I’ve been thinking a lot about Celegorm lately. Not Celegorm the handsome, sometimes charming, often crude rogue who teases his brothers and alarms the genteel, but Celegorm in Beleriand, Celegorm the terrifying.
Celegorm the Fair, dripping in blood. Celegorm all the more frightening because he can seem so jovial, and laugh so brightly. He who you do not believe could be subtle, as he stalks through the halls with a pack of jubilant dogs at his side, he who drinks hard and laughs loud and does not temper his voice – but who walks with absolutely silent tread, who comes up on you unawares, whom you do not sense until his breath is on the back of your neck.
They all have stories of Celegorm the Hunter, Celegorm the Wild, Celegorm the Mad.
Once, on a hunt, his bow broke, and his knife was lost, and so he tore the hart’s throat out with his bare hands.
That’s nothing; I saw him do it with his teeth.
Ai, wait until you’ve seen him do the same in battle…
Celegorm who needs nought but hands and teeth and fear to hunt, whether his prey is a rabbit, or a deer, or an orc, or a man.
Or an elf.
They whisper of the rites he performs in the woods, when he returns with dried blood crusted under his nails and his eyes bright and burning. He still burns the offerings of the old world, and whispers fey prayers in an ancient tongue, and they shiver, and say he is invoking his old friend, the Huntsman.
But he is of the Seven Dispossessed, the Irreverent, they who recognize no gods, no over-lords, no Valar…
It is not homage. It is respect.
It is habit.
It is not worship.
(It is worship, a little.)
Do you think the Huntsman still hears him?
Well, has he ever missed a kill?
He hasn’t.
Celegorm the Fey, who whispers dark things in the ears of picketed horses and laughs to see them pull up their lines and flee.
He likes his fun, says his brother, the crafty one, the shade of the Spirit of Fire, his eyes like flint and his tone dismissive. Pay it no heed. (It is not a suggestion, but a command.)
Celegorm the Damned, who fears nothing in the dark forest, for there is nothing more terrifying than he. Celegorm the Blood-Soaked, Celegorm the Merciless, Celegorm who paints himself with blood for battle, who tattoos thorns beneath his skin, who dresses his pale hair with pretty beads, made of bone; brilliant gems, grinning death-heads.
Celegorm the Fair, aye, fair indeed. Fairest of the monsters.
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