Chapter Text
Walking in the garden was a serpent-shaped heart and he told me,
What is broken cannot show, and less than beautiful is worse than unholy.
Idolized my innocence,
Stole it from me in the end.
Now I'm wide awakened and still paying for the poison they sold me.
-Sara Bareilles, “Eden”
The air seemed to grow thicker and fouler as the company of one-hundred steel-clad Ñoldorin roqueni and their new king drew further away from the great lake by which they had made their camp. Fog spewed out from the great mountains to the Northeast, obscuring the Ñoldor’s vision of the fell peaks of the Black Enemy’s fortress.
Still, none, save for their king, felt fear, and he kept that hidden from his face. As for the rest, they were Caliquendi, so they could still see and breathe far better than they believed Moringotho had anticipated. Their voices were free of fear and full of power, even as they commented on the way that the waters seemed to grow darker and the winds grew more biting. Some even commented lightly on the frantic, whispering voices carried by the wind.
“Thralls for us to one day free, perhaps,” suggested Orwaturco, a nér of middling years and powerful build.
The Ñoldor who accompanied the newly-acclaimed, still uncrowned Nelyafinwë Ñoldóran were confident indeed. Still, Maitimo knew that it was his duty to care for those who trusted him with their lives, so he halted his roqueni a league from the rendezvous point and sent out two of the lightest footed Ñoldor in his company to scout the terrain.
“Let me know how much greater Moringotho’s force is than what we agreed upon. We can handle much, but we must be sure that they have not brought those Valaraukar with them,” he ordered, using the name that he and Makalaurë had constructed for the monsters of fire and shadow.
I fear that the Oath might make me do battle with them anyway, but I shall not make my companions fight them with me, he thought.
Beside him, Anarcalin lifted his helm to speak.
“‘Twas wise to send out scouts, Ñoldóran, but you must know that we shall have to fight the Valaraukar someday. Moringotho will not forever refrain from using such mighty troops.”
Maitimo nodded gravely but gainsaid his old friend nonetheless.
“Not forever, but we will need greater forces and a better understanding of their powers if we are to bring them down,” he said.
***
Within minutes, his fears of the presence of Valaraukar were proven justified. The first signs of trouble came in the form of pained and panicked cries from their scouts, which echoed so loudly through the valley of the surrounding mountains that all of the assembled Ñoldor heard them.
“Valaraukar, Valaraukar!” came the panicked cry.
They had not stopped in the valley, but they were close to the pass of the mountains, and Maitimo suddenly understood the trap.
“Retreat!” he shouted suddenly, drawing his sword and turning his mount. “Away from the pass, away from the mountains, there lies the trap!”
He spurred them on, catching the thoughts of his captains they fled back towards Mithrim.
We must make for the safety of the high hills that we saw, he shouted to them. We stopped too close.
***
They never made it to the hills, but as screeches and howls filled his ears, Maitimo knew that it would not have saved them if they had.
“Keep charging, keep riding, get the spears around the perimeter!” he shouted, but he knew that that would avail them little.
Urqui and the wolves that were not wolves rode down for the hills, poured out of the pass behind them, and came for the mountains. They were about to be surrounded. They were about to be ambushed.
Nay, nay, not like this. We must not go down without a fight. At least some must survive, must ride back to Mithrim.
He could hear his heart pounding in his ears, and his whole hröa seemed to shake, save for his sword hand, which somehow held steady as he placed himself amongst the spear-Quendi and prepared for the fight.
Nelyo, how did they do it? How did we miss them? Anarcalin’s voice was in his head. His golden roquen, his oldest friend, his first lover, was using the shortened form of his ataressë for the first time in years. Anarcalin had not called him that in almost two centuries, not since he had dared to kiss his lord’s eldest son and heir on the mouth as the lights mingled in the woods outside of Tirion. That was how Maitimo knew that all hope had fled.
Maiar—Mahtan always said that Moringotho had Maiar sworn to him, was his reply. One of them must have cast illusions. We must fight. We cannot die here. You cannot die here. I must not be captured.
***
The battle raged on, fierce, hard, and hopeless. They brought down more urqui than Maitimo could count. Thrice they drove them back into the hills, and even gained the higher ground. It mattered not. More came, and some of his company were slain.
On the third charge, when only twenty or so had fallen, Maitimo could feel and hear hope beginning to swell amongst their rank. His own fëa felt dark and cold, and even beneath his woolens, his leathers, and his armor, his hröa shivered, and he felt their Doom coming upon them. He knew that it was futile, but he dared not say anything. Not even as Námo’s proclamation and Moringotho’s prophecy echoed in his head.
Slain ye shall be…
Ai, death, which you might welcome…but not your death….
Still, he fought on, killing every beast that came at him. He thought too, trying to drown out the words of the Valar and strip them of their power.
I am Ñoldóran now. I cannot show them fear. I cannot kill their hope. Let them go to the Halls with honor and glory. Let me go to the Halls. Let me avoid capture.
When the Valaraukar came at last, he charged headlong toward them, shouting at his roqueni to flee and leave him to his fate.
Let me die, let me die, let me make such a great stand that they must kill me.
But they did not obey him. His roqueni cried aloud, shouting, “For Nelyafinwë Ñoldóran!”
All of those closest to him fell. A sword of fire and flame pierced Anarcalin’s steed, and Maitimo screamed as his companion fell to the earth.
Up! Up! Fight! For Aldaronion! For your yondo! he urged. He tried to cover Anarcalin.
“For our brave Arán!”
He raised his shield, but a mace that was bigger than his head landed on it again and again and again until the shield broke. His arm shook, and he screamed again as he felt his ulna fracture under the weight of the blow.
“For Arán Russandol!”
His shield was shattered, and his left arm was useless, but he raised his sword to block the next blow that came.
Angry tears pricked at his eyes, and despair filled him until it choked breath and blocked out the sounds in his ears.
Another Valarauka’s whip lashed towards him. Orwaturco threw himself in Maitimo’s path to block the strike.
“Nelyafinwë!” the roquen rasped as the demon dragged him from his horse. Maitimo let out a wordless howl as he saw the mace descend and smash his loyal follower’s face.
No, no, no. I am not brave. That was Findekáno, not me, and we left him behind. Flee! Do not try to save me. If I survive this…
A heavy blow caught him upside the head, striking his left cheek just as his father had with his blade before Losgar, and then darkness took him.
***
He awoke to find his head aching, blood dripping down the side of his face, and his shattered left ulna stabbing against the skin of his forearm, his shield arm.
Bright-dark spots danced in front of his eyes, and rusty red fluid flowed into nose, into his mouth, and made him choke and sputter. Something hot and cruel wrapped around his steel boot, its heat burning through his greaves to lap at his skin. Quaking, cloudy laughter sounded from a mouth that seemed to be filled with soot.
“Araninkë,” the creature—a Valarauka, he realized—chuckled. Little king. Even then, lying with his face half buried in foul, ashy soil, Maitimo’s pride flared up, and he spat furiously at the mocking epithet.
The lash around his ankle tightened, and he grunted as the creature tugged. Pain flared up his leg as his knee and his hip joint were jerked almost out of place, and Maitimo’s face dragged in the dirt.
His heart raced, and his vision swam, and his head exploded in a burst of pain. His lungs seemed at once to be full to the point of bursting and devoid of air.
I am not dead, I am not dead, I must die.
He breathed in deeply, ignoring the pains that wracked his entire hröa. Then he threw his head and his chest back and flung himself forward, bending at the waist and clutching at the hot whip with both hands. It hurt to hold it, even with his gauntlets and steel gloves protecting his flesh, but he cared for everything. He only wanted to die. Then it would stop hurting. If he lived, then the pain would grow and grow and grow until his mind shattered and his fëa rattled against the cage that held it captive.
I cannot allow that to happen.
Another blow sent him spiraling into blackness.
His last thought was, I hope that it is enough.
***
The next time that he awoke, he was still alive, and something black and rough was bound across his head, stopping his vision. Blood no longer dripped down his face, and the left side no longer felt broken. It still hurt though. It felt as if some power had reached through his flesh and knitted his bones back together, resetting it and forcing it to heal too fast.
“He keeps fighting,” the sooty voice complained.
“You’ll have to kill me to stop it,” Maitimo rasped. His voice was jagged and sounded fey and foreign to his ears. That realization made him laugh so hard that it sent spasms of pain coursing through his sore neck and his beaten head, and the pain made him laugh even harder.
“That was a mistake.” Another voice, soft and silky and sweet as honey, filled his ears and dripped into his mind.
Then a hot, bone-crushingly strong hand grabbed his chin, and suddenly a flask was being forced between his still-open lips. A liquid like honeyed miruvor filled his stool-laughing mouth, and panicked rebellion suddenly gripped his pain-addled mind.
He tried to fight the urge to swallow. He tried to spit it out. But the hand on his chin held his head back, and its mate clamped his nose shut so that he could not breathe, could not spit, and had no choice but to swallow.
The hands holding his mouth and his nose shut suddenly released him. He sucked in air and sputtered and tried to spit as his lungs expanded and contracted and burned.
“There now, that wasn’t so bad,” the honeyed voice purred. Maitimo’s stomach lurched when breath sweet as sulfur ghosted over his neck.
His head began to swim, and his limbs were going limp, and his eyes were sliding shut.
No, no, no, he thought as he thrashed on the ground. He tried to make his hands—his unbound hands—rise to his face, but his nerves were misfiring. His limbs felt too heavy. His muscles wouldn’t cooperate. His fingers felt thick and clumsy and useless.
He tried to roll, try to stand, but his legs would not cooperate, and anyway, his knee and his hip hurt so badly that he doubted that he could have managed it. His breath was coming out too fast, and he could feel hot, angry tears pouring down his face, running into his nose and his mouth.
“Let yourself sleep now, Maitimo Araninkë,” the honeyed voice commanded. “Besides, I have heard that you have swallowed much that was far less sweet.”
Maitimo’s stomach lurched again. Bile rose in his throat, and a scream tore at his lips. He kept trashing. He kept trying to fight. He tried to make his muscles move, tried to spit out the tears and phlegm filling his mouth.
He tried so hard to stay awake.
The last thing that he heard was, “So, Melkor was right. He does surrender beautifully.”
***
Maitimo jolted awake as bright, clean, unsullied lights suddenly flooded his eyes.
The Trees! I am in the Halls with the ghosts of the Trees! That thought only lasted for a moment, for his eyes soon became accustomed to the light. Then he knew the truth.
There were three lights, not two, and the sight of those lights set the sounds of his Oath ringing in his ears. His heart pounded, and the emptiness within him suddenly filled. A sick, dreadful feeling of urgency flared within him, and he shoved himself to his hands. His broken left arm protested, and his knees—his bare, bruised knees, he realized with a sickening jolt—scraped on hard, unforgiving stone as he tried and failed to rise. He slammed down onto his hands and knees and exhaled deeply and painfully.
The haze that clouded his mind lifted, and the reality of his situation crashed around him suddenly as laughter rang out from every direction.
He had been captured, and his captors had drugged him and stripped him bare. His armor was gone, as were his leather and woolen clothes. His eyes dropped down to his hands, his naked, bruised arms, and he felt hundreds of eyes taking over him. The roaring flames of innumerable fire pits soared around him, and their smoke filled his lungs and choked him. His skin prickled from the exposure, and sweat dripped down his hröa, sliding between the cleft of his naked buttocks and his exposed genitals.
Instinctively, he fell back onto his heels and drew his hands in front of himself, trying futilely to shield his intimate parts from those terrible, scorching, searching gazes.
A cruel, high-pitched laugh rang out and drowned out the others. Maitimo’s eyes slid shut, trying with every fiber of his being to ignore the blinding lights of his father’s Silmarils—his jewels, his birthright, his brothers’ birthright—and to avoid seeing them bound to his Enemy’s brow. The Oath rang so loudly in his ears and burned so fiercely within his heart and mind that an angry growl tore from his throat, and his hands went to his ears as he tried to block out the sound.
His head felt light, and when he reached up to feel for his copper circlet, he saw that it was gone. A cold clutch of fear overtook him then, as he realized that his neck too felt too light.
No, no, no, he thought as his fingers fumbled futilely about his neck. His nails scraped over the bare skin of his chest, clawing at it and searching blindly for the glass pendant that should have been there.
‘Tis gone! They took it…Finno’s gift…they had no right… ‘twas mine. ‘Twas all I had left of him.
The tears came again against his will, and the sound of that cruel, glass-shattering laugh rang out in his ears.
“Open your eyes,” that all-too familiar, all-too powerful voice ordered.
Findekáno, please! he thought as he clawed at his chest and fought the order with all of his might.
The laughter in the hall died, and a great, thundering creaking filled the hall. Maitimo’s eyes flew open of their own accord. His horrified curiosity overcame his will to disobey. So it was that he saw the great, towering, fallen Vala rise from his huge, twisted throne of slick, shining obsidian.
“Moringotho,” he spat. His heart pounded in his ears, and fear filled his lungs, but defiance fell from his lips, for he saw, and he understood what his Foe’s latest crimes had cost him.
Moringotho’s fana still bore the stolen guises of Finwë and Fëanáro, and he was still far too tall, standing at least fifteen feet. Darkness radiated off of him like a great, smoking shadow as it had never done in Aman. He wore long robes of black satin that opened obscenely at the chest and revealed thick, veiny, corded muscles. But the veins looked black against his clammy, sallow flesh. He no longer possessed the tanned, healthy pallor that Finwë and Fëanáro had enjoyed, and his face’s stolen features were twisted into a rictus of pain. His smile was still hatefully happy, and it split those horribly handsome features, but that smile no longer met those eyes, which were all pupil, all black, and all agony.
The light of the Silmarils burned from a heavy iron crown on his brow, and as much as their light pained Maitimo, he could see that they hurt Moringotho a thousand times more.
It was Maitimo’s turn to let out a mocking laugh that shook his wounded hröa but delighted him no less.
“Are Atar’s creations too heavy for you, Moringotho? I have often thought that he poured some of his fiery fëa into those stones along with the unsullied Light. Does the fëa of Curufinwë Fëanáro burn your brow? Perhaps you should surrender it to his eldest yondo,” he said, spitting again.
The entire cavern of Moringotho’s hall shook as the fallen Vala walked towards Maitimo. Heavy, steel-toed boots clanged against the ground. Maitimo was so afraid that bile filled his gullet, and he had to swallow it down to avoid vomiting, but still, he laughed as one fey. The sound hurt his ears, but it banished that loathsome grin from Moringotho’s face.
“You are Melkor no more!” he shouted. His voice was quaking with horror, but he was still laughing. The sound was high and anxious now, and he shook so badly that the black, serpentine columns of the cavern seemed to tremble and twist in the light of the fires and the Silmarils, but he was still laughing.
Then Moringotho’s black-gloved, clawed left hand caught his chin. The touch felt like ice. It was colder than anything that he had ever felt before, even colder than the most frigid winds that had blown from the Helcaraxë into the northernmost parts of Araman. The cold was so intense that it froze Maitimo’s laughter in his throat, and it contrasted so sharply with the sweltering heat of the cavern that it almost burned his skin.
Moringotho forced Maitimo to look up, into his eyes and into his crown. The light of the Silmarils was blinding this close, and Moringotho’s fana seemed to shiver and shake under their light. The sound of his Oath, spoken in his father’s own voice, roared in his ears.
Take it, Nelyo, take it, Fëanáro seemed to whisper in his ear. But Fëanáro was dead, and Maitimo had had a role in that, and Moringotho’s fana looked so much like him that, for one horrible moment, Maitimo’s mind seemed to splinter in all directions. His fingers itched to reach up and snatch a Silmaril from that iron crown, but another part of him was so convinced that it was Fëanáro standing above him with eyes that smoldered with loathsome contempt that it drowned out the sounds of the Oath. A creeping, cloying sense of contentment slithered through his veins until….
The icy hand on his chin jerked his face up and forced his head back so sharply that he hissed in pain. The confusion left him, and his vision suddenly became clear as he realized what was happening.
His Enemy’s mouth, filled with sickeningly sweet, cloying breath that tasted like rot, fastened over his own. His eyes were opened so wide that it hurt, but he felt none of it. He felt nothing but horrified revulsion that clawed at his belly and made him want to retch.
Moringotho’s fana felt frightfully solid and real, so close to a hröa that it made the biting, possessive kiss feel all the more wrong. Then that too wide, too full mouth opened, and a long, serpentine flicked out over his lips.
Revulsion overcame fear, and Maitimo’s lips parted of their own accord. His teeth snapped and clamped down on that tongue.
Black bile filled his mouth, making him choke and sputter. His stomach roiled in disgust, even as Moringotho drew back and howled in pained outrage.
Maitimo knew that he should have savored that small victory, but the taste of Moringotho’s sludge-filled blood was so foul that all that he could do was spit onto the ground. His throat felt dry and parched, and a bittersweet taste filled his mouth.
I need water, he thought stupidly.
Then a hand—his Enemy’s left hand—darted out and caught him on the chest. Maitimo found himself pinned onto his back suddenly. The hand was so hot that it actually burned his flesh. His eyes watered, and a silent scream ripped from his throat. His heels were on the ground, and Moringotho was between his legs. He could not close them. He was completely naked and entirely exposed.
“Do you feel that, boy?” his enemy hissed. “I held the Silmarils in this hand as I crossed the Helcaraxë. Their fire still burns hot in me, and ‘twill burn you every time I touch you and mark your hröa, as is my exclusive right.”
Maitimo found that he could not breathe, but his lungs felt as though they were on fire. Perhaps they were on fire. Perhaps the hand on his chest was burning through his flesh and setting his organs afire.
I cannot let him. I cannot. I cannot, he thought. Findekáno is the only one allowed to hold me down like this, the only one allowed to have me like this, the only one allowed to mark me. I have to stop him. I must.
He began to trash again. His right hand, his uninjured sword hand, clawed at Moringotho’s thick forearm so fiercely that he felt flesh sloughing off beneath his fingernails. His right leg slammed into the fallen Vala’s left, knocking it just a little to the side.
“Enough!” Moringotho cried. His voice was suddenly dark and deep and devoid of all amusement, but he pulled away. Maitimo lay on the ground, his legs still spread and the imprint of his Enemy’s hand still seared into his flesh. Yet he was unviolated, for now, and he could not hold back a sob of relief.
Not yet, not yet, not yet, I am still only yours, Kánya, he thought madly as tears streamed down his face again, burning his eyes and his cheeks.
“Mairon!” Moringotho shouted. Loathing delight filled the fallen Vala’s voice once again, and Maitimo’s tears turned cold and scared at the sound.
Then that same honeyed voice from early called back, purring out the words, “What does my arán desire?” Maitimo’s tears froze on his cheeks, and he gritted his teeth.
I must not show weakness again before that one. I must remain entirely in control, he thought as he forced himself out into his elbows and drew his legs together again. He ignored the pain in his left arm and his left leg as he drew his heels protectively upwards to shield his buttocks. He knew that the gesture would do little to protect him in the long run, but he also knew that the long he remained defiant, the longer he could keep himself intact.
“This unruly child is still far too strong. He needs to break so that he can learn to bend,” Moringotho.
No, I will not bend. I will never bend. You can break me again and again, but I will not bend, Maitimo told himself. You will have to kill me instead. I will never serve you willingly.
“As the Arán of all the World commands,” the honeyed creature—Mairon—crooned. Maitimo hissed sharply and tightened his core, steeling himself for battle.
I can fight this creature, he assured himself. Then the next words out of Moringotho’s mouth knocked the wind out of him, and threatened to quell the fire that burned hot within his guts.
“And Mairon, remember to leave no permanent marks on his hröa. Those will only be left by my hand or in my presence on my express order. And do nothing to his face. I want him weak, but I like him pretty.”