Fountain, Flower, Sword by Kenaz

Chapter 4 - Ecthelion

Ecthelion had nearly reached the King’s Square when he stopped and turned aside.  He had not intended to let Elemmakil waylay him for so long, and yet his presence had come as balm unlooked for. The boy roused something in him... well, something best left unexplored. The sun had set fully now. He would only draw unwanted attention to himself if he went so late to dinner.  Unfortunately, he had now thoroughly recovered his appetite, and would now have to make do with whatever he could muster in his own kitchen.

Returning home, he rooted through the pantry, thoroughly flustering his cook and housekeeper who had not been expecting him, and took a cold plate of cheese and sausages and a bottle of wine up to his withdrawing chamber, dismissing the housekeeper’s insistence that the cook should fix him a proper meal. He sat to his simple repast content for once with his food and with his thoughts.

A late knock at his door caught him off his guard, thought it shouldn’t have. Only one person had leave to come directly to his apartment without announcement, and he came almost nightly. A moment after the knock, Glorfindel’s golden head illuminated the doorway, his brow furrowed in familiar concern.

“Your absence at dinner was noted. Is aught amiss?”

Rising to greet him, Ecthelion shook his head. “No, I was unavoidably delayed, and did not feel like making a scene with a grand entrance. I will make my apologies tomorrow.”

“You will. Turgon was displeased.” Glorfindel joined him at his table, picked up his goblet, sniffed the contents, and took an investigative sip. “This one is sweeter than your usual choice.”

Ecthelion poured him a portion. “Why displeased? We have a standing invitation to his dinner, not a standing command.”

“He has had news. Maedhros is finally summoning the banners, as we long assumed he would. Turgon will send ten thousand men to stand with Fingon. You and I are to flank him.”

The pronouncement seemed to draw all the air from the room. “Damn,” Ecthelion hissed. Ten thousand men was no small part of their army.

“He would send more if he thought he could spare them. We will march on Anfauglith in a fortnight.”

Ecthelion sat bolt upright, his appetite vanishing in a trice. “So soon?”

“Turgon feels there is no time to waste, especially if we wish to reap the benefits of surprise. Our arrival will be unexpected, and with any luck, Morgoth’s host will be ill-prepared for our number.”

A frisson of unease coursed through his veins. “My heart is troubled at this.” Ecthelion admitted. “Turgon must realize that if we go forth, he cannot long hope to contain the secret of the city.”

“You think we should not go, then?”

“I know we must go, and moreover, I would we had joined Fingon sooner.  Perhaps Fingolfin would not lie under that cairn on the mountain had we ventured forth sooner. Turgon must possess wisdom which we do not to have held us in reserve until the last. But it is a simple matter of course that the arrival or departure of thousands of men will not go unmarked by our enemies.”

“True,” Glorfindel nodded. “Then it is well we have already begun training new men to increase the watch in the mountains and on the gates. Speaking of which, your would-be defender continues to impress me.”

“Elemmakil?” Ecthelion asked, almost dreading to speak of him. “So you have not come to regret taking him on.”

“Quite the contrary.” Glorfindel refilled their cups. “True to his word, he does not tire easily, and he takes nothing for granted. I admit I shall actually be saddened if he should apply to you again.”

Ecthelion shifted stiffly in his chair. “You assume I would take him.”

“Why wouldn’t you?” Glorfindel smiled broadly. “He is still rough around the edges, but fully trained, I think he will prove an asset. You play at indifference, but think: you may be turning your back on an excellent house-carle. Why are you so set against him?”

“I’m not.” Ecthelion now wished he had said nothing, but could not rightly evade the question. “I dislike sending green boys to their deaths. Nor do I think it right or proper for idolatry to stand as the basis of service.”  He rolled the stem of his goblet between his fingers, watched the wine spinning in the bowl. “He was so damnably eager. When I looked at him, all I could think was that I had never been that young.”

Glorfindel’s hand settled on his forearm. “But you were, Ehtelë. We all were.” His voice had gone wistful, and Echthelion could feel the weight of his gaze like a burden. “You were so very happy then, unencumbered by sorrow. You sang then.” His other hand rose to stroke Ecthelion’s hair. “I would hear you sing again.”

“Findë.” Ecthelion sighed, fixed his eyes on the table.

“I ask for nothing in return.”

“Oh, but you do,” Ecthelion countered. The argument was old but unassailable.

Glorfindel released him. “The heart loves as it will, Ehtelë; foolish or no, it simply does.  Would that I could turn mine to some more fruitful venture, for no-one is more weary than I of your bloodless refusals.”  He ran a hand roughly over his own face.  “You are as loath to hear the words as I am to say them, but my convictions bid me speak, and not hold myself to a coward’s silence:  I have loved you since we were young. Since the days when you played your flute and sang for me at the water’s edge in Tirion.”

The admission fell like a blow, though Ecthelion had known the truth of it long before. This was a wound he had been given the power to heal, and yet, he had not the will to do so. “This love of yours exacts a heavy toll, my friend.  For you are my friend, and as dear to me as my own blood. I feel I am the villain each time I turn you aside. I despise knowing that mine is the hand that deals you pain, and yet—”

His words were interrupted by the clatter of gravel on the window. The taut moment had been ended, but Ecthelion felt no relief from it. Rising from his seat at least gave him space to breathe without the suffocating weight of regret so near. He pulled aside the curtains and opened the leaded frame. His stomach lurched and twisted, and he nearly laughed in despair at Elemmakil’s unfathomably inopportune arrival. He stood below on the wall of the fountain, the very place where Ecthelion had first laid eyes upon him. The wind and his night’s adventures had teased out stray locks of hair from the queue which had earlier barely contained it. He was cradling a cache of strawberries in his shirt, and in his free hand he held one single, gloriously ripe berry, which he raised to Ecthelion like a tribute.  

Who’s there?” Glorfindel asked even as he crossed the room to look for himself.  Ecthelion felt the heat of his body behind him, heard the small intake of breath as he looked down and saw Elemmakil and the simple offering in his outstretched hand. “Ah.”

“Findë—”

Glorfindel shook his head and backed away from the window. “I begin to see now.  Forgive me.” In his rush to leave, he overturned one of the goblets. Wine splashed across his tunic and pooled on the floor at his feet.  As the red stain blossomed across his belly, he let out a pained laugh. “I look as if I’ve been run through. It seems appropriate, does it not?”

“The heart loves as it will,” Ecthelion whispered. He knew when Glorfindel’s shoulders sank in defeat that he wore the full measure of his guilt, his pain, and his truth in his face.

“It does,” Glorfindel ceded.

He departed without another word, leaving Ecthelion alone in his rooms, and with Elemmakil still standing on the fountain’s edge, a single berry having proven as sharp a weapon to a man’s heart as any knife.