Southern Ventures
Part 2 - Reflections, Conversations and a Loss of Temper
Posted: August 1, 2008
Title: Southern Ventures
Series: Favourite Addition
*****
Riding sedately behind the vanguard, Erestor checked the whereabouts of Faenel and Lachel, never far apart. He was practicing the southern human languages he had once spoken fluently and had intended to use the morning occupying his mind in that exercise. Despite inevitable shifts, he thought the old Haradic and the nomads’ ancient tongue would help him pick up the present languages faster. He had gleaned all he could from Elrond’s contacts, and from whatever scraps of written messages and the rarer records he and Elrond had obtained. Once they got past Lórien he expected to find better sources, and hopefully a teacher. Meanwhile, as the miles fell behind under Meren’s hooves, he was reviewing the roots and forms of the verbs he was most confident of and beginning to compare them with the new lists he had been compiling. Or he had been reviewing them. Now his eye was caught by another flash of yellow and he started parsing less intellectual matters.
After what had passed in the stable, Glorfindel had made opportunities even amid busy preparations to linger with Erestor over a meal or chat with him in his office. Erestor deftly retreated, or deflected him with the many minutiae of their plans, plans which were best played out with Glorfindel less, not more, attentive. He frowned over his thoughts, leaving Meren to keep to the track on the tail of the horse ahead without his guidance.
Nothing easier than to indulge the Elda, if that would solve the problem – one smile of the right nuance would bring Glorfindel to his bed. If he wanted. Or had reason. But though his body might stir at the thought – and pragmatically, he did not deny it – such a liaison would be nothing like the occasional convenience of his southern days. Not for Glorfindel a quick roll under the stars. Those couplings had sometimes been useful, or arisen from a desire for companionship or merely the need to touch. Even, rarely, to slake a fierce, quick desire born of frustration, anger or emptiness – but such fires were the fastest to cool and by morning left only cold ashes.
No. The Elda was not a lover to take lightly. And not one to evade easily, once taken. But then, Erestor hardly wanted a lovelorn watchdog at his heels in Harad, either. He could instead satisfy him… it might make things easier? He contemplated the possibilities of managing Glorfindel by such means.
The dream which suggested the Elda in Maglor’s place still lingered in his memory. Feelings evoked in sleep recurred uninvited at odd moments by day, the old spark ignited afresh by a chance word or look. Easy – too easy – to imagine the Elda’s voice, still burred with the accents of a city lost two ages past, commanding him as Maglor had. That lord had once compelled his surrender in a tenor smooth as honey, but for a slight roughness after long days in the field, bringing him to his knees no matter what tensions the lord provoked.
And he had not been predictable: uncertainty had kept Erestor on perpetual edge. He could still hear the lazy laugh and feel a hard hand on his shoulder, reaching for him imperatively, sometimes to segue into seduction, sometimes not, as the mood took him. The cynical face hovered in memory. Maglor had taken kisses when he chose, though he had made sure to teach his pained melmendur the pleasures that could be had from a harsh master well-pleased. Protest had been batted away with a light remark or a hand drawing him close and Erestor had learned fast, like a horse quivering under a severe but skilled rider, that it was better to please no matter what was asked. He might flinch and earn no more than an indulgent laugh, but disobey his lord and Maglor was capable of dealing out punishment as casually as he reprimanded his soldiers.
Yet Maglor called up liquid desire in him, confusing and overwhelming, even knowing his lord’s proclivities. Maglor let him withhold nothing. Even when Erestor burned with betrayal from Caranthir’s games, those hands, demanding, and his words, commanding, had not brooked refusal.
Of necessity Erestor moulded his behaviour to the brothers’ requirements, bore his bruises – and found himself responding. In the end, a look or a word was enough. Obedience, desire – and fear – would play their heady part and find Erestor ready to command.
The thought of Glorfindel employing his Gondolin drawl likewise left him shaking his head impatiently.
The lusty lord was not one for ruthless predation. He might perhaps be pleasured, distracted or confused by such games, but not, thought Erestor, manipulated by them. Glorfindel smiled and sought his company in comradeship. He flirted and gave knowing looks in friendly, lascivious innocence and made jokes that were truly funny. He made Erestor laugh. Odd feeling, the Elda’s affectionate attention. They were poles apart, he and Glorfindel, no matter his appeal, or what unsavoury dreams spun darker promises.
Shunning schemes and idler thoughts, he stirred Meren to a trot off to the side of the main thoroughfare. Harad would come soon enough and put an end to companionship, but still he remembered how it felt to have those hands on him, to be pinned by those eyes, to be held and kissed.
Empathic and uneasy, Meren raised a canter and Erestor, glad of distraction, leaned forward and let him run.
Heads went up as they passed, and none made to stop them, though Glorfindel himself looked after them where they merged into the trees that screened horse and rider rapidly from sight. Anuial looked to his commander for a signal. He made none. Let Meren stretch his legs and Erestor shake himself free of whatever he was brooding over. He would allow Erestor to take his freedom by day, while he could. There would be more night rides, not on this journey.
They were heading into tension and danger, but for the moment there was no need to keep Erestor pent up on the leading strings he hated, no matter how good he had become at abiding restrictions. Glorfindel let him go, and trusted him not to exceed the outlying scouts’ positions.
***
Days wore by, and Lórien drew nearer, though not yet near. Glorfindel’s unabashed hopes showed not the least signs of waning. Erestor remained pleasant and cool but never encouraging.
Glorfindel went on watching him at the least opportunity – apart from anything else, apparently fascinated by the new clothes – and sought him out to share the time of day whenever he found an excuse. Erestor was left to practice cold good sense for them both.
Availing himself of the plentiful occupations such a journey and such a caravan supplied, Erestor stayed away from him when he could. Seeing to the mares, talking to one of the teamsters, listening to the wagon-master’s concerns (for whom worrying out loud seemed to be part of how he best did his job), there was never a dearth of company. In fact, Ardhomen sometimes sought him out. The wagon-master was an efficient elf with an eye for detail and the business of planning this journey had thrown them much together, in the course of which he had become used to taking his worries to Erestor.
Elrond had shrugged when the drawback of his many anxieties was put forward. ‘No-one more thorough,’ he had said, and Erestor, seeing the wagon-master at work, had come to agree.
As they rode knee to knee through a balmy morning, Erestor let the other’s words wash in one ear long enough to indicate he was listening before letting them flow out of the other, content to enjoy the deep wilds beyond the bounds of the Vale.
It was not the first time he had ridden these paths, but the circumstances of that first rain-drenched misery back in the Second Age, when he had ridden so subdued in Galadriel’s train, were far different than these fresh summer days. Three events in succession had hit him hard and left him adrift while he was being so firmly shepherded west and north. A way of life that was all he had known of freedom had been abruptly and violently terminated. He knew he faced detention but whether worse or better than the mines, he had as yet no way of knowing. Third, last and worst, all his hopes of finding his mother and brother were at an end, and it was this bereavement that had shocked him to the core.
Meanwhile he had been carried along among the guards of the company like so much baggage, a barely regarded Noldo kin-slayer among Doriathan Sindar, carted to an unsure fate. Subdued, captive and among enemies, he had barely noticed the guards’ bullying which was their own personal punishment for the losses in the fighting against Erestor and his party. Despite their hostility, such petty harassments meant nothing to him in the mire of his grief.
It was Celeborn himself, coming upon three of his guard with Erestor in their midst, who had put a stop to that. He had needed only one jaundiced look to divine exactly what was going on. Erestor had said not a word. “Get him to his feet, Haldir – bring him away.”
He turned his attention and his deep, incisive voice on the three silent guards. “You dishonour yourselves in this.” He saw no need to mention his own, similar, lapse of honour where Erestor was concerned. “Only look at him – he is past caring what you do. You could punish a corpse with as much profit.”
Haldir, like his lord, kept his feelings to himself. He drew Erestor up off the forest floor and out from among the guard with a hand to his arm, and from then on, Erestor had been kept under Celeborn’s eye. The lord had even played chess with him – games which could stir Erestor’s mind, at a time when his thoughts came and went like fish in deep water, silent, half-formed, fading before he grasped them. Celeborn had seemed to understand, without comment. In such manner had he finished the journey at Celeborn’s side, and Haldir’s, and there had been quiet in which to grieve…
And here he was, returning along that same path once travelled so grimly. Yet nothing could diminish his keen awareness of leaving Imladris behind with challenge and change ahead and a good horse under him; not memories of a futile past, nor cautious apprehension over facing Galadriel once more. If anything, having that meeting ahead of him, knowing how it would be, served to heighten his senses. Since truth, with her, was the only option, he would give her a truth that satisfied her. And then – continue on his way.
Ardhomen was asking him something, and Erestor was content to rouse himself from his thoughts. He cast a habitual look around while picking up the conversation.
“I am sure that wagon is listing to the right. It will wear out the bearings.”
“I would think you can shore it up at noon – ask Lord Glorfindel to allow a longer stop to check it over.”
Relieved at this idea, the wagon master nodded decisively and went to speak to the driver of the wagon. He would far rather take the time to check than risk the greater damage of an axle or wheel bearing breaking on the road.
** *
Glorfindel, of course, agreed to this. He was not surprised to see the pair together. He was well aware of what Erestor did and where. Calmly accepting of his role, and confident the other elf would not hold it against him, he kept a peripheral eye on what Erestor was doing. Lord of a great House, commander of a significant section of Turgon’s forces, he had no difficulty in assuming both authority and responsibility, nor in expecting others to accept it; he was barely aware the duty of oversight might be considered awkward. Used to a practice of vigilance, he hardly needed to give a thought to the effective surveillance of one in his charge.
When, therefore, he found himself with some time on his hands and his thoughts strayed to Erestor, he knew where to look for him. Confident that Erestor was committed to the task ahead, he felt no hesitation in pursuing his interest in him. He had last glimpsed him heading for the pocket of land where the drovers were watching their equine charges. Cheerfully, he made his way over there.
Erestor was in the middle of brushing himself free of debris after grooming Meren; he merely raised an eyebrow at his visitor.
Glorfindel smiled to himself. They might not be friends, but Elrond and Erestor had surely picked up each other’s habits over the years. “More new clothes, Erestor? They suit you.”
How Glorfindel could manage to pursue him so intently and yet in such amiable fashion, Erestor never quite worked out. He blandly schooled his expression to one of mild politeness. “I enjoyed ordering a few new things, yes.”
“You shouldn’t spoil new clothes grooming horses,” observed the one-time Lord of Gondolin augustly, one moreover who routinely worked and fought in the most expensive cloth he could find to furnish his wardrobe.
Erestor looked surprised. He had always dressed finely working for Maedhros, and Maglor had decidedly preferred him decorative. He had early been used to clothes serving him, not the other way around. He never catered to his clothes.
He ran a hand down the crisp sleeve, which his new stipend had paid for, brushing off Meren’s hairs and dust. The faded yellows and greens were as muted as Glorfindel’s creams and browns, designed for their unobtrusive colours, but despite that they pleased him. Apparently they pleased Glorfindel, too, who was taking in the sight of him appreciatively.
Erestor ignored the stare but, at a wave of Glorfindel’s hand, fell in at his side. “What’s the point of wearing them if they stop me doing what I want?”
“They are far too good to get horse all over them.”
“If I were thirty years old, and someone else paying for them, perhaps.”
“It’s a shame to ruin them – you could get changed.”
“I could, yes. But who wants to waste clothes by not wearing them? Or live in dull colours?”
He could have been passing the time of day from his tone, but Glorfindel had seen the colours of his Imladris wardrobe… He let his teasing drop and took them to find the mares, with the idea of pleasing Erestor. Whickering approval met them and a dainty rush of small hooves. The palominos had lost their shyness.
“Bribery and corruption,” murmured Glorfindel in Erestor’s ear. Still, he held out a small sack in which he had stowed a few carrots and dried apples. Erestor shot him a look but took a handful, and severely rebuked Lachel for butting Glorfindel for the fruit.
“You have spoiled them, Erestor.”
“Perhaps. But they are young and willing to learn. I didn’t want to rush them.”
Glorfindel split what was left with him and went off to Asfaloth, out on the edge of the hill, looking around, endlessly curious and wary. He patted the finely muscled shoulder and thought about how Erestor would feel and look if touched with the same freedom. Asfaloth tossed his head, and he imagined Erestor doing the same…
Not once since what Glorfindel termed the ‘stable kiss’ had Erestor encouraged another embrace. Occasionally – less often than before – Glorfindel could win a smile from him but never a hint of the admittedly exhausted creature who had suggested a kiss in the straw. With that, he contented himself, along with an affable determination not to be put off. Erestor remained drily friendly and always courteous, affording him, if with irony, all the status of lord and warder on this trip, but the kiss had been real and he had not forgotten the feel of the supple body pressed to his own. More than once he had mulled over the conversation which had covered so much ground and yet left much unspoken in the quiet of that night; he wondered still at those detached eyes which watched him even as they kissed.
“Shall we see what they have made for supper?” Meals were simple affairs, prepared with skill and economy. Flat, stone-baked bread and roasted meat were most common, varied with stewed root vegetables from stores brought with them, and whatever summer greens and herbs were garnered along the way. The scouts routinely carried simple linen satchels across their shoulders to hold anything they came across to add interest to the common fare.
“You know, you make it very clear you want more than supper.” It was a rare reference on Erestor’s part, one that Glorfindel was careful to take in his stride.
“Well, yes – if you are of like mind, I would be very pleased…” There was nothing unseemly in his smile and no pretence. He liked Erestor. He was not ashamed of it.
“It was not meant as encouragement.” The tone was bland, but Erestor’s brow creased as he realized his words were rather less repressive than he had intended. Glorfindel’s easy optimism did not invite harsh responses.
“Yet it has seemed at times you shared my feelings. Or so I thought,” pensively Glorfindel searched Erestor’s face, which gave so little away. He received only silence for answer. They went to find the others and some food with no more said.
***
And so the days passed, in hard work and camaraderie of sorts.
When trouble came, it was out of the blue and from a source unexpected. Glorfindel was talking to Anuial when a commotion of squealing horses and mules arose from the train behind him. Anuial’s warning exclamation was hardly necessary; he turned in time to see Lachel wheeling aside, ears laid back flat in a pell-mell run.
She brushed hard by him but Anuial’s hand was pulling him roughly round for a matter more urgent – Erestor was stalking up to a muleteer in the middle of the ruckus in a fit of anger Glorfindel had seen the like of once before – and he wanted no repeat of the temper that had set a naked blade to an unarmed adversary. Looking down the sword poised in anger, without weapon to defend himself, was a moment he would not quickly forget. Perhaps in that, more than anything, he had glimpsed the elf Elrond referred to in his determinedly upheld cautions.
Glorfindel moved fast to close the distance.
“What do you think you were doing?” Erestor’s voice was arctic, the hands tense, but not yet raised to strike.
Glorfindel warily stood by but did not touch. Not yet. Not until Erestor lost control or acknowledged him. ‘Never surprise a fighter without being prepared to fight, fight hard and fight to win.’ He had been brought up on that maxim, and in turn drilled his own recruits in its wisdom. He kept his hands to himself and every reflex ready.
Erestor ignored him. “Well?”
Merendil, a little shaken by Erestor’s look, but still the most practical of elves, was comforting one of his animals while carefully undoing a girth and easing skewed panniers comfortably back onto the saddle blanket. “He’s a good-tempered beast but what do you expect when she sticks her nose in his flank? He kicked out and I don’t blame him!”
“You hit her.”
Anuial, Glorfindel and Merendil all watched Erestor take a step closer – Glorfindel nearly moved, but the muleteer was uncowed and shot straight back, “She made to bite him and I rapped her on the shoulder.”
Erestor frowned blackly.
Merendil turned to Glorfindel with his own complaint, willing to stand up for himself and his mule, but not hopeful that Erestor in his current mood was listening to reason. “Those mares are too young for this trip. Left to roam alone and too curious by far – it’s a recipe for trouble. That Lachel has taken a fancy to poor Evan here, and won’t leave him alone. Half-wild and no sense, my lord.”
The muleteer did not look at Erestor as he spoke, but Glorfindel had the strong feeling he wanted to glare at the elf and apply the same epithets, and Erestor was not taking kindly to his speech. Time to separate them.
“Erestor.” In that one word Glorfindel was commanding more than Erestor’s attention. He was telling him – ordering him – to back down.
Erestor ignored him.
“You’ll keep your hands off those mares, Merendil. Or you’ll answer to me in like manner.” The even words were more chilling than if his anger had been on open display.
“You’ve no call to threaten me on account of such a pair of ill-trained youngsters. You’d do better to take them in hand instead of letting them annoy my mules and go biting them. If you won’t see to it, I will – and not before time! She’s upset him before and if she misbehaves, I’ll be teaching her better manners and quite rightly.” He ended as mulishly as Evan, clearly meaning every word.
“And I am telling you to leave her alone.”
Merendil looked him up and down, unimpressed. As Glorfindel’s sixth sense ran alarms up his spine at Erestor’s tense stance, he continued brusquely, “You heard me. You deal with it or I will. Look at me like that all you like, if she does it again she’ll learn better, as is only right, and there’ll be nothing you can do to stop me.”
Erestor lashed out.
Reflexes barely proved sufficient to block the strike, which bruised not just skin and muscle but bone itself. “Erestor!”
*‘Erestor!’* indeed. Glorfindel’s forearm ached from the intervention.
Dark eyes, in a face white with what Glorfindel guessed was anger, met his as if shocked. Anuial aborted his own forward surge, and Merendil came slowly out of his defensive counter almost as white-faced as Erestor. Evan stirred uneasily. Glorfindel ignored them for the moment.
“What can you be thinking?” The low voice he carefully employed still carried easily to the circle of on-lookers who had all paused in their doings to watch. He quelled their interest with a caustic look.
When Erestor took half a step back, Glorfindel deliberately relaxed, in a trick as old as the hills and still surprisingly effective. The others copied him unconsciously and some of the tension dissipated. Merendil drew in a shaky breath and let it out again.
Anuial cast a look about them at those standing around astonished and snapped off a few choice orders. He nodded to a drover who had come up, concerned, and the elf came closer to murmur a word to Merendil and pat Evan, preliminary to looking him over with Merendil’s obvious approval. Apparently he was not sure how badly the mare had bitten him.
“This way.” Glorfindel’s tone brooked no refusal. Thanks to Anuial, their immediate audience was scattered, though covert looks still came their way from those still in eyeshot. He led Erestor to one side. “Well?” His curtness matched his displeasure.
Erestor glanced once darkly at Merendil, then began looking in vain for Lachel, whose careening flight had taken her out of sight. He almost moved off in pursuit, but Glorfindel’s stolid authority forestalled that move as effectively as he had the blow, though somewhat less physically.
Seeing Erestor at a loss for immediate words, Glorfindel stood back with a gesture of dismissal and an admonishment, “Go then – but don’t go far.”
Thus released, the Elven culprit turned on his heel and left as precipitately as had the horse. Glorfindel only lingered for a few words with Merendil and Anuial before following him. Erestor had instinctively headed for that part of the camp where the guards had set their own fire, for here, none would intrude. He was still vibrating with tension when Glorfindel came up to him.
“Erestor?” The word hung like a reprimand between them, more command than question.
“He hit too hard. The mare is too young for such treatment.”
“If she’s too young to behave and too young to be taught, you had no business bringing her,” said Glorfindel flatly, though he sensed there was more going on here that remained unsaid. His arm hurt. Erestor had struck in earnest. “What possessed you?”
Rather than answer him, Erestor said curtly, “I’ll make sure they both behave.”
Glorfindel said nothing more; he neither wanted nor needed an apology for himself, and he deemed it not the time to take up the matter of Erestor’s behaviour toward Merendil. The small physical rebuke to the mare, just and harmless, delivered by one attuned to horses all his life, did not warrant any such upset, let alone violence. He was not done with the matter, but later was soon enough for that, when Erestor had regained his equilibrium.
He turned his hand up in a gesture that meant, ‘Go and see to it then,’ and Erestor strode past interested elves to find his miscreant and deliver her to the drovers along with Faenel. Gathered up and led to where their fellows grazed and dozed in the sun, he left them with a word and a pat.
Silent and solitary for the rest of the day, he found Glorfindel while the night’s camp was being set. He sighed at the look Glorfindel gave him, then sat down and spoke as if he was half-way through saying something. “Stripes are no way to teach. She’s young and I would not stand for it. And yes, I have apologised. Of course.”
And Glorfindel, opening his mouth to refute any excuse for violence, closed it again, starkly reminded of a fireside conversation late one night, back in Imladris. Appalled, the Elda had listened to a scant telling of Erestor’s early life. Neither the fire nor the wine they sat over had eased the chill of Erestor’s words. He had let the silence fill with the crackle of logs rather than offering unwanted comfort. Now it was distant camp talk, the stamp of a hoof to shake loose a fly, and the life of the woods about them that filled the void while neither elf said a word.
Glorfindel had tried to read between the lines of those sparse disclosures. By his own admission, Erestor had come young under Maglor’s predatory eye, and had been raised thereafter to loyalty and obedience under an agreement that he was destined for that lord’s bed, though the claiming was delayed until his majority.
Generosity. Security. In return for these, bestowed on his mother and baby brother, the young ellon had accepted his place in the Fëanorian household.
Although Erestor had betrayed little more than family circumstances and seduction brought to bear, Glorfindel had wondered at the long pauses and the fleeting expressions that spoke of more. Until today, it had not figured in his worst imaginings that the story included physical chastisement or worse, coercion.
But now, at Erestor’s words and his reaction earlier, Glorfindel’s mouth thinned in anger at the thought. From what Erestor had said, he devoutly hoped that none of the like had occurred until after his majority, but even so… Damn the Fëanorians anyway, so much havoc had they wrought. He was shaken by pointless anger against the dead as he imagined a young elf suffering such treatment as something to be endured and survived, rather than an outrage to be promptly and publicly denounced and condemned.
He composed himself to better calm. There could be no excuse, physical or social, for what Erestor had done. Quietly he said, “He was worried for his mule: she was biting and needed to be stopped, and to know better next time. A reprimand at the time can work far better than indulgence, and he did not hurt her. He would not do so.”
“Be that as it may, I should not have hit him. I told Merendil so. It won’t happen again. Normally I have more sense.” He shrugged, more indifferent than contrite. “I was angry, but he was right – I should not have left the mares to run wild so long. I’ve spoilt them; I’ll start riding them and persuade them to better manners.” Erestor had his face turned to the forest fringe around them.
Somewhat disarmed by the confession, curiosity led Glorfindel to ask, “Why on earth did you bring them? You must have known they would take a lot of managing…”
Erestor glanced at him wryly. He stretched out his legs, and settled back. “We all needed to bring two or three horses.”
Glorfindel felt the shift – saw the change in him; the admission of fault was over. He hardly wanted Erestor vulnerable, but he still hoped for some openness between them. He eased himself more comfortably against his tree-fall. “A couple so young and so green?”
Erestor gave him an old-fashioned look that questioned his intelligence. “They will make the perfect show. Surely you can see that?”
Glorfindel, picturing Erestor atop one of the palominos with the other alongside, entirely agreed and yet – “I cannot like this plan of yours.” He did not like it at all. Nothing seemed more unsuitable.
“It is not a question of liking when it will give you something in common with the Southron nobility. The additional show will serve to reinforce the kind of high status they will best relate to and respect.” Glorfindel pulled a face. Erestor took no notice. “And since it means I will be over-looked as an agent, fine sensibilities are neither here nor there – not when weighed against the chances of success. You must see that it invites far less risk.”
“They are not going to over-look us on * any* account, Erestor. We will be the biggest news in at least a century, barring the Umbar take-over. And as for being safer, no. I disagree. It’s foolhardy and puts you at risk.”
“Not at all. You need to understand these people. Your standing with Elrond, your wealth, your military command – all these will make you a recognizable quantity. You they will understand no matter what their suspicions – and superstitions – of elves and strangers from unknown lands to the north. They will be able to deal with you – they will be more than anxious to do so, with such wealth and custom as we shall represent. And I will be protected by your honour. They will not wish to put your good-will at risk – they will be too concerned about profitable trading. And with me attached to you, they will look at what I am and discount me as a person to reckon with.” Erestor had made all these arguments before. Glorfindel had listened but he had never reconciled himself to the proposal.
Stubbornly, he said, “You may be right, but I don’t have to like it…”
Erestor shrugged, thinking about what lay ahead. “Well, think of it as a kind of strategy – a war-time decision. Not ideal but necessary. Calculated. You wouldn’t think twice over hard choices in a battle that got the job done.”
Glorfindel thought about the wars he had seen. “That never means the orders are easy. Just necessary. And battles are different.”
“Yes,” acknowledged Erestor. “Battles are very different – but the principle is the same. And it will work. It offers the best chances. It is what we discussed and planned for.”
Glorfindel knew the argument was lost before he started. Elrond had given it his seal of approval, and he would not change Erestor’s mind. Those two really were very much alike, more than either ever admitted. Ruthless, for one. He gave in, saying lightly, “So – you insist on being my slave?”
Their eyes met. The moment changed. The light of interested debate in Erestor was doused, a flash of – something – came and went in his eyes, to be replaced by a now-familiar stillness. Glorfindel wanted to groan out loud and settled for silently and roundly cursing himself: he was a thorough-going oaf.
Erestor merely got to his feet with a slight nod of his head. “You’ll excuse me? Your point – Merendil’s point – about the horses is fully taken, and I’ll see to the matter. And as to the other – ” He broke off ambiguously, with a slight shrug.
Glorfindel was left looking after him with the feeling of being entirely wrong-footed, even though from first to last, Erestor was culpable. Except for his own comment – which he could only regret, trusting Erestor would know he meant no disrespect or hurt by it.
*****
Melmendur (Quenya) catamite (lit. love servant)
Faenel ‘Brightstar’ (S. radiant or white star)
Lachel ‘Nova’ (S. leaping flame star)
*****
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