The Last Luster

The Last Luster
By Isabel Schemes
Pairings: Glorfindel/ Erestor, Glorfindel/ Erestor / Elrond, mild Glorfindel/ Elrond
Rating: NC-17 (in later chapters)
Warnings: Graphic male/male sex, borderline NCS, mentions of domestic abuse
Disclaimer: I do not own the rights of Lord of the Rings characters, plots and all included in the novels.
Summary: Erestor’s illness has reached its’ crux over darts and wine, and a risky decision is made to help him… only, will he agree to the procedure?


Part Two: Healing Methods

Erestor laid down the withered book filled with rotting pages. His mind was elsewhere and his every attempt at work had horribly failed. An empty bottle of wine lay next to his thigh, while the partially empty bottle sat between his legs. Looking down at the pages scattered atop his reclining body, Erestor grabbed at his glass and took a deep swig of wine. Sighing, he shoved himself from the bed and watched as pages covered in a scribe’s dirty scrawl, flutter like feathers to the ground.

His room was a great mess, bottles and papers cluttering the desk and floor. Luckily, Erestor had sense to keep important papers on the desk, and he let the scraps fall to the floor. He treaded lightly over his work and reached his window seat. He began to pull the curtains apart, slowly, like a child at midwinter unwrapping a gift. At first he only peeked out his window, trying to get a sense of who might linger below his window. When he saw only a few elves, he flung open the curtains and took in the world he kept himself from. He set the glass down on the windowsill, the bottle reflecting twinkling lanterns from the courtyard and a sudden wave of nostalgia grabbed him.

There was a young couple below him, two male elves, who were chasing each other across the hidden lawn. Erestor watched their courting and snorted in disgust. Erestor couldn’t fathom how so many elves could be so ignorant of the downfalls of love. Here those elves were, passionately coupling and for all they knew, tomorrow one would leave the other willingly or not, no matter what promises lay between them. Erestor relished his knowledge, feeling safe as he watched everyone around him love and get hurt by their lover.

As he turned from his view however, he felt remorse wash over him. He didn’t know why, but he wished he could be one of those elves on the lawn. He wished he could be foolish, and ignore his intellect, just for one night perhaps. But it was better this way. Better safe than sorry he thought. And the world around him crumpled as he watched his barriers solidify more and more. The ice was clenching his heart, he knew, but now he didn’t care.

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Glorfindel stood at the bottom of Erestor’s building, staring up into his window. Inside the window lay nothing, only darkness that Glorfindel felt would suck him in. He knew he would soon be facing a near impossible task – bring down the walls of a well adjusted hider, an elf who’s perfected the art of isolation. He didn’t think too hard on his quest, he just moved forward.
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“Glorfindel! I… I did not expect you here so soon!” Erestor cried out in surprise as he opened the door a crack. Glorfindel stood smiling at him, gently, and he nodded in assent to waiting a bit. Erestor closed the door to his bedroom and tided up his main sitting room. He blushed when Glorfindel strode in and immediately began the search for the dart board. Erestor sat timidly on the couch while the guardian set up the game.

“You’ve been working hard I see,” Glorfindel stated. Erestor’s face was heavy with darkness below the eyes, and the skin was stretched thin across his cheek bones.
Erestor nodded.

“Well, how many games tonight? I think three rounds a game, nine darts each. You must win two out of three rounds to win the game,”

“I don’t know. Let’s just play ‘till we’re tired of it,” Erestor decided. Glorfindel laughed.

“I don’t think I could ever get tired of darts. Unless of course I’m playing with you…in which case, I might get bored of winning all the time,” Glorfindel teased. Erestor smiled softly before rising to the get some wine.

“You may very well regret that comment later,”

“Good,” Glorfindel thought, “He’s in a competitive mood tonight… maybe he’ll talk more than he drinks,”

Glorfindel was lighting more lanterns while Erestor poured heady wine into two glasses. Then the game began.

“What’s odd about the way we play,” Glorfindel mused, “Is that it’s always silent,” Erestor didn’t comment on anything, not the game, the weather, work, nothing. He merely played the game, his forehead scrunched up in concentration, his hand trembling as it continually brought the wine to his lips. Glorfindel admitted to breaking focus several times just watching Erestor’s luscious lips slide over the rim of the cool glass. What he didn’t know, was the Erestor was also looking at him, and in a similar fashion.

“That’s odd,” Erestor thought curiously, “I’ve never seen Glorfindel so well groomed before. Normally his hair is a tangled web crawling with leaves from patrol,” Erestor also noticed how the guardian’s golden hair fell delicately across his neck, sometimes revealing the smooth skin beneath the flaxen locks. Glorfindel wasn’t built like many other elves; he was manlier, like a human, with a broader chest and his muscles were more discernable on his body. Erestor sometimes wondered if Glorfindel’s masculine chest had hair covering it. It was a guilty fantasy, Erestor knew, but he just could not keep his wonderings away from Glorfindel.

By the end of the second game, Glorfindel had won one, and Erestor had won the other. Two wine bottles had already been consumed and Erestor’s head was playing with fancy images in white and black; some consisting of the Golden Lord, some with Aiglos and still others with all three of them. Glorfindel was fairly intoxicated, although he knew he had had significantly less wine than his partner.

Woozy and tired, Erestor relaxed against the soft cushions of the couch, and he briefly forgot about the walls around him. His throat was heavy and his head was floating, but it felt great. He felt free from his gilded cage, and he just let the alcohol slide down his throat like water in a stranded man.

What followed was a relaxed conversation, with Erestor reclined on the couch and Glorfindel resting his legs on a tired ottoman. Laughter grew between them, jokes and quips increased as Glorfindel drew Erestor out of his shell. Glorfindel never had trouble getting Erestor to laugh; his problem was getting Erestor to allow a constant loving connection between them; and to have the connection when Erestor was sober.

“That wasn’t true!” Erestor stood as he howled with laughter at Glorfindel’s story, “I only threw rocks at Lindir because he wouldn’t stop throwing them at me!”

“And when I finally dragged you both from the river, the horses had run off with our clothes,” Glorfindel added with a snicker.

“Ai, how embarrassing that patrol was. I can’t even imagine what Elrond thought when he saw the three of us wet and naked! ”

“He probably thought we’d been copulating,” Glorfindel giggled.

“Hm? All three of us? At once? I bet he liked that image,”

“Maybe next time we go on another ‘patrol’ together we should invite him. We’d go up north and find a nice summer hideaway in the mountains. Remember how the men used to have their trade road right next to the old aspen grove?”

“Mm hmm, and how you and Lindir used to terrorize them by howling like banshees in the night,” he reminisced.

“If I remember correctly, you used to take their stuff and move it, or replace it only after they had searched the entire forest for their goods. Sometimes you’d even drop it on them while they were sleeping,” Glorfindel chuckled.

“Ah yes, well, you know how it goes,” more laughter followed and another bottle was finished.

“Why don’t we go back up there for a bit? I’ve got a whole two months coming up where I’ve got nothing to do. We could stop by the old waterfall and take the old road up into the mountains for a week or so, just to get away from it all,” Glorfindel posed.

Erestor grew somber when he heard this.

“Oh come on, you know I don’t have time for a ‘patrol’! Besides, those trips were always so childish,” Erestor shrugged the idea off and moved to find more wine.

“So? They were fun,” Glorfindel replied quietly. He followed Erestor to the wine cabinet.

“Yes, well…”

“You used to be fun. You used to love to travel. You’d spend hours pouring over accounts of the Wilds when you couldn’t visit them yourself. What happened? Why do you now hide?” Glorfindel whined as he wove his arms around his friend and took the wine from his hands.

“I grew wiser and older,” Erestor replied shortly, snatching back the wine and plopping back onto the sofa. Glorfindel decided to drop the question and he moved to the chair across from his friend.

“Besides, I’ve been to every place in the region, there’s nothing more this world could possibly show me that I haven’t already seen. Indeed, sometimes I feel I’ve seen too much,” Erestor muttered. The bottle in his hand was now open and he began to pour more wine for them both. While Erestor began to down wine in an attempt to stop the images in his head, Glorfindel wisely left his glass on the table.

Glorfindel was right. He used to love the mountains, the air and the freedom. With Lindir, the three of them would carry daypacks and somaponapons and disappear into the mountains for months at a time. They’d live off the earth, only killing animals for food and skins. They’d find ways to climb to the top of peaks and Erestor knew he used to live off the excitement of looking out over the rest of the world. He loved the feeling of complete exertion, yet total exhilaration at standing on top of a mountain. Although he’d been a fairly well trained warrior and a well versed traveler, nothing in the world could compare to actually standing atop a mountain and knowing your own legs brought you there.

That feeling was another thing he’d left behind when he went to marry Aiglos in Lothlorien. At that time, Erestor was so sure he would do anything to stay with his beloved. Although, he still loved him beyond the grave, Erestor knew how wrong that concept had turned out to be. Again more images crossed his mind, and he again drank to cover them over. The end effect of his drinking, he hoped, would be darkness inside his head.

“Why do you think that?” Glorfindel asked quietly. Erestor stared dumbly back at him until Glorfindel moved next to him on the couch.

“What?” Erestor was having trouble comprehending his words, but he understood fully when Glorfindel took his glass away.

“Hey! You have no right to take that away from me!” Erestor firmly protested and made a quick move to reclaim he glass, like a child reaching for a forbidden toy. Glorfindel easily held him away from the glass, and he ended up pulling the advisor on to his lap and throwing the glass across the room, its contents spilled on the floor.

“You don’t need anymore. Ai, you’ve almost had three whbottbottles yourself and you don’t need anymore,” Glorfindel tried to soothe his partner by rubbing circles on his chest, but Erestor would not be calmed. The images were flurrying back and forth inside his head and he need to reach the darkness swiftly.

“No!” Erestor complained and tried to move away, “You don’t understand! I need to make him go away!”

Glorfindel held Erestor close to his chest as he tried to make sense of Erestor’s words.

“Make who go away?”

“Aiglos,” Erestor whispered. Glorfindel’s thoughts became somber as he understood. Aiglos, Erestor’s lover and mate, the elo too took Erestor away from him all those years ago was coming back to take him away again. Glorfindel wasn’t jealous of Aiglos (he’d only fallen in love with Erestor upon his return to Imladris) but he had taken away a dear friend.

“Ai, these memories aren’t going away! Glor-y! Please let me have a drink,” Erestor pleaded with his captor, attempting to shrug off the powerful arms encasing him.

“No, you don’t need it!” Glorfindel said strongly.

“Please! I promise n’t n’t have anymore once I go black inside,”

That statement made Glorfindel’s blood run cold. Erestor wanted to let darkness take him?

“No, calm down. Why don’t you just tell me about the memories, maybe they’ll go away just by talking,” Glorfindel consoled softly, and he began to run a hand through the advisor’s raven hair. Erestor stopped fighting and slowly, cautiously, rested the back of his head against the Golden Lord’s shoulder. Taking a ragged breath, he tried out the new method.

“I just…I can’t stop remembering the fight we had Glor-y, right before he died,” Erestor’s eyes welled up as he replayed the event in his head, “I didn’t mean it Glor-y, I didn’t. He was just so… jealous and angry but he never meant to hit me, I know that. He was just mad ‘cause dinner was cold and I was in a huffy mood. I said I hated him, but I didn’t mean it Glor-y, I really didn’t! And then he just… He walked out and… I can’t help but think that his last thought of me was that he didn’t love me anymore,”

Glorfindel sat stunned, holding his precious elf in his arms tightly, while the elf sobbed into his neck. Erestor wound his arms around his waist, atop Glorfindel’s, and held himself while he cried. The images wouldn’t leave him now, and he cried harder as he continued to see Aiglos’s haunting face staring back at him, cold, confused and love lost. The very face Aiglos had probably worn to his death.

Glorfindel soothed the advisor, stroking his belly and holding him fiercely. He even murmured words of endearment, words Erestor wouldn’t remember in the morning, to soothe him.

“Shh, it’s alright now, he wasn’t mad, he knew you loved him and he loved you. Don’t you worry now, for I love you, and Elrond loves you. Everyone loves you, if only you’d come outside to see,” Glorfindel whispered into his ear. Erestor nodded slowly, his body sagging into Glorfindel’s warmth. Slowly, Glorfindel maneuvered them so he stood and carried his precious bundleo tho the bedroom. The room was dark and cluttered. Stepping over papers and bottles, he made it to the bed and gently laid his partner inside the bed sheets. He opened all the windows in the room, letting in the soft glow of the lawn lamps, before completely tucking in Erestor.

The sight of the trashed, emotionally drained elf now falling heavily into sleep nearly broke his heart in two. Why had Erestor never told hf hif his pain before? Glorfindel had no answer, but come morning, he’d find it. Kissing his forehead softly, and wiping away the drying tears, Glorfindel left to find Elrond. But not before finding all the wine in Erestor’s possession, and pouring it down the privy.

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Elrond had just left the party behind and made it into his night shirt when Glorfindel arrived. The guardian looked distressed and exhausted, his chest falling and rising in an erratic rhythm. Elrond didn’t voice his questions until his friend was lying safely on the bed with him.

“What’s the matter Glorfindel?”

“Erestor, he… Ai gods it’s horrible!” The blonde then promptly began to weep as he remembered the sight of his interest lying helplessly in bed, a fit of tears on his cheeks.

“Shh… now tell me,” Elrond comforted, drawing the guardian up on his knees so eventually Glorfindel’s head rested on his chest.

“He got himself completely drunk during our dart game, and when we started talking of the past, he began to drink more and more until I couldn’t take it anymore! As I kept him away from the wine, he said he wanted…” Glorfindel drew in a shuddering breath, “That he wanted to be black inside. He said he wanted the images to stop and that they were of Aiglos,”

Glorfindel paused for a minute and buried himself further into Elrond’s chest. He felt his Lord’s heart seize as he recounted Erestor’s dark wish.

“Then he told me of how he and Aiglos had fought… El, he thinks Aiglos died hating him,” Glorfindel finished and only began to cry more. He couldn’t imagine how long Erestor had blamed himself for the final rift between his love and him, and how difficult it was to go on thinking the way Erestor did. Erestor was very brave, but at the same time stupid for thinking his love would hate him. Elrond was at a loss for words. He had made sure Erestor didn’t fade with Aiglos, because that’s what Erestor wanted, but he hadn’t known how long this had affected him, and in the manner it did so.

“What,” Glorfindel rose from Elrond’s chest as he spoke, “What should we do? This problem can’t be solved by simply making him go to a ball or by making him meet new friends,”
Elrond assented, nodding his head.

“We need to love him,” he said simply, his eyes reflecting the pain he knew would come of this for them.

“What do you mean? He won’t let us near him long enough,” Glorfindel asked brokenly. He could see no way now to rescue his love from the dark.

“We force him,” Elrond whispered. When the words fermented in his mind, Glorfindel jerked away from Elrond and angrily sat up from the bed.

“You mean we force ourselves on him?! We rape him?!” Glorfindel was furious. He couldn’t believe Elrond was proposing this.

“Nay melin, we do not take him with out his consent in the end. We reunite him with the passions of being loved and giving love, and we take it as his pace. But it must happen. If not, we will loose him. If in the end, he refuses to love us back, and by that I also mean be penetrated, he won’t be and he’ll be gone. And I don’t want that,” Elrond explained, his words heartfelt.

“Nor I, but I do not like this method. It is cruel,” Glorfindel shook his head at the thought.
Elrond slowly approached him, and enveloped his friend fiercely.

“It is not cruel if you are not cruel. It is not rape, it is sexual healing and he will agree,”

Glorfindel snorted, “You mean he agrees before or after we take him?”

“Before. He agrees to undertake sexual healing beforehand. If not, we will find another method,” Elrond compromised. Glorfindel stared at his Lord for a minute.

“Is there another method?” He asked slowly.

“No. Not this far in,”

With a heavy sigh, Glorfindel nodded in agreement. He hoped Erestor would agree to be healed, or else Glorfindel didn’t know what elouldould cure his love.

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Please Review! And thank you for reading. - Isabel