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Confirmation reaches them in the spring that Elwing of Sirion has the Silmaril.
It takes as long as the spring only because they weren't looking. They can stretch the oath that far, they can be disinterested in knowing - but now they know, and so there it is. Elwing of Sirion is twenty-three. Half-man, so fully grown. Sirion is a city of refugees. Elves and Men and, since there are Men, children. Elwing herself has infant children.
They debate whether to send messengers. Debating is allowed, even protracted debating. The Oath, these days, is loud in their minds, and louder when they're pushing it like this, but they drag out the debate for a few months. Messengers will probably be shot on sight. The last time Elwing of Sirion received news of the House of Fëanor it would have been the news that her brothers, twins, aged seven, had not survived the sack of Menegroth.
They send messengers anyway. The messengers are shot on sight. They have good armor, Fëanorian armor, and return home injured but not lethally. Maglor's songs no longer stitch them together. War makes you worse at healing. Maglor's songs are more powerful than ever - he can knock back a wave of approaching enemies, he can make a blade's next touch deadly, he can make them faster and more impervious to danger, but he can no longer do healing.
Maedhros, when he thinks about this, thinks that perhaps there needs to be part of you that is not broken for healing spells to draw on. Or perhaps the Enemy is amused to strip that away first. Perhaps the Enemy finds it suited to the theme as the Oath tugs and yanks and twists them into violence against the lands they once defended and the peoples they once sheltered.
They send messengers to Sirion again. The messengers deliver a plea for the Silmaril, an offer of anything at all in exchange. The messengers do not return at all.
The Enemy is many many hundreds of miles from here but at night Maedhros can hear him in his head. Is it so implausible that I really let you go? the Enemy likes saying. You serve me better free than you ever would have willingly.
The Oath allows them to work slowly. They begin planning the sack of the refugee camp even more slowly than the Oath allows, so slowly that its currents are constantly tugging at them. Any slower and the currents would erode all the things they care about which are not the Oath, and it would be a disaster to go to Sirion once they've been stripped of their capacity to care about anything that is not the Silmaril. So they do not hold out forever. But they work as slowly as they can.
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"All right." Back to staring at the wall.
"In the beginning someone named Eru created this world. He had created already the Ainur, powers that acted according to his design, and he set them the task of building the world he had envisioned and given them space for. Morgoth was one of those powers, and his task was destruction; when others built continents he upended them, making mountains, and when they had thriving forests he drowned them in fire and under the earth, making coal, and while he hated the other Ainur and desired the destruction of the world, his doings helped to forge it.
Eventually the other Ainur tired of contesting with him over land and left the world to him, and build their own continent where he was unwelcome and they could design things as they preferred it. This continent was Valinor; it is west of here. The rest of the world was for the Enemy, and he delighted in it and sunk his power into the land and built a great stronghold.
And then we were put in the world. We awakened by the lake Cuivienen, far east of here. We learned to speak and delighted in language, we explored and delighted in the world, we made ourselves at home in the trees.
And Morgoth was intrigued, and jealous, and when some of our people wandered in innocence too far from the others he captured them and took them to his stronghold. And he tortured them and forced them to breed and tortured their children and did this for many generations, until he had foot soldiers made in mockery of us and bound by his magic to serve him.
And then he escalated, taking more and more Elves, until we were afraid and ventured barely at all from the lake shore, and starved, and lived in terror. And eventually one of the other Valar rode by, and learned of us, and we were frightened of him and he learned why we were so frightened, and he told the other Valar and they decided to war with Morgoth."
Eventually the other Ainur tired of contesting with him over land and left the world to him, and build their own continent where he was unwelcome and they could design things as they preferred it. This continent was Valinor; it is west of here. The rest of the world was for the Enemy, and he delighted in it and sunk his power into the land and built a great stronghold.
And then we were put in the world. We awakened by the lake Cuivienen, far east of here. We learned to speak and delighted in language, we explored and delighted in the world, we made ourselves at home in the trees.
And Morgoth was intrigued, and jealous, and when some of our people wandered in innocence too far from the others he captured them and took them to his stronghold. And he tortured them and forced them to breed and tortured their children and did this for many generations, until he had foot soldiers made in mockery of us and bound by his magic to serve him.
And then he escalated, taking more and more Elves, until we were afraid and ventured barely at all from the lake shore, and starved, and lived in terror. And eventually one of the other Valar rode by, and learned of us, and we were frightened of him and he learned why we were so frightened, and he told the other Valar and they decided to war with Morgoth."
imeanforever
- should she mention that -
- no. Maybe not.
"I didn't know children worked that way."
- no. Maybe not.
"I didn't know children worked that way."
"The Valar have powerful magic.
So the Valar warred with Morgoth, and much of the world was destroyed in their fighting. The Valar won and took Morgoth prisoner. Morgoth had already bred and created and released many horrible creatures into the world, so then the Valar came to us and invited us to their paradise where we could be safe. Most of us went.
And after three Ages of the world, Morgoth was pardoned, and he promised he'd never do such awful things again, and he came to live among us in Valinor. And he spread lies and tried to provoke a civil war and then assassinated the King, destroyed Valinor, and fled.
The King was my grandfather, and my father succeeded him. My father was worried that Morgoth, back here on this continent, would return to torturing and enslaving and breeding orcs, so he prepared us to go off to war with him. The Valar were angry and tried to deter us from departing, and then there was a battle, but we reached these shores. We tried to stop him. We held on for a very long time, and lots of people lived in safety they would not otherwise have known. But in the end we lost, and so now he is back to freely torturing and enslaving and slaughtering, and someday he'll decide I am not amusing enough to permit to wander around free and I suppose he'll come after us."
So the Valar warred with Morgoth, and much of the world was destroyed in their fighting. The Valar won and took Morgoth prisoner. Morgoth had already bred and created and released many horrible creatures into the world, so then the Valar came to us and invited us to their paradise where we could be safe. Most of us went.
And after three Ages of the world, Morgoth was pardoned, and he promised he'd never do such awful things again, and he came to live among us in Valinor. And he spread lies and tried to provoke a civil war and then assassinated the King, destroyed Valinor, and fled.
The King was my grandfather, and my father succeeded him. My father was worried that Morgoth, back here on this continent, would return to torturing and enslaving and breeding orcs, so he prepared us to go off to war with him. The Valar were angry and tried to deter us from departing, and then there was a battle, but we reached these shores. We tried to stop him. We held on for a very long time, and lots of people lived in safety they would not otherwise have known. But in the end we lost, and so now he is back to freely torturing and enslaving and slaughtering, and someday he'll decide I am not amusing enough to permit to wander around free and I suppose he'll come after us."
"Melkor is the name he was known to us by."
imeanforever
"I wonder why some of them have bits of their real names in the ones you know and some of them don't."
"Manwë and Ulmo are both derived from their real names. Manwë is the King of the Valar. I am mildly tempted to send you off to Valinor so you can ask for an audience with him and tell him to fight Melkor, but there are far too many ways that could fail."
"A few hundred years ago there were enough forces on this continent alone to take him down, and our only problem is that we were disunited. But if I'd had you then I wouldn't have been ruthless enough to actually do it."
"Manwë and Ulmo both would. I am honestly thinking that the best plan is to somehow get Ulmo's attention and ask for the name, but in general drawing the attention of the Valar is dangerous."
"Last time we talked they doomed us to never fulfill our Oath, wandering the continent in desperation until we died or wished we had, and then spending a long time bodiless and desperate to return to life."
He gestures around. "Worked out pretty well, didn't it? Except for the 'desperate to return to life', I really doubt I'll be that."
"We don't know. You can ask Ulmo to tell you once you have his attention, I guess."
"Thoughts?"
imeanforever
"Ordering hostile vassals with powers one doesn't understand is complicated and it sounds like Valar have a lot of powers I don't understand."
"Yes. And that I don't understand. I think it's nonetheless worth attempting, eventually, because otherwise he just kills everyone on the continent."