Chapter Text
The iron glows bright on his anvil. He takes a moment to check the temperature again, feel the give in the metal through his hammer. The normal forging process is a simple one, the welding of iron links something he could do in his sleep, but what he’s attempting isn’t quite normal.
His last few efforts lie discarded around his feet, and he brushes them aside with one foot as he grips his hammer, and positions the iron on the anvil. Such a small piece of metal.
He hums under his breath, barely audible to even himself, and begins his work. A swift strike down with his hammer, and then another, until he falls into a steady rhythm that settles alongside each breath. He can feel his heartbeat fall into place with the hit of his hammer, the metal bending and coming together beneath his hands, and he pushes down the little spark of anticipation that this might work .
The two ends of metal meet, and he can feel the moment that they begin to fuse, two pieces beginning to come one. He hums again, flipping the metal onto its side and continuing without a single break in his rhythm. He can feel the intent beginning to settle into the metal, a slow flow from deep in his chest to down his arm, through the hammer and into the iron, and he urges it along. Bind , he whispers in his mind, in time with the striking of the hammer. You want to bind, and hold.
The metal fuses, and one last strike rings out through the forge. He breathes out heavily, sweat dripping down the back of his neck.
A small coil of chain sits on the anvil, the last link still glowing orange.
“Well,” he whispers to himself. “That’s promising.”
0-o-0-o-0
Celebrimbor sets his tongs down, and pushes a few stray strands of hair back from his brow. “Well, that went well,” he muses as one of the other smiths heads over with a brush in hand. “Anyone hurt?”
There’s a chorus of negatives, and Celebrimbor braces his hands on his hips as he looks down at the shattered pieces of metal scattered across the floor. “Next time, we’ll try with smaller quantities of coal dust, I think. That was maybe too brittle.”
“You think?” someone else says to a chorus of laughter. “Shall we try again?”
“What time is it?” Celebrimbor asks. The forges have windows, but if they’re not cleaned regularly they’re soon all but blacked out with soot, and apparently the servants are more than a little apprehensive at coming in here after that time one of the smiths left a vial of phosphorus out and the light through the open door caused it to ignite. Maeglin had tried to implement some sort of cleaning rota, but predictably it hadn’t caught on.
Someone sticks their head out the door. “Around dusk?” they call back.
“Oh, shit ,” Celebrimbor says. He starts pulling his apron off, the strings catching on his head and nearly pulling his hair out of its plait before he manages to untie it, even as he heads for the door. “I’m going to be late. I’m going to be so late. Again .”
He sprints out of the forges and heads for the stairs. Barad Eithel stretches high above him, endless flights of stairs winding up from the large forges at the base of the citadel to the halls of the High King and King. Celebrimbor’s own apartments are a floor below Fingon and Maedhros’, and he all but falls through the door to his sitting room in his haste.
Maeglin looks up from where he’s sitting at Celebrimbor’s desk. “You shattered it again, didn’t you?”
“Maybe.” Celebrimbor heads for his bedroom. “Why are you here? I know I’m horribly late for dinner, but there’s no reason for you to be late as well.” Maeglin is already dressed for dinner, out of his more simple working clothes into formal robes more appropriate for dinner with their family, a circlet set on his brow and more than a few pieces of jewellery on him. Celebrimbor grabs the closest clothes he can reach that won’t be embarrassing, and starts trying to wipe the worst of the forges off his face.
Maeglin appears in the doorway, leaning up against the frame. “Dinner has been pushed back half an hour. Something came up in court that Fingon had to deal with, and Maedhros is still out with his patrol.”
“Oh, well thanks for telling me before I ran up all those stairs,” Celebrimbor replies, tossing a quick grin over his shoulder. "Wait, that isn't the important meeting Maedhros has been worrying about, is it?"
Maeglin rolls his eyes. "That was l ast week , Tyelpë. Sometimes I think you wouldn't be able to find your own head if it wasn't attached to your neck."
Celebrimbor pulls a face at him. "I was busy. What was it even about, anyway?"
Maeglin brushes some non-existent lint off his clothes. "What to do if Celegorm's Hunt fails," he says with a shrug. "It was military strategy for the most part. I was only there as a courtesy."
Celebrimbor ignores the little shiver of unease at the thought of Morgoth returning. "Well, that's unlikely to happen anytime soon. What has Fingon late this time? Anything bad?”
“Tedious,” Maeglin just says. “Various people are competing over who gets the regions in Himlad, but that’s just what I’ve heard from others. I wasn’t asked to be in council today.”
Celebrimbor drags the cloth over his face and tries to pretend that he’s not using it to hide his expression. “Right, well, that’s something,” he says. “Who’s going to be at dinner?”
He realises as he sees Maeglin’s frown in his mirror that the question won’t be as much of a distraction as he first thought. “Fingon and Maedhros, of course,” Maeglin says quietly. “Maglor, Caranthir, Glorfindel and Ecthelion. A few of the guild heads and others.” He hesitates for a moment. “Curufin, most likely.”
Celebrimbor makes himself let go of the face cloth. “Of course. Pick out some jewellery for me, will you? I can’t be bothered to choose.”
Maeglin steps into the room. "I could put your name in," he says quietly as he opens Celebrimbor's jewellery box and starts perusing through the various necklaces. "For Himlad, or a region of it. You do have a prior claim."
"You know that I don't," Celebrimbor says sharply. He shrugs a new shirt on and smooths it out. "Not anymore."
Maeglin tilts his head. "You could. It's not been that long since your father and uncle held those lands. People still remember."
"What people?" Celebrimbor yanks his undershirt into place. "The ones who died in dragonfire whilst we fled? Or the ones who took refuge elsewhere and will barely look at me anymore." He snatches up a tunic and pulls it over his head. "I don't have a people, and I don't want one. I'm fine right here."
When he turns around, Maeglin has two necklaces dangling from his outstretched hand and an inscrutable expression. "It was only an offer," he says quietly.
Just like that, Celebrimbor can feel the irritation drain away. "I know, I'm sorry," he says, taking the necklaces and hanging them both around his neck. "I just...I don't like thinking about it."
Maeglin hums. "It was your home. It's okay to be sad that it isn't anymore." He takes a few rings from the box and hands them over. "Do you want to stay here?"
Celebrimbor shrugs sharply, and then looks up just in time to see the disappointment on Maeglin's face before it is carefully smoothed away. "I do," he says softly. "I think I do. But it's only been a year or so." He slips the rings on. "You?"
Maeglin glances away. "I'm not planning on going back to Gondolin anytime soon. Let's leave it at that."
Celebrimbor knows not to push. Sometimes it's hard to remember that he's only known Maeglin for a little over a year, that the other is so much younger than him and has never seen the shores of Aman or the light of the Trees. Kindred spirits, Fingon likes to call them, when he finds them asleep in Maeglin’s study over piles of notes, or runs into them in the very early hours of dawn as he wakes and the two of them are heading to bed.
Celebrimbor isn’t sure about kindred spirits, not when Maeglin is sometimes so many steps ahead of him in the tangled snarl of politics that Celebrimbor can’t even see the stairs, or somehow keeps his head when their work goes wrong and Celebrimbor has resorted to throwing brushes at the walls, but he supposes friends is good enough for now.
They head downstairs. The large dining hall, the one that opens out into the main courtyard of the High King’s citadel, is far too large for a family dinner, and they both turn off the main corridor towards one of the smaller formal rooms that hasn’t been taken over for something else. A little over a year after the Galad Lain and Barad Eithel is still far from any sense of normalcy. Not that Celebrimbor has much of an accurate standard for what passes for normal. He is a Fëanorian, after all.
A steward opens the door, Maeglin waving him off before he can announce them. Most people are already here, though nobody is sitting down at the table in the centre yet, instead standing around with glasses of wine and idle small talk. Celebrimbor glances around, but he can’t see Curufin anywhere. He isn’t sure whether to be relieved at that or not.
Fingon waves them over, still in his formal court clothes, though his crown has been traded out for a simple circlet. “Maedhros is going to be late, so we’ll start without him now that you’re here,” he says, getting them both glasses. “Tyelpë, Idhron told me there was some sort of accident in the forge earlier. I hope nobody is hurt?”
Celebrimbor grimaces. “We got some ratios wrong and the blade we were working on shattered, but nobody got hurt.” He sips at his wine and drums his fingers against the stem. “If my latest idea works, it will be fascinating. We know that intent matters when it comes to forging blades, we know that our hatred for Morgoth’s creations is why our weapons gleam in battle against them, because we’re thinking of what these weapons will accomplish when we craft them.” Distantly he’s aware of Maeglin taking the wine glass out of his hand before he spills it. “What if we can enhance it?” Celebrimbor asks, looking back and forth between Fingon and Maeglin. “I think if we can adjust the ratios, imbue intent further towards the beginning of the process rather than the end, which is where we currently think it really matters, then perhaps we can do more.”
Maeglin looks long-suffering, but Maeglin always looks like that at the start of a project. Celebrimbor knows that he’ll come round. Besides, Fingon looks intrigued, and it’s Fingon’s signature that keeps their forges so well stocked.
“More of what?” he asks as they all take their seats and the first course is served. “At a certain point, a blade’s edge cannot get sharper.”
Celebrimbor shakes his head. “Not sure yet, but it would be an aspect of the fëa more than anything, I think. Lómion?”
Maeglin tilts his head, considering. “Most likely. But there is only so much that a material can take, depending on the material in question.” He glances at Celebrimbor. “Hence the shattering.”
“It was just the ratios,” Celebrimbor replies with a wave of his hand. “I’ll work it out.”
The door opens, and Celebrimbor looks up just in time to see Curufin step through.
He’s dressed in simple robes adorned with the Fëanorian star, a circlet pinning his hair back from his face. His cane taps against the stones as he murmurs an insincere apology for being late and heads to an empty seat, next to Maglor. “Busy?” Maglor asks as Curufin sits down and is served.
There are spots of inks on his fingers as he picks up his fork. “Nothing important,” he says quietly. “Just some notes.” His gaze flickers up and catches Celebrimbor’s, just for a moment.
Celebrimbor looks away, turning back to the rest of the table. “Anyway,” he says. “If we can get the material right, and the process, then we could completely change the way that we forge weapons! And it’s not just weapons I’m thinking of. Here, let me-” He digs in his pocket for one of the endless notebooks he always has on him, and Fingon abruptly straightens.
“No, absolutely not,” he says, and the timbre of his voice has changed so drastically that everyone around the table jumps. “I’m enforcing Amil’s rules, and that goes for everyone. No works at the dinner table. Tyelpë, put it away.”
Celebrimbor’s hand slides the notebook back into his pocket without ever making the conscious decision to do so. Fingon blinks, and then sits back in his chair. “I hate it when Nelyo does that,” Maglor remarks as the rest of the table sits there in silence. “It’s so horribly creepy. Is he on his way?”
Fingon is flexing the fingers of his right hand absent-mindedly. “He’s just ridden in. I’ve told him to come straight up, if nobody minds him still in patrol armour and not formal robes.”
Naturally, nobody is going to disagree with the High King. It’s only a few minutes later when the doors open and Maedhros strides in, hair windswept and cheeks still bright from riding and the stiff breeze outside. “Sorry I’m late, beloved,” he says, pressing a swift kiss to Fingon’s lips before taking his seat beside him. “We came across wolf tracks on patrol, and followed for a little to ensure the livestock were safe.”
“Wolves, down from the mountains already?” Ecthelion asks. His voice is still little more than a rasp, his throat damaged by the balrog’s fire alongside the rest of him at the Galad Lain, but Celebrimbor has had a year or so to get used to it. Ecthelion frowns. “It’s early in the season for that.”
“It seemed like a very small group,” Maedhros adds as he is served and starts to dig into the first course. “Most likely youngsters driven out by another pack. I’ve alerted the rangers, and they’re going to follow up on it tomorrow.”
Ecthelion hums. He sounds unconvinced, and Glorfindel briefly sets a hand on his arm. “I’m sure you have it well in hand,” Ecthelion says quietly. He reaches for his glass, but misjudges the distance. Only Glorfindel’s quick reactions prevent wine being spilt all over the table.
Maedhros huffs a laugh. “Depth perception again?” he asks. “I was breaking plates left and right when I had this half of my face bandaged, and this eye wasn’t working all that well.” He grins wryly at Fingon. “And only a few of them were on purpose.”
Ecthelion dips his head as Fingon laughs. “I was tempted to start bringing your meals wrapped in cloth at one point,” he reminds Maedhros. “We were running out of plates in the camp.”
Celebrimbor watches Glorfindel slowly rub his hand up and down Ecthelion’s arm as talk turns to other things, the quiet murmurs between the two of them that makes Ecthelion smile softly and reach for his glass again.
He has seen Ecthelion with the healers, learning how to live now that half of his sight is gone, learning how to move again. He hadn’t meant to watch most of the time, caught in the doorway or pausing without meaning to on the small balcony that overlooked the healers’ halls, but then Curufin had hidden himself away and only allowed Haerel to help him, and Celebrimbor couldn’t help but be curious.
He had asked Haerel, one long night after Curufin had nearly fallen leaving dinner and only Maedhros’ quick reflexes stopped him cracking his head open again, but Haerel had refused to tell him anything. He had briefly considered trying to find out more, but Maeglin has an unnerring sense for when Celebrimbor is about to do something stupid, and had stopped him just as Celebrimbor had started wondering whether Haerel kept records.
Celebrimbor chances a look across the table at Curufin. He looks up from his plate, half an ear listening to Fingon talking politics with Maeglin, just in time to see Curufin look up and catch his gaze.
Celebrimbor freezes. Curufin’s eyes widen ever so slightly, and then he straightens up in his chair. A haughty expression flits across his face, one ever so familiar to Celebrimbor from the past few decades.
He'd never noticed, all those years, just how cracked it was.
“Pass the butter, would you?” Curufin asks.
Celebrimbor refuses to change his expression. Glorfindel is actually closest to the butter, and reaches for it, but Celebrimbor snatches up the plate before he can get it, ignoring the mild confusion on Glorfindel’s face. He’ll apologise later. “Here,” he says, just as quietly, holding the plate out.
Curufin reaches out and takes it from him, his expression entirely inscrutable. Celebrimbor has barely let go and begun to sit back when Curufin’s hand trembles, and then shakes. The plate wobbles precariously in his grip.
"I've got it!" Celebrimbor all but launches himself out of his chair in an effort to catch the plate, just as Curufin jerks it back out of his reach and then loses his grip entirely. The plate tips and then falls, shattering into pieces on the dining table.
There is silence. Celebrimbor looks up to see Curufin staring at the broken plate, expression set in stone. He desperately wants him to look up and meet his gaze. He wants him to smirk and say something that has the whole table laughing with him, to pick up his knife like nothing ever happened.
"Well," Maglor says, breaking the silence so sharply that Celebrimbor almost flinches. "At least the butter will have an interesting texture now."
A servant sweeps in and swiftly clears the smashed plate and smears of butter from the table. Curufin blinks once, still staring at the table, and then turns back silently to his plate.
"Tyelpë," Fingon says, and Celebrimbor is watching Curufin so closely that he can see the smallest of shivers run across his face as Fingon says his name. "Tell Maedhros about the new project you were telling me of earlier."
Maedhros has half an eye on Curufin, but at Fingon's bidding turns expectantly to Celebrimbor. "What are you working on now?" he asks.
Celebrimbor tears his gaze away and makes himself look at Maedhros. "It's early stages yet, and you have to hear me out first, but I think I could be onto something."
0-o-0-o-0
He usually knows when he's dreaming.
He's not sure if that makes it better or worse.
The mud is slick and deep beneath his feet, grabbing at his ankles and trying to pull him down as he runs, shoving his way through the melee. Thunder cracks overhead, lightning illuminating the peaks of the mountains until he realises that the thunder is the sound of rocks hurtling into the sides of the fortress from the trebuchets, and the lightning is the glare of fire from a flaming whip raised high overhead.
He stumbles forwards, the crowd getting thicker and thicker. There is a shout from ahead, and then a wind whips up out of nowhere and strikes out across the field, nearly sending him down into the mud.
He doesn't know if this is the one they win, or one of the many that they lost. Based on probability, the latter is more likely, but probability never seems to have much hold in dreams.
The edge of the crowd finally appears, and he can see the blond hair and iron crown and eyes filled with a fire that wants to burn everything around. He shoves his way through the last few feet, stumbling into the clearing.
He arrives just in time to see the blow land.
0-o-0-o-0
Celebrimbor sits bolt upright with a strangled cry.
One year, three months and seven days since the plains outside Angband, and he can remember the sound of a mace colliding with a helm as if it happened yesterday.
His hands are shaking. Celebrimbor stares down at them, willing them to stop. When they don't, he presses them to his face again, his fingers tangling in his snarled hair and pulling at his scalp until it hurts.
One year, three months and seven days since he fought through the melee just in time to see Curufin stood in front of Maedhros crumpled in the mud, in time to see him thrown aside by Sauron's blow. In time to scream as Sauron struck again, and his father fell lifeless to the ground.
Celebrimbor makes himself take his hands away from his face. It's dark, even when he gets up and twitches the curtains aside at the window, but the embers are still warm in the grate, so it can't yet be near dawn. The stone floor is cold beneath his bare feet, enough to shock him fully awake as he pads across the room for the pitcher of water on the side.
He drains two glasses before his throat seems to forget the scream that still lingers there.
For some, he knows, it was more than a year and a few months. What Maedhros went through to secure their victory at the Galad Lain isn't exactly common knowledge, but it's not a secret, especially amongst their family. It would be hard for it to remain a secret even if they had wanted it to, given the number of times Fingon has broken off mid-sentence to clutch at his head, or one of Maedhros' brothers has paled at something he can't see and swiftly left the room.
Celebrimbor can tell when they're talking about it all whenever they break off mid-conversation as he enters the room. He isn't sure whether to feel left out, or be grateful that he cannot remember the days that never happened and yet left so much behind.
Fingon had let slip one evening that he believed only the ones who remember are those whose outcomes had changed drastically with the changing fortunes of the battle. After the anniversary celebrations a few months ago, Celebrimbor had overheard Maglor and Caranthir discussing how Turgon didn't remember anything because he had done the same thing each cycle.
He had retreated each time. And as Celebrimbor doesn't remember his own death, he must have done the same. Time and time again, all the way to the end. To the final assault that is all that he can remember.
The pitcher of water is all but empty. Celebrimbor blinks down at the glass in his hand.
Morgoth had been so dark. Hurrying after Celegorm to the rear lines, Curufin unconscious in his brother's arms and blood streaming from beneath his helm, he had still felt it when Morgoth had stepped from the gates. The horror that had sucked his breath from his chest, that had made him want to drop to the mud and bodies beneath his feet and hide, drape himself over his father until his heart stopped trying to crawl out of his chest.
Celegorm had slung Curufin over one shoulder, grabbed Celebrimbor's arm with his free hand, and started to run. It had probably saved them.
Celebrimbor sets the empty glass down with a quiet clink. Separate thoughts start to interconnect, drifting together and coalescing into a premise that could be something, if looked at in the right light.
He shoves his feet into the closest pair of shoes he can see, and almost forgets to shut his door behind him. The servant's staircase is the quickest route down to the forges, and this time of night it's unlikely that he'll run into anyone and send another serving dish flying.
He lights the forge quickly, and then leaves it to come to temperature as he hunts out some iron rods from the store cupboard. He only has quarter inch rods, but there are enough to work with for now, and he grabs a handful before hurrying back to his bench and anvil.
The forge comes up to heat quickly, and soon the iron rods are glowing a bright orange. Celebrimbor tests the heat, and satisfied with the malleability of the iron, starts to forge the first scarf. With every ring of his hammer he pushes the burning terror of seeing his father collapse, feeling the blood beneath his hands, down through the hammer and into the metal.
"Bind," he breathes in time with the ring of metal on metal. "Bind, and hold ."