lintamande | don't touch me

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.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

lintamande

This doesn't reassure them much. They don't fight back, though.

From:

imeanforever

When Sauron has healed them she tells him to, with absolutely minimal approach/contact/bothering of the prisoners, let them all go.

Edited Date: 2016-05-26 03:49 am (UTC)

From:

lintamande

This requires unchaining them one by one. Maedhros is rubbing restlessly at the stump of his hand.

From:

imeanforever

"Do you want me to have that fixed? It can probably be fixed," Promise says.

From:

lintamande

"Not by him," Maedhros says. "I can feel him. If Eru cares to personally do it, sure."

From:

imeanforever

"I meant Eru," Promise says. "But if you want him to care to personally do things I have the impression you might wait a while."

From:

lintamande

"I'm pretty good with the one hand. Let me know when you're ready to think about bringing back the dead and ending the war, that's more my area of expertise."

From:

imeanforever

"Okay. I suppose I can also just do it myself whenever there's a gate, if you haven't decided to be obliterated by then." When Sauron has let everybody go she sends him to go wait where she left him before.

From:

lintamande

"Do you want to address the prisoners, or do you want me to? Or should we wait until we tell them what we're doing about orcs?"

From:

imeanforever

"...You probably know more about what this brand of prisoners wants to hear than I do. I'm not sure what to do about orcs yet."

From:

lintamande

"Easiest thing would be to relocate them to a continent with no Elves or Men, hope that by the time they invent transoceanic sailing the old wounds on both sides will have healed. Is there a continent with no Elves or Men? If not, Eru can raise one out of the ocean."

From:

imeanforever

Is there an uninhabited continent?

From:

lintamande

No.

From:

imeanforever

"Continents are all inhabited. Having him raise a continent seems like it would have side effects if I didn't know enough about how continents worked or something."

From:

lintamande

"And if he were inclined to fuck things up. He knows how to do it without side effects, it's how Valinor came around. ...you could relocate everyone in Valinor here and all the orcs to Valinor."

From:

imeanforever

"Why that way around?"

From:

lintamande

"Valinor is perfectly safe and everything is edible and it's meant to be a paradise. A million orcs used to taking orders from Melkor, or dead since who-knows-when, are more in need of that than we are. Everyone in Valinor will be super annoyed to end up here but annoyed is all, the Eldar aren't innately inclined to war and we know how to build cities and agriculture and so forth."

Edited Date: 2016-05-26 04:24 am (UTC)

From:

imeanforever

"What about the Valar, would I have to order them around not to make trouble with this plan?"

From:

lintamande

"There's no way you're bringing back any of the dead without giving the Valar orders. Or, I guess, ordering Eru to tell them you have his permission."

From:

imeanforever

"...Okay, but that isn't what I asked."

From:

lintamande

"Yes, they will object to anyone except Elves who they've vetted for purity being permitted in Valinor. I think it's worth it anyway because it's the most cut-off from the other continents, hard for accidental contact to occur, aforementioned paradise considerations, and that Valinor has psychological healing attributes which I think the orcs are, of all Arda's peoples, most in need of."

From:

imeanforever

Do you anticipate any problems from my perspective with implementing that plan?

From:

lintamande

Moving the Elves will cause political instability internal to the Elves which is hard to predict but unlikely to kill anyone and vanishingly unlikely to kill more than seven people. Elves outside Valinor eventually fade. You could ask me to change that about them.

Edited Date: 2016-05-26 04:36 am (UTC)