Blood and Fire

5. A kindness

Their retreat was surprisingly easy. The Noldor must have decided against a headlong rush into Menegroth’s uncharted passageways. Oropher could not blame them. He would have done the same in their place. As it was, the muffled sounds of shouted orders that came echoing after them concerned him despite his relief. Death had been postponed for the time being, but now that Fëanor’s sons had secured the only entrance to Menegroth, any attempt to break out would be immeasurably more dangerous. The trap was sealed.

The upwards-sloping avenue opened into another domed crossroads of a cavern, smaller than the last but similarly arranged. There had been no time to take down the lanterns here and it was well-lit, the leafy ceiling so clearly illuminated that even the stone squirrels clinging to the pillars cast unwavering shadows in the tranquil pool. It was all so peaceful and tidy and bizarrely normal that the bloodstained Elves spreading out among the benches and beneath the bright tapestries might have fallen out of a nightmare.

Shouts echoed up from below. They had minutes, maybe.

Who still lived? More than Oropher had expected. The archers were mostly out of arrows. There were enough benches and tables around the square to delay the Noldor for a few minutes at least. They were heaping up a hasty barricade when the sound of footsteps came ringing up from the avenues on either side. A moment later, before Oropher could react to give orders, cries of “Friend!” could be heard. Then the lookouts came running to tell him what he already knew, that Dior and Celeborn had arrived with those Sindar that still survived.

Now the square was crowded and noisy, no longer peaceful. Celeborn was limping slightly and Dior, although as bloody as anyone, appeared unwounded. The barricade was already head-high, a rickety structure barring the wide mouth of the passage down to the main square. “Nimloth –” Dior was saying urgently as he strode through the chaos to join Oropher and Celeborn at the barricade. “Has she –?”

“Dior!” came Nimloth’s voice from behind them. “Where are y– oh Dior –”

The women archers had arrived silently and unnoticed, some still with a few arrows in their quivers, having descended from the overhead galleries and come swiftly through secret passageways to join the men at the agreed location. They clustered in the wide archway opposite the barricade, dusty and sweat-sheened, but oddly pristine among the battered, bloody men.

Nimloth came pushing through the chaos. She was very pale and she seized on Dior with fierce relief. “You’re alive!” she exclaimed. Her hands on his stained and clotted mail were white and clean. “Dior, oh Dior –”

He enfolded her in his mail-clad arms and pressed his face against her hair.

“Yes,” he replied. The word was strangely quiet amid the clamour of the barricade-building and the martial sounds drifting up from the lower square. “Love. I’m alive.”

“Did I get it right?” she said anxiously. “The gate – there were so many –”

“Perfectly. It was perfect.”

“But they kept coming, Dior –”

“Your timing was perfect,” said Dior. He released her, smiling a little in a way that would have been familiar to anyone who had known Lúthien, not unkindly but with a distinct suggestion of distance. “Thank you. You’ve done what you can. Take the women to the treasury and stay there till it’s all over.”

Nimloth stared at him. There was blood on her clothes now, and smeared in rusty drying streaks over her fair skin. “Dior, I don’t –”

“Take the women and go.”

“No! We’re staying! This is our home! And I am staying right here, with you!”

It seemed for a moment as though Dior might tell her again to leave. Certainly Oropher would have done and judging by Celeborn’s frown he was not alone. Dior, however, nodded and said, “Very well. Then you and the women hold the back line. You should not fight unless things go very badly wrong. This is a battle, not a drill. If I tell you to leave, you will go to the treasury. At once. Do you understand?”

She nodded, wordless. The gleam in her eyes hinted at unshed tears.

“Good,” he said. “I love you. Now go to the back.”

Somewhat to Oropher’s relief, Nimloth left. The sounds filtering up the broad passage suggested that the Noldor were taking their time about mustering for a fresh assault. He peered through a gap between a bench leg and a skewed seat, trying to make out something other than torchlight moving dimly in the smoky darkness. Behind him, Dior and Celeborn were organising the mingled Nandor and Sindar in preparation for another attack. The air was full of blood and sweat.

They might survive. Or they might die here beneath the stone and earth, already entombed, far from the greenwoods of Ossiriand.

So be it. Oropher was a Green-elf. He was used to death.

The gash to the thigh, just above the knee, had bled badly. It might not have been fatal if not for the arrow in his eye. He had fallen in the first charge and lain in his own fluids while the fighting raged above him, dying in the dark.

His lips were white. There was a bluish mottling around his mouth.

Caranthir had seen dead Elves before. He had not expected to find his brother lying dead on the filthy ground.

“Curse them,” said Celegorm beside him, very quietly.

Around them the men were still sorting the dead and the dying from the merely wounded. If not for the need to find the missing man, they might have pursued the fleeing Sindar into the tunnels. Now he had been found. Curufin. Not the first of Finwë’s house to die, but the first death among the sons of Fëanor.

The blood from the arrow-wound was drying into a sticky, blackish mess around the black-feathered shaft. Their brother’s long fingers were still curled around a missing hilt. His sword had fallen a little way off by the fountain and lay half in the cloudy water.

“Valar curse them!” said Celegorm again.

He swung around and slammed the pommel of his sword violently into a pillar. The blow dislodged a squirrel from where it clung among the leaves of a stone vine. It smashed into several pieces as it hit the floor. The head stared sightlessly up with glassy eyes. A kick sent it skidding into the crimson fountain.

“Brother –”

Celegorm was already halfway across the square. He did not look back.

A shout rang up the passage. “Dior Eluchíl!”

“Parley?” suggested Celeborn, as he and Dior joined Oropher at the barricade. He did not seem particularly hopeful. A twist of hair had escaped his jewelled helm and lay sticky and matted against his neck. “Which son is it?”

Down below, a lone figure stood in the smoky archway. Oropher shrugged. “I couldn’t tell you. Ask him.”

“I shall,” said Dior in his quiet way. He raised his voice. “Who calls me?”

The response was immediate. “Celegorm Fëanor’s son! Still alive, Dark Elf?”

“So it would seem! Will you parley, Fëanor’s son?”

“With my sword, Eluchíl! Come out and fight!”

Oropher snorted, unamused. Celeborn’s eyebrows had disappeared under the rim of his helm and he shook his head. Dior gave them both a faint smile and leaned forwards, resting his elbows on a table leg. “Your offer is appealing, Fëanor’s son, but I think not. Was there anything else?”

The figure below them came two steps closer. “If you will not come out, coward, face me before your men! Let them see how a lord of the Noldor deals with a child-king born of a Dark Elf and a mortal. And when my foot is on your neck, I shall take my father’s Silmaril back from your unworthy hands!”

“It’s bound to be a trick,” said Oropher, not troubling to keep his voice down. “Don’t.”

Celeborn nodded. “I must agree.”

“Only Dark Elves could doubt the word of one who has seen the Blessed Realm,” cried the figure contemptuously. “Fight me, Eluchíl! Prove yourself a king!”

Dior’s expression remained unaltered. “I must beg leave to doubt your word, son of Fëanor,” he called back. “It seems to me unwise to trust an exile who would slay Elves for jewels. Nor need I prove my kingship. I am not Morgoth Bauglir. What would I gain from your brothers, should I win?”

“Your life, Dark Elf! Defeat me and my brothers will withdraw from Doriath.”

“Now that,” said Celeborn beneath his breath, “is most certainly a lie.”

It was Oropher’s turn to nod. “Agreed.”

Between them, Dior sighed. “No doubt it is,” he said as quietly and lifted his voice again. “Then come here, son of Fëanor, and face me before my men! And we shall see how a lord of kinslayers deals with a king born of threefold race and Maiarin blood!”