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'...And Finally'

Part 3
 

" Elladan is the one you need to worry about," Erestor said, through a mouthful of delicate, nut strewn pastry. "He's the one who's actively thinking about it."

We were sitting on a terrace in the private wing of the palace enjoying the fresh, clean breeze coming off the bay and equally enjoying a mid morning snack of fruit, pastries of various types and a refreshing herbal tea.

" Elladan?" My mind had been elsewhere, and for a moment I was puzzled.

"Your son," Erestor replied, gesturing over to the other side of the terrace. "That one, over there."

Elladan was in animated conversation with Faramir and two other mortals.

I watched him, partly because I love my sons, and enjoy watching them, partly trying to see him as others did. Elladan is the one that is physically more like me. Most regard them as identical. I have never understood why, to me the differences are many.

Elladan I had called him at birth - elf man. Celebrían had been horrified. It is the closest we ever came to a genuine fight in all the years of our marriage, but I had seen what I had seen and she was enough her mother's daughter to eventually give way and accept it.

Elrohir was my elven knight, almost purely elf, the fires of otherness banked down, all but out of sight.

These two were myself and Elros repeated, though not as unlike as we had been. Elros had been elven to the eye, graceful, with silk smooth hair and hairless skin, while, my features were not quite as fine drawn, my lips far fuller, my eyes rounder, my hair having a tendency to resemble more spider web than silk.

Hair there was too where elves did not tend to have it, a fine line down my stomach, under my arms, more extensively in my groin. Differences that were attractive, erotic even, I was told. It took the persistence and charm of a king to convince me. Elladan carried all these same marks of mixed blood that I did, Elrohir none, twin to my twin.

Elros and I had responded very differently to our place between two races. Having come through blood and fire, he had felt at liberty to question, to distance himself from his elven heritage, until the time came when he finally rejected it, walking away without a backward glance either for it or me.

I, on the other hand, had forced my hair into intricate braids to hide the fact that it was far from straight, carried myself carefully, studying those around me until the day Erestor, coming upon me tormenting still-wet hair to straightness lost patience with me and said,

"Elrond, your forefathers were kings amongst men. Tuor was acceptable to Turgon himself. Everyone knows your bloodline, stop this nonsense and be yourself. It is the only way you will ever earn respect."

This brought me up short. "Do you say I receive no respect?" I asked him sharply.

The almost yellow eyes flicked scorn at me as he pulled himself up to his full height.

" Elfling," he said "If you do not respect yourself, how can you ask it as a gift from others?"

" Elrond? Am I boring you?”

I cane back to myself again, shaking my head to clear it and smiled for him, to take the edge off the annoyance I could hear in his voice,

"Forgive me," I said. "I was thinking of the time you told me to respect myself and stop trying so hard to pass for pure born Noldor. Do you remember? I never thought it bothered Dan as it had me."

"Ah!" He put his hand lightly on my arm, a meaningful gesture as Erestor is not generally a tactile person - I did wonder how this worked with young Lindir - and said, kindly,

“ Elladan, unlike you, was not asked to survive, unaided, in Lindon, after a brutalized childhood, nor has he had to make his place in the world without guidance. I cannot believe you have not spoken with him about this, probably extensively."

I had, of course, taken time with Elladan to talk about these differences that we carried, to let him know that I understood his occasional unease with himself.

I knew he sometimes felt more at home in the company of the northern rangers than he did amongst strange elves. Still, they were not my children alone, they were also children of the silver lady of the golden wood and I had hoped this would mitigate things. Up until recently I thought it had.

Now I watched him talking, trying himself at fitting here with these others, and I shivered. Erestor was watching too, chin on hand, a considering look on his face. “You need to speak with him,” he said quietly, “Preferably before he makes himself too comfortable here.”

Glorfindel.

He takes such joy in life, having known the silence and coolness of death. His delight in every smallest contact between us, treasuring our love as something precious, easily lost, is something I have long since learned to take for granted.

It had taken some time for me to realize that the recent silences, the extra tenderness, the increased and sometimes innovative lovemaking were not simply his response to the tiredness and tension that had become part of my every waking moment.

To my shame I had been touched by his concern, took pleasure from the passion he offered me, never thinking that in loving me, he had chosen to not add his doubts and uncertainties to my list of concerns.

It took several days, and some very determined evasion from him, before it all came out at last, as these things are wont to do, in the dark hours before dawn.

I had fallen into bed, exhausted after further late night discussions, to find him lying waiting for either the sunrise or my return, whichever occurred first. Some instinct of the heart, told me that now, finally, he was vulnerable. I shook off tiredness and told him firmly that I would allow neither of us rest until he told me what it was that troubled him.

He denied flatly that there was anything to discuss, but he evaded my eyes, turning rather to lie on his stomach, his face hidden. I lay beside him, stroking his hair, telling him that, tired though I was, we would talk, or we would lie without rest. The choice was his.

Finally he believed me. He propped himself up on his elbows, facing the head board, not me, and allowed his thoughts to creep out into the light at last.

“It never bothered me before, but as our time gets closer and closer, I find my mind keeps going to this - to wondering if -- somehow -- perhaps --" He glanced at me out the corner of an eye. I lay on my side, watching him, keeping my face as smooth and calm as though I was chairing a meeting. I raised a brow slightly.

“Go on,” I said.

He compressed his lips, gave me another look. “You’re laughing, aren’t you?” he asked me, getting ready to refuse to take it further. I assured him I was not, and reminded him that I was actually too tired to laugh at much and would he please get on with it.

He took a breath, released it, tried another and started to speak again, once more to the headboard, in a tone that was impersonal and distant.

"It is not impossible, after all this time, these several thousand years, for Gil- galad to have finally been reborn in Aman.”

Now I understood the averted eyes. He had no wish to watch my face as I considered this impossible possibility, afraid, no doubt of what my expression might betray. As I tried to logically consider the chances of this having happened, he flung himself onto his side to face me.

“I can see it as though it has already happened,” he said , forcing himself to meet my eyes now. His were troubled, his face was set in tense lines, and he looked old and tired. ”I imagine our ship docking, us disembarking, and him standing there, waiting for you. I see your face as you see him…I have seen this before and I can see it now, your eyes seeking him, seeing no one else-“

We had met in Lindon - Glorfindel, the newly returned hero of Gondolin, myself, Earendil’s son, newly Gil- galad’s lover. I had not yet learnt to school my face, hide my emotions. Looking back, I might as well have carried a sign proclaiming it. He knew how I had looked well enough.

I pulled him to me and held him against me, my face in that mass of golden hair, my hands rubbing his back, savoring the silken skin even as they tried to offer comfort and some kind of security.

“I keep thinking if I could just find some way...now...here - while we are still together - to make you love me more. To be sure...to make you sure…” he spoke into my neck, trying to keep his voice even, but failing.

“Glorfindel, light of my soul, enough.”

I tried to make my voice gentle yet firm, I recognized it is a tone I had often used with my children, and bit back a smile. I was speaking to one who had become a legend before I was ever born, one who had bought the life of the child who later became my father with his own.

“All I can give you are words. Can they be enough for the peace of your heart?”

I brushed back his hair, lifting his head to face me, and stroked my fingertips along an eyebrow, the curve of a cheek, then finally the line of his upper lip. He lay still under my touch, watching me with those clear, blue eyes.

“I loved Gil- galad.” I told him quietly. “ I loved him with every fiber of my being. He was the center of my world. I tried to remold myself to please him. He was not my first lover, though I think he liked to believe that, but he was my first love.”

I paused, making sure I still had his attention, held his gaze.

“And then he died, Glori. And I thought my life would end too. I lived, instead of fading and following him into the dark, because there was still too much left, undone- you know this.” I reminded him, smiling and kissing his cheek softly. “You were there.”

I released him, rolled onto my side and propped myself up on an elbow, chin on hand, and proceeded to stroke him slowly, from the shoulder, to neck, then chest, following the lines and curves I knew so very well. He lay very quietly, watching my moving hand, nodding at my words but keeping silent.

Evenly, I asked him, “ Glori, how pathetic do you actually think I am?”

He looked up at me, startled. “What do you mean?’

I sighed. “ Melleth, Gil- galad died over three thousand years ago - quite some time past even by our reckoning, wouldn’t you say?”

He frowned at me slightly, trying to follow my reasoning. I leaned in closer, holding his chin lightly, refusing to allow him to look away again.

"In those three thousand years, of course I have mourned him. I have missed him, not just as a lover but also as a friend. In that time I have also married, fathered three children, fought wars and lost my wife to unthinkable horror. It took rather a long while, “ I added, chuckling softly, “but I have healed, and I have found myself with you.”

He sighed softly, still frowning and made as though to move away from me, but I was faster, clasping him to me and claiming his lips. Tangling my left hand in his beautiful hair, I parted them and took possession of his mouth.

The kiss had been meant as a reassurance - a reminder of what was between us, but somehow it took on a life of its own. I found myself tasting him with a care and an intensity not usually to be found at this late hour, stroking my tongue against the bridge of his mouth, relishing the texture of the insides of his cheeks, sucking on his lips, tasting deeply of that velvety area beneath his tongue.

We kissed as though it was our first time together or as though it was our last. Hands moved with increasing tension and need over one another’s bodies, till our focus closed in, shutting out the world, the room, everything save the sensations we evoked in one another, we kissed till he was breathless and I was breathless too.

I was the one to break it off, drawing back to look into his face, into his darkening blue eyes. Both of us gasping for breath, I leaned over him, elbows on his shoulders, and took his face between my hands, more roughly than I had intended.

“Gil- galad, aye and Celebrían , are my past, Glori. I would not be without the memories, the bitter with the sweet. I could not wish I had never met and loved him or married and built a life with her. These things have made me who I am, but that is behind me. You are my present, my future, the only one I can imagine spending eternity with.”

He silenced me with a touch, then moved a hand to my hair, lifting it back from my face. He stroked my forehead and cheek with his fingertips, his heart in his touch.

“I just wish we could get there and get it over and done with and to deal with the reality.” he finally admitted. “I need to know. If he has returned, I need you to either go to him or turn to me. I need to disembark from that ship at your side and watch your face.”

I started to object, to deny his lack of trust in me, but he shook his head and his hand stilled, resting on my cheek.

“You said yourself, all you have to give me now are words. I know you would never lie to me. Do not think for a moment I imply that, but I am not convinced that even you yourself know the truth."

His hand moved to the back of my head, under my hair, and the hand on my waist slid down to rest on one buttock, fingers circling softly for a moment, then settling, gripping and drawing me to lie fully on top of him. I moved a leg over him and settled to lie, chin on folded arms, watching him. He brought his hands up to cup my face and said seriously ,

“I need to be there if and when you first see him. That very first moment. Only then will either you or I really know.”

We lay still and simply looked at each other for a few minutes, he idly playing with my hair while I traced the curve of his ear and watched his eyes behind the dark gold lashes.

Finally I said "I already know." and moved back slowly onto my side, drawing him with me, moving my arms up around his neck. I rubbed my lower body against his, giving him all the little signs and suggestions known and understood between long time lovers.

Some of our kind move from partner to partner, finding pleasure for a time, but offering no commitment, and, eventually, moving on. Some of us, needing more, are prepared to wait until we find the one that speaks to our hearts (or, in the case of Celebrían and myself, to the politics of the day) and then we are content and bind and search no more.

Part of this, no doubt, rests in the fabric of who we are. However, another part of it, is answered by plain common sense. We take care to have time apart, to have our own personal interests and concerns, and to travel - sometimes to spend long years apart - I once did not see Gil- galad for nigh on forty years. Our reunion was unforgettable.

Glorfindel and I had spent an unusually large amount of time together, but I would be old indeed before the touch of his hand, the smell of him, the taste of him, no longer filled my senses or drew me on to ecstasy. We had taken a very long time to find one another amongst the continual trauma of my life, and I was always aware of our good fortune.

He took time to carefully finish unbraiding my hair, combing it through with his fingers. Loose hair in bed was about the only thing he insisted on from me, after which he started to kiss his way down my neck slowly and lingeringly, sucking gently, careful to leave no mark where it could be seen publicly.

I let my head fall back, leaving my hands resting lightly on his shoulders as he moved from the base of my throat to run his teeth along my collarbone, barely touching, making me shiver.

He moved lower, licked a finger and rubbed it over a nipple, drawing back to watch the effect. The breath caught in my throat and he ducked his head to take the little nub of skin between his lips, licked, blew, licked again and then - without warning - sucked, using tongue and teeth, sending a thrill of pleasure/pain racing through me. I dug my fingers into his shoulders, hissing.

He began to roll the other nipple between a finger and thumb, increasing the pressure on both, making me moan and wind my fingers in his hair, drawing him closer to me.

After a few minutes of this, he released me and continued down my body, kissing and licking, his touch gentle and knowing, stopping occasionally to bite hard enough to mark.

By this stage I was making whimpering noises in my throat, a thing he swears he loves, my head moving from side to side. I ran my hands over his back, unable to do more as he was holding me down with an arm across my stomach.

After an age, during which he lit fire in roiling trails throughout my body, he propped himself up on one elbow and looked at me, running his tongue over his lips He stayed still for a minute, watching my aching length as though he had never seen it before and then bent forward and began to lick it slowly, little, darting motions of his tongue, making me shiver and squirm against the bed.

When he reached the tip, he stopped again. I tried thrusting up at him, desperate for contact, my breath catching in my throat, but he moved back from me, glancing up ,his face all innocence.

"No Glori, please, please..."

"Please, what ?"

"Please stop teasing" I hissed at him.

He laughed softly, was still laughing when I twisted under him and managed, at some strain to my muscles - Glori is not light - to roll us over. I sat astride him, my hands on his shoulders, looked down at him. Both of us laughing now with my hair hanging over his face.

"Allow me to demonstrate,” I said, a little breathlessly.

I slid down him, licking a trail as I went, and then grasped his cock firmly in my hand, opened my mouth and swallowed. No teasing, no preparation, I just simply took him in as deep as I could.

I sucked him hard, my teeth grazing him, letting the pressure pull the skin tight, then slid back until I held the head alone in my mouth, rubbing my tongue roughly back and forth, thrusting it into the slit, listening to his soft, pleasured moans. Then I worked my way down his swollen length, in a series of sucking kisses , while he twisted his fingers through my hair, tugging sharply, sending knife thrusts of sensation through me.

The pressure on my hair increased and he persuaded me to be kissed , slowly and thoroughly, his arms now round me, holding me against him tightly, the hand not twined in my hair moving firmly up and down my body, a pause in the rush and the passion.

He released my mouth, trailing his lips across my face and then sharply sucked the tip of first one ear and then the other. He then drew back and pushed my head lightly to get my attention. His eyes were so close I could see nothing else. They were narrowed, dark and dangerous looking.

"Now?" he asked briefly. I nodded, wordlessly.

He moved over me, fumbled briefly in the little box of oddments I kept on the table beside the bed, and came back with the oil bottle. He knelt, opening it, then poured some into his hand, and coated his beautiful erection, the oiled flesh shimmering softly in the candlelight. My body stilled for a moment as I watched him.

The room was absolutely still save for the soft hiss of the candles and our breathing. I was aware of my body as though it were a thing separate from me, lying on the soft sheets, waiting for ecstasy.

He added more oil to his fingers, put the bottle back on the table, and sat back, his face serious, focused. Then his head was between my legs and he was kissing the insides of my thighs, sucking to leave marks.

He lifted my right leg to rest on his shoulder, and slowly inserted a finger inside of me, pushing very slowly past the ring, allowing me to savor the sensation of stretching, of pain balanced with pleasure that he knew I loved. I drew my other leg up round his waist and hollowed my back to arch my hips up to him.

He moved the one finger within me, withdrew it, inserting two in its place. Two become three, moving, then turning and twisting up, and the pleasure seemed to rush up my body and out through the top of my head. I know I shrieked. I know I grabbed at his thighs, and I know a voice, which I assume to have been mine was crying, "Now! Please, inside me now! fuck me...damn you!"

And then the fingers left, and his hands were under me, lifting me, and then his cock was pressing against my opening. I threw my head back and thrust up against him and he left off care and gentleness and pushed forward hard with a heavy grunt, counterpoint to my scream, sheathing himself completely within me in one movement.

The world stopped as he gave me moments to adjust to his length and width deep within me. To adjust to the pleasure that was pain, to the pain that was bliss, and then he drew back and thrust within me twice, all but splitting me in half, then angled himself again, finding my pleasure center, making my head jerk back and my teeth snap together.

My mind dissolved into a place of white light, heat, noise and striving and he rode me hard and fast and deep and took me to the brink, as his hand clamped at the base of my aching, weeping cock -almost there - as he released. - almost there -

And I began a chant of sounds, phrases and curses that eventually resolved itself into "Fuck me, do it...do it!" as I writhed and clawed, his hands gripping my thighs to leave bruises.

At last he threw back his head and cried out and thrust so deeply into me that I felt - for one moment - pain again, and then I felt him swell and come within me, as he knelt above me, perfectly still with his eyes closed.

He pulled out of me almost at once and turned onto his back, guiding me to kneel over him with my knees bracketing his shoulders and my hands gripping the headboard. He drew me forward so that he could take my length into his mouth drawing it deep into his throat, and sucked me roughly, carrying me, screaming his name, to a mind numbing completion,.

Afterwards, we lay apart, staring at the ceiling, waiting for our breathing to return to normal. Presently he turned his head to look at me, catching my eye. I raised an eyebrow to him, too exhausted to even think of speaking or moving.

"You know, sometimes, when you‘re dressed up and being 'oh so dignified and correct', I can't help wondering what people would think if I were to tell them the very proper, controlled Lord of Imladris is a screamer." he said, smiling broadly.

He had left me very little energy to retaliate with. Instead I rolled over, put my head on his chest and twined myself around him, loving the hardness and the solidness of him.

"I would have to tell them," I said, "that it is caused by the good, noble and excellent Lord Glorfindel deploying a fearsome and deadly weapon of torture."

He wrapped his arms around me and kissed the top of my head, before settling to an attempt to restore order to my hair. Under his touch, I slipped into reverie.

~*~*~*~*~

The Road to Edoras
We left Minas Tirith, taking the road back to the north for the last time, serving also as escort to the remains of the late king of Rohan, with my daughter and bond-son riding the distance to the Golden Hall in company with us.

We were more like a small moving town than simply a group of travelers on the long road home. A king of Gondor must ride out suitably accompanied. The number increases proportionately when his queen is also present.

Added to the guards, the servants, the small group of ladies of good birth, there were the escorts of the Lord of the Mark, the Prince of Dol Amroth, and of course the entire elven company that had taken that same road earlier, heading to Gondor to see my daughter bound to Isildur's heir. We made a merry and secure company on the road.

Through the first day I found myself watching my sons.

They were riding in their sister’s company, the only elves in a party of mortals. Elrohir seemed fairly quiet, but Elladan was apparently enjoying himself, talking, laughing and occasionally raising his voice in song, not behavior I normally associated with him. Erestor’s warning came back to me and I determined to speak with him that evening.

After the evening meal I sought then out. They were part of a small group making plans to hunt along the way the next day. I motioned them to join me as I passed and made my way over to a secluded copse of trees close by, where the horses were corralled for the night.

They, as is the way with sons who like to feel they have outgrown parental authority, took their time in joining me, but eventually they arrived.

We exchanged a few inconsequential comments on the day and our fellow travelers, and then spent more minutes scrutinizing the horses before I finally drew in a firm breath and said ,

“You seem to be making quite an effort to seek out mortal company, Dan. Is there something we should be discussing here?”

The corner of his mouth twitched. Of all my children Dan is the one who has the most trouble hiding his thoughts and emotions. The other two, should they so choose, can be unreadable. I usually found it a relief to be dealing with him, though not this time.

"I thought we agreed we should have time to investigate the possibilities before giving you our choice," he said. "All I was doing was-"

”All you were doing," I cut in, "was making the best effort you could to pass as a child of the second born."

I knew my voice was bitter, but it seemed outside my control. He flashed me a hurt look, standing very straight, his arms at his sides.

"Adar, I enjoy their company, is that such a bad thing? We like the same things, I am comfortable with them. You always make it sound such a bad thing to choose mortality Adar, ” ,he added, "Yet your own brother, our uncle, did just that very thing. How is it he was right yet I would be wrong?"

I remembered the fights, the shouting, the pleading, the tears that had accompanied Elros' choice, In the end Ereinion had threatened to send him from Lindon, so tired was he of having his household in uproar because of it. I was never one to hold my tongue.

"When," I asked quietly, "did I ever say I agreed with my brother's choice?"

"Well he must have been right." Dan retorted. "Otherwise there would have been no Gondor, no royal house, no king and no victory. Perhaps," he added "you were the one who was wrong."

"Hush, Dan." Elrohir had kept out of it till now, but obviously felt it had gone far enough.

"I will not hush, brother." he responded, his voice rising slightly. "He tells us we must choose, then he tells us which choice we should take, as though there are no answers but his, and when i give him an example -"

" Elros was right in that time, I see that now," I cut in again. "But this is a different age, a different world! What grand purpose do you think you would be serving, Dan, by remaining here...becoming mortal? What cause would that advance?"

"What would I advance, eternally young and eternally useless, in Valinor?" he threw back at me. "There are things to do here, Adar, things to achieve. Over there..." he was starting to pace back and forth now, as he did when agitated, "There we would be nothing, nothing but half mortal curiosities."

"Dan!" Elrohir . He reached out a hand but Elladan moved out of his reach. He would never brush his brother away, simply put himself out of reach.

"Well that is what we are!"

He swung to look me full in the face, anger kindled on his.

"You may call us half elven as much as you wish, but we are really half mortal, and that is how all Elvenkind sees us. You just won't accept it. You can try and try all you wish, but I don't see why I should. Here there are people who accept me for who I am. I don't have to be constantly watching how I move, how I speak, how-"

"When have you ever had to be careful of how you presented yourself to others of our kind?" I asked blankly. Not in my house, of that I was certain.

"Did you never think, all the times you would send us to Lorien to grandmother and grandfather, to ask us if we wanted to go there, Adar?” he said softly, turning over bright, painful eyes on me. “It was a nightmare, all politeness because of our family connections, and all the time the whispers..."

"Why did you not tell me?" I asked in disbelief. Not at his words, they rang too true to my own life experience, but to the fact that he -that they- would have kept silent.

"You would have just told us to be proud of ourselves!" he cried, out of patience. "How was I meant to tell you? You would have said I exaggerated. How was I meant to tell you?"

He was almost shouting now, unsettling the horses. "You were always so proud of us, you always thought we could do anything. How could I make you believe the whispers? How was I meant to tell you about the guard who was DARED to bed me, for a bet, to see how a mortal looked below the waist, and then drew a picture to show them?"

He stopped, hearing, I suppose, in his own voice, the remembered pain and humiliation, and being embarrassed by it. He stood breathing hard for a minute, staring at me, waiting for me to speak. Instead, Elrohir cut in softly.

"It's true enough that we hated going there, Adar," he said. "But they are our kin, what could either we, or you, do? We had to. And I do agree with him," He added, "I have no idea how we would have convinced you of the pure misery of it."

So much for all my efforts to be an approachable father. This was as good a time as any, I supposed, to discover that I had been a total failure as a parent.

I moved forward, planning to say I know not what to Elladan, but he stepped back from me at once, shaking his head.

"Adar, you have no idea what it was like, and you have no idea what we have to decide. Just let us do it alone, as you first agreed, and let us tell you when we are done. Surely," there were bright, unshed tears in his eyes, "surely it isn't so hard for you to understand that I might just want to be amongst people who won't judge me - us?" He realized a little late that he was speaking for himself, leaving his brother out of the decision-making.

"Of course I understand it can be difficult," I finally managed to interject. "Do you think I never had to deal with any of this myself, including..." I hesitated, but he had a right to know this. " Including the curiosity about my body? Do you really think I never experienced that? At one stage it felt as though I had half of Lindon trying to court me!"

"Well once the high king had satisfied HIS curiosity, I would be willing to bet no one else was determined enough to attempt an investigation." he said flatly.

I could feel my eyes widening and my mouth dropping open in disbelief. We stared at each other wordlessly. Nether of us knew how we had arrived at this place. Then, with an angry gesture of head and hand, he turned and walked off, back to the camp and, no doubt, his new friends.

Elrohir stood uncertain between us for a moment and then turned, as he had all his life, to follow his brother.

~*~*~*~*~

Part 4

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