No Way You Can Fall by Himring

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Chapter 1

(Names:  Fingon=Findekano, Maedhros=Maitimo, Turgon=Turukano)

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i

Fingon:

‘Idolatry—what does that mean to you?’, he asks.

There it comes—finally. But I had not expected such an oblique approach to the subject.

‘Idolatry? Strictly for Vanyar.’

‘Ah?’

‘Noldor may not always love altogether wisely, it is true...’

‘And the difference is?’

‘In love, there is no way you can fall.’

Where do I get the nerve to make such an outrageous claim? As if the streets of Tirion had not been littered with estranged couples, even before the Darkening of Valinor! But I am determined not to yield an inch over Maitimo. I will take any punishment meted out to me rather than forswear him.

Only—there was no reaction, no punishment that I was able to recognize.  It was not until much later that I began to wonder whether that exchange was, in fact, about what I imagined it to be about. Maybe, in truth, Namo was trying to finding out whether I would take Maitimo back in any condition they chose to give him back to me.

In which case I was not exaggerating at all.

 

ii

Fingon:

In the early hours of the morning, I turn over and, without looking, drowsily reach out my hand. I encounter an empty pillow. The sheets on the left-hand side of the bed are cool to the touch. Echoes of past loss and present anxiety reverberate through me; I quickly sit up in bed.

He has not gone far, however. He is standing by the window, looking out into the grey light just before dawn. Having heard me move, he turns and meets my eyes.

That faint apologetic smile that seems to say: I know I have no right to take up space or breathe the air, but you will forgive me once again, won’t you?—that smile, that apology is progress. Not so long ago, he was so certain that his existence was unforgivable, he would not have bothered to apologize. My therapeutic approach is unsophisticated, even crude. I get up and put my arms around him, giving him a safe place to stand. Feeling some of the tension in his muscles drain away, I demonstrate to him once again how perfectly my head fits against his shoulder.

See? You belong here. With me.

And although, if asked, he would say he has failed and betrayed me all the way, when I feel his palm gently settle against the small of my back, it is I who feel loved and secure. 

 

iii

Fingolfin:

I’m standing beside my desk fuming once again about my son’s persistent evasions and my brother’s diplomatic attempts to pacify me, when suddenly, finally the meaning lurking beneath Arafinwe’s hints becomes clear to me and the revelation hits me right between the eyes. One moment, it all seems ridiculous and incredible, the next it is the only possible explanation. Even before I have quite reached that conclusion, I find myself storming out of the house and rushing through the streets of Tirion towards Findekano’s house.

Several of Findekano’s staff, loyal to their master’s known wishes, try to delay or even stop me, but I will not be denied this time. I was not High King of the Noldor once for nothing. I relentlessly bully my way past them, pick out the youngest and most frightened-looking of them, elicit the whereabouts of their master’s cousin and head straight towards the kitchen.

When I enter the room, it is empty except for Maitimo and one of the kitchen maids. The maid takes a look at my face and runs. Maitimo, who, for some obscure reason, is standing by the sink next to a large pile of potatoes, does not even look up.

‘Uncle’, he says quietly—I suppose I raised my voice enough outside so that he knew it was I who was approaching—‘you aren’t here to ask how come I love your son, are you?’

The sheer gall of this takes my breath away. I expected him to deny it, at least attempt to cover it up with diplomatic phrases. But he has come right out and actually said it.

‘Oh, am I not?!’

Still he refuses to raise his head.

‘Surely, you must know what my answer must be?’

And while I am still searching for words to reject the supposition that I might have any insight whatsoever into such unnatural desires, he continues:

‘Since Findekano is manifestly the most lovable creature in Arda, how could I help it? The wonder is that he doesn’t have to fend off his admirers with a broom, wherever he goes.’

‘That is not funny!’

‘Isn’t it? Then it’s a good thing I am not joking, isn’t it?’

He lifts his hands a little way out of the sink. He is still not looking at me.

‘Look. I’ve just peeled a potato. Do you know how difficult that would have been to do with only one hand?’

His right hand is, in fact, holding a potato, his left a kitchen knife. I ignore this pointless, ludicrous attempt to distract me and demand:

‘Do you think all this is fair to my son?’

‘Of course not’, he replies, unmoved. ‘I’m not in the habit of thinking things are fair to Findekano. But are you implying that I should be the one to deny your son what he has decided he wants?’

That is precisely what I was implying, of course. My son is a normal, decent elf at heart, so this entanglement is obviously Maitimo’s fault. By some insidious means, though, my nephew seems to be contriving to put me in the wrong.

‘But...’

This time he interrupts me.

‘No. I’ve had a bellyful of leaving Findekano. Each time I do it is worse than the last. I will not leave him again, unless he sends me away himself.’

His voice is still perfectly even and placid. He bends farther over the sink, cold-shouldering me, as if I was not worthy of his notice. The movement makes the heavy coils of his hair slither forward and downward, baring the pallor of his neck.

I cannot help envisaging my son as he threads trembling fingers through those shimmering tresses, ardently kisses the white skin beneath, a prey to lust, while Maitimo behind the curtain of his hair conceals a self-satisfied smirk...  Blind rage and disgust overwhelm me. I feel the gorge rise in my throat, my hands clench and unclench. Suddenly, I am very frightened of myself.

I will never know what I would have done. Fortunately, at this moment there comes the sound of running feet. The door crashes open. Either Findekano’s staff does not stay bullied for long or that kitchen maid was not merely fleeing, as I thought.

Findekano takes in the scene at a glance. Then he turns to me and says just one word:

‘Out.’

I stare at him. Almost irrelevantly, it occurs to me that all this time I thought that it was Turukano who was the obedient one of my sons, because he agreed with me about almost everything. But on the few occasions when Turukano disagreed, he disobeyed me without the slightest hesitation. Findekano, on the other hand, disagreed with me about many, many things, but always leaned over backwards to see my point of view. And so I foolishly imagined that, loyal soul that he was, he was easily swayed by everyone—until this moment, when he is throwing me out of his house as he would any stranger, because he thinks I am a threat to Maitimo. Maitimo, I recognize at this moment, is not negotiable.

I leave without arguing, but not quite quickly enough. My hand is already on the door handle, when I overhear Findekano’s loving, anxious voice saying:

‘Maitimo, he’s gone. You can let go now.’

I hear the potato and the knife clattering into the sink and, as Maitimo allows himself to be pulled away by Findekano, I turn around in time to see what I was not meant to see. Bloodless cheeks, lips rigid, eyes showing white like a panicked horse’s—obscene, yes, but not at all in the way I imagined. I close my eyes, take a step backwards and pull the door shut.

 

iv

‘He’s right, you know. Your life would be easier if I returned to Mandos.’

‘Oh, much easier! So much easier that my one remaining problem would be why I should bother to get up in the morning at all.’

‘I’m sorry.’

‘You’re sorry? My father scares you halfway to Mandos—and you apologize to me?’

‘I ought not to have been scared. I was trying so very hard not to take you for granted...’

‘Maitimo. Take me for granted. At least as much as this.’ 

 

v

 

Fingolfin:

Returning to Findekano’s house the next day, I have learnt my lesson. I enquire politely whether my son will consent to see me and do not mention Maitimo at all. Findekano receives me alone, severe and remote as a judge.

‘Before you say anything’, he greets me, ‘I would like to remind you that I am no longer the king of Hithlum or any other country. Do not attempt to persuade me that I should continue to make sacrifices to preserve a royal reputation. It will not work, I tell you.’

Thus inadvertently answering the question how long this has been going on. It seems at least I did not overlook an affair being conducted right under my nose. But how much else did I overlook?

‘How is he?’, I ask him, ignoring his comment.

He is surprised at the question and regards me distrustfully before replying, in a tight, clipped tone:

‘He asked me whether I wished him to return to Mandos.’

When he sees the expression of shock and alarm on my face, his own expression becomes milder.

‘You did not suggest it to him?’

‘I did not! I just wanted him to leave you...’

My son is clearly rapidly revising his opinion of me, inclined to absolve me of active malice, but astounded at the depth of my stupidity. How was I supposed to have known that asking Maitimo to give up Findekano would be tantamount to suggesting suicide to him? After all, as of yesterday, I had not even seen Maitimo since before the Dagor Bragollach. On the other hand, Findekano may be right about my monumental stupidity, for during all the time since our return to Tirion my son and I were closely in contact with each other and yet I never had an inkling he regarded himself as bereaved, until he went and fetched Maitimo from Lorien. He did not make much fuss about it...

‘Can you cope?’, I ask him.

I continue to surprise him—as he continues to surprise me.

‘It is Maitimo’, he informs me kindly, as if he imagines I have somehow overlooked that all-important fact.

That was precisely what I meant, my son. If you had to fall in love with a cousin, couldn’t it have been a female cousin? And if it had to be a male cousin, couldn’t it have been one with a reasonably clean slate and in full possession of his faculties?  It appears the answer to those questions is no and no and no.

‘He said that you were manifestly the most lovable creature in Arda’, I inform him grudgingly.

His face lights up.

‘Did he?’

It had occurred to me that if it was quite that evident Maitimo might not have got around to mentioning it to my son. It seems I was right. I might even have gained a little forgiveness by repeating it to him.

‘I suppose you are now going to tell me that you think he is.’

He smiles.

‘No—just the only one, for me.’

Clearly, there is no hope of Findekano regaining his sanity any time soon. Come to think of it, this misguided passion already seems to have withstood almost any test that elf or Vala could devise. A new thought crosses my mind. It was my son that Irmo sent for...

‘I suppose the Valar must know?’

‘I guess they do’, he answers. He hesitates.

‘What are you not saying?’

‘I think they want him for something, so they gave him to me to try and patch him together again...’

‘Is that what Maitimo said?’, I ask, rather suspiciously.

He frowns at me.

‘Maitimo? He told me he thought Namo had let him out of Mandos so that he could remember me.  He was in no condition then to speculate about Namo’s motives. If he has thought about the matter since, he hasn’t discussed it with me.’ 

 

vi

Fingolfin:

Neither of us had expected Maitimo to be waiting for us outside the door, straight and still in his black clothes like a young pine tree in the centre of the courtyard. Correction: it’s not us he’s waiting for, for he greets me politely and distantly and immediately shifts his attention completely to Findekano, as if my reactions are of no interest at all. I conclude that he is here to establish that Findekano made it through the interview with me intact, body and soul. Which would be absolutely ridiculous if there had not been that moment of near-violence in the kitchen, the moment I hate to remember and cannot forget...

Findekano goes to him, reaches up and, pulling Maitimo’s head downwards, whispers something in his ear. It must be something reassuring. Maitimo loses some of that careful lack of expression and permits himself a small relieved smile.

It is not at all like the imaginary scene that disgusted me so and yet, as they stand there, paying no attention to me for the moment, they are so clearly a couple that I wonder why it doesn’t seem to bother me all that much.  It was because I was thinking of Maitimo as a Feanorion behind that curtain of red hair that I got so upset earlier, I realize, because I felt that this was still Feanaro somehow getting back at me... In fact, I do not even know how my brother would feel about this affair, if he were here to see it. Maybe he would take a look at the way Maitimo’s neck obediently bends at the slightest pressure of my son’s hand, and the walls of the house would shake with the eruption of his wrath.

But if so, he would be missing how their attitudes match each other. Just as Findekano firmly interposes his jutting shoulder between Maitimo and the rest of the world, that curve of Maitimo’s body seems to be trying to shield Findekano from anything that might threaten him—less obtrusively, less confidently perhaps, but the impulse is the same.  I have failed to distinguish Maitimo from Feanaro before; it was always a mistake. Maitimo has his own flaws—and fatal enough they turned out to be—but he was always far less likely than either myself or Feanaro to confuse love with power. And I see now that I have no choice but to hope that Findekano is right about Maitimo, because every other imaginable alternative would clearly be so much worse. 

 

vii

 

Fingon:

The soup is hot and spicy the way I like it. It is potato soup.

The moment that fact percolates my consciousness I lose all my appetite. I carefully put down the spoon beside my plate. Maitimo, across from me, looks up questioningly; then he puts down his own spoon, too.

‘I suppose we have weathered the storm, at least for now’, I say, ‘but I cannot get over that scene when I came into the kitchen. Father looked as if he was about to strangle you with his bare hands and you, holding the potato knife...’

‘I was not going to harm him’, he says.

I begin to answer, then stop and give him a very hard look.

‘I ought to be glad to hear that, since I most definitely didn’t want my father to end up with a kitchen knife in his belly... But you sound far too certain. What you mean, don’t you, is that you would just have stood there and let him do whatever he felt like doing, without raising a finger to stop him?’

‘It is the only way, I have found, to make really sure of not harming anybody’, he says reasonably, apologetically.

I take a deep breath and consider yelling at him. Where does he think he’s coming from, a Feanorion going pacifist on me? The thing is—I can see perfectly well where he is coming from. This time, there was no oath and nobody to defend, neither father nor brother, neither Noldo nor Sinda nor any other living being—not even the honour of the House of Feanaro. What honour, he would ask me, what house? There is no House of Feanaro, now.

He is watching me.

‘I am sorry’, he says quickly, ‘he had me cornered, mentally. I knew there must be something I could say that would stop making him angrier and angrier, but I was so terrified I was about to lose you, I couldn’t think straight. Really, I should just have screamed and run away. Your father would never attack anyone who did that. It’s not something I find easy to do, though—concealing one’s fears is very habit-forming. Maybe I should put in a bit of screaming and running practice, do you think?’

I would really, really like to yell at him. But there is that very slight hopeful lift to the corner of his mouth. And the image he is conjuring up is hard to resist: Maitimo going down to the garden each day for an hour to practice screaming and running away with all his customary concentration and discipline, just as he now goes to improve his balance and the coordination of his right hand, exercising with a wooden blade.

I prop my elbows on the table, put my head in my hands, and laugh and laugh and laugh. It’s mainly relief, of course. Maitimo is still with me, and I haven’t had to give up my father for him.

Maitimo is still with me. Yesterday, when I hauled him out of the kitchen like a half-drowned man out of a shipwreck, I almost wondered whether I was doing him a favour in clinging to him so hard, whether it would not be kinder to let go. But today he sits across the table from me and calmly eats his soup—or he would have, if I had let him.

‘Maitimo’, I say, when I’ve finally caught my breath, ‘the next time you consider letting an enraged member of the population of Valinor rip you to pieces—remember you are my heart, will you?’

‘I will.’

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Chapter End Notes

The motif of a discussion of idolatry is taken from a story of Lyra (A Minor Talent), although the conversation itself is a rather different one.

 

See here for Esteliel's picture of Maedhros and Fingon, commissioned by Erulisse  for help_japan at LiveJournal, and based on the story above: http://esteliel.livejournal.com/424392.html.