Less than a week later the ships of Gil-galad arrived.

Maglor was awakened from Elwing's bed by his brother's shouts from the door. Maedhros burst into the room, a sword in his left hand. "The High King," he shouted, breathless, "is coming. Ships fill the bay." Maglor was up and in armor in an instant. "Get the soldiers," he said. "I will secure the boys."

Elrond was bent over Elros' crib, whispering something in Quenya. He looked up when Maglor came in, suddenly afraid. Maglor walked right by him to the window. He closed the metal shutters, locked them, and fastened securely the window-glass. Then he turned to Elrond. He wanted to explain, to give him some reassurance, but he found that he could think of nothing to say. So he left, and locked the bedroom door behind him.

Maglor's well-trained soldiers rode behind him in formation to the waterside. Maedhros was already there with his own soldiers, a grim expression on his face. At least fifty ships were coming, all armed and filled with Elven soldiers. They had an hour, at most, before the ships would arrive.

"We will have to burn the harbor," Maedhros said. Maglor nodded, and ordered a torch to be brought. Sirion was a new city, built mostly of wood, with dense houses for Elven merchants by the water. The fire spread quickly among them. Most of the residents escaped their burning homes, but not all. A woman leapt from the top of a burning house, her hair on fire. Her son followed soon after, calling for his mother.

As Maglor watched the flames escort the boy to Mandos he thought of other flames, and other children: at Alqualonde, at Doriath. He imagined Elrond's face on the boy as he fell to his death. This is the path that I chose the day I spoke my vow. And, for the third time in his life, Maglor watched a city burn by his hand.

"We have bought ourselves a night," he said to Maedhros.

Maedhros was silent, his face twisted in fury. Then he barked orders at his men, giving instructions for the evacuation of Sirion. Maglor yelled his own orders, and ran off to Elwing's house.

By the time he returned it was dark, and the boys were asleep. He went to their room to fetch them, but was distracted by the broken window.

The glass was shattered, in pieces on the floor. Maglor picked up a shard and found that it was covered with blood. Even the bars of the metal shutters were bloody, as if someone had torn his hands trying to open them by force. Someone...

Maglor knelt by Elrond's bed and moved the sheet that was covering him. The boy's hands were cut in great gashes, as were his legs. His hair was matted with blood, and blood mixed with tears on his pillow. Maglor tensed, and looked down in surprise to see his fingers had closed on the glass he held. Soon his own hand was bleeding, and his blood mixed with Elrond's on the floor.

He shook his hands free and fetched a damp cloth to clean Elrond's wounds before the long journey. He ran a damp finger along the cut on the boy's forehead. Not deep, only a scratch really. It should heal without problems. Elrond's breathing shifted, but he did not wake. There was a great deal of blood. Maglor found another gash, this time on the boy's chest. He had obviously used his entire body in a hopeless attempt to break through the window. This, too, Maglor cleaned as well as he could. Then he found his fingers returning to the boy's face. Such an unusual face, unique in all of Arda, long like an Elf's, yet rounded, with the softness of a man-child. To Maglor it was indescribably beautiful. He touched the boy's hair, dark and heavy beneath his hand. It had been so long, so many years, since Maglor had felt the touch of another Elf. He placed his fingers, gently, on the boy's chest.

At that moment Elrond's eyes opened. All his earlier defiance was gone, leaving only fear in his moonlike eyes.

"Let me go to Gil-galad," he whispered.

"I can not," Maglor answered. Do not ask me, sweet child...

"You said you would care for us," Elrond said, begging.

Maglor thought of all the reasons Maedhros would give. While they had the boys as hostages they were safe from the vengance of Elwing's people, who would not risk the lives of the last heirs of Doriath. And, if Elwing herself were to return, perhaps she could be prevailed on by her people to exchange the Silmaril for her sons. And then he thought of the other reason: that he simply could not live without these boys. They gave a meaning to his life beyond destruction, beyond the madness that was continuing to possess him. Or they brought their own kind of madness. Either way, he could not let them go.

"I will care for you. Always. I will give my life for you if need be. But I will not be parted from you. I could not bear it."

The child did not struggle as Maglor took him into his arms. The blood loss had weakened him, or perhaps he had given up. He lifted up Elros as well, and brought the boys downstairs to the wagons that waited to take them to their new home.

*******

Notes:

Thank you to all my kind reviewers. You are keeping me writing, and I am very grateful. Please keep the reviews coming. Not all the chapters will be this dark, I promise.

Bows to Soledad for helping me get inside Maglor's head, and to greenleaf-legolas for reading a draft just in time.

For those who asked about Elrond and Elros being twins - it is not stated anywhere in the canon that they are, or even in Unfinished Tales. So I do not consider it binding on fanfic writers, and have gone with my understanding of Elrond's personality.

If you are committed to the idea that they are twins, but want to enjoy the story anyway, here is a thought. Elves mature much slower than humans, reaching maturity at age 50. I have imagined that as half-Elves Elrond and Elros grow in fits and starts, sometimes at the human rate, sometimes at the much slower Elvish rate, sometimes slower than either. They will also reach maturity at age 50. Elrond is six years old at the beginning of the story, and has obviously matured at the human rate all that time. If you like, you can imagine that they actually were twins, and that Elros has been growing unusually slowly.

I should also remind my readers, in case it isn't perfectly clear from the story, that any and all moral judgements made by the characters in this story or any other of mine are theirs and not mine.

A final deep bow to the Great Professor Tolkien, who created these wonderful and disturbing characters. I couldn't have made them up.

Elrond held Elros in his arms all the way to Himring. He made no sound, except to dutifully and emotionlessly ask for food when the baby cried. When Maglor tried to touch him he pulled away and wrapped himself around Elros as if the boy could protect him from a danger beyond words

At Himring, there was a great deal of work to be done. Rooms had to be cleaned out, and set up. Elros had to be fed, and diapered, and taught. There were servants, of course, for these jobs, but somehow Elrond was always on hand, expressionless and silent, when they needed to be done. Maglor was busy most of the day, but at night he liked to sing to the boys, and tell them stories. Elrond at first ignored him, or tried to, but the stories pulled him in, forced him to listen even as he faced the wall with a scowl. After a few weeks he lost even that resistance. He especially liked it when Maglor told creation stories: the formation of the Dwarves by Aule, the Gift of Iluvatar to Men, the awakening of the Elves. They made him think of beginnings, of possibilities, of freedom.

Then Elros spoke his first word: Father. He spoke it to Maglor.

Elrond fled the room, and ran to the study. Maglor found him crouched in a closet behind the oldest books, whimpering noiselessly. Maglor brought him downstairs and put him to bed, singing the most comforting songs he could, but the tears did not stop.

As the weeks and then months went on, Elros learned other words. He said "Let's sing" and "I love you" and "Why is Brother crying?" Maglor taught him basic songs, and then began to train him to use a small wooden practice sword. Elrond's sobbing began to disturb Elros at night, so Maglor let Elrond sleep in the study. Sometimes Elrond would lock himself in for days at a time, sneaking downstairs when no one was looking to find a little food. Alone in the study he would cry while reading, or read while crying, or simply sob while holding a book in his empty arms.

After two years Morgoth attacked, and they had to move again. Maedhros went off in disguise to try to join Gil-galad's soldiers. Maglor mocked him for thinking an over-large one-handed Elf could pass unnoticed, and took the boys and the rest of his people to a refuge on the coast, far south of Gil-galad. There was much to do again in the move, and Elrond did as much as he could. But when the tumult settled down, he found that he had even less responsibility than he had before. Maglor, no longer a ruler, had more time to be a father. Elros learned to ride, to dance, and to fight with all the skill Maglor could teach. Elrond did some of his lessons for a time, and then once again lapsed into silence and tears. Maglor reached out to him at first, as often as he could, but learned after a while that he was not wanted.

In the silence of the study Elrond dreamed, sometimes asleep, sometimes awake. First his dreams were only of violence. He remembered the knife he had once held in a lost moment of defiance. He thought how he could use it on all the people who betrayed his family, ending with himself. He remembered Maglor's touch on his chest. 'Never,' he thought, and did not know what it was that sickened him so.

Sometimes he searched among the books for more stories, for someone else's memories. Some books were in Westron, which he could not understand, or in Quenya, which he understood somewhat but could not read without assistance. Others were of herb-lore or craft, and while he found them interesting they could not give him what he needed. Only a few were story-books that could tell him tales. He learned of Maglor's grandmother Miriel, who sent her soul to Mandos by her own will after birthing her son. He read about the creation of the Silmarils, and the genius of Maglor's father Feanor. Finally he read about Luthien and Beren, his own great-grandparents, and of their bravery and love.

There was an especially large book, written in unusual letters. Could they be Khuzdul? The Dwarves did not teach their language to outsiders. Elrond liked to hold this book, to touch it. It reminded him that there were things he did not understand but could learn one day. It was a long time before he thought to open it. He flipped through the pages, understanding nothing but marveling at the letters. Finally he saw, about a third of the way through the book, some notes scribbled in Sindarin. A translation, it seemed.

The notes were messy and difficult to understand, but they seemed to be on the creation of the Dwarves. He remembered that story, spoken in Maglor's musical voice, pulling his sullen face from the wall. Here it was, written in Maglor's hand.

In this strange book Elrond read of Aule and his forming of the Dwarves from clay in the darkness in the beginning of days. How the new-created Dwarves cowered and begged for mercy from the one who had just given them life as he held above them a destroying hammer, weeping in shame at his creation. How Iluvatar had adopted them and allowed them, malformed, misshapen, to survive.

So they are foster-children, Elrond thought, like me.

He read further of the sleep of the Dwarves (or was it imprisonment?) for long ages, while the Elves awoke under starlight. Then he went on to read in amazement (although he knew it to be true) how the Dwarves revere Aule, and call him Father. For who else do they have to love?

Maglor's song drifted up the stairs. Perhaps he was singing to Elros, although the boy was long asleep. Elrond unlocked the door to the study and went downstairs to meet him.

Maglor turned, astonished. "Tell me a story," Elrond said, before Maglor could speak. His voice shook and he sounded even younger than his eleven years.

"What story would you like?" Maglor asked. His voice also trembled, as he feared of losing this one last chance that was given him.

"Stories of the beginning," Elrond said. "All of them."

Maglor nodded. Perhaps this child really would be a Master, if these stories could feed his broken heart.

"I will tell you all the stories I know, and how to sing them. I will teach you Quenya, and Westron, and Proto-Elvish, and even what I have been able to decipher of Khuzdul, so you can find other stories on your own. I will teach you to write, and to compose songs, so you can make new stories of your own. Would you like that?"

So this is what you offer me, Elrond thought, to take the place of a mother, a father, a people, a home. But he knew he could not live without it, and so he would take it and live.

He sat with Maglor well into the night, speaking of languages. The next morning their lessons began. A few months later he sat on the balcony, as night fell, and began a song.

One of his own.

***********

Notes:

The story of the creation of the Dwarves is found in Silmarillion 2, 'Of Aule and Yavanna'. Remember, though, that in my version of Middle Earth Elrond wrote/compiled 'the Silmarillion', in the Second Age. And Maglor's Khuzdul is probably not that great. So I am NOT claiming that this is identical to the creation story Dwarves tell among themselves.

Thanks to Honesty for pointing out the Maglor-Aule connection, way back in her review of 'Naming the Stones'. *Bows to insightful reviewer*

Also many thanks to Soledad and greenleaf-legolas for draft reading and emotional support.

As always, I am very grateful to all my loyal and kind reviewers. Keep up the good work!