Chapter Text
Dear Maedhros,
I haven’t felt the change of the seasons so acutely before. Watching the leaves turn yellow and orange and slowly fall, unable to feel it in the same way that I once did and without him by my side, is not something I want to experience again. And yet I know I will, this time again next year.
Is this what grief is like, Maedhros? Watching the world continue on and knowing that there is an empty space beside you that you can no longer share it with? I know in my mind that the grief will lessen, that I am not the only person who has loved and lost and lived on, but my heart is fickle, and harder to convince.
I crowned my grandson yesterday. It was in all regards a beautiful ceremony, and though Dior is young I think he will grow into the role of King admirably. I will make sure of it, because I will remain here to guide him as best as I can. Part of me doesn’t wish to, but I made my sacrifices, and I made my choice. I will keep making that choice.
I’m sure your nephews will tell you all of the details of Dior becoming King, so I will spare the repetition here. Your’s and Fingon’s gift that Maeglin gave to us was appreciated as well. I know that we do not have the same cultural history that you do, nor place the same importance on gems that you and your people do, but it is a beautiful necklace, and I think means all the more considering who made it.
Did you consider giving Dior the actual Nauglamir for a moment? I have to ask. I’m curious whether the thought crossed your mind, or if the necklace that Maeglin and Celebrimbor made together was always the original idea.
In continuing with the tradition of these letters, Maedhros, I will once again be honest.
I think I could have kept Thingol alive.
In that moment, holding the Silmaril on his barely breathing chest, I could feel the remnants of what I once was. I could feel the gaping holes that had been torn through him when I had wrenched the Silmaril’s grasp of him loose, and I could feel the tattered edges stirring and recoiling from the brilliant light that I held. In that moment, I had yet another choice thrust in front of me that I had not been expecting to have to face.
I think I could have forced it. I think I could have done something . I could have sewn the edges together with that thread of light, could have done my best to mend him, but I think it would have poisoned him anyway in the end. It would have been a half life at best. It wouldn't have been right.
Maybe that's just what I want to believe.
What I know, though, is that one day I will see him again. I may have tied myself to the same fate that the rest of the Eldar of Beleriand live under, but I think that if anyone can ever cause the endless Sea to be crossed once again, it might just be you and Fingon. And so I live in hope, still, that one day I will return to my old mistress’ gardens and my love will be walking there, waiting for me.
In the meantime, my grandson has a realm to rule, and I have a task in front of me. I look forward to meeting you again, under less fraught circumstances. I don’t think we have yet had the conversation we might owe each other, after more than a decade of these letters. Perhaps one day, in the future, you might step beneath Doriath’s boughs and see a little of what I sacrificed so much for to love.
I hope that your son is well and growing fast, and continues to give you an endless source of delight. I will treasure the time I have with my family now, and it is all the more precious for the choices I have made.
Give my regards to Fingon, and your nephews. I wish you all the best. Truly.
Melian
It’s late in the evening, and the candles are beginning to burn low on the desk beside her. Melian sets her quill aside and reaches for one of the drawers in the desk, pulling out a new candle. It takes only a moment to light it and switch it out, and then she drops the candlestub into a half-full basket beside her. Soon that will need taking out, the stubs melted down and remade into new candles for them.
She is about to turn back to her writing, the draft of a proposal for next week’s court session concerning the somewhat tense relations with Belegost and Nogrod, when footsteps echo through the corridor. The door swings open a few moments later, and her grandson walks inside.
“I see Beleg and Mablung did not go easy on you,” Melian remarks, setting her quill aside. “You were training later than usual, as well.”
Dior glances down at himself, seemingly only now noticing the grass stains across his trousers and the mud streaked through his hair. “They’re both away next week, so we’re trying to fit in as much as we can in the time we have,” he says. He looks over at the desk. “Is that the Belegost proposal?”
Melian nods. “Come, have a read of my notes and see how I have arrived at my conclusions. I’ve done my best to lay it out coherently. And then you should help me write the proposal, to understand the language we should use.”
Dior looks tired, but he just nods, and toes off his boots to grab a chair from across the study. He does have his own study to work in, but this early into his Kingship and with the amount of work Melian is putting in to help him, he ends up in hers more often than not. It’s only been a few months since his coronation. Sometimes it feels like so much longer.
“Oh,” he says, reaching into his jacket. “Before I forget. A number of letters arrived from a Noldorin courier. Most of them look official, and are in my study, but this one is addressed to you directly.”
He holds out a folded piece of parchment. It’s sealed with bright red wax, and Melian doesn’t have to look at the sigil pushed into the wax to know who has written. “I was wondering when this would come,” she says softly, reaching out to take it. “It’s been a while.”
“Who is it?”
It takes a moment for Melian to realise that Dior has probably never seen Maedhros’ personal sigil, only that of the High King and King of the Noldor in Beleriand that is used for all the official letters that have been exchanged between the two kingdoms. She turns it over to show him the sigil imprinted on the wax. “Maedhros Fëanorion,” she says. “After all this time exchanging letters, I recognise it easily.”
Dior frowns. “He’s written before?”
“He first wrote to me after the Galad Lain, and the story he told me meant I had to reply,” Melian says. She sets the letter down, folding her hands in her lap and ignoring the instinct to hide that small folded piece of parchment. “He then wrote back. We have exchanged letters since then, and he has become…he was a confidante, of sorts, during a difficult time.”
Dior’s expression softens. “It must have been difficult,” he offers.
It was unimaginably difficult, but Melian won’t go into it now. “We were both honest with each other in these letters,” she says. “But it was…for me, it was secret. Nobody knew about them except for Beleg and Mablung, my handmaidens, and the few trusted marchwardens who would courier the letters from the border until they reached my hand. If Thingol had known…”
Dior makes a face, and then seemingly realises he’s done so and tries to smooth his expression out. He’s getting a little better at it. “Well, nobody should care now,” he says. “I mean, his nephews were at my coronation. Surely nobody cares if Maedhros writes to you.”
Melian smiles. “As long as they don’t know how long these letters have been going back and forth, it will be fine.” She pushes the parchment scroll on her desk towards Dior. “Now, read through this, whilst I read Maedhros’ letter, and then we’ll discuss the proposal.”
Her hands are perfectly steady as she breaks the seal and opens the parchment, but she can’t quite help the jump of her heart. This is the first letter from Maedhros since the one she sent to him, the day after Dior’s coronation. It had taken her that long to write, to overcome the heavy cling of grief that turned the whole world grey, and she does not quite know what Maedhros might say in response.
She makes herself open up the folded parchment, her heart easing slightly at the familiar slanted handwriting, and starts reading.
Dear Melian,
Firstly, I wish to tell you how sorry I am for your loss. I regret not saying it when Thingol died, on the borders of your realm, but I was tired and hurting and scared that trying to apologise would only hurt you more in that moment. And then I did not think I should write to you until you had first written to me, in case you were resentful or angry with me for my part in everything.
A little cowardly, I think, but Fingon is in the habit of telling our son that it is alright to not be brave all the time, so perhaps I should take a little of his advice and just promise myself that I will do better next time.
I am sorry for your loss, Melian. I do not know exactly what it is to lose a spouse like this, but I do remember very clearly what it was like when Fingon died first in the cycles, and the pain was unimaginable. You have more strength than I think I do, understanding that to bring him back with the Silmaril would have hurt him more, and choosing instead to let him go and let him find peace. I don’t know, if the same choice was in front of me, that I could have done the same.
Perhaps that’s how we all ended up here. I think I do cling tightly to the things I love, for fear of losing them like I have lost others. I think that is what led me to the path I went down only a short time ago, which nearly led to tragedy if not for the children wiser and better than us. I was scared of what could come to pass, and I was so tired of the Oath hanging over my head waiting to strike, like a sword perpetually dangling and threatening everything I hold dear, and I thought if I just acted then I would at least know what was coming and have some control over it, to shape it to the best possible outcome. I was angry as well, of course, at Thingol’s slight to us, and it coloured my perspective more than I think I realised.
The scariest thing was looking back afterwards and being unsure what was an influence of the Oath and what was just me. Whether that capacity is still within me, I don’t know. I think so. I think everyone is capable of good and terrible things, no matter the intentions. Perhaps it is better thinking like this, knowing the dangers. At least this way I can try to avoid them, or at least not blindly stumble into a similar situation again. I hope so, at least.
I can hear Fingon saying that I am being melodramatic, so I will stop there with the self-recrimination.
I hope Dior is well, and settling into Kingship with your guiding hand. Lómion and Tyelpë have both been the subject of a lot of attention since being so pivotal in the retrieval of the third Silmaril and ending the Oath. They both hate it, though Lómion at least bears it with a lot more grace than Tyelpë ever will, who has taken to hiding behind me at every official event.
We did actually consider sending the actual Nauglamir to Dior’s coronation, by the way. Only very briefly, and then Fingon pointed out it could be considered a slight by some of your court, and that Finduilas has more claim to it than anyone else, so we sent the other necklace instead. New starts, and all that.
Ereinion continues to be a delight. He is fast now that he can walk and run, and I do live perpetually in terror when I turn around and don’t immediately see him. He has a pony now, gifted to him by Azaghal, and at least two nights a week I have to convince him that he cannot sleep in the stables with it. My brothers are continuing to compete to see who can get him the best gifts, and his room is filling up with useless things that he is nonetheless attached to when Fingon and I try and clear some space. I will have to put my foot down soon, I think, lest Ereinion think the world is always like this, but for now it’s harmless enough. I will continue to enjoy every moment with him.
Fingon says I do not do well without a project, and I do have to reluctantly agree with him. I have set my sights on Ered Gorgoroth, now that Nan Dungortheb is clear. It is early days, but if we may resurrect the agreement we had previously, between my forces and the marchwardens, I would be grateful for help in clearing those mountains of the worst of the threat there. I understand that may be busy for a while, with the Girdle down and the creatures lost within it released, but let me know if it is something we might pursue.
If I may offer some final words, on what you wrote to me, before I finish this letter and go to bed.
Yes, grief is like that. It does not go away, not entirely, but it does become easier to bear as the world shifts to accommodate the gap now within it. Sometimes that feels unfair. Sometimes it feels like the whole world should be raging at the loss, the injustice of it, the pain of the loss, but then nothing would ever get done, I think, and we would all be worse off.
It does require time. It sounds trite, but it is true. It will get easier. I hope that it does soon for you, in a way that does not invalidate the love you have for him.
I also hope that I may step beneath the boughs of Doriath at some point and see the realm that you taught yourself to love. It is perhaps too early for those sorts of discussions in an official capacity, but I think we can build ourselves towards it.
I look forward to hearing from you. Let me know how Dior is getting on; he does write to Lómion and Tyelpë, but I would like to hear your thoughts as well, as someone who understands what it is to rule. And Tyelpë gets annoyed if I ask to read his letters.
Maedhros
Also, whilst I am writing this and have your attention, please remind Túrin to write home to his parents and sister. They are trying to plan Nienor’s wedding, and he has not yet given them an answer as to when he and Beleg will return to Dór-Lomin. I normally would not be reduced to messenger like this, but even I fear the wrath of an irate mother trying to make plans, as any sensible person would.
“Grandmother? Does Maedhros write anything important?”
Melian realises she is staring down at the letter. Something reassuring and familiar has settled back on her shoulders. “Nothing vital,” she says, setting the parchment aside. “But then that has never been the purpose of these letters.” She looks over to the draft. “How far have you gotten?”
“About halfway.” Dior angles the parchment towards her. “I have some questions about the third paragraph here, where you have set out calculations for the weregild.”
Melian leans over to remind herself of what she wrote. “Let’s go through it together, then, and I’ll explain my reasoning.”