The Captive by Glorified

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Chapter 3: What’s in a name?

Ella and Maglor get to know one another a bit better and have their first altercation and Ella realises the Elvish protocols for naming are rather more conventional than she had realised and inadvertently over steps a mark with her house guest and feels the wrath of Feanorian pride.  Embarrassed and frightened she unexpectantly gets an apology and gets an insight into Maglor's fractures and hurts and begins to sense within herself a strange pull and growing impulse towards him.

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Chapter 3: What’s in a name?

 

I yawned I had slept late, the sun was already well up in the sky and I lay indolently lolling my foot out of the bed in the cool air thinking about getting up listening to a strange thud thwack sound coming from outside. What could be making that sound I wondered? I listened for a while trying to make out its rhythmical cadence. It was someone digging I realised and the clods of earth were the thudding sound and the thwack were the spade being struck into the earth.

 

Maglor I thought or Kano as I had named him, he was keen, that was for sure, My head hurt, I was an inept drinker and could not keep steady on my feet after two glasses. I should get up I thought and offer him breakfast at least.

 

I blinked in the bright sunshine, and gestured for him to come into the kitchen,

As usual he downed his over shirt and walked in, “I’m sorry I said its late I’m usually an early riser, but the late night and”, I let my explanation dwindle as I watched him wolf down the food I had prepared. He was thirstily gulping down his second glass of milk as I watched his Adams apple bobble up and down when I asked.

“Elrond ?”

“He went just after dawn, he will be back before the end of the week”.

He hungrily took a thick slice of bread with honey and butter I had thickly slavered on it.

As I prepared him another one he took it and thanked me and was out the door to return to his digging. I watched as he broke the bread off in chunks and licked the honey of his fingers before stripping off his shirt and returning to his work. I watched the muscles of his back ripple and bulge as he bent over and I broke myself away from my gaze perturbed at my sudden fixation.

 

Later that day we were walking towards the village to collect supplies for the garden and house and I decided to broach the subject of names. “Elrond tells me that you use your father name as an eppesse?”,

He said nothing only shooting me a dark furtive look.

I began again, “Its just that, well…. we …. we need to call one another something”,

Silence.

“You could call me Ella” I ventured,

“That is your name?”

“One of them”,

“It means?” he asked,

“It means high maiden or fairy maiden”, I said quietly,

“He quirked an eyebrow and I was sure there was a faint glimmer of amusement on his lips”,

“If you wish, Ella” he emphasised the last vowel.

“And you?” I asked seizing my opportunity!

“My brothers used my father name but it has been a long time since anyone called me by it”

“Kano is it I?” I asked,

He stopped and nodded looking me up and down as if assaying me over something,

“Then I will call you that if that is your wish”, he nodded imperceptibly barely acknowledging me and continued walking.

 

We collected the goods from the village and the tradesman loaned us a small cart to carry the things in which Maglor or Kano used to pull along the road after us. I realised I was still uncomfortable with what to call him, he had hardly been enthusiastic over my suggestion, actually down right scathing if his icy look had been anything to go by. It seemed even though he had agreed he was not accepting with my proposal of name for him.

When he came to the house for supper later that day I put things to the test. He had got use to helping me set the table and serve the food and as we sat down I said,

“You don’t like Kano do you?”,

He looked directly at me fixing with a hard stare, his eyes shining with a metallic glint,

“Ella he responded, you may call me what you wish this is your house”,

I felt chastised although he had said nothing to admonish me.

“Forgive me I did not mean to offend”,

He said nothing and began eating his food.

I felt flustered by his silence.

“I, I”….. I began,

The chair screeched as a he dragged it back across the floor and stood abruptly up, he placed his plate with half eaten food on it with a clatter into the sink and was out of the door and striding across the yard before I could blink.

Damn I thought me and my big mouth, why couldn’t I just have left it!

I left him alone that night and in the morning he resumed his work digging in the garden.

 

We said nothing about our altercation until a week later when I went to collect the drift wood he had piled for me in his rooms.

“These look really beautiful”, I enthused, as I picked my way through the piles of whitened gnarled branches,

My back was turned towards him and when he came up behind me I turned to find him close, his face looking down on me, I could hear my breathing becoming laboured at his proximity. If he was doing this to intimidate me he was certainly succeeding. He placed a hand on the wall behind me and fixed me me with his eyes,

“Maglor, you can call me Maglor”,

He watched my lips as I mouthed “Maglor, then louder Maglor, yes if you wish”,

“Thank you Ella”, he said then turned from me and sat down to resume mending something.

I stood feeling like a naive school girl who had been dismissed by her tutors rather than the mistress of her own house. I walked away as dignified as I could feeling his eyes on my back following my steps.

 

“It’s really not working”,

“You and he?”,

I rolled my eyes,“Well who else did you think I meant?”,

The Peredhil laughed at me trying to lighten my mood

“I know he can be dour sometimes”,

“To be honest he frightens me a little sometimes, we had an argument about his name and he stormed off and then a week later he came up behind me and right up in my face told me he wanted to be called Maglor”,

“Well at least you know now!”,

“Its more than that though, I don’t think I could ever be easy with him like you and he are”,

The Peredhil looked at me enquiringly,

“You have so much shared history, understandings”,

“Give it time”,

We reached the sand dunes at the top of the beach and helter skeltered down their long inclines to the reach the water edge. We took off our boots and as we walked through the turquoise lacy ebb and flow of the tide, I sighed enjoying the crystalline sand rushing between my toes and the cool feeling of the flowing water. We walked for a while in companionable silence.

“I think he is finding it difficult”,

I thought of the way in which he way he carefully cleaned and put the garden tools away. The way he kept his rooms meticulously, everything folded, set away. The way he kept our conversation clipped and with certain protocols never sharing any personal insights. Everything, everything was gauged to my reaction.

“I mean being free but not really being free. Under curfew as it were. I don’t want him feeling beholden to me” ,

“You will not hurt his pride, Feanorian pride is indissoluble, it comes naturally born of birth and breeding and no circumstance can eradicate it”,

“Yes I’ve seen how he walks” I laughed,

“He walks?”,

“Oh you know when he thinks I am not looking, like a Prince, a Lord, self determined, proud, and assured”,

Elrond nodded smiling,

“What of his brothers, mother?”

“Nothing!, nothing I have heard of anyway”,

“How could they stay away and allow a stranger to give him a home!”

Noldorian politics are difficult and it maybe that there are circumstances that we do not understand.

“Phooey!”

The Peredhil laughed at my outburst.

Is there anyway of helping him more?”

“I think he needs what you are giving him now, the solace and anonymity of a quiet existence”,

 

Maglor was away cross the meadows when we walked back there mending fencing which had come down in the storm a few days earlier.

“I will go and take my leave of him”, I nodded.

“Give my regards to Cel”, I said.

I returned to the kitchen to begin dinner.

 

Later when we were sat down for our evening meal I watched him as he ate, he looked up suddenly and my gaze stuttered, I cleared my throat asking him if he wanted more wine. He stayed my hand as I went to reach for the jug knowing I found it rather too large for my small hands. I found my self looking at his as he poured; the muscles under his forearm flexed and relaxed as his long sinewed fingers gripped the handle. Elrond had done a good job of re setting the bones in his two crooked fingers and Maglor had decried anytime off as they set using his other hand for tasks. He pushed the glass to me looking at me enquiringly. I kept my eyes down cast, I looked up to find him looking straight back at me, relaxed now his chair pushed back from the table his long legs stretched out in front of him and arms crossed as he took long swills of the liquid. His look was one of appraisal but also concern.

 

I got up and begin the clearing up and he accompanied me taking the dishes over to my large stone sink. He had taken to helping me clear away. I washed, he wiped. We usually talked in a companionable way and chatted about the days events and what work need doing the next day. I was elbow deep in warm soapy water as he stood by my side taking the plates from my hand and wiping them when I notice his hands stop wiping the plate he was holding. He placed it down carefully and splayed his long fingers evenly over the wooden counter.

“Ella”, he said my name softly yet clearly intonating every syllable and consonant. “There, is something I wanted to speak to you about”,

I stood still my hands in the warm soapy water my eyes fixated on the iridescent way the soapy bubbles caught the dipping sun and reflected a kaleidoscope of hues wondering what could have caused this sudden alteration in mood?

“I am sorry”, he stated simply,

I scrabbled about in my brain to think what exactly he was sorry for? Apart from treating me with no deference like I was some sort of servant, which I accepted came naturally to him, I struggled to see the offence. I pulled my hands out of the warm soapy water and watched as the as the bubbles slurped and swilled about. Wiping my hands dry on my apron I turned to meet the bright gaze I knew was focused on me. His expression looked like I had never seen it before, earnest and open, the veil fallen and the pain showing through. The last beams of the sun caught his iris’s making them translucent like shining orbs of water.

“Do not feel”, he continued, “that I do not acknowledge the cost to yourself for taking me in, that I do not know what will be said and the slur on your good character by association with myself. I know, he paused,……. after being so abrupt and throwing my food away, the other day …… my temper was inadmissible after your kindnesses to me”,

“Its alright I said, really I take no offence”,

“But you should do”, he admonished,

I shook my head, looking down.

“Did Elrond speak to you?” I asked.

He hesitated, “Yes he did”,

“He said you were scared , that I had scared you…… I am sorry Ella”, he said softly….”sometimes my expression in my attitude and dealings with others is a little unskilled, abrupt …..it shall not be in the future”,

I nodded in acknowledgement.

“I will need to retire to my bed now”,

He walked to the door, and I after him to lock up, although there was really no need. As he went through the doorway he turned and looked down at me he was very close and I suddenly felt very small against his tall lean and muscled build. I caught his breath, the fumes from the alcohol across my cheek and the smell of the sweetness and cleanness of lavender and moss

“I hope you sleep well”, Ella, he said softly, then he was gone striding towards the low out buildings.

Afterwards, I stood with my back against the door breathing heavily my heart was thudding in my chest, my mind full of implications, wondering what exactly Elrond had said for me to receive such an apology. I went to bed to find my slumber but tossed and turned until the sky blushed pink and I fell asleep exhausted and woke late again.