A madness most discreet by Agelast

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Findekáno II

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My father's house was a noble pile, and terribly ostentatious. Well, it was fit for a prince of a craft-proud people, and thus hopelessly overdone. I loved every over-decorated bit of it. 

Night had fallen hours ago, and the hour grew very late - the silvery light of Telperion was waning at last. I leaned even closer to Maitimo, who again pretended not to notice. He did not need to knock on the main doors, for they were already open. I could see the anxious face of Arvarno, my father’s butler, peering out into the darkness. 

“Is my Lord Findekáno quite well?” he asked nervously. 

“Oh, he's well enough,” Maitimo assured him, “I just needed to put him to bed.” Arvarno took a few steps forward – but once again Maitimo held him off.

“I can handle it, good sir. It's not the first time I've had to deal with a kinsman besotted by drink.”

I was about to protest, to say that I wasn't drunk at all – but I thought better of it. After all, I was quite satisfied with clinging to Maitimo in an unseemly fashion for a while longer. In a voice set low -- presumably not to disturb me -- Arvarno said that he would see to our things. As Maitimo and I made our way to my chambers, I managed to yell out that he should bring up the best wine available in elvendom to my rooms, immediately. 

“Dearest cousin, you really are the most terrible brat,” Maitimo whispered in my ear. I shuddered, half delight and half unease. Why did he do this to me? Did he not know the effect he had on me? Or did he know, and do it deliberately, I thought as we finally barreled into my bedroom. 

 

I was dumped on my bed with very little ceremony. I struggled out my robes, now uncomfortably close and sweaty. I wondered if Maitimo would help me out – my hand seemed to be caught in my sleeve. But no help was forthcoming. He was quite absorbed with the pile of books I kept on my bedside table. He pulled one out and examined it.

“Isn't this one of mine...?” 

He flipped it open to the flyleaf. Sure enough, written in bold black tengwar, was his full name, taking more the half of the page. He closed it with a soft sigh. 

“You said you had lost it.”

“I had not finished it when you asked for it back,” I said, finally freeing myself from my damp robes. I kicked them to the floor and got up to find a nightshirt. 

“You ought pick that up, don't leave it for the servants,” he said absently, such brotherly advice surely second nature to him now. I made a noncommittal sound as I returned, freshened by a splash of water on my face. I kicked the robes underneath my bed, and guiltily looked around to see if he would protest further. 

But no, Maitimo was stretched on my bed, eyes closed, my - his - book perched on his chest. I was about to say call for some light--my lamp on the side table was inadequate for any kind of reading. It was spookily good timing then, that Arvarno should have knocked on the door. I hurried to open it, and ushered him in. The bottle of wine was deposited on my desk, and I instructed Arvarno to freshen the linens in the room next to mine – once Turukáno's – for Prince Nelyafinwë. He bowed and left quietly.

“I have often wondered if my father hired him for his extreme quietude, if that is the right word to use,” I observed to no one in particular. (It wasn't, of course.) Maitimo was silent, and with a stab of panic, I wondered if he had fallen asleep. He had not. He regarded me thoughtfully, and watched me as I poured out the wine. He accepted a glass, never taking his eyes off of me. We half-finished out the bottle in this way, neither daring to speak nor to break our staring contest. I was about to say how silly this was when he interrupted me. 

“Are you truly jealous of me?” he asked, looking then as sad as a child might, after hearing that his beloved dog had been run over by a cart. I swallowed loudly, and wondered how he could have known this unkind thing, this terrible canker on my soul. I had never spoken of it to anyone at all, and from the outside at least, our friendship was as it had ever had been. Carefully, I asked what he meant by that. He made an impatient gesture with his hand, and I could not help but smile. Always-diplomatic Maitimo, had lost his legendary patience at last. 

“Jealousy is an ugly emotion,” I started slowly, “And not one that anyone would be proud to admit to having. But it is a very human one, I think. It is common enough in everyone. I know I have felt jealousy for Turukáno’s easy relationship with our father, and of Findaráto's graciousness and popularity. I know that I shall never be as beloved among our people as he. But, you ask about yourself, I am... I ashamed of my feelings towards you, Maitimo.” 

I lapsed into silence. He filled my glass again. Will dull surprise, I saw that it was empty. I took another swig of the wine, and noted that it was indeed fine stuff, the finest wine in my father's cellar, in fact. It was the stuff my father brought out when he wished to impress someone. Certainly, it wasn't meant to be guzzled in the dark by the likes of us. 

How I savored the taste of it on my tongue. 

“Go on,” Maitimo said. 

And so I did. 

 

“I am jealous. I am incredibly jealous. Of everything. Absolutely everything. Of you. Of other people who are near you when I am not. People who you can speak to in a way that I cannot speak to you. I'm jealous of those fawning maids who fall over whenever you even look at them. Every one of which you could have, who could have you in a way that I cannot. I am jealous of every moment I am not with you, and every moment I do not think of you. The only thing I am not jealous of is your brothers. I have never been, because what I feel for you is not the feeling between brothers. Or between cousins, half-cousins, even. Such want does not come with those feelings. Such hunger –“ I broke there, my face flushed. I could not look at him, not then. 

“I know what I feel, and I know it is wrong. It is such a sin that our people have never even considered it and I am sinner. I cannot easily look upon the Shining Ones anymore, for I am sure they could see into my heart and read this terrible flaw. But I cannot change. I do not want to change.”

We sat in silence for a long while. I did not look at him, I looked anywhere but him. I noticed, idly, that my wine glass was broken – it was a delicate thing, part of a set that my mother had received on her last begetting day from my aunt Eärwen. It had been green sea-glass, made from the sands of Alqualondë. I had cracked it, having gripped it far too hard. Now there was cut on my left hand, already starting to bleed. Blast it. My mother would surely ask some difficult questions tomorrow. 

 

“Findekáno, look at me,” he said. And with great reluctance, I did. He did not look disgusted at my depravity. Nor did he look sympathetic and kind, ready to gently push his wayward young cousin to the path of righteousness. No. His handsome face looked troubled and sad. Ah, this did nothing at all to make him less attractive to me.

“So you love me, cousin? Is that your confession?” he said, his hands flexing slowly, experimentally. I nodded. He looked at me, eye to eye. My heart twisted within me, for his eyes had always held a special fascination for me. They held a flame – for was he not the son the Spirit of Fire himself? Oh, his gaze was less searing, perhaps, than that of Fëanáro's, but then again, perhaps it was more steadfast. And for me, it was far more beautiful.

He reached out his hand, and I stiffened, ready for – Eru knows what – a blow, a kiss, what? I got neither, as it turned out. He plucked out the golden twists from my hair, long forgotten and deeply tangled within it. I smiled a little, at those twists, for they were my only vanity – or so I would like to think. 

“You'll get marks on your face, if you sleep with these things,” he murmured, as he handed them back to me. As he did, he noticed the cut on my right hand. He shot me a look of mild reproof, before taking his tunic and ripping a strip of fabric from it. He ignored my weak protests, and tied a firm bandage around my hand. 

I watched him carefully, avidly, for had I not confessed this is what I wanted to do, more than anything? Memory was a wonderful thing for the Eldar, and if nothing else, I wished to remember the time my fair cousin was in my bed, gently bandaging my wounds. If only I could forget that I had just embarrassingly confessed my love --- which, of course, would not be returned. How could it be? And yet there was a little part of me that cried out against the unfairness of it. That little part desperately wanted a yes. That little part – oh but it was my heart, which wanted, no, needed, some confirmation that as flawed as I was, as wrong as I was, I was not wholly alone in my wrongness.

Maitimo, oh, dear Maitimo declared then that he loved me too.

(Of course, I already knew that.)

He paused and looked at me, a hunted expression in his eye.

“But I cannot say if that is the sort of love you seek from me...” 

I stifled a sigh, which earned me a sharp look from him. He continued, “I do not know if I could love you like that. Perhaps though – in the future – I don't know... I am so sorry.” He did look wretched, as if he was truly sorry for not giving me what I so ardently wish for. 

I could not help it. I burst out laughing. It was all too strange! I laughed longer than the situation warranted – perhaps the situation did not warrant laughing at all. Surely Maitimo expected anger from me. Or perhaps I should have shed a few tears and discreetly wiped them away. Like... Oh, like his girlfriends of the week! Shamefully, I giggled at that, and wondered if I resembled those stricken females at all. This earned me a strange look from Maitimo. 

“Forgive me, Neylo, forgive me!” I managed to wheeze out. “It's just too funny, it really is. You looked so stricken, so very sorry that you could not take me now and do a dozen unnatural acts with me until the morning!” My chuckles died after that, as I saw that he was getting up, surely intending to leave. 

“Will you not stay in Turvo's room? I promise not to compromise your virtue any further,” I said, a smirk curling up my mouth. 

He shook his head, and said with a considerable amount of regret, that he really ought to get back home. His father expected him at the forge early the next morning. My smirk, if anything, grew. I knew exactly how much he enjoyed his time at his father's forge. 

As he hunted for his other boot – which had been pushed under my bed – I leaned back, more comfortable than I had been for months now. At least everything was out in the open. He finally found his errant boots, and got up from the floor with a cry of triumph. He sat on my bed to put them on. (For the last time, I thought, not without a certain amount of regret.) 

* * *

“Nelyo?”

“Hmm?”

“We are still friends, are we not?”

“Of course. It would more than a confession on your part that you want to bugger me silly for us to stop being friends. Or do you want me to bugger you silly?” He shot me a sly look. I buried my face into my pillow. 

He continued on. “Anyway, it's actually a bit of compliment.”

“I am glad my unnatural passions have given your ego a boost.” My voice was still muffed by pillow. 

A snort. I could hear him moving about in my room. I set my pillow down to observe him. 

“Don't be difficult. Now, where is my cloak?” 

“On the wingback chair, no, there, pushed back a bit.” 

Maitimo paused by the door, and said, “Do you really think I'm vain?”

I made a most un-princely sound.

“As vain as me, perhaps. Not as vain as Tyelkormo.”

He grinned. Predictably, it was dazzling.

“You are most unfair,” he said, very pleased.

Then he left, and I was bereft again.

* * *

Later, when my ruined robes were found, and the smashed wine glass recovered, as well as the bottle of father's best wine found all drunk up – and all of these things linked back Maitimo's stay in my rooms at the dead of night, my parents' worst suspicions were roused. Dark hints were dropped about my poor choice in friends, and my father threatened to write a sternly worded letter to Fëanáro on the deleterious effect Maitimo had on my morals. It was never sent, I think. My father lost his nerve or perhaps he realized how that ridiculous letter would surely make us the laughingstock of the Fëanáro's dinner table.

In any case, the whole thing was a sort of irony that I do not like. 

Not one bit.