#gil galad russingonion | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

tar-maitime · 3 months

Text

initiate the heart within me

Rating: T Characters: Maedhros | Maitimo, Fingon | Findekano, Ereinion Gil-galad, OCs Relationships: Maedhros/Fingon, fem!Maedhros/Fingon Additional: Long Peace, Gil-galad son of plot hole, also Gil-galad Russingonion, Adoption WC: 3.2k

The others of the scouting party are still picking through the settlement, but Maedhros already knows it won’t avail them anything. Orcish destruction on this scale doesn’t leave survivors.

Once, this was a relatively happy and peaceful place, with a mix of Noldor and Sindar and a few Avari all mingled together. Maedhros last rode through it only a few months ago, and there was as little foreboding of trouble as if they’d all been in Valinor. It just goes to show that none of them are ever safe here, not really.

Her second approaches her, looking grim. “My lady,” he says, “what would you have us do?”

They’ve already dispatched the band of orcs that did this. There won’t be anything useful to salvage; such raiding parties destroy or befoul anything they don’t take. “Bury the dead,” she says shortly. “We should have time and safety enough for that, at least - to give these people some dignity.”

He nods, and goes to relay the order to the others. This business should not take long. Even in this long peace, they have grown skilled in making graves for large numbers of people quickly.

Maedhros moves to join them, falling into the rhythm of searching half-destroyed houses for bodies and bringing them out to be arranged. It’s not until the fourth such house that something breaks her out of it, something she almost doesn’t recognize at first because it’s so out of place here.

There’s a baby crying quietly.

She freezes, momentarily sure she’s imagining it - but no, there it is again.

It takes her agonizingly long to search, scrambling, for the source, pulling open cupboards and drawers, checking increasingly unlikely spots. At last - it can’t have been more than a few minutes, but feels longer - she traces the cry to the bedroom, and a heavy wooden chest shoved under the bed. Somehow, someone had managed to bundle an infant, only a handful of months old, into the chest and the orcs hadn’t found it. Perhaps the child had somehow slept through it all; perhaps the attack had been so riotous that it was impossible to hear one small cry in all the din. However it happened, the child’s survival is nothing short of a miracle, of the kind Maedhros scarcely believes in anymore.

Carefully, she cradles the baby against her chest, all too aware of her armor and the black and scarlet blood smearing her. It - he, she discovers after a brief investigation - ceases wailing in her hold, blinking up at her uncertainly.

He’s so small, so fragile. Nothing in her life has been allowed to be fragile in so long, no since she ceased to be so herself. And yet, once upon a time, wasn’t she so sure she would have this? A child in her arms, one of her own, hers and --

The bond is usually quiet these days, not from any lack of love but simply for the need to avoid distraction, but now it opens up without her conscious decision, letting her banked fire flare in Fingon’s mind leagues away. He answers instantly in starlight. Russë? Is everything all right?

Maedhros struggles to master herself. This is nothing she needs to involve him in. It is not anything at all, not to her, not beyond her duty to see the child into safety and care the way she would for anyone under her protection.

I’m fine, Finno, she replies. Don’t worry.

He retreats, leaving the faintest trace of skepticism behind. Maedhros is left to stare at the slightly squirming baby, until at last she makes herself get up and go outside.

The revelation of the baby prompts a second, more thorough scouring of the village, but no other survivors are found. They make shift to bury the dead as best they can. At the last minute, Maedhros gathers a few things that look like they might have sentimental value someday from the house where she discovered the child. Through it all, she can’t quite bring herself to pass him along to anyone else.

When they ride away, back to Himring, the baby is lashed to her chest in a sling.

- - -

Himring is neither designed nor supplied with the needs of an infant in mind. Most places in Beleriand, so far as Maedhros knows, aren’t; elves don’t pour themselves into bringing a new life into the world lightly, and few have felt safe enough to do so since the Darkening. The folk of that destroyed village must have believed themselves very secure indeed, right up until they didn’t.

But despite this and despite the eventful centuries since her brothers were this small, Maedhros has not forgotten the basics of care. As soon as she can amidst the chaos of the scouting party’s return, of getting cleaned up and jotting down notes for a later report on the attack, she makes arrangements. For an improvised cradle to be brought to her chambers, for rags to be donated to serve as catchcloths, for their softest blankets available to be rounded up as stand-ins until she can figure out proper clothes, for someone to inquire among the Edain of Himring if any women are nursing - Men cannot seem to stop having children, and when some of them joined Maedhros’ forces, they brought or started families, to general elven bewilderment.

It does occur to Maedhros, at one point, that she could hand the baby off to someone else, and make all this their responsibility. She is the commander of Himring; she has the authority, and arguably better things to do. But she doesn’t. The baby stays in her arms, or within her sight, or lashed to her chest, through all the rest of the day. It has never been her way to trust anyone but herself with the really important things, and there can be nothing more important than this.

The corollary to this, which had not occurred to her, comes early the next morning when the Edain wet nurse, a sweet-natured woman called Aelfwynn, stifles a cry as the baby nurses. Maedhros, alert to every detail occurring in that corner of the room, frowns and leans forward sharply. “Is something wrong?”

“No, my lady,” Aelfwynn says quickly. “It’s only - I could’ve sworn I felt something tug at me, here,” she rubs at her breastbone, “but...deeper inside, somehow. Like it was yanking at my soul.”

Of course. Maedhros should’ve thought. Elven children need nourishment of the fëa as well as the body, and in the normal course of things, would receive both at the same time from the mother. But with an adaneth...things are different, for them. there is no way of knowing whether such a thing would hurt both Aelfwynn and the baby, but Maedhros thinks it likely.

“Give him to me; I can amend it,” she says, reaching out her arms, and when Aelfwynn passes the baby over Maedhros holds him against her shoulder, stroking his back with her hand, and hums quietly, reaching out with her fëa to the child’s. As poor an offering as it is, he accepts it eagerly - clearly, the day or so since his parents were slain has left him desperate. Maedhros pours into his spirit until he is satisfied, then continues to hold him, swaying slightly back and forth.

A flare of starlight in her mind. Russë, what’s going on? I thought I felt...

Briefly, Maedhros curses whatever prevented her from foreseeing this. She and Fingon are bound soul to soul; of course he would feel it when she touched her soul to another. Nothing. There is no need to be concerned; don’t worry about it.

I’m not worried, but I am increasingly curious. Fingon’s thought turns almost hesitatnt. Russë...do you have a child there with you?

Lying to one’s bonded husband is impossible, and Maedhros has carried a distaste for untruths since Angband. Yes, she admits, an infant I found in the ruins of a village near here that was sacked. There is no need to make a fuss, though, she adds swiftly, for she can feel Fingon about to do just that. As soon as I can work out a better solution than this, he will go there posthaste.

And yet, Fingon says far too knowingly, it is you and not another appointed for the task who is nurturing his fëa.

Maedhros doesn’t know how to explain that she hadn’t thought of anyone else, had simply seen the trouble and moved to fix it herself, in a way that doesn’t undermine her side of the argument she can see on the horizon.

Not that I blame you, Fingon continues, he’s wonderful, I can already tell. I’m coming to you as soon as I can, love.

There’s no need -- Maedhros protests, but receives no acknowledgment. This is exactly why she wasn’t going to tell him until it was all over. She wants to see him, of course; she always does. But there’s no point in him acting like...like this is a child they’re adopting together.

She passes the baby back to Aelfwynn to finish nursing, and makes herself leave to find something to do - but not before giving instructions to come find her when the baby is done.

- - -

It doesn’t matter, she tells herself, that the child’s dark hair curls almost like Fingon’s, that his soft skin is just a few shades lighter, that he looks like the child they can never have. It doesn’t matter that he laughs like sunshine, that his soul nestles trustingly against her battered one, that he watches her with serious eyes as his tiny hands reach to brush curiously over the scars on her face. It doesn’t matter that she’s started to remember the old lullabies she used in Valinor, to soothe him when he fusses. It doesn’t matter that she almost thinks she hears him sleepily call her “ammë” one night as she puts him down - she probably imagined it anyway.

It doesn’t matter that he’s the first entirely soft, pure, innocent thing in her life in too long --

No. That does matter. It’s why she absolutely cannot keep him.

- - -

Fingon arrives withing another week, clearly having come at top speed, and as always his mere presence is enough to make Maedhros start half-believing in impossible dreams. He greets her warmly with a kiss - their marriage is an open secret at this point; after his behavior at Mithrim there is little point in pretending - and at first trades pleasantries and news with her as if this is an ordinary visit, but once they have more privacy, he looks around and asks, “Where is he?”

Maedhros can just catch the edge of his thought - I would have expected him to be with you. In truth, she has kept the child with her at almost all times these past days, some reason or another always seeming to arise why she cannot pass him off to someone else, but today she had given him over to Aelfwynn as soon as the sentries reported Fingon’s approach. She cannot let him think she is attached.

(She cannot be attached.)

“He is with the wet nurse, around here somewhere,” she says, trying to sound vague and not as thought she gave Aelfwynn specific instructions so she would know where they were at all times. “I can try and find them if you want to see him.”

Fingon’s arm goes around her waist as he leans against her. “Love, I don’t think you’re fooling anyone but yourself,” he says gently. “If even that.”

Maedhros does not allow herself to bend. “There is nothing to fool anyone about,” she says firmly, leading Fingon towards the room wehre she knows Aelfwynn and the baby will be. “I would, however, be endlessly grateful if you could take the child with you when you return west, if you think you can manage it. “Dor-lomin and Hithlum should have a better selection of possible adoptive families than the March.”

Before Fingon has the chance to answer, they’ve reached the door, and Maedhros strides inside, her eyes automatically scanning the room. Aelfwynn is not immediately visible, and neither is the baby, and for one brief moment instinctive panic rises in Maedhros’ throat --

-- and then Aelfwynn comes around a corner - the room is shaped like a knight’s move - and the baby in her arms babbles happily at the sight of them, and Maedhros breathes again.

She feels Fingon’s I-thought-so as clearly as if he said it in her ear, but that doesn’t stop her from crossing to take the baby in her own arms, balancing him on her hip so she can see him properly. “There you are,” she murmurs, and then, remembering herself, “The wet nurse I spoke of, Aelfwynn. Aelfwynn, my guest Crown Prince Fingon Fingolfinion.”

Aelfwynn executes a deep curtsy. “I’m honored, my lord.” She moves past them towards the door. “Let me know if you need me again, my lady.”

Only once she’s gone does Maedhros fully register the sheer love and joy on Fingon’s face and pouring over their bond. He can’t seem to take his eyes off her and the baby she’s holding.

“Russë, he’s perfect,” Fingon breathes, coming closer. “He’s wonderful. I see now --”

“There’s nothing to see,” Maedhros cuts him off. “He’s not mine, I’m not keeping him, I can’t. There’s no way around it and you’re not going to change my mind, so just...leave it.”

Sorrow and something uncomfortably close to pity flit across Fingon’s face. “Why can’t you, exactly?” he asks quietly. “Don’t try to tell me you don’t want to; I can see that you do - I can feel it.”

The words won’t come, for a moment. “I - there’s no way to take care of him here, not long-term,” she gets out. “It’s a wonder we’ve been able to manage at all for this long. If it weren’t for Aelfwynn, I don’t know what I’d have done. And the next time there’s an attack, or I need to ride out, what happens then? Or when Morgoth finally does break out and this place is on the front lines, where I wanted it to be? How am I supposed to keep him safe, give him any semblance of a normal childhood?”

The way Fingon is looking at her drags more words out of her, ones she hadn’t meant to let loose. “How - how would I be able to be a mother to him? I’m not gentle or nurturing anymore, Finno, you know that. I’m hard and dangerous, I’m not completely sane, I’m Oathbound and doomed, I wake up every morning and practically dare the Dark Vala to come at me. What part of that sounds like someone who should be keeping a child?”

Fingon just looks at her for a long moment, then carefully pulls her into a hug, baby and all. The baby takes advantage of this development to paw at Fingon’s braids.

“The part you left out, love,” he says, muffled against her shoulder. “The part where you clearly already love him and would do anything for him, where you would protect him from anything including yourself.”

“That isn’t enough,” Maedhros protests. “It can’t be.”

“It can,” Fingon promises. “You can let yourself love him, and I can help you and love him right alongside you, and he can have family and love and care from us. Everyone wins. Anything else is just logistical details.”

Maedhros almost, almost lets herself relax into the embrace. “How can you love him, though?” she protests. “You’ve known about him for a handful of days; you met him just now --”

Fingon pulls back, and carefully takes the baby from her. “For one thing,” he says, holding the child close and rubbing soothing circles on his bac, “he is manifestly lovable; it would be more surprising if I did not. For another - he is your child, Russë, that much is clear. If we were Edain and you surprised me with a baby in their fashion, I would love him at once if only for that, and I can do no less even if the child in question is not ours by blood.”

That, finally, makes Maedhros break down. She begins to weep, and they end up in each other’s arms again, the baby held carefully between them.

“Ssh, there, Russë,” Fingon murmurs, his thumb stroking across her spine as he holds her. “It’ll be all right. It will.”

- - -

In the plan they eventually end up working out, Fingon will take the child back with him to Barad Either - eventually. For now, they deem it best for the baby to continue with Aelfwynn as a wet nurse until such time as he can be weaned, and since it would be impossible and ridiculous to ask her to relocate to Barad Eithel, the baby has to remain at Himring as well, for the time being.

This, Fingon declares, means that he will be staying for a while, too.

“Won’t you be needed in Hithlum?” Maedhros asks, trying to be practical despite how much the idea raises a thrill in her.

“I can be spared away for some months, for something like this,” Fingon assures. “Since Dor-lomin was given to Men, there has been much less for me to do. And my father will understand if it is for the sake of a new grandchild.”

Particularly one that hasn’t vanished into wherever Nevrast’s people went.

Maedhros hums, thinking. “You could probably tell everyone that he’s our child by blood,” she points out. “Everyone who doesn’t already know better, I mean.” The news of Sauron leaving her unable to bear children had only been shared with a few, thought her brothers and Fingolfin were among them.

“Perhaps,” Fingon says noncommitally. “I can think on it. We have time to decide.”

He lifts his head. “And you know this means you must come west to visit more frequently, of course. A few months out of every year, at least. Maglor can hold Himring at need, and he will for this, you know it.”

Maedhros does know it. “I will work out a schedule with him,” she promises. “First I must work out how to tell him that I have acquired a child in the first place.” A thought occurs to her. “And he should have names. We can’t just keep calling him ‘the baby’; it’ll get ridiculous.” She had held off on any naming so far in an attempt to not get attached, but that’s not really a concern now.

Fingon hums, thinking. “Ereinion,” he says at last. “Scion of kings - and I do mean scion, not son, for I dearly hope there is never a circumstance where I must become king.”

“You would do well with it,” Maedhros says, because Fingon does well with everything.

“It would not be worth it, to have inherited it from my father,” Fingon says quietly. Then, “But Ereinion, I stand by it. Have you thought at all of an amilessë?”

Maedhros has, for all her trying not to. “Gil-galad,” she murmurs. “Starlight. He looks so much like you, and --” She can’t say it, but even when she was trying her hardest to keep her distance, some tiny corner of her had dreamed of Fingon taking him as his own, letting him be hers at least by proxy.

“A good name,” Fingon says, nestling closer against her side. “A beautiful name. Ereinion Gil-galad. Ours.”

They stay curled up there together with their son between them until evening is well on its way.

#silmarillion #maedhros #female maedhros #fem!maedhros #fingon #gil-galad #russingon #maedhros x fingon #gil-galad origin story #my stories #roots of my tree

19 notes · View notes