Title & Chapter Number: An Arrangement of Thorns 22/36
Author(s): - Author's Index
Fandom: Middle Earth
Rating: NC-17
Disclaimer: I do not own these settings or characters, and am making no profit from the writing and sharing of this story.
Warnings: BDSM, twincest, angst.
Betas: None
Cast: Erestor/Elladan/Elrohir
Timeline: TA AU
Spoilers: None
Summary: Elrohir thinks. Erestor upsets Elladan, and Elrohir has a talk with Erestor.
Notes: This was an idea that struck me a while back when I was tossing around ideas on what to do when I'd finished with Glorfie and Erestor. Seems I haven't quite gotten Erestor out of my system. This is NOT the same Erestor as the one I wrote in my previous series.
It had been a tiring day, made all the more irritating by the monotony of the work assigned to them. Elrohir had known how to care for his own horses almost since he'd been old enough to ride, but cleaning their stalls was not one of his regular duties. Certainly it wasn't his job to do the work of the stable hands for an entire day. Even so, he did not completely object to the hard, manual labor that had swallowed his day. It helped him to maintain his resentments, kept his focus on the retribution he felt he deserved.
The next day would be free, and after that Elladan would spend a week confined to the immediate vicinity inasmuch as his duties allowed. Then Erestor would be leaving with Elrond and Glorfindel, off to Lothlorien for at least a month, and Elrohir expected that all manner of things would change during that time. The smile that surfaced as he thought of that was not entirely pleasant.
Elladan had not seemed put out by their day of work. On the contrary, Elladan had put his back into it with distracted amiability, had chattered incessantly and occasionally whistled a tune that Elrohir had heard sung by several other soldiers. Elrohir knew the cause of his good mood well enough; he had made appropriate excuses for him at the breakfast table that had not included mention of intimate relations with their father's chief advisor. Elrond had accepted those excuses, and Elrohir had felt more than a tickle of dismay at the ease with which he could deceive his father.
In small ways they had both lied before, small, usually ill conceived deceptions designed to get them out of (or into) trouble. Still, it had used to seem to Elrohir that Elrond and Celebrian were oddly all-knowing, not in the mystical way of their grandmother but in the simple, pedestrian manner of telepathy that most adults seemed to possess in regard to elflings. It was annoying and comforting, something to be tested but also something to feel safe in, a sort of invisible safety net that was always there.
During the last years of their protracted elven adolescence, Elrohir had believed that the time for those little lies and tests were behind them, that they were entering into an adulthood of responsibility and truthfulness that would allow them the freedom they had sought blunderingly as elflings. They could have respect and privileges instead of treats and cuddles; they would exist on that same, moveless plane their parents lived on. Childhood had not ended with a definitive putting away of toys and story books, but Elrohir had felt as if adulthood might be attained that way, that on his fiftieth name day he had achieved something intangible yet real. He could see that thing in his father's eyes, thought that perhaps he'd attained that adult telepathy for himself.
Now it seemed that adults operated in the dark as much as elflings, that small lies had merely been traded for larger ones, that Elrond could not see his thoughts as easily as he might see sunlight through window glass. The difference between elflings and elves, Elrohir thought, was that no one was there to sort matters out for them when situations went from bad to worse. No one advised unless asked for advice. He stopped to consider that Erestor was his father's advisor, shuddered at the thought.
There could be… ramifications. The word "criminal" danced in Elrohir's mind, barely seen, surfacing sporadically like a bit of bark tossed upon ocean waves. He supposed that what he was doing with Erestor was unethical, but not actually a crime. What he was doing with his brother was another matter. And what of the payment he was demanding of Erestor for it? Was that not criminal in its own way, this insistence on an apology made in figurative blood? He would never be brought before any law court for that, but Elrohir could well imagine what his father would say. He tried not to think about that, tried not to envision the look Elrond would give him. Not even the possibility of words spoken was as frightening as the expression he knew he would see, not the look of a disappointed father confronting a wayward son but that of an elf staring at something foreign, unrecognizable.
"I'm no better than he is." Elrohir said flatly to the empty room as he levered himself out of his bath. The scent of horse, straw, hay, and manure was gone, but he still felt dirty. Perhaps that was something else about being an adult, something that wasn't mentioned along with talk of responsibility and privileges earned. Perhaps with making one's own decisions and taking one's own course came the obligation to walk in one's own cloud of stench and filth. He knew a great deal of the history of his family; he was far from the first of his line to live with thoughts and deeds that made reverie come slowly and uneasily at night. He was not even one of the worst offenders. It was not something he would ask his father about.
-Too late for choices.- An oddly gentle voice spoke in his mind, and Elrohir grimaced. It was what he'd told himself from the beginning, since the time when making a different choice actually had been possible. He didn't believe that voice anymore, the siren call of his darker nature. Even so, he thought he could understand Elladan a little better, could see why his brother was so inclined to let personal matters roll over and around him with so little resistance.
Someone tapped on the door, and Elrohir sighed, shrugged quickly into a bathrobe and hurried back to the bed chamber.
"Enter."
"Elrohir?" Elladan opened the door barely far enough to let himself in, closed it behind him. His hair hung forward, and when he looked up to meet Elrohir's gaze, Elrohir saw that his eyes were reddened as if he'd been crying.
"Oh, Elladan, what is wrong?" Elrohir felt his own heart surge at the sight of Elladan's misery, a sharing of feeling that had always been between them but had strengthened in the past weeks. Elladan moved toward him, reaching instinctively, and Elrohir folded him into his embrace unmindful of his wet robe and dripping hair.
"I don't know." Elladan said dully, head resting on his brother's shoulder. "Erestor… Everything was so wonderful this morning." His voice thickened as if he would sob. Elrohir tightened his grip, and Elladan took a deep breath, shuddered against him.
"What did Erestor say to you?" The words came out cold and flat.
"Nothing… nothing really. Just that something had come up, that we… that I… could not be with him tonight. I would not be bothered except for that I know it is not true."
"How do you know, Elladan?"
"I just do."
Elrohir did not doubt him. If either of them could be said to have a touch of their grandmother's ability, it was Elladan. He was the one person who really could see the truth when he wished to, and now it seemed that he'd seen more than he'd ever wanted to.
"Elladan, stay here."
"Where are you going?"
"To see Erestor." He pushed Elladan down gently on the bed, tossed his robe aside and darted into the bath to grab a towel. Elladan stared wide eyed as his brother briskly dried himself, wrung out his hair with atypical ferocity.
"You cannot!"
"I can, and I will." He jerked open the wardrobe door, pulled out a pair of leggings and a tunic without bothering to look at them. Once dressed he dragged a comb cursorily through his hair, smoothing the surface only. "Stay here."
"Elrohir!"
But Elrohir was already leaving, the door nearly slamming shut on his brother's final entreaty.
~*~*~*~
He jerked on the handle to Erestor's door, only dimly surprised that it was unlocked. In his mind he had envisioned himself wrenching it, beating on the solid oak with his fist, ripping the door from its hinges if necessary. That Erestor could have reduced Elladan to tears in this way was unthinkable, unimaginable, unforgivable. It made the dark thoughts of his own transgressions seem like nothing more than self pitying babble, the weeping of a child who has cut himself on a shiny, new toy.
The unlocked door allowed him to proceed with unslowed momentum, but he was utterly unprepared for what he found. Erestor sat huddled in the center of his libertine's bed, legs folded, head in hands, sobbing like a child. Elrohir came to an abrupt halt, jumped at the sound of the door slamming shut behind him.
"Erestor…"
"Damn you." There was no force behind the words. "Are you satisfied now?" Erestor looked up, black sloe eyes wet and limpid, glaring. "He went to you, of course, his elf knight. Because I hurt him. But it is really you who has hurt him, now isn't it?"
"I don't know what you are talking about." He'd been thrown off track, but he felt his anger re-emerging again as he was faced by the advisor's mixed sorrow and fury. "I know he has spent his day in bliss, and he came to me tonight in tears. Have you broken that trust that we spoke of, Erestor? Did you send him away?"
"I can't do this, Elrohir." Erestor stared down at his hands, swallowed hard.
"You don't love him."
"I did not say that. I just… can't." He sighed heavily. "Has it not occurred to you that there is more here than your ill used feelings?"
"Oh, yes, it has. There are also Elladan's."
"You two were meant for each other, made for one another." There was no spite or venom in the words, only a sort of dull flatness. "I thought I understood that."
"You talk in riddles."
"Because you would not listen to the unvarnished truth." He took a deep breath, looked up to meet Elrohir's eyes. "Have pity, Elrohir. You think you are hurting me by forcing this closeness, rubbing my face in what can only be a loss. But Elladan is talking of bonding, and you are hurting him, too. Or is that also what you want?"
Elrohir stared, opened his mouth and then closed it. Erestor smirked, wiped the back of his hand across his damp cheeks.
"And everyone mistakes you for the intelligent, wise one. I can live with the loss, elf knight. I'm sure your brother can, too. But he shouldn't have to deal with it at all. Do you understand?"
"You have caused this."
"Yes, yes I have." The dark eyes glinted brightly, now steel edged instead of tear rimmed. "I'll admit my error. But now… leave it alone, Elrohir. Please. For your brother's sake."
"Alright." He said softly, turned on his heel. "I guess I don't need to demand anything of you. It seems to me that you're getting what you deserve without my help."
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