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:

imeanforever

And lots of fairies live for millennia without getting caught by anybody and most vassals wouldn't seek the ability to die, what's your point?

From:

lintamande

And innocents who wander into fairyland?

From:

imeanforever

I was trying to get one home when Thorn got us, I could have done it given a little more time. They're not inevitably trapped.

From:

lintamande

Where is that one now?

From:

imeanforever

Probably dead. It was a long time ago as mortals age. I don't think Thorn wanted to keep her around long term and doubt he bothered to de-age her.

From:

lintamande

I do not have unlimited power over Fairyland.

From:

imeanforever

I figured.

From:

lintamande

Silence.

From:

imeanforever

How objectionable do you find the general sentiment underlying my revisions, when I'm not being hopelessly clumsy about it?

From:

lintamande

Joy and triumph snatched from the jaws of tragedy, the lessons of ages finally acted on in a momentous time of healing - that's good. Acquiring absolute personal power is understandable but much more objectionable by my lights.

From:

imeanforever

Man, this guy. Well, I'm trying not to be petty about it.

From:

lintamande

It would be wise to surrender it as soon as the tasks ahead of you are surmountable with less dangerous methods and better-understood resources. If I had your assurance you would do this, I would hesitate less to aid you in the healing of the world.

From:

imeanforever

...It sounds like you have other universes that could use healing too, she points. So that might be a long time.

From:

lintamande

Silence.

From:

imeanforever

Some people just write down stories. On paper. Instead of using other people to make them.

From:

lintamande

Silence.

From:

imeanforever

Not a fan of this prospect?

From:

lintamande

I am not going to cooperate in teaching you to behave less disastrously if that's going to embolden you to tamper with other worlds. You will make a mistake that gets you vanquished from my world eventually.

From:

imeanforever

Oh dear.

Well, that could've gone better.

Are people here with food yet?

From:

lintamande

People are here with food. They're talking with Maedhros. There is no hugging, just a lot of standing in relative proximity.

From:

imeanforever

She takes the food and does not have to be hand-fed and that is nice.

From:

lintamande

People kind of stare, awestruck, when Maedhros explains that Eru has immunized them to fairy orders. "Do you believe that?" Maglor asks dubiously.

"No, but I'm enjoying it," Maedhros says. "And - the oath did change, I can feel it."