The High King of the Noldor
Year 1495 of the Trees | Year 14325 in the Years of the Sun
The midday bells rang out across Tirion, their voices bright and many-toned, echoing through the alabaster corridors of the palace. Sunlight streamed through crystal-paned windows, casting long beams of gold across the high hall where the regency of the Noldor now sat enthroned.
Alcaron stood at the foot of the dais beneath the banners of Finwë's line—white flame on blue for the House of the King, woven anew by the crafts of his people. At his right hand sat Fingolfin, ever-stern and methodical; to his left, Finarfin, calm-eyed and thoughtful. Behind him, standing in solemn attention, was Almirion—his son, taller now and strong of voice, already learning the weight of command.
Before them lay a court alive with fervor. Lords and artisans came forth in turn: a dispute over the allocation of rare mithril from the northern quarries; a petition from the Guild of Glasswrights, requesting land outside the city walls for a tower of flame and art; complaints of rivalry turned to sabotage in the forges of the lower city.
Voices rose, tempers flared. The Noldor were brilliant—but brilliance brought pride, and pride brought friction. Alcaron listened, watched, and when the moment came, he spoke. His words were clear, reasoned, firm as stone carved by rivers.
"You will not build higher than the fire towers," he said to the glasswrights, "for their light is sacred and their view, unbroken, a symbol to all of Tirion's unity. But you shall have land, and stone, and flame—so long as your ambition serves the people, not yourselves."
The hall stilled at his judgment. Even the loudest among them bowed low and stepped back.
In Eärondë, his rulings were met with grateful silence or graceful acquiescence. Here, in Tirion, there was always a pause—a moment of weighing, of internal contest. Yet they obeyed. Even the proudest of the Noldor knew the hand that guided them was both steady and wise.
When the session waned and lesser petitions were passed to scribes and aides, Alcaron stepped away for a moment of breath beneath the tall windows. The mingled light of Laurelin and Telperion glowed through the stained glass in hues of silver and green.
He closed his eyes.
I hear your thoughts before your words, beloved, came a gentle touch upon his mind, warm as the sea-winds of home.
Nimloth, he whispered in thought, a quiet smile brushing his lips.
Eärondë thrives. Elenwëa sits your seat with grace, though she listens too long before speaking. There was a chuckle. She is more like you than she knows.
That is well, he answered. And Almirion grows restless. The city tests him, as it tested me.
He will learn. As you did. As we all must.
A breath passed between them in silence. Then a faint sorrow traced her final words:
But something moves, Alcaron. I feel it on the wind.
He opened his eyes. The sunlight had shifted slightly. A strange stillness settled over the Tower Hall, unnoticed by the lords and scribes who still murmured across the chamber.
Something stirred within him—a tremor in the roots of the world. He could not name it yet. But it was there, like a shadow before the fall of night.
And so he turned back to his people, the day not yet done.
The forge was dark.
Once, its walls rang with the song of flame and metal, and the air shimmered with heat and light. Now only the wind whispered through narrow windows, drawing soft sighs through rafters thick with soot. No fire burned. No hammer fell. The great anvil sat untouched beneath its velvet cover. The forge tools lay precisely in their places, unused.
Fëanor sat in silence, hands resting on his knees, eyes fixed upon the stone casket before him.
Within it, the Silmarils lay. Cold now, though their light never dimmed. Their radiance was still a marvel—shimmering with the mingled fire of the Trees, with the soul and craft of their maker. Yet to Fëanor, they no longer brought pride. Only pain.
His face was drawn and hollow, the brilliance of his youth now a pale ember behind tired eyes. His hair, once wild as flame, had been tied back simply. He had not spoken aloud in days and years.
From the hallway, soft footsteps approached.
"Father," said Maedhros, hesitant, standing in the doorway. "Tyelkormo found a lynx cub in the woods. He thinks he might tame it. It's wild and foolish, like him."
No answer.
Maedhros waited. Then gently, he placed a covered bowl upon the forge table and left as quietly as he came.
Later still, Nerdanel entered. She did not speak. She simply crossed the room and sat beside her husband, hands folded in her lap. Her presence was calm, like water pooled beneath the stars. She looked not at the Silmarils, but at Fëanor's hands—scarred, idle, still.
"It was not only you," she said, softly. "He found cracks in all our hearts. Even mine. He twisted all that was noble in you until it served his envy."
Fëanor did not look at her, but his voice broke the silence at last, low and hoarse.
"I let him in. I listened."
His gaze did not waver from the casket.
"I thought he praised my works because he understood. I thought he envied me because I had surpassed even the Valar in craft. But he saw the fire in me…and fed it. Until it burned all else away."
He fell silent again, and the quiet seemed heavier after his words.
"I turned him away," he said at last. "When he came again—I ordered the gates barred. I would not hear him."
Nerdanel touched his hand gently, but he pulled it away—not in anger, but in sorrow.
"I am not ready," he whispered. "Not ready to hold a hammer. Not ready to love you again. Not even ready to look upon my sons without fear that I might… say too much. Shape too boldly. Burn too brightly."
From the far end of the corridor, the aged voice of Finwë could be heard, speaking gently with young Curufin and Caranthir. His steps were slower now, his presence more often felt than seen. But he remained—the one steadfast light in Formenos, even in its cold.
"He watches you with pride, Fëanáro," said Nerdanel. "Not for your fire—but for your choice."
But Fëanor said nothing more.
The Silmarils shimmered in their case, beautiful and still.
And the forge remained cold.
The evening air over Tirion was light and fragrant, stirred by a sea-breeze that crept up the white slopes of Túna. From the high western terrace of the King's palace, Alcaron gazed out in silence. Below, the city gleamed—a wonder wrought of silver and crystal, of tall towers and vaulted streets. The mingled light of Laurelin and Telperion cast long shadows and golden gleams upon every dome and spire, catching in the fountains and glazing the marble walks with the glint of stars.
But he looked beyond the city now, toward the west, where the Mountains of Aman stood high and silent, crowned with snow. And further still—where the sky dipped to meet the Sea and the realm of the Valar lay beyond mortal sight. There, the mingled light softened into a radiant hush, and the colors of creation breathed softly upon the clouds.
Alcaron stood in the heart of that stillness, but peace did not find him. His robes, fine and flowing, bore the sigils of his House and the runes of the Hidden City he had raised in the East—but they hung on him now like a mantle of waiting. His eyes, sharp and deep with years, bore signs of a weariness that rulership could not ease.
In Eärondë, the twilight hours were music: wind and song and water mingling in harmony. Here, in Tirion, they were watchful.
He turned at the sound of footsteps behind him. Almirion stood there, his son—tall now, near grown, his face noble and his bearing proud, though shadows clung at the edge of his eyes.
"You walk alone again," said Almirion softly, stepping to the balustrade. "Evening after evening."
Alcaron smiled faintly, but did not reply.
Almirion looked up at the sky, where the twin lights played across the clouds like oil on water.
"I've had dreams, Father. Of a darkness that moves but does not speak. It wraps the light, not in fire, but in silence. A silence that stings."
Alcaron's brow furrowed slightly, but he remained silent.
"I dreamt of Grandfather," Almirion said. "He was crying. But no sound came. Not even when he called."
That stirred Alcaron, and his hand clenched upon the stone rail. He turned to his son at last.
"You have always felt the threads more keenly," he said. "Even when you were small."
Almirion nodded but said no more. He stepped back, sensing his father's wish for solitude. As he turned to go, Alcaron reached and gently placed a hand on his shoulder.
"I am proud of you," he said. "Return to your rest. The dawn may bring new burdens and maybe some answers."
Almirion bowed and left, and Alcaron returned his gaze to the sky.
But even as the light bathed the city in gold and silver, he felt the rising of a shadow within his spirit. A faint tremor passed through the depths of his being—like the wind before thunder.
Night fell, but the stars did not yet blaze, for the Trees still glowed.
Alcaron stood upon the same high balcony, arms folded across his chest, his cloak stirred by the wind. Below, the lamps of Tirion had been kindled, their lights swaying like fireflies in the streets. The fountains still sang, and voices drifted like the music of harps from distant halls. All seemed calm—yet he did not feel calm.
Then it came.
There was no warning. No sound.
Only a snap.
Not of wood. Not of rope. Something deeper.
A cry within him—a tearing, terrible, soundless cry that echoed through the corridors of his soul. His knees buckled, and he fell.
The bond between father and son, forged in faë and memory, severed in an instant. Not dimmed, not faded—but violently, completely undone.
"Finwë…"
His whisper was a gasp, ragged and choking. Osanwë—mind-touch, heart-speech, the grace between kin—had vanished. Not merely silenced. Erased.
His hands clutched at his breast as if to still the rupture within, but there was no comfort. He wept without restraint, tears falling to the stone at his feet.
He knew, though none had told him.
Finwë was gone.
Murdered.
Slain in a land where no blood had been spilled since its making.
Then the heavens shifted.
From the west, a strange gloom crept, like ink spilled upon the edges of the air. Alcaron looked up through blurred eyes, and beheld a terror beyond all telling.
Telperion, the elder of the Trees, flickered.
Once.
Twice.
And then—
Gone.
Its silver light faded like breath on glass, until only emptiness remained.
Gasps turned to screams across the terraces below. The music in the streets was stilled. Bells rang wildly. Lamps flared, and doors slammed shut. In the far-off towers, horns began to call—warning, or mourning, none could say.
Alcaron rose slowly, trembling. His face was pale as the stones beneath his feet.
He looked out upon the world he had known, and found it changed.
He was no longer a steward in a time of peace.
The Light was dying.
And night—true night—had come at last.
The sound of the bells shattered the hush like spears hurled against marble. Not in harmony did they toll, nor with ceremony or the joy of festival, but wild and broken, like the cry of a wounded beast. From the high towers of Tirion they rang—one after another, then many at once, in clamor and disarray. Never had they sounded so, not in all the long years of the city's grace.
All around the high palace, torches were being lit—uncertain, flickering lights that cast long shadows on walls once bright with the mingled gold and silver of Laurelin and Telperion. But now there was no light save that of the stars, distant and cold, shimmering above the trembling towers.
Alcaron stood motionless in the corridor, his cloak trailing behind him like a shadow given form. His face was pale, his spirit taut as if strung upon some unseen thread. He had not spoken since the light had vanished, and in that silence, he had felt it: a sundering deeper than grief.
It had not been a fading, but a breaking—like the shattering of crystal under a hammer. The bond between fëar, between a son and his father, had been torn asunder. And from that silence Alcaron knew with certainty what no herald had yet spoken aloud:
Finwë, the High King of the Noldor, was dead.
The steps that broke the silence came quickly—urgent, uneven. Almirion came running, his breath shallow, his eyes wide with fear and confusion. He was pale as the moonlight of Cuiviénen, his silver-blonde hair clinging to his brow.
"Father," he gasped, "the city—the Trees—there is no light! Only the stars remain!"
"I know," Alcaron said softly, and his voice was like the hush before a storm.
Almirion stared. "Both? But how? What power in this world—?"
Alcaron raised his hand, and his son fell silent. The King-Regent's face was lined with pain, but beneath it lay something harder—resolute, unbending.
"The light of the Two Trees is ended," he said. "And more than light has passed from the world this night. I felt it, Almirion—felt it like the earth feels the sundering of stone. Your grandfather is gone. The bond between us is broken. No word. No cry. Just silence… and in that silence, the end of an age."
Others were arriving—courtiers, lords, artisans, warriors of the royal household. Some came in armor, others still in the garments of their craft. Fear and disbelief filled their eyes.
The Prince's Finarfin and Fingolfin came swiftly through the crowd, their noble brows darkened with alarm. They looked to Alcaron, waiting for his word.
He turned to Almirion, his voice suddenly sharp with command.
"Gather riders. Take swift horses. Go to Formenos."
Almirion blinked. "To my uncle?"
"No," Alcaron said. "Not to your Uncle. To the King."
The words hung in the corridor like thunder about to fall.
"My brother is now the eldest of Finwë's house. He is the King of the Noldor by right of succession and blood, for I rule only as steward. We do not send word to him as a kinsman—we summon him as sovereign."
Alcaron looked beyond Almirion to a captain of the royal guard who had come, armor shining faintly in the torchlight.
"You will not go alone," he said. "Formenos stands far from here, and in these days I trust no shadow. Take a company of the royal guard. They will ride not merely as escort but as honor guard, bearing the standard of the King and the seal of the city. He must be brought back in majesty and in safety. Go swiftly, and let there be no delay."
The captain saluted with hand to heart. Almirion bowed, and without another word, turned and ran down the corridor, already shouting for steeds to be readied, for arms and cloaks and sealed letters.
Then Alcaron turned to the assembled court.
"My lords, my kin," he said, "the light has gone. The Trees are dead. The King is slain. And Melkor walks the world again. This is no sorrow of the forge or quarrel of pride. This is doom. Doom that calls for unity, for counsel, for strength."
He looked to Fingolfin and Finarfin, to the lords and nobles gathered.
"Summon all houses. From the forges and the halls of lore, from every craft and tower. Let the city stand still for a day, but let her heart be kindled. We must meet, and swiftly—for the world we knew has ended."
No voice rose to question him. For in the depth of their hearts, each of them knew it to be true.
And as Alcaron turned again to the darkness that lay beyond the windows, he murmured to himself, too soft for others to hear:
"Only the stars remain. And they are watching."