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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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imeanforever
"It stands, and if it didn't, uttering a question like that wouldn't help. I can fly two hundred miles in a few hours. If nothing interrupts me, I don't make some catastrophic social error that puts everyone on guard, and the Silmaril is actually there six days sounds like plenty."
"How likely?"
imeanforever
"I don't understand what terms you want that answer in. I don't know how likely any of the things that could obstruct me are."
"If those are the only things you expect to obstruct you then we're fine." He sighs. "This is horrifying. All right. You have, as discussed, permission to give people orders in Sirion, though not orders that will be in place for more than six days. If you get a Silmaril, bring it to us."
He points it out on the map. "It looks like a refugee camp at the mouth of a river."
"Houses that have been built quickly. Lots of people in very little space."
"Nothing else comes to mind. You are small enough to claim to be a child, if you do think of a way to hide the wings, and as I said we hesitate to hurt children."
"Do you have any idea what the Eldar act like? I am not typical."
imeanforever
"No, I don't know that either. And I'm not sure exactly how long ago it was I last met a mortal of a different kind..."
"You could always say that you are a fairy from fairyland, and not explain that this lets you command people."
"If you think more information will improve your chances of success, I can introduce you to people who are better at behaving in a manner typical of the Eldar."
imeanforever
"I think trying to pass for one is not going to be my best plan. I'm missing too much background knowledge."
"I agree. Some of the Maiar don't interact with Elves or Men much, if that helps."
imeanforever
"I'll probably let them think I'm a Maia. What does swearing sound like if they want me to do that?"
"You just say 'I swear before Manwë and Varda - you don't even have to say that, but people usually do - that -' and then whatever they're asking. Mortals can do it falsely."
"Are you okay? You do not have to answer personal questions truthfully or completely."
"Yeah," he says, "me too, though this is close to the worst. Okay. Good luck - what do you want me to call you?"