Animal Skins by Ilye

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Celegorm

Please note: This chapter contains reference to self-tattooing, which could be construed as self-harm.

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It had been several days since he'd fled blindly from the camp. When he’d first tried to stand after Irissë found him, he’d swayed on his legs like a newborn fawn before his knees gave out and he collapsed back into an ungainly heap in the grass. He’d laughed, but she tsked that it was no wonder he’d exhausted himself, and had wrapped him up in her cloak and left him there whilst she went hunting and built a fire.

After Irissë had fed him the rabbit she’d caught and cooked, and banked the fire to make the charcoal they’d need, he lay with his head in her lap and simply watched the stars.

That first night out in the wild was the first time he’d ever felt really free since before his capture. Ithil carved a wide arc high above them whilst he rested there with her, content to simply be. Irissë’s fingers were in his hair, soothing against his scalp. They’d cropped it short in the name of hygiene, but despite numerous attempts at washing it still retained a yellow-grey tinge. It was obvious in the daylight, when it flopped into his eyes and got on his nerves, but the moonlight purged Angband’s lingering taint and bleached it back to its original silver-white. He hadn’t been able to see the stars or moon whilst he hung from Thangorodrim, obscured as they were by sloughs of greasy grey clouds, and he’d barely moved beyond his bed since he returned to his brothers’ camp by the lakeside. The cool breeze seemed to ventilate his very soul and the starlight sparks in the darkness masked everything that was terrible and hurt.

He was naked, at ease in the night, and he may have worn an alien skin, but he wore it under an Elven cloak.

He eventually came to realise that Irissë was watching him. He transferred his attention from the stars to her shadowed face and tilted his head in query. One hand slipped from his hair to his face and she traced her fingertips lightly over the scar that bisected his mouth and pulled his top lip up into a permanent sneer. He snapped playfully at her fingers. She snatched her hand away, but tweaked his nose as she did so. Without really thinking he smiled at her, but the movement made him overly aware of the scar and he brought his own hand up to follow the path her fingers had just taken.

“That was the first mark they put on me, you know.”

“What did they do?” Irissë asked, her voice even and no more than a whisper. If he hadn’t felt her other hand tighten momentarily in his hair, or heard her swallow hard before she spoke, he’d have thought her unaffected by the thought of his torture.

“The Orc captain struck me to shut me up,” he replied, and smirked. “Didn’t work, though. Just set the tone of things to come.” He fingered the scar again. “It’s going to be the first one to go.”

Irissë’s eyes twinkled as she blinked and nodded. “All right, then.” She scanned his face, lingering on his right cheekbone where they’d enjoyed backhanding him most; on his left eyebrow, split when they’d slammed his face into the floor; on the clipped and ragged edges of his ears.

“Do you remember where they all came from?”

He scoffed, and swept his hand towards the white-hatched disaster that was his bare torso in the moonlight. “Too many to count, Falcon. I couldn’t possibly remember them all. There are a few –” he caught her hand and pressed it against the brand on his chest, “– like this. That’s where they tried to mark me as their property. And this –” he moved her hand up to the thick stiff band around his throat, “– was from the iron collar they made me wear.”

He’d said it all lightly enough, but Irissë’s expression had crumpled into dismay. Her hand clenched into a fist where it rested against his neck and she bit her lip to hide the hitch of her breath. It made his innards twist as he realised in alarm that, beyond the jesting and the tough love, she cared enough to be saddened by what had been done to him. It seemed as though she were the only one, most of the time; his brothers’ attitudes ranged from Maitimo's detachment through fear that he’d come back either corrupted or insane, to Carnistir’s casual disdain that he should pull himself together, to Curufinwë’s cold curiosity at the new workings of his mind.

He looked up at her as kindly as he remembered how and took her hand in his.

Of course you cared enough. You came for me, when noone else would. You understand me.

“And then there’s this.” He guided her hand down and wrapped her palm over his bandaged stump. “I’ll always remember this one.”

“So I should think!” Irissë sniffed and swiped a few flyaway hairs from her face, her chin lifted vixen-proud. “Sometimes I wonder why I came for you, you know.”

“Because I burned the boats with my father, you mean?”

She glared at him and twisted away, no doubt stung by his bald admission.

“Ships,” she said finally. “They’re ships; don’t let Círdan catch you calling them boats .”

“I have no intention of letting Círdan catch me at all – I’m sure he’d have more to take insult at than because I misnamed his vessels.”

He thought of white sand stained and foaming with something far thicker than water, slick and oily in the flaming torchlight – and then beyond, to the roar and crackle of a bleached wood inferno and the sea that steamed and hissed as they turned their backs. And he felt absolutely nothing at all.

“Your people must hate us.”

She nodded. “They do. They can’t understand why I insist on returning to see you.”

He reached up and set his fingers against her jaw.

“I’m sorry they died and I didn’t.”

She caught his hand in hers and cupped it around her cheek. The smile that swelled it into his palm was soft and sorrowful.

“I think a little bit of you did die, you know.”

“The bit that makes me Elven.”

That sad smile again, and another nod. He was right. She understood him.

“And that’s why you’re not angry over the ships.”

“Oh,” she laughed then, bitter and wild, “I’m angry. But I’m not angry at you – I can’t be, not anymore. You’re not the same person – animal – that you were then. There’s no point.”

He’d gazed up at her, and all his words had died on his lips because nothing he could say meant anything. She squeezed his hand, then let go and went back to combing her fingers through his hair. Then she’d drawn a deep breath, and he’d fallen asleep to the sound of her nightingale song.

The next morning, they’d set to work.

~~~

He came back to the encampment still wearing Irissë’s cloak over his bare torso. “I’m resigned to you bloodying all my clothing these days,” she’d said with a twinkle in her eye, as she’d carefully replaced the padding over the new wounds on his right arm and buckled his brace back up. Though they’d made straight for his quarters upon arrival, and slipped through the camp unhindered, it was not long before his brothers arrived.

He folded himself cross-legged on top of his animal skins as Irissë let them into the room, hood drawn over his face and eyes glinting as he watched. They clamoured at her, asking after his health and his sanity, and he just listened, smirking. He didn't flinch as they approached, or when Makalaurë reached out saying, "Let me look at you," and threw back the hood.

When they all finally fell silent, gawping, he laughed and thrilled at the way it pulled the new, self-made scar across his mouth.

“Well, brothers? Aren’t you going to ask me what kind of creature I am today?”

Silence. A cleared throat; an awkward shifting of weight. Irissë rolled her eyes, but the drama was his alone and he was going to savour it.

“Ask me,” he pushed, then again more loudly when still no answer came, “Ask me!”

“Well tell us, then,” sniped Curufinwë from the back of the room, then affected a sing-song. “What kind of creature are you today, Tyelko?”

“Today…” he grinned, and the distance grew greater between him and them. “Today, I’m a Celegorm.”

Makalaurë stared at him. Maitimo was frowning, not fiercely but in that soft, confused manner he had when he was trying to puzzle out an academic problem. It was Carnistir who broke the moment as he swore and spat on the floor.

“Filthy Wood-elf language!”

"It’s the language of the thralls, actually," Celegorm replied lightly, with a leer of malice just below the surface. "Sindarin – I learned it in the Pit, don't you know?"

"Oh, I see.” Maitimo stepped forward now, his expression suggesting that everything was clear to him now. Celegorm suspected his brother had it all wrong. “Well, that would explain why you look as though you've been rolling around in the embers." He reached out as though to touch the marks that striped Celegorm's cheekbones, still raised and livid beneath the charcoal streaked into them. "What happened, Tyelko? Are you all right?"

"I'm fine – better than fine, in fact. I am well ."

The furrow between Maitimo's eyebrows deepened and he shot a backwards glance at where Irissë stood, impassive. "You don't look well . Whatever you've been doing, you've opened up all your wounds again–" he gestured to a patch of skin now visible through the cloak opening, "and you've got dirt inside them – you're filthy! I shall call for a bath."

He turned towards the door

"If you like, though they won't come out."

Maitimo looked back at Celegorm over his shoulder. "Pardon?"

"The marks. They're permanent."

What do you mean? How–

"Stop asking such stupid questions," Curufinwë cut in, elbowing past a glowering Carnistir to step in front of Maitimo and take control of the situation as easily as that. He raised an enquiring eyebrow and held out his hand. "May I?"

Celegorm shrugged his good shoulder and obliged by extending his left arm through the cloak opening. Carnistir drew in closer, peering down at the black stripes that now scored Celegorm’s forearm.

“I see, so you’ve embedded – what, charcoal? – under the skin. Must be important to get the depth correct, I should think. This one here, see? It looks too deep to me. I expect it’ll fade in time.”

“Then I shall have to make it again.”

Curufinwë’s lips pursed, with no clue as to whether he were hiding a scowl or a smile. Maitimo huffed a sigh of frustration, counterpoint to his hopeless expression that suggested he’d have half-preferred Celegorm to stay out in the wilds where he belonged, whilst Makalaurë had withdrawn next to Ambarussa, frowning. It was Carnistir who threw his hands up with an angered cry and spun to face Irissë.

“You let him do this?” he hissed, jabbing a finger towards her, “You helped him do this! Didn’t you? What were you thinking? You know he’s quite mad!”

Irissë’s expression opened with the beginnings of a furious defence, but Celegorm was on his feet and in front of her before she could speak.

“Don’t you dare talk to her like that!” he thundered at his younger brother. Carnistir flushed and had the grace to look intimidated as Celegorm loomed over him, eyes and teeth flashing amongst the new tattoos across his face. “I am not, actually quite mad – in fact, I think I’m saner than I have been in many a year and it’s Irissë you have to thank for it!”

He felt a hand on his shoulder, and looked behind him into Irissë’s calming eyes. He took a breath, but Carnistir had already turned on Curufinwë.

“Neither should you have taken him to the forge!” he hissed. “Didn’t it occur to you that it might send him lunatic again?”

Curufinwë just shrugged. “Bad ideas seem to run in our family, don’t you think?” he remarked placidly. Celegorm gave a self-deprecating laugh at that, then turned his attention to Ambarussa who had appeared at his side like an umber spectre.

"Permanent, you say?" Ambarussa muttered, his eyes fixed curiously on Celegorm’s face. He reached out, and Celegorm let him. “Looks like good camouflage to me. I don’t see why it’s a bad idea at all.” Celegorm made a noise of affirmation that twisted into a thrilled grunt of pain when his brother's fingers caught one of the marks a bit too harshly. Ambarussa’s ears twitched, but he made no apology.

"Whilst I was travelling," he said instead, pushing the cloak aside so he could investigate further, "I visited the lands of Men in the South. There, horse-like creatures roam the plains, white-skinned with black stripes." He looked up, expression impassive. "Zebras, they're called. You remind me of them."

Celegorm's laughter barked through the hush that had now fallen. "No chance of that, I'd say," he grinned. "Never once was I anybody's prey, and never shall I be yet."

“And I bet zebras don’t have our father’s crest marked on their chest, either.”

Celegorm looked up at Maitimo, who stood with his arms folded and his eyes fixed on the place where Morgoth’s servants had once seared their brand into living flesh. It had taken some time, but Irissë had finally succeeded in etching the outline of Fëanor’s eight-pointed star over the top of it. It was unfinished and lacking detail, but unmistakable nonetheless. Beside him, Curufinwë was frowning thoughtfully.

“I’m sure I could devise some coloured dyes to finish it off,” he murmured, more to himself than anyone else. Maitimo nudged him with his elbow and cleared his throat pointedly.

“So, tell me about this Celegorm creature, then.”

Celegorm offered him an arch look, but Maitimo's face had softened into an expression that suggested he was genuinely interested. Irissë shifted her weight at Celegorm’s side and dropped a touch of camaraderie to his back.

“Celegorm was born in the shadows,” he began, “and he speaks the language of the thralls.” He looked around the room. For once they were all listening.

“Celegorm is a thing to be feared,” he continued, and his heart beat joyfully for it was true. “He understands the ways of the animals, and the darkness. When at full strength he can bring down a wolf or an Orc with his bare hands.”

“What is his habitat?” Maitimo asked.

“The woods, the fields, the lakes, the mountains. He is a creature of the wilds, and will likely return there at intervals for it brings him alive. Confinement makes him unhappy, though he can stand it for a time.”

“And what does he eat?”

“Same things as you, mostly, although he can go for periods on insects and grubs if he needs to.” He paused and bared his teeth in a smile. “He is camouflaged and good at catching his own food.”

Maitimo nodded, thoughtful. Irissë and the rest of the brothers were quiet around them in varying states of discomfort. Then Maitimo unfolded his arms from across his chest and laughed, light and relieved, and the atmosphere shattered.

“He sounds like a tough old thing to me, this Celegorm,” he said, stepping close and reaching for Celegorm’s shoulder. “Oh, brother, I think you know what you are, but do you even know what you look like now?”

Celegorm threw his head back and cackled. “I haven’t a clue!” He threw a glance back at Irissë, who grinned back at him. “Well, then, isn’t someone going to fetch me a mirror, so I can admire our handiwork?”