erestor came to join him and their faces appeared in the glass, pale and ghostly, like they were floating in the absolute darkness of the mirror. Their faces seemed lit by some unearthly light.

Erestor reached out slowly, fingers touching dark, cold glass for a moment. His fingertips tingled for it was like passing his hand through icy water, or as if his fingers had dissolved into the mirror somehow. He drew them back but his fingertips still tingled and he rubbed them together quickly, an unpleasant sensation indeed.

'Unbroken still?' he said wonderingly. It seemed to him there were shadows drifting in the air behind him in the mirror and when he turned his head there was nothing. 'Ghosts?' he murmured. 'But whose?'

'What do you see?' Glorfindel peered into the dark glass. Within the mirror, their faces floated and behind them, or before them- he could not tell which, was a distant light like a star. They stood looking into the mirror and suddenly it seemed to Erestor that they teetered on the brink, the very edge of a chasm of vast darkness… And they were beacons of light.

Erestor had the strangest feeling of dislocation then…He was disembodied and adrift in that vast emptiness within the mirror. Like the distant light, far away in the dark.

…It was almost unbearable on those stark, cold winter days in Himring, bleak as his own heart. He was cold steel, staring out at Angband, his one fist clenched.

In shock, Erestor stumbled back. A sudden sense of vertigo struck him hard as a blow and he clutched at Glorfindel's arm. All sense of time and place was gone, pulled, distorted by the Oromarde-Curvëof this place, and Erestor was suddenly in Himring again at his lord's side. But the memory was not his; that memory was Maedhros'.

He was not even aware that beside him, Glorfindel had gone rigid, his eyes wide and he stared in horror at something far away and distant in the mirror…

He heard Glorfindel's voice as if it came across a great distance. 'Come away! Erestor!'

He felt as if he were someone else, Glorfindel tugging at his arm but Erestor had sunk to his knees and reached out to the dark, cold glass… his hand seemed to dissolve into darkness, leaching his warmth, sending out a flare of light. He barely felt Glorfindel shoving his arm under Erestor's shoulder and hauling him to his feet.

'Come Erestor! We cannot stay here!'

'No, no you do not understand,' Erestor cried and scrabbled at the mirror's edge. 'He is there!' Glorfindel prised his fingers away and shook him hard.

'No, I do not understand,' he said and hauled Erestor away and towards the wide, sweep of stairs that led back down to the great hall, away from this place. 'And I think nor do you. There is more in the mirror than mere ghosts. We must fly this place.'

tbc

Melian: Queen of Menegroth. She was a maia, like Olorin/Gandalf. She kept Menegroth safe through her 'girdle' a protective circle that kept all evil from their doors. In my verse, Celeborn has studied under her, has a wealth of wisdom and 'magic'.

Oromarde-Curvë: The High Hall of Knowledge. This was the seat of learning, the centre of Celebrimbor's experimentation in Science and the High Arts of invention, innovation, technology, knowledge. There is no question that Fëanor understood Science and Technology in an intensely serious and deep way; he harnessed light, he discovered ways of imbuing crystals with phosperhence that remained long after the source of the light had gone. He created the Palantri- seeing stones that communicated over long distances. I have attributed Galadriel's Mirror to Celebrimbor as I cannot see Galadriel accepting this from Fëanor or Curufin - and Celebrimbor would have had the benefit of both his father and grandfather's knowledge as well as his own developed over a long life and his association with Sauron.

*The light splitting into pencil beams of light is the copper-plate test that quantum mechanics uses to show how particles do not behave as expected. (short version!) I have no doubt that Annatar would have been able to show Celebrimbor this. The copper sheen on the mirrors is a ME version of the experiment.

If you think about it, the elves lived forever- Fëanor made significant discoveries in his lifetime and Celebrimbor lived through the first age (part of it anyway) and it was 1697 when Eregion was destroyed, and he dies. So he must have been at least 1880 years old depending when he was born. That's a long time to be thinking about science and technology! Also war tends to drive invention and I do not believe that Maedhros would not have invested time and money into developing weapons, improving farming to supply his armies. Not just Maedhros but Finrod, Turgon also living in hidden cities where they must have developed technologies for surviving the isolation.