Half the Distance

Title: Half the Distance
Series: Innocence Stripped Away
Chapter: Twenty : Those Left Behind
Author: Orchyd Constyne
Contact: soultornasunder@gmail.com
Website: http://www.hithanaur.net/
Update List: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/nairn_orchyd/
Fandom: LOTR
Archive: OEAM
Disclaimer: I do not own LotR or any characters, lands, or items from the Tolkien world. They belong to their respective copyright holders.
Rating: NC-17
Warnings: BDSM, twincest
Beta: Alex, Ashek Thordin
Cast: Erestor/Glorfindel, Glorfindel/Thranduil, Thranduil/OMC, Erestor/OMC, Legolas/Elladan/Elrohir
Summary: Following the events of "Something Special, Something Sacred", Erestor finds himself in a dark pit of despair and fear as his bond with Glorfindel is threatened, stretched, and remade. Legolas returns to the valley where his heart was once broken to find a second chance and a new way of seeing those around him. Thranduil has lusted after Glorfindel's submission for years, and now that Erestor has opened the door for him, he intends to capture the elusive warrior as his own submissive.

//...// indicates a memory.

---

Imladris, Spring, Third Age 2086

It was not his habit to lock Elves up.

It was not his habit to lock *anyone* up.

For the last three days, though, Elrond had kept Erestor confined to one of the smaller rooms meant for observation in the House of Healing. These rooms had been built with windows on either side of the door so one could look in on a patient without disturbing them. Usually, the patient was lying in bed, resting.

However, this room's current patient had not slept in the last four days. Three of those four days, he had been locked inside, prevented from causing harm to himself or anyone else.

Well, Elrond mused worriedly as he watched Erestor swing at nothing yet again, as *little* damage to himself as possible.

Three days of watching his old friend.

Watching him yell and scream at no one. Strike out with his fist. Curl on the stone floor and sob himself ill. It was painful to see, especially when he was unable to help. Elrond had been confounded, uncertain of the right course of action. It was obvious Erestor was plagued by a long dead Elf, but Elrond could not discern the hows or whys to the situation. Erestor's tale of Authon's final moments had been terrible, and he vividly remembered the state his Councillor had been in when he returned to Imladris from his ten-year absence. Never had he seen Erestor so pale, so quiet, but Elrond had attributed that to whatever business Erestor had needed to tend to in Lindon.

If he had only known what that business had actually been... Had only thought to ask...

Elrond only knew the beginning of the tale and the end. The middle was still a mystery. It was the middle that concerned him the most. The middle is what had led them all to this point, and Elrond needed to discover it.

Erestor, though, wasn't telling that part of the story.

This left Elrond in a precarious position. Did he violate his friend's privacy in hopes of relieving the current malady, or allow this scenario to play itself out as it was, from gruesome beginning to gruesome end? Which crime was worse? Infringing on Erestor's thoughts or permitting him to live this haunted life?

He shook his head as he took a deep breath.

No, he could not allow this to continue. Erestor could hate him for this if necessary, but the answers were hidden within his dear friend's mind, and it was there that Elrond resolved to go in order to find them.

With his decision made, Elrond left Erestor's door and went into the apothecary. Thoughtfully, Elrond brew a pot of chamomile and hibiscus tea, adding a generous amount of clover honey to the light, fragrant liquid. Into one teacup, he added several drops of a wild lettuce tincture, knowing the dose was more than adequate for Erestor.

His friend's eyes watched him warily as Elrond entered the room and set the tea tray down on a table.

"I have brought us tea," Elrond said, stating the obvious. He poured tea into both cups, and then handed Erestor the doctored one. "Drink."

Erestor looked down at the cup. "You do not have to use subterfuge to have me drink what it is you wish me to drink," he murmured. "I trust you."

"I was not trying to sneak the tonic into your body. You are too clever to fall for such things anyway," Elrond said. "Drink it while sitting on the bed." He sat down on one of the chair and crossed his legs, sipping from his cup as he watched Erestor do as instructed.

They sat in silence.

Drinking tea.

It was not a comfortable silence.

Erestor blinked several times after he had set his cup aside.

"Lay down," Elrond said gently, placing his teacup beside Erestor's on the tray. He climbed onto the bed beside Erestor, urging his friend to set his head in his lap. As he stroked Erestor's hair, the Noldo slowly slipped into a light, fitful rest.

Elrond took a deep breath, let it out, and closed his eyes. He 'reached' with his mind, his focused thoughts like intangible fingers, until he could grasp at Erestor's sleeping mind. He took one more calming breath, then 'stepped' into Erestor's thoughts.

Maelstrom.

That was the only word Elrond could think of to describe what he saw, what he *felt*, when he linked his mind with Erestor's. He could not discern one event from another, one thought from the next. Elrond needed order and he needed it *now*.

One word is whispered into the tempest of emotion before him.

"Order."

Within a moment, the chaotic thoughts disappeared and the mindscape before him became an endless library, each shelf containing books. Each book, Elrond knew, contained a memory. The flexibility of the mind was something Elrond was well versed in, and he exploited that now. Walking through the vast library of Erestor's mind, Elrond randomly chose a book so as to know where he stood in the timeline of his friend's life.

//It is all my fault! What have I done? *Kinslayer*! That is what I have become. He loved me. *Loved* me! How could I have done that? Blood on my hands... I cannot wash it off. Never will it come off. My fault, all my fault--//

Elrond slammed the book shut and shelved it back in the space it belonged. His heart hammered in his chest, and tears stung his eyes as the blackness of self-loathing Erestor felt slowly dissipated from his senses. Such darkness!

But he was where he needed to be. All he had to do was move backwards. There had to be some moment, some defining event that changed Erestor from the witty, warm Elf he had known to the distant, calculating, controlling Elf he now knew.

He just had to find that moment.

Elrond chose books from the impossibly long shelves more or less at random. He would never be able to fully explain the contents of the memories he experienced. His mind simply refused to dwell on the degrading and tortuous acts he found there. That Erestor had survived them more or less visibly unscathed was something to marvel at. It disturbed him how much Erestor had kept hidden from him.

Another book.

Another horror.

But, Elrond could see a pattern emerging in the behaviours of Authon. The Elf had been insidious in his intent, it seemed, and he doubted Erestor ever saw the true purpose of any of the torture. No, Erestor had been too swept up in enduring the torment to see how masterfully Authon had conditioned him. Slowly, surely, twisting and warping all that had been Erestor and replacing the brilliant, bright Noldo with something unrecognisable.

He paused to look through a very thick book, and Elrond had to slam it shut. Authon had ignored Erestor's use of a safeword. He had run over Erestor's boundaries, showing him that there was nothing sacred between them. The most basic, most important tenant of what they did had been brushed aside.

What was more unsettling than the disregard for a call to stop was that, afterward, as Erestor had wept, Authon had tended to him, whispering how beautiful Erestor was. How much he loved Erestor, and that he knew Erestor better than Erestor knew himself. What had begun as a means of repaying a life debt, Elrond realised, had turned into a gradual wearing down of all Erestor had been. The systematic dismantling of the Elf that was replaced by what Authon had wanted.

A mindless, willing body that would not fight back, would not speak out of turn, would bend to his demands without question. It was *criminal*. He replaced the book and walked on.

With a sour face, he shut another book, quickly putting it back. While some Elves might enjoy certain acts of humiliation, Erestor had never been one to truly take to many of them. Authon removing himself from Erestor's mouth in order to allow his seed to spatter upon Erestor's face was... It was disgusting. The sense of degradation Erestor had felt, of being filthy and worthless, had been overwhelming, and it lingered still within Erestor's spirit, even millennia after the events.

Yet another book showed the final stripping of who Erestor had been.

Authon took his name from him.

Elrond's heart broke to see his friend, his old lover, reduced to the title 'dog'. No creature deserved such treatment, and with great sadness, Elrond closed the book and put it on the shelf.

What made his burden even harder to bear was that, through each memory he had looked into, Erestor had held onto one hope.

One prayer.

//Please, Elrond. Please. Miss me. Need me. Come for me. Save me.//

Over and over.

For years.

Memory after memory was coloured by that hope. The hope that the one person he loved, that he trusted, would come for him.

Elrond picked up a final book.

It was frightfully thin.

He opened it and gasped.

Erestor was sprawled across a soiled bed, gripping the bedsheets hard enough to rub his palms raw. The pain that raged from his backside, radiating out to his limbs, was unbelievable. 'I love you' whispered in harsh, unyielding tones coupled with vulgarities.

Six years, he had held on.

Six years, he had hoped.

As the tears wet his cheeks, as he bit his lip until blood flowed over his tongue, Erestor let the hope go.

Let the prayer die.

//He will not come.//

Eyes closed, Elrond shut the book softly, cradling it to his chest.

He had never come for Erestor. He had barely noticed his decade-long absence. Never thought to question why there had been no word from his advisor. He had left Erestor to that monster, unknowingly abandoning him to a living hell. Elrond knew he had played his own part in the making of what Erestor had become, and with that lingering hope died the last of the submissive, loving Elf Elrond had kept at his side for thousands of years.

"I will make this right," he whispered to the silent stacks. "I promise, Erestor, I will find a way."

*****

It was quiet.

The room was too still, but what had he expected with the power those assembled possessed?

Elrond looked around at the gathered Elves. Glorfindel was pale, having learned from him earlier what was in Erestor's mind; the extent of what the Noldo had endured for ten seemingly short years. Celebrían was calm, quiet, sitting in a chair waiting for when her words would carry the most weight, much like her mother, as Galadriel also sat silent, waiting. Celeborn stood with his arms folded, obvious confusion in his eyes, for he had been kept in the dark through much of this ordeal.

And then there was Thranduil.

Like a sleeping cat, he looked harmless. His emerald eyes were as calculating as ever, and there was hardness around his mouth that Elrond knew was usually hidden by a bored smile. Thranduil's time in Imladris, the Half-Elf was certain, would leave its mark on the Elvenking.

Elrond sighed.

"We have a problem," he began.

"Yes. We do," Thranduil said, his voice slithering through the room with annoyed indifference. "Your Chief Advisor has harmed my slave."

Elrond met Thranduil's eyes unflinchingly. "You will wait until I have finished saying what I need to, Thranduil, or so help me, I will toss you out of my valley without a second thought."

He had not raised his voice, but the room seemed to ring with it. Thranduil's mouth thinned some, his eyes narrowed, but he remained silent.

"As I was saying," Elrond began again, "we have a problem. I have already explained this to Glorfindel. At the beginning of this Age, Erestor went to the Grey Havens to fulfil a debt he owed. An Elf by the name of Authon had prevented a deathblow during the last siege against Sauron, and thus, Erestor felt he needed to repay him. Authon named his price, and it was Erestor's submission for the course of ten years."

His voice remained steady, though there was little emotion placed into it, as he retold of the events he'd seen in Erestor's mind.

All of them.

"Throughout it all," he said when the whole situation had been explained, "Authon kept assuring Erestor he loved him. That his abuse *was* love. I believe Erestor fought that notion, but gradually, Authon wore away his resolve. It started simply, boundaries pushed little by little, the removal of everything that made Erestor an Elf, and all with the words of love and affection on Authon's tongue. He finally believed it." Elrond shook his head. "He *had* to believe it. It cemented his newfound definition of love when Authon died proclaiming he loved him, and ever since, Erestor has measured the love in his life by the redefined 'love' Authon left as his legacy."

The room fell silent now that Elrond had stopped talking. It was Glorfindel who spoke up, his words weak and tired.

"What... are we to do?"

Elrond held up his hands in defeat. "I do not know. It is why I asked you all here. I am hoping, between us, we can discover the secret to undoing all the damage Authon did, and Erestor has compounded since."

"I will merely have to love him *more*. He will understand that," Glorfindel said, squaring his shoulders.

Sadly, Elrond shook his head. "No, Glorfindel. That will not help. His sense of love is so completely warped, he does not see what you do as love. You do not abuse him in any sense, and it is abuse he has come to equate with the emotion."

"Toss him out of a mallorn," Thranduil helpfully offered. "Let him hit a few branches on the way down."

"Why, again, did you invite him?" Galadriel asked. "For I do not believe he will have anything truly constructive to say in this conversation."

Elrond glared at the Elvenking, but his words were for Galadriel. "Do *you* want to try and bar him from this?"

Glorfindel did not care about the petty sarcasm Thranduil currently used. He'd spent so much time with Thranduil recently, he knew what drove the Elf to behave as he did now, but Thranduil was not his concern at the moment. *Erestor* was. "Why can't I be enough, Elrond?"

A smile crossed Elrond's lips as his attention turned to his Captain. "It is not about being 'enough', Glorfindel. He just cannot connect the emotion of love with the way you express it. He cannot believe you love him because you do not abuse him. Just he believes that because he loves you, he must express that through abusing you. We have all seen that, tried to help you through it, but we did not have all the pieces to this puzzle. Now we do." He glanced at the other Elven lords. "But, what do we do with those pieces now that we have them?"

"I am still voting for the throwing him out of a tree." Thranduil raised his hand. "Anyone?"

Celeborn, who had kept himself quiet this entire time, glared at Thranduil. "If you have nothing useful to contribute, do us the favour of remaining silent."

"What do we do? How do we bring my Erestor back?" Glorfindel demanded, his usually gentle disposition wilting under the strain of everything.

Galadriel stood and walked to Glorfindel, placing her hand on his shoulder. They made a striking pair, both tall, with such golden hair and the light of Aman still in their eyes. "'Your' Erestor is the one secured in his room to prevent his hurting himself or others. You have never met the true Erestor, the one free of this destructive influence."

Elrond did not have to look into Glorfindel's mind to know the thoughts that whirled inside it. The panic on his face, the fear in his eyes, spoke volumes.

What if the true Erestor, the one Elrond had known and loved, did not love Glorfindel?

Thranduil could also see the change in Glorfindel. The tensing of his body, the way his posture was locked, and the telling manner in which he began to tug at the cuffs of his shirt. He was a sharp Elf, sharper than even his reputation hinted at, and he, like Elrond, knew what was spinning around in Glorfindel's head.

"If we do not repair this damage, you will have lost him anyway," he said gently. "Is it not better to take the chance? Do you love him enough to want him well, no matter what it means for you?"

Five pairs of eyes stared at Thranduil in astonishment following his questions.

It made Thranduil uncomfortable.

"What? I do have a heart, you know. And my heart still says that a few thwacks with a mallorn branch--"

Glorfindel took Thranduil's hand and smiled at him, taking the moment of levity. "Quit while you are ahead, meldir."

Elrond tried to bring the conversation back to where it needed to be. "We still have not answered the fundamental question -- how?"

The room erupted in noise.

Thranduil again made a snide comment, and Celeborn turned on him. They began to argue, Celeborn saying that Thranduil was no help while Thranduil informed him that there was little help to be given. Galadriel tried to calm her husband, and Glorfindel insisted to Elrond he *could* teach Erestor how to love properly once more as Elrond insisted, in turn, that it was not within Glorfindel's ability to heal the wounds of Erestor's heart.

Everyone talked over everyone else, except the Lady of Imladris.

Celebrían watched the scene with detached, demure amusement. As if anything would be done with them not listening to each other. She shook her head and stood, her mere movement drawing attention to her. The other four in the room silenced without a command from her, and all eyes focused on her.

"It is quite simple, if you would cease making it so complicated," she said in her gentle, regal way. "You must teach him how to love again. He has made a connection between two things that should never have been connected. That connection *must* be severed."

Glorfindel immediately seized upon the words. "How can I do that, my Lady?"

"You cannot," Celebrían said, her voice full of sympathy for Glorfindel's frustration. "The last person that Erestor truly loved before this burden came upon him was my lord. He is the only one that can redraw those lines."

No one in the room could argue with Celebrían's logic, and so the group fell back into uncomfortable silence.

Elrond frowned, furrowing his brow as he did when in deep thought, and he could swear there was the prickling of a headache behind his eyes. "I must consider this," he murmured. "Thank you all."

It was an obvious dismissal, and though Glorfindel lingered after the others had gone, Celebrían merely shook her head. There was nothing more for the Balrog Slayer to do.

Alone in the small room, Celebrían now addressed her husband. "Can you do this?"

He met her gaze, showing to her honesty he showed to no other. "I do not know," he said, his expression showing his uncertainty.

She slipped her arm around Elrond's waist as they left the room, her words solemn. "Erestor still waits for you to save him, my love. If you cannot, no one else will."

TBC...