Suffering

Suffering


Chapter Six


Thanks for all the reviews.

Thanks to Nemis for betaing this and especially help with Quenya.

*sound of trumpets* And the smut returns…


~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Celebrían paced the length of her chamber, casting occasional worried glances at the empty bed. The fingers of her left hand relentlessly traced across the empty space on her right where her wedding band had once sat, feeling the emptiness there even more acutely.

Four months, four months now since she had seen him, that last bitter morning in Lothlórien, with the golden leaves fluttering around her bowed head as she watched him ride off, his back proud, his dark hair bound in a long queue which snaked across his shoulders. For two of them she had been content to remain in the Golden Wood, enjoying the wind in the mallorns and the trickling waters of the rivers. But then the pangs of her heart, drawing her constantly to him, had grown so strong she could not ignore them, and she had traversed the long pass over the Misty Mountains, the two tiny elflings bouncing in their saddles at her side.

Fair had been the afternoon light on the highest roofs of Imladris as she had rode down the long pass into the valley, desperate for some sight of him. But the Last Homely House had been empty indeed, although the household retainers had rushed out to meet them, Glorfindel swinging the twins up into his arms and plying them with sweetmeats.

The sharp outrage she had felt at the time upon hearing that her husband had just departed some weeks hence for Gondor, had dulled in the ensuing weeks, and she was unable entirely to repress the sense of dread which crept into her dreams.

Celebrían sank down onto the edge of the downy coverlet and bit her lip between her teeth until the iron tang of blood stung her tongue.

*Where are you, meleth-nîn?* She cried in the privacy of her own mind. *?Ai, a thousand times I would take my words back if I were only to see you again. A thousand times…*

But her litany availed her not, for still he did not come, and still the fingers of icy doom crept up her spine.

~*~

He should not have gone there, he knew. It had been a spur of the moment decision as he stood on the glimmering white battlements of Gondor looking east, resolutely turning his back on the glory of the sunset and the burnished splendour of the Anduin. In the East a shadow and a threat grew in his mind, preying on him when he slept and when he woke. Scarce more than a yén, and he could already feel it, trembling in his veins, the call of Ring to Ring, blood to blood.

But surely it could not be … scarce two hundred sun-rounds, and the One lost in the reedy beds of the Gladden Fields. Yet the whispered blood of Melian told him that it was not so, that certainty would only be wrought in the fires of Mount Doom. And so, with a guard of ten, he had trod the lonely path to Mordor. There he had found the black Tower still cast down, the crumbling slabs of rock lying discarded in ruins on the scorched ground, the all too familiar stench of death wafting through the calm air.

But as they had turned and began to pick their way back across the desolate wilderland that lay before the Black Gate, all had fallen into darkness. He had no words to describe it, no mind to understand what had happened. All he knew was that it had been his fault; by his word were his men slain, although by their own hands. The call of the Marshes, the hideous lure of the bloated faces floating in stagnant pools. More than once, Elrond had found himself screaming the name of some comrade long since lost, and scrabbling on the edge of the mire he so carefully skirted, reaching for a wizened hand in the hope – nay, the conviction – that if he could but touch the lost warrior, then the death itself would be annulled. But some thread of silver certainty had always pulled him back, to find himself gasping and choking on filthy water as he lay on his back like a stranded salmon.

But for the others there had been no brightness, no Ithil-hued stream of light tugging them back, and, one by one, they had chosen ruin. Countless times he had plunged into the repellent water, twining weed plugging his ears and blig hig his eyes, struggling with the desire to fall down, down, ever down into the tempting darkness. Time and again, he had grappled for a cooling hand, only to fail, to heave himself to the perilous security of dry land only to watch as the bright ardour of life faded away in the countenance of a trusted solider.

Now he was ashamed, cast low by his weakness. And for the first time in his long life he heard the music of the sea, faint to be sure, but still there, the sighing of the waves on a distant strand.

*What use is a protector who cannot protect? Aye, this was a fool’s mission, and I am the fool*

Thus it was that he had not gone to Lothlórien. For how could be come to the House of his beloved wife’s mother as a disgrace to the fair name of the bride who wanted him not, how could he besmirch her name further? Instead, he struggled onward, his frame rife with raw infected cuts to which the blood of the Atani left him exposed, his hair matted in a sheer sheet down his back. And his body was pitifully thin, for after the sight of those floating carcasses, and feeling little more than a carcass himself, he could not bring himself to touch the raw flesh of the few creatures he managed to catch, and in the first light of summer there were few berries to scrounge.

Through the gap of Isen, the icy waters of the fast-flowing river burning his abraded skin, but leaving him little cleaner. Elrond turned his face to the west, imagining the great sea beyond, and he was half-tempted to seek out the home of his youth in Lindon, to bathe himself in its chilling emptiness and watch the seagulls in their far flight.

But she drew him back, as she always did, the scent of her hair, the light of her eyes, and the unwilling touch of her warm hand on his arm. And so he turned north, the westering sun on the endless seas to his left, the mountains rearing up to his right. On and on across the open lands he went, refusing his lagging body its respite, refusing everything but the onward path, Imladris before him, and Mordor behind, the gulls in his ears and love in his heart.

The Master of Rivendell did not imagine what he seemed to be until frightened villagers chased him from the bounds of their hamlet, pelting him with stones and with curses against evil spirits. With a wry smile, he remembered that he had been here only five sun-rounds past, and how Glorfindel had laughed at him for being named a Power.

“Once a god, now a demon of the Shadow,” he laughed, and was surprised to hear the smooth timbre of his voice, a little cracked from disuse, but otherwise clear and fresh as a bell.

But Rivendell was beyond, just a handful of leagues over the horizon, he was sure, as he trudged onwards, hours melting into days. And there was no turning back.

~*~

“Naneth, naneth!” Elrohir piped, scampering up the broad flat-topped rock on which Celebrían sat, reading in the sunlight, poetry ebbing and flowing through her mind. “Naneth, there is the strangest creature on the path.”

“What does it look like, ion-nîn? And where is Elladan?”

“Elladan is stalking it. But it is all black and hunched, and it seems to be in pain, for it cries out and whimpers, like that rabbit we found in the woods.”

*An orc*

The elf-maiden sprang upright, the ancient volume falling forgotten to the blanket on which she had been resting.

“Go back to the House, Elrohir. As quickly as possible, and raise Glorfindel. Tell him that one of the yarontaaro comes upon us.” She uttered up a swift prayer to the Valar that her sons her not yet of an age to be learned in Quenya.

When she reached the path, it was too late to see the intruder, but the elder twin was all too visible, his dark hair shining under Anor’s rays. With a swift leap, she was upon him, grasping the scruff of his neck in one hand, the other clamping across his mouth. Elladan bared his teeth to bite his attacker, but seeing that it was only his mother, he raised a quizzical eyebrow – a trait he shared with his father.

“No time, pen-tithen.” She scooped him up into her arms and set off towards the nearby house at a frantic run, her heart pounding in her mouth.

Stumbling over tufts and stonesr skr skirts catching on the toes of her boots, she pounded to a halt in the courtyard, depositing Elladan on the ground, where he clung tightly to his brother. Glorfindel she could see, his merry face grim, and even Erestor was there, fumbling with the fastenings of his sword.

But before any of them could make a move, the dread figure appeared in the archway, breathing heavily and streaming blood from myriad cuts, caked in dirt from head to toe.

A pulse started, hard and fast, in the back of Celebrían’s head, although she knew not why.

Glorfindel paced forward with measured steps, his hair as bright as his sword, as vengeance itself.

“Speak, uruk, or I shall cut your throat before you draw another breath.”

“I… I …” But it was too low, too ragged for any of them to make out.

“Speak. Why does an uruk come to Imladris? Begone!”

“I heard it was a sanctuary.” If there was laughter in that tone, they did not recognise it amid the pain.

“Not for such as you, and not while our lord is missing.”

“I bring him back to you…” And he slumped to the ground, all will, all strength sped.

There was something profoundly un-orcish in the angle of those long limbs, in the light of the eyes which stared blankly up at the midday sky.

Celebrían understood first, too stunned to move. ‘Twas the twins hurtling, windmilling progress which startled her from her appalled trance.

“Ada! Ada!” they screamed as one, leaping on the prone form. “Wake up, ada. Adar? Adar?”

The sword dropped from Glorfindel’s hand as he raced forward, but Celebrían reached her husband first, cradling the rank head to her bosom.

“Is he … is he?” She could not force out the words.

“Nay.” The Lord of the House of the Golden Flower pressed his fingers into the lord’s neck. “His heart beats and he breathes.”

~*~

Carefully, they bore Elrond into the House, his long legs dangling limply over Glorfindel’s cradling arms. How long he lay there, neither could say, as the healers fussed around him, stripping off his ruined clothes with sharp knifes.

With a quelling look Celebrían wrested a sponge from Atalinal’s hand, and began to dowse the lord with water, not daring to scrub at the abraded skin. Her gaze alighted on the raw, lumpen flesh raised proud above the hideous gash on his leg, and she winced involuntarily as he squirmed with the pain as she ran tender fingers over it, tracing the red lips of the open wound. How he had acquired this she cared not, only that he might recover from it.

Grey eyes flickered into wakefulness, such was the ecstasy of pain, and surprisingly strong fingers clamped around her wrist, halting her progress.

“I did not wish to send you to Mandos with the sorrow of our marriage. I am sorry that you are here.”

With a flaming ache, she understood what he thought.

“I am not in Mandos, dear my love,” she whispered, knowing that he would not remember her profession. “I, like you, am here in Imladris. Now hush a while and let me cleanse you.”

She slid her hands across his body, tracing the network of myriad scars as little by little she sluiced away the clinging grime. Only one area remained.

Ignoring the sudden fire which leapt high within her, she moved her sponge onwards, delicate as a feather-touch. Nonetheless, she blushed scarlet to see his involuntary reaction, her hand trembling.

*‘Tis naught. ‘Tis naught. ‘Tis naught*

But still she quailed, imaging what might be, and stepped back, to allow the healers to administer their salves, tipping noxious potions down the unresisting throat.

And Elrond dreamed…

~*~

She smiled at him radiantly, beckoning him on, perching on the edge of his desk.

“I have missed you.”

“And I you.”

“You were ever so far from me.”

“Never. I was always here.” And she pressed a hand to his chest, savouring the frantic pulse of his heart under her palm.

“Really?”

“Really. I am with you, as you are with me, until the ending of days,” Celebrían said with a seductive smile.

“But you felt ever so far…”

“Hush now a while.”

“You bid me to quiet?” he laughed, the joyous sound re-echoing through the study.

“Only if you wish to be silent.” She slid her hand downwards, the silken fabric of his robes slick beneath her fingers. She reached his breaches, and, with a practised twist, caught the button, twirling it from its fabric prison. He was hot beneath her palm, hard already as her nails skated along his length, the delicious friction of skin against skin driving him to distraction. “Ai, my Celebrían…”

“Me?” She looked up, her hand continuing its delicious ministrations.

“Only you, and forever you.” His trembling hands cupped her head, drawing her deep into a kiss. “Ai …hervess-nîn, you must stop…”

“Why?” She caught his lower lip between his teeth, nibbling on the reddened flesh while his fingertips explored her sensitive ears.

“Because…”

“Because?” She slithered down his body, her hands catching in the waistband of his breeches and drawing them with her.

And then there was nothing but delicious tension as her mouth closed upon him, toying with him, drawing him to the brink of ecstasy only to slacken a little.

He wanted to … he wanted to… ai, by all the Powers he wanted to, as he involuntarily jerked forward against her warm hands and warmer mouth.

But he stayed himself.

“I will not spend myself this way,” he gasped.

“Really, my lord?” She drew her teeth across him, and it was only with the most majestic effort of will that he stopped the inevitable. “I thought you wanted it…”

“Nay, I want this.” Clasping one arm around her waist, he bowled her to the floor. When he tried to move to one side she held him fast, her lips hot and hungry on his own.

“Stay. I like this. You are so very near, so very real.”

He shifted atop her, grinding his hips into hers until she could not possibly mistake his intentions, and she whimpered softly.

With increasing desperation, he fumbled her many skirts aside, lifting the silken material until he could kiss the gilded flesh of her inner thighs, seeking out every last freckle for attention.

“Ai… why do maidens wear so much cloth?”

“To save ourselves from unwanted attentions…”

“And are mine unwanted, O my lost love?” He toyed with her, his teeth nipping her creamy flesh between his teeth, then smoothing the marks with soft kisses, his hand roaming across her sides.

“Never… ai, Elrond, when will you get to the point?”

And so he did, and she unfolded before him like the niphredil on the eve of spring, an endless flower of desire. As the spasms of joy ran through her, she tugged him upwards, her silver hair intermingling with his black locks.

“Together…”

He kissed her with passion unquenchable, and sank himself into her until nothing mattered except the melding of flesh and the surging of blood, each, agonising, wonderful stroke, until the world crashed over him and he was no more…

~*~

Elrond awoke, his heart hammering, his flesh stuck to his garments, in an empty room. With a groan he levered himself upright, his elbows aching under the pressure. She was gone from him, and yet she never was his, a mirage in the floating incandescence of the nightmares which had plagued him. There was only the lingering need in his pounding flesh, and the clinging cloth to remind him.

With a sigh, he rose, dowsing himself with water from a jug which stood near at hand

Still barely able to move, he wrapped a blanket around his shoulders, swathing himself in its voluminous folds, and hobbled to the window, sinking gratefully into the chair. His eyes followed the lonely progress of Gil-Estel through the heavens, and once more he found his thoughts turned to his ill-fated journey and those who had perished in his service…

“Hir? You should not be up. Your weakness lingers…” Celebrían’s voice penetrated his reverie. Painfully slowly, he turned his head towards her, a blush rising to his cheeks as he remembered his dreams.

“I should not have gone,” he spoke coolly, praying that no tremor of emotion would betray him.

“Aye, you spoke of it in your delirium. But you could not have known.”

“I should have. ‘Tis my duty to know.”

“Your mind cannot have the compass of all things, Elrond,” she soothed him.

“Nay, it cannot. I should have learnt that a long time ago. Ah, but it cannot be helped now.” He rose carefully, wincing at the jagged pain which lanced through him, although the cuts had already healed. Walking tentatively forward, he captured one of her hands in his own, wrapping his long fingers around hers.

Celebrían flushed and averted her eyes from the sliver of pale skin which glimmered in the half-light.

“Many harsh words escaped me in Lothlórien,” he sighed at last, “and I apologise for them.”

She raised her hand to brush the tousled midnight hair back from his eyes, but his next words stayed her.

“I do not expect you to forgive me; indeed mayhap you should not, but I ask that we set them aside, at least. I know this … marriage is hard on you, and I wish that I could make it else wise, but I cannot.”

“Ai, I shall do as you wish … for the sake of the twins, although I cannot forget,” she whispered. “Is this situation so difficult for you?”

Elrond thought fleetingly of his dim, distant hopes and nodded, his heart chilled within him.

“Aye, very difficult indeed.”

“This thing should never have come to this pass.” Celebrían tenderly pulled the blanket around him, warding off the shivers which had begun to run through him, not knowing that her innocent touch made him shudder more. “I should have been stronger … I should have … But there is no use for that now. This marriage, which both of us wish undone, cannot be undone.”

Elrond swallowed convulsively as she continued.

“I will live my life and you yours. Each will not impede the other, and mayhap we can build our own separate towers out of the ruins of the one which could never come to be.”

“You are wise, hervess.” He choked down the rising dread. “So very much wiser than I.”

They stood stock-still, confounded by their mutual adoration, simply listening to the beating of their hearts. But then, before they could move away, they heard the skittering of small feet in the corridor, and two sleep-mussed heads poked around the door.

“Naneth!” Elladan exclaimed, skidding to a halt. “Oh…”

“You were supposed to be asleep pen-nîn tithin,” she said severely.

“We … we thought that adar might like some biscuits.” Elrohir extended one hand to show the crumpled mess of one of Lindir’s confections. “We were just going to leave them here…”

“You are very kind.” Elrond knelt down and let his sons embrace him stickily. “Would you like me to tell you a story?”

They nodded frantically, and the tall elf-lord scooped them up, settling them on the edge of the bed while he slipped under the covers.

“Well, once upon a time, many years before even your old ada’s daeradar was born, before there were either Men or Elves, there was darkness upon the face of Arda, with only the stars of Varda Elentári for light. And in the deep forests, the cold forests, the dark forests, there were many things of evil abroad.” He crept one hand up Elrohir’s spine and pounced on his son’s head, rumpling his hair. The elfing squealed with laughter, and tried to do the same to his twin, who squirmed away.

“Would you be afraid of them, ion-nîn?” the elf-lord asked Elladan, pulling a terrible face.

“Yes.” The boy grabbed his twin’s hand nervously.

“So would I. They were very, very scary indeed. But then, Oromë, a mighty warrior came into the forests of Middle-earth, his bow and spear by his side, Nahar, his horse, shining like burning silver…”

“A better warrior than you, ada?” Elrohir asked quizzically.

“Better by far: for Oromë is one of the Powers of Arda, terrible in his anger, a hunter of monsters and fell beasts, and yet he loves horses and hounds, and the sound of his horn, the Valaróma, is like the upgoing of the Sun in scarlet.” The words flowed easily from him, an ancient music he had first heard on the clifftops of Sirion.

“Better than Glorfindel?”

“Better even than he. And the sleeping earth trembled at the beat of the golden hooves of Nahar. Turrhum … turrhum … turrhum… And all the creatures of light were glad, for at the tremendous noise of the Valaróma, the evil things were frightened and the mountains shook.” Elrond pretended to be a mountain. “And so they fled away, and even Morgoth himself, who made them in a mockery of the works of the Valar, was scared.”

“But why, when there were no Elves?”

“The olvar and the kelvar still had need of protection, and ‘twas already in the Music that the Elves would awaken beside the waters of Cuiviénen. And thus, Oromë played his part in making Arda a little safer for the Firstborn and the Followers both, so that Morgoth Bauglir would never forget that there are Powers in the world greater than he, and that they still remembered that this was the world of the Children.”

“Ada?” The younger twin looked at him sleepily.

“Yes, Elrohir?”

“Will you kee saf safe as Oromë did?”

“To the best of my ability, híni, to the very best of my ability.”

“That is alright then.” Both twins snuggled closer to him, and he slipped into a fitful doze, comforted by their shallow breathing.

Celebrían, unable to sleep, paused on the threshold and sighed a little mournfully at the three dark heads nestled so close together. She longed to go to them, to curl herself into the heat of Elrond’s body and hold their children tight, but she knew she could not. There was no place for her here.


TBC


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híni – children
hervess-nîn – my wi yar yarontaaro – blood-begetters (Quenya).


A/N: The story of Oromë is taken from the Silmarillion ‘Of the Beginning of Days’ and the ‘Valaquenta’.