Author's Note: Just another drabble. I think this could easily be a lot better, but I like the idea and don't have, so I'm sharing it with you. Also may make it into a kind of collection thing I'm considering, but we'll see.

The spirit if not the words of Maedhros' responsewas partially inspired by Martin Luther's "Hier stehe ich; ich kann nicht anders."

There Is No Other

Sprawled on the grass, Fingon watched while the other began a letter to one cousin or another. His hair fell forward as he wrote, a blood-tinted waterfall; he bit his lip in concentration. The use of the left hand was not yet habitual, Fingon noticed with a pang of guilt, and so his hand shook the slightest bit, even after so many months not fully recovered.

"Have you ever thought of what life could have been like had you not taken the oath?"

Maedhros glanced down at him, surprised. "No," he said, and turned back to his writing.