*** Second Age After the Fall of Eregion ***
The sun rises,
The sun sets
And the earth turns
While love is found
And lost
And found again.
But you I will love eternally.
***
Chapter Eight
Erestor woke to a feeling of difference, which he could not for a moment identify. His bed was smaller than usual, the wall closer – and warmer – than he was used to… Lindir. He lay remembering the evening before, and was not on the whole displeased. He tried his leg. All was well. So. A smile edged its way over his mouth. He really should not have put Lindir to the test in that fashion, yet his suitor had not in fact seemed to mind at all. The silver hair was grey in the dark, the sorely-tried elf in question soundly in reverie, his back warm and solid. Certainly he had seemed happy enough the night before. Erestor’s smile broadened. He, too, felt extraordinarily good. He let Lindir sleep on. Minstrels kept late hours; doubtless he was used to sleeping into the day.
He rose, washed, dressed and departed. Lindir slept on. Erestor grinned. If he was to have a lover, it was a fine thing to have the morning peaceful still.
*** Imladris: One week later ***
Elrond paced the floor of his office until he had calmed down. Once he was sure he could keep his temper, he called in Erestor’s replacement. “Have you seen a list of specifications for the new craft-hall? I’ve pulled the builders off their projects to plan the next phase of construction this morning and I can’t find the report. I told the crafters to tell me what they wanted by yesterday and the meeting will start shortly, as soon as the builders arrive. So where is it?” Every time he needed something he had to ask for it. Erestor had provided his wants in advance of needing to voice them.
The makeshift roof of a large concourse currently sheltering most of the artisans leaked and was reported too flimsy for proper repair; it was becoming an urgent matter to put the new building in hand. Getting the builders together to consult on such a large project was a miracle of co-ordination given their other projects, and the meeting had taken him a long time to arrange.
He had never realized how many people Erestor had so smoothly managed in the manifold ways Elrond now had to oversee or do himself. When he wondered why Erestor had not trained an assistant, he tried to imagine Erestor asking for help and immediately understood. Erestor did not in general ask for things. Except in taking this deeply regretted departure, and that had been no request. Erestor simply told him he was leaving and that was that. Elrond’s anger with Lindir deepened at the thought. Erestor never showed upset. But over this feckless musician he had abandoned his job, left Elrond to cope with matters Erestor invariably managed and retired hurt to lick his wounds without showing any sign whatever of wanting to return.
A week since, Lindir had come back down the valley looking irritatingly hopeful, presumably returning from yet another attempt to inveigle Erestor’s forgiveness. Elrond pursed his lips in disapproval. Lindir had caused far too much trouble and inconvenience. Only Erestor’s assurance that Lindir was kept well occupied while up there, and was moreover offering tuition to the boy Gwinor to ready him for more formal lessons in Imladris, had elicited Elrond’s consent to those many visits.
He went back to his office to wait for the artisans’ specifications. Meanwhile the horses’ feed was reported missing and urgently needed by next week, even though the order had been placed. Elrond checked – the last payment had not been settled and so their suppliers had withheld the next despatch. He made a note to himself to pay it.
He wondered why the interviews for teachers had not gone ahead. He had expected to be given a schedule of when each prospect had offered to attend; he found the letters still sitting in the pile he had placed them in ready for delivery. Days ago.
Elrond frowned.
Lothvaen was going through papers in the next room. Elrond gave up waiting for him to find the report and joined him in the search. This office was – in disarray, thought Elrond grimly, while phrases like ‘utter chaos’ and ‘wholesale disorder’ came and went in his mind. Disarray covered it, he told himself, and told Lothvaen to stop looking.
Enough was enough.
“Listen to me, and follow my orders to the letter. Take the list of names I will give you. Find those elves in person, and bid them make ready to ride with me up the valley. They are to meet me in the court. Do it yourself and do not get distracted. Tell them – tell them, I would be *greatly obliged* if they would attend me at short notice. While you’re doing that I will find this report and start the consultation off for the new craft-hall. Then I will bring Erestor back, so you are to create some order here – at least sort what has been done, what is waiting for attention, what you are unsure of, what needs keeping for our records. Can you manage that much?”
Lothvaen, both upset and relieved, nodded. “Yes, my lord. I can do that. And as soon as I have the list I’ll fetch the elves you want.” He knew Elrond was being forbearing, despite his displeasure, and was deeply grateful. He intended to work *very* hard to reduce the desk and shelving to somewhat better order, greatly relieved to hear Elrond’s plan. Also, dismayed. Erestor was not going to be any more pleased than Elrond was. He had never guessed just how much traffic passed through Erestor’s hands and would never again dismiss his work as easy. Erestor made it seem so, that was all.
***
Next, Elrond set about eliminating the Lindir problem. He summoned the harper and grimly waited for him to appear.
“I want a word with you. Sit down.”
Lindir sat, eyeing him a little surprisedly.
“I am bringing Erestor back. You will leave him alone from now on. You will not say one word out of turn nor will you upset him in any way whatever. Do you understand me? King or no King, I’ll send you packing back to Lindon before I let him go again, and leave you to explain it to Ereinion. Are we clear, Lord Lindir?”
“Quite clear, but my lord, you do not understand…”
“What do I fail to understand? A knee harmed when you were failing to pay attention to your lover? You cannot tell me he wouldn’t have tried to stop you wrenching it like that! An elf so distressed he has left his home and his work and does not want to return? A simultaneous marriage and seduction planned, to his shame? Following him to his retreat as often as you can to importune him and destroy his peace of mind there, too?”
“No, but…”
“Lindir, leave him in peace. Don’t distress him further. Is that so hard to understand? Too much to ask? I do not want you speaking to him, visiting him, or in any way bothering him. I will *not* have you upsetting him. That is my final word on the matter.” He waited to see if Lindir was going to argue further, and nodded in satisfaction when Lindir said nothing more.
Lindir, shocked, nearly persisted with his protests, and was even fully prepared to ignore this decree – but Erestor’s words stuck in his mind. Erestor had welcomed his attentions in some ways certainly, but he had also said he was angry, and hated him, that his feelings had not changed. Maybe *Erestor* had told Elrond he didn’t want to return because of Lindir. Maybe he had truly felt harassed by Lindir’s visits and wanted to be left alone. Maybe he, Lindir, had over-persuaded Erestor and Elrond had promised him to deal with the matter. Heartsick, Lindir obeyed Elrond, and worried about Erestor misunderstanding how he felt. He should have said more… Even if he would not have been believed, he should have told Erestor how he felt.
***
Elrond rode up the valley with his surprised and daunted train of elves in his wake. Arrived at the schoolroom, he summarily asked Erestor to interrupt his class. “Give them an early lunch or something,” he said vaguely. “I want you to interview these, test them this afternoon, and come home with me this evening.”
Erestor stared at him. “My lord?”
“You heard me. I am recalling you. Today. You wanted to choose your replacement – these are the best I could think of.”
Erestor looked over the uncertainly smiling faces. Indeed, there were here assembled some fine scholars, some younger elves, bright and lively, and even a minstrel among them. “Can they do mathematics?”
“How would I know?” said Elrond, impatiently. “Hardly likely is it, when only you and I seem to have any grasp of it at all.”
“Oh, I don’t know. Glorfindel can do enough to keep his books…”
Elrond refrained from some acid comments about how that worked out sometimes. “Look, if they cannot do the arithmetic, have the post holder back to Imladris weekly and teach him yourself. He can pick it up from you to show the children.”
They settled down to interviews and then to watching the elves with the children in the later afternoon. Erestor chose two of them, Hellevuir for his cheerful manner and store of tales and lore, and Aduin, for his quick wits, geography and rudimentary arithmetic.
Elrond reiterated firmly, “Maths classes, every week, in Imladris. You can take an advanced class, and I will take a beginners’, and we will make sure at least this problem is solved.”
Erestor did not ask what had brought on this flurry of lordly orders from Elrond. As was his wont, he accepted his lord’s wishes, arranged for his gear to be sent on after him, bade the children good bye, promising to visit soon, congratulated his successors and thanked the rest for coming. Before he could even catch his breath he found himself on Elrond’s most staid and comfortably-paced mare, headed for home.
“Lindir won’t be seeking you out,” said Elrond, abruptly during the ride back.
“My lord?” Erestor asked, thinking he had misheard him.
“I’ve told him what I expect. How unfavourably I view his attentions to you. He has his orders. He’ll leave you strictly alone. You and he will not be speaking at all.”
If Elrond thought Erestor’s silence was relief, and Erestor, shocked, thought Elrond was referring to the manifest inequality of the match, there was none to divine the misunderstanding and correct them.
***
Unhappily, Erestor placed his small pack on his bed and made his way downstairs to face the disorderly proceeds of his months of absenteeism. With Lothvaen’s help he reviewed each piled collection of documents to his mounting confusion. His mood did not improve. He did not go to the halls that night, but worked late and thence took himself to bed.
He had never thought Elrond would prevent them. Disapprove, perhaps. Forbid? Of all the outcomes he had imagined – Lindir bored, unfaithful, uncaring, without time to spend together, or merely hurtfully crass – Elrond’s interference was one his doubts had entirely overlooked. Yet he would never gainsay Elrond in his stated wishes.
*** Retreat from Eregion ***
Picked up from the battlefield, carried in agony, waiting to be seen – he had never ceased to be grateful to the grey-eyed healer who had brought him surcease from torment. He learned afterwards that Lord Elrond himself had practiced his other calling that day and it had been his hand that withdrew the knife from Erestor’s knee and tended him patiently, returning many times until he had done all he could, despite the chaos of the running retreat and savage bouts of fighting that recurred.
Drugged out of his mind, still in agony whenever they were on the move, what Erestor remembered from those days of hazy awareness was the immense kindness of the healer and the gentleness of his handling; especially did he recall how the calm voice was steady when the healer had to cause his patient pain, telling him what was happening, expecting him to bear it. Elrond had helped him in more ways than with the healing of his knee, bringing him through with his pride and his dignity intact. It was a debt he could never sufficiently repay.
Once he was back on his feet, however unevenly, Erestor, displaced son of a weaver and her retired soldier turned tavern-keeper spouse, had had the effrontery to offer Gil-galad’s Herald his services in whatever capacity Elrond could best use him. Never had he imagined the result. Elrond had neither laughed at him, nor dismissed him with a curt instruction to get well and find occupation suited to his station. The tired lord had looked him up and down, cast a jaundiced look around his neglected affairs, and said without much hope, “I have not yet found the elf who can help me out here with any good result. Each trial has come to nothing. Would you care to work for me for a few days? I cannot set you to building or guard duty…”
“Of course I will see what I can do,” had been his answer, little thinking that his intention to tidy up, set things out into categories and carry Elrond’s messages would turn into far more. Perhaps he would write a few letters, the gist of which presumably Elrond would dictate, and maybe execute a few further instructions. Instead, he rapidly found that Elrond would murmur, “Thank you for showing me this, do you think you could see Issilion and deal with it between you?” and “What did you think of this? If you have any ideas I would be glad if you would take it off my hands.”
Erestor soon discovered a peculiar satisfaction came of his work. What he would never find out, was that Elrond, watching curiously from his own room when he heard the sound of laughter, saw elves speaking with his injured assistant and their eyes grow hopeful and their posture straighten in relief. Nor did Erestor ever guess that inside of a week Elrond had decided he had unearthed a gem, cheerful, willing to shoulder decisions, and yet having no apparent desire for recognition or praise in recompense.
Indeed, Elrond found such tasks as he delegated so deftly handled that in short order he had been tempted to reverse the order of business between them.
“Go through those for me, would you?” he said, one day. “Give me what you feel I should look at, and if you could deal with any of the rest, I would be grateful.”
Erestor had stared at him, before nodding. From then on, he judged what Elrond would want to see, did what he deemed needful with the balance and logged each item with a brief note, constituting a daily report that he laid every night on Elrond’s desk.
Thus it was that against all Erestor’s expectations Elrond kept him on as his assistant, even with other elves made available when Imladris’ battle-readiness became a less urgent matter and the building work grew less frantic. With the house walls up and the blocks of the outhouses complete, Erestor dropped hints that he was not the best qualified person to be so highly placed in Elrond’s affairs and that he would perfectly well understand if he were replaced with someone senior to himself.
Elrond took no notice. Elrond found his presence highly competent, cheerful and restful, apart from his hair-raising tendencies to all sorts of starts in life outside the office. Puzzled by these at first, Elrond had concluded that this other, more haphazard side of Erestor arose from his bright intelligence. Curiosities distracted him all too easily and time had somehow failed to diminish his youthful outlook.
Despite his more unfortunate eccentricities, Elrond continued to turn a deaf ear to thoughts of replacing Erestor and adamantly retained him.
*** Present day ***
Wearily reviewing his desk, Erestor felt far from youthful. His knee hurt. He missed Lindir even while being furious with him for broken promises he had been stupid enough to believe. Never hurt him again? Try very hard? Empty, worthless dross that only made a fool of him. That Lindir heeded Elrond’s whim so readily after such promises and abandoned him without a word, after the night they had shared, cut far deeper than the marriage fiasco.
Then there was his lord himself, who offended him daily by being friendly after so coolly giving such orders.
Erestor sighed at the memory of earlier, happier times, and listlessly gathered the matters Elrond should take care of this morning. He had placed himself at his Lord’s disposal, to serve him as he pleased, and he would never go back on that, but it was a dreary business working for a master who barred him from the freedom to choose his own company. He was more than angry. He was both hurt and deeply humiliated. Maintaining his usual polite deference and respect rankled. He would never refuse Elrond, nor ever do less than his best, but he felt neither at ease with him, nor well-disposed to his overtures.
Elrond felt the difference, finding him far more reserved.
“Erestor, are you well?”
The tentative enquiry brought a calm response.
“Yes, thank you, my lord.” Erestor laid before him various messages, a couple of reminders from Erestor himself and some small deliveries which Elrond had wanted. Then he retreated, when before he would have lingered to pass a pleasant word and elucidate the morning’s business. No longer. Since his return to Imladris he said the very minimum.
Elrond kept a sharp eye out, but was sure that Lindir was not contravening his order. Regretfully, he attributed Erestor’s reticence to the twofold unhappiness of hurt arising from Lindir’s insult and upset about his knee.
For his part, Erestor found it hard to credit that Elrond could so high-handedly lay down the law and then act as if their relationship would barely change. As far as he was concerned, the less he had to spend time with his employer the better, and he worked doubly hard to make sure what he handed over was in such good order that there was very little need for discussion.
Glorfindel, too, found much changed. In the past he had enjoyed a gentle entertainment in watching the odd pair at work, the butterfly assistant solving with a name a puzzle Elrond frowned over at his desk, or commenting over his shoulder that if they did *that*, would the issue not all fall into place? Elrond would nod, briskly, and make a note, and then move on to the next matter, just as likely to benefit from Erestor’s thoughts. Now, he found them far too quiet, the efficiency turned cold, and Erestor not just withdrawn but actively avoiding all unnecessary exchanges with their lord. It was highly uncomfortable to witness, not just because of the atmosphere but because something was so obviously wrong with Erestor.
Elrond thought giving Erestor all the space he wanted was the answer.
Glorfindel disagreed.
***
Lindir looked for Erestor and did not see him anywhere socially. Apart from his attendance on Elrond by day, it was as if he had never returned to Imladris. Elrond let Erestor work late thinking he was happier keeping busy. Glorfindel watched them all, more and more puzzled.
Three more weeks went by. Erestor was sitting at his desk and leafing through one last request before leaving for the day. He had at last re-imposed order in Elrond’s affairs. His work was all in hand; even so, he felt no satisfaction, and regarded the scatter of completed message scrolls and waxed letters with loathing. He bitterly regretted coming back here. His rooms were comfortable enough, and the refuge he sought in the taverns and friends’ houses friendly and companionable, but he missed his old routines, the pigs, the children, his previous ease with Elrond, and above all, Lindir’s attention.
He could not stop thinking about the harper, for a while so misleadingly persistent and now so suddenly – and painfully – indifferent. How dare he let Elrond come between them? Bitter anger, so unaccustomed and so unlike him, surged up once more against both of them, and yet again he refused to let it take him over. He would ignore them. He would get on with his life. They were not necessary to his well-being… He stared at the hated desk, blinking back tears. Who needed a sex life anyway? And if he really wanted one, he doubted he would fail to find someone willing. The thought held no appeal, and he swatted away moisture from his cheek angrily. He would *not* mope over a snotty, ignorant noble’s willingness to sever all ties, nor his own lord’s callous and surprising veto, hurtful though it was.
He drew a blank sheet toward him, and inked his nib neatly. Swiftly he drew a few lines, curving imitation of a horse’s neck, flanks and haunch. More ink, more lines, drawn straight and sure. He bit his lip, and changed a couple of details. Sketched a few trials in the margins. Knotted his brow and set a few final touches to the work. Then he went looking for a carpenter, to call in a few favours.
***
The Captain took to watching the hall by night. He saw Lindir doing all his duty, pleasantly behaved, but looking in vain for Erestor, of whom there was no trace to be seen. Erestor no longer ate with them, and Elrond had not insisted. His absence left a large gap that Lindir did nothing to fill by conversation – he was as taciturn at table as Erestor was by day in Elrond’s offices. At mealtimes only Glorfindel and Elrond spoke of anything more than the food before them.
In the end, Glorfindel went further afield to see where Erestor was lurking, having had no success by day in engaging a willing response to his enquiries. Erestor looked no happier, but he had ceased working in the evenings and seemed to be more evasive, as if he had something new to hide. Lindir was no more informative about their situation, shrugging off his questions as if there was nothing to say. His eyes said differently, and he was drinking more than he had been.
Glorfindel kept hunting. The gardeners had not seen Erestor lately, nor had he been in the taverns recently by night. Eventually he found a nervous looking carpenter with whom Erestor was known to be friendly, who, when asked, evaded the Captain’s questions. However, he did glance anxiously – and surreptitiously – up the hill behind his shed and Glorfindel took the unintended hint and followed the path upwards.
***
“What on Arda?”
Erestor started guiltily and looked past Glorfindel to see who else was with him. He visibly relaxed when no-one else appeared.
Glorfindel, having tracked him down in the corner of one of the far paddocks, stood staring bemusedly at a horse, rows of leather strapping, wood, rope and buckles, a length of knotted string, ink, a quill and some parchment covered with notes in figures. Stones stopped the wind blowing the sheets awry, and in the midst of it all, Erestor had looked engrossed and now turned shifty.
“Erestor, what are you doing with poor Gaerlin?” Glorfindel’s first thought was for the horse, threatened with this miscellany of equipment.
In fact the horse looked very content with the company, in itself unusual. Gaerlin had been a highly nervous animal for a long time, ever since orcs had attacked a party which included the unfortunate beast. He had never afterwards been able to tolerate a rider on his back, traumatised by an orc landing on him and riding him briefly, terrifying him beyond all future reassurance. Glorfindel, sorry for him, had always made sure to make a big fuss of him, lonely and bored as he sometimes seemed. But here he was, hanging close by Erestor’s shoulder, not at all apprehensive.
Erestor looked vaguely round at his paraphernalia. “Just a little idea I had?”
Glorfindel patted Gaerlin, resisted the temptation to do the same to Erestor, and squatted down beside the inky notations. He found a diagram amongst a series of measurements, and whistled soundlessly. “Does Elrond know what you are up to?”
“Of course not.” Erestor all but stuck his nose in the air. “Are you going to tell him?”
“Erestor, you are not going to harness Gaerlin to this – this *contraption*, are you? If you actually get it built?”
Erestor looked offended. “It’s a lot further along than it looks. Not all the pieces are here. These are just for measuring up. In *private*. And he gets bored. He’ll like it. He wants someone to take an interest.” He frowned at Glorfindel. “What are you doing here anyway? I am not at work now…”
Glorfindel blinked at the hostility.
“I could leave, if you want,” he said. “I came because I want to know what is wrong with you, and thought you might tell me, away from the offices.” Away from Elrond, he meant.
“What do you mean, what is wrong?”
Patiently, Glorfindel stated the obvious. “You are missed in the halls. We never see you. You are unhappy, and you were working very hard. Now you’ve disappeared. You barely speak to Elrond any more, and Lindir does not come near you.” Glorfindel enumerated the unadorned points in his blunt way.
“Surely that is my business, and none of yours?” Shameful that Elrond had decided he was not good enough for a lord. Worse to have to admit it to Glorfindel. He refused to look at the Captain, and studied his picture and then the rope in his hand, wondering if it would be more useful *there*, or perhaps *here*…
Glorfindel waited in vain to regain his attention but persevered anyway. “Elrond missed you. I missed you. Lindir could not visit you often enough and now is pining for you. Why have you been hiding yourself from us?” He refrained from saying, ‘And why are you squirreled away up here with Gaerlin, building some device that Elrond will never for one moment *dream* of letting you tie to one of his horses?’ Instead he asked gently, “Is it your knee? Is it worse? Has something happened?”
Erestor stared at him. Glorfindel was a steady presence in Imladris, normally undemanding, reliable, self-contained, pleasant. He seemed content to be an adjunct of Elrond in his social dealings, almost as if he were in love, had he shown the least hint of other signs of it. Sober, well-dressed, old-fashioned, *expensive* given his taste in clothes and horses. Glorfindel had always been distantly benign, never personal. Yet he was now rooted solidly as if he could stay a century until he got an answer.
Erestor gave in, saying stiffly, “Elrond does not want his Harper associating with me.”
Glorfindel digested this surprising fact.
“How do you know?”
There was a kindly command about Glorfindel’s manner that was very hard to resist. Reluctantly, Erestor answered, “He said so. He views Lindir’s attentions unfavourably. Those were his words. He told me he forbade it strictly, that I was to come back to work, and that Lindir was not to come near me.”
“Why?”
Erestor shrugged. “He did not say. I doubt the likes of me are expected to consort with nobles of his degree.” He almost kept the bitterness out of his voice.
Oh ho. “Erestor, did Lindir bother you during his visits?”
Erestor shrugged but even in his glum mood a smile nearly broke out. “He tried to…”
“And?”
“We – came to an understanding.”
“What kind of one?”
Though Erestor did not answer, Glorfindel read his expression and the hand gesture with the flutter of fingers easily enough. “And Elrond forbids this?”
“He said what I told you. We did not discuss it. But if Lindir did not agree with him, I don’t think he would have obeyed him, Glorfindel.” There was raw pain revealed in that last sentence, the first crack in Erestor’s façade.
“Erestor,” he said kindly, “I do not understand what is happening, but I cannot believe Lindir is disinterested – or that Elrond meant it as you think. I am going to think on this and find out a little more, but I will talk to you again soon.” He made to leave.
“Glorfindel…” Uncertainly, Erestor sought the words for the question he wanted to ask and did not quite find them. Why was Glorfindel putting himself out? “You have no reason to trouble yourself.”
Glorfindel eyed him for a moment as if considering his responses. “If being here makes you unhappy, someone should at least enquire what’s wrong. I confess what you say about Elrond has surprised me. I think it is time for someone to trouble themselves. Imladris is much more – comfortable – with you here, you know.”
He thought back to Elrond’s increasingly bad moods in Erestor’s absence and the difficulties of organising what needed to be done efficiently. Without Erestor to review his own requisitions, the figures had been badly out more than once. Plus which, he cared. “For the moment, I will leave you to carry on with Gaerlin and bid you farewell.” He looked doubtfully at the array of wood, leather, buckles and straps that Erestor had been piecing together and measuring, apparently trying them against the horse. He made to speak but changed his mind and forbore to comment. Gaerlin seemed perfectly happy and interested in the process. He supposed both of them were glad of the company.
It was Elrond he needed to speak to now.
Parmasambe
Library of Imladris
Disclaimer: All publicly recognizable characters, settings, etc. are the property of their respective owners. The original characters and plot are the property of the author. No money is being made from this work. No copyright infringement is intended.