Chapter Text
Mairon ran his long-fingered, elegant hands over the lapels of his inky-dark suit jacket and smiled.
He would be “The Admirable” once more, he thought. He’d inspire respect and even a healthy dose of fear.
Yes, he could sense it—he was on his way back up.
Wrenching this dubious establishment from Arafinwë’s trembling hands was but an unfortunate first, provisional step on the path to success that had to be borne with equanimity, of course, but Mairon could see the potential in this enterprise.
If he’d been given the choice, he would never have elected a school of all things to start his comeback.
At first, he’d utterly despised everything about this noisy, crowded place, but he’d soon changed his mind as he progressively realised how complex and alterable it was.
Sure, Arafinwë’s rule had been one of strenuous compassion and inefficient nurturing, but Mairon prided himself on being able to dismantle and optimise any machine he came upon.
The raw materials—the setting, the people, the context of unsupervised indoctrination—were highly promising, and he was looking forward to setting his plans into motion.
Children, after all, had such open minds, and—with the right help—he might well forge a new army of corrupted, perverted creatures to carry him to his goal.
A discreet knock on the door interrupted his internal monologue, which he’d never willingly have called a pep talk, because he didn’t need such weak-minded, soppy, therapeutic encouragements.
“The students are waiting for your speech,” the bat-like creature Mairon had recently hired informed him. “I can hear them puttering around down there.”
As she was clinging to the ceiling as if fiercely aware of the sticky debris that followed young ones wherever they went, Mairon wasn’t entirely sure where his future underlings were to be found presently.
Were they already at his door?
“I’m coming. Gather the…staff,” he barked.
He shuddered and invoked the Dark Lord to keep his new employees from devouring their charges before the bell rang.
“Growing pains, teething problems,” he muttered to himself as he grabbed the long, intricately ornamented cane he’d forged for the occasion and left his office.
As soon as he arrived in the “Auditorium”, he had to suppress a groan.
Half of his employees were huddled in the shadows, wary of the bright light streaming through the stained-glass windows.
A pair of dark green curtains had caught fire.
One of the said glass panes had burst into multicoloured shards when Glaurung had smashed his massive head through it.
Worst of all, though, were the fresh, hopeful faces of the half-baked, puffy-cheeked creatures, who were milling around the room noisily.
Distraught by their enthusiasm, Mairon started to regret having rejected Ungoliant’s application to become the new lunch lady—she might have cowed them into solemn, fearful silence.
Banging his cane onto the polished wooden floor, he learned his first lesson: If you wanted something done well, you had to do it yourself!
“Silence!” he bellowed. “Many things are about to change in here!”
“How’s your dad holding up?”
Finrod turned around to find Beren, hip cocked and youthful face grave, standing just behind him.
“He’s plotting his revenge,” the golden-haired youth replied with a quick shrug.
They both knew that Arafinwë, the former headmaster of the boarding school they’d been confined to, was prone to long, diplomatic discussions rather than forceful, reckless action.
“I wonder what the new tyrant will be like,” Beren mused aloud.
Despite their difference in actual lived years, the two adolescents shared an irrepressible taste for adventure, which translated more often than not into a proclivity for what was considered “naughty behaviour” by their elders.
Hence, they had been sent to boarding school in hopes that the strict rhythm and strong sense of community and mutual responsibility would temper their flights of daredevil fancy.
Thus far, the success of that plan had been middling at best, for it was their inherent sense of honour, fairness, and loyalty that motivated most of their transgressions, and the imposed helplessness of the strict setting had only strengthened their resolve to oppose injustice and abuse by any means necessary.
“If he thinks we’ll just roll over, he’s sorely mistaken,” Finrod declared pugnaciously even as the heavy oaken door behind them opened and a tall, lean man strode in.
From the oddly metallic sheen of his long hair to the pinched expression on his unnaturally beautiful face, he radiated the kind of cold sophistication that was laughably misplaced in a school for teenagers.
Just like Arafinwë’s devastating fall from power, though, the theatrical entrance of their new headmaster was soon displaced in the youngsters’ minds by entirely more pressing and mundane preoccupations, namely the unexpected addition of a new student to their roster.
“She’s beautiful,” Beren sighed. “She looks so delicate—I shall protect and defend her fiercely.”
As he drank in the dark, glossy hair and the huge, bright eyes of the young girl, Finrod sniggered.
His experience with his sister and cousin had taught him never to mistake ephemeral beauty with actual weakness, so he easily recognised the stubborn set of the girl’s rosy mouth and the understated but undeniable determination in her slender shoulders.
“I wonder what her name is,” Beren went on, undeterred.
“Why don’t you simply ask her? It seems it will take another hour for that fop to finish his procession through the room anyway.”
Despite his cheery attitude, Finrod couldn’t fully shake the shiver of apprehension trickling down his spine.
The headmaster’s first announcement only cemented the vague sense of dread assailing the student body.
Things were about to change, and Finrod was almost certain that it wouldn’t be for the better.
Nonetheless, his oath-bound, avowed friend looked ecstatic as he sidled up to the mysterious newcomer to shoot his shot.
“One has to take the good with the bad,” Finrod repeated his late grandfather’s heartening words under his breath.
As per usual, the young man was thoroughly convinced that he’d be able to cheat the system, reap rich rewards, and stave off the machinations of evil.