Arrangement of Thorns

Posted: May 2003
Author: Kharessa Bloodrose

*****

Part Thirteen

His tears had subsided, the shaking of his frame tapered to the occasional slight shiver. He clung to Erestor as if the advisor were an anchor or a beacon, something to hold him in place and give him a point of reference at the same time. His inner stars had shifted; his soul was adrift. Elladan was an outward vision of that shift, that untethering. Erestor was unknown, relatively speaking, and therefore safe.

"Are you alright, Elrohir?" Erestor asked with genuine concern, and he nodded against the older elf's broad chest. "Little one, lirimaer, sweet heart, I never meant to truly hurt you. If this is too much it can be over, I would never hold that against you, little love."

Soft words, kind and gentle. Elrohir melted, wrapped his arms tightly around Erestor's body. It felt so good to be this warm, this close. The endorphin rush was fading, and he was beginning to feel the ache in his shoulders, back, wrists, thighs, legs and ankles. From neck to knee his skin felt raw and painful in spite of the balm.

"Elrohir?" His brother's voice, sharp with concern. Elrohir bit his lip, closed his eyes.

"Hurts." He finally managed to say. Erestor kissed the top of his head, stroked his arm.

"I know, sweetheart." He crooned into Elrohir's hair. "It will get better, love, give it time."

He considered that, swallowed hard. The pain in and of itself was not so bad; the pain he could have dealt with. He had known that Erestor meant to beat him, had suffered himself to be chained like an animal because he could not countenance walking away and leaving Elladan to be beaten in his stead. He had thought he would weather it as any other sort of punishment, though more personal and humiliating than anything that had ever been meted out under his father's roof in his memory. He'd seen the marks on Elladan's back, had seen his brother whipped. It couldn't be any worse than the accidental injuries he'd incurred during weapon's training.
It had been different, very different. He'd been required to ask for it, and he'd been forced to find pleasure in it. Erestor had used him while he was immobilized and too dazed and hurting to fight, and he had been more or less forced to bring his brother to orgasm.

No, not forced. His brow furrowed, lower lip quivered. He had told Elladan that he would not refuse him again. If that had been force, then he was a liar. He had never lied to his brother, never intended to. And there was the safe word, also. He knew Erestor would listen to that word, and he trusted it as Elladan did. So, he had taken Elladan's cock in his mouth for some other reason, and not because his cock had been pressed to his lips, his hands pressed to the sides of his head, not because of the motivating slap across fresh welts Erestor had delivered.

"Elrohir!" Elladan's voice again, concern increasing to alarm. Erestor rocked him, slipped a hand under his chin and tilted his face up. Worry shown clearly in his dark eyes. Elrohir met his gaze easily; there was no judgment in that dark gaze, none of Erestor's half contemptuous amusement. Tears stung his eyes again, this time of gratitude.

"I didn't know." He said softly, and Erestor nodded.

"No, you didn't." He said soothingly. "Talk to me, Elrohir, tell me what was hardest for you."

His eyes were wide and guileless as he looked at Erestor; the first tear slipped down his cheek silently, and he did not wipe it away. "I liked it."

"The whipping?"

"No… Yes… What Elladan was doing to me." He shifted uncomfortably. "Both together."

"That's nothing to be ashamed of, love. That is the point, pen-rhovan, to be unable to separate one from the other. You did well."

"You looked beautiful, brother." Elladan said, and Elrohir cast him a quick, sideways glance. He lay on his side, head propped on his hand, watching him with eyes softened by concerned tenderness. "Was I like that, Erestor?"

Erestor smiled. "You were and are beautiful, Elladan, never a disappointment to me." He stroked Elrohir's cheek. "You have never disappointed me, either."

He looked askance at the dark haired elf, and Erestor chuckled.

"If I did not find you desirable, I would not be taking this time with you, Elrohir. Have no fear, little one."

No fear. It was an odd reassurance when Elrohir felt there was plenty to fear. In another way, though, he thought he could understand. Here was a sort of sensual fatalism that denied fear, that made fear meaningless. He remembered what his brother had said to him, -if I have no choices, then I have no guilt.- No guilt, and no fear.

It contradicted his denial of force, but it also made sense. If a choice had been made, then he had made it weeks ago, had merely confirmed it when he'd allowed Erestor to lock his wrists within the dangling mithril cuffs. He was not a hero, not the voice of sanity, not a check rein on anyone's behavior. Elrohir did not want to look at the truth that lay beneath these things that he had been telling himself, but he supposed that soon he would have to. The only defense he had were the words he'd spoken to Erestor: -I didn't know.- He knew what his father would say to that, had heard it time and time again. Ignorance is not a defense.
*****

The twin elves slept, Elrohir half on top of Erestor and Elladan close at Elrohir's side. Elrohir had not spoken much. Erestor hadn't expected that he would. Given time to adjust he would speak more freely to Elladan, and then Elladan would speak to him. It would be awkward for a bit, but he was confident that his former student would rise above his confusion.

Elrohir felt right in his arms, warm and pliant in a way he had not been previously. Always there had been a stiffening at gentle contact, a slight pulling away until he could will himself to relaxation. Elrohir had not wanted to deal with both sides of him; he wanted one or the other, stability, unchangingness. Now he saw the point of it, understood that it was not solely for the sake of keeping him unbalanced, understood why Elladan curled up close to him, kissed him, whispered endearments in the soft darkness of night.

He missed having Elladan in his arms, but he knew that Elrohir needed him. He glanced over silken hair still bound up to keep the long tendrils from aggravating raw skin. Elladan lay nestled at Elrohir's side, not wanting to wrap his brother in an embrace while he was sore and hurting. By morning the worst of it would be past; he had not used a whip or flail on Elrohir. He would be sore and uncomfortable for a day or so, but this had been nothing like the decorative, skin slicing stripes that he occasionally covered Elladan's back with. Honestly, he didn't know if Elrohir would ever be able to bear up under such treatment, but he found that it didn't matter. It was not for their sameness that he desired the twins, not for his likeness to Elladan that he wanted Elrohir.

Erestor had been concerned for Elrohir in a way he hadn't been for Elladan. Elladan was all enthusiasm and exuberance; their had been no need to maneuver Elladan until he'd felt his back was to the wall. His tears afterwards had been simple reaction, and though he had offered no defense Erestor knew that he might have said the same words that Elrohir had. In his case, however, the "I didn't know" would have been in reference to the extremity of feeling. Elrohir had not been speaking of that; he had already told him that he hurt, and he was not one to repeat himself.

Elrohir… He kissed the top of the elf's head, smiled at the soft murmur that greeted his action. It had started because of Elladan, of course. All of it had started with Elladan, the looks he cast his brother's way, unremarked by any save for the chief advisor of Imladris. Unremarked even by Elladan, Erestor believed. Elladan was not prone to intellectualization as Elrohir was; he would not have told himself pretty lies to cover the truth, but would have rather ignored it. He would have ignored it until it became a mystery even to him, a blind spot in the middle of his love for his brother. Erestor had known that, and like any stalker closing in on his prey it was from Elladan's blind spot that he'd struck.

He had tossed the idea around with his lover then, and had been called a malicious meddler. Erestor didn't see it that way. Elladan in his arms was pure joy, and he wished he could have shared this with his former love who had obstinately refused to have anything to do with this. –I will be here when you tire of them,- was what he had said, had vanished on the night he had made his first move on Elladan. Erestor missed him. He was not yet prepared to give up the pleasure of the twins, though, his enthusiastic young lover and his lover's brother. Elrohir was not ready for that, and neither was Elladan. Elladan had only begun to find the love his heart had insidiously, secretly craved, and Elrohir was not yet ready to give to him fully.

And he did love them, not just the process of remaking them until they could see each other. He could not explain that, not to them, not to himself. Elladan was his shining star to whom he would give anything, and he supposed that he himself had been guilty of intellectualization at the outset. Meddling was the excuse to have Elladan, not the reason. Perhaps the real reason was why his lover had left him, and if so he had to admit that his lover had been justified.

*****

previous | Chapter Index | next

If you enjoyed this story, please send feedback to: Kharessa Bloodrose