Maglor in the 1848 French Revolution by Aprilertuile

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August 1847

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The owner of the building had been right. The attic room in summer could become unbearably hot, but neither Maglor nor Louis minded much. It beat sleeping in the street with all the risks associated with that.

The good side of having a place for themselves was that they could spend evenings reading together on the couch, side by side, enjoying each other’s company without people throwing speculating looks at them. They discovered very quickly that their notion of personal space was non-existent when it came to each other. That was perhaps a bit dangerous for it was a habit they also had outside the safety of their home.

The worst side of this apartment was the neighbours. Maglor had heard two of the building’s women speculating about why two young men would be rooming together in a one-bedroom place, or about why they were never seen with ladies around the neighbourhood.

As if the simple fact that those two were keeping an eye on the street and comparing notes loudly in the hallway wasn’t reason enough to avoid bringing anyone back in the area…

The two were annoying but so fond of discussing their latest theories that Maglor was pretty sure that the two hens wouldn’t dare to make an official complaint about their presence and supposed proclivities.

To be honest, the fact he was pretty sure Louis and his own private life were the subject of fantasies from their neighbours meant that Maglor was still looking around for better solutions.

Sadly for the time being, they were stuck: Louis kept studying regularly, in anticipation of his return to classes, and both Maglor and him kept picking up odd jobs and pooling the money they earnt for rent and food.

As it turned out, Maglor was a more than decent cook, but Louis was hopeless on anything but the very basics.

Maglor had had some flashbacks of some of his own early attempts when Louis tried to cook. Needless to say he was very prompt to take over. Burnt or uncooked food was not really to his tastes, and these days he was loath to waste food.

A harsh lesson he learnt over and over: Periods of abundance were always followed by periods of poverty and scarcity. It was almost scary how circular and universal that truth was.

It would be nice if he could manage to get to a comfortable level of living most of the time instead of managing to get comfortable once in a while only to lose everything again all too soon.

He was tired of looking at himself in a mirror only to see a far too thin figure with hungry eyes.

But here he was again, careful about money, careful about food.

Nothing was permanent, yes, apart from elves. And he was an elf, stuck in an ever changing world… though, truly, elves were hardly left untouched by the passing of times. They were merely…

Maglor was humming mindlessly while cooking that day, thinking on how to phrase his thoughts. “Merely showing the passing of time differently than humans” didn’t quite cut it properly.

Of course it was different. One was a mortal race the other a race of immortals. And yet for all their immortality, elves, apart from Maglor himself, banned from elven lands, were all gone: disappeared from the mortal realms, lands that the men conquered little by little.

And it wasn’t for nothing. He had known elves who absolutely adored these lands and couldn’t imagine leaving… And they all left at some point.

What men gained in physical decline, elves gained in weariness.

Maglor could feel it in himself. The feeling of “yes, that again… Let’s just sit there until the whole era passes or something, anything, kills me first” that took him over far too often to be healthy... Followed by periods of being in awe of the world and human ingenuity.

Somehow he was still there regardless, no doubt because he always found himself somehow distracted by something, be it music, a case of a persistent kid gone wrong or something of the sort. It had been kittens once. Well, a whole adult cat with it, but the whole mom and litter had been somehow dumped in his lap one day, when he was minding his own business, just sitting in a street corner, under the rain, hoping no one would notice him there, but too tired of everything to bother moving.

Moving required energy. Moving required caring. Moving required actually wanting something and that time he just couldn’t.

But someone had dumped those poor things literally on his lap as if he was just a convenient bench, and had left. And he found himself with the terrifying company of a near feral mother cat and four obnoxious kittens in severe need of a climbing post.

The simple selfish mewling company had been a balm to his tired heart, even if cats don’t live all that long in the grand scheme of things, they had been the company he needed at the time.

The door opening threw Maglor nicely out of his thoughts, and he turned to find Louis who looked something like shocked. Or happy. Or something. Not one of his usual looks.

“Louis?”

“I met a doctor.”

“That… Happens?”

“I mean… I met a doctor who wants an assistant and agreed to take me as such.”

Did Maglor want to know how that had come about? Deciding he didn’t unless Louis felt like sharing specifically, he just smiled and told him :

“Congratulations!”

“That comes with a pretty decent salary too. We can. We can find a better place than this, Max.”

Did Louis really mean he wanted Maglor to mooch off of him? Was Louis even aware of how they already looked to others? That was bound to create problems. This era was not kind to perceived “moral offences” even if there was no actual offence going on.

Perhaps it was pity or an unspoken apology for having pulled him into homelessness for a few days over his ex-girlfriend? Or something similar.

But if so Maglor really needed to let him know he didn’t care much in the end. He always knew his arrangement with Ismérie was temporary anyway.

“We?”

“Well, sure. You don’t really want to stay in this place do you? Winter’s going to be a nightmare. Pretty sure there’s a sort of unholy magic in there that makes the outside temperatures worse.”

“Yes, but it’s protected from the wind, it’s dry and it’s safe.”

Also Louis had no way to really judge the temperature as the young fool slept curled up against Maglor every night, and according to those who knew him in the past, it was a fact that Maglor radiated enough heat to keep someone warm in the snow. Alright, he was pretty sure that it had been an exaggeration. Elrond had been a somewhat dramatic teenager at times, but still, it has been said.

“It’s a crappy place, the neighbourhood is horrible, and I’m pretty sure you hit your head on the ceiling at least twice since we moved here. It’s fine to share with you, Max. Please? Let’s just move away with my first pay!”

“Louis, all due respect, and you know I love you well… But have you heard our neighbours talking?”

Louis grimaced at that.

“All the more reason to actually leave this place. Homosexuality has been technically legal since the revolution, but people very clearly still find ground to arrest people for it. I don’t plan on being under arrest for that anytime soon. So?”

Maglor blinked at that. At least the young man was aware enough of the facts.

“So it’d be easier to avoid being under arrest somehow for that if you found your own apartment?”

“So that the old hens we have for neighbours can claim I left you and you’re now a dangerous homosexual out to infect everyone in sight by the power of… I prefer not to know what they think homosexuals can do or how actually but yeah…”

That had Maglor wince.

This was a possibility that he hadn’t thought about, but probably a low one. In theory.

That was the downside of having such babbling, nosey and judgmental old hen for a neighbour.

“If anyone throws accusations at me, I can point fingers at Joséphine and prove that her simple presence does mean I’m not homosexual, and you?”

Not only Maglor had no one to vouch for him on that point, his last lover, a delightful woman with a wicked humour, having been dead for close to one or two hundred years previously, but on top of that he had more tact than to shove a lover under the bus to prove a point, thank you very much. What was wrong with this era?

“Nice of you to involve your previous lover in your personal problems.”

“She involved me first in her problems.”

“Correction. She involved you in something that resulted in a consenting sexual encounter between you that will have lasting effect in her life. She came to you because you chose right alongside her to take the risk to get her pregnant, with all the consequences that would have.”

“She came to me because she was out of other options and, and here I quote her, I “know what it is to be poor and without a future”. Louis corrected bitterly.

Maglor blinked at that. The more he heard about her, the less he understood what Louis had seen in her.

“You’re still both responsible for her current state. It was her right to involve you as the father of her child. On the other hand, our neighbour’s babbling is entirely due to our own behaviour. To have her involved and shamed in a public place for your sake is naught but cruelty and selfishness.”

“I’m not going to jail because an old coot has fantasies about what I get up to behind closed doors!”

“Louis, months ago Ismérie basically warned me off of seducing you. She kept doubts about our relationship for months. Upon us moving in here, our neighbours instantly thought that we’re a couple. There’s a reason why everyone thinks so. That reason is our behaviour.”

“We don’t have a relationship!”

“No, but we live together and we’re close for no reason they can understand, and be honest with me even just this once. Is it really an impossibility?”

Louis looked down at that and Maglor nodded.

“But we did nothing! There’s no reason for people to…”

“People don’t need reason, Louis. Or there would be far fewer problems in this world. We may have done nothing, but people still can’t explain our closeness and just… Jump to easy and inaccurate conclusions. You can’t exactly blame them for making assumptions, we all do it. Besides, if you get your own place, you’ll be spared further rumours from our lovely neighbours.”

Louis looked frustrated to high heaven at that.

Maglor emitted a surprised sound when Louis kissed him.

“There, at least if we’re accused of something, we’ll have actually done something.”

Maglor almost wanted to point out there was more to do than kiss, or that he hadn’t actually asked for it, but he decided that silence was the better, safer, road to take.

Besides, he loved that little impulsive idiot.

One day, he’ll have to try to consider why he almost always fell for the impulsive ones.

Louis let himself fall on the couch, looking distinctly unhappy.

“You know, there’s a difference between asking me to come because you’re “fine with sharing with me because the current house is really crappy”, and asking me to come with you because you actively want me there.”

“Alright then. I want to move to a better place, and I want you to live with me. Will you come?”

Maglor nodded and Louis smiled. He was going to say something, but someone came knocking at the door, startling the both of them.

The elf was faster to reach the door to open it and he stepped back, as Joséphine passed in front of him to get to a distinctly unhappy Louis:

“What do you…?” Louis started to ask.

“Ismérie’s sick, and I don’t know what to do and the doctor won’t come as we can’t pay him and…”

Louis was out of the door before Joséphine was done talking, leaving Maglor to deal with his very pregnant ex-girlfriend.

“Right. I’ll walk you back.”

“What if I go back and catch…” Joséphine asked with tears in her eyes.

“I’ll stop you right there, Miss Joséphine. This is not your home. I left you a place to work and live in once, but I don’t owe you anything. I won’t let you chase me from my home this time around.”

“I didn’t mean to…”

“That’s nevertheless what happened. I understand that you’re afraid, but you need to grow up and become independent. Neither Louis nor I are your father or keeper.”

“I just… I was hoping… Louis loved me and… This child is…”

“The child is the only reason Louis has been as accommodating to you as he’s been. Miss Joséphine, I understand your hopes for Louis, but before you just latch onto someone else for guidance you need to find your own footing. In short, grow up. You’re an adult or near enough. You need to assume the results of your own choices.”

“But… What if I actually fall ill too?! I don’t want to die like that! Ismérie has been sick all day!”

“Look, speak to Louis, not to me. I apologise for it, but I’ll be honest with you: I don’t know you. I don’t owe you. And neither do I care for you. You’re nothing to me. I was nice once. But you can’t keep intruding in my own private life. So see with the one actually concerned by your common child, not the innocent bystander.”

She winced and nodded, looking downcast.

Maglor knew he was harsh, but she was so… Strange: she could be entirely unbothered to cry on his shoulder one moment just to act shy like a dove the next, then she’d push into his personal space to get to Louis, and then act like a terrified mouse. Maglor didn’t know if she was a doubtful actress or doing it naturally and unconsciously, but he found the inconsistent behaviour to be grating.

Joséphine stayed silent most of the way back to the tavern and they found Louis just leaving Ismérie’s room. He looked pale and sort of helpless when he looked up at them:

“It’s Cholera.”

Maglor barely managed to catch Joséphine as she fainted, the news clearly too much for her. Louis looked at her in shock and somewhat pity.

“Louis, come get her will you, also you’ll need to talk to her.”

“I have nothing to tell her.”

“Louis, did you just sleep with her because she was pretty and there or did you like her?”

“Of course I liked her. I’m not that shallow that I’d sleep with a girl just because she looks pretty. Not with all the consequences it’s liable to have. I’m not that rich and powerful that I could afford it.”

“Then you need to speak to her.”

“But…”

“If only for the sake of your child.”

Louis grumbled but came to Maglor to pick up Joséphine and carry her to her room. Maglor watched him go with mixed feelings, and a wry smile. His eyes then hardened with determination, and he went to Ismérie’s room.

She had put limits on what she could afford, which was normal, but she was a generous soul who didn’t deserve to die this way.

He sat next to her bed, and placed a hand on her face and another on her wrist, checking her pulse. And then he focused on encouraging her immune system, as he did a while ago for Louis.

Maglor was so focused on his task that he didn’t realise when the door opened on Louis. The man entered the room with a worried face, ready to pull Maglor outside, for safety sake, as Cholera was highly contagious…

But he froze in the entrance of the room, seeing Maglor at Ismérie’s side:

Maglor was looking like he was faintly glowing, not like a fire was glowing: it could have been a trick of the light on the man’s pale skin… if enough light could ever enter the room.

The man’s hair was as ever a bit of a mess at the end of the day, but picking through the hair was the tip of a pointy ear. Louis wondered faintly how he never noticed that.

The air itself seemed to be buzzing, something very similar to what he had imagined, or perhaps really felt, when he was sick himself. He shivered in response to that strange invasive feeling.

Louis instinctively wanted to stop him, to ask for explanations, to ensure Ismérie was well…

But he was rooted in place, watching.

When Maglor stopped, he finally noticed that Louis was at the room’s door and very much aware he had done something not quite human.

“What are you? No, forget that. What did you do to Ismérie?”

“I did to her the same thing I did to you when you fell ill. Sadly I can’t do miracles, I can only even out your lot’s survival chances. The rest will be only her.”

“You’re not human.” Louis said simply.

“What else could I be?”

Louis bit his lips, and Maglor waited calmly. If Louis was in need of some adjectives to define him, he could help, he’s heard a lot over the years when he accidentally or not revealed his nature.

Depending on Louis’ reaction, Maglor would either stay and take the risk to keep on living as he had been this time around, or he’d leave immediately. He had his harp on his back as always when he left the apartment, he had his spare pouch of money, and everything that was precious to him was always on him so… If necessary he could head straight to the doors of the city and be nothing but a footnote on a renting agreement as far as people in Paris were concerned.

Hopefully, Louis wasn’t the kind of man to get sneaky and cruel once he learned something he disliked. He had been rather straightforward so far, so Maglor had hopes there. But it wouldn’t be the first time he’d be mistaken about someone.

Louis stayed silent and on guard for a while, watching Maglor with wary eyes, studying him in a way that Maglor strongly disliked, until several hours later, when Ismérie decided she felt far better and could go back to work and Louis struggled to make her understand that in fact, no, she couldn’t yet.

That amused Maglor somewhat, despite the feeling of dread he felt at Louis’ strange reaction.  Maglor dearly hoped that Louis would at least give him a chance to explain, or to leave, before he did something drastic.

He couldn’t, and wouldn’t if he could to be fair, cure stubbornness, and the argument would have been pretty hilarious to watch in other circumstances.

In the end, Ismérie agreed to rest for a few days, and Maglor and Louis left the tavern together, walking side by side to their apartment.

“Do I need to leave?” Maglor asked quietly.

“No.”

“Really?”

“Don’t leave, Max. Hells, is Max even your real name?”

Maglor hesitated a bit on that one, and Louis sighed.

“My name has been lost to time. You can call me Maglor if you want, but Max is fine and as real as any other.”

“Maglor.” His name had a foreign feeling on his tongue, and Maglor had the sudden desire to hear him pronounce the name he grew up with: Makalaurë. Just to hear it. Just for once…

But no, Maglor would be good enough as far as “real name” went. He had no wish to go into the whole: well yes I have several names, want their history?

Let the last one who called him Makalaurë be Maedhros. Let the name be buried with his brother.