MANY apologies for being gone for so long. Work commitments and just a big block on trying to get all the pieces in the right place and in the right order. It should not be so long a wait for the next chapter.

Thanks for all the reviews- they really help to keep me writing and for the favourites and kudos on Ao3. Special thanks to Spiced Wine whose fab story, Dark Star, gave me an idea and whose work I reference in this.

Beta: Many thanks as always to Anarithilien.

Chapter 8: Into the Past

In the thin morning light, Glorfindel strode up the narrow trail that they had walked the day before, following Erestor's tall, lean form as he almost loped ahead. Forcing himself to unclench his fist over the hilt of his sword, Glorfindel thought, as he always did, that it never quite fit his hand as had Rilmapentë*, but that blade was long gone, melted in boiling, raging fire. And though Eruvatúrë* was Aman-forged and blessed by the Valar, the smithing was never as good as that of the Exiled Noldor. He sighed. Everything in Phellanthir dragged memory from him, forced him to think upon things long and best forgotten.

'Holy Mountain of Shit! Something stinks like Námo's' arsehole.'

Glorfindel closed his eyes and considered asking for forgiveness but thought better of it for Erestor would almost certainly do it again within ten minutes.

But when he drew close to where Erestor had stopped, he realised there was an evil smell that coated the back of his throat like the stench of a rotting corpse. Erestor had stopped and was staring out over the treetops, eyes wide.

'What do we do? Go back and investigate if that thing that flew overhead is below, or press on?' he said slowly. 'I do not think it was a dragon, though it sounded like one. But this stinks and dragons have an entirely different stink.'

Glorfindel remembered; brimstone and hot metal; the absolute silence before the blast of fire, heat that melted stone, boiled blood. 'It is no dragon,' he agreed. 'Does it present a greater threat to Imladris than whatever happened to Rhawion? I think not. We press on,' he said decisively. 'We will hunt it in our return.'

Erestor stood on the edge of the trail that wound high along the cliff face. 'I do not want Niphredil being eaten. He is a sweet thing and I cannot bear to think of him suffering.'

Glorfindel spared him a dubious glance. He would have said many things about Erestor's impossible, grumpy horse, but sweet was not one of them. 'Asfaloth will have gone away from here,' he said as he began to make his way towards the ruined Tower. 'He will have heard this winged creature, whatever it was, and be aware. I am sure your beast will do likewise.'

Erestor followed Glorfindel though he looked doubtful and a little upset. 'Niphredil is not always very clever,' he admitted and took three longer strides to catch up with Glorfindel. 'I hope he sticks with Asfaloth. The last time I told him to stay close until I needed him, he ran home. With luck he has already gone home,' he said uneasily. 'Do you think whatever it was is hunting them?'

Glorfindel did not stop. 'No. They are too clever. It will pursue easier prey I think, if that is what they do. The horses will be far from here.' He spoke with conviction for Asfaloth was an intelligent beast and loyal. He would have gone from here, or hidden. Niphredil however, was as stupid and stubborn a beast as he had ever met.

They walked on in silence for a moment and then, from behind him, Erestor said, 'Do you think it a cold drake perhaps?'

"I do not know.' Glorfindel glanced back over his shoulder, reluctant to halt now that they were close. 'There is naught here for a cold drake, no treasure, no hunting- or what there is is sparse. Whatever it is may well be far from here already.'

'Then you are determined that we find what there is in the Tower that Sauron wishes to keep from us.'

'Yes,' Glorfindel said, although he felt cold at the thought and a foreboding settled in his heart.

This is the edge of my own fear, he thought.

No matter what Erestor said and his own rational and reasonable logic, he could not shake off memories of the Valarauki. He did not remember every cut and slash of that battle, but he remembered that sense of absolute certainty that he would die upon the Cristhorn. How could he forget that moment that Idril had turned to him, her lovely eyes wide with fear and looked at him as she had never looked at him before? As if she had never really seen him until then. In that moment, she knew the secret of his heart; how he had watched her and yearned for her, and never approached her for he knew her heart was not his to take.

It never had been.

In her eyes was gratitude and understanding and love, but not the love he wanted. She loved him for sparing her and her family, Eärendil, and of course, Tuor. But she did not love him for himself.

'That Tuor,' came a voice that seemed disembodied and less real than the memory of Idril, her long hair like spun gold lifting in the wind.

What?' He turned his head slowly towards Erestor.

'He was an ugly bastard,' he said, grinning and he wiped his forehead as if he were hot. 'Never knew what Idril saw in him. And hairy! Námo's balls, he was hairy. Perhaps that was what she liked about him?'

Utterly still now, Glorfindel narrowed his piercing blue eyes and fixed them upon Erestor's. 'You will stop.' His fist bunched in Erestor's tunic. 'Now.'

He spoke slowly and emphatically and noted with some satisfaction that the amber eyes widened ever so slightly. 'I will not fight you as well as whatever else might be in there waiting for us.' He brought all the Ages of command to bear upon Erestor. 'And if you do not cease, I will seek out this creature that is not a dragon and throw you to it,' he snapped, hoping it had teeth. A lot. And that they were sharp and it was not too fussy, for he thought Erestor would be tough and stringy, he thought as loudly, strongly, as emphatically as he could.

'Oh I assure you, I am.' Erestor laughed slightly and instead of pulling out of Glorfindel's grasp, he pushed against him so they stood chest to chest. 'Tough and stringy as an old weasel.'

He met Erestor's amber stare and for a moment the light reflected back as it would a wolf and Glorfindel found the hairs on the back of his neck rise slightly. He was not afraid of Erestor. No. He trusted Erestor.

'You still think it is not Maedhros? You wonder still if it is the Valarauku?' Erestor stared at him, his strange amber eyes intent and serious. 'Do not fear. It is not your Balrog, Laurëlindë. It is Maedhros. I have seen him, felt him. Ever since we arrived. Even you have dreamed him.'

'Anyone who does not fear a Balrog is a fool,' he replied, clenching his fist about his sword. 'But it is not Maedhros either. Your misplaced loyalty to him blinds you.'

'Well I suppose if anyone knows about misplaced loyalty it would be you, Laurëlindë, with your misplaced loyalty to Turgon the Unutterably Turgid. And that is one of the more polite names I have heard him called.'

'And that would have been in Himring by your noble lord,' Glorfindel snapped and then he shook his head. 'We have been through this,' Glorfindel stepped back and deliberately breathed. Slowly. As he had on the battlefield of the Tears, as he had when he saw the great shadows wheeling silently in the skies over Gondolin, as he had when he stood looking back at Idril as he took the path back towards Gondolin where the Valarauku waited, cracking his whip of flame…

Ruinátorë…

Glorfindel ruthlessly shoved the memory away, pushed it back into the darkness of his other life and locked it away, focused on now. Without another word, he turned and led the way into the ruined Tower of Phellanthir, where the Mirror stood in dust and silence of Ages, and where his fear trembled like harpstrings, sending waves out into the Dark.

0o0

Erestor's foot kicked against something away on the darkness across the floor. It must be more glass, he thought, for the floor was in darkness and shadow. He wondered briefly why Sauron had allowed all the mirrors, but the one they had found above in the upper hall, to be destroyed so wantonly.

Glorfindel was disappearing into the darkness, his outline dimly seen in the grey morning light that filtered through the cracks in the roof.

Their footsteps were soft in the dust that coated the floor. Another crack as Erestor trod down too heavily on something. He thought at first it was glass again but it was the wrong shape, more like a dried branch. Glorfindel turned his head at the sound and cast a glance back at Erestor.

Erestor stopped suddenly, looking down into the shadows that hid the floor. He felt a sudden nausea and did not stoop; these were no dried branches. How could he ever have even thought that? Maybe flotsam from the long ago destruction of the city. But not wood. No, it was not wood. The brittleness of ancient bones.

'Tread carefully my friend,' Glorfindel said gently and held out his hand to Erestor. For a moment, Erestor thought about refusing but they had come too far together for such delicacy and he clung to his friend shamelessly.

'I had not thought…How could there be anything left after so long?' he gasped and suddenly it seemed the dust rose up and he walked amongst ghosts of those slain by the cruel hand of Sauron.

When Erestor had arrived at the third city with expectation of a welcome, good conversation, and some drunken reminiscing, he had not expected the city to impress him as much as it did. It was an incongruous mix of artisans, craft -folk warriors who stayed loyal to the House of Fëanor and scholars of curvë. After the stratified society of Gil-Galad's court and city, Erestor had felt himself breath deeply, for it reminded him of Himring with its practical, homogenous mix and sense of purpose. Here was an air of suppressed excitement of discovery, a busy hubbub of voices, and not all Elves; there were Men and Dwarves amongst them too. Narvi had dwelled there for a while until death took him. They said it was after Narvi's death that Annatar had arrived.

Erestor looked up at the desolate ruin it was now and remembered again how light had filled the space like a physical entity, a warm, golden light that could not come from any lamp. He let his fingers drift over the pitted yellow stone and remembered how it had looked… like sunlight filled the air. If Menegroth had been still and starlit like the night, Phellanthir was like day and filled with a rich and golden light like warmth itself. Above him the domes were cracked and fallen, but once those vaulted roofs had been cut through with bejewelled glass, coloured with molten jewels, garnets and sapphires and emeralds. He had floated on light.

Now in the plunging darkness, he felt his feet crunch on shattered glass and felt such sadness that the crafted illusion, that homage to light, had been utterly destroyed, desecrated and every single soul slaughtered…The image of Celebrimbor's last moment that he had glimpsed in Glorfindel's mind struck him like a blow. Too much!

Sauron, Annatar had been here when Erestor had first visited. The thought made him feel sick. Knowing that Gil-Galad had rebuffed Annatar, that Elrond and he himself had both agreed, it had more than alarmed him to find the stranger who declared himself like Glorfindel, from Aman, sent to help.

Erestor glanced ahead watched Glorfindel begin to ascend the wide sweep of stairs that had somehow survived the desecration and time. A faint glimmer of light shone from him and glinted in his hair. He looked much as Annatar, in that Annatar too was the embodiment of masculine beauty; taller than most elves even, lithe and lean, one knew there was a wiry strength beneath the unimposing craftsman's tunic – and the shirt he wore beneath the tunic was silk - not just silk but very fine. His simple leather boots were deceptively simple. In fact, that had been how Erestor had summed him up; deceptively simple. More deceptive. His warnings had fallen on deaf ears for Celebrimbor was too caught up by then in his latest project…and he mourned Narvi's loss and that had made him vulnerable.

Late summer it had been and the air was warm. Erestor sat on a low chair, comfortable as only the carpenters and designers of Eregion could make it, a glass dangled from his long fingers, its full bowl half filled with some delicious sprit that smelled a little of flowers and junipers. Unbelievably, there were chips of ice in the bowl and slices of some sort of green, sharp fruit and basil over which another drink had been poured that fizzed and frothed. Erestor stared at him in wonder and sipped, then drank it.

Celebrimbor laughed and patted his hand to make him pause. 'It is from the East. But far more potent that you would think.' There had been little dainties of some sort of sugary jelly or candy that had melted in his mouth and Erestor really did consider abandoning everything he had sworn and moving to Phellanthir. Celebrimbor's silver-grey eyes moved quickly over Erestor's face and settled on his mouth, as if he knew what Erestor was thinking.

I will die happy if you kill me now! he had exclaimed with his usual exaggeration, flirtatious as always, maybe a little provocative even.

Do not die just yet, Celebrimbor smiled slowly, and smoothed a hand through his auburn hair, but there was the slightest tremble in it and Erestor mentally kicked himself. Hard.

He leaned forwards and touched Celebrimbor's hand briefly. 'I am sorry to hear about Narvi,' he said simply and plainly.

Celebrimbor looked away across the lawns and gardens. 'It is strange to think I will never see him again. Do you think they go to Aulë across the Sea to dwell in the Seven Halls as their stories tell?' For a moment there was such longing in his voice that Erestor wondered if some of the more preposterous tales were true; but he immediately dismissed them. It was hard enough to believe a dwarf and an elf could be friends at all.

I have something I wish to show you. It is a secret though. I can show you only part…the part I wish Erenion to know about. He grinned, and Erestor laughed. It was not hard to guess that he was also there to bring intelligence to Gil-Galad; it would be strange if he did not. But Celebrimbor knew too that Erestor was loyal to his House and would do nothing to damage or harm him. Not a hair on his head.

'Are you ready to join me here yet?' Celebrimbor asked letting his eyes slide to the brooch on Erestor 's tunic, a silver, pointed Fëanorian star. 'Ah,' he sighed. 'Of course you are sworn to protect the children of that damned woman.' Celebrimbor looked away then, eyes distant and full of memory. 'I still cannot understand how she fled with the Silmarils, abandoning her children. She cannot have known then, but she must certainly have believed that Maedhros would kill them.'

'The stories, my lord, are untrue.'

Celebrimbor had waved it away, Of course he knew, even secured and kept free of the taint of the Oath by his careful uncles, the rumours and fanciful stories of Elwing had reached him. 'Not just untrue, but ridiculous. How she could she have held onto the blessed jewel if she was a seagull? In her beak? For gulls do not have claws. It is as silly as the story of Fingon taking his harp to search for Maedhros, and singing to him,' Celebrimbor said with bitter amusement. 'Anyone who knew Fingon would have known he was armed to the teeth and silent as a cat. But he listened to his heart, and the Song.' He glanced at Erestor then and Erestor saw that he had understood everything. 'No one who saw them could have any doubt, their Song was so entwined…'

Both had fallen silent then and this was the pattern of their conversation every time they met; remembering the beloved dead. Trying to comprehend. To resolve. Erestor was not sure if it ever did any good.

He had glanced at the balcony then and into the gardens that were scented with jasmine and honeysuckle still, even so late in the year. A sense of power thrust itself upon Erestor and there was Annatar, quite suddenly. Like the wind he had arrived. He was dressed in a simple tunic and shirt, breeches and boots, his long black hair tied back with a leather thong like Fëanor had done, as Curufin… and there Erestor saw the resemblance; he was not only dressed as they, but looked like them, grey eyes, full mouth, clever hands…

'Are you luring him to join us?' The voice was low and comfortable, pleasant, alluring even. 'It would be useful to us –your knowledge is well known, your cunning mind… were you not called cunning flame by Nelyafinwë…' A calculated mistake, for Erestor had winced and Celebrimbor reacted, both instinctively, intuitively, expecting the reproof, but Maedhros was long gone and could no longer object. 'Oh I am sorry- I knew him oversea…'

'Erestor?'

He realised that Glorfindel had been calling to him and shook himself. 'I am here,' he said and stepped carefully through the unseen debris strewn over the floor to the foot of the wide staircase upon which Glorfindel waited.

'You are too much in the past,' Glorfindel said quietly. 'We must be aware now for we do not know if the Nazgûl has returned…' He did not say but Erestor thought the Nazgûl had been well and truly vanquished and had fled back to Sauron.

'That may be so, but perhaps Sauron has sent a more deadly enemy against us,' Glorfindel whispered. 'We do not know yet what that mirror does.'

'When Celebrimbor showed me this place, the light had split into the helyanwë,' Erestor remembered. 'But he kept saying that was not the wonder. He called it

Ilweranta. He said the colours were simply a manifestation of the wonder he had discovered. He had said discovered emphatically, like the nuance was important; not invented…But Annatar was there and he did not want Celebrimbor telling me more. He contrived to keep it to a discussion of the mirrors and the way the light worked.' Erestor said, still unable to completely understand, to forgive himself for being duped by Sauron. How could he not have known the cruel malice in the black heart of such a one? There had been those who warned him, indeed he himself had conveyed those warnings to Celebrimbor. But Celebrimbor was his father's son, his grandfather's heir indeed. His curiosity and thirst of curvë was all encompassing. Later Erestor realised that Celebrimbor had been bereft and vulnerable; none of them had realised how much Narvi meant to Celebrimbor, nor how he would grieve his dear friend. But Sauron did. Oh he had used that to his advantage indeed.

Erestor shook his head at his own uselessness and glanced up. Glorfindel caught his eye and he knew that his friend had understood, seen everything through the strange power in this place. It was useful, he thought with the calm, rational part of his mind, and followed Glorfindel up the stairs where the air became thinner, tighter.

Now the darkness opened like a mouth and Erestor knew they approached the Oromardë. Their footsteps were dulled by the dust on the floor, soft underfoot, muffling all sound. Devouring it, Erestor found himself thinking, for this is where they had found Rhawion, and lost him. The site of their failure. He felt Glorfindel's thoughts too, his self-recrimination and the harshness of his own criticism, but he said nothing; they both deserved it.

Ahead of them, thin grey light that filtered into the dim, silent hall. Not light split into colour, for the prisms were long gone. This was just thin daylight threading its way through the gaps in the rock, in what had once been the marble, carved roof, and striking gashes in the darkness so daylight bled onto the floor, onto the smashed glass. The air though was thin, and he felt his lungs starved as if he were very deep underground…looking at his hand felt dreamlike and as if he were not quite here. He wondered if perhaps this strangeness and the visions were because dreams had power, could become manifest? Perhaps that was why he saw Maedhros and Glorfindel saw the Valarauku?

He caught Glorfindel's elbow suddenly. 'Perhaps I should go alone.'

Glorfindel turned to him, his cool blue eyes focused intently. 'Why do you suddenly say this? Do you think me afraid?'

Erestor barked a short laugh. ' Never!'

It drew a brief smile from Glorfindel and he turned and strode off into the dim grey light as if he had never known a moment's fear. Around the edges of the grey light, shadows clung in the corners and darkness shifted. A thin black shroud fluttered and the grey light skimmed an iron crown.

0o0o

Approaching from the mountains, the track swerved hard to the right and towards The Angle. It was a route used by the few hardy merchants and Rangers who still braved Caradhras. But they met no one in this bleak winter cold.

They cut away from the old track and across the heathland and moor to avoid taking another two days. Neither Elladan nor Elrohir wished to rest. Brambles curled around them and tore at their cloaks, the wetland had crept up to the very edge of the old city. Marsh and bog squelched beneath their feet and it was with utter relief that they found the grey road, broken, and great slabs of granite upended as if the earth itself had been in tumult, but long ago.

They arrived mid-morning in the shadow of Phellanthir, for the winter sun was low in the sky and never seemed to climb above the height of the tower, so it cast long shadows. The trees clustered together as if in fear and the thick brambles tore at their cloaks and tripped the horses as they passed. Like some fairytale. thought Elladan. His anxiety for Erestor had settled into a sharp ache that did not ease though they were close now.

He could already be dead, he thought with panicked fear, but Elrohir was holding him steady and he knew better than to blunder ahead with no regard for danger.

Soon they found an old campfire on the banks of the river. It was several days old, perhaps a week and had been built in a dwarvish pattern. 'Gimli's work,' they agreed. It was evident though that the camp had been abandoned in haste and no care taken to hide it. They found traces of horses later, and then the carefully hidden saddles and bridles of their friends.

'Asfaloth will find Barakhir and Baraghur,' Elrohir said. 'But Niphredil has probably gone home by now. I have never known a more disloyal and cowardly horse. Erestor spoils him.' But it was not unkindly said.

Elladan leaned over the hidden saddles and noted how carefully Glorfindel's elegant and simply decorated saddle was placed and Erestor's seemingly thrown, its more elaborate and defiant eight-pointed star emblazoned on the skirt. A surge of panic hit him and he instinctively clasped the hilt of his dagger.

In the shadows of Phellanthir the knife was heated, and although it did not burn his skin, he felt a flame of excitement burning through him as if he rode to meet a lover, the butterfly excitement in the pit of his belly, the flutter of adrenaline along his nerves. He glanced at Elrohir and said, 'My blade is warm. Trembling almost. As you say Aícanaro does when battle is near.'

Elrohir shot him a sideways look, alarm mixed with interest. 'Do you think it denotes some unknown danger?' He thought for a while and then said, 'The creature yesterday? Do you think it warns of dragons? A cold drake perhaps.'

Elladan pursed his mouth. There was a cold malice but where a cold drake had cunning, so Glorfindel had told them many times, the beast that had passed over felt merely savage and hungry. It did not have an intelligence of its own.

'I think something else guided that creature,' Elladan replied. 'We know not why Erestor is within the tower. But Celeborn said that a soul had been devoured… Perhaps the Woodelf was right. Perhaps Rhawion is trapped within and Erestor has come to free him. Perhaps it is Rhawion who is danger.'

It was strange that the mere mention of Legolas Thranduillion had such an effect on Elrohir; he turned to Elladan irritably. 'If he believed that fool, then he is a bigger fool. He has put himself in danger on the say-so of that….' He closed his mouth tightly without speaking the insult. His eyes snapped back to the forest. 'Come, we will find them and end this unnecessary risk to our friends.'

He strode off into the woods, and it seemed the trees made way from him then as if they felt his burning fire.

Above them, Phellanthir loomed like a fang in the dull wintry light. The dead leaves rattled on branches of the trees that clustered up against the old ruined wall that look more like a quarry of cliff now than carefully, smoothly engineered stone, dressed marbles and polished granite. The city was merely a rocky outcrop, like Weathertop or Amon Hen. Undeterred Elladan forced his way through the overgrowth and onto the old road. He picked his way carefully along the trail, and it wound up the side of the hill towards the old citadel. Below them the forest spread, a canopy of dull brown and bleak twigs that scratched against each other.

His hand clasped the hilt of the dagger instinctively, feeling its warmth rush up his arm, into his chest.

It had been a gift from his father when in truth Elladan was too young to wear it. Not a begetting gift, just a gift. For if Elrohir was the beloved son of their mother, Elladan was his father's, though neither would have admitted it or shown it.

It was given to me by one like my father when I was your age, Elrond had said, his eyes filled with such an expression of longing and nostalgia that Elladan did not speak in hope that he would say more, for Elrond never spoke of those days, never spoke their names. No one did but Erestor, and he wore his old loyalties like a badge, like a banner, defiant and proud. Celebrian had been outraged and neither Elladan not Elrohir knew if she was annoyed that Elrond had given their child a knife or if it was the association she disliked.

Elrohir was as thrilled, never jealous of his brother but delighted that he had something so exciting. It was hefted differently, to favour a left hand, to use easily as if the other hand was busy elsewhere… or deadened, or lost. And the twins had whispered together in the dark, enamoured of the tales of Fëanor, and wove a tale of their own: that Maedhros had wrought it to be with him always; that he could, if he chose, ease the Oath, his own passing…except of course he could not. Because he had sworn, Elladan had insisted, with a certainty borne of Erestor's tales, that he would recover the Jewels that were his own father's soul.

Elladan had hardly dared wear the dagger let alone use it, for even in Elrond's valley the names were confused with treachery and blood and murder. Until one afternoon in the sleepy Autumn. Elrohir had been gathered up by their mother and curled against her while she wound wools around his hands for weaving. He remembered the guilty look Elrohir cast him as Celebrián pulled him close, like a cat, and that Elrohir had called Elladan over too. But their mother had said that Elladan had to go to the study to finish what he had left the day before. It was not unkindly meant but cold nevertheless. She had not watched him with the same devotion that she watched Elrohir and it caused Elrohir as much pain, perhaps more, for their mother's seeming indifference to one of them.

Elladan fetched the gift from his father first and then perched himself resentfully on the edge of a hard chair at the too high desk with books and ink and pens before him. Left to his own devices and of an age when hunting and war and battles and heroism were far more in his mind than copying tengwar script, he drew the thin sharp blade from its sheath surreptitiously, liking the slide of steel, the satisfying shwoosh of fine sharp metal. He twirled the dagger between his fingers, watching the firelight flash and slide upon the blade, finding it soothing. He was examining it, holding it reverently, delicately, when Erestor burst in, cold and fresh from the hunt.

'So young man, you have been banished here to finish what you could have finished yesterday,' he declared and leaned over the chair to look at the paper Elladan hurriedly pulled towards him. 'Your tutor will not be happy with you when she hears!'

There was the familiar scent of sandalwood and spices and ink that was so Erestor and that Elladan loved, for Erestor was fascinating, mercurial, kindness itself, but demanding too. His long black hair shone almost blue, shifted and slipped over his shoulder and brushed the oak desk and the rough woven parchment, and Elladan gazed up. Erestor had always been there, always been their refuge. But now Elladan recalled the strange expression on Erestor's face as he caught sight of the dagger that Elladan had tried to hide.

'I did not think Elrond had kept this,' Erestor had murmured half to himself.

Then he had reached over Elladan's shoulder and flipped the dagger out of his fingers, deftly caught it by the blade, spun and hurled it into a beam where the dagger wedged, whirring from the impact. 'Use it and be damned,' Erestor had said with a casual laugh and Elladan had stared for a moment and then turned with wide-eyed wonder at his father's oldest friend.

Erestor had turned to him and said gently, 'He to whom it belonged would be ashamed to see you treat it like some delicate and precious artifact.' And because Erestor was gallant and witty and flaunted his past like a flag, Elladan had begun to twirl the dagger showily until it became a habit. He loved to see the light catch in the symbols and runes etched so finely and in intricate design, turning them to a liquid molten river of words, almost speaking, lingering on the Fëanorian star, and stroking the rúmilic runes. He found he liked the slight edge of notoriety it brought that was more like his brother than he, but it brought too, his mother's disapproval.

Suddenly Elrohir grasped his arm, staring ahead. He pulled Elladan to the ground beside him, and he could feel Elrohir's heart pounding loudly in his chest, blood pumping.

'Look. There. Between the trees below,' Elrohir hissed.

Elladan edged himself forwards until he could peer over the ledge and into the woods below. Something big was moving around down there. Really big. Not big enough for a dragon but it must be the creature that had passed over them. There was a gleam of a grey hide like wet stone. A blunt ugly head rose up on a long sinuous neck and seemed to scent the air. They could not see any eyes but a long tongue flickered out from a lipless mouth.

'What is that?' Elladan asked in horror. As he spoke, a spiked tail thrashed amongst the trees and he heard Elrohir gasp. Elladan felt a little sick; it was much, much bigger than he had thought. And then its head lifted higher and it easily looked up from amongst the treetops. 'It must be the size of a cold drake. Do you think that's what it is?'

They had never seen one. Only a firedrake. And that only once. They had seen Smaug far off, distant fire, that strange winter in Mirkwood where all had been blurred by the miasma of Dol Guldur*. He frowned. 'What is it doing here?'

'Do we attack it or leave it?' Elrohir spoke Elladan's own thoughts. 'Why is it here? Surely this is not the way an elven fëa has gone from the world?'

They both felt the brush of its ravenous appetite then, a reptile. Cold-blooded and savage. But the cold made it sleepy and it was at rest. Its ugly, blunt head quested the air lazily, and then sank back down low. Great reptilian pinions were folded back and its grey skin gleamed wetly for it had begun to rain lightly and everything was covered with fine mist.

'There is no question that it is a creature of shadow,' Elrohir shuddered. He rubbed a finger over his eye. 'It is no threat to our horses or to us right now…

'That is not to say that will not change. And perhaps this is the threat to Erestor.'

'That is true.'

They both watched the ugly beast for a moment. '

'We should kill it.'

A foul stench wafted on the breeze and Elladan almost gagged. 'Yes, we should. It stinks of death.' He leapt lightly from the track onto a fallen boulder far below them and scrambled over the ruins and clutter, rubble. He heard his brother follow and together they made their way from the ruined city walls into the forest below.

Elladan paused and looked again. The beast was hidden from view but Elrohir was right: it stank like carrion. He could hear it move too, its huge body crashed through the woods every time it moved; it was hardly well hidden.

He glanced at Elrohir who was drawing Aícanaro from his black sheath and felt for the tingle he always sensed when that dark blade was drawn; but this time, he felt no thrill of lust from his brother's sword. Aícanaro's lust was silent, slumbered, untouched by the prospect of the beast's blood.

It is not enough for you, my Darkness, he heard Elrohir's thought and shuddered, but he knew too that the beast's blood was too sluggish for Aícanaro, its intelligence blunt and reptilian.

Silently they tracked the creature's blundering trail, broken trees and crushed bushes. It had caught something, for suddenly a horrible gurgling scream rent the silent forest and something was slaughtered.

It was not hard to signal to each other to approach from either side and suddenly its blunt head was up.

With sick horror, Elladan saw that it had no eyes just a maw of teeth. A string of rich red gore was strung from its jagged fangs and gobbets of meat flecked its grey silvery hide that gleamed like stone in the rain.

Striking at Elrohir, it opened it jaws wide like a serpent's, and like lightning it snaked its head and lunged again.

Elrohir leapt to one side and then rolled and came up on his feet, dark Aícanaro clenched in his fists. Elladan slashed at its flank with his frost-bright Alcarinwë and black blood spurted from the wound. The creature swung its head round towards him, and he dived between the trees just as the jaws snapped shut. But it was hampered by the trees and Elrohir approached, his blade dripping with blood and a smudge on his high cheekbone. He shouted so the thing swung its head away from Elladan and towards Elrohir. Elladan could not see what happened next but the creature reared back, shrieking and gurgling. Dark blood spattered over Elrohir's face and Elladan shied away in horror though his brother did not; he never did. Frost-bright, his own sword ripped through the tough hide and joined the dark magic of Aícanaro, plunging into the flesh of the beast, hacking its sinuous, repulsive reptilian neck until at last the creature writhed like a decapitated serpent, its great wings flailed and flapped until it keeled over, legs still twitching.

Elladan breathed hard and wiped his sword on the grass that was churned up and bloody. Then he looked towards the carcass of the animal that had been butchered by the dreadful beast. Though its hide had been black it was now unidentifiable, for it had been gnawed and torn apart completely. The long legs of the slaughtered animal could have belonged to horse or deer or mumâk for all they could tell.

For a dreadful moment, Elladan thought it his own sweet Baraghur and he almost cried out, but it could not have been. No. It is not. They are tearing up the grass on the plains and have found Asfaloth. He blinked. Whilst he could indeed feel what Elrohir felt at times, and knew his thoughts, it was rarely as clear as this. He found his own brother's eyes staring back at him.

'Not them,' Elrohir said and Elladan felt his brothers' warmth caress him, soothe him, and he breathed. 'A deer.' He was looking upwards, above Elladan's head. 'The creature must have ripped it apart in a frenzy.'

Elladan glanced upwards and at first he thought it was the branches of the tree itself and that something dark and heavy had been caught in them. A cold wind fingered its way through the forest and he saw that is was antlers caught in the tree and the stag's head that hung from it. He grimaced.

'A frenzy indeed.' He looked down at the slain creature and pushed at the huge talons with his foot. 'Eru knows what havoc it might have wreaked had it been left to hunt these lands. Many folk will sleep more safely though they know it not.'

But Elrohir did not speak. He was leaning over the creature's head where his sword had almost hacked it off though it still clung by veins and tendons to the still twitching neck. He reached down, and for a moment Elladan thought he was going to dip his hand in its cold blood.

'Do not touch it!' he exclaimed and Elrohir glanced at him askance. Then he ignored Elrohir and reached down, but as he straightened, he pulled something long and thin between his fingers.

'What is this?' he said, holding it up so Elrohir too could see it.

'Reins? Is that what this is?' He stared at Elrohir. 'This is a bridle of sorts. Look at this.' He pointed with the tip of his sword at the ugly, gaping mouth with its thick crust of teeth. Dried dark wetness was at the corner of its mouth and a sharp metal spike against its cheek. A cruel master indeed but a master nonetheless.

'This can only be the Nazgûl,' Elrohir said darkly. 'Did Glorfindel not vanquish it? It must still be here,' Elrohir hissed, drawing Aícanaro once again and pulling Elladan towards him and behind him then. He backed away from the carcass. 'I should have guessed.'

'Or it has been joined by its Brethren.' Elladan pulled away and stepped out into the clearing made by the beast. 'There is no sense of them here and it stinks enough on its own.'

'Come away,' said Elrohir with a sudden sense of foreboding. 'The Nazgûl is not here but it will not be far.'

'At least this is one less threat,' he added as they climbed back upon the path. They did not turn again and so they did not see the shadow that circled far on the edges of the forest, nor did they hear the whump of leathery wings upon the wind. Below them the fell beast was still, but soon its carrion kin would arrive to feed.

They searched and saw that a holly tree had fallen across the main entrance to the Tower. A fine thread of black linen caught on Elladan's finger and they knew they were following Erestor. Within, the dust rose like flocks of ghostly birds and a shadow merged into the dark, yet they did not see it.

0o0o

Notes:

* Rilmapentë* - Glorfindel's sword that he used to fight the Balrog. Forged by Curufin himself for Glorfindel after his own sword was lost in the Battle of Unnumbered Tears.

* Eruvatúrë- the new sword, relatively, given him by Gil-Galad when he arrived from Aman.

* Celebrimbor had openly criticized his father, Curufin, for what happened in Nargothrond: Beren came to Finrod for help in getting a Silmaril which he needed in order to wed Luthien. Celegorm and Curufin, who were living in Nargothrond at the time, persuaded most of Nargothrond to stay behind; only ten warriors, went with them and they were all promptly captured by Sauron. Finrod died protecting Beren.

* The time that Elorhir and Elladan saw Smaug is based on where I think Spiced Wine's amazing and gorgeous spin-off is going, based on Sons of Thunder. I love the fact that we dip into each other's 'verse.

Translations:

Ilweranta- rainbow, lit. But Celebrimbor uses the word like we would 'spectrum'. It is a more scientific term in Quenya than our usage of the word rainbow.

helyanwë - sky-bridge, noun. This is the common word for rainbow in Quenya.